Lenten Devotional – Day 29

Q. 44. What does the preface to the Ten Commandments teach us?

A. The preface to the Ten Commandments teaches us that because God is the Lord, and our God and Redeemer, therefore we are bound to keep all his commandments.

When I think of your ways,
    I turn my feet to your decrees;
I hurry and do not delay to keep your commandments.
Though the cords of the wicked ensnare me,
   I do not forget your law.
At midnight I rise to praise you,
   because of your righteous ordinances.
I am a companion of all who fear you,
   of those who keep your precepts.
The earth, O LORD, is full of your steadfast love;
   teach me your statutes. (Psalm 119:59-64)

The truth is, of course, that the curtness of the Ten Commandments is an evidence, not of the gloom and narrowness of a religion, but, on the contrary, of its liberality and humanity. It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted: precisely because most things are permitted, and only a few things are forbidden. - Gilbert Keith G. K. Chesterton

  NASA had high hopes for their Mars orbiter - it would make possible some exciting new research into the Red Planet. They were stunned when suddenly, without warning, they lost the Mars orbiter in deep space. After the initial shock, NASA tried to determine what went wrong. The answer was almost as alarming as losing the orbiter itself. The fatal malfunction was the result of a tragic error in calculations - bad math doomed the Mars craft. One set of engineers had worked with English measurements - while another set of engineers did their calculations by the metric system! ...

  A costly failure was the result of measuring by two different standards ... . You can't keep vacillating; commuting back and forth between what the world around you says is right and what your Lord says is right. You can't just go God's way when it's convenient and doesn't cost you much. In God's words, you have to "choose this day whom you will serve." When you do, life is a whole lot less confusing. - Ron Hutchcraft, "The measurement mess," Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, December 1999.

Lenten Devotional – Fifth Sunday in Lent

Q. 42. What is the sum of the Ten Commandments?

A. The sum of the Ten Commandments is: to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind; and our neighbor as ourselves.

“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matt. 22:36-40)

Reverence and respect for God's commandments teach us the way of love - love of God and love of neighbor. What is impossible to individuals is possible to God and those who have faith in God. God gives us the grace to love as he loves, to forgive as he forgives, to think as he thinks, and to act as he acts. - Gospel Meditation by Don Schwager

  These commandments have not changed for the past 3,400 years. Why? Because human nature has not changed. During the past 3,400 years, there have been all kinds of changes in the lives of human beings. Civilizations have changed. Knowledge has changed. Medicine has changed. Science and technology has changed. Politics and political systems have changed. Nations have changed. Government has changed. Perpetual change is the mark of the human experience during the past 3,400 years of history.

  Meanwhile, while all these changes have been going on for 3,400 years, human nature has not changed. Today, people still worship various gods in their lives. Today, people still swear and cure. Today, people still don’t find time to worship. Today, people still have problems honoring their parents. Today, people still murder, still commit adultery, still steal, still lie, still covet other peoples’ spouses or property. Change is all around us human beings, but human nature has not changed. People still need the Ten Commandments, for our human community as much today are people did 3,400 years ago.

  With the arrival of Jesus in human history, how does Jesus handle the Ten Commandments.? In the first five books of the Bible, which are called the Law, there are more than 600 laws, rules and regulations for human society. Jesus seems less concerned with all of these 600 laws, rules and regulations. Instead, Jesus highlights two commandments in a special and sacred way. Jesus says that the whole Old Testament rested on two commandments and everything else depended.

  The first commandment was this, quoting from Deuteronomy 5. “You shall love the Lord your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.” In this commandment, Jesus invites us to love, not only our husband or wife or children or grandchildren or family or friends or neighbors. More than that, Jesus invites us to love God, who is the source of all life. And we are invited to love God, not just a little bit, but with all our heart, soul, and mind. For Jesus, this is the first and greatest commandment.

  And the second is like it for Jesus. Jesus quotes from Leviticus 19:18, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” That is, just as you look after your own self-interest and life, so you are to work for the benefit of your neighbor as you would work for the benefit of your own life. Jesus said, “Do these, and you shall live. Do these, and you will understand what it means to discover your life. Joy in life consists of loving both God and your fellow human beings.”

Lenten Devotional – Day 28

Q. 41. Where is the moral law summarily comprehended?

A. The moral law is summarily comprehended in the Ten Commandments.

“And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” (Matt. 19:17)

A businessman notorious for his ruthlessness, announced to Samuel Clemens, aka, Mark Twain, "Before I die, I mean to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I will climb Mount Sinai and read the Ten Commandments aloud at the top."
"I have a better idea," said Clemens, "You could stay home in Boston and keep them." - Clifton Fadiman, ed., The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1985), 483.

  Many states have passed laws requiring each motor vehicle licensed in the state must have an inspection sticker generally on the driver’s side of the windshield. States made these laws because some of us are careless about keeping our cars in safe operating condition. The law is for the good of the owner of the vehicle and for the others who might be jeopardized by its operation. So the law is for the good of all concerned.

  Suppose the legislators in your state passed another law requiring a green star sticker on the passenger side of the windshield. They explain the purpose of this law: “We made this law just to let you know that we have the authority to legislate. We want you to get this sticker because we can simply make you are get it.” That would be an arbitrary, tyrannical law. During the next election, the electorate may be inclined to see some new faces in the legislature!

  Law must originate from authority in order to have validity; yet just laws are not arbitrary expressions of authority, just because one have this authority. The Ten Commandments lose their authority if you don’t embrace the author. Simply having the Commandments posted on the wall without a relationship with the creator produces little compliance.

  The Ten Commandments, for instance, were not arbitrary laws, but were based on principles, which have proven themselves for centuries among humans. In it, God is saying, “Remember your spiritual relationship with me, and remember the dignity and purpose of man.”

  Theologian Douglas Alan Walrath reminds us that "God's love includes not only a sustaining center but protective boundaries." Indeed, by dishonoring the boundaries, we diminish the power of what he calls "God's endless, bounded love." Boundaries like the Ten Commandments "protect us from jeopardizing our relationship with God, from violating other humans and from destroying ourselves." Or, as he ends his treatment of this theme, "We become the persons God created us to be as we are blessed with God's soul power. That godliness continues in our lives as we embrace God's endless love and honor the boundaries set by God's commandments." - Walrath, Counterpoints: The Dynamics of Believing Today (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1991), 60, 61, 63.

Lenten Devotional – Day 27

Q. 39. What is the duty which God requires of man?

A. The duty which God requires of man is obedience to his revealed will.

“And Samuel said, “Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obedience to the voice of the LORD? Surely, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams.” (1 Sam. 15:22)

Obedience to God's will does not mean everything will go smoothly, that the wind will always be at our backs and that the journey will be easy. Jesus told his disciples to cross to the other side of the lake, even though he knew the wind would be working against them. Despite the wind's contrariness, they struggled on because they knew they were doing his will. -Shawn Craig in Between Sundays, cited in Christianity Today, February 8, 1999, 72.

  There is an old Jewish joke about a child who hates kreplach dumplings. His mother tries to reassure him and one evening brings him into the kitchen, standing him next to her as she prepares dinner. "Look," she says, "here's the dough. First you flatten it and shape it." The boy nods happily. "Then you take the filling and lay it across the dough.” The boy nods once more, happy as can be. "Finally, you fold the dough over the filling and you have ... "Kreplach!" The boy screams and runs sobbing from the room.

  In many ways, when it comes to the word "obedience" and the theme of "trust and obey," we are in the same position as the boy in the story. Each step of the Christian faith suits us fine. We applaud faith. We rejoice when there is talk of love and hope. But then we see what all this has been leading up to; and, like the boy who hated kreplach, we scream, "Oh, no, obedience.”

  It goes without saying that the life of obedient discipleship does not promise to be easy. Trusting and obeying would hardly be such difficult traits to master if we were privy to all the plans and plots intertwined around our lives. Discipleship means not knowing where we are going, but finding joy and contentment in knowing that we go there with God.

  In an article entitled "God Lite," theologian James R. Edwards traces how "The more we obey God, the more real God becomes to us and the greater our love grows. And the more we love God, the more we become like God.”

  "It is like a good marriage: People who love their spouses want to please them; and if they do not want to please their spouses, they can hardly talk of loving them." Edwards then shows the way in which "obedience is not a penalty levied on faith. It is the strength of faith. The Bible absolutely will not separate faith and obedience, as though obedience were some kind of inheritance tax that God levies on the free gift of salvation. God cannot separate them and still offer salvation. There is something about love that is no longer love apart from obedience. Dietrich Bonhoeffer kept saying this in The Cost of Discipleship: 'Only those who obey can believe, and only those who believe can obey."' - Christianity Today, April 29, 1991, p. 30.

Lenten Devotional – Day 26

Q. 38. What benefits do believers receive from Christ at the resurrection?

A. At the resurrection, believers, being raised up in glory, shall be openly acknowledged and acquitted in the Day of Judgment, and made perfectly blessed in the full enjoying of God to all eternity.

“So it is with the resurrection of the dead. What is sown is perishable, what is raised is imperishable. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power.” (1 Cor. 15:42-43)

Please God, don't let me be behind Mother Teresa at Judgment Day. - T-shirt seen at Chautauqua Institution

  God in Jesus Christ assures us that the final victory will be God’s and the establishment of God’s Kingdom into eternity will also include judgment. The Westminster Confession indicates that “God hath appointed a day, wherein he will judge the world in righteousness by Jesus Christ, to whom all power and judgment is given of the Father.” All will be judged to “appear before the tribunal of Christ, to give an account of their thoughts, words, and deed; and to receive according to what they have done in the body, whether good or evil.” The comfort of the disciple of Christ is the recognition that judgment will be carried out by Jesus Christ who is also our savior.

  20^th Century theologian Karl Barth comments on this comfort by saying: “This future comforts the church in all affliction and persecution because it knows the Judge… The Judge is one who was judged for us. Through him we have been acquitted and from him we can now look forward to joy and glory.” - Karl Barth, The Heidelberg Catechism for Today, Richmond, John Knox Press, 1964, p. 82.

  “Jesus said, ‘God is not the God of the dead but of the living’” (Luke 20:38). His meaning was that those who love and are loved by God are not allowed to cease to exist, because they are God’s treasures. He delights in them and intends to hold onto them. He has even prepared for them an individualized eternal work in his vast universe.”...

  “On the day he (Jesus) died, he covenanted with another man being killed along with him to meet that very day in a place he called paradise. This term carries the suggestion of a lovely gardenlike area.”

  “Anyone who realizes that reality is God’s, and has seen a little bit of what God has already done, will understand that such a “Paradise” would be no problem at all. And there God will preserve every one of his treasured friends in the wholeness of their personal existence precisely because he treasures them in that form. Could he enjoy their fellowship, could they serve him, if they were “dead”?” - Dallas Willard, The Divine Conspiracy, p. 84-85

Lenten Devotional – Day 25

Q. 37. What benefits do believers receive from Christ at death?

A. The souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness, and do immediately pass into glory; and their bodies, being still united to Christ, do rest in their graves till the resurrection.

“So we are always confident; even though we know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord—for we walk by faith, not by sight.” (2 Cor. 5:6-7)

To a world ruled by fate and the whims of capricious gods, Christianity brought the promise of everlasting life. At the core of the Christian faith was the assertion that the crucified Jesus was resurrected by God and present in the church as "the body of Christ." The message was clear: By submitting to death, Jesus had destroyed its power, thereby making eternal life available to everyone. This Christian affirmation radically changed the relationship between the living and the dead as Greeks and Romans understood it. For them, only the gods were immortal - that's what made them gods. Philosophers might achieve immortality of the soul, as Plato taught, but the view from the street was that human consciousness survived in the dim and affectless underworld of Hades. "The Resurrection is an enormous answer to the problem of death," says Notre Dame theologian John Dunne. "The idea is that the Christian goes with Christ through death to everlasting life. Death becomes an event, like birth, that is lived through." - Kenneth L. Woodward, "2000 Years of Jesus," Newsweek, March 29, 1999, 55.

  "Souls are like wax waiting for a seal. By themselves they have no special identity. Their destiny is to be softened and prepared in this life, by God's will, to receive, at their death, the seal of their own degree of likeness to God in Christ. And this is what it means, among other things, to be judged by Christ." -Thomas Merton, "New Seeds of Contemplation"

  The transition from “earthly” life to “heavenly” life is part of the Kingdom of God and is a reality that all persons face. Reformed faith takes death seriously. While physical death is associated with sin, death is also part of the natural biological processes. For the disciple of Christ the processes of justification, adoption, and sanctification is complete and made perfect in holiness.

  The Christian hope of eternal life includes the “resurrection of the body” and the resurrection of the dead as we affirm when we join together in worship and declare our faith in the Apostles’ Creed. This hope emerges from the resurrection of Jesus Christ in his act of defeating death on the cross. God redeems the whole person, not just the “immortal soul,” but the whole existence. Paul asserts that “we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” (Rom. 6:5)

  This resurrection is the new life that emerges from the physical death of this earthly existence, it is God’s act for us. (1 Cor. 15:42ff). Our resurrection bodies will be “ours” in that in some mysterious way, our own selves will be raised from the dead, our own bodies not another human being, but we are the ones who will be “changed” (1 Cor. 15:51-52).

Lenten Devotional – Day 24

Q. 36. What are the benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification?

A. The benefits which in this life do accompany or flow from justification, adoption, and sanctification are: assurance of God’s love, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Ghost, increase of grace, and perseverance therein to the end.

“For the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” (Rom. 14:17)

“There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for the long apprenticeship in what earlier generations of Christians called holiness.” -Eugene Peterson

  A parishioner complained about the pastor's constant harping on the theme of drawing nigh unto God. She confessed that I don't want to get close to God. I just want to get over in a corner and sneak into heaven quietly. I don't want to be a saint. I just don't want to go to hell.

  I cannot believe what I'm hearing! I exclaimed.

  I can explain it easily, she said calmly. When I started the ninth grade I set my heart on finishing high school with straight C's. And I did. You see, if you fail you have to repeat, and I wanted out. But if you start making A's people begin to expect things of you.

  It's exactly like that with God, she continued. If you're too bad you'll go to hell, and I don't want that. But if you're too good, he'll send you to India, and I don't want that either.

  Rutland provides a marvelous commentary of how his parishioner is not an isolated story, but part of a pattern of belief that reaches out to choke the lives of millions of sincere, but sincerely confused Christians. Quite apart from the obvious theology of works, her theory of C-class Christianity betrayed a pathetically distorted understanding of the character and nature of God. Her confusion, far more serious than the merely epidural misjudgment of 'how God acts,' sprang from her twisted concept of 'who God is.' - Mark Rutland's The Finger of God: Reuniting Power and Holiness in the Church (Wilmore, KY: Bristol Books, 1988), 16-17.

  Good works and obedience to God’s law are part of our response to justification, adoption and sanctification. They emerge as a response of gratitude to the salvation and redemption we experience in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

  We live in a society which wants and some ways demands instant results. We don’t want to wait, we dislike things which require patience, we want it all now, but it can’t be ours in an instant. Discipleship requires following Jesus for as long as it takes and gaining the benefits of justification, adoption and sanctification can take a long time. However long it takes, it is worth it and the benefits revealed to us will be “assurance of God’s love, peace of conscience, joy in the Holy Ghost, increase of grace, and perseverance therein to the end.” Disciples of Christ who achieve these benefits discover a rejoicing which fills the soul and brings the full expression of joy in their lives. The goal is not to get into heaven, the goal is to do the will of God by taking into our lives the full benefits of God’s saving act in Jesus Christ.