It is the nature of the human mind to invent religion … there have been tens of thousands of them during recorded human history. Even today, even within just Christianity, there are thousands, each claiming to be from an inspired, infallible, inerrant Bible, each the outcome of Holy Spirit teaching. Some Christians relish this diversity / contradiction and to satisfy their spiritual / intellectual needs attend many churches and read many books by many authors found in many bookstores / websites worldwide. Other Christians want simplicity and certainty, and turn to a denomination with one tightly written catechism, one confession, validated by one group of like-minded men over time. This website represents the latter.

You obviously are having difficulty accepting the teaching promoted on this website. You have at minimum two choices: (i) you can take the path Keith (who replied above) took and struggle / read until conforming; or (ii), you can stick strictly to the Scriptures and let God lead you forward with peace of mind to a theology and house of worship in which you feel at home.

Joel: I think Dr Gaffin’s contribution to Biblical Hermeneutics: Five Views is helpful. I also found the book by Dr Greg Beale: Handbook on the New Testament use of the Old Testament to be a helpful read. Wish those two books were around ten years ago. I do not know where you are at, perhaps those resources might be beneath you. For the average unseminaried guy in the pew like me they are helpful. Keith

So what I want to know is when are Dr Tipton’s Hebrews lectures going to be available (in print or in online audio)?!?

Thanks much for the program. Appreciate you guys.

I agree with you Joel.

I always thought it curious the Hebrew word Mashiach (“anointed one,” messiah, “christos” in the Greek LXX) occurs almost 40 times in the Old Testament and each and every time refers to someone who lived prior to Jesus, even being applied to pagan Cyrus, King of Persia (Isa 45:1). One would think if we were supposed to see Jesus everywhere in the Old Testament, Mashiach would have been written, especially in the so-called prophecies about Jesus.

Just wanted to say thanks for putting the time and effort into this podcast. I don’t listen to every episode but listen on and off, started reading Vos but had trouble accepting a lot of what is taught and a lot of what is discussed on the show. I generally describe myself as Reformed, at least soteriologically speaking, but the redemptive-historical methods which attempt to read in typology into every sentence of Scripture are just very difficult for me to accept. It seems that special attention is given to specific words here and there, that may import some huge theological truth that is really mentioned nowhere in the text. On a strictly exegetical level it becomes more of a puzzle to try and fit together any correlations between OT and NT, and I can’t help but see it as wild allegory. For example in this particular podcast, the exodus is spoken of as a sort of salvific picture of the church, and Hebrews 3-4 are cited as support. Likely the quotation of Heb 3:7-11 is the main text in which the idea of the church’s “wilderness testing” was drawn from. Wouldn’t it be more reasonable from an exegetical standpoint to consider that Hebrews was written to… hebrews. Thus the background would most naturally refer to the historical backdrop of the hebrew people – and NOT necessarily mean that all of the hebrew historical texts are to be allegory for the church? I ask all of this not to be argumentative but to genuinely show the difficulty I am having with what is being taught, specifically in comprehending its legitimacy. It seems like the vast majority of what is being taught is unwritten and unrecorded. It is all implication and parallel. I can’t help but think it is safer to stick with what is exegetically clear and visible vs. teaching that is somewhat relative.

Thanks for any help you can give,
Joel