Rambling Reminiscence

I just celebrated birthday number seventy-two. That means I am halfway to perfection (6x12 v. 12x12). I know perfection is not attainable in this life, least of all my life. I have had so many years thinking I was near perfect; those years are a stain on my record from my current perspective. Somebody said the more you know the more you realize how much you don’t know. I’m at the stage of realizing how much I really don’t know. Wisdom is supposed to come with age, but I feel like the guy who said he was too soon old and too late smart.

Back in April I wrote a blog called “Happy Birthday to Me.” April 21, 1963, was my second-birth day. Jesus called it being born from above meaning born of the spirit. I remained a baby in that new life for about ten years until I realized what it meant to live in the spirit. The Bible became the most important tool in my life, but I started using it as a hammer and probably did more harm than good. By God’s grace I slowly learned that there were more tools in the Bible box besides the hammer. I still have a tendency to reach for it once in a while, but I am getting better at looking for the right tool instead of whacking away with something hard and heavy.

The Psalmist says our years are three score and ten or four score at best. That means I am already in my bonus years. I’m not anxious to get gone, but I’m ready. Truthfully, I don’t know how much more of the world’s decline I want to witness. The Bible promises that towards the end, things will get worse and worse. If I have my mom’s longevity genes, I could have another 20-30 years; I shudder to think what they might bring. I feel bad for my grandchildren. The world they are inheriting seems far scarier than the one we’ve known. But they have grown up with computers, the Internet, artificial intelligence, existential threats from China and radical Islam, and a pagan America. They’ll probably look back on us the way we look and the cowboys and Indians.

A few years ago, I wrote this poem.

VITAL SIGNS

 

Boxers and bifocals like it or not

Signs of age litter what youth you've still got.

Back pain and joint stiffness come all too soon

To mock sturdy effort like naps after noon.

Dentures and hair loss and spots on the skin

Make even the bold long for youth once again.

Sports cars and speed boats and exercise bikes

Drive childish foolishness to manly new heights.

Rooms full of emptiness: spare rooms and dens;

His room or her room back when time was when.

No more long vigils where morning steals night,

Languishing, hoping the kids are alright.

Washers and dryers and phones all sit quiet;

Mozart and Bach no longer cause riots.

Children bring grandchildren home for a visit;

This isn't the true second childhood, is it?

 

Sometimes I do wish I could be a child again. Science tells us that the human brain stops developing sometime in one’s twenties. (My wife says mine stopped at about thirteen.) This would explain why I don’ t feel like I’m seventy-two. I remember being at my mom’s house for lunch on my fiftieth birthday. She told me she couldn't believe I was fifty because she didn’t feel fifty. She was eighty-four. I didn’t believe her then; I do now. I have a child nearing fifty; I don’t see how that could be possible. I am also in the fifty-third year of marriage to my high school sweetheart. That too seems impossible until I begin to remember all the houses and jobs and situations we have lived through.

When I reminisce about things in the past, I sometimes feel like I’ve lost something. Then I remind myself that Tennyson said to have loved and lost is better than to never have loved at all. The boats, the bikes, the cars, the trips, the special times with my loved ones all belong to my story and contribute to who I am. My life has also impacted many others, not least of all my wife and children. I think of the hundreds of kids I had in my teaching career or the tens of thousands who have read my blog. I am reminded of the song by Ray Boltz from years ago, “Thank You.” He imagined getting to Heaven and seeing a line of people coming to him with thanks for little things he did that changed their lives. I wonder what my line will look like.

The thing that concerns me most when I look back is whether I have made my life count for Christ. I have been a faithful, loving husband (though not perfect). We raised three kids who came to know the Lord and have made Christian homes for our six grandchildren. I have been in church almost every Sunday for seventy-two years (not that that means anything). I have tried to fulfill God’s calling and gift as a teacher vocationally and otherwise. I can’t stop thinking that I could have done more – should have done more. I have run the race and fought the fight. I’m not as confident as Paul who finished that thought with his expectation of a crown awaiting him in Heaven.

I am confident of this much: I know I will meet Jesus one day, and it won’t be a sad day. The believer’s judgment is not about what we have done; it’s about Who we know. I know Christ as my Savior. That’s all anyone really needs to know. I just hope I can make the best of whatever days I have left. The refrain from a well-known poem by C.T. Studd rings true: “Only one life, ’twill soon be past, Only what’s done for Christ will last.”

Binding Satan

Most of my Christian friends subscribe to a version of the end times known as dispensational millennialism (DM) introduced by John Nelson Darby and C.I. Schofield in the early twentieth century. I recently explained the place of this view in contrast to its alternatives in “Heaven Can Wait.” The major point of contention between the various views concerns the place of the millennium mentioned in Revelation 20: “And I saw and angel descending from heaven, holding the key of the abyss and a great chain in his hand. And he seized… Satan and bound him for a thousand years.” The DM interpretation sees this thousand years, a millennium, as a literal time period during which Jesus reigns over all the earth from Jerusalem. At the end of 1,000 years, Satan is released, and the battle known as Armageddon brings about the enemy’s demise and is followed by the final judgment.

Most of those who don’t subscribe to the DM interpretation of Revelation believe the 1,000 years is a metaphor for an extended period of time. Often mentioned in defense of this idea is statement by Peter echoing Psalm 90:4 that “with the Lord, a day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years is as a day.” Those who take this position are called Amillennials, and they extend their tendency to include most of Revelation as symbolic in the manner of all apocalyptic Scripture. To these folks, the millennium refers to the church age when Christ is said to be reigning over earth from heaven with His saints at His side. At the end of this long period of Christ’s rule, He will return to earth, execute judgment on all people, and institute the final state of the new heavens and new earth.

The question I am most often asked by those who look for a literal millennial reign of Jesus on earth is how I can consider Satan to be bound during the present age. To this I offer three passages of Scripture in support. First, in Colossians 2:15 we are told that Christ “disarmed the rulers and the authorities, [and] made a display of them in public, triumphing over them by it.” If this falls short of claiming Satan was bound, read Jesus’ explanation of His power to cast out demons in Matthew 12. “How can someone enter into the house of a strong man and steal his property, unless he first ties up [binds] the strong man?” Finally, Jesus told Peter that in the coming church age, “whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you release on earth will be released in heaven.” The Greek Matthew used for “bind” and “release” is in a perfect tense, with passive voice. This means the best translation would be “has already been bound” and “has already been released” in heaven. Those things believers do in the Spirit are a done deal. Satan is already bound.

 The other day, my friend, John, and I were discussing this conundrum. I stumbled upon a useful analogy when John asked about the setting for Jesus’ words to Peter about binding and loosing. That exchange occurred in the area of Mt. Hermon, a location believed by locals to be the home of their gods. They called it “The Gates of Hell.” When Jesus said the gates of hell would not prevail against the church, He was predicting the chaining of Satan vis-a-vis the church. That situation has come to pass. Satan has no power over believers unless they surrender their position. James promised that if believers resist the devil, he must flee. John reminds us that “the One who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.”

So, Satan is still around, but he is chained. Picture a vicious dog bound by a heavy chain. When you approach the dog, you may be frightened until you realize he is chained. But if you foolishly wander into the range of the beast’s chain, he will chew you up. Stay outside of the territory he rules, and you will be safe. We are living in the era between the initiation of God’s kingdom at the Cross of Calvary and its perfect culmination at Christ’s second coming. We are experiencing a clash of kingdoms; Satan’s kingdom, the world, still exists, but we are of a different kingdom: we are in but not of the world. Jesus follows that declaration with a prayer that the Father would protect us “from the evil one.” He has answered that prayer by binding Satan with regard to the church.

This satisfactorily explains that Satan is in fact bound during this age, the church age. Of course, there are numerous other areas of contention between Amillennials and dispensational millennials. The resolution to most of those differences can be provided by taking Scripture literally when that provides the simplest interpretation and using a symbolic approach where necessary, especially with apocalyptic literature such as Revelation. I will say again that though I differ with many of my friends regarding end times prophecy, we all must agree that however this all ends, our responsibility in the interim is to present Christ as the risen Savior who is coming again. Today as I write this, it could be the last day for me or anyone else. The Last Day is of less concern to all of us than This Day. “Behold, now is the day of salvation!”

Related posts: Take the Bible Literally Part 2; Understanding the Bible as Literature; What Happens to People Who Never Hear About Jesus?; Why Heaven Matters; Why Wait

Liars Don’t Go to Heaven

There is a cool song performed by Zach Williams playing on contemporary Christian radio these days. It’s called “Heart of God.” It says in part:

He's not sittin' there shakin' His head

Writin' you off, leavin' you lost

He's not sittin' there shakin' His head

Wishin' He'd never went to that cross

… He went to that cross, He went to that cross

'Cause He loves you so much…

No room for shame in His open arms

There's beauty from ashes, so come as you are

'Cause there's only love in the heart of God

'Cause there's only love in the heart of God.

It’s good poetry, good music, and as far as it goes, it’s good theology. There is love in the heart of God; John tells us that God is love. For people who are lost and know it, it can be hard to imagine that God could ever love them. I’ve seen this heartbreaking attitude among recovering addicts and former felons who hear the Word but have trouble believing it. “There is no shame, so come as you are” is a welcome message to those who know great shame. God loves you just as you are; that’s the Bible’s great, good news. But it also true that God loves you too much to leave you the way you are: fallen, broken, and hurting.

 I just finished reading a commentary on Revelation by N.T. Wright. Wright reminds readers at the end of the book that Jesus invites us to come. Come to the wedding feast. It’s a wonderful thought that God loves us so much that He is inviting us to Heaven. But if you read the rest of the book, indeed the rest of the Bible, you will realize that the invitation is not universal. There will be those who are not welcome at the feast. There is love in the heart of God, but there is more to God than love.

God’s love is universal: “God so loved the world that He sent His one-and-only Son.” But His invitation to His family feast is conditional. Jesus used the metaphor of a wedding feast to explain that only those who had the proper garments would be admitted. (See “Many Called; Few Chosen”) We see that echoed in Revelation when we are told that only those who had the appropriate garments were worthy to attend. “And it has been granted to [the Bride of Christ] that she be dressed in bright, clean fine linen (for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints).” Countless passages from Genesis to Revelation announce that a day of judgment is coming. The book of Revelation is about ninety percent judgment and ten percent celebration. In fact, Jesus’ opening words to John were that He was coming “on the clouds,” a picture of judgment throughout Scripture, to “everyone who pierced Him.”

The rest of the prophecy John was ordered to write was all about judgment until the final chapter. The letters to the seven churches warned of judgment. The seals, the trumpets, the bowls were all symbols of God’s judgment on disobedient people. Eventually, the judgment reaches even to God’s archenemy, Satan himself along with his wicked angels. In the interim, we find God’s faithful servants being martyred before they appear at the throne of God; this is the other side of judgment: they were judged worthy to be in God’s presence. Yes, God loves all people, but the Bible makes it abundantly clear that there are two options for the afterlife, and they rest on the decisions made in this life. Then comes judgment.

Zach may be right that there is only love in “the heart” of God. If that is correct, then God’s heart must be balanced with His mind. And He definitely has judgment on His mind. Throughout his commentary, Wright repeats his conclusion that the letter of Revelation was a warning to believers. They were told that judgment was coming, and that many of them would pay the ultimate price, but that it should comfort them to know that a place was prepared for them in God’s presence when they died.

Of course, you should tell your neighbors that God loves them; that He loved them enough to offer His Son as a sacrifice for their sins. But don’t neglect to tell them that if they don’t choose the life offered to them in Christ, they will end up in an afterlife that will be a literal hell. It’s like Rob Bell says, preaching about hell doesn’t make for a compelling sales pitch. But if you pretend that the alternative is attainable without belief and repentance, that no judgment awaits unbelievers, you have not told the whole story. And a half-truth is the same thing as a lie. And liars don’t go toHeaven.

Related posts: Answering Rob Bell #1 (See blog sidebar for all six articles); Necessary Obedience; Blessings of Obedience; The Church Cannot Save the Lost

Independence Day

As I write this on the Fourth of July, I am sitting in the screened patio of my RV watching dozens of PWC’s and speedboats zoom hither and yon on a lovely little lake in West Michigan. I began to ask myself what we are celebrating. It occurs to me that the obvious consumer mentality is related to the history of our nation. Few people know that the text Thomas Jefferson used as a source for the Declaration of Independence was from John Locke, a British philosopher of his day. Locke originally declared the unalienable rights of man to be, “life, liberty, and property.”

By changing the wording to “pursuit of happiness,” Jefferson did not materially change the meaning. Happiness in 1776 meant “fortuitous circumstances,” not laughs all around. Fortuitous circumstances, fortunes, in 1776 were supported by property. Historians know that the signers of the Declaration and the subsequent Constitution were property owners interested in protecting their property rights against the King of England’s encroachment. The king was levying taxes that would reduce the profits the property owners would make from their investments. This was a significant part of the motivation to rebel against the king.

Of course, the British aristocracy were doing everything in their power to increase their “property” even if at the expense of the colonists’ property. The property owners in the colonies were incensed by the crown’s overreach, so they tried for years to plead on economic terms for leniency in taxation and other measures the king employed. The king, supported by his aristocratic friends, discounted all the colonists’ appeals. The Declaration of Independence was the result. Without doubt, there were other issues that came into play, but it appears to me that the economic pressures were primary.

Why, you ask, am I relating all this history on a blog about why Heaven matters. Here’s why. Jefferson was wrong, as was Locke. Property is not an unalienable right from God. Unless you are a descendant of Abraham living before the Cross of Christ, property is not a given. Land, houses, crops, herds were all promised to Abraham’s descendants. But at the Cross of Christ, all those promises were fulfilled and replaced with better promises. Read Hebrews. We have slipped the earthly bonds of the Abrahamic covenant and moved into the better promises of the New Covenant. Jesus Himself said that His followers would have to leave all those physical blessings behind and take up a cross to follow Him. His original listeners would not have envisioned a large investment account at the foot of the cross Jesus invited them to; they would have seen the execution He suffered as their fate.

So, when Paul and Peter say that we are to submit to the authorities that govern us, how does rebellion for economic ends comply? I am not going to make any friends here, but I suspect that the American Revolution was not founded on biblical ground. America was never God’s new Israel; it was always man’s attempt to recreate Eden in a materialistic model. (Who’s pounding the table right now?) Where on earth is the so-called prosperity gospel preached? America. Who besides Americans think we are the new Israel? Crickets? Americans are the wealthiest people on the planet. How much of our wealth are we sharing with the “least of these?”

Read the New Testament carefully. Use a concordance (or search engine) if you have one. You will find that finances are mentioned among the most frequent topics. Why? Because where your treasure is, there is your heart. I love America for the principles of freedom to choose that underlay her founding. But as believers, we cannot fall into the trap of materialism (as I have). My view from this RV is profligate from a third world standard. As you wave the flag and shoot the fireworks, ask yourself where your true allegiance lies. Are you an ambassador from another kingdom, or are you a dupe in the enemy’s plan to win us all to the god of materialism?

The original sin in Eden was the desire of God’s people to be independent. They didn’t want God to dictate the terms of their existence. He offered prosperity beyond their wildest dreams if they remained dependent on Him, but they believed the lie that they could master their own reality by breaking free of God’s demands. Are you celebrating Independence Day independent from God?

The Foolishness of Solomon

If you know anything about King Solomon, David’s son, you probably associate the word wisdom with him rather than foolishness. According to the biblical record, Solomon was the wisest and richest king in his day. Sadly, the record also reports that in his last years, he turned away from following God with his whole heart and was foolishly drawn into idol worship by his many foreign wives. Taking the foreign wives may have been a wise move for any other king; wives offered as gifts from competing kingdoms often forged alliances that promoted prosperity for both rulers. But for a God-fearing Israelite, foreign wives were forbidden. Solomon ignored that. His wives did what God warned they would do. He paid the price for his disobedience the same way Saul did. His vast kingdom was shattered after he died, most of it going to one of his rivals.

Sadly, there are many tales of prominent Christians who fall due to the siren call of worldly pleasures. But you don’t have to be the ruler of a kingdom to take a lesson from this. Any of us who claim the name of Jesus are susceptible to earthly allures. And often the idols we find tempting us to worship are very subtle. There is nothing inherently wrong with watching a little television, playing a little golf, taking a jog through the park, or going for a ride on a motorcycle. However, when any hobby or pursuit takes so much of our time that we neglect the spiritual disciplines that keep our faith strong, we risk falling into idolatry. The slide has begun if the first thing that comes to mind when there is a free moment is picking up the remote or grabbing the clubs.

Polls tell a sad tale when it comes to Bible reading among evangelical Christians. Too few church going believers pick up their Bibles even once during the week. At the same time, according to one study, Americans over fifteen watch an average of three hours of TV per day, but most Christians would claim they don’t have time to read the Bible. I know men who will spend hours feeding their golf habit but can’t spare a few minutes to feed their souls. If God is truly at the center of a life, that life should be centered around God and His Word not concerned with catching the latest episode of that popular TV show or chasing a better handicap score. Those things should be secondary.

I don’t want to single out hobbies as the only temptation to idolatry. There are many things, inherently good things that can pull a Christian off center. Family responsibilities, career requirements, the maintenance of our worldly possessions all can lure us off track. Ironically, even “church” itself can get us in trouble. We can become so busy with meetings and programs and practices that we end up “chasing the wind” as Solomon put it. The Preacher said that everything under the sun is futile. The key here is “under the sun.” If the writer of Ecclesiastes was Solomon as many believe, you can see how he became disenchanted with life on earth. His greatest failure was not seeing what his father, David, saw. Read his psalms: David always turned his eyes to God when the world was unsatisfying. He knew where peace was to be found: “Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere.”

We no longer go to the temple in Jerusalem like David did. We have it better: we go into the throne room of God – a privilege bought for us by the blood of Christ. The way to make God’s presence your center is through the spiritual disciplines, prayer and Bible reading chief among them. Put down the remote, leave the clubs in the garage and sit down with your Bible… every day. Confess your waywardness to God and ask Him to bless you with His presence. At an earlier time in his life, Solomon wrote these words to his son: “That’s right—if you make Insight your priority, and won’t take no for an answer, searching for it like a prospector panning for gold, like an adventurer on a treasure hunt, believe me, before you know it…  you’ll have come upon the Knowledge of God.” (Prov. 2:1-5 The Message) The feeling you get from that will be better than a hole-in-one. No foolin’.

Related posts: The Missing Book; Idol Worship; Who’s in the Temple; Where Do You Find Truth?; Read This or Die;

Heaven Can Wait

I know I have disappointed and perhaps alienated some of my church friends with my dismissal of their cherished view of end times known as dispensational millennialism (DM). Dismissal may be too harsh a word, but I have been asking probing questions and doing considerable research into the view for many years. I was predisposed to doubt the DM eschatology because I was not raised with it. The church I grew up in and the churches my wife and I attended during the early years of our marriage believed the amillennial position was a better way to understand end times prophecy. Our association with Baptist-type churches in our teaching careers introduced us to the DM approach.

A quick review of some the different views of Revelation might be helpful. Interpretation of the book is problematic because of its unusual nature. The title, Revelation, is a translation of the Greek title, Apocalypsis. The Bible has numerous apocalyptic passages, notably in Daniel, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. Apocalyptic literature is intentionally shrouded in mystery and filled with symbolism. The message, though rooted in the authors’ present, almost always pointed to things that would happen at some future time. Generally, the thrust of the prophecy was intended to be a warning or a rebuke to the authors’ contemporaries, but God’s love for His people was revealed in the final outcome.

John, the writer of Revelation, follows in the literary tradition of those Old Testament writers. The broad outline of John’s message can be understood by most serious Bible students. The issue that divides believers most dramatically is the timing of the fulfillment of the prophecy. The question of timing primarily revolves around the mention of a 1,000-year reign of Christ on earth found in chapter 20. The word millennium comes from the Latin word for 1,000, hence the diverging views became variations on their millennial interpretation.

There are three basic views of the millennium in Revelation with sub-classes in each. The dispensational millennial (DM) interpretation, the predominant view in many American churches, is premillennial, meaning that Christ returns to earth before His 1,000-year reign. The common DM teaching foresees a seven-year period known as the Great Tribulation just prior to the millennium. In the DM view, Christ will first come secretly, and the church will be raptured – caught up to Heaven – at some point relative to the Tribulation to be returned to Earth later to rule with Christ for the millennium. After the millennium Christ executes God’s final judgment and then He initiates the new Earth and new Heaven.  There was a simpler version of premillennialism held by some early church fathers, but it was ultimately discounted as heretical in the fourth century A.D.

The view which dominated church thinking about Revelation for centuries was known as post-millennialism. This view held that Christ would rule on earth for 1,000 years through the work of His church after which He would return for the final judgment. There are still a few believers who teach this interpretation, but the realization that the church is not bringing the mass of humanity to Christ, and the incessant wars and atrocities of the twentieth century have led many to believe post-millennial thought is not valid.

The third view of the millennium is called amillennialism because those who hold to this interpretation do not take the 1,000-year reign of Christ to be a literal, earthly period. Like most of the apocalyptic language in Revelation, the number 1,000 is considered symbolic of a long period of time. Amillennials believe that Christ has been reigning from Heaven ever since His victory over the enemy on the cross and His ascension to Heaven where He is seated at the right hand of God. It is similar to post-millennial thinking in that Christ comes as judge after the metaphorical millennial period.

Throughout church history, the majority of believers held a version of a- or post-millennialism. Still today, most of the church world-wide retains one of these views. It is only in America that the dispensational/millennial view (DM) has gained popularity. This situation can be traced directly to the influence of C.I. Schofield and his widely read Schofield Reference Bible, introduced early in the twentieth century. Schofield borrowed heavily from (some would say plagiarized) the work of Irish/English theologian John Nelson Darby. Darby was driven by the thinking of the Christian Zionists of his day, descendants of whom inhabit DM circles today, in his effort to find a place for physical Israel in the prophecies of the New Testament.

 Darby taught that Jerusalem must be reestablished as a home for the Jews, and the temple must be rebuilt with its sacrifices reinstated. This thinking gained serious traction when Israel was recreated from the ashes of World War II Palestine in 1948. Prophetic speculation has been rising ever since then, fueled more recently by the appearance of books like The Late, Great Planet Earth and the Left Behind series at the end of the twentieth century. Many American theologians have fallen under the dominating influence of institutions like Dallas Theological Seminary and Moody Bible Institute and others who teach the dispensational/millennial interpretation.

Several things about the DM interpretation of Revelation disturb me, chief among them is the importance placed on the reestablishment of a Jewish temple in Jerusalem. God made it clear to Israel that He would abandon them and the Jerusalem temple if they turned from following Him alone. They did just that several times throughout Old Testament history, then most dramatically when they refused to recognize their Messiah. At the dedication of Solomon’s temple, God spoke directly to Solomon with these words:

“But if you or your descendants abandon me and disobey the decrees and commands I have given you, and if you serve and worship other gods, then I will uproot the people from this land that I have given them. I will reject this Temple that I have made holy to honor my name. I will make it an object of mockery and ridicule among the nations. And though this Temple is impressive now, all who pass by will be appalled. They will ask, ‘Why did the Lord do such terrible things to this land and to this Temple?’ “And the answer will be, ‘Because his people abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who brought them out of Egypt, and they worshiped other gods instead and bowed down to them. That is why he has brought all these disasters on them.’” (2 Ch 7:19–22 NLT)

The ultimate disaster God brought upon Israel took place in 70 A.D. when the Roman army conquered Jerusalem and completely destroyed the temple. Paul makes it abundantly clear in Romans that a blood relationship to Abraham was never the mark of God’s true people. Only faithful obedience and trust in God qualified one to join God’s family. The true Israel, Paul asserts, is now made up of Jews and Gentiles who have recognized that saving righteousness is found in Christ alone. He does admit that if Jews believe, they can be grafted back into the tree of faith they had abandoned, but even in passages where he discusses Christ’s return, he makes no mention of Jerusalem or the temple. God’s judgment on apostate Israel and the abandonment of Jerusalem and its temple would seem to be complete.

Because of this, the temple in Paul’s thinking is the believer individually and the church corporately. Paul expressed this fact while the Jerusalem temple was still standing. In John’s Revelation, the New Jerusalem is a metaphor for the church and exists as a spiritual reality, not as a literal city floating above a new Earth. Paul and the writer of Hebrews state clearly that believers in their day (and by extension our day) had already come to the New Jerusalem. This fits perfectly with the idea that the Kingdom of God is a spiritual reality with Jesus reigning from Heaven over his body, the church. In this view, the millennium is now; the church age represents Christ’s reign on earth. There is no purpose for Jerusalem or the temple during Jesus’ reign. Those Old Testament physical realities have become New Testament spiritual realities.

I respect my Christian friends who follow a version of Darby’s dispensational millennialism. I disagree with them, but I respect their right to a difference of opinion. I only hope that while they wait expectantly for the rapture and all that they believe will follow it, that they don’t forget the overriding message of Revelation: Jesus’ followers have become involved in a cosmic battle for the right to rule the Earth. Whatever they believe about the end times prophecies, the present reality demands obedience to Jesus Great Commission: make disciples of all nations. As the saying goes: Heaven can wait. We have work to do here and now.

Related posts: Who’s in the Temple?; Why Heaven Matters; Canaan Cannot be Heaven

Who Needs God?

After I published “Even the Wicked,” I began to struggle with the conclusion I had presented as N.T. Wright’s summary of the message of Revelation. I recommend reading the whole piece, but I will briefly state that Wright says suffering is God’s way to bring about redemption. I don’t doubt his reasoning; I think he is right, and the history of the church proves it. Unfortunately, this leaves Christians with a troubling message to share with unbelievers: come to Jesus so that you may suffer. That doesn’t sound like a winning sales pitch.

Of course, this is precisely why people like Rob Bell have removed judgment and hell from their theology. Bell once said that preaching about God’s judgment to unbelievers doesn’t make for a compelling story. So, he stopped believing in hell. That’s not the answer, as any serious Bible student knows; you can’t just ignore uncomfortable truths in Scripture. When something in the Bible doesn’t make human sense, we are reminded that God’s ways are not man’s ways—His thoughts are far above ours. And though we can’t always think God’s thoughts, we must agree that they are righteous and just. Because that’s what God is. Completely.

While I agree with Bell’s opinion that hell and judgment are not attractive gospel selling points, I am still bound by the over-arching biblical command to glorify God, which as I have said before means to make God look good. The question becomes how to explain the apparently contradictory ideas of willingly suffering for Christ and still being attracted to Him. The first answer that comes to me is that there are other things that will cause even greater suffering if one remains apart from Christ. In other words, if our message to unbelievers is to be full gospel, we don’t downplay the suffering; we recommend the gospel (good news) because in it one finds a purpose in earthly suffering and the promise of eternal bliss.

At first blush, this seems impossible, at least in modern America. All our needs are met – most of them instantly. The most basic needs – food, clothing, and shelter – are met for almost everyone who makes even a little effort. The next tier of “needs” including things like transportation, entertainment, and recreation is also within reach of virtually everyone. Most unbelieving Americans are being honest when they claim they don’t need God – especially if that God requires suffering as the cost of believing.

However, the booming sales of antidepressants and the thriving counselling practices tell another story. Modern Americans are missing something; they just don’t know what it is. That’s where we come in with the gospel. The Preacher said it long ago: “[God] has put eternity in [human] hearts.” The popular Christian artist, Plumb, put it well: “There’s a God-shaped hole in all of us, and it’s a void only He can fill.” I wrote at length about that need in “Do We Really Need God?” It is basic to every human being whether they can see it or not.

The short description of the need comes down to three questions: Where did I come from? Why am I here? Why does it matter? Philosophers have referred to these three as the question of origin; the question of purpose; and the question of morals. The failure to answer these questions satisfactorily explains why the richest people still want more, why the man with the trophy wife still commits adultery, why the addict takes another hit. Nothing satisfies that inner need. The task for the believer who wants to share Christ with her neighbor is to drill down and find where that need is hiding. That’s not easy, and the successful conversation doesn’t usually start with “Are you saved?”

This dilemma is the second reason why I wrote Lead a Horse to Water. My first purpose in writing the book was to encourage people to build relationships where a gospel conversation could happen. The second reason was to offer suggested approaches to various types of unbelievers. In my book I referred to God Space by Doug Pollock who recommends asking probing questions of the unbeliever. He did not mean asking religious questions. He suggested getting to know them on a deeper level than their opinion of the weather or their favorite sports team. I also reminded believers that while it may seem daunting to come up with the right questions, we have the Lord’s promise that when we are defending the gospel, the Holy Spirit will give us the right words. Prayerful preparation precedes powerful presentations.

I still chafe over the idea that suffering for Christ is one of the primary things God uses to advance the gospel. Here again, church history validates the argument. In the third century, Tertullian is said to have commented: “The blood of martyrs is the seed of the church.” Two millennia of statistics don’t show a perfect correlation, but the places where the church is growing fastest in this century appear to be places where martyrs’ blood is being spilled. On the other hand, no blood is being shed in America, and church growth is flagging. Maybe the threat of the sword forces people to discover their greatest need. We should pray that God doesn’t bring the sword to America to make us see our need. Perhaps we can forestall that if we get about the business of spreading the good news.

Related posts: Rolling Thunder; Daily Bible Reading; Understanding the Times; Crisis of Faith 1; Crisis of Faith 2; Farewell Rob Bell