MarkRoss

     I recall quite vividly from my early childhood a curious impulse that I developed at the closing of one year and the coming of the next. From the anticipation and excitement that I saw in others around me, and perhaps from a measure of media hype, I had a sense that at midnight on New Year’s Eve, something truly amazing would happen, something that would totally transform things, something worth celebrating in the biggest way. My parents would be watching the TV as things unfolded in Times Square. Guy Lombardo and The Royal Canadians would be playing, as they claimed, “the sweetest music this side of heaven.” We watched with excitement as the ball began to drop down the pole. But as the stroke of midnight approached, I would run to the far end of the house where, from a darkened room, I could peer out into the night sky with eager longing, expecting that something quite magical would happen. I could hear from the TV the cheers that went up from the crowd in Times Square as the new year dawned. But to my surprise and disappointment, nothing ever happened in the night sky. There were no meteor showers or comets. Supernovae did not suddenly appear. From where I was looking, one could not even see fireworks, which can temporarily make it seem like the sky has become new. The cosmos, it appeared to me, was oblivious to our new year, and it stood unyielding against all our hopes for something really new. You might say I was experiencing my first encounter with the sense of futility that the Preacher of Ecclesiastes discusses: “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun” (1:9).

     I do not know just why I had this childhood expectation that a new year might bring a new beginning. But in myself as well as in others, I have often found that same hope emerging when something new is going to happen: a new car, a new house, a new job, a new therapist, a new spouse, or even just a new diet and exercise regimen. Almost as often, though, I have found that the cosmos remains unyielding to our hopes. The ball may drop and the crowd may cheer, but what has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun — or so it seems.

     We recently marked the beginning of a new year, and probably for all of us there is that longing for things that are new, for a life that is new. Our hopes are kindled high by the promises of the gospel. But looking back on previous years, we have known that hunger before. Where can we go for satisfaction of that desire? Where can that which is new and lasting really be found?

The exodus of the people of Israel from Egypt marked a whole new beginning for them, one that would deserve annual commemoration in full. It stood at the head of the new year: “This month shall be for you the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of the year for you” (Exodus 12:2). It marked the transition from slavery to freedom, from days of oppression in a foreign land to life as possessors in the Promised Land. At the heart of this great deliverance was the promise of God to Abraham, the blessing to him and to his descendants after him that they would become exceedingly numerous and inherit the land flowing with milk and honey. The fulfillment of this promise was advancing. Time, as it were, began there. It was the birth of a new day, a new era, a new nation. So pivotal was this event in God’s revelation of Himself to Israel that the meaning of His personal name is tied to the exodus (6:2–8). In those great acts of love and deliverance, “the Lord” was revealing Himself in ways that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob never knew (v. 3). By those acts, Israel would know that He is the Lord (v. 7). By those same acts, Egypt would know that He is the Lord (7:5). Moses would later exclaim that nothing like this had ever happened before (Deuteronomy 4:32–40). Though the course of the ages afterward, and Israel’s repeated failures, seemed to mock the new beginning made in the exodus, yet the events of those days truly did mark a new beginning, or perhaps we might better say, foretold a new beginning. The Passover feast prophesied a greater exodus. It spoke of the Lamb who, in future days, would take away the sin of the world. It found its fulfillment in Christ, who transformed that feast into a remembrance of Himself until He comes to make all things new. My childhood longing lives on. It was no futile hope. Thanks be to God.

Dr. Mark E. Ross is John R. de Witt Professor of Systematic Theology and director of the Institute for Reformed Worship at Erskine Theological Seminary in Columbia, S.C.

   First published in Tabletalk Magazine, an outreach of Ligonier. Website: www.ligonier.org/tabletalk.  © Tabletalk magazine. Used with permission

Leviticus 23:23–25   “In the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall observe a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blast of trumpets, a holy convocation” (v. 24).

  Kosher laws (Lev. 11), rules for intermarriage (Neh. 13:23–27), weekly Sabbath observance (Ex. 20:8–11), and more were all rituals that were part of the warp and woof of old covenant life, serving to remind Israel of the nation’s special status as the people of God. The Lord, however, knowing that His people were weak, added several feasts to the regular rituals prescribed in the Mosaic law so that the Israelites would have extra occasions on which to recall their salvation and thank God for His goodness. The call to remember and praise the Lord for His beneficence was one of the reasons for the Feast of Trumpets outlined in Leviticus 23:23–25 and Numbers 29:1–6.

     Since the Feast of Trumpets marked the beginning of the civil calendar in ancient Israel, the Jews eventually came to refer to the holiday as Rosh Hashanah, which in the Hebrew literally means “head of the year” or New Year’s Day. This day began the seventh month of the religious calendar (Tishri), a month in which the solemn Day of Atonement and the festive Feast of Booths were also celebrated (Lev. 23:23–44). In addition to a day of rest and special food offerings (Num. 29:1–6), all that Scripture prescribes for the Feast of Trumpets is a “blast of trumpets” (Lev. 23:23–25). While trumpets were blown on other occasions, it seems that at the Feast of Trumpets the instruments were sounded continuously from morning until evening.

     What was the purpose of the trumpet soundings? One answer is that the trumpet blast was a call for the people to assemble to hear the voice of God just as it was at the foot of Mt. Sinai. (Ex. 19:13). Given that the feast was celebrated even during the times God was not actively providing new revelation, it would seem that at every Feast of Trumpets there was an anticipation that the Lord might reveal Himself in power once more, especially to consummate the salvation of His people (Isa. 27). Seven is the number of completeness in Scripture, and the fact that the Feast of Trumpets was held in the seventh month of the year confirms this idea.

     Silver trumpets and the shofar (ram’s horn) were blown at the Feast of Trumpets, and ancient Jews also read Genesis 22 on this day. Each of these acts helped the Israelites to see God’s mercy in substituting a ram for Isaac and to anticipate the end of days when a greater lamb would be slain on their behalf.

Coram Deo

As we will see, Christians are waiting for the Feast of Trumpets to be fulfilled in its entirety. But Christ the Lamb of God has come and by His death has inaugurated the last days, which comprise the entire period between His first and second coming. Since we are now in the last days, the call to spread the good news of salvation is more urgent than ever, so let us preach the gospel to friends and family before the final trumpet blows.

First published in Tabletalk Magazine, an outreach of Ligonier. Website: www.ligonier.org/tabletalk.

 © Tabletalk magazine. Used with permission.

“As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favour of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth” (Daniel 9:13).

– Daniel 9:1–19

Exile—the very sound of the word struck the ancient descendants of Jacob with horror. To be cast out of the land that the Lord swore to Abraham was the final curse threatened upon the old covenant community for persistent, impenitent, and flagrant violation of God’s law as expressed in the Pentateuch (Genesis–Deuteronomy) delivered to Moses (Gen. 15; Deut. 28:15–68). Just imagine what it must have been like to lose one’s inheritance, the place where the Lord promised to dwell intimately with His people. Multiply that pain many times over, and we begin to see how awful the exile was for the ancient Jew.

However, exile was never God’s last word for His people. Our Creator told Moses that He would never forget the covenant He made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and that He would never destroy the people utterly (Leviticus 26:44–45). Thus, there always had to be a faithful remnant— Israelites in both body and soul. True Jews such as Daniel, Ezekiel, and Esther, who suffered in exile along with the rest of the Lord’s chosen nation, prove that God kept His promise of preservation. Nevertheless, having but a few godly people was never our Creator’s intent. He purposed to have a righteous nation (Exodus 19:6), so righteousness would have to finally be evident on a corporate level—righteousness not grounded in the people themselves but received through faith alone, due to the work of the perfect Davidic king (Isa. 53). God could not bring His people back fully from exile without true, corporate repentance, for faith without repentance is impossible. He mercifully could bring them back to the land, but without widespread trust in Him, He would not keep His word and pour out the full restoration blessings of the new heaven and earth (Deuteronomy 30:1– 10; Isaiah 65:17–25). Given this link between repentance and restoration, God’s promise in Jeremiah 25:1–14 that the exile would end after seventy years was contingent upon the Jews’ turning from their sin. The prayer we read in Daniel 9 indicates that this repentance had not come and was not even on the horizon (see v. 13). This lack of corporate repentance did not take God by surprise. In fact, He ordained it, just as He ordains all things. But that should not be our focus, as it was part of the secret things of God (Deuteronomy 29:29). What we must note is that the exile could not yet fully in 539 BC, and the fault for that was entirely the people’s own. God would have to dramatically intervene to bring about this repentance and restoration.

Coram Deo (before God)

Daniel’s prayer that God would not forget His promises of restoration is not based on the inherent goodness of the people but purely on the Lord’s mercy (Dan. 9:1–19). He asked God not to deal with the people as they deserved but to show grace and restore them despite the widespread failure to repent. If we learn nothing else from this prayer, it is that we can never demand God’s favour as if He owes us His kindness. Instead, our plea must always be for His grace and mercy.

Passages for Further Study

Isaiah 9:8–21   Jeremiah 15:19–21   Haggai 2:10–19   Luke 19:41–44

First published in Tabletalk Magazine, an outreach of Ligonier. Website: www.ligonier.org/tabletalk.

 © Tabletalk magazine. Used with permission  

RyanReeves

CONFESSIONS TODAY

Today, confessions are used in a variety of ways in the lives of Protestant churches. Not all of the trends in evangelical churches are hospitable to confessions. Forces such as the rise of Pietism and the Second Great Awakening have had a withering effect on the role of confessions— corporately and privately—in favour of a more immediate articulation of the faith. At times, confessions are seen as roadblocks to authentic faith.

While these trends are alarming, the confessions of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries have not passed away. They are used weekly in many churches, both in the context of worship and in catechizing new believers and children. They also are used to verify the fidelity of pastors and elders in a variety of denominations. In this sense, the confessions of faith not only form the boundary fence that helps ensure orthodoxy but are also used as living documents that contour the daily walk of

Christian disciples

Dr. Ryan Reeves is assistant professor of historical theology and assistant dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Jacksonville, Fla.

First published in Tabletalk Magazine, an outreach of Ligonier. Website: www.ligonier.org/tabletalk.  © Tabletalk magazine. Used with permission

RyanReeves

The Reformation was a struggle over the essentials of the faith. Protestants had to articulate their understanding of biblical teaching. In this sense, the Reformation confessions were a natural flowering of the Protestant commitment to the Bible.

THE WESTMINSTER STANDARDS

The high mark of confessions, though, was the Westminster Standards, which comprises the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Larger and Shorter Catechisms, the Directory of Public Worship, and the Form of Church Government. The confession served as a new expression of Reformed orthodoxy, while the two catechisms mimic Luther’s commitment to providing a manual for both clergy or adults (Larger Catechism) and children (Shorter Catechism). In terms of length and depth, no Reformation or post-Reformation confessional standard rivals that of the Westminster Assembly. Its history, though, comes out of the struggle over Puritanism within the English church.

     Since the time of Henry VIII (r. 1509–47), the English church had embraced only an essential confession—first the Forty-Two Articles (1552), later pared down to the Thirty-Nine Articles (1563). Though these articles were fully Protestant in theology, they did not clarify the church’s commitment to principles of worship and did not specify a position on controversial doctrines such as ecclesiological leadership structures or the presence of Christ in communion. Much of the failure in the English church to write a more comprehensive confession was not due to hesitation but to inability created by the violent swings between Protestant and Catholic allegiances under Henry’s two children, Edward VI and Mary I. For much of the sixteenth century, the Anglican Church did not have the luxury to write a lengthy, unified confession. By the time of Elizabeth I, not a few in England believed the earlier necessity of a limited confession to be a virtue. Shorter confessions might curtail the number of doctrinal squabbles that were emerging, for example, between Reformed and Lutheran leaders in Europe. Bishops such as Matthew Parker—though committed to the Reformed faith—began to express concern at the growing voice for the English church to alter its position on worship, vestments, doctrine, and other liturgical practices.      The result of this tension provoked the emergence of Puritanism, first under Elizabeth and then increasingly under James I. The label applied to the impulse to seek further reform rather than to a clearly defined movement. Yet all Puritans shared in the frustration at the hesitation of bishops and political leaders to reform the English church further.

By the time of Charles I, the situation was rather grim. Under Elizabeth and James, the plight of Puritans was often that they were ignored, though they were hardly persecuted. Charles, though, embodied a more aggressive stance against Puritans. In the end, strife between Parliament and king issued in the English Civil War (1642–51).

     The Puritans won the struggle, led by the heroic efforts of Oliver Cromwell—whose statue today still sits squarely in front of Parliament. During the war, Parliament ordered Puritan leaders (and a few Scottish consultants) to convene an assembly to expand the Thirty-Nine Articles into a full confession that matched other confessions in Europe. The Westminster Assembly made an honest effort to base their work on the Thirty-Nine Articles, but it soon found this model too constricting, and so started from scratch.

     This context of the struggles against Charles and the need for further reform explain the length and depth of the Westminster Standards. Rather than being seen as an attempt to summarize all doctrine, the Standards should be seen instead as an explosion of pent-up energies within Puritanism to define English Reformed doctrine and practice. Blood had been shed and voices silenced, and now that those voices were loosed from their confines, they felt it their duty to expound not only on their

doctrinal position but on worship, discipleship, and a bevy of other issues in the life of the church.                                                                  (to be continued)

Dr. Ryan Reeves is assistant professor of historical theology and assistant dean of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Jacksonville, Fla.

First published in Tabletalk Magazine, an outreach of Ligonier. Website: www.ligonier.org/tabletalk.  © Tabletalk magazine. Used with permission