And now, much as He did on the seventh day then, after He created life in us in Christ, He stands back in Sabbath. Not because He’s tired, but because He’s finished. When Jesus hung on the cross, His pronouncement was one that has great meaning for the followers of Jesus and the children of God. It is indeed finished. We don’t need to strive any more. We don’t need to improve on what God has done. The work He has done in us is His work, and it is very good. The call for us now is to Sabbath along with God, reflecting on and enjoying His finished work in creation. Creating us in Jesus.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” That’s how it all begins. And when I say “all” I mean all. This is the source of all things. It was an event that is absolutely unrepeatable. Unreproducable. Unobservable – because God was the only one there. Out of nothing, God made “everything.”
God created not out of boredom, because eternity was getting a little stale. Not out of loneliness, for God is completely and totally sufficient in and of Himself. God created out of love. It’s not unlike the reason why we have children. Some people have kids because they’re lonely or because they feel like there is a void in their lives. But often times, when kids come into the picture, it doesn’t necessarily fix that hole; it might put a band aid on it for a while, but it will come back. The best reason a husband and a wife have children is out of an overflow of love for one another. They love each other, and they want that love to spill over into others as well. So they have kids.
Before anything was created, there was an inexhaustible amount of love among the members of the Trinity. And that love spilled out into the creation of all that we see and know. So in the beginning God created. He created the molecules and the cellular division. He created the ecosystems that work in tandem with each other through His common grace. He knit together the vast number of individual species in all their glorious variety. He set the orbits of the planets in such a way that the tides on earth don’t rise more than they should. He planned night and day to be an appropriate amount of time to support different life systems in different areas. God not only created, but He created in such a way that all of His creation fits together in a harmonious way.
But let’s not stop there either. For in as much as God created the physical universe, He also created things that are invisible to us and yet are integral for the way we live. Take time, for instance. God thought that up, too, in the same way He thought up the Venus fly-trap or the brown trout. This too sprang from His creativity.
And so the process of creation went for six days. The heavenly bodies. The creatures and plantlife of the seas and the air. Then humanity, stamped and made uniquely with the imprint of the image of God. And then, quite suddenly it seems, creation is over. The end and conclusion comes at the end of day 6, as recorded as chapter 1 closes and moves into chapter 2, beginning in verse 31:
“God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning – the sixth day. Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. But the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.”
That’s how the account of creation ends. And at first glance, it doesn’t seem to end with a bang, but with a whimper.
Read More

The examples time and time again in the Bible are not so wholesome. Why? Because Jesus came not to save those who were whole but those who were sinners. The sick needed the great physician. Jesus stepped into the mess, not away from it. Jesus saw the wretchedness of the sin and called it for what it was. Jesus boldly proclaimed repentance of sin. Jesus radically welcomed those who repented and clung to him.

I recently received an email that prompted deep reflection. It stated:
“You will be accountable to the Lord God Almighty on the day of judgement for each idle, worldly secular word from the pulpit in lieu of wholesome Bible examples describing the Glorious Work of My Redeemer, Jesus Christ.”
There is something to commend in this comment.
Ungracious, unedifying, and even crass language can creep into the pulpit. A preacher ought not let foul language, slander, gossip, lies color his sermon. The scriptures themselves use careful language with sensitive topics. Many sins are spoken about in the pages of scripture without delving into the descriptive depths of those particular sins.
But, for the person who opens their Bible and reads the narratives of the Old Testament and the sins confronted in the New Testament, there is no shortage of shocking topics addressed.
I’ve come to expect this type of email from time to time. Why? Because I have zero issues with giving modern examples of God’s amazing work redeeming sinners. God is still in the business of doing amazing works amongst the worst of sinners.
Which Wholesome Bible Examples?
Lurking underneath this email is something that needs to be addressed:
“…in lieu of wholesome Bible examples describing the Glorious Work of My Redeemer, Jesus Christ.”
This is at the heart of the glorious work of our redeemer, Jesus Christ. He saves the unsavable. If we look for the wholesome examples of Jesus, we’ll scratch our heads looking for them.
Consider the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:7-30), living in fornication yet transformed by her encounter with Jesus.
Should we talk about the wholesome example of the woman caught in the act of adultery?
Maybe we can talk about the wholesome example of Levi the tax collector. Just to make sure we understand, that’s like Jesus redeeming a man who would be both a corrupt tax officer and in league with mob thugs.
To be clear, there would not have been an objection to Jesus’s ministry by the Pharisees if His work was amongst the wholesome.
Jesus came to save sinners.
Jesus came to save the fornicator.
Jesus came to save the drunkard.
Jesus came to save the homosexual.
Jesus came to save the liar.
Jesus came to save the thief.
Jesus came to save the adulterer.
Jesus came to save the idolater.
Jesus came to save the covetous.
Appalled at Jesus?
The Pharisees were shocked and appalled by the unwholesome company Jesus seemed to keep. They protested to his disciples about it:
10 Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. 11 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, “Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
Read More
Related Posts:

If the counties (and states) north of Richmond were red instead of blue and treated the working men south of Richmond with magnanimity rather than neglect or contempt, there still would be a problem because what those men need isn’t patronage; it’s control over their own lives and a say in the fate of their own communities. No wage ever will be high enough if the men who earn it aren’t free. “Rich Men North of Richmond,” like populism itself, is about control, not wages.

You don’t need a college degree to understand what’s happening in our country.
Oliver Anthony, the Virginia songwriter and singer behind the viral hit “Rich Men North of Richmond,” didn’t even finish high school. But his song is the most intelligent political commentary of the year. [The viral song debuted Monday at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.]
That’s because there are two parts to it, though most critics and many admirers have picked up only on one.
The song isn’t simply a class-war complaint. The trouble with the rich men north of Richmond isn’t that they’re rich; it’s that “they all just wanna have total control/Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do.”
Anthony, real name Christopher Anthony Lunsford, is a throwback to the folk libertarianism that gave us the American Revolution.
There’s a social and spiritual level to the song beyond its obvious economics.
Maybe that’s easy to miss because Anthony’s biography, which he summarizes on Facebook, sounds like something Hollywood would dream up for a working-class troubadour.
He lives in a trailer in Farmville, Virginia.
He cracked his skull working in a North Carolina paper mill, spent six months unemployed, plunged into depression, and tried to drown his suffering in alcohol.
And he can really sing: “Rich Men North of Richmond” has poignant lyrics, but its appeal lies as much in the simple catchiness of its sound, and Anthony’s voice puts autotuned pop stars to shame.
It would make a great movie, but Anthony’s life shouldn’t be reduced to a caricature, and neither should the message of his song.
Look at the first verse: “Overtime hours for bulls— pay” is the line that catches everyone’s attention.
Read More
Related Posts: