Back and Forth with God
By Ed Welch
During my first year in seminary, I stumbled across a sentence that would deeply shape my relationships with God, those closest to me, and the people I would counsel. It was a year when Scripture appeared to me as a series of fragments.
They were all good fragments, but the pieces seemed to lack coherence — and that lack of coherence could sometimes feel painful. So I was always alert to books and ideas that could help me see one story in Scripture rather than an anthology of short stories.
I was reading J. Gresham Machen’s book The Christian View of Man with that in mind, and a comment caught my attention. It was something like this: as God is personal, so man is personal. Ah, here was a grand unifying principle for Machen; perhaps it would become one for me..
...
Around the same time, I read Biblical Theology by Geerhardus Vos. He wrote so well about Christ as the center of Scripture, which set me off in a direction that I am still on...
Vos gave me a perspective on God-as-personal that was both cognitively and spiritually satisfying.
Today, the sentence might appear in shorthand whenever I say or write the phrase “back and forth.” Our relationship with God depends on words in which the conversation is passed from one to the other.
Back and forth. Reciprocal fellowship. The ceaseless interplay of spiritual beings.
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The full article is here
During my first year in seminary, I stumbled across a sentence that would deeply shape my relationships with God, those closest to me, and the people I would counsel. It was a year when Scripture appeared to me as a series of fragments.
I was reading J. Gresham Machen’s book The Christian View of Man with that in mind, and a comment caught my attention. It was something like this: as God is personal, so man is personal. Ah, here was a grand unifying principle for Machen; perhaps it would become one for me..
...
Around the same time, I read Biblical Theology by Geerhardus Vos. He wrote so well about Christ as the center of Scripture, which set me off in a direction that I am still on...
Vos gave me a perspective on God-as-personal that was both cognitively and spiritually satisfying.
To be a Christian is to live one’s life not merely in obedience to God, nor merely in dependence on God, nor even merely for the sake of God; it is to stand in conscious, reciprocal fellowship with God, to be identified with him in thought and purpose and work, to receive from him and give back to him in the ceaseless interplay of spiritual forces. (Redemptive History and Biblical Interpretation, 186)
Back and forth
All these years later, I still remember what it was like to read those lines.“Our relationship with God depends on words in which the conversation is passed from one to the other.”“To be a Christian is . . .” Vos is giving me his understanding of the heart of the Christian life. I’m all ears. “Not merely obedience . . . nor merely in dependence . . .” Where is he going? Had Vos drifted into heterodoxy, and I am the last to know? “To stand in conscious, reciprocal fellowship . . . to receive from him and give back to him in the ceaseless interplay of spiritual forces.” That is what Machen meant by personal. Something was unlocked.
Today, the sentence might appear in shorthand whenever I say or write the phrase “back and forth.” Our relationship with God depends on words in which the conversation is passed from one to the other.
God says, “Let’s talk” (Isaiah 1:18). The conversation can then begin with Him or me.
God says, “What is on your heart? Tell me” (Psalm 62:8). Then I tell him, and he hears what I say. He responds with compassion, or he simply enjoys that his child talks about what is important to him, and he acts.
Then he continues to speak, through his word, by his Spirit, and I get to be affected and changed by what he says.
God says, “What is on your heart? Tell me” (Psalm 62:8). Then I tell him, and he hears what I say. He responds with compassion, or he simply enjoys that his child talks about what is important to him, and he acts.
Then he continues to speak, through his word, by his Spirit, and I get to be affected and changed by what he says.
Back and forth. Reciprocal fellowship. The ceaseless interplay of spiritual beings.
...
Brought Near in Christ
Moses comes to mind. After the exodus from Egypt and the people’s immediate descent into idolatry, God speaks to Moses about the people “you brought up out of the land of Egypt” (Exodus 32:7)....
The full article is here
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