| | A nightly scene at my house during my childhood was me crying in my mom and dad's bedroom explaining that I didn't know if I was really saved. This was a nightly scene and a nightly scene that went on from the age of 7 to 13. That is 6 long years. I would go to church and the pastor would say, "if you are not 100% sure that you are going to Heaven then you are going to Hell." I would say the prayer there and then probably once on the hour every hour afterward. The pastor would also explain that dying was not the only thing to be afraid of but the rapture could also happen at any moment. This added an altogether new fear in me. I remember standing at the foot of my parents bed nearly nightly with tears rolling down my cheeks saying, "but mommy, I don't think I meant it." My mom and dad really had no answers for me because I was simply being true to what the pastor was preaching. As a senior in high school, I went to visit the pastor to tell him that I wasn't 100% sure. His response was that he knew I was saved because my attendance at so many of the church's events was the evidence that I was saved. He explained that no one unsaved would be so faithful. I remember leaving just as unsure as when I got there. Then the final time I talked with someone out loud was when I was a sophomore at Liberty University. A speaker explained that most people will not get saved because they have been in church too long and are too proud. Still doubting my heart in regards to 'meaning' the prayer, I went forward again in front of all of my Liberty friends to get saved. When I went back to talk to my 'decision helper,' he prayed the prayer with me as a means of nailing it down but wasn't convinced that I was lost. I lived a stressful life for many years because I didn't believe that I meant the prayer when I prayed it. I knew that I had a bad heart. I knew that I wasn't pure in my meaning. I knew that my belief wasn't 100% but everyone else seemed to claim that they knew my heart was pure. There is more to this story but this is enough for today, I only want to explain how bad theology led to this problem. I was correct in not being able to trust in my own meaning. There was good reason for my lack of belief in myself. John Piper's explanation of St. Augustine's City of God finally freed me. Piper explained his own testimony in reference to St. Augustine as, "I love God more now than ever before," and not as, "in 1982 I prayed the prayer." Augustine told me to cultivate my love for God by knowing God. This pushed me down a great theological journey of learning and loving. A learning and loving that has given me the ability to look back on my past and be thankful for the stress but also realize why it happened. It happened because my/our theology was existential not Biblical.¹
The Bible is a story of God's relationship with man. The amazing thing about this story is that God establishes covenant oaths with man. He establishes these covenant oaths via representatives for man, too: Adam, Noah, Abram, Moses, David, and finally Jesus. The crazy thing about this is that God stoops down to put himself in a covenant with man. Man is not climbing up to God, God is stooping down to man. Without an understanding of this story, proof-texting theology, moral theology, and existential trust in one's own meaning is necessary. With this covenental understanding, Biblical cohesion, profound exegesis, and true humility is possible. The toladote (Hebrew word for genealogy) is not simply the part of the Bible you have to make it through in your Bible reading, the toladote is extremely important because it shows the covenant lineage. The God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament can then be seen as the same God. The humans mistrust in God and desire for blessings in their understanding of blessings is seen as the difference. Christ came to write the law on our hearts only after a remnant realized that they couldn't do it on their own. A covenental understanding of the Bible, salvation history, makes the Bible come alive.
In reference to my above testimony the covenant is huge. God establishes covenants with man. Man doesn't have to worry about his sincerity or the perecentage of his meaning. Man doesn't have to trust in himself. Man trusts in the promises of God in his oath swearing. God told Abraham to circumsize as his part of the oath. God tells Moses and to put the blood over the door. God tells tells David what to do as a king. God stoops down and gives man a proposal. What if Abraham was hesitant to circumcise himself? What if he didn't really want to? What if one of the Hebrews in Egypt panted the blood on the door without really believing it? God keeps his promises. If God promises that he will bless us if we circumcise ourselves, then it doesn't matter what your attitude while circumcising yourself is, God keeps his end of the deal. He doesn't ask for an existential self belief, he asks for belief in his promise. If God promises to pass over your house if you paint the blood on the door and eat the lamb, it doesn't matter if you really wanted to paint it in a different color or if you wanted to eat chicken that night, it only matters that you did it, because God keeps his promises. He doesn't require you to believe in yourself. God's promise continues in spite of your intentions. If God would promise to give you a million dollars if you said I love you, is all you have to do is say it and the million dollars is yours. God keeps his promises. For 20 years of my life, I couldn't believe in myself and I was correct in not being able to but no one could give me the reality that God keeps his promise regardless of my intentions. So what does God promise?
I never understood the fact that the great commission was so adament about baptism: baptism was only a sign. Why would it be so important? Why did Mark 16:16 add Baptism to belief? Why didn't it simply say belief? This was an important text, this was the sending out. Why did Peter, at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, say,
Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call. (Acts 2:38 - 39)
Why did he include baptism in repentance? Because God promised! If a person trusts God they will take part in his promise. As circumsion, as blood on the doorpost, as following the Davidic covenant, Baptism was God's promise. If one repents and trust God then they will follow through by taking God up on his promise. Does their heart have to be 100% pure? Do they have to have 100% good intentions? Of course not, they simply have to take God up on his promise. It like bringing a coupon to the counter. God sent coupons. God said be baptized and I promise to remove sin. Baptism is God's promise. Baptism is not the end though. Baptism is the beginning.²
There is a reason why I finally found security in St. Augustine's City of God, Augustine was explaining to me the truth of holiness. I couldn't buy the belief of my own perfect intentions but I could fall more in love with the God of creation, the Jesus of the Bible. Now, looking back, I see why I struggled for so many years with my assurance. I was attempting to trust me and not God. Everyone around me was telling me to trust me, to believe my intentions and heart were pure when I said the prayer, but I knew they weren't. My heart didn't have to be perfect though, God gave a coupon. You don't have to want to support the overall goodness of the store in order to use a coupon, a coupon is a promise. You only have to believe that the store will follow through on its promise.
I don't wish that my life would have been different. I am wonderfully thrilled to figure out that I don't have to trust in my own intentions, in my own purity of heart. I simply trust in God's covenant. After I trust in God's covenant and be baptized then I cultivate my love for God. Then when I die, my soul will be in the presence of the God of which I have cultivated my love for via his means of grace. The God that stooped down and made a covenant with me. A God that should have punished us sinful humans for not keeping our end of the covenant in Adam, in Noah, in Abram, in Moses, in David but rather than punish us for not keeping the covenant he gave a new covenant through his son. This new covenant doesn't require purity of heart and perfect intentions, it requires the faith in God to accept his covenant. God's covenant comes in the form of instruments of grace (of which I will write about later). God promises to give grace. God swears an oath with man.
For so long I attempted to love grace, but I don't think I really believed grace. I really believed my own efforts. I started realizing that existence was grace and that everything is grace and then I started realizing that God gives us instruments of grace: sacraments. All who don't trust in their own works will seek out these instruments.
I will attempt to put this in a materialistic illustration. God is like a father that wants his children to have money to buy things for him but they have no means of working. God promises his children that he will put money in a cookie jar and in a sock drawer. Several children are working hard at cleaning the house but they aren't trusting the Father. Several children are telling other people that they trust in the Father ultimately but they neither visit the cookie jar nor the sock drawer and thus they have no means of buying things for the dad they love. Many of these children that scrub the floor and that clean the windows claim that it is all for the Father, all while ignoring his instuctions about the cookie jar and sock drawer. I want to get up off my knees and visit the sock drawer. I want to get down from my ladder and visit the cookie jar.
Looking back and realizing that God promised to forgive my sins via baptism has been wonderfully freeing but it is not only a hindsight. I am also able to look forward and understand that the covenantal God of Baptism is also the covenantal God of the bread and the wine and other instruments of grace. God not only gave an oath for the forgiveness of man's inability to fullfill their end of the covenant, he also gave an oath for the means of grace that enables one to truly offer good gifts to the Father: namely themselves full of grace. It is not by cleaning the floors and washing the windows that we earn money. It is not by self-righteous Bible reading and self-righteous witnessing that we earn grace. It is by going to the cookie jar and the sock drawer that we receive money. It is by taking part in the sacraments that we receive grace. It is so ironic to me that those who claim to believe that works don't get them to heaven, are scrubbing the floor so furiously. It is so ironic to me that those who claim to love the Bible are missing the very point of the Bible. How can we love the book that tells us about God's coupons and never use the coupons?
Lord,
Make us humble enough to get up from our knees and down from our ladders
Help us to visit your cookie jar and your sock drawer.
Lord, I thank you for the freedom found in your truth.
Lord, make me selfless as you are selfless
Lord allow me to take part in the love of the Trinity.
Your Kingdom come, Your will be done,
In Jesus Name,
Amen.
James S. Sturgill
- This is not to say that the Bible is not existential in some places. It is to say that the Bible is not existential in reference to salvation history which is the main story of the Bible.
- It is important to note here that trust in God is what makes one be baptized and thus have their sins washed away. God is still perfectly just. The theif on the cross certainly trust in God and thus would have been baptized had he known. God knows this. However, I do not know my intentions. I do not trust my own heart. I will take part in the promise, the coupon if you will, that God has sent. Some may be saved without baptism. Some may get a discount without the coupon but God does give an assurance via baptism, he does send coupons. The Old Testament is a testament to this reality, too. Those that were circumcised were not the only ones to receive blessings. Many non-Jews are in the Davidic line.
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| | Posted 7/3/2009 12:11 AM - 10 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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