New Thoughts (12/27/09-12/28/09)
In considering what Jesus has to say here, one matter that I feel must be addressed is the matter of who sits in judgment. It seems to me that we have a tendency today to lay claim to promises that were never made to us, to take every least statement that God made to any single individual and assume a corporate application in that statement – at least if it’s positive. The curses we will happily leave to the individual, but the promises are for all or they are no promise at all. It’s the perversity of human nature, to be sure, but how often that sentiment is on display, if not with quite such honesty.
So, when we come to a passage like Matthew 19:28, and Jesus is speaking of thrones and judging, we are quick to apply that passage to ourselves. See? We shall all rule and reign, and we shall sit in judgment upon the nations! How marvelous! Indeed, many of us have taken to practicing for the occasion even now! However, this passage is so clearly directed at the Twelve alone (the Eleven, really, for Judas will wash out) that we have no business using this verse to support our future standing. Indeed, there is a clear division here as to whom Jesus is addressing. The matter of thrones and judgment is for the twelve. That should be plain in the fact that He speaks of twelve thrones and of the twelve tribes. Then and only then, the object of His message is expanded to include all those who follow Him.
What then is the promise we can all take away from this? It is two-fold, although Matthew speaks only of one. First, we can take away the promise of just treatment. If we have been required to leave behind certain of the comforts and joys of this life in pursuit of our service to the King, then we can rest assured that we will be repaid and more for our troubles. Let me come back to that part later. Secondly, as Mark points out, we can take away the promise of persecution. Oh, and if we are inclined to write that off as some sort of error on Mark’s part, we can find the point reinforced in several places throughout the New Testament. Well, now! There’s a promise we could do without, eh? Isn’t that rather one of those curses that we can view as belonging only to the individuals being addressed at the moment? I’m afraid not. That’s the general promise. That business about judging and sitting on our own thrones was the limited part. Sorry.
That said, what is the big picture when it comes to this matter of judging and thrones? To what degree is it a limited position and to what degree a general promise? One thing I note is that whenever the thrones are mentioned, their number is limited. Here, apart from the singular throne of Christ, there are twelve so noted. This is clearly and explicitly associated with the number of the tribes of Israel. It is very specific.
In Revelation 4:4 (and elsewhere in that text) we find twenty-four thrones set up for the twenty-four elders. Curiously, nothing is said of the twelve for the Apostles, but I suspect this is because those twelve are reserved for later. But, the twenty-four, it seems to me, are to be associated with the twenty-four courses of the Levitical priesthood. This, too, reflects the justice of God, in that this lesser priesthood is not cut off by the coming of the Christ with His superior priesthood. Rather, they are honored and given places of authority in the ranks of heaven.
There is another point in Luke’s gospel in which Jesus speaks of the thrones of judgment upon which the Twelve will sit, but it must be understood that this is again solely spoken to the Twelve. This comes in response to the debate between those twelve as to who was the greatest. As part of His response, Jesus says, “I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom. Further, you will sit on thrones of judgment over the twelve tribes of Israel” (Lk 22:30). Again, let me stress that this is a specific promise to a specific group of men. I will save further consideration of that passage for its proper place in this long study.
As for us, as for the more general promise, we must look to Revelation 3:21. There, Jesus says, “I will grant to the those who overcome to sit with Me on My throne. For, I also overcame and sat with My Father on His.” Now, take note: Nothing is said here of judging. This is not a sharing out of authority. This is a presenting with honors. It is a recognition by the King of kings before the host of heaven. It is the Godly declaration of, “with this one I am well pleased.”
Over against this, I must also place 1Corinthians 6:2, where Paul reminds his readers that the saints will indeed judge the world. Fair enough. Paul has expanded the ownership on this one to cover all who believe, presumably through all the ages. We might also fold in Peter’s declaration that we are a chosen race and a royal priesthood (2Pe 2:9), but I rather wonder if we have misrepresented his meaning there. We see royal priesthood, and our eyes go straight to the royal part. Ooh, ah! We’re going to be royalty! But, is that really what he’s getting at? Is it not that we serve as priests in the royal palace? I’m not certain of that, but I am certain of this: the office of priest ought to weigh more in our balance than the office of ruler.
Returning to Paul’s point, it is clear enough from what follows that he speaks of the act of judging, and not merely some innate reaction to our very presence. It is not that we judge the world simply by setting the example of righteousness before them (although that is itself as things ought to be with us). It is that we have the wisdom to weigh the evidence and to assess the case. That’s his point. If we’re going to be judging the world as regards righteousness and sin, surely we ought to be able to deal with these petty issues of the day which would otherwise be taken to the lower courts for adjudication. We don’t need the world’s court system, he is saying, because we are to become a part of the Superior Court of heaven.
This is, at least in my brief survey, the only passage that supports any claim of office on our part, and as such, I’m reticent to make that claim. Yes, by Paul’s words it is clear that we will have our share in the duty of judging. Yet, I come back to the limited thrones. There are only so many seats given upon which the judges shall sit, whether we count the twelve over Israel, or the twenty-four. Of course, Paul is speaking here of the nations, not just Israel. So, I suppose the argument could be made that all these other passages were specific to Israel, whereas Paul is concerned with the larger Gentile population. Perhaps, but I would expect further support for such an understanding.
I come back to what Jesus says to the Gentile church. “You will sit with Me on My throne.” I see no promise of a throne of my own, either in what Jesus says or in what Paul says. Where the twelve and the twenty-four sit in their own right, I see that I am promised a seat with Authority. The delegation of His power is not something He gives away willy-nilly. The sharing of wisdom, on the other hand, is something He has promised to all who will ask it of Him. The wisdom to assess the case, the wisdom to settle matters honorably and in righteousness: These are part of the promise of heaven to all its citizens. Of course, in heaven, there is no call to exercise judgment, for all are honorable and righteous as He has regenerated them. But, come the reign of Christ, the final and full establishment of heaven’s kingdom on earth, then there will be call to judge and judge rightly. And, when that time comes, I expect the requirements of Micah 6:8 will remain in force: Do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. With God.
That is the key. Whatever it is we do, whether in this age or the next, it is with God. Let the honors and offices be to those for whom they are reserved. For myself, it is enough to know that I am and ever shall be with God.
Consider the nature of that kingdom which is to come. It’s there in the way Matthew speaks of it: the Regeneration. When it is applied to the individual, that word bespeaks “a radical change of mind for the better”, as Augustine wrote. When it applies to a nation or, as in this case, to all creation, it gets even better, for in this case, in the age to come, we find a kingdom in which all is established in perfect order and all who are in that kingdom are ‘dedicated and intimately united to God.’ Here, I borrow heavily from Thayer’s Lexicon. This is the promise! This is where we are headed, and our papers are already in order thanks to the Christ Who came as our Federal representative, paid the court the penalty that was due our crimes, and registered adoption papers on our behalf. We are not mere citizens of heaven! No! We are legally members of the King’s own household! Do we really need greater privilege and honor than that? Leave the striving for position to others. Leave the struggle for the throne to earthly princes. For our part, there is a King upon the throne, and His kingdom shall be forever and ever, Amen!
Something struck me in considering those concepts associated with the Regeneration, and that is how clearly they parallel the concepts associated with Life. The regenerated are, as I quoted from Thayer, ‘dedicated and intimately united to God.’ Well, now! What is Life? Life, particularly in this zoe aspect rather than the mundane physical plant of bios? Here, again, I shall resort to Thayer to provide answer. Life – the fullness of life – is found in God alone, that life consisting in essence and in ethic. It is found in God alone, and through Him, it is found in the Christ. Because of the Christ, that same fullness of life in essence and ethic is given to man! It’s given! It’s part of the gift package we have received from Him! And, what is this life? It is real! It is genuine! It is ‘actively and vigorously devoted to God.’ Let’s see: Regenerated into a dedicated and intimate unity with God, and possessed of a life actively and vigorously devoted to God. Do you see it? Well, of course, it ought to be connected, for the absolute fullness of life which is represented by zoe is perfected life. It is life such as we cannot fully possess until that resurrection has come which inaugurates the Regeneration!
Oh! For that day when all the vagaries of this present age have ceased! Oh! For that time when all is as it ought to be, when our inheritance has been given us in full. What a glorious day, when we shall stand with our Savior, when we shall be found sitting with Him upon His throne, marveling the more at His glory so close and so present. Reward? What more reward could I desire? What greater honor could I covet? I am my Beloved’s and He is mine! It is enough and more!
But, by God’s perfect plan I must endure – we must endure – this Present Age. This Present Age is, though it seems to last ever so long, but a point in time. It is, however, a critical point: the critical point. It is that decisive moment in which things reach crisis. The Church may be inclined to wonder about the Tribulation to which the Revelation points, as to whether we must go through it, or whether we are granted exit before it begins. Yet, it seems not unreasonable to suppose, as I have read in Table Talk on occasion, that the Tribulation began when the Christ died and rose again. This Present Age is the age of crisis. It is but a moment, but it is (by our perceptions) a long, drawn out moment. In this moment of crisis, we are called and encouraged to endure. It is in that endurance that we are assured of the reality and the certainty of the Promise.
That may seem contradictory, but it is not. The Promise awaits and we await the Promise. It is the one thing that shapes the course of our lives as Christians and yet we find ourselves in this now of crisis. Table Talk has been exploring the concepts of the ‘already / not yet’ this month. That is clearly where we abide. We are already redeemed but not yet fully possessed of our liberty. We are already citizens of heaven but not yet home in that blessed kingdom. We remain in crisis, in the long meantime. This is where we have been set to labor on behalf of that kingdom. This messy, unsatisfactory now is the field in which we are called to sow and to harvest. We are not called to this labor in hopes of earning a paycheck of some sort. We are not here seeking to earn our entrance into the next life. We have already gained entrance, secured our visa, tickets stamped and no least obstacle in our way. We are here because this is where the King of heaven has determined it is good for us to be. We are here because this is where we can be useful to the kingdom in this present age of crisis. We are here to make the decisive moment that is now clear to those whom the Master would call to Himself. We are here to serve.
In light of that, the closing comment to this morning’s devotion in Table Talk is worth quoting and remembering. “When we delay serving the Lord, we may miss opportunities to be used by God in service to other people. When we make commitments to others, not least the Lord, let us fulfill them quickly. We should not put off until tomorrow what can be done today, lest we miss a chance to do some good for the kingdom.” That is our calling so long as we remain in this long meantime of now. So long as we are granted time in this decisive moment of crisis, let us be about hearing God, serving God, doing with alacrity every least thing that He puts us in mind to do, that by all we do His kingdom purposes might be promoted even in this fallen land.
I have said that we serve not for our own profit, but for the profit of the kingdom, and this is true. At least it ought to be. That said, we can be assured, as Jesus Himself assures us here, that God is just. Though our deeds have no value in matters of earning entrance into the kingdom, we can be certain that our just Lord does not ignore what we do for Him, what we sacrifice for Him. Indeed, so richly does He remember to us our willing and sacrificial efforts on His behalf that our efforts are as nothing by comparison. Just look at that assurance Jesus gives: You have left home and family for Me? You will have them back many times over in this life! You have felt financial loss in the course of serving Me? You will be enriched well beyond what you have lost.
Now, I would hope it is sufficiently clear that Jesus is not guaranteeing physical return on physical loss. If I have lost one physical parent for the cause of the Gospel, I am not being promised a hundred physical parents in return. That doesn’t even make sense! Yet, I shall indeed know many spiritual parents in the years I walk with God. I can think of several already. I shall also, Lord willing, serve as spiritual parent to many others. My family has expanded beyond the physical bounds of nature. My family consists now in all who come to worship in the house of the Lord. I cannot even constrain it to those who share in worship under the same roof as me, nor even to those who live in the same span of time. No! My family has been extended across all time and all creation to include all who ever have or ever will bow in worship to the Christ of God – all whose trust has been securely placed in Him.
Arguably, this same trade of physical for spiritual is to be understood in the case of house and land, as well. For one thing, what need would I have for hundreds of houses? What need for more than one? Oh, sure, there are those who enjoy a summer house, or a winter home. But, even with that, I can count at most three. Hundreds? Why would I want them? Who would maintain them? As to farmlands: well, the spiritual mapping is clear enough if I but consider the parable of the sower and the seed. We are called to sow, to water, to weed in the fields of our Lord. Those fields are wherever we may be. Those fields are fields of mankind, but mankind as yet lying fallow, devoid of the germ of real Life.
The business of houses, then, remains the most difficult for which to find a spiritual counterpart. Unless the Lord should choose to explain that to me, I suppose I shall let it sit, and simply accept that there is such a counterpart, and it is to this that Jesus points me.
One thing is inarguable here: His whole purpose is to point us away from the material distractions of this present age and towards the immeasurable blessedness of the next. In that age, the age which is not yet, we are assured the priceless gift of eternal life. That’s Life as we had it defined earlier: Life in full, wholly devoted to God and shared in intimate relationship with Him. Forever. Time without end. No interruption. That’s an eternity in which to enjoy the fruits of what we endure for the present. The present is what? Eighty years? Ninety? So, for this brief window of time we may suffer a bit, though only for our own discipline and training. We will experience persecutions. That’s a given. There is never any maybe about it. But, what are these light and momentary afflictions, when measured against an eternal weight of glorious Life (2Co 4:17)? Be trained by what Jesus is saying, what Paul echoes! “We look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For what we see is temporal, but what is not seen is eternal” (2Co 4:18).
Listen and understand this: For so long as we remain in this age, both blessing and persecution are our lot, our inheritance. Mark has been very careful to make certain that we see both together. It’s not a pointless submission to persecution without end. Neither is it the non-stop blessing that so many today like to claim it is. God wants you rich? Maybe, maybe not. God wants you in perfect health? Well, certainly, come the Regeneration, you can count on it! Every least malady will be healed, every least sin abolished, and we can enter into an eternity of enjoying that perfect blessedness. But, not until that time. In this age, though you may (and I stress may) enjoy a degree of material comfort, it is by no means assured. What is assured is that you will experience persecution.
We have come to look upon sickness and poverty as clear indications that we are not serving God as we ought. If you are sick, we are told, it is because your faith is lacking. If you are poor, there must be some vow you have failed to keep with God. There has to be something in you that is causing you to live something less than the good life, as we define good. Don’t you see? Capitalism and holiness are synonymous! Ooh! Bow down at the altars of materialism, and we shall call you blessed of our god.
But, Scripture says something else entirely: If they persecuted Me, they will surely persecute you as well, for the slave is never greater than his master (Jn 15:20). Of course, the obverse is also true: If they keep My word, they will also keep yours. Or perhaps this will make it sufficiently plain: “In the world you have tribulation, but take courage! I have overcome the world” (Jn 16:33). You have it! No question. “Indeed,” Paul says, “all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted” (2Ti 3:12). Count on it! But, understand that with persecutions, there are also those rich rewards that Jesus has assured us about. Only, those rich rewards, if we look for them with eyes focused solely on the present, with a taste only for instant gratification, will ever evade us. Turn your eyes upon Jesus, not the houses. Turn your eyes upon Jesus, not the bank accounts, not the government. Seek first and foremost (indeed, solely!) the kingdom of God and rest assured that all your needs will be cared for by the Providential God of heaven and earth.
This is the answer Jesus gives to Peter’s question. What’s in it for us? Everything! What have we given up that this is so? So very little. Oh! May we never fall into the foolish trap of demanding that God give us what we are due! How marvelous indeed that He does not give us what we are due, but what He chooses to bless us with in spite of what we should otherwise deserve!
My Lord and King, once again I am forced to look at myself and see cause to be ashamed. How I have been in that foolish place! How I have been griping and complaining of all I give up in service to Your house, and how little it is recognized. Yes, I can pretty it up by saying my concern is for how little everybody else is doing, but let’s be honest, here. It’s all about me. Oh, Lord! Where has my faith been of late? How is it that I allow myself to be so downcast when I am certain of so rich a heritage in You! Forgive me, Father, for against You and against You only have I sinned. What cause have I to doubt You, to doubt Your best intentions towards me? What indeed have I been trusting in, that I am so easily laid low by these present days?
Oh, I don’t deny that these days are dark, and the outlook bleak, so far as eye can measure it or mind assess it. But, this I know, and this I must surely rejoice in: You remain! You have never once left Your throne, nor ever shall! Nothing but nothing in this world transpires without Your awareness, without Your express command. However dark the darkness, Light remains, and that the darkness cannot overwhelm your Light. Just as ‘impossible’ does not apply with You, so ‘possible’ does not so much as apply to that concept!
Lord, let me contemplate these great truths and be filled once again with the goodness of Your lordship over my life. Let me come once more to the place of thrilling to know myself a child of Your household, adopted into Your family, and destined to be so ever more! What more could I ask, after all? And what sort of ingratitude would it be in me to demand more in the now, when I have such a marvelous eternity set before me? No! Let me, like my Savior, my Christ, endure whatever persecutions and trials this life may throw my way for the joy set before me. Let my eyes and my heart be upon that joy, come what may: despising every hardship in the knowledge that I shall sit upon my Husband’s throne as He sits upon Yours. Glory be to Father, to Son and to the Holy Spirit! Amen!
