There is a false impression that I fear we Christians give to the world. It is wrong-headed, mistaken, and confusing. I wish that we did not so easily take people here, but we do. And when we give this false impression, we do God a disservice.
What am I talking about? So often we allow our point of emphasis in the faith to be far too small. Often we focus on one aspect of Christianity, but to the neglect of some of the Bible’s other themes.
For example, when you talk about Christianity to others, what do you present? Is your gospel presentation merely legal? Do you point out sin, judgment, and redemption? Is vicarious, penal, substitutionary atonement all that you share? Don’t get me wrong, I love the atonement, but there is actually more to present to the world than our sin and God’s forgiveness.
Sometimes, if we are not careful, we fail to present the goodness of God. Sometimes we fail to present the life and grace and peace of the Lord to a watching world. Sometimes we fail to show that living in the presence of the Lord is the source of the greatest possible human joy. And if we fail to present that joy, we fail to present Christianity accurately.
See the following verses found in Psalm 84:
1 How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord of hosts!
2 My soul longs, yes, faints
for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and flesh sing for joy
to the living God.
4 Blessed are those who dwell in your house,
ever singing your praise! Selah
10 For a day in your courts is better
than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
than dwell in the tents of wickedness.
12 O Lord of hosts,
blessed is the one who trusts in you!
When others hear you talk about the faith, does it sound like the above? If not, your picture is skewed. It is good to know and love the Lord. There is no greater joy than to worship the Lord. to be in the presence of the Lord is our desire. To live, even for a day in his presence would be worth more than living for a millennium somewhere else. Because God made us, he has the capacity to satisfy our souls. WE do not have the capacity to satisfy our souls with anything beyond what we were made for. So we glorify god, which is our purpose, to find the joy for which we were made.
I fear that, because of prosperity preaching, we have decided to deemphasize the truth of the joy of living in Christ. WE should not do so. The word of God is full of promises of life, peace, and joy. These promises are not based on material health or wealth. The promises of God are deeper than worldly things, as these promises reach into the depths of our souls. Do not sell Christianity short by only pointing to a legal transaction to buy our pardon. We love that element for sure. But the truth is, that legal pardon leads to the opportunity to have a joy that is not available to anyone who is not forgiven in Christ. Let us point people to joy as we call them to faith.
An Independence Day Reflection
It’s July 4, and so many of us are celebrating the birthday of the United States. It is a great gift from God to have been born in a nation where the gospel of Jesus Christ has been clearly preached in many places. I’m grateful to God for the freedom to worship the Lord, to preach the word, to share the good news of Jesus. I’m grateful that this nation has never established a government-controlled state religion or required its people to worship or not to worship in any particular form. I’m grateful to the Lord for men and women who have sacrificed of themselves in countless ways to establish and protect the freedoms we enjoy.
I am also deeply concerned for the future of the nation where I was born and for which I am grateful. Though we are most certainly not the nation of Israel under covenant with the Lord, we can and should learn from the fall of the northern kingdom of Israel. I say that because I believe that we as a nation are guilty of so many of the very same things that brought the judgment of the Lord on that people.
For you who do not know the story, let me sketch in the history. In Genesis, God promised to send the Messiah (or Christ) into the world to rescue sinners, crush the devil, and set right what went wrong at the fall of man. God chose one particular family, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to carry this promise. God changed Jacob’s name to Israel and promised that Israel would be a nation through which God would fulfill his promise. And Israel agreed to obey the commands and ways of God in order to have God bless and protect the nation. Eventually, this led to the nation being led by a king named David, and God promised that David’s family line would carry his ultimate promise.
In around 9:30 B.C., The nation of Israel divided. Ten of the 12 tribes separated from the leadership of the descendants of King David and went their own way. That nation was still called Israel or the northern Kingdom while the descendants of David and carriers of God’s promise were called Judah after David’s tribe. In 722 B.C., the Northern Kingdom was conquered by the Assyrian Empire.
Look at how Scripture describes the fall of Israel and the reasons for its fall.
2 Kings 17:6-8 – 6 In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria, and he carried the Israelites away to Assyria and placed them in Halah, and on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.
7 And this occurred because the people of Israel had sinned against the Lord their God, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods 8 and walked in the customs of the nations whom the Lord drove out before the people of Israel, and in the customs that the kings of Israel had practiced.
Here we see that the nation of Israel had turned away from the things that please God and had begun to do things that god had forbidden. They modeled themselves after the surrounding nations instead of following the terms of the covenant they had made with the Lord. Israel did this even though the covenant agreement included severe consequences for violating God’s commands.
What did Israel do? From verses 9-18 of 2 Kings 17, God lists the offenses of Israel. They refused to worship God. Instead, the people of Israel began to worship false gods. They bowed down to idols. They even began to sacrifice their children to their false gods. Other books in the Bible tell of how God warned Israel to change. Amos, for example, called Israel to stop allowing the super-rich to live in luxury while they oppressed the poor and needy in their land. Many prophets instructed Israel to stop practicing sexual immorality and all forms of wickedness. But the nation would not repent.
And here we are, over 2,700 years later in a nation that the people of Israel could never have dreamed would exist. We are privileged beyond anything we could have ever imagined. But I wonder how long we will be able to stand. I do not doubt the American drive or the strength of will of our soldiers. But I do wonder if the Lord will allow this nation to stand strong forever given the way that we so eagerly embrace the things that brought God’s judgment upon Israel. No, we are not a nation in covenant with God like Israel. But, throughout biblical history, God would only allow the nations around his people to live in sin for so long before his judgment on them would fall.
As a nation, we have seen gloriously good things. We have seen the Lord honored as our people have preached and spread the gospel. It was our soldiers who made a dramatic difference to put down Hitler’s Germany in World War II and helped to rescue the world from one of the greatest threats in history. It was the U.S.A. that stood against the threat of Soviet Communism to see the Berlin Wall fall and that wicked system of oppression collapse. And I am so grateful for those things.
But we are also a people who have embraced things that God has called wicked in his word to a degree that is beyond imagining. We, as a nation, have allowed the sacrifice of our children, not to a statue of a false god, but by abortion to the idol of human freedom and autonomy. We have openly embraced what God calls sexual immorality, redefining marriage, loosening any restrictions on divorce, and leaving generations of children without fathers. We have allowed in years past the kidnapping and sale of human beings to serve as slaves simply based on their color of skin. In the present, we still fear one another and hurt one another if we look different from each other. Now the modern slavery involves the kidnapping and sale of young boys and girls into prostitution through human trafficking, a very real American sin. In truth, the things God commands are ignored in our nation while the things God forbids are celebrated.
So, I ask, how shall we stand? Even if we are not Israel, even if we are not in covenant with the Lord, how shall we stand? The answer, dear friends, must be repentance. Our nation has been great in many ways. Our nation is great in many ways. We have been blessed in many ways. But if we, as a people, are not willing to turn from our sin, bow to the Lordship of Christ, and seek his mercy, I fear for our future. The Lord let his judgment fall on nations as great as ours in the past. Egypt fell. Assyria fell. Babylon Fell. Persia fell. Grease fell. Rome fell. Every great empire in human history has fallen. So we dare not take our freedom and our stability for granted. We need to bow, turn to Christ, and seek the mercy of God.
I’ll wrap up with a prayer recorded in Scripture. The Prophet Daniel, a God-fearing, God-loving, righteous man, prayed a prayer of national confession and repentance. In so many ways, Daniel was not personally guilty of what others around him had been doing. But he did not pretend that his own goodness would save the nation. Instead, Daniel prayed to God, confessing the nation’s sin, and asked the Lord to have mercy. Perhaps we could do the same, praying that the Lord have mercy on the nation we live in, on the nation he has so blessed, on the nation we love, on the nation that has so turned against him and his ways. May we pray for God’s mercy as we celebrate our independence, but not an independence from our Creator.
Again, Daniels’ prayer is for the people of the house of David, Judah. We are not, in America, the people called by God’s name as they were. But perhaps we can learn from this prayer to seek the mercy and favor of God as we turn from sin and to him.
Daniel 9:3-19 – 3 Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the Lord my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, 5 we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules. 6 We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land. 7 To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you. 8 To us, O Lord, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you. 9 To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him 10 and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets. 11 All Israel has transgressed your law and turned aside, refusing to obey your voice. And the curse and oath that are written in the Law of Moses the servant of God have been poured out upon us, because we have sinned against him. 12 He has confirmed his words, which he spoke against us and against our rulers who ruled us, by bringing upon us a great calamity. For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything like what has been done against Jerusalem. 13 As it is written in the Law of Moses, all this calamity has come upon us; yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord our God, turning from our iniquities and gaining insight by your truth. 14 Therefore the Lord has kept ready the calamity and has brought it upon us, for the Lord our God is righteous in all the works that he has done, and we have not obeyed his voice. 15 And now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day, we have sinned, we have done wickedly.
16 “O Lord, according to all your righteous acts, let your anger and your wrath turn away from your city Jerusalem, your holy hill, because for our sins, and for the iniquities of our fathers, Jerusalem and your people have become a byword among all who are around us. 17 Now therefore, O our God, listen to the prayer of your servant and to his pleas for mercy, and for your own sake, O Lord, make your face to shine upon your sanctuary, which is desolate. 18 O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy. 19 O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive. O Lord, pay attention and act. Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.”
Security not Taken for Granted
Do you question your salvation? Should you?
I recall hearing preachers, when I was younger, talking to people about their conversion. A person would walk the aisle at a church and pray with the pastor after a service. The pastor would then announce to the congregation that we had a new believer in our midst. Then, the pastor would look the young man or woman in the eye, tell them to write down the date of when they believed, and never, under any circumstances, allow themselves to question whether or not they are saved.
On the one hand, the pastor was doing something right. The pastor knew that, if a person is genuinely saved, genuinely converted, genuinely rescued by Jesus Christ, nothing will ever change that fact. We do not earn our way to God. We are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. So, if we are saved by Jesus, we become his and no force on earth, including us, can take us away from Jesus. Salvation is eternal, and Christ does not lose those he saves.
But, there is also a problem with authoritatively telling a person never to allow themselves to look back at an emotional event in their youth and question whether or not they are saved. Look at what Paul wrote to the Corinthians.
2 Corinthians 13:5 Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!
Paul called on the people of Corinth to look at themselves and test themselves to see if they are really in the faith. No way was Paul wanting them to look back for a date when they prayed a prayer with a pastor. Instead, Paul was asking them to examine themselves at present to see if they are saved.
What then should we do? Should we ignore our past? Should we doubt our salvation and never have confidence? No, that is not the way.
We should, however, look at our own lives and ask ourselves important questions:
- Do I believe that Jesus is the Son of God who died for my sins and rose from the grave?
- Do I believe that my only hope for my eternal soul is in Christ and in Christ alone?
- Am I willing to submit to the Lordship of Jesus?
You must ask yourself those questions. If you answer them in a genuine affirmative, the Lord tells you that you have salvation. If you do not genuinely believe in Christ, if you have not genuinely placed your hope in him, if you are not genuinely willing to follow him as your Lord, you have a major problem. A past prayer may be the moment that you had genuine faith. But a past prayer, for many, is simply a sign of an emotional reaction to a religious service. The far more important question for us all is, “Am I, right now, trusting in Jesus and Jesus alone—his perfect life, sacrificial death, and glorious resurrection—as my only source of salvation?” Ask,” am I willing to yield all authority over my life and soul to Jesus?” This is how you test to see if you are in the faith. And, these are questions that believers should ask themselves.
Unbelief
In Luke 1, we get the account of the events leading up to the arrival of Christ on earth. The priest Zechariah receives the promise from an angel that his wife will conceive a son. That son will be the prophet to prepare the way for the coming of the Messiah.
In the conversation between Zechariah and the angel, the old priest asks a question. IN some ways, it looks similar to a question that Mary asks the same angel in the same chapter, “How will these things be?” But Mary gets a simple answer from the angel while Zechariah actually receives a rebuke. Why?
Luke 1:18-20 – 18 And Zechariah said to the angel, “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.” 19 And the angel answered him, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. 20 And behold, you will be silent and unable to speak until the day that these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time.”
Why did Zechariah’s question get a harsh response? He did not believe. The bottom line problem was that Zechariah was asking out of doubt.
This leads to a very important biblical point. It is a point that we know in our heads as Christians, but which we somehow fail to see in its full light. Unbelief is a big deal.
You see, even when I say to you that unbelief is a big deal, it does not make you stop and think very much. On the one hand, you think, “I know that.” On the other, you do not let it go deep. To refuse to believe the Lord is a sin that is as ultimately insulting to the Lord who made you as any possible sin. Every other sin that mankind commits comes out of a lack of basic faith that God is who he says he is and will do what he says he will do.
Consider the fact that salvation from our sin comes to us by God’s grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. We are saved when we believe in such a way that it leads to repentance. True faith in Christ always results in salvation. What then is to be said of a lack of belief? A lack of belief leads to judgment. To refuse to believe in the Lord is a huge deal.
The word of God is clear through all of its pages that to trust in the Lord leads to life. To ignore the Lord or to not believe him leads to destruction. May we ask the Lord to help us trust him more. May we realize that nothing is actually more important than to believe, genuinely believe, in the God who made us and in his Son he sent to save us. And nothing is more of an attempt to rebel against the Lord than to determine that we will not acknowledge his existence.
Dangerous Leadership
When Paul wrote 2 Corinthians, he knew that the church in Corinth had been putting up with some false teachers. These were likely men who had very strong personalities and who claimed to be apostles. But these men taught a false gospel and they used their personalities and positions to gain power over the people.
Look at how Paul speaks of how the church let these men treat them.
2 Corinthians 11:19-21 – 19 For you gladly bear with fools, being wise yourselves! 20 For you bear it if someone makes slaves of you, or devours you, or takes advantage of you, or puts on airs, or strikes you in the face. 21 To my shame, I must say, we were too weak for that!
There was a brutality to these teachers. They abused the people. But, because they were so forceful, the people submitted to their cruelty and tolerated their false gospels.
Paul, for his part, sarcastically apologizes to the church for not treating them this way too. Of course, he does not think that it would have been right to stoop to such sinful methods to get the church to follow him.
What got my attention in this passage is the fact that this is not solely a first century problem. There are churches today that are “led” by “pastors” who lead by brute force and abrasive personality. There are pastors who lack character, who bluster and push, and who mold the congregation into the image they want. There are pastors who love their jobs and the idea of being successful far more than they love the people. There are pastors who will conveniently forget promises they made to one person or group of people in the church. There are pastors who will lie to one group or another in the church to make things happen. There are pastors who will ignore the rules of the church or sometimes even the law to get their way.
But, dear friends, we must not allow such men to lead. We must not allow abusive leadership to dominate our churches. The apostle Paul showed us that godly leadership does not look like such false shepherds. So we do not lead like this and we do not embrace or elevate leaders like this. May we be wise. May we be honest. May we be willing to hold leaders accountable, even if that accountability is uncomfortable for the church.
Of course, as a pastor, I’m not calling for us to ignore the biblical call to respect our authority figures or to submit to leadership. The bible is clear that we are to follow our elders and to make their jobs easier. We are to treat solid Bible teachers as worthy of double-honor according to Hebrews. But, with all that said, we must not allow someone to use the title of pastor or elder as a weapon to abuse the flock. That would never honor Christ.
Seeking the Word of the Lord
In 1 Kings 22, the kings of Israel and Judah wanted to battle against the king of Syria. Much of the story is typical of the warring of this period. But there is an interesting twist regarding the discerning of the will of God.
The king of Judah asked that the leaders seek out the will of God regarding their battle. Should they fight? Would they be successful? The king of Israel summoned many “prophets,” and all of them told him what he wanted to hear. All these men promised the kings that God was with them, that the battle would be a success, and that there would be a great victory over Syria.
The problem is, the prophets were speaking falsehoods. They were lying to the kings. They were claiming to have heard something from the Lord that they had not actually heard from the Lord.
The funny thing is, Ahab, king of Israel, knew that there was one other prophet out there. But Ahab did not want to summon Micaiah, because the true prophet of God often said things that Ahab did not want to hear.
When Micaiah was summoned, he first pretended to go along with the false prophets, but King Ahab knew that he was not speaking the word of God. So Ahab charged Micaiah to tell him the truth.
1 Kings 22:17 –And he said, “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains, as sheep that have no shepherd. And the Lord said, ‘These have no master; let each return to his home in peace.’ ”
Once this word was out, the two kings promptly decided to ignore it. They had a room full of people telling them what they wanted to hear. Why would they let one prophet get in the way? Even though the kings clearly knew that Micaiah was different from the false prophets, the kings decided that they were more interested in having someone agree with their desires than they were interested in actually knowing the word of the Lord.
What was the result? When the kings went into battle, Syria won and King Ahab received a mortal wound.
What shall we learn? One lesson for us today is that the word of God is worth far more than man-made opinions. When we need to know how to live or what choices to make about life, we need the genuine word of God to guide us. We cannot allow ourselves to simply listen for the message we want to hear. We need God’s word.
One thing that I have seen as a pastor over the years is a common practice of modern Christians asking what God wants them to do. These believers pray, and they ask the counsel of others. However, some of these folks ask and do not hear the answers that they want. Instead of humbly searching the Scripture to see the truth, they simply turn and ask another believer and another and another until they hear the answer they want to hear. At that point, the questioning Christian decides they have now heard the will of God, and they move forward with the plans they had all along.
Would that illustration be better with an actual story attached? A couple wants to get married in a church. They call and talk to Pastor #1. Pastor #1 examines the couple and finds that they should not be married for biblical reasons (perhaps one is a believer while the other is not). What does the couple do? Rather than examine the Scripture or try to learn from Pastor #1, they pick up the phone and call Pastor #2, and Pastor #3, and Pastor #4. Eventually, they will find a pastor who does not hold to the biblical standards that are getting in their way, and so they get their church wedding regardless of the counsel of others.
Quite often, in the wedding illustration I just gave, the believer in the couple will declare that they know that God wants them to marry this other person. They will not allow the use of the Bible to prevent them from doing the thing that they are sure God is telling them they are supposed to do. But, like the kings hearing from the false prophets in Israel, the believer is refusing to allow the solid and infallible word of God to be their authority. Instead, the believer allows fickle human emotions and very fallible urges, perhaps even “promptings,” to be their guide.
May we not fall into this trap. Christians, the word of God is the only sure way to know the will of God. God has told us in his word what is required of us. God’s word and only his word properly handled and interpreted is the only sure way for us to know that our choices honor the Lord. Impressions are confusing. Our emotions lead us astray. We are given to allowing our desires to rule us even when we are not following Scripture. But the Lord has given us what we need to please him. May we be a biblically led people for the glory of God.
What Poor and Persecuted Christians Do
In America, we do not know much about persecution. We may read the voice of the Martyrs newsletter or listen to testimonies of persecuted Christians, but we do not have a great deal of personal experience. In fact, for us, when things go against us, we tend to gripe like crazy.
It is wise, however, for us to learn from others who have been through something worse than we have. So, I want us to consider how one New Testament church responded to a set of hardships.
Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 8 about the actions of the Macedonians in the face of hardships. We know that these Christians had joy in the Lord. But they faced a severe test of affliction—and if Paul calls affliction “severe,” it was severe. The Macedonians also faced extreme poverty.
Now, stop and think. If you are a believer, really consider this. What would you do if you faced a severe test of affliction combined with extreme poverty? What would happen to your joy in Christ? Would you go inward? Would you tell others to leave you alone because you have suffered enough?
2 Corinthians 8:1-4 1 We want you to know, brothers, about the grace of God that has been given among the churches of Macedonia, 2 for in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. 3 For they gave according to their means, as I can testify, and beyond their means, of their own accord, 4 begging us earnestly for the favor of taking part in the relief of the saints
What was the outcome of the combination of joy in Christ with affliction and poverty? The Macedonians responded with an abundance of generosity. You see, there were other Christians who were also suffering. These poor and persecuted Macedonians begged Paul to let them give a little something to try to help those in need. The Macedonians were themselves in need, but they pleaded to be allowed to help others.
That, my friends, is what poor and persecuted Christians do. Those who truly know Jesus, who truly have the joy of the Lord, do not go inward when we hurt. Instead, resting on the joy of the Lord, believers in Christ continue to give of themselves for the good of others in the church. We do not hide. We do not close up our walls. We love each other and keep on giving to each other even when it seems that all we have has been taken from us.
May we Christians in America have the kind of joy in Christ and heart for God we see in the Macedonians of 2 Corinthians 8. May we have joy that overflows in love and generosity. May we not go into our shells when we hurt. May we instead glorify Christ and find joy in his glory as we give our very lives for the cause of Christ.
Sarcasm in Scripture
In general, I try to tell our people to be nice. I often say that we, as the people of God, must not mock, make fun of, or be harsh toward those with whom we disagree. And, in general, I believe I’m correct.
However, not every example in Scripture of the dealings of men of God with those who oppose God is nice and friendly. In fact, there are some that are downright sarcastic. There are some instances in which biting humor and mockery are part of the words of men of God to show the folly of idolatry.
Remember the story of the prophet Elijah on Mount Carmel? There 1 prophet of God faced off against 450 prophets of Baal. The challenge was simple: first one to get his deity to send fire down from heaven wins. Elijah let the prophets of Baal go first. They danced, chanted, and even cut themselves to try to get their false god to answer. Baal did not answer, because he is no god.
Look at how Elijah then mocked the prophets of Baal. This is actually pretty funny.
1 Kings 18:27 – And at noon Elijah mocked them, saying, “Cry aloud, for he is a god. Either he is musing, or he is relieving himself, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened.”
This is not nice. Elijah points out that their repeated chanting is not reaching Baal. Then he offers four alternatives. Perhaps Baal is really thinking about something hard, and so he cannot answer. Or, (my personal favorite) perhaps he is on the toilet and cannot be disturbed. Or perhaps he is away on a journey and has not made it back yet. Or perhaps he’s taking a nap and you guys need to yell even louder to wake him up.
What do we do with a story like this? First, I have to personally pull back my sweeping statement about always being nice.
There are some situations in which the people of God are not called to look at the ways of the world and pretend they are logical, sensible, acceptable alternatives. Sometimes people may actually cross the line into the ridiculous, and we should not pretend they have remained with the sane.
But, I would also encourage us to be very careful with the use of sarcasm. Like righteous anger, righteous sarcasm may exist. However, it is far more likely that you and I will go to sarcasm too soon or cross the line into cruelty at a time when it is not at all righteous. We need to be very cautious as we speak and as we joke. It is far too easy to let our humor feed our pride, to let our joking mask our gossip, to let our laughter accompany our grumbling complaints. It is far too easy for us to hurt others in a way that does lasting damage when we think we are funny.
So, I cannot say that sarcasm is inappropriate. But be really sure you know what you are doing. Be really sure that your motives are not dishonorable to the Lord. Use humor, when appropriate, to point out the ridiculousness of certain things that dishonor the Lord. But as you do so, be wise and careful not to begin to feed your own pride and selfishness.
More Questions than Answers
Some readings that I work through have such simple and clear applications that I cannot imagine missing them. Others are more difficult. Some daily studies tell me exactly what to do, exactly what behavior to avoid, and exactly what will please the Lord. Others, well, they require a lot more thought.
In my reading through 2 Corinthians 6, I find myself looking at a familiar passage, one with a traditional application. Yet, as I look, and as I agree with the traditional application, I recognize that there is much more present.
2 Corinthians 6:14-18 – 14 Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? 15 What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? 16 What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,
“I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,
and I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
17 Therefore go out from their midst,
and be separate from them, says the Lord,
and touch no unclean thing;
then I will welcome you,
18 and I will be a father to you,
and you shall be sons and daughters to me,
says the Lord Almighty.”
Let’s start with the common use of this passage. Many preachers over the years have used verse 14 as a prooftext for forbidding believers from marrying unbelievers. Do not be unequally yoked together with somebody who does not share your faith in Christ. That, of course, is a fair application of that text. This is not some sort of harsh restriction made up by God to keep people from loving whom they want, but a protection against uniting with someone whose life has a decidedly different focus than to follow Christ. Christians should not intentionally marry outside of the faith. To do so is to sin against the Lord and to set yourself up for a very painful future. Even if we find that sometimes the unbelieving spouse will come to Christ, the believer who willingly chooses to violate this principle is not honoring the Lord.
But marriage is not the primary point that Paul is making. Looking at the verse in context, Paul is talking to people who live in Corinth, who are surrounded by temples and idolatry. Paul is writing to people who must battle the temptation to return to their old practices, practices which violate multiple principles from the Lord.
In that context, Paul tells the Corinthians not to yoke themselves together with the unbelievers of the city. The Corinthian Christians are not to so tie themselves to their idolatrous neighbors that there is no distinction. Christ has no fellowship with idols. God’s temple must have nothing to do with the temples of idols. And since our bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, our lives must not unite us with the pagan worship of the world around us.
In Corinth, the application would have to do with a call to separate one’s self from the common community of Corinth so as to also be separate from the idolatry and the evil practices taking place in the temple. Christians would have to make personal choices that would cut them off from lucrative businesses and social success. Christians would have to say no to opportunities of advancement in the community, because to do so would require yoking themselves together with the idols of the city.
But how do we apply this today? This is where I have more questions than answers. Our society is not as overtly religious as was Corinth. Getting a job or being elected to public office in the U.S. is not socially tied to making some sort of false religious offering. Or is it?
We as believers must examine our lives to see where we, in order to function in our society, compromise our faith for the sake of participation. No, there is not a temple where we must go and bow to fit in. But the religion of the day looks different. The religion of our nation does not have the same type of worship as was present in Corinth. The religion of our day shows itself as a worship of pleasure, an intentional godlessness, a secular humanism, an aggressive atheism. Today’s religion is hedonistic, seeking personal pleasure as the highest good. Today’s religion is a worship of self, allowing every individual to decide to accept or reject anything as truth for them.
Given this undefined religion of today, what would it look like for a Christian to be unequally yoked together with it? That is a question that I think will look different for all of us. And it is a question that will be asked in every area of life. What jobs can a Christian not do because to do them ties us to the world in a dangerous way? What entertainment must we not take in because of how it will unite us with the religion of the day? Whom can we not marry because they are part of the religion of the world? Where should we not go? With whom can we not partner, even for a good cause?
These questions are hard. To some, they are fundamentalist and threaten legalism. But the commands of God are real. We must not be united with the religion of our world, a mindset and faith that denies the Lord, turns its back on Jesus, and makes man and not God the ultimate authority. We must be a people who are willing to lose social status in order to follow the God we serve. WE must be a people who are willing to let some opportunities pass us by in order to obey the Lord’s commands. We must be a people who gather in our churches for the glory of God without making those gatherings look like the religion of man. We must be people who are willing to change in order not to be yoked together with a belief system that opposes the things of the Lord.
At the same time, how are we to engage the world around us? We are not to be hermits. We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. We are to take the message of the love and grace of Jesus to the nations. We are to change the world in a variety of ways. And so we must think well, pray hard, make God our priority, and ask the many questions with honesty as we strive to live to the glory of the Lord.
Calling for a Response
One of the unfortunately bad raps that are often given to people from a reformed or Calvinistic church is the false belief that those who believe in sovereign election do not call for people to respond to the gospel. This, of course, is a caricature. While there are some who may hide behind their doctrine to refuse to obey the commands of the Lord or to follow the example of his disciples, genuine Calvinists will most certainly share the gospel. It is only hyper-Calvinists, those who believe it is wrong to share the gospel with others who have not shown signs of being chosen by God, who avoid sharing the gospel. And any biblical Christian will reject hyper-Calvinism out of hand. But the reformed, genuine Calvinists, will always be ready to share the gospel and give a reason for the hope within them just as God commanded us in 1 Peter 3:15.
No matter what you believe about sovereign election, you must not ignore the commands of Scripture and the example of the apostles.
2 Corinthians 5:20 – Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
Notice what Paul wrote here. He implores people to be reconciled to God. Paul, who said in the previous chapter, “We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God” (2 Cor 4:2), also says that he passionately calls on others to turn from their sins so that they can be made right with the Lord.
What must we learn? A commitment to Scripture, to sound doctrine, to the word of God and his way of ministry necessarily includes genuine appeal to others to be saved. If you are a Calvinist, you believe that you agree with Paul in his understanding of election. But Paul’s understanding of election still led him to implore the people of Corinth to be reconciled to God. Therefore, a biblical view of election most definitely includes a sincere call for others to be saved.
Christians, do not, no matter what your doctrine, stop calling people to respond to Jesus. No, never use tricks or gimmicks. Never twist Scripture. Never hide the truth of the gospel including the call to repent and to the Lordship of Christ. Never hide the hardships of the faith. But also do not hide the horror of the judgment of God. Do not hide the beauty of heaven. Do not hide the stunning love of Jesus.
Do not, whatever you do, refuse to call people to be reconciled to God. Tell people that they need a Savior. Tell them that, by God’s grace through faith and repentance, they must be saved. Ask them to commit their lives to Christ and find mercy. Tell them not to wait, because they do not know that they will have another chance. This is consistent with Paul’s practice.
2 Corinthians 6:1-2 – 1 Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. 2 For he says,
“In a favorable time I listened to you,
and in a day of salvation I have helped you.”
Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
How does this fit with a belief in sovereign election? For the biblical Calvinist, it is a great comfort. As we share the gospel with people, we also understand that the salvation of others is not based on our ability to persuade. My own personal cleverness or salesmanship has nothing to do with a person’s eternity. I am simply called to be honest, to make an honest appeal, and to leave the results to the Lord.
Pastor Travis Peterson 