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No Sense of Eternity

11:53 PM - Jan. 26, 2007 - Add to the Wildness

Writing on why cults prosper, deceased theologian Dave Breese says, "One of the chief reasons people refuse to believe the true Gospel of Christ after they hear of the truth of God is its ruthless illumination of sin and its call to repentance and faith in the Saviour."

Ruthless? Yeah. The message of the Bible is ruthless. It's ruthless about hunting down and exterminating the things that hurt the people God loves. If you had the option, you'd be the same. I'm pretty sure those of you who are raising babies anywhere in black widow territory are the same about spiders in the house.

The problem with us silly people is, we easily get mixed up. We assume (correctly, by the way) that the Bible is out to exterminate us as we know ourselves to be. And we get this stench of death in our nostrils, knowing that we're being told it's not okay to be the way we are, it's not okay to pretend or make up stories about God, and it's not our call who God is. It's His.

Nobody likes identity theft. Why do we keep doing it to the Almighty, and then assuming it puts us on good terms with Him?

The Bible is ruthless. Jesus said, "Hey, if you want to follow Me, get ready to die. Pick up that cross and let's go."

Which leads me to a sidebar, one of my all-time favourite a cappella bluegrass songs:

Tell me, do you want to be a lover of the Lord?
Meshach said to Abednego,
Abednego said to Meshach,
"Pick up the cross, let's go--"
Do you want to be a lover of the Lord?
Do you want to go to heaven when you die?

Well, it's better heard. The point is, I don't see a lot of that plucky acceptance out there in Christians. Like the rest of the world, we have no sense of resurrection. We live like this life is all there is. What should separate us from the pack is knowing how to live like the life to come is all there is.

The Bible says it before we ever realize it ourselves. I remember having a conversation with my mother about that sick, disgusted feeling people get about biblical Christianity. She was honest with me, and I said to her, "I remember that feeling. That's the way it's meant to be."

I doubt that made any sense. but the fact is, the Bible says this is how it will go.

2 Cor. 2:15-16 (NASB)
For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life. And who is adequate for these things?

Who is adequate indeed? Am I up for stinking in the reckoning of the majority? That is not how we're naturally made to live. But I no longer live a natural life. I'm not dying till death, I'm living till life.

A quick note here: this doesn't mean Christians are supposed to be obnoxious and then call the people they offend "persecutors." If you read the whole book, we're supposed to just be, and if anything's stinky, it's God. He seems to be okay with that, and it's not up to us to do His job for Him. He has His own ways. Being rude and annoying isn't among them.

He says it smells like death. Not just death, but death leading to death. (Takes me back to Genesis - "Adam, dying, you will die.") And He says it's a matter of the eye of the beholder. Others take joy in the same thing. It's a measure of the observer, not the one being observed.

Craziness? Futility? The Bible addresses that too.

1 Cor. 15:12-19 (NASB)
Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?

But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised;

and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain.

Moreover we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we witnessed against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised.

For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised;

and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins.

Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.

If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.
If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.
If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied.

I know that going in, especially as a former secularist. And yet, I cling to Christ. My mother once asked me in another conversation, "What's the difference between your beliefs and mine? We're both just trying to live better lives."

This is the difference. If you've hoped in your beliefs just to get you through this life, you are of all people most to be pitied. You're still going to die. Everything you do will be gone. Everything you tried - just within yourself, for yourself, all your greatest efforts at being a better human being - will be forgotten. Sure, some people will miss you and remember you.

Then they'll die too.

There is no point in preaching, if there's nothing real to preach about. There is no point in hoping, if the hope isn't based on things that can be tested and shown to be solid. Hebrews 11:1 (King James translation) says, "Faith is the substance of things not seen, the evidence of things hoped for." Apologist Dave Hunt sensibly points out, "In order to be the substance and evidence of anything, faith must first have substance and evidence."

If I have hoped in Christ for this life only, I'm a crazy, pathetic waste of oxygen. I know that.

Yet, here I stand. Knowing that I know that, does your explanation of Life, the Universe and Everything have an explanation for the existence of me?

Untitled Comment
Your entry brought to mind a young man that used to attend our church. He had only been going a short time. He had some mental illness and found a place he was accepted. He got really involved in everything. Not content to be a Sunday morning believer, he was present anytime the doors were open. He was in our SS class one day. We were studying Acts, but I don't remember the context of his comment. He said, "The reason I like this church so much is that Tracy doesn't preach all that hell, fire and brimstone stuff. (Tracy is our Senior pastor. He is male despite the rather feminine name).

Anyway... that VERY day in church, Tracy spoke on Revelation 21. He had been preaching through Revelation for several months and we were almost done. You can't really speak on this chapter without mentioning eternal condemnation. Anyway, I never saw that young man again.

There are two Ways, one of Life and one of Death, and there is a great difference between the two Ways (The Didache)... it is really an indictment of my evangelical church that it took this man so long to hear that God's love is balanced by His holiness. He must punish sin.

Great thoughts as usual ~
AcceptanceWithJoy - 8:22 AM - Jan. 30, 2007

Bees
A blogger left a comment on my site that you are bee farmers. I have been writing how God has been speaking to me through the study of bees. I thought you might be interested. But I also thought you could give me insight if you take a look. Please visit my site.
mustardseed - 3:15 PM - Jan. 30, 2007

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