A Philosophy of Gratitude

I believe Christians should be grateful. They should live a life shaped by gratitude, among other attributes appropriate to Christianity.

This gratitude begins with salvation. The person who recognizes what Christ did for them on the cross will overflow with appreciation when they turn from their sin and turn to Jesus in order to receive the great gift of grace made available by His suffering. Nothing I am aware of matches the glad exuberance of a new believer.

If a person has never had this experience of overflowing thankfulness, it may well be they never had a genuine encounter with Christ. You see it’s possible to believe in all the right things and still not be a Christian. Redemption begins with a sinner becoming aware of the magnitude of his sin and the price paid for our sin by the Lord. This is followed by a conscious decision by the convert to accept the gift of salvation, which naturally is followed by a huge relief of the pressure felt by having been aware of the ugliness of his own sin. Salvation is not in the knowledge of the facts, but in the experience of making a personal commitment and receiving forgiveness.

But as I mentioned earlier that starting point produces a wonderful gratitude in the believer’s heart. What comes as a surprise to many is that this sense of having been blessed, will not last forever. Even though the gift of salvation is eternal, the human heart will not retain the same gratitude for this salvation that it had when the experience first occurred. After the passing of time our thankfulness becomes more of a mental exercise, knowing we should be grateful, than an overwhelming, overflowing rush of emotion.

Nevertheless, I still believe my first assertion. Christians should be grateful. As we walk and grow with Christ the ongoing experience of living as a believer should bring us back to the point of overflowing gratitude again and again. In other words, the proper living of the Christian life will bring you to thanksgiving, not just because of its miraculous gift at the start, but also because of the ongoing experience with a miraculous God in your day to day walk.

Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, overflowing with gratitude. Colossians 2:6-7 (NASB)

Thinking about Work

 

Today I found myself thinking about works. What really constitutes works? At what point does our responding to God become works? Ephesians 2:8-10 makes some strong statements about works.

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:8-10 KJV)

The first use of the word works is in verse 9. It is there to tell us that we are not saved by works. I know people who are busy trying to balance a cosmic scale, scrambling furiously to do good works, hoping their good works will outweigh their bad works in the final judgement. This passage makes it clear that trying to balance the scales is working the wrong plan. Our positive actions do not weigh against our negative actions so the plan is doomed.

We are saved by grace, rather than by positive works. God has offered us a gift of salvation. Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty we owed for our own sins, and has offered this salvation to us if we are willing to receive it, by faith, as a gift.

But here is where theologians muddy the water. Many define receiving a gift as work. Furthermore, they would say, since humanity without Christ is described as dead in the previous context of Ephesians 2, dead men cannot do anything to bring themselves back to life. Therefore they believe God gives the gift to whomever He chooses and without any involvement by the receiver.

Let me step through some of the reasons why I agree with so much of this logic and yet arrive at different conclusions. First let me address the argument, dead men cannot bring themselves back to life. I would say amen. They cannot, and they do not. Jesus brings us back to life when we are declared forgiven, and not only forgiven, but also righteous in God’s sight. God does the work of redemption inside of the believer, we do not do it ourselves.

Being spiritually dead is a Biblical word picture. It is like being physically alive, but spiritually useless. The lost person is useless to God because of their sinful condition. It is not that they are incapable of doing anything, they spend every day doing something, but these things are of no importance, eternally speaking.

Jesus is offering to replace this useless, perpetual death with a very useful, eternal life. It is His gift offered to us, and like all gifts, one doesn’t have it, until they receive it. A gift we refuse or ignore, we do not get. As mentioned above, many people argue, if we actively cooperate in receiving the gift, such would constitute a work.

I disagree. If a man is to be given a wonderful gift, one they could never acquire on their own, he is not given credit for some brilliant accomplishment upon receiving the gift. All praise for the accomplishment goes to the giver. God gets all the praise for our redemption. Our willingness to receive what He sacrificed so dearly to provide is also to His credit. The receiver neither deserves nor gets any glory. The work of the accomplishment is not in accepting it as a gift, but in the sacrifice that secured it and the grace in desiring to give it.

Thinking, making mental choices, is not work. Following through on the choice might be work, but in this case it is Jesus who followed through, humanity is simply the recipients of the offer. Those who are willing to receive the gift are the redeemed, but not by any merit or work of their own, but by the activity, grace and glory of Christ.

I believe this moment of decision on our part is necessary for many reasons.

Without it there is no relationship in our relationship with Christ, we are only puppets doing whatever God chose for us to do. At least, up to the moment where He gives us Salvation.

Without this moment of decision humanity is essentially given enough free will to do wrong, but not to do right, meaning God is holding them accountable for actions they had no ability to avoid.

Without this freedom to choose, humanities love or God is never freely given and love is only possible when it is freely given.

Without this choice to receive on our part, 1 Timothy 2:4 as well as every other verses referring to God’s desire to reach the whole world, don’t make sense.

Doctrine of Commitment

Commitment is a sleeper. It’s a central part of our lives, and should also be a central part of our theology. Yet I call it a sleeper because it is seldom considered with the full depth it deserves.

Commitment is the central component of love. Many people will argue in favor of the emotional components of love, but emotions waver and it’s our commitment that carries us through those times.

Commitment is the heart of our salvation, first and foremost, God’s commitment to us. Chesed, is a Hebrew word expressing God’s love for us based on His commitment. Xaris, is a Greek word for grace expressing God’s commitment to us despite the fact we could never earn it or deserve it. (Studying individual words for commitment could go much, much further.)

We make a commitment back to God in the moment of salvation. We make a commitment to God to turn our lives around both in terms of repenting, turning away from sin, and discipleship, following the ways of Christ.

Living the Christian life also includes making commitments.

Christians commit themselves to a church family, in order to find a place to grow and opportunities to serve. This commitment to the local church is the subject of a great deal of spiritual warfare. People are easily driven away because they fail to see the church experience as an expression of their commitment to God, and instead get distracted by their relationships with one another. These believers always become spiritually stunted and useless to God’s kingdom work.

The fact that Satan chooses to focus his attack on our commitment to the local church is evidence of how important this commitment is.

So commitment is a sleeper. It is both the heart of our relationship with God, the focus point of satanic attack in our walk with God, and the point where the most failures occur in Christian growth.

Total Depravity

Descriptions of classical Calvinism generally begin with a statement on total depravity. This doctrine means a lost man is incapable of reaching out to God, because of the manner in which sin has corrupted the human form. In this corruption, this fall, we are remade to not desire the things of God. We are free to choose what we want, but apart from God’s intervention we will not want God.

Today I want to make a few notes about this construct and how people use Scripture to support this idea. I notice that with any doctrinal idea, the person who believes it, sees it in Biblical passages others would not. For total depravity, I have heard many verses cited, which made me scratch my head.

Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is more deceitful than anything else, and incurable —who can understand it? Saying the heart is deceitful, or that humanity is sinful, is not logically the same as saying we are incapable of choosing God, or desiring God. It is logically uncomfortable to think God created a world where we are capable of choosing anything else, but not that which we were created for, that which we need the most.

Romans 3:10-12 As it is written: There is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away; all alike have become useless. There is no one who does what is good, not even one. This passage is part of a longer one speaking of the nature of sin. This discussion of the nature of sin is in a longer passage describing why we need Jesus. In this context, it doesn’t appear to me to be a statement of absolutes but of general tendencies. Yes it does use all-inclusive language, but like Jesus speaking of chopping of a hand, it is used for emphasis. If it were literal lost people would not be able to do any good. But we all see lost people do good things. In my opinion this includes the ultimate good of reaching out to Jesus for salvation.

Ephesians 2:1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins (Note, this is a part of longer passage you should read carefully if wrestling with this issue.) This passage is affirming we were spiritually dead prior to coming to know Christ. It is step beyond though to say that spiritually dead means unable to choose life. Spiritual death is used comparatively to physical death, but like any illustration, we can choose to include details unintended in the original text.

1 Corinthians 2:14 But the unbeliever does not welcome what comes from God’s Spirit, because it is foolishness to him; he is not able to understand it since it is evaluated spiritually. This verse is describing what the process of rejecting God looks like inside the person. The term unbeliever here probably means more than one who rejects God, but one who rejects all things spiritual.

There is a habit of people arguing theological points to flood their opponents with Scripture, moving so quickly that each one cannot be evaluated as it goes by. While all of these passages will appear to read in support of total depravity to one who is already convinced of it, I have a hard time seeing it in any verse.

In my view, humanity is incapable of reaching out to a God they do not know. The intervention they need in order to make them capable of choosing God therefore, is a faithful witness speaking of the Christ who took on flesh to reach out to them. Those who hear of Him, have sufficient new information to make them capable of choosing or rejecting God’s Savior. Romans 10:14 But how can they call on Him they have not believed in? And how can they believe without hearing about Him? And how can they hear without a preacher?

Exploration of Worship

I believe one of the activities a Christian should participate in is worship, but I also believe worship can be a highly variable experience.

It can be either an individual experience or a group event. It can be a highly structured liturgical service or a single person in a stream of consciousness conversation with God. It can be centered on prayer, music, singing, listening, preaching, Bible study, rhythmic movement or any number of other things.

The only thing which is really fundamental to worship is human beings living out their personal relationship with God. God deserves to be worshipped. Humans have an innate need to worship Him. These two factors come together in the moment of worship. In this equation, God never changes. Therefore when the moment doesn’t come together, it isn’t the God side of the equation that is at fault.

Neither is the music, the message, the hardness of the pews, the passage chosen or the temperature of the room. It seems to be a common practice to blame something external when worship is dry or lifeless. But in reality it is always the fault of the individual, not the setting. We have gotten so spoiled by worship leaders taking us into the moment of worship, that we blame them when we fail to worship. Or even worse we have mistaken being entertained with worshipping God.

If this last conjecture is correct, then a lot of people in church, thinking they are worshipping, have never really done so. The reasonable response to this conjecture is to examine yourself in worship, even going back to consider the validity of your initial salvation experience.

Personal God

I believe God has personhood. This means He has the traits of a person rather than being an impersonal force. This is especially relevant since an impersonal force cannot love, show mercy, or make deliberate choices. God does all of these things and more. He is self-aware and cognizant of others. He holds appropriate emotions at their proper occasions.

The movie Star Wars ruined a lot of people’s theology. After that movie talked about a force as the most powerful thing in the universe, the idea of an impersonal God gained a lot of steam. But this is not how Scripture speaks of God, nor is it how any of us have experienced God. We experience God relationally and it takes personhood to have a relationship.

But if God is personal, and we relate to Him the same as any other person, then we must have an obligation to Him. The created one must relate to the creator in the manner the creator chooses. I suspect this is part of the appeal of God as an impersonal force. If God was impersonal we would be off the hook, but since God has personhood we are under His authority.

Understanding these details of God’s nature also helps us to understand how come salvation comes not by a series of rituals, or a benchmark of personal holiness, but rather through relationship with God. Why would a personal God want anything else? How could we expect our activities to measure up to God who is so much higher than us? (Please note I am not saying behavior is holiness and worship are irrelevant, I am only saying they do not bring salvation.)

Instead of earning or achieving salvation, we receive it by grace when we enter into a relationship with God.

Relationships and the Church

I believe most people have a need to find another person to share their life with in a deeply intimate way. God gave us this craving for many reasons, but the most intriguing reason is that it symbolizes God’s relationship with the church. (Eph. 5:22-27)

We should also remember there are ways in which this relationship can be corrupted. Fornication, strictly defined as sexual relationships without marriage are outside of God’s will. Adultery, sexual relationships of a married person with someone other than their spouse is also inappropriate. Homosexuality, sexual relationships with a person of the same gender also are also wrong. (1 Cor. 6:9) These general statements, once considered obvious, are far from obvious to today’s culture.

For today’s theology Thursday post, let me elaborate a little bit on the picture of marriage being like the relationship between Christ and the church.

Marriage starts with a commitment made before God and man between the man and woman getting married. Salvation is the point of commitment where a person enters the church, that is, becomes a part of the bride of Christ. This commitment is meant to be a lifelong promise not a temporary arrangement.

The relationship is exclusive, a person who seeks to hold this relationship with God cannot spend their life dabbling in other religions, any more than a married person should spend their life seeking other sexual partners.

These relationships are given definition in Scripture. Marriage is defined as a lifetime relationship between a man and a woman. Changing this definition to include homosexuality, multiple partners, or anything else which seems right to men, is to abandon God’s right to define the shape of human life and behavior. This is akin to those who seek to find God, but reject His plan of salvation in order to come up with their own.