Stars in the Sky, Sand on the Seashore and Psalm 2

Stars in the Sky, Sand on the Seashore and Psalm 2

Dec 20, 2022 | Eschatology, Theology

What if we are in the early church? Such a question would have appeared absurd to me not too long ago, but no longer. I’m now inclined to answer in the affirmative. As I no longer believe we’re necessarily in the “end times” (i.e., Jesus coming back any day), I now have a longer time horizon on things. The reason is because I think He’s only just beginning to build His church to populate His redeemed new heavens and earth (Rom. 8:18-22). That’s kind of a mind bender, isn’t it.

Psalm 2 speaks to Christ’s Messianic reign among the nations, the peoples, the kings of the earth, and the rulers. They rage, but the Lord assures us they plot in vain, thinking they can break the chains and shackles of the Lord and his anointed. History is littered with the futility of such mortal hubris. The one enthroned laughs and scoffs at them. Why?

7 I will proclaim the Lord’s decree:

He said to me, “You are my son;
today I have become your father.

8 Ask me,
and I will make the nations your inheritance,
the ends of the earth your possession.

9 You will break them with a rod of iron;
you will dash them to pieces like pottery.”

And when the Son asks, the Father gives.

Since I became a Christian over 4 decades ago, I’ve always believed Christianity is a minority report. It started out with a small band of peasants in an outpost in the Roman Empire, and against all odds became a worldwide religion and transformed the world. Yet, even in ostensibly Christian nations, Christians were not necessarily the majority of the populations. And while there may be upwards of two billion people today who call upon the name of Jesus, the population of the world is upwards of eight billion. But what if we’re just in the first inning of what turns out to be an overtime game?

Until recently I interpreted these words of Jesus to mean in the end few would be saved:

13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

That seemed to fit my experience, so it must mean few will be saved in the end. Well, maybe not.

A critical biblical hermeneutical principle is that the Bible was written in a specific historical context, and it’s primary meaning must be taken from that context. Until recently, I took these words of Jesus completely out of their historical context (not good) as if they applied to all times. I’m now convinced they absolutely do not. They were spoken by Jesus to Jews in first century Palestine, of whom John said in the first chapter of his gospel, “He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.” By taking the words out of their proper context we end up distorting their meaning. In addition, it is critical that we do not take our experience, what seems to be the case from our perspective, as the interpretive framework for Scripture. That is also not good.

Yes, Jesus’ words could have some spiritual meaning for fallen humanity and how easy it is to give in to sinful human nature, and how hard it can be to fight against it, but that was not what Jesus was saying. He was not saying this about all fallen humanity for all of history, and that only a very few would ultimately be saved from their sin and reconciled to God in Christ. Yet that’s what I believed! Why?

The answer is simple: I was living by sight and not by faith.

Which brings me to God’s promises to Abraham in Genesis 12, 15, and 17 respectively:

* I will make you into a great nation . . . . and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

* He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”

* 5 No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations. 6 I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.

Keep in mind this was before Abraham and Sarah bore Isaac. Then when Isaac was a teenager, the Lord told him to sacrifice his son, and when he was willing to do that the Lord doubled up on the promise (Gen. 17):

15 The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”

Even before my recent eschatological transformation, I felt a cognitive dissonance between Jesus’ words in Matthew 7, and these promises to the first Patriarch. Over the years I’ve come to believe God’s mercy and grace is far more capacious than I had originally thought, but I didn’t have the theological justification for that intuition. Now I do. It is impossible to lay out my argument in a short blog post, but I’m convinced Psalm 2 give us that justification in light of the rest of the redemptive history we find in our Bibles, including:

  • The Lord’s prayer
  • Kingdom language throughout the gospels
  • The Great Commission
  • Paul’s declaration of Christ’s authority over all things in Ephesians 1
  • Quotations from Psalm 2 and 110 in the New Testament, among others

In Ephesians 1, Paul says, “God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church.” The coming of God’s kingdom, the Kingdom of heaven, it’s blessings of righteousness and peace, are for the purpose of Christ populating his church and his eventual reconciled universe.

Looking back at Psalm 2, it’s clear the devil doesn’t stand a chance. It’s now unimaginable for me to believe Almighty God would allow the majority of those creatures created in his image to end up eternally separated from him. The metaphors of stars in the sky and sand on the seashore were not throwaway lines by Yahweh. Think about this imagined conversation between them:

“You do get what I’m saying, Abram, right? It will be lots and lots of people, kinda like sand on the seashore and stars in the sky. But of course, I’m just using language metaphorically, so you get the idea. I certainly don’t mean that many people.”

Well, maybe Yahweh didn’t literally mean every single grain of sand and every celestial ball of light, but it is way, way more than I thought when I misinterpreted the Matthew 7 passage. And we know now that Abraham had no idea just how many stars in the sky there really were, but the Creator God sure did.

I’ll end this post with a quote from Revelation 7. John is told by an angel about the 144,000 sealed by the living God, 12,000 from each of the tribes of Israel. I see those numbers as symbolic for the stars in the sky, and the sand on the seashore, the uncountable great multitude:

9 After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. 10 And they cried out in a loud voice:

“Salvation belongs to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb.”

11 All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12 saying:

“Amen!
Praise and glory
and wisdom and thanks and honor
and power and strength
be to our God for ever and ever.
Amen!”

 

DJ Stephen ‘tWitch’ Suicide and the Bankruptcy of Secularism

DJ Stephen ‘tWitch’ Suicide and the Bankruptcy of Secularism

Dec 18, 2022 | Culture

The entertainment world was hit with a suicide last week that appeared inconceivable to the secular minds that inhabit “Hollywood” and most of America. I wasn’t planning on writing anything about it because I have written about suicide here before and asked the question, “In What Kind of Culture Do 45,000 People a Year Commit Suicide?” A bankrupt secular culture—that’s what kind!

I recently finished a chapter on secularism in the book I’m currently working on, and I’ll quote myself: “Secularism is dead. It has been weighed in the balance and found wanting.” That’s why I’m writing this post, and because of the quote below. I came across it in a book I’d read and it makes a stunning comparison showing us just how bankrupt secularism really is. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer for a bankrupt culture, and what every secular person is looking for whether they know it or not. It’s for you and me to share the good news, the great, glorious, wonderful news with them!

This suicide, like every one of them, is of course tragic on so many levels. Not just for his wife, but imagine what this does to his two biological children and stepdaughter. Ugh! It makes me so angry. This guy who had absolutely “everything” the American dream could offer abandoned his family and puts a bullet in his head. As I said in my previous post on this topic, I can’t “judge” the man because there but for the grace of God . . . . However, God calls us to discernment and to be wise about the ways of evil in our midst—to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves, and to call spades, spades. The spade I’m calling a dark ace is the modern world’s established religion of secularism, and how it destroys everything in its wake.

I read this in Nicole Mering’s book Awake Not Woke not long after I learned about the suicide, and it’s stunning, but didn’t surprise me at all:

Viktor Frankl contrasts the lack of neurosis and suicidal thoughts among the prisoners in Auschwitz with the growing phenomenon of suicidal thoughts from teens living with ease in modern Austria. “We are living in a society, either in terms of an affluent society or in terms of a welfare state. . . . These types of societies are out to satisfy each and every human need. Except for the one need, the most basic and fundamental need. . . . the need for meaning.” Suffering is intimately tied to meaning. Serial gratification is intimately bound up with despair.

And Frankl said this in 1979. I can’t think of a better description of modern American and Western culture than the pursuit of “serial gratification.” Think of the child who gets everything they want. If your objective is to create a monster, a little Varuca Salt, there is no better way to do it. This is happening on a societal level by a secular culture that believes what it sells, that true meaning and satisfaction can be found in this life if only . . . . fill in the blank. If only I was . . . .

  • smart enough
  • good looking enough
  • thin enough
  • rich enough
  • tough enough
  • sensitive enough
  • sexy enough
  • well-dressed enough
  • well-read enough
  • loved and accepted
  • appreciated
  • Etc.

If only I . . . .

  • had a college degree
  • had a bigger how
  • owned a house
  • had a nicer car
  • had bigger muscles
  • had a smaller behind
  • had bigger breasts
  • had a smaller nose
  • had nicer hair
  • was a great athlete
  • had more money in the bank
  • had a better position in the company
  • had more respect among my peers
  • was more well known in my profession
  • travelled more
  • had a better personality
  • had a girlfriend
  • had a boyfriend
  • had a husband
  • had a wife who really loved me
  • had a husband who really love me
  • had kids who weren’t spoiled rotten brats
  • was rich and famous
  • Etc.

Here’s the deal too many Christians really don’t grasp, and non-Christians can’t: Without Christ, nothing will ultimately deliver on what it promises. No person, no thing, no circumscance, no place, nothing. People get by well enough pretending it does, but they lie to themselves and others. Our lives are defined ultimately by one thing, our relationship to our Creator, and only in Christ, only in the gospel, can we be reconciled to Him and know true meaning and satisfaction, true joy and hope and purpose, true love, true gratitude, Truth itself. Blaise Pascal said it perfectly and succinctly:

There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus.

We are the life raft in the dark and turbulent sea of secularism for our neighbors, and if they are willing, we can rescue them by introducing them to Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who told us 2,000 years ago:

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

 

What Does Psalm 2 Really Tell Us?

What Does Psalm 2 Really Tell Us?

Dec 16, 2022 | Theology

In my previous post I argued that Christians tend to over spiritualize Psalm 2 by thinking it only describes a future spiritual reality when Christ returns in judgement. Evangelical Christians, of which I am one, tend to over spiritualize everything. Because of this tendency, I looked at Psalm 2 this way until only recently.

Since I became a Christian, I’ve believed that Christ is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, ruling and reigning over the universe. That, however, tended to be an abstraction to me because of the horror show of so much history, not to mention current events. Psalm 2 as I saw it tells of a future time when the nations would become Christ’s inheritance. For now, it appeared that the world is the devil’s playground, and if most Christians are honest, they feel the devil is on offense and indeed winning. Shame on us for thinking such a thing.

We shouldn’t think this because it’s not biblical, whether we’re thinking about the past, present, or future. What I’m arguing is not my opinion, but the blatant text of Scripture. As I’ve come to this perspective on things I’ve come to realize the devil and his designs are getting crushed, slowly but surely, as he has been since Christ rose from the dead and was seated at the right hand of the Father Almighty. We see this reality prophesied by David in Psalm 2.

We’ll notice the Psalm doesn’t indicate David wrote it as do his other Psalms, but Peter in Acts 4 tells us he is the author. I encourage you to read this passage in Acts in light of the whole Psalm. Peter says what God, the “sovereign Lord” did with “his holy servant Jesus,” whom the Lord anointed (made king) “had decided beforehand should happen” according to God’s “power and will.” Do we really think God set all that up, made it all happen exactly like he wanted it to, only then when Christ rose and joined him on his throne to just be a spectator? To Let the devil win?

Of course not! You’ll yell at me. Look how Jesus is building his church, you’ll exclaim. His gospel is going forth to the ends of the earth. So, Jesus is indeed the conqueror. But, and here’s the rub: most Christians mean this regarding the salvation of individual souls, not the coming of God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. This is the over spiritualizing tendency of most Christians I referred to, and how they view Christ’s sovereign reign and rule “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked.” It’s all about the salvation of individual souls, while the world goes to hell in a handbasket.

Notice, however, the word “all” in Paul’s declaration of Christ’s sovereign rule, and he adds, “in the present age” as well in the one to come. That means now! Over presidents, kings, prime ministers, governors, mayors, city council members, legislators, unelected bureaucratic bodies, deep state security apparatus, militaries and their generals, corporations, schools, families, and anything else you can name. I’ve discovered when Paul uses the word “all” he generally means all. I know every Christian will say they agree with this, but that’s an abstraction to most of them, as it used to be with me. With all the evil done by “rulers” it sure seemed Christ wasn’t ruling, but that was me living by sight and not by faith. An example of this overspiritualizing is the church we go to.

The pastor and elders don’t see things quite like I do, and this often comes out in sermons. One Sunday, the pastor was talking about God reconciling sinners to himself, and he said something like, if we’re focused on “the culture wars” (a favorite bogeyman), and not salvation (as if they were mutually exclusive goals), “we’re just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.” So in this telling, culture (i.e., human beings living in community) is not only irrelevant to the Christian’s spiritual endeavor in God’s created reality, but no matter what we do, it’s a sinking ship! Unfortunately, that’s the default perspective for most Christians about in what appears to them as the “end times.”

We are indeed living in the “end times” since Christ rose from the dead and ascended to heaven to advance his kingdom on earth and build his church. Both are inevitable and cannot be defeated, as we see clearly in Psalm 2, the fulfillment of which we read about in our New Testament and see throughout history. Reading the Psalm it describes a present tense reality, as if the entire dynamic portrayed about the nations is happening at this very moment. The reign of the Lord’s anointed isn’t for some time in the future, but is now when “the nations rage,” when “the people’s plot in vain,” when “the rulers band together against the Lord and his anointed.”

The concept of anointing (mashiach in Hebrew, Messiah) was what the Lord did to appoint his chosen kings of Israel. The king was the anointed one, the Messiah of God. This man is chosen and consecrated, made sacred (holy in biblical terms, set apart) in a ceremony that includes the token applying of oil. He  was now God’s regent leading his people, his representative to work his will among God’s people on earth. Saul was Israel’s first Messiah, but he failed, and was replaced by King David, a man after God’s own heart. Jesus then came in David’s line to bring God’s kingdom to earth, the ultimate fulfillment of which will come at the end of time when Christ returns and all of creation is reconciled to him in ultimate victory over sin, corruption, and death.

The question we’re confronted with is what is happening now between Christ’s ascension to the right hand of the Father, and his second coming and the consummation of all things. In my next post I’m going to look at Psalm 2 in light of Christ building his church.

Psalm 2 Is Happening Now!

Psalm 2 Is Happening Now!

Dec 13, 2022 | Eschatology, Theology

I’ve made it to Psalms in my reading, and I’m amazed how much my perspective on Psalm 2 has changed. I always assumed it was talking about the future when Christ returned, and only then would God the Father make the nations Jesus’ inheritance, and the ends of the earth his possession, only then would he break them with a rod of iron and dash them to pieces like pottery (v. 8, 9). Because, you know, look around the world, or in history, and it doesn’t exactly look like Jesus is reigning, does it? Or is he?

It’s fascinating talking to Christians about current affairs and the state of the world. Inevitably all lament to one degree or another how horrible things are. Many are convinced Jesus is coming back soon. I heard Eric Metaxas recently say because of technology never before available, the mark of the Beast could actually happen now; he believes it will. Almost everyone believes we live in “the end times.” Because, that’s how it’s supposed to work, right? Things go straight to hell, they get really horrible, suffering and misery unmatched since the world began, and then bamo! Jesus returns like Batman to save the day. Or something like that.

I enjoy countering such pessimism with a bit of a different perspective on things. I might ask; I wonder what Christians in Europe were thinking in the late 1340s. It was kind of a tough time given they had to endure something called the Black Death, the bubonic plague. To get a sense of the damage:

Best estimates now are that at least 25 million people died in Europe from 1347 to 1352. This was almost 40% of the population (some estimates indicate 60%). Half of Paris’s population of 100,000 people died. In Italy, Florence’s population was reduced from 120,000 inhabitants in 1338 to 50,000 in 1351. The plague was a disaster practically unequalled in the annals of recorded history and it took 150 years for Europe’s population to recover.

Rush Limbaugh used to say most people think history started when they were born, and historical amnesia in our culture is at pandemic levels. What do you think those living in Europe at the time of the plague might have thought about the second coming? The phrase, “Bring out your dead,” would have been a common refrain in the streets. The level of suffering is staggering and impossible to conceive. Life was hard enough in the Middle Ages without the Black Death.

Dickens started A Tale of Two Cities with, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” and everyone seems to agree ours is most definitely “the worst of times.” I’m kinda thinking Europeans living in 1350 might disagree. By any measure we live in the best of times, and it isn’t even debatable. I could multiply historical examples like this, if not to this degree of suffering, to make the same point. Why all the gloom and doom at this point in history? Historical amnesia is one reason, certainly, but faulty theology is another. Which brings me to Psalm 2.

When I’m talking to my Negative Nellie Christian friends, I bring up Psalm 2 and ask them if they’ve ever considered it in light of current events. Then I’ll say something like, you do know at this very moment Jesus is sitting at the right hand of the Father “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come,” right? You do know right now Jesus is reigning, ruling, at this very moment, “until he has put all his enemies under his feet,” right? These are not theoretical theological points or Scriptural speculation; this is orthodox Christian doctrine since Pentecost. Yet it seems most Christians miss this part as their assessing the horribleness in which we live. They ought not do that.

There are many other Old Testament passages that make the point, but Psalm 2 is especially powerful. Our tendency, and not too long ago I was guilty of the same thing, is to see events happening in some way apart from God’s providence. Oh sure, I knew and believed God is the sovereign Lord over all things, and in fact in control of all things, but my emotional reaction to things sure didn’t reflect that. And what I believed about the “end times” effectively compelled me to pessimism. My eschatology, my understanding of the “end times” was basically what I described above, things get worse and worse, and eventually so bad Jesus has to come back to save the day. Which is why I so horribly misinterpreted Psalm 2.

Properly understanding Psalm 2 is too important to grapple with in a paragraph or two, so I’ll focus on the Psalm itself in the next post, but I will make a salient point about the Black Death.

If we look at the Great Commission Jesus gave his disciples, he affirms his authority over all things “in heaven and on earth,” which is the fulfillment of what we read about in Psalm 2. He then tells them, “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations . . .” I always assumed “nations” really meant individuals, and while it clearly does in light of the rest of the New Testament, the word Jesus uses doesn’t mean individuals. The Greek word Matthew uses (remember Jesus and his disciples spoke Aramaic, a form of Hebrew) for nations is ἔθνος-ethnos; properly, people joined by practicing similar customs or common culture; nation(s). Now read Psalm 2 in light of the Great Commission, and the bigger picture emerges.

Could Christians in Europe in the 1350s imagine the gospel going to the literal ends of the earth as it has in our day? A hundred years ago the African continent was heathen, and today it is primarily Christian. Whatever the numbers, by all accounts Christianity is exploding in China, as it is in South America. Even where Christianity is a minority religion or persecuted it grows and prospers. The nations are being discipled, God’s kingdom is advancing, and Christ’s church is growing, against which the gates of hell shall not prevail. There is much disagreement among Christians as to what exactly this discipling of the nations will look like in practice, but it is happening. Psalm 2 tells us why.

 

On Never Tiring of the Moon

On Never Tiring of the Moon

Dec 10, 2022 | Explanatory Power

During the most recent full moon, and the nights around it, as I gazed upon its never-ending beauty a thought kept coming to mind: why do we never tire of looking at the moon? Why is it we marvel at its beauty, find it mysterious, and awe inspiring, in the literal meaning of that word: A feeling of respect or reverence mixed with dread and wonder, often inspired by something majestic or powerful. Dread not in this case, but it never ceases to inspire awe. And this has been true for all recorded history. Again, I ask, why?

The obvious answer is God, but what is it about God and his creation, all of it, that fills the human soul with seemingly endless delight? It has something to do with “the beautiful,” as the ancient Greeks put it. I contend, if all we are is lucky dirt, then what the ancients proclaimed can’t exist, “the true, the good, and the beautiful.” Since these undoubtably do exist, we are not lucky dirt, but made in God’s image, and these realities point to Him. In some sense when we find truth, we find Him, when we encounter the good, we find Him, and when we gaze upon ineffable beauty, we gaze upon Him.

Paul makes this incredible claim in Romans 1:20, that in creation we can see “God’s invisible qualities.” In other words, in some real sense God who is invisible is made visible in his creation. We can see him in what he has made. What are these invisible qualities? “His eternal power and divine nature.” We cannot help but see the God-ness of God in what he has created. If you think about it, it only makes sense.

Some years ago, I went to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. It was incredible seeing before my eyes all the paintings I’d only seen in books. Coming upon a painting by Rembrandt I was stunned. There it was, hanging on the wall, not behind glass, but right in front of me in all its glory. I was looking at something from over 350 years ago that in some way was making visible the man who painted it. It was incredible to see in person.

A work of art reveals the unique personality of the person, especially in those who partake of greatness. There is no mistaking a Rembrandt from Da Vinci, Vermeer or Cézanne, van Gogh or Picasso, and so on. Music is the same way as we all know. How much more the living Creator God! The same God who made these men, made all other creators who reveal not only themselves in their work, but the one who created them.

I’ve been re-reading The Screwtape Letters, and Lewis has typically brilliant insight into how God captures us and reveals himself in creation. Speaking of human beings, Wormwood writes to his demonic charge:

He has balanced the love of change in them by a love of permanence. He has contrived to gratify both tastes together in the very world He has made, by that union of change and permanence which we call Rhythm. He gives them the seasons, each season different yet every year the same, so that spring is always felt as a novelty yet always as the recurrence of an immemorial theme. . . . If we neglect our duty, men will be not only be contented but be transported by the mixed novelty and familiarity of snowdrops this January, sunrise this morning . . .

Or a full moon!

As I gazed upon the brilliance and brightness of the moon, I knew it was the very same moon, in fact the very same side of that very same moon, that showed up last month, and the month before, and every month for my entire life. Yet the sameness never diminishes the novelty, and I can’t wait to gaze upon it again the next month. Only the living, Almighty, Creator God could pull off something like that. And one day in eternity we will gaze upon eternal ultimate beauty face to face. Pointing exactly to this, speaking more then he knew, Job out of his suffering uttered these prophetically astonishing words:

25 I know that my redeemer lives,
and that in the end he will stand on the earth,
26 And after my skin has been destroyed,
yet in my flesh I will see God;
27 I myself will see him
with my own eyes—I, and not another.
How my heart yearns within me!

The ineffable beauty we behold in the moon, in all creation, and our reaction to it, always leaves us wanting more. Our hearts, like job, yearn within us, yet we feel like we’re grasping water, and we can only catch a little bit. That is because it is only God himself in Christ, as Pascal so eloquently states, who can fill the infinite abyss in our souls.