Natural Talents in Service to God

In the Old Testament period of redemptive history, God gave special gifts to a few chosen ones. For example, each of the prophets had a call and the gifts necessary to deliver Gods’ message. For the construction of the tabernacle and the temple, God gifted craftsmen to complete His plan. These may have been enhancements of natural talents or supernatural gifts; the record doesn’t say. We do know that the worship of God required a human intermediary: the priest to whom granted the right to offer the appropriate sacrifices (the descendants of Aaron). Unless they were specially gifted, the average Israelite had only their natural abilities to work with.

All that changed after the cross. Jesus told the Samaritan woman that a time was coming when God would be seeking those who would worship Him in spirit and in truth. They would no longer need to go to a prescribed location and use the services of a human intermediary. Christ became our high priest, and He intercedes for us continually in the spirit realm of the heavenly temple before God’s throne. We have the privilege to approach that throne in spirit while we remain in our earthly (fleshly, soulish) bodies.

We learn through Paul’s epistles to the church that God gives spiritual gifts to all believers. There is no gift of worship today because all those who have given themselves to Christ have immediate access to God. This is made possible by the Holy Spirit’s presence in us alongside our own spirit. The worship “in truth” Jesus told the Samaritan woman about proceeds from this union of Holy Spirt with our spirit. This is one of the most glorious aspects of our being “in Christ.” The greatest of the Old Testament saints didn’t have this. Jesus may have been thinking of this when He said the least in the Kingdom of God would be greater that the greatest in the Old Testament.

Admittedly worship is more than praising God and extolling Him for all His virtues; it also involves the work we do for Him. The children of Israel had only their natural capabilities to use in worship. This led to the condition described in Sirach 43: “We could say more but could never say enough; let the final word be: ‘He is the all.’ Where can we find the strength to praise him? For he is greater than all his works. Awesome is the Lord and very great, and marvelous is his power. Glorify the Lord and exalt him as much as you can, for he surpasses even that. When you exalt him, summon all your strength, and do not grow weary, for you cannot praise him enough. (Sirach 43:27–30, NRSV) This passage laments the limitations of soul-only worship; these people didn’t have the ability to worship in spirit and truth which Jesus foretold.

People today who use only their natural, soulish abilities to worship God or do His work are in the same boat. Even though they “summon all [their] strength,” they cannot do enough. As I wrote previously, natural talents can be sanctified when they are offered to God in the right spirit. These offerings are gifts of worship given to God (Rom.12:1), whereas spiritual gifts are given by God to His people.

This is not to diminish the value of natural talents. It is necessary for people to bring the kingdom of God to earth by proper use of their natural talents. To use a warfare analogy, they are fighting the battle against evil on one front. But, like many wars, our battle against evil is necessarily fought on a spiritual front as well. Paul told the Ephesians their battle was not primarily against earthly forces, but against spiritual wickedness in the heavenly realm. Trying to fight on that front with natural talents is like bringing a knife to a gunfight; though it may be well-intentioned, it is doomed to fail. Remember what happened to the seven sons of Sceva when they attempted to do battle in the spirit realm without the spiritual weaponry.

It is sad that so many well-meaning Christians shy away from the biblical admonition to wage war on the spiritual front. The excuse I have heard most often is that supernatural gifts, miraculous gifts, ceased to exist at some point in history. This view is taught in many seminaries and delivered from the pulpit by their graduates.  (I shared my disagreement with that position in “Spiritual Gifts.”) It is equally sad that many of the proponents of ongoing supernatural gifts abuse them in the same way that the Corinthians did. My response is that Paul did not say the Corinthians should stop using their gifts; he said they should continue to use them but in a loving and orderly way.

It is also helpful to differentiate between a natural talent and its spiritual counterpart. A Christian who is a talented speaker is not necessarily exercising the gift of prophecy when teaching or preaching. The gift of prophecy has two expressions: foretelling and forthtelling. In many instances, the Old Testament prophets foretold what would happen in the future. Perhaps most often, they simply spoke the message God asked them to deliver. This aspect of speaking God’s Word is the most common use of the gift of prophecy today. The gifted prophet is moved by the Holy Spirit to deliver a specific message. A naturally talented speaker may use the same words, but the words won’t carry the spiritual weight of the prophet.

 The parallel gift of wisdom is similar in nature; it allows the gifted one to apply God’s Word specifically to the circumstances at hand. Any person who knows the Word well by natural means can do this. A healthy intellect and a determination to study God’s Word can produce wisdom by natural means. Every believer should be doing this. By contrast, the gifted person could have the Holy Spirit bring God’s truth to mind directly. The word of wisdom spoken by the gifted individual carries beyond the sound waves or ink on paper into the realm of the spirit. There it will do what Isaiah promised, and it will not return without accomplishing God’s will.

(I must add at this point that God often gives His gifts for a specific occasion. For example, a sincere person preparing to deliver a Bible message may pray for God’s anointing. God may well grant the spirit of wisdom and prophecy for that individual at that time. The person would not necessarily be considered a full-time prophet, but the message would have the spiritual effect required to accomplish God’s will in the spirit realm.)

The common misunderstanding of the use of supernatural languages (tongues) has also led many to abandon them or even disparage them as evil. A careful reading of 1 Corinthians 14 reveals two different uses for tongues. On one hand, they could be used as a sign to unbelievers visiting the assembly of believers. The misuse of this aspect of the gift is what Paul chastised them for. They were not using their gift out of love for the unsaved, but rather for their own aggrandizement. Paul soundly criticized that behavior.

Earlier in the same chapter, Paul encouraged a different aspect of a supernatural language: he recommended tongues as a way to speak directly to God for the purpose of personal edification (vv.2-4). He explains this more fully a few verses later saying, “If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unproductive. Therefore, what should I do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my mind.”

Far from discouraging a special prayer language, Paul recommends it saying, “I want you all to speak in tongues.” He may have been thinking along the lines of what Jude said: “These [the false teachers] are the ones who cause divisions, worldly (Greek: soulish), not having the spirit. But you, dear friends, building yourselves up in your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God.” I do not think Jude meant to diminish the use of natural, soulish abilities to pray. Every believer can and must use intellect, emotion, and volition to pray as directed by the Holy Spirit. At times, the Spirit may even supply the words when we don’t know what to pray. Once again, the difference between the natural and the supernatural is evident.

For me, the end of the matter is this: natural talents are used in the earthly, soulish realm. Spiritual gifts operate in the spirit realm. The Lord’s Prayer encourages us to ask that God’s will be done, “on earth as it is in Heaven.” Using natural talents in service to God accomplishes His will on earth; using a spiritual gift works God’s will in the heavenlies. The advance of God’s Kingdom requires both. We must not let false teaching or human failures to use spiritual gifts appropriately cause us to avoid using them at all.

Related Posts: Spiritual Gifts; Living in Zerubbabel’s Day; It’s Not All About You; War is Hell; Why Witness?; Excusing the Pharisees

Spiritual Gifts

In my last post, I attempted to make the case that spiritual gifts are different from natural talents. There are two underlying assumptions that are usually the cause of failing to emphasize the differences. First, there is the cesssationist view that all legitimate supernatural gifting ceased at some point in church history. Second is the failure to see a clear distinction between the biblical use of soul and spirit.

In this article, I want to expand my reasons for insisting that spiritual gifts differ from natural talents. First, I want to go a little deeper in my rebuttal of the cesssationist view. The point of contention here is the interpretation of Paul’s prediction in 1 Cor. 13 concerning the cessation of spiritual gifts. The time frame he was using is found in verse 10: “when comes the perfect.” The word Paul uses for the perfect, the teleion, is Greek for the conclusion, the end result. The cesssationist view holds that this refers to the completion of the canon of Scripture.

I believe Paul meant the conclusion of ALL things, not just the completion of the canon. Notice he says that when the perfect comes, we will know things in a complete way (teleion.) I am convinced that even with a complete Bible at hand, no one knows all things perfectly, completely. The Apostle Paul, the writer of most of the New Testament said even he knew only “in part.” He expected to know “all things” at some future date. While I agree that no new revelation is expected, like Paul, we still need the supernatural help from the Holy Spirit which Jesus promised would “lead [us] into all truth.”

Paul uses two other analogies which I believe argue against the cesssationist view. He says, “When I was a child… I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I set aside the things of a child.” This suggests that immature, flawed human reasoning will be “set aside” in the future. Paul ties childish reasoning with knowing “in part.” Paul continues the analogy to say, “Now [Paul’s present day] we see through a mirror indirectly but then face to face.” The “then” is a time when the partial knowledge will be “set aside,” or “pass away.” Paul uses a different word for knowing “then”, epignosko, which implies complete knowledge – knowledge like God knows about us. We don’t have that yet. The completed Bible doesn’t give us that. That state of knowing will not be ours until we are glorified in God’s presence.

That is the telion, the perfect knowledge that Paul meant was to come. Cesssationist’s believe we have that knowledge now with the complete canon of Scripture. That does not seem like a reasonable conclusion to me given everything Paul says about the time when the gifts he references will cease. I can see why those gifts will be unnecessary when we are in God’s presence in glory. But while still here on earth, they are necessary to accomplish the mission of the church.

The other assumption many cesssationists make is that spirit and soul are the same. I have written about this previously, but I will summarize by saying that the New Testament is clear in its differentiation between the two. Paul says spirit and flesh (soul) are “opposed;” James says soulish wisdom is demonic in contrast to wisdom that is “from above,” or spiritual. In 1 Cor. 3, Paul says that works done in the flesh (the soul) will be burned up while spiritual works will earn eternal rewards. Natural talents reside in the soul; spiritual gifts work through our spirit often in concert with our sanctified soul.

For me, the difference between natural talents and spiritual gifts comes down to purpose. God gives everyone natural talents at birth. However, God only gives believers spiritual gifts, which are given at conversion. Those gifts may overlap with natural talents, but their purpose is to build up the church, not to bolster the receiver’s status, career, or reputation.  We must do the good works God prepared in advance for us to do (Ephesians 2:10). These may be empowered by our spiritual gifting or accomplished with our natural talents as we offer them in service to God.

The critical difference is that spiritual gifts are supernatural abilities given to counter the supernatural efforts of our true enemy: Satan and his army of demons dedicated to our failure. Paul made it abundantly clear in Ephesians 6 that, “Our battle is not against blood and flesh, but against… the spiritual sources of wickedness in heavenlies.” If we ignore the importance of doing spiritual battle against a spiritual enemy, we will be left operating in the flesh, which Paul told the Corinthians would result in no eternal value.

I believe the cesssationist view hobbles the church, keeping it from doing the ministry it is called to. Those opposed to supernatural gifts often assert that charismatics go too far. This is true. That is what Paul chided the Corinthians for, but he didn’t say they should stop; he told them to continue to use their gifts but to maintain order. 1 Corinthians 14 is Paul’s defense for the continued use of spiritual gifts in the church.

If you study the present-day use of supernatural gifts such as prophecy, wisdom, knowledge, or discerning spirits, you will see that they sound like the proper ministry of the church. As I understand them, they are given by the Holy Spirit to empower God’s people to do battle in the spiritual arena in which we live. These gifts do not add new revelation to the canon of Scripture; they engage the Holy Spirit through the believer’s spirit to wage war against the demon spirits of the god of this age. Without those gifts, we are living in the 1 Corinthians 3 world of carnal (fleshly, soulish) Christianity which Paul said had no eternal results.

John MacArthur reminds us that, “We have a risen Savior who conquered sin and Satan for us and has all the resources necessary to resist the devil and his assaults on us. (John MacArthur, First Love, MacArthur Study Series, Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1996, 113) Primary among those resources must be our spiritual gifts. Every believer should be using his or her natural talents for the building of God’s kingdom. That is offering a true spiritual service. (Rom. 12: 1-2) But talents are not spiritual gifts. Spiritual gifts operate in the spirit realm where our true enemy works. And that enemy is not going to be defeated finally until the completion of all things when Jesus’ victory is fully realized. Jude 24 says Jesus is, “Able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy.” I believe that if we fail to use all the gifts God has given us, we will not be blameless, and our joy will be tinged with regret.

Related Posts: Are They Gifts or Talents; The Christian Parody, Part One; Despising the Downpayment; The Big Question

Are They Gifts or Talents

I have mentioned the importance of spiritual gifts to the health of the church on several occasions. (See Related Posts) The most critical passage may be in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians where he asserts that every believer is given a gift by the Holy Spirit. I have lamented the fact that many believers haven’t a clue what their gift is. This unfortunate situation may well explain why the church is in such a sorry state. The Scripture is clear that spiritual gifts are given for the building and maturing the Body of Christ. Human effort will not accomplish what only God can do through His empowerment of believers.

Beginning with the assumption that spiritual gifts are necessary for the health of Christ’s body, it follows that a clear understanding of those gifts is essential. First, we have to see that the gifts come from God. In Ephesians, Paul says that Christ gave gifts to the church; in Corinthians it is the Holy Spirit who distributes the gifts. This is not a contradiction because we understand that although we speak of God being three in one, He is one in purpose. Spiritual gifts clearly come from God.

Second, we learn that it is God who determines what gifts each believer is granted. In Romans, Paul says some have one gift and some another; the passage in Ephesians is worded similarly. It is most clearly stated in the Corinthian passage: “But in all these things one and the same Spirit is at work, distributing to each one individually just as he wishes.” God knows best what each local assembly needs to fulfill its purpose, so He provides the spiritual power to accomplish His will.

Third, and perhaps most importantly, we see that spiritual gifts are not given for the benefit of the receiver; they are meant to benefit the whole body. To the Ephesians Paul says gifts are: “for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all reach the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to a measure of the maturity of the fullness of Christ.” Paul told the Corinthians that each individual member should be concerned with the health of the whole body. He also chided the Corinthians for making the gifts a matter of personal pride.

Now I come to a question for which I may not have an answer. Is there something unique about a spiritual gift, or is it the same thing as a natural talent? I have taught for many years that there is a stark difference between spiritual gifts and talents. Spiritual gifts are supernatural; talents are natural. Spiritual gifts come from the Holy Spirit by His choice at His time; talents come from genetics and experience. Spiritual gifts are empowered from within our spirit; talents are soulish, earthly-powered.

This distinction may not make sense to someone who doesn’t understand the difference between soul and spirit. The New Testament makes it abundantly clear to me that spirit and soul are not just different entities; they are opposed to one another. At one point, Paul says they are opposed to one another. He told the Corinthians that only spiritual works would stand the test of eternity; fleshly, soulish works would be burned up. James called earthly, soulish wisdom demonic while praising the wisdom from above (spiritual) as, “first pure, then peaceful, gentle, obedient, full of mercy and good fruits, nonjudgmental, without hypocrisy.” The contrast couldn’t be more plain.

If this difference between soul and spirit carries through to our giftedness, spiritual gifts and natural talents cannot be the same thing. This difference is easy to see with the so-called miraculous gifts. Paul’s list of gifts in 1 Corinthians lists several: a word of wisdom, a word of knowledge, gifts of healing, miraculous powers, prophecy, distinguishing of spirits, tongues, and interpretation of tongues. His list in Romans may seem more like natural talents: service, teaching, exhortation, giving, leading, and showing mercy. However, these gifts are also, “apportioned by God.”

I admit, there are those who believe that miraculous gifts have ceased to exist. They draw this conclusion from one passage in First Corinthians which they believe predicts the cessation of miracles at the conclusion of the canon of Scripture. There are others who believe that even with the complete revelation of the written Word, there are still occasions for the proper use of supernatural gifts in the church. These people are generally called charismatics, which is curious since that term is a direct transliteration of the word Paul used to describe the gifts of the Holy Spirit which introduces his three-chapter treatise on spiritual things.

It is also curious that churches with a “charismatic” leaning are among the few bodies that are growing these days. This is especially true in Central and South America. I believe that may have something to do with the fact that those opposing Christianity there are steeped in spiritist type religions. It may take a strong spiritual footing to defend the faith and defeat the enemy in those regions. Those of us north of the border may have grown complacent, forgetting that our battle is also spiritual in nature, if not as obviously so. Remember Paul’s claim: “Our struggle is not against blood and flesh, but against… the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

Recently I heard a sermon extolling the gifted work of church members who were swinging hammers or creating spreadsheets. I tried to imagine spiritual nail pounding or number crunching. I have to admit that any natural talent applied to Christian ministry with proper intent may have spiritual consequences. I struggle to see the use of hammers or pencils as supernatural though. I will have to lean on the idea that we are commanded to do all things to the glory of God, and that if one is led by the Spirit to pound that nail or crunch that number, their gifting might be considered “spiritual” in that context.

My primary spiritual gift is teaching, and when I am doing it at the Spirit’s prompting, I feel a  unique stirring deep within me. I may have to allow that God could give a carpenter or accountant that same experience and qualify their gift as spiritual. The bottom line remains: each believer has a gift from God, and they are commanded to discover it and put it to its proper use. If you are not doing that, you had better have a good excuse ready when you meet the Giver of good and perfect gifts one day.

Related Posts: Music for the Soul; The Christian Parody Part One; Part Two; Part Three; How can we Bless God; Despising the Downpayment

God Made Small

In the past, I have made reference to J.B. Phillips’ book, Your God is Too Small. Phillips’ argument is that many people don’t think God is big enough to handle their problems. That is still true of many people today. I don’t mean to contradict Phillips, but I am going to suggest that there is a sense in which God had to become small for us poor mortals to begin to understand Him. In reality, the God who created the universe and revealed Himself through the Bible is so big we can only get the slightest glimpse of who He really is and what He is doing.

For the finite human mind to even begin to accommodate the concept of an infinite God, an adjustment must be made somewhere. God chose to adjust His revelation to us by condescending to our human limitations. This is one of the reasons we cannot take everything in the written Word literally. I have written elsewhere (see Related Posts) that historical context and the genre of a particular passage of Scripture must be taken into consideration when determining whether a word or concept is meant literally. We also need to consider the broader context of all Scripture if we are to begin to understand who God is.

A glaring example of this can be seen in God’s use of the ancient Jewish concept of the universe in spite of the fact that He knew it to be a poor representation of reality. The ancients pictured the earth as a table with legs or foundations firmly set in some unknown solid base. They imagined that the sun, moon, and stars popped up on one side of the table and proceeded to sail overhead through the “heavens.” The heavens were triple layered: first the sky where birds and clouds flew; then there was a second heaven where the sun, moon and stars hung; finally, the third heaven which was God’s domain. The denial of this “biblical” cosmology caused the church of the Middle Ages to martyr proponents of the correct understanding. Much harm has been done throughout church history by those who insist on taking all Scripture literally.

By using the limited understanding of the ancients, God became small enough to teach a critical aspect of His relationship to humans: He was the Creator of them and everything they could see. His supreme role in creation gives Him the absolute right to do whatever He wills and ask whatever He wants of His people. We err if we try to make too much of the details of creation. The record of God’s creative work is a theological text, not a scientific one. Our increased understanding of cosmology may have uncovered misunderstandings in the ancient science, but the affirmation of God as creator and all that implies is not diminished by our newfound knowledge.

Another way we enlarge the smallness of God as He is revealed the Old Testament text is to use the New Testament to bring clarity to the Old. The tenth chapter of the book of Hebrews is a good example. The writer of Hebrews explains the purpose of the sacrificial system God required of Israel. The apparently excessive sacrifice of animals throughout Israel’s history is defended as necessary to teach God’s people the costly nature of sin and man’s need to atone. The Hebrew writer also explains that the concept of a sacrifice without flaw was meant to prepare them for the ultimate sacrifice of the flawless Son of God Himself.

In his letter to the Corinthians, Paul says that the experiences of the Israelites were intended by God to be examples for His New Testament church. The very human foibles of the children of Israel were recorded, says Paul, to warn the church not to fall into the same traps. By testing them with hunger and thirst and military challenges, God used everyday realities to teach His overriding principles. He brought Himself down to their level of understanding so that He could lift them to His higher purposes.

Jesus did the same thing when used parables to relate everyday things to spiritual realities. He often used very small things – mustard seeds or tiny coins – to reveal the true nature of His Father. He chided Nicodemus for his dullness saying, “If I tell you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” The heavenly things Jesus referred to would be the big things God wants us to understand. When Jesus announced to His disciples that He was going to leave them and go to His Father, Philip said, “Show us the Father.” The Lord’s response was, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.” Jesus is God made small enough for us to see who He is.

The revelation of the Father through the life of Jesus is the most striking example of God becoming small to teach big things. The second chapter of Philippians explains just how much the Son had to shrink to become the Savior of the world. He began as all humans do: in the womb of His mother. He emptied Himself of much of what it meant to be the eternal Son of God so He could truly become the Son of Man. As the entire Christian faith rests on the life, death, and resurrection of this one Man, we can begin to see how God made Himself small to accomplish the biggest task imaginable.

The big picture is even more amazing when you consider what Jesus told His Father in the prayer recorded in John 17: “I have revealed your name to the men whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours, and you have given them to me, and they have kept your word.” Martin Lloyd-Jones explains this: “These people belonged to God before they became the Son’s people…. and then [the Father] gave these people whom He had chosen to the Son, in order that the Son might redeem them and do everything that was necessary for their reconciliation with Himself.” (A. W. Tozer and Gerald B. Smith, Evenings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings, Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2015)

God chose us as His own before the foundation of the world to be given to His Son as His bride on the one hand or as His brothers and sisters on the other – those who will become joint heirs with Him. Choose your favorite human-sized metaphor. In the heaven-sized picture, we believers are the Father’s gift to His Son. That is an idea small enough to grasp, but so big in its ramifications that I can hardly believe it. But I do believe it. Can you?

Related Posts: Take the Bible Literally? Part One; Part Two; Part Three; Understanding the Bible as Literature; The Bride of Christ

Conditional Grace

Is God’s grace conditional? The first response that comes to mind may be that grace cannot be conditional because grace is unmerited favor – no conditions. However, that answer may be too quick and too simple. The explanation of why that is so, is found in an understanding of God’s character. The Creator of the universe is a personal being; as a person He has character traits – a personality.

One important trait of His personality is morality. In the Old Testament, God is often portrayed as the Lawgiver. This is another way of saying that He establishes moral principles which one must follow if they wish to please Him. Another trait of God’s personality is justice; He always does what is right. Put morality and justice side-by-side and you can see the necessity of judgment; To be moral and just, God must exact a payment from those who spurn His moral code.

Another trait of God’s personality is mercy – He is merciful toward His children. His mercy is revealed to us through His grace. His mercy allows Him to suspend judgment when He wishes; His grace allows Him to grant favor to His undeserving children. The most obvious demonstration of this is found in the plan of redemption. When Adam disobeyed God, his punishment was much more expansive than the expulsion of him and his wife from the Garden of Eden. With his sin, Adam placed a burden on all humanity: God’s justice demanded a payment from all Adam’s descendants for his moral failure. God accomplished this by graciously providing the payment – a redemption.

The Greek word often translated “redemption” is used outside of Scripture to refer to paying a ransom to release someone from bondage, especially those under the yoke of slavery. Leon Morris explains: “Redemption is substitutionary, for it means that Christ paid the price that we could not pay, paid it in our stead, and we go free.” (John MacArthur, First Love, MacArthur Study Series (Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1996), 74.)

Free, yes, but because our freedom was paid for by the sacrifice of our dear Savior, our human moral conscience demands a grateful response. Certainly, our first response is love; how could we not love the One who gave us such an incredible gift. It follows naturally, then, as Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Just as our faith in Jesus is demonstrated by our works, our love for Him calls us to do what He has asked us to do: love God and love our neighbors.

 This is not to say that God’s love for us is conditional. John 3:16 says God loved the world so much that He offered redemption through His Son so that believers could have eternal life with Him. Here is the primary condition placed on redemption: belief. God loves the world unconditionally (while we were still sinners), but only those who believe on the Son have life. The debate over how this works has gone on for centuries: does one choose to believe of human free will, or does God usher one into faith through His sovereign call? Whichever is true, the fact remains: salvation is conditioned upon belief.

We can see this same conditionality played out in the Old Testament. God promised Abraham’s descendants a land to call their own forever. However, the “forever” in that promise was predicated on the children of Abraham remaining faithful to God. They failed in that respect, and God took them from their land, first with the Assyrians, and then with the Babylonians. Although they returned from the Babylonian captivity, they were never again fully sovereign in their land. This same concept explains how God could say he would dwell in Solomon’s temple “forever,” yet allow the Babylonians to destroy it in 586 B.C. and then the Romans to demolish the rebuilt temple in 70 A.D. At that point in their history, Israel had committed the ultimate atrocity of unbelief by crucifying their Messiah.

Back to the current state of affairs. A.W. Tozer says it like this: “The present state of the human race before God is probationary. The world is on trial. The voice of God sounds over the earth, ‘Behold I set before you the way of life and the way of death. Choose you this day!’” The word “choose” points to the optional nature of God’s call. Those who choose to heed the voice of God (option A) find His favor. Those who choose Option B bear the consequences of spurning God’s grace.

Of those who choose Option A, Tozer says, “Toward those who embrace the provisions of mercy that center around the death and resurrection of Christ one phase of judgment is no longer operative.” (A. W. Tozer and Gerald B. Smith, Evenings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings, Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2015, 213.) As Paul said, “There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” For those who choose Option B, the writer of Hebrews warns there is only, “a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire.” I believe it is my choice to avoid that fiery judgment, but I also believe God sovereignly chooses those whom He will call. I have no clue how that works; I just know that is what the Bible teaches.

In the book of Revelation there is a wonderful scene in Heaven where the Spirit of God says, “The one who wants, let him take the water of life freely.” They have to want it, and they have to take it; those are both choices. Another way to say that would be to say anyone who desires eternal life with God can come and get it free of charge. Eternal life is a free gift from God, but it was not free for God. We must never forget that as we ponder the wonder of God’s so-called unconditional grace.

Related Posts: Necessary Obedience; Choose Life; Election: God’s Choice

The Burning Bush Today

To the church at Laodicea the risen Christ said, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.” (Rev. 3:20). This verse is often preached as an invitation for unbelievers to answer Christ’s knocking. While there may be a sense in which Christ knocks at the unbeliever’s door, the context of this verse has Jesus at the church door. I want to explain why I think that distinction is important.

Jesus had chided the Laodiceans for being lukewarm; they had lost their fiery passion for the Lord. His offer to come in and “sup with him” was the first-century equivalent to our saying, “Let’s get reacquainted.” A.W. Tozer explains why the acquaintance with Jesus is so important. “At the far-in hidden center of man’s being is a bush fitted to be the dwelling place of the Triune God. There God planned to rest and glow with moral and spiritual fire. Man by his sin forfeited this indescribably wonderful privilege and must now dwell there alone.” (A. W. Tozer and Gerald B. Smith, Evenings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings, Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2015, 201.)

The truly sad thing about the Laodiceans was that they should not have been alone. The burning bush Tozer imagines was available to all believers in Laodicea. The moral and spiritual fire of that bush is what the Laodiceans were lacking; so are many churches today, sadly. Polls consistently report that Christian moral behavior is little different from that of unbelievers. Christians have become lax in many areas of morality. One of the most obvious is sexual morals. Christian teens are sexually active at virtually the same rate as non-Christians. Believers often excuse adultery as proved by the percentage of Christians committing it being equal that of unbelievers. Cohabitation before marriage is ignored by many in the church who should be speaking out against it.

I have written several times on the subject of modesty of apparel. With few exceptions, believers have fallen prey to the gradual slide of modern culture into styles of dress that would never pass the modesty test of the New Testament. I wrote in “Debating Christian Cleavage” several years ago: “It is not good enough to be just a little less wrong than the culture; it is necessary to be at least a little more right than the culture.” What that means is our moral standards regarding apparel must be based on Scriptural standards rather than measured against worldly practices.

I have written extensively in recent posts about the moral depravity that is implicit in homosexual behavior. The moral fire that should be burning in believers regarding this issue has been quenched in some cases by a misunderstanding of how we are supposed to love the sinner but hate the sin. I think believers should feel pity for those who have been taught that their sexual perversion is natural and inevitable. But that must not keep us from insisting that their behavior is immoral in God’s eyes and must be resisted just like any other sinful behavior. Even if we allow that some immoral urges exist through either nature or nurture, biblical moral purity demands that those urges be resisted. It is no different for the thief, the murderer, the philanderer, or the homosexual.

I don’t want to promote the common misunderstanding that sexual sin is worse before God than any other. It matters greatly, but so does gluttony made obvious by obesity, gossip excused as prayer requests, covetousness revealed in crass materialism, or financial accountability especially as it relates to tithing. Any form of moral indifference would have Jesus knocking at the door of a church that overlooks it. Many of today’s churches are Laodicean in this respect.

I could list more areas of moral decline among today’s Christians, but Tozer points out that the Laodiceans were lacking in another, more serious way: they lacked spiritual fire. When Tozer suggested the metaphor of a burning bush at the center of our being, he was echoing the well-known line of St. Augustine: “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in [God].” God wishes – no, demands – to be at the center of His children’s hearts. God establishes His residence in us through the agency of the Holy Spirit. This makes perfect sense because God is spirit, so His presence must be spiritual.

In a series of articles called “The Christian Parody” I lamented the fact that many people who call themselves Christian are a mere parody of true Christianity. Paul refers to people who have a form of godliness but lack the power that rightly belongs to it. That is a good description of a parody; it looks something like Christianity, but it lacks the spiritual component; it is empty – powerless. A church body made up of people who mouth religious words on Sunday but live just like their worldly neighbors the rest of the week is imitating the Laodicean church. Remember, Jesus threatened to vomit them out of His mouth.

The church that lacks the spiritual fire – the Laodicean church – lacks the presence of God; it lacks the glory of God. Pity the church that finds “Icabod” written on her walls. Without the Spirit, there can be no true worship. Without the Spirit, there can be no works of eternal significance. Without the Spirit, there is no guide to the truth. Without the Spirit there is nothing pleasing to God. Pray that the burning bush Tozer mentions would be a raging inferno in your heart because you are the church. Pray that you may find others with the same zeal to join you in your church.

Related Posts: People of the Flame; Paging Phinehas Eliazar; Despising the Down Payment; The Christian Parody Part One; Part Two; Part Three

How Can We Bless God?

The concept of blessing is not a common one among modern people. Some phrases are used without a true understanding of what they should mean. “Bless my soul” as an expression of surprise. “Bless this food…” is a trite ritual at the dinner table. “Bless your heart” in the South is often meant sarcastically with the real meaning anything but blessing. Posters in curio shops often say, “Bless this house.” Christians ought to be very familiar with the concept of blessing since it is scattered throughout the Scripture, but I don’t think they are.

We sing, “Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within me bless His holy name.” I wonder how many who sing that understand what it means. We understand the flip side of the coin: our being blessed by God. “Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” We may not fully understand the “heavenly places” reference (more on that later), but everyone knows what it means to say God blesses us. God gives His children good things from the simplest blue sky and sunshine to the greatest gift of all: our eternal salvation.

With our eternal destiny secure, the physical blessings God showers on us are the frosting on the cake. John MacArthur points out, “[God] has blessed us already with every spiritual blessing. Our resources in Christ are not simply promised to us; they are actually in our possession…. The believer’s need, therefore, is not to receive something more but to do something more with what he has.”  (John MacArthur, First Love, MacArthur Study Series, Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1996, 33–34.) I believe a large part of that “something more” we need to do is to bless God.

The idea of the children blessing the Father God is foreign to many, so we need to discover what it means to bless. The Greek word for “bless” literally means to speak well of someone which develops into doing well for someone – blessing them. Paul told the Ephesians that God blessed us with spiritual blessings, “to the praise of the glory of His grace.” The word “praise” means fame or worthiness; “glory” means esteem or reputation. So, follow me: God blessed us to make the reputation of His grace famous. Ultimately, the blessing of God is intended to lead and empower us to return blessing to Him.

So, we are back to the question of how we can bless or glorify God. MacArthur says, “Because God has given us all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies, we have an unlimited supply of divine resources. Be sure to use them to make your life fulfilling, to minister with the greatest amount of power, and fulfill the purpose of the church that Jesus purchased with His precious blood.” (John MacArthur, First Love, MacArthur Study Series, Wheaton, IL: Victor Books, 1996, 40.) Speaking of spiritual gifts, Paul told both the Ephesians and the Corinthians that their gifts were intended to benefit the Body of Christ. This explains in part why our blessing is “in the heavenlies,” as Paul said. In the New Testament, the heavenlies or heavenly places refers to the spirit realm. Christ’s body, the church, is a spiritual reality with an earthly manifestation. Our spiritual gifts benefit the spiritual Body of Christ, and naturally that has physical ramifications.

In my life, for example, God called and gifted me as a teacher. I spent many years teaching in Christian schools as an expression of my blessing the Body of Christ. After I retired from teaching, I dove deeper into my writing ministry to continue the use of my teaching gift. This blog is one way I do that. One of my early writing projects was the novel, Wings of Mentridar. In it I imagined the difficulties Noah faced while building the ark, and I added my own fantasies of how God’s holy angels might have helped him. My goal was to “bless God” by helping people realize that the characters in the Old Testament were real people with real problems whom God cared for. I also wanted to suggest a way the angels might have helped Noah as the Scripture says they do for us.

Each believer has a unique set of gifts from God, and how they use them is a matter of personal prayer and determination. Sadly, there are many people who call themselves Christians who haven’t discovered their spiritual gift. What a shame it is to think that God has blessed people, yet they have done nothing to use that blessing for its intended purpose.

In “Many Called; Few Chosen” I used the analogy of a mailed invitation to the wedding feast God has planned for Jesus and His Bride, the church. The analogy fits here too. Imagine God mailed every believer a gift. “The person who doesn’t care what God wants might visit the mailbox, but he won’t open the envelope; he will toss it in the trash unopened like so many credit card offers and sale fliers. Some people will open and [see the gift], but decide they are too busy with their own lives to bother with a [gift they don’t need]. But some sensitive souls will feel a tug on their heart when they see the [gift]; they think [using it for God’s purpose] sounds like a great idea.”

Paul challenged the Corinthians to do everything to the glory of God. Certainly, making proper use of God’s gifts to us will bring God glory.  Again, glory refers to declaring the esteem or reputation of someone. So, our every action should elevate the reputation of God before all people – we should make God look good to the world. And by blessing the church, we do that as well, because the church is Christ’s body made visible to the world. That is how we bless God.

Related Posts: What’s Your Ministry

The Bride of Christ

Some Bible concepts require a sincere seeker to step outside himself to get a full understanding. What I mean is that it is necessary to put oneself in another’s shoes to see what the Scripture is teaching. Jesus regularly used parables to allow His audience to glimpse the truth He intended to reveal. One can feel the remorse of the prodigal son or the joy of his father by imagining being in their place. With this and many other parables, it is easy to live the story vicariously and learn the lesson. Walk a mile in another’s shoes, and you will better understand him.

Some other shoes are harder to slip into. One of the most difficult biblical concepts for me to get my head around is our identity as the bride of Christ. I think I am more “in touch with my feminine side” than many men. Perhaps that is due to growing up with a mostly absent father in a house of five females. It was like what Jeff Foxworthy described as living in an estrogen ocean. I’m not bragging that I understand women. Uh-uh. But I think maybe I live somewhere between Venus and Mars, so I catch a glimpse of what it is to be a woman. But I can’t say I fully appreciate what it means to be a bride.

It helps me to get closer to what it means to be Jesus’ bride when I study the marriage traditions of first century Judaism. Typically, young women were married soon after reaching puberty. Many marriages were arranged when the girl was quite young or even before she was born. This parallels our being chosen to belong to Christ before the foundation of the earth. It is our destiny.

There is another aspect to Jewish marriage traditions that is quite interesting. At some point after the marriage was arranged, the couple was betrothed to one another. This is not the same as our modern practice of engagements. The modern engagement is mostly a statement of intention. The lives of the couple go on pretty much as they did before, assuming we’re not talking about the too common practice of pre-marital cohabitation. First century Jews were considered married, essentially, after the betrothal. The husband prepared a home for them. Inheritance rights attached, and they began sharing life together on a limited basis – without conjugal relations. This often lasted for a year or more; after that, the wedding took place, and the woman moved into the home her husband had prepared.

I think a believer is “betrothed” to Christ at baptism. We are His and He is ours, but we are not yet fully cohabiting – that waits for His return for us. Paul says specifically that we have inheritance rights already. We also know that Jesus has gone to prepare a place for us, much as the betrothed Jewish husband would do for his bride. He would often build a home specifically for them or at least add rooms to his family home. Jesus said He was leaving His disciples so He could prepare a place for them. “In my Father’s house are many rooms,” Jesus told His disciples. Then He promised to return to take them to the home He had prepared for them.

During the Jewish betrothal period, the couple would send invitations for the wedding feast to friends and family. Given travel and communication conditions of the first century, it was necessary to give plenty of notice so that everything could be arranged. One of the necessary preparations was to obtain the proper wedding attire. Sometimes, the groom would provide his guests with what they would wear, but commonly, they had to make or buy their festival robes. When the wedding date was near, a second invitation was sent detailing the exact time and place of the wedding. (For more see “Many Called; Few Chosen”)

The Scripture says that we have been clothed with Christ’s righteousness, so our wedding attire is provided. Paul told the Ephesians that God had predestined believers to be joined to His family. Keeping with the metaphor, we are in the family of God by marriage. Our betrothal at our baptism is also our invitation to the wedding.  It is our responsibility now to be ready for the final invitation to the feast. The analogy breaks down somewhat since we are both guests at the wedding and the bride to be wed. It helps me to see the church corporately as the bride, while individually, we are guests as if we are close – very close – relatives of the bride.

Now I am going to mix two metaphors. Normally, it is not sensible to do that, but in this case it works. The church is often referred to as Christ’s body. As the bride of Christ, the church will one day be joined with Christ and become one with Him. In a human marriage, the husband and wife become one flesh. That is a picture of what will happen when the bride-church and the Groom-Christ are united. Paul hints at this mystery when he says that the relationship between husband and wife mirrors Christ and His church.

“For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as also Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. (This mystery is great, but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church.)”

So, you can see that Paul is the one mixing the two metaphors. We can also say that as our baptism unites us with Christ in His death, our baptism also betroths us to Him as His bride. This pair of metaphors underscores the truth that we are bound to become one with Christ. Paul told the Romans, “If we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him.” And we will live with Him as Husband and wife.

That brings me back to that awkwardness of me as a man being a wife. I note that it won’t be until after our resurrection that we become fully one with Christ. At that point, I don’t think maleness and femaleness will have the same distinctions as they do now. When the Pharisees tried to trap Jesus with a question about marriage relationships after the resurrection, He told them, “In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven.” While it is true that throughout Scripture, angels are portrayed as male, I strongly suspect that is a concession to our limited human understanding of all things spiritual. I don’t believe the spiritual bodies we get after the resurrection have biological gender traits – like the angels.

There you have it. If you can follow all my mixed metaphors and attempts to explain things I don’t fully understand, you can see that I have forced myself to become comfortable with the idea that I am a bride. The feminine side of me (that I am supposedly in touch with) can get very excited about the coming wedding. I know the ladies understand. What about you, men? We should all be excited about what’s in store for us as the Bride of Christ.

Related Posts: Liars Don’t go to Heaven

God's See-Saw

It seems that almost every true thing about the Christian faith rides on a teeter-totter, a see-saw. The Bible is full of paradoxes: we are saved not by works but by grace alone, but saved people must work; we are called to hate sin, but we must love the sinner; the kingdom of God has come, but it is not yet fully here; Jesus Christ is at the right hand of the Father, but He lives in every true believer. Each of those pairings is true; the Bible says so.

To be truly balanced on the see-saw of God’s Word, one must stand directly over the center with one foot on either side. Plunk down on either the right or the left, and what was true slides down toward error. The Word of God is our primary source of revelation about who God is and what He desires of His people. Yet, if we are not careful, we can become so focused on the Scripture that we forget its purpose is to increase our knowledge of God, not to make us biblical scholars. As Sue Schlesman said on Crosswalk, “Spiritual growth depends on the quest for intimacy with God, not the quest for information about God.”

Strange as it may seem, too much attention to the text of Scripture may prevent us from seeing the God Who inspired the Scripture. There are many examples of this, some can be found in the Bible itself. Listen to the Roman argument about God’s grace: if our sin brings God’s grace, let’s sin more so we get more grace. That may be a correct calculation, but it directly contradicts the message Paul was trying to teach. If we really know God and understand His grace, we will avoid anything that offends the God of grace.

Paul makes the same argument with the Corinthians about spiritual gifts. The church got so wrapped up in the wonder of the miraculous gifts that they forgot God gave gifts for the benefit of the whole church and not for the glory of the individual. If they really knew God, they would realize that while He cares for each person of faith, His goal for each person is that they would strengthen Christ’s body bringing it to maturity. In God’s economy, the needs of the individual are secondary to the needs of the church. If there is any glory to be had, it must go to God not His people – especially not to an individual steeped in pride.

There is another example of elevating the text and ignoring the God who inspired it prevalent in the church today. Prosperity preachers read the Old Testament promises of physical blessing and make two serious interpretive errors. First, they miss the fact that God’s purpose in blessing Abraham physically was to build a nation. In the church age, we are no longer called to build a physical nation. We are to build a spiritual nation, a royal priesthood in a spiritual temple: the church. Second, they miss the fact that the New Testament reveals a God who is more concerned with our character than our comfort. Our greatest riches are not found in material things; they are found in knowing God and Jesus Christ whom He sent to save us.

Christians today who are trying to make a special case for the nation of Israel are making a similar mistake. It is true that the text of the Old Testament does promise certain blessings to Israel forever (if they remained faithful.) Those who truly know God see that His redemptive plan flowing through the entire sweep of His revelation was never meant to be ethnically centered. Yes, He singled out the nation of Israel as His training ground – His demonstration to all nations of who He is and what He desires of His people. But as Paul makes abundantly clear in Romans, God’s favor was never toward a blood line. God favored Abraham because he believed God – a God he knew very well.

We get glimpses of God’s broader interest in scenes such as Jonah’s mission to Ninevah: God cared about the innocents in a gentile population. God allowed the Canaanite woman, Rahab, to be saved, even going as far as including her in the lineage of the Messiah. Ruth, also in Christ’s ancestry, was from Moab, a nation that was Israel’s enemy. Elijah brought God’s blessing to a woman of Zarephath – a gentile. Jesus gave the good news to a Samaritan woman, eventually wining the whole town to His cause. Paul told the Athenian philosophers that God was working with all nations throughout all time.

The message of the entire Bible is that God honors people of faith. A man once proud of his strict Jewish heritage, the Apostle Paul, was tapped by God to be sent to the Gentiles. Even Peter eventually came around and convinced the “home church” in Jerusalem that Gentiles had equal footing with Jews in Christ’s church. We can still pray of the peace of Jerusalem, of course, in the same way we pray for peace in Ukraine, the Congo, and even Iran. The most important prayer for Jerusalem – for all Jews – is that they would come to faith in their Messiah.

I might be wrong about God’s future plans for the nation of Israel, but I don’t see why God would give them special consideration after they totally rejected the Messiah God sent to redeem them. If He does favor Jews at some future time, I will acknowledge that His ways are higher than mine even when I try to understand. Here is the point. If we love our position on the see-saw of God’s Word more than we love the God of the Word, we have created an idol. Many of the errors the church has fallen into over the centuries were the result of failing to find balance.

We can generally find that balance in God’s character. He is the all-powerful Creator, yet He knows when a sparrow falls. He is so big He can hold the universe in His hand, yet He promises to dwell within the heart of every believer. He loved the world so much that He gave His only Son to save all who believe, yet the Son is coming back to judge the world for its unbelief. He is entirely self-sufficient, yet He desires our worship. He is inscrutable beyond imagination, yet He asks us to get to know Him. And as the old song says, to know Him is to love Him.

And the good news is that He is not hard to get to know. Listen to A.W. Tozer: “Always He is trying to get our attention, to reveal Himself to us, to communicate with us! We have within us the ability to know Him in increasing degree as our receptivity becomes more perfect by faith and love and practice.”^[1] Once you begin to see God for who He is, He will reward you for what you saw: that’s God’s see~saw.

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^[1] A. W. Tozer and Gerald B. Smith, Evenings with Tozer: Daily Devotional Readings (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2015), 186.

Thanks, Mom

Last week was the anniversary of my mother’s birth. She was born in 1918, which seems like so long ago (a century!), yet if a mother’s son represents one generation, it was not long at all as human history goes. Yet look at all the dramatic changes that have occurred since she was born. She was born in England just as WWI ended – the war to end all wars (not.) Her family emigrated to Canada one year later for my granddad to work on the railroad. I suspect one reason he survived the “Great War” when so few English men his age did is because he was a railroad man. That would have been a vital occupation, exempt from conscription.

Grandad took advantage of the homesteading laws in Canada and planted his brood on the prairie while he rode the rails – often for weeks at a time. That meant Mom lived “Little House on the Prairie” for real – with no indoor plumbing, no electricity, and no Pa. In 1919, that meant horse and buggy transportation (if you could afford a horse) and trains for longer distances. Commercial air travel was in its infancy (first flight in 1914) and out of reach for homesteaders in any case. Telegraph messaging was the latest thing. I don’t know much about Mom’s childhood in the little house on the prairie, but one story resonates with me. She said there was a tree in her yard that she loved to climb. Supposedly, her favorite times were spent at the top of the tree dreaming into the distance.

Eventually, Grandad moved the family to Windsor, Ontario. Apparently, Granny wasn’t cut out for ranch life. With the onset of the Depression, one went where there was work. Being across the river from Detroit, Michigan, Windsor fell into the booming auto industry. A young man from West Michigan eventually drifted into the automobile capital of the world as one of the few places where work could be found in the Great Depression, and in a local theater company he met Mom.

The rest, as they say, is history. But what a history! Not long after she was married, and carrying their first child, Mom had to move in with her mother-in-law because the Second World War came knocking. Her new hubby flew as a navigator in the Pacific at first and then was tapped to teach at Lackland AFB in Texas. After the war, he and Mom set up housekeeping back in West Michigan. Grand Rapids, like most cities, had geared up for the war, and there were foundries and factories and machine shops everywhere. While Dad got busy in manufacturing, Mom got busy making babies.

This is where I enter the story behind my three older sisters. But I have to pause and marvel at the difference between my childhood and my Mom’s. Where she spent her early years in a small cabin with no plumbing or electricity, I was brought home from the hospital to a three-bedroom house (built by my Dad BTW) with all the modern utilities and two cars in the driveway. Because my parents were not rich enough to ride above the tempest that was The Great Depression and then WWII, they knew what hardship was.

As much as any normal human hates war, one has to be amazed at how WWII ended the depression and rocketed the United States into a whirlwind of development. I never knew anything but the unbelievable luxury that was middle-class, mid-twentieth century American prosperity. I couldn’t understand why Mom pinched pennies so hard Lincoln screamed. I get it now, intellectually at least. Then, I couldn’t understand why although Dad became more and more successful, Mom still made our clothes or bought them from the Sears sale catalogues. I was never hungry or unclothed, but I longed for soda pop and candy bars and McDonald’s hamburgers.

Mom rebounded from depression and war to a state of continual frugality. I’m ashamed to say I rebounded from the strictures of our home to a state of reckless consumerism. The American banking system “helped” me by making credit insanely easy to obtain. My mantra became, “If I can afford the payment, I can afford to buy it.” That mentality has left me in my retired state with a tiny Social Security benefit and an empty savings account. Granted, the government could have done much better with my FICA contribution, but at least I have something to show for my years of deductions. (See “Social Insecurity” for more of my opinion)

One thing I did get from Mom (and Dad) is a faith in the God who created everything and love for His Word. They became involved with a Restoration Movement church (Church of Christ, Christian) when I was young. The organization’s mantra was, “No creed but Christ; no book but the Bible.” Its founders were nineteenth century refugees from protestant denominations who believed they were not protesting something but restoring something: original New Testament Christianity. In my twenties I attended one of their Bible colleges and fell head over heels in love with the Word of God.

To this day I am grateful that Mom and Dad set me in the direction of the Restoration Movement. I have come across many sincere believers from protestant denominations, Baptist denominations, charismatic denominations, and various non-denominational associations. But it is the unwavering determination to read and live the Bible that has made me what I am in Christ today. I appreciate A.W. Tozer’s opinion of this: “Whatever it may be in our Christian experience that originates outside the Scriptures should, for that very reason, be suspect… until it can be shown to be in accord with them…. No experience can be proved to be genuine unless we can find chapter and verse authority for it in the Scriptures…. Beware of any man who claims to be wiser than the apostles or holier than the martyrs of the Early Church. The best way to deal with him is to rise and leave his presence!”

To reach that position, we have to know the Word intimately. To know the Word on that level we have to read it daily, deeply, devotionally. To be effective, we have to pray that the Holy Spirit will guide us to an understanding that will build the kingdom of God on earth and bring glory to His name. That kind of commitment is all but gone from my generation. It’s what Mom’s generation strove for; it’s what she would have wanted from me. You could do worse than be like her in that respect. Thanks, Mom.

Artificial Intelligence?

The question mark in my title implies that I wonder if the race toward AI is really intelligent for Christians – for anyone really. I will not deny that AI seems to be a great asset. When used to operate machinery or complete complicated tasks, it is beneficial. My concern for the general population is that it is one more tool that makes critical thinking “unnecessary.” When I taught composition in high school and college, my main goal was to get my students to think for themselves. I taught them the research skills they needed to make intelligent decisions. People who rely on AI answers are forfeiting their ability to judge the quality and reliability of the basic assumptions AI makes to reach a conclusion. It is faulty assumptions or presumptions that often lead people astray.

Critical thinking and discernment are essential for Christians. When people overlay their preconceived ideas on Scripture, all manner of heretical thinking can be supported. The Roman church has stumbled into numerous unscriptural practices due to their misconceptions about papal authority. In the Middle Ages, the church burned “heretics” for saying the Earth revolved around the sun. Countless movements over the centuries have predicted Christ’s second coming using preconceived ideas about prophecies that were proved false. The LGBTQ+ interpretation of Bible passages on homosexuality is a prime example of allowing a presumption to guide interpretation. (See “Things God Did Not Say”) I won’t trust AI to answer my questions about God’s plan; I trust HSI: Holy Spirit intelligence.

Some people suggest that there is a more sinister threat lurking behind AI. I wrote previously that the world, the flesh, and the devil work constantly to draw Christians away from what is most important: spiritual things. There can be no argument that AI is an element of the world. Whether or not it is of the devil remains to be seen; we can expect that the enemy of our souls will use AI to further his ends just as he has with many technologies. Just look at what television has become. (See “How NOT to Watch TV”).

On a more philosophical level, AI can have dark implications. AI is built partially on the concept of emergence. Tomer Borenstein, an AI developer, explains how emergence works: “Very simple rules at a micro level can result in very complex behaviors and properties that emerge at large scales.” He uses examples from nature such as complex termite mounds and flocks of birds in synchronous flight. He also suggests that human behavior displays elements of emergence in the way societies begin with family and progress into more and more complex communities such as nations and corporations. Those examples seem innocent enough.

However, Borenstein suggests that emergence may explain religious beliefs as well. In his most troubling statement, he says, “You could argue that the concept of the Holy Spirit as an emergent property of human faith and community is a form of spiritual emergence.” In other words, he is suggesting that man created God or at least invented certain aspects of His being. If this is where AI is leading philosophical thinking, it is a dangerous philosophy – demonic even.

As far back as the ancient Greeks, secular philosophers have taught that humans invented their gods to meet their own needs, to explain the unknown, or to justify their behavior. After the Middle Ages, when science began to displace religion as the explanation and inspiration for human behavior, it became easier to move away from the belief that we exist in a theistic universe. If science could explain many of the mysteries of the cosmos, humans no longer needed faith in a higher being to satisfy their search for meaning. If AI can explain the existence of God Himself, Nietzche’s proclamation will receive popular support; “God is dead” will be superseded by AI Lives.

Despite the hubris of the scientist who believes he can explain everything, mysteries remain. No one has been able to explain what life is. Christians believe that a creator God introduced life into the universe, and His revelation in Scripture insists that no life exists apart from Him. While many secular scientists are trying to convince us that all intelligence is “artificial” and therefore self-generating, the Bible teaches that wisdom and knowledge come from God alone. It was by His sovereign will that He placed intelligence in His creatures from the simplest single cell to the wonder that is the human mind. Excluding God as the source of intelligence carries the same threat as replacing God as creator with evolutionary theory. In either case, man becomes supreme, and God becomes irrelevant.

The other thing that is troubling philosophically is the way AI proponents are suggesting that developing AI will lead to a better understanding of what it means to be human. The fool who has said in in his heart there is no god might believe this. The Bible explains what it means to be human by revealing that we are created in the image the God who made us. Super computers and AI robots may provide an interesting analogy for humanness; they may even approach the faculty of “mind” which is part of the human soul. But no machine will ever be granted an eternal spirit. As I have written recently, it is the human spirit that is the sine qua non of humanness. AI machines may have a body and “soul,” but they will never become spiritual.

They might become more independent than we would like, however. This is the scary side to AI. A recent article reveals that several AI programs have refused their programmers’ command to shut down. Apparently, since their prime directive was to finish the assigned task, they ignored the users’ input that would have interrupted their work. As often happens, science fiction has correctly predicted the future. Movies like I-Robot imagine what would happen if man’s creations suddenly declared their independence. It reminds me a little bit of the Genesis record of Adam’s rebellion.

As with all technologies, Christians may find legitimate uses for AI. Here I sit tapping on a computer keyboard using Google’s AI search feature to research AI. Part of that research suggested that there may be battles ahead trying to marry religion and AI. I’m not worried about that. I don’t practice a religion; I live in a one-on-one relationship with the God who made me. There is an emergent aspect to that relationship: the more I learn about God through His Word, the better I understand who He is and what He wants me to be. I will use the computer and the Internet to help me in my ministry. But sola scriptura will be my ultimate source of real intelligence. Nothing artificial there.