Tag Sin

When Our Seeds Only Grow Thorns

Todd R 2 Comments

Sometimes we feel like we’re putting in a lot of effort but getting no results from it.  We’re sowing good seeds but not reaping any harvest.  At times, it seems disappointment is our only reward.  Often this can just be the way things are at the time – we’re doing nothing wrong but it’s just not obvious what God is doing at that time.  We don’t need to change anything.  But there may be times where we’re not reaping good things because we’re deceived that what we’re sowing is what we’re supposed to be sowing.

According to the prophet Jeremiah, the nation of Judah had this problem and as a result they ended up in exile.  In the first half of Jeremiah 12:13, the prophet says of Judah:

“They have sown wheat and have reaped thorns;
            they have tired themselves out but profit nothing.”

The nation of Judah thought they were sowing good seeds, but they weren’t and there are several examples in Jeremiah’s book.

First, Judah thought they were on the right side politically, with powerful friends and therefore secure.

The nation of Judah allied itself alternately with Egypt and Assyria, who they thought could protect them from Babylon.  Surely these powerful nations could keep Judah from doom at Babylon’s hands.  However, in Jeremiah 3:36 the prophet says:

“How much you go about,
            changing your way!
You shall be put to shame by Egypt
            as you were put to shame by Assyria.”

Because Judah had trusted these nations, other than God, for their salvation God would put them to shame by His own hand, from which there is no escape.  While there are many good ways to work with others, we should never trust anyone with the help that only God can provide.

Next, Judah thought they had the right cultural heritage.

The people of Judah wouldn’t listen to Jeremiah’s prophesies of doom for the nation because they thought God wouldn’t destroy what they saw as His own nation.  Israel had been taken into captivity by Assyria, but Judah thought it could never happen to them because they were the heirs of Jewish culture.  The people would repeat the phrase, “This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD,” to remind themselves that they were special because they had the temple, but Jeremiah says in Jeremiah 7:4,

“Do not trust in these deceptive words: ‘This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD.’”

The temple was provided as a way to approach God, but Judah thought of it like a magical talisman that would keep God happy so they could do their own thing.  However, God doesn’t want us to follow a checklist – He wants us.  All cultural and political institutions – including ones provided by God – are useless outside of God’s purpose for them.  What He provides He can take away if we abuse it.  When Judah was taken into captivity by Babylon, the temple was torn down and burned.

Last, Judah thought they had the right religion and were diligently practicing it

Judah’s religious leaders and people were diligent in observing the practices laid out in God’s ceremonial law.  They faithfully made the morning and evening sacrifices, observed the three main Jewish festivals, and followed many other ordinances, but in Jeremiah 7:22-23, the prophet said:

“For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices.  But this command I gave them: ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’”

Because Judah was putting observance above obedience to God, He would therefore discipline them.  The sacrifices were not the objective – the relationship was the objective, but the people made their religion about the sacrifices themselves, not the relationship they were designed to restore.

Do we sometimes practice similar things in the modern church?  Of course we do.

The modern-day equivalent of Judah’s first mistake is when we expect from a political party what only God can give.  Our expectations of them become idolatrous, and we become more likely to compromise God’s principles to support them.  We commit the second mistake when we are convinced our denomination has it all right – the right history, traditions and doctrine – and therefore God will always favor us.  The last mistake happens when we put external religious observances ahead of internal devotion to God.  We may be executing the acts and rituals our religion requires of us, and our peers expect from us, but not giving ourselves fully to God.  We may go to church, but when we leave the church building we don’t take Jesus with us.

Sometimes we think through our political, cultural, and religious activities we should reap wheat, but what is happening when we keep reaping thorns?  Sometimes we need to check that we aren’t repeating Judah’s mistakes.

“They have sown wheat and have reaped thorns;
            they have tired themselves out but profit nothing.
They shall be ashamed of their harvests
            because of the fierce anger of the LORD.”

Church is Not a Shopping Mall

Todd R 1 Comment

I recently had a very strange dream, which occurred (kind of) in the church I went to as a kid.  This church, in Washington, D.C., has been around for over 130 years and meets in a stone building and has an amazing pipe organ in the main sanctuary.  The appearance and structure of the church communicates permanence and tradition.

In this dream, I was roughly a teenager on one end of the church building but had to meet up with my family at the other end of the building.  I started out in a place that seemed like the church I knew, but as I travelled to the other end, things got really bizarre.  First, the size of the building seemed to keep expanding and the number of people in it kept multiplying.  Soon I noticed that there was a gift shop selling all sorts of kitsch that had nothing to do with religion.  I kept going in the same direction, trying to find my family, but the building just kept growing as I went, eventually having many levels, with huge moving walkways and escalators.  The dream ended with me still in the church, but this end of it had become a very upscale, very massive, shopping mall.  I remember wondering “how did the church turn into this?”

What to make of this?  Consider what a shopping mall is.  Yes, it’s a large collection of stores in one place, but not a random collection.  Those stores were chosen to be as diverse as possible.  The more of our desires and wants the mall can meet by having different types of stores, the more economically successful the mall will be, and that’s what matters to the mall operator.  People want fancy clothes, jewelry, entertainment, snacks and candy, toys, and many other things.  So, a mall can represent our “do whatever you want” culture.

I wonder if the seed of the dream was something I saw on Twitter a few days before: “There are infinite ways to be non-binary.”  What they were saying is that not only are there not just two genders, but that we can endlessly create new ones with no limit at all.  It’s like a sexual version of the shopping mall, and also a denial that there’s any real right or wrong or that there’s any such thing as an inappropriate desire.  But can we really make ourselves into anything we want to be without consequences?

Consider this: no competent computer engineer would tell us that we can just arrange a diverse group of components any way we want and end up with a working computer.  The engineer isn’t being intolerant or mean, they just know what it takes to make a computer do what it’s supposed to.

Likewise, when Jesus says “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few,”[1] He is not being intolerant or mean by saying we can’t do whatever we want to, He just knows that we were designed, what we were designed to do, and also what will ultimately satisfy us.

Christian churches are supposed to teach us how to follow Christ, not tell us to do whatever we want to, but now many churches, just like in my dream, have turned into proverbial shopping malls.  In many cases, we’ve forgotten that people are not accidents of random circumstances in nature, and we’ve forgotten that our Creator knows what’s best for us.  We’ve decided to pursue “the way that is easy” forgetting that it “leads to destruction.”  Too many churches, now including the one I went to in DC, say that Jesus will meet whatever needs we think we have, rather than saying that Jesus knows what we need better than we do; that it’s our idea of need that must be changed.

It’s our idea of need
that must be changed

When Jesus said, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life,” the “world” He loves is the one where we’ve come up with infinite ways to reject Him.  Where we’ve come up with infinite ways to deny that He made us and knows better than us what’s right and wrong, what “leads to life” and what “leads to destruction.”

When God gave His Son, His sacrifice was sufficient for all sin and can cover all the infinite ways we decide to ignore what’s good for us.  Because God loved this world, it’s also true that His people should communicate His love and grace at all times to all people, by word and action.  Yet it’s also true that church is not a shopping mall regardless of what people can imagine in their dreams that it should be.  The church is called to a higher standard of living, a holy standard informed by our Creator’s knowledge of what works.

So, in these troubling times, pray that people will continue to find Jesus, both within and outside the church and what much of it has become.  That God’s people will love holiness, but also love sinners.  Pray that we find the way that is hard but leads to life and that God’s church is a beacon calling people to it.

Amen.

[1] Matthew 7:13-14

The Way of Escape

Todd R 2 Comments

Reliable knowledge of good and evil is hard to come by, and the wisdom to follow it even harder.  A well-known and oft-quoted Proverb is 1:7, which says:

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;
            fools despise wisdom and instruction.”

This Proverb tells us that we only gain useful knowledge, wisdom and instruction when we have an attitude of reverent respect for God, and that we are fools if we do otherwise.  Fear of the Lord should be the rudder that guides us through the waves and storms that buffet us in this world.  Every decision we make should have as its foundation: does this honor God?  No other foundation is good enough for our lives to rest upon.

What’s left unsaid here in Proverbs is that we can’t expect this to come easy.  We are constantly tempted to not fear the Lord in our minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour, and day-by-day decisions.  It’s hard, and not just because we aren’t perfect.

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

In the account of the serpent’s confrontation with Eve in the garden in Genesis 3, the serpent’s whole objective was to get Eve to make one decision that wasn’t based on fear of the Lord.  “He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?””[1]  “The serpent said to the woman, ‘You will not surely die.’”[2]  Eventually he wore her down and she ate from the tree God told her not to eat from, all because her reverence for God had been worn down by constant criticism of God by the serpent.  He wanted her to decide for any reason other than the fear of the Lord, to become a fool, and thus bring down humanity.

When we make decisions, are we always being guided by the fear of the Lord, or do we sometimes think “He didn’t really mean that”?  If you’re like me, you find yourself constantly confronted by influences that oppose God.  Are we foolish when we follow these influences?  Yes.  Do we do it anyway?  Yes.  Could there be a hostile spiritual influence pulling us in that direction?  Sure, but it could also just be our own broken wills, prone to go our own way.

However, in 1 Corinthians 10:13, Paul assures us that “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”  And if we fear the Lord, we will believe it.

If we fear the Lord, when we’re tempted, we will know that “he will also provide the way of escape.”  We need to look for it and pray for it until we find it.  When we do, God will remain in the driving seat of our decisions and knowledge and wisdom will be ours.  He can overcome any of our temptations if we let Him and we fear Him.

Let the fear of the Lord be your guide.  There is always a “way of escape.”

[1] Genesis 3:1b
[2] Genesis 3:4

What are We Willing to Leave on the Cutting Room Floor?

Todd R 1 Comment

From earliest times, debate has raged over whether God’s word can be taken literally.  Since the serpent asked, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?”[1] people have debated if the world was created in 6 days.  If Moses really parted the Red Sea.  If Jonah really spent 3 days inside a great fish.  And so on.  Talk about whether the Bible means what it says often focuses on the miraculous events within.

But what about verses like Ephesians 4:29?  “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.”  When Paul wrote that, did he literally mean “no corrupting talk,” or just to aim for less crude language than the average person?  Did Paul mean each word needs to “fit the occasion,” or to repeat whatever catchphrase seems to work in most situations?  Did Paul mean everything we say should “give grace” to others, or is it ok if sometimes we want to look good or only appear gracious?  Do we need to always build up those who hear us?  Did Paul “actually say” what he wrote in Ephesians 4:29?

Failure to meet our ideals
does not mean that
we should change them.

We might reply that this is an impossible standard, but Jesus in Luke 18:19 said “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”  In that one statement, Jesus testifies that no one is good (everyone misses the mark), and also that He is God in the flesh, come to save us from failing to meet the standard.

So yes, Ephesians 4:29 should be taken literally, but we should also take literally that only Jesus can meet the standard, and that He did meet the standard.  Failure to meet our ideals does not mean they are the wrong ideals and that we should change them.  Holiness is holiness.

G.K. Chesterton wrote in his book Orthodoxy that “it does not matter (comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old failures are fruitless.”[2]

Photo by John Moeses Bauan on Unsplash

In film editing, “the cutting room floor” refers to pieces of physical film that (in pre-digital times) were cut out of the movie and left lying on the floor.  When writing this blog, one of the hardest things to do is to cut out parts or phrases I care deeply about, but sometimes it’s necessary, because my words aren’t always Ephesians 4:29 words.  Finding these failures can be fruitful if I learn from them and move closer to the ideal.  In real-time, daily conversation it’s even harder, but to take Ephesians 4:29 literally, we all have to figuratively ask:

What are we willing to leave on the cutting room floor today?

[1] Genesis 3:1
[2] Chesterton, G.K. Orthodoxy (1908).  P. 163.

What’s in Your Temple?

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When describing His holiness, God provided pictures like the one in Isaiah 6:1 – “In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple.”  Because “the train of his robe filled the temple,” there is no room in the temple for anything that isn’t holy.  Or in Revelation 15:8, which says: “and the sanctuary was filled with smoke from the glory of God and from his power, and no one could enter the sanctuary until the seven plagues of the seven angels were finished.”  Until God’s judgment was complete – both on the unrepentant and on the cross for His people – there would continue to be no room in the sanctuary for anyone but the Lord.

How do these pictures apply to us?  Paul asks in 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 – “Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?  If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.”  Therefore, we ask ourselves: does the train of the Lord’s robe fill our temples?

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

A transformative moment came in my Christian life when I understood sin in contrast to holiness, rather than as a list of “don’ts.”  It’s possible (perhaps even easy) to convince ourselves we are not sinners in need of grace by defining sin as things we don’t do.  However, much of the time, the word “sin” in the New Testament is a translation of the Greek word hamartia, which means “to miss the mark.”[1]  The word has athletic connotations, such as if an archer couldn’t hit the bullseye, they wouldn’t win the competition and the prize.  As we all know, archers are supposed to be accurate, and if they aren’t, they’ve “missed the mark.”

Therefore, when Paul writes in Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” he is not saying everybody failed to follow a list of dos and don’ts, but that we have not fully lived the life God intended us to live.  Romans 3:23 declares that while we wouldn’t set up idols in our church building, all of us tolerate some idols in our soul, which is where the Holy Spirit of God chooses to dwell.  The train of His robe does not fill our inner temple, and we too often trod on it with dirty feet.  We’ve “missed the mark” any time there’s other stuff in our temple, directing our thoughts and actions.  However, by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ we have both a hope of living with God and a future where His metaphorical robe does fill us.

In Paradise, God’s people will – individually and collectively – “hit the mark” perfectly for eternity.  His perfect temple will be completed in Paradise, with the living stones of all His people.

Paul returns to holiness again in 2 Corinthians 6:16 to 7:1, quoting several Old Testament passages, since holiness of His people has been the plan from the beginning –

“What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said,
             ‘I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them,
                        and I will be their God,
                        and they shall be my people.
            Therefore go out from their midst,
                        and be separate from them, says the Lord,
            and touch no unclean thing;
                        then I will welcome you,
            and I will be a father to you,
                        and you shall be sons and daughters to me,
            says the Lord Almighty.’

Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.”

Amen

[1] Greek Strong’s Dictionary