Getting Ready

This Wednesday I'll be doing something new, though it wasn't exactly on my bucket list-- surgery and a night in the hospital (woman's stuff 101). At the moment I'm more anxious about leaving my office in good order than about the surgery. My only regret is in missing several weeks of prime running weather. 

Several Scriptures have come to my attention lately:

"I trust in You, O Lord; I say, 'You are my God.' My times are in Your hand..." (Psalm 31:14-15 ESV).

"...The Lord takes thought for me..." (Psalm 40:17).

"Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him, and He will act... Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for Him..." (Psalm 37:5, 7).

While I trust that God will do far more than all I ask or think (Ephesians 3:20), I also know that I have nothing to lose. Even if the worst were to happen, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain" (Philippians 1:21). I can't imagine the fear that would come with facing any kind of surgery without knowing Christ. I can't even imagine facing the routine challenges of a single day of life apart from Christ. 

I know most of my friends are Christians, and I appreciate the prayers that will be made on my behalf. But if you don't know Christ as your Savior and Lord, consider where you would find peace in trying times. There is only one God who loved us enough to reach down to us when we were completely powerless to work our way to Him. We can't earn our way into heaven, but we can accept the free gift He offers and be adopted into His family. That gives us the peace to face any storm. 

For those of you who may be facing the "hospital storm," I found this resource from John Piper to be encouraging and more helpful than any pre-op appointment:

http://www.desiringgod.org/articles/ten-lessons-from-a-hospital-bed

In the hands of the One who knows all the answers when I don't even know what questions to ask...

© Dawn Rutan 2016. Photo by Dawn Rutan.  

Glory & Joy

I shared this quote from Tony Reinke in The Joy Project on Facebook:

“God’s glory and our most blissful joy collide into one end. Our collective joy requires majesty. We can have no true joy apart from his grandeur. To delight in God’s glory is the weightiest matter in the universe. We were made for this. To behold God’s resplendence is to be filled with his holy joy.”

That is a deep subject that requires more thought. It is perhaps illuminated by some verses from John’s gospel:

“I glorified You on earth, having accomplished the work that You gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify Me in Your own presence with the glory that I had with You before the world existed... But now I am coming to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves” (17:4-5, 13 ESV).

“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full” (15:11).

The work of Jesus was to glorify God through the plan of redemption, which enabled God to draw men unto Himself for eternity. God had no need to create the universe or mankind, but He did so in order to share His love and joy with us. C.S. Lewis said, “Joy is the serious business of heaven.” God’s glory and our joy are inextricably linked.

Jude wrote: “Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen”(24-25). In reading these verses this week, my first thought was to wonder whether the “great joy” referred to God’s joy or to our joy. The more I think about it, I believe it means both. God’s joy and ours will be mutual at that point. His glory will be magnified and our joy will be made complete.

In the meantime, it seems that the pursuit of joy and the pursuit of God’s glory are one and the same. As we pursue those things that glorify God, we experience the delights of His love and savor the joy of pleasing Him. That’s not to say that He doesn’t love and delight in us when we aren’t pursuing His glory, but our experience is tainted by sin, and we don’t perceive the relationship the same way.

After writing this far, I discovered this article by John Piper, God’s Glory and the Deepest Joy of Human Souls Are One Thing, in which he shares fifteen implications of this truth. Two of his points are: “sin is the suicidal exchange of the glory of God for the broken cisterns of created things;” and “Heaven will be a never-ending, ever-increasing discovery of more and more of God’s glory with greater and ever-greater joy in him.” So this pursuit of our joy and God’s glory is not limited to this life, but continues through eternity.

Piper is noted for saying, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.” The Westminster Catechism states, “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” Let us pursue those things that glorify God and maximize our enjoyment in Him!

“...In Your presence there is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore” (Psalm 16:11).

© Dawn Rutan 2016.

United

We’re all familiar with the scriptural admonition that is often repeated at weddings, “So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:6 ESV). The Apostle Paul repeated part of this verse in Ephesians 5:31 and then adds, “This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church.” Sam Andreades points out in his book enGendered that we tend to get this backward—it’s not that Christ and the church is like marriage, but that marriage is like Christ and the church. Marriage is a metaphor for the reality of union with Christ.

There are many Scriptures that talk about our union with Christ both as individuals and as a Body. Here are a few:

“For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His. We know that our old self was crucified with Him… So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus” (Romans 6:5-6, 11).

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).

“There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (Ephesians 4:4-5).

“So we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another” (Romans 12:5).

“…We are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part if working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (Ephesians 4:15-16).

So if we are united as one body with Christ, what God has joined together let no man put asunder. I think this has many applications for us individually and collectively.

1) If we have indeed been crucified with Christ and are dead to sin, then we have the ability to resist temptation, but even if we do sin we are not torn away from union with Christ. We may lose some of the intimacy of that union for a time, but we are not permanently separated.

2) If we in the local church are united with Christ, we should also be united with one another in worship, fellowship, and work. Those who choose not to participate are either not members of the body to begin with, or they are malfunctioning members who hinder the unity of the church. If they are indeed members of the body, then the body is responsible for bringing them back into fellowship and equipping them to work properly.

3) If the Body of Christ is the universal Church, united across time and distance, then some of the nonsense that divides us needs to be set aside. That’s not to say that we won’t have differing opinions on some interpretations of Scripture, or that there won’t be heretics in sheep’s clothing, but the true Body should be united in the essentials of faith. We have more in common with one another than we should have with those outside the Church.

Unity with Christ and in Christ is not just the ideal state, but it is the reality. God has indeed joined two into one flesh, and man cannot separate them. We may not really understand or know how to live in that reality now, but one day we will see the full consummation of it when Christ returns.

“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).

© Dawn Rutan 2016. 

Four Views

Pilate:Truth? What is truth? He says he is a king, bearing witness to the truth. Someone said he claimed he was “the way, the truth and the life.” The way to what? What truth? What life? None of it makes any sense. The truth as I see it is that these Pharisees have been a pain in my back since I got here. If I don’t do what they want, it could mean my job or even my life. If I release him, I’ll have a full scale riot on my hands, and I can’t afford that. This Jesus is right about one thing—I don’t have any real authority. If it isn’t the Jews telling me what to do, it’s Caesar and his lackeys. Even my wife thinks she controls me. The truth is that this whole thing is a mess. This is no way to live—fighting for control and living in fear. There ought to be some other way. No matter what I choose, I lose... I’ll hand him over. And if there is a God, I hope he has mercy on my soul!

Barabbas:Well, this isn’t what I expected. I was supposed to die today, but here I am out on the streets while my two buddies are hanging up there on crosses. I was ready to die. At least, as ready as anyone could be. I knew with all the trouble I’d caused that it would catch up with me one day. I saw my own father die on a cross, and I knew I’d follow in his footsteps. But now I’m free... Well, not really free. I’ll never forget the faces of all those people I hurt and robbed, and that girl who died. I deserve to be up there on that cross. Those other two guys were nothing compared to me. What did he say to Marcus? “You’ll be with me in paradise”? Really? Is it possible? It can’t be that easy, can it? I’m not sure who this man is, but there’s something different about him. He shouldn’t be up there in my place. I should be the one dying. Jesus, forgive me!

Peter: Why did I do it? Why did I deny knowing Him? I’m such a coward. I really thought I would defend Him to the death. I tried in the garden, but when He told me to stop I just lost my nerve. What would have happened if I’d stuck by Him? Would I have been arrested and beaten too? John wasn’t hurt. He stayed. He didn’t run and hide. When that rooster crowed and Jesus looked at me... I thought He would hate me. But there was no condemnation in His eyes... only love. He knew. He even told me what I was going to do, but I didn’t believe Him. Well, my pride has tripped me up before. Me and my big mouth. It seems like every time I got something right I immediately fell flat on my face. I walked on water, and nearly drowned. I figured out He was the Christ, then He told me to get my priorities straight. He invited me up on the mountain, then I babbled something about setting up tents. But no matter what I said, He still loved me. And now He’s in the grave, and I’ll never hear that voice again, telling me that it will be okay, reminding me that His love doesn’t change. Forgive me, Lord! Have mercy on me, a sinner!

Thomas: They’re saying they’ve seen Jesus alive. I’m not sure what to believe. Could they have been hallucinating? None of us ate much those first few days, so maybe it affected them somehow. Maybe they saw a ghost. But they said He ate some fish. I’m afraid to hope it’s true and just get disappointed again. I’m not sure hope is worth the pain. But these guys seem so sure of what they saw. It’s not just the women saying it. If it is true, will I get to see Him too? Or is it just for those who never doubt? Is it wrong to want some proof? I want to believe, but I’m scared too. It just seems too good to be true... My Lord and my God!

“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29 ESV).

© Dawn Rutan 2016

The Weight of Sin

In one of his messages this week Alistair Begg commented, “My sin must be absolutely horrendous if it takes the death of God’s only Son to fix it.” A couple different songs contain lines like “It was my sin that held Him there.” 

While we accept that to be theologically correct, I don’t think most of us really believe it. Part of our difficulty comes from our experience of the American system of jurisprudence. We believe in proportional punishment. A minor crime receives a smaller punishment than a major crime. However, that is not the case in all cultures or times. Remember that the two men crucified with Jesus are identified simply as thieves, although we don’t know the exact nature of their crimes. One of them stated clearly “We deserve our punishment” (Luke 23:41).

That doesn’t make sense to our modern ears. It’s natural to start comparing sins. Most of us aren’t guilty of any of the “big” ones. We might lie occasionally, steal a few office supplies, and get a little envious of our neighbor, but nothing worthy of death. Or so we think. It’s hard to even conceive how Jesus bore the punishment that we deserved, because we don’t really think we deserve it. Many who call themselves Christians would say that their salvation is because “I’m a pretty good person. I may not be Mother Teresa, but I haven’t done anything really bad.”

The problem is that God’s definition of sin bears little resemblance to the laws of our country. Many of our laws can be broken with very little consequence. (When’s the last time you exceeded the speed limit?) But God’s rule book demands absolute perfection, because He Himself is absolutely perfect. Anything less keeps us from even coming into His presence. The smallest of sins creates a barrier that we cannot cross, and therefore God had to create a way to cross it for us. David said in Psalm 51:4 (ESV): “Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You may be justified in Your words and blameless in Your judgment.”

The other piece of the puzzle is the question of why any death was necessary to pay for sin. Logically, it seems like God could have just said, “Okay, I’ll just write off the sins of anyone who repents.” The short explanation is that God set up the rules for this universe, and He decreed that sin must be dealt with by the shedding of blood. Hebrews 9:22 says, “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.” Why He did so is a mystery, not unlike the question of why He allowed sin to enter the world to begin with. We can speculate, but only He knows the real reasons.

It seems to me that an awareness of the weight of sin is something that grows as we grow in relationship with God. Unbelievers can sin with impunity because they have no conviction of sin. I can remember a time when I didn’t particularly care about sin or its consequences. Now even small things bother me much more because I don’t want anything to interrupt that fellowship with the Father. The conscience is more easily pricked by the Holy Spirit when we are actively seeking His guidance. At the same time, the enemy turns up the heat of condemnation to try to distract us from growing in faith and turn us away from the ministry set before us.

A right view of sin is necessary if we are to truly understand the importance of Easter. If my sin is unimportant or inconsequential, then the cross is meaningless. If my sin does not deserve death, then Jesus’ death and resurrection are merely a dramatic end to His few years of teaching on earth. However, if I deserved death but received forgiveness instead, then Easter should be a day of great celebration. “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

(Public domain)

© 2016 Dawn Rutan.

The Face in the Mirror

Earlier this week I read Psalm 17:15 (ESV), “As for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with Your likeness.” In the preceding verses David is talking about the “men of the world whose portion is in this life.” Those who are seeking satisfaction in the world will not seek satisfaction in God and His righteousness.

How often do we have misplaced priorities and start seeking our fulfillment in this life instead of in Christ? To dig a little deeper, how many of us can say, “I shall be satisfied with Your likeness?” If we lost everything else in this life—family, health, home—could we still find our peace and joy in God alone? I’d like to think I could, but I also know how quickly I can get discouraged with conflicts and difficulties. Reading the biographies of Corrie ten Boom, Anne Frank, and Diet Eman recently, I was amazed and convicted by their perseverance and good attitudes in the midst of horrendous circumstances.

To take the thought of God’s likeness one step further, consider 2 Corinthians 3:18, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” (See also Romans 8:29.) If we don’t find satisfaction in His likeness, are we really all that interested in being transformed into His image? When we look in the mirror, do we see a child made in the image of God, or do we see someone who is trying to fit in, look good, or hide behind a mask?

Paul also wrote, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2). As important as that is for Christian maturity, it seems as though many who call themselves Christians don’t particularly care to be transformed. The things of this world can be quite appealing and can bring some level of satisfaction, so why should we reject them in favor of being transformed into the image of God? After all, it takes time and effort to seek God’s will and to pursue righteousness. It’s far easier to go along with the world’s priorities for time, money, family, career, politics, etc.

As I’ve asked these questions of myself, some of my answers have bothered me because I see the inconsistencies within me. James write that we are to “be doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the Word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like” (James 1:22-24). In a couple different places recently I’ve heard this reminder from James. We may try to use different mirrors at times, but when we look into the mirror of the Word, we can’t pick and choose which parts we want to heed. That’s equivalent to loving the Lord with part of your heart, part of your soul, part of your mind, and part of your strength. None of us love Him perfectly, but that should be our heart’s desire, and being transformed into His likeness should be high on our priority list.

The song “Every Now and Then” by FFH is a good reminder of the distorted reflection and misperceptions that keep us from seeing our Father clearly. (You can read the lyrics here.) Sometimes we need to break the mirrors we’ve been using so we can see ourselves through the Father’s eyes and see how He is forming His image in us. He sees not just who we are today, but who we will one day be. That’s the perfect mirror we all need.

“I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation; He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels” (Isaiah 61:10).

“Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear—but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious” (1 Peter 3:3-4).

© 2016 Dawn Rutan.

Unforgiven

A presidential candidate has been reported as saying he is a Christian but doesn’t ask God for forgiveness. No doubt there is a faulty understanding of what it means to be a Christian. This is the heresy of antinomianism that the Apostle John was addressing in his first letter:

“If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us” (1 John 1:8-10 ESV).

But I wonder if that same misunderstanding tends to creep into the thoughts of established Christians at times. We talk about accepting Christ or inviting Him into our hearts. We may refer to an initial confession and repentance at the time of conversion, but sometimes that’s the last we hear about confession. Have you ever been in a church service (maybe even “revival”), and when the hymn of invitation comes, no one ever goes forward to pray? If someone does go forward, there may be some raised eyebrows as people wonder what’s going on. The implication is that only the unconverted or backsliders need to confess. I love some of the hymns in the invitation section of the hymnal; however, some convey the message that after conversion a person will never again need to confess.

The March 2016 issue of Christianity Today includes an interview with Fleming Rutledge in which she states: “American Christianity, as Richard Neibuhr pointed out long ago, has tended to preach a gospel without judgment and a Christ without a cross. This is an old problem. We want to be happy. We want to be positive. We want to overlook the almost unbelievable problems we face today.” She indicates that we are inclined to gloss over the Crucifixion and jump right to the Resurrection. We want the Good News of salvation without ever hearing the bad news of our sinfulness.

Martin Luther said in his 95 Theses, “When our Lord and Master Jesus Christ said ‘Repent,’ he intended that the entire life of believers should be repentance.” A life lived without confession and repentance is a life devoid of God’s forgiveness. The idea that one can be a Christian without ever asking for forgiveness is part of a greater deception that says, “It doesn’t matter how I act or what I say. My faith is private.”

Luther went on to say that faith is, “a living, creative, active and powerful thing, this faith. Faith cannot help doing good works constantly. It doesn’t stop to ask if good works ought to be done, but before anyone asks, it already has done them and continues to do them without ceasing. Anyone who does not do good works in this manner is an unbeliever… Thus, it is just as impossible to separate faith and works as it is to separate heat and light from fire!” (Introduction to Romans).

A living and active faith will be one of continual repentance, but it will also be made evident by the good fruit produced by God’s work in and through us. “What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? …So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” (James 2:14, 17). If one claims to have faith without having either repentance or good works, he is deceiving himself and one day will be called to account. We can only pray that such people will see the error of their ways before it’s too late.

“For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul? For whoever is ashamed of Me and of My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels”(Mark 8:36-38).

© 2016 Dawn Rutan.