Salvation and Judgment

Like Jude, I have much that I wish to say about the salvation that we share; I think several posts will follow on this topic. I begin here with a re-post from October 2007 that sets out some of the fundamental notions underlying my thoughts -- and, I hope, the thoughts of the church -- on our great salvation.

I’ve always thought of hellfire-and-damnation preachers much like I think of grits and sweet, iced tea – as home grown Southern commodities. Oh, I suppose you can get all of then north of the Mason-Dixon line, but there they would be only dim shadows of the full reality we have here in Dixie. Here we have the real Brother Love.

Hot August night and when you’d almost bet
you can hear yourself sweat he walks in.
Eyes black as coal and when he lifts his face
every ear in the place is on him.
Starting soft and slow like a small earthquake,
but when he lets go, half the valley shakes.

Cause it’s Love, Brother Love,
say Brother Love’s traveling salvation show.
Pack up the babies and bring the old ladies
cause everyone goes, everyone knows it’s Brother Love’s show.

-- Neil Diamond (adapted)

I like grits: butter, salt, pepper: please, no sugar – that’s for Yankees who even put it in their cornbread! And sweet tea? Well, that’s the house wine of the South. But, other than as cultural icons – kind of like Elvis – I’m not so fond of hellfire-and-damnation preachers. They tell you with tears in their eyes and a catch in their voice just how much God loves you. Then a moment later – sometimes without missing a single breath – they stride across the stage and with red face and popping veins terrorize you with the eternal fires of hell where the flames are never quenched and the worm never dies and where God is only too pleased to send you forever if you don’t repent this very night. And this always brings the shouts of Amen! from the crowds. “Are you saved, brothers and sisters? If you leave this place and on the way home die in a terrible car wreck, do you know where you’d spend eternity?”

I’ve heard my share of these preachers. They weren’t part of my spiritual traditional directly, but I’ve heard them often enough. And I’ve known a few – genuinely good men worthy of respect. Even so, I don’t care for their preaching. And it’s not just a matter of style; I don’t care for the style, but that’s just personal preference and not important at all. It’s not the simple and unsophisticated faith they typically express that bothers me; after all, God has not chosen to use the wisdom of the world for his glory, but rather the foolishness of the cross proclaimed with simplicity and power – the very wisdom of God. No, it’s their theology; that’s the problem. I find their vision of God more than a little confusing and frankly, disturbing. God loves me and God is willing to torture me forever in the fires of hell. These two notions need a lot more reconciliation than their sermons usually provide, and really than their theology provides. And the incessant question, “Are you saved?” makes me wonder: In their theology am I being saved by God, for God, or from God? It truly begins to sound like the latter. God, who is good, is disposed – by his very goodness – to send me, wretched sinner that I am, to eternal punishment. But Jesus interposes himself between my sinfulness and God’s righteous wrath to save me from God’s vengeance. Jesus saves me from God. Can that be right? Is that really the biblical image of salvation?

Such preaching always leaves me feeling vaguely disquieted, even a bit irritated. It’s taken me a while to realize why, but I think I understand now. These preachers’ vision of God is the God of my childhood; theirs is the same, slightly schizophrenic theology that I’ve struggled to shake but haven’t quite managed to. I find it hard to love their God – easy to fear him, but hard to love him. I find it hard to believe that he loves me. I find it hard to say that their God is good in any normal sense of the word good. And yet, I find it hard to let go of that theology. I am a Western Christian, a product of the Reformation, and that is the God of the Reformation. What is left if I let go of that image – some wimpy, culture-formed god who just wants us all to get along and who embraces us all in the end? That can’t be right either. What I want is the real God. What I want is the true theology of the church – faithfully received from the Apostles and faithfully preserved in Scripture and in the faith and practice of the one, holy, catholic, and Apostolic Church. What does the church say about God’s judgment?

He will come again to judge the living and the dead. This is the unanimous testimony of the creeds, Scripture, the Fathers, and the historic church itself. And it must be our starting point: Jesus Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead. Judgment is certain. At issue is what that judgment will look like. At issue is the nature and outcome of that judgment. At issue is our very understanding of God. Perhaps that’s why, in discussing judgment with Nicodemus, Jesus starts with God.

16 ‘For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
17 ‘Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned already, because they have not believed in the name of the only Son of God. 19And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. 20For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God’ (John 3:16-21, NRSV).

Any discussion of judgment must be firmly rooted in this passage and must keep coming back to it as a compass continually returns to true north.* Let’s lay out the major points here and then flesh them in later.

1. God’s fundamental and unchanging disposition toward the world is love. “For God so loved the world,” means just that. This is true corporately – God loves the whole world – and individually – God loves you. Imagine yourself at your best moment, at that time when you were closest to God. He loved you then. Imagine yourself at your worst moment, at that time when you were farthest from God. He loved you then. God’s unchanging disposition toward the world is love.

2. God sent his Son into the world to save the world – the most costly rescue mission ever mounted. Let’s get this straight at the outset: we are not saved from an angry God by the sacrifice of Jesus. We are saved by the loving God and for the loving God through the sacrifice of Jesus. I think my preacher friends knows this; it’s just that their theology doesn’t give them such a good way of expressing it. It is God’s desire and intent to save the entire world – not just to pardon sinners but to restore all of creation – through his unique Son, Jesus Christ.

3. Judgment began the moment Jesus entered the world as Christ, the Messiah, because at that moment people began making decisions about their relationship with him and to him. The Magi chose to bow down in worship and sacrifice. Herod chose to rise up in rebellion and murder. Jesus’ very presence makes judgment unavoidable. And here is the irony on which everything hinges: we worry about how Jesus will judge us when, in reality, we are the ones judging Jesus.

4. The nature of judgment lies in the human response to the presence of Jesus. “19And this is the judgement, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil.” I read this verse and imagine roaches in a dark, filthy room scurrying for cover when the light is turned on. Jesus’ presence provokes a response and that response is a self-judgment. Not only do we judge Jesus – whether we will bow before him or rise up against him – we also judge ourselves. If we are resolutely evil – evil and beyond repentance – we will flee from his presence. If we looking for the kingdom of God – perhaps even unknowingly – we will be drawn toward the light of Christ. Our response to the presence of Jesus is the judgment for or against us, and it is ours to make.

Now let’s put some flesh on these bare bones of theology. What does this judgment look like incarnationally? As usual, Jesus tells a story.

Now all the tax collectors and sinners were coming near to listen to him. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, “This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them” (Luke 15:1-2, NRSV).

Already in these introductory verses judgment is occurring; it provides the context for the following parables. Jesus is present and people must make decisions, judgments, about their relationships to and with him. Notice that when the light of Christ shone on Israel it wasn’t the tax collectors and sinners who scurried away toward the dark nooks and crannies, but the religious elite who did so. Unrighteousness wasn’t judged harshly; self-righteousness was.

11 Then Jesus said, ‘There was a man who had two sons. 12The younger of them said to his father, “Father, give me the share of the property that will belong to me.” So he divided his property between them. 13A few days later the younger son gathered all he had and travelled to a distant country, and there he squandered his property in dissolute living. 14When he had spent everything, a severe famine took place throughout that country, and he began to be in need. 15So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed the pigs. 16He would gladly have filled himself with the pods that the pigs were eating; and no one gave him anything. 17But when he came to himself he said, “How many of my father’s hired hands have bread enough and to spare, but here I am dying of hunger! 18I will get up and go to my father, and I will say to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; 19I am no longer worthy to be called your son; treat me like one of your hired hands.’ ” 20So he set off and went to his father. But while he was still far off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion; he ran and put his arms around him and kissed him. 21Then the son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” 22But the father said to his slaves, “Quickly, bring out a robe—the best one—and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate; 24for this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found!” And they began to celebrate.
25 ‘Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. 26He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. 27He replied, “Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.” 28Then he became angry and refused to go in. His father came out and began to plead with him. 29But he answered his father, “Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. 30But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!” 31Then the father said to him, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found” (Luke 15:11-32, NRSV).

In this story one player remains steadfast, unchanging in his true character throughout; one player experiences radical repentance, a recreation of heart and mind; and one player is revealed for what he truly was and is.

From first to last, what is the father’s disposition toward his sons in this parable? Love. Whether the sons are near or far, rebellious or obedient, shameful or upright, the father never wavers in his love for them. His sole judgment is that he will continue to love his sons – no matter what – simply because they are his sons. God’s fundamental and unchanging disposition toward the world is love. God’s fundamental and unchanging disposition toward you is love. Are you a sinner? Well, I am and I can only suppose you are, too. But more importantly, we are children of God through our Lord Jesus Christ and we are the undeserving recipients of God’s unchanging love.

The younger son is a jerk. There’s no need to paint a rosy picture where none exists: he is unconscionably disrespectful, intolerably selfish, unimaginably arrogant, and unashamedly sinful. In short, he looks a lot like me. Until…until the light of the memory of his father’s love pierces the darkness of his despair and he comes to his senses. And this memory forces a judgment. What will be his relationship to the father? Will he return and bow humbly before him seeking hesed, loving compassion, or will he, in continued arrogance distance himself even farther from his father’s grace? Judgment began the moment the memory of the father’s love surfaced, and that judgment was in the hands and heart and mind of the prodigal son. Judgment begins for us the moment Jesus becomes present to us. Jesus’ very presence make judgment unavoidable – not that Jesus judges us, but that we judge him.

The elder son has a thin veneer of righteousness. I even believe his claims – that he had worked faithfully for his father and that he had never disobeyed – don’t you? Externally, here was the perfect son. But he didn’t have his father’s heart. He was every bit as concerned with inheritance as his younger brother had been – concerned with position and pride and importance. And when the light of the father’s love blazed openly upon the returned prodigal, it was the self-righteous elder son who scurried for the darkness of anger and selfishness. The presence of the father’s love revealed the true heart of the elder son and provoked a response of self-judgment and rejection. Our response to Jesus reveals our heart and in that revelation lies the judgment for or against us. When our hearts are opened the judgment we have made about Jesus, and therefore our judgment upon ourselves, is revealed. Perhaps this is what John recorded symbolically in the Revelation:

Then I saw a great white throne and the one who sat on it; the earth and the heaven fled from his presence, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and the books were opened. Also another book was opened, the book of life. And the dead were judged according to their works, as recorded in the books (Rev 20:11-12, NRSV).

And maybe that’s what Paul had in mind in his instruction to the Roman Christians.

Or do you despise the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience? Do you not realize that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But by your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed. For he will repay according to each one’s deeds: to those who by patiently doing good seek for glory and honour and immortality, he will give eternal life; while for those who are self-seeking and who obey not the truth but wickedness, there will be wrath and fury (Rom 2:4-8, NRSV).

Both John and Paul speak of the judgment as an opening, a revelation, of what a man has written in the book of his life, of what he has stored in his heart. This is not as much God’s judgment on man as it is self-judgment. Let’s see what you’ve become. Let’s see your response to the light. What is it that you really want as revealed by the storehouse of your heart? Then that is what you shall have.

He will come again to judge the living and the dead. This is the testimony of the Creed, Scripture, and the voice of the faithful for two millennia. I believe it. Each of us will be judged – will judge ourselves – based upon the totality of our lives and the totality of our response to the Lord Jesus. Did we bow down in worship or did we rise up in rebellion? Did we scurry away from the Light of the World or did we let it fill us so that we became a light for the world? Will our opened hearts reveal the Father’s love or the emptiness of man turned inward upon himself? These are the judgments we will make. These are the judgments were are even now making.

Like the hellfire-and-damnation preachers I believe God loves us. And like them I, too, am concerned with being saved, but not saved from God – rather saved by and for our loving God through the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus. In fairness, I’m sure that is what many of them mean. So, we live not in fear, but in love and expectation.

If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in the world we are like him (1 John 4:15-17, NIV).

He will come again to judge the living and the dead. Even so come, Lord Jesus.

Amen.

Reflection: The Diary of Anne Frank -- Complicity In Sin and Salvation

My family recently attended this season’s final performance of The Diary of Anne Frank at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Virginia. It is a play that demands reflection. How does the Jewish holocaust occur, or the Rwandan genocide, or countless mass acts of terrorism? Who is responsible for these unimaginable but all too real evils? I know for certain – with a certainty beyond reason – that I am, and you are, and we are – all of us together. Through our solidarity with all men – our kinship to Adam of which St. Paul makes much in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 – my sin and yours ripples outward through all space and time making each of us entirely complicit in the sins of all men, everywhere and everywhen. I must repent of the holocaust because the burden of my sin has contributed to the fallenness of a world in which not only is the holocaust possible, but well nigh inevitable. Time is no barrier against sin. Why should the effects of my sin be unidirectional – forward only, but not backward? If Christ was slain for my sins from before the foundation of the world, then past, present, and future have no power to imprison sin – or grace. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner, we pray and we cannot even begin – most of us – to comprehend the magnitude of the sin or the mercy for which we pray. Thanks be to God that he grants us only that degree of self-awareness that his grace makes it possible to bear.

But, if we are complicit in the world’s sin, so too are we complicit in the world’s salvation. Through the prayers of our Holy Fathers, O Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us and save us, we pray, invoking the prayers of those who were, who are, and who are yet to come. And our prayers are there, too. As others pray – long ago or yet far away – they bind their prayers to ours and our prayers to theirs for the salvation of the world. Who can know what affect my prayer this day had on the grace that allowed faith to survive through the holocaust and to triumph over it? Who can know what affect the prayer of one in generations yet to come has on my faithfulness this day? But that no man lives unto himself alone, that I know for certain.

Given the complicity of all in the sins and salvation of all, we see forgiveness as essential. When a brother sins against me, I must also accept responsibility for his sin; I contributed to the corruption of the world and the relationship in which the sin was possible. (If this is difficult to accept, put it aside. It is helpful only when you are truly convinced – when you experience – that it is true.) If I then am to be forgiven of my part in his sin, I must forgive and must pray for his forgiveness: Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. If I do not forgive my brother how can God forgive me, since his sin and mine are inextricably intertwined?

A life in Christ is always personal – I and Thou – but never individual – I and Thou, alone. Sin and grace, fall and salvation: all is accomplished in the company of the other, for the life of the world. Amen.

Lenten Reflection: Do Not Spare Yourself

Saint Theophan the Recluse writes in The Spiritual Life, Chapter 51:

Of course, you need labor and effort, both mental and from the heart. Do not spare yourself. If you do, you will ruin yourself. Do not spare yourself, and you will have salvation. Abandon a certain wrongful activity that often strikes and afflicts almost everyone: That is, the fact that we spare no labor on any matter except when it comes to that of salvation. We want to think that we have only to contemplate salvation and desire it, and everything is all set. That is not how it happens in reality. The matter of salvation is the most important thing. Consequently it is the most difficult. This is by virtue of its importance and by the labor required. Labor then, for the Lord's sake! Very soon you will see the fruit. If you do not set to work however, you will be left without anything and be unworthy. Deliver us, Lord, from this!

I was raised in the Restoration Movement (to which I owe much indeed), with a pentecostal model of salvation – the pattern established by St. Peter in Acts 2.

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and to the other apostles, “Brothers, what should we do?” Peter said to them, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him” (Acts 2:37-39, NRSV).

This model presents salvation – like Pentecost itself – as an event, or a series of events, all one-off occurrences: repentance, baptism, forgiveness, chrismation (the gift of the Spirit) – salvation. And, some of these are singular events. We believe in one baptism, for instance, not to be repeated. But, surely, not all are. Repentance, for instance, is the ongoing life of discipleship. Repentance – metanoia – is not merely a one time changing of the mind – a realization of one’s lost estate and a turning to Christ – but rather a continual transformation (meta) of the heart/mind (nous), until one is conformed to the image of Christ. I need repentance no less this day than on that day some forty-five years ago when I repented and was baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. And such repentance is most serious and most difficult business, worthy of the best effort of an entire lifetime. Our salvation – not just the forensic eradication of guilt, but the healing of the soul – depends upon it. As St. Theophan reminds us all:

The matter of salvation is the most important thing. Consequently it is the most difficult. This is by virtue of its importance and by the labor required. Labor then, for the Lord’s sake. Very soon you will see the fruit.

Sermon: 8 Pentecost (26 July 2009)

Sermon: 8 Pentecost (26 July 2009)
(2 Samuel 11:1-15/Psalm 14/Ephesians 3:14-21/John 6:1-21)
Being-In and In-Being

Blessed be God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
And blessed be His Kingdom, now and for ever. Amen.

John Wesley, the father of Methodism, once remarked that if he were not run out of town after preaching, he reckoned it was not the gospel he had preached. He believed – and his life bore ample witness – that the gospel of Jesus Christ is so scandalous, so offensive, that a straightforward proclamation of it will almost certainly provoke hostility and persecution.

Saint Paul writes the letter to the churches in western Asia Minor – the letter we call Ephesians – while imprisoned in Rome, ca. 61-63. For a quarter of a century since his dramatic conversion Paul has proclaimed the gospel and for a quarter of a century he has suffered hostility and persecution: pursuit from town to town, arrest, beatings with rods and whips, stoning, and now imprisonment – all for the sake of the scandalous, offensive good news of Jesus Christ. To the Jews who await a mighty savior, a liberator, Paul proclaims Jesus as Messiah – Jesus the suffering servant, crucified, dead, and buried. To the Sadducees who put all their hope in this world, this life, and dismiss hope for any other, Paul proclaims Jesus risen the third day, Jesus trampling down death by death and upon those in the tombs bestowing life. To the Romans who hail Caesar as their god and Rome as the empire of their god, Paul proclaims Jesus as the one true Lord of lords and King of kings, the true Lord who has begun his reign in the Kingdom of God – the true Lord before whom every knee must bow and whose name every tongue must confess. Scandal and offense, and yet Paul attributes his current imprisonment not to these offenses, but to another aspect of the gospel, to the mystery of the gospel unique to his calling and mission.

1 For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you Gentiles— 2 if indeed you have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which was given to me for you, 3 how that by revelation He made known to me the mystery (as I have briefly written already, 4 by which, when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ), 5 which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to His holy apostles and prophets: 6 that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel (Eph 3:1-6, NKJV).

The great offense for which God appointed Paul herald, the great scandal for which Paul now finds himself imprisoned is this: the Gentiles have now become fellow-heirs with Israel, members of the same body, sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel. This proclamation has provoked the indignation of Israel – of scribe, Pharisee, and Sadducee alike – and the violent response of Rome’s minor functionaries and has landed Paul in a Roman prison awaiting trial before Caesar himself. And so Paul reckons – in light of “being run out of town,” in light of all his suffering – that it must be the gospel – the offensive, scandalous gospel – that he has preached, and in that he glories. “I pray therefore that you may not lose heart over my sufferings for you,” Paul writes from his confinement; “they are your glory” (Eph 3:13). Paul’s sufferings bear witness to his faithfulness to God’s calling and to the truth of his proclamation.

For this reason – for the good news that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs with Israel through faith in Jesus Christ – for this reason I am in prison, Paul writes. And for this reason, “I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ from whom the whole family in heaven and on earth is named,” (Eph 3:14-15, NKJV) – the whole family, for there is only one family in Christ: one body and one Spirit, one hope and calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all (cf Eph 4:3-6). Yes, Paul is in prison for the sake of this good news. The Jews, before whom he would not bow, are convinced that he effectively has been silenced by his imprisonment. The Romans, before whom he would not bow, believe he effectively has been quarantined by his imprisonment. The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, before whom Paul does bow, is not silenced, is not quarantined. This God to whom Paul bows his knees is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or imagine according to the power that works in us (cf Eph 3:20), the power which raised Jesus from the dead and which will also raise us with him. Does this bowing of the knees, this prayer of a Roman prisoner really matter? Some three decades later another Roman prisoner, Saint John the Theologian, exiled on Patmos is caught up in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day as he bows the knees; he is caught up in the Spirit and granted a vision of heaven; he who prays is granted a vision of prayer.

1 When He [the Lamb of God] opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven for about half an hour. 2 And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and to them were given seven trumpets. 3 Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. 4 And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, ascended before God from the angel’s hand. 5 Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and threw it to the earth. And there were noises, thunderings, lightnings, and an earthquake.6 So the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared themselves to sound (Rev 8:1-6, NKJV).

The prayers of the saints are never exiled, never imprisoned. They ascend before God who stills all of heaven to listen. They ascend before God in great clouds of sweet smelling incense. They ascend before God not feeble and alone, but powerfully united with the prayers of all the saints, all the Church. They ascend before God where they are answered and returned to earth with God’s earth-shaking power, with noise and thunder and lightning and earthquake. Beware scribe and Pharisee and Sadducee. Tremble Caesar and all the powers of Rome. A prisoner is praying. When Paul bows his knees he transcends all limitations of circumstance and space and time, and boldly approaches the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ through the way Christ himself has opened. When Paul prays he contends against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places (cf Eph 6:12). So, too, when you pray, when the Church prays to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we can ask or imagine.

What is Paul’s prayer? He prays above all that the Gentiles’ new status of life will be reflected in and matched by a new reality of life; that they will not only be in the family of God through Jesus, but that the family of God through Jesus will be in them.

Once, many came to John the Baptizer to confess their sins and to be baptized in the Jordan – all Jews, all in the family of God.

7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “Brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? 8 Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, 9 and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. 10 And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire (Mt 3:7-10, NKJV).

Being in Abraham was not enough; Abraham was not in them. They did not bear the fruit of faith and righteousness that Abraham had borne. The reality of life did not match the status and thus baptism would avail them nothing.

A certain man had two sons.

12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.’ So he divided to them his livelihood. 13 And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal living. 14 But when he had spent all, there arose a severe famine in that land, and he began to be in want. 15 Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16 And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything (Luke 15:12-16, NKJV).

This young man was still his father’s beloved son, still a member of the family. But, being in the family availed him nothing because the family was not in him. The reality of his life did not match the status of his life.

Parables abound. A king compelled the poor and the maimed, the lame and the blind to attend the wedding banquet of his son – gave them the status of honored guests, but cast out the one who refused to don the wedding garment. Ten virgins took lamps and went to meet the bridegroom; they were in the wedding party. Five had ample oil; five did not. Five lamps burned brightly; five guttered out. Five virgins escorted the bridegroom into the wedding; five did not.

Being chosen to be in God’s family, in God’s life, is an inestimable blessing; Paul cannot emphasize this enough to the Gentiles. Yet, unless the reality of in-being matches the status of being-in, one is an unrepentant son of Abraham, a prodigal son, an underdressed wedding guest, a wedding attendant left outside in the dark. As wondrous as it is to be in Christ, Christ must also be in us for reality to match status.

There are questions which haunt all those Christians who are even remotely awake and aware. Why does the church seemingly make so little difference in the world – so little difference that Europe is now increasingly described as post-Christian? Why are so many individual Christians seemingly indistinguishable from their pagan neighbors? Why am I no better than I am? Part of the answer – just part, but an important part – lies in these parables of Jesus and in the prayer of Paul: we have contented ourselves with status and have neglected reality; we have gloried in being in Christ without pressing onward until Christ is in us. This state is the sad result of an errant theology that equates salvation with status only and not with reality, with one-time event only and not with life-long process. It is marvelous to say, “We have confessed Christ; we have been baptized; we have received the status ‘in-Christ’.” But it is not enough unless we can also say, “We are confessing Christ; we are living the baptismal life; we are receiving the reality of ‘Christ-in-us’.” It is not enough to say “I have been saved;” we must also say, “I am being saved.”

And so Paul bows his knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and prays for these Gentile Christians that the reality of their lives might match their new status; that as they are in Christ, Christ might also be in them. He prays that the Spirit may dwell in the depths of their being – in the inner man. He prays that Christ may dwell in their hearts through faith. He prays that they may be filled with all the fullness of God.

14 For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God (Eph 3:14-19, NKJV).

Paul prays beyond status to reality, beyond designation to transformation. The beginning of our salvation is to be declared “in-Christ” by the grace of God; the end (telos) – the goal of our salvation – is to be filled with all the fullness of God, to be transformed into the likeness of Christ Jesus, and truly to be partakers of the divine nature.

The Father in us names us as His own. The Spirit in us strengthens us for the struggle toward righteousness. Christ in us roots us and grounds us in love, a love which passes knowledge, a love which fills us with the fullness of God. In the power of our God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – we are to work diligently to make reality match status. Not Paul only, but Peter also teaches this.

5 But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, 6 to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, 7 to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. 8 For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. 10 Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; 11 for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:5-11, NKJV).

Without these hard-won virtues and disciplines – gained through full immersion in the life of the Church – we are Christians in name and status, but we have not made the name and status established reality.

Following Paul’s prayer, his appeal to God on behalf of the Gentiles, Paul appeals to the Gentiles on behalf of God.

1 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called (Eph 4:1, NKJV).

Walk worthy of your calling. Live the reality of your status. This is Paul’s appeal to the Gentiles. This is God’s appeal, through Paul, to us.

Amen.