Holy Fear, Hellish Fire, and a Burning Bush

[current book: 2 Samuel]

I don't know if you know this, but this past year my soul has been through a theological washing machine.

I attribute this to discovering the Bible. Granted, I'd thumbed through the thing before. But last spring when—mysteriously, miraculously—God started uncovering for me vistas within Scripture I had never thought to see, I came to realize just how shallow my understanding of God's character really is—which began a deliciously invigorating scramble to mine his book for all it's worth.

On the whole this has been indescribably rich. God created this monster, and he has been blissfully feeding it, such that even (dare I say especially?) a book like Leviticus has become savory Scriptural grub. 

But in a way, this is terrifying. After all, what reading Scripture really does is shuttle you straight into the uncharted territory of God's heart, and who knows what you might find there? Just when you thought that your familiar friends Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John told you all there is to know about our gooey, lovey Lord, you read a less preached-on passage like Isaiah 13:6-16 and realize that the horrifyingly wrathful God of Israel spoke of not just Beatitudes but brimstone. Study the Word. All of the Word. With white-faced terror you will be winded with the knowledge that your (imagined) God is too small, your head is too big, and our cuddly Christ has a sword sticking out of his mouth (Rev. 1:16).

With these thoughts in mind, take a rabbit trail through what happened to me this afternoon. For a good couple hours today, I was tuning in to a series of lectures on eschatology. Eschatology is a theological word, deriving from the Greek word ἔσχατος (eschatos), meaning "last." It's the study of "last things," such as Bible prophecy, the Day of the Lord, the Second Coming of Christ, so on and so forth. 

Eschatology fascinates me. But more than that, it terrifies me. Don't misunderstand me here: I'm not saying I fear Hell, because I know (courtesy of a certain carpenter) that I'm not going there. Nor am I saying that I have a problem with God's judgment. In a way that is (blissfully, beautifully) impossible to describe, I am actually soaking in comfort: I know he's just, I know he's good, and that tension rests well with me. I've never felt the need to tumble off the cliff of heresy by sweeping Hell under the rug for the sake of my own whitewashed comfort.

But there's this holy fear, this wide-eyed terror, at how serious God is about his wrath that makes me uncomfortable but somehow alive. K.P. Yohannan, Asia's passionate preacher, credits his evangelistic fire to a crisis in his life in which he found himself unable to deny the reality of Hell thanks to the teaching of Scripture. Today I understood that fire Yohannan talks about. I didn't before—before I had bothered to think about the rich man and Lazarus, before I had had Revelation 20 thrust in my face. You want to be on fire for God? Read about how God is a consuming fire. Wrestle with the tough passages. Preach Hell. Obedience to Christ becomes as deep as eternity is wide.

My point is that this afternoon was a case-in-point for what I've been experiencing through Scripture this whole year. As I've discovered obscure passages, stumbled through eschatology, wrestled with Hell, chewed on judgment, and come to the visceral realization that every single syllable of God's word has a pointed, particular, powerful meaning regarding his nature and character, the heart of God has been writ larger and larger on my own as the most mysterious, priceless, gorgeous thing my soul has ever experienced.

In fact, what amazes me is that my soul hasn't burst.

After all, when I think about this logically, none of us should be able to bear this. How can we taste such seemingly paradoxical, majestically monumental wrath, love, mercy, and holiness and still stay sane? How can the heavens fit inside our heart, much less Hell? How can I possibly read of bowls and seals and trumpets, of one third of mankind slaughtered (Rev. 9:18), of blood up to horses' bridles (Rev. 14:20), of the Jesus who "treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God" (Rev. 19:15), without every shred of my soul descending into madness and despair?

Three thousand plus years ago, I think Moses glimpsed the answer in a bush that, though on fire, was not consumed (Ex. 3:2).

Botanically fascinating? Yes. But isn't it interesting how more than one thousand years later on the Day of Pentecost, when the Spirit came to inhabit believers with a permanence that it never had before, the Spirit appeared as tongues of fire that not only came to "rest on each of them" (Acts 2:3) but ultimately to dwell within each of them. Though shining with the God who dwells in unapproachable light (1 Tim. 6:16), the believers themselves were not blinded. Though burning with the God who is a consuming fire (Dt. 4:24), they themselves were not consumed. Moses' bush models sanctified saints.

When it comes to knowing God, I feel like that bush. The cry of Ivan Karamazov screams in my ears: that the earth, in concert with my head, must split open at the reality of such a God, in all his damning holiness, all his jealous wrathfulness, all his towering eternity.

But it doesn't. The earth weeps but does not wither. My head bleeds but does not break.

And somehow, God burns within me, yet I am not consumed.

Out of Egypt

So, you know how the exodus is a type of the cross? As in, Moses delivers Israel like Christ delivers believers, the Passover lamb is like the Lamb of God, etc., etc. Isn't it interesting, therefore, that Moses (a type of Christ) carries Joseph's bones out of Egypt? In the same way, the cross means not only forgiveness and peace with God; it also means a literal resurrection from the dead: our bones, too, will be carried up from this earthly Egypt when we receive a "heavenly body" (1 Cor. 15:40).

Isn't the Bible amazing?

P.S.: I'll be out of town this next week without internet access. I'm excited to catch up on some of my reading. Expect a whole whirlwind of posts when I get back!

Long Way Home

[current book: Exodus]

"When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, 'If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.' So God led the people around by the desert road toward the Red Sea. The Israelites went up out of Egypt armed for battle." (Ex. 13:17-18)

Love this. God turns down a short cut through Philistine country, even though the Israelites, armed and ready, would probably have had at least a fighting chance if war had broken out. Instead, he takes them the long way, which results in them being trapped between an obnoxiously uncrossable body of water and a giddy band of bloodthirsty Egyptians. He denies them the challenge they could have faced and gives them the challenge they could never have faced.

Isn't sin like this? We're told that we've been enslaved to an evil we cannot defeat (Rom. 7:21-24). In the same way that only God could have delivered Israel through the Red Sea, so only can the Good Shepherd lead us through the valley of sin and the shadow of death.

Imagine if he let us fight our own personal "Philistines." We wouldn't need him. We could fight the fight ourselves. But how small a world that would be, if we were its savior! 

Praise God that he takes us the long way. Praise God we can't part the Red Sea. Praise God that in our weakness he gains glory. Praise God that he alone can set us free.

"For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all" (Rom. 11:32).

Ready, Set, Genesis!

[current book: Genesis]

Reading Genesis is such an adventure. Talk about some pretty major weirdness.

But also some pretty major beauty. I love, for example, the story of Isaac and Rebekah in Genesis 24. Go read it if you haven't—it's gorgeous. And, as a friend of mine pointed out recently, it's filled with pictures of Christ.

Check this out:

1. An unnamed servant travels in the authority of his master Abraham to a far-off country seeking a bride for his master's son (Gen. 24:3-4).
2. The servant discovers Rebekah, a spotless virgin (Gen. 24:15-16).
3. Through prayer, the servant recognizes that Rebekah is God's chosen bride (Gen. 24:12-14).
4. He marks her with jewelry (Gen. 24:22).
5. He stays in her home (Gen. 24:23).
6. He testifies about his master Abraham and his master's son Isaac (Gen. 24:34-49).
7. Based solely on the servant's testimony, Rebekah leaves everything behind to love a man she has never met (Gen. 24:58).
8. The servant insists they depart immediately (Gen. 24:56).
9. Isaac receives Rebekah, loves her, and marries her (Gen. 24:67).

In the same way (!):

1. Just as the unnamed servant was sent by his master to a bride in a far-off country, so the Holy Spirit, who is the most "anonymous" member of the Godhead, has been sent by the Father into the world, to the Church (Rev. 4:6, Jn. 14:26).
2. Just as Rebekah was a virgin, so is the Church (thanks to the cross) a spotless bride (Eph. 5:25, 31-32).
3. Just as God chose Rebekah, so he chose the Church (Eph. 1:4, Rom. 8:29-30).
4. Just as the servant marked Rebekah with jewelry, so the Spirit is a deposit marking believers (Eph. 1:13).
5. Just as the servant stayed in Rebekah's house, so the Spirit dwells in believers (1 Cor. 6:19).
6. Just as the servant testified about Abraham and his son, so the Spirit testifies about God and his son (Jn. 16:33, 1 Cor. 2:10-12).
7. Just as Rebekah abandoned everything for a husband she had never met, so Peter says of the Church, "though you have not seen him, you love him" (1 Pt. 1:8).
8. Just as the servant that insisted Rebekah leave immediately, so the Spirit does not let believers tarry in the world: Christ is all or nothing (Mt. 13:44-45).
9. Just as Isaac took Rebekah in and loved her, so Christ has made the Church his everlasting bride (Rom. 8:38-39).

Isn't that wild??

On a side note, I really want to be like Isaac. As Rebekah approaches Isaac's tents for the first time, Isaac is out in a field "meditating." This is hearsay, but I heard once that while there is debate concerning the exact meaning of the Hebrew word here translated "meditating," many scholars believe that it implies prayer.

I love that. Isaac, lost in prayer, seeking God and not a spouse, chances to glance upward and sees his bride. May all God's blessings come like that.

You Can't Understand the Bible. (And Neither Can I)

"But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth." —John 16:13

What a verse.

It reminds me of all the times growing up my mom would tease my dad about "looking with his nose." He'd be digging around in the refrigerator for a good half minute looking for something, only to have my mom yank it out for him right in front of his face. (In medical parlance, I'm told this phenomenon has been alternatively termed "Temporary Male Blindness.")

There is a similar ailment spiritually.

Assuming some literary acumen, it is eventually possible to sink into the subtleties of Shakespeare with a little rereading here and a little historical context there. Similarly, I am no scientist; but I remember in high school eventually coming to grips with the abstruse lingo and abstract concepts of my biology textbook through a cocktail of confusion and hard work.

Not so with Scripture. You (as in you, in all your human reasoning and fleshiness) cannot understand the Word of God.

Oh, sure, you can do scholarly footwork. You can dig into the Bible's genres, its literary devices, its cultural and historical context, even some of its profound themes and messages (the depravity of man, the importance of justice, the paschal power of love, etc.). Many theology classes I have taken discuss these very things, all of which are a good start for understanding the Bible.

But the soul of biblical truth can only be communicated by the Spirit of God, not by the mind of man. The Jews did not understand the Scriptures (Jn. 5:39) until Jesus opened the minds of a select handful to understand them (Lk. 24:45). And on the Emmaus road, it took what must have been the greatest sermon of all time for Jesus' two traveling companions to realize that their interpretation of the entire Bible was incomplete, since they were not interpreting Scripture in light of Christ.

No—we are told that we are taught by the Spirit (Jn. 16:13, Jn. 14:26). In fact, in 1 John, one sees that it is by his anointing that we do not need to be taught by anyone else (1 Jn. 2:27). And in 1 Corinthians 2, one sees that only the Spirit knows the thoughts of God, which in turn teaches us these very thoughts (1 Cor. 2:12).

Don't you dare read the Bible as merely a human document with human understanding. You will ineluctably miss the very heart of what God is trying to say. But if we abide in the Spirit and let him teach us, then the scales will fall from our eyes (Acts 9:18), the veil will be torn (2 Cor. 3:16), and we will see.

Incidentally, this is the reason why there are so many divergent interpretations of the Bible. It is why atheists like Dawkins and Hitchens can only see what in their eyes is God's cruelty, unlike us who "with unveiled faces" (2 Cor. 3:18) are bowled away by the mercy of the cross. I believe this happens among Christians, too, particularly in academia. Biblical scholarship is great. But scholarship can become a mask for respectability, and evaluating Scripture with spiritual eyes can be academic suicide.

So. Tomorrow. I start this crazy thing. May I be humble enough to let the Author of Scripture teach me Scripture. "Male blindness" like my dad's is temporary. Spiritual blindness can be eternal.