Romans 5:1

"Therefore since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." (ESV)

For such a huge book, it always amazes me at the Bible's economic use of words. Nowhere else is so much said with so few words. A person could spend a lifetime just pondering verses like Romans 5:1. It is a verse that always stops me in my tracks.

The thing about this verse that floors me is the contrast it draws between my life outside of Christ and my life with Christ. The argument that is being made here is that we have peace with God and that Jesus is the reason for that peace. I am delighted to have peace with God. It is a much better option than being at war with God....but that's just it....since I have been justified by faith I have peace with God.

That means that before I was justified by faith I was at war with God.

Before Jesus clothed me in His imputed righteousness....I was considered by the Holy God and Sovereign Creator of the Universe to be an enemy. Someone He was at war with.

You only go to war with people that you hate. You only go to war with people that you need to destroy.

And that is a very, very chilling revelation. That God would regard me as an enemy worthy of warring against had there been no Christ...and no justification by faith.

And so my sin is really no small thing. It is the thing that God regards as heinous enough to hate me for.

But...Christ! Because of Christ and His saving work on the cross I have peace with God. I am no longer considered His enemy. He is no longer obligated to destroy me! I have peace with the most powerful Person in existance.

And that is a revelation worth rejoicing over.

Are you saved?

From what?

The wrath of God.

When I set it next to all of my worldly problems and cares...when I weigh that against all the things I want and dream about...I really don'thave much to complain about. But Ido have a lot to rejoice over. I have a lot to thank God for. I have a lot to praise God for.

It is simple...but not simplistic.

Soli Deo Gloria.

It's Been Forever

Well...it has indeed been forever and a day since my last posting. I do apologize to anyone who noticed. A lot has happened....and a lot has changed. But semper reformanda is still our battle cry. I...Jason...got married just a month ago...so that's a big deal...Aaron is still singing the stock song and Billy is still building houses. So some things change and some things stay the same.

One thing I've learned about marriage in my few short weeks as a husband is that, among other things, marriage means you have to watch movies and TV shows that you don't like and that you never would have watched when you were single. This weekend I watched Marley and Me and a few episodes of the TV series called Thirty Something. I think it might be one word like ThirtySomething....but at any rate...it is the type of shallow, silly, touchy feely show you would expect from the late 1980's.

The episode that I was forced to watch by my lovely wife was one about Christmas...one of the married couples on the show was having some kind of crisis because the husband was Jewish and the wife was "Christian" and they were having a dilema about what to do about the Christmas holiday. They have a baby on the show and just now the intrepid couple had gotten around to discussing what faith would be presented to their child in family traditions.

At one point the "Christian" wife character told the "Jewish" husband character that she didn't want thier daughter to miss out on the tradiions of Christmas that she grew up with, "...the reindeer, Christmas trees, and Santa...."

The husband was torn...because he wanted to light a Menorah...I guess...although he didn't say that.

What struck me as so silly...and what caused me to laugh out loud...was that she considered the tree, the Santa, and the reindeer as being "Christian." And the dilema was whether or not to expose their daughter as she grows up to such incredible symbols of the "the faith."

As I travel the world and talk to people I find it amazing how little real connection there is to the Christianity that is presented in the Bible. There is this ubiquitous happy clappy sort of understanding of what is Christian...but really...very little of that can be found in the Scripture. Of course, I would never expect Hollywood to get it right...not for a moment...but what tests well on the screen...even in the late 1980's...is a very large slice of what people really think. And all of these "spiritual but not religious" people watching the shows like this probably nod and say, "wow...yes...that is a tough one."

Our job...as Christians...is to try to not become cynical or jaded by all of this and to forge ahead into the world and try to correct these false ideas as gently and kindly as we can.

I find it so hard to engage the unbelievers in this modern world. The postmodern bug has made then immune to reason and to even the idea that there is an absolute truth.

I really believe that God designed it this way.

He wants us to realize with every conversation that without His sovereign smack the souls of these unbelievers will never be even remotely able to hear what we have to say.

So I need to talk less and pray more.

And blog more and pray even more.

Soli Deo Gloria!