Evangelical Theology, Second Edition: A Biblical and Systematic Introduction

By Michael F. Bird

Gospel-Centered Theology for Today

Evangelical Theology, Second Edition helps today's readers understand and practice the doctrines of the Christian faith by presenting a gospel-centered theology that is accessible, rigorous, and balanced. According author Michael Bird the gospel is the fulcrum of Christian doctrine; the gospel is where God meets us and where we introduce the world to God. And as such, an authentically evangelical theology is the working out of the gospel in the various doctrines of Christian theology.

The text helps readers learn the essentials of Christian theology through several key features, including:

• A "What to Take Home" section at end of every part that gives readers a run-down on all the important things they need to know.
• Tables, sidebars, and questions for discussion to help reinforce key ideas and concepts
• A "Comic Belief" section, since reading theology can often be dry and cerebral, so that readers enjoy their learning experience through some theological humor added for good measure.

Now in its second edition, Evangelical Theology has proven itself in classrooms around the world as a resource that helps readers not only understand the vital doctrines of Christian theology but one that shows them how the gospel should shape how they think, pray, preach, teach, and minister in the world.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zondervan
• Release date: Oct 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9780310093985

Michael F. Bird

Michael F. Bird is Deputy Principal and Lecturer in New Testament at Ridley College,?Australia. He is the author of numerous scholarly and popular books on the New Testament and theology, including, with N. T. Wright, The New Testament in Its World (2019).

Book preview

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS FOR

THE FIRST EDITION

This book was written for one reason. There are a lot of good theology textbooks written by evangelicals, but I do not believe that there is yet a genuinely evangelical theology textbook—a theology textbook that has its content, structure, and substance singularly determined by the evangel. This volume is an attempt at such an exercise. I have found many inspiring dialogue partners along the way: Kevin Vanhoozer, John Webster, Peter Jensen, N. T. Wright, D. A. Carson, and Alister McGrath. My goal has been to construct a theology of the gospel for people who identify themselves as gospel people, namely, the evangelical churches. Though obviously the term evangelical means different things to different people, I intend it as designating those faith communities who hold to the catholic and orthodox faith and who possess a singular religious affection for the triune God, combined with a zealous fervor to proclaim the gospel to the ends of the earth.

Many people must be thanked for what has appeared here. The usual suspects are my wife, Naomi, and my children, Alexis, Alyssa, Markus, and Theodore—they encourage me, support me, inspire me, and keep me accountable. I received help from friends who read portions of the manuscript in draft and final stages, including Michael Allen, Gerald Bray, Rhys Bezzant, Graham Cole, Jason Hood, Michael Jensen, Weber Hsu, John MacClean, Ben Myers, Michael Williams, and Trevin Wax. Their advice and corrections were crucial, but all faults remain my own.

My arrival back in Australia meant a transition from teaching exclusively New Testament to teaching theology and New Testament across two colleges, Crossway College/Brisbane School of Theology (Brisbane) and Ridley College (Melbourne). This has been a beneficial experience as it has enabled me to finally concretize proposals and plans that have been simmering away in my mind for over ten years. I’ve been consumed with what evangelicals believe as well as how and why they believe it. Recently, my poor students in Brisbane and Melbourne have had to put up with my attempt finally to verbalize those thoughts about the nature and goals of evangelical theology. The notes prepared for those classes, which ranged considerably in unity and coherence, formed the basis of the chapters that appear here. I’m grateful for the willingness of my students to listen and question me in the journey we took together.

I’m also grateful to my colleagues at Crossway College/Brisbane School of Theology and Ridley College for fellowship along the way as this volume was produced. Stephen Morton chased up several volumes that I needed to read in order to complete this project, and I am grateful to him for his excellent library support. My student Mr. Ovi Bociu chased up several obscure references for me and compiled my abbreviations list. Miss Kirsten Mackerras made some creative diagrams for me about christological heresies. David Byrd provided timely help with compiling a bibliography. I have to thank Special K, being none other than the indefatigable Katya Covrett, my editor at Zondervan, for her enthusiasm on this project, especially when it meant deferring other Zondervan projects I was doing.

Finally, a major inspiration of this book was my former lecturer and friend Rev. Jim Gibson (Malyon College and Salisbury Baptist Church). Jim is a remarkable chap as a lecturer, pastor, and theologian. He brings a wonderful mix of theological depth, evangelistic fervor, and pastoral sensitivity to his teaching ministry. His introductory course to theology and his concept of discipleship as gospelizing were formative to my own theological thinking, as will be clear from what follows. I always carried with me the idea of evangelical theology as a consistent application of the gospel, thanks to Jim. Our families have spent much time together, and they are among our closest friends. So to Jim this book is dedicated in gratitude for his friendship to me and my family.

Michael F. Bird, 1 April 2012

Holy Feast of St. Boschlavich of Guarderloopu

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

Several things have prompted me to revise and update Evangelical Theology for a second edition.

First, the feedback from professors, seminary students, and pastors has been warm, affirmative, and encouraging. There is certainly an appetite for a gospel-centered theology in the seminaries, colleges, and churches. I feel like I’m genuinely meeting a need with the precise type of theological project that I’ve undertaken in this volume. Many of those who are orthodox in their faith and missional in practice have genuinely appreciated an introduction to theology that makes the gospel the center, boundary, and integrating point for theology. So I hope to improve upon what I have already done in order to better serve churches that value the preaching and promotion of the gospel.

Second, various reviews and interactions underscored some of the weaknesses of the first edition. To be honest, I think some criticisms were rather fastidious, such as those reviewers who chided my employment of periodic humor across the volume. To the few professors who prefer theology to be dry and dour rather than winsome while wholesome, I can only quote the words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer who wrote from his prison cell that absolute seriousness is never without a dash of humour.¹ However, there have been some criticisms that I think were on target. Dr. Marc Cortez (Wheaton College) held my feet to the fire on anthropology, and all I could say in reply was "Revoco, which is Latin for I recant." Similarly, others have made me aware that the section on pneumatology also needed to be beefed up. In hindsight, a few sections could have been shorter, some fuller, and still more clearer or just plain improved.

Third, the footnotes of the first volume were rather white, male, and Calvinistic, so I’ve tried to cast the net wider in terms of dialogue partners. I’m doing my best to be mindful to incorporate more voices from the global church, more women theologians, and more from outside the Reformed tradition.

Fourth, I think it is fair to say that the election of Donald Trump as US president has also led to something of an identity crisis over the word evangelical.² Sadly, the evangelical label has become so broad as to be practically meaningless. The designation can include a diverse group encompassing prosperity preachers, conservative fundamentalists, and even progressive expressions of Christianity that push the boundaries of orthodoxy. In its nakedly political sense, evangelical is associated with the civil religion of white middle America and their anxieties over demographic and cultural changes in the United States. As a self-confessed evangelical, I do not wish to identify myself as such. The widening net for what counts as evangelicalism has led one friend of mine, Dr. Gerald McDermott of Beeson Divinity School, to abandon using the term evangelical as a self-reference and to use instead the term orthodox to contrast himself with other versions of Christianity. However, I am not yet ready to surrender the term evangelical to either the religious right or to progressive Christians. For a start, renaming this book Reformed Catholic and Missional Theology is too much of a mouthful, and the marketing peeps at Zondervan Academic would never go for it. On top of that, I think the term evangelical—in its biblical, historic, and global sense, as described for instance by the Bebbington Quadrilateral, as an entity that brings different traditions together—is actually worth preserving. As pastor-theologian Michael Jensen writes: It is worth telling the story of the evangelical movement because it is one of the great stories of our age, and it has so much that testifies to the power of Jesus Christ in it. It is worth standing in this heritage because it is intellectually rich and yet powerfully convicted of gospel truths. It offers a spirituality that is profound, and it compels people to do extraordinary things to help others.³ So irrespective of who CNN or MSNBC counts as evangelical, I’m sticking with the word; the critics can pry it from my dead hands. I hope this updated volume is a continued defense and thoughtful explication of what it means to be an evangelical Christian.

I have to thank several people for assistance in making these revisions. The Zondervan Academic team again has been most helpful. Several people read portions of the augmented manuscript including Scott Harrower, Kevin Giles, Matthew Estel, Andrew Malone, Stephen Wellum, Andrew Judd, and Jenny McGill.

Michael F. Bird, 1 February 2019

Holy Feast of St. Igor the Cantankerous

NOTES

1. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison: An Abridged Edition, trans. J. Bowden (London: SCM, 1971), 141.

2. Mark Labberton, ed., Still Evangelical? Insiders Reconsider Political, Social, and Theological Meaning (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2018); Craig S. Keener, Why I Almost Left Evangelicalism, Christianity Today, 24 January 2018, http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/january-web-only/why-i-almost-left-evangelicalism.html.

3. Michael Jensen, Evangelicalism: A Word Worth Keeping, Eternity, October 2015, http://www-archive.biblesociety.org.au/news/evangelicalism-a-word-worth-keeping. See also the round-table discussion with Russell Moore, Kevin De Young, and Mika Edmondson featured at the Gospel Coalition, https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/is-the-label-evangelical-worth-keeping/.

ABBREVIATIONS

Note: The standard abbreviations for classical Greek and Latin works as well as those of the church fathers will not be listed here. They can be found in The SBL Handbook of Style. Any that are not in that style manual will be spelled out in full.

OVERTURE

Without the Gospel

¹

Without the gospel

everything is useless and vain;

without the gospel

we are not Christians;

without the gospel

all riches is poverty,

all wisdom folly before God;

strength is weakness,

and all the justice of man is under the condemnation of God.

But by the knowledge of the gospel we are made

children of God,

brothers of Jesus Christ,

fellow townsmen with the saints,

citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven,

heirs of God with Jesus Christ, by whom

the poor are made rich,

the weak strong,

the fools wise,

the sinner justified,

the desolate comforted,

the doubting sure,

and slaves free.

It is the power of God for the salvation of all those who believe.

It follows that every good thing we could think or desire is to be found in this same Jesus Christ alone.

For, he was

sold, to buy us back;

captive, to deliver us;

condemned, to absolve us;

he was

made a curse for our blessing,

[a] sin offering for our righteousness;

marred that we may be made fair;

he died for our life; so that by him

fury is made gentle,

wrath appeased,

darkness turned into light,

fear reassured,

despisal despised,

debt canceled,

labor lightened,

sadness made merry,

misfortune made fortunate,

difficulty easy,

disorder ordered,

division united,

ignominy ennobled,

rebellion subjected,

intimidation intimidated,

ambush uncovered,

assaults assailed,

force forced back,

combat combated,

war warred against,

vengeance avenged,

torment tormented,

damnation damned,

the abyss sunk into the abyss,

hell transfixed,

death dead,

mortality made immortal.

In short,

mercy has swallowed up all misery,

and goodness all misfortune.

For all these things which were to be the weapons of the devil in his battle against us, and the sting of death to pierce us, are turned for us into exercises which we can turn to our profit.

If we are able to boast with the apostle, saying, O hell, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting? it is because by the Spirit of Christ promised to the elect, we live no longer, but Christ lives in us; and we are by the same Spirit seated among those who are in heaven, so that for us the world is no more, even while our conversation is in it; but we are content in all things, whether country, place, condition, clothing, meat, and all such things.

And we are

comforted in tribulation,

joyful in sorrow,

glorying under vituperation,

abounding in poverty,

warmed in our nakedness,

patient amongst evils,

living in death.

This is what we should in short seek in the whole of Scripture: truly to know Jesus Christ, and the infinite riches that are comprised in him and are offered to us by him from God the Father.

NOTES

1. Posted by Tullian Tchividjian and arranged by Justin Taylor at the Gospel Coalition website from John Calvin’s preface to Pierre Robert Olivétan’s French translation of the New Testament (1534): http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tullian/2011/06/06/gospel-gold-from-john-calvin/.

WHY AN EVANGELICAL THEOLOGY?

The purpose of this volume on Christian theology is to produce a textbook for Christians that represents a biblically sound expression of the Christian faith from the vantage point of the evangelical tradition. It is intended to be a book about theological doctrine that is accessible to laypeople, seminary students, and leaders in the evangelical churches.

That statement, of course, implies a question: What is an evangelical? The designation evangelical means different things to different people, and there are different proposals about construing the boundaries of evangelicalism. For some, evangelical is a pejorative term basically meaning the same thing as fundamentalist. For others, it is largely a cultural term describing those aligned with a particular social and political bent associated with conservative American politics. For others still, it is synonymous with a particularly Reformed expression of theology and practice. Then there are debates as to whether evangelicalism should be defined doctrinally or by certain types of piety.¹

When I refer to evangelicalism, I am referring to a historic and global phenomenon that seeks to achieve renewal in Christian churches by bringing the church into conformity to the gospel and by making the promotion of the gospel the chief mission of the church.²

Several factors have shaped contemporary evangelicalism.

1. The Reformation was the attempt to recover the gospel and to restore it to its rightful place in the churches. It is entirely unsurprising that many of the early Reformers were given the label evangelicals to designate their particular beliefs and practices.

2. The convergence of Puritanism and Pietism in North America and the British colonies that brought together diverse groups in shared causes like seeking revival and working for the abolition of slavery.

3. The missionary movements of the last two centuries that forged together new modes of partnership that transcended denominational lines.

4. The old liberal versus fundamentalist controversies of the early twentieth century over core Christian doctrines.³

5. The separation of evangelicals from the fundamentalist movement in the mid-twentieth century.⁴

6. Evangelicalism is slowly becoming shaped by voices beyond Anglo-American networks.⁵ The last quarter of the twentieth century saw a steady decline in Christianity in the West and a simultaneous surge in evangelical and Pentecostal Christianity in Asia, Africa, and South America. The international composition of the World Evangelical Alliance and the Lausanne Movement shows that evangelicalism is now a truly global phenomenon. The future of evangelicalism in the world is nonwhite.

7. Since 2000, evangelicalism in the Anglo-American sphere has become increasingly fragmented, with groups gravitating toward certain theological nodes and particular ecclesial cultures: Calvinistic complementarian church planters, evangelicals who remain within mainline denominations, social justice evangelicals, charismatic evangelicals, and liturgical evangelicals. On the one hand, evangelicalism has always been a village green where diverse groups—Arminians and Calvinists, egalitarians and complementarians, credobaptists and paedobaptists—can gather and share common interests and common cause. But on the other hand, the differences within the evangelical fold are becoming more pronounced. The various subgroups within evangelicalism articulate and prioritize things like doctrine, mission, and social justice in different ways. There is a genuine risk that the evangelical movement in the West could splinter into factions with each headed in a different direction.

Evangelicalism, as a theological ethos, has normally been defined by a number of distinctive beliefs (not distinctive in the sense of being unique, but distinctive in the sense of characteristic, especially when taken as a whole). Alister McGrath regards evangelicalism as marked by a strong belief in

• the supreme authority of Scripture for knowledge of God and as guide to Christian living;

• the majesty of Jesus Christ as incarnate God and Lord and as the Savior of sinful humanity;

• the lordship of the Holy Spirit;

• the need for personal conversion;

• the priority of evangelism for both individual Christians and for the church as a whole; and

• the importance of Christian community for spiritual nourishment, fellowship, and growth.⁶

Another way of summarizing the cardinal features of evangelicalism has been the Bebbington Quadrilateral, in which primary marks of evangelicalism are⁷

• conversionism, the belief that human beings need to be converted to faith in Jesus Christ;

• activism, the belief that the gospel needs to be proclaimed to others and expressed in a commitment to service;

• biblicism, a particular regard for the Bible as inspired and authoritative; and

• crucicentrism, a focus on the atoning work of Christ on the cross.

I think Bebbington’s four-point description of evangelicalism basically holds true, though one could perhaps distil it further so that evangelicalism is, above all, historic Christian orthodoxy combined with energetic fervor to promote the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Evangelicalism, broadly defined, has always been concerned with theological, spiritual, and missional renewal through the gospel. The Reformation was concerned with restoring the gospel to the church. The magisterial Reformers linked the christological foundations of the church with its gospel message, since it was the preaching of the gospel that mediated the saving presence of Jesus Christ. The reform of the church therefore required recovering the apostolic message and reordering the church according to evangelical symbols. The history of modern missions is the history of churches feeling led to take the gospel to the ends of the earth. Revivalism was the quest to see the gospel spread like wildfire in one’s immediate setting. Pietism emerged as the attempt to cultivate a particular spirituality based on the experience of those who knew the forgiveness and peace promised in the gospel. I take it as proven that evangelicalism refers to the constellation of movements where there is a commitment to a gospel-centered orthodoxy, a gospel-soaked piety, and gospel-promoting activities. As Stanley Grenz wrote:

To be evangelical means to be centered on the gospel. Consequently, evangelicals are a gospel people. They are a people committed to hearing, living out, and sharing the good news of God’s saving action in Jesus Christ and the divine gift of the Holy Spirit, a saving action that brings forgiveness, transforms life, and creates a new community. As a gospel people, evangelicals continually set forth the truth that the center of the church is the gospel and that the church, therefore, must be gospel centered.⁸

I have written this volume for the benefit of evangelical churches who embrace this general pattern of belief and practice. It is a gospel-centered theology for Christians that seek to define themselves principally by the gospel. What we need, as a matter of pastoral and missional importance, is an authentically evangelical theology—that is, a theology that makes the evangel the beginning, center, boundary, and interpretive theme of its theological project.

So I intend to undertake the enterprise of constructing an evangelical theology by putting the evangel (i.e., the gospel) at the helm. That is because I unabashedly believe that the good news of Jesus Christ is the most important doctrine. The gospel is the canon within the canon simply because the biblical canon is the scriptural expression of the rule of faith,⁹ and the rule of faith is itself an exposition of the gospel. The gospel is what authenticates a true church and authorizes its doctrines because the gospel represents the authority of Jesus Christ. If so, as Wolfhart Pannenberg noted, The proclamation of the gospel, then is not merely one thing among others in the church’s life. It is the basis of the church’s life.¹⁰ Furthermore, the gospel permeates all doctrines, it defines the church’s mission, and it constitutes our identity as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. The gospel is the most significant story in the life of the church, so evangelical theology should accordingly be a theology of that story, the gospel.¹¹ In the words of the English Puritan John Owen, All true theology is, in a sense, gospel theology, for, in whatever stage it existed, its object and prime mover was God the Son.¹²

An authentic evangelical theology should be a working out of the gospel in the various loci of Christian theology (i.e., the topics in theology like the nature of God, the person and work of Christ, the church, last things, etc.), which is then applied to the sphere of daily Christian life and the offices of Christian leaders. The gospel is the glue between doctrine, experience, mission, and practice. The gospel is where God meets us and where we introduce the world to God. My task is to lay out what a theology driven and defined by the gospel looks like. I will defend the view that theology, at its essence, is the drama of gospelizing—that is, making the gospel shape our thinking, praying, preaching, teaching, and ministering in relation to God so that we increasingly participate in the life and mission of God.

Before I go further, I must lay my ecclesial and theological cards on the table. On the church side of things, I did not grow up in a Christian home, but I came to Christ through a Baptist church in Sydney, Australia. I also attended a Baptist seminary (Malyon College) and have been a pastoral intern and itinerant preacher in Baptist churches. I taught for five years in an interdenominational theological college committed to the Reformed tradition in Scotland (Highland Theological College); more recently I spent three years teaching at an interdenominational college in Brisbane while being on the preaching team of a Presbyterian church (Brisbane School of Theology). I am now a lecturer in theology at an Anglican College (Ridley College). I would describe myself as an ex-Baptist post-Presbyterian Anglican, as strange as that sounds.

I love the Baptist tradition. It has a rich heritage of being the church of believers and for believers, and I am most grateful for that heritage (indeed, its enduring influence will be obvious in the following pages). In my theological journey, I eventually came to feel that the Baptist way was somewhat lacking when it came to an understanding of the sacraments. I also think Baptists could use a lot more catholicity in their understanding of the church.¹³ I find the Presbyterian tradition full of a rich theological heritage that I admire, and I think that the Westminster Confession of Faith (peace be upon it!) is one of the best Protestant expressions of the Christian faith. Yet I find myself now comfortably nested within the Anglican tradition because the genius of Anglicanism is in being able to be both Protestant and Catholic at the same time. I have learned to love the Book of Common Prayer and appreciate the liturgies in the Anglican tradition. Most of my favorite theologians are Anglican (J. I. Packer, John Stott, Alister McGrath, Sarah Coakley, and N. T. Wright), which does add a certain layer of attraction, besides the obvious one of senior clergy wearing purple vestments.

As for my theological leanings, I am first and foremost a follower of Jesus; second, I consider myself an evangelical; and third, I identify with the Reformed tradition.¹⁴ As a self-identified Reformed type, I thereby gravitate toward the Calvinistic scheme of theology. I am a Calvinist because I think it is broadly biblical and because it corresponds with my experience of slavery in sin and receiving God’s efficacious grace in salvation. Calvinism often gets a bad rap as being a cold, wooden, and unfeeling system of doctrine. So when I explain Calvinism to people, I usually say this: People suck. They suck in sin. They are suckness unto death. And the God who is rich in mercy takes the initiative to save people from the penalty, the power, and even the presence of this sin. This is Calvinism. The rest is commentary. I am more than willing to part company with Calvin and the Reformers when I feel compelled by the biblical evidence and Christian tradition. That happens often. So although the Reformed tradition is a fallible system of Christian thought, I still think it is as close to being on target as we can be.

I do not generally like tags or labels for one’s position since they are by nature limiting and open to misunderstanding. Still, I rather like C. S. Lewis’s description of mere Christianity, which focuses on the major doctrines of the Christian faith shared by all orthodox Christian traditions.¹⁵ I would like to think of myself, then, as a mere evangelical in that I belong to the big tent that is the evangelical church where Presbyterians, Anglicans, Methodists, Lutherans, and Baptists go for fellowship, theological discussion, and sharing in a common mission. It is a place where we can disagree about the six literal days of creation, baptism, church government, women in ministry, or the millennium, because we are united in the one holy catholic and apostolic church by our common profession of faith in Jesus as Lord. There is no denying the differences in doctrine among evangelicals, and those differences are not always insignificant. Still, I like to think that the things that unite us in the gospel are ultimately far stronger than anything that might drive us apart.

As proof of that point about unity within evangelical diversity, J. I. Packer (a Calvinist Anglican) and Thomas Oden (an Arminian Methodist) joined together to write a book called One Faith: The Evangelical Consensus, which shows the agreement on key doctrines between a number of evangelical statements of faith written between 1950 and 2000. The book shows the extent of shared belief in the evangelical family. Whatever differences and diversity there may be, we can still speak authentically of one evangelical faith.¹⁶

Going broader, evangelicalism overlaps with what is affirmed in other Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox traditions, what Thomas C. Oden called consensual Christianity.¹⁷ Evangelicalism then can legitimately see itself as an expression of the church catholic whenever it affirms the catholic doctrines of the church (e.g., the Trinity) and the catholic practices of the church (e.g., baptism and the Lord’s supper). So besides being a mere evangelical, I would also describe myself as a catholic evangelical. For me this means reading Scripture not in the isolation of my own study but as part of the communion of the saints, which includes my local church, the global church, and the departed saints of the past as well. The best definition of being a catholic evangelical is given by Kevin J. Vanhoozer:

Catholicity signifies the church as the whole people of God, spread out over space, across cultures, and through time. "We believe in one . . . catholic church." The evangelical unity of the church is compatible with a catholic diversity. To say that theology must be catholic, then, is to affirm the necessity of involving the whole church in the project of theology. No single denomination owns catholicity: catholicity is no more the exclusive domain of the Roman Church than the gospel is the private domain of evangelicals. Catholic and evangelical belong together. To be precise: catholic qualifies evangelical. The gospel designated a determinate word; catholicity, the scope of its reception. Evangelical is the central notion, but catholic adds a crucial antireductionist qualifier that prohibits any one reception of the gospel from becoming paramount.¹⁸

I believe that it is a matter of ecclesial life and death that evangelical churches commit themselves to retrieving voices from the Catholic and Reformed traditions. This must be done if we are to avoid rabid pragmatism, escape megachurch pastor cultism, thwart theological anarchy, stop repeating the errors of the past, evade the odious errors of civil religion, and avoid the moral therapeutic deism that characterizes so much of Western Christianity.¹⁹ It should be repeated in order to be remembered that the Reformation was about the attempt to restore the catholic faith, the canonical witness, and its reception in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan creeds, not the repudiation of all things catholic for something palatable and popular or innovative and original. At its best, evangelicalism seeks renewal by resourcing itself in Catholic and Reformed traditions in order to bring the church to a gospel-faith that seeks spiritual formation and missional direction.²⁰

Another confession that I have to make is that I am not by specialty a systematic theologian. I cut my scholarly teeth in the realm of biblical studies. I’ve worked in areas as diverse as the Septuagint, Second Temple Jewish literature, the study of the historical Jesus, the Synoptic Gospels, the letters of Paul, New Testament theology, and textual criticism. Not exactly the standard training ground for a systematician, who is supposed to do a mandatory PhD on Karl Barth and thereafter write a postdoctoral tome on something like divine aseity or sexual desire in Augustine’s sermons.

But this book was not something I dreamed up one Sunday afternoon. The first essay I ever published was on systematic theology.²¹ I have also spent the better part of fifteen years trying to figure out how to integrate systematic and biblical theology as well as musing over the nature of evangelical theology. In all of my scholarly ventures, be they historical critical inquiries or biblical theological surveys, I have always tried to be conscious of the big picture and the big questions that go with it. Simply asking, So what? can help the most myopic of textual hacks look at the world beyond their own microscopic postage-stamp-sized field of inquiry.

What is more, integrating biblical and theological studies is all the fashion these days.²² Many theologians are writing biblical commentaries, as in the Brazos Theological Commentary on the Bible series and the International Theological Commentary series coming out with T&T Clark. Meanwhile, several biblical scholars are trying to be more theologically active by engaging in theological interpretations of Scripture, and the Journal for Theological Interpretation even encourages such an enterprise.²³ If theologians can write biblical commentaries, why shouldn’t a biblical scholar write a systematic theology? I am encouraged that since the first edition of this book that a couple of other New Testament scholars in Anthony C. Thiselton and Dale B. Martin have also written systematic theologies, meaning that I am not alone in moving from New Testament studies to systematic theology.²⁴ I should add that John Calvin wrote his famous Institutes of the Christian Religion in part to clarify disputed matters that he never had time to engage in his biblical commentaries. Great Christian thinkers like B. B. Warfield, Adolf Schlatter, and Leon Morris taught and wrote in the fields of New Testament and systematic theology. The best reason for exegetes such as myself to undertake this project is that systematic theology should, in its ideal state, be an aid and clarification to exegesis and be performed by those with a solid grasp of biblical studies.

Finally, I would point out that American Orthodox Theologian David Bentley Hart regards a breadth of knowledge as the best qualification for any theologian. He writes:

Theology requires a far greater scholarly range than does any other humane science. The properly trained Christian theologian, perfectly in command of his materials, should be a proficient linguist, with a mastery of several ancient and modern tongues, should have a complete formation in the subtleties of the whole Christian dogmatic tradition, should possess a considerable knowledge of the texts and arguments produced in every period of the Church, should be a good historian, should be thoroughly trained in philosophy, ancient, medieval and modern, should have a fairly broad grasp of liturgical practice in every culture and age of the Christian world, should (ideally) possess considerable knowledge of literature, music and the plastic arts, should have an intelligent interest in the effects of theological discourse in areas such as law or economics, and so on and so forth.²⁵

I do not presume to think that I have all of these proficiencies, only a theological polymath could. Yet I hope that my biblical background and periodic forays into the church fathers and systematic theology will make me a well-equipped theologian—surely it cannot hurt—but how capable I am as a theologian will have to be decided by others.

I intend in this volume to construct an evangelical theology, one soaked in Scripture, in deliberate dialogue with theologians of the past and present, with an ear to the door of current debates, in order to equip evangelical churches with a gospel-faith that seeks spiritual formation and missional direction. I hope this volume helps create a gospel culture in churches where the God of the gospel is worshiped and the mission of the triune God continues in the mission of the church.

NOTES

1. See Stanley J. Grenz, Revisioning Evangelical Theology (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1993); Jon R. Stone, On the Boundaries of American Evangelicalism: The Postwar Evangelical Coalition (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1999); Andrew David Naselli and Collin Hansen, eds., Four Views on the Spectrum of Evangelicalism (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011); D. A. Carson, Evangelicalism: What Is It and Is It Worth Keeping? (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2011).

2. On the history of evangelicalism, see David F. Wells and John D. Woodbridge, The Evangelicals: What They Believe, Who They Are, Where They Are Changing (Nashville: Abingdon, 1975); Leonard I. Sweet, ed., The Evangelical Tradition in America (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1984); David Bebbington, Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: A History from the 1730s to the 1980s (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1989); Mark A. Noll, David W. Bebbington, and George A. Rawlyk, eds., Evangelicalism: Comparative Studies of Popular Protestantism in North America, the British Isles, and Beyond 1700–1900 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994); Randall Balmer, The Making of Evangelicalism: From Revivalism to Politics and Beyond (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2010); Stuart Piggin, Spirit, Word, and World: Evangelical Christianity in Australia (Brunswick East: Acorn, 2012); Donald M. Lewis and Richard V. Pierard, eds., Global Evangelicalism: Theology, History, and Culture in Regional Perspective (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2014); Geoffrey R. Treloar, The Disruption of Evangelicalism: The Age of Torrey, Mott, McPherson and Hammond (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2017).

3. Though it is common to call someone liberal if they are less conservative than thou, when I say old liberalism, I mean the set of theological commitments than runs roughly from Friedrich Schleiermacher’s The Christian Faith (1821–31) to the First World War (1914–18). Note this definition of old or classical liberalism: "In theology, the term liberalism, especially when joined with the term classical, refers to the post-Enlightenment orientation that sought to reconstruct Christian belief in light of modern knowledge. To be relevant, liberalism wanted to adapt itself to the new scientific and philosophical mind-set. Like the Enlightenment, it championed freedom of the individual thinker, Christian theologians included, to criticize and reformulate beliefs free of authorities" (Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Christology: A Global Introduction [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003], 95). According to Michael J. Langford (The Tradition of Liberal Theology [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014], 1, 17–18) liberalism is about balancing religious faith and human rationality combined with a humane approach to social problems and courageous enthusiasm for social justice. He lists further features (21–59): a nonliteral approach to the Bible, reason and revelation in harmony, a nonlegalist account of redemption, the possibility of salvation outside a narrow path, toleration, original sin but not original guilt, belief in free will, a view of providence that respects the natural order, need for faith and works, minimal number of basic teachings, and a range of acceptable lifestyles. Or else, liberalism can be conceived as the attempt to put the Catholic faith into its right relation to modern intellectual and moral problems (Charles Gore, Lux Mundi [London: John Murray, 1904], vii).

4. The separation between evangelicals and fundamentalists was hastened by a number of factors. Foremost was the rise of a number of Christian leaders who retained belief in the fundamentals of the faith but rejected the separatist ethos and legalistic subculture of fundamentalism. This was led through the ecumenical efforts of Billy Graham in his evangelistic crusades and by other leaders like Carl F. Henry, J. I. Packer, John R. W. Stott, and Henry H. Ockenga.

5. See Timothy C. Tennent, Theology in the Context of World Christianity: How the Global Church Is Influencing the Way We Think and Discuss Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007); Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011); Jeffrey P. Greenman and Gene L. Green, eds., Global Theology in Evangelical Perspective (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2012).

6. Alister E. McGrath, Evangelicalism and the Future of Christianity (Leicester, UK: Inter-Varsity Press, 1995), 51.

7. Bebbington, Evangelicalism in Modern Britain, 1–17.

8. Stanley J. Grenz, Renewing the Center: Evangelical Theology in a Post-Theological Era (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2006), 337.

9. The rule of faith (regula fidei in Latin) is a short summary of the basic tenets of the ancient church’s faith, covering creation, and salvation. It was important to many of the church fathers like Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Hippolytus.

10. Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1991 [1988]), 2:463.

11. Kevin J. Vanhoozer, The Voice and the Actor: A Dramatic Proposal about the Ministry and Minstrelsy of Theology, in Evangelical Futures: A Conversation on Theological Method, ed. John G. Stackhouse (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2000), 61 (61–106).

12. John Owen, Biblical Theology: The History of Theology from Adam to Christ (Morgan, PA: Soli Deo Gloria, 1994), 593.

13. On proposed correctives to these deficiencies in the Baptist tradition, see Anthony R. Cross and Philip E. Thompson, eds., Baptist Sacramentalism, SBHT 5 (Milton Keynes, UK: Paternoster, 2003); Anthony R. Cross and Philip E. Thompson, eds., Baptist Sacramentalism 2, SBHT 25 (Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2008); Steve R. Harmon, Towards Baptist Catholicity: Essays on Tradition and the Baptist Vision, SBHT 27 (Milton Keynes: Paternoster, 2006); Curtis W. Freeman, Contesting Catholicity: Theology for Other Baptists (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press).

14. The word Reformed means different things to different people, ranging from not Catholic, all the way through to Calvinism as viewed through the prism of the canons of Dort. According to Richard Muller (Reformed Confessions and Catechisms, in Dictionary of Historical Theology, ed. T. Hart [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000], 466 [466–85]), the Reformed tradition is not the theology of any single person, be it Luther or Calvin, but it is the broad consensus of the theology of the Reformation, from the first generation thinkers of Luther, Bucer and Zwingli, to the second in Calvin and Bullinger, which developed into the confessional theology of the Reformed churches.

15. C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Collins, 1998 [1944]).

16. J. I. Packer and Thomas C. Oden, One Faith: The Evangelical Consensus (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999).

17. Thomas C. Oden, Classic Christianity: A Systematic Theology (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2009), xvi–xxi.

18. Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005), 27 (italics in original). See also Markus Bockmuehl, Seeing the Word: Refocusing New Testament Study, STI (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2006), 158–59; Robert Jenson, Creed and Canon (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2010).

19. See esp. J. Todd Billings, Catholic and Reformed: Rediscovering a Tradition, Pro Ecclesia 23 (2014): 132–46.

20. For a good example of this, see Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain, Reformed Catholicity: The Promise of Retrieval for Theology and Biblical Interpretation (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2015); Oliver D. Crisp, Retrieving Doctrine: Explorations in Reformed Theology (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2010).

21. Michael F. Bird and James Gibson, Quest for an Authentically Evangelical Prolegomena to Theology, in Proclaiming Truth, Pastoring Hearts: Essays in Honour of Deane J. Woods, ed. R. Todd Stanton and Leslie Crawford (Adelaide: ACM Press, 2004), 95–106.

22. See, e.g., D. A. Carson, Systematic Theology and Biblical Theology, in NDBT, ed. T. D. Alexander and Brian S. Rosner (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2000), 89–104; Markus Bockmuehl and Alan Torrance, eds., Scripture’s Doctrine and Theology’s Bible: How the New Testament Shapes Christian Dogmatics (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2008); Andrew Hay, Dogmatic and Biblical Theology: Continued Tension or Restored Relationship? SBET 32 (2014): 170–79; Brian Lugioyo, Kevin J. Vanhoozer, and Benjamin E. Reynolds, eds., Reconsidering the Relationship Between Biblical and Systematic Theology in the New Testament, WUNT 2.369 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014).

23. See Joel B. Green, Practicing Theological Interpretation: Engaging Biblical Texts for Faith and Formation (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2012).

24. Anthony C. Thiselton, Systematic Theology (London: SPCK, 2015); Dale B. Martin, Biblical Truths: The Meaning of Scripture in the Twenty-First Century (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2017).

25. David Bentley Hart, In the Aftermath: Provocations and Laments (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), 177–78.

PART ONE

PROLEGOMENA

Beginning to Talk about God

Prolegomena is where you clear the deck on preliminary issues and show how you intend to set up a system of theology. It is what you say before you say anything about theology—in other words, a pretheology or a first theology. Topics dealt with here include defining theology, giving a definition of the gospel, stating the purposes and goals of theology, and outlining a theological method. These chapters lay the foundation for the rest of the volume, which will explore the God of the gospel and what he has done for us in Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

We have been studying cheerfully and seriously. As far as I was concerned it could have continued in that way, and I had already resigned myself to having my grave here by the Rhine! . . . And now the end has come. So listen to my piece of advice: exegesis, exegesis, and yet more exegesis! Keep to the word, to the scripture that has been given to us.¹

Where exegesis is not theology, Scripture cannot be the soul of theology, and conversely, where theology is not essentially the interpretation of the Church’s Scripture, such a theology no longer has a foundation.²

An evangelical theology is one which is evoked, governed and judged by the gospel.³

The gospel possesses something distinctive, namely, the coming of the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, his suffering, and the resurrection. For the beloved prophets preached in anticipation of him, but the gospel is the imperishable finished work.⁴

NOTES

1. Karl Barth on the occasion of his farewell to his students in Bonn prior to his expulsion from Germany in 1935. Cited in Gordon D. Fee, New Testament Exegesis: A Handbook for Students and Pastors, rev. ed. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1993), 6.

2. Benedict XVI, Verbum Domini, § 35.

3. John Webster, Word and Church (London: T&T Clark, 2001), 191.

4. Ignatius, Phild. 9.2.

§ 1.1 WHAT IS THEOLOGY?

What exactly is theology? If the question is posed in a multiple-choice format, we could choose from the following options.

a. The name of the eighth full-length album by Sinead O’Connor, released in 2007.

b. What my father tells me to stop doing and to get a real job.

c. The study of God.

d. All of the above.

The answer is option (d), All of the above. However, option (c), The study of God, is technically the more correct answer, and we can unpack that a bit more.¹ The Compact Macquarie Dictionary defines theology this way: The science which treats God, His attributes, and His relations to the universe; the science or study of divine things or religious truth.² Augustine defined theology as rational discussion respecting the deity.³ The Swiss theologian Karl Barth contended: Dogmatics is the self-examination of the Christian Church in respect of the content of its distinctive talk about God.⁴ Reflecting Barth, John Webster says, Dogmatics is the church’s evaluation of its own utterance by its own given norm of revelation.⁵ The Anglican theologian Alister McGrath asserts that theology is reflection upon the God whom Christians worship and adore.⁶ Kathryn Tanner surmises that Christian theology is trying to figure out what Christianity is all about, what Christianity stands for in the world.⁷ Robert Jenson said that theology is the thinking integral to the task of speaking the gospel, whether to humankind as message or to God in praise and petition.⁸ Sarah Coakley calls theology an integrated presentation of Christian truth . . . [that] must attempt to provide a coherent, and alluring, vision of the Christian faith.⁹ All of these definitions are generally correct, however, my favorite definition of theology, especially dogmatic theology, is given by Jaroslav Pelikan, who regarded theology as, What the church of Jesus Christ believes, teaches and confesses on the basis of the word of God: this is Christian doctrine.¹⁰

To put things simply, theology is the study of God. It comes from the word theos, which is Greek for God, and from logos, which is Greek for word.¹¹ It is the attempt to say something about God and God’s relationship to the world. It is thinking about faith from faith. In a sense, theology is very much akin to the study of philosophy, worldview, religion, ethics, or intellectual history; it is a descriptive survey of ideas and the impact of those ideas.

But there are at least two key differences that distinguish theology from other intellectual disciplines like philosophy and religious studies. The first difference is that theology is not the study of ideas about God; it is the study of the living God. Christian theology, then, is different from the study of seventeenth century French literature, ancient Greek religion, and medieval philosophers because the Christian claims that he or she is in personal contact with the subject of inquiry. It is one thing to debate the political thought of Cornel West or to discuss religious themes in the novels of Marilynne Robinson in the classroom. But it would be quite another thing to do that if West or Robinson were sitting in the classroom beside you. Theology, then, is not an objective discipline (i.e., a detached study of an object) like the physical sciences, nor is it a descriptive discipline like the social sciences. Theology is speaking about God while in the very presence of God. We are intimately engaged with the subject of our study.

Second, theology is studied and performed in a community of faith. Theology is something that is learned, lived, sung, preached, prayed, and renewed through the dynamic interaction between God and his people. Theology is the conversation that takes place between family members in the household of faith about what it means to behold and believe in God. Theology is the attempt to verbalize and to perform our relationship with God. Doctrine is corporately professed, prayed, and practiced. Theology can be likened to the process of learning to take part in a divinely directed musical called Godspell.¹² To do theology is to describe the God who acts, to be acted upon, and to become an actor in the divine drama of God’s plan to repossess the world for himself.¹³

Evangelical theology, then, is the drama of gospelizing. By gospelizing I mean striving to become what the gospel declares believers to be: slaves of Christ, vessels of grace, servants of the kingdom, a people worthy of God’s name, so that we might participate in the life and mission of God.¹⁴ Dedication to the drama of gospelizing is crucial because, as Kevin Vanhoozer declares, evangelicals need to recapture a passion for biblical formation: a desire to be formed, reformed and transformed by the truth and power of the gospel.¹⁵ To pursue Vanhoozer’s image, the task of theology is to enable disciples to perform the script of the Scriptures, according to advice of the dramaturge the Holy Spirit, in obedience to the design of the director, Jesus Christ, with the gospel as the theme music, and performed in the theater of the church. The company of the gospel shows what they believe in an open-air performance staged for the benefit of the world. The purpose of gospelizing is to ensure that those who bear Christ’s name walk in Christ’s way.¹⁶

NOTES

1. I should add that technically speaking theology is simply any discourse about God, while dogmatics concerns itself with a church’s official teaching and its prescription for belief and practice. When I say, theology, I mean it in this dogmatic sense in terms of the quest for normativity, right belief, right worship, right-heartedness, and right practice.

2. Arthur Delbridge and J. R. L. Bernard, eds., The Compact Macquarie Dictionary (Macquarie, NSW: Macquarie Library, 1994), 1045.

3. Augustine, Civ. 8.1.

4. Karl Barth, Church Dogmatics: The Doctrine of the Word of God, trans. G. W. Bromiley, ed. T. F. Torrance (London: Continuum, 2004 [1932]), I/1:11 (hereafter: CD).

5. John Webster, God without Measure: Working Papers in Christian Theology, 2 vols. (London: T&T Clark, 2016), 1:216.

6. Alister McGrath, Christian Theology: An Introduction (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001), 137.

7. Kathryn Tanner, Jesus, Humanity and the Trinity: A Brief Systematic Theology (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2001), xiii.

8. Robert Jenson, Systematic Theology, 3 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977), 1:5.

9. Sarah Coakley, God, Sexuality, and the Self: An Essay On the Trinity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 41.

10. Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 1:1.

11. Note that theology proper is discussion of the doctrine of God, whereas general theology is the discussion of all matters in relation to God.

12. Here I am playing on the Stephen Schwartz musical Godspell (1971).

13. On theology as drama, see Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Drama of Doctrine: A Canonical Linguistic Approach to Christian Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005).

14. See Michael J. Gorman, Becoming the Gospel: Paul, Participation, and Mission (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015).

15. Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Evangelicalism and the Church: The Company of the Gospel, in The Futures of Evangelicalism: Issues and Prospects, ed. C. Bartholomew, R. Parry, and A. West (Leicester, UK: Inter-Varsity Press, 2003), 72 (40–99).

16. Vanhoozer, Drama of Doctrine, 16, 102, 442.

§ 1.2 WHAT DO YOU

HAVE TO SAY BEFORE

YOU SAY ANYTHING?

1.2.1 INTRODUCTION TO PROLEGOMENA

1.2.1.1 Definition and Task

For Christians, theology is studying God as he is known according to Holy Scripture and in the church’s witness and worship. Now if you are going to engage in a study of God, before you formally begin, you need to say something about how you intend to undertake such a study. This is what theologians call prolegomena. The designation prolegomena derives from the Greek word prolegō, which means things I say in advance. So theological prolegomena is what you say before you begin to say anything about God. Prolegomena is a type of pretheology theology. It lays the groundwork for engaging in a systematic study of God and his relationship to the world.

1.2.1.2 Prolegomena in Church History

The task of developing a prolegomena has a long and distinguished history. When many of the Christian apologists in the second and third centuries tried to talk about Christianity to Greeks and Romans, they did so by appealing to a shared philosophical framework in order to commend the Christian faith. Justin Martyr contended that Christian beliefs contained a form of wisdom which corresponded with many of the teachings of Plato and Stoic philosophers.¹ Clement of Alexandria composed two works, Protrepticus and Stromata, that were a simultaneous critique and appropriation of Greek philosophy. This established the common ground for a discussion about God between a Christian leader and a philosophically minded pagan. We should not sneer at this synthesis of theology and philosophy; it provided theology with a grammar to discover its internal coherence and contextual relevance. As Eric Osborn says of early Christian thought, An extended treatment of the earliest Christian philosophy showed that, with all its Platonism and Stoicism, it ended on the claim that Jesus was God.²

For many early Christian thinkers, their first theological task was apologetic, defending and commending the faith with the philosophical tools at hand rather than constructing a preface to an elaborate system of doctrine.³ From Christendom’s eclipse of pagan Rome until well into the modernist era, it was typical for theologians to offer a preface on theological epistemology—that is, the study of knowledge and knowing in relation to God.⁴ Prolegomena, then, ordinarily addressed matters related to the knowledge of God. Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine is largely a prolegomena to Christian theology, engaging in biblical interpretation, doctrine, and piety that yield proper knowledge of God. Thomas Aquinas commenced his massive Summa Theologica by claiming that philosophical knowledge alone is insufficient and that humanity acquires knowledge of God primarily by means of divine revelation. In keeping with that thesis, Aquinas then presented his famous five ways to demonstrate God’s existence on philosophical grounds. Yet that was only a preliminary move to pave the way for his discussion of God’s being and nature according to God’s self-revelation.⁵ Calvin began the Institutes with the claim that our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.⁶ For Calvin, these two objects of knowledge, God and the self, belong intractably together. Calvin saw that knowledge of God is attained not by human deduction but by divine revelation communicated through nature, Scripture, and the testimony of the Spirit.⁷ Thereafter, Protestant scholastics such as Francis Turretin, Charles Hodge, and Herman Bavinck followed Calvin’s lead and made the knowledge of God the first move in their respective theological systems. More recently, Dale Martin’s theological offering, working out of the American liberal tradition, begins by setting up the interrelationship between knowledge, faith, and grace in a decidedly postmodern way: all knowledge is social, all belief is interpretation, and the truest interpretation is the one that promotes love of God and love of neighbor.⁸

The form and function of prolegomena, with its concern for the knowledge of God, has usually been driven by the reigning philosophical framework of the day.⁹ One can see the influence of Neoplatonism, Aristotle, nominalism, and European humanism in the way that theologians have prefaced and organized their respective theological systems. On the eve of the Reformation, philosophy had become less of a handmaiden to theology and more of an alien and obscuring force, a stifling imposition that complicated rather than clarified the simple disciplines of piety. In certain wings of medieval theology, theology was less scriptural and more speculative and sophistic.

In response, the Reformers aspired to make Scripture the foundation for all knowledge of God rather than relying on philosophical specters or the near endless archives of tradition, papal declarations, and canon law. The key contribution of the Reformation to the subject of theological prolegomena was the assertion that theology should commence with a description of the mode of God’s self-communication to his creatures, not metaphysical speculations about What is God? or Why believe in God?

Now we have to remember that the Reformers themselves were not immune from the philosophical currents washing over Europe at that time. Their return to the authority of Scripture grew out of a new humanism with a penchant for critical history and was born of a medieval nominalism that was skeptical toward religious authority.

The Reformers claimed to have thrown off the weighty yoke of medieval philosophy, yet they had done so only by smuggling in a more anthropocentric philosophy that would eventually flower into a fully fledged philosophical naturalism with a humanistic orientation. While exposing the inherent problems of making ecclesiastical authority the ultimate criterion of theological truth, the Reformers paved the way for the same attacks on ecclesiastical authority to be leveled at scriptural authority. In other words, the Reformation rejected church authority as the basis for knowledge, yet that same skepticism was soon deployed against Scripture, the idea of revelation, and even the concept of God. So although the Reformation and Counter-Reformation brought about spiritual renewal in both Protestant and Catholic churches, they were largely based on a crisis of authority, a crisis that would soon spill over into other areas of religious life in Europe.

We have to remember that prior to the Reformation, the