“The Christian Scriptures are the primary text for Christian spirituality. Christian spirituality is, in its entirety, rooted in and shaped by the scriptural text. We don’t form our personal spiritual lives out of a random assemblage of favorite texts in combination with individual circumstances; we are formed by the Holy Spirit in accordance with the text of Holy Scripture. God does not put us in charge of forming our personal spiritualities. We grow in accordance with the revealed Word implanted in us by the Spirit” (Eugene H. Peterson, Eat This Book, 15).

Col. 3:16-17, Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.

Worship, which is Spirit-led and Scripture-saturated, is corporate discipleship; by Spirit and Word, worship provides both corporate-formation and personal spiritual-formation.

“Language, spoken and written, is the primary means for getting us in on what is, on what God is and is doing. But it is language of a certain stripe, not words external to our lives, the sort used in grocery lists, computer manuals, French grammars, and basketball rulebooks. These are words intended, whether confrontationally or obliquely, to get inside us, to deal with our souls, to form a life that is congruent with the world that God has created, the salvation that he has enacted, and the community that he has gathered. Such writing anticipates and counts on a certain kind of reading, a dog-with-a-bone kind of reading [Peterson equates this with Hebrew word hagah, that is, “meditate”, cf., Ps. 1, Ps. 63, Isa. 31:4.]” (Eugene H. Peterson, Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading, 3-4).

“My children, like all children, are sinners; they were born that way. But that doesn’t mean they need to become experts in sin. Wise, yes–jaded, no. While they are by no means innocent before the throne of God in themselves, I still want to maintain their ‘innocence’ as long as possible” (R.C. Sproul Jr., Eternity in Our Hearts: Essays on the Good Life, 23).

Compelling but short observation made by Thomas J. Davis, who is reflecting on Luther’s theology of the Lord’s Supper: “But too much real insight is lost if wrinkles are simply ironed out of theology” (This Is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 108).

It is a great observation, and Davis’ verbiage is premier. Theology is oftentimes constructed in a two-dimensional fashion, which gives theology a flattened-ironed-bland-boring and merely-propositional feel. But if Theology has wrinkles, e.g., pesky loci that refuse to be ironed flat, that refuse to fit well under this or that Trinitarian sub-heading, etc., then such wrinkly-nuances make for a three-dimensional(ish) theology. So, a Wrinkly Theology presents the doctrine of the knowledge of God, and the creation that is derivative, as a topological(ish)-tapestry.

Wrinkly Theology is like a great work of art: you can walk back and forth and around it; you can change your point of view and perspective; yet, from every new vantage point, you realize something new – some light-explosion-within-a-diamond like intricacy you hadn’t noticed before. But an Ironed Theology (a flattened-two-dimensional/merely-propositional theology) has no such spark, no intricacy, no ebb-and-flow Holy Spirit jet-stream. Wrinkly Theology is something that can provide shape and posture to your life. Ironed Theology is too over-simplistic to meaningfully describe the fecundity of life.

Wrinkly Theology, indeed. Oodelally!

“When I was in junior high I even had a picture of Jesus hanging on my wall right next to the poster of Michael Jordan. In some ways that is a visual example of how I would define my relationship with Jesus at the time. I was a fan of Jesus, like I was a fan of Mike. I had memorized his records and knew his stats, but I did not know him” (Kyle Idleman, Not a Fan: Becoming a Completely Committed Follower of Jesus, 46).

“In relating to us, the triune God creates the means by which he condescends to us. He takes on human language, meaning, experience, and even flesh (supremely in Christ) in order to faithfully maintain his covenant with us; and he does all of this while remaining fully and completely God” (K. Scott Oliphint, Covenantal Apologetics: Principles and Practice in Defense of Our Faith, 96).

Regarding the condescension of God, John Calvin drew a correlation between how a nurse who speaks baby-talk with an infant and how God lisps in speaking to us – God condescends “far beneath his loftiness” in order to accommodate himself to us.

“Spiritual warfare calls us to be watchful because Satan’s chief means of destroying people is through deception (Gen. 3:1-5, 13; John 8:44; 2 Cor. 11:3; 1 Tim. 2:14; Rev. 12:9)” (Joel R. Beeke & Mark Jones, A Puritan Theology: Doctrine for Life, 194).

“If you read through the four Gospels that tell of Christ’s life, you’ll find that Jesus says “Believe in me” about five times. But care to guess how many times Jesus said “Follow me”? About twenty times. Now I’m not saying that following is more important that believing. What I am saying is that the two are firmly connected. They are the heart and lungs of faith. One can’t live without the other. If you try and separate the message of follow from the message of believe, belief dies in the process. Our churches will continue to be full of fans until we break down the dichotomy between following and believing. Following is part of believing. To truly believe is to follow” (Kyle Idleman, Not a Fan: Becoming a Completely Committed Follower of Jesus, 32-33).

“For nothing is more frigid than a teacher who shows his philosophy only in words: this is to act the part not of a teacher, but of a hypocrite” (St. Chrysostom, Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, Homily I. NPNF1 11:4).

Frigid teaching is the worst, indeed. Yowsers!