The Untouchables

In the 1987 movie, the tough Irish beat-cop Jim Malone (Sean Connery) on Elliot Ness' squad arrives home one night, unaware an assassin is lurking outside, watching for an opportunity.  But when the mafioso sneaks up behind the seemingly-oblivious cop with knife in hand, Malone turns to thrust his gun in the man's face, disgustedly saying, "Ain't that just like a wop, bringing a knife to a gun-fight ?"

I often notice the cars in my church' parking-lot with combative pro-gun bumper-stickers of the "cold, dead hands" variety.  A few other cars sport the "Gadsden Flag" vanity license-plates--a rattlesnake and "Don't Tread On Me" motto--sponsored by my state's Rifle Association.

I have to shake my head.  Ain't that just like a "conservative Christian," bringing a gun to a spiritual fight ?

"The pursuit of Happiness"

The Declaration of Independence claims so, but I'm skeptical that all men are "...endowed...with certain unalienable Rights" by "their Creator."  I don't have Jefferson's deistic qualms about naming God as Who He IS: but the question is if He actually guarantees every human being is entitled (for what else is a "right" ?) to "...Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."

It's stirring political rhetoric.  I doubt it's sound theology, as does A. W. Tozer.

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"You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier."          --2 Timothy 2:3-4.

That we are born to be happy is scarcely questioned by anyone. No one bothers to prove that fallen men have any moral right to happiness, or that they are in the long run any better off happy. The only question before the house is how to get the most happiness out of life. Almost all popular books and plays assume that personal happiness is the legitimate end of the dramatic human struggle.

Now I submit that the whole hectic scramble after happiness is an evil as certainly as is the scramble after money or fame or success....

How far wrong all this is will be discovered easily by the simple act of reading the New Testament through once with meditation. There the emphasis is not upon happiness but upon holiness. God is more concerned with the state of people's hearts than with the state of their feelings. Undoubtedly the will of God brings final happiness to those who obey, but the most important matter is not how happy we are but how holy. The soldier does not seek to be happy in the field; he seeks rather to get the fighting over with, to win the war and get back home to his loved ones. There he may enjoy himself to the full; but while the war is on his most pressing job is to be a good soldier, to acquit himself like a man, regardless of how he feels.

"Oh Lord, redirect my focus. Help me today to be a 'good soldier of Jesus Christ.' Amen."

"The Truth Shall Make You Free"

In John 8:31-2, Jesus tells “Jews who had believed Him” that “the truth will make you free.”

They began to argue with Him, saying they were children of Abraham, and have NEVER been anyone’s slaves.

They knew it was a lie.  Each Passover they recited how they were slaves in Egypt.  They also knew that their people had been carried off to Babylon as captives.  They knew that Israel had been conquered and ruled by the Persians, and then by Alexander the Great.  Even as they argued with Jesus that they were free, they knew Roman conquerors were their masters.

They were angry that Jesus challenged the lie they told themselves.  So angry He knew they wanted to kill Him: which He said showed they were actually children of the devil, loving lies and murder as satan does. By the end of the conversation they proved Him right, picking up rocks to stone Him.

“Conservatives” today have a chip on their shoulder about being “FREE AMERICANS:” and follow a liar who promises he'll save them from their own "tyrannical" government, and “Make America Great Again.”  What if Jesus told them that following those lies makes them slaves…and shows they are children of the devil ?

Jesus was right.

Jesus is still right.

Proverbs 4:23

 "Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life."     --  Proverbs 4:23 

Proverbs 23:7 puts it another way: in our usual slight misquotation, "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he."

I remember a quote from a pastor, who credited it to Harry Truman: "What's down in the well comes up in the bucket."  (Trying to track down that saying's origin, I find it's been ascribed to numerous people besides Truman, including a slightly different form by evangelist Vance Havner.)  That puts Proverb's wisdom pretty well.

But I didn't realize until I started pondering and studying Proverbs 4:23 how often Jesus alludes to its wisdom:

 "...how can you, being evil, speak what is good?  For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart."

                                                                                                                                       --  Matthew 12:34

"But the things that proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and those defile the man." -- Matt. 15:18

"For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts."  --  Mark 7:21

^"The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil; for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart."  --  Luke 6:45 

Proverbs' take on man's spiritual identity is exactly that of Jesus: man's identity is always in God's moral terms...and shows in all that a man does, as either righteous or evil.

John puts that wisdom even more succinctly: "By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious (my emphasis: other translations say "manifest"): anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother." (I John 3:10).

The set-up of the old joke is profoundly right: "There are only two kinds of people..."

Prayer

C.S. Lewis pointed out that prayer seems to be "hard-wired" into human beings.  It's totally in character for Him Who created us that He'd make us innately pray-ers, so fiercely does He desire our intimacy with Himself.

Lewis also pointed out that all who pray report the same experience.  Buddhists, Sufis, and Hindus as well as Christians say that prayer gives them a sense of "peace" or "transcendence."  Like those who embark on a voyage...whether tourists, sailors, pirates or merchants...the experience is the same for all who sail; land falling from sight below the horizon, the vessel's pitch, and the smell of salt-air.

"Departures are all alike," Lewis wrote, "It is the landfall that crowns the voyage."  In this, he wrote, Christian prayer is unique.

It seems too that Christian prayer is unique in that it is "traveling hopefully"...with expectation.

Jesus told us to have that expectation when He said "...whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive..." (Matthew 21:22).

Christian readers surely noticed that I omitted Jesus' qualifying words: "...if you have faith."

In Jesus' context, it seems "faith" means (as it always must) believing what Jesus says, and doing it...expect that our Father will honor prayer in Jesus' name.

Lawlessness

"Lawlessness" has come up frequently in my recent study.  First in Matthew 24, Jesus' prophesy of the last days before His return, when He says "Because lawlessness is increased, the love of many will grow cold" (Matthew 24:12).

That sparked my back-of-mind remembrance that the end-time personage we call "anti-Christ" seems to be the one designated "the man of lawlessness" in II Thessalonians 2.

It came up again when I was reading Skye Jethani's chapter "How to Fail the Last Judgement," when Jesus rejects the plea of those who point to their mighty works done in His name, telling them, "...I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness" (Matthew 7:23).

With more study, I was reminded that "lawlessness" is I John 3:4's very definition of sin: "Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness" (my emphasis).

And John couldn't be more spot-on.  God gave us "the Law:" the religious commandments to the Jews, but also the Spirit's direction in every man's "innermost being."  Any act, word, or thought contrary His Law is, therefore, by definition, "law-lessness."

Understanding what scripture says about lawlessness seems especially critical for Christians in our time, which many of us consider the "last days" Jesus prophesied, and the time "...that man of lawlessness will be revealed..." (II Thessalonians 2:8).

This is also a time when so-called "Evangelicals" have made themselves a solid political "demographic" for a faction whose ways are entirely "lies" and "murder."  Scripture's test whether we hear and understand its words is manifestly for this very time:  "...what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness ?" (I Corinthians 6:14).

Amen.

Amen.

Again: What's Jesus Mean His Followers are "Hypocrites !" ?

"And He was also saying to the crowds, 'When you see a cloud rising in the west, immediately you say, "A shower is coming," and so it turns out.  And when you see a south wind blowing, you say, "It will be a hot day," and it turns out that way.  You hypocrites !  You know how to analyze the appearance of the earth and the sky, but why do you not analyze this present time ?' "    --  Luke 12:54-56

If He'd wanted, God could have phrased Romans 2:13 and James 1:22-25 in terms of "hypocrisy."  Those scriptures contrast "hearers" and "doers" of God's word: which would be anyone's definition of "hypocrisy."  It was certainly Jesus' definition of hypocrisy in Matthew 23:3.

And any of Jesus' fallible followers are capable such hypocrisy, at a moment's notice.  At Antioch, Paul had to call out Peter for falling into it: and Barnabas as well, Paul's own fellow missionary (Galatians 2:11-13) !

But Jesus only rebuked His followers once for hypocrisy: and it wasn't for failure to do His word.  He could have dinged any of them, any of us, on that score, at virtually any moment.

His unique use of "hypocrisy" on that occasion was about His followers' failure to Spiritually "analyze" the time in which they were living.

That's significant.

It's especially significant for His followers living in these last days before His return.

Amen.

Skye Jethani: How to Fail The Final Judgement

"Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’ "

                                                                                                                 --  Matthew 7:22-23

"How could such people--leaders full of power with effective ministries and dynamic preaching, who affirm Jesus' divinity--be excluded from His Kingdom ?  Why would Jesus ever say to such people, 'Away from Me' ?"    --  Skye Jethani, What If Jesus Was Serious ?, p. 163

The Greek word Jesus uses, egnōn, is a tense of γινώσκω, "to know."  Strong's glosses the word as "intimate knowledge."  That's why when the angel tells Mary she's pregnant with The Messiah, she asks how that can possibly be, since she'd never "known a man" (Luke 1:34). 

How does anyone know Jesus (or anyone else, for that matter) ?  Spending time with someone is the only way to intimately know them.

Skye Jethani's doodle for his chapter shows a Christian's check-list.  "Right Theology," "Bold Preaching," "Fights Evil / Injustice," and "Performs Miracles" are all checked "A+."  Only "Communion w/ God" is marked "F."

Jethani titles his check-list "How to Fail The Final Judgement."

We have Met The Enemy, and...

When I was a kid, I loved what I then thought were "patriotic" quotations: the "hooray for us" sayings that (I then thought) defined loving my country.  They all struck the nationalistic "My country, right or wrong" note.  Only later did I understand that "nationalism" is a prideful caricature "love of one's country," and actually destructive to one's country.

One saying I memorized back then was Oliver Hazard Perry's triumphant report of his naval victory in the War of 1812: "We have met the enemy, and he is ours."

By the time I was a young adult, I'd become a fan of Walt Kelly's wonderful newspaper comic-strip, Pogo.  And I had to laugh when Pogo re-worked Perry's quotation for the turbulent Vietnam years: "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

Walt Kelly's proverb stuck in my memory not just because it was clever and funny, but because it was so spot-on relevant to America in that time.  It remains in my memory because it's relevant for human beings, of whatever nation, in every time.

That wisdom almost bears the force of a Biblical teaching.  That's why the inner front-page of my Bible, where I've written the verses that I've kept going back to for a half-century, includes a section of exhotations to self-examination.

Knowing "all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do" (or "Him to Whom we must give account:" Hebrews 4:13), every disciple is wise to practice the regular discipline of self-examination, "to see if you are in the faith" (II Corinthians 13:5).  How else can we be sure we are walking in God's ways, and not merely satisfying our own caricature of them. ?

When I was a mailman, I substituted  one day on a route in the student ghetto.  There was a run-down old two-story frame house on one block: paint completely weathered off its walls, its porch sagging, and every other sign of long neglect.  But people were living there, maybe very poor students or very poor drug-users: and I had mail for them.

As I stepped onto the porch, I saw a large notice spray-painted on the wall next to the front-door: NO RIFF-RAFF !  Maybe put there by a threatening landlord or the house' residents, I didn't know: but I froze, not sure if I should dare walk across the porch to their mail-box.

At that uncertain instant I had to examine myself, if I might be riff-raff.  If so, I'd very definitely been warned.  And that's undoubtedly the point of scripture's exhortations that we continuously examine ourselves to see if we're "in the faith."

We put our faith in being a follower of Jesus: forgetting that Jesus called out some of His followers as "Hypocrites !" (Luke 12:54-56).  That was His invariable characterization of the Pharisees: so it should sharply catch our attention that the only other time He used it was of a crowd of His Own followers.

We easily convince ourselves that our devoted Biblicism and evangelicism stand us in good stead with Jesus, forgetting that He excoriated the Bible-believing, evangelical Pharisees as hypocrites in those regards (John 5:39, Matthew 23:15).  (Jesus even endorsed the things Pharisees said, telling His listeners to obey their teachings (Matthew 23:2): as prelude to His point-by-point condemnation of the Pharisees' hypocrisy.)

We want ourselves, indeed every follower of Jesus, to be convinced hearers of the Word, and heralding the Kingdom to all people.  More importantly, that's Jesus' desire for us.  His is the one that counts.  Our continual need for self-examination is that we may be satisfied with less than Jesus desires for us, and do His Word only to our own measure.

We have met the enemy, and he is us.

Amen

Let the Others Judge

In I Kings 22, Israel's evil king Ahab was planning to go to war with an enemy-nation.  He invited Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, to visit him, hoping to persuade Jehoshaphat to join in his war.

But when they counseled together, the Godly Jehoshaphat asked Ahab to "Please inquire first for the word of the Lord" (v. 5).

Ahab called together 400 of Israel's prophets, all of whom duly prophesied that God would bless Ahab with victory over his enemies.  But Jehoshaphat evidently suspected those prophets might be agents of Ahab's political "spin," and again asked "Is there not yet a prophet of the Lord here that we may inquire of him ?" (v. 7).

Reluctantly, Ahab admitted "There is yet one man by whom we may inquire of the Lord, but I hate him, because he does not prophesy good concerning me, but evil. He is Micaiah son of Imlah” (v. 8).  But put on the spot, Ahab knew He had to let Micaiah speak, to satisfy Jehoshaphat.

The messenger sent to summon Micaiah warned him that all the other prophets had pronounced God's blessing on Ahab's plans, and begged him not to say otherwise.  But Micaiah told him, "As the Lord lives, what the Lord says to me, that I shall speak" (v. 14).

But when he appeared before the kings, Micaiah also told Ahab to go ahead with his plan, and God would "give it into the hand of the king" (v. 15).  He must have said it in a tone of heavy sarcasm: Ahab could tell Micaiah didn't mean it; and angrily told him "How many times must I adjure you to speak to me nothing but the truth in the name of the Lord ?" (v. 16).

So Micaiah did.  He announced that God said if the kings persisted in their plan, their people would be scattered throughout the mountains, leaderless: so they and their armies should best go home "in peace" (v. 17).

Micaiah's prophecy proved true.  Israel and Judah were defeated in the battle Ahab desired to fight, and Ahab himself was killed.  But my attention was drawn to how Ahab received...or rather, how he refused to receive...God's word.

"Did I not tell you," Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, "that he would not prophesy good concerning me, but evil ?" (v. 18).  Ahab said (publicly, at least) that he wanted to hear "nothing but the truth" of God's word: but he didn't really.  And when God's direction was contrary to his wishes, Ahab rejected God's word.

Ahab rejected God's word in the deadly self-delusion that Micaiah's words weren't really God's words.  Ahab convinced himself that Micaiah's unfavorable prophecy was personal with the prophet, because "he hates me."

It can be impossible, for those entirely certain all their ways are pleasing to God, to ever believe God would contradict them.  For the self-confident, God's correction or warning can only, ever, come from the prophet's opinions, emotions, politics, or personality.

It's mortal error to mistake God's word.  Ahab's deadly mistake was dismissing Micaiah's prophecy as personal animosity.  He'd made the same mistake when he rejected Elijah's warning that God would punish the king's sins with nationwide drought, claiming the prophet only said so because he was an ill-intentioned "troubler of Israel" (I Kings 18:7)

So it's a heavy responsibility God entrusts to all who "...pass judgement" on prophetic utterances (I Corinthians 14:29).

Micaiah showed the true prophetic spirit, entirely determined that "what the Lord says to me, that I shall speak."  Those who "pass judgement" on prophecy...the Church' "official" prophets in Spirit-filled worship, or kings, or we ordinary members of the Church to whom God is speaking...must judge prophecy on no other criteria than is it God's word ?

Today's self-willed and self-assured, like Ahab, who will not believe God's ways and plans can ever be different than their own, can only ever hear God's prophetic warnings as personal attacks by the prophet.   It is a deadly error to mistake God's word, in our time as much as it was in Ahab's.

Amen.