Tag: Christian Life

Why Keeping the Lord’s Day is Glorious (Part 3)

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8)

Why is keeping the Lord’s Day holy glorious?

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity to please and glorify God in obedience to His commandments.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can remind us that the Lord Jesus created it, kept it, and fulfilled it, and gave it to believers as a way of imitating Him.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity for growth and maturity in Christ.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can be a time well spent that helps us not to live overly busy and distracted lives.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a way of joyfully, peacefully, and graciously witnessing publicly to whom it is you belong, and to whom it is you ultimately submit!

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is part of our confessional heritage as particularly Reformed Christians.

  1. Keeping the Lord’s Day is glorious because it can remind us that our Lord Jesus created it, kept it, and fulfilled it, and gave it to believers as a way of imitating Him.

The Lord Jesus Christ who is God and man created the Sabbath, kept it joyfully, and fulfilled it. These are three aspects of Christ’s work that we should consider. As God, the Lord Jesus Christ created the Sabbath for the good of man as a creation ordinance to order man’s time pattern and rhythm according to God’s own time-keeping as His redemptive story unfolded in space and time history.[1]  Our Lord Jesus says: “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27) to emphasize the gift of God the Lord’s Day is, particularly to believers. Jesus Christ our Lord also kept the Sabbath Day joyfully as a true human being in obedience to God (John 17:4). Christ said that “Heaven and earth shall pass away but not one jot or tittle shall pass away” from the moral law, particularly the fourth commandment as given by God to man (Matt. 5:17-20). It was our Lord’s delight to keep the Sabbath Day holy unto God.

Jesus fulfilled the Sabbath Day as a covenant of works, but He opened up for believers the power and transformative grace to fulfill it, too, not as a basis for works righteousness, but as a privilege of grace for the glory of God. Jesus fulfilled the law’s perfect demands, so that we could be free to live God’s law as a glorious way of life. Jesus became Savior to save us from the law, but he is also our example to teach us how to live saved according to the law. The Lord Jesus fulfilled all the moral law for believers, particularly as revealed in the Ten Commandments, so that in Him, by His power, we might meet the righteous requirements of God’s Law who “walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit” (Rom. 8:4). The Apostle Paul teaches this great and glorious news of freedom from the Law as a covenant of works, and the opportunity and privilege for believers now to live as Christ lived according to the law:

For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit (ESV Romans 8:3-4).

Note very importantly in Romans 8:3-4 that God doesn’t change the holy and righteous requirements of His law. God changes us! God doesn’t overlook or disregard or abrogate or abolish His law, but He changes our hearts and writes the law on our hearts as He promised in the Old Covenant (Jer. 31:33; Heb. 10:15-17)! God doesn’t change the law, he changes our relationship to it! Once we were “married” to the law as a binding covenant of works, but now we are “married” to Christ by faith, and in Him, we live according to the law as a way of life: “…In order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us…” (Rom. 8:4; 1 Cor. 7:1-12). God upholds His just law and graciously changes us from within (in a way the law is powerless to do!) so that we might uphold it, too. He truly is the God who is just and also the justifier of all who believe in Christ Jesus!! (Rom. 3:24-26).

Suggested Questions to Ponder and Ask Yourself to Help You to Keep the Lord’s Day Holy:

Is this activity on the Lord’s Day going to glorify God above all things? / Is this activity a work of necessity or mercy that I lovingly desire to do to love God and neighbor? / Is this activity going to hinder me (or others) from publicly worshipping God and attending to any calls to worship that God calls me to through his ordained servants? / Is this activity loving and the best use of my time for myself, my family, my guests, my neighbors, and those who look to me for leadership? / Is this activity going to be consistent with God’s Word, and particularly His clear teaching on how he desires the Lord’s Day to be remembered? / Is this activity work that I normally engage it on other days, and can it wait? / Is this activity a distraction from my taking time to grow up in God’s Word? / Is this activity something that will not be conducive to remembering what I learned in the morning worship sermon and meditating upon it and hiding in my heart so that I won’t sin against God? / Is this activity properly living a godly example before a broken and lost world?

Prayer: Dear Jesus, I want to keep the Lord’s Day holy, please help me. Grant me your wisdom and discernment. Amen

In Christ’s love,

Pastor Biggs

 

[1] The fourth commandment is a commandment that is rooted not merely in redemption, but also in creation teaching that this is a commandment that is binding on every creature who has ever lived, does live, and will live (contrast Exodus 20; Deuteronomy 5). One important implication of keeping the Lord’s Day holy is that it is imitating God as He rested after His glorious creation work and following His work-rest pattern (Gen. 1:31).

(To read the entire study on why keeping the Lord’s Day is glorious, click here: From Your Pastor.Why Keeping the Lords Day is Glorious.March 2016)

Jonathan Edwards: “The Excellency of Christ”

Jonathan Edwards- ‘The Excellency of Christ’ (edited and updated for 21st century Christians by Rev. Charles R. Biggs) 
 
“And one of the elders said to me, “Weep no more; behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has conquered, so that he can open the scroll and its seven seals.” And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain, with seven horns and with seven eyes, which are the seven spirits of God sent out into all the earth. (ESV Revelation 5:5-6). 
 
Edwards begins by stating: “There is an admirable conjunction or meeting of diverse and paradoxical elements in the Person of Jesus Christ.” 
 
Jesus is called a “Lion”. “Behold the Lion of the Tribe of Judah”. Jesus is also called “Lamb”. “…I saw a Lamb”. John saw a Lamb who had prevailed to open the book. The book was John’s vision, or visual portrait of God’s decrees where the events in time and space were foreordained from the foundation of the world. The Lamb was “as if it had been slain”.  
 
A lion is a devourer, one that is able and desires to make a terrible slaughters of others. No creature falls more easily prey to a lion than a lamb…The lion excels in strength, and in the majesty of his appearance and voice. The lamb excels in meekness and patience, besides the excellent nature of the creature as good for food, and yielding that which is fit for our clothing, and being suitable to be offered in sacrifice to God. But in Jesus Christ, we see both: 
 
Because the diverse excellencies of both the lion and lamb wonderfully meet in him! 
 
Such are the various divine perfections and excellencies that Christ is possessed of. Christ is a divine person and therefore has all the attributes of God. There do meet in Jesus Christ infinite highness and infinite condescension. Christ, as he is God, is infinitely great and high above all. He is higher than the kings of the earth for He is King of kings, and Lord of lords. He is higher than the heavens, and higher than all the highest angels of heaven. 
 
So great is Christ, that all men, kings and princes, are as worms of the dust before him…He is so high, that he is infinitely above any need of us. He is above our reach, that we cannot profitable to him, and above our conceptions that we cannot fully comprehend him. Christ is the Creator and great Possessor (owner) of heaven and earth. He is sovereign Lord of all. His knowledge and wisdom is without bounds. His power is infinite, and none can resist him. His riches are immense and inexhaustible. His majesty is infinitely terrible (awesome or awful). 
 
And yet Jesus is one of infinite condescension. 
 
None are so low or inferior, but Christ’s condescension is sufficient to take a careful notice of them. He condescends graciously not only to the angels, humbling himself to behold the things that are done in heaven, but he also condescends to such poor creatures as sinful men- -even to those who are of the lowest rank and degree, such as those commonly despised by their fellow creatures- – yet Christ does not despise them (1 Cor. 1:28). 
 
Christ condescends to take notice of beggars (Luke 16:22) and people of the most despised nations of men (Col. 3:11). He that is thus high, condescends to take a gracious notice of little children (Matt. 14:14). What is even more significant, is that Christ takes a gracious notice of the most unworthy, sinful creatures, those that have no right to ask anything of God, and those that have infinitely offended God’s holiness and character by living sinfully and selfishly, a law unto themselves. 
 
And yet so great is Jesus’ condescension. 
 
What a meeting of infinite highness and low condescension do we see in the Person of Jesus Christ! We see in many of our experiences what a tendency that a high position or station with men will make them quite the contrary in their disposition.  
 
If one worm be a little exalted above another, by having more dust, or a bigger dunghill, how much does he make of himself! What a distance does he keep from those that are below him! And a little condescension is what he expects of other men below him and for his position to be acknowledged as important and powerful! 
 
Yet Christ condescends to wash our feet, even the feet of sinners who think so highly of themselves! 
 
In Christ we also see infinite justice and infinite grace come together paradoxically and meet in his person. 
 
As Christ is a divine person, he is infinitely holy and just, hating sin, and disposed to execute deserved punishment for it upon sinners. He is the Judge of the world, and the infinitely just Judge of it, and will not at all acquit the wicked, or by any means clear the guilty.  
 
And yet Christ is infinitely gracious and merciful. 
 
Though his justice by so strict with respect to sin, and every breach of God’s Law, yet he has grace sufficient for every sinner, and even the chief of sinners. There is no benefit or blessing that sinners can receive that is greater than the sufficient grace of Christ, that can be received by even the greatest of sinners! 
 
Christ not only bestowed grace for those sinners who will receive it by faith, but he suffered in this world of sin and misery in order to mercy to sinners. He suffered the most extreme evil unto death, receiving in himself the curse and punishment of God for sinners, although he was blameless and without sin. Christ had sufferings in his soul, that were the most immediate fruits of the wrath of God against the sins of those whom he loves and stands in for as the merciful Savior. 
 
In the Person of Christ we see infinite glory and lowest humility come together paradoxically and meet in his person. 
 
Infinite glory, and the virtue of humility meet in no other person but Christ. Infinite glory and lowest humility meet in no created person, for no created person has infinite glory, and they meet in no other divine person but Christ….In Jesus Christ, who is both God and man, those two diverse excellencies are sweetly united. Christ is a person infinitely exalted in glory and dignity (Phil. 2:6ff).  
 
But however he is thus above all in glory, yet he is lowest of all in humility. 
 
There never was so great an instance of this virtue among either men or angels. None were ever so sensible and aware of the distance between God and him, or had a heart so lowly before God, as the man Christ Jesus (Matt. 11:29). What a wonderful spirit of humility appeared in him, when he was here upon earth, in all his life! In his contentment in his humble outward condition, contentedly living in the family of Joseph the carpenter, and Mary his mother, for thirty years together, and afterwards choosing outward poverty, contempt, rather than earthly greatness. He was content to wash dirty disciples’ feet, in all of his speeches being a humble yet content man, and his cheerfully sustaining the form of a slave through his whole life, and submitting to such immense humiliation in death. 
 
In the Person of Christ we see infinite majesty and transcendent meekness come together paradoxically and meet in his person. 
 
These again are two qualifications and qualities that meet together in no other person but Christ. Meekness is a virtue proper only to the creature. We scarcely ever find meekness mentioned as a divine attribute in Scripture, at least not in the New Testament. But Christ being both God and man, has both infinite majesty and superlative meekness. 
 
Christ was a person of infinite majesty. It is he that is mighty, that rides on the heavens, and his excellency on the sky. It is he that is terrible out of his holy places, who is mightier than the noise of many waters, even the great waters of the sea. Before him a fire goes, and burns up his enemies around him, at whose presence the earth quakes, and the hills melt. He is the One who sits on the circle of the earth, and all the inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers…He is the One who inhabits eternity, whose Kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and of whose dominion shall never end! (Psalm 45). 
 
And yet Christ was the most marvelous instance of meekness, and humble quietness of spirit who ever lived! 
 
He says about himself that he is meek and lowly in heart (Matt. 11:29). There was never such an exemplary life of meekness and humility than Jesus. Under injuries, persecutions, jeers, and sinful slander, Jesus did not revile! Jesus had a wonderful spirit of forgiveness, ready to forgive his worst enemies, and prayed for them with fervent and effectual prayers! With what meekness did he appear in the ring of soldiers that were condemning and mocking him- – yet he was silent, and opened not his mouth, but went as a lamb to the slaughter. 
 
Jesus Christ is a lion in majesty and a lamb in meekness. 
 
In the Person of Christ we see the deepest reverence towards God and yet equality with God. 
 
Christ, when on earth, appeared full of holy reverence towards the Father. He paid the most reverential worship to him, praying to him with postures of reverence such as kneeling before him and others. God the Father has no attribute or perfection that the Son has not, in equal degree, and equal glory, yet Christ was reverent before His Father. 
 
In the Person of Christ we see an exceeding spirit of obedience with supreme dominion over heaven and earth. 
 
Christ is the Lord of all things in two respects: (1) As God-man and Mediator between God and man, and thus his dominion is appointed, or given to him by His Father. He has his dominion in one respect as by delegation of God; He is His Father’s vicegerent. (2) In another respect, he is Lord of all things because he is God, and so he is by natural right the Lord of all, and supreme over all as much as the Father. Thus, he has dominion over the world, not by delegation, but in his own right. 
 
And yet is found in the same Jesus Christ, both God and man, the greatest spirit of obedience to the commands and laws of God that ever was in the universe which was manifest in his obedience here in this world (John 14:31). The greatness of his obedience appears in its perfection, and in his obeying commands of such exceeding difficulty. 
 
Never has any one received commands from God of such difficulty! One of God’s commands to Jesus was that he should yield himself to those dreadful sufferings on the cross which he underwent with full knowledge and willingness for us (John 10:18). As Philippians 2:8 says: “He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” As Hebrews 5:8 says: “Though he was a Son, yet he learned obedience by the things he suffered.” 
 
In the Person of Christ we see absolute sovereignty and perfect resignation. 
 
Christ, as he is God, is the absolute sovereign of the world, the sovereign disposer of every single event. The decrees of God are all his sovereign decrees, and the work of creation, and all of God’s works of providence are his sovereign works.  
 
Yet Christ was the greatest example of resignation that has ever appeared in this world. He was absolutely and perfectly resigned when he had a near and immediate prospect of his terrible sufferings, and the dreadful cup that he was to drink. The idea and expectation of this made his soul exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death, and put him into such agony, that his sweat was as it were great drops or clots of blood, falling down to the ground. Yet in these circumstances, he was fully resigned to the sovereign purposes of God and his will (Matt. 26:39): “O my Father, if this cup may not pass from me, except I drink it, thy will be done.” 
 
What an amazing act of grace was it when Christ took upon our human nature. In this act of great condescension, he who was God became man. The Word should be made flesh, and should take on him a nature infinitely below his original nature. We should appreciate the remarkably low circumstances of his incarnation: He was conceived in the womb of a poor young woman, whose poverty appeared in this, when she came to offer sacrifices for her purification, she brought what was allowed of in the Law only in the case of poverty, a pair of turtle-doves or two young pigeons. 
 
Christ’s infinite condescension marvelously appeared in the manner of his birth. He was brought forth in a stable, because there was no room for them in the inn. The inn was taken up by others, that were looked upon as persons of greater account. The blessed Virgin, being poor and despised, was turned or shut out. Though she was in such need, yet those that counted themselves her better would not give place to them. Therefore, in her time of giving birth, she was forced to give birth to her son in a stable, and laid him in a feed trough. 
 
There Christ lay a little infant, and there he eminently appeared as a lamb. But yet this feeble infant, born this way in a stable, and laid in a feed trough, was born to conquer and triumph over Satan, that roaring lion (cf. 1 Peter 5:8). Jesus came to subdue the mighty powers of darkness, and make a show of them openly, and so to restore peace on earth, and to manifest God’s good-will towards men, and to bring glory to God in the highest!  
 
In Jesus Christ’s life, and especially in his suffering and death, he appears as paradoxically both lion and lamb. 
 
He appeared as a lamb in the hands of his cruel enemies, as a lamb in the paws and between the devouring jaws of a roaring lion. He was a lamb actually slain by this lion, and yet at the same time, as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, he conquers and triumphs over Satan, destroying his own devourer! In Christ’s death on the cross, we see the glorious strength of the lion destroying his enemies, as he was brought as a lamb to the slaughter. 
 
In Christ’s greatest weakness he was the strongest!  
 
Even in Christ’s present state of exaltation in heaven, we see the attributes of both the lion and the lamb! In his exalted state, he most eminently appears in manifestation of those excellencies and strength of a great lion, but he still appears as a lamb. Though Christ be now at the right hand of God, exalted as King of Heaven, and Lord of the universe, yet as he is still in the human nature, he still excels in humility! 
 
Though the man Christ Jesus be now at the right hand of God, and is the highest of all creatures in heaven as a glorified man, yet he still excels all in humility because he still knows the infinite distance between the Creator and the creature. Though he now appears in such glorious majesty and dominion in heaven, yet he appears as a lamb in his condescending, mild, and sweet treatment of His saints here on earth. For he is a lamb still, even amidst the throne of his exaltation, and he that is Shepherd of the whole flock is himself a Lamb, and goes before them in heaven as such! 
 
Though in heaven every knee bows to him, and though the angels fall down before him adoring him, yet he treats his saints with infinite condescension, love, mildness, patience, and endearment. And in his acts towards the saints on earth, Jesus still appears as a lamb, manifesting exceeding love and tenderness in his intercession for them, as one that has had experience of affliction and temptation like them. 
 
Behold the Lamb who instructs, supplies grace, and comfort, coming to His own, and manifesting himself to them by His Spirit, supping with them at His table, and enabling them to do that which pleases God. Behold the Lamb admitting His people to sweet communion with Him, enabling them with boldness and confidence to come to him, and quieting their hearts with his peace. 
 
Jesus Christ will come again and will appear as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. He will appear in infinite greatness and majesty, when he shall come again in glory, with all his holy angels, and the earth shall tremble before him, and the hills shall melt (Rev. 19:11-17; 20:11). The devils tremble at the thought of his appearance, and when the time comes, the kings, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, shall hide themselves in the dens, and in the rocks of mountains, and shall cry to the mountains and rocks to fall on them, to hide them from the face and wrath of the Lamb! 
 
Jesus Christ will at the same time appear as a Lamb to his saints. He will receive them as friends and brethren, treating those who believe and have awaited his return with infinite mildness and love. The church shall be then admitted to him as his bride and that shall be their wedding day. The saints shall all be sweetly invited to come with him to inherit the kingdom, and reign with him in it for all eternity. 
 
Jesus Christ the Lamb of God invites his people to come unto him and trust in him. With what sweet grace and kindness does he invite us to sup and fellowship with him by His Spirit. Jesus Christ the Lion of Judah invites his people to come to him in his glorious power and dominion for defense and shelter amidst the storms and struggles of this life. 
 
Would you choose for a friend a person like Christ with such dignity? It is a thing common to our experience in this world to have those for our friends who are much above us because we look upon ourselves honored by the friendship of such. Thus, how a young inferior maid would be pleased to have a great and excellent prince to give his dear love to her?! This is the stuff of fairy tales! But Christ is infinitely above you, and above all the princes o of the earth for he is King of kings. So honorable a person as this offers himself to you, in the nearest and dearest friendship! 
 
Christ will himself give himself to you by faith, with all those various excellencies that paradoxically meet together in him, to your full and everlasting enjoyment. He will forever after treat you as his dear friend, and you shall always be where he is, and shall behold his glory, and dwell with him, in most free and intimate communion and enjoyment (1 John 3:1-3; Rev. 21:1-7). 

Why Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy is Glorious! (Part 2)

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8)

Why is keeping the Lord’s Day holy glorious?

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity to please and glorify God in obedience to His commandments.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can remind us that the Lord Jesus created it, kept it, and fulfilled it, and gave it to believers as a way of imitating Him.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity for growth and maturity in Christ.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can be a time well spent that helps us not to live overly busy and distracted lives.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a way of joyfully, peacefully, and graciously witnessing publicly to whom it is you belong, and to whom it is you ultimately submit!

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is part of our confessional heritage as particularly Reformed Christians.

  1. Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy is glorious because it is a privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace.

While the Old Covenant saints enjoyed a blessed holy day on the last day of the week, New Covenant saints that confess and believe the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead are blessed to keep the Lord’s Day on the first day of the week (Rev. 1:9-10). It is a privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace to have a Christian Sabbath that is also the Lord’s Day. This is a particular privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace because only God’s people who are recipients of His saving grace can properly keep the Lord’s Day holy from a pure heart (Matt. 5:8; cf. 1 Tim. 1:5).

God gave the Old Covenant saints the last day of the week as the Lord’s Day or Sabbath to point them to the Promised Messiah and Hope that was to come. Now that Christ has come and has been resurrected according to the Scriptures (1 Cor. 15:1-4; Luke 24:25-27; 44-47), the Lord’s Day or Christian Sabbath is on the first day. This first day of the week reminds us that we are part of a new creation, the first fruits of the resurrection in Christ Jesus—Hallelujah!! (1 Cor. 15:20ff). Although the day has changed now for the commandment to be kept (from last day to first day), the commandment remains the same in substance and in the goal to promote the glory of God and the good of His people!

The Westminster Larger Catechism, Q&A 116 teaches us: What is required in the fourth commandment? A. The fourth commandment requireth of all men the sanctifying or keeping holy to God such set times as he hath appointed in his word, expressly one whole day in seven; which was the seventh from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, and the first day of the week ever since, and so to continue to the end of the world; which is the Christian sabbath,(1) and in the New Testament called The Lord’s day.(2) (1)Deut. 5:12-14; Gen. 2:2,3; 1 Cor. 16:1,2; Acts 20:7; Matt. 5:17,18; Isa. 56:2,4,6,7 (2)Rev. 1:10

We should reiterate again that believers in Christ can never keep any of God’s laws in order to merit salvation or the favor of God (that is as a covenant of works), but we can keep it holy and set apart from all other days with a sincere heart that desires to please God. As God’s people in Christ, it is a privilege and blessing to be those who are set apart for the LORD’s own chosen possession to be a holy people, and to be different from the world in order to glorify God (Titus 2:11-14; 1 Peter 2:9-12): “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable…they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Pet. 2:12; cf. Matt. 5:13-16).

What a blessing the Lord has given to us as a gift this special day! What a mercy and kindness of God that we as believers can have one day in seven to freely honor and joyfully worship God, and that we can be reminded of our everlasting rest that is yet to come (Heb. 4:9-10), that we can worship and serve Christ, knowing we are united to Him in his death and resurrection (Col. 3:1-4), and that we can receive the means that the Spirit has provided for our growth in Word, Sacrament, prayer, and fellowship (cf. Acts 2:41-37).

Suggested Questions to Ponder and Ask Yourself to Help You to Keep the Lord’s Day Holy:

Is this activity on the Lord’s Day going to glorify God above all things? / Is this activity a work of necessity or mercy that I lovingly desire to do to love God and neighbor? / Is this activity going to hinder me (or others) from publicly worshipping God and attending to any calls to worship that God calls me to through his ordained servants? / Is this activity loving and the best use of my time for myself, my family, my guests, my neighbors, and those who look to me for leadership? / Is this activity going to be consistent with God’s Word, and particularly His clear teaching on how he desires the Lord’s Day to be remembered? / Is this activity work that I normally engage it on other days, and can it wait? / Is this activity a distraction from my taking time to grow up in God’s Word? / Is this activity something that will not be conducive to remembering what I learned in the morning worship sermon and meditating upon it and hiding in my heart so that I won’t sin against God? / Is this activity properly living a godly example before a broken and lost world?

Prayer: Dear Jesus, I want to keep the Lord’s Day holy, please help me. Grant me your wisdom and discernment. Amen

In Christ’s love,

Pastor Biggs

(To read the entire study on why keeping the Lord’s Day is glorious, click here: From Your Pastor.Why Keeping the Lords Day is Glorious.March 2016)

Why Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy is Glorious! (Part 1)

Dear Beloved, the next few weeks on the KCPC blog will be focused on showing why keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious! I hope this will encourage you in your faith. – Pastor Biggs

—————————–

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8)

Why is keeping the Lord’s Day holy glorious?

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity to please and glorify God in obedience to His commandments.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a privilege and blessing of the Covenant of Grace.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can remind us that the Lord Jesus created it, kept it, and fulfilled it, and gave it to believers as a way of imitating Him.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is an opportunity for growth and maturity in Christ.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it can be a time well spent that helps us not to live overly busy and distracted lives.

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is a way of joyfully, peacefully, and graciously witnessing publicly to whom it is you belong, and to whom it is you ultimately submit!

* Keeping the Lord’s Day holy is glorious because it is part of our confessional heritage as particularly Reformed Christians.

  1. Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy is glorious because it is an opportunity to please and glorify God in obedience to His commandments.

God has given His people commandments for His glory and our good. The law of God, as summarized in the Ten Commandments, is a clear revelation of God’s righteousness and holiness. The commandments are a clear expression of what it means when believers are admonished: “Be holy, as God is holy” (Lev. 20:26; 1 Pet. 1:15-16).[1] God commands His people in the fourth commandment to “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy”. This commandment teaches us that God wants us to set apart one day in seven for holy worship and rest. He desires that we make the Lord’s Day special.[2]

As Christians we should desire to fear God and keep all of His commandments. Indeed, the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom (Prov. 1:7; Ecc. 12:13). Fearing God and keeping His commandments is a constant teaching throughout Holy Scripture (Exo. 20:20; Deut. 10:12-14; Jer. 32:38-42; Psa. 130:4; 2 Cor. 7:1). As believers, we are taught to work out our salvation with “fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12-13; cf. Exo. 20:20; Isa. 66:2). Although there is absolutely no fear of God before the eyes of the wicked and foolish in this world (Psa. 36:1-2; Rom. 3:18), Christians have been granted the fear of the Lord as a blessing and gift of the Holy Spirit in Christ (Jer. 32:38-42; Heb. 12:28-29)! Do you understand fear of the Lord as a blessing and aspect of the work of the Spirit? God promises in Christ that by His Spirit He would cause His people to fear Him:

I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever…And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me (ESV Jeremiah 32:39-40b)

In Holy Scripture, the fear of the LORD is another manner of describing a desire to obey and please God and to keep His commandments (2 Cor. 5:9-11: “We make it our aim to please Him…Knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others…”). In Christ, the commandments for Christians are not merely a duty or obligation (although they are that!). Rather, in Christ, the commandments for Christians are privileges of grace (Matt. 5:17-20; Rom. 6:17; 8:1-6). Christians have been set free to please God in this way before a dying and dark world infested and possessed by sin. Only a Christian can truly say with David, “O how I love your Law! It is my meditation all the day!” (Psa. 119:97); and with the Apostle Paul cry out, “The law is holy, and the commandment is righteous and good!” (Rom. 7:12).[3]

God is very clear that although the ceremonial and civil laws of Israel have been fulfilled in Christ (Col. 2:16-17; Mark 7:19; cf. Rom. 14:17), nevertheless, the moral law, summarized in the Ten Commandments is still a duty and privilege for God’s creatures to keep, particularly His own people. There is no other commandment where God so fully exegetes and unpacks the meaning as to why His creatures, particularly His set-apart people are to keep the Lord’s Day holy than the fourth commandment. Although many evangelical Christians emphasize (rightly!) Jesus’s fulfillment of the ceremonial and civil laws of Israel, and his fulfillment of the moral law (summarized in the Ten Commandments) as a Covenant of Works, they often fail to teach the importance of the ongoing requirements of the Law of God for believers. For instance, our Lord Jesus clearly said:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven (ESV Matthew 5:17-20).

Jesus with a holy hatred despised the legalism of the Pharisees. Jesus was constantly pointing out that the Law as a way of righteousness or as a Covenant of Works was impossible for sinful man (Matt. 5:20), but He as Lord of the Sabbath, also upheld and honored the moral law revealed in the Ten Commandments. The Apostle Paul taught that faith in Christ’s righteousness was not to overthrow the moral law of God: “Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law” (ESV Romans 3:31). God’s people in Christ should also seek to uphold the moral law in reliance upon His grace and Spirit.

As fallen and sinful human beings, let us be honest that we often desire to go about doing our own work in our own way, selfish and stingy of our time. We want to work as much as we possibly can to get ahead, and to live our lives as fallen people as separated from God as we possibly can! The natural, fallen man sees the Lord’s Day as a hindrance and something that prevents him from doing what he wants to do. And we don’t like to be out of control (in our estimation!) of our calendars and our schedules. This was one of the reasons why Israel often did not rejoice and delight in keeping the Sabbath, and this can be our reason, too!

Yet God in His mercy and covenant faithfulness counters the sinful heart that deceives us by alluring His people to a promise of “Riding on the heights of the earth” in our delight of His holy day! Who in their right minds would not want to enjoy this treasure of a promise given by a Holy and Faithful God and Father?! Have you ever ridden on the heights of the earth??!! God promises as loving Father and blessed Savior:

If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath, from doing your pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbath a delight and the holy day of the LORD honorable; if you honor it, not going your own ways, or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly; then you shall take delight in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, for the mouth of the LORD has spoken. (ESV Isaiah 58:13-14).

“THEN you shall take delight in the LORD…!” Don’t miss this promise. God in His merciful kindness and grace desires to set His people free from our selfishness and self-centered “will worship” of doing our own thing the way we want to do it (“…From doing your pleasure…going your own ways, seeking your own pleasure…”), so that we can experience the liberty of life in the Spirit and the peace that goes with that in Christ! (Gal. 5:1; Rom. 6:1, 14; 8:6: “…The mind of the Spirit is life and [glorious!] peace”). Our great God and Father wants us to understand that true Christian freedom is keeping the Lord’s day with delight! Do you call the Lord’s Day a delight? Do you take delight in the LORD? If your life is joyless, and you have asked God to search your heart for sin that may be hiding, that you’re not seeing (Psa. 139:23-34), perhaps this is something that you haven’t taken seriously enough?! In Christ, we are set free from selfish focus on ourselves, to live unto God, gratefully desiring to do His will. Let us pray more that we will not only do God’s will as we are commanded, but to will to do it from tender and loving hearts that have been thrilled by His grace and love! “…For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13).

Keeping the Lord’s Day Holy is an opportunity to show the freedom we truly possess in Christ. As a Covenant of Works, the law summarized in the Ten Commandments, particularly the fourth commandment on keeping the Lord’s Day has been fulfilled in Christ. No fallen sinner could ever keep God’s law as a way of works, or as a covenant of works to earn or merit their salvation. Jesus Christ, the glorious God-Man has accomplished this perfect law-keeping for us in our stead, on our behalf (Gal. 2:16-21). This glorious God-Man has died in our place under the just wrath of God because we did not keep God’s commandments, and we did not take seriously his teaching to keep his Sabbath holy. The glorious Gospel is that when we believe in Christ alone by faith alone through grace alone, this perfect righteousness, or perfect law-keeping of Christ is imputed to believers as if we have never sinned and perfectly kept the commandments of God. “And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20).

Suggested Questions to Ponder and Ask Yourself to Help You to Keep the Lord’s Day Holy:

Is this activity on the Lord’s Day going to glorify God above all things? / Is this activity a work of necessity or mercy that I lovingly desire to do to love God and neighbor? / Is this activity going to hinder me (or others) from publicly worshipping God and attending to any calls to worship that God calls me to through his ordained servants? / Is this activity loving and the best use of my time for myself, my family, my guests, my neighbors, and those who look to me for leadership? / Is this activity going to be consistent with God’s Word, and particularly His clear teaching on how he desires the Lord’s Day to be remembered? / Is this activity work that I normally engage it on other days, and can it wait? / Is this activity a distraction from my taking time to grow up in God’s Word? / Is this activity something that will not be conducive to remembering what I learned in the morning worship sermon and meditating upon it and hiding in my heart so that I won’t sin against God? / Is this activity properly living a godly example before a broken and lost world? / Prayer: Dear Jesus, I want to keep the Lord’s Day holy, please help me. Grant me your wisdom and discernment. Amen

In Christ’s love,

Pastor Biggs

 

(To read the entire study on why keeping the Lord’s Day is glorious, click here: From Your Pastor.Why Keeping the Lords Day is Glorious.March 2016)

 

Notes

[1] Note that Old Covenant people were addressed by God’s commandment as those He had redeemed out of slavery: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery…”
(Exo. 20:2). So that we are to understand that all of the commandments are made in the context of God’s covenantal grace to His people who once were enslaved, but now freed by His grace (indicative). The commandments can only be kept by those who ultimately received God as their Savior, and believed in His promises of grace made to Abraham and his seed.

[2] The distinction between Sabbath and Lord’s Day is made later in study.

[3] The Westminster Larger Catechism, Question and Answer 97 is helpful here: What special use is there of the moral law to the regenerate? A. Although they that are regenerate, and believe in Christ, be delivered from the moral law as a covenant of works, so as thereby they are neither justified nor condemned; yet, besides the general uses thereof common to them with all men, it is of special use, to show them how much they are bound to Christ for his fulfilling it, and enduring the curse thereof in their stead, and for their good; and thereby to provoke them to more thankfulness, and to express the same in their greater care to conform themselves thereunto as the rule of their obedience.

Soul Idolatry, Or, “How Do I Discover and Destroy My Idols by Faith in Christ”

Soul Idolatry, Or, “How Do I Discover and Destroy My Idols by Faith in Christ”

By David Clarkson[1]

Edited by Pastor Charles R. Biggs

 

“For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.”

– ESV Ephesians 5:5

 

Do You Have Reigning or Ruling lusts?

Everything created that seeks to master your spirit and to bring your life into conformity unto it is potentially a reigning or ruling lust. Every love that is not subdued and submitted under the Lordship of Jesus Christ is a potential lust. Every desire that you have that seeks to rule you rather than to bring you delight in God is potentially a reigning or ruling lust. Every reigning or ruling lust is an idol, and every person in whom it reigns is an idolater. What are your reigning and ruling lusts?

Pleasures, and riches, and honors are the carnal man’s “trinity”, and these become gods that make men idolaters:

ESV 1 John 2:16 For all that is in the world- the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions- is not from the Father but is from the world.

In Satan’s kingdom, every one bowing himself to his lust worships it as an idol. When the mind is most taken up with an object, and the heart and the affections most set upon it, this is soul worship, and this is what is due only to God.

Secret and soul idolatry is when the mind and heart is set upon anything more than God; when anything is more valued, more trusted, more loved, etc.

According to Ephesians 5:5 (as well as Colossians 3:5 and Revelation 21:8) teaches us that soul idolatry will exclude men out of heaven as well as open idolatry. He that serves his lusts is as incapable of heaven as he that serves, worships idols of wood and stone. We must be careful as Christians, and learn to daily watch and pray. We must learn to live a life of daily repentance: Turning from the “over-desires” or inordinate loves and desires that we see seeking to master us, and influence us, and turn for grace and strength in Christ Jesus alone.

 

Can Christians Commit Idolatry??

Yes, but more subtly from the heart, or the soul (Prov. 4:23). The danger of soul idolatry is that we often do not notice it as easily because it is inward, from the heart, and so we fail to recognize the dangers of it as we do outward, more obvious idolatry. Many fine Christians would never bow the knee to wood and stone idols, but will bow down from their hearts or souls to other idols that are unseen, yet just as grossly idolatrous and displeasing to God (Deut. 4:19-21; James 4:1ff).

The following are the acts of soul worship so that you might prayerfully consider each one and if found an idolater in God’s sight, you might ask Him to forgive you and restore to you the joy and love of your salvation. God is always crying out to His people: “Return, O Israel…for you have stumbled because of your iniquity” (Hos. 14:1ff). Let us bring our confession to Him each day, knowing He is faithful to forgive us and restore us, and to give us new and wondrous grace to live for Him (Hos. 14:6-8; John 15:1ff; 1 Jo. 1:7; Heb. 4:14-16).

Are you an idolater? If so, remember God gives more grace in order that you might humble yourself through repentance and confess your sins to Him, knowing that He is faithful and just to forgive you and cleanse you from all unrighteousness (James 4:6ff; 1 John 1:7ff):

  • Esteem: That which we most highly value we make our God. Estimation is an act of soul worship. What we most esteem we make our God such as high opinions of self, our accomplishments, what folks think of us, how we dress ourselves up before others, our possessions, etc. Whose opinions do you esteem the most? At the end of the day who has power over you to judge you “guilty” or “non-guilty”? God or other men? Who do you live your life before? Whose opinions do you “need” to make you someone important?
  • Mindfulness: That which we are most mindful we make our God. What do you think about the most often? When we should be thinking about God and we’re thinking about other things, we are revealing what we love the most. Are our thoughts seeking to follow after God’s thoughts? Do you set your minds on things above where Christ is? (Col. 3:1-4).
  • Intention: What is our greatest longing and goal in life? God and nothing else must be our chief end. If our chief end is to be great, safe, rich, powerful, famous, when it is our own pleasure, credit, profit, and advantage, this is soul idolatry. What do you get up each day with a mind of accomplishing and doing?
  • Love: That which we most love we worship as our God. Do we love riches, possessions, family, and/or friends more, or equal with God? Love, whenever it is inordinate, it is an idolatrous affection.
  • Trust: What do I trust in? Who do we trust, and/or depend upon the most? Where is our confidence? Trust God “with all of your heart” (Proverbs 3:5). Do you trust in your wisdom, strength, intellect, handgun, abilities, etc? Do you trust ultimately in riches, how much you have in your savings account and/or retirement; do you trust ultimately in your friends? Do you boast in yourself, and in your own wisdom or boast in the Lord (1 Cor. 1:29-31).
  • Fear: What we fear, we worship as our God. That is our god which is our fear and dread: ESV Luke 12:4-5: “I tell you, my friends, do not fear those who kill the body, and after that have nothing more that they can do. 5 But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! Those therefore who fear other things more than God; who are more afraid to offend other people than to displease God; who fear more to lose outward enjoyments than to lose the favor of God and His Spirit; who fear outward suffering more than God’s displeasure and wrath.
  • Hope: Ask yourself: What is my hope? Christ alone should be our hope as Christians; he is our hope and righteousness. What excites your hope each day helping you to get through the day?
  • Desire: That which we chiefly desire is the chief good in our lives, and what we account as our chief good is our god. To desire anything more, or so much as the enjoyment of God, is to idolize it, to prostrate the heart to it, and worship it as God only should be worshipped. What is your heart prostrated before in worship? Pray with the Psalmist that God alone would be your chief desire: Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever (Psalm 73:25-26). Pray for the Holy Spirit to grant you not merely to “do” for God, but that you might will and desire to do good (Phil. 2:13- “to will and to work for His good pleasure”).
  • Delight: Delight is an affection that in its height and elevation is called “glorying”. What do you “glory in”? To take more pleasure in any way of sin, uncleanness, temptation, intemperance, gluttony, drunkenness, earthly employments or enjoyments, than in the holy ways of God, than in those spiritual and heavenly services which we may enjoy God, is idolatry. Would you rather be “glorying” in other things (even lawful and good things) rather than worshipping God and fellowshipping with His people? How do you keep the Lord’s Day? How do you spend your money? Are you generous? The answers to these questions will reveal your idolatry or love for God alone.
  • Zeal: What are we zealous for? Are we zealous for ourselves, our plans, our vacations, our dreams, our agendas more than God? Are we fervent for ourselves and our own good and glory, and indifferent, lazy, and lukewarm in our zeal for God and His Kingdom? Are we more zealous for political parties, persons and/or teachers in the church or in our communities than we are in God and His Church? Do we spend more time thining about, and planning our vacation and retirement than we do in preparing ourselves for worship of the Living God and to appear before the Judgment Seat of Christ?
  • Gratitude: What are you most thankful for? Do we honor “diligence” or “luck” or “prudence” or “fortune” more than God’s goodness? In response to compliments, and/or other offering you respect do you give glory and thanksgiving to your “diligence” or your “luck” more than God?

When our care and industry (hard work) is more for other things than for God, we are idolaters. No man can serve two masters!

 

How Many Masters Do You Have?

When you are more careful and industrious (hard working) to please men, or yourselves, or your children and posterity, than to be serviceable, useful and faithful to God; if it is more important to you to provide for yourselves and your family more than to serve God; if you are more careful what you shall eat, drink, and wear more than how you may honor and glorify God you have a hateful and burdensome master who is not God: ESV Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other….ESV Matthew 6:33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

To live like this is to idolize the world, yourselves, your lusts, your relations, while the God of Heaven is neglected.

We must remember that the Bible defines true conversion to Christ as “turning from idols”: ESV

1 Thessalonians 1:9-10: For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.

Does this characterize your life? You have “turned to God from idols to serve…to wait for His Son…”?

Have you experienced true conversion? How do you know if your affections of your heart and your actions seek something more than God; if you’re an idolater- -how can you be assured of your knowledge and relationship to Christ?

 

Who then shall be saved??!!

Where is the heart in which some idol is not secretly advanced? Where it that soul that does not bow down to some lust or vanity? Where it that person that does not give that soul-worship to the creature which is due unto the Creator alone?

On the one hand, we find in Scripture that the people of God can be guilty of terrible sins such as stumbling into unforgiveness, anger, lying, drunkenness, murder, adultery, denial of Christ, and blatant idolatry itself (Abraham and the patriarchs, Noah, David, Solomon, Peter, etc). On the other hand, how can this be consistent with the state of grace when this is blatant spiritual idolatry that is offensive to God??!!

Answer: There is an aptness and still a propensity in every saint of God to be idolaters, just as much there is a propensity and aptness toward other sins. In fact, idolatry as a sin is a root and foundational sin to all the others in the heart. The corruption of our natures in Adam consists of proneness to all abominations, including idolatry.

Grace is imperfect in this life and only corrects this corruption in part. Grace weakens the disposition and desire to idolatry,but it does not completely abolish it. That is why we must be aware of it, and constantly be fighting to kill it in its first motions, and thoughts to sin. We must watch and pray that we do not fall into temptation.

It is true that those folks, those natures that are most sanctified on earth are still a seminary (seed bed) of sin; there is in them the roots, the seeds of atheism, blasphemy, murder, adultery, apostasy, and idolatry.

This disposition to idolatry remains more or less in the best, while the body of death remains. Remember the Apostle Paul’s struggle and great frustrations for his own sins (Romans 7:20-25):

Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

 

Is Paul’s Struggle Familiar to You?

Is the Apostle Paul’s struggle in Romans 7 familiar to you? Do you have a fight, a conflict within your soul against sinfulness? Is your alliance with the Spirit of God warring against your flesh? Are you hopeful of being delivered by Jesus from the body of death?

Love in the regenerate still may be inordinate, therefore the other affections, desires, delights, desires, fears, zeals, etc. can give way to actual sins of idolatry in their actions.

With that said, however, we must still understand the power of Jesus Christ, and the fact that true believers have been united to Christ and take part in not only the removal of our penalty for sin, but we are empowered by God’s Spirit to live as more than overcomers (Romans 8)!

 

Are You Habitually Idolatrous?

The regenerate will still have a disposition toward idolatry, but they will not be guilty of habitual idolatry. The unregenerate and unbelieving are guilty of constant and habitual idolatry, but the regenerate will not be (1 Jo. 2:1-3). True Christians are not habitual idolaters; idolatry does not characterize their lives.

Believers will not yield to these idolatrous notions knowingly, willingly, constantly as unbelievers do; these idolatrous desires are not tolerated or allowed, but rather fought against because they have the Spirit that wages Holy War against the flesh (Gal. 5:16-26).

Believers resist idolatry by living watchfully, prayerfully, carefully, and fully and constantly dependent upon God’s strength and grace in Christ. True believers in Christ will resist, lament and pray against idolatry; they are neither arrogant or ignorant of their remaining sinfulness, but they know that sin shall not reign over them as their master:

ESV Romans 6:11-14: So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. 13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. 14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.

Are you a habitual idolater? Has arrogance made you neglectful and apathetic (see Rev. 3:14-22)? Has ignorance caused you to overlook it? Is your life privately characterized by idolatry?

Are you still a slave to sin? Does sin have dominion over you? Has it mastered you?

Begin with your private life. Begin with your heart. Ask God to search you and know you. Is your private life characterized by idolatry as sketched above? Are your hearts and minds filled with idolatry?

If you are characterized by habitual idolatry, you cannot claim the assurance of the knowledge of salvation in Jesus nor can you have assurance that you are empowered by His Spirit.

How can you be assured of your faith in Christ that it is truly a saving faith?

True believers fly to the blood of Christ for pardon; they run desperately and violently as possible to Christ and His power to overcome sin and idolatry! When believers see sin, they run to Christ to confess it.

Believers are diligent to mortify or kill their idolatry when they find it in their hearts and minds so that they can please Christ in their daily duties.

The idolatry that the saints united to Jesus are prone to is not the same as reigning, habitual idolatry of the unregenerate and the unrepentant. None are more ready to disclaim this idolatry than those who are most guilty! Those who are most guilty of idolatry reject any need from God or others.

Our proneness to idolatry is the reason why we must all be neither arrogant nor ignorant toward the remaining sin that is within us. We must seek the LORD and ask Him through watching and praying that He would deliver us more and more, and grant us a deeper repentance and trust in Jesus Christ.

The more we understand what we have been delivered from, and from what we are being delivered, and just how much it has eaten us up inside like a cancer, the more diligent we will be in exalting the grace of God found in Christ Jesus, and running to Jesus for His cleansing blood to purify and empower us over our sins.

Do you live a life of repentance, asking God to search your hearts and minds to cleanse of all of your idols?

Are you an idolater?

 

What is your hope?

If you realize how deeply your idolatry goes, wouldn’t it behoove you to use your time more wisely in seeking Christ, and seeking Him to make you pure as He is pure? The root to all of the believer’s fruitfulness is found in union with Jesus and we grow as behold the gracious face of God each day in our prayers and in our walk:

ESV 2 Corinthians 3:18 And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

Our only hope is in our Savior Jesus Christ! So be strengthened by the grace that is in Jesus (2 Tim. 2:1); watch and pray that you fall not into temptation (Matt. 26:41); be strong in the LORD and in the power of His might (Eph. 6:10); resist the devil, draw near to God (James 4:6ff). Remember the words of James; if we need grace, God will grant it as we ask for it:

“…[God] gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.”

Let us pray together for a closer, more committed walk with the Living God by His Spirit!

 

Prayer

Dear Lord and Father, help me to watch and pray against idolatry in my heart. Keep my heart pure and clean, and my focus fixed on Christ! Grant me grace to be self-aware of my sin, leading me to daily repentance; make me Christ-aware as I keep my the focus of my affections, feelings, emotions, will and mind on Jesus and not on my base and sinful lusts. In Jesus’s Name. Amen.

 

In Christ’s Love,

Pastor Biggs

 

 

[1] The sermon is by David Clarkson (1622-86), entitled ‘Soul Idolatry Excludes Men from Heaven’ (from Works of David Clarkson, Vol. 2, Banner of Truth Trust). Clarkson was a ministerial colleague of John Owen, and the minister who preached and ministered to Owen’s flock after John Owen’s death (yes, Pastor Clarkson was in the shadows of a greater man—but both were great men!).

Westminster Shorter Catechism: Q30 (Part 2)

Question: WSC 30, Part 2: How does the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ?

Answer: The Spirit applieth to us the redemption purchased by Christ, by working faith in us, and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling.

 

More on Union with Christ

Scripture Memory: ESV Galatians 2:20: I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

 

An Explanation:* “Uniting us to Christ…” Union with Christ is the fount from which all blessings of eternity and time flow forth by the Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:3-14). Christ is the Reservoir of all blessing from the Father through the Spirit (1 Cor. 1:9). Believers have union and communion with Christ in grace and glory (WLC, 65-66). What are the practical implications of our union?

  1. The church has union with Christ in the Father’s eternal election. This is a union that precedes our birth and conversion, back into the eternal electing mercies of God. Union with Christ includes union in eternity, in history in the fullness of the times, and the Spirit’s union in the application of our salvation. This covenant theology recognizes that union with Christ is not merely a present experience, but an eternal reality in the plan of God. A covenant of grace was made with Christ as the Second Adam, and all the elect in Him as His seed (Heb. 13:20-21).
  2. The church has union with Christ in the Son’s incarnation. No higher honor was given to humanity than when God the Son took our nature into permanent union with God. The purpose of Christ’s incarnation is particularly His priestly office and work to make propitiation for His people, and intercede for them (Heb. 1:1-2; 2:17; 7:25). The incarnation forms a necessary link with Christ, so that we might have His righteousness to us. Christ joins with us in our nature and this incarnational union makes possible all of the righteousness that He earned and will give to us as we receive it by faith. Only those who are sanctified in Christ can all ourselves “brethren” of God’s Son (Heb. 2:11). This is important as part of God’s promise of being “with us”; the incarnational union impresses upon us that He is not merely God for us, but God with us.
  3. The church has union with Christ in His death, resurrection, and ascension. This is particularly Paul’s theme in his writings (Rom. 6-8). We died with Christ on the cross, were buried with Him, rose from the dead with Him, seated with Him in Heavenly Places, etc (Col. 3:1-4; Gal. 2:20). All of the believer’s experiences of saving faith flow from his union with Christ in these great, redemptive-historical events. Whatever Christ did and received, belong to us as God’s children. As believers, we should count all of these blessings as our own possessions. This union with Christ is an abiding reality that believers must live out of by faith. In 2 Corinthians 5:14-15: “One died for all, then all died, therefore we should live not for ourselves, but for Him who died and has risen from the dead.” Christians died with Christ 2000 years ago with Christ on the cross, but we experientially live this out being transformed in time by God’s Spirit.
  4. The church has union with Christ in the Spirit’s works of personal salvation. The Spirit establishes a vital union with Christ through effectual calling and regeneration. We are in space and time united to Jesus Christ. In Romans 8:30, Paul wrote: Romans 8:30 “And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” Freedom from condemnation belongs to those who are “in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8). The Spirit of Life liberates us from sin to live for Christ.
  5. Communion with God in love flows out of union. Spirit, faith, and love are the three “chains of union” (William Ames). The Spirit from God to unites us; faith from us to unite us; love to give ourselves wholly to Christ as His Beloved. All that Christ has or has done is ours by faith in Christ Jesus. The Christian is a fruitful branch, an eating and drinking guest at the banquet, a beloved bride, clothed in His righteousness and glory. All these will be realized at the Consummation of all things, and we will live blessedly (Rev. 19:7ff; 21:1ff)! We shall have total, unhindered, intimacy with Christ in heaven for all eternity! We shall realize fully the Lord’s love for His bride!

* Compiled from Dr. J. R. Beeke’s lectures on soteriology.

 

A Prayer: Thank you, dear Jesus, that you loved me and gave yourself for me. I am grateful to confess: “I am crucified with Christ…and the life I live now, I live by faith in the Son of God” (Gal. 2:20).

 

In Christ’s Love,

Pastor Biggs

 

Be Filled with the Spirit

Pentecost was a once-for-all, unique, redemptive-historical, unrepeatable act of the Risen-Ascended Christ in sending forth His Spirit (John 7:37-39; Acts 1:5; 2:33-36). Pentecost was the coming of Christ to His Church as the life-giving Spirit at a new stage of redemptive-history (Acts 2:33-36; cf. 1 Cor. 15:45). Pentecost can be no more repeated than the death and resurrection of Christ can be a repeatable event. Pentecost and the first few stages or phases of the event that are recorded in Acts is not a paradigm for all believers to experience individually, but a pattern to note how the Spirit was poured out upon the Body of Christ in redemptive-history by the Risen-Ascended Christ and spread from Israel to the nations.

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8).

Dr. Luke’s important stress throughout the Book of Acts is on how the apostolic gospel spreads from Mt. Zion in Jerusalem to Israel on the Day of Pentecost to the nations, or “to the ends of the earth” as the Old Testament prophets foretold (Psa. 2:8; 22:27; 72:8; Isa. 2:2-5; 5:26; 45:22; 52:10; cf. Acts 28:28:31). The events recorded in Acts 8, 10-11, and 19 are “extensions,” “expansions,” or “stages” of the once-for-all Day of Pentecost through the foundational ministry of the apostles: “…Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets…the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord” (Eph. 2:18-22).

The Apostles, the newly reformed, reconstituted Israel received the promised gift of the Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, then they were used as Christ’s instruments of blessings to give the life-giving blessings of the Spirit to the believing remnant in Jerusalem, then to Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth (even Old Covenant believers who had not heard of the full work of Jesus and the Spirit heard the complete news of redemption, and received the Spirit (see Ephesians 18:24-19:5). The Book of Acts emphasizes that because of Pentecost, the Church is the Body of Christ made up of Jews, Gentiles, slave, free, male, female, and all are one in Christ (cf. Gal. 3:26-29). The blessings made to Abraham have now gone to the nations; Abraham has become more fully the “Father of many nations” (cf. Gen. 12:1-3; Gal. 3:14, 16, 29).

Now believers who receive Christ, receive the fullness of His Spirit, and are baptized in the Spirit upon conversion or regeneration.

For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free- and all were made to drink of one Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13).

We must make clear that the baptism of the Spirit takes place for each member at the time of being incorporated into the one body of Christ, at the time of saving inclusion within the covenant community in regeneration, and not at some time subsequent to that saving incorporation. Christ baptizes all believers with the fullness of His Spirit through faith. All believers are sealed unto the day of redemption by Christ’s Spirit (Eph. 1:13-14). All believers are the “dwelling place of God in the Spirit” (Eph. 2:22) and the temple of God in which the Spirit and Glory of God dwells (1 Cor. 3:16). Dr. Sinclair Ferguson writes that “…Pentecost (or the Acts as a whole) provides us not with a two-stage paradigm for personal experience of the Spirit, but rather that at the point of faith we participate individually in the effect of the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost.”

There are importance applications and implications for believers today.[1] Dr. Richard Gaffin makes an important distinction between understanding the eschatological dimension of Pentecost that was once-and-for-all (historia salutis, an event in the history of salvation) and the individual-experiential dimension (ordo salutis, the order we receive the blessings of redemption) that we continue to enjoy as Christians united to Jesus Christ. To think more about the individual-experiential, ongoing dimension of Pentecost in the believers’ lives, let us think particularly about the signs on the Day of Pentecost and what they symbolize for Christians as the work of the Spirit in us because of what Christ has accomplished.

Although the signs and wonders of Pentecost have passed away, the meaning of the signs have not. On the Day of Pentecost there was wind, or the very “breathing” of the life of God into His body (cf. Ezek. 37:5-9), there was the light of fire that rested above the disciples’ heads (Mal. 3:2-3; Exo. 3:2; Heb. 12:28-29), and there were the languages that they spoke to God and one another (Acts 2:1-4). What are the meanings behind the signs that we should understand as Christians today?

Life (Wind/Breath): God gives believers His life in the Spirit in our union with Christ. This is the full and abundant New Covenant life that was not possible until Jesus Christ had fully completed His work of sinners in His life, death, resurrection, and ascension. In Christ, by the Spirit, the Father makes us alive (Eph. 2:1-10). He breathes into us His life to live for Him, and to live abundantly and joyfully in the Spirit (cf. John 20:21-23). “If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you” (Rom. 8:11; also Rom. 8:2, 6, 10). This life is given to believers to live for Christ in union with Christ. This is abundant life that is nourished by the reservoir of grace found in Christ; apart from Christ we can do nothing, produce nothing living and good to the glory of God (John 1:16-18; 15:1ff; Rom. 8:5-11).

Light (Fire): God gives us light to purify us, to consume our dross, but to also enlighten our minds to the truths of Scripture (Eph. 1:18; Heb. 6:4; 10:32). God gives light to warm our hearts to know more deeply His love for us in Christ and be filled with all the fullness of God (Eph. 3:16-19). The Apostle Paul prays for believers to have illumination by the Spirit to know who they are in Christ, to experience the deep love of God the Father found in Christ Jesus through the Spirit in our inner being (Eph. 1:15-23; 3:14-21).

Language (Tongues): While the languages of Pentecost as signs and wonders to testify to a new epoch of redemptive-history were necessary in the transitional time between the Old and New Covenants, they are no longer necessary now as the complete, inspired Scriptures have been written and given to God’s people. But what these languages pointed to are still important to us. The two important aspects of these Spirit-given languages were for worship and witness. The worship of God in Spirit and truth through transformed hearts (John 4:24; Jer. 31:31-34; cf. 1 Cor. 14:1-5), and the witness within the community in building one another up in the truths of Scripture, and the witness to the world in the good news of salvation.

We see the glorious use of these Spirit-given “love” languages particularly in the Apostle Paul’s writings. Paul often stresses to speak to one another to encourage and especially to speak the truth in love (Eph. 4:15, 25-32, 1 Cor. 12:7; 14:5; cf. Acts 9:31). Isn’t encouraging, humble, holy, honest speech a wonderful and glorious working of God’s Spirit?! The Apostle Paul refers to the ongoing work of the Spirit and the implications of Pentecost in the believers’ life not as a second blessing, but as a continual need to seek to be filled with the Spirit of God. The Apostle Paul teaches the churches to be “filled with the Spirit”, which can also be said as being filled with God’s Word. The Spirit works so closely in and through the Word of God that it is important to note this.

“And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with all your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (Eph. 5:18-20). “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.  And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col. 3:16-17).

In both of these important passages, we see the “love” languages given by the Spirit for true worship of God (“…Giving thanks always and for everything…” “…With thankfulness in your hearts to God…”) and to witness (“…Addressing one another in [Scripture]…singing and making melody…” “…Teaching and admonishing one another…”).

So let us as a family at KCPC, united to Jesus Christ by faith, seek to be filled with the Spirit of God because we have received the baptism and full immersion in the Spirit in our union with Jesus Christ by faith!

We should remember that the Spirit of God’s presence is not known first and foremost through a feeling (although feelings should and do accompany). The Spirit of God’s presence is known first and foremost from His blessed fruit and His holy effects on one’s life (Gal. 5:16-25; cf. John 3:8: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit”). What are the blessed fruits and holy effects of the Spirit in your life? In the life of your family? In our congregation at KCPC? These fruits and effects of Christ’s Spirit will reveal Christ’s life in us to others, causing us to hate the sin that remains in us, and to desire more holiness (Christ-likeness) (Rom. 7:11-25); to desire humility in our worship to God and service to one another, and to cultivate honesty before God and others. These fruits and effects of Christ’s Spirit will be seen in our learning to walk as Jesus walked (imperfectly, yet sincerely by His Spirit):

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit- just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call…

Let us pray to be filled with the Spirit, and learn some helpful hints as to how from Dr. John Harvey.

 

Helpful Hints on how to be filled with the Spirit of God (by John Harvey)[2]

  1. Make certain that your heart is wholly (sincerely) devoted to God (Deut. 6:5; 11:11-13; 30:6; Psa. 31:23; 111:1; 116:1; 119:2, 10, 34, 69, 145; Jer. 24:7; Matt. 22:37; Luke 10:27; 2 Cor. 6:16; 1 Jo. 5:21).
  2. Determine not to compromise your walk with God (Psa. 119:1-8; Phil. 1:21; 2 Cor. 5:-10, 14-15).
  3. Be sensitive to and repentant over sin (Psa. 130; 139: 23-24; 1 Jo. 1:8-2:2; 2 Cor. 7:10-11).
  4. Be faithful in the little things (Matt. 25:14-23).
  5. Remember who gets the glory! (Rom. 11:33-36; Psa. 115:1).
  6. Devote yourselves to prayer (Rom. 12:12; Eph. 6:18-20).
  7. Keep your eyes on Jesus (Heb. 12:1-2).

 

For Further Reading and Study

Intermediate: A Theology of the Holy Spirit – Frederick Dale Bruner / Beginner: Anointed with the Spirit and Power: The Holy Spirit’s Empowering Presence (Explorations in Biblical Theology) – John Harvey / Intermediate: Perspectives on Pentecost – Richard Gaffin, Jr. / Intermediate: The Holy Spirit – John Owen / Advanced: The Holy Spirit (Contours of Christian Theology) – Sinclair B. Ferguson

[1] As Dr. Ferguson writes: “…While Pentecost is also once for all time in character, implications of the baptism of the Spirit which took place on that occasion overflow the banks of that Day and flow on, down through the centuries. Just as the blood of Christ cleanses men and women from every tribe, tongue, people and nation (Rev. 5:9), so the Spirit flows from the riven side of Christ on Pentecost into Jerusalem, and from there spreads throughout Judea, gathering momentum on to Samaria and indeed to the uttermost parts of the earth (Acts 1:8).”

[2] Remember that while these are helpful hints, and they are biblical, we must nevertheless always remember the sovereignty of God in His Spirit’s working (cf. John 3:3-8). Though there are ways we can prepare, and seek God, we must always be willing to wait upon the LORD. But seek Him we must because of both the command and the privilege! Amen.

“Why Is It That You Ask My Name?” – The Questions God Asks Us

Word of Encouragement- Week Ending March 3rd, 2012

Series: The Questions God Asks Us

“Why Is It that You Ask My Name?” – Genesis 32:29

ESV Genesis 32:29-30: Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel (meaning “face of God”), saying, “For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered.

 

Jacob was a sinner who was chosen by God to be a recipient of His love and promises through the Gospel. Jacob was a man that reveals to us that even the dearest of God’s people have lots of struggles in their lives; struggles with self, with others, and struggles also with God. At a difficult and challenging time of Jacob’s life, he prayed to God and asked Him to show grace and mercy to him in his time of need; and God answered his prayer (Gen. 32:9-12)! This prayer revealed that Jacob is growing in grace and spiritual knowledge in his life. Be encouraged: God continues the work that He begins in us!

While alone one night apparently thinking through his situation in solitude a “man” appears to Jacob, who only progressively is revealed as the Living God Himself (Gen. 32:24ff). Jacob wrestles with this “man” throughout the night and was permanently marked by this conflict (Gen. 32:25-32).

Jacob’s life with God is revealed in his struggle: a trust in God, but mixed with apprehension; dependence upon God, yet mixed with his own independence; boldness before God, yet often arrogance too; righteousness from God, yet mixed with sin. These are typical descriptions of all who are called by God and given grace to live (Romans 7:14ff). Isn’t Jacob a bit like you and me?!

And by His grace and power, God changes Jacob’s name to “Israel” because He was a man who wrestled with God and prevailed (Gen. 32:28). We learn here that Jacob (and all of God’s people) will always have success through humility and prayer, not through our own power or ingenuity; we are all needy before God. Jacob names the place “Peniel” because he knows he had seen God’s holy face, and yet he lived to tell about it (Gen. 32:30). Jacob has been humbled before God who is stronger, and is now more completely His strong tower and Savior.

Lots of naming going on in this passage in Genesis that we should recognize in the larger context: Jacob’s name is changed; Jacob names the place; God asks Jacob’s name; Jacob asks God’s name. And this is where we must stop and ponder. God has willingly revealed Himself to Jacob. God has revealed Himself to Jacob in many uncertain situations, particularly has He revealed Himself as a good and covenant-keeping God of promise. But especially God has revealed Himself in His loving acts toward Jacob.

God asked Jacob his name to humble him and to remind him that he is the “supplanter” or “deceiver”. God sovereignly puts Jacob “in His place” (but mercifully!). Jacob will no longer be identified by flesh, but by the Spirit and will be known from now on as “Israel” or “one who prevails”; this is real spiritual transformation by God’s grace and power.

It is one thing for Jacob to answer God’s question to humbly admit the guilt of who his name reveals that he is. To ask Jacob for his name is God’s prerogative; for us to ask for God’s name, that is another matter completely. I think what we should notice is that Jacob desires to attempt to control God by asking His Name and to lead in the revelation relationship between them. At this point, God is revealing Himself graciously to Jacob in His acts of mercy, but it seems because of Jacob’s remaining pride and control, He is not noticing the revelation of God as He should.

God chooses to come close to His people in redemptive-history, but He does not reveal everything about Himself. Even when God does reveal Himself in His names and attributes it is progressively throughout Scripture. There is still a mystery to God that only He knows, and is unwilling to fully reveal to us. And when God does choose to reveal Himself, it is in His own good and perfect timing. God reveals Himself to His people clearly by His grace, but not completely. God chooses to “keep His holy distance” and not to be controlled by sinful man.

To know a name, and to know it intimately, was a way of having possession or ownership of someone or something in the ancient world; it could be a revelation of authority, or of controlling another. It was right for Adam and Eve to be given by God as His vice-regents in creation the authority to name the animals. God has a right to change our names (and this is a blessing of His showing His authority over us, and the blessing of the New Creation, Isaiah 62:2; Rev. 2:17; 3:12). But for us to know the intimate details of God’s Name, His holy character in entirety, His fullness of glory and deity, is not for us to ask on our terms. This grace of revelation is a mystery that is God’s alone to reveal- -and in His good time, if at all.

There is a similar incident of God’s people asking for God’s name in Manoah, Samson’s father in Judges 13:17-18. And God asks the same question he does here to Jacob: “Why do you ask my name?”: “And Manoah said to the angel of the LORD, “What is your name, so that, when your words come true, we may honor you?” And the angel of the LORD said to him, “Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful?”

Both of these biblical passages seem to teach that on the one hand God will reveal Himself on His own terms and in His own time (God does indeed teach us that He is ‘Jehovah Jireh’; ‘Jehovah Tsidkenu’; ‘El Olam’; ‘I Am that Am’, etc. and we can truly know Him through His names and attributes). These Scriptures also seem to reveal that we are to reflect on our encounters with God- –particularly God’s gracious acts toward us.

Both Jacob and Manoah are encouraged by God to ponder what they already know about the character of God through His acts of promise, power and grace. Our encounters with God should bring humility before Him as we receive the revelation He chooses to make know to us about Himself.

These incidents seem to be a quiet invitation into humbly mediating upon God’s acts and the gracious and merciful character of God that is revealed clearly to us in His acts for us!

These incidents foreshadow the incarnation. In the Old Covenant, God veils His name sometimes, and denies a full revelation of Himself to Jacob (and Manoah). Later, when God would enflesh Himself in the womb of the Virgin Mary, of her very human substance, God veils the full revelation of Himself, that is His glory (Phil. 2:6-8). Yet He reveals His name as JESUS, the Savior of sinners, which is everything we truly need to know about God!  God’s full glory and full disclosure of His face are kept until later (and even then as creatures we cannot know God as God knows Himself, as He is in Himself!). 

God’s name is “Wonderful”; His Name is “JESUS” the name above every name; His full God-ness and glory are veiled and not fully revealed, but what do we behold?

We behold God coming near to us in Jesus Christ, revealing Himself in the fullness of the times in His Almighty power and grace in His mighty acts of power and grace to sinners. We see the face of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor. 3:17-18); we don’t behold His glory as the “naked deity” (or “God in Himself” or “God in His essence”) but as the God who makes Himself and His Name known to us in Jesus Christ.

God reveals all that we need to know about Him- -He has given His people a Savior- -there is salvation from sin! Matthew (1:21) teaches us: [The Virgin Mary] will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.“

God reveals Himself in the flesh (John 1:14), and this God wants us to ponder his character revealed through Jesus’ acts for us: What has God done for us? How are we to be saved? What is our hope for the future? These questions are answered sufficiently in Jesus Christ and we can encounter Jesus every day through his Word and by His Holy Spirit. The LORD redeems us from the slavery of sin and death so that we can truly know Him as He has revealed Himself in JESUS. Isn’t God wonderful?

For every question of God that you may have, for every time you feel your questions go unanswered and you seek to delve into the mysteries of God’s revelation He has not fully revealed to you, stop yourself, and go to Jesus Christ. There you will find the answer to God’s mystery (Eph. 3:9-10), the very embodiment of God’s mystery and plan for the ages (Eph. 1:9ff), salvation from sin, and every thought of God’s love that He has been pleased to reveal to you in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ!

There are some things in our lives that God will not reveal to us. We may be tempted to control God because we want to stay in control and lead in our relationship with Him. But we must understand, that God alone is the Sovereign King, let Him alone reveal Himself, and let God speak, and let us listen.

Like Jacob, let our encounters with God by His Spirit through His Word transform us into humble, receptive, children who know that we will prevail through God’s power and persevering prayer. Let us leave our old identities behind, and let us find our new names in Jesus!

And let that draw us into the worship of God through the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

“And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” – ESV Acts 4:12

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so 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.” – ESV Philippians 2:9-11

God reveals Himself sufficiently and fully to us in Jesus Christ. Let us go to Christ to find all the answers we need for our lives and for growing in godly, Christ-likeness.

 

In Christ’s love,

Pastor Biggs

“Is Anything Too Hard for the LORD?” – The Questions God Asks Us

Word of Encouragement- Week Ending Feb. 25th, 2012

Series: The Questions God Asks Us

“Is Anything Too Hard for the LORD?” – Genesis 18:14

ESV Genesis 18:14 “Is anything too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you about this time next year, and Sarah shall have a son.”

 

Beloved in Christ, this is your question today: “Is anything too hard for the LORD?”

Sometimes you think there is something too hard in your life that even God cannot help you with. You believe, but sometimes you are inconsistent with what you say you believe. You believe in a sovereign God who rules over the world. You believe in the Almighty God who is maker of heaven and earth. You believe that God was made flesh and lived and died for you. You believe that Jesus has risen from the dead. You believe that Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords.

Yet your worry, anxiety and fears betray what you’re hiding, and they reveal a heart that wants to believe, more than actually does believe. As a Christian, you know the truths of God are infallibly true and wonderfully revealed to you in Scripture, but you often live inconsistently with these truths, and you’re easily troubled. But again, let God ask you: “Is anything too hard for the LORD?”

Abraham and Sarah waited a very long time to hold in their arms the baby that had been long promised to them by God. For twenty-five long years, they waited on the promise of God to be realized in their lives. There were times of strong faith, and also times of failure during their wait. In Genesis 18, God manifested Himself to Abraham and Sarah to assure them that His promises would come to past “next year” (18:10) —and Sarah laughs in unbelief, and then tried to deny that she had indeed laughed:

“So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I am worn out, and my lord is old, shall I have pleasure?” …. But Sarah denied it, saying, “I did not laugh,” for she was afraid. He said, “No, but you did laugh.” (Genesis 18:12, 15).”

Isn’t she a bit like you and me?! Sarah couldn’t see how God could take her state of practical death in that she was too old to have babies, and grant her new life. Sarah could not conceive in her mind how she could ever conceive a child through God’s life-giving power. What God had promised was just a bit beyond her grasp of faith.

God knew also that she had laughed, and He was not angry with her and take away His gracious promises to her as it were. Rather, it was as if God was confronting Sarah with her laughter of unbelief so that she might see her sins, and might behold in Him the One who could do all things!

This is our God, dear congregation of Jesus! God reveals Himself and keeps His promises to us in spite of our lack of faith, and our silly, limited unbelief. God is always going to be faithful to His people even when His people are unfaithful to Him (2 Tim. 2:13). This in itself is a reason to ask yourself: “Is anything too hard for the LORD?” God can do all things; even forgive our sins because of His mercy.

Whatever your worries, anxieties, and fears are revealing is wrong deep within your heart, you can go to God, with a mere seed of faith, and find a great and powerful Christ ready to forgive, ready to pardon, ready to receive and ready to give to you above and beyond what you could ever ask or imagine!

What are your worries today? What is it in your life that is too difficult for you? What threatens to overwhelm you in your fears? What is too great– too hard– too difficult for you?!”

But you say: “You don’t understand my situation.” You don’t understand that I have made this problem for myself, and I must get myself out.” “There is no way that you would ever understand the problems at my workplace…in my marriage…with my children…the change that never seems to come with myself!?”

Think on Christ. Jesus loves you, and he has lived and died for you. God permanently took upon Himself a human nature from the substance of the Virgin Mary, to unite God and man together forever in Him. In Christ, God did the unbelievable. The Incarnation is the “enfleshing” of God Almighty with the goal of securing your redemption! When God sent His Son into the world, it was with you and your hard situations in mind! God who is Spirit united Himself to a body; God who is infinite united Himself to finitude; God who is everywhere present, became local in Jesus; God who is all-knowing, became limited and learning. And all for us!

“Is anything too hard for the LORD?” Think about the Incarnation and how in Christ God reveals what is in our estimation the “impossible”. Remember: “For nothing will be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37). When the Angel Gabriel came to the Virgin Mary in the fullness of the times and told her that Jesus, the Son of God, would be born to her, she didn’t laugh- – but believed. This is how we too come to understand and believe.

We may not fully understand our situation (and many times will not!); we may doubt a bit in the power and grace of God toward us (this is a reality of weak faith in this life); but we are to bow before God in humility with the little faith we have in a great Christ, and say with Mary:

“Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.”

We are to simply seek to believe God’s Word to us. What is too hard for you today? This thing you are concerned about is never impossible with God. Believe. Think of the change that God has wrought in your heart by the power of the Spirit. Have you always believed? No! How did you come to believe in Christ in the first place? Was this not a mighty “impossible” display of God’s power in taking a hardened sinner far from God, and making your heart loving and teachable, and full of desire to follow Jesus?

Is this not a hard thing, too? Go back to your conversion, think on how the power of the Spirit came upon you to transfer you from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of God’s son; how you were raised, like Lazarus, from the spiritual dead, and seated with Christ in the heavenly places; how you were dead in trespasses and sins, enslaved to sin and the devil, and you were raised to new life in Jesus! (Col. 1:13-14; Eph. 2:1-8; Col. 3:14). Truly, I ask you, when you think of the work that has begun in you, “Is there anything too hard for the LORD?”

Think of the work yet to be done because God is committed to you. He who began a good work will complete it in you! (Phil. 1:6). God is committed to changing us. Ask Him for more faith. Don’t keep your doubts from him, but rather confess them. If you laugh at what you find to be unbelievable at the moment, learn from Sarah, and don’t cover it up and lie to God. God knows our hearts, and He kindly deals with us not according to our sins, but he pities us knowing that we are but dust (Psalm 103:11-15). Like a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on us.

Confess your worries and anxieties and fears to God. Tell him how you are struggling. Go to God in Jesus Christ who wears your nature before the face of God to represent you as your Great and Faithful High Priest, and ask Him for more faith to trust and believe all that He has promised to you.

Then laugh. Laugh with a deep joy, and hearty, belly-like, robust laugh (a real guffaw!), that God is good. Laugh with all your heart knowing that Jesus is for you, and not against you. And if God be for you, who or what could possibly be against you, or harm you?! (Psalm 27:1ff; Romans 8:30ff). Nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus, so go and flourish in your faith, knowing that nothing can harm you (Romans 8:35-39). In Christ, you’re more than a conqueror over everything that God allows to come into your life!

The hardest, most difficult, trying, exasperating, soul-crushing, and painfully unbearable work that could have been imagined, or done by you or anyone else, has been done for you in the death of Jesus Christ.

What was impossible for us has been done for us. Our sins against God were a constant and permanent reminder that we owed God for every sin in our words, thoughts and our deeds. We owed God not only an infinite payment for the sinful condition and our actual sins, but also we owed him a perfect lifetime of righteous living according to His commands, for His glory alone.

We could never repay such a debt. But God did the impossible; God did what was hard for us. God sent His Beloved Son Jesus to perfectly keep His commands and earn all righteousness before Him for us. God sent Jesus, His Beloved Son to die and provide an infinitely valuable sacrifice for our infinite sin-debt against a Holy and Just God for us. God was satisfied with Jesus’ hard work on our behalf; Jesus was raised and vindicated as a permanent and eternal memorial that all who believe in Him have been forgiven. And this, very hard thing, by grace, because of God’s love, has been done, for us.

Laugh.

Laugh.

Laugh.

God is good and faithful.

Look to Jesus who loves you!

“Is there anything too hard for the LORD?”

In Christ’s love,

Pastor Biggs

Christmas Is About Jesus: Salvation from Sentimentalism and Cynicism

Word of Encouragement: Christmas Is About Jesus

“…You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us)….And he called his name Jesus.” –Matthew 1:21-25

Christmas is about Jesus

Christmas is about Jesus. Well, so much for a thought-provoking, stimulating, catchy opening sentence for a Christmas devotion. You say: “I know that Christmas is about Jesus, tell me something I don’t know.” But I think this is a good way to begin this devotion, and furthermore, I think we too often forget that Christmas is about Jesus. So, once again:

Christmas is about Jesus. Christmas is about Jesus the Savior of sinners, God in the flesh who came as a child in a pitiful manger equipped for cattle not for Deity. Christmas is about Jesus who came to be born to live for His people, to die for them, to be raised from the dead for them, and to be exalted in His ascension-enthronement at God’s right hand as Eternal Lord and King on David’s Throne.

Matthew’s genealogy in chapter one of his Gospel teaches us a lot about Jesus, but we can focus on two things. The genealogy teaches us that (1) God does the impossible, and (2) that God saves sinners. Now when we speak of God doing the impossible, it doesn’t mean that it is impossible from God’s point of view (for nothing is impossible with God, Luke 1:37!), but from our limited, finite, weak point of view as sinful humans.

A longer purpose sentence in writing this devotion would be summarized this way: Matthew’s genealogy teaches us that Christ has come to show that God does the impossible, and that he gives true hope to those with misplaced hopes as well as to the hopeless.

At Christmastime, we need faith in Christ to be realists about our situation and to truly behold what God has done for us in Christ. That is why I want to continue to emphasize that Christmas is about Jesus. Oftentimes at Christmastime, we are either full of sentimentalism or bloated with cynicism concerning the hope in our lives.

Sentimentalism and Cynicism at Christmastime

What are sentimentalism and cynicism you ask (and I’m more concerned to define these terms with how people actually live and act, not by formal definitions of these two things)? Well, I would describe a person characterized by sentimentalism as one who thinks too highly of man and what man can actually achieve for good in this world.

Sentimental: Folks who tend to be characterized by sentimentalism continue to hope that good times and good change will come for the world, but this hope is a false hope that is not grounded in the truth and reality of God (and oftentimes when sentimentalists do not see their hopes fulfilled, they then idolize and worship the past, imagining that things were better “back then…alas”). Sentimental folks don’t talk a lot about sin and sinfulness, and they don’t necessarily see the world in all its troubles.

Cynical: Folks who tend to be characterized by cynicism have lost hope and no longer expect that good times and change can or will come. This hopelessness is not grounded in God’s truth and reality any more than sentimentalism. Cynicism is more of a reaction to sentimentalism; you see this reaction at generational levels today. Grandparents that were sentimentalists might produce grandsons who are cynics. Oftentimes young people tend toward more sentimentalism, and they grow into cynicism after experiencing pain and difficulties in a cold world. Cynicism often masquerades itself as self-realized maturity, whereas sentimentalism might masquerade as innocence and the goodness of man. Sentimentalism sees only the good in the world and tends the overlook the bad; cynicism sees too much of the bad without acknowledging any of the good in the world.

You can hear sentimentalism in Christmas songs all around us an on the radio and in the “air” at this time of year. Crooners croon: “It’s the most wonderful time of the year…” Listen in for a moment:

“It’s the most wonderful time of the year
With the kids jingle belling
And everyone telling you “Be of good cheer”
It’s the most wonderful time of the year
It’s the hap-happiest season of all
With those holiday greetings and gay happy meetings
When friends come to call
It’s the hap- happiest season of all…”

“With the kids jingle belling?” Is there anyone at your home “jingle belling” right now? Honestly.  “It’s the hap-happiest season of all…” Is it really? For all?? Have you seen the poor and destitute? Have you peaked into the homes past the well-lit trees in the windows to behold the people full of strife and rampant dysfunction? Have you seen the people with the Rudolph antlers and the shiny nose after the Christmas party dealing with depression and loneliness and alcoholism seeking change in clinical therapy? Have you seen the little the rest of the world has in comparison to the riches we have as Americans, and how impoverished many people are who have never owned one of Disney’s “princesses” (and never will)? Sentimentalism sings “Fa-la-la-la-la” when there is sadness and misery all around us. Sentimentalism sings “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire” forgetting that many cannot afford chestnuts, and are barely staying warm by a fire- -if they have one at all!

You can *hear* sentimentalism better at Christmas than cynicism, because cynics don’t necessarily sing about Christmas at Christmastime, unless they are singing about Grandma getting run over by a reindeer coming home from a Christmas visit, or the one-horse open sleigh turning over and seriously injuring Frosty the Snowman, or wanting an alien for Christmas. But because cynics don’t “do Christmas” and therefore they don’t sing much about it (although those days might be coming to an end, I’m hearing more cynicism in Christmas songs now; it is indeed a “Mad World” isn’t it?!).

Sentimentalism has false hopes of what mankind can actually achieve in thoughts of peace and unity and love at Christmas. You may recall the great Jim Reeves Christmas song from the 1950s: “A long time ago in Bethlehem…And man shall live forevermore because of Christmas day.” Now I’m not going to criticize the great Jim Reeves (and for those who know not of Jim Reeves, well you should know this wonderful singer of times past—there’s my sentimentalism for you!), but Reeves’ song teaches us that mankind will live forever just because of Christmas; this is not true; this is classical liberalism.  Sentimentalism wants feelings of what Christmas should be, but it is because of feelings more than the power of God that came down to sinners in Bethlehem’s manger.

This song Mary’s Boy Child by Jim Reeves seems to be saying that just the knowledge of Jesus being born at Christmastime will make everything all right at Christmas…and man shall live forevermore (and I don’t know what kind of person Reeves was so this is not criticism of the man, just the message). Christmas is so much more than merely a message of man trying to change himself, or being overwhelmed with “Christmas-ey” sentimental thoughts and feelings of Jesus in a manger that will make us all nice people. The message of Christmas is more than merely getting Linus to tell us what Christmas is all about, and then we change in response to the commercialism, etc., and we decide to get a small and meek Christmas tree rather than a great and shiny one, and we are all changed- –and we all do it ourselves.

No, we must be changed. We must be changed by a sovereign work of God. God was born into the world and took upon human flesh to be with us so that he would grant us the power by His grace and Holy Spirit to be transformed into new people; a new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). Sentimentalism will not hold out true hope for anyone; sentimentalism will just not do.  Sentimentalism too easily embraces classical liberalism: “A God without wrath brought [good] men into a kingdom without judgment, through a Christ without a cross (H. R. Niebuhr).” No. Mere sentimentalism will not do. We must be changed from the inside out; sinful man must be changed from the heart.

Now those characterized by cynicism are onto this, but they don’t have the answer either. Hopelessness is not the answer for false hopes!

Usually folks who are cynics (not in the formal philosophical, Marcus Aurelius sense) are those who are converted from sentimentalism, but they find that the “hope” that they had in the future, and in the love of human beings never appeared, and that their warm-feelings of the brotherhood of man and peace and kindness faintly faded into a memory, and this “hope” never manifested itself in their heart nor in the hearts of others. Cynics thought at one time things might get better, but they have now lost hope that good times and change will never come, and so let’s just mope knowingly. But this cynical hopelessness is not grounded in the truth and reality of God any more than sentimentalism.

Cynical folks think they know. They are always giving “knowing glances” and looks and sneers to those who are especially eat up with sentimentalism. Two people are having coffee at Starbuck’s. One is a sentimental person, and the other is a cynic (who formerly was a sentimental person). Bob the sentimentalist says: “You know, I just love Christmas, the lights, the good cheer, the ‘decking the halls with boughs of holly’, and gathering with family- -don’t you just love it?! If only it would be Christmas all through the year?” The sentimentalist will think on the bright lights and surface things of Christmastime, with false hopes that good can come and will come through people. The sentimentalist forgets the loneliness, poverty, grief, guilt, and funerals that still take place on and around December 25th!

Maria, the cynic responds: “Get a life, Bob! I don’t do Christmas. It is all fake and surface. No one really cares and after the lights are taken down off the freshly cut trees (those trees could have continued to grow by the way!), and no one cares for others, and the good cheer is all conjured up with hopes that someone will give me a present (but they just give it to me so that I will give one back to them in return; I know). At Christmas, I think of those who suffer, and those who are lonely, and when I think back to my memories of Christmas, all I can recall is a big turkey on the table surrounded by gluttonous dysfunctional family members who had too much to drink, and did not care a lick about anyone but themselves.”

Jesus Came to Save Sentimentalists, Cynics, and All Who Will Believe!

Both the sentimentalist and cynic are trying to find hope in this world of sin and misery. The sentimentalist is trying to seek hope in man’s ability to change and do good; the cynic has given up hope, but deep down would like to find hope, but would never (or rarely) admit it. Both are missing Jesus, and the important fact that Christmas is about Jesus. Both sentimentalists and cynics are imbalanced and wrong. Jesus came to save both sentimentalists and cynics. Christmas is about Jesus.

Well, there I go again! Christmas is about Jesus. When God came into the world, he came to seek and save both the sentimentalist and the cynic (and whosoever else would believe). For the sentimentalist, God must show the true sinfulness of mankind and the hopelessness apart from Jesus the Savior, no matter how much figgy pudding one might have! For the cynic, God must show that there is hope for repentant and believing mankind as they look to Jesus for hope, but hopelessness is not the only answer for those who have given up hope. Amen!

Christmas is about Jesus, and Matthew’s genealogy shows to us that whether you tend to be characterized by sentimentalism or by cynicism, you can have hope in Jesus Christ. Whether Sentimentalist, or cynic, we should understand that God became man “in our mess” with hope in our hopelessness to rescue and save all who would believe! God shows us Jesus’ rich heritage as the very realization of all of the promises of God to Abraham and David (Matthew 1:1-2); God also shows us Jesus’ heritage as one born in a dysfunctional, “messy” family (Matthew 1:3-6). In Matthew’s genealogy, God calls sinners to repent of both sentimental faith in false hopes and cynical hopelessness.

You must see Jesus Christ as your only hope; Christmas is about Jesus your only real and enduring hope. In Matthew 1, God reveals Himself to Joseph, Mary’s betrothed husband, and tells him that Jesus will be a Savior from sin; Jesus will be a Savior for sinners; Jesus will be Immanuel, which means “God with us”:

ESV Matthew 1:21-23: [Mary] will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).

Jesus will be a Savior. Jesus will save His people from their sins. This we must emphasize. God would do the impossible but by forgiving sinners. God would not overlook sinfulness and the selfish deeds of mankind, but would indeed judge them. However, he would send Christ Jesus, His only Begotten Son to be cursed and judged in the stead, or in the place of all who would believe.

God does not believe in either sentimentalism or cynicism. God disagrees with and contradicts the sentimentalist that man could change on his own or have any hope apart from Christ; the Bible teaches that man is cursed by sin and under the condemnation of God, described as being “without God and without hope in the world” (Eph. 2:12ff). God disagrees with and contradicts the cynic who thinks all is hopeless, because God graciously offers true and enduring hope for mankind, and salvation and peace with God for helpless, hopeless sinners in Jesus Christ. Jesus’ name “JESUS” means God saves. God comes into our dark and miserable state, and grants us hope in Jesus. Jesus comes to rescue us out of our sinful estate by living and dying for us.

Christmas is about Jesus. This is our hope. How so? Jesus came to live for sinners; Jesus came to die for us on the accursed cross; Jesus came to shed His blood for those who believe, and grant to us His perfect righteousness as we receive it by faith; Jesus came to be raised from the dead and seated at God’s right hand. God offered Jesus to be judged in place of sinful man; God justly and righteously punished sin in Christ, but God justifies or makes right sinners who believe in Him (see this great hope in Romans 3:23-26):

ESV Romans 3:23-26: “…For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

This is true hope. This is real and lasting hope that changes man from within. This is the hope that can turn our false hopes and blurred dreams of what man can do into realizing the power of the Holy Spirit and how He transforms us by His grace, and can give us hope and make all our dreams come true in Christ. Even as we live in a fallen world characterized by sin and misery, pain, suffering, death, poverty, and helplessness, there is hope for us in Jesus Christ. Hope to have peace with God, and great joy in the midst of whatever affliction He call us to live through.

We can embrace the tension of the reality of living in a world with great hope (as the sentimentalist sings about at Christmas), and in a world still tainted by the disease which is sin and misery (as the cynic refuses to sing about at Christmas).

True hope for both the sentimentalist and the cynic is found in Jesus Christ. Christmas is about Jesus. Christmas is not merely a warm feeling to be embraced, or rejected without thought.

Christmas is a declaration, a message, a proclamation that what man could not do, nor would want to do for himself, or for another (even at Christmas)- – God did, in our Savior Jesus Christ. This is what is so impossible- -God did in Jesus Christ all that we need so that we could receive His righteousness by faith and hope in Him alone! (Romans 8:3-4).

For the sentimentalist, I would say that you must stop painting things too rosy in this world even at Christmastime. This world is fallen, and although a good world created by God, it is infested with many sinfully selfish and greedy people who care only for themselves, and it is a world much characterized by misery and enslavement to sin and the devil. And Jesus came to cure us; Jesus came to remove the curse as far as it is found!

For the cynic, you must stop painting things too hopeless in this world especially at Christmastime. You, too, are a hypocrite and part of the problem. You sneer at the sentimentalists “knowingly” but you too have no answers, you too, have no hope. You are right that things are wrong, but you are infested with this sinful dis-ease too- -and Jesus is your only hope.

Stop hoping in something like a Christmas season that is not rooted in God’s truth and reality; stop the hopeless rant about the Christmas season that is not rooted in God’s truth and reality. Notice the sane and biblical balance between the imbalances of both sentimentalism and cynicism in Isaac Watts’ Joy to the World; there is both sorrow and love; hopelessness and hope!:

“No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.

He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.”

Matthew’s genealogy teaches us that God who does the impossible has done it- -for us! God has come to heal us of our sinful dis-ease and to show us our king. Hail, the newborn king! Hail, the Son of Righteousness! Hail, God’s Son clothed in human flesh for us. For us and for our salvation he came to give us real and true hope.

In Matthew’s genealogy we see the “cold-hard” truth of the reality of sin in the Bible. Our greatest gift from God is Jesus Christ, Savior of sinners, hope of all those who believe.  We don’t have it in us to change, or to convert ourselves; there are no “born again” Scrooges in this world, only Scrooges who continue to be greedy and nasty for self. Sure, man can change a little, perhaps for a season, but can never learn the truth and love and grace of God apart from God’s powerful work in man by Jesus Christ. Mankind by nature, including all “Ebenezer Scrooges” are those who are ever learning and never able to come to a knowledge of the truth (apart from the saving and glorious work of Jesus Christ; 2 Tim. 3:7!).

What we need is the transformation power of God’s grace found in Jesus Christ, and no matter how great a “Scrooge” you may be- -you can change permanently and become a disciple of Jesus by God’s transforming power and grace found in Jesus, the Savior of sinners! No matter how grossly sinful your past has been, no matter how sinful you have been both in public and private; no matter how terrible you acted under the influence of that wine you had at Uncle Tommy’s a few years back and said things to the family you regret; no matter how many times you have miserably failed from your self-induced “new starts and resolutions” to be a “good and kind person” and found yourself to be worse; no matter how often you have tried harder and crashed. You can have great hope.

Christmas is not about you. Christmas is about Jesus.

But sadly, you may realize that you have often rejected Jesus Christ. You may have rejected the only hope of the world in Jesus either through sentimental hope in yourself, or through cynically denying yourself any hope.  You may have thought Christmas was about you and so you have seen no real change for the better.

You may just realize that the only real change that has happened to you, the only “true” conversion you have ever experienced, has been from going from a sentimentalist at Christmas to a card-carrying, dyed in the wool cynic without hope. Well, congratulations. How is that change working for you? So, you can see through everything now- -even Christmas; you can see so clearly through everything so well and so clearly, that you can now see absolutely nothing! (got that idea from C. S. Lewis!). You can hear the sentimentalism in those Frank Sinatra Christmas songs… “It’s that time of year when the world falls in love…” yet you cannot change yourself, and you have no hope of real love for yourself.

A New Beginning in a New Family Tree!

Here’s hope: Christmas is about Jesus. If you think you’re hopeless, and you come from a hopeless family line, look again at Jesus’ genealogy, his family tree. God has not only done the impossible in providing salvation, God has incarnated Himself not into the best of families, but into a typical, sinful, family tree. This was so that all sinners would have hope; even those deemed the most “hopeless” in the eyes of the world. Jesus wasn’t tainted by our sins, he was sinless, but he was incarnated, or made flesh in our messiness here in this world.  If you read through Matthew 1:1-25, you will find great hope for yourself (and I recommend that you do read it- -go ahead- -right now, read it…I’ll wait….)….

….Did you see? In Jesus’ genealogy there is Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and the wife of Uriah (Matthew 1:3-6). What’s so special about this?

Jesus’ family tree was tainted by sin (but Jesus was not- -that is our hope!). In the ancient world, genealogies normally would not include women, and they were selective. Ancient genealogies would be selective about the important and special people in the family to include and (ahem…exclude!).

Matthew’s genealogy is selective, but he is not excluding the embarrassing sinfulness of Jesus’ family tree. Scandalous activities happened with Tamar; Rahab was a prostitute; Ruth was a Moabitess (Moabites were particular enemies of God and his people); and “wife of Uriah”- -now this is embarrassing! Her name was “Bathsheba” and she is the young woman with whom David committed adultery and then proceeded to kill Uriah her husband, so that King David could selfishly keep her for himself. This was Jesus’ family tree. There were “skeletons” in the closet for Jesus’ family.

Let me say it again: Jesus’ family tree was tainted by sin, but Jesus was not! The Holy Spirit caused Mary to conceive (Matt. 1:18ff; Luke 1:31-35); the power of God through His Spirit impregnated Mary so that God would become man, but a man without sin. A man without the taint and sinful disease we carry within us. He was without sin, so that He could be a faithful Savior- -one who could truly and really save us from this lowly estate and condition and grant believers peace with God and hope in the world.

Matthew’s genealogy teaches to us that no matter how sinful we have been, no matter how dysfunctional our family from which we come, God offers to repentant sinners who believe in Jesus a new beginning in Jesus. This begins a new family tree in Jesus Christ as a new creation of God. This is not just a decided change, but a real transformation by God’s Spirit (2 Cor. 5:17).

Jesus’ family tree and history was nothing sentimental. Growing up, Jesus could not look back at His family tree and see only the good, and boast about his “great people” or reflect dishonestly upon his family’s past (although there were great and godly kings, righteous men, and heroes in his family no doubt!). Jesus had to look back and see a family tree of folks who even at their best were still sinners. Jesus could have been tempted to cynicism when looking at the family tree if he had been tainted like us because of the kind of folks who made up His family tree.

But his sinful family tree is why Christmas is about Jesus. All of our families are dysfunctional. Every single family in this world is dysfunctional (have you read Genesis 3 lately, or do you remember the family of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? Or, have you read Genesis 16, or Genesis 38, or Psalms 32 and 51, or the Book of Judges lately?). Sentimentalism will never give enough hope to make our dysfunction go away; cynicism cannot sneer enough at the façade of many people’s dreams and hopes at Christmas, because Matthew 1 reveals them all for us to see.

Yet Matthew’s genealogy is with great hope, not tainted by either sentimentalism or cynicism. Jesus was pleased to call even the chiefest and greatest of sinners “brothers”. Here’s hope from Hebrews 2:10-14:

“For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. 11 For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one origin. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, 12 saying, “I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.” 13 And again, “I will put my trust in him.” And again, “Behold, I and the children God has given me.” 14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things…

What great hope for all! Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers this Christmas! (Heb. 2:11b). Jesus shared in our flesh and blood and partook of the same things, that is, he came to save us out of a world of sin and misery to cause us to live life as we should, with real hope rooted and grounded in God’s truth and reality. And Jesus came to transform us so that we would be like Him.

Christmas is about Jesus. Jesus’ birth is a manifestation of God doing the impossible by living and dying for sinners. Jesus’ birth is about God coming to a sinful, dysfunctional, hopeless people, and granting hope through the extended and blessed hand of a Savior.

Jesus is the hope for both sentimentalism and cynicism.  For those sentimentalists who have yet to see yourself as you truly are, and the world as it really is at Christmastime, see the sinfully tainted family tree of Jesus, and yet the true hope found in Christ alone. See Jesus dying at the hands of weak and blind and selfish sinners. For those cynics who have lost hope at Christmastime and perhaps see yourself, and the world as it really is (at least you see the world as it really is), don’t lose hope, but see God doing the impossible through transformation, and real change that comes through knowing Jesus Christ as Lord.

Nothing should stay the same; nothing has to stay the same. In Jesus Christ, there is true hope for both the sentimentalists and cynics, and this hope is rooted and grounded in God’s truth and reality!

Christmas is about Jesus and Jesus is about God doing the impossible by becoming man. Perhaps you are a person at present inspired by all the dashing through the snow, eating chestnuts roasting by the fire, singing your fa-la-la-laaas, and living the nearly perfect picture Christmas print by Currier & Ives over at Farmer Gray’s, passing the coffee and the pumpkin pie, singing at the top of your lungs with Andy Williams that It’s the most wonderful time of the year, and thinking this year will be the best of them all.  Christmas is about Jesus. Look to him for your real hope.

Or, perhaps you have it all figured out (don’t you?!), and right now you have folded arms, eyebrow raised, perfectly placed sneer on lip thinking how you would like to see that one horse open sleigh turn over, and that those sad souls who are walking in the winter wonderland “making plans” and dreams for the future with Parson Brown, would come to realize when they later conspire by the fire, would face unafraid that the plans that they made in that miserable, hellish winter wonderland will just be the nightmare that one day ends in divorce. Perhaps you would rather rant on at your best about how Christmas should not be so commercialized?! But honestly, what have you done to lift a finger to make a difference in this miserable world? How can you change, too? Christmas is about Jesus. Look to him for your real hope.

Do you want hope that is false, misleading, and empty, not grounded in God’s truth and reality? Or do you want hopelessness leading to despondency and despair? Or, better, do you want God’s way where you look to Jesus and see one who didn’t falsely mislead you about yourself, or the world, or the past, nor did he just give up on you.

Jesus came to live, die and be resurrected and exalted for all who believe- -and this is our only hope!

Christmas is about Jesus. Jesus says sentimentalists repent! You have not seriously and realistically considered your own sins or the hopelessness and misery of this world apart from God. Jesus says to the cynics repent! You are very hypocritical, and the hopelessness that can be very real is nothing to savor, but to flee from to the hope found in Christ alone.

If you read Matthew’s genealogy, you can tell you’re a sentimentalist because of seeing the great heritage only, and not the sin. If you read Matthew’s genealogy, you can tell you’re a cynic if all you see all the sin, but not see the great heritage. Those who trust in Christ alone for hope see both; and they see both a great heritage and great sin in themselves, too, and they know that their only hope can be found in Jesus.

 

Christmas is about Jesus. But I’ve said that already.

 

Love in Christ, and Merry Christmas!

 

Pastor Biggs