Theology

What is the Gospel? by Greg Gilbert

Kirk E. Miller

What is the Gospel? by Greg Gilbert is a great little book explaining the Gospel in an unintimidating 121 pages of colloquial language .

The book provides an accurate, concise, clear presentation of the Gospel in very a Pauline, protestant, evangelical, and Reformed fashion. He explains the Gospel in very “Romans’ road”-like terms and uses penal substitution as his foundational motif in explaining the Gospel (hence very Pauline, protestant, evangelical, and Reformed). Gilbert uses the well-known, often used, and quite excellent, “God, man, Christ, response” outline to explain the Gospel. This outline demonstrates a fantastic and simply model to help one get a solid grasp of what the Gospel is really all about. It also prompts one to ask important questions about what the Gospel message assumes (sometimes called the “bad news”), means, and implies.

Continue reading →

The Difference Between Typology and Allegory

Kirk E. Miller 9 Comments

You may have read my previous post entitled, Are “Authorial Intent” and “Christ-Centered” Mutually Exclusive? (if not, you may want to do so before continuing, although it’s not necessary).

But this post prompts the question, if we are to preach Christ in all of Scripture (that is, preach Christotelically; see my previous post Christ in the Old Testament: Christocentric or Christotelic Hermeneutic?), are we allegorizing? If Christ is not at all present in a text, then are we spiritualizing the text by preaching Christ?

I have had enough experience with a certain school of interpretation to realize that many people answer this question in the affirmative–unfortunately. It has appeared to me, however, that part of their reason for doing so was a fundamental misunderstanding, a confusion of typology and allegory.[1] So, let me try to spell out some of the basic, introductory differences between typology and allegory.

Continue reading →

Are “Authorial Intent” and “Christ-Centered” Mutually Exclusive?

Kirk E. Miller 2 Comments

As interpreters, teachers, and preachers of God’s word we desire to be faithful to the Biblical text. We know that this entails interpreting Scripture according to the Biblical authors’ original intent, historical context, and literary context, among other things. We don’t want to be guilty of eisegesis–reading our own thoughts and ideas into the text rather than getting our conclusions from out of the text (exegesis).

But at the same time, we know that Christ said the entirety of Scripture speaks of Him (Luke 24:25-27; cf. 1 Pet 1:10-12; Rom 1:2). And so as Paul, we would love to say that even in our expositional preaching “I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor 2:2).

But what about the majority of texts where Christ is not mentioned? How do we preach Christ then? Do we preach the authorial intent and then sort of arbitrarily jump to Christ at the end, tack on an altar call or two with some repeated “Just as I am” choruses?

We want to avoid moralism; so we want to preach Christ. We don’t simply want to draw conclusions like, “don’t be like Saul,” “don’t be like the Israelites,” or “be more like David,” as if this alternative is somehow more honest to the authorial intent. But how do we preach Christ-centered in passages that have seemingly little to do with Christ at all?

I think you get my drift.

Continue reading →

Humble Orthodoxy by Joshua Harris

Kirk E. Miller

It seems incredibly inappropriate to criticize a book that focuses so heavily on humility… which is why I’m glad Humble Orthodoxy has basically nothing to criticize.

I consider myself a pretty well-abled critic. So, I don’t say this lightly; the book is fantastic.

The title of Joshua Harris‘ book, Humble Orthodoxy: Holding the Truth Without Putting People Down, does a fine job explaining what the book is about (based largely on 2 Tim 1:13-14 and 2 Tim 2:23-25). The following statement sums up the book quite well:

Here’s what I believe: truth matters…but so does our attitude. This is what I mean by humble orthodoxy: we must cared deeply about truth, and we must also defend and share this truth with compassion and humility. [pg.5]

Continue reading →

Some Concerns with So Called “Secondary Separation”

Kirk E. Miller 13 Comments

Introduction

Let me start out by saying that this is a response to Dave Marriott’s blog post entitled Guarding What Is Primary: Second Degree Separation which was posted today on The Gospel Toolbox. But with that said, let me add that I say “response” for lack of betters words. “Response” makes it sound like I am arguing with him, which is not what I’m doing. (For all I know, he may agree with me!) I am more so continuing the conversation.

Continue reading →