No Non-theologians: Prolegomena

Some of us are theology nerds; others aren’t. I am the former. Nostalgia waves over me when I ramp the DeLorean of my imagination up to 88 mph, reminiscing about staying up late in Carver 319 with my roommate Brady, and our other Bible College buddies discussing and debating Reformed theology, Barthian Neoorthodoxy, the Emergent Church, and how kangaroos found their way to Australia after the flood. Good times.

But theology isn’t just for theology nerds. Karl Barth said, “In the Church of Jesus Christ there can and should be no non-theologians.”[1] Theology means, “the study of God.”[2] In our culture where everything is formalized and specialized, it’s easy to assume that, like everything else, theology is for the experts - theologians, seminary students, and pastors. While formal theological education is, at minimum, beneficial for the church, if not necessary, that doesn’t mean the task of theology is exclusive to the educated.[3]

To be a Christian is to be known by God, and to know God in the Lord Jesus Christ. The Magisterial Reformer, John Calvin, begins his Institutes of the Christian Religion - possibly the most famous systematic theology ever written - thus, “Our wisdom, in so far as it ought to be deemed true and solid Wisdom, consists almost entirely of two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves.”[4] And, of course, Question 1 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism famously asks:

Q1: What is the chief end of man?

A1: Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

Theology is the task of every Christian. Theology is the task of the church. Theology is seeking wisdom in the knowledge of God and ourselves. Theology is glorifying God and enjoying him forever.

Redemptive history, in a sense, is the people of God doing theology. The Old Testament is the record of God’s people believing and wrestling with the protoevangelium (Gen 3.15). The New Testament opens with the fulfillment of the promise in the incarnation of the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Acts, the Epistles, and the Revelation are the Apostolic witness to the church of the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.

The catholic creeds[5] represent the early church’s theological summary of orthodoxy in response to heresy. In the stream of the Protestant Reformation, different traditions formulated confessions and catechisms to summarize their interpretation of sacred Scripture, to serve as their public confession of faith, and to catechize children and converts.[6]Along with creeds, confessions, and catechisms, the church has a rich tradition of doing theology. In the 5th century, St. Augustine penned theological classics still in print today, including his magnum opus, The City of God. St. Thomas of Aquina authored the massive Summa Theologica, a multi-volume systematic theology that shaped Roman Catholic theology and is still referenced.

John Calvin opened the floodgates of Reformed systematics with his Institutes. In the following centuries the Puritans, the Continental Reformed, the Presbyterians, and the Baptists penned thousands of words of theology. These men were not merely academics; most of them were ministers, as well. Baptists like Charles Haddon Spurgeon and John Bunyan didn’t even have a formal education.

In the Modern era Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics reigns as a multi-volume Neoorthodox systematic that continues to elicit conversation. From the great Princeton postmillennials, like Warfield and Hodge, to Reformed giants like Louis Berkholff, Reformed systematics persist. Accessible lay-level systematics like Grudem and Sproul have also helped connect the seminary to Sunday School. The task of theology belongs to the church, and the church has always been up for the task.

What about you? How would you assess your relationship with theology? As a member of the church, this is your task - to be known by God and to know God in Jesus Christ. How is the task going?

I’d like to help. Whether you’re a theology nerd, or someone who doesn’t know anything about theology (and if you were honest, you might say you don’t really care about theology), or anything in between, I’m starting a series of essays for you. These essays may not be consecutive - I may write other essays in between - but the goal is once a week, or every other week to put out an essay on theology. The plan is for each essay to be accessible. Assuming the reader knows little to nothing about theology, I’ll introduce the basics of Reformed theology that we believe here at Christ Community Church.

If you’re a Christian, you’re a theologian. If you were unaware, let me be the first to congratulate you. And let me help you think through how you’re known by God and how you can know God better in Jesus Christ.

[1]Barth, Karl, Letter dated January 2, 1968.

[2]Literally, “A word about God;” θεός theos - God; λόγος, logos – word.

[3]There is a long tradition of theological education in the history of the church. The modern university evolved out of the medieval university. In the medieval university there were three higher education courses of study, following the general education in the arts (what we would today call the Liberal Arts) – 1) Theology; 2) Law; and 3) Medicine. Theology was considered the “Queen of the Sciences.” This tradition migrated west as the major universities in England – Oxford and Cambridge – and the oldest universities in America – Harvard being the oldest, along with schools like Yale, and Princeton – were founded to teach theology and train ministers. Formal education was born out of the church’s effort to teach theology, the “Queen of the Sciences,” at the highest level.

[4]Calvin, John, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, book 1, chapter 1, section 1.

[5]Also called the early ecumenical creeds – the Apostles’ Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, and the Chalcedonian Creed (or statement).

[6]The Lutheran tradition produced the Augsburg Confession; the Dutch Reformed, the Three Forms of Unity – the Belgic Confession, the Heidelberg Catechism, and the Canons of Dort; The Church of England, the Thirty-Nine Articles, the English and Scottish Presbyterians, the Westminster Standards; The Baptists, the 1689 London Baptist Confession (a revision of the Westminster, and previous Reformed Baptist editions). For further reading, check out Trueman, Carl R. The Creedal Imperative (Crossway, Wheaton, 2012).