Year 2, Day 31: Romans 8

Neither Universal Salvation Nor Works Righteousness

Today as I began to read Romans 8 my mind went down a path against universal salvation.  So I’m going to write a little bit here against the concept of universal salvation and then move on.  Of course, the natural tendency when wrestling against universal salvation is to end up in works-based salvation.  I’ll try to avoid that pitfall as well.  So let’s begin with two great verses that Paul gives us in this chapter:

• Romans 8:4 says “in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.”
• Romans 8:9 says “You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.”

In Romans 8:4 we have a very clear perspective that the righteous requirement of the Law is fulfilled in those who walk according to the Spirit and not according to the flesh.  In Romans 8:9 we hear that anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ (Holy Spirit) within him does not belong in Christ.  Clearly these passages lift up the idea that while God desires all of humanity to be saved in Christ, not all humanity will be saved.  There are those who do not walk according to the Spirit; and there is no guarantee that the righteous requirement of the Law will be fulfilled in them.  There are those who do not have the Spirit of Christ in them; and Paul is quite clear that those do not belong to Christ. 

We as Christians need to be blunt and honest in our teaching that there is no such thing as universal salvation.  Yes, God has extended the gift of salvation to all people, but not all people will receive the gift and certainly not all people will live according to the Spirit.

However, we must also be careful to not become focused on our works as the reason for our salvation.  Our works are nothing more than the proof of the faith that dwells inside of us.  James 2:22 tells us that faith is completed by works.  In other words, works are the proper response to faith.  We cannot be saved by our works because we can only do God’s will because we are saved!  Thus, it is not our works which save us, but our works which are evidence of the salvation that we have already received through Christ.  Works are not the reason for salvation, but rather the evidence of it.

Conclusions about Salvation

Therefore, we can come to a conclusion as we read through this chapter.  Not all will be saved, but all who are in Christ – who have the Spirit of Christ within them – will be saved.  And we can know that we have the Spirit of Christ within us when we are God’s slaves, humbly responding to Christ’s Spirit in word and deed.  Finally, we may live in confidence of the resurrection since the same Spirit that dwelled in the resurrected Christ now dwells in us.

Tying Faith and the Holy Spirit Together

Faith is the response to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  As Paul says here in chapter 8, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit comes when a person belongs to Christ.  A person belongs to Christ when that person has become a slave to God: humbly submitted to God with a contrite heart.  Do you hear the emphasis on submission in Romans 8:7?  Submission to God is the effect of living in the Spirit.

What Then Shall We Say?

We end this chapter with Paul’s looking back to suffering as seen from the perspective of the hope of eternal life.  Paul makes a few bold statements that are easy to say but hard to embody.  Paul tells us that the sufferings of this present day are simply not worth comparing to the coming glory.  And of course that is true.  However, that also doesn’t mean that our present sufferings don’t cause us pain. 

But this is the next step in the pursuit of God.  God did not spare His own Son.  Jesus endured the pain of rejection and especially the pain of the cross because He was able to focus on the coming glory.  That doesn’t mean the pain was meaningless, but Jesus put it in the proper context.  So it is with us who follow Christ and who have Christ’s Spirit.  We will have pain.  We will face rejection.  We may even find abuse.  But in the context of eternal salvation in the glory of God, it is temporary pain.  It is capable of being endured for the sake of God.

After all, who can separate us from the love of God?  Once God’s Spirit genuinely dwells within us, who can take it away?  Once God is genuinely living within us, once we have genuinely crucified ourselves with Christ, and once we have been empowered by the Holy Spirit – who will be able to remove to promise of future glory?  That is the life sustaining hope right there.  The pain and worry of this world is temporary when compared to the experience of the eternal glory of God that is to come.  Stay the course.  Endure for the sake of God.  Live confidently in the hope that God can save.

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Year 2, Day 30: Romans 7

Recapping

Paul gives us an argument here in Romans 7 that is often misunderstood.  The reason that it is often misunderstood is because the theology we glean from the prior chapters is often not tight.  In order to truly get what Paul is saying in this chapter, we must fully grasp the argument that Paul has established before.  So let’s recap.

Under Christ, we are slaves {not even servants!} to God.  In Christ, we are crucified with Christ to life and death.  We are given a new life and a new agenda.  We are no longer governed by the ways of this world and should no longer be governed by the desires of this world.  As God’s slaves, we are slaves to righteousness and should pursue that which righteousness pursues.

What Is the Purpose of the Law?

Having very loosely recapped the past chapter or two, we are now ready for what Paul says in chapter 7.  Paul says we are free from the law.  Now, this does not mean that we can toss the Hebrew Scriptures.  Certainly not!  If nothing else, the fact that nearly every book in our New Testament has at least one quotation from the Hebrew Scriptures tells us that Paul is not telling us that the followers of Jesus Christ can ignore the Hebrew Scriptures.  In fact, Jesus Christ Himself tells us that he came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it.  So Paul is certainly not telling us that we can ignore the Hebrew Scriptures.

Rather, what Paul is saying is that if we are doing righteousness then the law has no affect on us.  See, the Law’s primary focus was to be a mirror to us as Christians and point out our sinful nature.  Having seen our sinful nature, the Law then points us to Christ.  But once we have seen Christ and truly received the gift of salvation, then we no longer need to be directed to Christ!  In fact, if we are doing righteousness then we no longer need to have the mirror there to illustrate how sinful we are!  This is why Paul tells us that those who are in Christ are free from the Law.

The part of us that is obedient to God and Christ truly does not have a need for the Law.  The part of me that is disobedient has every need for the Law in order to point me back to Christ.

Speaking of My Sinfulness

Having said that, let’s also re-introduce reality.  I am not perfect.  I am not a person who only does things that are righteous in God’s eyes.  I do have sin in my life.  I do need to confess my sins and be reminded that I need the Law to remind me of my perpetual need for Christ.  So while in the ideal world the follower of Christ has no need for the Law; the fact that I am living both in the Kingdom of the World and the Kingdom of Heaven means that I still have need for the Law.  This is why the Hebrew Scriptures make such a prevalent appearance in our New Testament.  As Martin Luther says, we are “simul justus et peccator” – simultaneously saint and sinner as it is often translated.  The saint in me has no need for the Law, only Christ.  The sinner in me has every need for the Law to remind me who I really am and to drive me back to Christ.

Conflict Between the Ideal and Reality

To close this blog, I think it is important to have a discussion about the conflict that Paul talks about in the last half of this chapter.  It is the conflict that was prevalent in the end of my last paragraph.  “When I do right, evil lies close at hand.”  “I do not do what I want to do, but I do the very thing that I do not want to do.”  Both of these questions lift up Paul’s struggle – every true Christian’s struggle – with his nature.  We want to be Christ’s; but so often we are the world’s.  Ugh.

It’s not very helpful, but welcome to life, right?  We are not perfect and never will be this side of the resurrection into eternal life.  We want to do right, but we won’t perpetually do right this side of death.  It is a struggle that rages within us at our very core.  Like our planet – which has a molten core churning about its inside that creates the magnetic field of the earth – we too have an inner churning that creates a field around us.  Sometimes that field is helpful and full of righteousness; sometimes that field is destructive and driven by our sinfulness.  But we are in a struggle – in a war – and that struggle exists in the very core of our being.

So who can save us?  If all of us have this struggle, then we are indeed wretched!  We are a pitiable race.  But thanks be to God that He saw fit to give us Jesus Christ.  Thanks be to God that His salvation has come to us a free gift which relies on no part of our character.  There is grace indeed.

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Year 2, Day 29: Romans 6

More Chocolate Ice Cream, Please

Paul gives us a great opening statement in Romans 6.  Essentially he asks if we should continue in sin so that by our ever-increasing sin tally we can show God’s graciousness all the more.  And in a twisted human manner, this makes a lot of sense, right?  After all – if I may make a food analogy – if chocolate ice cream is good, then more chocolate ice cream is better, right?

Ha!  This thought always amuses me.  Yes, chocolate ice cream is good.  But if I sit down and try to eat a whole gallon of chocolate ice cream I will reach a point where I no longer value the chocolate ice cream.  No matter how much ice cream I eat, I will eventually get to a place where I am full or just plain tired of the taste.

So it is with God’s grace and forgiveness.  God has an infinite ability to forgive, but He only promises forgiveness to the contrite in heart and the repentant.  If I continue in my sin without care for God’s ways, it is as if I no longer have a taste for caring about repentance and forgiveness.  Just like too much chocolate leads to an internal devaluing of chocolate’s appeal, too much sin leads to a devaluing of God’s grace and forgiveness.

A Better Understanding not an Increase in Opportunity

Then Paul moves us to another great thought.  Rather than approaching life as though we are free to sin all we want, what we should be doing is approaching life with the perspective of a new understanding to humanity.  That understanding is this: just as Jesus died for our sins, so we have died to our sins; just as Jesus has risen to a new life, so we have risen to a new life in Christ.  This is the point of baptism, and notice that Paul makes no mention of faith or needing to “believe” that it is effective when baptism is done.  Baptism is a sign for us that in Christ we are dead to sin and free to live a new life.  Our baptism is a symbol of death and a proclamation that we believe that just as we rise from this water so to shall we rise into new life.*

How cool is it to think about baptism as a reminder of our death to sin.  In fact, this is precisely why Martin Luther encourages us to think about our baptism each and every morning.  It is not because this baptism forces God to save us, but it reminds us of the promise that God can and will save us!  Remembering our baptism each and every day reminds us that because God can save us we can live a new life.  Remembering our baptism does just what Paul talks about here in Romans 6.  When we remember our baptism we remember that we are not to go on sinning but rather we are to live a new life in Christ.

Slaves To Righteousness

Masterfully, Paul then transitions us from realizing we are to live a new life to presenting ourselves to God.  Furthermore, Paul returns us back to an image I blogged about as we began Romans.  Paul says we are to present ourselves to God as tools of righteous – even as slaves to righteousness!

This is such a huge concept, and I have blogged about it in the past.  Furthermore, this is a concept that normally rubs the typical American (or human) completely the wrong way.  In Christ, we are not free.  Yes, we are freed from sin.  We are freed from the bondage of sin.  We are freed from the consequences of sin.  But we are not free in every sense of the word. 

We are slaves to God.  We are slaves to righteousness.  And thanks be to God we are slaves to the consequences of righteousness: namely eternal life!  We are free to do God’s will; but we are not free to do as we please!  When we do as we please, we are sinning and are putting ourselves back into slavery to sin.

You see, there are two simple choices: slavery to sin and slavery to God.  If we are following God, we are His slaves.  If we are following our own hearts we are by definition following sin and a slave to it.  There is no true “freedom of the human will.”  We may exert “free will to choose,” but in doing so all we are doing is choosing which master we serve: God or sin.  Of course we have free will, but we are never our own master.

As proof of that, think about death.  We may be master over our choices, but how many of us can choose not to die?  No, all shall die.  So at the very least we can see that this idea of “free will” is not with respect to our whole life but rather with respect to the choices we make.  I can choose to serve God or I can choose to serve sin.  But I will eventually die whether I exercise my free will to choose it or not.

I’ve gone a bit off topic here, so let me try and reign it back it.  I absolutely believe in free will – human beings have the ability to choose which master we will serve {See Joshua 24:15 as an example}.  But in that choice we must know that the wages of sin is death and all who choose to serve sin will die.  That’s all of us to some extent.  But we can receive the free gift of eternal life from God through Jesus Christ.  Pay special attention to the contrast here between “wages” and “gift.”  We have all earned the wage of death, but we can receive the gift of life.

Thanks be to God!  Amen, amen!

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*I do feel the need to assert here that I am not teaching salvation by baptism.  I teach and believe that salvation comes through the death of Jesus Christ on the cross and only through Jesus’ death on that cross.  This is why I speak of baptism as a sign.  Baptism is a declaration of God’s promise that He can bring into new life those who truly belong to Christ.  Baptism is an act that the Christian church professes to practice because Christ commands it and because it declares our belief in the resurrection to new life.

Year 2, Day 28: Romans 5

Peace With God

Keep in mind that the book of Romans reads much like a logical argument or even a legal brief.  In Romans 1-3, Paul has made his case already that nobody is righteous {with or without the Law}.  Then, in Romans 4, Paul made the case that the only way that any of us are righteous is through Jesus Christ and the righteousness that He brought to the table for us.  Now Paul will make the case that if we are indeed resting in the promise of righteousness gained through Christ, then we have peace and hope with God.  This is the thrust of chapter 5.

Grace Abounds

Here is the point of the first 11 verses: if God saw fit to save us when we were full of sin, then how much more we should know the life that comes in God now that we have been saved through Jesus Christ.  At first, that sentence feels very much like a “well, duh!” kind of sentence.  But I’m not trying to be Captain Obvious here.  I really want us to look deeply into what Paul is saying and make sure that we actually do get what Paul is saying.  If we really get it, then we should really be living it out, too, right?

You see, what Paul is saying is that if we really believe that we are saved through Jesus Christ and through nothing of our own action, our lives should be different.  If we really are saved in the midst of our sinfulness, then we should be a new creation!  We shouldn’t simply acknowledge our salvation before God.  We shouldn’t simply talk about the day when God will make us a new person.  We should be that new person right here and right now.  If God can see it fit to save us while we are still in sin, God can see fit to change what we even while we are in these fleshly and corruptible bodies.

Sure, we are not perfect.  We will always be tempted by the pull of sin for as long as we live here in this world.  And yes, there will come a day when we are resurrected in new bodies with a pure heart.  But we do not have to wait to experience that feeling.  We can be changed here and now.  After all, suffering brings about endurance, endurance produces character, and character brings us into hope.  We may not be perfect now, but we can indeed know the hope that is in God right here and right now.

Adam and Christ

Having made this trio of theological assertions {all are condemned, Romans 1-3; righteousness only  comes through Christ, Romans 4; and the righteous have hope and peace with God, Romans 5} Paul now sets up the case.  Sin came through one man: Adam.  Once sin entered the world, it infected everything and everyone.  Death became the natural end of life in spite of the fact that life was not designed to end in a perfect world. 

But if sin came through one man, then it also makes sense that righteousness should come through one man: Jesus Christ.  Now that righteousness has entered the world, it too can infect everyone.  Although death is the now the natural end of life, through Jesus Christ death is no longer the final word.  Death may be the end of life, but eternal life with God is now the final word.  Death came through human sinfulness; true life comes through the righteousness of God through the God-made-man.

In fact, there is a neat little comparison that Paul does here in this chapter.  He makes the following argument: Judgment follows even one act of sin; righteousness follows even one great act of righteousness {Specifically, the one act of Christ upon the cross.}  Another neat way of thinking about this is: One single act of sin brought many trespasses, yet many trespasses were forgiven through one single act of righteousness.  Both of these arguments follow from Paul’s words, and both of these arguments show the consistency of God’s character in both judgment and forgiveness.

Repetition

As we read through these concluding verses we come back around full circle to where I began this particular blog post.  But before we go there, did you notice all the repetition in this chapter?  The word “one” is repeated eleven times.  The word “reign” is repeated five times.  The phrase “much more” is repeated five times.  Clearly what we have going on here is the assertion that what is gained through the reign of one Jesus is much more than what was lost through the reign of the sin of one Adam.

Full Circle

Now how does that bring us back full circle?  Well, if we believe what this chapter says, then those in Christ should be “much more” than we were before we were in Christ.  We may not be made perfect and unblemished, but we are still part of the kingdom of heaven and Jesus’ Christ’s reign here on earth.  We should be different.  Those in Christ should absolutely be much more than what we were before we received the gift of grace that comes through Christ’s death for us.  If we believe the faith, then shouldn’t we be living the faith, too?

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Year 2, Day 27: Romans 4

No Works will bring about Righteousness

Here is a great chapter against works righteousness – perhaps one of the chapters most influential in Martin Luther’s own understanding of “salvation by the grace of God through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ.”  It begins with a quote from Genesis 15:6.  Abraham believed the Lord, and it was credited to Him as righteousness.

Now here’s the interesting thing.  In order to believe, you must first have an experience.  I’m not going to believe a word in any book unless I first read the book.  I’m not going to believe a word that a speaker says until I have heard the speaker talk.  The same is true with Abraham.  He could not believe in God until God had come to Him.  Abraham’s belief is not a work of righteousness.  Abraham’s believe is a response to the righteousness of God that comes to him.  As a response, it is credited to Abraham.

We are no different in Christ.  Our belief in Jesus, our belief in His death being able to pay the debt of our sins, our belief in God’s ability to conquer death in us as He did in Christ – all of these beliefs are not works of righteousness.  They are responses to the righteousness that came to us in Jesus Christ and as such are “credited” to us.  But the truth is that we do nothing but respond to the grace of God that is perpetually before us.  We may act, but we our actions are always responses to the gift that God has put before us in the first place.

This is a vitally important understanding for us to have.  As Paul says, if we are able to earn salvation, then salvation is due to us.  If we work our way into salvation, then salvation is not a gracious gift but simply an economic transaction.  If salvation was able to be earned, it would not be credited to us but rather due to us.  Thus, because the Bible tells us that it is credited to us, we can know that salvation is grace given by God to which we can then respond rather than something that is owed to us by God because we are righteous.

When was Faith Reckoned

Paul then gets into a discussion about when faith was reckoned to Abraham.  Paul says that the reckoning occurred well before the act of circumcision.  We know this to be true. Abraham is credited in Genesis 15 while Abraham wasn’t given the covenant of circumcision until Genesis 17.  Abraham’s faith came before any act.  Abraham’s salvation comes as a gift from God, and his faith is on account of his response to God’s gift.  In any case, it is not because of some act that he performs.

Again, we are no different.  We are not saved because of any act we perform.  We are not saved because we were baptized (whether as an infant or an adult).  We are not saved because of some “sinner’s prayer” that we prayed.  We are saved as a gift of God that He has lavishly granted to all through Jesus Christ.  All we must do is to receive the gift.  God gives the gift, we respond.  As a part of our response, we faithfully do things like baptisms, prayer, evangelism, teaching, preaching, service, communion, etc.  None of those things save us, but they are phenomenal responses to the salvation that God has offered to us in the first place.

The Significance of Our Response

I love the way Paul ends this chapter.  As it was counted to Abraham, so it shall be counted to us if we believe.  It is not our belief that saves us, yet our response is not lost on God, either.  When we receive the gift of salvation, it is counted to us as righteousness.  When we believe in Christ, it is counted to us as righteousness.  When we evangelize and proclaim Jesus Christ to the world it is counted to us as righteousness.  When we serve in Christ’s name, when we give a cup of cold water to the thirsty, when we visit the sick or imprisoned, and when we do anything else that demonstrates the grace and compassion of God it will be counted to us as righteousness.  It is righteous because God’s righteousness has come to us and we have responded to His righteousness.

We can have confidence as Abraham had confidence.  We can look to God and believe His promise.  He was with Abraham and fulfilled what He promised.  He was with David and fulfilled what He promised.  He was with Jesus and fulfilled what He promised.  He is with us, and He will fulfill what He promises to us as well.  Have faith, believe.  Rest in the fact that your salvation is not based on your own works but on the grace of God and the righteousness of Jesus Christ.  Then, respond!

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Year 2, Day 26: Romans 3

The Purpose of the Law

Here Paul brings logic into the mix of the discussion.  Let’s make sure that we understand why the logical argument is needed.  You see, many among the Jews believed that the Law was their salvation.  Paul argues that the Law doesn’t bring salvation; it actually brings knowledge of just how far we are from deserving salvation!  Then Paul is no doubt asked a great question.  If the law doesn’t bring salvation then why even have it?  It is out of this line of thinking that Paul begins this chapter.

The Law is good and the Law is necessary because it points to our life and highlights sin.  Through our ever-increasing understanding of sin, we also have an ever-increasing understanding of God’s grace.  When we look to the Law, we understand just how big the chasm is between us and God.  When we probe the depth of the Law and see what true righteousness looks like – we are inherently laying the foundation for understanding the heights to which God’s grace rises.

Think of it this way.  If you are walking down the street and find a $5,000 bill, you consider yourself lucky.  You might try to find the owner, but let’s say that you can’t because the bill has been there for several days and the owner is long gone.  So you pocket the money and count yourself blessed.  You didn’t earn it, and you slip right past the need to fathom God’s blessing upon you.

However, now think about walking down the street and suddenly a black van pulls up beside you and IRS agents crawl out of the van.  They inform you that you are being arrested for some mistake on your taxes unless you can pay the $5,000 penalty incurred by your mistake.  Not having the $5,000 on your person, they begin to arrest you.  All of a sudden, some stranger appears and hands the agents $5,000 and demands your release.  In this scenario, you are going to ponder the grace and generosity of the stranger who had no reason to intervene but he does anyway. {Yes, the scenario is contrived.  But I’m okay with that.}

In this second case, the IRS agents are analogous to the Law. {And please don’t stretch the analogy too far, all analogies break when stretched too far.}  The Law comes along and tells us about an error we made.  Just like in taxes, sometimes we are aware of an error and sometimes we aren’t aware of an error.  The Law demands that a payment be made, a payment that we have no chance of paying.  So when we find the payment made by someone who had no reason to make the payment, we now realize God’s grace.  The Law points us to Jesus, who paid that debt when we could not.

Righteousness In Christ

In the second half of the chapter Paul talks about the fact that the Law and the Prophets bear witness to faith and righteousness, which comes apart from the Law.  You see, all are saved through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ.  Righteous comes not from our own faith, but because Christ was faithful.  When we turn to God and trust in His ability to save, we are cloaked in Christ’s righteousness.  Nothing we do – even our so called “belief” – is righteous.  Our righteousness originates purely in Christ.

This is why Paul can make the claim in the end that God is the God of the Jews and the Gentiles.  There doesn’t need to be a different God if the same righteousness coming from the same Jesus Christ is what matters.  Law or no law, it is the righteousness of Christ that saves and is the foundation of salvation.

Think of it this way.  Paul came to an understanding of Jesus Christ much like I did – through the Law and an understanding of how the Law illustrates human depravity.  Paul saw the need for salvation through Christ because of his understanding of God’s Word and the truth it contains.  Through the study of the Holy Scriptures, Paul came to know that humanity has no chance of saving itself.  In this sense, Paul used the scriptures to help him come to Christ.  The being true, salvation still comes through Jesus Christ and not through the Law.

On the other hand, it is possible for a person outside of the law to still come to an understanding of human depravity.  It is possible to come to the knowledge that human beings are selfish, self-centered, hedonistic individuals without knowing the Law.  In this case, it is possible that a person could rationalize that such a self-centered person cannot make a righteous way into salvation themselves without corrupting it.  Such a person would still need a “righteous outsider” to save them.  Faith and salvation still comes through Christ.  {Although admittedly that this is a far more difficult and risky approach because it eliminates a very useful tool in understanding the nature of humanity: God’s Word.  But it is possible to come to an understanding of human depravity without the Law.  That’s Paul’s point.  One simply needs to be introduced to Christ in this situation.}

In either case, though, the result is the same.  Whether through the Law or through human observation, we understand that we cannot save ourselves.  We simply cannot do it.  We need Christ.  Those who have the Law have an incredible tool to use in the process.  But it results with the same ending and the same need for Christ’s righteousness to cover what we cannot make for ourselves.

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Year 2, Day 25: Romans 2

Careful Consideration Must Be Given

Great harm has often been done with the opening verses of Romans 2.  I have heard person after person lift up Romans 2:1-3 as proof that they have no right to “judge” one another.  Now, on one hand this is absolutely correct.  Not one of us human beings have any right to judge whether a fellow human being is going to be with God in eternal life or destined to eternal torment.  None of us can ever sit in the judgment seat of God and dutifully determine the eternal destination of anyone.  It’s just not possible for us to do that with any kind of righteousness.

However, this does not mean that we cannot “judge” an act as sinful or righteous.  This passage does not mean that we have to throw open our doors and accept all kinds of behavior into our midst.  This passage is not advocating that we should accept any behavior because we are ourselves sinful!  No!  While we should never pronounce eternal condemnation upon people; neither should we embrace all actions, either.

In fact, Romans 2:4 is the key to understanding the opening verses.  Paul is asking his readers if they overlook judgment and “presume the riches of God and His forbearance.”  In the same verse Paul then reminds us that judgment is supposed to bring about repentance.  Do you see it?

Repentance is the key!  Forgiveness is given to the repentant and contrite heart; not the heart that skips judgment and goes straight to grace!  How can you ever arrive at repentance if you never allow the Spirit to convict of sinfulness?

In order to be true followers of God, we must proclaim both God’s grace as well as God’s condemnation of sin and our need for repentance.  This is precisely the Law and Gospel mix that we hear so much about.  It is the Law that drives us to an understanding of our sinfulness and our need for God’s Gospel of salvation!  It is the Law – and our complete and utter lack of attaining it – that drives us to the cross!

No Partiality

Paul then levels an incredible line: God shows no partiality.  Wham!  No partiality.  Actually, to be true to the text we should understand that the word “partiality” – or “favoritism” – is the subject of the sentence.  So the true translation of this text is literally, “For partiality is not within God.”  Not only does God not show partiality, but partiality has no place within God.  Wow.  Now that’s deep.

You see, God may have a chosen people.  But the Hebrew people weren’t chosen because they were better.  They were chosen for a task.  They were chosen to display God to the world.  God is not partial to the Jews because He loved them more and He will not be partial to them because they were His chosen.  Rather, all will be held up to the same standard and as we shall hear in the next chapter all will be seen as coming short of that standard.  So there really is no room for partiality within God.  All are measured against the stick of righteousness, and all have literally no hope of measuring up.

It’s not sounding very good for humanity if we take what Paul has said in the first two chapters thus far.

From Where Does Our Hope Come?

So who then can look for hope?  Those who have a circumcised heart can look for hope.  Those who not only hear the law but who also do it have hope. 

I’m not talking works based salvation in these words.  We do the law out of response!  We do not do the law in order to earn salvation.  Those who have an internal response to God’s gift of faith can look for hope.

Recognizing Our Sinful Nature

But even then, who among us can actually say that we are perfect inside where it counts?  Who among us can say that our heart is always circumcised with respect to following God?  Who among us – if God truly were to lay out the desires of our heart before Him – would honestly be able to rise up and confess that we fit into the righteous category? 

Without Christ, I doubt that number is very big.  But now that I’m introducing Christ into the equation, I’m guilty of putting the cart before the horse.  The point of Romans 2 is to lead us to our need for Christ, but not yet arrive there.  It is still valuable for us to dwell on our unrighteousness and just how uncircumcised our hearts actually are.  So we know the answer is Christ, but let’s not go there yet.  Paul doesn’t go there, yet.

I know.  It is painful.  We want to jump to Christ.  We want to revel in forgiveness and be done with the pain of judgment.  We want to assert the truth that we know is already there.  We want to be a people of Easter and assert the victory of God. 

But hold on just a little longer.  Let’s be a people of Maundy Thursday for just a little longer.  Let’s understand our need for that Passover Lamb.  Let’s recognize just how hard our hearts can be.  Let’s understand just how much we are guilty of teaching against sin but going out and doing the sin we confess is wrong.  Let’s truly wallow in our rebellious nature for a day or two before coming ack to the grace we already know is there.

Paul talks about how hypocritical we sound when we profess something to be true and then prove it to not be true with our practices.  Paul actually goes to the extreme of calling those kinds of opportunities not just hypocritical but actually he calls them blaspheming the name of God.  That’s a pretty base accusation.  But it is the truth of human sinfulness.  When push comes to shove, it is who we are when left to our own devices.  When left to ourselves, God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because our humanity does not match what we profess to believe in our hearts.  People all across the world are given ability to blaspheme God because we who are His children deny Him with our lifestyle and our words.

I know it is painful to stay here, but trust me.  If we dwell here for a day or so … then what comes in the future will feel all the more welcome!  Hang in there.  Contemplate your sinfulness today.  Contemplate the ways that our inability to walk the walk actually blasphemes God’s name in the mouths and minds of those who witness it.  As Paul reminds us in the beginning of this chapter, let these thoughts drive you to repentance!

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Year 2, Day 24: Romans 1

Personal Confession

Okay, this may be the biggest challenge I will have faced with respect to the blog.  The book of Romans is one of my all-time favorite books of the Bible and I could likely do a blog post on each paragraph, much less each chapter.  So I will endeavor to keep them readable … but I will be letting a few things slip through the cracks in doing so.  So … the comments section is wide open if I don’t address a part of the passage that you get something out of as you read!  It’s just not possible to cover it all for the next 16 days!

Paul, the Slave

“Paul, a ‘doulos’ of God.”  Doulos is a Greek word that literally means “one who becomes the property of another.”  If your Bible says servant, scratch it out and write in the word slave.  It is one thing to be a servant of God; it is entirely another thing to be His slave.

Let me expound.  A servant does something because they feel like they are willingly serving their master.  But this mindset backfires, because there will inevitably be days when I am unwilling because of the task or because of my human “bad mood.”  When I think of myself as a servant, I open myself up to be subject to my own mood and my own attitude.  That is not at all who Paul was! 

Paul was a slave.  Paul gave up his attitude and mood and just did what God called him to do.  That’s precisely what makes Paul such an awesome example for us.  Paul was God’s slave.  God commanded; Paul did.  Yes, there are days where Paul wrestled with God – see the Corinthians as an example.  Paul wasn’t perfect.  But his mindset was slave, not servant.  God demands obedience and contrition, not a person who “decides” to go along with His work.

Paul’s mindset was that he was God’s property.  That’s precisely what the word “doulos” meant.  That is what makes Paul great in my eyes.  He doesn’t need to be anything but God’s property.  He knows that being God’s property is far better than being a person of his own choosing.  Wow.  Now that’s a powerful challenging thought to American culture and the modern (or post-modern) mindset!

Paul, the Apostle

Paul also uses the word “apostolos,” which we often think of as “Apostle.”  We turn it into a title, but it is not a title.  It is a job description.  The word apostolos literally means “one who is sent (to do the bidding of another).”  Paul is a person who was sent to do God’s work.  He is sent by God.  He isn’t out doing his own work.  He isn’t out making his own path.  He is out actively looking for where God is leading.  Again, Paul’s focus is not on his own greatness but on God being the master in charge.

Paul and the Gospel

Paul then begins this awesome section about not being ashamed of the Gospel.  How cool is this?  Here is Paul, who gave approval to the death of Stephen, now saying that he is not ashamed of that which he tried desperately to snuff out!  Awesome!  And why should he be ashamed?

Paul goes on that add that the reason he is not ashamed is because through Christ God has brought salvation to those who don’t deserve it.  That is what the rest of the chapter is about.  Paul talks about how God has been made plain to the world.  God has been declared to the world through words in some cases and through nature in other cases.  God’s fingerprint is all around us! 

Excuses, Excuses

None of us have any excuse.  All of us are guilty of the list of sins that Paul asserts as we close out this chapter:

• Our hearts are darkened by our humanity
• We claim to be wise in our thinking but we show our foolishness when we ignore the pursuit of God
• We glorify things of our own making
• We pursue the lusts of our own hearts
• We exchange the relationship that God desires for unnatural relationships that we desire
• We are filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice, envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness, gossip, slander, hatred for God, insolence, haughtiness, boastfulness, disobedience (especially to parents), foolishness, faithlessness, heartlessness, ruthlessness

So God gives us over to what our hearts desire.  God watches us sink into the sin that our hearts pursue.  God knows the guilt that rests in our heart.  We are guilty, friends.  There is no decree that we deserve except for the decree of our guilt.

Knowing this, do we still desire to think of ourselves as God’s servants and dislike thinking of ourselves as God’s slaves?  No, having deserved death let us become God’s slaves.  Let us become His property, for clearly we do not deserve even that.  Knowing the depth of evil that lay within our individual hearts and our collective communal essence, why would we want anything other than to be God’s slave?  The more we add of ourselves to God’s work, the more we are likely to despoil it.  Rather than force ourselves on God, let’s learn to be content doing what He desires us to do.

Humility before God is righteous.  God desires contrition and a broken heart.  Let’s give Him that today.

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Year 2, Day 23: 2 Kings 25

Warning

Well, today I am probably going to say a few things that run pretty close to heretical in a few ways.  So let’s be up front about that today.  I’m not going to be heretical, but a few people out there might think that I am.

Zedekiah

But before I get to the heresy, let’s just imagine being Zedekiah for a minute.  I know the Bible says that he did evil in the sight of the Lord.  I know that he wasn’t a great guy from a righteousness perspective.  Yet, Nebuchadnezzar captures him and forces him to watch as his family is slaughtered in front of him.  Nobody deserves that punishment.  That is just plain old cruelty.

To make matters worse, they then put out his eyes.  The point of this is clear.  The last thing Zedekiah would see would be the slaughter of his sons.  That would be the vivid memory that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

The Babylonians and God’s Perspective

I know this kind of thing happened often in ancient days.  This was one king’s way of taking another king’s stuff and eliminating the competition.  I understand that thought behind it and I know why they did it.  But from a human decency perspective – from a love your enemy perspective – this is simply inexcusable.  This act alone shows me why the Old Testament prophets struggled with God when He made it clear to them that Babylon was going to be the agent of doom upon Judah.  These Babylonians were nowhere close to respectable, much less righteous!

But God used them anyway.  Let us not forget that God judged them later and punished them by having them be destroyed by the Persians.  Again, from the perspective of God and His righteousness, things work out in the end.  But for Zedekiah, he might beg to differ.  I guess it does show us a little how we need to remember to view the world through God’s perspective rather than our own.  It might not make a great amount of sense, but we cannot fathom God’s ways most of the time.  We are called to trust, not understand.

The Importance of Religious Institutions

So now let’s get to the heresy part.  Let’s set the stage.  God’s holy city was Jerusalem.  God’s temple – His dwelling place on earth – was Jerusalem.  There is no more sacred place to the Jewish faith than Jerusalem.  God allowed the city to be destroyed.  God allowed His temple to be robbed and burned.  God allowed the house of His kings to be burned and destroyed.  God allowed the walls of the city to be pulled down and destroyed.  God allowed His priests to be dragged before Nebuchadnezzar and to be killed in his presence.

Here’s the heretical part for some.  We think our religious institutions are so great that God would never let them fall into disrepair.  We think our paraments and chalices and worship implements bring so much glory and honor to God that He would never let anything happen to them.  We think our religious programs are changing so many lives that they would never stop being in God’s favor.  We think that the “kingdom of God” that we have built for Him is so marvelous that He will love it forever.

But God sends a different message to us in this chapter.  Buildings are nothing to God without faithful people; let them be destroyed.  Our worship implements are nothing to God without faithful people; let them be melted down and used to adorn someone else’s court.  Programs are nothing to God if they are not truly bringing about faithful people; let them pass away.  If the goal of what we do is not to inspire a relationship with God in the people around us, then what we do is meaningful only to us.

That’s a harsh reality, but it is a lesson God teaches the Hebrew people over and over.  I think He’s also taught it to us as Christians before, too.  We need to focus on God’s plan, not our plan.  We need to focus on God’s relationship with us, not our own lives.  We need to be God-centered and God-fearing if we are to accomplish anything that has any kind of meaning.  The size of the building, the beauty of the stuff, the magnificence of the act … all these things are meaningless and worthy of being destroyed if they are not creating and growing a relationship with God in the people around us.

It is a tough way to end a book of the Bible, but it does serve as a good wake-up call to us as followers of God.  And that is the point of 1 & 2 Kings.

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Year 2, Day 22: 2 Kings 24

The Beginning of the End

Today we hear the preparation for the ultimate fall of Jerusalem.  The fall certainly begins today, but it will end tomorrow.  We hear of Nebuchadnezzar {Also known as Nebuchadrezzar, which I personally prefer because it sounds more menacing!  LOL} coming into Judah and King Jehoiachin gives up the city.  It is inevitable, now.

God Is Faithful

Of course, there is an underlying thread that must not be forgotten as painful as it is to hear.  This end of the story is the fulfillment of God’s promise.  God has warned these Hebrew people about the blessings they would receive if they followed Him and the curses that they would suffer if they rebelled.  This passage – as painful as it is to hear – is proof that God is a God of His Word.  God keeps His promises.

This is significant to remember.  We like the loving God of forgiveness.  We like the loving God who sent Jesus into our hearts so our sins could be forgiven.  We like the loving God who gives us the warm fuzzy Holy Spirit who comes and makes us feel good when we allow ourselves to get spiritual.  And don’t get me wrong, these are all great things!

But we forget that God is just.  In order for God to be just He must be a God who exacts punishment against those who rebel in spite of His love.  He must send His Son to die a bloody death in spite of how much we neither deserved it nor asked for it.  He must send His Holy Spirit to convict us and call us out of sin and cause us the gut-wrenching struggle that tears us apart when we do what we know that we should not do.  In order for God to be just, that is the God we must also recognize.

God begins the process of dragging His people into slavery because they need to learn a lesson.  They need to learn what it means to depend upon God.  They need to learn what it means to follow God.  They need to learn what it means to truly be dominated by the sinfulness that exists in the hearts of mankind.  They need to fall to rock bottom before they can begin to appreciate the ascent into God’s presence.

Bondage

To be honest, so do most of us.  Sure, most of us in America won’t go into human bondage.  But we will go into bondage under our technology.  We will go into bondage by the desires of the people around us.  We will even go under bondage under the free will of our own minds.  We may not know physical bondage, but we will know emotional, psychological, and spiritual bondage.  We will know it, because it is what our humanity cries out to experience.  It is the natural consequence of having a heart and a soul that longs for things other than the humbleness and God-centeredness that is the cure.

I know I’m putting the cart a bit before the horse, but that’s okay today.  When we focus on our lusts and our desires (whether they be physical, emotional, or psychological) we end up in sin.  We either tear down our life or the life of those around us.  Usually it is a fairly slow process until we have sunk so far that we are consumed by it in the end.  This is the message of the nations of Judah and Israel in the books of 1 & 2 Kings. 

This is why it is so important to understand that humbleness and God-centeredness is the cure for the human condition.  When we lust after what we want, we destroy life.  When we humble ourselves, turn to God’s desires, and pursue what He knows is good for us, we build up and support life.  It may seem funny, but the fundamental key to having a life full of peace, happiness, and joy is to stop pursuing what we want and start pursuing God.  This is the message of many of the latter Minor Prophets, and we’ll get to them next year in our study.*

But for today, we begin to see the end.  Judah has crossed over the point of no return.  They have rebelled against God, and now they rebel against Nebuchadnezzar.  There is no more help to come for them until they have experienced a little bondage and are ready for God.  It is a painful process, but it is such an important one to understand.  It began slowly and innocently enough with Solomon.  Now it ends with a quick bang and hardly a whimper from the people.

But even with that said, it is not the end of the story.

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* I found myself thinking about the Declaration of Independence as I wrote this paragraph.  We want to declare: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”  I fundamentally agree that we are endowed with certain rights from our Creator.  But speaking from a theological standpoint I disagree with the conclusion.  As a Christian, my rights are not life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  My rights are humbleness, being a slave to God, and the pursuit of God.

Don’t get me wrong, though.  I think God will allow me to experience life if I see my rights as what I say above.  And don’t hear me trying to start an anti-America war with this point.  For a non-Christian, I think that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are fine goals to establish.  But for the Christian, they just aren’t what God wants us to focus on.  True life, liberty, and happiness will come when God is our focus.

Year 2, Day 21: 2 Kings 23

Josiah’s Bold Reforms

Josiah reforms the land.  I give a tremendous amount of credit to Josiah for what he does here in this chapter. Do you know how many enemies Josiah must have made as he went about this business?  How many people did he make upset, especially those who believed that these foreign gods!  They would be angry at him for tearing down the idols and altars!  I can only imagine the potential backlash against Josiah.

Furthermore, Josiah’s reforms have a direct impact upon the economy.  How many times are we told about the cult priests and prostitutes having their places of worship disrupted?  Each of those places that Josiah overturned was a profit machine, employing all kinds of people for very nefarious jobs.  But Josiah knows that this kind of economy must be sacrificed for morality and spirituality if they are to truly be God’s people.

In all of this, Josiah does it.  In fact, I give Josiah even more credit because he knows that judgment has already been pronounced by God against Judah.  Josiah knows that God is still angry and while the judgment may not come in Josiah’s days, it will certainly still come.  In spite of knowing that this judgment is still coming, Josiah goes about the reforms.  He could have rested on his heels and glorified that at least destruction wouldn’t come in his day.  But Josiah doesn’t.  He makes reforms while looking to the future.

Only after “putting the house in order” can Josiah turn to asserting spiritual growth.  This is a huge lesson, one that I often forget and I need to remember.  Josiah knows that he can’t assert growth in God until the false gods have been put away.  The false gods and their ways must be destroyed so that the whole land can focus on God.  This is the difference between Josiah and the many kings before him of whom it was said “They did right in the eyes of the Lord, but not like David.”  Those other kings made small steps of progress, but Josiah purified the whole land!

Learning Josiah’s Lesson

Spiritually, this is no different than for us.  How many times do Christians stagnate in their spiritual growth because they still have remnants of false gods and ungodly desires in their heart?  Until we purify the whole land (or the whole body – heart, mind, and soul) we cannot really hope to become the spiritual person God wants us to be.  Josiah was remembered as one of the great ones because he was willing to purify it all.

Passover

So we hear about Josiah reinstituting the Passover.  I am surprised when I read that the Passover wasn’t kept since the time of the judges.  That is several hundreds of years of time – more than half a millennium, even!  No wonder God was angry with them.  The Passover is a celebration of remembrance of how God has delivered them and it wasn’t even remembered for about a half of a millennium!

This is another lesson we can learn.  I have often been a person who proclaims that we should embrace the new things that God is doing in our midst, but neither should we throw out the traditions that matter to God.  The Passover (or in Christianity we might say The Lord’s Supper) is vitally important to remembering God’s salvation of His lost.  We should not neglect the remembrance of those times.  Like Josiah, we need to call forth the remembrance of His grace.

However, I do think that we need to be careful and not let the traditional approach stagnate us.  Our relationship with God must remain relevant to the culture around us while retaining the wonderful connection to God.  When our practices mean nothing to anyone but ourselves, evangelism stops.  I am sure that Josiah reinstituted the Passover, but I am likewise sure that the Passover celebration happened slightly differently than when Moses was alive.  No doubt there were culture improvements to cooking methods, serving methods, even changes to speech that were present with Josiah’s Passover that would have been different than with Moses.  The focus should not be on maintaining everything (including methodology) exactly the same.  The focus should be on retaining God’s Spirit and being able to relate it to people’s lives.

The Last of the Chapter

The chapter ends with Josiah’s death in battle and the evil reign of his child and grandchild.  It also mentions that the Pharaoh of Egypt was getting a little too big for his britches.  After all Josiah did, it seems so pointless when we know the people fell into evil as soon as he went away.  But I doubt it was pointless to Josiah, Huldah, and the priests of the temple.  And for Josiah’s contemporaries who found God in those reforms, it was not pointless.  Even though the future may not look bright, we should still be a people of reform.  We may not know what the future holds or how faithful the future will be, but we can change lives in the present.  That’s another lesson that we can learn from Josiah’s life.

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Year 2, Day 20: 2 Kings 22

The Great Kings

Today we meet Josiah.  Josiah, Hezekiah, and David are all known as the greatest kings of the Hebrew people.  David, of course, is remembered as the best – probably because he came first more than anything else.  Hezekiah is known for his great repentance, his recovery from illness, and his dedication to producing copies of the Law.  Josiah is known for his all-around reformation of the country, reformations which were desperately needed after Manasseh and especially Amon.  Notice that Josiah (along with Hezekiah) is said to have done righteousness in the eyes of the Lord as David did.

Josiah

It is in Josiah that we see this great sense of repentance that we haven’t seen since David.  Yes, Hezekiah repented greatly, but only after he was told that he was going to die.  Josiah repents only after merely hearing the Word of God.  Josiah listens to the Law of Moses and his heart is cut to the quick.  Josiah listens and immediately dispatches a priest to go and inquire from the Lord what is to happen to them because of their disobedience.  This is what puts Josiah on the same pedestal as David.  Josiah hears, assumes guilt, and repents.  Josiah doesn’t try to argue it away.  Josiah doesn’t try to cover it up.  Josiah doesn’t try to rationalize.  Josiah hears, feels convicted, and responds without having to be punished or threatened with punishment.

What makes Josiah great?  It isn’t his wisdom.  It isn’t his wealth.  It isn’t his command over the people.  It is his willingness to hear the Word of the Lord, feel conviction on his own, and humble himself before the Lord.  That is what makes a person great – king or layman.

Huldah

Notice that in those days the priests went to Huldah to inquire from the Lord.  Who is Huldah?  Well, she is a woman for starters.  These men go to a woman to find out what the Lord really has to say.

Hopefully I have telegraphed my writing well enough that you know where I am going with this.  God has no problem speaking through a woman – even unto the leaders of His great reformation!  God has no issue with a woman being seen as a prophetess – and what is a prophetess but a female prophet, or more precisely a female person who brings the Word of God to their contemporaries!  God spoke words of wisdom to Huldah’s contemporaries through Huldah.  This point is hard to refute.  God has no issue with women in positions of leadership.

But I have a second reason for commenting on this.  What is this passage saying about where true faith is to be found in the time of spiritual lacking?  Typically, true faith is found best among the women.  These men – who are supposed to be priests – go to a woman to find true faith and the true voice of God.

It is often that way today.  In most churches that you go to, is the congregation predominantly male or female?  The youth that are involved, are they predominantly male or female?  The people who do the work in the church, are they predominantly male or female?  It is usually the women of a society who typically hold fast to faith and the calling of the Lord. 

I don’t mean this to say that men are incapable of doing it.  Obviously, we do have prophets as well as prophetesses!  But in general, the women are far more likely to hold fast.

So what does this priestess of the Lord say to the men who seek her out?  She says that all the things written in the Law were going to come true.  The Lord will hand them over to foreign nations and let them be driven from the land.  Why?  Because they have forsaken Him.  God is a God of His word.

Consequences, Revisited

This should sound a fair bit like yesterday.  Wouldn’t it have been nice for Josiah’s repentance to have evaporated the need for judgment upon the Hebrew people?  Wouldn’t it have been nice if that genuine repentance could have erased the consequences?  But alas, this is not to be.  Judgment comes, largely because God knows that even if this generation embraces Him that it won’t be too long before we see a generation that does not embrace Him.  Just because there is a repentant generation now does not mean that the sinful nature of humanity is not right around the corner waiting to rear its ugly head again.

Finally, let’s do look at the relief that God does give to Josiah.  Even though the nation will be judged, it won’t be during Josiah’s time as king.  Josiah will be gathered to His people in peace.  Josiah will be allowed to live out his faithfulness in the land.  The full judgment may not be avoidable, but because of Josiah’s reaction to the Lord God grants them a temporary stay of execution.  God is gracious, because Josiah is humble and contrite upon hearing the Word of God that God has given to the people. 

I think God also realizes that the people will fall away again.  So God gives a stay of execution knowing full well that their righteousness as a nation is merely a temporary state.  Isn’t that an interesting thought upon which to end?

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