Carey Conference 2016 Day 3

Our final morning consisted of two sessions. Dan Strange of Oakhill College presented his apologetic approach on the gospel as the subversive fulfilment of culture, which can be accessed in is books and elsewhere. The conference sermon was given by Andrew King of Highbury who took us to Ephesians 2 and argued persuasively for churches with a diverse make-up.

I should have mentioned previously that on the other two days there was a woman's track with Julia Jones. About a hundred of us were there over the three days, a little down but that may well have been only due to the timing. Next year we will be earlier on January 3-5. Leonardo De Chirico will be the main speaker, God willing. There was a good spirit and hopefully many blessings will flow from it.

EMA 2013 Day 1

This year's Proclamation Trust Evangelical Ministry Assembly is in the Barbican for the first time. There are some disadvantages to the venue besides its unfamiliarity but the idea of getting 1250 people in one room is attractive and as we get used to it I'm sure it will grow on us. The EMA tried to break out a few years ago to Westminster Central Hall but then retrenched to St Helen's where only 850 can be catered for.

Day 1 included three plenary sessions and an afternoon seminar stream. Vaughan Roberts was the token Anglican for the day (how things change) kicking us off with  the first 12 verses of 1 Peter.

Dan Strange then took us to the strange world of cultural studies and how we engage with m modern man. One sometimes fears a lot of work is being done to get to some fairly obvious points but it overall it is pretty stimulating. His enter, explore, expose, evangelise paradigm is good and the need for subversion and fulfilment in preaching was most interesting.

In the afternoon I chose to hear Mark Dever on ministry in  changing world. That was very good. He gave us the option of Q & A or coffee next. I was one of only two who voted for coffee and so we had an okay bit of interaction to close.

The final session was Paul Mallard on Colossians 1:9-14, which like the rest of the day was okay. Indeed okay sums it up for me. Being a grumpy old man, lots of things annoyed me (having a singer with a microphone to lead the singing, out of sync videos, students reading the Scriptures badly instead of letting the man who was about to preach on it, the lack of EP books on the bookstall, etc) but I am wise enough to let those go.

What is sad, however, is firstly the way conferences lose their edge. I remember the early days of EMA when you had Dick Lucas, Australians we had never heard and, above all, an eagerness to carefully expound Scripture. Obviously things move on but one can't help feeling that, like most conferences, it is now a matter of filling slots with good material rather than anything more inspired.

More disturbing is the whole matter of preaching. There was a moment at the end of Vaughan Roberts address where a strange thing happened. First, he quoted Lloyd-Jones (that's rare enough at EMA). Then, he actually preached (from the heart as he would say). I have heard him say before that he is unhappy with being called a Bible teacher. He wants to preach. And for those few minutes, and to some extent before,  that is what he did. As the Lloyd-Jones quote goes, the man gave me an idea of the glory of God and that was worth the whole of the rest of the day.

I should add that a conference is always more then the sessions. It was good to see many people. With some there was time for just a wave but it was good to chat at some length with others, including two people in particular who have faced recent deaths in the family.

So we'll see what we get today and hopefully I'll share it later.

Strange teaching 02

After the break, Dan Strange carried on with a further series of points:

3. The precious good news: Christ and salvation
1. Jesus is Yahweh
2. False faith in the Son
3. Christ's saving work
4. The necessity of verbal revelation
4. The Gospel as subversive fulfilment of other religions
The gospel is both the antithesis of false religion and, in a sense, the fulfilment of it. We need to show both.
5. Let the nations be glad: the church, mission and eschatology

Focusing on Tim Keller, we were given an example of an approach that emphasises not only Christianity's uniqueness but also the connections.

Coming to a close we looked at contextualisation and the point of contact and the lack of it when we seek to  bring the gospel home. There is no non-contextualised Christianity.

"No truth which human beings may articulate can ever be articulated in a culture -transcending way – but that does not mean that the truth thus articulated does not transcend culture" (Don Carson).

It was good to be introduced to Bavinck's idea of possessio.

"We would ... prefer to use the term

possessio, to take possession [as opposed to the common terms "adaptation" and "accommodation"] .... Within the framework of the of the non-Christian life, customs and practices serve idolatrous tendencies and drive a person away from God. The Christian life takes them in hand and turns them in an entirely different direction; they acquire an entirely different content. Even though in external form there is much that resembles past practices, in reality everything has become new, the old has in essence passed away and the new has come. ... [Christ] fills each thing, each word, and each practice with a new meaning and gives it new direction. Such is neither "adaption" nor accommodation; it is in essence the legitimate taking possession of something by him to whom all power is given in heaven and on earth (Bavinck ISOM 178-179).

So this has been an interesting and stimulating couple of lectures promoting a balanced Reformed approach to false religion. The book will be worth reading (at least Dan's part) when it appears.

Useful discussion followed among the 20 or so present.

Authors quoted through the morning included Hendrik Kraemer, Jacques Dupuis, John Frame, Christopher Wright, Richard Bauckham, J H Bavinck, Mike Ovey, R Letham, C Van Til, John Murray, J Witte, John Stott, C Platinga and Tim Keller.

Strange teaching 01

Dan Strange lectures at Oak Hill on Culture, Religion and Public Theology. He has recently completed an SCM book (with Gavin D'Costa and Paul Knitter) called Only One Way? Three Christian Responses to the Uniqueness of Christ in a pluralistic world. This morning at LTS he shared with us his thesis, which is in summary

Non-Christian religions are sovereignly directed, variegated and dynamic human idolatrous distortions of divine revelation behind which evidence demonic deception. Being antithetically against yet practically dependent upon the truth of the Christian worldview, non-Christian religions are 'subversively fulfilled' in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

He defended this thesis with a very carefully worked out biblical and theological argument. He used the following headings (before the break):

1. YHWH's transcendent uniqueness: God and Trinity

Implications - 1. Yahweh's transcendent uniqueness 2. God's name and glory 3. Derivative uniqueness of Israel and the church

2. The perilous exchange: creation and fall

The relationship between Christianity and other religions is one of both principial discontinuity and practical continuity.

1. Principial discontinuity

Antithesis between true and false faith

Lies about God which lead to divine judgement and human disintegration

Deception which only brings disappointment, disillusionment and destruction

Religions are worldviews

Here he took the example of Islam. Its unity without diversity idea works it out in all sorts of ways.

2. Practical continuity

Like Christians, unbelievers are full of inconsistencies with their own views. Elements here include

Anthropological complexity

Historical or phenomenological complexity

Personal complexity

Other religions are made of imaginal, remnantal, influential and demonical revelation.
(To be continued)

Affinity Conference 3-5

Greg Beale



Dan Strange

So another day of it yesterday. We began with Greg Beale's paper which was a development of previous work on hermeneutics and the question of whether the NT use of the old is legitimate and to be followed. He made a good and scholarly contribution on this, focusing in the latter half of his paper on the use of Hosea 11:1 in Matthew 2. We found it difficult to discuss the paper in our group but were glad to hear someone setting out what I think most of us agreed with.

Stephen Clark spoke next (and I chaired). This was a more practical paper on the use of the Bible in church life (originally Martin Downes was to have done a paper on use and abuse so this was a different paper to the one intended). So we said various useful things about reading the Word, preaching, personal Bible study, etc.

The third paper of the day was from Dan Strange who outlined the contrasting views held within the Reformed world over involvement in public life. On one hand, there is the more Lutheran seeming two kingdoms approach and, on the other, what Dan called a transformational approach (chiefly growing out of Van Til), the view he himself favoured. We had a lively discussion on the question of how we argue in the public sphere - from natural law or straight from the Bible. We did not come to any firm conclusions and there was some disagreement, for example, on how Christians should deal with the challenges we are currently facing in the public sphere.

Another good day then.

The Truth Shall Set You Free

Most of the papers have now arrived for The Affinity Theological Study Conference 2-4 February at High Leigh Conference Centre in Hoddesdon, Herts. The programme is

DAY ONE

We arrive by 11.30 and after lunch and a welcome we have

14.15 Paper 1: Is the Princeton View of Scripture an Enlightenment Innovation?

Carl R Trueman (Professor of Historical Theology and Church History at Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia) Interview with Trueman here.

Then after tea at 16.15

16.45 Paper 2: Lost on the Old Testament? Literary Genres and Evangelical Hermeneutics

Peter Naylor (Minister, Immanuel Presbyterian Church, Cardiff)

DAY TWO

9.15 Paper 3: Right doctrine, wrong texts. Can we follow the apostles’ doctrine but not their hermeneutics?

Greg Beale (Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia)

11.00 Coffee Break

11.30 Paper 4: Every heretic has his text: the use and abuse of the Bible in the church

Stephen Clark (Minister, Freeschool Court Evangelical Church, Bridgend and Tutor at London Theological Seminary). This I understand is Martin Downes' paper. He can't be there because of the continuing situation at home.

We're free after lunch until

17.00 Paper 5: The Sufficiency of Scripture for Public Theology

Dan Strange (Lecturer in Culture, Religion and Public Theology at Oak Hill College, London)

Followed by Dinner and 20.30-21.30 Corporate Prayer

DAY THREE

9.15 Paper 6: Preaching the Word in the Power of the Spirit: biblical, historical and practical reflections

Hywel R Jones (Visiting Professor of Practical Theology at Westminster Seminary, California)

After a coffee break at 11 there's

11.30 Panel Discussion

Followed by lunch and depart (though I'll have to make a quicker getaway as I'm hoping to see my son in  a play in Aber that night).