Toby J. Sumpter's Blog, page 13

Food & God

The first thing that God pointed out to Adam in the Garden was the menu: all the trees He had created to make food for the man. From the beginning, even in a perfect world, God wanted Adam to think of his relationship to God in terms of food and hunger and satisfaction. When Adam disobeyed and rebelled against God it was eating the wrong food at the wrong time. 

Later in the wilderness, Israel wrestled with God, again often with food: complaining about water, manna, and quail. When Jesus came, He fed the five thousand and the four thousand, and He said that He came down from Heaven as the true manna, the bread of life, that whoever ate and drank of Him would live forever. And He gave us the Lord’s Supper so that we might eat and drink and fellowship with Him until the end of the world. 

God has always presented Himself to us as our food. There is something about hunger that is meant to constantly teach us about our need for God. This is why fasting and feasting have always been integral parts of walking with God. You naturally think about food and drink multiple times a day. You tend to measure your days by meal times. 

All of this is meant to teach us that we need God like that. Just as you feel the physical hunger for physical food, you are to understand that you need God’s presence in your life constantly. How can you fight sin and glorify God continually? By communing with God constantly. Throughout your day, pray things like: “Lord, since you are with me, help me honor you now and always. Lord, grant me the grace to remain in Your presence and help me bring glory to your name in this task. Lord, please be with me now so that all that I do may be an expression of love for You.”

God invites you to think of Him as your food. And therefore, as you think about food, think about God. Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. So come and welcome to Jesus Christ. 

Photo by Victoria Shes on Unsplash

A Marriage Tune Up

Eph. 5:22-33

Introduction
As we begin a new year, it’s worth reviewing the most basic assignments we have in our marriages. The central paradigm is the gospel, and the central duties are love and respect: husbands are commanded to love their wives and wives are commanded to respect their husbands. The question is not whether your marriage is talking about the gospel; the only question is: what is your marriage saying about Christ and His Church? 

As with many of these things that we hear often, it is incredibly important that we determine by God’s grace not to be merely hearers of the Word but doers. And this means focusing on your assignment and not hoping your spouse is getting the memo. Of course a message like this can be a good conversation starter, but the focus should always begin with dealing with yourself first (eg. logs in eyes, etc.).

The Text: “Wives submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and He is the Savior of the Body…” (Eph. 5:22-33).

Summary of the Text
The Bible teaches that marriage is one of the central pictures of the gospel (Eph. 5:23-25, 32), and therefore generally speaking, the state of marriage in a land will tell you a lot about the state of the gospel in that land and therefore the state of that nation. Alexander de Tocqueville said, “Of the world’s countries, America is surely the one where the bond of marriage is most respected and where they have conceived the highest and most just idea of conjugal happiness.” Elsewhere he says, “It is in regulating the family,” that religion “works to regulate the state.” Many Americans want our nation to return to Christ, but they do not understand that faithful marriages are central to that project. 

This gospel is embodied by a wife submitting to her own husband as to the Lord Jesus (Eph. 5:22), and each husband taking responsibility for his wife just as Christ does as the head of the church (Eph. 5:23). This means that a wife is to obey her husband as the church obeys Christ in everything (Eph. 5:24). And husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church, laying down his life for her efficaciously, making her pure and holy (Eph. 5:25-27). This love is exemplified in the way a man cares for his own body, nourishing and cherishing, again, just as the Lord does the Church (Eph. 5:28-30). A man leaves his father and mother to become one flesh with his wife, and this is all a great mystery that proclaims Christ and the church (Eph. 5:31-32). Therefore, since the stakes are so high, a man must love his wife, and a wife must reverence her husband (Eph. 5:33).  

Husbands Love
The command is for husbands to love because men need to be reminded to do this and because it is what a wife particularly needs. A man more naturally tends to respect, but that is not the particular command given. Christ is the model of this love, and what the Bible particularly points out is the duty of taking responsibility for her as her head and sacrificing for her good (Eph. 5:23, 25-27). This requires you to understand the difference between responsibility and guilt: you may not be personally guilty for some sin of your wife, but you are responsible for all of it, just as you may not be guilty for some injuries in your body but you are responsible (Eph. 5:28). Christ is the only One who had the right to claim innocence, but He took responsibility for us.

This love also requires thoughtfulness about your wife’s needs. You are not to love her aimlessly. You are to love like Christ, which is to say efficaciously. You are to give yourself for her to make her more holy and pure (Eph. 5:25-26). And you are to do this in order to present her to yourself more glorious and lovely, just like Jesus does (Eph. 5:27). Loving your wife well doesn’t mean doing whatever she wants; it means doing whatever it takes to make her a better woman. 

Wives Respect
The command is for wives to respect because women need to be reminded to do this and because it is what a man particularly needs. Women tend to more naturally love, and while that is certainly good (Tit. 2:4), the particular command is for wives to respect (Eph. 5:33). And this is also a word for single ladies: your standard for a man needs to be not whether you do or could love him; your standard needs to be: do you respect him? 

What is respect? Respect is honor, looking up to, thinking highly of, including the kind of trust that willingly submits to and obeys (Eph. 5:22, 24). Just as we live in a world that despises fathers; we live in a world that despises true husbands. And unfortunately many Christian women feel free to dishonor their husbands openly, making fun of them, talking them down, complaining about them, or simply being difficult for them, and it is often all dismissed with the hand-waving excuse, “oh, but I love him.” However, the example a woman is given is the obedience of the church to Christ. How would you have the Christian Church submit to Christ? Then show the world in your submissive respect for your husband. 

Fellowship Multiplied
This love and respect is designed by God to result in a glorious unity and fellowship. But sin has twisted every son and daughter of Adam, and the curse has particularly attacked marriage, creating tension and hurt where there was none before (Gen. 3:16). This is why the only way for a marriage to have true Christian fellowship is by the blood of the Lamb: “If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:7). If this is true of Christian fellowship in general, it is most certainly true of Christian marriage in particular. So keep short accounts. Have no backlog of sin or bitterness between you and your spouse. Confess and forgive: that is how the blood of Christ cleanses you so you can walk in the light in fellowship (1 Jn. 1:9). 

But the other thing to underline here is that marriage fellowship is one of the primary contributors to all fellowship. What you are sharing with one another is either true Christian fellowship (koinonia) (1 Cor. 10:16, 1 Jn. 1:3) or else it is some kind of Satanic, pharisaical cancer. You are one with your spouse, and when you come here, you are sharing that with one another (1 Cor. 11). This fellowship is what you are multiplying with your children. And this is why our nation is in the state that it is in: our homes and marriages are often toxic cesspools.     

Conclusions
Never forget that these instructions come as part of the great “therefore” of Ephesians 4:1. We love because He loved us first. We work because we are His workmanship (Eph. 2:10). Which is to say that all of this is only possible by God’s grace. But grace is not something vague, like a Christian version of “luck” or “good vibes” or random windfalls. Grace is the personal favor and blessing of God in Jesus Christ. It begins with His personal forgiveness, but it also includes His personal gift of the wisdom and power to obey all of His commands: we stand in His grace (Rom. 5:1-2). Standing in His grace is like standing on the gold metal platform at the Olympics (only infinitely better). And it’s in that state that God calls you to love your wife or respect your husband. 

There are particular strengths and glories that men and women bring to the world, and they take shape as men take responsibility and love their wives and as women submit to their husbands and respect them. Harmony is not the result of everyone singing the same music. Harmony happens when each part sings the part assigned to them. And incidentally, you can’t sing your part well while trying to get your spouse to sing their part. You will encourage them the most to sing their part when you delight in your part the most. 

And this is the kind of harmony that builds Christian nations. 

Photo by Marc A. Sporys on Unsplash

That “Conservative” Bathsheba Calendar

Introduction
So then, Ultra Right Beer has released a “Conservative Dads Real Women of America” pin-up calendar – you know, twelve months of PG-13 cleavage, swimsuits, and slightly naughty poses in the kitchen. But don’t worry. It’s all completely “conservative” cleavage. None of those boobs ever voted for a democrat. But of course that is what these so-called “conservative women” are being presented as: boobs and butts and legs. Oh, and apparently one gal has guns. And all absolutely REAL, we are told breathlessly by the used car salesmen. And at the very same time, if those insults weren’t enough, piles of “Conservative Dads” are being mocked as nothing but cocks.

OK, maybe that’s not all they are, but the clear message is that a little bit of lust is just fine. A little bit of lust is human. A little bit of lust is conservative. And if you have a problem with this little bit of lust, you’re probably jealous or you’re a fundamentalist neanderthal or both. And we can’t win with puritanical prudes like Jenna Ellis or Meg Basham and Allie Beth Stuckey. If conservatism doesn’t have a little bit of lust it will be the party of nerds and losers.    

Not to be left in the dust of Mammon, Zondervan quickly announced that they have a “Conservative Dads Real Women of the Bible” devotional calendar releasing shortly, featuring Bathsheba partially submerged in her rooftop bathtub on the front cover with the verse “I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys” (Song 2:1). 

Ok, not sure about the Zondervan calendar, but the Ultra Right Beer calendar is real. Real lame, but I digress. UItra Right Beer was launched last year by one Seth Weathers apparently as a response to the Bud Light suicide commercial featuring the crossdressing gonzo Dylan Mulvaney up to his waxed chest in a bubble bath. While folks familiar with the conservative world will recognize a number of the names of the women who chose to have their bodies ogled by conservative lust, the one that is likely to register to most folks is Riley Gaines, the former NCAA competitive swimmer who has courageously objected to men participating in women’s sports. The calendar even heralds its own virtue by donating 10% of the profits to the Riley Gaines Center to protect women’s sports “from extreme leftist ideology seeking to destroy real women.” 

This is like a Cancer Society calendar celebrating chain smoking. This is like an NBA basketball calendar with twelve months of midgets. This is like a Drivers Ed calendar for Conservative Teens with twelve months of pictures of teens happily drinking and driving. This is like calling government money for private schools “school choice.” Heh. You can’t fight extreme immorality with a little less immorality.

El Problemo                                                          
Seth Weathers responded somewhere with a picture of a woman in a hijab, only her eyes showing, saying that having heard all the complaints against “calendargate,” this Muslim lass would be the January 2025 model. Jenna Ellis vocally condemned the calendar and received all kinds of ridicule, including piles of normal pictures that she has posted of herself doing ordinary things. And regardless of whether I would have personally recommended every one of them (having a pretty overactive pastoral vibe-o-meter on selfie-posting), there is nevertheless a massive difference between a photo op of Bathsheba in her skivvies on the rooftop and the occasional selfie on the run. And this is why conservatives, up to this point, really can’t have nice things.  

Amid the cries that there’s nothing wrong with a little cleavage, what are you, some kind of pervert? Another good woman protested that the calendar was clearly celebrating the sexualization of these women rather than celebrating their true glory: motherhood and homemaking — where are all their children and strollers? And then, as if to prove that the point of the calendar was in fact lust, a Twitter mob began shrieking as though she was suggesting that children be included in the lust calendar. Ah. So the point is lust, then isn’t it? You can’t have it both ways. Either the point is sexual or it isn’t. And it clearly is. 

As I have pointed out previously, there are many on the conservative right who are not really interested in conservatism; they just don’t want the extreme excesses of the left. They want to return to a point earlier in the story where no one knew that the seeming nice man (introduced in chapter 3) was actually a grotesque villain (as came out in chapter 7). But the problem, el problemo, as we call it in the biz, is that this is like running the wrong way up the escalator and thinking you have solved some significant problem. But at best you’ve only delayed the inevitable outcome. You cannot deal with gross immorality by returning to an earlier stage of the lust. You cannot deal with a mass abuse psychosis (with thousands of middle school girls contemplating hormone suppressors and mastectomies) by returning to an earlier stage of the grooming. What is needed is full repentance. The sin must be repudiated utterly.

And yes, the grooming was the pinup calendars of the 1950s. It was the grooming of lust that said you can harbor adultery in your heart and that won’t impact your families, your churches, or your nation. And here we are, a near corpse of a nation, like the concubine raped all night and left for dead at the Levite’s doorstep, and these so-called conservatives want to go back to the beginning of the night with the cat calls and leering looks. Of course many Christians cannot even fathom really going back to the 1950s. Many Christian communities would be horrified for one of the ladies to show up to a church picnic in her bra and underwear, but if there’s water within hundred yards, feel free. And if you don’t act like a stripper like all the other girls, you’re probably a Islamofascist. And many “Christians” for fear of being thought weird, buy the $90 scrap of fabric that publicly proclaims you’re primary value is sexual. And incidentally, that has been happening for decades as women have been convinced that they have to sacrifice their modesty in order to swim very fast and win medals. We invited the lust of men into women’s athletics a long time ago with many of the required uniforms.

It’s actually been quite encouraging to see all the pushback on this calendar. 1950s “conservatism” is a dead end. Jesus said that adultery begins as lust in the heart. Men and women who do not honor the marriage bed and marriage vows and Christian modesty cannot be trusted to honor their vows to uphold the constitution or anything remotely resembling biblical justice or prudence. 

Collision of Religions
What we are seeing in real time is the collision of two rival religions. One is the religion of the Enlightenment that introduced a fundamental bifurcation between ultimate, transcendent truth, goodness, and beauty and this world’s public good, and Christianity, which says that you cannot have public good apart from transcendent truth, goodness, and beauty. One says you can have freedom and happiness apart from Christ, and the other says, how’s that working out for you? In other words, modern secularism has claimed that you can believe whatever you want privately and practice whatever faith you like in your heart or in your free time, but when it comes to the public square and the public good, everyone must assume neutrality and agnosticism. And that means, that you can do whatever you want in your private life, including lust, including adultery. But you can’t practice lust in private and get fidelity in public.

But if the resurrection, ascension, and gift of the Holy Spirit is anything, it is the public announcement that Christ is King of this world. This is the dominant message of the book of Acts. What the public officials did out in public, God reversed in public with many witnesses: “Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain; whom God hath raised up… This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses. Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear” (Acts 2:23-24). 

The message of the Christian Church is the message of Pentecost, and it is a public message for all to see and hear. It is a message of repentance for all: kings, judges, senators, law enforcement, business men, pastors, seminary professors, journalists, brewers, and everyone. The son of David has been coronated King, and His throne is in heaven, over all kings and lords and authorities. 

In other words, there’s a sense in which we will either have the obscenity of Christ in the public square, or else we will have every other kind of obscenity in the public square. 

Conclusion
In the early 1800’s, Alexander de Tocqueville wrote, “Of the world’s countries, America is surely the one where the bond of marriage is most respected and where they have conceived the highest and most just idea of conjugal happiness.” Elsewhere he explains how he sees religion having its most significant impact on the state: “It is in regulating the family,” that religion “works to regulate the state” he wrote.

Many Americans want our nation to return to Christ, but they do not understand that faithful marriages are central to that project. And the only way to have faithful marriages is for every form of lust to be repudiated and repented of. This does not at all mean a nation of hijabs. What a silly argument. We are Christians. There is a colossal difference between the adorning of a godly woman who is not hidden under layers of burlap and a striptease on the sidewalk or a calendar. 

Technology is a Tool

Technology is a tool, and modern communications technology is no different. Cranes and bulldozers are tools for lifting and carry heavy objects and moving earth. Smart phones and messaging and texting and social media platforms are tools that make the heavy lifting and moving of words and communication easier. So all by themselves, tools are gifts from God, and therefore the fundamental question is: what are you using them for? You can use a crane with a wrecking ball or a bulldozer to break things (and if that’s what needed to be done, that’s great).

Scripture teaches that the tongue is like a sword, like a flamethrower, like the rudder of a great ship, and therefore, communication technologies amplify the power of the tongue, for good or for ill. While social media can spread lies, slander, propaganda, pornography, and destruction, by the same token, it can be used for great good: spreading the truth, knowledge, gratitude, the gospel, and some measure of community. 

So what are you using these tools for? How are you teaching your family to use these tools? A father who buys his ten year old son a wrecking ball for Christmas may be considered the greatest dad ever for about fifteen minutes, until the first house on the street is leveled. But just as firearms and chain saws are dangerous but have good and lawful uses, parents who do not give any teaching or training for the right use of phones and social media are not preparing their children for the real world.

There is certainly freedom for greater or lesser use of various tools. But do not kid yourself in either direction. Do not pat yourself on the back for rejecting smart phones and social media apps, and do not pat yourself on the back for embracing them. This is really no better than congratulating yourself on whether or not you allow the use of hammers in your house. The question is: how is the tool being used? Are you talking about it? Are you discussing it? Are you checking in and walking together in wisdom? Don’t assume anything. Your goal is to love God and love one another with these tools in true wisdom.

Photo by Bermix Studio on Unsplash

Christmas & the Outer Darkness

Christmas Eve 2023 Homily

If there is one thing our land lacks, it is the fear of God. Romans 3 says there’s none righteous, none seeks after God, all are unprofitable, our mouths are like open graves, our tongues are full of poisonous venom, full of cursing and lies and bitterness, shedding innocent blood, destruction and misery fill our days, there’s no knowledge of peace, and the final summary of it all is: there is no fear of God before their eyes. If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, then the refusal to fear God is the beginning of all kinds of destructive insanity. 

Even in the Christian Church, you do not hear messages on the fear of God, the wrath of God, the justice of God – even at Christmas, maybe especially at Christmas. But Christmas is all about the justice of God: “Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this” (Is. 9:7). Christmas is all about the zealous justice of God, which ought to make everyone tremble: “Let all mortal flesh keep silence // And with fear and trembling stand… Christ our God to earth descendeth // Our full homage to demand.”

But Christians rush to the verses about perfect love casting out fear, and remember: the angels told Mary and Joseph and the shepherds to “fear not.” Of course there is a kind of fear that Christ came to take away: the fear of death, the fear of torment. But there is also a kind of godly fear that Christ came to restore: “Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear” (Heb. 12:28). “Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12). And Jesus Himself said, “And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him” (Lk. 12:4-5). 

So what is this godly fear? It is an acknowledgement of God’s utter immensity and power and perfection and justice. It is an acknowledgement of your own frailty and weakness and utter dependence and deficiencies. All things exist and hold together by the power of God’s omnipotent Word, and therefore we are all walking and living every moment on the high wire of God’s kindness, suspended over absolute eternity. Your heart trembles to see madmen walk across wires suspended between skyscrapers. Maybe you get sick at the thought of being in outer space or sky diving. But we are all constantly walking the high wire of existence, a hairsbreadth between us and forever. We all live in outer space. It is only God’s merciful will that keeps us from flying off this globe into the darkness. 

But then add to this reality the fact that we have all repudiated, cursed, and defied the One who holds us at every moment. He holds us, giving us every breath, every heartbeat, and we demand our own way. He gives us life and health and every good thing, and we are full of bitterness and complaining. We are held up by His almighty power, and we struggle and kick and curse. In our sinful folly, we demand to be left alone. We try to run away from Him – which means, in our sinful insanity, we are trying to destroy ourselves. Like foolish toddlers on a balcony without a railing, we scream and kick and insist that God let us toddle around by ourselves. God is light, and He is the light of men, the light of all existence. Without Him there is only darkness, complete and absolute darkness. 

It’s often been said that the night before the birth of Christ was the darkest night in the history of the world. And there’s something profoundly true about that. But it’s also true that wherever Christ has not yet come or wherever Christ has been rejected, wherever people insist on continuing in their sins, insist on going their own way, in that place there is still great darkness. Of course, so many people, even Christians, don’t want to talk about the darkness. They only want to talk about the light: grace, love, and joy. Isn’t that what Christmas is about? 

But Jesus Christ, the One whose birth we are celebrating, is the One who came speaking, perhaps more than anyone else in the Bible, about the darkness, about judgment, about Hell. Jesus said the tares are the children of the Wicked One growing in His Kingdom that will be gathered up and thrown into a furnace of fire. Jesus said that the Kingdom of Heaven is like a great net cast into the sea, and when it is pulled up to the shore, the bad and wicked are separated from the good and cast into a furnace of fire, where there is wailing and gnashing of teeth. Jesus repeatedly warned cities of their reception of Him, saying that their judgment would be worse than Sodom and Gomorrah. Jesus said that those without a wedding garment will be cast out of the Marriage Feast, into outer darkness. He said that the one who buries his talent in the ground will have his talent taken away and be cast into outer darkness, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Jesus said those who refuse to cut off hands and pluck out eyes that cause offense will be cast into hell, into fire that is never quenched, where the worm never dies. 

When the Light of the World comes into the world, the first thing you notice is all the darkness. We cannot talk about the birth of the Light of the world, without talking about the darkness of the world, the darkness in our lives. And when we do that, it must cause us to tremble. The King has come, and we have rebelled. The Lord of Glory has appeared, and we have been plotting against Him. There is a kind of fear that He came to banish, and it is the fear that we see in our first parents in the Garden, the kind of fear that tries to hide. But you cannot hide from the Lord of all Light. In His Light everything is manifest: every thought, every word, every glance, every act. All is plain as day to Him. The kind of fear that tries to run away, tries to hide is foolish, fleshly fear of punishment. But godly fear trembles because we have offended our Father’s love. Godly fear falls to the ground in worship because we have not honored our King. Godly fear acknowledges that true justice would mean our destruction. It acknowledges that it would be good and righteous and holy if all sinners were cast into Hell for our insolence. Godly fear wants nothing but the glory of God because He is worthy, because He is the King. Godly fear does not run from the King. Godly fear stumbles toward the King, trembling and full of joy. Even if we perish, it would have been worth it to be so near the King. 

John Bunyan once called godly fear a “blessed confusion.” It’s the confusion of knowing the greatness of God and the frailty of being a creature, the confusion of knowing the goodness and holiness of God and the shameful filth of our own hearts and lives. And in the midst of that confusion, hearing the words, from our Savior Himself, Come. Come and welcome. Come into the feast. Come into the light. And the fear of the Lord drives you in, trembling with joy. Because Christ has come for us. Christ was born for us. All is grace. All is gift. All is Christmas. 

“The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined” (Is. 9:2). 

In the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Photo by Tim Umphreys on Unsplash

On Beheading Satanic Shrines & the Slip-N-Slide of Neutrality

Introduction
So last Thursday, Michael Cassidy, a Christian brother and veteran from Mississippi found himself at the capitol building in Iowa where a satanic shrine was on display, apparently pieced together with foam noodles and bungee cords. Cassidy pulled its head off, which was appropriately stuffed with trash bags, and threw the image down. Being a law-abiding citizen, he immediately turned himself into the capitol security and received their citation. A GiveSendGo campaign was quickly opened for his legal defense, and as of the time of this writing around $74K had been raised in his support. 

In the week leading up to this, a fairly significant outcry had issued over Iowa’s decision to permit such use of public space. Among those defending Iowa lawmakers was evangelical Christian and state representative Jon Dunwell, insisting that while he personally disagreed with what the statue intended to communicate, Christians must not prohibit such displays. In fact, Dunwell insisted that the Satanic shrine was necessary to defend for the sake of “freedom of religious expression.” 

As it happened, I’ve been in the midst of an Advent-Christmas sermon series, and yesterday’s message was titled “Deck Your Idols.” And as I mentioned to my congregation yesterday, I had prepared the sermon before any of this stuff with Michael Cassidy had taken place. But God works in mysterious ways, and make of the timing of all this what you will. I preached from Micah 5 where the prophecy is given that the Messiah will be born in Bethlehem (Mic. 5:2), and when the Messiah comes, He will save His people, gathering a remnant, and in and through them, God will destroy all witchcraft and idols. The birth of Christ in Bethlehem means the destruction of all idols. 

But It’s Just Spiritual!
However, huffing on cans of secularism for the last century, many Christians have been quick to side with Rep. Dunwell, insisting that Christ only came to destroy idols metaphorically or spiritually deep, deep down in your heart (where?) down in your heart. One X commenter named “Aaroninwriting” wrote: “Smashing statues, no matter how evil and idolatrous they are, is not what the Christian is called to do. There’s a large swath of the church that’s embracing what is an Islamic ethos, because it’s dressed up in Christian garb and wrapped in a flag. The deception that’s currently afoot seems so reasonable, so righteous, but it’s going to end in the judgement of God. This emerging Militant Christian Zeitgeist is not of the Biblical Christ whatsoever.” This fellow was kind enough to label this tendency in his bio with the self-ascribed descriptor “anabaptist.” Which is exactly what this position is. This should be distinguished from regular old “baptists” who may or may not subscribe to this retreatism and Gnosticism. 

I replied to Mr. Aaroninwriting thusly: “Um. Smashing idols is exactly what Christians are called to do. It’s the only thing we’re called to do. Somebody get this guy a Bible.” Followed by: “It’s the only thing we’re called to do —with regard to idols. “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away…” (Col. 3:5-8). And a little later to at least one thread, arguing that my Colossians verse could not possibly apply to Mr. Cassidy, I wrote, “While I do not believe there is a direct correspondence between what Gideon did with the idol in his home town and our situation, there is an important lesson and analogy to be applied in our public square, and I think it’s a legitimate application of Colossians 3.”

Jenna Ellis, among others, also lent her voice to objecting to Mr. Cassidy’s actions, arguing that it was a mistake to see God’s commands to Israel to destroy idols applying to any Christian today. Ellis raised the question of whether those defending Mr. Cassidy would also defend someone who beheaded a statue of Allah. Thankfully, 69% answered her poll in the affirmative, and she seemed to think this was proof that “Christian Nationalism” is a subversive movement to undermine our constitutional order, replacing it with “a theocracy, including blasphemy laws and criminalizing other religions and their practice.” While Ellis says she hates such satanic shrines, she believes that Christians are not required to tear it down because the statue has no innate power, is not requiring Christians to disobey God, and because our war is not against flesh and blood but against spiritual wickedness. 

From Israel to America
While it is true that Christ teaches that idols begin and must be uprooted primarily from the hearts of men and our personal lives, it is also true that He teaches that external and public actions must often be taken to eradicate them. Plucking out the eye that causes sin and cutting off the hand certainly begins with personal repentance, but does not necessarily end there. On what basis would Rep. Dunwell or Jenna Ellis prohibit a pornographic display at the Iowa State Capitol building? Remember, we are now at the point where the Sisters of Perpetual Perversion are insisting on their “religious right” to publicly display their private parts to little kids in the name of what David French calls the First Amendment.

While Ellis and Michael O’Fallon and others are insisting that this display and others like it are traps for conservative Christians, intending to get them to over-react in violence and so invoke a tyrannical response from the left, I do not think they see how the whole set-up of supposed constitutional neutrality is a trap. Let me grant the point: are there some on the left hoping that some right wing kook will blow up an abortion clinic or assassinate a prominent LGBTQ activist? Absolutely. And let me state clearly: we must not condone, support, or encourage any of those sorts of revolutionary tactics. But that does not mean that all external, public acts are thereby off the table. Calmly beheading a satanic shrine made out of trash bags and pool noodles is not joining the BLM mob, not joining Islamists, or turning our struggle into a “flesh and blood” war or somehow taking matters into our hands.

Was Moses taking matters into his own hands when he broke the golden calf down and ground it to powder? Was Gideon taking matters into his own hands when he tore down the altar in his home town? Was Samuel taking matters into his own hands when he hacked Agag to pieces before Saul and his anabaptist struggle session? The point is that Jesus and the apostles certainly teach that the training of Israel in holy war has its first and primary application in individual piety, familial faithfulness, and church discipline, but it does not and cannot end there. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Christ. Just wars, capital punishment of murderers, and yes, the suppression of false religions and blasphemy are the foundations of Western liberty. Just ask Augustine, King Alfred, John Calvin, or even George Washington.

As Joe Boot said to Jenna Ellis on X, “Madam, you need to read some history. The modern West has only recently repealed Christian blasphemy laws replaced by pagan ones. US states throughout the 20th century started repealing these laws. England in 2008 & Scotland only in 2020. All social orders limit some speech.” In other words, it is certainly true that the specific laws and instructions that God gave to Israel do not apply to modern Americans in a one-to-one way, but the moral principles of those laws and commands certainly do stand and have a public application. Christians have understood this for centuries. 

The point is that there is no such thing as neutrality. This was a wet dream of the Enlightenment, and I mean that pretty much literally. Freud and Marquis De Sade were assisted by Darwin and Rousseau, Hobbes and Locke – in their own ways, to posit a neutral public square that would ultimately allow for freedom of orgasm, which is basically what the First Amendment means to modern Leftists and their deceived conservative acolytes. The problem with the Ellis-O’Fallon powerplay narrative is that it doesn’t go deep enough. Enlightenment secularism was wrong. And this is demonstrated easily by the simple question: by what standard? By what standard would Ellis or O’Fallon or Dunwell prohibit pornography or a sodomite shrine? And appeals to “common sense” or “basic human decency” are really meaningless at this point. Turns out “common sense” and “basic human decency” now require things that the founders of our nation would have never countenanced: from Drag Queens in our libraries to the Sisters of Perpetual Perversion in our baseball parks — sorry your so-called “neutrality” looks an awful lot like a baseball bat coming down on our head. 

The Ellis-O’Fallon-Dunwell position pictures Leftists and Christians in a death struggle on the mountain of civic Justice. In their view, our job is to basically hold still as much as possible while the Leftists jerk and shake and convulse with their revolutionary lusts. In their view, if we respond with anything other than what the Supreme Court has handed down as the current law of the land, we will allow the Leftists to convulse even more and that will lead to loss of Christian freedom and inevitably a stumble further down the mountain of civic justice. The problem with this view is that it imagines that we are playing on relatively neutral ground, as though we both have our feet planted on something solid, even if the Leftists are apoplectic and epileptic. But the so-called “secular experiment” was always a set up. Turns out that the neutral public square is actually a slip-n-slide and just to keep things colorful it’s generously lubed with K-Y Jelly. In other words, the myth of neutrality is a lie, which means it’s immoral and therefore it never could produce true civil justice or religious equality. Ellis and Company think if we only hold still we can preserve some semblance of the “liberal order,” but we’ve been sliding down this mountainside for the last fifty years and no amount of compliance has slowed us down. The answer is to get off the slip-n-slide of neutrality, and start hiking back up the mountain of biblical law. That isn’t tyranny. That’s the only path to real freedom and justice.

Speaking of heads getting cracked, C.S. Lewis wrestled through this very point in the second volume of his Ransom Trilogy. In Perelandra, the hero Ransom experiences a sort of parallel universe version of the original Garden of Eden on the planet Venus with its very own Satanic-tempter, a demon-possessed scientist named Weston who has become the “Un-man.” After reasoning and arguing for many days, Ransom finally concludes that the only way to win this battle will be by literally killing the Un-man. “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, here goes—I mean Amen,’ said Ransom, and hurled the stone as hard as he could into the Un-man’s face.” 

Of course, some will say that I’ve just condoned literal violence, and how can I praise this while saying I do not support vigilante violence? I would simply refer you to the founding of America. How were the Boston Tea Party, the Declaration of Independence, and the War for Independence justified? You cannot celebrate the founding of our nation and then condemn the very same spirit and principles that established our freedom. It was on thoroughly biblical and Christian principles that we refused to submit to tyrannical taxes and the breach of natural law and our covenants with the King of England. And this is because God’s Word always reigns supreme. God’s Word defines and defends true religious freedom, freedom of conscience, and separation of powers – including the separation of church and state. But by that same Biblical standard, there comes a time to topple statues, even the kind crafted out of flotation devices. 

Conclusion
Jenna Ellis claims that civil disobedience is sometimes called for but only when the magistrate is requiring disobedience to God. Now to be clear: I have not claimed nor would I insist that every Christian has a moral duty to physically tear down every symbol of unbelief, like tearing down every pride flag next June – as though you are in sin if you walk by a rainbow flag and fail to deface it. However, I am claiming that what Michael Cassidy did appears to have been nothing but virtuous, and therefore something to be celebrated and emulated. 

Presumably, Ellis and others would say that pornographic displays ought to be prohibited because they pose some kind of immediate threat in a way that a cheesy Halloween display does not. But I beg to differ. Ellis would be right that no one is seriously tempted to convert to “satanism” because of this shrine in Iowa. No, not hardly. But we have all witnessed another seduction taking place actively, and that is the ongoing seduction of secularism. I’m not worried about Iowans turning to the dark demons of the occult just yet (although that is certainly waiting in the wings), but what I am worried about right now is our lawmakers humping our modern goddess of neutrality. The satanic shrine is Enlightenment porn. It’s a Victoria’s Secret display for naïve lawmakers and journalists. 

The Iowan shrine is just another kind of drag queen on display. The seduction isn’t an overtly sexual perversion yet. This is the secular foreplay, grooming our leaders and neighbors to snuggle up to the myth of neutrality and so-called religious equality. But after that comes the sodomy and the pedophilia and the cancel culture. It always does. You cannot celebrate immorality and then somehow preserve justice in the public square. You cannot pull justice out of the hat of neutrality. There is no true justice or equality under the law unless Christ is King. There can be no true religious freedom in human society apart from the Word of God. 

Glorify God With Your Body

This was a talk I gave for a Logos School Assembly – Life Between the Sexes 2023

Introduction
This is a Christian school, which means that we seek to honor Christ and one another as we study and learn and grow up. This may seem obvious, but it bears stating that apart from knowing Christ, the ways we are trying to honor Christ and one another won’t make sense. So when we have these talks, one foundational question to ask yourself is: do these talks resonate with you? Do you generally want to listen and learn or do they seem like someone speaking a different language, or maybe worse, do they seem offensive or repulsive to you? It says in 2 Cor. 2:16 that the gospel smells like death to those who are dead, but it smells like life to those who are being saved. 

The talk today is about life between the sexes, and I want to hit several practical recommendations, but I want to ground it all in the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

“Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Cor. 6:18-20). 

You could summarize the Christian teaching on life between the sexes as that first command from the Apostle Paul: Flee fornication. Flee sexual sin. Notice that he doesn’t say, avoid or keep an eye out for. He says “flee.” Flee means to run away, to rush, and generally the word means to run away from danger and to make haste toward a place of safety. 

God Bought Your Body
I want to come back to this in a minute, but first the reasons for running away from the danger of sexual sin. There are two reasons: 1. Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in You from God and 2. You are not your own because you were bought with a price. This is why I wanted to begin with the foundation for how we seek to pursue our life together as men and women, male and female. 

Paul says that we must flee fornication because our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and they do not belong to us because Christ bought them with His blood. It’s interesting that God bought our bodies. Often we talk about how God saved our souls. That’s certainly true, but this text says that God bought our bodies and fills our bodies with His Spirit. His Spirit is not just in our hearts, not just in our souls, not just in our minds, but also in our material, physical bodies.

But if the Holy Spirit is not in you, and if you don’t know if your body was bought with a price, then the command to flee fornication will seem strange, maybe even repulsive. The world is shouting at you all day long that your body belongs to you. You can do whatever you want with your body, and that if you don’t let your body and its passions rule you, you will be sad, hurt, and unfulfilled. That’s why you have do whatever “feels good.” And some Christians even partially give in to this by imagining that God really only cares about your heart or soul, but not so much about our bodies: why’d you get that tattoo, why’d you dye your hair blue? “I just like it.” Man looks at the appearance, but God looks at the heart, we say, misapplying the verse.

But God created our bodies. He created us body and soul to image Him, male and female in His image, to display His glory. And when we scorned Him, He sent His Son to pay the penalty for our rebellion and His Spirit to fill and sanctify our bodies, so that we can please Him and glorify Him with our bodies. 

Part of the effects of the Fall is the awkwardness and shame we can feel in our bodies. Sometimes there are also various forms of ingratitude or resentment about our bodies and envy or covetousness of others. Rosaria Butterfield has pointed out that transgenderism is fundamentally a radical envy of a completely different body than the one God gave you. For Christians, not only did God give you your body and your neighbor their body, but He also sent His Son to redeem our bodies, to make them holy. This means that they can be used to glorify Him now through obedience (offering our bodies as living sacrifices), and in the resurrection, our bodies will glorify Him perfectly forever. Our obedience is our sacrifice of praise. 

How To Flee Fornication

1. “Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous” (Heb. 13:4). The whole point of courtship is to find a spouse in a way that honors God, marriage, and one another. But treating courtship and the bodies God has given us and our interactions together casually is to dishonor the marriage bed and dishonor Christ. Imagine walking into the White House to meet the president in shorts and flipflops or showing up to a fancy dinner in your sweatpants and an old t-shirt. There’s a kind of thoughtlessness that simply is dishonoring. It’s the same with how you interact with one another. Be thoughtful. Hookup/dating culture is also practicing for fornication and adultery, not fleeing from it. If you’re just flirting, talking about who likes who, who has a crush on who, and serially giving yourself to various people (even just emotionally), you’re playing games with emotions that are meant to be ruled carefully until you’re ready to find a spouse. But revving up those emotions before you’re ready is a great way to practice infidelity. This includes the cheap emotional thrill of gossiping about other people or spreading rumors. 

2. Treat one another as brothers and sisters. Of course there is a difference between your actual brothers and sisters and everyone else, but the point is to be kind, courteous, respectful, but not intimate. You shouldn’t be close with anyone of the opposite sex who isn’t actually family. And be really careful about pretending that you can (e.g. “They’re practically like family!”) It would be incredibly awkward and weird to have romantic thoughts about a brother or sister, and while you’re in junior high and high school, you aren’t ready to get married yet, so don’t pretend you are. Don’t day dream that you are. Don’t imagine that you are. Don’t talk like you are. Don’t spend a lot of time together, don’t privately message one another. Gents, hold doors, seat the ladies, look out for their needs; gals, thank the guys and cheer them on. 

3. “Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving” (Eph. 5:4). Crude jokes about body parts or sexual functions are dishonoring to the marriage bed, dishonoring the way God made our bodies, and frequently tend toward being unguarded against sexual temptations. When you make light of the way God made us, instead of being thankful, you’re practicing to be thoughtless, rude, and lustful. Of course, God made our bodies and they are funny in some ways, but if you wouldn’t tell that joke in front of your mom, don’t tell it in front of your friends or on a text thread. This also means not listening to music or watching shows that are full of filthiness. 

4. Lastly, flee fornication and honor the marriage bed by prepare for marriage and family. Work hard at your studies, grow in personal disciplines of holiness and self-control and purity. Read your Bible regularly. Pray regularly. Grow into a mature man or woman of God. Maturity means taking responsibility for yourself and then beginning to serve others. What can you do for yourself and how can you help others? Can you pick up a job? Can you volunteer? Do you see things that need to be done and do them without being told or do you only do those things that are asked of you? Seeing what needs to be done and doing it on your own is maturity, and maturity is thoughtfulness and shows honor and is preparing for marriage.

So flee fornication because Christ is worthy. He has purchased us with His blood and filled us with His Spirit, so that we may glorify God in our bodies. 

Photo by Vitolda Klein on Unsplash

Blessed Confusion

Psalm 128 is one of our community’s favorite psalms: “Blessed the man who fears Jehovah…” But do you stop and consider that opening line? Blessed is the man who fears Jehovah. It is the fear of the Lord that is the beginning of wisdom (Prov. 9:10), and especially when it comes to worship, we are required to draw near with reverence and godly fear for our God is a consuming fire (Heb. 12:28-29). 

When John saw Jesus, it says that he fell down at his feet like a dead man (Rev. 1:17). God is described in Scripture like a great and terrible storm of glory and majesty. “The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burned at his presence, yea, the world, and all that dwell therein” (Nah. 1:4). When Israel met with the Lord at Mt. Sinai, thick smoke and clouds descended on the mountain, full of lightning and thunder, and the whole mountain shook (Ex. 19:16-18). Think of standing in front of a volcano, a tornado, and tidal wave of glory as high as a mountain towering over you. 

Even the presence of angels are described as terrifying. The first words out of the mouths of angels are almost always: “do not be afraid/fear not.” If the messengers of God make people tremble, how much more God Himself? 

God is immense, majestic, and even in His goodness, there is awe and reverence, and the sense that we deserve to die. The fear of God shows us that we are next to nothing compared to Him – dust and ashes compared to Him. And then add to that our sins, and yes, even our forgiven sins, creates what John Bunyan called a “blessed confusion” – deep shame combined with profound relief. 

This is the salt that is to season our entire lives: God’s immense greatness, our miniscule frailty, and His glorious goodness in the face of our filth and rebellion. 

And it is to be particularly evident in our worship. The psalmist says, “rejoice with trembling.” As they sang on the banks of the Red Sea: “Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?” (Ex. 15:11)

Photo by Matt Hardy on Unsplash

The Most Vulgar Slur You Can Think Of

On the Necessity of Prophetic Naming

Introduction
This article is a follow up thought on Kevin DeYoung’s piece, but not so much a direct response but a further explanation and defense of at least one part of DeYoung’s objection and concern for the “Moscow Mood.” Likewise, this perhaps serves as a sort of tangential answer to Denny Burk’s recent Sunday School class on Doug Wilson’s use of coarse language. 

The Bible insists that words are powerful. God created the heavens and the earth by the power of His Word, and He upholds all things by the power of that same Word, which is the Lord Jesus Christ (Gen. 1, Col. 1, Heb. 1). Because human beings are made in God’s image and likeness, we are verbal creatures, and our words imitate and mimic His words. We see this immediately in the Garden of Eden when God gave Adam the task of naming the animals (Gen. 2). This was not merely a matter of assigning relatively random or capricious titles to the animals (like “Fred” or “Fido”), but rather something far more scientific, something more profound, related to the taxonomy of creatures, and what they were for. This becomes clear as the result of that labor was concluding that a helper had not been found that was suitable for Adam.

All of this naming culminated in the creation of the first woman from Adam’s side, and when she was brought to the man, he sang a poem over her, and named her “woman” because she was taken from man. The word for “woman” is related to the Hebrew word for “fire,” and indicates that she was created to be the glory of man (cf. 1 Cor. 11). But naming is not merely descriptive; it is also prescriptive and therefore prophetic. After the Fall, Adam re-named his wife “Eve” because she would become the mother of all the living. And notice that Adam names her this in faith believing that they will live and despite the curse of sin, his wife will bear children, including the seed that will crush the seed of the serpent.

Battle of Words
All of this is why words are so powerful and potent. This why Scripture says that “Pleasant words are as an honeycomb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones” (Prov. 16:24). Likewise, “There is that speaketh like the piercings of a sword: but the tongue of the wise is health” (Prov. 12:18). “Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof” (Prov. 18:21). Words and names give either life or death, sickness or health, and we are always in some sense eating our words and becoming what we say and hear. James famously says that the tongue is a flamethrower, a tiny flame that is able to set whole worlds on fire – even the fires of Hell itself (Js. 3:5-6). And therefore he warns God’s people to guard their words carefully. Our mouths must not be simultaneously full of cursing and blessing, like some kind of foul fountain (Js. 3:9-12). And yet, clearly James does not intend to forbid all cursing, since he also commends the Psalms to be sung (Js. 5:13). 

Many Psalms include curses and imprecations: “Break thou the arm of the wicked and the evil man” (Ps. 10:15, cf. Ps. 58:6, 69:25). “As he loved cursing, so let it come unto him: as he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him. As he clothed himself with cursing like as with his garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones” (Ps. 109:17-18). And perhaps the most infamous: “Happy shall he be that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones” (Ps. 137:9). Evidently, since God’s people are required to sing the Psalms, God’s people are to have these blessings and curses in their mouths so that the Word of Christ may dwell in us richly (Col. 3:16).

Elsewhere, Hosea prays that God will give “whoring” Ephraim “a miscarrying womb and dry breasts” so that they will be bereaved of their children (Hos. 9). And of course Paul warns the Galatians from turning away from the true gospel, saying that if anyone preaches another gospel, let him be anathema, that is, cursed or damned (Gal. 1:8). And if all the church ladies thought that was quite enough, Paul repeats himself in the very next verse: let anyone who preaches another gospel be damned (Gal. 1:9). And we ought to pay careful attention to this curse because it comes in the same letter in which Paul warns Christians about biting and devouring one another with their tongues (Gal. 5:15). Evidently, there is a kind of cursing that is full of love. There is a kind of cursing that is filled with the Holy Spirit, that has crucified the flesh and all of its lusts (Gal. 5:22-25). 

God Himself models this for us: “And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed” (Gen. 12:3). And the patriarchs take this same language upon their own lips and pass it down to their children (Gen. 27:19). God proclaims blessings and cursing to Israel, and the people affirm them and say, Amen (Dt. 30). So God speaks blessings and certain kinds of curses that His people are required to affirm and echo. And this imitation of God’s Word is part of our prophetic naming. We are not merely agreeing with God’s assessments, we are announcing in faith what will become of these things. This is an act of dominion and rule. By the authority of God’s Word, we are binding on earth as it is in heaven. God says that the adulterer is already cursed (Prov. 22:14). Homosexuality is not merely the kind of sin that will lead to cursing, death, and destruction, it is itself a terrible curse of suicidal madness (Rom. 1), as is the murder of one’s own children (Dt. 28:28, 53-57).

When the Church speaks officially in excommunication, it is formally pronouncing a curse: handing a hardened sinner over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh (1 Cor. 5:4-5). While God forbids all cursing out of personal animosity and vengeance (Rom. 12:14), there is a kind of cursing that mimics God’s own cursing which foretells the Hellish destruction and agony that has already begun in certain actions. The Church and Christians in general must recover this authoritative naming – both blessing and cursing – speaking God’s words after Him, as acts of dominion and justice. 

At the center of this theology of prophetic cursing is the Cross. But for far too many Christians, the Cross is merely a nice piece of jewelry, an ornate piece of wood in the sanctuary or on the roof of a church building. And it isn’t the God damning curse that Scripture says it is: “For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them’… Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written ‘Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree” (Gal. 3:10, 13). We read these words and it is easy for them not to be the gut punch they ought to be. Perhaps we conjure up generally “bad” connotations, but not the foul stench of a curse, not the reflexive repulsion of a hateful obscenity. So let your imagination dwell on this for a moment: a man strung up naked, bleeding, defecating, suffocating, screaming in agony. Don’t look away.

And the thing we must not miss is that our God, the God of infinite blessing, also spoke this infinite curse. His Eternal Word became this vile curse. God spoke this revolting curse about our sin. It was a righteous and holy curse, but it was the most offensive obscenity, vulgarity, and blasphemous curse in the history of the world. And that curse has become the salvation of the world. 

The distinctions between slurs, vulgarity, swearing, cursing, and obscenity are important and helpful distinctions, but they all come together in the Cross of Jesus Christ. There we have a blasphemous oath, the fiercest damnation of Hell itself, and the most vulgar obscenity and bigoted slur of the righteous God-man stripped naked and shamefully lynched as a spectacle for all to see. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. 

Conclusions
So this is the center of all prophetic naming. Preachers of the gospel in particular are required by God to proclaim this curse: the filthy fact of our Lord Jesus with stakes driven through His hands and feet hanging from a Roman gibbet for the forgiveness of all our sins. The only One who didn’t deserve to be there, hanging like an animal ready for the butcher, like a stag to be gutted, stripped and shamed like a whore. The Righteous for the unrighteous. 

Certainly words are powerful. And we must not overuse certain potent words and so water them down. And we do not speak curses with any sort of glee or lustful thrill. Some folly we are required to laugh at like our Father in Heaven (Ps. 2), and sometimes wisdom does answer a fool according to his folly (Prov. 26:5) or mock certain superstitious irrationality with a kind of juvenile sarcasm (1 Kgs. 18). But we do not chuckle about real curses. We do not rejoice in the death of the wicked, lest we bring God’s wrath upon ourselves (Job 31:29). But sometimes it is right and proper to name the evil, to pronounce the curse – not because we relish the filth but because more than anything, we want it die and rise again. 

This is why church discipline and excommunication is sometimes the most loving thing: pronouncing the the destruction of the flesh “that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus” (1 Cor. 5:5). Some churches and elders do not love erring sinners enough to save them by this means. This is why the Cross is at the center of our prophetic cursing and naming. Whatever gets nailed to the Cross, whatever needs to die stays there and is buried in the tomb of our Lord, but whatever God wills to save will be raised to eternal, indestructible life. The prophetic task sometimes includes the naming of filth out loud in order for Jesus Christ to be evidently set forth as crucified (Gal. 3:1).

So when Pastor Wilson named what Nadia Bolz-Weber did with a bunch of purity rings, this was no junior high coarse jesting, which is clearly prohibited by Scripture (Eph. 5:4). It was rather a prophetic naming. The goal is for that kind of objectification and destruction of women made in the image of the living God – for that sin to be shamed, humiliated, and repudiated for the vulgar obscenity that it is, so that women everywhere may experience salvation, honor, and real love in Christ. 

Another example occurs to me: Given how unborn babies are being mixed up in test tubes, frozen in labs, discarded down drains, bought and sold to the highest bidders, and wombs are being rented, before ripping children from their biological parents (if they somehow manage to escape being poisoned, beheaded, and dismembered in the middle passage of pregnancy), America has collectively said that human babies are nothing more than niggers. 

And why would a Christian minister, knowing the offense of that word, dare name what we do to our children by the millions by that name? Certainly not for kicks. Not for some kind of cheap thrill, or even for the accolades of five belligerent white-supremacists. No, the only good reason would be in the real hope that maybe it would be the kind of truthful offense that would prick consciences and bring a righteous shame and anger on our land – so that all our hatred of the image of God would be crucified and all human life would be cherished and honored. 

Rolling Stone magazine recently ran an article on the so-called empowerment of using the c-word, and it was interesting to note that some folks have apparently noticed that the increasing offense of vulgar obscenities (f-word, c-word, etc.) has roughly corresponded with an overall decrease in societal offense of profanity and blasphemy (e.g. using the Lord’s name in vain). And whatever the evidence they may cite to back up that assertion, the claim rings true: Christians have put up with the casual dishonor of the name of the Most High God, and our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ in particular. But if you write or say certain sexual or ethnic slurs, you have committed the unforgiveable sin. But this tells us who we really fear. It tells us what we really worship. The deepest offense in our vocabulary is against man, against their skin, against their sexuality and dignity. But while men certainly can and do hate and abuse one another in truly despicable ways, our deepest offense is against our Maker, our Savior, the Triune God of Heaven. 

Take all the bad words you can think of, the worst words in every human language, list them all out, with no blanks, no asterisks, now stand on a street corner and yell them with all the vitriol you can manage. And you still haven’t even come close to the obscenity and coarseness of our Lord Jesus Christ hanging on the Cross. And He hung there for the sins our land, for all the hate and vitriol, for all the murder and violence, for every lustful thought or glance, for our all bitterness and envy. He hung there so that by that curse, we might be set free and come under His blessing. So don’t look away. This too is central to the “Moscow Mood,” and this is how we win.

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger on Unsplash

Why We Worship the Way We Do

Why do we worship the way we do? One way to answer this question is by noticing the texts in the New Testament that urge us to offer our bodies and our praises as sacrifices: We are to offer our bodies as living sacrifices (Rom. 12:1). When we walk in love toward one another, it’s a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God (Eph. 5:2). When we give offerings and gifts to the work of ministry, it’s a sacrifice, acceptable and pleasing to God (Phil. 4:18). When we acknowledge God and do good and share with one another, these are sacrifices of praise, pleasing to God (Heb. 13:15-16). We are being built up into a spiritual house together in the church, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (1 Pet. 2:5). 

But once we establish this point that New Covenant worship is to be full of these kinds of spiritual sacrifices of praise, we realize that the Old Covenant sacrifices were our training wheels. They were previews of the final bloody sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross, but they were also tutors or teachers, preparing us to offer what God truly always wanted: broken and soft hearts, lips of praise and thanksgiving, joyful fellowship, and wholly consecrated lives. 

And that is what we find in the three principle Old Testament sacrifices: a sin offering focused on cleansing from sin, a whole burnt ascension offering – focused on a wholly consecrated life arising to God as sweet smelling aroma, and a peace offering, where the worshipers ate and fellowshipped in the presence of God. And wherever we find those three sacrifices together, they are always offered in that order: sin offering, whole burnt ascension offering, and peace offering. 

If you add a Call to Worship to the beginning and a benediction at the end, we find this same basic pattern of Christian worship throughout the history of the Church: we are called into the presence of God, we confess our sins, we hear the Word read and preached, consecrating our entire lives to Him, we sit down for communion in His presence, and then we are sent out with His blessing. Why do we worship this way? Because we are holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ. 

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash