Luke 15:11-32: Two Perspectives

The love with which God has loved his children through Christ is amazing, magnanimous, and over-generous. It is prodigal. He demonstrated that love most fully on the Cross, but Jesus also illustrated that love in his parables, particularly his story of the Lost Son. In Luke 15:11-32, Jesus responds to the criticisms of the Pharisees for his eating with sinners by telling three stories of seekers who rejoice when they find a lost thing they were looking for. The third, and most pointed, is the parable often called the Prodigal Son. Dr. Roy Clements, former pastor of Eden Baptist Church in Cambridge, and Dr. Philip Ryken, pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, each exposit this text well, for they both understand that the story is at least as much a lesson about the elder son as about the prodigal son.

Clements’ sermon is relatively simple in its organization. He begins with a n observation that relationships normally break down in two ways. In what he calls “the big row,” the relationship is severed drastically, by an argument or some catastrophic event that propels the two parties away from each other. Conversely, in “the big freeze,” the relationship just slowly and quietly fades away, as the affections grow cold and what once was love fades to indifferent acquaintance. Both are equally disastrous, but in fact it is easier for the prodigal son to be restored after the big row than for the elder son (and the Pharisees, and religious hypocrites today) to be restored from the big freeze. Clements, finally, has two major areas of application. We should consider the overwhelming, costly, self-giving love of the Father’s free grace, and we must see the terrible danger of spiritual pride, “the mackintosh that grace just cannot get through.”

Ryken’s sermon is similarly structured, though rather than using relational terms for his homiletical framework, he uses the concept of lostness. His main points are two: that we should realize how lost the prodigal son is, and that we should also realize how lost the elder brother is. Regarding the prodigal son, he has three sub-points. First, the brother was lost before he ever left home, since he was impatient for his father’s death, wanting only the material benefits his father could give him. Second, he was lost when he ran away, since he fundamentally wanted freedom to sin. Third, he was still lost even when he decided to return home, for he was thinking as a servant rather than as a son. The elder brother was also lost, as he had likewise rejected his sonship.

Exegetically, these brothers both do fine work. They each do a good job of referencing the context of the story, showing how the parable is Jesus’ response to the criticism of the Pharisees. Each pastor gets to the basic point of the parable, which is focused not so much on the rebellion and repentance of the prodigal son as on the welcoming love of the Father and the resentfulness of the elder son. Both Clements and Ryken draw the comparison between the hypocrisy of the elder son in his pretension of virtue and the hypocrisy of the Pharisees in their works-based righteousness. What Ryken draws out that Clements doesn’t however, is that Jesus is drawing a contrast with the parable—as well as the two it follows—between the joy of the loving Father at finding and receiving lost sinners, and the cynical refusal of the Pharisees to share that joy regarding the sinners Jesus ate with.

Homiletically, both sermons were a minor disappointment. While they each, especially Clements, have a conversational manner that is easy to listen to, neither of them were particularly clear with the outline of their sermons. The points listed above were there, I think, but none of them were particularly clear. Clements’ were more like recurring themes than concrete points around which the sermon was organized. Ryken’s points were a bit clearer, but they sort of applied only to a portion of the sermon, rather than serving as an outline for the entire talk.

Nonetheless, both of these men seem to be gifted preachers dedicated to expositional preaching. They both do an able job of opening God’s Word up for God’s people. They both apply it well, asking piercing questions that force the listener to examine his own life for traces of the pride and hypocrisy that characterized the elder brother. Both of these sermons are fine meditations that show evident laboring in the Gospel.

Review: Reformation of the Church by Iain Murray (part 3 of 12)

This post is the third of what will ultimately be twelve essays interacting with Iain Murray's book The Reformation of the Church.
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In Section III of The Reformation of the Church, Iain Murray begins the examination of “The Need for Reformation” with three excerpted articles, one on the many abuses in the Church of England in the sixteenth century and two on the relation of the state to the church. Thomas Wilcox, in “The Necessity of Reformation”, written to Parliament in 1572, lays out various ways in which the English church still resembled too much the Roman church and failed to reflect the standards of Scripture. Among the abuses he attacks are absenteeism, scarcity of preaching, lack of a plurality of elders, corruption of the office of deacons, and failure of “ecclesiastical discipline.” William Ames, writing in 1631, continues a dialogue “Concerning a National Church” by responding to an essay by Dr. John Burgess. In the excerpt, Ames argues that a state-run hierarchy ruling local churches is found nowhere in Scripture, and that unity among particular churches is found primarily in common confession, not in organizational rule. Finally, Charles Hodge, writing in 1863, surveys various ways in which state and church related to one another throughout history, showing that the separation of church and state that has characterized the United States is both biblical and a historical innovation.

Wilcox’s thoughts on needed reform in the Church of England are significant in light of recent discussions because they essentially represent an application of the regulative principle beyond worship (formal services, that is) to the rest of church life and polity.[Blogger's note: This refers to discussions among myself and my fellow interns.] He goes on for several pages elaborating on the stark contrast between the Anglican church, with all its extant ceremony and extra-scriptural offices and practices, and the early church of the Apostolic age, when the church simply observed the ordinances of Christ in what John Cotton later called “their native puritie and simplicitie.”

Wilcox’s boldness in so frankly laying out all the ways the church needed reform is both breathtaking and inspiring. In a time when disagreeing with the civil and ecclesiastical authorities could have dire consequences, it took great courage and commitment to the rule of the Word of God to declare, “we in England are so far off from having a Church rightly reformed, according to the prescript of God’s Word, that as yet we are not come to the outward face of the same.” Though Hodge’s assertion that the Reformation in England was effected by the civil power rather than the clergy or the people, surely men like Wilcox must have played a large role in pushing the English church beyond mere separation from Rome and towards true Scriptural reform.

Ames’ thoughts “Concerning a National Church” seem to represent an important development both for the modern idea of the separation of church and state and also for the autonomy of the local congregation. Ames is not writing as a Congregationalist, and in fact his argument leaves open ample room for organic bottom-up organization such as Presbyterianism, over against the top-down hierarchical episcopacy. However, some of his statements such as, “I never read either in Scripture or in any orthodox writer, of a visible particular Church,” reflect a growing awareness in the Reformation world of the rule of Scripture for church government, which formed the basis for congregationalism to be recovered by some of the English Puritans.

Corporate Worship and the People of God

For millennia, worship of God has been the fundamental act that characterizes His people. From the Old Testament distinction between the pagans who worship false gods and the Israelites who worship the true God to the New Testament division between the church and the world, worship has always defined the people of God, for it is fundamentally what God’s people are all about. Since the Reformation dispensed with the idea that the practice and pronouncement of the Church are inherently infallible, Christians have asked what worship is, and how Christians should go about doing it. They have answered these questions in many different ways. Ligon Duncan, in his two chapters in Give Praise to God, Don Carson, in his chapter in Worship By the Book, Terry Johnson, in Reformed Worship, and David Peterson, in Engaging with God, all address the topic in slightly different, yet helpful, ways.

Duncan is primarily concerned with laying out the Regulative Principle, the guideline that Reformed churches have traditionally used in shaping their worship. In contrast to what has been called the normative principle, characteristic of Lutherans and Anglicans, which asserts that Christians are free to use any practices in worship that God does not explicitly forbid in His Word, the Regulative Principle asserts that the church may only do in worship what God has specifically commanded us to do. Duncan frames his chapters around the question “Does God care how we worship?” He answers, from the Scriptures with a resounding affirmative, laying out reasons why this is so, theological reasons for absolute Biblical faithfulness in worship, and a discussion of what a Reformed worship service should look like, touching on the distinctions between elements, forms, and circumstances of worship. Duncan’s work is tremendously helpful in understanding what the Regulative Principle is and its biblical-theological groundings.

If Duncan is primarily concerned with how worship should be practiced by the church corporately, Carson’s aim is a more fundamental question of what worship is. He notes that while our English word “worship” has been used of other activities and attitudes between humans, it takes on a very different definition when used of the activity directed at the true God by His people. He provides a “definition” a paragraph long that will not be reproduced here, but that Carson seems to think necessary in covering all of the essential points for a true understanding of Christian worship. This definition is, of course, because of its thoroughness and Biblical basis, prescriptive as well as descriptive. It tells us not only what worship is, but why we do it, how we should do it, and the character of the One to whom we direct it.

Johnson, like Duncan, is also focused somewhat on the Regulative Principle, but he seems to approach it more from the position of a pastor understanding what should be done in his church than that of a theologian investigating the question more academically (Duncan, however, surely agrees with Johnson’s position, as he edited the series in which Johnson’s booklet appears). He also goes beyond the Regulative Principle itself to address the attitude and spirit with which we engage in worship. Johnson takes Jesus’ words in John 4 as a framework for tracing out basic Scriptural justification for the Regulative Principle and how it looks in the church: “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.” Under “truth,” Johnson establishes that Scripture must regulate worship. Considering “spirit,” he shows how true worship is more a matter of the heart and spiritual state than of external forms and practices.

Peterson has quite a different take on worship. The thesis of his book, which traces worship throughout the progressive revelation of Scripture, is that in the New Covenant worship is no longer the activity of God’s people in particular places at particular times, but rather is characteristic of all of life. The New Testament understands that everything we do is to be done to the glory of God, and that every action a believer takes says something about God and His character. Corporate meetings of the church, then are not particularly for worship any more than they are for breathing, but rather are intended for edification, encouragement, and teaching of the believers.

Peterson’s exegesis is provocative, and rather helpful in understanding the place of worship in the whole sweep of redemptive history. If the Reformed tradition has at times been guilty of seeing too great a continuity between the Old and New covenants, Peterson’s thoughts help us learn to look at the subject from a proper, post-cross, perspective. His assertions about the whole-life character of worship raise at least two specific questions about worship and the church that are worth pursuing. First, is it proper to speak of “worship” as being the fundamental reason we gather as a body on Sunday morning, and if not, then why do we gather? Second, is there any basis for a different standard of guidance for corporate worship than for all of life?

As regards the first question, I believe it is proper to think of our public gatherings as intended first and foremost to worship, praise, and glorify God together. This is based mainly on a teleological understanding of creation and redemption. The reason that humans exist, indeed the reason that all of creation exists, is worship. We are created by God specifically for the purpose of glorifying Him by living in fellowship with Him, obeying Him, and loving Him. Even after the fall, this is still the purpose of redemption. God elected to save a people for himself so that they would be reconciled to fellowship with Him and give Him praise, so that He would be glorified. This is what it means to be a child of God, and more importantly to the present discussion, this is what it means to be the people of God. He redeemed us not to remain individuals, but to be united as His people with the sole task of bringing Him glory together. When we gather on Sunday morning to worship God, we are fulfilling the purpose for which we are being saved, and we experience a foretaste of the ultimate assembly of all God’s people, when we will be devoted for all eternity to singing His praises.

So then, if corporate worship is indeed the reason we gather as a church, then we are faced with another question: what is unique about corporate worship? What sets it apart from the worship that we as believers engage in with our whole lives? Particularly, why is it that we are held to a higher standard (the Regulative Principle) when we praise God corporately than in the rest of life? Are we bound in our private or family devotions only to those actions positively commanded in Scripture?

Terry Johnson provides an answer. Explaining how the Reformed doctrine of the church flows into the Regulative Principle, he notes we have “sharply limited the church’s authority and power to those specifically delegated to it by Christ. Its authority is extensive yet is ‘ministerial and declarative.’” The church may require of its members no more than what God requires in Scripture. Since Christians are commanded to be at the weekly public worship services of the church, we may only do those things that God requires of His people.

Worship is, as the back of Peterson’s book notes, “of immense concern to the church,” and especially to pastors, elders, and leaders in the church who are in charge of leading their congregation in the worship of the living God, in spirit and in truth. There is much more in these readings that I have not plumbed, and that will continue to shape my thinking about worship for a long time to come. Learning better to worship God and more deeply to engage with him is a life-long process, and one that I trust will bring greater joy and delight the more I pursue it.