Okay then. I have finished Piper’s book, and I still like it. It is well worth reading, and should be taken seriously. He emphasizes a number of things that I believe that Wright should incorporate into his broader insights, without giving up those broader insights. There are any number of places where the sweep of …
Whatever We Call It
The next to last chapter of Piper’s book (not counting appendices) returns to the question of imputed righteousness. “Wright regards the imputation of God’s righteousness as something that can be imputed to us or counted as ours as at best a category mistake” (p. 163). And of course, we need to return to a distinction …
Speaking of Hatchet Jobs
A correspondent informs me that somewhere out there on the web, one of our local critics is chastising us for a bunch of stuff. All to be expected, and part of the cost of doing business. This is not worthy of comment, but one point Nick Gier made in this criticism was too good to …
Speaking of Second Temple Judaism . . .
There are a couple of things to be drawn out of chapter ten, in which Piper argues (and in my view, demonstrates) that there is a single self-righteous root for both “self-help moralism” and prideful “ethnic badges.” That is the first point. But the second, and the one where I want to spend some attention, …
If That’s Grace, Then We Don’t Want Any
In the ninth chapter of Piper’s book, he starts to get into the issues that make Wright’s project really vulnerable — if we take Wright’s offerings in the “take it or leave it” way he offers them. For my part, I intend to continue to learn from Wright, but that can’t be done on Wright’s …
Ministerial Suffering Unto Glory
Posting this week will continue, but may be spotty and erratic here and there. I am down in Monroe for their annual pastor’s conference. The lead off talks tonight were by Peter Leithart and Jeff Meyers, both of them very good. Jeff made one point that was worth the entire trip — what does Paul …
Cattiness at the Christian School
Once there were two headmasters of two Christian schools who were good friends. They lived in different cities, and didn’t see one another very often, but they did make a point of catching up a couple times a year. One time they got together for lunch when their schools were competing in a regional spelling …
Especially For You
Something we have said here many times is that this meal is not a reward for being good. This is not an awards ceremony. We sometimes draw this false conclusion from the practice of church discipline—if someone can be excluded from this meal, which excommunication most certainly does, then weren’t they excluded for being bad? …
Really Married
Since I used my stand-by marriage analogy in the previous post, let me modify it slightly before Frank Turk says something about it. I do this because I know the illustration is not exact. Let me modify it so that it is exact. Suppose that marriage exists, just as it does today, but with this …
Then Learn from the Baptist
Let me begin my discussion of this next chapter in Piper with a caution for any defenders of Wright who think that Piper is “missing it,” or “not understanding,” or anything along those lines. This chapter is discussing issues right at the heart of the Reformed understanding of how the gospel works. Piper is arguing …