The Birthday Party

Some of my closest friends came by one day and told me, "We've decided to celebrate your birthday." I was a bit baffled for the moment, but they explained further. "Well, you never told us when your birthday actually was, but we are very grateful for your friendship. Therefore, we've agreed -- your friends -- to mark May 3rd as your birthday and celebrate your arrival on this planet. We'd love it if you came."

Well, I was touched, really. It was such a kind gesture. Such a warm sentiment. So I arrived on May 3rd as previously arranged. Several people noticed me and wished me a happy birthday. Most were caught up in the experience, but that was okay. It was really quite a crowd, and that indeed seemed like a real statement of gratitude. They had some good food and a nice cake (no candles) and they sang some songs and then came the gifts. I looked around the room and it looked like just about everyone was holding something. "Oh, my," I thought, "this is amazing." I had no idea just how amazing it was. One by one they came up with their gifts ... and handed them to one another. "We do this in remembrance of your birthday," they told me warmly.

This went on for a few years. I was torn between being flattered that they would gather every year just for my birthday and being confused about the gifts they gave each other without a single though to me. But, okay, that was how they chose to do it. Fine. It wasn't my celebration; it was theirs. They liked party hats, so party hats became part of the event. A bunch of them enjoyed horses, and horses liked sugar cubes and apples, so sugar cubes and apples became part of the event. An extremely popular fictional character on a TV show loved balloons at his birthday, so they became part of the event. Eventually, they couldn't even imagine my birthday celebration without sugar cubes and balloons, even though I've never expressed favor for any of it. It was their celebration.

One year, however, I invited them all to my house on May 3rd. "Hey, everyone," I said, "why not come over to my house? I have the room. I'm naturally there. Seems like it would be a natural place to celebrate my birthday." Well, they hemmed and hawed. Several said they'd come, but most kicked at the ground a bit and complained that if they came to my house, they wouldn't be able to meet with their friends and family. No, it would be better if they celebrated where they wished because, after all, getting together with friends and family and exchanging gifts like that was really what celebrating my birthday was all about, wasn't it?

You know, it has been years and I still haven't figured out this "birthday celebration" thing yet. It gets more and more elaborate. Sometimes I don't bother showing up at all. Doesn't seem to disturb them, though. They still say, "Happy Birthday!" to each other and give each other nice things. I frankly don't get it.

God is Dead

The story is told of a pastor who was in a deep depression for days over a difficult circumstance in his life. Finally his wife went into her room and came out in funeral attire.

"Are you going to a funeral?" he asked.

"I'm in mourning," she answered.

"Who died?" he asked.

"God is dead," she replied.

"No, He's not! Don't be ridiculous!" the pastor asserted.

"Well," she said, "I know that but you don't appear to, so I thought I'd mourn with you."

He got the point.

Worship as a Gift

I love my wife. She may not be "God's gift to mankind", but there is no doubt that she is God's gift to me. She is suited to me. We talk about just about everything, enjoy each other's company, share with each other, appreciate each other. We don't seem to suffer from the same maladies that so many others endure like conflict over finances or sex. We are just right for each other. I love her dearly.

Sometimes when I'm away from her I'll find myself pining for her. Perhaps that's not the right word, but that's how it feels. I long to be with her. I just want to be in her presence. I want to touch her hand and tell her that I love her. It engrosses my thoughts, almost mandating that I do so. You see, my love for my wife is not complete, not fulfilled, until it is expressed. I need to let her know that I love her to satisfy a necessary part of my love for her. And it's not that she doesn't know if I don't tell her or show her. It's not "news". It is something in me that requires it. I have to tell her.

God demands that His creation praise Him. To many, that sounds like egomania. Even believers sometimes struggle with this idea that God demands worship. At least we, as believers, do worship Him, but there can be this nagging question in the back of our heads, "Why does God demand worship? Isn't it some sort of megalomania? Is God really the ultimate egomaniac?" According to the dictionary, megalomania is a mental illness marked by delusions of grandeur. Egomania is an obsessive love for oneself and regard for one's own needs. God, then, cannot be a megalomaniac because, well, His grandeur is no delusion. He is an egomaniac in a sense because His love for Himself is well documented. That is, God is indeed self-centered because He is the center of all that is. We are not, so we must not be. He is, so He must be. We are to be God-centered because He is the center. So in Him and in Him alone is egomania accurate and correct.

But I don't think that's the end of the story. If we are His creatures created to bring Him glory, then isn't it in our best interest that we ... bring Him glory? If He is rightly God-centered, ought not we also to be God-centered? And if, as in the example of loving my wife, I am not fully satisfied until I express my love, is it not in my best interest to do so? As such, isn't our act of worship, commanded by God, an act of satisfaction for us? Isn't that command, then, a loving command to give us the best? Doesn't that make the worship of God a gift to us as well as to Him? Well, I'll tell you what. Try that out in church today. See if worshiping God doesn't bring you a deep sense of joy. Then you think about these questions.

Declining Trends

According to the latest Pew Research report, the marriage rate in America has set a record low. In 1960, 72% of Americans were married. In 2010, we hit a mere 51%. In fact, it dropped 5% in one year. In 1960, 15% of Americans had never been married. In 2010, that his hit a high of 28%. Unless something changes, clearly it won't be long before marriage will be in the minority. While the marriage age is rising, divorce rates are dropping. That, they surmise, is largely because marriage age is rising. Another critical revelation in the report? In the age group of 18 to 29-year-olds, 44% say marriage is obsolete (even though 61% say it's something they would like to do some day).

So how is this reported in the news? "The face of the American family is changing," they say. Well, I suppose that's to be expected. Since "marriage" has shifted its definition from "a man and a woman" and "for cooperation, commitment, and procreation" and "for life" to "whomever you wish" and "for whatever you want" and "for as long as you want ... or don't", it stands to reason that "marriage is obsolete". Strip this structure of its meaning and it's not surprising that it means very little. Apparently, then, while "family" used to mean people related by birth or marriage, it no longer means that, either. Now it means more of "household" or "group of people loosely related" or "whatever we want it to mean ... how dare you be judgmental?"

And, really, how dare you? Just the other day Paris Jackson, "the daughter of Michael Jackson", went on the Ellen DeGeneres Show to share "the best advice her father gave her". That was possible because "father" no longer means "A male person whose sperm unites with an egg, resulting in the conception of a child" and "daughter" no longer requires "female offspring". So, look, if we're going to change the entire definition of father, daughter, son, and marriage, we certainly have no reason to retain some sort of word that used to mean "family" and now means ... something else.

So what are we left with? God's image of His Son and His Bride can easily be discarded because, after all, marriage is obsolete. The biblical picture of "God the Father" is really no longer relevant because "father" is simply "the male figure in a person's life" (and, let's face it, likely a goof and possibly a pervert). No, no, that's too harsh. For most, the "father" is "the breadwinner" and a "good father" is the one who gives his "kids" everything they could want. Now that's a "God the Father" we could get behind, eh? Oh, wait ... that's Santa Claus. Okay, we can live with that.

Most people will read this as another rant. "Stan's complaining about nothing ... again. It's just the nature of things. Things change. That's the way it works. Get over it." Maybe. I just find it odd that the treasured images in Scripture like marriage, family, and father are all under simultaneous attack in our society today. You may think of it as inevitable change. I have to wonder. Who would benefit from undercutting all of these images God has created to express Himself and His relationship to us? Certainly not His allies.

Great Contentment

The banner at the sporting goods store read, "Now is the winter of our discount tents." Of course, that's not right. (I made it up.) It's not about tents. It's about discontent. I suspect that discontentment is a primary driving force for most people. We're not content with our lot in life, so we try to improve it. We're not content with our weight, so we go on a diet. We're not content with our job, so we look for something new. We're not content with our wardrobe, so we go shopping. We're not content with our spouse ... well, you get the idea. While this is certainly normal (in the sense that it is typical, average, the usual), it is contrary to what the Christian life should be.

Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me (Phil 4:11-13).

Paul here has discovered the secret of contentment. No, that's not accurate. He has learned the secret. Paul says that he has "gone to school" in a sense and finally learned the secret of being satisfied with what he has whether he is rich or poor. Now that would be a great lesson for us to learn, wouldn't it? So ... what's the secret?

First, from the text, where is contentment not found? It is not found in circumstances. It is not found in having enough or having more. It is not found in abundance or comfort or possessions or even "the necessities". Contrary to our normal human thinking, genuine satisfaction is not found in what I have or don't have. So, where is it?

He states it right there. "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me." It's really that simple. Jesus actually said the same thing, didn't He? "Seek first the kingdom of God ..." and you know the rest. David said, "You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound" (Psa 4:7). He wrote, "You make known to me the path of life; in Your presence there is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore" (Psa 16:11). There is nothing more than "fullness of joy". You can't get "more fullness". Full is full. And Paul says that there, in that place, genuine contentment lies. He told Timothy, "There is great gain in godliness with contentment" (1 Tim 6:6). While the Stones assured us, "I can't get no satisfaction", Paul would beg to differ. He had learned the secret.

Where, then, is there any room for discontentment? In what sense would or should we be dissatisfied? I would argue that there is a clear calling for discontentment in the life of the Christian. Where? That would be the discontentment of not seeing the power of God "who strengthens me". That would be when we fail to find our deepest joy in the presence of God. Our discontent would be in our shortcoming of being aware of God, His love, His power, His goodness, His mercy, His grace.

While many try to balance family and work and fun and church and all, I find I want more of Jesus. If I can learn that secret of finding my ultimate contentment -- my fullness of joy -- in Christ, I think that my work and my relationships and my fun and my life will be more properly ordered. I think that finding satisfaction there is the secret to godliness with contentment. And that is great gain.

Paul on Apologetics

Okay, this is nice. I finally came up with a short blog entry.

I'm reading in 1 Corinthians these days and came across this passage which, from all appearances, is Paul's commentary on the use of Apologetics in winning converts to Christ:

I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God (1 Cor 2:1-5).

No? Well, perhaps that wasn't his point, but it does appear that Paul's approach was not an Apologetics one. And, in all honesty, I share his concern when Christians get excited about this scientific discovery that backs our faith or that line of reasoning that seems to prove our point. Like Paul, my concern is that "your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God." Do you see it another way?

Playing the Hand He's Dealt

I like Dr. William Lane Craig. He is a leading defender of the faith. He's not a casual defender like I might be called. No, he's on the frontline. When Dr. Craig speaks, the enemies of Christ run. In a recent trip to the UK, he offered to debate Richard Dawkins on the existence of God. Dawkins refused. Instead of picking up the gauntlet, he threw in the towel. Why? Well, Dawkins claims that it's because Craig believes the Bible. Of course, the Christian element saw it as an obvious ploy (it is, by the way, the logical fallacy known as "the strawman"), but even atheists accused Dawkins of cowardice. All this to say that Dr. Craig is a really smart guy doing a really good job defending the faith.

That being said, being really good at defending the faith doesn't make Dr. Craig infallible. I recently read this quote from him.

"The counterfactuals of creaturely freedom which confront Him are outside His control. [God] has to play with the hand He has been dealt." — William Lane Craig

Now, before any William Lane Craig fans get their knickers in a twist, please understand that 1) I admire the man, 2) I am not intending to attack the man, and 3) I'm only using this quote to illustrate a broader point.

Setting aside the concept of "counterfactuals" (not the point here), I believe that Craig has laid out the basic belief that a vast majority of Christians (and the rest of the world) hold. Let me rephrase it to allow you to see the point: "Creaturely freedom is outside God's control. He has to play with the hand He has been dealt." Ten years ago Anne Graham Lotz, the daughter of Billy Graham, after the September 11th attack, told the nation that God was a gentleman and wouldn't intervene where He wasn't wanted. This year she said, "As a country we have pushed [God] out of our government and schools, and it’s time to repent and invite Him back." We're saying, "Sorry, God. You tried, but our Free Will has blocked You. Try something else. Hopefully You can work Your way around another way. But at this time, Man's Will has prevailed. That's outside of Your control. You'll just have to play the hand You've been dealt." And I have to say that this is just not true. While most of the people who see things this way would strongly deny it, it is a blatant denial of the Sovereignty of God and a cold, hard contrast to explicit Scripture.

First, the pure references to "sovereign":

The Lord has established His throne in the heavens; and His sovereignty rules over all (Ps. 103:19).

1 Tim 6:13-16 is Paul's charge to Timothy which includes the phrase, "... which He will display at the proper time -- He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords ..."

In Rev 6:10 the martyrs under the altar cry out, "O Sovereign Lord, holy and true, how long before You will judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?"

In Acts 4:24-30, the believers pray to God beginning with "Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them ..." They mention some of God's works which include, strikingly, "In this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and Your plan had predestined to take place."

Beyond the word, "sovereign", in its various forms, the principle is held sacrosanct throughout the Bible.

We know God limits Satan (Job 1:12, 2:6). We know that fallen angels are under God's command (Psa 78:49; 1 Kings 22:17-23, etc.).

Who can forget the declaration of the multitude in heaven, "Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Omnipotent reigns" (Rev 19:6)?

But a serious number of references come from the Psalms.

For the kingdom is the LORD'S And He rules over the nations (Psa 22:28).

The earth is the LORD'S, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it (Psa 24:1)

For the LORD Most High is to be feared, A great King over all the earth. He subdues peoples under us And nations under our feet (Psa 47:2-3).

God is the Judge; He puts down one and exalts another (Psa 75:7).

The heavens are Yours, the earth also is Yours; The world and all it contains, You have founded them (Psa 89:11).

Say among the nations, "The LORD reigns; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved; He will judge the peoples with equity" (Psa 96:10)

But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases (Psa 115:3).

(Get that? He does whatever He pleases. See also Psa 135:6.)

And that's without the many references to God as "King". (Do a word search sometime on "king" in the Bible as it refers to God. There is a lot there.) And, of course, it takes no time or effort at all to call up one of the most common terms we have for God, "Lord", and recognize its connotations in terms of sovereignty.

Not to be outdone, there is much more in the rest of Scripture. Isaiah says things like "It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He it is who reduces rulers to nothing, Who makes the judges of the earth meaningless" (Isa 40:22-23) and "I am the LORD, and there is no other. I form light and create darkness, I make well-being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things" (Isa 45:6-7). Jeremiah tells the story of the potter (Jer 18:1-23) where the point is quite clear: "Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as this potter does?" (Jer 18:6). Isaiah warns about the pottery disregarding its Maker (Isa 29:16) and prays, "O LORD, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are our potter; we are all the work of Your hand" (Isa 64:18). (Of course, Paul pipes in on the pottery issue, too. "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?" (Rom 9:21).) One really pointed statement from Jeremiah is "Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh; is anything too difficult for Me?" (Jer 32:27). In Lamentations he writes, "Who is there who speaks and it comes to pass, Unless the Lord has commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High That both good and ill go forth?" (Lam 3:37-38).

Look, there's way too much to list it all. It just keeps going and going. But the real question is "What about God's command over Man? Is Man's "creaturely freedom" something that God is "dealt", something "outside His control"? Does the Bible address that specific question? Yes ... it does ... repeatedly.

"Power and might are in Your hand so that no one can stand against You" (1 Chron 20:6).

"With Him are strength and sound wisdom, The misled and the misleader belong to Him" (Job 12:16).

The LORD brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; He frustrates the plans of the peoples (Psa 33:10).

The LORD has made everything for its purpose, even the wicked for the day of trouble (Prov 16:4).

The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps (Prov 16:9).

Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand (Prov 19:21).

Shall I go on? The Scriptures are not unclear on the topic. God is Sovereign. He is not merely sovereign like a human king. There is nothing over which God is not Sovereign. Nothing comes to pass that He did not plan. All that He wants to happen happens. Nothing that He doesn't want to happen happens. He works all things after the counsel of His will (Eph 1:11). Nothing in human existence falls outside of "all things".

Dr. Craig is a good guy, a smart fellow, a great debater, and an admirable defender of the faith. As such, I felt I needed to bring as much "fire power" to bear as I could. As it turns out, space prohibits it. Suffice it to say that wherever Scripture speaks to the question of whether or not God is left with dealing with the hand He is dealt, the non-negotiable, unequivocated, crystal clear answer is "No! God does whatever He pleases." Nothing (not one, no thing, not even a little something, zero, zip, zilch, nada) is outside of God's control. You may feel like it. You may hear it often. You may think it. But you do all this in opposition to Scripture. Scripture is clear; our God reigns.

Sosthenes

I'll never forget good ol' Sosthenes. "Who's that?" you ask? Why, he's the guy who wrote the epistle to the church at Corinth, of course. "No, that was Paul!" Yeah, sure, but take a look at the first line of the letter and see what you find. It was Paul "and our brother, Sosthenes." What else do we know about this important fellow? Well, apparently he was the chief ruler of the synagogue in Corinth (Acts 18:17) who got beat up for ... being in the vicinity of Paul? Nice. What else? Nothing. Not one thing. We might take a guess. He might have been an opponent of Paul in Corinth (especially after the conversion of the Crispus, the other "ruler of the synagogue). But it seems unlikely that they'd beat up someone on their own side. So maybe he was also a convert? Or, maybe it's not even the same guy? Nope, we don't know much at all. That's why I'll never forget good ol' ... what was his name?

I'm a Sosthenes. I may be right up there at the front, right in the opening lines, so to speak, and most people wouldn't know I was there. I am one of the few people I know that can walk by a WalMart greeter without being greeted. I am, in a word, invisible. That's why I like Sosthenes. This guy is mentioned in the Bible as a co-author with Paul and no one knows who he is. Yet, he was used of God. He was important enough to God to have him mentioned in one of the books of the inspired Word.

I know I'm invisible much of the time. In fact, I like it that way, quite honestly. I know that almost everyone wants to be remembered when they're gone, but I mostly hope not to be noticed. So I'm quite delighted to keep Sosthenes in mind. My value is not in how many people remember me. I'm not a success if I make a name for myself. Being noted in history is not the point. Being where God wants me to be when God wants me to be there is all that really matters. Because He'll never forget ol' whatshisname -- me.

Keeping Christ in Christmas

We've heard this battle cry for decades: "Keep Christ in Christmas!" Often it's due to ignorance that produces moral outrage that those dirty rotten secular businesses would substitute "XMas" for "Christmas" and, "Look! Christ has been removed from Christmas!!" Piffle! The origin of the concept is seen in those handy dandy fish stickers on your local Christians' cars. You know, the one that includes "IXOYE"? That series of letters originated as a secret identification for persecuted Christians and stands for "Jesus" (I) "Christ" (X) "Son" (O) "of God" (Y), "Savior" (E), taken from Greek. Note that the "X" was "Christ". Thus, "XMas" is not the removal of Christ, but the secret identifier for those who really know Him.

Still, the cry has continued beyond this little bump in the road. It's a cry against the commercialism of the season, a cry against the materialism and the paganism (real or perceived) of the current culture's Christmas. It is a reminder. Christmas is first and foremost about Christ. We've pretty much forgotten that.

Ask anyone what Christmas means to them and you'll get a lot of standard answers. It's about "white" and snow. It's about decorations and lights, shiny baubles and animated snowmen. It's about Christmas trees and Christmas wreaths and Christmas mice. (Okay, maybe not that last one. I just know that we have Christmas mice.) It's absolutely about Santa Claus. No one can deny that. It's about TV specials and those classic shows that have survived the decades. It's about Christmas songs and Christmas cheer. It's about time with family and friends, gift giving, and, perhaps most importantly, gift getting. (Why else are there riots and fights that breakout on Black Friday every year?) Obviously, then, it's a time of debt, but delayed payment puts that off, right? Oh, and it's a time of food, to be sure. Yes, we know what Christmas is all about. So we cry, "Keep Christ in Christmas!"

There is a more accurate measure, however, than all of this as to whether or not our message is getting out there. This year Christmas falls on Sunday. Will your church have its Sunday services? The last time this happened was 2005. Big churches like Willow Creek didn't even open their doors that Sunday. One study reported (unofficially) that 20% of churches closed their doors for that day and 100% of them modified their Sunday routine. Drop extra services. Don't have Sunday School or the like. Shorten the service. That kind of thing. Certainly no evening service (like that's big news ... how many have evening services anyway?). All researchers agree that, while Christmas typically packs the house for churches, a Sunday Christmas has the opposite effect. The Chreaster Christians (those who only show up on Christmas and Easter) don't bother, and a good number of the regular attenders don't either. (Catholic churches, it seems, don't have the same losses on Sunday Christmases.) So it begs the question: "Why is it that sincere, weekly, church-going Protestant Christians (not just those nominal or marginal members) don’t show up at church when Christmas falls on a Sunday?" "What is more important than celebrating the remembrance of Jesus’ birth on Sunday – the Lord’s Day?"

This phenomenon of closing shop on a Sunday Christmas and seriously decreased attendance for those who don't tells us the sad fact that our churches are not getting the message out. We'll say we want to keep Christ in Christmas, but when push comes to shove, to many of us it really is more important to gather with family, get and give those gifts, have that wonderful meal ... do just about anything but recognize the real point of Christmas. So, as we wag a finger of rebuke at the world around us from the stores and the materialists and the TV ads to the "pagan influences" on Christmas or whatever other pet peeve we may have, perhaps it would be wise to check our own eyes for logs. It appears we have a big one right here in our own midst.

The Danger of Tebow

If you haven't heard of Tim Tebow, you're obviously not a sports fan. Tim Tebow is a football phenom who is currently the starting quarterback of the Denver Broncos. "Oh, how nice," the non-fans are saying. "So?" Tebow is known, above all else -- get this -- as a Christian. Yes, that's right, an outspoken, unwavering, clear-as-day Christian. He began life as the son of Baptist missionaries in the Philippines. He was educated as a homeschooled kid. (That raises eyebrows.) Florida law allows homeschoolers to participate in local high school sports, so Tim played football. Turned out he excelled at football, so Tim and his mother moved into town and got him into the best high school football program they could find. There he became Florida's "Player of the Year" ... two years in a row. He went on to play for the Florida Gators and went to the Philippines during summer breaks to help his father out with orphanage and missionary work. He won the Heisman Trophy and graduated from college in 2009 despite being asked to be in the NFL draft that year. He was drafted by the Broncos in 2010 and started the 2011 season as the backup quarterback. The starting quarterback was struggling, so Tebow was sent in and the rest was history. (I know, not much, but, it's just a saying, okay?) Before Tim was put in, the team was 1-4. Now they're 7-5. If you didn't do the math, that's 6-1 in the win/loss column -- a good showing for a young quarterback. But that's not what makes Tebow a standout.

No, no, what makes him a standout is his clear faith. In a 2009 interview, he told the world that he was a virgin and planned to remain that way until he married. In 2010, the NCAA passed a rule dubbed "The Tebow Rule" that precluded players from having messages in their face paint (you know, that black stuff they put under their eyes) because Tebow was known for wearing messages there. According to ESPN, 94 million people Googled John 3:16 after seeing it on his face in a 2009 BCS Championship Game. And, of course, there is now a new term: "tebowing". What's that? It's when you take a knee and pray in the middle of what you're doing. Lindsey Vonn did it after winning her first World Cup race. It made Time Magazine's "The Top 10 Everything of 2011" list. He doesn't drink, doesn't swear, is saving himself for marriage, is not quiet about his faith ... Tim Tebow is a standout Christian.

So ... what's the danger here? That they'll make fun of him? Too late. In fact, it's a given. That some people won't like him? That, too, is a given. Charles Barkley is begging the Bears to shut him down because Barkley just can't stand the guy. "If I don't ever hear the words Brett Favre or Tim Tebow again it won't be enough." That's to be expected. Nothing new in the world's response to a person openly dedicated to Christ.

No, the danger is to Christians. It's easy for us to get sucked into this notion that because Tim is being faithful to Christ, God is blessing him with victory. It's easy for us to conclude that doing what is right and standing for the truth will bring us warmth and comfort and good times. It will absolutely bring us blessing, but let's not confuse that with pleasure. Here, check yourself. If Tim Tebow was to start losing for the rest of the season, would it make you think, "I wonder if Tim is in sin?" That's a clue.

We are blessed by God. We are His and He blesses His own. We are not blessed to some paltry, worldly level of blessing. Ours is a blessing that exceeds standard earthly measure. Don't get caught in that trap. It's much more than that! I'd hate for you to miss it because it's so much better than that.

Tower of Babel

You remember the story of the Tower of Babel (Gen 11), right? Everyone, at one time, spoke the same language. After the Flood, people got together and decided to "build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens" (Gen 11:4). The goal was to minimize God and "make a name for ourselves" to avoid being "dispersed over the face of the whole earth" ... you know, like God commanded (Gen 1:28). God's "fix" was to confound their language (Gen 11:7). Being unable to understand each other, they split up and dispersed. Success ... at least on God's part.

This will almost seem like I'm changing the subject, but bear with me. If you look around, you'll find that the English language is headed toward being the "universal language". A friend from China told me that as young students there they were required to learn English because it was required for commerce with other countries. I got the same story from a friend from France. And Germany. Pilots have to learn English to have a common mode of communication with other planes and with ground control. Tourist spots in various countries typically mandate English because so many tourists speak the language. Just about anywhere you go you will likely find someone who speaks English because, due to the political and economic power of the United States, English is quickly becoming a universal language. And, let's face it, the most common language on the Internet is English, regardless of your native language.

Now, combining the first two paragraphs, do you see where I'm going? At the Tower of Babel, there was a universal language. This fact combined with human arrogance produced Cosmic Treason that required a confusing of the language. Confuse the language and that particular treason -- "We will not obey, but we will make a name for ourselves" -- was terminated. My question, then, is "Has America arrived at the same place?"

I've written more than once about the common confounding of the English language. "Lie" means "wrong", "love" means "sex", "gay" means "sex", "marriage" means "sex" ... okay, maybe I'm being too simplistic, but you know the drill. So much of our English has evolved or morphed or been co-opted that using it for communication can be nearly impossible. When "Do you love your mother?" gets understood as "Do you have sex with your mother?", we're looking not only at a misunderstanding, but more likely a fight. Some words have had to be discontinued because their meaning has shifted far enough to be offensive. It's not just that we're building new words -- "Internet", "LOL", "audiophile", "netiquette", to name a few -- but we're modifying existing words to mean something completely different. Who would have thought that the words "ear" and "worm" would combine to mean "a tune that keeps rolling around in your head"? We know "flame" and we know "war", so we should know that a "flame war" is a war fought with fire, but it's not; it's an angry exchange of rude email messages. "Optics" could mean things through which we look or it could mean the way a situation appears to the public. That's barely related. "Tweet" used to mean the sound a bird made, but now it's the communication mode du jour. And who would have thought that a "cloud" would be the hot new way of computing?

Some of it is understandable. Take "drama" and "queen" and put them together and you get a woman who is really tops at drama. I can see that. But now we have to come up with new words for deviance, like "polyamory" to explain how it's good to have group marriage or "serial monogamy" to highlight how people have sex with one person ... at a time. (Note how "monogamy" has changed from "married to one person" to "sex with one person" and "marriage" has changed to even make sense in a term like "group marriage".) The Oxford English Dictionary this year added "OMG", "LOL", and the heart symbol to its online dictionary. Now, come on, people!

The famous line from the 1967 movie, Cool Hand Luke, could likely be quoted by just about anyone. "What we got here is... failure to communicate." Well, it's here. "Liar" may mean "intent to deceive", but that's not how it's intended half the time. "Hypocrite" may mean "presenting oneself as having virtues one doesn't have", but that's not how it's understood all the time. "Atonement" may mean "amends or reparation made for an injury or wrong" or it may mean "just forget about it", depending on the circles in which you discuss the topic. "Faith" may or may not have any component of fact, evidence, or reason in it, depending on who is using the term. "Christ" may refer to the Savior of Man or may merely be a swear word without meaning. And slowly but surely we seem to deliberately be reproducing the Tower of Babel story. Language is being confused. Unfortunately, in the original story the outcome was a dispersal that replenished the earth. This time we're just likely to get into fights. "Do I do what to my mother??!!" "Who are you calling happy??!!" "I don't care if you thought 'retarded' was a nice way of saying 'not as mentally quick as others of the same age'; you will be sued for using that word." (Please, feel free to substitute "inmate", "niggardly", and so on.) This isn't looking like a good outcome.

Submit Not One to Another

There is no doubt that the Bible is full of commands to submit. Children are to submit to parents, slaves to masters, wives to husbands, and all of us to civil authorities. That's a start. The sense of a list like this is that Christians are to be, well, submissive. I'd like to suggest that this is a serious oversimplification. And this mindset (which tends to rule whether or not we recognize it) causes all sorts of problems.

There are categories of authority. Various authorities have various functions. We'll calm them "realms". Starting at the top, God, of course, is the ultimate authority. His is overall. That's why He is called "the King of Kings" and "Sovereign". As such, everyone falls under His authority and everyone is supposed to submit to Him. And that, dear readers, is the end of it. Under God, there are a variety of authorities. There is the civil government that has the authority to command our civil lives (Rom 13:1-5). There is the church leadership which has the authority to command our spiritual lives (Heb 13:17). In either case, however, they are under the authority of God and do not have the authority to countermand His authority. Thus, a civil government that commands contrary to God's commands is not to be obeyed. A church leadership that commands contrary to God's instructions is not to be heeded. And so it goes. There are a host of authority structures including parents, husbands, teachers, bosses, and so on. Each has their "realm". Each is under that higher authority of God. Each has their limited domain. None are allowed to counter God's commands.

Now, part of our problem these days is that we fail to recognize authority, its rightful role, and its right to command. We've been taught "Question authority" which only works if the questions are based around "Does it agree with God's commands?" rather than "Am I willing to obey those who are in rightful authority?" Part of our problem is that we often don't recognize rightful authority. Wives are not required to submit to their husbands despite the specific command otherwise. Most church members no longer vest any authority in their church leadership despite God's specific command otherwise. And, of course, in terms of civil authority the thinking is often, "If I don't get caught, it's not illegal." Submitting to authority is a problem.

On the other hand, submitting to authority is a problem. "Um ... Stan ... you just said that." I know, but we seem to have the reverse problem as well. We seem to willingly submit ourselves to authority that is not rightful. Young girls, in their search for affection, will submit to the authority of the boy who has their attention. No such authority exists. We will often dress to meet the approval of coworkers or friends even though coworkers and friends do not possess the authority to require it of us. (My mother has taught me, "You wouldn't be so concerned about what others think of you if you knew how rarely they did.") Some in the church have suggested that women should submit to men. Perhaps it's an easy mistake. Church leadership is male (1 Tim 2:12-13; 3:2; Titus 1:6) and husbands are male, so women should submit to men, right? That's a submission to authority that doesn't have the role. Wives are to submit to husbands, not all men. Men typically submit to the tyranny of macho, feeling a need to do what other males without genuine authority apparently demand from them. Many men, confused by egalitarian voices and expecting to get what they think they want, submit to their wives. Husbands are supposed to submit to their wives ... by loving them as Christ loved the Church, not by surrendering to them. How many of us have submitted to Hollywood as the shaper of common morality and culture, to Wall Street as that which defines our view of success, or to the advertising agencies which tell us what we need and how we should think? How many men have surrendered to the authority of pornography that has misshaped their view of intimacy? And, of course, we all have a real tendency to submit to Satan whenever we are tempted.

A failure to submit to the authority God has placed in the ways that God has prescribed is a serious problem in our world. An equally serious problem is our submission to authorities that have no right of rulership in ways that we were never called to submit. A failure to submit has left children without guidance and love, wives without direction, and families without proper leadership. A compulsion to submit when we shouldn't has led us into worldliness and confusion. We are commanded to submit one to another (Eph 5:24). Let's not misunderstand. That doesn't mean "submit to everyone" or "submit in the same way in all cases". It certainly doesn't mean "submit to those to whom God has not given authority" or even "submit to those in authority even if they contradict God's commands." We are to submit, but in the right way. We are not, then, always to submit one to another. We might want to reexamine to whom and to what we are submitting, because it looks like we have a real tendency to submit to the wrong ones and fail to submit to the right ones.

Church Growth Planning

On the Huffington Post of all places an article appeared titled, "How to Shrink Your Church". Pastor Tim Suttle argues that success in Church is not the same as success in business. While nearly all churches are aiming for "bigger and better", Suttle claims that the aim of the Church is not more people and more money, but faithfulness. The goal is not a greater reach, but to call people to godliness. That, he assures us, will not likely draw crowds. The double-edged error of the modern church, he says, is sentimentality and pragmatism. We are quite sure that the job of the church is to make people feel better, to affirm their lives, to grow, so we go with "what works". On the contrary, he says that the church is designed to die.

The Bible is full of contradictions. Not contradictions to itself, but contradictions to normal human thinking. "If anyone wants to be first, he shall be last of all, and servant of all" (Mark 9:35). "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). "To you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake" (Phil 1:29)."I die daily" (1 Cor 15:31). "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me" (Gal 2:20). "I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ" (Phil 3:8). These are things that we would call "counterintuitive". They appear contrary to common sense. We like when Jesus says, "I came that they might have life, and might have it abundantly" (John 10:10), but can't figure out how to lay that beside things like "He has said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.' Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may dwell in me" (2 Cor 12:9). "Wait, wait ... which is it? Abundant life or 'boast in weakness'?" We like all those happy "joy" verses, but how do we align them with the "suffering for Christ's sake" stuff? We are really looking forward to the blessings, but can't figure out how "Those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives" (Heb 12:6) fits in. So we hope to waddle, fat, rich, and happy, into the presence of God and do our best to encourage everyone else to do so.

The call from God, however, is not for our temporal pleasure. It is not for "good", but godliness. We are not called to comfort, but self-sacrifice. We aren't called to be "whole" but to be holy. Ours is a "peace that passes understanding" rather than the far more common blind peace the world offers that doesn't see the storm behind it. We are called to "the joy of the Lord", not a passing fad of pleasure or comfort. To some, even suggesting a life of sacrifice and obedience is tantamount to Phariseeism and the ultimate evil, but it's not my suggestion.

Pastors, try this. Preach consistently "I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service of worship" (Rom 12:1) and see how your church grows. Practice the Matt 18 (Matt 18:12-17) kind of church discipline and see what happens to the numbers. Urge your congregation to embrace suffering, appreciate discipline, work at discipleship, bear one anothers' burdens, count all things as loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ, aim for total surrender and genuine obedience and see if your membership swells. I suspect that two things will happen. First, numbers would tend to dwindle. We are promised "they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires; and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths" (2 Tim 4:3-4). Preaching the whole counsel of God including the "less savory" parts will not likely increase your numbers. It might decimate your church. Second, however, is that those who remain will be a different breed of Christian than our standard model today in America. Not nearly as wide, but far deeper, these would be used of God in ways that today's shallow "I want to be whole and healthy" version couldn't imagine. Against such depth the world has no defense.

Crime and Punishment

In the American legal system we have two primary categories of crimes. There are misdemeanors and there are felonies. What's the difference between these two categories? The difference is in their seriousness. And what makes one crime more serious than another? The primary difference is the level of the value.

Take, for instance, theft. Theft is acquiring someone else's property. There is "petty theft" and there is "grand theft". The difference? The value of the property. So, while the theft of something less than, say, $500 might be "petty theft", stealing something worth $10,000 is "grand theft". It's not only about value. A person sneaking a $500 ring out of a jewelry store is not charged with the same crime as a person who obtains the same ring with a weapon. Now we've moved into robbery. The value of the item stolen factors in, but so does the fact that a person was threatened in the process. A person, you see, is more valuable than a ring.

And so it goes. Murder is murder, but there are degrees of murder. Typically, murder requires malice. Thus, a person that commits homicide (the killing of a human being) while defending himself is not charged with a crime because it is self-defense. And there are other forms of homicide that are considered justifiable. But most homicide is classified as murder. There is manslaughter which is an accidental death -- murder in the 3rd degree -- which is not as serious as murder in the 2nd degree, a murder that is not premeditated. The worst case, murder in the 1st degree, is willful and premeditated. Each of these carry increasing levels of corresponding punishment.

Various crimes -- misdemeanors and felonies, petty theft and grand theft, manslaughter and premeditated murder, and all the rest -- carry various penalties. These penalties range from paying a fine or doing community service all the way up to life in prison or the death penalty. The penalty for a crime is determined by the severity of the crime. The severity of the crime is dependent on the value the crime entails. The theft of a candy bar will not have the same penalty as the theft of a car. The killing of a cat will not have the same penalty as the killing of a person. And we know it's supposed to be this way. We know that the penalty has to fit the crime. The original method for this was "an eye for an eye", but we're more sophisticated today. Still, the penalty must fit the crime. That's what is called "justice".

It is, therefore, God's justice that is called to task when the Bible claims that the wages of sin is death, and that the penalty is not merely physical death, but eternal, living death, where "there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matt 13:50), "where their worm does not die and the fire is not quenched" (Mark 9:48). Now, how does that make sense? How is that fair? How is that just? The question arises because we fail to grasp the value included in the crime. We think in terms of doing a bad thing and especially in terms of limited sinning. We don't do these things forever. Why should we pay forever? It's a failure to grasp the object of the crimes in question. Sin is not the same as theft or robbery or murder. These are crimes against humanity. Sin is a crime against God. So our problem with understanding the justice of eternal punishment is due to our problem to grasp the incalculable worth of God. We understand that murdering a person is bad, and we understand that murdering five people is worse, and we are pretty clear that murdering 10 children is horrible. What we miss is that telling the Master of the Universe "No" is vastly beyond the horror of a child slayer because the value of the Creator of all is so far beyond anything temporal so as to be infinite. When that is grasped, we can start to see the sheer justice of eternal punishment.

I would suggest that when we do not see the justice of eternal punishment, it is not due to a failure of God's justice, but a symptom of our ongoing criminal activity of obscuring the infinite worth of God. Now, I know there are lots of people who would say, "So? What's the big deal?" As for me, even though my sins are paid for, I want to continually align my thinking with God's viewpoint. On this, I'm not there yet. That's something I need to work on. You guys go ahead and talk among yourselves.

Twitter Theology

There are things I want to know, things that I will likely never know. Some of them are just way over my head. Science and physics and biology and all sorts of stuff like that just elude me. Still, I see things and think, "I wonder how that works." It's not likely I'll find out in a lot of cases.

The other stuff, though, is far more complicated. It's how people think. I want to know what that mother was thinking when she did that to her kid. I want to know what's really going on in Herman Cain's head about all these allegations. I want to know what kind of thinking goes into some of the choices people make. I want to know how atheists I know construct a moral code that is coherent and reasonable. I want to know how people I care about rationalize their behavior. And so it goes.

Much of this is simply stuff I can't ask about. I'm really just curious, but most of these questions sound like I'm pointing a finger and suggesting they're evil or strange or something else. I'm not. I'm just curious. I want to know about other people and their theology, but if I asked the question (and started digging enough to get the answers I'm seeking), it would soon become a battle rather than an inquiry. And, of course, various people I'd like to ask are not people I can ask. Not too many pastors, for instance, will let me question their theology. I'm not suggesting they're unsure or anything. It's just that the questions I would have would feel like I'm questioning their character. I'm not, but those feelings are hard to push aside. Try asking a parent or a sibling something deeply personal or perhaps questionable and see how far that goes. No, too close, too personal, and way too defensive. So, I'm stuck with curiosity.

I'm pretty sure that things aren't going to get better in this failure to communicate in a world dominated by texting, Facebook, and Twitter. If our "social networking" is limited to 140 characters, exactly how deep are we going to get into a theological discussion or a moral investigation? Our "socializing" today is explicitly shallow and seriously surface. I can find out where you're eating or shopping, perhaps, but why you are in favor of redefining marriage to include same-sex couples? Yeah ... no, that's taboo. Too much thinking. Too many characters. Not going to fly on Facebook. Go away. "I just do."

My real concern here, of course, is that we're going to do the same thing with God. Let's interact with Him in a largely surface, extremely brief, completely shallow way. When pastors tell me, "I'm no theologian", I wonder what the hope is for those who are being told that right practice is far more important than right doctrine, and theology is not nearly as important as just loving God. You know, I wonder how that would fly in a marriage relationship. "Really, honey, I don't want to know much about you at all. I just want to love you." I don't think I'm looking forward to Twitter Theology.

Hypocrite

I have a few pet rants, tirades I try to avoid because they can get ... well ... tiring. (Get it? "Tirade" ... "Tiring"? Oh, never mind.) One of those that I'm often thinking about even if I'm not ranting about it is the English language. Oh, no, not merely words and their meanings, although that is part, but the effect of words on communication. You say "blue" and I think it means "red" and we're not communicating. Words are symbols for reality. We use them to transmit what we're thinking. If the symbols we are using are not for the same things, then our transmission gets scrambled.

I remember that whole brouhaha when the U.S. military failed to find extensive caches of WMDs. It was the reason that Congress had approved sending the troops into Iraq. We won't go into the fact that WMDs were actually found and mostly kept quiet by the press. There is no denying that we didn't find what we expected to find. And what was the public outcry? "Bush lied!" Now, I had a hard time with that. I understand the term "lie" to mean "a false statement made with deliberate intent to deceive; an intentional untruth." There is a fundamental difference between a false statement and a lie. The difference is intent. If I say, "My house is beige" and my wife corrects me and says, "No, it's more of a buff color", I wouldn't be accused of lying. I'd be accused of being male. Okay, I'd be correctly accused of not knowing the difference between "beige" and "buff" and telling what I believed to be the truth without an attempt to deceive. That's not a lie. Nor is there any evidence, going back to the Iraq War example, that the president lied. All indications are that the information that the president and Congress had was wrong, not that they intended to deceive.

"Hypocrite" is another such word. Just as "liar" is intended to be much harsher than "mistaken", "hypocrite" is in no way a morally neutral term. And we all get that. Jesus's harshest language was reserved for the Pharisees, and it was especially aimed at their hypocrisy (Matt 6:2, 5, 16, 7:5, 15:7, 22:18, 23:13-31, etc.). Jesus seemed to have compassion for sinners, but had a short fuse for hypocrites. Even today, hypocrites can get shut down pretty quick. I know for me when an outspoken advocate for saving the planet from anthropogenic global warming turns out to be producing 10 times the average carbon footprint, I tend to ignore his input. It looks like hypocrisy. But, my topic here is the meaning of words, communication. So what does hypocrisy mean? Hypocrisy is not the problem of being guilty of the thing to which I am opposed. Instead, it is "a pretense of having a virtuous character, moral or religious beliefs or principles, etc., that one does not really possess." Do you catch the difference? Lying is not simply false information, but the intent to deceive. Hypocrisy is not merely lacking a virtuous character, but the pretense of having it when you lack it.

This is an extremely common failure to comprehend. Imagine the conversation. "Son, I want you to avoid taking any kind of drugs." "Did you take drugs when you were my age, Dad?" "Yes, I did." "Then how can you tell me not to, you hypocrite?" Nope. Sorry. That is the wrong use of the word. It is a popular use, but it is wrong. You cannot be a hypocrite when you do not pretend to have a virtue you don't have. Paul, for instance, continually called on believers to press on toward godliness. In one place he says that he was the chief among sinners (1 Tim 1:15) and in another he admits that he has not arrived at perfection (Phil 3:12). Does that make him a hypocrite for calling on us to press on to perfection? Not at all! He makes no pretense to virtue, so he is not a hypocrite.

Here, think of it this way. You're going to go rock climbing ... extreme rock climbing. Who do you get to help you? Well, you get someone who has done it. So he's giving you instructions and says, "Do this and don't do that" and you say, "Have you done those things?" If he admits to failing to follow his own instructions, do you assume he's a hypocrite? Or do you assume he learned from his mistakes and is passing that wisdom on to you?

So let's see if we can stop misusing terms like "lie" and "hypocrite". When someone is mistaken without intent to deceive, it is not a lie. And when someone says, "This is the way; walk ye in it" and doesn't claim to, you can't label him or her as a hypocrite until they claim to do it and don't. Let's see if we can save our accusations for those who are really guilty of something. If someone claims, for instance, that the highest call of Christians is to give all your belongings to the poor and they do not, you can't call them a hypocrite. There will likely be other things you can say, but "hypocrite" won't fit without their claim that they do it. Pretense of the possession of virtue. That is hypocrisy.

Showers of Blessings?

The famous hymn, The Doxology, begins, "Praise God from whom all blessings flow." Think about that for a moment. How many times have I heard a football player or an athlete or someone that just survived a killer tornado or any number of people who say, "We are really blessed." It's a friendly term, "blessed". It offers the idea that we have been given more than we deserve, and it is indeed quite true. When you hear that term, consider the source of the blessing. All blessings flow from God. "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change" (James 1:17). And we are indeed showered with gifts.

My father has a coffee cup with the this verse written on it: "Eye has not seen nor has ear heard, nor has the heart of man imagined what God has prepared for those who love Him" (1 Cor 2:9). What an astounding thought. You think you know what kinds of things God can offer you? Think again. You think you've got a handle on what God can do in your life? Think again. Do you think that your prayers are big enough? You might want to reconsider that. The same God who exceeds your capacity to dream is the one that provides every blessing. Praise God!

A Question for Dan

Okay, this will appear to be something that I do not intend, so let me get this straight at the outset. First, I am asking for information, not for conflict. I am seeking to understand, not to debate. If an answer is forthcoming and I don't understand, then there may be questions that follow, but my primary goal here is not disagreement or debate, but simply to get it clear. The obvious disagreement I express in the question is simply to show the obstructions I have to understanding. Second, although the title says this is a "question for Dan", it would most accurately be a question for anyone who holds the view that Dan holds. To be perfectly clear, I've heard it in far more places than simply in Dan's comments. We have been told from multiple sources that we are to "cover it with grace" or, in Dan's words, "infuse it with grace." As Dan has said, we are to "embrace grace." And it's not just Dan.

Okay, so with that preface, I'm seeking understanding on this concept. Dan has repeatedly said that we shouldn't view the Bible as a "book of rules", but should approach it with grace. I am trying to figure out what it means. What it appears to mean is that, since no human is perfect, especially in their understanding of Scripture, we ought not hold too tightly to our views. Most accurately, we shouldn't try to suggest that our views are true, at least for others. You read that God forbids "a man to lie with a man as with a woman" and conclude that it's a sin for a man to lie with a man as with a woman (homosexual behavior). Fine. You can conclude that. Just don't tell anyone. Don't suggest to anyone else that it's a sin. At no time should you tell a person performing such acts that they are sinning. Hold your view, by all means, but do so in the silence of your own head.

I don't know. Perhaps its along the lines of "Don't make any issue of sin." Don't point it out. Don't make a statement about what is or is not. Don't suggest that anyone else should see it the way you do. Keep all that to yourself. Embrace grace. And there it is again. I just don't know what that means.

The examples I'm offered is "Do it like Jesus did." Is that a reference to the times He drove the merchants from the Temple? Or the times He took the Pharisees to task in the harshest of terms? Or the times He pronounced woes over (cursed) the cities of Israel who had rejected Him? These don't seem like the idea that is being expressed in "Embrace grace." Is it like when Paul told the Galatians, "O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you?" (Gal 3:1) or contended with Peter publicly for eating with the Jews (Gal 2:11ff)? Or is it closer to the time when Paul turned the young man over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh (1 Cor 5:1-5)? Or did these people (Jesus and Paul) fail to "embrace grace" in these instances?

It seems as if there are two things in view with this "embrace grace" thing in regards to the Law. First, it would seem that embracing grace assumes that none of us can know we are correct in our view on biblical issues, so it is unkind (graceless) to be confident. There is nothing available that would allow you to have any certainty that your view on this or that is correct, so certainty is a bad thing. Second, it appears that it is evil in some sense -- perhaps "less than admirable" -- to point to something as sin. Sin is ... mushy, muddy, unclear. I mean, really, given the first premise that we can't really know what is or isn't moral, on what basis can you really say, "What you're doing is sin!"? No, no, the better approach, if I understand this concept, is to keep you mouth shut. If they're sinning, they're sinning. No big deal. You just be nice to them. That's "grace". Trying to correct them or seeking their repentance is just not your place. Embrace grace.

I don't know. It all seems so muddled. Jesus called sin sin. All the writers of Scripture had no problem calling this or that sin, correcting those who transgressed it, and seeking constantly for repentance. It is impossible to read Scripture and hear "Well, this is my view, but I don't want to appear too certain" or anything like it. And even when Paul is saying that we are not under the Law, he is assuring us that we are not eliminating it, but affirming it. "Infuse it with grace" seems to say, "Don't be concerned about sin and certainly not in the lives of those around you", but Scripture seems to militate against that view. I can't seem to put together "grace" and "minimize sin" and have that connect with anything biblical. Did Jesus do that? He did it when people repented. He did it when people agreed with Him. That's not what we're talking about. So someone needs to help me out. What does it mean to "embrace grace" in the context of these topics? What view are we to take of sin? Is it "private"? "Keep that to yourself"? Am I understanding correctly when I say that certainty is a mistake and we ought not involve ourselves in right and wrong, especially for other people? Is that what it means? I can't imagine that since that's what I read in the Bible, so someone needs to clear this up for me.

Now, a little reminder here. I am not looking for a fight. I'm looking for clarity. I would ask that my commenters, on either side, would keep that in mind. I don't want this to become a war of words or a character assassination. I just want to understand.

Calvinistic Caricature

On another blog a friend presented a picture of Calvinism that was perhaps a popular understanding, but not very accurate. I don't want to link to that blog because putting a name to it tends to make it personal and I don't want to make it personal. But I do want to address the popular understanding ... or misunderstanding. So here is the representation offered over there:

Calvinism is the view that God decides whether you go to Heaven or Hell and nothing that you do affects where you end up. If God wants to save you, then he will, and you can’t resist it. If God wants to damn you, then he will, and you can’t resist that. God saves some people and not others, but not based on anything that the people themselves do. God does not want everyone to be saved.

Now, I understand where this comes from, and that's the nature of a "caricature". A caricature takes certain genuine characteristics of a person or a thing and then exaggerates them. Thus, there are certain characteristics of Calvinism in this depiction that have been exaggerated ... and thus misrepresented. So let's see if we can clear the air, because I'm relatively certain that there are more than a few who actually believe that this description is not a caricature, but an accurate representation. I'm quite sure that the guy who wrote it believes that. So what's the truth?

Calvinism (I hate that term ... can we switch to something less "man-centered"? Maybe "Reformed theology" or "the doctrines of grace" or something?) holds that human beings in their natural condition are dead in sin (Eph 2:1), hostile to God (Rom 8:7), inclined only to evil (Gen 8:21), and incapable of recognizing the kingdom of God (John 3:3) or understanding the things of God (1 Cor 2:14). While we all agree that "all have sinned", those who disagree with Reformed theology argue that Man is not so bad off that he cannot overcome his "dead in sin" condition, hostility to God, evil inclination, and inability to recognize or understand the things of God and, with the proper wooing from God, choose to come to Christ. That's a key difference between the two views. How bad off are humans in their natural state? Dead, or only mostly dead? The doctrines of grace hold that Man is spiritually dead and incapable of changing that condition. That's the initial condition.

According to Reformed theology, then, why do people go to Hell? The caricature version above indicates it's because "God wants to damn you" and it is "not based on anything that the people themselves do." The biblical ... I'm sorry ... Reformed theology view is that "all have sinned" and, on that basis (what they do), they have earned damnation for themselves because the wages of sin is death (do I really need to give you a verse for that?). So, with all things in static condition without God's direct intervention, human beings will have chosen to go to Hell and God would allow (not force) them to do so. Praise God that He does not leave it in static condition.

A solution, then, is needed. Outside of Reformed theology, the solution is that God will lay out His offer to everyone, encourage them to come, and leave it up to them. This view requires that the human condition be not quite so bad as Scripture seems to say it is. Thus, Reformed theology argues that God is sovereign in everything, not merely some things. We believe that those who receive Christ do so not by their own actions or will, but by God's work (John 1:12-13). We believe that those who are appointed will believe (Acts 13:48). We believe that in order to believe you must first be one of His sheep (John 10:26), that faith is a gift from God (John 6:64-65) rather than a summoning from the will of the human being, and that this it does not depend on human will or effort, but on God who has mercy (Rom 9:16).

Is it true that Calvinism believes that salvation is "not based on anything that the people themselves do"? This would not be an accurate representation of Reformed theology. While we surely believe that spiritual life (regeneration) is initiated by God and faith is a gift from God, we believe that each person must exercise that faith and choose Christ. No one is saved who doesn't do that. We believe that "With the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved" (Rom 10:10). Further (and perhaps more than those who oppose this view), we believe that you are required to "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling", keeping in mind that "it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Phil 2:12-13). (Our view of "the Perseverance of the Saints" includes work instead of "it doesn't matter what you do".)

Is it true that Calvinism believes that "God does not want everyone to be saved"? I'm afraid, with all due respect to my friend at the other blog, that this is simply a lie. You cannot avoid the straightforward statement from Paul that God "desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1 Tim 2:4). Reformed theology argues that, while this is clearly (because it says so) a desire of God, it is not the plan of God. Those who disagree with this must argue that it is God's will that all are saved, but He is bound in some sense and incapable of accomplishing His will. Human Free Will appears to be Sovereign in that view. In the Reformed view, God desires that all be saved (in direct contradiction to the caricature above), but wills "to show His wrath and to make known His power" on "vessels of wrath prepared for destruction" (Rom 9:22). He desires to show mercy to all, but wills to contrast wrath with mercy. The Bible suggests that He is well within His rights to do so as the "Potter" (Rom 9:21).

There are two defining positions in Reformed theology. The first is the Sovereignty (capital "S") of God. We believe that He works all things after the counsel of His will (Eph 2:11), that He is sovereign in everything, including salvation. He incorporates "second causes" like Man's free will (lowercase "f" and "w") and Man's work, but is the First Cause of everything because, well, He's God. It is hardly possible to overemphasize this concept -- the Sovereignty of God. The second point is like unto the first. God is the issue. He initializes salvation for His purposes and His glory. He saves whom He will save and does so perfectly. He accomplishes what He intends without fail. Everything that occurs is, in the final analysis, to His glory. Not Man's. He enables us to cooperate and we cooperate, but those are two phases. The first is "monergism" -- His effort alone -- and the second is synergism -- His work in us and our work for Him. All for His glory. He regenerates and we respond. He gifts us with faith and we believe. He dwells in us and we work out our salvation. It is not about us; it's about Him. These are the two positions that make Reformed theology somewhat different than the rest. They make grace much larger since in the other views I at least mustered the right faith on my own and accomplished the right decision. That's something, right? Thus, "the doctrines of grace". And while there are tendrils to truth in that caricature above, it does not truthfully represent what we believe. On the other hand, what the other beliefs do with the passages that I've listed (and more) eludes me. But, hey, that's their problem.

Anti-Choice?

So, according to the news, the Obama campaign strategists have already determined who the next Republican candidate for president will be. They've already put out an ad explaining how Mitt Romney contradicts himself ... often.

I get that this is the case. Romney worries me because you cannot know what he believes. The principle to which he seems most dedicated is "Say what you think the voters want to hear." That means that we get a chameleon in office. Clinton pulled that one off pretty well. I was not impressed. I don't want it again.

What really disturbed me, however, was not Romney, but the ad against him. I only got to see a small piece of it where they explained that he was both "pro-choice" and "anti-choice" (their words). Really? Do we have to go there? Again? Because once again we play the word game where sound bytes determine truth and words have no genuine relation to reality. I wish to address that lie.

There are many terms in the question of abortion. There are "pro-choicers" and "pro-lifers". There are "anti-abortionists" and "pro-abortionists". And, of course, a very popular term for those who are opposed to today's abortion laws is "anti-choice". The term is a lie. And we know who the father of lies is, don't we?

So let's examine the positions that are really held rather than those that are maliciously assigned by their opponents. There are indeed those who are "pro-choice". These would argue "We would like to make abortion rare, but we don't want to remove the choice for a woman." It is not accurate or fair to qualify these as "pro-abortion" because they see it as a "necessary evil" rather than a good thing ("pro"). There are also, despite the loud protests, "pro-abortion" people. They see it as a perfectly acceptable method of reproductive management. In this group there are those who see it as somewhat acceptable and those who would like to see it expanded. "Don't let 'that one' reproduce." China, for instance, has this going on. India is suffering from the choice women are making against having female offspring. It's acceptable and encouraged. That's "pro-abortion". And I think the case can be made that President Obama is actually "pro-abortion". But, while both of these allow for the termination of the life of an unborn child, I don't think it is right or fair to characterize these two as "pro-death" or "anti-life". That does not rightly represent their views on the matter.

On the other side, we have the baseline "pro-life" view. They might be called "anti-abortion", but they cannot be called "anti-choice". That would be a lie. Just as the aim of the pro-abortion side is to provide the woman with the ultimate freedom (as opposed to aiming at killing babies), the "pro-life" side is not aiming at preventing choice. To make such a nonsensical claim is to say that laws against murder are "anti-choice" because they aim to prevent people from choosing to kill. Not the case. In fact, it is not really right to call this view "anti-abortion". It works, I suppose, but it's not completely accurate. You see, it is not abortion that is being opposed. It is baby-killing. Thus, "anti" doesn't really play a part here unless we are called the "anti-baby-killing" view. (Strange. I haven't seen that one. I wonder why not?) You see, if modern science could come up with a method whereby a pregnancy could be terminated but the baby not die (the aim of abortion is to terminate a pregnancy, right?), there would be nothing to protest. It is the death that is being protested, not the woman's right to choose whether or not to be pregnant. So to label this view as "anti-choice" is indeed a bald-faced lie.

There is, at the end here, one other thing that bothers me. It's just a feeling, a possibility, a sense of things. If the medical profession did indeed come up with a way of terminating a pregnancy without terminating a life, what do you think the outcome would be? Would women take that option, or would they continue to terminate the life? It is my sense of it that most women who wish to terminate their pregnancy have no interest in allowing that life to continue. If they did, they could continue the pregnancy and give up the child. They don't. Now, that thought is disturbing to me. Is there an underlying current of "pro-death" in this world of abortion, an unconscious need to eliminate that life rather than merely terminating a pregnancy? I don't really know. That thought bothers me. If it is the case, my argument against labeling some "pro-death" or "anti-life" would fall apart. But don't call us "anti-choice". It isn't accurate, let alone kind.

The Cain Mutiny

I have to tell you that this whole Cain thing is a mess. First he can't settle on 9-9-9 or 9-0-9. Then he bobbles the ball on abortion. For or against? Can't really say because he appears to have taken both positions. Then he has not just one, but multiple accusations of sexual harassment. His defense is "Uh, uh!" To be fair, it would be difficult to mount a much better defense. These kinds of things are inherently "He said, she said." And now we have a new accusation of a 13-year affair. From a "friend" (his term).

All of this is, well, hard to evaluate. He could modify his 9-9-9 plan and still be qualified for the job. He could misspeak on abortion and still be qualified for the job. (I have to say that you can't favor the murder of babies and be qualified for the job.) And it is somewhat offensive to me that he is being tried in the court of public opinion on the harassment and affair charges and declared guilty when the American justice system demands "innocent until proven guilty". But the question I have is not about the any of these. The question I have is more basic.

Cain's constant denial is one thing. His lawyer's comments are another. "This appears to be an accusation of private, alleged consensual conduct between adults - a subject matter which is not a proper subject of inquiry by the media or the public." Let's think about that. When Gary Hart was caught cavorting on a boat with Donna Rice, his candidacy was terminated. When Bill Clinton was accused of affairs with Gennifer Flowers and Paula Jones, there was hardly a bump in the road. Ted Kennedy's event with Mary Jo Kopechne didn't seem to bother his political career much. Bill Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky got him impeached ... for lying to Congress ... and not removed from office. Congressman Gerry Studds was censured by the House for engaging in a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old male House Page, but he won re-election. Rudy Giuliani shut down his bid for the GOP presidential nomination when the news of an affair with his current wife surfaced. What makes the difference? When is it acceptable or unacceptable to violate sexual mores?

In the days of the Clinton presidency issues, the question of character came up. James Carville assured us, "Character doesn't matter." Is that the case? Is it necessary for a politician to be a person of good character? Why not for some? I got a hint on this from the news report the other night. Herman Cain, according to his interview with CBN in March, is a Baptist preacher. "My faith is a big part of who I am and at my church now, which is the same one I grew up in, I’m one of the Associate Ministers there because I was called to the ministry." Ah, see? There it is. Could it be that Bill Clinton coasted past the allegations of affairs and stayed in office after the last one because no one expected any better?

It's tough, these days, to expect better. The Bible says that all have sinned, that we are sinners at the core. It appears that the public record is bearing that out. But it would appear that people who profess to be Christians are to be held to a higher standard than those who do not. I suppose that's the way it is. I don't guess that I'm particularly surprised. But I'd like to tell Lin Wood, Cain's lawyer, that character matters and that illicit sex is not "a subject matter which is not a proper subject of inquiry by the media or the public." I would classify that as mutiny, Mr. Wood. And I'd like to tell Mr. Cain that honesty is the best policy and that any damage done to the name of Christ is far worse than damage done to your own reputation. (I'm not saying that he's not being honest. I would simply encourage him to be forthright.) Politics is a messy business. Being a Christian in that particular venue is quite difficult. Finding a viable Christian candidate is rare. I'm just glad that I serve a living God who is not bound by humans to accomplish what He intends.

Forgotten Commandments

While there is discussion among many about what is and is not applicable from the Old Testament laws, we're all pretty much agreed that the "Big Ten" are universal. You know those. The Decalogue. The Ten Commandments. Now those apply to everyone. I mean, sure, no one keeps them perfectly, but we're still pretty much agreed about them, right? Or are we?

Well, we're all pretty sure about murder and adultery. Bad. Well, most of us are sure about murder and adultery. Stealing is certainly a sin unless the government does it to take from one group to give to another. But as long as we don't call that "stealing", it's not, right? Because we're all pretty sure stealing is bad. And making idols ... that's definitely not a good thing. Of course, since modern day idols are much more subtle -- power, money, and so on -- we might find we're on the wrong side of that one at times, but mostly we still understand "idolatry" to be a sin. That whole "you shall not bear false witness" thing we're pretty sure about, too, until we start examining it closely. I mean, is that a prohibition against all lying? If a Christian hid a Jew from the Nazis in World War II Germany and lied about it, was that good or bad? Rahab lied about the spies and was commended for it. So that gets a little hazy. But, yeah, we're opposed to lying in general. Taking the name of the Lord in vain? I don't know. I mean, how bad can words be? Maybe that's not so universal. And, look, isn't covetousness the mainstay of capitalism? Just about. But if you call it "covetousness", we're still opposed to it.

There are two that, in my opinion, have been essentially ruled out in modern society. These aren't merely questionable. They can, in fact, be objectionable. The first obvious one is the Sabbath rule. I mean, look, didn't Jesus say, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath" (Mark 2:27)? Doesn't that mean that the Sabbath is terminated? Of course, if you think that one through, it does not. It merely means that the Sabbath was made for the benefit of mankind. That doesn't mean that it is no longer in effect, as if those things God does that benefit Man are no longer of benefit. So most will point to Sunday as the "Christian Sabbath". And that's all well and good as long as we don't think in terms of "Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work ..." (Exo 20:9-10). No work on the Sabbath. That's a little tough. On the other hand, it's almost sickening to hear of church folk who go out to lunch on Sunday after church and refuse to tip the waiter or waitress because "They shouldn't be working; it's the Sabbath, you know!" Someone somewhere is missing the whole point. Mostly.

The one that most catches my attention these days, however, is the other forgotten commandment. "Honor your father and your mother" (Exo 20:12). Paul pointed out (and, therefore, confirmed that it was still in effect) that it was "the first commandment with a promise" (Eph 6:2). It's a fairly straightforward command. Nothing too flowery or too obscure. "Honor your father and your mother." What could be more clear? Yet, today, not only is it not done, but it is often not encouraged. We shouldn't, for instance, honor bad parents. And while there is no "age clause", no indication that parents cease to be parents when we become adults and, as such, no longer need to be honored, that's the standard view. Adult children have no need to honor their parents. They are obligated, instead, to do what's right for themselves, to do what they feel they should, to seek their own path.

At a church I attended awhile back, the pastor asked the congregation to pray for two teenage girls in the church. They wanted to go on the youth mission trip, but their parents wouldn't let them. "Please pray that they can raise the money to go." I contacted the pastor. "Pastor, what about 'honor your mother and father'?" "Oh, don't be ridiculous," he told me. "They're both 18 and feel led to go, so they aren't required to concern themselves with what their parents say." You see? "Honor your father and your mother" only goes so far ... and the cutoff for that distance is getting shorter and shorter. Age, quality of parents, the perceived wisdom and capability of their instructions, whether or not the kid wants to go along with it, these things can easily serve to eliminate a commandment. And by the time the parents are old and need the assistance of their adult children, you can be fairly sure that in most cases they're going to be carted off to an old-folks home against their will because it's too much work to take care of them and honoring your father and your mother at that age is completely irrelevant.

I would beg to differ. I would suggest that the Bible offers no cutoff. It could be that "obey" is a command to children (Eph 6:1), but "honor" is not. What does it mean to honor your father and your mother? How would that look? Mere obedience? I don't think so. How, for instance, would children of "bad parents" honor their parents without simply nullifying God's command? How would a daughter whose father abuses her honor her father without submitting to the abuse? Is it honoring to shuffle off aging parents to a home because we don't want the hassle of caring for them? (Please note: That is a specific scenario. I understand that some of the needs of the aged are beyond the capacity of their children to care for, and I understand that there are even some parents who would prefer to go to a home to avoid being a burden to their children. These are not the cases in question.)

John wrote a definition of sin. "Sin is lawlessness" (1 John 3:4). The Law is, therefore, eternally significant. One of the clearest commands in all of Scripture is "Honor your father and your mother." Little ambiguity there. And while the outworking of that command may get confusing at times, it is still a command of the Decalogue, the "Big Ten", the Ten Commandments. It would seem to me that finding ways to avoid obeying this command would tend more toward the "lawlessness" side rather than the right side. How do you honor your parents? Or do you?

By This We Know

A short time ago there was a discussion under one of my recent entries about the Bible as a book of rules. There was, obviously, disagreement on that point. In the discussion, one person said, "The only way we can know other people are believers is by their adherence to the Law." Now, to be abundantly clear here, this person had already stated clearly and unequivocally, "Following the rules doesn't produce salvation," but, still, I have to admit that I balked at the statement. Really? Is that the only way we can know?

I'd have to say at the surface that in truth we cannot know that a person is saved. A person might make it abundantly clear that they are not saved. Jesus said, "By their fruits you will know them" and obviously meant that we were to recognize false teachers by their fruits, not by their words. They could say all the right things. Don't be fooled by their words. And Jesus warned about the tares among the wheat, the goats among the sheep, the wolf in sheep's clothing. There will be "lookalikes", people that seem to be "from us", but are, in fact, "not of us".

Having said that, however, I still mulled over the concept. And the next day in my reading I came across this:

By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome (1 John 5:2-3).

Now, that's interesting, isn't it? "By this we know ..." How do we know? "When we love God and obey His commandments." We are commanded first and foremost as even the casual Bible reader knows to "love God with all your heart" and so on. What does John say that is? "This is the love of God, that we keep His commandments."

There are two impacts with this passage. First, it would appear that, at least to a large degree, our commenter was accurate. We know a believer because he obeys God's commands. Oh, sure, maybe to varying degrees. Certainly not perfectly. But it would appear that a believer makes it a point to live a life of obedience to God's commands. And this is what sets him or her apart from a non-believer. The second harks back to the question of rules. If commandments (at least, God's commandments) make rules and a life of obedience to the rules marks a true believer, I would suggest that the Bible is indeed, at least in the area where God makes commands, a book of rules. How can it not be?

So, I think John cleared up my question with my commenter's comment. All clear now. Thanks, John.

If I Were King

I don't have any political aspirations. You can keep your governorship. I don't want to be a congressman. I have no interest in the Oval Office. Now, emperor ... that might be interesting. Of course, I've no interest in that either when it comes down to it. No, running a country isn't really something I'd care to do.

You know someone with real purpose? That would be your local pastor. Nations are big and people are important, but, after all, if anything is of the highest importance, it would be God Himself. And a pastor's job is to shape his people into followers of God, disciples of Christ.

Now, contrary to popular opinion, I am not a pastor. (I'm somewhat surprised how many people have assumed I am.) But if I was, what would I do? Where would my focus be? Where would I try to take my church?

First and foremost, I would aim my church for maturity (Eph 4:11-16). I would preach the Word in season and out of season. While many pastors aim for the lowest common denominator, I'd try to give them greater depth. What does the Word say? What does it mean? How should we then live?

Of course, none of that should be news. I tend to take that for granted. What else would I do? I'd try to teach my people the importance of worship. First, worship does not simply take place on Sunday mornings. It is a lifestyle. A sacrificed life is your reasonable service of worship (Rom 12:1-2). Second, the worship that does take place in churches is not as is commonly viewed. In the standard church service today there is an audience sitting in an auditorium paying attention to a performance that is intended, hopefully, to bring them closer to God. I would rearrange that understanding. On Sunday morning there is indeed performers and an audience, but the audience at church is God, and the performers are the congregation. Those up front are simply enablers to help the performers provide their best for God. They are not where the attention should be aimed, and I would try to teach them that as well as shape every aspect of Sunday morning worship to that direction.

What else? I would want to make a focus on relationship. Obviously the first relational focal point would be Christ. How do we form, cultivate, and maintain that relationship? Next would be the people of God. While the world tells us that we need to do what feels good, to serve ourselves first, I would want to focus attention on serving each other. I'd make discipleship a key value. I'd make the hard work of walking alongside others to build them in in Christ a key value. I'd try to encourage a church that includes people. "Oh, you're new here! I've never met you before! Hey, are you doing anything after church? Would you like to come with us for lunch?" I would want it to be an intolerable thought of having people come and go without being noticed. I'd want it to be a given that we don't attend church, but we are part of church. We are all ministers. On the other hand, I'd like it to be the norm rather than the secret desire to be connected, to be bearing one another's burdens, to be accountable and together rather than working at it alone.

If I were king, I'd likely step down. That's not really my calling. That's not really my heart. Neither am I a pastor. That's not my calling either. So maybe my ideas of church are no better than my ideas of how a country should run. I like to think they're not. I like to think that there are some who share those ideas. I even like to dream that some are pastors.

Sweet Comfort

I'm in favor of thinking things through. I'm in favor of examining Scripture, for instance, to see what it actually says. I'm in favor of thinking ideas through to their logical conclusions to see how they come out. I think it's a good plan. So here's one that, in my opinion, is rarely ever thought through.

Jesus was not vague or unclear: "Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few" (Matt 7:13-14). It isn't hard to understand that Jesus (along with the rest of Scripture) was saying that "many" will go to destruction and "few" will find life. Hard, cold fact.

Now, consider the claim of the Bible and, therefore, Christianity that we have "the Gospel", the good news. And if I ask you what that is (and you're not confused by voices hoisting some counterfeit "gospel"), you'll be able to tell me something about how Christ died for our sins and those who place their faith in Him can be saved. You know ... "narrow gate" stuff. And I would agree with you that it's certainly good news. But a skeptic asked me once, "How is that good news? You're claiming that all those who do not put their faith in Christ are doomed to eternal torment. That's good news?"

There are a variety of answers, but I'd like you to think this one through a bit. Purely in terms of reason, of concepts, of principles, of doctrine, we can say, "Yes, that's good news." And we can say it because Jesus said it. and we can say it because saving "a few" is far more than saving no one, the alternative. And we can say it in view of the price paid by Christ on our behalf. We have lots of reasons to say it is indeed good news. But what about the "many"?

No, let's make it more personal. Let's bring this down to our level. We all know some of the "many". We are all acquainted with, friends with, related to, close to those who will not take the narrow gate. So if you are faced with the death of a loved one -- a wife or sibling, a parent or grandparent, your closest friend in school, someone near and dear -- who you know rejected Christ and went to their grave condemned, what then? Where do you find comfort? When a loved ones dies without Christ, where's the "good news"?

This, my friends, is where the rubber meets the road. This is where you separate the sheep from the goats (so to speak). You see, if the "good news" to you requires "makes me feel good" or something like that, you're in trouble. It doesn't feel good to lose a loved one to eternal torment. So where is the Gospel at that point?

To me, I've found my answer in this: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is right?" (Gen 18:25). As long as "good news" depends on me, my comfort, my well-being, my understanding, my approval, then the Gospel is in jeopardy. On the other hand, when I place it in God's hands, agree that God is good, and trust that God will do what is right regardless of my current capacity to comprehend or feel the truth of it, all of it becomes "Gospel" -- good news. In that I find sweet comfort.