Thursday, June 6, 2024

Excerpts from J. V. Fesko, The Giver of Life (2024)

 


[G]iven that all of God's laws are his commands, his precepts have a moral dimension. Just because a law is ceremonial, for example, does not mean that Israel should ignore or disobey it. Israel had to obey all of God's commands. Similarly, the moral law can have ceremonial aspects. The fourth command to observe the Sabbath, for example, has a moral substance (worship God one day a week), with a positive ceremonial accident (the Sabbath, the last days of the week). With the advent of Christ, the moral substance remains the same (worship God), but the positive accident changes (we worship on the first, not the last, day of the week). (J. V. Fesko, The Giver of Life: The Biblical Doctrine of the Holy Spirit [We Believe: Studies in Reformed Biblical Doctrine 6; Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Academic, 2024], 89)

 

On Eph 2:20:


Continuationist proponents such as Grudem argue that "built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets" is not the proper translation of the underlying Greek. Rather, he claims that Paul says, "built on the foundation of the apostles who are also prophets." Grudem based his case on the lexeme των αποστολων και προφητων and concludes that, since there is only one definite article, the anarthrous προφητων means that the reference is to one distinct group, not two. Grudem concedes that there are occurrences of one group with two distinct components governed by one definite article (Acts 13:50; 15:2; Rom 1:20; 2 Cor 6:7; 7:3, 13, 11; Phil 1:19, 25; 2 Thess 1:4; 2:2). Grudem's candor is welcome but ultimately undermines his claim, especially in light of the fact that no English translation renders Ephesians 2:20 in the manner (so ESV, KJV, NKJ, NLT-SE, NET, NIV, Weymouth, NAS, Young's, NRSV, TNIV; see also Eph 3:5). Furthermore, had Paul written of the "prophets and the apostles," one might argue that he intended to refer to the Old Testament prophets and New Testament apostles, which would mean that the New Testament prophets were no longer consigned to the foundation. Yet, that Paul writes of "apostles and prophets" means that he refers to the New Testament rather than Old Testament prophets. (J. V. Fesko, The Giver of Life: The Biblical Doctrine of the Holy Spirit [We Believe: Studies in Reformed Biblical Doctrine 6; Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Academic, 2024], 274)

 

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