NOW AND FOREVER

See!  The home of God is with men, and he will live among them.  They shall be his people, and God Himself shall be with them.  Rev. 21:3, Phillips.

Picture this: A lovely wedding has taken place.  Candles were lit, vows taken, matrimonial cake shared.  The bride, wreathed in smiles, waves as she rushes away to enjoy her long-awaited honeymoon--apart from the groom!  Smiling indulgently, he sees his bride off, glad for her happiness.  Having made her secure in his love and financial support, he is content for her to spend the rest of her life free from worry, though they will actually see little of one another.

Absurd?  Of course.  But let's stop and think a minute.  In the metaphor of marriage with the Lamb, Christians anticipate more than an occasional encounter with God--though, in fact, some might be far more comfortable if He would be content to "see them off" to roam happily among the galaxies forevermore.  Heaven is a wonderful idea if only they didn't have to meet up with God very often--once a week in a worship service, perhaps.

Our text today says that God is going to make His home with us!  In other words, after the honeymoon (the millennium?) we are going to live together!  And not at opposite ends of the universe, either!  Those who find their times of communion with the Father to be their greatest joy on earth experience great agony in being separated from Him.  A bride and groom do not wait eagerly for their wedding day so that they may continue to live apart!  If they did, it would make no sense for them to consider marriage.

How, then, can it be so for some Christians?  Simply enough, they understood that the only way to live forever is through "marriage" to God.  Thus, it is considered a "marriage of convenience" in the hearts of many believers, rather than a celebration of the union of hearts.  The astounding part of this is that they secretly think that God feels the same way--that He has to take us because of the death of Christ.

In choosing the marriage metaphor, God wanted to portray Himself as eager to live with us!  "You'll be mine at last!"  He exclaims from heaven.  But only when our hearts burn with the same desire will He commence the wedding.  Then He will wipe away the tears caused by separation from Him.  And we shall be one.

ENOUGH!

So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow.  2 Cor. 2:7, R.S.V.

In Paul's tender pastoral letters to his friends in Corinth, we can see him "walk with them" through several stages of spiritual growth--stages that we can recognize by experience.  As with many new believers recently come from a very depraved world, they had lost some of their sensitivity to the hurtfuness of sin.  They were willing to tolerate something as destructive as incest within the body of Christ, incapacitated with uncertainty about how to deal with their friends in trouble.

When Paul appealed to them to deal decisively with evil in their midst, they were most eager to show themselves obedient to his leadership.  They dealt so harshly with the offender that Paul needed to write again, reminding them that restoration of the sinner is the ultimate goal.

But most of us would admit that this is the more difficult transition.  It is often easier to become indignant with sinners, particularly when we perceive their sins to be especially offensive, than it is to love them back into our fellowship.  When we see them tentatively approaching the church door, embarrassment on their faces and hesitant confusion in their steps, how easy it is to ignore them--sometimes with an obvious deliberateness.  We often justify our coolness by asserting that we do not wish to be thought of as condoning their sins.  More likely, we reveal our inadequacy in knowing how to love them dynamically, creatively, into wholeness.

Involved here is something very central to our witness about the character of God.  Where do so many people get the idea that God frowns at sinners, holding them off at arm's length until their reputation (by some self-wrought means) gets cleaned up?  Have they been watching us Christians?  Is this where so many people miss the central truth that we become whole only by being embraced by the Father?

Disfellowshipping a believer for obvious sin has the dual purpose of seeking to gain his serious attention and of announcing that the body of Christ does not embrace such behavior.  But how quickly the church must then act to clarify that God does not use rejection as leverage for character change!  It is our God who inspired Paul to plead with the Corinthians, "It is enough!  Now restore him."  Because that's exactly what God would do.  Let's embrace them in His name!

THE GOOD NEWS IN GOOD MANNERS

Love has good manners.  1 Cor. 13:5, Phillips

He had all the right answers.  He knew where the texts were in his Bible and understood a great deal about the original manuscripts.  Well-read in Christian literature, well-versed in current events, he was regarded as a theologian, though he held no degree.  Yet he was offensive in his manner of speaking to people.  He seemed more interested in being right than in being careful.

A Christian, she dressed properly enough.  Her skirts were an acceptable length, and her necklines were modest.  She didn't attend unseemly gatherings, and she taught her children to memorize scriptures.  Yet her conversation was sometimes less than appropriate, her manners slightly coarse.  She prided herself in the fact that her worldly neighbors counted her as "one of the gang," but she did not seem to realize that her compatibility came at the expense of deeper, inner virtues.

Paul states that "love has good manners."  How important are good manners in sharing the good news about our Father?  Is He not judged by the deportment of His followers?  God is love, and God has good manners.  When those who profess to follow Him display rudeness of any sort, or lack of finesse, they cannot help but stain God's character--no matter how properly they are attired or how many scriptures they are able to quote.  Lack of dignity reveals a lack of caring respect for others.  It's like serving the truth of God on the tip of a poisoned arrow.

Having good manners means far more than knowing which fork to use for your salad.  It is the whole presentation of a person in every setting and at all times.  And mannerliness does not end when one is out of the sight of others. Though a quality of inner dignity and outward composure that finds its best expression in deferring to other people, it also operates in total privacy.  When a person has a sense of personal worth, it is reflected in even the minutiae of life.

God is like this.  Go to the desert and see how perfectly formed are His tiny living things.  Who sees them?  Go to the sea and witness the extravagant detail of microscopic marine life.  Why does it matter?  Then go to your prayer closet and discover how careful He has been with every detail of your life.   Even when it didn't matter to you!

Friends, we can trust our lives to the Father!

JOY TO THE WORLD

You have given more joy to my heart than others ever knew, for all their corn and wine.  Ps. 4:7, Jerusalem.

"You just can't make a case against liquor from the Bible!"  Her telephone voice carried urgency and conviction, suggesting important personal reasons why she had to hold that point of view about alcoholic beverages.  Rather than trying to defend the Scriptures, I asked her why she felt it was so important to defend liquor, especially since I knew she had been raised a nondrinker.  "What do you seek to accomplish by it?" I asked.

"I feel better able to handle stress, to mingle with people, and to enjoy myself," she explained.  "It just gives me a good feeling after I've had a little wine."  We spoke for a while about the difference between the actual, real world and a chemically altered perception of the world.  I expressed my conviction that Jesus gives us strength and perspective to face life as it is, rather than "granting us permission" to pretend to escape from the demands of life through a chemical numbing of the brain.

But I could tell she was more than just philosophical about the matter.  She was frightened.  She was terrified about facing life's demands without the comforting illusions of adequacy that the bottle promised.  At the root of it all, she simply doubted that God could enrich her life with a quality of joy and confidence that was superior to her chemical buzz.  It was a crisis of faith, a concrete battle with the object of her trust.  But she thought she had already heard all the "religious answers."  She was one of the most talented, promising, and attractive of my schoolmates, and I was grieved to hear, several years later, that she had committed suicide.

Could it be that many people are drawn to the illusory joys of an increasingly drugged world because they have never tasted (as had David) of the kind of joy that God imparts?  Worse yet, could it be that many Christians don't know that God intends that they should know such joy?  When the angels sang, "Joy to the world," they meant it!  They were announcing that we should even now know the joy of being intensely loved, freely forgiven, personally guided, and richly enabled by our Father.  He pervades our problematic world with such hope and meaning that each succeeding conflict with the forces of darkness brings us new springs of joy.

IT DOES HAVE TO MAKE SENSE!

Grain must be ground to make bread; so one does not go on threshing it forever.  Isa. 28:28, N.I.V.

"Just do it!"  Tired of explaining everything to her 5-year-old, Mother had finally resorted to simply commanding.  "But it doesn't make sense!" lamented the young lad.  "I don't care!  Just do it!" answered his mother with a great deal of exasperation.  "It doesn't have to make sense!"

Ten year later it was Mother, referring to her son's wasted condition from drug use, who lamented, "But son, it just doesn't make sense!"  Turning to go out the door, he paused only long enough to mumble, "It doesn't have to make sense!"

Sometimes God asks things of people that seem to make no sense.  Some people reason that since God is an authority figure it doesn't have to make sense.  However, if you believe this, you have some exciting things to learn about Him!  God's actions are full of integrity, and they make the very best sense!  The times we have difficulty finding meaning in our circumstances may be when our ability to analyze and appreciate the larger picture--the reality that encompasses more than just our personal areas of concern.

Our text today reminds us to consider the larger picture.  "Grain must be ground to make bread; so one does not go on threshing it forever.  Though he drives the wheels of his threshing cart over it, his horses do not grind it.  All this also comes from the Lord Almighty, wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom" (Isa. 28:28, 29, N.I.V.).  If we were to focus solely upon the grain with no thought of the sweet-smelling bread that would result, we might wonder at the whole process.  Why crush wheat?  In what manner should it be crushed?  And, with no understood objective, timing becomes distorted: What is too long and what is long enough?

Our loving Father's wisdom is magnificent!  We may trust that He is able to handle all the intricate details of "the larger picture" without diminishing a single individual or minimizing anyone's specific needs.  We may know that His actions, or apparent lack of them, are precisely chosen and perfectly accurate in every circumstance.  Whether He allows us to experience painful consequences or moves to alleviate our distress, we may know with perfect confidence that God has chosen the most sensible option.

MAKING A NATION GREAT

And what other nation is so great as to have such righteous decrees and laws as this body of laws I am setting before you today?  Deut. 4:8, N.I. V.

We often hear news reports of "bloodless coups d'etat," in which some country's government has been overthrown by key people within its own ruling class.  These self-asserted leaders, who sometimes turn out to be national heroes to succeeding generations, usually claim their right to take over the government because the previous leaders were mismanaging the country.  They claim to offer a better form of government.

That is  precisely the charge that Lucifer brought against God when the rebellion began in heaven!  Though Lucifer's coup attempt was not successful, God did not count Himself to be victorious simply because He had removed Lucifer and his followers from the seat of government.  Questions had been raised that would linger in the minds of all of those who lived within God's realm.  Since God relishes free, thoughtful loyalties, won without force or coercion, He had but one option.  He had to demonstrate the actual superiority of His government so that His people might make informed choices to live with Him.

We earthbound children of the King are also invited to cast our own votes--indeed our destinies--in this great conflict.  But we who live such short lives, who operate with such a miniature reference point, who barely comprehend what we see (much less the unseen), and whose thought processes so readily get lost somewhere between "cause" and "effect"--how shall we see the government of God in operation, that we might properly cast our votes of loyalty?

Our Father, who has always specialized in parables, has given us an acted parable, a lived demonstration tailored for our level of understanding, of the government of God.  He has given us principles for human government that, when put into practice, give us glimpses of His goodness.  Admittedly adapted for sinful people, these principles still demonstrate God's respect for each one's personhood, dignity, and freedom.  They exalt the power of love and cooperation, and offer provision for restoring the errant.  Revealed most extensively through Moses and richly amplified by Jesus Christ, these principles for human government are clearly the best that this sin-burdened planet could ever know.

God's desire for Israel, and for all who find His government to be wise and gracious, is that all nations should come to know the greatness of a God who governs so wonderfully.

LEARNING TO LOVE REALITY

If it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?  1 Peter 4:18, N.I.V.

You know them.  They live lives in mortal fear that they will do something to merit God denying them eternal life.  They continually measure the hems of their garments and spend hours reading labels in the supermarket.  Their libraries are full of books that admonish, their cupboards reflect a careful sterility, and their sleep is like that of one on death row who has been granted only a tentative reprieve.  Yet they say that God loves them.

Perhaps they have read today's text and shuddered.  But, friends, Paul is not saying that it is hard to be saved!  He is addressing the attitude of believers who act as though it is.  In verse 12 he begins, "Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trial you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you" (N.I.V.).  It is not strange that we who are in this world should experience hurt--Jesus Himself did.  This world is a hurtful place because it has rejected the One who is the source of all goodness and love.  That is reality.  If we do not accept this reality, feeling that our connection with God should somehow prevent any further hurt done to us, we will never experience being "overjoyed when [God's] glory is revealed" (verse 13, N.I.V.).  The revelation of who God is, is inextricably connected to that very reality--and if believers have a hard time experiencing joy over God, "what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?"

Paul's advice is that we should "commit [ourselves] to [our] faithful Creator and continue to do good" (verse 19, N.I.V.).  We need not be dismayed by the trials of this life and the hurt that inevitably follows.  We may learn to love even painful reality because of the larger reality of who God is.  In seeing His commitment to salvaging every fragment of our hopes in hopeless situations (without compromising the personhood of any individual), we experience comfort.  In realizing that we are exposed to grief, not because of some inadequacy on our part (or God's!) but because of God's reluctance to manipulate circumstances, we find peace in knowing that He will never manipulate us.

Let us make a firm commitment not to let our relationship with the Father look so unpleasant and tenuous that we turn away those who do not yet know Him.

NO HANDLES OUT

When he was abused he did not retort with abuse, when he suffered he uttered no threats, but committed his cause to the One who judges justly.  1 Peter 2:23, N.E.B.


Some psychologists speak of us as having "handles" sticking out--those vulnerable, sensitive areas of our lives by which other people can influence us or even control us.  Like the handles sticking out from a pot on a stove that people can bump or grab, our feelings and actions often are controlled by people touching sensitive areas.

For example, I am feeling unsure about my slightly chunky appearance, yet it means a great deal to me that others view me as attractive.  An admired friend makes one small, negative comment about people who are overweight, and it sends me straight into an unhealthy crash diet.  Or one of my colleagues on the job stifles a yawn while I am expressing an opinion and I become darkly discouraged, even unwilling to talk, nursing my bruised sense of self-worth.

While He walked among insensitive men, Jesus was a perfect example of one who had no "handles" out.  There was no way in which the abuses, the attacks, or even the unintentional snubs of petty people could cause Him to lose His composure.  His stability did not result from other people always treating Him properly, but from knowing that He was loved by His Father.

Jesus, "knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God" (John 13:3, R.S.V.), was able to minister to the needs of His disciples.  What a challenging insight!  The one who most securely knows that he is a child of God really is the most adequate, the most secure, person.  He does not need to boast, to create status positions for himself, or to defend himself against someone else's false views of him.  He knows who he is and can now help others discover how valuable they are too!

The means by which Jesus cures our offensive attitudes and actions are not religious mysteries.  He knows that we do most of the stupid things we do because we are frantically trying to prove to others and to ourselves how valuable, how worthwhile, we really are.  With nail-scarred hands extended, with embracing arms, He comes to us announcing warmly that we are His children, purchased at a great price.  What healing love this is!

WHO SHUTS THE LAST DOOR?

Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy.  Rev. 22:11, R.S.V.

For more than six thousand years God has done everything His creative mind and loving heart could do to get evildoers to stop doing evil, and the filthy to become pure.  Then with equal energy He has worked with the righteous to help them remain in that vital relationship with Himself.

How strange it is, then, to hear Him speak the utterly final words in today's text.  He declares that a solid wall exists between the evil and the holy, and that it shall not be crossed from either direction.  Does this mean that God Himself has slammed the door on repentance or turned His back on free choice?  Or has He run out of patience with the increasing wickedness of a sin-sick planet?

God spoke of a time when the people of this planet with have sorted themselves into two groups: "For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the people; but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you" (Isa. 60:2, R.S.V.).  In Bible symbolism, "light" represents truth about God and "darkness" stands for error or deception about Him.  Into a world that presently lives in various shades of gray, God will send increasing beams of intense, winsome truth about Himself.  And people must respond.

Those who choose to be enlightened by that truth will be marvelously changed by it!  Their spiritual capacities will be enhanced, their characters more and more transformed into the likeness of the One they love to behold.  They will become so resolutely settled in their unshakable loyalty to God that no deception of the enemy could turn them away.  They will not change their minds.

Something equally powerful happens to the minds of those who turn their backs on truth.  According to Paul (see Rom. 1:18-23), they become futile in their thinking and their minds become darkened.  Claiming to be wise, they become utter fools until they cannot change their minds.  At that time God will announce that the time for choosing is over, not because He has arbitrarily shut it down but because everyone will have made final choices.  No one will be changing their mind!  The righteous will not; the wicked cannot.

DOES FAITH TWIST GOD'S ARM?

Then Jesus answered her, "O woman, great is your faith!  Be it done for you as you desire."  And her daughter was healed instantly.  Matt. 15:28, R.S.V.

There is hardly a parent whose child was seriously ill, who didn't feel, with this ancient Canaanite woman, an intense desire for divine healing.  She has, in fact, been lauded as a model of faith in that she persisted in asking for Jesus to heal her daughter even after He apparently put her off.  But what mother, with the very life of her child hanging by a slender thread, would have given up quickly?

Unfortunately, this encounter between Jesus and a tenacious mother has sometimes been interpreted as the way in which one's faith is used to extract favors from God.  Some assume from this story that the woman's faith somehow coaxed Jesus to do it for her.  This seems to confirm the misconception held by too many that if one asks for a specific miracle and it is not granted, this is because one did not have sufficient faith to "twist God's arm" and obtain the blessing.  This has led to a great deal of needless self-depreciation and distress in the presence of God.

Actually, the actions of Jesus in this situation reveal some precious qualities about our God.  Rather than being imposed upon by the Canaanite woman, He had actually traveled a great distance out of His way just to be available to meet her need.  His apparent indifference to her need drew His prejudiced and indifferent disciples into understanding the hurt such attitudes can inflict.  By healing her daughter, Jesus rebuked the insular narrowness of the Jews.

Jesus' love for this unnamed woman's daughter was matched by His eagerness to let this woman reveal a priceless quality of faith.  She had heard about Jesus' ministry and teachings, and she responded by placing her full confidence in Him.  This confidence led her to Him with her request, but her confidence was not based on His response to that request.  She adored Jesus because of who He was, not because of what He would or would not do for her.  As with Job, her trust in God was based on something larger than her personal circumstances.  For Faith is not the Christian's "inside track" to obtain special favors from God.  It is trusting God for God's sake alone!