The biggest underlying question to be looked at before we examine God’s love from a Biblical perspective is, if God loves the world so much why does he allow so many to perish? To put it another way, if God sovereignly and only elects, as some would maintain, how is it that God claims to love the world, and yet allows so many to perish? A God of love who allows most people to perish is a God whose love becomes a love that is not understandable. John Wesley, so famously wrong about much doctrine, perceived at least this—a God who puts people into Hell without any chance of redemption is an evil God, and Wesley famously denied that we had such a God.
The logic of the difficulty is irrefutable. To state it briefly, the first premise is that God alone sovereignly chooses to save some. The second premise comes from the first, God deliberately excludes some—most of mankind—and makes it impossible for them to be saved because he sovereignly has excluded them. The difficulty of what is being suggested is obvious—God’s love for the world must include a plan to put or allow, if you will, most people to go to Hell, and that is hardly a good definition of what we understand love to be.
The premises can be stated thus:
1. God is a God of love.
2. God sovereignly chooses to save some.
3. God sovereignly chooses to damn most.
4. Therefore, God’s love is expressed in the damnation of most of the human race.
Yet, stated so starkly, I doubt there are many who would really hold to these glaring contradictions. Indeed, many Christians, upon hearing this strict interpretation, have noted that that if they really believed in that sort of God they would turn away from Christianity. The definition of love becomes so distorted that they cannot understand how God could be a God of love. Some have pointed out that under this belief system God and Satan at least agree on the general aim that both want most people in Hell.
Chafer, no Arminian himself, refers to this difficulty when he points out, “The fact indicated in this text, that the one ground of condemnation is the failure to believe on Christ as Savior, confirms the truth, restated more than one hundred times in the New Testament, that the one and only condition of salvation is faith in Christ as Savior.”1 Thus, the difficulty is overcome when we realize that while all of the above premises may be true, salvation in every case is dependent on faith. It is very true that conviction and calling must come from God, but it is also true that no one gets there apart from faith. Indeed, the lack of faith is what separates us from a loving God, for it says that he is not come to condemn the world, but that the world, through him, might be saved.
Thus we have the complete sovereignty of God in each of our salvation, without exception, but we also have a hundred percent response of faith. Sovereignty and the choice of man works together in a way that we cannot, in this lifetime, understand. But we can understand the goodness of a God, who in his mysterious purposes, has elected some to be saved, and still holding everyone to account for not having faith. It is not a complete answer, I am afraid, but it seems to be what the Bible leaves us with, and is the best that I can do.
It is only with man being given responsibility for his faith, or lack thereof, that the love of God becomes evident. First, he loved us enough to send his son to die for us, that as the Scripture says, “whosover will may come.” Jesus, going to the cross, famously laments over Jerusalem over and again, saying, oh Jerusalem, oh Jerusalem. The lament itself only makes sense if we clearly see that when he says how often I would gather you and you would not, that when he says that he was holding Jerusalem responsible for their poor choices. Choices are somehow always folded into the sovereign plan of God.
I always think of the rich young ruler, whom Jesus loved (says the gospel), whom was given the choice of laying aside his riches and following Jesus, or following his riches. He chose wrongly, following his riches, of which he had many. Jesus was saddened by his choice, and uses his choice to remark that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get to heaven. At least in this case, we see someone loved of God, invited by God to follow, and refusing to do that which he knew was right. I think that the many of the lost souls can fit into this same category, loved by God, invited to follow, and yet finding some excuse not to follow. I do not know for certain, but I picture God saddened by the choices of so many for whom he died, but who for one reason or another, never have faith. God, fully justified, and yet still loving, is perfectly righteous to judge those who were given every opportunity to escape their judgment. Can there be anything more tragic to the lost to know that they have died and been judged, and yet still are loved by God? I can think of nothing worse to happen to me than to know I have missed the love of God, and because of justice an eternal wall now separates me from his love.
The discerning reader may note that I have avoided the common arguments of election. I think these arguments are argued far too much, and I think that we are not to know the complete picture of God’s election, much less be able to explain it coherently to anyone (something no one has ever done). At every point we see the word of God, we have one obligation, and that is to believe. Therefore when the scripture points to his sovereignty and election, as it does in so many places, our obligation is to believe. When he tells us that we must believe, then it becomes our responsibility before God to believe. Let the theologian work out how God does it; it is my plain duty to believe God, and that I fully aim to do.
Back to the question, what does it mean when it says God loves us? The perfect definition of love is what it always will be: Jesus. If fact, if I may borrow from an old saying: “Know Jesus. Know love.” “No Jesus. No love.” In the end, it will come down exactly to that. God has already judged the sins of the world, being borne on the back of our Savior, and if we persist in not believing that, we place our souls to be judged justly—something that not one of us can ever bear, and condemnation will always result.
God loves us enough to send his own Son to die in our behalf. We may think being old and experienced that we understand what love is all about, but until we meet Love we know nothing about it. Our worldly experiences, both disappointments and victories, will always pale before the love of God. And everything we think we know about worldly love will change irretrievably once we know Jesus. The best love experiences will serve but as preludes to the main act; the worst experiences will dim and be forgotten as we get to know the one true love, Jesus.
I leave with one devotional thought. Is there anything more that a loving God could give to free men other than that which he has freely given? In the cross which Jesus willing endured God literally gave his all. I find it such a wonderful harmony that each of the early Fathers was asked to give his child. Abraham literally was asked to sacrifice his son. Jacob watched his sons fight, and Joseph fled for his life, having stolen his father’s blessing, but his curse was to never see either his mother or his father again. Jacob’s favorite son was lost to him for many years but was at last restored, giving us a picture our Son who will one day be restored to us. In all three cases men were tested, being asked of God to give up their own sons, and giving us a picture of what, one day, God would do for us. Greater love hath no one than this—that Jesus should be freely offered that we might have the forever love of God. It is the ultimate gift of God. It is impossible that God should do more.
1. Chafer, L. (1947). The Convicting Work of the Spirit. In Systematic Theology (Vol. 2, p. 218). Dallas: Dallas Seminary Press.
Saturday, May 30, 2015
Sunday, May 24, 2015
What does the Bible mean when it says we should train up a child in the way he should go?
Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
Proverbs 22:6
Jesus said to suffer the little children to come unto him, and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of God. I have spent a lifetime working with children, mostly nine and ten year olds, and I am still a bit amazed by the readiness with which a child receives the gospel. I have eight grandchildren, and each of them I found wonderfully open to things which would help them to know God. I believe that this openness, this readiness is what our Lord refers to when he says “for such is the kingdom of God.” Elsewhere, the Lord reminds us, “Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:4).
As a society, I think we often recognize this preciousness of the young child, and though the nine and ten year olds that I teach have begun to lose their “very young preciousness”, there is still much to see and appreciate that is just so wonderful. As a teacher in his last weeks, I am grateful to God that he allowed me to spend so many rich years in the company of young children. They have kept me young in so many ways (I learned to solve the Rubik’s Cube this year!). The Bible gives us much direction in raising children, but what specifically does it mean when it says we ought to train up a child in the way he should go?
As a teacher, my heart aches when I deal with children of split custody homes, or worse, homes broken completely, without the benefit of a mom or a dad. The children often are finding an equilibrium in my class, and some wonderful adaptations happen all the time. Still, I look down the road for those children, and my heart aches for the basic fundamental way that they perceive the world. Without regard for finding fault, or attaching blame, children of motherless or fatherless families, or children with an abundance of three fathers or mothers, will never gain a “normal” view of relationships.
Often we in the church teach that we should appreciate our heavenly father as we appreciate our earthly fathers. More than once I have had adults come to me explaining that their earthly fathers were horrible abusers, and asking how to gain a good view of a benevolent Father in heaven. It is not that salvation is not offered to all such people; if I read my Bible correctly salvation is offered to all. But those with a severely distorted image of their mother or their father will have such a more difficult time in coming to Christ, in seeing the goodness of God.
It would seem to me to be a fundamental mistake to talk about this verse without mentioning that it is so important that the essentials be met in the family. My heart aches for the parents who have experienced divorce and are trying desperately to give some sense of normal to a child in that context. It is not uncommon for me to see children who go to two different homes, with one home supporting the school homework model, and the other neglecting it. Often these children have to manage two different backpacks, and made decisions several days in advance anticipating their schedule changes. It is a wonder to me that some do it so efficiently! Yet many struggle. I have had situations with children in more than two custody situations—often with a loving grandmother in the background. Home rotation is an excuse for late homework, or long term assignments are left at the wrong home. When I as a teacher ask the right questions I realize the responsibility of such children is at least double that of the ordinary child. They must find strength from themselves, at an age when most of them have barely mastered the ABCs, or the multiplication tables.
I wonder what the outcome will be for these children, but then I look at forty and fifty year old adults who reflect deep distrust of long term relationships that originates in the decades past problems of their own mothers and fathers. They seem to have problems maintaining long term relationships themselves, and thus the weakness of the parents is endowed to the children. It is because of family decline that many prophecy the complete decline of American society.
How would I advise such parents? All such parents often reach the same conclusion. They must begin with the basics. Find that relationship with God. Make it fundamental—strip all priorities aside and begin living with Christ as the Lord of your whole life. Often I see someone bereft of their spouse with everything already stripped away. They are hurting—hurt bad enough to jettison a lot of the baggage that stops us from following God. But that is just the beginning of perhaps a decade of rebuilding the broken.
The children are understandably broken when families fracture. Often we teachers see children lose a year or more in education. Instead of paying attention to the classroom and the lessons being taught, their little heads are filled with all the confusion and trauma of what has happened to them. They begin to fall behind, and do not take the time to absorb the new steps, and sometimes do not have the reinforcement that is so important coming from home. This is the time for “acting out”, expressing the frustration that is filling their hearts. Parents readily get this without having to be told—I see situation after situation where a compassionate parent is working to shore up the deficiencies showing up in the child. Often well-meaning school counselors intrude at this point and diagnose the child with ADD, when the parent should know it is the frustration of their life which is not unfolding in the way they had expected. Many millions of children have been diagnosed thus, when a central focus on the basics of life is what their little hearts are really crying out for.
Which brings me back to the question: how are we to train up a child in the way he should go? In these cases the answers are varied with the ages of the children. One bit of advice is that if you make a big sudden change over to following Christ do not expect your child to automatically and quickly follow, particularly if it is an older child. One does not usually change overnight—if you stop for a moment and consider, it took years for you to follow Christ. Give your child time to consider what you are doing and thinking. More evangelism takes place by parent’s examples than we might expect, and it is not here the spoken word that wins, but rather the deed. Take pains to let your faith be known, but also take care not to make your child feel uncomfortable and pressured to change. Be prayerful, for it is the Lord who softened your heart, and it is to the Lord that we must go if we expect to see change in our child.
To those who are blessed with a cohesive family the answer is easier. Never stop doing the things that you are doing—Bible classes, church attendance, and all the rest. Along with it, be sure to fill the house with Bible stories that are read often, with prayer and devotions in which the child participates. Over all, bathe the children in prayer. It was my earnest prayer that both my children come to Christ at an early age, and they both did. It was my earnest prayer that they both meet that someone special who was devoted to God, and they both did. We do have a God who is concerned for us, and when we present our own children to him in prayer, we have every confidence that he loves them more than we do.
I cannot leave this topic without reflecting on a special meaning that some have given to this verse. I do not think the meaning is present in the verse, but I agree with the philosophy behind it. Years ago, I seem to remember James Dobson teaching this on the radio—but my memory being on it is, I cannot say for certain. Dobson taught a very useful meaning to the verse. We should look for things that our child finds suitable, and when we find them, then perhaps we have found a characteristic that needs building. In other words, if we find that the child is particularly interested in scientific things, then we should work to awaken that interest. If he is musically inclined, then we ought to do what we can to see those interests enhanced. In short, child-reading then becomes a life-long process where we help the child to find fulfillment. Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it.
I think the verse studied is not meant to be that wide in its interpretation—but what a wonderful thing it would be to seek to give to our children. In the busy-ness of life, I think the Bible is remonstrating us to take care of the basic teachings that are so important: knowledge of the gospel, a readiness to take things to God in prayer, to respect their fellow man. If we teach them to fear God and love their fellow man, we have accomplished much.
Proverbs 22:6
Jesus said to suffer the little children to come unto him, and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of God. I have spent a lifetime working with children, mostly nine and ten year olds, and I am still a bit amazed by the readiness with which a child receives the gospel. I have eight grandchildren, and each of them I found wonderfully open to things which would help them to know God. I believe that this openness, this readiness is what our Lord refers to when he says “for such is the kingdom of God.” Elsewhere, the Lord reminds us, “Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:4).
As a society, I think we often recognize this preciousness of the young child, and though the nine and ten year olds that I teach have begun to lose their “very young preciousness”, there is still much to see and appreciate that is just so wonderful. As a teacher in his last weeks, I am grateful to God that he allowed me to spend so many rich years in the company of young children. They have kept me young in so many ways (I learned to solve the Rubik’s Cube this year!). The Bible gives us much direction in raising children, but what specifically does it mean when it says we ought to train up a child in the way he should go?
As a teacher, my heart aches when I deal with children of split custody homes, or worse, homes broken completely, without the benefit of a mom or a dad. The children often are finding an equilibrium in my class, and some wonderful adaptations happen all the time. Still, I look down the road for those children, and my heart aches for the basic fundamental way that they perceive the world. Without regard for finding fault, or attaching blame, children of motherless or fatherless families, or children with an abundance of three fathers or mothers, will never gain a “normal” view of relationships.
Often we in the church teach that we should appreciate our heavenly father as we appreciate our earthly fathers. More than once I have had adults come to me explaining that their earthly fathers were horrible abusers, and asking how to gain a good view of a benevolent Father in heaven. It is not that salvation is not offered to all such people; if I read my Bible correctly salvation is offered to all. But those with a severely distorted image of their mother or their father will have such a more difficult time in coming to Christ, in seeing the goodness of God.
It would seem to me to be a fundamental mistake to talk about this verse without mentioning that it is so important that the essentials be met in the family. My heart aches for the parents who have experienced divorce and are trying desperately to give some sense of normal to a child in that context. It is not uncommon for me to see children who go to two different homes, with one home supporting the school homework model, and the other neglecting it. Often these children have to manage two different backpacks, and made decisions several days in advance anticipating their schedule changes. It is a wonder to me that some do it so efficiently! Yet many struggle. I have had situations with children in more than two custody situations—often with a loving grandmother in the background. Home rotation is an excuse for late homework, or long term assignments are left at the wrong home. When I as a teacher ask the right questions I realize the responsibility of such children is at least double that of the ordinary child. They must find strength from themselves, at an age when most of them have barely mastered the ABCs, or the multiplication tables.
I wonder what the outcome will be for these children, but then I look at forty and fifty year old adults who reflect deep distrust of long term relationships that originates in the decades past problems of their own mothers and fathers. They seem to have problems maintaining long term relationships themselves, and thus the weakness of the parents is endowed to the children. It is because of family decline that many prophecy the complete decline of American society.
How would I advise such parents? All such parents often reach the same conclusion. They must begin with the basics. Find that relationship with God. Make it fundamental—strip all priorities aside and begin living with Christ as the Lord of your whole life. Often I see someone bereft of their spouse with everything already stripped away. They are hurting—hurt bad enough to jettison a lot of the baggage that stops us from following God. But that is just the beginning of perhaps a decade of rebuilding the broken.
The children are understandably broken when families fracture. Often we teachers see children lose a year or more in education. Instead of paying attention to the classroom and the lessons being taught, their little heads are filled with all the confusion and trauma of what has happened to them. They begin to fall behind, and do not take the time to absorb the new steps, and sometimes do not have the reinforcement that is so important coming from home. This is the time for “acting out”, expressing the frustration that is filling their hearts. Parents readily get this without having to be told—I see situation after situation where a compassionate parent is working to shore up the deficiencies showing up in the child. Often well-meaning school counselors intrude at this point and diagnose the child with ADD, when the parent should know it is the frustration of their life which is not unfolding in the way they had expected. Many millions of children have been diagnosed thus, when a central focus on the basics of life is what their little hearts are really crying out for.
Which brings me back to the question: how are we to train up a child in the way he should go? In these cases the answers are varied with the ages of the children. One bit of advice is that if you make a big sudden change over to following Christ do not expect your child to automatically and quickly follow, particularly if it is an older child. One does not usually change overnight—if you stop for a moment and consider, it took years for you to follow Christ. Give your child time to consider what you are doing and thinking. More evangelism takes place by parent’s examples than we might expect, and it is not here the spoken word that wins, but rather the deed. Take pains to let your faith be known, but also take care not to make your child feel uncomfortable and pressured to change. Be prayerful, for it is the Lord who softened your heart, and it is to the Lord that we must go if we expect to see change in our child.
To those who are blessed with a cohesive family the answer is easier. Never stop doing the things that you are doing—Bible classes, church attendance, and all the rest. Along with it, be sure to fill the house with Bible stories that are read often, with prayer and devotions in which the child participates. Over all, bathe the children in prayer. It was my earnest prayer that both my children come to Christ at an early age, and they both did. It was my earnest prayer that they both meet that someone special who was devoted to God, and they both did. We do have a God who is concerned for us, and when we present our own children to him in prayer, we have every confidence that he loves them more than we do.
I cannot leave this topic without reflecting on a special meaning that some have given to this verse. I do not think the meaning is present in the verse, but I agree with the philosophy behind it. Years ago, I seem to remember James Dobson teaching this on the radio—but my memory being on it is, I cannot say for certain. Dobson taught a very useful meaning to the verse. We should look for things that our child finds suitable, and when we find them, then perhaps we have found a characteristic that needs building. In other words, if we find that the child is particularly interested in scientific things, then we should work to awaken that interest. If he is musically inclined, then we ought to do what we can to see those interests enhanced. In short, child-reading then becomes a life-long process where we help the child to find fulfillment. Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it.
I think the verse studied is not meant to be that wide in its interpretation—but what a wonderful thing it would be to seek to give to our children. In the busy-ness of life, I think the Bible is remonstrating us to take care of the basic teachings that are so important: knowledge of the gospel, a readiness to take things to God in prayer, to respect their fellow man. If we teach them to fear God and love their fellow man, we have accomplished much.
Friday, May 15, 2015
Who do you say that I am? -Jesus
This one question is the most important question to all of mankind. If Jesus is who the Bible presents him to be, then every man’s fate is dependent on whether he recognizes and accepts that which Jesus has done. It is not too much to say that every man’s eternal fate is wrapped up intrinsically with this one man. Who, you may ask, is Jesus, that he should have so much to do with my eternal destiny?
Today is the age of materialism, and it is often believed that what you see is what you get. Nancy Pearcey tells us about the self- contradiction of materialism: “Indeed, the sheer act of asserting materialism contradicts itself. If I say, “Everything that exists is material,” is that statement itself material? Is it merely a series of sound waves? If I write out the statement, is it nothing but marks on a piece of paper? Of course not. The statement has a linguistic meaning. It has logical properties. It has a social function (communicating to others)— all of which transcend the material dimension. Ironically, materialism cannot even be stated without refuting itself.”1 The Bible proclaims that man is an eternal being, created in the image of God, lost in the throes of sin, and held captive to a blindness that cannot acknowledge their Creator.
There is an empty spot in the soul of man that used to be filled by our knowledge of God, and we have no way of filling it again, but we are continually drawn towards filling that emptiness with anything that we can find; we invent our idols, and sometimes give those idols the very power of a god so that we may fill this empty void. But it is to all no avail. Nothing quite fits the void except the very person whose absence made the void, and man is doomed to an endless chasing after the wind, trying to fill an unfillable hole.
Who is this Jesus that he should act as the winnowing fork for mankind? Investigating what the Bible says about Jesus is a worthy study, and will be the focus of this short piece. But I believe it is very important to recognize the very different Jesus who is presented by the world. Every kind of Jesus is presented from the world, that people might look and receive that which is counterfeit. The lie abounds in the world that Jesus was just a great teacher and a wonderful person, but the Bible sets serious claims for Jesus being God come in the flesh. If we believe in anything less than the picture so clearly drawn in scripture, we are making Jesus out to be less than we ought, and imperil our own souls. Calling Jesus, who claims to be the very Son of God, a great teacher or a good person is the highest of insults. Some teach that Jesus is just an angel come for the mercies of mankind, but even this is insulting to the God, who in his great mercy, came in answer to our critical need.
“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Romans 10:9, 10). Across the New Testament is broad agreement that we are to hear the gospel and believe, and that believing we will be saved. How is it that Jesus is able to make such fantastic claims? Those very claims preclude any chatter about Jesus being a good teacher—for if he were not telling the truth, then it is obvious on the face that he could not be good. He did not leave that choice as an option for us. Either he must be lying (and therefore an evil teacher), or he must be mad (delusional people are be held not to be responsible for their beliefs), or he must be who he said he was. If he was mad, he would have been dismissed at once, but then what are we to do with his miracles? What are we to do with the masses who chose to follow him, knowing that they would lose their families and membership in the synagogue? Such people give their uttermost, their all, testifying that who they saw was neither a teacher, nor a delusional deceiver. And that leaves us with only one choice—he was who he said he was—and we need to take the utmost care with those claims. It does no good to suggest that since you have seen no miracles that you will not believe in them, for are we not then making the materialist’s objection that he knows that only what is visible is real? Such a claim itself is more than what we can see, and therefore it is self-refuting.
It will do no good whatever to dismiss the witnesses of history, for they were just as you or I and very probably just as skeptical as we would be. Thomas, skeptical to the end, was shown the holes in the very body of the Lord, and his reply should carry great weight with us, “My Lord and My God.” Skeptical of miracles? That is exactly how you are supposed to be—and I submit, it is exactly how many of the witnesses were. Miracles are not supposed to happen every day. They are supposed to shock us when we see them, they are quite out of the ordinary. When one person tells us they see a miracle, we have every right to offer skepticism, but when multitudes over the course of years tell us the same thing, in many times and in many ways, of course it will shock our sensibilities, but by all means it should cause us to stop and behold.
It is no good for us to dismiss the scriptures out of hand. They have been rigorously studied, copied many thousands of times over, and withstand all the criticism of the centuries. The gospels present a four sided portrait of Jesus that is in great harmony, and the differences are no more than a reasonable person might expect from different witnesses. Contrast the recent unrest in Ferguson, and the wide variety of witnesses. We have some “witnesses” who testified what they saw, and yet were proven beyond a reasonable doubt not to be there at all. There are witnesses in sharp disagreement who were there—what they saw and interpreted widely varied. Should we not expect our four writers of the gospel to give us a somewhat different emphasis on Jesus? That is exactly what we find. Men and women who were present and saw these things agreed with the presentation of the gospel writers. Any who exaggerated or stated things that were not true were not accepted as valid. There are really very few “disputed” passages in the gospels, and one could safely remove those disputed passages and still be left with a multitude of plain claims for Jesus that present him as God come in the flesh. Philip Schaff, an eminent theologian of the 1800’s, summarizes the first three gospels this way: “We conclude, then, that the Synoptists prepared their Gospels independently, during the same period (say between A.D. 60 and 69), in different places, chiefly from the living teaching of Christ and the first disciples, and partly from earlier fragmentary documents. They bear independent testimony to the truth of the gospel. Their agreement and disagreement are not the result of design, but of the unity, richness, and variety of the original story as received, understood, digested, and applied by different minds to different conditions and classes of hearers and readers.”2
But what of the Christ, as he is presented in the gospels? We learn that the Son existed with the Father before all time, and from the gospel of John we learn that “all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made (John 1:3). Indeed, John seems to emphasize Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior of all mankind. Luke, the careful physician, says, “and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:23). Thus Luke records the testimony of those who heard the voice of God; testimony can be no higher. Mark, who spent a great amount of his time with Peter, was most qualified to share Peter’s words about the Messiah, and he did share, saying, “Peter answereth and saith unto him, Thou art the Christ” (Mark 8:29). Matthew agrees with the other gospels, saying, “And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (Matthew 28:18, 19, italics added). In all the gospels, then, there is a great harmony and agreement. Jesus, the Son of God, has come to redeem a world lost in sin. Schaff concludes this about the claims of the gospels, “He, the humblest and meekest of men, makes these astounding pretensions in the most easy and natural way; he never falters, never apologizes, never explains; he proclaims them as self-evident truths. We read them again and again, and never feel any incongruity nor think of arrogance and presumption.”3
These are the claims of Jesus. The question remains. Who do you say that he is? For if what is recorded is correct, and the historical evidence is very strong that it is, one day each of us will have to answer that question, and we will be held responsible for our reply. God has sent his Son to be a propitiation for our sins, but he will not force himself upon us. His Spirit woos us and convicts us, for he does indeed love us, but in the end, we must decide to believe. It is the only way given among men whereby we must be saved. If we dare to offer ourselves on the basis of our own merit, we shall surely fall. Recently a leader in New York made the facetious claim that when he died he would receive a “fast pass” to heaven, and would bypass all others based on his merit. The man who trusts his own merit is trusting a fool; there will be no good end to such trust. God sees us as we are, and chose freely to die in our behalf, that we might not have to die ourselves. But we must receive the gift of God if it is to have efficacy in our lives. What fools we must look like to the God of infinite mercy who has provided salvation to all when we spurn out of hand his free gift, if we will but receive it. “But as many as received him, to them gave he the power to become sons of God, even to those who believe on his name.” If you have not seriously looked at the claims of the gospels, perhaps today is the day to start looking.
1. Pearcey, Nancy (2015-03-01). Finding Truth: 5 Principles for Unmasking Atheism, Secularism, and Other God Substitutes (p. 192). David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.
2. Schaff, Philip (2014-01-12). History Of The Christian Church (The Complete Eight Volumes In One) (Kindle Locations 8600-8604). . Kindle Edition.
3. Schaff, Philip (2014-01-12). History Of The Christian Church (The Complete Eight Volumes In One) (Kindle Locations 1815-1817). . Kindle Edition.
Today is the age of materialism, and it is often believed that what you see is what you get. Nancy Pearcey tells us about the self- contradiction of materialism: “Indeed, the sheer act of asserting materialism contradicts itself. If I say, “Everything that exists is material,” is that statement itself material? Is it merely a series of sound waves? If I write out the statement, is it nothing but marks on a piece of paper? Of course not. The statement has a linguistic meaning. It has logical properties. It has a social function (communicating to others)— all of which transcend the material dimension. Ironically, materialism cannot even be stated without refuting itself.”1 The Bible proclaims that man is an eternal being, created in the image of God, lost in the throes of sin, and held captive to a blindness that cannot acknowledge their Creator.
There is an empty spot in the soul of man that used to be filled by our knowledge of God, and we have no way of filling it again, but we are continually drawn towards filling that emptiness with anything that we can find; we invent our idols, and sometimes give those idols the very power of a god so that we may fill this empty void. But it is to all no avail. Nothing quite fits the void except the very person whose absence made the void, and man is doomed to an endless chasing after the wind, trying to fill an unfillable hole.
Who is this Jesus that he should act as the winnowing fork for mankind? Investigating what the Bible says about Jesus is a worthy study, and will be the focus of this short piece. But I believe it is very important to recognize the very different Jesus who is presented by the world. Every kind of Jesus is presented from the world, that people might look and receive that which is counterfeit. The lie abounds in the world that Jesus was just a great teacher and a wonderful person, but the Bible sets serious claims for Jesus being God come in the flesh. If we believe in anything less than the picture so clearly drawn in scripture, we are making Jesus out to be less than we ought, and imperil our own souls. Calling Jesus, who claims to be the very Son of God, a great teacher or a good person is the highest of insults. Some teach that Jesus is just an angel come for the mercies of mankind, but even this is insulting to the God, who in his great mercy, came in answer to our critical need.
“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved” (Romans 10:9, 10). Across the New Testament is broad agreement that we are to hear the gospel and believe, and that believing we will be saved. How is it that Jesus is able to make such fantastic claims? Those very claims preclude any chatter about Jesus being a good teacher—for if he were not telling the truth, then it is obvious on the face that he could not be good. He did not leave that choice as an option for us. Either he must be lying (and therefore an evil teacher), or he must be mad (delusional people are be held not to be responsible for their beliefs), or he must be who he said he was. If he was mad, he would have been dismissed at once, but then what are we to do with his miracles? What are we to do with the masses who chose to follow him, knowing that they would lose their families and membership in the synagogue? Such people give their uttermost, their all, testifying that who they saw was neither a teacher, nor a delusional deceiver. And that leaves us with only one choice—he was who he said he was—and we need to take the utmost care with those claims. It does no good to suggest that since you have seen no miracles that you will not believe in them, for are we not then making the materialist’s objection that he knows that only what is visible is real? Such a claim itself is more than what we can see, and therefore it is self-refuting.
It will do no good whatever to dismiss the witnesses of history, for they were just as you or I and very probably just as skeptical as we would be. Thomas, skeptical to the end, was shown the holes in the very body of the Lord, and his reply should carry great weight with us, “My Lord and My God.” Skeptical of miracles? That is exactly how you are supposed to be—and I submit, it is exactly how many of the witnesses were. Miracles are not supposed to happen every day. They are supposed to shock us when we see them, they are quite out of the ordinary. When one person tells us they see a miracle, we have every right to offer skepticism, but when multitudes over the course of years tell us the same thing, in many times and in many ways, of course it will shock our sensibilities, but by all means it should cause us to stop and behold.
It is no good for us to dismiss the scriptures out of hand. They have been rigorously studied, copied many thousands of times over, and withstand all the criticism of the centuries. The gospels present a four sided portrait of Jesus that is in great harmony, and the differences are no more than a reasonable person might expect from different witnesses. Contrast the recent unrest in Ferguson, and the wide variety of witnesses. We have some “witnesses” who testified what they saw, and yet were proven beyond a reasonable doubt not to be there at all. There are witnesses in sharp disagreement who were there—what they saw and interpreted widely varied. Should we not expect our four writers of the gospel to give us a somewhat different emphasis on Jesus? That is exactly what we find. Men and women who were present and saw these things agreed with the presentation of the gospel writers. Any who exaggerated or stated things that were not true were not accepted as valid. There are really very few “disputed” passages in the gospels, and one could safely remove those disputed passages and still be left with a multitude of plain claims for Jesus that present him as God come in the flesh. Philip Schaff, an eminent theologian of the 1800’s, summarizes the first three gospels this way: “We conclude, then, that the Synoptists prepared their Gospels independently, during the same period (say between A.D. 60 and 69), in different places, chiefly from the living teaching of Christ and the first disciples, and partly from earlier fragmentary documents. They bear independent testimony to the truth of the gospel. Their agreement and disagreement are not the result of design, but of the unity, richness, and variety of the original story as received, understood, digested, and applied by different minds to different conditions and classes of hearers and readers.”2
But what of the Christ, as he is presented in the gospels? We learn that the Son existed with the Father before all time, and from the gospel of John we learn that “all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made (John 1:3). Indeed, John seems to emphasize Jesus as the Son of God, the Savior of all mankind. Luke, the careful physician, says, “and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:23). Thus Luke records the testimony of those who heard the voice of God; testimony can be no higher. Mark, who spent a great amount of his time with Peter, was most qualified to share Peter’s words about the Messiah, and he did share, saying, “Peter answereth and saith unto him, Thou art the Christ” (Mark 8:29). Matthew agrees with the other gospels, saying, “And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (Matthew 28:18, 19, italics added). In all the gospels, then, there is a great harmony and agreement. Jesus, the Son of God, has come to redeem a world lost in sin. Schaff concludes this about the claims of the gospels, “He, the humblest and meekest of men, makes these astounding pretensions in the most easy and natural way; he never falters, never apologizes, never explains; he proclaims them as self-evident truths. We read them again and again, and never feel any incongruity nor think of arrogance and presumption.”3
These are the claims of Jesus. The question remains. Who do you say that he is? For if what is recorded is correct, and the historical evidence is very strong that it is, one day each of us will have to answer that question, and we will be held responsible for our reply. God has sent his Son to be a propitiation for our sins, but he will not force himself upon us. His Spirit woos us and convicts us, for he does indeed love us, but in the end, we must decide to believe. It is the only way given among men whereby we must be saved. If we dare to offer ourselves on the basis of our own merit, we shall surely fall. Recently a leader in New York made the facetious claim that when he died he would receive a “fast pass” to heaven, and would bypass all others based on his merit. The man who trusts his own merit is trusting a fool; there will be no good end to such trust. God sees us as we are, and chose freely to die in our behalf, that we might not have to die ourselves. But we must receive the gift of God if it is to have efficacy in our lives. What fools we must look like to the God of infinite mercy who has provided salvation to all when we spurn out of hand his free gift, if we will but receive it. “But as many as received him, to them gave he the power to become sons of God, even to those who believe on his name.” If you have not seriously looked at the claims of the gospels, perhaps today is the day to start looking.
1. Pearcey, Nancy (2015-03-01). Finding Truth: 5 Principles for Unmasking Atheism, Secularism, and Other God Substitutes (p. 192). David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.
2. Schaff, Philip (2014-01-12). History Of The Christian Church (The Complete Eight Volumes In One) (Kindle Locations 8600-8604). . Kindle Edition.
3. Schaff, Philip (2014-01-12). History Of The Christian Church (The Complete Eight Volumes In One) (Kindle Locations 1815-1817). . Kindle Edition.
Sunday, May 10, 2015
How can we read and understand the Bible?
The doctrine is crystal clear on this point. A natural man cannot understand the things of God—neither can he behold the God who is made present in the scriptures. “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (2 Cor. 2:14). The fool says in his heart that there is no God—not because he is a fool, though that may indeed be the case, but because natural man cannot know God.
The Bible clearly teaches that man is born in sin; he cannot understand the things of God apart from God’s call. But the Bible is equally clear at this point; Paul declares that to us belongs the ministry, or the word, of reconciliation. “And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:18, 19). It is to be our aim to reconcile the world to Christ. Is Paul thus saying that the whole of the world is going to receive the word of God? No, a thousand times no! Rather Paul is saying that we should use every tool possible for offering Christ to the lost world, in the knowledge and hope that some will be saved. It was Paul’s aim to lead to Christ every person whom he met, and he used every bit of persuasive speech that he could muster to influence his audience. “Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Colossians 1:28). A worthy goal—that of presenting every man in Christ, and it was something that Paul knew to be impossible, for there has been no time of universal salvation, nor will there be any time where all sinful men find regeneration. Rather Paul was giving to us a lofty goal—that, if by any means, some more might be saved.
Isn’t Paul at this point suggesting the need of the field of apologetics? If by any means, he says, implying that we ought to be ready to defend the faith against all. Indeed, Peter says this very thing, “Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear” (I Peter 3:15). We have to live in a blinded culture, with a blind people who have devised all sorts of evil thoughts and systems to deny God, but we ought not to remain blinded ourselves. Let us seek to do as both Peter and Paul did, to present in every manner that we can possibly conceive the resurrected Christ in the hope that some might have their veil torn down, and that they might see. We can present the word of God as servants who need not to be ashamed. Examine our proofs, test the words, and perhaps find the very power of God.
Nancy Pearcey has some great insights along this line: “At its best, apologetics includes not only the critique of idols but also the creation of life-giving alternatives. Christians often have a habit of defining themselves by what they are against. Yet to oppose what is wrong, it is most effective to offer something better— to “overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12: 21). If science is often used to bolster arguments for materialism and determinism, then Christians should make it their goal to do better, more accurate science. If literature is used to glamorize sin and brokenness, then Christians should fire up their imaginations to create higher quality, more inspiring works of fiction.”1 Christians from many different perspectives tend to agree on this one main point—that if the Bible says it, then it must be true. Our disagreements tend to come more on interpretation of the Bible, rather than on questioning the foundation of the Bible. In other words, we have great general agreement that the Bible is true, but sometimes we differ on what it is saying. But how can we defend that which we know not?
The knowledge of the Bible is weak among many of our churches. I was a bit shocked at the end of last year when a national movement almost was started to read the Bible through this year, and so many of whom I would term the best of servants admitted to not ever having read the Bible through. According to a recent survey, less than 20 percent of churchgoers read the Bible on a daily basis.2
Believing the Bible to be true, as Jesus did when he reminded us “that the scripture cannot be broken” is a huge asset in our Christian world today. The word of God is the foundation of all wisdom, and that wisdom which is not based on its truths must be error-ridden. It becomes our job, in defending the faith, to proclaim the truth of the scriptures to all, and that includes being able to show where people make their mistakes. But how can we do that unless we know the Bible ourselves, with a knowledge of the vain philosophies that have so successfully captivated so many? The field of apologetics is wide open, and I am so glad to see professors like Nancy Pearcey reminding us to sharpen ourselves to better face the unbelieving world.
Lewis reminds us that when we find ourselves going the wrong way the quickest way back is to turn around and go back the way we came. If you find yourself a believer, but not given to Bible reading, the quickest way to correct that is to begin reading today. Annual Bible reading plans abound, and there is no shortage of devotional reading plans that can be followed. The quickest way to maturity is to begin building the basics in your life, and a daily habit of reading his word will begin to transform your life. I am hoping and praying for a renewed movement for Christians to read their Bible, similar to what I saw starting at the end of last year when many people spoke of beginning Bible reading.
But how are we to read the Bible? First, we need to read it with great respect towards its context. I am reminded of the saint who wanted to know the will of God for his life, and opened his Bible at random, reading, “Judas hanged himself.” Puzzled, he decided to try again, and opening he read, “Go thou and do likewise.” We can all laugh at the old saw, but there is no substitute for knowing the word of God. Many are the Christian fables that abound, and one that I often hear is that there is more than one way of coming to God. I think American Christians may want to believe this because tolerance is considered such a great virtue. Can other religions be correct in any way? Our Lord has said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except by me”? Christianity has closed itself off as the only way to God, and that message rings clearly in the scripture, but how shall we know it if we do not read it?
As to understanding the Bible, that is proving for me to be a lifelong pursuit, and so it ought to be with all of us. We have found the lost treasure, the hidden diamond, and it is both rare and precious. Understanding comes with frequent reading, it is to be hoped, and as we become more aware of the precious treasure we have been given, we should become much more aware of our need to share. Paul tells us that we have a ministry of reconciliation, and I think it is past time that we found out about it. Is it time for your daily Bible reading yet? Our Lord reminds us that blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it. How precious it is that we can go to read the Bible for ourselves, and then seek to keep it. There is a great blessing here for all who will find it.
1. Pearcey, Nancy (2015-03-01). Finding Truth: 5 Principles for Unmasking Atheism, Secularism, and Other God Substitutes (p. 269). David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.
2. “However, when asked how often they personally (not as part of a church worship service) read the Bible, a similar number respond "Every Day" (19 percent) as respond "Rarely/Never" (18 percent). A quarter indicate they read the Bible a few times a week. Fourteen percent say they read the Bible "Once a Week" and another 22 percent say "Once a Month" or "A Few Times a Month."”
LifeWay, Rankin, Russ, 2012, retrieved from: http://www.lifeway.com/Article/research-survey-bible-engagement-churchgoers
The Bible clearly teaches that man is born in sin; he cannot understand the things of God apart from God’s call. But the Bible is equally clear at this point; Paul declares that to us belongs the ministry, or the word, of reconciliation. “And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:18, 19). It is to be our aim to reconcile the world to Christ. Is Paul thus saying that the whole of the world is going to receive the word of God? No, a thousand times no! Rather Paul is saying that we should use every tool possible for offering Christ to the lost world, in the knowledge and hope that some will be saved. It was Paul’s aim to lead to Christ every person whom he met, and he used every bit of persuasive speech that he could muster to influence his audience. “Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus” (Colossians 1:28). A worthy goal—that of presenting every man in Christ, and it was something that Paul knew to be impossible, for there has been no time of universal salvation, nor will there be any time where all sinful men find regeneration. Rather Paul was giving to us a lofty goal—that, if by any means, some more might be saved.
Isn’t Paul at this point suggesting the need of the field of apologetics? If by any means, he says, implying that we ought to be ready to defend the faith against all. Indeed, Peter says this very thing, “Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear” (I Peter 3:15). We have to live in a blinded culture, with a blind people who have devised all sorts of evil thoughts and systems to deny God, but we ought not to remain blinded ourselves. Let us seek to do as both Peter and Paul did, to present in every manner that we can possibly conceive the resurrected Christ in the hope that some might have their veil torn down, and that they might see. We can present the word of God as servants who need not to be ashamed. Examine our proofs, test the words, and perhaps find the very power of God.
Nancy Pearcey has some great insights along this line: “At its best, apologetics includes not only the critique of idols but also the creation of life-giving alternatives. Christians often have a habit of defining themselves by what they are against. Yet to oppose what is wrong, it is most effective to offer something better— to “overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12: 21). If science is often used to bolster arguments for materialism and determinism, then Christians should make it their goal to do better, more accurate science. If literature is used to glamorize sin and brokenness, then Christians should fire up their imaginations to create higher quality, more inspiring works of fiction.”1 Christians from many different perspectives tend to agree on this one main point—that if the Bible says it, then it must be true. Our disagreements tend to come more on interpretation of the Bible, rather than on questioning the foundation of the Bible. In other words, we have great general agreement that the Bible is true, but sometimes we differ on what it is saying. But how can we defend that which we know not?
The knowledge of the Bible is weak among many of our churches. I was a bit shocked at the end of last year when a national movement almost was started to read the Bible through this year, and so many of whom I would term the best of servants admitted to not ever having read the Bible through. According to a recent survey, less than 20 percent of churchgoers read the Bible on a daily basis.2
Believing the Bible to be true, as Jesus did when he reminded us “that the scripture cannot be broken” is a huge asset in our Christian world today. The word of God is the foundation of all wisdom, and that wisdom which is not based on its truths must be error-ridden. It becomes our job, in defending the faith, to proclaim the truth of the scriptures to all, and that includes being able to show where people make their mistakes. But how can we do that unless we know the Bible ourselves, with a knowledge of the vain philosophies that have so successfully captivated so many? The field of apologetics is wide open, and I am so glad to see professors like Nancy Pearcey reminding us to sharpen ourselves to better face the unbelieving world.
Lewis reminds us that when we find ourselves going the wrong way the quickest way back is to turn around and go back the way we came. If you find yourself a believer, but not given to Bible reading, the quickest way to correct that is to begin reading today. Annual Bible reading plans abound, and there is no shortage of devotional reading plans that can be followed. The quickest way to maturity is to begin building the basics in your life, and a daily habit of reading his word will begin to transform your life. I am hoping and praying for a renewed movement for Christians to read their Bible, similar to what I saw starting at the end of last year when many people spoke of beginning Bible reading.
But how are we to read the Bible? First, we need to read it with great respect towards its context. I am reminded of the saint who wanted to know the will of God for his life, and opened his Bible at random, reading, “Judas hanged himself.” Puzzled, he decided to try again, and opening he read, “Go thou and do likewise.” We can all laugh at the old saw, but there is no substitute for knowing the word of God. Many are the Christian fables that abound, and one that I often hear is that there is more than one way of coming to God. I think American Christians may want to believe this because tolerance is considered such a great virtue. Can other religions be correct in any way? Our Lord has said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except by me”? Christianity has closed itself off as the only way to God, and that message rings clearly in the scripture, but how shall we know it if we do not read it?
As to understanding the Bible, that is proving for me to be a lifelong pursuit, and so it ought to be with all of us. We have found the lost treasure, the hidden diamond, and it is both rare and precious. Understanding comes with frequent reading, it is to be hoped, and as we become more aware of the precious treasure we have been given, we should become much more aware of our need to share. Paul tells us that we have a ministry of reconciliation, and I think it is past time that we found out about it. Is it time for your daily Bible reading yet? Our Lord reminds us that blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it. How precious it is that we can go to read the Bible for ourselves, and then seek to keep it. There is a great blessing here for all who will find it.
1. Pearcey, Nancy (2015-03-01). Finding Truth: 5 Principles for Unmasking Atheism, Secularism, and Other God Substitutes (p. 269). David C. Cook. Kindle Edition.
2. “However, when asked how often they personally (not as part of a church worship service) read the Bible, a similar number respond "Every Day" (19 percent) as respond "Rarely/Never" (18 percent). A quarter indicate they read the Bible a few times a week. Fourteen percent say they read the Bible "Once a Week" and another 22 percent say "Once a Month" or "A Few Times a Month."”
LifeWay, Rankin, Russ, 2012, retrieved from: http://www.lifeway.com/Article/research-survey-bible-engagement-churchgoers
Sunday, May 03, 2015
How are we to compare Elijah and John the Baptist?
Before I can compare these two Biblical figures, I need to present them as the Bible does. Elijah is considered the chief of the prophets. Not only does he have a large portion of 1 Kings given to him, but he also appears with Christ at the Mount of Transfiguration. It is there at the mount that Bible scholars figure his appearing with Christ implies that he is representative head of the prophets, and Moses, who also appeared, represents the head of the priests.
In many ways Elijah’s miracles were to prefigure the Christ who was to come. He raised a child from the dead, in the manner of which Christ was going to do. He fed the widow and her son with food that would not run out, even as Christ was to feed the five thousand. He withstood the soldiers of the enemy and conquered them, first with the priest on the mountain, and then with those set by the wicked king to apprehend him, and that is just as Christ is going to do at his return, where none shall be able to stand against his power and might.
John the Baptist, appearing in the New Testament, was nonetheless the last of the Old Testament prophets. It was his job to announce the coming of the Lord, and to proclaim to the people the need of repentance. He baptized many in the name of repentance, and even baptized the Lord when the Lord appeared before him. It was John who saw the Spirit of God descend like a dove and abide upon Jesus.
John the Baptist was like Elijah in several ways. 2 Kings tells us that Elijah “was a man with a garment of hair and with a leather belt around his waist.” Matthew tells us that John clothes “were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist.” If we were to see such men in our times dressed this way we would probably seek to have them committed. I have often wondered what Zechariah and Elizabeth thought of their only son, John, and whether they knew God’s hand was upon him, or if they perhaps thought John had lost it. My reflection is unrewarded, for we are simply not told what they thought; we are told that both of them were prepared for God to do something special. Due to their age, they may not have lived themselves to see what God did through John the Baptist.
John was also like Elijah in temperament. They both confronted kings and rulers with their sin. Elijah confronted Ahab and gave him a dire prophecy about the future of his descendants. John confronted Herod for marrying his brother’s wife, and ended being beheaded for it. They both seemed to like living on the edges of their society. Elijah seemed to show up at unexpected times and places, earning the enmity of Ahab. John seemed to delight in the wilderness, and became a big enough figure that many Jews started coming out to where he was. They both worked very hard to turn people back to God, and they both preached the deep need for repentance.
Interestingly, the connection between the two, though hundreds of years apart, is not as remote as you might think. The last words of the last book of the Old Testament say, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.”
Scholars have long thought that passage meant that either the real Elijah, or one in the spirit of Elijah, would come before the coming of the Lord. Now this is where it gets a bit complicated. John the Baptist was sent as the forerunner of Jesus, and we have clearly seen that he was in the spirit of Elijah. Indeed, had the nation of Israel accepted the coming of their King, John the Baptist would have been considered Elijah. Jesus himself said this (Matthew 11:14), “And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come.”
But if he was not Elijah since Israel rejected their King, then that leaves the prophecy of Malachi unfulfilled. Interestingly Revelation does tell us of two prophets who both seem to be in the spirit and manner of Elijah. Is one of these two men the Elijah which is to come? Or is Elijah going to be another prominent character, not mentioned in the Revelation? I think the former is true, though there is no way to be certain until it happens. It is definitely the job of the two who are called witnesses to turn the nation of Israel back to repentance. This the Bible declares they will faithfully do until 1,260 days are past. That works out to exactly 3 ½ years.
Revelation 11 says that when their testimony is finished, then the beast will attack and kill them, leaving their bodies unburied in the streets of Jerusalem for 3 ½ days. The whole world will rejoice over the death of these two men because they tormented those who lived on the earth. But at the end of the 3 ½ days, God will cause them to come alive again, and will take them up to heaven, even while their enemies are watching. I can only speculate what will happen to the minds of the Jews who are watching, but it is easy to believe that at that point, with the incredible things they saw these two men do, along with their message, that they will as a nation at last recognize their folly. Zechariah tells us that at this time they will mourn for he whom they pierced, an obvious reference to Jesus. The prophets, coming in the spirit and power of Elijah, will have successfully accomplished that for which they were sent, to turn the hearts of Israel back to their God.
Why two prophets in Revelation, but only one prophet foretold in Malachi? I do not have an answer for that, but some scholars have suggested the identity of the two as Elijah and Moses, since these two were the ones appearing on the Mount of Transfiguration. Others suggest Elijah and Enoch, since these two men, out of all the men who have ever walked the earth were the only two not to have died. Enoch, says Genesis, was not, for God took him. Elijah was separated from Elisha by the chariots of fire, and a whirlwind carried him off to heaven. It would fulfill the Scripture just to have one prophet coming in the name of Elijah, and turning the nation toward God. But how God intends to do it no one is yet sure. We have to but wait and watch.
But the very names of Elijah and Enoch bring to mind that which the Lord has long promised. Both men escaped death, prefiguring the Rapture, the point at which God will pull his children out of the earth, that his judgments might at last be poured out upon the earth. Woe to those who are caught in this time! Think of it! The two witnesses are turning waters into blood, and bringing plagues upon man, and this is a woeful judgment, but at the same time it is evident in Revelation that judgments are being poured out upon the earth in many other ways. Israel will strike a false peace that will end with the death of the witnesses, and then the armies of the Middle East will mass to attack Israel. It is at that time, that great moment, the last possible moment before the little nation of Israel is destroyed, that the Son of Man shall appear, and all of the anger and sin against Israel shall come to exactly nothing.
Jesus tells us that he will come into Jerusalem, and there he shall rule for 1,000 years, bringing the peaceful bliss at last upon the earth, that has so desperately needed it. Zechariah and Isaiah describe this time as a time when men shall put away the instruments of war, beating their swords into plowshears, lifespans of men shall greatly increase, and all men shall honor the Jews as the nation which brought the Savior. Are we now living in the generation which shall see these things unfold? May it be so, and may Jesus return soon, heralded by one like unto Elijah.
In many ways Elijah’s miracles were to prefigure the Christ who was to come. He raised a child from the dead, in the manner of which Christ was going to do. He fed the widow and her son with food that would not run out, even as Christ was to feed the five thousand. He withstood the soldiers of the enemy and conquered them, first with the priest on the mountain, and then with those set by the wicked king to apprehend him, and that is just as Christ is going to do at his return, where none shall be able to stand against his power and might.
John the Baptist, appearing in the New Testament, was nonetheless the last of the Old Testament prophets. It was his job to announce the coming of the Lord, and to proclaim to the people the need of repentance. He baptized many in the name of repentance, and even baptized the Lord when the Lord appeared before him. It was John who saw the Spirit of God descend like a dove and abide upon Jesus.
John the Baptist was like Elijah in several ways. 2 Kings tells us that Elijah “was a man with a garment of hair and with a leather belt around his waist.” Matthew tells us that John clothes “were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist.” If we were to see such men in our times dressed this way we would probably seek to have them committed. I have often wondered what Zechariah and Elizabeth thought of their only son, John, and whether they knew God’s hand was upon him, or if they perhaps thought John had lost it. My reflection is unrewarded, for we are simply not told what they thought; we are told that both of them were prepared for God to do something special. Due to their age, they may not have lived themselves to see what God did through John the Baptist.
John was also like Elijah in temperament. They both confronted kings and rulers with their sin. Elijah confronted Ahab and gave him a dire prophecy about the future of his descendants. John confronted Herod for marrying his brother’s wife, and ended being beheaded for it. They both seemed to like living on the edges of their society. Elijah seemed to show up at unexpected times and places, earning the enmity of Ahab. John seemed to delight in the wilderness, and became a big enough figure that many Jews started coming out to where he was. They both worked very hard to turn people back to God, and they both preached the deep need for repentance.
Interestingly, the connection between the two, though hundreds of years apart, is not as remote as you might think. The last words of the last book of the Old Testament say, “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.”
Scholars have long thought that passage meant that either the real Elijah, or one in the spirit of Elijah, would come before the coming of the Lord. Now this is where it gets a bit complicated. John the Baptist was sent as the forerunner of Jesus, and we have clearly seen that he was in the spirit of Elijah. Indeed, had the nation of Israel accepted the coming of their King, John the Baptist would have been considered Elijah. Jesus himself said this (Matthew 11:14), “And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come.”
But if he was not Elijah since Israel rejected their King, then that leaves the prophecy of Malachi unfulfilled. Interestingly Revelation does tell us of two prophets who both seem to be in the spirit and manner of Elijah. Is one of these two men the Elijah which is to come? Or is Elijah going to be another prominent character, not mentioned in the Revelation? I think the former is true, though there is no way to be certain until it happens. It is definitely the job of the two who are called witnesses to turn the nation of Israel back to repentance. This the Bible declares they will faithfully do until 1,260 days are past. That works out to exactly 3 ½ years.
Revelation 11 says that when their testimony is finished, then the beast will attack and kill them, leaving their bodies unburied in the streets of Jerusalem for 3 ½ days. The whole world will rejoice over the death of these two men because they tormented those who lived on the earth. But at the end of the 3 ½ days, God will cause them to come alive again, and will take them up to heaven, even while their enemies are watching. I can only speculate what will happen to the minds of the Jews who are watching, but it is easy to believe that at that point, with the incredible things they saw these two men do, along with their message, that they will as a nation at last recognize their folly. Zechariah tells us that at this time they will mourn for he whom they pierced, an obvious reference to Jesus. The prophets, coming in the spirit and power of Elijah, will have successfully accomplished that for which they were sent, to turn the hearts of Israel back to their God.
Why two prophets in Revelation, but only one prophet foretold in Malachi? I do not have an answer for that, but some scholars have suggested the identity of the two as Elijah and Moses, since these two were the ones appearing on the Mount of Transfiguration. Others suggest Elijah and Enoch, since these two men, out of all the men who have ever walked the earth were the only two not to have died. Enoch, says Genesis, was not, for God took him. Elijah was separated from Elisha by the chariots of fire, and a whirlwind carried him off to heaven. It would fulfill the Scripture just to have one prophet coming in the name of Elijah, and turning the nation toward God. But how God intends to do it no one is yet sure. We have to but wait and watch.
But the very names of Elijah and Enoch bring to mind that which the Lord has long promised. Both men escaped death, prefiguring the Rapture, the point at which God will pull his children out of the earth, that his judgments might at last be poured out upon the earth. Woe to those who are caught in this time! Think of it! The two witnesses are turning waters into blood, and bringing plagues upon man, and this is a woeful judgment, but at the same time it is evident in Revelation that judgments are being poured out upon the earth in many other ways. Israel will strike a false peace that will end with the death of the witnesses, and then the armies of the Middle East will mass to attack Israel. It is at that time, that great moment, the last possible moment before the little nation of Israel is destroyed, that the Son of Man shall appear, and all of the anger and sin against Israel shall come to exactly nothing.
Jesus tells us that he will come into Jerusalem, and there he shall rule for 1,000 years, bringing the peaceful bliss at last upon the earth, that has so desperately needed it. Zechariah and Isaiah describe this time as a time when men shall put away the instruments of war, beating their swords into plowshears, lifespans of men shall greatly increase, and all men shall honor the Jews as the nation which brought the Savior. Are we now living in the generation which shall see these things unfold? May it be so, and may Jesus return soon, heralded by one like unto Elijah.
Monday, April 27, 2015
What is wrong with allegorical interpretation?
When I think of allegory, I think of Tolkien’s use of the word in his introduction to The Lord of the Rings. If I recall his remark about allegory correctly, he said that he “cordially dislike[d] allegory in all its manifestations”. I remember trying to get a handle on the meaning of allegory, and wondering why Tolkien despised it so.
Well, as an adult who has long studied the church, I have come to appreciate why Tolkien despised it so. When it is applied to the Bible, allegory takes the meaning which the interpreter wants to give it, and he can follow his fancy to its furthest borders. I have now read many allegorical interpretations of passages in the Bible, and I can certainly attest to the creative imaginations of the interpreters. The early Christian Fathers were much more careful to distinguish between literal and allegory. It was not until much later in history that allegory began to rear its ugly head. Pentecost, in his epic work on Things to Come, tells us that “Origen was the first to lay down, in connection with the allegorical method of the Jewish Platonist, Philo, a formal theory of interpretation, which he carried out in a long series of exegetical works remarkable for industry and ingenuity, but meager in solid results. He considered the Bible a living organism, consisting of three elements which answer to the body, soul, and spirit of man, after the Platonic psychology. Accordingly, he attributed to the Scriptures a threefold sense: (1) a somatic, literal, or historical sense, furnished immediately by the meaning of the words, but only serving as a veil for a higher idea; (2) a psychic or moral sense, animating the first, and serving for general edification; (3) a pneumatic or mystic and ideal sense, for those who stand on the high ground of philosophical knowledge.” Unfortunately, allegory was to lead many away from the truth of the scriptures until, at the time of the Reformation, the Bible began again to take a central point in developing our creed.
John Walvoord, in his excellent commentary on Revelation points to the many many people who have interpreted Revelation according to the whims of their own personal history (allegory), “The very multiplicity of such interpretations and identifications of the personnel of Revelation with a variety of historical characters is its own refutation. If the historical method is the correct one, it is clear until now that no one has found the key.” That is the huge problem with an allegorical approach to the Bible. Meaning is found in the interpreter rather than in the text, and confusion always results.
Yet for some reason, many otherwise excellent commentators lose it when they come to prophecy. Bewildered by the symbols and metaphors that abound in such works like Revelation, they mistakenly think the correct course is to abandon normal interpretation. Yet how can we possibly hope to understand anything if God did not use language in its native sense, to communicate his message and hope to a world in desperate need of a Savior.
There are some in the church who would substitute the church for Israel, but in order to do that, they are forced to allegorize many of the promises to Israel. A little over a hundred years ago no one looked to the Bible and foretold the regathering of Israel. Yet the scripture is plain, and indeed Revelation focuses heavily on Israel’s plight before the world. The lack of Israel as a nation is the biggest single reason prophecy was allegorized. But the lack of the nation Israel also led to other mistakes by the church, mainly in the “allegorizing” of Israel to mean the church.
Romans Eleven is where much of this confusion originates, and it is to that chapter that we must go to find any resolution. Paul tells us that we have been grafted in where Israel, because of their rejection, were broken off. We have replaced Israel then, in a sense, gaining the salvation which they had sought. At this precise point, many have allegorized the church to have replaced Israel entirely. But this is clearly not what Paul is teaching. He goes on, in an often ignored verse and tells us, (11:25) “that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob.” The plain meaning of the text is that the blindness which happens to Israel is but to be temporary, and that when God is finished with the Gentiles, his Son will return to Sion. At that time all of Israel will be turned back to the Lord. While we may argue about the precise meaning of all, there is no doubt that God is going to turn the whole of the nation of Israel back to him. Paul explains to us the reasoning and goodness of our God in verse 29, proclaiming that “God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
In other words, God is not at all finished with Israel. They did not lose the unconditional promises of God—rather they lost the blessing and presence of God for a time, because they rejected their Savior, but God intends to make every word of his promises to Abraham come true. One day, he will return to Jerusalem and there will become the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Why? Because God is faithful even when Israel is not.
There is a similar theme taught in many Christian circles—that God is faithful even when we are not. Perseverance of the saints is taught almost everywhere, and loudly do we proclaim the faithfulness of God, even in the face of our wayward hearts. How is it that so many make the tragic mistake of proclaiming that God is through with Israel because of the hardness of their hearts? Since the beginning of time God had to foreknow their hardness of heart. Did he make those famous promises to Abraham knowing that they would not be literally kept? A thousand times no! God has always intended to fulfill each and every promise.
It is of course different with the conditional covenant that God made with Moses. Under that covenant, Israel had to promise to keep the law, a forbidding task that they proved never equal to. Thus the scripture proclaims that Christ is the end of the law for everyone that believes. The law was intended to be a tutor to lead them to receive their Messiah, but they did not expect a suffering Savior, except for a remnant that did believe. Some in the church proclaim that the church has now become the recipient of all the promises to Israel, but God says his “gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
Having Israel clearly in sight in the world makes it much easier to literally interpret these passages; I do not know how I would have fared in past centuries without the evidence of Israel to foreshadow God’s faithfulness. But it is not important how I would have fared, for now we have that evidence, and many obscure passages that we felt we had to allegorize away can now be taken literally. Israel stands as a nation in the world today because of the sovereign purpose of God. Should we not believe that he means what he says when he says all of Israel will turn and be saved?
I have a friend who himself grew up with many Jewish friends, and when my friend looks at these passages he remarks that the friends he had would never accept Jesus. He is absolutely correct! It would take a real miracle for Israel to finally recognize her king. But that is exactly what the Bible says we are going to get. A real miracle. In the Old Testament there are even passages that tell us that Jews will be called back out of foreign lands, and will at last have a peaceful home. God will at last live among us—and it does not get more miraculous than that!
I think, as an older man, I have come to appreciate Tolkien’s comment a bit more, and I agree totally with him. I “cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations”.
1. Pentecost, J. Dwight (2010-05-11). Things to Come: A Study in Biblical Eschatology (Kindle Locations 553-559). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
2. Walvoord, John (1989-03-01). The Revelation of Jesus Christ (p. 19). Moody Publishers - A. Kindle Edition.
Well, as an adult who has long studied the church, I have come to appreciate why Tolkien despised it so. When it is applied to the Bible, allegory takes the meaning which the interpreter wants to give it, and he can follow his fancy to its furthest borders. I have now read many allegorical interpretations of passages in the Bible, and I can certainly attest to the creative imaginations of the interpreters. The early Christian Fathers were much more careful to distinguish between literal and allegory. It was not until much later in history that allegory began to rear its ugly head. Pentecost, in his epic work on Things to Come, tells us that “Origen was the first to lay down, in connection with the allegorical method of the Jewish Platonist, Philo, a formal theory of interpretation, which he carried out in a long series of exegetical works remarkable for industry and ingenuity, but meager in solid results. He considered the Bible a living organism, consisting of three elements which answer to the body, soul, and spirit of man, after the Platonic psychology. Accordingly, he attributed to the Scriptures a threefold sense: (1) a somatic, literal, or historical sense, furnished immediately by the meaning of the words, but only serving as a veil for a higher idea; (2) a psychic or moral sense, animating the first, and serving for general edification; (3) a pneumatic or mystic and ideal sense, for those who stand on the high ground of philosophical knowledge.” Unfortunately, allegory was to lead many away from the truth of the scriptures until, at the time of the Reformation, the Bible began again to take a central point in developing our creed.
John Walvoord, in his excellent commentary on Revelation points to the many many people who have interpreted Revelation according to the whims of their own personal history (allegory), “The very multiplicity of such interpretations and identifications of the personnel of Revelation with a variety of historical characters is its own refutation. If the historical method is the correct one, it is clear until now that no one has found the key.” That is the huge problem with an allegorical approach to the Bible. Meaning is found in the interpreter rather than in the text, and confusion always results.
Yet for some reason, many otherwise excellent commentators lose it when they come to prophecy. Bewildered by the symbols and metaphors that abound in such works like Revelation, they mistakenly think the correct course is to abandon normal interpretation. Yet how can we possibly hope to understand anything if God did not use language in its native sense, to communicate his message and hope to a world in desperate need of a Savior.
There are some in the church who would substitute the church for Israel, but in order to do that, they are forced to allegorize many of the promises to Israel. A little over a hundred years ago no one looked to the Bible and foretold the regathering of Israel. Yet the scripture is plain, and indeed Revelation focuses heavily on Israel’s plight before the world. The lack of Israel as a nation is the biggest single reason prophecy was allegorized. But the lack of the nation Israel also led to other mistakes by the church, mainly in the “allegorizing” of Israel to mean the church.
Romans Eleven is where much of this confusion originates, and it is to that chapter that we must go to find any resolution. Paul tells us that we have been grafted in where Israel, because of their rejection, were broken off. We have replaced Israel then, in a sense, gaining the salvation which they had sought. At this precise point, many have allegorized the church to have replaced Israel entirely. But this is clearly not what Paul is teaching. He goes on, in an often ignored verse and tells us, (11:25) “that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob.” The plain meaning of the text is that the blindness which happens to Israel is but to be temporary, and that when God is finished with the Gentiles, his Son will return to Sion. At that time all of Israel will be turned back to the Lord. While we may argue about the precise meaning of all, there is no doubt that God is going to turn the whole of the nation of Israel back to him. Paul explains to us the reasoning and goodness of our God in verse 29, proclaiming that “God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
In other words, God is not at all finished with Israel. They did not lose the unconditional promises of God—rather they lost the blessing and presence of God for a time, because they rejected their Savior, but God intends to make every word of his promises to Abraham come true. One day, he will return to Jerusalem and there will become the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Why? Because God is faithful even when Israel is not.
There is a similar theme taught in many Christian circles—that God is faithful even when we are not. Perseverance of the saints is taught almost everywhere, and loudly do we proclaim the faithfulness of God, even in the face of our wayward hearts. How is it that so many make the tragic mistake of proclaiming that God is through with Israel because of the hardness of their hearts? Since the beginning of time God had to foreknow their hardness of heart. Did he make those famous promises to Abraham knowing that they would not be literally kept? A thousand times no! God has always intended to fulfill each and every promise.
It is of course different with the conditional covenant that God made with Moses. Under that covenant, Israel had to promise to keep the law, a forbidding task that they proved never equal to. Thus the scripture proclaims that Christ is the end of the law for everyone that believes. The law was intended to be a tutor to lead them to receive their Messiah, but they did not expect a suffering Savior, except for a remnant that did believe. Some in the church proclaim that the church has now become the recipient of all the promises to Israel, but God says his “gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
Having Israel clearly in sight in the world makes it much easier to literally interpret these passages; I do not know how I would have fared in past centuries without the evidence of Israel to foreshadow God’s faithfulness. But it is not important how I would have fared, for now we have that evidence, and many obscure passages that we felt we had to allegorize away can now be taken literally. Israel stands as a nation in the world today because of the sovereign purpose of God. Should we not believe that he means what he says when he says all of Israel will turn and be saved?
I have a friend who himself grew up with many Jewish friends, and when my friend looks at these passages he remarks that the friends he had would never accept Jesus. He is absolutely correct! It would take a real miracle for Israel to finally recognize her king. But that is exactly what the Bible says we are going to get. A real miracle. In the Old Testament there are even passages that tell us that Jews will be called back out of foreign lands, and will at last have a peaceful home. God will at last live among us—and it does not get more miraculous than that!
I think, as an older man, I have come to appreciate Tolkien’s comment a bit more, and I agree totally with him. I “cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations”.
1. Pentecost, J. Dwight (2010-05-11). Things to Come: A Study in Biblical Eschatology (Kindle Locations 553-559). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
2. Walvoord, John (1989-03-01). The Revelation of Jesus Christ (p. 19). Moody Publishers - A. Kindle Edition.
Saturday, April 25, 2015
What does the Bible say about diversity?
The Bible is absolutely clear on the subject of diversity, if by diversity we are meaning racial or cultural background. The gospel is to be made available to all, regardless of their background. But it is also absolutely clear that every lifestyle is a sinful one, utterly rejected by God. There is no one, not one anywhere in the world who will be able to clothe himself in acts to please God and gain salvation. So if you will allow me the somewhat painful quip, the meaning of diversity begins to sharply diversify from the meaning given to us in this world.
We are taught in our culture today to accept every lifestyle and culture. Indeed the national mantra seems to have a blind eye in differentiating between lifestyles, and national morality seems to be unable to call any lifestyle good or bad in comparison to others. Not so with the Bible. When we are talking about any lifestyle at all they are all condemned by the righteous God as being utterly worthless to save us. When we dress in our best clothes of righteousness, they are as filthy rags in the sight of God, and we could never hope on that basis to have standing with God.
Indeed then, diversity becomes very different. The African, the American, or the European are at the same disadvantage—all are lost no matter how noble or perverse their lifestyle. It is never a question of bringing ourselves to God in hopes of acceptance, for such hope is always doomed. We stand, as Jonathan Edwards long ago said, as sinners in the hands of an angry God.
But having said that, does God judge us differently? Yes, of course he does. God recognizes that there is a great deal of difference in the way we sin—you might say that some of us are better than others at it—and thus will be subject to a stricter judgment. Actually this judgment is different in two ways. First, Jesus tells us a story where the sheep and the goats are separated, one on the right hand and the other on the left. This judgment might be looked at as the big judgment. Those with faith in Christ are on the one side; those without faith are on the other side. There is no redemption for those without faith, for the provision for sin has been once for all made when God gave his Son on the cross, that whosoever believes might be saved. The “whosoever” includes all sorts of people from all sorts of diverse backgrounds—but they all must have faith in the work of God for salvation.
Those who are sorted into the faith side are still subject to judgment, but their judgment is at the bema seat of Christ. The New Testament refers to this judgment often, but perhaps the one most often recalled is found in 2 Corinthians 5:10, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” The peril of one’s salvation is not the question of this judgment; rather the judgment is given to the faithful sons of God, as well as those sons who have not proved faithful, yet still have faith. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians that fire will test the quality of each man’s work (1 Cor. 3:14, 15), and that his works might well be burned up, and the man will suffer loss, yet will still remain saved. No matter what our background before Christ might be, we are called to leave that diversity and join the unity of the body, living daily to show the fruits of the Spirit himself, such as love, joy, peace, and patience. In conclusion then, we see clearly that there is a judgment for the saved, and that God will weigh that which we have done.
But there is also another judgment, and this is for those who are goats, separated initially by Christ. They are to appear in what the Bible calls the Great White Throne judgment. Here, John tells us in Revelation 20:13 that God will judge each person “according to what he has done”. Again the Bible teaches us, if you will allow my punning again, that God is going to judge “diversely”, first for those who found Christ, and also for those who are lost. They will be very different judgments, and yet God will reward and punish according to what people have done.
James, the brother of Jesus, tells us in what may be the first epistle of the New Testament, that we are not to judge by appearances, and we are not to make evil decisions based on judgments. When we have the poor enter our church, and tell them to sit down there, while we say to the rich, take this seat of honor, we do evil. We, as a church, are to treat one another with the respect that is due brothers and sisters in the Lord, no matter how diverse the background is. When we so act we are demeaning not just our brothers, but also ourselves, for God has called us to a station that should eagerly show love to those who are in the family of God.
And that thought brings us precisely to the key difference in the way we define diversity. The country insists that all lifestyles are worthy of respect, and that is altogether untrue. The Bible teaches us the exact opposite—all our righteousness is as filthy rags, and there is none righteous, no not one. We are not to accept benignly every lifestyle we see, but rather we are to make judgments about the lifestyles we see, even while loving all of those who are so woefully lost. Paul tells us that we are given a ministry of reconciliation, and that we are to lovingly share the gospel with those who still have the veil over their hearts, if by any means, that veil might be lifted. We are, as Paul says (2 Corinthians 5:15, to present Christ who “died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him.” We are called away from those horrible lifestyles unto the living and true God, whom we behold for the first time.
Jude, another brother of Jesus, says that we “are to snatch others from the fire and save them . . . hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh”. The gospel has been wisely defined as one beggar telling another beggar where to get bread. The challenge for older Christians is to remember that they are but beggars, but beggars with one mission, and that to reconcile other beggars that they might come to see the Bread of Life. We who have been rescued ourselves from our dark way of life, ought to seek, if by any means, that others themselves are rescued from their darkness.
We should not ever forget what God has so plainly told us. Paul reminds us of the words of Moses in Romans 10:19, “I was found by those who did not seek me; I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me.” Jesus tells us the same thing when the Jews refused his message, (Luke 14:21) “Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” We are chosen, in the profound mysteries and unknowable wisdom of God, but let us never forget that part of the reason for which we were chosen is that we might arouse Israel to jealousy. We have been given that which they have spurned, and we ought always remember that we were chosen, in part, because of their stubborn refusal to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah.
So coming around in a full circle, I might suggest that we were chosen for the very reason that God planned, that is, to diversify and enlarge his plan of salvation to extend to all people, and not just Israel. When we get to heaven, we will stand proudly next to all sorts, the proud and the humble, the drunkard and the fool, the wise man and the prudent, the lustful and the gluttons, the martyr and the denier, the Black, the Asian, and the white—and we shall all be in full accord and loving each other, as different as we could possibly be. With one caveat, all of us shall be one in he who called us, saved and rescued from our waywardness by a God who did not want to judge us, but rather sought to bring us pardon and relief in Christ. Diversity? I do not think we will ever see so great a diversity, but at the same time we will see that we were all sinners, rescued and called out from the old unto the new. Bless the Lord, oh my soul!
We are taught in our culture today to accept every lifestyle and culture. Indeed the national mantra seems to have a blind eye in differentiating between lifestyles, and national morality seems to be unable to call any lifestyle good or bad in comparison to others. Not so with the Bible. When we are talking about any lifestyle at all they are all condemned by the righteous God as being utterly worthless to save us. When we dress in our best clothes of righteousness, they are as filthy rags in the sight of God, and we could never hope on that basis to have standing with God.
Indeed then, diversity becomes very different. The African, the American, or the European are at the same disadvantage—all are lost no matter how noble or perverse their lifestyle. It is never a question of bringing ourselves to God in hopes of acceptance, for such hope is always doomed. We stand, as Jonathan Edwards long ago said, as sinners in the hands of an angry God.
But having said that, does God judge us differently? Yes, of course he does. God recognizes that there is a great deal of difference in the way we sin—you might say that some of us are better than others at it—and thus will be subject to a stricter judgment. Actually this judgment is different in two ways. First, Jesus tells us a story where the sheep and the goats are separated, one on the right hand and the other on the left. This judgment might be looked at as the big judgment. Those with faith in Christ are on the one side; those without faith are on the other side. There is no redemption for those without faith, for the provision for sin has been once for all made when God gave his Son on the cross, that whosoever believes might be saved. The “whosoever” includes all sorts of people from all sorts of diverse backgrounds—but they all must have faith in the work of God for salvation.
Those who are sorted into the faith side are still subject to judgment, but their judgment is at the bema seat of Christ. The New Testament refers to this judgment often, but perhaps the one most often recalled is found in 2 Corinthians 5:10, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” The peril of one’s salvation is not the question of this judgment; rather the judgment is given to the faithful sons of God, as well as those sons who have not proved faithful, yet still have faith. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians that fire will test the quality of each man’s work (1 Cor. 3:14, 15), and that his works might well be burned up, and the man will suffer loss, yet will still remain saved. No matter what our background before Christ might be, we are called to leave that diversity and join the unity of the body, living daily to show the fruits of the Spirit himself, such as love, joy, peace, and patience. In conclusion then, we see clearly that there is a judgment for the saved, and that God will weigh that which we have done.
But there is also another judgment, and this is for those who are goats, separated initially by Christ. They are to appear in what the Bible calls the Great White Throne judgment. Here, John tells us in Revelation 20:13 that God will judge each person “according to what he has done”. Again the Bible teaches us, if you will allow my punning again, that God is going to judge “diversely”, first for those who found Christ, and also for those who are lost. They will be very different judgments, and yet God will reward and punish according to what people have done.
James, the brother of Jesus, tells us in what may be the first epistle of the New Testament, that we are not to judge by appearances, and we are not to make evil decisions based on judgments. When we have the poor enter our church, and tell them to sit down there, while we say to the rich, take this seat of honor, we do evil. We, as a church, are to treat one another with the respect that is due brothers and sisters in the Lord, no matter how diverse the background is. When we so act we are demeaning not just our brothers, but also ourselves, for God has called us to a station that should eagerly show love to those who are in the family of God.
And that thought brings us precisely to the key difference in the way we define diversity. The country insists that all lifestyles are worthy of respect, and that is altogether untrue. The Bible teaches us the exact opposite—all our righteousness is as filthy rags, and there is none righteous, no not one. We are not to accept benignly every lifestyle we see, but rather we are to make judgments about the lifestyles we see, even while loving all of those who are so woefully lost. Paul tells us that we are given a ministry of reconciliation, and that we are to lovingly share the gospel with those who still have the veil over their hearts, if by any means, that veil might be lifted. We are, as Paul says (2 Corinthians 5:15, to present Christ who “died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him.” We are called away from those horrible lifestyles unto the living and true God, whom we behold for the first time.
Jude, another brother of Jesus, says that we “are to snatch others from the fire and save them . . . hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh”. The gospel has been wisely defined as one beggar telling another beggar where to get bread. The challenge for older Christians is to remember that they are but beggars, but beggars with one mission, and that to reconcile other beggars that they might come to see the Bread of Life. We who have been rescued ourselves from our dark way of life, ought to seek, if by any means, that others themselves are rescued from their darkness.
We should not ever forget what God has so plainly told us. Paul reminds us of the words of Moses in Romans 10:19, “I was found by those who did not seek me; I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me.” Jesus tells us the same thing when the Jews refused his message, (Luke 14:21) “Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” We are chosen, in the profound mysteries and unknowable wisdom of God, but let us never forget that part of the reason for which we were chosen is that we might arouse Israel to jealousy. We have been given that which they have spurned, and we ought always remember that we were chosen, in part, because of their stubborn refusal to acknowledge Jesus as the Messiah.
So coming around in a full circle, I might suggest that we were chosen for the very reason that God planned, that is, to diversify and enlarge his plan of salvation to extend to all people, and not just Israel. When we get to heaven, we will stand proudly next to all sorts, the proud and the humble, the drunkard and the fool, the wise man and the prudent, the lustful and the gluttons, the martyr and the denier, the Black, the Asian, and the white—and we shall all be in full accord and loving each other, as different as we could possibly be. With one caveat, all of us shall be one in he who called us, saved and rescued from our waywardness by a God who did not want to judge us, but rather sought to bring us pardon and relief in Christ. Diversity? I do not think we will ever see so great a diversity, but at the same time we will see that we were all sinners, rescued and called out from the old unto the new. Bless the Lord, oh my soul!
Saturday, April 11, 2015
Part 7-What are the seven cries of the cross?
1. Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
Into thy hands I commit my Spirit. What does it mean? The obvious meaning is that God the Son has committed his Spirit into the hands of God the Father. But there is so much going on now that I am afraid it gets rather more complicated. In the gospel of John, Jesus tells us that the work he is doing has been given him from the Father (“For the work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me.”—John 5:36) The choice was definitely one which Jesus freely made, but at the same time it was the will of the Father. (“For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.”—John 6:38) Confused yet? In another place he tells us that He, Jesus, has the power to lay his life down, and power to take it up again. But to confuse the issue, he adds that he receives this commandment from his Father (“I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.”—John 10:18). The answer lies in the very personality of the Triune God. The Father and the Son, being one, are always in perfect accord with one another. If the sun were to hit the one, we would see the perfect shadow of the other; they are that close together in nature. Being of one there is no separation of wishes or accord, but they are one, in a fashion which on this side of the world I can never hope to comprehend.
Remember that Jesus remonstrates Peter, who does completely exhibit his willingness to fight for his Lord, and does it by cutting off the ear of one of the servants. Jesus reminds all there, saying that he has only to ask and the Father will send legions of angels (Matt. 26:53). But it was not to be, and Peter, confused and blown away, runs and hides and then denies his Lord. Peter was willing to fight, but he knew nothing about submission to desperately wicked unrighteousness. In everything, Jesus was completely and perfectly submitted to the Father.
It was at this point, culminating in the resurrection, which so much changes for the believer. I think Chafer suggests more than 30 identifiable changes that happen at or near the time of a single person’s salvation. Here, with the last cry, Jesus is giving himself to the Father in his death, and beginning that process which enables you and me to come to Christ. There is probably much more going on here than we can ever give voice to, and I have unanswered questions. Does Christ use this period of death to descend into hell, and as other places in the New Testament seem to indicate, does he preach to those in hell? He clearly tells us that he will spend three days and three nights in the “belly of the earth”. What did he do during those times? How is it that those who were marked by their faith before Christ—how is it that they were saved? Hebrews clearly teaches it is given to man once to die and after this the judgment. I do wonder exactly what happened those days and nights when he was dead—perhaps one day we will find out just what our spectacular Lord did, but now we just do not know. The legalities alone, taking back the ownership of some men from Satan, would be fascinating to know and understand. We do know that what our Lord did those days has forever transferred us to the kingdom which is above.
Colossians 1 at least gives us a glimmer of what Christ did on the cross. It says, (v. 21&22) “And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight.” When Christ declared it is finished, it was finished in this sense also. We are wicked. We are reconciled to God. And nothing, not our wicked return to wrong behavior, nor anything else shall pluck us out of the Father’s hand, for we are once for all delivered by the sacrifice of Christ, in fulfilling the purpose of the Father. It is God who saves us; and it is his mercy which overcomes.
Though we emphasize properly the grace of God, the Bible knows little of the Christian who is not pressing onward with his calling—there is not much room in the Bible given to Christians who walk away from their God. And the most sober warnings are attached to those who do wander—up to and including questioning the foundation of their calling. So it is in Colossians, the very next verse: “If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister” (v. 23). One of the expected signs when we look at every Christian, is that somewhere and somehow they are continuing in the faith, and their hope in the gospel continues.
Having lived a long life already, I have had the misfortune to see many who chose not to walk with God, sometimes for a period of years, though I thought I knew their character well enough to judge that they were Christian. In every case, I have discerned the saint being brought back in some manner into the fold. “No man shall pluck them out of my Father’s hand.” I would guess that even we ourselves, when we find ourselves unfaithful, yet God is always faithful—it is just part of who he is. As Paul says he cannot deny himself. Nevertheless, appreciating the wonderful and matchless free grace of God is not warrant for the person who is outwardly rejecting the clear counsel of his God to assume that grace is there; he should examine himself closely to see whether he is, indeed, in the faith.
Colossians is a great short book that covers some of the fundamentals of the cross. Just as Jesus was able to confidently commit his Spirit to the Father’s hand, so also he was able to take our sins and nail them to the cross, blotting out everything which would separate us from God: (Colossians 2:14) “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.” In this gospel we are clearly given freedom, but the supposition is that the saint who truly knows the grace of God, will turn willingly toward the Savior, and surrender that freedom willingly to become, as Paul says, a slave of Jesus Christ.
When we know all that we has done for us, moving us past the keeping of laws and rules which would only condemn us all over again, when we realize the freedom that we have because of Jesus going to the cross, that we might not ever have to, our hearts should be so filled with love and appreciation that giving ourselves to him each day for the rest of our lives ought to be our privilege. “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power” (Colossians 2:9, 10). Or perhaps more powerfully as translated in the NIV version: “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been give fullness in Christ.” Think of it—the Scripture is clear. We have been given fullness in Christ—made to be complete, and yet we find ourselves so incomplete. In the sight of God, he looks at us and sees no blemish, but freely loves us because every sin we have committed is covered by the work of his Son. How that ought to motivate us to seek to serve and follow him! Indeed, hadn’t our daily cry ought to be that of our Savior? Should we not be crying out daily, Father, into Thy hands I commit my spirit. It is only in him that we can find ourselves made complete, free to be what he has created us to be.
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
Into thy hands I commit my Spirit. What does it mean? The obvious meaning is that God the Son has committed his Spirit into the hands of God the Father. But there is so much going on now that I am afraid it gets rather more complicated. In the gospel of John, Jesus tells us that the work he is doing has been given him from the Father (“For the work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me.”—John 5:36) The choice was definitely one which Jesus freely made, but at the same time it was the will of the Father. (“For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.”—John 6:38) Confused yet? In another place he tells us that He, Jesus, has the power to lay his life down, and power to take it up again. But to confuse the issue, he adds that he receives this commandment from his Father (“I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.”—John 10:18). The answer lies in the very personality of the Triune God. The Father and the Son, being one, are always in perfect accord with one another. If the sun were to hit the one, we would see the perfect shadow of the other; they are that close together in nature. Being of one there is no separation of wishes or accord, but they are one, in a fashion which on this side of the world I can never hope to comprehend.
Remember that Jesus remonstrates Peter, who does completely exhibit his willingness to fight for his Lord, and does it by cutting off the ear of one of the servants. Jesus reminds all there, saying that he has only to ask and the Father will send legions of angels (Matt. 26:53). But it was not to be, and Peter, confused and blown away, runs and hides and then denies his Lord. Peter was willing to fight, but he knew nothing about submission to desperately wicked unrighteousness. In everything, Jesus was completely and perfectly submitted to the Father.
It was at this point, culminating in the resurrection, which so much changes for the believer. I think Chafer suggests more than 30 identifiable changes that happen at or near the time of a single person’s salvation. Here, with the last cry, Jesus is giving himself to the Father in his death, and beginning that process which enables you and me to come to Christ. There is probably much more going on here than we can ever give voice to, and I have unanswered questions. Does Christ use this period of death to descend into hell, and as other places in the New Testament seem to indicate, does he preach to those in hell? He clearly tells us that he will spend three days and three nights in the “belly of the earth”. What did he do during those times? How is it that those who were marked by their faith before Christ—how is it that they were saved? Hebrews clearly teaches it is given to man once to die and after this the judgment. I do wonder exactly what happened those days and nights when he was dead—perhaps one day we will find out just what our spectacular Lord did, but now we just do not know. The legalities alone, taking back the ownership of some men from Satan, would be fascinating to know and understand. We do know that what our Lord did those days has forever transferred us to the kingdom which is above.
Colossians 1 at least gives us a glimmer of what Christ did on the cross. It says, (v. 21&22) “And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight.” When Christ declared it is finished, it was finished in this sense also. We are wicked. We are reconciled to God. And nothing, not our wicked return to wrong behavior, nor anything else shall pluck us out of the Father’s hand, for we are once for all delivered by the sacrifice of Christ, in fulfilling the purpose of the Father. It is God who saves us; and it is his mercy which overcomes.
Though we emphasize properly the grace of God, the Bible knows little of the Christian who is not pressing onward with his calling—there is not much room in the Bible given to Christians who walk away from their God. And the most sober warnings are attached to those who do wander—up to and including questioning the foundation of their calling. So it is in Colossians, the very next verse: “If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister” (v. 23). One of the expected signs when we look at every Christian, is that somewhere and somehow they are continuing in the faith, and their hope in the gospel continues.
Having lived a long life already, I have had the misfortune to see many who chose not to walk with God, sometimes for a period of years, though I thought I knew their character well enough to judge that they were Christian. In every case, I have discerned the saint being brought back in some manner into the fold. “No man shall pluck them out of my Father’s hand.” I would guess that even we ourselves, when we find ourselves unfaithful, yet God is always faithful—it is just part of who he is. As Paul says he cannot deny himself. Nevertheless, appreciating the wonderful and matchless free grace of God is not warrant for the person who is outwardly rejecting the clear counsel of his God to assume that grace is there; he should examine himself closely to see whether he is, indeed, in the faith.
Colossians is a great short book that covers some of the fundamentals of the cross. Just as Jesus was able to confidently commit his Spirit to the Father’s hand, so also he was able to take our sins and nail them to the cross, blotting out everything which would separate us from God: (Colossians 2:14) “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.” In this gospel we are clearly given freedom, but the supposition is that the saint who truly knows the grace of God, will turn willingly toward the Savior, and surrender that freedom willingly to become, as Paul says, a slave of Jesus Christ.
When we know all that we has done for us, moving us past the keeping of laws and rules which would only condemn us all over again, when we realize the freedom that we have because of Jesus going to the cross, that we might not ever have to, our hearts should be so filled with love and appreciation that giving ourselves to him each day for the rest of our lives ought to be our privilege. “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power” (Colossians 2:9, 10). Or perhaps more powerfully as translated in the NIV version: “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been give fullness in Christ.” Think of it—the Scripture is clear. We have been given fullness in Christ—made to be complete, and yet we find ourselves so incomplete. In the sight of God, he looks at us and sees no blemish, but freely loves us because every sin we have committed is covered by the work of his Son. How that ought to motivate us to seek to serve and follow him! Indeed, hadn’t our daily cry ought to be that of our Savior? Should we not be crying out daily, Father, into Thy hands I commit my spirit. It is only in him that we can find ourselves made complete, free to be what he has created us to be.
Sunday, April 05, 2015
Part 6- What are the Seven cries of the cross?
1. Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
In this Easter Season, it is perhaps altogether fitting that I write about the sixth cry from the cross. What exactly is finished? Jesus was referring to the finished work of the cross, where God himself took on the sins of mankind and bore the punishment for those sins, that is, death on the cross. I believe that at the moment that Jesus said “it is finished” the veil of the temple, a veil two inches thick, was rent from top to bottom. It helps if we understand that the veil in the temple separated the holiest place of God so that it remained private. The high priest alone was allowed in this place, and he brought sacrifices that the sins of the Jewish people might be atoned for. No one else was allowed into this place, not even the other priests. The father of John the Baptizer was in this place when he was given the vision from the angel, and if you remember the story, his speech was taken away from him until the baby was born, because he was skeptical of the message. The other priests worried that the high priest might have a heart attack, or otherwise become incapacitated, so they attached a rope around his ankle with a bell. As long as they heard the bell ringing, they could assume all was okay, but if they became concerned they could always haul on the rope and drag him out. What they were not allowed to do at any time was to enter the holy of holies. The significance of the veil being ripped was that God served notice that we no longer had to have the high priest act for us—we have been given direct access to the Father through what the Son had accomplished. It is finished.
But there is so much more that was finished at the same instant! Jesus had given us the pathway to God; now he would be able to give us the very Spirit of God to live and dwell within us. Jesus said, “It is good for you that I go away. Unless I go away, the Comforter will not come to you” (John 16:7). The work was finished, and Jesus could at last send the Comforter to us. We were made righteous, as all are made righteous, if they will but believe God. Soon Jesus breathed on the apostles, giving them the Spirit, and he bade them to await the filling of the Spirit in Jerusalem.
It is finished. God’s plan, in the making from eternity past, was at last revealed to the world. In Genesis, God had foretold that the Serpent would bruise the heel, but the Son would bruise his head. All of creation had been waiting for this point, that God should come in the flesh and give himself as an offering. In so doing, Satan thought he had won a great victory, killing the Son of God, and instead the Son had dealt Satan a lethal blow, rising from the dead, and freeing mankind from the bonds of sin. As long as we are in the bondage of sin, Satan owns us, and it is interesting that Jesus did not dispute that ownership. During the temptations of Jesus, Satan took him up to a very high mountain, and offered to Jesus all the kingdoms of the world. They were his to offer, but with this cry, “it is finished” the end of that time had come.
And so the gospel was given to mankind, that “whosoever” believeth might be saved, rescued from the long coming judgment of God.
At that point, Jesus became the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords. He took over the ruler ship of the world from Satan and made the possibility of salvation happen for all men. Revelation tells us that we will reign over earth for a thousand years, for he will be the King of the earth, and all nations will bow before him. It is this time that the prophet Isaiah prophesied that the swords shall be turned into plowshears, and the young child who dies at one hundred shall be thought accursed.
In a manner of speaking, all that was accomplished when Jesus finished his work on the cross. We await its happening two thousand years later, but in the purposes of God, it is a finished act, a never-ending salvation for whosoever will come. And we can add absolutely nothing to his act. We cannot do good deeds, acts of contrition, or gain indulgences. We cannot “help” God any in the work of the cross, and until we see all that he did on the cross, we cannot really appreciate the offense we cause to our Father when we pretend to bring our good works before him. I recently read about a rich man doing so many good deeds that he was heard to brag that when he died, he would get a “fastpass” right on through the turnstile to heaven. Poor soul! He is depending on his good works to do what God did perfectly in sending his Son. How God must be insulted with our best works, which the Bible tells us are as filthy rags in his sight. The word for filthy rags is actually a used menstrual cloth—it is that offensive to God when we pretend that our righteous acts can stand before God a single instant.
This is not to say that all was accomplished on behalf of the believer at the cross; it most definitely says that our sins were paid for in full at the cross. For instance, Jesus told the disciples in John 14 that he was going to prepare a place for us, that where he is we may be also. Keith Green aptly points out that God worked on the creation of the world for six days, but he has been working on our place in heaven for over 2,000 years. What a wonder that place must be!
When Jesus said it is finished, what exactly did he mean? He meant at least this—that every sin which a believer brings to the cross has been fully provided for. There is no sin, not one, which is not provided for, with the exception of the sin of unbelief. Moses, in the wilderness, had a poisonous viper lifted up on a stake. Those Israelites who were bitten by a viper were told to go and gaze upon the viper, and that then they would not die. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, John tells us, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish. A month ago I was told that a man with many covered up tattoos came into one of our services, and expressed reluctance in going forward to receive forgiveness because of all of his tattoos. The usher was able to assure him that God did indeed have mercy and forgiveness for all. Why are we so certain that there is mercy and forgiveness? Because at the cross we find that it has all been finished. In giving his all for us and accepting the penalty of sin, he completely made us free. There remains nothing possible left to be done, and God in giving his all, more than he gave at the very creation of the world, can give no more. But there is no need for more. It is finished. Only lift up your eyes on the gift of God, and believe.
Isaac Watts long ago found that wonderful grace at the cross, and penned the words to a lovely hymn, one that I wished we would still occasionally sing in our church. It is called, “When I Survey the Wonderous Cross”:
When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.
Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.
See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?
His dying crimson, like a robe,
Spreads o’er His body on the tree;
Then I am dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
In this Easter Season, it is perhaps altogether fitting that I write about the sixth cry from the cross. What exactly is finished? Jesus was referring to the finished work of the cross, where God himself took on the sins of mankind and bore the punishment for those sins, that is, death on the cross. I believe that at the moment that Jesus said “it is finished” the veil of the temple, a veil two inches thick, was rent from top to bottom. It helps if we understand that the veil in the temple separated the holiest place of God so that it remained private. The high priest alone was allowed in this place, and he brought sacrifices that the sins of the Jewish people might be atoned for. No one else was allowed into this place, not even the other priests. The father of John the Baptizer was in this place when he was given the vision from the angel, and if you remember the story, his speech was taken away from him until the baby was born, because he was skeptical of the message. The other priests worried that the high priest might have a heart attack, or otherwise become incapacitated, so they attached a rope around his ankle with a bell. As long as they heard the bell ringing, they could assume all was okay, but if they became concerned they could always haul on the rope and drag him out. What they were not allowed to do at any time was to enter the holy of holies. The significance of the veil being ripped was that God served notice that we no longer had to have the high priest act for us—we have been given direct access to the Father through what the Son had accomplished. It is finished.
But there is so much more that was finished at the same instant! Jesus had given us the pathway to God; now he would be able to give us the very Spirit of God to live and dwell within us. Jesus said, “It is good for you that I go away. Unless I go away, the Comforter will not come to you” (John 16:7). The work was finished, and Jesus could at last send the Comforter to us. We were made righteous, as all are made righteous, if they will but believe God. Soon Jesus breathed on the apostles, giving them the Spirit, and he bade them to await the filling of the Spirit in Jerusalem.
It is finished. God’s plan, in the making from eternity past, was at last revealed to the world. In Genesis, God had foretold that the Serpent would bruise the heel, but the Son would bruise his head. All of creation had been waiting for this point, that God should come in the flesh and give himself as an offering. In so doing, Satan thought he had won a great victory, killing the Son of God, and instead the Son had dealt Satan a lethal blow, rising from the dead, and freeing mankind from the bonds of sin. As long as we are in the bondage of sin, Satan owns us, and it is interesting that Jesus did not dispute that ownership. During the temptations of Jesus, Satan took him up to a very high mountain, and offered to Jesus all the kingdoms of the world. They were his to offer, but with this cry, “it is finished” the end of that time had come.
And so the gospel was given to mankind, that “whosoever” believeth might be saved, rescued from the long coming judgment of God.
At that point, Jesus became the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords. He took over the ruler ship of the world from Satan and made the possibility of salvation happen for all men. Revelation tells us that we will reign over earth for a thousand years, for he will be the King of the earth, and all nations will bow before him. It is this time that the prophet Isaiah prophesied that the swords shall be turned into plowshears, and the young child who dies at one hundred shall be thought accursed.
In a manner of speaking, all that was accomplished when Jesus finished his work on the cross. We await its happening two thousand years later, but in the purposes of God, it is a finished act, a never-ending salvation for whosoever will come. And we can add absolutely nothing to his act. We cannot do good deeds, acts of contrition, or gain indulgences. We cannot “help” God any in the work of the cross, and until we see all that he did on the cross, we cannot really appreciate the offense we cause to our Father when we pretend to bring our good works before him. I recently read about a rich man doing so many good deeds that he was heard to brag that when he died, he would get a “fastpass” right on through the turnstile to heaven. Poor soul! He is depending on his good works to do what God did perfectly in sending his Son. How God must be insulted with our best works, which the Bible tells us are as filthy rags in his sight. The word for filthy rags is actually a used menstrual cloth—it is that offensive to God when we pretend that our righteous acts can stand before God a single instant.
This is not to say that all was accomplished on behalf of the believer at the cross; it most definitely says that our sins were paid for in full at the cross. For instance, Jesus told the disciples in John 14 that he was going to prepare a place for us, that where he is we may be also. Keith Green aptly points out that God worked on the creation of the world for six days, but he has been working on our place in heaven for over 2,000 years. What a wonder that place must be!
When Jesus said it is finished, what exactly did he mean? He meant at least this—that every sin which a believer brings to the cross has been fully provided for. There is no sin, not one, which is not provided for, with the exception of the sin of unbelief. Moses, in the wilderness, had a poisonous viper lifted up on a stake. Those Israelites who were bitten by a viper were told to go and gaze upon the viper, and that then they would not die. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, John tells us, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish. A month ago I was told that a man with many covered up tattoos came into one of our services, and expressed reluctance in going forward to receive forgiveness because of all of his tattoos. The usher was able to assure him that God did indeed have mercy and forgiveness for all. Why are we so certain that there is mercy and forgiveness? Because at the cross we find that it has all been finished. In giving his all for us and accepting the penalty of sin, he completely made us free. There remains nothing possible left to be done, and God in giving his all, more than he gave at the very creation of the world, can give no more. But there is no need for more. It is finished. Only lift up your eyes on the gift of God, and believe.
Isaac Watts long ago found that wonderful grace at the cross, and penned the words to a lovely hymn, one that I wished we would still occasionally sing in our church. It is called, “When I Survey the Wonderous Cross”:
When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.
Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.
See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?
His dying crimson, like a robe,
Spreads o’er His body on the tree;
Then I am dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.
Friday, April 03, 2015
Part 5- What are the Seven cries of the cross?
1. Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
I think it most significant that Jesus cries out, “I thirst” after receiving the sins of the world. I have no doubt that he was thirsty, and perhaps almost on the twilight of consciousness, after his enormous physical abuses, but there, I think is much more to his cry. After all, during all of his enormous suffering, he consistently expresses that which we would expect of a noble Savior. He comforts women he finds on the way to the cross with warnings of a great judgment coming upon Jerusalem, he takes time to assure the thief on the cross that soon he will be in Paradise, and he commits the care of his mother to his best friend. Now are we to believe that he is crying out because he thirsts?
I realize that this cry is a fulfilment of Psalm 69 (v.21, “They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink”), and that Jesus had just received the sins of the entire world into his very body. Who would not be literally thirsty at this point? But I would suggest that perhaps the thirst is more than that. The spiritual analogy of the Holy Spirit filling us with living water is very powerful. Jesus himself refers to the same comparison when he says, “He that believeth in Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” (But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believe in Him should receive; for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.) (John 7:38, 39). John adds the second verse, telling us that Jesus was indeed speaking of the Holy Spirit.
Elsewhere, Paul tells us that we should not quench the Spirit, and thus we learn that we can, by sin, quench the very gift of God which Jesus’ act on the cross enabled for us. I would suggest that the sins of the world had an enormously “quenching” effect on Jesus, so enormous that at the very moment of taking those sins into his life he found his eternal relationship with the Spirit to be utterly and completely quenched. Hence, those words, “I thirst,” escape from his mouth, as he experiences and tastes of sin, and loses that relationship in the terrible judgment of the Father.
Sometimes those who were crucified lingered and suffered on their cross for two or three days. The Roman Empire seems to me to be rather like our own day, where we seem to choose the most barbaric way of execution. Who would choose electrocution as a method of death? Or the guillotine? The gruesome descriptions of these manners of death serve to remind me of how the cruel nature of man seems to arise again and again. Crucifixion as a method of execution was particularly barbaric. Certainly the cruelty of man in Christ’s death is especially horrific. The Son of God, the Savior of mankind stood before men and silently endured the scorn as guards slapped him and teased him saying, prophecy and tell us, who struck thee? Jesus had already, in his last words to his disciples, reminded them that he had only to pray—just once—and the Father would have sent legions of angels to stop the whole process. Instead, he met the gruesome process head on, and endured the scorn of the cross that I, that you, might be saved. Philippians reminds us that “he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross”. Therefore, says Paul, God hath exalted him to the highest place, putting Jesus as the head of everything.
And that is the precise model for us. Our greatness is not in what we know, or in the way that we preach or teach or speak. Our greatness is measured in the way that we serve one another, and if we are despitefully used and abused, then the measure of greatness is all the more. Jesus tells us that if we would be great, then we should become the servant of all. In the cross, he has modeled the picture of the perfect servant, giving us the stellar example of how we should act. Stephan, our first martyr, gets this lesson well, for even as they are scorning him and stoning him to death, he cries out just as Jesus would teach us, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
And so I should learn, not to lead, but to serve, not to condemn, but to warn, not to reject, but to love. I find that to be a most difficult lesson, one that I need to relearn and relearn as I journey through life. I become inured to doing the same things the same way, and constantly I encounter others who know little of righteousness, and are busy building their own lives on a false foundation. This past year I have tried to make it a practice to pray for the strangers that I see walking on the way to the bus, to pray for the driver next to me. I find that it is not easy to pray for a stranger, for I cannot see into their hearts as Jesus did, and I often find myself groping for the right words that just are not available to me, for I cannot see their needs. But that prayer habit has changed me in an unlooked for way. I am becoming less self-centered and more other-centered, but even more than that, I realize that in the midst of my pleas for strangers, I must be equipped with the very power of the Holy Spirit if I am to make a difference. In other words, I thirst. Not me alone, but the whole of the church with me. We thirst. May God pour out his Spirit bountifully into our lives, that we might become effective witnesses of the joy that is ours because the Son of God gave himself so long ago.
I hunger and thirst for the righteousness and love of God to be poured out into me, that others might see him living in me, and come to know the servant of all servants, Jesus Christ. I have had for more than thirty years, a picture of a lion hanging over my mantel. The lion is a depiction of Christ, coming the second time, angry and ready to judge the world, chasing away the darkness and bringing light. All the world shall gaze and see in that day, and the folly of men will be laid bare, as the Lion of Judah brings light to this dark world. In that day he will come as a lion ready to devour, not as a meek lamb, willing to go to the slaughter, that you and I might find life. Our world is as thirsty as it has ever been, and men do not even recognize the dire drought of their souls, or the peril that is upon them if they linger in choosing to follow the Lamb of God, who has indeed taken away the sin of the world.
It falls to us, waiting upon that coming and ever watching, that we should bear the good news to the lost. I cannot do this in my own power. You cannot do it in your own power. We thirst with a powerful thirst, that we might be filled, that many yet might hear and be saved. God has not forsaken us during this age, but abides faithfully, waiting for us, his own children, that we might turn from our own devices and realize how desperately thirsty the church is. God waits upon his church that they might call upon him in our time of need. Isn’t it about time that we recognized our need, and called upon the only One capable of filling us? It is bad enough that we should go about thirsty, but how shall we ever give the Living Water to others except that we be filled.
Oh God, we are so thirsty and in deep need of the waters of your Holy Spirit. Bring us back to you, that we might be used as instruments to proclaim the deep and abiding joy that your Son gave us upon that cross, so long ago. Lord, we thirst!
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
I think it most significant that Jesus cries out, “I thirst” after receiving the sins of the world. I have no doubt that he was thirsty, and perhaps almost on the twilight of consciousness, after his enormous physical abuses, but there, I think is much more to his cry. After all, during all of his enormous suffering, he consistently expresses that which we would expect of a noble Savior. He comforts women he finds on the way to the cross with warnings of a great judgment coming upon Jerusalem, he takes time to assure the thief on the cross that soon he will be in Paradise, and he commits the care of his mother to his best friend. Now are we to believe that he is crying out because he thirsts?
I realize that this cry is a fulfilment of Psalm 69 (v.21, “They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink”), and that Jesus had just received the sins of the entire world into his very body. Who would not be literally thirsty at this point? But I would suggest that perhaps the thirst is more than that. The spiritual analogy of the Holy Spirit filling us with living water is very powerful. Jesus himself refers to the same comparison when he says, “He that believeth in Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” (But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believe in Him should receive; for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.) (John 7:38, 39). John adds the second verse, telling us that Jesus was indeed speaking of the Holy Spirit.
Elsewhere, Paul tells us that we should not quench the Spirit, and thus we learn that we can, by sin, quench the very gift of God which Jesus’ act on the cross enabled for us. I would suggest that the sins of the world had an enormously “quenching” effect on Jesus, so enormous that at the very moment of taking those sins into his life he found his eternal relationship with the Spirit to be utterly and completely quenched. Hence, those words, “I thirst,” escape from his mouth, as he experiences and tastes of sin, and loses that relationship in the terrible judgment of the Father.
Sometimes those who were crucified lingered and suffered on their cross for two or three days. The Roman Empire seems to me to be rather like our own day, where we seem to choose the most barbaric way of execution. Who would choose electrocution as a method of death? Or the guillotine? The gruesome descriptions of these manners of death serve to remind me of how the cruel nature of man seems to arise again and again. Crucifixion as a method of execution was particularly barbaric. Certainly the cruelty of man in Christ’s death is especially horrific. The Son of God, the Savior of mankind stood before men and silently endured the scorn as guards slapped him and teased him saying, prophecy and tell us, who struck thee? Jesus had already, in his last words to his disciples, reminded them that he had only to pray—just once—and the Father would have sent legions of angels to stop the whole process. Instead, he met the gruesome process head on, and endured the scorn of the cross that I, that you, might be saved. Philippians reminds us that “he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross”. Therefore, says Paul, God hath exalted him to the highest place, putting Jesus as the head of everything.
And that is the precise model for us. Our greatness is not in what we know, or in the way that we preach or teach or speak. Our greatness is measured in the way that we serve one another, and if we are despitefully used and abused, then the measure of greatness is all the more. Jesus tells us that if we would be great, then we should become the servant of all. In the cross, he has modeled the picture of the perfect servant, giving us the stellar example of how we should act. Stephan, our first martyr, gets this lesson well, for even as they are scorning him and stoning him to death, he cries out just as Jesus would teach us, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
And so I should learn, not to lead, but to serve, not to condemn, but to warn, not to reject, but to love. I find that to be a most difficult lesson, one that I need to relearn and relearn as I journey through life. I become inured to doing the same things the same way, and constantly I encounter others who know little of righteousness, and are busy building their own lives on a false foundation. This past year I have tried to make it a practice to pray for the strangers that I see walking on the way to the bus, to pray for the driver next to me. I find that it is not easy to pray for a stranger, for I cannot see into their hearts as Jesus did, and I often find myself groping for the right words that just are not available to me, for I cannot see their needs. But that prayer habit has changed me in an unlooked for way. I am becoming less self-centered and more other-centered, but even more than that, I realize that in the midst of my pleas for strangers, I must be equipped with the very power of the Holy Spirit if I am to make a difference. In other words, I thirst. Not me alone, but the whole of the church with me. We thirst. May God pour out his Spirit bountifully into our lives, that we might become effective witnesses of the joy that is ours because the Son of God gave himself so long ago.
I hunger and thirst for the righteousness and love of God to be poured out into me, that others might see him living in me, and come to know the servant of all servants, Jesus Christ. I have had for more than thirty years, a picture of a lion hanging over my mantel. The lion is a depiction of Christ, coming the second time, angry and ready to judge the world, chasing away the darkness and bringing light. All the world shall gaze and see in that day, and the folly of men will be laid bare, as the Lion of Judah brings light to this dark world. In that day he will come as a lion ready to devour, not as a meek lamb, willing to go to the slaughter, that you and I might find life. Our world is as thirsty as it has ever been, and men do not even recognize the dire drought of their souls, or the peril that is upon them if they linger in choosing to follow the Lamb of God, who has indeed taken away the sin of the world.
It falls to us, waiting upon that coming and ever watching, that we should bear the good news to the lost. I cannot do this in my own power. You cannot do it in your own power. We thirst with a powerful thirst, that we might be filled, that many yet might hear and be saved. God has not forsaken us during this age, but abides faithfully, waiting for us, his own children, that we might turn from our own devices and realize how desperately thirsty the church is. God waits upon his church that they might call upon him in our time of need. Isn’t it about time that we recognized our need, and called upon the only One capable of filling us? It is bad enough that we should go about thirsty, but how shall we ever give the Living Water to others except that we be filled.
Oh God, we are so thirsty and in deep need of the waters of your Holy Spirit. Bring us back to you, that we might be used as instruments to proclaim the deep and abiding joy that your Son gave us upon that cross, so long ago. Lord, we thirst!
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Part 4- What are the Seven cries of the cross?
1. Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Picture Jesus at this point. Beforehand, he remonstrated Peter, probably confusing Peter, who in his flesh I think had determined to protect to the death Jesus. When Jesus was arrested, Peter takes a bold swipe with his sword and Jesus bids him to stop—explaining to Peter that if Jesus wanted protection he had but to ask of the Father who would send more than twelve legions of angels. He has been whipped, beaten by professional soldiers, had his hands and feet nailed to a cross, but only after being forced to carry his own cross. He was mocked, ridiculed, and tried twice illegally, in the dead of night. At any point, the Bible tells us that he could have but prayed to his Father and had legions of angels by his side to deliver him. Yet, he allows himself to be strapped to the cross, and bears it willingly, praying for those around him, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” He notices women weeping for him while carrying the cross, and blood streaming into his face, he looks at the women, probably including his own mother, and he tells them not to weep for him, but rather for themselves and the coming judgment. He has looked upon John, his best friend, and has given him custodial care of his mother, and now the hour is come for which he is sent into the world. But just before that hour, the thief on the cross recognizes that he is being crucified with the Son of God, and declares his faith. Jesus takes the time from his deep agony to declare to the thief that he would soon be in Paradise with him.
The point is that up until now, the time of this awful cry to his Father, Jesus has been everything we would expect a Savior to be. He has never been concerned for himself, but is looking out for the thief, the soldiers, his mother, and even those who were weeping for him. He is not centered in himself; he is squarely centered in others, and this is not a normal reaction of someone to the brutal punishments he has had to endure, but it is everything we would expect from a Savior. So how do we explain this cry?
First, we should note that in his last cry he commits his spirit to his Father, indicating that he was still communing with God. So he was not broken in fellowship with the Father, at least not for more than a time. Scholars have long interpreted this passage as the time when the sins of the world were put into Jesus, thus crushing the presence of the Spirit of God. At that point, at that precise moment, Jesus felt himself emptied of the fellowship he had known with his Father.
Yes, he had been sent into the world for this very reason, but the cost was higher than Jesus had ever known. All of the energy that God put into the creation of the world, breathing life, wonderful and diverse life, into our world was as nothing to the price Jesus paid on the cross, for on the cross he gave his all, and giving his all, he had no more to give. People who do not think about it sometimes will wonder aloud why God does not do more to save the lost; there is no more to be done, for the highest price of all was paid that we who believe might be forever children of God.
The cry is an echo of Psalm 22, but perhaps it is more accurate to say that Psalm 22 was a prophecy echo of what was to come. Jesus took on the burdens of all of our sins, and indeed the Bible declares that he took on the sins of the whole world. Whosoever will may come, but only because the sacrifice is totally efficacious toward all those who will believe. God prepared a “free” way to heaven, but the cost, free to us, was not free to him. When we hear the echoes of this cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” we ought to be utterly compelled to lay ourselves humbly at the foot of that cross. He who gave his all for us has commanded us that we might take up our cross and follow him.
John the apostle, the beloved one, the one to whom Jesus was perhaps closer than anyone else, tells us that Jesus himself foretold his death. I wonder at the complete sovereignty of God, for here were evil men, willing to kill the Son of God that their nation might continue, and they freely chose their course, and it was the will of the Father that the Son lay down his life. Yet within all of that Jesus declares, “No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:18). We cannot explain how the choices of evil men in an evil world should paint the very portrait of the world which God has ordained, but neither are we expected to. Instead, God has ordained the death of his Son before the foundation of the world, and Jesus gave his life willingly, completing the will of his Father perfectly, and those men who opposed God with every fiber of their being, found themselves completing the perfect plan of God. It is a wonder beyond all wonders, for God makes it plain that he will hold responsible those who acted so evilly, yet still it completes the plan of God perfectly.
I am reminded of Psalm Two, where God declares that he laughs in derision at the plans of all the kings and leaders of our world, and I am also reminded of Psalm 109, where the fate of Judas, the one who betrayed Jesus, is so plainly discussed. God is sovereign, and yet he will judge us for our actions. He judges us in complete justice, holding us responsible for that which we do, for he sees our hearts better than we do ourselves. But the judgment only makes sense as we have choices, and choices that we are held to account for.
Is this not the course of our present world? Over and over again, we see men making choices, and yet the sovereign plan of God is not affected. It is no accident that men in history saw the need for the Balfour Declaration, that Israel should be regathered after all these centuries. It is no accident that we see the sentiments of the entire world beginning to focus on abandoning this nation to its fate. We should always keep in mind this dual focus of God, that his will is always done, even in the evil plans of men, but he will always righteously and justly hold us responsible for our actions. It is no accident that the Bible commands us to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, and those nations that fail to support Israel will be judged for that lack of support. The will of God will be done, but woe to those who lift a hand against Israel. Historically, it might be well to remember that those who have stood against this little nation have been used of God to bring judgment, and yet, they themselves are judged for daring to take on this least of nations.
I also think of a spiritual application. The saint, having believed in God is told to, and is empowered by the Spirit to turn from his sins. Yet, he still has a choice. He can choose to participate in sin. I have done that. Those times I have done what Paul has commanded us not to. I have quenched the Spirit of God. My cry becomes, at those times, like that of Jesus, and I ask God why he has forsaken me. The way of restoration every time for the saint is to confess, to agree with God, that the sin is sin, and then the Father will freely forgive me and renew me in his Spirit.
But the feeling of abandonment when I sin consciously and of my own volition is total. I can get very used to walking in the Spirit and having his fellowship. If the Bible is to be believed, God has given us his Spirit for all of eternity, but at those bleak times of sin, the sense of being alone, the feeling of being lost and without his leadership is complete. We become like the ship without a rudder in a stormy sea, bereft of the guidance that we need to continue our course. For the Christian, God is faithful, and will restore his Spirit to us every time when we confess. For Jesus, of course there was no need of confession. His was the perfect life, before the Father, the angels, and all of mankind, that we might realize God himself cared so much for us that he was willing to take on this separation.
For I think, multiplied many times, this is exactly what happened in that moment to Jesus. He, who had been in complete fellowship with the Triune God for all of eternity, found sin to be the sword which cut off that fellowship. I will never be able to estimate or talk of that complete loss, for I simply cannot fathom what that was like. Philippians reminds us that Jesus emptied himself when he came in the flesh, making himself of no account. When the sins of the world at last were imputed on Jesus, he was really of no account, for the Father was judging him for our very misdeeds. And this was done that we might be forever free of judgment, that man and God might be restored to the fellowship of God’s design.
John 3:14 gives a wonderful picture of what God has done with the cross. To the Jewish people of his day, this must have provided a most powerful image, and if we will but reflect on it a bit today, it should be that same powerful image. Jesus said to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and one who seemed to want to follow him, that, “as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him should have eternal life.” We have but to look and believe what was done to Jesus on that cross, and we will enjoy fellowship with the Father forever. He was forsaken simply for the reason that you and I might be found.
2. 6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3. Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4. 9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5. I thirst
6. It is finished
7. Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Picture Jesus at this point. Beforehand, he remonstrated Peter, probably confusing Peter, who in his flesh I think had determined to protect to the death Jesus. When Jesus was arrested, Peter takes a bold swipe with his sword and Jesus bids him to stop—explaining to Peter that if Jesus wanted protection he had but to ask of the Father who would send more than twelve legions of angels. He has been whipped, beaten by professional soldiers, had his hands and feet nailed to a cross, but only after being forced to carry his own cross. He was mocked, ridiculed, and tried twice illegally, in the dead of night. At any point, the Bible tells us that he could have but prayed to his Father and had legions of angels by his side to deliver him. Yet, he allows himself to be strapped to the cross, and bears it willingly, praying for those around him, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” He notices women weeping for him while carrying the cross, and blood streaming into his face, he looks at the women, probably including his own mother, and he tells them not to weep for him, but rather for themselves and the coming judgment. He has looked upon John, his best friend, and has given him custodial care of his mother, and now the hour is come for which he is sent into the world. But just before that hour, the thief on the cross recognizes that he is being crucified with the Son of God, and declares his faith. Jesus takes the time from his deep agony to declare to the thief that he would soon be in Paradise with him.
The point is that up until now, the time of this awful cry to his Father, Jesus has been everything we would expect a Savior to be. He has never been concerned for himself, but is looking out for the thief, the soldiers, his mother, and even those who were weeping for him. He is not centered in himself; he is squarely centered in others, and this is not a normal reaction of someone to the brutal punishments he has had to endure, but it is everything we would expect from a Savior. So how do we explain this cry?
First, we should note that in his last cry he commits his spirit to his Father, indicating that he was still communing with God. So he was not broken in fellowship with the Father, at least not for more than a time. Scholars have long interpreted this passage as the time when the sins of the world were put into Jesus, thus crushing the presence of the Spirit of God. At that point, at that precise moment, Jesus felt himself emptied of the fellowship he had known with his Father.
Yes, he had been sent into the world for this very reason, but the cost was higher than Jesus had ever known. All of the energy that God put into the creation of the world, breathing life, wonderful and diverse life, into our world was as nothing to the price Jesus paid on the cross, for on the cross he gave his all, and giving his all, he had no more to give. People who do not think about it sometimes will wonder aloud why God does not do more to save the lost; there is no more to be done, for the highest price of all was paid that we who believe might be forever children of God.
The cry is an echo of Psalm 22, but perhaps it is more accurate to say that Psalm 22 was a prophecy echo of what was to come. Jesus took on the burdens of all of our sins, and indeed the Bible declares that he took on the sins of the whole world. Whosoever will may come, but only because the sacrifice is totally efficacious toward all those who will believe. God prepared a “free” way to heaven, but the cost, free to us, was not free to him. When we hear the echoes of this cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” we ought to be utterly compelled to lay ourselves humbly at the foot of that cross. He who gave his all for us has commanded us that we might take up our cross and follow him.
John the apostle, the beloved one, the one to whom Jesus was perhaps closer than anyone else, tells us that Jesus himself foretold his death. I wonder at the complete sovereignty of God, for here were evil men, willing to kill the Son of God that their nation might continue, and they freely chose their course, and it was the will of the Father that the Son lay down his life. Yet within all of that Jesus declares, “No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:18). We cannot explain how the choices of evil men in an evil world should paint the very portrait of the world which God has ordained, but neither are we expected to. Instead, God has ordained the death of his Son before the foundation of the world, and Jesus gave his life willingly, completing the will of his Father perfectly, and those men who opposed God with every fiber of their being, found themselves completing the perfect plan of God. It is a wonder beyond all wonders, for God makes it plain that he will hold responsible those who acted so evilly, yet still it completes the plan of God perfectly.
I am reminded of Psalm Two, where God declares that he laughs in derision at the plans of all the kings and leaders of our world, and I am also reminded of Psalm 109, where the fate of Judas, the one who betrayed Jesus, is so plainly discussed. God is sovereign, and yet he will judge us for our actions. He judges us in complete justice, holding us responsible for that which we do, for he sees our hearts better than we do ourselves. But the judgment only makes sense as we have choices, and choices that we are held to account for.
Is this not the course of our present world? Over and over again, we see men making choices, and yet the sovereign plan of God is not affected. It is no accident that men in history saw the need for the Balfour Declaration, that Israel should be regathered after all these centuries. It is no accident that we see the sentiments of the entire world beginning to focus on abandoning this nation to its fate. We should always keep in mind this dual focus of God, that his will is always done, even in the evil plans of men, but he will always righteously and justly hold us responsible for our actions. It is no accident that the Bible commands us to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, and those nations that fail to support Israel will be judged for that lack of support. The will of God will be done, but woe to those who lift a hand against Israel. Historically, it might be well to remember that those who have stood against this little nation have been used of God to bring judgment, and yet, they themselves are judged for daring to take on this least of nations.
I also think of a spiritual application. The saint, having believed in God is told to, and is empowered by the Spirit to turn from his sins. Yet, he still has a choice. He can choose to participate in sin. I have done that. Those times I have done what Paul has commanded us not to. I have quenched the Spirit of God. My cry becomes, at those times, like that of Jesus, and I ask God why he has forsaken me. The way of restoration every time for the saint is to confess, to agree with God, that the sin is sin, and then the Father will freely forgive me and renew me in his Spirit.
But the feeling of abandonment when I sin consciously and of my own volition is total. I can get very used to walking in the Spirit and having his fellowship. If the Bible is to be believed, God has given us his Spirit for all of eternity, but at those bleak times of sin, the sense of being alone, the feeling of being lost and without his leadership is complete. We become like the ship without a rudder in a stormy sea, bereft of the guidance that we need to continue our course. For the Christian, God is faithful, and will restore his Spirit to us every time when we confess. For Jesus, of course there was no need of confession. His was the perfect life, before the Father, the angels, and all of mankind, that we might realize God himself cared so much for us that he was willing to take on this separation.
For I think, multiplied many times, this is exactly what happened in that moment to Jesus. He, who had been in complete fellowship with the Triune God for all of eternity, found sin to be the sword which cut off that fellowship. I will never be able to estimate or talk of that complete loss, for I simply cannot fathom what that was like. Philippians reminds us that Jesus emptied himself when he came in the flesh, making himself of no account. When the sins of the world at last were imputed on Jesus, he was really of no account, for the Father was judging him for our very misdeeds. And this was done that we might be forever free of judgment, that man and God might be restored to the fellowship of God’s design.
John 3:14 gives a wonderful picture of what God has done with the cross. To the Jewish people of his day, this must have provided a most powerful image, and if we will but reflect on it a bit today, it should be that same powerful image. Jesus said to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and one who seemed to want to follow him, that, “as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him should have eternal life.” We have but to look and believe what was done to Jesus on that cross, and we will enjoy fellowship with the Father forever. He was forsaken simply for the reason that you and I might be found.
Monday, February 16, 2015
Part 3- What are the Seven cries of the cross?
1.Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do
2.6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3.Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4.9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5.I thirst
6.It is finished
7.Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
In one of the most touching cries of all seven cries from the cross, Jesus, without explanation, gives his mother’s care over to his best friend. John, perhaps the only witness of the scene of the cross, did not write his gospel until last of all, and it is not strange that no other gospel remembers this cry. Matthew may have been made on the strength of what was already written in Mark, and in any case, Luke, as the meticulous physician, does the best job of a non-witness to the cries on the cross, equaling the number of cries given to that of John. But it is not until John, writing his gospel in his old age, recalls so vividly this cry of his best friend. Indeed John seems to recall this cry with great vividness, but that is not so strange to me. An aside to his mother and best friend might well be expected. But the unasked question is strange. Why were the brothers of Jesus not given charge of their mother?
I think it may suggest a temporary split in the family over the very person of Jesus. There is not enough evidence to do more than just suggest that this might be a possibility, and on this side of heaven, we are not to know. But I will try to submit what we do know, and discuss its relevancy. We know that there is a time when the brothers of Jesus and his mother are seeking to find him, but Jesus not only seems to avoid them, but to almost insult them. Matthew (13:47 NIV) tells us that “Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” In verse 48, Jesus replies with a question asking who is my mother and who are my brothers, hardly a respectful question, and the scripture is blank about them ever meeting with Jesus. Did they meet? Or was there a reason, unstated in the gospels, for Jesus to be avoiding them at the time?
What was going on in the life of Jesus at the time? We know from the gospels that early on in the ministry of Jesus he gathered opposition to his teaching. There were men who were the religious leaders who correctly saw him as a challenge to their leadership. The seven woes of the Pharisees are a famous indictment of this leadership, but I think they probably did not have to wait for Jesus to utter the seven woes to know an enemy. I am reaching beyond the text here, but what if those leaders, or someone influential who knew them, went to the family of Jesus and explained the problem?
I can quite imagine the conversation going something like this:
Again, I do not know that such a conversation, similar or varied, ever took place, but if it did, would that not explain the behavior of his brothers and his mother? His mother, of course, had divine intervention that this child was of God, and she knew that, but I would point out that mothers who have their children’s well-being threatened might do almost anything. His brothers had only whatever family tradition had given them, and apparently it was not enough. What if his family (Joseph, being absent is probably deceased) had decided to come and put him away? I can well imagine his skeptical brothers wanting to do the right thing for their mother’s peace, for the community, and because of political pressure. They may have thought that Jesus had lost it, and that it was their duty to save him by putting him away. By the time of the cross, his mother is there weeping at the foot of the cross, and perhaps wishing that she and his brothers had managed to put him away someplace safe. She was not to have understanding of what was happening until Sunday morning, when the tomb was found vacant. Perhaps she was the first to have faith in her family in the resurrected Lord.
But what of her brothers? I am not sure about Jude, for we are not told, but with his short epistle we have evidence that somewhere sometime he came to belief. But again, perhaps not at first. We are told something about James that stands out, and in Acts 15:7 and 8, Paul tells us that, “After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.” Why is James singled out here? Could it be that our Lord makes a special appearance that his own brother might believe? That James does believe is beyond dispute, and he becomes a renowned leader of the early church, but I do wonder about all the things that might have gone into the making of his belief. By the time of the beginning of Acts, both the mother of Jesus and his brothers are mentioned, and evidently by Pentecost they had all come to faith.
But enough speculation, for that is all that it is, and we need to deal with the scriptures we do have, not the ones that I may imagine. We know that Jesus gave his treasured mother to his treasured friend, both of whom watched him die, not understanding at all what was happening. Interestingly, this cry includes the last recorded words of Jesus to his mother. It is not known whether the risen Jesus ever spoke to his mother. I would assume that John faithfully told her all she needed to know, but the scripture is mostly silent on the mother of Jesus after this point.
I cannot help think that with the sovereignty of God that he may have been planning the best for his mother. John, scripture accords us, was the first to realize what the empty tomb meant, and first believed in the risen Lord. Luke does not tell us this part, but Luke does record Peter’s running to see the empty tomb. He leaves out the fact that John is also running to the tomb, and outran Peter to the tomb, stopping and looking at the grave clothes that were there. Peter charged ahead of him to the tomb itself and looked in first. John follows afterward, and records of himself (John 20:8) that he saw the tomb and believed.
I do further wonder at the Mariolatry that has been so prevalent throughout our church age, and perhaps that is why God saw fit to give no more information on the mother of God. Many sects have caused much grief to themselves through worship of Mary. As the mother of God, Mary should have the highest accord and honor, but all worship should be saved only for God himself. But is it not a marvel, that in this last of seven cries, Jesus takes care of his mother? And does anyone doubt that both Mary and John are presently before our Lord? Our God is good!
2.6th hour- Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.
3.Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
4.9th hour- My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
5.I thirst
6.It is finished
7.Into thy hands I commit my Spirit
Woman, behold thy son! , Behold thy mother!
In one of the most touching cries of all seven cries from the cross, Jesus, without explanation, gives his mother’s care over to his best friend. John, perhaps the only witness of the scene of the cross, did not write his gospel until last of all, and it is not strange that no other gospel remembers this cry. Matthew may have been made on the strength of what was already written in Mark, and in any case, Luke, as the meticulous physician, does the best job of a non-witness to the cries on the cross, equaling the number of cries given to that of John. But it is not until John, writing his gospel in his old age, recalls so vividly this cry of his best friend. Indeed John seems to recall this cry with great vividness, but that is not so strange to me. An aside to his mother and best friend might well be expected. But the unasked question is strange. Why were the brothers of Jesus not given charge of their mother?
I think it may suggest a temporary split in the family over the very person of Jesus. There is not enough evidence to do more than just suggest that this might be a possibility, and on this side of heaven, we are not to know. But I will try to submit what we do know, and discuss its relevancy. We know that there is a time when the brothers of Jesus and his mother are seeking to find him, but Jesus not only seems to avoid them, but to almost insult them. Matthew (13:47 NIV) tells us that “Someone told him, “Your mother and brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to you.” In verse 48, Jesus replies with a question asking who is my mother and who are my brothers, hardly a respectful question, and the scripture is blank about them ever meeting with Jesus. Did they meet? Or was there a reason, unstated in the gospels, for Jesus to be avoiding them at the time?
What was going on in the life of Jesus at the time? We know from the gospels that early on in the ministry of Jesus he gathered opposition to his teaching. There were men who were the religious leaders who correctly saw him as a challenge to their leadership. The seven woes of the Pharisees are a famous indictment of this leadership, but I think they probably did not have to wait for Jesus to utter the seven woes to know an enemy. I am reaching beyond the text here, but what if those leaders, or someone influential who knew them, went to the family of Jesus and explained the problem?
I can quite imagine the conversation going something like this:
Leader: Well, you know this Jesus of yours is creating a great disturbance.
Family: Yes, we can see that he is attracting great crowds wherever he goes.
Leader: He is not very respectful of our venerated religious leaders either.
Family: No, there are times when he seems to insult them.
Leader: You know we are subject to Rome, but our own leaders are quite upset, and possibly may be forced to harm Jesus, especially if all these crowds keep up. The Romans, who knows what they will do? And it is not doing our nation any good right now.
Family: We understand that.
Leader: It may come to a place where the leaders will be forced to action. And then Rome may get involved. It is better for all of us if this problem would just go away.
Family: We understand. We will try to get Jesus to pull back for a while, and perhaps we will find a place to keep him quiet.
Leader: If you are going to do anything, I suggest sooner is better than later.
Again, I do not know that such a conversation, similar or varied, ever took place, but if it did, would that not explain the behavior of his brothers and his mother? His mother, of course, had divine intervention that this child was of God, and she knew that, but I would point out that mothers who have their children’s well-being threatened might do almost anything. His brothers had only whatever family tradition had given them, and apparently it was not enough. What if his family (Joseph, being absent is probably deceased) had decided to come and put him away? I can well imagine his skeptical brothers wanting to do the right thing for their mother’s peace, for the community, and because of political pressure. They may have thought that Jesus had lost it, and that it was their duty to save him by putting him away. By the time of the cross, his mother is there weeping at the foot of the cross, and perhaps wishing that she and his brothers had managed to put him away someplace safe. She was not to have understanding of what was happening until Sunday morning, when the tomb was found vacant. Perhaps she was the first to have faith in her family in the resurrected Lord.
But what of her brothers? I am not sure about Jude, for we are not told, but with his short epistle we have evidence that somewhere sometime he came to belief. But again, perhaps not at first. We are told something about James that stands out, and in Acts 15:7 and 8, Paul tells us that, “After that, he was seen of James; then of all the apostles. And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.” Why is James singled out here? Could it be that our Lord makes a special appearance that his own brother might believe? That James does believe is beyond dispute, and he becomes a renowned leader of the early church, but I do wonder about all the things that might have gone into the making of his belief. By the time of the beginning of Acts, both the mother of Jesus and his brothers are mentioned, and evidently by Pentecost they had all come to faith.
But enough speculation, for that is all that it is, and we need to deal with the scriptures we do have, not the ones that I may imagine. We know that Jesus gave his treasured mother to his treasured friend, both of whom watched him die, not understanding at all what was happening. Interestingly, this cry includes the last recorded words of Jesus to his mother. It is not known whether the risen Jesus ever spoke to his mother. I would assume that John faithfully told her all she needed to know, but the scripture is mostly silent on the mother of Jesus after this point.
I cannot help think that with the sovereignty of God that he may have been planning the best for his mother. John, scripture accords us, was the first to realize what the empty tomb meant, and first believed in the risen Lord. Luke does not tell us this part, but Luke does record Peter’s running to see the empty tomb. He leaves out the fact that John is also running to the tomb, and outran Peter to the tomb, stopping and looking at the grave clothes that were there. Peter charged ahead of him to the tomb itself and looked in first. John follows afterward, and records of himself (John 20:8) that he saw the tomb and believed.
I do further wonder at the Mariolatry that has been so prevalent throughout our church age, and perhaps that is why God saw fit to give no more information on the mother of God. Many sects have caused much grief to themselves through worship of Mary. As the mother of God, Mary should have the highest accord and honor, but all worship should be saved only for God himself. But is it not a marvel, that in this last of seven cries, Jesus takes care of his mother? And does anyone doubt that both Mary and John are presently before our Lord? Our God is good!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)