Interpreting difficulties in the ministry

A question was raised by Suman in this week’s class. The prophet Haggai rebukes the people in Jerusalem for saying that it was not yet time to build the Temple, because of the difficulties they were facing. The question asked was, how we know that the difficulties indicate that God’s time had not come, and when it was the natural opposition one faces from those who are against God. Since the response we make is diametrically opposite we need to be able to distinguish between the two.

I tried to think of instances in the Bible where difficulties indicated that God’s time had not come. I could not think of any instance in the Old Testament!! In the New Testament Paul mentions of being hindered in his plans, which he saw as a means of God guiding him in Acts 16:6-9. But here Paul was actively attempting to perform some action for the furtherance of God’s plans and had not given up. It was in this activity that he experienced the guidance of God through a hindrance and a call to Macedonia.

It would appear from this that difficulties never mean giving up and waiting for God to reveal His will. It may mean that I need to seek God’s will for the moment, but it does not mean doing nothing. Most often it will be the natural opposition to the work of God and is not something for us to be surprised at. If God wants us to be doing something different you will get a clear word from God accordingly – just like Paul in Acts 16 and the prophecies of the 7^th and 8^th century prophets against the activities of the kings of the time. So if we do not have a word we need to assume that it is natural opposition to the work of God and not that God’s time has not come.

In this regard I have found the advice of Prakash Yesudian to have been very useful. He said that we would be continuously tempted to question the call we have responded to because of difficulties in our life. He advised that we should never question the first call we had received but stubbornly stay with the call till we hear a clear word from God otherwise.

Vision of Ezekiel 10

One of the interesting points that came up in today’s discussion in the Prophet’s class was the vision which Ezekiel saw of the glory or presence of God leaving the Temple in Ezekiel ch 10. The vision creates a problem as it can be seen as similar to the concept in Hinduism and other similar faiths where God is seen as residing in a physical space. In contrast the Jewish faith always saw God as beyond boundaries, and so the prophets proclaimed God’s judgement on the nations outside Israel as they saw as God ruling over the whole universe.

The Temple was where God met Israel, but was not the residence of Yahweh. So how do we interpret this vision of Ezekiel?

My preference is not to see the vision of Ch. 10 as depicting the departure of Yahweh from the Temple, but rather from Israel. So it is a vision of Yahweh breaking His relationship with Israel and departing, leaving Israel in exile.

The obvious difficulty with this is that Yahweh has promised in the various prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah of the restoration of Israel and so Yahweh had not departed from Israel!

My understanding is that the promises of restoration speak not only of the Israelites but also the Gentiles coming to the restored Israel and this refers to the Church and not the nation of Israel. So the Temple of Ezekiel 40-48 is the New Israel, the church, and the return of Yahweh to the Temple in chapter 43 is Yahweh establishing a new relationship with the new Israel, the Church.

Those who prefer to see Ezekiel 40-48 as a picture of the restoration of the nation of Israel at the time of Cyrus would find it difficult to explain why many of the promises were not fulfilled at that time. The same is true of the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah on the restoration of Israel as they were only partially fulfilled at the time of Cyrus. These promises are fulfilled only in Christ and so we need to see the restoration of Israel as the New Testament Church.

Who are apostles

I am making this a new thread as some may be interested in this.

Pete said...

Mr. Lee and others . . . a question came up in our staff devotions this morning. First, how would we define the role "Apostle". Secondly, Paul addressed himself as an Apostle (i.e. Gel' 1:1). He was even obligated to defend his role to other leaders in the church (i.e. Gal 2:7-9) " . . . as Peter is an Apostle to the Jews I am to the Jews etc." How, was he qualified to claim that role? How could/would one claim that role today? Peter

Gospel of the Kingdom

1. In the study of the Prophets, we find that the false prophets were characterised by four traits:-

                a. They prophesied peace when there was no peace

                b. They prophesied for material gain

                c. Their message brought no reformation in the lives of people

                d. They had not been in the presence of God.

This would be a fair description of much of today’s preaching, since the gospel is “good news” and so we preach the “good news” that God is at peace with us. With the taint of the prosperity gospel, all the preachers justify their huge incomes. Because of the lack of a call for an encounter with God, lives are not changed and the church seems to be in the same mess as the nation of Israel in 8^th and 7^th century B.C.

A question was raised by one of the discussion networks as to what is the minimum content of the gospel that we can agree on. Once we began looking at the question, it became apparent that the gospel is far more complicated than popular preachers would have it. To me the gospel is of the kingdom.  Let me know what you think of it.

The Gospel of the Kingdom

Introduction

One of the struggles of the church has been to reconcile the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the Gospel of Paul. This has led some to see it as two different Gospels and to say that Paul changed the whole meaning of the Gospel to his understanding. We obviously reject this view, but this still leaves us with the problem of reconciling the two.

Jesus, according to Matthew preached the Gospel of the kingdom, which was Good News to the poor according to Luke.

Paul preached Christ crucified and risen and ascended into heaven.

I could give different approaches to dealing with this. One is to see that the Gospel in the four Gospels as necessarily incomplete as the crucifixion was in the future and so it was a prelude to the Gospel as preached by Paul. So hints to the work of the cross are scattered through the Gospels, especially after the confession of Peter, but the Gospel preached is that of the kingdom.

To avoid confusion in reference to the four Gospels and The Gospel of Jesus I will call the latter the Good News rather than Gospel from here on.

But I would prefer to launch into my thesis as I have not studied all the different attempts to solve this question and so do not dare to venture even a simple sketch of their positions.

The Gospel of Jesus

What is the Good News of the kingdom? It is the Good News that God was establishing His kingdom here and a call to people to join that kingdom. People were called to Repent, because that kingdom had come into their midst and was available. So what were they to “turn their minds” (repent) from? The kingdoms of the earth!!

If we look at Matthew’s Gospel it is when JB is imprisoned that Jesus begins His call to establish the Kingdom of God as against the kingdom of Herod.

This establishment of the Kingdom of God was Good News to the poor for within the Kingdom of God people were cared for, they received justice, and oppression disappeared. Also this kingdom was in opposition to the kingdom of Satan and we see this conflict in the many healings and driving out of demons by Jesus. This conflict with Satan is depicted as clearly as the conflict with physical authorities in the form of the high priest and the Roman officials.

People were asked to believe in this Kingdom and in Jesus Christ and to enter the kingdom. So when Jesus was crucified, died and rose again, what happened to this Kingdom which was promised? Did it disappear and be replaced by a “spiritual” kingdom dealing only in spiritual matters and not the physical also like Jesus preached and did?

Here Paul’s genius saw what Jesus was doing and developed the hidden ideas of the Gospel of Jesus into the completion we see now. Unfortunately the Protestant – Roman Catholic position saw the popular Preaching in the church rejecting many aspects of the Gospel which are central to it because of the distortions to these ideas they perceived in the Roman Catholic Church.  The question is can they re-discover these ideas of the gospel.

The Gospel of Paul

Paul saw the community of faith built up by people who trusted in Jesus completely for their physical and spiritual lives and any other needs they may have. “We are no longer living for ourselves” of II Cor 5:15 makes this fairly clear. But he said that entry into this community was made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ which dealt with our spiritual failures and (I believe our physical failures – e.g. flunking your exam and not only your illnesses!). This was also stated by Jesus when He said that the Son of Man came to give His life as a ransom for many.

But this community of God lives in the world which is opposed to the kingdom of God. In this conflict the Kingdom of God does not withdraw, but lives like a leaven within reaching out to and transforming those who are called and chosen. All that we as believers do in this world is being a part of that leaven.

Since the Roman Catholic Church sees itself as this Kingdom of God, popular Christianity threw the Kingdom out and reduced the Good News to the doctrine of salvation, which in its extreme form asks people to believe in the doctrine rather than in Jesus Christ!!

Demands of the Good News

So what does the Good News demand from us? That we believe in Jesus and the Kingdom He is setting up, and commit their entire lives and possessions to this Kingdom! This was the challenge to the rich young ruler!

So what do we preach? The “Good News of the Kingdom”. That God has come and dealt with our weaknesses and so we can enter this Kingdom and He will look after us and provide for us as we obey Him and follow His principles. We will never be asked to leave the kingdom as long as we believe and trust in Jesus for our whole life.

This Good News does not appeal to the rich as they feel that they can look after themselves quite well and only require assistance for spiritual salvation. So they ask Macdonalds if they can have the meat in the burger without the bread sandwich!! Unfortunately as the rich young ruler learnt, this is not possible. But as the preachers soon learnt that if they want to be well off this is what they need to give. And so arose the simplified Good News – believe in the doctrine and you are saved. Accept the spiritual salvation Jesus is giving you and you will be blessed. Invite Him into your heart and make a spiritual repentance – a physical repentance is not necessary.

But the Good News is genuine Good News to the poor as it is the only hope they have to survive in this alien world. (We are foreigners, living as ambassadors for a foreign nation, in this world.)

We need to get back to the Gospel of the kingdom, and turn from this world. The problem is that every nut case who has brought disrepute to the Good News has taken this stand and led his people to live in cultic communities and to fight, often physically, the world they see around them. But just because the Good News can be easily distorted, do we have the authority to modify it? Can I take away grace since it leads people who misunderstand it to take sin lightly?

Now how do I deal with people who have half the Good News? There are many variations:-

a. Those who believe in Jesus for salvation but have complete control of their lives for all else;

b. Those who trust Jesus for everything but do not know the doctrine of salvation;

c. Those who believe in the kingdom but not in spiritual salvation;

Personally I do not believe that those who come under item (a) which forms bulk of the popular Christianity have salvation, while the other two may.

Who is God's Israel?

The Fourth Week of the Prophets Course discussed the meaning of the concept of the remnant in today’s world. Many, being influenced by the perception of the church in the US see the restoration of the remnant as being fulfilled in the creation of the nation of Israel after World War II. This understanding is problematic.

There are two different issues here. 1. Is the Israel in the New Testament the Church or the Jewish nation? 2. Is the restoration of the remnant promised in the prophets, especially Isaiah fulfilled in the Church or the nation of Israel or neither?

All theologians agree that Israel in the New Testament is the Church and not Israel. Paul says in Rom 9:6 ‘not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel’ emphasising that Israel and ethnic Jews are different.  John the Baptist in Matthew 3:9 says that being of Jewish descent is not relevant since God could raise up ‘Jews of faith’ from elsewhere. In Luke 12:32 Jesus says that God will give the kingdom to the ‘little flock’ or His disciples. So the new kingdom of which Jesus speaks is the Church and not the nation of the Jews. This is more forcefully put across in the parable of the landowner in Matt 21:33-46. In verse 43 Jesus says very clearly that the kingdom will be taken away from the Jews and given to His followers. Verse 45 states that the Jewish leaders perceived the parable as an attack on them.

Because of their understanding that the Church was New Israel, the Biblical writers used terms used for Israel for the Church. O James writes to the 12 tribes of the dispersion (James 1:1) and Peter writes to the exiles of the dispersion (I Pet 1:1).

From these passages it is clear that the Church saw itself as the New Israel, taking on the role of the Old Israel which had failed God. Hence in the understanding of the Church the old nation of Israel ceased to have any role in the salvation of the world or in God’s plan of redemption.

The Jews in the time of Jesus (and some Christians today) struggled with this message as it seemed to go against the promises in Amos 9:11-15, Joel 3:1-3, Hosea 14, Isaiah 40-66, Jer which speaks of God’s calling back the Jews who have been scattered all over the world and restoring to them the kingdom. They stress God’s undying love for the nation of Israel and how He would not give them up. So the Jews in the time of Jesus (just as the Jews in the time of Isaiah and Jeremiah) refused to believe that God would reject them. So they rejected Jesus and His teaching.

Jeremiah 25:11f and Jeremiah 29:10 date this restoration promised by the prophets as occurring within seventy years, identifying it with the edict of Cyrus. Isaiah 44:28 and 45:1 identify Cyrus as the one to restore Israel as the Servant of Yahweh. It is therefore evident that the restoration spoken of by the prophets in those times, especially by Isaiah and Jeremiah was from the exile under the Assyrians and Babylonians, and not the exile under the Romans. Therefore the rejection of the Jews spoken of by Jesus was a second casting away and there is no prophecy of their restoration after this casting away as the Church has now replaced the nation of the Jews.

Then is it wrong to see the restoration of the nation of Israel today as a fulfilment of the promises in the Bible? Recognising the multiple fulfilment of prophecies in the Bible, and the nature of the events I would find it difficult to see it as not a fulfilment of the prophecies in the prophets of the love of God for the nation of Israel.  But even if it be a fulfilment of the prophecy of the Old Testament prophets, it is only a secondary fulfilment. Even Paul saw the remnant amongst the Jews joining the Church, rather than the Church joining the nation of Israel.

However many see the restoration of Israel as a preparation for the end-times wars of Revelation and Ezekiel. Here I struggle a bit, as, if Israel has been replaced by the Church, should not the end-time wars be between the Church and the World and not between the nation of Israel and the World. In my mind, Israel today is the church, and nation of Israel is a distraction of little relevance to salvation history. I think I am struggling with the concept of two Israels – the nation and the Church. To me the relevant Israel is the Church.

I am just airing my views and do not think I have the complete answer to this conundrum. I am trying to define the problem for others to get into the act and give their views.

Covering of the head in worship

Discussing rituals Vijaya Barathi shared how a church she was attending insisted on women covering their heads while another church she attended did not. This made for confusion on the minds of people.

In the Old Testament, shaving one’s head was always a sign of mourning. In Deuteronomy 21:12, when a woman is taken captive she will shave her head and mourn for a month and then after the period of mourning she could be taken as a wife by the captor.

In Jeremiah 16:6 it says that the dead would not be lamented and people would make themselves bald in mourning. So also in Ezekiel 27:31, people mourn for Tyre by making themselves bald.  In Isaiah 22:12 God calls for mourning and baldness because of the calamities God was bringing on the nation of Israel. So baldness became a synonym for sorrow.

Here when Paul says that if a woman does not cover her head she may as well shave her hair off. This is a statement many have not understood, but we in India have no difficulty in identifying with the mark of widowhood. If a woman did not recognise the authority of her husband over her she may as well take on the attire of a widow who is freed from her husband.

In this sense, covering of the head was a sign of marriage, and some of the women in Corinth were rebelling against it. Paul says that for good order they should continue to observe the same.

So should women cover their heads? If the discussion is about married women then obviously single women are excluded from this stipulation. However some churches have held that woman has to be under the authority of a man and if not the husband then the father – very much like Islam. Somehow I do not agree with this, and am convinced that this applies only to married women.

Further, if a culture has some other indication of marriage in their society, instead of covering the head, the symbol prevalent in their culture would be quite adequate. The issue was not whether to cover one’s head or not but whether to submit to one’s husband by wearing the symbol of his authority.

Gospel of Success

The Gospel of Prosperity still rules the world of evangelism, though most thinking evangelicals have rejected the same. However, the Prosperity Gospel has morphed into the Gospel of Success and like the H1N1 flu this mutation is often more dangerous than the original. Many who reject the Prosperity Gospel have accepted the Gospel of Success without question.

The Gospel of Success essentially stems not from the Bible but the psychological theories that glorify the self which has been more and more popular in recent times, and does not recognise the fallen nature of man. Since I do not have the training to critique these psychological theories, I would recommend the book “Psychology as Religion – The Cult of Self-Worship” by Paul C. Vitz. He probably swings a bit too much to the other side, but then we all do when we are correcting a deviation.

I would like to look at the understanding of “Success” from the Bible.

Success – a word study

The first shock one gets when one takes a concordance and looks for the word success. In the KJV the word comes only once – Joshua 1:8!! Hence this is the proof text of the Success Gospel. The word translated as ‘success’ here is ‘sakal’ whose root means ‘to be circumspect or intelligent’. In other words it means to be wise. It is translated usually in the Bible as consider, expert, instruct, prosper, (deal) prudently, skill (ful), good success (Josh 1:8), teach, understand, wisdom. Hence the correct translation of Joshua 1:8 should read as, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have GOOD UNDERSTANDING (OF THE MIND OF GOD).”

The word ‘prosperous’  in Joshua 1:8 translates ‘tsalech’ whose root means to push forward, and is used in various ways including push forward in whatever endeavour you are undertaking. In the case of Joshua 1:8, the word coming to Joshua is, “that for you to be successful in entering the Promised Land you need to meditate on the word of God so that you can have a good understanding of the mind of God”.

So, while I agree with the success theorists that in the plan of God and the purposes of God you will be successful if you live by the values of God, it does not mean that I will be successful in whatever I touch, like Midas’ Golden Touch. It also does not mean that “success” is an acceptable Christian objective. I have heard it said that God does not plan for failure and does not call you to failure. That is true, but God’s success may appear as a failure to the world. And so success needs to be seen as ‘a successful fulfilling of God’s purpose for me’, and not understood from a worldly perspective