Friday, April 15, 2005
---The Spectacle
Numbers 21When Israel was suffering in Egypt, God saved them and brought them out to make a nation of them to serve His Purpose. In the desert, when they needed food and water, He provided for them. But again and again, it just wasn’t good enough for them.
4 They traveled from Mount Hor along the route to the Red Sea, to go around Edom. But the people grew impatient on the way; 5 they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, "Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the desert? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!"
6 Then the LORD sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. 7 The people came to Moses and said, "We sinned when we spoke against the LORD and against you. Pray that the LORD will take the snakes away from us." So Moses prayed for the people.
8 The LORD said to Moses, "Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live." 9 So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, he lived.
And every so often, the incessant griping started to make even the loving God of Israel angry. Worse, His Provision for their needs was now “miserable” to them. God sends poisonous snakes among the people to afflict them, and many die. But God relents, as always, and provides relief to His People when they repent of their sins. But there is something very different about the relief this time. First of all, God doesn't remove the affliction of venomous reptiles from the camp like they asked (v.7). Instead, Moses is to make an image of one of the snakes out of bronze, and lift it up over the camp on a pole. When anyone is bitten, they can be healed by looking at the bronze snake.
What’s going on here? They most certainly aren’t being asked to worship the image of the snake (Their descendants tried that for a while, and fared badly for it. King Hezekiah had to clean up that mess ( 2 Kings 18:4 ) ). No, they are simply to look at it. What is God trying to tell them, and us?
Later, Jesus says:
John 3Jesus has begun to show us the purposes of His death, the reasons for the terrible manner in which He is to die. Like the display commanded to Moses, Jesus is to become a spectacle for all generations to come of the consequences of our sin. People---Jews and Romans--- who thought, acted, and made their decisions just like we do today, subjected history’s only truly innocent Man to a humiliating criminal’s death because He insisted on telling the Truth. Jesus is the Indictment against us, our lives, our governments, and the way we live our lives in rejection of God.
14Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.
16“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Blessedly, however, there’s more. I have always found it easy to remember the first halves of Romans 3:23,24 and 6:23, but for some reason I have a problem remembering the most important part of each:
Romans 3We deserve to be cast away by God, but He loved us too much to leave us under that curse:
23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
24and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
Romans 6
23For the wages of sin is death,
but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 5Jesus is also our Pardon. If we can be led by His Holy Spirit to acknowledge our crime against God, and to look up and see the inexpressable horror of its consequences, and repent, God will forgive us.
6You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. 8But God demonstrates his own love for us in this:
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
But even that wasn’t all! If we acknowledge our powerlessness against our sin, and place our faith in Jesus (Ephesians 2:8-9), He will restore us to God’s Presence, with full rights as the children and heirs of God (John 1:12), so that we may sit at the very feet of the Almighty and learn His Ways (John 14:26).
The unsearchable Miracle which restores us to God is found only in Jesus Christ---the condemning spectacle of His death, the Pardon in His Sacrifice, and the Hope in His conquest over death by His Resurrection---because only in Jesus is the whole Truth found, together with the Power to put it into effect in our lives.
Romans 8
38For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
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Saturday, April 09, 2005
---"Head of Church - How the Papacy Works"
From those wacky guys at HowStuffWorks. I just had a feeling that there was some kind of major misconception at work here. Matthew 16 indeed says:
Who is the Head of the Church on earth? No Christian would have to ask:
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15“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”There is apparently an easy temptation to misinterpret verse 19, at least for some. However, Mounce, in Basics of Biblical Greek, uses verse 19 as a beginner's example of Greek exegesis , especially the phrases "estai dedemenon " and " estai lelumenon ", which are future passive pluperfect periphrastic contructions (See also http://www.greekbible.com/, if you have inclinations to 1st-Century Greek). This is also indicated in the NIV text notes. To make a long story shorter, the meaning is "will have been bound" and will have been loosed"--- Peter, and the other Apostles, aren't being given power to give orders to Heaven (or in place of Heaven!), but assurance of Divine Guidance in the decisions of the Church. This is, after all, pretty basic theology, fully consistent with doctrines established in the rest of the Gospel---unless for some reason you really want to mess it up.
16Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
17Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. 18And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.19I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
Who is the Head of the Church on earth? No Christian would have to ask:
Ephesians 1Jesus is the Leader of His Church, and His children on earth! All would be well advised to stay out of His Way.
22And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.
Labels: Bible and Religious Commentary
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Wednesday, April 06, 2005
---Civilization Takes Another Leap
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,152273,00.html
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,152176,00.html
http://www.anncoulter.org/ (this week’s commentary: “The Emperor's New Robes”)
Is it significant that the English language uses the same word for both judicial and sexual misconduct? We say “sexual perversion” and “perversion of justice”. Why? A reflection of the similarly severe consequences of both to our social structure? Certainly neither can be tolerated if a society is to survive for any length of time. And here we are, as citizens of the American Republic, suffering under both kinds in apparently unlimited abundance.
Before you look the other way while your judicial institution passes judgment on the Ten Commandments, think about how many human empires have fallen to dust since the Ten were written down.
The truth is, Civilization doesn’t actually work. It never has. It was a failure from the beginning---how many human civilizations have lasted more than a few hundred, perhaps a thousand years? Certainly none will last forever. If insanity is to be defined as trying the same thing over and over, fully expecting it to work “this time”, then our species is in serious trouble, if that wasn’t obvious from other observable parameters. I think we are able to continue to convince ourselves to keep trying the same mistake again and again, and to believe that Civilization is The Thing To Do, because at the end of every generation, we destroy the evidence. God instituted the Fifth of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:12) for a good reason.
Civilization doesn’t actually work, because the concept is flawed from its foundations up. It would require that we replace God’s Judgment with a mindless paper automaton of laws, sufficient to predict and counteract all the enormous number and ever-evolving variety of ways that an ill-motivated human can discover to cause evil and chaos. It would also require that we replace God’s Justice with some sort of administration for the impossible system of laws made up of men who, although evil and sick with power, are to be expected to act in the interest of the governed instead of for the personal political and financial gain of the administrator.
Worst of all, the very idea of human government apart from humanity’s Creator requires that we separate ourselves from God’s Presence. Civilization’s founding principle is the lie (John 8:44), and its driving ambition is evil. Evil is a terrible basis for a government. Remember the Third Reich? The Soviet Union? But maybe it will work next time.
Given a few generations at best, a given attempt at government most often differs from hell only in duration. Been in a court of law in the U.S. lately? Nor is the perversion limited to the judiciary. Had an elderly relative’s insurance near the finish line while they were under extended care in a hospital lately?
How do we escape this worst of all bad ideas? How do we fix this? By returning to God’s Kingdom, and submitting to the King He has placed on its Throne:
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,152176,00.html
http://www.anncoulter.org/ (this week’s commentary: “The Emperor's New Robes”)
Is it significant that the English language uses the same word for both judicial and sexual misconduct? We say “sexual perversion” and “perversion of justice”. Why? A reflection of the similarly severe consequences of both to our social structure? Certainly neither can be tolerated if a society is to survive for any length of time. And here we are, as citizens of the American Republic, suffering under both kinds in apparently unlimited abundance.
Isaiah 10Why can’t we make a government that lasts? Why does every system either fail outright and disappear or become degenerate and abusive or succumb to the madness of power? While we can argue indefinitely about whether or not the American Republic has or hasn’t arrived at its “Rubicon” moment, there is no reason at all to believe that it is headed in some other, more constructive direction. Babylon, Assyria, Greece, Macedon, Rome, all gone. There is no reason to believe that any of the current crop of government systems will fare any better. Where else would we go for hope for the future? France? Saudi Arabia? China? It’s all been done, most of it more than once. In fact, in all of human history, the Truth is the only form of government that hasn’t been tried.
1 Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, 2 to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the fatherless. 3 What will you do on the day of reckoning, when disaster comes from afar? To whom will you run for help? Where will you leave your riches?
Before you look the other way while your judicial institution passes judgment on the Ten Commandments, think about how many human empires have fallen to dust since the Ten were written down.
The truth is, Civilization doesn’t actually work. It never has. It was a failure from the beginning---how many human civilizations have lasted more than a few hundred, perhaps a thousand years? Certainly none will last forever. If insanity is to be defined as trying the same thing over and over, fully expecting it to work “this time”, then our species is in serious trouble, if that wasn’t obvious from other observable parameters. I think we are able to continue to convince ourselves to keep trying the same mistake again and again, and to believe that Civilization is The Thing To Do, because at the end of every generation, we destroy the evidence. God instituted the Fifth of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:12) for a good reason.
Civilization doesn’t actually work, because the concept is flawed from its foundations up. It would require that we replace God’s Judgment with a mindless paper automaton of laws, sufficient to predict and counteract all the enormous number and ever-evolving variety of ways that an ill-motivated human can discover to cause evil and chaos. It would also require that we replace God’s Justice with some sort of administration for the impossible system of laws made up of men who, although evil and sick with power, are to be expected to act in the interest of the governed instead of for the personal political and financial gain of the administrator.
Worst of all, the very idea of human government apart from humanity’s Creator requires that we separate ourselves from God’s Presence. Civilization’s founding principle is the lie (John 8:44), and its driving ambition is evil. Evil is a terrible basis for a government. Remember the Third Reich? The Soviet Union? But maybe it will work next time.
Given a few generations at best, a given attempt at government most often differs from hell only in duration. Been in a court of law in the U.S. lately? Nor is the perversion limited to the judiciary. Had an elderly relative’s insurance near the finish line while they were under extended care in a hospital lately?
How do we escape this worst of all bad ideas? How do we fix this? By returning to God’s Kingdom, and submitting to the King He has placed on its Throne:
Isaiah 9We admit our mistake, and accept Him by faith:
6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, [a] Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this.
Romans 3:We re-admit His Presence into our lives:
23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
John 14:We become God’s Nation:
26But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.
Exodus 19:6
You will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
1 Peter 2:9
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
Matthew 16:18
…and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hell will not overcome it.
Labels: Bible and Religious Commentary
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