The Fundamental Blog

It occurs to me that to speak the word, “God,” is to do the name a disservice. To use any type of illustration in order to convey God is to make Him less than He is, and we all do it. Words, whether spoken or written, regardless of their eloquence can not give adequate honor to our omnipotent Creator. You see, God is infinite! I know that it seems to be an obvious observation but do we ever really think about that? How can we? How can the finite mind of mortal man begin to comprehend the endless immensity of the limitlessness of the infinite? When we label our single infinite deity, Jehovah, God, YHWH or in any way attempt to identify Him in our finite language, we end up putting God in a box. We try to use the biggest box possible, the box with stretchy sides, but it always ends up the same; God gets put in the box.

We lose perspective when this happens because instead of realizing our inability to begin to fathom the majesty of our mighty God, by failing to keep this realization in the front of our minds, we reach a point where we conclude that the box is big enough, it’s all we can do, there’s no point in belaboring the issue and we might as well move on to other things. The other things involve teaching our children that, “God is great, yeah, but see how nicely He fits into this box?” We begin to act like we are the ones who are over deity because while we have accepted that God is in a box, we are not in a box ourselves. We begin to think more highly of ourselves than we ought and as a result God becomes less as we make ourselves more. This should never be.

“THE CHURCH HAS SURRENDERED HER ONCE LOFTY CONCEPT OF GOD AND HAS SUBSTITUTED FOR IT ONE SO LOW, SO IGNOBLE, AS TO BE UTTERLY UNWORTHY OF THINKING, WORSHIPPING MEN. THIS SHE HAS DONE NOT DELIBERATELY, BUT LITTLE BY LITTLE AND WITHOUT HER KNOWLEDGE; AND HER VERY UNAWARENESS ONLY MAKES HER SITUATION ALL THE MORE TRAGIC. THE LOW VIEW OF GOD ENTERTAINED ALMOST UNIVERSALLY AMONG CHRISTIANS IS THE CAUSE OF A HUNDRED LESSER EVILS EVERYWHERE AMONG US. A WHOLE NEW PHILOSOPHY OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE HAS RESULTED FROM THIS ONE BASIC ERROR IN OUR RELIGIOUS THINKING.” (The Knowledge of the Holy - A.W. Tozer)

When I first read this in the preface of Tozer’s book I was awed by the relevance it holds, especially today, in the religious community that we observe all around us. “The church has surrendered,” which means that since we are the church; we have done this to ourselves. If that weren’t damning enough, we pass the error on to every new generation; not only the mistakes of the surrender, but the fact that surrender is acceptable in itself! It is one thing to make a mistake but it is another to teach our next generation to keep the same pattern of making those mistakes. To receive wrong answers is bad enough but to pass along the faulty methods that lead to these wrong answers and encourage the use of the same methods that produced them is sheer lunacy.

I think back to the days of my childhood and remember that presenting one’s self at the house of God used to be a big deal. This is a bit of a misconception on my part though as I didn’t realize, at the time, that people were not really putting on their Sunday best to honor God, they simply wanted to look their best before a gaggle of church-ies. Still, at 4 years old, I thought that there was due a certain degree of reverence upon approaching the house of worship. In the church of my childhood, the sanctuary was a solemn place; passing through doors that towered three times my height seemed to strike a particular awe in me. The admonitions to sit still and quit fidgeting taught me that there was something going on, even though I wasn’t sure exactly what that was, that demanded respect and propriety.

Fast forward to the 21^st century and we see people arriving at church services in whatever they can pull out of the laundry basket that doesn’t smell too bad, and if they manage to run a close encounter with a comb or toothbrush, well, that’s just a bonus. OK, I know that it’s our hearts that make the difference and not our clothes. Jesus, Himself, dressed in the raiment of the common people of His day and taught against the piety of those who wore fine garments. I want to be clear that I am not scolding the church for not presenting a better hypocritical image to the world, God knows that the world sees that plainly enough already. What I am saying is that our fruit, or rather the standard by which we grade our fruit, is appallingly decayed. This is one of the, “hundred lesser evils,” that our new Christian philosophy is leading us toward.

How is it that our position before God has become so highly elevated over the years? That it should happen at all can not come as any startling revelation, it was a recurring theme within the 12 tribes. It seems as though each time the nation of Israel would find themselves on the right track, no sooner was the realization made then they would start to err and wander down the road of iniquity again. Once, God’s people fell on their faces in worship. Now, the only falling on one’s face happens if the worshipper is so soundly asleep that they slide out of the pew! The tendency of people to embrace the morally relative position that we are NOT all in our sin leads us to the condition of exalting ourselves in our own eyes. We, who are all merely worms, may be able to look at one another and boast that we are better than this one and certainly no worse than that one but when we view ourselves correctly, in contrast to the perfection of our Lord Jesus Christ, we must again resume the perspectives that our wormliness affords.

Now, realizing that we have been given a certain freedom, in Christ, there should be a little latitude of attitude right? If the gap between the creator and the created is closing, and I believe that most would agree that this would seem to be the case, then either Deity is being diminished or non-deity is being exalted. This is becoming increasingly apparent in the appearance of our congregations at large. The fact that inappropriate apparel is tolerated in our churches testifies to the sad state of affairs that the church finds herself in today. Whether it be short skirts, low cut blouses, or T-shirts with offensive slogans, we have become so lax that nothing seems of shock our sensibilities.

But, “God doesn’t care what I wear, He just wants me at church.” Actually, God doesn’t need you in church at all! Yes, we are not to forsake the gathering together with other believers but church meetings are not legal requirements that demand fulfillment in order to validate salvation. Each time we allow our presence to reflect poorly on our Saviour we are mocking the cross of Christ. I think that God would rather you not come to church at all if by attending it means that you are leading the little children astray by the things that are allowed to pass unchecked. It is true that God doesn’t care what you wear, He cares about the condition of your heart. What we too often forget is that the condition of our hearts is evidenced in the actions that we take and the abominations that we allow.

Just as good works, while doing nothing toward earning your salvation, are an inescapable evidence of your walk of faith in Christ, your presentation, your personal appearance, is a piece of the fruit of grace that shows the conviction of your heart. We need to return to the reverence that we all feel, deep down, ought to be a basis of worship and teach the proper values to our congregations. Children need to understand that we make ourselves presentable to reflect our deep respect and thankfulness for all that the Lord Jesus has, by grace, brought into our lives. He died for us, can’t we take a moment to comb our hair so that we may appear respectable for Him? We will never achieve the kind of holiness that Christ demonstrated on earth as long as we are steeped in a culture of sin and locked into an existence of the human condition. One day in Heaven, after we have all been changed in that, “twinkling of an eye,” we will be perfect reflections of the grace that saved us. We are ambassadors of Christ Jesus for as long as we remain here on earth and we have a responsibility to carry His banner high, and in such a way that the world will see that we are different not of our own accord, but because Jesus Christ has allowed us the freedom of claiming His Father’s gift of grace to us by faith in Him who died in our place on the cross at Calvary.

There are many areas of our lives that need to be addressed as well personal appearance, our business practices, our attitudes toward giving, the entertainment that we allow and the value that we place on the things of this world, to name a few. If you claim the cross of Christ as your own then the least you can do, the one thing that you should not be able to keep from doing, is make sure that in all cases, your outward presentation of the conviction of your heart is such that any who would look upon you would come away with the idea that you are living your life to the glory of God through the grace given and the freedom received in Jesus Christ. It is easy to claim to be a Christian, but does it show in your life choices? If not, why not? How can we abide life choices that would cause another to stumble? This is a part of our working out the salvation that God is working in us.

If our conversion is genuine, if the conviction within us is real, then we must be diligent in our portrayal of what it is to be a Christian. We must be always on our guard, not only at church on Sunday but at all times, to make sure that by our actions, by our attitudes, in our speech, in our moral conscious, and in the things that we allow to pass as acceptable among us that we do not give the world the occasion to ridicule our faith or our Lord Jesus Christ.

All for the Glory of Christ

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