Tuesday, June 29, 2010

June 29, 2010: When Rightly Rebuked

Today I have a word of counsel that I hope none of you will ever have to use: if you are ever caught in a sin and rightly condemned for it, acknowledge that you have done wrong. Do not deny your sin, excuse it, or explain it, and for heaven’s sake don’t say, “I’ve put that behind me,” or, “I think we should just move on,” or, “I don’t want to dwell on the past.” Say these three words: “I have sinned,” and then be silent and wait for questions and further consequences. Answer all questions honestly and take all consequences humbly. Time – maybe years and years of time - will determine the sincerity of your remorse and the validity of your repentance.

The Bible shows a striking contrast between King Saul and King David when they were rebuked for their sins. When Samuel condemned Saul for disobedience regarding the Amalekites, Saul at first said, “But I did obey the Lord!” (1 Samuel 15:20). Bold-faced denial always seems to be the scoundrel’s first tactic. Who knows – maybe, if nobody presses him for details, he can get away with it just that easily. Unfaithful drug-abusing sodomite liar Ted Haggard tried the denial strategy for a few days in November of 2006 until it got crushed down by a ton of facts. I think that people like King Saul or Ted Haggard or Bill Clinton or Barry Bonds could pull a security fire alarm, get their hand sprayed with dye, and then raise that hand in your face and swear it was not red. See Proverbs 30:20: "This is the way of an adulteress: She eats and wipes her mouth and says, 'I've done nothing wrong.'"

When Samuel did not fall for Saul’s blanket denial, Saul switched to explanation. He said in verse 24, “I was afraid of the people and so I gave in to them.” There is a thin line between explanation and excuse. If you are asked, "Why did you do this?", then I suppose it is legitimate to outline the thought processes that led to your downfall while still taking responsibility for your action. But volunteering such information in advance sounds a lot like you are excusing it, or least softening it. ("You see, I had a good reason for acting as I did - I was under a lot a pressure, etc. If you had all those people clamoring in your ear and threatening mutiny you probably would have done the same.") Confess before you explain. I do not know that I have ever heard an explanation for sin that did not sound a lot like "This is not really as bad as it seems."

Finally, Saul decided he would apologize and get it over with so they could move on like nothing happened. In verse 25 he said to Samuel, "Now I beg you, forgive my sin and come back with me, so that I may worship the Lord." Essentially Saul was asking Samuel for a photo op. The people respected Samuel: if he appeared together with Saul it would confirm Saul's good standing. Saul made his request explicit in verse 30: "Please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel; come back with me...". An insincere repenter always seeks to avoid the consequence of public shame. He wants to be honored just as he was before, and for that he needs you to forget everything quickly and not make a big deal out of it. Remember this, if you are fallen and dependent on others' grace: no offender ever has the right to say "Let's move on." Forgiveness may be given to you, but you cannot demand it; honor may never be given to you, and you should not even ask for it.

Compare Saul's response to David's when he was condemned for committing adultery with Bathsheba and killing her husband. 2 Samuel 12:13: Then David said to Nathan, "I have sinned against the Lord."

There it is. His words were very simple. There was no denial, no excuse ("Come on Nathan, she was taking a bath on the roof for crying out loud"), no rush to restoration ("You're right, Nathan, and I'm very, very sorry. Now I think we should all just put this unpleasantness behind us and move on, don't you agree?"). David's sin was evil, pure evil, and he acknowledged that plainly without trying to shift blame or negotiate terms of grace.

You will never fall as badly as Saul or David. But if you do fall, remember the following words so that you can say them without qualification and without looking to anyone's transgression but your own. "I have sinned. I have sinned against the Lord. God be merciful to me the sinner."

Monday, June 21, 2010

June 22, 2010: The Negative And Judgmental Jesus Who Wants You To Suffer And Die (Part 2)

Yes, I know that the title of this week's and last week's Pastor's Page is provocative. That's deliberate. By speaking forcefully I honor the literary tradition of my apostolic namesake, who in Galatians 5:12 said that he wanted gospel opponents to cut off their penises, and who in Philippians 3:8 compared everything but Christ to a steaming pile of sh--. All that I write is tame in comparison.

I was asked last week to provide Scriptures to support my contention that Jesus is negative and judgmental and he wants you to suffer and die. Gladly:

Read any of Jesus' sermons (the one in Matthew 5-7 and Luke 6 will do), and you will see that he is very negative and judgmental about sin. He is so strict that he makes Old Testament commandments harder than ever to obey, expanding the definitions of murder and adultery, for example, to include anger and lust and unjustified remarriage. See Matthew 5:21-22; 27-28; 19:9. His standards are so high that he routinely dismisses potential disciples who want to follow him but who don't quite make the grade. For example:

1) A man says he will follow Jesus after his father dies. Jesus retorts, "Let the dead bury their own dead. You go and proclaim the kingdom of God." (Luke 9:60)
2) A man says he wants to follow Jesus, and Jesus immediately challenges his willingness to be homeless: "Foxes have holes and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head." (Luke 9:58)
3) A man will follow Jesus after he says good-bye to his family. Jesus says, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God." (Luke 9:62)
4) In Matthew 19:16-22, Jesus turns away a morally upright man because he won't give all his money to the poor.
5) In Matthew 10:38, he says that anyone who does not take his cross and follow him is not worthy of him.
6) In John 6:66-67, a whole crowd of disciples walks away from Jesus after a difficult sermon. He not only lets them go, he asks the 12 if they want to leave too!
7) Even Peter, who by sheer grace made it through all that weeding out, is blasted for his lack of faith (Matthew 14:31), called the Devil (Mark 8:33), and threatened with excommunication (John 13:8).

And that's the disciples! Active opponents are called thieves and robbers (John 10:8), sons of Satan (John 8:44), sons of hell (Matthew 23:15), snakes (Matthew 23:33), carcass crypts (Matthew 23:27), blind guides (Matthew 23:16), and blind fools (Matthew 23:17). Among other things.

The point is frequently made that Jesus judges sin, not sinners, but that homiletic talking point does not hold up well under biblical scrutiny. It's not sin but sinners who need to have millstones hung around their necks (Luke 17:2), who will weep and gnash their teeth (Matthew 8:12), whose only reward will be earthly renown (Matthew 6:6).

I believe that Jesus is negative and judgmental because we keep giving him so much to be negative and judgmental about. We sin, and we sin, and we sin some more, and we live among sinners who corrupt us and whom we corrupt.

There is only one way out of this stinking mess, only one exit from this iniquitous maze, and that is through suffering and death. You could put it this way: Jesus wants you to suffer more so that you will sin less; he wants you to die so that you will be sinless. He himself "learned obedience from what he suffered" (Hebrews 5:8), because it was God's will to "make the author of [our] salvation perfect through suffering" (Hebrews 2:10). So, while the Buddha Siddhartha Gautama founded a religion on the basis of avoiding suffering, Jesus went the other way and embraced it, postponing the gratification of full joy until after he "endured the cross, despising its shame" (Hebrews 12:2). He insisted that his followers walk that Via Dolorosa behind him, taking either a figurative cross (Mark 8:34), or - in Peter's case - a literal one (John 21:18-19).

Early Christians were eager to share in the sufferings of Christ. Paul wrote that he wanted to know "the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings" (Philippians 3:10), and was committed to filling up "what is still lacking of Christ's afflictions" (Colossians 1:24). The apostles rejoiced in Acts 5:41 not because they were feasting luxuriously but because "they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name."

By the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they taught us that being a Christian was a lot like death. Paul wrote, "our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with" (Romans 6:6), and, "I've been crucified with Christ; therefore I no longer live, but Christ lives in me" (Galatians 2:20). Peter wrote, "He bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness" (1 Peter 2:24).

It is the absence of any rigorous proclamation about the cross that renders so insidious the crap preaching of gospel lite proponents I critiqued last week - Joel Osteen, Robert Schuller, Joyce Meyer, Andrew Wommack. There are many others. They do not see a holy Jesus who hates your sin, who died for it and insists that you die to it. They see an indulgent Jesus who wants to stuff you with goodies regardless of your spiritual condition. Rather than urging us to die to ourselves, take up our crosses and follow Christ, they tell us think positively and buy shoes. Actually, they want you to buy their books and send them money so that they can think positively and buy shoes. Lots and lots of shoes. But you would do better to contemplate the cross of Jesus Christ, and repent of your sins, and meekly plead for God's good and perfect will to purify you no matter what the cost.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

June 15, 2010: The Negative And Judgmental Jesus Who Wants You To Suffer And Die (Part 1)

No, I do not intend the title above to be taken ironically. Read it at face value. I believe that our Lord Jesus Christ is negative and judgmental and he wants you to suffer and die. Of course, he wants to give you life too (John 10:10: "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full"), but that life tends to come after all the pain, suffering, death, and - worst of all - crushing blows to your self esteem.

There are people with huge churches and notable ministries who teach differently, but they are all wrong. For some reason I've bumped into their influence a lot in the last few days. For example:

- I was just asked to read a book written by a woman who would race home after her church service to listen to Robert Schuller's "Hour of Power" TV program, and who later joined his staff. Schuller is the guy who famously stuck his middle finger in the face of God and the Scriptures by defining sin as "any act or thought that robs myself or another human being of his or her self-esteem," and saying that our "real problem is that deep down we feel we're not good enough to approach a holy God." Sin, in the Bible, is lawlessness - 1 John 3:4 - and our real problem is that deep down we do think we're good enough to approach a holy God. By the way, among other scandals, Schuller is now estranged from his minister son, and his Crystal Cathedral has a budget shortfall of 55 million dollars.

- Recently at church someone commended to me the ministry of Joyce Meyer. Meyer, author of Eat The Cookie...Buy The Shoes funds a decadent lifestyle with tax-free contributions from gullible followers she has succeeded in swindling. A short list of her indulgences: an $11,000 French clock, a $105,000 Crownline boat, a $19,000 pair of vases, French crystal valued at $18,500, two curio cabinets worth $5,700, a table worth $30,000, and a $14,000 custom bookcase. Not to mention 4 houses and a $10-million Canadair jet. I'm not a Meyer fan.

- A friend indicated support of Andrew Wommack, the author of God Wants You Well. Wommack writes "I believe the message the Lord has entrusted me to deliver will change the way the body of Christ perceives God" - and when was the last time you read something more arrogant and cultish than that? Wommack teaches that the doctrine of God's sovereignty "is the worst doctrine in the church today...The belief that God controls everything that happens to us is one of the devil's biggest inroads into our lives," and he condemns praying to God about illness, saying, “You have a tumor? Don’t pray to God about the tumor. Talk to the tumor itself!” Wommack's god is one who only wants nice things to happen to you in this life - and I actually know of a god like that. He offered Jesus a pain-free, luxurious lifestyle [Matthew 4:8-9]. He's called Lucifer.

- I read an enthusiastic endorsement of Joel Osteen by well-known atheist Hemant "I Sold My Soul On E-Bay" Mehta. Mehta said, "[Osteen] makes you feel good...He just reaches out to people, whether or not you really believe in God. And he doesn't reference God or the Bible a lot. I think that's for good reason." I don't know where to start with Grinning Joel Osteen. How about if I put it this way - it is impossible to do all three of these things: (1) Read your Bible a lot, (2) Listen to Joel Osteen, (3) Not puke. Now I happen to know Mr. Mehta personally - he was my son's speech coach - and I can vouch for him as a cordial, pleasant, well-spoken atheist who rightly regarded my son as a wicked sharp impromptu speaker. Good guy. But Joel Osteen? Dang. Please listen, Christians: leave mind-numbingly vapid platitudes about achieving your best life now to atheists who will find them inoffensively compatible with their philosophy. We who love Christ must feast on meatier fare than that in order to have strength to bear the cross that our Lord lays upon us.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die," and there is more biblical wisdom in those 11 words than in every sermon the prosperity vendors have ever preached. Forget health and prosperity and long life and self-fulfillment. Your goal must be to please Christ, not yourself. Trust Christ, exalt Christ, bow the knee to Christ, and live for his glory and pleasure rather than your own. He must become greater, you must become less (John 3:30).

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

June 1, 2010: What's Missing? (Part 2)

I closed last week by promising to talk about one of the Bible's chief motivations for getting us to turn from sin and turn to Christ.

It's fear. Not "reverence", "awe", "respect", "honor", "deference" - nor any other of those milder terms we like to substitute for it - but just plain fear. Wholesomely biblical righteous terror.

About 15 years ago in a theology class I heard professor Wayne Grudem say to us, "When I'm traveling alone and I come back to my hotel room at night, what do you think keeps me from ordering porn on the TV?" You can imagine the stunned silence as we waited for him to answer. He said, simply, "The fear of the Lord."

It is significant that Grudem did not say, "Because I love my wife"; or, "Because I love the Lord"; or, "Because I'm so grateful to God for his grace"; or, "Because I choose to live out the gospel in the power of the Spirit." Those are all good reasons too, but when battling depravity a man will often find them insufficient. Even Wayne Grudem, a godly professor in an evangelical seminary (and a man whom I hold in highest regard), has to acknowledge that, sometimes, he's just afraid of God. And that fear helps him to do what is right.

If you are a Christian and the notion of fearing God seems alien, then I'm afraid I have two hard things to say to you: (1) You don't read your Bible enough, and (2) The preaching you are acquainted with is probably too light.

Let me recommend a dose of stern stuff from Jonathan Edwards, rightly regarded as America's foremost theologian. In 1746 he wrote, "The Scriptures place much of religion in godly fear; insomuch that it is often spoken of as the character of those that are truly religious persons, that they tremble at God's word, that they fear before Him, that their flesh trembles for fear of Him, and that they are afraid of His judgments, that His excellency makes them afraid, and His dread falls upon them, and the like: and a compellation commonly given the saints in Scripture is 'fearers of God,' or 'they that fear the Lord.' And because the fear of God is a great part of true godliness, hence true godliness in general is very commonly called by the name of the fear of God; as every one knows that knows anything of the Bible."

That last clause is a dagger, isn't it? Edwards dismisses fear-deniers as biblically illiterate! Well, he's right - they are. But to be fair to them, they do have two Bible passages in their favor. One is Romans 8:15 (For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship by whom we cry, "Abba, Father"); and the other is 1 John 4:18 (There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love).

I would say two things to those who would use the texts above as bludgeons to beat all righteous fear out of us. First, in the Romans passage, the Holy Spirit does not liberate us from all fear, just from slavery to it. Fear isn't the only way we relate to God. We also love him, and by the Spirit's gentle prompting call him "Dad". If you have had a good earthly father, you will know instinctively what it means both to fear a person and to regard him with strong affection. If you didn't have a good father, please take my word for it that these emotions of terror and delight can co-exist. Fear and love are not incompatible.

Even though 1 John 4:18 seems to suggest that they are. John says that there is no fear in love, because perfect love drives out fear. That is true. But my simple response is, "Well, do you have perfect love?" If you do, then I guess you needn't fear. But I don't have perfect love - so I do fear. The verse continues, "The one who fears is not made perfect in love." I acknowledge to my shame that I am not made perfect in love. If you have been so perfected, then please stop reading here, for I have nothing to teach you, and have no more right to instruct you than John had to baptize Jesus. I should be sitting at your feet and learning from you (if you would condescend to take me as a disciple).

To the rest of us imperfects, I say, let us give fear its rightful place. There will come a day when, perfected in glory, we will neither fear nor be able to fear. (A wonderful moment in C. S. Lewis' The Last Battle has Narnian saints in Aslan's country realizing that they can't feel afraid even if they try.)

But when I hear (this side of heaven) that a supposedly Christian man has, after 30 years of marriage, left his wife and kids to go live with a stripper, I want to ask him the same question that the penitent thief in Luke 23:40 asked the belligerent moron crucified on the other side of Jesus: "Don't you fear God?" That question retains its potency 2,000 years after it was first uttered. How is it even possible for such a sinner not to tremble with terror? How can any Bible-reader forget Hebrews 10:31: "It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God"?

Last week I warned about evangelical teaching that omits any mention of the wrath of God - or that even goes as far as to deny that God is angry with us. This week I similarly warn against teaching that omits fear (or that actively crusades against it!) as a motivation for holy living. Please listen to me: fear is extremely biblical. I leave you with a series of texts below that insist upon it.

Luke 1:50: His mercy extends to those who fear him, from generation to generation.
Luke 12:5: But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him.
Luke 23:40: But the other criminal rebuked him. "Don't you fear God," he said, "since you are under the same sentence?"
Acts 9:31: Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace. It was strengthened; and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it grew in numbers, living in the fear of the Lord.
Acts 10:34-35: Then Peter began to speak: "I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right.
Romans 3:18: There is no fear of God before their eyes. [This is a bad thing.]
2 Corinthians 5:11: Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men.
Philippians 2:12: Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
Revelation 19:5: Then a voice came from the throne, saying: "Praise our God, all you his servants, you who fear him, both small and great!"