Flee Idolatry
We are prone to wander, prone to leave the God we love. One theologian put it that our hearts are idol-factories. We must be vigilant of our hearts. Keeping ourselves from idols means keeping the living God central to what we believe and how we live, giving Him the glory due His name.
keep yourselves from idols (1 John 5:21, NKJV)
The writer of Judges closes with words of indictment and need: “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judg. 21:25). Ezekiel closes his prophetic word with a name of great promise, “THE LORD IS THERE” (Ezekiel 48:35). Paul and other epistle writers frequently end with a benediction that lifts the readers’ eyes to God or expresses words of encouragement.
How does John wrap up his first epistle? What does he want ringing in our ears? “Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen” (1 John 5:21). It seems like an odd and abrupt way to end his letter, raising a topic that he has not mentioned earlier. Yet idolatry has everything to do with what John has written.
Idolatry is the worship of false gods, something prohibited by God in the Ten Commandments (Exo. 20:3-6). We tend to think of idols as objects made of metal or wood or stone but idols can also be whatever we give acclaim or allegiance, even worship in some way.
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Is Work Good?
When we work hard at the tasks He has by His providence given us to do, we glorify Him: “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ” (Col. 3:23–24). That’s why we feel satisfying exhaustion and invigorating hunger at the end of a full day’s work (Eccl. 5:12). When we fail to work hard, we harm ourselves as well as others.
Here’s a quick word association test: What is the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word work? Go ahead and think about it. Regardless of your answer, I’m guessing that few of us would respond with the word good. We don’t tend to think of work as good, but rather as difficult, frustrating, and exhausting. Perhaps that has more to do with our experience in this fallen age than it does with God’s design. The Bible helps us to change our perspective in several ways.
The goodness of work is enshrined in the pattern of creation. God worked on the first six days, creating the heavens and the earth and all its fullness (Gen. 1:1). He did that by speaking, “Let there be light” (Gen. 1:3); by blessing, “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen. 1:28); by forming (Gen. 2:7, 19); and by bringing together (Gen. 2:19, 22). Because God is good in His essence, we know that all God does is good. With creation we have an explicit superlative, telling us exactly what God thought about the work of His hands: “And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Gen. 1:31, emphasis added). Both the act of creating and the finished creation itself were pleasing to God.
There are several important principles that follow. First, if God was conducting good work before the fall, then work itself is not a product of man’s fall into sin. Neither is work the curse itself. Adam was supposed to rule the earth and subdue it, but when he failed in his mission, something new was added to both Adam and Eve’s labor as a result. Pain was introduced.
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What’s the Impact of Asbury’s Outpouring? John the Baptist Offers 3 Lessons
John the Baptist was always clear that his role was to point to the one coming after him: “He must become greater; I must become less” (John 3:30). He was also keenly aware that his ministry was a preparation for a movement that would follow. In the same way, Asbury kept Jesus at the forefront with a countercultural message of “no celebrity except Jesus.” Asbury leadership hopes that their experience will one day be part of a plethora of chapters about how many met God.
We often only realize that we are living through historic events by looking back on them.
Consider the Moravians. In 1727, this group of Christians fleeing persecution in the modern-day Czech Republic began a 24-7 prayer vigil. They couldn’t foresee that their non-stop prayer session would ultimately last for 100 years and launch a global missions movement.
Or take the example of John Wesley and George Whitefield. In 1738, in a New Year’s prayer meeting, where the men and others were gathered, at “about three in the morning, as we were continuing instant in prayer, the power of God came mightily upon us, insomuch that many cried out for exceeding joy” later wrote Wesley in his diary.” The preachers likely had little idea that in the ensuing months, they would start traveling across the UK teaching the word of God, a campaign that would mark the beginning of the Wesleyan revival and the First Great Awakening in the US.
Church history has taught us to never underestimate the long-term impact when God’s tangible presence comes upon a group of people; this understanding has led me to closely track the aftermath of the 2023 outpouring at Asbury University.
For those who need a refresher: One year ago this week, as a seemingly ordinary Wednesday morning chapel ended, 18 or 19 students lingered to worship and pray. Though the school in rural Kentucky has a history of revivals, few likely believed that this meeting would continue for the following 16 days, drawing over 60,000 people, including students from 300 university campuses and Christians from almost every continent.
While we have yet to see a global revival since Asbury’s concluded, there is more going on than our eyes can see. I believe that we have entered a season of spiritual preparation. I’ve observed parallels between this event and a biblical preacher who also hailed from the countryside and who also drew a crowd: John the Baptist.
Prophesied by Isaiah as “the voice of one calling in the wilderness” (John 1:23; Is. 40:3), John called the people to repentance and consecration. He was the embodiment of answered prayer and devoted his ministry to proclaiming that something greater would soon be following him. Seeing evidence of these elements all around the world provokes me to wonder what next global move Asbury might have heralded.
A Call to Repentance and Consecration
From the wilderness, John the Baptist earned his nickname by “preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins” (Mark 1:4). Crowds followed him into the desert to confess their sins, get baptized, and reconcile themselves to God.
In a similar way, crowds entering Hughes Auditorium were confronted with the state of their own hearts. Here is how David Thomas, who was in the core leadership team stewarding the outpouring, described it to me in an email interview:
For the first few days of the Outpouring, it seemed that repentance and forgiveness were almost all we could do. All over the room, people were making their way to another, tumbling over one another to make the first move of offering apologies, owning mistakes, forgiving grievances, and explaining misunderstandings. The front steps of Hughes were populated by people on their phones sending texts of reconciliation and restoration.
Thomas’s remarks were echoed by one of the transatlantic visitors. Al Gordon, a London pastor, reported feeling a weight in the air even in the parking lot.
“I was met with an overwhelming sense that I have to get right with Jesus,” he recounted. “Before I stepped into the chapel, I was crying out in repentance, confessing my pride, humbling myself before God.”
Asbury students led the way in modeling this wave of repentance. From the stage, hundreds shared their testimonies. Their stories would vary from simple things like, “I sensed Jesus inviting me to text a friend asking forgiveness for something in our relationship that was not quite right,” to dramatic transformations such as, “Three days ago I renounced witchcraft and gave my life to Jesus.”
Student leaders would also not allow anyone to lead worship who was not “authentically right with Jesus,” said Thomas. Instead of offering them and the guest speakers who came a standard green room, they created a “consecration room” where they were asked to receive prayer and ask for God’s forgiveness for any sins, prior to sharing anything from the platform.
A Call to Prayer
John the Baptist was born out of prayer, specifically those of his elderly parents. When the angel appeared to his father, Zechariah, his first words were, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard” (Luke 1:13).
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“Save Alive Nothing That Breathes”: How Should We Understand Divine Commands to Destroy? A Response to Paul Copan
Written by Nicholas K. Meriwether |
Tuesday, March 26, 2024
God requires that the state, a collective entity, punish evildoers (Rom. 13:4). This “sword” can be carried by the state in dealing with its own citizens, or with the army of a foreign power. Of course, to go beyond those directly responsible for the evil being judged and to punish the innocent along with them requires the explicit instructions of God, and this has occurred in only one instance: the herem against the peoples of Canaan, people groups so evil that the land itself “vomited” them out (Lev. 18:26-28). Without explicit divine instructions, however, innocent civilians may not be singled out by an army or the state, which is precisely the evil perpetrated by Hamas against Jews on Oct. 7.On Nov. 27, Paul Copan responded to a reader’s inquiry concerned about the language of divine judgment in Ezekiel 9, specifically, Ezek. 9:5-6. 6 men, likely angels, are appointed by God to exercise divine judgment against the inhabitants of Jerusalem. One man is assigned the task of marking those who are repentant so that they may be spared, but the others are to kill the rest of the people, including women, young adults, and children:
And to the others he said in my hearing, “Pass through the city after him, and strike. Your eye shall not spare, and you shall show no pity. Kill old men outright, young men and maidens, little children and women, but touch no one on whom is the mark.”
While there may be various factors that lessen the severity of the divine injunction, such as that not everyone in the city is destroyed, there is no getting around the fact that in this and in other instances of divine judgment, some who appear innocent of the actions bringing judgment are not spared, including children, even infants, as well as adults not in positions of authority. The moral question is intensified by the fact that in several passages, it is not angels who execute divine judgment, rather God commands the nation of Israel itself to carry out his judgment, that is, to carry out herem (Deut. 7:1-2; 20:16-18; Josh. 6:21; 1 Sam. 15:1-3).[1]
Paul has written extensively on this topic, most recently in Is God a Vindictive Bully?[2] In his response to the inquirer, Paul claims that such passages do not mean what they appear to mean, rather this is Ancient Near Eastern hyperbole, or “trash talk,” mixed with merism, an inclusive rhetorical expression, as when we say we looked “high and low.” While I appreciate the enormous effort Paul has made to exonerate God of acting unjustly, and though I am neither a theologian nor a Bible scholar, I remain unconvinced that he is successful in respect to herem.[3] While it’s always possible that the Bible exaggerates or employs widely-accepted hyperbole, several instances in which herem against the innocent is commanded specifically and in detail make it implausible that mere hyperbole is meant.
Which Cities to Destroy: Deuteronomy 20:10-18
Here God instructs the Israelites regarding how to attack a city. They first must offer terms of peace, and only besiege it if the residents refuse. By contrast, if the city is a Canaanite city, they must “save alive nothing that breathes, but you shall devote them to complete destruction” (vv. 16-17). The interpretation that this is mere hyperbole doesn’t fit with the fact that two categories are specified, and different instructions assigned to each category. Why would mere hyperbole be employed in the giving of instructions if the eventual treatment is the same? I suggest the simpler explanation is that we take the instructions at face value. This interpretation is reinforced in the passages below.
Achan and his Family: Joshua 7
God had commanded Joshua to place the entire city of Jericho under herem (6:17-18) in keeping with the deuteronomic herem policy for all the Canaanite peoples (see above). However, Achan violates the policy by keeping some of the herem bounty for himself, and so Israel is defeated by the people of Ai. When Joshua cries out to God, he is divinely guided to Achan. The latter, his entire family, and all their earthly goods are placed under herem, viz., Achan and his family, including his sons and daughters, are stoned, and all Achan’s goods are buried under rock (vv. 24-26). Joshua’s actions are fully in keeping with the herem policies in Deut. 20; there is simply no reason to think this is hyperbole or merism. But if it is not in this instance, why should we think the original policy is?
The Destruction of the Amalekites: 1 Samuel 15
Saul is instructed to destroy the Amalekites. Speaking for God, Samuel tells Saul,
“Now go and strike Amalek and devote to destruction [herem] all that they have. Do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” (v. 3).
Yet Saul fails to complete the task, sparing the sheep and cattle as well as the king, Agag, and for this reason, is rejected by God. God tells Samuel, “I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments” (v. 11). When Samuel goes to deliver the news to Saul, he says, “What then is this bleating of the sheep in my ears and the lowing of the oxen that I hear?” (v. 14) Saul responds by saying that although he had devoted the Amalekites to destruction, he had spared the livestock as well as the king (v. 20). Is Saul using hyperbolic language with Samuel? This hardly seems likely. After announcing to Saul that he has lost the throne, Samuel calls Agag, who comes hoping “the bitterness of death is past” (v. 32). Why would Agag anticipate his death if no one other than Amalekite warriors had died in battle? Samuel then kills Agag himself (v. 33). The straightforward reading is that this passage is consistent with Deuteronomy 20 and Joshua 7: Saul had violated herem when he spared Agag after killing all the Amalekites.
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