Grace: Enabler or Empowerer?

The world believes that grace enables.  Most of the Church believes that grace enables.  The common vein of thought in our culture is that to give a gift to someone who has clearly made poor decisions and choices in life will only enable them to have the resources to continue to make poor decisions in life.  In other words, grace enables.  To tangibly help someone who has a track record of squandering that which they have will facilitate the same kind of behavior.  This kind of anti-gospel philosophy which believes that grace enables is deeply rooted into the American psyche.  However, the gospel speaks a different word to us.  The gospel proclaims that grace does not enable, but rather it empowers.  Paul states in Titus 2:11 that it is grace that saves and grace that instructs.

If we want to see lives transformed and people affected by the glorious truth of the gospel then it only makes sense that we would pattern our behavior after God’s own behavior and dispense grace to those, who like ourselves, do not deserve it.  The Bible nowhere teaches that a good work ethic and sound choices throughout life bring salvation or instruction for godly living.  Grace does this.  The simple message of the gospel is that we have all fallen infinitely short of deserving God’s blessings and love, but that in Christ Jesus we have received the gift of salvation and infinite blessing.  How is it then that this truth is so radically misrepresented in the lives of so many ‘hard working’ Christians?

If the Church is going to be effective in the world on the disciple making mission Christ has called us to, then we must let the gospel be more than our ticket to heaven.  The gospel must shape the very core of who we are and the manner in which we think about every aspect of life.  The gospel of undeserved and immense blessing must determine our actions towards those around us, especially those in need.  Pouring out undeserved help to those who are in need (including those whose poor choices are directly responsible for their situation) is a powerful testimony to the truth of the gospel and a means of dispensing grace.  And it is grace that saves not good choices.  It is grace that instructs not a wise budget.  It is grace that must instruct the heart to make wise, gospel centered choices and decisions.  However, lacking this grace is not grounds for us to withhold this grace, but is all the more reason to dispense it.

In closing, the gospel must shape who we are.  We must let the gospel categorically reorient everything about us as people.  As followers of Christ and children of God, we have one purpose in this world: to proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light (1 Peter 2:9).  One very tangible way to proclaim His excellencies is by considering the opportunity to mimic God in dispensing grace as vastly more valuable than holding onto our possessions, money or time.  Remember that grace has saved and instructed you.  Battle against the empty deception and worldly philosophy that says grace enables.  Finally, take time to examine your life and ask yourself whether or not it has been radically reoriented around Christ and His gospel.

The Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Greatness of Service

Dietrich Bonhoeffer asserts that the fundamental flaw in humanity is the knowledge of good and evil.  Mankind, in his eating off the forbidden tree, has been separated from his Origin and in so doing has become an origin himself.  No longer does he act based solely on the will of God which is his to know in unbroken communion with his Origin, but now he acts upon his own will.  He is now the arbitrator of his own situations and judge of his own ‘righteousness’.  In the words of Bonhoeffer, “in becoming like God he has become against God.”

This understanding sheds light on many of our struggles as well as upon the repeated emphasis of Jesus (and the rest of the Bible) to show greatness in service and obedience.  This is not merely a quality which we (and Jesus for that matter) are to show in this life, only to have our bondage broken in heaven where we will be granted real authority and dominion to do with as we please.  Rather, upon our glorification, we will truly understand what authority and power are.   Authority and power are not ‘blank checks’ for man to do with as he pleases.  They are gracious gifts and masterfully crafted means by which the infinite, joy producing glory of God is revealed and pursued.  Authority and power are the greatest means by which we can serve and obey.  They grant freedom in this age and perfect freedom in the age to come to pursue and display the glory of God.

However, because of our knowledge of good and evil, our becoming an ‘origin’ in ourselves this is a major struggle for us.  Our hearts do not embrace service, submission and obedience as the ultimate purpose of authority.  Because of this there has been, is and will continue to be struggles for ‘power’ in this world and even within the church itself.  My mind goes to the complimentarian, egalitarian debate.  Most evangelical feminists cannot conceive of submission and equality coexisting together.  This is not a struggle for the members of the Trinity.  Because of this we would do well to seek diligently to be led by the Spirit in our lives since we all will struggle with this (since it is explicitly stated in the Bible that the knowledge of good and evil is the root problem of post-Fall man).  It is no mistake that the member of the Trinity who is often referred to as the ‘forgotten God’ is the member who dwells within us.  We are led by One who, in His perfect equality of essence with Father and Son, never speaks on His own authority.   “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.  He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.” (John 16:13-14)

Infinite power, infinite wisdom, infinite greatness in every facet of the word is here displayed in perfect, complete and whole hearted service and obedience.  This cannot be viewed as a temporary situation within the Godhead brought about by the necessity of the Fall and therefore temporary in nature.  To do so would undermine the entire purpose of creation which is to put on display the glory and greatness of God.  The redemption of mankind does not necessitate a temporary intrusion into the inner workings and qualities of the Godhead, but rather serves as the pinnacle of displaying them.  The roles which each member of the Godhead preformed and the attributes displayed by them are not anomalies of action governed by man and his fall.  They are the point of mankind and even of his fall.

It is my prayer that as we continue in our lives and walks that we will be led more and more to a place where we strive after and long for true greatness: service and obedience.   That we will seek a place where authority and power are sought after in order to pursue and display the glory of God for the good of mankind.

Preserving the Gospel

[This post was written in response to the question, “what will/can you do to preserve the gospel in our generation?”]

Introduction:

“It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all” (1 Tim. 1:15).   To preserve the gospel one must understand the gospel.

Understanding the Gospel:

To understand the gospel is, of course, to understand certain objective truths; namely, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.  However, the nature of the gospel is such that mere recognition of objective facts is not enough for true understanding.  True gospel understanding, which is necessary for preservation, must include an existential element as well; namely, that I experience myself as included among these sinners whom Christ came to save.  Paul is not speaking hyperbolically when he states that he views himself as the foremost of all sinners.  In his heart of hearts he knew that he was undeserving of such rich grace and mercy.  It is no mere coincidence that the one who understood himself as the foremost sinner went to perhaps the greatest lengths to preserve the message of the gospel.

Understanding the Gospel as One in Desperate Need of the Gospel:

Richard Baxter is recorded to have said that he found lying within his heart the root of every known sin.  To understand that Christ came to save sinners does not constitute gospel understanding.  To understand that Christ came for sinners and that I am a sinner in need of Christ to save me is gospel understanding.  The gospel is the power of God to salvation (Rom. 1:16), which means that if one is to truly understand it one must be affected by it.  In other words, essential to the ongoing understanding of the gospel is the ongoing experience of the gospel.  In his acute awareness of the depth of his own sin, Paul recognized the perfect patience of Jesus Christ on display (1 Tim. 1:16).

Recognizing Our Sin as a Means to an End:

The gospel is not primarily about my sin or your sin.  The gospel is primarily about who God is in Christ.  This is to say that understanding the gospel, which (again) one must do in order to preserve the gospel, does not terminate with understanding that I am a sinner in need of salvation.  True gospel understanding comes to grips with our own sinfulness as a means of beholding the glory of God in the face of Christ.  Our own sinfulness serves as a foil to salvation in Jesus in the greatest narrative of all time.  The understanding of our own sinfulness opens up avenues to understanding Jesus Christ that are otherwise unavailable to us.  Understanding the gospel in its fullest and purest form is understanding Christ in His fullest and purest form.  This understanding cannot come by means of mere propositional truths, but must join with these truths a subjective realization.

Conclusion:

To preserve the gospel one must understand the gospel.  To understand the gospel one must have experienced and continue to experience the gospel.  So, how do I plan to preserve the gospel in my generation?  I plan to do so by striving with all my might to understand the gospel in all of its objective elements along with and by means of my very subjective experience of it.

The Exaltation of and Emphasis upon the Son of God

The issue has been raised as to whether or not a Christ centered approach to Scripture, preaching and life does or may lessen the devotion rightly due to the Father.  This seems at first to be a valid concern.  After all, at the consummation of the ages will not the Son hand all things over to the Father? (1 Cor. 15:23-24)  However, when one realizes the eternal relationship between the Father and the Son, a Christ centered emphasis is clearly the only one wherein God is enjoyed in the same manner and fashion which God enjoys Himself; and enjoying God in the same manner and fashion wherein He enjoys Himself is to be the goal of every believer. (Eph. 5:1)

A good dose of Edwardian theology goes a long way in rightly understanding how a proper honoring of the Father legitimately comes through the exalting and emphasizing of the Son.

The Son is eternally begotten of the Father.  The Son’s existence is one of necessity.  It is necessitated by the Father’s need to fully delight in that which is most delightful, Himself.  However, in order for one to delight fully in something, that something must exist as the ‘you’ in an ‘I’, ‘you’ relationship.  Therefore the Father begets the Son.  In begetting the Son the Father produces His own image and that which is the exact representation of His own nature. (Col. 1:13; Heb. 1:3)  Thus the Son, like the Father has life in Himself (Jn. 5:26) and possesses every other attribute of deity.  Because the Father is immutable this necessity of delighting in Himself has been an eternal need and thus we rightly understand the Son as being eternally begotten.  There has never been a time when the magnitude of the Father’s perfections and beauty has not necessitated the existence of the radiance of His own glory in the person of the Son in order that He may fully delight in these perfections and beauty.  Thus there has never been a time when the Son was not.

So, the Father has eternally delighted in Himself by means of eternally delighting in the Son.  Therefore, if we are to be true imitators of God as beloved children, we must likewise delight in the glory of the Father by delighting in the person of the Son.  Anything less than this would be falling short of the divine precedent of worshiping the divine.  Hence, it should be the purpose of our churches and our lives to relentlessly pursue the exaltation of and emphasis upon the Son of God in order to magnify the glory of God the Father in the same manner He does so.

Always and Fully Labor for Christ

1 Corinthians 15:58—Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

These verses are from the end of 1 Corinthians 15 where Paul declares that the gospel message is of foremost importance.  There is no other message, mission or cause that begins to come close to possessing the inherent value possessed within the good news concerning Jesus Christ.  The majority of chapter 15 is spent defending the validity of believing in the resurrection of the dead.  In his defense of the resurrection the apostle unfolds certain breathtaking aspects entailed in the glorious future that lies ahead for believers.

These bodies that we struggle with now will be transformed into imperishable temples fashioned for an eternal existence, completely incapable of deterioration or malfunction.  Death will be swallowed up in victory.  In other words, the one thing that has haunted humanity from the first sin in the garden will be no more.  The greatest terror known to mankind, death, will be a vague memory which no longer wields the devastating power (or any power for that matter) that it does now.  This is merely a small sampling of the glories Paul mentions in this chapter and nothing more than the smallest tip of the iceberg of what awaits those who have genuinely trusted in Christ as Lord and Savior.

These glorious truths, as marvelous as they are, are not what caught my attention this morning.  What did catch my attention was the affect that these truths had on the apostle and should have on us all.  After 57 verses of argument and truth, after 57 verses of doctrine and theological instruction, the apostle culminates with one simple and practical verse that, if embraced, will encompass the entirety of our lives.  Because of the infinitely glorious hope awaiting those of us who have trusted in Christ we are admonished (actually commanded!) to stand firm.  Nothing, absolutely nothing is to move us off our convictions or deter us from our task.  What is our task?  Paul writes, “Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord…”  This is our task.  We are to be completely committed to the work of the Lord, the labor of the Kingdom.  We are to be about what Jesus is about.  Because of what is awaiting us and the glory of Christ who will receive us, the only fitting and fulfilling thing to do is to give ourselves fully to the work of the Lord, who gave Himself fully for us.  Please don’t miss the implications of the words always and fully.  There is never a moment in this life that is not to be given to the work of the Lord.  We are to always to be about the business of the kingdom.  Far too often Christians find themselves wrapped up in various ‘other’ causes to the detriment of the Church at large and their own souls.  Likewise, the degree to which we engage ourselves in the work of the Lord is described as full.  When it comes to laboring for Christ we are to leave nothing on the table.  We are called to completely spend ourselves for the cause of the Kingdom of Christ.

Let us not lose sight of these glorious truths and implications.  We must continually fuel our passion for Christ by exploring the Excellencies of His person and work.  We must never give in to the ever present temptations to diminish our labor for Christ by laboring for other causes.  May the surpassing love of Christ permeate every aspect of our beings and may we always and fully labor for Him who is glorious beyond measure.

Christ-Centeredness of Job

Job’s counselors seem to have a good grasp on the divine attributes of God, His righteousness, omniscience, omnipotence and so forth.  What they do not have a grasp on is the way in which the free sovereign God makes use of these attributes.  There theology has no place for the suffering of the righteous, no place for the forgiveness of the sinner.  All they can comprehend is righteousness and justice.  “To the scales” they cry.  However, this single-minded focus on justice and righteousness shows that they do not, indeed cannot, comprehend true righteousness; divine righteousness.  The inadequacies of man in reference and regard to the Almighty’s righteousness are deep and wide, no amount of good can make up for the rebellion and injustice done on man’s part toward the Almighty.  If justice were the only measure of God then all mankind would be doomed.  If we hold to the theology of Job’s counselor’s then mankind is without hope.

However, if we can allow for the suffering of the righteous in our theology (specifically the suffering of the righteous to accomplish the purposes of God) then we can allow for the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ to mean something to us.  Job’s plight is surely not retribution for his sin seeing that he was “blameless, upright, fearing God and running away from evil.” (Job 1:1)  Job’s plight is a beautiful picture of God allowing one righteous to suffer in order to accomplish His all good, merciful and wise purposes.  It is no wonder that God rails on Job for 71 verses in chapters 38 & 39.  Job in his despairing and questioning of God is leveling a charge of injustice against the divine principal which allows the righteous to suffer and which ultimately leads to divine mercy.  Job is fighting against the very divine principal that makes possible Job’s own statement, “As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at last He will take His stand on the earth.” (Job 19:25)  If God does not allow the righteous to suffer then Christ cannot suffer, if Christ cannot suffer then man cannot know forgiveness.  If man cannot know forgiveness then man cannot truly know God.  And if man cannot truly know God then God has created in vain.

What God is doing in and through Job is pointing ahead to what He will do in and through the Lord Jesus Christ.  Job does not understand his role as a divine shadow of the true substance; Christ.  Those of us who stand on this side of the cross and have been blessed with the full and final revelation of God in Christ must be cautious about how we view/embrace our suffering.  We are to be “always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” (2 Corinthians 4:10)   Let us embrace our plight in this life for the sake of Christ and His gospel.  Let us hold fast the “the hope laid up for [us] in heaven” (Colossians 1:5) and let us look to Christ for our strength.

Is God Unjust? The exclusive nature of the Aaronic Priesthood and Jesus.

Lev. 21:17 “Speak to Aaron, saying, None of your offspring throughout their generations who has a blemish may approach to offer the bread of his God. 18 For no one who has a blemish shall draw near, a man blind or lame, or one who has a mutilated face or a limb too long, 19 or a man who has an injured foot or an injured hand, 20 or a hunchback or a dwarf or a man with a defect in his sight or an itching disease or scabs or crushed testicles. 21 No man of the offspring of Aaron the priest who has a blemish shall come near to offer the LORD’s food offerings; since he has a blemish, he shall not come near to offer the bread of his God.”

At first and on a superficial level this text may seem to indicate that God withholds or deprives those physically less fortunate of some blessings. It seems as if our God plays favorites. However, this deduction can only be made when one reads this text unbiblically and man centered. To read this text and come away feeling that God is unjust one must first remove Christ from the center and replace Him with man as the interpretive key to understanding it. This regulation seems unfair to those who have a physical handicap, it seems harsh and unloving, but this understanding makes the Law an end in and of itself and removes Christ from the center of understanding. If the Law was merely given to govern Israel and did not in any way stand for and anticipate Him who was to come, then this text may be problematic.
However, when one realizes that the Law was given as a witness to the righteousness of God (Romans 3:21) it becomes clear that the point here is not that God plays favorites, but rather that no one can approach God, minister before God or otherwise engage the Holy One of Israel if they are beset with any impurity. To stand before the Almighty, man must be whole in the truest sense of the word. He must be without spot or blemish. What is described concerning the physical condition of sons of Aaron here in this text is paradigmatic of the spiritual condition of mankind. The requirement for coming before the Judge of all the earth is perfect purity. This is portrayed in the Law by setting certain physical parameters which dictated who could and could not serve in this capacity, but to understand this text as merely promoting these physical parameters is, again, to remover Christ from the center.
We all find ourselves described in this text. We are all beset with numerous impurities and unable in our own natural composition to stand before a most holy and just God. Nevertheless, God has made a way. God Himself has broken through the barrier created by His own holiness; He has bridged the gap created by His own righteousness. He has taken humanity upon Himself in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. He has, through the incarnation, made a way for man to realize this perfect purity. We now find ourselves with a kinsman redeemer, one of our own who has realized perfect wholeness and purity and has, because of His doing so in human form, made it possible for us to realize this as well.  This pureness and wholeness, which the Lord Jesus has, may be credited to mankind on the basis of faith.
A text which at a very superficial level may seem harsh and cruel is, when rightly understood with Christ as the center, rich in grace and mercy. This is our God and His Christ. Blessed be His name forever.