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Just wanted to let everybody know that our website is now up! Please check it out. If you’re willing, please be willing to donate to the organization. If we want to grow and place the clubs at universities across the country, we need funding. Also, tell others about us. Thanks everybody! Summit is going great.

www.ratiochristi.org

Wow! These past three weeks at Summit have been crazy. I haven’t gotten more than 6 1/2 hours of sleep a night. But it is totally worth it. To be with the students day after day as they go through a two week apologetics seminar is one of the most fulfilling things I have ever done. At Summit I am currently head of the ‘Classroom’ (where the lectures occur). Currently I am listening to David Noebel, President of Summit Ministries, give a lecture on worldviews. It’s amazing to see how much the students pull out of these lectures and how much fun the students actually have in the classroom.

On another note, I’ve been working with a couple other individuals to set up the Ratio Christi organization (formally Reasonable Faith Apologetics Club). We should hopefully have the website up soon and as soon as it is, please check it out and, if at all possible, please donate. Ratio Christi is an organization connected with Southern Evangelical Seminary (Charlotte, NC). We have two chapters of the clubs: one at Appalachian State and one at UNC Charlotte. Since setting this up, and depending on the donations we get, we hope to put several other clubs at secular and liberal campuses over the next several years. Eventually, we hope to have chapters at all major university campuses.

Pray for me as I head off to Summit Ministries today and go through the next couple months counseling students and providing lecture material. I will try and update the blog quite regularily and maybe have a couple recordings up sooner or later of the lectures I give. Nonetheless, please be in prayer for me and those that I may come into contact with over the next two months.

-Randis

(What follows is a preview of an essay I am currently writing on the historical reliability of the gospels. I hope to expand it in due time beyond the limits of the essay. Also, the following paragraphs represent a small section of a first draft so, if you know me, they may look nothing like this in the end.)
What sources did Luke and Matthew use and what is their literary relationship with Mark? According to the twentieth-century British scholar B.H. Streeter, there are evident signs in the gospels that suggest a use of sources. Streeter went beyond the “two source hypothesis” argued first by Christian Weisse and Heinrich Holtzmann and postulated what is called the “four source hypothesis.”[1] According the four source hypothesis, Luke and Matthew used Mark’s gospel for certain information contained in all three gospels, ‘Q’ (meaning “source”) for information not included in Mark, and from where Matthew and Luke differ used different sources, respectively ‘M’ and ‘L’. It should be noted that Streeter never intended to imply that the gospels were historically inaccurate. Rather, Streeter and many of the other proponents of his theory simply intended to show the literary relationship between the Synoptics. It has only been recently that scholars have implied that this method goes against the reliability of the Gospels. This modern view is surely unwarranted. It is well known that historians of the Greco-Roman world quite often used sources—many sources—in constructing their histories. Why should the Gospels be any different? In dealing with the Synoptics then, we must construct an accurate picture of what ‘Q’, ‘M’, and ‘L’ really are. The definitions of these supposed documents are often quite ambiguous and discussions of them can often be misleading.

‘Q’ is a hypothetical document that originated 40-50 A.D. that seeks to answer why, in so many places, Matthew and Luke are so similar (roughly 200 verses) in what they report while Mark and John both fail to record the saying. There are several problems with hypothetical Q, not least of which is that there is no evidence whatsoever ever in textual fragments or church reference that suggests Q ever existed. Furthermore, one could always suggest, in line with the ‘Farrer hypothesis’, that Mark was written first, with Luke using Matthew as his source (or vice-versa).[2] Nonetheless, even though the Q hypothesis has undergone severe criticism recently and is beginning to decline in popularity among scholars, it is still the prevailing view of the time and I see no reason to abandon it in its entirety as of yet.[3]

What I do feel needs to be abandoned (and is in the process of being abandoned) is the common definition of Q held by many liberal scholars. Q is often argued to be quite like the Gospel of Thomas in that it is not really a gospel at all but merely a record of Jesus sayings. It is here that Q proponents believe Matthew and Luke derived most of their shared sayings while taking many of the events from Mark. Proponents of this type of Q hold that Luke preserves more of the original Q sayings and parables than does Matthew. The idea is that Jesus was no more than a cynic philosopher and reformer comparative to Socrates, Plato, and the like. After his sayings were preserved in Q, Matthew, in line with his exegesis, came through and Judaized them. Unfortunately for them, this line of reasoning has come under severe scrutiny from scholars across the field, most notably beginning with Albert Schweitzer. Schweitzer’s criticisms were put to rest for some time but have been resurrected recently with the work of E.P. Sanders and N.T. Wright in recent years[4]. As these scholars point out, this view of Jesus completely strips away his Jewishness and turns him into somebody he most certainly wasn’t. There is no reason to accept this idea other than the already preconceived presumption that the Jesus of the New Testament (in all his Jewishness) couldn’t have been the Jesus of history. It seems much more plausible reversed: instead of Jesus’ Stoicism being stripped and replaced with a Jewish portrait that his Jewish portrait would be stripped and replaced with a Stoic portrait. And this is certainly what we find with Gnostic documents compared to the canonical documents. Even with Luke’s gentile exegesis Jesus is still remarkably Jewish.
Further, I think because of the lack of both textual and referential support for the existence of Q we cannot sufficiently label it a single document. As Luke mentions, several other eyewitness accounts were circulating at this time and oral tradition was permeating. Q, as far as I think can be allowed, should be defined as a collection of multiple pre-canonical documents and oral sayings. While some believe there is no reason to speculate the existence of Q whatsoever, I see no reason to believe that Q was a single document. The evidence doesn’t seem to support it. Wherein Matthew and Luke quote word for word exactly what Jesus said it’s reasonable to think they were writing off the same source. Why should they change the wording? In other places, while reporting the same saying, the wording differentiates. It seems to me that this is a prime example of oral tradition. Matthew and Luke obviously had the same tradition available to them but from different sources.

It seems to me that the definition of Q, as commonly promoted by its proponents (specifically Burton Mack) is almost entirely wrong. There is no reason to differentiate it so much from the gospels. As Wright notes, “those who first hypothesized Q, after all, saw it simply and solely as consisting of those passages in Matthew and Luke which do not overlap with Mark.” He continues, “Q belongs, if anywhere, within the early missionary community of Jesus’ followers…”[5]

What then of ‘M’ and ‘L’? How should these, in line with the four-source hypothesis, be interpreted? There certainly are passages unique to Matthew and Luke not found in Mark and the four-source theory seems to have the most explanatory power. The idea is that Matthew had a source, unknown (or at least unused) by Luke and vice-versa. It needs to be stated though, that even if Q is eventually dismissed by scholars, B.H. Streeter’s theory will not take too much of a hit. For if the Gospel of Matthew was written by the apostle Matthew as church tradition holds, then it seems reasonable that much of his unique material comes from personal experiences and reminiscences.[6] Since Luke refers to careful investigating the facts in his gospel and, in Acts we find “we” passages in which he often claims to have stayed with the apostles and other believers it is quite reasonable to think that he may have interviewed the eyewitnesses prior to his writing of Luke-Acts. Ben Witherington III, respected professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary and author of more than thirty books on Jesus believes that Luke 1-2, because of its seemingly different characteristics (including its seemingly Semitic structure) is a prime example of what ‘L’ is. Witherington notes, “I have suggested elsewhere that Luke was privy to this material because he spent two years in the Holy Land in the late 50s while Paul was under house arrest in Caesarea Maritima, during which time Luke surely must have gone to Jerusalem and interviewed many persons, which may well have included Mary.”[7] Given Luke’s immediate preface (Luke 1:1-4, wherein he takes the position of a Hellenistic historian), this seems to me to be more of a plausible hypothesis given the “we” passages and the claims by Luke to have been in the company of the eyewitnesses than Crossan’s belief that these were merely theological stories meant to emphasize Christ’s divinity.[8]

[1] Blomberg, Craig, Jesus and the Gospels: An Introduction and Survey (Broadman & Holman Publishers: Nashville, 1997), p 92
[2] See, http://www.ntgateway.com/Q/farrer.htm
[3] For other competing hypothesizes see Blomberg, 1997.
[4] See Wright, 1992 and Sanders, E.P., The Historical Figure of Jesus, (Penguin Press: Allen Lane:1993)
[5] Wright, 1992, p 441-442
[6] It should be noted though, that an extremely large portion of Ignatius’ quotes of Matthew material is unparalleled. This may suggest that ‘M’ was still in circulation during the journey of Ignatius. See Blomberg 1997; cf. Early Christian Writings, (Penguin Classics: New York, 1987) tr. Maxwell Staniforth and Andrew Louth.
[7] Witherington III, Ben, What Have They Done With Jesus: Beyond Strange Theories and Bad History—Why We Can Trust the Bible, (Harper One: New York, 2006) p 98.
[8] For the both Crossan’s views and archeological evidence Witherington finds in support of both Matthew and Luke’s birth narratives see CBS 48 Hours: The Mystery of Christmas, December 20th, 2005; cf. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/12/19/48hours/main1135330.shtml, last accessed 5/20/08

Answer: That I am not my own,[1] but belong with body and soul, both in life and in death,[2] to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ.[3] He has fully paid for all my sins with His precious blood, and has set me free from all the power of the devil.[5] He also preserves me in such a way[6] that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head;[7] indeed, all things must work together for my salvation.[8] Therefore, by His Holy Spirit He also assures me of eternal life[9] and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live for Him.[10]
[1] I Cor. 6:19, 20 [2] Rom. 14:7-9. [3] I Cor. 3:23; Tit. 2:14. [4] I Pet. 1:18, 19; I John 1:7; 2:2. [5] John 8:34-36; Heb. 2:14, 15; I John 3:8. [6] John 6:39, 40; 10:27-30; II Thess. 3:3; I Pet. 1:5. [7] Matt. 10:29-31; Luke 21:16-18. [8] Rom. 8:28. [9] Rom. 8:15, 16; II Cor. 1:21, 22; 5:5; Eph. 1:13, 14. [10] Rom. 8:14.

Question 1 from the Heidelburg Catechism
(My new, once a week blog segment will be posting the questions of the Heidelburg Catechism. I think, as a body of believers in Christ, we often look past creeds. Yet, in the early church creeds were an important component of worship. These tie back to the apostles (and even to the pre-Christian Jews with the Shema). Scholars have spotted roughly 18 oral church creeds preserved in the New Testament.

I saw The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian at minight this past Thursday. I must say, absolutely amazing! The acting is spectaculor, the imagery is captivating, and the plot will keep you awake. I will try not to spoil it for you if you haven’t seen it.

As in the book, a year passes between the two stories (in the films it is more like two and a half years, so the kids look remarkeably older). As they head back to Narnia as ‘Kings and Queens of Old’ they encounter a completely different Narnia. Aslan is gone, the Narnians are in hidng, and the evil Telmarines have taken over. It becomes a three hour struggle for the Pevensie children and Prince Caspian (a runaway Telmarine that wants to put the empire straight) to successfully defeat their foes.

There are some major plot differences between the book and the movie. Disney obviously took more liberties in this film than they did in the first. The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe succeeded in being a well designed children/adult movie. This isn’t the case with Prince Caspian. I’m not sure how Disney managed to get away with a PG rating with Prince Caspian. There are more battle scenes, more bloodshed (even the slitting of throats and the chopping off of heads), and overall more violence. If you know me, this doesn’t bother me. I would actually prefer a movie like this than not. But Prince Caspian looked more on par with Lord of the Rings then it did The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. Disney also manages to throw in a romance, something I think was extremely cheezy.

I thought the movie was amazing. But given the plot changes, exagerrated violence, and the romance story I think C.S. Lewis would probably beg to differ.

After giving a speech a couple months ago I got involved in a discussion with a certain woman at my church on apologetics. It was a very pleasant discussion and I look forward again and again to talking with this lady. She was a big fan of Hank Hanegraff’s program “The Bible Answer Man” which is now located out of Charlotte, NC. I am also a fan of the program, though I seldom get to listen to it anymore. Usually I just get the Christian Research Journal. She expressed how thankful she was for the ministry the Christian Research Institute provided. I was pleased to here her gratitude. However, towards the end of our discussion she mentioned that Hanegraff had “gone of his rocker” within the past couple years with his search in eschatology and referred to it as “craziness”, “heresy”, and “lies”.

If you are unfamiliar with Hanegraff’s eschatology (the study of the end times), Hanegraff published it in a book called “The Apocalypse Code”. In the book, Hanegraff lays out a case against belief in the rapture, against a late date of Revelation, against a future tribulation, and against a literal reading of Revelation. His opinions stand in stark constrast with those of other modern pre-millenial dispensationalists like Tim LaHaye, Tom Ice, and even the renowned Norman Geisler.

I want to say this with the most respect possible, to those that believe in the rapture, a future tribulation of the church, and a literal tribulation. But can you justify it scripturally? Where in scripture is there any suggestion that there will be a rapture of the church prior to a second coming and how can you date this view previous to Jonathan Darby? Why are we to interpret certain things in Revelation as literal and others not? Have you studied it in conjunction with the apocalyptic language in Daniel? Have you studied Revelation and Jesus’ other apocalyptic statements in conjunction with the Jewish War of A.D. 63-70?

I don’t mean to sound patronizing. As someone who believed for years and years in the rapture and a future tribulation, wrote papers on it, gave speeches concerning it, and even as a child wrote a book about the end of the world, I think it is one of the biggest traps the church has ever fallen into. For the vast majority of Christianity there has been no doctrine of a rapture. It originated with John Darby in the early 19th century and became popular soon after. As far as general dispensationalism and a view of a future tribulation goes, I think this is a major misconception based off of bad readings of scripture and a lack of understanding concerning Second-Temple Judaism and early Christianity. If you find my statements as overly forceful, I apologize but it is something I think the church needs to fix. Eschatology is a major component of our worldview (Creation, Fall, Redemption, Restoration) and we need to understand that it is not and should not be a grey issue.

The story of Ignatius is one of my favorite stories of the early church. To read his seven letters that he wrote while he was on his way to be executed is extremely powerful. Lee Strobel does a fantastic job demonstrating the certainty through which Ignatius believed in Christianity. Take a listen.