Assurance of Salvation
I was a serial go-to-the-fronter during the 1980s, first as a kid, and then as a teenager. As a fourteen-year-old, I’d already “prayed the prayer” on multiple occasions. I went to the front at a Billy Graham rally and said the prayer. I went to the front at a Luis Palau meeting and said the prayer. I sat with head bowed at numerous churches, in numerous denominations over the years, and said the prayer. I said it ever more fervently, ever more anxiously, and often with tears. And I kept praying and going to the front because I was never entirely convinced that I’d prayed and gone to the front enough.
What would you say to fourteen-year-old Barry, once you’d told him to get rid of that ridiculous fluff on his upper lip? Many Christians, I think, would say something like this: “As long as you were sincere when you prayed the prayer, you are saved.”
The thing is, looking back, I’m really not sure I was.
It wasn’t until I was twenty, and in my second semester at university, that I felt a deep, inner assurance that I was truly saved.
Where did that suddenly come from? According to Scripture, this profound inner sense of assurance is something that the Holy Spirit gives us.
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Are Images of Christ OK? Yes.
To understand whether the creation or use of a visual representation of Jesus violates the second commandment, we must ask whether the work: diverts glory away from God and toward a false object, distorts the story of God’s relationship with his people, or diminishes God’s nature and deforms those who use it. While icon veneration may divert glory away from God, narrative and exegetical depictions of Jesus perform a different function.
For years, Christian leaders have sounded the alarm over declining biblical literacy. In past eras, knowledge of biblical history, characters, and concepts was far more common, even among non-Christians. To make matters worse, the decline in biblical literacy is accompanied by a parallel decline in book literacy. The percentage of Americans who regularly read books of any kind (much less Scripture) is astoundingly small.
But people today aren’t dumb. Many nonreaders can talk for hours about the history, characters, and metaphysics of fictional universes like the MCU. This is a form of literacy; it just isn’t grounded in books. It’s grounded in visual media.
It’s not surprising, then, that visual adaptations of biblical stories like The Chosen have been so influential in recent years. Such works help nonreaders access biblical stories, characters, and ideas. They also prompt regular Bible readers to engage with well-known stories in fresh ways.
Throughout history (especially in premodern times), visual representations of biblical stories have fostered biblical literacy. But there’s also a long history of opposition to biblical images. This opposition is largely rooted in the belief that the second commandment prohibits visual depictions of Jesus.
Yet not all depictions of Jesus serve the same purpose. An icon, designed for veneration, doesn’t work the same way as an illustrated Bible storybook or a biblical show (like The Chosen).
As we’ll see, images of Jesus can be used to retell biblical narratives or illuminate biblical ideas without violating the second commandment, as long as they don’t divert glory away from God, distort the new-covenant story, diminish God’s nature, or deform those who use them.
Purpose of Second Commandment
When applying a biblical command to a new context, we should understand its original rationale. We mustn’t be like the Pharisees who, forgetting the purpose of Sabbath regulations, applied them in an overly broad and restrictive manner (Matt. 12:1–14). Before we can discern how to apply the second commandment to depictions of the incarnate Son of God, we need to consider its purpose.
Fortunately, the second commandment explains itself. When God prohibits graven images, he says it’s because he’s “a jealous God” (Ex. 20:5). An idol diverts glory away from the One to whom it belongs—and toward a false object. God forbids idols because he refuses to share his glory with anyone or anything—even an image that ostensibly represents him (Isa. 42:8).
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Four Good Responses to the Good News
Now that I have spoken of the suffering Saviour, I desire this of you. Rouse yourselves up to be suitably affected with what I have spoken from these truths. There are three or four ways you should respond.
Wonder
And the first thing I would exhort you to be taken up with is wondering. What man or woman is there among you that can hear these things spoken of, and not wonder at it? That Christ should have suffered all this for the like of you and me! That He who is the Son of God should have quit heaven, and that the Son of God should have become man, that He should have been put so sore to it as to die — for sinners!
I cannot tell what calls for wonder from us, if this doesn’t. O the height! O the breadth! O the length! O the depth of this mystery! That the Son of God should have been put so sore to it as to die for sinners, and not only to die, but to drink the cup of the Father’s wrath! Who can hear this declared, and not wonder at the hearing of it? O wonder! O wonder at it! Wonder at the hearing of it!
Detest Sin
Did our Lord Jesus Christ have to suffer such great sufferings? Well then, see how you should look on sin. Should not sin be very detestable to you, and very abominable? Should not be at very much pains to forsake sin, when it was sin that brought our blessed Lord Jesus Christ to undergo such great sufferings, sufferings which would have brought you to such sad condemnation, and to lie under the wrath of God eternally and eternally?
Sinners, I think that supposing there was nothing else to motivate you to forsake your sins, and to hate every false way, and to hate the very least word and thought of sin, that this might be a motive — that it brought our Lord Jesus Christ to undergo such great sufferings.
Love to Him will call for this. “All ye that love the Lord, hate evil” (Psalm 97:10).
Don’t Disappoint Him
Our Lord Jesus Christ was brought to so many and so great sufferings. And He has undergone them so cheerfully. Has He not? And He is satisfied to see the travail of his soul.
O do not yet then do what you can to disappoint Him, while He is making offer of His blood to wash you! Do not do anything that will make Him regret that He shed His blood for the like of you! For when you do not give him a suitable meeting, you give him good reason to regret it, for you are doing what in you lies to make His sufferings of none effect.
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There’s Never Been a Better Time to Be a Man in America
Written by Aaron M. Renn |
Thursday, August 22, 2024
For many of us, we can spend so much time focusing on the problems of men in society, or complaining about the latest attack on toxic masculinity in the media, that we forget how good our own opportunities are. Just because there’s so much bad in the world doesn’t mean you can’t personally succeed. And the more that you succeed, the more you are able to do to help other people and be a positive influence in society.Two things can be true at the same time:
Men in general are underperforming in society relative to women, and have a large numbers of struggles in education, employment, with finding purpose in life, substance abuse, etc.
It’s never been a better time to be a man who has his act together.So much of the discussion of men today talks about their problems. The problems they have, as with Richard Reeves book Of Boys and Men. Or the problems they cause, as with the endless complaints about “toxic masculinity.”
But you shouldn’t just look at the world through the lens of averages, but through the lens of yourself.
What opportunities and challenges does this world provide you personally?
The truth is, for a man who has it together, there’s a ton of opportunity out there. In many ways, it’s a golden age.
Just consider the availability of knowledge. Think about all of the facts and insights that just I myself have provided in this newsletter. The information I’ve posted on attraction, on how relative attractiveness shifts as we age, and on the dynamics of online dating is knowledge people of my generation never had access to. We had no choice but to listen to official messages that sent out a lot of false information, including the equivalent of claiming that women are attracted to servant leaders (hint: not true).
Or think about the vast amount of information available about health and fitness. Yet, there’s a ton of conflicting info, and plenty of “misinformation and disinformation.” You really do have to “do the research.” But at least there’s actual availability of information, something you didn’t have back when the USDA’s food pyramid was telling you to load up on carbs.
Then there’s the products we can get, such as for actually eating healthy. When I grew up, we had delicious vegetables from our garden, but for the most part, everybody was forced to eat mass market, highly processed food because that was all that was available. The 1970s and 80s were a low point for consumption amenities. Today, farmers markets are everywhere. They are all sorts of options for buying fresh, healthy, ethically sourced food. Yes, it’s often expensive. But it’s available. When I was a kid, you couldn’t get a lot of this stuff no matter how much money you had.
Want to start a business? The barriers are lower than ever. Prior to the Internet, I would never have been able to get my message out unless a miracle occurred and some newspaper hired me as a columnist. Until five to ten years ago, making a living from online writing was essentially impossible.
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