What Kind of Love?

John 3:36 - “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.”

We were watching an episode of The West Wing the other night. The President is visiting a small town in Oklahoma that a tornado has just destroyed. He is in a shelter and speaking with a female volunteer about what has happened. She tells him she used to drive the school bus and that a number of the children who took her bus to school had been killed by the tornado. She then questions how a loving God could do this to people. They try to do the right thing. They do good. They go to church. How could He do this?

This verse, John 3:36, came to my mind. The wrath of God REMAINS on all who do not obey, who reject the Son. The Son takes away the wrath of God from all those who believe. As Romans 5:1 says, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Peace with God. Think about that statement for a moment. Is God our enemy? The fact that we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ did implies there was no peace before. Wait a minute! I thought God loved us all?

Of course it's a terrible thing when a tragedy strikes. I know people question these things and invariably lay the blame at the feet of God for such disasters. This shows how great the deception is that humanity is under. The craziness of this deception is that we are the ones who are fallen, sinful, corrupt, and enemies of God. His wrath is upon us and we stand condemned already. Yet when tragedy strikes we point the finger at God, wondering how He can do this to us; thinking ourselves the innocent ones and He the villain. We hear all the time that “God is love.”, and this is used to trump and justify all wrongdoing, all sin. “Aside from a few bad apples we're all pretty much good. Sure, we're not perfect, but God loves us.” We never hear, “If you reject Jesus Christ, the wrath of God REMAINS on you!” It's there ALREADY! It doesn't just come on you at some future time. You're in it RIGHT NOW! At any moment He can strike you down and be perfectly justified in doing it. As John 3:18 says, “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is CONDEMNED ALREADY, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” A tornado, a car accident, a fire, some illness, old age. Sooner or later, one way or another, we are all going to die. How could a loving God do this to people?

I found myself thinking of a different question. Knowing what the Scripture says of fallen man's position before God, I wondered, “Why does a loving God allow people to keep on living?” The fact that the rejectors and blasphemers of Christ remain alive and live their lives apart from Him, enjoying the many blessings they do, is a testament to the patience and grace of God. What's more, every breath we take is a gift of God (Acts 17:25 “...since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”) and a proof of His grace bestowed upon sinful, fallen humanity. Romans 2:8 throws a sobering light on the future of those who reject Christ: “...but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.” The meaning of “wrath and fury” as copied from the Strong's speak of “passion (as if breathing hard):--fierceness, indignation, violent passion (ire, or (justifiable) abhorrence); by implication punishment:--anger, indignation.” I picture God coming after His enemies in vengeance, breathless in His wrath. Thinking of God like this, as the Bible presents Him, scares the crap out of me!!!

Knowing this is what makes the Gospel the Good News. Jesus came to take the wrath of God upon Himself in the place of the elect. He came to take the punishment from God that we all deserve. For those who believe, the elect, He suffered the wrath of God in their place. Because of this, the truth of Romans 5:1 comes to those who believe – we have been justified by faith, and have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. God is no longer our enemy, breathless in His wrath as He comes after his enemies. Because of what Jesus did we have peace with Him. As it says in Romans 4: 7, 8

“Blessed are those

whose transgressions are forgiven,

whose sins are covered.

Blessed is the one

whose sin the Lord will never count against them.”

Memory Lane

This was kinda what it was like for me when I was first introduced to Calvinism.

(Special thanks to Dan Phillips of Pyro for this vid.)

From a slave to his Master

I am as You say I am. I do not have any problem whatsoever agreeing with You on my condition. I am filthy and corrupted. Over and over again I prove that I can do nothing that is spiritually good for anything. You are holy, and righteous and good. You are full of grace, mercy and truth. You hate sin, are at war with the sinner, and Your judgement has already been pronounced – GUILTY! There is none like You – NONE! Every religion, every god, every ethic, every belief system – you are found in none of these. These are empty. These are a distraction - a wide road among many that is so easy to follow. Do I honestly believe that if I do a thing, or don't do a thing, that this somehow saves me from Your wrath? I can only run to You and throw myself at Your feet knowing that only You can save me...from You – Your full wrath poured out on me. What can I bring, apart from Your enabling, that will make You find favor with me? There is nothing. What can I do, apart from Your work in me, that would bring You pleasure? There is nothing. Is not all of MY righteousness as filthy rags? Or, as the original language puts it – used menstrual cloths. I agree with You – this is the best that can be said about ALL of my righteousness. 

 

Who will save me from this body of death? Thanks be to Christ Jesus! Clothed in His righteousness, You are the one who justifies the sinner. You do it. Not I, the sinner. It is Your righteousness, not mine. I am the slave in the slave market - completely bound, owned by sin and utterly helpless. You purchased me. I am your slave, but what a poor slave I am. It is unfathomable to me – You, my gracious Lord, took the full wrath of God's anger against me. You took ALL of it in my place and in exchange clothed me in Your righteousness. And then the pronouncement - “Paid in Full!” You declared me righteous. You did. I know I am not, but You declared it. All because You saved me...from You.

From: a lowly slave, with immense thankfulness, to his glorious Master.

Change...again.

Another chapter closes.  A new one opens. 

Okay.  That's about as cheesy as I want to go.

Suffice it to say, we're moving...again.

It doesn't seem like that long ago I was writing about moving to Kindersley.  Now we're moving again as I start in a new position in Saskatoon.

We're leaving behind a pretty good church, and a great church family.  Some good co-workers and a VERY cool neighbor. 

May 1, 2014 is "The Day".  We have movers coming to pack us up a few days before and moving us in one day after.  So we'll be camping in our new digs for the first night, eating pizza and watching The Desolation of Smaug - good times!!!

We're looking forward to the change in a lot of ways...but I think leaving our church and church family is going to be harder than we think.

Another chapter closes.  A new one...yeah, enough cheese!

The Blessing, and the Curse, of Discovering John MacArthur

I've been giving some thought lately on my discovery of John MacArthur a few years ago. As I pondered this, I realized that this discovery has been a HUGE blessing to me in so many ways. However, I've also realized that this discovery came with a curse of sorts.

After completing two whole years of Bible College – each year at a different school and roughly six years apart – I felt I had a pretty good grasp on things. I sailed along for many years in this condition. Along the way, I was introduced to Calvinism by a group of people that began to attend the Church I was a part of. I couldn't stand their arrogance! There's just no other way of putting it. I did not agree with them AT ALL!, but a big part of this had to do with how they carried themselves. I went to my Pastor with my concerns about this only to discover that he was a Calvinist as well. All this time and he never said anything of the sort, neither in one-on-one conversations nor from the pulpit. I picked up “What is Reformed Theology” by RC Sproul and finally discovered, with all the snotty arrogance left out, what Calvinism was about. I realized that this is what the Bible taught and did a complete turnaround in my belief on this.  I'd like to think that the "snotty arrogance" in those who initially introduced me to these doctrines has remained with them.  

Both the Bible schools I went to never taught any specific Doctrines, except for one class. It was at the first school I attended. The class was the Doctrine of Salvation. The school's Director came to give us a talk before the teacher came, and one of the things he stressed was a warning for us not to get caught up in the “doctriney stuff”. I realize this now, years later, that I imbibed basically a “We love Jesus, not doctrine” mentality.

Fast forward many years later.

The night I discovered John MacArthur I was searching Bible teachers' names on You Tube. I had heard of MacArthur when I was a new Christian so I put his name in. There were a number of hits and some were with him on Larry King Live. For years prior to this I had watched numerous talk shows in dismay when they had a pastor giving the “religious perspective”. “Wishy-washy” is about the kindest term I can use to describe what those pastors would usually say. MacArthur was COMPLETELY different! Whatever question he was asked would be given an answer based out of the Scriptures. No matter how hokey or crazy the other participants thought he was, it didn't matter – his answers were based on the Bible. I respected that! I watched a number of those Larry King shows and my respect for him continued to grow. I went to the Grace to You website and discovered I could download his sermons for free – I did! I then discovered that he had whole sermon series from the books of the Bible. Galatians, Philippians, Romans – I could get them all...and I did. I began to listen to him teach from a book starting at chapter one, verse one and continuing all the way through the entire book. This was the first time I had ever experienced anything like that. I began to see what God had to say to these specific churches about what was going on in them. It was so eye-opening! ALL the sermons I had ever heard were more often than not based on verses taken out of their context and used to speak to an issue going on in our lives today. Hardly any effort at all was made to exegete a specific passage and teach what was actually being addressed. MacArthur was completely different - he did EXACTLY that!

Over many months I continued to listen and learn. In the process I began to grow in the Lord. My knowledge of His Word increased and so did my love of Him. I began to see that loving Jesus can never take place unless one begins to learn sound doctrine. Divorcing doctrine from Jesus is an absurdity! We must worship God in spirit AND in truth – John 4:24. The huge blessing of discovering John MacArthur has been my growth in the Lord, beginning to really love the Word, and starting to understand what the books of the Bible are about.

Almost on the heels of this blessing has been the curse. In my growing understanding of the Word I've come to see how enemic the teaching in the churches I've been a part of has been. When I began to see how completely ignorant of the Word I was, the term “Biblically Illiterate” came to mind. There I was, standing in my own arrogance (those two whole years of Bible College, don'tcha know!) while all the while being completely illiterate when it came to doctrine. I fit right in with pretty much everyone else because we all were/are illiterate. Two years of Bible school and very little understanding of any of the Doctrines of the Christian faith. Almost two decades in the Church and very little understanding of any of the Doctrines of the Christian faith. The shepherd digging into the Word to feed the sheep is foreign. Shallow and superficial, cultural relevancy, social justice – these are what spews from pulpits Sunday after Sunday. The church has become one more social gathering that meets together to make itself feel better and to help the community. The curse is in seeing this taking place and not being able to do anything about it. In learning the Word and beginning to understand the plumb line of Doctrine I am seeing how far from that plumb line the church has moved...and it kills me!

I am not being facetious when I say that I am thankful to God for these. Raising up John MacArthur, a faithful man who ministers the Word of God in the face of hatred, antagonism and jealousy – and these come from within the Church! Year after year he has taught the Bible, chapter and verse, to the sheep God has given him to shepherd. God has used him to open my eyes to the truth of Scripture, to see how far I am not, and to call me to repentance. Because of this I see more clearly the wretched state of the church today. But I also know that God is sovereign over all, and that He is continuing to save His own. For this I am truly thankful!

This has been the blessing, and the curse, of discovering John MacArthur. And I thank God for this discovery!