Full Contact Christianity

Repenting from Lordship Salvation…Halfway

28 August 2011

The first error of lordship salvation is thinking that God won’t save you (or hasn’t saved you) if you have a rotten life. Entry into heaven goes with a good life (conditionally or inevitably), and if you examine your life and see that it’s not good, you’re not going to heaven.

The second, and more subtle, error of lordship salvation is thinking that Yahweh is the sort of god who would send you to hell if He could.

I’m finding that there are an awful lot of people who have halfway repented from lordship salvation. They no longer believe that Yahweh requires sanctification in order to enter heaven. However, in their heart of hearts, they still believe in a furious god who would send them to hell if he could.

So they invest themselves in the Free Grace gospel: Jesus saves us on the sole condition of faith alone, with no works before, during, or after the moment of faith required. No front-loading the gospel; no back-loading either. Just belief in the proper content. God won’t weigh your works at heaven’s gate to determine your eternal destiny; He will ask a simple question about your soteriology. Pass that theology test, just once, at any point in your life, and you’re golden. That done, you can forever fend off the vengeful deity: you have already done all that is required of you, and he can’t send you to hell, no matter how he might want to. This would, in fact, be good news…if Yahweh were even remotely like the god they’re describing.

***

Do you see that there’s a lot of self-effort going into passing the theology test? That the good news of the freeness of God’s grace is being turned into a weapon to hold a (fictitious) angry deity at bay?

Do you see that when we do this, we don’t actually trust God at all? That if we did, we could just trust Him to guide us into whatever content we need to know?

***

To the people I’ve just described, I have a message. I didn’t think of it myself; I inherited it from someone who lived five centuries ago. He was a Roman Catholic, confessor to a neurotic Augustinian friar named Martin Luther. Luther was so obsessed with his sins that he would be in the confessional for six hours at a time, trying to get forgiveness for everything, lest he be damned.
Finally–so the story goes–his confessor shouted at him, “God doesn’t hate you; you hate Him! Don’t you know the Scriptures command you to hope?”

Exactly.

God doesn’t hate you. And if you’re trying to hold Him at bay, be it with a stack of good deeds, a saving proposition, or with the very words of John 3:16, then the problem is that you hate Him.

But you don’t believe the very first words of the verse. “God so loved the world…”

The solution is simple: trust Him. He who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him.

5 Comments | Bare Minimum Gospel Foolishness, Controversies, The Free Grace Food Fight | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Justification by Faith in Genesis 1

21 August 2011

If you read through the days of creation in Genesis 1, you’ll see an overall pattern:

God commands a thing into existence
He divides it from other things
He names it
He evaluates it

The pattern is not slavishly adhered to in every case; like a musical theme it’s embroidered upon in various ways, for various reasons. But the overall pattern holds. The only time God says something is “not good” is when he’s looking at a man alone. The man was meant to be the image of the triune God, and he cannot do this by himself, without another person to relate to.

And then, in due course, Paul comes along and tells us, “If any man be in Christ, He is a new creation.”

When we believe in Jesus, we, too, are born into existence by God’s command, separated by the gospel to be a new people for His name, and given the right to be called the children of God. The evaluation comes after all that.

If God says “not good,” it will be for the same reason He said it in the garden: because we fail to reflect the image of God to which we are called, for which we are separated from the world, and by which we are named. This failure is certainly possible.

But notice that failure, if it comes, comes after we are re-created, separated to God, and named His children. None of those things are dependent upon passing an evaluation. Which is to say that we are justified by faith, not works, and we know this from the very first chapter of the Bible.

Comments Off on Justification by Faith in Genesis 1 | Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Mystical Union: Reading John 17:3

14 August 2011

In the ongoing discussion of 3D Theology, our esteemed opponents have taken significant exception to the way we are using John 17:3. The various objections mostly have to do with how our reading of the verse conflicts with this theological formulation or that one, and are being dealt with in the venues where they were made. To my eye, one particular point of discussion has been notably absent: discussion of the immediate context. I’d like to remedy that lack today.

In a sense, this discussion needs to start in 1:1 — and some of the issues that will come up in the ensuing discussion can probably only be resolved that way — but for today, let’s just work through the beginning of this prayer.

Jesus begins by saying that the hour has come, and then makes His request:
He asks the Father to glorify Him.
The purpose for the Father glorifying Him is so that He can, in turn, glorify the Father.
He will glorify the Father because the Father has given Him power over everyone.
The purpose for the Father giving Him power over everyone is in order that Jesus give eternal life to all those the Father has given him.
And what is this eternal life? It is to know the Father, the only true God, and to know Jesus Christ whom the Father sent.
Jesus says He has, in fact, glorified the Father, and finished the work the Father gave Him to do.
On that basis, He asks the Father to return to Him the glory He had before the world existed.

It all hangs together nicely, doesn’t it? (For those of you who want to talk Greek, some comments are already online here .)

This is to say that eternal life is not a thing. It is not a widget that Jesus puts in your pocket and then you walk away. It is not a ticket stashed at the Will Call window by the pearly gates.

Eternal life is knowing the Father, and Jesus Christ His Son. Jesus is the Life (14:6); the Father has life in Himself and has granted to the Son to have life in Himself (5:26). Eternal life is ongoing relationship with the One who is Life. Because He is infinitely faithful and He loves you, if you want a relationship with Him, you’ll have one. He guarantees it.

Over time, eternal life looks like this: first, you don’t have it at all; you’re dead in your trespasses and sins. Then you believe, and you do have it. Then, as you grow, you have more of it, until you have an abundant life (10:10), and the living water Jesus gave you becomes a fountain of life to those around you (4:14, 7:38). Stop believing, like Thomas did (20:27), and you’re still a part of the family (1:12-13). You’re born again; you can’t get un-born (10:28-29). Eternal life is, well, eternal. But like Thomas, you can lose a blessing (20:29), and of course you can fail to be a blessing to others.

Simple as that. God is a Person–know Him.

6 Comments | Meditations, Mystical Union | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Mystical Union: Understanding Works

7 August 2011

We are often fond of saying that justification is a gift, and sanctification is a lot of work, which is true in one way. But what we often mean by it is that we do nothing in justification, and then sanctification is quid pro quo all the way. That needs a rethink.

In Ephesians 2:8-9, Paul says that salvation — by which he means being made alive with Christ, raised with Christ, and seated with Christ in the heavenly places — is not of works, lest anyone should boast. Boasting is excluded by God’s grace.

Thing is, this is also true of sanctification, is it not? We don’t buy our way into spiritual blessing in this life any more than we buy our way into the family to start with. Everything we have — everything — is given by God. “What do you have, that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as though you did not?”

Why, indeed.

God blesses us in sanctification, to be sure, but it’s not a quid pro quo type of transaction, any more than justification is. Sanctification is hard — very hard, at times. But it’s hard because we’re sinners, and it runs counter to our nature to cooperate with God instead of rebelling against Him. God is seeking to give us His blessings, to pour out far more than we can imagine, but there are certain relational blessings He simply can’t give us without our cooperation. You can give a rebellious 2-year-old a hug whether he wants it or not, but you can’t give him the experience of a good hug unless he’s willing to receive it. If he fights you, you may succeed in getting your arms around him and squeezing, but relationally speaking, it’s hardly the same experience, is it?

Sanctification is, above all, a relationship with the living God. Like all good relationships, it requires that we be willing to receive the other person.

But is this so different from justification? As long as a person insists on working, on taking his destiny into his own hands, on keeping Jesus out of the picture, then he cannot be born again. “But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to be called sons of God….”

The difference is in scope more than in kind. But we ought to expect nothing else: “Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh?”

7 Comments | Meditations, Mystical Union, Uncategorized | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Mystical Union: Eternal Life is a Dimmer Switch

31 July 2011

When we begin to talk about eternal life (or for short, “life”), we often adopt binary language — you got it or you don’t, end of story. Then, as a separate issue, we discuss the matter of sanctification. There is, of course, a reason for this. In the End, there are only two places to be, and two sorts of people to be in them. Those who have life will live on the New Earth, where God will dwell with His People, and those who have chosen death will die in the Lake of Fire, eternally quarantined away from the God they so despised. Among the folks who live on the New Earth, some of them will be spiritual giants like Deborah or Peter, men and women who receive great reward. Others will be…how to put it?…largely spiritual failures. People who, like Samson, might have shown a great deal of early promise, but frittered it away. There is a sense in which these are separate issues, the one decided in an instant of faith and the other worked out over the course of a person’s whole life.

In deference to that separateness, many folks will drop “eternal life” language entirely when they start talking about sanctification. Growing up, I can’t recall ever hearing anyone use “eternal life” language in connection with walking with God: “life” was always about justification, never sanctification.

This gets into your hermeneutics, and you begin to read any passage that discusses “eternal life” or “life” as if it were talking strictly about the new birth, which is a serious problem.

But a growing number of commentators have begun to realize that Scripture doesn’t quite speak in that way. In many passages, eternal life isn’t something you get when you die; it’s something you have now (e.g., John 5:24). So there is a growing desire to respond to those passages, but at the same time a great fear of impairing justification by faith alone by confusing justification and sanctification, and the result is an odd blend. These folks discuss the new birth in terms of having eternal life, and then discuss sanctification/growth in terms of experiencing eternal life.

This is a quantum leap forward from where we were, and we should applaud it. However, it doesn’t quite go far enough to really be following the way Scripture speaks of the issues.

In brief, it’s not enough to talk about having/not having eternal life, and then, separately, experiencing eternal life. That’s helpful, but it’s not the way the Bible talks. The Bible talks about not having life, then having it, and then having more life (e.g., John 10:10).

Here’s the difference. The “having/not having vs. experiencing” model is like a conventional light switch and a blindfold. The light is either on or off, but how much you experience the light depends on something totally separate — the blindfold. Maybe it’s on good and tight, and you can’t see a thing, even though the light is on. Maybe it’s slipped upward just enough that you can see down along the sides of your nose. Maybe it’s gone cockeyed, and you can see out of one eye, but not the other…and so on. The light being on is one concern; the blindfold is another, entirely separate set of concerns.

The “not having/having/having more” model is like your basic dimmer dial switch like you might find in a suburban dining room. Turn the dial just a little, and you’ll feel the click as the switch goes from ‘off’ to ‘on.’ But there’s just a trickle of current flowing; you can barely see the light. Keep turning the dial in the same direction, and the flow increases, the light gets progressively brighter. On and off are still distinguishable states, but it’s all on one continuum, not two totally separate issues.

Jesus came that we might have life, and that we might have it more abundantly. He gives us a gift in the new birth, and sanctification is, in this sense, a distinguishable, but not separate, affair. It’s getting more of what you got to start with.

5 Comments | Meditations, Mystical Union, Telos of the Gift | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Mystical Union: Knocking the Bottom out of the Swimming Crib

24 July 2011

During the summer, people generally prefer to swim outside. Although it is common to swim in pools these days, old-school swimming facilities usually depended on natural water features: ponds, rivers, and oceans. An ideal natural swimming location would have clean water, a gradually sloping, sandy bottom, and very little current. Such places existed, of course, but they weren’t as common as one might hope. In response, waterfront staff developed a variety of work-arounds to allow swimmers to safely use the water in the absence of perfect conditions.

In situations where the water was very deep, or the current too fast-moving, one of those work-arounds was called a swimming crib. The crib was basically a very large wooden crate, ballasted and tethered to function sort of like a ‘swimming pool’, immersed in the lake or river. (You can see an example here.) One of the most basic uses for a crib was to provide a shallow area for beginners to swim in water that was naturally very deep. The lake bottom could be thirty feet down, but a 3-foot crib provided an artificial ‘shallow end.’

***

One typical take on eternal life is that it’s “living forever with God” — a simplification that I have certainly been guilty of, myself. The focus is revivalistic, focused on a heaven-or-hell afterlife. A person who ‘has eternal life’ is ‘saved,’ which means that he’s going to go to heaven when he dies…and that’s pretty much it.

Given that definition, the Gospel of John, which is very, very focused on eternal life, takes on the appearance of being all about whether people go to heaven or hell. The purpose of the book, “that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life in His name” is understood to be about taking people who were going to hell and making it so they’re going to heaven…and that’s pretty much it.

This is the theological equivalent of building a 3-foot swimming crib in some very deep, very fast-moving water. Problem is, what we’re protecting people from, in this instance, is God.

***

Eternal life has to be “living forever” — otherwise, as Zane Hodges aptly observed, “eternal life” isn’t a very good name for it — but is that all we need to say about it? Jesus didn’t think so. “And this is eternal life,” Jesus prayed to His Father, “that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent.”

Eternal life, according to Jesus, is knowing God. How? Through Jesus, who said, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.” That’s inexhaustible. It’s far, far deeper than “going to heaven when you die.” And while, of course, lip service is paid to this notion, in fact it is largely ignored. We keep everybody in the 3-food swimming crib of going to heaven, when they could be diving deep into relationship with God Himself.

The solution? We need to knock the bottom out of the crib. This will undoubtedly be the occasion for much whining, but we have no right to speak in a way that stands between people and a living relationship with God.

35 Comments | Meditations, Mystical Union, The Free Grace Food Fight | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Reasons to Rejoice

17 July 2011

God speaks, and it is. When He said, “Let there be light,” there was light — end of story.

David depended on this for his spiritual well-being: “Blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity.” David sinned; no doubt about it. While he harbored his sin, it ruined him, but when he confessed it he was forgiven and the Lord did not count it against him. If the Lord said David was righteous, then who could argue? And so David was free from his burden: “Be glad in the LORD and rejoice, you righteous; and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!”

Let’s think through the implications of that. If God declares us righteous not because we have earned the declaration, but simply because we trust him, casting ourselves on His mercy, then it follows that we have peace with God. Think about it — what disrupts our peace with God? Sin, right? But what sin could we commit that we cannot confess, and be forgiven?

And if we have peace with God, then we have access to His presence. What could keep us away?

And if we have access to God’s presence, then this is worth rejoicing about, is it not? Moreover, if we know that we have access to His presence at any time, then it follows that His glory shines on (and therefore through) us, and even when we die we will have access to His glory. This gives us hope; we know how the story ends.

But not only that, we also know that the end of the Story will be reflected in the little stories of our life, now. So when a difficulty arises today, we know that the hard times teach us to persist, and by persisting we become different — better — people. The sort of people who see hope not just in the far future, but in the present, who benefit from difficulty rather than being defeated by it.

How can we be like this? Because the Holy Spirit is in us, and He pours out God’s love in our hearts. We are able to love the people who create difficulties for us, not because we are so wonderful but because the love of God flows through us.

Just how far will God’s love carry us? We would think twice about giving up a kidney for someone we love. There’s no way we’d give up a kidney for a stranger, let alone a convicted murderer on death row. And that’s just a kidney; we could live without a kidney. God’s love is demonstrated in Jesus giving His life for us, and He did it when we were His enemies.

If God gave us His Son to bring us to Him when we were His enemies, what will He do for us, now that we are His friends?

We still sin, and in this life there are consequences for sin, but considering all He’s done for us, will God not certainly save us from His present wrath against sin?

So here are our reasons to rejoice: We will enter into God’s glory when we die, we can reflect that glory even in our current difficulties, and what’s more, He loves us more deeply than we can imagine.

2 Comments | Stealth Romans | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Crock-Pot Theology

10 July 2011

There are times when it is necessary to say nothing, to wait and grow. There are also times when the growing is done, and it’s time to let your hard-won light shine. We all go through such seasons. I’m going through a wait-and-grow season vis-a-vis the Free Grace Food Fight presently, which is why I’ve had nothing to say about it for a while.

Then, too, different people have different gifts. Some people are theological microwaves; pop in a question and get an answer back 30 seconds later. Others are crock-pot theologians. Answers may be few and far between, but rich and flavorful for having been so long in the preparation.

My friend Michele is such a person, and she’s just delivered a crock-pot feast over at Sanc’s Blog. The specifics are aimed at a narrow segment of the Christian community; if you don’t live in that end of the pool, just let the references to modern-day Euodia and Syntyche pass you by. The meat of the matter is accessible enough, and it’ll be a blessing to you, if you can hear it.

34 Comments | The Free Grace Food Fight | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

A Little More Verse Theological

7 July 2011

Means of Grace

Dance, song, and shouts of joy; the foolishness of preaching;

Sunrises, moonstones, and rainbows; the pleasing stretch of reaching

Across a Sabbath table laden with a feast.

Trumpets and Purim, Christmas and Easter—

the joy of the festival board

Where we eat and we drink and are merry indeed,

the better to fear the Lord.

‘Tis barely begun, this work of naming unnumbered

hundreds of graces;

But may God bless our task, and sharpen our eyes,

and with excellent food stuff our faces!

Comments Off on A Little More Verse Theological | Poetry | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols

Yahweh Laughs

4 July 2011

“The Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King; He will save us.” The text is Isaiah 33:22, and it is often taken by David Barton types as indication of the biblical inspiration for our three branches of government. Be that as it may, let’s not overlook the obvious: the Lord, and not the will of the people, is each of these three things.

God would have spared Sodom for 10 righteous men, but surely there were many times that in Habakkuk’s Judah, and they were carried away into Babylon. Greater light calls for greater accountability. Our fathers who founded this country were overwhelmingly orthodox, trinitarian Christians. They possessed the Scriptures and a wealth of the knowledge of God. Much has been given us, and much will be required of us.

Yet we have rejected the Lord. The People are our Judge, The People are our Lawgiver, The People are our King, and therefore it is up to The People to save us — and The People, quite frankly, are not up to the job.

A government of the people, by the people, for the people, cannot but perish from the earth. Only a nation intent on serving Christ and bringing its honor and glory into the New Jerusalem — only a nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We have not kissed the Son; how can we delude ourselves that He is pleased with us? How can we expect that He will save us?

But then, being saved by Him would mean having to recognize Him as Judge, Lawgiver, and King, and at that price, we don’t want Him to save us. And He won’t. If we insist on saving ourselves, He will let us. And then, when we take counsel together to break His bonds in pieces and cast away His cords from us, He will laugh, and His derision will ring from sea to shining sea.

And we who are made in His image and charged with reflecting His likeness — we should not run about like Chicken Little, squalling that the sky is falling. No, God laughs, and we should laugh with Him.

***

But perhaps we can hope for better. Perhaps, if God is incredibly gracious, He will grant us repentance, and we will one day have nine Supreme Court justices who publicly acknowledge God as the Judge of the nation, a President who openly announces that Jesus Christ is King of America, and the best a President can hope for is to humbly serve as His vassal. Perhaps we will have senators and congressmen who know and proclaim that God is the Lawgiver. Perhaps we will have these things because God has given us a heart to insist on them.

I am not talking about some small, politically active evangelical cabal taking over Washington. That would at best have a temporary good effect, and at worst lead to the Republic of Gilead.

No, I am talking about a reformation in our churches, so that believers will be one, shining forth the glory of the risen Christ so that our neighbors will see us and believe the gospel. A reformation that leads to believers being commissioned and released for Spirit-led, loving ministry in their communities. A reformation that loves our whole nation into the Kingdom, a neighborhood at a time.

It is in this way, and in no other way, that our nation can be saved.

***

On this day, of all days, let us not be puffed up with vainglory about how proud we are to be Americans. (Grateful, sure. Proud? Maybe not the best idea.) Let us not make delusional speeches about how wonderful we all are. He who exalts himself will be humbled.

Rather, let us confess the sins of our people, that His grace might soon lift them all into the light. Let us seek the kindness and forbearance of God for our people, because He promises that those who humble themselves will be exalted.

America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law.

2 Comments | Meditations | Permalink
Posted by Tim Nichols