A Gospel Presentation - Part 6 (Culmination/Cure)

Previous Posts in this Series:
A Gospel Presentation: Part 1 (Two-Age Worldview)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 2 (Creation/Curse)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 3 (Covenant/Commitment)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 4 (Confirmation)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 5 (Charismatic Witness)

"After all of this I will pour out my Spirit on all kinds of people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy. Your elderly will have prophetic dreams; your young men will see visions. Even on male and female servants I will pour out my Spirit in those days. I will produce portents (wonders) both in the sky and on the earth - blood, fire, and columns of smoke. The sunlight will be turned to darkness and the moon to the color of blood, before the day of the Lord comes - that great and terrible day! It will so happen that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be delivered. For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who survive, just as the Lord has promised; the remnant will be those whom the Lord will call." (Joel 2:28-32, NET)

"Then the angel showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb (Jesus), in the middle of its street. On either side of the river was the tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. There will no longer exist anything that is cursed [because sin and illness and death are gone]; and the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and His bond-servants will serve and worship Him [with great awe and joy and loving devotion]; they will [be privileged to] see His face, and His name will be on their foreheads. And there will no longer be night;  they have no need for lamplight or sunlight, because the Lord God will illumine them; and they will reign [as kings] forever and ever." (Revelation 22:1-5, AMP)

I chose these two Scriptures to open this last post because they capture the essence of what all of time and history is leading up to: The Day of the Lord, followed by the restoration of the Kingdom of God. As I have mentioned many times during this series, our Great Hope and the essential, fundamental message of the full Gospel, is that God is working out a plan to restore all things (Acts 1:6, 3:21).

A Gospel Presentation - Part 4 (Confirmation/Cross)

Previous Posts in this Series:
A Gospel Presentation: Part 1 (Two-Age Worldview)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 2 (Creation/Curse)
A Gospel Presentation: Part 3 (Covenant/Commitment)

"For I say that Messiah has become a servant to the circumcision in behalf of the truth of God, to confirm the promises given to the fathers, and for the Gentiles to glorify God for His mercy..." (Romans 15:8-9, NASB)

In some ways Jesus is the easiest part of this narrative to write about, and in other ways, He is the hardest thing to write about. On the one hand, few are confused as to who Jesus is and what He has done. Those of us who have grown up in the Faith have heard about Jesus all of our lives and heard the wonderous stories of his life; the miracles, the teachings, his death and his resurrection, etc. many times over. On the other hand, the layers of meaning run endlessly deep - the possible avenues for discussion and commentary could (and have) fill volumes upon volumes. In Evangelical circles, the 'volume' on Jesus is turned way up, and I don't seek to change that in any way. When speaking of Messiah Jesus, he deserves to have the volume all the way up. What I have hoped to achieve with these writings is a turning up of the volume in some other areas as well, to present what I believe is a full Gospel, ala Acts 18:24-26. What I want to do here is communicate how Jesus fits into the narrative I have been speaking about throughout this series.

Jesus as Messiah/King

A good starting place in speaking about Jesus, is his role as 'Messiah'. In keeping with some of what I brought up in the last post, I will point out that 'Messiah' is a thoroughly Jewish term. There was a whole 'messianic expectation' that had formed prior to Jesus' appearance, mostly in the Intertestamental Period (the ~400 year period between the end of the Hebraic Scriptures, Genesis through Malachi, and the beginning of Matthew). This expectation centered, in part, around the Davidic Covenant and the Jewish hope of one who would come to sit/rule on the throne of David forever. It is critical to understand that at the time of Jesus birth, the primary expectation of a 'messiah' within the mind of a Jew, was the expectation of a coming King. A political figure, to put a modern context to it. This is clear when we look at what the Magi say when they come to find the one they are searching for:

"After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, "Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him." (Matthew 2:1-2, NIV)

What God Has Joined Together...

"Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate." - Matthew 19:6 and Mark 10:9

This blog post started because I had this verse running through my head for several days. I sought the help of others in brainstorming the list below and I'm grateful for their counsel!

Everyone has heard this verse before - likely at a wedding. The context for the verse itself is marriage. The Pharisees are questioning Jesus about whether it is lawful for a man to divorce his wife and this is part of Jesus' response. With that being said, while the verse clearly applies to marriage, it seems possible that Jesus is stating a broader principle here. If you think about the context of what marriage is (an institution God himself created), and the way the metaphor is used throughout Scripture to describe the relationship between God and His People (covenant), it doesn't feel like a stretch to say that this verse can be applied to many things. By that I mean - there are many things that God has joined together, and my natural questions are a) what are those things and b) what have 'we' tried to separate?

Husband/Wife - no need to dig further here

Love/Obedience

Disobedience/Wrath

The Gospel/The Kingdom of God

Repentance/Forgiveness/Faith?

His People/Messiah Jesus

The Storm

Luke 6:46-49 (Blessed Hope Translation - see sidebar for a link)
"Now, how foolish it is for you to address me with, "Lord, Lord," but not do what I command. Anyone who comes to me and hears my teachings and obeys them - I will show you what he is like. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundations on bedrock. Now when a flood came, the torrent struck that house but was unable to shake it, because it had been built well. If someone hears my teachings and down not obey them, however, he is like a man who built a house right on top of the ground without any foundation. As soon as a torrent struck it, it collapsed. And the ruin of that house was great."

Matthew 7:21-27
"Not just anyone who says to me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the person who does the will of my Father in the heavens. Many people will say to me in that Day, "Lord, Lord, it was in your name that we prophesied, wasn't it? And it was in your name that we drove out demons, was it not? And yours was the name in which we did many miracles, was it not?" And at that time I will publicly declare to them, "I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!" Given these things, if anyone hears these teachings of mine and obeys them, he may be compared to a wise man, who built his house on bedrock. The rain fell and the floodwaters came and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall, because it had been founded on the bedrock. But if someone hears these teachings of mine and does not obey them, he may be compared to a foolish man, who built his house on the sand. The rain fell and the floodwaters came and the winds blew and struck that house, and it fell. And its fall was great."

I've heard many sermons over the years on what we call "The Sermon on the Mount". There are two accounts of it and I have shared the same excerpt from both versions. Typically, when someone is preaching on this section - they refer to the 'flood' or the 'storm' as the "storms of life". That we need to be well-grounded in order that we not lose our Faith in the trials of this life. While that may be one application that can be made, I don't believe it captures the spirit of what Jesus is saying here. First, a couple observations:

a) Jesus' crowd here is his followers, otherwise known as his disciples. Earlier in Luke 6, verse 20, we read that, "Jesus, then, directed his attention to his disciples and said..." Certainly The Twelve would have been there, and these teaching would have been directed at them, but also there was a greater multitude that was following, who were not considered the inner circle, but were nevertheless disciples.

b) The entire tenor and tone of this sermon is eschatological, meaning, it is about a) what Jesus' eternal Kingdom will be like and b) what Jesus will be looking for upon his second coming. From the beatitudes at the beginning, ("blessed are you who are hungry now, for you WILL in due time eat as much as you want"), to the clarifications of the law in the middle section ("truly I tell you, these have received their reward"), to the very clear exhortations to "obey" at the end - all of it is pointing to a future reality.

It seems clear that the flood or storm that Jesus references at the end of this sermon has to do with a coming time of great distress, or 'tribulation' if you want to use a Biblical word. One indication is that the storm strikes everyone - both the one who built on the bedrock and the one who built on the sand...not only that, it is described as the same kind of storm (just 'flood' in the Luke account and 'rain', 'floods' and 'wind' in the Matthew account). The storms that each of us face in this life are very different. Some people tragically lose children, some people lose parents painfully to accidents or sickness, some people go through life with debilitating illnesses or conditions, and some people seem not to have much tragedy at all in their lives. So this can't be talking about the regular 'storms of life' that each of us faces, because those are very different, person to person. Sure - those storms can certainly test our faith in the God of the Universe, but with time, we usually heal, or the pain becomes more bearable.

But what about THE Storm? As someone who has only recently started wading into the waters of the different opinions on what 'the end times' will be like...I can't claim to know much of anything. I know there are pre-millenialists, post-millenialists, pre-tribulation rapturists, post-tribulation rapturists, and a hundred other (seemingly) positions that people take. I don't know much about any of that, but I know what the Bible has to say about The Storm, the great and terrible Day of the Lord:

Matthew 24:21
"For then [at the second coming] there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be." There is a parallel verse in Mark 13:19, "For in those days there will be such tribulation as has not been from the ginning of the creation that God created until now, and never will be."

This passages above seem to be a reference to Daniel 12:1, which says,
"At that time shall arise Michael, the great prince who has charge of your people. And there shall be a time of trouble, such as never has been since there was a nation till that time."

Joel 2:31
"The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the mood to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes."

Luke 21:34-36
"But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and care of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap. For it will come upon all who dwell on the face of the whole earth. But stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man."

Revelation 3-19 has a lot to say about what this period will be like (but again, a reminder, that I do not yet understand much of the nuance of the debate as to the timing of various parts of this such as rapture, resurrection of the dead, etc):

Revelation 6:12-17
"When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and behold, there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black as sackcloth, the full moon became like blood, and the stars of the sky fell to the earth as the fig tree shreds its winter fruit when shaken by a gale. The sky vanished like a scroll that is being rolled up, and every mountain and island was removed from its place. Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb..."

Think about this - six million Jews were exterminated in Nazi death camps during WWII. Millions and millions of soldiers died fighting for their countries and millions more civilians were killed as a result of bombings, starvation, etc. AND YET - the Bible promises a period of distress and suffering that will be unparalleled in human history. The Bible says that every human on the face of the earth at that time (and some would argue, anyone who has ever lived) will experience 'it' (Luke 21:34-36 above). The pain and suffering experienced throughout the world during WWI and WWII is incredible - but to think there will be a time worse than that...

I wonder if I'm ready for The Storm. Oftentimes, I doubt that I am. I feel weak in my faith, or I doubt my ability to suffer. It sobers me up - it makes me realize that I have work to do, to prepare myself. The normal storms of life will come, no doubt about it, but will I allow those things to press me in to Jesus and God's promises? Or will I become increasingly focused on myself and my own pain? I talked in a previous blogpost about how we counsel one another through difficulty...and while we certainly need someone, at times, to sit with us in our pain, we also need people who remind us that this isn't all there is. That no matter what happens here in this life, even if death should come for us, it isn't about THIS LIFE. It's about the life to come - it's about faith in Jesus and in the promises of God and about His Kingdom. Paul put it so perfectly in 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 (a verse I have quoted often here): "There we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, yet our inner self is being renewed day by day. For our light and temporary affliction is producing for us an eternal glory that far outweighs our troubles. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

Let us, together, fix our eyes on what is to come - and not allow the cares and concerns and troubles and afflictions of this life weigh us down and choke out our faith.

Social Justice Gospel? Hold Up.

I see a lot of pastors and Christians these days talking about social justice and about racism in general and using the words of Jesus to justify their positions and I'm here to say - the Gospel may have something to say about Social Justice, but it is not primarily about Justice or Social Justice, on this side of Heaven. In fact, the only true justice that the Bible speaks of, is the justice that Jesus will oversee when he returns in Glory and sits on his throne, judging the living and the dead, in Jerusalem (Isaiah 2). I think Christians and Pastors walk a dangerous line when they make statements like, "if you call yourself a Christian and don't have a social justice mindset, you might be following the wrong Jesus". That's a paraphrase of sentiments I've heard and read lately and to me, it's a slippery slope that confuses the true message of the Gospel.

Let me be clear - do my statements above suggest that I don't think Social Justice is an important issue? No. By no means. I will explain further where I believe the nuance lies, but I am not dismissing the history of oppression and marginalization that blacks, Native Americans and others have suffered in the United States, over it's history. I am not saying that anyone is free to wipe their hands from doing hard work related to racial reconciliation; that is important work that needs to be done, of that there is no question.

Jesus makes many statements in the Gospels about what our attitude, as disciples, should be towards the poor, the widowed, the sick, the prisoner, etc. Matthew 25 comes to mind, "whatever you did for the least of these brother and sisters of mine, you did for me." Luke 4 also comes to mind - the scroll that Jesus reads when he emerges from the wilderness, which is a quote of Isaiah 61, "The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed and to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Others for consideration: James 1:27, Galatians 2:9-10, Matthew 6:1-4, Proverbs 14:31)

In talking about Luke 4, there is some nuance, and the nuance lies in the 'when' - if you are a Kingdom Now type of person - what evidence do you have to point to that Jesus' Kingdom is being established right now? Do we have any less strife now, on nearly any level you want to talk about, than we did 500 years ago? To boil it down all the way, was Jesus saying that he came to proclaim freedom for the prisoner, now? Was he saying that he came (the first time) to reverse oppression, now? I would argue that the unequivocal answer is no. I think what Jesus is saying in Luke 4 is that He came to give hope - to proclaim that there is a day coming when the prisoner will be free, when the oppressed will no longer be oppressed - when the blind will see and the lame will walk. In other words, Jesus came to tell us exactly what his Kingdom will be like, to show us glimpses of what His Kingdom is like (with miracles) and to tell us how to we can be a part of it. Most the miracles that Jesus performed during his ministry were related to provision and healing - the 'first fruits' of what His kingdom will be like - a window, if you will, into what is to come. Were those miracles performed in order to suggest that we can have all of that now...no, it was to say, "hey guys, I'm going to do what I've said, all along, that I'm going to do and it's worth persevering in your faith to see that happen, whether in your earthly lifetime or not."

And what about the suffering that Jesus PROMISES to those who follow him (Matt 10:38, Matt 24:9, Mark 8:34, Luke 9:23)? How much social justice will Christians feel when the tide of public opinion turns against them (which it most certainly will at some point) and they are shouted down, beaten and killed for faith in Jesus?

I think it is more than fine to preach messages about how we are to care for our fellow man - but if that message is not paired with the Gospel - we are only shallowly teaching people to save others from suffering in this world, and potentially delivering them to an eternity of suffering in Hell. Let me say that again in a different way - if anything that we do in the service of others, as Christians, is not paired with the eternal hope of Salvation that can be had by trusting and believing in Jesus' sinless death on the cross, then we are simply alleviating temporary suffering on this side of His return and potentially damning people to eternity of suffering in hell. The true message of the Gospel, which Jesus preached, is "repent and believe" - it is the same message that John the Baptist preached and the same message taught by the Prophets in the Old Testament. There are certainly ways we can emulate the life of Jesus in caring for the poor, sick, widowed, imprisoned and oppressed, but none of what Jesus did in those efforts was ever devoid of telling people the Truth about the coming Kingdom.

Paul is very clear that in this world - our problems will continue on until Jesus returns. Sickness, death, and suffering will all be present right up until Jesus restores everything. At the end of 2 Corinthians 4, Paul says

"But we have treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed, perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. So death is at work in us, but life in you. [...] So we do not lose heart. Through our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal." (7-12, 16-18)

Paul and the disciples were not suffering beatings, imprisonment and death because they were going around caring for the poor/widowed/imprisoned and healing people. No, they were suffering because of the truth about the Kingdom - for the message they carried that says that in order to inherit the Kingdom, we have to submit ourselves and our very lives to His authority; that we have to take up our crosses with Him and follow Him.

 

As a result of everything I have just said, the Church has an extremely difficult job. If taken too far, the issues of the world become distractions that take us away from truly following Jesus. As my pastor likes to say, the gospel is Jesus + Nothing = Salvation. In very emotionally heated times, it can become easy to get caught up in a good cause, without remembering that the only cause that will ultimately matter is that of the Gospel. Does this abdicate anyone from responsibility? No - but that is the difficulty. How do Christians be in the world but not of it? To truly care for our fellow man is to sit with them in their suffering, yes, but also to share the hope of something better - to share with them the hope that one day the King is going to return and set everything right. It is an acknowledgement, inherently, that everything in this world, good and bad alike, is temporary. It is an acknowledgement that try as we might, without Jesus, nothing will truly be fixed - that suffering, injustice, sickness and death are a part of this fallen world until He returns.

So how are we counseling people? Are we pointing them to Jesus - are we most concerned about their souls, with everything else coming second? Are we willing to sit with someone in their suffering and deliver a true message of hope?