The Death of God in the Death of Kingship

There is one idea that I believe, if we properly understood and embraced it, would illumine much of what we don't understand about Scripture and enable us to accept much of what we don't like about Scripture.  This idea is one that has gradually but steadily been leeching out our consciousness for quite some time, beginning with the French Revolution.  The idea creates a whole category of understanding that we are, for the most part, completely lacking today.  And because we don't have this category in our minds, much of what the Bible says does not make sense to us and cannot be embraced by us, because we have no way to process it.

The concept I am referring to can be named by many names, but for our purposes I will call it Kingship.
The notion of Kingship, generally, is the idea that a person in an office of ultimate authority and power has the sovereign right to rule over all in his domain.  Everything in the kingdom is owned by and is to be used in service to the King.  Now to be fair, never in the history of the world has Kingship been exercised in a perfectly noble way.  That is because there has never been a completely noble king.  In fact, history probably gives us many more examples of unrighteous kings than of righteous ones.  And even the righteous ones were known to have a bad day or two (think of King David taking Uriah's wife Bathsheba, impregnating her and then murdering Uriah to try to cover it up).

But like everything that is based on an ideal, the ideal is based on something even higher: the nature and character of God.  For example, we think of marriage as instituted by God as a helpful arrangement  for the purpose of securing the procreation of the species, the rearing of children, the providence and ordering of society and the felicity of humankind.  While that is true, there is a deeper meaning, origin and purpose to marriage that Scripture teaches us about: "This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church." (Ephesians 5:32 ESV)  Thus, marriage, primarily is not about humans at all - it is, first and foremost, a picture of the relationship between Christ and the church. [this is actually the great travesty of the modern effort to redefine the marriage relationship - but that's another article]

So it is with Kingship.  The human institution of Kingship is based on the ideal of Kingship and the ideal of Kingship is based on an aspect of the nature of God.  If we want to understand the universe rightly, in all its beauty and grandeur and truth, we must have a category in our hearts for Kingship.  Or, stated negatively, if we don't have a concept of a being of power and authority whose right it is to sovereignly rule all things according to his own will and pleasure, we won't be able to make sense of God and his world.

O.k., big deal.  Right?  Who doesn't understand Kingship?  Well, to put it bluntly: we don't.  Modern society is experiencing a Crisis of Kingship.  It is beyond the scope of this article (or the reader's attention span, no doubt) to go into the history of the erosion of the concept of Kingship.  Suffice it to say that, beginning roughly with the Enlightenment, modern culture has all but completely jettisoned the idea of royal rule.

We live in an era where every man is the king of his own kingdom.  Human rights ordains that no person may own another person.  Human equality tells us that no person is above another person.  Democracy dictates that no person may rule another person.  Postmodernism decrees that no person may judge the beliefs of another person.  And humanism preaches that there is nothing of higher value than a person.

So it is with this backdrop that we humans then sit down and read our Bibles and try to make sense of a story in which God, by virtue of his character, owns all people, is far superior to all people, rules all people, judges all people and is of infinitely greater worth than all people.  In fact, the story goes on to say that though humans owed all their allegiance, service and worship to this God, they rebelled against him and are guilty of the highest crime of treason which God will punish in the most severe manner imaginable.

Can you see why many people who read the Bible today experience a huge disconnect between that story and theirs?  They have no category into which to put this kind of narrative.  In reality, a story like this can't be anything but a myth from a bygone era.  

Why?

Because, since Kingship no longer exists, neither does God.

Chick-fil-A: It's No Longer Safe To Be A Christian In America

BULLETIN: Never has something so accurately encapsulated the culture war that is being waged right now against Christians and the teachings of the Bible as the furor surrounding the personal comments made by Dan Cathy, who happens to be the head of Chick-fil-A in support of traditional marriage.

For the record, here are the ACTUAL COMMENTS that have outraged the militant gay community and their willing accomplices in mainstream media and politics. When asked about his company's support for the traditional family he replied:

"Well, guilty as charged," said Cathy when asked about the company's position.

"We are very much supportive of the family -- the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives. We give God thanks for that.

"We operate as a family business ... our restaurants are typically led by families; some are single. We want to do anything we possibly can to strengthen families. We are very much committed to that," Cathy emphasized.

"We intend to stay the course," he said. "We know that it might not be popular with everyone, but thank the Lord, we live in a country where we can share our values and operate on biblical principles." (from an interview with Baptist Press)

Did you hear the anti-homosexual hatred in that statement? Neither did I. But apparently the pro-gay militants heard it - and they've issued a fatwa against Chick-fil-A. Look at some of the vitriol that is being spewed at Cathy and Chick-fil-A.

A Chicago politician, Alderman Joe Moreno, who represents Chicago's Logan Square neighborhood, said he will use his aldermanic privilege to block Chick-fil-A from opening a restaurant in his ward.

"I don't believe a company that speaks out against gay rights in our country today...should have the opportunity to operate in the city of Boston." - Thomas Menino, Democrat Mayor of Boston

Commenting on alderman Moreno's plan to block Chick-fil-A from opening a restaurant in the city, Chicago mayor Rahm Emmanuel offered his support: "Chick-fil-A values are not Chicago values," the mayor said in a statement when asked about Moreno's decision. "They disrespect our fellow neighbors and residents. This would be a bad investment, since it would be empty."

Then on Friday, on Fox News' Bill O'Reily show, Laura Ingraham interviewed Wayne Besen, executive director of Truth Wins Out, a gay rights group. I encourage you to watch the video of this interview because it's hard to believe what is being said.  Here's a link to the video

Here are some highlights:

"They have given millions of dollars to anti-gay organizations and I find it incredibly hypocritical that they would complain about not being able to open up a store. One of the groups they gave money to, the Family Research Council said it's the government's moral duty to legislate morality, and now they're complaining that morality's being legislated in the way they don't like."

REALITY CHECK: What these government officials are proposing to do is NOT legislating (writing laws), they are are threatening to illegally misuse their position of power to oppress a private company because they hate the fact that the company's leader believes the Bible is true.

Besen calls Cathy's statements in support of traditional marriage, "horrible", "bigoted", "nasty", "horrible" (again), "nasty" (again), and "controversial".

REALITY CHECK: Well, I'll give him the last one, but let's remember that what he's calling "horrible", "bigoted", and "nasty" is God's clear teaching in Scripture that homosexuality is an evil perversion.

Laura then asks a BRILLIANT QUESTION. She says, "Can you be a practicing traditional Christian in the United States today and speak your mind and not be branded a hater? Can you be - and not be ostracized?"

The answer to that question is, for the first time since this country's inception, in question. In case any of you were paying attention, this is STEP 5 of 6 in the homosexual militant's manifesto of how to defeat the taboos against itself and gain protected status as a minority. STEP 5 says: Make the Victimizers (people who don't believe homosexuality is acceptable) look bad.

Do you think they are succeeding?

What this means on more of a spiritual level is that "For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths."  (2 Timothy 4:3-4 ESV)

Why Did The King Throw A Party?

Do you ever hear something that you've heard many times before, but for some reason you hear something in it that you hadn't heard before?  That happened to me the other day when I was reading in the Gospel of Matthew.  In chapter 22 Jesus is telling a story in which he compares God the Father to a king who throws a feast in his son's honor.  The nation of Israel is compared to people the king invited to the feast, but who refused to come (caring instead for their own concerns).  We Gentiles, in this story, are the rag tag bunch who end up attending the feast.

Now, one of the rules of proper biblical interpretation I learned early on was that parables typically have one or two main ideas, and that one shouldn't try to allegorize each element of the parable too closely.  I've always understood the main point of this parable to be the story of how God first chose Israel to be his people, but that when they rejected him he rejected them as well and chose for himself a different people from all the peoples of the world - and I think that this is the right way to read this passage.


However when I re-read this passage the other day it was something else that struck me.  It wasn't so much the main text of the story, but the context of the story.  It hit me hard that there is something that is assumed by this story that we cannot assume in our day.  


What I'm talking about is the theme of this party.  Why did the king throw a feast for his son?  What was his purpose, his motivation?  Why was he so angry with those who ignored his invitation that "he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city"?  Why was it so important to have the feast full of celebrants that he had his servants go out and gather anyone and everyone they could find from the highways and the byways to come to the feast?  Why, when the king found one hapless fellow at the feast without proper wedding attire did he have his servants "'bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness.’"


You see, we hardly know how to answer these questions today.  Because we've been taught - and we love hearing it - that the feast was for us!  That God went out looking for us because he wanted us at his party.  That those mean old ungrateful Jews weren't worthy to be God's people, but we were.  That there was no way God could enjoy a party without his favorite peeps (you guessed it) - US.


And THAT'S what hit me right between the eyes.  The passionate purpose behind the party was that the King was deadly earnest about seeing his SON honored!  This was so important to the king that those who thumbed their noses at the invitation were rewarded with the death penalty.  When the king sent his servants out to gather anyone they could find to attend the feast, it was because it would have been a travesty for the son of the king to show up to his own feast and find no one there to celebrate him.


What's sad about this, to me, is that many in the church today are like the guy at the feast in his swimming trunks and Hawaiian shirt thinking the party is for him because the king thinks he's a great guy and is just so pleased that he would honor his majesty by showing up and gracing him with his presence.  You remember what happened to that guy, right?

Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’(Matthew 22:13 ESV)

Evangelicals and the GOP; The Gospel-Centered movement and the Tea Party

Read on...it's not what you think.

This is not a post that talks about how Christians should or should not vote Republican.  That might be an interesting and helpful topic, but, though it's been done poorly far more than it's been done well, that's not what we're doing in this post.

What I'd like to explore a bit here are some of the parallels that I see in trends that are occurring in both the world of Evangelicalism and the Republican party.  Let me explain how my brain got to this funky place.

There are many areas of interest that I have followed for a long time: technology, sports, literature, movies, music, culture trends, etc..  Two arenas of activity that that I have tracked for quite some time, both in terms of contemporary development as well as historical trends, are the areas of Christianity and of Politics.

One of the most significant developments in recent years within America's political life has been the emergence of the Tea Party movement.  Whether you love, hate or are indifferent towards the Tea Party there is no denying that its advent has really shaken up the US political scene.  The rapid rise of the Tea Party has been a major disruptive force rocking the status quo in this country's politics, causing the establishment leaders on both sides to be somewhat flummoxed.  Similar to Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority in the 1970s and the Rush Limbaugh show in the 1980s, The Tea Party is giving  a voice and influence to conservative Republicans, who had, for some time, been feeling taken for granted by the party leaders.

I was just talking with a friend about this the other day and it dawned on me how many similarities there are between the Tea Party in the political realm and the Gospel-centered movement in Christianity.  I won't go into great detail here to describe the Gospel-centered movement; suffice it to say that it is a sub-group within Evangelicalism that believes that many leaders, churches, denominations and other organizations that function under the rubric of Evangelicalism have let go of their commitment to the preaching, teaching and living of the Gospel and are instead embracing and advancing a worldly, person-centered philosophy and world-view.

So, on to the point of this post.

As I was talking to my friend about the Tea Party it occurred to me that a lot of the ways I was describing it could just have easily been used to talk about the Gospel-centered movement.  Don't get me wrong: while I do consider myself to be both a Gospel-centered Christian as well as a Tea Party Republican, I am not inferring some fundamental connection between the two ("If you're a real Christian, you're also a Republican", or "If you're a Tea Partier, you must also be a Gospel-centered Christian").

For the sake of length I will attempt to be brief (too late), but here are some of the similarities that I perceive:

• Grass-roots origins

Neither of these movements came about as a result of high-level strategy meetings by key leaders in the parent group.  Rather, they both sprang up organically of their own accord.  It seems that the impetus (frustration, concern, discontent) behind these movements quietly built up over time as their members (I say 'members' even though there is usually no formal membership as there is no formal organization to belong to) became increasingly dissatisfied with the direction the parent organization was going but didn't know what to do about it.

There was/is no one leader or group that can be said to be spearheading these movements, no address or phone number to call to contact them and no formal structure or organization.  Rather, there are many like-minded people and groups that are finding common cause through a set of shared core values.  There are presumed leaders/spokesmen in both groups, but they speak representatively and not authoritatively.

• Raison d'être (Reasons for Existing)

As I alluded to above, the reason the Tea Party ad the Gospel-centered movement came about is because the conservative base in both organizations (Republican party and the Evangelical church) began increasingly to feel as though these groups were, for various reasons, filling up with people who really didn't share the values that the groups had originally formed around.  As this happened and critical mass began to shift away from these values toward something more "moderate", understandably, the same kind of shift began to be seen in the leadership of these groups (one could easily make a chicken and egg type of argument and say that the shift in leadership happened first and the shift in membership followed, and vice versa, but that is not the focus of this post).  Why exactly this happened is open for debate (I will postulate a theory later), but the fact that it happened is indisputable.

As more and more moderates joined these groups and took up leadership in them, increasingly they began to push and pull them away from the founding principles towards a more centrist set of actions and policies.  Little by little the conservative members of these groups began wondering what was becoming of them?  As Ronald Reagan famously said of his exodus from the Democratic party in 1962, "I didn't leave the Democratic Party. The party left me."

As this realization began to dawn on the conservative members of these groups they were left with the question: "O.k., What do I do about this?"  As is often the case in these situations, the initial response of most of these people was not to abandon ship.  Many of these folks began to seek ways to voice their concerns, restate their values, rally their supporters and take back the ground that had been surrendered in an attempt to pull their organizations back in the right direction.  That is the role that the Tea Party is playing right now for the Republican Party and the Gospel-centered movement is playing in Evangelicalism.

• Other Similarities

There are many other similarities between the two groups:   

- Both are attracting the best and brightest conservative leaders.

- Both groups are exerting a surprisingly strong influence on their respective cultures and arenas of activity.   

- They are both holding large, well-attended rallies and conferences to which like-minded folks flock in great numbers to identify with the movements, hear from their leaders, be inspired by one another's passion and voice their solidarity.   

- Both are making the moderate, in-name-only types very uncomfortable as the conservatives show by their passion and commitment how genuine and heartfelt their beliefs are, compared to those who are there by default or for convenience sake.  Many of the moderates seem uncomfortable with the way these movements are revealing them to be moderate because part of the nature of these movements is to clearly define themselves by what they DO and DO NOT believe.  The moderates have long enjoyed the luxury of hiding under the generic banner of their respective organizations, to be a member of which one need only subscribe (and often not even formally) to a very basic set of values.  Many of these folks only held to some of the stated values of the group.  The existence and work of these conservative movements has served to shine a light on those furtive members who heretofore had been able to slink around unnoticed, and that makes them very uncomfortable. 

- As a result, there are already a good number of 'posers', 'hangers on', and 'ooh, ooh, me too'ers joining the ranks of these movements.  There are a number of people who do not truly identify with the values of these groups, but are shrewd enough to sense the momentum shift that is happening and so have made the calculated decision to hook their wagons up to this horse. 

-Those outside these groups publicly (have been forced to) acknowledge the significance and influence they possess.  But privately they often scorn the members of these movements as simpletons, unrealistic, rigid, uncompromising stick-in-the-muds.  They not only believe that these movements are wrong in what they assert, but they resent their ability to organize into a force that they must reckon with. 

-Those who find themselves outside these movements, but inside their parent organizations, are maddened by the way the advent of these movements has weakened their brand (GOP, Evangelical) and their control over the power, resources and influence that those brands once possessed.  More and more, people are coming to the conclusion that the label Republican or Evangelical hardly means anything.  This is forcing members to further define themselves - something that those who are not in the conservative movement find undesirable as well as difficult.  They use words mushy words like moderate, independent, progressive, and centrist.  But when asked to define what they mean by those terms, they either are unable or unwilling to do so.  They are frustrated that not only can they no longer take for granted those 'right-wingers' in their organization and expect them to follow their orders and do their bidding, but they are increasingly finding that they no longer have the ability to steer the ship and are finding themselves more frequently in the back seat, along for the ride.

"O.k." you're saying, "So What?  What does this all mean?"  Well, that is a HUGE subject that has largely yet to be decided.  But I do think we can make a few observations.  

1. First, if you find yourself in one of these movements, this should be a very encouraging time, because the momentum is yours.  The wind is in your sails right now.  You are no longer only a fringe malcontent whose voice is not being valued or heard.  What will become of your movement is yet to be seen, but you are no longer being taken for granted by the organization that you used to feel at home in but where, in recent years, you have felt ever more a stranger in your own home.
2. Part of the point of this post is to note how similar the development of these two movements - from two very different arenas - is.  What I think we can learn from this is that history has some cyclical tendencies to it.  If you care to look, you will notice over and over in history, in almost every sphere there is a cyclical pattern that looks something like this: A) People are discontent with the way their group has strayed from its traditional roots and values; B) People get frustrated enough to start talking and debating and working against this shift; C) Those who find themselves in solidarity in their resistance to this drifting start to band together informally and then formally; D) Eventually there is either a cataclysmic break up over irreconcilable differences between the conservative resistance and the parent group, or the power and influence of the conservative group simply becomes so strong that it either retakes control of the parent organization (rare!) or peacefully steps away from it leaving it to die a slow death.  This cycle of drift and recovery can be observed in nearly every sector of life from politics to business, religion to academia, and more.
3. You may have already identified what phase each of the two groups we have been talking about are in this cycle: we are in phase C.  The question before us is, what will phase D look like for these movements?  Cataclysmic breakup (3rd political party / new conservative Gospel Coalition) or peaceful reclamation?  Time will tell.

In Defense of Hell: Why Even the Nicest of Sinners Deserve Eternal Torment

Even for those of us who agree that people are sinful and deserve harsh punishment for their rebellion against the King of the Universe, there is often a nagging feeling in the pit of our stomaches when we think the severity and duration of hell.  Sure, part of it is that we know that we ourselves deserve the same fate, but have graciously been saved from it.  Part of it is that we can't think of wishing that destiny on our worst enemy, much less those we love and care for.


But there is something else that bothers us.  Deep down we sometimes wonder if the punishment really fits the crime.  We have a hard time thinking of an eternity of anything.  Sometimes we've even thought about an eternity of heaven and wondered whether we'll get bored.  But to think of the worst possible physical, mental, emotional and spiritual anguish imaginable going on for hours and days and weeks and months and years and decades and centuries, with no breaks or rest or reprieve ever...  In our humanness, we can't imagine anything that would warrant such supreme severity.


Yet this is what Scripture teaches us.  So, to help us adjust our perspective from what makes sense in our man-centered society to what is actually true in the God-centered universe of reality, I want to put forth a few thoughts.


Beware of Being Nicer Than God
Many today are trying to downplay, soften, or even explain away the reality of Hell.  For whatever reason, they are not giving God's judgment toward sinners a place of prominence (or a place at all) in their message to a lost world.  They are trying to be nicer than God.


Have you ever seen this situation: a rebellious youth who has disrespected, disobeyed and dishonored his parents in pretty much every possible way finds a sympathetic ear with another adult who understands the hard time he's going through.  He knows how unreasonable, harsh and unfair parents can be.  Poor kid, let's go get some ice cream.


What has this fellow done?  He may think he has tried to help a troubled young person, but in reality he has just condoned the sinfulness of the youth and dishonored the parents.


That is the role may are playing today in spiritual matters.  They take the side of the one who is in rebellion toward God.  They coddle his anger about God's "injustice".  They downplay the severity of God's anger toward the sinner.  What they are really saying is that God is an abusive, extreme, unreasonable tyrant and that they in fact know better than he does what is just and true and good.


He Must Increase, But I Must Decrease.


I was just talking to someone today about how our natural reaction is to feel uncomfortable with the idea of eternal punishment.  My response was that whenever this feeling of unease starts to well up inside me I immediately have to warn myself that I am elevating the importance of people and lowering the importance of God.  


The reason why most people end up walking away from key biblical doctrines is because they simply can no longer reconcile them with the human-centeredness that they have allowed to burgeon in their souls.  If the highest measure of goodness and worth is the value of a human being, then God is a petty tyrant.  How could a good God possibly throw the vast majority of people who have ever lived into Hell for ever?


The solution to this quandary is not to explain away what is hard to accept within the context of humanism, but to explain why humanism is wrong.  If we labor to recover a correct view of humanity from a biblical context we will begin to see that the problem in understanding divine justice is why God would save ANY of the guilty, rather than sending EVERYONE to hell.


Every Transgression And Disobedience Received A Just Penalty


Sometimes people object to hell by saying, "How can it be just for God to punish a sinner with that level of torment FOREVER?!  Wouldn't it be more reasonable to set a limited sentence for their limited crimes?  Is it hell really a fair punishment for lying or stealing?


These kinds of statements reveal several misunderstandings about God and sin.  First, all sin, of actions and of the heart, are at their core, rebellion toward, disbelief in, and hatred of God.  Lying isn't ONLY lying; it is a rejection of the God of truth.  Stealing isn't ONLY stealing; it is spitting in the face of the one who made all things and owns all things - including us.


Additionally, we all believe that some offenses are deserving of greater degrees of punishment than others.  Sometimes the severity of the offense depends on the person who is sinned against.  For example:

• If I lie to a complete stranger I may not get in trouble at all
• If I lie to my child they may call me on it, but they can't punish me too much
• If I lie to my wife I will get in a fight and have to sleep on the couch
• If I lie to my employer I will likely get fired
• If I lie to my country I will be labeled a traitor and will likely lose my life

The wrong action is the same, but the increasing levels of authority against whom I sin increases the level of the offense and thus the level of punishment.  In our case even the smallest treason against God Most High warrants a punishment of the highest level.

Also, the suggestion that it is unjust of God to punish for an eternity an offense that was temporary just doesn't hold up.  What defense attorney at a sentencing trial for his client who has been convicted of murder ever would make the argument that the duration of the prison sentence should be short because his client only spent a brief 5 minutes murdering his victim?

So, bringing this all together.  Picture a person who committed the most heinous act imaginable against a small child.  Now consider that this person violated several children several times a day, year after year for over 20 years.  Now picture this person when he finally gets caught, not only failing to show remorse, but laughing and bragging about his exploits.  


Even this horrific tale doesn't even begin to approach the stench of our sins before an infinitely holy God.  A sinful person who does not perfectly love the Lord his God with all his heart and soul and mind and strength at all times, is a million million times worse than that child abuser, and he is offending at that level 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, for his entire life.


When we begin to understand this, it makes hell make more sense, it makes the cross more astounding, and it makes grace more amazing!

Words in Songs Matter (part 2?)

Some people think I get worked up about little things.  For example, some lyrics in worship songs really get my undies in a bundle.  "Relax," people tell me, "it's just a song."

Just a song?!  Why not put arsenic in my coffee and tell me to calm down 'cause it's just a drink!?  I'll come back to this part of the rant, but first I want to get to the song that's got me heated.

As with the song "Above All", I feel cheated with this song too.  I know the song writers probably don't have nefarious intent, but with songs like these I feel like I'm being ambushed.  They lull me into complacency by appealing musical arrangements and decent-to-good lyrics.  I allow my guard to slip as I attempt to let go and enter into worship.  And then they spring the poison on me.

It's like I'm out for a walk in the park with my sweetie and we come upon a quaint horse and carriage ride.  The rig is charming and the driver has an honest smile.  What the heck, let's do it.  We settle in to a very picturesque moment together as the driver takes us to a little traveled section of the park.  And just then, in that quiet moment...in that peaceful place...the driver stops the carriage, turns around and flashes us!

Whoa!  Unfair, right?  All we wanted was a peaceful time of intimacy, and we end up being accosted!

Ok...the song...

The song I want to unfairly pick apart is called, "Come, Now Is the Time to Worship," by Brian Doerksen.  It's pretty short, so I'll post the lyrics here in their entirety:

   Come, now is the time to worship

   Come, now is the time to give your heart

   Come, just as you are to worship

   Come, just as you are before your God

   Come

   One day ev'ry tongue will confess You are God

   One day ev'ry knee will bow

   Still the greatest treasure remains for those,

   Who gladly choose You now

Once again, for most of the song I'm being drawn in.

   Come, now is the time to worship

Amen.

   Come, now is the time to give your heart

Amen.

   Come, just as you are to worship

   Come, just as you are before your God

Well...God doesn't always want us to come just as we are, if that means we're holding on to our rebellion and hardness of heart.  As it says in Joel: "rend your hearts and not your garments".  But I can understand where these lines could be coming from.

   One day ev'ry tongue will confess You are God

   One day ev'ry knee will bow

Amen!  We're quoting Phil. 2:10.  How can you go wrong with that?

   Still the greatest treasure remains for those,

   Who gladly choose You now

And there it is.  Right here at then end, when we were all worship-ey and Amen-ey.  Right after quoting that precious passage of Scripture, the song writer jerks a knot in the song.  Do you see what he just told us he believes?!

It's not a little thing!  It's so significant that if the song writer really means what he says here, then he has placed himself firmly outside of classical Christian orthodoxy.  Put differently, this song is NOT a Christian song.  In fact it's not just an un-Christian song, it's an anti-Christian song.  It's heretical.

Why?  The song writer is taking the truth of the eventuality that every knee will bow before the lordship of Jesus Christ and he is turning it into the heresy of Universalism.

By adding the lines that "still the greatest treasure remains for those who gladly choose you now", the songwriter is saying that ultimately everyone will bow in faith, repentance and adoration before Jesus, but it's just better if you do it now, because you'll receive a "greater treasure".  Everyone will be ok and will receive a treasure, but you'll get a greater one if you choose Jesus now.

Compare this with the passage I just read recently in Revelation 1:7, "Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him, and all tribes of the earth will wail on account of him. Even so. Amen."

Yes, one day every knee WILL bow, and every tongue WILL confess that Jesus is Lord.  But, for the enemies of God this conquering ceremony will not be a happy one.  They will WAIL for the horror of it.  If you fail to throw down your weapons of rebellion and bow your knee to King Jesus now, you will later bow as a vanquished foe and shortly thereafter be thrown into a lake of fire to be tormented for all of eternity.

I don't have time here to go into how dreadfully this message dishonors God, belittles the cross and misleads sinners.  But let me say a word about why I think this matters so much.

God tells us that those who teach should be VERY CAREFUL.  He tells us that if a teacher causes someone to go astray that it would be better if a millstone was tied around his neck and he was thrown into the sea (Matt. 18:6).  He tells us in James 3 that not many should become teachers because they will be judged more strictly.

But these are just SONGS!  Don't be so picky!

Really?  I heard a PREACHER say recently that he thought that people retained more of what they got in the song service than what they got from the sermon.  Why is one of the biggest books of the Bible entirely made of SONGS?  Not to mention that large portions of other books are SONGS.

Let's be honest.  Much of the theology that people get nowadays does not come from their rigorous Bible reading and study.  People get much of their doctrine these days from SONGS.


So...am I just being picky?

Two Songs, Two Viewpoints

There are two songs making the rounds in church worship these days that sound very similar and yet they illustrate two very different views of life.  The reason they sound so similar is that they refer to the same verse: Heb. 12:2 "looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God."


The scene is this: Jesus has set his face like a flint toward Jerusalem, knowing full well what is waiting for him there. He sends off Judas from the supper table knowing that the next time he'll see him will be when he betrays him with a kiss. He prays so earnestly in Gethsemene for his Father to find another way that he sweats bullets. If there was one thing in the universe that Jesus didn't want to do, it was the one thing he was purposely walking right into.  The horror of the cross that Jesus was about to willingly climb up onto wasn't the physical brutality of it - that was like a mosquito bite compared to the real carnage of the cross. The horror and hell of the cross was that God the Father was about to torture the soul of God the Son by pouring out onto him the white hot rage of his wrath for every God-belittling sin that we human rebels had ever and would ever commit.


That is the context this verse speaks out of. This verse asks the all important question - WHY?!


Why on earth (and in heaven for that matter) would Jesus do this awful, horrible thing?!  There is a reason. It's not because Jesus was a victim and couldn't escape. There are a bunch of verses that tell us otherwise.  "For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again.  No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord." (Jn 10:17-18).  Or, "Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?" (Matt. 26:53)


The reason Jesus willingly carried the cross was because he wanted to get something that could only be gotten by hanging on that tree and having his own dear Father bludgeon the life out of his soul with the judgment of the sins of the whole world.


This verse puts it more succinctly: "Jesus,...who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame"


He endured the cross FOR the joy that was set before him.  Wow!  What was that joy that he wanted so badly that it was worth paying the price of the worst possible fate?  Here's where the songs come in.


The first song is "Above All", by Michael W. Smith.  The song starts out with two very God exalting verses that basically exclaim the worth of God being "above all" else.


   Verse 1:
   Above all powers
   Above all kings
   Above all nature
   And all created things
   Above all wisdom
   And all the ways of man
   You were here
   Before the world began


   Verse 2
   Above all kingdoms
   Above all thrones
   Above all wonders
   The world has ever known
   Above all wealth
   And treasures of the earth
   There's no way to measure
   What You're worth


Then the song goes into a chorus which describes the cross.


   Crucified
   Laid behind a stone
   You lived to die
   Rejected and alone
   Like a rose
   Trampled on the ground


And at the climactic point in the song the writer tells us what the joy was that Jesus desired to purchase, even though the price meant going through Hell.

   You took the fall

   And thought of me

   Above all

Wow!  Really?!  Me?!  Above every other valuable thing in the universe, even above the worth of God's own perfections, and honor, and self-sufficient, infinite happiness, the one thing that Jesus thought of that made the prospect of taking the full brunt of his Father's hatred worthwhile was the chance to be with me?  


But wait, wasn't it I (and those like me) who stoked the Father's fury to begin with because of my wretched, God-despising rebellion?  Wasn't it my putrid wickedness that propelled every lash of the whip, every thorn in the brow, every flesh piercing nail and the very Trinity-dividing, Father-forsaking, soul-incinerating punishment that Jesus had to endure?


This song is indicative of the most widely held view of God's redemption of sinners in today's church.  Namely, that God saved sinners because there was something in them that he found worthy of saving; because he found them desirable; because his happiness would have been degraded if he couldn't have them with him in heaven.  


And not only this!  This value that we sinners have to God was so great ("God SO loved the world") that he counted the price of humiliating, torturing and killing his own Son not too high a price to pay to gain our friendship.


Now, before I go off...let me switch gears.  Let's look at another song, and another viewpoint.


The second song is "Savior King" by Hillsong United.  This song's lyrics span many more themes than "Above All", and so the lyrics that address this topic are fewer.  But the scene is the same.  We're still "fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame."


How does this song explain what motivated Jesus to choose to climb up on that cross and face unendurable torture?  The song puts it simply:


   Let now your church shine as the bride
   That you saw in your heart 
      as you offered up your life


At first blush this might sound like the same message, but it is VERY different.  This song echoes Ephesians 5:25-27:  "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish."


There are several points to notice here, but we'll settle on two:  


1) Christ died to get himself a bride, and that bride is THE CHURCH.  Jesus didn't die for you or for me as individuals, he died for you and me as members of his body, the church.  People often say, "If you had been the only person on earth, Jesus still would have come and died for you."  I don't know that that's biblical, and I'm sure that the thought behind it isn't.  Think of the scores of people that God smote in his anger and are even now burning in the white hot fire of his rage.


2)  Christ went to the cross to get a bride that would show off his greatness.  He died for her to cleanse her and make her spotless so that he could present her to himself as a prize, a trophy.  And what does this trophy signify?  What does it proclaim?  "In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory." (Eph. 1:11-12)  The purpose of the cross was to magnify the justice of God's wrath toward sin and the extravagance of his mercy toward sinners.


So, the next time you hear either of these two songs, think of the two very different viewpoints they represent.  


Which song represents you?