Biblical Theology Writing Assignment

The following is a writing assignment I gave to my eighth grade theology class. We are studying Biblical Theology, and have been looking at the Fall of Man. The Fall of Man impact all of the fundamental relationships of man: toward God, toward Creation, toward Man. Instead of showing gratitude toward God, sin causes man to be thankless and independent toward God. Instead of working the Creation to bring it to fullness, sin causes man to be lazy and self-serving in his labor. Instead of showing honor toward men, serving the good of the other before oneself, sin causes man to envy the good of his neighbor and seek to magnify his own good at the expense of others. Given the reality of sin, how does the Christian prepare for victory against the enemies of the Flesh, the Accuser, and the World? The following assignment aims at finding answers to that question.

Identifying the Enemy and Strategizing for Victory

1. Write as many ways as you can imagine that a child is tempted to turn away from God in the three fundamental relationships of man:
1. Gratitude toward God
2. Work to Creation
3.  Honor to Man 
2. Begin writing the ways one could go about defeating each temptation (what thoughts, what prayer, what actions, etc.)
3. Complete three temptations and three tactics of response at a time.

Example:

Temptations:

1. As a teacher I am tempted toward ingratitude toward God by complaining about how little time I have to complete my job.
2. As a teacher I am tempted toward laziness toward Creation, by choosing to read for pleasure rather than grade student papers.
3. As a teacher I am tempted toward impatience with my students by not reviewing material they have not learned well.

Tactics of Response:

1. To defeat ingratitude about how little time I have, I can remember that all circumstances are from God, who promises the power to obey in all my responsibilities without having to control all the outcomes myself. I can offer a prayer thanking God for the promise of help and asking Him to help my to be wise with the time I am given. I can then consider what are the priorities of the work I have, and make a plan to complete each priority in order of importance.
2.  To defeat laziness in grading I can remind myself that the pleasures of leisure are made sweeter by the labors of work, and I can “go to the ant” and "consider the field of the fool" so that I see the destruction that laziness brings. I can offer a prayer thanking God for the chance to help my students grow in knowledge and wisdom and their skill in writing. I can then plan to work for thirty minutes of uninterrupted grading before taking any sort of rest, then take a five-minute rest of stretching & drinking water, and then work for an additional thirty minutes, and so on until I am finished grading.
3.  To defeat impatience toward my students’ ignorance I can remind myself of God’s long-suffering toward my own ignorance in the many things He has said to me in His Word, but which I have not yet learned. I can also remind myself that learning truth is an everlasting activity that is worth every moment of effort. I can offer a prayer thanking God for revealing truth to man that brings life, joy, and communion with God and man. I can then assess what barriers may be causing my students ignorance, and strategize ways of helping them discover the truth that they are missing.

Trinitarian Greeting

The opening of Peter's first epistle has a wonderful Trinitarian greeting:

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.

The odd (odd to Gentile ears like mine, anyway) phrase "for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ" is likely a reference to the sealing of the New Covenant, the Old Covenant being sealed with blood by Moses at Sinai (Exodus 24:8):

And Moses took the blood, sprinkled it on the people, and said, "This is the blood of the covenant which the LORD has made with you according to all these words."

Elected by the Father.

Sanctified by the Spirit.

Sprinkled into the Covenant by the Son.

The Measure of Man

The pursuit of human excellence is the original and loftiest pursuit ever undertaken by man. It drove Adam to rebel, Achilles to fight, Plato to contemplate the verities, and the Son of God to take up human flesh.

There have been a multitude of pathways toward perfection pursued by men. They are as so many facets of a diamond, splintering light into an array of colors, now dazzling, now captivating, now titillating the spirited part of the human soul to renew its own efforts to exceed its capacities and become, well, Divine.

In Greece, men became gods by physical and mental prowess, exhibited through fearless acts of courage in battle, ingenuity in labor, craftiness in speech, shrewdness in policy, wit in the company of friends and ecstasy in the embrace of a lover. Rome was an homage to Greece, which was itself a variation on a theme by the cultures of the Ancient Near East, with their exhibitions of violence and sexual manipulation of the gods.

The measure of man was manifest in his power to accomplish whatsoever he willed, and to will nothing less than what excelled the capacities of all other men. This spirit endures today in every corner of Western Culture. Man wants to show his worth through the domination of every undertaking. Is it any wonder that video games captivate the imaginations of youth, who lack the means to ascend, but are overflowing with the passion to do so? Video games allow one to taste the superhuman qualities by means of simulation, at once satisfying the passion, but at the same time stultifying power to ascend in the natural world. So too many of the musical and theatrical choices available play into the same passion, and resort to the same means of simulation to achieve the temporary fix. Music that highlights ecstatic and erotic love, wealth and fame beyond measure, domination through expressions of anger, domination, or control are available at a hand's random snatch from the shelves. Movies portray sex that evokes cries of ecstasy, or limitless cognitive prowess available upon instantaneous conjuring, or physical capacities to endure pain or overcome obstacles that are by implication superhuman, or even explicitly so. Even outside the acknowledged realms of simulation, where "reality" is supposed to take place, a simulacra of superhuman images predominates. The television personality with the perfect complexion, quickest wit, or most incisive analysis must also appear as natural and unscripted as possible. Celebrities from all areas of life, whether sports, business, entertainment, religion, what have you are portrayed in glorious perfection until a relatively minor and all-too-human flaw or mistake becomes the fodder for pretenders to the throne to devour in all the splendor of unmitigated envy.

Protagoras is credited with saying that of all things the measure is man. From one vantage point, the empirical one at least, this is true. Man does measure all things--evaluating them scrupulously or unscrupulously. The other things in the world do not measure. But taken in another way, Protagoras' claim is patently false. Man is not the standard by which man measures. If this were so, perfection, superhuman qualities, the qualities of divinity, would not be that by which man measures--for they are not what man is, at least not by the same empirical test that acknowledges man as that thing that measures all things. No, man measures himself against his idea of God, and insofar as man's position toward the One True God is rebellious, he cannot accept the One True God as the One by which to measure himself. Rather, he must judge by the false image, the idol, the supplanter god who serves as the placeholder for the Triune God. No Christian who has a modicum of Biblical knowledge could deny the pervasiveness of idolatry, nor fail to acknowledge it as an exchange of Truth for Lies.

And yet.

And yet Christians more often than not measure by the measurements of pagan and infidel idolaters. Christians measure one another by the topics of the classical encomium:

What is the greatness of your race?
What is the greatness of your country?
What is the greatness of your ancestors?
What is the greatness of your parents?
What is the greatness of your intellectual education?
What is the greatness of your training in skills?
What is the greatness of your cultural knowledge?
What is the greatness of your mind?
What is the greatness of your body?
What is the greatness of your fortune?
How do you compare to the greatness of others?

One can craft the pretense that such measurements are simply instrumental--one is not judging anyone's "true worth" by such standards, after all. But I remain skeptical. I don't see alternative measurements very often, unless it is something like, "judge not, lest you be judged," which sounds more like a defense against one's own failings being declared than it does a plea for an alternative measure of excellence.

If not these things, then, what is the measure of man?

When one considers the life of Christ, by what measure will His life be discovered as the most excellent of all, the one that displays humanity at its most excellent? He was not from a great race, country, ancestors, or parents. Though few would argue against his capacity for knowledge, skill, and cultural awareness, no one could seriously maintain that he exhibit any of those to the highest degree during his lifetime. Nor did his mind, body, or fortunes seem altogether more excellent than all other men. He does not compare well, and even the long train of unfaithful admirers of Jesus cherry pick ideas of his that could have and may have originated before him or gained more potent expression after him.

With what measure, then? Consider the negative. At what point did Christ endure, undergo, take up what no man before, or after him, could? It is not hard to conceive that another man might be wounded more grievously than Christ, and remain courageous and stalwart. It is not hard to conceive that another man might be scorned more than Christ was, and come through undaunted. It is not hard to conceive that another man might be more honored than Christ was in his life, and remain remarkably humble.

What then? What did Christ undergo than no man could before him, or after? The just penalty for the sins of the world. Consider what it must have taken for a man to endure the unmitigated wrath of God poured out for every offense, and to do so without guilt or cause for condemnation. The ultimate humiliation, the ultimate denial of one's human excellence. Surely this was something Christ endure that no man before or after him could.

Even so, the negative construction beckons the question: if it was by enduring the wrath of God that Christ exceeded all other men, what was it that enabled Him to endure, the positive quality that was able to overcome? If wrath is an outpouring of hatred, the rejection of worth or value or excellence; then would not love be that which would need to be greater in order to endure? This seems most fitting. Only the man who was most beloved by God (the Being excelling all others in Love) could endure the greatest measure of wrath. Christ, the Son of God, was so loved by God that He could not only endure the shame and injustice of the world, but also willingly take upon Himself their due penalty for their transgressions, the wrath of God.

The most astounding aspect of it all is that in being the man most beloved by God, Christ was also the man most capable of loving, and so poured out his love upon men, that they too could become the most beloved of God--the very means by which human excellence reached its apex; the very means by which the human is made partaker of Divinity, of Divine Love.

The measure of a man's greatness is in how much he is loved. Those who are beloved of God are the men who are the greatest, who are granted participation in the divine nature. Those who pour out the greatest love toward others reveal themselves to be those who partake most fully in the divine nature, for their capacity to love is proportionate to the measure of love they receive from the Father. No greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends.

The Liberating Effect of Education

From Dave Hicks, via Circe Institute.

A “rigorous” education is for me one that saves souls one at a time and pulls that soul out of his socio-economic context, whatever that is, and gives him an “out of body” experience, so to speak. It frees him from his passions or at least puts him at odds with them, makes him aware of the assumptions underlying the arguments swirling around him, causes him to recognize and detest cant and mediocrity, and establishes in him an insatiable hunger for whatever is good and true and beautiful. It gives him a star to follow, whatever the crowd is doing. Makes him a Magus.

 The italicized portion is, for me, the primary and most difficult aim of education. Plato sought it, Augustine sought it, Calvin sought it, and all wise educators today seek it.

Wherein "difficulty" is really just how things are supposed to work

Why does God delight in difficulty, while man is so content to be at ease? It is tempting to examine the curse in Genesis three and imagine how supple and responsive Creation must have been to Adam's efforts before his Grand Rebellion, but there is no hint that the labor would have been easy for all of that perfection. Rather, the only indication seems to be that man's labor would not be fruitless (thorns and thistles choking to death) or debilitating (sweat of the brow implying painful exertion). 

I don't think that one could say Adam would not need to be daily wrapping together grapevines into some shapely order, or disentangling them with great care when they had grown waywardly in the night. I don't think that one could say little Cain and Abel wouldn't have required a great deal of patience as they learned from their parents the things that were new and at which they were unskilled. God Himself waited when Adam named each creature that He trotted before the man, all the while knowing that none of them would be adequately suited. God could have told Adam as much, and perhaps Adam would have taken God's word for it, but Adam's knowledge would have been far less intimate than it was as a result of the long process of investigation. God, who enjoys everything He does after some fashion, surely delighted in watching Adam learn, however slowly or rapidly Adam was able to draw his conclusions about each beast.

Indeed, as one reflects upon the tasks that seem most difficult--getting a child to learn, teaching a new skill to an unskilled worker, waiting for all of the aspect of a planned event to come together, gathering the scads of data that trickle in bit by bit by bit--they seem to be difficult not insomuch as they are fruitless or debilitating, but rather insofar as our capacity to enjoy the labor is deficient. The intemperance of wanting to get the expected result from the labor apart from the difficulties associated with the labor thwarts one's enjoyment of the labor itself--such intemperance is the thorn that chokes the life our of the growth God seeks to develop in us.

How did we get to be in this situation where false ideals persist about our labor: that results must be immediate, tangible, and fully formed at every stage of our efforts? Perhaps part of the problem is the way in which the corruption of sin bends our attentiveness; shaping our expectations. Sin, arising as it does from corrupt desires, is self-absorption. James seems to hint at this problem in his rebuke in the opening verses of chapter four:

Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? 2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet[a] you do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. 4 Adulterers and[b] adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? 6 But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble."

James acknowledges that our displeasure arises from the self-absorbing nature of our desires for pleasure. We want what we want, but when we do not receive (did we not think to ask?). We grumble and fight and steal to get it because God has refused it to us (why should He give when we've purposed to abuse it?). God resists such prideful grasping, since such grasping is a being-for-death.

When I grow angry that my child does not fulfill my expectations, do I do well to be upset?

When I get incensed that my student fails to follow my wishes to the exact letter, am I seeing my labor rightly?

When I grow bitter that my colleague cannot seem to "get over" his particular faults, is it from justice or from inconvenience that I condemn?

I do not mean to imply that expectations of results are of necessity flawed. No doubt Adam would have to develop some expectations for how his labor would go, even in paradise, since he had many things over which he was to labor. But when one's expectations are thwarted, this too is from the hand of God, and our reaction demonstrates our own orientation toward Providence. Is God not patient with us? Has He not borne with our stupidity, our rebelliousness, our incapacity? Has He not done so to an exponentially greater degree than we shall ever bear with another soul, indeed all other souls, in our own responsibilities and tasks?

Rome was not built in a day, the Oak of Great Girth and expansive shade did not grow in a fortnight, and no human soul (excepting perhaps Enoch), no matter the greatness of its growth, has even reached full maturity in this course of life in this broken body.

What then shall deliver our minds from captivity to the discontentedness of misplaced desires? Surely the love of Christ. If self-absorption wrecks upon the rocks of wretched desires, contentedness must embark unto the safe harbors of Christ's handiwork on our behalf. Chronicling the patience of Christ toward oneself cannot but make evident the great discrepancy between where we ought to have been by now and where we have actually come. I may not throw teenage tempter tantrums at my stupid siblings any longer, but I still complain when my boy's shoes come untied (again). At the same time, chronicling the effects of God's kindness reveals how much further we have come than we would have had God not show that grace by which we were made able to stand. I may still complain when my boy's shoelaces remain perpetually uncoupled, but it doesn't take me very long to repent of it, nor do I seem to fall so easily prey to the temptation as once I did.

In short, it is not quite enough to "think of others" in order to do well by them as instruments of growth in their sanctification. One must "consider oneself rightly" which certain requires a healthy dose of remembering, counting, even reveling in all the various ways Christ's love for us has patiently shaped us through all of our deficiencies and recalcitrance in order to go and do likewise.