The Arts by Modern Reformation

The Arts

12 Problematic Portraits: The Lutheran and

Reformed Debate over Religious Images | by Harrison Perkins 22 Beauty, Art, and Images in Worship

| Mark Mattes and Michael Horton Q&A 34 “What Language Shall I Borrow?”

| by Jonathan Landry Cruse 46 The Unbearable Ambivalence of Film

| by Mark Bowald

VO L . 33 , NO. 1

January/February 2024 M O D E R N R E FO R M AT I O N

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Contents

I. RETRIEVE

08 R EFOR MATION OUT TAKES | Fish and Ships:

Reformed Mission Brazil| by Zachary Purvis

Modern Reformation January/February 2024 Vol. 33, No. 1

12 ESSAY | Problematic Portraits: The Lutheran

and Reformed Debate over Religious Images | by Harrison Perkins II. CONVERSE

22 INTERV IEW | Beauty, Art, and Images in

Worship: Mark Mattes and Michael Horton Q&A III. P E R S UA D E

34 ESSAY | “What Language Shall I Borrow?”:

Why Christians Need Poetry | by Jonathan Landry Cruse I V. ENGAGE

05 F RO M THE E D ITOR

| by Brannon Ellis

46 ESSAY | The Unbearable Ambivalence of Film:

With Consideration of Terrence Malick’s To the Wonder | by Mark Bowald 56 BOOK R EV IEWS

P O E TRY 30 Sunrise in the Outer

Faith and Film: A Brief Annotated Bibliography | by Mark Bowald

Banks | by J. A. Baker 40 Paul and All

| by Sarah Steele 42 The Tree of Life

(Revelation 22:2) | by Thomas Wysong 58 It Was a Good Day

| by Mike Hall 60 B AC K PAGE

Come, See God in Action! | by Michael Horton

Endsheet illustration by Raxenne Maniquiz

Editor-in-Chief Michael S. Horton | Chief Content Officer Eric Landry | Executive Editor Brannon Ellis | Managing Editor Patricia Anders | Poetry Editor Jonathan Landry Cruse | Production Assistant Anna Heitmann | Copy Editor Kate Walker | Proofreader Ann Smith | Creative Direction and Design Metaleap Creative Modern Reformation © 2024. All rights reserved. ISSN-1076-7169 | Modern Reformation (Subscriptions) 13230 Evening Creek Dr S Ste 220-222, San Diego, CA 92128 (877) 876-2026 | info@modernreformation.org | modernreformation.org | Subscription Information: US 1 YR $48. Canada add $10 per year for postage. Overseas add $9 per year for postage. Modern Reformation is a publication of Sola Media

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Fundamentalism & American Evangelicalism The Evangel

20 What Has Become of American

Fundamentalism? | by George Marsden M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

40 Rethinking How We Think about

the Evangelical Mind and the Local Church | by Charles E. Cotherman 56 Fundamentals for the Evangelical

T H E E VA N G E L

Future | by Daniel J. Treier 24 Anglicans and the Gospel | by Gerald Bray

Vo l . 31, No. 1

Evangelicals & the Bible

28 Bad News and Good News: The Gospel

According to Luther | by Robert Kolb

34 What Is the Gospel? A Baptist Perspective

| by Michael A. G. Haykin January/February 2022 $9.00 per issue E VA N G E L I C A L S & T H E B I B L E

44 Evangelicals and the Evangel Future

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T H I N K I N G T H E O L O G I CA L LY

| by Michael Horton

M A R C H /A P R I L 2 0 2 2

VO L . 31, NO. 2

March/April 2022

10 Learning to Read Scripture Like the

Church Fathers | by Craig Carter 36 Everything in Nature Speaks of God:

Understanding Sola Scriptura Aright | by Jordan Steffaniak $9.00 per issue

54 Restoring Eve | by Kendra Dahl

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VO L . 31, NO. 3 M AY/ J U N E 2 0 2 2

May/June 2022 M O D E R N R E FO R M AT I O N

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M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

From the Editor

ROWING UP, I al-

ways wanted to be an artist. I drew in my sketchbook whenever I had free time (all right, even when I was supposed to be doing something else). I don’t draw much anymore; I’ve long since moved on to other creative outlets. But I’m still awed by the deep magic of starting with a blank surface and ending with an image representing something in the real world or pulled straight from the imagination. Not only can skilled artists convey representations, but they are also capable of conveying emotions. Is anything more moving than music? Is anything more powerful than story? Being creative isn’t like having absolute perfect pitch—an innate gift possessed only by the fortunate few. We all enjoy the gift of creativity because every one of us is made in the likeness of our Creator. And we can cultivate this gift into something more beautiful than what we started with. Creative endeavor—which happens every time we take nothing and make it something, or do more with less, or take this and transform it into that—is one of the brightest and clearest ways we reflect God’s image. Nevertheless, some of us are called to devote ourselves to the arts—to cultivating the beautiful fruits of human creativity in especially committed and skillful ways, not only for our own enjoyment but to bless others. Historically, Christians have been great patrons of the arts, celebrating this wonderful gift from our generous Father. In this first Modern Reformation issue of the new year, we’re offering a theological perspective on a small sampling of the creative arts, and in this way hoping to contribute to helping fellow Christians evaluate, appreciate, and participate in them with enthusiasm and care. To supplement this issue, I interviewed a printmaker, Carla Meberg, about her journey as a Christian, an artist, and a

patron of the arts (which you can find at modernreformation.org/artsinterview). We’ve even decided to include a feature on the arts in each of the subsequent issues throughout this year. My favorite thing about art is how delightfully needless it seems. In The Four Loves, C. S. Lewis compares art to friendship and philosophy, each sublime yet utterly “unnecessary.” Like love or joy, art “has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival.” Air and water are precious because we can’t live without them. Art and music are precious because, without them, we wouldn’t want to. Especially in our utilitarian, pragmatic culture, art feels not only unnecessary but also indulgent. Irresponsible. Excessive. In these ways, art hints at an even greater mystery, an even deeper magic: grace. In his novel The Idiot, Dostoevsky remarked without explanation, “Beauty will save the world.” Surely, this is what he meant: the Creator must save. In God’s seemingly irresponsible, excessive display of “the riches of his grace, which he lavished” upon undeserving sinners in Jesus Christ (Eph. 1:7–8), he shows us that what is least necessary—the costliest gift “lovingly crafted” and freely given—is what we need most.

Brannon Ellis Executive Editor

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

Vol. 33, No. 1

Retrieve Learning from the wisdom of the past

January/February 2024

R E F O R M AT I O N O U T TA K E S

Fish and Ships: Reformed Mission Brazil by Zachary Purvis

IN 1556, JEAN DE LÉRY SAILED ACROSS THE ATLANTIC OCEAN , the “abyss of water

that is the Western Sea.” When he saw giant porpoises, sea turtles, and flying fish—just a few of the marvels and terrors he witnessed—he remembered Psalm 104:25–26: “The sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number—living things both large and small. There the ships go to and fro, and Leviathan, which you formed to frolic there.” Between bouts of nausea and vertigo, as strong waves tossed the ship up high and thrust it low, he thought of Psalm 107:23–30 and those mariner merchants in the tempest, who “reel and stagger like drunkards, who are at their wit’s end . . . who plead with God to hush the storm.” That Léry relied on the Psalter to make sense of his surroundings is both remarkable and hardly surprising. He was then only twenty-two years old, but he was also one of fourteen deeply committed Huguenots, or French Reformed, sent by John Calvin’s church in Geneva to form the first Protestant mission to the New World. Léry and his companions arrived in the Bay of Guanabara, “Antarctic France”—a fortified island near present-day Rio de Janeiro, Brazil—having sailed from the Norman Port of Honfleur, where the River Seine meets the English Channel. The little French colony there was run by Nicolas Durand de Villegagnon, whom the modern Austrian novelist Stefan Zweig described as “half pirate,” and who was by any account an eccentric military adventurer. The same year the colony was established, 1555, Villegagnon invaded the island with two ships and six hundred soldiers. France had new economic interests in the region. Since the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, Spain and Portugal had carved up the New World into respective zones of influence. When the Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvarez Cabral stumbled onto Brazil in 1500, Portugal claimed it. The discovery was an economic windfall. Up and down the coast grew the tree known as “brazilwood,” the source of a highly valued red dye. Traders built great fortunes on shipments of this dyewood sent back to Europe. Now, France sought to challenge Spain and Portugal and to gain a foothold in the rich market. Villegagnon established the colony, in the name of Henry II, the French king, with these aims. Léry would later claim, with solid evidence, that Villegagnon had written to Calvin in 1555 and asked for Geneva to send him some “ministers of the Word of 1

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God, along with other personages well instructed in the Christian religion.” Later, Villegagnon denied sending any such letter, which in any case is no longer extant. Regardless of whether the call was sent out, the fourteen Huguenots heeded it, traveling to Brazil to establish a Reformed refuge and mission. The Genevan church specialized in training native Frenchmen to return to France as Reformed missionaries. To preach the gospel of justification by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone was not an easy calling in Roman Catholic France. Because so many students from the Academy of Geneva later died as martyrs, they joked morbidly that their diplomas doubled as their death certificates. The Reformed church in France was a church “under the cross”—that is, a church that suffered intense persecution. But the biblical vision of all nations coming to worship God in fulfillment of the promise made to Abraham, a vision so profound in the Psalter (Pss. 86:9; 87), captured the heart of this persecuted church. Léry and his fellows were called to suffer not in France but in Brazil. Relations between Villegagnon and Léry’s party declined to perilous levels shortly after the Huguenots’ arrival in Brazil. They quarreled over various things, but central among them was the Eucharist. With neither bread nor wine available (at least as most Europeans knew them), the Reformed ministers wrestled over whether and how to celebrate the Lord’s Supper. But this dispute was overshadowed by another about the nature of the sacrament itself. Villegagnon, whom Léry feared was a “crypto-Papist,” attempted to undermine the Reformed understanding of Christ’s presence in the sacrament as it was taught by Calvin, the members of Léry’s party, and eventually the major Reformed Confessions: 4

For although they [Villegagnon and his deputies] rejected the transubstantiation of the Roman Church, as an opinion which they openly said was stupid and absurd, and although they did not approve of consubstantiation either, still they were not content with what the ministers taught and proved by the Word of God, that the bread and wine were not really changed into the Body and Blood of the Lord, which also was not contained within them; rather that Jesus Christ is in heaven, whence, by virtue of his Holy Spirit, he communicates himself in spiritual nourishment to those who receive the signs in faith. 6

This was no minor disagreement. As a result of it, Villegagnon had three of Léry’s party killed, and he plotted the deaths of the rest. The occupied island was clearly 7

Detail of a 1613 map by cartographer Pierre de Vaulx showing the colony of “France Antarticque.”

January/February 2024

no safe place for the Huguenots. Since the next boat of brazilwood wouldn’t be departing for Europe for another two months, they took up residence at a tiny trading post—a few shacks, really—among the native Tupinamba people on the Brazilian mainland. In 1558, Léry finally returned to France—barely. The ship was a leaky, rotting hulk that drifted off course. Their provisions exhausted, the crew and passengers were reduced to eating whatever on board could provide “juice and moisture,” including tallow candles and lanterns made from animal horns. The French colony was a disaster: it folded in 1560 along with, so it seemed, Reformed missions in Brazil. Léry went on to complete his studies for the ministry at the Academy of Geneva at a time when the Wars of Religion began to squeeze France. In August 1572, the Saint Bartholomew’s Day Massacre unleashed a bloody wave of violence against French Protestants. Léry managed to escape to the town of Sancerre, where the Huguenot population was besieged for eight months by royal Catholic forces, being subjected to miserable conditions and reduced to starvation. Léry provided pastoral care for the suffering people. This included grimly practical instruction—based on firsthand experience of starvation during his return voyage from Brazil—on how to eat rat meat and boiled leather successfully. Under the terms of a negotiated surrender, Léry was finally able to leave and in 1574 wrote his Memorable History of the Siege of Sancerre. Four years later, he 8

Engravings from Léry’s 1578 French edition of History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil showing customs of the Tupinamba people.

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

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published his History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil. Both books are filled with soaring descriptions and deeply troubling images—of the Atlantic crossing; of the Tupi, real and perceived; of the palpable horrors under the siege. They are like twins, mirrors, each a reference to and reflection of the other. They are at once fascinating and disturbing to those who read them. But what Léry tried to convey in his twofold account was above all—in his paraphrase of Psalm 107—confidence in being “delivered . . . from so many abysses of death.” The Reformation helped Christians like Léry rediscover confidence in God’s grace and his word, which he found particularly in the Psalter. He also discovered the reason for the short-lived Reformed mission there. Léry understood that all Christians, along with the Genevan church that originally sent him, remain in this life as pilgrim people who make our way in and through the nations as we await our true homecoming. We trust God to rule the sea while we sail; we trust God, in his providence, to build his church while we send out workers called to the task. 10

Zachary Purvis (DPhil, University of Oxford; MAHT, Westminster Seminary California) teaches

church history and theology at Edinburgh Theological Seminary.

Jean de Léry, History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil, trans. Janet Whatley (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 8–11. 2. Stefan Zweig, Brazil: Land of the Future, trans. Andrew St. James (New York: Viking Press, 1941), 43. 3. Olivier Reverdin, Quatorze Calvinistes chez les Topinambours: Histoire d’une mission genevoise au Brésil (1556–1558) (Paris: Minard, 1957). 4. Janet Whatley, introduction to History of a Voyage, xx. 5. W. Robert Godfrey, John Calvin: Pilgrim and Pastor (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2009), 136. 6. Léry, History of a Voyage, 40–41. 7. For more on the disagreement that persisted after the French colony expired, cf. Frank Lestringant, “Villegagnon, entre légende noire et légende dorée,” Revue d’histoire du 1.

Protestantisme 1, no. 1 (2016): 35–53; Irena Backus, “Nicholas Durand de Villeggagnon contre Calvin: Le Consensus Tigurinus et la présence réele,” in Calvin et ses contemporains: Actes du colloque de Paris 1995, ed. Oliver Millet (Geneva: Droz, 1998), 163–78. 8. Léry, History of a Voyage, 210. 9. See Janet Whatley, “Food and the Limits of Civility: The Testimony of Jean de Léry,” Sixteenth Century Journal 15 (1984): 387–400; Adam Duker, “The Protestant Israelites of Sancerre: Jean de Léry and the Confessional Demarcation of Cannibalism,” Journal of Early Modern History 18 (2014): 255–86. 10. Heiko A. Oberman, “Europa Afflicta: The Reformation of the Refugees,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 83 (1992): 91–111.

P R O B L E M AT I C P O R T R A I T S :

The Lutheran A N D

R E F O R M E D

D E B AT E

O V E R

RELIGIOUS IMAGES

by H A R R I S O N P E R K I N S

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

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HE GREAT CHRISTIAN HOPE is that we

will see God. Jesus assured us that “blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt. 5:8). In this age, “we walk by faith, not by sight,” suggesting that sight is the better experience (2 Cor. 5:7–8). Waiting on this side of Christ’s return, however, Christians have wrestled with our longing to behold God, particularly regarding whether or not it is acceptable and suitable to make images of him (whether sculpted statues or painted icons) in light of the prohibition in the Ten Commandments: “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth” (Exod. 20:4). Some of our hardest fought battles have been over images of the incarnate Christ, since he alone is God made visible: “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known” (John 1:18). The Reformation period witnessed the eruption of this debate amid burgeoning groups of Protestants. However, their many shared convictions did not carry over to a united interpretation of God’s prohibition of images. In this essay, I want to explore one episode of the debate between Lutheran and Reformed factions of the Reformation enterprise, the Colloquy of Montbéliard (1586) between Theodore Beza (1519–1605), John Calvin’s successor in Geneva, and Jakob Andreae (1528–1590), a principal author of the Formula of Concord. This historical debate affords opportunity for deep reflection regardless of which side we take. Reformation-era Protestants took theology seriously because they realized that the fruits of faithful Christian practice must grow from the rich soil of true doctrine. Our investigation of this sixteenth-century event should help us to re-examine the importance of our doctrines of worship, images, and idolatry, following them to their natural end in faithful communal life and genuine personal piety. After all, the apostle Paul supported one of his most fundamental admonitions for the Christian life—to have an others-centered mindset of humility—with some of Scripture’s deepest reflections on the significance of the eternal Son taking upon himself our human nature (Phil. 2:1–11). 1

***

The Colloquy of Montbéliard The Colloquy of Montbéliard in 1586 was a public debate convened to address the growing tension between a French-speaking Reformed region and Count Frederick, the German prince under whose jurisdiction they lived. Those belonging to the Reformed faith sought official permission to worship according to their own confession rather than the Lutheran confession. Although the debate was overtly

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biblical and theological, we must remember how entwined religion and politics were in early modern Europe. The question of adhering to and practicing a region’s authorized religious confession necessarily intersected with the authority of the civil authorities; challenging the established confession readily suggested a challenge to their authority as well. Although Beza and Andreae’s discussion revolved around matters of conviction and conscience, there were political, cultural, and confessional identity factors at stake in this debate. Beza and Andreae discussed Christology, the sacraments (especially the Lord’s Supper), predestination, and worship. Although their discussion on worship included music, our focus for this essay is on their debate over art and images in worship. Throughout the colloquy, Beza and Andreae wrestled over whether, and to what extent, a Protestant church should retain practices and décor prevalent prior to the Reformation that had not been explicitly authorized by God’s word. These issues would ultimately center around a growing divergence between Lutheran and Reformed views about how Scripture regulates our practices pertaining to worship. The Reformed hold that we do in worship only that which Scripture commands (the regulative principle); the Lutherans hold that we can do in worship whatever Scripture does not forbid (the normative principle). The colloquy, then, embodied wider developments that remain points of division still today. Within this wider discussion, Beza and Andreae agreed on several points, one of the most important being their rejection of iconoclasm—that is, the forcible removal and destruction of church statues, paintings, or other artwork or elements now deemed idolatrous. Andreae denounced the violence of the iconoclasts across France and the Netherlands, and Beza responded (to Andreae’s relief ) that Geneva also decried this rash behavior of overzealous crowds. The problem, Beza argued, is not with church buildings but with what happens inside them, which must accord with biblical mandates. Importantly, Beza also agreed with Andreae that “painting and sculpture has great use in civil affairs”; artwork concerning secular things was not a point at issue. This initial agreement, however, did not outweigh their differences. Andreae proceeded to speak in favor of the value and propriety of organs, paintings, and sculptures, while Beza urged simple psalmody and argued against the making of what he considered unlawful images and the use of such religious artwork in worship. Beza homed in specifically on the unlawfulness of making and using images depicting the persons of the Trinity—including Jesus Christ as the incarnate Son—as well as heavenly beings, according to Exodus 20:4. Andreae acknowledged that Lutherans “think exactly the same thing” as the Reformed when it comes to images “which are looked at in holy places” for the purpose of worshiping them or using them superstitiously. This constitutes grave idolatry. Idols “should be taken away” in such cases; indeed, “God not only forbids that they be adored, but also that they be made.” Montbéliard shows Lutheran and Reformed consensus about the biblical prohibition of images used as objects or means of worship and the grave spiritual danger of such practices. For the Reformed, 2

Montbéliard shows Lutheran and Reformed consensus about the biblical prohibition of images used as objects or means of worship and the grave spiritual danger of such practices.

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Jakob Andreae (1528–1590)

Theodore Beza (1519–1605)

the biblical prohibition against man-made images of God or heavenly beings was absolute; making them against God’s command is inseparable from false worship and inherently unlawful. For Lutherans, God’s word doesn’t prohibit image-making as such, but it does condemn making and using them in service to “superstition and idolatry.” This subtle but crucial difference comes through clearly in Andreae and Beza’s discussion about imagery in the old covenant tabernacle and temple. Andreae argued that God’s law could not proscribe religious imagery altogether because the Jerusalem temple included artwork of cherubim alongside lions, bulls, trees, and other ornate artifices. Beza responded that, on the one hand, the depictions of cherubim were constructed under God’s direct instruction and placed in an area of the temple where the people were not permitted to enter—namely, the Holy of Holies. On the other hand, the depictions of earthly things such as lions and plants were not meant to visualize heavenly realities or God himself, and Reformed criticism of images doesn’t apply in such cases. Perhaps the most heated moments of the colloquy came when Beza and Andreae took up the question of images of Jesus. Beza raised the issue of the crucifix and the widespread depiction of Christ crucified in statues and paintings. On this issue, Beza cast aside his typically composed rhetoric: “Our hope is placed in the true cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, not an image. For this reason, I confess that I 9

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whole-heartedly detest the image of the crucifix.” He had previously stated his preferred method of displaying Christ to the congregation: “But I would be willing to have the passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Christ crucified, depicted for Christians by the preaching of the word, just as we read him depicted by Paul to the Galatians (3:1).” Again, in Beza’s estimation, the use and abuse of unauthorized images are one and the same, so no lawful and helpful use for images of Christ could be warranted. Beza’s strong stance on this matter sparked in turn an intense response from Andreae. Taking away visible images, he said, could never remove idolatry from someone’s heart. He contended that Roman Catholics had abused “the Lord’s Prayer, the Apostles’ Creed, the Apostolic Epistles, the Gospel,” so should these be done away with too? Andreae, for his part, had seen plenty of images in churches that were not abused because proper teaching of God’s word had warded off superstition and idolatry. “For if the word of God should ring out purely, there is no longer any danger from images.” Thus Andreae maintained that the use of images was a matter of Christian liberty that should be preserved. Beza replied with a similar emphasis on the power of God’s word, but to opposite effect: “We do approve of written, as opposed to painted, images. . . . For pictures do not speak, but the word of God always speaks, and for this reason it should remain in the word, and not be stuck in a picture.” The disagreement, then, depended in part on different views about whether the use of images is an attempt to accomplish something Scripture itself is meant to achieve. This pointed interaction over biblical convictions also brought to the fore a less direct divergence of concerns in ongoing reform efforts. Andreae was conservative regarding change, not wanting to discard more traditional practices than was necessary. Even in cases where he conceded that various practices had detrimental results, he defended grounds for retaining them provided that pastors properly explained the truth and fended off the possible dangers of idolatry attached to images. Beza was more concerned to simplify worship according to what he saw as biblical principles and to strip away what he saw as inevitably leading to idolatry and corrupted worship. Despite much effort to agree to consensus principles, Andreae and Beza reached an impasse. The debate, of course, did not end as the colloquy closed in 1586. We have its proceedings because Andreae published them with his annotations on Beza’s comments. Beza later responded with his own published responses to Andreae’s annotations. Count Frederick seems to have been convinced by the Lutheran position and continued to refuse official recognition of Reformed worship in Montbéliard. Yet he was nevertheless motivated to publicly support the cause of the Huguenots against Roman Catholic persecution in France. Ongoing encounters and debates helped entrench Lutherans in their approach to images as a mark of confessional but nonradical identity. Meanwhile, “the people of Montbéliard,” in historian Jill Raitt’s words, “never forgot their Reformed origins and the long struggle against the efforts of their rulers to impose” the Lutheran confession. It took them another fifty years after the colloquy to officially adopt Lutheran12

We must be measured in our reform, especially when changes are loaded with wider ramifications than just for our own consciences or immediate circles.

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ism. Although in many countries today, religious freedom (thankfully) lowers the political stakes involved in disputes between confessional communities, disagreement about the use of images as well as our broader principles of how to regulate worship according to God’s word remains alive between Lutheran and Reformed churches. 20

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Conclusions for Today Admittedly, as a Presbyterian, my lot falls with Beza and I find that his arguments resonate with my own concerns and conclusions. Nonetheless, as I reflect on this debate, there are many aspects of Andreae’s contribution that I appreciate. Lutherans had great concern about the disastrous effects of radical iconoclasm in the wake of riots instigated by Andreas Bodenstein von Karlstadt (1486–1541), resulting in serious social and political upheaval. I appreciate that Andreae and other Lutherans were not only following their theological convictions but were also leery of sparking more unrest. We must be measured in our reform, especially when changes are loaded with wider ramifications than just for our own consciences or immediate circles. We certainly shouldn’t welcome or incite uprisings with our theological endeavors. Perhaps most pivotally, I deeply appreciate Andreae’s resolve not to depart too quickly and uncritically from traditional practices. Although I demur from his assessment about the use of religious images, his commitment to well-worn traditions, refusing to abandon them without what he considered explicit theological necessity, is a refreshing stance in our age of anti-traditional biblicism. Andreae’s trust in the consensus authority of church officers and his appreciation for traditional worship are admirable. Today, biblicism is used to justify countless novel practices—ironically not well grounded in Scripture—to upend traditional patterns of worship. We should learn from Andreae’s willingness to allow his church’s confessional commitments to shape the way he thought about personal piety and the shared doctrines and practices that bound together his ecclesiastical community. We should all strive for careful consistency between theology and practice—Reformed, Lutheran, or otherwise. Beza also provides us with insights for today. He certainly wanted more wide-ranging reform of worship practices than did Andreae, yet he manifested a similar caution about reforming too quickly. As was Calvin’s principle, all reform must be tempered with pastoral patience. Shepherds must not get too far ahead of the pace of the flocks they lead. Beza’s stance in the debate further helps us to be sensitive to which biblical and theological principles might specifically apply to church worship practices and which pertain to broader concerns about cultural or civil affairs. The debate between Lutherans and Reformed about the use of images will likely not be resolved this side of Christ’s return. This irresolution, however, directs us again to the main motivation for wrestling with the question of images in the first 21

Beza’s stance in the debate . . . helps us to be sensitive to which biblical and theological principles might specifically apply to church worship practices and which pertain to broader concerns about cultural or civil affairs.

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place: We want to see Christ. No matter where we land on the question this side of eternity, faith become sight is the final hope held up before us all. No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. (Rev. 22:3–4) Harrison Perkins (PhD, Queen’s University Belfast) is pastor at Oakland Hills Community Church

(OPC), online faculty in church history at Westminster Theological Seminary, visiting lecturer in systematic theology at Edinburgh Theological Seminary, and author of Catholicity and the Covenant of Works: James Ussher and the Reformed Tradition (Oxford University Press, 2020).

For some reflection on debates in the patristic era, see Harrison Perkins, “Images of Christ and the Vitals of the Reformed System,” The Confessional Presbyterian 14 (2018): 212–15. 2. Concerning some of these issues beyond our scope, see Jill Raitt, The Colloquy of Montbéliard: Religion and Politics in the Sixteenth Century (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993); Richard Cross, Communicatio Idiomatum: Reformation Christological Debates, Changing Paradigms in Historical and Systematic Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 226–55; Joshua Pauling, Modern Reformation (September 2020), https://www.modernreformation.org/ resources/articles/. 3. For background on the colloquy, see Jill Rait, “Montbéliard, Colloquy of,” in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation, ed. Hans J. Hillebrand (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), https://www.oxfordreference.com; Raitt, Colloquy of Montbéliard, 3–10; and Jakob Andreae and Theodore Beza, Lutheranism vs. Calvinism: The Classic Debate at the Colloquy of Montbéliard 1586, ed. Jeffrey Mallinson, trans. Clinton J. Armstrong (St. Louis, MO: Concordia, 2017), x–xi, 13–21. This last source is a translation of the records from the colloquy. 4. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 462, 465–67. 1.

Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 461, 480–81, 493–95. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 459–60. 7. Raitt, Colloquy of Montbéliard, 136–37. 8. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 460–61. 9. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 472–73. 10. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 457. 11. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 462–63, 486–87. 12. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 489. 13. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 477 (emphasis added). 14. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 490. 15. Lutheranism vs. Calvinism, 489–92. 16. Jacob Andreae, Acta Colloquii Montis Belligartensis (Tübingen, 1587). 17. Theodore Beza, Ad Acta Colloquii Montis Belligardensis pars prior (Geneva, 1588); and Theodore Beza, Ad Acta Colloquii Montis Belligardensis pars altera (Geneva, 1588). 18. Raitt, Colloquy of Montbéliard, 187. 19. Bridget Heal, “‘Better Papist than Calvinist’: Art and Identity in Later Lutheran Germany,” German History 29, no. 4 (December 2011): 584–609. 20. Raitt, The Colloquy of Montbéliard, 176. 21. R. Scott Clark, “Calvin’s Principle of Worship,” in David Hall, ed., Tributes to John Calvin: A Celebration of his Quincentenary (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2010), 247–69. 5. 6.

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Converse Exploring perspectives from the present

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I N T E RV I EW

Beauty, Art, and Images in Worship: Mark Mattes and Michael Horton Q&A

In the following exchange, theologians Mark Mattes and Michael Horton take turns asking each other some of the questions on their minds as they wrestle with the similarities and differences between their respective Lutheran and Reformed traditions on the role of images in worship, the difference between art and idolatry, and the nature of beauty. MM: The doctrine of common grace is influential in the Reformed tradition. Are there aesthetic implications embedded within it? MH: Definitely. Calvin upheld a clear distinction between the common and the holy. On the Lord’s Day, Christ gathers his people in saving grace through his word and sacraments. Believers then go out into the world, taking up their common callings where God sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. We’re not only giving gifts to unbelievers but receiving gifts from them. In this common arena, we give and receive not the grace that regenerates but the grace that restrains and blesses for the natural flourishing of all people. Just as believers share in the common curse, so unbelievers share in the common grace that enlightens and enriches all of God’s image-bearers. We would be ungrateful to the Holy Spirit, Calvin says, if we rejected the fruit of their labors. This is premised on the fact that everyone remains created in God’s image, though fallen.

Michael Horton

MM: What might be the connection between a heightened emphasis on the sovereignty of God in the Reformed tradition and the concept of beauty?

Mark Mattes

MH: I think there’s sometimes a self-contradiction in much of Christian practice. We sing “This is my Father’s world,” and then, “This world is not my home, I’m just a passin’ through.” Well, the world as it is in its rebellion against the Triune God isn’t my home. But it’s this evil age that’s passing away, not this good creation. Just as our bodies will be raised, the whole creation will enjoy the everlasting Sabbath (Rom. 8:18–25). “The earth is the Lord’s and everything in it” (Ps. 24:1). If the earth is the Lord’s, then I don’t have to carry the burden of saving it, redeeming culture, or making my country great again. I’m set free to go to work, hoping for the gift of another day to love and serve my neighbor, passing along the gifts God has given me for their welfare. Believing in God’s

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sovereignty enables us to wait patiently—but not passively—for the Lord to make all things new. MM: William A. Dyrness, in my judgment, makes an excellent case for a distinctively Reformed approach to aesthetics. He claims that Calvin encouraged us to direct our attention not to sacred objects but outward, toward life as coming from God. Do you agree with that assessment and, if so, what should contemporary Christian artists and theologians take from it? 1

MH: Yes, even in his Institutes, Calvin offers important clues along these lines. He speaks of “contemplating God in his works” as opposed to speculating. These works are “what one can point to and the eye can see”; that is, God is revealed by being reflected in the natural world. (Some historians have said that this emphasis contributed to landscape and still-life painting.) In various places, Calvin reproaches Stoics and monks for deprecating emotion or the enjoyment of God’s gifts of laughter, marriage and friendship, good wine, and a decent wardrobe. If God’s ideal for us were monastic austerity, using only the minimum necessary to sustain life, then why did he create so many colors? Isn’t it all a bit much? Calvin pauses to savor the variety of God’s creation, and he criticizes Anabaptists for condemning secular learning in the arts and sciences. In fact, he received much of his intellectual and spiritual formation in the circle of Jacques Lefevre D’Étaples, a catalyst of French humanism. Calvin’s first published work was a commentary on Seneca’s De clementia. He maintained connections to leading Renaissance poets (some of whom he recruited to Geneva). The first book of the Institutes contains a string of quotations from Cicero, Seneca, and other classical authors influential in aesthetics. Calvin’s sermons and commentaries are also filled with striking natural imagery and analogies. Sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Reformed preaching was generally marked by such allusions, often exhibiting detailed knowledge of flora and fauna, medicine and astronomy, as well as works of classical rhetoric. Calvin’s successor, Theodore Beza, wrote poetry and even a couple of plays that were performed in Geneva—but not on a Sunday! MM: I find it striking that you emphasize how Calvin savors the variety of God’s creation and you affirm so strongly that it’s this evil age that’s passing away, not this creation as such. Both claims resonate markedly with a Lutheran theology of creation. Substantive differences exist between Lutherans and the Reformed over Christology and sacramental theology—we’re both well aware of that. But I’m not convinced there’s a huge difference in our two confessional traditions with respect to a theology of culture. Does H. Richard Niebuhr overdraw a distinction between “Christ transforming culture” (which he labels as the Reformed approach) and “Christ and culture in paradox” (the Lutheran approach)? I tend to see greater similarities between the two traditions with respect to culture than does Niebuhr’s typology, though I confess I’ve used his categories in the past.

Maybe there are different nuances, but it’s hard to conclude from primary sources that our confessions are categorically opposed in our approaches to culture.

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MH: As you know, the so-called Yale School of Niebuhr, Frei, and Lindbeck was fond of such typologies, which can be useful pedagogically. But Niebuhr’s contrast between Lutheran paradox and Reformed transformation seems beholden to a tendency in late nineteenth-century German historiography to reduce every system of belief to one central dogma. So, for Lutherans, it’s justification; for Calvinists, the sovereignty of God. Like many topologies, the one Niebuhr proposed privileged his own modern outlook. Nothing in the classic Reformation confessions, catechisms, or standard systematic theologies justifies this contrast in central dogmas. “The sovereignty of God” is not an independent locus in any classic Reformed confessions, for example, but “justification” is always a major one. The doctrine of election is asserted no less clearly in the Book of Concord; all the Reformation confessional documents affirm God’s sovereignty and election but give far more space to justification and the sacraments. I think Niebuhr correctly perceived a world-embracing rather than worlddespising emphasis in the Reformed tradition. And Calvinists have been at the forefront of modern developments in the arts and sciences, but so have Lutherans. Both traditions also emphasize the eschatological paradox of the “already” and “not yet” of Christ’s kingdom. Maybe there are different nuances, but it’s hard to conclude from primary sources that our confessions are categorically opposed in our approaches to culture. Speaking of differences, let’s dip into a few issues that divide our traditions to some extent. About Andreas Karlstadt’s iconoclasm, Luther wrote: [He] blames me for protecting images contrary to God’s Word, though he knows that I seek to tear them out of the hearts of all and want them despised and destroyed. It is only that I do not approve of his wanton violence and impetuosity . . . . On the destruction of images I approached the task of destroying images by first tearing them out of the heart through God’s Word and making them worthless and despised. 2

Karlstadt was motivated by a legalistic spirit, Luther argued. Even Zwingli condemned the violence, insisting that images should be removed by the government authority only after the people have been taught properly. Some Lutherans today say that Luther’s patience (letting the word do its work) meant acceptance of images. What’s your take? MM: Within the same context of this anti-Karlstadt quote, Luther wrote, “I say at the outset that according to the law of Moses no other images are forbidden than an image of God which one worships. A crucifix, on the other hand, or any other holy image is not forbidden.” On the face of it, Luther seems less focused on patience or acceptance than on evangelical liberty versus idolatry. He does not reference John of Damascus, but his stance echoes Damascene’s distinction between an image of the invisible God, which is unacceptable, and that of the 3

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incarnate God, which is acceptable because the Son of God assumed a human nature, including a body. Defenders of icons in the Eastern tradition honor icons’ ability to teach the faith, remind us what God has done, and incite us to devotion. They also offer grace, as if they were sacramental, since they serve as windows of the divine to humans. Nothing in Luther affirms this last conviction—that icons bring grace; but Luther would share the first three affirmations about images. Of course, Eastern Orthodoxy, as I understand it, requires icons, as opposed to merely permitting them. The images we’re discussing are external or outside us. In principle, we could cleanse congregations of their presence. But for Luther, the wider category of imaging includes an inescapable internal dimension, since words themselves convey images. No imaging, no language. Because language inherently employs images, we need to rethink the acceptability of a crucifix: “It is impossible for me to hear and bear [Christ’s passion] in mind without forming mental images of it in my heart. . . . If it is not a sin but good to have the image of Christ in my heart, why should it be a sin to have it in my eyes?” Luther sought patience with images because he wasn’t convinced that their use necessarily leads to idolatry. But he was convinced that Zwingli’s rationale for rejecting images led to a false dichotomization between material and spiritual realities. Luther’s appreciation for the physical and the tangible grows out of his sacramental theology. Counter to Zwingli, he sees the sacraments as offering believers an objectivity in Christ’s promise, so that faith is never reflected back on itself (i.e., “Was my repentance truly sincere?” “Have I withheld something in my heart from Christ?”), resulting in the misstep of attempting to assure our faith in itself as opposed to Christ. Luther is anxious that Zwingli’s move places the object of faith where it shouldn’t be: one’s subjectivity. The key word for Luther against Karlstadt is heart. More than anything, Luther is a theologian of the heart. He’s convinced that the gospel creates new desires and new wills that accord with nature as God designed it for humans, in which we honor God neither like slaves fearing hell nor as hirelings drooling for heaven, but instead as children who adore their Father. As God made it, nature operates according to the law of love in which all things exist to serve their neighbors. Sinful inwardness disorders nature as God made it. As idolators, people look not to Christ but instead to some saint imaged in a painting or a statue to grant favor. The best way to free people from such idolatry is not to demolish images but to preach the word that changes hearts. Both the Reformed tradition and Lutherans are interested in purity. For the Reformed, images are an abomination to God and therefore the church should be free of them. For Lutherans, nothing external guarantees purity of heart. Only faith in the word secures that. The word is the reality to which the heart must be attached, not a human-made image. If images are idolized, then Luther has no patience for them. But images need not be idols; at their best, they remind us of scriptural truths and provoke devotion within us. That said, those images that are grounded on legends instead of on scriptural narratives have no place in the church. 4

Luther sought patience with images because he wasn’t convinced that their use necessarily leads to idolatry. But he was convinced that Zwingli’s rationale for rejecting images led to a false dichotomization between material and spiritual realities.

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MH: One of Calvin’s main arguments is that all images of the invisible God— apart from the incarnation communicated through word and sacrament—are inherently idolatrous. He particularly argues that attempting to represent Christ’s humanity apart from his deity is a Nestorian separation of natures. This would seem to be an argument Lutherans would share. 8

MM: True enough. To represent Christ’s humanity apart from his deity would be a Nestorian separation of natures. But it is a rare thinker who would label Luther as Nestorian! For Luther, when we worship Christ, we worship not only Christ’s divine but also his human nature, since as incarnate his two natures are inseparable. When we worship Christ, we don’t worship merely his deity but also his humanity. As Jack Kilcrease explains, “Whoever worships the humanity of Christ . . . is no longer adoring a creature (for this is what is meant by the union of natures) but the Creator Himself, for the unity is what is fundamental.” For Lutherans, not only Christ’s divinity but also his humanity is adored. That said, this robust incarnational approach to worship offers no license to worship an image. Arguing against the suitability of images, Calvin, with characteristic eloquence, challenges the attempt to justify the use of images based on the cherubim covering the mercy seat: 9

What, indeed, I beg you, did those paltry little images mean? Solely that images are not suited to represent God’s mysteries. For they had been formed to this end, that veiling the mercy seat with their wings they might bar not only human eyes but all the senses from beholding God, and thus correct men’s rashness. 11

In the divine service, the greatest divide between our traditions is the regulative principle: “What is not commanded is forbidden” versus “What is not forbidden is allowed.”

To be sure, for both Luther and Calvin, idolatry is a grievous sin in which one is ultimately placing one’s trust in nothing other than a projection of themselves. But it’s a mistake to think that images such as a crucifix primarily exist to represent God, as if the divine mystery could be confined to an artifact. Instead, a crucifix is a vivid reminder that Jesus died a painful death for you. Were you not a sinner, the Lord Jesus would never have had to become sin (2 Cor. 5:21) in order to die as your substitute. Hopefully, that message will sink home and make us grateful. To understand a crucifix from a Lutheran perspective is to recognize that it’s a lot like a sermon. The purpose of a crucifix is less a visual representation of the incarnate God than a form of preaching, albeit not an auditory but instead a visual one. Likewise, every auditory sermon is chock-full of vivid imagery. MH: Do you agree that in the divine service, the greatest divide between our traditions is the regulative principle: “What is not commanded is forbidden” versus “What is not forbidden is allowed”? MM: Yes, this is spot on in terms of describing the different attitudes between Lutherans and Reformed with respect to worship. No doubt the Scriptures

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offer patterns for various approaches to worship, such as praise to God or lament or confession or prayer. Likewise, the divine service has a long history stretching back to the synagogue. The Reformers’ goal was to purify the Mass. Luther retains the altar, for example, not because any sacrifice is being offered to God but instead because Christ as testator distributes his body and blood to the beneficiaries of his testament (Heb. 9:11–27). If I understand correctly, the Reformed more so than Lutherans are convinced that a specific pattern for worship is offered in the Scriptures. Lutherans do ground our liturgy in the Scriptures, of course—for instance, the LCMS Lutheran Service Book prooftexts each part of its liturgy. That said, the Lutheran liturgy is a revision of the mass purified of all sacrificial language about the Supper as well as prayers to saints and the like. We should be cautious in thinking the Bible has a pattern or game plan for everything. No doubt, it does for doctrine and life. But thinking that it has an outline for every matter in worship can lead us astray. Restorationist groups like the Church of Christ, for example, have said that since instrumental music for accompanying worship is not explicitly specified in the New Testament, then in church we should only sing a cappella. In this regard, nineteenth-century American Lutheran theologian Charles Porterfield Krauth labeled Lutheranism as a “conservative reformation.” In principle, Lutherans have latitude in worship styles. In practice, this is the case if we compare worship in Ethiopia with that in Frankenmuth, Michigan. (Incidentally, the worship services of the conservative Presbyterian congregation and the Reformed Baptist congregation, in my Des Moines, Iowa, neighborhood are very similar to a conservative Lutheran worship service.) Be that as it may, and despite the recent rise of contemporary worship, the Lutheran instinct is to retain whatever is retainable from the Roman Mass. Mike, can we shift gears once more and return to the overall question of aesthetics? Do you think there’s a connection between the importance of vocation and beauty? 12

MH: This is a great question, and I don’t hear it raised often enough. Our modern culture has narrowed beauty and aesthetics mostly to visual consumerism. What about “the beauty of holiness” (Ps. 96:9)? Of marriage and friendship, a meal shared, even a sorrowful but “precious” death in the Lord (Ps. 116:15)? We don’t have just one vocation. We’re children, siblings, spouses, parents, volunteers, and so forth. Even changing diapers can be a beautiful sort of performance art when you’re trying faintly to imitate the providence of a good Father who takes care of sparrows and knows the number of each person’s hairs. MM: Embedded in my work is a critique of atheism. While atheists experience beauty, they have no rational basis for how to account for it. To their way of thinking, the experience of beauty does not correspond to anything in reality—because there is no God who is beauty—but instead is a happenstance product of pur-

Despite the recent rise of contemporary worship, the Lutheran instinct is to retain whatever is retainable from the Roman mass.

Our modern culture has narrowed beauty and aesthetics mostly to visual consumerism. What about “the beauty of holiness” (Ps. 96:9)? Of marriage and friendship, a meal shared, even a sorrowful but “precious” death in the Lord (Ps. 116:15)?

While atheists experience beauty, they have no rational basis for how to account for it. To their way of thinking, the experience of beauty does not correspond to anything in reality—because there is no God who is beauty—but instead is a happenstance product of purposeless evolution.

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poseless evolution. Not only are secularists lacking with respect to objective truth in ethics, but likewise beauty. In such a secular environment that avoids questions of truth by reducing everything to power, is it fair to say that people today are left without a “chief end”? Might not Roger Scruton’s perspective (that beauty permits humans to feel “at home” in the world) be appropriated for sharing the gospel with people of all ages, especially young people? 13

MH: One of the reasons I encourage our readers to pick up your Luther’s Theology of Beauty is its apologetic relevance in our nihilistic age. At least in the last few centuries, Roman Catholics have done the heavy lifting in aesthetic theory (for example, Hans Urs von Balthasar) and practice (J. R. R. Tolkien). At the same time, there’s a Christocentric specificity in Luther that you highlight so well: not just a transcendent Beauty but a Mediator of all beauty in creation now present with us in the most concrete, accessible, and particular person of the incarnate Son crucified and raised for us. It is this sort of “apologetics of the cross” that connects with those who feel hopeless and abandoned by God. MM: How might the cross shape a shared “Reformation” approach to aesthetics? MH: You’ve written so beautifully on this, Mark. Lots of things come to mind, but I’ll mention only two. First, we’re in Christ so we can expect to follow him on the same trail: suffering and then glory. We live in a fallen world, we’re fallen, and so is everyone else. Corruption spreads to every domain, even to nature itself. If we assume that God expects us to smile all the time, then we need only look at Golgotha. There is God himself, in our flesh, ripped apart by our transgressions. Sometimes Christian artists exhibit a triumphalist view of life: happy, upbeat,

William A. Dyrness, The Origins of Protestant Aesthetics in Early Modern Europe: Calvin’s Reformation Poetics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022). 2. Martin Luther in Luther’s Works, vol. 40, Church and Ministry II, trans. Bernhard Erling and Conrad Bergendoff, ed. Conrad Bergendoff, general ed. H. T. Lehmann (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1958), 85 (hereafter LW). 1.

LW 40:85–86. John of Damascus, On Holy Images, trans. Mary H. Allies (London: Thomas Baker, 1898), 15–16. 5. LW 40:99–100. 6. LW 40:146. 7. See the Large Catechism in Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert, The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical 3. 4.

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cheerful, like a Thomas Kinkade painting. But with a more biblical appreciation of the extent of the fall, we should be able to jibe with the horror, tragedy, and evil we can’t explain away. As Bono has said, the Bible’s songbook includes the blues: provocative lamentation that sometimes I feel awkward singing in church. Knowing how the story turns out, we don’t mourn like those without hope, but we do weep with Jesus at Lazarus’s tomb. The biblical account of original sin is big enough, broad enough, and deep enough to allow us to grieve with our neighbors whether it’s in their novels, screenplays, or music or just in their living room. Good art is neither a gratuitous celebration of depravity nor a dishonest suppression of the truth. Second, at the cross, our sins were forgiven—including our failures in our vocations. By “what we have done and what we have left undone,” we have contributed our own ugliness to God’s beautiful creation. But “Father, forgive them!” (Luke 23:24) is the last word. At the cross, tragedy and comedy meet. Mark Mattes (PhD, The University of Chicago) serves as the Lutheran Bible Institute chair in theology as

well as department chair at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa. Prior to this call, he served parishes in Illinois and Wisconsin. He is the author of several books, including Law and Gospel in Action (New Reformation Press, 2019) and Martin Luther’s Theology of Beauty (Baker Academic, 2017). He serves as an associate editor of Lutheran Quarterly and a member of the Continuation Committee of the International Luther Congress.

Michael Horton is editor-in-chief of Modern Reformation and the J. Gresham Machen Professor of

Systematic Theology and Apologetics at Westminster Seminary California in Escondido.

Lutheran Church, ed. Robert Kolb and Timothy Wengert (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000), 388:20–21. 8. Kolb and Wengert, The Book of Concord, 1.11.3–4. 9. LW 73:263–64. 10. Jack D. Kilcrease, The Self-Donation of God: A Contemporary Lutheran Approach to Christ and His Benefits (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2013), 120; see also “On the Divinity & Humanity

of Christ,” LW 73:267.

11. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1.xi.3.

12. Charles Porterfield Krauth, The Conservative Reformation and

Its Theology, 2nd ed. (repr., Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1978).

13. Roger Scruton, Beauty: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford:

Oxford University Press, 2011), 174–75.

Good art is neither a gratuitous celebration of depravity nor a dishonest suppression of the truth.

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POEM

Sunrise in the Outer Banks by J. A. Baker

My weathered family walks the eroding beaches under cream and pewter sky that’s seen vacations faded and dull with blight, the wind pulls out what’s layered beneath, the great revealer of these visions unclear in the indifferent light: I saw the Roanoke colony and its con of gift shop history, clear messages in trees hidden for tourist dimes, my siblings around me lost to time, distance, and memory, with money and misdirects we navigate this decaying rind. I considered the buried bones of houses eaten by salt water, the tide take and give, abandoned to proverbial guilt, our blurred parents ahead sinking further from us walkers who wonder is our structure still sound in what we’ve built? I dug up the question of making progress and what could it finally mean that cream overcomes pewter, power seeding to the surface of the day to stand where we are together as the ground is eroding is to stand in a place where we must rethink not purpose but way, and when vacation time’s done, the wind blows us apart, maybe one day it will a clearer vision impart.

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Persuade Thinking theologically about all things

“ W H AT

L A N G UA G E

S H A L L

B O R R O W ? ”

WHY CHRISTIANS

Need POETRY

by J O N A T H A N L A N D R Y

C R U S E

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HAVE A LOVE/HATE relationship with poetry. My appreciation for the literary form swings on a pendulum between “Is there anything more beautiful than the crafting of words?” and “What in the world does this even mean and why did I waste my time reading it?” This is not necessarily due to a deficiency on the part of the poet but is oftentimes occasioned by my own limitations to appreciate the genre. In recent years, however, I have become more and more convinced of the need for believers to digest good poetry. If you object, I understand. I myself confess to have been more often asleep than awake in an introduction to English poetry course back in my sophomore year of college. But Christians don’t have the liberty to ignore the poetic form. Former poet laureate of California, Dana Gioia, puts it bluntly: Poetry is not merely important to Christianity. It is an essential, inextricable, and necessary aspect of religious faith and practice. The fact that most Christians would consider that assertion absurd does not invalidate it. Their disagreement only demonstrates how remote the contemporary Church has become from its own origins. It also suggests that sacred poetry is so interwoven into the fabric of Scripture and worship as to become invisible. At the risk of offending most believers, it is necessary to state a simple but unacknowledged truth: It is impossible to understand the full glory of Christianity without understanding its poetry. 1

Following Gioia, I suggest four reasons why Christians need poetry. More than discovering a need for good poetry, I hope to awaken in you a love for it as well! ***

Our Book Is Poetic The first reason is that the Bible is poetic. By this, I mean more than to say that the Bible contains poetry, which it does. It contains a lot, actually: one-third of the Scriptures could be classified as poetry. This includes books like Psalms and the Song of Songs, which are filled with remarkable Hebraic verse, but it extends into the New Testament as well with some of Christ’s teaching (think the Beatitudes), the canticles in Luke’s Gospel, and the Christ hymns of Philippians and Colossians. The biblical authors intentionally filled their pages with images, symbolism, metaphor, motifs, parallelism, alliteration, and assonance. But we can widen our scope when we say that the Bible is poetic. Here we must affirm and admire the beauty, artistry, and sensitivity of expression with which the Bible is composed. Taken as a whole, Scripture is the premier work of literature, utilizing the greatest conventions of human language (the Westminster

Our book is a poetic book, and we grow in our faith by reading it. So, we must come ready to read, and even love, poetry.

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divines would speak of “the majesty of the style,” WCF 1.5) to capture our hearts and affections and draw us in love toward the Author. Consider how the Bible opens with the first Adam failing to attain for himself and all humanity the fruit of the tree of life. Thousands of years later, the apostle John closes out the canon with the second Adam granting access to the nations at long last to eat of that same tree. What is this but a Holy Spirit-inspired inclusio? Sometimes we see the theology but miss the poetry. We correctly call the pattern “typology” but forget to see that it is also artistry. The two are not mutually exclusive: the divine and human authors present to us soul-saving truth and do so in a beautiful way. Our book is a poetic book, and we grow in our faith by reading it. So, we must come ready to read, and even love, poetry. ***

The Devotional Power of Poetry The second reason we need poetry—and here particularly I think of sacred poetry, at times called devotional poetry—is because of the unique way in which it can unlock our minds to the things of God and elevate our souls nearer to him. “Poetic Expression . . . [has] a way of penetrating and detonating in the soul,” said Pastor Kent Hughes. How poetry does that is something of a mystery. Much could be said about the techniques of meter, rhyme, assonance, and so on. But when it comes to Christian devotional poetry—which aims to “awaken a greater love of God and desire to be like him”—some have simply concluded that it is a work of the Holy Spirit. For example, theologian Jeremy S. Begbie writes that Christians do not need to be suspicious of the arts, particularly poetry, as a means of being drawn closer to God. “Distinctively literary devices need not be spurned: the Spirit can employ them and with them move the reader or hearer.” I would hasten to add that when we speak of the Spirit using something like poetry, it is not to suggest that our poems can give us new revelation. On the contrary, they can open our eyes to understand old revelation in a new way. For example, the Scriptures tell us that Jesus “himself bore our sins in his body on the tree” (1 Pet. 2:24). Saying nothing more than this fundamental truth, Jacob Revius (1586–1658) is able to help us grasp it in a personal and affective way that we might not have otherwise: 2

No, it was not the Jews who crucified, Nor who, Lord Jesus, spat into your face, Nor who betrayed you in the judgment place, Nor who with buffets struck you as you died. No, it was not the soldiers fisted bold Who lifted up the hammer and the nail, Or raised the cross on Calvary’s curséd hill, Or cast the dice to win your seamless robe. I am the one, O Lord, who brought you there,

Persuade

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I am the heavy cross you had to bear, I am the rope that bound you to the tree, The whip, the nail, the hammer, and the spear, The bloody, thorny crown you had to wear: It was my sin, O Lord, it was for me. 5

Poetry can also help us reflect on truths we might not have fully considered before. John Donne makes the profound and punchy observation in Holy Sonnet 11 that “kings pardon, but He bore our punishment.” Even this single line provides ample food for sanctifying thought. Jesus: a king who goes above and beyond by going down to death below. Or consider how Emily Dickinson captures the themes of assurance and faith: I never saw a moor, I never saw the sea; Yet know I how the heather looks, And what a wave must be. I never spoke with God, Nor visited in heaven; Yet certain am I of the spot As if the chart were given. 6

There is a reason engaging preachers often quote good hymns in their sermons: they recognize that verse has a way of connecting with the affections of those who are listening. George Herbert, the great British poet (and preacher himself !) of the sixteenth century, acknowledged this: A verse may find him who a sermon flies.

If our goal as Christians is to know Christ better (Eph. 1:17; Phil. 3:10), then how can we exclude God’s gift of good poetry when it is such an effective means of enabling us to do just that? 8

***

Poetry and Prayer If devotional poetry is to draw us closer to God, then a third reason is similar to the second: Sacred poetry helps us speak to God. We often struggle to articulate our love for the Lord and all that he has done for us. The best place to turn when words fail us are God’s words in Holy Scripture, but great devotional poems can also shape our prayers. Retired Wheaton English professor Leland Ryken writes, “Acting as our representatives, poets say what we too wish to say, only they say it better.” Consider the personal language in these lines from the hymn “Jesus, 9

If our goal as Christians is to know Christ better . . . , then how can we exclude God’s gift of good poetry when it is such an effective means of enabling us to do just that?

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Thy Blood and Righteousness” by Count Nikolaus von Zinzendorf: Jesus, thy blood and righteousness My beauty are, my glorious dress; ‘Midst flaming worlds, in these arrayed With joy shall I lift up my head. When from the dust of death I rise To claim my mansion in the skies, Even then this shall be all my plea, Jesus hath lived, hath died, for me. Jesus, be endless praise to thee, Whose boundless mercy hath for me— For me a full atonement made, An everlasting ransom paid. 10

Our frustration with poetry is that, unlike most prose, it doesn’t make sense at first read and we don’t want to take the time to figure it out. I wonder if that is not the same reason so many of us struggle to read our Bibles, or to read them well?

While I did not write these words, I can say them. In fact, I would not have been able to say them unless someone else had written them. Yet, like the best of devotional poetry and hymnody, Zinzendorf ’s words are so biblically solid and universally true of the Christian experience that any believer can bring them to God in prayer and truly say, “For me—for me!” We can “absorb” the language of devotional poetry “as expressions of what is in our own hearts.” 11

***

The Humbling Hand of Poetry Finally, we need poetry because it humbles us—a most needed Christian virtue. It does so in at least two ways. First, it slows us down. One would think that the brevity of poetry would endear the art form to our twenty-first-century culture that likes everything fast and in bite size. But while poetry can at times be short, it’s rarely simple. It requires reflection and meditation. Our frustration with poetry is that, unlike most prose, it doesn’t make sense at first read and we don’t want to take the time to figure it out. I wonder if that is not the same reason so many of us struggle to read our Bibles, or to read them well? We are no longer accustomed to sitting and thinking over texts. The mind wired for Twitter—filled with pithy and punchy one-liners—needs to be retrained. Gioia puts it like this: “All that is necessary to revive Christian poetry is a change in attitude—a conviction that perfunctory and platitudinous language will not suffice.” Poetry slows us down and reminds us that wisdom requires time and reflection (Ps. 37:7–9; Prov. 21:5b). Besides slowing us down, poetry also shrinks us down. It humbles us by revealing how small we really are before a massive world and an immense, eternal God. Without poetry, we might ignore the fact that some experiences in life are 12

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actually beyond our comprehension or understanding or articulation. Human nature flees from admitting its finitude; poetry embraces it. Devotional poetry can situate us in the sea of unspeakable sorrows, or in the pastures of God’s undeserved blessings. It helps us ask, “What is man that you are mindful of him?” (Ps. 8:4). John Piper, a poet himself, says, Paradoxically, poetry is an expression of the fact that there are great things that are inexpressible. There is no one-to-one correspondence between the depths of human experience and the capacities of language to capture that experience. There are experiences that go beyond the ability of language to express them. For the poet, this limitation of language does not produce silence; it produces poetry. 13

Words will always fall short, but poetry nevertheless tries. The author of “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” recognized this. The final stanza opens with these arresting lines: 14

What language shall I borrow to thank Thee, dearest Friend, For this, thy dying sorrow, thy pity without end? The Christian knows there is no language known to humanity that is sufficient to express the great things of God and the glories of the gospel. But poetry does the next best thing: it takes the poor language we have and enhances it. Through rhythm and rhyme, layers of meaning and shades of beauty are drawn out that bare words do not hold themselves. The skillful artist takes sounds and syntax and produces something remarkable for the believer: something that opens our eyes to God’s world and word, something that draws us closer to him in prayer, something that speaks to us at the deepest level. Poetry makes our language better—and it makes us better, too. Jonathan Landry Cruse is the poetry editor of Modern Reformation, pastor of Community Presby-

terian Church in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and author of The Character of Christ and What Happens When We Worship. He is also a hymn writer whose works can be found at www.HymnsOfDevotion.com.

Dana Gioia, “Christianity and Poetry,” First Things (August 2022), https://www.firstthings.com/article/2022/08/ christianity-and-poetry. 2. R. Kent Hughes, The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2015), 234. 3. Leland Ryken, The Soul in Paraphrase (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2018), 14. 4. Jeremy S. Begbie, A Peculiar Orthodoxy (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2018), 122. 5. Jacob Revius, “He Bore Our Griefs,” trans. Henrietta ten Harmsel (1630). 6. Emily Dickinson, “I Never Saw a Moor” (1862). 7. George Herbert, “The Church-porch” in The Temple (1633). 8. It’s worth noting that this is the primary reason we at MR happily devote several pages each issue to poetry—some of 1.

which is written by readers just like you. Leland Ryken, The Poetry of Redemption (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2022), 94. 10. Nicolaus L. von Zinzendorf, “Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness,” trans. John Wesley (1739). 11. Ryken, The Poetry of Redemption, 94. 12. Gioia, “Christianity and Poetry.” 13. John Piper, “God Filled Your Bible with Poems,” Desiring God (blog), August 2016, https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/ god-filled-your-bible-with-poems. 14. Lutheran hymnist Paul Gerhardt (1607–1676) first translated the text from Latin into German, followed by Anglican vicar John Gambold into English in 1752, and then again by American Presbyterian minister James Waddel Alexander (1804–1859). 9.

Through rhythm and rhyme, layers of meaning and shades of beauty are drawn out that bare words do not hold themselves.

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POEM

Paul and All by Sarah Steele

Paul didn’t ask to be saved. He was out “serving God” But was really depraved. To his laws and traditions Was fully enslaved, And still He didn’t ask To be saved. Paul didn’t ask to be blinded. He was off on the road And was feeling high-minded, When the force of the Light And the Lord’s harsh words grinded, And then He was standing there Blinded. Paul didn’t ask for correction. He was sure he was right, Walking life with perfection, When Jesus called out Gave his heart new direction, Even though He didn’t ask For correction.

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God doesn’t wait for our asking. When we’re dead in our sins And don’t care and sit basking, He comes and he calls us And starts the unmasking. So I’m thankful that God Doesn’t wait For our asking.

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POEM

The Tree of Life (Revelation 22:2) by Thomas Wysong

How sweet to see on brightest banks The King’s Tree stooped with luscious fruit No knot or mold on pearly flanks No rot within its roots No sunspot wilts the dappled leaf No wind howls past the bough No winter snap brings petal grief No ice crests on its brow No vulture spreads its dirty wing No carrion brings the crow No dregs despoil the crystal spring By which the good tree grows But golden leaves are lovely fanned A crown upon the holy tree Placed freely by the Holy Hand Which wove the thorns on Calvary Here the nations bruised and sore Shall come on foot appealing Plucking forth the promised cure His leaves of grace and healing

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IV.

Engage Connecting with our time and place

T H E U N B E A R A B L E

Ambivalence of Film: W I T H C O N S I D E R AT I O N

O F

Terrence Malick’s TO THE WONDER

by M A R K B O WA L D

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LASSIC PROTESTANTS are intrinsically ambivalent about human nature and thus human culture. On one side, we’re haunted by historical shadows. We’re disturbed by the specter of Constantinianism, since both Scripture and history bear witness to the pitfalls of wedding faith with political culture; we’re sensitive to the perennial temptation of elevating the works of our own hands into idols, a sensitivity learned in the Reformation; and we fully embrace our Augustinian theological heritage in its frank acknowledgment of original sin and total depravity. On the other, brighter side of our Protestant ambivalence toward human culture stands our commitment to the cultural mandate as foundational to original human nature and purpose as created in the image of God, which he pronounced “very good” (Gen. 1:31). Even as sinners, we continue to reflect our Creator’s image and are still called to exercise our mandate to fill and subdue the earth. Ultimately, we believe that the heights of God’s redemption of humanity in Christ reach higher than the depths to which our depravity descends. We have every reason, and endless evidence, that as a species we will always find ways, consciously or otherwise, to twist our cultural calling to unholy ends. Likewise, we have every reason and evidence to believe that our holy God in Christ will accomplish a far greater good despite—and even through—the works of our sinful hands. This ambivalence—this wrestling between Christ and culture—is in our age best represented in the advent of what is likely the most powerful cultural form in human history: film. Filmmaking possesses an unparalleled power and scope in human cultural expression. Filmmakers draw from and assimilate with ease every other form of human creative and expressive culture: storytelling, music, architecture, photography, painting, and sculpting. The legions employed in the production of films extend across nearly every imaginable area of human life, from electricians to hair and makeup artists, accountants, lawyers, drivers, costumers, “Craft Service” personnel (embracing everything from food preparation to cleaning). Films literally project worlds, worlds that present themselves to us as real and, perhaps even more poignantly, as possible. In the second half of this essay, I focus mainly on one remarkable film— Terence Malick’s To the Wonder (2013)—for illustration and to motivate discussion of these themes. But in this first half of the essay, it’s important to explore just how thoroughly film as a cultural form has saturated our media landscape. In its broadest conception, it now encompasses a dizzying array of long- and short-form video and other similar content. This explosion of moving pictures paired with sound into every aspect of everyday life and technological media has occurred in the span of one generation—roughly the last thirty years. In

[The] wrestling between Christ and culture . . . is in our age best represented in the advent of what is likely the most powerful cultural form in human history: film.

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that time, film has transitioned away from being a particular art form with clear boundaries and fairly strict technical and financial limitations on its producers and consumers. The film The Blair Witch Project, made in 1999, stands as an important sign of the rapid shift to affordability and availability of the technology to produce film. Production costs of that film were $60,000. (To date it has earned something close to 250 million dollars). In the twenty-five years since then, the technology to shoot in industry minimum 4K and lighting and sound recording equipment have become easily affordable. Perhaps more startling is the fact that people have access to any of the professional level post-production tools and technology simply with an Adobe Creative Cloud subscription that presently costs only $54.99 a month. There are myriad apps and free open software available even more cheaply. Film today retains almost none of its former barriers to its producers and requires no special knowledge, literacy, or means for its consumers to access and digest on their smartphones. Film is now readily made, readily distributed, and readily viewed. Attempting to make sense of the cultural impact of film amid such dramatic changes is a bit like being caught in a small rowboat in a local river during a historic flash flood. How do we navigate what we thought was familiar territory during an unprecedented situation? It feels less a time for leisurely contemplation in front of a fire with a pipe and good brandy than just holding on for dear life. Perhaps the best way to make sense of filmmaking’s impact, then, is to compare it to another revolutionary cultural form on which we’ve gained slightly more perspective: print. ***

The Advent and Cultural Power of the Printing Press Western history nominates Johannes Gutenberg as the inventor of the printing press in the early fifteenth century. Although there is evidence of similar technology being employed centuries earlier in Korea and China, we need not dawdle over the details of who invented what first. The point here is that the catalyst for the history of print as an indisputably world-changing cultural form is the possibility of its mass production and distribution by means of the printing press. This technology emerged and spread in Europe at a time that those of us who are sympathetic to Protestantism consider highly providential. For Christians, the services the printing press rendered to the religious revolutions of Martin Luther, John Calvin, Thomas Cranmer, Jan Hus—as those uniquely committed and invested in the authority and clarity of Holy Scripture and to its availability to every Christian—cast the newly powerful cultural form of print in the most gracious of rose-tinted light. Yet, as will later be the case with 1

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film, deep ambivalence remains. The power of the printing press as a tool of culture cannot be simply or solely connected to the goodness and love of the Trinity. It is also connected to, and complicated by, the nature of the human beings who wield it. To be clear, the measure of the impact of the printing press in the early modern era had little to do with the existence of books as such. Books had existed in various forms for hundreds or even thousands of years prior to the invention of the printing press. The sweeping expansion of the influence of print culture was then and continues to be measured by one metric: accessibility. As with film, this accessibility can be mapped across two dimensions: production and consumption; and again, some of the most revolutionary change in this cultural form came in the span of a single generation. As a seminary student in Grand Rapids in the 1990s, I spent inexcusable amounts of time and money in local theological bookstores. It was a golden era to build a library. There were so many new and used theology books available that some people rented high-capacity travel vans or small busses to coordinate group visits, making the rounds among all the stores in the area in one fell swoop. Foremost among these was the old Eerdmans bookstore, run by the venerable Allen Sundsmo, for whom managing a bookstore meant keeping abreast of new developments in publishing and serving clients what he deemed suitable to each one’s taste—a kind of theology sommelier. A new kind of publisher arrived in those years, however, in the person of Jon Stock, whom I met when he visited and delivered books for sale to Eerdmans in those days. He, along with his partner John Wipf, had just fostered a revolutionary new publishing house (Wipf & Stock), at the center of which was a new printing technology called “print-on-demand.” They began obtaining the rights to out-of-print theology titles, digitizing them, and making available low-cost, one-off physical copies far more quickly—and with far less financial investment— than required by traditional bulk printing methods. Fast-forward to the present where not only print-on-demand but e-books and self-publishing have virtually removed all traditional barriers for both the production and the consumption of books and other textual media. The two remaining barriers to the production of books in our day are whether an author is willing to commit the time and energy to write one, and whether that author is willing to risk the personal exposure of writing to the masses. ***

The Cultural Catalyst of the Internet Following fast on the heels of these recent revolutions in print, the production and consumption innovations that underwrite the broad accessibility of film as a cultural form have appeared in the universal adoption of a wonderful and terrible trinity of technological synergy: cable television, the internet, and the smartphone. Nowadays we’re only beginning to realize the power of the moving image

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shared through any and all means. Twenty-four-hour news, streaming shows and movies, Tik Tok, YouTube, front door surveillance cameras. To all of which we now must add the emergence of A.I., “deep fakes” and such that further complicate the potential power and scope of filmic media. Power for what? The good? Or otherwise? Anyone paying attention will concede the negative balance on film’s cultural ledger. “What the world is to-day,” Mark Twain once wrote, “good and bad, it owes to Gutenberg.” Will we say the same one day about film? This brings us to one more remarkable factor in film’s tremendous growth as a cultural force, which I’ll call the “literacy threshold.” Robert Darnton, reflecting on the impact of “forbidden” political texts in the emergence of the French Revolution, observed: 2

The making of meaning occurs at the street level as well as in books. The shaping of public opinion takes place in markets and taverns as well as in sociétés de pensée [societies of thought]. To understand how publics make sense of events, one must extend the inquiry beyond the works of philosophers and into the communication networks of everyday life. We could argue about what’s required for meeting the most basic “literacy threshold” for reading printed material, but the threshold for filmic material nearly coincides with having functioning eyes.

Writing in 1995 before the technological and cultural revolution we’re discussing here came into its own, Darnton was still thinking primarily of the cultural form of printed books. Back then, cell phones were only phones. The internet was populated mostly by text, with less than 15 percent of the population of the United States having access. Books have always required a lengthy and difficult process by which a person comes to possess literacy—the capacity to read and understand. Consider the effort of years of learning and practice necessary to acquire even basic competency. It’s hard to overstate how much stronger Darnton’s network effect shaping public opinion is today than during the French Revolution (or even the 1990s). The literacy required to “read” film is a fraction of that required for texts. Perhaps it requires a cursory facility with speaking a language, but even this low bar is lowered further by the universality of the tools of art used in filmmaking. My Korean language literacy is nonexistent, but I am still able to enjoy Korean film, following the story and being moved by the artistry. We could argue about what’s required for meeting the most basic “literacy threshold” for reading printed material, but the threshold for filmic material nearly coincides with having functioning eyes. Even more than with modern print media, then, public opinion has become the only remaining barrier for consumption. And this raises once again the ambivalence of human nature and cultural accomplishments. Not everyone with time and energy has something worthwhile to say, nor is the court of public opinion populated primarily by good, kind, or gracious jurors. To this point, I’ve mostly allowed film to languish on the darker half of human cultural ambivalence. We’re right to harbor deep concerns over the power and scope of film, residing as it does in unclean hands. Yet film’s power also represents the pinnacle of positive human cultural expression, with equal capacity to be used for the good—espe-

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cially, perhaps, in hands that have been washed in the redemptive wake of Christ’s transforming work. Amid such ambivalence, film can be both tragic and beautiful, a powerful pairing of depth and height brilliantly captured in the work of Terence Malick. ***

The Theological Paradox between God’s Love * and Human Ambivalence in To the Wonder Equal parts auteur and recluse, Terence Malick is one of the world’s greatest living filmmakers. He is also one of the precious few explicitly exploring the dimensions of Christian faith with a positive voice and vision. Malick was raised Roman Catholic and reportedly is now Episcopalian. Regardless, his films—especially in recent years—clearly articulate Christian themes through the lens of a phenomenological style of filmmaking. Phenomenology, most closely associated with Martin Heidegger, is a school of philosophy that focuses on meaning as grasped through direct, conscious experience of the world around us. For Heidegger, words and speech are a “reduction,” a diminishment of human “Be-ing.” That’s because Be-ing presents itself most fully in the moment, providing its own inarticulate and incalculable categories for comprehension. Transposed into cinematic terms, the fullness of Be-ing is better captured in images than in words. Malick is peerless in executing this style. That he can rely so little on words and dialogue and still “tell” such powerful stories speaks uniquely to the power of the image in storytelling and confirms the foundational place of metanarratives for human sense making. (This also means we should take note as we watch: if and when Malick allows speech, he does so with the highest level of intentionality. When Malick’s characters speak, pay attention; when he injects the frame with off-screen narration, treat it as the voice of Malick himself.) Malick marries this impressionistic style with a narrative format in what is perhaps his most singularly Christian film, 2013’s To the Wonder. Even quick shots of a Golden Corral Restaurant feel like landscape paintings. Malick shows us that the world is expansive and large, beautiful and bright and bold. Juxtaposed against the breathtaking beauty of creation, the characters in To the Wonder are each complex, conflicted, flawed, and inevitably selfish—or in Christian vernacular, sinful. This juxtaposition between sin and beauty is central in To the Wonder, ultimately serving as an object lesson pointing to the profound grace of the God who loves us without fail, despite us. The primary character around which the narrative is woven is Neil, played by Ben Affleck. We meet him while he is traveling in Europe and falling in love with Marina, a French woman played by the effervescent Olga Kurylenko. Neil and Marina share moments of profound love portrayed in the most stunning 3

* Caution: plot spoiler alert!

Phenomenology . . . is a school of philosophy that focuses on meaning as grasped through direct, conscious experience of the world around us.

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settings: gardens, cathedrals, castles, old European streets, and endless beaches (in Malick’s films, we always see lots of water). Neil brings Marina and her daughter home to the United States to live in a suburb of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, which we might think mundane by contrast; but Malick presents it too as a painting in motion. Against such a rich backdrop of being and time and beauty, the characters are in love. Yet from the very beginning, it’s a conflicted love. Neil and Marina each inevitably act in selfishness, even violence. Marina dances (literally and figuratively) around Neil, both seeking his attention but also seeking to manipulate him into something deeper to which he remains stubbornly resistant. Eventually, coinciding with the expiration of her visa, the film suggests that Neil has cheated on Marina with Jane, a friend from earlier in his life (played by Rachel McAdams). Reluctant and distant, Neil often broods—all while continuing to champion the cause of creation care and the poor who suffer from the callous actions of the rich and powerful. Yet, we also see him expressing tenderness, care, regret, and eventually—and most importantly for Malick—repentance. Jane, Neil’s old flame, carries all sorts of her own complex baggage; their tryst proves empty and fleeting. Almost immediately after Neil’s affair with Jane ends, Marina returns to him and they’re married in a church. It’s here that we meet the fourth main character, Father Quintana, a priest portrayed with gravitas and genuineness by Javier Bardem. He arguably steals not only the scene (as they say) but also the film, both in his performance and in his role in the story. Like the other characters, Quintana wanders through Malick’s troubled but fundamentally beautiful world, desperately trying to make sense of its paradoxes, searching for faith. In a voiceover prayer, he reveals his struggle to trust God: “Everywhere you are present, and still I can’t see you. . . . Why don’t I hold on to what I’ve found? . . . My heart is cold . . . hard.” In Malick’s filmography, priests are especially conflicted, broken. Despite his internal struggles, however, Quintana still shows faith both in his deeds and in his words. In one prophetic scene, he preaches with Neil and Marina present: 6

Terrence Malick

Man is in revolt against God . . . Hosea, in the breakdown of his marriage, in the spiritual infidelity of his people, in that broken marriage we see the pattern of our world . . . the man who makes a mistake can repent but the man who hesitates, who does nothing . . . with him [God] can do nothing. 9

On biblical cue, like the sudden and unannounced arrival of the serpent in Genesis 3, an Italian friend of Marina’s arrives and echoes that original Edenic temptation. She, like the serpent with Eve, tries to convince Marina to read the story of her life with Neil differently. She prompts her to “leave while you can”—to seek freedom from the bondage of her marriage covenant. Fast on the heels of this we witness more dramatic fighting as a culminating meltdown between Neil and Marina. The next few scenes show Malick’s most profound demonstration of the unbearable ambivalence of human nature. Marina first

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repents of her role in these conflicts with Neil. Echoing Romans 7, she confesses to God in voiceover, I’ve hurt people . . . I know what I am. . . . My god what a cruel war. . . . I find two women inside of me . . . one full of love for you . . . the other pulls me down to earth. 10

Then, in the very next scene, Marina follows the neighborhood handyman to a hotel and breaks her marriage vows. She then confesses and asks Neil for forgiveness, which he initially resists but then gives. The damage, however, is done, and the truth of the ambivalence of human nature has now been shown clearly in all the characters human Be-ing. Finally comes the film’s sweeping sixteen-minute conclusion. It is framed as a final prayer “to the wonder”: God. The sequence begins with Neil visiting first a divorce lawyer and then Father Quintana for spiritual guidance. These conversations are interspersed with a scene in which we see Neil trying yet failing to repair a broken clock—to fix time. The music swells, carrying us to the final resolution. Neil accompanies his priest as he visits the poor and ministers to drug abusers and the destitute in his parish. A voiceover prayer from Quintana begins: 11

Teach us where to seek you. . . . Christ be with me . . . Christ before me . . . Christ behind me . . . Christ in me . . . Christ beneath me . . . Christ above me. . . Christ on my right . . . Christ on my left . . . Christ in the heart . . . Thirsting . . . We thirst . . . Neil is here shown kneeling in front of Marina, repenting, asking for forgiveness, while Quintana’s prayer continues. Flood our souls with your spirit and life . . . So completely . . . That our lives may only be a reflection of yours . . . Shine through us . . . Show us how to seek you . . . We were made to see you . . . We then see Neil and Marina at the airport, exchanging final goodbyes without bitterness. And finally, the last prayer is uttered that summarizes, closes, and

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encloses the film. This prayer is all they are able to say, all that needs to be said; and in it, Malick tells us something about all we can say. In Marina’s voice, the final prayer is offered: “Love that loves us . . . merci.” 12

***

Repentance as Conclusion Against the backdrop of the shattering beauty of creation; in light of the ways we have sinned by what we have and have not done, both knowingly and otherwise; despite ourselves, the Wonder—God in Christ—is faithful to us and grants us unfathomable grace of which we are only ever partially aware. Malick shows us that we are creatures who should live in perennial confession and thankfulness. The vision in Malick’s most overtly Christian film of a loving Creator God, a deeply compromised humanity, and the beauty and grace that persist in the world—very much despite us—is one that transcends denominations. It should resonate particularly loudly among those with reformational convictions. The characters in this film represent humanity in all the good we inevitably wreck and the havoc we cannot help but wreak. Nevertheless, they, like we, receive constant grace, making us able somehow through it all to begin to show faith ourselves. We live in a time when the technology and art of film production and consumption is exponentially more powerful and more available than ever before.

On this history, see especially Elizabeth L. Eisenstein, The Printing Press as an Agent of Change: Communications and Cultural Transformations in Early-Modern Europe, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), as well as the fascinating and counterintuitive work of Robert Darnton, The Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (New York: W. W. Norton, 1995). 2. From “The Work of Gutenberg,” a tribute published in 1.

the Hartford Daily Courant (June 27, 1900), 7. See Rod Dreher’s review of Malick’s A Hidden Life, https:// www.theamericanconservative.com/on-not-getting-malickmovie-a-hidden-life/, and also his discussion of this film as an entry point to an online “diary” entry. 4. For an accessibly introduction to phenomenology, which also happens to be written by a Catholic priest and theologian, see Robert Sokolowski, Introduction to Phenomenology (Cambridge: 3.

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Our time offers the possibility of using this power for untold good or ill. Film confronts us with a cultural form whose ambivalence is as unbearable as that of human nature itself. As Christians, we aren’t above this ambivalence, but we’re uniquely suited to engage it, devoting our energy to understanding the unique peril and promise of filmmaking for our time. There is a terrible beauty in our human creaturely ambivalence that is not meant for resolution in this age. It is inherent to our good yet fallen condition, to life and death. It is named in the gospel, in repentance and forgiveness; it is felt in the paradoxical relationship of doubt and faith; it is revealed in Scripture in the already and not yet of the kingdom of Christ, who is the incarnate fullness of both divine and human Be-ing yet no less powerful Word of truth and grace. As we wrestle with this newest and most powerful of cultural forms, film, we should give thanks, merci, to the Lord of creation and culture for the grace to continue hearing and telling his story and ours—even as we rightly pause to consider with care the ambivalence of the filmic witness we bear and the impact it makes. Mark Bowald is professor of theological studies and director of master’s programs at Grace College and

Theological Seminary. He serves as canon theologian and examining chaplain for the Anglican Diocese of the Great Lakes (ACNA) and is the former general editor of Christian Scholar’s Review. With industry experience in film and television, he writes and speaks on hermeneutics, theology, and culture.

Cambridge University Press, 1999). The film even contains a phenomenological philosophy Easter egg at the 1:00:54 mark. In the scene, Neil is lying on a mattress on the floor reading the newly available translation of Heidegger’s Sein und Zeit (Being and Time). 6. Malick uses Marina’s daughter as a foil who occasionally observes that things just don’t seem right. At 0:08 already, she asks her mom why she’s unhappy. At 0:21:22, she insists 5.

“we need to leave . . . there’s something missing.” 41:35, Marina’s voiceover: “You told me about her . . .” 8. 24:08. 9. 34:45. 10. 1:26:14. 11. 1:28:03. 12. Expressing “thank you” in French but also, I believe, evoking the English word mercy. 7.

Film confronts us with a cultural form whose ambivalence is as unbearable as that of human nature itself.

January/February 2024

Book Reviews

Faith and Film: A Brief Annotated Bibliography by Mark Bowald

• Roy M. Anker, Catching Light: Looking for

God in the Movies (Eerdmans, 2004). Anker has written and edited many other film related books.

• C hristopher Deacy and Gaye Williams

Ortiz, Theology and Film: Challenging the Sacred/Secular Divide (Wiley-Blackwell, 2008). Both Deacy and Ortiz have written other worthwhile related books.

• Craig Detweiler, Into the Dark: Seeing the Sa-

cred in the Top Films of the 21st Century (Baker Academic Press, 2008). An early entry in the relevant Cultural Exegesis series edited by William Dyrness and Robert K. Johnston.

• B rian Godawa, Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom and Discernment, updated and expanded edition (Intervarsity Press, 2009).

• Robert Jewett, Saint Paul at the Movies: The Apostle’s Dialogue with American Culture (Westminster John Knox, 1993). This is an early classic in the field; Jewett has written several follow-ups.

• Robert K. Johnston, Reel Spirituality: The-

ology and Film in Dialogue (Baker Academic Press, 2000). This is an anchor volume in the Engaging Culture series edited by Johnston and William Dyrness, which includes several film related texts. Johnston has edited or written many other exemplary film and faith-related books.

• Terry Lindvall and Andrew Quicke, Cellu-

loid Sermons: The Emergence of the Christian Film Industry, 1930–1986 (New York University Press, 2011). A misleading title, it is more comprehensive in tracing ecclesial attitudes toward film in the United

M O D E R N R E F O R M AT I O N

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States. This is a compelling read of a more nuanced history than many assume. Lindvall has published additional related contributions, beginning with the fascinating God on the Big Screen: A History of Hollywood Prayer from the Silent Era to Today (New York University Press, 2019).

• Edward N. McNulty, Faith & Film: A Guide-

book for Leaders (Westminster John Knox, 2007). A useful guide for a church or Christian small group viewing and discussion.

• Barbara Nicolosi and Spencer Lewerenz, eds., Behind the Screen: Hollywood Insiders

on Faith, Film, and Culture (Baker Books, 2005). Unique take including interviews with Christian filmmakers.

• Jeffrey Overstreet, Through a Screen Darkly:

Looking Closer at Beauty, Truth, and Evil in the Movies (Regal Books, 2007).

• William D. Romanowski, Eyes Wide Open:

Looking for God in Popular Culture, rev. ed. (Brazos Press, 2007). An excellent film-centered introduction to the topic. See also his Cinematic Faith (Brazos Press, 2019) and his other books on cinema and American Christianity.

January/February 2024

POEM

It Was a Good Day by Mike Hall

At the end of twenty-four hours, There was still work left to be done. Satisfaction as to the results was low. Cheerful moments numbered, few to none. Day after day was considered a loss. Frustration was at an all-time high; Confusion dominated the mental landscape. All that was left was to heave a heavy sigh. No solutions seem to be in sight. Morale was bereft and sinking. What could rally the spirit within From this pit of mournful thinking? Didn’t I grant you a day to live, A chance to flourish, love, and forgive? The miracle of life was on display, So count it as a good day. Every day is a blessing to be used, Not to be squandered and abused. If all that can be done is to plug away, Then count it as a good day. Each day has opportunities to achieve, To serve Me, have faith in Me, and in Me believe. At the end of the day, just stop and pray, And count it as a very good day.

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January/February 2024

Come, See God in Action! by Michael Horton

Bucer and Vermigli played a large role. As in Strasbourg and Geneva, besides the Te Deum and the creed, the metrical psalms formed the core of corporate praise. The public reading of Scripture went through the whole Bible each year (the New Testament three times). The congregation came forward, standing rather than kneeling, to receive Christ’s body and blood by faith. Families sat together in pews instead of men and women being separated as in medieval services. All of this would have been familiar to those in other churches of the Reformation on the continent. Calvin reminds us that public service shapes the daily life of the covenant community. Our relationship with Christ is personal but never private. The liturgy is a heavenly drama we don’t simply attend but participate in each Lord’s Day, a covenantal conversation in which the church militant joins its voice with the church triumphant. God gives everything to us; we receive and are changed by the gift; and then we exchange gifts of gratitude with one another and take those gifts out into the world. 4

AS WE FOCUS ON THINKING theologically about

the arts, let’s not forget the art that most fundamentally shapes us: the drama of the liturgy. In accordance with the early fathers, Calvin called the divine service a “celestial theater.” In Christian worship, heaven and earth embrace in response to the presence and activity of the Triune God. The choir of heavenly hosts singing “Holy, Holy, Holy!” is joined by the redeemed choir on earth. Justified, renewed, and strengthened in our faith, we cannot remain silent or passive. We publicly confess our sins and our faith in God’s promise; we respond in prayer, spoken and sung; and we give of our treasure. Especially in his approach to the Supper, Calvin heightened this ancient sense of heavenly drama. “Calvin articulated a new conceptualization of ‘liturgy’ itself,” according to Lee Palmer Wandel: “For him, certainly, the Supper was a drama, but the source of that drama was God. No human movement could add to that meaning in any way, no crafted object could draw greater attention to those earthly elements. Perhaps most important of all, however, was Calvin’s insistence on frequency. Most evangelicals condemned the medieval requirement of annual communion as nonscriptural. . . . But no other evangelical so explicitly situated the Eucharist within a dialogic process not simply of deepening faith, but of the increasing capacity to read the signs of the Supper itself, and by extension, of God, in the world.” The brightest flower of Reformed liturgies in English is the 1552 Book of Common Prayer in which 1

Michael Horton is editor-in-chief of Modern Reformation.

As quoted by John D. Witvliet in “The Spirituality of the Psalter: Metrical Psalms in Liturgy and Life in Calvin’s Geneva,” Calvin Theological Journal (1997), 204, on Ps. 138:1. 2. Witvliet, “The Spirituality of the Psalter,” 207, on Ps. 105:44. 3. Lee Palmer Wandel, The Eucharist in the Reformation: Incarnation and Liturgy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 171. 4. Diarmaid MacCulloch, Thomas Cranmer (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996), 414–17. At Cranmer’s suggestion, Bucer wrote a full revision titled Censura with twenty-eight chapters of critique and analysis. 1.

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Daniel

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THE KINGDOM AND POSSESS

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