Heart Rending
Heart -Rending is divinely wrought and solemnly felt. It is a secret grief which is personally experienced, not in mere form, but as a deep, soul-moving work of the Holy Spirit upon the inmost heart of each believer. It is not a matter to be merely talked of and believed in, but keenly and sensitively felt in every living child of the living God. It is powerfully humiliating, and completely sin-purging; but then it is sweetly preparative for those gracious consolations which proud unhumbled spirits are unable to receive; and it is distinctly discriminating, for it belongs to the elect of God, and to them alone.
13 And rend your heart and not your garments.
Now return to the LORD your God,
For He is gracious and compassionate,
Slow to anger, abounding in lovingkindness
And relenting of evil. Joel 2:13 (NASB)
Over the years I written much on this blog about the necessity of repentance in the heart of the believer. First, no one comes to Christ without it and second, no believer grows in Christ without walking in daily repentance. This walk of repentance on a daily basis is actually something we are called to do continually. That is what we do when we obey our Lord in taking up our own cross and follow Him (Luke 9:23) and present ourselves as living sacrifices holy and acceptable to God (Romans 12:1). None of you truly in Christ can say you are blameless in and of yourself. You, like me, are a sinner who is saved by grace through faith as God’s gift. This salvation makes us blameless in God’s eyes, but we still must come continually to the throne of grace to confess our sins (1 John 1:9), which both humbles us and God uses this to grow us in Christlikeness as he forgives and cleanses us from all unrighteousness. As Jesus told Peter on that last Passover before going to the Cross.
8 Peter *said to Him, “Never shall You wash my feet!” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.” 9 Simon Peter *said to Him, “Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head.” 10 Jesus *said to him, “He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you.” 11 For He knew the one who was betraying Him; for this reason He said, “Not all of you are clean.” John 13:8-11 (NASB)
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The Diseased Ethics of Bailout Culture
Our culture has been shaped by the godless notion that compassion means the abolition of consequences. Addicts should be given a free home and a safe place to kill themselves. Career criminals should either be released, or sequestered away in a resort prison where he can think about what a bad boy he’s been. Corrupt politicians should be allowed to weasel their way out of straight answers and accountability structures. But God will not be mocked, nor can the fixed order of his creation ultimately be undermined.
What would you do if I told you that the most important part of wealth generation was . . . generating wealth? Would you be surprised? Would you look at me like I’d just told you that the wheels on the bus do, in fact, go round and round?
One might hope.
Sadly, we no longer live in times where we can assume general agreement on basic facts. Thus, instead of the time-tested formula for prosperity, otherwise known as labour → wages → reinvestment, we must languish under the auspices of “progressive” math, which looks like labour → taxation → redistribution. Which really just looks like an approaching renaissance of soviet-style living blocks.
One of the results of this new formula rollout has been the steady acceptance of what might be called “bailout culture.” Bailout culture develops when half-dead businesses, organizations, and institutions are supplied with indefinite transfusions of government money. What revived my attention on the topic was recently learning that Ontario has pledged 1.2 billion dollars towards “beleaguered colleges and universities,” but the truth is that most of Canada’s infrastructure has been consuming snowbank-sized quantities of government sugar for decades. Which explains why it’s so inefficient, unproductive, and hard to watch climb the stairs.
Part of the problem is that a hungry state never wants to let go of its vested interests, even when its skin is falling off in sheets. They also know they won’t have to. You see, it doesn’t matter how unproductive your interests are, so long as everyone is forced to use them. So good luck trying to sell milk outside of the Canadian Dairy Cartel — I mean Commission; which incidentally received 4.7 million of your tax dollars in 2021.
The other part of the problem is that most of us have been conditioned to believe regulated bodies can do a better job of running stuff than private-sector bodies. And we only believe that because we’ve been conditioned to believe the government is a lean, mean, organized machine, when really it’s more like the first UNIVAC computer, which spent thirteen hours trying to spell “hat.” Thomas Sowell puts his finger on the problem: “[R]ight now there is a widespread belief that the unregulated market is what got us into our present economic predicament, and that the government must ‘do something’ to get the economy moving again.”
What’s the government going to do about the housing market? What’s the government going to do about rental prices? What’s the government going to do about understaffed hospitals and schools? What’s the government going to do about the fact that I only had seven dehydrated carrots in my instant soup-powder mix? If you’ve ever asked any of these questions, you know the conditioning has worked.
How did we get here? As with everything, it starts with sin, which in this context looks like a dark and perverted desire to avoid responsibility. If people can be convinced that such a desire is justified, all it takes is some benefactor, in this case the state, to come along with an offer of “help.”
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Thoughts on the Church’s True Nature and Mission: A Partial Rejoinder to Larry Ball’s Challenge to the Spirituality of the Church
The church has a definite purpose to accomplish, which her Lord has provided her with the authority, gifts, and power to achieve. It is her business to make disciples of all nations, baptizing and teaching them to observe all that Christ has commanded. This will often result in great social, economic, and political consequences, yet the church’s purpose is not to seek socio-political reform as such, but to reconcile men to God so that, being in the right relation to him, they may in turn stand in the right relation to their fellow men.
What is called ‘the spirituality of the church’ seems to be rather unfashionable at present. In its most recent consideration we find longtime PCA minister Larry Ball inveighing against what he regards as its weaknesses. He says:
The term “spirituality of the church” has become one of those phrases that often stops all further conversation about the relationship between church and state. Few Christians ever question the meaning of the phrase. It assumes that the church should remain silent about all political matters. Although the expression does not appear in any of our confessional standards, it has become a doctrine of Presbyterianism as sacrosanct as any one of the five points of Calvinism. No one is allowed to challenge it without being labeled with a pejorative term.
I fear, as a supporter of the truth which this purports to challenge, that I shall contradict nearly everything above. I shall question the meaning of the phrase spirituality of the church. I shall deny that the concept requires silence about all political matters. I shall dissent from the suggestion that it is as sacrosanct as the doctrines of grace, and shall ponder its church-state implications. Above all, I shall forgo labeling Larry Ball pejoratively for challenging it.
Ball first inveighs against interpreting the term in light of “Greek dualism” that “assumes that the spiritual is the higher good and that the physical is the source of evil.” That would be mistaken, but I am not aware that anyone does such a thing.[1] The spirituality of the church does not refer to the church’s essence, as such, nor posit that other institutions like the state have a lower essence. Its corollary is not ‘the physicality of the state.’ A solely spiritual, non-corporeal essence can only be asserted of the church triumphant in heaven. The church militant on earth is a physical, visible institution that does indeed have physical concerns that fall under its purview, not least in its charitable and diaconal affairs.
He then inveighs against the church’s spirituality if it “means that the church must not speak to political issues because we live in a pluralistic society, and we must not impose our views on others.” This is a large topic, full consideration of which is not possible here. He is correct that the church should not refrain from truth-telling merely for fear of offending infidels. If we keep silent we may rest assured that others will not. However, there is scriptural warrant for not giving needless offense (Acts 15:19-22) and for not taking the side of any political faction (1 Cor. 1:10-16; 3:3-4; see footnote).[2] The spirituality of the church does not mean keeping quiet to avoid offending per se, but it does mean refraining from behavior that does not directly fall under her duty of making disciples. The question in any case of proposed church action is whether it is a part of that duty, and if it is not then she ought to refrain from it.
Third, he says that the concept is sound if it “means that there are two realms ordained by God and they must remain separate.” This is close to what is properly in view in the ‘spirituality of the church.’ The state and the church are both ordained by God (Matt. 22:21), the former to rule in civil and the latter in spiritual affairs. There is some overlap in their respective concerns, however, which makes it somewhat unhelpful to speak of two realms that “must remain separate.” In addition, there are other authorities established by God (especially the parental/familial) that have their place in human affairs.
While the church does not have any business administering the affairs of the state or family, and vice versa, the church is nonetheless still subject to the state’s authority. She must comply with fire codes, abuse reporting requirements, etc., and her officers are as liable to criminal prosecution and civil liability as other citizens. In addition, there are matters which fall under the jurisdiction of both church and state. An abuser would incur the church’s censure and the state’s indictment, for example, and there are many matters that receive the ban of both church and state in their respective capacities as ministerial/declarative and force-wielding authorities (say, polygamy). It would perhaps be better to say that there are different aspects of life in this world that are governed by these various authorities in their different ways.
Now I assert the following. First, the term ‘spirituality of the church’ is not the best available. Its weakness is that ‘spirituality’ has several meanings, and that it is not obvious which of these is in view. Spirituality/spiritual can mean having a spiritual essence; being guided by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 2:13, 15); dealing with the invisible realm that includes angels (Eph. 6:12); or can refer to the part of man that animates his body.
Many of the proponents of what is called the spirituality of the church do not use that exact term: it does not appear in Thornwell, who gave the doctrine in “its most classic form” (in Sean Lucas’ phrase), nor in Stuart Robinson’s The Church of God As An Essential Element of the Gospel that David Coffin – probably our most learned minister on this topic – regards as the masterpiece on the doctrine. Dabney refers to the concept as “the church’s spiritual independence” in discussing a minister who suffered on its account. Elsewhere C.R. Vaughn called it “the non-secular character of the church.” The exact phrase “spirituality of the church” first appears, as near as I can tell (but I am no authority here), in Henry Van Dyke Sr.’s speech objecting to the General Assembly’s actions regarding the United States’ war aims in 1864. (And inconveniently for the scholars who like to imagine that the concept was dreamed up by southerners to justify slavery, he happened to be a minister in Brooklyn.) It occurs only twice in that speech, which is called “The Spirituality and Independence of the Church.”
What term is preferable then? The truth in view does arise from the church’s concern with spiritual affairs and its powers of government and teaching being spiritual in nature. Yet it also arises from the church’s independence viz., other authorities, as well as from its role as an ambassador of Christ that represents his claims to the world (which also implies its independence and otherness). For my part, I do not think the concept requires a single term, nor that it is always advantageous to summarize all that it entails with a single phrase. It is an inferred doctrine, in many respects, that arises from various aspects of the church’s nature, role, and relations, and in many cases, it is best discussed at length.
Second, the concept does not preclude all political involvement. The church reserves the right to treat those things that would infringe upon her independence, such as laws restricting her freedom of speech or ability to assemble. Vaughn speaks of the church having “political duties,” says “these duties when done involve no breach whatever on its true spiritual sphere,” and objects to the northern church’s “political deliverances” because they were excessive and “entirely transcended the duty of the church” (emphasis mine).
Third, the doctrine is largely useless as a defense against ‘social justice’ in the church if taken in isolation. For on the conception of our would-be reformers, all matters are moral and have spiritual significance: for them politics is the highest expression of piety, for they believe that the prophetic injunctions to seek justice entail their version of justice, rather than the particular requirements of God’s law (Isa. 8:20). To be useful the doctrine has to be abetted by polemics that show the social activists’ aims and notions are incorrect. It is insufficient to simply say the church is a spiritual/redemptive institution, for they believe social justice is of the essence of redemption and pure spirituality. The concept must not proceed alone, then, but in company with other arguments and teachings about the nature of justice, salvation, individual responsibility before God, etc.
Fourth, the doctrine assumes the separation of church and state, but is not strictly synonymous with it. Saying that church and state are separate does not necessarily say anything about the proper nature and function of each, nor discuss their proper relations in those matters in which both have a part (e.g., morality). Even established churches have the duty of not meddling in most affairs of state, hence Van Dyke quotes the Anglican Toplady criticizing the divines of his church for bumbling by involvement in politics.
Fifth, the doctrine is meant to defend the church from being co-opted by politicians and the state, to the neglect of its concern with redemptive affairs. Those people who are infamous for their expediency and lack of scruples, for whom even plain honesty and simplicity of speech are too much to ask, would not hesitate to use the holy church of God for mere political advantage, thus making it worldly, profaning its message, and turning its focus from heaven to earth. In such an unholy alliance of the spiritual and the political the church would be reduced to a propaganda arm to a certain wing of their constituents, but would receive little of spiritual significance in return.
Sixth, the concept is somewhat embattled in that its greatest opponent, the revolutionary spirit, wishes to subsume everything under itself and has, as such, brought practically all matters into controversy. We live in an age in which everything is political because there is a great body of men in this country who wish for everything to be subjected to the control of the state down to the most minute particulars. It is a matter of political controversy to assert there are only two sexes. It is a matter of politics to spank one’s own offspring. It is a matter of politics for the church to exist or operate at all; and that arises, not because she has transgressed the distinction between the civil and the ecclesiastical, but because her enemies have done so. She may expect to be accused of indefensible meddling where she does not belong as a matter of course, for her very existence is hateful to many. Yet that does not mean that she should regard the matter of civil/ecclesiastical distinctions as a moot point and throw herself wholly into the arms of the enemies of her enemies. She has a proper mission of spiritual redemption even where she is the target of political opposition.
Now I have been writing inductively, as it were, discussing various facets of this important concept without giving a clear definition of it. In sum, what is in view is that the church has a definite purpose to accomplish, which her Lord has provided her with the authority (2 Cor. 10:8; 13:10), gifts (Eph. 4:7-16), and power (Acts 1:8) to achieve. It is her business to make disciples of all nations, baptizing and teaching them to observe all that Christ has commanded (Matt. 28:19-20). This will often result in great social (Acts 17:6; 19:19), economic (Acts 19:25-28), and political consequences, yet the church’s purpose is not to seek socio-political reform as such (Jn. 18:36), but to reconcile men to God so that, being in the right relation to him, they may in turn stand in the right relation to their fellow men (Matt. 22:37-40; Jn. 13:34-35; Gal. 5:13-14; 1 Tim. 1:5; 1 Pet. 1:13-25; 1 Jn. 4:4-20). The corollary of this is that activities which are not directly involved in this mission are excluded from the proper realm of church action. This includes all questions of a purely political or social character, and many others (educational, philanthropic, artistic, etc.) besides. For the church to give itself to such affairs is to transgress the proper bounds of its task and to risk being weighed down with the affairs of this life (Lk. 21:34) to the neglect of fulfilling its appointed task.
Tom Hervey is a member of Woodruff Road Presbyterian Church, Five Forks (Simpsonville), SC. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not of necessity reflect those of his church or its leadership or other members. He welcomes comments at the email address provided with his name.
[1] The real dualistic conception is between the kingdom of Christ and that of Satan.
[2] If intra-ecclesiastical factions are forbidden, as the passages from 1 Corinthians here suggest, how much more alliances between believers and unbelievers in questions of temporal politics (comp. 2 Cor. 6:14-16) in which believers themselves might be divided (comp. 1 Cor. 6:1-8)!
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A Letter to the Bereaved Parent
It will not always be winter, though it may be a long and dark winter. On that final Day, “the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings” (Malachi 4:2). In the meantime, you must meditate on the goodness of God, even when we do not see it. I do not know why the Lord has brought us into “the sacred circle of the sorrowing,” but that is okay. We do not have to make “calculations” and always find the “purpose” behind things. God knows. I don’t need to know. What I do need to know in my affliction is His character.
Dear bereaved parent,
I am so sorry for the loss of your precious child. No words can adequately describe the piercing pain and deep sorrow you are going through right now. No English word can describe a parent who has lost a child. When a wife loses a husband, she is called a widow. When a child loses a parent, they are called an orphan. There are no sufficient words to describe the bereaved parent. Due to original sin, we understand that the wages of sin is death (Rom. 3:23; 6:23) and that, in most circumstances, we will bury our parents and spouse. One day, you assume your child will be planning your funeral. But, oh, the horror of burying your own child. In that, you see the grim enemy of death in full force. After losing his son in infancy, theologian R. L. Dabney wrote, “Ah! When the mighty wings of the angel of death nestles over your heart’s treasures, and his black shadow broods over your home, it shakes the heart with a shuddering terror and a horror of great darkness.”
My friend, my heart breaks for you. Part of you dies when your child dies. To bury your own child is also to bury half of yourself. The bitter cup and the sharp thorn will always be with you until glory. Though the grief and sorrow change over time, a missing family member will always be at the dinner table. There will always be one less family member during family photos. But, my friend, there is hope in the darkness. As a fellow sufferer and bereaved parent, I hope these words will be a source of comfort in your affliction. As I write this letter to you, I am also preaching these truths repeatedly to my soul. I need these reminders daily.
In 2022, my wife and I lost our precious son Isaac in his infant years. During this past year, the Lord has brought us a new ‘circle of friends who have been on a similar journey as a bereaved parent. In his book, Seasons of Sorrow, Tim Challies describes this group as “The Sacred Circle of the Sorrowing,” which was taken from Theodore Cuyler. Challies writes:
If you have lost a child, you are not alone. After Theodore Cuyler’s child passed away, “he was ushered into “the sacred circle of the sorrowing,” a community made up of fellow sufferer … He had not been invited into the circle or asked if he wished to join. Rather, Providence had directed him to be part of it, and he had chosen to submit, to bow the knee… (p.128-129).
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