BibleDriven

King Eddie? Really?

On Sunday, 29 January 2012, megachurch “Bishop” Eddie Long was crowned “King” by Messianic Rabbi Ralph Messer at a service held at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Lithonia, GA.

Just when you thought things couldn’t get any sillier, scarier, sadder …

The online video of this absurdity is some 12-14 minutes long—far too long to bear for anyone with any sort of grasp of biblical and historic Christianity, with any love for the church of the living God (“which he obtained with his own blood”), with any concern for lost sinners, with any heart for the cause of the Gospel in the world!

This is the sort of thing let loose on people when “church” is detached from its biblical moorings. The writer to the Hebrews reminds us, “… we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard [i.e., the biblical Gospel], lest we drift away from it” (2.1). The truth and teaching of the Gospel are matters of life and death. It’s critical to get this right.

It’s critical to teach and preach this faithfully—with power and proportion, but without any apology. It’s why James issues this warning: “Not many of you should presume to be teachers … because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly” (James 3:1). And it’s why the danger of drifting away from truth, and so losing truth, can’t be treated too seriously. If we drift, we not only lose the gospel, we lose ourselves as well at last. Fellows like Long and Messer are in a fearful place!

The world is full of exotic currents, ready to take you off to who knows where. There’s a strong current to this present evil age, always pulling us away from safe harbor in Christ. Richard Phillips reminds us, in his great commentary on Hebrews, that there are all sorts of subtle undertows at work in daily life.

Just don’t pay attention—just read uncritically, watch TV mindlessly, embrace the unspoken assumptions of the workplace or of popular religion, become preoccupied with the sights and sounds, the offers and applause, and the special effects of the world—and you’ll be drawn out, out, out until you’re swept away!

Eddie Long and Ralph Messer, and the whole bunch of their ilk, should seriously come to grips with what Jesus himself did, when the crowds meant to crown him a king. We read, “Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself” (John 6.15). Even he, who had claim to the throne of David, would not be made “king” on false pretenses, under false impressions, on the authority of men, because of misguided enthusiasm. His sole concern, rather, was for the kingdom of God, and the “King” God himself would crown!

By the way, a very good piece outlining at least 27 misrepresentations of the Torah and other Jewish sancta, as well as of New Testament and Christian biblical interpretation and theology made during this bizarre ritual (written by Rev. Wil Gafney, PhD, Associate Professor of Biblical Hebrew and Jewish and Christian Scripture at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia) can be found and read HERE! I recommend it as a good exposé of the kind of foolishness these sorts of “pastors” and “rabbis” are spouting.

There is only one King who matters!

He is both “Lord and Christ”—”he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.” (1 Timothy 6.15-16).

King Eddie? Really? No! Not really!

A little more on the “Deeper” studies …

A while back, we had out on our church sign this simple but deeply crucial invitation: “Come find your place in God’s story.” That is, in the plainest way, the heart of the Bible’ s truth and call.

See, there is a story—there really is a “way things are,” history is full of meaning, your life in history is momentous in the most far-reaching ways—and that story is God’s, the God of

the Christian Scriptures. There is no way to live as you should, to live in a way “pleasing to the Lord” that meets the end of your existence, apart from finding your place in God’s story; and there’s no way to “find your place” in God’s story if you don’t know God’s story, as he’s told it to us in his Word.

So, the purpose of this series during our Wednesday evening study time is to put “the big story” in place—to help you know what you believe and why you believe it in a way that works itself out in greater wonder, greater worship, and greater good works than we’ve known before as we love and serve our great God!

Let me encourage you to make the commitment—re-order, re-prioritize, re-think, revise your whole schedule, if necessary—to fill your seat in this study and find your place in God’s story!

“We have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.” (Colossians 1.9-10)

“Deeper” Bible Study on Wednesdays

Our Wednesday evening Bible studies this year will be geared to a pretty ambitious goal—to read the whole Bible through over the course of the year and to develop a basic working knowledge and understanding of the story of God (and our part in it) revealed in the whole Bible.  I’ll post more info here in the next day or two about the schedule and what the class will be like.

But go ahead, if you haven’t al ready, and get started on a plan to read the whole Bible over the course of 2012.

You can find a selection of reading calendars HERE! To quote Jim Hamilton: “there it is, throbbing on your desk, the living word of God”!

We have Met the Idols … and They are Us!

A remark by Joshua Harris got me thinking about this. He recently said, “Idolatry is the overflow of the heart that is not satisfied in God alone.” I wondered what that might look like in practice.

In our place and time, how does this idolatry express itself Of course, there are all the obvious sorts of culprits (“the usual suspects”)—money, sex, power, etc. But as I thought about it another, more subtle and disturbing possibility came to mind. What if the obvious things aren’t really the idols? What if they’re just means for worshi

ping the idols? What if the idols are closer to home? What if we are the idols we worship? What if the prevailing sin of our time and place is self-deification?

Christ the Sum and Centre

“Christ Jesus the Lord, is the sum and centre of all divine revealed truth; neither is any thing to be preached unto men,

as an object of their faith, or necessary element of their salvation, which does not, in some way or other, either meet in him, or refer unto him. All truths, especially divine, are of a noble and precious nature; and, t herefore, whatsoever mysteries of his counsel God has been pleased in his Word to reveal, the church is bound in

her ministry to declare unto men.

And St. Paul professes his faithfulness therein, ‘I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God’ (Acts 20.27): but yet all this counsel (which elsewhere he calls the testimony of God) he gathers together into one conclusion, ‘I determined not to know any thing amongst you’ (1 Corinthians 2.1-2), that is, in my preaching unto you to make discovery of any other knowledge, as matter of consequence or faith, but only of Jesus Christ and him crucified (2 Corinthians 4.5). And therefore preaching of the Word, is called preaching of Christ,—and ministers of the Word, ministers of Christ (1 Corinthians 4.1-2; 2 Corinthians 3.6, 14),—and learning of the Word, learning of Christ (Ephesians 4.20); because our faith, our works, and our worship (which are the three essential elements of a Christian, the whole duty of man, the whole will of God,) have all their foundation, growth, end, and virtue, only in and from Christ crucified.”

—Edward Reynolds (1599-1676)
An Explication of the Hundred and Tenth Psalm

2010 Recommended Reading

The 2010 Recommended Reading List is now posted on the “Reading Lists” page.

The theme this year revolves around “the fellowship of the gospel” in the context of “life together” in the local church.

Happy reading!

Bumper sticker

I was just on the way from the church over to my little “reserved” table at Starbucks for an afternoon of java and jotting some notes on the history of Christian thought when I noticed, on the car in front of me, this remarkable “thought”—Jesus is coming … look busy!

Aaauuugghhhhhh!! Now, if I’m not completely mistaken, that’s a quote from George Carlin—not really the best source of theological reflection, you know.

And I don’t know if the little lady driving this car was a Carlin fan (if so, I would never have guessed it), or whether perhaps she thought that this “thought” had some merit, but its message is fundamentally unbiblical and the attitude behind it dismissive and dangerous.

Here’s what I mean. Jesus is coming … that’s absolutely true. God “has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness” by this man whom he’s appointed, and of this he has “provided proof to everyone by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17.31). The appeal that flows from that truth, though, is not “Look busy!” but “Repent!” The Judge of all the earth will not be fooled by “looks.” Oh no! “We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ …” (2 Corinthians 5.10), and the word Paul uses there for “appear” is actually passive voice, and means “be made known, be revealed, be brought to light, be seen through,” i.e. for who we really are.

“Looking busy” when Jesus comes won’t make any difference. What’s the hope of the hypocrite—the one who pretends to be other than what he or she is— when Jesus comes? None!

Jesus is coming! Repent! Be faithful unto death! Hold fast to our confession and to the hope set before us! Don’ t grow weary in doing good!

“We must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12.1-2).

But what we must not do is just try to “look busy”!

Great question from D. A. Carson

Carson began the devotional with this true observation: “When people know little about the God who has actually disclosed himself, it is terribly easy for them to sink into some perverted view of this God, until the image held of him has very little to do with the reality.”

He concluded with this troubling illustration: “Yesterday I received in the mail a letter from one of America’s premier television preachers, inviting me to send money and offering me in return a Christmas tree ornament of an ‘angel’ with a trumpet, to remind me that God had commanded the angel looking after

me to blow a trumpet

to celebrate me.

What kind of pared-down and domesticated image of God do such leaders hold that they should utter such nonsense?” (D. A. Carson, from the August 14 Devotional, For the Love of God)

Indeed!

Finally … some vindication

Please read the article entitled “The day the circus came to church” written by Pastor Don Hattaway (Tabernacle Baptist Church, Cartersville) and appearing in The Christian Index (July 30, 2009). In case there’s not a copy of The Christian Index at hand, the article can be read online HERE. More and more voices are beginning to cry in this ecclesiastical wilderness,

and my hope is that the Lord is about to do great and mighty things for his church in our place and time.

“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts …” (Hebrews 3:15; 4:7).

We’re all Christians, but …

“All my family are Christians …” That’s how the woman with whom I was having an intriguing chat at the coffee shop began her next story. She’s a spry and inquisitive lady of nearly 70 years, well-read

and well-traveled, and an absolutely delightful conversationalist. We’d talked about seeing the country by train, about her late husband and friends she’ d known in other places. She’d told me of times spent in London and Scotland, of an opportunity missed to visit Japan, and of a Lutheran pastor she had once that, for just a moment, I reminded her of.

Then she leaned forward and began, “All my family are Christians …,” and I wondered what would follow. Her next words gave me pause: “… but we’ve all taken so many different routes.”

“Do you mean different routes to becoming Christians?” I thought.

But before I could ask, she made clear that she meant that they each had such different ways of “being” Christians. One, she said, was a “religious fanatic,” another a good and kind person, but who “never went to church,” yet another had decided that her Christianity and heavy drinking were quite compatible. She herself, she noted, was “spiritual” and a “Christian” but not much of a church-goer, and really quite comfortable with people believing whatever they liked as long as they didn’t judge her.

And it hit me hard. There, right in front of me in the person of this charming and entertaining and interesting older lady, sat the embodiment of much American religion — moralistic, therapeutic, deistic, consumerist, individualist, neo-gnostic, postmodern, pluralistic, and completely self-assured and self-satisfied. This is all that many folks — even many church members — have. It is their own little religion, their own unique route and journey, for sure, and they really like it. But it is not biblical nor h

istoric Christianity, nor is it good news in the end.

These are strange days. Therefore, “… be alert, with all perseverance and requests for all the saints.

Pray for me also, that I may be given the message when I begin to speak—that I may confidently make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may be able to speak boldly as I ought to speak” (Ephesians 6:18-20, NET).