Hill Road Journal

Divine Wrath and Discipline: An Old Testament Discussion

WONG Fook Kong

This article deals with the issue of divine discipline tinged with divine wrath in the Old Testament. Divine discipline could be divided into formative and corrective discipline. Corrective discipline could be further divided into corrective speeches and corrective actions. Our impression of an angry God comes mainly from passages about his corrective discipline. These took the form of prophetic corrective speeches and his acts of judgments. They fill up a significant portion of what we read in the Bible, thus giving us the false impression of an angry and violent God. Actually this was not the full picture. In reality, God neither acted nor spoke for most of the biblical period. Also, when he acted and spoke, he was not necessarily angry or violent. There were many positive words and actions in the Old Testament as well . A more accurate picture is a balance between a forgiving, patient God and a severe God. This is encapsulated in passages like Exodus 34:6-7. Nevertheless, there is no easy way to practice corrective discipline, either by God in ancient Israel or in the church today. Innocent people related to the person being disciplined are always affected to a lesser or greater extent. The best we can do as a community is to follow the example of the LORD, who mixed love with severity, mercy with chastisement .

An exploration of 1 Corinthians 6:1-11

Joyce Wai-Lan SUN

When dealing with cases involving criminal elements inside the church, churches in Hong Kong are often reluctant to report the matter to the police for fear of adverse effects on public image and witness. First Corinthians 6:1-11 is frequently cited as the biblical basis for such decision. At the same time, recent years also witness, from time to time, to Christians bringing civil litigations against each other or even against the church without remorse, and without taking into account of Paul's teaching in 1 Corinthians 6.

This essay therefore seeks to locate the continuing relevance of 1 Corinthians 6:1-11 to the modern world by analyzing Paul's concern and reasoning in the passage against its socio-historical background, including the legal system and characteristics of civil litigations in the Roman society . It argues that 1 Corinthians 6:1-11 is actually a passage dealing with Christians asking the secular court to judge on their internal disputes. Paul's chief concern therein is the church's ability to protect its dignity and unique identity, and to maintain a clear demarcation with the surrounding world. His teaching is still applicable to disputes among Christians, as well as between individual Christians and the church today.

On the other hand, 1 Corinthians 6:1-11 should not be regarded as deterring the church from reporting internal criminal happenings to the police or other governmental authorities. Nor should it be posited as a pretext for the church to cover up crimes for its members. Unequivocal condemnation of offenses and willingness to report crimes committed are in fact proper identity expression of the church as the people of the kingdom of God. After all, whether the matter at hand involves civil litigation or criminal elements, the core question for the church is still how to demonstrate its identity as the eschatological people of God's kingdom on earth and to adopt a lifestyle which is consistent with such identity.

The Sinews of Christ's Body – Church Discipline according to John Calvin

Daniel YK LEE

For Calvin, church discipline was so crucial to the well-being of the Christian Church that he was prepared to defend its exercise even to the point of jeopardizing his own ministry in Geneva. This essay shows that the reformer sought to arrive at a theological account , as well as a practical arrangement, of the church discipline within the basic tenets of Reformation theology. Under the sole headship of Christ and the notion of the church as communiosanctorum, the jurisdictional and disciplinary authority is harnessed to the service of the Word of God, and firmly regulated with a lawful assembly, an accountable procedure, and restrictions on its measures. In this way, Calvin's teaching of church discipline demonstrates the intricate relation between authority and freedom, communal and individual life, and ecclesiastical and civil government.

Is Discipline a Mark of the Church?－An Anabaptist Perspective

Andres S. TANG

This paper aims at giving a theological analysis of the Anabaptists' interpretation of discipline. For the Reformers of the 16th century, against the background of arguing justification, the Word of God was the definite mark of the true church. However, Anabaptists of the 16th century and 17th century were not satisfied with this and proceeded to understand the meaning of salvation from the perspective of sanctification. It was in this sense that church discipline was introduced into their faith community as a crucial practice for the salvation of the disciples. For the Anabaptists the practice of church discipline was not a way to gain justification but the sequential act of believing in Jesus Christ. It was understood as a necessary means of keeping one in following Jesus Christ. Underlying this was a kind of discipleship-salvation and discipleship-ecclesiology . This kind of church discipline did not help the states or local governments facilitate their social discipline. What was crucial to the church discipline was the confession of Jesus as the Lord, whereas to the social discipline, the confession of the king or the governor as the Lord. However the practice of church discipline strengthened the faithfulness of the church believers and in turn gave positive witness to the society around.

Bonhoeffer's Theology of Church Discipline

Samuel CHIOW

For Bonhoeffer church discipline is the “dynamics of transformation” at work in the church-community. Church discipline is a collective responsibility of the church-community. Church-community is where sanctification is done. Sanctification is proven in the living out of the gospel . The Church-community must subject herself to the discipline of the Word. Church discipline, as part and parcel of the sanctification of the church-community, is Christological and eschatological in that it is forward moving toward the day of the coming of Christ. The practice of church discipline is necessary for the church-community to live “a life worthy of the gospel.” The aim of this paper is to distil from Bonhoeffer’s ecclesiology his understanding of the dynamic of transformation in the communal act of church discipline. Church discipline for Bonhoeffer “is necessary, visible consequence of the proper exercise of the office of the keys within the church-community.”

Child Sacrifice: YHWH command or condemn?

KOO Wai Hung

Alice Logan's paper “Rehabilitating Jephthah” tries to “rehabilitate” Jephthah's controversial vow in sacrificing “whatever comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites” (Judges 11:31). Archaeological and literary evidences are stated by Logan in order to support a conclusion that the author of Judges views Jephthah 'positively.' Logan only stated the evidences briefly without much development of the arguments. This paper further investigates both archaeological (especially those findings in Carthage) and literary information about child sacrifice, and tries to gather information from scholars, both from the field of archaeology and biblical studies, that child sacrifice may once have been a 'pleasing' practice in YHWH's view. However, though child sacrifice may have been a pleasing act, it does not necessarily imply that the author of Judges views Jephthah positively in the current literary construct of the Book of Judges.

John Howard Yoder's Biblical Realism

YEUNG Nok Ki

This paper attempts to identify the context, tasks, concern, content, purpose, and source of John Howard Yoder's theological method – biblical realism. Through putting Yoder in conversation with other biblical realists such as Claude Tresmontant, Edmond Cherbonnier, Hendrik Kraemer, and Paul Minear, this paper argues that the task of Yoder's biblical realism is to study the Scripture straightforwardly and on its own terms, and is concerned with reproducing the formal model of Scripture in speaking about God. Its purpose is to assist the church to hear the Word of God. Regarding the content of biblical realism, Yoder consolidates and expands Minear's position by specifying God's acts in the historical objectivity of Jesus Christ and of the Church that Jesus founded. The Scripture – the early Church's witness to God's historical and real saving acts in Jesus – thus serves as a guiding norm for all later Christians who seek to be faithful to the eschatological, saving reality of Jesus in their contexts under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Yoder's emphasis on the historical objectivity of Jesus and of the church as attested by Scripture is underpinned by the theological sources that Yoder uses for his constructive task: Yoder's Anabaptist historiography, especially his investigation of the Christology, Ecclesiology, and Biblicism of the Swiss Brethren, who Yoder calls “the first Anabaptists.” The result is that, Contrary to Minear's subjective approach to biblical realism, Yoder's biblical realism is concerned with God's particular, historical, and real acts in Jesus Christ and the Church that Jesus founded, as attested by the biblical point of views.