New Thoughts (08/10/11-08/14/11)
Before I consider the content of the message Jesus relays here, I would point up the rather shocking tone in which that message is delivered. It was doubtless a sufficient shock to the sensibilities to hear this Man laying out these prophetic woes against the most respected representatives of religion at the time. These were the pillars of the community! These were the exemplars of piety, the upholders of God’s Law! Or, so they were perceived. For this Man, this Jesus, to come out of the hinterlands and shout curses at them in the midst of the Temple must already have been raising a few eyebrows. Some were doubtless entertained by the spectacle. Some few may even have felt the right of His observations. But, it’s not at all unreasonable to expect that many were offended by His audacity. It all rather depends on whether one listens with ears of flesh or with ears open to God’s voice.
All that being said, it serves as but a precursor to the utterly shocking treatment He gives them now. “You fools! You blinded souls!” Let’s put it in our own vernacular, for truly, it is already there: You morons! Indeed, Wuest, in his paraphrase, does his best to allow the rudeness of this label to shine through: “Impious, godless morons and spiritually blind ones.” Yet, even with that, I’m not sure we grasp the full strength of the insult. We might well recognize by our own usage that a moron is one deemed as lacking in learning or understanding. That would be insult enough for a scribe or lawyer, whose very living and reputation rested upon being known for exactly these qualities. We might also recognize the idea of a moron being one with no forethought, no wisdom. Indeed, this probably strikes nearer our most common usage of the term.
You see your friend do something which was clearly going to have the exact negative result that it indeed had, something that should have been easily avoided. Perhaps it’s as simple as walking into an open door because he was too distracted by texting on the cell phone or some such. What is your reaction to witnessing this event? “You moron.” Of course, we being meticulously faithful to the teaching of Christ would never ever think to say such a thing. Except we do.
But, the term goes further in its original meaning. In a world that still found God relevant to their lives, wisdom bespoke knowledge of God and the good sense to apply that knowledge to living. It is only as God has been removed from our thinking that the term has lost much of its power. Go back. The term bespeaks being empty and useless, for surely to be without knowledge of God is to be, as Solomon so beautifully framed it, ‘vanity and wind’ (Ecc 2:11). All the brilliance and acumen of the world, all the grand discoveries of science and the marvelous inventions of technology, all the beautiful creativity of the artistic; it is of absolutely no value if it lacks that knowledge. Be as offended as you like by that news, but it remains the Truth. Vanity and wind. All our great achievements, all our supposed advances as we have evolved to the modern, humanistic, atheistic conception of mankind is vanity and wind. It is empty. It is useless. By very definition, it is Godless.
And here we arrive at the true depth of insult that has been leveled at the temple occupants: To be a moron is to be Godless. We could reverse it and find it still holds perfectly true. To be Godless is to be a moron. How do you suppose your pastor would respond to you calling him a Godless man? I should hope there would be no cause for such, but surely many who label themselves pastors of ‘Christian’ churches are precisely that, just as these men, for all their posturing and precepts and pronouncements, were empty and worthless. Worse, as we shall see, they were teaching in direct opposition to Truth. We could try and fancy it up, but if one teaches what is opposite to Truth, what is one teaching but the Lie?
Thinking on this matter of what is empty and useless, I could look at much of what is delivered to us as current events and news and find proof that the vast majority of humanity is caught up in exactly such things. It should hardly surprise. As I have already made reference to, so much of what has been going on in society at large has been aimed at taking God out of the equation of daily life. Why should we be shocked to discover the result is empty and useless? Look at what passes our time. Vanity and wind, and not much else! We chase after news stories with a fervor that is unbecoming. We hunger after the next video clip, so we can watch the depravities happening in this place and that. We spend weeks on end exploring the fall of this person, that politician, or some star whose sole claim to fame is being in constant moral freefall.
What of our industry, such as it is? What do we produce anymore? If you want to profit, you had best be doing something related to entertainment, because that’s where the money’s being spent. Forget about items with some utility. Appliances? Clothing? No. We outsource all that to people with less imagination. For us, it’s entertain us or bust. And, don’t you believe we’ve been immune to this influence in the church! Some resist, but even in the most resistant, one finds this mindset infiltrating.
One other thing that has been on my mind of late, which touches at least tangentially on this point: We like to puff ourselves up with the idea that we are so much further advanced, us modern folk. We’re better educated, wiser to the ways of the world, and able to probe the operation of nature. Well, here’s an amazing thing! I’ve been reading through this overview of various men of God through the centuries, and something really jumped off the pages at me the other day. Here was the record of one such pillar of the Church, and it is noted that he obtained his master’s degree (the first of three, if I read it correctly) in such and such a year. Fine. But, a quick jump back a page or so reveals that he was all of nineteen at the time. By twenty five, he was shaping the course of church history! Look around you! Even if one follows the official standard course of education today nonstop, you’re not getting near a master’s degree until 22 or so. Most folks today take five or six years to deal with a four year college program, so call it 24.
You will argue that the curriculum presented in our time is far advanced from what was then available, and therefore the longer time is necessary. The truth is that such arguments are but vain conceit on our part. These guys were mastering concepts and abilities that surpass the vast majority of college grads today. Honestly, the accomplishments of these men become only that much more amazing when one stops to consider the age at which they began accomplishing, let alone the circumstances in which they did so! Truly, we have become only weaker, less able, emptied of all which is of value, as we have allowed ourselves to see education as no more than preparation for the world. That point draws me nearer to the subject of this passage, or at least its significance, for this is exactly what the teaching Jesus decries was doing: putting the eyes of man firmly on the stuff of earth, rather than drawing them upward towards the kingdom of heaven.
Before I turn to that content, though, I want to consider the crowd reaction just a little bit longer, particularly the negative reaction I suppose to have been there, at least in some of those observers. The reason I find such a reaction likely is because I recognize such reactions in myself. In this case, I am not thinking so much about some offense felt at how an ostensibly honorable man is being treated. It’s strictly a matter of tone. There are times when the tone in which the message is delivered will cause us to shut out the actual message. It no longer matters how true the speaker’s points may be. We aren’t even hearing the points. We’re too busy gnawing on the offense we felt at some perceived insult in his words, or some perceived error that we allow to serve as invalidator for all that follows.
This opens up a whole series of thoughts for me. First, there is that sense of the matter that I need to be more aware of how I’m reacting to things, and those occasions when I have ceased listening for whatever reason, and thereby quite possibly missed hearing the Truth. There are so many triggers for this response! It may be tone of voice. Somebody comes with a scolding tone and frankly, all their words are immediately discounted. It may be that they have said something that runs counter to my understanding, an understanding I may feel particularly strongly about. Having predetermined that they must be wrong on this point, since I am obviously right, I can tend to shut out whatever else may follow, or else shift into a highly critical mode of listening, just looking for reasons to reject everything else that is said, rather than listening for what truth might be there.
This can be particularly the case when listening to preaching and teaching. There are those whose words I am inclined to take with little question, and others whom I decide are so questionable as to require rejection of pretty much anything said. Neither approach is good. On the one hand, an unquestioning acceptance of any man’s word denies the reality that all men are fallible, even me. Indeed, I have to question my own teaching, lest I find I’ve led myself astray! On the other hand, if I reject the whole body of a man’s message because of one error, am I not likewise unjust in my measure of the man? Is there not a concept of separating the wheat from the chaff, rather than throwing out the entire crop because one has found out that there is chaff there? The wheat and the tares might serve as the more obvious illustration for my point, but it strikes me that the wheat and the chaff better point up the absurdity of the approach. All wheat has chaff. All teaching, I dare say, has errors. Again, we are imperfect men, every one of us. There are bound to be things we have gotten wrong. There are bound to be things that even my particular heroes of the faith have gotten wrong. Apart from the degree of Holy Inspiration by and under which Scripture was authored, it is inevitable. If one looks at enough of any man’s teaching and truth claims, there will be mistakes in it. Let me stress, for my own benefit, that this applies most immediately to my own studies. And that may well be the hardest place for me to see the mistakes.
Allow me to balance this point somewhat. There are those teachers whose mistakes and errors are so numerous and so egregious as to make it not only advisable but even mandatory that we remove ourselves from under their teaching. We are to listen critically, in that we are to listen with a clear understanding of Scriptural truth. But, we are not to listen critically as those seeking to find every last error in a man’s message. Come back to the example of the Bereans, who are commended for both “receiving the word with great eagerness” and “examining the Scriptures to see whether these things were true” (Ac 17:11). Notice the mindset here: They received the word gladly, but they checked to ensure that what they received was legitimate. We might put it in the terms of “trust, but verify.” This is the mindset we ought to have towards our teachers and preachers. If, in the course of verification, we arrive at the place where trust is no longer possible, because they have been dangerously wrong too often, then it is time to depart from under that teacher, to remove oneself from the presence of that preacher. This, of course, pertains to the exposition of Scripture, or what is proclaimed with the authority of such exposition.
Let me turn to another aspect of my point though, and that is the aspect of the evangelist, the believer hoping to have a positive impact on the culture around him. In this case, we also need to be very mindful of just how easily we can cause our listeners to completely shut us off. Tonally, we must strive to be engaging in how we present ourselves and our message. Yet, we must not come across as saccharine. If there is not a clear validity and earnestness to our presentation, it will not be at all convincing. Neither, however, are we likely to gain much of a hearing by being a scold or doomsayer. Oh, there’s a place for that, believe me! There’s a place for speaking the cold Truth of sin unforgiven. But, if that is the whole of our message, or our introduction, I fear we will never gain a hearing for mercy and forgiveness being on offer. Where is the seasoning with salt?
Likewise, and particularly in dealing with an educated audience, it is necessary that we prepare ourselves to make an intelligent and accurate presentation of our case. Sloppy thinking will not impress a thinker. An inability to defend the more difficult points of the faith will not convince the skeptic. Granted, it may well be that nothing will convince the skeptic, but we needn’t make it easier for them to reject the Truth. No! We are supposed to be prepared to give a defense of what we believe, a cogent defense, not just an emotional plea, or a justification by feelings.
The sum of it is that as we go out to change the world, we had best have an understanding of the world we wish to change. I have doubtless noted this before, but it bears repeating. Paul made it a point to know the people to whom he went to evangelize. He got to know how they perceived their world. He read their poetry, observed their arts and their religious practices. He got to know their particulars so that when he presented the Gospel, he could present it in a fashion that they were able to receive, in a fashion that addressed that which he had observed. Indeed, if he found scraps of truth in their writing or actions, he pointed these out, and then pointed out how this related to Truth. I don’t get the sense that he went through places like Ephesus shouting from the street corners, “Convert or be condemned!” No. He reasoned. He expounded. He presented the logical case for faith, and he did so with great effect. Why? Because he made sure to present the message in such a way as to avoid those immediate dismissals of the message.
The final aspect of this matter of tone and response that I would consider is that of the rebuke. What Jesus is delivering here is a rebuke. It is wrapped most thoroughly in the prophetic voice, but it is a rebuke nonetheless. Indeed, I could argue that the prophetic voice is almost always speaking a rebuke, and when we find a claimant to prophecy who is not speaking a rebuke, but rather handing out nothing but attaboys, we do well to shut out his words (contrary to much of what I’ve just been saying). But, when the rebuke comes, what is our response? I know what mine is. My immediate response is a shutting down and shutting out. To the degree possible, I just don’t want to hear it. But, hear it I will. I am not quite so childish as to stick my fingers in my ears, but it’s close to that. I will, I can almost guarantee, seek to remove myself from the presence of my rebuker.
But, why is that? Well, we can say it’s because the flesh rises up, and that’s fine. It’s true as far as it goes, but it’s not really the why of the matter. We can say it’s because of the tone, but that’s an absolute evasion, more than likely. Honestly, we ought to recognize that Truth is not made untrue by tone. Granted, there are ways the message can be delivered that might more readily get past our defensiveness, but we who are supposedly growing into the mature image of Christ ought to be able to arrive at a place of vulnerability before one another, whereby we are willing to receive even the hard word, even the hard word with bad timing and poor delivery. Often times, the Truth hurts. But, the Truth always heals if we will but hear it.
For my own part, I know that if I can remove myself from the scene of confrontation, allow that first fleshly response to fade and emotions to cool, I will almost certainly recognize the Truth of the rebuke. It is the heat of that first response that needs to be addressed. This, I find, is beyond me to change. What a surprise! But, I serve the One Who can change it. It is a part of that maturity I just spoke of, that we can hear what the Spirit is saying, even when it is delivered by lips that may make the message less palatable. Do you know what one of my first reactions tends to be? If God wanted to change this in me, He could certainly speak to me directly! Yes, He doubtless could. Of course, there’s the question of whether I would be listening. There’s also the question of why I find it so objectionable that He should use an intermediary. After all, are we not all intermediaries on His behalf? When I teach, am I not His intermediary, or hoping to be so? There is much for which I need forgiveness.
Lord, with that in mind, I pray most fervently that You would first and foremost forgive me for so treating Your messengers. I am no different in that regard than these whom You gave up on for their destruction of Your prophets and Your Son. That’s a hard thing to have to admit to, but there it is. This is the enormity of my crime, and I pray You can yet find it in Yourself to forgive. More than that, though, I see a lacking maturity in myself, that I pray You would aid me in correcting. Bring me to that place, Holy One, that I can accept the corrective word in the love by which it is offered, rather than in the offended pride that is in me. Oh! That vile pride of mine! When will it ever be subdued, Father? What must be done, that I might finally, once for all, be quit of it? It’s been years, Lord, that we have had cause to talk of this problem, years that I have seen it, thought it dealt with, and just found it returning. When will I have the victory over myself, Sweet Spirit? Will You come, will You work with me on this? For without You I am quite hopeless. Yet, I know that with You, all things are possible. Let me hold to that. Let me hold to that great Truth not only for my own issues of maturity, but also for my beloved’s issues of health. All things are indeed possible in You and with You. Let me not lose sight of that in the seemingly unchanging situation we are in.
This morning, I will begin by considering the overall thrust of what Jesus is saying here. My view of that from back when I first put the outline of this study together can be seen in my choice of heading for the section: “You’ve Been Bought”. Some may recognize this as a song title from Steve Taylor back in the ‘80s. The song does not address the issues seen here so much, or perhaps it does. My application of it to the section, though, has to do with the priorities shown by the teachers of this false message regarding oaths. Note well what is considered more important by these men. It is the stuff of profit. The gold offered at the temple was what really had their attention, not the God of the temple. The offerings set on the altar, of which they could perhaps expect a portion, depending on the nature of the offering, was what they served as priests, not the God to whom the offering was made.
This same emphasis is clearly evident in the use they have made of the court of the Gentiles, which Jesus had cleansed of their business partners the previous day. Indeed, it is the disruption of their business that really has them up in arms. Challenges to their erudition and expertise they could deal with. They could have tolerated, perhaps, another sect with another viewpoint. What was one more? Oh, they would have defended their own purported beliefs strongly enough, but a new sect was hardly a killing matter. This was business! This was profit and loss statements. And that is where I arrive at my title. The rewards, the material benefits, had come to mean more to these men than God and godliness. All of that hypocrisy of which Jesus has been complaining is rooted in this issue. They pose because the money comes in more freely when people think you’re holier than you are. It’s no longer about those people and their condition. It’s about the condition of their bank accounts.
I needn’t rant at any great length on the matter of how many modern ‘ministries’ are in this exact same game. Indeed, I cannot come to this passage without recalling a certain morning, back when my wife was inclined to watch the morning televangelist shows, when I heard one such speaking on this passage. Considering verse 17, he was advocating that the gold truly was the more important item. God, after all, wants us all rich, because it’s good advertising for His kingdom! To teach such a thing, one must either be utterly ignorant as to Church history, or malevolently determined to corrupt as many believers as possible! That was, quite frankly, the last time I suffered that particular ministry to be heard in our household.
Today, I am far more concerned with the degree to which this applies to all of us. Perhaps it is a maturing of my own character over the years. If so, I can only claim it as evidence of God’s work, not my own. At any rate, I find it needful to continually draw my eyes back from how this applies to others, and consider how it applies to me. There is, in that regard, a truly disturbing thread in what Jesus is saying. He is pointing to those things which are types and shadows. (I just need to add that this aspect of the thing is just now occurring to me.) The altar and the sacrifice were established as intermediate steps, pointers to the Christ and His work. The temple likewise was established as an intermediate point. Truly, God has no need for a house, Who owns the whole of Creation! Even heaven, as we are inclined to think of it, is but an intermediary, a shadow of the real thing, which remains far and away above our capacity to imagine as it truly is.
The purpose of these types and shadows, these intermediate representations, is to draw the thoughts of man higher. They are parables every bit as much as are the lessons Jesus teaches. They are presented to us in earthly terms, physical, visceral, easily grasped in our minds. But, they are presented to serve primarily a symbolic function, and that function is ever and always to direct our attention to the real deal. That is the sum of what Jesus is saying in the latter half of this passage. The altar is about Him Who sanctifies not only the offering upon the altar, but the altar itself. The temple is about He Who dwells therein. Heaven’s throne is of interest solely because of the One Who occupies the throne. He is the reality. He is the point. These intermediaries are of value only in so much as they serve to keep our attention on Him. It is of a piece with the earliest lessons of His ministry: Seek first the kingdom, then all these mere things will be taken care of. God knows what you need. Frankly, He knows better than you do! (Mt 6:32-33).
These things are Truth. Yet, they are not to become our focus. I come full circle, after a fashion. God will provide. It is His very name! Yet, the provision of God is not the point. God is the point. You have likely heard the popular adage, “seek the Giver not the gift.” I have actually heard at least one preacher teach that this is wrong, and of course we will seek the gift, because it’s our nature. This is a message for the emotions, though, and seeks to leave thought behind as if it were some sort of great evil in man that he was created with a brain. The brain, let it be said, is not a product of the Fall. It is part of the original design, and intended to be used and used well. But that’s another message for another time.
Every intention of the Church and the life of the Church ought to be to take us farther from the stuff of earth and nearer the fullness of heaven. All of it is supposed to serve to help us pursue the course Jesus sets before us, the course of keeping our eyes on the kingdom, the course of being like our eldest Brother. This is nothing new to Christianity. It was ever so. From Adam onward, this was to be the purpose of God’s people.
Interestingly, I was given to teach on a passage from Jeremiah 35 last week, which deals with the descendants of Rechab who, by their father’s instruction, had foresworn all the trappings of settled living, of material satisfaction. Much of this had to do with not allowing even the appearance of complicity in their former ways, for the Rechabites were Canaanites by nature, although long associated with Israel and Israel’s God by choice. But, the lifestyle commanded for them was one which caused a constant tension between his children and the world around them. They remained nomadic, thereby avoiding the propensity to get caught up in home and possessions. One who is ever on the move is not so inclined to allow his life to be cluttered up with possessions. They’re extra weight to have to carry on the next journey. And, anybody who’s ever owned a home knows what a burden it can be at times, what a constant responsibility.
A similar point is made by Paul with regard to marriage. Marriage, let it be said outright, is not bad. It is a great good, one of the greatest we are granted to experience this side of heaven. Yet, it comes with great responsibilities, and responsibilities such as keep our attention earthbound. A wife must be provided for. A husband must be attended to. And then there’s children! Children are a blessing, but again, they are a responsibility, and one that cannot be relinquished. They are a great financial responsibility, as much as we may try not to think of it in such terms. But, it’s true. And, the breadwinner cannot help but feel it. It becomes easy to lose sight of the promise that our Provider will see to our needs if we will but see to looking to Him.
The sum of it all is that we are very much prone to allowing our eyes to be drawn earthward. It’s not just home life or work life that does this. We can and do bring the same mistaken perspective into the house of God when we come. We are perfectly capable of debasing the holiest of ceremonies by our mindset, and it frankly doesn’t matter whether we are in a leadership role, a supporting role, or the role of participant. When we sing or play an instrument in worship, where is our attention? Is it on getting the notes right? That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not the main thing. Is it on making sure (we who are on the worship team) that we are smiling and appearing to be into what we’re singing? I tell you truly that to the degree that it is merely posturing, we have fallen into the camp of those who have been bought.
What of preaching, or teaching? Are we trying to impress everybody with our fine phrases, or with the depths of our insight? For shame! The finest of preachers is of no further value than that God moves upon the hearts of his hearers. To arrive at the place of thinking I am anything, my insights are of any value, my particular choices of emphasis in matters of doctrine or exposition are of some inherent value is to arrive at the place of being bought.
Well, what of those who are in the pews? We are in no way exempt. Why, for example, do you bring an offering? Is it, in your mind, payment for services rendered? Or have you been sucked into the idea of giving your ten percent because God is thereby somehow obligated to give you ten or a hundred times as much back in return? As if you could obligate God in any way, shape or form! Or, perhaps you give because everybody else is doing so, and it would make you look a cheapskate not to do likewise. None of these are of any value. All of these are earthen, leaden acts. When giving is an obligation, or a matter of being seen, or a seeking after more of the material stuff, we are right back with these Pharisees, setting up our own tables for the money changers and focused on nothing greater than this life. Eternity is lost on us, if not to us.
We have utterly missed the point. The point is not the church building. The point is not the forms of worship so very much. The point is the Object of our worship, the God to whom we hope to point ourselves and others. Our lives, our words, our practices: all of these things are intended to serve as intermediaries, as symbols, as pointers to the heavenly reality. This is our purpose. It is for this that we were created. The Westminster Shorter Catechism opens with the question, “What is the chief end of man?” and with the answer, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him forever.” Notice the primary clause of that answer: To glorify God – to draw the attention to God, to make Him more evident. Were we to use Jesus’ words, we could say it is to be the salt and the light.
Our lives, our primary and chief purpose in being here, is to glorify God. This is intended to be true of us whether it be as individuals or as a body of believers. If we have a church building, the purpose of that building is to be the same as our purpose: To glorify God. It is to serve as a place that directs the attention of man back to Him. Beacon of hope? That’s fine, but it’s secondary. Abundant life? Well, it’s a side-effect, true. But, it’s secondary. Christian community? That’s grand, but it’s beside the point. Songtime? Oh, dear. That’s so far down the scale of importance as defies acceptance at all. Sorry. Listen, these are names that have been given to churches right here in my area, and in many cases, to churches I have been member of at one time or another. But, really, the very name serves to misdirect. It’s not about having an abundant life, at least not as we tend to measure it. It’s about recognizing that the abundance that matters is being stored up for us in heaven, else it’s all a horrid deception anyway. It’s not about the songs we sing, it’s about the reason we find for singing. It’s not really even about community, not even in that unique, koinonia sense of the matter. If it’s about community at all, it’s about the communion we share with the saints of every age, the communion we share with those who have entered heaven before us and those who will come after. It’s about an eternal community, not some enclave in the midst of a particular city.
We have to get our eyes back heavenward. We have to get our sense of God’s purpose expanding beyond not just the physical plant of our particular church, not even the potential coalition of local churches and the community around us. We have to get our sense of God’s purpose back on His scale, a scale that encompasses the whole of eternity and thereby the whole of earthly history – even history future. It is not that we ought to suppose ourselves so great a boon to God as to think we ought to have an impact beyond our own time. Looking back at the greats of Church history, I do not find men who were thinking of making a name for themselves. They were men who were doing very little more than living the life God set out for them, seeking to be faithful to His call on their lives. They were not thinking big things, nor consciously doing big things. But, what they did was big indeed. Consider, just for a moment, how big a thing it is that some preacher from well more than a thousand years ago is still a directing force in the Church today. Think of how well many of the writings of these men who pastored not just churches, but entire cities, stand up today. These men amaze, and only the more so because they had no intention of amazing anybody, no real aim, I think, of leaving a posterity. They had all they could do to try and assist their present.
Oh! That we would be likewise determined to leave our present in better health than we found it! No, I do not think particularly of ecological concerns, or environmental. I think of the spiritual. We are indeed in dark days, although whether they would rank as darker than previous periods I am not so sure at all. Seems a bit of a conceit on our part, if you ask me, much like our sense that we are so much more advanced than those who came before. It is only ignorance that allows us to think so. But, if we will truly lay hold of that teaching, truly turn our eyes towards the kingdom and stay focused there, what will be accomplished? What will it do for our day and age if we will stop looking for personal benefit from being in God’s house and start seeking His benefit?
Let us, then, be conscientious in rooting out every practice in our own lives that drags our godly thoughts back to earth. Let us beware the tendency to think our giving into the church is anything. Let us beware the tendency to think our service to the church is anything. Let us, in short, beware of thinking ourselves anything. But, let us instead live in a very real and all-permeating sense that Christ truly is all and in all. Then, let us see, even if it be from a berth in heaven, what God will do. Oh, but even there I sense a misdirection! Let our efforts not be in hopes that we will one day look upon the effects thinking, see what I did for God? No! Let us only expect to be absolutely astonished to learn what God was able to accomplish even with the likes of us.
Behind the issue of Pharisaic misdirection lies another, and that is the issue of oath taking. In this regard, it is not so much the Pharisees who stand convicted, but those who came to them seeking ways to skate out from under their own oaths. The fact that there has even been discussion as to which oaths are binding and which are not demonstrates that the problem was prevalent. That problem was, frankly, not in the taking of oaths, but rather a problem of seeking to appear more honest, more righteous than one really was. It was a desire after the capacity to sound sincere and be considered sincere without the requirement of actually being sincere.
Thus, this whole system had arisen determining which oaths were meaningful and which were not. The point Jesus stresses here is that it makes no particular difference what circumlocutions you may incorporate in your oath, the fundamental of the thing is unchanged. Whatever it is you may choose to swear by to assure your listeners, it is truly God you call down as witness. Of course, no self-respecting Jew would say that they swore by God that such and so was true. So, they had these first-layer circumlocutions by which to invoke His presence apart from His name. The problem was only being exacerbated by this systematic teaching as to which references were binding and which were not. What Jesus teaches is that they are all binding, for all have invoked God as witness, and He will be truthful witness even to such an untruthful invoker.
This point draws us once again back to the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus had addressed the issue of oath-taking on that occasion. “You were taught that you should make no false vow, but fulfill all vows to the Lord. But, I tell you this: You should make no vow at all – not by heaven, that being the throne of God, nor by earth, which is His footstool, neither by Jerusalem, the city of the great King” (Mt 5:33-35). That is a clear instruction, is it not? Make no vow. Take no oath. Swear by nothing, for you ought to have no need to do so.
How the Church has chosen to interpret this has varied over the years. After all, we still take our wedding vows, do we not? Does a pastor not give solemn word that he will represent God earnestly, and speak honestly on His behalf? Do we not, each of us, as His servants, swear to obey? Mind you, in all these things we know ourselves severely challenged to keep the words of our promises.
On a societal level, it gets even more impossible to avoid the matter of oaths. We are, if elected, sworn into office. If one serves in the military, one makes certain oaths concerning the defense of the country. On what may appear a lesser scale, we sign contracts and obligations one to another. Arguably, every time you sign a check or a credit card receipt, you are taking oath, swearing that you are good for the money promised.
Yet, this was one of the major reasons behind the Church’s disapproval of secret societies such as the Rotary, the Masons, and so on. They required oath taking, and a Christian was not to take an oath. Said so right there in the passage we just read. This would, as we see, preclude the Christian from the larger part of living in this day and age. He could not serve in the military. He could not serve in government. He could not, presumably, obtain a loan, a driver’s license, or any number of other basics. He could not wed, so far as I can tell. Perhaps a civil wedding, but isn’t that evidence of a sort that one is taking the issue farther than intended? If we find Christ teaching the Christian to avoid being wed before God, we surely find ourselves misapprehending His meaning.
I should have to believe, then, that Jesus is being at least a little hyperbolic in that command. The point is not so much that we must never, ever make a vow, take an oath, swear to the truth of a matter. I would imagine that His own apostles found it necessary to do just that on any number of occasions when testifying to the Gospel. The point, though, is not the oath, it’s the need for an oath.
Let me explain that. We give oaths, by and large, because the one hearing the oath feels need of assurance. There are other aspects to it, of course, and much that we do along the lines of swearing to this and that is as much formulaic expectation than anything else. Signing our checks is in this category. It’s just expected. We probably think of it more in light of its endorsing aspect than its assuring aspect, but that latter aspect is there. A check is a promissory note. It is not money. It is the promise to give that money to the holder of our note.
On the other side of the oath stands the giver thereof, and it is to him that Jesus addresses His point. Even though I may be called upon to give an oath, I must not be of such a nature that others must bind me by oath for me to keep my word. In short, we are to be those whose word is their oath. That lies at the heart of, “let your yes be yes and your no be no” (Jas 5:12), “so that you may not fall under judgment.” Let’s consider that verse more closely, for James repeats the Mount message: Don’t swear by anything! Take no oath; but let your word on the matter be unchanging so that you may not fall under judgment. Notice that the matter of judgment does not refer back to whether or not you took an oath, but rather to whether you were true to your word.
Can I just say that this does not preclude a word of maybe. Yes and no are not the only words we are permitted on every matter under the sun. Even God has been known to throw in an if clause on His word. It is hardly to be thought, then, that we are not permitted the same.
Let me make the point twofold. First, if there must be an oath, let us take it with great seriousness. The promises made to one another in marriage, for example, ought surely to be matters of great weight to us, and matters we deem most thoroughly binding. When I said, “for better or for worse until death do us part”, that’s what I meant. There’s no place in that for, “until I see something better.” There’s no room for, “so long as you keep your figure.” There’s no if attached, no clause by which to render the rest invalidated. I think, in spite of divorce rates, we understand this. We get the solemnity of that vow. Likewise, at least for some, when we hear our elected officials swear to uphold the Constitution and the law of the land, we rather expect they might actually do so. We may even wish we could immediately remove from office all who are found in violation of that oath.
But, there are those lesser occasions. There are those moments when we, in casual conversation, may be describing an event that we suspect might be hard for our hearers to believe actually occurred. And, what do we do? Why, we jump immediately to, “I swear it’s true!” In fact, so blithe are we about those two little words that we’ll happily use them to bolster our credibility even when we know ourselves to be exaggerating the story. The fish was this big, I swear it!
This is exactly the mindset Jesus is opposing. The point He makes in the Sermon on the Mount, and the point He makes here are one: Whatever you may choose to swear by (even if nothing more than yourself), you have invoked God as witness to the veracity of your word. He takes it a step further, though, and here is where we really find ourselves up against it. Even if you do not swear by anything at all, even if you manage somehow to abide by the command to take no oath, every word you speak invokes God as witness to the veracity thereof. That’s the standard we are called to. That’s the standard we are held to.
Our word is to be trustworthy. We are to be a people who, at least to those who know us, require no oath in order to be thought trustworthy. We are to be a people who take no oath lightly, and indeed, take no word of ours lightly. That is what it means to let your yes be yes. If I said I would, I will, and I will at the earliest opportunity. If I said I would not, I must likewise hold by that, even if the situation changes so as to make it more painful for me to refuse. Does this utterly preclude changing our mind on any given matter? I think the record of Scripture would tell me no. I think of that man who swore to sacrifice to God the first thing that exited his house, only to find it was his daughter. There was good cause to repent of one’s vow, but he held fast. I cannot think that God was pleased.
The point is more basic, more central to our being. No oath can be taken lightly and, as our every word is to be as under oath, no word can be taken lightly. “I say to you that every careless word that men shall speak, they shall render account for it in the day of judgment” (Mt 12:36). The reason for that judgment is to be found in this matter of oaths.
The main examples Jesus sets out here are those of altar and temple. When He brings heaven into the discussion, it is but an extension to more fully establish His point. But, consider the altar and the temple. Of the temple, Jesus says, “When you swear by the temple, you also call as witness Him who dwells in the temple.” Consider that in light of the New Testament. You are the temple. I am the temple. Each one of us who has found himself called to Christ is a temple of the Living God. This is the claim upon our words. We cannot but swear by the temple when we speak. We always speak as from the temple, as the voice of the temple. As such, we always speak with God as witness, as the backing for whatever claims we are making. We always speak on His behalf. Surely, we must therefore be truthful both in the content of our words and in our representation of His Word.
I would move the image further, though. We are both the temple and the gold within. We are both the altar and the sacrifice set upon it. Paul calls us to be living sacrifices (Ro 12:1). These images that Jesus has set forth, these intermediary signposts pointing to heaven: each of them has been superseded under the New Covenant. It’s no longer buildings and inert physical objects that are to draw our focus towards God, it’s His very people. It’s you and I. And, it’s every day.
I suspect we are sufficiently familiar with the significance of walking about as temples of God. I wonder, though, if we give sufficient thought to being the altar. Before I proceed farther with this line of thought I want to focus on that which I selected as being the key verse for this passage. It was a challenge to choose one verse to serve as the key in this case, but I settled on verse 19, particularly the second half of it. “Which is more important, the offering or the altar that sanctifies it?” The expected answer is obvious, and the fact that they had gotten it so thoroughly wrong is disconcerting at the very least. But, I want to bear this in mind in considering the believer as altar. If I am correct in making such an association, then it is absolutely needful for me to remain mindful that the altar is nothing in itself.
Let me expand on that. The point Jesus makes in regard to the offering is that except that offering is given upon the altar, and that in accordance with God’s instructions for such offerings, it is not only of no value, it is actually a corrupt and offensive thing. This gets back to the heart of the doctrine of original sin. We cannot, in our own power, offer anything of worth to God. Whatever we may seek to do for Him, to give to Him, it is necessarily corrupted and debased by our inherent nature as children of Adam.
This idea may sound like something out of eastern religion. I am thinking of that culture which would insist on including mistakes in all their works for the reason that only the gods are perfect. Of course, such attentiveness to making certain there are mistakes would require that one believed it possible to manage perfection after all. But, set aside the inconsistency. For the Christian, there is a call to acknowledge that we are not only fallible, we are incapable of failing to fail. We are forced to concede that perfection isn’t happening this side of heaven. However, rather than accepting this and taking it as reason not to bother ourselves with trying, we are called to try anyway, to do our best and, as it were, trust God to do the rest. This is the exact opposite of that eastern approach.
The result is that we bring our best as offering to God. To do otherwise would be insulting in the extreme. At the same time, we remain mindful that even our best is nothing but filthy rags. It requires the holiness of the altar to make our poor offering a thing of worth. In that light, I am more inclined to perceive Jesus, the Christ of God, as the altar. That is certainly a legitimate view, and one to be maintained. He is most assuredly the ‘meeting place between God and sinner’ that the altar represents, that phrase being something from Fausset’s Encyclopedia. He is also emblematic of the “mighty salvation and security” that God imparts to His worshipers, as that same source also notes. Let me stress, however, the caveat that is added at this point. That salvation, that security, symbolized in the horns of the altar, is imparted not to every person that happens to lay an offering thereupon. It is for those who come to Him in accord with His instruction.
Isn’t that something? We have to follow instructions. The life of faith, of true, Christian faith, is not a life of unruly abandon. The service of worship is not to be a free for all. That has not changed. It was most assuredly not the case under the Old Covenant. Neither was it permitted under the New. Much of what Paul deals with in Corinth serves to make the point: All things decently and in order. God is not a God of confusion, but of peace (1Co 14:33). That still has not changed. We are brought into a liberty in Christ, to be sure, but it is a liberty from, not a liberty to. It is a liberty from sin and its bondage. It is not a liberty to come to God any which way we please, to claim to honor Him with whatever activities happen to catch our fancy.
The value of the altar is, then, twofold. It is first of value only to them who worship not only in truth, but in true accord with God’s way. There is one way. That is the clear message of the Gospel. There is only one approach to God that is sanctioned. He Who is the Way, is the Altar, is the atoning sacrifice thereupon. It is He who cleanses us, and it is He who cleanses such as we may bring as offering. It is He, and only He, who renders pure and acceptable these imperfect gifts we bring. This is part and parcel of the point Jesus makes in verse 19. The altar sanctifies the offering. It is most certainly not the other way round.
In this, He but speaks the same message God spoke to Moses, and through Moses to Israel. Look at this: “For seven days, you shall make atonement for the altar and consecrate it. It shall then be most holy, and whatever touches the altar shall also be holy” (Ex 29:37). One could spend time considering how this final week in Jerusalem parallels that point, and one would be perfectly right in doing so. That is very much what is transpiring, and as Hebrews points out, it is not the earthly copies only that are purified, but the true Temple in heaven. To my current point, however, I want to stress the lengths gone to in order to establish that altar as consecrated and holy. It was no small thing.
Consider, as well, the practice of those reformers who occasionally came to the fore in Israel. When they realized the enormity of the crime of idolatry, they did not simply reject the false gods. They did not settle for declaring their worship unacceptable. They undertook to profane the altars of those false gods, to render them as utterly unholy by perception as they already were in reality. Burning the bones of dead men upon these altars, that was the point of it – to render the altar worthless and unusable.
Again, the contrast is stark. This idolatry set forth the work of man’s hands as somehow creating a thing worthy of the gods. God, on the other hand, insisted that man’s hands stay as far out of the work as possible, lest they contaminate it further. As it was, even with the altar made of unworked stone, it required God to sanctify the result. Here is a clear demonstration of the real situation in our own lives. We, too, are structures of unworked stone, insofar as our salvation and our sanctification are concerned. We are purely and completely the stuff of earth, the fallen seed of Adam, unless and until God determines to make the necessary atonement on our behalf, consecrating us. It is necessary that we get this through our heads. We have not earned His kind attentions, nor ever shall. We have nothing in us to recommend us to Him. It is all by His hand or it is nothing at all.
But, let me turn to the result, a result echoed a chapter later in Exodus. “You shall also consecrate them [the altar of burnt offerings and its utensils] that they may be most holy. Whatever touches them shall also be holy” (Ex 30:29). Notice the second half of these to statements: Whatever touches the altar shall also be holy. Again, viewing Christ as the altar, this is a most marvelous grounds for hope. We, who have touched the Altar of Christ, nay, been touched by that Altar, are holy. We are so not in ourselves, not in any inherent sense, but solely by transference from that most perfect holiness of Christ.
The sum of this is that the gift has no value except the altar first cleanse it and render it holy. This is true of such offerings as I may bring to church. This is true of the tithe, for those of us who tithe. The tithe itself is of no intrinsic value. It is just money. It is the proceeds of earthly endeavor for most of us; for all of us if indirectly so. For even the pastor receives his pay from our pay, and therefore even his portion, apart from the altar, is earthly and profane.
The same can be said for our efforts, whether in teaching, evangelizing, pastoring, serving. Whatever role we may take in the life of the church, there remains nothing in that role by which to commend ourselves to God. No man shall find grounds to boast before God (1Co 1:29), not even His apostles, not even the heroes of the faith. If there is value to anything that we do on behalf of the Gospel, it is solely because God has touched it, cleansed it, sanctified it, and rendered it serviceable. As I said earlier, we ought surely to find ourselves amazed, looking back upon our days on this earth, to see what He has been able to accomplish with the likes of us. John saw it as he worked. “He must increase. I must decrease” (Jn 3:30). When we look back across the years of our existence here, if there remains any thought of boasting, any trace of pride, it shall certainly be extinguished in the realization of what God has done, and that He has done it not because of us, but rather in spite of us.
Now, then: Let me move that altar into personal space. Yes, the altar is assuredly set forth to turn our eyes upon Jesus. But, now we are there. We are His. We seek, as best we may, to serve Him wholeheartedly and exclusively. And, having done so, we are given to recognize that we are indeed the temple of the living God (2Co 6:16). God Himself says, “I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” Your body, he continues, is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you (2Co 6:19-20). You are not your own. You have been bought with a price. Those seven days of atonement were spent on you. Don’t you see, then, that you have been made not only the temple, but also the altar?
Again, let me stress: There’s nothing to boast about in that. After all, if it was the altar that made the offering holy, what made the altar holy? It is God Who sanctifies the altar, and God alone. It required His atoning Blood to accomplish that sanctification. That true altar in heaven, the true temple, is it possible that this is indeed referring to ourselves, to the living temple that Paul is talking about, to the altar of our lives?
This is our reality, however poorly we show it who have been thus sanctified. We have been cleansed by His blood. We have thereby been separated out from the profane. We are the stuff of earth, but we have been touched by God. We were not worthy of His proximity, let alone His acceptance. But, He has made us so. He has taken that coal that Isaiah wrote of, and touched our lives with it (Isa 6:6). Truly, there is nothing in all of this that we can claim as the work of our own hands, the result of our own efforts. Far from it! If there is anything of value in this man, it is of His doing and His alone. If there is anything praiseworthy, I shall yet find no cause to be proud of it, for it is nothing in me that has made it so, only His work upon the raw stuff of my nature.
It is God, Jesus reminds, Who sanctifies the offering. It is so, because it is God (and only God) who sanctifies the altar in the first place. The significance of the altar in God’s sight is something that we would do well to stress. This is something that has become lost, I think, to the New Testament church. We don’t really get the altar concept anymore. It’s just a table, a piece of furniture. Oh, we have our pretty communion service ware, but then we’ve reduced it with plastic cups. Why? Too much work keeping the glasses clean, I suppose. I’m sure glad God doesn’t look upon us in that way!
We can, and do, develop that same mindset towards the whole of our worship service. If we don’t like the songs, that’s what we think matters. It’s not about whether we are doing things God’s way. It’s about whether we’re doing things in a way sufficiently comfortable to us. What’s wrong with that picture? Go back to what I said about the altar’s value: it applies to those who come to Him in accord with His instruction. I praise God that we have come to a church that takes this issue a tad more seriously than our former place of worship did. It feels a bit restrictive at times, it’s true, but I expect that’s a good thing. We’re really not supposed to be quite that free and easy in the courts of the King, even if we are family.
But, the importance of the altar in God’s sight is my focus right now. Something was noted regarding the record of the temple reconstruction under Ezra’s and Nehemiah’s oversight. The first thing to be rebuilt was the altar. Isn’t that something? Only after the altar had been reestablished was the foundation of the temple laid. Now, I would understand reestablished to include not just the piling up of the stones, nor even the refashioning of the brass bowl, but also that work of purifying the result, those seven days of atonement Moses established. I’ve not done the research on this point, I’ll admit, but I’m reasonably confident that if one seeks it out in the record left by those two men, you will find it to be so.
Why, then, was it important to make note of this? Why would the Spirit of the Living God see fit to make certain that these men left word for us that the altar came first? I should have to think it’s because the altar is to come first. If we are to become that living temple that is our purpose in existence, we must first establish the altar. To clarify, God must establish the altar. We can at best provide the raw materials. Until that place is established in us, any attempt to build a godly life is premature. We’re not ready for it, and the foundation we might lay at that point will be faulty, for it shall not have been laid per the Cornerstone, Christ Jesus. I am only touching on this point in brief, although I certainly seem to have taken a reasonable amount of time leading up to it. But, the power of this point deserves a more complete exposition. It deserves to be dwelt on at length, what it means to be the altar of Christ.
One thing it assuredly means is that we ought take that much greater care as to how we live. Are we permitting ourselves such activities, such thoughts, as defile the altar? Frankly, there’s no question in my mind. I know I have. I despair, betimes, of ever living up to the promise of Christ in me. I need look no farther than yesterday, a day that began with reminders no less strong as to the importance of my words and thoughts, along with my actions. And yet, the day was filled with moral failure. The day was filled with such frustration and anger as boiled over not only against those around me, but against my very God! How can the altar rail against Him Who sanctified it? I don’t know. But, I know it has been that way. I do not say it should be. Not by any means! But, it has been my experience too often of late.
And now, I turn to the last item I had thought to consider in this study, the instruction given in Matthew 5:23-24. “If you come to the altar and recall that your brother has reason to be offended with you, stop! Set your offering there before the altar and go reconcile with your brother first. Then, you can come and present your offering.” I was originally planning to note this as yet another evidence of how seriously God takes His altar, and I suppose I am still doing so after a fashion. But, just at this moment, I’m wondering: How does one deal with this when it is God Himself who has reason to be offended? Indeed, how does one deal with this when it is God Himself Who is offending you?
It’s a hard thing to even admit to, this being upset with God, convinced that He is being unjust. It causes, or should cause, a certain wrestling within the soul. It does for me, for I know it cannot be true. I fully understand and accept that I am in no wise fit to try and sit in judgment on His ways. God is Just. He defines it. Who shall then call Him on His decisions? He answers to none, nor need He do so. Yet, it is hard, very hard, to watch the suffering in this house and claim that it is somehow good. What good is it? Shall we praise You from the grave? Honestly, there has been a large part of me which would just as soon see this whole earthly existence business brought to an end. Just get it over with. Call us home and be done with it. I’m sickened to the core with watching my wife’s agony. I’m disgusted with my own response. I am watching us both coarsen, become more and more foul. It’s not that either of us desires to be this way, I don’t think. Who could want such a thing? No, it’s the constant, unrelenting stress and agony of being.
Honestly, Lord, it’s all well and good to know that there’s this treasure stored up in heaven, but there remains the present. I don’t think either of us is crying out to You for a life of ease. And, I understand that these bodies, such as they are, wear out with time. But, if it’s time, then let’s be done with it. If not, then what? How do I reconcile the unrelenting agony of my love’s condition with Your goodness? What is good about this? What? How are You being glorified here, ‘cause I just don’t see it. God, I’m trying to trust You in spite of the situation, but as Jan cried to You yesterday, it’s no easy thing in the face of what’s been happening. If we are sons of heaven, why have we been left to rot in hell? I don’t understand. I don’t know how to be reconciled to You just now. And yet, I see the time nearing when I am to be in Your house, serving as best I may in Your worship. And, I shall worship You. To Whom else would I turn, Lord? But, You sure don’t make this easy.
How long, Father, how long? The need goes unanswered and the weakness of the flesh seems to infect the spirit. Do not abandon us, O Lord, in this unending hour of need. Thou, my Shield, where are You? Thou, my Peace, be settled once more within us. Gladly would I continue to serve Thee in this life, but gladly would I rather see our sufferings at an end, and we brought home to You once for all. It’s a dark prayer I offer up this morning, Sir, and I beg Your forgiveness for that. But, my heart is so sore within me, my hope so nearly gone. Come, then, and strengthen what remains. Come, Lord, and shed Your joy abroad in our hearts that we might truly rejoice in You. Perseverance needs the occasional encouragement, and where shall we find it but in You? Bring, sweet Jesus, Your words of Life to bear on this situation, I pray. Far be it from me to demand it of You, but O! To know the miracle of Your touch on her health. Please, Holy One. Please, deliver her and make her once more whole.
In the meanwhile, my Lord, I can only seek that You grant me the persistent faith of Job, and not the muddled compassion of his wife. Strengthen us both to trust on in spite of it all, to love You and long for You even so. Help us to become less attached to this world, if that’s the point of it. Whatever it is we’re supposed to be learning and gaining from this, please quicken our understanding to grasp hold of it. Gladly would I rejoice in You, my God. Gladly. And, I feel certain I shall do so again. Oh! That it might be soon.
