Religion and the Gospel

And there it is. The part that I cannot get right. The part that I fight so hard against, knowingly or not. The very difference between Christianity and other religions. The difference between following Christ, putting Him at the center of my life, obeying out of love and a changed heart – the difference between that and a Christian “religion”.

All religion is the process of earning your right to be in heaven or personally attaining nirvana or enlightenment. And this includes the pharisaically perverted version of Christianity. The author distinguishes the Gospel from other religions and rightly so. It is different. Your good and bad deeds are not used to reward or punish you. We deserve punishment, but it has already been meted out and hence there is no need to continue trying to earn rewards and escape punishment. It’s been done. The price paid the goal achieved.

Some would say… then why be good? No, it’s not out of fear of death and the devil and hell. Those all have been defeated. We should want to be good out of respect and love and obedience to the one who made us and the one who saved us.

And that’s where I go horribly wrong. I cannot do anything right. I still do evil. I have awful thoughts and behave quite contrary to what I profess. And it is not because I am ignorant. I know what I do is wrong… Sometimes I forget… Sometimes I simply don’t care. I… don’t… care… at… all. Why would I be like that? Heck… I might even be deliberate. Strike that… I can be deliberate. I am deliberate. I am a stubborn, rebellious child. It is second nature. I’ve done it for so long. And sometimes when I try especially hard… I fail even harder.

I can make excuses till Christ returns. I can give explanations until the cows come home.

But see, I can also be “good”. I can serve and love and care and be generous. I can sacrifice and I can even hold my tongue. I can pray even though it is not my strongest point. But do you also notice the “I”? The “I can” and “I do” and “I am”? And what am I doing it for? Sometimes I exhaust myself so hard trying to… earn my right to heaven. Earn my right to fit in. Earn my right to belong. Earn my right to have friends. Earn my right to be noticed. Ugh!

Sometimes I really enjoy “serving” and I start to worry that it doesn’t “count”. Count for what? Am I still trying to keep score? No, I am worried that God sees my heart and I am doing it for the wrong reason… Am I doing it for the wrong reason? Is at least a part of it for the right reason?

So I am the righteous prig and the sinner simultaneously. I fear I have been working on this problem for a very, very, very long time – to no avail.

But I am beginning to understand that “I” am working on it. Alone. And I haven’t been accepting help. And the best place to go is to the One I have been avoiding recently. I had been thinking I was angry at Him. But perhaps I am angry at myself (certainly at others) but mainly myself for not getting it right after all these years. I’m not gonna get it right until I let myself go… I don’t need religion. I need more of the Gospel.

(How did today’s sermon manage to sync perfectly with this chapter that I have put off for so long…?)

            For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

            So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

(Romans 7:15-25 ESV)

The Problem of Sin

When I was very young, I had a very simplistic concept of sin. I was taught the Ten Commandments and I was more concerned that I would not be able to recite them all verbatim than I was concerned with understanding what they meant. Thou shalt not murder… or is it you will not kill… and is there really a big difference? At least I have not taken the life of another person through violence. Okay, I have that one under the belt. I think I can keep that one fairly well. Is that number 5 or 7?

Then Jesus threw that rod in the wheel – anyone so much as hates their neighbor and you have already broken the commandment not to kill. Really? You cannot even think it and it is a sin? Okay, so I have broken that commandment. Many times over. Let’s pick another one.

Truth is I would sit in my pew at church – still when I was little – and listen to us confess our sins and promise to do better. In my mind, I believed that I would honestly try to do better and keep a clean slate for the week. I would be the best “me” I could be. When I got older I realized with clarity that I had no sooner stepped out of the sanctuary, than all of my good intentions were blown away by the wind. A puff really.

I believe many of us are still operating under this misguided idea that we can be good. Or even that we are already good enough. We are at least much better than others. And if we can be good enough on our own, we don’t need anything else. (especially not God?)

So how do we define our goodness? By how smart or talented we are. If not, then at least by how smart or talented our children are. By the job that we have? By the art we create? By the number of people who look up to us. By the number of people who follow us? By the house we own or the car we drive? By the money we can make. Or the people we know.

Do we define our goodness against the evil in the world? We live in a free country. We belong to organizations that stop bad things from happening. We belong to the “right” political party. We give to charity. We don’t approve of dysfunctional lifestyles. We’re not divorced. We don’t drink. We don’t smoke. We adopt strays – human or animal.

How do we define sin and how do we distance ourselves from it. How do we attempt to turn the tables to redirect suspicion? “She’s a gossip!” Even if what she’s gossiping about – about you – happens to be true. Still you’re the victim. We make sin out to be the bad things that happen to us. Against us.

No, sin is our inability to accept that we are not good enough. Our inability to accept that we do infinitely bad things – even if we only think them. Our attempts to redirect the bad away from us. To make ourselves look good. To always be looking out for number one – ourselves. To prove that we are better or the best.

The sin is making “me” the ultimate end. Putting ourselves on the pedestal by any of the means necessary and available. This is so hard. Exhausting really. Always trying to prove to others and especially to ourselves that we are worthy of the rare space available on the lifeboat.

All we need to define ourselves. The easy way. Is to look towards that which is truly the ultimate. The beginning and the end. God and His sinless Son. That perfect relationship that we once had and then lost. We have been trying to regain it ever since whether we knew it or not. Filling ourselves up with everything – pride mostly – that we thought would fill the emptiness. But what we really needed was to put aside all forms of pride and accept the loving relationship with our Maker. Accept His Son who was able to do what we could not.

Not saying that it is easy. I certainly cannot get it right. But that is okay, because I know that I am sinful and I know that there is HOPE for a restored relationship someday. It’s not about me. Never was. Never will be. I came with nothing. I’ll leave with nothing. But I’ll gain what I have been missing – God.

The Knowledge of God

Wow! This is a rough one. Tim Keller argues that we all know that God does indeed exist if for no other reason than Human Rights and morality. You see, in the past our morality was based upon our religious beliefs. The Ten Commandments for example come directly from God. Jesus embellished upon them in the Sermon on the Mount. God said “Thou shalt not kill.” Jesus said if you hate your brother, you have already killed him. And so Christians recognize that murder is evil. Why? God said so.

Atheists can be moral beings as well. They can fight just as strongly for Human Rights as a believer would. But what are their morals based upon? They cannot say they are from God, but they also cannot say they are from evolution and natural selection. Humans are the only “animal” who believes in the rights of the weak. In the animal world, the strong live off of the weak. Killing is not only acceptable, but it is necessary to survival.

So if there is no God, who has the say on what is good and what is evil? The majority? What if the Nazis are the majority? The author points out that if one person must be chosen to make such weighty decisions, everyone else would be quick to object. We would only be placing another person in God’s Judgment Seat. Or another government, country. Wouldn’t it be better just to let God make the rules?

Without God there are no rules. There is no right or wrong. There is no good or evil. And life has no meaning. So why would we continue as if there is? If there is no life after death, why bother about morals, human dignity and rights? We just live for ourselves and our own pleasures while we can.

But we don’t. Why? Because there is a God.

If we do allow that there is a God and that he has given us superiority over the animals and He takes care of us, His precious children, we do have a purpose and meaning in our lives. And there is a promise for after this life. And we would have every reason to help the poor, protect the weak, sacrifice our time for others even when they are of no relation to us. Because He commanded it. And we obey.

The author calls it “dishonest” to live as though there are rules, but ignore the one who made them.

Some wonder how humans will continue to believe in Human Rights and live morally without a God to back their beliefs. That we’ll begin to live immorally without a firm foundation for our “up in the air” morals. That it has already happened.

We can agree that it is wrong to napalm babies. But we disagree on whether it is right or wrong to abort them…

And so our morals are another indicator that there is a God and we are His special creation made in His image and not an accident.

The Clues of God

1.     What began the universe?
We seem to agree that the universe had a beginning, but we cannot agree on how it began; however, there must be a cause. We do agree on cause/effect relationships. Something fueled a Big Bang. It could have been a dying universe, a super black hole. It could have been a creator.

2.    What fine-tunes the universe?
The universe is perfectly calibrated for us. The Earth could be one inch further or one inch closer to the Sun and we would not exist. That is only one of multiple factors that must all fall within a very narrow range. It would be easier to win the Power Ball. Or it was made specifically for us. By a creator that holds us in the balance.

3.    What regulates the universe?
Man has yet to create a working perpetual motion machine. They always run out of steam eventually. I have heard that the expansion of the universe is slowing down. I have heard that the spin of the Earth on its axis is slowing down. I have heard that the moon is falling towards Earth. But the constant of gravity remains … constant. As other things slow down… why do our scientific constants remain the same – regular? We take it for granted. But perhaps it is that creator maintaining the universe.

4.    What do we long for?
This question pertains to beauty and its purpose. When you walk outside on a clear evening and witness the stars coming out and you cannot help but gaze in awe and wonder. When you listen to a song and it moves you. When you go to the Farmer’s Market to pick out flowers for your window boxes and you gasp at each new color of flower and scent of bloom. How can you possibly choose? Different people are stirred by different forms of beauty. My favorite song might be your least favorite. I might be enthusiastic about bright colors and you might lean towards neutrals. But that piece of beauty that gives you goosebumps… I don’t know… the Grand Canyon… doesn’t it make you feel like you are a part of something bigger and more important than just yourself. Like you are a small piece of a much larger puzzle. And that puzzle is not an accident. It holds the answer to what we are looking for.

5.    If we cannot trust our feelings, we also cannot trust our logic.
This question comes from what is called the clue-killer. Evolution states that love is merely a chemical reaction that our bodies developed in order to survive. Evolution states that attraction to beauty guarantees survival of the fittest. Evolution states that we cannot trust our feelings for they are chemical reactions geared for survival. Evolution states that we would make up religion because it would ensure our survival – that we would believe in things that were not true because it would help us survive. If we cannot trust things that we hold dear because there is no truth only survival of the fittest, how can we possibly trust our logic if it only works as a tool to ensure our survival? And why would we even want to survive if there is nothing there in the end?

6.    What are we talking to?
1-5 are directly from the book, but in my own language. For better or for worse. Number 6 is mine although this chapter might have alluded to it or even planted it in my mind. But it has been in my thoughts. Because I think all the time. Why ever would we have the ability to think? I talk in my mind all day long. It is far more prevalent that I have a conversation in my head than with a live person. Evolution would say that it ensures my survival somehow. I say it is because we are designed for relationship. But since the fall and our fallen relationship with God, we do our talking with the person we most love and enjoy – ourselves. We were made to be one in communication with our Creator, and in its absence, we are stuck with second best. This is my number one clue to the existence of God.

pray without ceasing
1 Thessalonians 5:17 (esv)

note to self… that isn’t talk in one’s mind without stopping

Intermission

Part 1 of the book, The Reason for God, spoke to the seven biggest objections people of a primarily modern, post-industrial, age-of-information culture have about the Christian faith. The author, Timothy Keller, argued that there are no sufficient reasons for disbelieving Christianity. I happen to agree. In Part 2, he will argue that there are sufficient reasons for believing in Christianity.

But first there is an Intermission. Let me say that I didn’t need to be convinced of Part 1. I’m guessing I won’t need to be convinced of Part 2 either. More importantly, the Intermission appealed to my heart. It spoke to me in a way that bought me joy. It put into words, in an eloquent manner, very much what I wish to believe. That the Christian Worldview makes sense of this world we live in. That it is complete. Logic and rationality are a part of it. They are not everything alone. They cannot explain this world that we live in. It is like accepting the part of me that must have knowledge and collect knowledge, but denying my artistic tendencies. Boring! Suicidal!

Forgive me. I just wanted to share the parts below and I didn’t want to massacre them…

“The view that there is a God, leads us to expect the things we observe – that there is a universe at all, that scientific laws operate within it, that it contains human beings with consciousness and with an indelible moral sense. The theory that there is no God, does not lead us to expect any of these things.”

Page 121 referring to the book Is There a God?
Written by Oxford philosopher Richard Swinburne

“Imagine trying to look directly at the sun [God] in order to learn about it [Him]. You can’t do it. It [He] will burn out your retinas, ruining your capacity to take it [Him] in. A far better way to learn about the existence, power, and quality of the sun [God] is to look at the world it [He] shows you, to recognize how it [He] sustains everything you see and enables you to see it [God].”

Page 122 referring to a metaphor
attributed to C.S. Lewis

“We have a sense that the world is not the way it out to be. We have a sense that we are very flawed and yet very great. We have a longing for love and beauty that nothing in this world can fulfill. We have a deep need to know meaning and purpose. Which worldview best accounts for these things?”

Page 122

“Christians believe that the Christian account of things – creation, fall, redemption, and restoration – makes the most sense of the world.”

Page 123

“That is why, if God exists, we would expect to find that he appeals to our rational faculties. If we were made ‘in his image’ as rational, personal beings, there should be some resonance between his mind and ours. It also means that reason alone won’t be enough”

Page 123

But the punch line is the best part… Read the book yourself!

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16 (niv)

Hint… God the Playwright wrote Himself into the story…

You Can’t Take the Bible Literally

I’ll start by saying that I take the Bible very literally. I do. Every part of it, I believe. Exactly as stated. The history, there chronicled, is truth. Fact. The songs and the poems were written by real people to be used for worship and enjoyed. The parables were truly told with purpose. The letters were actually written to persons and people to convey knowledge and to encourage. And even, to correct.

I admit, I like to read the research that proves the authenticity of the Bible. I like to be reminded of my religious education and the foundation I was given to support the truth of the Bible. I can get sucked right in, following link after link. This book that I am reading included some of that. And it reminded me of how I got to where I am.

Part of why I don’t dwell on the research is because of the simple beauty of the Bible stories I learned as a child and now teach on a weekly basis. Stories about Jesus walking on water, healing the sick, resurrecting the dead, controlling the weather. Stories about the Children of Israel grumbling, Moses praying and God answering. Simple stories about the pride of Pharisees and the humility of tax collectors. Parables about the prodigal son and the even the rich man and the mustard seed. Stories that are easy to remember and easy to tell.

The stories are even better because they are true. And sometimes the truth hurts. It hurts because as a child I always identified with the good son or the humble tax collector. I was a good girl and identified with the people that seemed good in the stories. But then I grew up and recognized that I’m usually the bad person in the story. And when I forget, there are always the sermons and Bible studies to remind me. I hate that I am not only the Prodigal Son, but I am also the Elder Brother. And that is no better. I am the righteous prig as well as the sinner.

Regardless of who I am, I am not good enough. I am not worthy. And who likes to hear that on a regular basis? Don’t we prefer to hear how wonderful we are? Even if it isn’t true? Aren’t we quick to take credit and faster to assign blame?

I understand why, especially in today’s (American) humanistic world, we would rather not take the Bible literally. Wouldn’t we rather take the passages that make us look good? Exactly like the child. And ignore the ones that magnify our sin? We want to be Peter and dwell on the good and forget that he denied Christ. We would rather distance ourselves from Judas, the evil villain of the story, even though most of us are Judas at some time every day.

And in today’s world, are we trying to make everyone as acceptable as possible? Including ourselves? If everyone is good and right regardless, why, then aren’t we to be included in parade?

In the end, we are to accept everyone, regardless of their sin, because that is the grace shown to us, sinners, by Christ Himself. We accept the sinner, but we don’t support the sin. But instead of dwelling on the sins of others, we concern ourselves with our own sins. We look towards a right relationship with Jesus. And others will see Truth at work.

I was intrigued by one suggestion. If you have trouble accepting All of the Bible, try just dealing with the Divinity of Jesus and His life, death and resurrection. That is what Christians can agree on. Don’t be diverted by the controversial stuff. Huh, interesting.

            All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

(2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV)

Science Has Disproved Christianity

I think that I can comfortably admit that this particular point bothers me above all others previously discussed in the book. Not that I think that science has disproved Christianity, but rather science thinks that it has disproved Christianity. I am frequently annoyed by seemingly confident headlines that state that there is no God. And much like an atheist reading this book, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, I find their “proof” remarkably flawed.

Perhaps it is because I abhor conflict, but I would really like the disciplines to get along. Much like a school child must give equal weight to their reading, writing and arithmetic, science and religion must live together amicably. You laugh.

For instance, in my own mind and not because of someone else’s teaching. And again, I am not the first person to think this. Nor will I be the last. I do not think myself unique in this position. But I have always imagined that the universe could very well have come into existence in a Big Bang way. Only not because of a random primordial occurrence, but rather because God said let there be and there was.

Just because God could say, let there be, and there was, doesn’t necessarily mean that he said light and a switch was flipped. He didn’t wave a wand and pull a rabbit out of His hat. No, for me, He would be more like the conductor of a tremendous symphony orchestra directing the beginning with His hands. Raising the lights brighter until He is pleased and it is good.

Ah yes. My influence might be C.S. Lewis himself. Look to the Magician’s Nephew when Aslan sings Narnia into existence. That is it precisely.

And I must imagine that God also enjoys surprises. He has worked into our DNA the very blueprint for wonders. The mutation for blue eyes that has recently entered the news. Spontaneous mutations in cats and the shape of their ears or the texture of their fur. Ligers. Tall, short, thick, thin.

I can buy evolution to an extent – changes within species. Can I accept it as the “be all end all” answer to why we are here. Nope. No way.

I was startled by a video posted on Facebook recently. It’s a mini lecture on Stupid Design by Neil Degrasse Tyson. To sum it up in my own words… We are horribly ridiculous creatures. It is a wonder that we can even survive. There is no way an intelligent, perfect Being was behind our creation. He could have done a much better job. That being said, we are utterly amazing creatures to have spontaneously evolved out of the ooze. But nope, we are nothing special and the universe wasn’t made for us. It is funny, but somehow I find it merely demonstrating how amazing we are and the miracle that is our world…

The more I see and hear of our universe, the more in awe I am and the more I want to learn more – not to disprove God’s existence, but to gaze in wonder of what He has made for us.

Psalm 8 (esv)

Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!

You have set your glory
in the heavens.
Through the praise of children and infants
you have established a stronghold against your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?

You have made the a little lower than the angels
and crowned them with glory and honor.
You made them ruler over the works of your hands;
you put everything under their feet:
all flocks and herds,
and the animals of the wild,
 the birds in the sky,
and the fish in the sea
all that swim the paths of the seas.

Lord, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!