“Frozen,” the recent Disney movie, seems to have taken kid-dom by storm. At least in my world. My two girls know all the songs, play the characters, and love the story. It is an astonishing tale with bright colors, flying ice, dramatic turns.

And that’s just the latest. Before that there was Despicable Me, about astonishing characters that don’t exist in real life (minions, among others). And the Lion King, where animals talk. And Toy Story, where inanimate dolls do. Finding Nemo, where fish and sharks sing together. That’s not to go into Monsters University, or How to Train Your Dragon, or even further back into Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, or Snow White.

Here’s the thing… they are all unreal and fantastical. And they are all astonishing.

Movies have done that. Graphics and colors and movement… they have raised the bar on astonishing. Good news comes in fairy-godmother forms, magical responses, wondrous self-realizations.

I wonder in the midst of all of it – are we astonished by the real Good News? Does the Gospel – the incredible, way-more-than-Disney-could-ever-do awesome news of God become man, Jesus Christ who atoned for our sin on the cross and rose from the dead and lives forever to forgive and give life in his own name – does that still astonish me?
And what does it mean if it doesn’t?

Not that we’re after feelings. But it seems like the really, really, really good news sometimes gets lost in the distraction of the colors and imaginations of man. The story of the Gospel could fit right into such an imagination. Yet it isn’t imaginary. It’s real, more real than anything else we know.

So here’s a push to re-evaluate the incredible-ness of the good news. Here’s a vote for ‘gospel astonishment.’ Gospel astonishment that drives us to our knees, makes our hearts soft, leads us to sing, to act, to feel… and keeps us right where we need to be.

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

Astonishing!

One often misunderstood phrase is the simple statement  ‘I want to please God.’  Is this ok? Should I have this desire? Is God not pleased with me already? Do I go in and out of acceptability? Confusion!

In English we can look at “please” in two ways – either from the perspective of an agent, or from the one receiving the action. If my aim is to please God, then the issue could be my attitude (desiring to please) or the issue could be the receiver’s attitude (God’s pleased-ness). This is a huge distinction. Let’s look at these two options in light of Paul’s statements.

Option 1: It is about God’s attitude. If Paul was saying that he is worried that God will not be pleased with him, and is concerned about God’s displeasure, that would mean that God’s pleasure is based on whatever Paul did in any particular situation. Depending on things like how much Bible reading you did, or whether you avoided sin today, God might be displeased with you or pleased with you… if this is what Paul is referring to, then “I want to please God” would have an implied question: “did I?”

Option 2: It is about Paul’s attitude. On the other hand, if Paul is focused on his own heart’s desire, then it is regardless of what God’s state is. Paul could be saying — I am so excited by what God has done for me, I now have this incredible desire inside to please God. (God might be already pleased… God might not be pleased… Paul in this sense is talking about himself, not about God’s pleasedness).

Do you see the difference? In reality, option 1 goes pretty strongly against the Gospel. The proclamation of the good news is that there has been a great exchange: my sin on Christ, Christ’s righteousness on me. I get the attitude of God in Matthew 3:17—“this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased” – and Jesus gets the wrath on sin that was rightly due me (that’s called propitiation).

So… Option 2 is the best way to think about these verses. And if that is true, we would expect that the believer would never be said to be in God’s displeasure. That’s the case… and further, there are statements about unbelievers not pleasing God. Romans 8:8, for example, says that “those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”  1 Corinthians 10:5 says of unbelieving Israelites that “God was not pleased” with them.  That makes great sense… because you have to be in Jesus to please God, and then you please him all the time (in a God-oriented sense).

But what about the actual verses in Paul? Good question, let’s take a look:

1 Thessalonians 2:4: “We speak, not to please man, but to please God”

Colossians 1:9-10 “… we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will… so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully desiring to please him…”

1 Corinthians 7:32 “The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord.”

2 Corinthians 5:9 “we make it our aim to please him.”

Galatians 1:10 “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God?”

These (and a few others) all refer to man’s heart… the believer’s desire to please. This desire to please God is often contrasted with the desire to please man. It is all about the changed motivation of the believer, from self to God.

In Paul’s heart was a desire to please God, and he wanted his fellow believers to have that desire too. His actions were guided by a desire to be a God-pleaser, not a man-pleaser. This is a wonderful desire that I pray, in the Spirit, we all have.

But may we never think that God who has clothed us with the alien righteousness of Christ and united us through death into the life of Jesus might ever look with displeasure on us. Paul’s statements about his attitude and his prayers for others to have a similar attitude do not reflect an uncertainty about his acceptability before God. Rather he reflects the transformation that the Holy Spirit brings, where our hearts desire to do the things that are pleasing to God… just as we are already pleasing to him in Christ.

So… may you increasingly find in your heart a desire to please God, which is a fruit of the Spirit within you, and is aimed at a God who is already hugely pleased and has accepted you in Christ.

Looking out with somewhat saddened eyes at evangelicalism today. Humbled by my own lack of understanding, and grieved by what looks to be decreasing, not increasing, humble discussion and interaction over the Word of God.

I’m also currently reading a book which contrasts what I’ll call mixed-grace vs. grace-based churches. Have an interesting chart, which perhaps I’ll get to post later.

But thinking on this leads me to reflect on Christian growth and what it means to be protected and matured in Christ. And what leads us to grow. What are the ‘means’ by which we grow?

A mixed-grace approach follows some of the Puritans, where God’s grace has to be appropriated by the correct disciplines.  In fact, such an approach often equates the means of grace with man’s effort in spiritual disciplines, though such effort might be empowered somehow by God. Growth comes, for example, through the sweat and tears of extensive prayer and Bible study. The bottom line is that the emphasis of such a church is on man: effort of man in prayer and the effort of man in studying and meditating on the word. Without that effort, maturity will not come.  Methodism’s categories of piety and service seem to fit this model.

The grace-based church seems different. The focus is not on the extent of a person’s effort, but on the provision of God. The primary means of grace are the ones specifically identified in the Bible, and the focus is on God’s gift. Depending on whether you are from a Reformed or Lutheran background, generally these are identified as Word/Gospel and Ordinance/Sacrament. The Word is received (preached), as are the ordinances (partaken of). Notably, there isn’t a heavy emphasis on the effort of taking communion or the depth of study in the Word, as if one’s length of effort releases more of God’s grace. Rather the emphasis is on God who gives.

See the difference? Means of grace involving the preaching of the Word (something you receive) and the ordinances (something you receive) carry a different (dare we say liberating) flavor than equating growth with how much time you are spending in self-effort (i.e. timed Bible study and prayer).

Receive from God. You’ll mature!

And… you’ll want to read more about Jesus and pray more with Jesus, too!

Lots of confusion swirling about our American Christian culture about sanctification recently. Which is undoubtedly a good thing, as it makes us go back to Scripture and look at how sanctification is actually addressed, in context, in God’s Word.

What that biblical examination reveals is that artificial divisions, such as ‘progressive’ and ‘positional,’ are just that — artificial. The Bible talks much of sanctification, and is fairly relentless in its insistence that it is a work of God alone.

You have passages such as the beginning of Romans 12, where we are called to present ourselves a living, holy, blameless sacrifice. We are quick to note that only Jesus makes us alive, it is not our work… but then we want to take the other two adjectives and make them (at least partially) our work. We shouldn’t. We should realize that Jesus has made us alive, holy, and blameless, through his work on the cross, and our job is to respond to that in laying down our lives as a sacrifice in loving other people. Our love doesn’t make us holy. Rather our love is a response to Jesus’ finished work making us holy.

So why do we focus on our effort in personal morality as attaining sanctification? On the one hand, it is simply how we have been raised. Traditionally, the Puritans and those following them are credited with much of the push towards our effort in sanctification. On their heels, for example, J.C. Ryle believed that a person might “climb from one step to another in holiness, and be far more sanctified at one period of his life than another” (Holiness, 20). For many evangelicals, this sort of view is simply what was in the water growing up — that Christians improve in moral behavior in a sort of step-wise fashion.

On the other hand, our confusion is because we miss the context. We can certainly find verses in the Bible that talk about effort. For example, 2 Corinthians 7:1 refers to “bringing holiness to completion in the fear of the Lord.” Look! Effort toward personal holiness! Yet a fuller look at context presents a different picture: namely, a corporate one where holiness is a gift resulting from God’s redemptive activity (“since we have these promises”). The church needs to work out the implications of this already-given gift. So… yes, effort, but as a result of and not as a movement toward sanctification.

Our action in moral effort is a response to what has been done to us, not a ‘both-and’ approach to holiness. So we can eagerly embrace “being holy in all your behavior” (1 Peter 1:15) as a call to reflect who we are (sanctified by the Spirit, 1 Peter 1:2), instead of a command to attain what we are not (get holy or else). Our sanctification cannot be based on whether we sin or not — because we do, we fail — but must be based on what Jesus has done. Or more precisely, what Jesus has done, alone.

What this does is free us from a focus on ourselves, individually. In a progressive-type sanctification model, we perceive living the Christian life as an airplane with two wings: what Jesus has done, and what we (helped by God) must do. In order to fly, we need both wings. It seems to push towards an over-realized eschatology, in that we strain for what glorification brings (which is not promised in this earthly existence). Those who teach this are quick to say that we are never perfect, yet the emphasis for these teachers is that our effort in personal, progressive sanctification and our ability to be personally holy as a distinct work from Jesus’ work on the cross is one of the central, key components of the Christian life.

But a more biblical model sees our efforts at holy living to be far downstream of flying. Scripture says Jesus has done it all. His justifying and sanctifying and regeneration is a gift. In order to fly, we get on the plane — union with him. And when we look out the window, amazed that we are flying, what is birthed in us is a radical joy that is infectious, a love that is a response to what has been done for us. So we serve a cup of cold water to the thirsty kid in the next seat. Or we just can’t stop talking about how we’re flying, in Christ.

The sanctifying action is done by Jesus. Our actions are downstream of his substitutionary atonement and are subsequent to it. Renewal and change flow from abiding in Jesus, who he is and what he has done. In him, our fruitfulness is assured. There’s rest in that, not anxiety. There’s a settled identity in Christ, not an uncertain, effort-dependent one.

It has been refreshing to see this talked about more and discussed more. I’ve recently been particularly refreshed by a reformed treatment that walks through Scripture in an honest way. Refreshing because often proponents of a two-tiered sanctification process appeal to the reformed tradition, and especially the Westminster Confession, as proof of such a division. This interesting book is part of the New Studies in Biblical Theology, edited by D.A. Carson, written by David Peterson, called Possessed by God. Consider this, from his final summary in the book (p.136):

The popular view that sanctification is a process of moral renewal and change, following justification, is not the emphasis of the New Testament. Rather, sanctification is primarily another way of describing what it means to be converted or brought to God in Christ and kept in that relationship. It would be more accurate to say that renewal and change flow from the regeneration and sanctification that God has already accomplished in our lives… Sanctification is thus primarily the work of Christ on the cross and of the Holy Spirit through the word of the gospel…”

And further, in that same summary:

The call to ‘be holy’ can so easily degenerate into a moralistic and perfectionist programme for believers to pursue. In New Testament terms, we are to live as those who have been brought from death to life, discharged from the law to belong to Christ, led by the Spirit in a continuing struggle with the flesh. We are to live with a confidence in what God has already done for us and trust in him to continue his transforming work in us until we see him face to face.

Can’t wait! May you too live in confidence in what God has already done for us and may you  grow more and more in your dependence on and trust in Jesus… that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

“You will lose one childhood memory with every fact you push into your brain.” That was the  unsubstantiated but scary claim of one of my medical school professors, even as thousands of such facts were assigned to be memorized.

And I have found that my grade-school memories of living in Hawaii have grown shrouded in uncertainty over the years. They aren’t gone… just faded into the background of a busy life.

Which brings me to communion. I’ve grown to really like the word, with its flavor of intimacy and shared fellowship.  More than “The Lord’s Supper,” communion captures the longing that Jesus had, the “earnest desire that he desired” to share that time with his disciples, on that evening he was betrayed. We remember a moment long anticipated, yearned for even, on the part of the Son of God.

But mostly… I’m amazed at what Jesus set up to help us remember. I’m one of the ones Jesus died for. This ordinance is for me. I am in constant danger of thinking like the world and having the world rob me of right thinking about the death of Jesus and its ongoing daily meaning for my life. And thus… this ordinance, this remembrance, this special acted-out teaching gets replayed with frequency in my life. So that I might, along with the rest of our body, remember Jesus.

There is no heavy self-examination for worthiness involved. We are all unworthy. There is no making sure that I’ve cleaned up first, no clearing the slate so that I have done something to deserve taking. Nothing like that can be found in scripture, for all that people try to bring in Matthew 5 or John 6 out of context.  They shouldn’t. Neither of those passages have anything directly to do with what Jesus established in communion.

There is not even a special badness for the unbeliever who partakes. Not that eating crackers and drinking grape juice will help them. I mean, Judas was there in Luke 22, and he didn’t get zapped… nor did he change his course.

In communion there is only a gift from Jesus. He will pay for our sins alone. He will die alone, betrayed. He is eager to have us remember that everything – everything – is a gift. In Christ alone, grace alone.

And so I don’t care who takes the elements. Or rather… I do care that all are invited. Right? Because no one has standing over another. That’s the problem Paul has in 1 Corinthians 11. He is saddened that some churchgoers are coming early and pigging out on the communion elements. That sets up a hierarchy, that prevents some people from partaking based on when they come, that says something about who deserves it. And no one deserves it. We all receive.

That’s why it is important for new believers and old, for weak, barely-awake believers and mature, for anyone who calls on the name of Jesus to have this incredible tool to ward off the world… because that’s what is needed. For us again to marvel at the amazing sacrifice of Jesus Christ for each of us. Together.

So bring your kids. Bring your angry friend who needs a reminder. Bring your busy executive. Bring your frazzled housewife. Come to the cross. Find there grace, in the body given for you, in the blood poured out for you. Realize you are part of a new covenant, one in which all is fulfilled.

“It is finished” is Jesus’ last word on this. And it is. We believe it. And communion once again places that incredible act of Jesus at the burning center of my life. Where it needs to be. Because our only hope is in him.

Death tried to swallow Jesus, and it got swallowed in the process. The sting of death is that we die as sinnners and go to meet the one who cannot tolerate sin. but now the death of Jesus has taken away our sin. And so we still feel death, but like the bite of a scorpion without venom, there is no sting. All that is left is the victory of Jesus. His resurrection, and the resurrection of the dead, brings online a new lifestyle with a new pattern. Life-then-death is replaced with death-then-life.

That’s Rory Shiner, in One Forever, on our union with Christ.

The amazing thing is that our transfer into this new kingdom is by associating with the death of Christ. In practice, we need to connect more steadfastly the resurrection of Jesus with our own resurrection. Because we all die… and our trust is that the power which resurrected Jesus will also resurrect us, as children and heirs with our Savior.

Wow!

From Tim Keller, in a sermon from 2003:

“If it is true you’re saved sheerly by grace, then the person you’re talking to about the gospel could easily be a better person than you, more moral, have more fiber, have better character. Why? Because your salvation has nothing to do with how good a person you are at all. There can never be a shred of superiority in your dealing with people.”

Refreshing… even beyond the exhortation to not think you’re superior… it is freeing to realize that my morality and goodness isn’t the issue, but the grace of the gospel of Jesus. We have such good news to freely share!