Is God Moody?
God’s actions are always perfectly proportionate to his character. God’s character never changes. When it looks like God has changed in the Bible, we should explore those passages for changes in the situation: people’s attitudes, behaviors, and decisions—not changes with God’s character or being.
Have you ever seen someone so moved by emotion that you could tell their brain had kind of checked out? Maybe you’ve been there yourself. Sadly, I know I have. Whether it’s the result of anger, frustration, confusion, or despair, there’s a certain look in a person’s eyes when they’re operating on pure emotion. God never experiences this.
Changing Character?
The doctrine of impassibility describes how God isn’t controlled by passions. While I hope you have control over your emotions, at least most of the time, you can certainly relate to experiencing emotions that don’t match reality.
Think of a surprise birthday party. You walk into a dark room, and all of a sudden, a lot of people jump out at you. Your immediate response might be shock or fear, but in your rational mind you’d be elated or happy. God never experiences anything like this. There’s never a time when God’s emotions dictate his attitude toward a situation. God is never out of control.
Now, to be clear, there are plenty of passages in the Bible that talk about God having feelings. Again, this is anthropomorphic language. Passions or emotions don’t affect God the way emotions affect us. We can’t read our experience into God.
So whatever it means in such descriptive passages about God, we must keep the prescriptive passages in mind. For example, Malachi 3:6 that tells us God never changes, and Hebrews 13:8 says Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. When we see a change in God’s mood, we need to ask how this change fits with passages that say God doesn’t change. How can we make sense of the two realities — passages that say God doesn’t change and passages that describe God changing from anger to delight?
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Is It Possible to Suffer Well?
You could experience a baker’s dozen of serious issues layered one on top of another. Financial pressures. Health pressures. Relationship pressures. Spiritual warfare pressures. The pressure of unthinkable grief or cruel pain. It will not crush you if you believe Christ is in it. All that matters is knowing Jesus is walking in the fiery furnace with you. The pain may feel white-hot, but be encouraged—his “peace like a river” is able to quench every anxiety and fear.
It Is Well
When peace like a river attendeth my way,When sorrows like sea billows roll;Whatever my lot thou hast taught me to say,“It is well, it is well with my soul!It is well with my soul;It is well, it is well with my soul!—Horatio Spafford (1876)
He Is Enough
When Paul spoke of being hard-pressed on every side, he wasn’t speaking lightly. He wasn’t saying, Whew, things were a little tough for a while. He was describing pain that was so oppressive that he “despaired of life itself ” (2 Cor. 1:8). How in the same sentence can Paul be pressed in like that, yet not be crushed? Nancy Severns knows the answer. She has been bedridden for five years with pain from Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a debilitating disorder that affects her entire body, inside and out—her ribs even slip out of place! When all feels torturous, Nancy slowly inhales and calmly acknowledges the pain. She then enters it much like the three Hebrews entering Nebuchadnezzar’s fiery furnace. There in the middle of hellish, white-hot agony, she finds the Son of God. And she feels his protective embrace.
I do the same thing. When the fangs of pain sink into my hips and lower back, it’s a signal to begin deep breathing. I then walk into the pain and hold it near me, even have a conversation with it. I don’t fret and say, This is killing me, or, I can’t stand this, or Oh, no, not again! Words like that are fraught with anxiety, and we all know that fear only exacerbates the problem. Instead, like Nancy, I serenely acknowledge the pain and allow it to press me in on all sides, and then I take one more step of faith.
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Cremation or Burial: Does Our Choice Matter?
My goal isn’t to condemn or shame anyone who has chosen cremation for others (much less those who’ve simply carried out their departed loved ones’ directives). My desire is forward-looking, to give us something to think about as we make decisions about our funerals and as we discuss plans with our friends and loved ones, especially those who are in Christ. Burial is a Christian act in that it better represents the biblical examples, biblical analogies, and biblical teachings on the body. So as our culture paganizes, let’s be countercultural. Let’s reclaim Christian burial.
For most of history, no one asked whether Christians should cremate their dead. Burial was such a standard practice that it was usually referred to as a “Christian burial,” and cremation was something people read about in Viking tales.
But things have changed in the West. And as cremation has become more common, it has become less strange. In many countries, cremation is now more common than burial, and often Christians now opt for cremation without a second thought. Nevertheless, “What do you think about cremation?” is a question I still get asked as a pastor, so it’s worth pondering.
I argue that “Christian burial” isn’t a misnomer but a fitting description.
It’s not that God is somehow unable to resurrect cremated remains (it’s easy for him). And it’s not that cremation is a violation of a direct biblical command (it’s not, but that doesn’t mean all cultural practices are an equally good fit with Christian theology). Rather, I argue burial is a Christian act in the sense that it better reflects biblical precedents, biblical imagery, and biblical theology about the human body and its future.
For that reason, Christian burial is a practice worth reclaiming as a sorrowful yet joyful way to visibly proclaim the Christian hope amid a hopeless culture.
Ask the Right Question
While there’s no moral prohibition on cremation in the Bible, Scripture gives numerous examples of God’s people burying their dead and almost no examples of God’s people being cremated. Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel, Joseph, Miriam, Moses, David, Elisha, John the Baptist, Stephen, and most famously Christ himself were all buried (Gen. 25:10; 35:19, 29; 49:31; 50:14; Num. 20:1; Deut. 34:6; Josh. 24:32; 1 Kings 2:10; 2 Kings 13:20; Mark 6:29; Acts 8:2; 1 Cor. 15:4).
It’s worth asking why. There were other options—Stephen Prothero says that “with the notable exceptions of the Egyptians, the Chinese, and the Hebrews, cremation seems to have been the standard practice of the ancients” (5). Yet burial was the standard practice of God’s people in both Testaments. Why?
This pattern didn’t stop with the completion of the Bible. History shows that as Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire, cremation disappeared and was replaced by burial. The same is true in basically every culture where Christianity has become dominant or influential. One could argue it has only been with the waning of Christianity’s influence in the Western world that cremation has been making a comeback (though the rising population and funeral prices have also played a role). Why?
Why has burial always been the dominant practice among God’s people throughout history, even when it was countercultural? Could there be natural fitness between Judeo-Christian beliefs about the human body and Judeo-Christian burial practices?
The answer is yes, for a simple reason. Namely, what we believe about the human body and its future influences how we treat the human body—even after it’s dead.
The Body Among World Religions
To take one example: historically, Hindus have burned their dead. In places like India or Nepal, cremations are often done in public. This is at least partly because of what Hindus believe about reincarnation and the human body. According to one Hindu website, “After death, the outer flesh, the physical body serves no purpose and the quickest way to release the soul & help in the re-incarnation process is to burn the body.”
There’s a natural fitness between Hindu beliefs about the body and the afterlife and Hindu cultural practices surrounding death—which shouldn’t surprise anyone.
Other religions view the body as a shell or a prison for the soul. While this doesn’t necessarily rule out burial, it does make belief in a bodily resurrection seem pointless—after all, who wants to go back to prison once he’s escaped (Acts 17:32)? On the flip side, while not all who practice burial believe in a bodily resurrection, belief in a bodily resurrection does seem to lend itself to burial (as we see throughout Christian history).
Religion is part of culture, and cultural beliefs influence cultural practices.
The Body in Christianity
Christianity is different from Hinduism in this respect. As Christians, we don’t only believe in the immortality of the soul—we believe in the resurrection of the body. Unlike many other religions, Christianity has a positive view of the human body and of creation in general. Scripture teaches that God created the world and everything in it and then pronounced it “very good” (Gen. 1:31; see Gen. 1–2).
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Not Augustinian Enough
Watkin has written a fascinating tome. He has honored Keller’s request for a “Christian High Theory,” and it is a gift that Keller saw its fruition before departing into glory. Though I do not believe this book will see a legacy similar to that of The City of God, no work should be burdened with this pressure. It speaks in profound ways to our moment. It would be great for the types of classrooms mentioned above, and will be helpful on the shelves of many pastors, providing signals for further research. I am grateful Watkin pushed me to read my Bible more closely and appreciate its comprehensive relevance for late-modern life in fresh ways. That is success.
What would Augustine write to the late-modern West? Christopher Watkin, in his widely lauded Biblical Critical Theory, seeks to answer that question by performing a similar type of social analysis for a very different context.
This is a unique work. I am not sure I have ever read a book that so thoroughly weaves biblical theology, systematic theology, and apologetics, all the while engaging prominent philosophers, whether Christian or non-Christian. But in some ways it is inspired by the author of the foreword. If you have listened to or read much of Tim Keller’s writings over the years, much of this will feel familiar in both style and content. Watkin invokes Keller’s own insights throughout the volume and engages many of the same figures who were commonly invoked in Keller’s writings and sermons, such as Charles Taylor, N.T. Wright, and of course J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. This is not a criticism of Watkin, who admits that he is not seeking to provide anything new. Rather, he wants to package many of these insights into a single compelling narrative. That he has accomplished.
Watkin’s is a quintessentially modern Reformed work, reflecting many of the emphases of second and third generation Neo-Calvinists. Other than Keller, Watkin refers to Francis Schaeffer, Herman Dooyeweerd, Cornelius Van Til, and Alvin Plantinga as key inspirations. The perspective here also bridges Neo-Calvinist and Radical Orthodox thought, as John Milbank is a regular figure who pops up, along with his friend David Bentley Hart, who is not technically part of Radical Orthodoxy, but travels alongside those figures. And, as such, James K.A. Smith makes frequent appearances. If you have trafficked in Neo-Calvinist circles for the past couple of decades, much of this material will feel familiar.
Something unique, however, is the textbook nature of this work. At the end of each of the twenty-eight chapters, Watkin provides a set of “Study Questions” to help the reader probe further. This lends a certain practicality to the work, making it accessible for small group discussions or even Bible college and MDiv classrooms.
The book is written as a “so what?” work. Watkin explains that the title of the book could have easily been The Bible: So What? and says that his aim is “to paint a picture of humanity and of our world through the lens of the Bible and to compare aspects of this image to alternative visions. It is a book about how the whole Bible sheds light on the whole of life, how we can read and understand our society, our culture, and ourselves through the lens of the Bible’s storyline.” Therefore, it is not fitting, as some might be prone to do, to criticize the book for its lack of scholastic rigor or systematic depth.
As mentioned above, across the twenty eight chapters, Watkin weaves biblical theology, systematic reflection, and apologetic considerations. The book is largely structured around the biblical story, but also around systematic loci with constant asides on modern and postmodern philosophers. Watkin explains that, though inspired by The City of God, the structure of his work is markedly different. Whereas Augustine spends the first half in that great text critiquing Roman religion and philosophy, and then traces the story of Scripture, Watkin constantly weaves examination of contemporary culture within the larger scriptural story. Yet it is worth considering which parts of the biblical story he attends to. After spending almost half of his book getting through Genesis 1-22, Watkin discusses the liberation narrative of Exodus, and then quickly jumps to the prophets. He explains that the people of God are freed to worship, but then spends almost no time talking about worship.
Very little is said about Leviticus and Numbers, and the cultic life of God’s people is severely under-examined. Similarly, there is insufficient attention to the law in general and its role in the story of God’s people. Thus, Deuteronomy is barely engaged, as are the more historical books such as 1-2 Samuel, 1-2 Kings, and 1-2 Chronicles, which display how the law is applied and often misapplied or ignored, and what the consequences of that can be. So, we have a fascinating discussion of liberation and the prophets (and also very insightful material on the Wisdom literature), but what about priests and the law? and how these relate to civil power?
There are two primary devices that frame the material in the work: figures and diagonalization. Figures are patterns and rhythms that shape our sense of ourselves and the world around us. He provides six broad categories of figures: 1) language, ideas, and stories; 2) time and space; 3) the structure of reality; 4) behavior; 5) relationships; 6) objects. The dominant ensemble of figures in a particular cultural moment form a “world” in which we live and move. The “world” of the late-modern West is deeply imprinted by the Christian heritage that it increasingly rejects. This means that the Christianity retained by our culture is profoundly fragmented and distorted, and the principles that are harmonized in the Bible are set in opposition.
To address this problem, Watkin turns to his second device of “diagonalization,” which refers to the way that the “figures” of the Bible cut across and rearrange the false dichotomies presented to us in our culture. Diagonalization shows how a cultural dichotomy splinters the rich biblical reality, resulting in fragmented options and unsatisfying compromises. It answers these with the biblical picture which reveals how the best aspirations of the options are fulfilled in a way none of the contemporary options could have envisioned. This is a type of “third-way” logic, something I have publicly critiqued, but Watkin’s use of this device is often satisfying for how it gives concrete content rather than just a default posture. It is tethered to the biblical figures, and through them, Watkin seeks to “out-narrate” the Bible’s cultural rivals, resolving late-modern tensions through diagonalized narration. At times, however, this diagonalization can appear forced, or a bit sloppy, and thus can fall into some of the standard pitfalls of third-wayism more generally.
The book has many profound strengths, starting first with the style and structure. This is a great sourcebook of quotations from some of the best Christian commentators on late-modern culture. One could simply pool these quotes for one’s own use, or follow these breadcrumbs to some of the most penetrating writings by Christian thinkers on Western culture over the past two centuries. Furthermore, the structure, in the ways it differs from The City of God, is, in some senses, rhetorically effective. For instance, today, very few actually read the first half of Augustine’s tome, which focuses on an immanent critique of his contemporary culture, but rather jump into the second half in which Augustine traces the history of the two cities through the biblical narrative. Watkin’s more integrated approach might serve to expose a greater amount of readers to the critiques of contemporary culture than a neat division would. And within this integrated approach, Watkin lets his “figures” wash over the reader. At times the reader can get overwhelmed with the sheer abundance of material, yet, the net effect at the end is that Watkin’s way of seeing the world becomes almost second-nature.
Besides the strengths of the style and structure, Watkin is actually quite impressive on particular issues. Some reviewers will draw attention to the confusing title of the book, which might make the reader assume that Watkin is either going to directly discuss “Critical Theory” and how Christians should view it through the Bible, or that Watkin will employ the tools of “Critical Theory” in some way. Watkin does neither, and this might frustrate some.
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