Forgiveness?

The issue of forgiveness is fraught with complications. My small group recently grappled with this thorny problem, namely, whether or not we should petition for God’s forgiveness on a continual basis, and whether it is incumbent upon us to forgive others in order to receive God’s forgiveness. 

Matthew contains several passages that address this issue. 6:14-15: “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” Pretty blatant, huh? No wiggle room there. Our forgiveness from God is directly proportional to our forgiveness toward our fellow man. 

Similarly, in chapter 18, Jesus answers his disciple’s question about forgiveness with a parable, the upshot of which is that the unforgiving man will not receive forgiveness from the Father. The message is clear: in order to receive God’s forgiveness, we must forgive. That means that our righteousness, our rightness with God depends upon what we do. Fair to say? Our standing with Yahweh is in our hands. 

Hmm. Does this sound right? That our salvation and forgiveness of sin depends upon ourselves and our own ability? First, it’s directly contradicted by a later New Testament book, Titus, where in 3:5 Paul explains, “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost.” This passage states categorically that forgiveness of sins, salvation, is entirely dependent upon God’s work, not ours. Ephesians 2:8-9 echoes this sentiment, as well as Galatians 3:1-5. Paul spends a great deal of time hammering this point home in Romans 3-5, as evidenced in 3:28: “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the law.”

Well, we seem to find ourselves in a bit of a bind here. On the one hand, Jesus dictates that forgiveness comes through the efforts of man; on the other, Paul claims that grace and salvation are solely works of Jesus Christ and our faithful acceptance of His work on the cross and in the tomb. Who do we believe? On the one hand, Jesus is the Son of God and Messiah, so He seems to be the more credible source. On the other, the entire Christian message is predicated on this fact, that man cannot earn his way into God’s good graces, that through effort and devotion alone he cannot fulfill the demands of God’s righteousness. How do we reconcile these seemingly contradictory messages?

Here’s how I do it. And this may seem like a cop-out, but it’s quite possibly the only way to do it. Jesus was outlining the true demands of the Mosaic Law when He laid down these strictures. Remember that the Sermon on the Mount, which is where we found the first reference, featured Jesus defining the true meaning of the Law. Not that merely an outward abstaining from sin would suffice (i.e. committing adultery through the physical act) but the thoughts and feelings of the heart were enough to condemn people of sin (i.e. that a married man merely lusting after a woman constitutes adultery). God judges the heart, not just the behavior, Jesus preached, because He sought to debunk the myth that observance of the Law would justify people before God. No one ever completely fulfilled the demands of the Law perfectly, in thought and deed. Which meant that salvation and justification must come another way. Jesus was, in essence, knocking out the last wobbling supports of the righteousness man could produce to clear the way for the righteousness that He would offer after His resurrection was complete. 

So when He ordered men to forgive in order to receive God’s forgiveness, the undercurrent went something like this: “You have to forgive perfectly, completely, unconditionally, and utterly. Can you do it? Can you forgive like God forgives? Can you muster the strength of will, the compassion, the grace and mercy that God can muster? No? Then neither shall you be able, of your own ability, to obtain God’s forgiveness. Are you ready to give up and admit that you need help? That you can’t do it yourself? Good. Now you’re ready to hear some good news…”

The passages in which Jesus lays down the Law occur before the Crucifixion. They were setting the stage for the new kind of righteousness, a radical and utterly subversive understanding of the way people were to behave and live. As the Galatians reference I mentioned outlines, we received salvation through no work or worth of our own, relying completely on the sufficiency of Christ to provide for us. Even as we were saved, so should we also live. And here is the wonderful nature of the Gospel, because now the old passages of Jesus take on a new meaning. Because if we live as we were saved, completely relying on Jesus to live for us and through us, then we can forgive as God forgives because we have the life of God in us, animating us through the Holy Spirit. Isn’t that cool?

So now in light of this understanding, the two seemingly incompatible philosophies are reconciled by this simple principle, that conversion and redemption, joining the family of God through the death and resurrection of Christ, marks the switch from ego-centric activity to Christo-centric activity. The source of our activities and will in our lives no longer originates within ourselves, our minds, emotions, and will, but rather from the Holy Spirit who indwells us. And this should help us answer the other issue mentioned earlier, namely, whether or not we should continually petition God for forgiveness. 

If it is true that all our sins were forgiven at our redemption, as I John 1:7 and 9 suggest, and it is true that we are indwelled by the Holy Spirit and that nothing will ever separate us from that union (Romans 8:35, 38-39), if we are in fact the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21), then should we continue to ask for God to do what He did at Calvary? It would be like a man who owed another man ten thousand dollars continuously asking his debt-holder to forgive him the debt even after the debt-holder had forgiven it. 

But wait, you might rejoin, suppose the debtor continues to run up debt beyond that initial ten grand? Wouldn’t the debt-holder have to keep forgiving that debt? In my flawed analogy, according to the worldly context of justice, yes. But God’s forgiveness, as Hebrews 10 discusses, covers all sin: past, present, and future. In the analogy, it would be akin to the debt-holder saying, “I forgive you for your past debt, and furthermore, for any debt you may incur henceforth.” 

Hebrews 10 outlines this explicitly, drawing the distinction between the old covenant, which required sacrifices again and again, to pay for the sins as they were committed, and the new covenant, through Jesus, which covers all Sin past and future. Verses 10 through 12: “By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God.” 

The common objection to this free grace message runs something like “well, if we’re covered by Jesus’ blood and have unlimited forgiveness, let’s go out and have a ball, and if we sin, well, it’s all good.” The answer to this occurs in Romans 6, where Paul rebuts this argument soundly by explaining the fact that Christians no longer live in obedience to their sinful natures. We are dead to sins, he claims in verse 11, that we might live to God’s righteousness. And this brings us back to our first conclusion, regarding the indwelling Holy Spirit. As we walk in the newness of life that the Holy Spirit brings, we must choose to allow the new life of the Spirit to control. This will diminish the need for asking for forgiveness as we will commit fewer sins as the Holy Spirit takes over more of our hearts and behaviors. 

(Also, if a “Christian” decides to keep his sinful ways after having a conversion experience, without the slightest indication that his heart and attitude has been changed, then we have to question the genuineness of the conversion. The Holy Spirit hates sin; therefore, the continued presence and enjoyment of sin would be intolerable to the true convert, whereas the false convert, lacking the presence of Righteousness Himself, may freely wallow in sin without a scorched conscience.)

All that said, I believe that Christians should ask for forgiveness of God. Now, calm down, steady on. Before you froth at the mouth, let me clarify. I’m not saying we ask for forgiveness for the sins we commit; I’m advocating we ask for forgiveness for the breaking of the fellowship and relationship with God. In terms of marriage, a husband might ask for forgiveness from his wife (or, theoretically, vice versa. But let us remain in reality). Does it mean that until he does so their marriage is broken, that asking forgiveness “remarries” them? Certainly not. But their relationship is damaged and their fellowship, their intimacy might be marred, and asking for forgiveness can restore that intimacy. Similarly, when I sin, that sin does not come between me and God in the sense that it did before my conversion, which caused spiritual death and separated me from Life Himself. It is not as creature and Creator, as God and man, that sin sunders me now; rather it is as Father and son, as Husband and bride, the relationship I now share with Him that needs to be mended. For it is possible to grieve the Holy Spirit, as Ephesians 4:30 tells us, and like any person who has wronged another, to restore a right relationship with them we must admit our culpability and turn back to Him.

Far-Gazing

When the wind wails like a mournful crow,
when the trees tremble like caffeinated children,
when the grass mutters like a spiteful spouse,
when the clouds darken like an agitated pond,
I see further down time’s rivulet
than the far-seeing prophet
who searches the sagebrush of
murky despair, the broad highways
palmed in indelible tragedy.
Spittle and blood sashay against the
hell-forces pushing up through
viscera and memory
elbowing each other as they
bowl in wooden sands, flailing
and falling from bottom to top.
Whenever my hair rises in salute
to mystery and reality, my breath wheezes
a victory of platitudes; nothingness
presides.

O come Bright Wonder!
Come and deliver
a sensible peace,
a smiling serenity
to tortured tongues
that flap with foul breath
and messages of inanity,
preambles of insanity.
The sun scolds my brow,
beaten with sins,
dejected by compromise
with facile temptations,
bland imprecations.
Release temples tempestuous
from the sheen of fallen dark,
rain petals floating on a windy
shore.
Sigh no more.

What's in a Name?

I was recently struck by something that may seem obvious to you, but stay with me. God does a lot of renaming in the Bible. People come up in the narrative and God decides to rename them. This is puzzling and somewhat ironic since God’s first marching orders to man was to name everything. Man must have done okay in naming the animals, but apparently we’ve botched the process of naming ourselves.

You see this all over the place. Abraham is the first and clearest example. Abram was not polysyllabic enough, it seems. Not to be left out, Sarai becomes Sarah. It skipped a generation, but then Jacob gets a new handle too: Israel. Funny that the name of the country was originally the name of the scheming, lace-panty grandson of Father Abraham, whose name meant “swindler, cheat, liar” appropriately enough. It even happens in the New Testament, when Jesus dubs Simon “Peter”. Later, Saul of Tarsus becomes Paul, wishing to avoid any unpleasant associations with the first king of Israel who was a bit off in the head. At least, until his head came off. But Paul, in his attempt to pursue humility, took a name meaning “little”, which may have also referenced his stature. Physically at least; in the annals of God, it’s another matter.

All very uninteresting, you might muse. Ever the cynic. Allow me another observation before a possible application. I’ve always enjoyed how names meant something in olden days. You never really get that very much nowadays except for Muslim names or African names with fifty letters and some weird punctuation like apostrophes and hyphens thrown in for color. What does “Tom” mean? Or “Phil”? “Jessica”? “Heather”? But “Abraham” means “Father of many” and “Sarah” means "princess," though the rename seems to imply that she would be mother of nations and kings (Genesis 17:15-16). Isaac means “He laughs” because of Sarah’s incredulous chuckle gave way to joyful giggling. We noted Jacob’s name, and it was changed to Israel since he struggled with God. Heck, even his brother Esau got into the act, thanks to his bountiful hair. “Peter” means “rock” and Jesus gives the meaning for this name change, explaining that the Church would be founded in some way upon Peter’s ministry and service. The point being, here, that the names said something about the person; they spoke of the person’s identity. Abraham became the father of a great nation, and spiritually the father of the Christians since his lineage included Christ, the Father of the new covenant. Peter became the rock of the early church, acting as a leader and apostle, dedicated until his death.

I have a name that originates in the Bible, which means “Beloved”, but by and large our names mean nothing to us anymore. They don’t speak about us or describe who we are; they’re just devices for differentiation. But names used to not only tell us what we were to call the person, they told us about the person as well, which is probably why people were given their final names later in life, not at birth. Which leads me to my final Scriptural references.

Revelation 2: 17. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will…give him a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to him who receives it.”

God’s not done renaming people. When we stand before Him and are shriven of our earthly flesh, purified in Jesus’ holy presence and burnt clean of imperfection, to each of us will He give a new name. And based on His naming practices in the past, the name He will give will describe us. This passage leapt off the page when I first encountered it; I have always fancied that the name He’ll bestow will be related to my unique relationship with Him. For each of us will have our entirely original relationship with God. He does not intend to subsume our personalities, to eradicate our individuality, but rather to perfect it by uniting it with the Source of meaning and life and personality Himself. Each of us will express our relationship with Him in our own way, in Heaven as we do on earth.

I also like that the new name is private. No one else will know but Him and me. No one else will impinge upon our intimacy, our connection. Like lovers have a pet name for each other that only emerge during their private times, I and God will share our private joy even in the midst of the fellowship of the saints.

Because I’m looking for a new name. Not that my old name doesn’t suit me, but I associate it with my past, the failings and sins that haunt me to this moment, that dog my steps, thoughts, and words and shall until my life is over. If I were to answer the question God asked Jacob, when He wanted to hear Jacob confess who he was, what he had done, my name(s) would be different but equally hopeless and shameful. God wants to change our name, but we have to acknowledge our name first. We have to realize that our identity as we have managed it is hopeless, and allow God to rename us, change our identity.

So I eagerly await the day when I’ll turn over the white stone and read the name God wants to know me by, who He thinks I am and who He’s making me to be. The name will be an identity unique and united with Jesus with unadulterated harmony and perfection.

What’s in a name, the Bard once queried. Who you are and who you will be is the answer. So what’s your name?

Lessons from Spackle

It occurred to me today that I have achieved expertise at mudding a wall with spackle. I know this because it fell to me to put the second coat of spackle on. The first coat is usually done with a quick-drying compound that must be mixed many times and immediately applied to the cracks and joints between pieces of drywall. I also did this, preparing the room for a second coat. The first coat is literally filling in the cracks, getting the major joints and separations covered, so that the second coat, and third if necessary, will create a smooth, seamless transition from one drywall board to another. Then it will be time to paint.

Now, I did a decent job at the first coat. There were a lot of rough edges and iffy mud jobs, but again, the goal isn’t purity, it’s practicality. The subsequent coats require the more seasoned hand, feathering the spackle out to where it fades into nothing, a seamless transition to the drywall. And I put up the slower drying spackle that constitutes the finished coats. My uncle, who is “supervising” this home improvement project, stood in general approval of the progress of the room, but he failed to compliment me for (to my mind) the fine execution of the second coat. Don’t misunderstand; ever since I did a great deal of spackling for the upstairs rooms in which I now abide, I have been teasingly referred to as an “expert” in mudding walls. That is to say, I know the techniques well enough to need no instruction or oversight to put up the initial and subsequent coats. I’ve done a lot of first coats, and been plied with compliments by my uncle who is quick to praise and bolster my self-esteem in matters handyman.

So the lack of his praise in this case struck me as an even higher praise than the explicit acknowledgment usually rendered. In essence, my expertise in spackling has become so accepted that it is now expected, and hence unremarkable. When you are truly proficient at something, others tend to notice it less. Familiarity may not breed contempt, but it certainly leads towards complacency. This we find even if the familiarity is with excellence.

Allow me to illustrate this further with my favorite activity, golf. (Note: it is not only possible, but distinctly likely, that I am wildly overrating my abilities in spackling. Which, by the way, is a delightfully absurd statement in and of itself. Be aware that my uncle’s indifference might not have sprung from familiarity with excellence, but plain oversight, and the lengthy discourse you just suffered through was nothing more than me stroking my ego.)

As my elder sister could tell you from taking Theory of Coaching Basketball, there are four accepted stages of progression in mastering a skill: Unconscious Incompetent (where the novice is doing the motion required by the sport or activity wrong and doesn’t know it); Conscious Incompetent (where the novice realizes his/her inadequacies and struggles to correct them); Conscious Competent (where the practitioner begins to perform the motion correctly through diligent practice and conscious effort); and finally Unconscious Competent (also known as “being in the zone,” where the practitioner is performing the activity correctly without thinking about the motion and theory; highly desired by athletes professional and amateur alike). This usually applies to the athlete shooting a basketball, throwing a baseball, or swinging a golf club. The progression of knowledge and mastery is only to be gained by repetition and mental focus. And as I have discovered to my chagrin of late, even the physical action can be superseded by the mental element. It is of paramount importance that the golfer maintains a proper mental attitude, attempting to focus lightly on the golf swing during a round, allowing the practice to flow freely.

How does this relate? Well, if the golfer is dedicated (read: obsessed) enough to practice, study, and be deliberate in building his swing, then the results should produce an improved swing. Where once the irons sprayed all over the place, or the driver produced a banana slice shot, the wild vacillations and inconsistencies should diminish to the point where the golfer is hitting a consistent fade of ten yards every tee shot, or knows that his nine-iron will travel 145 yards every time. And less and less will the golfer focus on the swing mechanics of the driver or nine-iron, turning his attention increasingly to aiming the ball and controlling the distance properly. The swing can become unconsciously competent.

And here we finally see the correlation to my spackling expertise. Because if someone is familiar enough with the golfer’s game, they will no longer exclaim in the precise judgment and control of the drive, or the precision of the nine iron shot, because they expect nothing less. They have seen the golfer execute the shot enough times that the result is no longer surprising; indeed, the surprise comes only when the golfer fails to execute the proper shot. My uncle still remarks on my “gorgeous” driver shots, but only as a response to his inability to hit consistent drives. He witnessed my recent woes and repeatedly expressed shock and amazement at the futility of my shotmaking, so used was he to a higher caliber of play from me.
So take it from me that if you’re doing something exceedingly well and no one seems to notice or applaud, it probably springs from the fact that they expect excellence from you and we never marvel at the fulfillment of our expectations, only at their thwarting. Which is more satisfying? Is it better to hear the praise or to understand that the lack of praise denotes a respect and faith in one’s ability and proficiency? That is too great a question for me to answer for anyone other than myself. And here we delve into the murky waters of psychology and the machinations of people’s minds.

I must confess that for myself, I luxuriate in the praises of men, which should tell you something about me. The man who is truly confident in himself needs no other validation or confirmation.

One final point. Is there any application from this discussion concerning our life with God? I have often marveled at the parallels between life and golf, and the analogies of golf to the Christian walk are no less striking. The main lesson or moral that might apply here takes a slight twist on the notion of the unconscious competency that is the highest level of proficiency. For the progression of faith-walking is similar to the mastery of a skill. We begin in blissful ignorance, unaware of our need for salvation and deliverance from sin. The carnal mind is not subject to the laws of God, neither indeed can be, for he is hostile towards God. Once the good news has been revealed to us, once the Spirit begins to work on our hearts, we become conscious of our need, our depravity, and ultimately become saved. The line between conscious incompetent and competent need not be salvation, for even after we are saved we are still learning to know the will and mind of God, and we still make horrendous mistakes and grieve Him. In fact, it sometimes seems to me that most Christians never actually progress from the second to the third phase; I myself often feel like I am hopelessly incompetent in living the Christian life and obeying God’s mandates.

And here we must differentiate between worldly endeavors and the ordinances of God. For we do not progress in closer fellowship with Jesus by dint of our efforts, our study, our practice of rituals, even rituals like reading the Bible or attending church. If you doubt this, you need only read of the Pharisees of Jesus’ and his disciples’ day, whose job it was to be preachers and teachers and students of the Scriptures, yet who could look on the physical face of God and shout for his execution. The efforts of man do not avail in the context of God. This is what Paul meant when he chastised the Galatians in chapter 3 of his epistle, reasoning with (and railing a little at) those believers who were trying to continue in the life of Christ in a completely different manner than that which led to their salvation. We are not saved by our own efforts, but through God’s provision; as we have been saved, so should we walk, relying not on ourselves to fulfill the requirements of Jesus, but again allowing God to have His way in us, to provide for our life even as He provided for our salvation.

And this is the difference between the stages, because we never become consciously competent in walking with God. We never become proficient in living the Christian life through our own verve and mastery. We become competent in living the Christian life to the extent that we focus our attention and will towards God, away from ourselves. So we must delete the Conscious Competent phase and skip to the Unconscious Competent phase, in which we are not oblivious to God, but rather we are oblivious to ourselves, our efforts to please Him and live for Him. He wants to live for us, not the reverse; to live through us, to accomplish His will His way, and use us as His hands and feet. The hands don’t decide what to do; they obey the head.
In fact, true Christ-likeness involves the recognition in us of our complete and utter inadequacy to live the Christian life. We don’t ever make it past the Incompetent stage! Our competency comes from surrender of our lives to God. This is the good news of living the Christian life: the pressure’s off! You don’t have to sweat it! Just let go and let God, to use an old cliché.

So who then gets the praise, the glory? Well, if we’re unequal to the task and God’s the one doing the work, bringing souls to Him, performing miracles, then who should get the glory? And this is the crux of the matter, because as long as we delude ourselves that we can live for God, do His work our way, be Consciously Competent for Him, then we can claim credit for the successes and bask in the glory. If we relinquish our foolish dreams of adequacy for God, He receives all the glory. And despite the countless hymns and songs and sermons the Church enjoys every Sunday that claim to espouse this attitude, it is all too rare nowadays to see in everyday Christian behavior.

So you must choose in your Christian walk: would you rather go it alone, take up the yoke and burden of evangelism and purity and observance of God’s perfection, and so claim the glory (what little there will be) for yourself? Or will you allow God to be your competency, to live and work through you, and so surrender both your life and the glory to Him?

What the Foolish Heart Feels

I wonder if loneliness can develop a hardened crust, a scab on the heart, a tough kernel that fulfills the prophecy it first believed long ago when the prophecy was untrue. Can it be that someone who thinks of themselves as worthless and unbecoming to the fairer sex will in fact truly become such because they've walked in that belief for so long? Or does the belief immediately render that person undesirable? And for that matter, how many times can someone be overlooked or rejected before such a self-opinion cannot help but form?

It's frustrating to think that I would be hung up on the opinion of other people when I claim to believe that God's opinion of me is of infinitely greater worth. And yet, I can't help it. I feel so unattractive, so crippled and bilious, so awkward and lonely, that even if a girl showed a hint of interest, would I even notice, or recognize it for what it was? Would I ever believe something contrary to my worldview? Or has my self-esteem been warped to the point where I can no longer believe a woman would find me desirable?

And that's not even the worst part! Because I have a sinking feeling that my pervasive and twisted view of my desirability for women may be tainting my view of God's love for me. After all, the feeling goes, if that species of humans specifically designed to find blokes like me desirable uniformly rejects me, with an imperfect understanding of who I am, then how much more can God, who knows my flaws and foibles with perfect clarity, who knows my divided and double-minded heart, who has felt my every betrayal, even stand to look at me?

You may be thinking to yourself, "Wow, what a monument to self-pity." And you wouldn't be wrong. It's all a lie, I know that with my head. But the lie fits so well in the wounds of my heart, like puzzle pieces designed to coincide, that they seem legitimate. "Well, that's silly," you might counter. "As if the fact that knife wounds fit the knife that makes them indicates that the wounds were justly given! The King of Liars knows where the wounds are, and can tailor the lie so well that they seem indistinguishable from the wound itself." All well and good; that doesn't help dispel the lie very much.

What combats a lie? Truth, obviously. I can receive the truth from the Lord, and from other books that discuss His Word. I can recite the truth to myself based on my study and my experience of God's love. If I'm feeling particularly vulnerable or pitiable, I can appeal to family for validation. And yet, if I'm being honest, when all the other parts of the lie have been dispelled, that kernel still remains. And will until a girl, of her own free will, decides that I am more than just a nice guy, a brother in Christ, a smart teacher or funny classmate, an avid golfer or clever wordsmith, whatever else I clothe myself in, and wants me for me. "God wants you for you," you retort. I can't disagree, but I can't see that affection in God's face. I can't feel that warmth of embrace, or the way His face lights up when He sees me or hears my voice. All these things may be true, but the heart is foolish and instinctive; it needs tangible affirmation.

Does that make me a fool? Then I guess I'm a fool.