Monthly Archives: January 2011
Knowing How to Live Righteously
Paul made the following forceful statement about knowing God:
For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. (Rom 1:19-20, emphasis added)
In other words, we know God is there, and his attributes are revealed to us by God and perceived in all that he has made. There is no excuse for being an atheist.
How clear are these attributes? How clear is God’s plan for living a righteous life? Flipping back to Genesis, I was somewhat intrigued by the story of Cain and Abel.
Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground. In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. (Gen 4:2-5)
The sacrificial system wasn’t in place yet. That wouldn’t be codified for over 1000 years. God accepts the offering that Abel gives, but not the one that Cain gives. This angers Cain (v. 5). God, however, offers interesting consolation:
Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. (Gen 4:6-7)
God is indicating that it isn’t about the sacrifice, it’s about doing well and ruling sin rather than letting sin rule you. It’s not about the religious offering. It’s about freedom from sin.
What happens next? Does Cain heed God’s advice? Does he live a godly life worthy of acceptance? Nope–Cain kills Abel in a jealous rage. He’s upset that God accepted his brother’s sacrifice and not his.
Cain is told by God to live virtuously. God is trying to explain that it isn’t about the sacrifice at all. It’s about living free of sin in the first place.
But there’s something deeper here. Cain was simply told to live in a worthy manner, without being given any rules or regulations. The Law, which codifies living in a worthy manner, was centuries away from being written down by Moses. This indicates that Cain already knows how to live virtuously!
And so, I believe, do we. It’s just that we don’t. And therein lies the problem, which Paul discusses in Romans 7:
For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For 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.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. (vv. 14-25)
Matthew 24: A Very Misunderstood Passage
Matthew 24 is called the Olivet Discourse. It is Jesus’ own discussion of eschatology and is often the center of criticism. In this sermon, Jesus makes the single most controversial prediction of his earthly ministry: he predicts the end of the age and says that it will occur within the lifetime of his hearers.
Obviously, we’re still here so many contend that this prediction didn’t come true. Faced with that dilemma, the leading prophecy experts (Tim LaHaye, Thomas Ice, and others) say that “generation” doesn’t refer to Jesus’ hearers at all but some far distant generation.
I read LaHaye’s book Are We Living in the End Times? (Tyndale House Publishers, 2000) many moons ago. I didn’t know anything about prophecy and only a tiny bit about hermeneutics. If I knew then what I know now, I would have realized just how poorly LaHaye’s arguments are constructed. Let’s focus just on the issue at hand: did Jesus predict that the hearers of his prophecy in Matthew 24 would see the fulfillment?
LaHaye answers that with an emphatic no. Through some hideously complicated eisegesis, LaHaye argues that “this generation” in Matthew 24:34 isn’t the hearers of Jesus’ message, but the generation alive when Israel is reformed as a nation. That happened in 1948. A biblical generation is around 30 years. Obviously, 1978 also came and went and LaHaye recognizes and addresses that problem. He says that “generation” refers to the length of the generation at the time in history when Israel reforms. People are living a lot longer nowadays and therefore 50 to 100 years from 1948 is the more likely timeframe.
Standard biblical hermeneutics teaches that the first consideration in understanding a passage is the audience to whom it is directed. Ask, “How would this audience have interpreted Jesus’ words?” And with that in mind, there is no other conclusion that you can possibly come to: Jesus meant that his hearers would see the fulfillment of his prophecy.
Again, since we are still here, that interpretation seems to present a serious problem for Christianity. After all, I’m not a Jehovah’s Witness because the founder of that organization made numerous failed prophecies. It would be a double standard to say that I reject a religion purporting the same basic message as Christianity on the basis of a failed prophecy by its founder if I excuse Christianity’s Ultimate Founder on his failed prophecy.
The trick is that Jesus isn’t a failed prophet. Let’s start at the beginning of the Olivet Discourse to find out why Jesus isn’t a failure. Read the rest of this entry
Daniel’s Seventy Weeks
Daniel’s famous seventy weeks prophecy not only predicts the coming of the Messiah, but the exact date of Jesus’ crucifixion. This prophecy also predicts an “abomination of desolation” in that same timeframe. Here’s the prophecy:
Seventy weeks are decreed about your people and your holy city, to finish the transgression, to put an end to sin, and to atone for iniquity, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal both vision and prophet, and to anoint a most holy place. Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, a prince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time. And after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed. And he shall make a strong covenant with many for one week, and for half of the week he shall put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on the wing of abominations shall come one who makes desolate, until the decreed end is poured out on the desolator. (Dan 9:24-27)
This is a seriously misunderstood passage. The folks in Tim LaHaye’s camp think that this refers to the Antichrist. Actually, it refers to the Messiah. Both Satanic forces and heavenly forces are in view and presented as having a hand in the events. However, the ultimate focus of the passage is Jesus Christ, the Messiah, and his actions are what LaHaye and his futurist school of thought gravely misunderstand. Indeed, they must for their interpretation to even work. Read the rest of this entry
Back Rome Again 