Theology: PCD, Chapters 1-9

"Creatio ex nihilo"

"Creation out of nothing"

sola scriptura

"Scripture alone"

Christus victor

(Christ the victor). Divine conflict and victory.

The three categories about Providence (general providence)

-Preservation -Concurrence -Governance

Prevenient grace

A gift of grace from God that comes before us, preceding anything we do. For all people, not only the elect. A classic concept of Arminian theology.

Nonreductive physicalism

A kind of materialism that still recognizes the human being in relationship to God.

Hypostatic union

A language used by Christians to describe the unity of the divine and human natures in the person of Jesus.

Theotokos

A name for the mother of Jesus. The one who gave birth to God.

Imputed righteousness

A phrase used often by Protestant theology. Refers to the righteousness of Christ that is the basis of our acquittal from sin. Our righteousness is based on an acquittal that is not our own.

Contrition

A step towards salvation in which we feel sorry for our sin and wish that it could be made right.

Communication of Attributes

A theological concept implied by the Hypostatic union. Shows us how to think about the things that are appropriate to God (attributes such as eternality, immutability, etc) and the things that are appropriate to humanity (attributes such as finitude and mortality) when we see those attributes in the incarnate Jesus.

Natural theology

A theology drawn from general revelation. Its evidence comes from nature

Sacrament

A visible sign of spiritual grace. A connection between visible, material creation and the grace of the Spirit.

Antinomianism

Acting as though God's law has nothing to say to the Christian life, as if it doesn't matter how we live.

Total depravity

Affirms original sin. We are completely incapable of saving ourselves

Consubstantiation

Affirms that Christ is truly in and with the bread and in the actual substance of the bread. Martin Luther and many Protestant traditions following him affirmed this.

Perseverance of the saints

Affirms that God will finish his saving work in the elect. The elect cannot fall away.

Works righteousness

Also called legalism. We attempt to be our own Saviors.

Monophysitism

Another name for eutychianism. It sees the incarnate Jesus as having only one nature.

Synergistic

Arminian soteriology is synergistic, meaning that God works together with human beings in the process of salvation.

Apollinarianism

Attempts to "solve" the problem of Jesus by suggesting that he must have been less than fully human, almost as if the Word had taken over a human body.

Heresy

Beliefs that have been rejected by the church as contrary to Scripture

Holistic dualism

Both a physical body and a spiritual soul

The two natures of Jesus Christ

Both divine and human

Ongoing continuity

Both types of revelation are in a relationship together.

Monergistic

Calvinist soteriology is monergistic, meaning that God is the only actor in salvation.

Dogma

Christian teachings at the highest level of authority and trustworthiness

Council of Trent

Clarified the relationship between Scripture and tradition for post-Reformation Catholicism. Rejected the principle of sola scriptura and affirmed that Catholic relies on both Scripture and living tradition as interdependent and authoritative sources for theology.

Nicene Creed

Distills the truth about God revealed in Scripture into a brief and teachable format, one that helps us know the character and identity of the Triune God. (Ousia, Homoosia, Homoiousios)

Gnostic hierarchial dualism

Divides creation in two: material and spiritual. Spiritual is good, material is bad.

Donatist controversy

Donatists wanted a pure church and demanded holiness from their leaders. Rejected the possibility that people who had betrayed the church might be able to repent and be reinstated. Donatists thus formed separate church. According to Augustine, this was an attack on the unity of the church.

Rule of Faith

Early summaries of Christian doctrine, which took mature form in ecumenical creeds.

Functional view of the image of God

Emphasizing the unique function human beings have in caring for God's creation. We have a function that reflects God.

Modalism

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three modes in which God works through the world. They are like three masks God wears when He goes to work.

Unconditional election

God chooses or elects some people "According to the 'good pleasure of his will' without regard to their foreseen faith".

Sanctification

God declares us righteous because of what Christ has done, and God makes us righteous as we grow in relationship with him.

Psychosomatic unity

God is a creature who is always both physical and spiritual.

Relational view of the image of God

God is a relationship between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We also need relationships. No human can be truly alone.

Providence

God's continuing work in creation. His plans.

Immutability

God's divine perfection. Unchangeable

General revelation

God's self-disclosure through creation and the human concience

Special revelation

God's specific self-revelation through Scripture

Preservation

God's work and will in upholding all of creation

Concurrence

God's work in and with all that He has made

Governance

God's work in guiding all things to the purpose for which they have been made and God's active rule over creation.

Justification

God's work in justifying sinner, forgiving our sins and making us right with God.

Doctrine of Appropriations

Helps us to talk about God's threeness.

filioque

In latin, meaning "and from the Son"

Pelagian heresy

Insists that humans do no inherit a corrupted or sinful nature. Each stands in the position of Adam, and each sinful act results from a decision to obey or disobey God. Basically, human nature is "neutral".

Adoptionism

Makes Jesus into an ordinary human being who merited adoption by God. It is a form of subordinationism. Jesus' moral progress won him the title of the Son of God.

Subordinationism

Making Jesus and the Spirit less than God the Father

Sacramental

Many things seem sacramental, or sacrament-like

Eucharist

Meaning communion, or giving thanks. One of the seven sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church

Montanist controversy (Montanism)

Montanists claimed to speak for the Holy Spirit, and raised questions about the relative authority of the written Scriptures versus new claims to truth.

Nestorian heresy

Most subtle and pernicious of the Christological heresies. Acknowledges the fullness of both Jesus' humanity and his divinity. Nestorius, however, wanted to keep the two natures separate.

Perichoresis

Mutual indwelling. Used to point to the relational nature of God. The 3 persons of the trinity all dwell in each other.

Impassibility

Not being subject to passions or suffering

Eutychianism

Presents a Jesus whose humanity has been undone by God. Taught that "Christ is of two natures before the Incarnation, and of only one afterwards".

Priesthood of all believers

Protestant theology emphasizes this. Limits sacraments to church practices that truly belong to all Christians.

Marcion (Marcionism)

Pushed for the church to adopt a coherent collection of texts. Rejected the old testament around the year 140.

Gnosticism

Refers to a variety of groups in the ancient world who claimed to have access to a special form of gnosis, a secret knowledge only available to them and that would open up the doors for salvation.

Wesleyan Quadrilateral

Resources for understanding God. Scripture, Tradition, Reason, Experience.

Orthodoxy

Right Christian belief

Substantial view of the image of God

Sees human beings as sharing in some aspect of God's substance. We can relate to God in a way an animal cannot.

Deification

Sees the work of Christ as drawing us into the very life of God.

Soteriology

Study of salvation

Pneumatology

Study of the Holy Spirit

Theology

Study of the things of God

Mixed body

Taught by Augustine. There is always the "wheat" and the "tares" of the church. Although the enemy has sowed tares among the master's good seed, the servants are not to pull up the weeds lest they "uproot the wheat along with them"

Arianism

Taught that Jesus was God's first and greatest creature. Jesus was created by God.

Arminian

The Arminian understanding focuses on God's loving desire to be in a saving relationship with humanity and sees this as connected to God's opening up space for human agency, along with divine grace, in salvation.

Inspiration

The Spirit's work as the author of the Scriptures, and work the spirit did in and with the human authors of the Biblical texts

Hermeneutics

The art of biblical interpretation

Limited atonement

The atoning work of Christ is only effective for the elect. It does not apply to those who will remain in sin.

Panetheism

The belief that God and the world are so bound together that God could not exist without the world

Pantheism

The belief that the world itself is divine

Tritheism

The belief that there are three Gods.

Biblical canon

The books that make up the Christian Bible. The "measure" of the Bible and the measuring stick for Christian faith and life.

Theological anthropology

The doctrine of the human being, what sort of creatures we are and what we are like.

Irresistible grace

The electing grace of God will not fail. It cannot be resisted.

Natural law

The idea that God built a moral framework into creation itself.

Unveiled continuity

The idea that both types of revelation are truth about God, and both are continuous with one another, but we are unable to see this until God pulls back the veil that has clouded nature.

Imago Dei

The image of God

Apologetics

The rational defense of the Christian faith to those who are not believers.

Original sin

The reality that all human beings are born under the condition of sin, are sinner bound and chained.

Apostolic church

The same church as that of the apostles. Apostolicity is about authority and truth, and the authority of the apostles is their eyewitness testimony to Jesus. The church teaches the apostolic faith, sound doctrine that is true to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Patripassianism

The suggestion that God the Father died on the cross

Calvinist

The understanding that salvation focuses on the priority and sovereignty of God's grace by emphasizing God as the sole agent of salvation.

Atonement

The way Christ's work undergoes the separation between humans and God, opening up the possibility that we may again be reconciled or made one.

Illumination

The ways that the Spirit continues to work in and with God's people, as readers of Scripture, to help us understand what we read.

catholic

This word (with a lowercase "c" implies both universality and wholeness. Refers to the universal church, NOT the Roman Catholic church.

Innerant

To claim something is innerant is to make a strong claim about the truth and reliability of the texts. God does not err, and these texts are the Word of God. in + ERR +ant. Not in error

Anthropomorphize

To form God in our own image instead of remembering it is the other way around

Infallibility

To state that Scripture will not fail.

Succession

Truth of tradition is guaranteed through succession.

Repentance

Turning away from our sin and towards God.

Particularity

Used in theology to point to the goodness of a God whose love extends to particulars. Jesus does not come as a generic human being. He comes as we do, with particulars. Maleness, Jewishness, location.

Constantinianism

Used to point to the church's collusion with and corruption by the state, to the bride's trading Christ's love for worldly power and wealth.

Second Vatican Council

Valued Scripture and tradition equally. Described both sacred Scripture and sacred tradition as coming from one source of revelation, the Word of God.

Council of Chalcedon

Worked through the questions raised by the christological hereies, which resulted in a doctrinal statement defining boundaries for Christian talk about and understanding of the identity of Jesus Christ. Affirmed that the two natures of Christ (human and divine) are truly united into one person.