‘God’ always includes the Son

There is a refrain I hear from some leaders in our churches and teachers in our seminaries about Jesus. It goes something like this.

Jesus Christ is the lens through which we read the Bible.

This notion gets deployed frequently when people are trying to wrestle with the passages in the Bible that depict God calling for blood and unleashing wrath and devastation on the people of God or on other nations.

In broad strokes, I hear people saying that we should use what we know about Jesus Christ to help us interpret these passages, which often means that we should conclude that those passages don’t actually show us a true picture of God but are the creation or projection of the men who wrote those parts of the Bible. In short, we use the lens of Jesus to help us dismiss those passages as not reflecting the true nature and will of God.

This is not the only way that notion of “Jesus as the lens” gets used, but it certainly gets used that way.

This makes no sense to me.

It makes no sense to me because Jesus Christ in the New Testament does not shy away from talk of wrath, fire, and punishment. The “lens” of Jesus that we are offered in this exericse is usually not a complete image of the Jesus of New Testament. The lens itself is an edited view of Jesus. It is not Jesus but our own ideas about who Jesus should be that shapes both the lens and work we do with it in the rest of the Bible.

But it makes no sense to me for an even bigger reason.

It makes no sense to me because I affirm the doctrine of the Trinity.

Orthodox Christians worship God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three-in-one and one-in three. In other words, there is no mention of God anywhere in the Bible that is not inclusive of the Son. When God unleashes snakes on the people of Israel or demands the blood of entire villages, the Son is doing those things just as much as the Father and the Holy Spirit. There is no Jesus lens through which we can view the God of the Old Testament because the God of the Old Testament is fully present in Jesus. They are the same. If we think that one some how corrects or screens out the other, we misunderstand what we claim to believe when we sing “God in three persons, blessed Trinity” and recite the creeds.

This does not make it easier for us to grapple with God as revealed to us in the Bible, but that is okay. Making it easy for us rarely seems to be God’s primary motivation.

Digging through the sand

[N]one can trust in the merits of Christ, till he has utterly renounced his own.

— John Wesley, Salvation by Faith

This is so hard.

We are so good at polishing our own resume. We do such a good job listing off our own merits. We spend so much time telling ourselves “I am good enough” and “I deserve to be happy” that we cannot easily say “I am a sinner.” Indeed, some of us cannot say it at all and are upset at the notion that we need to.

I meet so many Christians who cannot comprehend the idea that they are sinners or that they need a Savior.

Other people, yes. But not them.

They have never murdered anyone or committed adultery. They go to church. They pray. They give. They do good works. Surely, this is enough. This is what they have been taught by example it means to be a Christian. Surely, Jesus must smile when he looks upon them.

We fight our whole lives to get ahead and prove we are worthy. As a result, we often cannot admit the one true thing and the first most necessary thing for our salvation — that we are sinners. We cannot admit that we need saving. We feel entitled to heaven and can explain why we deserve to get in. We do not worship God. We worship ourselves.

It is the most heart-breaking thing I see as a pastor because I know it is all sand.

I know the day will come for each of us when we look death in the eye, and in that day we will discover that there is only one foundation strong enough to support us. We are not enough. I am not enough. I need a Savior because I am a sinner, full of pride and self-righteousness. My resume means nothing. Only Jesus Christ can save me.

There is nothing more heart-breaking as a pastor than seeing someone who imagines themselves to be a Christian finding out in the midst of a hurricane that their confidence has been built upon the sand of their own self-righteousness rather than the solid rock of faith in Christ. I’ve found no work more difficult, more challenging, or more holy, than getting on my knees with someone as the waters rise and digging through that sand to find that rock. I wish I had time and skill enough to do this better. I am repeatedly humbled by the importance of the work and my limitations in doing it. I am constantly reminded that without the grace of God, we would all drown.

There is nothing more heart-breaking as a pastor than seeing the ones who never found that rock and got carried away by the waves when the sand beneath their feet gave way. There are a many things I need to learn to do better as a pastor. This is the one area I most feel at a loss — helping people to see, to understand, and to embrace the most basic truth of our faith. We are sinners. We need a Savior.

But I will keep digging so long as God and the United Methodist Church call me to dig.

The path of true peace

He that sleeps in death, has a false peace; he that is awakened, has no peace at all; he that believes, has true peace …

— John Wesley, “The Spirit of Bondage and Adoption“

When I first started to read John Wesley’s works, one of the things that I found most helpful was his attention to the spiritual condition of individuals. He writes much like a physician describing various forms of disease and illness, and often times even makes that comparison himself. To be a caretaker of souls, he writes, you must understand the causes of symptoms before you can administer the proper medicines.

In the sermon quoted above, Wesley discerns three spiritual states, each with its own characteristics and needs.

Sleeping
The sleeper or “natural man” is one who is either not aware of the things of God or imagines themselves to be in good stead with God when they are not. The first group we might call non-believers. The second group includes both those who worship a god other than the Trinity or who worship in the Christian manner but mistakenly think that mere outward worship and adherence to formal practices such as attending church semi-regularly and praying from time-to-time mean they are on good terms with God.

Such folks are at peace but it is the false peace we read warnings about in the prophets. Like the kings of the Old Testament, they can find no shortage of people to tell them that they have the approval of God, but such comfort and peace is difficult or impossible to square with careful attention to the Bible.

Waking
The sleepers are many. The awakened are few. These are persons who have come honestly face-to-face with their sin. They see and therefore grieve the fact that they are out of line with God, damned justly, and unable by their own power to do anything about it. This is why, as Wesley says, they have no peace at all.

The awakened are tormented and troubled. They know they deserve to suffer. Like the prodigal son, their unworthiness is the only plea on their lips.

As terrible as this state is, it is a huge spiritual achievement. Nothing is more difficult in the work of ministry — I have found — than helping sleepers shake off their slumber. Nothing is more emotionally and spiritual draining than walking through the daylight with an awakened sleeper who sees God and — like the disciples and prophets before them — is struck with terror.

Believing
An awakened sinner who cries out to Jesus and who does not relent until they have found him is the one who truly believes. They have a belief grounded on a deep assurance that Jesus Christ has forgiven them and that they are beloved not because they are worthy but because God is great. And the fruit of this faith — which is a gift given to us by God — is peace, true peace.

The believer requires continual encouragement and support as they grow in Christian maturity — we Methodists call this “going on to perfection.” And they need the watchful love of fellow Christians to help them along the way and help them avoid slipping backward or away from their faith. The grace of God will bring to full flower what he has started within them, if the believer continues to be a co-worker with God in their own spiritual growth.

Pastoral Challenge
Such is the landscape of the spirit that Wesley saw as he did his work long ago in England. The map he left us remains useful to those of us working in different fields. I find that pastoral work requires a great deal of attention to such things because there is so much temptation to let sleepers rest in comfort and so much difficulty in helping people through this process to a place of real peace.

The work is hard and the rewards are few. It should never be forgotten that Wesley was tossed out of many churches for disturbing the slumber of those who were used to lullabys rather than gospel preaching.

As tempted as I am to let sleepers lie, I am regularly in my pastoral work brought face-to-face with those who have been permitted to sleep and have found the bedtime faith that they have spent a lifetime in provides no comfort or peace in the day of trouble. They come to the edge of their mortality and they try to lean on their faith and discover it has nothing to give them but empty words.

I am not very skilled at helping people navigate this spiritual terrain. I am trying to do it better as I go. But I am grateful to those who have left me guidance, Wesley and others, so I might help the souls in my care find what God has promised.