Future Veterans

But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction ... -- 2 Peter 2:12

We have come to Veterans' Day when we recall and revere those who gave pieces of their lives to, so they hoped, save their nations and advance civilization and liberty.  It is becoming fashionable, I fear, to dismiss these courageous and worthy souls as puppets of government schemes and corruption.  Governments are corrupt, and there is no end to schemers. 

That is a little like what Peter says here.  Even in the Body of Christ, rising up like blemishes on the face of the Bride, there will always be those who cannot give up their corruption.  The material world and this fleeting life is all they believe in, all they hope for, and all to which they care to cling.  Such people make a travesty of religious faith.  They deceive and dissemble, connive and conceal.  They mock the truth and righteousness by every word they speak and every vile plot they hatch in the dark corners of their hearts.

There's a part of me that reacts to this and says, This should not be.  We ought to be able to rid ourselves of such "irrational animals", these destroyers and deceivers.  That ought to be the case in the Church, certainly, but also in the world.  We have a bias in the modern age toward thinking that tomorrow will be a little better and a little brighter than today, and next year there will be newer and better things and a better world than we had last year.  We are past the false teachers of Christianity and the despots of the world.  There will be no more mud and blood and Great Wars, no more global conflagrations.  Slowly but surely we are ridding the world of violence, corruption, and evil.  We just have to press on.

It's a nice thought, but it is wrong. There are going to be wars, depressions, famines, earthquakes, and pestilence.  Our nation will go the way of all nations.  There will be death and destruction such as never seen before in history because there are more people and more advanced technology and more powerful and deadly weapons than ever before.  It could start tomorrow; or, it may be forty years or more.  I made be in the middle of it, or I may die before it really gets going.  The reason I know this will happen is simply that there are so many blind, unreasoning, brutish people in the world and far too many of them are in positions of power and influence.  They will do irrational, stupid things.  They will destroy much and will themselves be destroyed by their own corrupt practices and beliefs. 

Those whom we celebrate on Veterans' Day stood up against the brutes and beat them back for a time.  But such creatures are never eradicated.  They came back to be dealt with once more. 

We should pray that both in the Church and in the world, we may be able to stand strong when it is our time to face the adversaries.

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

So Lot chose for himself all the Jordan Valley, and Lot journeyed east. Thus they separated from each other. -- Genesis 13:11

As Lot learned through much suffering and loss, the path that looks easy in the beginning does not always end so pleasantly.  Sometimes, too, there are separations that need to take place.  The man who would become Abraham had been called to leave behind his land, his people and even his family to follow God and found a new nation.  Loyalty and love had caused him to keep his nephew, Lot, with him as he sojourned in Canaan.  We read how both Lot and Abram prospered and how the increase of their herds caused conflict that led to separation.

Before jumping too far ahead and saying, “Abraham good; Lot bad”, I note that both men had their weaknesses.  Abraham could be controlled by fear and be less than forthright in his dealings.  Meanwhile Peter’s Second Epistle calls Lot “righteous” and speaks of the torment of his “righteous soul” as he dwelt among the lawless in Sodom (2 Peter 2:7-8).  I’m reminded, also, of the conflict between Barnabas and Paul that caused their parting (Acts 15:36-41).  When the Lord divides us from a friend, associate, or family member, it isn’t always because one of us is pulling the other down or because one is right and the other wrong.  It may be part of a greater plan that He has, the ends of which are beyond our powers of speculation and discernment. 

I think about that a lot these days.  You may have seen that map of the United States where it is divided regionally into, I think, eleven different cultures like the Deep South and Greater Appalachia.  Whether there is much to that or not, we seem to be hearing more talk of secession and of unsustainability of the current national model.  We are seeing greater disagreement between the secular and the sacred, between Muslim and Christian, black and white, left and right, often with violence and bloodshed.  Jesus does say (Matthew 10:34-39) that He has come to divide, to sift and to separate, the believing from the unbelieving, the righteous from the wicked, the wheat from the tares, and the sheep from the goats.

We lament these divisions, conflicts and losses, in part because we do not see the destiny to which they move us, but also because of our natural human affection for one another, for the American dream, for a simpler time, or whatever it is we feel is slipping away.  Abraham never stopped caring about Lot.  He rescued him from the king of Elam (Genesis 14), and he interceded for Lot and his family when God was about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. 

Death, disagreement, or distance, partings of the ways are unavoidable.  Trust God.  Continue to love the departed and pray for an unbroken circle.

Scattered Thoughts on Holiness

And Shecaniah the son of Jehiel, of the sons of Elam, addressed Ezra: We have broken faith with our God and have married foreign women from the peoples of the land, but even now there is hope for Israel in spite of this. -- Ezra 10:2

The Lord requires us to separate ourselves from the world, not in terms of physical distance but in spiritual dimensions.  Thus the children of Israel were forbidden to marry outside of the Covenant People as a sign to us not to cohabit with or unite ourselves to the world’s matrix.  We corrupt our spiritual DNA by mixing it with apostasy, unbelief, and materialism. 

In John 17, as Jesus prays for His disciples, He acknowledges that they will remain in the world while declaring that, like Him, they are not of the world.  They not of the world, even as I am not of the world (John 17:16).  Jesus, however, sent them, and sends us, out into the world to encounter tribulation and persecution for the sake of the kingdom.   

The distinction and the dividing line between the Christian and the non-Christian is not that we inhabit different physical spaces but different psychic spaces.  Our souls are in different spheres though our bodies may interact.  The non-believer inhabits and lives according to the fallen, distorted, Adamic world still ruled by the satanic “powers and principalities”.  We live in the kingdom, and the kingdom lives in us. 

Marriage within the boundaries of the covenant produced righteous children leading ultimately to the Seed of Abraham, Jesus the Christ.  The significance – that is, the “sign value” -- of marriage transcends the relationship between a man and his wife.  The womb is a creative space, and we can find such space in our interactions with the world system and marry ourselves to it.  The products of that union may have some good qualities, but they also contain the seeds of corruption.  This is what we see over and over in the great tragedies, whether it’s Shakespeare, Wuthering Heights or Goodfellas.

We can avoid that by uniting ourselves with Christ.  Look at 1 Corinthians 7:14, For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.  We are the Bride of Christ.  We are made holy by Him. We become His creative space.  The Church has – or maybe, is a matrix, too.  The offspring of the union between Christ and His Bride does not have that built-in element of decay and degeneration. 

Divers

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?  What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever?  What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. -- 2 Corinthians 6:14-16

Yesterday we talked about our witness to an unbelieving world, about hating sin while seeking to rescue those tangled in its snares.  We understand, too, that we each have our individual weaknesses and have to watch ourselves around certain situations.  We want to reach out to people, but can we be friends with those who reject Christ?  Matthew Henry thought not:

The caution also extends to common conversation. We should not join in friendship and acquaintance with wicked men and unbelievers. Though we cannot wholly avoid seeing and hearing, and being with such, yet we should never choose them for friends. We must not defile ourselves by converse with those who defile themselves with sin.

I have to disagree with that interpretation.  Too much in Scripture points a different direction.  Jesus was a friend of sinners.  Now it is true that those with whom He associated were often repentant seekers, or perhaps people seeking to repent; nevertheless, He broke with the pharisaic view of complete separation.  At the same time, those tax collectors and prostitutes were mostly Jews or sympathetic to the people and faith of Abraham, with the possible exception of the Syrophoenician woman whose daughter was afflicted (Mark 7:24-30).

In our case, when the overall culture was more permeated with Judeo-Christian values, it was probably easier to be a friend of sinners.  At worst we were dealing “cultural Christians”.  I heard John Starnes, the gospel singer, give his testimony.  Before he came to Christ, he had someone ask him if he was a Christian.  He replied, “Of course.  I’m an American.”  That reminds me of a convict I was talking to one time.  He was a black guy, and he was wearing a scarf over his head, kind of Arab fashion.  Nation of Islam is extremely popular in prison.  I knew this guy, and we talked all the time, but I’d never seen him with that headgear, so I asked him if he was a Muslim.  He said, “Hell no, man.  I’m a Baptist!” 

However, it seems to me, perhaps because I am getting old and because I don’t get out much anymore, that our nation is becoming less “Christian” in its overall morals, ethics, and mindset.  The zeitgeist is not the Holy Ghost. Our public discourse is saturated with lies and deception.  We have become decadent.  The most egregious immorality is excused when it is not lauded and celebrated. 

In this world, in this society, the idea of separation starts to make more sense.  We do risk becoming contaminated when we allow ourselves to be immersed in vulgarity, lust, and violence, baptized in nihilism. 

Perhaps the balance comes in being open vertically only to God while searching for kindred and lost treasures in the horizontal.  It’s like being in a surface-supplied diving suit, tethered and connected to a source of fresh air and power by a diver's umbilical giving us light and life as we explore the murky depths looking for that which may be saved.  As long as we remain in the suit – having put on Christ, the new man – and don’t break our connection, we can stay down here and do our job.  Our life is always, though, above, and we can never forget that we are in -- but not of, this world.

Escaping the Elements

But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? -- Galatians 4:9

I am an advocate for common sense.  We can avoid a lot of trouble in life solely by paying attention to our sensory inputs, being courteous, and keeping our mouths shut.  When it comes to spiritual truth, however, we need revelation.  Our sense data and the common principles of horizontal relationships are inadequate. 

The Gentiles to whom Paul preached had little to go on other than elementary rules.  From those rudiments, they constructed, we might say, their gods who were fickle and petty, plagued with the same weaknesses as humans.   Occasionally there were flashes of inspiration and glimpses of the absolute as God laid the groundwork for the coming revelation in Christ.  The nations often had an archetype they could link to the gospel of Jesus Christ.  There was nothing as full and complete as the Law and the Prophets given to the Jews, but everybody had something. 

Nonetheless, Jew and Gentile alike were, for the most part, in bondage to rules, ceremonies, rituals, and rites meant to appease divine wrath and gain divine favor.  The Jews had the advantage because their God, though requiring careful approach and respect, was perfect.  He was, indeed, “jealous”, not willing to share worship with any idol, not subject to depiction in any form.  He was, in many ways, as Paul proclaimed to the Athenians, the Unknown God. 

Through Christ, though, we come to know God, even more we are known by Him.  He could not know us, be associated with us, befriend us, or call us His children when we were unrighteous and unholy.  We were strangers, alienated from our Father.  The only way for us to be accepted was through the perfect sacrifice, the Cross.  God has been satisfied in His justice, His righteousness, and His holiness.  We are now family.

I no longer have to offer a lamb or a calf on an altar to be in God’s favor, to receive His grace and forgiveness, or to have access to Him in prayer.  I don’t need to worry about being able to get to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover or the Feast of Tabernacles.  God blesses me because I am His child, adopted in Christ – not because I give my tithe.  To ask the one who has put his faith in Christ to go back to appeasing God through ceremony and animal sacrifice is an affront to the blood Jesus shed.  

Yet, I still give to those in need.  I help out ministries.  I don’t commit adultery thereby keeping my wife from committing murder.  I don’t steal, and I try not to lie or covet.  I did my best to honor my parents, and I have no other gods and no graven images.  I’m assuming it’s OK to have some depictions of Jesus and angels and saints.  I do wish I could convince the boss that the buck-naked waterboy statue is of the devil.  I’m still working on the cussing thing and the Sabbath.  I don’t do or not do those things because I’m trying to impress the Lord, but because I want to live and act in a way consistent with my new nature. 

I try to pay attention to the Spirit and follow His leading rather than going by what I see and hear in the natural realm.  I do not want to be in bondage again to the elements of sense.   I do not want to act out of fear but from faith, because … the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom (2 Corinthians 3:17).

The Law is good.  The disciplines, rites and ordinances of the Church are good – baptism, communion, prayer, fasting, etc., but they don’t make us right with God.  Only the Blood of the Cross makes us right.  We are set free as children of the King and citizens of the Kingdom, and we ought not be in bondage to anything -- good or bad. 

Armed to the Teeth

Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh,  arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God. – 1 Peter 4:1-2

This is similar to Paul’s instruction in verse 5 of Philippians chapter 2: “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus….”  How we think is our protection against being entrapped and controlled by the world and its illusions.  If you tell someone these days that listening to certain kinds of music, reading some books, watching some shows on television, or looking at certain kinds of pictures on the internet is a bad idea, you are liable to get accused of legalism.  What you are really guilty of is common sense. 

If you have a well-developed sense of right and wrong and have come to comprehend what it means to reject self and take up the cross, a great deal of popular culture is going to make you uncomfortable -- at best.  When I started getting my life straightened out thirty-plus years ago -- I'm still working on it, you'll know I'm finished, mostly, when you hear I'm dead -- I was kind of an audiophile.  I had a big component system with a receiver, cassette deck, turntable, high-quality cartridge, and huge speakers, and I had dozens of albums.  I decided it was all too much of a distraction, and I needed some Christmas money, so I sold everything.  I remember, though I hated to see a lot of it go, feeling a sense of relief that it would no longer be there to draw me away.  

I didn't do it because somebody told me that I would go to hell if I didn't.  I didn't do it so I could tell people how holy I was.  I didn't even do it because I thought God would love me more.  I no longer wanted to live for my own passions and my own ends.  I didn't set foot in a movie theater for nearly twenty years.  The only show we would watch on television for a while was Dr. Quinn.  Having to listen to country music in some place like a restaurant made me almost ill -- some country music still has that effect.  

Some stuff I can genuinely enjoy, like Firefly, but I still have to be careful because it is so easy to pick up on the characters' way of thinking.  It's not that we don't understand these things are fictional and fantastic.  We do, but we also identify with them.  We admire courage and boldness, skill and ingenuity.  We want those things in our lives, and, similar to what Father Stephen is saying in the linked post, we end up feeding, strengthening and encouraging a self that really just needs to die.  We tend to pick up on whatever truth is contained in what is being said or sung or depicted and when we bring it in, some other not so elegant stuff tends to come along for the ride.

To stand strong against the world, the flesh, and the devil, to be identified with Christ, there are some things we may find it necessary to let go, for a time, or forever.  If it is pulling us down, we ought to turn it loose.  Think like Jesus.