He gave him no answer…
When the Pharisees put Jesus on trial before Caiaphas, the final charge they brought against him was blasphemy. This was on the basis of Jesus claiming to be the Son of God and His sitting “at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven” (Matt 26:63-66). But for the unbelieving Pilate, this would be a hard accusation to put a righteous man to death for.
But this is exactly why the Pharisees delivered Him to Pilate – so that he could sentence Him to death. To be sure, they heaped other accusations against Jesus to make sure that Pilate would see Him as a threat. However, Pilate could see right through this ruse, and when he questioned Jesus, he asked him “are you the king of the Jews?” to which Jesus merely said “You have said so” (Matt 27:11). (more…)
The gospel in Spurgeon’s Ministry
When C.H. Spurgeon examined 20 years of his sermons being published and read and considered why it was that people not only bought them but also read them. The only thing that stood out to him as to why was the centrality of the gospel. (more…)
Gods love in us
1 John 3:1 says "See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him".
I’ve heard this verse quoted numerous times to support the notion that God loves us so much that he calls us his children. This may be true (John 1:12), but is it really the intended meaning that John intended us to take from the passage?
Why are we Gods children?
When I recently read this verse I read it to say something along the following lines: "See what kind of love the Father has put in us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are" (translation mine). Clearly the Greek word translated "given" can’t be translated as "put in us" however, there are some good reasons to consider that this might be what John is getting at. In other words this is a passage that is designed to show us that God has given us of his love – that this love is in us through the indwelling Spirit of God and this makes us his children. We are not children only because he loves us, but more because we have his nature if we are born of Him (cf Phil 2:15, Rom 9:8, 1 John 3:10).
Why not "God loved us so much that He called us His children?"
In reality the view I’m taking shouldn’t change your theology significantly. However, I believe it suits the theme of 1 John better than the traditional view. For starters, only one other place in 1 John speaks of Gods love for us – and that is manifested through the propitiation (wrath bearing) of Christ on our behalf (1 John 4:9-10).
While it is absolutely true that God is love (1 John 4:8), the way love is often presented by well meaning believers is often inconsistent with the righteousness and holiness of God. Seeing the love that God has for us through the cross, means seeing the sacrifice and propitiation of wrath which leads to Gods grace. Without the propitiation of Christ and His atonement, God could not set His love on us. The love of God is generally not a "feel good about us" type of love – rather it is a benevolent, grace filled love that demonstrates the sovereignty and sufficiency of God – and Him alone. There is nothing lovable in us that motivates God – His motivation to love is solely based on His character.
Examining the context
In 1 John one of the themes of the book is the interdependence between the new birth, obedience to Christ and love for the brothers. Together this interdependence brings assurance of salvation which is one of the key purposes of John in writing (1 John 5:13).
If we examine the passage in 1 John 2:28-3:10 the passage starts by asserting that the one who is born of God practices righteousness (1 John 2:29), then John inserts a parenthesis in 1 John 3:1-3 which I believe should be read as Gods love in us. After this, he carries on to assert that the one born of God will practice righteousness and the one not born of God will practice sin (1 John 3:4-8).
In verse 9, John begins to wrap up this section by saying that one born of God cannot make a practice of sinning because he has Gods seed abiding in him. Then in verse 10 he sums up the passage by restating the main point: "by this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil". John is simply restating what Jesus said when he said "by their fruit you will know them" (Matt 7:16-20). He then gives the evidence "whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother". In this summary John states his main point is that one born of God will practice righteousness – but he also includes that believers will love their brothers. However, apart from 1 John 3:1-3 John hasn’t spoken of loving the brothers.
If we take the traditional view of this verse, it simply doesn’t fit this conclusion.
Narrowing it down
Not only this, but even verses 1-3 of 1 John 3 require this understanding of the verse.
Why would John state that the reason does not know us with regard to us being the children of God? If God loves us enough to call us the children of God, then why would it be obvious to the people around us who we are? However, if we have this love in us, then it should be obvious, which would then require this explanation – the world doesn’t recognise the love of God in us because it does not know God.
Furthermore, verse 2 is also helped. Gods love abiding in us makes us Gods children – "what we will be has not yet appeared" suggests that if we already have the love of God in us, what will we be like when we are perfected? What sort of channel will we be to display Gods character? We will see him as he is, so we will be like him – this is purifying.
The big picture
The big picture of 1 John is to assure believers by helping them understand the character of God that is in us (specifically one of righteousness – or obedience and love for those who have been born of God). Understanding that the love of the Father has been given to us through us abiding in Him, and by Him abiding in us.
Jesus Christ – the God man
Yesterday, I spoke in our series on Christ on the topic of Christ the man.
I began by exploring things that demonstrated that Jesus is human (which I think should be reasonably clear upon a straight forward reading of the gospels). We also looked at some of the points that demonstrated the deity of Jesus. Then we looked at why Jesus came and what Jesus accomplished. (more…)
Preaching God or preaching Christ?
I just had a Jehovah’s witness knock on my door. Unfortunately they seemed to be in a hurry to move on and weren’t interested in engaging in a conversation at all. However, the tract she left with me is a fairly standard variety from the Watch Tower.
What really concerns me though, about the tract is that it is similar to what many (most?) Christian churches teach. This particular tract has six questions:
- Does God really care about us?
- Will war and suffering ever end?
- What happens to us when we die?
- Is there any hope for the dead?
- How can I pray and be heard by God?
- How can I find happiness in life?
If we start our journey looking for "truth" to suit us, we will find it in religion if we want to – but we won’t find Christ, nor will we find salvation, nor the joy that comes from fellowship with Christ.
The questions above are generally asked and answered from a man centric perspective – as if God will fulfil all our needs. But man is not here for mans sake. We were created for the glory of God, so if we want the truth, we must start with Christ’s own purpose for creating us (Col 1:16, John 1:3), not with my perceived wants or needs.
Scripture teaches that salvation is through Christ alone, not through "God" (John 14:6). Far too much of our "theology" and "philosophy" is man centred, and not Christ centred. Yet, we read the following in Colossians 1:15-20 of Christ:
"He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross."
The point of this passage is that Christ is preeminent "in everything" (Col 1:18). The Father has "put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church" (Eph 1:22 emphasis added)
One of the key distinctives of Christianity is that we worship Christ – because He is God alone and worthy of our worship. It is Christ we will worship in Heaven (Rev 5:9-10), and it is Christ we will bow the knee to (Phil 2:10) – and this will be to the glory of God the Father (Phil 2:11) because it is the appointed way the Godhead has decreed things will be.
However, we dilute the Christian message by not talking about Jesus Christ and talking about "God" instead. In the modern (or rather post modern) world "God" is a term that requires defining – that is to say that the meaning of "God" is quite subjective and for that reason almost irrelevant.
We as Christians (myself included), need to be preaching Christ, and Him crucified (1 Cor 2:2) as the cross of Jesus Christ is a clear distinction from simply preaching "God". Only when we do this will we become truly effective. As Peter said tot he Jerusalem council all those years ago:
"This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. 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." (Acts 4:11-12)
The cults and false religions are out there spreading the news of Christ, without talking about Christ. This is a deception that leads people to believe that they can be saved without worshipping Christ, when the reality is that all those who are "saved" without Christ are not saved at all.
The promise of the Holy Spirit
This morning I did my second sermon this year. I was given this opportunity a couple of weeks ago (I only had one other sermon scheduled this year), so I'm thankful for this opportunity. (more…)
I go to prepare a place for you
When we read this passage in John 14:2-3 we could be inclined to think of a mansion with Jesus rushing around fluffing pillows and making sure the furniture is in order before His guests arrive.
I am going away to prepare a place for you (John 14:2)
However, when we consider the new Jerusalem in Revelation 21:2 we read:
“I also saw the Holy City, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband.”
When John sees the new Jerusalem which is the eternal dwelling of Gods people (Rev 21:3) he notes that it has been “prepared like a bride adorned for her husband”.
What sort of preparation is in mind here? Meticulous preparation. A bride will spend months thinking about what she will wear, how she will do her hair, what sort of makeup to wear, etc, then on the day put it all together over several hours. The preparation of the bride on the wedding day has to consider the likes and dislikes of her groom, what is appropriate in her culture and family, her own preferences (colours, styles, etc) and then how to mix all these things together for best effect on the day.
When John sees the new Jerusalem, it is this sort of preparation that he has in mind.
However, it all started with the method of Jesus’ going. It is not simply that Jesus was going away to prepare heaven, but that his going away provided the preparation for those who believe in Him to be with Him forever (John 14:3). He is now in heaven, glorified at the right hand of God, his work is done – it was done at the cross once and then He sat at the right hand of the Father (Heb 1:3).
The sacrifice of Christ was not something that was rushed in at a last minute as a back up plan as some suppose, rather it was the divine plan of God to provide a sacrifice for Himself (Gen 22:8) that would satisfy his justice. This was meticulously planned by God from before the foundation of the world (Acts 2:23).
It is a divinely granted privilege to be part of this – and it should drive us to worship with a thankful heart!
For more on this, read Ephesians 1:3-10.
Hollywood and God
If you love the Lord and have a weakness for movies, the videos on this site should be helpful.
Personally, my family has found this challenging, and this site was a great way to 
get us over the edge and dealing with our problem error.
For us the thing that locked it was that if we say we love God, but are happy to see the Lords name used as a curse word for our entertainments sake we are living in hypocrisy and error.
This all relates back to our worldliness, and talking a good talk, but walking a poor walk.
Summer Listening – Jesus on the cross
I was walking along the beach a couple of days ago and I was listening to this sermon while I was walking.
If you want a refresher of what Jesus went through on the cross, why we have the cross as a symbol of Christ and what Jesus accomplished on the cross, then you should take an hour and 10 minutes and listen to this sermon.
It is very refreshing to go over the basics.
God, evil and free will
This is a big subject. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but even so, I don’t have all the answers, so comments and discussion is welcome 
.
Why is evil in the world?
In last weekend’s sermon, I said that evil serves a purpose. Specifically I said that this purpose was more important than the problems that evil caused which means that removal of evil would prevent a greater good from coming about.
The way I exemplified this was by looking at Adam and Eve before the fall and asking “what did they know about God before the fall?”. Which is an interesting question.
Before the fall they probably knew about Gods non-moral attributes – His power, knowledge, wisdom and such. They may also have knew something of the love of God and a few other things. The question is similar to asking what can be known of God from natural revelation – that is – from the created order. Lots can certainly be known of God from natural order – certainly enough to leave men without excuse (Rom 1:20). However, sin throws many of the attributes of God into sharp relief and makes these less obvious attributes of God more apparent. Without sin, we would know very little (if anything) about the justice of God, the mercy of God, the grace of God or the holiness of God. However, with sin, these things become much clearer.
Thus, sin serves a greater purpose – that is to illuminate the character of God.
Now – this is where things get interesting. One person after my sermon said that I almost made evil sound like a good thing. I hope it is clear that we should never suggest that sin or evil is ever good. It is in fact opposite to all that God is, and so it is to be hated to the utmost. My point is not to justify evil – but to demonstrate that evil serves a greater purpose – which is why it has not been removed.
If we look at Romans 5, we find that the law came in “to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more”. The logic here is similar – if the law came to increase sin, then more sin means more grace, which results in the glory of God – thus perhaps if we sin, we can glorify God. This is why Paul asked in Romans 6 “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?” Certainly not! Are we to celebrate sin and evil so that the character of God may be shown more clearly? Again – No!
Does God “use” evil reactively?
Now if evil is in the world, and the Lord has allowed it to happen for his own glory, this seems to be all well and good and we can accept this. However, this is only the beginning. Scripture presents a picture that is considerably more complex than God just allowing sin to remain.
Take for instance Gen 45:8 and Gen 50:20. These passages have Joseph talking to his brothers years after they sold him into slavery in Egypt. The interesting thing about this is that they intended evil for him. They expected to never see him again, and yet God used their evil for his own purposes. This is clear from Gen 50:20:
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.
In the same way that Joseph’s brothers intended evil, so God intended good. The one action had two intentions – the intentions of man and the intentions of God. Note the equivalence of mans purpose and Gods in the one action. If God wanted Joseph in Egypt why did he use the evil of his brothers to bring it about? Many would say that Joseph’s brothers intended evil and God reacted by piggybacking on that evil. However, this text says that the intentions of God and the brothers were both played out – in other words God intended this evil act as part of His divine plan – not reactively, but at least just as proactively as Joseph’s brothers.
We see the same thing in Peters speech on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2:23:
this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.
We should know that the death of the Christ was foretold by prophets hundreds of years before the Lord came to earth. This verse tells us that Jesus was delivered up to death (which for someone not worthy of death is a great evil), and that not only was this foreknown by God, but it was Gods plan. God appointed (or ordained) evil as a means of achieving good. Evil was in the plan of God – not because of His foreknowledge, but because it was His sovereign plan to utilize evil for His ultimate end.
How does free will fit this?
This raises some questions, which frankly we cannot answer adequately. How can God ordain or appoint evil actions on the part of men to fulfill His purpose without Himself being evil? I don’t know. God is holy, and righteous and just and completely separate from sin. But what I can say is that it seems from scripture that this is indeed the case – God appoints evil to achieve his will.
A mistake we can easily make when looking at this is to say that the relationship between Gods sovereignty and mans free will is the same as my sovereignty and your free will. That is to say that I can only influence you to do things – I cannot directly have any autonomy over you. Thus my sovereignty stops and your free will starts. This is a very common error and I believe it undergirds fallacies such as Arminianism as well as Open Theism and others.
We must be careful not to relate to God on a creature to creature basis – He is creator and is not bound by the same restrictions his creatures have, and neither is He limited by His creatures or creation (miracles should be ample evidence of this). To make this mistake is to make an error in category – that is to put God in a category with His creation.
This thinking is also at odds with scripture. Proverbs 21:1 for instance clearly states the sovereignty of God over the will of man:
The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; He turns it wherever He will
The Lord is not limited by our free will. However, how does God move man, while not being responsible for the failure of man? I don’t know, but that doesn’t mean we can just throw this out. We don’t understand the trinity or how God can become man either, and neither do we throw them out.
Why is this important?
The ramification of throwing this truth away is this: If we don’t believe that God is sovereign over the will of man and can determine the heart and will of man, then praying for people to be saved, or for the government or for any person’s will to be changed is pointless at best. However, given the word of God sets an example and encourages us to pray for people generally as well as for their hearts and for their salvation (1 Chron 29:19, 1 Tim 2:1-2, Eph 6:19-20, Rom 10:1, Col 4:12) this indicates that this is in fact true.
The great truth of all this is that God will be glorified through the presence of evil in creation. His character is demonstrated to His creation through the contrast that evil introduces and we can clearly see great breadth and perfect balance in the Lord, which should lead us to worship Him – not only for what he has done for us (although this should be part of it) but more importantly because of His greatness.
Not only will God be glorified by evil, but we can rejoice in God. When we are suffering, we suffer because of sin and evil, but we suffer so that we may be changed to be more like Him in His perfection (James 1:2-4). Even if we suffer due to some human conspiracy or the evil desires of another human, God is sovereign over this and we can seek the Lords help. Finally, if we are telling people about Jesus Christ, we can ask Him to open their hearts to the truth (Acts 16:14) – and know that we are not asking the impossible – as all things are possible with God (Mark 10:27) and that we can entreat Him on this basis (Mark 14:35).
Our God is not trivial, nor academic, but is powerful, sovereign, majestic, worthy of worship and able to answer our prayers!
Jesus is the door
Following from my post last week, and my previous one on the subject, I had a thought yesterday that adds to to getting the word of God out electronically for no cost.
Jesus said “I am the door of the sheep… If anyone enters by me he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture” (John 10:7,9).
When we put up barriers like charging or registration on a website that people must go through to listen to listen to sermons, download content, etc we essentially put another gate before them before they even get to the Lord. This is only a hindrance to the gospel, and I’m sure it will be judged by the Lord.
Wasn’t this just what the Roman Catholic church was doing before the reformation? Putting gates before the people before they could enter the kingdom? We should be going and preaching, getting it out, not hiding our lights under a bushel (to mix metaphors).
Isn’t it a great thing that justice will be done one day! We can lobby and see no change, but God will judge righteously and justice will be done ultimately. I just pray that I have enough discernment to not put myself into this position of judging by putting myself before the possible salvation of others.
Four and a half point Calvinism and the Gospel
If you’ve done study into the details of salvation (sometimes referred to as soteriology) you’ll know that the Synod of Dort in 1619 came up with five affirmations of Calvinism, commonly known as the “Five points of Calvinism”.
The five points can be remembered using the acrostic TULIP:
T = Total Depravity of man
U = Unconditional election
L = Limited Atonement
I = Irresistible Grace
P = Perseverance of the saints
I’ve been very strongly in the Calvinist camp since a short time after I was saved, however I’ve heard others express one point of difference between the five points and the scripture – and I share this.
Half a point difference
The one point is in the Limited Atonement. According to the Moody Handbook of theology the third point of Calvinism is as follows:
Because God determined that certain ones should be saved as a result of God’s unconditional election, He determined that Christ should die for the elect. All whom God has elected and Christ died for will be saved.
My point of difference is that the writings of Paul seem to disagree with one small point in this – that is that the death of Christ while effective only for the elect, was not only for the elect.
For example lets have a look at 2 Corinthians 5:18-20:
All this is from God who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that in Christ, God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors of Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
While I understand that Paul was writing this to believers, the key here is in the use of the word “world” – because that is what Christ was reconciling to Himself. This theme would seem to fit with classic verses such as John 3:16:
For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
That is that God loved the world – not just the elect, and so the death of Christ was sufficient not only for the elect, but also for those who perish.
1 John 2:2 would seem to confirm this:
He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
Propitiation means to make atonement – so this would seem to be stating clearly that Christ atoned for the sins of the world.
How this affects the Gospel
The point of this little nitpick is that this changes the gospel we preach. Today the Gospel is either badly watered down or lumbered with conditions. However, there is only one condition for salvation – believe on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved (Acts 16:31). This message of reconciliation is thus “the punishment for your sin has already been taken care of in Jesus’s death – believe in His sufficiency to appease the wrath of God on your behalf and you will be saved”.
To believe in the sufficiency of Christ means we need to believe that He is the incarnate God and as such is without sin, thus his sacrifice for sin is acceptable.
If the death of Christ was only for the elect, then the message we preach must be “believe on the Lord and that affirms that your sin was punished in His death”. This is quite a different message and raises questions in the mind of the hearer – “Was my sin really covered in Christ’s death? How do I know? If I believe, is that just me or is it because of His work?”
However if all that is required is believing in the sufficiency of Christ, we are better able to repent as we can see that that is all that is required (and by repentance I mean the sanctification that results from believing in Jesus).
So there we have it – I’m a four and a half point Calvinist – and if you didn’t know – Jesus was punished for your sin – you just need to believe in Him to be saved from the punishment of your sin – so believe and be saved!
**Update**
Dom was good enough to take time to respond to this post and email me to let me know. He makes some good points in his post. And as a result I’d like to clarify what I’m saying here as I did in my comment on His blog post:
I’m certainly not a universalist, nor do I subscribe to Hypothetic Universalism. Mankind is utterly depraved, and incapable of saving himself, thus election and consequent regeneration by the Holy Spirit are necessary acts of God on an individual.
In my mind (and thus this post), I have always distinguished between atonement and justification. On reflection – this is not necessarily everyone’s understanding, and thus is misleading.
I regard atonement as being related to the value of Christ’s death (which is infinite), and regarding justification (or redemption) as the application of that atonement. This means that if God chose to do so – the death of Christ would be sufficient for the salvation of all men everywhere – however, God has chosen some – not all – to be redeemed or justified, and thus the application of Christ’s death is strictly limited to those who believe.
Perhaps I should say the following by way of clarification: Christ’s death in itself had unlimited and infinite value because He is Holy God. The intention of Christ’s death (actual satisfaction and atonement of sin for individuals) is given only to those who believe. Salvation is offered to all – the whole world, but received only by those who believe.
For further reading on this issue I recommend Dogmatic Theology (also on Logos) by William Shedd (p739-750)
Purity in Worship
I was just reading of Matthews account of Jesus walking on water in Matt 14:22-33 and found this statement:
And those in the boat worshipped him, saying: “Truly you are the Son of God”
I was struck by the simplicity of the moment. There was no music, no prayer, no hype, no grand words, just 12 men responding to the person of Jesus.
They responded because of what they had just seen – Jesus had defied the natural elements by walking on water. His authority was unmistakable – no one can do this – yet here is Jesus doing it.
How would you react? Like the disciples we’d be awestruck, with no real words to say, beyond a simple acknowledgement that this must be God’s Son – who else can do such things?
Our worship is often full of pretense. The modern church often puts people into a state of hype through music, high powered emotional preaching and a myriad of other methods.
The stark contrast is that these men were simply responding. Their focus was simply the person of Jesus and they responded to what they’d just seen.
Paul calls us to respond in Romans 12:1 where he says:
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship [emphasis added].
Our response to Jesus should be to give him our lives, yet how can we do this if we don’t know him? Many “believers” today spend no time reading their Bibles, and no time praying. How can they know him? How can they respond?
We should spend more time focusing on the person and the majesty of Jesus Christ, and let the person of Jesus as revealed in Bible move us to respond in worship.
Pure worship results in pure lives. Pretentious worship results in worldly lives (cf James 1:27)
Get hard or go home
I’ve been reading a book by Ian Wishart called “Eves Bite“. If you want a very thought provoking and challenging book to read… actually – no - you should read this book. It will shake you to your core. Order it from the eves bite website.
I’ve also been listening to some talks given at a conference recently and between the book and the talks, I’m more convinced than ever that we are living in the last days and that the return of Christ is not far away.
The world around us is doing a fantastic job of popularizing evil. Every radio station, TV network, newspaper, magazine article and government department are working hard to demolish any basis of morality at all.
We are continually fed movies, TV programs and articles by the media that portray homosexuality as normal, vilify fundamentalist religions and their adherents, promote the atheistic and secular mind set as healthy and rational, dilute marriage and parenthood to either optional or subject to the state, promote the state as the ultimate authority, endorse pleasure as the ultimate pursuit and generally desensitize us to violence, sexual impurity, greed, lust, drunkenness and a great range of other evils.
The amazing thing is not so much that it is happening – after all it was predicted nearly two thousand years ago by the apostle Paul:
[1] understand this, that *in the last days there will come times of difficulty. [2] For people will be *lovers of self, *lovers of money, *proud, *arrogant, abusive, *disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, [3] heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, *not loving good, [4] treacherous, reckless, *swollen with conceit, *lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,
2 Timothy 3:1-4
The truely amazing thing is that Christians by and large don’t care.
Interestingly enough, the above verse is actually aimed at those who say they follow Christ. Paul continued:
[5] having the appearance of godliness, but *denying its power. *Avoid such people. [6] For among them are *those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, [7] always learning and never able to *arrive at a knowledge of the truth. [8] Just as *Jannes and Jambres *opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, *men corrupted in mind and *disqualified regarding the faith.
2 Timothy 3:5-8
These people have the appearance of godliness… meaning that they look OK on the outside. There are lots of these people in the church, but they are dead inside.
Genuine believers are not to sit idly by. When Paul wrote to the church at Corinth which was entrenched in a broad array of evil practices he said to them:
[12] For what have I to do with judging *outsiders? *Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? [13] God judges* those outside. *“Purge the evil person from among you.”
1 Cor 5:12-13
What Paul is instructing the believers to do is to put those who are practicing evil out of the church.
“Wait a minute”, the liberalist says “who are we to judge”? The answer to that question depends on where you stand. If you love Christ and seek to see him glorified, it puts you in the position of judge. If you don’t care for Christ and the salvation his death wrought for you, then it puts you either on the outside – subject to Gods judgement, or it puts you in the position of the one who should be judged by the church and possibly purged.
Simply put, faith in Christ and evil practices do not go together, and this is the exact compromise that Christians have made that has led to this apathy. We love the world. We love the things of the world (the TV, entertainment, sex, money, alcohol, drugs or that high) more than we love God.
On this John wrote:
[15] Do not love the world or the things in the world. *If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
1 John 2:15
Are there that many apostates in the church?
If you don’t think this is you – then change. Starting to day repent and turn from the ways and thinking of the world and look for the truth – and look for the truth in the word of God – it is nowhere else.
The world around us is blinding those in the world not only to the truth of Christ, but any truth at all. There is a conspiracy – not of human origin, but satanic, and it is here. Right now. It is pervasive, and there are few who are not under its influence.
If you feel as strongly about these things then lets get hard and lets wake up and let the world know about the state that it is in. We need to tell people that they are lost, that they have been deceived and are going to be judged by an impartial and all righteous and all powerful judge who is not fooled by the political correctness and so-called tolerance of the west for all things evil.
Believers – the time has come – get hard or go home.
Jesus demonstrated his deity – part 2
We saw that Jesus proved his deity by demonstrating what he knew – that he was not constrained in his knowledge as we are constrained.
We can also see that Jesus demonstrated his deity by forgiving people of their sins. There are two occurrences where he did this in the gospels, but for this study, we will focus on just one of those occurrences - Mark 2:1-12.
In this story we are in a location where crowds had gathered to hear Jesus and as a result there were people desperate to see him who simply couldn’t. get to him. Four men had a friend who was paralyzed who wanted to help him get to Jesus in order for Jesus to heal him. When they got to where Jesus was they decided that since they couldn’t get through the crowd they would take their friend over the crowd and drop him in front of Jesus – through the roof.
They did this, they got above Jesus and removed part of the roof, and then dropped the man down in front of Jesus to ask him to heal him.
Oddly Jesus doesn’t immediately heal the man. Instead he said to the man “Your sins are forgiven”. There are a number of interesting reasons why Jesus may have started by forgiving the mans sins.
Firstly one of the Jewish thoughts of the day (and it is a corollary to that which is held by proponents of the health, wealth and prosperity gospel today) is that sickness, disease and suffering are punishment from God, and the corollary is that prosperity, health and success are a blessing of the Lord. We see this thinking in John 9:1-3 where the disciples ask who sinned that the man should be born blind – him or his parents to which the answer was neither – the purpose of the mans suffering was that “the works of God might be displayed in him”.
The implications for this are staggering. This man, if subscribed to this philosophy (and given that was what the rabbi’s taught, this was likely), he would have lived his life performing penance for his sin, feeling guilt and shame at his situation. In addition to this, he is now present before the Holy Christ, so these feelings would have been greatly magnified, for which forgiveness is a great cure.
It is critical to quickly note here that physical infirmities are not necessarily related to sin. When the apostle Paul was afflicted with a “thorn in his flesh” the Lord revealed to him that “My grace is sufficient for you, my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:7-10). That is that the purpose of Paul’s affliction (the nature of which we are not exactly sure of) was to cause him to depend more fully on Christ, rather than on himself. Often our own physical issues have the same purpose – to cause us to depend on the Lord or seek him more fervently than we otherwise would.
The second reason that may be behind why Jesus decided to forgive the mans sins is that ones sin is a far more important issue than ones bodily condition. This illustrated clearly in Matt 5:29 - “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose your one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell.” The point of this passage is not to prescribe a behavior, but to emphasis the seriousness of sin on the tail of the subtleties of sin (the subtleties being dealt with in Matt 5:27-28).
The third and the key reason that Jesus forgave the mans sin is that he wanted to make a point to those who were there. The point was simple - that he did indeed have the authority to forgive sins.
When Jesus forgave the mans sin, the question immediately entered the mind of the Pharisees who were there ” who can forgive sin except God alone?”. The Old Testament is clear about this. In Ps 51:4 David said “against you, you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight”. In this verse we have the very definition of sin – that which is evil in Gods sight. What is evil in Gods sight? Anything that violates his righteous character.
Likewise, given sin is only against God, so is forgiveness only available from the one who has been sinned against. Dan 9:9 says “to the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness” and Micah 7:18 says “who is a god like you, pardoning iniquities and passing over transgression for for the remnant of his inheritance?” Not only is it only God who can forgive, because its only him who has been offended, but as Micah points out, what other god is there who forgives? If we survey man made religions, we generally find that other gods exact some kind of penance in exchange for sin, however, the Lord does not – there is only forgiveness through faith in Jesus or eternal punishment for sin.
Thus, the Jewish listeners were correct in their thinking that only God can forgive sins – and Jesus was claiming to be God by forgiving this mans sins.
However Jesus’ point in this passage is to demonstrate that he is in fact God. Thus to demonstrate that he could forgive sins, Jesus healed the man of his paralysis. The healing of this man was instant, complete and compelling.
The man entered the room in a state of sin, completely dependent on his peers for transport (and no doubt a great many other things) and left forgiven of his sins and walking, carrying his own mat! Such a complete transformation can only be ascribed to a miracle – specifically the miraculous work of God done in a short time.
In this, Jesus showed not only that he had complete power over physical infirmities, but also that he had complete power over sin, and by so doing, he proved that the claim he made about himself – that he is God – is true.
Jesus didn’t just demonstrate his power over sin and infirmities. Next we will investigate a couple of other things that demonstrate the deity of Christ.
