Have you heard the term systematic theology but don't know exactly what it means or how it is different from other ways of studying theology? In this episode, Dr. Gray Sutanto of Reformed Theological Seminary discusses what systematic theology is and how it is helpful for the average Christian, providing some tips for those who want to try it out for themselves. Also in this episode: the one thing that Amy's husband says there is to do in Dayton.
Links for this episode:
Dr. Sutanto's faculty page and publication list
Lecture on "Bavinck's Christian Worldview"
Discussion with Tim Keller on "Bavinck, Epistemology, and Ministry in Global Cities"
"10 Things You Should Know about Systematic Theology" by Scott Swain
God and Knowledge: Herman Bavinck's Theological Epistemology by Gray Sutanto
The Wonderful Works of God by Herman Bavinck
The Trinity by Scott Swain
Have you heard the term systematic theology but don't know exactly what it means or how it is different from other ways of studying theology? In this episode, Dr. Gray Sutanto of Reformed Theological Seminary discusses what systematic theology is and how it is helpful for the average Christian, providing some tips for those who want to try it out for themselves. Also in this episode: the one thing that Amy's husband says there is to do in Dayton.
Links for this episode:
Dr. Sutanto's faculty page and publication list
Lecture on "Bavinck's Christian Worldview"
Discussion with Tim Keller on "Bavinck, Epistemology, and Ministry in Global Cities"
"10 Things You Should Know about Systematic Theology" by Scott Swain
God and Knowledge: Herman Bavinck's Theological Epistemology by Gray Sutanto
The Wonderful Works of God by Herman Bavinck
The Trinity by Scott Swain
[ MUSIC PLAYS] I have a heart full of questions quieting all my suggestions. What is the meaning of Christian in this American life? I'm feeling awfully foolish spending my life on a message. I look around and I wonder ever if I heard it right.[MUSIC STOPS]
Amy Mantravadi:Welcome to the(A)Millennial podcast. I'm your host, Amy Mantravadi, coming to you from Dayton, Ohio, home of the U.S. Air Force Museum, also known as the main reason that tourists come here. Located on Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the museum surely has the country's best collection of aviation items other than the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. Depending on what you're looking for, some might argue it's even a bit better. If you can't make it to Dayton in person, especially during this time of travel restrictions, check out the virtual tour on the museum's website, where you can get a 360 degree view of all the exhibits. Today, I'll be speaking with Gray Sutanto about systematic theology. Some of you may be very familiar with this type of theological study, while others may have heard the term but have little idea of what it means. Whichever camp you fall into, I hope that today's discussion will be of some benefit to you. We're going to talk about what systematic theology is, what it involves, and how it differs from and builds on other methods of theological study. We'll also dig in a little to the debates in history surrounding this topic. Scripture tells us that our purpose as human beings is to know God, glorify him, and rejoice in him. All of those things require us to understand something about theology, which is nothing other than the study of God. So when we talk about systematic theology, we're talking first and foremost about how we understand our Creator as he has revealed himself and the intentions he has for us as his creatures. Let me illustrate this by appealing to a familiar biblical story. When God revealed himself to Moses in the burning bush, he told him,"I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." When Moses asked God his name, he replied,"I AM who I AM." Furthermore, God told Moses,"I have certainly seen the oppression of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their outcry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings, so I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite." Those quotes are all from Exodus chapter 3. Every one of these statements tells us something about who God is: enough that we might spend a lifetime in meditation upon them. We learn that God is personal, compassionate, eternal, self-existent, never changing. He is above and beyond history, and yet intimately involved in it, carrying out his plan on behalf of those he loves. Think of how it changes our lives to know these things about God. This is the whole purpose of the study of theology: to bask in the greatness of our God and to turn around and praise him. Now, let's head on to the interview where I'll be discussing this with Dr. Sutanto.
Jon Guerra:[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]
Amy Mantravadi:And I'm here with Dr. Gray Sutanto. He was educated at Biola University for his bachelor's degree, Westminster Theological Seminary for his masters, and he received his PhD from the University of Edinburgh. He has served as teaching elder at Covenant City church in Jakarta, Indonesia. He is a visiting fellow at Kampen Theological University, associate fellow at the Neocalvinism Research Institute, and fellow in modern theology at the Greystone Theological Institute. His research interests include the Dutch Reformed theologian Herman Bavinck and the Neocalvinism movement, along with several other theological topics. He is currently the assistant professor of systematic theology at Reformed Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C., and his published works include God and Knowledge: Herman Bavinck's Theological Epistemology, and he also contributed to the editing and translation of Herman Bavinck's Christian Worldview and Herman Bavinck's Philosophy of Revelation, and he's been published in several theological journals. So Gray, thank you so much for coming on the podcast with me today. I really appreciate it.
Gray Sutanto:Thanks so much, Amy. It's great to be here. Thanks for having me.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah. So how have you and your wife been doing during the coronavirus pandemic? I know you said you've been in Indonesia all this time, but teaching virtually still with RTS.
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's right. It's been a really surprising year and a half or so. I mean, we'd anticipated actually moving to DC back in May of 2020, but already in February, the consulates in Jakarta and Indonesia were basically closed because of the pandemic, and there were a few executive orders on immigration that meant that immigration was basically frozen for the work visas for a while now. So we've been just back here, still in Jakarta and teaching, like you said, virtually on Zoom for RTS. We've definitely grown in confidence in teaching over Zoom. I bought into,"How is this going to work?" But you know, the students have been incredibly tenacious, hardworking, patient with us, and we've been very grateful for that, and we've been close to friends and family still as well here in Jakarta where we have come from. So overall, it's gone as good as it could have been, so we're really grateful for that.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, I know it's just been so challenging this whole year. It's been really interesting to hear from all the missionaries that our church supports, because of course they're all over the world and some of them haven't been able to go back to the places where they're supposed to be working, whereas some of them haven't been able to come back to the U.S. So we just have all these international connections that haven't been being made this past year. So I'm glad that you've been able to sort of make that work despite the difficult circumstances. Has Indonesia been particularly hard hit by the pandemic?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, I think- we've been grateful in Jakarta that we've been able to work from home, and a lot of our friends have been able to work from home, but in other more- maybe in smaller towns, in smaller cities, and also in just the more rural areas, people don't have the privilege of being able to work from home. So they've been still having to carry out their work, so our numbers aren't exactly the best right now, and we haven't really flattened the curve. So it's a bit worrying to take a look at that, but at the same time, we're very hopeful of the vaccine and we're reminded, like you said, this is a very global thing. Lots of different nations are struggling with this, and so we have to also kind of zoom out and realize that we're all in this together and dependent upon this vaccine together. So we're hopeful for that.
Amy Mantravadi:Well, thanks so much for just sharing a little bit about how things have been going. And now we can get into the topic that we're to discuss today, which is systematic theology, and as I mentioned, you are the assistant professor of systematic theology for RTS in Washington, D.C. So maybe you could just start out by telling us, what is systematic theology?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's a great question, and depending on who you ask, you might get different people answering that question. Well, systematic theology, as it is understood here today, basically refers to thinking about what the Bible teaches holistically, logically, and in a way that therefore connects particular doctrines that you find in the Bible together. So instead of asking the question perhaps of,"What does the book of Genesis chapter three say particularly in a narratival form?", you might be asking the question,"What does it say about the condition of humanity? What does it say about the nature of human fallenness, sin, human wrongdoing? What does it say about the law of God?" And then you're therefore taking teachings from, let's say the Book of Genesis, and connecting it with New Testament texts, let's say in Romans chapter five on the fall of man. You're connecting it with different descriptions of the conditions of sin, let's say if you get from the Book of Proverbs. So you're trying to therefore ask the question of,"What does the whole Bible say about particular doctrine?" But it is a bit more than that too. It's also asking the question of,"How do we use philosophical tools and concepts to help articulate what the Bible teaches in a way that is not only logically coherent and persuasive, but also that makes sense for the world today?" So it's definitely the interconnection of exegesis, biblical theology, and philosophy for the sake of articulating a coherent system of truth together, if that makes sense. And there's probably more to say, but that's an overall rough sketch of it.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, no, I appreciate that- kind of summing it up in a way that's pretty easy to understand there. And that leads me really naturally into my next question, which is how is systematic theology different from biblical theology? And just to give a little personal example there, when I was in college and I did a degree in biblical literature, my senior year I had to take a course in biblical theology where we went over the whole broad narrative of the Bible and looked for the broad connections in the narrative, but I actually never had any courses in systematic theology because I was mainly looking at the study of the biblical text as a work of literature, and so we didn't get as much into systematic theology. So if you had someone ask you to compare the two- systematic and biblical theology- how would you do that?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's a great question. I think historically there hasn't been a strict separation between the two. So when you take a look at the Church Fathers, the medieval doctors, the Reformation divines, they don't really make a strict distinction between biblical theology and systematic theology. They normally regard just the whole work of theology as sacred doctrine, which is really just exegesis of Scripture in a way that is something for the whole Church to believe universally. It's a catholic statement about what Christians ought to believe about God and the Bible, and classically they argued that theology is the study of God and all things in relation to God. And the Bible teaches us about all those things in relation to God, and also of course, God himself. So the modern division between biblical and systematic theology is really, again, a 19th, 20th century division because of the specialization of the disciplines in the modern research university, rooted really in the German research universities, right? So I think today we see that division because of that specialization, but again, classically it hasn't been the case. But because we live in the present times, here's how we might divide the two perhaps. If biblical theology asks about the story of redemptive history from creation, fall, redemption, consummation, right? The basic plot line of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and in the middle of that, what God had done in Christ Jesus. Systematic theology perhaps goes a little bit beyond the narrative of the biblical text and asks the more unifying questions of,"What is behind the biblical text and what does the whole biblical text teach coherently?" So it traces the biblical text to the foundations of the biblical text, so if this is what, let's say again, the Book of Genesis teaches about the narrative of Joseph and Jacob, what does this tell us about the character of God that is behind this? What does this say about the faithfulness of God that he would do this to the sinners that we see in particular narratival accounts. So it traces behind the exegesis, as well as along with the exegesis, if that helps.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, I think that does help, and systematic theology is pretty commonly divided by topics. Sort of as you're talking about, making links and going behind the biblical text to look at what the Bible has to say about a particular theme throughout the text. What are some of the common topics that tend to be covered in systematic theology?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah. Some of the common topics- I think you would probably begin with what theologians have called prolegomena, which simply just means the things that you say beforehand, right? So what are the theological assumptions and foundations, presuppositions, then you have to affirm before you study theology. Well, you would have to say something about the fact that you can't know anything about God unless God reveals himself to you, right? Just as when you meet a stranger, you might not know anything about them, unless they've disclosed themselves to you. They've voluntarily and willingly said something about themselves to you. So it is with God- our knowledge of God. So normally systematic theology starts with the doctrine of revelation, right? That God has spoken both in nature and in scripture, and God therefore is knowable to us, even though ultimately he transcends creation and is far above us. So the doctrine of revelation normally comes first in the work of systematic theology. You even see this in the Westminster Confession of Faith. Chapter one is on the light of nature and scripture, and it's a description of how God has disclosed himself to us basically. And then you would normally get to doctrine of God: how God is one, that we worship the one God, and that he is indivisible and so on, but he's also at the same time a triune God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And then we would get to the doctrine of creation, that God has created all things out of nothing; doctrine of Providence, that God continually sustains creation; the doctrine of the creation of humanity, that mankind is made in the image of God; and how humanity is fallen and redeemed in Jesus Christ, doctrine of salvation. Therefore towards the end, we also get a doctrine of the church and last things, how has God redeemed us, not only as individuals, but as a community of believers united to Jesus Christ and how by his Spirit, he is working to renew all things so that there would be no more sin in the last day and there would be a total restoration and consummation of God's creation in the last day. So there is definitely- you see the connection there, don't you, between biblical and systematic theology? There is a following roughly a biblical plot line, even if in its articulation of those particular loci, there is a more philosophical, expositional aspect to it.
Amy Mantravadi:And it almost seems like with the topics you mentioned in systematic theology, you're looking at things that are essentially implied topics from the biblical texts in certain cases, such as- the Bible starts with God creating. It doesn't spend a lot of time with the backstory of what happened before God created, although there are certainly things in scripture that lead us to think of certain considerations that happened before that, such as that God already was aware that he would have to save humanity, and there was a plan in place for how that was going to happen. But it does really compliment our study of the biblical text in that way. How did systematic theology then develop as a discipline in Christian history? You mentioned that in previous times, it wasn't thought of necessarily as different from biblical theology, but were there particular periods during the Reformation or even earlier that you kind of saw that starting to develop?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's another great question, and it's almost like for any of these questions, you could probably spend about 45 minutes each, because there's so many things to say- so many different angles you can take. So maybe I could mention probably two here. I think in the Reformation period, there was a heightened focus on the writing of biblical expositional commentaries. So you think about Calvin's commentaries on particular books of the Bible- Now, this wasn't completely new. You already see this even in the Church Fathers and the medieval doctors. Aquinas wrote so many commentaries on the scriptural texts, but I think in the Reformation, the desire to reform the Catholic tradition by way of an appeal to the Bible heightened that focus. And so Calvin understood, for example, that you can't just hand over the voluminous amounts of commentaries that he had written to just anyone, so he started to write The Institutes of Christian Religion as a kind of remedy to that. It wasn't exactly a systematic theology the way we understand it here today, but it was basically a summary of Christian teaching for the Church that he thought would be helpful. And I think also you can take a look at the confessionalism of the reform periods as a kind of proto-systematic theology. And now some might maybe contend with what I just said there, but basically I think the confessions are a nice summary of the scriptural texts that is very logically focused, tightly knit, and also in a way that is immediately understandable to the Church in that present day. Right? So you take a look at the Westminster standards, Confession of Faith, larger, shorter catechisms, and the Three Forms of Unity. These were basically, I think, theological texts that said, what do we need to believe? What are some errors that we need to encounter in Roman Catholicism or in the Radical Reformation side of things. And so it presented not only the truth of things, but also in a philosophical expositional way, denied errors that attended to it, right? So you see these different genres where you...in the Reformation, but really it was in the modern era with some concerning developments, which basically started to say things like,"Well, the Bible is grounded in history and the Bible therefore should be read as free from the doctrines of the Church." And so the origin of biblical studies actually it comes with this Enlightenment and philosophical assumption that the Bible in and of itself is not a theological text. It's just a human book, like any other human book, and you should be able to read it free from the constraints of churchly confession. And so when the modern research university started to say, therefore,"Well, we got to therefore distinguish between the historical study of the Bible on the one hand and churchly dogma on the other," and that became a really strict bifurcation in the modern research university. Figures behind that are figures like Friedrich Schleiermacher in the 19th century and so on. So there's that kind of movement, and I think what happened after that is theologians started to say,"Okay, maybe there's something helpful about this division between historical biblical study on the one hand and churchly dogmatics on the other, but how do we therefore reevaluate this division in a theological way?" And they started to say, therefore, that in the historical exegesis of the biblical texts, we can use some of the methods of historical grammatical exegesis, that the modernists have taught us, but at the same time, not completely divorced that from churchly dogma. So we started to say, therefore, there's a distinction between biblical studies and systematic theology, not division. This is a cause for self-reflection perhaps, because I don't think many of us realize how much of the modern seminary curriculum is indebted to movements in the modern research university and the Enlightenment. But there's always going to be, I think, a tension, but also a reciprocal relation between where the Church is and where the modern culture is, and I think this is one way where we see it for better or for worse.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, I think that's a good point. And it seems like in every era of Church history, there's been a kind of swinging of the pendulum slightly in one direction or another. For instance, I've spent some time studying medieval Christianity for the novels that I write and just for some theological interests, and that period was characterized by very sort of high-minded philosophical considerations. So they had something like systematic theology and that it was arranged by topics, but it imported philosophical ideas very heavily, probably more than you would see today. And the Reformation, I think, was in part a correction against what they saw as a lot of philosophizing and getting away from the plain gospel and the scriptural text. So like you said, there was this big explosion of commentaries and things like that, and then maybe you have to correct back in the other direction a little bit, but that is interesting that you can think at every point there is sort of a going back and forth between those two things. So how is a book on systematic theology usually set up? If I were to go to the library- if I had a library nearby, that stocked systematic theology works. Luckily I do, but assuming that you're in a city that does- and you get, say, Herman Bavinck's systematic theology, or Louis Berkhof or someone like that, how would you go about navigating it? How would you expect to find it arranged?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's a great question. I think it really depends on which particular texts you're thinking about. Like you said, in the medieval period, you actually would get more treatments on particular topics perhaps even in isolation, right? So there's particular treatments by Bonaventure purely on the doctrine of illumination: kind of just a one-off study on illumination, his journey of the mind to God. But I think in Bavinck's example- in Bavinck's case, because he came after the rise of modern biblical study and modern biblical criticism, he has this heightened interest to talk about theology in that narratival fashion, right? So he would really start off with the doctrine of revelation and then doctrine of God and creation, fall, redemption, and last things. His Four volumes is really set up according to that biblical plotline. And I think in Bavinck's case as well, you get this more rigorous historical attention to the development of doctrine. So oftentimes in the modern period and afterwards, you get a systematic theology-not just their summary of these particular doctrines, but also their sense of how the doctrine had developed. So in Bavinck's case, again, you would start with the biblical exegesis, and then after that, you would go to the Church Fathers, to the medieval doctors, to the Reformation, to the moderns, and then Bavinck's own restatements toward the end of his particular chapter. So whatever doctrine you dive into in the middle of his dogmatics, you would get that kind of chronological, genealogical tracing out of that particular doctrine. I think that's really, really helpful. So if you want to get a more concise philosophical treatment of a particular doctrine, maybe going to an Aquinas or a Bonaventure would be useful, but if you want this more historically conscious tracing out of a particular doctrine, then diving into Bavinck and isolating a chapter in Bavinck on a particular doctor would help you do that.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, and for those who have any experience with reading Aquinas, it could be very confusing for the modern reader because it's set up very much in the question and answer format that was popular in the time, and it can get a little difficult to determine which part is actually him stating what he believes and which part is him stating what someone else believes. And there isn't the historical necessarily- like you said, going through all the different historical periods like you might see nowadays, so that is interesting just to think about how it's developed over the years. Yeah, so thank you for that. Some Christians have contended that systematic theology either causes us to ignore the original biblical context and narrative, or causes us to delve into areas of speculation that God never intended. As a teacher of systemic theology, how do you respond to such criticisms? I've heard this particularly from- certain theological movements tend to make these arguments more than others, but what do you think when you hear something like that?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, I think my first gut instinct is maybe to say that,"Well, the biblical text itself, I think, and the arrangement of the biblical text requires particular theological choices and theological judgments, right?" The fact that the canon was set up in a particular way was, I think, partly a product of the Church's ecclesial and theological confession about what they think the presentation requires, right? So there's lots of different scholarly movements on this, but the theological interpretation of scripture movement that came out, I think, in the last two decades or so pointed out to the fact that even in the way that the canon was arranged in the early Church, it's reflective of theological judgments. So in other words, there's never been a time or period where there was a purely neutral historical standpoint from which to read the biblical texts. It always came with theological assumptions about reading these different authors, whether you're in the Apocalypse of John or in the Book of Mark or something that Peter had wrote, that these authors were writing in a way that was inspired by a single divine author, right? That was a theological judgment. That's a theological confession. So even as you're studying the Bible as a biblical historian, you have to come to grips with the fact that if you're reading the Bible as a canon, you're really bringing into it a theological consideration. And to push us even further, I would suggest that even the most basic plot line summary of the Bible of creation, fall, consummation, or redemption, consummation is itself a theological summary of the Bible, right? The moment you move away from what the words of the Bible and history of the Bible actually says to any summary that you have of the Bible's plotline, you're already saying that this is one story- that there's a single divine plan, and here's a coherent way of summarizing the biblical texts. You can't escape from theological judgments, in other words. And so if this kind of criticism is coming from an evangelical or Christian biblical studies scholar, then I would suggest to this person that you're already presupposing theology, even as you're studying the biblical texts. And when you're studying the biblical texts, in the work of exegesis there will always be theological questions that would arise, that prompt you toward asking about questions about being, questions about knowing, questions about ethics that go beyond strict exegesis, I think. You know, when you are reading Exodus 3:14, God says,"I AM who I AM." That prompts you toward particular questions about what this circular way of describing God means exactly. When you're asking questions about how God created everything out of his Word, what does that actually mean? It requires some philosophical exploration. And then when you're asking the question of,"How do I communicate what I see in my exegesis to the Church in the modern world?" then you're asking questions about,"What are the philosophies that are present today and how do I communicate it to the modern world?" So instead of I think dividing the two, again, we do well to think about these disciplines as really complementing one another, and you can't really do one without the other, right? And this is why, again, in history, theology and biblical studies have also gone hand-in-hand as sacred doctrine.
Amy Mantravadi:And thinking back to what you mentioned about the doctrine of revelation or a doctrine of scripture, when you come to the biblical text, you come, like you said, with a set of assumptions about what this book is. And in a certain sense, your belief that it is the Word of God and that it's worth reading has to stand a little bit outside of the text itself, because the text tells you that, but you have to have some faith in yourself to believe the text. So I think, like you said, there are- I don't think anyone comes to it neutrally- comes to the study of the Bible neutrally. So that's probably a good way of thinking about it. I mentioned that you've done really extensive research on Herman Bavinck, who wrote an influential work of systematic theology in the 19th century. How does his approach to systematic theology compare to others in the broadly Reformed tradition? It probably would be way too long of an answer to compare him to everyone else who's written systematic theology, so let's keep it within at least the Reformed world.
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, really, really useful question here. I think one way to think about his work, again, is his rigorously genealogical approach to the history of theology, right? He never just says a doctrine as if it just drops out of heaven. He's always aware that whatever he says is in the context of his present moment, and he's standing upon the giants of these church dogmaticians that have come before him, right? So that's, I think, incredibly useful, because theologians today need to be aware that everything that we say here today is responsible to the history of the Church, right? We can't just say things in isolation. And then I think another useful way of thinking about what Bavinck was doing is he was trying to proclaim this confessional, catholic, Reform tradition to the modern world. He saw that as a responsibility of the theologian, the Church dogmatician. He actually argued that each generation requires a new systematic theology, not because the truth changes, but because the world changes. And so how you articulate the same truth should use the philosophical tools, concepts, terms, and even the cultural lingo of the current day. So you see in Bavinck, I think, a very consistent desire to articulate that truth in a way that is winsome, relevant, and penetrative to his modern academic milieu. So I think that's incredibly useful for us to think about as well- that I think the Church, like you said, does go through a kind of pendulum swing between one pole to another, and I think one of the poles that we could tend to get used to is kind of the isolationalist pole that says,"Hey, all we need is just to be in the Church." And there's a sense in which that's completely right and true. We believe that the Church is beautiful. This is the people of God. God has redeemed us to be a set apart people. That's very, very true and Bavinck would affirm that. But at the same time, we are still in this world- that we're not of the world, and we are to communicate and be salt and light in this world. And how can we therefore be a light in this world unless we read what others are doing and saying right there? And so I think that that's what Bavinck was doing in a very unique way, and even in his own period, you would see Church dogmatics- not just Barth's, but I mean, theologies that were being written by his contemporaries. But I think he was particularly acutely aware of those twin responsibilities of being in the catholic tradition, Reformed broad tradition, and at the same time engage in modern culture.
Amy Mantravadi:Yeah, and the thing for those who are not familiar with Bavinck- the thing that's interesting with him is that he was writing originally in Dutch, so in a sense- he's an older theologian in the sense that yeah, he lived in the 19th century, but it's only been within the past few decades that a lot of his stuff has been translated. I mentioned that you've been involved in helping with the translation of some of his work, so in a way he seems very contemporary, even though he was writing a while ago, because the exposure to him in the American church is still only ramping up now. So it's just a very interesting case of how we connect to history in that way. So if an average Christian, without a seminary education wanted to study systematic theology, where would you recommend that they begin? Could you maybe suggest a resource or two that are more accessible for the average person?
Gray Sutanto:Yeah, that's a really useful question. I think perhaps it might be a bit intimidating to just jump into Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics, four volumes that it is, so I would suggest actually some contemporary treatments of particular doctrines would be really useful just as a starting point. I can think of maybe Scott Swain's little introduction to the doctrine of the Trinity, or even particular popular works that are useful in introducing, let's say, the Westminster Standards, Chad VanDixhoorn's Confessing the Faith. That would be really useful. But if you're thinking about primary sources, let's say in someone like a Bavinck, then his Wonderful Works of God would be a great place to start. I think there, if it's Church Dogmatics- sorry, Reformed Dogmatics. I don't know why I keep saying Church Dogmatics today. I haven't been thinking about Karl Barth too much recently. But his Reformed Dogmatics is a very footnoted, historically rigorous text. His Wonderful Works of God was written for the ordinary person. In the preface, he actually says modern people are so busy nowadays and so totally bombarded by the news and work that they scarcely have time to read theology, and that's why he wrote The Wonderful Works of God: to engage with that kind of readership. So his Wonderful Works of God would also be a great place to start there. Can I circle back to the question that you asked before?
Amy Mantravadi:Absolutely.
Gray Sutanto:You asked,"How does Bavinck differ a little bit from other theological works in his day?" You know, I think it's useful here to distinguish him from maybe the Dutch pietist tradition, or maybe even the Puritan tradition that we might be used to reading in the Reformed world: the Puritan Paperbacks that are- I'm not saying they're bad. They're very good. I think of a lot of the Puritan Paperbacks that you see, you get almost a desire to write evergreen exposition of doctrine. In other words, they desire to write something completely timeless: an historically distinguished piece of work that simply tells you what the doctrine in a very devotional way. And I think Bavinck would probably say something like,"That's useful at all, but it's not going to be helpful to penetrate the modern world." And I think that's one way to distinguish Bavinck's works from the Puritan tradition is that he thinks that an evergreen kind of desire is a limited good. I think he would actually argue that the theologian has a harder job of, yes, actually trying to reinvent something every generation. And I think that's worth thinking about, because I think sometimes we think to write something evergreen and timeless is actually a more pious, more holy thing to do. Bavinck would actually suggest that that's actually a more- it reflects a lack of ambition perhaps. And controversial or not, but that's another insight that Bavinck would challenge our readership today,"Hey, don't just deny the world, but see the world as an opportunity for you to say something fresh." Well, and that's getting also into the Neocalvinist tradition that you also have researched a lot. So yeah, these debates are ongoing. I think ever since the Church began there have been debates over,"How much should we incorporate philosophy into our theology?" and"How much should we be engaging with the world or trying to be separate from it?" These are questions that never go away, so it's been good to talk about some of them today. Thank you so much for coming on to answer these questions, and I hope that it's been a good introduction for a lot of people. Thank you, Amy. It's great to be here.
Jon Guerra:[MUSIC PLAYS] I need to know there is justice, that it will roll in abundance, and that you're building a city where we arrive as immigrants and you call us citizens and you welcome us as children home.[MUSIC STOPS]
Gray Sutanto:It was great to have Gray on the podcast today. I'm especially thankful that we were able to make an interview work despite the 12 hour time difference. As always, the music is the song"Citizens" by Jon Guerra. I'd like to give a special shout out today to my husband Jai for caring for our son Thomas while I've conducted these interviews, and to Thomas for taking time to nap so that I can edit them. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine on you and give you peace. May the Lord lift up his countenance on you and be gracious to you. Amen. Have a great week.
Jon Guerra:[MUSIC PLAYS] Is there a way to live always living in enemy hallways? Don't know my foes from my friends and don't know my friends anymore. Power has several prizes. Handcuffs can come in all sizes. Love has a million disguises, but winning is simply not one.[MUSIC STOPS]