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Go to the Ants

Christ Church on February 17, 2022

Collegiate Reformed Fellowship is the campus ministry of Christ Church and Trinity Reformed Church in Moscow, Idaho. Our goal is to teach and exhort young men and women to serve, to witness, to stand fast, and to mature in their Christian Faith. We desire to see students get established in a godly lifestyle and a trajectory toward maturity. We also desire to proclaim the Christian worldview to the university population and the surrounding communities. CRF is not an independent ministry. All our activities are supplemental to the teaching and shepherding ministry of CC & TRC. Students involved with CRF are regularly reminded that the most important student ministry takes place at Lord’s Day worship.

Lord of Lions & Lambs

Christ Church on February 13, 2022

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INTRODUCTION

Humanists can only offer unity without holiness, which is unity without wholeness. Humanistic unity, because it rejects God, must ultimately destroy our humanity. But God is determined to heal our enmity through holiness. He is determined to reconcile all things in Christ, and when they are reconciled they will be fully and completely whole. Some of this was pictured in the distinctions Israel was required to make between those clean animals they could eat and the unclean animals prohibited.

THE TEXT

“And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron, saying unto them, speak unto the children of Israel, saying, these are the beasts which ye shall eat among all the beast that are on the earth…” (Lev. 11:1-47)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Following the warning that the priests must be sober in order to teach the Israelites to distinguish between clean and unclean (Lev. 10:10-11), this chapter explains the clean animals that God allowed Israel to eat and the unclean animals they were forbidden from eating (11:1-2). Clean land animals chew the cud and have divided hooves (11:3-8). In the waters, Israel could eat the fish that had scales and fins, but the others are to be abominations to them (11:9-12). Among the birds, a number of specific species are prohibited (11:13-19). Among swarming flying creatures, only the hopping locusts, beetles, and grasshoppers may be eaten (11:20-23). Finally, we learn that all animals that die (except for those killed for sacrifice or eating) become unclean, and whatever their carcasses touch become unclean and the various requirements for cleansing (11:24-43). All of these instructions are given because God is the Lord of Israel, and they are to be holy just as He is holy (11:44-47).

WHAT MAKES THEM CLEAN OR UNCLEAN?

The great question is: what made certain animals clean or unclean? The leading contenders for answers are: A. It’s a mystery only God knows, B. It was hygienic and health related, C. It was symbolic. But I’ll add a fourth option that I lean towards, which is a combination of all three, with C (symbolism) being primary. Many of the unclean animals seem to be associated with predators, eaters of carrion, or in some way associated with death or the serpent that goes on its belly in the cursed dust (Lev. 11:42). But we should always interpret Scripture in light of Scripture, and especially the Old Testament through the lens of the New Testament.

One of the clearest and most extended passages in the New Testament on clean and unclean animals is found in Acts 10 where Peter sees a vision of a great sheet being let down to the earth, full of beasts, creeping things, and fowls of the air (Acts 10:11-12). Then Peter heard a voice that said, “Rise, Peter, kill and eat” (Acts 10:13). But Peter, being a faithful Jew refused saying, “Not so, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean” (Acts 10:14). To which the voice replied, “What God hath cleansed, do not call common,” and it says that this happened three times (Acts 10:15-16). Immediately after this vision, Peter is asked to go to the house of a Gentile Centurion named Cornelius, and the Spirit gives the same command “rise” (Acts 10:20). Arriving at the house of the Centurion, Peter explains the vision to Cornelius, explaining that it would have ordinarily been unlawful for him as a Jew to keep company with a Gentile, but he says, “God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean” (Acts 10:28). After preaching the death and resurrection of Jesus and the forgiveness of sins, the Spirit came upon all those listening, and Peter called for their baptism (Acts 10:44-48).

THE ANIMALS ARE PEOPLE

All of this tells us that one of the primary purposes of the designation of clean and unclean animals was to distinguish between Jews and Gentiles. But with the coming of Christ, God was announcing that the salvation offered to Israel in the Old Covenant was now being proclaimed to all of the nations of the earth. This was prophesied in Isaiah: the wolf [unclean] will dwell with the lamb [clean], the leopard [unclean] shall lie down with the young goat [clean], etc. (Is. 11:6, cf. 65:25). The warring predatory nations shall be at peace with Israel and one another.

A great deal of the New Testament is taken up with the inclusion of the Gentiles in the New Covenant, and many Jews for any number of reasons (personal preference, ignorance, or fear) continued following the food codes, and so right on schedule there were conflicts in the early churches. Paul notes an example in Galatians 2 where even Peter withdrew from eating with Gentiles when certain Jews came into town, and Paul rebuked Peter openly because he was not walking according to the truth of the gospel – making something more than faith in Jesus Christ necessary for justification and therefore fellowship (Gal. 2:11-16). Later, in Acts 15 a more formal appeal was made to the apostles and elders in Jerusalem, and their decision made it clear that Gentiles were only to be required to keep themselves from idols, sexual immorality, and the only food restrictions were related to offerings to idols (Acts 15:20, 29).

So the animals represent people, particularly Jews and Gentiles, and therefore, so long as the Jews were the only people of God, the Jews could only eat “Jewish” animals. But once God made himself the God of all the nations, then God’s people were free to eat all the animals. The principle is that we must be holy as God is holy. In the Old Covenant, the primary focus was on distinguishing Israel from the other nations of the earth, but in the New Covenant, the primary focus is on reconciling the nations of the earth. “For [Christ Jesus] is our peace, who hath made both [Jew and Gentile] one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; having abolished in His flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances; for to make in himself of the two, one new man, so making peace” (Eph. 2:13-14).

CONCLUSION

Unbelievers promises unity and peace apart from Christ, which means letting sinners keep certain sins and demanding uniformity. When the enmity inevitably increases, they demand to be given more power to enforce more uniformity. But Christ is bringing unity through His holiness. Christ is bringing unity and peace through removing our sins and restoring us to our full humanity. Christ is reconciling the lions and the lambs of the nations by removing the enmity, not by turning us all into generic land animals. Humanists try to pacify our lust for sin and deform our humanity. Only Christ can remove our sin and make us more human. This requires faith in Christ, and obedience to His Word. This means husbands and wives, parents and children, pastors and parishioners, magistrates and citizens trusting and obeying Christ.

Strange Fire

Christ Church on February 6, 2022

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INTRODUCTION

God is holy, holy, holy, and while He is also love, He will not allow His worship to be trifled with. Those who treat His courts with flippancy or hypocrisy are asking for His judgments. The sons of Aaron remain a terrible warning to us, and yet also in Christ a sort of type or promise.

THE TEXT

“And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the LORD, which he commanded them not…” (Lev. 10:1-20).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Shortly after being ordained to be priests, Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire to the Lord, and the Lord consumed them with His fire (10:1-7). Moses instructs Aaron that there is to be no drinking of wine or strong drink in the tabernacle, so that they pay careful attention to the requirements of the law and teach Israel to do the same (10:8-11). The offering of Nadab and Abihu being interrupted, Moses tells Aaron and his sons how to complete the offering (10:12-15). The chapter closes with Moses asking why the sin offering wasn’t completed, and Aaron explaining his reason (10:16-20).

THE REGULATIVE PRINCIPLE OF WORSHIP

The text does not say explicitly what it was that made the offering of Nadab and Abihu “strange fire.” Since the warning about drinking in the tabernacle is immediately given (10:9), this is one likely thesis, or it may have been a combination of that and failure to follow some of the careful distinctions (10:11). Some commentators suggest that they may have been an attempt to go into the Holy Place or Most Holy Place. At any rate, the foundational problem was disobedience: “strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not” (10:1).

This is one of the key texts for explaining what theologians call the “regulative principle of worship.” All biblical Christians must hold to some version of this, which essentially means that whatever we do in worship must be commanded by God. And the corollary is that whatever God has not commanded is prohibited. The central reason for this is that there is no other way to draw near to God except by faith in His Word. As soon as you begin substituting human traditions or your own bright ideas, you are not drawing near by faith.

Some versions of the regulative principle of worship draw arbitrarily narrow lines, insisting on explicit permission for every detail (e.g. psalms only, no instruments), but for some reason they do not object to women taking the Lord’s Supper or the change from worship on Saturday to Sunday. However, we agree that all of worship must be authorized by Scripture by explicit command or by good and necessary consequence and therefore must be according to Scripture.

And the stakes really are high. Ananias and Sapphira lied about their offering and were struck dead (Acts 5), and many in Corinth were sick or dead because of how they celebrated the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. 11:29-30). New Covenant worship is no less sacred to God. “Let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:28-29). In other words, the question is not whether we will be consumed, the question is whether we will survive. And so this is why we must only come in and through Jesus Christ, the new and living way (Heb. 10:20).

DRINKING IN THE PRESENCE OF GOD

It’s a striking change from the Old Covenant to the New, that God has explicitly commanded His people to share wine in His presence, in the Lord’s Supper. Yet, drunkenness is still clearly forbidden (Gal. 5:21, Eph. 5:18). And the same requirement holds outside of worship, since believers are to be vigilant and filled with the Spirit (Rom. 13:13, Eph. 5:18, 1 Thess. 5:7). While we insist that obedience requires wine in the Lord’s Supper, and that the One who turned water into wine gives freedom to enjoy the gift of wine, we of all people must be known for our carefulness, vigilance, and sobriety. Drunkenness is listed among those sins of debauchery that will not inherit the kingdom (1 Cor. 6:10). We are no less required to pay attention to our lives and our worship, as the priests of old (Lev. 10:10). The same warning applies to other mind-alter drugs. The joy of the Lord is our strength, but this joy is alert and clear-minded, not buzzing and clouded.

FAMILY TIES & THE JUSTICE OF GOD

Our text closes with Aaron’s submission to the justice of God while we assume still feeling the human pain of loss (10:3, 19). This is a tension we often feel in this life, and we need to practice getting our hearts and heads around it in faith. The principles are these: God is perfectly just and in the end, when we see the complete populations of Heaven and Hell, we will be like the saints who witnessed the judgment of Babylon in Revelation, and we will shout Hallelujah! at all of His judgments (Rev. 19:1-3). It will not be pretty good; it will be perfect, glorious, absolutely wonderful. And together with this is the fact that God will destroy the wicked. He will give some over to the Hell that they demand. And some of those may be ones we have known and loved in this life. But Jesus told us this when called us to be His disciples (Lk. 14:26). There is a gleeful acceptance of this that does not know what spirit it is of, but there is sober, joyful acceptance of this in which there is great peace because He is worthy. How can we not trust the One who gave Himself for us for our sins? And finally, precisely because He is a God of great mercy, we plead with Him for the salvation of our loved ones and then rest in His infinite goodness.

CONCLUSION

In many of the Jewish traditions surrounding this story, Nadab and Abihu are presented as something like heroes or saints, representing all sinners. We need not go that far while still acknowledging that they are mentioned again when God explains the Day of Atonement, the one day each year when one priest could enter the Most Holy Place, without dying (Lev. 16:2).

It’s easy to come to church and not really grasp the glorious reality of what God offers: “By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh; and having an high priest over the house of God; let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water” (Heb. 10:20-22).

Am I Ready for Marriage?

Christ Church on February 3, 2022

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Fear the Lord & Love Your Kids

Christ Church on January 30, 2022

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INTRODUCTION

God has made the world such that wisdom and understanding (and therefore power and influence) are to increase over the course of generations under His blessing. But when cultures rebel, God gives them over to a kind of drunken stupor, and this is where dark ages come from.

God’s blessing is on those who fear Him, and the center of all human rebellion is a refusal to fear the Lord. But we must be mindful of the fact that there is always a temptation among religious types to try to manufacture the fear of the Lord, which only prolongs the judgment. So our central task in parenting is to fear the Lord, and raise our children in the fear of the Lord so that God’s blessing may be upon them, and upon our children’s children.

THE TEXT

“Wherefore the Lord said, forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honor me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men…” (Is. 29:13-29)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Just before our text, we are told that God’s people are drunk with a spirit of illiteracy (29:9-12). This is because God’s people are drawing near to Him with words but not in their hearts, and the only kind of fear they have of the Lord is the kind that is taught by the precepts of men (29:13). Therefore, God has determined to do this marvelous work of striking them drunk, such that even their wisest men will be incompetent (29:14). And even though they squirm and pontificate, all of it will be used by God the Potter to turn everything upside down (Is. 29:15-17). He will cause the deaf to hear and the blind to see; He will lift up the humble and poor and put down the scorners and plotters (29:18-21). God’s people will not be ashamed, and when they see how God saves their own children, they will fear God rightly and fools will learn understanding (29:22-24).

COVENANT SUCCESSION & THE FEAR OF THE LORD

The particular thing this text zeros in on is a contrast between a faux fear of the Lord, the kind that is manufactured by men, and the real fear of the Lord, the kind that only the Lord can give (compare 29:13 and 29:23). This authentic fear of the Lord is taught through the earth-shaking, sovereign works of the Lord (23:14-21), but it is manifest particularly in the marvelous gift of believing children (29:23).

This sets up the goal of the increasing momentum of covenant succession: your job is to fear the Lord so that you might teach your children (Dt. 4:10, 5:29, 6:2), and this text says that the gift of believing children increases a right fear of the Lord (Is. 29:23). The goal is for this to snowball, to pick up steam, to turn into an avalanche of God’s blessing. This is not something that we can manufacture, and that is why the central thing is the fear of the Lord.

What is the fear of the Lord? Abraham did not withhold his only son from the Lord because he feared the Lord (Gen. 22:12). The midwives feared the Lord and disobeyed the king of Egypt and saved the Hebrew baby boys alive (Ex. 1:17). The fear of the Lord sings praises and glorifies God (Ps. 22:23). The fear of the Lord is to hate evil, pride, arrogance, and a perverse mouth (Prov. 8:13). The fear of the Lord is conscientious, joyful, believing obedience to God no matter what (Dt. 31:12).

SOME SCATTERSHOT PRINCIPLES

There are a number of temptations that face a community like ours where God has been in the process of blessing our families over generations. One of them is to take that blessing for granted, another is for new believers or new folks joining us to latch on to certain external forms without understanding or embracing the substance. Both of these temptations are variations on thinking that the fear of the Lord can be taught by the precept of men (Is. 29:13). But none of us should want that kind of cheap knock off. So, what we want to do is fear the Lord honestly and apply these principles, without getting wound tight about the exact method. “The fear of man is a snare, but whoso putteth his trust in the Lord will be safe” (Prov. 29:25).

Christian parenting is like the rest of your Christian life: it proceeds from faith in the promises of God. So what are those promises? “And they shall be my people, and I will be their God: And I will give them one heart, and one way, that they may fear me forever, for the good of them, and of their children after them: And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from them, to do them good; but I will put my fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from me” (Jer. 32:38-40, cf. Is. 59:21, Ez. 37:24-26). And faith in the promises means being calm and confident and no panicking.
This faith in the promises goes together with the joy of the Lord: “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For He knows our frame; he remembereth that we are dust… But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear Him, and His righteousness unto children’s children” (Ps. 103: 13-14, 17). This mercy is not begrudging: God rejoices over His people (Is. 62:5, Zeph. 3:17). Our joy is fundamentally in God’s covenant mercy. Christian parenting is sharing this kindness and joy with our children.
The central command that God gives children is to obey their parents, and the central command that God gives parents is to teach their children to obey them (Dt. 6, Eph. 6). Obedience is right away, all the way, and cheerfully. This is the task of discipleship, and discipleship consists of both positive and negative discipline. Think of obedience like a skill, and parenting like coaching. Good coaches teach and practice a lot, before the game. Practice obedience regularly. Negative discipline must be used when a child refuses to obey. The rod of correction is love (Prov. 13:24, Heb. 12:6). And some children need lots of love. Remember also that we become like our friends (Prov. 13:20). Seek out godly covenant community.

CONCLUSION: THE WORK OF HIS HANDS

“Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain that build it… Children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is His reward (Ps. 127:1). Believing children are a gift from the Lord, the work of His hands (Is. 29:23). And it is a gift that God loves to give. So ask Him for it.

“Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine by the sides of thy house: thy children like olive plants round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed that feareth the Lord” (Ps. 128:3-4). Fear the Lord, believe His promises, rejoice in His goodness, and love your kids and grandkids.