Thought I'd (finally) share the latest with you all...
Spring has sprung.
The bare ground now has daffodils, hyacinths and tulips springing up. I'm so happy to see my cute little flowers blossoming. And the trees are finally budding and even flowering in some species. Lawns are green again and get this... today I literally saw two cute little cotton-tailed bunnies hopping around. One was chasing the other... (we all know what that was about). I love the Spring time here. I just wish it wasn't so rainy - it's a lot like a Melbourne winter.
God and the GAP
Today, we won a competition for 50% off at Gap (you know that store that sells really nice clothes for the whole family) for a whole year! This is like God's way of saying, "I not only care to provide for you, but I also want to dress you well!" Cool huh? For those of you who don't fully understand how big of a blessing this is, let me explain... GAP is our favourite clothing store. It is good quality, however, it is on the pricey side (for American prices). I like to shop their clearance wracks and just look out for their sales. But to have 50% off for a year, is even better. It's funny, because we had already been talking about how we want to "stock up" on good clothes and shoes to bring home (since it is SO much cheaper over here). And then this happened. They are giving away one of these everyday to one customer until April 30. We had only entered once, and won. This is not the first time that we've blessed with the Gap.... last year I scored a $60 pair of jeans for free for Clay, and we got another pair earlier in the year ridiculous cheap - like almost free!
The kids
Mia is a dream baby. [Oh yeah, I guess that I haven't had the time to blog and mention that we had a baby girl January 17 this year.] She's easy and sweet. Sleeping so good too. We are so relieved that she is fitting into our family so nicely. She's laughing now, holds her head up well during tummy time, is easily engaged and enjoys batting dangly toys. The boys love her so much. Yesterday afternoon I was in the basement loading some laundry when I faintly heard crying from upstairs. I switched on the baby monitor (that we had turned off for my cousin who had been sleeping downstairs), and heard the sound of music playing from her room. While I raced upstairs, I noticed that the crying had stopped. Jordan who had also been asleep, had climbed into her cot to settle her and had turned on her musical mobile. He was patting her on the back, and explained to me that she had been crying. Such a sweet big brother.
Speaking of Jordan, we celebrated Jordan's 3rd birthday with a cute little party for him and his friends. I had invited quite a number of children with their mothers and realised that unless we had the party carefully planned we'd run into chaos in our little townhouse - especially since it was going to be a rainy day. So I scripted a mini Playschool-like concert that Clayton and I performed. We had a guitar, sang songs and acted a little. It was a lot of fun and the kids were captivated. I even made props out of cardboard boxes. The party was a great success, however, I was a little exhausted afterward. The next day we had my cousin from Shanghai arriving, so there was little rest to be had. I should mention that we did have a lovely visit from Esther.
We had a wonderful Easter weekend getting together with friends. The kids enjoyed an egg hunt but didn't forget what it was all about; celebrating our Saviour's death and resurrection. While at church, Judah wrote his reflections on Easter: "Jesus died on the cross for are sins, because: if we died for ARe sins we would'ent be able to come alive again. So we selabrate easter because Jesus died on the cross." I thought I'd include the spelling mistakes for your enjoyment. But he really is doing very well at school. Clayton and I were only tonight looking at his spelling words for the week with slight astonishment with where he is up to with words like merchandise, precise and device. I'm not certain that we even knew the meaning of those words at his age. And he seems to come by it all very easily without really even studying. I know where he doesn't get that from! Before long he'll be correcting my spelling!
Nathan is also leaping ahead with his reading and (experimental) writing and will start real school in August. He has decided that he is going to build muscle. He loves to claim that he is hot and sweaty and walk around topless. He even stands infront of the mirror flexing his biceps! (No joke.) We think he might be our athletic one. Nathan is looking forward to playing soccer again and picking up some basketball too.
The boys continue to work on their break-dance moves. Tonight we again slid the coffee table aside and let them do their thing. Nathan's latest trick is spinning 180 degrees on his head. Judah likes to perform a sturdy and well controlled head stand and then launch backwards. Jordan, just likes to strut his stuff. And Mia is a captive audience. There's never a dull moment with these kids.
Us grown ups
Well, Clayton is still suffering from fatigue so he's taking it slow. Please keep him in your prayers. He had some blood work done today to just make sure everything is okay. He feels that the Lord has reassured him that his health will not fail him. I guess this is just where wisdom kicks in - in terms of setting limits, maintaining a sustainable pace and good routines, adequate sleep, good diet etc. This marathon was never going to be easy - we suspect it was his latest "sprint" that he is paying for. He really will deserve a medal when this is over. He recently taught a series that he prepared from the book of Proverbs. It was really good for him to get back into sermon preparation and delivery. I was encouraged as a listener to enjoy all the meaty stuff that he dished out with such clarity - nice to see that all this study is really loading up his arsenal so to speak. Even more encouraging to witness him flowing in the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
Me... well there's not much time for anything on top of keeping the house in order, and the family fed and looked after. Keeping the house in order is a continual challenge, but my job has become significantly more challenging since we decided to go gluten free for Nath. It has added considerable cost, time and labour to meal preparation! But, if it turns out to make a difference, then it's a sacrifice that's worth it. I was recently asked to mentor one of the girls from the college who attends our church. I've met with her only a few times now, but it has been positive for both her and myself included. It has got me thinking more about how I need to be sowing into the deposit that the Lord has given me, by spending more time studying His word. I have to admit that I do find this difficult to do with the busy family life that we have, and the constant demands that there are, but I'm sure that God will work with whatever I can do. We have Logos software on the computer so I'm going to ask Clayton to show me how to use it.
I'll try to upload some photos at a "more godly hour". It's way past my bedtime and I'm afraid that this coach is going to turn into a pumpkin.
Thursday, 28 April 2011
Thursday, 21 April 2011
eternal security, the unpardonable sin and suicide - a response to some common questions
Recently one of my students emailed me the following:
My friend and I were talking last night, and he brought up the question of how we know we are saved--as in, if you were once saved, but then turned away from God later in life, or died while in the throes of sin (and would suicide count here? isn't it a sin like any other?), would you go to heaven? I thought you would, because God ultimately knows every action and thought and emission of the heart, and he can judge our intentions. But then I was reading Hebrews for a paper I'm working on, and I came across 6:4-6, which says: "It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace." I guess I'd just like to know what your thoughts are on the subject, whenever you get the chance.
Since I have come across these sorts of questions a number of times I thought it was high time I formulated a response. Here was my attempt:
What you've asked is a very good question. And a very important question. And a big question. There are a number of issues here, so I appreciate you asking for my thoughts on the matter rather than "an answer" - because I almost certainly could not give a satisfactory one. But since you've asked, I will "think aloud." Here goes:
1. Regarding the effect of God's grace and the effects of sin.
Some people think that when we surrender to the Lordship of Christ; when we ask Him to forgive our sins, he forgives everything we have done to that point, making us "perfect" (if you will) in that moment, and then giving us the power through the Holy Spirit to not sin from that point on. Its almost as if any sin committed before that point is covered, but after that we are on our own. In that moment, God sees us the way that He sees His perfect son. But after that moment, he sees, well, us again. In fact, whether we think that or not, many of us live that way. This means that when we do (inevitably) sin, we are living outside of God's grace and must repent immediately unless we die in that state, which would mean that we would be eternally damned. This, I think, explains a lot of "rededicating" that goes on in Churches (don't know if you know what I mean by this or not, but I'm referring to the tendency for people to "get saved" over and over and over again because of a misunderstanding of the power of God's grace to redeem the entirety of one's life).
I don't think this is how it works. I think this diminishes the power of God's grace. In effect it makes our own actions more powerful than God's. I don't at all want to end up at the other extreme and affirm "once saved always saved" in a way that means it doesn't matter what you do. It clearly does. I just want to be conscious to make God's grace more powerful.
When we come to Christ then and ask forgiveness He forgives us - not just for what we have done, but for who and what we are (Adam's descendants), and hence what we will do in the future. God redeems our entire life, because he sees it all - not just the little bit of it that we can see looking back. I think this is a wonderfully encouraging thought. When we are saved, God decrees over us "not guilty." In that moment we "hear" this in faith - sins forgiven, saved. In that moment, we are so optimistic. We don't know how the rest of our life is going to turn out. We don't know how we are going to disappoint God in the future. In that moment, we honestly believe that we never will. But God actually knows the end from the beginning, and He still decrees over us "not guilty - saved."
Now there is, of course, a sense in which God's decree is (in the words of Jesus) "...neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more." And there certainly is a sense in which the Holy Spirit is given in order to sanctify us and that we are actually and properly (I'm trying to say "ontologically" without using a big word) different from that point on. I'm not sure whether or not that difference means that it is easier not to sin. I think it means that we are from that point on, acutely aware of our sin. We loathe it, and do not want to do it (See Rom 7 for this dynamic - this is, I believe, a saved person) and recognize its sinfulness. It is this loathing of sin that assures us, I believe that we are in fact saved, because it is indicative of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives (more on that later - I think).
2. On the theoretical underpinnings of this discussion
You may or may not be aware of an old debate between "Calvinists" and "Arminians" which raises similar questions to the one you are asking. The essence of the question is this. On the one hand, we believe that God's power to save is infinitely more powerful than our own power to thwart our salvation. But on the other hand, we observe that there are some people who become born again, and then for whatever reason, walk away from this later in life. How do we explain this? The Calvinist would say that the person who appeared saved to us, was never really actually saved (or only appeared to walk away, but continued to actually be saved). The Arminian would say that this proves that we do actually have the (God given) power in our own self will to walk away from Him and thus to thwart his plans for us. It seems to me that both have a ring of truth to them, and both affirm important things (God's power and sovereignty on the one hand, and the reality that we are held accountable by God for the decisions that we make on the other). I would only make the point that while there may be no difference that is visible from the outside, there is an enormous difference between a sinful person who has walked away (or who by walking away demonstrated that they were never really saved or whatever) and rejects God and ceases to "struggle" with sin, and a sinful person who has slid away, and yet is desperately concerned about this and cries out to God to change them and for the power to be different though they may never fully receive what they hope for in this life in a way that would be visible to those observing their life from the outside. the latter evidences the presence of the Holy Spirit (and hence is still "saved"), while the former evidences a rejection of the Holy Spirit. For this reason I often encourage people who are concerned that they are "struggling" (with sin) in a particular area. At least they are struggling! Because of the presence of our adversary and the reality of the Holy Spirit living inside of us, that struggle is pretty much guaranteed. Where the struggle has ceased, there is a problem.
What shall we say then of the person who "falls away?" I'm not sure that we have come much further than the Calvinist/Arminian formulation of this problem. We must either say that the person was never "properly saved" (there's probably a better, more technical way of putting this!) or that they actually were saved, but only temporarily and that they "walked away." But it seems to me (not to others I can assure you - this is apparently a very important question) that it is pointless to speculate about this. The point is, well, not to fall away/walk away/slide away. And I think that it is very helpful in this quest to realize that God has forgiven and redeemed our whole life, not just the bit that we saw when we first came to him (which would be pretty rough luck if you came to him at the age of 5 say. But it is typically these sorts in my observation who struggle with this question). And we can count on that. So when we do sin, and come to God in sincere repentance, we are not moment by moment changing our status from "lost" to "saved" we are reminding ourselves that we are His; we are learning to depend on Him more and more; we are being changed moment by moment from the inside out by the Holy Spirit - the one who convicted us of the wrong in the first place. When we do have moments of "rededication" it is not as if we are "starting again." It may just be that there is an area of our lives that the Holy Spirit now wants to deal with that we may not have been conscious of having not surrendered to Him.
3. On the unpardonable sin
The passage that you mention is often raised by people concerned that they have committed the unpardonable sin. It is a challenging word and should not be lightly brushed aside. Sin is serious. Every sin is serious. Sin sent Jesus to the cross. We should not take the grace of God lightly. It should produce in us the obligation (for want of a far better word) to live in a way that is pleasing to him. However, given what I've said under #1 and #2, I believe that if a person is concerned that they have committed the unpardonable sin (blasphemy/rejection? of the Holy Spirit), that is the evidence that they have not.
4. On suicide
A ticklish question. I hope you can see from the above why I do not think that suicide automatically damns a person just because they have not had a chance to repent after doing it. There are probably good reasons for believing that it does. But I just don't. Suicide is always tragic, undoubtedly sinful, and probably terribly selfish, but I'm just not sure how helpful it is to those who do battle with or who have done battle with this desperate thought for those of us who have not (I have had many battles - not this one. I do not presume that you either have or have not struggled with suicidal thoughts, and would not judge you either way) to speculate about it. Here's at least one reason why. If (let's say for example) a Christian person is struggling with suicidal thoughts, what they desperately need is to cry out to a God who hears and a God who cares and a God who saves. But if all that they can see from this God (reflected in, interpreted by and spoken by His servants - which so often is the way that we "hear from God" and understand God's word) is that He is with them but only up to a point, and that if they make this decision they do so on their own, then all this person hears is judgment. And this is the kind of thought that is more likely to drive them towards the act rather than away from it.
My friend and I were talking last night, and he brought up the question of how we know we are saved--as in, if you were once saved, but then turned away from God later in life, or died while in the throes of sin (and would suicide count here? isn't it a sin like any other?), would you go to heaven? I thought you would, because God ultimately knows every action and thought and emission of the heart, and he can judge our intentions. But then I was reading Hebrews for a paper I'm working on, and I came across 6:4-6, which says: "It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace." I guess I'd just like to know what your thoughts are on the subject, whenever you get the chance.
Since I have come across these sorts of questions a number of times I thought it was high time I formulated a response. Here was my attempt:
What you've asked is a very good question. And a very important question. And a big question. There are a number of issues here, so I appreciate you asking for my thoughts on the matter rather than "an answer" - because I almost certainly could not give a satisfactory one. But since you've asked, I will "think aloud." Here goes:
1. Regarding the effect of God's grace and the effects of sin.
Some people think that when we surrender to the Lordship of Christ; when we ask Him to forgive our sins, he forgives everything we have done to that point, making us "perfect" (if you will) in that moment, and then giving us the power through the Holy Spirit to not sin from that point on. Its almost as if any sin committed before that point is covered, but after that we are on our own. In that moment, God sees us the way that He sees His perfect son. But after that moment, he sees, well, us again. In fact, whether we think that or not, many of us live that way. This means that when we do (inevitably) sin, we are living outside of God's grace and must repent immediately unless we die in that state, which would mean that we would be eternally damned. This, I think, explains a lot of "rededicating" that goes on in Churches (don't know if you know what I mean by this or not, but I'm referring to the tendency for people to "get saved" over and over and over again because of a misunderstanding of the power of God's grace to redeem the entirety of one's life).
I don't think this is how it works. I think this diminishes the power of God's grace. In effect it makes our own actions more powerful than God's. I don't at all want to end up at the other extreme and affirm "once saved always saved" in a way that means it doesn't matter what you do. It clearly does. I just want to be conscious to make God's grace more powerful.
When we come to Christ then and ask forgiveness He forgives us - not just for what we have done, but for who and what we are (Adam's descendants), and hence what we will do in the future. God redeems our entire life, because he sees it all - not just the little bit of it that we can see looking back. I think this is a wonderfully encouraging thought. When we are saved, God decrees over us "not guilty." In that moment we "hear" this in faith - sins forgiven, saved. In that moment, we are so optimistic. We don't know how the rest of our life is going to turn out. We don't know how we are going to disappoint God in the future. In that moment, we honestly believe that we never will. But God actually knows the end from the beginning, and He still decrees over us "not guilty - saved."
Now there is, of course, a sense in which God's decree is (in the words of Jesus) "...neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more." And there certainly is a sense in which the Holy Spirit is given in order to sanctify us and that we are actually and properly (I'm trying to say "ontologically" without using a big word) different from that point on. I'm not sure whether or not that difference means that it is easier not to sin. I think it means that we are from that point on, acutely aware of our sin. We loathe it, and do not want to do it (See Rom 7 for this dynamic - this is, I believe, a saved person) and recognize its sinfulness. It is this loathing of sin that assures us, I believe that we are in fact saved, because it is indicative of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives (more on that later - I think).
2. On the theoretical underpinnings of this discussion
You may or may not be aware of an old debate between "Calvinists" and "Arminians" which raises similar questions to the one you are asking. The essence of the question is this. On the one hand, we believe that God's power to save is infinitely more powerful than our own power to thwart our salvation. But on the other hand, we observe that there are some people who become born again, and then for whatever reason, walk away from this later in life. How do we explain this? The Calvinist would say that the person who appeared saved to us, was never really actually saved (or only appeared to walk away, but continued to actually be saved). The Arminian would say that this proves that we do actually have the (God given) power in our own self will to walk away from Him and thus to thwart his plans for us. It seems to me that both have a ring of truth to them, and both affirm important things (God's power and sovereignty on the one hand, and the reality that we are held accountable by God for the decisions that we make on the other). I would only make the point that while there may be no difference that is visible from the outside, there is an enormous difference between a sinful person who has walked away (or who by walking away demonstrated that they were never really saved or whatever) and rejects God and ceases to "struggle" with sin, and a sinful person who has slid away, and yet is desperately concerned about this and cries out to God to change them and for the power to be different though they may never fully receive what they hope for in this life in a way that would be visible to those observing their life from the outside. the latter evidences the presence of the Holy Spirit (and hence is still "saved"), while the former evidences a rejection of the Holy Spirit. For this reason I often encourage people who are concerned that they are "struggling" (with sin) in a particular area. At least they are struggling! Because of the presence of our adversary and the reality of the Holy Spirit living inside of us, that struggle is pretty much guaranteed. Where the struggle has ceased, there is a problem.
What shall we say then of the person who "falls away?" I'm not sure that we have come much further than the Calvinist/Arminian formulation of this problem. We must either say that the person was never "properly saved" (there's probably a better, more technical way of putting this!) or that they actually were saved, but only temporarily and that they "walked away." But it seems to me (not to others I can assure you - this is apparently a very important question) that it is pointless to speculate about this. The point is, well, not to fall away/walk away/slide away. And I think that it is very helpful in this quest to realize that God has forgiven and redeemed our whole life, not just the bit that we saw when we first came to him (which would be pretty rough luck if you came to him at the age of 5 say. But it is typically these sorts in my observation who struggle with this question). And we can count on that. So when we do sin, and come to God in sincere repentance, we are not moment by moment changing our status from "lost" to "saved" we are reminding ourselves that we are His; we are learning to depend on Him more and more; we are being changed moment by moment from the inside out by the Holy Spirit - the one who convicted us of the wrong in the first place. When we do have moments of "rededication" it is not as if we are "starting again." It may just be that there is an area of our lives that the Holy Spirit now wants to deal with that we may not have been conscious of having not surrendered to Him.
3. On the unpardonable sin
The passage that you mention is often raised by people concerned that they have committed the unpardonable sin. It is a challenging word and should not be lightly brushed aside. Sin is serious. Every sin is serious. Sin sent Jesus to the cross. We should not take the grace of God lightly. It should produce in us the obligation (for want of a far better word) to live in a way that is pleasing to him. However, given what I've said under #1 and #2, I believe that if a person is concerned that they have committed the unpardonable sin (blasphemy/rejection? of the Holy Spirit), that is the evidence that they have not.
4. On suicide
A ticklish question. I hope you can see from the above why I do not think that suicide automatically damns a person just because they have not had a chance to repent after doing it. There are probably good reasons for believing that it does. But I just don't. Suicide is always tragic, undoubtedly sinful, and probably terribly selfish, but I'm just not sure how helpful it is to those who do battle with or who have done battle with this desperate thought for those of us who have not (I have had many battles - not this one. I do not presume that you either have or have not struggled with suicidal thoughts, and would not judge you either way) to speculate about it. Here's at least one reason why. If (let's say for example) a Christian person is struggling with suicidal thoughts, what they desperately need is to cry out to a God who hears and a God who cares and a God who saves. But if all that they can see from this God (reflected in, interpreted by and spoken by His servants - which so often is the way that we "hear from God" and understand God's word) is that He is with them but only up to a point, and that if they make this decision they do so on their own, then all this person hears is judgment. And this is the kind of thought that is more likely to drive them towards the act rather than away from it.
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