Thorns

This post’s kind of heavy.  Just wanted to warn you.

Matthew 7:29  And when they had platted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right hand: and they bowed the knee before him, and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews!

It occurs to me that they didn’t sell crowns of thorns at a stall in the Jerusalem marketplace.

Some soldier or two, in the excitement of the moment, picked those thorns and sat down to weave a halo out of them, likely pricking their hands in the process.

That’s me sometimes.  Deliberately sinning against the One who died for me.  Slowly and carefully weaving my own condemnation, oblivious to all the harm I suffer from it.

That kind of sin: callous, spiteful provocation of God, is what Jesus forgave us at the cross.  He didn’t die to save a band of bumbling ne’er-do-wells.  He died for his vicious mortal enemies, in order to reconcile us to the Father in the only way possible.

Some of his last words before his death begged forgiveness on the people who mocked and crucified him.  He was pleading for us.  I don’t know how to express this level of grace, mercy and love better than this:

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.  For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die.  But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:6-8

Same Old Lie

CNN.com published a story today about a series of ads that a coalition of atheists in New York City has contracted to put up around the subway system.  These ads proclaim things like “No God, No Guilt: Debaptize Now” and other catchy anti-religious slogans.  Now, before you ask, I’m not writing about how riled up I am about these billboards.  People have always rebelled against God and asserted their right to his place, and some more vehemently than others.  He’ll deal with them later.  What strikes me is that although the atheist coalition is trying to be edgy and provocative, the sentiment (similar to the popular “Born OK the First Time” bumper sticker) isn’t anything new.  In fact, it’s just a rehash of the first lie ever told.

In the Garden of Eden, God placed Adam and Eve to tend it and to enjoy his company.  Their minds were free.  There was only one rule: Don’t eat the fruit of that one tree over there.  It’s special. It will kill you.

[But] the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. Gen. 3:4-5

What the serpent told Eve was that God wasn’t being straight.  He’s keeping the good stuff for himself!  If you guys could get a hold of that knowledge, you would become your own gods!  You wouldn’t need to listen to that schmuck– you could make your own rules!

When the first man and woman took a bite of the fruit, the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, their eyes were indeed opened, as the serpent had said.  And they didn’t die immediately.  And they did become gods after a fashion.  Death, however, came inexorably as repayment for sin, which is fundamentally rebellion against God (cf. Rom. 6:23).  And men only became gods of themselves.  By replacing God on his throne with our own free will we all become feeble, distorted gods, doomed to corrupt everything we touch.

So what was the result of the first lie we believed, the same lie that’s become part of the fabric of every culture on earth because we hope that by repeating it we can somehow make it true?  We’ve become wise.   Human wisdom, the wisdom of the world, which tells us subtly and persuasively that we can be lords over our own lives, is a symptom of a fallen world that has rejected God.  When people say things like “No God, No Guilt,” they’re just repeating the same tempting fallacy that’s been whispered from mouth to ear since the dawn of time.

In an interesting side note, the atheist group responsible for the subway ads calls itself The Big Apple Coalition of Reason.  But they’ve really escaped from reason. I’ll talk more about that some other time.

[H]ath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?  For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. 1 Cor. 1:20-21