The wide application of God’s INDIGNATION and its NUANCES

Mark 3:5 (Jesus’ response to human callousness)

John 3:36 (God’s response to stubbornness toward His Son)

Romans 1:18, 2:5, 8, 4:15, 12:19, 13:4-5

Ephesians 2:3, 4:31, 5:6

Colossians 3:6 (and if you return to those practices, you shall feel God’s wrath again), 8

1 Thessalonians 1:10 (“…to come”), 2:16 (70 A.D., “abomination of desolation”

prophesied by Daniel and Jesus), 5:9 (“not appointed to…”)

1 Timothy 2:8

Hebrews 3:11 (because of their stubbornness!), 4:3

James 1:19 (“slow to wrath,” just like God Himself!), 20 (human wrath does not work

God’s righteousness, i.e., resurrectionary graciousness; just the opposite!)

Revelation 11:18 (nations were angered by God’s taking His great power to reign, so His

anger came…), 12:17 (but the Dragon also got angry)

[6/18/08; 6/30/16]

At the Cross, Jesus was not suffering under what so many theologians assert he was suffering under, in order that we might not have to suffer under it. Rather, he was suffering under what he should not have had to suffer under, in order that we could enjoy what he was rightfully going to get in recompense. Here the justice that is operative is entirely restorative and not at all penal or punitive. The Just One died wrongfully for the sake of the unjust and irreverent so that “Him Who is judging justly” (1 Peter 2:23) might requite him with the promise of the Covenant (Hebrews 10:36) and a “great reward” (Hebrews 10:35) to share with those who consent to believe he suffered for them. The benefit of his suffering of abuse is only enjoyed through exerting faith in the Message about what he did for us and on our behalf. Here there is not an ounce of penal substitution. It is heroic inclusion, lock, stock, and barrel. [6/18/08]

The Evangelical movement, so-called, boasts many a “guard dog” of their distinctive “dogmas.” And I would go so far as to grant them this designation…with the exception of the modifier. For they have not behaved themselves as gentlemen (they are predominantly men), but are needlessly dogmatic and denunciatory, bristling with prickly shibboleths. But worse, they have not guarded the supremacy of Scripture itself alone, in its own inspired vocabulary and conceptuality, but have fenced it off with their own novel, creedal barbed wire. One could have hoped at least for chain link, but the numerous gaps in their logic evidently demanded another recourse for protection. Non sequiturs and excluded middles fill in for many a missing link. You could drive a semi through some of the gaping holes in their logic. [6/18/08]

BAPTISM facilitates universal participation—BOTH male AND female, BOTH Jew AND non-Jew, BOTH slave AND free—in the New Covenant, by Christ’s CIRCUMCISION at the Cross, which “stripped off” his ENTIRE male, Jewish FLESH

WHO PROPITIATED WHOM?

God Himself “provided” (Gen. 22:13-14; Hebrew:  “saw [to]”) the sacrifice, not us.  So He ‘paid for‘ the sacrifice for our sins, yet not for the sins themselves, of course (for Scripture never teaches that sins are, or can be, ‘paid for’).  He bought and paid for us, not for our miserable sins, for Heaven’s sake!

Thus God Himself gave the propitiation concerning our sins:  Israel had been taught and commanded to sacrifice in various ways to God, but when the full time came—the time, that is, when all those old shadows would be dispelled by the Light radiating from the Open Tomb from behind the Cross that cast its long shadow across the irregular landscape of antiquity, and though obscure in contours to earth-bound mortals, yet was distinctly visible to the eyes of Heaven—I repeat, when that time came, God sent His very own Son, begotten before all ages of time, before They together had planned the creation of all else.  The Son, according to plan, was both given by the Father and voluntarily, obediently gave himself to be the coverage, shielding, or protective shelter concerned with our sins as well as those of the entire world (1 John 2:2).  What a Savior!  Hallelujah!  Hallelujoshua!  Praise Jesus!  [3/17/04]

STRIPPING OFF THE FLESH = CLEANSING BY THE SPIRIT

The New Testament teaching and depiction of immersion suggests that the cleansing of the heart, the spirit, and the inward human entails the stripping off of the entire flesh or outward human (Col. 2:14-15a; 2 Cor. 5:16-18).  This was what circumcision pre-figured by the partiality of its symbolism.  But what it only pre-figured, Jesus literally fulfilled by his crucifixion—the off-stripping of his entire body of flesh in death, and his descent, in spirit and soul, into the Unseen, there to herald and proclaim to the dead, preceding his resurrection from that abode, dressed in an immortal body or outward person that perfectly befitted his wholesomeness of Spirit.

Water immersion allows all who believe to participate in Christ’s circumcision at the Cross (Col. 2:11-15), which was the ultimate cleansing off of human flesh—Adam’s mortal flesh or “body of death” (Rom 7:24), banned from regenerative fruit for his eating forbidden fruit.  Thus the flesh was not merely “washed off” with water; the mortal flesh itself was ‘washed off of’ the freshly-regenerated (Tit. 3:5) spirit—the body of death cleaned right off of its now-immortalized soul!  When a person emerges from the water of immersion they are picturing the dressing (“in-slipping”—endu-) of their freshly sanctified spirit with a suitably congruent wholesome body, fit for agelong life in the regenerated New Earth (Matt. 19:28).  The cleaning must be more thorough than often supposed.  This body of Adamic origin is much too decayed to survive by any measure short of a full replacement when Christ returns.  [3/23/04]

WHERE GRACIOUSNESS REIGNS, GRACIOUSNESS TRAINS

How is it possible so to misunderstand the graciousness of God as to deny that this age of its superabundant dispensing is attended by a law that expects graciousness from us?  Dispensationalism, however, has historically been well known for this distinctive and perfidious denial.  This denial, in practice, leads to the tragic stunting of spiritual growth to maturity in the image of God displayed in His own Son—graciousness and truth personified.  For the Law of Messiah—the Law of Liberty {James 2:12-13) that Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount—is seemingly as far beyond the Law of Moses as graciousness itself is beyond indignation.  It appears to require graciousness from us even where the Law at times invoked wrath (Rom. 4:15). The new requirement is clearly a much heavier burden to our decaying flesh than Moses’ requirement.  However, the New Covenant, by which “He has made the former  old“—and in starkest contrast to the former, which is “getting old” and is “decrepit” and “near disappearance“ (Heb. 8:13)—supplies a new power for obedience as well as a new example of suffering abuse in the interests of obedience, rewarded with a new and “better” (Heb. 7:29) and “living“ (1 Peter 1:3) expectation of resurrection from the dead!  As a result, Messiah’s yoke is “kindly” and his load “light” (Matt. 11:30).

The heavier and more spiritual Law of Messiah is most certainly an indispensable part of the new order of graciousness inaugurated by Jesus; indeed, it dares to demand that we become as gracious as Jesus, who went the full length of graciousness by sacrificing himself under the assault of misdeeds.  No greater love has any person than to give their soul (that is, ‘earthly existence’) for their friends  (John 15:13).  [4/8/04]

The Law of Moses demanded righteousness…to a point; the royal Law of Messiah requires graciousness…to a fault.  [4/13/04]

That said, the Lord’s Prayer does not authorize us to pardon sins-in-general that others may commit, but precisely to forgive “our debtors” of their debts against us and pardon “those who trespass against us” of those specific trespasses.  Clearly, then, blanket, wholesale pardons were not what our Master expected of us, much less the clerical usurping of such an imaginary right.  This strongly suggests that the admonition to “get sins confessed to one another” (James 5:16a) likewise does not refer to a broadside confessional, but to our own specific sins against those particular persons.  This is still no small duty, yet is happily attended by graciousness from God and hence power from Above.  Let’s not make a mountain out of a molehill.  [4/23/04]

The Post-Resurrection Explosion of Favor from God, through Christ

The reason God appears so often “wrathful” in the Old Testament but so largely “gracious” in the New Testament, is because the Law of Moses–the Old Covenant–was not able to vivify (Gal. 3:21)  and therefore could not justify its subjects but only convict them of sins and injustices, which, when persisted in, brought upon them God’s indignation, anger, or  wrath.  “For the Law is producing indignation” (Rom. 4:15); “the Law through Moses was given; graciousness and truth came to be through Jesus Christ” (Jn. 1:17).  Thus there is indeed a vast difference between the face and disposition that for the most part characterized Jehovah under the Old Covenant, and how He much more perfectly became characterized after the Resurrection of Jesus Christ His own Son, who was commissioned to “take away the sin of the world” (Jn. 1:29) and thereby unleashed an utterly unprecedented, even astounding, torrent of favor!  Yet God’s attitude toward sin had not altered one iota between the Old and New Covenants.  He remains the very same God throughout every era and eon.  The change was on our part when we “realized the favor of God in truth” (Col. 1:6) and trusted Messiah Jesus, thus receiving God’s gratuitous justification and remission of sins and thereby entering God’s favor and Kingdom!  So the problem had been entirely on our side, not on His, for the Law was impotent (Rom. 8:3) and without benefit (Heb. 7:18), its weakness (Heb. 7:38) due to our weakness of flesh (Rom. 8:3, Heb. 7:16).

However, that weak Law did become an escort (paidagogos) to Messiah for the Jews (Gal. 3:24), the superinduction (epeisagoge) of “a better expectation, through which we [also those of the nations] are drawing near to God” (Heb. 7:19).  But it is an escort no longer!  (Gal. 3:25)  Now that we (both Jews and those of the nations) are sons of God by trust in Messiah Jesus, we have our Father’s very own motivation, and so are no longer “under law” (Rom. 6:14-15, 7:1-2, 6, Gal. 3:23, 25, 4:5, 21, 5:18), which is to say,  “under guardians and administrators” (Gal. 4:2), “under the elements of the culture” (Gal. 4:3), and due to our fleshly weakness,  “under sin” (Gal. 3:22, Rom. 7:14), hence “under a curse” (Gal. 3:10).  

Messiah Jesus has reclaimed us from the curse of the Law of Moses (with any attendant anger of God) against our sins.  It is, much rather now the favor of God that is our starting point for conduct and behavior.  Moses’ Law is no longer our ethic, training us by the use of disciplinary curses and object lessons of anger and destruction (which might easily lead to the notion of a constitutionally angry Deity).  Jesus’ favor now takes actual priority since it has invaded a creation still disrupted by sin, and in spite of sin (Rom. 5:6-8), and even overwhelming it (1 Tim. 1:14), taking it off guard, so to speak (1 Cor. 2:6-13), and triumphing over all our enemies in high places (Col. 2:13-15, 1 Cor. 15:8-28).  The saving favor of God is now our trainer (Tit. 2:11-15), our discipliner in ethics (Heb. 12:1-15); the Wholesome Spirit of graciousness is now our coach (Jn. 14:16-17, 26, 15:26, 16:7-14)!  [11/24/97]

God might have spared ancient Israel their tormented history, as we know it, by not giving them the Law/Torah of Moses at Sinai in the first place.  The Law aggravated their sinfulness, thus exposing them in a higher degree to God’s anger than the surrounding nations who had less knowledge of God’s desire, so were less liable to disciplinary action for conscious violations.

In tandem with this provocative intrusion of revealed demands that could not help but heighten Israel’s culpability and expose them to the danger of disciplinary avenging by God, He conjoined sacrificial provisions that promise pardon/ release/ remission/ forgiveness from sin.  But in reality those sacrifices, in themselves, accomplished exactly nothing whatsoever to effect that forgiveness.  They had this one benefit:  they were attached to explicit Divine promises concerning forgiveness, thus faith in God was required to keep offering them.  It was this faith that pleased God to pardon the Law’s infractions, though any essential and perpetual cleansing of the conscience could not actually be attained by the operation of those sacrifices.

Upon reflection, this is truly astonishing!  It means that “in the forbearance of God” He “passed over the penalties of sins which had occurred” throughout Israel’s entire tortured history long “before” the essential cleansing was made available through Jesus, the Messiah (Rom. 3:25, Heb. 1:1-3).  So it was not so much the ancient sacrifices that God was after (to be sure, He even despises and overtly denounces them in no uncertain terms at decisive moments throughout their history), but rather their trust that He really had pardoned them their sins.  The ancient mechanism was in itself but a sign, the obedient performance of which could only be a fruit of their belief that God forgave them when He saw the sign (for He saw their repentant, trusting heart impelling it,  [12/26/22]).

However, with the work of Messiah accomplished, the Truth was fully unveiled, and the whole scheme of things was inverted!  Wrath and grace were transposed; anger and favor  got counter-emphasized.  Now grace/favor could vaunt over wrath/anger for a change, because Messiah’s Crucifixion had justified God in bursting forth from heaven to avenge his unjust execution by Raising him from the dead and exalting him to highest heaven, above all enemies of God’s Kingdom, and giving him superabundant favor as an agelong recompense!  Such an expression of God’s hidden heart was historically impossible prior to Messiah’s barbaric murder.  That heinous deed forced God’s hand to intervene in history and natural processes (uh…His own design, as we know…) beyond all precedent.  This divine judgment precipitated a new age in which the entire Old Covenant Law was itself pointedly “nailed”!  God Himself nailed it fast and blew it to Kingdom come!  The supreme standard of righteousness it is no longer!  What the Father did for the Son, what God did for His chosen Messiah, far surpasses every precedent of justice.  And, mercifully, it even left the culprits alive in the bargain so that they could have time to repent and trust God anew!  The human imagination had never conceived such love from any deity.

The spiritual polarity of the universe was reversed in an instant on Resurrection morn!  Then at Pentecost, 50 days later, the circuit between heaven and earth was closed and the juice turned on, in order to blow Satan out of the water in the first of a new series of shattering encounters with his resurrected, exalted, and now enthroned Foe!

For us who trust the Victor, Messiah Jesus, this compact scenario heralds a new order of the cosmos!  The old-fashioned Law of Moses cannot possibly hold the New Wine of God’s Wholesome Motivation thereupon injected into human affairs.  God’s favor has taken over!  The Regime of Grace now demands supreme allegiance.  Accordingly, the first words we communicate among strangers to this Truth must be words of favor from God in the Messiah—favor that “overwhelms  (huperpleonaz-) with trust and love in Messiah Jesus” (1 Tim. 1:14).  Thus Paul can add:  “Faithful is the explanation, and worthy of all welcome, that Messiah Jesus came into the world to save sinners, foremost of whom am I.  But therefore was I shown mercy, that in me–foremost!–Jesus Messiah should be displaying all his patience, toward a pattern of those who are about to be believing on him for life agelong” (1 Tim. 1:16).

Moreover, it is then precisely this favor that proceeds to become the pivot of our way of life in this age, in contradistinction to the old-fashioned Law of Moses.  Our ethic, our morality, our very customs must become  powered by favor so that God gets full credit for every good action and activity we do.  God’s own Motivation of Wholesomeness is now our inspiration for good projects and fine deeds.  “Don’t fence me in by antiquated rules” could well be our byword in the face of inveterate judaizers; “Don’t tread on me,” our rejoinder to hypernomian tyrants who dare devalue and disdain the motivational dynamic of Divine favor set loose to stimulate every human potential to the very zenith of glorious achievement and integrity.  [11/25/97]

from crucifixion to CORONATION!

To argue that Christ ‘paid the penalty for our sins’ or (worse) outright ‘paid for our sins’ would not be quite so misleading (yet still errant) were it immediately added:  but this was a heinous injustice because he was sinless and had done no wrong but remained perfectly obedient to his Father; therefore God repaid him superabundantly for that terrible injustice he suffered, raising him from the dead and exalting him to David’s throne, covenantally promised him in Scripture, even in spite of the scheming of Satan to keep him from that sovereign position.

Of course, the Bible never states that Christ ‘paid for our sins’ but that he “died for our sins“—quite a different matter!  It was, indeed, for us and for our sins and for our salvation (in different, but all correct, senses) that Jesus died.  He surrendered himself, in obedience to his Father’s desire, to his mortal enemies whom they both knew would slay him.  He thereby fulfilled or ‘satisfied’ the ancient covenant.  But this is far different from ‘paying for sins’, or ‘satisfying’ sin’s affront to God’s honor (Anselm’s theory), or yet ‘satisfying’ God’s penal justice against the sins of the elect, or even of all mankind (Calvin’s theory, with variations).  [08/05/94]

The undercurrent of the Gospel—the Proclamation of God’s Kingdom—is that God loves human beings.  The entire apparatus of covenants, the paraphernalia of priesthood, the regalia of kingship, the paperwork of scripture…they all aim to substantiate this single message:  God loves us and He wants to save us for His own agelong inheritance.  If we but trust that this is true (which, without the Resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ—who taught in the fullest way that this is in fact the case, and confirmed his own explanations with miraculous liberating acts of compassion—we could never have believed) then we are thereby justifying God’s behavior in sending Christ to us and allowing him to suffer and die for us.  We are thereby confessing, admitting, avowing, alleging, asserting, in fact nothing less than proclaiming (!) that God is upright-and-just in allowing—even ordaining, destining!—such evil to befall His only Son.  We are proclaiming, likewise, that everything Christ taught was true and right since God would never have resurrected—and thereby confirmed and glorified—a liar and imposter.  The Resurrection of Christ is God’s supreme theodicy; yes, it even goes so far as justifying evil in the world because it shows us God’s bedrock intention and power to reverse its effects, even far overcompensating its victims for their suffering of abuses.  With this firm knowledge we can dare to contemplate the meaning–even the benefits (!)—of various evils without spiritually blanching and fainting from dread.  It may be Friday, but Sunday’s comin’!!!

The love of God is first, last, and central.  The knowledge of that—which comes only through the Proclamation of Christ and of God’s favor in him—is what creates a new breed of humans who can love vigorously, ferociously, durably, indefatigably, intransigently, in the midst of, in the face of, in the teeth of, -evil-not-yet-destroyed-but-poised-for-fresh-attacks.  The knowledge of God’s love, confirmed to us by sufficient proofs, accordingly engenders love within us and, further progressing, makes us more truly human, that is, more brilliant reflectors of God’s image, producing wholesome fruits of the Holy Spirit in every conceivable variety of good activity on planet earth.

Thus does the Wisdom of God get the credit for our salvation by choosing the “stupid” device of mere trust  (1 Cor. 1:17-2:16).  For trust cannot clutch God to force His repayment of the debt under which we may otherwise imagine our “love,” “sacrifice,” “works of law,” “good works,” “self-immolation,” “fasting,” “celibacy,” “poverty,” “humility,” etc. have placed Him.  Any of these could potentially be valid only as fruits or end-products of His love for us, not as ‘merits’ for exacting (extorting?) our “rightful due” from Him.  [11/03/94, with some inspiration from William Tyndale’s tract, “Justification by Faith”]

If indeed, “through law is the recognition of sin” (Rom. 3:20), “where no law is, neither is there transgression” (4:15), “sin is not being taken into account where there is no law” (5:13), and “sin I knew not except through law” (7:7), then it should not be hard to imagine the effect of Jesus’ great intensification of legal requirements, both in his exalted teaching and in his absolutely sinless conduct.  In fact, his behavior far exceeded the rightness/justness of the Decalogue; he demonstrated for the first time in history the full, miraculous extent of divine self-sacrificial love in service to needy humanity.

This profoundly intensified manifestation of the divine norm for human behavior evoked envy, hatred, jealousy, outrage from the leaders of the Jews—scribes, lawyers, Saducees, Pharisees, and chief priests.  The conviction and exposure of sin brought by the public career of Christ led ineluctably to his crucifixion.  For his righteousness was too great to be tolerated by sinners, especially self-righteous, hypocritical sinners—which is to say, censorious, judgmental of others, not excluding even the sinless…nay, especially the Sinless One.  Hence the extraordinary restitution of which that Worthy One was worthy, deserving first Resurrection, but then Royal Exaltation in extremis!   [11/15/94]