Wrath = your right to be wrong.

For the Lord will not cast off for ever:  

But though he cause grief,

yet will he have compassion

according to the multitude of his mercies.

For he doth not afflict willingly

nor grieve the children of men. 

To crush under his feet all the prisoners of the earth, 

To turn aside the right of a man before the face of the most High, 

To subvert a man in his cause, the Lord approveth not.      Lamentations 3:31-36

The sport of calvinist/augustinian proponents is reprobate hunting.  They love to point out that their supposedly logical system demands that God pre-select certain people to go to hell in an unmitigated evil condition.  Notice it is that their logic demands it…not that God has stated that He will so behave in view of man and his problem of sin.  Ironically, these same calvinist imaginators (they have no right to be called “thinkers” since they dream in the realm of lies) will argue indefinitely that God can do whatever He wishes.  Except, of course, that He cannot do anything that is contrary to their imaginative system.  Instead of glorifying God in their expression of how He acts, they make Him their puppet.  Even in the foolishness of the calvinist theory of reprobation, they betray themselves as not knowing the heart of God: if the reprobate are condemned as a class, why has He made them each unique – like the supposedly pre-selected saved?

Verse 33 points out that God does not willingly cause affliction for humans.  The best translation for this verse is that He does not have the heart for it.  It is not a part of who He is to cause harm to His own creation.  It does not mean that He cannot bring discipline.  It means that He will not bring it without feeling it.  When the calvinist characterizes God as acting from a position of coldness and random inertia, he has ignored the truth of Scriptures that teaches that God keeps records and takes the time to visit with each person in judgment (Revelation 20:11-13).  The reason for this activity is obvious, each person is unique and God must explore what has happened in the life of each individual.  He does not condemn an entire class of peoples (what the calvinists call “reprobates”) by fiat but allows condemnation to work if humans choose darkness instead of light (John 3:19).

The wrath of God is often pictured as some relentless beating that God wishes to unleash upon all sinners.  Instead of whipping the sinners that deserve it (the reprobates don’t seem to count in this equation…), God whips His son Jesus instead.  The difficulty in this picture is that Jesus IS the wrath of God.  God’s wrath is best pictured as establishing the absolute standard for what is right and expecting all of creation to adhere to it.  To solidify His cause, He integrates Himself into creation and fixes that standard indelibly; signs it in His own blood, you might say.  God rejects any other attempts (pagan, legalism, etc.) to deal with Him apart from a Jesus deal.  This rejection is wrath.  The more deceptive and comprehensive the alternative dealers (satan and his minions) are, the more they are subject to the severity of eternal consequences.  Minions are not all angelic or demonic…some are human.  Even so, on the last day, God will pay them the compliment of their position in the created order by judging each according to the books.

The good news that the apostles began to preach by the power of the Holy Spirit was that the shed blood of Jesus on the cross was able to cleanse us of sins.  Because we are human, we have the right to stand before God and have the books opened as we are examined.  We have no hope that we will survive that examination unless the blood of Jesus has done its cleansing work in our lives.  We cannot invent systems of thought or imaginary scenarios that would, by the remotest possibility, lead people astray from the clear call of the Cross of Jesus Christ to come there for salvation.

Come to the cross.

Why look in there?

The heart is deceitful above all things, 
and desperately wicked: 
who can know it?   
I the LORD search the heart, 
I try the reins, 
even to give every man according to his ways, 
and according to the fruit of his doings.  Jeremiah 17:9-10

The illogical theological system that Calvin and his type concocted in response to their love for Augustine led them to draw stupid conclusions that they passed on for later generations of Christianity to explore.  People in the Dutch lands where the tulip grows most beautifully fell in love with Calvin and honored him with the T-U-L-I-P acronym that outlines the calvinist system.  The T stands for total depravity.  The calvinist types believe that man became utterly wicked when Eve ate figs in the garden and passed them on to Adam.  In their explanation of what mankind became, they grab for verses such as Jeremiah 17:9 to prove their case.  At first glance, it does seem to give credibility to their way of thinking.

 It is possible that we "Jesus above all else" believers would have to yield the floor to the augustinian/calvinist school of thinking if it weren't for the beauty of verse 10 that destroys the T of the TULIP.  If calvinist prophets are correct, then why is Jesus poking around in the human heart?  What is He in search of if, in His divine omnipotence (calvinists love to distract people from simple truth by using big words and grandiose notions to reinvent reality), He cannot remember that all humans are TOTALLY wicked.  You see, there is a difference between desperately wicked and TOTALLY wicked.  God knows the difference between desperate and total and, since He knows that depravity is not total, He visits His creation to offer a gift that will stir the heart of desperate humanity.

The heart of every human person was designed by God and built to respond to love.  The human capacity to love was not destroyed by sin and God considered that it was best to put Himself into His creation (Jesus is God) so that He could raise a banner to rally us to His Ultimate Love.  At the Cross of Calvary, God closed the deal on His pre-foundation of the world plan to draw the hearts of mankind to Him.  Having "John Three Sixteened" us all, He left us without excuse, knowing that we can only avoid the love of the Cross by deliberately closing our hearts to Him and investing that love in a foolish system.

The angels shouted and sang to humanity at the birth of Jesus.  God shouts and sings to us from the cross of the Unfailing Love that can heal every desperate heart.

Come to the Cross.

No Autonomy - chosen in the servant.

Isaiah 42:1  Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.

Isaiah 43:10  Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. 

Isaiah 44:1  Yet now hear, O Jacob my servant; and Israel, whom I have chosen:

Isaiah 45:4  For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me. (KJV)

Anyone see a pattern here?

When Calvin and people of that mindset began to imagine that they were more important than they were (what my Dad would call, "too big for their britches!"), they grabbed at an understanding of words from their OWN frame of reference instead of digging into the biblical context and gaining wisdom.  Full of knowledge of their own system of thought designed around Greek philosophy, they considered that the word "elect" could be used to describe how they were individually chosen by God for salvation.  There is no truth in the concept.  Paul does not support it.  The only way that anyone can make it work in the New Testament is to take out the prepositional phrases that the Apostles use:  "through Christ...by Christ...in Christ Jesus"...etc. 

The truth about salvation is that it is only available as a relationship with a servant of God.  The wonderful mystery that God designed before all worlds is that He became that very Servant and drew into Himself the work of all servants who had gone before Him in His own plan: Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, the 12 brothers, Moses, Aaron, Joshua, Samuel, Saul, David----------->Joseph, Mary, Jesus.  He then set in motion the plan to incorporate (the word means to bring into a body) everyone who has a relationship with Him into the church; "to the Jew first and also to the Greek (aka gentile)." Romans 1:16.

The beautiful thing about servanthood is that no one is exempt. NO ONE!!  Anyone can have a relationship with the Living God through Jesus Christ who is God Himself.  As one of us, -human- His expectation is that we will be conformed to life as He lives it...as a servant. (Luke 22:27)  His service to us is well understood in the way that He taught and behaved among the people in 1st century Palestine.  His service to us is best demonstrated by the Love that He exclaimed to the world from the Cross.  No one is exempt from the cross of Jesus.  Everyone must eventually do business there.  

Come to the Cross.

Above all else, guard your heart.

 The watchmen that went about the city

They found me,

They smote me,

They wounded me;

The watchers on the walls

They stripped my veil off of me.  Song of Solomon 5:7

Probably the most misunderstood book of the Old Testament is the Song of Solomon.  The most important difficulty is that most translators and interpreters establish the story along the lines of two principle characters: Solomon and the Shulamite virgin.  The reason that this problem exists is because translators refuse to properly render the Hebrew letters d-w-d as David.  Obviously, this rendering would introduce another character into the story that would make it more complicated.  However, when one reads the book of Ecclesiastes immediately before the Song of Solomon, the allegorical meaning of the Song becomes clear.  Solomon, knowing that he is profligate and unfaithful to the Lord, is able to point out his failure poetically by placing this virgin in “romantic” tension between himself and his powerful father, David.  The resulting story is a question to be answered by Israel; will you follow David with a heart for God or Solomon with all the trappings of religious power?

The tension in this book is poignant today in that there are religious ideas such as calvinism that are offered that seem wise and grandiose like Solomon.  The proponents of this system of thought strip away the heart of the loving God that is represented by David (1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22) to exalt an image of God that is derived from pagan and Greek sources instead of the Hebrew pasture.  If calvinism could work its will throughout Christianity, it would rewrite the Christmas story as the birth of Herod the Great’s grandson in a palace instead of the son of David in a manger.  The notions of calvinism are designed to reconstruct a city like the one administered by Solomon; heartless, pompous and apparently powerful but, in fact, a prison of man-made foolishness.

The prophetic character of the verse above shows the Shulamite virgin, supposedly the object of the king’s desire, being stalked and beaten by the administration of Solomon.  Watchmen, who are paid to protect the city from an outside threat, are imprisoning and terrorizing the virgin.  She is desperately trying to escape the walls of Solomon’s pagan city to pursue the vision of her beloved, King David.  She, like the church, is mistreated in the same fashion as her beloved, Jesus, Messiah, son of David the King (Romans 8:17). 

The trajectory of this story finds a landing place in a courtyard in Jerusalem where hidebound fools who deliberately ignored the heart of the Scriptures in favor of its ritual demands curse God by claiming that they “have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15).  The echo of this shout is punctuated by the sound of a hammer, driving accursed iron into the hands of God Himself (Jesus is God!) as the Savior completes the last details of a plan that was made before the foundation of the world.  The glorious promise made by God to all of humanity is that He has broken down the walls of Solomon’s city and opened the doorway of the cross to humble hearts that want to come home to a loving Father.

Come to the Cross.

Time for a trade-in?

Ecclesiastes 12:14 For God will bring every work into judgment, with every hidden thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil. (ASV)

 

Every believer should be able to picture the hidden things mentioned by Solomon in this verse.  After all, Jesus discusses the keeping place for the hidden things of man in Matthew 6:19-20.  The repository for our treasures has one of two addresses.  Either we are keeping our junk in our own backyards or we are storing treasures in heaven where their value cannot decrease.  Obviously, our own junk, stored on earth, will ultimately be burned up with all of old creation (2 Peter 3:10).  Our own lives, if they are entrusted to Jesus Christ and His saving power, are being stored away in the special heavenly place that Jesus is preparing (John 14:2-3).

 

The problem presented to the calvinist in this picture is to explain why there is any need for judgment at all.  According to Calvin’s defective imagination, God had to be perfectly efficient and could not create mankind without deciding in advance which of these creatures (who were intrinsically evil) He would choose to store away in heaven while allowing their personas to wander the earth for a short time.  Having made His arbitrary choice, He made Adam first to appear innocent and Eve to be not so innocent (you calvinists are intrinsically misogynistic…) and the rest is history.  Since the whole story is pre-programmed and, like evolution, cannot be anything other than what it will be (silly as a song by Doris Day), then there is no point in judgment since no one will do anything other than what he or she was going to do all along.  The calvinist joins with the foolishness that continues to be taught in pagan temples and halls of science throughout the world, trying desperately to explain to a lost world why their junk is really heavenly treasure.

 

The calvinist, in his ultimate foolishness, clings to old creation and tries to force himself to believe that he has found the back gate to the Garden of Eden.  Ignoring the biblical picture, they follow the teachings of a man who imagined vain things and then used propaganda to keep them from exploring the truth…no need for you children to “pry into the eternal counsel of God,” since Papa Calvin will take care of you at the judgment…good luck with that.  Where the Bible clearly teaches that old creation will be burned up (2 Peter 3:12), calvinist theology teaches that this old earth will be restored and they will return to the Garden.  The bad theology of the calvinist teaches that God is an anesthesiologist who inoculates them with peace and wakes them up from the bad dream that they had been down in the world, doing evil things.  None of their evil counts so, again, what in the hell do they mean when they talk about judgment?  Certainly not what the Bible means when it talks about hell and judgment…or heaven and judgment.

 

In the midst of this confusion, or the confusion of any pagan or neo-pagan system, stands the cross of Calvary.  The Cross establishes the standard that will be used to accomplish the judgment of the works of mankind.  The work that Jesus does on the cross establishes a revulsion for sin while maintaining an all embracing love for sinners.  How else can God accomplish the plan that He has worked out down through the ages to do away with sin by becoming sin for us? (2 Corinthians 5:21) The cross is the place where Jesus Christ extends an invitation to any and everyone to trade their sin for a new creation life.

Come to the Cross.

Pay attention to where you land.

Proverbs 11:31 Pay attention! If the righteous receive what is coming to them on earth, how much more (is this so for) the ungodly and the sinner! {Synthetic Version = a vernacular blend of 17 English language translations.}

Here is an example of a poor translation that only gets worse.  How in the world did anyone get the idea that the “ungodly and sinner” get what is coming to them on this earth? 

As a translator, the difficulty one faces is trying to make sure that the sense of what has been stated in another language is truly reflected in the new tongue.  ß Take a look at what I’ve just written and imagine that a translator into some other language focused on the word “tongue” from a technical perspective, the physical human tongue.  If that imaginary translator ignored the idea of “tongue” as meaning “language,” and shifted the meaning toward the tongue in someone’s mouth, the meaning would be skewed.  When the translators of 16 out of 17 of the versions polled for the verse in Proverbs (ironically, the New Living Translation was the closest to a correct translation…) chose to use the word “earth” for the Hebrew aretz, they ignored the falseness of the ultimate outcome of the verse’s meaning. 

Again, how on earth did anyone get the idea that the “ungodly and sinner” get what is coming to them on this earth?  There are millions of “ungodlies” and “sinners” that do not get what is coming to them on this earth.  In some ways, we as believers in Jesus Christ are forbidden from helping them GET what is coming to them…(Romans 12:19).  In some ways, we as believers in Jesus Christ are continually thankful that we do not always get what is coming to us on this earth.  (I am, of course, not taking a calvinist perspective where they postulate that no one actually ever does anything on earth but are robotically controlled by God to be totally ok or totally evil.  This idea is evolutionary and precludes any capacity for “humans” to deserve any recompense for their actions – especially since their actions just happen or were pre-programmed from before creation).

So, let’s rewrite the verse with the proper word for “earth.”

If the righteous receive what is coming to them in the land, how much more (is this so for) the ungodly and the sinner!

Now we have an opportunity to get at the meaning of the author by evaluating the poetry he is using.  When we consider that he is a Hebrew, then we can cast about for parallel verses that will help explain what he is saying.  There certainly are many that are excellent candidates.  My personal favorite is Ezekiel 26:20:

Then will I bring thee down

with them that descend into the pit,

to the people of old time,

and will make thee to dwell

in the nether parts of the earth,

in the places that are desolate of old,

with them that go down to the pit,

that thou be not inhabited;

and I will set glory

in the land of the living:

Obviously, there are two lands that stand in opposition to one another.  The land of the living where there is glory and everything that goes with the Glorious One. This land is not described.  The land of the dead is inhabited by its proper citizens, the twice dead.  They are twice dead because they were dead in their trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1-3) but refused to be delivered by Jesus Christ from that condition after he joined them in that land (Isaiah 53:12, Mark 15:28) to lead them forth to the Glorious One in the Glorious Land. By the way, His deliverance came AFTER the cross…not before old creation.  No doubt the idea that the author was trying to get at was that the repayment mentioned in Romans 12:19 would be final and appropriate. 

There is one place where any weary traveler on this earth who wishes to enter the rest that is promised in that Glorious Land may come.  Jesus Christ has made a way home through His death on the cross.

Come to the cross.

Up to Down, Left to Right.



He does not deal with us according to our sins,
           nor repay us according to our iniquities. 
For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
           so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;
As far as the east is from the west,
           so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
As a father shows compassion to his children,
           so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him.  Psalm 103:10-13 (ESV)

When Calvin made up his imaginary nonsense about pre-packaged reprobates that God made before He ever birthed them into the world, he failed to read this part of the Bible.  What part of "(The Lord) does not repay us according to our iniquities" did Calvin not get?  Hell bent on injecting Greek philosophy into his foolish notions of what Christianity is, Calvin ignored the Word of God.  Calvin decided that a revival of Gnostic stupidity that taught that a limited number of humans were injected with a "divine spark" would jazz up Christianity -- make it more fun.  The fun for Calvin was that he got to teach those who bowed down to him that they were DSR...Divine Spark Recipients.  Calvin was a pagan priest....just like his spiritual daddy, the medieval pope.

The picture that is imbedded in these verses is obvious.  What can be understood as the vertical perspective is seen in the "steadfast love" that connects heaven and earth.  Jesus preaches this perspective in John 10:11-18.  Jesus (Jesus is God) was on earth tending to the business that the Father sent Him to accomplish.  There was no separation between Them even though Jesus was constantly in a realm corrupted by sin and death.  His job was to establish His position as Shepherd.  Steadfast Love between heaven and earth makes salvation available for all who will enter into a relationship with Jesus.  It is not made available before then.
The horizontal perspective, "transgressions removed as far as east is from west" points to a work that we humans (none of whom are totally depraved -- according to the depraved imagination of Calvin) could never accomplish.  The hands of God (Jesus IS God) are nailed in an outstretched gesture that will not threaten (John 3:17).  He who became sin for us, takes sin away into death and beyond, returning to proclaim salvation accomplished in Himself (2 Corinthians 5:21).  Since no one is totally depraved, no one is excluded from having sins removed.  Whosever will may come.  The only place to which humans may come for restoration, salvation, forgiveness of sins and entry into the Steadfast Love of the Father and the Son is the cross of Calvary.

Come to the cross.

Jabbering nonsense...the Myah Myah factor.

We find the three friends of Job sitting with him at the end of a long discussion that seems to be weighty and important.  No doubt they are some distance away from his bad breath (19:17) but they had come to bring him comfort in his affliction.  When the Lord shows up in a whirlwind (38:1), He doesn't take sides with anyone in the discussion but poses a number of questions.

"Who are you people that are jabbering nonsense in the midst of an adult discussion?  Put your big boy Underoos on and play a round of divine Jeopardy with Me and We will see what you really know!" (38:2-3).

Look at how easily anyone can refute the nonsense of Calvin who claimed to know what the secret counsels of God were before the foundation of the world.  The calvinists want to make people believe that God chose them personally before the foundation of the world.  They also want to make people believe that they can tell which of us are rejects and refuse.  Notice, again, that their claim is that they KNOW what happened before the foundation of the world.

"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the world? Remind me of the discussion we had at that time..." (38:4). 

God invites Job to discuss the mechanics of creating the cosmos.  Implicit in His question to Job is that God did not take Job's perspective into consideration at that point in time since Job did not exist.  Humans are not eternal beings; we are adapted to the eternal realm in Christ Jesus.  Notice that God is not asking Job to step into the eternal realm and talk about things that happened before the foundation of the world.  He is talking to the mere man about the actual work of creation.  What happened before the foundation of the world cannot be discussed with mortals until later...until Jesus becomes one of us.

Calvinists go off the rails by making up fantasies about discussions in the eternal realm that they have never heard.  They have no more capability than Job to discuss the creation of the world, much less the "secret counsels" of God in "eternity past".  If you don't know where the corners of the earth are fastened, who can trust your calvinist Myah Myah about being personally chosen for salvation (or that the rest of us were personally chosen to burn in Hell) at a time when you and Calvin didn't exist.

When Jesus does come to mention the mysteries from the foundation of the world (NOT from before the foundation of the world - Matthew 13:35), they turn out to be parables: designed to be hidden from the members of the Myah Myah factory.  Jesus Christ is loved by the Father (John 17:24) from before the foundation of the world, chosen (Ephesians 1:4) before the foundation of the world, and established as the relationship by which humans may enter into the love of the Father (1Peter 1:3-20) before the foundation of the world.  No created or derivative human that was made by the merely human procreative process was hand picked by God before the foundation of the world.  To do so would bypass Jesus and what He was chosen to do.  Salvation is only made available to us in time (1 Peter 1:20).  That time came when Jesus shed His saving blood for all humans.  That time was the cross.

Come to the cross.

Woman Power and salvation.

And so we arrive at Esther in our journey through the books of the Bible that began on 14 July.
Esther is important to me personally because, when its pictures were applied to my heart by the Holy Spirit, I learned that Calvinism was nonsense and that I was a sinner in need of a savior.  I gave my heart and life to Jesus Christ in 1988 and began the long, slow process of learning Biblical Theology that is all about Jesus and the cross (Luke 24:25-27). 

Parable --

Most believers are familiar with some of the parables of Jesus.  It appears that an important part of God's teaching style (Jesus is God) relies on the use of parable.  Pay attention to the parables of Jesus and you will find very few that mention the name of God.  Implicit in His teaching is the fact that these parables are thoroughly valid pictures of how God relates to man and His instructions in the application of righteousness.

Calvin, in his foolishness and pride, despised many of the sacred things of God.  Calvin hated the book of Esther, ostensibly because the book neglects the use of God's name.  Notice that, using Calvin's way of thinking, most of the parables of Jesus should be set aside.  Thank God that Calvin and calvinists did not write the Bible nor select what the Holy Spirit wanted in it.

Esther is a powerful parable that is despised by Calvin and his calvinists because it makes their "theology" a lie.  Calvin taught that he had figured out how God chose those who were "elect" before Jesus died on the cross; even before Jesus created everything (John 1:3...Jesus IS God!).  Calvin taught that when God chose the "elect," all of those that were left over were automatically caused to be reprobates = worthless trash that was designed to help fuel the devil's hell (Matthew 25:41...this verse by itself shows Calvin to be a fool and a liar.  Humans were not designed for hell/reprobation).

The book of Esther clearly teaches that Calvin was not correct in his understanding of election and used his own imagination (like Joseph Smith) to establish the theory of a single decree by God to save only a few while damning the rest.  Calvin did not understand God's use of agency!  The universal decree by Haman that condemned all Jews is a picture of a comprehensive decree of damnation against humanity (Revelation 5:1-4).  Every one is included.  Everyone.  However, working through his agents, Esther and Mordecai, the king allows a new decree to be written that authorizes war in his own kingdom (Esther 8:7-11). A separate decree of salvation that does not negate the first decree.  What a concept!  Sinners in the Nail Pierced hands of a Loving God...Jesus is GOD!  Apparently Calvin wasn't taught this kind of divine thinking at law school.

Clearly, the agency of Esther and Mordecai is the agency of salvation for the Jews.  Clearly, this is a picture of salvation in Jesus.  Any one that is willing to stand with Jesus and fight for salvation is welcome.  The way of salvation for the Jews under Haman's death penalty was not available until Esther gave her life for her people (Esther 4:16).  The way of salvation for all of mankind was not open until Jesus gave His life (Revelation 5:5-6) on the cross and made it the place where whosoever will may come to enlist.

Come to the cross.

Mighty men are tried.

 

Nehemiah 4:14. And I made an inspection, and, being strengthened in heart, said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, “Be not afraid of them: remember the Lord, He who is great and fearful in power, and fight for your brothers, your sons and daughters, your wives, and your homes.”

Nehemiah surveys the strength of the enemies of the people who are rebuilding the city walls and realizes the truth about them…they outnumber his people dramatically.  However, he knows that the Lord God has given him a task to complete and that mandate outweighs the strength of his enemy beyond measure.  He goes on to provide outstanding leadership not only as an administrator, but also as a warrior and fellow laborer in renewing the strength of Jerusalem.  Every stone laid on top of the next is one less toehold that the enemy of the Lord’s people has in the city where the name of the Lord is invested (2 Chronicles 6:6). 

When believers in Jesus Christ are assembled spiritually, they are described by the apostle Peter (1 Peter 2:1-7) as being a house of living stones.  The first stone among them and to which they conform (in time…no one has pre-creation credentials except Jesus—God Himself!) is the elect/tried/servant stone of Jesus Himself.  Each stone that is laid in this building brings all of creation closer to the last day, the last moment: the invasion by the Lord God to save His people. 

Calvinists like to make up fantasies about the end of time as though it will arrive because something nebulous they call the “Kingdom” will spring forth from their legalism and the forces of evil will melt away -- somehow.  Jesus, they claim, will show up somehow and everyone gets to go home to the Garden of Eden… the garden has apparently been hidden away in Tibet or who knows where. Avalon?  Ragnarok?  Pahranagat Valley?  Meanwhile, calvinists prefer not to bother about building walls by somehow winning souls for Jesus.  They don’t seem to have much use for standing watch or fighting spiritual warfare against an enemy that has humanity’s destruction as its target; it must be that they consider humanity not worth fighting for…worth Jesus’ dying for – but that’s another story that only involves them and God’s top secret counsel.  Apparently when one has his salvation ticket punched in advance and is thankful that God will let him in on reprobate hunting as a lifetime sport, then it is unnecessary to fight for brothers, sisters, children, wives, families, homes and homelands.

God created mankind so that He could ally us to Him in the warfare prescribed against Satan and evil.  Some of mankind will get to “enjoy Him forever.”  They have no hope to enjoy Him at all when they build their own mighty fortresses (Isaiah 28:14-18) and try to wait out the devices that the enemy has in store.  The place to enlist with Jesus Christ and forsake spiritual evil is the cross.  The cross was provided to humanity so that everyone can have hope in a relationship with God through Jesus.  The cross was accepted by Jesus as the final crushing place of the living stone that is available to all of mankind.  The cross was blessed by the Father as the place where the limitless supply of sin cleansing blood can be found by all.

Come to the cross.

The Secret of Agency

Ezra 9:24-30. Ezra wisely deposited different parts of the temple treasure into the hands of a dozen priests.  Rather than loading a wagon and using twelve mules to pull the load, he trusted others to help him.  As agents, appointed to complete the adornment of the temple, these twelve men relieved Ezra of direct (and constant) responsibility for the treasure.  

God works through agency.

Abraham = agent of fatherhood

Moses = agent of legal administration

Jesus = agent of salvation

There are times when God is both owner and agent.  There are some things that cannot be accomplished through agents within the created order. Obviously, God must create without help from creation.  He uses His own raw material to work out the specifics-the stuff of creation.

The calvinian perspective is that God has no agents.  They believe that He has plenty of play actors (Greek word = hypocrite) who pretend to do things that are effective for God.  However, their ideas point to the notion that God does everything - absolutely everything - and nothing happens that He doesn’t do directly. (Unfortunately, this philosophy is precisely the same as evolutionary doctrine.)

If the calvinians are correct, God has made other human beings that appear to be just like them into worthless trash that could never be good in any way.  It doesn’t take much common sense to understand that what they really believe is that they are special and anyone that disagrees with them or doesn’t conform to them is worthless trash.  Since they have made themselves special they believe that God will rubber stamp their perspective.

God works through agency.

New creation cannot be accomplished from within the created order.  New creation was not accomplished at the time of old creation (or before).  In other words, no one was preselected to receive new creation (new means NEW- stop lying to yourself with restoration theology!) before the old creation was accomplished.  Sin, a key component of new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17-21), was not available until it happened in the garden.

Jesus Christ - agent of salvation - is God and man; creator and participant in the created order.  He, as firstborn from among the dead, provides the glorious treasure that is intrinsic to His entire being for all  mankind.  It is available to any clay pot on earth (2 Corinthians 4:6-7).  His only begotten and firstborn status can be poured like oil into clay pots - all they need to do is ask for it and accept it.  Jesus took the time to make himself available as agent of salvation at the cross. 

Come to the cross.

The Way is a way of walking...follow!

Solomon, the great king of Israel, finished the defining work of his lifetime by building the Temple for the Lord God and building Jerusalem into the greatest city of the world of his time.  The wealth of the nation can be well defined by noting that silver (1 Kings 10:21) was so common that it was worth the same as copper pennies would be to us.  The construction projects that Solomon undertook rivaled anything that was done in Egypt.  His power and influence, gained for him by the greatness of his extraordinary father, David, established peace in the land of Israel and throughout what we would call the Middle East.

The Lord God made a contract with Solomon in 2 Chronicles 7:17-22.  If Solomon would perform his side of the contract, the Lord God would make his throne continuous until the Messiah.  If Solomon turned away from the deal God made with him (which, of course, he did -- the king worshipped idols...1 Kings 11:4-7), then the temple of the Lord would be destroyed, the people taken into captivity, and the throne of David abandoned.

Notice that the consequences of the contract included the destruction of the Temple.  Surely this is a rather strange thing to promise.  After all, why would the Temple be hooked in with the throne of David and the works of Solomon?  Why was the fate of the Temple contigent on the faithfulness of Solomon?

The real answer comes from inverting the question.  What is it that Solomon was supposed to do in order to maintain the Temple in its authoritative condition?  Solomon was supposed to continue to wage war against evil.  By all accounts, the land had not been purged of idols or idolatry since Joshua and the Host of Israel crossed the Jordan.  Instead of destroying the idols and idolaters, Solomon eventually allowed idolatry to trickle into his life and the trickle became a flood (how does the incidental become monumental?? it grows!).  Meanwhile, he established what could be understood as a calvinian way of living..."I am ok because God chose me.  I don't have to bother with spiritual warfare as long as I am protected by the Temple and my father's faithfulness..."

The calvinian idea runs in the same riverbed as Solomon's.  God pre-selected them, they believe, and actualized their faith to make them sinless and perfect no matter what they do.  They are under no obligation to join with the balance of Christians who are challenging darkness as a choice.  They have wandered off the way of the cross and become entangled in the brambles of a ridiculous heresy that is based on the commandments of men (Titus 1:14); Augustine, Luther, Calvin, etc.  Salvation is something God does...or doesn't do...and they have no part in making that happen.  "We calvinians just need to sit here in smug narcissism and wait for God to make righteousness miraculously bloom at our feet.  Can't wait to smell the flowers of Eden."

The Way of the cross has no side paths that lead to a more "adult" understanding of God's plan that exempts the follower of Jesus (Jesus is God!) from doing the work He assigned.  All side paths lead to either brambles or cliffs.  Any side path makes the vision of the cross obscure.  The Holy Spirit only guarantees to keep the cross in view from the Way.  The Way of the cross leads home...a home that is new for those who are a part of the new creation.  No one is restored to Eden.  The door of Jesus (John 10:1-9) does not lead back to there, we must choose to move "further up and further in," so to speak.

Come to the cross.

Good news...it's New Creation.

 “Oh give thanks unto the Lord for He is good.

For His mercy endures forever.”  1 Chronicles 16:35 NKJV

Here is my question for the calvinist …

When does the mercy of God begin?

Think about forever.  Not from our perspective.  Think about it from God’s perspective.  If God is always, then doesn’t He have mercy always?  Forever, for humans, has a beginning point and it seems absurd that God, who has no beginning (or end), would need to have mercy before there was some object that requires mercy.  But this is the way practical, created people think.  I don’t need jumper cables when my battery is working properly. 

The problem for the calvinist is that he has bought into the bad philosophy (Greek, no doubt) that teaches him that he is an eternal being and has always existed.  Of course, somewhere in his unconscious, he realizes the ridiculousness of this idea but he has managed to shut the door to that part of the house.  If he could ever get that door open again, he would find that he is created and contingent like the rest of humanity and needs to depend on the provision of God in time.

God’s mercy was fully operational when he created the heavens and the earth.  His mercy was fully operational when He made everything that supported human life.  His mercy was fully operational when He made man in His Image (Jesus is the image of God (Colossians 1:15) so being made in God’s Image means that Adam was in a right relationship with Jesus…same as Paul saying that we are “in Christ” (1 Thessalonians 4:16) if we trust in Him).  God’s mercy was, is and always shall be fully operational because He is God and mercy is a part of His love.

Calvinist doctrine teaches that God had no mercy when He created because He preselected a number of humans that He arbitrarily wanted to destroy.  They were all just as human as Adam from whom they were derived and just as sinful as anyone else (except for the babies that Calvin, Luther and Augustine want to burn in hell – no mercy there…).  Calvinists believe that they existed before their birth and that God had mercy on them before creation.  They don’t have any pre-creation credentials (the Mormons will be glad to provide them with some) but they thrive on making up imaginary stories about reprobates that God hated because He has always wanted to.  Mercy, for the calvinist, only happens now and then…when one of them comes along.

Obviously, all of this calvinian way of thinking is derailed from what the Bible teaches.  There is not the slightest hint of biblical evidence that God hated reprobates before he created and that He fully intended to burn them in hell.  The Bible teaches that every human is subject to the same worthless condition (Revelation 5:2-3) due to evil and sin and death.  The Bible teaches that every human is loved by the God who gave His only begotten Son to provide salvation.  That salvation was worked out on the cross of Calvary – in time.  No one gets salvation credentials (or is blotted out) before the foundation of the world.  You cannot be registered in heaven in the church of the firstborn before the firstborn is risen from the grave (Hebrews 12:23).  The cross is the beginning point of the new creation. 

When God says it is NEW, He means new!

The cross is the beginning point of the new creation.

Come to the cross.

Oil of gladness

A lot of Christian people have bought into the unbiblical idea of constant (discrete) creation as opposed to immediate and enduring creation (analog) that is described in the Bible.  Constant creation establishes a God who is making everything constantly and making everything happen that comes to pass.  The reason that many people think that this is a good description of God’s way of doing things is because it is the way they would do it if they were God.  Obviously, the enduring creation way of doing things leaves room for trouble.  After all, the stuff that God makes might have the capacity to forget Him and do something stupid…or evil…or sinful.  You see, there are only 2 ways of looking at this situation if you believe in God.  Either the constant creation idea is correct and God becomes the author of evil, or, the enduring creation position is truly descriptive of reality and creatures are able to rebel.

A really good example of the idea of discrete creation is the Big Bang theory.  Attempts to make the Genesis description of creation fit in with the Big Bang cosmology are foolish.  It is like trying to make an elevator arrive more quickly by continuing to push the lighted button.  An analog result cannot be derived from a discrete condition. 

In 2 Kings 4:1-7 we find Elisha giving a widow the opportunity to save her children from captivity.  Her dead husband owed money and she has nothing with which to pay except to turn over her two small boys to the creditor.  The picture that results from this story is a wonderful image of salvation.  Certainly the widow saves her boys, but there is also the picture of how salvation works in the world.  The oil does not cease until the last vessel is filled.  There is more available but nowhere to put it…analog condition.  (The discrete idea would be that a certain amount was destined and was made during each nanosecond of the pouring – Calvinism and Open Theism).

Notice that the oil does not stop flowing after the fifth pot is filled and the widow has to return unused vessels to their owners. 

Notice that the prophet does not tell the widow to only fill the pots that have handles and skip the jars. 

Notice that the woman does not fill only copper vessels and leaves the clay pots out on the front porch. 

In her need and in her desire to save her boys, she is obedient to the prophet’s word and fills all.  The oil is still flowing when she calls for another jar and all have been filled.  Then “the oil stayed” (verse 7).  This incident is not a picture of calvinistic pre-selection.  “Whosoever will” may be filled with oil.  Salvation is abundant beyond the need!  Calvinists lie when they say there is only enough for them (assuming they can produce proof of their certification of eternal pre-selection…something that the Bible does not guarantee) and everyone else was chosen to go to hell.

Here is the problem.  The calvinist wants to have both types of creation operating simultaneously.  Discrete and analog.  When they need to prove a difficulty they have caused themselves in one area, they switch universes and have God bail them out.  Look at the idea of de facto sovereignty.  Calvinists want a God who is constantly making everything and, as a result, making them perfect from before creation and injected into this corrupt creation that is the fault of evil --- evil that came about as a part of the analog creation and for which God is not responsible.  When you boil it down, it is just a new expression of the old heresy of dualism.

Is there any way that humans can describe exactly how God made the oil continue when, scientifically, the amount in the original jar should have been all there was?  If we are incapable of describing how God makes something as simple as extra oil, how are calvinists so confident in describing who gets saved and who goes to hell?  Is their God big enough to keep oil flowing but has to put discrete limits on salvation to humans that He cares enough for that He will die on a cross (Jesus is God!!).  Oil from a jar can flow and flow…blood from His own body has to be measured out drop by drop to the pre-selected, exclusive, special ones that God lets in on the game of hating reprobates?

There is a place where blood has been provided to wash any and all of humanity from our sins.  Jesus Christ died on a bloody Roman cross to provide salvation for people that is only limited by the total number of people that live from Adam to the return of Jesus.  No calvinist knows that number.  They, like all others who obey Jesus, are under orders to bring vessels that can contain oil – the ministry of reconciliation.

Come to the cross.

Champion of sinners.

"Led her to the Soudan's right."  Spenser

Bathsheba is caught up in the web of an intrigue that David’s son, Adonijah, inflicts upon the family of the old king (1 Kings 1:5-27).  David had promised that Solomon would be King of Israel when he died but Adonijah decided to make himself king.  David, even though he is old and cold (1 Kings 1:1), is not dead.  Bathsheba and Nathan, the prophet, stir him into action and he delivers a stunning rebuke to his own son, Adonijah.

When Calvin used this scene to illustrate his idea of justification, he must have been watching some 2-bit 1950’s black & white movie made by an English lawyer.  David, the judge who is napping on the bench with his ridiculous wig askew, is finally awakened by Nathan – the attorney – and Bathsheba.  Hearing their case, the old man gavels and sends a writ of right to Adonijah who reads the verdict and surrenders himself to Solomon.  Calvin’s idea of justification is a courtroom trial where God, knowing that a sinner is a sinner, shrugs off that status because He arbitrarily wants to acquit the sinner of guilt

The real picture of justification that comes from this passage shows that David, man with God’s heart in him, orders a military and spiritual challenge to Adonijah: rebel son without a promise to act upon.

Jesus (who is God!) followed a predetermined plan (no other persons were included in that plan) by which He could, as God and man, hold the rank and title of Lord of Hosts.  First-born from among the dead (Colossians 1:18), Jesus Christ is qualified to lead the dead who will follow Him and be the human component of His Host – His Army.

Jesus Christ is your judge if you surrender yourself to His ability to champion your cause – your lostness and hopelessness and rebellion against Him.  His verdict against the rebellion of Satan must be military and spiritual – not a lot of foolish rhetoric and paper shuffling.  Jesus invites humans to join Him in spiritual warfare; the ministry of reconciliation.  The door opens at the cross.

Come to the cross.

X+Y= Calvin, too.

In 2 Samuel 7:10, the Lord promises to give the Children of Israel a place to dwell that cannot be invaded by the “children of wickedness.”  I thought about this verse all week and kept noticing that my thoughts were drawn away from the conflict and focused on what is the common denominator. 

Children.

Human children.

How do human children get into the world?  Is it a spiritual process?  A rational process?  A function of the soul?  Do people talk about children and they appear?  Are there storks involved…?  Do parents order them from the Sears Roebuck catalog?  (Yes…this was told to small children once upon a time.  No doubt the modern equivalent is that they are purchased on EBay.)  Can preachers preach them into existence or do politicians derive them from villages?

There is a biological process that requires male and female cells to combine and make human children.   These cells are manufactured in the bodies of the two human parents.  When they are combined together, they share all sorts of information packets that begins the whirlwind process (air head young people should not “sow the wind” without expecting to “reap the whirlwind”) of grabbing proteins and other stuff with which to build a baby.  The baby is a human baby.

I am sure this all seems rather obvious to everyone.  It may even seem rather silly that I contemplate such things at my age.  However, if you will look at the 2^nd sentence in the paragraph above, I think you may see something very remarkable.  Physical, biological cells are manufactured in the human bodies of two separate persons.  Because of God’s creative power that He introduced into the human organism (you cannot make a case for constant/continuing creation without bumping up against the seventh day rest = Genesis 2:2), the mechanism of sperm/egg combination works today as it did on day one of procreation. 

Please stop for a moment and pay attention to what I am NOT saying.  The end result of the procreative process in a world that has been and is ravaged by sin and death can be very different from the likeness of God in Adam/Eve’s creation and the likeness of Adam to which we are all subject (Genesis 5:3…most people who make noises about man being in God’s image refuse to remember that we who have fig juice in our veins cannot go home beyond Seth).  BUT, the end result of the combination of human sperm to human egg (aka, conception) always results in human life.  It cannot turn into a dog (sorry, Calvin, you are wrong) or an indescribable critter that will become a new species.

100 billion instances of this process later, we find that it has 100% repeatability.  There is no evidence that out of 100 billion sperm/egg combinations, 1% of them (one billion), for instance, became something not human.  Even in the 1 in 100,000,000,000^th instance of an egg that is divinely fertilized (Luke 1:35), the resultant person who has the right to call Himself the Son of God, uses the title, “Son of Man.”  Jesus is GOD!  

Point? 

Calvin and Calvinists have a philosophy of “muddy mysticism” (C.S. Lewis) that teaches that corruption (depravity) in the human being is total.  This corruption, they say, reaches into all parts of humanity.  This defilement, depravity or corruption, they say, is intrinsic in all parts of the body and completely ruins the body.

Oops.  Calvin forgot to tell God how to create so that the procreative mechanism in humans would be ruined when Adam and Eve ate figs.  How sad that, once again, his ideas prove to be foolish and unbiblical and his notion of the sovereignty of sin is greater than what he calls “God.”  How sad for him that there are other human functions that cannot be understood as corrupted.  Human reasoning has to be reliable (‘Bulverism’ by C.S. Lewis) for Calvin to make his monumental mistakes in theology and for others to try to show where they need correcting.  Rain falls on the unjust and just thinker alike.  

Meanwhile, Jesus is that one in one hundred billionth instance of the reliability of the procreative mechanism with only a sinful female component – virgin birth.  Jesus fulfilled the destiny that He had been assigned when He made it plain - in time - that new creation begins at the cross (1 Peter 1:20). 

Come to the cross.

Forced March at Midnight

Forced March at Midnight

For Dr. (Major) Shawn Madden, USMC, Retired,

and all those who said ‘Yes’ to the call to serve and command to go for their country.

This one is personal.

1 Samuel is dear to me in a way that only those who know me can understand.

40 years ago today, I was in my last week of Navy boot camp – Chief Traylor was our company commander.  At one point, I did 2000 jumping jacks to redeem the 20 point deficit in our “inspection being perfection” week…

Jabesh Gilead (1 Samuel 31:11-13) was a small place with a tiny biblical history.  However, it was important to King Saul.  It was the place where he had first experienced military victory as a young king (chapter 11) without the help or interference from Samuel that caused him grief in later life (For you Calvinists who can’t read what the Bible really says but have to come up with your own imaginary version, compare Saul as king with Deuteronomy 17 and dare to accuse him of wrongdoing.  Y’all need to find a new sport and stop reprobate hunting – it’s not a spiritual gift.)  The men of Jabesh Gilead, hearing the news that Saul and his sons had been desecrated, rose up and marched all night to rescue the dignity of their king.

This valiant act of love and kindness was not motivated by pre-determined forces of sovereign power that needed another small story to close out the book of 1 Samuel.  These men were motivated by the fact that, while they were yet outcasts in the land of Israel (Judges 21:8-15), their king loved them and threw aside his pastoral life to become their champion.  Saul – anointed by the Lord of Hosts – led the host of their brothers to rescue the small and weak and worthless (aka, practical forgiveness…).  “Greater Love” was demonstrated by Saul – “greater love” was returned by the warriors from Jabesh Gilead 40 years later.  The redemptive power of Jesus worked through His chosen servant, Saul, to restore honor and dignity to men whose faith followed their love.

Faith follows love.  God so loved the world that He saw a cross from the moment of creation – planned the cross to open a way.  The way of the cross leads home for those of us who are human and will respond to that love.  The Holy Spirit knows how to get the motivating Love of Jesus into our hearts.  It is up to us to allow that love to overflow into action.  Putting feet to our faith, we must 1. enlist with Jesus, our Captain, 2. challenge darkness, and, 3. rescue the perishing.  The ministry of reconciliation is our military unit in spiritual warfare (2 Corinthians 5:17-21).  Our headquarters has a door that is a cross.

Come to the cross.

How to become elect.

 

Ruth is blessed by the careful attention and the words spoken to her by Boaz. 

“The Lord recompense your work

            And a full reward be given you

Of the Lord God of Israel,

            Under whose wings you are come for refuge.”

                                                            Ruth 2:12

Ruth exemplifies the heart of the Living God who is alien to her.  She devotes herself to the mother-in-law she loves and transfers her trust to that woman’s family, land and Lord (1:16-17).  In order to bring an income to their meager household, Ruth works in the fields to harvest barley.  As she serves her mother-in-law, the people of that area observe the beauty of her devotion.  Her servant’s heart helps her gain favor with Boaz and, ultimately, wins her a place in the lineage of the Son of God, Jesus Christ.

There is a fundamental condition of servanthood that stands against the Calvinist world view.  Calvinism establishes a special class of humans that are considered to be elect or chosen.  Biblical theology establishes that this notion is incorrect and reminds the Calvinist that elect and servant are the same thing (Isaiah 42, 43, 44, 45…).  Calvinists need to be made aware that God (Jesus is God) established servanthood as the qualifying manifestation of the work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers (Luke 22:26-27).

Why servanthood?

Is there anyone that can be disqualified from serving?

           

Whosoever will – may serve.

            No special qualifications!

Lame, old, sick, wounded, privileged, abused, weak, strong, rich, poor, young, male, female… Anyone can pray.  Everyone can surrender.  No one is blotted out before the foundation of the world.  Whosoever will cannot be qualified by the ignorance of Calvin whose system of reprobation served his own psychology and undermined the cause of Christ.

Ruth – not born to the “elect” realm of Israel, teaches Israel about God’s heart and passes that legacy to her great-grandson: David = God-hearted King. (Acts 13:22) Servant.

Jesus Served mankind by coming to seek and save the lost.  He served mankind a blood-bought redemption.  He served out the penalty on a cross meant for me – meant for you.

Take up your cross and learn election.  You won’t find it by searching for what happened before the foundation of the world – that way is blocked.  There is only one way.

Come to the cross.