Knowing God
J I Packer
Class notes #7 – November 2, 2005
- Review from last time
- So: “What is the work of the Holy Spirit? Why is it important?” What is the nature of the Holy Spirit? What does He do and why is it important?
- Is the doctrine of the Trinity neglected as Packer charges? Why or why not?
- In what way does knowledge of the Trinity make a difference in your life?
- What are some of the names of the Holy Spirit? (pp 66) What do these names tell us about Him?
- What is the relationship between the work of the Father and of the Holy Spirit? Between the Son and the Holy Spirit?
- What does Packer mean by the Son (or the Holy Spirit) being ‘subject’ to the Father? In what ways is this true? What does it NOT mean?
- How do our conclusions lead us to pray? What do we mean when we pray TO the Father, THROUGH the Son, BY the power of the Holy Ghost?
- Packer obviously believes the Holy Spirit is often ignored in the church. How might this be so? Why might this be so?
- What are Packer’s thoughts on the importance of the Holy Spirit to the life (and the very existence) of the church?
- What does Packer say about honoring the Spirit in our Faith, Life and Witness (pp 72)? How do we do this?
- Read Romans 8:1-30. What does it tell us about the life a Christian should have with the Holy Spirit?
- Next week (November 9) – Chapter 18 – “The Heart of the Gospel”. Big question: What does Packer say is the heart of the Gospel? What do we mean by “propitiation”?
Below is a class email sent November 3rd....please read and consider this for the class next week.
All:
Below is a piece that came out today by Rev Peter Toon – a name I have mentioned in the past as a strong advocate of the 1928 Prayerbook and traditional Anglican Theology. This is a review of a recent book written by Rev Paul Zahl – a well known evangelical Episcopal theologian. Dr Zahl is currently dean of Trinity Seminary – one of only two conservative Episcopal seminaries left in the country.
Fr Toon is mildly critical of Dr Zahls book as you can see. His comments dovetail nicely with our conversation in the class last night about the Trinity and the Holy Spirit. Note in particular Toon’s emphasis on the importance of the Trinity, the two ways of understanding the Trinity (Ontological and Economic) and the procession (From the Father, through the Son by the Holy Spirit). Note also the way Toon’s says Zahl approaches good works – ie it is in those works that we encounter Christ.
After reading the last few chapters of Packer’s book (Chapters 5 & 6) what do you think Packer would say based on Toon’s evaluation of Zahl’s book about these questions? We can talk about it some next Wednesday!
Blessings
Fr Ian
Too short? A consideration of Dr. Paul Zahl as systematic theologian.
A short essay written at the request of several “orthodox Anglicans”
Usually a book with the title, “Systematic Theology,” has many pages and sometimes comes in several volumes. Yet Dr Paul F.M. Zahl, now Dean of Trinity School for Ministry in PA, published a few years ago a book entitled, A short Systematic Theology (Wm. B. Eerdmans). The text does not take up more than 100 pages! And in his preface he argues that there is real merit in such a short book (which I guess is about 40,000 words)- after all is not the New Testament itself a short book.
I ask myself after reading it:
Does his brevity prevent him from doing justice to his subject? I think so.
Does his brevity open him up to the charge of denying Articles I,II, & V of The Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion and thus of advocating error or heresy? I think so.
I think so, but I am not sure on both counts.
The impression he makes is of a dynamic Protestant theologian who is committed to the heart of the Lutheran Reformation (justification by faith alone), to the Protestant doctrine of penal substitution in the death of Jesus on the Cross, and to the insistence that true saving faith issues in works of love, and a life of true moral and spiritual freedom. At the same time, he causes one to think that he has doubts as to the veracity and usefulness of the Church dogma of the Holy Trinity and the Person of Christ as also of the need for carefully defined doctrines of the place of the Church and Sacraments in the economy of salvation.
Now to the content of his case, which is attractively presented.
Zahl insists that theology must begin from the bottom as it were and work upwards. He does not mean from contemporary human experience (like the Presiding Bishop of ECUSA and his advisers), but from the accounts of the historical Jesus found in the Four Gospels. So he starts with Jesus and notes wherein he is unique within Judaism. Then he focuses on his passion and crucifixion, which he shows provides the full and universal Atonement for human sins and sinfulness.
Further, and importantly, he interprets the death of Jesus on the Cross as penal, substitutionary Atonement, even as the Protestant Reformers explained and preached this doctrine. Yet the way he writes of this is not in sixteenth-century style but as one who has learnt much from his recent periods of study in
Then he proceeds by accepting the apostolic claim that Jesus was raised from the dead and ascended into heaven; and, on this basis, proceeds to ask how the same Jesus, now exalted, is present with us (“Lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the age”) when in fact he is actually absent from us as the historical Jesus. His answer is perhaps surprising – not in sacraments, not in preaching of the Word, not in church fellowship, not in the gifts of the Spirit etc., but he is found in “works of love”. Here he connects with the Protestant emphasis on justification by faith expressed practically in deeds of love. “I would not work my soul to save/ for that my Lord has done./ But I would work like any slave/ for love of God’s dear Son.”
It is only when he has presented all this that he suggests that it is appropriate to consider the full identity of Jesus, the crucified and ascended One. The identity of Jesus appears from what he achieves. And this is presented very briefly. For him, the church dogma of the Incarnation (Jesus is One Person made known in two natures, divine and human) is apparently useful but not necessary for it is too speculative.
With regard to the Church doctrine of the Trinity, he seems to be skeptical as to both its truth and its usefulness. For he says it is speculation based upon speculation (i.e., it is built upon the dogma of the Person of Christ). However, in his brief treatment he does not distinguish between the dynamic, biblically-based “economic” Trinity and the ”ontological” Trinity of church dogma (God as God is in and unto himself as Three Persons, One Godhead, in his own infinity and eternity) The biblical portrayal of the Father sending the Son into space and time to be incarnate by the action of the Holy Spirit, and then of the movement in the Spirit, through the Son to the Father in the sacrifice of prayer and good works of the disciples of Jesus, would seem to be a major theme of the New Testament. Is it not the case that for the New Testament there is the double “flow”: (a) from the Father through the Son and by the Spirit come creation, revelation, salvation and redemption and (b) to the Father through the Son and with the Spirit flow worship and service, prayer and good works?
What Protestant Reformers learned after their discovery of “justification by faith alone” was that the church dogma of the Trinity and Person of Christ (for this see the decrees of the first four Ecumenical Councils) in the pious, devout mind provides a paradigm which profoundly assists in the understanding and interpreting of Scripture unto holiness and salvation. In this realization, they joined Fathers such as Augustine and Bernard, Thomas Aquinas and Anselm.
Dr Zahl also reveals his departure from the full Protestant and classical Anglican tradition by his embracing and defending of the doctrine of God as passible, the God who in his deity, is subject to change of feelings and moods. It is one thing, we may recall, to attribute to the human nature of the Lord Jesus changing moods and feelings; it is yet another thing to deny the long-held doctrine of the impassibility of God the Father (see Article I).
Much more could be said about this little book for it does have the merit of being both readable and gently provocative of serious thought. At the same time, it is impossible to tell from It what value for salvation Dr Zahl places upon the historic Liturgy of the Church (wherein church dogma most carefully influences the content and style of prayers), the recital of the ecumenical Creed, the visible Church wherein are preached the Word and the Sacraments administered, and, as an Anglican, the classic Anglican Formularies (the authentic BCP, Ordinal and Articles). Would he agree that you cannot have God as your Father and the Lord Jesus Christ as your Saviour without having the Church as your mother?
A final thought. In the “old days” at least in
November 3, 2005 petertoon@msn.com
