INTRODUCTION

Justice, freedom, and love are the buzz words of our culture, but it is not at all clear that many of our neighbors know what these words mean. The Bible teaches that all three of these gifts originate in the Triune God and are only received and enjoyed through the Cross of Jesus.

THE TEXT

“For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself…” (Gal. 5:13-23).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

True liberty is the ability to love our neighbors, through serving them lawfully from the heart (Gal. 5:13-14). The opposite of liberty (slavery) destroys community, through biting and devouring, driven by lusts and envy (Gal. 5:15, cf. Js. 4:1-3). Those who walk in the Spirit are led by the Spirit and therefore free from the lust of the flesh (Gal. 5:16). There is a battle in true Christians, where they sometimes find themselves doing what they do not want to do (Gal. 5:17). But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the condemnation of the law (Gal. 5:18, cf. Rom. 8:1). You can tell you are under the condemnation of the law because you are enslaved to the works of the flesh (Gal. 5:19-21). The marks of true freedom are the fruit of the Spirit, against which the law can bring no charge (Gal. 5:22-23).

NEGATIVE V. POSITIVE JUSTICE

The Bible teaches that justice is primarily negative and punitive (Rom. 13:3). It is only positive in declaring innocence, affirming or praising the righteous (Rom. 13:3), but otherwise it condemns and punishes, executing God’s wrath (Rom. 13:4). Lady Justice is pictured in all the old paintings and statues as blind or blindfolded holding a set of scales in one hand and a sword in the other. Her job is simply to weigh out certain actions and demand equity – retribution and/or restitution that restores balance to the world, according to the law of God (cf. Ex. 22:1-15).

Related to the notion of justice is the notion of “rights,” and rights always imply obligations. If you have a right to life, everyone around you is obligated not to harm you. If you have a right to private property, everyone around you has an obligation not to take or damage what belongs to you. If you are a wife, you have a right to be provided for, and your husband is obligated to provide for you as himself (Eph. 5:29). Justice is called for when one of these obligations has been breached, defied, or severely neglected — eye for eye, tooth for tooth, life for life (Dt. 19:21). However, when someone claims they have a right to a job, education, health care, or welfare, the implication is that someone else is obligated to give it to them. But who? God has assigned the family government the ministry of health, welfare, and education. God has assigned the church government the ministry of worship in the word and sacraments. God has assigned the civil government the ministry of justice, punishing evil doers.

LOVE IS LIBERTY TO SERVE

The problem with coerced “love” from the state is like that demon-possessed guy in the tombs from the gospels – his name is Legion. First, the state is presuming to know how my resources are best used for the good of others. Second, the state is presuming to know how my neighbors will be best cared for and served. Third, the coercion of the state destroys the personalism of individuals freely giving and serving and receiving, reducing “love” to a merely material transaction or wealth transfer. Fourth, the automated provision of the state creates weak, irresponsible, immature, and ungrateful dependents. Fifth, the coercive automation of the state is massively inefficient. In all of these ways (and more), love and liberty are destroyed by the threatened violence of the state. True liberty is the room to exercise true wisdom and generosity with time and resources to care for the needs of your neighbors, and in particular, those entrusted to your care (Eph. 5:28-29, 6:4, 1 Tim. 5:8).

SINS & CRIMES

Many moderns confuse jurisdictions by conflating sins and crimes. Crimes are those acts that harm the person or property of others or are designated by God to corrupt society and therefore fall under the jurisdiction of the civil magistrates for punishment. Sins are those thoughts and acts that break fellowship with God and others, many of which fall under the jurisdiction of families and churches. True love, liberty, and justice occur when each jurisdiction submits to God’s assigned sphere. In a Christian civil order, all crimes would also be sins, but in most civil orders, there are a mix of crimes that may or may not be sins. So if the magistrate orders that meeting for worship is a crime, it would not be a sin to disobey that order (Dan. 3:18, Acts 5:29). But the other point is that not all sins are or should be crimes. So for example, covetousness is a sin and it may reveal itself in bad thoughts or words, but it isn’t a crime until it turns into overt theft or vandalism. The point is that Lady Justice deals with black and white actions, punishing evil doers upon the testimony of two or three witnesses, but she is not entrusted with matters of the heart, house rules, or matters of worship. When “justice” tries to meddle in those things assigned to the family or church, you don’t get love, liberty, or justice.

CONCLUSIONS

The greatest act of liberty ever performed was also the greatest act of love and justice: Jesus laid His life down freely as a ransom for sinners. No one took His life from Him, He laid it down freely (Jn. 10:18). And He had that freedom because it was obedience to His Father.

But the sinful heart of man always wants to get this backwards and upside down. The sinful, prideful heart of man wants to collapse and confuse justice, liberty, and love in order to remake the world according to its own wisdom, which always involves manipulation and coercion and demands that you must acquiesce to the demands of government thugs.

But justice only punishes or exonerates. That’s all it does. And that is what it did in the Cross. God’s perfect justice punished Jesus in our place, and then because our debts were fully paid, God’s justice exonerates all who trust in Him. That is a supreme manifestation of God’s love and liberty, but you cannot mix them up without confusing the gospel.

Those who receive this gospel really are set free, and the Spirit begins to lead them to love their neighbors freely and generously in imitation of Jesus in obedience. But slavery to the flesh is manifest and obvious. So which one are you? What characterizes your life? Is it the fruit of the Spirit or the works of the flesh? If it is the works of the flesh, then any demand for justice is only to have the law of God fall upon you with all of its fierce condemnation. But if it is the fruit of the Spirit, you are truly free, and you are a manifestation of the righteousness of God in Christ.

The Pharisees came and asked Him, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” testing Him. And He answered and said to them, “What did Moses command you?” They said, “Moses permitted a man to write a certificate of divorce, and to dismiss her.” And Jesus answered and said to them, “Because of the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. 6 But from the beginning of the creation, God ‘made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, 8 and the two shall become one flesh’; so then they are no longer two, but one flesh. 9 Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate (Mark 10:2–9 NKJV).

INTRODUCTION

There might not be a more contested topic in the modern era than human sexuality, and this is because a constellation of cultural leaders going back to Darwin, Rousseau, Freud, and Marx have successfully discipled a number of generations in their claims that human freedom, happiness, and fulfillment come from individuals following their own feelings and desires, and sexual desires have come to be seen as the center of what it means to be human. While it is sometimes claimed that Jesus had nothing to say about these things, that is simply not true. And here, in this text, is one such place where Jesus gives us His authoritative word on human sexuality. It has been a massive failure of the Christian Church not to declare these words authoritatively and stand behind them with loving discipline.

THE TEXT

“…But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; and the twain shall be one flesh: so that they are not more twain but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (Mk. 10:2-9).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Pharisees come to test Jesus with a question about divorce, no doubt trying to catch Him in the intricacies of their traditions, the law, and public opinion (Mk. 10:2). Jesus turns the question back on them, asking them for the law given by Moses (Mk. 10:3), and they reply by quoting from Dt. 24 (Mk. 10:4, cf. Jer. 3:8). But Jesus replies that Moses made this concession for Israel because of the hardness of Israelite hearts (Mk. 10:5). Jesus says that this was never God’s intention, since God made them male and female at the beginning of creation (Mk. 10:6). And it is because they are made male and female, that a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife (Mk. 10:7). This is the only way two people become one flesh, and this is something that God does and therefore man must not try to defy this union (Mk. 10:8-9).

THE MODERN LIE

The modern world has embraced the lie that human freedom and happiness is found in what Carl Trueman has called “expressive individualism,” the idea that you and I are most free when we are the least inhibited in acting on our internal desires. Sigmund Freud pressed that lie into a particularly dark and sexualized direction, insisting that the very essence of being human and human happiness was found in sexual pleasure. This is why the modern world has rejected nearly every moral and legal constraint on sexuality because if an individual’s fundamental humanity is expressed in their sexual desires and gratification, to restrain or restrict that is to deny their humanity. This of course began with pornography and fornication, but has quickly led to the rejection of marriage, homosexuality, transgenderism, and gender fluid queer theory.

THE AUTHORITY OF GOD

What Jesus teaches here fundamentally is the authority of God and His Word over human sexuality. If Jesus was the original flower child, this was an important moment for Him to say something like “chill out, dudes, the kingdom of God isn’t about that” (in Aramaic). But that isn’t at all what Jesus said. He first appealed to the Mosaic law and then all the way back to the authority of God in creation itself (Mk. 10:5-6). Not only did God Himself make mankind male and female, God Himself made marriage between one man and one woman (Mk. 10:7-8). We must not miss the fact that God is the One who joins a husband and wife together (Mk. 10:9). This is why we may not break it apart, but also why we cannot force anything else together.

SEXUAL IDOLATRY

We touched on this last week, but every person must begin all reasoning about truth and morality from some ultimate authority, either God the Creator or else something or someone within the creation. When something or someone within creation is chosen as the ultimate authority (reason, science, experience, experts, etc.), the Bible calls this an idol. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves: who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator” (Rom. 1:22-25).

When Freud and others placed sexual gratification at the center of human identity and happiness, they were essentially claiming sex as a god, which is not really new, since ancient paganism always had gods and goddesses of sex and fertility. But there are two fundamental results of idolatry. When you worship some part of creation, you end up destroying it, and that worship ends up destroying you (Ps. 115:4-8). Instead of receiving sexuality as one of the great gifts of God, worshiping sex demands of sex what it cannot give and so it destroys sex and destroys human life and happiness. When we submit to God, when we worship the Creator, we are enabled to receive His created gifts for what they are and truly enjoy them under His blessing (Ps. 16:11). Being made male and female is so much more than sex. Reducing our humanity to sexual functions turns people into objects and destroys our humanity: friendship, family, worship, work, hobbies, study, creativity, laughter, beauty, and so much more.

CONCLUSION

The same God who makes male and female, and makes them one flesh, has come for our race of fallen, sexual sinners. And He has bound Himself to us by an unbreakable covenant, in the blood of His Son, in order to take away all our sin and shame and make us human again.

Sexual guilt and shame are some of the strongest feelings in the world. And Satan is the Accuser; he brings condemnation with truth, lies, smears, spin, and shame. But here’s how you know sex is no god but just a pitiful idol: sex cannot save you. You can use it like a drug. You can seek all the pleasure and satisfaction in the world and you will still end up feeling empty. God did make us hungry for happiness and joy, but all the pleasure in this world can never make you whole. As Augustine said, “our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee.”

So do not look in a humanistic mirror trying to see just how bad it all is. Every attempt to compare yourself to yourself or others will result in distortion, either patting yourself on the back for not being as bad as thosepeople over there, or else you will land in a slew of despond, drowning in despair. The only good mirror in the world is the Cross of Jesus Christ. Look there. And when you look there, you see yourself there. You see yourself and all your sin flayed, beaten, naked, and then dead, and then the body is taken down, put in a tomb, and three days later, He is risen, and you are risen in Him. All the gunk is gone. All the filth is gone. All the shame is gone. And all that remains is a holy and pure and glorious humanity: male and female.

INTRODUCTION

So we have reached a point in our society where people can no longer deny that religion influences our culture, customs, institutions and the like. People’s eyes are starting to open given the wild changes we’re experiencing. The 2015 Supreme Court Decision Obergefell v. Hodges claimed that a man has the constitutional right to marry another man. Transgenderism is being normalized to the degree that Boston Children’s Hospital now has a Gender Multispecialty Service that provides affirmative care to gender diverse and transgender individu- als. And these services are provided for children as young as 3 years old.
Our culture is increasingly confused about fundamental principles: What is a man? What is a woman? What is marriage? And this confusion is the result of God handing us over to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. God’s Word sheds light on these matters. And through his Word, God graciously restores man so that he can know both himself and his Creator.

THE TEXT

“And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, ‘Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife?’ tempting him. And he answered and said unto them, ‘What did Moses command you?’ And they said, ‘Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. And Jesus answered and said unto them, ‘For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female . . . ‘” (Mark 10:2-9)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Pharisees attempt to trap Jesus with a question about divorce (v. 2). Notice this is a temptation of Christ, not a genuine question about particular grounds for divorce. That being the case, biblical grounds for divorce (and there are such grounds) don’t come up in this exchange. Jesus replies to the Pharisees by asking them about the law of Moses (v. 3). They read Moses to say that a man can put his wife away through divorce papers (v. 4). But Jesus explains that Moses took that measure because of their hard hearts (v. 5). From the beginning of creation, God made male and female (v. 6). And this is the very reason a man leaves his parents and holds fast to his wife (v. 7). This cleaving is such that the two are no longer two, but one flesh (v. 8). And man must not tear this one for God is the one who joined the two into one (v. 9).

A GRENADE AMONG THE UGLY ISMS

This passage is truly a death blow to many of the vain ideologies that beset us. If we take the sword of the Spirit seriously in these nine verses, then transgenderism, nihilism, paganism, and secular humanism are slain. We see the rise of these empty philosophies around us in the dissolution of marriage and the defaming of the image of God. And the text at hand speaks directly to that image and the divine institution of marriage.

GOD MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE

Verse 6 states plainly that God made them male and female. We hear this same truth in Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 5:2. It is clear that God likes to create in binaries. He made sun and moon, heaven and earth, sea and land, peanut butter and jelly. We are not surprised to see him make male and female. And we are not surprised that they go together so well. This is his craftsmanship and it is glorious.

Genesis tells us that God made man and woman in his image. Here is the fundamental answer to the question. What is man? The image of God. What is woman? The image of God. But Scripture tells us more. 1 Corin- thians 11:7 says that man is the glory of God and woman is the glory of man. There are those who would look down upon this verse, believing it to in some way degrade the female. But what is degrading about being the glory of the glory of God? Who thinks being the crown of the crown is a slight?

THEY TWAIN NO MORE TWAIN

God made them different so that they might pair so well. And here is why androgyny is not only boring but the pits. It attempts to erase the two rather than join the two. Marriage is glorious for its leave and cleave. There is action there. There is something captivating. There is a miracle, a work of God. If you get rid of the distinction, then you get rid of the unity. And if you get rid of the distinction and the unity, then you get rid of the fruit.

This one flesh union in marriage and its fruit obliterates nihilism with its meaninglessness and despair. The first woman came from man. And man has been coming from woman ever since. Along these lines, Paul says, “For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God” (1 Corinthians 11:12). In other words, all of this leaving, cleaving, and procreating is a big neon sign pointing you to your Creator. How could you despair in ear shot of the babies cooing? The kiddos giggling? And in the case of our covenant children, God stills the enemy and the avenger with the noises coming out of the mouths of those babes (Psalm 8:2).

WHAT GOD HATH JOINED TOGETHER

And this leads to another point. Jesus does not only say that the two become one, but God joins the two to- gether (v. 9). It follows that there is no room for paganism. That is, there is no room for thinking that creature alone did this. Creature did not make them male and female in the beginning. And creature did not keep mak- ing them male and female down through the centuries.

Look at a man. Look at a woman. God’s fingerprints are all over them. Then, look upon man and woman joined in marriage. And remember as you do that this is the very picture Obergefell attempted to defame. Neverthe- less, look at that marriage. And here again, you see God’s handiwork.

LET NOT MAN SEPARATE

Jesus provides an imperative that you might think should already be clear. That imperative is, “Let not man separate what God has joined together.” And we can hear the rage of the kings in the background, “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us” (Psalm 2:3). The kings of the earth from Psalm 2 do not like the bonds that have come down upon them from the Creator. Those given to homosexual lust and acts are in the same situation. They do not like God’s order and design. They do not like two becoming one. In this sense those given to transgender confusion are the same. They too reject the design of the Creator. And according to our Lord’s words, those who would divorce without cause, while not stumbling to the same degree, are stumbling in the same direction, tearing apart what God himself has fashioned.

The good news is, amid all of our futile attempts to stamp out the image of God, amid our attempts to tear apart what he has fashioned, the Father sent his Son, a Son of Man, a Second Adam. Through his blood, man is reconciled to his Creator and the image of God in man is restored.

INTRODUCTION

There’s a new dogma in our culture which insists that Science must always be capitalized. You must bow low in the divine presence of Science. But if you haven’t noticed, the science always seems to flow in the unscientific direction of totalitarian entities tightening their grip on power. They want Science to be an infallible word, a sovereign decree, and to have preeminence above all. But mainly they want to use it as a tool for the vanity project of human pride.

THE TEXT

Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist (Col. 1:15–17).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

In this epistle from Paul, he lays the cornerstone upon which all the rest of his arguments will rise. The central confession of the early church centered upon this man Jesus, who was the promised Messiah and the embodiment of the divine Logos. That confession is here in the form of a hymn.

Pauls insists on a few things about Jesus in this poetic theology. Much controversy & speculation has centered around the meaning of the phrase “firstborn of every creature.” The meaning however is quite plain when you examine what comes before & after. He’s the image of the invisible God (likening Christ with the first Adam), He’s the firstborn of every creature (likening Christ with Israel, Cf. Ex. 4:22) (v15), but unlike Adam & Israel, Christ is the headwaters & estuary of all creation (vv16-17).
Though He’s the image and first-begotten of the Father, He is also God. By this we have assurance that the same God who personally made all things, is the same God who became a man and for our salvation laid down his life and rose again to personally remake all things. Paul also gives a thumbnail description of what took place in Gen. 1-2. All heavenly & earthly things were brought into being by Him; this includes any division of angelic entities: thrones, dominions, principalities, powers. He made them all and their continued being is due to Him alone and for Him they are and were created (v17, Cf. Eph. 3:9 & Pro. 8).

THE DARWINIAN HERESY

This Pauline explanation of the origin of all things is diametrically opposed to the explanation that currently has prevalence in our culture. Darwin introduced a heresy that the church at large has yet to satisfactorily jettison. Instead, many have sought to harmonize Darwinism with the Biblical account. But that’s like trying to harmonize orange juice and toothpaste.

The central claim made by Science since the Darwinian revolution is that being isn’t contingent on Divinity. Everything can come from nothing. But this turns the entire universe into a blind, unfeeling, impersonal place. There’s no order, rhyme, or reason. There’s no right, because we’re all just shrapnel. There’s no one to say “thank you” to for all the splendors. This doesn’t comport with what a minute of genuine scientific observation informs us of.

This revolution has resulted in Science becoming a religion itself, instead of a servant in service of faith. Science, done rightly, is like a systematic theology of general revelation. But modern man wants Science to do heavier lifting than it’s able to. It wants reason to supplant faith. But this is like trying to take your eyeballs out in order to look at them. Where does reason come from?

Modern thinking wants to insist that “the science is settled” until it isn’t. That’s played out in fast-forward over the last few years in regards to pandemics, vaccines, global warming, gender, and the list could go on. The planet is dying, except where it isn’t. Masks work, until they don’t. This tells you that we aren’t dealing with science, but the hardened paradigms of Scientism. The current insistence is that Science speaks an infallible word of order from chaos; but with each new discovery we find orderliness, design, engineering beyond our wildest imaginations. From rhododendrons to rhinos to rhomboids, we live in a gloriously tidy place.

SOMETHING FROM NOTHING

But both the materialistic view of creation, and the Genesis account agree that once there was no creation, and then there was creation. What Genesis gives to us, however, is that creation came from a Creator. Darwin needs the pixie dust of millions, wait…hundreds of millions…hold that…tens of billions of years to win the existential lottery. The evolutionary explanation for the heavens and earth is like the sad gambler in the Vegas airport who is pulling the slots even as his plane is boarding, thinking, “This time I’ll hit the jackpot.”

As Lewis points out in Miracles, when Jesus fed the 5000 he was simply doing something that usually takes a full season. He made more bread from bread, and the Colfax granaries add their witness that these things be so. Our trouble is thinking that Jesus could take a process we take for granted and somehow perform it in the amount of time it took for Him to offer a simple prayer of thanks to His Father.

Miracles are not unreasonable. They’re the most logical thing in the world if you first acknowledge that created being is itself a gift and a miracle. The problem when Christians refuse to acknowledge the first miracle of Creation, endeavoring to curry favor with the evolutionary worldview, is that they end up confronted with what to do with the supreme miracle: the resurrection. But if you grant the first “life from death”, the second & superior “life from death” follows easily.

ENCHANTED CREATION

So not only is the Darwinian explanation factually incorrect (as we see in the comedic attempts to explain missing links, “prehistoric” fossils in places they don’t belong, and soft tissue in dino bones), it is an incredibly bland, boring, and unenchanted way of seeing the world.

Woodpeckers peck trees with enough force that their brains should explode (the deceleration of pecking is 1000 g). But they’re designed such that their long tongue and a spongy pocket combine to provide cushioning which prevents such an unfortunate demise.

The sun is an inferno 800,000 miles wide, 100,000,000º inferno, warming us from 93,000,000 miles away. This distance just so happens to be not too close & not too far. It’s perfectly situated. The Sun’s energy output is 3.8 x 1033 ergs/second. Enough energy to melt a mile thick & two mile wide bridge of ice which extends the entire way from the Earth to the Sun in one second. Each second the sun’s energy output would power the US for 9,000,000 years. Or to use a more explosive illustration, one second of solar output is equivalent to the detonation of the entire world’s nuclear stockpile times 7,000,000. The largest power plants have a total energy generation of 3-5 GW. Comparatively, every second the sun produces the energy of ten million such power plants per human. And the sun is just one star amongst trillions.

What we find when we look around us isn’t an ugly mechanical pragmatism. We find beauty. While there’s a function to the peacock’s feathers, there’s also a sheer, over-the-top beauty. Butterfly wings, nebulas, the eye-pleasing patterns we find in sea-shells, flowers, galaxies, and cell-structures all are ostentatious displays of derivative glory. It isn’t just an orderly world, but it is objectively beautiful one. Putting this all together, we live in an enchanted world, made by God the Father, Son, Spirit.

BY HIM AND FOR HIM

Not only was it made by Jesus Christ. But it was made for Him. This is something which Scientism can’t answer. It has no reason for why we’re here. It can’t answer, “What am I here for?” But as our catechism wonderfully puts it, your chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.
You were made, and every atom was made, and every galaxy cluster was made, and every termite was made for Christ. As Col. 1:18 declares that all this was done so that in all things Christ might have the preeminence. Reason must bend her knee and acknowledge the task for which she was made. That task is to render worship to the fountainhead and ocean floor of all the glory: Jesus Christ. He made the world, and then He remade it. This is the good news. Behind all these shadow-glories which surround us, awaits the real glory.

INTRODUCTION

We will be taking a brief three-week break from our current series in 2 Corinthians in order to spend our time on what might be called a “back to school” special. Here at Christ Church, and at King’s Cross, and at CCD, we will all be addressing the same topics for these three weeks, and using the same texts. The reason for this is that our adversaries are not opposed to us for no particular reason. No, they have arguments, and we have a responsibility to address them. But as we do this, we want to do it on God’s terms, not theirs.

THE TEXT

“Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist” (Col. 1:15–17).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Jesus Christ is the visible image of the invisible God (v. 15). As such, He is the firstborn over all creation (v. 15). He is the firstborn over all creation because He is the Creator of all things in that created order (v. 16). This means, in the first instance, that He is not contained by that created order—He is the Lord of it (v. 16). He created everything in Heaven, and on earth. He created all the visible creatures and all the invisible creatures. He created the thrones, the dominions, the principalities, the powers, and all things else (v. 16). Not only was everything created by Him, it was also created for Him (v. 16). He is prior to, and underneath, everything. He is the one who sustains everything that He has made (v. 17). This means that He created everything, and that He holds together all that He has created. The basic takeaway for Christians is that Darwinism is the Ur-enemy.

THAT WORD SCIENCE

What is the most basic question we can ask about knowledge? The word science comes from the Latin scire, “to know,” and so science lays claim to knowledge about the material world. But because most people think that our debates about science and reason and revelation are debates about what we know, we go astray. The foundational question rather is this—what are the preconditions for being able to know anything at all? What kind of a universe is necessary for it to be possible for bits of that universe to know things?

The scriptural answer to this is plain. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge: But fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Prov. 1:7). “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: And the knowledge of the holy is understanding” (Prov. 9:10).

And so in the context of our text from Colossians this morning, the Creator of all things was made incarnate so that He might reconcile to Himself all the things that He had made, things which had been estranged from Him because of our sin. “And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled” (Col. 1:21).

In your minds. In your knowing. This includes scientific knowing. Engineered knowing. Historical knowing. Practical knowing. And so what this means is that the fear of the Lord is not the rival of science. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of science, the foundation of science, the ground of all science. It is what must be assumed in order for there to be any such thing as science. “The works of the Lord are great, studied by all who have pleasure in them” (Psalm 111:2).

THE REAL QUESTION

The materialistic and atheistic scientist wants to treat this subject as a matter of what we know. He thinks the question of whether God made the world or not is the same kind of question as whether or not it is raining outside. “Let’s just apply the scientific method and go check.” But if there is no Creator, and the universe is just an infinite concourse of atoms, then no knowledge of anything is possible—and this would include the idea that the universe is a concourse of atoms. That means it is not the same kind of question at all.

Now I know that this might seem heady to some of you, but it is really important. If the cosmos is just the debris field of the Big Bang, and there is no God, then it is just simply an accident. But if you want to know what happened in an accident, the one thing you don’t do is ask the accident. It doesn’t know. It’s the accident. As soon throw thousands of Scrabble tiles in the air and then eagerly expect them to spell out a detailed explanation of how no one actually ever invented the game of Scrabble.

THE PURSUIT OF TRUTH

The pursuit of truth, any kind of truth, scientific and philosophical included, requires an antecedent commitment to the idea that there is such a thing as truth. And if someone denies it, saying there is no truth, just ask him if that is true. If anyone’s worldview says that there is really no reason to believe anything he says, then feel free to not.

Earlier generations of unbelieving scientists were like the prodigal son before he ran out of his money. They were still spending the capital they had inherited from their father. But now, just like the prodigal son had no money, they have no basis for truth. They say that matter is the only thing that exists . . . but truth is not material. But what color is it? How much does it weigh? What chemicals make it up? The truth represented by the statement that “all is material” is not itself material.

The scientific method cannot conclude no God. This is because the scientific method cannot consistently conclude with no scientific method. So it is not the case that science makes the idea of God incoherent. Rather a godless science makes science incoherent.

CHRIST THE ARCHE

And so we do not deploy our minds in order to defend the faith. Rather we recognize that it is the Christian faith that defends our minds.

In the verse just after our text, it says that Christ is the beginning (arche), the preeminent one, the one who was firstborn from the dead. Christ is everything. It means that He is the first principle. He is the integration point of all things. He is the cornerstone. He is the ultimate elemental, the final Word. Christ is Lord. In the gift of Jesus to us, God the Father poured the footings for all possible knowing.

But never forget the fact that the foundation of every form of lawful knowing, including the true gift of the scientific method, was established by a bleeding Christ. The crucified and risen one is the one who is given universal dominion, which means that His humility is the foundation of His exaltation. In turn that means that His humiliation is the deep foundation that enables us to know anything.

Again, it is Christ or chaos.

INTRODUCTION

Christians do not merely believe that God created all things from nothing and an intelligent design of the universe, we believe that the only fully rational accounting of the universe, science, logic, reason, and human experience begins with the authority of Scripture, submits to the supremacy of Jesus Christ in all things, and surrenders in glad worship at His throne.

THE TEXT

“Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: for by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him and for him: and he is before all things, and by him all things consist” (Col. 1:15-17).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Apostle Paul is in the process of reviewing the gospel that was preached to the Colossians and has begun to bear fruit in their lives (Col. 1:4-8), and the prayer the apostles now have for the Colossians is that it might bear much fruit in their lives in knowledge and wisdom and good works and strength and joy (Col. 1:9-11), since salvation is deliverance from darkness into the kingdom of the Son, redemption through His blood and the forgiveness of sins (Col. 1:12-14).

This is where our text picks up underlining the power and potency of the gospel by underlining just who Jesus is: the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all of creation (Col. 1:15), the Creator of all things, the reason for all things (Col. 1:16), and that means that He is before and greater than all things and He is the One who upholds all things (Col. 1:17). Because that is Who He is, He is the Head of the New Creation, the firstborn from the dead (Col. 1:18), the fullness of God Himself, and therefore His cross is potent to reconcile all things, reconciling His enemies to Himself and presenting them holy and innocent in His sight (Col. 1:19-22).

ACKNOWLEDGING THE CREATOR

Paul’s argument is this: If we preach the death and resurrection of Christ and men and women who are dead in their sins come to life, full of peace, from the madness and violence and confusion of sin and darkness, then a New Creation has begun. And if Jesus is the Head of that New Creation, He is the Head, the Source, the Firstborn of the Old Creation. He is the Center.

Another way to put the argument is that everyone must have a standard for truth, a standard for evidence, a standard for making sense of everything. Paul is claiming that Christ and His authority is that universal standard for all men everywhere. Christ is the ultimate standard because He is the image of the invisible God, the Creator all things, and because without him nothing could exist (Col. 1:15-17). Of course the comeback is something like: But you can’t simply assert what you must prove. And our response is twofold: First, why not? You’re asserting a canon of reason, but you haven’t proven that you must prove every assertion in order for it to be valid. But the fact is that everyone must start with a presupposition that ultimately trusts God or man, the Creator or something in creation. You might start with reason, logic, science, experience, psychoanalysis, or consensus. But then you are beginning with a presupposition that one or more of those things are reliable guides to truth and coherence, but you haven’t (and cannot) prove their full reliability. In fact, all of those things are highly limited and have let people down in every era, and the last few years is no exception. Second, the proof of the authority of Christ is the forgiveness of sins and peace with God.

EVIDENCE BASED FAITH

It is sometimes claimed that reason and faith are opposites, or that science and religion are at odds. But the Bible everywhere teaches that God is reasonable, His creation is reasonable, and He expects human beings who bear His image to think and reason. What the Bible rejects is autonomous reason. We reject human reason that rejects the authority of God’s Word. Faith is simply reason in submission to God.

This means that all thinking people must reject Darwinism as complete nonsense and irrationality. It makes no sense at all to trust reason or science based on the assumption that the present world emerged by accidents and mutations. This is to claim that order and meaning emerged from chaos and meaninglessness, but every canon of reason and science rejects this.

Unlike irrational religions and superstitions, the Bible everywhere assumes that God has established certain natural patterns and habits to the created order. This order is what allows nature to be studied, for the nature of things to be observed, logged, experimented with, and learned from. Cause and effect, logic, reason, and the scientific method all require an orderly and intelligent universe. In fact, modern science emerged from a largely Christian and Protestant worldview that believed in a personal and rational Creator God.

CONCLUSION: WHAT ABOUT MIRACLES?

One of the obvious questions following the assertion that God has created the world with an order and nature that is fix and stable is: then what about all the miracles in the Bible? The simple answer is that the Bible itself presents miracles as, well, miraculous, unusual, deviations from the norm. In addition, it assumes that in order to believe in miracles, any rational human being would need evidence, testimony, and proof.

The central miracle of the Bible is the announcement that Jesus rose from the dead. And when John records the resurrection, he records the doubt of Thomas, who says he will not believe unless he sees the nail prints in the hands of Jesus and puts his hand into the side of Jesus, where the spear pierced Him. Then John says that the next time Jesus appeared, that was exactly what Jesus presented to Thomas (Jn. 20:27). And Thomas answered and said, “My Lord and my God” (Jn. 20:28).

And John’s gospel closes with these words, “And Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: but these are written, that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that by believing you might have life in His name” (Jn. 20:30-31).

THE TEXT

12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. 13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. 14 But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

6 Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, 2 of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. 3 And this we will do if God permits.

4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.

7 For the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it, and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessing from God; 8 but if it bears thorns and briers, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

9 But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner. 10 For God is not unjust to forget your work and labor of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister. 11 And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, 12 that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises (Hebrews 5:12–6:12 NKJV).

INTRODUCTION

The persistent weakness of God’s servants is not a bug, but rather a feature. God does it this way because He wants us to glory in Him, and not in ourselves. If we won the battles all by ourselves, we would be tempted to trust in ourselves. But God wants us to trust in Him as the one who raises the dead. If we lapse into trusting in ourselves, we are trusting in a power incapable of raising the dead. In a world like ours, that’s no good.

THE TEXT

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. So then death worketh in us, but life in you” (2 Cor. 4:7–12).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Earthen vessel, clay pots, were the cardboard boxes of the ancient world. They were used to store anything and everything. In Paul’s metaphor, our lives are the cardboard box while the pearls and diamonds inside it were the gospel, the excellency of God (v. 7). Paul then moves on to describe how beat up the cardboard box was (v. 8). All of his comparisons are meant to describe how the box remained functional, despite having gone through a lot. Troubled, but not distressed (v. 8). Perplexed, but not despairing (v. 8). Persecuted, but not abandoned (v. 9). Down, but not out (v. 9). Always carrying the death of Christ on the box so that the life of Christ might be seen within the box (v. 10). Coming at the same thing from another angle, he says that death has tattered the box to such an extent that the resurrection gems inside it can be seen (v. 11). Paul then adds a surprising twist—the death works in the apostles, but the life he is talking about resides in the Corinthians (v. 12). They were, as it were, part of Paul’s internal glory (v. 12).

WEAKNESS AS GOD'S COPPER

Just as copper wire conducts electricity, so also man’s frailty and weakness conduct the power of God. Anyone who has ever touched an exposed hot wire is learning something about electricity, and only secondarily about the copper.

Paul was squeezed but not squashed (v. 8). As one translator puts it, he was “bewildered, but not befuddled” (v. 8). He was persecuted by men, but never abandoned by God (v. 9). Paul was knocked over, but not knocked out (v. 9). They came close at Lystra, when they stoned him in the city, and dragged what they thought was his corpse outside the city limits, and left him there for the birds. But when they were gone, and the disciples were standing around his body, Paul opened his eyes and said, “We done here?” He then got up and went back into the town (Acts 14:19-20).

The afflictions of those who are closely following Christ are not haphazard. They are not random. They are not meaningless. They are not pointless. On the contrary, they are thepoint. How else can the copper conduct the electricity unless it is strung into wire?

WHAT PASSES UNDERSTANDING

When all these sorts of things are barreling down on us, it is easy to give way to anxiety. We are juggling cares, responsibilities, obligations, possible disasters, and tenuous relationships. But Paul—who knew quite a bit about this whole subject—said that we were to be anxious “for nothing, but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving” we should present our prayers to God (Phil. 4:6). He then says that the peace of God will protect us (Phil. 4:7).

There are two crucial things here. One is that we shouldn’t be worrying on our knees. Worry and anxiety are not sanctified because we give way to them in a posture of prayer. The key is that we are to present our petitions to God with thanksgiving. Sing a psalm.

That leads to the next thing. Doing this will not protect the peace of God down in the nether regions of your heart somewhere. No, the peace of God is not the frail thing that needs protecting, but is rather the great shield of God that does the protecting. What needs protecting are our “hearts and minds” (Phil. 4:7). Our hearts and minds are not the shield. They do not do the protecting. They are our soft innards that need to be protected.

BEARS MUCH FRUIT

Fruit bearing is a function of substitution, and we are called to imitate the Lord in this. Some people assume that as Christ is the only one who can die as a fully efficacious substitute, then that must mean that we do not participate in substitutionary exchange at all. But this is false. Remember what Paul said here—death was in him, and life in the Corinthians (v. 12). Husbands are to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her, and this results in their ability to wash her with the water of the Word (Eph. 5:25-26). And Jesus tells us plainly that unless a grain of “wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal” (John 12:24–25).

Christ sets the pattern of “my life for yours.” But He sets the pattern so that we might follow His example. And as we follow His example, He is pleased to enable us to “bear much fruit.” We are Christians. This is the Way.

Text: Hebrews 4:14–5:11