I have found much to disagree with in Steve Chalke’s book The Lost Message of Paul.
Is there anything I can applaud? Actually, yes, there is.
I can see that he often attempts to support his arguments from Scripture. I recognise that he gives a central place to Christ. It is clear that he recognises a continuity between the teaching of Jesus and that of Paul. In these respects, Chalke’s theology is different from, and better than, that of old-fashioned liberalism.…
Steve Chalke (The Lost Message of Paul, ch. 19) argues that, if Paul’s words in Colossians 1:19f mean anything, ‘all’ must mean ‘all’, and that the ‘reconciliation of all things’ must include all people, without exception.
Here’s what Chalke says:
‘The theologian John Piper uses the same kind of ‘does-all-really-mean-all’ argument to dismiss the power of Paul’s magnificent declaration about Christ in Colossians 1.19–20:
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him [Jesus], and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.…
One of the problems with Steve Chalke’s book The Lost Message of Paul is that he bites off much more than he can chew. As a result, influential Christian leaders and teachers such as Augustine, Luther and Calvin are dismissed with a wave of the hand, opponents are caricatured, and opinions are advanced without consideration of the reasons and evidence that might be adduced either for or against them.
No doubt the response to such criticisms would be, “But I simply didn’t have time or space in a book of this kind to dot every ‘i’ and cross every ‘t’.” But that’s precisely the problem: if you want to claim that in a number of important ways Protestantism has completely misunderstood and misrepresented the Christian faith, then you have to work much harder than this to support your arguments and to rebut the counter-arguments.…
In chapter 13 of The Lost Message of Paul, Steve Chalke asks: Where does the Western church get all its ideas about guilt and unworthiness before God? The Eastern half of the church has never accepted the doctrine of ‘original sin’. That doctrine owes its origin to Augustine of Hippo and was developed much later by John Calvin. It teaches that we all enter the world with Adam’s fallen nature. The analogous doctrine of total depravity teaches that there is ‘no vestige of goodness left in us’. …
In chapter 12 of The Lost Message of Paul, Steve Chalke deals with ‘the wrath of God’.
Chalke thinks that the idea that God is capable of wrath, or anger, is mistaken. Three reasons are discernable.
According to Chalke, much of the responsibility for the doctrine of the wrath of God must be laid at the feet of John Calvin, who is described as brilliant but legalistic.
Calvin, it is said, ‘effectively replaced Jesus’ image of God as a loving parent with that of God as a stern, courtroom judge.’
This is a lazy and misleading caricature of the great reformer, and I shall say no more about it at this time.…
Chalke, Steve. The Lost Message of Paul (2019). SPCK. Kindle Edition.
Although I’ve already given a critique of some of the teaching of this book, I’m going to pause in order to give a chapter-by-chapter synopsis of the whole thing.
I want to make sure I’ve grasped Chalke’s teaching before saying any more about how convincing, or unconvincing, I find it.
Second only to Jesus himself, Paul is the most influential person in Christianity. …
In chapter 9 of The Lost Message of Paul, Steve Chalke urges us to leave our Reformation-shaped prejudices and get back to the thought world of the apostle Paul. If we do so, he insists, we will discover that the word pistis (usually translated ‘faith’) means something other than we thought it did.
‘I believe,’ says Chalke, ‘that it is far more accurately translated as “faithfulness” than “faith”.’
How does he know that? Well, because Paul was steeped in Hebraic thinking. …
Does the expression pistis Christou mean ‘faith in Christ’, or ‘the faith [or faithfulness] of Christ’?
This post is not an attempt to settle the question once and for all, but rather to respond to an argument mounted recently by Steve Chalke.
In chapter 10 of The Lost Message of Paul (2019) Chalke says that:
‘Martin Luther, John Calvin and countless others following them have chosen to translate pistis Christou as ‘faith in Christ’, and then to hang their whole doctrinal approach on it.…
