Category: Devotional Grist

Romans 6 — Meets Two Similar Objections From a hypothetical foil

1 — Hypothetical Objection #1

Shall we continue to sin that grace may abound?

Considerations

1.) The Apostle has so heightened God’s favor (grace) and the liberating character of Christ’s work for us (Chapter 5) that he must pause and deal w/ those who might reach inappropriate conclusions based on his teaching.

One wonders if today God’s favor (grace) and the liberating Character of Christ’s work for us is so emphatically heightened that we are forced to pause to reject accusations of antinomianism.

2.) Sinning is the issue that is being dealt w/ here and as obvious as this might seem we must pause to emphasize that there is no way that we would know what sinning is, which we are to be dead to, or what walking of newness of life is, which we are to be alive to, w/o a standard. There must be some standard that informs us what sin is and what walking in newness of life is. That standard ever remains God’s law.

Now for the Christian that Law is redeemed under Christ, which is to say that we are not using the law as a means to curry or earn God’s favor, (we have no need to do that since we have freely been given God’s favor in Christ) but rather the Christian esteems God’s law for it is the standard that tells him what He must turn from and it is the standard that informs him what walking in newness of life means.

Without any objective standard, as found in God’s word, the idea of being “dead to sin” and “walking in newness of life,” would be impossible to qualitatively and objectively determine.

2-14 — Hypothetical Objection Answered

vs. 2 — Emphatic rejection // Rhetorical Question

Parallel passage — Gal. 2:19 — 19 For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God.

Considerations

1.) Died to Sin — Sin is being referred to here as the controlling principle from which the pagan lives. We have died to the necessity that we must be controlled by sin … by who we are in Adam.

This does not mean that we no longer sin individual sins. It merely means that the person who has died w/ Christ is the person who can now say “no” to sin, because Sin is not that principle, or life source, from which they are being animated.

vs.3 — Parallel passage — Gal. 3:27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.

Considerations

1.) “Do you not know”

Appeal to the mind. The Apostles expects them to have learned something important. The Christian life can not be lived apart from the life of the mind. He answers this whole objection by seeking to set people’s thinking straight.

2.) The appeal to Baptism

Notice — The appeal isn’t here to somebody’s decision for Christ. Now, that is not to diminish the necessity to make a decision for Christ but it is to say that when it comes to these soteriological matters Paul puts the emphasis on the objective covenant markers in the Christian’s life. The emphasis is on the means of grace when it comes to correction in thinking and growth in Christ.

3.) Baptized into Christ Jesus // Baptized into His death

Identification – In Baptism we are identified w/ the death of Christ. Vs. 10 seems to be what the Apostle is getting at here. Just as Christ died to sin, we, in being identified w/ Christ in Baptism, likewise should reckon ourselves dead to sin.

– In Baptism the previous controlling principle of our life (sin … sometimes also referred to as “the law”) is broken and we are put into Christ. We thus die to sin and are resurrected to walk in newness of life.

4.) Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father

Excursus – Minor proof for reality of Trinity

19 Jesus answered and said to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.”

Romans 1:7 — According to the Spirit of Holiness

In the New Testament we find varied places where Christ’s resurrection is attributed to each person of the Trinity. Doctrine of perichoresis.

The link below gives the tune for this hymn.

http://www.lutheran-hymnal.com/online/tlh-470.mid

Rise again , ye lion-hearted, saints of early Christendom.
Whither is your strength departed, wither gone your martyrdom?
Lo, love’s light is on them, glory’s flame upon them
And their will to die doth quell, even the lord and prince of hell.

These the men by fear unshaken, facing danger dauntlessly;
These no witching lust hath taken, lust that lures to vanity.
Mid the roar and rattle of tumultuous battle
In desire they soar above all that earth would have them love.

Great of heart, they know not turning, honor, gold they laugh to scorn.
Quench desires within them burning, by no earthly passion torn.
Mid the lions’ roaring, songs of praise out poring,
Joyously they take their stand on the arena’s bloody sand.

Would to God that I might even, as the martyred saints of old,
With the helping hand of Heaven, steadfast stand in battle bold!
O my God, I pray thee, in the combat stay me.
Grant that I may ever be loyal, stanch, and true to Thee.

Rise again, ye lion-hearted, saints of modern Christendom
With lesser loves ye now be parted, Soldiers in His “age to come”
Lo, our Lord commands us, triumph’s promise is upon us
And our will to fight doth quell, even the lord and prince of hell

Wouldn’t you love to sing this in a Sunday Morning worship service?

Mt. 21:18 Now in the morning, as He returned to the city, He was hungry. 19 And seeing a fig tree by the road, He came to it and found nothing on it but leaves, and said to it, “Let no fruit grow on you ever again.” Immediately the fig tree withered away. 20 And when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither away so soon?” 21 So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done. 22 And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”

On Monday of the first day of Holy Week we have the event of Jesus withering of the fig tree. Matthew places this cursing and withering as simultaneous events. Jesus curses and the tree immediately withers. The context of the fruitless fig tree reveals that the fig tree is serving as a illustration and metaphor for the fruitless ritual of the Temple and the fruitless life of God’s covenant people, Israel. Jesus comes to the Temple and expects to find fruit and instead finds no nourishment for the people. Jesus may have anticipated early fruit on the Fig tree and finding none uses the tree as a illustration to reinforce the cleansing of the Temple.

The idea of a fruitless fig embodying barren Israel was not a completely novel idea. We find this kind of language being used in Jeremiah 8:14 and Micah 7:1. It may very well be the case that Jesus’ action is consistent w/ a framework of understanding that would have been familiar to the Jews.

The idea of the owner coming to find the expected fruit and being disappointed with barrenness or refusal, whether of Temple, or Tree, is articulated a third time in Matthew 21:33f w/ the Parable of the wicked vine-dressers. Here the landowner expects fruit from his vineyard but after the repeated sending of his representatives to collect what is to be expected, finally the landowner resolves to come in judgment upon those who will not yield up the fruit that is rightfully his.

The repeated message in Temple Cleansing, Fig Tree Cursing, and Vine-dresser’ Comeuppance is that eventually judgment falls upon those who are covenantally unfaithful and who participate in a defiant, consistent, and ongoing disobedience. In history that judgment that was promised and prefigured in all of these events came to pass w/ the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.

We are reminded in all of this that when salvation comes it means both deliverance and condemnation at the same time. Deliverance for those who have been about the Master’s business but condemnation for those who have been lived w/ self at the center neglecting to yield up to God what He rightly expects and has so abundantly provided for.

There is one thing we want to explore here in conclusion and that is Jesus pronouncement in Matthew 21, “Let no fruit grow on you ever again.”

Now, remember in these words Jesus is referring to National Israel. I would submit that Jesus words mean that Israel as a National entity is eschatologically irrelevant. Certainly, Jews as individual Jews have, do and will continue to be converted but these words of Jesus suggest that God is finished with Israel as a National entity. No fruit will grow on them ever again.

If people would pause and think about the implications of that last paragraph they might have to re-think their whole theology.

Hebrews 8:10 makes it abundantly clear that the Old Testament case law applies in the New and Better covenant.

7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. 8 Because finding fault with them, He says: “Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah— 9 not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the LORD. 10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. 11 None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds[b] I will remember no more.”13 In that He says, “A new covenant, ” He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

While it is true that 7:12 teaches the explicit change in the law,

11 Therefore, if perfection were through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people received the law), what further need was there that another priest should rise according to the order of Melchizedek, and not be called according to the order of Aaron? 12 For the priesthood being changed, of necessity there is also a change of the law. 13 For He of whom these things are spoken belongs to another tribe, from which no man has officiated at the altar.

one must ask what exactly the explicit change is given that 8:10 clearly teaches that the OT law remains valid since it is that law which is to be written on the hearts and etched in the minds of the New Covenant people.

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

I would contend that given the explicit statement that the new and better covenant includes the OT law put in minds and written in hearts the explicit change that 7:12 is referring to is the explicit change that comes with the fulfillment of the ceremonial law. Such an interpretation does justice to Hebrews since the danger that the author of Hebrews is dealing with is the danger of the Jews, to whom he is writing, going back to the Old Covenant ceremonial system. The danger in Hebrews is not the danger of the recipients of the letter applying the OT moral and case law. That is not what the book of Hebrews is about. In Hebrews the danger is that people are inching towards going back to the ceremonial shadows. And so the writer to the Hebrews tells them that the Levitical Priesthood which officiates those ceremonies and the ceremonial law is past. That is the explicit change in the law that is being spoken of. Indeed the context demands that reading in vs. 10-11.

The context of 7:10-11 is the ceremonial law and the Levitical Priesthood — not the moral or civil law as those aspects of the law will be now written on their hearts and put in their minds of those of us in the New Covenant.

Indeed, to appeal to 7:10-11 as proof that the Old Testament law is done away with actually proves to much for such a sweeping change would have to apply to the Moral law as well so that, if we were to be consistent, would have to say that the Moral law (the Ten Commandments) no longer apply. I know of no Reformed theologians who have ever suggested such a thing.

So the new and better covenant that is promised in Hebrews chapter 8 is a new and better covenant because it is the fulfillment of all that the old and worst covenant anticipated. The old covenant is set aside in the sense that when the reality comes the shadows are no longer present but in as much it is the fulfillment of the Old Covenant it brings to the fore all that the Old Covenant promised. The thing to keep in mind is that they are not two antithetical covenants but a covenant of promise and covenant of fulfillment. Try to think of the relationship between the two covenants like the relationship between a engagement promise and a wedding promise. When the wedding promise comes the engagement promise is fulfilled and set aside and only inasmuch as it is taken up into the new and better wedding promise. The two promises though distinct are clearly related and even though the former engagement promise is put off it is putt off by being incorporated into the wedding promise which it anticipated.

The coming destruction of the reprobate will serve the glory of God just as the catastrophic destruction of Stalin’s communism or Hitler’s Nazism glorified the rule of justice. America looked forward to the destruction of Nazism, Japanese Imperialism, and Soviet Communism and longed for the day when the enemies of justice would be destroyed. Yet when a Christian expresses a longing for the day when the enemies of God’s glory will be destroyed they are stared at as if they were growing horns out of their heads. Sure, Christ lovers desire that the Christ haters would surrender just as our grandparents desired the surrender of the Axis powers. However in both cases, where there is a refusal to surrender there is a eager anticipation and longing for the utter defeat of those who stand in the way to God’s justice triumphing.

It is a good thing when rebels against God’s order, destroyers of God’s people, and creators of cultures of death are put down. Would that they would learn that it is God’s kindness that is giving them time to repent. Would that they would thus repent and so be destroyed by conversion and not continue in their unholy defiance of the Lord Christ which will lead to their destruction by judgment. But if they will continue to plot in vain against Christ and if they will continue defy God, then I look forward to their destruction and I will rejoice when it arrives just as my grandparents looked forward to the destruction of the Axis power and rejoiced when the Axis were finally defeated.

None of this is said w/o understanding that I deserve to perish w/ the Christ-haters. None of this is said as if I do not yet have wickedness in me that has needs of being conquered. However, due to God’s strange grace and furious mercy He has put me in Christ and as such I have gone from God’s enemy to God’s friend. As God’s friend I can’t help but desire that all who oppose His majesty, soil His splendor, and mock His Holiness to be utterly conquered. As God’s friend I can’t help but desire that all those who belittle His grace, rage against His law, and profane His transcendence be consumed by God’s glory.

With all that is within me I would that God’s enemies sue for peace by fleeing to Christ but if they will not and if they will continue to kick against the goads of God’s long-suffering patience and unrequited love then I look forward to rejoicing in their utter destruction.