Volume 1, Number 3 March 2000
In Ephesians 1:2-6 Paul writes, "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved."
The passage goes on to detail the marvelous gift that God has granted us in Christ and it is tempting to quote it all! However, for the topic before us the above portion will give us more than enough to consider in this small space.
Verse 5 is a wide open window into God's plan and purpose: it is "the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace."
Far from the tyrant that many have pictured Him to be, God's intent toward us is for our good to the end that we will praise Him for His marvelous grace. We must understand this before we can pass judgment on how God deals with us.
Those without understanding are like children who rebel against their parents. With limited understanding, they complain even when they are denied that which is potentially harmful to them. God wants our best for His best.
Note that all this was determined "before the foundation of the world." As a real estate appraiser, I get to watch wise builders and foolish builders. The wise ones do their homework before laying a foundation. God is infinitely wise. His purposes are ordered, not random and arbitrary!
Romans 8:28-30 is a familiar passage that speaks directly to this issue: "And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren; and whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified."
Foreordination and predestination are topics that have long divided the church. I believe Paul puts things in perspective for us here by showing us that what God has accomplished beforehand was based upon His foreknowledge.
Let me repeat from the previous edition; the moment that God conceived this creation He knew its history from beginning to end. Yet it was still necessary for Him to order (ordain) everything in creation so that its history would come to pass.
I do not believe scripture teaches that God creates a life He has arbitrarily decided to condemn. If He does, then it can hardly be said that His will is of "kind intention." He creates that life in spite of the fact that He knows it will reject Him and be lost, and He uses it for His purposes.
Scripture tells us that God is not willing that any should perish. If He has arbitrarily created some individuals for destruction, then it becomes obvious that His will is for those to perish. This contradicts God's revealed truth.
Though many will choose the path that leads to condemnation, God did not create them so that they had no other choice. He orders their choices to serve His purpose.
Diligent builders order soil tests, and have engineers design a foundation that is suitable for the proposed structure. Those who skip this important step cause a great deal of grief in the world.
God's purposes demand a foundation suitable for the deficiencies of the soil (humankind). So, before the foundation was laid God chose His Son to be of the nature and quality that was suitable for His purposes and our needs.
Have you got Foundation problems? Do you notice cracks in the walls of your life? Are there doors that stick so that you can't open the ones that lead to growth, and you can't close the ones that you need to close in order to find healing in your soul?
Remember, God's intention toward us is kind. He is unbelievably patient with us (AMEN!). It is His kindness which affords us the opportunity to grow in faith. If we trust His design and build according to His specifications, we will find ourselves standing firm in faith: unwavering and unshakeable. That, as we will see, is virtue.
"But He looked at them and said, "What then is this that is written, 'THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone'? Everyone who falls on that stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust." (Luke 20:17-18)
This statement of Christ follows the parable of the vineyard and warns the Pharisees of the danger of not recognizing the Messiah. Years ago, an engineer teaching the Sunday school class I attended painted a marvelous image from this verse.
This passage speaks of Christ as "the chief corner" in the kingdom of God. As a foundation is being laid out, an initial corner is set at the proper location and becomes the chief corner.
The line to the next corner is then taken the proper distance in the right direction and it is set. From there, the third corner is set at the proper distance and direction, and so on.
But in a building that is carefully constructed, an additional check is made at each corner after the second one. That check is a return to the chief corner.
By triangulation, the distance and direction of every corner from the chief corner can be computed. If a corner is not in correct relation to the chief corner, an error exists somewhere in the previous measurements.
Each corner must be double-checked as it is laid out because subsequent errors could accidentaly put other corners in the right place while leaving some in the wrong place. The relationships among the corners must be right, but each one must also be in right relationship with the chief corner.
Hopefully, I don't need to fill in many blanks here for you to see the rather obvious significance of Christ as the chief cornerstone.
Our spiritual walk is demarcated by many reference points. The lives that others have lived before us provide landmarks that comprise part of the spiritual kingdom that God, in Christ, has raised up.
The problem is that those lives are flawed. We can, as Paul suggests, imitate him "as he imitates Christ" but we should never exalt any mere man to the position of being our primary reference point. We must look to the chief corner for that.
Our relationships with one another certainly need to be correct, but the image is clear. They can only be correct when our individual relationships with Christ are correct.
The work God is doing in our individual lives is important at the personal level, but it is infinitely more important in the context of what He has accomplished in His eternal kingdom.
God will use each of us to teach, encourage and strengthen others, but we must fix our view upon Christ and allow the Holy Spirit to make the corrections which bring us into proper alignment with our Lord.
" So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God's household, having been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together is growing into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit." (Ephesians 2:19-21).
I had not planned on going to this passage at this point, but being the diligent students of the Word you are, someone is sure to point out that in Corinthians Paul says Jesus is the foundation and there can be no other. Here he speaks of the foundation being the apostles and prophets. Is Paul contradicting himself?
No. He is simply saying that Christ is the foundation of the foundation: the chief cornerstone. The teachings of the prophets and apostles are also foundational, but they are subordinate to Christ.
The image he draws here is glorious! Having been consigned to this world as aliens and strangers, we have become Kingdom citizens and are being fitted together as a dwelling place for God.
Each piece is being carefully crafted by the Spirit of God to fit in the prescribed place that God has ordained. The church is the earthly representation of that work. It is apparent that our individual pieces need some precision trimming to fit where we belong!
Humility demands that we glory in, not despise, how God chooses to use us in this building. He has prescribed roles for each of us and we should accept them with great joy.
There will always be those who are jealous of what God is doing with others; but, I have yet to meet anyone who was jealous of those who are being persecuted for His name.
We should never second-guess His ways. We will find our greatest joy by living for the purposes for which He has called us. Let us not be jealous of one another but rather fulfill our calling with all virtue!
Last time, we looked briefly at 2 Peter 1:1-8 where Peter gives us specific instruction about how to build our house of faith. Hopefully, you have a general grasp of how I see these components of construction coming together in our lives to grow us up. The next few issues will be dedicated to developing each of these areas further.
Peter opens his instruction by saying that we are to be most diligent about these matters. They are to be top priority in our lives so it is important to pay attention to them.
Perhaps it would be helpful to reflect upon Peter's life. As he write this, he has been through a lot and the Lord has matured him with time.
Early in his walk, his philosophy seemed to be "leap before you look." We call him impetuous for his tendency to just jump in without thinking things through. Once in awhile he got it right, but more often than not, he found himself in a learning opportunity.
The first thing he says should supplement our faith is moral excellence, or as the KJV says, "virtue." The root word here is hardly inclusive language as it has the connotation of manliness or courage to do the right thing.
This word only appears five times in the NT and three of them are in this passage. The fourth is in 1 Peter 2:9 where he tells us we are called to "glory and virtue."
The fifth usage is in Philippians 4:8 where Paul says we are called to "proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you." In other words, God is virtuous and we must be too!
Faith immediately puts us to the test. We can talk the talk, but can we walk the walk? There are those who stoically follow the precepts of scripture relying upon their own strength. That is the path to certain failure.
1 Corinthians 10:12 says, "Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall." That is good advice! If we think we stand by our own strength, sooner or later we will be confronted with a situation that will test our foundation.
If our success depends solely upon our own ability to make right choices, we will fail miserably. However, if our faith is in God's ability to supply all we need through Christ, we will pass the test. Right living is important, but the right power for living is essential.
Satan will be content to let us have our way as long as we live in our strength for it is there that he retains his hold upon our lives. He will let us do good things as long as we do them for the wrong reason. He does so because the praise that belongs to God is given to us.
The greatest battle we continually face is the encroachment of our own pride. When we stand in the presence of Christ, we see our weakness and need, and we tend to gratefully acknowledge His aid. When we stand in our own strength, we become puffed up and arrogant.
Unfortunately, even our reliance upon God does not guarantee us that we will escape arrogance. It comes in many forms. One of the most devious is our tendency to become self-confident because God has allowed us to grow in faith.
We come through the struggle victoriously in Christ only to be undone by vanity. In our hearts we say, "Look what God did for me. I must be really getting it right. I am something special." Remember "wow" is often followed by "oops."
It is so easy to fall into this trap. The enemy loves it and we are so prone to take the bait. We begin to look down on others who haven't experienced the kind of success we have and consider that they don't have this thing called faith worked out very well. If they just believed/thought/acted like we do, they would get on track.
Fortunately, God will not let us get away with that attitude forever! He disciplines those he loves. In spite of our arrogance and presumptuousness, He is the loving Father who calls to us again and again, urging us to a proper attitude.
When His light dawns on us, we understand the need for self-control. More on that next time! There is much more to be said on "virtue" and I hope you will take this as a starting point for your own study.
As we close this section we will remember Peter's admonition in verses 8-9 each time: "For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins."
Everywhere we look today, people's eyes are turned to the sky. Scientists spend billions of dollars scanning the heavens with arrays of radio telescopes hoping to make some contact with an intelligent life-form outside our world.
In Romans 1, Paul makes it clear that God's truth is evident even to the unrighteous because He has made it evident in them. Paul is so bold as to say they we can understand God's power and divine nature by observing His creation. Yet for all their looking, it is rare to find skywatchers who will acknowledge God or praise Him for His mighty deeds.
In their professed wisdom, they become fools and their hearts are darkened. We are a distracted culture! Sadly, the church does not fare much better.
Much of the church is pre-occupied with the idea of the end times. Never mind that we have been in "the last days" since Christ came, much of the Christian world is obsessed with the idea that "this is it!"
Don't' get me wrong, we are to have a sense of expectancy that our Lord will return at any moment. However, we are not to be so focused on His coming that we live as though there is no tomorrow (or today!). The field is "white unto harvest" and we are to reap while time remains.
Our instructions are clear, there is nothing virtuous about standing in the field gazing at the sky and letting the crop be destroyed around us!
Real virtue demands that we give ourselves to what God says is important, regardless of the cost. When we hesitate to stand for what we know is right because the consequences are intimidating, we fear men rather than God. To be blunt, that is idolatry. I'm still learning this lesson and we need to encourage one another in this regard.
We live in evil days and it is tempting to focus on escaping the madness around us. Faith requires us to fix our eyes on Jesus and do what He is doing. It is uncomfortable to stand in the face of evil and, in the name of Christ, confront its lies, but virtue demands it. As we stand, we will find that God is able, and our faith will grow.
"Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong."
(1 Corinthians 16:13)