Seeing God’s Face

Photo by spoon

I had an interesting thought the other day on the way to work, something I had never really thought about before: Will we see God’s face when we’re in heaven?

You see, the night before, my youngest son had been having trouble sleeping because of bad dreams. So I sat with him at bedtime and read Scripture to him. I found myself reading out of the Old Testament… the sixth chapter of Isaiah where he has a vision of the Lord seated on his throne… Exodus 33 when Moses is on the mountaintop speaking with God.

I wanted Josh to see the bigness of God, so I read the part where Moses tells the Lord, “Now show me your glory,” to which God replies:

“I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.”

The narrative goes on to say that the Lord placed Moses in a cleft in the rock and covered him with his hand until his glory had passed by, then removed his hand so that Moses would see his back because “my face must not be seen.”

So if seeing God’s face spells certain death, will heaven be like Exodus 20:18, with the Lord on a smoke-filled mountaintop and we trembling at a distance, telling Jesus, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”?

But everything I’ve talked about so far is Old Covenant. Hebrews 7 and 8 says we have a better covenant founded on better promises. One way the New Covenant is superior to the Old is that our very nature has changed. You see, under the Old Covenant, sins were merely covered, not atoned for. That’s why the priest had to continually offer sacrifices. (See Hebrews 7:27.) But under the New Covenant, Jesus sacrificed himself “once for all.” In doing so, he took on the penalty of our sin upon himself and exchanged our unrighteousness for his righteousness:

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Cor 5:21)

That’s why David’s psalms continually exhort us to “seek his face.” I believe David foresaw the day when we, as spirit-filled, born again believers, would be able to see his face and yet live… and also to the ultimate Day when “we shall see face to face:

Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. (1 Cor 13:12)

The Words of Martin Luther King, Jr.

We sometime forget that, beside leading the Civil Rights movement, Martin Luther King, Jr. was also a man of God.

So I say to you, seek God and discover Him and make Him a power in your life. Without Him, all of our efforts turn to ashes and our sunrises into darkest nights. Without Him, life is a meaningless drama with the decisive scenes missing.

But with Him, we are able to rise from the fatigue of despair to the buoyancy of hope. With Him, we are able to rise from the midnight of desperation to the daybreak of joy. St. Augustine was right — we were made for God and we will be restless until we find rest in Him.

Love yourself, if that means rational, healthy, and moral self-interest. You are commanded to do that. That is the length of life. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. You are commanded to do that. That is the length of breadth of life.

But never forget that there is a first and even greater commandment,“Love the Lord your God with all thy heart and all thy sol and all thy mind.” This is the height of life. And when you do this you live the complete life.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

A Social Network Christmas

Touching and funny. The Christmas story told via Joseph's Facebook account...

School Today

Righteous by Nature

Photo by seier+seier’s

I was reading Romans 2 the other day and verse 28-29 jumped out at me:

I have come to the conclusion that a true Jew is not the man who is merely a Jew outwardly, and a real circumcision is not just a matter of the body. The true Jew is one who belongs to God in heart, a man whose circumcision is not just an outward physical affair but is a God-made sign upon the heart and soul, and results in a life lived not for the approval of man, but for the approval of God. (Rom 2:28-29, J B Phillips’ New Testament in Modern English)

Circumcision was an outward sign, but Paul is saying here that the true Jew is one whose heart has been inwardly circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature (see Col 2:11-12). It struck me how we try to circumcise ourselves outwardly, by changing our behavior to look more “Christian,” and we encourage others to do the same. Here’s an example:

When my wife and I were still dating, we attended a Harvest Crusade in Anaheim, CA. At that time, my wife smoked, and as we drove out of the stadium parking lot, windows down, someone shouted, “Jesus is Lord!” to which my wife shouted back, “Amen!” Without missing a beat, the person yelled back, “Then why are you smoking?”

You see, it’s much easier to circumcise ourselves outwardly… stop smoking, quit swearing, dress more modestly. All those things are well and good, but in Mathew 23:23, Jesus called the Pharisees “hypocrites” for focusing exclusively on external behavior:

You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.

Here’s where we get it wrong. We think sin is about behavior. It’s not. Before you were saved, you were not hell-bound because of your behavior. You were hell-bound because of your nature:

All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. (Eph 2:3)

We were by nature objects of wrath… not by behavior. Do you see the difference?

If you don’t grab a hold of this, then you’ll fall into the trap of thinking that, because you sin as a Christian, then you are still a sinner. But that’s not Biblically true. In my last post, I proved in the Scriptures that we are not sinners or fallen creatures, but a new creation (see 2 Cor 5:17 ). So in the same manner that we once were sinners by nature, we are now righteous(ers) by nature!

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Cor 5:21)

Fallen Creature or New Creation?

Photo by shannonkringen

Here are a couple of Scripture verses for you to consider:

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: Although we are still sinners, Christ died for us. (Rom 5:6-8)

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a hybrid creature; the old things have not quite passed away; but behold, some new things have come! (2 Cor 5:17)

Unless you glossed over the verses above, you probably realize that that’s not how they read… I changed a few words.

Before you start picking up stones, let me explain.

You see, despite how those verses really read, most of us think and act as if my rendition were true. And it doesn’t help when theologians and Bible scholars publish books that say as much. Case in point:

When we pray, we pray not only as saints but also as sinners, very much inclined to use prayer to advance our own selfish interests, even when we pray out of desperation. Prayer for that reason is highly complex. On the one hand, the very act of praying reminds us that we are children of God. On the other hand, that same act of praying exposes us for the fallen creatures we are. (Italics Mine)

Jerry Sittser, When God Doesn’t Answer Your Prayer (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003), pp 67-68.

And:

This prayer is simple and profound: “Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” The most basic concerns that true prayer should address are found in this prayer: It identifies Jesus as God’s son, acknowledges that we are sinners, and asks God for mercy. (Italics Mine)

Ibid, p 105.

But is that what scripture really says about us? Are we some kind of hybrid creature — part sinner, part saint? Let’s look at the correct rendering of Romans 5:6-8 and 2 Corinthians 5:17.

Romans 5:6-8
You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

2 Corinthians 5:17 (AMP)
Therefore if any person is [ingrafted] in Christ (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old [previous moral and spiritual condition] has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come!

Romans 5:8 says that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. “Were” is past tense! Otherwise, the verse would read like I rewrote it: “Although we are still sinners…” but it doesn’t.

Romans 5:10 goes on to say that we “were reconciled to him [God] through the death of his Son.” To reconcile is to change or exchange. According to Vine’s, it denotes “to change from one condition to another.” When you balance your checkbook and find an error, it’s your checkbook, not the bank that makes the adjustment, the change. By reconciling us, God didn’t change; he didn’t decide to accept us in spite of us being sinners. Instead, he changed us from sinners to righteous-ers — that is, the righteousness of God. He re-made us back into his own image, created in true righteousness and holiness (see Eph 4:24). If, as Romans 5:19 says, that through the obedience of Jesus we were made righteous, how then can I be both righteous and a sinner at the same time? Am I a righteous sinner?

In the Scriptures, “sinners” is never used as a description of the church. The Bible refers to the church as saints, or holy ones, but never sinners. If you identify yourself as a sinner, you are separating yourself from Christ — because Jesus, our resurrected high priest, can have nothing to do with you:

Such a high priest meets our need—one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners… (Heb 7:26; Italics mine)

You are not a “fallen creature,” as Sittser claims — you are a new creature!

The Truth About God

Ever notice how “lie” is smack-dab in the middle of the word “believe”?

It makes a great word picture, showing us that Satan is much too clever to come at us with a boldfaced lie. Instead, he wraps some truth around the lie — like he did by quoting Scripture to Jesus to tempt him into sin.

Likewise, he comes at us by telling us the truth about our earthly nature. Or, to put it more precisely, he points out reality instead of Truth.

In 2 Corinthians 10:4-5, Paul describes thoughts as strongholds and tells us to “take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

But every wrong thought doesn’t necessarily originate from Satan. There is also the mind of the flesh which is hostile towards God:

...for the mind of the flesh [is] death, and the mind of the Spirit — life and peace; because the mind of the flesh [is] enmity to God... (Romans 8:6-7, Young’s Literal Translation)

But whether the thought comes from devil or the flesh, the solution is still the same... take every though captive. Here’s what I mean:

I woke up one morning feeling particularly down. I had been taking care of the kids while my wife was out of town visiting her mother and I was feeling overwhelmed. I sat on the edge of the bed for a long time thinking about how I didn’t have the strength to even start my day and contemplated staying home from work.

But then I remembered a verse. Or, more precisely, I remembered a song. It was Everlasting God, by Lincoln Brewster. At the end of the song a young child reads Isaiah 40:28-29, but it was verse 29 that popped into my mind that morning:

He gives power to the weak
   and strength to the powerless.

As I spoke the words, I could feel strength return to my body. I got up, got ready for work and had a great day. But here’s the deal: I had to say these words out loud. Romans 10:17 says that faith comes by hearing, not by thinking. Would I have had the same experience if I’d sat on the bed and just thought about that verse? I doubt it.

Does it feel strange to do that, like you’re talking to yourself? David didn’t think so... he talked to “himself” regularly:

Why are you downcast, O my soul?
    Why so disturbed within me?
    Put your hope in God,
    for I will yet praise him,
    my Savior and my God.

- Psalm 42:5 (Also see Ps 42:11, 43:5)

And:

Praise the LORD, O my soul;
    all my inmost being, praise his holy name.

Praise the LORD, O my soul,
    and forget not all his benefits-

who forgives all your sins
    and heals all your diseases...

- Psalm 103:1-3 (Also see Ps 104:1,35, 146:1)

Your soul (i.e., you mind, emotions and will) must submit to either the flesh or the Spirit... there’s no middle ground. Remember, your flesh dwells within you, but you are not your flesh. So tell your flesh to shut up, tell your soul to rise up, and walk in the victory He’s promised.