The Aroma of the Sanctuary

Tell the Israelites: This is My holy anointing oil … It is not to be used for [ordinary] anointing on a person’s body, and you must not make anything like it using its formula. It is holy, and it must be holy to you. --Exodus 30:31-32

As for the incense you are making, you must not make any for yourselves using its formula. It is to be regarded by you as sacred to the LORD. --Exodus 30:37

When they observed the boldness of Peter and John and realized they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed and knew that they had been with Jesus. --Acts 4:13

To be holy means to be set apart to and for the Lord. The term consecration is one side of the holiness equation. We give ourselves over to God that He might work in our lives according to His purpose. In the Old Testament spiritual economy of animal sacrifices when a man gave a lamb or a ram or a bull to be sacrificed, he had consecrated it. For his part, he had made it holy to the Lord. People could be holy as well, as one entire tribe was dedicated to serving God; this fell especially the sons of Aaron, who constituted the priesthood. They lived solely for that end, to stand in as mediators before God, offering sacrifices in obedience that God might look favorably upon His people. The priesthood foreshadows what is revealed and fulfilled in Christ, our great High Priest.

There is another side to holiness, and that is God’s work in making holy what is given to Him in consecration. It is referred to as sanctification.

According to Exodus, holiness has its own aroma. The Israelites were strictly forbidden to use any of the aromatic anointing oil or the incense burned on the altar in the Holy Place in their homes or on anyone who was not a priest. There was a dividing line between the holy and the profane. When a priest came into the courts of the Temple, he washed off the contamination of the common world. When he left after fulfilling his duties, he had to leave behind the priestly garments in which he had ministered. Still, I am sure a priest returning to his home retained some of the smell of the holy. If he had been anointed, the oil had penetrated his skin. If he had been in the Sanctuary, the smoke of the incense was upon him, on his skin and in his hair. The fragrance of holiness clung to him.

I would guess that many of us have met people who seemed to be perfumed with holiness. The cachet of God’s presence lingers upon them. They have been with Jesus. They have met the Lord in secret and the scent of His touch pervades even their material being. When Peter and John were brought before the Sanhedrin for preaching in the name of Jesus, they impressed the rulers with their boldness. The religious leaders took note of the fact that these simple fishermen had been changed by having been with Jesus. But another man was even more aware of this: the crippled man the Apostles had encountered at the Gate Beautiful. When Peter and John looked upon the lame man as he asked for alms, he caught the scent of holiness, of the Holy of Holies. He believed, and he was healed.

What we learn from Exodus is that holiness cannot be imparted indiscriminately. We are not to take what is holy and give it to the dogs anymore than we should throw pearls to hogs. We cannot drag people into the presence of God. What we can do is go into His presence ourselves and spend time there. We can place ourselves before God and allow the sanctifying atmosphere to permeate our being. Then, those with whom we come in contact will catch the scent of holiness and be drawn to Him.

Those who follow Christ are the salt of the earth, the light of the world. Jesus asks if salt loses its savor or saltiness, what good is it. Savor is a lot like aroma. If the Christian does not have the fragrance of heaven, if his presence has no bite or flavor, what good is he? The weakness and ineffectiveness of Christianity in the modern world must be laid at the feet of the individual believer -- at my feet. The Lord asks only that I give Him time -- that I have enough faith in Him to spend time in His presence. I don’t have to isolate myself physically. I can enter the Sanctuary on a plane, even in coach, in the mall, or at the office. Even briefly entering the presence of God allows that aroma of holiness to be renewed.

I can’t blame anyone else. Bringing that fragrance of life into the world is my job, and I have failed too often. What I can’t do much about are the plentiful and futile attempts to concoct a knock-off. Every time church doors open across America there are people who put forth their best effort to make others believe they are drenched in holy cologne. It is a waste of time. Only a true encounter with God in secret will sanctify us and impart the right scent. Accept no substitutes.

But thanks be to God, who always puts us on display in Christ, and spreads through us in every place the scent of knowing Him. For to God we are the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To some we are a scent of death leading to death, but to others, a scent of life leading to life. And who is competent for this? (2 Corinthians 2:14-16)

Feeling A Little Sheepish?

Who perceives his unintentional sins? Cleanse me from my hidden faults. … May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to You, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer – Psalm 19:12-14

The verse does not speak about secret sins, those things we know of and hide from others. It says that there are things below our level of awareness that are wrong. As Lynyrd Skynyrd said, “There are things goin’ on that you don’t know.” The Psalmist prays to be free even of those. If there are sins we know not of, could there be virtues of which we are unaware? I think so. In fact I think the true saint often does the good unconsciously. It could even be that what we do unaware reflects who we really are.

It is always a struggle for me to keep my motives pure. I can do the right thing all day long – provided I get full credit. Jesus taught us that when we give or do righteous acts we are not to let the left hand know what the right hand is doing. Keep it secret, even from ourselves. That seems a little bizarre, but it means we should not think of what we are doing as righteous. We should not think of it at all.

Luke 17:10 – In the same way, when you have done all that you were commanded, you should say, ‘We are good-for-nothing slaves; we’ve only done our duty.’

The old man is always hanging around to take credit for anything righteous. It’s like humility. An indication that I may have missed the point is having the thought flash through my head: “Damn! Ain’t I humble though!” So, too, if I find myself thinking that I must be an awfully good person to have done so much for others, I may be edging toward the ditch. Obviously I can only speculate on what is in the mind of a true saint, but I’m fairly certain they do not get caught up in thinking about their own good deeds. For one thing that draws us back into the past, while the saint is normally focused on right now.

I probably shouldn’t have gone down this road because I don’t really have any practical way to deal with what I see as my problem. I mean, if virtue is hidden from me, if I am not aware of it, how can I do anything about it one way or the other? The Psalmist prayed that God would cleanse him from hidden faults. Then he prayed that what he said and his thoughts would be pleasing to God. That might be something I could do. I could meditate on, as Paul said, those things that are true, honorable, just, pure, beautiful, and commendable. Proverbs does say that as a man thinks within himself, so he is. If I meditate on Jesus and all that He did, on how He lived as well as His death, burial and resurrection, if I keep Him before me then possibly I would be cultivating that hidden virtue. And when you think about it, that’s what it means to have Christ in my heart – not spatially but relationally.

One more passage that illustrates this concept that I’m trying to get hold of is in Matthew 25 where Jesus tells us about a coming judgment and a division of the nations as a shepherd would separate the sheep from the goats. This reference to dividing sheep and goats speaks of a difference in the very nature of the groups about to be judged. I suppose a goat might occasionally or at times act like a sheep, or the odd sheep might exhibit some goatish behavior now and then, but basically they are different creatures, with different attitudes and characteristics, different hearts, you might say. Jesus condemned the one group, the goats, for their neglecting and rejecting Him. He blesses and rewards the sheep for accepting and caring for Him. Strange as it may seem, both groups ask the same question. “When did we do that?” You see, the goats were simply being goats, and the sheep were acting like sheep. Neither one thought they had done anything special, good or bad. They were simply following their hearts.

And I will give them one heart and put a new spirit within them; I will remove their heart of stone from their bodies and give them a heart of flesh, so they may follow My statutes, keep My ordinances, and practice them. Then they will be My people, and I will be their God. -- Ezekiel 11:19,20

What Does It All Mean, Mr. Natural?

He went away from there and came to His hometown, and His disciples followed Him. When the Sabbath came, He began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard Him were astonished. “Where did this man get these things?” they said. “What is this wisdom given to Him, and how are these miracles performed by His hands? Isn’t this the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James, Joses, Judas, and Simon? And aren’t his sisters here with us?” So they were offended by Him.

Then Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his hometown, among his relatives, and in his household.” So He was not able to do any miracles there, except that He laid hands on a few sick people and healed them. And He was amazed at their unbelief. – Mark 6:1-6

Those folks from Nazareth have kin all over the world. Some of my ancestors might have come from there.

After all, I wonder, what do we expect?

What I don’t expect is for the commonplace to suddenly take on the transcendent and for the profane to become sacred. I don’t expect “Holy unto the LORD” to be inscribed on my milk cow’s bell. The mockers will often speak of Moses and his encounter with a talking plant, as though a talking animal were any less fantastic. At least the Scripture is clear in the case of the burning bush that it was not the vegetation speaking, but God Himself through it. With primates the source is less certain.

People just don’t like the common to get out of hand. As in the case of Jesus whom the Nazarenes thought they knew, we can be offended when someone or something around us takes on attributes of the divine. I don’t know if it so much that familiarity breeds contempt. It is more like we just stop looking at the things that are most familiar.

What intrigues me most about this passage, though, is that Jesus’ homies do not really question the wisdom of what He is saying or the miraculous power attributed to Him. They seem to acknowledge this, and, in fact, it is this very fact that offends them.

Who are YOU to have wisdom and divine power? The fact that God may be able to speak or operate in this world through some people is not the issue. It is when God begins to speak and operate through someone I know that I have a problem.

You don’t have to empty hospital rooms or break up funerals to cause offense – though I am pretty sure if you did the AMA, the AHA, and the National Association of Funeral Directors, not to mention the ACLU and CAIR, would be on your tail for practicing medicine without a license, unfair trade practices, violating the civil rights of the dead and making a mockery of Mohammed. Much less dramatic demonstrations cause more than enough offense, as the folks that voted for Proposition 8 in California found out. The fact that a person believes in Christ, thinks Global Warming is a scam, opposes Islamic fascism, same-sex marriage, socialism, or one of the left’s other causes du jour is quite sufficient.

Merely living a decent life is enough to make one offensive to many. After all, if there are people who do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with their God that means it is possible. Some of us may be a little more comfortable thinking that holiness is a nice concept, but not very practical -- which brings me to the point that has been nagging me for the last few days. As 2 Peter 3:10 and 11 puts it:

But the Day of the Lord will come like a thief; on that day the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, the elements will burn and be dissolved, and the earth and the works on it will be disclosed. Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people should you be…[?]

Or, how should we then live?

You and I may not have the same set of questions. Mine go something like this:

Do I really believe that I am a child of God in Christ?

Do I really believe God is my Father and cares for me more than any earthly parent possible could? And the corollary to that – do I believe God cares more about my loved ones than I do?

Do I really believe this world is not all there is, and that life, therefore, has a purpose beyond the futility of animal existence?

Can God really be trusted?

Is God able to work His will in the lives of those who trust Him?

Is my obedience really more important than my comfort, my reputation, my status, and my possessions?

Those are a few of my questions, and, like I said, other people may have different ones. The bad thing is that after all these years my answers are still pretty weak and tentative, and sometime inconsistent. I guess the good thing is I do know the right answer.

Bluetooth Man

I started to post an old piece I had written, but I just finished the Walker Percy novel, and it has me thinking about philosophers and novelists and what a hard job it is to write a modern/post-modern/post-post-modern book that people will actually read. The various genres of literature – fantasy, science fiction, westerns, historic, etc., take us out of our mundane world in a fairly straightforward way. We move into the writer’s world or into their time, learn the rules and the boundaries, and the story then unfolds before us.

Sometimes things throw us off. I remember several years ago reading a Max Brand western called, I think, The Seventh Man. The hero is not a bad man, but he is a wild throwback of sorts who lives outside civilization. He helps a man sought by the law by taking the fugitive’s mare, Gray Molly, and leading the sheriff and his men away from their quarry. One of the pursuers deliberately shoots the mare in an attempt to end the chase. The hero escapes but vows revenge on all the members of the posse for the mare’s unnecessary death. He is able to carry out his revenge, in part because of his companions -- a magnificent stallion and a highly intelligent wolf or wolf-hybrid. The climax of the story is a long chase across country, and the hero is nearly undone by something he doesn’t understand: technology. Though those who are after the hero have no horses that can match his steed, the telephone has made its appearance, and it is used by a clever official to run down the avenger.

I was ambivalent. I understand the use of new technology as a plot point, whether it is the telephone, the telegraph, railroads, barbwire or whatever – man versus machine, the end of the frontier – all of those things are part of the historical reality. Technology changes and forces the culture to change. Dealing with it can make an interesting story, just generally not one I prefer. I like worlds where there is no GPS, no computers, no cell phones, telephones, or telegraphs, where there’s open space and room to get lost.

The more gadgets you hang on anything, the less it becomes a human endeavor. Sure, humans still build the gadgets – at least I think humans were involved in creating Vista – but many of these devices create limits as much as they create opportunities. I’m obviously not against technology, but I think we have to be careful and choose wisely to find things that make us stronger and more independent rather than weaker and more dependent.

It seems to me that as we have less and less privacy, it becomes increasingly difficult to describe or diagnose the human condition. The more our lives are open and viewable, the less we actually see. Consider the celebrity phenomenon. You can know everything about a sports figure or a movie star or a politician, but their actions, thoughts and beliefs can become contaminated by their own image. We see too much of them, and, they, in effect, see too much of themselves. That is, they see too much of what they are trying to make themselves appear to be. I am afraid we will soon learn this is precisely the case with Obama. He is like a man caught in a hall of mirrors unable to distinguish where he actually stands.

Any literary work that attempts to depict man in the late 20th and early 21st centuries is forced to work with and around rapid technological advances. It is difficult not to get trapped by gadgetry. Take, for example, that classic movie The Thing, made, I believe, about 1982. The computers and some of the other equipment look archaic, but it works for the story. Try to remake that movie and set it in 2010 and the plot would have to change in several points to make sense. I wonder how many recent movies or action/adventure novels set in the current time frame have a conveniently inconvenient loss of cell phone service or loss of the cell phone at some point. Stories often turn on isolation and the lack of communication between various parties. It is going to look more and more contrived for people not to think of Google or not having security videos or not taking pictures with their camera phones.

Look there -- it's a David Gemmell heroic fantasy novel and a guaranteed bluetooth-free zone. I know where I'm headed.

This Must Be For You

Anyone who has an ear to hear should listen to what the Spirit says to the churches. -- Revelation 3:22

This ends the section of the book of Revelation where the Lord gives specific messages to each of the seven churches of Asia Minor. If you attend to experts discussing this section, some will say that the various churches are types – some churches are like Philadelphia, or Smyrna, and others are like Ephesus or Laodicea. Other students of the Bible will tell you that these represent stages or ages that the Church will go through leading up to the end times. Futurists and pre-millennialists tend to think that way.

I don’t know about all that, but I don’t think it matters so much. I think this verse could be the key to the whole book of Revelation, if not the Bible. What does it say? Anyone who is capable of hearing should, not must, but should listen. Listen to what? What difference does it make to me what the Lord said to some ancient, long-dead Christians in Thyatira or Sardis? I’m not where they were, and they were not dealing with my problems.

What God says, He does not say solely to one group of people in one period at one place. His word transcends culture, language, space, and time. I’m all for using the available tools to study Scripture, for good hermeneutics, and, at least to some extent, interpreting in the light of tradition and context. All that is fine, but first and foremost, God is speaking to me where I am, in whatever mess I’m in. One of the ways in which He speaks is by His written word, and, if I will listen, He will speak in an immediate way that is exactly what I need to hear right now.

This isn’t about pulling texts out to prove some point or reinforce my inclinations, or any kind of bibliomancy. This is about reading the word of God with my ears open, reading with the understanding that somehow, in some way completely incomprehensible to me, God ordained that I should open this book and read these words, and that He really wants to speak to me and have me understand. He brings me to this point with all the – don’t think of it as baggage any more – gear, tools, and equipment I need to hear Him. What the Spirit says (not said, He’s still talking) to the churches I am equipped to make real. The stuff I’ve been through along the way has outfitted me to see this passage and see it come alive in my life.

The Bible, any holy book, but especially the Bible, is dangerous. It really is like a sword. A fool with a weapon can do a lot of damage, whereas someone who knows how to use a weapon can deploy it intelligently for self-defense and good. The Bible is loaded, and it can be lethal. People, even some with the best of intentions, have hacked the Bible, perverted the words and gone counter to the intent of the Author. We can't let that scare us. If we are willing to listen to what the Spirit says to the churches, or to disciples, patriarchs, kings, judges, shepherds, or cities, we will hear Him speaking to us.

Come, let us return to the LORD. For He has torn us, and He will heal us; He has wounded us, and He will bind up our wounds. He will revive us after two days, and on the third day He will raise us up so we can live in His presence. Let us strive to know the Lord. His appearance is as sure as the dawn. He will come to us like the rain, like the spring showers that water the land. (Hosea 6:1-3)

Walker Percy Profundity Accompanied by Silliness

Southerners have trouble ruling out the possible. What happens to a man to whom all things seem possible and every course of action open? Nothing of course. Except war. If a man lives in the sphere of the possible and waits for something to happen, what he is waiting for is war – or the end of the world. That is why Southerners like to fight and make good soldiers. In war the possible becomes actual through no doing of our own. – From The Last Gentleman by Walker Percy

I feel I owe something to the late Dr. Percy. Prior to this, I have read only Second Coming, one of his last novels, dealing with the same protagonist, Will Barrett, at a time later in life. That novel had a profound influence on me, very much the final boot out the back door of frozen fundamentalism. I always felt like a gate crasher there anyway. It was only a matter of time.

Like Barrett I am, in many ways, a reactionary. Some people want to make things happen. I’m more likely to want to keep things from happening. Others create. I fix things. I solve problems – usually problems created by others, but occasionally ones created by myself in an attempt to solve someone else’s problem.

As others have observed, this can be a difference between men and women. Not so much that women cause all the problems, but that they like to talk about situations as if something needed to be fixed. My wife seems to think that talking – endlessly – about anything is somehow beneficial. Not only is it beneficial to her, it is beneficial to our relationship. Ever notice it is the little old men who are most likely to be deaf?

Someone needs to explain this to me. If my wife and I are in the car, and I’m driving, are we not doing something together? Why doesn’t being in the car together listening to music count? Why doesn’t sitting on the sofa or the bed together watching a movie count? Why does it only count if we talk? I cannot enjoy music if someone is talking over it. I cannot follow a movie if someone is talking the whole time.

And this one really gets me: we’re watching a TV show, my wife keeps chattering, paying no attention to what is going on, and then she suddenly realizes something is happening on screen. “What’s he doing? Why is he doing that?” Do you know why I will never give up my DVR? Because I can hit the pause button and not miss the entire rest of the show while I explain what has happened up to that point. Of course, it also means that I now watch television in about five minute increments, but it’s better than nothing.

After all, I'm a problem-solver.

Strength and Weakness

A few days ago, I heard a chorus that said grace is enough for us, and it contained the line, “The weak will lead the strong.” I don’t know who wrote the chorus, but I can guess that one passage he or she had in mind was this:

But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Therefore, I will gladly boast all the more about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may reside in me. So because of Christ, I am pleased in weaknesses, in insults, in catastrophes, in persecutions, and in pressures. For when I am weak, then I am strong. – 2 Corinthians 12:9,10

The old saying is that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. I am reminded of this every time I watch The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and come to the scene where the Beavers, Peter, Lucy, and Susan are running across open ground thinking the White Witch is about to catch them. They can only go as fast as the slowest member of the group. They will not leave anyone behind. So must our intent be in the Body of Christ. In John 17, Jesus prayed that we would all be one in Him. Paul tells us to be considerate of weaker brothers. If I think I am strong then I ought, all the more, show deference to the weak. It is good and appropriate that we are advancing in the kingdom, learning, gaining enlightenment and power, but we should not leave our brothers and sisters behind. Keep the weaker in front, encourage and support them.

Jesus said the meek shall inherit the earth. If you want to know what meekness is watch a powerful man wrestling with his small son. It is obvious that at any time the father could easily overcome the child’s small strength, but he does not. Not only does the man give in to the boy’s efforts, but he does so in such a way as to protect the little one and keep him from injuring himself. Meekness is strength voluntarily yielding and shielding.

“Turn the other cheek” has always been a problem for me. Does God really expect me to let people just run over me? Must a Christian surrender to oppression and injustice?

Think about what the Lord is saying. He is talking to me personally. If someone wants to cheat me and take my coat, not only should I give him the coat, but I should throw my shirt in, though he did not ask for it. As the old folks would say, “If he can live with it, I can live without.” Who is stronger: the one who connives to steal the coat, or the one who gives it up joyfully with the shirt as well?

The law said that a soldier might make a demand on a civilian to carry his pack for him to the next mile marker. Jesus said if that demand is placed on me, I should carry it not to the next mile marker, but joyful go a second mile that I don’t have to. Who is stronger: the one who makes a demand under an oppressive law, or the one who thinks nothing of the burden and the second mile?

If someone slaps me on the cheek, it stings. It is enough to make the adrenaline dump and blood rush to my face. I feel anger, but I am not really hurt. Who is stronger: the one who slaps someone’s face, or the one who smiles and offers to let them slap the other cheek?

The Lord isn’t telling me to be a pacifist, to stand aside and allow the wicked to oppress, ravage, and destroy the less powerful. He is telling me to keep my perspective. The world is full of cowards and petty tyrants who will attempt to bully and humiliate us. When He says, “Turn the other cheek”, He is thinking of those people, people who can possibly be moved, changed, or inspired by the meekness and joyous nobility of the true Christian.

Do not be overcome by evil. But overcome evil with good.