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December 31, 2011 by Gerald Hiestand
Scripture as Sacrament?
Augustine famously defines a sacrament as “a visible word” — a visible sign of an invisible grace. Lombard and the Scholastics take this farther (or “clarify”, if you’re Catholic), and assert that the sign not only signifies Christ and his work, but also dispenses the grace that it signifies. Thus Thomas defines a sacrament as, “The sign of a sacred thing in so far as it sanctifies men” (Summa III.60.2).
I’m preaching a sermon this Sunday on the Christian’s motivation for reading the Bible… And it’s struck me that most low-church evangelicals adopt an essentially sacramental view of Scripture, in this later Thomistic sense. We see the Bible as a holy book (i.e., an external sign) about Christ that uniquely mediates the grace of Christ to those who read it through the eyes of faith.
Of course, there’s nothing unique about this view of Scripture reading — it’s consistent with the way Christians have always read the Bible, at lease since Origen. But there’s a certain irony here in that we low-church protestants view the Scriptures in a sacramental sense, but don’t view the sacraments in a sacramental sense.
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Welcome to the SAET blog. Herein you will find the theological/pastoral ramblings of the Rev. Matthew Mason, the good Doctor Jason Hood, and Pastor Gerald Hiestand. All three write under the premise that theology and the pastorate belong together, and that (at least some) pastors must once again function as writing theologians for the wider church, for the ecclesial renewal of theology and the theological renewal of the church.
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Gerald Hiestand
Gerald has served as the SAET board president since 2006. He has been in pastoral ministry since 1999, and serves currently as the Senior Associate Pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, IL.
Jason Hood
Jason is a graduate of Rhodes College, Reformed Theological Seminary, Highland Theological College and the Univ. of Aberdeen. Jason works as Scholar-in-Residence and director of Christ College Residency Program at Christ UMC. He's trying to figure out the twitter thing, @jasonbhood, and sometimes writes for ChristianityToday.com.
Matthew Mason
Matthew earned an MTh at Oak Hill College, London. He is an Assistant Pastor at Church of the Resurrection, Washington D. C. (Anglican Mission in the Americas), and edits Ecclesia Reformanda, a journal of Reformed theology.
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Recent Comments
Don’t get me started…
Not the least of the problems, and perhaps the biggest reason we evangelicals tend to be comfortable with instrumental language re Scripture and uncomfortable with it re sacraments, is seeing the sacraments as primarily human actions (public profession of repentance and faith, us remembering Jesus’ death) rather than as first and fundamentally God’s actions for us.
12/31/11 5:15 PM | Comment Link
Could there perhaps be some explanation to this irony in the low/high and Catholic/Protestant concepts of things that are sacred versus things that are sacramental?
12/31/11 5:37 PM | Comment Link
Eric,
Could you expound further on the sacred vs sacramental distinction?
Matthew,
Figured that would rile you up a bit. And I think you’re for sure on to something.
12/31/11 6:29 PM | Comment Link
So, where would we, as confessing & professing Christians, not Methodist, Baptist, Catholic, ect., but simply as New Testament Believers, be if we took everything ‘extra’ that mankind has added to our worship of Him out of our relationship(s) with Him? I’ve often been concerned over this issue when asked by people who are part of any given number of denominations about certain parts of their [churches] worship services. My tried and try method of ‘testing’ anything of this sort is to go to the Scriptures and test whatever it is we’re talking about by the Scriptures themselves.
12/31/11 6:52 PM | Comment Link
Matthew,
RE: sacraments as human, rather than as God’s actions.
It’s the same problem we see in sanctification, isn’t it? It is so hard for people to see how God could be at work in human action…has to be “God alone” or “my strength alone” rather than human work in the strength of the lord.
12/31/11 8:48 PM | Comment Link
Well, for example, Protestants consider marriage sacred, and Catholics consider it sacramental (which, as I understand the term, includes sacredness).
Essentially, my thought was that the Protestant tradition uses the word “sacred” for some things that the Catholic tradition calls “sacramental.” It’s not an exact correlation, of course, just an observation based on a few cases. I thought that the common root word was interesting (“sacer” – Latin for “holy”), especially as you applied the word “sacramental” to your observations of how Protestants view Scripture. The distinction I spoke of, on further reflection, is probably mostly based on how the different traditions use the word.
Anyway, just some musings I had.
01/3/12 9:20 AM | Comment Link
Matthew, Any church father in particular? Also do you mind giving an example? Cheers.
01/7/12 9:47 AM | Comment Link
Sorry, it appears Gerald wrote this. Same questions to you, Gerald.
01/7/12 9:49 AM | Comment Link
David,
Are you looking for examples of where a church father(s) read the Scriptures in a sacramental way?
If so, Origen is your man. I don’t have his works in front of me, but maybe I can dig up some proof texts. But his whole general approach to Scripture reflects this, I think. Beyond this, the whole monastic movement viewed scripture in a sacramental way. (I don’t mean “sacramental” in a formal sense, but only in that they saw grace as mediated through the reading of Scripture. To read the words of God was to be brought into contact with God, and thus changed to be more like God.)
01/7/12 10:02 AM | Comment Link