"The true Light, who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world" (John 1:9, HCSB).
"Jesus said, I came into this world for judgment, in order that those who do not see will see and those who do see will become blind" (John 8:39, HCSB).
Like the blind man admitting he couldn't see clearly, we must also come clean and confess our inadequacies, sins, weaknesses, shortcomings, or in short, our sin (calling a spade a spade) to God, and not be engaged in a coverup, hypocrisy, facade, or masquerade. Why? "Be sure your sin will find you out" (cf. Num 32:23, KJV). "You have set our unjust ways before your secret sins in the light of Your presence" (Psalm 90:8,, HCSB). The primary condition of salvation also is to admit our disqualification for it--that we are wholly blind to spiritual truth without Christ in our lives. We will never know we are blind until we try to see the light or seek sight!
Light itself doesn't heal blindness, but Christ is the Light who can. Even believers can have spiritual myopia and not see things the way they should through the lens of the Spirit--having a Christian worldview--having mind and thinking renewed--the lense of our interpretive framework. The point of healing is to admit we need it, and just like when Jesus healed the blind man when he saw "men as trees walking"; oh, how different his life would've been without this straightforward confession!
He didn't try to see, but had faith he could! I know Jesus had quite a reputation for healing the sick but it still was an act of faith to come to Him for it. We must go to the Lord. So, salvation is not trying but trusting, and its the object of our faith that matters for it to be genuine. Faith doesn't heal or save, Christ does! Blindness isn't just physical but spiritual--we all are that way without Jesus. We may not know when we began to see or how we see, just that we do! We must be like the blind man who said, "All I know is that I was blind, but now I see!" But God is interested in more than physical sight! Then our testimony cannot be denied or refuted by scholars! Once the light is in us and we see we have spiritual discernment and our outlook changes and it can have dramatic and radical changes in our lives and testimonies.
We all need to see men as they are in reality, as sinners and God can open our eyes to see the Big Picture with Him in the equation to be oriented to the real world or Reality 101. The world has too high a regard for man, that he is the measure of all things, that man must be deified and God dethroned, and what they really mean is "glory to man in the highest," not to God alone be the glory--Soli Deo Gloria! God alone deserves the glory and worship for He alone is worthy, for worship means "worth-ship."
If ever we get healed (and we must want to be healed!), and we will if we believe, we must give God the ultimate and final glory--He only uses men as His instruments and vessels of honor! But note that spiritual healing is what is promised, not necessarily physical healing with salvation. Then we can overcome our lack of intuition or insight into God's will by following Jesus, which is the essence of ethics (orthopraxy or right conduct). When our eyes are opened, we can then see God at work and that: when God needs to lend a helping hand He uses ours when He wants to love someone He uses our hearts when He wants to listen to a person in time of need when God listens, He uses our ears! God is in the business of using us as vessels of honor to accomplish His will and glory.
So how is God moving in our life? We can only know if we see and our eyes have been opened by grace and when our spirits have been quickened. "God works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform!" Now, no one sees perfectly in time but we all can use spiritual enlightenment from the Word of God, especially its preaching to illuminate us. Our blessed hope is the beatific vision or the full measure of seeing God as He is with our eyes having full restoration in glory.
CAVEAT: WE MUST ADMIT OUR BLINDNESS TO SEE, AS JESUS TOLD THE PHARISEES THAT BECAUSE THEY SAY THEY CAN SEE, THEY ARE BLIND: "'If you were blind,' Jesus told them, you wouldn't have sin But now that you say, 'We see'--your sin remains" (John 9:41, HCSB). In sum, we could say that if we don't come clean we may remain in our sin and not be rescued, for salvation is a form of rescue or deliverance from slavery and blindness. Soli Deo Gloria!
About Me
- Karl Broberg
- I am a born-again Christian, who is Reformed, but also charismatic, spiritually speaking. (I do not speak in tongues, but I believe glossalalia is a bona fide gift not given to all, and not as great as prophecy, for example.) I have several years of college education but only completed a two-year degree. I was raised Lutheran and confirmed, but I didn't "find Christ" until I was in the Army and responded to a Billy Graham crusade in 1973. I was mentored or discipled by the Navigators in the army and upon discharge joined several evangelical, Bible-teaching churches. I was baptized as an infant, but believe in believer baptism, of which I was a partaker after my conversion experience. I believe in the "5 Onlys" of the reformation: sola fide (faith alone); sola Scriptura (Scripture alone); soli Christo (Christ alone), sola gratia (grace alone), and soli Deo gloria (to God alone be the glory). I affirm TULIP as defended in the Reformation.. I affirm most of The Westminster Confession of Faith, especially pertaining to Providence.
Sunday, January 26, 2020
Sunday, January 19, 2020
You Destroyed My Faith!
"Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall" (1 Cor. 10:12, KJV).
"Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if you do these things you shall never fall" (2 Pet. 1:10, KJV).
"But he that shall endure to the end, the same shall be saved" (Matt. 24:13; cf. 10:22, KJV).
We aren't born tabula rasa, which John Locke believed, with a blank slate but are naturally creatures of faith as a sixth sense or instinct and that is the primary way we first learn: we take our parent's word for it! Faith is knowledge acted upon and knowledge used wisely is wisdom. Both are virtues we should practice as believers. The definition of knowledge is believed or interpreted as being a justified true belief--we must believe it and it must be for a good reason, as if by some authority.
Faith is putting trust in what we have good reason to believe. It's also knowledge in action. We have a right to our own opinions about the knowledge we know but cannot make up our own knowledge or fabricate our own truths. Beliefs can be true or false and are very subjective, while truth itself is what corresponds with reality according to the correspondence theory of truth of John Locke. To Christians, truth is what agrees with God. Nothing is true because it's believed or untrue because it's doubted.
Children may learn to believe in Santa (a harmless myth) by being encouraged and they will eventually find out it's all pretend, but they usually know we are serious when we relate the true Christmas story. We can all learn lessons of childlike faith and innocence from kids (cf. Mark 10:45). They need to learn faith and put it into practice! Parents don't destroy the children's faith in Santa, they just outgrow it by being around older and more mature kids or from the real world. Kids have a big imagination and would probably believe even if not so encouraged.
Many atheists will insist they were once believers who lost their faith (the Bible would call this going apostate and departing from the faith which only proved they never had any according to 1 John 2:19). They had some traumatic experience they couldn't cope with and took it out on God, developing an animus towards Him and then towards Christians, becoming militant atheists even anti-theists bent on destroying the influence of the church and neutralizing Christian influence.
It should be noted that the same sun melts the butter, hardens the clay; we all either become bitter or better by the same experience and no one skates through life trouble-free without adversity or trials. Our faith must be tested in the crucible of the trench warfare of real OJT in life. Even Jesus didn't exempt Himself from adversity and was honest enough to warn us and to count the cost of discipleship.
You don't need all the answers to believe and just because you believe it doesn't mean you can defend your faith, But belief without evidence is called blind faith and we are commanded to have a reason for the hope that is in us! Being apologists is for all believers! We are to "contend for the faith" (cf. Jude 3) and "in defense of the gospel"(cf. Phil. 1:7) as Jude and Paul did respectively.
We must remember that no matter how strong our faith, it's still faith and we are saved by faith, not knowledge, which is the error of Gnostics who try to achieve a secret, privileged knowledge of the elite. We are not saved by intellectualism either--it isn't how much we know, but Whom we know as Paul said in 2 Tim. 1:12 that "I know in whom I have believed...." Christianity isn't a faith of enlightenment, but of salvation and redemption from the real culprit-sin, not ignorance. Assurance is not an automatic fruit of salvation but belongs to its well-being, not being and some people need to have a spiritual wake-up call before realizing their precarious faith.
One warning Jesus gave was not to cause a brother to stumble (cf. 1 Cor. 8:12) or a child to lose faith! To wage war against the saints is odious to God. We're all supposed to be on the same side as they say in the battle to the troops fighting each other; "The enemy is over there!" Note that it's been said that we are our own worst enemies! We should be fighting sin and evil, not each other! We ought to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace per Eph. 4:3. It's our job to reassure and foster faith in the weaker brother, but it's not our calling to certify salvation.
Now faith is the "substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen" according to Hebrews 11:1. For illustration purposes, let's say I reach my hand into my pocket and grab something and ask you what it is! I hold it behind my back and you take a guess or two. Finally, you come to believe I'm holding my car keys because you can hear them! That's right, there's evidence for faith! But this is still faith though you are convinced. But let's say I open my hand and show you my keys in them; then I've destroyed your faith and given you first-hand knowledge!
This is akin to getting the first-hand knowledge of our Lord and Savior via a personal relationship with Him--we have encountered Him empirically and know Him like for who He is and what it says: "Taste and see that the LORD is good" (cf. Psalm 34:8). The proof of the pudding we'll find out is in the eating! We need believers with first-hand experience and knowledge of the Lord. But know this: It's faith till we eat! What I'm trying to say is that we can know God and be sure of our salvation by the Spirit residing in us: "The Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are sons of God" (cf. Romans 8:16).
Let's take another example of faith: a tightrope walker demonstrates he can walk across the rope with a wheelbarrow and asks how many actually believe he can push a person across in it! Almost everyone raises their hands and says they believe. Then he asks of a volunteer! No one is willing to test their faith! Where's the faith now? He didn't kill their faith but found out they had none for we must be willing to exercise or put it into practice for it to be bona fide, saving faith. Anyone can say they have faith but it must be proved by our behavior, conduct, and works--we're known by our fruits per Matt. 7:20.
A good example of faith in action is a kid flying a kite on a cloudy day: The passerby asks him how he knows the kite is really up there since he doesn't see it! The kid says, oh, I feel a tug every now and then to reassure me. Likewise, we feel God drawing us towards Him in fellowship and love. Faith is like that--God reassures us and keeps us in the faith and doesn't let go. Experience in flying kites made his faith strong and likewise, an experienced walk with Christ yields strong faith. The more trials we successfully pass with flying colors the more real our faith to us.
NB: Our faith is held by God's power (cf 1 Pet. 1:5) who will not let go of us nor give up on us (cf Phil. 1:6)--we're all works in progress. Someone hostile to the faith may ask some questions we cannot answer, but no issue or problem with the Bible or the faith is going to bring Christianity to its demise after 2,000 years. But sometimes God allows us to have doubts and to experience hardened hearts; it is important to realize that doubt is not a Christian problem but a human one, it's an element of faith, not the opposite of it. It can take courage to doubt.
But in the final analysis, we should doubt our doubts and believe our tried and true faith, so we can say with Paul's swan song (cf. 2 Tim. 4:7): "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith," knowing we are kept in Christ from beginning to end (cf Jude 1: 24). God doesn't teach us to swim only to let us drown!
In sum, let me quote the late Rev. Billy Graham: "If you want to keep your faith, you must give it away!" Let me add: A privatized faith is no more than a cloistered faith that cannot reach out to the lost. Soli Deo Gloria!
"Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if you do these things you shall never fall" (2 Pet. 1:10, KJV).
"But he that shall endure to the end, the same shall be saved" (Matt. 24:13; cf. 10:22, KJV).
We aren't born tabula rasa, which John Locke believed, with a blank slate but are naturally creatures of faith as a sixth sense or instinct and that is the primary way we first learn: we take our parent's word for it! Faith is knowledge acted upon and knowledge used wisely is wisdom. Both are virtues we should practice as believers. The definition of knowledge is believed or interpreted as being a justified true belief--we must believe it and it must be for a good reason, as if by some authority.
Faith is putting trust in what we have good reason to believe. It's also knowledge in action. We have a right to our own opinions about the knowledge we know but cannot make up our own knowledge or fabricate our own truths. Beliefs can be true or false and are very subjective, while truth itself is what corresponds with reality according to the correspondence theory of truth of John Locke. To Christians, truth is what agrees with God. Nothing is true because it's believed or untrue because it's doubted.
Children may learn to believe in Santa (a harmless myth) by being encouraged and they will eventually find out it's all pretend, but they usually know we are serious when we relate the true Christmas story. We can all learn lessons of childlike faith and innocence from kids (cf. Mark 10:45). They need to learn faith and put it into practice! Parents don't destroy the children's faith in Santa, they just outgrow it by being around older and more mature kids or from the real world. Kids have a big imagination and would probably believe even if not so encouraged.
Many atheists will insist they were once believers who lost their faith (the Bible would call this going apostate and departing from the faith which only proved they never had any according to 1 John 2:19). They had some traumatic experience they couldn't cope with and took it out on God, developing an animus towards Him and then towards Christians, becoming militant atheists even anti-theists bent on destroying the influence of the church and neutralizing Christian influence.
It should be noted that the same sun melts the butter, hardens the clay; we all either become bitter or better by the same experience and no one skates through life trouble-free without adversity or trials. Our faith must be tested in the crucible of the trench warfare of real OJT in life. Even Jesus didn't exempt Himself from adversity and was honest enough to warn us and to count the cost of discipleship.
You don't need all the answers to believe and just because you believe it doesn't mean you can defend your faith, But belief without evidence is called blind faith and we are commanded to have a reason for the hope that is in us! Being apologists is for all believers! We are to "contend for the faith" (cf. Jude 3) and "in defense of the gospel"(cf. Phil. 1:7) as Jude and Paul did respectively.
We must remember that no matter how strong our faith, it's still faith and we are saved by faith, not knowledge, which is the error of Gnostics who try to achieve a secret, privileged knowledge of the elite. We are not saved by intellectualism either--it isn't how much we know, but Whom we know as Paul said in 2 Tim. 1:12 that "I know in whom I have believed...." Christianity isn't a faith of enlightenment, but of salvation and redemption from the real culprit-sin, not ignorance. Assurance is not an automatic fruit of salvation but belongs to its well-being, not being and some people need to have a spiritual wake-up call before realizing their precarious faith.
One warning Jesus gave was not to cause a brother to stumble (cf. 1 Cor. 8:12) or a child to lose faith! To wage war against the saints is odious to God. We're all supposed to be on the same side as they say in the battle to the troops fighting each other; "The enemy is over there!" Note that it's been said that we are our own worst enemies! We should be fighting sin and evil, not each other! We ought to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace per Eph. 4:3. It's our job to reassure and foster faith in the weaker brother, but it's not our calling to certify salvation.
Now faith is the "substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen" according to Hebrews 11:1. For illustration purposes, let's say I reach my hand into my pocket and grab something and ask you what it is! I hold it behind my back and you take a guess or two. Finally, you come to believe I'm holding my car keys because you can hear them! That's right, there's evidence for faith! But this is still faith though you are convinced. But let's say I open my hand and show you my keys in them; then I've destroyed your faith and given you first-hand knowledge!
This is akin to getting the first-hand knowledge of our Lord and Savior via a personal relationship with Him--we have encountered Him empirically and know Him like for who He is and what it says: "Taste and see that the LORD is good" (cf. Psalm 34:8). The proof of the pudding we'll find out is in the eating! We need believers with first-hand experience and knowledge of the Lord. But know this: It's faith till we eat! What I'm trying to say is that we can know God and be sure of our salvation by the Spirit residing in us: "The Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are sons of God" (cf. Romans 8:16).
Let's take another example of faith: a tightrope walker demonstrates he can walk across the rope with a wheelbarrow and asks how many actually believe he can push a person across in it! Almost everyone raises their hands and says they believe. Then he asks of a volunteer! No one is willing to test their faith! Where's the faith now? He didn't kill their faith but found out they had none for we must be willing to exercise or put it into practice for it to be bona fide, saving faith. Anyone can say they have faith but it must be proved by our behavior, conduct, and works--we're known by our fruits per Matt. 7:20.
A good example of faith in action is a kid flying a kite on a cloudy day: The passerby asks him how he knows the kite is really up there since he doesn't see it! The kid says, oh, I feel a tug every now and then to reassure me. Likewise, we feel God drawing us towards Him in fellowship and love. Faith is like that--God reassures us and keeps us in the faith and doesn't let go. Experience in flying kites made his faith strong and likewise, an experienced walk with Christ yields strong faith. The more trials we successfully pass with flying colors the more real our faith to us.
NB: Our faith is held by God's power (cf 1 Pet. 1:5) who will not let go of us nor give up on us (cf Phil. 1:6)--we're all works in progress. Someone hostile to the faith may ask some questions we cannot answer, but no issue or problem with the Bible or the faith is going to bring Christianity to its demise after 2,000 years. But sometimes God allows us to have doubts and to experience hardened hearts; it is important to realize that doubt is not a Christian problem but a human one, it's an element of faith, not the opposite of it. It can take courage to doubt.
But in the final analysis, we should doubt our doubts and believe our tried and true faith, so we can say with Paul's swan song (cf. 2 Tim. 4:7): "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith," knowing we are kept in Christ from beginning to end (cf Jude 1: 24). God doesn't teach us to swim only to let us drown!
In sum, let me quote the late Rev. Billy Graham: "If you want to keep your faith, you must give it away!" Let me add: A privatized faith is no more than a cloistered faith that cannot reach out to the lost. Soli Deo Gloria!
Jesus Doesn't Need To Prove Anything!...
"At the same time, God also attested by signs and wonders, various miracles, and distributions of gifts from the Holy Spirit according to His will" (Heb. 2:4, HCSB).
"Despite all this they kept on sinning and did not believe His wonderful works" (Psalm 78:32, HCSB).
"You are the God who works wonders, You revealed Your strength among the peoples" (Psalm 77:14, HCB).
Gideon was known for putting out the fleece and testing God's Word (as Jesus told Satan, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God,"), but we no longer need to do this as an act of faith, having the fully revealed Word of God. God didn't have to prove anything to Gideon but obliged his immature and growing faith. Likewise, Jesus never had to prove anything to the world, just be His perfect self and that should've sufficed. There is an anecdote of Muhammad Ali being asked to fight a teen and he refused to go along with the "test" of his greatness; then the teen bragged that Ali was afraid of him and refused to defend himself--actually, Muhammad would not stoop to the level of fighting a naive teen, he was still the champ to anyone who knew better because this was not challenging nor worthy, but he was protecting the kid. The Word of God speaks volumes and is self-attesting, proof in itself (if it appealed to any higher authority, it couldn't claim to be the final arbiter of truth).
Jesus performed many miracles or signs as John referred to them as, but not to prove Himself! He met needs and had compassion. He never did anything on-demand, for personal profit or gain, showy, or any biggie miracle that would erase all doubt and force belief even against one's will. I'll give you a for instance: after feeding the 4,000 the Pharisees asked for a sign to prove He was from God. What was the feeding of the 4,000 but a miracle to behold to the believer? They should have reasoned He supplies all their needs.
Jesus would not oblige them and their hardened hearts that refused to believe despite the miracles He did perform. John 12:32 says they would not believe, not that they could not believe--viva la difference! Miracles are simply unusual events caused by God or they'd be called "regulars." The thing about miracles is that they only give an appetite for more miracles and skeptics are never convinced, but only harden their hearts with some excuse or doubt. Miracles don't produce faith, but faith produces miracles! These Pharisees needed a miracle done in their hearts not a sign from heaven. They were probably expecting Jesus to prove He could outdo Moses and bring down manna! When a person is stubborn or hardened in heart, no miracle will make him repent and come to Christ for salvation--there would also be some way to explain it away and expect only a bigger one. Their mistake was to think God must oblige them and be their genie or miracle worker; however, Jesus didn't want to be known as a miracle worker but as our Savior.
In reality, Moses didn't do that but God used him as His spokesperson and God brought faith by performing miracles through him for forty years in the wilderness where they were tested. If Jesus had obliged them and performed a miracle to prove Himself, where would it end and what about faith. The biggest miracle is the radical change in one's heart to accept Jesus as Lord and Savior and become a new creature in Christ.
Every miracle or sign Jesus accomplished was a lesson to be taught about His divine nature: He raised the dead to prove He is the life; He fed the multitude to prove He's the bread of life; He calmed the storm to prove His power over nature; He healed the sick to prove He's our Healer; He cast out demon to prove authority over them and Satan. Every one of the divine attributes of God can be attributed to Jesus and they are illustrated by His sayings and acts. Basically, Jesus showed He had all authority as the only begotten Son of God. Jesus went about teaching, preaching, and doing good and also convincing the multitudes of His compassion. With Jesus in charge, we need not worry or fear that our needs won't be met.
Not to berate miracles in Scripture, because without Jesus doing them, He'd be but a footnote in history and Christianity would be disemboweled if one removed its miracles. Note that other religions may have miracles but they remain intact without them--the miracles are believed on account of the religion already being believed--miracles are given to kindle and feed the dormant or nascent faith of believers. Faith cannot survive on mothballs or in a dormant stage, it must grow and go forward in progress or rest in peace. No amount of evidence will convince the hardened heart--God must do a work of grace first. We must not be as clueless in not having eyes to see that God can supply all our mundane needs too ("daily bread"). Soli Deo Gloria!
Sunday, January 12, 2020
You've Come To The Right Man!
In our time of need we need to know the source of all blessing and comfort, the only One able to heal us of our infirmity or disability and we all have some deficiency that makes us imperfect--we all need improvement and have flaws and can get worse off. Jesus gave a few commands that illustrate the abundant life in Him: come to Him, follow Him, obey Him, serve Him, abide in Him, know Him, and even love Him. These are interconnected or linked to the successful walk with Christ by faith in fellowship, obedience, and good works.
To Christ there is no barrier to His love and outreach, we are within the boundaries of His grace and never at a distance or removed from grace. We have all the resources we need if we know the Lord, but we must never get a big head that we are favored in some special way or that God is respecting us or showing partiality. We all come to God under the same conditions: He has leveled the playing field.
What we need is a great God who can meet all our needs and this knowledge will give us great faith. If your faith is small, get a bigger God! If you think of just the humanity of Jesus, your thoughts of Him are too human. Jesus desires to get down and dirty with us to get intimate, sharing our sorrows and weaknesses. Jesus knew how to get up close and personal with men and to see where they were coming from, identifying with them in their infirmities. Jesus does care and we can know this by His infinite compassion towards us. God's mercy towards us has no bounds! We all come to Him on the same conditions of being sin-sick and beyond cure without His grace.
God doesn't have to heal us or to have mercy, then it would be justice! God is bound to save no one! But no one is ever the same after encountering Christ, He has some impact, good or bad either to soften their heart or to harden it, but change will inevitably happen. When we are transformed by grace, we cannot but talk of it: we get the "can't-help-its," like the apostles did in Acts 4:20, NIV, saying, "... we cannot help speaking of what we have seen and heard." This was the effect on the multitudes after Christ would heal someone--though He admonished them not to spread the news, they couldn't help themselves to this wonderful event that they couldn't help but praise.
Jesus praised and recognized great faith when He saw it and would tell them that it wasn't superstition but their faith in Him that healed them. But Christ didn't want to be known just as a miracle worker--that would not be a reputation that would change the world or save mankind. He first came to be our Savior and His miracles were only signs of His deity and emphasized His attributes in particular, like being the resurrection and the life, so He raised Lazarus from the dead.
Jesus was the kind who believed in doing it right or not doing it at all and everything He did, He did well and it was of good report. Anything well worth doing is worth doing well! He was known for going about doing good. "Can an Ethiopian change his skin or a leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil" (Jer. 13:23, NIV). But it is impossible for man to do good apart from God (cf. John 15:5; cf. Psalm 14:3; Isaiah 64:6) but we are only vessels of honor being used by God for His glory to do His works. We are to be a godly people zealous of good works and we are saved unto good works (cf. Titus 2;14; Eph. 2:10)!
We can only venture to speak of what Christ has accomplished through us (cf. Romans 15:18; Amos 6:13; Hosea 14:8 Isaiah 26:12). God is not impressed with our self-righteous do-goodery. As much as we tend to believe we can be good without God, it's impossible The good news is that we can be ambassadors of Christ's goodness and mercy to spread the good word to the lost. As Christ promised: "Come unto Me all ye who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest" (cf. Matt. 11:28). "Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you, I do not give as the world gives. Your heart must no be troubled or fearful" (cf. John 14:27, HCSB).
In sum, we must acknowledge Christ as having sole authority to make us whole, complete, and free from any spiritual malady or defect: i.e., we must defer to His power and lordship for this to be effectual, whom alone to know is eternal life! Soli Deo Gloria!
To Christ there is no barrier to His love and outreach, we are within the boundaries of His grace and never at a distance or removed from grace. We have all the resources we need if we know the Lord, but we must never get a big head that we are favored in some special way or that God is respecting us or showing partiality. We all come to God under the same conditions: He has leveled the playing field.
What we need is a great God who can meet all our needs and this knowledge will give us great faith. If your faith is small, get a bigger God! If you think of just the humanity of Jesus, your thoughts of Him are too human. Jesus desires to get down and dirty with us to get intimate, sharing our sorrows and weaknesses. Jesus knew how to get up close and personal with men and to see where they were coming from, identifying with them in their infirmities. Jesus does care and we can know this by His infinite compassion towards us. God's mercy towards us has no bounds! We all come to Him on the same conditions of being sin-sick and beyond cure without His grace.
God doesn't have to heal us or to have mercy, then it would be justice! God is bound to save no one! But no one is ever the same after encountering Christ, He has some impact, good or bad either to soften their heart or to harden it, but change will inevitably happen. When we are transformed by grace, we cannot but talk of it: we get the "can't-help-its," like the apostles did in Acts 4:20, NIV, saying, "... we cannot help speaking of what we have seen and heard." This was the effect on the multitudes after Christ would heal someone--though He admonished them not to spread the news, they couldn't help themselves to this wonderful event that they couldn't help but praise.
Jesus praised and recognized great faith when He saw it and would tell them that it wasn't superstition but their faith in Him that healed them. But Christ didn't want to be known just as a miracle worker--that would not be a reputation that would change the world or save mankind. He first came to be our Savior and His miracles were only signs of His deity and emphasized His attributes in particular, like being the resurrection and the life, so He raised Lazarus from the dead.
Jesus was the kind who believed in doing it right or not doing it at all and everything He did, He did well and it was of good report. Anything well worth doing is worth doing well! He was known for going about doing good. "Can an Ethiopian change his skin or a leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil" (Jer. 13:23, NIV). But it is impossible for man to do good apart from God (cf. John 15:5; cf. Psalm 14:3; Isaiah 64:6) but we are only vessels of honor being used by God for His glory to do His works. We are to be a godly people zealous of good works and we are saved unto good works (cf. Titus 2;14; Eph. 2:10)!
We can only venture to speak of what Christ has accomplished through us (cf. Romans 15:18; Amos 6:13; Hosea 14:8 Isaiah 26:12). God is not impressed with our self-righteous do-goodery. As much as we tend to believe we can be good without God, it's impossible The good news is that we can be ambassadors of Christ's goodness and mercy to spread the good word to the lost. As Christ promised: "Come unto Me all ye who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest" (cf. Matt. 11:28). "Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you, I do not give as the world gives. Your heart must no be troubled or fearful" (cf. John 14:27, HCSB).
In sum, we must acknowledge Christ as having sole authority to make us whole, complete, and free from any spiritual malady or defect: i.e., we must defer to His power and lordship for this to be effectual, whom alone to know is eternal life! Soli Deo Gloria!
Friday, January 10, 2020
The Old Humanism...
"God is not dead, nor doth he sleep." --Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Humanism isn't a newfangled idea or concept but was an idea concocted or developed by the Greeks in antiquity. They sought to make man the measure of all things or that everything is related to man and interpreted with him in mind (known as Homo mensura in Greek). This was promulgated chiefly by Protagoras. The actual roots stem from ancient times (postdiluvian or after the Noachian flood, aka the Deluge) when the people sought to make a name for themselves (cf. Gen. 11:4). Man has always had trouble with the truth because his pride gets in the way; he tends not to accept the authority of God and seeks to be his own man. Sin is basically that: the declaration of independence from God. As it is written (Rom. 1:28, HCSB): "And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God...." In fact, Voltaire went so far as to define God thus: "Man has created God in his image." And Sigmund Freud went on to insult God as being a "projection."
By definition, humanism is the deifying of man and the dethroning of God! Men have tried to make a name for themselves since the tower of Babel (cf. Gen. 11:4). Friedrich Nietzsche proclaimed unashamedly that "God is dead," which meant that He either doesn't exist or is totally irrelevant. They exalt man and ignore God or make Him irrelevant, even declaring Him dead. What kind of God dies? But our God refuses to and will not die! What they are doing is worshiping man, because man is by nature a religious creature that is hard-wired to worship someone or something and never can claim to worship nothing even if he's a self-proclaimed nihilist or atheist. They are parading themselves and are braggadocious of their own achievements, not God's accomplishment, and in this way are very religious. John Dewey, who co-wrote Humanist Manifesto [I], in his book Common Faith, posited that we can be "religious" without "religion" or claiming no official or affiliated religion.
It sounds offensive to say, "Glory to man in the highest!" This is counter-intuitive but is what they are maintaining unawares. Man is not worthy of worship but man cannot but worship someone or something. Humanists tend to live in the here and now and refuse to let God into the reckoning. Without God in the equation, man is without purpose and hope and is empty. This void or God-shaped vacuum can only be filled by God according to Blaise Pascal! Sartre said that unless one considers God in the picture, man is a "useless passion." Christians, on the other hand, live their lives in light of eternity, not just for the mundane and the present circumstances--they can live above them and have hope for the future that lifts the spirit. Augustine of Hippo is known for maintaining that man is restless until he finds his rest in God.
Humanists live for themselves like animals in heat avoiding pain and seeking pleasure. But Christians live for God and have a higher purpose in living that brings meaning and definition. They have a destiny to live out and a reason for being. I want to point out that even Christians can become humanists by letting their pride get in the way and becoming self-centered and selfish and losing track of the will of God, seeking short-term pleasure in life instead of a life defeating evil and the power of sin. And when Solomon says that there's nothing new under the sun, he's right in that even Adam and Eve were humanists when they ate of the proverbial apple and sought their own wisdom, pleasure, and meaning in life independent of God's will and love.
We must realize that God has a purpose for everyone and Christians realize fulfillment in God only. God even made the wicked for the day of evil. When we have served our purpose God may call us home to glory, but we're all here for a purpose that we may not be aware of. Paul said in Col. 1:16 (MSG): "...[E]verthing got started in him and finds its purpose in him." We are all here for a reason and must never say as the old proverb goes: "Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die!" Those famous words are in Scripture and man has always been guilty of this kind of thinking.
Julian Huxley wrote Religion without Revelation to point out that we can be good without God and don't need God or believe in absolutes to have ethics or morals. That's basically what Satan has always tried to convince man since the Garden of Eden: We can be good without God, or we can be as gods! This is what's so deceiving of false religions because they may seem good on the outside and people are tricked into thinking that they mean well, but Satan knows how to insert just enough error to be dangerous and inoculate one from the truth and deceive with an element of truth.
In conclusion, we'll never arrive at objective truth (true regardless of whether it's believed and apart from personal input or perspective) unless we start with God in the picture, as Athanasius said, "The only system of thought into which Jesus Christ will fit is the one in which He is the starting point." We must not begin with man and explain the universe or explain away God, but must begin with God and explain everything else: reality, man, the world with all the academic disciplines, current events, and history. The Bible starts out as rational,, "In the Beginning," and it's theological as well as rational, even without realizing it or becoming atheists, they are practical atheists maintaining: "Down with God; up with man!" Au contraire! The divine viewpoint should be: "All the world is relative to Christ," according to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Carl Henry said, "The Christian belief system is relevant to all of life." Soli Deo Gloria
Humanism isn't a newfangled idea or concept but was an idea concocted or developed by the Greeks in antiquity. They sought to make man the measure of all things or that everything is related to man and interpreted with him in mind (known as Homo mensura in Greek). This was promulgated chiefly by Protagoras. The actual roots stem from ancient times (postdiluvian or after the Noachian flood, aka the Deluge) when the people sought to make a name for themselves (cf. Gen. 11:4). Man has always had trouble with the truth because his pride gets in the way; he tends not to accept the authority of God and seeks to be his own man. Sin is basically that: the declaration of independence from God. As it is written (Rom. 1:28, HCSB): "And because they did not think it worthwhile to acknowledge God...." In fact, Voltaire went so far as to define God thus: "Man has created God in his image." And Sigmund Freud went on to insult God as being a "projection."
By definition, humanism is the deifying of man and the dethroning of God! Men have tried to make a name for themselves since the tower of Babel (cf. Gen. 11:4). Friedrich Nietzsche proclaimed unashamedly that "God is dead," which meant that He either doesn't exist or is totally irrelevant. They exalt man and ignore God or make Him irrelevant, even declaring Him dead. What kind of God dies? But our God refuses to and will not die! What they are doing is worshiping man, because man is by nature a religious creature that is hard-wired to worship someone or something and never can claim to worship nothing even if he's a self-proclaimed nihilist or atheist. They are parading themselves and are braggadocious of their own achievements, not God's accomplishment, and in this way are very religious. John Dewey, who co-wrote Humanist Manifesto [I], in his book Common Faith, posited that we can be "religious" without "religion" or claiming no official or affiliated religion.
It sounds offensive to say, "Glory to man in the highest!" This is counter-intuitive but is what they are maintaining unawares. Man is not worthy of worship but man cannot but worship someone or something. Humanists tend to live in the here and now and refuse to let God into the reckoning. Without God in the equation, man is without purpose and hope and is empty. This void or God-shaped vacuum can only be filled by God according to Blaise Pascal! Sartre said that unless one considers God in the picture, man is a "useless passion." Christians, on the other hand, live their lives in light of eternity, not just for the mundane and the present circumstances--they can live above them and have hope for the future that lifts the spirit. Augustine of Hippo is known for maintaining that man is restless until he finds his rest in God.
Humanists live for themselves like animals in heat avoiding pain and seeking pleasure. But Christians live for God and have a higher purpose in living that brings meaning and definition. They have a destiny to live out and a reason for being. I want to point out that even Christians can become humanists by letting their pride get in the way and becoming self-centered and selfish and losing track of the will of God, seeking short-term pleasure in life instead of a life defeating evil and the power of sin. And when Solomon says that there's nothing new under the sun, he's right in that even Adam and Eve were humanists when they ate of the proverbial apple and sought their own wisdom, pleasure, and meaning in life independent of God's will and love.
We must realize that God has a purpose for everyone and Christians realize fulfillment in God only. God even made the wicked for the day of evil. When we have served our purpose God may call us home to glory, but we're all here for a purpose that we may not be aware of. Paul said in Col. 1:16 (MSG): "...[E]verthing got started in him and finds its purpose in him." We are all here for a reason and must never say as the old proverb goes: "Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die!" Those famous words are in Scripture and man has always been guilty of this kind of thinking.
Julian Huxley wrote Religion without Revelation to point out that we can be good without God and don't need God or believe in absolutes to have ethics or morals. That's basically what Satan has always tried to convince man since the Garden of Eden: We can be good without God, or we can be as gods! This is what's so deceiving of false religions because they may seem good on the outside and people are tricked into thinking that they mean well, but Satan knows how to insert just enough error to be dangerous and inoculate one from the truth and deceive with an element of truth.
In conclusion, we'll never arrive at objective truth (true regardless of whether it's believed and apart from personal input or perspective) unless we start with God in the picture, as Athanasius said, "The only system of thought into which Jesus Christ will fit is the one in which He is the starting point." We must not begin with man and explain the universe or explain away God, but must begin with God and explain everything else: reality, man, the world with all the academic disciplines, current events, and history. The Bible starts out as rational,, "In the Beginning," and it's theological as well as rational, even without realizing it or becoming atheists, they are practical atheists maintaining: "Down with God; up with man!" Au contraire! The divine viewpoint should be: "All the world is relative to Christ," according to Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Carl Henry said, "The Christian belief system is relevant to all of life." Soli Deo Gloria
Sunday, January 5, 2020
Seeking God's Face...
"The light of the glory of God is given us in the face of Jesus Christ," whom to see is to see the Father's face in spirit (cf. 2 Cor. 4:6). NB: Jonathan Edwards said that the main business of the Christian life is seeking God! We are told to seek His face ("My heart says this about You, "You are to seek My face," LORD, I will seek Your face. Do not hide Your face from me..." (Psalm 27:8-9, HCSB). God is not hiding or playing some game of cosmic hide and seek, He's waiting to be found and will reveal and authenticate Himself to all sincere seekers, but not triflers. God hides Himself that we may earnestly seek Him. ("If only I knew where I might find Him" per Job 23:3) God's whereabouts are as near as the mention of His name!
This search for God never ends but begins at salvation and will end at the beatific vision in glory when we do see His face. We don't know Christ after the flesh but should recognize His Spirit at work and moving in the body, as it bears witness with our spirit (cf. Romans 8:16). God as the Hound of Heaven seeks us who are the lost sheep: "I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me" (Isaiah 65:1, NIV).
When Christians say, "I found it!" what they really mean is that God found them and revealed Himself to them as the hymn Amazing Grace goes, "I was lost but now am found." Pascal also mused: "I would not have found God had He not first sought out me." God wants to make His face shine upon us in blessing us, and this is His commitment to us as believers. Blessing and seeing God's face are correlated.
The inauguration of Christ's ministry (the official initiation ceremony) at His baptism included the Father's stamp of approval and official blessing, and He knew His mission and that God was with Him--that's His name: God is with us! You could say Jesus was coming of age and His rite of passage. "... [I]f only I may finish my course and the ministry I received from the Lord Jesus..." (Acts 20:24, ESV). We are to embark on our mission with God's blessing also and know that God is with us too. We are blessed in the Beloved by association. Having this ministry from God or ordination to His service we've also been commissioned), we can anticipate the continual blessing and prosperity of God in whatever we do to His glory and in His name.
As we get to know Christ, we grow in likeness, for we are all works in progress and Christ wants to show Himself in our witness. Remember, God isn't finished with us yet and always finishes what He starts (cf. Phil. 1:6). You might think of us as a slab of marble that the divine Sculptor is attempting to make into a statue of Christ, and what he does is take away everything that doesn't resemble Christ! We all have some rough edges to get smoothed out and that's why we are put through the crucible because our faith is more precious than silver or gold and must be tested for our sake.
To receive God's blessing, we must have faith and make the commitment to go on in self-denial to "follow Him [in lordship to salvation] more nearly, ]getting] to know Him more clearly, and to love Him more dearly," as quoted from Richard of Chichester. Moses came to know God face to face, like a friend and his face, was hid with a veil to hide the glory. There is something about a person having spent time in fellowship with the Lord. It was obvious the disciples had been with the Lord after the resurrection appearances.
Receiving God's blessing gives us a new outlook on life and new hope, purpose, and meaning in life. With God we have dignity! Without God, the question of life's purpose is meaningless, according to atheist Bertrand Russell. The more we are assured of His blessing and approval of us, the more confident we get to attempt more in God's name and to venture out in even greater things expecting even greater blessings. It is true that the greater blesses the lesser, and also that we also ought to bless one another!
But we are saved to be a blessing (cf. Zech. 8:13). God wants our cups to run over! One function of the body of Christ is to be a blessing to the community in mission (cf. Jer. 29:7) and to bless the members of the body in ministry to one another. We all can bless each other with our spiritual gifts and teach one another in discipleship or mentoring. May we pray God's blessings on each other.
The more we become like Christ, the more blessings we receive in Him to share. We are blessed to pass it on. "But He gives more grace..." (cf. James 4:6)! There is more to salvation than being forgiven: to seek the Lord's sanction and blessing in all our labors. We should see God at work in us. And we are to ever seek God's blessings in our work for temporal as well as spiritual things. He blesses us with every spiritual blessing in Christ (cf. Eph. 1:3) and the promises to Abraham that God will bless those who bless us is ours to claim, for all who have faith in Christ are children of Abraham (cf. Gal. 3:7,29) and we are joint-heirs of Christ.
In prayer, we can access or gain entree into the throne room of God for prayer in boldness (cf. Heb. 4:16), as Moses spoke to God face to face as to a friend, and to whom no prophet ever did again. What unrealized, untapped potential there is in prayer there is when we have faith in Jesus' name.
The antithesis of seeking God's face is to be hiding from God or the truth. Sooner or later we may meet our "burning bush" and confront God and have a moment of truth with Him. Then we are sanctified by the truth (cf. John 17:17) and realize its power over us. We are to "contend for the faith" or the truth delivered to the saints. The polar opposite of truth is apostasy and this is not the final lot of the believer.
If God were to withhold His grace from us for any length of time, we'd be without hope and God in the world, just as George Whitefield said of a man going to the gallows: "There but for the grace of God go I." God can harden the heart of a person who rejects Him in judgment much like He did to Pharaoh when he didn't believe the miracles Moses performed with the "finger of God." For God hardens whom He will and has mercy on whom He will (cf. Romans 9:18); it's His prerogative to do as He reserves the right to do with His ultimate free will. Soli Deo Gloria!
This search for God never ends but begins at salvation and will end at the beatific vision in glory when we do see His face. We don't know Christ after the flesh but should recognize His Spirit at work and moving in the body, as it bears witness with our spirit (cf. Romans 8:16). God as the Hound of Heaven seeks us who are the lost sheep: "I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me" (Isaiah 65:1, NIV).
When Christians say, "I found it!" what they really mean is that God found them and revealed Himself to them as the hymn Amazing Grace goes, "I was lost but now am found." Pascal also mused: "I would not have found God had He not first sought out me." God wants to make His face shine upon us in blessing us, and this is His commitment to us as believers. Blessing and seeing God's face are correlated.
The inauguration of Christ's ministry (the official initiation ceremony) at His baptism included the Father's stamp of approval and official blessing, and He knew His mission and that God was with Him--that's His name: God is with us! You could say Jesus was coming of age and His rite of passage. "... [I]f only I may finish my course and the ministry I received from the Lord Jesus..." (Acts 20:24, ESV). We are to embark on our mission with God's blessing also and know that God is with us too. We are blessed in the Beloved by association. Having this ministry from God or ordination to His service we've also been commissioned), we can anticipate the continual blessing and prosperity of God in whatever we do to His glory and in His name.
As we get to know Christ, we grow in likeness, for we are all works in progress and Christ wants to show Himself in our witness. Remember, God isn't finished with us yet and always finishes what He starts (cf. Phil. 1:6). You might think of us as a slab of marble that the divine Sculptor is attempting to make into a statue of Christ, and what he does is take away everything that doesn't resemble Christ! We all have some rough edges to get smoothed out and that's why we are put through the crucible because our faith is more precious than silver or gold and must be tested for our sake.
To receive God's blessing, we must have faith and make the commitment to go on in self-denial to "follow Him [in lordship to salvation] more nearly, ]getting] to know Him more clearly, and to love Him more dearly," as quoted from Richard of Chichester. Moses came to know God face to face, like a friend and his face, was hid with a veil to hide the glory. There is something about a person having spent time in fellowship with the Lord. It was obvious the disciples had been with the Lord after the resurrection appearances.
Receiving God's blessing gives us a new outlook on life and new hope, purpose, and meaning in life. With God we have dignity! Without God, the question of life's purpose is meaningless, according to atheist Bertrand Russell. The more we are assured of His blessing and approval of us, the more confident we get to attempt more in God's name and to venture out in even greater things expecting even greater blessings. It is true that the greater blesses the lesser, and also that we also ought to bless one another!
But we are saved to be a blessing (cf. Zech. 8:13). God wants our cups to run over! One function of the body of Christ is to be a blessing to the community in mission (cf. Jer. 29:7) and to bless the members of the body in ministry to one another. We all can bless each other with our spiritual gifts and teach one another in discipleship or mentoring. May we pray God's blessings on each other.
The more we become like Christ, the more blessings we receive in Him to share. We are blessed to pass it on. "But He gives more grace..." (cf. James 4:6)! There is more to salvation than being forgiven: to seek the Lord's sanction and blessing in all our labors. We should see God at work in us. And we are to ever seek God's blessings in our work for temporal as well as spiritual things. He blesses us with every spiritual blessing in Christ (cf. Eph. 1:3) and the promises to Abraham that God will bless those who bless us is ours to claim, for all who have faith in Christ are children of Abraham (cf. Gal. 3:7,29) and we are joint-heirs of Christ.
In prayer, we can access or gain entree into the throne room of God for prayer in boldness (cf. Heb. 4:16), as Moses spoke to God face to face as to a friend, and to whom no prophet ever did again. What unrealized, untapped potential there is in prayer there is when we have faith in Jesus' name.
The antithesis of seeking God's face is to be hiding from God or the truth. Sooner or later we may meet our "burning bush" and confront God and have a moment of truth with Him. Then we are sanctified by the truth (cf. John 17:17) and realize its power over us. We are to "contend for the faith" or the truth delivered to the saints. The polar opposite of truth is apostasy and this is not the final lot of the believer.
If God were to withhold His grace from us for any length of time, we'd be without hope and God in the world, just as George Whitefield said of a man going to the gallows: "There but for the grace of God go I." God can harden the heart of a person who rejects Him in judgment much like He did to Pharaoh when he didn't believe the miracles Moses performed with the "finger of God." For God hardens whom He will and has mercy on whom He will (cf. Romans 9:18); it's His prerogative to do as He reserves the right to do with His ultimate free will. Soli Deo Gloria!
Sunday, December 29, 2019
Great Expectations?
"I believe that I shall see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living" (cf. Psalm 27:13).
"I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living" (Psalm 27:13, KJV). "Wait on the LORD; be of good courage, and he shall srengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD" (Psalm 27:14, KJV). "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength" (Isaiah 40:31, KJV). "... [F]or it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you" (Hosea 10:12, KJV).
Charles Dickens wrote the book by the title Great Expectations and made this a treasured classic. William Carey preached: "Attempt great things for God; expect great things from God." We are to be ever-waiting for the coming of Christ, the Parousia (Second Advent or Coming). In a manner of speaking, we're all "expecting." We all need delayed gratification. We're pregnant with God's hope and promise! It's not just during Christmas that we should honor and recognize the magi or wise men, but today to emulate them. In other words, "wise men still seek Him!" This is the common message on many a greeting card because it applies, resonates, and hits home.
Jonathan Edwards said that the main business of the Christian life is the seeking of God. We are to always seek His face and R. C. Sproul says that finding God begins at salvation, just like it says in Amazing Grace: "I was lost but now am found." The Good Shepherd found us as lost sheep, we didn't find Him. Pascal said that if God hadn't first sought him, he never would've found God. Scripture says: "I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me" (Isaiah 65:1, NIV).
His coming is sure; are you ready? Being prepared for it isn't just a matter of making our funeral arrangements and taking care of our final expenses! Hezekiah was told that he was about to die and to get his house in order! Do you feel that if you were to die today that you have lived according to the will of God and have completed your mission? When David had completed God's purpose, God took him (cf. Acts. 13:36). We're all here for a purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil, and God orchestrates and micromanages all of history for His glory and plans with no backup plan or Plan B. We are either in the will of God or not, and the safest place to be is in the will of God. We are bold when we know God is with us just like the apostles willingly gave their lives for the gospel message as martyrs. They considered it an honor to suffer for His name's sake.
We must wait patiently on the Lord, for He will not tarry and His promise will be fulfilled in God's timetable. Waiting can try our patience, but the great hope we have should make it worth it and give us the grace to do God's will till the end. There is great expectation in anticipation! Our payoff is great and this is a greater motive to wait patiently, for the present trials we endure are nothing compared to the reward we'll see in heaven. Simeon was told by the LORD that he'd see the Messiah before he died and when he did it turned out to be worth the wait and he could depart in peace. We may not die happy, but if we died fulfilled, that is much greater, for happiness can be deceiving. Over seventeen million hours ago John said that we were "in the last hour." This only shows God's perception of time, not that the Lord tarries or delays His coming, for we know that His patience means our salvation.
Jesus said that if we seek, we shall find, but we must search for God with all our heart (cf. Jer. 29:13; Deut. 4:29) to find Him, for He doesn't deal with triflers. In our expectations, we are to aim high for God has not set any limit as to how far He can take us if we trust in Him. We are to walk on water and move mountains! But if we aim at nothing we will surely get there. Therefore, dream big!
In the final analysis, we must realize that the enemy is a killjoy seeking to discourage us from finding our mission in life or calling in Christ (we're then as meandering stars) and his ominous words are: "Hath God said?" He asked Eve this and got her first to doubt God's Word, then to believe his words, and finally to disobey God's Word. God wants to be our Guiding Light, Beacon, and GPS through this life and we must let Him lead the way.
This reminds me of Alice in Wonderland where she asks the Cheshire Cat at the fork in the road, "Would you tell me please, which way I ought to walk from here?" He said that depends upon where you want to go. Alice says, "I don't care where." The cat tells her that it doesn't matter which way she walks then! Alice says, "As long as I get somewhere!" The cat says you'll do that if you walk long enough--you're sure to get somewhere!" But we want God's best! In sum, we must not "settle" but seek God's will for our lives and not some default plan. Soli Deo Gloria!
"I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living" (Psalm 27:13, KJV). "Wait on the LORD; be of good courage, and he shall srengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD" (Psalm 27:14, KJV). "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength" (Isaiah 40:31, KJV). "... [F]or it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you" (Hosea 10:12, KJV).
Charles Dickens wrote the book by the title Great Expectations and made this a treasured classic. William Carey preached: "Attempt great things for God; expect great things from God." We are to be ever-waiting for the coming of Christ, the Parousia (Second Advent or Coming). In a manner of speaking, we're all "expecting." We all need delayed gratification. We're pregnant with God's hope and promise! It's not just during Christmas that we should honor and recognize the magi or wise men, but today to emulate them. In other words, "wise men still seek Him!" This is the common message on many a greeting card because it applies, resonates, and hits home.
Jonathan Edwards said that the main business of the Christian life is the seeking of God. We are to always seek His face and R. C. Sproul says that finding God begins at salvation, just like it says in Amazing Grace: "I was lost but now am found." The Good Shepherd found us as lost sheep, we didn't find Him. Pascal said that if God hadn't first sought him, he never would've found God. Scripture says: "I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me" (Isaiah 65:1, NIV).
His coming is sure; are you ready? Being prepared for it isn't just a matter of making our funeral arrangements and taking care of our final expenses! Hezekiah was told that he was about to die and to get his house in order! Do you feel that if you were to die today that you have lived according to the will of God and have completed your mission? When David had completed God's purpose, God took him (cf. Acts. 13:36). We're all here for a purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil, and God orchestrates and micromanages all of history for His glory and plans with no backup plan or Plan B. We are either in the will of God or not, and the safest place to be is in the will of God. We are bold when we know God is with us just like the apostles willingly gave their lives for the gospel message as martyrs. They considered it an honor to suffer for His name's sake.
We must wait patiently on the Lord, for He will not tarry and His promise will be fulfilled in God's timetable. Waiting can try our patience, but the great hope we have should make it worth it and give us the grace to do God's will till the end. There is great expectation in anticipation! Our payoff is great and this is a greater motive to wait patiently, for the present trials we endure are nothing compared to the reward we'll see in heaven. Simeon was told by the LORD that he'd see the Messiah before he died and when he did it turned out to be worth the wait and he could depart in peace. We may not die happy, but if we died fulfilled, that is much greater, for happiness can be deceiving. Over seventeen million hours ago John said that we were "in the last hour." This only shows God's perception of time, not that the Lord tarries or delays His coming, for we know that His patience means our salvation.
Jesus said that if we seek, we shall find, but we must search for God with all our heart (cf. Jer. 29:13; Deut. 4:29) to find Him, for He doesn't deal with triflers. In our expectations, we are to aim high for God has not set any limit as to how far He can take us if we trust in Him. We are to walk on water and move mountains! But if we aim at nothing we will surely get there. Therefore, dream big!
In the final analysis, we must realize that the enemy is a killjoy seeking to discourage us from finding our mission in life or calling in Christ (we're then as meandering stars) and his ominous words are: "Hath God said?" He asked Eve this and got her first to doubt God's Word, then to believe his words, and finally to disobey God's Word. God wants to be our Guiding Light, Beacon, and GPS through this life and we must let Him lead the way.
This reminds me of Alice in Wonderland where she asks the Cheshire Cat at the fork in the road, "Would you tell me please, which way I ought to walk from here?" He said that depends upon where you want to go. Alice says, "I don't care where." The cat tells her that it doesn't matter which way she walks then! Alice says, "As long as I get somewhere!" The cat says you'll do that if you walk long enough--you're sure to get somewhere!" But we want God's best! In sum, we must not "settle" but seek God's will for our lives and not some default plan. Soli Deo Gloria!
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Man's Never-ending Quest
"The only system of thought that Christ will fit into is the one where He is the starting point." --Athanasius, church father and father of orthodoxy.
"But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death..." (Heb. 2:9, KJV, italics mine).
"For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom..." (1 Cor. 1:21, ESV, italics added).
"If a man is not made for God, why is he happy only in God? If a man is made for God, why is he opposed to God?" --Blaise Pascal, French scientist, mathematician, and philosopher
"Our hearts are restless till they find their rest in [God]." --St. Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo
"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." --Henry David Thoreau, author
"The search for God begins at salvation." --R. C. Sproul, theologian
"Searching for God is the main business of the Christian life." --Jonathan Edwards, theologian and revivalist
Whether mankind admits it or not, he's on a search for something to fulfill his inner needs--he's looking the Jesus he doesn't know. He seeks the "pleasures of sin for a season" (cf. Heb. 11:35). He may find it in the pleasures the world has to offer (cf. 1 John 2:14-15) or in some kind of intellectual fulfillment, but he will never be satisfied till he has found it in God because we are made to know God and to love Him in a personal relationship. God desires to get personal! This void or hole in mankind's heart is a vacuum only God can fill (according to Pascal) and all of us will naturally seek crutches to lean on in order to find a substitute. Augustine said "we are restless till we find our rest in [God]!" Man is a religious being who is meant to worship God, and if not, will find a substitute god to worship. He will not find it in political freedom, education, culture, higher standards of living, materialism, sex, drugs, nor false religions, but only in the truth that sets free.
Nature abhors a vacuum and man has expressed it in his boredom and frustration with himself and the world. Man is not an animal in heat seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, but is hard-wired for meaningful work, dignity, purpose, and service in God. But "emptiness is the ultimate truth," according to the Dalai Lama and Carl Jung said that "the central neurosis of our time is emptiness!" We instinctively sense something wrong with us and the picture. Billy Graham says, "We grasp at every passing straw, and even as we clutch it disappears." We are designed to be fulfilled in God doing His will and work, and ignoring design breaks faith with the Designer: for we are meant for purpose, honor, meaning, and dignity because we are in God's image.
So many today think of God as a thing to be used, such as the "Force," of Star Wars fame, but God is a divine person that loves us. We use and manipulate things, but we know, relate to, and love persons. Mankind will not admit it but he's really searching for the benefits without the Benefactor! He may be looking for peace of mind (but not in Christ), prosperity (but not in God's economy), intellectual fulfillment (but not the truth to set him free), better relationships (but not humbly and not with God), (the answer, but not the Answerer!) or even just to know if there is a God or not (out of curiosity, not sincerity), without committing oneself to Him.
Truth is free but not cheap, we must be willing to come to Christ for it. We look for what we want to see and view the world according to what we are, not what it is. If we want forgiveness, we must first become convicted and file for spiritual bankruptcy, realizing we cannot please God on our own merit. And so the qualification for salvation is to realize one's unworthiness! We must first realize our emptiness and need to be filled and made complete.
It should be noted that the Jews of Jesus' day were looking for a Messiah, but the one of conventional standards would deliver them from Roman oppression. They wanted a military hero but got a pacifist that would rule the world of hearts in love. It is a proven psychological fact that our prejudices and inclinations bias our viewpoints and and worldview--known as confirmation bias. No one is totally objective and we all must realize that just because He didn't fit the profile doesn't mean He's not who He claimed to be. The Jews saw no personal need of forgiveness or preaching and weren't seeking a Savior.
But Jesus is not always what we want Him to be and we must accept Him for who He is--the full package--or not at all, which is rejection. We cannot dichotomize Christ and accept forgiveness without lordship and divide His offices and personhood as Lord and Savior--we must trust Him as Savior and also submit to Him as Lord of all. We dare not "divide His person nor confound His nature," according to the church fathers.
Jesus didn't come to do our bidding but to do the will of the Father, which was total relinquishment of His will to the Father's as the motto of His life. Jesus is the only person who was born to die, yes to complete His mission He had to be crucified and die for our sins, carrying our penalty and paying the full cost. We also have a purpose to fulfill God's purpose for our lives, and when we are done we can say with Paul that we have nothing to boast of but what Christ has accomplished through us. Paul only wanted to complete the mission that God gave him (cf. Acts 20:24) and that ministry being obedient to the heavenly vision and the will of God for his life. We also must live with a purpose and submit ourselves to God's will, which is not a one-time event but continual, progressive, and ongoing.
To really see, we need the eyes of our hearts opened (cf. Eph. 1:18) and that can only be done by Jesus Christ illuminating us through the convicting power of the Holy Spirit using the Word (cf. 1 Thess. 1:5; 2:13) to speak God's message. The whole world is blinded by Satan (cf. 2 Cor. 4:4) and doesn't see a need for God apart from a work of grace in the heart. They have eyes but see not nor perceive (cf. Isaiah 6:9). The whole world is under the influence and power of the Adversary (cf. 1 John 5:19)!
But Christ, as Savior, came to set us free from Satan's power, our sin nature, the sting of death, and the influence of the world-system that corrupts our minds. The world at large doesn't see Jesus at work in Providence and is blind to the works of God, sometimes even calling them flukes, accidents, luck, or chance. We all tend to see what we want to see! No one has perfect objectivity but God.
We must not become distracted by the world and it's pleasures and realize that God is at work in us to do and to will of His good pleasure (cf. Phil. 1:6); we are the vessels of honor being used for His glory if we let Him (cf. Isaiah 43:7). It has been said by Corrie ten Boom, "If we look at the world, we'll be distressed; if we look at ourselves, we will be depressed; but if we look at Christ, we'll be at rest." The way to victory is to keep our eyes on Jesus, the "Author and Finisher of our faith" and this will keep us focused on spiritual priorities.
We must "consider Jesus" (cf. Heb. 3:1) and look at Him (cf. Isaiah 45:22), and also to realize that we "see Jesus" (cf. Heb. 2:9) spiritually and in Scripture that it's all about Him and if we keep focused on Him, all else pales in comparison. We must not resort to the quest of the Greek disciples who said, "But we would see Jesus," for it's with our spiritual eyes we must see and be illuminated. It is a fact that believing is seeing, not seeing is believing!
To find God, we must be open to who He is and who He claimed to be. We are to always seek His face! Sincerity matters, but it's not everything. Our praise is recognizing Him for who He is as the eternal Son of God. He's not just some babe in a manger who's cute and comfortable with our sensibilities and sentimentalism, but the Almighty God in the flesh--Lord at His birth. Yuletide brings the revelation that He was born into our space-time continuum to identify with us but He did it in the fullness of time (cf. Gal. 4:4), when all was according to plan.
He entered history--the time-space continuum! And this is history that can be vouched for! But whether He's born in us is a matter of salvation! In our never-ending quest, we should not put God in a box, making Him too small, or we'll never find Him. He can be real to us and our quest can be complete in Him as the "Captain of our soul and Master of our fate." Only knowing and acknowledging the real Jesus satisfies and the danger is to accept "another Spirit, another gospel, another Jesus." (cf. 2 Cor. 11:4). The divine diagnosis: Man needs God! In summation, NB: Wise men still seek Him!
CAVEATS: DON'T LET YOUR CONCEPT OF GOD BECOME TOO SMALL OR YOUR THOUGHTS OF HIM TOO HUMAN! I MATTERS HOW BIG YOUR GOD IS, NOT HOW BIG IS YOUR FAITH? ITS OBJECT IS VITAL. Soli Deo Gloria!
"But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death..." (Heb. 2:9, KJV, italics mine).
"For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom..." (1 Cor. 1:21, ESV, italics added).
"If a man is not made for God, why is he happy only in God? If a man is made for God, why is he opposed to God?" --Blaise Pascal, French scientist, mathematician, and philosopher
"Our hearts are restless till they find their rest in [God]." --St. Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo
"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." --Henry David Thoreau, author
"The search for God begins at salvation." --R. C. Sproul, theologian
"Searching for God is the main business of the Christian life." --Jonathan Edwards, theologian and revivalist
Whether mankind admits it or not, he's on a search for something to fulfill his inner needs--he's looking the Jesus he doesn't know. He seeks the "pleasures of sin for a season" (cf. Heb. 11:35). He may find it in the pleasures the world has to offer (cf. 1 John 2:14-15) or in some kind of intellectual fulfillment, but he will never be satisfied till he has found it in God because we are made to know God and to love Him in a personal relationship. God desires to get personal! This void or hole in mankind's heart is a vacuum only God can fill (according to Pascal) and all of us will naturally seek crutches to lean on in order to find a substitute. Augustine said "we are restless till we find our rest in [God]!" Man is a religious being who is meant to worship God, and if not, will find a substitute god to worship. He will not find it in political freedom, education, culture, higher standards of living, materialism, sex, drugs, nor false religions, but only in the truth that sets free.
Nature abhors a vacuum and man has expressed it in his boredom and frustration with himself and the world. Man is not an animal in heat seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, but is hard-wired for meaningful work, dignity, purpose, and service in God. But "emptiness is the ultimate truth," according to the Dalai Lama and Carl Jung said that "the central neurosis of our time is emptiness!" We instinctively sense something wrong with us and the picture. Billy Graham says, "We grasp at every passing straw, and even as we clutch it disappears." We are designed to be fulfilled in God doing His will and work, and ignoring design breaks faith with the Designer: for we are meant for purpose, honor, meaning, and dignity because we are in God's image.
So many today think of God as a thing to be used, such as the "Force," of Star Wars fame, but God is a divine person that loves us. We use and manipulate things, but we know, relate to, and love persons. Mankind will not admit it but he's really searching for the benefits without the Benefactor! He may be looking for peace of mind (but not in Christ), prosperity (but not in God's economy), intellectual fulfillment (but not the truth to set him free), better relationships (but not humbly and not with God), (the answer, but not the Answerer!) or even just to know if there is a God or not (out of curiosity, not sincerity), without committing oneself to Him.
Truth is free but not cheap, we must be willing to come to Christ for it. We look for what we want to see and view the world according to what we are, not what it is. If we want forgiveness, we must first become convicted and file for spiritual bankruptcy, realizing we cannot please God on our own merit. And so the qualification for salvation is to realize one's unworthiness! We must first realize our emptiness and need to be filled and made complete.
It should be noted that the Jews of Jesus' day were looking for a Messiah, but the one of conventional standards would deliver them from Roman oppression. They wanted a military hero but got a pacifist that would rule the world of hearts in love. It is a proven psychological fact that our prejudices and inclinations bias our viewpoints and and worldview--known as confirmation bias. No one is totally objective and we all must realize that just because He didn't fit the profile doesn't mean He's not who He claimed to be. The Jews saw no personal need of forgiveness or preaching and weren't seeking a Savior.
But Jesus is not always what we want Him to be and we must accept Him for who He is--the full package--or not at all, which is rejection. We cannot dichotomize Christ and accept forgiveness without lordship and divide His offices and personhood as Lord and Savior--we must trust Him as Savior and also submit to Him as Lord of all. We dare not "divide His person nor confound His nature," according to the church fathers.
Jesus didn't come to do our bidding but to do the will of the Father, which was total relinquishment of His will to the Father's as the motto of His life. Jesus is the only person who was born to die, yes to complete His mission He had to be crucified and die for our sins, carrying our penalty and paying the full cost. We also have a purpose to fulfill God's purpose for our lives, and when we are done we can say with Paul that we have nothing to boast of but what Christ has accomplished through us. Paul only wanted to complete the mission that God gave him (cf. Acts 20:24) and that ministry being obedient to the heavenly vision and the will of God for his life. We also must live with a purpose and submit ourselves to God's will, which is not a one-time event but continual, progressive, and ongoing.
To really see, we need the eyes of our hearts opened (cf. Eph. 1:18) and that can only be done by Jesus Christ illuminating us through the convicting power of the Holy Spirit using the Word (cf. 1 Thess. 1:5; 2:13) to speak God's message. The whole world is blinded by Satan (cf. 2 Cor. 4:4) and doesn't see a need for God apart from a work of grace in the heart. They have eyes but see not nor perceive (cf. Isaiah 6:9). The whole world is under the influence and power of the Adversary (cf. 1 John 5:19)!
But Christ, as Savior, came to set us free from Satan's power, our sin nature, the sting of death, and the influence of the world-system that corrupts our minds. The world at large doesn't see Jesus at work in Providence and is blind to the works of God, sometimes even calling them flukes, accidents, luck, or chance. We all tend to see what we want to see! No one has perfect objectivity but God.
We must not become distracted by the world and it's pleasures and realize that God is at work in us to do and to will of His good pleasure (cf. Phil. 1:6); we are the vessels of honor being used for His glory if we let Him (cf. Isaiah 43:7). It has been said by Corrie ten Boom, "If we look at the world, we'll be distressed; if we look at ourselves, we will be depressed; but if we look at Christ, we'll be at rest." The way to victory is to keep our eyes on Jesus, the "Author and Finisher of our faith" and this will keep us focused on spiritual priorities.
We must "consider Jesus" (cf. Heb. 3:1) and look at Him (cf. Isaiah 45:22), and also to realize that we "see Jesus" (cf. Heb. 2:9) spiritually and in Scripture that it's all about Him and if we keep focused on Him, all else pales in comparison. We must not resort to the quest of the Greek disciples who said, "But we would see Jesus," for it's with our spiritual eyes we must see and be illuminated. It is a fact that believing is seeing, not seeing is believing!
To find God, we must be open to who He is and who He claimed to be. We are to always seek His face! Sincerity matters, but it's not everything. Our praise is recognizing Him for who He is as the eternal Son of God. He's not just some babe in a manger who's cute and comfortable with our sensibilities and sentimentalism, but the Almighty God in the flesh--Lord at His birth. Yuletide brings the revelation that He was born into our space-time continuum to identify with us but He did it in the fullness of time (cf. Gal. 4:4), when all was according to plan.
He entered history--the time-space continuum! And this is history that can be vouched for! But whether He's born in us is a matter of salvation! In our never-ending quest, we should not put God in a box, making Him too small, or we'll never find Him. He can be real to us and our quest can be complete in Him as the "Captain of our soul and Master of our fate." Only knowing and acknowledging the real Jesus satisfies and the danger is to accept "another Spirit, another gospel, another Jesus." (cf. 2 Cor. 11:4). The divine diagnosis: Man needs God! In summation, NB: Wise men still seek Him!
CAVEATS: DON'T LET YOUR CONCEPT OF GOD BECOME TOO SMALL OR YOUR THOUGHTS OF HIM TOO HUMAN! I MATTERS HOW BIG YOUR GOD IS, NOT HOW BIG IS YOUR FAITH? ITS OBJECT IS VITAL. Soli Deo Gloria!
The Art of Bible Study, Approach And Technique
"[A]nd there he revealed himself to Samuel through his word" (1 Sam. 3:21, NIV).
"[T]ill what he foretold came to pass, till the word of the LORD proved him true [tested him]" (Psa. 105:19, NIV).
"For I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God" (Acts 20:27, NKJV).
"Open my eyes, that I may see wondrous things from Your law" (Psa. 119:18, NKJV).
"It's not the parts of the Bible I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I do understand." --Mark Twain
NB: It is one thing to know the Scriptures, and quite another to know the Author, as the Bible doesn't so much as describe God as to make Him known.
We all need to address a problem with a plan of attack and studying the Bible is no easy one for the novice. Basically, all the rules that apply to any literature also do apply to Scripture, only more so. The Bible, for instance, is to be taken literally, at face value, but not everything is meant to be literal but as plays on words and figures of speech. Poetry is usually figurative and not to be taken literally all the time, which is a common mistake; likewise, citing Proverbs as promises you can take to the bank or divine directives is mistaken--all genres must be treated accordingly. One common error is to interpret the Bible according to our experience; the flip side is correct, though--interpret experience according to the light of the Scripture. The Bible makes sense and common sense is a basic concept--if common sense makes sense, seek no other sense, or you'll have nonsense, it is said.
The Bible is a library with a coherent theme that forms a complete picture taken as a whole, and to see the big picture one must recognize the storyline, the revelation of Jesus everywhere, and main message, which even a child can comprehend. Normally, we interpret it as it's written and let Scripture be its own interpreter or Supreme Court. This means understanding poetry as poetry and narrative as narrative, history as history, etc; i.e., distinguishing genres. Be careful not to read into the Bible what you already believe and are just looking for proof texts to validate yourself. We must search for the intended meaning to the recipients and what the author meant, not what it means to us when we see some far-fetched idea from some isolated passage. Don't look for far-out truths, but try to see the obvious ones first. Caveat for mysticism: Note that "no prophecy is of any private interpretation" (cf. 2 Pet. 1:20), and God isn't going to show you unique, or personal truths that no one else knows as some special revelation--He reveals truth to the body of Christ and the church in particular to confirm it. "For it is no empty word for you, but your very life..." (cf. Deut. 32:47, ESV).
The Bible is meant to change our lives, not increase our knowledge and it will keep us from sin, or sin will keep us from it. We must apply ourselves to the study of the Word, and be in the right spirit, frame of mind, having an open, willing, and obedient attitude. We need to be like Ezra, who "prepared his heart to seek the Law of the LORD," (cf. Ezra 7:10). God's Word will test you and it's what sanctifies us as Jesus called it truth (cf. Psalm 105:19; John 17:17). Don't think it needs to be rewritten, it just needs to be reread, for you don't read it once and put it on the shelf. Even Lincoln said he was profitably engaged in reading the Bible! We need to be like Paul said, "The Word is very near you...." Paul urged Timothy to give himself wholly to the Scriptures (cf. 1 Tim. 4:15).
Remember, when reading, that the entirety of God's Word is truth (cf. Psalm 119:160), and this means the sum of it, and you cannot divorce or isolate Scripture to suit your private interpretations. What would the reader have understood? That means don't try to apply ex-post facto standards or laws to Bible times, but interpret according to the time written and don't fit it into politically correct norms. The whole purpose of reading is to see the world through the spectacle of God's Word and get a Christian worldview, experiencing the mind of Christ and thus be sanctified by the Truth. It is said the Bible is our beacon, our celestial fix, our heavenly GPS, and our guidance system for life; however, it's much more than a rule book or set of instructions or code to live by--we experience God in the Word and find that He speaks through it.
One key to reading, as with all reading, is to do it with purpose and have the right attitude: a needy heart, a willing spirit, and an open mind. God will show us "Aha!" moments in the Word if we do this. We learn to experience the living God in the living Word! No need to get Bible fatigue, or boredom from overuse of familiar versions, try new ones! When we learn to see Jesus in the Word, we can rightly divide the Word of Truth (cf. 2 Tim. 2:15), as exhorted; the whole of Scripture is about Him in some fashion.
The most common mistake is to take texts out of context and get a pretext, even when using it as a proof text. As is the case with all reading, common sense, grammar, logic, diction, syntax, and the rules of inference and allusion or quotation apply. Don't read into the text (eisegesis) with preconceived notions and opinions just looking for verifications! You must be willing to go where the Truth leads and be willing to admit you could be wrong! There is no such thing as total or perfect objectivity but this is no excuse not to have sound study technique and habits.
In studying it, be sure to interpret narratives or history in light of didactic or teaching passages, implicit in light of explicit, obscure and unclear in light of the clear, and also don't forget that we interpret the New Testament in light of the Old Testament and vice versa--never dividing what God has progressively revealed and joined (cf. Mark 10:9). A caveat for Gnosticism or mysticism: Don't individualize it or think it applies especially to you and no others or there is some secret message or knowledge to be had. It is easy to take a mere academic approach or to over-spiritualize, allegorize (see it merely as a tall tale and only a practical lesson to be learned), or be guilty of subjectivism (inserting personal opinion and feelings).
For example, seeing the story of Job as merely a grin and bear it, or David and Goliath as standing up to your foes; or the feeding of the multitude as being prepared. Even though some passages are allegorical, such as Sarah and Isaac and Ishmael, but we must see the deeper meaning of what is intended, that which only the Holy Spirit can illuminate. Thus, there is grave danger in negligence of the author's intent and concentrating on your immediate impression. In other words, we don't read it like we would Aesop's Fables for the moral of the story, that we could learn from any fictional source. We can expect "the day to dawn and the morning star to arise in [our] hearts" (cf. 2 Pet. 1:19).
There's more than one way to skin a cat: Do word studies traced through the Word; look for the big picture and see the main message gradually revealed from book to book; take on a subject and see the entire Word develop the doctrine, known as topical study; trace the development of a doctrine; study one book at a time or certain genres of books; study by genre, such as poetry, proverb, history, prophecy, law, and gospel; do an exegesis of one text and analyze it critically, in context, to decipher its message in detail, or do expository studies to reveal and expose truths needed to be discovered, broadcast, or disseminated even using a lexicon, Bible dictionary, or Bible handbook.
In sum, we take Scripture at face value (the Bible does engage in symbolism and Jesus didn't always beat around the bush though) and take it according to the whole analogy of the Word and we cannot fabricate our own truths; we have a right to our own opinions and applications, but not our own truths.
CAVEAT: We need to steer clear of being mystical and interpreting passages with private meanings that others don't see; i.e., wondering what it means to us, not what the writer intended and what the recipient understood--the Bible isn't a fairy tale or bedtime story. Soli Deo Gloria!
"[T]ill what he foretold came to pass, till the word of the LORD proved him true [tested him]" (Psa. 105:19, NIV).
"For I have not shunned to declare unto you the whole counsel of God" (Acts 20:27, NKJV).
"Open my eyes, that I may see wondrous things from Your law" (Psa. 119:18, NKJV).
"It's not the parts of the Bible I don't understand that bother me, it's the parts I do understand." --Mark Twain
NB: It is one thing to know the Scriptures, and quite another to know the Author, as the Bible doesn't so much as describe God as to make Him known.
We all need to address a problem with a plan of attack and studying the Bible is no easy one for the novice. Basically, all the rules that apply to any literature also do apply to Scripture, only more so. The Bible, for instance, is to be taken literally, at face value, but not everything is meant to be literal but as plays on words and figures of speech. Poetry is usually figurative and not to be taken literally all the time, which is a common mistake; likewise, citing Proverbs as promises you can take to the bank or divine directives is mistaken--all genres must be treated accordingly. One common error is to interpret the Bible according to our experience; the flip side is correct, though--interpret experience according to the light of the Scripture. The Bible makes sense and common sense is a basic concept--if common sense makes sense, seek no other sense, or you'll have nonsense, it is said.
The Bible is a library with a coherent theme that forms a complete picture taken as a whole, and to see the big picture one must recognize the storyline, the revelation of Jesus everywhere, and main message, which even a child can comprehend. Normally, we interpret it as it's written and let Scripture be its own interpreter or Supreme Court. This means understanding poetry as poetry and narrative as narrative, history as history, etc; i.e., distinguishing genres. Be careful not to read into the Bible what you already believe and are just looking for proof texts to validate yourself. We must search for the intended meaning to the recipients and what the author meant, not what it means to us when we see some far-fetched idea from some isolated passage. Don't look for far-out truths, but try to see the obvious ones first. Caveat for mysticism: Note that "no prophecy is of any private interpretation" (cf. 2 Pet. 1:20), and God isn't going to show you unique, or personal truths that no one else knows as some special revelation--He reveals truth to the body of Christ and the church in particular to confirm it. "For it is no empty word for you, but your very life..." (cf. Deut. 32:47, ESV).
The Bible is meant to change our lives, not increase our knowledge and it will keep us from sin, or sin will keep us from it. We must apply ourselves to the study of the Word, and be in the right spirit, frame of mind, having an open, willing, and obedient attitude. We need to be like Ezra, who "prepared his heart to seek the Law of the LORD," (cf. Ezra 7:10). God's Word will test you and it's what sanctifies us as Jesus called it truth (cf. Psalm 105:19; John 17:17). Don't think it needs to be rewritten, it just needs to be reread, for you don't read it once and put it on the shelf. Even Lincoln said he was profitably engaged in reading the Bible! We need to be like Paul said, "The Word is very near you...." Paul urged Timothy to give himself wholly to the Scriptures (cf. 1 Tim. 4:15).
Remember, when reading, that the entirety of God's Word is truth (cf. Psalm 119:160), and this means the sum of it, and you cannot divorce or isolate Scripture to suit your private interpretations. What would the reader have understood? That means don't try to apply ex-post facto standards or laws to Bible times, but interpret according to the time written and don't fit it into politically correct norms. The whole purpose of reading is to see the world through the spectacle of God's Word and get a Christian worldview, experiencing the mind of Christ and thus be sanctified by the Truth. It is said the Bible is our beacon, our celestial fix, our heavenly GPS, and our guidance system for life; however, it's much more than a rule book or set of instructions or code to live by--we experience God in the Word and find that He speaks through it.
One key to reading, as with all reading, is to do it with purpose and have the right attitude: a needy heart, a willing spirit, and an open mind. God will show us "Aha!" moments in the Word if we do this. We learn to experience the living God in the living Word! No need to get Bible fatigue, or boredom from overuse of familiar versions, try new ones! When we learn to see Jesus in the Word, we can rightly divide the Word of Truth (cf. 2 Tim. 2:15), as exhorted; the whole of Scripture is about Him in some fashion.
The most common mistake is to take texts out of context and get a pretext, even when using it as a proof text. As is the case with all reading, common sense, grammar, logic, diction, syntax, and the rules of inference and allusion or quotation apply. Don't read into the text (eisegesis) with preconceived notions and opinions just looking for verifications! You must be willing to go where the Truth leads and be willing to admit you could be wrong! There is no such thing as total or perfect objectivity but this is no excuse not to have sound study technique and habits.
In studying it, be sure to interpret narratives or history in light of didactic or teaching passages, implicit in light of explicit, obscure and unclear in light of the clear, and also don't forget that we interpret the New Testament in light of the Old Testament and vice versa--never dividing what God has progressively revealed and joined (cf. Mark 10:9). A caveat for Gnosticism or mysticism: Don't individualize it or think it applies especially to you and no others or there is some secret message or knowledge to be had. It is easy to take a mere academic approach or to over-spiritualize, allegorize (see it merely as a tall tale and only a practical lesson to be learned), or be guilty of subjectivism (inserting personal opinion and feelings).
For example, seeing the story of Job as merely a grin and bear it, or David and Goliath as standing up to your foes; or the feeding of the multitude as being prepared. Even though some passages are allegorical, such as Sarah and Isaac and Ishmael, but we must see the deeper meaning of what is intended, that which only the Holy Spirit can illuminate. Thus, there is grave danger in negligence of the author's intent and concentrating on your immediate impression. In other words, we don't read it like we would Aesop's Fables for the moral of the story, that we could learn from any fictional source. We can expect "the day to dawn and the morning star to arise in [our] hearts" (cf. 2 Pet. 1:19).
There's more than one way to skin a cat: Do word studies traced through the Word; look for the big picture and see the main message gradually revealed from book to book; take on a subject and see the entire Word develop the doctrine, known as topical study; trace the development of a doctrine; study one book at a time or certain genres of books; study by genre, such as poetry, proverb, history, prophecy, law, and gospel; do an exegesis of one text and analyze it critically, in context, to decipher its message in detail, or do expository studies to reveal and expose truths needed to be discovered, broadcast, or disseminated even using a lexicon, Bible dictionary, or Bible handbook.
In sum, we take Scripture at face value (the Bible does engage in symbolism and Jesus didn't always beat around the bush though) and take it according to the whole analogy of the Word and we cannot fabricate our own truths; we have a right to our own opinions and applications, but not our own truths.
CAVEAT: We need to steer clear of being mystical and interpreting passages with private meanings that others don't see; i.e., wondering what it means to us, not what the writer intended and what the recipient understood--the Bible isn't a fairy tale or bedtime story. Soli Deo Gloria!
The Post-ethical Society
"Nothing good ever came from Christianity." --Madalyn Murray O'Hair, atheist activist or should I say "anti-theist?"
"Morality is a nebulous thing; listen to the God within." (New Age philosophy)
"The summation of Christian ethics: "Follow Me," Jesus
"The test of an idea is not whether it's true, but whether it works." --John Dewey, father of American public education and philosopher-author of A Common Faith
"Ethics is about not getting caught." --Author unknown
"Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people" (Prov. 14:34, NIV).
"Morality is merely an extension of self-interest." --Karl Marx
"The Law of God is engraved in man." --John Calvin
"...[T]he propitious smile of Heaven" that fall only on that nation that does not "disregard the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained." --George Washington from Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville as quoted by David Noebel.
"If we are not governed by God, then we will be ruled by tyrants." --William Penn
"Morality is not based on private opinion, but transcendent truth. Morality is merely responsible decision-making [to the secularist]" --Charles Colson
"There is a way which seems right unto a man, but the end thereof is death" (Prov. 14:12; 16:25, NIV).
"All a mans' ways are right to him, but the LORD weighs the heart" (Prov. 21:2, NIV).
"... Hate what is evil; cling to what is good" (Rom. 12:9, NIV).
"Let all things be done decently and in order" (cf. 1 Cor. 14:40).
"A person may think their own ways are right, but the LORD weighs the heart" (Prov. 21:2, NIV).
"Who stands fast? ..., not the man whose final standard is his reason, his principles, conscience, virtue but God." --Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a martyr in his own right during Nazi regime who opposed Hitlerism
By way of intro, Kant's moral argument for God is as follows: ethics exist, to be possible, justice must exist, because it must occur in the afterlife; therefore a Judge must exist; the one who is capable to render it must be all-powerful and all-knowing.
READ ON TO SEE HOW OUR MORAL LAXITY HAS DEVOLVED INTO MORAL PARALYSIS AND MORAL DEPRAVITY, DUE TO LOSS OF BIBLICAL VALUES AS OUR ANCHOR.
We have inherited a post-ethical world that doubts the very existence of any objective, absolute, and universal morals and ethics, but that they are only relative to society, culture, time, person, and situation. This is called moral relativism and the ethics of situation-ethics. Kant pondered the very existence of ethics too and concluded that they don't exist if one rules out God from the equation--they both necessitate the other. Kant reasoned that God must exist for ethics to be possible. "If God does not exist," goes Dostoevsky's dictum, "then all things are permissible." But we know ethics do exist and guilt is real, whether psychologists can explain it away or not. We are responsible, moral creatures that will have to give an account of ourselves to God at Judgment Day.
Secular Humanism has ruled God out and will not let a Divine Foot in the door to interfere with their personal mores and standards of behavior, which allows them to live like animals because they believe they are, in essence, animals. You can rise no higher than your image of yourself! And what you think about God, according to A. W. Tozer is the most important thing about you. The thing about ethics to realize is that where you begin determines where you'll end up. Doctors still take the Hippocratic Oath, but their interpretation of it is purely humanistic. The basic command is: "First, do no harm!" Christianity is the only worldview that gives dignity to man and thus purpose, meaning, understanding, and legitimate goals.
We are not headed toward a utopia and man is not perfectible, contrary to modern thought. They reason that if a man is perfectible and always evolving then so is society. The truth is that we now have more knowledge but less wisdom and that is a dangerous combo. Most people today believe they have a right to make up their own code as they go along and whatever "feels right" to them is the right thing to do. This all started going into a downward spiral after the teaching of Dr. Timothy Leary, who said, "Turn on! Tune in! Drop out!" A whole generation was lost in the quest to find themselves and gave no credence to religious feelings or interest.
The formula of Secular Humanism was "down with God, up with man!" We deify man and dethrone God. This kind of thinking goes back to Protagoras saying, "man is the measure of all things" or Homo mensura in Latin, WHEREBY WE BEGIN WITH MAN TO MAKE OUR CONCLUSIONS. NOTE THAT ATHANASIUS, FATHER OF ORTHODOXY, SAID, "The only system of thought Christ will fit into is the one where He is the starting point." The conclusion of the matter is that without God there is no anchor to weigh in on and to tie everything together with, no grounds for commonality and unit and no common thread or unifying factor. If there is no God, then there are no moral absolutes and all values, principles, ethics, and standards are relative. In essence, this is to say that if we let ethics be the result of personal decision and whim, it's the same as denying any ethics at all--if there is no universal standard, there is no standard; this will lead to utter chaos and destruction of society, for no society has survived the loss of its gods, according to George Bernard Shaw.
There are many ethical systems and most people seem to think the ends justify the means, which is pure pragmatism and what communists embrace. The New Morality says all that matters is the motive of love or good intent, not the results. In reality, the motive and the end result must be righteous and pure in God's eyes for it to be ethical. Politics without principle is one of the Seven Deadly Sins named by Gandhi--that is our present reality, in which pragmatism and expediency rule. And to most people, the Golden Rule has degenerated into the phrases: He who has the gold, rules! Might makes right! Do unto them before they do unto you! (Iron Rule). It is a proven fact that Americans follow the Brazen Rule, which says treat unto others the way they treat you! They certainly don't go high when others go low, but stoop to their level and are a no better example of righteousness. Our contemporary intelligentsia believes ethics evolve with time and are suitable only for the age they are in, but morals are timeless: what was right in Moses' day, is still valid today--God's principles and laws don't waver, because God is immutable and never whimsical, arbitrary, nor capricious.
The whole premise of having ethics is that we are in God's image and are obliged to act like He would, just as Plato observed: If I want to know how to live in reality, I must know what God is really like! The good news is that Jesus came to explain God to us and to show us the Way! We have no excuse not to know the highest ethic achievable: The Sermon on the Mount highlighted in the Golden Rule. But this can only be realized by believers living in the Spirit. The Christian life has not been found unworkable and failed, but found difficult and not attempted. Christianity is not the first choice of many because it demands so much--denying yourself, giving up all, and following Christ no matter the cost. In religion, you can be good without God, and are already considered good by nature.
We have a president with no moral compass, it's alleged, is it any wonder that our nation is becoming numb to ethical dilemmas and growing apathetic and calloused toward ethical issues, with a gradual normalization of wrong? When you have everyone doing their own thing, chaos results and it turns out like Israel before it had a king: "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes" (cf. Jdg. 21:25). Our nation is in moral paralysis and it has little or no sense of "ought" to judge our laws by, which are only the vested interest of those with the most money, loudest voice, and most influence with the rich and powerful and/or ruling class.
People have traded morals for practicality and we live in a market-driven and results-oriented society that is not truth-centered or oriented. According to pragmatism, the value of an idea is its result, not its truth, which cannot be ascertained. They say we must be results-oriented. The rich and powerful have succeeded, by and large, in eradicating God from the public arena and common marketplace of ideas, and the Christian voice has been muffled and nearly silenced, and even fallen for Satan's lies, as the Evangelical Right turns a deaf ear to political mischief.
Alas, the day when our nation decides that anything goes and we are answerable to no one and there's no Higher Power we are held accountable to--a day when God is dead in our nation, or no longer relevant and believable. We are approaching that day now when all we get is lip service and an occasional nod to God to satisfy the so-called Evangelical Right, who believe they represent God but have hijacked the faith. In the final analysis, morality matters simply because God is the moral center of the universe--He is our judge, we are not His judge.
The ultimate questions we must inquire concerning are: Does man have a purpose? Can man live without God? Has man forgotten God? The idea of Secular Humanism is being good without God, a religion without God in the picture. We must rise to the occasion and fly our Christian colors and vociferously proclaim and spread the word of our Great Commission. CAVEAT: God is the only reliable anchor of society, the glue that holds it together via His divine institutions family, church, government--all meant to curtail and keep evil at bay.
A word to the wise is sufficient from Saint Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo: "Government is not a necessary evil, but necessary because of evil." But then again, as an afterthought, I daresay our Bohemian and iconoclastic president has defied all norms of expectation and seems to be more of a Teflon president than Reagan, getting by with his unconventional M.O. without losing any of his loyal, devoted "base." Soli Deo Gloria!
"Morality is a nebulous thing; listen to the God within." (New Age philosophy)
"The summation of Christian ethics: "Follow Me," Jesus
"The test of an idea is not whether it's true, but whether it works." --John Dewey, father of American public education and philosopher-author of A Common Faith
"Ethics is about not getting caught." --Author unknown
"Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people" (Prov. 14:34, NIV).
"Morality is merely an extension of self-interest." --Karl Marx
"The Law of God is engraved in man." --John Calvin
"...[T]he propitious smile of Heaven" that fall only on that nation that does not "disregard the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained." --George Washington from Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville as quoted by David Noebel.
"If we are not governed by God, then we will be ruled by tyrants." --William Penn
"Morality is not based on private opinion, but transcendent truth. Morality is merely responsible decision-making [to the secularist]" --Charles Colson
"There is a way which seems right unto a man, but the end thereof is death" (Prov. 14:12; 16:25, NIV).
"All a mans' ways are right to him, but the LORD weighs the heart" (Prov. 21:2, NIV).
"... Hate what is evil; cling to what is good" (Rom. 12:9, NIV).
"Let all things be done decently and in order" (cf. 1 Cor. 14:40).
"A person may think their own ways are right, but the LORD weighs the heart" (Prov. 21:2, NIV).
"Who stands fast? ..., not the man whose final standard is his reason, his principles, conscience, virtue but God." --Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a martyr in his own right during Nazi regime who opposed Hitlerism
By way of intro, Kant's moral argument for God is as follows: ethics exist, to be possible, justice must exist, because it must occur in the afterlife; therefore a Judge must exist; the one who is capable to render it must be all-powerful and all-knowing.
READ ON TO SEE HOW OUR MORAL LAXITY HAS DEVOLVED INTO MORAL PARALYSIS AND MORAL DEPRAVITY, DUE TO LOSS OF BIBLICAL VALUES AS OUR ANCHOR.
We have inherited a post-ethical world that doubts the very existence of any objective, absolute, and universal morals and ethics, but that they are only relative to society, culture, time, person, and situation. This is called moral relativism and the ethics of situation-ethics. Kant pondered the very existence of ethics too and concluded that they don't exist if one rules out God from the equation--they both necessitate the other. Kant reasoned that God must exist for ethics to be possible. "If God does not exist," goes Dostoevsky's dictum, "then all things are permissible." But we know ethics do exist and guilt is real, whether psychologists can explain it away or not. We are responsible, moral creatures that will have to give an account of ourselves to God at Judgment Day.
Secular Humanism has ruled God out and will not let a Divine Foot in the door to interfere with their personal mores and standards of behavior, which allows them to live like animals because they believe they are, in essence, animals. You can rise no higher than your image of yourself! And what you think about God, according to A. W. Tozer is the most important thing about you. The thing about ethics to realize is that where you begin determines where you'll end up. Doctors still take the Hippocratic Oath, but their interpretation of it is purely humanistic. The basic command is: "First, do no harm!" Christianity is the only worldview that gives dignity to man and thus purpose, meaning, understanding, and legitimate goals.
We are not headed toward a utopia and man is not perfectible, contrary to modern thought. They reason that if a man is perfectible and always evolving then so is society. The truth is that we now have more knowledge but less wisdom and that is a dangerous combo. Most people today believe they have a right to make up their own code as they go along and whatever "feels right" to them is the right thing to do. This all started going into a downward spiral after the teaching of Dr. Timothy Leary, who said, "Turn on! Tune in! Drop out!" A whole generation was lost in the quest to find themselves and gave no credence to religious feelings or interest.
The formula of Secular Humanism was "down with God, up with man!" We deify man and dethrone God. This kind of thinking goes back to Protagoras saying, "man is the measure of all things" or Homo mensura in Latin, WHEREBY WE BEGIN WITH MAN TO MAKE OUR CONCLUSIONS. NOTE THAT ATHANASIUS, FATHER OF ORTHODOXY, SAID, "The only system of thought Christ will fit into is the one where He is the starting point." The conclusion of the matter is that without God there is no anchor to weigh in on and to tie everything together with, no grounds for commonality and unit and no common thread or unifying factor. If there is no God, then there are no moral absolutes and all values, principles, ethics, and standards are relative. In essence, this is to say that if we let ethics be the result of personal decision and whim, it's the same as denying any ethics at all--if there is no universal standard, there is no standard; this will lead to utter chaos and destruction of society, for no society has survived the loss of its gods, according to George Bernard Shaw.
There are many ethical systems and most people seem to think the ends justify the means, which is pure pragmatism and what communists embrace. The New Morality says all that matters is the motive of love or good intent, not the results. In reality, the motive and the end result must be righteous and pure in God's eyes for it to be ethical. Politics without principle is one of the Seven Deadly Sins named by Gandhi--that is our present reality, in which pragmatism and expediency rule. And to most people, the Golden Rule has degenerated into the phrases: He who has the gold, rules! Might makes right! Do unto them before they do unto you! (Iron Rule). It is a proven fact that Americans follow the Brazen Rule, which says treat unto others the way they treat you! They certainly don't go high when others go low, but stoop to their level and are a no better example of righteousness. Our contemporary intelligentsia believes ethics evolve with time and are suitable only for the age they are in, but morals are timeless: what was right in Moses' day, is still valid today--God's principles and laws don't waver, because God is immutable and never whimsical, arbitrary, nor capricious.
The whole premise of having ethics is that we are in God's image and are obliged to act like He would, just as Plato observed: If I want to know how to live in reality, I must know what God is really like! The good news is that Jesus came to explain God to us and to show us the Way! We have no excuse not to know the highest ethic achievable: The Sermon on the Mount highlighted in the Golden Rule. But this can only be realized by believers living in the Spirit. The Christian life has not been found unworkable and failed, but found difficult and not attempted. Christianity is not the first choice of many because it demands so much--denying yourself, giving up all, and following Christ no matter the cost. In religion, you can be good without God, and are already considered good by nature.
We have a president with no moral compass, it's alleged, is it any wonder that our nation is becoming numb to ethical dilemmas and growing apathetic and calloused toward ethical issues, with a gradual normalization of wrong? When you have everyone doing their own thing, chaos results and it turns out like Israel before it had a king: "Everyone did what was right in their own eyes" (cf. Jdg. 21:25). Our nation is in moral paralysis and it has little or no sense of "ought" to judge our laws by, which are only the vested interest of those with the most money, loudest voice, and most influence with the rich and powerful and/or ruling class.
People have traded morals for practicality and we live in a market-driven and results-oriented society that is not truth-centered or oriented. According to pragmatism, the value of an idea is its result, not its truth, which cannot be ascertained. They say we must be results-oriented. The rich and powerful have succeeded, by and large, in eradicating God from the public arena and common marketplace of ideas, and the Christian voice has been muffled and nearly silenced, and even fallen for Satan's lies, as the Evangelical Right turns a deaf ear to political mischief.
Alas, the day when our nation decides that anything goes and we are answerable to no one and there's no Higher Power we are held accountable to--a day when God is dead in our nation, or no longer relevant and believable. We are approaching that day now when all we get is lip service and an occasional nod to God to satisfy the so-called Evangelical Right, who believe they represent God but have hijacked the faith. In the final analysis, morality matters simply because God is the moral center of the universe--He is our judge, we are not His judge.
The ultimate questions we must inquire concerning are: Does man have a purpose? Can man live without God? Has man forgotten God? The idea of Secular Humanism is being good without God, a religion without God in the picture. We must rise to the occasion and fly our Christian colors and vociferously proclaim and spread the word of our Great Commission. CAVEAT: God is the only reliable anchor of society, the glue that holds it together via His divine institutions family, church, government--all meant to curtail and keep evil at bay.
A word to the wise is sufficient from Saint Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo: "Government is not a necessary evil, but necessary because of evil." But then again, as an afterthought, I daresay our Bohemian and iconoclastic president has defied all norms of expectation and seems to be more of a Teflon president than Reagan, getting by with his unconventional M.O. without losing any of his loyal, devoted "base." Soli Deo Gloria!
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