Not long ago I posted an Ask RC piece in which the question was, “What kind of pizza topping are you?” I didn’t try to answer the question, because the piece was actually about the internet and its sundry and silly quizzes and how we give them too much credit, even while we think we’re too clever to give them any credit. One reader responded with words to this affect- “That’s an incredibly stupid question, even for you.” Now I’m no shrinking violet but I thought, “Surely it would have been biting enough had he simply said it was a stupid question. But to go even further, “even for you” is kind of cruel.”
Which is what inspired this Ask RC. The answer is not too terribly complicated. In fact the answer reminds me of an answer my grandmother gave me when I was a little boy that deeply puzzled me. I asked her why my grandfather was so grouchy. She, thinking I meant, “today” mentioned that he had fallen and hurt his knee. I, having meant “all the time” went away thinking that must have been quite a painful fall to make a man perpetually grumpy. People are such jerks because a long time ago these two people listened to someone they shouldn’t have listened to, came to distrust the living God, and defied Him by eating a piece of fruit He had, for a time, forbidden them. That is why people are such jerks.
What this answer ought to remind us of, however, is the right way to ask the question. Usually, when we say, “Why are people such jerks” what we really mean is “Why are other people such jerks?” Because we are all jerks we tend to think that only other people are jerks. The question ought to be, “Why are we such jerks?” This gentleman who apparently believes I mostly ask stupid questions apparently thinks I’m something of a jerk. And he’s quite right. In fact, I’m far more of a jerk than even he knows. Heck, I’m far more of a jerk than even I know, and I’m with me all the time, and know my every thought. There are only three persons who know me better than me, and they would all agree that I’m a jerk.
Which is why they covenanted together to rescue me. The Father sent the Son to live a perfect, not-a-jerk-in-any-way life in my place, and in the place of all those who the Father gives to Him. The Son died a jerk-in-every-way death in our place. The Spirit gives us new life, applies that work, and begins the lengthy process of de-jerking us, which process will end at our deaths. For now, when they look at me they see Him, and they love me with a perfect, infinite and immutable love.
The ultimate answer to every “why” question has two simple answers- for God’s glory and for the good of His children. He is glorified in saving jerks like me. And jerks like me are saved, loved, adopted, heirs.
In my Introduction to Philosophy class I had my students read through a portion of Clarence Darrow’s closing argument in the trial of Leopold and Loeb. These two young men murdered a teenage boy simply because they embraced the ethics of Nietzsche and thought themselves capable of committing the perfect crime. Darrow’s argument is classic rationalization. He argued that the boys couldn’t be blamed for what they had done because of the failures of their parents in their upbringing, because of their malfunctioning endocrine glands, because of childhood traumas. Darrow argued that retributive justice was barbaric, and unfair, that what these young men needed was rehabilitation. Darrow argued for a more “humanitarian” theory of punishment.
Darrow is best known for defending Scopes for teaching evolution in the Tennessee trial memorialized in Inherit the Wind. William Jennings Bryan served as the prosecuting attorney. As gifted as Bryan was, Darrow met a far more astute opponent in CS Lewis. Lewis published his essay in an obscure Australian quarterly but it is republished in the collection of essays, God in the Dock. There Lewis does not argue the virtues of capital punishment. Rather he argues against the humanitarianism of a humanitarian theory of punishment. Time was prisons were called penal institutions. Now they are Rehabilitation Centers. Can you see the difference? In the former you went to pay your debt. In the latter you go to be healed. In the former you are the perpetrator. In the latter you are the victim. In the former you are responsible. In the latter you are a helpless pawn.
And therein is the problem. It sounds nice, wonderful even to embrace a view that covers over our guilt. Trouble is the same theory covers over our humanity. It robs us of our dignity. Lewis, however, exposed yet another horror that comes with this theory. When you pay your debt to society, when you are responsible for what you do, that debt can be paid. When, however, you are “sick” you are not done until your masters determine you are done.
There is yet another problem, however. If we are victims and can’t be held responsible for what we do, then those who make such determinations about us are likewise victims and can’t be held responsible for what they do. If we are all puppets on strings then those who think they hold the strings need to look up. They will find they too are on strings. In a closed system where men are machines to be manipulated someone or something must manipulate the men manipulating other men. As Lewis said in The Abolition of Man–
Man’s conquest of Nature, if the dreams of some scientific planners are realized, means the rule of a few hundreds of men over billions upon billions of men. There neither is nor can be any simple increase of power on Man’s side. Each new power won by man is a power over man as well. Each advance leaves him weaker as well as stronger. In every victory, besides being the general who triumphs, he is also the prisoner who follows the triumphal car.
There is no escaping responsibility and maintaining humanity. We do what we do because we are what we are. We have no one to blame but ourselves.
Thesis 13- We must pray for those who watch out for our souls.
The Reformers did not merely affirm that Scripture alone could bind the conscience, they also stood firm on the doctrine of the perspicuity of Scripture. Perspicuity is a rather fancy, or unclear word meaning, “clear.” That is the Reformers, while recognizing that some parts are more clear than others, affirmed that the Bible is clear in what it teaches. One need not have specialized training in order to know what the Bible was actually saying. While this doctrine was probably a comfort to humble believers at the time of the Reformation, in our day we might find it a tad insulting. Wouldn’t it be better, we seem to reason, if the Bible were complicated, and it took a genius like me to make sense of it all? We complicate what is simple, in order to manifest our pride.
Consider, for instance, this plain command from the author of Hebrews- “Obey those who rule over you, and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls, as those who must give an account. Let them do so with joy and not with grief, for that would be unprofitable for you. Pray for us; for we are confident that we have a good conscience, in all things desiring to live honorably” (Hebrews 13: 17-18). I think it is safe to say that among those of us who are in tradition of the Reformation, that we are more apt to spend our time enjoying debate over who actually wrote the book of Hebrews than we do praying for those who watch out for our souls. When we argue about who wrote Hebrews we can show off how smart we are. When we pray for those who watch over us, we must confess how needful we are.
We come to texts like the above, and we have to find something to argue about. It couldn’t possibly mean that we ought to obey those who watch out for our souls. That’s just too easy. It couldn’t be calling us to pray for those who watch out for us. Wouldn’t it be better if we construct the perfect argument in favor of the perfect form of church government? Wouldn’t we be wiser to write the most perfect book of church order? Wouldn’t the church be safer from error, from schism, from a failure to love one another, if we study more carefully the nuances of Robert’s Rules of Order, for the sake of our elder board meetings?
Most all of us have seen failures in the church. We have seen moral failures among our pastors. We have seen church splits more nasty than celebrity divorces. We have seen internal church feuds that make the Hatfields and McCoys look like a quilting bee. We have broken fellowship over the color of the carpet in the church narthex. What we have failed to do is pray. We have failed to pray for our pastors and elders. We have failed to see them as shepherds called to watch over our souls. The solution isn’t a movement or a program. The solution is obedience. Pray for those who watch over your souls. And pray that you would obey them in all submission, that their callings would be joyful. Such would profit you well.
It is natural, when confronted with hardship, whether it be personal, national, even global, to wonder where the hand of God is in the hardship. When that hardship hits us or those whom we love, we often fall into fear that somehow this means God is angry or unhappy with us. When it hits those whom we hate, we often fall into an ungodly joy that somehow this means God is angry or unhappy with our enemies.
This much we know- God is sovereign over all things. If it happens, He ordained it to happen. God tells us just this in -I am the Lord, and there is no other;
There is no God besides Me. I will gird you, though you have not known Me, That they may know from the rising of the sun to its setting That there is none besides Me. I am the Lord, and there is no other; I form the light and create darkness,
I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do all these things’ (verses 5-7).
It is a short, but treacherous step to go from affirming God brings something to pass, however, to claiming to know why He brings something to pass. God ordained that the man born blind in would be born blind. But Jesus explicitly denies that God ordained this because of the sin of the man or his parents. Rather He ordained it that Jesus might manifest the glorious truth that He is the light of the world. God’s ways are not our ways. We must not presume to know His ways.
Could God be judging people or nations with the coronavirus? Of course He could. He is God, and He does indeed send judgment. He might, however, have a different goal in mind. Perhaps He has sent the virus to demonstrate to the watching world the compassion of His people. There may be a day when Christians are not just the first ones to respond, but are the only ones to respond. And such would glorify Christ.
Of course God is not inefficient. He is not consigned to pursuing one goal only. He could be judging people and nations with the virus. He could be showing believers and unbelievers alike that their false god, the state, is weak and anemic and can’t protect them. He could be reminding us all that death is coming for us all, and that what follows can be far worse. He could be providing opportunity for believers to reflect the glory of Christ in serving those in danger. He could be teaching His saints, if the virus isn’t as bad as some are making it out to be, one more lesson in how not to get caught up in media driven hype, or, if it is worse than it is being made out to be, He could be teaching His saints to not have our heads in the sand.
The glory of God’s Word is that we don’t have to read the tea leaves of current events to discern our calling. It, the Bible, equips us for every good work, including the good work of discerning our calling. Which means we can turn off the news and still know just what we are supposed to do- disciple the nations, bring all things under the subjection of Christ, visit widows and orphans in their trouble, rejoice and give thanks, to rest in His victory, to store up treasures in heaven. If we do these things, and the virus disappears, we will continue to do these things. If we do these things and coronavirus kills us all, we will die as faithful soldiers. Be of good cheer. He has already overcome the world.
