Here’s my annual Thanksgiving post.
Even in tumultuous times, we have much to be thankful for.
Photo credit: Wikimedia
On Thanksgiving
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On Biblical Hymns, Part 3: Every Knee Will Bow
Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Christ As Firstborn
Our hymns typically have stanzas. The hymn in Philippians 2 does as well. The stanzas are easy to spot,* because the phrasing is parallel, and the content progresses from “down” to “up”:
- 6 who, although He existed in the form of God,
- did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself,
- taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.
- did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied Himself,
- 8 Being found in appearance as a man,
- He humbled Himself
- by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
- He humbled Himself
- 9 For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name,
- 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
- 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Php 2).
The first hymn in our series celebrated Christ’s sufficiency to rule. This second hymn celebrates his humility as demonstrating his qualification to rule. The first stanza notes his humiliation; the second, his exaltation.
Note that it all begins with a relative pronoun, which is one of the suggested identifying characteristics of hymnic material in the NT text. Then comes a note of surprise, indicated by the “although”: “Even though he was exactly the same shape as God, he didn’t cling to what he had, but he emptied himself!”
This is surprising for a couple of reasons:
- What it means to be “in the form of God”
- What one would expect from such an exalted person
In English, “he was in the form of God” implies uncertainty, even fraud: “he looked like so-and-so, but he actually wasn’t.”
There’s none of that in the Greek. The word is morphe, or “shape.” Paul says Jesus is exactly the same “shape” as God. Since God has no body, we’re clearly not talking about physical shape or appearances. Jesus is like God in all of his non-physical qualities—his personhood, his characteristics or attributes, his perfections.
If some of God’s attributes are unique to him (we call those “incommunicable” attributes), and Jesus is exactly like him in those respects, then what is the only logical conclusion?
Jesus is God.
And what would one expect from such a person?
If the kings of the earth exalt themselves—ancient monarchs, and even the much more recent Hirohito, were viewed as gods—then why would the genuine God humble himself?!
Surprising, indeed.
And how, specifically, did he humble himself?
He became a mere human.
And not a very distinguished one, at that. A subject of Rome, in a backwater village in a backwater province, son of a manual laborer, with people asking questions about the circumstances of his conception (Jn 8.41).
And then, he intentionally took a path to execution as a common criminal, by the most torturous means ever devised.
You can’t get any lower than that.
And now for the big surprise.
God reaches down to the depths, to the bottom of the barrel, and raises him up, not merely to exoneration, or even to elevated human status, after the fashion of Joseph in Egypt. Not even to revelation of the Father’s approval, or of his heavenly origins.
No. All the way. All the way to the top. To the name that is above every name.
To the point where his Roman executioners, and the corrupt Jewish leadership, will bow to him.
And not just the corrupt ones. Everyone. Those despised, and those deeply admired. All humans will bow.
And not just humans. Demonic powers. And angelic ones, too. All of heaven. All of hell.
They—no, we—all will bow, and we all will agree that this one is Lord. Lord of us, Lord of all.
Those who now deny God. Those who hate him. Those who question him, because they have suffered greatly in this life. Those who have simply ignored him as inconsequential.
We all will bow to the one who, though he is God, humbled himself.
Sing of him. Sing of his marvelous works.
Sing it in private and in public. Sing it to those you love, and to those you don’t. Make it what everyone who knows you thinks of when they think of you.
Sing.
* For a slightly different look at the structure, see here.
Part 4: Morning Light | Part 5: Manifested, Vindicated | Part 6: Eternal Glory | Part 7: If and Then | Part 8: God and Us
Photo by Michael Maasen on Unsplash
On Biblical Hymns, Part 2: Christ As Firstborn
All the New Testament passages most commonly identified as taken from hymns in the early church are about Christ. No surprise there. They celebrate his uniqueness, his glory, his powerful work in accomplishing our salvation. I’d like to begin with the classic—and controversial—passage from Colossians 1:
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. 18 He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to have first place in everything. 19 For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, 20 and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross; through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven.
This is an inductive passage—that is, it draws us along to its main point at the end, rather than stating it up front. The main point is that God the Father has planned a cosmic reconciliation by placing all that God is into a human form; “all the fulness” of God is “to dwell in” Christ (Co 1.19), “His beloved Son” (Col 1.14). This is the means God has chosen to accomplish his primary goal, “to reconcile all things to himself” (Col 1.20).
Why should God become human? Why this shredding of the fabric of the universe?
Because, as an old churchman named Anselm noted, only God can make an infinite payment, and only man can die, death being the payment required. So God designs the perfect and eternal payment for sin “through the blood of his cross” (Col 1.20).
Can the Son accomplish such a work? Can he reconcile God, the perfect Creator, with his broken and devastated creation? Is he capable? Is he worthy?
Paul presents the answer to the question, the evidence for the conclusion, at the beginning of the passage. The second person of the Godhead, God the Son, is
- The image of the invisible God. By becoming man, he makes the invisible visible. He can be seen, and touched, and heard (1Jn 1.1-3). Those who have seen him have seen the Father (Jn 14.9).
- The ruler over all the universe. The Jehovah’s Witnesses use the phrase “the firstborn of all creation” to support their heretical claim that Jesus was God’s first created being. I’ve written at some length about why their reading of this text is certainly wrong. As that series demonstrates, the phrase means that he is the ruler over everything that has been created. Why is that?
- Because he is the Creator of all things (Col 1.16). This fact is stated repeatedly elsewhere by other writers (Jn 1.1-3; Heb 1.1-2). If you make something, you are sovereign over it; you can do what you want with it.
- Because all things were made for him (Col 1.16b).
- Because he maintains all things (Col 1.17). They exist because he continues to want them to, and he directs how their existence proceeds.
- He is the ruler of all those to be delivered by his cross, called here “the church” (Col 1.18a). The Father has appointed him to this position (Eph 1.19b-23).
- He is the one whose resurrection makes possible the resurrection of all those who follow in his train (Col 1.18b).
I’ve mentioned that some of the biblical benedictions are thought be early church hymns as well. It seems appropriate to include one here:
33 Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! 34 For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? 35 Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to him again? 36 For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen (Ro 11).
Sing of him. Sing of his marvelous works.
Sing it in private and in public. Sing it to those you love, and to those you don’t. Make it what everyone who knows you thinks of when they think of you.
Sing.
Part 3: Every Knee Will Bow | Part 4: Morning Light | Part 5: Manifested, Vindicated | Part 6: Eternal Glory | Part 7: If and Then | Part 8: God and Us
Photo by Michael Maasen on Unsplash
On Biblical Hymns, Part 1: Introduction
God’s people sing.
They always have.
- On the day of Israel’s great deliverance from Egypt at the Red Sea, Moses led God’s people in a song of delight and rejoicing before the God who had delivered them (Ex 15.1ff): “The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea!”
- At the end of his life, Moses composed a song by which Israel could remember God’s words (Dt 32.1ff): “Ascribe greatness to our God!”
- Hannah, the mother of the prophet Samuel, who introduced the monarchy to Israel, wrote a song of thanksgiving for the end of her long period of infertility (1S 2.1ff): “He raises the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap!”
- David, the “sweet psalmist of Israel,” and his son Solomon set up elaborate musical infrastructure for the Temple, including (apparently) hundreds of professional singers to lead the congregation of Israel (1Ch 15.16; 2Ch 5.13).
- Like Moses, David too left behind a song for his people (2S 23.1ff): “The Spirit of the Lord spoke by me, and his word was on my tongue!”
- And like Hannah—with her words deeply embedded in her heart—the Jewish girl Mary composed her “Magnificat” (Lk 1.46-55) in response to the news that she would bear the Messiah: “My soul exalts the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior!”
In the church age, the New Testament speaks of God’s people singing, placing great importance on congregational singing as part of regular worship (Ep 5.19; Co 3.16). Paul—who sang with Silas when they were in a Philippian jail (Ac 16.25)—speaks of the importance of our understanding what we’re singing (1Co 14.15). James urges suffering believers to sing (Jam 5.13). And in the ages to come, God’s people will continue to sing in their praise to him (Re 14.3)—including, apparently, that song of Moses from Deuteronomy 32 (Re 15.3).
We all know that Old Testament believers had a hymnbook, called today the Book of Psalms, containing 150 songs written by several authors over many generations, from Moses (Ps 90) to Asaph (Pss 50, 73-83) to the sons of Korah (Pss 42-49, 84, 85, 87, 88) and especially including David, who wrote, among many others, the universally known and loved Psalm 23.
What did the early New Testament churches sing?
There’s no New Testament equivalent to the Book of Psalms. But there are three passages in Luke’s Gospel that are poetic and lyrical—
- Mary’s “Magnificat” (Lk 1.46-55)
- Zechariah’s “Benedictus,” his prophecy at the birth of John the Baptist (Lk 1.68-79)
- Simeon’s “Nunc Dimittis” upon seeing the infant Jesus in the temple (Lk 2.29-32)
We can’t know whether the early church sang these as songs in corporate worship, but there are other passages in the New Testament that scholars suspect are taken from hymns sung by the early church.
How do they know that?
Well, they don’t; there’s no reliable record from those days as to what those believers were singing. But students of the Scripture suggest that certain passages sound lyrically like hymns—they evidence certain patterns that are typical of hymns, such as
- A beginning—an “introductory formula”—that sets the passage off from what precedes
- Reference to a “faithful saying”
- A relative pronoun, particularly in reference to God
- Rhythmic structure / patterns
- Repetition, in the fashion of a refrain
- Parallelism
- Distinct vocabulary
- Doxologies
- Hapaxlegomena (words that occur only once in the New Testament)
- Interruption of the flow of the passage
- Exalted or liturgical language
Since prose can have these elements as well, most of this is subjective, and much of it is just guessing; for a scholarly discussion of its weaknesses, see this article. (And if you want a second rigorous look at the topic, try this.)
That said, there are a few passages in the New Testament that are routinely viewed as reflecting early hymns:
- Ephesians 5.14
- Colossians 1.15-20
- Philippians 2.5-11
- 1 Timothy 3.16
- 1 Timothy 6.15b-16
There are also several benedictions (e.g. Ro 11.33-36), which might have served a similar purpose.
We’ll take a look at these, and perhaps some others, in the posts to come.
Part 2: Christ As Firstborn | Part 3: Every Knee Will Bow | Part 4: Morning Light | Part 5: Manifested, Vindicated | Part 6: Eternal Glory | Part 7: If and Then | Part 8: God and Us
Photo by Michael Maasen on Unsplash
After the Storm
In the American West, where I grew up, the sky is big. The land in Eastern Washington is flat, and the horizons are long and low. As a result, you can see a thunderstorm a-comin’ for a long ways. You can see the sheets of rain falling from the thunderhead long before it reaches you, and in the summer I used to enjoy sitting out in the pasture and just waiting for it. Then it would arrive, the warm rain, and you could get completely soaked and not care—indeed, you could relish it as a delightful experience.
The aftermath was enjoyable too. There was the decrescendo of the storm, the petering out of the patter of the rain; the petrichor; and the calm silence, all the quieter in contrast with the recent rage.
If we learn anything from the life of Jesus, we learn that he is sovereign and active in the storm as well as in the peaceful, pastoral scene we think of when we hear him called “the Good Shepherd.” We learn that he accomplishes his will as certainly and easily in the storm; we might even say, if I can do so reverently, that he does some of his best work precisely at those times.
We’ve been through a storm, haven’t we? We’ve been surrounded by chaos, much of it intentionally designed; we’ve been told by people we trust that we need to be angry, agitated, active, desperate; that Those People are evil incarnate, and irremediably dangerous, and if we don’t stop them, It’s All Over.
God has graciously designed us humans so that when the situation turns desperate, we’re able to cope with it in surprising ways. There’s adrenaline, which can empower a man of average build to lift a car off someone. There’s the flight response, which enables us to get outta here faster than we ever thought possible.
But adrenaline’s a dangerous drug (so to speak), and we don’t do well as drug addicts; we don’t thrive under constant chaos and ongoing pumped-up responses to perceived threats—real or exaggerated.
We’re made for peace—peace with ourselves, peace with one another, peace with God.
The storm can be exciting—the adrenaline rush can be stimulating and energizing—but we’re not designed to live there.
In the face of the greatest storm in cosmic history—that day when the heavens were darkened, the Godhead was rent, the sins of the world crushed the Creator himself—Jesus had a surprising message for his friends.
Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful (Jn 14.27).
Peace in the storm, with a view to long-lasting peace after the storm.
So how shall we, as disciples of Christ, live after the storm? Paul writes to Jesus’ disciples in Thessalonica,
9 Now as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; 10 for indeed you do practice it toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, to excel still more, 11 and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands, just as we commanded you, 12 so that you will behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need (1Th 4).
After the storm, peace. Excel at loving one another. Get all stirred up about leading a quiet life. Mind your own business. Make something. Be a wholesome, productive, contributing part of the community.
Especially given that much of the recent storm was of our own making, how about if we just live quietly, peaceably, faithfully for a while?
You know what Paul talks about right after this? Jesus’ return (1Th 4.13-18). It’s coming. What say we focus on how the Good Shepherd will deliver us, rather than on fighting transient earthly opponents with carnal weapons?
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Why Putting Bullets in the Stove Is a Bad Idea
Every so often I take a post here to share a personal story I find entertaining. This seems like a good time to lighten the mood a bit.
This story actually isn’t about me; it’s about my Dad.
Dad grew up on the frontier, in primitive conditions. His father homesteaded just up the Lemhi valley from Salmon, Idaho, on Sandy Creek, just a couple of miles down from the Continental Divide. They eventually lost the farm and ended up sharecropping on another piece of land nearby (the “Kadletz ranch,” as he referred to it). When that wasn’t all that successful either, they ended up in town (Salmon), in a small house with one of those desk-sized woodburning stoves that functioned as a combined furnace, stovetop, and oven—you know, the ones with those circular “burners” that you could lift up by hooking with a handle, to see how the fire was doing underneath. A stovepipe came out of the top and angled out through the wall.
Dad was the second-youngest of 11 kids. Most of the older ones were on their own by this time, and his mother had died several years before. As a result, he was often left alone in the house to entertain himself.
One day he discovered, over in the corner, a coffee can full of ammunition—miscellaneous rounds for miscellaneous firearms. It occurred to him that it might be fun to drop a .22 short into the stove, by, you know, lifting up the circular burner thing with the hooked handle.
He did.
And after a few suspenseful seconds, he was rewarded with a “pop!” and the sound of the slug ricocheting around inside the stove.
In retrospect, he showed remarkable self-restraint for a 12-year-old. I’d have emptied the whole can that day. But he decided that every day, as a special treat, he’d drop another round in the stove after his Dad left.
Time passed.
And as he got down toward the bottom of the can, he found a rifle shell. I don’t know exactly what it was, of course, but probably something along the lines of a .30-06, with, you know, a more serious gunpowder charge and a pointed slug.
This’ll be fun, he thought.
The next morning he managed to contain his excitement through breakfast, waiting for his Dad to leave the house. When he (finally!) did, Dad rushed over to the can in the corner, grabbed the rifle round, ran to the stove, lifted the circular burner thingy with the hooked handle thingy, dropped in the round, and stood back to see what would happen.
At that moment his Dad came back into the house. Apparently he’d forgotten something.
It was a cold day, and his Dad walked over to the stove to warm his hands, then turned around to get some BTUs on his behind, when
Ka-BLAM!
The round went off. The little circular burner thingies went cartwheeling across the room in random directions. The stovepipe came out of the wall. The room filled with smoke and soot.
And my grandfather—whom, incidentally, I never met—spun around and said something I can’t in good conscience report here, but which could be loosely paraphrased as “Well, what do you suppose might be the matter with the stove, eh?”
In the split second before H-hour, he had noticed that his 12-year-old son was in the corner, hunkered down, as though he suspected there might be something about to happen.
The stove wasn’t the only warm thing in the house that day.
For years I thought this had happened when Dad was around 3 or 4. Toward the end of Dad’s life, we were talking about it, and he said, no, he was actually about 12 at the time.
I said, “You were old enough to know better!”
He said, “Seems to me Dad said something to that effect at the time.”
Apply this true little parable any way you like.
Photo credit: Wikimedia
How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 12: Gratitude
Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide | Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance | Part 9: Love | Part 10: Peace | Part 11: Encouragement
Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father (Col 3.17).
It’s no accident that we come to the end of this relatively lengthy series two days after the US presidential election. Now, regardless of the election’s eventual outcome, it falls to us to decide how to respond to its results—to decide whether we’re going to live in peace with our so-recent political opponents, whether we’re the “winners” or the “losers.”
Paul concludes the passage we’ve been studying with a call to thankfulness, or gratitude. Everything we do, he says, should be done for Christ and in gratitude through him to the Father.
I’ve written on this idea before. And so has Paul. Have you noticed that three of his four admonitions in this paragraph include thanksgiving?
- We live out peace in connection with thankfulness (Col 3.15).
- We encourage one another with thankfulness (Col 3.16).
- We do all things with thankfulness (Col 3.17).
This is a pervasive concept in biblical thinking. God has been unimaginably good to us—so good, in fact, that literally everything evil about the world pales in comparison.
What do you have to be thankful for?
No matter who is president of the US, or which party controls the Senate or the House of Representatives or the Governor’s Mansion or the County Council or the Mayor’s Office,
- You’re living far better, in measurable ways, than 90% of the people in the history of the world.
- There’s plenty of air to breathe—even if you have difficulty breathing.
- Purified, drinkable water still falls from the sky—even if it falls at inopportune times.
- Food still grows right out of the dirt.
- The sun gives us light and warmth every day, without fail.
- There is beauty to be seen and heard and appreciated all around us—in birds, in flowers, in rocks, in waterfalls. Even in morning glories, the bane of my childhood weed-pulling experience.
- God is alive, and great, and good, and engaged in our world, and directing all things to a certain conclusion that is, he assures us, good (Ro 8.28).
- If you’re a believer, you are regenerate (doubly alive), and forgiven, and befriended, and cared for, and loved, and escorted to that good end.
- And you are endowed with a mission, a purpose to live, one that you are well equipped to carry out, one that will certainly succeed, and one that will eventuate in perfect relationships and perfect glory.
There’s not a government or official in all the history of all the universe who can negate or even endanger any of that, or who can compete with that for any of my confidence or my fear.
God is great. God is good.
Let us thank him.
And let us live out that gratitude with a confidence and joy and grace that makes even our “enemies”—who are, when all is said and done, our fellow images of God and the ordered objects of our grace—to be at peace with us (Pr 16.7).
Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash
How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 11: Encouragement
Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide | Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance | Part 9: Love | Part 10: Peace
Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God (Col 3.16).
We live in the light by living out love (Col 3.14) and peace (Col 3.15).
But we need to go a step further.
I suspect that a lot of people would prefer to keep to themselves and mind their own business. Especially these days, we see a lot of confrontation and shouting and volleys of snarkitude—what we used to call “flame wars” back in the early days of the internet—and some people say, “You know what? I am so done with that.”
Someone I know often says, “People are the worst.” And theologically, that’s true (Rom 3.10-18).
But that’s only half the story.
People are also in the image of God (Gn 1.26-27; 9.6; James 3.9). And like God, they are not solitary persons; as God is in eternal fellowship among the persons of the Godhead, so we are designed as fundamentally social creatures; one of the first things God said about the first human is that it was not good that he should be alone (Gn 2.18). And following his eternal plan, God is in the process of gathering, from every ethnicity and nation, a people for his name—a large assembly that no one can number, united in corporate praise to God.
Sure, there are introverts, and they’re not inherently less godly than extroverts.
But a solitary life is not in our genes, or in our cards. We’re designed for relationships.
And the “friends” or “followers” we see on social media are not often healthy patterns for those relationships.
Paul says in our passage that as we grow individually in our relationship with God—which we do initially through the “Word of Christ”—we necessarily move outward, interpersonally, with what we’re learning. It’s not enough to hold our relationship with God close to the vest, as “a very private matter”; part of our growth is interacting with other believers about what we’re learning.
There are at least two reasons for that.
First, as a long-time teacher, I know that the best way to learn something is to teach it. As a simple example, I minored in Greek in college, and I’ve used it repeatedly in the years since: in my work in publishing back in the last century, and in my private study, and in my teaching at BJU since 2000. This year I volunteered to teach a section of Greek 101 to meet a scheduling need—the first time I’ve ever taught Greek.
Boy, am I learning a lot.
I’ve been capable in Greek for many years. But now I’m realizing how many details I’ve lost over the years because I just didn’t have any reason to recall them.
Leaps and bounds. Just by teaching 101.
You’ll understand your relationship with God significantly better if you’ll describe it to others. I promise.
There’s a second reason to share your faith with other believers: they’ll reciprocate. That may involve telling you what they’ve learned, thereby adding to your storehouse of understanding. It may involve encouraging you in the difficult times, cheering you through the rough spots. It may be as simple as listening to you and really hearing you. There’s a benefit in that.
And so Paul says we should be “teaching and admonishing one another”—and he specifically names our worship together as one of the ways we do that. We’re not just “friends” on some social media platform, trying to impress others with how delightful our lives are, or to shame them into thinking—and voting—the way we do. We’re partners, colleagues, in the great work of God in gathering and developing a people for his name.
We seek to achieve that goal before any other.
Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash
How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 10: Peace
Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide | Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance | Part 9: Love
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful (Col 3.15).
From love (Col 3.14), Paul turns his attention to peace.
We all say we want peace, but very few people actively behave in ways that make peace more likely.
There are reasons for that.
In the first place, there are people who pursue peace in all the wrong ways. They think we’ll have peace if we just refuse to fight—but because they don’t take into account the presence of evil in the world, their actions end up increasing the potential for violence rather than lowering it. “If wishes were fishes … .”
In other cases we see people who talk about peace but don’t live by their own rules. Those of us of a certain age well remember the “peace movement” of the 1960s, and the violence wrought in the streets of Chicago during the 1968 Democratic Convention by “anti-war” protestors. And the protestations of “peace” by the leaders of the USSR, which was, as one pundit put it, “the peace of the graveyard.”
This sort of thing can lead to cynicism. An acquaintance of mine, visiting Greenville, questioned the name of our “Peace Center for the Performing Arts.” “Peace?” he said, with a hint of a sneer. I explained to him that it was named for Roger C. Peace, a Greenville newspaper publisher and philanthropist. That seemed to settle him down.
So now we have to make excuses for naming things for peace. Stinkin’ pinko commie freaks.
All of this is just distraction.
The fact is that God is a God of peace (Rom 15.33; 16.20; Php 4.9; 1Th 5.23; Heb 13.20). It’s the essence of his character. (And yes, he’s a God of war as well [Is 59.17-20]; as “The Greatest Generation” has shown us, often those who have seen combat are the most eager for and delighted in peace.)
It should be no surprise, then, that God has brought peace between himself and us (Ro 5.1) and that he brings peace to his people (Ro 1.7; 8.6; 15.13). But interestingly, he has not promised us external peace; in fact, Jesus told his disciples that they would have tribulation (Jn 16.33; cf Mt 10.34) and even persecution (Lk 21.12), and that as history progressed there would be troublous times (Mt 24.6).
So where is the peace?
It’s on the inside, not the outside. Jesus leaves his peace with us (Jn 14.27), and it rules in our hearts (Co 3.15; Ro 8.6; 15.13; Ga 5.22; Php 4.7). We’re empowered to be an oasis of peace in the midst of swirling chaos.
That means that we can “follow peace with all” (Heb 12.14). We can be de-escalators of conflict, sources of resolution in disputes.
Let me tell you something I’m ashamed of.
I was in Ghana, on a long overnight public bus trip from Accra to Wa, where my team was going to minister for 3 weeks. The driver stopped for a restroom break, and I saw that someone was trying to get a couple of my female team members to pay to use the restroom. I knew that we had never had to pay at this location before, and I jumped to the conclusion that they were trying to take advantage of “rich Westerners.” It was 2 or 3 am, and I was really tired, and I just decided to refuse to cooperate. I said we weren’t going to pay. (The girls had already used the restroom.) The man followed me back to the bus, arguing all the way, protesting that he had to collect the money. (It amounted to about 50 cents.) I steadfastly refused. The principle of the thing, you know.
A Ghanaian man, also riding on my bus, stepped between us and began to de-escalate the confrontation. He and his wife paid the fee and refused to let me reimburse them.
I was deeply, deeply ashamed.
People with peace in their hearts simply don’t act the way I had.
My brethren, let us “follow after the things which make for peace.”
Part 11: Encouragement | Part 12: Gratitude
Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash
How Not to Have a Civil War, Part 9: Love
Part 1: Introduction | Part 2: Acknowledging the Divide | Part 3: “Great Is Diana!” | Part 4: Letting Hate Drive | Part 5: Pants on Fire | Part 6: Turning Toward the Light | Part 7: Breaking Down the Walls | Part 8: Beyond Tolerance
Paul has begun laying out a lifestyle that brings unity and comity. It begins, he says, when we recognize that everyone, even our “enemy,” is in the image of God. We build on that recognition by exercising forgiveness, even as Christ has forgiven us. Now, in the longest section of our passage, Paul lays down a series of four attitudes that will drive our actions toward unifying the body of Christ and peacemaking in our social circle.
14 Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. 15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father (Col 3).
He begins with love.
Love gets a lot of talk, but not much actual doing. And in fact, it’s as much about doing as it is about feeling. My longtime friend and colleague Randy Leedy has defined agape love as “a disposition of the will, a self-sacrificing commitment to secure the highest interests of its object, independent of the object’s attractiveness or the prospect of repayment.”
Notice a couple of things.
First, love is not just a feeling. It is a feeling, an emotion, of course. It is far from sterile.
We all know this. Those of us who are married know how ridiculous our union would be if there were no feeling—what an old roommate of mine used to call “zing.” We men don’t do things for our wives simply because it’s our duty—and our wives would not be pleased if we did. There is certainly an emotional component.
But there is action. None of us wants to hear “You say you love me, but … “ Love goes beyond the feeling; it takes action on behalf of the loved one.
When you love someone, you do something about it.
A second thing to notice is that love is fundamentally not self-centered. You’re not in the relationship just for what you can get out of it. We’ve looked at that idea earlier in this series with reference to sexual ethics. But it goes far beyond our sexual desire and expression. The one who loves is focused on the needs of the loved one, and he is oriented toward satisfying those needs to the extent that he can, with no limit to the sacrifice he is willing to make.
Jesus himself emphasized that idea when he said, “When you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you” (Lk 14.13-14a).
You’re not living out love because your life will be better if you do. You’re living out love because life will be better for everybody else if you do.
Does this principle have implications for how we live during an election season? during a pandemic? during a period of racial strife?
You bet it does.
We are impelled to care lovingly for fellow believers who vote for Biden, or for Trump, or for Jorgensen, or even for nobody at all.
For those who protest in the streets, or for those who think that’s a sin.
For those who wear masks, or for those who refuse to.
Even for those who say “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.”
Yes, even for Yankees fans.
The biblical lifestyle is one of serving, caring for those we find repulsive or those who mash all our buttons.
It’s not about winning.
Winning comes, eventually.
But not because we sought for it.
Part 10: Peace | Part 11: Encouragement | Part 12: Gratitude
Photo by Jens Lelie on Unsplash
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