The Seeking Church, Part 15

October 2, 2008

Daniel 9:3 – “So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed and said, ‘Alas, O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, 5 we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. 6 Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land.'”

We have been looking at Daniel 9:3-6 and trying to glean from it aspects of prayer and life that will benefit churches that are truly looking for God Himself rather than religious activity to keep people busy and make them think that they are happy. Verse 3 has a key to true prayer in that Daniel gave his attention to the Lord God to seek Him. It is possible to seek most anything else but God in outward forms of religious prayer as we use His name. True prayer is always a seeking of God for Himself and His presence first and foremost. Daniel sought God by prayer and supplications with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. These outward things were means to help him focus on what he really needed to do which was to seek God.

We have noted in previous newsletters that in seeking God Daniel confessed his sin. Sin is what separates from God and it must be removed. Sin brings guilt and the guilt must be removed so that a perfectly just God could return to His people. The presence of unrepented sin is also in the soul and must be repented of for God to return. There are several aspects of sin that we can refer to as the essence of sin, but one important essence is that all sin is against God. David taught this in Psalm 51:4 and Daniel repeats that thought in 9:7. The unfaithful deeds of the Israelites were committed against God. It may be true that a believer is forgiven and will not perish in hell for his or her sin, but it is also true that sin is the reason that God withdraws His face from the believer or a church. If any individual or group of people desire to have the presence of God in their midst, that person or group of people must learn to confess sin and seek God to grant them repentance of it. While we are told that we must simply believe that our sin is gone and it is, that is not how the Bible looks at it. Sin must be removed by the blood of Christ and God Himself must grant forgiveness and His presence in our soul according to His own will. God is not obligated to forgive us no matter the words we say. We must learn to seek Him by confession and repentance.

Daniel uses four words for sin here. He is not satisfied to confess sin in the general, he uses four words to get at how bad it really is. He wanted to be thorough and not just get by. If you want to use Strong’s numbers to track these down, the word for sinned is #02398, the word for iniquity is #05753b, the word for wickedly is #07561, and the word for rebel is #04775. The word for sinned has the basic meaning of to miss or go wrong. The word for iniquity basically means to do wrong. The word for wickedness has the basic meaning of to act wickedly, and the word for rebel has the meaning of being rebellious. This may sound simple and straight to the point, but this should help us see the true nature of sin and why we must see our sin and repent of it if we any expectation of God returning to His people in the professing Church and working through them.

There is a contrast in this verse between God and the Israelites. God keeps His covenant and lovingkindness with those who love Him and keep His commandments. This is seen in the New Testament as well when Jesus said in John 14:15 that “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” He goes on in verse 21 to say even more: “He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.” We must be careful about the cause of love in this text, but we can at least see the link between loving God and God’s disclosing Himself to people. A people that desire God to disclose Himself to them must pursue God in love and keeping His commandments. The Greatest Commandment is to love God and the other commandments are only kept in love.

Without going into distinctions and similarities between the Old and New Covenants, we can at least know that God is the same God and that love for God will always involve keeping His commandments. There is no seeking of God apart from keeping His commandments and there is no love for God apart from keeping His commandments. God comes to those that love Him and keep His commandments and His love is with those people and He discloses Himself to those people. This is a vital point to make. The New Covenant promise is that God would live in His people and work in them to keep His commandments. Part of this work is that only true believers know God and love Him (I John 4:7-10). Only true believers know God in truth and so receive the love from the God who is love. But it is more than just receive the love of God; it is to have this God who is love live in those people and for the Spirit to bear the fruit of love in and through those who have Christ.

In Daniel 3 we see that God kept His covenant, yet the Israelites did not. God kept His lovingkindness, yet the Israelites did not. The covenant and lovingkindness of God were with those who loved Him and kept His commandments. The same is true today. In the New Covenant the love and mercy of God is in and on those who love Him and that very love for Him is from Him. While the Old Testament covenant people were cast off for breaking the covenant, the New Covenant people are in a covenant that God will work in them so that they will not be finally cast off. However, the New Covenant people are still in a relationship with God. They must submit their hearts and wills to Him in order to be His instruments of glory in this world. When they sin, the Lord withdraws and turns them over to hearts that are growing harder. The closeness is not there and the power and love of the Lord are not present with the people. They are turned over to their own devices.

Daniel draws the contrast out for us to see. We need to take a solemn warning from this. Instead of keeping the covenant with God to love Him and keep His commandments; the people missed the goal and went wrong (sinned). In going wrong they actually did what was wrong (iniquity) which broke the covenant. In breaking the covenant they acted wickedly and this was rebellion against God Himself in turning aside from His commandments and ordinances. All that is not in love is wickedness and rebellion against God. Then in verse 6 he confesses that they had not listened to the prophets. What is so bad about that? Prophets spoke in the name of God and indeed spoke the words of God to the people. It is a wicked thing not to listen to God and to actually turn from keeping His commandments. It is not that the people had totally turned from their religious practices, but they had turned from God in their hearts. They did not love God and when they did not love God they were wicked people who did not seek the Lord. They broke the covenant and in doing so they were rebels who deserved death.

In all sin there is a turning aside from the commandments and ordinances of God. We say we want God and yet by our turning from the commandments of God we show we don’t love the way His glory shines through us. The Ten Commandments are reflections of His own holiness and self-regard and when we turn from them we are turning from that which God’s glory shines in. When we turn from the commandments we turn from the way God works Himself in His people and then shines His glory through them. “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” When we turn from the commandments of God we are covenant breakers in that in the New Covenant it is God who works the love and strength in us to do them.

The professing Church in America has assuredly sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled. It has turned aside from His commandments and ordinances. It is not listening to those who truly preach the Word of God and it does not love God and is not keeping His commandments. Is there any reason to think that God is with those who are rebellious against Him and who are sinning against Him? Is there any reason to think that God is with those who do not love Him and keep His commandments? Remember from John 14:15, 21 that God dwells with those who love Him and keeps His commandments and discloses Himself to them. Is there any reason why God should be present with those who take His name today but are seeking the world and numbers rather than Him? We must learn to see the true signs of the absence of God and of the presence of God.

Daniel 9 tells us some of the basics we need to know to return to the Lord and how to seek Him. We must confess our sin in truth and we must see it for what it really is. It is rebellion against God and it is acts of wickedness and hatred against Him. We should not expect the glory of God to dwell in and among us when we are turning from Him like that. It is not confession of sin alone that will cause God to return and disclose Himself to us; it is a true repenting of those sins that have come between us and God. We cannot just turn from outward sins and get busy doing outwardly good and religious works. We must repent of sins of the heart and pray for God to show grace and return in power to our souls. Let us also not think that repentance is something easy that is done without pain in the soul, but instead the professing Church has much sorrow and contrition that must take place. God only dwells with the contrite. Let us learn from Daniel that we need to take sin seriously and to seek a true repentance from all the worldly and religious things we love in order to love Him in truth and keep His commandments from the heart.

Posted in The Seeking Church | Leave a Comment »

The Glory of God in Justification

October 2, 2008

The issue in the past few posts has been on sola fide (faith alone), but even more of why faith alone must be seen in light of grace alone and Christ alone and to the glory of God alone. Some of these have focused on the word “by” which is key to the way many try to hide a work in the phrase of justification by faith alone and make justification out to be less than grace alone. Let me try to get at the issue in a different way for the moment by giving a magnificent quote from the second volume (p. 29) of Herman Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics.

“Mystery is the lifeblood of dogmatics. To be sure, the term ‘mystery’ (mustjhrion) in Scripture does not mean an abstract supernatural truth in the Roman Catholic sense. Yet Scripture is equally far removed from the idea that believers can grasp mysteries in a scientific sense. In truth, the knowledge that God has revealed of himself in nature and Scripture far surpasses human imagination and understanding. In that sense it is all mystery with which the science of dogmatics is concerned, for it does not deal with finite creatures, but from beginning to end looks past all creatures and focuses on the eternal and infinite One himself. From the very start of its labors, it faces the incomprehensible One. From him it derives its inception, for from him are all things. But also in the remaining loci, when it turns its attention to creatures, it views them only in relation to God as they exist from him and through him and for him [Rom. 11:36]. So then, the knowledge of God is the only dogma, the exclusive content, if the entire field of dogmatics. All the doctrines treated in dogmatics-whether they concern the universe, humanity, Christ, and so forth-are but the explication of the one central dogma of the knowledge of God. All things are considered in light of God, subsumed under him, traced back to him as the starting point. Dogmatics is always called upon to ponder and describe God and God alone, whose glory is in creation and re-creation, in nature and grace, in the world and in the church. It is the knowledge of him alone that dogmatics must put on display.”

The doctrine of justification by faith alone must be seen in light of what dogmatics and all things are meant to do. We must look at what justification by faith alone means for who God is and the display of His glory first and foremost as the most important aspect in determining what it means. If we start or end with human beings, we will not see what the doctrine really is. Sinners are justified by faith alone must be taken into the very glories of God Himself in order to understand how sinners are really justified. Justification is what God does to display His glory. The word “by” must be seen in light of who God is and how He manifests His glory in this. The word “faith” must reflect a way that God shines His glory into the human soul that is devoid of human works. The word “alone” shows us that it is in truth God alone who glorifies Himself in the salvation of sinners. Justification by faith alone, when seen in the light of God being the one central dogma, is now turned from how we can protect human responsibility and free will at all costs to how can we show this teaching for what it is in shining forth the glory of God. Bavinck’s statement is simply beautiful in that it points us to the source and end of all things. It helps us to keep justification by faith alone in its proper perspective. When justification is seen in the light of God and His glory, many of the issues are then seen in the brightness of His glory.

The starting point for justification, or at least the point by which all things are judged relative to, is the character of God as revealed in Scripture. The truth of a doctrine is only seen and can only be judged as true relative to God Himself who is the true standard of all things. This is one important facet of Scripture alone because we can only know God as He has revealed Himself in Scripture. This leads us to Christ alone because Christ is how God has shone Himself and His glory out. This leads us to grace alone because God shines His glory out in Christ by grace alone. God does not do what He does because of sinners doing something to obligate Him by, but because He is God and does all things out of love for Himself as triune. The doctrine of justification is primarily how God justifies sinners (Romans 4:5; 8:33). God saves to demonstrate His righteousness (Romans 3:25) and so that He would be just and justifier of those who have faith in Jesus (Romans 3:26). He saves to the praise of the glory of His grace (Ephesians 1:6). Salvation is not primarily about human beings, it is primarily about the glory of God. Therefore, justification must be seen in light of the glory of God because it is primarily about God. When we examine justification as if it is primarily about man and defending his rights, we are looking at it upside down and will be deceived for eternity.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | Leave a Comment »

Justification by Faith Alone: What Do You Mean by “by”?

September 28, 2008

The historical Protestant and biblical teaching on justification by faith alone is that it is by grace and is not by faith. It is obvious from the previous sentence that I have either left my senses, have no grasp of logic, have no sense of word usage, or that the word “by” is being used in different ways. When a sentence is written like that, the equivocation is set out with clarity. Clearly one can believe and make a statement that one believes in justification by faith alone and believe something differently about it than others do. A lot of heretics agree that justification is by faith. In fact, Roman Catholicism believes that human beings are justified by faith. In history they were ready to put Luther to death because he declared that justification was by faith alone. The battle between Rome and Luther (in this sense and at this point) was over the word “alone.” It is also true, however, that in many ways the battle was also over the word “by”. If we use the word “by” in a certain way, it is a contradiction to what the Reformation battle “alone” was over. The battle was over the teaching of salvation by grace alone because it was by Christ alone and to the glory of God alone. The word “by” can mean either “on account of” or “through.” If it means on account of, then the word “alone” takes on a totally different meaning than if “by” means “through. In fact, the Pharisees might have agreed to justification by faith and perhaps to faith alone if we defined things in a way that many define them today. Justification by faith alone is only God-centered and to the glory of God alone to the degree that we show how the words “by” and “alone” are meant to protect grace alone.

The old Puritan Robert Trail set this out quite clearly:

“If we say that faith in Jesus Christ is neither work, nor condition, nor qualification, in justification; but is a mere instrument, receiving (as an empty hand receives the freely given alms) the righteousness of Christ; and that, in its very act, it is a renouncing of things but the gift of grace; the fire is kindled.”

The fire being kindled that he spoke of is the accusation of being an Antinomian (against Law). It drives people to calling others this name when the true Gospel is preached. There is utterly nothing a man can do to save himself and that includes coming up with faith itself. This shows that Trail did not believe that a person was saved because they came up with faith, but they were saved by the grace of God alone through faith. Saving faith is when the soul renounces all other things but grace and receives grace. If at any point an individual speaks about or believes that faith in Christ is a work, some condition that the sinner must come up with, or is a qualification for justification, that person demonstrates that he does not understand the biblical doctrine of grace alone through faith alone.

Romans 4:16 tells us this: “For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace.” We must go over and over this verse and drill it into the depths of our hearts. Whatever faith is, it is only biblical faith if it is in accordance with grace. We know that whatever is of grace cannot be of works because a work would make grace to be no longer grace (Romans 11:6). Faith cannot be a work but can only operate in the sphere of grace alone. In a recent book on justification the author said that the real battle in the Reformation was over faith alone and not grace. The truth of the matter (in my opinion) is that the Reformation was over the glory of God in all things and in particular salvation. Since the battle was over the glory of God, it was over the doctrine of salvation by grace alone. The reason that there were so many words and ink spilled over faith alone was directly related to the tenacity of Luther over salvation to the glory of God alone by Christ who saves by grace alone.

Behind and underneath many battles over words and doctrines is a real cause that is hidden. While there has been a form of unity reached between Arminians and Reformed people in some circles over the Gospel, there is no real peace at that point unless the Arminians are no longer Arminians or the Reformed people are no longer Reformed. The Arminian will believe in justification by faith alone as long as he can keep faith as the act of his own will. That is in direct conflict with what the Reformers taught about salvation by grace alone. There are also many Reformed people in our day who seem to forget that the doctrine of justification by faith alone was meant to defend grace alone. When Reformed people defend justification by faith alone in words and yet do not defend grace alone, they have stopped defending the doctrine that Luther was willing to die for even though they use the same words. If we really believe in the doctrine of depravity, then we know that sinners are saved by grace alone and not by any work or condition fulfilled by men. While the noise of theological verbiage is shooting down any precise notions of justification in the interest of false unity in our day, the Gospel of Jesus Christ is by grace alone. There is no true unity apart from the Gospel of Christ alone who saves by grace alone under any name.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | Leave a Comment »

The Seeking Church, Part 14

September 25, 2008

In the last newsletter we looked at Daniel 9:3-6 but primarily asked why we need to confess our sins in prayer when seeking the Lord. We will continue with the same thought but with a different focus this week. We know that we are to confess sin, but many times we don’t really think about why. We recognize that we have sinned and know that we need to be forgiven, but many times we have a wrong idea of what forgiveness really means. If the professing Church in America and beyond is going to truly repent and seek the Lord, it must learn what it means to seek the Lord for forgiveness. The confession of sin is at the heart of this.

Daniel 9:3 – “So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed and said, ‘Alas, O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, 5 we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. 6 Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land.”

The text shows us that the primary thing that Daniel is doing is seeking the Lord. Part of seeking the Lord is to confess sin. God does not need to hear us admit that we have sinned, so we know that confession of sin is for another reason. But it is so easy to go astray. Last week we pointed out that confession must come from the heart. What we must avoid is the practice of confession that is of the mouth or intellect only. But why is that important in this context? Why is it so important to confess sin and to really have the heart broken for the sin we are confessing? It is because of the nature of forgiveness. In other words, we must confess sin from the heart because we must be really forgiven of sin as it really is. But there is even more to the story. Unless we deal with what forgiveness really is, we will not grasp what true confession really is and why we need to seek the Lord Himself.

We can imagine a person that says s/he is seeking the Lord. This person confesses sin in an intellectual fashion but has no real sorrow for the sin and does not see it as all that bad. This person simply knows that s/he has violated the commandments of God and is guilty. This person has heard that if sins are confessed and followed by believing what God says about confessing sins then those sins are no longer held against you. Nothing has really happened in the heart and all that is done here is perfunctory and goes no deeper than the mind and a few beliefs. The person might even have affections in the heart if s/he thinks that hell has been avoided, but that is based on nothing but self-interest. But again the whole thing seems more like a transaction or like one is manipulating God to forgive him or her. If we simply admit that we have done something wrong in order to escape punishment, then something is terribly wrong with this picture. It seems to be, however, the majority report in the modern day.

The real issue is whether we are seeking the presence of God in our hearts and in our midst or whether we just want to escape hell and some external judgment by seeking God. By “seeking the presence of God in our hearts” I am meaning something that is real. It is to seek the very presence of God Himself to fill us with Himself. If we seek God in order to obtain something from Him, then we are not seeking God but ourselves. We must seek God in accordance with His holiness, love for Himself, and His glory, or we are not seeking God but self. Confession of sin and seeking forgiveness in the believer must always have a higher purpose than simply to escape punishment. If not, the very confession of sin is idolatry and sin itself. We are to have no other gods before Him and we are not to have any idols. Yet if we go to God and our love for ourselves is seen in the desire for God to serve ourselves rather than to display His glory, we are our own god and are in service of an idol. We can get very intense in our efforts to escape punishment, but that does not mean that we love anyone but ourselves.

It should be clear that our confessions must be motivated by love for God and His glory to be true confessions. In our day we have turned even our confession of sin into a self-centered act which in our minds has relegated God to something less than He is. It has been told that a famous atheist who scorned of God was dying. Someone asked him if it turned out that God really did exist would God forgive him. The man purportedly said this: “He must, it is His job.” If that man’s reply is wrong then so is the way God is treated in much of religion today. We think that forgiveness is something that God must do as long as we confess to Him and admit we have done something wrong. While many say that God is sovereign, they certainly don’t apply it at this point. God is not obligated to forgive sin. He does not have to do so and there is nothing a human being can do to bring God under some form of obligation to forgive sin. God is perfectly holy and just even if He does not forgive sin. If we would meditate on that for a while, it might change our thoughts and practices of confession of sin.

God knows human hearts with perfect understanding. Can our unfelt confessions that come over lips moved by cold hearts be seen as true confessions? Are our confessions any better than some religious ritual that an utter pagan utters to an idol? If we really believe that the true and living God will simply gloss over our sin because we have said some words, then we are not in the worship of the living God in truth but have idols in our own imaginations. Our cold and perfunctory confessions that we think will automatically bring forgiveness are nothing but the reflections of idolatrous hearts. If we think that our cold and perfunctory confessions will bring the presence of God back to our congregations, then our hearts are so hard and cold that we must begin to cry out to God to break our hearts so we can confess our sins in truth. Our hearts are open and naked before God and He knows when we truly confess or when we are trying to use religious practices for selfish purposes.

What is true forgiveness of sin? It is when the sin that stands between God and the soul is removed and God is now dwelling in the soul. This is a point that must be driven into our souls. Forgiveness is not just intellectual, but it is the return of the living God to human souls. In the Garden of Eden sin meant that Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden where they walked with God. Isaiah 59:2 tells the issue: “But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.” Deuteronomy 31:18 makes the point in a different way: “But I will surely hide My face in that day because of all the evil which they will do, for they will turn to other gods.” The phrase “hide My face” is throughout Scripture as a punishment, yet when God turns so that His people will see His face and behold His countenance that is what was thought of as truly good. Sin is what keeps God turned from a people and sin is what keeps God from returning to a people.

True forgiveness is not just an intellectual act of the mind of God, but it is for Him to return to His people. Thus we can see how this impacts our confession and how this should influence our seeking of God. Confession of sin is not just babbling of words in a religious manner, it is striving for a heart that is broken from its sin and sees how horrible sin really is. This is a heart that is confessing sin in its pursuit of God Himself and it knows that its sin is the real problem. The heart that loves God and desires His presence in the soul will turn against itself and cry against itself for its true love which is God. Confession of sin then takes on a sense of urgency and certainly of a spiritual reality. When true confession is uttered to God, it comes from a heart that knows and feels the weight of its sin and so is far removed from a perfunctory utterance of the lips. This is a heart that is truly seeking God Himself and desires for God to dwell in its soul. Oh that the churches would wake up to what it means to seek the Lord and to desire His presence to dwell in them. If only we would be turned from seeking ourselves in our religious practices to seeking God for His presence and His glory. We must understand that if we are going to see God return to His people (which is true forgiveness) in power and glory it will take much pain of the heart. We must be turned from a slight dealing with sin and be turned to repenting of it regardless of the pain or cost.

In the text of Daniel 9 we can read it as if he was cool and calm and simply began to confess sin in a monotone voice. But let us read the rest of the chapter and book and we will know that the above is not a description of Daniel at all. He was a man who was blood earnest in all that he did. Here was a man that loved Israel because it was the nation that God has set His glory upon. He knew that the sin of Israel had to be forgiven in order for God to return and His face to shine on His desolate sanctuary (Dan 9:17). The sanctuary of the Lord is very desolate in our day. There can be a lot of religious activity and great numbers of people crowding to places of religious excitement without the presence of God being there. Many times it appears that people mistake activity and excitement for the presence of God as the Israelites did. But when God comes or is about to come people get very serious about the sins of their hearts and begin to devote themselves to seeking God Himself. It begins with true conviction of sin and then a true confession of sin. It continues with a true seeking of God. Without a true turning from sin in the heart, there is no true seeking of God. God is not manipulated by our words, but He must work true confession in our hearts. If we have even a slight desire for God to turn His face back to us in our day, we must start where Daniel started. We must begin to confess our sins, but we must learn to seek the Lord to work a truly broken heart in us in order to truly forsake sin and to seek His face. If we try anything less than this, we are kidding ourselves at best. Most likely it will be that we are deceived and God’s judgment will continue.

Posted in The Seeking Church | Leave a Comment »

Do You Ever Deserve Grace?

September 25, 2008

It may seem tedious to have several posts on sola fide. Even more ridiculous, some would say, would be to spend much time on the word “by” in the phrase of justification by faith alone. I recognize the absurdity of it all in our modern day, but the spiritual reality of the day is that the Gospel of grace alone is being denied by many under the guise of justification by faith alone. I am not arguing that justification by faith alone is incorrect, but that what is being said about it today is different than what was taught about it in the Reformation and, more importantly, Scripture. We live in a day where the truth of the Gospel has been hidden using the historical language of the Gospel.

If we are going to hold to the doctrine of justification by faith alone as taught by Scripture, then we cannot allow for faith to be a work in the slightest way. The Scriptures tell us over and over that the Gospel allows man no room for boasting at all. The Scriptures tell us that we are justified by grace and not by works so that there would be no room for boasting (Ephesians 2:8-10). In all ways and at all times faith must not be a work. There is an analogy of this to a point in what is called the spiritual disciplines. We are told that the spiritual disciplines are things we must discipline ourselves to do. While I would argue that I Timothy 4:7 should not be used to justify what is called spiritual disciplines and it is exegetically improper to do so, that is not the point here. The means of grace are exactly that. They are means of grace. Grace is never merited or earned in any way, shape, form or fashion by any one other than Christ. Reading the Bible does not in and of itself bring grace to me or anyone else no matter how much anyone does it. Prayer does not in and of itself bring grace to me or anyone else no matter how much anyone does it. Grace only comes when God gives it and it is always based on Himself and nothing a human being does. Grace is always the prerogative of God and man can do nothing to even make it more likely that God would give grace. Grace is always based on God’s love for Himself within the Trinity.

If we try to teach that we should discipline ourselves in the modern sense of the word so that we may have grace, we have just taught a system of works. We should study Scripture and we should pray, but we must realize that it is God who teaches us spiritual things and gives Himself by grace in the study of Scripture. We do not go to Scripture to earn or make it easier for God to give grace; we go to Scripture to receive grace if God so chooses. We do not go to prayer in order to earn something from God; we go to plead with God for His sake to revive us again. It is in prayer that we receive grace rather than earn it. Grace is always optional with God at all times or it is not grace. We are to go to the throne of grace to receive grace and nothing but grace. If we go to prayer thinking we can get something because we pray, we are throwing ourselves back into a system of works. If we try to be holy in order to earn something or obtain something from God, we are throwing ourselves into a system of works. If we practice the sacraments or ordinances because we are trying to get something from God, we are throwing ourselves back into a system of works. Grace is always and only given because of Christ and in His name.

In order to get the issue of justification by faith alone drilled into our souls, we must always keep in mind that grace is never earned or merited in the slightest way. Our using the means of grace does not make it more likely that God will show grace, or grace is no longer grace. When we go to the means of grace we must always keep in mind that God has no obligation to show us grace because of our efforts. He does give grace through the means of grace but He is not obligated to do so. We only have Bibles because of grace and we only desire to study them if we desire to study them out of love for Him because of grace. If we desire to study them for selfish reasons, then we are trying to use the Bible to manipulate God for our own self-centered purposes.

I really am still discussing faith alone. I am trying to make the point that we have moved far from the truth of grace alone in Reformed circles too. We have many that have moved from baptism, the Lord’s Supper, Bible study, and prayer as means of grace where God may show grace if He pleases to being channels of grace at man’s disposal. That is Roman Catholicism, which believes it is the true Church and it has grace to dispense as it pleases. That is, when a person practices what Rome says, that person then receives grace. While many Protestants may not use Rome’s system, the same thought is present and many have forgotten that grace is always sovereign because it is God who shows it as He pleases. In justification by faith alone we must always remember that the reason it is by faith is in order that it would be to the praise of the glory of His grace which is always sovereign. A grace at our disposal is a grace that comes by the works of man. When we use the word “by” in justification, we are heretics unless we use it to set out the glory of a free grace that is not earned in any way by human effort but is in the hands of God to give.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | Leave a Comment »

The Link Between Grace Alone and Faith Alone

September 22, 2008

We continue with sola fide in this post. I would like to continue looking at the link between grace alone (sola gratia) and faith alone, but also the other “alones”. The first four sola’s are tightly linked and cannot be separated in time or eternity. It is utterly impossible to have one without the other three. While the last sola (sola scriptura) of the five (in the order that I am treating them) is tightly linked, it is not linked in the same way. If grace is not received by faith alone, it is not grace alone but is grace plus some form of work. If we do not receive grace alone, then all of salvation and sanctification are not by Christ alone either. If salvation and sanctification are not by Christ alone, then they are not to the glory of God alone. In other words, the doctrine of faith alone is vital to all of Christianity. We cannot toss out faith alone without tossing out the core of Christianity.

Previously I mentioned that both the Arminian and the Reformed views of justification use the same words of “justification by faith alone.” Both use the same term, but historically the positions have meant something different by those same words. This is not a diatribe on Arminians, but on the Arminian position. This is also not a diatribe on Reformed people, but is against what seems to be a prevalent position among the Reformed today. If we do not stand firm on justification by grace alone through faith alone, we may appear gracious but we will have thrown out the Gospel and will be preaching another Gospel. It is true that there are many people in our day who use the words “justification by faith alone,” but that is a far different thing than truly believing in the justification by grace alone that comes through faith alone. Paul warned us sternly that there is no other Gospel (Galatians 1:6-9) and no one has the right to change the Gospel. We can strive for unity within a denomination and across doctrinal lines on some things, but we cannot have unity at the cost of the Gospel no matter what the reason is.

Martin Luther stood before the most powerful men in the professing Church and the political realm of his day and did not recant the Gospel of grace alone through faith alone. What we must understand is that he realized he was also standing before the living God, and he feared God more than men. It did not matter to him (ultimately) the men or the positions of men that he stood before. He could not give up the Gospel of grace. What we must understand is that we are also standing before the living God and we must learn to fear God more than men. It should not matter to us the position of men in a denomination or of the worldly courts, we must stand firm for the Gospel because the Gospel of grace alone through faith alone is the Gospel of the God we stand in the presence of each moment. If any man, woman, or child sells out justification by grace alone through faith alone that person is under the wrath of God. It matters not whether the person is a pastor or denominational leader, if that person does not believe (true faith) in justification by grace alone through faith alone that person denies the Gospel and we have no right to unite with that person. If a person agrees with us in words and yet not in the concept, we still have no right to unite with that person or persons. Even if people adhere to the phrase “faith alone” that does not mean that they adhere to grace alone in truth. Even if they adhere to the phrase “grace alone” that does not mean that they adhere to the biblical truth that is supposed to be expressed by that phrase.

It is also true that a person may not agree to a certain formulation of words but can still believe and trust in grace alone. Nevertheless, words are important and they have meanings. We have to explain and explain what faith really is and its link with grace alone, Christ alone, and the glory of God alone. The Gospel is so precious and so glorious that we can never for a moment relax our position on these things. One can say that we have so much in common with others that we should unite with them and work together, but let us not forget that the Pharisees had much in common with Jesus. Having a lot in common did not mean that they were truly united and it does not mean that we should be united with those who assert the Gospel of faith alone in words though they deny it in reality. If we would not work with people in the Gospel who assert that there is salvation in ways other than Christ, then we cannot work with them if they deny justification through faith alone. A denial of justification through faith alone (properly understood) is a denial that salvation is by Christ alone. It is also a denial that justification is by grace alone. Sola fide was utterly vital to understanding the thought and the Gospel that the Reformers taught. The question we have to ask in our time is whether they were biblical. If their teaching lines up with Scripture, then they taught the Gospel of God. If it does not, then let us repudiate the Gospel they taught. In our day we want to be both politically/denominationally correct and hold to the Reformers. We cannot have both if the Reformers taught the eternal Gospel of Jesus Christ which is always by grace alone to the glory of God alone. That grace can only come through faith in order to be a grace that is truly grace and to the glory of God alone.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | Leave a Comment »

Justification BY Grace Alone THROUGH Faith Alone

September 19, 2008

In the last post the effort was to set out that the true act of faith is to receive grace. In one sense faith is the sight of the soul (Hebrews 11) in that it is by faith that people looked ahead to see Christ and saw the certainty of the promises of God. Faith is what receives grace in order that there is nothing in the human being that merits or works for salvation. That is why only the humble receive grace because only those who are empty of self can have true faith which does nothing but receive grace. Salvation is by grace alone and must be received in a way that keeps all merit away from those receiving grace. That way is faith. We must point out this nature of faith or we will be in great danger of treating faith as a work. When we tell people to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and they will be saved, it is most likely that we will be understood as telling them that they need to make an act of the will to believe what Christ has said and therefore be saved. It sounds to them like they are being told to do something of themselves that they can do. But in fact they are being told to do something that is impossible for a proud and self-reliant person to do. If the very nature of faith is to receive grace, then it is the most humbling thing that we can tell a person that s/he must do if we tell them what it really means.

When we tell people to believe the Gospel, it must not be just an intellectual assent that we want them to give. The type of belief that saves is not one that just believes the facts but is a receiving faith. Understanding and believing facts is nothing more than the devil and any unbeliever can do. In fact, when Scripture uses “believe” in many cases what it really means is that one is to have faith but it is hard for people to understand what “faithing” is so it is translated as “believing.” In reality what we must tell people is that they are to believe (faith) in Christ alone in such a way that their faith is receiving grace alone to be saved. Only those who are broken from self and are truly humble can have true faith in Christ because to believe in Christ alone is to receive Him by grace alone and grace requires nothing of merit or works in those who receive it. The function of faith is that it receives grace. We cannot receive grace if we trust in ourselves in any way. This is a basic issue of faith.

John 1:11-13 shows how this works: “He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him.
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” It is clear from this text that those who received Him were those who believed in His name, but those who did not receive Him were those that did not believe in Him. Colossians 2:6 tells the same story: “Therefore as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” It is by receiving Christ/grace through faith that one is saved and it is by receiving grace through faith that a believer grows. If a person truly believes, that person receives Christ. If a person receives Christ, then that person truly believes. A true faith has nothing to do but to receive Christ.

This points us to a vitally important part of justification by faith alone. If we take the word “by” as if to mean that faith is what we must come up with and it is faith itself that justifies us, then we are left with a justification that is by a work. If faith is something we come up with of ourselves (or even some of ourselves) then justification is by a work of man. This is an important point between Arminian and Reformed teaching. Both use the words “justification by faith alone” but both do not mean the same thing by it. The Gospel of justification teaches us that justification is by grace alone through faith alone. It would be more understandable to say that we are justified through faith alone. In fact, the longer phrase of “justification by grace alone through faith alone” shows this. Sinners are only justified by grace (Christ) and not by faith but through faith. Grace comes through faith and when it is said that a sinner is justified by faith alone it is an effort to say what Scripture says about men being justified through faith apart from works. What we must do is realize that Scripture is stripping men of any worth, merit, value, or works in terms of justification when it says that they are justified through faith without works.

The reason that Scripture strips men of anything they are or can do for justification is because justification is by grace alone which is to say that it is by Christ alone. Faith must be what receives Christ alone by grace alone because there is nothing else that strips man of all that he is or can do. What we must see is that a person must be stripped of all that s/he is or s/he will trust in his own merit or worth to some degree and so it is not grace alone that the person trusts in. A person that is not completely stripped of all merit or works cannot look to and have faith to receive grace and Christ alone by grace alone for salvation. This is not just playing with words or pointing to differences of semantics, this is an essential of the Gospel. The Gospel is by grace alone because it is earned by Christ alone and comes to human beings through faith alone. Anything else is a false gospel.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | Leave a Comment »

The Seeking Church, Part 13

September 18, 2008

The focus of this article will remain with Daniel and his seeking the Lord God in prayer and supplications. As we have tried to press before, it is God Himself who must be sought in prayer or we are praying to ourselves. The acts of fasting, sackcloth and ashes that Daniel mentioned were outward acts of self-denial that pointed to the inner need to die to self in order to seek the Lord. We might also mention that these times of seeking were not limited to a few minutes here and there, but were to be the whole of life. What is called prayer in our day is really prayers for self and the desires of self. But Scripture teaches here and in other places that self must be denied in order to pray. When Daniel prayed to the LORD his God, he confessed sin.

Daniel 9:3 – So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed and said, “Alas, O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, 5 we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. 6 Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land.”

What we need to ask ourselves is why Daniel confessed sin. We are told today that if we confess our sin we will be forgiven. That is a causal relation from saying words to forgiveness and is a system of works for forgiveness. If all we need to do is to admit that we have sinned in order to be forgiven, then forgiveness for sin is contingent on saying the words. Surely something deeper is intended. First, what does the word confess mean? The meaning is obvious from looking at the word. It consists of “con” and “fess.” The prefix “co” points to working together or doing something in accordance with a standard or in accordance with another. The word “fess” means to acknowledge. In the past people “fessed up” when they admitted their guilt. If we take the parts of the word and put them together, we have the biblical idea of admitting or acknowledging a crime against God which is sin. But does “co” mean more than that? We are to acknowledge sin in accordance with what God says it is. In a court of law the charge is read against the defendant and s/he is asked to admit guilt or not. If the defendant confesses to the crime, s/he has to confess in accordance with the charges against him or her.

True confession of sin, therefore, is to acknowledge that our sin is as God says. It says that God’s view of sin is correct and that I am guilty of violating His cosmic law and stand guilty before Him as a lawbreaker that deserves eternal wrath for my sin. David’s confession in Psalm 51 shows this. He confessed that his sin was against God and God alone (Psalm 51:4). God is the One that is wronged by sin. The text shows this: “Against You, You only, I have sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are justified when You speak And blameless when You judge.” When a defendant is ready to confess or acknowledge guilt, the punishment for the crime is set out so that the defendant can know the punishment or the crime being confessed to. David confessed his sin and since his sin was against God in the ultimate sin he then says that God is just and blameless no matter what He does with David.

It is imperative that when seeking the face of God that we do not blow off sin as a minor thing. Our sin is against God Himself and to really deal with it requires that view. We can shed a tear and admit that we are sinners to a degree, but for us to seek the face of God requires that we deal with our sin in all of its hideous ugliness. It requires that we deal with our hearts and lives as in the presence of God. It requires us to seek God to give us a deeper knowledge of our sin. If we do not seek to know our own hearts and a deeper understanding of sin as against God, then we do not truly desire God for Himself. In one sense true confession to God is to take God’s side against ourselves and plead with Him to glorify Himself in our case. Ah, some say, surely that is going too far. Why would God want to make us feel bad? The greatest thing God gives to people is Himself. Unless we are broken from our sin which He hates He will not come and dwell with us. When God opens people’s eyes to the horrid nature of their sin, He is acting in accordance with the greatest mercy possible.

We see that from the very beginning Daniel sought God and therefore he confessed his sin and the sins of the nation. By definition sin leads to God withdrawing His face and presence. If sin is the reason that He turns His face, we can only seek the presence of God by turning from sin and by seeking Him and His face. This is why they had times of national mourning in the Old Testament and in the early days of the United States. Time was set aside for national mourning and repentance in order to seek the face of God. Dealing with sin is no easy issue and we have been led astray if we think it is. Dealing with sin is dealing with our own sin, pride, and hard hearts. God judges sin by turning people over to hard hearts and pride, so if we are going to be turned from it we must see our sin and deal with it as it is. When God deals with sin, He brings sorrow and contrition for sin. How many spouses have heard glib apologies that the other person did not really mean? They were obviously not genuine.

What is one real difference between a genuine dealing with sin and one that is not? It has to do with what is going on in the heart. The heart can have a sense of sorrow that is real just over the issue of being caught. That is not having sorrow for the sin itself but is having sorrow for the consequences. Many people within the visible Church have sorrow for sin in the sense that they have been caught and in the sense that they are facing eternal torment in hell. They have a sorrow based on selfish considerations. True sorrow for sin is when we have sorrow because we have sinned against God Himself. True sorrow for a believer is realizing and then having the sense of shame and sorrow in the presence of God because that sin has offended his or her Beloved.

Another reason that God is merciful in showing us our sin and bringing contrition over it is that humility is necessary to receive grace. God is opposed to the proud and He will crush them. If God does not humble a soul, He is opposed to it as His enemy. Pride is a sure sign of being a child of the devil who is pride incarnate. Humility, on the other hand, is the emptiness of self and the pride of self. It is Christ who was perfectly humble and then humbled Himself to go to the cross. Pride is to be like the devil while true humility is the emptiness of self and a false pretense to humility and then to have the life of Christ in the soul. Humility is absolutely necessary to pray in a way that is seeking God Himself. Without humility we will be doing nothing in our prayers but praying for self. We must have the emptiness of self or we will be full of self and seek self while we say we are seeking God.

We must be careful and not limit this to the physical action of using words that sound like humility and words that sound like we are praying for God’s sake. This requires a deep work of the Spirit in our hearts. This is not something that will happen in five minutes and in our spiritually degenerate age is most likely not going to happen without a longer period of seeking the Lord. In order to really seek the Lord, our hearts must be broken and we must become people that truly desire emptiness of self so that we can truly seek the Lord. He has told us that we will find Him if we seek Him with all of our hearts and souls. “But from there you will seek the LORD your God, and you will find Him if you search for Him with all your heart and all your soul” (Deut 4:29). What will it take to seek the Lord with all of our hearts and souls? It will take a lot of dealing with our own hearts and souls. We have to deal with our pride and self-centeredness. We have to deal with our self-love. We have to deal with our own self-seeking. Seeking the Lord is not something that can be done like turning on a switch, it can only be done when we begin to deal with our own hearts from their very depths.

In order to seek the Lord from the heart the heart has to be cleansed. We have sinned against the Lord and we have been turned over to hardness of heart. We have sinned against the Lord and He has withdrawn His face from us. Our hearts have been turned over to pride and self-centeredness. We have practiced the externals of Christianity out of love for self rather than love for God. We have gone through the motions of Christian acts and yet our hearts are cold and hard. There is no program that we can come up with and there is nothing we can do of ourselves to force God to give us true repentance and to turn His face toward us again. Our hearts stand against us and down deep we like our external comforts and religion more than we want the pain of dealing with our own sin and our own hearts. This is also part of the judgment of God. We prefer Bible studies that fill our heads with knowledge rather than those that deal with our own wicked hearts and are a step to seeking the true and living God. We prefer to pray for the bodily illnesses of our 122nd cousin than to deal with our own sin and cold hearts in prayer meetings. We prefer to pray for people’s temporal welfare rather than their eternal welfare. We prefer to pray for people rather than to pray for God’s name to be exalted and glorified in the advancement of His kingdom. What is our problem? We have proud hearts that are hardened by our selfish desires for our own physical and spiritual comforts. With desires for self like that, we desire God for our comfort rather than desiring broken hearts in order to desire and seek God. Unless our hearts are truly broken and humbled we will not truly seek God in prayer and we will continue our downward spiral. Until we are ready to deal with our hearts and God in truth and reality, our personal prayers and our prayer meetings will be no better than those of the Pharisees. They sought themselves in prayer, but so do we. We must learn to seek God Himself rather than to seek Him for things, even religious things.

Posted in The Seeking Church | Leave a Comment »

Sola Fide (Faith Alone) Comes By Grace

September 16, 2008

We will now move to thinking about sola fide (faith alone). This teaching of Scripture is easily distorted by a man-centered view of the world and of theology. However, if we start with the teaching of Scripture that God is God-centered and that all God does is to manifest His own glory, it will help us to understand the true activity of faith. We should also know that faith alone is related to Christ alone since God manifests His glory through Christ. Faith alone is tightly linked with grace alone because God operates according to Himself and grace is caused by Him rather than human beings. The activity of faith, therefore, is always primarily that which displays the glory of God through Christ and comes to human beings through faith.

Romans 4:16 – “For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace, so that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, 17 (as it is written, ‘A FATHER OF MANY NATIONS HAVE I MADE YOU’) in the presence of Him whom he believed, even God, who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist. 18 In hope against hope he believed, so that he might become a father of many nations according to that which had been spoken, ‘SO SHALL YOUR DESCENDANTS BE.’ 19 Without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb; 20 yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, 21 and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform.”

Romans 11:6 – “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.”

Ephesians 2:8 – “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

Habakkuk 2:4 – “Behold, as for the proud one, His soul is not right within him; But the righteous will live by his faith.”

James 4:6 – “But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, ‘GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE.'”

The five texts above demonstrate the main point about faith that we must hang on to with tenacity. Faith is not a human work or salvation would be by works. Faith is not something that a human being does in terms of work or effort, but it is the way human beings receive grace. Grace cannot be received by human worth, effort, work, or merit of any kind. Grace can only be received by the humble (empty of self) soul. As we see from Romans 4:16, salvation is by faith so that it may be in accordance with grace. So often we hear from Arminian and Reformed people alike that we must believe in order to be saved. That is true, but we are urged to have faith and believe as if an intellectual belief is all that is necessary. We are urged to believe without being told what the Bible says that it really is. If we do not understand something of the nature of faith and why we must believe we will miss the real point of faith and so miss the Gospel while teaching correct words about it.

Faith does not look to itself to see if it has faith, but looks to God in order to receive grace. Abraham believed in accordance with grace rather than His own works because he looked to God to perform the work rather than himself and even his own faith (Romans 4:21). Faith is what receives grace rather than faith being a work itself. If faith comes from human beings as something worked up by human beings, then salvation is by at least one work of a human being. If Reformed people are going to claim the five sola’s of the Reformation, they must hold to the teaching of faith (including justification by faith alone) that exalts the glory of God through Christ by grace alone as well. Faith has nothing to do but receive grace. When we are said to live by faith and work by faith, all that means is that we live and work by grace that has been received by faith. The proud always look to themselves and even faith alone. The truly humble do all by grace and so have nothing to boast of.

Posted in Historical Reformed Theology | 1 Comment »

The Seeking Church, Part 12

September 12, 2008

We are looking at what it will take for the professing Church to awaken to what it is and primarily to God Himself. Part of the spiritual judgment that is upon us now is that we lack true spiritual understanding and God has turned His face from us. The presence of God and the power of His Spirit have been replaced by activities and programs. But the only way to return is to seek the Lord in prayer for Him to turn His face back to us.

Daniel 9:3 – So I gave my attention to the Lord God to seek Him by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth and ashes. 4 I prayed to the LORD my God and confessed and said, “Alas, O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments, 5 we have sinned, committed iniquity, acted wickedly and rebelled, even turning aside from Your commandments and ordinances. 6 Moreover, we have not listened to Your servants the prophets, who spoke in Your name to our kings, our princes, our fathers and all the people of the land.”

In previous newsletters we have looked at how we are to give our attention to the Lord God to seek Him. Prayer is not just tossing words into the air toward the heavens, but it is to seek God Himself. Prayer is to be a communing with God in worship, adoration, confession of sin, and praise. Indeed we are to have supplications or requests, but our requests would be a lot different if they were part of communing with God and seeking His face. When God turns His face from a people, they are left to themselves and so they seek themselves. A religious people that seek themselves will use God’s name and do many outwardly good things in their seeking of themselves and their own name and honor. But true prayer is centered upon God, His glory, His kingdom, and His will.

In Daniel 9 we see that Daniel gave his attention to the Lord God in order to seek Him. He sought God by prayer. While this has been noted before, we cannot be reminded of this too many times. True prayer only occurs when it is seeking God Himself. It is not when people use the name of God or ask God for things, but true prayer is only when God Himself is sought. Prayer is how we are to seek God. A person or a church that does not pray is not a church or a person that is seeking God as He has set out in the Bible. It is true that people will say words and say a lot of words for the health of other people and perhaps ask God to save other people, but that is not a sign of true prayer either. True prayer is when people seek God Himself in their prayers. Making this point has been highly repetitious, but it must be drilled in our heads and hearts because true prayer is rarely seen. We have learned to say words in our so-called prayer meetings and yet not seek God. We can go into our meetings with cold hearts and no real love for God and say certain religiously acceptable words and leave feeling good that we have prayed. We have not prayed when we have done that but rather God is even angrier for our idolatrous prayers. Instead of seeking Him for Himself we seek Him for what He can do for us or in order to make ourselves feel religious.

Daniel also sought God by fasting. The last newsletter ended on this subject. Fasting is a way of humbling self to seek God rather than a way to earn anything from Him. God operates on the basis of grace alone and our works cannot possibly earn anything from Him. Fasting is part of what people do when they desire God more than anything else. They begin to humble themselves in order to seek Him. They desire the presence of God more than their food rather than thinking this will earn anything from Him. The sackcloth and ashes are external signs of seeking God and of mourning. The sackcloth provides a level of discomfort to the flesh as a person walked forcing them to think of their physical discomfort as a reminder of the spiritual trial they are in. The ashes were a sign of mourning. But we must be very careful at this point. The humanistic way of looking at this will do nothing but lead us to works and external things. Daniel did these things as means to seek the Lord.

How can sackcloth and ashes help us seek the Lord now? Physical discomfort is not meritorious before God, but the discomfort is to remind us to seek the Lord from the heart. Our minds and hearts are so prone to wander and so sackcloth was used to bring physical discomfort to help people to focus on seeking the Lord. The constant chafing was to be a constant reminder to pray. But why pour ashes on yourself? It was also a physical reminder that the soul that is seeking God is a soul that needs to mourn. The ashes did no good in and of themselves but they were to point to the person mourning for sin and also to bring others to mourn as well. Outward physical things can help remind others as well. We don’t need to use those things in the same exact ways now, but something that can remind us would be of help. Perhaps a rubber band or an object that constricts the skin would remind us to focus on what we must be focused on. Perhaps a smudge of dirt on our hand would tell us that we must mourn. If any person or church is truly serious about seeking the Lord, something will be done to keep our minds focused.

The text then guides us (v. 4) to the words of the prayer. Notice again that Daniel prayed to the “LORD my God.” The object of prayer is not ourselves and not anything or anyone else. We are to pray to God. But Daniel prayed to YAHWEH which is the name of the covenant God of Israel. It was the name of the God that was given to Moses when he was sent to tell Pharaoh to let God’s people go. It refers to the self-existent God who has no need at all. Everything about YAHWEH comes from Him and all of His motives and desires are from Himself and for Himself. But it is not just to the covenant name of God that he prays, but he prays to “my God.” We can pray to YAHWEH as the God of Israel without having bowed in submission to Him as my God. True prayer is not just words with the name of the true God, they are words to a personal God as well. YAHWEH was the God of Israel in the sense that He made covenant promises to them and took them for His because of His own name’s sake. But the few that truly loved God bowed in utter submission to Him and He was now “my God.”

It should bow our hearts to consider this one phrase. This refers to a God that is willing to be called upon in a personal way and calls upon people to submit to Him. It is so easy to use the name of God in prayer, but to refer to Him as “my God” refers to our submission, our acknowledgment of His utter Lordship over us, and the fact that we are His to do with as He pleases. It also refers to a personal God. “My God” refers to one that is truly God over me. True prayer begins in the heart and it does not just look to an impersonal God out there who is bigger and stronger than we are, but it starts with a bowing of the heart to “my God.” It is much the same as Jesus taught us to pray to “our Father who is in heaven.” We can just use those words, but if those are the words from a heart that knows the God behind the words they are used in reference to the God who has sent Christ and has reconciled His children to Himself by the blood of the cross. They are no longer just words, but are expressions of hearts that know this God. We can see something of the heart in this when doubting Thomas saw the wounds of the risen Lord and then said “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28). It was a pronouncement of his belief and his submission to the risen Lord of all. In much the same way we must learn to pray with a submissive heart to “my God.”

Daniel started his prayer with confession, but before he got to the actual confession he worshipped. It is true that these are more words that some might think God would be impressed by, but Daniel was praying to His God. He states what is in his heart and that was that his God was the absolute ruler (Lord) who is the great and awesome God. In light of the sin he was about to confess, he needed to pray in worship and recognition of who God really is. This great and awesome God keeps His covenant and lovingkindness for those who love Him and keep His commandments. But the Israelites had not loved God and kept His commandments. Rather than that, they had been wicked and had rebelled against Him by turning aside from His commandments.

Here is a lesson for individuals and churches across the land. We must learn that part of a true seeking of God is confession sin. It is true that all believers are in the New Covenant, but the New Covenant involves keeping the Law of God because of the life of God in the soul of the believer being worked out in love. When a believer violates the commands of God, that shows that the believer is not walking in the Spirit and that God is not working and His life in the believer in the same way. It is utterly vital in prayer to confess sin to God. Daniel confessed the corporate sin of the nation. We must learn to confess the corporate sin of the local church and of the Church in larger terms. Let us not think that God is as individualistic as we are. We sin because we are sinners, but also because we are parts of groups of sinners. Local churches sin when they allow wicked people to join and when they do not practice church discipline on those who are in sin. The church brings guilt upon itself by sinning against God when these things happen. Each person cannot just begin to confess his or her sin and call it good, but the whole church must confess the corporate sins.

We must learn that if we are going to truly seek a holy God that is always faithful to His own glory, we must confess our sins. It will not do just to state them and go on our way, but we must seek the Lord for hearts that mourn for both our personal sins and our corporate sins. Instead of looking for bigger buildings and programs, we need to be on our knees crying out to God for our sins. The professing Church is under judgment because of its sins and it must learn to mourn and confess those sins before God will turn His face back to us. We are deceiving ourselves if we think it will happen in any other way. May God give us all broken and mourning hearts.

Posted in The Seeking Church | Leave a Comment »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »