The Shack – Mark Driscoll Is Sincerely Wrong – Part 2

On April 8, 2008 Mark Driscoll began a series on the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ. He wanted to make sure that the people of his church were not deluded by what has often plagued by yet another fad.

In my last post I responded to the idea that The Shack teaches graven image worship. I mentioned that the idea of God being part of creation is exactly what happened in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. God in his fullness (Colossians 1:19) dwelled in Jesus and became one with all creation. It could not be any other way. The question of whether an image of God can be created and whether it is graven image worship was answered at the Second Council of Nicea in 787 AD. Images CAN be used to tell the story of the Gospel. It has been a part of the theology of the Church for some 1300 years; and thank God for it! Without it we wouldn’t have Michelangelo’s great painting in the Sistine Chapel, which I saw in its magnificence in 1992. Pastor Driscoll’s pointing to the Puritans in his defense of his point denies the history of the development of the doctrines of the Church. Now don’t get me wrong. As I have named this series and stated in the first post I think Mark Driscoll, an otherwise wonderful minister, is sincere, but sincerely wrong. He is not ignorant except in his not seeing or understanding where our doctrine of the Trinity came from and what it actually is as stated in the Nicene Creed.

In this post I want to answer the charge of The Shack promoting modalism or Sabellianism. Sab-what?!! Sabellius was a third century priest and theologian. His major belief was that the only true God was God the Father. That is why some call modalism or Sabellianism Monarchianism, that God the was the one, true Monarch of heaven. Jesus and the Holy Spirit, were just modes or sides of God the Father manifested in different situations. However, Sabellius believed Jesus and the Father are united as one person. I know, confusing.

Right from the top it would seem that the charge of modalism in The Shack couldn’t possibly be true because of the manifestation of two or more of the three persons simultaneously. There are scenes of meals where all three are together with Mack. There is a communion scene where all three are together with Mack. It would seem to me that if modalism was what was being taught, you would never have more than one of them in a scene at a time.

How about the idea of them being “three”? One of the proofs Sabellians (the modern Oneness movement in some charismatic churches) use is that the only number used for God mentioned in the Scriptures is “one.” Now remember, Trinitarians believe that God is one. We also believe God is three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The concept of the Trinity took so long to develop as a doctrine is that they needed to make sure to maintain the concept of the one God as described in the Shema in Deuteronomy 6. However, the other thing they couldn’t deny was that God had manifested himself as the Son, the Father who loved him and the Spirit who is our Advocate. So how could God be both 1 and 3? I will try to explain.

In John 1:1 we see two images of God. One is called God and the other the Logos or Word. John the Apostle somehow knew that Jesus, the one whom he ate with and saw rise to the “right hand of the Father,” was also God. He knew it by what Jesus said. He knew it by what he witnessed Jesus do.  He knew it because Jesus left no doubt that he was DIFFERENT than the Messiah anticipated by the Jews. He also mentions the coming of the Holy Spirit. So as Desi Arnez used to say, “You have some “splaining” to do.”

Enter the theologians. Over the course of the next 300 or so years men who spent their time reading and re-reading the Scriptures started to see that there was obviously a change going on in the idea and concept of God. Just having Jesus around made things complicated. Here was one who was obviously to be worshiped and was being worshiped, but the Scriptures said that none but the one God was to be worshiped.

Here is a sort of time line of development:

• John’s Gospel: circa 90 AD – defines Jesus as the Word, the Creator, become flesh
• Ignatius of Antioch: circa 107 AD states Jesus and the Holy Spirit are God (letters to the Ephesians and Symaeans)
• Polycarp, Bishop of Antioch: circa 150 AD states that to not confess Christ is to be at odds with God as is Satan
• Justin Martyr: circa 155 AD proclaims the Word made flesh is at the same level as God (On the Resurrection)
• Irenaeus of Lyons: circa 180 AD states that Jesus (as the Word) always existed, something that is only true of God (Against All Heresies)
• Clement of Alexandria: circa 200 AD attributes the forgiveness of sins with Jesus’ action on the cross when forgiveness is only given by God (see Exhortation to the Heathen, Stromata and Fragments)

I think you get the picture. I have not yet said anything about Origen, Tertullian, Athanasius of Alexandria, the Cappadocian Fathers or Hillary of Poitiers. I would recommend you read Athanasius’ On the Incarnation of the Word as a great expose on basic Christian belief of who Jesus is and what he has done for humanity.  But suffice it to say that this section shows a clear, constant, historical development by the Church of the doctrine of the Trinity. So God is truly 1 in 3 and 3 in 1.

But the key issue is can the Father and Spirit be manifested among us along with Jesus. Only speculation is available. For one thing, the scripture from Colossians 1 I mentioned above points to the fact that where Jesus is, so are the Father and Spirit. Then there is the visit of the 3 to Abram in the desert, 3 whom Abram fell down to worship. Was that the Trinity coming to visit? Certainly there was a tie in to God. I’m not sure it was angels because Scripture also shows how angels will not allow themselves to be worshiped. But again, it is speculation, not abject fact.

The early church did talk in great detail about the concept of homoouision, or interpenetration of the Father, Son and Spirit into each other such that they are one at all times while each remaining distinct; that where one is, all are. By having them sitting in 3 chairs at dinner with Mack is Paul Young stating that that is how the Trinity exists in itself? That’s a stretch. If he did, I would have to agree with Mark Driscoll. But I think Pastor Driscoll used some mighty great spin to make his point, not theological reality. In fact, all Pastor Driscoll would have had to do is pick up the phone and call Paul Young, or Facebook message him to ask if he was saying that Papa, Jesus and Sarayu were each manifestations of God at some time. I’m sure Mr. Young would have said, “Absolutely not!”

OK. So we’ve shown that The Shack does not promote graven image worship. Nor does it promote modalism. I want to reiterate that while Pastor Driscoll’s concern that his church should stick to solid doctrine is a valid one, and while his passion for correctness is not to be disparaged or discounted, as is evident in some of the responses left at the You Tube location for the video, what I have been examining in the light of the Scripture and Christian theology are the charges he makes. Those charges lead to his central charge that The Shack teaches heresy. So in my final post in this series, I will take a look at the last charge, that of goddess worship.

 

The Shack: Mark Driscoll is Sincerely Wrong – Part One

On April 8, 2008 Mark Driscoll began a series on the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ. He wanted to make sure that the people of his church were not deluded by what has often plagued by yet another fad.

Over the last 10 years since I became an elder and pastor in my denomination I have seen, participated in and fallen prey to a number of fads. I fell for the Contagious Christian fad, the Purpose Driven fad, the Prayer of Jabez fad and even the WWJD fad that hit the church over that time. Mark wisely and sincerely does not want the members of his church to follow a fad that would lead them down a fruitless path.

I would agree with him that the phenomenon that is Paul Young’s The Shack can be viewed as yet another fad. It can be viewed as pop theology for the unsuspecting not dissimilar to the recent speculation on “hidden truths” supposedly unveiled by The daVinci Code and The Gospel of Judas. So again I say that Mark Driscoll is sincere in his desire to protect his church from doctrinal error. Unfortunately, he is sincerely wrong.

He is wrong in his assessment of The Shack as a book full of heresies and, frankly, wrong in some of his theology that leads to his assessments. It is my purpose in this series to write about where he is wrong and to lead to a stronger theology than what he offered. Again, I believe he is sincere and probably, like all good pastors, trimmed away what is a voluminous amount of information in trying to pare down his sermon to a mere 1 hour and 3 minutes. But in the paring is crucial truth that has been omitted.

Allegation 1: The Shack teaches graven image worship
The first thing that Mr. Driscoll claims is that The Shack, in portraying the Father out to be a black female and the Holy Spirit out to be an Asian or Eurasian female is creating a situation where “the invisible God is made visible and the Creator God is part of Creation.” I really think that he just has a problem with imagery.

Has God portrayed himself in the Scriptures in physical ways to help us to understand facets of his incomprehensible being? Absolutely. God has portrayed himself as three strangers to Abraham, a burning bush to Moses, a still, small voice to Elijah, a dove to the witnesses of Jesus’ baptism, a voice to the disciples and tongues of fire to those present at Pentecost. Which of these is who God really is? This is a foolish question, I know, for these are manifestations for our understanding and does not portray God as he is in himself. It is no different in The Shack.

On page 95, at least in my copy, Papa, the black female representing the Father states that he is revealing himself to Mack in this way for Mack’s well being, not because that is who God is in himself. Graven image worship, as described in the Scriptures occurs when men say, “God is…” a Golden Calf, or a man with a dog head or this thing or that thing, and worship what clearly has come out of creation as though it was the immutable God himself. Mack isn’t making God into a black female, neither is Paul Young. In this fictitious story, God is portraying himself this way to actually help Mack understand that our images of God are NOT who he is in himself. Papa is trying to destroy some of the graven images we HAVE made of God in the Christian Church over the years. Is God white with a long flowing beard? Yet ask most Christians what image comes up in their minds when asked what God looks like and that is the answer you will get.

Mr. Driscoll also states that making the Creator part of Creation is also graven image worship. Problem here is that is exactly what God has done in having the Word become flesh. (John 1:1-3,14) If God does not attach himself to Creation in Jesus Christ, if Christ is not both fully God and fully man, then our salvation is not done. And it is not just men that Jesus is redeeming, it is the whole of Creation, which was equally affected and fallen when Adam sinned. The Creator entered Creation in order to unite it to him and fix it.

A simple glance at the four Gospels and we see that the Jews wanted to stone Jesus for blasphemy, for claiming he is the one, true God. The concept of Trinity, where God is 3-in-1 and 1-in-3, was not defined in its entirety until 300 years after Jesus. It was a 300 year process of discovery which included not recognizing Jesus as God for the first 30 or 40 years after Jesus’ ascension. When the writings of the New Testament started to appear, one can see a progression of God’s revelation to the early Church.

But the fact is that the Creator of the Universe (John 1:3), the one who was with God in the beginning (John 1:1-2), became flesh. That is the doctrine of the Christian Church as stated in the Nicene/Constantinopolitan Creed of the 4th Century. So for over 1600 years we really have believed that the Creator is part of the Creation.

Theology Warning: Some of what is presented here may cause you to say, “Wow!”
OK, now for some serious theology. Mr. Driscoll presented some serious history of the Church and the formation of its doctrines in a very condensed form that, unfortunately, left out some important players and information.

First let me say that what Augustine wrote about the Trinity (de Trinitas) was NOT the seminal treatise on the Trinity. Much of what became the doctrine of the Trinity was forged over hundreds of years and first codified in the Nicene/Constantinopolitan Creed, much of which was written by Athanasius, not Augustine. Some clarification of the doctrine or its parts was done by the Cappadocian Fathers and certainly one key piece, perichoresis (how each persona of God interpenetrates the others such that where one persona is present, the other two are also fully present), was added 300 years after Augustine’s treatise by John of Damascus. Even this says nothing of the work of Origen, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Calvin or Hillary to name a few. In modern times, much of the meaning of the doctrine of the Trinity has been revived under Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics and the work of the Torrence brothers, James and Thomas. There are others still whom I haven’t mentioned who will help carry Trinitarian theology to people in this century.

The key things to remember in creating a Trinitarian theology of God is first and foremost, “Who is Jesus?” and “Who is God?” I would point Mr. Driscoll to two things in the Scriptures, one which he raised and the other which he neglected: 1) God is Spirit (John 4) and 2) God is love. (1 John 4:8) These are the only two definitive “God is” statements in the Scriptures. These are the only two that describe God in his being (ousia) and not his actions which come out of his being. All theologies must reconcile themselves to these.

What these men discovered was that in Jesus is our hope and salvation. Jesus is the Father’s only begotten Son, but he was his begotten Son for all eternity. They defined that Jesus and the Father are of the same substance or homoousian. (John 10:30, 14:9) Who God is in himself is expressly represented in Jesus Christ. (Hebrews 1:3) The fact that the Father would hold back nothing to save the Creation from its fallen state is expressed in Jesus. (John 3:16)

OK, love and Spirit, right? If God is love, then any response of his must be a response in love. This is exactly what Papa tells Mack on page 121. Mack assumes that God gets so angry with people that he kills them for his sin. Papa says to him, “Mackenzie, I am not who you think I am.” I think at this point it is important to bring in Hebrews 12. Here the writer reminds his audience that bad stuff happens to Christians. Some of it is used by God as a means to discipline us. But here again, does God discipline in anger or in love? Hebrews 12 answers that.

Jesus says that he was sent because of the Father’s love (John 3:16). Paul tells us in Ephesians that God’s plan has always to adopt us. He predestined us to adoption and how? “…in his love …” (Ephesians 1:4) Doesn’t sound much like the angry God who has separated us from him because he can’t stand being in our presence because of our sinfulness. Sounds more like Papa, Jesus and Sarayu in The Shack.

In my next post I will take a look at Mr. Driscoll’s second allegation: That The Shack teaches modalism. You may want to go look that up in a theological dictionary.

 

Resistance Isn’t Futile, It’s Foolish

Wow! It has been a long time since I posted, so I guess I have a lot to catch up about.

During that time I started using Facebook more often as an immediate means of posting and getting feedback. Most of the time my posts are pretty benign. “Frank just got back from Sons of Italy.” “Frank had a great time at the Caffe Prada wine tasting.” Etc. But as soon as I get on the topic of the Gospel, some of my previously friendly “friends” turn negative.

One person wrote, “Cut this s*** out! This is a friendly site.” Others wrote, “Doctrines are invented by men.” Still others wrote, “That is just one point of view.” ‘So-and-so’ says this, ‘… .’” I respect their point of view, but I am actually not in the business of getting people to believe, but getting people to think. I even teach my high school classes, “In this class you will learn to think.” I won’t give them what to think, I will teach them the importance of thinking about what someone says, determining how much value it has to them and their lives.

Once again, I will endeavor to pass along something to think about. I post what is accepted Christian thought from the point of  view of the early church, quoting early church sources and writings as my support. I may or may not have it in my posts, but I have the resources to share with all who ask. I am passing along information to think about. I welcome comments, but please think about and support what you think if you decide to comment beyond something appreciative. Please say what you like, but support what you say. That is just good etiquette.

I have written before on the excitement in the Apostle Paul’s voice as he announces to the world what God has done for humanity through Jesus Christ. In Ephesians 1 the excitement is palpable. We are blesses with every heavenly blessing in Jesus Christ. We have been adopted into the eternal relationship shared by the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Most importantly, this was predestined by the Father before there was a creation. Yet, as it says in John 1, men (read people, not just males) prefer the darkness to the light of the freedom given to us by Jesus.

I get to counsel a lot of people because I am a pastor. I hear the stories of mean things that people say about other people. It is hurtful. So my advice to them is to view what these people are saying as a gift, a gift you DON’T have to accept. What God is offering us is also a gift that we have the choice to accept or refuse. But here’s the kicker, refusing the gift doesn’t change it’s existence.

The draw of God is real. Maybe you don’t think so, but it is. Every time you feel compassion for someone, that is the love of God pouring through you. Every time you feel joy, that is the joy of God pouring through you. Every time you connect with someone, that is the relationship of God pouring through you.

While some researchers believe that our emotions come about as a result of the hypothalamus, the limbic system in our brains, there is no agreement as to how or why it works. What differences in operation of that system define love from anger from fear? What we do know is that we have emotions. try as they might, scientists cannot find any clear reasons as to why?

So why is it so difficult to accept even the possibility that we have those emotions because they were given to us by a loving creator? Why is it easy to take either the religious point of view of God as little more than an emotionless bean counter recording all the things we do in our lives so that he can later exact revenge, or scientific point of view which believes God as a creation of man? I believe it is because accepting God for who he is, and that he really is in control, and that he really does have a plan that includes us is so much harder.

Religion is easy because it gives us a list of things to do or don’t do, believe and not believe. Science is easy because it tries to eliminate the very existence of God by facts and reasons and rationale even though there is so much that is scientifically unprovable.

Both leave us empty with doubts and fears that our existence is purposeless. We are at the whim of either an apathetic God who has to be convinced to love us or an apathetic science that explains the whats of life without explaining the whys. Both cause us to question our current existence much less our future.

The God Paul is telling us about is not emotionless and not apathetic. He is so determined to bring us to him and reveal to us the life we were supposed to have all along that he did something outrageous in the annals of religion, he became us. He lived as one of us, suffered as one of us, stressed as one of us, cried as one of us and ultimately died as one of us. He did it to reveal that the God we don’t know, one Paul told the Athenians was “the unknown God” (Acts 17), has had a plan for us that includes all his greatest blessings like unfettered love without doubts, freedom from all threats and worries and a purposeful life eternal creating and discovering as mankind has never done before.

This is not universalism because some, even some reading this post, doubt that God wants this and has always wanted this for us. To the critics I’ll say this, in the long run my details might be off, but will be solely because I cannot fully comprehend “every blessing from heaven” as God has designed this. Because of doubt some will actually refuse this amazing gift from the God who loves them. Some of you right now question what I am saying. That is your right. God has given you the ability to accept or reject this gift. But it doesn’t change the reality of the gift. The gift is there. It’s yours. No one can take it away from you, but you can reject it.

Repentance in the Bible is the word “metanoia” which means to change your mind. God is asking you to change you mind about him about the gift he is offering you. He is calling you to believe the adoption he has done for you. To accept his love and purpose for you. To accept the freedom and peace only he can give you. You can resist, but that would be foolish.

 

Enter the Sabbath

9There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; 10for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. 11Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following their example of disobedience.

To tell followers of Jesus Christ about the importance of Sabbath unleashes a torrent of varied responses. Some will argue that the Sabbath is the rest of the 7th day given to Israel at Mount Sinai. “It is the identifying sign of God’s people,” they will argue, and there is some validity to their argument.

Others will say that Sabbath is Sunday, saying that the day was “transformed” at the cross. Again, there is some validity to what is being said. Still others will say that it is another day or any day as long as you keep one. All these people have valid arguments about why their day, any day or no day is appropriate as a Sabbath.

Whatever that day is, God tells us in the section of Hebrews 4 above that we must enter into it. So what day are they talking about? Are they talking about any day? What is this scripture telling us?

Anyone who knows me well enough knows that when it comes to studying the Scriptures I am always talking about context. The context from which a Scripture comes means looking at where that section is placed in relation to the whole story that is being told. It means also looking at the subject of section and the object of the section. In other words, what is it talking about and to whom is it talking?

This section from Hebrews 4 is in the middle of a dialogue about Jesus Christ, the subject of the book of Hebrews. Hebrews was written (though it is unclear who wrote it, another interesting study) by Jews to Jews. It was written to explain the superiority of Jesus Christ, himself the fulfillment and fulfilling of the promises to Israel, to the old Mosaic covenant. Let me be clear, it is not about the superiority of Christianity to Judaism, it is about the superiority of Jesus Christ to an entrenched religion. Frankly, you can substitute any religion, including Christianity as we know it, in the place of Judaism here. So Jesus is both the subject of Hebrews because it is about his fulfilling of the shadow of Mosaic and Talmudic laws with the light of God’s very presence among men.

Any discussion about the Sabbath then has to proceed from this reality. This book is about a person, Jesus Christ, and his superiority over all things. (Hebrews 2:7-8) It is in this context that we should look at what is said. There is a rest for the people of God and it is not a day, it is a person. Let’s look.

Whatever the Sabbath is and was, it was to be an everlasting sign for the people of God. Now the Sabbath day was given to Israel and Israel was commanded to keep the day, but what are we to make of that in light of Jesus?
In Hebrews Chapter 1 we find that all things created have a period of existence and then they are worn out, obsolete, they die or are destroyed. It says:
“10He also says,
“In the beginning, O Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
11They will perish, but you remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
12You will roll them up like a robe;
like a garment they will be changed.
But you remain the same,
and your years will never end.”

Notice that it doesn’t replace any days. There is no shifting of one day to the next. There is no replacement of the Sabbath day, Saturday, with the Lord’s Day, Sunday. Yes it is true that most of the first century Christians worshipped on Sunday. But that is not proof and this is not talking about swapping days. It is taking the focus off something that is every bit as Created as you and I, namely a day, and replacing it with something eternal, namely the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity.

It was He who became flesh (John 1:14) and it is into Him that we must enter. He is superior to any day for he is uncreated and eternal. Only in Jesus do we find rest. It is only in the one who himself is in the Father and the Father in Him that we can find rest from our work. We find rest from our suffering and pain, our frustrations and fears, our worries and our striving.

To not enter into Jesus means continuing with our struggle to find out what this life is all about. We must worry about what to eat, drink or wear. We must worry about appearances. Even those who tell us they don’t worry about appearances towards others must worry that their appearance is not like others. Even the hermit worries about what to eat or where to sleep. Even the monk has a set of rules and standards he must live under.

But in Jesus Christ we find rest from all that for he is the one who does all things for us. He gives us life and breath. He gives us the ability to earn a living. He gives us the knowledge of how to create and how to live in community with others. He shares his love that we may love someone.

The rest that He offers, the Sabbath He gives us, is one that asks, “Do you believe that I am doing and will continue to do all this for you? Do you believe that I will sustain you and provide for you? Do you believe that I am here with you and nothing that happens will ever decrease my love for you?” This is lasting rest. This is meaningful rest. Not the observance of days or rules, rituals and religions.

Only Jesus can give us the rest we have searched for all of our lives. If we really want to find true rest, we must enter into that kind of trusting relationship. We must enter into Jesus as our Sabbath rest.

 

Sharing Naturally

Paul meets Lydia and the women at the river.

“From there we traveled to Philippi, a Roman colony and the leading city of that district of Macedonia. And we stayed there several days.
On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer. We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there. One of those listening was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, who was a worshipper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. If you consider me a believer in the Lord, she said, come and stay at my house. And she persuaded us.”  (Acts 16:12-16)
“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men. You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:13-16)
Is there a correct way to evangelize the world? Some people would lean toward having to walk up to perfect strangers telling them they have to be saved. That seems to be the approach that Paul and Timothy took in Macedonia that led the conversion of Lydia and her household, whatever that meant in those days.
Others would say to take a more passive approach to evangelism that allows your lifestyle to speak for itself. Again, that seems to be what Jesus is saying in the famous Sermon on the Mount. So which one is correct? I think most of us are smart enough to say, “Well, both are correct depending on the circumstances,” and that is fair enough.
But I think both miss the point in a major way because both are being used from the wrong starting point.  The general sense in which most view these scriptures comes from a version of the Gospel that goes something like this:
When Adam and Eve fell, God was pissed, so he threw them out of the Garden. From that point mankind spent its time trying to get back to God. This was not possible of our own, so we invented our own religions or tried what God gave us but our way. So the Word came to be made flesh as Jesus and die for our sins because there was a legal requirement of death to pay for sin. But Jesus also rose from the dead showing the power of the atonement for sin and eternal life that was offered. He went back to his follower and told them to scurry about preaching the Gospel of this atonement and how God was offering them a choice. They could either follow Jesus or they could burn in hell. Those, and only those, who heard the message and followed Jesus would spend eternity in Heaven and everyone else could go to Hell; and we followers better make sure we’re doing it, or else.
OK. I don’t want to get into the depth of theology necessary to analyze this. If you have followed my posts at all you know most of the points I would argue. I think I’ll just limit my comments to a couple of things that just don’t make sense.
1)    This version of the Gospel has Jesus working at odds with the Father. The Father is pissed and Jesus offers himself up to satisfy the Father’s anger toward humanity. Logically, this doesn’t make sense. God has existed in perfect harmony and unity for eternity before our creation. How do we have such power over God to change that nature?
Jesus and the Father are one. (John 10:30) They always have been one and always will be one. So whatever Jesus is doing to reconcile humanity, he is doing it with the full knowledge and approval of the Father.  Not only that, but it is the Father’s plan that humanity would be saved.
2)    This version of the Gospel puts the power and responsibility for salvation in the hands of us people. Didn’t we already say that we’ve tried our ways of getting back to God with abysmal results? What makes us think we can do a better job now? And before you start saying, “Because the LOOORRRDD will guide us by the Holy Spirit,” let me immediately respond to you with a few reminders: Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Southern Baptist, Free Will Baptist, Methodist, Four Square Gospel, Grace Communion International. These are just a few denominations who all have their own idea of what it means to be Christian and who gets to be one.
No, God is NOT relying on us to get people saved. That is a gift of God to humanity by grace. (Ephesians 2:8-10) God gives us the blessing, even the responsibility of telling people what He has already done.  It is a blessing to tell people God loves them and sent Jesus to bring them home.
So now, what do each of these portions of the Scripture mean in that light? What is evangelism in that light? First and foremost is Christ’s example and teaching.  Our first responsibility is in our transformation. As we respond to the Spirit and are changed and people notice.
I was told a story about a woman who was really unapproachable. She was rude to people. She was judgmental and just very difficult to be around. One day she was rude to a woman at church and the woman was offended. She sulked home angry about how she had been treated. She really wanted to give that woman a piece of her mind.
She went home and in the course of prayer, told God how angry she was. The woman offended told me God’s response to her, “How do you know how far she has come since she got to know me? How do you know what she has experienced in her life that makes her this way?”
This woman told me that her heart melted. She knew that regardless of how that woman treated her, she needed to apologize and reconcile with her. The next time they were at church she threw her arms around her and begged her for forgiveness. The offending woman was overwhelmed and the two became very close. The offended woman, who was younger, cared for the offending woman, who was older, even after the offending woman entered an assisted care facility. It was the overwhelming love of God that transformed both women, but it was the willingness of the offended woman to respond to the work of the Spirit that caused this reconciliation.
That being said, are we just supposed to sit back and wait? No. We also have the responsibility of going to people. What does that mean in light of the love of God?
Each of us has a sphere of influence in which we exist. People accept and trust us in that sphere of influence. Christ is asking us to be his spokesperson in that sphere of influence. We can reach out and tell these people about God’s love because they trust us.
There are two well-documented statistics that you can find in the research of George Barna. One says that the overwhelming majority of people who surrender their lives to Jesus did so because of the influence of a close friend, co-worker or relative on their lives. The other is that the overwhelming majority of those who do not attend church don’t because no one has asked them. So we really do have lots of opportunity to reach out and share the love of God with those we love. We just have to do it.
Lastly, what about meeting strangers? I have learned that to become someone “who doesn’t know any strangers.” Although an extrovert, I am fairly shy when it comes to meeting new people.  I can’t just walk up and introduce myself to someone I don’t know. Yet I know it is important for me to share the love of God with as many as I can. How do I solve the problem? Icebreakers.
Icebreakers are people I know who introduce me to people I don’t know.  In conversation I look for places where we have interests or experiences in common. I’m a husband and a dad. I’m a teacher and coach. I have experience in business and love sports. I use those interests as starting points for conversation.
Inevitably, conversations will get around to the fact that I am a minister (some like to say, “preacher”) or some problems people are facing. Those are doors the Holy Spirit is opening for me to help (and I do mean help) reveal God for who He is in love; to reveal who Jesus is and what how he helps us.
This is the example we are seeing from Paul and Timothy.  They went out to pray. The Spirit opened the door for conversation with the women at the river. Notice it doesn’t say, “Paul walked up to Lydia.” Instead, notice how it came about, “We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there. One of those listening was a woman named Lydia.” Lydia was among those with whom Paul was having a conversation. She was probably dyeing stuff purple with her “household.” It doesn’t say Paul gave a sermon. We make that connection because of a cultural belief based on the itinerant preachers of the 19th Century who went from place to place preaching.
Paul and Timothy probably were welcomed by the women and after they had prayed. Then they got into the conversation of who they were, where they were from and why they were there. Paul probably talked with Lydia about her business. That was how the door likely opened. It was a natural outpouring of the love of God in each individual identifying itself and joining the “strangers” in the communion of conversation. It is after that that Lydia has her heart opened, that she and her “household” are “dyed white” in baptism, and she invites them to go to her home to eat and continue the conversation with the rest of “those in her household.”
It is easy for some of us to talk politics, but we had to learn about them first. It is easy for some to talk about sports, but we had to learn about them first. It is easy for some of us to talk about child rearing, but we had to learn and experience it first.  In the midst of our natural conversations about the things that interest us the door will open and we will have to choose to share or not share what our experiences are with the love of God through Jesus.
The power of the transformation of Jesus on our lives, our experiences of the love of God are the things we can talk about naturally. We can talk about God while gardening, while sharing coffee and cake, while watching our kids at the playground or tae kwon do class, while talking on Facebook.  It becomes a natural outpouring of our experiences. The Spirit is opening the doors, it’s time for you to walk in.

 

There Is No Fear In Love

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. (1 John 4:18)

I live in fear. I live in it all the time. I’ll bet you do, too, even if you don’t admit it.

Fear doesn’t show itself as shaking knees, trembling hands or a quickly beating heart. Sometimes it shows itselv in much less obvious ways. Le me prove it too you.

Today I was proctoring the SAT test at the high school where I teach. The day started normally and I was having as good a time as one can in an all but silent room. Then came the first mistake. In my oral instructions I accidentally misread “work in section 3 on page 4.” Instead, I said, “work in section 4 on page 3.” Understand, if I let students work in the wrong section, that is a misadministration. That’s bad.

I quickly felt the fear of what these students thought of me. “What an idiot. Duh, we can’t work in section 4 before we work in section 3. Loser.” All of this took about 5 seconds after which I corrected the mistake instructing them to work in section 3.

The sense of inadequacy was unnerving. My cool had been blown. I made a mistake. No big whup, right?  We all make mistakes,” I told myself. “Five minutes remaining in section 6,” I later said. Then I looked. There were actually 6 minutes left. The fear of rejection again flowed over me.

Don’t deny you haven’t felt this at some point in your life. We all have. Mistakes are the equalizers, the humblers, the humanizers of life. Men, maybe you walked into a meeting with your zipper down and a white flag flying. Ladies, maybe you tucked your skirt into your pantyhose or your panties. Maybe you trailed toilet paper stuck to your shoe.

On one of the Food Network’s shows a professional chef mistook salt for the sugar that was to go into his dessert. Much as the judges tried to downplay it, it was the determining factor in not selecting him as champion. We fear these kinds of mistakes because we fear the rejection of others. All of us fear not belonging to someone or some group.

We learn this fear of mistakes from the very beginning. We are taught to do good or fear punishment. Often what the child thinks is that the parent has stopped loving him or her when they are corrected. This fear causes him or her to lie about the choices she or he makes, to not try, to avoid decisions.

In society, this fear is enforced in the same two ways: We accept those like us and ostracize or push away those who are annoying, obnoxious or just not like us. So we make sure we are doing what is acceptable by whatever group we want to remain a part of. We also punish in fear. Don’t believe me? Answer this: What do you do when you are driving on the highway and a police car enters into it.

God tells us we belong. He says, “I will never leave you or forsake (read this as reject) you.” (Hebrews 13:5) Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, “I don’t condemn you.” She had been held out as rejectable by those who had caught her. He also told Nicodemus, “God did not send His Son into the world to condemn it, but that the world through him might be saved.” (John 3:17) God’s nature is love not rejection or punishment.

When God does punish (Hebrews 12), He punishes in love. He will allow or even encourage the consequences  of our decisions to happen to us to teach us. He loves us and wants us to choose Him, His nature, His mind and thought process.

As we choose Him, He will reveal more of Himself to us. As more of God’s nature  is revealed in us, we leave less room in which Satan can work. God’s perfect loe is casting out our fears. What God has given us in Jesus is His personal attention, His personal correction and His personal direction for our lives. He is doing this from the inside out.What He is doing is showing us His acceptance. That acceptance transforms us from the inside out. We obey because we know we are loved. We don’t fear His rejection when we make mistakes.

Danny Silk points out in his book, “Loving Our Kids On Purpose,” (2008, Destiny Image Publishing, ISBN 0-7684-2739-8) that it wasn’t Satan who planted the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden; God did. He didn’t hide it atop a barren, snow-capped mountain top where still naked Adam and Eve would not want to go. Nor did He hide it behind a thorn bush, another challenge to our naked couple. He placed it in the middle of the Garden, next to the Tree of Life so Adam and Eve would have to choose.

Choice and discovery are parts of the joy of life. God will not take that way from us. Satan has turned that choice into something that has to be done right or else cause us to be rejected by God. He has made choice something to be feared when we make bad choices. But God’s own perfect love will cast our fears away from the inside out.

 

True Freedom

To the Jews who had not yet believed him, Jesus said, If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. They answered him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?” Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth; everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” (John 8:31-36)
Jesus was a problem for the Jews.  He didn’t fit their mold. Here he had just denied the law, as far as they were concerned, because he didn’t agree to stoning a woman caught in adultery, and now he wants to accuse them of being slaves to Satan. What?! Is he serious?!
You could almost hear them saying, “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Let’s get this straight: You let this sinful woman, this woman CAUGHT breaking the Law, you let her go without condemning her or her sin, but to us you say we are slaves to the devil? Don’t you have your positions off a little bit?”
Then there is “us”. We sit back, read the story, tell the Jews 2,000 years after the fact, “Duh, you guys just don’t get it do you? Hello! This is the LOOORRDD!! He came to die for you”
But most of the time, we don’t get it either. We truly are sons and daughters of the devil until and unless “the Son has set us free.” That is what Jesus did for the woman. He set her free. He didn’t condone her actions. He didn’t condemn her. Notice what he didn’t add to his statement, he didn’t say to her, “I don’t condemn you, but wait until my Dad gets you. Boy, then you’re in for it!” He said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.”
Do not continue to be a slave to sin, he told her and tells us. But we do. We run from the “God-stuff.”I have to borrow this statement from Wayne Jacobsen (http://www.lifestream.org/transition.php), “There are two ways to run from God-rebellion and religion” We excuse our sinfulness behind wild living because, “We are free.” Or we hide behind it in religion and become slaves to the Law, to a legal requirement we believe we are under now that we have been, “Washed in the blood of the Lamb.”
I wish I could truly say I understand completely what it means to live my life free from sin, to live in the freedom Jesus has given me. But the fact is I run “from ditch to ditch” either falling into the trap of rebellion by not wanting to look religious in my presentation of a life of freedom in Jesus; or in the condemnation (of self and others) and fear of trying to live a “pious” life. I either cuss too much, drink too much, lust too much, or I am looking down my nose at people I see cussing, drinking and lusting.
But I CAN give you a glimpse of what this life is like because I truly have experienced it. I can share what is the crux of a life in Jesus’ freedom. It starts with knowing deep down, “Neither do I condemn you.” (John 8:32) To know that you can stand before the Lord and have him tell you, “I am not condemning you” automatically takes a weight off our shoulders.
I had a conversation the other day with someone who was a bit pre-occupied by death. He didn’t understand it. Wasn’t sure what, if anything, waited on the other side. But he was burdened, and it was obvious, by his life. We all know who we truly are on the inside, don’t we? He didn’t want to say it, but you could easily get the sense of his main concern, “What will God say to me. How bad will hell be? I certainly know I don’t deserve heaven.” What if he knew he would say, “I don’t condemn you.” How would that change him? How would it change you?

But that is only part of the story and part of the problem. You see, in John 8, Jesus is standing before the Jews, people who need to know his freedom. He is saying he won’t condemn. He is setting people free because the Father sent him to proclaim “freedom for the captives.” Isaiah 61:1 says, “The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.”
What the Father-Son-Spirit has given us in Jesus is not only the key to the prison cell door, he is giving us training and a purpose for living. I saw a great story on Fox News a few weeks back. It is a story about a business called, “Felony Franks.” It is a hot dog stand in Chicago that hires ex-convicts to run the business. They serve “Pardon Burgers” and “Misdemeanor Wieners.” Their slogan is “Food so good, it’s criminal.”
The owner, Jim Allen, only hires ex-cons. Here’s the rub: Mr. Andrews is legally blind. He also owns a paper company that hires ex-cons as well. “Best crew I’ve ever had,” he says.  It is his mission to give people that second or third or fourth chance no one else will give them. (http://www.november.org/stayinfo/breaking06/FelonyFranks.html) When you are in prison you know it. You have no freedom. Even if someone lets you out, you still feel like you’re in prison because you can’t find work.  Mr. Andrews is truly setting people free. He is giving them a life to live, not by watching them, he can’t, but by giving them a reason and a means to get on with life.
That is what we get in and by and through Jesus. Once we recognize Jesus for who he is and what he is giving (it’s still an active giving) to us, we don’t need to live like hellions nor saints. In fact, the best way for us to live is just to spread the blessing of this freedom with people we know. Set prisoners free. Proclaim this great news to the poor in heart. Let those who are caught up in their own darkness that they are free.
So what about me? How did I know it? How did I sense it? How do I know I am free? I know I am free because I don’t condemn people for who they are as often as I did. I am free to love and forgive and accept people for who they are. I am free because I know that Jesus doesn’t condemn me, doesn’t condemn you and isn’t asing me to do anything to earn his love. I don’t need to feel religiously superior because other people are either caught up in their own sin, or religiously locked in a prison of performance.

I have friends in imprisoned in both categories. Some feel they can do whatever they want. They condemn themselves to hell, in their own minds, because they would rather be in hell having lived a “free” life than to be caught up in the condemnation of religion. On the other end of the spectrum I have friends who feel it necessary to quote scripture at the drop of a hat. Of course they leave the blessings for themselves and the curses for others.
Both groups are in prison, still, because neither believes there is a way out. The way of freedom is too scary for them. They fight and kick and scream that there is no other way. But there is for Jesus said, “I.” Let me emphasize that word, “I.” He didn’t say religion. He didn’t say church.  He didn’t say the Bible. He said, “I.” “I am the way.” I don’t feel freedom because of something I’ve done or do. I feel freedom because Christ says, “I am the way.” In other words, I (Frank) don’t have to worry about the how as long as I am focused on the who.
This is hard. I have moments and days where I believe I’m free. I live in the lack of pressure to live up to what my society thinks I am supposed to do. Then I feel the pressure of not being what I or others feel I should be. I’m not a good enough dad. I’m not a good enough husband. I’m not a good enough neighbor or teacher or pastor or coach or whatever.
None of this can change the reality of what the Son of God has done. That is why HE is the way. HE has lived a life in perfect obedience to the Father, something I could never do. HE has destroyed the pain of death by providing resurrection. HE has destroyed the corruption of sin that would have otherwise destroyed all humanity and me. HE has given me a place in the Father. HE has given me a union with the Trinity and with all humanity that makes me feel as if I belong. I feel free and know I am free because HE has done for me what I cannot nor would not do for myself.
I am free to love. I am free to give. I am free to care. I am free to care. I am free to mourn with those who are mourning and laugh with those who are laughing. I am free to rejoice with the rejoicing and free to comfort those who are hurting. I am free to enjoy a snoring baby, a cool waterfall, the roar of the ocean and the dance of dolphins. I am free to roast marshmallows and free to smoke cigars. I am free to dance with my wife and free to cry when my son or daughter is in pain. I am free.
The Jews just couldn’t get this because they wanted to hold on to their idea of what God wanted. The evangelical right is doing the same thing. They set up standards, all in the name of the glory of God, that are nothing but prisons; prisons because no one, not even they themselves could live up to those standards.
True freedom only comes when we trust that God is doing something in us and for us and to us that is happening solely because of his love for us. We don’t earn it, accept it, have a personal relationship with it, get baptized in it (unless it is he who is doing the baptizing), or anything else. “It is the gift of God lest any man should boast.” (Ephesians 2:9) Remember, Jesus HIMSELF is telling you, “Neither do I condemn you.”  Be free.

 

The Whole Duty of Man

This is a discussion introduction, I don’t really give sermons anymore, I gave on Memorial Day Sunday 2009. Nothing about patriotism is in it. I think the subject is a bit more important because in it is the seed of a lasting world peace so there will truly be no more war.
Ecclesiates 12:13 – “The whole duty of man is to fear God and keep the commandments.”
The Shorther Westminster Catechism says, “What is the chief end of man? Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.”
We sing praise songs and hymns.
We lift up supplication and adoration to God in our prayers.
We enjoy fellowship and communion with each other – and then we go home.
People who go to church don’t always “get” what it’s all about. They don’t understand  the pageantry or the symbolism, the words (like perichoresis or homoouisios) or see the point of all that goes on. But what they do know, what they clearly recognize is that they enjoy being around others that are doing the same thing.
Now I know that those of us who do not have a long history in our denomination (What was the Worldwide Church of God and is now Grace Communion International, www.gracecommunion.org) don’t always understand some of the things we talk about from our past like:
•    Third tithe
•    Night to be Much Observed
•    The Young Ambassadors
But I want to describe one thing that I hope will stay in your mind, because keeping it always in mind will help you understand what this “whole duty of man” concept is all about.
I want to tell you about an annual event we experienced known as the Feast of Tabernacles. You can find it described in Leviticus 23:33 and Deuteronomy 16:13. Jesus, himself, spoke in the Temple during the Feast in John 7. But for us, the feast was THE big event of the year.
•    We were commanded to save a second tithe, yes I said second as in another 10% of our money, so we could celebrate – and, boy, we knew how to party.
•    We were to gather “at the place where God would place his name” together.
•    Our kids would count the full moons until the Feast would arrive.
Our excitement grew as we would get closer and closer to the Feast site and you would start seeing the little green stickers, just like you had on your car, on cars from different states and Canada.
Or there would be an awe in the eyes of people who traveled with their second tithe mone to lands they’d previously only dreamed about.
The next thing you knew, you were checking into your hotel, or pull up in your RV or set up your campsite and you knew you had arrived. WOW! It brings a smile to my face just to think about it. But the excitement wasn’t over, it was still building.
And it continued to grow as the first night’s church service would open with rock concert anticipation. The roar of people in conversation and in joy was deafening, yet pleasing as you could see smiling faces everywhere and hear laughter. Then the worship conductor would welcome us and we would all start singing in unison:
Glorious things of thee are spoken;
Zion, city of our God
He whose words cannot be broken
Formed thee for His own abode!
For the next 8 days you were together eating, drinking, talking and singing in glory to our God. Friendships were made. Romances started. Games would be played. Sites would be seen. Serving and giving and loving and sharing would be in abundance. City officials would tell us how we had transformed an area in such a short time. There was a genuine joy everywhere you went.
Then, on the eighth day, after the last song of the 10th church service was sung and the closing prayer had been done, it was over.
•    Tears were shed as good-byes were made.
•    Promises to stay in touch were made
•    See you next year!
The let down and sadness were obvious. We were leaving the joy of the Feast, to enter back into “The World.”
What we had then we did not understand, for God was still revealing his true identity to us. What we now understand, we long for even more since the Feast is all but gone in its celebration. For what we experienced then at the Feast, and experience now every time we come together, is the joy of communion, real communion with God. It is the communion He has enjoyed for all eternity and for which we have been made.
So now what? Now that we know we are united in Christ in communion with the Trinity
Now that we can understand what communion is like and the joy and love that comes from it (1 Corinthians 13)
Now we have a choice to make. It’s not a one-time choice either.
Now we have to choose whether to take this communion with us, choose to remain in its joy, or we can surrender to Satan’s whisper, “But God doesn’t do this in the ‘real’ world.” Or “That’s just an emotion. You can’t live on emotion.”
The joy of communion with God is a choice. It’s there. It’s real. We can surround ourselves and wrap ourselves in its presence; or we can deny its presence because of what we see going on around us. All of that is really there, too, but all that is what you get when you don’t live in God’s communion. As Morpheus tells Neo in the movie, “The Matrix,” as God told the Israelites and tells us still today, “Choose wisely.”

 

What are you afraid of?

There I was, clutching the top of the 30-foot pole as tightly as I could. All I needed to do was to go from the last spike, which I used to effortlessly climb the pole to that point, onto the flat top. My then 6-year-old son pleaded with me to do what he had seen other do already: jump from the top onto a trapeze swing just 15 feet away. Besides, I was safely cinched into a harness and had an experienced assistant belaying me from the ground. But there I was frozen. I came down because I couldn’t get over my fear.

1 John 4 verse 18 tells us, “There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love.” (The Message) Fear of what God thinks of you is crippling. The Gospel is supposed to be freeing, but the story many have received as the Gospel only adds to their fears.

“God is an angry God,” many hear, the statement being taken from the famous 1741 Jonathan Edwards sermon. “Your sins have separated you from God,” is the scriptural warning. This concept of God comes in defiance of what the church preached for 1700 years. The writings of Ireneus of Lyons and Athanasius of Alexandria are consistent in telling us that all of humanity has been joined to God. God loves us.

Jesus himself talked about how we are in the Father and the Father in us (John 14). We find our very being held together, “for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’” (Acts 17:28, The Message)

But fear became the common concept. Where this came from, I’m not sure. Some blame Augustine whose constant battle with what he had done in his past often choked his writing of a loving, forgiving, accepting God. Some blame Western theologians who either mistakenly accepted Augustine’s neo-Platonist duality where spirit was good and flesh bad, or were power hungry trying with all their might to maintain control over the minds and hearts of lesser educated Christian laity.

Wherever it came from, however, it is contrary to the basic idea of God’s love for humanity. (Psalm 103) He longs for us to return to him for he doesn’t hold our sins against us. He understands our blindness and sin. He doesn’t condone it. (John 8:11) He loved us enough to send Jesus, not to condemn us, but to save us from the doubt and fear that is the basis for all sin.

In Genesis 3 we see that Satan used doubt to sew the seeds of fear against God in Eve’s mind. He tells her God is holding back. He says God can’t be trusted. She shares this with Adam and they take things into their own hands. Next, we see the two cowering in the bushes. Since they can’t trust God anymore, they believe that revealing themselves would cause God to act in an unknown way.

Since most of us hold onto that Augustinian/Western concept of duality and separation, we act much like our forebears and have a wrong concept of fearing God. We believe God can’t stand us because we sin. We avoid church or use it as a measuring stick to show how much more worthy we are to God than someone else. 

But fear is a useless enterprise. It does not draw us any closer to God. Fear does not draw us closer to each other. Fear separates. It destroys. It keeps us from moving forward, much as I could go no further up that pole. 

As far as the church thing goes, I’d like to have a dollar for every time someone said to me, “I need to get my act together before I can go to church.” I’d be cash rich. My portfolio is another story. But since we are at it, is the downturn in economy causing you to fear? Do you question whether God loves you? Do you think a declining portfolio value is a sign of God’s rejection?

Only when we recognize the reality of the Triune God can fear be overcome. We can only move forward when we realize that God is saying to us, “Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more.” Some believe that the woman who was caught in adultery is the same one who anointed Jesus with the expensive ointment just prior to his own death. She felt free from her own past and free from the worry of what “wasting” her portfolio of ointment.

Only when you understand that God in his mutual indwelled self is love (1 John 4:8) can you release your fears about Him, your fears about life. Only then will you realize that God is out to get you, get you to realize that in Jesus he has collected you in His arms to tell you, “I will never leave you or forsake (reject) you.”

 

What you may not know about Christmas will make you Merry

Sorry I haven’t posted in awhile, but my other hats as husband, dad, pastor, high school teacher and volleyball coach have just been eating my time up. By the way, please check out my church’s new website at http://newdirection.ws. There is a lot of really interesting material, audio, visual as well as written, that will help you on this great journey with the Father, Son and Spirit.

It is the Christmas season and we have endured all kinds of challenges regarding what was meant to be a joyous occasion for the world. You remember the scene in Matthew: “For I bring you tidings of great joy. For to you this day is born in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the King.”

Yet this message of the fact that a Savior is born is lost in the cacophony of, “Secularists are trying to destroy Christmas,” or “There is no gods or angels,” or “Christmas has become too commercial.” I love that last one because it assumes there can be a level of commercialism that is acceptably attached to the birth of the Savior.

I don’t want to add to the cacophony, but I do want you to know somethings about what early Christianity (and some still do today) called, “The Incarnation.” It was in the Incarnation that early Christians found hope, joy and peace, which is why the Angel Gabriel declared, “Peace on Earth!”

 ”Incarnation” is a funny way of repeating what was written about Jesus in the Bible and taught in the creeds of the early church, that Christ became man. Often this story of the Incarnation gets lost in the birth of a baby. That is not to say that Christ wasn’t born a baby, but it is the identity of that baby that so often gets lost. We proclaim the son of God, but that story gets lost in the myriad of other stories, chief among them being stories from pagan mythology where the gods come down, have sex with a woman and the child borne is said to be the son of a god. By the way, I use the word pagan solely as a means of separating the source of the stories from the story of Jesus. But more on that in another post.

Let’s start the story of Christmas in another place. Let’s start the story at its literary beginning. Let’s start at the beginning of the Bible, in the Pentateuch or Torah, in the first line of Genesis where the first words hit us like a ton of bricks. “In the beginning God created.” (Genesis 1:1)

The beginning of the story tells us a few things: 1) There was a beginning. This is something that scientists have proven. At some point there was nothing and then there was something. There was no pre-existent mass as the law of half lives of matter would beg to differ. But a beginning there was.

2) God was there before the beginning. Note that it doesn’t say, “stuff was about to happen and then God showed up.” This is poignantly portrayed in the New Testament in the first chapter of John’s Gospel, “In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God (Theos) and the Logos was God (Theos).” The Greek here denotes a time of existence in which the Logos and Theos and Pneumos (Spirit) existed, but there was no physical creation. This is an important point to remember as we get into the story.

3) This God that was before the beginning created. Again, the first chapter of John’s Gospel gives us another view of this same story: “All things were made by him (the Logos) and there is nothing in existence that he didn’t make.” (John 1:3) By the way, this is my paraphrase of the text, so don’t freak if your bible doesn’t say exactly that.

This Logos was the Creator we meet in Genesis 1:1. But the Creator is with God. OK, what gives here? Two Gods? Well, this is the beginning of the doctrine of the Christian Trinity, but let’s not get sidetracked except to say that the Father, Son and Spirit have always existed in love (1 John 4:8) such that it is part of their character. The point is that whoever this Logos is, he created everything. Not only did he create everything including you, but He is the one who sustains you keeping your heart beating and your brain waving. (Acts 17:28)

Let’s now continue the story of Christmas. You know the part where Gabriel tells Mary she is going to have a baby? This is where things get mixed up. Did Jesus become God’s Son when he was conceived, when he was born or what? To understand this you have to pay close attention to the storyline here. 

We know there is God. We now know there is this other God or part of God known as the Logos. We know that they existed before there was a Creation, and we know that this Logos was the one who created everything. Now notice John 1:14, “The Logos (Word) became flesh and dwelled among us.”

What is this saying here? Well first we have the Word, the Logos, and he became flesh. It doesn’t say he became a man, it says he became “flesh” which is even more important. It is saying that not only did the Logos become man, but he became man as you and I are man (human). He put on all of our limitations. He could die. He needed to eat. He needed sleep. He even needed to take a dump. 

What!! That’s disrespectful! That’s sacrilegious! But that’s true! He was every bit human as we are, subject to pain, sorrow, laughter, joy, anger and pooping. If he is not that way, and later theologians would paint a picture of him that was less than truly human, then we cannot be saved.

Now comes the part where the Incarnation should make us happy: When the Logos also becomes human, he the creator becomes part of His own creation. Creation now becomes permanently interlinked with its Creator. Jesus isn’t half god and half man, he is fully God and fully human.

That is why the Incarnation is great news! That is why the life of Jesus is great news! That is why his death and resurrection are great news and why his ascension into heaven where He sits at the right hand of the Father is amazing news!

Listen to the words of Athanasius of Alexandria from the 4th Century: “He, the Mighty One, the [Creator] of all, Himself prepared this body in the virgin as a temple for Himself, and took it for His very own, as the instrument through which He was known and in which He dwelled. Thus, taking a body like our own, because all our bodies were liable to the corruption of death, He surrendered His body to death instead of all, and offered it to the Father. This He did out of sheer love for us, so that in His death all might die, and the law of death thereby be abolished because, having fulfilled in His body that for which it was appointed, it was thereafter voided of its power for men. This He did that He might turn again to incorruption men who had turned back to corruption, and make them alive through death by the appropriation of His body and by the grace of His resurrection. Thus He would make death to disappear from them as utterly as straw from fire.” On the Incarnation of the Word,” Chapter 2:8

The Logos became flesh that he would permanently abolish the death and corruption we all face because of our sin, our disobedience, our inability to follow God as we were planned. He who made us “in his likeness” planned all along for us to live like Him for all eternity. The Incarnation is the beginning of the end for death. It was the beginning of the end for all the negative parts of our creation, the destruction, the disease, the mental illness, the war and hunger and arguments and pettiness that causes us to separate ourselves from each other. In Jesus’ body is the beginning of a fulfilling life that was always the plan of the Father. (John 10:10)

That is why the news of Christmas is “joy to the world,” because “the Lord, the Logos, Jesus, the Messiah has come! Let Earth receive her King.” 

- Merry Christmas to you all!

Frank