Month: June 2013

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

The Omniscient Forgiver

Last week we learned of new ways that our government has been collecting data on us. Through web visits and wireless communication they gather and sift our locations, our contacts, our interests. They’ve stuck their collective nose where they shouldn’t, though we’ve given them tacit permission by voting for officials who would make us “safe.” Many Americans are surprised, outraged, and probably nervous about being exposed.

Remember, though, that our God knows not only the words we type and text, but the thoughts and intentions of our hearts. We can’t get off His grid. Wherever we go, He is there, attentive and writing it all down. He misses nothing from no one, Americans included.

What does He do with all that? He judges us. He holds us to account. We cannot vote Him out of office nor can we change His policies.

But, for those who are in Christ, there is no condemnation. Have you gossiped, lusted, lied, been lazy, clicked into bad areas of the Internet? God knows. God sent His Son to die for that. We are naked and exposed in heart before His word but we are also clothed and covered in Jesus.

No one will find out anything about you that Jesus didn’t already know when He went to the cross. He’s your defense now, more informed than any Big Brother. He is God, the Omniscient Forgiver. As a prism separates white light into a spectrum of colors, so the cross refracts our punishment onto Christ.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Tightening the Screws

Ambrose Bierce construed the verb “acknowledge” or “confess” in The Devil’s Dictionary as follows: “acknowledgment of one another’s faults is the highest duty imposed by our love of truth.” In other words, the more we are wound by truth the tighter we put the screws on our neighbors.

We love the truth; that’s good and necessary. We are learning to confess sin, to speak the truth about sin, not only for salvation but also for worship. Appropriate confession depends on accurate truth so that we know what should be confessed, so that we don’t chase the standard around like a ball of mercury.

Loving the truth is good, confessing sin is also good. But a great temptation for truth lovers is to see it as our duty to speak about everyone else’s need for confession first. I suppose this is better than seeing no sin at all; at least we acknowledge God’s law. But if we acknowledge the truth and exalt it as the rule of life (which it is) primarily for others (which it isn’t), we double our disobedience. Denial of sin is another sin.

We also make our work double. Approaching confession in this way requires us to regard the truth in one instance and then to disregard it in another, to be smart and then dumb. Many, it seems, listened to Jesus’ words but they did not do them. They both acknowledged His word and refused to acknowledge it. James referred to the hearer-no-doer as a self-deceiver. Self-deception causes self-destructive without self-awareness. The Word is a mirror so that we can see ourselves, not a microscope so that we can scrutinize someone else.

Our highest duty as truth lovers is to love the truth accurately, as it exists on its own, and applicably, as it exposes our hearts. We have plenty to acknowledge at home before we take our show on the road.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

One Makes the Other

Theologians (a.k.a. debaters) love to go around on the nature of Christ’s work on the cross. Two common views are that 1) His sacrifice was substitutionary or 2) His sacrifice was exemplary. Which is it?

Without a substitution we could not have salvation. We needed someone to pay our penalty, to do what we couldn’t, so that we could be freed from the punishment due our unrighteousness. “Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous” (1 Peter 3:18). “God put forward [His Son] as a propitiation by His blood to be received by faith so that we could be forgiven” (Romans 3:25).

Of course, that doesn’t mean that His death is not also an example. It isn’t only an example, as some liberals say, but it is an example. In fact, the willing sacrifice of Christ on behalf of others is the example. The love and patience and endurance of His suffering is glorious because it wasn’t for Himself, it was for others. His sacrifice provides both a propitiation and a pattern.

The Lord’s Table is a moving indicative, a message we receive by faith and a model we emulate by faith. By faith we give glory for Christ’s sacrifice for us. By faith we live glory as we give our lives for others.

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

A Pocketful of Pesos

Solomon warned that “The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD is safe” (Proverbs 29:25). How does the fear of man trap us?

The fear of man catches us in the trap of comparison. Down in the pit we can’t see out of the pit to get any sort of perspective. The only ones we can see are the ones right next to us. Of course, the taste-makers themselves never disclose that they feel just as trapped, but we listen to them because we have no one else to listen to.

The fear of man catches us in the trap of confusion. We’re stuck looking at others and we can never know how to please our protean neighbor or the motley preferences of the mob. Everyone wants to be paid but everyone has his own currency of glory. Some want euros, some want dollars, and all we have is a pocketful of pesos. No wonder we’re so broke.

The fear of man also catches us in the trap of competition. The only way to get out is by climbing on top of each other. No one actually wants all the way out, though, since we still want the approval of men. They might fight us for the top spot, but we need them to be on top like the tip of the iceberg needs a base.

The fear of man leads to servitude not free fellowship. The fear of man prohibits love, makes every sacrifice selfish, and turns us into reflections of reflections which have nothing of substance to reflect. The fear of man keeps us from believing God (John 5:44) and ruins us, now and forever.