Taking every thought captive

Although I’m supposed to be preparing something from Genesis 18 for our church preaching workshop tomorrow, I’ve been diverted by Lot as I’ve been reading through Genesis 12-23 to try and fit things into context. So here are a few thoughts, prompted by my reading and Kent Hughes.

Lot really is a righteous tragedy. He left the sophistication of city life in Ur with Uncle Abraham to be an alien and a pilgrim in a cultural backwater (at least, Canaan would have seemed that way to a sophisticated Mesopotamian. But he evidently hankered after the sophistication of city life, perhaps given a boost by his spell in Egypt when Uncle Abraham overshot the landing strip in Canaan.

Yet his choice of an urban paradise was strange, given the depravity and debauchery of Sodom. Ur had a high culture, though it was thoroughly idolatrous. Not only had it piped water, but a sophisticated law code. But Sodom was a place where dignity was cheap and respect for authority virtually non-existent. The law of Sodom was “anything goes”, and generally it did. 2 Peter 2:10 makes it clear that Sodom was not merely a place of debauchery, but also of anarchy.

Sadly, Lot ended his life a cave man, quite literally. And his tragic spell of utter depravity recounted in the final part of Genesis 19 would have shocked even his debauched erstwhile neighbours of Sodom.

But God’s verdict on Lot was that he was righteous (2 Peter 2:7). Was it that in order to prepare him for the Holy City God had to knock out of him completely and forever the desire for worldly city life? For preparation for eternal city life is not to be found in urban sophistication, but in sanctified camping. Such an attitude is not the exclusive isolation of shunning everything in the world, trying to live as if it doesn’t exist. What it means is sitting loose to worldly idolatrous culture — what Scripture calls separation.

The highlight of Abraham’s tent dwelling tour of Canaan was his communion with God, signified by his frequent altar building. Lot seemed to take more delight in Egypt and Sodom, until God’s discipline made him an unfit earthly citizen, so that he might be well fitted for heaven.

Lot can teach us this, among other things, that we need to take care of an unhealthy desire for urban sophistication, lest we, too, suffer similar painful discipline. Yes, Lot was saved, “but only as through fire” (1 Corinthians 3:15); in Lot’s case quite literally.

It’s obvious when you get to the end of Judges that everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes. But reading through the book a few weeks ago I noticed that the rot had set in with Samson when he asked his gather to get a Philistine wife, “for,” he said, “she is right in my eyes” (Jdg 14:3). The irony of Samson’s story was that he did the greatest good when his eyes had been put out.

But after listening to Bryan Chapell speaking today about Gideon, I wonder whether the rot had set in earlier. It doesn’t say that Gideon did what was right in his own eyes, but his ephod (Jdg was a terrible snare to the people of God. His judgment was certainly faulty, and even though he refused kingship, calling on the people to acknowledge YHWH’s rule over them, his actions didn’t help commend this attitude to them.

Bryan stressed the importance of the preacher’s testimony in commending the message of Scripture. Perhaps Gideon illustrates what can happen when preachers fail to commend the message of Scripture wholeheartedly by their life.

It struck me this afternoon as I returned from worshipping with the Lord’s people that there was a tremendous difference in the volume of traffic then with that earlier when I had been walking the short distance to where we meet. A couple of hours earlier the number of vehicles I saw was in single digits. The road was quiet, the local Presbyterians were already gathered for worship, and the local Anglicans had finished — Baptists get a lie in before worship!

Once I turned the corner onto the main road the roar of traffic greeted me. And the focus was the local petrol (gas) station and convenience store where evidently the lure of mammon was greater than the attraction of the Almighty. How different a Sunday the undeceived spend from the deceived — it put Revelation 20, which was the passage of this morning’s sermon, into a contemporary context. It is the business of Satan to deceive the whole world. But what blessing there is when the “light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God” (2 Cor 4:4) shines in the heart. How grievously were our first parents deceived by the deceiver of the whole world — that single deception affected the whole world, for that “one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all men” (Rom 5:18). But, conversely, “one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men.”

May we who are undeceived truly know “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6) this day, and every day, and be drawn closer to the Almighty and living God.

Last month I started, belatedly, to use The Legacy Bible Reading Plan. I’ve been playing catchup, so I’m still with April. I started with Joshua and noticed a few things that may have struck me before, but I can’t remember. I’m sure they’ve been spotted by others, but here they are, in any case.

There are some interesting names and descriptions for God in the opening chapters. Rahab calls him “God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath” (2:11), which surely shows a mature understanding of who he really is. Just what did she discuss with the two spies?

Joshua calls him “the living God” (3:10) which echoes (post-)Exilic descriptions. He also refers to him as “Lord of all the earth” (3:11, 13) which shows that he believed in more than a tribal deity.

Moses is almost always called “the servant of God”, and occasionally “the man of God”. It reminded me of my late friend, Robert Duff, who had “servant of the Lord Jesus” inscribed on his tombstone. His inspiration was the Apostle Paul, but the concept is the same. I wonder how appropriate it would be to have a similar inscription on my own tombstone.

And finally, the ideas of promise and witness are prominent in the closing chapters.

I think I’ll want to revisit these ideas for further meditation and development. If I do, I’ll post the results. As I progress through the reading plan I’ll post up my simple observations on each book in the hope that they might provoke others to further meditation, too.

It has well been said that some people know the price of everything, but the value of nothing. Sadly, when it comes to faith in Christ, many are completely clueless about true value. We may talk about value judgments, but without knowing what true value is, or how to make sound judgments, we really only exercise personal preferences.

Marketeers work on the concept of perceived value. Sometimes we are pleasantly surprise when we receive something of real value, like the expensive watch we received some time ago for very little. But more often we soon realise that we have been sold a shoddy and valueless piece of junk. The only value in the transaction accrued to the unscrupulous marketeer, whose bank balance was greatly enhanced. Such experience, and particularly our failures, can lead us into a cynical state where we refuse to believe it is possible to know true value.

Twice this past week I’ve been faced with the concept of true value. On Sunday, R C Sproul preached on The Precious Blood of Christ, and on Thursday evening the opening hymn and Scripture reading at the prayer meeting and Bible study focused on the preciousness of Christ. A reprise of our earlier studies in Daniel reminded us that the major theme of chapters 1-5 is the question of value. Witness the bookends of references to the sacred Temple vessels, and the many references to precious metals in the various images. The culmination of God’s assessment of Belshazzar, the king with no scruples and no values, is all about value.

True value, ultimate value, is to be found in God himself. Christ is that “chosen and precious” cornerstone (1 Peter 2:6) whose “precious blood” (1 Peter 1:19) has ransomed his people whose faith, when it is tested for genuineness, proves more precious than gold (1 Peter 1:7). No wonder Christian believers consider God’s promises “precious and very great” (2 Peter 2:4), for it is through them that we may become partakers of the divine nature.

These are things of true value. But without God, they are simply empty words of promise and futile gestures if Christ was merely a deluded human being. And Christian believers are simply gullible if they suffer for a vain faith. Their value is not intrinsic, but extrinsic. It is their relationship to God, the fact that they derive from God’s character and being, that gives them value — real value, true value, eternal value.

The challenge of earthly life is to recognise that true value, and to let it have an abiding and persuasive influence on us. Viewed form the framework of earthly values we will reject God’s Living Stone, the Lord Jesus Christ, while in reality he is “in the sight of God chosen and precious” (1 Peter 2:4). Not to concur with God’s value judgment of his Son is to being dishonour and ultimately divine judgment on one’s head. But to concur with it wholeheartedly is to bring oneself honour, rather than shame.

Whatever we value in life, may our supreme value be God’s chosen and precious Cornerstone — the Lord Jesus Christ. He is of supreme value, and only a life supported by such value and strength will be truly worthwhile and of lasting value in God’s sight.

Doug Groothuis has started a series of posts in the style of C S Lewis’s Screwtape Letters. It’s compulsive reading — humour with a sting in the tail. Enjoy The Luciferian Laptop and Education, for Hell’s Sake. No doubt further insightful posts will follow.