The Meaning of Sovereignty

To be sovereign means to have ultimate authority over something. The term is typically applied to a monarch who rules over a population in a distinct geographical area. This is easy to understand when applied to our physical world. Most modern examples have evolved into constitutional monarchies with a governing body such as a parliament taking on much of the actual rulership, and the monarch is merely a figurehead. Many modern Christians have adopted that picture of their Monarch, King Jesus. He has become a symbol of rulership with no real authority over their daily lives.

I can think of at least two reasons why modern Christians balk at the idea of a totally sovereign God: Old Testament history and the spirit of independence. To our modern sensibility, the Sovereign of the OT is distasteful. Yahweh slaughtered thousands of His own people as punishment for their disobedience. He ordered the annihilation of entire populations during Israel’s conquest of the Promised Land. It is not enough to say that this was a common practice in ancient times. We know that God ordered it whereas He told His people to abstain from many other things that were common at the time, child sacrifice, for example.

For the last 250 years in America, we have come to think of government authority as granted by the consent of the governed. We become citizens by our own free will. Prior to America’s founding, authority usually rested with a king who declared people to be his subjects. This is precisely what the Founders set out to change. The Declaration of Independence is such an integral part of our consciousness that we allow it to bleed into our understanding of God’s authority. It is true that we “consent” to become His children through our voluntary union with Christ, but we may forget that we are giving our allegiance to a Father/King and not an elected representative. Scripture is clear: we must subject ourselves to King Jesus.

The fact that some people squirm under the sovereign authority of our Creator should not surprise us. Adam and Eve forced us into our rebellious situation when they were cast out of the Garden of Eden. Biblical history reveals that doing “what was right in their own eyes” became the repeated mantra of the children of Adam. We sometimes refer to pride as the original sin, but it has its roots in a desire for independence. That root has rhizomes that creep into every generation of humankind. The only escape from its stranglehold is to die to Adam and be born again in Christ Jesus.

There are people, myself included if I am being honest, who understand the intellectual concept of a Sovereign God, but fail to live fully with its implications. Like all Christian disciplines, it is not enough to understand sovereignty; you must apply it rigorously. Submission to God’s authority is the most obvious application of His absolute sovereignty. Repenting of our innate tendency toward independence and submitting to God’s ultimate authority is essential to genuine Christian faith. Sincere believers will always align themselves with the will of God as found in the Scripture.

I think one of the most common failures of Christians is believing that God is sovereign but not trusting His work on our behalf. I know that is my biggest problem. I have a sincere intellectual commitment to the sovereignty of God, but I am emotionally detached from that truth. I believe that is the source of my occasional worry. It also reveals a streak of independence trying to surface. If things aren’t going according to my plan, I prove that I don’t trust God completely by worrying. If I was fully committed to His total sovereignty, I would trust that His plan will be better for me than my plan. No worries.

In his book, Shattered Dreams, Larry Crabb makes the case that our innate drive for independence often leads us to sinful positions in the most insidious ways. He suggests that even when we think we are succumbing to God’s will, we imagine that His response will be to bring our plans to fruition. Crabb says this displeases God greatly, and He often adds to the discipline He has begun because of our stubbornness. We must be fully broken of our tendency toward independence; God wants us to be exclusively dependent on Him. Until we hit bottom, as it were, we will never fully trust God’s sovereignty.

I know some people struggle like I do because of a misinterpretation of Romans 8:28. There was even a popular song a while ago that encouraged the misunderstanding by saying “God works all things together for my good.” While the ultimate outcome of “all things” will be for our good, we may have to go through some serious “not good” things to get there. There was much good that came from Paul’s God-ordained ministry to the Gentiles. To arrive at the good outcome, he had to endure stoning, beating, near drowning, imprisonment, and more. His understanding of what he told the Romans was that he was privileged to suffer for Christ’s sake. There is not a hint of worry in Paul’s writings that he doubted God’s good plan for his life.

Study the lives of Noah, Job, Moses, Joseph, David, and more. I could mention that our Lord Himself had to endure terrible not-good in His totally human self in order to accomplish the best good imaginable. Yet, like Job, He said, “Nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.” Jesus’ prayer in the garden of Gethsemane proves His humanness. He showed His willingness to fulfill the plan He and His Father had initiated before the world was made, even though it meant suffering the most brutal torture and death man has ever devised. Worse that that, He had to be separated from His Father during the hours he bore the sin of all mankind. That is truly a fate worse than death if you understand what it really entailed.

James implied that if you truly believe, your behavior will show it. I the case of our belief in God’s sovereignty, our unbelief might be hiding behind our protestations of belief. As Crabb says, it is not easy to trust God when a friend dies of cancer, a wife departs a marriage, a job is taken from you, people treat you in horrible ways, or any one of dozens of not-good things that must be a part of God’s plan. They must be; that is what it means to say He is Sovereign.

Related Posts: Necessary Obedience; What Happened in the Fall

The Greatest Miracle of All

When Jacob awoke from the dream where he saw the stairway to heaven, he said, “Surely Yahweh is indeed in this place, and I did not know!” I think many Christians who are sleepwalking through life could say the same thing. To use medical terminology, they are awake and alert times zero – spiritually unconscious. Literally, not conscious of God’s presence or His activity in their lives. This is a sad state of affairs. They are missing the greatest miracle of all: the God who created them is present with them.

It all started with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden with God. We read that they walked with Him in the cool of the day. Sadly, God’s arch enemy tricked them into thinking they were missing something by being forbidden to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (See Related Posts) The penalty for their indiscretion was banishment from the Garden and the tree of life. They traded the pleasure of tending trees that would yield their fruit naturally for ground that would bear thorns and thistles. They would have to earn their bread by the sweat of their brow. Alone.

They didn’t realize it immediately, but perhaps their greatest loss was the presence of God. This is what God meant when He told them that they would surely die if they disobeyed Him. Certainly, losing access to the tree of life meant they would die eventually, but their rebellion caused death of a more disturbing kind: their close relationship with God died the day they chose to defy Him. While God did not totally abandon them – He promised a day of redemption – He would no longer be a friendly presence in their daily lives.

In the centuries that followed, people forgot the God of the Garden and became so wicked that God destroyed all but eight souls in a devastating flood, finding only Noah who truly sought Him. When earth’s population began to swell again, people tried to manufacture a godlike presence by building a tower to reach the heavens. Again, God intervened and confused their language which caused them to disperse into rival clans and nations. None of them sought His presence. He chose one person to be the father of His chosen nation: Abram.

God made Himself known personally to Abram, later changing his name to Abraham, which means father of nations. I already mentioned his grandson, Jacob/Israel, who only recognized the nearness of the God of his grandfather after the wrestling match. Little is written about the presence of God until Jacob’s family was forced by a famine to rely on the wisdom of the brother they tried to murder: Joseph. He recognized God’s hand in his two-decade sojourn in Egypt with his rise to power second only to Pharoah himself. To his repentant brothers he said, “What you meant for evil, God used for good.”

The record is silent for nearly four hundred years until Moses comes on the scene. Having become slaves to the Egyptians, the Israelites were sorely pressed. Like Joseph, Moses was serendipitously propelled to power in Pharoah’s house, only to lose his temper and murder an Egyptian causing him to run for his life. It is in the desert of Midian that he encounters the God of creation who had been mostly forgotten by His people. At the burning bush, God, who announced Himself as Yahweh, chose to present Himself to Moses in order to call him for a monumental task: delivering His people from slavery. (Exodus 3)

Yahweh’s presence with Moses was validated in two ways. First, He spoke directly to Moses and empowered him to do numerous miracles. Second, Yahweh instructed Moses to construct a special tent where Yahweh would make His physical presence known. The pillar of fire and smoke signaled His presence with Israel as they trekked through the desert. It was not a warm fuzzy presence, as we see in the people’s frightened response at Mount Sinai. Nevertheless, the tabernacle and the Ark of the Covenant became symbols of God’s presence with His people.

Joshua inherited Moses’ mantle and led Israel through the conquest of the promised land. After Joshua died, Israel’s history reveals on again, off again knowledge of the presence of Yahweh among them. Many generations later, when Solomon builds a magnificent temple to replace the tabernacle, he admits that a stone edifice, no matter how great, cannot contain the Creator of the universe. Still, Yahweh deigns to occupy Solomon’s temple as long as the people remain faithful to Him. That doesn’t last very long, sadly.

Yahweh literally withdrew from the temple after countless warnings and allowed His people to be taken as prisoners to Babylon. Ever mindful of His promise, He limited their captivity to seventy years, after which they were allowed to rebuild the temple. Zerubbabel’s temple, a sad reflection of Solomon’s glorious building, never held quite the status of former times. Five hundred years later when Israel’s Messiah came, Herod’s rebuilt temple had size and grandeur, but it didn’t have the shekinah glory of Solomon’s. Nor did the Jews seem to place much stock in it as God’s dwelling place on earth. Rather, it had become a marketing tool; a den of thieves, Jesus called it.

The Jewish leadership did not realize that God’s presence was again in their midst in the form of Yahweh’s incarnate Son. Isaiah had said Immanuel, God with us, would come, but they missed His appearance. The angel had told Matthew to call his son Immanuel. Jesus validated His status through His teachings and miracles. Still, only a few Jews believed He was who He said He was. Then, when the time for His sacrificial death came, He told His disciples that He would be leaving them. They were distraught. Strangely, He told them it would be to their advantage for Him to leave. He promised to send a Comforter in His place, the Holy Spirit of God to be not just with them but in them.

They didn’t really grasp the full meaning of Jesus’ promise until the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit fell upon them in power. (Acts 2) This represents the greatest miracle of our age. Not only does the Creator God dwell with us, He lives in us. It gets even better; the Spirit grants gifts to each believer so that God’s work may be accomplished. Unfortunately, there are too many believers who are awake and alert times zero concerning this. They pay little attention to the notion that God lives in them, and many make no effort to discover what gift He has blessed them with. (See Despising the Downpayment)

Too many Christians are clueless about God’s presence in their lives. The Apostle Paul encourages us to set our minds on things above where Christ sits on the throne, ruling over His kingdom on earth. Paul also says that our true hope of glory rests on the truth that Christ is in us. The miracles of Moses or Elijah or even Jesus pale by comparison with the miracle of God making His dwelling place in believers. If you are joined with Christ, you have resurrection power within you. Why aren’t you doing miracles or at least recognizing them all around you?

Related Posts: The Knowledge of Good and Evil; Spiritual Gifts

Taking the Name of God in Vain

Almost everyone can quote the third of the Ten Commandments in its traditional English form, “Thou shall not take the name of the Lord Thy God in vain.” The majority of those who can quote it think it forbids cussing. Over the years, people have come up with some creative euphemisms for the phrase God damn: gosh darn, golly gee, doggone, dadgum, or just G-D. They think that by substituting a word for “god” that they have met the requirement of the commandment.

Carmen Imes in her book, Bearing God’s Name: Why Sinai still matters, says that the word “take” is better understood as “bear,” as in bearing a load or an image. Young’s Literal Translation comes close with “Do not take up the name of Jehovah thy God for a vain thing.” Imes suggests that bearing the name means being identified with the named One. A modern understanding of vain in this context would be empty or useless. In other words, if you are going to bear the Name, call yourself a follower of the Name, you had better be sure the things you do honor the Name you bear.

A quick review of where the Name comes from will be helpful. Several times in the Old Testament, “The Name” appears to people as God in human form. When Moses asked what he was supposed to call the being he encountered in the burning bush, he was told to use the name Yahweh. Numerous divine epiphanies are identified as Yahweh throughout the history of Israel. In her book, Imes asks where we find Yahweh in the New Testament. She frankly states that it isn’t there unless you follow the root of the name the angel told Mary and Joseph to call their miraculous baby boy: Yeshua.

Our Savior’s parents would have spoken Aramaic, a version of Hebrew, in their daily lives. Thus, it is likely that the angel who announced His birth would have told Mary, “You shall call His name Yeshua.” We got “Jesus” from the Greek translation where Yeshua becomes Ἰησοῦς pronounced Yaysous, hence Jesus in English. If you translate directly from the Aramaic to English, you have the name Joshua. Our Saviour’s given name was Joshua. Since God regularly gives descriptive names to His special people, it is no surprise to learn that in Hebrew, Joshua/Yeshua means God saves. He does, indeed!

According to Imes, there are two reasons why the name Yahweh doesn’t easily carry over into the New Testament. First, by the time of Jesus birth, the Jews had over one thousand years of substituting “Lord” for the Hebrew name of God out of reverence for Him. Second, the writings of Moses spelled the name he was given for the God of the burning bush YHWH. In ancient Hebrew, vowels were added later to aid pronunciation; Yahweh is as close a guess as any. Jumping to Greek was difficult because there are no letters that correspond with Y, W, or H. The authors of the New Testament, who were mostly Jews, simply continued the long-standing tradition of referring to God as Lord.

Now we are back to bearing the Name. We know it is the only Name by which we can be saved, thanks to Peter’s defiant assertion. We also have a pretty good idea that many, if not all the appearances of God/Yahweh in the Old Testament were probably the pre-incarnate, eternal Son of God. So, it appears that bearing the name of Jesus in the New Testament means exactly the same thing as bearing the name of Yahweh in the Old Testament. One must take pains not to bear the name without effect. And the effect must be to glorify God.

There is another interesting sidelight to the discussion of important names in the Bible. God’s people were known as Israel because their forefather, Jacob, was given that name after he wrestled with the Angel of Yahweh. Jacob means grabber, overcomer, or usurper in Hebrew. That name is a good description of much of what occurred in Jacob’s life. After his bout with the Angel, Jacob the overcomer was renamed Israel, “He who contends with God.” In retrospect, that properly describes what the nation of Israel did throughout their existence. It has been suggested that, “[Israel] is a reference to the Jewish people's ongoing struggle with God, and the obligation they have to explore their faith.”

I can’t think of a better description of the plight of those of us who have named the name of Jesus. Paul made his own struggle plain in Romans seven. He told the Galatians that there would be a continual battle within them between the Spirit and their flesh. After commending the heroes of the faith, the Hebrew author encourages us to, “run with patient endurance the race that has been set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the originator and perfecter of faith.” That “race” by the way is a marathon not a dash.

Imes says that when Jesus asked His followers to pray hallowed be Thy name, “His is prayer implies a personal commitment to honoring that name through a life of faithful obedience. He fulfills Israel’s vocation to bear Yahweh’s name with honor.” So, in one sense, the church, the Body of Christ, is the Israel of God. Our obligation is to represent His interests on earth; we are encouraged to “contend for the faith.” The church is at once the temple of God and His Israel: His contenders. This lends credence to my belief that physical Israel isn’t getting a second chance to accept their Messiah in the last days. They had their chance, and they blew it royally.

This also explains Paul’s comment to the Ephesians that God’s purpose for the church is to “Display His wisdom to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. This was His eternal plan, which He carried out in Christ Jesus.” (Eph. 3:10-11 NLT) It is our responsibility to bear the Name with all the best intentions and glorify God in the process. If we do that, we will not bear the Name of the Lord our God in vain. I would still recommend that you avoid cussing.

Related Posts: His Name Shall Be Called; There’s Something Fishy About that Name; In Jesus’ Name

The Most Important Thing

If people want to please God, they must understand what is important to Him. The root of it all can be found in Hebrews: “Without faith, it is impossible to please God.” That is a simple statement with profound implications. The most basic question is faith in what. Again, the Hebrew writer explains: “The one who approaches God must believe that he exists and is a rewarder of those who seek him.” No surprise there. Jesus said those who seek will find. James said those who seek wisdom need only to ask. The Bible is the source of wisdom. Ignorance of what is important to God can only be the result of failure to seek to know.

It is depressing to read the current statistics regarding Bible reading among people who profess to be Christians. Although the Christian pollster George Barna has found a resurgence in weekly Bible reading, the American Bible Society reports that less than ten percent of people they polled read the Bible daily. I would hazard a guess that the weekly readers are largely Sunday readers, and I wager they read while in church. As if the poor reading numbers weren’t bad enough, Barna found that only one in three Bible readers affirm the Bible’s teachings as authoritative. Ouch!

A Pew Research study found that 54% of Americans say they believe in the God of the Bible. That is curious since Barna reveals that so few of them read their Bibles regularly. How can they believe in a God they hardly know? It is no wonder that our society is so rapidly abandoning the founding principles that have made America what she is. Our founding documents assert that proper government must be centered on “natural law,” which to them meant things that were ordained by their Creator. The founders believed that our rights are “unalienable” precisely because they are mandated by God not man.

It is easy to understand why our increasingly secular society is willing to leave behind godly principles. What is most disturbing is how many self-described Christians behave similarly. I believe the pollsters have uncovered the reason for that: even people who read the Bible are not concerned with aligning their behavior with the requirements God ordained in the Scripture. Why would they when even their preachers discount the Bible’s authority? In “Wise up, America,” I paraphrased Jeremiah: “I am against the [preachers], declares the Lord…. They are leading you into futility; They speak a vision of their own imagination not from the mouth of the Lord.”

The practices and principles America has begun to abandon form a list of the things God considers to be important. Allegiance to God is important; family is important; marriage (one man, one woman) is important; sexual purity is important; civil order is important; obedience is important. The Ten Commandments sum up what God requires: the first four describe a proper relationship with God; the last six the relationship between people. Jesus summed them even further when He said, “Love God; love your neighbor.” He said the entire Old Testament law rested on those two ideas, as do the original documents that defended America’s founding. That also explains why so many American institutions once proudly posted the Ten Commandments for all to read.

The Ten Commandments were explicit. But there is more to what God considers important if you read through the Bible carefully, with an eye for the subtleties. In chapters two and three of Genesis, you can see the importance of marriage, family, and obedience. Had Adam and Eve not strayed, they would have grown from one couple to a family that ruled the earth under God’s hand. In Genesis 9, the record of the flood, and again in chapters 18-19, with the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, we see how important sexual purity was. Throughout the books of Israel’s history, we see God demanding civil order and obedience to His commands.

If you read between the lines, you can see how important children are to God. Read about Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel, Manoah and Samson, Hannah and Samuel, Elizabeth and Zechariah, and of course, Mary and Jesus. In each case, God miraculously provided a child who was destined to accomplish His purposes. Even David’s adulterous relationship with Bathsheba brought forth a child who would become one of God’s chosen kings of Israel. Neither David nor Solomon were perfect – far from it. Yet God used them to accomplish His plan.

This may be a stretch, but I can see the importance of civil order in God’s promise to David that one of his descendants would sit on the throne of His kingdom forever. King Jesus, born in the line of David, now rules God’s kingdom on earth. Christ’s body, the church, when it is faithful, spreads Christ’s kingly rule, transferring people from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. Christians like our founding fathers tried to apply God’s principles of civil order through a constitutional government. I would like to think that America’s prosperity through 250 years is evidence of God’s blessing for their efforts.

It is not hard to figure out what is important to God. We may occasionally hear the still, small voice or the whisper beneath the whirlwind. We can certainly sense the prompting of the Holy Spirit if we pay attention to His voice. Without doubt, conscientious, regular reading of the Word of God aided by the Spirit of promise will make God known to us. Jesus revealed what is most important when He prayed to His Father: “Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” The only question is whether it is important to you to learn what is important to God.

Related Posts: Through the Bible in Seven Minutes; Lessons From History

What’s the Power For?

Years ago, when I was first introduced to the idea that our prayers were meant to exert power over circumstances, someone cautioned that we weren’t to use the power indiscriminately. The example he gave was that we should refrain from using it to blow out the tires of the car that just rudely cut us off in traffic. Hah! I should hope not. Yet, some of the prayer requests I remember from that time are equally frivolous. I remember someone praying that her kitchen blender would be miraculously repaired so she wouldn’t have to buy a new one. Another reported laying hands on his car when it refused to start. I don’ t recall if that prayer worked or not.

Let me be clear: I do believe that God is intimately involved in our day-to-day lives. I also believe that He is able to accomplish miraculous things with inanimate objects. Jesus turned water to wine; he stopped the wind and calmed the raging seas. However, when Paul said that the same power that rose Jesus from the grave gives life to our mortal flesh, I think he had something more significant than blenders or automobiles in mind. The word Paul uses to ascribe life to our flesh is zoe (ζωή); its New Testament use is almost always with reference to the life that comes from God: spiritual life. Paul told the Ephesians when they were, “Dead in trespasses, [God] made [them] alive together with Christ.” Same word: zoe.

Jesus said that He had come to provide abundant life to His followers. It’s that word again. There are those who would twist His words to mean Jesus promised an abundance of material possessions. If that were the case, Jesus would not have used zoe. When a man asked Jesus to intervene to provide his material wealth, Jesus remarked, “Not even when someone has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.” Zoe is not about physical life. Nor is the power we are given through Christ about physical reality, though there may be instances of crossover because spiritual life is of a higher order than physical life.

So, what is the power for? The old hymn “Power in the Blood” spells it out nicely. The wonder-working power in the precious blood of the Lamb, according to the hymnist, is so we, “would be free from the burden of sin,” and “Over evil the victory win.” Those two verses summarize what the Christian life is all about. Christ’s atoning death on the Cross of Calvary removed our guilt, the burden of sin. We are freed from the penalty of sin because Jesus paid the price for us. That same sacrifice also allows us to triumph over evil. “God will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able.” “Greater is He that is in you.” “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” That reminds me of another great hymn: “Victory in Jesus.”

Another aspect of our victory over evil is the call to spread the good news of our victory to all the lost souls around us. “Send the light, the blessed gospel light; let it shine from shore to shore.” There was a good measure of sound biblical teaching in those old hymns! They also taught us that our condition would not always be restful. “Onward Christian Soldiers Marching as to War.” The enemy of our souls will do whatever he can to thwart our efforts to announce his defeat at the Cross. We are not at a picnic; we are at war. The power Jesus grants will come in handy when we face the enemy.

There is a more subtle aspect to the power we have through Jesus: our forgiveness rests on His work on our behalf. Although we have the power to overcome temptation, the Bible clearly teaches that we will still sin occasionally. It has always confused me that while Calvary provides forgiveness of all our sin, we are still told to ask for forgiveness. John MacArthur explains that there are two types of forgiveness: judicial and parental. God the judge grants us judicial forgiveness on the basis of our union with Christ. God the Father requires us to ask for forgiveness to restore the parent/child fellowship that is hindered by our sin.

We can see this played out in our human relationships. When my son sins against me, by disobedience for example, he does not cease to be my son. However, our relationship is damaged. By asking my forgiveness, our healthy parent/child bond is restored. If I sin against my wife by failing to honor her as I should, she does not stop being my wife, but I can say from personal experience, she will not be happy with me unless I ask for her forgiveness. The power to forgive is an important part of the image of God’s grace that followers of Christ are called to.

If you are having trouble seeing forgiveness as an aspect of the power we have in Christ, look at what Paul said to the Galatians. He said that the spirit and our flesh are at odds with one another. After contrasting the works of the flesh with the fruit of the spirit, he says, “Now those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh together with its feelings and its desires.” Our union with Christ in His death, symbolized in our baptism, gives us the power to “follow the Spirit” as Paul advises.

When you sing the contemporary chorus that says, “The same power that rose Jesus from the grave lives in us,” it refers to spiritual power. Far from being less welcome than physical power, it represents the ultimate power in the universe: God’s power. I said before that spiritual power is of a higher order than physical power. That is because our physical universe is a subset of the spiritual “universe.” God stepped down from Heaven to create the world as we know it. Another old song says, “He’s got the whole world in His hands.” As such, He has the ultimate power to accomplish His will here on earth as the Lord’s Prayer seeks.

When Paul wrote repeatedly that we are to live, walk, follow the Spirit, he was inviting us to make use of the power that God provides. Rather than trying to blow out the tires of the guy who crosses you, use your power to calm your own heart and offer forgiveness to the guy who offended you. That’s what the power is for: making us more like Christ.

Related Posts: Powerful Meekness

Don’t Be a Poser

Some people are going to stand before Jesus on judgment day and insist that they did what He had asked them to do. To some He will say, “Depart from me; I never knew you.” It is not enough to say you know Christ; you must be known by Christ. “I know my sheep,” Jesus said, “and my sheep hear my voice.” The critical part of that is the voice. Jesus speaks to His sheep through His Word. The reason there will be surprised “followers” on judgment day is because many make little or no effort to read and know His Word – to hear His voice. Either through ignorance or malice, they pose as Christians but fall short of the real thing.

People who pose as Christians are not harmless. I think there are two classes of Christian posers. In one case, you have people who are doing what they have been told by other people. The problem is that they have not been told the truth. (See “Lies We Have Been Told”) For example, some people think  regular church attendance is not necessary for believers. If they mean that going to church won’t save anyone, they are correct. However, the Bible does command that we “not abandon our meeting together.” More than this, there are scores of biblical commands to do things for one another that, practically speaking, will only happen regularly in a gathering of believers.

As another example of believing what you have been told, many Christians think that the ground of their salvation is their good deeds. “I’m a good person; God will surely allow me into Heaven when I die,” according to many people. If you hear something often enough, you tend to believe it must be true. This is clearly not Bible truth. “There is none righteous, not one.” “No one good but the Father alone.” “Their deeds are like filthy rags.” That’s what the Bible says. It is also plainly stated that the only way to gain Heaven is to be found in Christ. Salvation is not about what you do but who you know. Naturally, if one truly knows Christ, good works will result, but they are a result of salvation not the cause.

These two examples show how ignorance might cause a person to think they are in Christ, but they may hear Him say otherwise at judgment. The second class of posers is more sinister: they pose as Christians knowing that their position is not biblical. Worse than that, they often deny the Bible’s authority. It baffles me why people would call themselves Christian while denying the only thing that defines Christianity. Ever since the beginning of time, Satan has been trying to get people to worship anyone or thing except the God of the Bible. The biblical record of Israel repeatedly describes the nation’s penchant for idolatry. They couldn’t seem to resist following the gods of the nations surrounding them.

At one point in Judah’s last years before captivity, they were claiming the protection of the Temple of the Lord while blatantly worshipping Queen of Heaven. Through the prophet Jeremiah, they were told that God saw them as the posers they were. He orchestrated their deportation to Babylon as promised. He explained through Isaiah that they had profaned the name of Yahweh by claiming His name while worshipping idols. There are posers today doing similar things. They explain away the miracles recorded in Scripture. They rewrite God’s prohibitions against sexual sins. They deny the historical truth of Jesus’ earthly mission. They erase God’s impending judgment of unrighteousness by preaching only His love. They preach worldly prosperity as the highest good.

These are the idol worshippers of today. They don’t have golden calves or Asherah poles in their homes. However, they worship at the altar of science that denies miraculous intervention. They worship human lust and encourage violation of God’s sacred design for sexuality. They bow to the intellectuals who don’t believe the Scripture is the inspired Word of God. They cater to the god of ease by denying the consequences of unrighteous behavior. They openly worship mammon – material prosperity – in spite of Jesus’ condemnation of it.

I should probably admit that God has been known to use posers for His purposes. Samson had all the marks of God on his life. He was born of a formerly barren mother. He was dedicated from the womb as a special class of person: a Nazarite. He was granted incredible strength which he used to hold back the Philistines in their subjugation of God’s people. However, as the record shows, he was selfish and irreverent in the use of his special gift. God accomplished His purpose through Samson, but he is definitely not a model to be imitated.

We could mention how Abraham posed as Sarah’s brother to protect her from Pharoah. Then there’s the deceitfulness that characterized Jacob’s life: stealing his brother’s inheritance rights and the blessing of their father; the subterfuge he used with Laban to obtain his large flocks. Many of the Pharisees in Jesus’ day were major posers; the Messiah called them what they were: hypocrites. But God used even them to set the stage for what was inevitably to come. Even Judas posed as a true disciple, yet his treachery was used by God to bring the Lamb of God to the sacrificial altar on Calvary.

I find comfort in knowing that in His sovereignty, God can accomplish His will with anyone He chooses. Doubtless, the people Jesus would not claim as His own in spite of their profession also accomplished some good in the world. But as we know, being good is not what earns God’s favor; it’s being known – belonging to Christ. That is why Paul said to the Corinthians, “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith. Examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize regarding yourselves that Jesus Christ is in you, unless you are unqualified?” On the day of judgment, I want to be qualified to hear, “Well done good and faithful servant,” and not “Depart from me [you poser]; I never knew you.” You too?

Can You Trust Your Bible?

I have been having an online discussion with a former friend who was educated in a fundamental Bible college and served as a youth pastor for several years. Sadly, he has fallen under the spell of modern intellectuals who have convinced him that the Bible texts we have today cannot be trusted to deliver the truth of the original authors. Their argument is that after centuries of copying and recopying the text, and with the influence of human thinkers down through the years, the Bibles we read today bear no resemblance to the original text. They are not truly God’s Word.

When we began our interchange, I quoted 2 Timothy 3:16, “All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness.” I argued that if God was invested in the original writing through His Holy Spirit, it was only reasonable to assume that He would continue to superintend the transmission through the years. His response was (I paraphrase) that evil men developed the concept of inspiration to prompt obedience to their version of the truth. Naturally, since I was arguing from the Scripture as we have it today, he rejected the idea completely. He doesn’t believe our Bibles are reliable, so using them to prove a point is pointless.

I also used a defense of the Bible that is common today; we have thousands of very ancient manuscript fragments that in total represent every New Testament book. The sheer volume of manuscript evidence leads honest Bible scholars to the conclusion that while we don’t believe we have any copies of the originals, the fragments we do have push their reliability to a very high degree of confidence. We also have the written records of men we call the Apostolic Fathers, many of whom were acquainted with men who either came from the same generation as the Apostles, or they knew someone of that age. The Apostolic Fathers quote from most New Testament books, and their writings agree conceptually with the ancient fragments of Scripture we do have.

Even that defense of the Scripture failed to sway my friend; he believes the modern apologists who say the Gospels were written many decades after the events they record and therefore have no basis for belief. In his opinion, the authors could not have been eyewitnesses as they claim to be. The fact is that a contemporary of the Apostle John, Polycarp of Smyrna, (writing around 110-140 AD) is known for quoting or alluding to about 20 out of the 27 New Testament books. The textual arguments in favor of the reliability of our New Testament are decisive. Other ancient texts lack this volume of documents, yet scholars accept their writings without question.

I can see only one reason for choosing the modern dismissive view of the text of Scripture over the testimony of numerous ancient writings which give credence to its validity. God’s arch enemy has been using intellectual arguments ever since God first created Adam and Eve. The Serpent basically said to Eve, “Use your intellect woman; did God really say that?” Instead of looking to her heart and choosing to believe God, she fell for Satan’s intellectual ploy. She reverted to her soulish, fleshly appetite and disobeyed. Sadly, Adam joined her in her deception. Because of their disobedience, their spiritual connection with their Creator was severed, and they were left with nothing but worldly, soulish wisdom which James identifies as demonic.

You will note that the Bible record, which I choose to believe, paints a sad picture of the results of following worldly wisdom. First, things got so bad that God had to destroy virtually the entire human race and start over with Noah and his family. Soon after, the people became so proud of their worldly accomplishments that God had to confuse their language and leave them to their own devices as scattered nations. God chose one man, Abram, to become the father of a chosen nation which was supposed to become the people of God. They repeatedly chose to ignore the wisdom of their Creator and “did what was right in their own eyes.” The results were disastrous.

Paul tells us that God’s chosen people were never simply physical descendants of Abraham. The faith of Abraham, his choice to believe God, is what prompted God to call him righteous. Paul continues to identify faith – belief in God – as the sine qua non of God’s people. Without faith, the Hebrew writer says, it is impossible to please God. What my former friend has done is to disbelieve God by dismissing the Bible as authoritative in its present translations. He is saying no to God and yes to his intellectual friends.

I should clarify something at this point. It is not my opinion that the modern translations of the Bible are identical to the original manuscripts. All you have to do is read one passage in several different versions, and you will notice that many words are translated differently from version to version. This is inevitable when going from the original language (Hebrew or Greek) into the target language. Often, there is no exact English word for the original word. Translators use a word that they believe best represents the meaning of the original. Even though the different words are usually synonymous, the connotations of each word may differ. For example, “work” and “labor” are virtually synonymous. However, their meaning varies slightly depending on the context they are used to describe.

Versions also differ due to the underlying purpose of the translators. A direct word-for-word translation will sometimes sound quite different from a thought-for-thought version. When translators move away from direct literal translation, the occasion for commentary increases. (For a more detailed discussion of Bible versions, see “The Best Version of the Bible.”) It is also likely that the personal views of the translator will come into play, especially when deciding whether a passage is meant to be taken literally, or if it is figurative in some sense. I have covered this aspect of translation in several previous articles. (See Related Posts)

My deluded friend accused me of gatekeeping; he believes that we who trust that the Bibles we have today are sufficiently accurate to demand belief are closing our gates to people of different opinions. I suppose he is correct in a way. The Bible recommends discernment; it says we should have nothing to do with those who deny its truth. The Bible cautions us to beware of those who will believe anything that fills their itching ears. Paul warns Timothy that people will come to the church bringing teachings of demons. It’s hard to imagine anything more demonic that undercutting a person’s belief in the trustworthiness of Scripture. When I shared that idea with my fallen friend, he accused me of being the one who is misleading people.

I am sorry that my friend has lost his faith in the inspiration and accuracy of the Word of God as it is recorded in our modern Bibles. I still believe that with discernment and careful study, a modern version of the Bible can lead a person to saving faith and the truth about who God is and what He requires. As I wrote previously, “The Bible is a supernatural book. Reading the Bible without seeking the Holy Spirit’s help is a waste of precious time. Not reading the Bible at all is a waste of life.” The reason I can say this with confidence is that I believe the same Holy Spirit who inspired the original authors can use the words of today’s Bibles to convey God’ truth. Jesus did say the Holy Spirit will be our guide to the truth. That is a faith statement I am willing to die for. I will have to wait for the resurrection to know how my friend fares with his opinion.

Related Posts: Take the Bible Literally; The Vulture Has Landed