november 2000

Dead Sea Scrolls

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Contact us for a Prospectus Ph: (02) 9936 6020 Fax: (02) 9936 6032 Email: [email protected] November 2000 No. 521

EDITORIAL OLYMPICS

Evidence for the defence ...... 4 An Olympian view ...... 22 An event is coming that will make Sydney’s success insignificant, DEAD SEA SCROLLS reports John Woods. The dawn of Christianity ...... 5 The scrolls enrich our context for the early church, reports Bernard PARENTING Secombe. Scrolls and Scripture...... 7 The disillusioned generation...... 23 John Davies talks to Peter Hastie about the scrolls and the Bible. Ecclesiastes speaks as cogently today as ever, sugests Marion Andrews. Conspiracy theory...... 9 Adrian Schepl finds little to fear in Barbara Thiering’s bizarre challenge to orthodoxy. BOOKS

DEVOTION Is the New Testament History?...... 24 Deeply affected ...... 11 Jesus and the Logic of History ...... 24 Jonathan Edwards on the understanding that draws us closer to God. The Doctrine of Repentance...... 24 MISSIONS Genesis for Today ...... 24 Land of the Rising Son ...... 12 Robert Benn has encouraging news from Japan. LETTERS ...... 25 NEWS Home Front ...... 13 PRAYER ...... 26 Across Australia ...... 14 TOUGH QUESTIONS World News...... 15 Baptised in the Spirit?...... 27 CULTURE WATCH Jason Summers looks again at a vexed question. Movie Watch: High Fidelity ...... 17 ESSAY

ART A time to die ...... 28 Sublime depravity...... 18 On 22 November 1963 three famous men appeared before the heav- Art and the Christian: Michael Jensen explores the issues. enly throne. Peter Barnes comments.

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AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 3 EDITORIAL Evidence for the defence The Dead Sea Scrolls are a good friend to historic Christianity.

n 1947, a young Bedouin shepherd, Until 1947, the oldest complete Hebrew of canonical books. This suggests that the Muhammed ed Dhib, was playing near manuscript of the Old Testament was the Essenes distinguished in their minds the top of some cliffs that surrounded text of Codex Leningradensis, dated to between canonical and non-canonical texts. the Dead Sea. He picked up a stone 1008. This text was made 1400 years after Only the canonical texts seem to have war- andI threw it into a small hole in the cliff the last book of the Old Testament had ranted commentaries. This lends support face. There was a sharp crack: the sound of been written. This was the text used by the for the Protestant view of the canon. broken pottery. Little did he realise that he King James translators – the Textus As far as the New Testament is con- had stumbled upon a treasure trove of Receptus. It was regarded as the authorita- cerned, the Dead Sea Scrolls show that the ancient documents that had lain undis- tive Masoretic Hebrew text. apostolic proclamation of Jesus as the turbed for nearly 2000 years. He had found Obviously that manuscript was a copy divine Messiah was consistent with some of the Dead Sea Scrolls. of a copy of a copy etc. This raised a press- the messianic expectation of the period. The Dead Sea Scrolls originally ing question: Could scholars be sure that Several Qumran documents, 4Q252, belonged to a religious community called the text in Codex Leningradensis was 4Q246, and 4Q521 speak of the Messiah the Essenes, who lived at Qumran. They identical to the original text, as given by being of the line of David, having the titles were a Jewish ascetic group who lived pri- God, to the Bible writers? What assurance “Son of God” and “Son of the Most High” marily in three locations: Qumran at the could they have that the Bible text today is (as in Luke 1:32-35), as well as having enor- Dead Sea, the Essene Quarter of pure? mous powers such as raising the dead. Jerusalem (Mt Zion), and an area near After carefully comparing the Biblical Damascus. texts, the scholars were amazed to discover According to Albright, the Qumran evi- Archaeologists have established a num- that, apart from a tiny number of spelling dence supports the view that the concepts, ber of important points about the Essene variations, there were no significant differ- terminology and mindset of the Gospels community. Through the discovery of ences between the Dead Sea Scrolls and the are consistent with a Palestinian setting in coins on the sites, it appears that the com- Masoretic Text. Albright, himself a former the early first century. In other words, the munity began in the reign of John liberal scholar, declared: “The Dead Sea historical data of the New Testament are Hyrcanus (134-104BC) and carried on Scrolls prove conclusively that we must accurate and the documents are not an until about AD 70 when it was destroyed treat the consonantal text of the Hebrew invention of the church of the second cen- by the Roman army. Bible with the utmost respect and that the tury as was formerly believed by radical Archaeologists believe that when the free emending of difficult passages in which Bible critics. Roman legions advanced towards Qumran, modern critical scholars have indulged can- As Millar Burrows, a liberal biblical the inhabitants hid their precious docu- not be tolerated any longer.” scholar, admits: “If one will go through ments in the caves nearby, hoping to What does all this show? It demon- any of the historic statements of the retrieve them later. But they never did. The strates that the Jews throughout their his- Christian faith he will find nothing that community was slaughtered. There is evi- tory have been faithful in copying the has been or can be disproved by the Dead dence that some people returned to the site Biblical manuscripts with remarkably few Sea Scrolls”. later, around 130-135, but the details are errors. The text we have today faithfully Peter Hastie sketchy. represents the original autographs. As the ______Since 1947, further discoveries of docu- Jewish historian, Josephus said: “For, ments have been made in the Dead Sea although such long ages have now passed, From the Convener region. William F Albright, the famous no one has ventured either to add, or to leader of the American School of Oriental remove, or to alter a syllable”. In art, as within the Research, wrote shortly afterwards: “What Further, the Dead Sea Scrolls also con- humans who create an absolutely incredible find! … this is the tribute to our knowledge of the canon of it, there is potential greatest manuscript discovery of modern the Old Testament. The canon represents for both great times.” the collection of books which believers beauty and vileness. recognise as inspired by God, and given to Christians, who The significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls them as Scripture. Jews and Protestants know that artists are stems from their age. Dr W F Libby of the accept the 39 books of the Old Testament fallen, can see truly art’s potential and its University of Chicago, conducted Carbon as inspired. However, Roman Catholics limits, suggests Michael Jensen. Inklings of 14 dating tests on the scrolls in 1950. This also accept the collection of books known God are present in the human arts – the is a reliable form of scientific dating when as the Apocrypha as part of the Bible. Christian has been given the eyes of faith to applied to uncontaminated material several Interestingly, every book in the Old see them. Jensen’s profound essay begins thousand years old. Testament, with the exception of Esther, on page 19. Dr Libby’s results indicated an age of has been found at Qumran. While many 1917 years for a scroll in Cave 1 with a 200 apocryphal books have been found too, it is Robert Benn, year (10%) variant, which left the date important to note that the only commen- Convener somewhere between 167BC and AD233. taries that have been found at Qumran are National Journal Committee ap

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 4 DEAD SEA SCROLLS The dawn of Christianity The scrolls help illumine the early church.

he famous Dead Sea Scrolls were A better prospect for a New Testament found between 1947 and 1956. For link was the Aramaic fragment from cave 4 nearly 19 centuries they lay hidden which says that some unidentified person in cliff caves above the wadi shall be hailed as the Son of God and called QumranT which runs down to the north- Son of the Most High. These titles remind west shore of the Dead Sea. They were the us of Luke’s nativity record but even so, as library of a withdrawn priestly community far as I know, no scholar has asserted a link whose members possibly slept in the caves, between them. In fact there is no real evi- but certainly used the now ruined buildings dence that any NT author looked to nearby for communal meals, ritual bathing Bernard Secombe Qumran for ideas, and the community’s and an intense literary activity. own writings do not refer to any works that A Bedouin shepherd found the first later formed the New Testament. cave. It had 10 clay jars but only one held authors, hymns, texts on astronomy, apoc- Nor can the unnamed but distinctive scrolls, though later four more scrolls were alypses and various community rules. Most personages in Qumran’s writings – the unearthed there. Sensing value in his finds, are written in old Hebrew, some in Aramaic Teacher of Righteousness and his persecu- the shepherd took them to an antiques and a few in Greek. Generally they date tor, the Wicked Priest – be identified with dealer who then approached St Marks between 200 BC and 68 AD, when the any New Testament characters. Though Syrian Orthodox monastery in Jerusalem, Romans invaded to crush the Jewish revolt. one Sydney scholar thinks the Teacher was where their significance began to dawn. All fragments in cave 7 were in Greek and John the Baptist and the Wicked Priest was A search by shepherds and scholars on papyrus – popular with early Christians. Jesus, she has almost no support (but much located another 10 scroll-bearing caves, and In 1972 a Spanish Jesuit scholar, Jose strong opposition) from international more than 800 manuscripts. Fewer than a O’Callaghan, writing in the journal Biblical, scholarship. Jesus was not a priest in dozen were intact however, and many were claimed to have recognised among them Qumran’s terms, and there is no evidence decayed to fragments with only a few faded bits of Mark’s Gospel, Acts and several that he “persecuted” John; indeed Matthew and uncertain letters. epistles. His “evidence” was some tiny 11 records their mutual respect. More than 200 books of the Hebrew scraps with only isolated legible letters, and Paleographers and modern dating tech- Bible came to light plus many previously the only complete word in “Mark” was niques date the relevant Qumran writings unknown works including specialised com- “and”! The claim has not enjoyed much up to two centuries before John and Jesus. mentaries (pesherim) by community support. This includes the time of Maccabean inter-

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 5 DEAD SEA SCROLLS

Many scholars think that John, with his (Mt 12:11,12). Qumran wrote “Let no man ascetic lifestyle, might have been reared at assist a beast in birth on the Sabbath, even if Qumran, and that his hallmark baptism was she drops [her young] into a cistern or pit, an adaptation of their ritual bathing. let him not lift it up.” (Damascus Though unprovable, this theory is not Doc.11/13) They also forbade mingling with unreasonable. His ministry began quite close others, or being anywhere near Gentiles on to Qumran (Luke 3:2,3). His vocation (Mt the Sabbath. Jesus mingled in synagogues on 3:3) used the same Isaiah passage (40:3) the Sabbath, pointedly healed on that day, which the Qumran community (based in the and taught that acts of mercy to man or desert) claimed for their own mission; and beast were consistent with God’s benevolent his vivid language (Mt 3:7-12) compares intention for the Sabbath. with their visionary expectations. His bap- • With their focus on priestly holiness (see tism, an initiation rite to publicise personal Lev. 21), Qumran rigorously excluded any- repentance and life-changing faith, appar- one with mental or physical defects. Jesus’ ently ignored the Temple system whose lead- compassion however included such people – ers Qumran saw as corrupt. Although some disabled, diseased and demoniacs – as well as think they were Sadducees, I accept that the “prostitutes and sinners”. Qumran devotees were Essenes and that • Yet Qumran and dawning Christianity had there was an Essene “quarter” in Jerusalem, comparable views of God’s grace and man’s with others spread among Judaean society. need of it. In the Community Rule (say 125 Though the New Testament does not men- BC) we read: “As for me, I belong to an evil tion them, they were a fact of life during the humanity. My iniquities, transgression and The two Bedouin shepherds who found Lord’s ministry. By tradition, his wilderness sin, together with the perversity of my heart the scrolls temptation was in that region and he did visit ...and man is unable to establish his steps Jericho, only about 12 sparsely inhabited since justification is with God, and from his ference with the High Priesthood; and many kilometres away. Without suggesting any hand is integrity of way”. Their hymns also scholars see the Teacher and Wicked Priest as contact between them, I think Jesus was well often emphasised God’s grace and mercy, contestants in that struggle, between 160 aware of Qumran and its teaching. and acknowledge that justification is from and 140 BC. Probably this struggle was the him. Indeed they had grasped from genesis of the sect. In reacting to Greek and Roman cultural Habakkuk that the just man shall live by his Qumran’s writings evolved during long influences in Jerusalem, Qumran was still faith, the very essence of Jesus’ message and political/social unrest, including the Roman thoroughly Jewish and priestly. Their own Paul’s. Their strenuous efforts to be pure and presence since 63 BC. Their introspective writings show this clearly even while reveal- holy were not attempts to earn salvation, but legalism contrasts with the freer, outgoing ing creative thinking and unusual practices. to express devotion. Gospels and epistles interpretation by Jesus of God’s earlier reve- They actually used a different calendar: solar align with this. lation. He himself did not fit their apparent with 364 days as against the lunar with 354 • Paul: The Community Rule also speaks of expectations of two Messiahs (Deliverers) - days. Thus they celebrated holy days and true righteousness being instilled into a one Aaronic and priestly, and one Davidic, feasts out of timing with other Jews. man’s heart “in a spirit of humility, patience, military and political. I say “apparent” Qumran offers a much better under- because there was also mention of a Prophet- standing of Jewish life and thought during Messiah, and a recently released text (40521) the inter-testamental period than we had looked for only one Messiah, and his before. Thus they enrich our view of the expected ministry was not unlike that of social, spiritual and intellectual culture that Jesus. Even so, this does not form any link formed the background for dawning between Qumran and Jesus’ ministry. Christianity. Moreover, by his sacrifice and triumph, Jesus Specific differences of thinking include: broke the bounds of their parochial ideas of • The Gospels: As in Matthew 5, there are New Covenant. beatitudes in 4Q525 – example “Blessed is Yet with all the differences, there are sim- the man who has attained Wisdom and walks ilarities in ethics and theology – naturally, in the law of the Most High”. However they since both groups had deep Jewish roots. lack the promise of following blessings that Both also had convictions of being a right- all Jesus’ beatitudes have - “...for they will...” eous remnant living in the “last days”. John The Sermon on the Mount also shows Jesus the Baptist was a pivot between a complex opposing some pervasive Essene doctrines. Judaism and the Lord’s teaching and passion Matt 5:43 reads “You have heard that it was which was the dawn of Christianity. said ‘Love your neighbour and hate your Josephus, the first century enemy’.” This is hugely negative: It was not Jewish/Roman historian, tells us that the an Old Testament injunction, but it was (celibate) Essenes would receive the young taught at Qumran – the Sons of Light were (male) children of other people and to hate the Sons of Darkness. The Lord’s raise/instruct them in their way of life. John emphasis in v44 (“Love your enemies...”) was the child of an old priest and “he grew intensifies the clear Old Testament principle and became strong in spirit; and lived in the of God’s compassion. desert until he appeared publicly to Israel” • Qumran’s Sabbath rules were more severe (Luke 1:80). Where in the desert would this than those of the Pharisees who would at be possible for one impliedly so young? least pull an animal from a pit on the Sabbath Scroll jar

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 6 DEAD SEA SCROLLS abundant charity, unending goodness, under- standing ... mighty wisdom which trusts in all deeds of God and leans on his great loving kind- Qumran’s legacy ness”. This compares with the Fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5. Paul’s other list there, headed John Davies tells Peter Hastie “acts of the sinful nature” is not unlike the how the scrolls help us understand the Bible Rule’s “ways of the spirit of falsehood”. This list also perceptively includes “slackness in the search for righteousness”. • Jude: (v14,15) quotes from the apocryphal 1st Book of Enoch, and this raises interesting ques- or so before Jesus, though some overlap tions about lines of “inspiration”. Qumran had his ministry. They are Jewish writings about 20 copies of 1 Enoch (more than of rather than Christian, though they tell us Genesis, Exodus or Leviticus) which suggests a lot about at least one branch of Judaism that this book had the status of Scripture there, at the time of Jesus and a bit before. This, and possibly elsewhere. This could help to of course, is very relevant to the study of explain Jude’s usage. Christian origins. • Revelation: The Temple Scroll is the longest writing from the caves. At length, it describes a So how many scrolls are there, and futuristic (and seemingly ultimate) Temple, vast, John Davies what do the writings consist of? gilded and glorious – grander by far than Herod’s There are many scrolls represented – Temple which was not yet built. However it was There seems to have been quite a in Hebrew, Aramaic and a few in Greek. earthly, and it apparently represented their aspira- flurry of interest in the media lately There are a few scrolls which are rela- tions vis-a-vis the shunned priestly regime in about the Dead Sea Scrolls. Why is tively complete, like the main Isaiah Jerusalem. By contrast, the New Testament’s that? scroll, but most of them are in small frag- futuristic vision was the New Jerusalem (Rev. 21) ments. Putting them together has been which needed no temple at all! Well, a few of the scrolls have been on like putting together 800 jigsaw puzzles Qumran’s scrolls and scraps represent more exhibit in Australia, which has sparked where most of the pieces are missing and than 20 copies each of Deuteronomy, Psalms some of the recent interest. However, the those that remain are badly damaged and and Isaiah; with many quotations/allusions in main reason is that it’s only relatively all mixed together. In most cases, there their own writings from those books. This com- recently that the scrolls have been fully isn’t any picture on the box to help pares with early Christian usage of Jewish published and translated, at least in a pre- either! Scripture, though of course, emphases differed. liminary edition. This gives us access to Many of the scrolls are parts of the For example; Qumran stressed Psalms 37, 78 & the life and thought of the people who Old Testament – all books except Esther 106 while Christians preferred Psalms 2, 40 & wrote them, people who lived close to the are represented by at least one copy. 110. time of Jesus’ ministry. They’re a window Some of the scrolls are other Jewish writ- on a significant aspect of our cultural her- ings we knew about before, such as Thus the two groups varied in their interpreta- itage. I suppose too, the romance of the Jubilees, Sirach, and Psalm 151. However, tions of the essence of historic Judaism. One Scrolls’ accidental discovery in 1947 and many are documents we didn’t know was an earnest human quest, with some enlight- the intrigues surrounding their acquisi- about, such as the War Scroll, the ened glimpses, but was also rather reactionary tion by the Israeli authorities, probably Community Rule and the Temple Scroll. and withdrawn from society. Though without contribute to their mystique. There are also various liturgies and some self righteousness, they had a somewhat brittle commentaries on books of the Old attitude. During the Jewish revolt of 66-70 AD, What exactly are the Dead Sea Testament as well as parts of the Old Rome easily crushed it all; and it was then long Scrolls? Testament strung together in much the forgotten – until its scrolls were found. The The term is used to describe any same way that some New Testament other sprang from a long promised divine initia- ancient writings found in the vicinity of writers collate Old Testament texts. Not tive to meet human need. It showed and the Dead Sea. There are a number of sites all of the Scrolls have been given descrip- encouraged a revolutionary, outgoing love, as around its shores where scrolls have been tive titles like those I’ve already men- many parables and miracles attest. It grasped found. Because of the dryness of the cli- tioned. Most of them just have a cave that the only Messiah devotedly died as a sin- mate, the organic materials of the scrolls number and a fragment number. ners’ substitute and rose again, to set penitents were able to survive there, whereas they free from bondage to the Law, sin and death. Its would have perished in a wetter climate. So who exactly wrote these scrolls? powerful message eventually captured Rome Mostly, the term refers to those scrolls Well, many of them are copies of older and its empire, although, tragically, in the found at one site, Qumran on the north- scrolls, like the Biblical scrolls, for exam- process, it lost much of its sense of spiritual west shore, in a series of 11 caves. That’s ple. The ones which are original compo- freedom, and some even returned to Qumran’s where the vast majority of the scrolls sitions, or some of them at least, may idea of withdrawing from society. from the Dead Sea were found. have been written close to where they were found. There is a set of buildings at Bernard Secombe is a member of St Giles Are Christian writings among Qumran, which was probably the centre Presbyterian Church, Hurstville. He recently them? of a community of Jews in the Dead Sea completed his Masters in Judaic Studies. No. There have been a couple of area. It seems that these people were claims that some, at least, of the scrolls mainly priests, who had withdrawn from The New South Wales Art Gallery held an exhibi- are early Christian writings. But this isn’t the temple in Jerusalem about the middle tion on the Dead Sea Scrolls from July to October. generally reckoned to be correct. Many of the second century BC in protest at ap of the scrolls can be dated to the century what they saw as abuses there.

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 7 DEAD SEA SCROLLS

Some of the scrolls seem to have a dis- scrolls were a long time in being released, Over the past century, there has been a senting or sectarian flavour. For one thing, and it’s true that there was some steady stream of discoveries which have they operate on a different calendar from Jewish–Christian rivalry in the early days of added to our understanding of the Bible. that which became the orthodox Jewish the project which contributed to the None has quite captured the public imagi- calendar. This community is thought to delays. Scholarship is not the detached pur- nation like the Dead Sea Scrolls because have been made up of Essenes, a Jewish sect suit we might like to think it is. Politics and they fill out the picture of the life and we know of from other sources. There are professional jealousy play their part. But ideas of people who lived in the times and other theories about them, but that’s still there has been no conspiracy to suppress places depicted in the Old or New the generally accepted view. Of course we the scrolls. I was at a seminar in Sydney Testaments. can’t rule out the possibility that many of recently, where three eminent Jewish schol- Discoveries like those at Ebla, Nineveh, the scrolls found in the caves were brought ars working on the scrolls, one of them the Babylon, Ras Shamra, Tel el-Amarna, Nag there from other places in Judea or beyond, current chief editor of the project, said that Hammadi and many other places have and they might represent a somewhat any notion of an attempt by the church to added enormously to our appreciation of broader spectrum of the varieties of suppress the scrolls was nonsense. Bible times. We’ve got documents referred Judaism at the time. to in the Bible, like the Book of Enoch. We What do the scrolls reveal about also have epic poems of the Canaanites Some say the scrolls undermine the some of the main elements of which are like some of the Psalms in their authority of the Bible. Is there any Judaism around the time of Jesus? language and imagery. We have some substance to that claim? The scrolls reveal an interesting combi- ancient accounts of creation and the flood It’s hard to see how. The Biblical scrolls nation of scrupulous concern for the law, which we can usefully compare with the found in the Dead Sea region provide evi- and correct ritual procedure as the Essenes Biblical accounts. dence for the text of the Old Testament understood it. Their zeal for the law was There are also accounts of international which is about 1000 years earlier than the mixed with a warm devotion to God, which events like battles and treaties written from earliest surviving manuscripts we had prior they expressed in some of their hymns, the perspective of the foreign nations with to their discovery. There are some minor which we could sing today. Their writings which Israel interacted – the Egyptians, the differences, and at some points they may reveal that they indulged in a lot of specu- Babylonians, the Moabites, and so on. correct the readings of later manuscripts. lation about what they saw as the coming We also possess other “gospels” which These corrections are usually worked into showdown between the forces of God and tell us how Jesus was viewed in some early modern Bibles, and you sometimes see a the forces of darkness, and the coming of Christian or pseudo-Christian circles. footnote telling you this. the messiah, or rather two messiahs. Usually what happens when a fresh discov- The sectarian scrolls, that is the non- ery is made is that one group of scholars Biblical ones, simply fill out our picture. Two messiahs? gets all excited and says that this radically They correct to some extent our under- Yes. They hadn’t realised that the faith- changes our understanding of the Bible. standing of Judaism around the time of ful priest and the faithful king promised in Another group sees it as confirming every- Jesus. They certainly don’t contradict what the Old Testament could be one and the thing they have always believed. After a we know from the Bible. same person, as Jesus revealed himself to while, things settle down, and we see that a be. The priesthood figures prominently in few more pieces fit into the jigsaw puzzle. Doesn’t Barbara Thiering say there the community and its thinking. The However, there always seem to be a few has been a huge conspiracy by the scrolls combine priestly and visionary ele- pieces left over that don’t seem to fit. Later churches to suppress the scrolls ments which were previously thought to discoveries usually fill in these missing because they are afraid that the belong to opposite ends of the Jewish the- gaps. Church’s teaching will be proved ological spectrum. wrong? What would you say is the main thing I don’t want to be unkind to a former How did the community at Qumran we learn from the Dead Sea Scrolls? lecturer of mine at Sydney University, but end? For me, they give us first-hand evidence Dr Thiering is very much a lone voice. The Whatever community was still living at of the kind of environment in which the Australian press likes to treat her as a world Qumran through to 68 AD would have felt New Testament was written. They help us authority but, apart from a few scholars the force of the Roman army. The Jewish to see the New Testament as being written who refute her, she scarcely rates a foot- attempt to break free from Rome was to real people struggling with the issues of note in any serious discussion of the scrolls crushed, along with the remnants of the how to relate to God and his revelation in these days. Qumran settlement. In another way, the Old Testament. Her theories about the Scrolls being a though, the Essenes survived in the form of The more we learn of ancient culture coded message, totally at variance with the their precious manuscripts, hidden away in and religion, particularly those elements New Testament account of Jesus, simply the nearby caves. which interact most closely with the won’t stand up. The carbon-14 dating and Biblical documents themselves – because of other related analyses of the Scrolls make Are there any other discoveries like geographical or historical proximity – the her views impossible, and in any case, her the scrolls which help us to under- more the Bible itself stands out as unique. reconstruction is the result of a string of stand the Bible? For the Christian, it has a ring of authority uncontrolled speculations. I’m glad you said “help us understand”. unmatched by any other document. Amid I remember when she was lecturing me So often, Christians start looking for all the conflicting voices we may hear, many some time ago, she said that Jesus should “proof ” of the Bible’s account in archaeol- of them sounding superficially like the be identified with the revered individual ogy or ancient documents. We need never Bible, we have Jesus’ assurance, “My sheep known in the scrolls as the Teacher of be afraid of what the spade might uncover, hear my voice.” Righteousness. Now she thinks, with no and we ought not to feel so insecure about more evidence, he is the arch-enemy of the the Bible that we need to prove it by exter- John Davies is Principal of the Presbyterian Teacher, the Wicked Priest. It’s true that the nal confirmation. Theological Centre, Burwood, N SW ap

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 8 DEAD SEA SCROLLS Breaking the code No Bible scholars take Barbara Thiering’s theories seriously. Nor should we.

s many readers of this magazine Essenes believed that the prophecies of the will know, the Dead Sea scrolls Old Testament were coming true in their made a recent visit to Australia, time and place. They used a method of and enjoyed much publicity. It’s interpretation known as pesher, where each notA really surprising that the scrolls met verse of prophecy is followed by a com- with such interest here – after all, it is an ment showing how it is actually referring to Australian scholar who has made the most the present community. Some of the scrolls fascinating (and bizarre) claims about the certainly follow this pattern. scrolls – Barbara Thiering. Adrian Schepl One example is the commentary on On Palm Sunday 1990, the ABC Habakkuk 2:8 (“because of the blood of screened a documentary on Dr Thiering’s men and the violence done to the land, to work. In the 10 years since, she has released fathered two sons (Jesus of the Apocalypse, the city, and to all its inhabitants”). The several books through major global pub- p27). This seems to me as absurd as saying commentary reads, “Interpreted, this con- lishers HarperCollins and Doubleday. In that Warner Bros cartoons featuring cerns the Wicked Priest whom God deliv- that time many readers – and a number of Yosemite Sam and Bugs Bunny are actually ered into the hands of his enemies because churchgoers and leaders – have come to see telling us what really happened in the of the iniquity committed against the Barbara Thiering as the greatest thing since American Civil War. Teacher of Righteousness.” diced communion bread. Who else (besides At this point, we meet the scrolls. They The “Teacher of Righteousness” was the movie-makers) has been able to turn appear to be the work of the Essene com- probably a key Essene leader who was guid- the life of Jesus into a Mills and Boon novel munity, which existed from about 150BC – ing his people away from the mainstream to with a twist of McGyver? 70AD. No scholar believes the scrolls to be become the true people of God. The Along with John Spong and A.N. related to Christianity – no scholar, that is, ‘Wicked Priest’ is thought to have been a Wilson, Thiering has gained the attention except Barbara Thiering. corrupt Jewish leader. Paul Barnett and of the international media circus. But she is She believes they have a lot to tell us most other scholars agree that this com- courting disaster both with biblical scholar- about early Christianity, and that the mentary predates Jesus by nearly 200 years. ship and contemporary Christian faith. Gospels and Acts in turn have a lot to tell This gives us a snapshot of how the pesher If her theory is correct, just about every us about the scrolls. Jesus and his followers method works. New Testament scholar should start look- were in fact Essenes living in Qumran, and ing for another day job, and the church we can reconstruct the story of their com- Now we come to Thiering’s innovations. should abandon what it has held as truth munity by meshing together the Gospels, After explaining the pesher method of for the past 2000 years. The consequences Acts, and the scrolls, with a liberal sprin- interpreting the prophets, Thiering pre- of her work are truly monstrous. kling of malarkey. sents the view that the community then Thiering’s bottom line is this: events like Some of Thiering’s work follows a fairly wrote their own story in “code” – the the virgin birth, the miracles of Jesus, and standard scholarly view of the scrolls. The Gospels and Acts (Jesus, pp.4, 25). Like the the resurrection weren’t really historical events (no surprises there). But (here comes the shock) they weren’t fairy-tales either. For most people, this exhausts the options – what else could possibly be left? Quite a lot for a fertile imagination, so it seems. The Gospels and Acts, says Thiering, are actually written in a type of “code” (Jesus the man, pp.22-25). Jesus’ miracles aren’t literal events or myths: they’re riddles, stories with multiple mean- ings, which we need to unlock. When we read in the Gospels about the miraculous feedings and walking on water (Jn. 6:1-14; Mk. 6:30-44; Lk. 9:10-17; Mk. 14:13-21) these stories aren’t to be accepted on face value: they’re actually recording the first ordinations to the Christian ministry (Jesus, p90). The “word of God increasing” in Acts 6:7; 12:24 actually means that Jesus’ had Sorting fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 9 DEAD SEA SCROLLS

Jesus was on the road to recovery, and it was business as usual. We don’t even have to deal with such outrageous claims to shoot big holes through Thiering’s work. She has made some foolish errors straight off in her understanding of pesher. This method of interpretation, says New Testament scholar Tom Wright, was never a way of writing his- tory in the scrolls. Yes, it was a way of read- ing some of the material, but there is no reason to think the Gospels are a radical new exercise in writing pesher. The claim is A portion of Isaiah in the scrolls unfounded and absurd. “Pesher was a way of saying ‘we are the people spoken of by the prophets’, not ‘we are the people who prophets, the only way to really understand This crucifixion came about after a split can set new crossword puzzles for others these stories is to read them using the with John the Baptist. John is supposedly to solve’.” pesher method. The church’s big problem, the one that the Habakkuk scroll calls the Besides her basic interpretive method, of course, is that until Barbara Thiering “Teacher of Righteousness”, and Jesus is Thiering’s work is seriously flawed in other came on the scene with the “keys to the identified with the “Wicked Priest” (Jesus, areas. Because she has the keys to this mon- kingdom”, we’ve all been blind. p19). While John opted for a stricter com- ster machine called “pesher in the Gospels” But now we see! And what do we see in munity rule, Jesus was a little lax in matters she is able to rearrange the pieces wherever this coded history? Well, a story most of the law, and opposed John. He split off she wants them. Wright compares her work screen writers would kill for. Romance to form his own party, but came a cropper to peeling off all the stickers on a Rubik’s (including two marriages and three child- when Pilate paid a visit to Qumran (Jesus, cube and then lining them up without ever ren (Jesus, pp88, 133, 146, 150, 222), pp112-115). Thiering’s dating of the doing the hard work. intrigue, power plays, treason – and the Habakkuk pesher here is about 200 years Thiering claims that “the New eventual death of an aged and secluded later than virtually all other scholars’ dat- Testament does not support any assertion Jesus in Rome (Jesus, p160). Who among ing. that the resurrection is the central event of us has had the wisdom to see these hidden When Jesus was crucified, he didn’t Christianity” (Jesus, 117). It is only a recent treasures just below the surface of the actually die on the cross. If you think this phenomenon (in the past 200 years) among Gospels and Acts? sounds like a reincarnation of the old fundamentalists. She has failed to engage ‘swoon’ theory, you’re dead right. Yet both Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 and church Jesus, it seems, did not spend his days Thiering is so certain: “Jesus did not die on history’s creeds. traipsing all over Palestine – rather, the dif- the cross... This is not conjecture, but New Testament scholar Luke Timothy ferent geographical locations listed in the comes from a reading of the text by the Johnson calls her work “the purest poppy- Gospels (‘Jerusalem’, ‘Capernaum’, pesher method” (Jesus, 116). cock”. Scrolls scholar A.D. Crown ‘Bethany’ etc.) were actually coded names Jesus, it seems, was actually poisoned. describes her work as “fiction ... and sand for different parts of the Qumran commu- But his constitution was strong, and he castles”. nity. So Jesus was not actually crucified in merely fainted. One of the two men cruci- Jerusalem, but in Qumran (Apocalypse, 87- fied with him (Simon Magus) revived him If Thiering is correct, “it seems doubtful... 88)! in the burial cave with an antidote. Soon whether anyone would ever take Christianity seriously again”, says Wright. For Thiering, it is liberating to have Jesus lifted down from the stained glass to join the average pleb. But what a disaster for our faith! The writer to Hebrews is quick to remind us that though Jesus knows the human experience, he was “without sin” (Heb. 4:15) – for he was God in the flesh. It is a mercy that several scholars have taken the trouble to analyse Thiering’s claims. How devastating for the church if her work were to go unanswered. Thank God for the reliable, historical record we find in the Gospels – and that they are accessible without having to wade through wads of ridiculous puzzles. What a delight to know that the very same Lord and Saviour whom we worship is found on the pages of the Gospels in the God-man, Jesus of Nazareth.

Adrian Schepl is a student at the Presbyterian Qumran ruins Theological Centre, Sydney. ap

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 10 DEVOTION Spiritual understanding True knowledge enriches our understanding of God, suggests Jonathan Edwards.

racious affections arise from the And though men’s religious affections mind being enlightened, rightly truly arise from some instruction or light in and spiritually, to understand or IN THE the understanding, yet the affection is not apprehend divine things. Holy PRESENCE gracious unless the light which is the affectionsG are not heat without light; but ground of it be spiritual. Affections may be evermore arise from the information of the OF GOD excited by that understanding of things understanding, some spiritual instruction which they obtain merely by human teach- that the mind receives, some light or actual ing, with the common improvement of the knowledge. faculties of the mind. The child of God is graciously affected Men may be much affected by knowl- because he sees and understands something edge of things of religion that they obtain more of divine things than he did before, this way; as some philosophers have been more of God or Christ, and of the glorious mightily affected, and almost carried things exhibited in the gospel; he has some beyond themselves, by the discoveries they clearer and better view than he had before, have made in mathematics and natural phi- when he was not affected. Either he losophy. So men may be much affected receives some understanding of divine new view of Christ in his spiritual excellen- from common illuminations of the Spirit of things that is new to him, or has his former cies and fulness. Things that appertain to God, in which God assists men’s faculties knowledge renewed after the view was the way of salvation by Christ are opened to to a greater degree of that kind of under- decayed: “ And this is my prayer, that your him in a new manner, and he now under- standing of religious matters, which they love may abound more and more in knowl- stands those divine and spiritual doctrines have in some degree by only the ordinary edge and depth of insight” (Phil 1:9), “Put which once were foolishness to him. exercise and improvement of their own fac- on the new self which is being renewed in Such enlightenings of the understanding ulties. knowledge” (Col 3:10). as these are things entirely different in their Such illuminations may much affect the Such is the nature of man that it is nature from strong ideas of shapes and mind, as in many whom we read of in impossible his mind should be affected, colours, and outward brightness and glory, Scripture that were once enlightened. But unless it be by something that he appre- or sounds and voices. That all gracious these affections are not spiritual. There is hends, or that his mind conceives. But in affections do arise from some instruction such a thing, if the Scriptures are of any use many persons those apprehensions that or enlightening of the understanding, is to teach us anything, as a spiritual, super- they have, wherewith they are affected, therefore a further proof that affections natural understanding of divine things that have nothing of the nature of knowledge or which arise from such impression on the is peculiar to the saints, and which those instruction in them. As for instance, when imagination are not gracious affections. who are not saints have nothing of. (1 a person is affected with a lively idea, sud- Cor2:14) denly excited in his mind, of some shape or Hence, also, it appears that affections very beautiful pleasant form of counte- arising from texts of Scripture coming to Jonathan Edwards (1703-58) was a leading nance, or other glorious outward appear- the mind are vain, when no instruction American theologian and philosopher. This ance: here is something apprehended or received in the understanding from those extract is taken from The Religious Affections conceived by the mind; but there is nothing texts, or anything taught in those texts, is (Banner of Truth). ap of the nature of instruction in it, persons the ground of the affection, but the manner become never the wiser by such things, or of their coming to the mind. more knowing about God, or a Mediator When Christ makes the Scripture a Christian Singles

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c†RdddddddddddddddHwsRdddddTuceyPddddddHw csRdddddddddHwgsRdddddddddddddHwc spiritual and gracious affections are not Scripture must be vain, when the affection csRddHwchfcsRddddddHwc raised after this manner; these arise from the is founded on something that is supposed enlightening of the understanding to under- to be taught by it which really is not con- Any nice singles can join! stand the things that are taught of God and tained in it, nor in any other Scripture; Send for FREE colour brochure: Christ, in a new manner. There is a new because such supposed instruction is not PO Box 122 WALLSEND 2287 understanding of the excellent nature of real instruction, but a mistake and misap- Ph/Fax: 02 4955 5445 God and his wonderful perfections, some prehension of the mind. www.christiansingles.com.au

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 11 MISSIONS Land of the rising Son Japan has few Christians, but they are working hard.

top!” I steadied the car. “Did you fallen world ... not one on the way up. Truly see it?” Fred Reid had been amazing! working in Japan for 13 years as That was the catalyst. He now had to a missionary of the PCA. Beside read the Bible in order to further help this him‘S in the back seat was Seima Aoyagi. girl. And, according to his promise, God’s They work together on one of the massive word “did not return unto him empty”. campuses of the University of Tokyo. This Seima committed his life to Jesus, Son of was their first visit to Australia. I, the God, Saviour. The obvious question was, of Australian driver, had no idea what I had to course, “Is she now your wife?” “No!”, stop for. “What do you call it? A dragon?” Robert Benn Seima responded with a broad smile. But he By now I had woken up to the fact that we is now married to a wonderful wife who is had just passed a frilled-neck lizard. The baptised. Two hundred students now now expecting their second child. kind that we used to catch and put in each gather for Bible study and are growing in Fred was the lizard man. Seima was the other’s desks as kids. passion to save their friends. As students linguist. It was incredible the way he would Fred didn’t catch that one, but was are saved we direct them into the local hear a new word, stop us mid-sentence, absolutely delighted to spend two hours in church, and there they bring the passion of interrogate us in respect to the meaning ... the Healesville Nature Sanctuary in new life in Christ.” and then a few sentences later he would Victoria trying to handle anything that prove it to be part of his vocabulary. crept or crawled. A missionary and a rep- Fred commented on the role of English- Fred and Seima spoke to the General tilologist (reptile-lover)! In Japan on teaching in the process: “It’s the most out- Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of Saturdays he and his kids catch snakes for standing tool that can be used to build rela- Victoria, and from that point on they had pets. They buy mice to feed them. Modern tionships out of which we share the reality no spare time. Many of the commissioners missionaries. A bit too much for Aussie of our faith in Christ. All the students want and visitors wanted to talk further about mission directors. But, what a marvellous to speak English to native English-speak- what God is doing in “planting Presbyteries story of mission. ers. We try to get as many teachers there as in Japan” where only a quarter of one per Fred takes up the story: “It was with possible – from America and Australia. We cent is evangelical Christian in a land of 125 much enthusiasm and encouragement that Japanese speakers can then enter into their million people. the Presbyterian Church in America lives to help them understand and respond decided to send a team of missionaries to to the Saviour.” Robert Benn is director of Australian Japan to focus on college ministry and In May the General Assembly of the Presbyterian World Mission, and convener of church planting. We believed that by doing PCJ formalised the Chiba Presbytery of 11 the National Journal Committee. ap both, and through intensive evangelism and congregations. This Presbytery was discipleship, we would be investing in the planted as a direct result of college min- long-term future health of the Presbyterian istry/church planting, and a strong part- Church of Japan.” nership between PCJ and PCA. After the The idea came from the director of assembly recognised the Chiba church planting in the PCA, who had Presbytery, they immediately proposed observed that there was no other single planting another thriving Presbytery ministry within the PCA which had before 2015. affected the explosion of the church as had Seima was not a silent partner. Long RED ROCK reformed college ministry. before he became co-leader of College Near Coffs Harbour He said, “Through the PCA’s invest- Ministries, he had been like any one of ment of men and money in evangelising the those Shinto/Buddhist materially success- 2 Bedroom Holiday House open fields of college ministry, in one year ful Japanese students. Then how had he over 40 students entered seminary to pre- come to be a Christian leader? During his $150 per week pare for ministry. This gave them a passion college years he had become attracted to a to do the same on a broader base across the young lady. He found out that she was a $20 cleaning fee country. Christian and felt terribly sorry for her. “So we came to Japan. It is difficult to Could she not understand mature reason? M. Hall, 12 Bimble Ave confront Japanese men with the gospel Could she not follow an evolutionary S. Grafton beyond their student days, because they explanation of origins? He would educate become consumed by company structures. her out of pity. What amazed him was that Ph 02 6643 3068 In the past four years we have had four she had as good a grasp of the theories of young Japanese Presbyterian men and two evolution as he did. Yet, she believed in women doing evangelism on a campus of God and that he had communicated in 12,000 students. Ten students have been mercy to what she understood to be a

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 12 NEWS

riage & cohabitation and divorce & remar- obviously looking for money. About $130 riage. Marjorie Armstrong has been was stolen. appointed village manager at Kirkbrae home Kilsyth. Evangelism training In administrative moves, the assembly approved a new set of regulations to help Pictured, members of the St.Andrews sessions institute the work of deacons, the Wagga Wagga congregation (Rev. Derek .front revised constitution of the Presbyterian Bullen) who underwent evangelism train- Women’s Missionary Union; and the ing by Bruce Murray from the Assembly revised constitution of the PYV. A change Evangelism Committee earlier this year. was proposed to the rules governing the The group are keen to implement the train- election of new elders to include a compul- ing through their outreach group. For more sory course in the doctrines of the information, contact Bruce Murray on (02) Westminster Confession of Faith. 9153 0733. The assembly was challenged by addresses from Barbara Firth (Home Mission Workers’ Association), Winifred Allen (Presbyterian Women’s Missionary Union), and Saltshakers’ Peter Stokes. It thanked John and Lyn Woodward for many New Victorian moderator years’ chaplaincy work for the PCV, and Reg and Elaine Mathews for 10 years ener- The General Assembly of the getic and faithful service with the Home Presbyterian Church of Victoria,which met Mission committee. in Benalla from October 2 to 5, inducted Peter Phillips, minister of the Clifton Hill Appointments Presbyterian Church, as moderator for 2000/2001 before a large gathering at St Mr Laurie Leighton was inducted into Andrews, Benalla. the session of the Bairnsdale Church in Moderator General Bruce Christian, the Presbytery of Gippsland (Victoria) on who visited the assembly from New South July 30. For the past year, Mr Leighton has Ambassador for Christ Wales, gave four strong Biblical exposi- been the permanent, part-time pastoral tions, and Fred Reid, a Presbyterian worker in the home mission station. This The American ambassador, Edward Church in America missionary in Japan, appointment has been renewed for another Gnehm Jr, and his wife Margaret wor- urged workers to step forward. year. shipped with the St Columba’s Peppermint Rev. Adrian Van Ash was inducted to Grove (WA) congregation during his offi- the Scots Church parish in Sydney on cial visit to Western Australia in October. Friday October 27 by the Presbytery of Rev. Keith Morris reported that the visit Sydney was low key at the ambassador’s request. Address updates Aged-care chaplain Rev. D R (Rudi) Schwartz, 5 Church Deaconess Dianne Yates has been Street, PO Box 768 Naracoorte SA 5271 appointed Chaplain to Aged Care Tel: (08) 8762 1035. Mobile: 0419 797 246 Complexes in Brisbane. She will establish E-mail: [email protected] and train teains of volunteers to assist in Rev. Jim Elliott, Phone: (02) 9745 3935; this ministry, eventually statewide, it is Fax: (02) 9706 3499; Mobile: 0414 453 935 hoped. Dianne has served as assistant in Peter and Lorraine Phillips E-mail: [email protected] Gladstone, Toowoomba (St. Andrew’s), The new clerk of Presbytery of the Bundaberg and St. Paul’s Brisbane and was Hunter is Rev. John Macintyre, PO Box chaplain to St Andrew’s War Memorial Victorian assembly 123, Newcastle NSW 2300 Tel. O: (02) Hospital from 1987 to January 2000. Her 4929 2379 Tel. H: (02) 4957 2634 E-mail: John Wilson reports that, in other news [email protected] from the assembly, recognition was given to Joan Campbell’s 26 years’ missionary Burglary in Brisbane service with WEC. The Theological Education Committee is receiving appli- A break-in at Anne Street Presbyterian cations for OT/Hebrew lecturer to replace Church, Brisbane, caused $2500 damage on Allan Harman, who retires next year. The the night of August 13. It appears likely Christian Education & Nurture that the intruders hid in Interior House Committee reported its proposal to during the Korean evening service, then appoint a project coordinator to develop a forced entry by physically breaking into new Presbyterian/reformed Sunday School doors, windows and fibro walls. curriculum. The Church & Nation Computers and office equipment in all Committee is producing booklets on mar- areas were undamaged as the intruders were Dianne Yates

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 13 NEWS

call to aged care chaplaincy comes as a nat- Lord, His glories show – and the benedic- They also repaired the college’s internal ural flow on from the many years of minis- tion. Next Sunday, the commissioning ser- road, and did the wiring for two buildings, tering to the elderly as a hospital chaplain. vice was held in the new St. Andrew’s replacing numerous extension leads, plugs church building which occupies such a and adaptors lying around the floors. Ministry candidates prominent position in the town centre. For more details about Mobile Mission Workshop, contact David and Margaret The Reformed College of Ministries Stephens, Box CP 278 Mildura 3501; reports that it has four ministry candidates phone (03) 50247121 in 2001. At the time of going to print there are seven men in various stages of applying across MERF shipment to Sudan to be accepted as candidates, after a period of low student numbers in recent years. The Middle East Reformed Fellowship- Australia is sending a trial shipment of sec- New home in Dromana australia ond-hand clothing, gardening equipment, books and Bibles to South Sudan. MERF- Emotions were mixed on 4 June at the Australia coordinator Rev. Les Percy said last service of the 36-year-old Dromana the aim was to send a six-metre shipping Presbyterian Church, Vic, which was to be container of relief supplies from Brisbane pulled down to make way for a large retail to Lokichoggio, the United Nations base in development. The church was filled with Northern Kenya. From there the material present and former members and visitors, will be ferried into Southern Sudan. including the Rev. Fred Belcher, now 92, Mr Percy said that because of the civil who was home missionary there from war, which has raged for more than 40 1977-1980. The service was led by Rev. Peter Dodds McCormick years, people living in Southern Sudan are Andrew Venn. The most poignant part of in continuing need of assistance. the decommissioning service was the Jennifer Burgess is researching the life of International aid agencies, hospitals and removal of the cross from the wall behind Peter Dodds McCormick (1834-1916) and schools have been bombed by forces of the the communion table where it had been thought some readers may have informa- Islamic Government in Khartoum which fixed for the last 36 years. tion. Peter Dodds McCormick, who has a policy of Islamisation of the whole of Then the congregation left the old arrived in Sydney from Scotland in 1955, the Sudan. The church has suffered fierce building for the last time and headed was an elder in the Presbyterian Church. persecution. towards the new church where, with the He was also at the opening of the MERF hopes this will be the first of sev- sun streaming in through the high win- Presbyterian Military Institution at eral containers of relief supplies. Most of dows, they completed their worship with Liverpool in 1916. He was active in Scottish the clothing was bought from Drug Arm in the singing of the last hymn – Praise the societies, and wrote Advance Australia Fair, Brisbane, with donations making up the which was first performed on St Andrews rest. Freight accounts for most of the day in 1878. She is also trying to obtain a $18,000 needed to send the 6 tonnes to copy of a book written by Peter D Lokichoggio. McCormack, Bonny Banks of Clyde. Please For details of how to donate, contact contact her by email [email protected] MERF-Australia, POBox 64, Zillmere, Qld or write to 20 Crucis Street, Coorparoo 4034 Qld 4151. Tools with a Mission David and Mararet Stephens recently returned from Thailand, serving with Mobile Mission workshops. They worked at the Evangelical Bible College for Karen refugees in remote Palau. Their team cleared and repaired a blocked water canal, was cleared and repaired, bringing fresh river water right up to the property. Tanks were constructed and installed above the buildings with pip- ing being laid some 150 metres to the newly opened canal. The benefit of this will stay with the college for many years as clean water is pumped up and gravity-fed on tap to the bathing and eating areas. With the students, they cleared a large area of the 10- acre property and established sizeable gar- den beds of beans, corn and other vegeta- bles. This again will help the college long Scenes from Dromana Presbyterian into the future by providing much of their Church’s decommissioning own food and a surplus that can be sold. Contents of MERF shipment to Sudan

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 14 NEWS

Games outreach Christians in the Molucca province. Recently, thousands of Lasker Jihad fight- Bible Societies across the world took ers infiltrated the Moluccas in East advantage of the massive spectacle of the world Indonesia, ethnically cleansing the Sydney Olympic Games to share the Word Christians in the area. The city of Ambon of God. While the Bible Society in has been destroyed. Many hundreds have Australia produced 570,000 New news been killed and thousands made homeless. Testaments and Gospels for distribution in There are no longer any Christians on Australia, tens of thousands of sports the island of Tenate, where 10,000 once Scriptures in a variety of languages have lived. All Tenate’s church buildings have been published by national Bible Societies been razed to the ground. Unless interna- in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas. tional action is taken, Christians may be Some examples: driven out of most of the islands in the • The German Bible Society (GBS) printed Moluccas. Moluccan Christian leaders are 10,000 copies of a sports New Testament, now calling for an international peacekeep- Das Leben Gewinnen (Win Life) to coin- ing force to be sent to the region to halt the cide with the Games. bloodshed. • In Sierra Leone, hundreds of Gospels of Floods in Mozambique In September, Indonesian President Luke were distributed to participants in a Abdurrahman Wahid invited groups of football gala held on September 23. Recent heavy rains in Mozambique, Muslims and Christians from Ambon to Organised by the Bible Society in Sierra South Africa and Zimbabwe have been discuss reconciliation. Christians refused to Leone (BSSL) and Christian groups, the followed by the rains of Cyclone Eline. As meet till the government took seriously event was timed to coincide with the a result of the cyclone 650,000 people have Jihad warriors in the region. Christians felt Olympics. been displaced and 700 killed. The cyclone that they were not treated as citizens of • Athletes from Bangladesh received sports has destroyed crops for 2 million people in Indonesia. The government has failed to New Testaments in Bangla (Bengali) in Mozambique. There are great fears of provide protection, and factions in the their Olympic packages through a cooper- malaria and cholera outbreaks. Many army have backed the jihad. ative effort by the Bangladesh Bible Society Mozambicans have been awakened to spir- and the Bible Society in Australia. itual issues. Many people are asking: “Is Irish mission growth • A special sports edition of the Indonesian God trying to get our attention?” National Bible, featuring the testimonies of pastors and missionaries are busy with peo- The retiring convenor of the Overseas Indonesian and international sports stars, ple wanting to return to church or wanting Mission Board, Rev. Jim Campbell, told was published by the Indonesian Bible to know about Christ for the first time. the recent Irish Presbyterian General Society and distributed to members of the Assembly that for effective missionary Indonesian Olympic team. The church is ‘out of touch’ work “we need men and women, older and • Australia helped the Nepal Bible Society younger, with different gifts and skills, the provide Scriptures for Nepali Olympic ath- Professor Duncan Forrester, who heads ability to relate easily to people in new cul- letes. Christian ethics and practical theology at tural situations and who have a strong com- • Young people were the focus of the Edinburgh University, has called for the full mitment to Jesus Christ and his Church”. Ceylon Bible Society’s (CBS) sports out- involvement of gay people in the life of the The church has mission partners in 16 reach program during the Olympic Games. church and criticised the Church of countries. Over the past 30 years, mission- The CBS Youth Department and Scotland’s attitude to gays and lesbians. aries in active service have doubled to about Interdenominational Youth Committee “There are a ‘silent majority’ of the gay 80 and partner churches from five to 20. organised special sports events throughout community,” he says “which believes that the Olympic fortnight, during which the Church and its attitude to gay people Driver bars Christians Scriptures were distributed to young par- are for the most part hypocritical and ticipants and spectators. oppressive and totally out of touch with the A Seattle, US, bus driver forced off two realities of today”. passengers having a private conversation about God. Kelly Smith, one of the pas- Molucca crisis sengers, appealed to the Rutherford Institute, which has filed an action against In April more than 5000 Muslim funda- the Snohomish County Community mentalists met in Jakarta where they Transit in the Snohomish County Supreme declared a jihad (holy war) against the Court. She wants compensation for dam-

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AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 15 NEWS

ages, and an order prohibiting the transit Freedom in India desperate attempt to curb the rapid service discriminating against passengers spread of Protestant Christianity among because of religious convictions. The US Commission on the Hmong minority in the country’s International Religious Freedom will north-west provinces along the Chinese Real victory hold hearings on religious freedom in border.” India and Pakistan to determine Stephen Higgins from the Anglican American policy. The hearing comes Christians jailed Media Sydney reports on a function organ- after concerns of growing assaults on ised by Quest Australia called An Evening India’s religious minorities since the rise VOM reports that three American mis- with the Stars. Joe Deloach, a former to power of the Hindu nationalist sionaries were arrested in China, then Olympic 200 metre gold medallist, told Bharatiya Janata Party in 1998. Christian released two days later. The three were those present: “I trained for four years for converts have been intimidated, detained with 130 Chinese members of the a race that lasted 19.75 seconds.” But, he churches and schools burned, priests and China Fang-cheng Church, a 500,000 said, “the most important thing that we can missionaries murdered. member evangelical group. Beijing’s ever accomplish is having a relationship Communist rulers banned the church last with Jesus Christ”. Sudan continues campaign year for its affiliation with overseas Christians and its refusal to join govern- Vatican lashes ecumenism The government of Sudan has waged a ment-controlled churches. decisive aerial campaign against many Dr Ishmael Noko, General Secretary of humanitarian organisations in largely Sudan: a double miracle the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), Christian Southern Sudan. Voice of the was saddened by the blow to ecumenism Martyrs (VOM) reports: “It has bombed A plane carrying the first Bibles trans- from the recent Vatican document plants, airstrips, clinics, UN compounds, lated in the Nuer language crashed, in Dominus Iesus. Particularly it stated that International Red Cross, Samaritan’s Purse Mading, Southern Sudan, but amazingly “ecclesiastical communities which have not Hospital, TEAR Fund and others.” no one was injured. Locals praised God preserved the valid Episcopate and genuine for the double miracle of sparing the and integral substance of the Eucharist Buddhists converted plane and giving them Scriptures in their mystery, are not Churches in the proper own language. A Nuer man at the dedica- sense.” The LWF believes that ecumenism In a Buddhist temple in Myanmar, in a tion service for the new Bibles said is not an option for the church but essen- remote village, Buddhists have seen the “Praise God! Our dream has been ful- tial. It plans to discuss the document with Jesus film and turned to Jesus. VOM filled.” Roman Catholic representatives. reports: “Several Buddhist elders and the However, the World Methodist village chief professed faith in Christ as a Korea: Church founder dies. Council responded favourably, saying result of the film.” Dominus Iesus reaffirms Jesus Christ as the Kyung Chik Han, the founding pastor one saviour of the world. At the same time Christian radio jammed of Young Nak Presbyterian Church in it acknowledges the need for continued dia- Seoul, Korea, died in April, aged 97. The logue so each church will “come to a fuller In Vietnam authorities have been jam- 60,000-member Young Nak Church is recognition of the churchly character of the ming FEBC’s Christian Hmong dialect the largest Presbyterian Church in the other”. radio broadcasts. VOM reports “this is a world. K. M. SMITH Funeral Directors – since 1877 53 BROOKES STREET, BOWEN HILLS TELEPHONE (07) 3252 2031 1- 1/182 Bay Terrace, Wynnum, (07) 3548 4133 For prompt courteous and considerate attention to your Funeral requirements we are available 24 HOURS A DAY, 7 DAYS A WEEK. Our Head Office is located at 53 Brookes Street, Bowen Hills – with ample off-street parking available. If it is more convenient, our trained staff will make funeral arrangements in your home. If you prefer, the arrangements can be made by telephone. FREECALL 1800 819 938 To: K.M.Smith, Freepost 202, PO Box 2170, Fortitude Valley, Qld, 4006 ------Please send me information on pre-arrangement of Funerals. Name: ...... Address: ......

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 16 CULTURE WATCH

Movie Watch Time for the disclaimer. There’s stuff in this movie that will make you blush. There Shiloh High Fidelity are values here that will reflect the values of Reviewed by Phil Campbell your disconnected kids. There’s some Coffee swearing – it’s gritty and real – and one rel- Bed & Breakfast atively modest bedroom scene. But the one redeeming feature of High Fidelity is that when it all pans out, the relational disasters Come and be spoilt on that come from the commitment-free life a coffee plantation. style are made all too clear. The movie cli- Big country style maxes with an old-fashioned marriage pro- posal that will bring the glimmer of a tear to breakfasts, late check- the sternest eye. out. High Fidelity sells itself as “a comedy Three bedrooms. about fear of commitment, hating your job, falling in love and other pop favourites”. Close to Gold Coast John Cusack and Iben Hjejle in High National Parks. Fidelity John Cusack and Iben Hjejle are Rob and Laura; as the story opens, Laura is moving Relax & Enjoy. out, and Rob is determined not to care. His Tariff $65 double per et’s be honest. If you’re a typical parting words to the slamming door: “If reader, you’re a middle-aged or you really wanted to mess me up, you night, Single & Weekly senior Australian Presbyterian, and should have got to me earlier.” rates your children and grandchildren From there, Rob narrates his litany of available haveL grown up and made choices that have relationship failures in the first person – left you in despair. Their interest in the laconic, humorous, and more than a touch church you love is minimal; their world is sad. There’s Janet in grade eight, who Lot 3/22 Stokers Road, different in ways you can’t even under- dumped him; Allison Ashmore at college, Stokers Siding. stand; and their moral choices have left you who dumped him. Layer after layer peels confused and hurt. You’ve watched while away, as Rob buries himself in his retro Phone: (02) 6677 9554 the conventions of marriage and life com- “hits of the 70s” record store, determined mitment have been sidestepped and not to be heartbroken by Laura’s depar- ignored, and it’s more likely you’ve grieved ture. Come as Strangers, as they’ve floated from one relationship to It’s not working. Rob sinks deeper and Depart as Friends another with no real commitment at all. deeper into despair - “Do I listen to pop If that’s true of you – please don’t music because I’m miserable, or am I mis- bother writing to tell me it’s not – then erable because I listen to pop music?” High Fidelity is a movie that will help you Either way, after five failed relationships, make some connections. It will also make Rob can’t shake the feeling there’s some- Nathan Tasker you sound incredibly hip – if that’s still the thing wrong, so he decides to track down live in concert word these days – when you tell your adult his previous lovers and ask them to help kids they should see it while it’s still in the him work things out. It’s a long journey, theatres. and one that highlights the problem. Rob has never been prepared to commit. Fidelity has never been a part of his moral and intellectual makeup. And now, at 35, Launching his new CD he’s face to face with the consequences. “It “Acoustic Hope” made more sense to commit to nothing,” (available on says Rob, “and that’s been suicide by tiny the night) increments.” This is a movie that packs a surprisingly potent punch. It’s an Ecclesiastes-style first-person journey through a life style that doesn’t work – and that makes it an uncomfortable trip. But the bottom line is a rock-solid marriage proposal that goes a little like this: “I’m sick and tired of the fan- tasy – it doesn’t exist. I’m sick and tired of Sat 2 December having to think about this stuff all the time. Sat 2 December Marry me?” AbbotsleighAbbotsleigh GirlsGirls SchoolSchool Romantic? Maybe not. But it’s a cry for (1666(1666 PacificPacific Highway,Highway, something far more solid and substantial Wahroonga)Wahroonga) than the fantasies of a lost generation. If you don’t see it yourself, at least recom- 7.30pm7.30pm mend it to someone who needs it. Tickets:Tickets: $15.00 $15.00 atat doordoor (enquiries(enquiries 94879487 5352)5352) Phil Campbell is Culture Watch editor. ap nathan tasker

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 17 ART Sublime depravity Is art a distraction or worse, or part of God’s good gift?

It is the glory and good of Art, The propagandist makes her ideology That Art remains the one way possible everything, and takes no joy in the act of Of speaking truth, to mouths like mine at least. creating itself. The medium is used as a kind of trick, and is seen as merely the uch was the hope of Robert packaging for a higher good. The Browning. However, in this fallen reader/viewer/consumer is treated patron- world, art is cursed. As Nicholas isingly, as if the art is the spoonful of sugar Wolterstorff writes: “Art is not iso- that makes the ideological medicine go latedS from the radical fallenness of our Michael Jensen down. nature. It is an instrument of it. Art does Some great art has been made out of not lift us out of the radical evil of our his- propaganda – Virgil’s great Roman epic tory but plunges us into it. Art is not Art involves the imaginative arrangement The Aeneid is an example. However, it is man’s saviour but a willing accomplice in and presentation of matter, such as words, because of the complexity and subtlety of our crimes.” or paint, or notes. For matter to become Virgil’s treatment of his themes that his The human imagination reveals its own “art” means that it has been invested with work transcends a mere celebration of the fallenness in its art. Not only do inher- a special kind of significance, or meaning. founding of the Roman state. We may also ently corrupt forms of art – blasphemy, It is universal and ubiquitous – no human view a masterful piece of propaganda such pornography, idolatry, kitsch, propaganda society is without some form of art, and as the Nazi film The Triumph of the Will in – proliferate; but our expressions of order virtually no human being would live out of a new way when the historical context has are subject to chaos, and our hopes are contact with art. radically changed. However, in the main, subject to despair. And yet the arts have The arts are held to engender an aes- the propaganda of any ideology tends to the capacity to elevate us, to provide some thetic response, meaning that something be simplistic, banal and one-dimensional, of our most glorious moments, to show us more than a merely sensory or intellectual re-enforcing conformity to its agenda. most in tune with ourselves and the world, or even emotional response may be felt Propaganda is an act of pure power. even to give us inklings of the divine. As when we experience art. The danger of The pornographer makes inducing desire within man and woman themselves, there such a broad definition is that we shall be his goal, and again uses all the tricks and remains the tension between the potential making statements that are necessarily powers of art in the service of his end. both for great beauty and also great vile- general, so that the major differences While true erotic art, like the Song of ness. between the arts will be obscured. Solomon, celebrates the human reality and Artists of all kinds throughout history Whatever theological observations we God-givenness of sexual bliss, pornogra- have struggled with this paradox, juggling offer, then, would ideally be sharpened by phy takes sex away from flesh-and-blood the contradictions within the artistic discussion of the major art forms and indi- people and makes it an unliveable, perma- endeavour. Christian theology is in a vidual works. nently tumescent fantasy. It removes not unique position to address this paradox, just the clothes but also the human indi- with its doctrines of createdness and yet The height of human hubris is most viduality of the (usually) women depicted; fallenness. Despite some historical false poignantly captured by the story of the and feeds on the physiological desires of trails, a Christ-centred view of the place of Tower of Babel: “Come, let us build our- men. It is prostitution by proxy. It pro- the arts is a tremendously fruitful one. selves a city, and a tower with its top in the motes loneliness. By “the arts” I mean the whole gamut heavens, and let us make a name for our- My point is that pornography is not of human imaginative and creative activity, selves; otherwise we shall be scattered including literary, musical, architectural, abroad upon the face of the earth” (Gen theatrical, visual, and even televisual arts. 11:4). The history of human art reveals that this arrogance – of created beings cre- ating in defiance of the creator – has since then continued largely unfettered. It is not the arts themselves that are corrupt; in fact the opposite is true. The uses to which art is put reveal how perverse human creativ- ity can be. Thus art has been distorted by its users into corrupted forms, like pornography and propaganda. Propaganda and pornography form an interesting pair. They represent the most cynical forms art can take – the use of the power of human creativity for a base end, Breughel’s Tower of Babel whether indoctrination or masturbation. An example of Bauhaus architecture

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 18 ART

urban life is lived in conditions that are unsympathetic to human beings as physi- cal organisms rather than machines. The media bombards us with the braying brashness of its commercials. But even in that which is intended for beauty, there is the mark of ugliness. Bauhaus architecture is an outstanding example of an aesthetic method that, in the attempt for a purity of form, (in many cases) actually brutalised (and still bru- talises) those who use it. One of the glo- Sydney Opera House ries of human creative expression, the Sydney Opera House, has to live cheek- by-jowl with a building of extraordinary just morally bad – it is artistically bad as banality. well. Its potent and direct realism impris- Czech dramatist and president Vaclev ons the (male) imagination. It is control- Havel recalls a childhood encounter with ling rather than liberating. the ugly: “As a boy...I used to walk to Self-portrait by Francis Bacon As human creativity serves Eros, so school in a nearby village along a cart track also it may serve Mammon. There is of through the fields and, on the way, see on course nothing wrong with artists receiv- the horizon a huge smokestack of some in service of them. ing pay for their work, nor in their being hurriedly built factory, in all likelihood in Further, while art may succeed up to a encouraged by a commission to produce the service of war. It spewed out dense point, many artists speak of the frustrating work that is socially desirable and gen- smoke and scattered it across the sky. Each experience of the gap between imagination uinely wanted. Many of the great time I saw it, I had an intense sense of and realisation. Modern theorists have Renaissance artists and musicians had aris- something profoundly wrong, of humans proclaimed the sense of connection we tocratic benefactors; and today govern- soiling the heavens ... It seemed to me that experience via the arts a fantasy. ment agencies fulfill much the same func- ... humans are guilty of something, that Humanity’s paradox, so evident in its tion. However, commercial interests often they destroy something important, arbi- art, is to be at home and not at home in the serve to degrade the arts. trarily disrupting the natural order of world; to see the possibility in the world, When the arts serve the purpose of things and that such things cannot go and yet to discover it tantalisingly out of making someone rich, the purpose has a unpunished.” reach. Artistic activity, hoping for a kind demeaning effect on the artwork itself. Ugliness sours our taste for the world. of transcendence, is carried out under the Rather than challenging us or elevating us, Within Western culture the institutions of shadow of death, which threatens the such art keeps us comfortable – it takes no high art have been set up for the protec- entire enterprise with meaninglessness. risks. Art becomes sentimental, nostalgic tion of our traditions and the maintenance The 20th century artist Francis Bacon and bland. It is unlikely to be vital or gen- of what is viewed as the finest expressions once said: “Man now realises that he is an uinely stimulating, although it may be of our cultural aspirations. accident, that he is a completely futile very nice. Rock music, though it still While this is in itself no bad thing, being, that he has to play out the game explicitly appeals to the rebellion and rev- these institutions – museums, galleries, without reason. I think even when olution that were its roots, is in fact sup- opera houses and libraries – can become Velasquez was painting ... they were still ... ported by massive multinational corpora- our own towers of Babel. From justifiable slightly conditioned by certain types of tions. pride in cultural heritage sprang the 19th religious possibilities, which man now ... The enslavement of human artistic tal- century nationalism which in turn has had cancelled out of him. Man now ent to the advertising industry is another spawned our century of death in the name can only attempt to beguile himself for a symptom of Mammon’s power over the of ethnic identity. time, by prolonging his life ... You see, arts. That the height of our imaginative Even contemporary Western society is painting has become – all art has become – energy is used in representing the talis- marked by elitism and snobbery in the a game by which man distracts himself.” manic properties of sweetened carbonated name of high or fine art. The arts have Interestingly, Bacon’s art, with its dis- water is a uniquely human kind of tragi- become inaccessible to the great torted human forms and agonised expres- comedy. unwashed, whose dirty fingerprints might sions, was certainly no distracting game, That things are ugly is not merely a smudge them. Rather than mediating but rather a terrifying, anguished gaze at matter of personal taste. Human beings between and connecting human beings, human despair. Some aestheticians – even have themselves contributed much to the for most people the arts in fact enhance avowed atheist Peter Fuller – have given an sum total of ugliness in the cosmos, some- the feeling of alienation from the upper intriguing diagnosis of this breakdown in times even in the course of their attempts middle class lifestyle. the arts. The lack of a transcendent core of to make beauty. There is a natural ugliness meaning has led to the tendencies of mod- that is the result of the brokenness of our Further, our (Western) culture has par- ern art towards either despair or deca- living conditions – the de-formity of the ticipated in the “alienation of art”, cordon- dence. world, and the slouch of our own bodies ing off the aesthetic from the ethical, Those artists that seek to depict the towards decrepitude and death. allowing art to lie and exploit with “real” world, even broadly defined, are Modern pragmatism means that atten- impunity. Beautiful lies are the most accused of “naïve” realism. Optimism and tion to appearance in the objects that sur- enchanting of all. Art is to be entirely “for celebration are not the currencies in which round us is only a concern when it is art’s sake”, which means it can operate at the world of the arts trades – nor has it for affordable, if not profitable. Much of the expense of human beings rather than a century or more. Fuller discerns a loss of

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 19 ART

faith in the mimetic power of art that par- Third, since (especially in the West) art expression, with revelatory significance, of allels this present age of doubt in a divine often involves the outward expression of the Ultimate Concern. The symbols of art core of meaning. the inward state of the human psyche, and the symbols of religion are consider- Human beings have also been guilty of evangelical Christians, who have a strong ably overlapped. great idolatries in their interaction with doctrine of the inner sinfulness of that However, for those who would uphold what they have created. So impressed have psyche, may well fear what such expres- the Christ revealed in the scriptures as they been with their own attempts to cap- sion reveals. That is, the public projection God’s true communication with ture transcendence in created matter that in art of inner depravity may draw a cen- humankind, Tillich’s claim for art is they have turned their creations into sorious response, rather than an intelli- extremely unsatisfactory. objects of veneration and worship. gently engaged one, from conservative But what is to be said, thought and felt Since pre-historic times, art and reli- Christians. about the arts if what we do speak is to be gion have been closely linked; and at times Fourth, Protestant evangelicals have theologically accurate? Dorothy Sayers the overlap has been almost total. Humans displayed a suspicion of metaphor and once wrote: “The Church as a body has have used art as a form of mediation representation – which are central to the never made up her mind about the Arts, between the spirit and the flesh, and as arts – perhaps derived from the priority of and it is hardly too much to say that she capable of providing religious experience. the sensus literalis in scripture reading. has never tried. She has, of course, from Artists are unable to stay away from reli- “Fiction is lies”, as (incredibly) I heard a time to time puritanically denounced the gious themes and religious or spiritual well-known preacher say recently. Art Arts as irreligious and mischievous, or descriptions of the effects of art. tried to exploit the Arts as a means to the Even the notorious PissChrist revealed teaching of religion and morals ... And the attraction of artists in the contempo- there had ... been plenty of writers on aes- rary scene to religious themes. Art tres- thetics who happened to be Christians, passes into fields that religion may have but they seldom made any consistent thought its own. Even secular society has attempt to relate their aesthetic to the cen- its own way of “worshipping” objects of tral Christian dogmas. That is, there has art – keeping objects in museum-shrines been no consistently adequate theological so that we can make pilgrimage to them, attempt to relate art to Christian teach- view them, and may stand contemplatively ing.” It is to this task that we now turn. before them in wonderstruck and silent awe. In thinking theologically about the arts we will be naturally attracted to the doc- The Christian response to the arts has trines of creation, humanity, revelation been, however, rather ambivalent. As we and eschatology. The doctrine of creation have seen, the warp in the world that is a affirms that God created the universe result of the fall is mirrored in the human through and for Christ. Creation and arts. redemption are thus intertwined acts of Church history has been characterised God. The creation has absolute depen- by wild swings between a total embrace of dence on God; but is, nevertheless, other the arts and various periods of vehement from God. iconoclasm. Christian aesthetics have The Christian doctrine of the Trinity ranged from Puritan simplicity to Baroque expresses the structure of created reality: ornamentation to Orthodox reverence of the tension that holds between God’s dis- icons. In Christian thinking about music tinction from, and relatedness to, the uni- and poetry there have been similar contro- verse, and between unity and plurality. versies. Matter – the stuff with which art is made – There remains among contemporary is neither evil, nor is it all there is. Christians several causes of uneasiness Humanity is given a unique role in the with the arts. First, the strength of the sec- creation as the divine viceroy. Creation ond commandment, reiterated so strongly was in need of subduing, naming and in Romans 1-2, has rightly been taken as a Michaelangelo’s David enjoying. Human beings were given the warning against depictions of the divine. capacity to imagine, to describe, to exer- Christ is the only true image (eikon) of cise choice; and to become second-order God (Col 1:15): our imaginations are not creators by working to shape God’s cre- allowed free play or diversion concerning traffics in illusion. Metaphor is too loose, ation according to these gifts. John Calvin him through the mediation of the human too fluid, too slippery a form of commu- even went as far as to say that the human arts. To deal in the symbolic is to risk cre- nication. The truth that art bears is often capacity for art is innate. Built into the ating God in our image. complex and not susceptible of easy verbal structure of the world was the Sabbath, a Second, the gospel mission (because explanation. rest for humans from their work. Art is a “the time is short”) holds an absolute Fifth, as the religious and the aesthetic part of the subduing, naming and enjoying precedence over artistic activity (at least in are felt by some modern theologians to be of God’s world: it interacts with creation theory), to the point where it is excluded responses to the same thing, more ortho- and gives it order and new significance. altogether. The old created order is dox Christians have recoiled from the arts. Conversely, the Christian doctrine of beyond redemption (it is said) and will For John Macquarie, “art ... is something creation does not allow the human being soon be exposed to the fire of judgment. like revelation.” Paul Tillich, building on to worship the creation, even when he or The human arts have no eternal value; so Rudolf Otto’s comparison of religious she makes it into art. Rather, creation that they are not worth cultivating. and aesthetic experience, saw in art an attests God’s glory (Ps 19), as human art

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 20 should really do. points to the end of death’s rule and to The wisdom literature of the Old the future transformation of the present Testament explores the relationship of order. man and woman to God and to creation. The testimony of the Apostles is to the “The fear of Yahweh” is the principle resurrected Christ’s Lordship over the which explains both the freedom and the world. What occurs in Christ is a re-cre- limit of human wisdom. ation – a new humanity is formed, by the On the one hand, humble service of Holy Spirit, in the present age. This is a and deference to the mighty creator and people with imaginations re-formed as sustainer of the cosmos enables a person hope in Christ. They experience a present to comprehend his or her experience, resurrected reality (John 10:10, Col 3:1- because it recognises divine order. There is 5); and they anticipate the future perfect- no division between sacred and secular – ing of their bodies by godly obedience all the world is God’s. expressed in service, knowing all the while On the other hand, the phrase is a that perfect obedience is not (yet) theirs. sharp reminder of the limits placed on Here is the beauty of holiness, rather than human wisdom. It acknowledges the dis- the holiness of beauty. parity between human understanding and Can art – creative endeavour – be a part God’s purposes. It recognises the hubris of this process of re-creation? There is a of men and women, and rebukes it. Above danger in speaking as if the arts in them- all, Jesus Christ provides the model of true selves extend Christ’s work, or as if “inspi- Francis Bacon’s Study After Velazquez's human wisdom; and as Paul explains in 1 ration”, in the normal artistic sense, could Portrait of Pope Innocent X Corinthians 1-2, Christ’s cross – an out- be akin to sanctification. However, we can rage in the world’s eyes – is in fact the wis- view human art as anticipatory. dom of God in action confounding proud When order is wrested from the hands human wisdom. “The fear of Yahweh” of chaos in a work of art, may we not catch then, provides a useful motto for a glimpse of the final goal of creation? As What might humans “do” with the arts Christian discussion of the arts. Hans Kung writes: “Art’s particular service in response to the challenge of Dorothy The fall is not simply from rationality, to man consists in symbolising ... how Sayers? Will we be wasting our time in as platonists and rationalists of all kinds man and society might be ... The human creating art or thinking about it when have been tempted to suppose, but from imagination knows that something is not “the time is short”? Will art have a divert- God, and it therefore corrupts all the right with the present world, and either ing or even corrupting influence on us, sources of goodness, beauty and truth. dreams of something better, or despairs leading us to idolatry or immorality? As art so eloquently explains, human entirely. Art can turn us in the direction of Surely not. society is troubled profoundly by death. a perfection we do not possess.” Art is a good part of God’s good cre- Christ’s resurrection from the dead Karl Barth was deeply suspicious of any ation; the freedom, ability and materials notion of art which suggested a contact necessary to produce art are his gifts. point for human experience of the divine. Yet, like everything created, it is in And yet his love of Mozart’s music led bondage to decay as a result of sin (Rom him to make the astonishing claim that the 8:20-1). composer should hold a “place in theol- The Christian hope gives us confidence ogy, especially in the doctrine of creation there is in the arts potential for real com- and in eschatology”. He wrote, it must be munication and expression, pleasure and remembered, in the context of a discus- joy. The Christian hope gives us a grasp of sion of the “shadowside” of creation, reality that should richly inform discus- thinking of finitude and all its effects sions of the arts. The Christian hope including death. This is not an evil, but speaks of God’s judgment, and thus allows part of the limits inherent in being a crea- for a thorough critique of the abuses of ture. art. The Christian hope also draws our Barth heard in Mozart an expression of imaginations heaven-ward, where Christ, the goodness of creation, including its the true image of God, is seated (Col 3:1- limits; and that “creation praises its Master 5). and is therefore perfect”. Barth’s view is in There is then every good reason for a harmony with that of the biblical Wisdom Christian delight in the human arts. literature. Inklings of God are present in Indeed for Christians to maintain that the human arts (just as they are in nature); there is a real joy in the arts has a divine the Christian has been given the eyes of source glorifies the God they worship. faith with which to see them. Far from wasting time, they are (poten- The musical, poetic and painterly ren- tially) a redemption of time. The arts, ditions of the human condition may take created and experienced under the fear of us to the “very threshold of transcendence God, have their own peculiar ecstatic and the theological”, but it is only holiness. encounter with Christ that takes us over it. Works of art are altars to an Unkown This is an edited version of an essay that first God – the God that makes himself known appeared in kategoria, published by Georges Rouault’s Christ on the Cross in the glory of the incarnate Word. Matthias Media.. ap

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 21 EVANGELISMPARENTING Nothing new Generation X can learn much from Ecclesiastes.

eriodically, council workers paint (insolent pride) and deifies agnosticism,” over the graffiti along the dykes says Professor Carson. We see, already, a that keep the waters of the Peel slide into New Age superstition and ulti- River out of Peel Street in mately a latter-day form of animism. Tamworth.P It doesn’t take long for more to The writer of Ecclesiastes takes us along appear. As I walk past, I scan the hiero- the pathway of his search for meaning. His glyphics for a word I can read. Every now conclusion was “fear God and keep his and then an English word appears apolo- commandments” (Eccl. 12:13). Jesus said, getically as if by accident. I used to wonder “If you love me, you will obey what I com- how the artists could be so clever as to Marion Andrews mand” (John 14:15). invent their own language and alphabet. Modern man does not want to fear or These graffiti artists follow a long line of love God; postmodern man does not want people who have lawlessly defaced public Now, we have a generation of young to obey God. These words are a goad for places. The difference is that their forerun- people who have largely been brought up the wise. We are to know God with our ners usually communicated something – a without formal religion or absolute truth. minds, fear and love him with our hearts, slogan, a political statement, a message to Today’s mottoes are “if it fits, wear it”, “the and obey him with our lives. This is some- shock the older generation. Expression as most important person in the world is me”, thing different from all the ‘isms’ of man. opposed to communication is now the “horses for courses”. We call it Generation This is the way, the truth and the life. focus. There is no message to communi- X or the X-Gen. The work of parents of the X-Gen, then, cate, only confusion and despair to express. The children of Christians are part of is the same as it is in any generation. It is Everything is meaningless. the X-Gen. However, being ‘in’ a particular living as an example of how to be in the Professor Marshall Berman of New generation does not mean being ‘of ’ it. world and not of it. It is taking time to lead York recently addressed the Melbourne Professor Don Carson (The Gagging of our children to Christ, the One who gives Writers’ Festival. The Sydney Morning God) says, “Confessional Christianity can- them prized citizenship in a better world Herald reported: “Looking like the left- not wholly embrace either modernity or where everything shall be as it should be. overs of Einstein after a decade on speed, postmodernity, yet it must learn certain I recommend the booklet by Sinclair B. Berman shuffled to the microphone, ear- lessons from both. It must vigorously Ferguson, The Pundit’s Folly, as a commen- rings jangling, in a session titled ‘After Post- oppose many features of philosophical plu- tary of Ecclesiastes that speaks clearly to an Modernism?’ and said that all this “after ralism, without retreating to modernism.” age of despair and may be used as an evan- po-mo” talk was nonsense. Po-mo hadn’t The writer of Ecclesiastes knew how the gelistic tool with those who are disillu- even arrived yet. X-Gen feels. He wrote to express how dis- sioned with life. ap “By way of proof, he (said), ‘Scooby illusioned he was with human systems and dooby do! I am everyday people! Different institutions. He pursued education, plea- strokes for different folks! Scooby Dooby sure, science and work with extreme Do! Oh, yeah, I am everyday people!’” energy and zeal. He experienced great suc- He might as well have said: cess. Yet, they were all “a chasing after “Meaningless! Meaningless! Utterly mean- wind”. We need not fear Generation X. ingless! Everything is meaningless.” Where it questions the arrogance of mod- (Ecclesiastes 1:2) Psychiatrist Dr Kath ernism it does well. Where it embarks on a Donovan says that “disillusionment with search for truth and meaning we have RED ROCK systems and institutions and their leaders” opportunity to shed light. Where it talks Near Coffs Harbour is common among young people today. about spirituality we, of all people, have the This attitude has followed an era when advantage. 2 Bedroom Holiday House modern man decided he could get on well without God. Modernism dictated that Modern man reads with his head; post- $150 per week spirituality and feelings were out; science modern man reads with his heart. Modern and reason were in. Knowledge is power man looks to science; postmodern man $20 cleaning fee was the motto. looks to visions. Modern man values peo- Modern man believed he was the pinna- ple for their status; postmodern man values M. Hall, 12 Bimble Ave cle of evolution. He had the right to decide people for how they relate. S. Grafton what is right and wrong. Then we had We do, however, need to fear for Hiroshima, Vietnam and man-made eco- Generation X – fear the search that takes Ph 02 6643 3068 logical disasters. Young people of the 1960s them into destructive lifestyles, fear the and ’70s focused on these failures of mod- rejection of absolutes that puts them at ern man and started to behave as if there odds with their Maker. “Postmodernism were no right or wrong. ruthlessly applied nurtures a new hubris

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 22 BOOKS

The Doctrine of a minute, small birds about 250 times a minute); 6. the reptile would evolve a mus- Repentance cular development which would enable it to books Thomas Watson fly. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1668, There is no point in this happening in reprinted 1987. Reviewed by Peter Barnes bits and pieces; it all has to be simultaneous or the reptile would land flat on its cold- blooded stomach for ever entertaining, in a Today we are undoubtedly weak where peculiar hot rush of blood, the notion that the Puritans were strong – at understanding it could fly. the ways of God and of sin in the human The fossil record reveals a decided soul. Watson was the most readable and paucity of half-bird, half-reptile creatures. quotable of all the Puritans, and he is as Even the archaeopteryx was obviously a pungent and as hard-hitting as any of them. bird with claws, not a reptile. Teilhard de Here is Puritanism at its best: “Till sin be Chardin waxed eloquent that ‘Evolution is bitter, Christ will not be sweet.” Every page a light which illuminates all facts, a trajec- is full of insight, and Watson gives his tory which all lines of thought must follow.’ reader no place to hide. He warns, he On the contrary, it belongs with the explains, he pleads, he challenges. Here is a other creation myths of the ancient world. man who knows the Scriptures and who It is Genesis which gives us the history. Is the New Testament knows the human heart. Read this, and you Andy McIntosh has given us yet another History? surely cannot remain unaffected. helpful guide to this whole debate, and Paul Barnett gives us every reason to be assured of the Sydney: Hodder and Stoughton, 1986. historical accuracy of the first book of the Genesis for Today Bible. Andy McIntosh Jesus and the Logic of Surrey: Day One, 1997 History Reviewed by Peter Barnes Paul Barnett Leicester: Apollos, 1997. Today, there is no general concept of the Reviewed by Peter Barnes divine ownership of the world – a situation which has been brought about partly by the CHRISTIAN Church’s own compromises with the the- The number of so-called scholars who ory of evolution and partly by the world’s BOOKS take seriously gnostic and apocryphal readiness to believe whatever theory leaves works from the second and third centuries God out of our daily lives. For Sale/Wanted but scoff at the New Testament documents Yet the book of Genesis is so crucial – it We stock a wide range of is indeed cause for alarm. It has, however, raises and answers a multitude of issues, provided fodder for the satirists, from such as why we wear clothes, why we have new & secondhand Evangelical Archbishop Whately who in 1819 used the heterosexual marriage, why we have gov- & Reformed titles historical insights of David Hume to cast ernments, and how we should approach the Catalogues available doubt on the historicity of Napoleon environment. Bonaparte, and Ronald Knox a century According to William Paley, the world is Hours: later who showed that the second half of like a watch, and its workings show that Open Mon-Fri 2:00pm-5:30pm Pilgrim’s Progress was written by a middle- there must be a watchmaker (i.e. God). & Sat 10:00am-1:00pm aged Anglo-Catholic woman referred to in Richard Dawkins has attacked this, and the scholarly literature as “Pseudo- says there is no purpose or design in nature. Bunyan”. In effect, the watchmaker is blind. This is Rockdale Rudolf Bultmann became famous for superstition to rival the crassest kind of Christian Books his ridiculous statement of 1926 that “we voodoo. 11 Watkin Street can know almost nothing concerning the Dawkins would have us believe, for life and personality of Jesus”. example, that birds evolved from reptiles, Rockdale NSW 2216 Far more historically convincing is the gradually, over millions of years. For a rep- Tel (02) 9568 2813 view of C. F. D. Moule – hardly a wild-eyed tile to evolve into a bird which flies, the fol- fundamentalist – that the coming into exis- lowing would have to happen, all at once, Fax (02) 9590 3268 tence of the Nazarenes is an event only to not gradually: 1. the reptile would have to Email [email protected] be explained by “a most powerful and orig- evolve hollow bones so that it could fly; 2. or visit our web site at: inal mind and a tremendous confirmatory the reptile would have to evolve feathers; 3. event”. the reptile would have to evolve a preening www.rcb.com.au Paul Barnett is a sure guide to the evi- gland (when the bird is preening its feath- dence which is handled with integrity and ers, it is spreading oil from the base of its RCB is supported by Bexley- intelligence. These two works may lack the spine); 4. the reptile would have to evolve satirical bite of Whately and Knox, but they the ability to turn its head 180 degrees so Rockdale Presbyterian Church deserve to be widely read. They are solid that it could preen its feathers; 5. the reptile replies to the unwarranted historical scepti- would have to evolve a much faster breath- cism that rules too many academic roosts. ing mechanism (we breathe about 12 times

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 23 EVANGELISM An Olympian perspective Impressive, yes, but not the last word.

t a time when much glory is given of righteousness (2 Peter 3:13). In the to men, let us not overlook the meantime we must strain every sinew for glory that is God’s. justice and mercy. As a nation that has largely turned away from the one true God AThe Olympic opening ceremony was we are in danger of seeking spiritual experi- fabulous. Who will forget the horsemen, ences in the wrong place and making the evocation of Australia’s early history as heroes (icons) of those who ultimately the dream of a little white girl guided by an have feet of clay. We need to remember the Aboriginal elder in one scene after another John Woods words of the Lord, “I will not give my glory of astonishing imagery, Cathy Freeman to another or my praise to idols” (Is 42:8). running up all those steps with the torch There is a legitimate human glory but only and then across a circle of water which tion is about to be completed. because God has given it - the recipient became a circle of flame. Yet all this drama We are told that 4 billion people watched acknowledges it is from God, and it is seen and ceremony, magnificent as it was, pales the opening ceremony on TV as well as the finally to be for God’s glory. Thus Joseph into insignificance with comparison to the 110,000 at the stadium. It will be no prob- said to his brothers, “Tell my father of all return of our Lord and Saviour Jesus lem to God to ensure that all men will see my glory in Egypt” (Gen 45:13AV). It is Christ! The Scripture says, “to him be his Son as he returns.When Jesus returns in said of Shane Gould that when she glory and power for ever and ever! Amen. his unique and incomparable glory that will returned from Munich, at her first time at Look, he is coming with the clouds, and be this earth’s last and greatest day of glory. church, she placed all her medals on the every eye shall see him, even those who In that wonderful word that he used, it will communion table. Betty Cuthbert clearly pierced him; and all peoples of the earth be the “palingenesia” - the regeneration, the gives the glory of her athletic career to will mourn because of Him. So shall it be! new birth of all things (Mat 19:28), when God. My wife and I were privileged to be Amen.” (Rev 1:6,7). the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne. present at the swimming on one of the Mark (13:27) adds that he will call his In the weeks of our Olympic rejoicing a nights that Australia won gold. The noise people from the ends of the earth. Matthew news item told us that 4 to 6 million level in the enclosed stadium had to be (24:30) also notes that the nations will women and girls a year around the world experienced to be believed as the crowd mourn. Luke (21.28) adds that God’s peo- are sold into prostitution and slavery. We chanted, “Susie! Susie! Susie!” and later ple, sons and daughters of the kingdom, long for the palingenesia, when there will “Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!” during the relay. should lift up their heads for their redemp- be a new heaven and a new earth, the home The PA system boomed out in song. “Heroes live for ever”. I think that the parish priest who con- ducted Mrs Samaranch’s memorial service did far better. He noted that in the very last scene of the opening presentation that the word “Eternity” had come up in the fire- works outline of the harbour bridge imply- ing that it was the God of Eternity who must be given his place in human lives. The gospel readings spoke of hope and the res- urrection. The glorious God of Eternity, who commands our worship, will judge all (Re 14:7) The Father has given the Son fur- ther glory that has become His as a result of his earthly suffering which culminated in His atoning death for the forgiveness of sin, (1 Peter 1:18-21, Lk 24:46, Re 5:1-14). The hymn writer Henry Hart Milman has captured this Scriptural truth so well: Ride on! Ride on in majesty! In lowly pomp ride on to die; Bow thy meek head to mortal pain, Then take, O God, Thy power, and reign.

Rev. Dr John Woods is former minister of Sutherland Presbyterian Church, NSW, and A scene from the Olympics opening ceremony in Sydney a former missionary to Africa. ap

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 24 LETTERS

who surely is “God’s greatest gift”? We subtle but important distinction between seem to have, in recent years, become so ‘made righteous’ (McClean) and ‘declare concerned to get our doctrine and theology righteous’ (Eveson) is, as we all know, more letters right that it can replace the preaching of than words. I hope it was an honest mistake Christ, and we are in danger of developing on the part of the editors or McClean. what Lloyd-Jones calls “an ossified ortho- What has made this more prominent to doxy”. me was reading McClean’s argument A. W. Tozer stated some years ago that against cheap grace and his stress on our “popular fundamentalist theology has union with Christ. It is not uncommon for emphasised the utility of the cross rather Protestants to fall into the Roman Catholic than the beauty of the One who died on it. view when trying to defend the Bible’s pre- The saved man’s relation to Christ has been cious doctrine of Justification against the made contractual instead of personal. The charges of antinomianism. But I greatly “work” of Christ has been stressed until it suspect that our brother’s sentence was an has eclipsed the person of Christ, and what honest mistake. He did for me seems to be more important than what He is to me.” Mark Herzer Recent Scripture Union Notes tell of a Presbyterian Church in America, Gospels first Hindu professor asking Sadhu Sundar Hatboro, Pennsylvania Singh, “What particular principle or doc- Glenn Witham writes (AP, September) trine have you found that you did not have Time to honour prophet that “Paul was the first writer in the New before?” “The particular thing I have Testament and was followed by the Gospel found,” he replied, “is Christ!” Shakespeare, wrote: “The evil that men do writers...” May I ask him who told him that, Let’s keep our focus where it ought to lives after them; the good is oft interred and by what authority? Is it contained in be – on Jesus Christ, Lord and Saviour, with their bones”. In some cases, the the Scriptures or logically deduced God’s greatest gift. Correct doctrine can “good” is discovered much after their death thereby? Can he quote any Scripture in help show us the way to him, and teach us – as it was for Bach and his music. support of such a statement? If the Gospels the truth about him, but it must never That a prophet is not without honour were not committed first to writing: become an end in itself to satisfy our acad- except in his own house can also be true, 1. How could anyone “consent to the emic thoughts. Our focus must always be even in the person’s own lifetime! The words of Jesus Christ, and the doctrine in upon Christ as a living Person to whom we acknowledgment often comes after his/her accord with Godliness” (1 Tim 6:3)? can relate in a personal way, and through demise. So be it. But let’s not leave the hon- 2. How could “the Word of God dwell whom we can come to the Father. our too long! in you richly...”(Col 3:16) I am thinking of a great Australian (a 3. How could “many peddle the Word of Rev. David Todd, Queenslander) who served his country God” (2 Cor 2:17)? Sandgate, Qld with honour as educationist, writer, theolo- 4. Who would know that “God has in gian, traveller, orator etc – Doctor Harold these last days spoken to us by his Son” Unjustifiable error James Whitney. As his biographer, I am (Heb 1:2)? beginning to come to terms with the truth 5. Who would know, if Paul was imitat- I read your articles on justification with of “good” buried/forgotten after one’s ing Christ (1 Cor 11:1)? great interest since this very doctrine has demise. What a pity! So much could be dis- 6. What are the books and parchments, been greatly misunderstood by most mod- covered by reading his works! Paul asks Timothy to bring (2 Tim 4:13)? ern “theologians” of the Evangelical per- 7. Why does Jesus say concerning the suasion. I hope it was an editorial oversight, Dr Noel Wallis, destruction of the temple; “He who reads because the statement in question is a great Russell Island Writers’ Group let him understand” (Mt 24:15)? theological blunder if left unchallenged. It Also if the gospels were written “that is especially grievous in the light of Peter Olympics revisited you may believe that Jesus is the Christ is Hastie’s careful interview with Phillip the Son of God” (John 20:31) why then Eveson. What a shameful waste of money and would the Holy Spirit send Paul, who was In the September issue, we read this gross idolatry we saw in Sydney recently. not an eyewitness, to the Gentiles without from John McClean’s (“Justice and Worshipping flames, drum beats and pagan them? If Paul was so successful without Mercy”) summary of the doctrine of justi- priestesses just like the worst heathens of them, why then did John bother writing at fication and Martin Luther: “What a won- history. While hundreds of thousands of all? Surely the first premise of Paul’s writ- der, then, to discover that God’s righteous- Australian farms and businesses are failing, ings is a knowledge of the Gospels. ness was not, in fact, a demand. But that it those in control use circus stunts to distract was a gift, by which he made righteous the hungry and miserable from reality. The Neil Cadman those who entrusted themselves to him.” same things happened during the last days Norman Park, Qld This must be contrasted to Eveson’s of the corrupt and immoral Roman empire. statement: “Augustine understood the verb “Thus saith God, Why transgress ye the Jesus, the greatest gift ‘dikaio’ to mean ‘to make righteous’ rather commandments of the LORD, that ye can- than ‘to declare righteous’. So the idea not prosper? Because ye have forsaken the I must confess that the words on developed that when God justifies the sin- LORD, he hath also forsaken you.” 2 September’s front cover greatly disturbed ner, he actually makes him righteous. On Chronicles 24:20 me. “Justification – God’s greatest gift.” Is the contrary, Paul taught that when God this not elevating an important doctrine justifies us, he declares us righteous even J.E.G. Pickering, above the place of the Lord Jesus Christ, though we still remain sinners.” (p. 8) The Gympie, Qld

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 25 PRAYER

coness candidate, 1 other minister 10 Presbytery of Tasmania; 5 parishes and under jurisdiction, 6 retired ministers; 6 special (home mission) parishes Neville Wilce clerk. totalling 19 congregations with 1270 30 Pray for the 5 million people of communicants and adherents, 1 mis- Scotland and its social and economic sionary, 5 retired ministers; Stephen welfare under its devolved govern- Warwick clerk. ment; and especially for refreshment 11 Tumut home mission station SE NOVEMBER 2000 of spiritual life in the Church of NSW; about 55 communicants and 4 21 Universities and other tertiary educa- Scotland and all other churches, and a elders; vacant, Fred. Monckton, tional institutions; those students powerful impact of the Gospel in interim moderator. graduating shortly, and the prepara- national life. 12 There are about 2875 “ruling elders” tion for Christian witness in 2001, in our denomination. Pray for their especially to new students. DECEMBER 2000 spiritual lives and effectiveness, and 22 The NSW Presbyterian Market of the 1 Pray that all our preachers will deal in a the selection and training of new PWA at Homebush Showground in biblical way with the utter seriousness elders especially in your own parish. aid of the Presbyterian Theological of sin, and God’s complete answer to 13 Bruce and Elizabeth Harrison (he was Centre library. it in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. inducted last year) as they work in the 23 Long-term home missionary Des 2 The NSW Illawarra parish of central Qld Springsure parish with Gallagher and Jean and the 5 elders of Shoalhaven-Nowra and 3 other con- four centres including Emerald; about the Manly-Lota home mission station, gregations with about 230 communi- 20 communicants and 2 elders. Brisbane; one congregation with cants and 28 elders; David and 14 Newcastle Korean Community parish about 65 communicants and 5 elders, Margaret Robson. Jesmond; Kyung Cheong(Andrew)Oh. and work among children; Noel Wallis 3 Cairns parish, Qld; about 145 com- 15 Heidelberg parish, Melbourne; about interim moderator. municants and 12 elders; Donald and 75 communicants and 8 elders; Wally 24 Warialda home mission station, north- Gloria Broadwater, Russell and Laurel and Margot Gear. ern NSW including North Star; about van Delden. 16 Martin and Naomi Levine, the 22 25 communicants; Peter Phelps; Peter 4 Peter and Lorraine Phillips and the 7 elders and 215 members of the Thorneycroft moderator. elders of Clifton Hill parish, Melbourne Beecroft parish, northern Sydney. 25 The three congregations of Boort, with about 30 communicants. 17 Drs Patrick and Jenny Fung from Pyramid Hill and Wycheproof com- 5 Thank God for the faithful work of Sydney Chinese Presbyterian Church prising the SE Mallee Patrol parish, chaplains and church visitors in hospi- Surry Hills, who have been serving Vic; having about 75 communicants tals, and pray it may prove a turning with Overseas Missionary Fellowhip and 9 elders; Darren and Ruth point in the lives of many patients. in Hong Kong (previously in Middleton as they minister there. 6 Moss Vale home mission station south Pakistan) and anticipating a new 26 Presbyterian Ladies’ College, of Sydney; about 65 communicants appointment. Armidale NSW. The Principal Mrs. J. and 9 elders; David Hawkins modera- 18 Hamilton parish in suburban Scholl, pupils, staff and council. tor and supply. Newcastle, NSW; John and Lynne 27 As the Islamic fasting month of 7 Noorat parish western Victoria, Webster, the 220 communicants and Ramadan begins, pray that great num- including Darlington; about 130 com- 26 or so elders. bers of the world’s Muslims (well over municants and 13 elders; Barry Oakes, 19 Woody Point and Scarborough con- a billion) will come to learn that the inducted 1999. gregations comprising (Redcliffe) true revelation of the one God is 8 Hallelujah Korean congregation, Peninsula parish, north Brisbane; through his Son Jesus. Ashfield NSW; about 75 communi- about 165 communicants and 7 elders; 28 Willoughby congregation, Sydney; cants; Byung Geun Kim and Nam Peter and Katrina Whitney. about 20 communicants and 4 elders; Soon Kim; Peter Hastie moderator. 20 Presbytery of the Hunter, NSW; 12 vacant, John Penman supply, Peter 9 On this Jewish Day of Atonement parishes, 3 home mission stations and 2 Boase interim moderator. (Yom Kippur) pray for the work of other congregations - a total of 30 con- 29 Presbytery of Central Coast , NSW; 5 John and Katy Graham (Bondi, gregations with 1885 communicants parishes and 1 home mission station NSW) and other Christian Witness to and adherents, 2 defence chaplains, 1 with 770 communicants and adher- Israel workers, and that many Jews hospital chaplain, 1 missionary and 6 ents, chaplain, 1 ministerial and 1 dea- will learn the truths of Isaiah 53. retired ministers; John McIntyre clerk.

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AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 26 TOUGH QUESTIONS Baptised in the Spirit? How tongues of fire became a hot debate.

ill me Jesus, fill me,” came the This still does not deter some people cry from the back pew. from arguing that there are examples in Thankfully, the cry came during Acts where people are filled with the Holy a time of congregational prayer. Spirit some time after their conversion Most‘F of the congregation were too embar- experience (Acts 4:31, 9:17). This is true, rassed to open their eyes and see who broke but Luke makes a distinction between the Presbyterian protocol. No one said “baptism” and “filling”. Various people are anything. Nevertheless everyone was filled with the Holy Spirit on occasions, but thinking, “Uh oh, there’s a charismatic in Jason Summers this is specifically for the purpose of the church”. If this incident was a one-off, empowering them for mission. then most of the members would have overlooked it. But this went on for a num- a second baptism then the writers of the For example in Acts 4:31 Peter and John ber of weeks. Every time the minister New Testament would have made this pray. They are then filled with the Holy prayed, a man sitting in the back row would clear? Further we find in the book of Acts Spirit. As a result, they spoke the word of cry out “Fill me Jesus, fill me”. ample evidence to show that there is one God boldly. This is not a second baptism Finally, someone decided to deal with Spirit baptism. that gives a Christian some superior this un-Presbyterian behaviour and con- There Luke talks of the baptism of the strength to beat sin and live a super-spiri- front the rebel publicly. One Sunday morn- Holy Spirit twice only (Acts 1:5, 11:16). tual life. It is a special filling specifically for ing as the cry went up “Fill me Jesus, fill He does this for good reason. The “bap- mission. Should we pray to God asking him me”, a man sitting down the front of the tism” of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2 is a spe- to fill us with his Spirit so that we may church stood up and cried out “Don’t do it cial event. It signalled the restoration of preach the word more boldly? Yes! Jesus, he can’t hold it in”. Israel to their vocation as a light to the gen- We can be assured that according to the Funny as it may seem, this story raises a tiles and was also the special empowerment New Testament the Holy Spirit was poured hotly debated question: Do Christians for that mission. On the day of Pentecost out on the day of Pentecost. It is this one need a second filling or baptism of the the blessing of the new age began to flow. baptismal event that all believers share in. Holy Spirit after their initial conversion This event has its roots in the Old Praise God that he has given us his Spirit in experience? Some say yes. They insist that Testament. For example we read in Isaiah full. He is both transforming our lives and a second blessing of the Holy Spirit is nec- 32:15, “..till the Spirit is poured upon us empowering us for mission. That is why we essary for a truly empowered Christian life. from on high, and the desert becomes a fer- must never undervalue the third person of For example, I can remember a time tile field, and the fertile field seems like a the Trinity. Praise God that he has not left when a well-meaning brother told me that forest.” Also Ezekiel 39:25-29, “I will no us alone. if I really wanted to be victorious over sin, longer hide my face from them, for I will I needed to receive this second baptism. pour out my Spirit on the house of Israel, Jason Summer is a student at the Presbyterian This sounded very appealing to me. Who declares the Sovereign LORD.” Finally Joel Theological Centre, Burwood, NSW. ap doesn’t want to be victorious over sin and 2:28-32, “And afterward, I will pour out my be fully empowered by God? So my Spirit on all people.” brother prayed in tongues over me. Guess How then could this extraordinary what happened? Nothing. event or ‘baptism’ be repeated time and time again? The Old Testament prophets Christian Singles

hen the doubts began to rise. Why did regarded it as a one-off event. As believers,

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sRdddddddddHwcfcsRdddddddddddddHw sRddHw sRddddddHw rooms of theological colleges, but one that common source and not their own private impacts our daily walk with Jesus. So the tank. In Acts 11:15-17 Peter declares that crucial question is what does the Bible say the gentiles had been given the same gift as Any nice singles can join! concerning this issue? he had. The reason why Luke never talks Send for FREE colour brochure: It’s interesting to note that the New about a believer receiving a second “bap- PO Box 122 WALLSEND 2287 Testament makes no mention of a second tism” is because the first one is a once-for- Spirit-baptism experience. Surely if our all event that all believers share in and as Ph/Fax: 02 4955 5445 spiritual health and vitality depended upon such does not need to be repeated. www.christiansingles.com.au

AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 27 ESSAY A time to die JFK, Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis all gave their account on the same day.

hose who are old enough are some- century. He was less than evangelical on times asked: ‘What were you doing issues like the atonement and the inerrancy on 22 November 1963?’ I am one of Scripture, but he was devastating in who can remember! The question defending in a simple but well-thought way Tis a way of making the point of how deeply the basic supernatural truths of Scripture. the world was affected by the tragic assassi- His Screwtape Letters is deservedly a classic nation of President John F. Kennedy in work, although his cogent and reasoned Dallas, Texas. Of course, each day many essay Fern-seed and Elephants (on modern people come to their journey’s end, but it is biblical criticism) has not received the atten- less well known that two others who Peter Barnes tion it warrants. Critics have ignored it appeared before the divine throne that fate- rather than responded to it. ful day were Aldous Huxley and C. S. ble scientific connections, Huxley came to A humble man who avoided the lime- Lewis. warn against the dangers of dehumanising light, Lewis sought to be a Christian in In many ways, the lives and deaths of scientific progress in his novel Brave New both word and deed. As he was dying, he Kennedy, Huxley, and Lewis reveal to us World, published in 1932. It is brilliantly commented that it was all “solemn fun”. So something about modern life and death. done, even better than George Orwell’s three men lived and died, and on the same John Fitzgerald Kennedy (known as Jack 1984 with which it is often compared. day left time to enter eternity. We can only or JFK) was the 35th President of the In later life Huxley embraced a kind of be justified by faith in Christ, but God will United States, and the first Roman Buddhist mysticism, but on his death bed judge our works. Catholic to hold that office. Huxley had his wife give him LSD, in a des- The prophet Daniel records his vision of In the election campaign of 1960 (where perate attempt to experience something the great day: ‘A fiery stream issued and he narrowly defeated Richard Nixon, beyond this world. Not long before he came forth from before him. A thousand whose five o’clock shadow is said to have died, Huxley confessed: “It is a bit embar- thousands ministered to him; ten thousand cost him votes), Kennedy assured the rassing to have been concerned with the times ten thousand stood before him. The American electorate that his Catholicism human problem all one’s life and that at the court was seated, and the books were would make no difference to how he ran end one has no more to offer by way of opened’ (Dan.7:10). the country. He was true to his word there, advice than ‘Try to be a little kinder’.” Everything shall be judged – our words if nowhere else. As a dynasty, the Kennedys Huxley lurched between science and the (Matt.12:36), our motives (1 Cor.4:5), and would rival the Hapsburgs and the humanities, reason and faith, and was never our deeds (Mt.16:27; Rom.2:6). Indeed, Romanovs for power mania and corrup- able to reconcile them because he rejected “there is no creature hidden from his sight, tion. Votes were bought and juggled in the God of the Bible, the God of science but all things are naked and open to the order to achieve the desired results. and belief, reason and faith. Thus, for all his eyes of him to whom we must give Furthermore, JFK’s affair with Marilyn insights and all his intellect, Huxley could account” (Heb.4:13). Monroe must have played some part in her do no better at the end than reduce the It is not mine to judge, but it appears suicide in 1962. JFK’s religious faith, such issues of life and death to platitudes. that only one of these three men had any as it was, never interfered with his more understanding of the issues. But 22 carnal ambitions. C. S. Lewis (like JFK, his nickname was November 1963 is past and gone. It is now Aldous Huxley was a grandson of the Jack) was once a decided atheist who argued more appropriate to ask: How shall you scientist T. H. Huxley, known less than that the amount of suffering in the world give account? affectionately as ‘Darwin’s Bulldog’ showed that there was no God. However, Peter Barnes is minister of Revesby because of his vigorous advocacy of the after his conversion he became perhaps the Presbyterian Church, and books editor of theory of evolution. Raised with impecca- best-known Christian apologist of the 20th AP. ap

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AUSTRALIAN PRESBYTERIAN • 28