What a Kingdom! What a King!

 

“The kingdoms of this world have become the Kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ. And He shall reign forever and ever!” 

I can’t really recite those immortal words without hearing the powerful choral strains of Handel’s Hallelujah chorus echoing in my brain. I suspect that the heavenly choir itself will be singing that masterpiece right up to and forever after the final consummation, resulting in “a new Heaven and a new Earth,” ushering in the blessed, eternal state.

The kingdom of God, of Heaven, of Christ Jesus our Lord, is far more than an incidental theme of holy scripture. Kingdom created, polluted, re-taken, restored, recreated--this is certainly the background theme that ties all of the varied subtexts of the Bible together. And in the New Testament Gospels and other apostolic accounts, the Lord’s kingdom takes center stage again and again as the King Himself steps onto the stage of earth’s history.

The Son of God had, like David of old, been anointed by His Father as the rightful King of kings and Lord of lords. Various Old Testament “Christophanies” such as the Commander of the Lord’s armies who faced off with Joshua, suggested that God the Son had visited the earth personally before His future incarnation. But Jesus’ conception and birth as a human child meant far more than just another “sightseeing” visit, only to return to His past glory. 

In becoming a man, God’s anointed King was stepping across a veritable Rubicon of space and time that would unite godhead with humanity in an indissoluble link--the Person of Jesus Christ. Saint Matthew’s genealogy traced the kingly line of David to its ultimate Potentate, the One who was to receive “all authority in heaven and earth.” The risen Christ had finished His life of active and passive obedience to the Father, which had secured our redemption from sin and death. And on the basis of His hard-fought victory, He gave the martial orders to His followers: “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations... You shall be my witnesses.”

Back in the Garden of Eden, the original Man and Woman fell to the wiles of the devil, surrendering to him the power and authority over the earth that their Creator had meant to be ours. Ever since then, down through our tragic and sickening history, mankind has made a mess of this world, all in the name of pride, arrogance, sinful autonomy and evil desire. Greed, lust, laziness, violence, wrath, and all the other escapees from Pandora’s box, have plagued the hearts, minds and accomplishments of humanity. It seemed like God’s kingdom-dream had been a cruel joke, a pipe dream never to be realized.

But, as the long, intricate pages of the Bible reveal to us, for centuries the sovereign unseen hand of God was moving, predicting, presaging, preparing the stage for the promised “Seed of the woman” who was to crush the wily serpent’s ugly head!

The story of the Old Testament is a story about kings and kingdoms. Most of the kings portrayed were inadequate at best, and positively bestial at worst. Earthly kings comprised a “rogues gallery” of imperfect--in fact, rebellious--rascals and tyrants. They squandered and misused the power that Providence put into their hands. And the Lord God had no alternative but to punish them and the wayward people who followed their loathsome example. And to add insult to injury, He lashed their backs and their foolish pride with the whips of nations even more wicked than His own chosen people had become!

With infinite, sublime patience, Jehovah God was teaching them, and us, and the world, that Adam and Eve’s disobedience--their “declaration of independence” from their Creator, was not worth the price they and we would have to pay. Satan had decided that, for himself, it was “better to rule in hell, than to serve in heaven.” And Adam’s race had chosen to join that rebellion, turning our backs on the loving kingship of our kind heavenly Father. But God was not willing to “wash His hands” of our predicament and let us face eternal hell with the devilish dragon!

From all eternity, His anointed King was preparing to enter history as ONE of us. Armed with the “full armor of God” and filled with the Spirit. Resisting Satan’s temptations, casting out his minions from their human hosts, remaining strong in His times of pain and weakness, willing to pay the horrendous price of forsaken-ness and death on the cross.

“You shall be my witnesses,” the King told his followers. King Jesus calls us His witnesses still. Yes, I’m a citizen of the United States, and proud of it. But I’m enormously MORE glad to be a subject of a far BETTER nation--a KINGDOM that will never be shaken. It is a kingdom that is calling out to those in rebellion, those who are the King’s sworn enemies. It is a kingdom that offers peace, joy, love, mercy, forgiveness... and eternal life.

To enter this better kingdom costs a person nothing in the way of qualifications or payment. Jesus the King has supplied both the holiness we need, and the payment we could never afford.

On the other hand, entering God’s kingdom costs a person EVERYTHING. You must renounce and turn your back on your previous life of rebellion and self-sufficiency. You must willingly begin again, with Christ as your King. 

Believe me, you’ll find in Jesus not only a gracious Ruler and Protector, but your dearest Friend. Leave your past behind you, child of this world, and kneel before your true King.

MNA

11/14/2020

Obey the Call

He entered the human world 

    without the fertilization of a human father.
His birth was foretold by centuries-old prophecies 

    and angelic messengers.
He grew up among the poor and oppressed, 

    one day to challenge the rich and oppressors.
His powers healed and freed from demons, 

    His teaching lighted the spiritually blind.
He ruled over nature--even death!--with His word, 

    He resisted the very powers of hell.
His followers tried to crown Him their king, 

    His enemies’ attempts to smear Him all failed.
He claimed Heaven as His origin, God as His Father, 

    Himself as the only way to be saved.
His warnings threatened eternal torment, 

    His promises offered joys beyond hope or thought.
He told fallen women that faith had saved them, 

    He told pious men they must be re-born.
His fellow rabbis marveled yet resented His audacity, 

    kings and rulers feared His popularity.
He warned His disciples they must be ready to die, 

    and predicted his own death many times.
His entire life’s plan was to orchestrate His own sacrificial death 

    on a cross during Passover.
He entered Jerusalem as a King, cleansed its Temple as a Priest, 

    taught there as a Prophet.
His call rang out across and beyond the Holy Land, 

    so that even Gentiles were seeking Him.
He eluded arrest more than once, 

    then yielded to the mob after preparing His soul to die.
His trusted treasurer sold Him out, His best friend denied Him, 

    His closest followers fled.
He spoke the truth at His trial and it condemned Him, 

    His truth perplexed even Pontius Pilate.
His road to execution was pure torture, 

    His body and soul were bared and forsaken even by God.
He lived the only pure and perfect life ever lived, 

    so saintly and sinless even death released Him.
His agony on the cross bore the weight of man’s sin, 

    paying the debt we could never afford.
He came out of the tomb never to die again, 

    glorified by His Father, ready to take His Throne.
His disciples encountered Him numerous times after His death, 

    changing their lives forever.
He calls out still today by His followers, His word, His Spirit, 

    commanding repentance and faith.
His call is, “Come to Me. I am what you need. 

    I have what you need. Leave all else behind.”

Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Messiah, Jesus the Christ, Jesus Light of the World.

The greatest human being who ever lived was God Himself in human flesh. This God-man did nothing but good, spoke nothing but truth, offers nothing but the beauty of union with Him and His Father.

 
Jesus Christ is the worthiest human being in existence, now occupying the throne of the universe. He is also the most ignored, neglected, hated person in all creation. His followers must still be prepared to suffer, because in His own words, “Remember, they hated Me first.”

But the reason He came in the first place was to SAVE His Father’s enemies from their SIN. Our own human rebellion made this world a place of suffering. Right now, Christ is gathering a new humanity that will stand with Him against that rebellion until He comes back to make ALL things new!

Obey His call. Join with Jesus. Surrender, repent, believe, obey Him. 

The day He returns, my friend, it will be TOO LATE.

MNA
10/31/2020

Together Again!

 Once again, R.C. Sproul’s series on the life of Joseph has inspired some fresh insights in my heart and mind. Hope they are helpful to some of you out there in the “real world.”

His lesson this morning concerning the reunion of Joseph with his father Jacob reminded me of how precious the relationships in our lives remain even after they’ve been broken for a number of years. And how great the joy can be, and will be, one day when those broken relationships are healed, re-established or reunited.

As I think back over the years, so many people come to mind that I’ve shared cherished friendships with, or family closeness, but have since lost touch with either by death, or by distance, or even by disagreements that cannot be reconciled. Although I still have wonderful relationships with many friends and family members in the present, I can’t help but think of my departed Mom and Dad, for example, who always were there for me, cheering me on in my endeavors, my successes and defeats. The joy we shared together is all the more precious even as a fond memory after their death. And, like Jacob and Joseph, our reunion in Heaven will be a time of unspeakable ecstasy as well.

There are friends from my school days that were as close to me as family, but are gone as well, such as my pal David Wade, a fellow I witnessed to and prayed for constantly, but never knew whether or not the Lord saved him before he passed away. There is a couple that Linda and I got to know at one of the many churches I directed music for. They befriended us in an especially beautiful way, and especially appreciated the poems I shared with them. I don’t even recall their names, but they brought an abundance of joy and encouragement into my soul without even knowing it at the time.

Glen Rosenberger is another friend of immensely joyful memory who has passed on. He counseled Linda and me during a very challenging “rough patch” in the beginning phase of our marriage. I’ll never forget his useful metaphor of loving servanthood: being willing to be “the Lord’s donkey” rather than a heroic stallion! Glen poured his time and prayer so selflessly into our lives at that time, as did many other teachers and pastors down through the years!

I just recently got back in touch with a pastor’s wife we had a strong personal friendship with years ago while the children were little and our family was traveling around doing concerts. What a special joy it has been to share with her, now that her husband is in a nursing home facing some awesome challenges. It was so good to find out that their memories of Linda and me are equally precious to them!

Toward the end of the book of Genesis, when Joseph’s brothers return home and tell Jacob their father the good news that his favorite son still lives and is Prime Minister in Egypt, he first finds it hard to believe. He has spent several decades pining away and mourning the loss of Joseph, believing him to be the fatal victim of ravenous beasts. 

Finally, when their father chooses to believe their astonishing report, he exclaims: “It is enough. I will go down to Egypt and see Joseph before I die.” Like the old saint Simeon, who held the baby Jesus in the Jerusalem temple, father Jacob was faced with the fulfillment of a long lost hope: to somehow be reunited with Joseph after many years (and tears!) of separation. After nearing the very edge of despair, as if truly believing “everything is against me!”, this venerable patriarch was as “surprised by joy” as anyone in biblical history.

At their actual meeting down in Egypt, Joseph showed an equal level of joy at their reunion by falling on his father’s neck and he “wept on his neck a good while” (Genesis 46:29). Tears of joy will certainly flow that day when all the relationships we’ve cherished and lost are brought back together. Like the overjoyed father of the prodigal son, we will rejoice that lost, seemingly dead, relationships are “alive again!”

Treasuring and cherishing the people in our life ought to be near the top of our list of priorities. Filling those relationships with times of deep, lasting, truth-filled enjoyment, centered on our shared love for our Lord and Savior, will make our memories of one another worthwhile, even when distance, disagreement, or even death itself, comes between us.

And, then, Lord willing, “When we all get to Heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be!”

MNA

10/24/2020

PRIDE...KILLS...LOVE

Power, all authority, was there

Resting on the shoulders of the just.

In the Upper Room, so unaware,

Disciples lounged, their feet adorned with dust.

Every one preoccupied with self,

Keeping close the greatness self assumed,

Intimacy languished on the shelf.

Like a pet, egos were fondly groomed.

Love, however, made its presence plain

Softly, unobtrusively and low;

Leaving them to preen, He rose again.

Over to the basin stand to go.

Volunteering humbly, love complete,

Exemplifying grace, He washed their feet.

MNA

10/11/2020

Some Testing Required

R.C. Sproul’s series of Saturday messages on the life of Joseph, the Old Testament patriarch, have been both fascinating and inspiring. Not long ago, my own pastor preached a series on the providence of God, in which he highlighted several Biblical characters, including Joseph. 

There are many reasons why believers ought to find Joseph’s story so helpful in our journey to sanctification. This man’s unique dreams, his privileged upbringing, the betrayal and enslavement at the hands of his own brothers, his reaction to being sold as a slave in another country, his faithfulness to the Lord when faced with sexual temptation, his loyalty and good will toward fellow prisoners, his wisdom and wise use of his God-given gifts, and the list goes on.

I was especially struck this morning by the way that testing figures throughout the story of Joseph. God appears to be putting Jacob and his family to the test by giving Joseph his bizarre dreams of future prominence. Obviously, Joseph’s older brothers react to this test in a purely negative way, seeing those dreams as simply a way their spoiled sibling is “lording it over” the rest of them. The very way they decide to “solve” this problem ironically ends up sending their hated brother into the path that eventually leads to the dreams’ fulfillment!

The next series of tests is directed at Joseph, at least primarily. His faith and his faithfulness are sorely tested through a gauntlet of crushing disappointments, all while he is choosing to do the right thing time after time. Repeatedly the devil seems to be whispering, “Just give in and accept the fact that God has abandoned you. There’s no use in remaining virtuous. Surrender is your only logical option...” Joseph seemed to be destined for obscurity by the dismal circumstances in which he found himself. Can’t you imagine the echoes of despair in his mind, like: “May as well have gone ahead and given in to Potiphar’s wife. Certainly, God wouldn’t have cared!”

But, no, Joseph somehow, with God’s help, waited patiently for the tide to turn. Patient endurance is certainly a virtue that this present culture of “gotta have it now” must reacquire. And it must be admitted that Christ’s church must also seek to major on such ideals if it is to become all our Master wants us to be!

All the while that Joseph is waiting, his father is also being tested. Jacob has seemingly lost his favorite, darling boy. But it’s interesting that when God requires him to suffer this great loss, Joseph’s father ends up favoring the younger of the two sons borne by his favorite wife. Benjamin becomes the new Joseph in Jacob’s life, to be coddled and protected at all costs. Rather than seeing his loss as an opportunity to sharpen his parenting skills, he falls back on his old habits of favoritism. And when Benjamin must accompany his older brothers to Egypt, he can only moan that everything seems to be against him!

I’m challenged by this negative example to have a more optimistic view as I face the future. May the Lord give me the trust in Him it will require to take future losses in stride, and see them as opportunities to grow and change for the better. We must realize that the Lord gives and the Lord takes away, even as Job of old admitted. When we advance in years (and, hopefully, in wisdom) we often find that more gets taken away than we’re comfortable with. At those times, we need to recall the words God gave Paul concerning his “thorn in the flesh.”

Well, God’s grace was certainly “sufficient” for Joseph, especially when the day came for this former slave and long-time prisoner to be elevated to the role of Prime Minister in the land of his captivity! It amazes me that somewhere in the intervening years, Joseph apparently developed or otherwise obtained the gift of interpreting dreams, not just having them himself. Either that, or he was taking a tremendous leap of faith when he encouraged his fellow prisoners to share their visions with him. “Don’t interpretations belong to God?” he asked them, then urged, “Tell me your dreams.”

Tested and tried over and over, this young man refused to let the disappointments drive him deeper and deeper into himself, becoming a bitter, hermit-like malcontent. Rather, he remained outgoing and interested in the moods and the needs of others. God gave him a caring heart that shone out even when few people if any seemed to care about him. When the day came for him to leave the prison forever, he was prepared to set that caring heart loose to meet the needs of entire nations of people faced with a seemingly worldwide famine.

Then, the rest of Joseph’s story continues the testing theme in a beautiful, yet intriguing way: the way that this new Prime Minister of Egypt takes the unexpected opportunity to put his own family to the test! It seems to me that Joseph is absolutely justified in acting almost like the unseen hand of God Himself in the lives of his ten older brothers when they come before him to purchase life-sustaining grain for their families. All the while he is magnanimously meeting their physical needs, Joseph is giving them almost playful little tests to sound out their characters and get them to face their own suppressed guilt. His use of his own elevated position to manipulate their circumstances--all for their own good--may seem arbitrary to those used to democratic rule. But isn’t it a great picture of how Romans 8:28 is worked out in all our lives?

And at the end of the road that God’s providence lays out for you and me, there is a “land of Goshen,” a new heaven and new earth, waiting for those who remain faithful through all the testing and trials He planned for us along the way.

MNA

10/3/2020

Four Haiku

One

"Never" is a ghost,
ever lost in time and space,
ever chased by hope.

Two

Hunting man foresees
times of want and scarcity
that may never come.

Three

Hawk wings her foray
high above the land of life,
dropping swift with death.

Four

Dark it stalks its prey
while we mask our hunted nerves
with our viral posts.

by MNA
7/27/2020

hai·ku

/ˈhīˌko͞o/

noun

• 1.a Japanese poem of seventeen syllables, in three lines of five, seven, and five, traditionally evoking images of the natural world.

Change Hunger

Once upon a life I

arrived unclothed, to be

girded and swathed, cleaned

and pressed into servitude, 

meeting need & wish & whim

of the goggler in the glass:

one who all life long

yearned for a new reflection.

Following sires and siblings, I

wore handmedowns & hashtags,

hovering, wondering who and why,

and whither I ought to fly away--

land of never, planet past forever,

city with a skin-suited savior,

spired sanctuary chancel of song,

or a celebrated penman’s paradise?

But mirrors blur and darken

with the nodding and the waking,

and the plodding and the quaking fears

that heaven is but a phantom,

or piety just a pantomime performed

for force uncaring by poor devils daring

to face a shattered lookingglass

with pointless, mindless courage.

Though doubting, I am hoping

that transformation might be mined

in the lively tomb of neglected scrolls

where chiefs and kings were made

to morph from the curse of their births,

into chrysalis-breaking immortals,

by washing the feet of the lowly ones who

like me, are all longing for change.

MNA

7/19/2020

Ascent

Blessing comes down
in heavy drops
threatening to break
the fragile crust
I walk on.

Dangerous pleasures
set off sirens
athwart the straits
marking the passage
to my destiny.

Freshly freed captives
leave crippled footprints
on stones crossing
rivers in flux
flowing through me.

Dream gathers dark,
lost feathered figures
in cloistered chambers
closed as tight
as sleeping eyes.

Wishful words ascend
between cobalt skies
past celestial candles
burning black holes
in a Euclidean canvas.

Blessings break and
pleasures pass by...
captives cross and
dreams nearly deify
as my prayers defy gravity.


MNA
7/5/2020

What Do We Want from Our Pastors?

Looking back on the many different churches I’ve been a part of, the matter of church leadership has always been a major concern. Pastors, elders, deacons (and deaconesses), board members, teachers, and various other office-holders appear in my memory in varying shades of “the good, the bad, and the ugly.” The overarching question that I keep coming back to is: What does the Lord of the church want His church to be? Because that ought to determine the nature of the church’s leadership.

Shepherding the “flock of God” is, or should be, a high and holy calling. Jesus prayed, not only for His immediate band of apostles and other followers, but also for “those who will believe through their word.” For the church of the future, all the way down to you and me. And He prayed that the Father would “sanctify them by Thy truth; Thy word is truth.” Throughout the Scriptures, the ministry of that sacred, sanctifying word is of paramount importance.

If you’re like me, you’re in constant need of reminding about “the basics.” I’m apt to forget what the Bible is. Not simply a written record of the opinions of those who lived centuries ago in a far-off land. It’s exactly the opposite. The Bible is the eternal truth of the living, ruling, supreme, saving God of the universe. The Bible’s message is as contemporary and relevant as if it had been written this very morning. And its truth, its WHOLE truth, is to SANCTIFY God’s people.

Parts of the Scriptures are thrilling, inspiring, fascinating, heartwarming, challenging. Other parts are strange, obscure, tiresome, uncomfortable, terrifying. But Christians consider “all Scripture” to be “God-breathed...profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God should be complete, fully equipped for every good work.” Serious Christians should desire to learn and treasure and obey “the whole counsel of God.”

Perhaps you find yourself in a church that seems content with lighthearted “sermonettes” on a Sunday morning. Your pastor picks his topic based on what he deems to be the “felt needs” of his people. Or the current crisis facing society the previous week. Or maybe he follows the dictates of the church calendar that rotates through a set litany of topics each year. Many pastors appear eager to make their flocks feel better about themselves and life in general. They portray God as a fountain of happiness, but downplay His desire to SANCTIFY us (make us HOLY).

Really, I’ve found that, by and large, a church will get the kind of pastor it WANTS. And very often, the kind it DESERVES. Unless a group of believers is truly hungry to be taught ALL of the Scriptures, that group will end up with a pastor who is more of a “hireling” than a shepherd. One who feeds the sheep with just what will keep them barely alive, not make them all that God wants them to be.

When was the last time that your minister preached through an entire book of the Bible? How about one of the difficult ones like Ecclesiastes or Ezekiel or Hebrews? Does your preacher tend to cycle through a limited pool of topics or preach only from the New Testament or even just the four Gospels? Would you be willing to go deeper and broader in God’s truth, if only your leader was willing to lead the way?

God gave us 66 books for a good reason. He knew what His people needed from all eternity, and He gave it to us in the form of a magnificent Book! Do we want a pastor who is everybody’s “pal” and keeps us all feeling good Sundays with his jokes and anecdotes and pep talks? Or do we want a scholarly mind that grapples with the depth and breadth of holy Scripture in order to challenge His people to make strides spiritually, preparing them for an unknown future that might include persecution and call for strong, sanctified soldiers of the cross?

What DO we want from our pastors? Isn’t it time to voice those desires in prayer? Isn’t it high time to be serious about our faith, our Lord, our churches, our world?

MNA
7/3/2020

Not Knowing

How do we know what we know? Is it possible to know anything with absolute certainty? My five senses are continually sending me information about the world around me (including data about my own body), but can I trust those senses to give me accurate messages? Can I be certain that the workings of my own mind are sifting through that data in a reliable way?

Such questions don’t normally occur to us as we live our day-to-day lives. But philosophers have routinely discussed them for centuries. Epistemology is the study of the whole question of human knowledge and how it is acquired. Many thinkers have come to the conclusion that all we can be sure about beyond any doubt is that we are having sensations--sense perceptions. Others are convinced that the only real knowledge is found in the recesses of the mind--rational thought. Yet others conclude that it is a mixture of the two that determines what and how we know.

Personally, I’m convinced that the claim to “know” something beyond doubt is most usually a doubtful claim.

When God created men and women, He gave them a capacity to “know” Him and trust Him. They enjoyed fellowship with their Creator in a way that you and I only dream of. And yet, even in the Garden of Eden, doubt soon crept into the thinking of our first parents! It slithered into Paradise in the form of a devilish serpent.

The first human couple were tempted, doubted God’s goodness, and fell into sin, dragging their descendents in along with them. Ever since then, the whole question of “knowing” has been up for grabs. When Adam and Eve lost touch with their Creator, their whole basis for certainty about things was short-circuited. The world itself was no longer “very good” in the sense that God had first made it. Indeed, it was under a divine pronouncement of judgment--His curse. There was now no longer God’s unfettered benediction upon creation. Evil had entered, both in the world itself, in ourselves, and in our knowledge of it.

“You will be as gods,” the serpent had lied, “knowing good and evil.” The devil insists that there are really two sides to ultimate truth. God cannot be trusted. He’s not really as good as He is making out. He actually has a dark side. He’s holding back the good stuff for Himself, unwilling to share it with you humans. He’s a cosmic killjoy. His word can safely be questioned, doubted, even disobeyed. And “you will not surely die.”

This is why I normally meet a claim of absolute certainty with a degree of suspicion. There are a great number of false claims flying around. Ever since the Fall and the expulsion from Eden, people have had to be content to be BELIEVERS rather than KNOWERS.

What I mean is, since God the Creator-friend of Eden with whom Adam and Eve communed has become physically absent from us (until Jesus was born), any knowledge of Him has had to come to us “second-hand.” And human beings have learned to imitate the proverbial “man from Missouri” who stubbornly refuses to take anything at face value. While we continue to long for certainty and crave to be sure that we are sure, we find ourselves needing to TRUST some source or other in the HOPE of having that certainty.

“How do you KNOW that God exists?” Frankly, I cannot fully and finally answer that question to my own personal satisfaction. I have intellectual proofs and arguments that are convincing. I have had experiences and have read the Scriptures, and have even spoken to Him. But my own KNOWLEDGE of God’s reality is based on my FAITH in something, Someone, outside of myself.

It is interesting that the words “faith” and “knowledge” are used in the Bible in a somewhat interchangeable way. We are instructed to be true to the “faith of Christ” and to grow in the “knowledge of Christ.” Perhaps the growth from initial “faith” into “knowledge” is a progressive thing, becoming more and more firmly convinced through increased experience as a believer. But notice that those brought initially into Christ are referred to as BELIEVERS and not KNOWERS.

“Faith” is listed in the New Testament as one of the ninefold “fruit of the Spirit” and is in many ways superior to knowledge. If we consider the term “knowledge” to refer to something that is beyond any doubt, then we can see how faith would be a superior virtue. To go on believing something even though doubt is a possibility, must mean that that something holds a very high value to me. We experience this with our loved ones. I might doubt that my child can succeed in what he or she is attempting to do, but out of LOVE for that child, I go on BELIEVING.

I often wonder about the Lord Jesus and His mission here on planet earth to save His people from their sins. He was born into a Jewish peasant family and became a genuine human being with a body and a soul. But He was also fully God from the very beginning (John 1:1). His two distinct natures were never mixed or combined or confused with one another. So as a human being, Jesus was limited in his knowledge just as you and I are.

Never was any man more challenged to go on believing when it was possible to doubt God, than was Jesus Christ. As His death march to the Cross of Calvary drew closer and closer to His own personal “judgment day,” the Bible tells us that Jesus grew more and more agitated and emotion-laden. In his final hours with the twelve disciples, Jesus begged His heavenly Father for some other path than the horrors that awaited Him as the sacrificial lamb who’d be forsaken on that middle cross. To proceed with that assignment, Jesus had to fix His eyes firmly on “the joy set before Him.”

I just wonder if Christ “knew” with a sense of inhuman certainty that everything would turn out well--that crucifixion would be followed by resurrection? Or, like we, was he plagued with a sense of doubt even as His face felt the blows, His back felt the stripes, His shoulder bore the beam, His hands and feet felt the nails, and His voice screamed, “My God, why?”

If those words are true, if His mission really happened, and accomplished all it meant to, then all my doubts can be faced with an unflinching faith, and I can leave the ultimate KNOWING to my Heavenly Lord who knows ALL THINGS, and who reveals to me all I NEED to know.

Amen

MNA
5/22/2020

Heart on a Leash

I’m told that the pastor-theologian Jonathan Edwards was the keenest mind that America ever produced. He was one of the preachers God especially used during the 18th century to lead in the revival that came to be known as “The Great Awakening.” Edwards is also known for his thought and writing in the field of philosophy. One of his most important works in that field is his treatise on the freedom of the will.

Edwards insisted in that work that the human will (which he defined as “the mind choosing”) always makes its choice as it is directed by the person’s strongest desire at the moment. To put it in more modern lingo, the mind ALWAYS chooses by “listening to the HEART.”

You might object that you have often chosen a course of action because you were FORCED into it by your wife, your boss, your best friend, or the weather. Your heart wasn’t in it, it wasn’t at all what you DESIRED to do at the moment, but you chose it anyway.

But if you consider the exact circumstances of each choice, you will discover that Jonathan Edwards had it exactly right. When your boss told you to do something you didn’t care to do, you did it because you didn’t WANT to disappoint him or her, or simply because you WANTED to keep your job. Your conflicting desires at the moment came to a point where the strongest one won the battle. You gave in to your wife because you desired harmony with her more than your own way. You gave your wallet to the mugger because you desired your life more than your money. You cancelled the picnic on a rainy day because you didn't desire soggy sandwiches.

So, all of our mental decisions, and hence, our actual choices of action, are prompted by the desires of our hearts. The strongest desire ALWAYS WINS.

This is a challenging idea, at least in my mind. When I examine my own heart--I mean when I HONESTLY examine it, I find all kinds of selfish desires: wealth, ease, comfort, the respect of my fellow man, the love of my wife and children, self-esteem, and so on. And yeah, there are other darker desires lurking down deep that I don’t wish to even LOOK at, let alone acknowledge or make public.

One of my ongoing, overpowering desires involves expressing my love of beauty and creativity. I enjoy the ACT of creating, whether musically, visually, or poetically. I love to engage in, observe, revel in, immerse myself, lose myself in the realm of the beautiful. Sometimes I find myself desiring beauty so much, it is like a narcotic--like a golden idol I’m tempted to WORSHIP.

This is one of the many reasons I need the Lord in my life. I need His presence. I need His truth. I need His only begotten Son Jesus the Christ. I need the Holy Spirit’s promptings to grab my heart and SHAKE it. I need my DESIRE for HIM to grow...and grow...and grow.

I need my desires to pant for God like an exhausted deer longs for streams of water. I need God’s word to follow me through my day, poking me like a cattle prod when my darker desires start to belch their poison from far, far down in my soul. I need a ready antidote for that sinful venom when I taste it on my tongue.

Desire can be a wonderful, meaningful, glorious thing--as can creativity and beauty.

But I must never forget that the most UGLY and POISONOUS being that ever lived began as the most beautiful of the heavenly host. And one of the things he counted on in Eden was that the woman would see in that forbidden fruit a thing “desirous for making one wise.”

Desire is like an awesome, gorgeous animal. It’s a huge, splendid tiger. There is coming a day when all the tigers of humanity’s desires will finally be let loose to roam freely throughout the land, never to hunt or kill again in all God’s new creation… 

But that day isn’t here yet. For now, that huge, beautiful beast must be on a strong leash. I can’t afford to totally set it free. Because all of my sins began, and will continue to begin, at the point of my strongest desire.

Lord God, may your strong, wise, beautiful hand always hold tightly to my heart’s leash.

Amen.

MNA

5/3/2020

In the Picture?

TRUTH is that which corresponds to reality as it is perceived by GOD.

The preceding sentence is probably the most accurate definition of truth ever devised. Notice that the definition is carefully worded so as to put the final measure of truth in God’s hands, not ours.

Saint Anselm defined God as “that Being than whom no greater can be conceived.” This was the opening of his “ontological argument” for God’s existence. The argument from BEING. Basically, the argument is that God exists NECESSARILY, both as a concept AND as a Reality. For if HE didn’t exist, neither could, or would, anything else!

It follows quite easily that since God’s existence is the only way reality can be accounted for, then His VIEW of reality is the only way TRUTH can be rightly defined.

Since our corporate “fall” in the Garden of Eden, we, Adam and Eve’s offspring, have been engaged in the vain attempt to turn truth into a subjective animal. A amorphous chimera that can be molded and nuanced to suit us and our subjective experience. Together with our primordial parents, we swallowed the lie, “You shall be as gods.” Satan followed that promise up with the qualifier: “knowing good and evil.” But what he really meant was that we could REDEFINE right and wrong according to our corporate whim.

For fallen human beings, created in God’s image, yet saddled with a sinful nature that rebels against Him, we are actually FAR from truly “knowing good and evil.” Oh, we THINK we know what they are. We might even come close sometimes. But guess what? The history of our race proves quite clearly that our “god”-like knowledge of right and wrong is way out of kilter.

Lets take COVID-19 as a present-day example.

Pretty much our entire planet is agreeing right now that this new virus is an unqualified EVIL. It is immobilizing and terrorizing whole populations. It is killing many of our loved ones. It is closing down thousands of businesses. It is separating families. It is a source of misinformation and confusion, much of it on a global scale.

But, if Anselm is right, if God must be, and truth is reality as HE sees it...

Then we must ask ourselves, “What is the truth about the coronavirus as God perceives it?”

When Indiana’s governor gave a speech about the measures our state was taking to combat and accommodate the present crisis, he closed the address by citing his hope and plea for the people of faith in our state to continue their important work of reaching out to struggling and hurting people. He saw this as a way to keep up our morale and our hope for a better tomorrow.

I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, but on youtube, the comments following the governor’s speech included a bunch of criticisms that chastised him for mentioning “people of faith” along with the heroic health care workers and first responders who were facing the crisis with “real” help, and not that religious nonsense (or words to that effect).

It seems that we really DO prefer to define truth, even good and evil, with God out of the picture, even though He, and no other, is the source of all being, and the arbiter of all truth, and the only true KNOWER of what is good, and hence, what is evil.

There are times in the Bible narrative, when God takes definite, concrete steps to “shake things up,” and get folks’ attention. I recall one story of how the Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant from the Israelites and hauled it off to display it triumphantly in one of their pagan temples. God shook things up by making their idol Dagon topple over and break apart, then sending a plague of tumors and an infestation of rats!

The Philistines did all they could, humanly speaking, to solve this problem in a manner that left the Hebrew God out of the picture. Their solutions failed miserably. So they finally sent the Ark back to Israel in a cart pulled by two milk cows who had just calved, while keeping the calves away from the mothers. The cows pulled the cart straight back to Israel, proving to the Philistine leaders that God really HAD caused the plague and the infestation. “Scientific” proof!

Pestilence, plague, natural disaster, fire falling from heaven, whatever tragic situation humans have faced or will face in the future, can we not stop playing the pointless game of facing the crisis with God out of the picture? The truth is that He’s in it. He could not NOT be in it. His being makes all other reality possible. And only He perceives the crisis as it TRULY is.

Read your Bible and you’ll get a clue of the many ways God has USED seemingly evil things in the past to bring about enormous GOOD. Natural evils as well as human evils, nothing is beyond God’s ability to sovereignly sanctify it. Even evil men nailing His only Son to the cross.

Health care professionals, first responders, philanthropists, good neighbors--all of these can be symbols of hope for those caught up in a terrifying viral crisis like we’re facing right now.

But, as we thank them for their efforts, let’s trace the hope we feel back to its ultimate SOURCE.

Crises like this are one of God’s ways of making us keep Him in the picture.

MNA
4/3/2020

Whose Glory?

One of my favorite "modern" movies (produced after the year 1960) is the Spielberg film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Not only is it a great father-son story about alienation and reconciliation between Indy and his dad Henry, it's also a story that suggests tension within a number of deep theological issues.

Holy grail-lore expert Prof. Henry Jones is missing from a privately financed hunt for the cup of Christ. Archaeologist-adventurer Indiana Jones hurries to Venice, Italy in order to find his missing father. Suddenly, unidentified assassins begin attacking him, thinking that, like his dad, Indy is seeking the holy grail. They are members of a secret band of soldiers sworn to safeguard the secret of the grail's whereabouts with their lives.

During this action-packed story, two key confrontations stand out. First is the meeting of the chief of the secret band with Indy, where the chief asks him: "Why do you seek the cup of Christ? Is it for His glory...or for yours?" Indy assures the man that all he wants is to find and rescue his father. Informed of the location where Henry is being held, Jones continues his quest to free him.

Later, after rescuing his dad, the two of them are on the run to evade the Nazis who pursue them. At a crossroads--one leading back to Venice, the other to Berlin--Henry insists that they go to Berlin to retrieve his grail diary, in which there are clues that will safely guide them to find the grail. Indiana strongly objects to venturing into the Nazi stronghold, but Henry counters: "The quest for the grail isn't archaeology. It's a race against evil." It seems that the Germans also want the cup of Christ to help them capture the world.

Fanciful grail legends aside, one must admit that the stakes are even higher than world domination, when it comes to deciding WHOSE glory each of us is seeking, whatever our personal "quest" may be. When Henry Jones suddenly slaps his son in the face after Indy, in frustration, uses "Jesus Christ" as a curse, and tells him, "That's for blasphemy!", he suggests a world and life view that includes an overpowering belief in God. Henry's quest for the grail is not for his own glory. He has something much greater and higher in mind. He is on a divine mission.

I believe that a compelling reason so many are doing all they can to avoid God, Christ, and the church, in our day, is that they find it impossible to live with the idea of an all-powerful Being who designed and created and sustains this universe for HIS glory and not for OURS.

Even worse than those who flat-out deny God's reality are those who vainly attempt to re-define who He is. This includes folks in so many of our churches who pick and choose among the Lord's biblical attributes to cobble together a Frankenstein-like deity of their own liking. A tame, toothless God they can live with. A God who lets humans "fulfill their own destiny" or "just follow their hearts." A grandfatherly semi-supreme Being who doesn't really judge anyone for his or her sins.

Asking myself, "Will this glorify God...or myself?" in regard to what I am thinking, doing, saying, seeking, is probably the most important question I could possibly ponder. And the one I'm least likely to ask. Why? Because the remaining sin within me is resting too comfortably. Because I deplore confrontations (especially with myself!). And, honestly, because I am normally too insulated against the glories of God's creation that shout, scream and sing about the glorious Being HE truly is!

The Apostle Paul wrote to his son in the faith, young Timothy: "I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith." He claimed that a crown of life was awaiting him in glory. Heaven is where God's people will graciously be permitted to share in the glory that is Christ's. But for now, we are on a divine quest. A quest for HIS glory. Like Henry Jones told his son, "It's a race against evil!" To focus on heavenly glory, I must confront and kill the evil WITHIN.

Our Captain, King Jesus, is coming again, perhaps sooner than we imagine. He will be leading his armies into the true "Last Crusade" to deliver his people and crush their enemies. When He comes, will he find you "seeking HIS glory...or YOURS?"

MNA
4/2/2020