In This Issue

The Spirit Unites Us To Christ: The Christian Life

Rev. Dr. Richard Topping

Rev. Dr. Richard Topping

In order to become a person who can be taught by others, nothing less than conversion is required; and that is a work of the Spirit who tames our egocentricity so that we can learn as pupils, together with other pupils, in the school of Christ.

In the last issue, we closed Part Two of Rev. Dr. Richard Topping's article with this first sentence. Now we move into the third and final instalment of this wonderful reflection, which was originally presented at the Renewal Day in November 2009 at St. Andrew's Newton Presbyterian Church in Surrey BC. Dr. Topping is St. Andrew's Hall Professor of Reformed Studies at the Vancouver School of Theology, Vancouver BC. -- Kit Schindell

Read Part 1 and Part 2

What would this mean for sermon preparation and/or personal Bible study? Do we get our ideas of Christian scholarship more from the academy than from the Gospel and our Reformed tradition?

Jesus Christ by his death and new life has won the benefits that God intended for us. Salvation is won through Christ. God redeems what is broken in the world that He has made. However, these benefits lost in the fall and won back by the Son of God remain external to us. There is potential grace afoot in the universe through Christ. This grace is apart from us, external to us, because we are sinners; we don't receive grace automatically. Book Three of the Institutes of the Christian Religion is called, "The Way in Which We receive the Grace of Christ . . ." and the whole of this section is about how the benefits of salvation won in Christ come to us through our contact with God.

Christ is the mediator of grace and so to receive the benefits of his life into our lives we need personal contact with Christ. "He must become ours and dwell in us." Calvin loves to speak of our union with Christ, our engrafting into Christ, are being made one with him: "We are apparelled with him." So close is our fellowship, our personal contact with Christ that we are united with him more closely "than are the limbs with the body." Calvin says that our hope for resurrection and eternal life would be faint were it not for our "complete and entire" union with Christ. Fellowship with Christ is close, personal, intimate -- he lives in us and we in him. What happens to Christ, death and resurrection, happens to us, because we are in him. Our union with Christ is the condition for our access to a spiritual life.

But Christ remains outside of us, apart from us, until by faith we are joined to him. And for Calvin, faith is always and everywhere the work of the Holy Spirit. Faith is confidence and trust that the benefits of Christ are mine. That what happened back there and then on the cross and at the empty tomb applies to me here and now. Jesus Christ by his death and new life achieves salvation and the Holy Spirit is the means by which this salvation reaches even us. It is the work of the Spirit to create faith, not just that God and Christ exist but faith in God come among us in Christ for us and our salvation. Faith is the channel opened by the Spirit, at the hearing of the Gospel Word and at the sharing in the sacraments, through which the blessings of salvation achieved in Christ flow to us. Faith is what is generated in us by the Spirit's work of breaking down our sinful resistance to God so that we can behold the love and grace of God come in Jesus Christ. By faith, which is the work of the Spirit, we are bound to Christ and his benefits. "Perfect salvation is found in the person of Christ . . . that we may become partakers of it, he baptizes us in the Holy Spirit and fire . . . bringing us into the light of faith in his gospel and so regenerating us that we become new creatures." And again, "The Holy Spirit is the cause of our enjoyment of Christ and of all his benefits."

The Spirit works (ordinarily) by means of the Word and Sacraments. In Calvin's thought, while it is certainly true that the Word read and proclaimed is never effective without the agency of the Spirit, it is also certainly true that Calvin is not an "enthusiast" or a spiritualist, and his thought could never give rise to a generic understanding of spirituality. While Calvin always respects the freedom of Almighty God to work as God chooses, he does note again and again that the Spirit works by certain regular means in the life of the people of God. These are scripture and the sacraments.

Scripture is a clear and sufficient witness to the Gospel in its own right. However, we misconstrue and misunderstand it because of sin... Read more ...

Stuff Happens

by Cassandra Wessel

Recently I wrote a light poem for a contest entitled. I titled it, "I Blame Ketchup".

Ketchup on fries,
on chilli, on rice,
on Jello, on meat pies,
on pizza by slice.

Ketchup on eggs,
poached or fried,
soft boiled or hard,
deviled or dyed.

Ketchup they boast,
on steak is the most,
on hot dog, or bun,
foot long's more fun.

Ketchup on jerky,
chicken, or turkey,
dark meat or light,
'til belt is too tight.

Ketchup on chives
may give you hives
sniffling, or sneezing,
and horrible lives.

Yes, I maintain,
ketchup's to blame.
Ketchup by name,
is to blame.

I blame ketchup,
not God.

Of course, blaming ketchup for what goes wrong is laughable. Stuff does happen. Natural disasters plague our planet. Stress zones in the earth's crust snap. Earthquakes and tsunamis devastate. Fiery volcanos erupt. Hurricanes and tornados roar, rend and ruin. Low pressure systems collide with high, causing massive storms. Jet streams propel them like missiles across oceans and continents. Natural disasters fiercely tear through human attempts at civilization.

Stuff happens. It happens because this earth is a living thing. It struggles as with the pain of childbirth. St. Paul, wrote. "We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time." Romans 8:22 (NIV) The earth has done this because pride laden evil entered in the form of a serpent at the beginning of human history. When Adam and Eve reached proudly for God-forbidden fruit and consumed it, they soon found themselves consumed. This action propelled them from God's presence. It became the spiritual barrier between themselves and God, but it also tore the physical realm, making ongoing tragedy certain.

Nevertheless, people never seem to expect tragedy. Often they never even think about 'stuff happening'. They shove death and disaster far from their minds. When it happens, they find themselves unprepared. Then, face to face with tough questions, they ask "Why? Why me? Why my family?" Their questions compel them to search for answers, usually in all the wrong places, like alcohol or drugs. Instead, their questions lead to even more fearful questions, which remain, unanswered.

Similarly, some believers fail to think about "stuff happening". They simply assume nothing will happen to them because they are Christians. They believe God protects them... Read more ...

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