Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
    the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.

• 1 Corinthians 1:18-25

The Lord says:
“These people come near to me with their mouth
    and honor me with their lips,
    but their hearts are far from me.
Their worship of me
    is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
Therefore once more I will astound these people
    with wonder upon wonder;
the wisdom of the wise will perish,
    the intelligence of the intelligent will vanish.”
Woe to those who go to great depths
    to hide their plans from the Lord,
who do their work in darkness and think,
    “Who sees us? Who will know?”
You turn things upside down,
    as if the potter were thought to be like the clay!
Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it,
    “You did not make me”?
Can the pot say to the potter,
    “You know nothing”?

• Isaiah 29:13-16

The fool says in his heart,
    “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, their deeds are vile;
    there is no one who does good.

• Psalm 14:1

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.

• Ephesians 2:8-9

“ ’We do better to adore the mysteries of deity than to investigate them. What is more, these matters cannot be probed without great danger, and even holy men have often experienced this.  Therefore, there is no reason why we should labour so much on those exalted topics, such as ‘God’, ‘the unity and trinity of God’, ‘the mystery of creation’ and ‘the manner of the incarnation’. What, l ask you, did the scholastics accomplish during the many ages they were examining only these points?  But as for one who is ignorant of the other fundamentals — namely ‘the power of sin’, ‘the law‘ and ‘grace’, l do not see how I can call him a Christian. For from these things Christ is known, since to know Christ means to know his benefits and not, as they [the scholastics] teach. To reflect upon his natures and the modes of his incarnation. For unless you know why Christ put on flesh and was nailed to the cross, what good will it do you to know merely the history about him? … Christ was given us as a remedy and, to use the language of Scripture, a saving remedy. It is therefore proper that we know Christ in another my than that which the scholastic» have set forth.  (Commonplaces, Introduction).”

• Tony Lane, A Concise History of Christian Thought

Philip Melanchthon, (1497-1560), was Martin Luther’s partner for much of the early reformation.  If you read the biographies of Martin Luther, Melanchthon did not always agree.  He was a reliable sounding board for Martin Luther.

Melanchthon’s book that is quoted above, Commonplaces, was the first attempt at a systematic theology, a theology that explains things in a logical manner.  And the quote from the book puts the concept of theology as a purely intellectual activity on its ear.  Yes, we can have a systematic form of theology.  Yes, we can explain many things of God in a logical, intellectual manner.  But in each and every case, there is an element of belief, that spiritual portion of faith that transcends the mind and can only be comprehended in the spirit.

Melanchthon is attacking those who argue theology from a strictly intellectual point of view.  Without an understanding of Grace and Faith, the Apostle Paul would agree that salvation cannot be independent of those things.  Because without those things, there can be no salvation or we have self-created a work=based faith that boasts of nothing but works.

Remember that Luther and Melanchthon fought the papacy and policies of the Roman Catholics that had everything to do with works and buying salvation through indulgences.  The key people arguing with Melanchthon, to whom he alludes here would be the Roman Catholic emissaries sent by the Pope.  The Roman Catholic church may have some of the beliefs that stem from the thing Luther argued against, but they have done some internal reforms, like what Erasmus had desired.

In the Scripture from 1 Corinthians, Paul makes a distinction between Jews and Gentiles.  By the time of Melanchthon the distinction was between the Roman Catholics and the Reformers.  In Heaven there will be one people, united, those who love the Lord and obey His commandments.

For those who do not understand the things of God, all this faith and grace stuff is indeed foolishness, but for those who have God in their hearts, they understand in a spiritual sense.  It is that gulf that must be crossed, and only by the Holy Spirit’s revelation, before we can ever exit the intellectual realm to discuss things of God regarding such things as faith and grace – those things necessary for salvation.

There was an old Statler brothers hit song, Flowers on the Wall.  The person arguing that he has plenty to do argues that he can count the flowers on the wall and play solitaire until dawn with a deck of 51.  But there are 52 cards in a deck, and you cannot win with only 51 cards.  Yet, someone who has all the intellectual knowledge of the world, but without spiritual knowledge, they can never understand Christian theology.

If you like these Tuesday morning essays about philosophy and other “heavy topics,” but you think you missed a few, you can use this LINK. I have set up a page off the home page for links to these Tuesday morning posts. I will continue to modify the page as I add more.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.