Hitchhiking Through Mark

This is a review of a book. Mark Through Old Testament Eyes The author is Andrew T. Le Peau. I had never heard of him but two things caught my attention.

1) He has taught the book of Mark for over 10 years at InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. 

2) The offer of reading intertextually, seeing how the Old Testament can illuminate the New Testament.

I can best describe my experience reading this book with a couple of analogies. 

1) Hitchhiking. While traveling dependent upon the goodwill of fellow travelers you are sometimes stuck in places where there has been little traffic. In these places previous hitchhikers inscribe their thoughts and ponderings on the backside of street signs. These texts tell you if you should wait or push off on foot. They give you a sense of not being alone, others have traveled this way before. 

2) Postcards. Everyplace I have visited I like to pick up postcards. They remind me of my visit and they are images I can share with others who have not been to those places.

The book is not technical and not quite devotional. It is a guide for learning and teaching Mark’s Gospel. More of a map with multiple points of interest noted nicely in tables and sidebars. I knew I was traveling in Mark but I didn't know there was so much to see along the way.

The notes the author has built into this commentary are informative and refreshing. You will go through the Gospel verse by verse for the most part. The brilliance of this author is the way he uses the many iterations of his teaching to pass on to the reader a rich experience. It shows. He points out Old Testament references a lot. Some of them I really appreciated, some of them I still need to ponder. All of them are worthwhile. You won’t feel like you've wasted your time with this book. Le Peau pays attention to the structure and passes on his insights. I found this really refreshing.

His bibliography is four and a half pages. Names with more than one entry are Kenneth Bailey, G. K. Beal, Craig Blomberg, Walter Bruggemann, R T France, John Gondingay, Richard Hays, Derek Kidner, Temper Longman, Alec Motyer, Rodney Stark, Mark Strauss, Willard Swartley John Walton, Christopher Writght, and N. T. Wright. As you can see the author has done his homework. My thanks and appreciation to Kregel Academic for providing me with a copy of this book for an unbiased review.

I recommend this work to students, teachers, pastors or anyone wishing to study/travel through Mark. The author, Andrew T. Le Peau, is an excellent teacher/guide. I look forward to future volumes in this series. Like postcards they will be worth collecting and showing to others who wish to travel this journey.

Thy will be done…

Thy will be done…

We have come to the 3^rd imperative in the Lord’s Prayer. But I have to get something off my chest.

I knee jerk at the idea that it is wrong to pray “thy will be done” or that praying the Lord’s prayer is “vain repetition”. I have read some word-of-faith teachers claim that praying “if it be your will” or “thy will be done” is evidence of a lack of faith. The hyper-grace teachers claim that the Lord’s prayer belongs to the old covenant and therefore it is not for Christians. Both of these assertions are ridiculous.

Here’s why. Now I might step on some toes, so if I do I’m sorry. Soapbox mode ON.

Praying the Lord’s prayer is praying scripture not “vain repetition”.

“Use not vain repetitions” is the King James translation, other translations say, “Do not use meaningless repetition” (NASB), “Do not heap up empty phrases” (ESV), or “Do not keep on babbling” (NIV). To suggest that praying the word of God back to God is vain or babbling is nonsense. The word of God spoken is powerful. “But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it” (Deu 30:14). We have been entrusted with the word of God and reading it, speaking it, praying it, meditating on it are all ways of learning it and keeping it in our heart.

Psalm 119 is full of examples:

13 With my lips I declare

all the rules of your mouth.

43 And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth,

48 I will lift up my hands toward your commandments, which I love,

and I will meditate on your statutes.

54 Your statutes have been my songs

in the house of my sojourning.

And here is a New Testament example:

Eph 5:18 &19

And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart,

Eph 6: 17 & 18

take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication.

I would have to say that it is appropriate to worship God with His word in prayer from the passages above.

What about a lack of faith? Does praying “thy will be done” or “if it be your will” demonstrate a lack of faith? Here’s the rub. Insinuating that someone is deficient in faith because they claim not to know the will of God is also insinuating that somehow you are superior in your faith since you don’t pray like that. Well, how convenient for you. So then if you are superior in faith how about you just tell them what the will of God is and they won’t need to pray at all since they are standing in front of you, the prophet that insinuates!

What about the Lord’s prayer being a part of the old covenant according to hyper-grace teachers? Dumb and dumber. The logic goes like this.

1. The portions of the Gospels before the Crucifixion belong to the old covenant because of Heb 9:22, “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.”
2. The Lord’s prayer occurred prior to the Crucifixion.
3. Therefore it is part of the old covenant.

See any problem with that logic? (One problem is the first half of Heb 9:22 that says “almost everything” but I’ll leave that for another post.) The logic is built on a weak analogy. Every book of the New Testament was written after the Crucifixion. Every word of every book was breathed out by God after the Crucifixion. So by their own definition (after the Crucifixion) every word of the Lord’s prayer was written down by an Apostle directed by the Spirit, after Pentecost. So where do the hyper-grace teachers get the authority to place these things into the old covenant?

John 1:16 &17, “For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” Grace came through Jesus Christ. Forgiveness came by Jesus Christ. Hyper-grace teachers will tell you that there was no forgiveness before the cross because there was no “shedding of blood”. Well that is just not true.

Here are two New Testament examples of forgiveness without blood (pre-crucifixion).

Matt 9:2 And behold, some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.”

3 And behold, some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.” 4 But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? 5 For which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’? 6 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he then said to the paralytic—“Rise, pick up your bed and go home.”

Lu 7:47 Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little.” 48 And he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” 49 Then those who were at table with him began to say among themselves, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?” 50 And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

Soapbox mode OFF.

A review of Leaving Mormonism Why Four Scholars Changed Their Minds

To receive truth is a fundamental principle of Mormonism… Joseph Smith.

This work is the testimony of four scholars, all formerly LDS, contending for truth in a loving spirit of peace. If you are expecting another book about problems with Mormon history or Mormon scriptures this is not that book. You will find references to those things but the thrust here is to tell the how and why of the journey towards truth for these four authors. I encourage you to read on.

Dr Corey Miller CEO of Ratio Christi, searched the faith of his roots for the good life. Dr Miller answers questions most don’t think to ask about the nature and limitations of personal testimony. The implications of which are relevant for traditional Christians and Mormons alike. His exposure to the gospel of traditional Christianity made his Mormon experience feel like a “religious veneer of behaviorism” (p25). His working through these conflicts clarified his faith and he shows how we can have confidence in our testimonies. He clarifies the significant differences between the Mormon and Christian concepts of God and the plan of salvation.

Dr Latayne C. Scott tells of her heartbreaking journey from Mormonism. She was determined to discover the truth. Her journey led her to “Representational Research” a research method for reasoning or perhaps you could call it a hermeneutic for our mind. This tool along with “True Narrative Representations” enables one to rationally discern truth from fiction from error from lies. These tools Dr Scott explains very well and they have implications that are further reaching than just Mormon studies. This is a rich field to glean from for anyone who works with words. This section alone is worth the price of the book.

Dr Lynn K Wilder was a tenured professor at Brigham Young University. She has three sons who all served missions. She believed that the outside world was in opposition to the LDS Church and the Prophet. She never took seriously anti-Mormon literature but dismissed them as lies. However her position at BYU required her to wrestle with some hard questions about racist ideas in the LDS scriptures. This fractured her bubble. She writes that it wasn’t only these difficulties that led her away from Mormonism but rather it was her search for truth in the words of Christ. She doubted everything else. She found these most fully in the New Testament.

Dr Vince Eccles is descended from a well known Utah family. His upbringing was both wonderful and tumultuous. By the laying on of hands, after his baptism into Mormonism, his father prayed “Make him a peacemaker” quoting a section of Matthew 5. His father also instilled in him a rich imagination and a love of rigorous study. As a six year old boy he wondered what he would see if he flew a rocket ship to the edge of the universe. This was a good mix for a future physicist. Disillusioned by the LDS Church his search for the Creator took on a scientific quality. His boyhood rocket became a metaphor in his search for truth. Dr Eccles established criteria for assessing doctrines. He came through with three creed-like statements, God is One, God is Spirit, and God is Love. His journey of faith has been like his childhood both wonderful and tumultuous. Discouragement and a “dark night of the soul” eventually comes to all Christians. The truth Dr Eccles found and his dogged determinism to keep his rocket ship flying has enriched the Christian Church. His insights on the call of Abraham, the meeting with Melchizedek, the Shema, and the Golden Rule are wonderful and edifying. It is this reviewers hope that Dr Eccles will continue to write and share more.

Thanks to Kregel Publishing for a review copy of this book for an unbiased review.