The End of All Stories

“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are—as you used to call it in the Shadowlands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning.”

And as He spoke, He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.

—C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle.

The Blood of Christ and Abel

For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. (1 Cor. 15:16,17)(ESV)

Why is this so? Why would the sacrifice of the perfect Lamb of God lose its efficacy if the Resurrection had not happened? The shedding of blood is the shedding of blood, is it not?

And that is the point.

The writer of Hebrews says that the blood of Jesus speaks a better word than the blood of Abel (Heb. 12:24). Blood pollutes the land and guilt rises up to infect the inhabitants (Deut. 21:1-9), and this is intensified when we consider the blood shed from the first murder. Abel’s blood cries out against the earth itself and against God’s image bearers.

Jesus, God’s perfect image bearer, finally answers the crying out for justice with his own blood and drowns out the noise.

And yet we are left with more innocent blood. The levies of Abel’s blood were simply overwhelmed with the pure blood of Christ. And innocent blood cries out. If anything we are more doomed, and our sentence even greater, for we absorb the guilt brought on by the murder of the Son of God. The sons of Adam are all culpable. We have Christ’s blood on our hands.

Without the Resurrection, this is where are left, still in our sins. End of story.

But there is no gnostic “gospel.”  Christ bodily rose from the dead. The sentence was reversed. Death itself was swallowed up. The blood of Christ still remains sprinkled on the earth, but the song it sings is now a different tune.

Thanks to the Resurrection, the blood crying out for condemnation now cries out for mercy and atonement. Thanks be to God for this wonderful gift.

An Act of “Christian” Terrorism? Not Even Close.

Once again we have the worshipers of Reason being unreasonable. The fundamentalist who killed 76 people in Norway is being regarded as another example of the horrors of religion when not kept private. See, Christians commit acts of terrorism too. Just like Muslims. They might as well be exactly the same.

Of course, the only basis for calling him a Christian is the guy’s Facebook profile, which is about as deep as most people looked. They see a piece of ice floating on the water, and then have faith that it is actually the tip of an iceberg 300 feet tall. They don’t have to actually look, though.  After all, they have reason and science on their side by default, so they don’t have to engage in any actual freethinking.

Breivik was a fundamentalist, no doubt. But as this article points out, he was an Enlightenment fundamentalist.

 In an on-line manifesto, Breivik makes it clear that he is not a “fundamentalist Christian.”  He prefaces one comment with, “If there is a God…” and says that science should always trump religion.  So in terms of religious convictions, he sounds more like Richard Dawkins than Jerry Falwell.

The article is insightful, and I encourage you to read it, as it also highlights one of the key problems with our culture: desiring the fruit of the tree (Christendom), while wanting to do away with the root and tree itself (Christ).

Citizens in Colonies of Heaven

This is a re-post of a previous article with minor edits. I actually still agree with most of what I wrote 4 years ago, which is weird.

“But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.” Philippians 3:20,21

This passage seems short and simple, but is pregnant with underlying meaning and first century cultural undertones. With our twenty-first century eyes, we typically read this as meaning that our true home is in heaven, and that we should always be longing to return to our true home. Christianity is simply the road-map to get us to the correct destination. All other guides lead to Hell.

But Paul was not a westerner living in the United States, nor were his readers. Nor did they live after the Enlightenment, which loves to force every concept into some sort of dualism. So what meaning could the word “citizenship” have in the time period?

What was the most popular and well-known form of citizenship during the first century, of which Paul himself had attained?

In the Gentile world to which Paul directed his preaching, the power of Rome overshadowed all walks of life, especially in Phillipi, so it is not unreasonable to think that the context here is Roman citizenship. Add the fact that Phillipi was a Roman colony founded by Augustus, planted permanently with Roman military veterans, and was referred to as a “miniature Rome,” and the case stacks up that Paul wrote to a Romanized city filled with Roman citizens.

So what did this citizenship mean? In the rich diversity of the Empire, with it’s sprawling colonies, certainly it did not mean that a Roman citizen longed to return once and for all to the mother city, Rome, and that the ultimate goal of their lives, was to reach that glorious place. A proposal like that sounds silly.

What it did mean, however, was that a citizen could call on the power of Caesar to intervene, as Paul did when he was on trial. It also meant that if there were ever any problems in a colony, or that Caesar’s authority was questioned, that he (or a representative) would come down from Rome (usually at the head of a legion or two) to reestablish Roman rule and authority. Likewise, Roman citizens were to exude Roman values, to essentially carry Rome wherever they went. Leaven for the land.

Here we have a more plausible meaning for the passage. Jesus, the true lord and king of the world, coming to complete the work the church has undertaken since his resurrection, and finally, once and for all, reestablishing the authority of the Father over all of creation. But in the process, the creation itself will be renewed into a “new heavens and new earth”, of which the Spirit was a down payment.

After all, simply “going to heaven when you die”, seeking to escape the good creation of the one true God, would really be no different than the Platonic view of the world, which most pagans held anyway. There’s nothing inherently controversial about that view. But the message that Jesus is Messiah, the lord of all the earth, and to him every knee should bow, including that of Caesar, would turn a few heads, I imagine.

So why do we want to escape an earth that Jesus has in subjection, and will renew (along with our bodies) when he comes again?

The early Christians were not persecuted because they wanted to escape their bodies and leave the world. Who cares if they did that? Good riddance, some would say. They were persecuted because they were odd, peculiar, and stood in direct defiance to Caesar’s authority, claiming another king.

In the same way, our loyalty should not be to any governments of man, nor their agendas of power and death. We tolerate them, and respect their God-given authority, but only as the parodies and shadows they are of the true King. They need to be reminded that they eventually have to report to upper management.

Begin telling people that your allegiance is to another King. That you have a citizenship that trumps your obligations as a citizen of any government on earth. That you reject their claim that there is no authority above them.

You are a citizen of heaven. Act like one.

Baptizing the Straw Man

I grew up in a tradition that claims baptism is necessary to be saved, or to be right with God, or to enter into the covenant. I still believe this. But among much of the American evangelical world , people who believe this are said to hold to the false teaching of “baptismal regeneration,” that it is the act of baptism itself that saves.

But this is a straw man.

We all love straw men, so it’s understandable. They’re so much easier and lighter to carry around than actual arguments. For my side, it’s easy to use them along with a few proof texts to “debunk” Calvinism, to rip off a few petals of the TULIP and then act smug as if the whole flower has been uprooted and flung on the sidewalk.

No one I know actually believes baptism alone saves.  Not many people think that falling into the pool has eternal consequences.

The spectrum of beliefs isn’t a ping pong table, where the ball is on one side or the other.  It’s not all or nothing, where either baptism does nothing, or baptism does everything.

You have most Baptists who think baptism doesn’t actually do anything and is just an outward sign of what has already happened. A part of the public confession, but a person is saved before they get wet. For sure, it is an important act of obedience that every Christian should perform, but if it was necessary for salvation, wouldn’t that mean salvation was dependent on a work of man?

But this denies the power and sovereignty of God.

Namaan and Noah and Israel, Oh My!

The example of Namaan is helpful here. Do we dare scoff at water as he did? As Leithart says:

Like Namaan, some Christians doubt what the New Testament says about the power of baptismal water. (1 & 2 Kings, p. 194)

We would do well to listen to the words of Namaan’s servants:

“My father, it is a great word the prophet has spoken to you; will you not do it? Has he actually said to you, ‘Wash, and be clean’?” (2 Kings 5:13)(ESV)

Would Namaan have had his flesh restored “like the flesh of a little child” if he had not baptized himself? Would his new birth have come?

Leithart continues:

To say that water can cleanse leprosy, wash away sins, or renew life is an insult to intelligence. Water is just too simple, not to mention too physical and tangible.  But that is exactly the point. Baptism is an insult to the wisdom of the world: through the foolishness of water God has chosen to save those who believe. (1 & 2 Kings, p. 195)

A few more hypotheticals.  What if, when God parted the Red Sea, the Israelites just stood there and didn’t cross? Or what if Noah made no move to get on the ark when it started to rain? The baptisms of the flood and the Red Sea were real acts of salvation, and yet each required a form of obedience. And yet, when the Israelites looked on from the opposite shore, they knew it was God that had delivered them, and not the shuffle of their own feet.

So, when presented with baptism, do we look up to God and with Namaan say “Why don’t you just wave your hand and make it so without me getting wet? Seems easier.”

And I must draw attention again to this brilliant satire video that sums up some of the New Testament teachings. I’ll let it speak for itself.

What About the Children?!

I read a lot of the Federal Vision Reformed theologians (Leithart being one of them), and they continually affirm that baptism does indeed do something.  I can get behind that, because it obviously does justice to the larger body of Scripture. However, they typically then take it and try to apply it to infant baptism. On that issue, I stand with the Baptists and am firmly credobaptist.

I understand the desire for paedobaptism.  The idea is compelling and some of the arguments bring up some interesting questions, such as what is meant by 1 Corinthians 7:14.

However, the foundational idea is that baptism has replaced circumcision in marking the people of God.  Hence, baptizing infants into the promise is good and proper.

But I think Paul in Galatians makes it clear that faith in Christ, brought about by hearts put under the knife of gospel preaching, is the new circumcision. Baptism has more to do with the priestly washings and the laver in the temple, and meant for people who can actually perform priestly work in the kingdom (as in, not infants.)

What in the World Did You Just Read?

This post is just a big, personal brain dump. A winding road through rolling hills. It is based on what my current understanding is of the situation.  Pouring it out in blog form was triggered by recent conversations I’ve had, both in person and through blogs, and then reading a passage in a commentary that essentially claimed I was a false teacher (not me personally, just a “those who say that” generalization.) Calling each other false teachers is a favorite sport among Christians, but it can turn into a contact sport with real injuries.

As mentioned earlier, I think a lot of men are being sculpted from straw around this topic, like kids forming men out of snow in their front yards. It’s fun, and you have something to show for your work.  But it never lasts. This was an initial attempt to scare the scarecrows away.

So what does everyone think? I know people from varied traditions have read this blog. Please chime in.