You Can Never Go Back

A few friends and I had a conversation recently about how difficult it is to watch a football game now that is not in HD. We all laughed at how grainy old football clips are, even to the point of not being able to follow the football very well. The odd thing is that, at the time, none of us even noticed that the picture was grainy.

This phenomenon happens with just about every technology. Old pictures are far fuzzier than you remember when you first took them. We wonder how anyone ever played a game like "Pong" or "Space Invaders." And who doesn't notice the improvement of special effects in movies now?

I don't know of anyone who would trade HD for the old grainy TV. I hardly know anyone still using a "film" camera. We would never go back to those antiquated technologies. They simply do not capture reality as beautifully and as easily as modern equipment.

It is the same with the disciple of Jesus Christ. At each moment of our journey in Christ, we believe that we see our Lord clearly, and that we understand the beauty of His Word. Yet, with each successive day He comes into clearer focus, and His glory and worth becomes clearer. Sometimes, we will stumble across an old journal entry, or a note scrawled on a page, and we may chuckle at how we understood our Lord and His promises. We may marvel at our uncertainty, brashness, pride, or understanding. We see that, at that time, our picture of God was very grainy. We should be glad that the clarity has improved, and we should be grateful that we never have to go back.

Of Sin and Hell

Sin and hell have this in common: they are both terrible things. However, they are terrible in different ways. Sin is terrible because it is rebellion against God. Hell is terrible because it highlights how awful that rebellion is. Without hell, we would not understand the grievous treason that it is to shake our collective fist in the face of the Almighty God.

In my series of posts on the doctrine of hell, I have tried to demonstrate that hell is a real place, and that it is a just place. The horror of hell lies not in the mere fact of its existence, but in the fact that it must and should exist. If there is to be any sort of cosmic justice, then we must have a place where iniquity is punished to the proper degree. Hell is that place.

Dear reader, if you are not in Christ Jesus you are most certainly going to hell when you die. Everyone not found in Christ Jesus at the great day of God's judgment will forever suffer in that place where the worm never dies and the fire is never quenched. Your life is even now precarious. You could perish this very day and your soul would be required of you. It does not matter what you think of me, or of your justness, or of your wisdom, or of your own righteousness, you will certainly perish if you are not found in Christ. Your sins will weigh you down. You will not stand before God guiltless. You will surely die in your sins, if not for Jesus Christ. "Almost every natural man that hears of hell, flatters himself that he shall escape it," says Jonathan Edwards. He is certainly correct.

You must, if you have any vestige of conscience, admit that you are a lawbreaker. You have sinned, and your sin will damn you. The reason you have sinned is because you have a corrupted heart. Your own sin has flung open the doors for your own death and damnation. No other witness will be required but your own deeds. Your stolen pleasures, your lusts, your lies, and your thieving will bear witness against you. Every thought of your heart will be laid bear; every action will be examined; every word you spoke will be judged.

A converted soul will see that sin is heinous and should never exist and that hell is just and must exist. The fleshly, self-flatterer will say to themselves that sin is not really that bad and that hell is heinous. The regenerated, born-again soul will see it in the reverse. If you are a Christian, then you know this is true. This is precisely why you cling to Christ in the first place. He is the only one who can save you from your sin. We have a Savior who is come to save us from our sin. He isn't come first to save us from hell. A converted soul will first realize that they must have deliverance from sin. A converted soul will see the truth of their rebellion and see that they need a Savior from sin.

If you are reading this and do not agree, know that I have written this in hopes that you will be awakened to the danger that you are now in. If you are reading this and do agree, then it is my hope that you might be awakened to the danger of those souls around you. Their only hope is Christ Jesus. Pray for their awakening, and pray that you might be bold enough to speak the truth to them in love.

The Doctrine of Hell, Part 2

In yesterday's part one on the doctrine of hell, I pointed out that the Bible teaches that hell is a place, that hell is a place where justice is meted out, and that hell is a place that God Himself created. Hell is a good place, though it is quite terrible. It is good because hell is a just place. Hell is where sin is punished exactly as it ought to be punished. The failure to understand that hell is a place where justice prevails is, perhaps, one of the primary reasons we shirk the doctrine of hell altogether.

Though we are all sinful and selfish beings, we all have an innate sense that there is something called "justice." We may, and often do, disagree as to what justice might look like, but we have a keen sense of "fair" and "unfair." This is why the idea that a loving God would not send anyone to hell simply falls flat on its face, even in a cursory examination. We understand that crimes deserve punishment. If an infamous criminal came before a judge, and the judge said, "I'm going to let you go because I am too loving to punish the guilty." We would immediately protest. The families of the victim of the criminal would be especially upset. How could God get away with being less just than a human judge?

So then, I do not think that the idea that a loving God would not send anyone to hell is really a very serious argument at all. It could be that this objection really comes from the idea that hell is too harsh for the crimes committed. This, in my opinion, is a much better objection. How can God punish for eternity something done in a finite time? Also, how can God punish someone in hell simply for failing to believe that God exists and/or that Jesus Christ is the Messiah? Do people really deserve an eternity of agony for not capitulating to God? And if they do, doesn't this make God some sort of tyrant unfit to be worshipped or served?

These are excellent questions, and these questions are why feathers get ruffled by the idea that Ghandi might be in the same hell as Hitler. Christians ought to take time to work through these questions for the sake of their own sanity, and for the sake of those who would sincerely like to know how we could believe such a thing. The Bible teaches, quite clearly, that if Ghandi died a Christ-rejector then he does go into the same hell as a Christ-rejecting Hitler. How can this be just?

First, we have to recognize that rejecting Jesus of Nazareth is not the same as rebuffing the friendship of just any other person. Jesus is the Messiah, the perfect representative of God on earth, for in Christ "the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily" (Colossians 2:9). God is not like our neighbor. Here is a partial description of what God is like from the Westminster Catechism:

God hath all life, glory, goodness, blessedness, in and of himself; and is alone in and unto himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creatures which he hath made, not deriving any glory from them, 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.

Follow this simple logic. God is the fountain of all being. God is good. Therefore, all the good that we enjoy comes from the fountain of God's being. Let me break down what that means for us.

Because God is the fountain of all the good we enjoy, we are experiencing a gift from God when we love, kiss, eat, sleep, hug our family members, hold our spouse, and play with our children. Every happy thought, every joyful tear, these are all little drops of pleasure that had their source in the mind of God. When we reject Jesus Christ, and by rejecting Christ we reject God, we are rejecting the source of all of those things that are good. We are trying, in our rebellion, to get at the streams of joy without having to love the fountain from which they flow. This is pure folly and the root of all evil. What this does to us is it demonstrates that we are, in this condition, unfit for good things because we do not love the most wonderful thing of all: God Himself. Secondly, this folly cuts us off from enjoying the good things of life as we should.

Here is how rejecting God sullies the joys that we do have. Imagine a clear mountain stream. As it flows, it is crystal clear, it is cold, and it is refreshing. It will even remain liquid below freezing temperatures because it is moving. For some strange reason, we decide we love the water but hate the stream. So, we dam off a little section for ourself. The water is stilled. We play in it, but we soon find it is muddied. If we leave it alone, it freezes. As it sits alone, it also begins to stagnate. It is no longer refreshing, clear, or safe to drink. So what do we do? We curse the stream and blame it for our lousy water.

Hell may be described as a place where people go who hate God. There, they are cut off from the stream of God's goodness. Hell is a place where all of God's favor is withdrawn, even the muddy pools of our own making. God is the source and rightful owner of even the waters we muddy. For the rejection of Christ, God has decreed that we are to be cut off from the fountains of His goodness. So then, hell is partially the agony of remembering the sweet taste of stolen waters that we are no longer allowed to enjoy, and it is partially the consuming hatred of the Being who refuses to share this water on our terms.

This is why Ghandi, if he died in rebellion to Christ, goes to the same hell as Hitler. Ghandi enjoyed his muddied version of peace and equality, but if He did not love the Prince of Peace, then he cannot keep it. Hitler loved authority. But if he died not loving the Sovereign God, then he cannot keep it.

Do we still worry about Ghandi? We shouldn't if we believe in a just God. God will give Ghandi exactly what he deserves, and so it will be with Hitler. The punishment will be neither too great nor too little. It will be perfect justice. All who look on the punishment of hell will marvel. They will marvel at the folly that put people there, and they will marvel at the justice meted out in that place.

On the last post in this series, I will look at why the outright denial of hell belittles the salvation found in Jesus Christ the Lord.

Broken by Love

In honor of Valentine's Day, I want to say a few things about how love has humiliated me in all the right ways. That is, not my love for others, but specifically, the love that God has for me. Love has changed my life, and I believe that it is, at the end of the day, the only thing that really can.

The law of God is useful, but it is not as powerful as love. The Law of God is the negative side of love; that is, it points us to what God loves by showing us what God hates. When God says, "Thou shalt not steal," It means that God hates thievery. On the flip side, God loves honesty. When God says, "Do not murder," itmeans that He hates jealousy, envy, and strife. On the other hand, it teaches us that God loves life. "Do not covet" teaches us a similar lesson about what God hates, and it teaches us that God loves it when we are contented with what we have.

Herein lies the weakness of the law: it reveals hateful things in me. I confess that "not stealing" is a good law and it is holy. I love that God hates stealing. But what I find in my soul is thievery. Also, I find when God says, "Do not covet," there is a propensity in me to long for those things that aren't mine. I do this when I lust and scheme and get jealous. The law draws up the battle lines between myself and God, and in my flesh, I dig in when I hear it.

If the law of God draws up the battle lines, the love of God crosses the lines waving the flag of truce. God's love says, "You have assaulted the things that are good. You have embraced evil. You have loved wickedness. But come here to my flag of truce. I love you still. Let us have peace. I would have you for my son." And so God appeals to us in love in ways that the law cannot. The law of God says not to covet; the love of God gives me a reason not to.

Here is where I am broken by love: I see that Jesus has come because of love. I see that he was sent because of love. I see that Jesus himself is God's flag of truce. I see that Jesus has given himself, that he has died for my rebellion, and I see in that act the horror of my own sins. The law of God revealed the rebel; the love of God has broken him.

So then, I want to remember on Valentine's Day the love that broke the rebellion. I see that the One who hates murder was willing to be murdered by me so that I might see how terrible murder is. I see that the One who has all riches was willing to be impoverished so that I could see what is valuable. I see that the One who hates sin was willing to be sin so that I might become the righteousness of God. There are no words adequate to describe this love, this grace, that caused my surrender to my God. He won my surrender through His love. He showed me the foulness of my sin through His love. I am so thankful for the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord.

That is worth pondering on Valentine's Day. I pray that you will.

A Letter To My Non-Christian Friend

I hope that this letter finds you well. I have sat down to write this letter today in order to try and clear up some awkwardness that has sprouted in our relationship due to my faith in Jesus Christ. It could be that this letter will only serve to deepen that discomfort. Nevertheless, I am committed to being your friend, and I hope that we will find that the differences we have will serve to help us grow as persons.

There are many sources of contention between us regarding my faith and yours. I say "your faith" because we all implicitly place our hope in something. I place my hope in Jesus Christ and his teachings as outlined in the Bible. I know that some of the things that are in the Bible, and that I therefore believe, make you uncomfortable. They may even seem monstrous. I want to confess to you that there are many things in the Scriptures that make me uncomfortable as well, even if I am conscience bound to believe them.

Let's cut to the most difficult Biblical teaching first: the doctrine of hell. Hell is no minor point in the Bible. Jesus himself describes it as a place where "there worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched" (Mark 9:48). It is alternately described as a place of oppressing darkness, of unending despair, a place of wailing and gnashing of teeth, and an everlasting separation. It is an awful place.

More liberal theologians have attempted to soft-peddle this doctrine. They have alternately tried to deny that it exists, or that no one but "the truly terrible" will ever go there. This is an injustice to the Bible and to the historical teaching of Christ and Christians. If I were to eliminate this from my system of beliefs, it would undermine my faith. Though it sickens me, I believe that there is a hell. I believe that those who fail to love Jesus will ultimately spend their eternity there.

This is what moves me to write this letter. I want to explain how I can believe this and remain sane. I want to explain because I never want you to go there. My attempts to talk to you about Jesus are not rooted in arrogance on my part, though I confess to arrogance and pride in many, if not all, of our discussions. It is certainly not about one-upmanship. All of our disagreements, over what constitutes sexual immorality, how much one should drink, and even the 'personhood' of babies in the womb; they all flow from my understanding of Jesus and the judgment to come. Practically speaking, your sex life is infinitely less important to me than is your understanding of Jesus. If I could somehow communicate to you his grandeur, his 'realness', and his grace, then I am convinced that he could teach you all these things far better than I, and he could ultimately lead you into far more joy.

Regarding hell, you must wonder how I could believe that anyone could deserve such a fate. I believe that when any crime is committed, that the punishment must fit the crime. We probably share this core belief. So then, if hell is really that bad, the question is whether or not Jesus is that good. I believe that he is. I truly believe that. Here's why.

First, I believe that every good thing that we have is because of him. Have you loved? I know that you have. Our loves come from him. He made everything good. He gave us both the sweet fruit and the taste buds to enjoy them. He made skin and sex. He designed everything about our bodies: our eyes and eyes and nose. He gave us smell and sight and hearing. He made us in his image, and it is this image that gives birth to the impulse of music and art and joy and poems. We are little creators, copiers really. We are moved to created because we can see, unlike every other animal, the beauty of God's work, even if we do not realize that this is what moves us. This is why primitive men drew the deer running in the cave, and this is why Rembrandt painted. They saw something transcendent even in the mundane. They saw the hand of God.

Jesus is the incarnation of God. He is God with us. I believe that there is one God in Three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. One God; Three Persons. I cannot fathom how this can be because God alone is like this. But I believe his very being is why we have community, love, and relationships. It is stamped on our persons. It is why I am your friend.

What does all of this have to do with hell? This still does not explain how I can believe that people will go there. First, I will start with myself. My friend, I should be in hell. I have been pridefully arrogant towards you in ways that would warrant my punishment. Think of this: if Jesus of Nazareth was really so good, so kind, and so gentle, why on earth did they kill him? This man healed lepers, reached out to prostitutes and thieves, and even dined with the religious. He shared his love and wisdom with all. So why kill a man like this?

Because it is precisely this goodness that makes us push him away. We do not, it turns out, love what is good. We like that Jesus healed lepers. We do not like that he commanded the adulteress and the sexually immoral to cease their sin or perish. It turns out that we are fired up about his gifts: sex, relationships, and freedom, but we are not fired up about him. So we, like thieves, steal that which belongs to him and flows from him, and use it in ways which he never intended, like a child who uses a screwdriver to punch holes in the wall instead of using it for its intended purpose.

The consequences of this behavior are that we wind up not really enjoying the gift as we should. We also harm others in the process. And ultimately, we run away from God with our precious sins. We run away into the dark, like Golem with his precious, and we stroke our sin and love it, even if it proves our undoing. This truth is ever present within myself. I have done this. I am guilty. But Jesus has come to save me, not just from the things that I have done and do, but he has come to save me from myself.

I believe, ultimately, that this is precisely what hell is. It is an eternal justice in this regard: it is the permanent giving over to conceit and selfishness, devoid of the current common graces we now enjoy. It is God coming into the room with the disobedient child and taking back his screwdriver. He is saying, "You will no longer harm others with my gifts." And when he takes back that which is his, it is natural to scream, and howl, and suffer. It is a horrible fate to ever love the gift, to be addicted to it, and to never learn to love the giver.

Take abortion for example. God says that every life is sacred. He says that children are good. Abortion says that children are a burden, inconvenient, and not worthy of life. Sexual immorality says, "I know how to make me happy with sex. I know what it is for." God says, "No you don't. I'm telling you what it is for and how it can add to your happiness." Yet, we refuse his counsel, we do whatever we wish, and when we are not satisfied we blame him or those who seem to speak for him.

I know that many Christians are a pain. I know that many are judgmental. I know that many who claim to be Christians really aren't, and they are truly as foul as you think that they are. I grieve at that. I find it difficult to share the truth about Jesus because of them. I find it hard to show you the love of God displayed for us in the death of Jesus.

This letter is already too long. I thank you if you have made it this far. Perhaps what I have said has further angered you. I beg of you, please let me know where and how. I am willing to listen. I would not be much of a friend if I didn't.

I want to close this letter with a few questions. Really, I want to ask you to think about something upon which everything else hinges. Who do you think Jesus of Nazareth is? You know what I think. What do you think?

Do you think he really rose from the dead? Think about that. If he didn't, it is the grandest conspiracy in the history of the world. It means that Peter, Paul, and hundreds of the early Christians were liars. It is historically undoubtable that they either lied or that they saw Jesus alive after he died and was buried. Could it be that he really did rise from the dead? I confess to you that if I were persuaded that he didn't, I would cease to be a Christian immediately. All my hope is fixed on the resurrection of Jesus. Could it be that he really did rise from the dead? If he did it changes everything. Could it be that he really was the Son of God? That he really did die to change us; to purge us of our sins? I urge you to give him a chance.

Again, I thank you for reading this.

Your friend,

Brad

We Must Suffer, but Only a Little

"Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—" (Philippians 3:8-9).

Suffering is certain in this life, even for the Christian. Perhaps I should say especially for the Christian. The types of sufferings we might experience in this world are limited only by experience and the imagination. People suffer terribly of sickness, hunger, from the beast of war, and death. There are infinite ways to break the heart, but there is really only one way to heal it.

This is why the "prosperity" gospel fails so spectacularly. This is why "name it and claim it" theology is so heart-breaking. This aberration of the gospel, which is really no gospel at all, tells the unwary that if you only believe God enough, then he will prosper you in this life. This is fine in good times. It kills in the bad. It kills faith when one is diagnosed with terminal cancer, when a beloved child is struck and killed crossing the street, or when a spouse betrays marriage vows. Then, the person is inevitably left twisting in the wind, thinking that all these things have come upon them because of a lack of personal faith. This is not so. It cannot be so!

Our Lord Jesus left infinite riches to become a pauper with no home. He was a King, a sovereign despot, who died with only eleven close subjects. And my, how he died! No one ever believed in God as Jesus did, and yet he was stripped of his only worldly goods, the clothes on his back, and he was nailed to a tree. The testimony of Jesus utterly overthrows the notion that we will not suffer. The Lord Himself said, "Take up your cross and follow me." Follow him where, you may ask? To calvary, of course. We must follow him up that lonely road and die there with him. It is the only way to live.

So, we will suffer. We will suffer scorn for righteousness sake. Some of us will contract diseases and waste away in the flesh. Some of us will spend many days in agony as life drains from this mortal coil. Some of us will suffer betrayals of the worst kind, from those whom we dearly love, and we will mourn. Ah me, how every Christian will mourn here! Anyone who fights in a war knows grief. We will see casualties of Satan, we will be wounded ourselves, and we will mourn the darkness. Our mourning and our cries will ascend to high heaven, and God will treasure up our tears by number. We will suffer. We will mourn. Some will grow old and go down to the grave with gray hairs. We will walk feebly on walkers. We will be fed Ensure with a spoon held by others. Our pride and strength will be wasted. We will return to the dust.

And after all this, after all this suffering, we will see the King of Glory. He will greet us as sons and daughters. He will delight over us. He will usher us into his joy. He himself will wipe away our tears. He will clothe us with his own robes. He will give us a crown. He will make us whole in every way. We will know that he heard our cries. We will know that he knew our sorrows, and that he cared. And in that day, we will look back upon the canvas of our lives and say with Paul, "Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord!" We shall say it was worth it?! It is true indeed that Christian people are a strange lot. We are mad, actually. We are mad with hope. It is why our elderly, our infirm, and our sick can suffer so valiantly. We are crazy with hope. This is why we can call death gain, and this is why we do not mourn like the world.

I grieve for the world, and I know I must suffer. I am sorry to say that you must suffer as well. It is the way of this fallen world. But I will tell you this, dear child, you will only suffer a little compared to the glory that will be revealed in you. You must suffer...but only a little.

He Lives to Intercede

There is great comfort to be found in this verse, "He is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:25). It is the type of comfort that can drive away the dark night of despair; it is the type of truth that can warm a heart grown cold.

Jesus is the Christ; he is the Son of the Living God; he is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. By his will, the world holds together. He framed our night sky with billions of stars; he knows the name of each one of them. He knows when we rise up, and he knows when we lie down. He knows every word we speak even before it passes our lips. He knows the length of our days, and he knows the frailty of our flesh. He is incomparable. He is mighty. He is God. He is all this, and he is interceding for you.

Robert Murray M'Cheyne said it like this, "If I could hear Christ praying for me in the next room, I would not fear a million enemies. Yet distance makes no difference. He is praying for me." We would do well to lay hold of this truth for ourselves. Peter reminds us, "Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you" (1 Peter 5:6-7). You see that Christ cares for you? Do you feel that, when your flesh is weak, it moves our Lord Jesus to intercede? Jesus the Mighty kneels for us. He stoops for us. He prays for us. Are you surprised? The enemy of our souls would like for us to think that Jesus was done with us when he rose from the dead, as if the resurrection was the final mission accomplished. No, our Lord ascended to the right hand of His Father where he ever lives to intercede for his beloved people.

Oh, blessed thought, Jesus intercedes for me and for you! He asks of the Father on our behalf, and the Father delights to answer. You are safe today, beloved. Jesus has prayed for you. He loves you today as he did at Calvary. You are not forgotten; you are engraved on his hands; you are the love of his heart.

Some Things Every Pastor Should Know

I have been in the pastoral ministry for seven years now. It is not at all what I thought it would be when I began. It is not at all what I thought it would be when I graduated seminary. It is so unusual, in fact, that I find it is very difficult to explain what it means to be a pastor.

I know that it is my duty, as a pastor, to display the glory of God through the proclamation of the atoning death and glorious resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. I also know that it is my duty to display the glory of God in such a way that it will cause Christians to love God and one another more. The difficulty then, lies not in the job description, but in the carrying out of one's duty.

In the best case scenario, a young man who aspires to enter the pastoral ministry does so because he wants to do exactly what the job description calls for. Unfortunately, a young man enters the ministry with the idea that he can actually accomplish it. He goes to seminary, learns to parse Greek and Hebrew words, he learns to preach, and he might even learn to say prayers. He will then get hired, go to a church, use those skills confidently, and quickly find that his skills do not avail him.

For myself, I was under the impression that simply preaching the Word of God rightly would lead to the growth of the church, the salvation of souls, and the general progress of others in holiness. What I did not realize was that none of these things can be measured very accurately, that true spiritual growth is like fighting an uphill battle against a deeply entrenched foe, and that the vast majority of pastoral work is actually personal. I need to explain this because I believe it is far too often overlooked in the mentoring process of training a pastor.

I confess that when I began as a pastor that I thought I was an above average Christian. I thought that I was smarter than the average pew-sitter, and that I was more zealous for my God than many of my contemporaries. I even reckoned myself as one of the better preachers that I had ever heard. I thought that this would mean that I would be a great pastor and that the goodness and mercy of God would be showered upon those who would sit under my ministry. I have hardly met a pastor who did not esteem himself in the same way.

I want to be exceedingly careful here, lest I be misunderstood. I ask you to allow me to grant that what I thought was and is actually true. Grant to me, that compared to the average Christian, that I am of above average zeal and talent, and that I am an above average preacher. Here's what I learned: even if you grant me this, it is utterly and completely insignificant. I was, in the beginning, impressed with my skills even if God wasn't. It is difficult to learn that God is not interested in sharpening our talents and skills per se. He loves us far more holistically than this.

This leads to one of the greatest discoveries in the ministry. When a young man is preparing for the ministry, he believes that God is preparing him to use these skills to help others, and so he does. However, for a young pastor in pursuit of the heart of God, he will quickly find that the tools he thought were meant for others will first be turned upon himself. The sermons he prepares for others will convict him deeply if he has a modicum of true zeal for personal holiness. The Word will reveal to him his own failures and sin, and most often, he will ascend to the pulpit knowing that he preaches as the hypocrite. It is marvelous thing to watch a man preach "Thus saith the Lord!" when it is apparent that he himself keenly feels the weight of those words, and I highly doubt that God corrects a flock when He hasn't first dealt the shepherd the brunt of the blow.

This is how we begin to see how insignificant talent and skill are. By this, I do not mean that skill in the Word of God is useless. I simply mean that the pastor does not develop his sermon for eloquence. He approaches the Scriptures as one who goes to God, like David, and says, "Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!" (Psalm 139:23-24). Sermons are for the heart, and they are for the whole church, the pastor included. When a man preaches to others, he ought to know first that he preaches to himself. If he should forget this, he will be a poor pastor, and he will become an enemy to the flock and to his own soul besides.

Pastoral ministry is particularly out of step with modern times, and this poses its own challenges to the modern pastor. It is decidedly not a forty hour a week job, and the product which the pastor produces cannot be measured. These two truths are permanently inter-twined. A man never gets a break from the all-seeing gaze of God. David wrote, "You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O LORD, you know it altogether" (Ps. 139:2-4). The primary responsibility for the pastor is to walk humbly with his God and to bare himself unflinchingly every moment to the light of God's grace. Every action must be measured; every word must be weighed. Everything that he does must be done to display God's worth, even when he sits to eat. A pastor who opens himself to the scrutiny of God will not falter under the scrutiny of man.

This is slow, necessary, and lonely work The pastor must place himself under the discipline of the Lord; he must feel the weight of his yoke upon him. And when the pastor sees that his own sin is deep and odious, and when he finds that the chastening stripes of the Lord are gentle and loving, then he will be prepared to face the flock of the Lord in a right spirit. Oh how naive is the thought that learning Greek and parsing verbs is the major portion of sermon preparation! People often ask me how long it takes to prepare for a sermon. I often say, "It has taken me my entire life." We usually both laugh at that, but I could not be more sincere.

I have not touched on how the title of "pastor" will cause others to treat you differently, and it will hinder genuine relationships as much as it helps. Maybe some day I'll write on those aspects, but this post is already too long. I am very grateful that God has given me the privilege to pastor, and I hope that if you are a believer reading this, you will take a moment to pray for your own pastor as he seeks to love both you and Lord with all of his might.

How to Think About Art

Before I write about the nature of artistic endeavor, I want to be clear from the start that I am not a stereo-typical "artist." In speaking of art, I feel a bit like the guy who can play G, C, D, A, and E chords on the guitar. Sure, I can play basically every country music song ever written with those, but does that mean I can play the guitar? Listen first to Eliot Fisk play the guitar, and then you can tell me if the ability to perform a five chord progression qualifies one as a "guitarist."

I am, however, a bit of a wordsmith. I am also an orator. The proof of the former is that you are reading this. The second proof is that I am a preacher. Unfortunately, the art of oration is a bit of an under appreciated art form in this era of history. (Insert angsty sigh here to prove my artistry.) This does not qualify me to define what art is or does, but I'm going to give it a try for you anyway.

I am writing this, primarily, with the Christian in mind. I fear that many of my fellow Christians, especially evangelicals, have no clear grasp of what art is for and what it is should do. This is evident in the way that we condemn works of art like Harry Potter or "modern" art. Each is sniffed at or assailed for different reasons, and those reasons more often reveal the ignorance of the observer than it does the quality of the art. Yes, sometimes art is bad. But if art is bad, it absolutely must be bad for some other reason that "It offends me." Being offended is not the cardinal sin, nor is a measure of the value of something communicated. My wife may say, "You're being an idiot." I may say, "You've offended me!" My nearby friend may say, "Nevertheless, you're being an idiot." Not a very artistic conversation, but it can demonstrate that offense taken is no measuring stick for value.

So let me take a few criteria we can use to judge the value of an artistic expression, whether it be art by painting, by music, by oratory, poetry, or writing in general. These are made up criteria for myself. I use them to make certain that my personal sensibilities, which are sometimes wrong, are not getting in the way of a more objective consideration of what I am being presented. These are not in order of importance, but rather, they represent a series of questions I ask myself as I analyze art. Some questions I answer are not "stand alone", but naturally lead to other questions.

1. Is this piece presenting something that corresponds to reality?
I need this criteria when I am presented with something that is offensive to me. If I am watching a television show, reading a book, or looking at a painting, I ask myself if this is corresponding to reality. Even abstract art is attempting to say something about reality. If I am reading a novel, and one of the characters is flirting with adultery, it alarms me. I do not like it. But does this correspond to reality? Yes. Is it sinful for me to read about this? Not necessarily. If it were, the story of David and Bathsheba is too obscene to consider. So first, I ask if this corresponds to something in reality. Sin is reality. Simply presenting things as they are is not necessarily bad.
2. What is this art saying about reality?
I am reminded here about an art display I once saw where a man had taken a dead cow, put it behind glass, and put maggots and flies in there to display a rotting carcass. All that was missing was smell. The visceral reaction to that is, "That isn't art! That's just disgusting!" Well no, it was presented as art. This guy was "dead" serious. Was it reality? Yes. We die and we rot. Is it disgusting to look at? Yes, it most certainly is disgusting. So what was the man saying about reality? I think he was saying, "You are going to die, rot, and the maggots will eat you."

This is true, but is the piece trying to say that this is all we have to look forward to? Did it mean to do that, or did it only mean to spark the conversation?

Now remember, not every art piece is a Rembrandt. This very blog post is a work of art, if I may say so. It is low art, and it will be quickly forgotten. But it is serving a purpose. But hopefully, it may lead the reader to further thought. Dead, maggot filled cows will not be around in a 100 years like Rembrandt, but I thought that the artist who offered the dead, rotting cow was very brave, and he reminded me of a harsh reality. Death is real. Death is ugly. Death is coming. That isn't the whole story, but it is a true story and people need to be confronted with that reality from time to time, especially in a sanitized, clean, high-brow art museum. It was an unforgettable display to be sure. I'm still writing about it.

3. Does the art "keep it between the lines?"
I judge art on a continuum. This is most helpful in judging stories, movies, but it might apply to paintings and such. Imagine a line at the top that is called "cheesy" and at the bottom there is a line called "indulgently/erroneously wicked." I define cheesy as a movie whose message is, in reality, too good to be true. For example, and I hope I do not get hate mail for this, "Facing the Giants" stayed mostly above the "cheesy" line. Does that mean it is bad art? Not necessarily. I would say that it is what it is. It didn't win an academy award for a reason. Does that mean it is useless? No. It was entertaining, and there were elements that can lead someone to introspection and thought.

On the flip side, I recently played through a game called "Bioshock." Can games be art? Certainly they are, just as comic books are art. I think that Bioshock dipped below the "Indulgently/erroneously wicked" line. (I can't think of a better antonym for "cheesy".) The characters in the game were irredeemable. The story gave you no reason to feel any sorrow or sympathy for the villains. That is below the line because "good" stories should give us pause when we consider the villain. Great art does that. Consider gollum in "The Lord of the Rings." Was he a wicked little thing? Indeed, most wicked. Did the story move us to pity him? Yes, it did. There was a reason that Frodo didn't slay him outright. The ability of a story to help us see wickedness as pitiful is a mark of reality and it says something right about reality. Hope springs eternal for the redemption of others, and when they aren't redeemed, we should feel grief.

The reason I take pains to point out a few steps I take in regarding the arts is because I get the sense that many Christians feel that if a movie, painting, or book depicts wickedness then that movie, painting, or book itself is wicked. If this were the case, then the Bible would be wicked. Rather, a piece of art ought to deal with reality as it is, but not indulgently one way or another.

Finally, I want to be clear that not everyone has to enjoy or work at understanding artistic expression. I have an acquaintance who is a police officer, and his job is to troll the internet to look for child pornography. He has to sift through thousands of pornographic images every day and try to determine if those depicted are under age. I pray for him and others who have his job.

For me, it is important as a Christian to understand those who are around me. Why are they watching "The Office"? Why is this guy putting a dead cow under glass? What are the video games that children are playing teaching them about reality? What's right with it? What's wrong with it? I need to be able to have a conversation with someone, in a sane manner, that demonstrates that I have, in good faith, tried to understand what they are saying. Then, they will be more prone to give my words a fair hearing as well.

A Great Sign of the Apocalypse

When someone mentions the apocalypse, I wonder what pops into your mind? Do you think of the sun growing dark or the moon turning to blood? To you imagine chaos in the streets, rioting, looting, and things burning? Do you imagine war and death and horror? Are these the signs of an apocalypse? Do you imagine a catclysm of epic proportions?

These may be signs of the apocalypse, but I want to say that there is a sign of the apocalypse that is far more familiar and wonderful. We are about to celebrate the dawn of the apocalypse. It did not begin with a great deal of fanfare.

The apocalypse began, and I use the term "began" very loosely, with a silent invasion. It was not a massive army that invaded, but a single subversive. He did not ride in on a war horse, he came as a baby, the son of a poor carpenter of Nazareth named Joseph.

You may have not thought of Jesus as being a sign of the apocalypse. You have probably never thought of Christmas as a time to commemorate the greatest invasion in the history of the world. But he is a sign of the apocalypse. The innocent baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger came to bring a sword, to ultimately slay all of his enemies, and to rule the world with a rod of iron. This baby will celebrate on Christmas will make the mountains quake, he will shake the stars from the heavens, and he will smite the world by the words from his mouth. He is the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End, and the rule of his kingdom will never end.

Simeon knew this. Simeon was a godly man who lived for the day of this king's arrival, this rebel who would overthrow the prince of darkness. Simeon took the baby from the arms of his young mother and said, "Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed" (Luke 2:34). Simeon saw that this baby was the beginning of the end of the world as it was, and that he would usher in the world to come.

I know that many of you that read my blog believe that Jesus is the Messiah, and I know that some of you do not. I beg you all to consider this sign again. When you pass a nativity, even a cheesy nativity, and you look at that scene of the donkey and sheep and doting mother and father, please consider what you see. Consider who this baby is that angels announce his birth. That so many, myself included, swear to their last breath that this little baby is the future King of Earth, the defeater of Death, and the scourge of Satan. Are we Christians all mad? Am I insane? Maybe. Or maybe Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

Is it true, or is it not true that this baby would grow up to be crucified and then rise from the dead? Did he come out of the tomb or didn't he? If he didn't, then I am a fool. If he did, then you are a fool if you do not consider what I say. Take heed this Christmas season in the midst of your giving and receiving of gifts. You are celebrating something as old as the fallen world: the promise of an apocalypse. This child has come for judgment, both yours and the world.

My dear friends, I want to wish you all a Merry Christmas. Above all, I want you to see that Jesus Christ is Lord. It is true! The little baby did grow up and conquer sin, death, and hell. Won't you at least consider the possibility? And if you already believe it, I hope that you will believe it enough to tell someone how Jesus brought the sword to your own soul.

The Promise of Christmas Part 1

I often feel that Christians handle prophecy rather poorly. Normally, when someone hears someone speak about prophecy, we think of visions of apocalyptic doom. I get a little bit squirmy when most people talk about prophecy, and if a prophecy lecture were like a bus-ride, I try and get off the bus at about the point where folks begin to talk about scorpions being helicopters, China being Magog, and speculating that if President Ahmadinejad puts on a purple turban then he is indeed the anti-Christ. I can, however, stomach charts which have up and down arrows representing the time of the "rapture."

Fortunately, prophecies are easier than all that silliness that usually passes for prophetic interpretation, and they are aspects of it that are far more important than speculating on the identity of the country who is Gog. I am speaking of the prophecies concerning the Immanuel, whose birthday we are about to celebrate. Are the prophecies concerning the advent of the Messiah clear or not? I believe that they are clear; I just don't think the average Christian has given them much thought. This is tragic both to personal faith and for credibility towards those who are looking from the outside in. It is, for example, far more important to understand what the Old Testament has to say about the Messiah than it is to get the greeter at Wal-Mart to say "Merry Christmas!" instead of "Happy Holidays!" Yet we see where many invest the majority of their energies. Indignation is easier than study.

So I thought that we might start at the very first Christmas prophecy, Genesis 3:15. The scenario is bleak. Satan, that old serpent, has just talked Adam and Eve into a vain power grab. Satan told them that God had withheld the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil because God knew that if they ate it they would become like God themselves. They coveted God's authority, power, beauty, and Being, and so they ate. Ironically, they did come to know good and evil. They now knew good as a memory, for everything good that they had ever known had come from being in right fellowship with the good God who made them. They knew evil as their reality; evil is being alienated from God.

Into this predicament steps God Himself. He seeks out the man and woman, and He curses them for their own good*. He also has these words for that old serpent Satan, He says:

Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life. I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.

Two things, two very important things are foretold here by God. He says that the serpent will "eat dust" all his life as he "crawls on his belly." This does not simply mean that, as a serpent, he suddenly became legless. It means that the serpent, who is the devil, will suffer continual defeat forever. He will never triumph. He will always eat dirt. In the prophecy of Isaiah, Isaiah sees a day when, "The wolf and the lamb shall graze together; the lion shall eat straw like the ox, and dust shall be the serpent's food" (Isaiah 65:25). You see that, even in the restoration of all things when all manner of beasts live in harmony, the serpent is still eating dust. The enemy of men, the devil, will still live in abject defeat when God restores all things.

The second important prophecy is how this ultimate defeat is going to come about. It will happen through a battle with the "seed" of the woman. This person will be bruised by this seed in the battle. His heel will be bruised, indicating a crippling, but not life-threatening wound. The serpent, however, will have his head bruised, indicating a mortal wound. (It can be translated "crushed in both instances instead of bruised. It indicates more than a superficial wound.)

The rest of the Old Testament develops this idea of who this seed will be. Is it Cain? Abel? Seth? We must wait to find out the answer to that as the Biblical narrative unfolds. Who will crush the head of Satan? Who will usher in the time when the wolf shall graze with the lamb?

I'll take a look at how the story is revealed as Christmas approaches, and I hope that you will see that it all leads to a manger in Bethlehem and a cross in Jerusalem.

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*That God designed the curse for our good may sound ridiculous, but I very much believe that it is true. Going into all those details will require another post all its own.

Old Testament Law as Martial Law

One way I like to think about the Old Testament law is to view it as a sort of divine martial law. It is interesting that even the Ten Commandments do not make their debut until Exodus chapter 20, that means we have fifty chapters of Genesis and twenty chapters of Exodus before we have much law at all. Why is it, then, that discussions of the Old Testament are dominated by law? Is there another point to the narrative of the Old Testament besides the "Thou shalts" and "Thou shalt nots"?

The law makes it debut only after Israel's rescue from the captivity of Egypt. Specifically, the law begins to pile up on the nearly salvaged nation after each transgression of the law only recently given. God rescues Israel, gathers them at the foot of Mt. Sinai, calls Moses up the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments, and Israel throws a party and makes an idol before Moses can get back. You've all seen the movie, probably, of Charlton "Moses" Heston breaking the commandments and having to go back for more, right?

The Apostle Paul tells us why God gave the Law to Israel. He writes:

This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise. Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made" (Galatians 3:17-21).

Paul says that the law came 430 years after the promise was made to Abraham that all nations would be blessed through his "seed" or his "offspring." Paul interprets this Messianically, meaning that the "seed" through whom the world would be blessed is the Messiah, whom Paul professed to be Jesus of Nazareth. Paul's explanation of the law is rather simple. Israel was so obstinate in the wilderness and so unfaithful to God, that God had to issue a sort of "divine martial law" to keep Israel in check until the Messiah came to redeem them and establish a New Covenant with them.

Martial law is established in a country that has become chaotic, often during a rebellion or riotous protests against a government. This is what we see in the Old Testament. The sinful people of God rebelled against him time after time in their wilderness travel. So God clamped down on them through the enforcement of divine martial law. He told them what to eat, how to shave, what to wear, when to take a holiday, when to work, and when not to work. All of this so that their rebellion would not utterly destroy them before the time of redemption.

Since Jesus is the promised Messiah, the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, and David, and since he has instituted the New Covenant by his own death and resurrection, martial law has been lifted. That isn't to say that the divine martial law was wicked. It all, every rule, jot, and tittle, flowed from the two commandments of loving God with all one's heart, mind, soul, and strength, and loving one's neighbor as oneself.

So it isn't moral relativism to insist in one epoch the abstaining from shellfish and then to eat it in another. It is simply a different circumstance. It is a good thing for a government to institute curfews during a period of martial law so that order can be maintained. This is the purpose that the law serves: to restrain wickedness. It serves, spiritually speaking, to keep the spiritual looters and rioters from harming the people of God.

Jesus Said That

I always find it curious when someone who is not a Christian proceeds to tell Christians that they are not good Christians. Usually, the phrases that get used are something like, "Judge not that you be not judged!" or "God loves everyone just the way that they are." Usually, this comes about when a Christian has voiced his or her opinion about some type of behavior being sinful.

Now, the first thing that a Christian must keep in mind is that this sort of argument is not to be taken personally. Secondly, they must remember not to get angry about this because it is patently silly. Silly things should not make us angry or defensive. If my buddy Matt tells me that he is the Queen of Sheba, anger should not be my first impulse.

Once these first two impulses are squashed, the third imperative can follow. That is, we must remember that the main issue is always Jesus. Who is Jesus? What did Jesus teach? Did Jesus really rise from the dead? This is far more important than debating marriage laws, polygamy, homosexuality, or whether or not someone should vote Republican.

So if I say, "I believe that 'gay marriage' is as ridiculous as a squared circle," and someone retorts that I'm being a judgmental bigot who is unworthy to call myself a human being, much less a Christian, because Jesus would never say such a preposterous thing, I need to think, "Heeeey...this person doesn't know about Jesus very well" not "Heeeey...he just called me a BIGOT!"

Here is something that Jesus actually said, "He whom God has sent utters the words of God, for he gives the Spirit without measure. The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him" (John 3:34-36). Jesus makes some pretty big claims in this passage.

First, Jesus claims that God sent him. Next, Jesus claims that when he is speaking, he is uttering the very words of God. Then, Jesus claims to be the rightful ruler of all things because God gave him everything. Finally, Jesus says that whoever does not obey him will perish under the wrath of Almighty God. Jesus made it abundantly clear throughout the gospels that he believed himself to be the only way to get to God (John 14:6). He also defined marriage, and a great list of other things whilst he was here, including affirmations of the Old Testament.

This is how the Christian can deal with name-calling and misunderstanding. Jesus said, "It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher, and the servant like his master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household" (Matthew 10:25). Basically, if someone objects to the teaching of Jesus, even though it is a hapless Christian merely parroting the words of the Great Teacher, the one who is objecting falls under the condemnation of which Jesus spoke. In reality then, it could be Jesus who is the judgmental bigot who is unfit to be a human being, or he could be the King of the Universe who gets to make the rules for the creation that he himself helped make and currently sustains.

What is Truth?

Pontius Pilate, in his fascinating conversation with Jesus of Nazareth, asked Jesus if he were a king. Jesus said, "For this purpose i was born and for this purpose I have come into the world--to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice." Pilate said to him, "What is truth?" (John 18:37-38).

This conversation stops me in my tracks. Pilate asked a great question, and interestingly enough, John does not give Jesus' reply. He leaves the question dangling in the air, echoing down the millennia until it reaches us. I can still hear Pilate ask it. He was so close to truth that it was literally staring him in the face.

For several centuries, Christianity has enjoyed a hegemony on truth in the West. Western civilization was shaped by the Bible, Christendom enforced the Bible onto the populace to the point where unbelievers and deviants were persecuted. For good and for ill, the Bible was used and abused to force conformity amongst the Western populace.

That is, until the rise of the Anabaptists and Mennonites and others like them. They rebelled against the "church-state" paradigm. They believed that conversion could not come by the government or the sword, but only by grace through faith in the gospel. Eventually, persecution led many of them to the New World. There, Baptists would eventually be instrumental in insuring the separation of Church and State and the freedom of religion for all people, even freedom to worship the devil.

Believe it or not, that grand and great dream laid down by the early American Republic has had a major impact upon truth. As the early Baptists suspected, if given the chance to freely worship the devil, some people would. And some would be Buddhists, and some would be Hindus, and some would be Moonies, and some would be atheists altogether. Being a Baptist myself, I am altogether delighted that they have the freedom to be as wrong as they please.

For the first couple of centuries, the people of the United States spoke Bible, as did their ancestors in Europe. I do not mean that all the people in the United States were Christian; I would never argue that. However, it is apparent that they all filtered their understanding of life, predominantly, through a Biblically colored lens.

Take Thomas Jefferson as an example. He was, from what I can tell, a Christian heretic par excellence. He famously cut out the miraculous parts of the Bible, leaving in all the laws and the moral code and the ethical teachings of Jesus. It seems that he admired the teachings of Jesus. Such would have been the attitude of many in that day: the default lens for interpreting right from wrong was a Biblical one. One can hardly read a novel or or thinker who wrote from the beginning of the republic until the early 1950's who wasn't profoundly aware of Biblical traditions of right and wrong, and even the moral stories* that the Bible contains.

Now, things are on different. Christianity does not enjoy the hegemony it once did. That's not to say that its influence isn't strong and felt. It surely is. However, there is a much greater competition of ideas out there in the market. Some are compltely foreign to a Biblical worldview. Jefferson did away with the miracles. Post-Modern America has ditched most of the Christian ethic.

This brings me back around to Pilate and his question to Jesus: What is truth? I think for many, Pilate's original question may even assume too much. Instead, the question of the day might be, "Is there such a thing as Truth?"

I believe that there is Truth that is objective, real, and unchanging. I believe that Truth is embodied in the person of Jesus Christ. The challenge for Christians is now, as it has always been, is to take the gospel, the story and teachings of Jesus, and put them into the market place of ideas. The gospel is a narrative without parallel. The beauty of Jesus is without rival. He is a teacher without equal. If Christians would just see that He is the message, we could be a far more winsome and compelling people.

She Kissed His Feet (Lk. 7:36-50)

Simon was a religious man. He understood morality; he understood right from wrong. He knew what things a good person should do and what things a good person should avoid. Mostly, I would guess that Simon and I would probably cast similar votes on election day. I would guess that he and I would avoid the same places, habits, and people. One day, Simon had the privilege of having Jesus over to his house for dinner.

During the course of that meal, a very unusual thing happened. A woman who was a known "sinner" came over and began to kiss Jesus' feet. She kissed his feet. She was crying as she did this, and she was wiping off his feet with her hair. How awkward for Simon. How awkward this is for me to watch, you might say, as I read this story. I am a by-stander, these many years later, to a very intimate, and potentially humiliating moment.

I am not really concerned with Simon. I don't need to analyze his thinking. I understand him well enough because I'm like him. I relate to Simon. I think most people I know are probably like Simon.

I have also known a few women like the one in this story. That is, I have known some sinful women. I have known some, what others call, "loose" women. I only mention this to say that I know some folks like her; who do and have done the things she did. She is hardly an unusual character.

I do not understand Jesus. I do not know anyone like him. He is the odd thing in this story for me, and the one that I most want to be like. I can relate to Simon because I am Simon. And really, I think he is the most common, if not the most easily despised character in the story. I can understand the immoral woman. I cannot understand Jesus, and yet I must.

I know that the main point of this story is that the immoral woman loved Jesus more than Simon. I get that part of the story. I amen that part of the story. I love it that Jesus rebukes Simon's, and therefore my, pettiness. I need more than that.

I want to know how Jesus did it. How did he gain this woman's love, real love. She was a woman of "ill repute." She knew what it was for men to desire her. She knew what it was to enjoy a man. So, I have to wonder, how was her encounter so different with Jesus? He obviously did not pursue her as an object of lust. I want to know what he said to her. I want to know where he met her. I want to know how his kindness to her and his love for her as an individual was made so obvious to her that it broke her heart and healed it at the same time. I want to know what he did or said that was so powerful that it would overcome her probable dislike of Simon so much that she would break taboo to go into Simon's house and kiss Jesus' feet! How did he do that? I say with those gathered, "Who is this, who even forgives sins?" I say this and I know who he is. He amazes me.

There are plenty of Simons in my town, and there are plenty of people of ill-repute. I want the church to be like Jesus, who was able to sit with both, who was able to amaze both. Oh that God would help the church to be amazing again like his Son is! For myself, today I must be contented to watch Jesus as the woman kisses his feet while Simon scowls, and the guests shift nervously in their seats.

The Ordinary Jesus

You would not have known him, most likely, if you had passed him on the street. He would have been just another face in the crowd. Especially if you had met him before his ministry really began to take off. One testimony to this fact is that from 12 to roughly 30, we know nothing of what Jesus was up to. Nothing at all.

Isaiah said it would be like that. As he peered down the corridor of time with the eyes of the Spirit, he saw the Messiah. This is how he described his coming King:

He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground. He has no form or comeliness; and when we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him (Isaiah 53:2).

Isaiah thought that there was nothing particularly attractive about Jesus. He looked to Isaiah to be stunningly normal. No shekinah glory beaming from his face, and no halo encircling his head. He was an ordinary Jewish guy, an ordinary man.

Another shocking example of Jesus' apparent normalcy was his reception at Nazareth. Upon his arrival the people exclaimed, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He says, ‘I have come down from heaven’?" (John 6:42). Think on that for a moment. Nazareth was probably a small, rural town where everyone knew everyone else. They'd seen Jesus grow up, they knew where he lived, they knew his parents and what his father did for a living. Whatever they had observed in his young life must have been rather unimpressive. After all, they certainly hadn't expected that he would be the Messiah of Israel, and frankly, they thought he was probably out of his mind for saying so.

There are two points that I want to make from the ordinary life of Jesus. The first is that when you silence his word, you take away much of what demonstrated how extraordinary he truly was. Jesus was ordinary to look at, but when he opened his mouth rivers of living water flowed out. This is why churches die today, I believe. They hold to an exalted Jesus, and they picture him as a sort of mystic, probably, with a halo over his head, but they will not heed his word, and because of this, they miss the marvel of who Jesus is. When pastors and teachers fail to proclaim the Word of God, we will wind up missing the human Jesus as well as the divine one.

How quick we run past the man to embrace the God, and thereby we miss much wonder. Yes, I trumpet and proclaim Jesus as God, and I love that truth with passion. But with equal fervor I must say, "Yes! Yes! And he is man! (With a little 'h',even!) He cried and bled and worked and walked and breathed and fell. He was splendidly and wonderfully ordinary. Yes, he holds the worlds together by his will, but behold him stumble on the way to calvary! I am excited, friends, that Jesus is God, but I am also excited that he is man.

Do you think that you would have recognized him just by looking? Could you have spotted him in a crowd? I think not. He was too ordinary. If you still think that you would have been able, then I propose a test. Go to your church nursery this Sunday and look at all those precious babies and see if you can pick out the next great pastor or evangelist or author or Christian. Then go to to where the toddlers are being taught and see if you find greatness there. Or observe the teenager who serves you fries with your burger or sacks your groceries. Can you see glory there? Or do you overlook them because they are ordinary and familiar? Do not underestimate the "ordinary" man, for from such stock God saved the world.

For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (1 Timothy 2:5).