The most important Person in the universe

Romans 1:1-7

Here's the opportunity before us. We don't have to die before we die. We don't have to stay stuck with the lives or even the selves we have. We can be new again by the reviving power of the gospel. We can live in his newness all our lives. We can live on a path of fresh discovery. Isn't that what we want? As we begin this journey through Romans, we're standing at a threshold of revival, freedom, joy, wisdom. God wants to show us more of himself than we've ever seen before. He wants to meet every one of us at the intersection of God-discovery and self-discovery, and he wants to bless us there, so that we start thinking, "I never knew he was that good. I feel like a new Christian all over again." That is what the book of Romans is for. That's our opportunity. Let's begin now.

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures (Romans 1:1-2)

The word translated "servant" means "slave." Paul was not a slave because he had to be; he was a slave because he wanted to be. He found more freedom in slavery to Christ than he found in his own autonomous self-definitions. Paul had oppressed Paul. Christ had freed Paul - through the total devotion to Christ that the word "slave" communicates. Paul didn't resent his Master. He wasn't embarrassed to call himself a slave to Christ. It's the first thing Paul wants us to know about himself. He found green pastures and still waters here. And the Bible says all believers are slaves of God (1 Peter 2:16). We are not our own; we've been bought with a price (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). We don't want to belong to anyone or anything else. We want to be free of the entanglements that are only embarrassing by now, and we want to grow in our surrender to Christ. We know by now that we suffer no loss of dignity in being slaves of Christ, because he is good. We do experience loss of control, because he is Lord. But he made himself a slave for us, so we can trust him (Philippians 2:7). God came down in Christ and accepted slavery for us. Our whole problem is that we think like bosses. And we fear that God will treat us the way we treat others. But he humbled himself. He stepped down to our level, and even lower, and died for us. He deserves our wholehearted trust, as no one else does. If you're a Christian, you understand that. Christ has won your heart. You know that you are his personal property now in every area of your life. When you read the Bible, you don't see it as a menu of options. You revere it as the word of your King. You're free to fail, because he is gracious. But you're not free to pick and choose, because he is Lord. You know that slavery to Christ is where he puts his blessing: "I will pour out my Spirit on my slaves" (Acts 2:19). Total surrender to Christ - it's the first word of the good news of Romans: "Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus."

The lordship of Christ over the whole of our lives is the watershed issue of our times. You know what a watershed is - the ridge or crest in a mountain range where the water runs off one way or the other. Here is the dividing line in our generation - not whether we like Jesus, nearly everyone likes Jesus, but whether we hand ourselves over to him, to obey him, because we're better off under his control. Total surrender to Jesus is not an add-on to salvation; it is salvation. When we put our out-of-control lives under the control of Christ, we get traction for salvation. If you find yourself compulsive in any area of your life, you can surrender yourself in all your need to the Lord Jesus. He will enslave you, but he will not demean you. He will surprise you with how slavery to him makes everything better than your own self-protective autonomy. He loves you more than you love yourself. We believe that together. And what we're doing as a church is aligning ourselves together happily as one, so that people in our time can see what they do not yet believe - that bowing to Jesus brings the beautiful life they're longing for.

That was Paul's mission - to spread that message. He says, "I've been called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God." He had no agenda but the gospel. He was willing to go anywhere, do anything, to advance the gospel. So here we are, as we read Romans 1, face to face with an apostle from the first century, telling us what Christianity is really all about. We can be thankful for that. This book of Romans puts us directly in touch again with original, apostolic, pristine Christianity, before the centuries and centuries of distortion. We can leapfrog back over all that and learn again from an apostle of Christ what the gospel really is. And Paul himself is the ultimate poster-boy of the real thing. He had been a self-righteous Pharisee. He had felt called to show everyone else how wrong they were. He had seen himself as set apart to the law. And it made him not a lot of fun to be around. But Christ loved that Pharisee and made him a miracle. He softened Paul's heart, so that Paul stopped saying to people, "I'm here to get you to repent of your badness" and he started saying to himself, "I'm here to repent of my goodness." That's why Paul was so convincing with the gospel. He was ready at heart to surprise people with a message of how good God really is.

Paul calls it here "the gospel of God." It came from God. It's all about God. It's not about what we do for God; it's about what God has done for us in Christ. And that message of grace from beyond ourselves is nothing new. Verse 2 says it was promised beforehand in the holy scriptures of the Old Testament. You can read the whole Bible from cover to cover as God's good news for bad people through the finished work of Christ on the cross. Many people don't see the Bible that way. They see the Old Testament as a book of judgment and the New Testament as a book of hope. They see the God of the New Testament as a kindler, gentler versio n of the scary God of the Old Testament. What they overlook is all the grace in the Old Testament, and for that matter all the wrath in the New Testament. Are we aware of all Jesus said about hell, and in detail, and does it disturb us? If we don't even notice, why? Here's why. We today don't believe in hell and wrath and judgment. So how can we feel there's anything at stake when New Testament voices warn us about these things? But when the Old Testament talks about wars and plagues and famines - we notice that. To us, the ultimate disaster is not hell; the ultimate disaster is no food on the shelves down at Publix. The horrors of hell have little impact, because losing our health is scarier to us than losing God. But what does God long to say to people who treat him so lightly? He wants to have a whole new conversation with us. What about? Verses 3-4: concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 1:3-4)

At this point Paul probably turned to the blackboard, as it were, and began drawing a chart of history. What is he showing us? That God has a plan for this world, he's working his plan, and it's all about giving his Son an eternal kingdom of redemption. All of history centers on Christ. Here are the two things we need to know about Christ. One, he was descended from David according to the flesh. The angel said, "For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord" (Luke 2:11). God had made a promise to King David in 2 Samuel 7, around 1000 B.C. God promised that the royal line of David would lead to the Messiah and a new world of peace that we could never create on our own. And God fulfilled his promise in Christ. Jesus was born into the Davidic family, but in obscurity. It didn't look royal, much less history-changing. The throne of David was under Roman domination. The great kingdom had crumbled into a dumpy little fifth-rate backwater. His own people didn't receive him. Some king, some kingdom! It looked as though his life came to nothing. It looked like evil was as strong as ever and that the promises of God were a pious dream. But that takes us to the second thing about Jesus.

Two, he was declared to be the Son of God in power. He died in weakness, but he was raised again in power. His resurrection was his day of coronation (Psalm 2; Acts 13:32-33). The resurrection of Jesus was how God declared to us, "Here's what the kingdom looks like!" So it's okay if evil is still strong today. The cure has begun. The Spirit of holiness that raised Jesus from the dead is giving people new and eternal life every day. Christ is a power that evil cannot stop, he is at work in the world today, and he will renovate the whole universe as one continuous explosion of life and joy forever. That's the magnitude of the gospel. Every man-made hope is at best a slap-dash quick-fix on the surface. But Christ is a solid hope. Think of him rising up from all the evil he'd borne for us on the cross. Think of him bursting out of that tomb in the power of the Holy Spirit. Think of him ascending to the Father and taking his place above every name. Think of him holding all authority in heaven and on earth. Think of him as the King, because he is. He is not negotiating. He is pouring out the Holy Spirit of God in our generation, and his kingdom is forever.

Here is what that magnificent Lord Jesus Christ is accomplishing in the world today:

through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ, to all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints: grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 1:5-7)

Here is how we see King Jesus making a difference today. He is breaking in and subverting evil and creating newness in real-life people struggling through this exhausted old world. Two things. One, "the obedience of faith." There's more than one kind of obedience. There's legal, technical obedience. There's outward compliance to what the Bible commands. That kind of obedience may be socially beneficial. You have to require it of your kids, to raise them up as civilized human beings. But mere decency is not the triumph of the gospel. The triumph of the gospel is the obedience of faith - when our hearts open up and we trust him so much that we gladly change how we live. We run toward him. We bow down in surrender. We beg him to change us according to the gospel. That is the obedience of faith.

So there are three human conditions, three ways to live - not two, but three. First, there's disobedience, obviously. Some people don't want to obey God, so they don't. Second, there's the obedience of unbelief. Other people don't want to obey God, but they do anyway. Third, there's the obedience of faith. Christians have such faith in Christ, they want to obey him. That is the triumph of the gospel. As the risen Christ is at work in the world today, he is not just getting people to stop sinning. He's not just getting people to start obeying. Through the Holy Spirit, he is giving our hearts a new relish for God, a new taste for God, so that we love to obey him. That's real obedience, and it's living proof that King Jesus is at work in our hearts. That newness and joy within - that is the power of the Holy Spirit that will someday fill the universe.

Two, "among all the nations." His work goes deep into the heart and out far to all the nations. How could it be otherwise? He's not the American God. His kingdom is for everybody. I know that some of you are thinking right now what an overrated claim this is. You're thinking that there is no one true religion for all the nations. You're thinking there can't be, because it would put some people over others and that isn't fair, and so forth. I understand. But the all-nations, Jesus-is-the-only-way claim of the gospel is better than you think. Here's why Paul could say this with a clear conscience. Paul understood religious oppression. He had lived that way and had repented of it when he accepted the gospel. He was now running in the opposite direction because of the gospel. He was well aware of the problem, and he knew the gospel was the only answer. And the world he was speaking into was radically pluralistic like our world today. He understood that too. And here's why Paul could pursue all the nations for the gospel with humility. The all-nations claim of Christ is not a function of religious arrogance. It's a function of his grace to all alike. "The obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations" - that gospel means nobody has to qualify. Nobody can be better than another. It is zero-demand. Christ provides everything by grace, for the sake of his name. So the typical human lines of exclusion on the basis of race and sex and class and nation and even, as we've seen, the disobedient versus the obedient - all these distinctions are leveled by the grace of God. His grace crosses all our boundaries. He offers every one of us something we could never do for ourselves - a new heart that loves him and wants to do the right thing for the sake of his name. No more grandstanding. No more "I'm better than you are." No more elitism but a new humility enters in and takes the form of a multicultural church of peace in Christ that outperforms every other claim of inclusivity. We see it, imperfectly but really, in every gospel-centered church today. It's the future of the world on display today.

The gospel is not saying to us, "Put your trust in Jesus, because then you'll be better than other people." It's saying, "Put your trust in Jesus, and you'll find a oneness with others in him you've never known before." We as a church have the privilege of making that real right here, so that people can see it and believe it.

Here is how we step inside that new world - "a slave of Christ Jesus." Wholehearted surrender. Is Jesus Christ the Lord and Master of your life? Will you become definite about that today? He promises, "The one who honors me I will honor" (1 Samuel 2:30). Do you believe it? Will you act on it today?

ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY


Christianity and Islam share much common ground. Both trace
their roots to Abraham. Both believe in prophecy, God's messengers
(apostles), revelation, scripture, the resurrection of dead, and
the centrality of religious community. This last element is
especially important. Both Christianity and Islam have a
communitarian dimension: what the church is to Christianity the
"umma" is to Islam.

Despite these significant similarities, however, these two
world religions have a number of significant differences as well.
I would like to comment on these -- not to engage in any kind of
polemic (since I consider polemic a sign of religious immaturity)
but to foster better understanding. A true dialogue between
religions can be built only on nuanced understanding and not
caricature.

I will discuss these differences under four general headings:


I -- The Understanding of God
=============================

Muslims and Christians believe there is only one God / Allah.
The basic testimony of Islam is called the 'shahada', the first
clause of which states that "la ilaha illa Allah" -- "There is
no god but God." This is certainly a statement that Christians
would affirm.

But how Christians and Muslims conceptualize God in their
respective theologies is actually quite different. The emphasis
in the Islamic theology of God can be summarized by one word:
'tawhid', which means "absolute unity." Muslims insist that
there is no distinction within the Godhead. God is sublimely one.
Thus the Islamic polemic against Christianity has centered on the
doctrine of Trinity. This is the central doctrine that causes
problems for Muslims when they consider Christianity. Muslims have
caricatured Christians as tritheists guilty of "shirk", that is,
attributing an associate to God. By believing in the Trinity,
Muslims say, Christians believe in three gods. This attitude is
expressed in the Qur'an:

Say not "trinity", Desist. It will be better for you. For
God is One God (4:171).

They do blaspheme who say: God is one of three in a
Trinity, for there is no God except One God (5:76).


But every one who knows Christian theology well knows that the
doctrine of Trinity was articulated precisely to oppose the idea of
believing in three gods! Apparently the understanding of the
Trinity was very inadequate among the Christians with whom the
earliest Muslims interacted. Early Muslims, therefore, came to
understand the Christian doctrine of the Trinity in very distorted,
inadequate terms. It seems that some even believed that Christians
worshipped Mary as part of the Trinity! This misunderstanding of
the Trinity found expression in the Qur'an itself:


And behold, God will say; "O Jesus the Son of Mary! Didst
thou say unto men, "Worship me and my mother as gods in
derogation of God?" (5:119).

It seems that in the era of the Qur'an it was assumed by many
people that the Trinity was the Father, the son Jesus, and Jesus's
mother Mariam (Mary)! So the Trinity was misunderstood.

This is not to place blame on the people back then. The
Trinity is not easy to understand; in fact, it is an ineffable
truth, not graspable by the human mind. How many heresies in
Christian history have arisen because people attempted to detract
from the mystery of the Trinity, coming up with doctrines that were
more easily "digested" by the human mind. No, the doctrine of
Trinity cannot be reduced to the pale categories of human reason.
It is arrogant for anyone to think that he or she can grasp the
mystery of the Godhead! So the fact that the doctrine of the
Trinity is not readily understandable in terms of human reason
should not worry us. This is what the proper Christians response
should be to any polemic against the doctrine of the Trinity. We,
in all humility and submission to God can only say this: God has
revealed himself as Trinity, i.e the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit. We do not rationally understand this; any explanation that
we come up with will be flawed. But since God has revealed Himself
as Trinity, we submit to Him as Trinity even if we do not
completely understand how he can be Trinity! It is blasphemy to
"reduce" God to something we can understand. The purpose of
theology is not to "cut God down" to the size of human reason but
to elevate human reason to the contemplation of the Divine Mystery
-- the Mystery which teaches us that the One God -- ineffably,
incomprehensibly -- exists in three Persons.

Perhaps the best way to enable our Muslim friends to
understand why we believe that God must be a Trinity is to
emphasize Christianity's fundamental teaching regarding God, namely
that GOD IS LOVE. Now, love can 'never' be exercised in
isolation. You cannot be all-loving and be alone. Love is
manifested 'in relationship', and for that reason the God who is
LOVE must exist within a "community within himself," that is,
within a community of three Persons, among whom their mutual love
is so perfect that they, though three, become perfectly One! This
is the fundamental truth underlying the doctrine of the Trinity.
So do not try to come up with a rational explanation of the
doctrine of Trinity to try to "prove the Trinity" to your Muslim
friends. That is a waste of time. Rather, try to help them
understand how affirmation of the mystery of the Trinity -- despite
the limitations of human reason -- is part of the Christian's
surrender and submission ('islam') to the God beyond all
understanding! We surrender to the all-holy Trinity not because we
can understand this sublime Mystery but simply because that is what
God has revealed himself to be.
It is from this same perspective -- that GOD IS LOVE -- that
we should try to explain how Jesus can be the Son of God. Such a
statement is blasphemous to Muslims; they believe that God is "far
above" having a son. On the contrary, Christians see the Sonship
of Jesus not as a blasphemy but as a testimony to the divine love,
which is so intense (again, beyond all human understanding) that
God was not content only to bless his creation from outside of it.
No, actually humbled himself to the point of becoming a part of his
creation through the Incarnation of his Son Jesus Christ! By
becoming part of the created order, by taking on a full and a
complete human nature, God sanctified humanity "from within," so to
speak. Both Islam and Christianity say that God is totally other
and beyond human comprehension, completely beyond the ability of
humans to grasp, yet Christians add something completely different:
that God sanctified the world by deigning to become part of it, by
loving us so much that he was willing "to come down from his
throne" to became part of this mess which we call the world. In
this bold -- and wonderful -- assertion, Christianity stands apart
from both Judaism and Islam, which stress the total otherness and
transcendence of God to the point where it is incomprehensible to
them that He could become part of the created order.
We Christians must never loose sight of the fact that even
though we are Trinitarian, we affirm that there is only "one God".
In fact, the Orthodox Christians in the Middle East always say in
Arabic: "In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit, ONE GOD!" (in Arabic: "Bismilabi wal-ibni war-ruhi-l-
quddus, ALLAH WAHID!"). This is to show that in affirming the
Trinity, we do not deny in any way that God is one.


II -- The Understanding of Revelation :
=====================================
Christianity believes that God revealed Himself in order to
redeem us, to save us -- that is to lead us to a fullness of life,
freed from the bonds of sin both in this world and in the world to
come. According to Islam, on the other hand, revelation is not for
the purpose of redemption, but for the sake of "guidance". That is,
God's revelation is meant to provide guidance for living in this
world.
In Christianity, revelation is mediated. We believe that the
Bible is the Word of God, but we do not believe that God
mechanically transmitted it through certain people as if they were
"channelers" of some sort. Christians hold that the Bible was
written by human beings under divine inspiration, the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit. The divine revelation was thus "filtered"
through a human lens and written in human words and within human
history. That is why our scriptures refer to historical
circumstances; it describes not some mystical, ahistorical
revelation of God but rather chronicles God's wonderful
intervention in human history.
In Islam, on the other hand, the Qur'an is considered the
"unmediated" word of God. In other word, Islam stresses very
strongly that in receiving his revelation Muhammad was illiterate--
and hence completely passive. He simply recited what was put into
his mouth, without any input of his own. ("Qur'an" means
"recitation.") The Qur'an -- which is seen as eternally existing
in heaven -- simply descended (another name for the Qur'an is 'at-
tanzil', "that which descended") and was expressed through Muhammad
as a passive instrument of revelation. Anyone familiar with
modern critical linguistic theory would have to question such a
view. According to such theory, 'all' communication is mediated;
as soon as a thought is put into words, it is mediated. The very
fact that a thought is put into words means that it is "processed"
and passed through a human lens, so to speak. The whole purpose of
revelation is for God, whose thoughts are so far above ours, to
mediate his communication to us through human language. God does
not think in human language; to say so is to limit his omniscience,
which is far beyond the constraints of human language! Thus
Christians must call the Islamic view of "unmediated revelation"
into question on both linguistic and theological grounds.
It should also be noted that Qur'an is much more a 'book-
centered' religion that Christianity. It is wrong to assume that
what the Qur'an is to the Muslim the New Testament is to the
Christian. Not so! The appropriate analogy is this: what the
Qur'an is to the Muslim, 'Christ himself' is to the Christian. We
are not 'book'-centered; we are 'Person'-centered (that is,
'Christ'-centered)! Muslims say that the Qur'an is the Eternal
Word of God; but we do not say that the New Testament is the
Eternal Word of God. Only "Christ" is the Eternal Word! Therefore
be sensitive to Muslims. Never insult the Qur'an; to insult the
Qur'an would be as offensive to a Muslim as insulting Christ would
be to a Christian! By the way, Muslims, in affirming the
eternity of the Qur'an, face a theological problem that is directly
analogous to the one faced by Christians who affirm that Christ is
the Word, existing from all eternity. Muslims ask us how we
Christians can say that there is One God, who alone is eternal, and
yet claim that Christ existed from all eternity. They accuse us of
ascribing an associate to God in saying this. But they face the
same problem in teaching the eternity of the Qur'an. How can one
claim that something besides God -- namely the Qur'an -- exists
from all eternity without ascribing an associate (in this case an
object, rather than a person!) to God? It is interesting that both
Christians and Muslims solved these parallel theological dilemmas
in virtually the same way: Islam asserts that since the Qur'an is
the Word of God, it always coexisted with God -- "as part of God,"
so to speak, since God could never be without his Word. We use the
same reasoning in defending the Christian doctrine of the eternity
of Christ: as the Word of God, Christ always existed with God the
Father. Christ is co-eternal with the Father since God the Father
could never exist apart from his Word! One Eastern church Father,
Gregory of Nyssa, explained this mystery in this way: God
eternally spoke his Word (namely, his Son). And when he eternally
spoke the Word, there came forth eternally from his mouth the
Spirit (namely, the Holy Spirit, "ruh ul-quddus"), by which the
Word was spoken. (Breath, after all, is necessary for speech!)
Thus, from all eternity, the Word and the Spirit co-existed with
the Father! Islam claims the same thing about the Qur'an as the
Word of God! Do you see the similarity in reasoning?
In short, while both Islam and Christianity affirm that God
has spoken and revealed Himself to humankind, still there is one
great difference: whereas Islam teaches that the Qur'an is God's
Word to humanity, Christianity proclaims that Jesus Himself is
God's Word to humanity. For Islam, therefore, God has spoken
through a Book: for Christianity, on the contrary, He has spoken
through a Person. In Islam, the written Arabic Book is the marvel;
in Christianity, the Person of Christ is the true miracle!
Christians believe that if Almighty God can reveal His will
perfectly through a Book, as Muslims assert, surely He can do so
even more perfectly and fully through a Person. For if God is a
personal God, then a personal life would clearly be a far better
means of revealing Himself than any Book, however excellent it may
be.
We must also mention here another standard Muslim argument
against Christians: that their scriptures suffered corruption and
distortion. This is called the doctrine of 'tahrif'.
Articulation of the doctrine of 'tahrif' began with the Qur'an
itself. Islam affirmed the veracity of the earlier revelations
given to the People of the Book; theoretically, they were fully
consistent with the Qur'an. Jews and Christians, therefore, were
urged to accept the revelation given through Muhammad:

O ye People of the Book! Believe in what We have
(now) revealed, confirming what was (already) with
you.(4:47)

And this is a Book which We have sent down, bringing
blessings and confirming (the revelations) which
came before it. (6:92)


When Jews and Christians brought arguments against Muhammad and his
followers on the basis of what their scriptures taught, however,
Muslims had to account for the discrepancies. How could the text
of the Old and New Testaments contradict that of the Qur'an if the
latter was a confirmation of the former?

A number of responses to the problem are found in the Medinan
'suras'. The Jews are accused of knowingly perverting the word of
God after having heard and understood it (2:75). Some actually
"write the Book with their own hands and then say, 'This is from
God'" (2:79); these "transgressors changed the word from that which
had been given them" (2:59). Others corrupt the text by displacing
words, changing them from their right places (4:46, 5:14), or by
"twisting" their tongues and reading it incorrectly:

There is among them a section who distort the Book with
their tongues. (As they read) you would think it is a
part of the Book, but it is no part of the Book; and they
say, "That is from God," but it is not from God. (3:78)

Of the Jews there are those who displace words ...
and say: "We hear and we disobey ... with a twist
of their tongues.... (4:46)


Moreover, the charge of concealment (ikhfa') is levelled
against the People of the Book. They know the truth as they know
their own sons, "but some of them conceal it (2:146); they thereby
"swallow fire" and will receive a grievous penalty for their
duplicity (2:159; 2:174). "Why do ye clothe truth with falsehood,"
the People of the Book are asked, "and conceal the truth while ye
have knowledge?" (3:71) Muhammad is depicted as coming to reveal
to them much of what they used to hide in their Book (5:16). Jews
are further chided for dismembering the Torah by making it into
separate sheets "for show" while concealing much of its contents
(6:91). Of Christians, it is said that "they forgot a good part of
the message that was sent them" (5:15).
It was a creative way of trying to explain the discrepancies
between the Qur'an and the earlier scriptures, but it is has
absolutely no basis in the manuscript tradition. Anyone who has
studied the manuscripts of the Jewish and Christian scriptures
knows that there is no evidence whatever for the corruption posited
by the doctrine of 'tahrif'. In fact the manuscript evidence, if
it establishes anything, establishes how carefully the texts of the
Old and New Testaments were passed down!


III -- The Understanding of Sin and Salvation :
=============================================


Sin and salvation are central categories in Christian theology
and spirituality. Christianity teaches that the effects of
original sin have corrupted the world and the human beings who
exist in it. In Islam, however, there is no such a thing as
original sin. The Qur'an does indeed state that Adam and Eve
sinned, but according to Islamic belief, they repented and were
fully forgiven so that their sin had no repercussions for the rest
of human race.

I believe the Islamic rejection of original sin is really the
rejection of a 'specific understanding' -- what I would consider to
be a 'narrow' understanding -- of original sin. Islam rejects the
doctrine of original sin that asserts that all human beings
inherited the guilt -- the culpability -- of the sin of Adam and
Eve. This seems unfair to the Muslim: Why should we have to
accept guilt for someone else's disobedience?

To respond to such a question, we Christians must move beyond
a narrow Augustinian understanding of original sin, the view that
"in Adam's fall we sinned all." The Calvinists later carried this
view to an extreme, saying that the result of Adam's sin is total
human depravity; that is, that original sin has made human beings
completely incapable of doing anything good without the assistance
of divine grace! Such a notion is thoroughly incomprehensible to
Muslims!

There are, however, other (in my opinion, better)
understandings of original sin in the history of Christian
theology. These can explain original sin to the Muslim inquirer in
more palatable terms. Western Christians (both Protestants and
Catholics) need to move beyond the traditional Augustinian-
Calvinist understanding of original sin and look toward the ancient
Christian East for what I would consider to be more satisfactory
explanations. Eastern Christianity understands original sin in
this way: No sin that is committed is without its effect. Every
sin that you and I commit -- every sin that is ever committed --
disrupts the entire cosmos. Your sin has an effect not only on you
but on everyone and everything else. Any sin that you and I commit
has a reverberation throughout the world, throughout the cosmos.
Every puff that you take on your cigarette pollutes the air that
everyone else breathes, so to speak. So when the Old Testament
claims that the sin of the father will be visited upon the
children, it is not issuing a threat; it is simply describing
reality. Think about this proposition, and I think you will
recognize that it is true. Is it realistic to claim, as Muslims
do, that Adam and Eve's sin -- the first of the human race! -- had
no effects in the world into which all other human beings were
born? I do not think so!

No, sin indeed has a "snowball effect": it accumulates
throughout human history, impacting upon all who are born into the
world. (Actually, we feel the effects of sin even before our
birth, while still in our mother's womb!) What started this off
was the sin of Adam and Eve -- the first, or original, sin in this
process. For the Eastern Christians to say that all suffer the
effects of original sin is not to say that all are "born guilty"
but rather that all human beings have to deal with the powerful
force of sin that has accumulated from the sin of our First Parents
until the present day. If we explained original sin to our Muslim
brethren in this way, perhaps it would be more understandable to
them (and to us, I might add!).

Once one understands original sin in this way, I think the
need for salvation -- the ability to break loose from the
overwhelming bonds of sin that have grown stronger and stronger
through the ages -- becomes evident. With sin's effects
everywhere around us, we have an undeniable proclivity to sin; and
no one of us sitting in this room this evening is capable of
freeing himself or herself from sin's grip. Because Islam has
understandably reacted against the deficient understanding of
original sin I described earlier, it has tended not to be receptive
to this more realistic understanding of the pervasive effects of
sin on all human beings. Thus, it sees no need for salvation; it
cannot understand how Christ's death and resurrection brings
salvation. "Salvation from what?" they ask. Just as it is
unthinkable to Muslims that one person should have to shoulder the
guilt for another person's sin, it is unthinkable that another
person (in this case, Christ) would be able to pay the penalty for
another person's sins.

Furthermore, because Muslims believe that prophets are sinless
(this doctrine is known as isma'), it seems a blasphemy to say that
Christ died the shameful death of a sinner on the cross. They
therefore deny that it was Jesus that was crucified; they say that
it was Judas (whom God made to look like Jesus so that he would
suffer his rightful penalty for betrayal). Through such a story,
Muslim see themselves as protecting the prophetic integrity of
Jesus, since a true prophet, according to Islam, could not suffer
the indignity that Jesus did. Muslims affirm that Jesus ascended
to heaven but deny that he died on the cross.

But back to our main point: because Muslims do not recognize
the universal and corruptive power of sin, unleashed as a result of
original sin, they see no need for salvation in the Christian
sense. If there is no sin that has a throttle-hold on you, you do
not need to be saved from it. What you should do, according to the
Islamic view, is to live a good life, pleasing God in all that you
do. Submit to God and follow His directives. Religion, to the
Muslim, does not mean salvation from sin; it means following the
right path, or the shari'a, mapped out by Islamic law. While
-------
Christianity is a faith concerned primarily with "orthodoxy," or
"right belief," Islam is a faith concerned primarily with
"orthopraxy," or right practice. It is a religion of law, and it
sees Christianity's rejection of the Law (as taught by St. Paul in
his writings, especially Romans and Galatians) as a serious
deficiency in the Christian way of life. This, of course, does not
mean that Islam is not at all concerned with right doctrine or that
Christianity is not at all concerned with right practice. It
simply means that the emphasis is different in the two religions.

But that difference in emphasis is very important. If one
recognizes the pervasive power of sin, salvation is not just an
option; it is a necessity. Christians lament the fact that a
faulty presentation of original sin led early Islam to "throw out
the baby with the bath water" with regard to their understanding of
sin. By reacting against an anemic understanding of original sin,
as I have described it, they have missed what Christians consider
to be the central truth of human existence: that no matter how hard
one tries to conform to "right practice," he or she will fall short
of the goal. We cannot live the kind of life that God wants by our
own power.... And that is why salvation is necessary.

These matters, of course, are very profound, and I do not
pretend to have exhausted what should be said about them. In this
part of my presentation, I simply wanted to point to the divergent
Christian and Islamic understanding of the crucial issues of sin
and salvation.


IV -- The Religious Community :
=============================
Let me conclude on a theme that reverberates in the hearts of
both Muslims and Christians: religious community. What the church
is to the Christians is what the " umma" is to Muslims.
Christians and Muslims both consider themselves as accountable to
a community of faith. It is not enough to believe in isolation; we
must link our lives to brothers and sisters in the faith.

Nevertheless, there are some noteworthy differences between
the Christian and Muslims visions of religious community. There is
no ordained ministry or "hierarchy" in the Islamic umma. Also, in
the Islamic umma there is more stress on homogeneity -- on a common
pattern of life throughout the Islamic world, regulated by the
'sharia', or religious law -- than in the Christian church at
large. Christians have attempted to "incarnate" Christianity as
much as possible in local culture. For example, the Bible, hymns,
and liturgical texts are translated into the local language and
adjusted to the local culture. On the contrary, one must learn
Arabic if one wants to be a good Muslim. The Qur'an is considered
to be "untranslatable"; that is, to the Muslim the message of the
Qur'an is inextricably link to the original language. Yes, one can
attempt to render the text of the Qur'an in English, French,
German, etc., but then it is no longer really the Qur'an, only an
interpretation of it. Thus, when he did his famous translation of
the Qur'an into English, the British convert to Islam, Marmaduke
Pickthall did not call his work 'The Glorious Koran' but 'The
MEANING of the Glorious Koran'. A translation is thus seen as a
deviation. To the Muslim, Arabic is a sacred language; therefore
one can perceive the perfection and inimitability (i`jaz) of the
Qur'an only in Arabic, according to Islam.

Moreover, Muslims and Christians have different understandings
of worship. Now, I recognize that it is difficult to talk about
"Christian worship" as a single phenomenon because, as we all know,
there are many, many different traditions of worship in
Christianity. Different denominations worship in markedly
different ways because they have all responded to different social
and cultural contexts. In Islam, all Muslims worship the same way,
throughout the world, with no significant variations, regardless of
social and cultural context. In all fairness, it seems to me that
there are strengths both to the Christian emphasis on adaptability
and the Muslim emphasis on uniformity.

When discussing differences between Christian and Muslim
worship, we should also note that Muslims are very attentive not
just to the interior aspects of worship but to the external aspects
as well. In this Muslims have much more in common with Eastern
Christianity than with Western Christianity, especially
Protestantism. Like Eastern Christians, Muslims use their whole
body in prayer. Both groups, for instance, make prostrations
before God in their worship. This seems strange to many
Protestants, whose worship consists of sitting (or maybe standing
from time to time) in a comfortable setting (on cushioned pews, in
air conditioned churches, etc.) What one does with the body in
most Western Christian worship seems almost unimportant. Not so in
Islam. The submission of the spirit is symbolized by the
submissive gestures of the body, made according to a ritualized
pattern. Muslims have a much easier time, therefore, understanding
the spirit behind the highly developed liturgical worship of the
Eastern Christian than they do understanding what they consider to
by the overly informal, unregulated worship of the Evangelical
Christian. This, to me, is an interesting topic in Christian-
Muslim relations that needs to be explored more fully in
scholarship and inter-faith dialogue: Christians and Muslims need
to examine more fully -- and more objectively -- the similarities
and differences between their experiences of prayer and worship.

How to Abide in Christ

"These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full."
--John 15:11
Jesus Christ did not come into the world just to show us how wrong we are and embarrass us and make us feel small. He came to spread his joy our way. He came to bring us what we all most deeply desire. Pascal wrote,
“All men seek happiness. . . . This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.”
You might hate your job. But tomorrow morning you’ll get up and go to work. Why? That job you hate is a stepping-stone to something else that does make you happy. God made us with a passion for happiness, because he too has a passion for happiness – through his own glory. The question for us is, where do we go to satisfy that raging thirst? God says in the Bible, My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and have hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. Jeremiah 2:13 These “broken cisterns” are the lukewarm, stale, unsatisfying mechanisms we build into our lives to make up for a lack of God. So, when Jesus says, “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full,” let’s listen. Three things here cry out for explanation: “my joy,” “in you” and “full.” “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy . . .” Jesus Christ was “a man of sorrows” (Isaiah 53:3). But here he refers to “my joy” because he was also a happy person. The Bible says that Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit (Luke 10:21), meaning that his joy had the power of God in it. The Old Testament predicted that God would anoint the Messiah “with the oil of gladness” more than anyone else (Psalm 45:7). Even when Jesus went to the cross, the Bible says he did it “for the joy that was set before him” (Hebrews 12:2). Jesus said, “I always do the things that are pleasing to God” (John 8:29). Jesus enjoyed a constant feast of God’s approval. That is joy! The Father said to him, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased” (Mark 1:11). Is it conceivable that Jesus was emotionally neutral about that? He said to his disciples, “Be of good cheer” (Mark 6:50, AV). How could he say that, if he was downcast? In fact, the way Jesus speaks here – “that my joy may be in you” – he seems to think that his joy is the only real joy we’ll ever experience. We are visitors to happiness now and then, and often strangers to it. But Jesus Christ is the owner of all the true and lasting happiness that exists in the universe, and he wants to share it with you. We need it, and for more than one reason. But here is one. We are created, dependent beings. Our joy is not innate to us. We’re not born joyful. We’re born screaming, and every single drop of happiness we ever taste comes from beyond ourselves. Every day throughout our lives, if we ask the question, “What’s making me happy right now?”, our answers run the gamut from my toys, to my sports, to my romance, to my spouse, to my children, my career, my retirement, and so forth. But it would never occur to us to say, “What makes me happy? I do. I don’t need toys or sports or romance or anything else. Endless happiness just wells up from within me.” We’re not like that. Every moment we draw our happiness from beyond ourselves. Jesus Christ is so relevant, because he comes to us from beyond. Forever and ever, from eternity past through time and on into eternity future, God the Father and God the Son always enjoy one another, always communicate to one another in the power of the Spirit the glory each adores in the other. The Triune God is the overflowing fountainhead of all real, solid, lasting, worthy joy. And he created us so that his glorious happiness would spill over onto us, catching us up forever in the joy of who God is. That is the loving purpose of God, so massively disbelieved in this world, so overlooked, so unknown and ignored. But it is the most relevant fact of our everyday lives. Christ came to teach us about it: “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you . . . .” Do you know the most amazing thing about God? The most amazing thing about God is not that he is complete and happy and full within himself. The most amazing thing about that gloriously complete and full Person is that he cares about grumpy little people like us who treat him poorly. The greatest glory of God is that he loves the undeserving, supremely at the cross. Only God would. Only God could. He has all happiness within himself – more than enough for us forever. And he came down to us in Christ, to give himself away, despite what we deserve. Believe it. “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you . . .” When we believe the gospel, something happens to us. We start feeling loved by God the way Jesus felt loved by God, because we are included by grace within the joy of the Trinity. In Christ alone, we sinners have God’s approval. Because of Christ alone, God rejoices over us. The Bible says, The Lord your God is in your midst, . . . He will rejoice over you with gladness; . . . He will exult over you with loud singing. Zephaniah 3:17 The Bible says, “As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you” (Isaiah 62:5). So dear, so very dear to God, dearer I could not be; For the love wherewith he loved his Son is the love he has for me! If you struggle to believe that God could rejoice over you and yet you’re looking to Christ to make it so, you are the one to whom he promises to transfer his joy. And you don’t need outward prosperity with money, health, popularity. It will be, he says, “in you.” And the fact that we don’t deserve it is the very thing that makes his love so sweet. It is so freeing when we stop living on the basis of what we deserve – grabbing and demanding – and we fall into the arms of Christ and start living on the basis of what he gives. Jesus Christ obeyed God perfectly, with no regrets, no backward glances, no pain of conscience but only a continual sense of God’s rejoicing over him – when he becomes yours, his joy starts seeking your heart, he starts giving himself to your heart. I’ve heard preachers say that God doesn’t intend to make us happy; he intends to make us holy. But pitting happiness against holiness is like saying, God doesn’t intend to make us colorful; he intends to make us red. Red is a major part of being colorful. And right here in this context, in verse 10, Jesus says, “If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love.” Those words in verse 10 are included in the things Jesus spoke so that his joy would be in us (verse 11). We have peace with God through the obedience of Christ. That’s both happy and holy. We then learn to abide in his love by obeying his commandments. That’s both happy and holy. Would someone please explain to me from the Bible why I have to choose between happiness and holiness? Moreover, can you see in the flow of this passage, in the sequence of verses 10 and 11, that joy is the ultimate purpose of God? In verse 10 he speaks to us about obedience; in verse 11 he says that he spoke to us about these things for a still higher purpose – so that his joy would be in us. I am so glad to tell you that the new work Christ wants to do in your life is not some cheerless, barren duty; he comes to give you himself, his cheerful, glorious self. We are sinful and weak and half-hearted. But he robes us in his own righteousness and places us alongside himself under the smile of God, and he says to us, “Welcome to your new home. You are now included. You will never be shut out. My Father and I have settled everything for you. And it only gets better from here.” “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” In this world we’re constantly struggling out of our sadness toward happiness, or, if we are happy, toward a higher happiness. But Christ gives a level of joy that nothing in this world can create, and he sets no bounds to our joy. He never says, “Enough is enough.” He never says, “I have nothing more to give.” He never says, “Uh, anybody got a new idea?” He says, “My joy is full, and I only gain by giving it away. You, for your part, can never enjoy me too much. The joy I give will be oceanic in its fullness forever.” If you are in Christ, you don’t need my permission to rejoice. It is his will. He put it the opposite way in Matthew 6:16, “Do not look somber, as the hypocrites do.” The nihilist philosopher Nietzsche explained why he rejected Christianity: “I never saw the members of my father’s church enjoying themselves.” And here’s why you and I can defy the darkness and dare to enjoy ourselves in Christ. The foretaste of God’s love that we have now will forever grow more ravishing, more astonishing forever in heaven. The joy of Christ will pour into us and joy in Christ will pour out of us, and we will never come to the end, because there is no end to his glory. Don’t be afraid that if you give yourself to Christ, you might get bored. Is river-rafting boring? I’ll tell you what’s boring and worse than boring – it’s knowing that others are out there swimming in the ocean of God’s love, and you’re not a part of it because you held back. The Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross to absorb the guilt of hold-back, face- saving, guilt-ridden, joy-skeptical sinners and to set them free into wholeheartedness. This is love. If he were a cranky, dark personality, then every moment of happiness in our lives right now would be a fraudulent mockery of our desires. But the truth is, Christ came and taught and died and rose again and sent the Holy Spirit and is now preparing a place for us, so that his joy will be in us forever and our joy will be full. That’s the gospel. Here is what God wants you to do with it. One, don’t settle for any lesser joy, and don’t look for joy in the wrong places. C. S. Lewis warned us about our own amazingly low standards, our defeatism and unbelief: If we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased. 2. Our culture tells us that the only joy we can hope for is right here, right now. That message says, “These things we have spoken to you, televised to you, emailed to you, posted to you, so that our sales pitch may get into you, and that your credulity may be full. So give your conscience away. Sell out. This moment is your only chance.” Are you settling for that? Here is God’s offer: “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field” (Matthew 13:44). Whatever it takes, lay hold of Jesus Christ. It will be no heroic sacrifice. You’ll be buying the field where the Treasure is hidden. Is there anything in your life keeping you from him? Let it go. It isn’t worth it. There’s no joy in it. And aggressively lay hold of him. He is the only true joy you will ever taste. None other exists. But he is offering himself to you, and freely, as you are. Two, go for all the joy in Christ that God will give you. The Bible says, “Eat, friends, and drink; drink your fill, O lovers” (Song of Solomon 5:1, NIV). Personal, daily communion with the Lord Jesus is precious beyond description or calculation. Get near to him. Enjoy him. Draw strength and comfort from him. Pour your heart out to him. Accept suffering for him. Practice his presence. Get involved in spreading his gospel to others. But know this. Joy in Christ will cost you big-time. Here’s what you stand to lose – your self-pity, your victimhood, your coolness, your brooding and woundedness and negativism. If you will believe the good news that Jesus Christ is the Friend of sinners and your Friend, then he will prove it to you very wonderfully, and you will have your own personal story to tell of miracle-joys you never even knew existed. And best of all, you’ll never need to deserve it. Will you give yourself wholeheartedly to the Lord Jesus Christ? Don’t expect it to be easy; but you can expect it to be joyful. “Enter into the joy of your Lord.”

What do you think of Jesus?

Revelation 22:13

In The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, Mr. Beaver says about Aslan the Lion, "Safe? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you." What do you think of Christ? Does your Jesus have to say to you, "Fear not," or do you have to say to him, "Fear not"? If a wimpy Jesus says to you, "Fear not," what was there about him to fear? But if the real, biblical, industrial-strength Jesus says to you, "Fear not," that's worth something. If your Jesus is big enough to scare you, he's big enough to save you.

Low thoughts of Jesus trivialize our thoughts about everything else. Low thoughts of Christ make sin into no big deal, salvation becomes a little garnish on the side of life, the resurrection becomes dubious in relevance, and our hearts get to thinking, "He has me in church for one whole hour in the week? He should count his blessings!"

But when our thoughts of Christ start moving up and become high and lofty, other good things start happening too. Our reverence grows, and with reverence humility, and humility gratitude, and with gratitude love, and with love power. High thoughts of Christ make a positive difference for Christ here and now and forever.

My purpose today is to raise our thoughts of Christ. I want to bring you to Christ, and leave you there. Let's think the passage through, phrase by phrase.

When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.

When the apostle John was enabled to see into heaven, he could handle it. When he was enabled to see into hell, he could handle that too. But when he saw Christ, he fainted dead away. And they were best friends during the Lord's humility here on earth. But when John sees Jesus as he is now glorified in heaven, John is not overjoyed. He does not walk up to him and high-five him and say "How ya been?" John is terrified.

The Bible says, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God" (1 Corinthians 15:50). The Bible says that even here in this life, for us to feel the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ in our hearts, we have to pray for strength (Ephesians 3:16-17). How can a paper bag contain white-hot nuclear fuel? The real Jesus, seen clearly, takes our breath away. 2

How different this is from the Jesus some people present today. I recently read a popular book that represents God as our jolly pal with giggles and winks and hugs. Does Bible reveal Christ that way? Does that kind of Christ have to say to us, "Fear not"? Does that kind of Christ scare us to death? "When I saw him, I fell at this feet as though dead."

Charles Misner commented on Albert Einstein's view of the Christian preaching he had heard:

[The design of the universe is] very magnificent and shouldn't be taken for granted. In fact, I believe that is why Einstein had so little use for organized religion. . . . He must have looked at what the preachers said about God and felt they were blaspheming. He had seen much more majesty than they had ever imagined, and they were just not talking about the real thing.

Is your Jesus the real thing? Does his majesty pull up out of your heart reverence? Even as you're sitting here, in your heart are you down before him as though dead? Or are you up in his face because he doesn't answer your questions and solve your problems on your terms? Is the Jesus in your mind the real Jesus? Or do you need to change your mind so that you can get in touch with the real one?

But he laid his right hand on me, saying, "Fear not."

It's better to be dead before the real Jesus than to be alive to all this world, because it's to weak people, broken people, guilty people, that Jesus says, "Fear not." Do you see how he laid his right hand on John? He didn't stand at a distance. He wasn't ashamed to come near and touch this man and reassure him, because the greatest glory of the risen Christ is not the fiery intensity of his majesty; the greatest glory of the risen Christ is that, even with the fiery intensity of his majesty, he draws near to sinners who are emptied of their self-importance before him and he says, "Fear not." He does it through his Spirit every day to millions of believers all over the world - all ages, all needs. When we are confused and need guidance, he says, "Fear not." When we struggle financially, he says, "Fear not." When our friends abandon us, he says, "Fear not." When it comes time for us to die, he says, "Fear not." The risen Lord Jesus Christ, with all authority in heaven and on earth, cares for us. He isn't safe. He isn't tame. But he's good. The Bible says, "He gives power to the faint" (Isaiah 40:29).

"I am the first and the last, and the living one."

Later in the Revelation Jesus will also say, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end" (Revelation 22:13). Only God can say that. In fact, back in the Old Testament, he did. "I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god" (Isaiah 44:6). And he has no guilty conscience when he says that. He's not thinking, "I really ought to make room for all religions. Who am I to make a universal claim that will require the whole human race to adjust?" In his book Orthodoxy, G. K. Chesterton 3 pointed out that in the modern world we've located humility in the wrong place. Humility used to moderate our ambitions. But in the modern world we've moved humility from our sense of self to our sense of truth. The modern world tells us we can assert ourselves personally and be demanding people, but it also tells us we cannot assert truth and let it make demands of us. So we are today egocentric people with weak convictions. But the gospel helps us rediscover humility. The gospel says that we were never meant to be modest about truth but only about ourselves. The gospel is our only hope for true humility in all this pushy, angry world. It shows us Someone Else who alone deserves to be the first and the last. He is all-sufficient, all-powerful, all-wise, all-satisfying. We are deeply disappointed with ourselves. We're just no good at being our own designer gods. But he will never disappoint anyone who trusts in him. He is all the God there is, all the God there can be, all the God we need.

But there's more. He is "the living one." You and I are living ones. But he is the living one. You and I borrow life. He exudes life. You and I are dependent. His existence is not precarious. He doesn't need protection or favorable trends or a tailwind. He generates all he needs to be himself out of himself. He is self-existent.

This is why for us to try living without Christ is to try living without life. In the Bible, "the living God" stands in contrast to the dead idols. The idols we make up in our minds are sort of like old books on the shelf. They're there, if we want them. But they don't pursue us or love us or contradict us. There is no danger that heaven and earth might flee away at their glance. But the gospel says that Jesus Christ is the ever-flowing fountainhead of all life, and apart from him there is no life, no hope, no future. If you are in Christ, his energy will flow into you in heaven forever, and he will never get tired or need a break but will forever lift you into more and more joy in ho wonderfully living he is. If you are not in Christ, you're living right now by the life of Someone you deny. You're living on borrowed time. You must deal with Christ.

"I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades."

Jesus knows what it's like to die. He died an atoning death. He didn't just suffer with us. He suffered for us. And he didn't just suffer for us. He died for us. He went all the way and paid the last cent of all the debt we owed. With the finality of death, Jesus completed and sealed forever the atoning sacrifice. Nothing needs to be added to the finished work of Christ on the cross. When we receive his full merit with our empty hands of need, God says, "That's enough for me!" The all-holy God wants you to know that his conscience is happy about this. He isn't lowering his standards when he shows mercy to sinners. He satisfied his standards in the death of Christ. And that's why God gladly offers sinners a clean slate. That new beginning for you and me is in Jesus, whose death satisfied the wrath of God against sin.

But Jesus isn't dead any more. We don't have to trust a dead Savior. He says here, "I died. But that's all in the past now. Behold, I am alive, I am the embodiment of life, and I will never die again. I will never go away. I will never wear out. I will never 4 slow down. I will never stop being what I am right now. I will still be bursting with life 99 gazillion years from now, and that's just for starters. Anybody interested?" Those longings in your heart for hope and a future and something new to live for that won't turn bitter and disappointing - do you think Jesus Christ might have something to do with your longings? Do you think the powers in his heart might be enough to satisfy the desires of your heart?"

I'm thankful for the word "behold." That's a visual word: "Behold, I am alive forevermore." That word says, "Look at me. Examine the evidences. Think it through." That word is there because Jesus is not saying to us, "My resurrection is a mystical truth you have to take on authority." He is not saying that. He is saying, "My resurrection is a knowable fact of history. It's on the public record of events here in your world. You can study the evidences for yourself. I'm not afraid of you thinking about this. I'm provoking you to think about it. I want you to be satisfied. Behold!"

What other great person in history has ever said, "I died, and behold I am alive forevermore"? What other person has said, "I am with you always, to the end of the age"? What other person has said, "Wherever two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them"? What other person can say, "Your sins are forgiven"? Think about that. If someone cheats you out of P1000, you might say, "I forgive him." But if someone cheats you out of P1000 and I say, "I forgive him," that's different. Jesus forgave people for their sins, whatever the circumstances. He spoke as if he were the one primarily concerned in every human sin, as if it were an offense against him. Why? Because our sins are an offense against him. If we're going to be forgiven, we have to get that forgiveness from the Lord Jesus Christ. He did not say, "I know the way to God." He said, "I am the way to God." Jesus did not say, "I know the truth." He said, "I am the truth." Jesus did not say, "Fit me somewhere into your busy life." He said, "I am your life." Who else can say, "Come to me, and I will give you rest"? Who else can say, "I am the resurrection and the life. Stake your eternal destiny on me"? Who else would dare to say, "Eat my flesh and drink my blood, and you will live forever"? Who else would dare to say, "Cheer up! I have overcome the world"? And who else would say, "I have the keys of Death and Hades"? Jesus claims all control over the powers of death that take control of us.

Let all our thoughts of Christ rise to the majesty that is his due. C. S. Lewis clarifies what's really on the line here:

People often say, "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was and is the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us 5 not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

Do not miniaturize Christ. Do not compartmentalize him with others. He is unique. You must either reject him completely and align yourself with his enemies, or you must take him at his word and humble yourself and open your heart to his love as your Lord and your God.

His eye is upon you right now, and he loves you. He wants to save you from everything that's against you. Are you willing? That's all he asks. I am asking you to call out to him with the prayer of your heart. Doubting Thomas had his problems, and Jesus, in his humility, accepted even a doubter. But Thomas did say to him, "My Lord and my God!" He raised his esteem of Christ. Will you bow before Christ today and say to him, "My Lord and my God"?