STOP!

I’ve often wondered why the Ten Commandments are mostly negative in their expression. Except for the mandates to keep the Sabbath and to honor one’s parents, the rest of the Decalogue is prohibitive in nature.

I am the LORD your God [and] you shall have no other gods before Me.
You shall not make for yourself an idol ….
You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain …
Observe the sabbath day to keep it holy ….
Honor your father and your mother ….
You shall not murder.
You shall not commit adultery.
You shall not steal.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
You shall not covet ….
Deuteronomy 5:6–9, 11–12, 16–21

Eighty percent negative. “Don’ts” and “Thou shalt nots.” Why, I wondered.

I finally found the answer the other day, courtesy of the infinite wisdom of the City of Dallas. Less than a mile away from my abode in this metropolis, while driving, I did a double take. I actually reversed back to the intersection (carefully!) to check out this unique phenomenon. Fortunately, I had my camera with me to record the biblical shrewdness of said City apparatchiks.

Yup, two (TWO; a.k.a. “2”) STOP signs. Back to back. One behind the other. Juxtaposed. Two of them! (I rejoiced to see that my tax dollars were being used responsibly by the sage bureaucrats controlling the council of that aforementioned city.) Two STOP signs. Why two?

Then I remembered. God gave 8 staccato STOP signs to the Israelites. Surely the City of Dallas can provide its denizens a couple in the same fashion.

I suppose it’s all got to do with depravity.

And you were dead
in your trespasses and sins,
in which you formerly walked
according to the course of this world ….
Among them we too all formerly lived
in the lusts of our flesh,
indulging the desires of the flesh
and of the mind, and were by nature
children of wrath ….
Ephesians 2:1–3

The propensity to sin is deeply embedded in us.

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,

Prone to leave the God I love.

Robert Robinson, 1758

That’s the believer; that’s I. Prone to wander, meander, and go adrift and astray. I need more than two STOP signs!

Or as Paul wrote …

There is none righteous, not even one;
there is none who understands,
there is none who seeks for God;
all have turned aside,
together they have become useless;
there is none who does good,
there is not even one.
Romans 3:10–12

Not even one.

This, of course, is not to say that humankind is as bad as it could be. We don’t deny glimmers and gleams of good here and there, though tainted by sin. A single bad egg in an omelet made of 9 other good eggs still produces a bad omelet!

This probably explains the negativity of the Ten Commandments (and the City of Dallas’s remarkable enterprise of duplicating road signs).

But one day, we won’t need STOP signs, for, on that day, we will be removed from the very presence of sin.

O that day when freed from sinning,

I shall see Thy lovely face;

Clothed then in blood washed linen

How I’ll sing Thy sovereign grace;

Come, my Lord, no longer tarry,

Take my ransomed soul away;

Send thine angels now to carry

Me to realms of endless day.
Robinson

Until then, O God, …

Let Thy goodness, like a fetter,

Bind my wandering heart to Thee.

Robinson

And watch for those STOP signs!

ILLUSION!

Late last year, I was in the Boston area for a theological conference and stayed with friends from my derm residency days in yon fair city. Being the frigid zone that that metropolis was (and is), I had on a jacket that I promptly divested when I got to my friends’ place. Equally promptly, their daughter, Katy donned it.

(Hard to believe that only yesterday—i.e., eleven+ paltry years ago—I was celebrating Katy's birth with her parents and extended family and friends! I am getting old. I think it was babysitting her that aged me. [Sorry, Miss Kates!])

Anyhow, there she is, almost twelve. Petite Katy, looking portly in a vastly oversized jacket. And she is, you know, a lot taller than she looks in the picture. The young lassie is actually kneeling on her Dad’s bedroom slippers. Such a ham! But quite a cool illusion.

Illusion.

Far too often, Christian life turns out to be a mask we put on. Looking like someone we are not. It’s easy to attach WWJD to my wrist, a cross to my neck, and a fish to my bumper. It’s easy for us church goers, evangelical stalwarts, theological aces, to look pious and sanctimonious. It’s particularly easy for seminary profs. Easy for the sacred to become profane in our hearts.

Jesus’ most scathing denunciations were directed at those of this ilk—the engineers of illusion, a.k.a. “hypocrites!”

“You hypocrites,
rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you:
‘This people honors me with their lips,
but their heart is far away from me.’”
Matthew 15:7–8

Is our Christian life a façade? Is it like that in our heart of hearts? A veneer of spirituality, but rottenness inside? “Whitewashed tombs with bones inside,” Jesus called them.

Illusions are meant to deceive. “We are who we are not” is what it announces to God who sees our hearts. Adulterated spirituality. While we might even fool all the people all the time, one Person is not taken in.

And there is no creature
hidden from His sight,
but all things are open
and laid bare to the eyes of Him
with whom we have to do.
Hebrews 4:13

For those of us tempted to cast illusions, the discipline of secrecy, Jesus says, is healthy.

“So when you give to the poor,
do not sound a trumpet before you,
as the hypocrites do …,
so that they may be honored by men. …
But when you give to the poor,
do not let your left hand know
what your right hand is doing,
so that your giving will be in secret;
and your Father who sees
what is done in secret will reward you.”
“When you pray,
you are not to be like the hypocrites;
for they love to stand
and pray in the synagogues
and on the street corners
so that they may be seen by men. …
But you, when you pray,
go into your inner room,
close your door and
pray to your Father who is in secret,
and your Father who sees
what is done in secret will reward you.”
“Whenever you fast,
do not put on a gloomy face
as the hypocrites do, …
so that they will be noticed by men ….
But you, when you fast,
anoint your head and wash your face
so that your fasting
will not be noticed by men,
but by your Father who is in secret;
and your Father who sees
what is done in secret will reward you.
Matthew 6:2–4, 5–6, 16–18

No more illusions! We are going to be the real thing!

OUTWARD!

Last Sunday, I preached on Jesus’ Parable of the Rich Fool in Luke 12—the guy who was lost in the delusion of his dreams of plenty and prosperity when God jolted him out of his fiction and fancy reminding him, starkly, “Tonight, I’m taking your soul!” What a story!

One of the things that jumps out at you when you read the Parable is the number of first-person pronouns—the I’s and the me’s and the mine’s.

And he [the Rich Fool]
began reasoning to himself, saying,
“What shall I do, since I have
no place to store my crops?”
Then he said, “This is what I will do:
I will tear down my barns
and build larger ones,
and there I will store all my grain
and my goods.
And I will say to my soul,
‘Soul, you have many goods laid up
for many years to come;
take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.’”
Luke 12:17–19

This was a dude who was consumed with himself. He talks to himself, he plans with himself, he congratulates himself, he indulges himself, he is gratified with himself. “Hey, who needs others, anyway?” Self-focused, self-oriented, self-conceited, and … self-deceived. The “I,” and “me,” and “mine,” as the Beatles sang ….

All thru’ the day:
I me mine, I me mine, I me mine.
All I can hear:
I me mine, I me mine, I me mine.
Even those tears:
I me mine, I me mine, I me mine.
Ev’ryone’s saying it,
Flowing more freely than wine,
All thru’ your life:
I me mine.
George Harrison, 1970

But that Rich Fool—surely he didn’t plough by himself? He didn’t sow by himself and reap by himself, did he? And was he planning on constructing those huge storehouses single-handedly, without any help? Insensible to everyone else but I, me, and mine. He wasn’t looking outward.

But God said to him, “You fool!
This very night your soul is required of you;
and now who will own
what you have prepared?”
Luke 12:20

The irony: All that he claimed was his—the I’s and the me’s and the mine’s—now by default they were going to belong to someone else!

And Christ adds ….

“So is the man who stores up
treasure for himself,
and is not rich toward God."
Luke 12:21

Not looking outward. Christ’s subsequent commentary explains part of what it means to be “rich toward God”:

“Sell your possessions and give to charity;
make yourselves …
an unfailing treasure in heaven ….”
Luke 12:33

Look outward.

Average giving in American churches is apparently 3% of income. Recent studies have shown that committed American Christians make $2.5 trillion in income each year. Now if they gave just 10% (while not a New Testament mandate, it’s a reasonable enough number), that would be $250 billion! $250 billion! Just a thousandth of that would sponsor 150,000 indigenous missionaries in closed countries; a hundredth of that would triple the current funding of Bible translation and printing.

We must look outward. Even in—and perhaps, especially in—these days of financial crisis. Economy in the worst downturn in the last two decades. Banks failing. Workers losing jobs. Homeowners losing homes. Yes, we must look outward—it is a spiritual issue.

… where your treasure is,
there your heart will be also.
Matthew 6:21

And a matter for joyful obedience.

God loves a cheerful giver.
2 Corinthians 9:7

Does our giving show that we believe our money belongs to God? It’s all His anyway, isn’t it? Look outward!

BRANDED!

Part of this Christmas season, I spent with good friends from Boston, vacationing in sunny, warm Florida, where we had the air-conditioning running in both condo and car. Now, that’s the way to spend Christmas.

There we are—Jake, Nancy, and I—before we launch out to the beach. (Well … not exactly! We drove around the beach. In fact, all the beaches from Miami to Ft. Lauderdale. We saw them all! Without getting any sun on our skin, sand on our bodies, or water in our belongings! In air-conditioned comfort. Now, that’s the way to enjoy surf and sand.)

But anyway, there we are, loyal fans decked out in Dallas Theological Seminary T-shirts. Jake’s has, in Hebrew, Hallelujah; Nancy’s, in Greek, boasts the motto of the school—Preach the Word; mine depicts DTS’s logo, bearing in addition to the Greek motto, an open Bible, a torch, and the date of the institution’s incorporation (1925). Branded!

Preach the word;
be ready in season and out of season;
reprove, rebuke, exhort,
with great patience and instruction.
2 Timothy 4:2

But, really, what are we to be branded by? DTS? Aéropostale? Nike? Louis Vuitton? Prada? Rolex? BMW?

For this reason I say to you,
do not be worried about your life,
as to what you will eat
or what you will drink;
nor for your body,
as to what you will put on.
Is not life more than food,
and the body more than clothing?
Observe how the lilies of the field grow;
they do not toil nor do they spin,
yet I say to you that
not even Solomon in all his glory
clothed himself like one of these.
But seek first His kingdom
and His righteousness,
and all these things will be added to you.
Matthew 6:25, 28, 29, 33

Branded by God. Clothed by Christ. Marked by the Spirit.

For all of you
who were baptized into Christ
have put on Christ.
Galatians 3:27

And this is to live in Him as He lives in us.

I have been crucified with Christ;
and it is no longer I who live,
but Christ lives in me;
and the life which I now live in the flesh
I live by faith in the Son of God,
who loved me
and gave Himself up for me.
Galatians 2:20

To live for Him and to live like Him.

Let us behave properly as in the day,
not in carousing and drunkenness,
not in sexual promiscuity and sensuality,
not in strife and jealousy.
But put on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and make no provision
for the flesh in regard to its lusts.
Romans 13:13–14

Branded by His life, believers are called to demonstrate Christlikeness in everything.

So, as those who have been
chosen of God, holy and beloved,
put on a heart of compassion, kindness,
humility, gentleness and patience.
Colossians 3:12

Not a bad New Year’s resolution, huh? Probably should be on our lists every year, for it is unlikely we’ll reach that kind of Christlikeness and perfection this side of life. But we will … one day. Branded imperishably, immortally!

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,
at the last trumpet;
for the trumpet will sound,
and the dead will be raised imperishable,
and we will be changed.
For this perishable must put on
the imperishable,
and this mortal must put on immortality.
… then will come about the saying
that is written, “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
1 Corinthians 15:52–54

2009. Perhaps it will be this year ….