Archives for July 2021

Christ Is Not His Name, Part 2: Responding to the Evidence

July 29, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

In the last post we noted the fact that Jesus is the Christ—the Messiah, the Anointed One—and that John’s Gospel narrates a series of miracles through which Jesus provides evidence of his Messiahship. I’d like to extend those thoughts in a couple of ways.

First, John’s use of the word signs for these miracles is precise. The Greeks had three words for miraculous events: “miracle” (or more literally “powerful thing”), which emphasized the power of the miracle worker; “wonder,” which emphasized the effect of the miracle on those who saw it; and “sign,” which emphasized the meaning or significance of the miraculous act. So the three synonyms addressed the three elements of the miraculous event: the one who did it, the act itself, and those who saw it happen.

John chooses to use the word that highlights what the miracles meant; as we noted last time, they demonstrate Jesus’ lordship over matter, time, space, physical and divine law, disease, and even death, and by implication, the evil forces. Anyone who directs the actions and effects of these things must be the recipient of an unprecedented anointing from God.

Second, John reinforces the meaning of these actions by including in the narrative account a record of Jesus’ teaching following the miracle.

After changing the water to wine, bringing life and joy by his creative authority, Jesus teaches about spiritual life and joy in his interaction with Nicodemus (“ye must be born again”) and with the Samaritan woman (“living water”).
After healing the nobleman’s son and the paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda, he proclaims that one day all will “honor the Son, even as they honor the Father” (Jn 5.23), and that the Son has “life in himself” (Jn 5.26).
After feeding the 5000 and walking on the water, Jesus presents himself as “the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst” (Jn 6.35). Here he builds on the earlier teaching of being born unto undying life and drinking water that slakes thirst forever. Later he claims repeatedly that he is “not of this world,” climaxing a series of exchanges with the words, “Before Abraham was, I am” (Jn 8.58). This is someone for whom walking on water should not really be surprising.
While healing the man born blind, Jesus proclaims, “I am the light of the world” (Jn 9.5)—and later, “I am the door,” opening, in effect, the entrance to what the light reveals.
After Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead, John recounts Mary’s anointing of Jesus’ feet, signifying that Jesus himself is the sacrifice that empowers all of his followers to overcome death through resurrection. Later Christ speaks of himself as a grain of wheat that brings life by being planted underground (Jn 12.24)—and then, “the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn 14.6) by whom his people will receive life eternal, and “the vine” (Jn 15.1), the source of ongoing life to all who trust in him.

So the meaning of the signs is amply reinforced. There’s no doubt about who this person is.

And yet, remarkably, he is opposed at every turn by people who really ought to know better.

After he heals the paralytic, “the Jews sought to kill Him” (Jn 5:18).
After the bread of life discourse, many disciples stopped following Him (Jn 6:66) and again “the Jews sought to kill Him” (Jn 7:1); he was accused of “having a demon” (Jn 7:20). The Pharisees accused Him of lying and having a demon (Jn 8:13, 48, 52); the religious leaders tried to arrest Him (Jn 7:30, 32, 44) and to stone Him (Jn 8:59).
After he healed the blind man, he was accused of having a demon (Jn 10:20), and they tried again to stone him (Jn 10.31) and to arrest him (Jn 10:39).
And after he raised Lazarus from the dead, they finally hatched the plan that led to His execution (Jn 11:48ff).

Will you believe, or not?

In the end, it’s really not about evidence, or the lack thereof.

It’s about whether or not you want to.

Artwork: The Resurrection of Lazarus by Giovanni di Paolo (1403-1482), from the Walters Art Museum

Christ Is Not His Name, Part 1: Evidence for Messiahship

July 26, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

In the US people traditionally have 3 names: a “first name,” which is typically the one we go by; a “middle name,” which might be the one we go by if the first name might be confusing (e.g., for a “Junior”); and a “last name,” which is the family name. So to American Christians, “Lord Jesus Christ” looks like it fits the pattern—but it doesn’t. “Lord” is of course a title, not a name; “Jesus” (actually “Joshua”) is the personal name; and “Christ” is another title, from the Greek word for “Messiah,” or “Anointed One.”

These two titles were central doctrines in the early expansion of Christianity. “Jesus is Lord” was a core confession (Ro 10.9; Php 2.11), probably in contrast to the phrase central to emperor worship in the first-century Roman Empire (“Caesar is Lord!”). “Jesus is the Christ” was a central theme in the early apostolic preaching (Ac 2.36; 9.22; 17.3; 18.5, 28), which was probably based on Christ’s exposition of the Hebrew Scriptures to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Lk 24.27).

It’s no surprise, then, when John tells us that he writes his Gospel “that you [readers] might believe that Jesus is the Christ” (Jn 20.31). And how does he do that? He writes, “These are written that you might believe …” (Jn 20.31).

“These” what? We find the antecedent of the demonstrative pronoun these, as we might expect, in the previous verse: “Many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book” (Jn 20.30)—“but these [signs] are written that you might believe.”

John tells us here at the end of his book that he has structured his Gospel around a series of signs that demonstrate that Jesus is Messiah.

What are the signs? Well, John makes it simple enough to find them; you just look through the Gospel for the Greek word translated “signs” (semeion) and see what John is referring to in each use.

Here they are—

Changing water to wine at the wedding in Cana (Jn 2.11). Some commentators note that John may not be saying that this was Jesus’ first miracle ever, but that this is John’s “roman numeral one,” the first sign he’s chosen to demonstrate Jesus’ Messiahship.
Healing the nobleman’s son (Jn 4.54)
Feeding the 5000 (Jn 6.14)
Healing the man born blind (Jn 9.16)
Raising Lazarus (Jn 12.18)
When the Jews ask him for a “sign,” Jesus points obliquely to his own resurrection (Jn 2.18-19).

That’s six miracles that John specifically identifies as “signs.” It’s been common among interpreters to include one more, to make the number seven. Some include the healing of the paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda (Jn 5.9), while others include the walking on the water (Jn 6.19). Yet others include both and pass over Jesus’ own resurrection, which, as I’ve noted above, is listed only obliquely.

Think about the significance of these specific miracles. In changing water to wine, Jesus demonstrates lordship over the quality of matter; in feeding the 5000, he demonstrates lordship over its quantity. If he made fermented wine—and I’m inclined to think that he did—he demonstrates lordship over time; in healing the nobleman’s son, he demonstrates lordship over space. (In the first two miracles, then, he’s Lord of time, space, and matter—the entire cosmos.) In healing the paralytic on the Sabbath, and the man born blind on another Sabbath, he demonstrates lordship over divine law; in walking on the water, he demonstrates lordship over physical law. In healing congenital blindness, he acts essentially as Creator, providing functioning eyes where there never had been any. In raising Lazarus from the dead—four days after he died—he demonstrates lordship over our greatest enemy, death. And he exponentiates that in his final sign; it’s quite an accomplishment to raise somebody else from the dead, but raising yourself from the dead (Jn 10.18) is on a different level entirely.

More than once John notes the effect that these signs had on those who saw them. Early on, people believed in him on account of the signs (Jn 2.23; 7.31; 9.16); and even Nicodemus, a member of the Sanhedrin, found them compelling (Jn 3.2), as did others on the Sanhedrin as well (Jn 11.47).

What’s the only reasonable conclusion from these well-attested signs?

Jesus is the Christ, anointed by God as prophet, priest, and king—authorized to speak to us for God, to speak to God for us, and to rule forever on the throne of his father David (2S 7.12-14).

This is the one at whose name every knee shall bow (Php 2.10). I am happily compelled to begin now.

Part 2: Responding to the Evidence

Artwork: The Resurrection of Lazarus by Giovanni di Paolo (1403-1482), from the Walters Art Museum

On Worship

July 22, 2021 by Dan Olinger 2 Comments

I’d like to share some thoughts on worship. This isn’t about the “worship wars”—what an oxymoron—but just some things that have occurred to me on the topic.

The English word worship comes from the early Modern English “worthship”; at its root it’s simply recognizing the worth of someone. These days we use it only in reference to God.

How do we recognize his worth? How do we demonstrate that he’s special? At the risk of sounding irreverent—that is most certainly not my intent—we do that in the same ways that we’d show respect for anyone else, but elevated, or exponentiated, because he’s exponentially more worthy than anyone else.

Believers are described as people who worship God (Php 3.3). Jesus said that God is seeking people to worship Him “in spirit and in truth” (Jn 4.23-24). That means that we’ll show our respect for him in the course of our living; our respect for him will be demonstrated by our attitudes (does your mind go to him during the day? Do you consider his will as you make your decisions?), our words (do you use his name emptily? Do you tell jokes about him?), and our actions (do you do what he wants?). In one sense, then, all of life should be worship: we base our priorities and decisions on His will, not ours. We worship him all the time; we thank him when things go well, recognizing those things as from his hand; and we thank him when things don’t go well, because those things, too, are from his hand, purposeful, for our growth and betterment (Ro 5.3-5).

But we also devote special times to worship. If we elevate God in our minds, then we’re going to worship him privately; we’re going to set aside time in our schedule to demonstrate that he is worthy of respect. (If he doesn’t get that time—if he’s crowded out by all the other things we devote time to—then how worthy is he?) The Psalmist spoke of seeking God every day (Ps 63.1; 86.3; 88.9; cf Isa 58.2).

That private time of worship springs from an inward attitude—“love the LORD your God”—that demonstrates itself outwardly in several ways. We give God attention by hearing his voice in the Scripture. We give him praise by speaking and/or singing about his worthiness. We seek his presence through prayer.

For the believer, private worship isn’t enough. We also gather for corporate worship with other believers. From the very beginning, God’s people have gathered every week for corporate worship (1Cor 16.2). If God is worthy of infinite respect, then he is worthy of creatures in his image, from every nation and era, praising him in unison (Re 7.9-12). (He’s certainly worthy of more than Hitler!) Our gatherings here are representative and anticipatory enactments of what will one day be at full scale.

Some cautions.

Worship is an act of love and respect, not guilt. It flows freely and naturally from the heart. If you’re not a morning person like David (Ps 5.3), nothing in the Bible says that we all have to follow his practice. If you’re taking care of a houseful of children, your time management choices are going to be limited—if you have any choices at all. You can demonstrate your respect for God—glorify him—in the ways you interact with your children, in telling them Bible stories, in praying with them. There may well be a season of your life where you have to express your worship in ways limited by your responsibilities at the time. Get creative; don’t feel the need to imitate some other believer’s practice, even if it works really well for him.

But we all know that we fall short in this area, as in others. Typically we fail to worship God because we’re focused on ourselves rather than Him. If worship is about recognizing someone’s worth, then you can conclude that the one you’re always thinking about is the one you’re worshiping. And for most of us, that’s ourselves.

We will never be satisfied worshiping ourselves. We’re not designed that way.

And if we fail to join with others in corporate worship, then we are depriving those others of the benefit of our presence. When we fail to tell others of God’s goodness to us, they don’t receive the encouragement from those stories that they would have.

Worshiping God is what we’re designed to do. Screwdrivers aren’t happy pounding nails. Worship points us to the truth of God’s greatness—it’s better to live for the truth than for a lie. And worshiping with others benefits them by pointing them toward God as well.

Worship may not be something you do much. Would you reconsider that?

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

E Pluribus Unum

July 19, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

My wife and I were eating lunch in a restaurant yesterday when a girl walked by in a T-shirt that said “Lexington Soccer.” I caught her eye and asked, “Lexington where?” She said, “Massachusetts”—as I hoped she would. I smiled and said, “I graduated from Lexington Christian.” She said, “So did my Dad.”

Small world.

And that got me to thinking about all the places I’ve lived and people I’ve known—which leads me to recycle what follows, a minor reworking of something I posted on Facebook on September 4, 2016.

I spent the first half my youth in the Pacific Northwest (Spokane, to be precise), and the second half in greater Boston (Newton, mostly). (And when I say “half,” I’m being precise; we headed east 3 days after my 10th birthday.)

But I’ve spent well over 2/3 of my life in the American South. There are lots of things I like about the region:

Barbecue. And to my friends in California, bless your hearts, you’re not “barbecuing”; you’re grilling. It ain’t barbecue unless you’re usin’ wood and takin’ more than 8 hours.
- Side note: in South Africa they “braai,” and they use wood, but they cook hot and fast rather than low and slow, so that’s not barbecue either. Though it is delicious.
The way Southerners soften their insults with “bless your heart.”
Biscuits and sausage gravy for breakfast.
Calling other adults “Sir” and “Ma’am,” even when they’re younger than you.
Dinner on the grounds. And persimmon pudding. Preferably simultaneously.
Fireflies.
The good people in mill towns like Poe and Slater and Zoar and Lockhart. (RIP, Eunice Loudermilk.)
The way everything’s sweeter here–cornbread and potato salad and of course iced tea.
The sound of the kudzu growing on a dog day afternoon.
Grits. Yes, really. Fresh and hot, with butter and pepper—and not a single crystal of sugar. What were you thinking!?

I am blessed for having lived in multiple regions. It’s helped me realize that despite our differences, we are all more alike than we think–that there really is more that unites us than that divides us. That reaching across regional boundaries and disbelieving stereotypes is good for the soul. And for the country. And that as polarized as we are in this country, “e pluribus unum” really is possible. But it starts with us, one at a time.

Our leaders, and our journalists, and social media are united in their efforts to keep us ginned up, angry and hostile toward the “other side.” They’re doing it almost entirely for the ratings, for the money, for the power. They’re posturing; they don’t believe half the things they’re saying, and you shouldn’t either.

Don’t buy it. You’re in the image of God; you’re not a beast. Think for yourself. And reach across the unbreachable boundary. Because they’re in the image of God too.

Photo by Joey Csunyo on Unsplash

It’s Not Martyrdom If You’re Being Obnoxious

July 15, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

There’s a lot of talk about Christians being persecuted these days.

I’d suggest a couple of moderating thoughts.

First, if you’re talking about in the US, then, no, they’re not being persecuted, relatively speaking. There are some instances of their being harassed, and that’s wrong. I think the well-known case of the Colorado baker is a pretty clear instance of that. But harassment, while condemnable on both ethical and legal grounds, is nothing like the persecution faced by the early church, or by the modern church in many places of the world. I’ve been in some of those places, and when American Christians cry “persecution,” it strikes me as just as inappropriate as calling an ID requirement for voting “voter suppression.”

Second, there’s some biblical wisdom that we can apply profitably to the matter of either harassment or persecution. To begin with the really big picture, God has designed the universe so that in general it rewards wise behavior and punishes foolishness. If you respect physical laws by not putting your hand into a flame or stepping in front of a city bus, you’ll live more comfortably—and probably longer. If you acknowledge the fact that your fellow humans are created in the image of God and therefore worthy of respect, courtesy, and care, you’ll have fewer interpersonal problems. Even in its pre-fallen state, the world may well have carried the potential of causing you pain if you didn’t pay attention. I suspect that if pre-fallen Adam had beat his head against an Edenic tree trunk for a while, he’d have decided not to do that anymore.

And in its post-fallen state, the potential rises exponentially. Now the world is broken. Creation groans (Ro 8.22), giving us earthquakes and tornados and tsunamis and pandemics. And we, as part of the broken world, engage in thinking and behavior that rejects the good God and denies his image in those around us. That kind of mistreatment and perversion of the designed order causes unfathomable pain. As Jesus’ half-brother James noted, “What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? ²You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel” (Jam 4.1-2a).

All of this means that when Christians suffer, there are more possible reasons than just “suffering for Jesus.” Christians, individually or corporately, might be suffering because they’ve said or done stupid things, placing themselves under the divinely designed cosmic order, whereby life is tougher if you’re stupid (as John Wayne allegedly said). Or they might be suffering because they’ve engaged in sinful thinking or practices that have social or legal consequences.

I’m not making this up; the Bible actually warns God’s people against this very thing. Perhaps the most concentrated biblical teaching on Christian suffering is 1 Peter, which lays out the fact and causes of suffering and then applies it in the three major institutions of life: the home (1P 3.1-12), the state (1P 2.13-20), and the church (1P 4.7-5.11). As part of that instruction, Peter says,

¹⁴If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. ¹⁵Make sure that none of you suffers as a murderer, or thief, or evildoer, or a troublesome meddler; ¹⁶but if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify God in this name (1P 4.14-16).

If you’re going to suffer—which is likely, he says—then suffer for a good reason. There’s no spiritual profit in suffering in itself—everybody suffers for one reason or another. So don’t suffer for stupid reasons.

Peter lists four behaviors here. Two of them are the specific sins—crimes, in fact—of murder and theft. The third item is a general term for evildoing. The fourth is a bit of a puzzle, what New Testament scholar Thomas Schreiner calls “one of the most difficult interpretive problems in the New Testament.” Because it’s a rare word, we don’t have much basis from usage for assigning it a meaning. Etymologically it’s “overseeing the affairs of others,” but what that means in a negative context isn’t clear. I’m inclined to read it as “being meddlesome,” “sticking your nose into other people’s business.”

Big sins will bring you trouble. So will little ones. I’d suggest that commenting on every passing social media post, whether or not you have any idea what you’re talking about, will bring you trouble. I’d also suggest that approaching people with a hostile attitude and confrontational speech will bring you trouble. And I’d suggest, finally, that blaming Jesus for your trouble in those cases is just wrong.

Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

On Prayer As Relationship

July 12, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Back in 2003 my family and I went to China for a month. While we were there, we took a weekend to visit Wuyi Shan, or Wuyi Mountain. It’s a popular tourist site, with the biggest attraction being hiking up the mountain itself. I was amused by the fact that bottled water cost 2 yuan at the bottom of the mountain, and 10 yuan at the top. Looks like capitalism to me. :-)

We hired a local guide while we were there, and one of the many places she took us was a Buddhist monastery in the area. She showed us the various sections of the place, and the highlight of course was the room with a large statue of the Buddha. Unsurprisingly, there was a small shrine there, with some incense sticks that devotees could light for a small payment. Our guide lit one, placed it in the sandbox that served as a container, and paused for a few moments to fold her hands, bow her head, close her eyes, and offer a prayer. We stood quietly as she did so.

As we continued our tour, I asked her what she prayed for when she prayed to the Buddha. She seemed surprised at the question, as if there were only one possible answer. “We pray for luck,” she said. “What do you Christians pray for?”

“We pray for one another,” I said.

I know my answer was simplistic. And that’s the point of today’s post.

Prayer involves a lot of things. In a post awhile back I noted that like many other Christians I usually follow the prayer pattern ACTS, for Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication. There are other patterns as well, and it’s perfectly fine to follow no pattern at all.

Which brings me to my point.

I think we often miss the whole point of prayer.

I’ve seen sermons and books about “how to get your prayers answered.” A colleague of mine and I were talking about prayer once, and she satirically referred to prayer chains as “adding your vote to the luck bucket.”

Prayer is not an election. (Election in theology is a different thing entirely. :-) ) It’s not a democratic process in which we all get together and try to talk an inattentive or uninterested or skeptical God into being convinced that this particular thing is really, really important to us, and would he please, please do the thing so we’ll be happier, or more comfortable, or less anxious?

Prayer includes requests, things we want “answered,” of course. In fact, God himself tells us to come boldly into his presence in prayer (He 4.16) and to let our “requests be made known to” him (Php 4.6). As a father—even a deeply imperfect one—I know how much more I would have given my children if they had just asked.

Ask. Yes.

But seeing prayer as primarily or essentially a shopping list is to miss the whole point of the thing.

Prayer is not a sacrament or a rite. It’s a natural consequence of being in a relationship.

For 37 years this month I’ve been in a formal, legal relationship with my wife. But it’s far more than just formal or legal. It’s personal. And because it’s personal, we communicate. We communicate because we like to, but more essentially we communicate because that’s what people in a relationship do; you can’t have a relationship without communicating, and communicating is pretty much the central way in which you conduct a relationship.

God and I have a relationship. So we talk. As you’ve often heard, he talks to us through his word, and we talk to him through prayer.

What do we talk about?

Whatever; whatever we have to say. I talk to him about what he’s said to me in his word. I talk to him about our relationship; what I’ve experienced since the last time we talked; how I feel about those experiences; what questions I have (and there are many).

We just talk.

And that’s why prayer is more than just asking for stuff, putting my vote in the luck bucket. It will include adoration—love talk, if you will—and confession and thanksgiving and yes, supplication.

And anything else.

That’s how relationships work.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

On Abundance, Part 4: We’re Richer!

July 8, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1: Needs and Wants | Part 2: Definition | Part 3: We’re Rich!

We’re rich in grace to save and grace to sanctify. We’re rich in love for one another. But there’s more.

Comfort

The Christian life isn’t all peace and light. There are difficulties, trials, whether the trials of temptation to sin or the trials of distancing and opposition from people we love. In these times we find that our Father, who is “the God of all comfort” (2Co 1.3), pours out that comfort on us without restraint: “our comfort abounds through Christ” (2Co 1.5).

If you’ve face deep waters, you know what that means. The brokenness of our world is a constant source of sorrow and exasperation to us, even as it wreaks sin and disease and death. In those valleys we find a comfort that is from beyond us; even as our friends tell us how strong we are, we realize that the strength to endure these things is not ours at all, except by transfer of deed; we’re strong because he comforts, strengthens, carries.

Hope

Just as the God of all comfort comforts us abundantly, so the God of hope enables us to abound in hope (Rο 15.13). Whenever we come across the word hope in the Bible, we need to remind ourselves that we don’t use the word anymore in the biblical sense; what we mean when we say “hope” today is hopelessly weak in comparison to the biblical concept. We “hope”—often forlornly—that something good will happen, but we’re pretty much left to hope that it’s in our stars.

Not so in Scripture. Hope is confident expectation of a promised future state. It’s what’s in the minds of the engaged couple as they plan their wedding. They’re not “hoping” to be married; they’re going to be married, and they’re making arrangements to be ready when the big day comes. Biblical hope is not wishing; it’s anticipating.

It’s walking onto the field knowing that your team is going to win, and eager to experience all the fun it’s going to be.

We “abound in hope,” Paul says, “in the power of the Holy Spirit.” If an omnipotent God stands behind his promises to us, then there’s no uncertainty about the outcome; there’s just eager anticipation of an absolutely certain future event.

And God pours that confidence all over us until we’re soaked in it.

Gratitude

What’s the only reasonable response to all this? Paul tells the Colossians,

As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving (Co 2.6-7).

I have a prayer list that attempts to list all the ways that God has been good to me—physically, providentially, spiritually. I pray thanksgiving for one or two of those every day. It takes weeks to get through the list. And these are just the big things; what about all the ways God supplies, directs, protects every day? What if we were to keep a diary of such things and pray exhaustively? We’d be praying all the time and falling further behind every minute. God’s abundant grace should stimulate our abundant gratitude, a never-ending sense of joy and peace and well-being that comes from having a perfect heavenly Father.

In Conclusion

Jesus famously said that he had come so that his people “might have life, and have it abundantly” (Jn 10.10). I’ve restricted this brief series to specific things that the Bible says God gives abundantly, but we’d be foolish to think that his abundance is restricted to these few things. Given his character, even his abundance is abundant; he pours out blessings of every kind on all of his people through all of their lives. He is a good, good God.

May you and I live today, and every day, as in the words of the Apostle Paul,

Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen (Ep 3.20-21).

Amen, indeed. May it be so.

Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash

On Abundance, Part 3: We’re Rich!

July 5, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1: Needs and Wants | Part 2: Definition

So what does God give us in abundance? What does he pour out on us lavishly, without restraint?

The Scripture names several things, but one much more than the others.

Grace

Pail tells the Ephesians that God has lavished on us “the riches of his grace” (Ep 1.7-8). Since this context is specifically about forgiveness of sins, we can safely conclude here that “grace” is the gift of salvation and specifically forgiveness; God has lavished his forgiveness on us, without regard to the enormity of both the quantity and the quality of our sins. This idea is borne out in Romans 5, where Paul writes that the abundance of “grace and the free gift of righteousness” (Ro 5.17) far outweighs the effect, as deep and pervasive and intense as it is, of Adam’s sin and our acquiescence to it. Down in verse 20, he intensifies the verb by saying that where sin abounds, grace “hyperabounds.”

You can’t out-sin God’s grace. His grace floods and eradicates the stain of the darkest of your sin. No one is beyond the reach and power of that grace.

Good news.

But there’s even more to this grace. We’ve been looking at the grace that forgives; but it doesn’t stop there. God gives abundant grace to sanctify—to change us from sinners into saints, to empower us to live in a way that reflects his forgiveness. Paul says that “God is able to make all grace abound toward you” (2Co 9.8). Now, this is in the context of his urging the Corinthians to be generous in their offering for the poor saints in Jerusalem, so he may be saying simply that since God has given them much, they should be generous with others. But he doesn’t seem to limit the application in that way; he says that his readers “may abound to every good work.” Sure, by being generous in the offering; but if we have “all sufficiency in all things,” surely this extends to more than throwing a Hamilton into the offering plate, doesn’t it? Shouldn’t God’s people “abound” in good works? (1Th 4.1).

Throughout the centuries God’s people have found that their abilities to endure temptation and trial, to love the unlovable, to do justly and love mercy and walk humbly with their God, far exceed what they thought they were capable of doing. They stand in wonder at what God does through them.

Ample grace to save, and ample grace to sanctify.

Love

Twice Paul speaks of abounding love—and not, as we might expect, God’s love for us, but our love for one another. He speaks of the Philippians’ love for him “overflow[ing] more and more” (Php 1.9); and he prays that the Thessalonians may “increase and abound in love one toward another, and toward all” (1Th 3.12). In a day when Christians are finding themselves divided by politics—and by ecclesiastical politics—we find that we can do better; we can abound in love for one another, the kind of love that brings such natural enemies as Jews and Gentiles together into one body, who worship God together (Ep 3.10). Overflowing love can do this.

There are more things that God gives us in abundance. We’ll look at them next time.

Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash

On Abundance, Part 2: Definition

July 1, 2021 by Dan Olinger Leave a Comment

Part 1: Needs and Wants

As we noted last time, a key word in the Bible for the generosity of God is the word abundance. It’s a fairly straightforward concept: an abundance is more than you need, a surplus. In the extreme, it’s an overflowing, even an effective lack of limitation—there’s always more, like bananas or mangoes or papayas in the tropics.

When I was a boy, we lived on a 2-acre farm in Greenacres (now part of Spokane Valley), Washington. We grew our own beef and vegetables, and a little fruit, and in retrospect I realize that we had a good supply of food, but we didn’t have much money. (As I recall, Dad made $75 a week in his job at the time.) I learned early on that when I poured syrup on the pancakes, Dad would intervene—forcefully—if I overdid it. “What, do you think we’re made of money?” As I watched the little dribble of syrup disappear into the pancake, I felt really, really poor. (Pun absolutely intended.)

A bit later we moved back East, and with Dad making a little more money, we would occasionally eat out in a restaurant. There was an International House of Pancakes nearby (they call it IHOP now, of course), and I noticed something when we ate there.

On the table they had not just a single bottle of syrup, but a whole rack of eight little pitchers, each of them a different flavor. And I noticed something else. Dad didn’t care how much syrup I used.

The reason is obvious—the syrup came with the meal, and you didn’t pay by the ounce, the way you did at home.

To a kid, being able to use all the syrup you want is the Millennium.

And you know what? If you like one flavor of syrup in particular, and you used up all that was in the little pitcher, you could just ask the waitress, and she’d fill the thing up again, all the way to the top!

The thing is bottomless!

No need to conserve. Use all you want. If you run out, there’s plenty more where that came from.

Abundance.

That’s how God gives to his people. He’s the kind of person who loves to pour out good things on his people, with complete abandon.

Now, while we’re defining the concept, we should recognize an abuse.

While God gives us lots of good things, he’s not primarily interested in the trivial stuff.

Sure, he knows about every sparrow that falls, and he’ll see to our tiniest needs (Mt 10.29-31). But his primary interest isn’t to make us rich, or powerful, or popular in temporal ways, and he doesn’t want that to be our primary interest either. Prosperity preachers claim to find support in biblical passages—Jos 1.7; Ps 1.3; Pr 10.22; Lk 6.38; 2Co 9.6; 3J 1.2—but in doing so they demonstrate that they’re focused on the temporal, the earthly, the comparatively trivial, and not on the heavenly treasure that God’s people are to be storing away (Mt 6.19-21). One can’t use such texts to encourage the very greed that the Scripture so roundly condemns (1S 2.29; Lk 12.15; Ep 4.19; 1Th 2.5; 1Ti 3.3). And it’s not difficult to see fruit in the lives of such preachers that undercuts the alleged biblical basis of their theology.

[Side note: there’s a lot of this kind of preaching in poor areas of the world, as you might expect. I see a lot of it in Africa. And I’m puzzled why it doesn’t seem to occur to all the thousands of people at those outdoor meetings that after all these years, they’re not getting any richer.]

In the Scripture, wealth is not proof of God’s blessing (Ps 73.12), nor is it a significant vehicle for God’s blessing (Lk 12.15). But Scripture says repeatedly that God gives abundantly (Jn 10.10).

Well then. If it’s not Bitcoin, what is it that God pours out so lavishly, so generously, so limitlessly and extravagantly, on his people?

Well, you’re going to have to wait a few days to find out. :-)

Next time.

Photo by Alexander Schimmeck on Unsplash