While it may be true that there are two kinds of people in the world, (those who like to divide the world into two kinds of people and those who don’t), there are in turn myriad places to draw these dividing lines. God Himself in Genesis 3 speaks of the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. As history moves forward toward the coming of the second Adam, the world is divided into Jews and Gentiles, who are, in fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham, ultimately brought together by the work of Christ, leaving us at the end of the story with two kinds of barnyard animals: sheep and goats.
Sometimes, I’m afraid, we draw with crooked lines. J. D. Hunter, a sociologist at the University of Virginia and a professing Christian, wrote an incisive and insightful book a decade or so back called Culture Wars. He argued therein that the world is divided into two kinds of people, the progressives and the orthodox. The progressives, whether they were raw secularists, new age devotees, non-observant Jews or mainline Protestants, agreed on one thing, that God had not spoken. They denied together that there was any transcendent truth. The orthodox, on the other hand, again whether Muslim or Christian, Mormon or Christian Scientist, agreed that God had indeed spoken. They agreed that there was a transcendent source of truth and morality. They just couldn’t agree on what that source was.
It’s a perfectly appropriate way to divide the world, as long as you realize that there are plenty of goats still on our side. Co-belligerancy in the culture wars may be a good thing, an appropriate battle strategy. Wisdom requires, however, that we remember that it comes with a peculiar temptation. It is all too easy to delight in what unites us, and diminish what divides us. It is all too easy to forget that our allies in the battle are our enemies in the war. That temptation is particularly grave when the barbarians are at the gate, when all the world is crumbling down around us.
Charles Colson argued that we have entered into a new dark age. But this time it’s different. The barbarians are no longer at the gate. Instead they sit upon thrones within. They aren’t marauding hordes, but polished assassins. What does a collapsing civilization look like? Because we are worldly we think it is found in the thundering hoof beats of Ghengis Khan and his army. We think it comes by way of Viking longboats, landing on our shores. We think we see civilization ebbing as the Roman army pulls back from the frontiers to defend the core. The truth of the matter, as the barbarian Pogo understood, is that we have met the enemy, and we are it. Here is the sign not of the coming destruction of civilization, but the current destruction: millions of dead babies, killed by medical professionals, hired by mothers, all enjoying the sanction and safety of the state. Judgment is here, and we are judged all the more that we do not know it.
Saint Augustine rightly drew the line. He wrote, in the dusk of the Roman Empire, of two cities. Some were citizens of man’s city. But by God’s grace, some looked for a city whose builder and maker was God. What separated these two cities, and the citizens therein, however, wasn’t what we think. Man’s city wasn’t simply that place that would not acknowledge God. The city of God isn’t that place where everyone is a theist. Instead Augustine’s explanation of these two cities reflected another important part of Augustine’s work, his battle with the heretic Pelagius. The battle between Augustine and Pelagius was the same battle that rages between the two cities. What separates the citizens of these two cities is the same thing that separated the two men praying in the temple. One prayed, “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get” (Luke 18:12). The other prayed, “God be merciful to me, a sinner” (v. 13). There are, as such, two kinds of people in this world, those who know they are sinners, and those who think otherwise. This is the great divide.
The culture wars call us to forget this distinction — to exchange it for another. This is why we keep finding ourselves embracing assorted power-grabbing schemes. Our neighbors hope in princes, and we hope with them. We are yoked with the unrepentant, which means we will always receive judgment. The penitent in Jesus’ parable, on the other hand, wasn’t a mere pietist. His prayer wasn’t merely private. He wasn’t so heavenly minded that he was no earthly good. Instead, this is the very power for the battle. We will not change the world by drawing perfect lines. We will only change the world by confessing that all we ever do is draw crooked lines. It is repentance that will bring down the walls of Jericho, that will establish the walls of Jerusalem. I tell you the truth, the penitent went out from the temple justified. Still more, he went out a soldier of the king. As Jesus ended this parable He reminded us of the weapons of His warfare: “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
We are a people of unclean lips, and we dwell in a land of unclean lips. What separates us from them is simply repentance. Our exaltation, after all, is simply to rule with Christ. It is His kingdom we seek, His glory that we pursue. And all these things will be added unto us.
The use of incense by God’s people goes at least as far back as the sacrificial system established by God for the nation of Israel. The incense symbolized the sweet aroma of the prayers of God’s people rising up into heaven, which prayers were a delight to God. This same practice and symbolism was a part of the church at least up to the time of the Reformation.
Calvin and those who followed him took the position that the use of incense was a part of the Old Testament ceremonial law, and thus should not be allowed. The book of Hebrews explains how the Old Testament sacrificial system was a shadow, a type, and Christ the reality or anti-type. To go back to the shadow is to implicitly deny that Christ has come once for all. As Paul warned the Hebrews against going back to the shadows, so Calvin warned Protestants against going back.
The English Reformation eventually birthed the Puritans whose desire it was to purify the church of the remains of Roman theology and worship. They vehemently rejected the use of incense, and eventually exercised influence beyond the Church of England. As such most, but not all, Protestant churches reject the use of incense.
While I understand the reasoning of Calvin, the Puritans and those who follow after them I take a different perspective. It is absolutely right and proper that we should never go back to a sacrificial system that pointed us toward the finished work of Christ. His work is finished, and there is no reason for going back. That said, we ought not to reject everything that was established in the Old Covenant. The Psalms were sung in the Old Covenant, but we certainly may and I would argue should still sing them today. God’s people gathered in the Old Covenant, and we do not deny the coming of Christ by gathering together in the New Covenant. We should have a deep fear of reinstituting Old Covenant sacrifice, but not be afraid to repeat any and everything they might have done.
They, and we, for instance, pray. What is it, I wonder, about the glorious reality of the finished work of Christ, that is implicitly denied by continuing to symbolize our prayers ascending in the incense? We still pray. God still delights to hear our prayers. We can be confident that they are indeed still a sweet aroma to Him. So why not the incense?
We ought to reject what became Rome’s false gospel. We ought to reject man-made additions and sundry forms of strange fire. We ought to reject sacrifices. I cannot see, however, how all of these truths mean we may no longer use incense in worship. Indeed I would suggest that if and as we use incense we remember that the faith did not begin with us, with the Puritans, with Calvin, not even with the New Covenant. We remember that we are a part of the one people of God that stretches all the way back to the Garden. That in turn is not just a sweet aroma to God, but a sweet aroma to us as well.
Though one could argue that it is bad for business, it has been my habit of late to emphasize a rather simple point- that wisdom is rather simple. God has not hidden His Word, but revealed it, and anyone laboring in too many complexities to reveal it is, more likely than not, actually concealing it. If your exegesis of a passage ends up looking like one of those equations from Good Will Hunting, or A Beautiful Mind, you know the kind, where there are more letters (often Greek) than numbers and it takes up the whole chalkboard, then you’re probably doing it wrong.
The same is true about economics. The dismal science is neither dismal, nor a science. Rather, it is simple common sense. The way to prosperity is not complicated. You need not acquire specialized tools that are in high demand. What you need to do is to work hard, and to consume less than you produce. That is the way to wealth. The way to poverty is to be lazy, and to produce less than you consume. These two principles apply for the individual, the family, a business, a government and a nation. Here’s a simple corollary. If you find yourself behind the financial eight ball because you’ve been consuming more than you’ve been producing, consuming more won’t help the situation. Debt does not solve debt.
Foolishness, on the other hand, can be horribly complicated. Things got real ugly during the Carter administration, fiscally speaking, because the government had figured out a way to turn debt into more debt by turning it into money. They borrowed money, then borrowed on the IOU’s. That’s a rather expensive wind and smoke machine designed to tell us all with all the thundering majesty of the Wizard of Oz, “PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE DEBT BEHIND THE CURTAIN!!!” Which is precisely what we’re being told now. Prices are going up, not because businesses have gotten more greedy. They’ve gone up because the government has been printing more money like it’s going out of style. It’s not Putin’s fault. It is the fault of the United States government that has racked up a debt in the tens of trillions.
Smoke and mirrors will not change hard realities. And foolishness cannot defeat wisdom. Regular people like you and me have for too long thought we could borrow our way to prosperity. Your local bankers and mortgage brokers thought they could borrow their way to prosperity. The Gordon Gekkos who walk the caverns of Wall Street thought they could borrow their way to prosperity. The Beltway Bandits thought they could borrow their way to prosperity. The piper is at the door, waiting to get paid, from all of us.
What can you do in these complex and troubled times? The simple things. You can work hard. You can produce more than you consume. You can refuse to get caught up in all the foolishness. And you can teach your children to do the same.
I’d like to posit four guesses, though I won’t be able to give a definitive defense of any of them. As the kids say, I’m bereft of receipts.
First, we may not be as radically more hurried than we once were. Instead we may be comparing the weights and responsibilities we have at this later stage in our lives with an earlier stage in our lives. The fewer expectations we have the fewer burdens we carry. When I was a baby I had no deadlines. As a kid I had to go to school, do homework and a few chores. But meals were prepared for me. My laundry was done for me. My housing was given to me. As a teen I picked up a part time job, mostly to have money to spend on my favorite things in my abundant free time. Children, a home and a yard, internet, electric, cell phone, insurance, gas, these things add up as demands on our time and mental energy. Most of these things, however, are things grown-ups had to deal with fifty years ago.
Second, we may be guilty of allowing our “want to’s” into our “have to’s.” If I feel rushed because I have to get through my racquetball game in time to go out to dinner before I go to the movies I’m failing to enjoy the racquetball game, dinner out and movie as what they are, times of rest and refreshment. If I have to work long hours in order to get my work done before my three week river cruise in Europe I may not be as hurried as I think I am.
Third, our efficiency tools, instead of increasing our margins, have crowded into them. The cellphone made everyplace we were into the workplace and every hour of the day work time. The smartphone made everyplace we were into worldwide information exchange place and every hour of the day time to exchange information. We’re expected to produce the results that come from constant connection. Even when we’re not on our phones, knowing that we could be wears on us.
My fourth theory is that we have forgotten how to rest. It is not my desire to dredge up old debates on keeping the sabbath, or the relationship of it to the Lord’s Day. I don’t want to dicker over whether a game of nine-pins is permitted or a Little League game forbidden. Far less do I want to dip my toes into arguments about Blue Laws. I simply want to observe that one other difference between our hurriedness and the relative peace of our grandparents is that they, by and large, neither worked, nor played hard, nor bought and sold on Sundays.
One thing we know from the fourth commandment is that God made us to both work, and to rest. We have been designed for the rhythms of the week, the only time measurement unconnected to the stars and the moon. I do want to encourage this- seek greater rest. Make time for genuine rest. Reading a book may not be as exciting as mountain biking, but it is more peaceful. Taking a nap may not be as entertaining a trip to the mall, but it is more restful. A simple game of backgammon may not give the adrenaline rush of a game of Mortal Combat with players around the world, but it will give you time to slow down and time with an actual person on the other side of the board. There is life in rest. Shalom.
The devil never wastes a good temptation. First, he presents it. When we fall for it he is right there not to congratulate but to accuse. When our foolish sin leads to hardship, as it always will, he tempts us to doubt the Father’s love for us. He isn’t, however, done yet. Our sin becomes for him a tool to silence us when we seek to speak in defense of the truth.
While I like to think I’m maturing away from such things I have over the years engaged in some internet debate. One way I know I’ve won such a debate is when the person I’m debating sinks to ad hominem, attacking me rather than my argument. When they respond, “Yeah, well, you drove drunk with your kids in the car” I throw my hands up in victory. That said, it may well be that I’m not so much maturing away from internet debates but shrinking away in fear. Because I know sooner or later someone will throw an old sin in my face. I can take it, but, I confess, it stings.
I’m not, I suspect, alone on this. In fact I suspect we often allow ourselves to be led into more sin by the weight of past sin. I wonder if the evangelical church would have been so quick to fold on the origins debate had not the church not gotten egg on its face over geo-centrism. We folded against Darwin because the ghost of Galileo haunted us. Or consider the full-scale retreat of evangelicals in the wake of the woke. How many are afraid to stand up, say in defense of Martin Luther King’s dream of a colorblind society, because our ancestors were so horribly wrong on racial issues? We believe we’re not fit to speak to the issue because we were once wrong on the issue.
This, friends, is the devil’s work. Not only has the work of Jesus on the cross rescued us from the eternal penalty of our sins, it has freed us from such bondage (Heb. 2:14-15). Cowering before these reminders of our past sins, coming to us through the ministrations of demons in flesh suits, is a failure to believe in the power and work of the gospel. My shame, as much as my sin, was nailed to the cross. My acknowledgment of my sins remains. The burden, however, is gone. The devil’s use of my past as a weapon against me, and against us, has been neutralized. Jesus has set us free, and we are free indeed.
The devil, the accuser of the brethren (Rev. 12: 10) has been defeated. As has been said by others, when the devil reminds us of our past, we ought to remind him of his future. Remind him as well that the sin he seeks to remind us of the Father has already forgotten about (Psalm 103). My prayer is that each of us, first, will stop joining the devil in accusing the brethren. Second, that we will hear only the Master’s voice as He calls us His beloved. Third, that we would without shame or fear speak all that He commands to the world that accuses us.
