theology – Page 41 – Like An Anchor

God’s Love Story — PDF online

19 May, 2013Marissa

The final version of what I’m going to call an “e-booklet” is now online. You can download “God’s Love Story” and read a chapter outline at this link.

Here are a couple excerpts. This first is from the introduction.

One reason we gravitate towards tales of heroism, rescue, and love is that there is a basic need in our souls for a relationship with God and His Son. Stories where the handsome prince rides up and rescues the fair princess speak to our longing to know the Prince of Peace, Who laid His life down to rescue His bride from captivity to sin. Jesus Christ is the most powerful, most loving, and most perfect hero-lover to ever exist, far surpassing even the most ambitious human attempts to fashion a story’s hero. The Bible is a living, dynamic book that includes instruction, history, prophecy, and a revelation of the plan of God which reads like a story. My personal theory as to why the Bible reads like a story is because our idea of what makes a good story comes from the sequential narrative God uses to reveal His plan.

This paragraph is from a discussion in Chapter 5 about the Greek words translated “love.”

While agape is a higher kind of love, I think there is something amazing in recognizing that it is not the only love God has towards us. Before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples that after His resurrection, “ye shall ask in My name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you: for the Father Himself loveth you, because ye have loved Me, and have believed that I came out from God.” (Joh. 16:26-27). The Father has phileo for those who have phileo for His son. This means the Father Himself has common interests and friendship with those who love and believe in His Son. In this context, it is certainly not a lesser love than agape. Philos is an incredible kind of love to share with the creator of the universe.

I hope those of you who choose to download and read the full e-booklet find it edifying and encouraging. I would love to hear your feedback.

I was reading through Ephesians (in my KJV Bible) when a word caught my eye. Earlier, I’d been reading something about the word history of “vocation,” and learned that it wasn’t until fairly recently that it referred to anything other than an ecclesiastical calling. With that in mind, I thought the word choice in Ephesians 4:1 was intriguing:

I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called

Prior to the mid 1500s, the definition of vocation was always linked to a calling from God (vocation, n. Oxford English Dictionary Online). Of the 11 definitions given in the OED, 5 have to do with a religious calling. Even after the word expanded, the primary meaning continued to involve a Christian calling – there simply weren’t other employments that you could choose instead of being born into. Here are two of the definitions (1a was first recorded in 1426, and 2a was in use by 1487):

1 a. The action on the part of God of calling a person to exercise some special function, especially of a spiritual nature, or to fill a certain position; divine influence or guidance towards a definite (esp. religious) career; the fact of being so called or directed towards a special work in life; natural tendency to, or fitness for, such work.

2 a. The particular function or station to which a person is called by God; a mode of life or sphere of action regarded as so determined.

Back when the King James Bible was being readied for its publication in 1611, these are the definitions they would have had in mind when they chose to translate the Greek word klesis (G2821 κλῆσις) as “vocation” here and as “calling” in ten other places. For them, a life’s work which you were called to had to involve Christianity.

Though one of the main reasons we can use “vocation” more generally now is that we have the freedom to choose a profession other than that of our parents, I think it goes deeper than that. It is telling of our society that when we think of a vocation, we rarely (if ever) think of anything religious or spiritual.

When we talk about finding your life’s work or discovering your calling, we mean finding employment that is lucrative and enjoyable for us. Even as Christians, when people ask “what do you do?” we are more likely to respond by telling them about our job than about our faith. I’m as guilty of that as anyone. But (except in a setting where we should clearly be talking about the kind of work we do) maybe we should re-think this. Our true vocation – our calling from God – should be the one that’s more interesting to talk about and more important to share.

Lights In The Darkness

2 May, 2013Marissa

Google earth at night city lights — Google Earth At Night

You know those pictures of the world at night, when you can see all the city lights? Maybe that’s something like what God sees when He looks at the world — a great darkness with tiny spots of light wherever there is a Christian.

Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. (Matt. 5:14-16)

Do all things without murmurings and disputings: that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world (Phil. 2:14-15)

How bright are our lights? Are we readily visible, contrasting sharply with the darkness, or do we blend in because we barely glow at all?

Pilgrims

30 April, 201330 April, 2013Marissa

I’m back! and the flu which was the reason for my blogging hiatus has indirectly inspired this newest post. Since I had to stay home from church services, I had the chance to watch a DVD sermon we’d just got in the mail (you can listen to “My Burden Is Light” on this website, if anyone’s interested).

In this sermon, he talked about getting rid of the old man and removing sin from our lives so we are not weighed down with excess spiritual baggage as we make our pilgrimage toward the kingdom of God. This sparked a thought I’ve been mulling over for the past few days.

I don’t know how you think about being “strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Heb. 11:13), but I’ve always thought more about being separate from the world and making a pilgrimage out of darkness than I have about the obvious flip-side of this statement. To be making a pilgrimage out of something, there must be a destination that we are making a pilgrimage toward. In much the same way, when we become a stranger to this world, we experience a change that makes us no longer strangers to God.

At that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: but now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. (Eph. 2:12-13).

Because of His redemptive work, we are “no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God” (Eph. 2:19). Coming out of this world and becoming strangers to it is what we must do once we have received the gift of forgiveness that allows fellowship with God.

When we are separate from the world in how we think and behave we, like those in the Faith Chapter, “declare plainly that [we] seek a country” (Heb. 11:14). Do our lives show that we are friends of God and strangers to the world’s ways? Do we proclaim with our actions that our sense of belonging is with God, and not with this world?

“If You Love Me”

20 April, 2013Marissa

A comment on my “Heart of Worship” post has had me thinking about the importance of keeping God’s commandments. The comment noted that “worship is also connected to commandment keeping and is not only praise and emotion.” This reminded me of something I noticed while studying love in the Old and New Testaments.

In John 14:15, Jesus Christ said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” This clearly states that that we cannot claim to love Christ if we are not obeying Him, and is not an isolated verse. The idea of loving God and keeping His commandments is paired at least eleven times in the Old Testament and nine times in the New Testament (Ex. 20:6. Deu. 5:10; 7:9; 11:1, 13, 22; 19:9; 30:16. Josh. 22:5. Neh. 1:5. Dan. 9:4. Matt. 22:38-39. Mark 12:30. John 14:15, 21; 15:10. 1st John 4:21; 5:2, 3. 2nd John. 1:6).

Keeping the Lord’s commandments is vital to having a loving relationship with Him. From the beginning, God expected obedience from His people. This is made very clear when He established the Old Covenant with ancient Israel.

See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; in that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply: and the LORD thy God shall bless thee in the land whither thou goest to possess it (Deuteronomy 30:15)

Jesus connected this ancient commandment with the New Covenant when He answered the question “which is the great commandment in the law?” He quoted Deuteronomy 6:4 by saying:

And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord: and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment (Mark 12:29-30)

This love goes much deeper than just loving God to fulfill a commandment. Our God wants a relationship with us. He wants us to love Him, because He first loved us (1 Jn. 4:19). Just a few verses after Christ said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments” in John 14, He added this:

He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me: and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him (John 14:21)

If we love Him and keep His commandments, we will be loved by both Jesus Christ and God the Father. And not only loved – Jesus Christ says He will manifest Himself to us. “Manifest” is from the word emphanizō, and means that Christ will let Himself “be intimately known and understood” (G1718 ἐμφανίζω; Zodhiates). To know our Creator personally is an incredible promise, one we can claim if we love God and attach ourselves strongly to Him by keeping His commandments.

Just a note … the ideas in this post, particularly the second paragraph, are part of a larger study I’ve been doing on love in the Bible. I’m not sure yet if it’s going to be more of a long-ish paper or a short booklet, but I’m planing to finish revising it and have a PDF available on this blog by Pentecost (May 19th) for anyone who would be interested in reading it.

Heart of Worship

7 April, 2013Marissa

In my last post on worship, I talked about blowing kisses to God, from the Greek word proskuneō. This time, I want to write about a more sobering verse, contained in one of Christ’s discussions with the scribes and Pharisees.

Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (Matt 15:7-9; Mark 7:6-7)

This word for worship is sebomai (G4576 σέβομαι), which Zodhiates lists as a synonym of proskuneō. It means to fall before, worship, adore. The word translated “in vain” is matēn (G3155 μάτην). It can also mean, “In a casual sense, meaning groundless, invalid” (Zodhiates). Used together, it means worship that is a vain and idle show of adoration rather than the real thing.

Trying to understand what invalidates a person’s worship of God, I went to the verse Christ was quoting from Isaiah. It reads, “this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men ” (Is. 29:13).

The state of our hearts is extremely important when we consider what genuine worship involves. It is clear from statements throughout the Old and New Testaments that “the LORD looketh on the heart” (1 Sam. 16:7) and expects His people to be pure on the inside. The last thing we should do is remove our hearts from God.

Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life. (Prov. 4:23)

And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart. (Jer. 24:7)

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. (Matt 5:8)

It is equally clear that we cannot fool Him with worship that is not genuine. Read Psalm 139. God knows us to the very center of our being. He is the one who searches the heart and discerns our thoughts and intents (Jer. 17:10; Heb. 4:12). An idle show of adoration certainly will not fool our God, nor will He accept such worshipers when He is seeking those who worship in spirit and in truth (John 4:23-24).

I want to close with a lovely song, from which I have borrowed the title for this post.

Tag: theology