Foundations Meadors Study Terms

Discipleship

Discipleship

As we learned in our first session on the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20), authentic ______________ presupposes steady learning upward toward the restoration of the image of God in us (= glorification: Colossians 1:28; Romans 8:30; James 1:2-4). The Greek word for ______________, mathetes, means "learner." To make ______________, thus means to make learners who are growing in Christlikeness through their educational faithfulness and obedience. ________________ isn't individual self-improvement, though. It involves __________________ of others too. Hence, Jesus' commission to make other _____________ (learners) of Christ, who teach "all that I have commanded you." ______________ thus involves obedience. It also involves authenticity--be baptized in "the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit." Baptism = all out marriage to God in permanent covenant relationship = "hook, line, and sinker," "all in," everything surrendered permanent devotion to Jesus as Lord. These things considered, our education is a __________________ pilgrimage toward eternal glorification in the kingdom of God.

Theology

Literally, "the study of God." ________________ is studied from revelation within nature (= general revelation), Scripture (= Biblical ______________), organized human categories (= Systematic _____________), and through the studies of scholars throughout history (= Historical _________________), among other branches of _______________________.

Exegesis

The task of explaining the original meaning of Biblical texts. The term comes from the Greek word exegeomai = explain. Greek _________________ of the New Testament thus aims to capture the original meaning of the New Testament in its original language and within its original cultural, literary, historical, and Biblical contexts.

Learning

__________________, as defined in this phase, is whole person growth in wisdom and intellectual understanding. ______________________ thus involves connections between what is currently known and things previously unknown. Once these connections are made, a person literally grows and increases "in knowledge and wisdom." Growth of this kind is literal, as neurons in the brain connect, dendrites with axons, to extend brain circuits and literally grow the brain. _______________ is thus literally "good for you" and improves you the __________er--a regeneration opportunity to combat the degenerative rewiring of the brain caused by sinful thoughts. ________________ is like weightlifting for the brain, body, soul, and spirit. Hence, Jesus has called us to discipleship (= _________________ to live and think in accord with God's design in imitation of Christ).

Shaliah Principle

The Hebrew concept that the person sent bears the authority of the one who sent them. Hence, in the Old Testament the prophets bore the authority of the God who sent them with the commission to preach His word. The prophets therefore prefaced their prophesies with the phrase, "thus says the Lord" even though they were the actual speakers. They spoke God's authority because God has sent and commissioned them to speak His word. Similarly, the apostles in the New Testament were sent by Jesus Himself and thus genuinely spoke with the authority of the risen Lord. Hence, Luke 10:16 "The one who listens to you listens to Me and the one who listens to Men listens to the One who sent Me." With this understanding, we are able to better understand the divine authority of Scripture even though it was historically written by human beings.

Repentance

________________________ involves a turning away from sin and a turning to God. The Hebrew word shuv for ________________________ depicts this act as a literal "turn" from one thing to another. The same idea is conveyed in the New Testament word epistrepho. The more frequent word for _____________________ in the New Testament, still connoting a turn, is the word metanoia, which refers to a radical change of mind upon encountering God. In baptism, the believer forsakes all other former objects of worship with a comprehensive re-think of reality--a comprehensive change of mind regarding the securities of life and life's ultimate meaning--what's eternally important.

The Order of Salvation (Latin = "Ordo Salutis")

The sequence of events that take place in the conversion of a sinner into a child of God within God's eternal covenant family. Theologians have constructed the saving sequence differently, but we might cite the essentials as: encounter with God; recognition of God as God (= cognitive faith/belief); surrender to God as Lord of one's life; confession of sin; repentance from sin and repentance to God as Lord and Savior; symbolic crucifixion/death with Christ (Galatians 2:20; Romans 6:3-13), burial with Christ (Romans 6:3-13), resurrection with Christ (Romans 6:3-13), justification (Romans 6:7); entrance into the body of Christ (the church; 1 Corinthians 12:12-27), lifelong discipleship in imitation of Christ (Matthew 16:24-26), bodily resurrection into the new heavens and new earth as a member of the eternal people of God (Revelation 21:1-7), eternal glorification (Romans 8:30).

Grace

Biblically, God's gift of saving benefits that sinners do not deserve--"while we were yet sinners Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8). Hence, Ephesians 2:8-9: "For by ______________ you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, that no one should boast." In addition to this dynamic, grace in the New Testament also describes the nature of God enabling his servants to do what they could never do on their own--namely, accomplish the calling of following in Jesus' footsteps--doing things "impossible for man but possible for God." In Acts 4:33; 6:8; and 11:23 grace thus associates with the apostles being enabled by God's ___________ to minister effectively through the Holy Spirit in ways that recall the works Jesus performed on earth.

Pneumatology

The study of the Holy Spirit--God's spiritual presence with and within His people. Key passages to ponder in Biblical ________________ include Ezekiel 36:22-36; John 14, 16; Romans 8; and Acts 2 (among others). In John's Gospel, Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as the Paraclete, who would come after Jesus' resurrection. The functions of the Holy Spirit include convicting of sin, reminding of what Jesus had taught, inspiring prayer (Romans 8), leading to repentance, enabling the work of God's people, facilitating faith (Acts 3:16), and giving birth to the church in Acts 2.

Scripture

The New Testament word for _______________ is graphe, which simply means "writing." Key passages for understanding the purpose of ________________ include Psalm 19:1; 2 Timothy 3:14-16, and 2 Peter 1:16-21 and Luke 24:27. Jesus taught the disciples after His resurrection that his ministry fulfilled "the law, the prophets, and the writings," which is the summation of our Old Testament.

Sacrifice

____________________ was God's way of maintaining relationship with His people after they had sinned. _____________________ symbolized the death required for the member of the covenant who had broken their covenantal promise--"the wage of death," as Paul would later describe it in Romans 6:23. The animal took the place of the human sinners, or, on the Day of Atonement, the entire nation of Israel. The Old Testament ________________s thereby provided a prefigurement or preview of what Jesus would perfectly accomplish for God's people on the cross, when He would _______________ Himself in the place of God's sinful covenant partner. The crucifixion is thus referred to as God's means of substitutionary atonement which results in the justification of the sinner. John's Gospel thus refers to Jesus as "The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." And the Book of Revelation refers to Jesus as "the Lamb who was slain."

The Law

In the Old Testament the _________ of Moses emerges as God's charter or constitution for the covenant. The understanding was that God's people were to be "holy" as God was "holy" (Leviticus 19:19). The ________ showed them how to be holy. That is, to be members of God's covenant people, they could not worship other gods, commit idolatry, murder, steal, bear false witness, etc. The law did not intend legalism, as Psalm 119 makes abundantly clear, and as Paul affirms--"the law is holy and righteous and good" (Romans 7:12). No, the problem is sin, which perverts the law to sever relationship with God (Romans 7:11).

Soteriology

The study of salvation. ________________ asks the questions: what are you saved from? What are you saved to? How are you saved? Who does the saving? Why are you saved? What are the features of salvation? The Bible is a book about salvation and is hence "good news." John 20:31 expresses John's sentiments along ________iological lines: "These things have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Son of God and believing have eternal life in His name."

Atonement (at - one - ment)

____________________ refers to a sinners becoming "one" with God through faith in Jesus, God's Son. The closest analogy in human relationships occurs in marriage, where, according to Genesis 1, "a man leaves his father and mother and cleaves to his wife, and the two become one flesh." The Bible thus describes _________________ with God symbolically as a marriage between God and his people Israel (Hosea and elsewhere in the OT), whereas in the New Testament the church is referred to as "the bride of Christ." Along the same lines, the Book of Revelation symbolizes God's final reconciliation with His people as "the marriage supper of the Lamb." Also at play is our inclusion into the unity of God's triune nature, as Jesus describes throughout John 17--"that they may be one as we are one."

creation ex nihilo (Latin "out of nothing")

"Creation out of nothing." God's ability to create out of nothing explains one part of God's uniqueness and virtually all of the miracles recorded in the Bible. He can create life, recreate life, accomplish a virgin birth, heal life, resurrect life, create the church via Pentecost, and create a new heavens and a new earth. Hence, saving faith must arrive at the conclusion that "what is impossible for man is possible for God."

Sin

_________ takes many forms in the Bible but generally refers to disobedience to God whether intentional or unintentional. The Biblically informed Christian worldview maintains that "all have _________" and thus require salvation by God's grace (Romans 3:21-25). The most frequent New Testament word for ________ is hamartia, which refers to the falling short of God's glory. Hardening and sensory malfunction (spiritual blindness, deafness, obtuseness) result from ________, because human beings cannot function properly in separation from their creator and sustaining life source. Hence, degeneration of life (hardening) inevitably precedes death for all who do not experience the regenerating work of God in their lives through the Holy Spirit. Whereas ________ causes degeneration that leads to death, atonement with God through faith in Christ results in regeneration (the opening of eyes and the replacement of hearts of stone with hearts of flesh--Ezekiel 36) that moves the believer toward eventual glorification (Romans 8:30).

Christology

The study of Christ. One's ____________________ is one's perspective of who Jesus was and is. ________________ has been approached from many angles throughout Christian history. The New Testament reveals Jesus' identity through His names (Messiah, Son of Man, Son of God, Emmanuel, Logos, Lord, Lamb of God, etc.) and also through Jesus' actions (baptism, temptation, miracles, teachings, prayers, ministry to the ostracized, cleansing of the temple, crucifixion, resurrection, exaltation, etc. The early church councils of Nicea, Chalcedon, Constantinople, and Ephesus later engaged in ____________logical dialog to discern how Jesus the Son related to God the Father and in some cases, God the Holy Spirit--the nature of Jesus' "being" within the Trinity.

Saving Faith

__________________ is intellectual belief in God's saving work through Jesus (hence John 20:30-31; Romans 10:9-10) followed by lifelong obedience and faithfulness to Christ as Lord, as symbolized in baptism (crucifixion with Christ, burial with Christ, resurrection with Christ, life in the body of Christ (the church), lifelong ministry in imitation of Christ, eternal resurrection with Christ, glorification with Christ; see Romans 6:1-13).

Biblical Theology

The knowledge and understanding of God revealed in and throughout the Bible. _____________________ ties together the themes of the Bible that thread from Genesis all the way to Revelation. Hence, our book, Creation, Sin, Covenant, and Salvation, is an example of _______________________. By contrast, natural theology seeks understanding of God through nature. Systematic theology seeks to understand God according to systematic categories classified by human thinkers; hence, theology, christology, pneumatology, ecclesiology, eschatology, etc.

Essay 1

How do the themes creation, sin, covenant, and salvation interrelate in the Bible? Questions to ask in answering include: how is sin an act that violates creation? (See Romans 1:18-32 among other passages). How is the covenant God's means of overcoming sin? How does salvation make possible God's original design for creation--humanity and all of creation? How does God's identity as Creator make salvation possible?

Essay 2

Please describe your understanding of the order of salvation (see earlier Quizlet slide) and how discipleship figures in the believer's pilgrimage from bondage to sin to eternal glorification. How does learning (= discipleship as envisioned in Matthew 28:18-20) contribute to successful pursuit of "the higher calling of God in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 3:14)?

Why we steward the earth even though God is going to recreate it in the future:

•1. We steward the earth in obedience to Genesis 1:28. = God created the earth and has called us to steward it.
•2. We steward the earth to maintain the worship and discipleship that creation inspires.
•3. We steward the world as an act of love toward God, who created the world and loves it Himself. (Romans 8:19-22; John 3:16)
•4. We steward the earth as an act of love toward those who suffer the consequences of pollution in other parts of the world.
•5. We steward the earth out of responsible love toward future generations who will inherit the earth our generation has stewarded.
•6. We steward the earth to preserve it as a preview of the new heavens and the new earth yet to come—i.e., a preview of heaven!

How does sin affect creation?

1.Whereas God generates life, sin degenerates life.
2.Whereas God inspires and sustains life and the human senses, sin disables life, hardens the heart, and desensitizes humans from their responsibility to wise stewardship of creation.
3.Whereas atonement with God leads to resurrection and eternal life, sin leads to human exploitation of the earth, the decline of human aging, and eventual death.