Ask RC: Does God really decide, and care who wins a football game?

I began asking this question myself long before Tim Tebow was even born. I was a little boy, deeply committed to the Pittsburgh Steelers. I remember praying that they would beat the Oakland Raiders in an upcoming playoff game. When my prayer ended fear set in- what if there were a little boy just like me, somewhere in Oakland, praying that the Raiders would beat the Steelers? My father comforted me by explaining that no real Christian would ever pray for the Raiders.

The truth is God does decide, and He does care. He not only decides who will win the Super Bowl, He decides who will win the game of hearts I play with my children. He decides, or rather decided, everything. There are no places, let alone no playing fields, where God stays on the sidelines. 

We need to remember that everything that happens must have a sufficient cause. And we must remember that every sufficient cause eventually traces its way back to God before time. This happens because that happened. That happened because this other thing happened. Eventually this takes us to “God said, ‘Let there be light, and there was light.’”

Of course God works in and through secondary means.  He gives the gifts. He creates the weather. The one who numbers the hairs on our heads softens the ground where a defensive back slips, and a playoff game ends on an eighty yard touchdown pass. There is no thing, no cause, over which He is not sovereign.

Isn’t it, though, somehow beneath His dignity to be concerned with such things? Yes, of course it is. God has only one concern- the manifestation of His glory. And that is how He determines what will happen in a football game, and what will happen in an election, and what will happen in a cancer ward. His goal isn’t ultimately to make little boys in Pittsburgh happy, or little boys in Denver happy. His goal, which cannot be thwarted, is to show forth who He is.

Does that mean He plays favorites for the likes of outspoken Christians like Tim Tebow or Drew Brees? Of course. Because God loves those who are His, even as He loves His own Son, God is certain to favor them. That favor, however, isn’t a path to winning a football game, but is instead the path to true victory, becoming more like Jesus. God isn’t glorified in giving Tim Tebow unlikely victories that somehow redound to God’s glory. No, God is glorified in making His children, including Tim Tebow, more like His Son. Sometimes that means leading them to the thrill of victory. Sometimes it means leading them through the agony of defeat.

The more difficult and pertinent question for me isn’t does God care, but should I?  I don’t pray for Steeler victories. I do pray that I, along with my parents and my children, will make memories together. And I pray that we would have grace to accept His providence, even when the Steelers lose.

Ask RC: Sin in Heaven?

The Question: If "The Fall" was caused by just one sin from the very first humans and all humans since have sinned, what are our chances of remaining sinless in heaven?  I assume we would still have our gift of free will, so surely someone would sin?

There is no chance whatsoever that we will, once we are in heaven, will fall again into sin, for at least two important reasons. First, God has so promised. The picture we are given of the eternal blessing we receive in Christ includes our being utterly pure, white, without spot or blemish. That we will stay in this state will at least come to pass on the basis of God’s promise. Remember when God stood with Joshua looking out at the city of Jericho and its rather substantial wall. God said, “See, I have delivered the city into your hands.” God’s Word is so certain that what He has spoken, though it has not yet come to pass, that it can be spoken of as in the past tense. I call this tense, “God’s prophetic past.”

Secondly, and perhaps ironically, it is precisely our free will which will be the means by which God’s promise is brought to pass. All moral beings, men, angels and even God Himself are free to choose. All of them, however, in their freedom, always choose according to their nature. God, for instance, could sin, if He so desired. But He does not so desire, for He is altogether good. He is “free” to do evil in one sense, but not free in another sense. No one forces Him to do good, but He will always and only do good.

When we enter into our reward, we will be fully and finally sanctified. That is, we will be fully and finally holy. There will be no more sin, no more desire for sin in us. We will have no more sin nature in us; we will be altogether good. We, like God Himself, will be free to do evil, were we so to desire, but we would never so desire because we will be altogether good. This is one of the greatest promises of eternity, that the struggle within ourselves between the old and the new man, between the Spirit and the flesh will be over. We will be at peace; we will enter into rest. Our warfare will have ended.

The more difficult question is how it is that Adam and Eve, who were created good, could in turn fall into sin in the first place. That answer is well outside the scope of these little missives. I do, however, address it in my book Almighty Over All, as well as in our sound teaching series, “How Strong Is He?” if you are looking to look into that conundrum. It is good and right for us to mourn the fall, to look deeply into all the destruction wrought by our parents’ first sin. But we must in turn look forward to the fullness of the promises of God. We will walk with Him in the garden again, unashamed and at peace. This is what Jesus has brought to pass for us, His beloved bride. We will be what we were made to be, and will stay so forevermore. 

The Kingdom Notes: Forty Days of Mourning

My deepest gratitude to all of you who have walked with me through my grief. Your prayers and encouragement have buoyed me up in the long and dark hours. It is possible that the below will be my last piece committed to this difficult journey.  Rest assured, however, that the deep wound will not fully heal on this side of glory, and even then my scar, like His, and yours, will beautify eternity.

  

Because we are modernists and Gnostics we love to pretend that symbols and rituals have no meaning, that all that matters is what is in our hearts. Because we are humans, and image bearers, we find we cannot escape symbols and rituals. When my wife and I were married almost twenty years ago there were precious few surprises.  Black tux for me, white dress for her. Traditional hymns were sung, traditional vows were taken. She processed with her father, and recessed with me. And in between, we exchanged rings- simple, traditional, gold rings. The only twist remained within the tradition, inside the ritual. Inside our rings we had inscribed Joshua 24:15- As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

Too many pundits tell us that if we want to have a successful marriage we need to make Jesus the center of it.  He is the glue, the center, the guide. There is wisdom here, but also danger. Is Jesus a means to a happy marriage? No, He is the end. Jesus does not exist for our marriages. Rather, our marriages exist for Him. Denise and I married not for ourselves, but that we might serve the Lord. We committed from the beginning not that I would die to self for her sake, nor that she would die to self for mine. Instead we would both strive to die to self for Him. We would pursue not our own happiness, but His glory. And in losing our individual lives, we found our one life together.

Jesus did not, forty days ago, take Denise from me. She was never mine to begin with. He placed her under my care. He blessed me with her wisdom, with her example, with her love. But she was then what she is now, and will always be, His. 

I too belong to Him. I asked Him to give me forty days to mourn- to devote time, space, energy to entering into my loss. Those forty days have drawn to a close. Crossing this barrier, stepping out of the ash-pile, however, hasn’t changed my heart.  Indeed despite recognizing the objective wisdom of my friend who suggested that I give myself over to mourning for forty days, I find myself not wanting to let go. I know, as I knew from the beginning that moving past this forty days will not end my sadness. I fear, however foolishly however, that it will end her, that she will pull further away from me.  I fear that I would be giving up the ghost, which seems to be all I have left of her. The dust of her death has become my familiar familiar.

The irony is the matching fears. That is, in putting that ring on Denise’s finger, in that ritual pregnant with promise and meaning, I was afraid. Could I be the kind of godly husband she deserved?  Would I be faithful in leading her? It is the same fear that haunts me now. Will I honor her memory by being the man she helped make? Will I be faithful to her memory, and our pledge? And the mirror of that fear is in the mirror of the ritual. On this, my fortieth day of mourning my beloved, I remove the ring she put on my finger. I cried through putting her ring on, even as I cry in taking mine off.

The ring reminded me not that my life was committed to Denise, but that our lives were committed to the Lord. Its absence, I pray, will remind me still of the message inside. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. God called me to be a husband for almost twenty years. He has called me to be a servant, a soldier, a disciple and a friend for always. Pray that I would be faithful.

Honoring the Living

There is, in all honesty, a constant tension when dealing with a terminal illness between giving up and facing facts. As I have noted earlier, during my beloved’s nine month battle with leukemia her most frequent question to me was “I can get better, can’t I?” Giving up hope is giving up, and neither of us wanted that. We do indeed serve a God who gave Hezekiah a new lease, who can make dry bones live and so from one perspective it isn’t over until it’s over. That doesn’t mean, however, that we can’t at least begin to discern what is more likely than not by reading test results.

This question became frighteningly practical to the two of us a few months before Denise passed away. We had yet to embark on a clinical trial that held out some hope for us. But still two of Denise’s dearest and oldest friends determined to come and visit. On the one hand this was a great blessing and an encouragement to Denise. She, though still cooped up in a hospital room, spent hours laughing and reminiscing with these dear ladies. They recounted shared childhood memories, and compared notes on the shared experience of growing up. On the other hand the visit spiked Denise’s fears. Was she facing, she wondered, a farewell tour? What did it say about her prognosis that these ladies were laboring so hard to come and see her?

A few months later we were left with only one choice- hospice. Yes we still believed God could heal. But in our more honest moments we in turn understood that He probably wouldn’t. This, in turn, prompted more visits. A flock of ladies from our beloved church in Virginia came down for one last visit.  Family members made special trips. Beall Phillips also came to see Denise. By this point Denise was fading fast. She asked insightful questions of her friends, but fell asleep in the midst of the answers.  I found myself in the unenviable position of having to ration her time.

Within a matter of days Denise’s visitor list multiplied by a factor of ten. The only difference was that she was gone. Scores of old friends said goodbye to a casket. I highlight this with the hope of not making anyone feel bad. We all have responsibilities and limitations. I can assure her friends that she never once asked, “Why hasn’t this one come to see me?” Instead I write to encourage you to choose the right hand. Go, and visit. Your loved one may fear more deeply that there is little hope. But that will be utterly trumped by the joy of seeing you.  “I must be dying or they wouldn’t have dropped anything to come and see me” is ultimately nothing compared to the joy of seeing you. And if God should bless, what a wonderful memory it would be if ten or twenty years later you could hear, “Remember that time you came to see me because you thought I was dying?”

The truth is, by God’s grace, that I have no regrets about anything. Everyone, childhood friends, relatives, pew neighbors, ministry associates, everyone has done wonderfully by us. We are so overwhelmed with the grace of others that our biggest burden is how to adequately say, “Thank you.” In the end we know we can’t, because the very source of all the kindness we have received is the same grace by which we are redeemed. You don’t repay that. You simply weep in thanksgiving.

So I ask two things. First, if you ever find yourself wondering, “Should I go?” The answer is “Yes, of course.” Second, receive not just my thanks, and the thanks of my children. But also receive the thanks of my dear wife. She is still grateful, on high. There is, among believers, no such thing as a “farewell tour.” There is instead only a “Until we meet again tour.”

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Ask RC: Should churches observe Sanctity of Life Sunday?

It is a legitimate and important question- the appropriateness of celebrating the incarnation, the celebration of Christmas. I believe it fitting and appropriate, but am in turn always uncomfortable disagreeing with brothers to my right. I understand their concerns, and appreciate their passion for the regulative principle of worship. On the other hand, one can not rightly argue that the birth of the Savior is off limits in the pulpit. The Bible talks about it, and so we may preach about it. Given that, I cannot embrace a position that suggests we can preach about it, but not in December. If we are allowed to preach the promises in Genesis, in Isaiah, if we are allowed to preach the first few chapters of Luke, it seems we ought to be allowed to preach them at any time of year.

The same, it seems to me, applies to not only the church calendar but to church history. That is, we can preach on the Lord’s triumphant entrance into Jerusalem and in turn about the resurrection, and so ought to be allowed to preach consecutive sermons on these events each spring. In like manner, if we are right that the Bible teaches the solas of the Reformation, it seems that it would be safe to preach on them the last Sunday in October. One is not, in so doing, becoming Romish in imposing a church calendar, or constructing holy days without biblical warrant. One is instead remembering the grace of God in space, and in time.

While the choice of December 25 as the anniversary of Jesus’ birth is rather dubious, we do know with certainty what happened on January 22, 1973. On that day the Supreme Court handed down its decision in the case Roe v. Wade. The nine men determined that every state had the duty to give women unfettered access to abortion up until the birth of the child. It was a day whose infamy overshadows December 7, 1941 in the memory of the church in America. Since that time perhaps 50, 000, 000 babies have been murdered in the womb with the full protection of the state and the knowledge of the church.

Abortion in America is, in the judgment of my very wise father, the greatest evil in our history. The American holocaust dwarves the evil of Nazi Germany in both numbers of the dead, and the numbers of we who know what is happening. Can we then impose an obligation that every pulpit should speak against this great evil on the third Sunday of every January? Of course not. The pulpit, like the bearers of God’s image, is sacred. We can not rightly impose any obligation not explicitly found in Scripture. We no more ought to impose Sanctity of Life Sunday on the church than we should impose the observance of the birth of Jesus.

On the other hand, Sanctity of Life Sunday is as fitting, as sensible, as reasonable as observing the Incarnation from the pulpit.  Just as we must preach the glory of the incarnation, sometime, if not in December, so we must preach the horror of this evil sometime, if not in January.  To be silent is to be complicit. It is to tell our children and grandchildren that we are as guilty as those Germans who knew, and were silent.  Of course our pews are filled with the guilty. The same is true of every sin we preach against. Of course the grace of God in Christ trumps even this great evil.

But the same Jesus who died for our sins calls on us to suffer the children to come unto Him. When we are silent, when we treat abortion as a mere social problem, a mere political issue, we expose our complicity. So preach faithfully. Proclaim not the sanctity of life, but the holiness of God, whose image the least of these bear. Call for repentance from the pulpit God placed under your care. Preach the same good news that He preached, that the captive are to be set free, that those marching toward death are to be rescued. Preach, and take the heat. For Jesus says such will make you blessed. Walk by faith, and preach by faith, in season and out of season.

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