Friday, August 17, 2018

Cripplegate's Clint Archer's Cliff Note Doctrinal Triage of Christology

Doing what God Himself didn't do: Christology in under 500 words.

Clint Archer wrote a woeful Cliff Note doctrinal triage of Christ Jesus--in 500 words. By using a self-inflicted constrain which God Himself never uses (for good reason), Archer not only omits a huge part of who Christ is--Creator--- but other doctrine ** like the impeccability of Christ (it wasn't that He just didn't sin, but that in His very unchanging nature--He couldn't sin (see Phil. 2 for an example--the Greek clarifies this very well)). Jesse Johnson (formally a "pastor" at MacArthur's church, now in Virginia) retweeted Archer's short list in a positive light. 

Under "The Person of Christ" Archer wrote: "He is fully God (i.e. uncreated and eternally one with the Father and the Spirit; see Col. 2:9 and Heb. 1:3, " but both references are  missing the issue which is Christ introduced as Creator:

Col 1:15  And He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation. 
Col 1:16  For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities--all things have been created by Him and for Him. 
Col 1:17  And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. 
Col 1:18  He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; so that He Himself might come to have first place in everything. 
Col 1:19  For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fulness to dwell in Him, 

Heb 1:2  in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. 
Heb 1:3  And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high;
Heb 11:1  Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 
Heb 11:2  For by it the men of old gained approval. 

Heb 11:3  By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible. 

But if the sound doctrine of Creation in six literal days by God's Word is just a matter of personal preference, then one will necessarily neglect this aspect of who the Christ Jesus the Lord truly is. Moreover, it will divorce also the "Christian" from sanctification and ecclesiology (among other doctrines--see Col. 1 above), since God Himself binds them together. Unless of course men at the Cripplegate think sanctification isn't necessarily necessary (also known as "easy believism").

This is why chopping up Scripture, that is to say, taking it out of context in an attempt to proof-text one's notion that there is a bare minimum (say, under 500 words), is not only daring to sit in judgment of God's Word and forcing it into a false grid of varying degrees of  importance and lesser importance, but it's nothing more than taking not only verses, but doctrine, out of context. Isolating down to "bare bones" isn't what Scripture teaches. Surely that isn't what Jesus ever taught in His three years of earthly ministry, culminating in His command in Matt. 28:19-20. If ever there was a place and time for "bare minimum" teaching, wouldn't it have been just before He ascended to Heaven? Yet He reiterated that the apostles and disciples are to teach ALL that He commanded. 

One example of Paul teaching the context of who Christ is and His gospel is in Acts 16:

Act 16:30  and after he brought them out, he said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?
Act 16:31  And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved, you and your household." 
Act 16:32  And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house

Paul teaches Christology, the Gospel, and regeneration from Genesis 1:

2Co 4:2  but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. 
2Co 4:3  And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, 
2Co 4:4  in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 
2Co 4:5  For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants for Jesus' sake. 
2Co 4:6  For God, who said, "Light shall shine out of darkness," is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ

Gen 1:1  In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth....3  Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. 

Stay away from men who think themselves as shepherds but tamper with sound doctrine.

Act 20:26  "Therefore I testify to you this day, that I am innocent of the blood of all men. 
Act 20:27  "For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole purpose of God
Act 20:28  "Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood. 
Act 20:29  "I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; 

Act 20:30  and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. 

**Other doctrines that the sound doctrine of Creation is inseparably bound to:

Go here, here, and here.






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