Re: [TruthTalk] Fw: Torrance

[Debbie Sawczak]

Your question, Izzy, recalls one that was asked a while ago, namely, Why are we so polarized on TT? It's because we are always reacting. I think some of us conservative-type believers on TT dwell on God's love for the disobedient because we've experienced a severe neglect of this in our own conservative circles. Perhaps the other conservative-type believers have seen a terrible neglect of teaching about how Christ changes us in the here and now.    I agree that if there is no sign of the latter, we are deluded; I've just been listening to a speaker who warned that such "spirituality" is mere narcissism, and he is right. But it is a matter of what ground you build on, where you start from. It was only when I started from a place of total security in being forgiven and reconciled to God that my walk started to change, because the walking can only be by faith/trust, not by effort--as people from both "camps" have said here. Another "bicameral" statement made on TT is that love is the sum of the commandments. I love "disobedient people" better when I focus on God's unquenchable love for us. Where else could our love come from?   I also find that the more my faith revolves around the person of Christ and a relationship with him rather than insistence on a set of correct doctrines, the more genuinely alive and active it becomes. Life is relationships; it can't be built on less.   And that brings me to your earlier post, about "majoring on" the inconclusivity of interpretation when we should be "confident in God's word". I know it doesn't seem this way to you, but acceptance of this kind of uncertainty IS confidence in God's word--as something greater than the shape forced on it by our reason or traditions, able to continue to renew and change our thinking (more than once, nudging us along a path). It is confidence in God and his ongoing covenant story rather than in the principles, generalizations, or jots-and-tittles we try to extract from it. The canon in its entirety argues for greater diversity than any one piece of it, and if you take this seriously (So-and-So thinks differently, and may be right!), it makes for not-insignificant uncertainty. It's not hard to allow uncertainty at the margins of our thinking, but harder to submit our ideological "darlings". If you think that some of us who so loudly profess this aren't always much good at carrying it out, you are right!   Debbie   P.S.: I think your post below might have been better appreciated by some if you hadn't seemed to imply that we could/should get rid of our bodies.     ----- Original Message ----- From: ShieldsFamily To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org Sent: Tuesday, April 26, 2005 9:06 AM Subject: RE: [TruthTalk] Fw: Torrance Why is it that liberal-type believers only dwell on God's love for the disobedient, whereas the conservative-type believers dwell upon God's deliverance from sin and victory over the flesh?  The Torrance type of deliverance is all in the mind.  The Jesus kind of deliverance is REAL! The "good news" is that we no longer are old, fleshly sinners, but all things are made new in Christ--thus we enter into the Kingdom of God. No one is happy, nomatter how much they try to convince themselves of it, when they are still dragging around a fleshly, sinful body.  Freedom from the flesh is freedom indeed! J Izzy   -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Lance Muir Sent: Tuesday, April 26, 2005 4:05 AM To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org Subject: [TruthTalk] Fw: Torrance     ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jonathan Hughes" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Lance Muir" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: April 25, 2005 19:38 Subject: Torrance     > I know I sent this to you a few weeks ago but it is so good I am sending > it again. >  > JBH >  > “The covenant between God and Israel was not a covenant between God and > a holy people, but precisely the reverse. It was a covenant established > out of pure grace between God and Israel in its sinful, rebellious and > estranged existence. Hence, no matter how rebellious or sinful Israel > was, it could not escape from the covenant love and faithfulness of God… > There were evidently critical moments in Israel’s history when it seemed > ready to do anything to flout the will of God in hope of breaking loose > from the grip of his unswerving love and of escaping from the painful > transformation of its existence that relations with ‘the Holy One of > Israel’ involved. No, the covenant was not made with holy people, nor > did its validity depend upon a contractual fulfillment of its conditions > on the part of Israel, for its was a unilateral covenant which depended > for its fulfillment upon the unconditional grace of God and the > unrelenting purpose of reconciliation which he had pledged to work out > through Israel for all peoples. And therefore…it depended upon a > vicarious way of response to the love of God which God himself provided > within the covenant—a way of response which he set out in the liturgy of > atoning sacrifice and which he insisted on translating into the very > existence of Israel in its vocation as ‘servant of the Lord.’ >  > “…the more fully God gave himself to this people, the more he forced it > to be what it actually was, what we all are, in the self-willed > isolation of fallen humanity from God. Thus the movement of God’s > reconciling love toward Israel not only revealed Israel’s sin but > intensified it. That intensification, however, is not to be regarded > simply as an accidental result of the covenant but rather as something > which God deliberately took into the full design of his reconciling > activity, for it was the will and the way of God’s grace to effect > reconciliation with man at his very worst, precisely in his state of > rebellion against God. That is to say, *in his marvelous wisdom and love > God worked out in Israel a way of reconciliation* which does not depend > on the worth of men and women, but makes their very sin in rebellion > against him the means by which he binds them for ever to himself and > through which he reconstitutes their relations with him in such a way > that their true end is fully and perfectly realized in unsullied > communion with himself. >  > “That is the way in which we are surely to interpret the Incarnation, in > which God has drawn so near to man and drawn man so near to himself in > Jesus that they are perfectly at one. In Jesus the problematic presence > of God to Israel, the distance of his nearness and the nearness of his > distance, which so deeply trouble the soul of the psalmists and prophets > alike, was brought to its resolution” (T.F. Torrance, /The Mediation of > Christ/, pp. 28-29). >  >      ---------- "Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every man."  (Colossians 4:6) http://www.InnGlory.org   If you do not want to receive posts from this list, send an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and you will be unsubscribed.  If you have a friend who wants to join, tell him to send an e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and he will be subscribed.