Opinions about “Dogma”⤒🔗

The word “dogma” does not have a positive sound in the ears of some church members. I have heard remarks like: “A sermon shouldn’t be so dogmatic!” This meant, as I found out on further inquiry, that a dogma is seen as something like a frigid law, like a duty the congregation has to fulfill, and that “dogmatic” has more or less the meaning of “boring.” The original meaning of the word “dogma” in fact seems to support that opinion. In the well-known words of Luke 2, “In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus,” we indeed meet the word “dogma”: an order of the emperor, a rule that you can’t ignore. You just have to obey. Dogma: cold and stern.

What Is the Dogma of the Church?←⤒🔗

At our university we teach the subject of Dogmatics. Professor Van der Schuit used to do it; after him, for almost forty years, Professor Van Genderen, and since 1993 it is my task to teach the courses connected with church dogma. But is it true that with Dogmatics the students are taught a boring topic? Or that they are trained to become severe ecclesiastical masters? No, the aim is quite different!

What is a dogma really? It is indeed the rule that the church has to keep; the rule for the church’s speaking, its doctrine. It is what the church believes and confesses. It therefore has everything to do with the confession of the church. In the church we not only believe, we also confess. This means that believing is not some vague pious feeling: there are words for it. In the church we don’t just speak about what we happen to find nice or useful or pleasing to our experience. What matters are the words of faith. These words:

• are precise;
• must be passed on to the youth of the church;
• serve to contradict errors: good words against wrong words;
• tell the world what the church really is and what truly motivates believers.

So they are not simply words about which preachers and theologians have reached agreement. No, they are the words of the church, of the church members, words that are derived from the Word of God.

Therefore, if today I say something about Dogmatics my aim is not to tempt you into the university kitchen so that later you can say, “Well, quite difficult but also interesting. I hope they do their best, but it is not for me. It’s for theologians.”

If our university resembles to some extent a kitchen then it is a kitchen that is meant to prepare food for the church. And if we resemble to some extent a cook who sometimes has to do some work in our university kitchen that is not intended for display in the church, on the pulpit, and so on—we still don’t keep the kitchen door scrupulously closed to members of the church. What happens here is not something secret—it is the faith and the doctrine of the church we are concerned with. It is even important that you look under the lids of the pans!

Let me put it this way: the Lord has not given his holy and glorious Word to theologians for their entertainment. He has given his Word to the church, just as the Father has given the church his Son and poured out the Holy Spirit—not on theologians, but on people who believe in him, on the congregation.

The Subject of Dogmatics←⤒🔗

And so also in the subject of Dogmatics we are concerned with church doctrine. We think about it. We try to see how church doctrine shows that attention has been given to Scripture. We may even ask if proper attention has been given to Holy Scripture. For that is the first task: always to return to the Word of God. A dogmatician must therefore speak first of all as a pupil, according to the word that in Isaiah 50:4 points to the Messiah: “The Lord God has given me the tongue of those who are taught.” If that applies even to the Son of God, how much more does it apply to his disciples. Here also, “A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master” (Matt. 10:24; John 15:20).

But Dogmatics does more than repeat the words of Scripture. It also shows the way in the midst of opinions that in the light of God’s Word must be called errors. If on the one hand it is said, “This is how it is,” then on the other hand it is sometimes necessary to say, “This is not how it is!” Yet another function of Dogmatics is to think about the meaning of dogma for the congregation. When Dogmatics speaks about the doctrine of the covenant of grace, for example, then how much admonition there is in that dogma for the congregation, but also how much support, how much comfort. Parents who worry about their children may in view of the promises of God’s covenant turn to the Lord himself. He himself gives us reason to ask him to lay his hand on the lives of the children. Dogma as warning; dogma as support; dogma as consolation.

By mentioning this side of dogma, the preaching of the Catechism shows a richness of glory to the congregation! There are so many connections. This fact, incidentally, also shows how at the university all the subjects are connected. For example: the preaching (including the preaching of the Catechism) belongs to the subject of homiletics that Professor Velema teaches—and it all ties together. Why? Because all theological subjects have their centre in the Word of God that has been given to us.

Dogma and Song of Praise←⤒🔗

We can therefore mention several points regarding the significance of dogma for the congregation: warning, consolation, foundation, confirmation, hope, surprise, but also repentance, humiliation, dedication, and so on. Without fully realizing it we speak then also about the effect that God’s truth, and therefore also the truth of doctrine, may have on the congregation. And then it becomes indeed understandable that, in addition to the foregoing, the song of praise is mentioned. We know about this in the congregation, don’t we? About the knowledge of God and his work that leads the congregation to the song of praise?

Blessed be the Lord, who on our way
Provides for us, and day by day
Upholds us by his power.
God of Salvation is his name;
This glorious name shall we proclaim.
He is our shield and tower. based on Psalm 68:19, 20

The song of praise in response to dogma! But in our thinking about dogma we must go deeper yet. We don’t just speak of the song of praise as conclusion, as effect, and as perspective of the doctrine of the church, but as truly belonging to church dogma, even as one of its characteristics. When talking with each other we perhaps occasionally say, “If you can’t say it, just sing it.” That is the real issue when we connect dogma and song of praise. And that has a profound reason.

Dogma as Song of Praise←⤒🔗

I said earlier that in our dogma we speak the words of the church that are derived from the Word of God. It’s habitual for us to say such things as: Word of God. We say it almost without thinking. But we do have a God who speaks! Who speaks our language, and about whom we hear at the same time that he is the Holy One of Israel and dwells in unapproachable light (1 Tim. 6:16). “The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable” (Isa. 40:28). This God seeks communication with human beings.

He still does, also now that we have become a sinful people who because of our sins can do nothing but cause a separation between God and us (Isa.59:2). And then we stand altogether at the beginning of any communication that can exist between God and us. On our side there is nothing, only emptiness, silence, and darkness. And then there is God who speaks. Not just at the beginning of creation—do we even understand the word “creation”?—but also after the fall into sin. “Where are you?” This is the end of a silence that should have been an eternal silence. Do we use that word without further ado? Do we write it down? Do we jabber about it as if we could understand it? Or do we have to say: this is God’s loving kindness and we do not at all comprehend it? Under these circumstances, a God who speaks to us. It is beyond our comprehension and our speaking. And if we say something about it we must not try to make the words our own, as if we can understand: God’s loving kindness … God spoke … Creation … Yes, it happens in modern theology that all these words are written without a capital letter. And modern theologians say: everything that is said concerning the above comes from below.

But here with the mercy of God to make himself known in his revelation is not nullified! On the contrary. Here the tone is given for all speaking about God, the tone of faith. It is also something of the tone of heaven, which God himself revealed to us in his Word. Think of Job, who struggles to comprehend God with his understanding from below, who looks for a dogma, a rule for his thinking that he can handle, but who at last receives an answer from the Lord himself:

Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (Job 38:4-7)

Job is taught the tone of heaven, where the inhabitants of heaven, morning stars, sons of God (we think here of angels) don’t nod affirmatively when seeing God’s work of creation, and also don’t affirm logically that something like a creation is happening here, but sing together and shout for joy! This, apparently, is the tone that belongs to the works of God, the tone of Psalm 104 (and so many other psalms): “O Lord my God, you are very great! You are clothed with splendour and majesty” (Ps. 104:1).

But then it is also the tone that enables us to recognize dogma as echo of the Word. You can’t say it? Just sing it!

And if this is so with respect to creation, how much more is it so by our thinking about the coming of the Son of God unto redemption. In Luke 2 the angels announced the dogma of the incarnation of the Word within the frame of a heavenly song of praise!

I could look at the entire dogmatics with you, but not even the Beknopte Gereformeerde Dogmatiek (Concise Reformed Dogmatics) allows me to do that here. But you do find in it all these things that can really only be said on the tone of the loving kindness of God who has made himself known: creation and redemption, the holy love of God, God’s eternal counsel wherein his plan of salvation stands at the centre, the fulfillment of the greatest intentions of our God!

What about Sin?←⤒🔗

Indeed, what about sin? Isn’t it difficult to sing about the doctrine of sin, which is also a central part of Christian doctrine? That is true: it is very difficult. But if you see the connection between the great seriousness of sin and the holiness of God and his wrath, and ask yourself what God means when he says that we must know our guilt—then even this dogmatic abyss whose depth cannot be fathomed nevertheless stands in the light of God’s loving kindness! God still says that we are guilty! The Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, still gives us knowledge of sin! Sin as a chapter of Dogmatics is still to be considered in the light of God’s mercy—even where we are reminded of the deserved eternal punishment. God does not throw humankind into darkness. He still calls the human being who sits in darkness. Reason and logic cannot comprehend this—only the song of praise can. Where faith listens and speaks, the song cannot be absent—not even here.

When Theology Has Passed Away←⤒🔗

The day will come when theology has passed away. Or should we say: when theology has reached its goal? Dogma then no longer needs to be an authoritative rule, and dogmatics no longer needs to begin a discussion about errors. The “yes, buts” that also in our theological stubbornness we don’t seem to be able to get rid of will have been silenced. God’s loving kindness remains, and the song of praise is based on knowing fully, even as I have been fully known. The partial knowing has passed.

Dogma also has then reached its goal. It has given rise to the song of praise, in an endless harmony of truth and adoration:

“Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honour and glory and blessing.” Revelation 5:12

And we today are already beginning to learn it, learning and singing at the same time:

“I will exalt you, O my God and King,
And bless your name forever as I sing.” based on Psalm 145:1

This article was translated by Freda Oosterhoff.