Theological Term of the Week

In case you haven’t guessed, I’m a firm cessationist. In this entry on continuationism, I’ve included a few links that make the positive case for it, even though I am not at all convinced by them. For counter arguments, see the entry on cessationism.

continuationism
The view that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit (healing, tongues, prophetic revelations) continue after theapostolic age, and are available for the  believer today.

• Scripture used to support continuationism (see Wayne Grudem’s argument below):

As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. (1 Corinthians 13:8-10 ESV)

• From Systematic Theology by Wayne Grudem:

[W]e have in 1 Corinthians 13:10 a definite statement about the time of the cessation imperfect gifts like prophecy; they will “be made useless” or “pass away” when Christ returns. And this would imply that they will continue to exist and be useful for the church, throughout the church age, including today, and right up to the day when Christ returns. Learn more:

1. Sam Storms: The Case for Continuationism
2. Tim Challies: Cessationism and Continuationism: An Interview with Dr. Wayne Grudem, Part 1, Part 2
3. Ian Hamilton/Wayne Grudem: A Debate on the Continuation of Prophesy

Related term:

• cessationism

Filed under Ecclesiology

Do you have a term you’d like to see featured here as a Theological Term of the Week? If you email it to me, I’ll seriously consider using it, giving you credit for the suggestion and linking back to your blog when I do.

Clicking on the Theological Term graphic at the top of this post will take you to a list of all the previous theological terms in alphabetical order.

Round the Sphere Again: Purposes

Of Suffering
Thirty-six of God’s purposes in our suffering with scriptural proofs (Apologetics 315).

Of Work
More from Gene Veith on vocation (The Gospel Coalition Blog):

According to Luther, the purpose of every vocation is to love and serve one’s neighbor. The farmer tills the ground to provide food to sustain his neighbor’s life. The craftsman, the teacher, the lawyer—-indeed, everyone who occupies a place in the division of labor—-is providing goods and services that neighbors need. This is God’s providential ordering of society. But for a Christian, the service rendered can become animated with love.

Read the whole post.

If God Were Single

Two reasons why it matters that God exists as Trinity: 

If God was not a Father, he could never give us the right to be his children. If he did not enjoy eternal fellowship with his Son, on has to wonder if he would have any fellowship to share with us, or if he would even know what fellowship looks like. If, for example, the Son was a creature and had not eternally been “in the bosom of the Father,” knowing him and being loved by him, what sort of relationship with the Fater could he share with us? If the Son himself had never been close to the Father, how could he bring us close? 

If God was a single person, salvation would look entirely different. He might allow us to live under his rule and protection, but at an infinite distance, approached perhaps through intermediaries. Her might even offer forgiveness, but he would not offer closeness. And, since by definition he would not be eternally loving, would he deal with the price of sin himself and offer that forgiveness for free? Most unlikely. Distant hirelings we would remain, never to hear the Son’s golden words to his Father: “You have loved them even as you have loved me.”

What’s more,

if God is a single person, and has always been alone, why should he speak? In the loneliness of eternity before creation, who would he have spoken to? And why would he start now? The habit of keeping himself to himself would run deep. Such a God would be far more likely to remain unknown.

Quoting from Delighting in the Trinity: An Introduction to the Christian Faith by Michael Reeves.