Theology beacon dictionary of theology

In the NT, the word soter occurs 24 times and is translated "Savior" on each occasion. There is a sense in which Christ became the Savior by His incarnation, that is, His taking of human flesh. In a much fuller sense, He became Savior when He died on the Cross. However, the uniqueness of Christ's power to save does not reside in His life or teachings, or even in His person, but primarily in His atoning death and triumphant resurrec­tion. As A. M. Hills says, "No other one ever put his own life and blood into the efficiency of his religion. No other is or can be such a Savior as Christ" (Hills, Fundamental Christian Theology, 304-5).

There are many lesser saviors— political, mil­itary, medical—but only one Savior from man's three great perils—sin, death, and hell. But the NT assurance is that "he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, see­ing he ever liveth to make intercession for them" (Heb. 7:25). He saves from sin now, from death in the resurrection, and from hell in the Judg­ment. His power to save from all sin now is the assurance of His ability to save from death and hell.

See christ, soteriology, cross, atonement, sal­vation.

For Further Reading: Richardson, ed., A Theological Word Book of the Bible, 20; gms, 303-57; Hills, Funda­mental Christian Theology, 2:104-10.

Donald R. Peterman

SCANDAL. This English term derives from the Greek skandalon, which means "that which causes sin" or "gives occasion for sin," or "that which causes stumbling," or "trouble, obstacle." It can also carry the idea of offense or that which offends.

Theologically, "scandal" relates to the exclu-siveness of biblical religion. Gerhard Kittel once coined the phrase das Argernes der Einmaligkeit, "the scandal or offence of particularity." Why did God elect to mediate His salvation through a small, Near Eastern nation like Israel? Why did He choose a Roman cross as the means of pro­pitiation and reconciliation of mankind to him­self? These ideas are scandalous and offensive to the sin-bound reason of man. The apostle Paul speaks of his people as having "stumbled over the stumbling stone" (Rom. 9:32, rsv). A cruci­fied Messiah was a stumbling block or scandal to the Jews and folly to the Gentiles (1 Cor. 1:23; Gal. 5:11). But these are facts or truths with which mankind must come to terms. Those who commit themselves to God in faith do not stum­ble, are not offended, do not sin (1 John 2:7-11; Luke 7:23). Failure to accept God's way of salva­tion through Christ and the Cross is to remain in sin. Indeed, rejection causes the Stone of Stum­bling to become the Rock of Judgment.

See christianity non-christian religions, com­parative religion, heathen (fate of).

Willard h. Taylor

SCHISM. The term comes from the Greek schis-ma, literally meaning "a split" or "a tear." In the NT it is usually translated "division" or "dis­sension," and in 1 Cor. 1:10 and 11:18 refers to factions and parties in the Corinthian congrega­tion.

In the Early Church it describes groups which broke away and formed rival churches. At first it referred to divisions not based on basic doctrine and so not necessarily heretical. According to Calvin (Institutes, 4:2-5), Augustine emphasizes this distinction. After the time of Irenaeus (sec­ond century), as emphasis on the institutional unity of the church increased, gradually all dis­ruptions were considered schismatic and even sinful.

In Roman Catholic canon law, schism is any break with the unity of the church, whether based on difference in basic doctrine or simple refusal of church authority (New Catholic Ency­clopedia, 12:1131).

The most serious schism in the Christian church before the Reformation was the East-West division in 1054 in which the church was divided into the Eastern Orthodox and the Ro­man Catholic churches. This schism was never healed, though certain overtures were made to the Eastern church in 1965.

See heresy division, separation. For Further Reading: Encyclopaedia Britannica Micro-paedia, 5:960; ERE, 7:232-35. M. estes haney

SCHOLASTICISM. This has to do particularly with the kind of Christian theology that was in vogue during the 9th to the 14th centuries. It made little use of Scripture and much use of an­cient pagans such as Plato and Aristotle. It dis­coursed about God on the basis of reason or dialectics, and on the basis of nature, with its ob­servable phenomena.



474

SCOTTISH REALISM—SECOND COMING OF CHRIST


See thomism, natural theology, natural law, realism and nominalism.

For Further Reading: Pieper, Scholasticism: Person­alities and Problems of Medieval Philosophy.

J. Kenneth Grider

Reid sought to apply Newtonian inductive methodology to the study of the human mind, and to combat the skeptical tendencies of Des­cartes, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume through ap­peal to "common sense" (common convictions as revealed in practical behavior and common lan­guage traits) and "consciousness." One happy outcome was a continuity between the philo­sophizing of the man in the street and that of the professional, on the one hand, and between pro­fessional philosophy and Christian orthodoxy on the other.

Because of Scottish Realism, philosophy in 19th-century America was considered to be the handmaid of biblical revelation. It provided sup­port for the theistic doctrines of Deists, Unitar­ians, and Transcendentalists, as well as for Calvinistic thinkers such as John Witherspoon, Charles Hodge, and James McCosh at Princeton. However, it also supported a free will position and thus was warmly embraced by such Meth­odists as Asa Shinn, Nathan Bangs, Wilbur Fiske, and Daniel Whedon, and by such Arminianized Calvinists as Timothy Dwight, Albert Barnes, and Charles G. Finney. It led to a spate of books purporting to refute Edwardian determinism.

Probably Scottish Realism received its finest expression in America in the philosophical writ­ings of Christian holiness authors Asa Mahan and Thomas Upham. Upham gave definitive ar­ticulation to a "faculty psychology" which dis­tinguished between intellect, emotion, and volition on the basis of conscious experience. His formulations became the context for understand­ing human nature in terms of which American evangelical Christianity yet today interprets spir­itual experience.

See realism and nominalism, realism, episte­mology, human nature.

For Further Reading: Grave, "The Scottish Philoso­phy of Common Sense," The Asbury Seminarian, Octo­ber, 1977; The Monist, April, 1978; Hamilton, articles in WTJ 1974, 1975, and 1978 issues.

James E. Hamilton

SCRIPTURE. See bible.

SEALING OF THE SPIRIT. Three times in the NT, reference is made to believers being sealed by or with the Holy Spirit (2 Cor. 1:22; Eph. 1:13; 4:30). As John Owen has so succinctly interpreted these statements, "God's sealing of believers then is his gracious communication of the Holy Spirit unto them, so to act his divine power in them, as to enable them unto all the duties of their holy call­ing, evidencing them to be accepted with him, both for themselves and others and asserting their preservation unto eternal life" (The Holy Spirit, 347).

In sealing, the mark can only be made upon the seal by the possessor of the signet, and the seal can only reflect the image of the signet which marks it. The sealing with the Holy Spirit denotes God's ownership of the one sealed, and the life of holiness reflects the presence of the Holy Spirit who seals.

Calvinists understand the sealing with the Spirit as the guaranteed eternal security of the Christian. As Paul indicates in Ephesians, be­lievers are "sealed for the day of redemption" (4:30, rsv), and this sealing is "the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it" (1:14, rsv). Arminians have no difficulty ac­cepting the idea of security, but they reject the teaching of an unconditional security effected monergistically by the sealing with the Spirit. When Paul exhorted his readers not to "grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed for the day of redemption," he did so because they were not being unconditionally preserved for eternal life.

The sealing with the Holy Spirit is not to be identified with conversion. It is distinct from re­generation and subsequent to it (2 Cor. 1:22; Eph. 1:13). It is the work of the Holy Spirit in a be­liever's heart in sanctifying grace, the witness of a pure heart and the evidence of Christ en­throned.

See holy spirit, baptism with the holy spirit.

For Further Reading: Carter, The Person and Ministry of the Holy Spirit, 302-5; Marsh, Emblems of the Holy Spirit, 26-37; Gordon, The Ministry of the Spirit, 75-89.

William B. Coker

SECOND BLESSING. See second work of grace.

SECOND CHANCE. See future probation.

SECOND COMING OF CHRIST. The revelation of eschatology (end-time events) in the Bible



SECOND DEATH—SECOND WORK OF GRACE

475

See SIN. ORIGINAL SIN, FIRST WORK OF GRACE, EN­TIRE SANCTIFICATION.

Secularism puts everything in man's hands. It denies absolutes and idealizes pluralism and rel­ativity. It makes man responsible for developing his own morality and ethics with reference to himself alone. It is a religious response to the supposedly religionless modern scientific and technological man. In one breath its advocates say that secularization is necessary to reach man in his religionless condition, and in the next breath they say that secularization is necessary to free man from the tyranny of his religious con­cepts.

Coming from opposite directions, however, the secularist and the biblical Christian meet in agreement on one point. The compartmentaliza-tion of life into sacred versus secular is wrong. To the secularist, we must secularize all of life. The Bible, however, views all of life as sacred, even the mundane, and therefore the attempts to sec­ularize it are wrong. The Christian shares Paul's view of life when he says, "Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Cor. 10:31, nasb; cf. Col. 3:17).

See WORLD (WORLDUNESS), PROFANE (PROFANITY), SANCTIFICATION, HUMANISM.