Spirit Hermeneutics Order Printed Copy

Author: Craig Keener
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About the Book

"Spirit Hermeneutics" by Craig Keener explores the role of the Holy Spirit in biblical interpretation, arguing that the Spirit's guidance is essential for understanding scripture accurately and applying it to contemporary contexts. Keener provides a comprehensive overview of biblical hermeneutics and offers practical insights for engaging with the text in a Spirit-led way.

Helen Roseveare

“If Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for him.” That was her mission’s motto. In 1953, Helen sailed for the Congo with hopes of serve Christ as a medical missionary with WEC (Worldwide Evangelization Crusade). For so many years she’d dreamed of being a missionary. As a young girl, she’d hear stories of her aunt and uncle’s experiences on the mission field, and now she was eager to have her own stories to tell. In 1925, Helen Roseveare was born in England. Because education was a high priority for her father, Helen was sent to a prestigious all girls school when she was 12. After that, she went to Cambridge. It was during her time in college that she became a Christian, truly understanding the gospel for the first time. She left her Anglo-Catholic background and became an evangelical. Her focus was to finish her medical degree and prepare herself for the mission field. After she became a doctor, Helen sailed to minister in the Congo. She was highly intelligent and efficient, but her role as a woman created struggles with her fellow missionaries and nationals. In that time period, single missionaries were seen as second-class citizens of the mission station. In the Congo, the medical needs were overwhelming. She couldn’t just stand by and watch all the suffering around her. She was determined to make a difference. She dreamed of establishing a training center where nurses would be taught the Bible and basic medicine and then sent back to their villages to handle routine cases, teach preventive medicine, and serve as lay evangelists. She didn’t have approval from her colleagues, who believed that medical training for nationals was not a valid use of time, evangelism and discipleship were more important. Despite the conflict with them, after only two years after arriving in the Congo, she had build a combination hospital/ training center in Ibambi, and her first four students had passed their government medical exams. Her colleagues weren’t as excited about her progress as she was. They felt that she was wasting time, so they decided that she would better serve the Congo by relocating in Nebobongo, living in an old leprosy camp that had become overgrown by the jungle. Helen argued that she must stay and continue the nursing training in Ibambi, but they insisted that she move. It was a major setback, but she went. Starting from scratch again, she built another hospital there and continued training African nurses. Still, she was strong-willed and seemed to be a threat to many of her male colleagues. In 1957, they decided to relocate John Harris, a young British doctor, and his wife to Nebobongo to make him Helen’s superior. Dr. Harris even took charge of leading the Bible class that she’d taught. She was devastated. She’d been her own boss for too long, and although she tried to let go of control, she just couldn’t. Everything that had been hers was now his. This resulted in tension between them, of course. Her independence was her greatest strength, but also a definite weakness. She did not know how to submit to imperfect leadership. In 1958, after over a year of struggling with who was in control in Nebobongo, Helen left for England for a furlough. She was disillusioned with missionary work and felt like she might not ever go back to the Congo. Back in England, she really struggled with why she had all these issues between herself and the male leaders in the Congo. She began to convince herself that her problem was her singleness. What she needed was a doctor-husband to work with her and be on her side during the power struggles! She didn’t think that was too much to ask. So, she asked God for a husband, and told Him that she wouldn’t go back as a missionary until she was married. She met a young doctor and decided he would be the one. (She wasn’t very patient in waiting on the Lord’s timing.) She bought new clothes, permed her hair, and resigned from the mission, all to try and win his love. He did care for her, but not enough to marry her. Helen was heartbroken, mostly because she’d wasted so much time and money trying to force her plan into reality - without God. Still single, Helen returned to the mission and left for Congo in 1960. It was a tense time for that country. They had been seeking independence for a long time, so a huge civil war was on the verge of beginning. Many missionaries left because the risk was so high. Helen had no plans of going home. She believed that God had truly called her back to Congo and that He would protect her if she stayed. She was joined by a few other single women, who made it difficult for the men, they didn’t want to look like sissies. She was given charge of the medical base in Nebobongo because John Harris and his wife left on furlough. She had so many opportunities to minister in the midst of the turmoil. She was sure that God had her right where He wanted her to be. She continued to learn to see God in the details of her life, to trust him more fully. She had been coming closer to total trust in God all of her life, between bouts of depression, sometimes feeling that she was not really a Christian because she was capable of spells of anger and bitterness and other sins. “I was unable to reach the standard I myself had set, let alone God’s. Try as I would, I met only frustration in this longing to achieve, to be worthy.” She came to recognize that hatred of sin is a gift of the Holy Spirit. Rebels were gaining strength, and there were reports of missionaries being attacked. Helen endured a burglary and an attempted poisoning, but always in her mind the situation was improving. She felt that she had to stay, because there was so much need and so many people depending on her. On August 15, the rebels took control of Nebobongo, and Helen was in captivity for the next 5 months. On the night of October 29, Helen was overpowered by rebel soldiers in her little bungalow. She tried to escape, but they found her and dragged her to her feet, struck her over the head and shoulders, flung her to the ground, kicked her, struck her over and over again. She was pushed back into her house and raped brutally without mercy. Helen suffered more sexual brutality before her release. God used this in her life to minister to other single women missionaries who feared that they’d lost their purity due to a rape and thus their salvation. Helen knew that her relationship with God had not been damaged. She had not failed God in any way because of the rapes. Finally, on December 31, 1964 she was rescued. Helen had a sense of joy and relief, but also a sense of deep sorrow as she heard of many of her friends’ martyrdom. Helen returned to Africa for the third time in March of 1966. She served for 7 more years, but it was full of turmoil and disappointment. The Congo had changed since the war. There was a new spirit of independence and nationalism. They no longer respected the doctor who’d sacrificed so much for them. Helen left Africa in 1973 with a broken spirit. Her 20 years of service in Africa ended in defeat and discouragement. When she got home, she went through a very, very lonely period in her life. She turned to God. He was all she had. Instead of bitterness there was a new spirit of humility and a new appreciation for what Jesus had done for her on the cross. God was molding her for her next ministry. She became an internationally acclaimed spokes-woman for Christian missions. Her candid honesty was refreshing in a profession known as one of super sainthood. Helen mobilized people by showing them that God used imperfect people with real struggles to be his ambassadors to the unreached world. By Rebecca HIckman SOURCES Roseveare, Helen: Give Me This Mountain (1966) Roseveare, Helen: He Gave Us a Valley (1976) Tucker, Ruth A.: From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya

The Holiness from Below - A Warning Against Self-Righteousness

As he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. (1 Peter 1:15) My hunch is that you are not a glib and shallow person. You are not the kind of person who would “pervert the grace of God into sensuality” (Jude 4). You are in earnest with the Lord, and you long to be holy. So do I. Indeed, what we deeply desire is nothing less than — may I come right out and say it? — sainthood. But Christians like us — who care so sincerely about holiness and are reaching so diligently for its high standards — we face our own temptation. Let’s come right out and say that too. If others pervert the grace of God, we can “nullify the grace of God” (Galatians 2:21). We can have “a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (Romans 10:2). We can “go beyond what is written . . . being puffed up in favor of one against another” (1 Corinthians 4:6). How could it be otherwise? There is always, in this life, more than one way to lose our way! Our very earnestness can become an opening to corruption, rot, and death. The great pastor and saint Robert Murray McCheyne warned his congregation, “Study sanctification to the utmost, but do not make a Christ of it. God hates this idol more than all others.” We should be serious about that too. So, let’s think about one way we can go so wrong, even while feeling we are so right. Two Kinds of Holiness Here is what we must understand. There are two kinds of holiness. One kind is Jesus’s holiness, and the other is our own self-invented holiness. Or to put it in other ways: There is the holiness of the Spirit, and there is the holiness of the flesh. There is the holiness from above, and the holiness from below. There is real holiness, and false holiness. “Real holiness from Jesus is, of course, like Jesus.” The difference is profound, even stark. But for us, it isn’t always easy to see the difference. Both kinds of holiness quote the Bible. Both talk about Jesus. Both go to church. Both are strict and firm and resolute. How then do these two holinesses differ? Real holiness from Jesus is, of course, like Jesus. Look carefully at what our key verse actually says: “As he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct” (1 Peter 1:15). His kind of holiness does not simply insist on a high moral standard. Any sinner can turn over a new leaf, and with enough willpower align externally with biblical norms. But real holiness reflects Jesus, it thinks like Jesus, its instincts resonate with Jesus. Real holiness embodies Jesus. Beauty of True Holiness When our Lord said, “Follow me” (Mark 1:17), he wasn’t recruiting our moral strengths to advance his cause. His call was and is, “I will teach you a new way of perceiving everything, including morality. I myself am how you avoid sin and become holy.” Jesus is why the Bible speaks of “the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 96:9, KJV). His holiness is humane, life-giving, and desirable in every worthy way. His holiness is both serious enough to warn and light enough to laugh (1 Peter 5:8; Zechariah 8:5); it’s firm and yet also freeing (Deuteronomy 5:32; Malachi 4:2). When we encounter our Lord’s real holiness in someone today, it’s both dignifying and delightful. But false holiness from us is, well, just us. It’s us at our worst, because it’s us exalting our smug superiority, us reinforcing our divisive preferences, us absolutizing our narrow rigidity, and so forth. It’s us asserting ourselves, in the name of the Lord, so that we become more demanding, more grim, more shaming of others. Great Divide I’ll make it still worse. Because false holiness comes so naturally to us, it feels good. Our moral fervor feels moral. But it isn’t. Our moral fervor is immoral. In those moments when we have enough self-awareness to see our carnal holiness for what it is, we are peering into a pit of hell. In Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis teaches us, The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual: the pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronizing and spoiling sport and back-biting; the pleasures of power, of hatred. For there are two things inside me, competing with the human self which I must try to become. They are the Animal self, and the Diabolical self. The Diabolical self is the worse of the two. That is why a cold, self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute. But, of course, it is better to be neither. (102–103) If this is so, and it is, then our pursuit of holiness is complicated. We might have expected a choice between two simple categories: sin versus holiness. But in reality, we are facing three categories: (1) sin, (2) our kind of holiness, and, (3) Jesus’s kind of holiness. And the great divide is not between (1) and (2). The great divide is between (2) and (3). Heart of His Holiness If our holiness is no more than that — our wretched rightness — then our holiness is a polished form of evil. The Pharisees proved that. They were morally earnest people and the archvillains of the Gospels. “If our holiness is no more than our wretched rightness, then our holiness is a polished form of evil.” The Pharisees hated Jesus, even while many sinners gravitated to him. Why? Because his kind of holiness has no pride at all. He isn’t pushy and strident and harsh. He really is “gentle and lowly” (Matthew 11:29). And that part of him isn’t a concession, moderating his holiness. It’s at the very heart of his holiness, because it is the very heart of Jesus himself. His kind of holiness melts in the mouths of all who humble themselves before him. This distinction explains something that perplexed me for years. The most repulsive people I’ve encountered along the way are not the worldly party boys on their weekend binges; they are harsh “church people” with their high standards — and no forgiveness. But the loveliest people I’ve ever known have been sinners of many kinds who are turning from both their coarsened evil and their refined evil, and they are humbly opening up to Jesus and his grace for the undeserving. When I hang out with them, Jesus is present. Sometimes I am moved to tears. But among genuinely holy people, I do not feel cornered, pressured, or shamed by their negative scrutiny. The real saints are too holy for that arrogant foolishness. And I hope you have a ton of friends like that! Not Righteousness of My Own It isn’t just our blatant sins that need correction. Our counterfeit holiness needs correction too. It doesn’t need intensification. A. W. Tozer wrote of his generation, “A widespread revival of the kind of Christianity we know today in America might prove to be a moral tragedy from which we would not recover in a hundred years” (Keys to the Deeper Life, 18). I believe that applies even more today. What self-righteous holiness needs is not success, power, and prominence, but failure, collapse, and devastation. Then we can humbly receive Jesus, with the empty hands of faith, and enter into the profound experience Philippians 3:8–9 describes: For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.