Paul Zahl Blog
Dean Zahl wrote this blog entry in September, but I thought it would be worth a re-read to those of you who might have read it. - DOBSeptember 8, 2006
EMERGENCY! (PART TWO)
I was leaving a service not long ago, having been just reduced to puree and gruel by a sermon that hammered me for 35 minutes with the Law, and I bumped into somebody I know. He is a layman. I asked him, "What did you think about the sermon?" This is what he said. He said, "It makes me wonder whether I did the right thing when I became a Christian. If it's really just all about effort, and trying harder, I think I'd be happier back in the world."
That was a shaking thing to say. In fact, it mirrored my own sentiments. I had thought to myself along the same lines, as I listened, once again, to a sermon that was pure exhortation. "If this is all it's about, just some perpetual form of cheerleading, I wonder seriously whether I have made a mistake. Have I put my eggs in the wrong basket?"
This is what Law does, when it is laden high on you like ten thousand starchily cooked pancakes. You know you can't do it. You know you can't do what you are being told to do. So a voice rolls right in, saying, "Chuck this! It's not real, it's not true, it's no different from the world's stoicism (at best), and is, to use the vernacular, a 'set up for failure'".
I think of that Nick Lowe song, so piercing in its truth-telling: "I'm a failed Christian." The singer wanted to be a Christian, he "tried" to be a Christian, but under the Law's terms, he failed. So now he's on the outside again, looking in – wistfully, 'tis true, but utterly sagging, probably never to return.
The Law creates “failed Christians." There are millions of them. Many of them are angry, many of them are resentful, many of them hate Christianity on account of the preaching of the Law, and many of them, in my opinion, are candidates for Islam. If not suicide.
I would like to direct your attention, dear Reader, to the following. We have almost all of us sung the Christmas carol "It came upon a midnight clear." It was written by Edward Hamilton Sears a long time ago. It has one killer verse, which, needless to say, has been cut from most contemporary hymnbooks, including our own. Here is the killer verse:
O ye, beneath life's crushing load
Whose forms are bending low,
Who toil along the climbing way
With painful steps and slow;
Look now, for glad and golden hours
Come swiftly on the wing:
O rest beside the weary road,
And hear the angels sing.
Sears addressed his Christmas carol to real people, to people seeking relief and not instruction, balm in Gilead and not exhortation, Gospel and not Law.
Dear preacher or preacher of the mind: These are your hearers. They are crushed and bending low. Are you any different from them? I beseech, thee, give them what you need: Grace and Mercy, not Do's and Don'ts.
Love, and ever,
PZ
posted by David Browder at 11/12/2006 10:07:00 PM
5 Comments:
I’ve read a little about what life was like in Massachusetts during that period, and I can safely say that I am very different from those “hearers” of "It came upon a midnight clear." I have never lived in threat of famine or disease, I am insulated from the cold and the harsher parts of nature, I have not watched any of my friends or family die prematurely whether at war or by accident, I have never had to work the land to eat or pay the bills. My life is safe, stable, and comfortable.
As Dr. Zaal said, these people were seeking relief, but I don’t think it was from religious instruction or legal oppression. Their lives were actually, not just metaphorically, toilsome, painful, and laborious. They indeed sought “balm in Gilead,” but why find an attack of legalism where there is none? Could we not just as easily say that they sought "relief not [psychological theology]"? This use of the carol is at best forced, and at worst lacks sympathy for a distinctly different species of human suffering.
In fact, the use of this carol is ironic when we realize its author was Unitarian. Their sect rejected creed and theology and tended towards rationalism and humanism. While different than modern day Unitarians, they were not known for oppressive religious prescription.
Yet with the woes of sin and strife
The world has suffered long;
Beneath the angel strain have rolled
Two thousand years of wrong;
And man, at war with man, hears not
The love-song which they bring;
O hush the noise, ye men of strife
And hear the angels sing.
Anonymous, thank you for the wonderful comment. Allow me to address it.
I think you are absolutely correct in your picture of the struggles of life (famine, disease, war, etc.). I could not agree more. I could also not agree more on their need for relief in the form of the Balm of Gilead. The issue lies in that which they would receive from the pulpit.
For example, think of the young banker who has to maintain a scorecard and justify his future employment by his performance annually. At home, he has a rebellious teenage girl and his marriage isn't going all that well. This banker goes to church and hears either:
a) a totally moralistic sermon on the five ways to manage your money, improve your marriage, or raise drug-free kids...
-or-
b) the law properly preached, followed by the soothing words of the gospel.... followed immediately by the law improperly preached, exhorting him to a holiness he cannot attain.
What is happening is that this banker is oppressed at work, in his home, and at church. How so at church, one might ask? The answer lies in the function of the law (according to St. Paul):
Romans 3:19-22 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For no human being will be justified in his sight by works of the law, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.
Romans 5:20 Law came in, to increase the trespass; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more,
Galatians 4:21 Tell me, you who desire to be under law, do you not hear the law? - (and the following example of Hagar and Sarah)
The law is there to convict the sinner, kill him, and drive him to the cross. That is why sermons should be in the format of law and gospel. Anytime the law is preached, it does its work and must be followed immediately by the gospel. When the law is misused in exhortation (by very well-meaning people, by the way), it does the very function it was designed for. This is called the "3rd use of the law" and it is deadly. Add it on to someone who is already suffering (that is us, regardless of what time period we are in), and Christianity becomes oppressive.
People wonder why they are not as holy as they hear they ought to be and they either:
a) leave Christianity
or
b) develop split personalities like Ted Haggard, deceiving all those around them with a holy public persona split from reality. These folks tend to explode. I saw it a million times back in Alabama where preaching the 3rd use of the law is the norm.
Legalism on top of everyday human suffering is not a good mix. The human condition is and remains the same throughout history. Pure Christianity offers something very different from everything else in the world: unconditional, free (not cheap) and unmerited favor which creates true freedom.
I am totally on board with Paul Zahl and his assessment of Christianity today.
You may not agree, but that is certainly not required here ;-) I hope that at least took a stab at answering your question.
David
I still have two problems with this explanation.
First, it ignores the fact that the major reason that people seem so intent on preaching “the law” is because the Bible seems to do exactly that. There are countless places in the NT, concentrated in the Gospels especially, where we are all called to do what the law requires. If it is simply a matter of law v. Grace, then the NT is truly a failure in communicating that idea. It is a jumbled mess (which would be fine for the modern Biblical critics, but is less evidently fine for those who believe in the Bible’s actual authority) This theory may be there, and surely people have found it, but it is just as easy to find what you call legalism.
If the comforted reader decided to pick up Galatians for his self, he would get to the end and read:
Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Look to yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. For if any one thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.
But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. For each man will have to bear his own load.
Let him who is taught the word share all good things with him who teaches. Do not be deceived; God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption; but he who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. And let us not grow weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we do not lose heart. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.
This is not proof that the Gospel you preach is not correct, but there is certainly more to the story than you admit.
Secondly, what about Adam? Why did he live the double life? What did he chose to sin? Was he over-burdened by the law? And what about those, from Adam to Noah to Abraham, through even the Patriarchs, that lived before the Mosaic law, and had their faith credited to them as righteousness? Were they burdened even by the need to follow the Lord?
By this free gracious gospel, we create a non-disprovable hypothesis. If we give up on the law, and just accept grace, we begin to live by the Spirit and are set free. Yet, if we attempt to do this, and end up getting worse, well, this is just a sign that we haven’t really given up on the law. ON the other hand, every mistake or negative experience of those striving for righteousness is proof that they are deceiving themselves and living a double life (rather than simply assuming that they are falling sinners who are striving for righteousness, knowing that when they fall their freely given faith will be credited to them as righteousness).
Anonymous,
Please excuse my delay in responding. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the busiest days of the week for me.
Once again, you show a solid grasp of your tradition (which I assume is Reformed, correct me if I'm wrong).
The problem I have with the Reformed is that they have this view of the law that puts a premium (if not primary emphasis) on its use as a sanctifyer. Once again, we must see what Paul actually thinks the law is.
Romans 3:19-22 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For no human being will be justified in his sight by works of the law, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.
It says here that the law is here to make everyone accountable to God. It measures one up to the bar of God's righteousness and finds one lacking. Also, Paul seems to believe that law and gospel are distinct. The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ has been manifested apart from the law. That is the gospel.
So, the law is there to accuse primarily.
Then, what are all of the imperatives one can find at the end of Paul's Epistles? Has Paul changed his mind mid-letter about the function of the law? I would suspect he did not. What does that leave then? That leaves accusation and description. If it is accusation (which it could be), then he does not follow it up with any sort of absolution. I believe it is description.
You and I both believe in holy living. The difference is that I believe holy living is formed from the message of grace. The law is preached to accuse of unrighteousness. It shines a holy light into the deep recesses of the human being. The gospel then comes to proclaim that all righteousness and holiness was won for the hearer and is imputed to him or her through faith. And it is enough.
That means the law is preached in all of its severity. 100 proof.
It's sort of like getting arrested in Sri Lanka and thrown into a stinking prison with a lot of violent criminals. Then, someone you don't really know (Sidney Carlton, maybe) bails you out for free and buys you a ticket back to the States. You are not going to take that lightly and sort of smirk a "thank-you" to him. You are going to fall down at his feet and weep. You are going to get all of his information and befriend him forever. That is the preaching of law and gospel.
When the law is preached as a sort of sanctifyer, it becomes casuistry. The law is conditionalized or made less severe for the Christian. It is then reduced to a nagging spouse. The problem with this 3rd use of the law is that the law doesn't think it has a third use. It still kills, convicts, and accuses and, because the preacher doesn't understand its proper function, the sinner is not absolved by the work of Christ. Nagging is never good for marriages and it is certainly not good in theology.
So, nobody is against good works. What we deny is the ability of the law to produce them in either Christian or non-Christian. The law produces the opposite effect (Rom 5:20)
Of course, I also disagree with you on the law/gospel hermeneutic. That's no surprise I know. I deny that hermeneutic reduces Scripture to unintelligible soup. Martin Luther didn't think so. Thomas Cranmer didn't think so. John Calvin didn't think so either. Otherwise, he would have blasted Luther when he had the chance.
As for Adam, I'll just leave you with this from Luther:
"The theologian of the cross holds that even before the fall, free will lacked an active capacity to remain in a state of innocence, but did so only in a passive capacity. Adam and Eve were upheld in their state of innocence not from within but from without. Man has no active capacity to progress -- much less to stand his ground -- in righteousness. The will in an active capacity always moves the creature to be independent of the creator and sets out to create its own goodness apart from God."
"Before the fall, man lived by faith with only a passive capacity for good. He was never meant to stand or operate alone, but to simply be one through whom God works. The active will remained unexpressed, and man lived fully in the will of God."
"After the fall, the active will attempts to claim something for itself and its works before God. The original sin is the sin of disobedience, of unfaithfulness, of an idolatry of reason, of independence from God. Adam strived by the exercise of his will for a knowledge not promised, for something not accorded him by God. Adam's sin was his declaration of independence."
So, nobody is throwing out the law. The issue is the function of the law. This may sound polemical, but it is the tradition of Luther that keeps the law in all its sternness and doesnot make it conditional and doable. It was not meant to be conditional and doable. (Matt 5:48)
By the way, Anonymous, I am really enjoying our exchange. You are obviously a very bright person and I am really glad you are engaging me!
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