New Thoughts (01/19/09-01/24/09)
It seems of late that every time I come to a new portion of the text, I see so very much more remaining that there is an urgency upon me; a desire to move more quickly through this phase of new thoughts. Yet, each time I find that such an increased pace is denied me. As I gather those things that are being put on my heart in reviewing the notes I have made in preparation, I can practically count the days that will be expended pursuing them.
What has happened, Lord? I remember it being different back there at the start. I remember the joy of gleaning one simple thought out of a passage of John’s letters. Indeed, I remember being so blown away by the power of some of those passages that even those thoughts evaded me, and I was left simply with the awe of knowing I had been touched. Now, it seems that even the simplest verse will take me a week to explore, and rarely (this is the saddest thing to me) is that sense of awe to be found. And yet, though the texture has changed so, and the effort takes longer, yet I know I am hearing You in all of it. Oh! But, how I miss that mood of old. How I worry that all of this is indication of a love gone cool.
So, my Lord, I cry to You: if, in any way, I have grown cool to You, rekindle me. Yes, I know that You call upon me to rekindle that love, but we both know that apart from Your intervention, this weak flesh is hardly capable of doing any such thing. So, Lord, intervene! Light the fire again, if indeed this is not just the comfort of many glowing coals.
The first thing I feel I need to look at, this time around, is something of a correction to my own perceptions on the preceding text. A few verses back, in Matthew 18:2 and its parallels, we heard Jesus call a child to Himself to stand as a model for faith. Become as this child. Now, in looking at that passage, I had focused in on the trusting nature of that child, his simple faith, as the thing being set before the disciples for them to model. But, there is something else there: something that passes almost unnoticed and yet remains a far more powerful lesson to heed.
What we miss is the nearly instant obedience of that child. Jesus calls him over and there is no hesitation in him. He is called and he comes. Now, the Calvinist in me can hardly help but see the essence of salvation in that simple statement. He called, I came. That’s it in a nutshell. Looking or not, willing or not, I came. My preferences and predilections really didn’t enter into the equation any more than this child’s wishes at that moment had any bearing on his obedience.
Quite apart from this image of salvation, though, that is the humility Jesus calls us to. That’s what He’s talking about with humility. When He commands, who are we to start a debate with Him? Who are we to request a delay of those orders while we go about our business? Humble yourself! The Lord, your God and your Master, has called you to action, and what sort of servant – especially one who has willingly sworn himself into lifelong service – would assert his own will over that of his Master? What sort of associate shepherd will reject the command of the chief Shepherd? And if he is so intent on his own way, what use is such a shepherd to the sheep? He is a danger to them! But here, perhaps I am getting ahead of myself.
So consider that child-like quality Jesus is commending. It is not, after all, that child-like faith that has no real foundation and no real backbone. It is this issue of obedient response. Respond just as obediently, just as immediately, to My simplest command as this child has, for you are My servants. Oh! But, how we all fail of this. How I, at least, fail of it. Why else do we experience those, ‘I should have said’ moments? Why else are we forever realizing only after the fact that what just went down was an opportunity for the Gospel? OK. We know this is true. We know, also, that to expend all manner of energy in kicking ourselves for such repeated failures is of no use to us or to Him. The question that remains, then, is how shall we be changed?
It is well and good to fall back on, ‘only by His grace’, and we should be absolutely correct in saying so. And yet, there must be something else. Now, let me be exceedingly careful here, because I do not wish, in any way, to make room for man’s efforts in the matter of salvation and worth. Yet, there is a place in the equation for man’s efforts. It’s just not as decisive a place as we like to think. In this case, I suspect what is missing from the equation is an earnest desire and willingness on our part. We are still in the place of fearing the embarrassment of confronting the world with faith. We are not inclined to admit such a thing, particularly because we know what Scripture says of those who are ashamed of Him before man. So, we clothe that embarrassment a bit. It’s not that we’re ashamed of Him, it’s just that we’re weak and fearful ourselves. And, maybe that’s even the truth of it. Even so, we are not excused. Even so, we have a responsibility to ourselves, to our Lord, and to those we have failed to confront.
Ah! But, we are returned to the agony of recognizing our weakness and at the same time being too weak to correct it. Yes. But we can pray. We can pray as we ought. We can start letting go of our focus upon the Provider for our needs and start focusing on becoming of greater use for His needs. We can start praying as servants.
Lord, Your will be done. Enough about me. Just let me be useful to You. Change the things that hold me back from answering Your command. Command as You desire and grant to me the power to obey what You have commanded. Indeed, Lord! Grant me a heart that desires nothing more, nothing greater, than to serve You as You command, to serve You with the immediacy of this child You have set before our eyes.
Luke introduces this thought with Jesus pronouncing a woe upon the stumbling blocks of this world; more particularly, upon those who set such traps in place. Matthew also notes a pronouncement along these lines, but has it following the transitional message of the millstone. So, we will be looking at the matter of stumbling blocks in the next study as well, I suppose. But, it is a topic that arises often enough that it is worthy of being considered repeatedly. You see, these stumbling blocks come in many different forms. Indeed, the image of a stumbling block may not suffice entirely to convey the meaning.
However, consider that stone one might find himself stumbling over. It is not that such a stone is invisible, it is just that it is so minimally out of place that we take no notice of it. It is almost smooth to the ground. It is almost rightly placed in the path. Think of the sidewalk where one slab of concrete has lifted minutely – not enough to really stand out, noticeable but not noteworthy. Yet, our foot will catch it almost every time, even when we know it’s coming. Or think about a floor which has, perhaps, a spot which is slightly – it need not be much at all – lifted compared to its surroundings. Such a floor maybe is covered over with carpet, and the rise is indiscernible now, no edge to give it away. But again, the foot will catch on that rise every time.
What I am getting at is this: It is the nature of that which causes us to stumble to be unobtrusive. It is in the nature of such things to be just a little out of true. Anything more and we would take greater note of the wrongness of the thing and step more carefully. Anything less and there would be no issue at all, no occasion for stumbling. This is the nature of error when it enters the Church. It is not so blatantly unorthodox as to set off alarm bells in every place it is heard. No. It is subtly altered from the Truth. It is just off the slightest little bit. Only the particularly attentive or sensitive will notice it. Others will give it no thought, even if it is pointed out to them. It’s like that little rise you know is in the flooring and yet give no thought to it until it catches your foot one more time. There is reason to be zealous for the proper alignment of doctrine and Truth. There is a reason to leave no least imperfection of fit between the two. For, those things that begin just barely off hide greater errors beneath, and those who catch themselves on the small departure will eventually find they have departed entirely.
Now, then: I have hinted at the fact that this is not an entirely accurate picture to use for the term Jesus has employed. At the very least, it is not the only image we can use. It is also a term for that trap-stick, the seemingly innocent thing that will, in the end spring the trap that ensnares us. One of our lexicons offers us the image of that sapling that has been bent and tethered so that it shall act as the spring to draw tight the noose about us when we have set off the trap. It is innocuous, or seems so to the eye. It is just one more birch tree laid low. It is not something obviously out of place. Yet, it is out of place. It is in disorder. It is a lethal danger to us.
This, too, is a marvelous picture of sin and more particularly the temptation that leads us to sin. The temptation is tempting because it doesn’t seem out of place. It blends in with our surroundings. Of course, looking around us, it should strike us just how sinful – sin filled – our surroundings are. So, what blends in with those surroundings ought more reasonably to fill us with caution. But, it’s not like that with us. As much as we want to be like Jesus, we also want to fit in to with this fallen world. Were it not so, these temptations would have no weight with us. Were it not so, we would not be so adept at laying such traps ourselves. Were it not so, we would not find that we only realize what we have done after that fact. And this, I believe, brings us to the reason Jesus has brought this up with His disciples now.
You see, it is terrifyingly easy for us to play the trap stick role, to be the stumbling block. We may do so even as we pursue what we think is the righteous course. How, you ask? Just look back at John’s last comments in this dialog. He thought he was doing a righteous deed, defending Jesus’ reputation by rebuking this stranger who called upon Christ’s authority. And that comment is precisely what Jesus is addressing now. John, by your actions, you have laid down a stumbling block. You have set a noose about that poor man’s feet, because you have planted a seed of distrust. Because of your misguided zeal, that one may well fall away from the faith that had risen up in him, and if that be so, let it be clear that the price of his loss to Me is laid to your account.
Yes, that’s a severe rebuke, if we can hear it addressing what He intends it to address! Now, lest we tangle our doctrine and theology beyond repair, understand that if this one John had rejected is truly amongst those Jesus has called, then John’s rejection will not amount to anything. Jesus has called and chosen, and He has never lost a one of those He was given, not even due to the misguided actions of His own. However, this Truth does not mitigate the error of which John is being corrected here. Just look at the weight Jesus has given that error! It weighs, in His sight, far more than the huge millstones that the donkeys are required to turn. It weighs more than your life. It weighs more than you can ever hope to balance.
If you are the one planting that seed of distrust, and that seed should take root, even were that one predestined to destruction, woe is upon you for helping him on his way! This is absolutely of a piece with the God we have in the Old Testament. Look at His treatment of the very nations by which He chose to rebuke Israel for her sins. Yes, these nations acted at His command, but they did not act in agreement with His purposes. They did not seek to rescue Israel by the rebuke of their war, but to destroy her. They did not seek reconciliation of God and man, but simply the death of man and not so much as a thought given to God.
In the same way, Judas is found to be acting according to God’s purpose. Yet, he is absolutely, irrevocably condemned for his willingness to do so. It is necessary that the Son must be betrayed, but woe to him through whom that betrayal is arranged. Better for him that he had not been born (Mk 14:21). How can that be? If God required him to so act, how can he be held guilty? For all that, why was it necessary?
Let me start with the latter question, because it is at the base of the others. Why was it necessary? Why, in this present statement, is it so impossible that stumbling blocks not come? In both cases, I think we must hear the same answer: Because God has decreed it thus. We don’t like to hear that, particularly in our piety. God? Decreeing evil? How can you say such a thing! Well, I don’t. I say only what I hear Him say, in this case. Whether or not it is truly evil is another question altogether. First and foremost let me say this: if a thing is truly inevitable or truly impossible, these being the extremities of probability, then we are declaring the event necessary in the philosophical sense. There is only one way for an event to become that absolute, that certain, and that is that the Absolute Authority of God is behind it. Only then does it become impossible that it should be otherwise.
Now, then, we must consider, if He has so authorized and decreed the outcome, how is it that he holds those operatives who achieve the outcome guilty of crime? Well, here, we can start by considering Joseph’s comments to his brothers at their reconciliation. “You meant it for evil,” he rightly points out. “But, God meant it for good.” This is where we, in our finite understanding of what goes on around us, get lost repeatedly. We perceive by the immediate impact. We perceive by the small detail, and we see evil. We see rightly inasmuch as we see. But, we do not see the greater scope in which God is acting. We do not see that what God is doing is indeed good as He is Good. We have trouble finding the good in pain. Yet it is there. We have trouble finding the good in sorrow, yet it is there. And, in all of it, we have the assurance of Scripture behind us, that God truly does work all things for the good of His servants, amongst whom we are counted.
But, turn back again to Joseph’s statement: You meant it for evil. That is the conviction of the sinner. That is the foundation for his guilt. It’s not good enough that you were doing what God had determined to get done. It doesn’t matter that you, by sinning, were really furthering the purpose of the kingdom. That was never your intent in doing so, and you know it. Your intent was only evil. Your intent was only to profit by the infliction of misery on others. Your intent was wholly and completely in opposition to the God of heaven even though He used you to further His own intents.
For the believer, the picture is slightly different, assuming belief is real in him. It is different first in that he is unlikely to be actively pursuing the destruction of his fellow believer, or even his potential fellow believer. It is different, as well, in that he has a cure for condemnation. It is different, thirdly, in that he ahs the activity of the Holy Spirit guarding him from continuing so far as to inflict irreversible damage on himself or on others. Yet, as we see in John on this occasion, that is no guarantee of perfect behavior in the believer.
Here, John still stands charged with planting the seeds of distrust in that poor, unknown coworker. Now, I will say again that we cannot be certain whether this was a true coworker in the kingdom, or one whose work is inadvertently turned to good purpose by the purpose of a good God. That, however, has no bearing on John’s error. It remains error, and it remains in need of confession and forgiveness.
The way in which Jesus counters the error in His disciples gives us a better idea of what the underlying nature of the sin is. You see the stumbling block that Jesus has most immediately in sight is that of refusing hospitality to another. Notice the connection that develops as we look across the three Gospel accounts. Whether you follow the introduction given to the millstone comment as Luke has given it, or follow Matthew’s sequencing which has the millstone comment leading into the pronouncement of woe upon the cause of stumbling, the connection remains. The stumbling block is that they refused hospitality to this co-worker because he was not familiar to them. It is that co-worker who is the child that ought to have been welcomed. That’s the whole point. He is a child in the faith, newly come to belief. It is entirely possible that he has only come to belief as he has found heaven responding to his call. In other words, he may very well have called upon the name of Jesus in a state of cynical unbelief, or maybe just opportunistic greed. But God opted to honor that call in spite of the motivation, and in doing so, He had begun to shift that motivation. John, in rejecting the man, worked counter to God’s own efforts. He became a stumbling block.
Why is this such an issue? We can see it clearly enough with those newly come to faith. We understand from church experience that if we don’t empower these newcomers to ‘connect’, then they will be gone before long. Sadly, when it comes to this aspect of the issue, our focus has a bad habit of being upon the well-being of our congregation more than upon that one we want to connect. Don’t connect them. Welcome them. Give them hospitality, not a job to do! That’s the message of Christ. Give them hospitality. Don’t just shake their hands at service, invite them home for dinner. In fact, invite them over at other times, just because. Get to know them and let them get to know you. Be hospitable! It’s there on the application form for deacon. It’s quite frankly there on the application form for adoption, if we but look. It’s not just a leadership qualification, it’s a part of that character that will show us to be sons of God, and not just children.
Here is another aspect of the trouble that comes of refusing hospitality to a fellow believer. When you refuse him hospitality you invite him to enter into the sin of resentment. Now, the more obvious the refusal, the more likely that resentment is to form, but even where your lack of hospitality is nothing personally directed at this one, just ‘the way I am’, resentment can form. Trouble can yet be brewing in the heart of that young believer who feels the lack of your fellowship no less painfully for its casual acceptance in your mind. You have not been passive in ignoring this aspect of godly character. You have been actively setting traps for those you were ignoring. You have created resentment by your callousness, and the price of the soul lost to that sin will be laid to your account.
John, of course, has added rebuke to rejection in this instance. He has not just failed to invite this man to become ‘one of us’, he has looked him in the eye and said, ‘not one of us! Away with you’. That’s just horrible, and yet we do as much in spirit on any number of occasions and think little enough of it. We see the youth who comes decked out in a fashion that raises eyebrows and hackles alike, and our thought is immediately, “Not one of us!” Our instant reaction is, “that one cannot be a child of God. Just look at him!” Never mind whether it’s racism, sexism, ageism or any other sort of division that causes us to react so. The very reaction is itself sin, just as the lustful thought is declared as much a sin as the act it considers.
Does this, then, mean that we should be utterly indiscriminate in who we bring into our circle of fellowship? Not at all. Even John, after being on the receiving end of this rebuke, would later write that we should not even so much as give a greeting to the false believer, the false teacher. Let such a one have no least sign of acceptance from us, lest that seeming acceptance be taken as approval, and we take upon ourselves a shared responsibility for the damage that one may do (2Jn 10-11). But, so far as I can see, this is the only just cause given us in Scripture. In all other cases, minor differences in our understanding, or in our degree of progress in the things of faith, even vast differences in progress, are no cause to withhold fellowship and hospitality.
Consider Paul’s example, as we see it in Romans. Here, the practical theology of Paul dictates this very point: If your brother is weak in some area (by your estimation), abstaining from more than is wholly necessary, don’t abuse him for his position, nor lead him to sin against his own conscience because of your insistence on your own freedoms. Don’t let these things destroy fellowship. And, no, just avoiding that weak brother so that you can keep enjoying your freedoms without concern is not answering the demand made. Having made his case, though, Paul brings his letter to a close, and in closing, he greets not just the big names, as it were, but the unknowns in ministry. The honor of his greetings are given equally to one and all.
Think, also, of his rebuke to those who were showing preferential treatment to some when they gathered in the Lord’s name. Wholly in opposition to the teaching of Christ, that is. Yet, it is so much in our nature that we fall into it by habit except we be ever so diligent to avoid it. What? Associate with that one? But, just look at him! He makes me nervous just standing there! Well, my friend, perhaps that nervousness would pass if you actually knew the man and not just his appearance. Quite frankly, I would suspect most of us would be made just as nervous by the likes of Jesus being present among us. We will, of course, deny such a thing most vehemently, but that is largely because we have a heavily romanticized view of Him, just as we do of the child he is using as his object lesson here.
So, be aware that your hospitality, your willingness to fellowship, can be a weapon in your hands. Just as the car you use to travel to work, to church or wherever can become a weapon in your hands if you are not focused on your task as driver. Or, just as the instruments of worship can become weapons of discord if they pull the attention of believers away from God instead of attracting their attention to Him. With hospitality, though, there is a time for it to be a weapon carefully aimed in defense of the faithful. But, we are called to take care that we not fire that weapon indiscriminately or to the harm of a true child of God.
If I look for a reason why we are given so many reasons to be concerned for the newer believers as much as (if not more than) the established ones, it lies in this simple fact: Christ is as present in that newest of believers as He is in the oldest. The character may not be as wholly remodeled after His image, but He is there in full. There is no such thing as partly Christ-filled. There is no God sort of, more or less abiding with us. He either abides and we are filled or He does not and we are not. It is our own human weakness that causes us to suppose it is otherwise. It is our own human weakness that sees degrees of being filled with God. He is all and in all for us. Period. It was established thus on the day He called you out of darkness, and it has been so ever since.
Now, our perception of His presence, even in ourselves, varies day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute. Our awareness that He is indeed within us, accompanying us through our day is variable in the extreme. Quite often, we are suddenly recalled to that awareness just when we most wish it weren’t quite so true. It is in our moments of greatest fallenness and failure that we are likely to discover the greatest sense of His presence within. Oh, we also have that feeling when we are drawing close to Him, yet this we could debate is no more than fleshly enjoyment. No, I am not saying it isn’t real and true. Not necessarily. But, these are times that we are likely to enjoy anyway. The nature of worship is such as stirs the senses to enjoyment. There is a reason, after all, why mankind so loves music, and loves to be where it is being practices skillfully. It stirs the soul, whether it is worship or not. When this combines with a focus on God, it is a powerful thing indeed! But the flesh was halfway there already, before ever the soul began to sing.
You know, I’m looking at this matter of when we most sense the real presence of God, and I notice it’s at both extremes. It’s there when were are at our spiritual hottest, and it’s there when we are spiritually sub-zero. It’s the in-between spirit that is numbed to the reality, the luke warm. Is it any wonder that Jesus declares He will spit out such a one! My, but that warning strikes a godly fear in me, and it no doubt ought to in the great majority of us, for truth be told, we spend a goodly part of our days in that lukewarm state; going about our daily routine with little thought for God, little awareness of Him. Unless we hit some particular crisis in the course of the day, we may well not give Him a thought. Unless we are contemplating doing something we know full well is unrighteous, we may well not give Him a thought. Yet, He has not abandoned us! He remains; watching over us, speaking into us, reminding us constantly of the way in which we should go!
That, my Lord, remains simply amazing to me. That You can somehow abide in me when You cannot abide the presence of sin. Oh, and I know myself a sinner yet. There can be no doubt of that. Too much remains for us to work through together. But, You do work together with me, and this I cannot understand. This I can only wonder at, and praise You the more that it is true.
Having established that John’s main failure in rebuking that stranger was a failure of hospitality, we would be well served to look beneath that failure to its cause. Why? Why did John react so poorly to this one who it seems was clearly exercising the authority of Christ as he claimed? Well, like most sin, the answer lies in pride. John and the other disciples, as we have seen throughout this whole exchange, were inordinately proud of themselves. These were the Twelve, dude, and you’d best not try and muscle in on their privilege. They were it! I think, in their estimation at this point, they ranked just barely below Jesus Himself. Well, now, just look at the results. Pride, as has so often been said, is the root of sin. If it does not lie at the root of absolutely every sin, it is so near to it as matters not. And, oh! The damage a believer’s pride can inflict, not only on themselves but on those they have any influence at all over.
Listen very clearly to what the Lord has been saying to me personally about this: Pride in the believer is like sleep in the watchman. The prideful believer is a sleeping watchman. We are called to be ever-watchful, lest the enemy come upon us unawares and snare us back into old sins. But, our pride closes our eyes to the danger, even forewarned as we are. No, I’m stronger than that. I’m wiser than that. He can’t fool me, I’m on to him. And, off to our sins we go, convinced we’re on top of it. Blind leaders! Blinded by our own pride!
Well, like that watchman sleeping on his tower, the Lord’s rebuke of our pride is resounding, and ought certainly to snap us out of our foolishness. If that watchman fails to warn the people, God says, the blood of every man, woman and child lost due to his negligence is upon his hands, and the guilt price shall be demanded of him. Whoa! Well, now, just replace that sleeping watchman with the pride-blinded believer and hear that same warning issued. Every soul damaged by your prideful negligence, every soul lost because of your towering ego being in the way of doing God’s work, their blood is upon your hands, and it shall be required of you.
There is a sin that is beyond forgiveness, as John tells us. Just about anything, any failure of ours, we can come to Christ for forgiveness knowing that He is faithful to forgive – if we repent, and don’t settle for the cheap, “I’m sorry” that means nothing to us beyond, “oops, I got caught.” But, there is, John says, that sin which even this will not cure in us. Now, our standard speculation is that this great and terrible sin is blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. In truth, I suspect that much of what we place in that category as we think of it has nothing to do with truly blaspheming anyway, but now, I find myself wondering if that’s truly what John is pointing to.
After all, with the Scriptural foundation of woe upon the sleeping watchman, woe upon the prideful believer who makes himself a stumbling block to others, and that assurance of due penalty; where is the cause to hope for reprieve in these cases. “Their blood is on your hands, and it shall be required of you.” I don’t hear an, “unless” there. As much as we prefer to keep all our thinking on the triumphant power of God’s mercy and love, we mustn’t allow these to eclipse the very real power of His justice and His wrath against the sin that brings death and destruction to His perfect creation.
So, let not pride blind us! Not even the pride of being His, belonging to Him. After all, it is nothing in us that has brought this about, but only His own choice. As Paul reminds us, let all our boasting be in Him (1Co 1:31). He doesn’t tell us to boast about being His, just in Him. Boast about Him and leave self out of it, else that boasting is ought but pride, and misplaced pride at that. Vanity of vanities, to think that bearing His mark makes us something! No! We bear His mark because He is everything. Us? We are but servants, else there would be no mark upon us. What pride is there in that? It is the lowliest of positions, yet it is a position we have gladly taken upon ourselves because of Who He is. Even that recognition of Who He is gives us no grounds for pride, because we only recognized Him after He Himself caused us to recognize Him, after He Himself cleared up our blindness in that regard.
So, yes! Absolutely! Rejoice in belonging to Him. Rejoice in the Lord always! But, in that same breath of rejoicing, recall that you truly are a servant, a bondslave of Christ, fit only to serve. Ah, but what a blessing to so serve! Indeed, such a blessing it is that we cannot help but think everybody should join with us in this particular servitude. Recognizing all men as slaves, a truth most regularly blind themselves to, we respectfully note the infinitely superior qualities of our Lord and advise those still chained to His enemy to shift their allegiance and take upon themselves that same mark we bear – His, and His alone.
Pride, as we see in John, has led not only to the potential downfall of that one he chastised, but it has bred its poisonous sin in himself as pride led to jealousy, and jealousy to groundless rebuke. John, like Saul in his later persecutions of these servants of the living King, thought he was doing right. Was he not doing all this out of deep piety, out of regard for the purity of the faith? In truth, no. Neither man was truly motivated by such concern, but it was the cover that a deceitful heart put over the truth, lest they see and repent. The truth is that it was self-image, self-importance that moved them to action, whatever dainty clothe they draped over their disfigured motives.
They did what they thought was right, or more precisely, they thought what they did was right. Indeed, there may have been occasions (I do not say this is definitely so, only possibly) for which the exact things they did which were now wrong would have been the right response. But, what I see in this rebuke Jesus gives to John is that righteousness consists of a lot more than just being right. John was right to be concerned for the purity of faith, and as he expresses that same concern in his later epistles, he speaks righteously. But, in this instance, that concern led to a mistaken action. He was, like men in the time of the judges, doing whatever seemed right in his own eyes. He was not truly guided by the Lord in this, nor heeding the command and will of his Lord. So, too, with Saul. In persecuting the Christians, he was displaying the same zeal for the purity of Faith as he would later display in defense of the Christians. But, what seemed right to him was rather obviously not right in God’s sight. Doing that right, in that way and that time, was not righteous.
Let me put this in less ambiguous terms, which I admittedly borrow from Paul. Even where the rightness of your perspective is accurate, even where you, for instance, are fully accurate in your view that a drink of wine is no sin, and that you can partake thereof without scruple or concern; to insist on your right to do so when you know the other believers you are with do not understand it so is unrighteousness. In a culture so beset with alcoholics and drug abusers, addictive behaviors of all sorts, this is an issue we all but guaranteed to have to deal with. Yes, you are quite correct in saying that a drink is not in itself sinful, nor is the partaking thereof necessarily so. Indeed, the testimony of Scripture is that no thing is sinful in itself. It’s not the thing. It’s YOU! It’s what you have done with it.
No, your drinking that drink did not suddenly make it sinful. Your doing so in front of one who struggles with a lack of control in such matters, who is still laboring to cast of the chains of enslavement to drink; that makes it sinful. You have set a trap for that one. Worse still, you did so knowingly. You knew his weakness, yet insisted on your rights. You not only failed to put others first, but you knowingly put this brother’s soul in peril. That you insisted on your own pleasure over the need of a brother is not necessarily sinful, just a disqualification for leadership. Indeed, you should look upon that deed if ever you feel an urge to boast in yourself. For, in taking your own rights in hand here, you have failed to serve a brother and thereby given proof that you are no leader. But, that’s no sin, just a demotion. The sin is that you have imperiled this brother’s soul. The sin is that you, in your blind, prideful insistence on an unnecessary right, may well have led a brother to abandon his own pursuit of righteousness, to fall back into full enslavement to sin, and thereby be lost for all eternity. And, that will absolutely be charged to your account.
Now, I can say this without regard for any person’s perspective on predestination. That perspective changes not one thing in this matter. Not one thing! You can tell me that if that one fell, he was bound to fall anyway and never truly in a state of grace, and I can even agree with you. Yet, I can also tell you it doesn’t matter. As the agent of his fall in such fashion as this, you are guilty, guilty, guilty! You can insist that being in a state of grace yourself, it is of practically no account for your sins are forgiven and your salvation assured. Indeed, on that latter (so long as you are correct in your self-assessed state of grace), you are quite right! Salvation is assured. So is the punishment for this crime.
Ah, yes, you can assuredly come to Christ and beg His forgiveness. You can come in true repentance, and even walk out that repentance. And, indeed, having done so, you can be quite comfortable in knowing that He has indeed forgiven you. But, as any parent knows, even when forgiveness has been granted, consequences remain. And, what I hear from Jesus in this statement of His is that punishment in heaven is just as certain as reward. If there is certain reward stored up for you for even so little an act as giving a cup of water to one of His, then so, too, is there certain punishment stored up for your part in leading one of His into trouble. How this all balances out for the true believer is a matter for the mercy of His court, and I shall gladly leave it in His hands, but let not your assurance of salvation lead you into callousness towards those around you. Let not that assurance weaken your dread of such a woe as has just been pronounced here. Let not that assurance become an excuse to take sin lightly, for such as do so are rightly condemned, and their assurance, I fear, is found in the end to be quite false and baseless.
Listen to the Master on this: The Son of Man will send His angels to remove every stumbling block out of His kingdom (Mt 13:41). And lest there be any misunderstanding about this, He specifically notes that this includes all those who commit themselves to lawlessness. Well, amigo! If you have become a stumbling block to your brother, where do you stand in that moment? Woe, indeed, to be so permanently removed from His kingdom!
Consider, just for a moment what it would be like to have a millstone hung about your neck. Being a New Englander, I’ve seen the old millstones that were such an intrinsic part of early American life. There was a reason one needed more than mere human power to grind with these things. They’re huge, and they’re heavy. We’re considering a stone that is at least as wide in diameter as I am tall, and quite likely thicker than I. That’s a whole lot of rock. Hang that around your neck, and you’d best hope there’s sufficient rope to let it touch the ground, or you’re quite completely done with life right there. One thing certain is that you’re not going anywhere while this thing is attached, nor are you going to stretch your arms long enough to reach the knot and untie it.
Add to this that Jesus doesn’t stop with immobilizing you. No. He still considers it your better choice to be dragged out mid-sea wearing this contraption. Think about that. The sea was, to the Eastern mind, the embodiment of all that was dangerously unpredictable, all that was cause for fear. Now, we’re suggesting that not only should this one head out into such a fear-inducing region, but do so with this stone for company. Can you imagine the dread in such a one’s mind during that trip? Can the boat even take this weight? Are we top heavy? What if the wind picks up?
Of course, none of that matters in the end, because the final doom pronounced for him is to be thrown in far from shore where the waters are deepest, still wearing this stone attached about his neck. As noted, if it had been possible to untie this weight, he would have done so long since while everybody else was busy with the boat. If he couldn’t do it then, he’s sure not going to be able to do it while plunging to the bottom, holding onto his last possible breath for as long as his lungs and sanity allow. Death is, to be sure, quite certain, and quite certainly dreadful in its approach to this one. It’s no death by crucifixion, but it’s cruel enough for all that.
And with all this firmly pictured in the ears of those listening to Him, Jesus says, Hey! It would be to the advantage of that one who causes one of Mine to stumble! He would have been a happier man dying thus than he will be facing what he shall face instead. The reality of the due punishment meted out by heaven’s judge so far surpasses even the sum of earthly suffering that the worst one might experience here would pale to insignificance by comparison.
We have difficulty grasping the severity of such a punishment because we have difficulty grasping anything like an accurate perception of eternity. So, think about this violent death Jesus has described. Think about the dreadful anticipation involved: the certainty of the final outcome, but all that time rowing out, and that last bit of time when breath is growing stale in lungs that cannot replenish their supply. Imagine that dread, that pain, that certainty of death always being there, but never quite arriving. Imagine spending forever in the sensation of that final breath, death just as inevitable an outcome, hope of reprieve just as thoroughly out of reach, but never even given the relative blessing of that death one dreads. Not even that for relief. Just a forever of waiting for it to come, wishing it would come, but as incapable of making it come as of avoiding it. Horror of horrors! And even this is but the least of the suffering in this punishment, for the real issue is knowing that God had always been available as an eternal companion and friend, that He is still, rather like death, there at hand and yet forever out of reach.
Indeed, to face even such a cruel physical death before one could sin in such unforgivable extreme as to make the Justice of heaven your doom would be far, far better. Far better to die most horribly, but arrive in heaven forgiven and faced with an eternity of joy, an eternity of holy fellowship, with every tear and sorrow wiped away.
You know, whether or not this issue Jesus has been dealing with is the unforgivable sin that John has in mind, or whether it’s blaspheming the Holy Spirit, or whether it’s something completely different or maybe even a combination of these things, we cannot say with real certainty. We can have our favorite theories, and we can have ourselves convinced of the validity thereof, but at the end of the day, God has left it ambiguous, and I dare say He has done so with good reason. What, after all, does He not do with good reason? But, really, the very reality that there can be a sin beyond forgiveness, and the ambiguity He maintains as to just what that is gives us every good reason to be very, very careful. It begins, and I have to say it only begins, to give us a comprehensible reason not to test His forgiveness more than we must.
What, after all, if we were wrong? What if we avoided the thing we thought was unforgivable, but kept right on going with the thing He really had in mind? What if we come to the end of our own days, all prayed up, all confessed and forgiven in our own thinking, only to discover that there’s this one thing on our record that even Jesus’ blood isn’t going to wash away? Look, it sounds heretical as all get out to say that there could be something that His blood doesn’t wash away, even in the most apparently devout. Yet, to me it seems the implication is there. Whether it is a real danger to the real believer, it seems to me the real believer must treat it as a real possibility and let his character, his action and his very thought be guided and guarded by that understanding.
What would happen, I wonder, if we were to bring this image of the drowning man, of ourselves in the role of the drowning man, to mind each time we faced a temptation to sin in even the smallest way? What if we could feel the terror of that drowning man for just a moment each time we considered doing that which would displease our Master, or even neglecting to do what would certainly please Him? What if, in each moment of temptation, we were to hear His voice as we felt that momentary terror, saying, “It would be better for you…”?
Is that what it would take? Would it be enough? Would we, could we, alter our decisions given such a potent reminder of the outcome? Would we really ever choose to sin if we could in that moment before choosing feel the experience that will come of that momentary illusion of pleasure? Would the teenage mother really have chosen extramarital sex if she had been able to experience the whole spectrum of the challenges and disappointments of the life that would lay ahead of her before she consented? Would that all but hopeless heroin-addicted beggar on the streets have ever shot up, ever even smoked that first bit of dope, if he had seen this present life of his before his eyes when the first offer was made? If the certainty of this final state had been there at the start, who would choose it?
Well, what I see in the millstone here, what I see in some of the other warnings Jesus will be delivering, is exactly that opportunity to lay the final results before our mind’s eye before we condemn ourselves to experiencing it. It would be better for you. Wow. Better to die by intentional drowning. Better to be blinded and lamed. And just think how much God values the whole man. Think about those requirements placed on the high priest that would enter His service. No blemish allowed. But, better for you that you should be so blemished as to be denied entry into the honors of priesthood than to have to face what would come your way if you went ahead with what you’re thinking.
Of course, it must be obvious to us that Jesus is not actually advocating self-mutilation here, nor suicide. He is not speaking of these punishments as things that should truly be meted out either on oneself or on any other. He is speaking with great hyperbole to make the point of just exactly how heinous sin is. The pictures He paints are highly amplified pictures. They have to be, because we are so adept at blinding ourselves to consequences. We are creatures of instant gratification. Advertisers know that. Scam artists know that. Even our children know that. And they play us like violins unless we keep ourselves aware of that weakness of ours. So, Jesus is placing before His own a tool to maintain awareness. However good that deal looks, the real outcome is such that even such horrors as this would stand you in far better stead.
God, Holy Spirit, I cannot help but recognize this as a call to dangerous prayer. There is such power to be had by having this real terror of the consequences of sin in mind, such great benefit to be gained if I can but think about the real extent of the danger to my soul before I do that which requires me to cry out for forgiveness, that I do indeed pray that You might bring this rebuke to mind in whatever moment I may weaken. Holy One, it is said of You that part of Your mission amongst God’s children – Your children – here in this life is to bring the words of Scripture to mind as they are needful to us. Well, here is a thing so wholly needful and so woefully often. I pray, then, that You will indeed bring it to bear in my own mind in such a fashion that I would truly learn to fear to choose to sin; to fear it in such a fashion as is truly holy, and founded upon love for You, but to fear it all the same, lest I come to the end discovering I have been fooling myself the whole time. You are able, and You are indeed willing to so will and work in me as to make me in every way fit to be Yours. So, yes, as if You really need my permission to act according to Your purposes, I hereby offer it. No doubt, I shall need reminding of that as You answer me, but there it is. May You be blessed to answer as best serves Your will, my Lord and Master.
