Christ Church

Refugees and Apostles

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Introduction

As we seek to live our lives as faithful Christians, informed by the Word of God, we soon discover that it is not a simple process. It is not as though the Spirit gave us a rule book, in outline form, fully indexed. He gave us laws, principles, stories, and parables, strewn across various ages and cultures of men. What are we to do with it all?

The Text

“Ye shall not eat any thing with the blood: neither shall ye use enchantment, nor observe times . . .” (Lev. 19:27-29).

“Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world . . . ” (1 John 2:15-17).

For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe . . .” (Heb. 5:13-14).

Summary of the Texts

These texts before us provide us with a good snapshot of the difficulty. First, consider this. The ancient nation of Israel was told to keep themselves distinct from the pagan nations round about. There were many aspects of this. They were not to eat blood (Acts 15:20), use enchantments (Gal. 5:20), or observe times (Gal. 4:10). They were not to round the corners of their heads (huh?), or trim their beards (what?). They were not to mutilate their flesh, or get tattoos (see?). Because the Lord was their God, they were not to prostitute their daughters (1 Cor. 6:9), which would defile the land. The question is which things in this list should we obey, and why? Christians obey some things on this list, ignore others, and have arguments about a third category.

The apostle John tells us that root of sin is an attitude, that of loving the world. If we are wise, we don’t work from a list of prohibited items to the attitude, but rather we deal with the attitude, knowing that it will necessarily entail a list. He breaks out what this love of the world looks like—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. These three things, as it happens, were part of the temptation in the Garden. The forbidden fruit was good for food, delightful to the eyes, and able to make one wise (Gen. 3:6). None of this is of the Father, but is rather of the world. And the problem with the world is that it is transient, while the one who lives out the will of God lives forever.

As these are difficult issues, they should not be sorted out by those who have been Christians for a year. These are not problems to be handed over to the nineteen-year-olds. Those not yet weaned are unskilful in the Word. But those who are mature understand the Word, and through long practice in sorting out these kinds of issues, know how to distinguish good from evil when a judgment call is needed. All Christians know some things, but not all are mature.

Some Practice Exercises

In this current climate, it is not possible for Christians to go more than fifteen yards without encountering some new practice commended, urged, or demanded by the world, and it is necessary to deal with the resultant questions from your teenagers. “Can I, can I, huh? Why not?” You can keep life simple (for a time) by always saying no, for no particular reason, but that is no worldview. What about temporary tattoos? What about getting permanent tattoos? What about reading vampire fiction for teens written by a Mormon? What could possibly be problematic about that? What about metal music that sounds like a troop of cavalry going over a tin bridge? What about those fetching lip rings and tongue studs? As G.K. Chesteron once put it, art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere.

Questions to Work Through

Begin by distinguishing the basic question—always an easy one—from the more complicated ones. Is this an expression of love for God and His Word or is it being filed under the category of, “Well, God never said I couldn’t“? This basic question is another form of asking whether you are being worldly or not. There is another question right next to this basic question. Think of all the people you know who are saintly and are at least twenty-five years older than you are. Do you want to ask them their advice on this or not so much? Is it because you already know what they will think and you don’t want to do it? An honest motive check would fix about 90 percent of our problems, and enable us to talk intelligently about the remaining 10 percent.

Once you have resolved to not be worldly, you still can’t go through life saying, “just because.” You should have reasons for what you say and do. Why are tattoos not in the same category as temple locks? Because of the flow of the whole story. Look at all the piercings and cuttings, and what they mean. Even the one required cutting in the Old Testament is replaced with baptism in the New. What is wrong with vampire fiction? The question should be answered by Christians who know the history of European literature, not to mention sexual diseases. The whole thing is a metaphor for immorality and syphilis. So what could be problematic about sweet Christian girls being taught to be drawn to a dangerous lover? Is this a trick question? What is wrong with music that celebrates rebellion? Why do we even have to ask?

Refugees and Apostles

But as we are interacting with the world (which we must do), we have to make a distinction between refugees and apostles. The twin businessees of the church are birth and growth. Evangelism must not exclude discipleship, and discipleship must not be allowed to exclude evangelism. So in this culture, robust evangelism means welcoming refugees from the world. That means, in the current culture, that we should want our churches filling up with tattooed people, those with memorials of who and where they used to be. But this should not be used as cover for receiving apostles of the world. We must not receive them, or give them the time of day.

God takes us all where we are, and not from where we should have been. If He only took those who were where they should have been, we would all of us be lost. Evangelism means that nonbelievers will be brought into the church. And they will track things in. So? Didn’t you track things in? Did God kick you to the curb?

 

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Romans 37: The End Of The Law (10:1-4)

Joe Harby on

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Introduction

We have already seen that Christ is the foundation stone and the stumbling stone, depending. For the one who believes, He is the foundation of all. For the one who does not believe in Him, He is the rock of offense.

The Text

“Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is, that they might be saved. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Rom. 10:1-4).

Summary of the Text

Paul has already said that he could wish himself lost if that would benefit his kinsmen (Rom. 9:3). Here he repeats his heart’s desire and prayer—that they would be saved (v. 1). He can testify on their behalf that they are zealous, and that it is a zeal for God. But it is not in accordance with knowledge—it is a false-hearted zeal (v. 2). Their problem is that they were ignorant of God’s righteousness (v. 3), and they were “going about” to establish their own righteousness (v. 3). As a result they had not submitted to God’s righteousness (v. 3). Paul’s conclusion is that Christ was the end (telos) of the law “for righteousness to” every one who believes (v. 4).

The Whole Point of the Law

When Paul says that Christ is the “end of the law,” he does not mean that Christ is the abolition or limit of the law, as in the phrase the “end of the dock.” He means that Christ was the whole point of the law, as in “what is the chief end of man? The word end here does not mean limit or boundary, but rather it means purpose or point. The law of God was therefore teleological (from telos), and the telos, the one it was driving toward was Jesus Christ. He is the point of the whole Bible. But He is the point of the law as more than just a person or placeholder. He is the end of the law in His righteous obedience. More on this shortly.

Ignorant of God’s Righteousness

Remember the conclusion of chapter nine. There is a trap for sanctimonious saints. There is a pit for the pious there. There is something in the (religious) human heart that wants to be righteous on its own. In our own tradition, in our own teaching and preaching, we must be careful not to leave any room for this tendency whatever.

A recent interpretation of Paul says that the “righteousness of God” refers only to God’s own faithfulness in keeping His own promises. It does not refer, the argument goes, to any righteousness of God that can be imputed to others. This view of God’s righteousness is deficient when held up next to this passage, for four reasons.

First, if the righteousness of God refers to His own righteousness, then the Jews were not ignorant of it. Second, they were “going about” to establish their own righteousness. Instead of what? Instead of the antecedent, the righteousness of God. They wanted their own righteousness instead of the righteousness of another. Third, the righteousness of God was not something they were willing to submit themselves to. This submission, we have just learned, is by faith—and if it is the righteousness of another, it has to be a submission by faith, by definition. And fourth, consider closely the language of v. 4. Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth. This fourth point requires some more from us.

Grace Everywhere You Look

If Christ is the whole point of the Torah, and if Christ is a stone of stumbling and rock of offense, then it follows that the whole point of the Torah is a stone of stumbling and rock of offense. In Scripture there is grace everywhere you look, and if you don’t want to see it, then you have to do some strange things to the Scriptures.

The language of v. 4 is consistent with the doctrine of imputed righteousness, and is consistent with nothing else. Everyone who believes receives something. What is that? They receive righteousness. We know that it cannot be their own righteousness because, if it were, they would not “receive” it, but would already have it, and we also would not have just been told that those who wanted their own righteousness were stumbling over the rock of offense.

I looked at multiple translations, and they all render it for righteousness to. Paraphrase this, amplify it. “Christ is the whole point of the Torah, His life and work being the complete fulfillment of it, in order that His righteousness might come to every one who believes in Him, instead of continuing to trust in his own righteousness.”

Ignorant Saintlets

What is the kind of thing that would make someone stumble so egregiously over news this good? God in His covenant righteousness sends a righteous Messiah, in order that the people of God might be gathered up and included in His righteousness, and reckoned as complete and perfect in Him. What would make someone kick against this?

The answer is found in our text. Religiosity is the thing that hides the righteousness of God from us. But it does not hide the righteousness of God considered as a goal toward which we might strive—no, it magnifies the righteousness of God that way. And the higher the bar, the better. At least that is what ignorant saintlets think.

God offers us a salvation that is by His grace from first to last. But because the God who offers us grace is also fully and completely righteous, there must be a completion of His holy requirements. This means that we, if we are to be saved at all, must be content with the righteousness of another, imputed to us. And in order to be content with this, we need to be willing to have all our good deeds despised by God. We must be willing for God to put them away with loathing, holding them between His thumb and forefinger. We must be willing for God to laugh at all our pious striving. Beads of sweat have broken out on the forehead as we wrestle with lust, with covetousness, with pride, with anxiety, with sin . . . with everything but our culpable ignorance of what God is like. Poor, ignorant sap. Christ is here. Believe in Him.

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Romans 36: The Stumbling Stone (9:30-33)

Joe Harby on

Introduction

Why is the issue of faith and works so complicated? The answer is that it is not—it is the sinful human heart that is complicated. Because of that, we take something straightforward—trust God in all things—and tie it up into knots. But the issues outside the heart are simple. They binary. Either you will build your life on the cornerstone that is Jesus Christ, or that same stone will fall on you and crush you (Luke 20:17-18).

The Text

“What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith. But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone; As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumbling stone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed” (Rom 9:30-33).

Summary of the Text

What do we say in response to the argument from Hosea and Isaiah? Our conclusion is that the Gentiles, who were not chasing righteousness, have nevertheless attained that righteousness (v. 30). The righteousness they attained to is the righteousness that is “of faith” (v. 30). Israel in the meantime was chasing after righteousness and did not catch it (v. 31). The righteousness they did not catch was something they missed because they did not understand the “law of righteousness” (v. 31). The law of righteousness is faith. This is made plain in the next verse—why did they not attain what they were chasing? Because they did not chase by faith, but rather by works of the Torah (v. 32). They tripped over the stumbling stone, and this issue of faith/works was that stone (v. 32). The quotation is from both Isaiah 8:14 and 28:16. In Isaiah 8, God sets the rock of stumbling (v. 14), and in verse 17 we see the right response to that stone, which is trust. Moreover, verse 17 is quoted in Heb. 2:13. And in Isaiah 28:16, the precious cornerstone is the one which, if someone trusts in it, they will never be dismayed. This verse is also quoted in 1 Pet. 2:6 and later in Romans 10:11. This is a stone of stumbling and it is a stone in which we are to trust—see the flow of the argument in 1 Peter. 2:6-8.

Line on Line

We know from the teaching of the New Testament that the stone of stumbling and the basic foundation stone are the same stone—Jesus Christ. The stone was rejected by the appointed builders, and so they in turn were rejected. But we must pay attention not only to the fact of their rejection of Christ, but must pay close attention to the nature of their rejection of Christ.

In Isaiah 8, the stone is a stone of stumbling. In Isaiah 28, it is a cornerstone, one in which we are invited to trust. But there are some other things in Is. 28 as well. Isaiah rebukes the people for their sin (vv. 1-8). They react to him —who is Isaiah trying to teach? Sunday School kids who can’t even read yet (vv. 8-9)? What they think is beneath them is actually way ahead of them. Then v. 11 is quoted in 1 Cor. 14:21, and applied to the gift of tongues (Dt. 28:49. So t hen, Isaiah says, you despise the abcs? ‘l’ll give it to you that way (v. 13)—so that you will fall backward, be broken, snared, and captured. But the one who trusts in the stone will be blessed (v. 16). The gift of tongues was therefore a sign of judgment on unbelievers, particularly unbelieving Jews (1 Cor. 14:22).

Faith Is a Pair of Eyes

In religious affairs there can be a vast difference between what you are doing and what you think you are doing. In our text, the Jews were “following after” the law of righteousness and, when they got there, they discovered it was actually the law of unrighteousness. The Gentiles who did not have a thought of righteousness at all found themselves tackled from behind by that righteousness. Found by God, they found they had faith in Him. Pursuing God with all their hearts, or so they thought, the Jews found that they did not have faith in God. They had faith in their way of having faith in God. The Torah was not intended for that use, but that is the use they put to it. And so when Christ came, they could do nothing but stumble over Him. Faith in faith, faith in your way of having faith, is damnable. Faith is a pair of eyes, designed to look at Christ. If they don’t see Him, they are blind eyes.

The Nature of Stumbling

Take two men. One says that we are justified by faith in Jesus Christ alone, by faith alone, plus nothing or no one else. Is he right? Of course he is right. But suppose he says this, not trusting in Jesus but rather trusting in his correct doctrinal formulation. He is lost, precisely because his formulation is correct. And flip it around. Another man can have a true heart-felt trust in Christ, but have been taught a real mishmash of doctrinal incoherencies. Can he be saved? Yes, but only because what he was taught is wrong. Was the Torah false doctrine? No, as we will see in Romans 10:6. Did God know that men would get it backwards? Yes, and He planned to use this as a way of bringing men to real faith (Rom. 10:5).

So Trust in Jesus Christ

You were lost in sin, and Jesus Christ was sent to die on the cross in such a way as to deal with all that sin. All of it. He was buried, and then raised to life again so that you could participate in that eternal life. Look to Him. That’s it —the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ for screwed up people. That’s the gospel. Don’t look to Him while holding your mouth just so. Don’t trust in Him and in your church volunteer work. Don’t believe in Him coupled with your mastery of the Westminster Confession. We are saved by grace, not law. We are saved by grace, not refined law, not doctrinal law, not the law of righteousness. No, we are justified by the law of righteousness, which is faith.

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Romans 35: Saving The Remnant (9:25-29)

Joe Harby on

Introduction

In order to understand Scripture rightly, we have to understand the flow of redemptive history. God’s revelation to us is progressive, and it unfolds over centuries. If we treat the Bible as the book that fell from the sky, we are going to have a terrible time comprehending it rightly. The works of God’s judgments and deliverances are sequential.

The Text

“As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved . . .” (Rom. 9:25-29).

Summary of the Text

In this short passage, we have four quotations, two from Hosea and two from Isaiah. This is a good place to let the apostle instruct us on what the two prophets were talking about. We have just learned in the previous verse that the vessels of mercy included the Gentiles (v. 24). Paul then confirms this by saying that Hosea predicted it by saying that God will take those who were not His people and make them His people (v. 25; Hos. 2:23). He follows it up with another citation. Those who were called not the people of God would be accepted as children (v. 26; Hos. 1:10). Isaiah cries out concerning Israel—even though the children of Israel were as the sand of the seashore, only a remnant would be saved (vv. 27-28; Is. 10:22-23). Isaiah had made the previous point that unless God saved a remnant, the Jews would have been wiped out just like Sodom and Gomorrah had been (v. 29; Is. 1:9).

Summary of the Citations

If you read carefully through the first two chapters of Hosea, this is what you will find. God takes Israel as a bride, and just as Hosea found Gomer unfaithful, so God found Israel unfaithful. Because of this, God put Israel away entirely (Hos. 1:6), but will have limited mercy on Judah (Hos. 1:7). Then those who were put away for their apostasy (and called “not God’s people) will again be called God’s people. This is the doctrine of the remnant followed by the full restoration. Paul also quotes Hosea on this restoration in a way that includes the Gentiles in it (Hos. 2:23). The restoration of Israel (utterly put away) means that other nations can come to the Lord also. Note the phrase comparing Israel to the sands of the sea (Hos. 1:10).

Isaiah uses the same expression—the sand of the sea—and says that even though Israel be of that great number, a remnant shall return to the Lord (Is. 10:22). The Lord will make short work of it in a decisive judgment (Is. 10:23). Paul is not dragging the Gentiles into this without warrant because just a few verses later, Isaiah himself includes the Gentiles (Is. 11:9-10). This is not conjecture, because Paul himself quotes this verse later in Romans while justifying the mission to the Gentiles (Rom. 15:12). In short, Paul is not prooftexting here—he is appealing to a sustained vision from the Old Testament. And then of course we see what a great mercy that gift of a remnant was (Is. 1:9).

Redemptive Timeline

Put all this together, and what do we have? The nation of Israel was called out from the nations to become and be a light for the nations. Though they grew and flourished numerically (sand of the sea), they consistently went astray, again and again, as anyone who has read their Old Testament knows. We have a history of cyclic apostasies and restorations. This typological pattern climaxed when the Messiah came. The vast majority of Israel fell away, and God spared a remnant. That remnant was to be used in such a way that the Gentiles would come to the Messiah, and then all Israel would eventually return, resulting in a huge blessing for the entire world (Rom. 11:15).

Remember Your Place In the Story

Now take what this means at the simplest level. It means that the ratio of saved to lost varies widely based on what moment in redemptive history we are dealing with. We cannot take particular passages like “many are saved but few are chosen,” universalize them for all time, and make them a permanent fixture. It is not playing fast and loose with the text to contextualize it.

Narrow the Way

For example, if you were to say to someone that you believed that the vast majority of the human race will be saved (as you should believe), the first thing you will hear is that the Bible says that the way is narrow, and only a few find it (Matt. 7:13-14). But remember the remnant. What are the remnant? The few who find it. What else are they? They are first century Jews. Consider it this way—with comments interspersed.

“Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them, Strive to enter in at the strait gate [through which the remnant enters]: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able [the majority of unbelieving Israel falls away]. When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are: Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets [the streets of first century Israel, remember]. But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out [the kingdom is taken from the Jews and given to those who will bear the fruit of it (Matt 21:43)]. 29And they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God [the Gentiles will flood in and sit down with the patriarchs and with the remnant]. And, behold, there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last” (Luke 13:23-30).

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