HC 28 — The Advantage That Comes From Believing in God’s Providence

Question 28: What advantage is it to us to know that God has created, and by His providence doth still uphold all things?

The Heidelberg Catechism, being closer to the Medieval Church than it is to the modern Church that came in with the Enlightenment breathes with a devotional air. Throughout the HC the Catechizer will provide this kind of question and answer in order to make sure that student comprehends what we might call the cash value of the doctrine. The HC is not interested in an abstracted theology that doesn’t have traction in every day life. As such we get these kind of questions. Here we find a rich and still practical theology.

Here, the interest is making sure that the student understands the impact of the truth of God’s providence as in the life of the believer. Urisinus and Olevianus as the Catechizers desires their students to take the truth of God’s providence and find daily comfort in their lives from the belief of this Doctrine.

The question once again pushes the student in the direction that all of their living is conditioned by the Creator, Sustainers, and Governor of all things. There is no living absent of God’s providence and control. Indeed, it is the case that in God we live, and move, and have our being. All of our lives are lived out before the face of God to whom we must give an account. For the Catechizer’s the God of the Bible is not remote but closer to us than our next breath.

It is good to return to these realities if only because modern man lives as if the sky above him is bronze with no notion of the reality of God. The Christian is a different kind of man. He knows that all of life is life as dictated and directed by the kind and merciful providence of God. All of life is riven with the testimony of the God’s divine control and we as God’s people should find the benefit/advantage of that truth.

Answer: That we may be patient in adversity;8 thankful in prosperity;9 and that in all things, which may hereafter befall us, we place our firm trust in our faithful God and Father,10 that nothing shall separate us from His love;11 since all creatures are so in His hand, that without His will they cannot so much as move.12

The Catechizers are brutally honest. God’s providence does not erase the reality of adversity that we face in our lives.

Ps. 39:10, Remove Thy stroke away from me: I am consumed by the blow of Thine hand.

However, with their confession of God’s providence the sting is taken out of the adversity the Christian faces because the Christian knows that any and all adversity is adversity that is under the direction and control of God the Father Almighty. We do not live in a world that is dictated by chance, fate, or bad luck. All that comes into our lives, including our adversity, comes into our lives as fashioned by God’s providence.

8Rom. 5:3, And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience hope.

Even in our adversity the Christian can glory because we know that as God’s providence is directing all things the final outcome of that adversity will work in us godly character, and one of the things that the Christian desires above all else is godly character.

God’s providence is also intended to cause us to lift our eyes in gratitude when God determines to bless us with prosperity. The tears of heaven sent adversity may last through the night but the joy of heaven sent prosperity cometh in the morning.

What a glory that we should be given the instinct to be thankful to our benevolent God when He heaps prosperity upon us.

9Deut. 8:10, When thou hast eaten and art full, then thou shalt bless the Lord thy God for the good land which He hath given thee.

Thankless Christians when soaked with prosperity is a terrible oxymoron.

This truth of God’s providence of course makes a completely dependent people shut up to God’s wisdom as to what is best for us. This embrace of the doctrine of God’s providence has the ultimate purpose, in terms of the advantage it is to be to God’s people, to work in us a placing of our firm trust in our faithful God and Father. God the Father Almighty knows what is best for us — both in terms of adversity and prosperity — and this providence of God is intended that we invest our reliance upon Him who has shown His faithfulness to Himself and us in providing His Son as a surety that we did not deserve. If our lives were only characterized by daily adversity (God forbid) the reality that God the Father Almighty has provided the prosperity found in providing Jesus Christ as our deliverance announces that God has shown Himself faithful in His providence.

1 Thes. 5:18, In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.

This firm trust in God driven by confidence in His exhaustive providence is to fill us with the confidence that nothing shall separate us from His love.

Romans 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
    we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

This reality that we, as the people of God the Father Almighty, can be separated from the love of God for His people reminds us that it is God’s love for His people as conditioned by love for Himself, that everything that comes into our lives by way of God’s providence is from the hand of God who is expressing His love to us in His providence as it unfolds in our lives.

The hard thing in all this is the ability to continue to believe in God’s goodness and love for us when providence brings adversity. It is at those times when we will be tempted to question a providence of God that is anchored in His love for us as conditioned by His love for Himself.

This is why it is good to learn our catechism and the truths therein before being visited by a hard providence because when we are in the hot box of a hard providence it is even more difficult to learn the truth being taught here. When parents are holding a child born crippled at birth it is hard at that point to lean on God’s providence if we have not already learned it. When persecution comes knocking it is hard at that point to lean on God’s providence if we have not already owned it. When wasting disease visits us it is hard at that point to lean on God’s providence if we have not already learned it. Let us pray earnestly that we might get this doctrine in the very marrow of our bones.

The catechism ends here reminding us again that “all creatures are so in His hand, that without His will they cannot so much as move.12″

Every event that happens in creation serves God’s purposes because every event that happens in creation has no reality apart from the reality that God gives it in His providence. Whether we consider the malevolence of our arch-enemy;

12Job 1:12, And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, all that he hath is in thy power; only upon himself put not forth thine hand. So Satan went forth from the presence of the Lord.

Job 2:6, And the Lord said unto Satan, Behold, he is in thine hand; but save his life.

Or rather we consider the movement of Satan’s armies;

Matt. 8:31, So the devils besought Him, saying, If Thou cast us out, suffer us to go away into the herd of swine.

Or rather we consider the operation of any secondary cause;

Isa. 10:15, Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? as if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself, as if it were no wood

Nothing happens in all creation apart from our Father’s leave. Nothing can come into our life apart from our Father’s leave.

Let us briefly ask what we would have to say if all this were not true. We would have to say that

1.) God is not God since God by definition is one who has totalistic and exhaustive sovereignty. If God’s providence is not true than God would not be worth worshiping since he would be just some kind of celestial bystander who would be as taken by surprise at the events that enter into our lives as we are. Take pity on those who worship a God who does not have the kind of providence that we learn in our Heidelberg Catechism.

2.) We would have to cower in fear of man. If God’s providence is not true than we are fools to cross tyrants or the wicked in our lives. It is God’s providence that gives us the courage to have no fear of man. It is God’s providence that causes us to realize that man can do nothing to us apart from God’s leave. A lack of confidence in God’s providence would make cowards of all of us.

3.) We would go mad with the grief that enters into our lives. It is only confidence in God’s goodness and providence that steadies us when hardships and persecutions come into our lives. If we really lived in a time plus chance plus circumstance world we would not be able bear up under the burdens of this life. Only the reality of God’s providence provides a backdrop wherein we can press on when life presses us down.

4.) We would not continue to contend for the crown rights of Jesus Christ in every area of life. Were we not confident of God’s providence we would not strive to bring every area of life under His authority. Apart from God’s providence we would hunker down and not risk great things for the glory of God, being fearful of what might come into our lives absent a God who controls all things.

God’s providence works in us both to accept hardship as from the hand of God while at the same time energizing us to contend, compete, and contest for the glory of our great God.

O Sovereign God,

We thank thee with all our being for your providence. We thank you that it is true that all our life is conditioned by you and dependent upon you. We pray that we might grow to adore you more and more because of your providence in our lives. We pray that you might keep us from being like Job’s wife who assigned wickedness to you because of what you ordained for Job and His family. Grant us thy favor to be confident in your goodness no matter come what may. Help us to be like our Father Job, who, despite the hard providence in his life refused to curse God. Help us to be like our Father St. Paul who was driven on by the confidence in your providence to never cease in opposing your enemies at every turn.

Grant us your grace, in light of your providence, to never surrender.

In Christ’s name we pray 

AMEN

Galatians 2:1-10; Paul, Titus & The Issue of Circumcision

Galatians 2 Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and also took Titus with me. 2 And I went up [a]by revelation, and communicated to them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to those who were of reputation, lest by any means I might run, or had run, in vain. 3 Yet not even Titus who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised. 4 And this occurred because of false brethren secretly brought in (who came in by stealth to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage), 5 to whom we did not yield submission even for an hour, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.6 But from those who seemed to be something—whatever they were, it makes no difference to me; God [b]shows personal favoritism to no man—for those who seemed to be something added nothing to me. 7 But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter 8 (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles), 9 and when James, [c]Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that had been given to me, they gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. 10 They desired only that we should remember the poor, the very thing which I also was eager to do.

This morning we are considering this first half of Galatians 2. Next week we will finish the chapter and will then roll into the advent season with four sermons consistent with that theme.

There are matters here that we need to absorb in our 21st century context.

You will recall that the the book of Galatians is in many ways the book of Romans with the difference that the book of Romans Paul is dealing with the same issues in a much more systematic fashion whereas in Galatians St. Paul is dealing with the same issues as in a triage situation. There is a danger of the central doctrines of the Gospel being abandoned due to subterfuge and deception. Enemies as termites are in the Church in Galatia seeking to eat away the foundation and so recast the new and better covenant in the image of the old and worse covenant. There is an attempt to re-imagine the faith once delivered forever unto the saints. There is an attempt put people into a intolerable bondage and all this as in the name and under the authority of Jesus the Christ.

In this book Paul uses some of his roughest language in order to defend the Gospel which he sees at being at immediate risk. He asks the Galatians “Who has cast a spell (bewitched you).” He says of his enemies that given their hyper concerns for circumcision as an absolute ceremonial law necessity for salvation he wishes that they would just go the whole way and emasculate themselves. He says that if anyone should preach another Gospel than the one he is preaching let them be eternally cursed/damned.

Certainly not very nice.

This startling language reminds us that there is a time and a place for everything under the sun, including defiant, militant, and shocking language. It reminds us of Calvin’s quote;

“The pastor ought to have two voices: one, for gathering the sheep; and another, for warding off and driving away wolves and thieves. The Scripture supplies him with the means of doing both.”

Now we live in a epoch in the history of the Church where frankly there is a need for the unrelenting usage of the voice required for driving off the wolves as by the clergy. As sheep you need to realize that when your shepherd throws rhetorical left hooks and uppercuts it is in the interest of protecting you. This is what St. Paul does in the book of Galatians because the Gospel is at stake.

Before wading in the matter at hand consider St. Paul here. Here is a man’s man. Perhaps one of the greatest heroes who has ever walked the planet. The man was a genius – one of those original thinkers who comes around every two or three generations. On top of that he was implacable and un-moving. He took all the outrageous slings and arrows of a determined enemy and did not budge. He considered not the opinion of man unless that opinion was consistent with the Word of God. He was beaten down… hounded relentlessly, scarred, shipwrecked, and stoned. According to Scripture he was not much to look at. Some scholars think he was a physically unimposing specimen and not very eloquent of speech. Yet, Scripture breathes with the man’s heroic humility. He was self-effacing and only for the sake of the Church would he speak of his accomplishments.

Parents …. if you want a hero for your sons, consider putting the Apostle Paul in their pantheon of heroes.

When we come to chapter 2 the battle has already underway.

There are 4 issues that St. Paul addresses here. Some of these 4 will overlap somewhat but we will look at them as 4 issue all the same because there are some slight nuances that are subtle enough to consider in their own right.

Paul time stamps the events with the mentioning of his going to Jerusalem again 14 years later with Barnabas taking Titus along with them. There is some debate among the scholars (as there always is on almost anything) as to exactly when and what the 14 years is later. We won’t get into the weeds of that debate and will just offer that a strong though not complete consensus believes that Paul is speaking of here the famous Jerusalem council mentioned in Acts 15. The reason that it is believed that the Jerusalem council that is being referred to here is because there is a good deal of overlap between Acts 15 and the issues that are swirling here in Galatians 2. Then there is the fact that you have some of the same players mentioned in Acts 2 that we find central to Acts 15.

In vs. 2 when Paul says that he went “and communicated to them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to those who were of reputation, lest by any means I might run, or had run, in vain,” the meaning here is not that Paul was fearful that he might have been in error but rather the concern that the other Apostles, though perhaps agreeing in principle with him, might have gone soft due to the politics of the situation seeking to try to keep the peace with the Judaizing party that had crept into the Church. We learn from Acts 15 that Paul learned that he was not running in vain and the Church leadership of Peter and James was with him on the matter of grace alone.
Here then we bump up against the first issue in this section.

I.) Issue #1 – The Matter of Titus (vs. 2-3)

They brought Titus with them to Jerusalem because he was a living incarnation of the issue at hand. Titus was a Greek and so uncircumcised and yet this Titus had expressed faith in Christ and was counted as among the Redeemed.

The issue at hand though was … “Is this to be allowed.”

Circumcision had been a sign of the old covenant but the old covenant had passed and a new and better covenant had been issued in by the Lord Christ. Circumcision was a blood right exercised upon the source of life. However, with the coming of Christ all blood rights had ended with the shedding of His blood and by His being cut off that which was typological in the OT was fulfilled in Christ. Christ was THE source of life which in his death had been cut off as the fulfillment of all the lesser cuttings at the source of life prefigured in the OT cutting of circumcision.

By demanding that circumcision be continued – that Titus be circumcised – the enemies of the Gospel wanted to return to the OT shadows. In point of fact the Judaizing- Pharisee party wanted to return to a Talmudism that found salvation being grounded in works. By this demonic desire to return to a Talmudic faith the enemy would have overturned the Gospel of free grace.

Understand that had they been successful in this attack on the centrality of Christ alone they would have overthrown Baptism and God’s sovereign grace and so salvation would have been redefined. The Judaizers said “be circumcised, keep the ceremonial law, and then you can come to Christ.”

This is what Titus’s presence was all about. If a Gentile Christian like Titus present in the very heart of the Hebrew Church in an Convocation led by Hebrew Christians was not compelled to be circumcised, then the principle was established and no Gentile would be forced to be circumcised.

Understand that the kerfuffle here was about the fact that Gentiles were coming in without being circumcised. They were pulling their hair out over this. All this angst over Gentiles coming into the covenant and yet not a peep in the NT about these same people being told that their children were no longer members of the covenant which is what we are being asked to believe if the Baptists are right about excluding children.

Anyway … this is the issue surrounding Titus’s presence. Titus was a symbol of the conflict. Is the Gospel Christ alone or is the Gospel in concert with the Judaizing impulse?

This is an issue we as Theonomist must keep before us. We desire to honor the Law and we should but we learn here in Galatians that it is possible to go to far. It is possible to go so overboard with the law that we find ourselves wasting away again in Judaizing-ville. We need to ask ourselves careful questions about the applicability of the law lest we fall into this Galatians error. We need to develop principles to teach us where and when the general equity of the law continues and when the law has been eclipsed in the new and better covenant.

Well, we know how the issue with Titus turned out @ the Jerusalem council.

10 Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? 11 But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus [b]Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they.”

Salvation would be by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

This moves us to the next issue here in Galatians 2

II.) Issue #2 – The Problem of Subversion – vs. 4

4 And this occurred because of false brethren secretly brought in (who came in by stealth to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage)

Clearly, St. Paul is dealing with the problem of 5th columnists in their midst. In the early Church existed poseurs whose work was not to build the church up but to tear it down. In today’s language we would refer to these types that Paul mention as FBI plants or “controlled opposition.”

Paul calls them “false brethren” which means they were not brethren at all. Neither were they simply misguided. They had an agenda. They were epistemologically self-conscious about what they were seeking to achieve. They were trying to kill the church.

Before we continue down this path let me briefly mention that here we find one more example in Scripture wherein there is support for the truth of and reality of conspiracy theory. Paul is speaking of a conspiracy here. Listen to the language here. “False brethren.” “Secretly brought in.” “Came in by stealth.” “To spy out our liberty.” “That they might bring us into bondage.” St. Paul could guest host for Alex Jones and the Info Wars.

I only bring this up because so many in the Church today want to dismiss conspiracy theory as one legitimate tool in which to understand reality. If St. Paul could, as inspired by the Holy Spirit, identify a Conspiracy then I can say that the Bible teaches explicitly that men act in a conspiratorial manner in order to advance an predetermined agenda contrary to what it looks like on the surface.

The conspiracy unto subversion here was to overthrow the liberty from the ceremonial law that Christians have in Jesus Christ. Once we are in Christ we are delivered from the ceremonial law.

We would add that we likewise have been saved from the accusatory power of the law. The law can no longer condemn those in Christ Jesus. The Gospel is that though we are great sinners we have been delivered from the law of sin and of death. The law now points us to Christ as the one who has stood in our place and took upon Himself the just accusation that fell upon His people. The law now points us to Christ as the one who has paid for all of our sins, rebellions, and guilt. We walk in that kind of liberty.

Oh blessed liberty that we have in Jesus Christ. To not only be forgiven of that which I hate most about myself but also to be reckoned with the obedience of Jesus Christ is sweet liberty indeed.

The false brethren wanted to steal all that way and put upon all believers again a yoke of bondage that would make them miserable their whole lives and they were doing it by means of the most subtle of subversion.

This is the way fifth columnists usually roll when they bring their rank heresy into the Church. They are subtle. They sprinkle their heresy in all the nicest phrases. They dress it up to look pleasing and to sound reasonable. This is what in our time R2K has done. This is what Federal Vision has done. This is what the New Perspective on Paul has done. This is what Dispensationalism has done. These fifth columnists always sound fair but when one gets close enough they always smell foul.

If the early Church closest to the death of Christ had to deal with this it should be no surprise that the Church in every generation will have to deal with fifth columnists acting conspiratorially with the intent of re-fashioning the Church.

Note, before we move on that this subtlety is a always a matter of a worldview shift. Whatever direction there heresy is attempting to run, it can not run in that direction apart from significant worldview shifts. This is why we bang so hard here on knowing what you believe and why you believe it and what you don’t believe and why you don’t believe it. You need to have that ever growing ability to sniff out the fifth columnists conspiratorialists.

This brings us to issue #3

III.) Issue #3 – The Territorial Arrangement (vs. 7-8)


7 But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter 8 (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles),

Here we see that the work is divided. It was not that Paul couldn’t evangelize Jews or that Peter couldn’t evangelize Gentiles, it was merely a matter where the emphasis of their ministry would be.

Now were Peter and Paul living today they would be accused of “racism” because of this arrangement. “How dare you divide people up according to their race/ethnicity?”

Don’t you two know that “Jew” and “Gentile” are a social construct?

We will speak more to this point next week but notice that while there is a respect of both people groups there is no agenda communicated here for there to be some kind of required assimilation between the two so that the distinctions of “Jew” and “Gentile” would disappear in a kind of pork sausage matzo ball soup.

Indeed, even upon conversion we know that often Jew and Gentiles did not worship together. Sure, there were times they would but there was no requirement to that end. There was nothing immature about a congregation that was a uniquely Gentile congregation nor about a congregation that was a uniquely Jewish congregation.

Hear Theologian John Frame on this matter;

“Scripture, as I read it, does not require societies, or even churches, to be integrated racially. Jews and Gentiles were brought together by God’s grace into one body. They were expected to love one another and to accept one another as brothers in the faith. But the Jewish Christians continued to maintain a distinct culture, and house churches were not required to include members of both groups.”

John Frame,
“Racism, Sexism, Marxism”

Jew and Gentiles were one spiritual body in Christ. Peter would minister among the Jews and Paul among the Gentiles and their respective church plants would all be one in Christ but the existence of the oneness in that Spiritual body in Christ did not require an assimilation that would result in the disappearance of both Jew and Gentile. John Calvin (Sermon on 1 Corinthians 11:2-3)

“Regarding our eternal salvation, it is true that one must not distinguish between man and woman, or between king and a shepherd, or between a German and a Frenchman. Regarding policy, however, we have what St. Paul declares here; for our, Lord Jesus Christ did not come to mix up nature, or to abolish what belongs to the preservation of decency and peace among us….Regarding the kingdom of God (which is spiritual) there is no distinction or difference between man and woman, servant and master, poor and rich, great and small. Nevertheless, there does have to be some order among us, and Jesus Christ did not mean to eliminate it, as some flighty and scatterbrained dreamers [believe].”

And here we see that order. Paul would go to the Gentiles and Peter would go to the Jews. Territorial issues are resolved and the unity of Christ is kept intact.

I need to keep my powder dry for next week on this subject but the abject idiocy and recklessness of the putative “White-Hat” churches is maddening beyond speech. It can only be explained by God sending a delusion upon them to blind them lest they see with their eyes, turn, and be saved.

IV.) Issue #4 – The Agreed Upon Requirement

10 They desired only that we should remember the poor, the very thing which I also was eager to do.

We need to speak on this so as to demonstrate that the OT law was still in force even though it is clearly noted in this text that the ceremonial law has been eclipsed.

The law throughout Scripture had required just this.

(Ex. 23:10-11; 30:15; Lv. 19:10, Dt. 15:7-11)

The prophets required this.

(Je. 22:16, Dn. 4:27, Am. 2:6-7)

It is found in the words of Jesus

(Mt. 7:12, Lk. 6:36, 38; John 13:29

The law continues to have its impact. Here we see that there is attention paid to these commandments of God.

When you combine this with the law that was placed upon the Gentile converts in Acts 15

(that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual[j] immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well.)

You see that the law had abiding validity. The law answers the question that is being answered here, “How shall we then live.” The law, in its third use, is a guide to life and applies to every area of life. The Law is Holy, Righteous and Good, when used lawfully. The Law is where we find our delight both day and night. There is no dialectic between law and grace such as the R2K cognitively challenged want to posit when used lawfully. The law is the means of God that He has ordained whereby grace restores nature in the believer who is saved by a grace alone that in the finished work of Christ, God’s ordained law was honored – that law that taught; “that the without the shedding of blood there could be no remission of sin.”

So, on this issue we see that there that, in the words of Jonathan Edwards, “the Law and Gospel doth sweetly comply.”

Conclusion;

Re-cap

Therefore having looked at the 4 issues covered in Galatians 2:1-10 let us resolved to move in terms of a proper understanding of these issues.

Rod Dreher’s Magnificent Hypocrisy

Rod Dreher decided to be the messenger of many of the worst aspects of the whole Achord affair. (Is “the Achord Affair,” our version of the “Dreyfuss Affair?”) As such he is fair game in this whole matter. Let us consider the hypocrisy of Rod in his excoriating of Achord.

1.) Dreher now lives in Hungary. Hungary is about the whitest of white Nations in existence which is doing all its can to pursue its Christianity and its ethnic roots. If ever there was a nation that was interested in White Christian Nationalism it is Hungary. Yet, here is Dreher living in the center of a nation that is the very epitome of what he is criticizing Achord for in his championing Christian Nationalism.

2.) Dreher talks about the putative moral failings of another man. These are failings that are only moral failings as existing in a New World Order social-order. There is no moral failings by Achord when you compare him to the Christian men he quotes in his book “Who is my Neighbor; An Anthology in Natural Relations.” The irony here is that Dreher is accusing Achord of moral failings while being the embodiment of failing morally as seen in his recent divorce. Apparently its acceptable for a immoral man, when measured by God’s standards, to accuse a moral man of immorality.

3.) Consistent with #2 is Dreher talking about how is “wife” resigned her position with the school in question because of her horror at Achord’s beliefs. When he talks about his “wife” having to resign we are supposed to feel sympathy. Yet, Dreher is no longer married to this woman he is calling “his wife.” If Dreher has not sympathy for her as seen by his divorcing her why is he insinuating that the reader of his drivel is supposed to have sympathy for a woman he just cast aside? Note that Achord has not cast his wife aside.

4.) Dreher writes his Benedict Option advocating the necessity to “embrace exile from the mainstream culture and construct a resilient counterculture.” Well, if Dreher is going to embrace exile then let him shut the Hades up concerning those who are attempting to push pack against the current darkness. If Dreher is in exile let him stay in exile and not involve himself in the culture wars he has decided to exile himself from.

5.) Dreher advocates exile and yet when he decides to get back in the cultural ring, if only for a moment, it is to the end of punching to the right.

6.) Dreher, by his complaint, seems to communicate the thought that if he sacrifices his fellow Christian who are to the right of Dreher then somehow the left will admire him and play nice with him. I have news for Rod. If the Revolutionary left is ever successful the first people they are going to consume is useful idiots like Dreher. Dreher, ultimately, is cutting his own throat by going after people like Achord.

7.) Dreher complains about Achord’s book, “Who is my Neighbor,” yet to date nobody from the Christian community has engaged the material in that book. If Dreher was consistent he would have to say the Church father’s quoted in that volume are every bit the “racist” that he accuses Achord of being. If Achord is saying things consistent with the Church fathers how can he be accused of those things that Dreher is accusing him of?

8.) In the end the screeching at Achord by Dreher et. al. is a screeching at the Church Fathers and at Church history. They can be enraged at what the Church fathers have said all they like but in doing so they are communicating that they are sons of another Father (John 8:44-45)  besides the Fathers throughout Church history. Indeed, they are the sons of the Fathers of the Cultural Marxist and Achord’s chief sin is that he is not a cultural Marxist.

9.) Dreher wrote a book titled; “Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents.” I’m laughing so hard at the irony that my belly laugh is having a belly laugh. Dreher pens the aforementioned book and now we find the hypocrite living by lies as well as attacking a Christian Dissident. Rod, thy name is IRONY.

Fie upon the opinion of these Anti-Christs who are going after a man who merely is guilty of standing in concert with the Church Fathers who have gone before.

I would love to see Dreher, or Roberts, or Littlejohn, or any of these harpies actually tell us why the Church Fathers in the book, “Who is my Neighbor”  are wicked men and then why the book is a wicked book.

Galatians 2:11-21

11 Now when [d]Peter had come to Antioch, I [e]withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed; 12 for before certain men came from James, he would eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing [f]those who were of the circumcision. 13 And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy.

14 But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter before them all, “If you, being a Jew, live in the manner of Gentiles and not as the Jews, [g]why do you compel Gentiles to live as [h]Jews? 15 We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, 16 knowing that a man is not [i]justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.

17 “But if, while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves also are found sinners, is Christ therefore a minister of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I build again those things which I destroyed, I make myself a transgressor. 19 For I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died [j]in vain.”

I.) The Case Behind Paul’s Rebuke of Peter

It has become the cause celebre recently to use this passage to prove that in the new covenant God designed that Christians should no longer have a concern to honor the ethnic identity which God assigned to them. The reasoning goes that in the new covenant since the dividing wall between Jew and Gentile has been broken down (Eph. 2:14) therefore all considerations of how we belong to a nation or a people as among Christians is no longer a matter of consideration. This passage in Galatians is brought forward in order to prove this cockeyed theory.

So, we ask what is Galatians 2:1-11 all about if it is not about the errant suggestion, so popular as among the modern Gnostics in the Church, that ethnicity was abolished in the cross so that it no longer is to be a consideration among Christians.

Now, before we tease this out let us say as effusively as we can that the Scripture’s clearly teach that in Christ all believers have a spiritual bond that is not to be disregarded. Indeed, that truth forms the heart of Paul’s rebuke here in Galatians 2. Clearly, the Scripture teaches that if we lift anything, including our belonging to our family or people group, above our allegiance to Christ we are guilty of some kind of idolatry. This is why Christ teaches that;

Anyone who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me;

(Matt. 10:27)

Our highest love then is set on Christ. He is the treasure that is to be gained at the loss of everything else if necessary.

However, Christ does not teach that in order to love him we must disorder our natural loves. He only insists that our natural loves do not rise above our love and allegiance to Him as our summum bonum.

Indeed, Christ demonstrates the necessity for the fifth commandment to be honored when He teaches as against the very same opposition that St. Paul faces in Galatians 2;

“But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is a gift to God”— Mt. 15:5

Here Jesus is clearly teaching the importance to honor family.

Paul reinforces this teaching of Jesus when he writes to Timothy;

“But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”

I Timothy 5:8 

So, as we come to Paul here in Galatians 2 we understand that Scripture has taught that our family/our people group is important and is to honored but not as above Christ.

And here we find the nub of the matter in Galatians 2. The Judiazers had lifted their ethnic identity above the Gospel of Jesus Christ, so much that they were insisting that if one wanted to be a Christ follower one had to first become a Judaizer. In other words Paul resists Peter here because it was the Judaizers who were insisting that Gentiles had to cease being Gentiles and become amalgamated so as to be cultural Jews.

The Judaizing sin was to insist that all the world had to be a Talmudic Jew to be a disciple of Christ.

In Galatians, Paul was the one in favor of the Church being comprised of Jew and Gentile but with the truth that these two could come together for worship and fellowship. The Judaizers and Peter were arguing that in order to be justified one had to become a socio-cultural Jew and keep the same Talmudic dietary laws. Paul, on the other hand, was reasoning that one could remain an ethnocultural Gentile and still be Christian. The Judaizers and Peter were the ones trying to force an integrated uniformitarian Church and Paul resisted them to their face and insisted that one could have a Gentile diet and be justified … Gentiles could be segregated and have their own Church. (see also Acts 15).

Peter is practicing an unbiblical favoritism because he is communicating to the Gentiles that they have to reject the new covenant in favor of the Talmudic interpreted old covenant. Paul resists Peter to his face not because Peter withdrew from table fellowship with the Gentiles but rather because by refusing table fellowship with the Gentiles Peter was favoring a talmudic interpreted old covenant over the new and better covenant. Peter was denying the Gospel in favor or Talmudism.

Now why do we conclude that the issue for Paul in Galatians 2:11f was not his desire for an amalgamationist Gospel but rather the issue for Paul was standing against Judaizing impulses? In other words, we are saying that this whole mess in Antioch that required rebuking Peter was not about the desire to eliminate Jewish and Gentile real ethnic distinctions but rather it was about going after the Talmudic/Judaizing attempt to redefine the Gospel as a different Gospel.

Keep in mind that among the Judaizers there were man made restrictions and stipulations when it came to table habits. These had been handed down from generation to generation by the Judaizing Rabbis who were seeking add to God’s Word. For example the Rabbis had set up a rule where meat consumed by Jews had to be processed in a definite way when purchased by a Gentile vendor. Another example had to do with washing the hands before eating — a washing not for ordinary hygienic reasons but for fear lest the hands be contaminated by contact with a Gentile (Mt. 15:1ff, Mk. 7:1ff).

So, the threat to the Gospel here in Galatians 2 is not the threat of upholding the everywhere taught in Scripture idea that there are distinct nations that remains. No, the threat to the Gospel that finds Paul so vehement about is the threat that the free grace of the Gospel was going to be changed out for a Talmudic Judaizing Gospel.

No one less than the greatest Theologian in the post Bible canon era, St. Augustine, could offer here;

“Difference of race or condition or sex is indeed taken away by the unity of faith, but it remains embedded in our mortal interactions, and in the journey of this life the apostles themselves teach that it is to be respected, and they even proposed living in accord with the racial differences between Jews and Greeks as a wholesome rule.”

St. Augustine on Galatians 3:28

So, away with this cultural Colonialism that keeps rearing its head in the cultural Marxist Church today. Away with this notion that Bono sang of when he envisioned “one day all colors bleeding into one.” If Jesus, right at this very moment, can remain a descendant of Judah and David then the Gospel does not include the stripping off of our creational identities.

And just in case in needs to be said, away with the idea that Christianity forbids us from having table fellowship and friendships with fellow Christians of different tribes, tongues, and nations who share a like precious faith.

Summing up this point let us observe that if we were to posit that instead of Gentile table partners the case had been that the table partners in Antioch had been Jews who were not Judaizers, and so non-observant, the complaints of those Judaizers coming from James would have been the same.

The issue here is not eating with Gentiles
The issue here is non-Talmudic lifestyles

Now, we need a sermon on Ephesians 2 in order to cement this but that will have to wait for another time.

Before moving on to the next point let us make an observation here brought up by vs. 14;

II) The Character of Paul’s Rebuke of Peter

14 But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter before them all, “If you, being a Jew, live in the manner of Gentiles and not as the Jews, [g]why do you compel Gentiles to live as [h]Jews?

Paul’s rebuke of Peter reminds us that nobody in the Church has a status that allows them to be counted as untouchable. If someone is in terrible error then they need to have, out of even love for them,  their ears boxed. Nobody gets a pass when it comes to error of this magnitude. Not even Peter … not even the Pope of Moscow, not even the R2K Escondido lads and not even those — whoever they may be — accounted today to be pillars in the Church. I hope that if I ever am in error of this magnitude someone would love me enough to metaphorically box my ears.

Note the manner Paul rebukes Peter. It is right out in the open before God and man. There is no passive aggressive campaign to undercut Peter. There is no gossip behind Peter’s back. Paul grabs the Mic, and says what he has to say and then drops the mic. There is no more to be said.

Peter’s sin was public and thus so was Paul’s rebuke. It needs to be said here that this provides a template for us when people write or speak publicly. If they are putting themselves out there publicly then it is proper to respond in public — especially when the issue is of great magnitude.

III.) The Content of Paul’s Rebuke of Peter

15 We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, 16 knowing that a man is not [i]justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.

The context here points in the direction that what we have said so far is exactly the case. You see my friends the issue here is not the idea that the new covenant requires ethnic and cultural assimilation. The issue here is the character of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

This is the connection between verses15-16 and what went previously. What is being argued here is this;

If a Jew who, having turned to Christ, has learned that strict and exacting obedience to legal requirements — human and divine — will not bring him into the Kingdom, tries, nevertheless, to impose such legalism upon the sinner Gentiles, his effort to place this burden upon them has no excuse.

If we were to paraphrase the verses above into a language that might make more sense to us we would offer;

“Though we are by birth, race and descent Jews who are a highly privileged people, and not nekulturny sinners of Gentile descent, yet, when we learned that our works done in obedience to the law –both divine and human — could never be adequate to make us righteous in God’s sight, and that this standing could be attained only by trusting in Jesus Christ, even we, who in self esteem were always looking down on the Gentile goyim, began to se that before God we were not any better than they. Hence, even we embraced Christ by a living faith, in order that by means of the exercise of faith we might receive as a free gift, that standing of being ‘not guilty, but righteous’ in God’s sight. It was by faith in Christ and His merits, and definitely not by our obedience to the law, that we received this blessing of being righteous, for by works done in obedience to law — human or divine — no weak earthly, perishable human, whose works never reach the goal of perfection, will ever be able to attain to the standing of righteousness before God.”

If this is an accurate free hand rendering of vs. 15-16 we see the abject silliness in seeking to make Galatians 2 prove that the new covenant demands ethnic assimilationism. A thousand times “NO.” Galatians 2 is about the attempt of the Judaizers to deny Justification by faith alone.

The verb “to justify” used here in the passive voice of the Greek verb — hence to be justified — occurs here for the first time in St. Paul’s epistles and is used three times to boot in these two vs.

So, we should ask what is Galatians 2 teaching about “to be justified.” As we examine this keep in mind that the word “justified” has different senses. The context has to be examined.

In Galatians 2:15-16 the three passive verbs of dikaios are used in the typical forensic/judicial sense. In this context justification is best defined as that free and gracious act of the Father, whereby on the alone basis of Christ’s accomplished mediatorial cross work, the Father declares the sinner as meeting all the requirements of His just Law and so is legally just in God’s court — and the latter accepts this by faith. Whereas prior the sinner was — subjectively speaking — judicially under condemnation, now He is justified.

This reminds us that our standing with God is based upon God’s judicial declaration wherein He accepts the blood atoning work of Jesus Christ as our substitute. Justification screams that we are righteous by works but not our work. We are righteous by the works of Jesus Christ. Therefore our works as a consideration are (thank God) not part of the equation. Christ fully meets the demands of God’s law — both the demands for perfect obedience and the demand that past accrued guilt — both natural and actual — be paid with the price of blood.

Conclusion

Briefly, since we are over time now, we want to articulate here something so obvious that it might be missed the way that a fish misses the importance of the water all around him — and that because the water is just so much part of his environment that he can’t see it.

The obvious thing we need to say is that the kind of Judaizing-Talmudism which brought this whole conflict on, hates with a mad passion Biblical Christianity. It is the case here in Galatians 2. It is the case in Acts 15. Judaizing-Talmudism remains in opposition to Biblical Christianity. We would do well to keep that in mind.

Let us continue to pray that God in Christ might grant redemption to the Judaizers-Talmudists as well as the useful idiots in the Church who continue to do their bidding.

 

 

 

 

 

HC Question 27 — God’s Providence

Question 27: What dost thou mean by the providence of God?

Answer: The almighty and everywhere present power of God;1 whereby, as it were by His hand, He upholds and governs heaven, earth, and all creatures;2 so that herbs and grass, rain and drought,3 fruitful and barren years, meat and drink,4 health and sickness,5 riches and poverty,6 yea, and all things come, not by chance, but by His fatherly hand.7

In Question 27 we are still dealing with the work of the Father confessed in the Apostles Creed. We now have moved from the creation work of God the Father Almighty to His ongoing work of sustaining (upholding) and governing His creation. The word the Catechizers use for God’s continuous work of upholding (sustaining) and governing His creation is “providence.”

This idea of providence was once central to the ways Christian’s spoke. If you listen carefully, the way we currently speak lacks this idea of providence. Instead, you will hear the idea of “luck” falling out of people’s mouths. And while we don’t want to be too exacting when we deal with people, it simply is the case that “luck” in our thinking has often replaced the idea of God’s total and overweening providence. This is to be expected from a people who have lost awareness of living in God’s presence. “Luck” bespeaks mindless chance, whereas “providence” reminds us that all things happen by God’s almighty and everywhere present power. We live in a world that pulses with God’s providential control exercised as by His upholding and governing all things.

Heb. 1:3, Who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.

The reality of God’s providence reminds us we do not live in a world upheld and governed by dark chaos and old night. The world and the events of the world do not unfold randomly or haphazardly but unfold as ordered by God the Father’s everywhere present power. This providence of God reminds us that God is always present — always present as a Father to His people and always present as an exacting judge to the reprobate. God the Father Almighty is never in need of anything from His creatures and is the one who;

giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also His offspring.

Acts 17:25–28

Were humans wise they would, upon learning this, fall on their faces to worship He who upholds and governs all things.

The fact that God the Father Almighty upholds and governs all things reminds us that God is not absent from the world He has created. God is present and is not silent. His presence is attested to by all that happens. The idea that God upholds all things communicates the truth that the continuance of the cosmos and everything in it is dependent upon God the Father Almighty. The idea that God governs all things communicates the truth that this continuing cosmos is ordered and ruled by the God whose power and person is always and everywhere present.

Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?
8 If I ascend into heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in [c]hell, behold, You are there.
9 If I take the wings of the morning,
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
10 Even there Your hand shall lead me,
And Your right hand shall hold me.
11 If I say, “Surely the darkness shall [d]fall on me,”
Even the night shall be light about me;
12 Indeed, the darkness [e]shall not hide from You,
But the night shines as the day;
The darkness and the light are both alike to You.

Psalm 139

Whereas before we have been considering God’s Almightiness (Omnipotence) here it is God’s omnipresence (everywhere present at all times) that is emphasized.

As Question 27 ends we return to the matter of God’s everywhere present power with a litany of examples explaining the exhaustiveness of God’s upholding and governing. It is God’s the Father’s almighty upholding and governing hand that accounts for;

herbs and grass, rain and drought,3 fruitful and barren years, meat and drink,4 health and sickness,5 riches and poverty,6 yea, and all things come, not by chance, but by His fatherly hand.7

We should not miss here that the Catechizer’s insist everything — both what we call blessing and what we call tragedy — come to us ordered by God’s sustaining and upholding. This life for the Christian is ordered by a personal God whose sovereignty is total and complete.

This is a truth that is required to be embraced by faith. For example, it is only faith in God’s goodness and providence that carried and carries me through having a much loved grand-daughter who was born broken and damaged with severe cerebral palsy. Can I receive even this as coming from the hand of God the Father Almighty who upholds and governs all things by His mighty hand or shall I begin to conclude that somehow God was absent from such a sorrow filled reality? If God is absent from the bumps and bruises of life then when those times come where is the Christian to turn? To the fates? To the idea that somehow Satan overcame God? To some kind of idea that teaches, “well, God didn’t want this but, you know, sometimes God is sovereign enough to not be sovereign.” Away with all such foolishness. If God is God then away with ideas of “bad luck,” or “chance” or anything else. If God is God let us praise His name by kissing the Shepherd’s staff when in His wisdom He wields it upon us. If God’s providence is not true in just this kind of manner then I have no interest in worshiping God. All things are from the Lord God omnipotent. And while I may struggle with some of those realities (a broken grand-daughter for example) at the end of the day I must join with my Father Job and say;

“Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?”

Other faith traditions (Arminianism) who seek to lessen God’s sovereignty don’t solve the problem of evil. Instead what they give you is the reality of the evil as combined by a God who can’t do anything about it. One ends up with not only the evil but also a severely diminished God hardly worth worshiping.

When God chooses to send to His people drought, barren years, sickness, and poverty, God’s people must be equipped in knowing that God is good and that this good God has sufficient reasons yet unknown and undeclared to us as to His purposes for the drought, barren years, sickness, and poverty that are providentially sent and ordered for our lives. We must remember that our good God will “will make whatever evils He sends upon me, in this valley of tears, turn out to my advantage.”

The Scriptures that explicitly teach that God the Father Almighty, in His work of providence, does indeed governs all that comes into our lives is taught explicitly in Scripture;

A.) God’s providence and rain

3Jer. 5:24, Neither say they in their heart, Let us now fear the Lord our God, that giveth rain, both the former and the latter, in His season: He reserveth unto us the appointed weeks of the harvest.

4Acts 14:17, Nevertheless He left not Himself without witness, in that He did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness.

B.) God’s Providence and sickness and health;

5John 9:3, Jesus answered, Neither hath this (blind) man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.

C.) God’s providence in wealth and poverty;

6Prov. 22:2, The rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all.

Job 1:21, And said, Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.

D.) There is no such thing as chance. God providentially ordains all;

7Matt. 10:29–30, Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

Eph. 1:11, In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will.

Christians have a choice. They can either worship the God of the Bible who by His providence upholds and governs all things and so be realistic about the word “sovereignty” or they can worship a god of their own imagination.

Addendum

One final word here. When it comes to God’s providence we insist that though we affirm God’s providence we admit that we don’t always know what God is doing in His providence. There is, within some expressions of Christianity, a knee-jerk pseudo-prophetic inclination for people to think they can always interpret God’s providence. Some people are inclined to think they can file through God’s filing cabinets are hard drives and be able to tell you why a hardship comes into your life. While, it is certainly true that there are times when we may be able to trace out the lineaments of what God is doing in His providence, we need to be careful about falling into a “this is that” mentality. It simply is the case that we often do not know why God is doing or has done what He is doing or has done. For example, I will never know, in this life with certainty, why God wounded my Grand-daughter Ella. Similarly, there are many things that will come into our lives that we will have to wait till the eschaton arrives in order to understand. Be wary of people who think they can tell you what every piece of God’s providence in our life means. They can be well intended and fruit-cakes at the same time.