JimPulse

Tim Keller, on morality:

The popular concept—that we should each determine our own morality—is based on the belief that the spiritual realm is nothing at all like the rest of the world. Does anyone really believe that? For many years after each of the morning and evening Sunday services I remained in the auditorium for another hour to field questions.  Hundreds of people stayed for the give-and-take discussions.

One of the most frequent statements I heard was that “Every person has to define right and wrong for him-or herself.” I always responded to the speakers by asking, “Is there anyone in the world right now doing things you believe they should stop doing no matter what they personally believe about the correctness of their behavior?”

They would invariably say, “Yes, of course.” Then I would ask, “Doesn’t that mean that you do believe there is some kind of moral reality that is ‘there’ that is not defined by us, that must be abided by regardless of what a person feels or thinks?” Almost always, the response to that question was a silence, either a thoughtful or a grumpy one.

(The Reason for God, Chapter 3)

Timothy Keller addresses the proposition that evil’s presence in the world disproves the existence of a God:

Philosopher J. L. Mackie makes this case against God in his book The Miracle of Theism (Oxford, 1982). He states it this way: If a good and powerful God exists, he would not allow pointless evil, but because there is much unjustifiable, pointless evil in the world, the traditional good and powerful God could not exist. Some other god or no god may exist, but not the traditional God. Many other philosophers have identified a major flaw in this reasoning. Tucked away within the assertion that the world is filled with pointless evil is a hidden premise, namely, that if evil appears pointless to me, then it must be pointless.

This reasoning is, of course, fallacious. Just because you can’t see or imagine a good reason why God might allow something to happen doesn’t mean there can’t be one. Again we see lurking within supposedly hard-nosed skepticism an enormous faith in one’s own cognitive faculties. If our minds can’t plumb the depths of the universe for good answers to suffering, well, then, there can’t be any! This is blind faith of a high order.

The fallacy at the heart of this argument has been illustrated by the “no-see-ums” illustration of Alvin Plantinga. If you look into your pup tent for a St. Bernard, and you don’t see one, it is reasonable to assume that there is no St. Bernard in your tent. But if you look into your pup tent for a “no-see-um” (an extremely small insect with a bite out of all proportion to its size) and you don’t see any, it is not reasonable to assume they aren’t there. Because, after all, no one can see ’em. Many assume that if there were good reasons for the existence of evil, they would be accessible to our minds, more like St. Bernards than like no-see-ums, but why should that be the case?” (The Reason for God, Chapter 2)

In Tuesday’s Life of Jesus class, we talked about the Holy Spirit, and his sanctifying work in the life of each Christian.

Saint Paul, in Romans 8:26-30, describes one way in which the Holy Spirit is at work:

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.  And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.  And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Leon Morris writes:

Believers are helped in their earthly troubles (in which they groan inwardly, v. 23). Likewise they are helped in their weakness, specifically in their weakness in prayer

The Holy Spirit, the third person of the Holy Trinity, indwells each Christian believer, and ministers to us in our weakness.  He intercedes for us, according to God’s will.

The Spirit’s help preserves and enlarges the hope in which we live…We should notice further that Paul does not say that the Spirit removes our weakness; it is still there, and we live our whole life in conditions of weakness. What the Spirit does is to help; he gives us the aid we need to see us through.

We continue to experience weakness, and we shall for the remainder of our lives in this world.  However, the work of the Holy Spirit is sufficient to help us through any and all of the difficulties we will face.

Paul [refers] to the fact that we who are Christians are not the spiritual giants we would like to be (and sometimes imagine we are). We are weak, and left to ourselves we will always be in trouble

We live our lives, depending on God’s strength, not our own.

We must not allow ourselves to be sidetracked by modern notions of what is or is not possible for God. Paul is saying that God is the author of our salvation, and that from beginning to end. We are not to think that God can take action only when we graciously give him permission. Paul is saying that God initiates the whole process.

Our sanctification is not driven by (nor is it limited by) our own resolve, strength, or ability.  It is God’s work, through and through.  He is at work in us, even when (perhaps especially when) we are not aware of that work.  At times, we may be tempted to believe that God’s Spirit is no longer at work in us, and we feel that we have lost our way.

God predestined his people to be conformed to the likeness of his Son. We are to become like Christ (cf. 1 John 3: 1), which…means sanctification. It is Gods plan that his people become like his Son, not that they should muddle along in a modest respectability.

God never stops pursuing his purpose: to make us more and more like Jesus.

This is all part of God’s predestination; he predestined us not only to be released from an unpleasant predicament, but in order that we might become like his Son.

In this week’s Life of Jesus class, we considered the difficult reality that Christians are far from perfect, and the fact that they continue to struggle — sometimes mightily — with the ongoing reality of sin in their lives.

St. Paul writes about precisely this struggle in Romans 7:

I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

This passage resonates with many of us, but it is difficult to come to terms with.

Leon Morris writes:

No believer is completely sinless. He is still a sinner, no matter how much out of character his sin is.

There may be little or no difference between a particular act of sin, as performed by a Christian, and that same act of sin, as performed by the non-believer.  The vital difference it that, for the non-believer, who is not yet being transformed and sanctified by the Holy Spirit, the sin is in keeping with his character, for this person has not yet come into relationship with Christ, he has not yet been redeemed by Christ’s atonement, and he does not have the Holy Spirit abiding in his life, performing his work of turning him into someone who more closely resembles Jesus.

For the Christian, the act of sin may be the very same, but it is different because this act is out of character for this person. He is in relationship with Jesus, he has the Holy Spirit at work in his life, and he has a new identity in Christ. Outwardly, there may not always be abundant evidence of this difference, or of the sanctifying work of the Spirit, but it is nonetheless a true and vital distinction.

When the Christian falls short, and he acts in ways that are at odds with his true identity, he may feel so despondent as to doubt the reality that he is a Christian at all:

What happens when he does sin? He feels dreadful about it. Then why does he do it? He simply does not understand (v. 15). In view of all that Christ has done for him and the resources Christ makes available for him, surely he should have resisted the temptation? He does not want to sin. He knows that. He knows that he ought not sin. But he is weak (in the flesh). Because he does not want to sin he can say with Paul, I do what I do not want to do (v. 16). When he reflects on that sin he is apt to say, nothing good lives in me (v. 18). But he cannot deny his responsibility; his sin proceeds from what he is. He knows that he did it himself. But his regret is deep and genuine, and he cries, O wretched man that I am! The sin is not the product of regeneration; it takes place despite regeneration. There is that within the believer (the old Adam?) which leads him to sin even when he does not want to. And when he sins he cannot but see that there is a power of evil that is too strong for him; thus he is enslaved to sin (v. 14), a prisoner (v. 23). But his inability to explain how he, a regenerate and redeemed person, falls into sin does not give him license to deny either the fact of his sin or the fact of his regeneration.

The Christian is redeemed, and the Christian sins.  Our feelings may argue that these cannot both be true at the same time, but the Bible assures us of this reality.  We struggle with the tension of it, and that tension will not be fully resolved on this side of Heaven.

Last week, the Life of Jesus class studied the parable of the Prodigal Son. We considered Luke 15:31-32:

And [the Father] said to [his elder son], Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.

Joel Green writes:

Accepting his unworthiness to be counted as a son, the younger had opted for the status of a day laborer; having severed his relationship as a son, he hoped to reestablish it as a hireling. Ironically, the elder son comports himself now not as a son but as a slave.

Just as the father had run out to meet his younger son, so, again dishonoring himself, he leaves the banquet over which he is host in order to plead with his elder son. Calling him son and conferring upon him the honor of an equal, he seeks restoration. In doing so, however, he advances a condition—namely, that the elder acknowledge the divine necessity of celebrating the recovery of the lost. As the son of his father, the elder must embrace his fathers gracious will. If he is really his father’s son, he will act as he has acted and rejoice at the recovery of the lost (cf. vv 5–6, 10). Hence, the father’s reference to his younger son as this brother of yours is presented as an invitation to restoration.

The younger son had utterly thrown off his relationship with his father.  For the father, it was as if his son was dead.  The return of the son to the father was a restoration like a return from death.

In last week’s class, the topic of creeds and their recitation came up.  For some, a congregation reciting a creed (or, for that matter, any part of a liturgy) may bring up uncomfortable feelings, or may even seem unhealthy.

Many Christians, over many centuries, have found value in the creeds, and have used them as an integral part of worship.  Peter Kemeny makes the case for creeds:

We recite the historic Christian creeds: the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed. Is this vain repetition? Hollow formalism? I say no. Here are my reasons:

…

In reciting creeds, we are saying to God, “here are the main things we believe as we come together to worship You.” The word creed itself comes from the Latin word, credo, which means “I believe.”

Second, reciting the historic Christian creeds underscores the unity of the church down through the ages. It is a way for a congregation of Christians to say, “we stand shoulder to shoulder with the church across the centuries. We hold to the faith ‘that was once for all entrusted to the saints’ (Jude 3).”

…

It’s unlikely that the historic creeds of the faith will be improved upon as summaries of what the Bible teaches. Let’s hold on to them.

In Tuesday’s Life of Jesus class, we talked a bit about liturgical worship in church.

No one form or expression has an exclusive claim to the right worship of God.  Personal experience and one’s personality may draw a person to one style of worship, or make some other style less appealing to that same person.

Some may think that liturgical worship, such as the services in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, is especially prone to becoming dry and lifeless.

One writer addresses this:

All forms of worship run this risk. This is more of an indicator of the state of one’s heart than the form of worship. In fact, most churches do have some kind of “ritual” in their worship even if they don’t call it that, i.e., it follows the same form week after week: sing songs, give announcements, pray, hear a sermon, and conclude with a song. Anything we do and any form of worship can become empty and meaningless when it is not done in the right spirit; it will become merely acting out a part rather than participating with our hearts, minds, and spirits. But if our worship is truly Spirit-filled and our hearts are open to God, then our worship will glorify God. The key to authentic worship is having a heart and attitude of praise and reverence that seeks to earnestly glorify God. Liturgy seeks to facilitate true worship.

There is no absolute “right” or “wrong” form of worship, in fact, it may be that certain forms are more [accessible] to some people than others. But worship that seeks to glorify God (and not merely to make the individual most comfortable or stimulated) will strive to create a worship environment that is utterly pleasing to God, whatever form that may take.