Christ is absent. Though he is not dead, he did go away, leaving his ministers to care for his bride and “raise up seed” for him. As levirs, they have the right to profit from the inheritance of the heir–the entire church–until the seed/son comes of age.

The church in Corinth was a pastoral nightmare. Factionalism, sexual immorality, incipient syncretism, using the church as a stage for self-promotion, and denial of the final resurrection were just some of the problems.

In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthian church, he confronts each of these problems directly and in an orderly fashion. The letter begins with what is soon seen to be the foundation for dealing with all of the relational problems in the church: the cross of Christ. In the cross we see the wisdom of God displayed. This is the wisdom that creates and orders the world as a master craftsman (cf. Proverbs 8). Paul and his co-labors are also Spirit-filled craftsmen who are building this new world according to the wisdom of the cross. If the Corinthians are to be faithful images of God in this new creation, they must build the life of their church according to the wisdom of the cross.

Continue reading at Theopolis Institute.

James Kirk learns via Vulcan mind meld that he will never marry.

Now as a concession, not a command, I say this. I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. (1 Corinthians 7:6-7)

Reliance upon rules and regulations is a sign of immaturity. There’s nothing wrong with them, of course, just as there is nothing wrong with the “gutter guards” used to keep the ten pin bowling ball moving towards the pins for children’s parties at the bowling alley. Likewise, there was nothing wrong with creeds, rosary beads or religious paintings in their early days. They were simply mnemonic devices for the illiterate. But, just as it was with the Pharisees in the first century, these lifeless, inflexible “stoicheia” become a problem when they turn into legislation and become mandatory. Failing to tithe one’s kitchen herbs leads to certain destruction. The celibacy of certain prominent men in the Bible is part of this discussion. The question is not “Is celibacy holier than marriage?” but why were these spiritual giants, including Jesus, celibate at all?

This post has been slain and resurrected for inclusion in my 2015 book of essays, Inquietude.

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Revelation was written to seven first-century churches as a spiritual wake-up call because of events that were “about to take place upon the whole world [oikoumenē]” (Rev. 3:10). The use of oikoumenē instead of kosmos indicates that the events that were about to unfold were confined to the Roman Empire. The same word is used in Matthew 24:14, Luke 2:1, and Acts 11:28.

Revelation is not describing a worldwide apocalyptic conflagration. Revelation is a prophetic symbolic description of what Jesus prophesied would happen to the temple, the capital city of Israel, and the old covenant world made of things that were destined to pass away. Jesus is the new everything. He’s the better temple, sacrifice, priest, and guarantor of a new covenant:

But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation; and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption (Heb. 9:11–12).

The book of Revelation is not a warning to what was going to happen to Israel. Jesus had made that clear 35 years before in the Olivet Discourse. Revelation was delivered to seven churches made up of Christians as a wake-up call. They would suffer the same fate as Israel if they followed in the theological moral footsteps of Israel. The indictments that are leveled against the seven churches drip with Old Covenant judgment language — even the threat to come in judgment if they didn’t wake up (Rev. 2:5, 16; 3:3) — pervades the two chapters. They were “about to suffer,” these things were “about to happen” (2:10).

Revelation was not a five-year warning (if it was written around the year 65); it was an ongoing warning. Anybody reading Revelation after the destruction of Jerusalem could have said, “Jesus warned us. He showed us. Everything He said would happen did happen. It could happen to us. Revelation is a lesson for every generation. We can look back and say that what God said would happen, did happen, and we’re not exempt.”

The question is, had some of these churches fallen from the faith in such a short time after their founding? Dr. Simon J. Kistemaker,[1] Professor Emeritus of New Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary and co-author of the completed New Testament Commentary series that was commenced by William Hendriksen, argues that there was not enough time for the Asia Minor churches to fall from the faith so quickly if Revelation is describing events around the mid-60s. He writes

Even a cursory reading leaves the impression that the recipients were second-generation Christians. It does not appear that the people in the seven churches had only recently received the gospel. . . . Paul . . . wrote two epistles to Timothy, who was a pastor there in the sixties. Nothing in Acts or Paul’s epistles relates to the conditions prevalent in the church of Ephesus when John wrote the epistle that Jesus dictated.[2]

A few comments are in order. On the day of Pentecost, Luke records “that there were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men, from every nation under heaven. . . . Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,” (Acts 2:5, 9). The reference to “Asia” (Acts 6:9; 16:6; 19:10; 20:4; 21:27; 24:18; Rom. 16:5; 2 Tim 1:15; Rev 1:4), the west coast province of Asia, is the area where Revelation’s seven churches were located, including Ephesus.

There’s a good chance that by the time Revelation was dictated to John (around AD 65) that the churches listed in Revelation 2–3 could have been operating for 30 years (Rom. 16:5) started from the testimony of Jews returning to their Asia Minor homeland and telling family and friends about what had been going on in Jerusalem. The message of the gospel could have also come by way of travelers by ship since Ephesus was a coastal city. “Ephesus has been estimated to be in the range of 400,000 to 500,000 inhabitants in the year 100, making it the largest city in Roman Asia and of the day. Ephesus was at its peak during the 1st and 2nd centuries AD.”

A Jerusalem-wide persecution took place after the death of Stephen that scattered many believers: “those who had been scattered went about preaching the word” (Acts 8:1, 4). It wouldn’t have taken long for the gospel to reach Asia Minor. Albert Barnes writes:

The Jews at that time were scattered into almost all nations, and in all places had synagogues. [John 7:35; James 1:1; 1 Peter 1:1]. Still they would naturally desire to be present as often as possible at the great feasts of the nation in Jerusalem. Many would seek a residence there for the convenience of being present at the religious solemnities.

According to Dr. Kistemaker, Paul ministered in Ephesus from AD 53–56. At Paul’s departure, he gave this warning to the Ephesian elders: “savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them” (Acts 20:29–30). “These words, in respect to Ephesus and several of these churches addressed in the Apocalypse, were now fulfilled; the ‘grievous wolves’ had come; these ‘perverse men’ had arisen.”[3] The first of Revelation’s seven churches in Asia is Ephesus (Rev. 2:1–7). Ephesus hadn’t completely apostatized but it was compromised.

There were constant attacks from Judaizers from Ephesus. Paul could not escape them even in Jerusalem:

When the seven days were almost over, the Jews from Asia, upon seeing him in the temple, began to stir up all the crowd and laid hands on him, crying out, “Men of Israel, come to our aid! This is the man [Paul] who preaches to all men everywhere against our people and the Law and this place; and besides he has even brought Greeks into the temple and has defiled this holy place. For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian in the city with him, and they supposed that Paul had brought him into the temple. Then all the city was provoked, and the people rushed together, and taking hold of Paul they dragged him out of the temple, and immediately the doors were shut. While they were seeking to kill him, a report came up to the commander of the Roman cohort that all Jerusalem was in confusion (Acts 20:27–31; 2 Cor. 1:8).

The spiritual condition of the churches in Asia Minor were threatened. Paul wrote the following to Timothy: “You are aware of the fact that all who are in Asia turned away from me, among whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes” (2 Tim. 1:15; see 1 Tim. 6:10; 2 Tim. 4:10–11, 16). This description seems to fit what was revealed to John. So whether first-generation or second-generation churches, there was spiritual decline.

Second, it didn’t take long for theological and moral problems to develop in churches. In the Corinthian church, Paul writes, “It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father’s wife. You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst” (1 Cor. 5:1–2). If the church elders wouldn’t do the removing, then God would (cf. Rev. 2:5).

In his second epistle to the Corinthians, Paul writes words similar to what John was told to write in Revelation:

Do not be bound together with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; just as God said, “I WILL DWELL IN THEM AND WALK AMONG THEM; AND I WILL BE THEIR GOD, AND THEY SHALL BE MY PEOPLE. “Therefore, COME OUT FROM THEIR MIDST AND BE SEPARATE,” says the Lord. “AND DO NOT TOUCH WHAT IS UNCLEAN; and I will welcome you. And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,” says the Lord Almighty” (2 Cor. 6:14–18; cf. Rev. 2:14, 20).

Paul wrote the following to the Galatians, “I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ, for a different gospel; which is really not another; only there are some who are disturbing you and want to distort the gospel of Christ” (Gal. 1:6–7; cf. Rev. 2:4).

Paul confronted Peter “to his face” over a doctrinal issue “because he stood condemned” (Gal. 2:11).

The writer to the Hebrews says of the recipients of his letter that they “have become dull of hearing,” that by this time in their faith they “ought to be teachers.” Now they “need again for someone to teach [them] the elementary principles of the oracles of God” so that they “have come to need milk and not solid food” (Heb. 5:11b–12).

John mentions “false prophets” that had already “gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1; cf. Rev. 2:2) and even “many antichrists” (1 John 2:18). These antichrists, John writes, “went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us” (v. 19). He writes similar descriptions in his second epistle. “For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist” and “If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house, and do not give him a greeting; for the one who gives him a greeting participates in his evil deeds” (2 John 7, 10–11). Could these antichrists be the ones that make up Revelation’s “synagogues of Satan” (2:9; 3:9)?

Peter writes, “But false prophets also arose among the people just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves” (2 Peter 2:1). All of these things happened before Revelation was revealed to John. It’s interesting that six of the seven churches did not receive letters from the New Testament writers, at least none that we are aware of. Like Corinth and Galatia, Revelation was their spiritual wake-up call.

So it shouldn’t surprise us that some people (not all: Rev. 3:4) of the seven churches had succumbed to false teaching and even immorality within a short time of their founding as evidenced by so much material found in Acts and the epistles.

Dr. Kistemaker dismisses the pre-AD 70 date for Revelation because, as he writes:

We are never told that John was a pastor in Ephesus before the demise of Jerusalem. The church fathers related that John settled in Ephesus after the Jewish war of A.D. 66–70. But even if he had been in Ephesus before that period, his time of service prior to his exile would have been short. But according to the seven letters to the churches in Asia, John was well acquainted with the spiritual status of each one of them. This hardly seems possible if John was there but briefly.[4]

John wouldn’t have had to be present at any of the seven churches to know their spiritual condition since what he wrote was revealed to him by God (Rev. 1:1–2, 11, 19).

The more I dig through the New Testament, the more convincing evidence I see that it was written prior to Jerusalem’s destruction, not as a warning to Old Covenant Israel (that had been done already) but to New Covenant Israel made of Jewish and Gentile believers so they would not suffer a similar fate (1 Cor. 10:1–11; Heb. 12).

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[1] I learned what I know of NT Greek from Dr. Kistemaker. He would say that I should have learned more. He is right. But I keep learning. I also took a number of NT courses from him. He was a great teacher; I just think on several points he is mistaken.
[2] Simon J. Kistemaker, “Hyper-Preterism and Revelation,” When Shall These Things Be? A Reformed Response to Hyper-Preterism, ed. Keith A. Mathison (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing), 232.
[3] James MacDonald, The Life and Writings of St. John (New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co., 1877), 156.
[4] Kistemaker, “Hyper-Preterism and Revelation,” 233.

The miraculous gifts given to the firstfruits church are part of a very large pattern, one which we can can see thwarted in the Garden of Eden, and presented as laws in the Ten Commandments. It is the “song of the Woman” after the crushing of the serpent. It is a “legal testimony” that the Word of God is true. We see this epitomized in the life of Paul the apostle, who sought every opportunity to testify in court concerning the resurrection of Jesus. In the greater picture, the witness of the firstfruits church is this part of the picture in the history of the world. That legal witness continues today, but in the first century it had a special purpose, and that was to divide the Jews into “two goats,” two women, Hagar and Sarah (the past and the future) and bring down the curses of the Covenant upon those who rejected the Gospel. The gift of tongues was part of that miraculous witness, a corroborrated legal witness in the courtroom of God, [1] and the purpose of this “Babelic” gift was completed when the Herods and their Temple, the “Babylon” of the day, was destroyed. [2] Consequently, the miraculous gifts ended with the firstfruits church. The time of “childhood” for the Church was over. [3]

Luke Welch has some related observations which are interesting, and he, like Jordan, demonstrates how much we Christians miss because we fail to read the Bible as a united book.

As I read along in Numbers, I keep seeing things that Paul has latched onto. For example, Paul says (1 Corinthians 14.5-9, 24):

“Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets, so that the church may be built up. Now, brothers, if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? If even lifeless instruments, such as the flute or the harp, do not give distinct notes, how will anyone know what is played? And if the bugle gives an indistinct sound, who will get ready for battle? So with yourselves, if with your tongue you utter speech that is not intelligible, how will anyone know what is said?… If, therefore, the whole church comes together and all speak in tongues, and outsiders or unbelievers enter, will they not say that you are out of your minds?”

The punch line to this whole thing is at the bottom, but let’s focus on the bugle thing first. Look at Numbers 10.1-3, 9:

The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Make two silver trumpets. Of hammered work you shall make them, and you shall use them for summoning the congregation and for breaking camp. And when both are blown, all the congregation shall gather themselves to you at the entrance of the tent of meeting. … And when you go to war in your land against the adversary who oppresses you, then you shall sound an alarm with the trumpets, that you may be remembered before the LORD your God, and you shall be saved from your enemies.”

The bugle gets two things to happen which Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 14:

1. Gets the congregation to assemble
2. Gets the congregation to be ready for battle by breaking camp while making a memorial directed at God.

Having established the passage connection, notice another huge one, which we see when God gives “the Spirit which is on Moses” out to the 70 elders, and two have not shown up at the elder assembly. They were caused to prophecy even in the camp, and Joshua wants to help by saying, “My lord Moses, stop them!” What is Moses’ reply?

But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the LORD’s people were prophets, that the LORD would put his Spirit on them!” (Numbers 10.29)

Remember that? Now I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. (1 Corinthians 14.5). Paul’s heart is Moses’ ministry desire too.

I note also that this prophetic period for both Paul and Moses:

1. was a forty year period between defeat of one enemy and another
2. Pharaoh, and Philistines (for Moses)
3. Caesar, and Satanic Israel (for Paul)
4. Moses took the people INTO the land for conquest.

Throughout Paul’s writing, he is calling the church to the conquest of the whole world, and at the end of those forty years they will be forced out of the land, in a sense, after the destruction of Jerusalem.

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[1] See A Tongue of Gold.
[2] See Three Babylons.
[3] See Cessation.

What is the referent of “body of Christ” in 1 Corinthians 11:29?

“For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself.”

Is it the members of the Church, as Doug Wilson supposes?

A few years ago, when one of my grandsons first came to the table (he was one year old), he was beside himself. His parents had taught him a basic catechism with signs because he could not really talk. He answered the question “Are you baptized?” by patting his own head. I was administering the Supper, and he was sitting in the front row with his parents and grandmother. When he got his bread, he held it up to show me. Now all this could be dismissed simply as a grandkid doing a cute thing, not really understanding it. But he also turned and pattern his mother’s head and his grandmother’s head. We are all baptized. He was discerning the body. To the extent he understood the Supper, he was discerning the body. To the extent that he did not understand the Supper (as the rest of us do not either), he was learning, just as we are. [1]

Why do paedobaptists always play the “cute” card? Is it not obvious that the corollary to “We are all baptized” is that Christianity is tribal and/or hereditary? That discussion is for another day. I just thought this was a great quote to illustrate what is often understood by this verse. But then what is the meaning of the verse? Its Covenant structure might shed some light on it.

It should be clear from this structure that the Communion table, a place of the kind of self-examination which leads to repentance and faith, is not for infants. It is not intended for the training up of children, except by observation. The “bread” they require first is the hearing of the Gospel. But the main point here is that the context of “discerning the body” is not about figuring out who is in and who is out.

The Lord’s supper is a combination of Israel’s Levitical priesthood eating the sacrifices before God, and Israel vowing to keep the conditions of the Covenant. Before the Mosaic Covenant, all sacrifices were whole burnt offerings. God ate the lot, as a consuming fire. The Noahic priests did not eat with God. To do so required a greater ceremonial cleanliness, a blameless people with “Levitically spotless skin,” as living sacrifices.

Moreover, Israel’s priests only ate before God, they never drank with Him. Between the first Melchizedek bringing bread and wine to Abraham (to vindicate him as a priest-king) and the last Melchizedek bringing bread and wine to Abraham’s children (the disciples), the wine was always to be tipped out as an offering. [2] The symbolism of the cup is tied to the jealous inspection of the bride in Numbers 5. In the big picture, the true priest-king was Christ, the only one who could rightly drink wine before God as a qualified Adam, the true Son of God.

So the distinction here, the “discernment” of the body is not the gathered saints but the act of judging rightly between sacred food and common food, between the house of God and the homes we live in, between the priestly table and the kingly table. When we eat at home, our food is not the body of Christ, and our wine is not the blood of the New Covenant. This is only the case when the saints gather together for self-examination, worship and Covenant renewal.

He whose god is his belly does not discern the Table as the flesh and blood of Christ but merely as food and drink. His outflow is not sacrificial blood and a river of living water but the filth of the bowels of King Eglon of Sodom. Those who discern what the bread and the wine actually are in God’s eyes will rightly discern themselves. Those who see  the Son of God on the Table, judging Jesus as righteous and themselves as unrighteous will, by eating and drinking, humble themselves and exalt the Saviour. His pure words are intended for our hearts, not our bellies (Mark 7:19). For those who love this world, Jesus’ pure words are Ehud’s left-handed (priestly) blade.

For Israel, this discernment was related to the difference between Passover and Tabernacles. At Passover, Israel was set apart for purification. At Booths/Tabernacles, a purified Israel was called to minister to, to “feed” the other nations. [3] For the Christian, this is the difference between the Lord’s table and the love feast. We examine ourselves, eat with God, and will then eat with the unconverted with the right heart, ministering out of God’s abundance.

So much for the basic argument. As always, the identification of the Covenant structure gives us even more information.

It is helpful to note that divisions in the assembly are often instigated by God for the purpose of purifying the church, as painful as this may be. It is not always simple, but in this case, gluttony exposed the swine.

At the Levitical step, we have saints acting like the sons of Eli, who treated the house of the Lord as if it were their own house, and the food of God as their own food. They exalted themselves instead of humbling themselves as God’s butlers, His faithful servants.

At the centre of the passage, Jesus is under the curse of the Law, drinking the cup in the place of the adulterous Bride. Even now He was covering their disobedience through His own death, just as He was still covering the sin of the Jewish leaders who were yet celebrating Passover and building the Temple in kingly (“Cainite”) disobedience to the Gospel.

The “Sanctions” part of the passage reinforces the idea that the Lord’s Supper is for the regular public renewal of the public profession of faith made by each saint at his or her baptism. Baptism puts the saint into the resurrection body, as one who has been slain by the Gospel and now possesses new life by the Spirit. The Table is the place of self-discipline for God’s knights, who judge themselves that they may not be judged, something which is insane to expect from a one-year-old unless one has an erroneous tradition to protect.

Notice that those who will not discipline themselves are disciplined by the Lord. This is exactly what we see in the letters to the seven churches in Asia, as Jesus “passes over” them on His way to destroy Pharaoh/Herod. He comes to tend His garden, the children of God (spiritual, not physical children), to feed them with righteousness and holiness. Those whom He finally removes (as He threatens to do in Revelation 2 and 3), are judged that the church might be preserved from being entirely “snuffed out.”

The final section, like the first, mentions the gathering (Booths). The Table is the place where the saints sit as elohim, heavenly rulers, those who are purified and are now fit to sit enthroned with Christ in heavenly places as His elders, His court, His advisors, and judge the wicked and advocate for the helpless by their prayers. The Lord’s Table is for the maintenance of the two-edged sword of the Gospel in our lives. It is a place of death and life, where we eat and drink Jesus, the priest-king, and then become life-giving food for the world.

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[1] Doug Wilson, in his foreword for The Case for Covenant Communion, edited by Gregg Strawbridge.
[2] See “The Forbidden Feast” in God’s Kitchen for more discussion and a diagram.
[3] See “Eat Local and Die” in God’s Kitchen for more discussion.

ART: The Death of Eglon via Sarah Louise 

Doug Wilson sees evidence for the classification of “Covenant children” in 1 Corinthians 7:14.

“For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy” (1 Cor. 7:14).

The Corinthians had wanted to know whether unbelief on the part of a spouse was in itself grounds for divorce. Paul has replied no, provided that the unbelieving partner is pleased to be together with the Christian in a marriage as biblically defined. If the only thing that is wrong is the spouse’s failure to believe in Christ, then the couple should still remain together.

But isn’t it somehow a spiritual contaminant to have sex with a pagan? No, Paul argues. A Christian ought not to marry a non-Christian (2 Cor. 6:14), but once married to one, a Christian needs to be faithful to his vows regardless. That means being faithful to all the vows, including the sexual commitment. But sex is an activity that often results in children. What about the children? Won’t the offspring of a mixed marriage be outside the covenant? No, Paul replies again. In this regard, the new covenant is not like the old. In the old covenant, the unclean contaminated the clean (Haggai 2:13-14). Jesus reversed this order—He would make the unclean clean by coming in contact with it (Mark 5:25).
And this means that in a mixed marriage, when the wife conceives a child, that child is not unclean, but rather holy. The word for holy here is hagia—and this is striking because when word is applied to persons, it is almost always translated or rendered as saints. A child of at least one believing parent is a saint, and is to be treated as such. [1]

If these children of a “mixed marriage” are “saints,” then the unbelieving spouse is also a “saint.” That is, they are not regenerate but still “under Covenant” according to the Federal Vision thinking. To be consistent, the unbelieving spouse should also be baptized, to demonstrate that through this marriage to a believer they are being “discipled.”

The argument against this is that such a person clearly has not believed, or has apostatized, so they are disqualified, but that the child is yet to be disqualified.

This does not deal with the inconsistency, at least not without the fairytale of faith beginning at conception. It just promotes the inconsistency sideways. We are waiting for a response from the child, but surely we are also waiting for a response from the unbelieving spouse to the gospel, which is the real issue here.

The word hagios gets used for all sorts of things in the New Testament, just as its corresponding meaning in English gets used for many things. If I go to the fridge to grab a steak, and my wife says, “Don’t touch that! It’s for the BBQ Sunday,” then it has been set apart. Concerning the BBQ, that steak is holy, just as unregenerate Israel was holy. One could be set apart without yet being cooked by the Pentecostal fire.

That could be the meaning here. But what is setting these unbelieving spouses and, presumably, unbelieving children, apart? They are set apart by the New Covenant thing that replaced the Old Covenant circumcision, and that is not baptism, it is the gospel. They are “in school” under the “elemental truths” in a New Covenant way. But they are, spiritually, still children, still under the tutelage of angels. And under the New Covenant, it is those who are born again and baptized who are those angels, the messengers. They are not merely “set apart” for transformation. They are the transformed.

Pastor Wilson made a very sound objection to this:

Hagiadzo is a verb that means to consecrate, dedicate, or set apart. The unbelieving spouse is hagiadzoed in such a way as to result in children who are hagia. Hagia is used in all kinds of ways, sure enough, but it is not used in all kinds of ways when it is describing people. Overwhelmingly, when hagia is talking about people, an appropriate translation would be saints.

Good point.

However, Matthew Colvin insisted that both Pastor Wilson and I are barking up the wrong trees. He writes:

I don’t find this persuasive. The Greek αγιαζω means “to consecrate” alright, but it doesn’t necessarily mean “to God”. A better interpretation takes it as “consecrated to one’s spouse”, as the Jewish marriage formula to this day says, “I consecrate you to myself”, and the Mishnah tractate on marriage is Qiddushin (“consecrations”).

Contextually, this makes sense: Paul is answering a Corinthian question about whether they need to leave their unbelieving spouses. His answer is that they need not, because they are legitimately married.

As a result, the children are “holy”, meaning “legitimate,” not bastards.

That doesn’t mean that Pastor Wilson is wrong about the “federal holiness (to God)” of the children of (even one) believer. Comparison with the OT’s parallel situation proves it: the Israelites who return from the exile in Ezra and Nehemiah DO have to separate from their pagan wives. But it does mean that 1 Corinthians 7 isn’t teaching this quite as directly as Pastor Wilson supposes, and that we can rummage in lexicons looking up hagiazo and hagios all day, and we won’t really make any headway.

Colvin links to some posts on his blog, which explain his position in detail. I like it for two reasons: 1) It means this passage gives no support to the practice of paedobaptism, and 2) it means the word hagio can be used of people without designating some kind of unregenerate sainthood, which the Federal Vision logically requires to maintain its practice of paedobaptism.

Colvin writes:

One of my Greek III students, Annelise B., surprised me with a translation I had never heard before. On further reflection, I decided that she was right and all the major translations (NIV, ESV, NKJV, etc.) are wrong. Her translation fits well with my preferred interpretation of 1 Cor. 7, which is that of David Daube.

In what follows, I’ll explain what her translation was, and why I like it.

First, the background, from an old post on this blog:

[Daube's view] makes sense of one of the most difficult passages of the Bible: 1 Cor. 7. First, the difficult verse, 7:14 — “the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the brother [sc. believing husband]” — is cleared up in an elegant way. Remarks Daube, “New Testament scholars have enormous difficulty infusing a measure of meaning into [ἡγίασται in 7:14]. The various conjectures often then become bases for more general theories about Paul’s concept of holiness. All this must be jettisoned.”

Daube explains that the Mishnah tractate on marriage is entitled “qiddushin” — “consecrations” or “sanctifications”, and that this is the ordinary way that the Rabbis conceived of marriage: “to consecrate a woman to wife” is to make her holy, special and proper, to one’s self, even as Israel is — as Steve Schlissel likes to put it — Mrs. YHWH. The verb qiddesh means “to consecrate to wife.” We thus no longer have to wonder what sort of “sanctification” is meant.

For Daube, then, 1 Cor. 7:14 is to be translated as, “the unbelieving husband is sanctified in [= is married to] the wife, and the unbelieving wife in [to] the brother [sc. believing husband]. But if the unbeliever departs, let him depart.” [2]

Annelise, being already familiar with this rendering, continued on to 7:15b, which reads in Greek:

οὐ δεδούλωται ὁ ἀδελφὸς ἢ ἡ ἀδελφὴ ἐν τοῖς τοιούτοις…

Now, you are probably familiar with such renderings as “a believing man or woman is not bound in such circumstances” (NIV) or “the brother or the sister is not under bondage in such cases” (KJV, NASB, ESV and NKJV). But Annelise, whether because she didn’t remember these English translations, or because she had an idea of her own that she wanted to try, rendered it this way:

“The brother or sister is not bound to such persons.”

I believe she is correct. There are several factors that commend her reading.

First, she interprets δεδούλωται to mean “bound in marriage to someone.” There is very good reason for thinking this, since it is in the perfect tense, and thus parallel with the twice-repeated ἡγίασται in 7:14. That verb was rendered as “has been consecrated/sanctified”, with the result that one is now “married.” That is, it refers to the action in the past by which the present state of valid marriage was produced: namely, the decision to continue living with one’s pre-conversion spouse. By contrast, οὐ δεδούλωται in 7:15 would similarly refer to the past action that has resulted in the present state of freedom to depart: namely, the refusal of the unbeliever to continue the marriage, evinced by his separation, so that the believer “has not been bound” by such cohabitation, and is thus not married.

Second, Annelise takes ἐν τοιούτοις as an inclusive masculine, not as a neuter: the believer is not bound “to or by such persons”, not “in such circumstances.” I cannot recall the use of the neuter substantive τοιαυτα in the dative to mean “such circumstances” or “such cases” in any other Greek literature. By contrast, Annelise’s reading of the word as a masculine substantive is paralleled several times within 1 Corinthians itself: “such persons” (τοιούτοι) will have affliction in the flesh (7:28); the church is to hand “such a person” (τοιούτον) over to Satan (5:5). As for its being dative, there is now an immediate parallel with “ἡγιάσται ἐν τῷ ἀδελφῷ” (“sanctified in the brother) in the preceding verse (7:14). In both instances, ἐν + dative.

Daube’s rendering of ἡγίασται rendered otiose centuries of tortured attempts to figure out how an unbelieving person can experience sanctification just by being married to a believer. Annelise’s rendering of δεδούλωται eliminates similar problems that have beset all attempts to understand Paul’s marriage and divorce halakhah. For instance: on the reading of the KJV and succeeding English versions, we are left wondering why the believer is “not bound in such circumstances”. The mere departure of one’s spouse does not, after all, dissolve a marriage. Hence the medieval privilegium Paulinum whereby abandonment, normally not grounds for divorce, becomes grounds when the departing spouse is an unbeliever. Such a halakhah is unprecedented. But on Annelise’s reading, the verse is merely stating the fact that the believer has not been bound to the unbeliever who departs. Since the original marriage was destroyed by the conversion of the now-believing spouse, and the unbelieving spouse departed, there has been no cohabitation to effect a new bond. Hence, the perfect tense is precisely what Paul wants: there has been no past action, and so there is no present state.

I am grateful to Annelise for this reading. I still vividly recall when I was in a similar situation with my teacher Dr. James Lesher in 1996. Without knowing the tortured scholarship on a particular fragment of Heraclitus, I translated it in a new way, and he, for his part, was persuaded. It got me a footnote in his next article, and launched me, for better or worse, on a career as a scholar. I regret that I’m not in a position to give Annelise more than this mention in a blog post. [3]

A Federal Vision friend remarked that looking for answers in extra-biblical literature is not the way to go about interpreting the Bible. I agree with that. And yet the extra-biblical literature we are looking at here is the Talmud. Much of what Jesus Himself said was for the purpose of contradicting the Oral Law, which the Jewish leaders had used to subvert the true faith of Israel. I do not believe Daube, or Colvin, are doing anything different here.

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[1] Douglas Wilson, Children As Saints.
[2] Matthew Colvin, Sanctified by the Believer”? 1 Corinthians 7. This is reproduced in full below for those interested, and for my own reference just in case his blog goes offline some day.
[3] Matthew Colvin, 1 Corinthians 7:15 and Serendipity in the Greek 3 Class.

“Sanctified by the Believer”? 1 Corinthians 7 – November 10, 2006

Quite some time ago, I wrote a blog post criticizing Mark Horne’s understanding of 1 Cor. 7′s language about children of mixed marriages (“otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is they are holy”). I advocated an opposing interpretation, rather forcefully. I have now come to believe that I was wrong, and that a third way is correct. As usual, consideration of the neglected Jewish background provides the answer.
David Daube’s contention is that two of the scenarios in 1 Corinthians — the incestuous union of chapter 5, and the marriage that becomes mixed as a result of the conversion of one spouse in chapter 7 — both depend upon a doctrine of conversion as new creation. By conversion to Christianity, the believer loses — in principle, at least — all his previous relations. Daube also suggests that this principle is at work in the epistle to Philemon in the case of the slave Onesimus.
The principle is at work in both ch. 5 and ch. 7, but not in the same way. In ch. 5, Paul’s concern is to rebuke the Corinthians for their misunderstanding and misapplication of the doctrine of re-creation. The principle, Daube suggest, is “the Rabbinic teaching that a proselyte is as a newborn child. Hence he has no relations from before; and as far as his pre-conversion ties are concerned, in principle the rules of incest do not apply; in principle he may marry his stepmother or indeed his own mother — neither is related to him, a new man.”
Of course, in 1 Cor. 5, the “new man” in question emphatically may not marry his stepmother. Paul prohibits such a union as porneia. Why does he do so, if this doctrine of new creation really applies to new converts, and the man in question is a new convert? The answer Daube gives is that what is true in principle cannot be used to flout the perceptions of others. Thus, although meat sacrificed to an idol is in principle fair game for a Christian to eat, Paul “will never eat meat again” if such eating “causes my brother to stumble” (ִεἰ βρῶμα σκανδαλίζει τὸν ἀδελφόν μου). Focusing on 8:9′s general maxim (“watch out that your very right to do something does not become a stumbling block to the weak”), Daube concludes that Paul restricts the freedom that the believer has in principle. He suggests that a similar restriction is at work in the case of πορνεία in chapter 5. As support, he adduces the words, “and such πορνεία as is not even among the gentiles” – sc. even Greeks and Romans did not allow marriage between stepson and stepmother.
(We note, by the way, that both of these issues are probably occasioned by the delivery of the Jerusalem council’s four commands, which Paul must have communicated to them at some time prior to the Corinthians’ first letter to him — making 1 Cor. itself the third piece of correspondence in the exchange, unless Paul delivered the Jerusalem prohibitions in person. That the council’s decrees were aimed specially at Gentiles, to urge them to follow the commands of Lev. 17-18, is thus further confirmed by Paul’s addition of “not even among the gentiles” to his mention of πορνεία in 5:1)
There are certain glaring objections to Daube’s reading, and I am not wholly convinced myself. But let me first explain why I find it attractive.
It makes sense of one of the most difficult passages of the Bible: 1 Cor. 7. First, the difficult verse, 7:14 — “the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified in the brother [sc. believing husband]” — is cleared up in an elegant way. Remarks Daube, “New Testament scholars have enormous difficulty infusing a measure of meaning into [ἡγίασται in 7:14]. The various conjectures often then become bases for more general theories about Paul’s concept of holiness. All this must be jettisoned.”
Daube explains that the Mishnah tractate on marriage is entitled “qiddushin” — “consecrations” or “sanctifications”, and that this is the ordinary way that the Rabbis conceived of marriage: “to consecrate a woman to wife” is to make her holy, special and proper, to one’s self, even as Israel is — as Steve Schlissel likes to put it — Mrs. YHWH. The verb qiddesh means “to consecrate to wife.” We thus no longer have to wonder what sort of “sanctification” is meant.
As so often with Daube’s suggestions, this recourse to a Jewish explanation results in the unraveling of further puzzles — which thereby serve as a confirmation of the solution to the first crux. In the present instance, I note a point that Daube did not mention: the odd locution “ἐν τῷ ἀδελφῷ” — which occasioned so much wrangling between me and Tim Gallant and Joel Garver — becomes crystal clear as a Hebraism: Paul is almost certainly translating literally the Hebrew idiom קָדַשׁ בְּ, which is used several times in the OT ( Lev. 10:3, 22:32; Ez. 20:41, 39:27, 36:23, 38:16; Nu 20:13). In all these instances, God is speaking of himself being “sanctified in Israel” — not human marriage, but perhaps similar if one considers the covenantal relationship between God and Israel. Later, the phrase becomes technical: in the Talmud, the idiom means “to marry someone.” The inseparable Hebrew preposition בְּ may mean “in” or “by”, and Paul has chosen the Greek ἐν rather than ὑπὸ + gen for agency, because he conceives of the consecration in question as the automatic effect of marriage (by whatever mode) rather than as the result of that someone’s agency within the marriage. In this, he is just like the Rabbis.
As a parallel for his understanding of 1 Cor. 7, Daube summarizes y.Yeb. 12a:

‘A heathen converts together with his two wives, who are mother and daugher or sisters. The ruling, it will be seen, implies that the marriages are now extinct, that neither woman is related to the other, and that continuing cohabitation will bring about a fresh marriage. This is what the Rabbis ordain: (a) he should keep one and dismiss the other; (b) once he has had intercourse after conversion with one, this is his wife; and (c) if he has had intercourse after conversion with both, both are his wives. The rationale of the decision is as follows. Jewish law prohibits marriage with a woman and her daughter or sister. However, owing to conversion, neither of these women is any longer related to the other. In principle, therefore, there is no objection to marriage with both. Nonetheless, according to (a), one ought to be discarded, because otherwise Judaism might look like a lighter sanctity: even heathers do not customarily marry mother and daughter or sisters, though as the present case shows it does happen. Which of the two is to go is up to the man; and it is worth noting that the verb in the text, hosi’, “to lead out,” may refer not only to dissolution of a marriage but also to dismissal where there is no room for divorce proper — e.g. to Halitzah. For, again, owing to conversion, the marriages are ended. He simply bids one of them leave. With the one he keeps, a fresh marriage is constituted by continuing cohabitation. This is evident from (b) where it is provided that once he has cohabited with one, he has lost his free choice: she has become his wife. It is confirmed by (c): by cohabiting with both, however undesirable it may be, he has made both his wives. It seems that the Rabbis do not even insist that he now divorce one of the two: the risk of giving the impression of a lighter sanctity is not in this case so overwhelmingly grave as to call for further measures once he has remarried both — heathens do occasionally contract this union.’
- “Pauline Contributions to a Pluralistic Culture” in Jesus and Man’s Hope, vol. 2, 223-45, repr. in CWDD II, 537-52.

The parallels with the situation in I Cor. 7 are apparent. If Daube is right, there is no “Pauline Privilege” to divorce in the case of conversion. The Roman Catholic Church has made that up on the basis of a misinterpretation. Rather, one simply allows the unbeliever to leave. Do not send him away if he is willing to continue. A fresh marriage is constituted by the cohabitation, so any child of the marriage is not illegitimate, but ἅγιος. Incidentally, Daube’s interpretation provides a clear reason for the difference between the status of the unbelieving spouse (ἡγίασται, “has been sanctified”) and the status of the child (ἅγιος, “holy” or “clean,” i.e. “legitimate”) — a difference which has proved difficult for other interpretations to explain.
Daube’s view also provides a basis for the permission to allow the unbeliever to leave the marriage. On the Privilegium Paulinum reading, the apostle is said to be allowing divorce, and for a reason that Jesus himself did not countenance. (There is no mention of πορνεία on the part of the unbeliever.) But on Daube’s reading, there is no divorce in view at all.
On the other hand, if the unbeliever wishes to stay, then the reconstituted marriage is to be welcomed by the believer, who is to prefer the possible conversion of the unbeliever to any exercise of spiritual rights.
All this I find fairly persuasive. It has huge consequences for Christian thought about marriage and divorce, which has been going merrily along for many years now pitting Paul against Jesus or trying to “reconcile” their supposedly different teachings.
We have now come full circle to reconsider 1 Cor. 5:1, where Daube suggests that the same doctrine is at work, and being abused. The Corinthians would not have tolerated open incest. But in this case, they are “puffed up” and proud of it. The reason, he suggests, is that they see the man who has his father’s wife as a shining example of the spiritual freedom they all have as new creations in Christ. Paul’s objection to this activity is based, Daube says, on the fact that it would present a stumbling block to pagans. Paul does not want the surrounding Greco-Roman culture to suppose that Christians are looser than themselves in matters of sexual morality.
The problem with this view was aptly put to me by my former student Betsy P., now in her first year at Hillsdale: Isn’t it absurd to suppose that Paul thinks marrying one’s stepmother is in itself unobjectionable, but doing so when the pagans would raise their eyebrows is grounds for ostracism from the church? It is indeed.
Yet it still seems to me that Daube’s reading accounts well for the spiritual pride of the Corinthians about this matter, and for Paul’s attacks on the same.
I would like to do some more research to get some more Rabbinic evidence. The most relevant tractate of the Talmud is b.Quddishin, which deals with the laws of marriage. Its content, however, is naughty — so much so that it is usually omitted from English translations, is not available online, and is not offered by Soncino Press for individual purchase. (You have to buy the whole Talmud to get it. I will eventually, but I don’t have the $850 for the whole set yet.)

In 1 Corinthians 11:7 we encounter a verse that many might find perplexing.

For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man.

I believe that careful attention to the logic of this verse is absolutely crucial to unlocking the puzzle of the difference between the female helper apostle, and the male helper apostle.

If one were reading without paying too much attention, one might fall into the trap of reading ‘man … is the image and glory of God; but woman is the image and glory of man.’ However, the text does not say that the woman is the image of the man. The woman is the glory of the man, but not his image. We will return at a later point to the question of whether women are also the images of God.
Who then is the image of the man? The image of the man is the priestly son. Eve was the glory of Adam, but it was Seth who was his image, the expression of his authority in the world: ‘And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and begot a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth’ (Genesis 5:3).

The blessing of the father is given to the sons who bear his image in the world. The firstborn’s blessing generally involves the laying on of hands. As the father leans upon the head of his son, he impresses his image upon him. His son then represents him and his authority in the world. The chief blessing of the right hand naturally belongs to the firstborn son, who is the chief image of the father. In Genesis 48:12-22, for example, we see Isaac giving Joseph the firstborn’s double portion (v.22), through laying his hand on both of Joseph’s sons’ heads (but reversing their birth order), thereby giving Joseph two tribal portions in Ephraim and Manasseh in contrast to the single portions received by his brothers.

As N.T. Wright and others have observed, Scripture’s use of the concept of ‘image’ should be understood as the visible representation or expression of a person’s authority and rule. The conceptual connection between image and authority is a tight one, and sheds considerable light on our current questions.

The relationship between image and sonship is clear elsewhere in Scripture, especially in references to the person of Christ. For instance, in Colossians 1:15 we read of Christ: ‘He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.’ It is the son who represents – who is the embodiment – of the authority of his father. The man’s possession of a son is his possession of authority, much as having a wife is having glory. Hebrews 1:2ff. reveals the same connection between the firstborn, image, and authority: as God’s image and firstborn Son, Christ is God’s strength and authority at work in the world.

All of this leads to an important conclusion: women cannot represent, or image, the authority of the man, as that is not the form of representation for which they were created.

Alastair Roberts, Representation and Ordination.

Art: Adam and Eve by Tamara de Lempicka

“But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep.” (1 Cor. 11:28-30)

Some more detailed thoughts on what God is doing in the Lord’s Table. Part 1 here.

Covenant Renewal Worship follows the Bible Matrix. This means that our Christian worship recapitulates the Creation Week, the Feasts of Israel, and the journey from slavery to Sabbath (servants to sons), and the process of maturity, from childhood to adulthood. [1]

Covenant Renewal Worship gets ridiculed by some, but there is plenty of Biblical and historical background for it. We are not under the Old Covenant, so there is certainly an amount of freedom in how we worship. But the kinds of “freedom” we prize as spiritual adolescents today have only been around for about the last two per cent of Church history. It’s time to wind back the clock.

The process is simple:

Call

…..Confession

……….Ascension to Worship

……………Teaching of the Word

……….Offertory

…..Communion

Commission

Most churches follow something close to this order by spiritual instinct. Although the church bells aren’t heard too often (the Call), the real pity is that many have dropped a Corporate Confession.

We won’t get into steps 3, 4 and 5. My target here is Communion.

If we subscribe to the idea of Covenant Renewal worship, there are implications for those who are practicing paedocommunion. They’re right in linking baptism and Table. But, despite all protests to the contrary, their baptism is hereditary. It is generational instead of “re-generational”, so now their Table is hereditary. The kids who are able to eat solid food are welcome to join in as part of the Covenant community. They have been declared “Christian” in their baptism, and in some mystical way the Table feeds them.

Well, the emphasis on Covenant Community is great. But the typology behind the Table, and its institution by Jesus, make it plain that this is, if not an abuse, a terrible misunderstanding of what the Table is about.

So, just what is God doing in the Lord’s Supper?

Among other things, Communion is a “jealous inspection.” (See Bible Matrix II, chapter 18, “Goblet of Fire,” for more on this.) Communion isn’t a disconnected, freestanding element of worship. Some pastors like to move the order of service around so people don’t get bored. But Communion is part of a process of worship, and it should be celebrated every time we worship, if possible. God is doing something very real in the entire process, so moving the order around is as sensible as drying your clothes before you wash them.

God calls us into His presence (Creation) and separates us from the world (Division). Under the New Covenant, unlike the Old, the world is welcome to come with us as witnesses to the glory! This includes our children. We sing the sacrifice of praise (Ascension).

We are taught the Word (external Law – Pentecost – Testing), [2] then examine and present ourselves (internal Law – Trumpets – Maturity). This brings us to the “Atonement” part of the service. But unlike Israel’s Atonement Day, we do not mourn but celebrate. We did our mourning at Confession (Division).

However, notice that Confession and Communion mirror each other in the “there-and-back-again” process. There is a link between the mourning and the celebration. We examined ourselves and confessed our sin. But God has done something new in the teaching of the Word, while the minister imaged Christ to us in heavenly places. Now the Spirit judges the thoughts and intents of our hearts. We judged ourselves that we might not be judged. In most cases, if not all, He finds internal Law. The Word has not returned empty.

So, the actual feeding isn’t Communion, it’s the Word. In some real sense, in this rite, the Word is eating us — from the inside. Will Jesus spit us out?

If we examine ourselves according to the Word, we don’t drink to the dregs (Atonement). The sword that “passed over” at Confession now passes through, but Communion is a sacramental “dose” of death. This is because we are already clean. We are washed. Like our High Priest, we “taste death for every man.” Firstfruits (Ascension of the Head) was a “taste” of Pentecost (Garden > Land). Atonement (Ascension of the Body) is a “taste” of Booths (Land > World). We taste the cup before handing it to the nations as prophets.

What this inoculation does is turn us into food. At this restricted Table we become an unrestricted Table, a Love Feast for all those “looking in” (Booths). [3] If Communion is about nourishment at all, it’s not about our nourishment. It’s about the Vindication of the Word in us as nourishment for the nations. So, worship begins with the Called and ends with the Sent.

This Table is not for the nourishment of the flesh. It is Covenant renewal, but it is not the renewal of Jesus’ side of things. Jesus renews us so we can be recommissioned to go out and renew the world.

This involves the renewal of our own vows on pain of judgment. This might sound stern, but “if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins.” That’s why we celebrate. If we are struggling with sin, we lay our burdens upon Him and receive new grace. The New Covenant cup only becomes a curse if we have a controversy with God about our sin, not if we are faithfully fighting it and mortifying it. Otherwise it would be a curse to every Christian. The Supper is only a curse to those whose vow is a pretense, like Judas.

Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. (1 Cor. 11:27)

In context, it is likely Paul had Judaizers in mind when he wrote this. And it explains much of the book of Hebrews, where all unbelieving Judah, post-Pentecost, gave Judas a new “body”:

“…since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame…” (Hebrews 6:6).

So, if your intentions are not those of Judas, or the Judaizers, or anything like them, come! Be renewed!

The bread and wine are consumed separately, but reunited in our own bodies. The saints are the resurrection body of Jesus. The food the children need is the gospel, mediated by hands and hearts made clean by the power of His resurrection.

It should be clear that the Table is not the place for infants or toddlers. It is a grave place, a place for those who carry the world on their shoulders. The Lord’s Table is for royal advisors, legal mediators, loyal knights, chosen ambassadors, Covenant delegates. It is only “for” the children in the sense that they shelter under this ministry until they, too, can take the vow of the martyroi.

Next post, I’ll cover how I suspect this is all echoed in the architecture of Exodus 24.

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[1] See Bible Matrix p. 217 for a basic chart, and Jeff Meyers’ The Lord’s Service for more historical and ecclesiastical background detail than I could ever hope to get my head around.
[2] James Jordan says that this should be primarily teaching, not preaching, at least not the kind of preaching that is aimed at non-Christians. Many churches continually preach at the saints as though they are not saved.
[3] See Eat Local and Die.

“…sprinkling or pouring conflates the Covenant head with the Covenant body.”

Doug Wilson writes:

“God, in baptizing the disciples with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, did so by pouring out His Spirit upon them. Pouring is therefore very clearly described as a biblical mode of baptism” (To a Thousand Generations, p. 102).

God poured out the Spirit, certainly. But can we then assume that the apostles poured water on new believers and their babies? Single words are clues, but they can be misleading. The effectiveness of word studies is limited because context is crucial. And the context of the Bible is most importantly structural. Structure is the answer.

The reason is that all of God’s new creations follow the structure of Genesis 1. It’s almost like, when God speaks, the Spirit will pick up anything available, anything lying around, and arrange it into the familiar pattern. This means that the Bible Matrix is crucial in identifying the meanings of many Bible symbols. Baptism and the Day of Atonement might not look anything like each other to us, but the Bible keeps tying them together, along with some other things, to tell us the same part of the Creation story. If we have eyes to see, this method also gives us hints as to the correct mode of baptism. It’s not about the motion of the water. It’s about the motion of the one being baptized. [1]

Although Days 1-6 have a 1-2-3 1-2-3 correspondence, the full pattern is also chiastic. There is a relationship between Day 2 and Day 6.

Day 2 and Day 6 both concern water, and it’s not immediately apparent. The rest of the Bible is a commentary, or the outworking, of the Creation.

On Day 2, God divides heaven and earth with a veil of water. On Day 6, the qualified mediator is to stand, with his redeemed/avenged bride, upon the waters. On Day 6 it was the spring of Eden, a foretaste of Christ and His bride on the crystal sea. [2]

The best examples are Joseph, and the feast structure.

Day 2 is Passover. Jacob “spreads out a garment” upon his favored son, like a veil separating him from his brothers (Covenant Hierarchy).

Day 6 is Pass-through, or Atonement. The robe is torn and bloodied with a substitutionary goat. The High Priest passes through the veil.

…..1 – Word

……….2 – Veil installed (nations divided – Circumcision)

……………3 – Old Israel lifted up

………………..4 – Pentecost

……………5 – New Israel gathered

……….6 – Veil torn (nations united – Baptism)

…..7 – Succession

Have you got that now? Passover installs the veil. Pass-through tears the veil. At Passover, God separates His people by installing a veil (darkness) and at Pass-through, it is the veil itself that is divided, to bring His people before Him, united.

We see this in Abram’s sacrifice. Abram is passed over in darkness (Day 2), then the Lord passes through the sacrifice as a fiery head and a smoky body, Ark and Incense. [3]

I hope you are still with me. The payoff for baptism is coming.

This passage actually prefigures the next stage in Israel’s history. The birds are not divided because they are the anointed head (as the dove descending upon Jesus), but the body is torn into Jew and Gentile (the animals that walk upon the Land). Priests were anointed with oil and the blood was applied to right ear, thumb and toe – a Jew was half a man, a priesthood yet to be given true kingdom. [4]

The passing through was Joshua and Israel, head and body, “walking on water” as dry land into Canaan.

So, sprinkling or pouring conflates the Covenant head with the Covenant body. Adam’s head was cursed (his brow, or literally his nose) and Eve’s body was cursed. The Head is anointed to carry out the mission, the Law, and that mission is to gather a new body.

So debating the meaning of baptizo isn’t the solution. The key is the context. All the baptism passages in Acts follow the same structure. The “passing through” of the golden High Priest, into the Most Holy Place, with a fragrant cloud of smoke, the Covenant body.

The High Priest made two approaches on the Day of Atonement: one for the priesthood (blood of a bull) and one for the people (blood of the first goat). After he presented His own blood as High Priest, Jesus would return “in like manner” for the firstfruits church for the second approach. You will see this all in Daniel 7. (See Jordan’s commentary, The Handwriting on the Wall.) [5]

Spirit baptism anoints the head. It puts us into the Head, into Jesus. You can pour all you like onto the head as long as it’s only the Spirit. Baptism is a “passing through” into government of the Land, as part of the body of Covenant elders, who stand before the throne with bowls of incense and advise God as Abraham did.

Also, concerning Paul’s mention of “all Israel” baptized in the Red Sea (1 Cor. 10:1-4): Israel’s baptism was as a single body of flesh. But the New Israel’s baptism is a group noun. It was not a single passing through but many passings-through, one for each individual. They are markedly different. Individualism is not anti-Covenant, at least not as far as the New Covenant is concerned, because the individuals are united by the Spirit of God.

The structure mentioned above is also found in the acsencion rite. The holy fire is poured upon the sacrifice (the final seal in Revelation refers to Pentecost), but the clean head is burnt by the Spirit before the unclean body is washed and offered. [6]

So, totus Christus structures the entire Bible, and it’s against pouring or sprinkling upon the head. Baptism is the body passing through the waters with clean feet into priestly government from the Holy Place.

Circumcision installed a veil (Hierarchy) and baptism brings the Tested, Matured and Redeemed/Avenged qualified mediators before God for Succession. Babies cannot be mediatorial elders.

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[1] Jesus uses this structure ironically in the parable of the good Samaritan. The story has seven stanzas, and each stanza follows the Covenant/matrix pattern. I the first cycle, the robbers leave the man for dead at Atonement. But at this point in the priest’s and Levite’s stanzas, they “pass by on the other side” instead of “passing through” as mediators. Both of their stanzas are missing the last line: Succession/Sabbath/Booths. They not only fail to enter into rest, they fail to carry anyone else into it under their shelter/shade as a true Tabernacle. See Tavernacles.
[2] See Walking on Water.
[3] See Pass-over and Pass-through.
[4] See Half Man, Half Beast.
[5] Available here. See also One Taken, One Left Behind and The Last Trumpet.
[6] See High As the Horses’ Bridles.

One thing I have realised over the last few years is how little the New Testament is commonly taught in the context of God’s “worship economy.” This is mostly due to the fact that the destruction of the Herods’ temple—or at least its significance—doesn’t even register on most Bible college lecturers’ radar, let alone that of the average Christian. We understand why the temples of the pagan gods were abandoned. Do we understand that the Temple of the true God had become a synagogue of Satan?

Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart.

If you think giving this verse a Jewish context is stretching things since this letter was written to Christians in a Gentile city, read the preceding chapter.

Christianity was still in the shadow of Herod’s temple. Judaism was the ‘seen’ religion. All that Christianity seemed to have outwardly was eyewitness testimony and suffering. It was not a religion of flesh but of Spirit. It had no obvious glory. As Jordan observes, because God’s people don’t resort to oppression and exploitation (slavery and harlotry) for instant glory and affluence, God’s cities always take time to build. The Herods were resorting to these things exactly, and breaking Moses’ three laws for Israel’s kings as Solomon did.

Rather, we have renounced secret and shameful ways; we do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.

Who is Paul comparing himself to here? Most likely, it is the Jews and Judaizers, hypocrites who had swapped mercy and justice for tithing their kitchen herbs. Paul returns to this theme later in the epistle, which might be an argument (a chiastic one) for its unity. The apostles’ lives matched their words. This view is supported by the next verse.

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.

As he did in 2 Cor. 3, Paul refers to the Veil. It becomes apparent that this chapter is working through the Tabernacle pattern. We have had an Ark/Word that is not being distorted, and now the Veil.

The veil was torn, the Ark was opened. But the Jews sewed it back together again! Jesus was correct when He said they would not only refuse to enter through the kingdom doors, but hinder others from doing so as well. This Veil is what was vanishing away. It was a Covenant-firmament. Those who refused to enter into the Light would be taken along with their beloved Veil into outer darkness. [1]

The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

What is the context of this letter? First century. The god of that age was Satan. The worship of God still had an earthly centre, but its rulers now belonged to their true father, the devil.

But Satan has now been bound. People are still blind today, of course, but the truth has been freed from centralised Herodian worship. In the literary structure, we are still in the Veil, in the darkness of Passover. Paul would also have been recalling his own blindness to the gospel until the light shined upon him. This moves the pattern to Ascension, Firstfruits — Christ as the image of God. This step is Moses on the mountain, and Paul has already spoken about Moses’ face being veiled.

Basically, Moses entered through the Veil on the mountain and was face to face with God (as Facebread). Moses became a human Tabernacle. Just as it was for the unbelieving Jews in Paul’s day, an OPEN Holy of Holies was intolerable. Without the Spirit of God, being face to face with the Law means death. So, just like those at the foot of Sinai, the Jews wanted Jesus’ face hidden. Paul tells us that Moses’ face-glory passed away. [2] But the glory of Jesus’ face is permanent, and we, by the Spirit, view it unveiled. We look boldly at the things that angels desired to look into. Ascension also corresponds to the third book, Leviticus, where Adam ascends, draws near to God, in a new Tabernacle.

For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.

Christians are merely signposts. Signposts are servants. They are not the thing signified, despite the fact that its name is written, engraved, and sealed with wax, on their “foreheads.” God is big on mediators. [3]

This moves the pattern from Ascension to Testing, preaching the Law received on the mountain to the people waiting below. The Head speaks the Law to the body. Will the body receive it?

Do many commentators deal much with the Jewish background in the “Gentile” letters”? A friend of mine studying at Moore College was surprised to hear a lecturer tell a student that one can’t understanding the Corinthian epistles without understanding the Temple. Perhaps things are changing, but I don’t recall hearing any sermons with this perspective since I became a Christian.

Paul wasn’t making general statements about the Christian life so much as opening the Old Covenant to these believers by the Spirit. Their Bible was the Old Testament and the apostle was their commentary.

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[1] See The End of Shadows.
[2] See Horns of Moses.
[3] See The Go-Betweens.