Following God: A Body Of Ministry

Recap

What is the Church?

What is the church? The bible uses the word a few different ways. Last week we discussed the primary meaning: The church is the people of God[1]. A family he assembles[2].

Another use of the word is to refer to a specific group of Jesus-followers who gather in a region. A number of the books in the New Testament were written as letters to these groups. The opening verses illustrate the point:

• Romans:  To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints

• 1 Corinthians:  To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours

• 2 Corinthians:  To the church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia

• Galatians:  To the churches of Galatia

• Ephesians:  To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus

• Philippians:  To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi

• Colossians:  To the saints and faithful brothers and sisters in Christ at Colossae

• 1 & 2 Thessalonians:  To the church of the Thessalonians

• 1 Peter:  To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion

• Jude:  To those who are called

• The first three chapters of Revelation contain letters to various churches in the region

The context shows that not everyone gathered in these places were Christians. So, while the primary meaning of “church” is the people called out by God, in actual practice these gatherings were primarily believers with some unbelievers as well. Some categories might help clear this up.

Visibility of the Church

The Invisible Church 

As far back as Augustine, the term “invisible church” has been used by theologians. This sounds like a reference to the X-Men, but Augustine did not have a School for Gifted Youngsters like Xavier did. The idea of the invisible church is that we can’t see all believers. Some are in other churches in other places. Many have died and some have yet to be born. A lot has happened in 2,000 years, and there’s likely more to come. The invisible church is all true believers in Christ[3] – those who have been, are, or will be adopted into God’s family. And on top of that, when we look at the church today, we don’t always know with certainty who the actual believers are. So the invisible church[4] is the collection of all true believers throughout all of time who will spend eternity with God, whether we see them or know about them or not.

The Visible Church 

That means the visible church is what we can see. Not the ones who are called to gather, but the ones who actually do gather. Some inside those gatherings aren’t believers and don’t claim to be[5]. Some claim to be but are not[6]. I said at the beginning that the church is the people called by God. That is the intended meaning. The bible also uses the word church to refer to the gathered body, who are sometimes a mixed bag. That’s the visible church.

• When Paul writes the Corinthians, he mentions a man in the church[7] that they are to throw out

• When John writes the seven churches, it is evident that some people are faithful, and others are not

• And despite popular opinion, it’s worth noting that every use of the word “anti-Christ” in scripture refers to a person in the church, not in government.

I mention this for two reasons:

One, to understand the terms and have some mental categories for understanding the varied uses of the word “church[8]” in the bible.

Second, as a warning. Be found faithful. Run the race. Press on. Don’t be hearers only, but doers also. Don’t pretend to be a follower. Continue to work out your salvation. If this makes you nervous, it probably shouldn’t. If it doesn’t make you nervous, it probably should.

Desertion and Abandonment

While we’re on the topic of warnings, I want to say something more about what I introduced last week. Last week, I paraphrased “forsaking the assembly” as skipping church, but the bible uses much stronger language.

The writer of Hebrews says, “Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, as is the manner of some[9]”

The word “assembling” or “gathering” is built on the word for synagogue, the Jewish worship gathering. He was saying “don’t forsake synangogue-ing”. Keep gathering together to worship God. It’s a verb, not a noun[10]. It’s not talking about a place or people that is named the church – it’s the action of gathering with the church at the church to be the church.

Forsake is the word I think I’ve misunderstood the most. It sounds to me like “don’t forget!” Like, “don’t forsake brushing your teeth!”  But that’s not the meaning at all. Let’s look at other uses of this word:

• You probably know the phrase that God will not leave you or forsake you[11]. This is the same idea.

• When David spoke about being abandoned to the realm of the dead[12] – same word

• When Jesus was arrested, Mark says[13] all the disciples fled. They abandoned Jesus in the garden.

• Then when Jesus hung on the cross, Jesus quoted[14] David “Why have you forsaken me?”

• When Paul said[15] we would be persecuted but not abandoned. Same word.

• Paul[16] also used this word to describe Demas and the others who left him stranded and betrayed

This is not merely good advice or encouragement. It’s not a life lesson. This is something almost like a rebuke. It’s a warning. Do not abandon the gathering. Don’t desert the worship service. Don’t leave! Press on! Don’t leave us in the lurch!

I don’t reiterate this to condemn you, but I do want to warn you. When we say “I don’t go to church”, that’s what the bible calls abandonment and desertion. That is a sobering thought.

The Church as an Ark

We are in the last days. We have been for 2,000 years[17]. Soon the end will come. God will destroy the world and remake it. He has told us this would happen. But it’s not the first time.

It's not the same thing, but something similar has happened before. The earth grew wicked. No one followed God. For a long time, He warned them that the end was coming. He made a promise to the righteous. He provided a vessel to protect the faithful remnant.

He has done it this time as well. This ending will be much more catastrophic. This end will be final. The results will be eternal. The stakes are much higher, so the warnings have gone on longer.

The church is something like the ark[18]. Those who enter and remain within will be protected from the ultimate devastation God will bring. Like the Israelites who were delivered from watery death[19] and guided into their rest[20], the true church will pass safely through this life because of God's miraculous intervention.

A Recipe for Disaster

Not only is it a miracle that God saves us from destruction – it’s a bit of a miracle that God saves us from each other. This came up in Message Plus last week. Since day one, the church has been a group of men and women, Gentiles and Jews, slaves and masters, young and old … you name the division, and it was likely represented in the church. You might be in a pew with a sworn national enemy – that’s over. You might be a slave sitting next to his master, but in the gathering you were equals. Whatever national, cultural or political distinctions might have existed between men and women were irrelevant in the gathering. How could this possibly work? This sounds like a recipe for disaster!

In Christ, things are different. Our primary bond is not to each other, but to Jesus. In finding our primary allegiance there, competing commitments fade into the background. Things that would fail miserably anywhere else work because of our unity in Christ.

Safety in the Church

Our unity in Christ also brings safety[21]. We are often at risk of breaking this though.

One of the Reformation goals was to translate the bible into the common tongue. If you were German or English, you should have a bible you could read in German or English. At the time, bibles were in Latin and were kept inside the church building. Few people read Latin besides priests, and not many of them even did at this time. So, in effect, the bible was unavailable to the common man. All that people would know of scripture is what they were told by their priest.

The Reformation happened alongside the introduction of the printing press. In God’s providence, the desire to get the bible out to everyone in their own language happened at the time it was actually possible.

The Catholic critique was that this would be dangerous because common people were not smart enough to understand God’s word. This is false, but the concern was valid. The Reformers spoke of the “priesthood of all believers” to refer to the idea that any Christian could lead a person to God and even understand God’s word without the intervention of a church official.

Many then, and today as well, misunderstood this to mean “the priesthood of each believer”. The Reformers did not suggest that each person could come to a complete and unblemished understanding of every concept in scripture. Most of scripture is clear, but there is safety in community. The properly functioning church was to be a place where ideas could be discussed by common believers and evaluated against scripture, and in doing so would be a guardian of doctrine[22]. This is also part of the reason for the church offices[23]of elder, pastor, and teacher.

Unfortunately, the misunderstanding of 500 years ago still flourishes today. If you are contemplating a new[24] idea, book, or teacher, ask around. There is safety in the church – and I don’t just mean the visible members today, but the invisible church that has gone before.We ignore these resources to our peril. We are here for one another.

Identity

The safety in our church can also be threatened by our other commitments. We are each individuals with our own interests and passions. Some are appropriate and some are not. Some are compatible with Christianity and some are not.

Such Were Some of You

When writing the church at Corinth, Paul pointed out the clear contrast in their lives before following Christ and life after. He gave a laundry list of sins – drunkenness, stealing, bullying, homosexuality, adultery, idolatry – all sorts of things that were markers of unrighteousness. Afterward, he said “such were some of you[25]”. You used to be like that, but no more because Christ gave you a new identity.

All of us had our own identities before Christ, but now Jesus is our identity. We don’t all become identical, but we have a shared identity. And that identity is not political. It’s not racial. It’s not our sexual orientation. Our identity is found in Christ and nothing may be allowed to compete with it.

Compatibility

Some of these identities are actually logical opposites of Christianity and cannot be held together without destroying the meaning of one. Even when our allegiances are compatible, it is worth taking a look at our priorities. Are you a Christian first, or something else? What story would your bank account show? Your Facebook wall? Your calendar? Your internet history? The words you say?

Here are some questions worth thinking about over the coming week:

• Are my allegiances, alliances, commitments and preferences compatible with Christ’s teachings?

• Do I identify as a Christian first, or something else?

• If someone were to ask those around me, how would they answer those questions?

Again, I don’t want you to feel guilty … unless you are guilty. But even so, this isn’t intended to condemn anyone – that’s not my job. But the Holy Spirit does use messages like this to bring conviction. That’s when you feel uncomfortable pressure on a tender spot. And in the church, it’s our job to sharpen one another, speak truth to one another, correct one another and sometimes even separate from one another[26].

We Should Reflect Well

I’ve heard people tell their kids, “We don’t do that” when they see them misbehaving. It’s shorthand for saying, “I know other people might do that, but our family doesn’t act that way. Your actions reflect badly on the family.”

The church is a family. We have an understood code of conduct. A family identity. What we do reflects on the family. Remember Anthony’s recent message when he said “you’re the type of person who does that sort of thing”? The church is a type of people who do certain things and don’t do other things. Are you a church sort of person? The name for that sort of person is a disciple of Jesus Christ.

The Community of the Church

Together, we are the body. Our individual gifts are for the body. All the spiritual gifts that are mentioned in scripture are meant to serve the church. The fruit of the spirit is not limited to expression within the church, but it ought to be evident there[27].

Writing the churches in Galatia, Paul says that the “fruit” of the Spirit is love[28]. In other words, those in the fellowship of the Spirit can be identified because of their love. What does it mean to love the body? If you keep reading[29], he tells you[30]. It is to be patient with fellow members (long-suffering is a better word that paints a vivid picture). It is to be kind to others in the church. It is to be humble, to share in suffering. It is a life of joy and peace and goodness – faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

It is a life that is lived as a reflection of our maker. We are his. We are the gathered ones. Gathered to hear from God and gathered for a mission.

Mission

We are not community just for fun, but it’s not exactly a slog. This is not the Rotary, but it is rewarding. God made this people and there is no other group like it.

The Church is Trinitarian

In scripture, we are the people of God, the disciples of Christ, and the fellowship of the Spirit. God is three persons, but one essence. The church is described in trinitarian terms that are complementary.

• God called his people to come listen to him.

• Jesus called his disciples to come and follow him[31] and make other disciples and teach them[32].

• The fellowship of the Spirit[33] has been called to one another.

The Church’s Three-fold Ministry

The church has a calling to ministry, and it is three-fold as well[34].

As a body, we are called to minister:

• to God in worship

• to the saints in nurture

• the world in witness

To God in Worship

The church has always worshipped God together in song. Not merely because of tradition, but because worship has always been happening since before the beginning[35]. Think of it as part of Jesus’ prayer[36] “on earth as it is in heaven”. For a short time each week, we on earth join in with the heavenly chorus that has been glorifying God for eternity. This is part of the church’s call. It’s worth showing up on time to participate.

To the Saints in Nurture

I already spoke about nurturing the saints a bit. The New Testament is loaded with “one another” verses. The one another refers to our brothers and sisters in the church body[37]. We accept[38] one another. We tolerate[39] one another. We forgive[40] one another. We confess sins[41] to one another. We love and serve[42] one another. We honor[43] one another. We bear[44] one another’s burdens. We speak truth[45], sometimes an uncomfortable truth[46], or even a stern rebuke[47] – all out of love for one another. We encourage[48]one another, pray[49] for one another, and on and on and on. Honestly, this is all just continued exposition on what it is to truly love.

To the World in Witness

Two things could be viewed as our witness to the world: what we show them and what we tell them. I think we have lost a lot of ground on that first one in recent years.

Showing them

What does the world see when they look at us? I don’t mean the show that we put on. I mean the way we are when we don’t know the world is watching.

• Does it look like we love one another?

• Do we look like we have turned from sin, or do we still cling to some of that “for such were some of you” stuff?

• Do we show that God is our highest priority, or are there other allegiances that are more evident?

• Of whom are we more critical – fellow Christians or the world? The bible reserves judgment for within the church[50]. We are not instructed to judge the world.

• Are we consistent?

• Do we love what God loves and hate what God hates?

• Do we judge all with the same scale[51]?

• Do we excuse sin?

What we do reflects on the church and what we stand for. We need to be aware of what we show the world.

Telling them

I don’t think I need to say too much about what we are supposed to tell the world. Or do I? It’s popular to say, “Preach the Gospel at all times. When necessary, use words[52].” I get the point. It’s meant to make the point I just made – that our actions count. But I’m saying more. I’m saying we ought to live consistent lives, AND use words.

I was all ready to say that “we all know the Great Commission[53]”, but then I wondered... do we? 

I think the general sense is that we are supposed to make more Christians. I guess that’s part of the package, but it’s not that easy. That makes it sounds like we should hop on a plane to a foreign land where people don’t know anything and do our best to lead them to Jesus. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but that isn’t quite what Jesus said to do.

To strip it down, he said to “make disciples”, which means followers. He says to baptize them, so he is talking about the sort of follower that repents and turns to Jesus. But the kicker is the end. He says “teach them to obey everything I have commanded you”. That’s more than a church mission trip. That’s more than a meeting at Starbucks. Teaching everything takes a lot of time. There’s teaching at the beginning of the process to make sure people know what they’re signing up for, and there’s a whole bunch of teaching afterwards too. Some people call it discipling, which just means teaching people who are now disciples.

Where Can We Make Disciples?

You know where there is an amazing opportunity to meet both believers and unbelievers and make them disciples? Wednesday night in this building.

It fills my heart to come here and watch Karl and his team teach kids what it means to follow Jesus, play games together, and memorize God’s word. There are few things that give me as much joy as hearing your kids recite their verses to me. A close second is looking around the room at all the other adults who show up to hear the same thing. This is the Great Commission. This is church.

I’ve been inside the youth room during youth group on Wednesdays too. Believers and unbelievers in their teens bare their hearts and bear one another’s’ burdens. They hear the bible explained. They ask questions. It’s deep stuff. It’s church. It’s the Great Commission.

Sunday morning, you can actually impact an entire room of unbelievers without leaving the building. The nursery is full of fallen humanity. Three of them are mine. They are small and you barely need a first language, let alone a second. It’s not mindless babysitting – it’s the Great Commission. And, it’s a two-for-one deal! In one act, you can serve your fellow believers and make disciples of their kids. This mission field exists on the other side of that wall. Who wouldn’t want to do that?! Again, it fills my heart to the brim when I see what happens in there.

You Can Even Make Disciples Outside of Church

Of course, the Great Commission can be carried out many other places. I’ve been part of philosophy groups, debates, pub theology, lunches with friends, Facebook conversations and elevator rides with strangers. There are endless opportunities to talk to non-Christians about things that are important to you. And I promise you, it’s not weird at all.

But you don’t have to limit your discipling to non-believers. You should do both. There are bible studies, small groups, Sunday School, evening classes, Message Plus and more. Some of my favorite time with fellow Christians happens at breakfast, around a backyard fire, on a car ride, game night at Tom and Amy’s…

The great news is that you don’t have to just choose one! You should grab a few from each group! Not only is it participating in the church growth movement that Jesus started, but it’s loads of fun.

But, please - don’t just tell them. You must do both. Show them too. Nothing you say will make up for a bad representation of the church. The people of God have a bad reputation these days, and much of it is deserved. We are ambassadors for Jesus Christ. We are his body created for ministry. Let’s do our best to worship God, serve the body, and witness to the world.

Closing

Be the Church

We’ve covered a lot in the last couple of weeks. Hopefully, you’ve seen that the bible’s description of life in Christ follows the model of the first[54] church[55]. They devoted themselves to learning, fellowship, communion, and prayer. They provided for one another. They shared meals in their homes. They met regularly. They told others. And the church grew.

I don’t want to end this with the assumption that we’re all on the same page. If you’re here and you have never repented for your sins, then the last two weeks may have been very confusing. The fantastic news is that you don’t have to stay on the outside.

A Bleak History

This church does not have any power over you. No church does. By the 16th century, the Catholic church had become a world power. It was not a body, it was a machine – a force to be reckoned with. The church was never supposed to be an institution or a bureaucracy. But it had become all that. The church was a body of government, organized from the top down. You needed to submit to that church and hope for a good hearing. 

The church was never meant to be an oppressor. The church was to be a light to the world shining hope from the mountaintops.

How do we become the church?

“The church” as an institution does not add us to God’s family. Rather, God adopts us and adds us to his family, and as a group we are called the church.

The way it’s explained in the bible is this:  God chose us before the foundation of the world[56]. Because of his love for the world, he sent his Son so that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life[57]. Through this he adopts us[58] as an act of grace[59]that we do not deserve[60].

This all happens because of our faith[61] in Christ[62]. We are established on the confession of truth[63]. That is our foundation. Paul[64]continues this language and replaces our confession with the apostles and prophets. He clarifies[65] that the foundation is Jesus himself. The point is that the apostles taught what they saw and heard[66], which was what the prophets foretold[67] and what we confess – and all of that refers to Jesus Christ being the promised hope for mankind. When we acknowledge our faith in Christ, we are confessing our agreement with the apostles and the prophets. On this foundation[68] a structure is built[69]; which Paul says is “a holy temple – a dwelling place for God by the Spirit”. The church is the assortment of stones[70] built on the solid apostolic witness that Jesus is Lord.

Come Inside the Church

If you are an outsider, you don’t have to be. You simply need to see your own sin and recognize you have no excuse when you stand before God. And understand that your best attempts still fall far short of what God requires. But also understand that Jesus lived the life you should have and suffered the fate you should have. And see that he is the one the apostles taught that the prophets spoke of. If you believe all this and trust God to save your life, then you are already on the inside. You are one of these living stones. If you’re not quite there yet, that’s ok. But please talk with someone about it. 

___________________________________________________________________

[1] At least that is the intended meaning. The word is also used to refer to the assembled body that may include unbelievers. More on that later.

[2] Hosea 2:23; Romans 9:8; Romans 9:23–26; 1 Peter 2:10; Galatians 3:26-29

[3] John 14:23; Ephesians 5:25

[4] Also called “universal church”

[5] 1 Corinthians 14:24

[6] Deuteronomy 13:1-5; Matthew 7:15-23; 24:11-28; Acts 20:30; 2 Peter 2:1-3; Revelation 2-3

[7] 1 Corinthians 5:1-5

[8] I should mention one other nuance in biblical use. Sometimes church means the local assembly – an individual congregation, and sometimes the word means a collection of gatherings (regional, for instance) or even all churches worldwide

[9] Hebrews 10:25 - NKJV comes the closest to communicating the force of the words used. I made some slight adjustments for readability

[10] Some suggest the meaning is “Don’t deny the invisible church” – IOW, don’t apostatize. But this word used here never means a “church body”. It is always an action, and an imperative: gather!  (See also Matthew 23:37; Matthew 24:31; Mark 1:33; Mark 13:27; Luke 12:1; Luke 13:34).

[11] Deuteronomy 31:6 – Same verse quoted in Hebrews 13:5

[12] Acts 2:31

[13] Mark 14:50

[14] Matthew 27:46

[15] 2 Corinthians 4:9

[16] 2 Timothy 4:10,16

[17] Joel 2:28–32; Hosea 3:5; Micah 4:1; Jeremiah 31:31-34; Acts 2:14-21; Hebrews 1:1-2; 1 John 2:18

[18] The ark was something like the visible church. Both are safe places on this earth, but only the true Christian will be judged by God on the merit of Jesus. - 2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 3:27; Ephesians 2:13; Hebrews 8:12

[19] When they crossed the Red Sea and the Egyptians were drowned – Exodus 14

[20] When they crossed the Jordan to enter the promised land of Canaan - Joshua 3

[21] Proverbs 11:14

[22] 1 Timothy 4:11-16; Acts 17:11

[23] Titus 1:9

[24] 2 Timothy 4:3-4

[25] 1 Corinthians 6:11

[26] 1 Corinthians 5:9-13; 2 Thessalonians 3:13-15

[27] John 13:35; Galatians 6:10

[28] Galatians 5:22

[29] Galatians 5:22-24

[30] He repeats himself in other books too. See 1 Corinthians 13

[31] Matthew 4:19

[32] Matthew 28:16-20

[33] 2 Corinthians 13:14; Acts 2:42; 1 Corinthians 1:9

[34] From The Biblical Theology of the Church, by Edmund Clowney

[35] Isaiah 6:2-3; Revelation 4-5

[36] Matthew 6:10

[37] And don’t miss the many instructions for the church to take care of the weaker among them. For instance, Paul's letters to Titus, Timothy, Corinthians, and others talk about the importance of caring for widows.

[38] Romans 15:7

[39] Ephesians 4:2

[40] Ephesians 4:32; Colossians 3:13

[41] James 5:16

[42] John 13:34, 15:12, 17; Romans 13:8; 1 Thessalonians 3:12, 4:9; 1 Peter 1:22; 1 John 3:11, 4:7, 11; 2 John 5; Galatians 5:13

[43] Romans 12:10; Philippians 2:3; 1 Peter 5:5

[44] Galatians 6:2

[45] Ephesians 4:25

[46] Matthew 18:15-17; James 5:19-20; 2 Thessalonians 3:15

[47] Titus 3:10-11; 1 Timothy 5:20; 2 Timothy 4:2

[48] 1 Thessalonians 5:11

[49] James 5:16

[50] 1 Corinthians 5:12

[51] Matthew 7:2

[52] People usually cite St. Francis of Assisi. The trouble is that he never said this. And what we do have from him actually says quite the opposite.

[53] Matthew 28:16-20

[54] Acts 2:42-47

[55] Much could be said about the marks of a true church. We are the people called out by God to hear from him and minister to him, one another, and the world. “Hearing from God” involves the proclamation of the word and proper exposition. Also, a true church historically must properly administer the sacraments/ordinances of baptism and communion – one to admit new members, and the other to feed them and show continued good standing. Then there are the issues of proper church offices and discipline. Lots more could be said.

[56] Ephesians 1:4

[57] John 3:16

[58] Ephesians 1:5-6

[59] Ephesians 2:8

[60] Romans 5:6-8

[61] The Reformers spoke of faith as notitia + assensus + fiducia. Or in English, awareness of biblical truth, agreement with this truth, and a life lived as evidence of our trust in that truth.

[62] This is not just grit or determination. Our faith has an object, and that object is a person.

[63] Matthew 16:13-20

[64] Ephesians 2:19-22; 1 Corinthians 3:10

[65] 1 Corinthians 3:11

[66] 1 John 1:1-2

[67] 1 Peter 1:10-12; Hebrews 1:1-2

[68] Revelation 21:14

[69] 1 Corinthians 3:16

[70] 1 Peter 2:5

Following God: What Is The Church?

We believe that the Church is Christ’s symbolic body in the earth[1], and that it should reveal His character, His message, and His love to the world. We believe that the Church is to go into all the world, preach the gospel, and make disciples. This will lead people to have fellowship with God[2] and community with others[3].

From our statement we’ve got two things being explained: what is a church is and what does it do. We’ll cover the larger “what it should do” part next week, but first I want to make sure we understand what the church is.

Why Are We Here, Anyway?

Church is kind of weird. Why do we do it? Is this like a country club that people get to come to once they’re Christians? Sometimes churches have that vibe. Is it a perq? A requirement? A tradition? A fun activity? A gathering? A way to earn something?

It’s worth spending a minute to think about. I wonder if it’s something we ever really consider. Is church just “the expected thing to do” if you’re a Christian? Do we come intentionally or because of expectations?

Perhaps We’ve Over-Corrected

Attending Church Doesn’t Make You a Christian

When I was a kid, I learned some clever sayings. For instance, I learned that being in a church doesn’t make you a Christian just like being in a garage doesn’t make you a car. I don’t know if people still think that, but if they do, I suppose this is a good reminder. Attending church doesn’t make you a Christian. Hopefully you’ll learn some things and get to know some people, but if you don’t place your trust in Christ, you’ve missed the point. The church service is for believers. We are here as part of the process of becoming more like Jesus[4]. If you’re checking things out, that’s fantastic. Ask questions and press in. But if you’re here for a long time and you’re not a believer, the bible says there’s danger there[5].

The Church isn’t a Building … Or is it?

We also liked to point out that this building isn’t the church – we are. That’s true, but I think it has some baggage too. This building is not what the bible means when it uses the word church, but it sure is convenient. It’s cold outside! I’m glad we’re in here! And having a stationary building makes it handy to give people directions. So no, it’s not about the building. The church is about much more. But in saying it was about the people, I think we gave an unintended message. I remember the point being made that “church isn’t here – you take the church with you when you leave”. I get what they were wanting to say, but I think in fixing the building problem they made a new one. The new problem is that people think they are the church, so they don’t need to come to the building. I believe that in saying that we (individually) are the church, we’ve accidentally devalued the assembly.

So, What is the Church?

Definition

Our word church doesn’t actually come from the bible’s word for church. The word church is the English version of the word that Scots and Germans pronounce ‘kirk’, and it means “The Lord’s house”. The biblical word translated as “church” is “ekklesia”. If you’ve ever heard the words ecclesiastical[6] or ecclesiology[7], these come from the same Greek word. Ekklesia has to do with being called out, from, and to. The church was called out and from the world and called to follow Christ.

Reformation Principle

The definition and role of the church was a huge dispute in the Reformation. Catholic doctrine said that people could receive God’s forgiveness through the ministrations of the church. In their view, the church was a body with authority to grant or deny access to God. The Reformers responded that no man stands[8] between us and Christ. Because the church is the called out ones, salvation makes us part of the church automatically. So to restate it, no church body controls the access to salvation – but rather, salvation is the point of access for joining the church. I think it is worth looking at how this works.

What Happens When We’re Saved?

Adoption

Part of what happens when we are saved[9] is called adoption. After we respond in faith and repent, we are justified by Christ’s work and then are adopted into his family. What is it to be adopted? Adopted by whom? Adopted into what?

Biblically speaking, we are adopted by God. Peter says[10] to believers, “Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God”.God adopts us.

Paul says[11] that too. He said we are joined into the body of Christ. He also speaks[12] of us being grafted in. Those who were not God’s people become God’s people. But God’s family is not a birth family. It is a family that is assembled by God. The Holy Spirit calls, the Son saves, and the Father accepts. This is adoption.

The family we are adopted into is called the church. This community was not man’s idea, it was God’s idea.

Adoption Joins Us to a People

When Peter says, “Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God”, he is saying that we went from having no status, to having a status of the highest order. Not only did we go from no people to people – we went straight to people of God! And that status is not an individual status. Certainly, we are saved individually, but we saved in order to make us his people. Upon salvation, our identification became part of a group. The People of God[13]. The Body of Christ[14]. The branches grafted into the vine[15], or shoots grafted into the olive tree[16]. The family of God[17]. The house of God[18]. His field[19]. Foreigners who are now citizens[20]; distant ones who are now brought close[21]. The flock[22] who needed to be gathered together. And even more pointedly, we became part of the bride[23] who was to be married to Christ the groom.

These metaphors bring many things to mind, but what they do not suggest is separation. This language all suggests a tight community that knows and loves one another because of their proximity and frequent gatherings.

Paul calls the church a body. And it is a body in a very real sense – not in a figurative sense like a corporation.

Not a Corporation

A corporation is a legal fiction. My business is a corporation. It’s just an idea written down on paper, but the law treats it as if it were a person. Obviously, it is not a person. There are a number of people in my company, but if you hire my company, you don’t get a person – you get the whole shebang. On paper, that whole package is referred to as a unified whole. For legal purposes, we essentially pretend that it is a person that can act, uphold contracts, fulfill obligations, and be held responsible for them. But my corporation is just a fictional being.

The Body of Christ

It’s a Corpus

The body of Christ is not a corporation, but it has corporality. Corpus is Latin for body. The word corporation means “to assume to have a body” or “to treat as if it were a body”. The word corporality means “having a body”. The church is what a corporation pretends to be. It is a body. You may think of other related words… 

The “corporate gathering” or “corporate worship” refer to gatherings and worship done by individuals assembled together into one body. The language is inescapable. Like a legal corporation, the church is comprised of parts. The difference is that the church forms a real thing – the body of Christ. That is foundational and undeniable bible teaching.

Parts of a Whole

When we talk about corporations or bodies, we often call the parts “members”. Your limbs are members of your body. The body of Christ has members[24] as well. I know this can bring up some uncomfortable reactions sometimes but try and set that aside for now. It is an inescapable fact of language that bodies have members, and we see this in scripture as well. When Paul writes the Corinthians, he mentions Crispus and Gaius and Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus… We see the same in other letters. “The church” was not some ambiguous, amorphous, undefined unit. Rather, it was a specific gathering of specific people who were known to Paul. In his letters, he was aware of a couple women who were fighting, he mentioned men who were disturbing the congregation with their false teachings, he knew which people were generous…  In other words, the church was a collective body, but it was made up of specific, identifiable members.

No Parts Not Included

The inverse of this is true as well. Not only is the church described in the bible as being made up of individual Christians – but individual Christians are always said to be part of a church[25]. There is nowhere in scripture the concept of a “lone ranger Christian”. There are no families who stay home and call themselves a church. There are no people who identify with the body of Christ who are not also part of committed corporate gatherings. There is no example of a person who chooses to “go it alone” with his faith. These days, I know countless people who use that reasoning, but the uncomfortable reality is that they have strayed from the biblical description of life in Christ. 

The early church would have been boggled to hear that there would be people who claim to be “in Christ” yet not a part of his body. If you were to see a severed hand on the sidewalk because it needed to “find itself”, would you think that was a good idea? Would you expect clippings from a houseplant to flourish on the kitchen floor? If you knew a person who was married, yet lived estranged from their spouse, would you think that was the picture of a healthy marriage? You pick the biblical analogy – separation from the church is an alien and destructive idea. You can’t be “in Christ” and not in his body. That just doesn’t make any biblical sense.

Development of the Church in Scripture

I want to look briefly at the biblical definition of the church to help give us a framework for our thoughts and discussions.

The Foundation of the Church

After Peter’s confession of faith[26] that Jesus was the Messiah, Jesus said that this confession would be the foundation of the church[27]. In other words, trust in Christ is what would identify people as the “called out ones”. This was not new language.

Ancient History

In Exodus[28], God tells Moses to approach Pharaoh and tell him to set the Israelites free. God actually repeats this command a number of times with greater detail. What he eventually says is “Let my people go so they may come worship (or serve) me on the mountain[29]”.

The first major ekklesia was God calling out his people from Egypt to Mt Sinai. When they got there[30], they gathered around to hear what God had to say through Moses. Today, we do the same – we gather together primarily to receive God’s word. We also respond in worship and prayer, and that’s a very close second.

A Biblical Pattern

When God gives us his word, he is “serving” us in a manner of speaking. I don’t mean this in the health and wealth sense. God is not a cosmic genie who appears to do our bidding. He doesn’t serve us according to our wants, he serves us according to our needs – and we need him. We gather in the service of the word. That’s actually where the word “service” comes from. God serves himself to his people.

This may sound familiar. Jesus is served to us at the communion table. In fact, God is always serving us, and he is always the first to act[31]. No one comes unless the Father first draws him[32]. We love because he first loved us[33]. We respond in faith because Christ first sacrificed himself for us[34]. Why should we think church is any different? God initiates, his people respond. That is the pattern. So too, in church, God gathers us together primarily to serve us with his word, and we respond corporately with grateful hearts in worship[35].

A Group with Authority

In Matthew[36], Jesus gives authority to this body of called out ones. Interesting note: Jesus says what to do if the person does not repent when brought to the church. He doesn’t say kick them out of the church – he says treat them as an unbeliever. Why? Because believers are part of the church! He doesn’t say let them go live their Christianity elsewhere. He’s saying their lack of submission to the church is indication that they are not believers. That’s worth some serious thought.

The Church is Born[37]

Luke ends his first book[38] with Jesus instructing the disciples to stay in Jerusalem. His second book begins[39] with the account of the Holy Spirit coming to live within the assembled believers. In this account we see a pattern: the gospel is preached[40], people come to faith in Christ[41], they are filled with the Holy Spirit[42], they are baptized[43], and they assemble[44] as a group[45] (church). After that, the group/church gathers to hear the word, to worship, and to serve one another[46]. But this isn’t a unique thing. This becomes the model that Luke describes occurring everywhere throughout the beginning of what we now call the church age.

The Church Age

From here on we see Paul follow the same pattern. Go to a new area, call unbelievers to repentance, baptize them, build a church, appoint elders to oversee it. We even see him give instructions on how to set up the churches, how the governing positions within the church are to work, what constitutes proper qualifications for service, and on and on. 

Recap of New Testament Church Language

So, we’ve seen that the idea of “called out ones” was an ancient concept that the Jews would have well understood. Even Greeks and Romans would have understood the more recent secular reference to the public assembly of the people. From the entire witness of the New Testament, we see that following Christ makes us new people. Paul says we are new people because we are each made a “new creature” in Christ[47]. Peter takes another approach[48] and says that once we were not “a people”, but now we are. So, by placing our trust in Jesus, we become new individuals with new hearts and we simultaneously become part of a new collective with a new allegiance.

Jesus talked about believers “abiding in the vine[49]”. He spoke of himself as the true vine and believers as the branches. He was the head, the originator, and the source of nourishment. True believers remained healthy attachments, but false believers were pruned away. Pruned away from what? Christ? Yes. The church? Yes. Because the church is referred to as the body of Christ, it’s all the same thing – just described with a different word picture.

Paul wrote extensively about the “body of Christ”. He says we are one body because we partake of his body in communion.[50] He spends an entire chapter[51] explaining that in the same way our own body has parts, the church too has parts. His point is profound: Though we are a unified corporate being, our individual identity is not lost[52]. There are parts of our bodies that might not seem as “glamorous” as others. But just because your face is seen by more people than your appendix does not mean that your appendix does not serve a vital function. Some are more visible, or more presentable, or more memorable, but that means nothing with regard to value. Each member of your body plays a vital role. Each member of Christ’s body plays a vital role. And related to that thought he mentions spiritual gifts[53] – these are abilities or ways of serving that are given to each member. There’s a passing verse that’s important here. He says that these gifts are given for the common good[54]. The point here is that the gifts are for the church. The body of Christ is a collection of many individuals, and they are to serve one another with their gifts. Just as there is no biblical concept of believers without a church, there is no concept of gifts of the spirit apart from the church.

Clarifications and Possible Objections

So am I the Church or Not?

This gets us back to the question I started with. If being a Christian joins me to the church, weren’t they right when they said we took the church with us when we left the Sunday gathering? In a manner of speaking, yes. We each take the message of the church with us. We share the witness of the church. But we are not each the church, per se.

This is what is called the “whole-to-part fallacy”. I only mention this because I know people love logic lessons.

• [Holding up a Lego brick] Is this a car?

• [Holding up a Lego car] Is this a car?

In Legos, a car is made from bricks. Without bricks there can be no car. However, it doesn’t work the other way around. Each brick is not the car.

Similarly, the church is comprised of individual believers. Without believers there is no church. But each believer is not by himself the church.

We are a part of the church. Collectively, you are the church.

Isn’t This Legalism?

Some will likely object that this is legalism. It is not. Legalism is when we take an issue of lesser importance or of personal conviction and set it up as a requirement for Christianity. If I say that Christians may not dance or play Euchre, or that they must get circumcised, I am taking things that are not biblical requirements for salvation and acting as if they were. But I’m not taking an issue of lesser importance here. We’ve looked at numerous examples that show the importance of this doctrine.

Is There No Valid Reason to Miss Church?

Now, we could get into legalism if we were to take attendance or place value on people because of how often they come. And this is not a caricature – I’ve seen this firsthand. I don’t know anyone here who is interested in that. We are interested in helping one another to flourish as human beings who are striving after God. The author of Hebrews warns against falling into the habit of skipping. There is no suggestion that a perfect record is mandatory. In fact, if you are sick and contagious, please don’t come to church! By staying home, you care for yourself and you love your neighbor by not infecting them. If you are traveling, I don’t see any mandate here either, though I do believe there is a blessing in finding a church service to attend if you are able. That’s one of the wonderful things about the family of God – you can drop in anywhere, because you’re family[55].

What About Work?

What if it’s more frequent? What if my job keeps me away from church?

I’m no authority, but the bible is. It says not to forsake gathering together[56]. In simple language, the author of Hebrews is saying “don’t skip church - even though there’s a lot of people who have that habit”. This is not a comfortable thing for me to say, because I know many of you in different situations. I’m not here to come down on anyone personally. Even privately, I may tell you what I think scripture teaches, but that doesn’t mean I dislike anyone or think less of them. All I can do is tell you what scripture says.

I suppose I can also tell you about my decisions, but those aren’t binding on anyone but my family. I grew up with the implicit understanding that if the church doors are open, we’re going. Sunday morning, Sunday evening, mid-week, father and son breakfasts – you name it, we were there. As I’ve grown, I’ve come to appreciate that. I don’t think that Wednesday night service or game night or similar things are binding on us, but I will tell you this – I try not to miss them. There are wonderful benefits to all sorts of corporate gatherings of the body that we’ll talk about next week. Like I said, we try not to miss those. However, when it comes to the Sunday morning service – the opportunity God has given us to meet with our fellow laborers, our brothers and sisters in the faith, and to hear from him? What possible reason would I have to miss that? The creator of the universe is holding open court. I can hear from him and be heard by him. I want to be there for that! I will plan my week around that. Work, play, all of it.

So here’s my bottom line. I would not recommend a career or a sport or anything else that would regularly take you out of the Sunday service. I’m not saying it’s the law, but would encourage you strongly. I could tell you countless stories of shipwrecked lives and broken families that might have had a different outcome had they ordered their priorities differently. I have been there myself. I enjoy sleeping in. I work Monday through Friday. We do chores Saturday. When else can I sleep in? I’ve had to work on Sundays before too. And each time, I’d say that though my priorities listed God first, my calendar told a different story. I’ve been on both sides, and I’m here to tell you that I would not go back. If there’s church on Sunday, my plan is to be here.

What if I Just Can’t Come?

I realize there are plenty of other circumstances. What about the disabled, the permanently homebound, and others who have legitimate and unavoidable reasons that keep them from coming?

If you are legitimately homebound for whatever reason, please don’t take any of this as guilt. There are always those in the body who we need to accommodate. There are those who visit members in the hospital and in their homes. We record and live stream the service for those who can’t make it for whatever reason. But we have the word ‘exception’ for a reason. The reason is because we know what the norm is supposed to be. If you are the exception to the rule, our hearts are with you and you should have no guilt.

I Go to Church Online

What about people who say that they go to church online? I am here to tell you that this is not church.

·       But can’t I hear from his word on my own in the woods?  …….   Absolutely you can.

·       Can’t we worship God while cleaning the house?  …….   Sure we can!

·       But I’m fed through sermon podcasts and books.  …….   That’s great!

Those are all wonderful, but they are not church.

I can love my wife wherever I travel in the world, but if I never see her, is that the same thing? I can take responsibility for my kids and get them in the right schools and the right youth groups and get them interviews for good jobs and all the rest, but does that mean I don’t spend time with them? These are horrible analogies, but hopefully you get the point. We work out our faith individually – we pray, we seek, we read, we worship, we listen to podcasts, we watch videos, we read books – and this is all good! But you cannot outsource church.

Do Not Forsake the Assembly

We know we are the body, and we know whether our circumstances are avoidable or not. We know we shouldn’t “forsake the assembly as is the habit of some.” We know we belong in community. You don’t need guilt from me, and I don’t want to give it. But if there is truth today that you need to hear, then I want you to be uncomfortable! I hope it digs in and festers, because that is how the Holy Spirit makes us better. This is life in Christ! This is life in the body. And the digging and festering sometimes come from the Holy Spirit through our friends, but that too is for next week.

Closing

God is everywhere. This is unquestionable. There is no place where he is inaccessible or unaware. However, he has always instructed his people to "come out" – to assemble before him. There are a number of reasons for this, not the least of which is receiving God's service. To remove ourselves from the church body and the gathering of the church is to separate ourselves from the primary means of grace[57]that God has instituted. This is why it is crucial to come to church.

And with that, I dismiss you with the words Paul wrote to the Romans,

“May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ[58].”

 _______________________________________________________________________

[1] Colossians 1:24; 1 Corinthians 12:27

[2] Acts 1:8; Matthew 28:19,20; Mark 16:15,16

[3] 1 Corinthians 12:13

[4] Romans 8:28-30

[5] Hebrews 6:4-8

[6] Related or pertaining to the church

[7] The study of the biblical doctrine of the church

[8] For instance, 1 Timothy 2:5 – “For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”

[9] Theologians talk about something called the order of salvation. It’s the idea that salvation can be broken down into individual events or separate aspects we can discuss. There is the part where God knows about our future salvation. There is the time when we first hear the general call of the gospel. The Holy Spirit calls us individually. We each respond. On and on. Depending on your perspective, we could talk of up to eleven things that are related to salvation, or contribute to salvation, or result from our salvation.

[10] 1 Peter 2:9-10

[11] 1 Corinthians 12:13; 1 Corinthians 10:16-17; Romans 12:4-5; Ephesians 5:23; Colossians 1:24; Ephesians 4:15-16

[12] Romans 11:11-24

[13] 2 Corinthians 6:16

[14] Romans 12:4-5; 1 Corinthians 10:17; 1 Corinthians 12:12, 27; Ephesians 4:12; Ephesians 5:23; Ephesians 5:30; Colossians 1:24

[15] John 15:1-17; Also read John 12, starting at v20. Why does it mention Greeks (non-Jews) coming to Jesus, then his response a speech about his imminent death? He knew that their arrival signaled the end of his ministry and his coming death. He gives clues about the grafting in when he says in v26, “My Father will honor the one who serves me.”

[16] Romans 11:11-24

[17] John 1:12; 2 Corinthians 6:18; Matthew 12:49-50; Ephesians 2:19, 3:6; Galatians 3:29, 6:10; 1 Timothy 5:1

[18] 1 Corinthians 3:9-17, 6:19; Ephesians 2:19-22; 1 Peter 2:5-7

[19] 1 Corinthians 3:5-9

[20] Ephesians 2:19; Philippians 3:20

[21] Ephesians 2:11-13; Acts 2:39

[22] Acts 20:28; John 10:16

[23] Revelation 21:9; Revelation 19:7-8; 2 Corinthians 11:12; Ephesians 5:31-32

[24] Early on, we read that believers gathered on the first day of the week to commemorate Jesus’ rising from the dead. These were the earliest Christian church gatherings. When the apostles traveled, they set up churches wherever they went. The New Testament is written mostly to “the church at …”. There was the clear assumption and expectation that believers would gather together.

[25] To head off possible objections, of course Jesus was not – and the apostles and other church-planters were not either. So, barring people who were out planting churches, or who were in prison for doing so, Christians in scripture were church members.

[26] Matthew 16:13-20

[27] Not Peter, who Catholics claim to be the first Pope

[28] Exodus 3:10

[29] Exodus 3:12, 5:1, 8:1, 8:20, 9:1, 9:13, 10:3, and on and on

[30] Exodus 19

[31] Romans 11:36

[32] John 6:44

[33] 1 John 4:19

[34] 2 Corinthians 5:18-20; Colossians 1:20; Romans 5:9-11

[35] Whether OT or NT, the pattern that emerges is that “the gathering” (synagogue or church) is the assembling of God’s people to hear from his word. This is what God’s people the Jews had done for millennia, so it was not an unusual thing for them to hear Jesus say.

[36] Matthew 18

[37] In its New Testament sense, at least

[38] Luke 24:45-53; Also recapped in Acts 1

[39] Acts 2

[40] Acts 2:17-36

[41] Acts 2:38a

[42] Acts 2:38b-39

[43] Acts 2:41a

[44] Acts 2:41b

[45] Or, in many cases back then, form one

[46] Acts 2:42-47

[47] 1 Corinthians 5:17, for one example

[48] 1 Peter 2:9-10

[49] John 15

[50] 1 Corinthians 10:16-17

[51] 1 Corinthians 12

[52] 1 Corinthians 12:12-27

[53] 1 Corinthians 12:1-11

[54] 1 Corinthians 12:7

[55] I’ve had a number of friends who have left Christianity say this is one of the biggest things they miss. They envy the belonging and kinship that believers (even those who are strangers to one another) share.   

[56] Hebrews 10:25

[57] Broadly speaking, the church service itself, but more specifically the sacraments of communion and baptism, which also occur within the church.

[58] Romans 15:5-6

Following God: Our Eternal Destination

“We believe in the resurrection of the saved and the lost, and that both will stand before the judgment seat of Christ; the saved will enter into everlasting life in God’s presence, and the lost will be sent into everlasting death, devoid of the presence of God. (Matthew 25:31-46; Mark 9:43-48; 1 Corinthians 4:5; Revelation 19:20; Revelation 20:11-15; Revelation 21:8).”

There is a lot that could be said about where we go when we die, and cultural notions haven’t helped to keep our view of Scripture clear. From Milton’s Paradise Lost to Dante’s Inferno,  from Chick Tracks to What Dreams May Come, people have ideas that waver somewhere between relatively solid and totally made up.

This is my attempt to focus on the Bible understood in its context. Keep in mind that the Bible has been given in what we call Progressive Revelation. God seems content to let the biblical writers use language, images and ideas from their time to convey the message He intends – for that time. As we will see, what begins as a vague notion of afterlife in the Old Testament clarifies in the New Testament. 

 I want to focus on three key biblical claims.

1.    After physical death, our existence continues. 

2.    We will wait for the final day of God’s judgment (Matthew 12:36) in a state of blessedness or despair (Luke 23).

3.    After the final day of God’s judgment, when God wraps up history as we know it, there will be a separation. All people will be consigned to an eternity fully absent the presence of God, or raised in a glorified, incorruptible body (1 Corinthians 15; Philippians 3:21; 1 Corinthians 15:49) to eternal life, fully in the presence of God (Matthew 25) in a New Heaven and New Earth (Revelation 21).

After Death, Our Conscious Existence Continues 

In the Old Testament, there was only one word which indicated an afterlife: sheol, a Hebrew perspective in line with the Ancient Near East (ANE) concept of the underworld. The Epic of Gilgamesh called it a house of dust and darkness,” a realm for departed spirits. In ANE thought, this wasn’t usually a great place. It wasn’t torturous, but it wasn’t something anyone looked forward to. The Hebrews agreed.

The Jewish people also accepted the ANE view of a three-tiered heaven: the atmosphere (Genesis 1:7-8), outer space or the firmament, (Genesis 22:17), and a place where God lives (Job 22:12; 2 Corinthians 12:2-4). I point this out only because it explains the language we often invoke that involves direction: going up or down, for example. 

Sheol was apparently sufficient for God’s purposes at this point in talking about the world to come. The writers of the Old Testament used this word 65 times to mean hell, grave or the pit (depending on the translation). 

●     The rebellious sons of Korah “went down alive into the realm of the dead” after an earthquake (Numbers 16)

●     Jacob and Abraham planned to meet family there (Genesis 37:35; Genesis 15:15)

●     God will deliver Israel from Sheol (Hosea 13:14)

●     God will redeem His people from Sheol (Psalm 49). Perhaps a decent analogy is that just like the Jews looked forward to a good life in Caanan, they hoped for an equivalent land in the life to come (namely a good future community together).

●     Isaiah 14: 9-15 says about the king of Babylon: “The realm of the dead below is all astir to meet you… it rouses the spirits of the departed to greet you…all those who were kings over the nations…will say, ‘You also have become weak, as we are; you have become like us… How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn…you are brought down to the realm of the dead, to the depths of the pit.’”

●     When Daniel received a messenger from God, he was told, “Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.” (Daniel 12:2). This is actually the first time in the Old Testament that we see a clear reference to a resurrection that hints at different destinations for the righteous and the wicked. #progressiverevelation

 This perspective gives us the background to what we see more clearly in the New Testament through the teaching of Jesus and the writings in Scripture.

After We Die, Our Existence Continues As We Wait For The Final Day Of God’s Judgment (Matthew 12:36) In A State Of Blessedness Or Despair (Luke 23). In the New Testament, the state of despair is called Hades; the state of blessedness is called Paradise or Abraham’s side.[1]

 Hades was the Greek term for the realm of the dead, an “eternal retirement” where the dead are less substantial (and less happy) versions of themselves. In Greek literature hades meant a variety of things:

●     a grave or tomb

●     the domain of the dead

●     place where dead spirits go

 Once again, biblical writers borrowed a well-known word to describe what happens after death. The New Testament writers use hades eleven times (Matthew 11:23, 16:18; Luke 10:15; 16:23; Acts 2:27; 1 Corinthians 15:55; Revelation 1:18; 6:8; 20:13, 14) as a state of existence where those who are not saved wait until the end of history.

●     "You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not prevail.” (Matthew 16:18)

●     “[David] foresaw and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.” (Acts 2:31) When we say in the Apostles Creed that Jesus ‘descended into hell,’ it’s best understood as a reference to Hades/Sheol, or “the lower parts” or the “heart” of the earth (Matthew 12:40; Ephesians 4:9)

●     Death and Hades are linked together (Revelation 1:18; 6:8; 20:13-14). They are both judged and destroyed (Revelation 20:13-14) at the end of human history when they are thrown into the “lake of fire.”[2]

Paradise (paradeisos – a garden or park) is a parallel place to Hades, a place in which those who have committed their lives to God dwell more fully in the presence of God as they wait for the end of human history. The Jews though it was neither in earth nor in heaven, but the souls of the righteous went there at death. We see this captured in the story of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16: 19-31.

“There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side.  So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’[3]

There is disagreement about whether this is a parable or a real story, but there is agreement about an important truth here: after this life ends, Hades is not the only option – there is also a Paradise (here called “Abraham’s side”) that offers blessing and goodness. We see this mentioned more times in the New Testament:

●     When Jesus was talking to one of the thieves on the crosses, he referred to paradise (“Today you will be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:42-43)

●     Paul was taken up into this paradise when he talks about a vision of the ‘third heaven” (2 Corinthians 12:2-4).

So when we die, our existence continues either in the despair of Hades or the blessedness of Paradise as we all wait for the final day of judgment when God wraps up human history with the final judgment. After the judgment, we go to one of two final, eternal destinations - what we typically mean when we talk about Heaven or Hell. 

After The Final Day Of God’s Judgment, There Will Be A Separation.[4] All People Will Be Consigned To Eternal Death Absent The Presence Of God[5], Or Raised In A Glorified Body (1 Corinthians 15; Philippians 3:21; 1 Corinthians 15:49) To Eternal Life, Fully In The Presence Of God (Matthew 25) In A New Heaven And New Earth (Revelation 21).

Tartarus was where the Greeks believed the really wicked people eventually landed. It was just a flat-out bad place to go. In Greek mythology, the Titans, rebels against the gods, were imprisoned there. We see tartarus used only once in the New Testament, and it’s not a future intended for humans, but for fallen angels (2 Peter 2:4) – Titans, if you will J. (Early Christians were called ‘atheists’ because they insisted that the ‘gods’ were actually lesser being called daimons – a position that Plutarch, who lived in the first century, also espoused). 

Gehenna is the word most commonly translated in the New Testament as “hell.” Gehenna is found in 12 verses: Matthew 5:22, 29, 30; 10:28, 18:9, 23:15, 33; Mark 9:43, 45, 47; Luke 12:5; and James 3:6.*  It’s a Greek word that comes from the Hebrew ge-hinnom, or "valley of Hinnom." In this valley, people burned their children in sacrifice to Molech during the Old Testament times. This valley eventually became the place where people threw all kinds of refuse, including the dead bodies of animals and of criminals. A fire burned continuously there.  

·      Gehenna is used to describe the final, everlasting judgment of the wicked (Matthew 25:41;46).

·      This future, punishing world is also referred to as a place of fire (Matthew 13:42) and destruction (apollymi -Matthew 7:13-14; 10:28; Romans 9:22; 2 Peter 3:6, and olethron, in 2 Thessalonians 1:6-9). 

·      It is a place of utter darkness and weeping/gnashing of teeth (Matthew 8:12; Luke 13:28). Different theologians have described Hell as characterized by guilt, regret, despair and destruction (of the self or of others), personal existence lacking goodness, full of ruin, waste, mental anguish, the loss of all that is beautiful and meaningful, and completely devoid of the presence of Christ. All common grace, all traces of the good and perfect gifts that comes from God, will be gone.

·      It is a lake of fire, which may well be a symbolic reference to the Dead Sea[6] (and casts some light on the Rich Man and Lazarus, which seems to be set around the Dead Sea or the Jordan Valley Rift). 

·      It is a ‘second death’ (Revelation 2:11; Matthew 10:28).  Hell was made for the Devil and his angels; they are spiritual beings, so this would seem to be a punishment intended for the spiritual side of our human nature (Matthew 25:41). This punishment is a type of second death in which the soul suffers a everlasting death instead of everlasting life (Matthew 10:28). [7]**

I like how C.S. Lewis summarizes:

“In the long run the answer to all those who object to the doctrine of hell, is itself a question: ‘What are you asking God to do?’ To wipe out their past sins and, at all costs, to give them a fresh start, smoothing every difficulty and offering every miraculous help? But He has done so, on Calvary. To forgive them? They will not be forgiven. To leave them alone [shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might]? Alas, I am afraid that is what He does… “  (C. S. Lewis)

Let’s summarize: the Bible uses a variety of images to hammer home a very important point: existence apart from the presence of God in the life to come will bring the fullness of death, not the fullness of life. It will be the exploration of the depths of all things unblessed; it will be an unfolding of destruction, not a restoration. It’s a place where there is no escaping the wages of sin (and I suspect, if we knew the ripple effect of our sin, and the cost we have accrued, this alone would be enough sober us). Because it’s an entirely different kind of existence, I don’t know precisely what all the implications are. I just know there will be weeping (sorrow) and gnashing of teeth (anger – Acts 7:54; Psalm 37:12)).

I just know it’s bad.

Christians will be raised in a glorified body (1 Corinthians 15; Philippians 3:21; 1 Corinthians 15:49) to eternal life fully in the presence of God (Matthew 25) in a New Heaven and New Earth (Isaiah 65:17; 66:22; 2 Peter 3:13; Revelation 21:1).

Paul said (Romans 8:23) that Christians eagerly await the redemption of our bodies. To the skeptics in Corinth who just weren’t convinced God could pull off a physical resurrection because of what they all knew happened to buried bodies, Paul supplied three analogies for the reality of bodily resurrection in 1 Corinthians 15.

●     A seed and a full-grown plant (1 Corinthians 15:36) The physical, mortal body will be raised as a new and better kind of physical, immortal body.

●     Different kinds of flesh (1 Corinthians 15:39). Just as there are different kinds of flesh in this life, why not believe God can raise us into another kind of flesh in the next?

●     Different kinds of bodies (1 Corinthians 15:40-41) Just like celestial bodies differ in glory, the new body we receive will be a different kind of glory altogether.

He concludes with, “So also is the resurrection of the dead” (1 Corinthians 15:42). Several paragraphs later he concludes: 

“Now listen to this: brothers and sisters, this present body is not able to inherit the kingdom of God any more than decay can inherit that which lasts forever. Stay close because I am going to tell you a mystery—something you may have trouble understanding: we will not all fall asleep in death, but we will all be transformed. It will all happen so fast, in a blink, a mere flutter of the eye. The last trumpet will call,[8] and the dead will be raised from their graves with a body that does not, cannot decay. All of us will be changed!  

We’ll step out of our mortal clothes and slide into immortal bodies, replacing everything that is subject to death with eternal life. And, when we are all redressed with bodies that do not, cannot decay, when we put immortality over our mortal frames, then it will be as Scripture says: “Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is you victory?
O death, where is your sting?” (1 Corinthians 15:50-55)

 So, where will Christians go after Paradise? When the New Testament speaks of heaven or the heavens, several words or phrases are used:*** 

●      Doxa – infinite worth, renown, or glory. “Yet what we suffer now is nothing compared to the glory he will reveal to us later.” (Romans 8:18)

●      Ouranos - the sky, or the dwelling place of God. “Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed by your name…” (Matthew 6:9; 7:21; Ephesians 6:9; Ephesians 4:10; Revelation 21)

●      Hupselos - on high, lofty, highly esteemed. “When [Jesus] had cleansed us from our sins, he sat down in the place of honor at the right hand of the majestic God in heaven.” (Hebrews 1:3) 

●      Epouranios – in the heavenly realm, the sphere of spiritual activity. “All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ.”  (Ephesians 1:3 as well as 1:20 ; 2:6 ; 3:10 ; 6:12)

●      Eternal Kingdom. “Then God will give you a grand entrance into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 1:11)

 They all refer to the realm of God, but the important thing is that they describe the presence of God, not the location of God. In Heaven we will see Jesus face to face (1 Corinthians 13:12; 1 John 3:2), and we will become as much like him as is possible for us to be (John 3:2). We will see his glory, power, and beauty in its fullness. As one hymn put it, it will be “joy unspeakable, and full of glory.” That just tells us about the experience of finally, fully being in the presence of Christ. If that was all we knew, it would be sufficient.

 But the Bible tells us more. Considering how all of creation has been groaning as it awaits God’s redemption (Romans 8:22), it makes sense that the earth itself will be made new. We will not fly away to some distant place. God will come to us (Revelation 21:3). This new Heaven and Earth will be the eternal home of God’s people. The Bible uses all kinds of imagery to try to capture this redeemed reality. 

·      It’s a peaceable kingdom where predators and prey will get along, and children will play with the deadliest of animals (Isaiah 11).

·      It’s a banquet, a symbol suggesting fullness and fellowship and celebration (Revelation 19:9).

·      It’s a place where pavement is like transparent gold (Revelation 21:21), a symbol showing that the glory of heaven is immeasurably greater than what we can imagine. 

·      It’s a place where we receive crowns (2 Timothy 4:8) symbols of reigning in creation as the steward God intended us to be. 

·      It’s a place where we will get a new wardrobe, which symbolizes the fact that we will be cleansed of all sin. (Revelation 3:5)

·      It’s a Kingdom, where we, the children of the King, are finally home.

 The classic passage on this is from John’s vision in Revelation:

I looked again and could hardly believe my eyes. Everything above me was new. Everything below me was new. Everything around me was new because the heaven and earth that had been passed away, and the sea [chaos and evil] was gone, completely. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride on her wedding day, adorned for her husband and for His eyes only. 

And I heard a great voice, coming from the throne. “See, the home of God is with His people.
He will live among them;
They will be His people, and God Himself will be with them. The prophecies are fulfilled:
He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; Mourning no more, crying no more, pain no more,
For the first things have gone away.” And the One who sat on the throne announced to His creation, “See, I am making all things new…”

 No one or nothing will labor under any curse any longer. And the throne of God and of the Lamb will sit prominently in the city. God’s servants will continually serve and worship Him. They will be able to look upon His face, and His name will be written on their foreheads. Darkness will never again fall on this city. They will not require the light of a lamp or of the sun because the Lord God will be their illumination. By His light, they will reign throughout the ages.” (Revelation 21: 1-5; 22:3-5)

 If theologians are correct, we will serve and reign on this new earth in a very practical, physical sense. Part of our ongoing, continuous worship of God will be that we will steward and enjoy the earth like God intended.

I believe the language of the Bible suggests we will explore, create, paint, write, build, sing, laugh, emote, think, - we will become fully alive in a wholly good heaven and earth in the presence of the unfiltered goodness, truth and light of God. 

We will be fully at peace with God, fully at peace with each other, fully at peace with God’s created, new world, that we will tend and work and explore and enjoy, and fully at peace within - our hopes fulfilled; our hearts no longer restless because they have found rest forever in Christ.

___________________________________________________________________

KEY SOURCES

·      The Bible 

·      C.S. Lewis – assorted texts

·      Timothy Keller - sermons

·      N.T. Wright – assorted essays

·      Randy Alcorn – Heaven: Biblical Answers to Common Questions

·      Erwin Lutzer – One Minute After You Die

·      Ken Boa – Sense and Nonsense About Heaven and Hell

NOTES

* The langue of Hell in the Bible allows for but does not require Eternal Conscious Torment (ECT). John Calvin, among many other theologians, thought the flames and darkness are the best human metaphors for the agony of an existence without Christ. The Bible also allows for but does not require the annihilation of those who are not saved – that is, the belief that souls are destroyed in hell (the eternal or everlasting nature of the punishment may simply mean that the second, spiritual death is irrevocable. No more chance at resurrection). Conditionalism stands on a middle ground: The unsaved will face God and receive just penalty, and afterward they will be permanently excluded from eternal life by means of a final destruction of human life and being. Think purgatory, but in the opposite direction. Both ECT and annihilationism/conditionalism are found throughout church history, though ECT has been the mainstream view. 

** The modern view of heaven began in the 1700’s with Emanuel Swedenborg. He said angels are perfected people and thought we could learn a lot for people claiming to make personal visits to heaven. This trend has escalated recently with all the NDE stories.  Biblically speaking, NDE’s are not stories of visits to heaven or hell; at best, they are returning from hades/paradise - a claim I still think merits criticism. They are full of elements that are extra-biblical at best and anti-biblical at worst.

BONUS, LENGTHY QUOTE FROM N.T. WRIGHT

In our vision, after the last judgment, heaven and earth are joined as one, and the new Jerusalem descends to earth, adorned like a bride adorned for her husband, as God at last comes to dwell among human beings (Rev. 21:1-3). In this new heaven and new earth, righteousness finally finds a home (2 Peter 3:13). The whole cosmos will be lit up with God’s presence, and all on earth will be filled with joy. All whose names were written in the Book of Life will inherit this joy, and the nations at long last will walk by the light (Rev. 21:24). Led by Christ, all that live will bow the knee with joy before God, and He will be all in all (1 Cor. 15:28)…

 Sadly, some will resist to the very end, and perversely choose the misery that comes from insisting on their own way over surrender to God’s love... It is absurd, and it is unreasonable, and it staggers belief, but it will be so. Some will refuse to repent, even at the cost of entry into the city of joy. By their own insistence, they will remain outside the city, wrapped in their pride, clinging to their sins (Rev. 22:15). Their lot is Gehenna, the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death (Rev. 21:8).

 The whole universe is hurtling to Christ and to the light which fills all with joy… But what of those who refuse the light and with triumphant obstinacy refuse to surrender to it? Since the whole world will be filled with light, they will be pushed outside of it, to the borders, to the dark fringes where existence shades off into near non-existence. Their own swollen will, victorious to the end, will bind them hand and foot, and they will remain in the outer darkness, outside the cosmos of light, away from the presence of the Lord and the glory of His power (Mt. 8:12, 2 Thess. 1:9). The lake of fire, the flame which burns but gives no light, and which was never meant for humanity but only for the devil and his angels (Mt. 25:41), was not built by God as a holding cell to punish people. 

But it is the only realm left for people who refuse to dwell in joyful penitence in the world God made. What other fate is left for them? If the whole universe is filled with God and they refuse to live with Him, where else can they go? All that is left for them is to remain in their self-chosen misery, at the intersection of God’s wrath against sin and their own refusal of His love. In that place, there is only weeping, and the gnashing of teeth.

Since Christ first entered the world through His incarnation, the universe has been in the process of separating and splitting apart. Since the Cross and Resurrection, it has been coming apart at the seams, as light separates from darkness, righteousness from sin, penitence from pride. At the last judgment, that separation will be complete, and all people will forever abide in what their deeds and hearts have chosen.

 – N. T Wright, quoted in “Heaven and Hell

ENDNOTES

[1] Some theologians say Paradise is the ‘blessed’ part of Hades. I am separating them because I think it does better justice to the passages of Scripture that describe them.

[2] This would make symbolic sense: Revelation said there is no more sea (the sea was chaos to the Hebrews; the home of monsters) in the New Heaven and Earth; why not choose a ‘sea’ to represent the place where all chaos goes?

[3] Some have speculated that this language purposefully draws from the imagery of the Jordan Valley Rift. 

[4] Biblical critic Bart Ehrman, who is radically skeptical of the trustworthiness of the Gospels, believes Jesus’ teaching on the separation of the sheep and the goats was definitely given by him. “I think in fact, it well encapsulates Jesus’ entire proclamation.  There is a judgment day coming and those who have lived in an upright way, loving others, showing compassion on those in need, helping those in dire straits, will be given an eternal reward; those who fail to live in this way will be severely punished.”

[5] “God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.” (2 Thessalonians 1:6-9)

 [6] The Dead Sea (and the land around it) was viewed by Jewish writers as a land of desolation, death and punishment.  http://www.askelm.com/secrets/sec106.htm.  

“Eyewitnesses around the time of Christ and the Apostles called it a “lake of fire and smoke”… we are told by Henry Maundrell (1697) that most of the map makers prior to the seventeenth century show ‘smoke ascending above the surface of the water… The first scientific investigation of the Dead Sea (1848) recounted that there was “a strong smell of sulfurette hydrogen” a “fetid sulphurous odour in the night.... “At one time today the sea assumed an aspect peculiarly sombre. The great evaporation enveloped it in a thin, transparent vapour, its purple tinge contrasting strangely with the extraordinary colour of the sea beneath and, where they blended in the distance, giving it the appearance of smoke from burning sulphur. It seemed a vast cauldron of metal, fused but motionless. In the afternoon of the same day it looked like molten lead. At night it had the exact hue of absinthe [or wormwood].”  http://www.remnantbiblestudies.com/article10_lake_of_fire_pt2.html. 

See also https://gracethrufaith.com/ask-a-bible-teacher/the-lake-of-fire/, as well as https://philologos.org/bpr/files/l008.htm, and https://www.biblestudytools.com/encyclopedias/isbe/lake-of-fire.html.

[7] “The second death is to be cast into the lake of fire ( Rev 20:14 ). This is a permanent state ( Rev 14:11 ), where in anything that would qualify as "life" is forever absent.”  - Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary Of Biblical Theology

[8] Trumpets were used to signal a lot of things. This is the last one; history is done.

Following God: Sin And Salvation

We believe that we sin when we disobey the commands of God’s inspired Word and reject His authority. All of us have sinned and are therefore, in our natural state, lost and separated from God. We believe men and women were created in the image of God (Genesis 2:26). However, by a voluntary act of the will, Adam and Eve disobeyed God (Genesis 3:6). As a result, mankind began to die spiritually (Romans 5:12-19). Sin separated humankind from God (Ephesians 2:11-18) and left us in a fallen or sinful condition (Romans 3:23; Genesis 1:26,27; Genesis 2:17; Genesis 3:6; Romans 5:12-19).

We believe that God the Father showed His love for all people by sending His Son to die as a substitutionary sacrifice for our sins. (Luke 18:27; John 3:16,17; Romans 11:33; 1 Peter 1:16; 1 John 4:7-10; Revelation 4:8.) 

We believe Jesus’ death paid the penalty our sins warranted, and His resurrection grants us the life we could not attain - both of these being necessary to reconcile us to right-standing before God.” (Matthew 16:16,17 and 25:31-46; Mark 14:61,62; Luke 1:34,35 and 2:7; John 1:1 and 1:14 and 5:22-30 and 10:30 and 14:6; Acts 4:12; 1 Corinthians 15:3-8; Hebrews 4:15; 1 Peter 2:22-24.)  It is not through our efforts (Acts 4:12 John 3:3; Romans 10:13-15; Ephesians 2:8; 
Titus 2:11; Titus 3:5-7).

When we admit our sin, confess that Jesus is Lord, and repent, we become a new creation and are gradually transformed into the image of Christ (Galatians 5:22, 23; 2 Corinthians 5:17; 2 Corinthians 3:18)

 ___________________________________________________

God made the world good.

 Over and over in the opening of Genesis, we read that God created and declared it ‘good’ (towb,good in the widest sense). As opposed to other ancient creation stories where everything was created by an act of violence, this was an act of artistry, care, and design.

This was a world where ‘shalom’ characterized life. Shalom is a Hebrew word found throughout the Old Testament that means peace, harmony, interconnectedness, wholeness, fullness of life. It’s life as it ought to be in a world without sin, brokenness or despair. 

There is a problem.

 Adam and Eve are given a choice – to be obedient to God and live within God’s design or choose their own way, represented by the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. They choose their own way, and immediately the world begins to break apart. When God said, “What have you done?” a better translation is, “Why have you crafted/made this?”  “And so sin entered the world, and death by sin.” Now, a life once characterized by harmony and wholeness would instead be full of chaos and brokenness.  Now there would be violence instead of gentleness, deception instead of truth, rebellion instead of obedience.

As Genesis unfolds, we see the original version of “that escalated quickly.” Cain kills Abel; soon men are bragging that they’ve killed a ton of people; before long, the whole world is evil in God’s sight. After the Flood, it’s not too long before people are building a tower to God to make a name not for God, but for themselves. Paul would eventually write to the church in Rome that all of creation groans as it waits for redemption. We are in ‘bondage to decay’ and ‘subject to futility’ (Romans 8).

“Countries like ours are full of people who have all the material comforts they desire, together with such non-material blessings as a happy family, and yet lead lives of quiet, and at times noisy, desperation, understanding nothing but the fact that there is a hole inside them and that however much food and drink they pour into it, however many motor cars and television sets they stuff it with, however many well balanced children and loyal friends they parade around the edges of it…it aches.” (Bernard Levin, British columnist)

 Have you seen the, “Well, there’s your problem!” memes? They point out something obvious to an apparently confused person. 

So, lest we be confused, why do we ache? We know the source of the problem: sin. 

 It’s deeply embedded in all of us from the moment we are born. For all the criticism we have of Adam and Eve, we would have done the same.[1] They are what we call archetypes, real people who in a broader sense are all of us. Their story would have been our story. Contrary to those who think we are born good or innocent, the Bible insists that we are born with the default mode set to “sin”. It’s our natural programming. 

·      All have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory. (Romans 3:23)

·      Death has passed on to all people, for all have sinned. (Romans 5:12)

·      Apart from God, we are enslaved to sin. (Romans 6:6, 16-17)

·      The wages of sin is death. (Romans 6:23). 

·      We have bodies of death in need of deliverance. (Romans 7:24)

The Bible doesn’t use the word ‘sin’ in the original language. The word sin comes from the Old 
English word synn, which is from the Germanic sunta or the Latin word sons, both of which mean guilty.[2] You've heard how people in very snowy countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland) have 300 different words for types of snow? There is a lot of snow and a lot of different conditions, so they want to be very precise. Apparently, the biblical writers saw a lot of sin, and they wanted to be precise.  

1)   hamartia; to miss the mark. “We all fall short of (or “miss”) the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). The devil has done this from the beginning (1 John 3:8).

2)   Paraptoma; trespass; blunder (Matthew 6:14-15)

3)   Parabasos; crossing a specific line.  Think of an athletic field in which there are boundaries you cannot cross without penalty (Galatians 3:19).

4)   chatta’ah : willfully going against what one knows is right and/or accidentally going against the divine order of things (Leviticus 4:14; Exodus 32:34)

5)   pasha: rebel; breaking a rule that has been established (Jeremiah 3:13)

6)   avon: willful 
or continuing sin (Genesis 15:16)

7)   adikia; injustice (Luke 18:6; 1 John 5;17).  Action that causes visible harm to another person in violation of divine standard.

8)   Anomia; lawlessness 

When we read, “Whoever commits sin (hamartia) also commits lawlessness (anomia), and sin is lawlessness” (Matthew 7:23; 1 John 3:4), we see that even the most accidental of well-intentioned moments of sin are like the worst. 

Why is sin so pervasive? Because we want to rule ourselves. We want to do life on our own terms: like Adam and Eve, we want to be like God, deciding what’s right and wrong. We want to worship and obey a god of our choosing.

If we don’t live for God, we will live for something else that will function in God’s place. We will worship things other than God. We will order our life in the service of things other than God that we think will bring us happiness and fulfillment if we can just do them right or better.

·      Sex/Sexuality

·      Jobs/Vocation

·      Toys/money/things

·      Children and Family

·      Reputation 

·      Comfort/Pleasure

·      Intelligence

·      Talent

·      Political or Social Causes

·      Appearance 

·      Self-control

·      orderliness

You may be looking at this list and thinking there is a pretty clear hierarchy here.  Someone who lives to be really smart is obviously a better person than someone who lives to greedily accumulate stuff.  A self-controlled person is clearly better than someone who lives for their own personal comfort or just pursues any pleasure they can find, right? 

Basically, you may be looking at this list, seeing one that applies to you, and finding ways to convince yourself it’s better than the others. It’s not, and here’s why.[3]

We begin to ‘lean on’ these things to bring us peace, happiness, value or hope. Instead of ordering our life around Jesus, we turn to one of these things and just try to do them more and better so that that broken shalom within us and around us will heal. We tend to think of this in terms of the scandalous sins, but the Bible doesn’t. Paul wrote in Romans 14:23 that any actionthat does not have its foundation in faith is sin. 

We begin to build our identity on these things. We don’t turn to Jesus to find the value, worth and dignity we have as image bearers of God (or children of God if we have committed our life to Christ). We look to these other things, and we begin to identify ourselves by them.

All sin leads to us building a false foundation for who we are and why we matter. 

·      “I am a good parent, therefore I am a good person, and my life matters and I have value.”

·      “I am successful, therefore I am an important person, and my life matters and I have value.”

·      ”I am attractive, therefore I am a desirable person, and my life matters and I have value.” 

·      “I am in control, therefore I am a capable person, and my life matters and I have value.”

 Without actually saying it, we think doing these things just right will save us from the groaning of this broken world in us and around us. And when we begin to put that much pressure on these things…

 We become enslaved to these things, and we enslave those around us to our cause. We become zealots on behalf of our own sinful cause. 

·      We overparent. We smother our kids because they bear the terrible weight of our worth -  and we judge those around us whose kids aren’t as outwardly put together as ours. We don’t just judge our worth on this – we judge the worth of others.

·      We spend inordinate amounts of time making money or studying to be successful so we can justify our existence. Anyone who gets in our way pays the price - and we look down on those who aren’t as focused and driven or as successful as we are. They are probably lazy, right? Sad, really, how worthless their lives are.

·      We pursue as many partners as we can to continually validate our desirability or we pressure those we are with to complete us; we lash out at anyone who suggests we might be using our attractiveness to manipulate, or use others. We desperately stay beautiful. We assume those who don’t meet the same cultural standards we do aren’t trying, and deserve either our pity or our judgment.

·      We are consumed by keeping every aspect of our life in our control on our terms. Any disruption receives our scorn or wrath, and we just assume people who aren’t as controlling of their circumstances (“as purposeful and put together”?) are either dumb, lazy or bad. Control = capability = value. Carefree/unorganized people = lazy or inept = a burden to be around.

 Do you see the destructiveness of this sinful pattern? How even small things – even good things - lead us here? Because we have given our lives to a false savior – and that’s idolatry. That’s a breaking of the First Commandment. 

 All sin begins and ends in idolatry - which is why all sin deserves an equal judgment. 

 There are certainly some sins that have a greater ripple effect on the world – even Jesus talked about sins that receive a ‘greater condemnation’ (Matthew 23:14). 

 However, when we stand before God to give an account of our life, all of our sins will come back to idolatry. We worshiped and served something other than Jesus – we worshipped and served something in creation rather than the Creator - and that thing will never save us no matter how much of it we get. It will always take our eyes off of Jesus, and we will always sacrifice those around us in some fashion. [4]

 There is a solution.  God is not stumped by our capacity to undermine ourselves.  God did not forsake Adam and Eve - he covered them and gave them authority over the very thing that tempted them.

 Like God covered up the shame and nakedness of Adam and Eve, Jesus covers up our shame, our spiritual nakedness, by offering Himself as the means to triumph over the power and destructiveness of sin. This is the only way we can be saved: through Jesus Christ.

The objective basis and means of salvation is God's sovereign and gracious choice to be "God with us" in the person of Jesus Christ, who is described as both author and mediator of salvation ( Heb 2:10 ; 7:25 ). But the movement of Jesus' life goes through the cross and resurrection. It is therefore "Christ crucified" that is of central importance for salvation ( 1 Cor 1:23 ), for "Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures" ( 1 Cor 15:3 ) and was handed to death for our trespasses ( Rom 4:25 ).

 What Jesus did in our name he also did in our place, giving "his life as a ransom for many" ( Matt 20:28 ). And if Christ demonstrated his love by dying when we were still sinners, how much more shall we now be saved by his life? ( Rom 5:8-10 ). So critical is the resurrection to the future hope of salvation that ‘If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins’ ( 1 Cor 15:17 ).[5]  

The Old Testament used some form of the word yasa (to save, help in distress, rescue, deliver, set free) to refer to God’s salvation of His people.  The New Testament uses some form of the word soteria (to save or to rescue) to refer to how Jesus brings salvation to all those who commit their lives to him.[6]

Because of Christ, we are immediately saved from the eternal PENALTY of sin when we surrender our lives to God. An overwhelming debt we build all our lives can be covered because the Lawgiver has taken the penalty for Lawbreaking upon himself in the person of Jesus. The wages or cost of sin is still death; it’s just that Jesus paid that debt for you. Our history is not our destiny.

So why a cross?

I believe the Jewish followers of Jesus understood clearly:

1.    This was the cost of the children of Abraham breaking the covenant God made with Abraham.  The cost of failing to uphold the covenant was captured in the covenant ritual: the covenant-breakers body would be broken, and his blood would be spilled. Jesus did this on behalf of the children of Abraham. 

2.    This was the Passover Lamb once and for all, whose blood on the doorposts of our heart would spare us from spiritual and eternal death. 

 However, I think there is more. Forgiveness involves suffering on the part of the one forgiving. The greater the forgiveness, the greater the suffering. We experience this in small ways all the time. When we forgive people, we not only take the pain of the original hurt (against our happiness, reputation, self-image, etc), but we give up the right to inflict the same in return. We give up making them feel what we felt. True forgiveness is costly. 

And the greater the sin that needs to be forgiven, the greater the cost of forgiveness.

“God did not, then, inflict pain on someone else, but rather on the Cross absorbed the pain, violence, and evil of the world into himself… this is a God who becomes human and offers his own lifeblood in order to honor moral justice and merciful love so that someday he can destroy all evil without destroying us.” (Tim Keller)

Because of Christ, we are being saved from the present POWER of sin. We were once dead in sin. We were incapable of bringing ourselves to life, and we were going to inevitably default to sin. Because the Holy Spirit is now in us, we have God’s power to break what the Bible calls “chains” of sin. We will struggle with temptation, but we are not doomed to failure. That which defines you or forms you now does not need to continue to control you.  We will see all those idols for what they are, and we will increasingly see Jesus for who he is. God will work in us (in a process we call sanctification) so that we lean on him; we build a real foundation of value, worth, and dignity (our identity) in how Christ sees us, not how we or others see us.  

One day, we will be saved from the PRESENCE of sin. In heaven, shalom will be restored.  The New Heaven and New Earth will not be broken, and neither will we. This is the solution that frees us from a life of brokenness and sin and an eternity of despair. 

“The gospel takes evil and loss with utmost seriousness, because it says that we cannot save ourselves. Nothing short of the death of the very Son of God can save us. But the “happy ending” of the historical resurrection is so enormous that it swallows up even the sorrow of the Cross. It is so great that those who believe it can henceforth fully face the depth of the sorrow and brokenness of life…. if we believe the gospel, then our hearts slowly heal even as we face the darkest times because we know that, because of Jesus… even our griefs, even the dyscatastrophes we know, will be taken up into the miraculous grace of God’s purposes. “Death has been swallowed up in victory.... Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:54 and 57).”  ― Timothy J. Keller, King's Cross

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[1] Christian theology teaches that all of us would have done the same.  The fancy term is “transworld depravity”: in any possible world, in any possible situation, all of us would have eventually done the same. Sure, sin “entered the world” through the first choice of Adam and Eve, but we should not be pointing fingers.  It is a part of Christian theology that is meant to humble us.  

[2] John Oakes, “What Are The Origins of the Word Sin?”

[3] Paul’s self-analysis went from, “I am the least of the apostles,” to, “I am the chief of sinners.” The longer he was in Christ, the more he saw the internal war sin was waging in his heart. Surely this represents the proper trajectory of the Christian’s understanding: the longer the discipleship, the greater the awareness of the sin that crouches at our doors and lurks in our hearts; therefore, the greater the humility in ourselves and the greater the grace we offer to others. 

 [4] In maybe the worst kind of idolatry, we turn to religious works – keeping the rules, always doing more to feel closer to God or earn God’s favor, showing others how important we are by the crucial things we all do, desperately trying to get rid of the bleak, relentless, gnawing emptiness. And we aren’t worshiping God at all but ourselves. That kind of religious grandstanding is “filthy rags” (Isaiah 64:6), the most ritually unclean thing you could imagine in Jewish culture. 

[5] “Salvation,” http://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/salvation/

[6]   http://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/salvation/

Following God: The Holy Spirit

 We believe that the Holy Spirit indwells believers (1 Corinthians 6:19-20), confirming their salvation (Romans 8:14-16) and enabling them to bear godly fruit (Galatians 5:22). We believe that the Holy Spirit convicts the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). He is the source of all power and all acceptable worship and service. The Holy Spirit also empowers believers to have a bold and effective witness (i.e Luke 12:12), so He manifests His gifts in their daily lives for the edification of the church and as a testimony to the world. He never removes Himself from the Church; He is always testifying of Christ; He is always seeking to focus believers on Jesus, not on themselves, their gifts, or their experiences. ________________________________________________________________

The Bible contains a lot of examples of how God reveals himself in.  In the Old Testament, God the Father instantiates[1] as a cloud, a pillar of fire, or various theophanies[2]. A lot of verses focus on God being around[3] us or surrounding us. 

In the Gospels, we see God the Son reveals Himself as Jesus incarnate.[4]  A lot of verses focus on God being among us or with us – Immanuel means exactly that. 

In the Gospels and Acts, the God the Holy Spirit is often described as indwelling us.[5] In John 14:16-18, Jesus told the disciples, "You know him, for he dwells with you and shall be in you." [6]

It’s not as if these weren’t happening all the time; for example, The Word – Jesus - was with God at creation and the Holy Spirit clearly temporarily indwelt people. Think of the narrative of God in the Bible building to a clear and fully rounded finale by the time the story reaches its crescendo: God is transcendent and immanent, greater than us yet housed within us - around, with, and in.

What do we know about the Holy Spirit?

1. The Holy Spirit is one of three persons/one essence of the Trinity

“Baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”  (Matthew 28:19)

“I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth.  I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him.”  Ephesians 3:14-17

“The Scriptures also attest to the deity of the Holy Spirit. He is spoken of as God and is identified with the title of Jehovah. The Christian who is indwelt by the Spirit is indwelt by God. The Holy Spirit possesses the attributes of deity, such as omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence and eternality. He does works only God can do, such as creating, regenerating and sanctifying. He is equally associated with the other members of the Trinity.”[7]

2. The Holy Spirit brings life.

In Genesis 1, the ruakh (breath or Spirit of God) moved over the chaos of the deep, bringing life and light where there had been death and darkness.  The Old Testament prophets said that the spirit of God would come again, but this time to bring spiritual life to the chaos, death and darkness in the hearts of humanity. 

Jesus fulfilled this when he breathed on the disciples after his resurrection (John 20:22) and they received the Holy Spirit (hagios pneuma).  Almost certainly, this is a flashback to Genesis imagery: God’s breath brought physical life to Adam; Jesus’ breath brings spiritual life to the children of Adam. 

This Holy Spirit brings comfort, protection, counsel, conviction and guidance, regenerating believers from spiritual death to spiritual life (Titus 3:5; 1 Corinthians 6:11). If you have experienced a life where you were dead (emotionally, spiritually, mentally) and you cried out to God and God brought life and light into the darkness, that was the Holy Spirit at work.

3. The Holy Spirit Baptizes Us Into God’s Family

A word used in the NT for baptism has to do with immersion, and the image that goes with it is that of soaking a cucumber in whatever you soak a cucumber in to make it a pickle.  It becomes something new.  I suspect the immersion of baptism is meant to give us a visual of our immersion into God’s Holy Spirit. When we are baptized by the Holy Spirit into Christ, we become something new. We are still ourselves, but we are different.  There is no question that we have been soaked in something that has changed us.

 In addition, if we have experienced a sense of oneness with Christ and with His people, we have experienced the Holy Spirit’s initiation into not only new life, but also new life in Christian community (Acts 1:4-5; 1 Corinthians 12:13).  When we read in 1 Corinthians that we are “baptized by one spirit to form one body”, this means that God has joined believers together through the shared baptism of the Holy Spirit. Now, the many become one. When we begin to find that we are at home in the family of God, that’s the Holy Spirit working in us. 

4. The Holy Spirit Indwells and Fills Us 

Along with Jesus, the Holy Spirit “indwells us” (1 Corinthians 3:16; 6: 16-19; 2 Timothy 1:14) taking up residence in the ‘temple’ of every believer upon conversion (Acts 2:38) and begins a continuous indwelling and filling. The Holy Spirit is the source of all acceptable worship and service (Ephesians 5:18-19).[8]

This is why we are able to have any kind of real success in our new life in Christ. (John 14:17-18; Ephesians 1:13;  1 Corinthians 6:19-20; 2 Corinthians 3:16). If you have ever had an experience where you struggled to overcome addictions, habits, attitudes, mindsets – and then have realized, “I’m doing better. I’m not stuck like I was” – that’s the Holy Spirit working in you. 

5. The Holy Spirit Inspired Scripture Writers and Guides Scripture Readers

·      Inspired Writers: “All Scripture is breathed out by God. …” (2 Timothy 3:16)[9]

·      Guides Readers: (1 Corinthians 2:9-10, 13; Ephesians 1:17-18; Romans 8:14). If you have ever been reading Scripture and thought, “I don’t get it,” then a friend explained it, or a class addressed it, or you turned on the radio and heard a timely presentation, or it just suddenly clicked: that’s the Holy Spirit. 

   6. The Holy Spirit Strengthens Us.

 The Holy Spirit strengthens our prayers, or faith, and our obedience (Romans 8:26-27; Ephesians 3:16-19; Galatians 5:22-23). Like God sent two helpers to Moses to lift us his hands for him so that the battle could be won, God’s spirit help us in our struggles.[10]

The Holy Spirit gives us strength to fight the battles we could never fight on our own.  It may get strength to you through friends, through the Bible, or through a personal experience of renewal. But if you have been strengthened in your prayer, your faith, or your ability to be obedient to God, it is because of the Holy Spirit.  

7. The Holy Spirit Enables Our Spiritual Flourishing.

The fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23) is the result of a Spirit-filled life, and evidence of the spiritual maturation process. True followers of God will be known by their fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindheartedness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Notice how many of these are relational.)

I also love this idea: that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit to us is reminiscent of Jesus pouring out water to wash the feet of the disciples. He served them by cleaning the dirtiest part of their physical body; the Holy Spirit cleans the dirtiest part of our spiritual body. 

8. The Holy Spirit equips us. 

·      natural gifts (“I have filled him with the Spirit of God, giving him great wisdom, ability, and expertise in all kinds of crafts.” Exodus 31:3)

·      spiritual gifts (Acts 6:8; 1 Corinthians 12; 14:4-5, 22; Romans 12; Ephesians 4; 1 Peter 4).   

The gifts are far more varied than we often realize.

o   Prophecy (boldly proclaiming God’s mind and purpose) 1 Corinthians 12, 14; Micah 3:8

o   Serving (a wide variety of ministries that “make the dust fly”) – 1 Peter 4; 1 Corinthians 12:5

o   Teaching – (explaining God’s truth) Romans 12; 1 Corinthians 12; Ephesians 4

o   Working – (bringing energy to a project) 1 Corinthians 12:6

o   Exhortation (motivational skills; encouragement) – Romans 12

o   Giving (joyful, sacrificial generosity) Romans 12

o   Mercy (compassion) – Romans 12

o   Intercession (prayer) Romans 8:26, 27

o   Wisdom (knowledge rightly applied to situations) James 1:5; Numbers 27

o   Words of Wisdom (insightful, practical knowledge) – 1 Corinthians 12

o   Words of Knowledge (giving insight into doctrine/spiritual truth) – 1 Corinthians 12

o   Faith (unwavering commitment) – 1 Corinthians 12

o   Healing (miraculous interventions for sickness) 1 Corinthians 12

o   Miracles – (supernatural acts) 1 Corinthians 12

o   Discerning spirits (insight into the “spirit” of a situation) – 1 Corinthians 12

o   Tongues (gifted in human or heavenly languages) – 1 Corinthians 12, 14

o   Interpretation of Tongues – (translating languages) 1 Corinthians 12, 14

o   Apostle (unique to the founding of the church) – 1 Corinthians 12; Ephesians 4

o   Leadership (church planters and church sustainers) – Romans 12

o   Pastor (“shepherds” who guide and lead) – Ephesians 4

o   Evangelist/Missionary (boldness in sharing the gospel) Acts 1:8; 5:32; 26:22; 1 John 5:6; Ephesians 4

o   Helps (serving the poor and downtrodden) 1 Corinthians 12; 1 Timothy 3:8-13; Romans 16:1-4; 12

o   Administration (oversight) 1 Corinthians 12; 1 Samuel 11 and 16

o   Celibacy (refraining from sex with purity) 1 Corinthians 7:7

o   Marriage (committing to a covenant with integrity) 1 Corinthians 7:7

o   Hospitality (openness and friendliness) 1 Peter 4:9-10

o   Craftsmanship (building, construction) Exodus 31:3; 35:30-35

o   The Arts (music, poetry, prose, painting…) Exodus 31:2-6; Exodus 35:25-26; Psalm 150:3-5 Luke 1:1-3

o   Voluntary Poverty (forgoing wealth without envy or jealousy) 1 Corinthians 13:1-3

o   Business Sense (reward from hard work and investment) Ecclesiastes 3,5

o   Courage (as seen in Gideon) Judges 6

o   Strength (as seen in Samson) Judges 13

o   Architectural Engineering (planning; constructing) 1 Chronicles 28

These gifts are different manifestations of the Spirit’s creativity in order to build up the church(Isaiah 11:5; I Corinthians 12:1-11) and point people toward God (John 15:26; John 16:13-14). There is no formula for gaining gifts. They are gifts given as the Holy Spirit wills (I Corinthians 12:7-11). We are recipients of these gifts by grace and God’s good mercy. These gifts are primarily (though not solely) meant to build up, encourage, and comfort the church. (Remember how the fruit was relational? Gifts too.)

These gifts are powerful, and because of that, they must be exercised in an orderly and understandable way (I Corinthians 14:26-33) that honors others above ourselves (Romans 12:1-10). They must be used in the context of love (I Corinthians 13:1-13), lest our expression or use of these good gifts could get all muddled up and cause others to stumble (1 Corinthians 8). 

Every attempt should be made to use the gifts in humility and service, so that we may share the desire of Jesus: that God increases and we decrease (John 3:30). The Holy Spirit is always testifying of Christ; He is always seeking to focus believers on Jesus, not on themselves, their gifts, or their experiences. 

9. The Holy Spirit is creative and innovative.

The Holy Spirit gives us the wisdom and ability to learn to use His gifts appropriately and contextually in new situations from culture to culture, person to person, and season to season.  – new wine needs new wineskins (Luke 5: 36-39). This enables us to be considerate of the effect and impact on those around us (I Corinthians 14:40).

10. The Holy Spirit Convicts Of Sin And Connects To Jesus

Jesus affirmed in John 16:8: “When [the Holy Spirit] comes, he will convict the world about sin, righteousness, and judgment.” The Holy Spirit shows the offense, reveals the foolishness of the sin, points out the consequences, convinces of guilt, and leads the sinner to repentance. To see our sin and desire God’s righteousness and salvation from judgment through Christ (John 3:5-8; John 16:8-11; Ephesians 2:8) - that is a work of the Holy Spirit. We convey the message (“plant the seeds”), but we don’t bring the harvest.

11. The Holy Spirit Empowers Us To Witness (Acts 1:8, 4:8, 31; 6:10; 9:17; 11:24; 13:9). 

There are at least 6 stories in the book of Acts where the Holy Spirit filled people and they speak with power about Jesus Christ and his Kingdom.  The Holy Spirit is the church’s greatest ally in its evangelizing effort. Without the help and the filling of the Spirit, the evangelistic task of the church will fail.[11]

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From “Fifty Things The Holy Spirit Does” at the Christian Post.

1. The Spirit convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8).

2. The Spirit guides us into all truth (John 16:13).

3. The Spirit regenerates us (John 3:5-8; Titus 3:5).

4. The Spirit glorifies and testifies of Christ (John 15:26; 16:14).

5. The Spirit reveals Christ to us and in us (John 16:14-15).

6. The Spirit leads us (Rom. 8:14; Gal. 5:18; Matt. 4:1; Luke 4:1).

7. The Spirit sanctifies us (2 Thess. 2:13; 1 Pet. 1:2; Rom. 5:16).

8. The Spirit empowers us (Luke 4:14; 24:49; Rom. 15:19; Acts 1:8).

9. The Spirit fills us (Eph. 5:18; Acts 2:4; 4:8, 31; 9:17).

10. The Spirit teaches us to pray (Rom. 8:26-27; Jude 1:20).

11. The Spirit bears witness in us that we are children of God (Rom. 8:16).

12. The Spirit produces in us the fruit or evidence of His work and presence (Gal. 5:22-23).

13. The Spirit distributes spiritual gifts and manifestations (the outshining) of His presence to and through the body (1 Cor. 12:4, 8-10; Heb. 2:4).

14. The Spirit anoints us for ministry (Luke 4:18; Acts 10:38).

15. The Spirit washes and renews us (Titus 3:5).

16. The Spirit brings unity and oneness to the body (Eph. 4:3; 2:14-18). Here the Spirit plays the same role that He plays in the Godhead. The Spirit is the life that unites Father and Son. The Spirit plays the same role in the church. When the Spirit is operating in a group of people, He unites them in love. Therefore, a sure evidence of the Holy Spirit working in a group is Love and Unity. Not signs and wonders (those are seasonal and can be counterfeited).

17. The Spirit is our guarantee and deposit of the future resurrection (2 Cor. 1:22; 2 Cor. 5:5).

18. The Spirit seals us unto the day of redemption (Eph. 1:13; 4:30).

19. The Spirit sets us free from the law of sin and death (Rom. 8:2).

20. The Spirit quickens our mortal bodies (Rom. 8:11).

21. The Spirit reveals the deep things of God to us (1 Cor. 2:10).

22. The Spirit reveals what has been given to us from God (1 Cor. 2:12).

23. The Spirit dwells in us (Rom. 8:9; 1 Cor. 3:16; 2 Tim. 1:14; John 14:17).

24. The Spirit speaks to, in, and through us (1 Cor. 12:3; 1 Tim. 4:1; Rev. 2:11; Heb 3:7; Matt. 10:20; Acts 2:4; 8:29; 10:19; 11:12, 28; 13:2; 16:6,7; 21:4,11).

25. The Spirit is the agent by which we are baptized into the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13).

26. The Spirit brings liberty (2 Cor. 3:17).

27. The Spirit transforms us into the image of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18).

28. The Spirit cries in our hearts, "Abba, Father" (Gal. 4:6).

29. The Spirit enables us to wait (Gal. 5:5).

30. The Spirit supplies us with Christ (Phil. 1:19, KJV).

31. The Spirit grants everlasting life (Gal. 6:8).

32. The Spirit gives us access to God the Father (Eph. 2:18).

33. The Spirit makes us (corporately) God's habitation (Eph. 2:22).

34. The Spirit reveals the mystery of God to us (Eph. 3:5).

35. The Spirit strengthens our spirits (Eph. 3:16).

36. The Spirit enables us to obey the truth (1 Pet. 1:22).

37. The Spirit enables us to know that Jesus abides in us (1 John 3:24; 4:13).

38. The Spirit confesses that Jesus came in the flesh (1 John 4:2).

39. The Spirit says "Come, Lord Jesus" along with the bride (Rev. 22:17).

40. The Spirit dispenses God's love into our hearts (Rom. 5:5).

41. The Spirit bears witness to the truth in our conscience (Rom. 9:1).

42. The Spirit teaches us (1 Cor. 2:13; John 14:26).

43. The Spirit gives us joy (1 Thess. 1:6).

44. The Spirit enables some to preach the gospel (1 Pet. 1:12).

45. The Spirit moves us (2 Pet. 1:21).

46. The Spirit knows the things of God (1 Cor. 2:11).

47. The Spirit casts out demons (Matt. 12:28).

48. The Spirit brings things to our remembrance (John 14:26).

49. The Spirit comforts us (Acts 9:31).

50. The Spirit makes some overseers in the church and sends some out to the work of church planting [through the body] (Acts 20:28; 13:2).

 Read more at http://www.christianpost.com/news/50-things-the-holy-spirit-does-129829/#cEBCHzHuuRQvooog.99

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[1] From instantia, or presence. God was “made present.”

[2] An appearance of God to people. https://www.theopedia.com/theophany

[3] https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/God-Surrounding

[4] From carne, or flesh. God was “made flesh” in Jesus.

[5] As is Jesus, by the way.

[6] After Jesus’ death, the gift of the Holy Spirit went from "selective and temporary" to "universal and permanent." 

[7] “The Person And Work Of The Holy Spirit.” https://www.moodybible.org/beliefs/positional-statements/holy-spirit/

[8] Great article from Billy Graham: “Does The Holy Spirit Live In You?” https://decisionmagazine.com/does-the-holy-spirit-live-in-you/

[9] Genesis motif: Moving over the chaos of the world and bringing words of life.

[10] Yet another way in which the “physicalness” of the Old Testament/Old Covenant foreshadows spiritual realities in the New Testament/New Covenant.

[11] Great overview here: “Who Is The Holy Spirit? 5 Things You Need To Know.” https://www.biblestudytools.com/bible-study/topical-studies/who-is-the-holy-spirit-5-things-you-need-to-know.html

Following God: Why Jesus Matters

 “We believe in the historical reality of Jesus Christ as the only incarnation of God. We believe in His deity, His virgin birth (Matthew 1:18-23), His sinless life  (Hebrews 7:26; 1 Peter 2:22), His miracles (Acts 2:22; Acts 10:38), His substitutionary death (1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21), His bodily resurrection from the dead (Matthew 28:6; Luke 24:39; 1 Corinthians 15:4), His ascension to the right hand of the Father (Acts 1:9; Acts 1:11; Acts 2:33; Philippians 2:9-11; Hebrews 1:3), His intercession for the sins of His people (1 Timothy 2:5-6), and His future personal return in power and glory (Acts 1:10-11).”

We believe in the historical reality of Jesus Christ as the only incarnation of God. We believe in His deity.

Jesus is unique. No one else in human history was, is, or will be like him. 

·      Jesus was not simply an enlightened being (Buddhism)

·      Jesus was not just one of thousands of gods who deserve your attention (Hinduism) 

·      Jesus was not simply a prophet (Islam)

·      Jesus was not the kind of being that we can one day become (Mormonism)

The miracle of the Incarnation is that Jesus remained fully God while he participated fully in human life as a man. We see ways in which God made himself visible and known in the Old Testament (“theophany”), but only once did he incarnate (become human).

His virgin birth (Matthew 1:18-23).

If you are wanting a scientific explanation as to how this happened, I have none to offer. It’s a miracle, which simply means God accomplished something supernaturally that would not have happened naturally. We don’t claim God had sex with Mary, like the Greeks and Romans would have assumed a god would do. In a way that honored Mary’s purity, heaven and earth became one in the person of Jesus Christ. If we are looking for a motif, go back to Genesis 1. The Spirit of God moved over the face of the waters, and soon there was life – and that included the first Adam. The Spirit of God moved over Mary, and soon there was life – what the Bible calls the last Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45).

His sinless life (Hebrews 7:26; 1 Peter 2:22).  

·      He was tempted as a man (so Jesus is what we often call “a sympathetic advocate” on our behalf when we pray in the midst of our temptation)

·      He resisted as God. He understood the power of temptation but never compromised his perfection and holiness. 

His miracles (Acts 2:22; Acts 10:38). God set up what we now call ‘laws’ to give an order, structure, coherence and predictability to the physical world. #science. When God moves in this system, the system responds like God created it to respond. God doesn’t break the laws of nature to do miracles; he interacts with a natural world whose laws were always part of a system of higher and greater laws. So, yeah, there are a lot of miracles. If God exists, it goes with the territory. If Jesus was God, he can do them too. 

C.S. Lewis compared God’s miraculous intervention in the world to the way events are influenced inside a fishbowl. If someone bumps a table supporting a fishbowl, the pebbles will shake and the water will ripple.  If the fish are committed to seeking an explanation only inside the fishbowl, because they do not believe anything exists outside the fishbowl, they will never find an adequate explanation for what happened.  Maybe they think believing otherwise allows for a violation of the laws of nature in the fishbowl.  But if the fishbowl hadn’t been effected, laws governing all of reality, not just the reality of the fishbowl, would have broken.  

In other words, our orderly and predictable fish bowl world is designed to function within the framework of a much bigger reality. When life in the bowl responds to God’s divine intervention, it’s a sign that the world is working as it should.

His substitutionary death (1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21). 

A just God demands justice; a merciful God provides a way out. Justice and mercy are both important things, but neither one is the only thing.  Justice and mercy aren’t found in separate parts of God’s nature, either; remember, God is ‘simple’. He always has these, and they are always a part of everything He does. 

In a cosmic turn of events that no other religion even remotely claims, God so loves the world that He comes to earth and on the cross absorbs His own righteous demand for justice while expressing the depths of His mercy.  Let’s think back to an analogy everyone in the Ancient Near East and in the Jewish and Roman culture of the first century would have understood: living in a Kingdom with a King.

·      When God is King, lawbreaking is sin, a treasonous dishonoring of the Lawgiver, the King. 

·      The King’s justice demands that the price of this treasonous sin be paid, and the price of treason is death.

·      If the price is paid by the offender, the offender’s record will be cleared– but of course, it will be too late.

·      However, as an act of mercy, the offender can be forgiven and live if the price is paid by a substitute. [1]

·      If the one who offers to pay the debt of the sinner is also sinful, they will merely be paying their own sinful debt; the one for whom they are giving their life will not benefit.  

·      Therefore, the only answer is a sinless person - who is the King Himself, the Lawgiver. 

·      A payment is offered by the faultless King for the treasonous sinner, who if they accept this redemption is not only forgiven, but adopted into the King’s family. 

His bodily resurrection from the dead (Matthew 28:6; Luke 24:39; 1 Corinthians 15:4).

If His death shows us the lengths to which he was willing to go to save us, then His resurrection shows us he has the power to do it. His resurrection means life is possible for us “though we were dead in our sins.” Because He physically rose from the dead, we know we can be raised from spiritual death in this life, and ultimately be raised to an entirely new life with Christ for eternity in the New Heaven and New Earth. If death is not strong enough to hold him, nothing is. He is Lord of all things.

His ascension to the right hand of the Father (Acts 1:9; Acts 1:11; Acts 2:33; Philippians 2:9-11; Hebrews 1:3). 

“The right hand” imagery is a picture of power. Jesus did not rise in broken weakness after a crucifixion. Hebrews 2:10 says that Jesus’ glory was consummated or perfected in His suffering. If you thought he was awesome before, you should have seen him after His resurrection (this is anthropomorphic language…it’s an image…biblical writers are doing their best to describe a God whose glory just gets more stunning the more we understand him and the more his power is revealed).

His intercession for the sins of His people (1 Timothy 2:5-6).  

Let’s be honest. We are prone to point, especially when the sin of others is easy to see, and especially when it lets us channel our anger or grief at sin to other people.  We often see what these ‘pointable sins’ are when something bad happens and we say, “Well, God is judging America because of...” 

You know what's missing from that list? Every other treasonous sin, especially the ones we don’t want to point out in ourselves.

·      Pride (I’m just better)

·      Lust (I want that… a lot…)

·      Anger (inappropriate and damaging)

·      Theft (from money to online piracy to time to virtue/innocence)

·      Deceit (covering up truth that needs to be known)

·      Rebellion (against the proper authorities in our life)

·      Judgment (of the heart, motivations, intentions)

·      Bitterness (I deserve better…you don’t…)

·      Gossip (Did you know…?  Would you pray for…?)

·      Greed (lack of contentment of things or people or circumstances)

·      Envy (active dislike for people for whom life is better)

·      Hardness of heart (the recognition of sin and its impact on the world does not move you – neither does the lostness of sinners)

·      Meanness (attitude, words, insults)

·      Dishonor and disrespect (trample on God’s image bearers)

When’s the last time we thought, “God ought to judge America because of people like me”?  

Let’s make it more personal. If everyone in this room nailed it except for you – never sinned, just lived perfectly – do you know what Jesus would have to do for you? He would have to become human, live a perfect life, die with the weight of your sin on His shoulders, then rise again and advocate just for you.  So don't be thinking, “I hope my spouse is getting this. I wish my kids were here.  I wonder if Anthony is listening to his own sermon? They really need to be broken in repentance.”  I’m sure they all do. I know I do. But if you don’t see that you do too, you will never appreciate the awesomeness of Christ – and you will be insufferable to live with. 

Why did Jesus have to become human? Because of your sin.

Why did Jesus have to die? Because of your sin.

Why does Jesus intercede for you now? Why does he have to continue to function as an advocate? Because of your sin.

Why highlight this on sermon about Jesus? Because if we don’t see our sin, we will never appreciate the awesome nature of Jesus Christ, who intercedes for us.

We might get all the theology – we might have a way of understanding the incarnation and substitutionary atonement, and we’ve watched The Passion, and we sent copies of the Jesus movie all around the world…. If we don’t understand why the phrase “Jesus loves you” ought to undo us, we will never understand the awesome nature of Jesus Christ. 

The good news is that in spite of all that, Jesus did not come to the world to bring condemnation but to bring salvation. I don’t point these things out so we are overwhelmed by condemnation. I want us to be in awe of salvation.  

“The gospel of justifying faith means that while Christians are, in themselves still sinful and sinning, yet in Christ, in God’s sight, they are accepted and righteous. So we can say that we are more wicked than we ever dared believe, but more loved and accepted in Christ than we ever dared hope — at the very same time. This creates a radical new dynamic for personal growth. It means that the more you see your own flaws and sins, the more precious, electrifying, and amazing God’s grace appears to you.”

“...We must say to ourselves something like this: 'Well, when Jesus looked down from the cross, he didn't think "I am giving myself to you because you are so attractive to me." No, he was in agony, and he looked down at us - denying him, abandoning him, and betraying him - and in the greatest act of love in history, he STAYED. He said, "Father, forgive them, they don't know what they are doing." He loved us, not because we were lovely to him, but to make us lovely.” – Timothy Keller

 Jesus’ love isn’t a trivial, easy love because we are so awesome. It’s a love that required a death and resurrection so that we, the dead, can be raised to life. So that we, the image bearers of God, can show the world what it looks like when a God of Salvation loves and then saves the most unlovable and the most hopelessly lost for our good and His glory.

His future personal return in power and glory (Acts 1:10-11). There will be a day when the world sees the glory and power of Christ. There will be a day when every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God. 

_____________________________________________________________________________

[1] In the Old Testament, we see the concept enacted in the scapegoat as well as the many ways in which substitutionary acts could pay the penalty of breaking the Mosaic law.

Following God: Who Is God? From Doctrine To Doxology

From the CLG Statement of Faith:

We believe that there is one God (Deuteronomy 6:4), eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit (John 8:54-59). God perfect in holiness, infinite in wisdom, and measureless in power. God (The Father): He is Creator, Redeemer and the Sovereign Ruler of the universe.

We believe that God is omnipotent (He can do anything that can be done), omniscient (He knows anything that can be known), omnipresent (there is no place or circumstance of which God is unaware or in which he is not active), and unchanging. He upholds all things by the Word of His power and grace, exercising sovereignty over all creation. He made all things for the praise of His glory and intends for people to live in fellowship with Himself. (Deuteronomy 33:27; Psalm 90:2, 102:27; John 3:16, 4:24; Colossians 1:17; Hebrews 1:3; I Timothy 1:17; Titus 1:3).

I love our current series. I know this puts me in a relatively small group, but I find theology fascinating. The books you will find on my shelves are overwhelmingly theological in nature, because I just enjoy reading about it. I understand this makes me weird. I know many people find this the opposite of fascinating. In fact, dislike is probably a mild term for the reaction many people have.

Christianity is doctrinal, and that’s not optional

The reactions I’ve I heard usually go something like this:

“Doctrine is dry and theoretical – Christianity is alive and relational.”

Or…

“We don’t need theology – we just need Jesus!”

I think I understand the motivation behind these statements, but the statements themselves are simply misguided. In fact, they could not be more wrong. I’ll show you why. When someone tells me that “we just need Jesus”, my first question will be “Who is Jesus?” And from that point forward, everything that person tells me will be theology. It might be bad theology, but it’s theology. See, at its most basic, theology is just talking about God. That’s literally what the word means. So when you explain to me who Jesus is, or when we have a discussion about our different views of Sunday worship, or when Jesus will come back, we are engaging in theological discussion. So let’s stop being afraid of theology! If you find it boring, then you need to read different books or talk to different people, because theology is fascinating!

The Doctrine of God

This whole series is talking about the doctrines listed in our statement of faith. Today’s topic is the Doctrine of God. I’m betting this is one of those topics that seems straightforward until you try to explain it. Hopefully today I will give you some new ways to think about the subject.

Who is God?

When approaching this topic, I had to give some thought to how I wanted to approach it. I’ve come at it from all sorts of angles. We could read bible passages that talk about who God is. We could do a study of the theology behind the concept of God. We could look at church history and see what wise people have had to say about the topic. Philosophy is always fun. Apologetics gives us a lot to talk about. In pondering all these approaches, I thought, why not do all of them?

So today will be a bit of everything. If one topic isn’t your cup of tea, stand by – the next one may be.

Also, this will be just a surface treatment. I’m hoping this does a few things. One, this should give you some things to chew on over the next week. Two, I’m hoping that it starts a discussion, whether with me or Anthony or a friend. Find some aspect that interests you and dive in! Three, I’m hoping something I say provokes you to join us after the service for Message Plus!

Apologetics

Let’s start with the practical. I want you to see that this topic is relevant to your life – and to everyone’s life. The most basic questions of life are best answered by God, and some of them are completely impossible without God. Consider the following:

1.     Why is there something rather than nothing?

2.     What does it mean to be human?

3.     Where does the concept of right and wrong come from?

4.     What is the purpose of life?

5.     Does life have any meaning?

6.     What happens when we die?

If I have a discussion about any of these – and I’ve had a lot of them – God is going to come up. I’ve heard a lot of alternate explanations, and none I’ve heard is even close to satisfactory. The fact is, God’s existence makes sense of life and reality.

(As I said, I’m dropping some bombs and moving on this morning, so if you want to talk more about any of these questions or their answers, let’s talk.)

Theology Proper

The answers to questions like these tend to start with philosophical arguments. The point of these arguments is to show that reality makes more sense if God exists than if God does not exist, and that is a very useful thing. However, philosophical arguments don’t always tell you what that God is like, or which God that would be – and those are some crucial details!

For this information we go to scripture. And here we find that the God described in these philosophical arguments must be the God of the Bible. Scripture, reality and history all reveal this God to be the true sovereign of the universe. If there are other beings we can loosely call “god”, they are an entirely different sort of being than he is.

God is an Objective Being

God is an objective being. He is not the cosmos, a vague concept, or a shared consciousness. He is not reduced to our thoughts or our experiences. He exists independent from us.

Language is elusive. The bible simply says that he is. He says his name is “I Am”. So statements like “to me, God is like this…” are unhelpful and often wrong. God’s identity is not up to our perspective – he is simply a matter of reality. And our perspective ought to be shaped by that reality.

The Morel Dilemma

We’re still months away, but I’m looking forward to morel season. I love morel mushrooms. They are delicious. When I was young, our family used go out hunting for them. If you’re a fan of morels like I am, you already know the reality of my next point. When searching for a tasty meal, not just any mushroom will do. The inexperienced hunter will often be fooled by what is called the “false morel”. The false morel is not actually a type of mushroom though – it’s a category. There is a whole group of mushroom varieties that may each be called a false morel. The reason they get this name is because they look like real morels. Some are more obviously false than others. Some look so similar that they fool people who you would think would know better. What makes this important is that these false morels are quite dangerous. Some have toxins that cause dizziness and vomiting, contain carcinogens, and some will actually kill you after eating one.

You’ve probably already figured out my point here. There are many ideas today of who God is. Some are obvious because they go by names like Allah or Vishnu, and look very different to the Bible’s description of God. That’s the type of false god we read about most often in biblical accounts. I think the bigger concern today is that our false gods look very much like the real God, and occasionally even fool people who should know better. These gods are said to be the God spoken of in scripture, but they are not. Some examples are the god of self-help described by people like Oprah, the god of mysticism that Rob Bell preached, the god of goodies peddled by countless televangelists, the god of niceness that the Mormons follow, or the god of moralism that has infected much of evangelicalism today. These gods are described in a way that has a faint resemblance to the actual God, but each is deeply troubling as well, because they get far more wrong than they get right. And like with morels, you only have to be a little wrong to end up sick or dead. It is vital that we understand who the God revealed in scripture is, because anything else is what the bible calls an idol, and idols have nothing to offer you.

Understanding God’s Nature

So how do we avoid being fooled? How do you know I’m not telling you about a false God this morning? The easy answer is the Bible, but that’s a lot. And when you’re reading it, you need to know what to look for. A little philosophy will help explain what I mean.

Shirts and the Nature of Reality

When thinking about God, and when reading scripture, it is helpful to understand the idea of nature, or essence. A thing’s nature or essence is made up what we call characteristics or attributes. My shirt could be described as a cotton-poly blend of blue fabric with plastic buttons. But is that enough?

·       Could it be another color and still be a shirt?

·       Are buttons required?

·       Could it be made of a different material?

·       Could it have a different number of sleeves?

These are all attributes or characteristics of my shirt. Some attributes are less important than others, meaning changing them does not damage the essence of the thing. If it were made of silk or colored yellow, it would still be a shirt. However, if it had no sleeves, it would be a pillowcase. So, it turns out that holes for my appendages are necessary attributes of a shirt, but other attributes are of little consequence to the shirtiness of my shirt.

It turns out that all of God’s attributes are essential. This is not because God requires all of them to be God. It’s because all of his attributes are defined by him. More on that later. Let’s talk about just a few of his attributes to give you the idea.

Trinity

Essence

A shirt has necessary qualities that make it a shirt and not a pillowcase or a potato. Those qualities aren’t the thing itself, but they are the best way we have to express the true essence of a shirt. Along these same lines, we can say that God has an essence. His essence is his intrinsic nature. And because language fails us, we list his attributes to try and describe his essence.

Three-In-One

So God has an essence. Scripture tells us that there is only one God – one being with this essence. However, it also explains that the Father is God, Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The classic way of communicating this idea is that God is one essence, and three persons. This is called the doctrine of the Trinity. That word is not in the bible, but the concept is

By the way, I’m not here to remove the mystery this morning – only to explain the concept. 

Logic

There is a logical basis for this in the bible that comes from at least two directions.

We’ve established that there is only one true God (one essence), and we can describe him by his attributes. However, we see God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit all described as having these attributes. If they each have these characteristics, then each of them is God – yet they are the same God.

The other direction is to see how people relate to the persons in the Godhead. In the Bible, we see each person of the Trinity treated as if he is God. Things that might seem the domain of God the Father alone happen to the other two as well. The Spirit is prayed to. Jesus is worshiped. Lying to the Holy Spirit is called lying to God. Jesus offers forgiveness. These would all be troubling if those persons were not God.

So, these three persons are all described as God, and the first Christians treated them all as God. Yet we hold that there is one God. The Doctrine of the Trinity is the resolution to this situation. This says that the trinity is one essence, eternally existing in three persons.

Scripture

There is also a biblical basis. Scripture contains all sorts of passages that can only be understood in light of the trinity.

1.  At Jesus’ baptism[1], the Holy Spirit fell on him as the Father spoke. If all three are present, they are individual persons.

2.  Jesus told his followers to baptize believers in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit[2].

3.  Paul said that “through [Jesus] we … have access in one Spirit to the Father.”[3]

The concept of the Trinity has confused many, but it doesn’t need to. The trinity is not a problem, it is a solution.

The Omnis

You’re probably familiar with the “omnis”, so I won’t slow down too much here. The fancy words for the common ones are omniscience, omnipresence, and omnipotence. Briefly, they mean that there are no constraints on God’s knowledge, there is no sense in which God is restricted by location, and there is no greater power. There is much more to it than that, but that’s enough to ponder for this morning.

Aseity

Aseity is an obscure word, but I like it. It may be handy for you to know, but if you forget the word you should at least remember the concept. The Latin phrase “a se” mean “from oneself”. This one is easiest to explain by contrast:

My kids do not exist by themselves. They would not have existed without me or their mother. This podium is not self-existent either. It required a craftsman, who used wood, that demands a tree, and soil and sunlight and so on. In fact, nothing in the universe is self-existent. The only thing that exists “a se” is God.

God’s existence depends on nothing and no one. God is in a class alone. All of existence can be categorized as either creator or created. There is one creator, and everything else is his creation, so that’s easy. God is self-existent. That’s aseity in a nutshell.

Simplicity

This next one will likely seem odd to you: God is the most simple being in existence. By simple, I do not mean uncomplicated or easily understandable. Simplicity means fewer parts. An automobile engine has thousands of parts. A mousetrap has only a few. The mousetrap is the more simple thing because it has fewer components. God is simpler still. He is comprised of only one thing:  divinity.

In short, God is God. He is not a collection of attributes. That would imply that those things exist outside of him. But we don’t believe that there is a parts store in the sky and God purchased a bunch of omniscience and mercy and knowledge and patience and aseity. If that were true, you and I should shop at the same store God does! But God didn’t get love from anywhere because God himself is love. He does not “have” lots of mercy – he himself is mercy. God’s attributes are not parts of him. God does not have parts. He simply is. “Because God cannot depend on what is not God in order to be God, theologians traditionally insist that all that is in God is God.[4]”

Immanence/Transcendence

Immanence and transcendence are a couple of my favorite attributes of God, and they have to go together.

·  Immanence means “among us”.

·  Transcendence means “apart from us”, or “wholly other”.

God is both immanent and transcendent, and that doesn’t make sense unless you are a believer.

Contrast

God is nothing like man. Treating him casually has cost the lives of Uzzah, Nadab, Abihu, Ananias, Sapphira, and countless others. In scripture, when God comes near, humanity falls on its face in terror and expects death. God is nothing like us, and ignoring that fact is extremely dangerous.

And yet, God came to live among men. He walked in the garden. He set up his tabernacle among the people. He not only came to earth but he came as one of us. He wasn’t merely like us – he was us. He was tempted as we are. He experienced pain and sickness and frustration like we do. To ignore this fact is to miss the point of Christianity entirely.

The Tension

So God is nothing like us and he is very much like us. He is distant and unattainable, yet simultaneously accessible from anywhere. He is beyond us and he is among us. We can know about him factually and we can know him experientially. He is transcendent and imminent.

I don’t have time to talk about the perils of majoring on one and excluding the other, but it is a real problem. Neither is a good idea.

Application

For our purposes this morning, I mention this as a piece of advice for you to consider. In worship, be conscious that your songs reflect both aspects of God. For me (and I think the authors of scripture), doctrine drives doxology. What this means is that when pondering the truth of who God is (doctrine) you will be compelled to worship him (doxology). There is no other adequate response.

For me, meditating on his attributes of transcendence and immanence is especially evocative.

This morning we sang Holy, Holy, Holy and reflected on God’s perfection and glory as a being worshiped by angels in heaven. We also sang that from the day he saved our soul we have been in his arms. Do you see the contrast? We sang “I will wait for you” because we know that we live in darkness and we encounter storms and God seems distant on his throne. And we also sang that in the valley he is near, in the quiet he is near, and God stands firmly by our side despite heights and depths that seem insurmountable.

God is transcendent and he is immanent. Reflect on that in your worship, as you pray, as you read scripture, as you ponder a sermon, as you go about life. God is near and he is for you, but don’t dare treat him casually. Transcendence and immanence. Both are true. Both are vital.

Other Attributes

We could talk about so many more…  God is loving, merciful, wrathful, jealous, patient, and on and on. This alone could be a whole series! You’re likely familiar with the Fruit of the Spirit[5]. That fruit is observed in Christians because when you are being made into the image of Christ[6], you being to look like him. (Notice that the Fruit of the Spirit means we look like Christ? Just another indication that the two share the same essence.)

All these other attributes of God’s nature are probably more familiar to you than things like aseity or immutability – but they are allessential characteristics of God. Again – not because he has these attributes in the sense that they comprise him – but because each of these things exist and are fully expressed in him. As I said before, all that is in God is God. So when thinking of God’s attributes, we’re not looking at parts of God, but aspects of him. It may help to think in terms of examining the facets of a jewel. No facet exists apart from the gem. They are one and the same. The facets are just ways of focusing our attention on one concept at a time. Is it really any surprise that puny humans are unable to behold all of God’s glory at once?

History & Orthodoxy

Anthony’s intro to this series talked about another topic that fascinates me … creeds. The church has developed creeds, confessions, and catechisms over the millennia to summarize the core of the bible’s message about God.

The Nicene Creed begins “I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth”. True, but short. It doesn’t say a lot, but what it says is right[7].

The Westminster Confession[8] on the other hand, goes into some crazy detail[9]. See what you think of this statement:

There is but one only[10] living, and true God[11]; who is infinite in being and perfection[12]; a most pure spirit[13]; invisible[14]; without body, parts[15], or passions[16]; immutable[17]; immense[18]; eternal[19]; incomprehensible[20]; almighty[21]; most wise[22]; most holy[23]; most free[24]; most absolute[25]; working all things according to the counsel of His own immutable and most righteous will[26]; for, His own glory[27]; most loving[28]; gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin[29]; the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him[30]; and withal, most just, and terrible in His judgments[31]; hating all sin[32]; and who will by no means clear the guilty[33].

God hath all life[34]; glory[35]; goodness[36]; blessedness[37]; in and of Himself; and is alone in and unto Himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creatures which He hath made[38]; nor deriving any glory from them[39]; but only manifesting His own glory in, by, unto, and upon them. He is the alone fountain of all being, of whom, through whom, and to whom are all things[40]; and hath most sovereign dominion over them, to do by them, for them, or upon them whatsoever Himself pleaseth[41]. In His sight all things are open and manifest[42]; His knowledge is infinite, infallible, and independent upon the creature[43]; so as nothing is to Him contingent, or uncertain[44]. He is most holy in all His counsels, in all His works, and in all His commands[45]. To Him is due from angels and men, and every other creature, whatsoever worship, service, or obedience He is pleased to require of them[46].

In the unity of the Godhead there be three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost[47]: the Father is of none, neither begotten, nor proceeding; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father[48]; the Holy Ghost eternally proceeding from the Father and the Son[49].

I suppose I could have just read that statement this morning and called it a day! Those confessions are meaty! If someone asked you who God was, would you come up with that answer? I know I wouldn’t. But I want to!

This highlights the value of these creeds and confessions. They were created by people way smarter than we are, who spent their lives on one subject, and who gathered to discuss and debate the fine points of the faith for weeks, and sometimes years! It doesn’t make them infallible, but they are at least worth reading and considering and measuring against scripture. THIS ought to be what informs your idea of who God is, and the measuring stick you use to determine whether the latest craze sweeping popular culture or evangelicalism is actually a faithful representation of God. By the way, if you wish there was something that went into even more depth and had even more scriptural support, you’re my kind of nerd. You should check out Systematic Theology[50]. Also, that statement I just read had a lot of words that may be foreign or confusing. Come to Message Plus and we can discuss them.

Summary

This topic is deep. We had limited time this morning, but hopefully you have learned some new things and some familiar things have been drawn to the surface for contemplation over the next week. Of course, there is MessagePlus as I’ve mentioned, where we can discuss any of these you would like, so join me if that interests you.

Benediction

We are not a church that typically does this, but rather than a closing prayer, I would like to read a benediction over all of us just as Paul pronounced over the Ephesians.

“May Christ dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.[51]”

_________________________________________________________________

[1] Luke 3:22

[2] Matthew 28:19

[3] Eph 2:18

[4] James Dolezal, from his excellent book on the subject titled “All That Is in God: Evangelical Theology and the Challenge of Classical Christian Theism.”

[5] Galatians 5:22-23

[6] Romans 8:29

[7] It continues with statements about Jesus and the Holy Spirit. They are God as well but will be covered in coming weeks.

[8] Chapter 2

[9] And another feature I like is every phrase is cross-referenced to supporting scriptures.

[10] Deu 6:4; 1Co 8:4, 6

[11] 1Th 1:9; Jer 10:10

[12] Job 11:7-9; Job 26:14

[13] Jhn 4:24

[14] 1Ti 1:17

[15] Deu 4:15-16; Jhn 4:24; Luk 24:39

[16] Act 14:11, 15

[17] Jam 1:17; Mal 3:6

[18] 1Ki 8:27; Jer 23:23-24

[19] Psa 90:2; 1Ti 1:17

[20] Psa 145:3

[21] Gen 17:1; Rev 4:8

[22] Rom 16:27

[23] Isa 6:3; Rev 4:8

[24] Psa 115:3

[25] Exd 3:14

[26] Eph 1:11

[27] Prov 16:4; Rom 11:36

[28] 1Jo 4:8; 1Jo 4:16

[29] Exd 34:6-7

[30] Hbr 11:6

[31] Neh 9:32-33

[32] Psa 5:5-6

[33] Nah 1:2-3; Exd 34:7

[34] Jhn 5:26

[35] Act 7:2

[36] Psa 119:68

[37] 1Ti 6:15; Rom 9:5

[38] Act 17:24-25

[39] Job 22:2-3

[40] Rom 11:36

[41] Rev 4:11; 1Ti 6:15; Dan 4:25; Dan 4:35

[42] Hbr 4:13

[43] Rom 11:33-34; Psa 147:5

[44] Act 15:18; Eze 11:5

[45] Psa 145:17

[46] Rev 5:12-14

[47] 1Jo 5:7; Mat 3:16-17; Mat 28:19; 2Co 13:14

[48] Jhn 1:14; Jhn 1:18

[49] Jhn 15:26; Gal 4:6

[50] For a very accessible but thorough treatment, I recommend “The Christian Faith” (1056 pg) or “Pilgrim Theology” (512 pg) – both by Michael Horton.

[51] Ephesians 3:17-21

Following God: The Bible

“We believe the Holy Bible to be the inspired Word of God, inerrant in its original manuscripts. It is our standard for faith and practice and the measure by which all of life and personal revelation is to be evaluated.” (2 Timothy 3:15-17; 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 2 Peter 1:21)

So let’s talk about the Bible. Why do we believe what we do about the Bible, and why does it matter?

1.We claim the Bible is ‘breathed out,’ or inspired: [1] God expressed himself accurately, uniquely and sufficiently through human authors. All communication occurs in a context, so the writers use their language (Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek), their jargon and their personality (there are different styles), but God inspired them and guided them.

The Bible is unique in that it is the only revelation from God to which we ascribe this level of trust. There is no other revelation that carries the authority of the Bible. It is it the only revelation of this nature that we have, it’s the only revelation of this nature that we need. 

2. We claim the Bible is infallible, or incapable of erring: 

“When all facts are known, the Scriptures in their original autographs and properly interpreted will be shown to bewholly true in everything that they affirm.”  (Dr. Paul Feinberg) [2]

“What the authors intend for us to understand or obey, properly understood in its… context, is true.” (John Piper)

 To say this confidently, we need to be confident that what we have today is what we are supposed to have, and that we are able to interpret it properly. Fortunately, that’s our next sections J

3. We claim the Bible is canonical (the books are the right books). The ‘canon’ is a ruler, a measure by which all other claims to revelation are judged.  

Old Testament[3] 

Ezra, in the late 5th century BC, gave 22 (the 39 we have now) books to the Sopherim (priests who performed their functions at the Temple, and who eventually became the Sanhedrin). Shortly after, the Jews closed the Old Testament canon, because “ the succession of prophets ceased” (Josephus) and “the Holy Spirit departed from Israel.” (Talmud). They believed that God had said all He had to say at that point in history. Besides, Northern Israel was gone and Southern Israel was in exile. The prophets said this was a time of punishment – which included the idea that God was going to be silent. Josephus wrote in the first century AD:

For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another [as the Greeks have] but only twenty-two books (they combined the 39 to 22), which contain the records of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine; and of them five belong to Moses, which contain his laws and the traditions of the origin of mankind until his death…but as to the time from the death of Moses until the reign of Artaxerxes king of Persia, who reigned after Xerxes, the prophets, who were after Moses, wrote down what was done in their times in thirteen books. The remaining four books contain hymns to God, and precepts for the conduct of human life.”

 NEW TESTAMENT

There were at least five requirements (some list more) for verifying which Holy Spirit-inspired books were to be included in the New Testament:

A.  Apostolicity: Was the book written by a first generation apostle or disciple? (Which, by the way, is why all those books in the Da Vinci Code were never going to be considered.)

B. Authenticity: Do historical traditions affirm the writings’ authorship and authority?[4]

C. Ubiquity: Did the book have a history of "continuous and widespread approval” among Christians?

D. Universality: Is the book consistent with the OT and known NT writings?

E. Effect: Does the book change lives? Does it have a spiritual and moral effect?

The shape of the accepted books took place fairly quickly considering how long it would have taken for the writing to circulate and be discussed. Paul was writing in the 50’s; Matthew, Mark and Luke were written in the 70’s.

·      Clement of Rome: eight New Testament books (A.D. 95)

·      Polycarp, a disciple of John the Apostle: 15 books (A.D. 108)

·      Ignatius of Antioch: seven books (A.D. 115)  

·      Irenaeus, in 130 A.D.: current canon, with some reservations 

·      140 A.D: The Muratorian Fragment  and the Marcionite Canon record a list of books very similar to what we have today

·      150-180: most current NT books were widely accepted

·      Origen, in 185: current canon with some reservations

·      Athanasius, AD 367 - accepted them all

·      Following church councils affirmed the core canon, though some traditions added certain books (the ‘deuterocanonical’ books). All traditions agree on the core canon.

http://visualunit.me. Statistics taken from The Bibliographical Test Updated, Christian Research Journal, volume 35, number 03 (2012) www.equip.org/article/the-bibliographical-test-updated/ 

From A.D. 100 - 300, there are 36,000 early quotations of the New Testament in the existing documents from the early church fathers (typically quotes contained in sermons). We could basically recreate the New Testament from these writing if we needed to.[5]

Here’s a visual from Dan Wallace: if you could stack all the extant manuscripts from other ancient sources, the stack would be about 5 feet tall. If you could stack all the extant fragments or the New Testament only, it would be about a mile high. 

"There is no body of ancient literature in the world which enjoys such a wealth of good textual attestation as the New Testament… if the New Testament were a collection of secular writings, their authenticity would generally be regarded as beyond all doubt." F. F. Bruce 

" It can be asserted with confidence that the sacred text is exact and valid and that no article of faith and no moral precept in it has been distorted or lost." - B.B Warfield

 5. We claim the Bible is knowable. It can be studied accurately.

 “We affirm the necessity of interpreting the Bible according to its literal, or normal, sense.  The literal sense is… the meaning which the writer expressed.  Interpretation according to the literal sense will take account of all figures of speech and literary forms found in the text. This means the correct interpretation is the one which discovers the meaning of the text in its grammatical forms and in the historical, cultural context in which the text is expressed.” Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

 6. We claim the Bible is true. Everything else in our Statement of Faith builds from that premise.  

“… here is a faith firmly rooted in certain... historical events, a faith which would be false and misleading if those events had not actually taken place, but which, if they did take place, is unique in its relevance and exclusive in its demands on our allegiance. For these events did not merely set a process in motion and then themselves sink back into the past. The unique historical origin of Christianity is ascribed permanent, authoritative, absolute significance; what happened once is said to have happened once for all..." J.N.D Anderson

 The Bible reveals who God is.

The Bible reveals who we are (human nature).

The Bible reveals what is wrong with the world, and the solution.

The Bible reveals how we are designed to live.

The Bible reveals why we have value, dignity and worth.

The Bible reveals Truth.

7. We claim the Bible is “existentially meaningful.”  It says something profound about human experience. In other words, the way in which the Bible matches up with and explains reality has profound implications. [6]

The Bible says our existence is very real.  Some religions teach that our experience of life as an illusion – in fact, even Stephen Hawking before he died claimed that our universe as a holographic projection.[7] But that’s not what we experience. We experience a very real world, where we have to look both ways before we cross the street, and food keeps us alive, and the Lions are terrible. The Bible says that the Universe and Humanity were created by a Good Creator. He made a real world, and Jesus blessed it by entering into it Himself. Christianity explains the origin and continuation of what you are experiencing now: real life, in a real world.

The Bible says there is good and evil. Atheism has no room for this language. 

 “In a world of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won’t find rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice.  The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”  - Richard Dawkins.

Eastern religions struggle with this same dilemma.  If all is one – if pantheism is true – then everything that happens is part of God, and any distinction between good and evil is an illusion. The Bible speaks of real categories of good and evil just like we experience. There is a God who is completely good, and by which we can understand good and evil.  There is a world in which evil is not an illusion (so I don’t have to pretend it’s not there). Acknowledging evil makes the good of healing and justice possible.

The Bible claims we are morally significant people. We have the ability to make moral choices for which we are culpable– remember, that’s biblically grounded language - and we are responsible.  People in every worldview at least live and order society as if we do good and bad things, and everybody believes SOMETHING is responsible – but there are remarkably different explanations.

·      genetics (humanism)

·      societal pressure (postmodernism)

·      religious oppression (Islam)

Apparently, we go wrong because fate has forced us, through nature or nurture, in a particular direction to the degree that we might be merely helpless victims and not responsible in any meaningful sense of the word. But we don’t respond to life this way. If someone robs, or murders, or rapes, or drives impaired….we expect for the people involved to be treated as morally responsible people. But why should we do that if it’s not their fault?

I think the Christian worldview allows us to exercise wisdom in determining if there are times when trauma genuinely takes decision-making abilities away from people. However, we are created as beings capable of doing moral actions that are praiseworthy or blameworthy because at some point we have chosen to do them. Creation groans or rejoices because we have made it so. 

The Bible claims that justice is important, in this life and the next. Justice has no meaning in a world in which there is no good or evil and no one is responsible. Either we all seek an illusion, or we seek a real thing.  Yet we all seek justice. From the time we are born, we see the need for situations to be made right. If there is no evil (the claims of atheism and some eastern religions), there is no such thing as justice, which seeks to make bad things right; there is only stopping people from doing things the majority does not prefer. Christianity recognizes that justice is a real thing, and God requires us to pursue it now.

 The Bible claims that people have intrinsic, eternal worth. How we treat them physically, spiritually, emotionally, relationally…these all matter because we are image bearers of God with eternal souls. 

·      Modern physicists say we are “chemicals running around in a bag,” according to Time magazine.  

·      Dawkins says,  “We are machines built by our DNA.” 

·      Scott Adams, the guy behind Dilbert, likes to describe us as “moist robots.” 

·      There’s an idea floating around in some circles that we are zombies in a sense, just bodies stumbling around with no self, soul, or consciousness inside.

Dinesh D’Souza gives two competing stories: 

"You are the descendant of a tiny cell of primordial protoplasm washed up on an empty beach 3 1/2 billion years ago. You are a mere grab bag of atomic particles, a conglomeration of genetic substance. You exist on a tiny planet in a minute solar system in an empty corner of a meaningless universe. You came from nothing and are going nowhere."

"You are the special creation of a good and all-powerful God. You are the climax of His creation. Not only is your kind unique, but you are unique among your kind. Your Creator loves you so much and so intensely desires your companionship and affection that He gave the life of His only son that you might spend eternity with him.

     When we treat people like people matter, we do so because we hold a view of life that lines up with the Bible. 

Now, do we live these important revelations in the Bible? Do we follow them to their conclusions and practically apply them to our lives?

·      There is a design for the universe?  That makes sense. “There is a design for my finances and my sex life? Well, the Bible is such an old book.”

·      People matter? Absolutely. “I just have to look out for myself and do what’s right for me.” 

·      We are moral beings with the privilege of making choices.  Awesome. “But that thing I did last weekend was not my fault.”

·      Justice is an amazing gift from God. “Please don’t make me feel the consequences.”

·      People have inherent value, dignity and worth. “I love reality shows where people are humiliated.”“Wow, I really gave Bob a piece of my mind!  You should have seen his face!”  “It’s just porn.”    

·      The love of money is the root of all evil. Generosity rules! But the first question we ask when we get a paycheck is “What can I buy?” rather than “Who can I help?”

 If the Bible is the best explanation for life, then it’s the best explanation for life. We cannot pick and choose the sections of the Bible that we think are relevant to our lives. It’s all or nothing.

RECOMMENDED RESOURCES

http://biblos.com.  An excellent site with parallel versions, links to other similar verses, cross references, commentary.

http://www.biblegateway.com.   Bible Gateway has a searchable online Bible in over 100 versions and 50 languages, plus TONS of helps.

http://www.followtherabbi.com/Brix?pageID=1458.  Ray Vander Laan’s site called “Follow the Rabbi.”  An intriguing look into Jewish worldviews and customs, as well as other cultural insights.

http://www.str.org/site/PageServer.  Greg Koukl’s site, Stand To Reason, has a ton of helpful information, including a lot of insight on how to read the Bible accurately. Just search “Reading the Bible” on his site, and you will be off and running. 

http://bible.cc/.  A great online parallel Bible with TONS of resources. 

Dan Wallace (a great place to start are his commentaries at bible.org) is the current gold standard on biblical manuscripts. https://www.dts.edu/people/daniel-wallace/

Cold Case Christianity (http://coldcasechristianity.com) – the website and J. Warner Wallace’s books, Cold Case Christianity and God’s Crime Scene.

Can We Still Believe the Bible? An Evangelical Engagement with Contemporary Questions, by Craig Blomberg (I have not read it, but it’s been highly recommended). 

The Case for Christ and The Case For Faith by Lee Strobel

 Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, by Kenneth Bailey. 

 Insights into Bible Times and Customs, by G. Christian Weiss

Understanding the Difficult Words of Jesus, by David Bivin and Roy Blizzard.

Hard Sayings of the Bible, by Walter Kaiser, F.F. Bruce, and others. 

Is God a Moral Monster?  Making Sense of the Old Testament God, by Paul Copan.   A book on how to read the Old and New Testament faithfully, with a focus on understanding God in the Old Testament. 

The Lost World Of Scripture, by John Walton.

Hard Saying of the Old Testament, by Walter C. Kaiser, Jr.  Insight into the historical, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds of troublesome passages in the Old Testament. 

Hard Sayings of Paul, by Manfred T. Brauch. This book takes forty-eight different teachings of Paul, and provides background and context.

Misreading Scripture With Western Eyes, by E. Randolph Roberts and Brandon O’Brien

Walking In The Dust Of Rabbi Jesus, Lois Tverberg. (her website is ourrabbijesus.com) 

Series on Biblical books by Timothy Keller (such as Galatians For You) or N.T. Wright (his New Testament for Everyone set)

 __________________________________________________________________________

[1] In 2 Timothy 3:15-17, Paul says to Timothy, “You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

[2] John Frame adds an important explanation of this. He notes that we describe our ages truthfully but imprecisely (“I am 50”), or we say things like, “That book is 300 pages long” when it’s actually 298, or “I got there at 5:00” when I got there at 5:01. Nobody holds this against us. 

“I think it is helpful to define inerrancy… by saying that inerrant language makes good on its claims….Many writers have enumerated what are sometimes called qualifications: non-chronological narrative, round numbers, imprecise quotations, pre-scientific descriptions of natural phenomenon (e.g., “the sun rose”), use of figures and symbols, imprecise descriptions (as Mark 1:5, which says that ‘everyone’ from Judea and Jerusalem went to hear John the Baptist). I do not describe them as “qualifications” of inerrancy. These are merely applications of the basic meaning of inerrancy: that it asserts truth, not precision. Inerrant language… makes good on its own claims, not on claims that are made for it by thoughtless readers.”  - “What Does Inerrancy Mean?”  

Justin Taylor, Gospel Coalition. https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/what-does-inerrancy-mean/

[3] The Law of Moses was taught to the priests and commanded to be publically read aloud every seven years so that the Israelites would not forget God’s laws (Deut. 31:9-11); nothing was to be added to or subtracted from its words (Deut. 4:2; 12:32). The stone tablets upon which God inscribed the Ten Commandments were stored in the Ark of the Covenant (Exod. 25:16, 21; Deut. 10:2-5; 1 Kgs 8:9; Heb. 9:4), a sacred place. Biblical authors make reference to earlier biblical writings (2 Kgs 14:6; 2 Chron. 25:4; 35:12; Ezra 6:18; Neh. 8:1, 3, 5, 8; etc.)  The prophets often rebuked Israel for not obeying the words of their predecessors (2 Chron. 24:19; 36:15-16; Ezra 9:11; Neh. 9:26, 30; Jer. 7:25-26; etc.).  There were written forms of prophetic oracles (2 Chron. 21:12; Isa. 30:8; Jer. 25:13; 29:1; etc.), as well as histories recorded by prophets (1 Chron. 29:29; 2 Chron. 9:29; 12:15; 13:22; etc.).  - http://www.credomag.com/2015/03/25/how-did-we-get-the-old-testament-paul-d-wegner/)

 [4] For example, Papias, a student of the Apostle John, observed that John said of the Apostle Mark that he "wrote down accurately... whatsoever [Peter] remembered of the things said or done by Christ. Mark committed no error... for he was careful of one thing, not to omit any of the things [Peter] had heard, and not to state any of them falsely."

[5] An example of reliability: When comparing Massoretic texts (900s) and Qumran texts (100s), Isaiah 53 has 17 letters different: 10 are spelling differences (honor/honour); 4 are additional conjunctions (‘and’). One is the last 3 letters for the Hebrew word for ‘light,’ added to complete the thought of "they shall see" at the end of verse 11. In other words, the accuracy is remarkable. This accuracy is seen over and over as more and more ancient manuscripts are uncovered.

[6] See my series “The Shape Of Reality” on my blog for a more detailed discussion on the following list. http://empiresandmangers.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-shape-of-reality.html

[7] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/05/02/professor-stephen-hawkings-final-theory-universe-hologram/

Following God: Statement Of Faith

“I believe in one thing only, the power of human will.” - Joseph Stalin

“There's nothing I believe in more strongly than getting young people interested in science and engineering, for a better tomorrow, for all humankind.” - Bill Nye

“It’s my life, it’s now or never. I’m not gonna’ live forever – I just want to live while I’m alive. My life is like an open highway; like Frankie said, ‘I did it my way.’ I just want to live while I’m alive. Its my life.” (Bon Jovi, “It’s My Life.”)

Everybody believes something.We are formed by what we think is true and good. We might not always be consistent, but our lives follow the trajectory of our beliefs. David wrote in Psalm 115:

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but do not speak;
eyes, but do not see. They have ears, but do not hear;
 noses, but do not smell. They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk;
 and they do not make a sound in their throat. Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them. (Psalm 115:4-8)

We become like what we believe – and ultimately, what we worship. So we are going to walk through our statement of faith in the next number of weeks to cover what we as a church confirm that we believe, because that informs how we worship and whom we become. 

CREEDS

Our statement of faith affirms and is based on the classic Christian creeds. Creed comes from the Latin word ‘credo’, meaning 'I believe'. We see the first statements emerging within the New Testament itself. 

·      55 AD: “Yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.” (1 Corinthians 8:6)

·      55 AD “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.” (1 Corinthians 15:3-7)

·      62 AD “Though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.  And being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.  Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (Philippians 2:6-11)

·      67 AD “Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of  our religion: He was manifested in the flesh, vindicated in the Spirit, seen by angels, preached among the nations, believed on in the world, taken up in glory.” (1 Timothy 3:16)

When the early church wrestled with differing theological challenges, they formed their own formal essential statements of belief. Iraneus is the first non-biblical writer to record a creed. He wrote around 180 AD about what he called the Rule of Faith:

: “. . . this faith: in one God, the Father Almighty, who made the heaven and the earth and the seas and all the things that are in them; and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who was made flesh for our salvation; and in the Holy Spirit, who made known through the prophets the plan of salvation, and the coming, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the bodily ascension into heaven of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and his future appearing from heaven in the glory of the Father to sum up all things and to raise anew all flesh of the whole human race . . .”

Hippolytus (225 AD) wrote this account of a baptismal service:

 When the person being baptized goes down into the water, he who baptizes him, putting his hand on him, shall say: "Do you believe in God, the Father Almighty?"  And the person being baptized shall say: "I believe." Then holding his hand on his head, he shall baptize him once. And then he shall say: "Do you believe in Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who was born of the Virgin Mary, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and was dead and buried, and rose again the third day, alive from the dead, and ascended into heaven, and sat at the right hand of the Father, and will come to judge the living and the dead?" And when he says: "I believe," he is baptized again. And again he shall say: "Do you believe in the Holy Spirit, in the holy church, and the resurrection of the body?" The person being baptized shall say: "I believe," and then he is baptized a third time.

As time went on, they became more detailed as they more specifically addressed new challenges. What follows is a combination of the Nicene Creed (320) and the Apostolic Creed (390), two of the earliest church-wide creeds that made official what had been taught as the core of the gospel for 300 years:

 I believe in God the Father, Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible; And in Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, our Lord, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.

Who, for us [ALL] for our salvation, came down from heaven, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary and made man; he suffered under Pontius Pilate; was crucified, dead and buried: He descended into hell (or the dead). The third day he rose again from the dead: He ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty: from thence he shall come in glory to judge the quick and the dead, and whose Kingdom shall have no end;

 I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life; who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]; who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified; who spoke by the prophets.

 I believe in the holy catholic and apostolic church: 

 The communion of saints:

The forgiveness of sins:

The resurrection of the body (the dead):

And the life everlasting in the world to come. Amen.

CONFESSIONS

Around the 1500’s (post-Reformation), we start to see Confessions of Faith that include statements on the Bible.[1] Confessions (again, generally speaking) are statements which a person must affirm in order to be accepted into a formal church body (ie, a denomination). These statements are like creeds in that they are drawn from scripture, but they fill in a lot of the blanks that the creeds leave. (For instance, creeds say little about creation, eschatology, means of baptism, sanctification, church discipline, exactly how God saves, etc): 

·      The Augsburg Confession in 1530 (Lutheran)

·      Belgic Confession of Faith in 1561 (Netherlands, Dutch Reformed)

·      The 39 Articles in 1571 (England, Anglican)

·      Westminster Confession Of Faith in 1646 (Scotland, Presbyterian)

·      London Baptist Confession of Faith in 1689  (Switzerland, Baptist)[2]

STATEMENTS AND DECLARATIONS

Statements and Declarations are a more recent development created by churches, denominations, organizations, or various alliances when they think that the view of the church needs to be made public on a specific issue. They are certainly worth taking a look at, as they hopefully help us clarify our views and state them more succinctly. They are, however, different from the above categories.

·      Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy

·      Manhattan Declaration (life, marriage, religious liberty)

·      Nashville Statement (human sexuality/gender roles)

·      The Ligonier Statement on Christology (Jesus)

In evangelicalism in the United States – which is our historical stream - a history of statements and declarations from the National Association of Evangelicals (1942) looks something like this:

·      National Association of Evangelicals Ecology Resolution (1970)

·      Chicago Declaration of Evangelical Social Concern (1973)

·      National Association of Evangelicals Resolution on Racism (1991)

·      Evangelical Declaration Against Torture (2007)

·      Manhattan Declaration (2009 – life, marriage, and religious freedom)

·      National Association of Evangelicals Statement On Immigration (2009)

·      Nashville Statement (2017) from the Coalition On Biblical Sexuality

Our statement of faith is meant to stand firmly on the tradition on the theological creeds while offering statements on historic Christian belief on two specific issues that have implications for image bearing (the sanctity of life) and covenant (marriage).

The Bible: We believe the Holy Bible to be the inspired Word of God, inerrant in its original manuscripts. It is our standard for faith and practice and the measure by which all of life and personal revelation is to be evaluated. (2 Timothy 3:15-17; 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 2 Peter 1:21)

God (The Father): We believe that there is one God (Deuteronomy 6:4), eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit (John 8:54-59). He is Creator, Redeemer and the Sovereign Ruler of the universe. We believe that God is omnipotent (He can do anything that can be done), omniscient (He knows anything that can be known), omnipresent (there is no place or circumstance of which God is unaware or in which he is not active), and unchanging. He is perfect in holiness, infinite in wisdom, and measureless in power.

God (The Son, Jesus Christ): We believe in the historical reality of Jesus Christ as the only incarnation of God. We believe in His deity, His virgin birth (Matthew 1:18-23), His sinless life  (Hebrews 7:26; 1 Peter 2:22), His miracles (Acts 2:22; Acts 10:38), His substitutionary death (1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21), His bodily resurrection from the dead (Matthew 28:6; Luke 24:39; 1 Corinthians 15:4), His ascension to the right hand of the Father (Acts 1:9; Acts 1:11; Acts 2:33; Philippians 2:9-11; Hebrews 1:3), His intercession for the sins of His people (1 Timothy 2:5-6), and His future personal return in power and glory (Acts 1:10-11).

God (the Holy Spirit): We believe that the Holy Spirit indwells believers (1 Corinthians 6:19-20), confirming their salvation (Romans 8:14-16) and enabling them to bear godly fruit (Galatians 5:22). We believe that the Holy Spirit convicts the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:8). The Holy Spirit also empowers believers to have a bold and effective witness (i.e Luke 12:12), so He manifests His gifts in their daily lives for the edification of the church and as a testimony to the world.

The fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-23) is the result of a Spirit-filled life, and evidence of spiritual maturity. True followers of God will be known by their fruit (Matthew 7:16).

The gifts of the Spirit are different manifestations of the Spirit to build up the body (Isaiah 11:5; I Corinthians 12:1-11). They ought always directly point people toward God (John 15:26; John 16:13-14). We are instructed to diligently seek the gifts (I Corinthians 12:31, 14:1), but they must be exercised in an orderly and understandable way (I Corinthians 14:26-33) and used in the context of love (I Corinthians 13:1-13), lest our expression cause others to stumble (1 Corinthians 8).

We have different gifts given as the Holy Spirit wills, and the gifts must be expressed in love, sincerity, and in a way which honors others above ourselves (Romans 12:1-10).

Sin: We believe that we sin (i.e, “hamartia,” in Romans 3:23, and “chata” in Judges 20:16 and Exodus 20:20) when we disobey the commands of God’s inspired Word and reject His authority All of us have sinned and are therefore, in our natural state, lost and separated from God. We believe men and women were created in the image of God (Genesis 2:26). However, by a voluntary act of the will, Adam and Eve disobeyed God (Genesis 3:6). As a result, mankind began to die spiritually (Romans 5:12-19). Sin separated humankind from God (Ephesians 2:11-18) and left us in a fallen or sinful condition (Romans 3:23; Genesis 1:26,27; Genesis 2:17; Genesis 3:6; Romans 5:12-19). 

Salvation: We believe that God the Father showed His love for all people by sending His Son to die as a substitutionary sacrifice for our sins. (Luke 18:27; John 3:16,17; Romans 11:33; 1 Peter 1:16; 1 John 4:7-10; Revelation 4:8)

We believe Jesus’ death paid the penalty our sins warranted, and His resurrection grants us the life we could not attain - both of these being necessary to reconcile us to right-standing before God. (Matthew 16:16,17 and 25:31-46; Mark 14:61,62; Luke 1:34,35 and 2:7; John 1:1 and 1:14 and 5:22-30 and 10:30 and 14:6; Acts 4:12; 1 Corinthians 15:3-8; Hebrews 4:15; 1 Peter 2:22-24.)  It is not through our efforts (Acts 4:12;  John 3:3; Romans 10:13-15; Ephesians 2:8; 
Titus 2:11; Titus 3:5-7). 

When we admit our sin, confess that Jesus is Lord, and repent, we become a new creation and are gradually transformed into the image of Christ (Galatians 5:22, 23; 2 Corinthians 5:17; 2 Corinthians 3:18)

Eternal Destiny: We believe in the resurrection of the saved and the lost, and that both will stand before the judgment seat of Christ; the saved will enter into everlasting life in God’s presence, and the lost will be sent into everlasting death, devoid of the presence of God. (Matthew 25:31-46; Mark 9:43-48; 1 Corinthians 4:5; Revelation 19:20; Revelation 20:11-15; Revelation 21:8).

The Church: We believe that the Church is Christ’s symbolic body in the earth (Colossians 1:24; 1 Corinthians 12:27), and that it should reveal His character, His message, and His love to the world.  We believe that the Church is to go into all the world, preach the gospel, and make disciples. This will lead people to have fellowship with God (Acts 1:8; Matthew 28:19,20; Mark 16:15,16) and community with others (1 Corinthians 12:13). 

Human Life: We believe that all human life is sacred and created by God in His image (Genesis 1:27). Human life is of inestimable worth in all its dimensions, including pre-born babies, the aged, the physically or mentally challenged, and every other stage or condition from conception through natural death. We are therefore called to defend, protect, and value all human life. (Psalm139)

Marriage and Sexuality: We believe that God wonderfully and immutably creates each person as male or female. Together they reflect the image and nature of God (Genesis 1:26-27).  Marriage is the uniting of one man and one woman as delineated in Scripture (Genesis 2:18-25; Matthew 19:5-6). It is intended to be a covenant by which they unite themselves for life in a single, exclusive union, ordered toward the well-being of the spouses and designed to be the environment for the procreation and upbringing of children.

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Why does this matter?

A friend recently told me a very simple but profoundly true thing: “I am the kind of person who does that kind of thing.”  It’s a phrase that’s intended to bring into sharp focus not who I think I am, but who I actually am. I an NOT talking here about victims of abuse, where actions are coerced. I am also not trying to suggest that the point is always to assign blame to something inside us. It’s a way of stating a generally true observation: What we do reflects something – healthy or unhealthy, whole or broken - about who we are.

·      I am the kind of person who does puzzles.

·      I am the kind of person who hates cardio.

·      I am the kind of person who thinks its okay when I leave stuff lying around the house for others to trip over, but not for others to do the same.

·      I am the kind of person who teaches ethics.

·      I am the kind of person who pastors.

·      I am the kind of person who rests more than I used to.

Why am I like that? Because I believe certain things to be true.

·      I believe doing a puzzle is a good use of my time. 

·      I believe that lifting heavy things will be sufficient exercise.

·      I believe that my sloppiness is inconsequential and everyone else’s is a big deal.

·      I believe ethics matter.

·      I believe pastoring is where God wants me to be.

·      I no longer believe that productivity is a sign of value.

I want to push back against this. I really do. The implications are unsettling. 

·      I should drop fried food altogether, but I don’t. I mean, I believe it’s bad for my heart, right? So what do I believe that is overriding that enough to spoil my belief about a healthy diet?

·      I believe God calls me to love my wife as a servant to her and yet I don’t do that consistently. What do I believe that is overriding my belief about servanthood?

·      I believe grace is unearned, and yet I find myself more inclined to extend grace to those whom I think deserve it. What do I believe that is overriding my belief about God’s grace? 

I can’t avoid it: What we do emerges from what we believe, whether that is a freely chosen belief or one that developed as a result of someone else’s positive or negative impact on our life. Another way of saying it: Where we follow emerges from whom we follow. 

We often say, “I believe X.” To find out if that is true in any meaningful way, look at what you constantly do or where you constantly go, and then ask yourself what that implies that you constantly believe. 

We must believe true things about God, His Word and His world in order to become true followers of Christ.  What emerges from that is meant to be life, abundant and everlasting. 

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[1] “Confessions usually were created in response to some historical controversy or event to make it clear how one group differed from others. It’s worth noting that church and state were not separated then, so while these were definitely theological distinctives, they were tightly identified with a region. Therefore, sometimes a group held to one that existed (such as Belgic or Heidelberg), but then rewrote it and tacked on their own local or religious distinctives.  Even if you don’t hold to any of these denominations, their explanations of scriptural principles are well worth reading.” – Scott Smith J

[2] “Catechisms essentially take a confession and turn it into a series of questions and answers that are easy to memorize. Examples: Westminster Catechism (Scotland, Presbyterian); Heidelberg Catechism (Germany, held today by many); New City Catechism (Tim Keller’s church – they even have an app).” – Scott, again

Followership

To start the new year, I want to talk about followership because – and I’m going to give away the point of the message this morning – there is only one leader who does not follow, and that is God. We Christians are called to be followers of Jesus before we are anything else. Great people follow great leaders well before they lead well. It is inevitable and necessary that we understand followership, or this enterprise of life in our culture and in our church is going to fall apart. 

We talk a LOT about leadership. From the time we are in elementary school and everybody wants to be the “line leader,” we are drilled with the idea of being leaders and not followers. Be a trend setter; be innovative.

If I see a conference advertised for Christians, it’s almost always about leadership. (‘Church leadership conference’: 20 million hits on google. ‘Church followership conference’: 135,000 hits, and a quick look at the list showed half the title contained the word ‘leadership’, as if the whole point of learning how to follow Jesus well is so you can lead. So…not really about followership after all. It’s seen as a means to a more important end). I’ve yet to get a mailer for a Followership conference. If I did, I doubt it would be held in a stadium. Maybe a classroom somewhere.  

Nobody takes pride in our culture in being a follower. We associate it with weakness.  You never hear at a funeral, “They were trend followers. They knew how to line up behind good leadership. They knew how to follow so well.” 

We live in a culture that devalues the art of good following. And I think that’s a problem.

 I get it: terrible things have happened when people blindly follow a leader. I remember as a kid reading about Jim Jones and his cult, and wondering how on earth people could be so gullible. The history of racism in our country was often the result of followers blindly accepting a grossly unjust status quo, and it was leaders (often Christian ones) who challenged this. 

 So, yeah, it’s important that we not be “sheeple” (docile, foolish, easily led by other people).

But…have we considered that the first recorded rebellion against God was because we (humanity) didn’t want to follow? We wanted to lead, and it was not our place. The best thing Adam and Eve could have done in the Garden was to follow God, and they didn’t.  When you read the stories of the primary figures in the Old Testament, their problem over and over is that they try to lead without having first learned how to follow the God who placed them in leadership. 

In the New Testament, the term “leader” as we think of leadership[1] in the church community is rarely used. More often than not, ‘leadership’ carries with it the idea of being an example. When words that more closely align with our idea of leadership are used, they are surrounded by cautions: 

 ·      “Not many of you should desire” it (James 3:1)

·      It’s going to look a lot like being a servant or a slave to others (Matthew 20:25-27). 

·      It’s not going to be the kind of leadership the world values: it’s not for your gain; don’t ‘lord’ over others (1 Peter 5:3). 

Following – “imitating Christ” or “being a disciple” – is the focus over and over again. Any discussion of authority or leadership stems from one’s passing on the message of Jesus and exemplifying the life of life of Jesus in words and actions. Over and over, this is about following Jesus – following him into radical self-sacrifice as seen in the “broken and spilled out” part of communion; following him into servanthood by doing lowly but honorable things, such as washing feet, etc. 

In God’s church design, ‘leaders’ are Christ-followers exemplifying Christ-followership and then helping other Christ-followers flourish in following Christ.

 Only some have this as a formal appointment, but we all have this as a calling. 

I’m not going to talk today about leadership and followership between people. Maybe that will show up this year because it’s an inescapable part of human community –we need good leaders, but not everybody is (or should be) leaders at all times or in all ways; we also need followers, which all of us are at some point or in some way. But that’s going to have to be a sermon for another time. 

I want to talk about Foundational Followership: Following Jesus. I will use three categories to help us think about this today (Rod Dempsey at disciplemakingblog.wordpress.com wrote the original list that informed my thinking here). 

Kingdom Perspectives

1.    There is only one King that we follow. (Eph. 1:21; Rev. 19:6).[2]

2.    Our job is to help others follow this King. When Paul says, “imitate me,” it’s paired with “as I imitate Christ.” 

3.    We are stewards who follow the vision of our King. Our successful stewardship will compellingly point others toward the King and pave the way into the kingdom. “Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that when they slander you as evildoers, they will observe your good works and will glorify God on the day he visits.” (I Peter 2:12)

4.    Humble obedience is a badge of honor for a good steward; it is the way in which the King plans for His followers to flourish, and by which the name of the King is made great. “Do you want the Kingdom run like the Romans run their kingdom? Their rulers have great power over the people, but God the Father doesn’t play by the Romans’ rules. 26 This is the Kingdom’s logic: whoever wants to become great must first make himself a servant; 27 whoever wants to be first must bind himself as a slave— 28 just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life as the ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:26-28)

Kingdom Principles

1.    To represent the King, we must spend time with Him:

·      his mission: save lost people 

·      his orders: spread the good news

·      our design: in His image (value, worth, dignity)

·      our purpose: glorify God by becoming like Christ

·      our worldview: the values of the King (God-others-self; people over things; love everyone as Christ loves us; be stewards committed to shalom) 

2.    If we spend time with Him, we become like Him. To be a good follower of the King, we must “be” before we “do.” (Like the Minions say, “be-do-be-do-be-do.”) Otherwise, when we go on mission, we run the risk of misrepresenting the King. I don’t mean we should passively wait until we are perfect. I mean we need to spend time with the King even as we go about the King’s business.

3.    A follower is a “doer” and not just a “be-er.” Followers don’t study the Bible and congratulate themselves on how smart they are. They do something with it. If we don’t – if it doesn’t change our lives in radical ways – we are deceiving ourselves (James 1:22). 

4.    God’s word is our textbook. Not Forbes, not the WSJ or the Washington Post, not CNN or Fox or The Constitution or somebody’s blog. Not our favorite preacher or teacher.[3]Followers of God have one primary text by which all other texts are judged. Be ready to feel the tension between the texts of empire and the Text of Kingdom. 

Kingdom Practices

1.    Followers connect new followers to the King. We are ambassadors or diplomats, tasked with representing the heart of the King, the message of the King, and the values of the Kingdom. 

2.    Followers follow the King together. Our King demands Kingdom community; forsaking community is not followership. That means face-to-face, dysfunctional, messy, hard, annoying and deeply meaningful family community.

3.    Followers are vulnerable and teachable. Leave no thought undiscovered, no behavior unexamined, no pattern unshaken, no assumption unchallenged, no attitude unchecked, no talent unexplored. #surrenderistotal

4.    Followers Follow the Mission: preach the gospel, and make disciples.

“[What] did Jesus first command us to do? “Come, follow me” (Matthew 4:19). In fact, it’s His first command, period. Maybe the place to relearn following is the place where we strip away all we have followed and find the core of what, why and whom we should follow.

“Come, follow me.” In His language, Jesus was asking His disciples to come away or come out. “Follow” did not mean to trail behind someone like a groupie waiting for an autograph but to choose to leave behind one life and completely enter another. Followers were to turn their backs to all other loyalties and priorities and turn their faces to Jesus alone. It was a radical change of focus.

That others do not want to follow our Jesus may have something to do with the reality that we do not leave behind the things we should. We talk about following Jesus, but our political, cultural, economic or personal glasses continue to filter every decision we make and every opinion we form. We are the tourists traipsing along behind the tour guide, getting sidetracked by sore feet and street vendors when our Guide is trying to point out the great kingdom sights for which we came. 

If we want the church to be a place people come to practice followership, we need to follow Jesus — not a political party, country, doctrine, church style or type, leader, or celebrity. Just Jesus.” Jill Richardson

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[1] 1 Corinthians 12:28 is a close definition of what we think of as leadership. “2941 kybérnēsis – properly, someone who steers (guides) a ship; (figuratively) the divine calling which empowers someone to lead in affairs relating to the Church. ("a helmsman who steers") refers to a pilot (a captain, as in Plato) – a director who guides, administrates, etc. (Abbott-Smith). Kybérnēsis only occurs in 1 Cor 12:28.).” Even then,“others would take it tropically here, and render it wise counsels.” – all quotes from Biblehub.

[2] “First, no one can be an effective leader until they first learn how to follow. Second, the heart of the Christ life is not leading – it’s following. The clarion call of Jesus to all who would listen was, “Follow me!” Finally, Jesus also made it clear that the greatest among us are those who serve others (Mt. 28:11).”  - James Emery White

1.     1 Corinthians 3:  “One of you says, ‘I follow Paul’; another, ‘I follow Apollos’; another, ‘I follow Cephas’; still another, ‘I follow Christ.’ Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized in the name of Paul?” Um, no.