Archive for the ‘Christ’ Category
…An Unworthy Manner July 20, 2010
“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes. Therefore, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But a man must examine himself, and in so doing he is to eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. For this reason, many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep. But if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged” (1 Cor. 12:26-31).
In this passage, Paul is writing in the context of a conflict among the Corinthian believers as to the physical abuse of the Lord’s table during communion. Certain believers were gorging themselves on the bread and wine to the point of drunkenness (12:21), leaving others out of the celebration altogether. Obviously, this would qualify as an “unworthy manner,” tantamount to taking God’s name in vain. The part that confuses us is the pronouncement of sickness and death as a consequence of these actions (12:30). To our sanitized sense of church, this seems very “Old Testament”, and out of character with the grace represented by communion.
Passages like this bring us face to face with an imagined conflict between holiness and grace. Christ came to fulfill the law, but the law is not a stand-alone. The law served to show us our sin in relation to God’s uncompromising holiness. When Christ’s sacrifice fulfilled the law, He allowed his blood to cover our sins and permit us to fellowship with Him in His righteousness. The holiness of God is unchanging, before, during, and after the law.
When those who claimed to be brothers and sisters in Christ trampled one another and indulged in the Lord’s supper with a self-focused, gluttonous attitude, they were spitting on Christ’s sacrifice. They were casting aside the significance of the observance for their own gain, forgetting who God is. They were taking Him in vain, demonstrating that, at best, they had not allowed the Spirit to reign in their hearts since professing Christ, or, at worst, that they did not know Him at all.
Does the same principle and punishment apply to us today? Our modernistic worldview has so sequestered disease and death in a scientific construct that, if it is occurring, we aren’t noticing. The principle, however, holds true in any instance of worship (read: life as a believer). Whenever we seek to magnify ourselves (whether openly or only in the attitude of our hearts), we are not honoring Christ. When we do it under the guise of celebrating Him, we are inviting judgment. When we become involved in the church to improve our social standing or to feel good about ourselves, when we do good deeds for the recognition of men, when we give of time and money for the wrong reasons, we make light of God – we take Him in vain. We invite judgment on ourselves in this way because we are tarnishing the name of Christ. Rather, we should, as Paul commanded the Corinthians, “. . . proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.”
Posted by Justin Lonas
Resurrection and Life March 30, 2010
“Martha then said to Jesus, ‘Lord if You had been here, my brother would not have died. Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Your brother will rise again.’ Martha said to Him, ‘I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die. Do you believe this?’ She said to Him, ‘Yes, Lord;I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world.’” (John 11:21-17).
Have you ever stopped to ponder the audacity of some of Jesus’ claims? We tend to grow accustomed to the words of Christ recorded for us, not necessarily ignoring them, but forgetting their context and power. When He made this statement to Martha, he wasn’t blithely looking toward heaven with a glow on his face uttering platitudes to comfort her at the loss of a family member, He was reassuring her by focusing her attention on His person and power, and in the process, turning her world on its ear.
For 1st century Jews, the “Resurrection of the Dead” was a concept of the last day, when all people would be raised to life by God. Clearly this is what Mary is clinging to in verse 24. Jesus’ response doesn’t invalidate this, but brings it to full expression in Himself. He tells Martha (and, through Scripture, all of us) that He is the hope of eternity and the very breath of life in bodily form! Anyone within earshot would’ve been scandalized to hear such talk–a Nazarene carpenter claiming to hold the destiny of the world and to be the source of life? Small wonder that later in this same chapter we see the chief preists and pharisees conspiring to kill Him. They weren’t particularly fond of His other incredible claims, like “Before Abraham was born, I am” (John 8:58), and “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up” (John 2:19), either.
But Martha wasn’t offended; she was astonished, and she believed. “You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world” (v. 27). For the Jews of that day, the only two logical responses to such a claim were indignation (reinforcement of the tradition belief system) or acceptance (realization that the belief system was being transformed by the presence of its object). Martha’s belief changed everything about her perspective on life, death, and faith–she knew that He could be trusted and would sustain her, and even restore Lazarus to physical life if He so desired. Christ was enough because He was life in full.
As we approach our grandest celebration of our Risen Lord this Sunday, remember that He is the Resurrection and the Life, and remember the power of that statement. It is no less bold today. We say we know that God is the Creator and the One who holds our lives in His hands, but do we understand the magnitute of this truth or its centrality to our spiritual rebirth in Christ? As we reflect on the fact of Jesus’ resurrection and long for our resurrection (or restoration) at His return, stand in awe of the fact that this Jesus whom we worship is life itself.
Posted by Justin Lonas
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