July Newsletter — The Plight & Hope of all Humanity
July Newletter (PDF)
The problem facing humanity is bigger than anyone has ever told us. When we turn on the television, watch the news, hear the grim reports of escalating tensions in the nations of the earth, as bad as the prognosis seems, the real problem is much deeper. The problem is not just “out there” as so many would like us to think. The problem is as close as our own skin.
The problem of humanity is two-fold; first, man is caught in bondage to sin, that all humanity is imprisoned under the reign of death and can do nothing, through might, will or mind to escape that plight. And second that humanity loves darkness, the indictment against humanity is not that they were enslaved to sin, it is that when the light, the truth of their plight, was revealed to them, when the prison door was flung wide, man preferred the darkness to the Light.
The Old Testament covers many things, but one of the greatest subjects is that is shows the utter failure of simply restraining their behavior to deal with the problem of sin. Time and time again God moves to counteract sin and shows definitively that no mere decree or program can deal with the problem, that man is wicked, totally depraved and nothing he can do in his strength will ever free him from that bondage. There is nothing man can do to reach God.
And so then, in the fullness of time this man, Jesus Christ, comes on the scene, and he begins saying these radical things, like you have to be perfect like God is perfect, and if you even call your brother a fool you are in danger of hell, and if you look on a woman with lust then you are an adulterer and if you hate your neighbor, a murderer. And If you have ever read the gospels, the sermon on the mount and felt the crushing weight of “I cannot live up to this,” you have gotten to the heart of what Jesus was saying, because, try as you may and strive as you might, you cannot live up to it, nobody can.
But the story does not end there. Dead in sin and captive to the reign of death all of creation languished under the yoke off the fall that there were none who could wretch themselves from the futility of sin. But there comes now this most beautiful one. Let your hearts stand captivated, in rapture and awe and wonder at the majesty, the beauty, the sear transcendence of this man, Jesus Christ.
There is a Man, a true man, but more then just a man: God. God came in the flesh, the one who stretches out the heavens as a curtain, the one who spoke and the heavens were made, the one who brought Israel out of Egypt by trials, signs, wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, this one who none could look upon and live: he comes in a manger, he takes on flesh and walks the earth.
In all his splendor, the highest comfort of a king’s palace would be a rubbish to him, yet he choose to come and live in poverty, to walk the dirt roads of the earth he made and not only that, but to be flogged, whipped, beaten, bruised and crushed and pierces upon a tree, in agony, in pain, there are not words to describe. That is God on that cross. The one who gives breath to men. That is God you are nailing to a tree. That is God so loved the world. That is the gospel. God suffered, died and was buried. The One who was life, and that life was the light of men — he was dead.
And then in glorious wonder and all consuming power, up from the tomb, shot forth from the belly of the deep arose triumphant this one, this Jesus Christ, and for the first time in all human history a man passed through the grave and came up alive. He was resurrected from the dead. There is right now a man who will live forever, in the flesh, in a body, in a physical frame.
He came up from the grave and ascended to the right hand of the Father and he holds the keys. The prison in which all humanity languished has been broken open, the light has flooded in and the power of sin is broken, the reign of death is ended. One has passed though the tomb and came out victorious, the first fruits, the first to live having died and he is the promise, the guarantee that just as he rose, so shall we.
If the Lord tarries in his return, our mortal flesh shall die, decompose and rot away, but my hope is not that I am going to be a spirit and go to heaven, that is great, but that is not my hope. My promise, what we are guaranteed if we remain in Christ, is not going to heaven when we die. The promise, the Christian hope, is that one day your physical body, he one you are in right now will raise to life again, it will be transformed, it will be glorified, it will truly live and you will be resurrected just as he was.
