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Are Christian Ministers “Reverend”?
Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox religious organizations call their priests “reverend,” or “reverend Fathers.” So do the large majority of Protestants, and a surprising number of Baptists, even fundamental, independent Baptists. Are Catholic priests “reverend”? How about Christian ministers–are they the “Reverend John Doe” and the like?
There is only one verse in the King James Bible where the word “reverend” appears:
Psa. 111:9 He sent redemption unto his people: he hath commanded his covenant for ever: holy and reverend is his name.
In this passage Jehovah’s name is “holy and reverend,” because He is the Almighty Redeemer, who in faithfulness to His holy covenant promises, redeems His people by His power, chooses and sets them apart to Himself, and makes them like Himself, until He brings them to eternally be with Him in His holy presence. Truly, Jehovah’s name is holy and reverend!
But “Rev. Mr. Jones” does not do any of that. Mr. Jones does not have an infinitely holy name or character; Mr. Jones does not redeem God’s people by an almighty arm and by the blood of Jesus Christ. Simply looking at the English word, one would conclude that a minister calling himself “Rev.” is a form of blasphemy, taking the honor due to Jehovah’s name alone.
What about the Hebrew translated “reverend” in Psalm 111:9? The form is the Niphal (generally passive) participle of the verb “to fear,” nôrāʾ, hence, “to be feared.” Jehovah’s name is “to be feared” and it is holy.
The Niphal participle appears in 34 verses in the Old Testament. Significant examples include:
Ex. 15:11 Who is like unto thee, O LORD, among the gods? who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?
Deut. 7:21 Thou shalt not be affrighted at them: for the LORD thy God is among you, a mighty God and terrible.
Deut. 28:58 If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, THE LORD THY GOD;
Mal. 1:14 But cursed be the deceiver, which hath in his flock a male, and voweth, and sacrificeth unto the Lord a corrupt thing: for I am a great King, saith the LORD of hosts, and my name is dreadful among the heathen.
Psa. 47:2 For the LORD most high is terrible; he is a great King over all the earth.
Psa. 66:3 Say unto God, How terrible art thou in thy works! through the greatness of thy power shall thine enemies submit themselves unto thee.
Psa. 66:5 Come and see the works of God: he is terrible in his doing toward the children of men.
Psa. 68:35 O God, thou art terrible out of thy holy places: the God of Israel is he that giveth strength and power unto his people. Blessed be God.
Psa. 76:7 Thou, even thou, art to be feared: and who may stand in thy sight when once thou art angry?
Psa. 76:12 He shall cut off the spirit of princes: he is terrible to the kings of the earth.
Psa. 89:7 God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.
Psa. 96:4 For the LORD is great, and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods.
Psa. 99:3 Let them praise thy great and terrible name; for it is holy.
Job 37:22 Fair weather cometh out of the north: with God is terrible majesty.
Dan. 9:4 And I prayed unto the LORD my God, and made my confession, and said, O Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping the covenant and mercy to them that love him, and to them that keep his commandments;
Neh. 1:5 And said, I beseech thee, O LORD God of heaven, the great and terrible God, that keepeth covenant and mercy for them that love him and observe his commandments:
Neh. 4:14 And I looked, and rose up, and said unto the nobles, and to the rulers, and to the rest of the people, Be not ye afraid of them: remember the Lord, which is great and terrible, and fight for your brethren, your sons, and your daughters, your wives, and your houses.
Neh. 9:32 Now therefore, our God, the great, the mighty, and the terrible God, who keepest covenant and mercy, let not all the trouble seem little before thee, that hath come upon us, on our kings, on our princes, and on our priests, and on our prophets, and on our fathers, and on all thy people, since the time of the kings of Assyria unto this day.
1Chr. 16:25 For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised: he also is to be feared above all gods.
The strong majority of uses refers to Jehovah as the One who is to be feared / reverenced. An examination of the complete list of texts (Gen. 28:17; Ex. 15:11; 34:10; Deut. 1:19; 7:21; 8:15; 10:17; 28:58; Judg. 13:6; Is. 18:2, 7; Ezek. 1:22; Joel 2:11; 3:4; Hab. 1:7; Zeph. 2:11; Mal. 1:14; 3:23; Psa. 47:3; 66:3, 5; 68:36; 76:8, 13; 89:8; 96:4; 99:3; 111:9; Job 37:22; Dan. 9:4; Neh. 1:5; 4:8; 9:32; 1 Chr. 16:25; note that the Hebrew versification is sometime slightly different than the English) reveals not a solitary text where a godly person, or a priest, or a minister, or anyone of the sort is called “reverend.”
Jehovah is reverend. If you are a Christian minister, you are not reverend.
What about a Catholic priest? There are a small number of texts where “to be feared” or “terrible” has the sense of desolate judgment. Thus, in Habakkuk 1:7 the evil, pagan Babylonians, who come to lay waste, kill, and destroy the Lord’s people, are called “terrible” (Hab 1:7). Likewise, a desolate, life-destroying desert is called a “terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water” (Deut 8:15). So Catholic priests, as representatives of their pagan and Satanic false religion, in the sense that they are pagan, evil, destroyers of God’s people, are “reverend” in the sense that they are actually terrible, are life-destroying like a desolate desert full of serpents and scorpions, and are soul-murderers the way that the pagan Babylonians were “terrible.” After all, the pagan Baylonians are their ancestors as they are part of that great harlot sitting on many waters, the future one-world religion centered in Rome, Mystery, Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and Abominations of the Earth (Revelation 17).
So let Catholic priests call themselves “reverend” or “terrible” if they wish–it is true, albeit not in the way that they intend, but in the same sort of way as when the Pope calls himself “vicar of Christ” he employs a title equivalent in Greek to “anti-Christ” (Latin vicarius = Greek anti).
So if you are a Baptist or a Protestant who claims to fear the true God, don’t call yourself reverend. In the good sense, it is true for the one God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, alone–He alone is holy and reverend. In the bad sense, of something genuinely terrible and destructive, it is true of pagan murderers of God’s people, and so, in that sense, an appropriate title for a Roman Catholic priest or of other servants of religions that are drunk “with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus” (Revelation 17:6). You are unworthy of “reverend” in the good sense, and I rather think you don’t want to be called “reverend” or “terrible” in the bad sense.
So Jehovah is “reverend”–Hallelujah–and Catholic priests are “terrible/reverend”–to their everlasting shame. If you preach the true gospel and are a servant of Christ, you are emphatically not “reverend.” So stop calling yourself or others “Rev.” The title is either blasphemy, if intended as a compliment, or a statement that they are pagan enemies of God, in the bad sense.
Spurgeon well commented on Psalm 111:9:
“He sent redemption unto his people.” When they were in Egypt he sent not only a deliverer, but an actual deliverance; not only a redeemer, but complete redemption. He has done the like spiritually for all his people, having first by blood purchased them out of the hand of the enemy, and then by power rescued them from the bondage of their sins. Redemption we can sing of as an accomplished act: it has been wrought for us, sent to us, and enjoyed by us, and we are in very deed the Lord’s redeemed. “He hath commanded his covenant for ever.” His divine decree has made the covenant of his grace a settled and eternal institution: redemption by blood proves that the covenant cannot be altered, for it ratifies and establishes it beyond all recall. This, too, is reason for the loudest praise. Redemption is a fit theme for the heartiest music, and when it is seen to be connected with gracious engagements from which the Lord’s truth cannot swerve, it becomes a subject fitted to arouse the soul to an ecstacy of gratitude. Redemption and the covenant are enough to make the tongue of the dumb sing. “Holy and reverend is his name.” Well may he say this. The whole name or character of God is worthy of profoundest awe, for it is perfect and complete, whole or holy. It ought not to be spoken without solemn thought, and never heard without profound homage. His name is to be trembled at, it is something terrible; even those who know him best rejoice with trembling before him. How good men can endure to be called “reverend” we know not. Being unable to discover any reason why our fellow-men should reverence us, we half suspect that in other men there is not very much which can entitle them to be called reverend, very reverend, right reverend, and so on … we would urge that the foolish custom should be allowed to fall into disuse.
C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David: Psalms 111-119, vol. 5 (London; Edinburgh; New York: Marshall Brothers, n.d.), 4.
–TDR
The King James Version and Old Testament Punctuation
The King James Bible has periods at the end of practically every verse. It also contains other punctuation marks, such as colons and commas, within verses. Does this English punctuation relate to anything in the Biblical text? The answer is “yes.”
The Old Testament accent marks, which there are strong reasons to believe are just as inspired as the Hebrew consonants and vowels, based on the statement of Christ in Matthew 5:18, among many other reasons, specify pauses or indicate disjunction in the text. In fact, God inspired a more detailed and specific system of punctuation in the original world language, Hebrew, the language in which He revealed 75% of His inspired Word, than the punctuation system of English. Every inspired word in the Old Testament has an accent revealing one of several levels of disjunction or an accent indicating conjunction, that words are to be read with a pause between them (disjunction) or connected (conjunction).
Consider, for example, Exodus 3:14-15. The bold “D” indicates a disjunctive accent in the Hebrew text, that is, a pause. There are levels of strength in the Hebrew accents–D1 is a stronger accent than D2, which is stronger than D3, and so on. (There are level 4, D4, very weak disjunctive Hebrew accents, and there are also conjunctive accents–every word has an accent–but I have not included the D4 very weak disjunctives, nor the conjunctive accents, below.)
וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֱלֹהִים֙ אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֔ה אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה אֲשֶׁ֣ר אֶֽהְיֶ֑ה וַיֹּ֗אמֶר כֹּ֤ה תֹאמַר֙ לִבְנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל אֶֽהְיֶ֖ה שְׁלָחַ֥נִי אֲלֵיכֶֽם׃
וַיֹּאמֶר֩ ע֨וֹד אֱלֹהִ֜ים אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֗ה כֹּֽה־תֹאמַר֮ אֶל־בְּנֵ֣י יִשְׂרָאֵל֒ יְהוָ֞ה אֱלֹהֵ֣י אֲבֹתֵיכֶ֗ם אֱלֹהֵ֨י אַבְרָהָ֜ם אֱלֹהֵ֥י יִצְחָ֛ק וֵאלֹהֵ֥י יַעֲקֹ֖ב שְׁלָחַ֣נִי אֲלֵיכֶ֑ם זֶה־שְּׁמִ֣י לְעֹלָ֔ם וְזֶ֥ה זִכְרִ֖י לְדֹ֥ר דֹּֽר׃
14 And God said unto Moses, D2 I AM D2 THAT I AM: D1 and he said, D3 Thus shalt thou say D3 unto the children of Israel, D2 I AM D2 hath sent me unto you. D1 15 And God said moreover unto Moses, D3 Thus shalt thou say D3 unto the children of Israel, D2 The LORD God of your fathers, D3 the God of Abraham, D3 the God of Isaac, D3 and the God of Jacob, D2 hath sent me unto you: D1 this is my name for ever, D2 and this is my memorial D2 unto all generations. D1
Note that the strongest disjunctive accents / pausal accents correspond to the periods in the English punctuation or to colons (and the accent on the colon is less strong than the one for the period). Note the correspondence of the weaker disjunctive D2 and D3 accents to commas in the English text and other places of natural pause. (There are reasons why some accents at levels D1-4 are stronger at times and weaker at times, but that is a discussion too complicated for this blog post.)
When the King James Bible was translated the inspiration of the Hebrew vowels and accent marks was generally accepted, unlike in modern times, when the Hebrew accents are generally viewed as an uninspired addition to the text, and one can take several years of Hebrew in evangelical or even fundamentalist seminaries and not even know how the Hebrew accent system works.
The fact that the Authorized, King James Version takes the Hebrew accents seriously is another way in which the KJV is superior to modern English versions. Furthermore, since the Hebrew text indicates pauses, when one is engaged in public reading of Scripture in the churches of Christ, one should take the punctuation seriously. Do not rush through the reading of Scripture. Pause where the KJV has a period. Pause where it has a colon. Pause for a slightly shorter time for a comma. Let the inspired words of God be read with reverence, solemnity, and care–read them for what they are, pausing over the punctuation just like Moses and the other Old Testament authors intended when the Holy Ghost dictated the Hebrew text– consonants, vowels, and accents–through the human penmen of Scripture.
May I also suggest that if you are going to learn Hebrew, you learn it from a source that takes the inspiration and preservation of the Hebrew vowels and accents seriously, and so makes sure that students learn the accent system, rather than being deprived of understanding this important aspect of the syntax God’s Word? What would you think of an English teacher that never taught his students what commas and periods are?
(Don’t you want to know whether someone is saying “Let’s eat Grandma” or “Let’s eat, Grandma!”) Shouldn’t students of Hebrew know the same sorts of things in the the Old Testament?
By the way, if you studied Hebrew but were never taught the Hebrew accents/punctuation, the resources below are a good place to start. I would read Futato first and then Fuller & Choi.
Basics of Hebrew Accents, Mark D. Futato
Learning the Hebrew accents will help you in your studying, preaching, and teaching of the jots and tittles of God’s infallible Word.
–TDR
The Amazon links are affiliate links, but I would recommend these works whether they were affiliate links or not.
The Place of Fear in a True Church and With True Worship
I’ve read recently, “Fear is not a virtue.” A company called, American Virtue Clothing prints “Fear Is Not a Virtue” on its clothing. Heather Delapi argues that “fear” isn’t found in the lists of virtues of scripture, hence is not a virtue. The English word “fear” is found 385 times in the King James Version of the Bible. I have read all of those verses, but I haven’t sorted through everyone of them to find how many times fear is rebuked or admonished and how many times it is extolled or commended. There are both.Fear is a virtue. No godly person lives without fear. It is a necessity for pleasing God. Just because it isn’t listed as fruit of the Spirit doesn’t mean that it isn’t a virtue. It is dangerous and wrong to say it isn’t a virtue. Why would I even write this? I’ve taught through Acts all the way through once, and in great detail about halfway through the whole book about five times. I’m teaching and preaching through it again right now as we evangelize and plant a church in Southern Oregon. When Luke writes under the inspiration of God to describe the basics of the church of Jerusalem in that classic passage in Acts 2:41-47, he writes in Acts 2:43 an attitude of that first church:
And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles.
“Fear came upon every soul.” This verse got my attention again on this subject, so I’m writing on it. This same morning as I was preaching the end of the book of Acts, in Sunday School I started a short series on “The Detection and Correction of Doctrinal and Practical Error.” In my introduction I quoted what Jesus said in Matthew 10:28 and elaborated about its part in that subject.
And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
“Q,” the Son of Man, and Christ’s Deity
The alleged document “Q,” according to critical or anti-supernaturalist scholars, underlies the New Testament Gospels. As explained in my study on the New Testament and archaeology, there is no reason to believe that “Q” ever existed. However, even if one granted, for the sake of argument, that “Q” did exist, it still provides evidence that Christ is Divine, for the Lord Jesus clearly identifies Himself as the Son of Man.In Daniel 7:13-14; the “service” the Son of Man receives is that which pertains only to Jehovah [see the other Biblical references to the Aramaic word pᵉlaḥ in: Daniel 3:12, 14, 17–18, 28; 6:16, 20; 7:14, 27; Ezra 7:24; the word means to “pay reverence to, serve (deity),” (Francis Brown, Samuel Rolles Driver, and Charles Augustus Briggs, Enhanced Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977]) and is translated in the LXX as latreuo, the word for the service/worship of God]). Thus, when Christ claims to be the Son of Man, He is claiming a Divine title.According to the skeptical, anti-supernaturalist criteria for evaluating the authenticity of Christ’s sayings about Himself known as the principle of dissimilarity, sayings of Jesus are recognized by skeptical scholars as authentic when they disagree with what early Christianity taught and what the Judaism of the time taught. In other words, the Christians were not making up sayings of Jesus and putting them into His mouth if they themselves did not employ them. This is a foolish skeptical criterion, for the likelihood that the Christians would teach what Christ had taught them and so there would be tremendous overlap is only natural. However, if one accepts this criterion as true for the sake of argument, the “Son of Man” sayings by the Lord Jesus pass it. Skeptical scholars recognize that Jesus’ “Son of Man” sayings are attested to by multiple sources. As Gary Habermas points out, even though “Son of Man” is Jesus’ favorite self‐designation in the Gospels, none of the New Testament epistles attribute this title to Jesus even a single time. So skeptical scholars, using their own critera, should accept the legitimacy of the Son of Man sayings in the Gospels.The real Jesus of history is a supernatural one who claims He is God in the flesh, the Divine-human Son of Man predicted by Daniel the prophet. A “Jesus” who was just a good teacher is entirely absent from the pages of history. Thus, my question in my debate with Shabir Ally on the accuracy of the New Testament picture of Jesus (on YouTube here):If, for the sake of argument, I granted that “Q” existed, does not the fact that “Q” still specifies a Jesus who has the attributes of God (Q 10:22 cf. Matthew 11:27; Luke 10:22), gives the Holy Spirit Divine status (Q 12:10; cf. Matthew 12:31; Mark 3:28-29; Luke 12:10), and who is the Divine Son of Man who shares Jehovah’s throne, glory, and worship[1] (Q 6:22-23; 7:34; 9:58; 11:30; 12:8-10; 17:22-23; cf. Matthew 8:20; 9:6; 10:23; 11:19; 12:8, 32, 40; 13:37, 41; 16:13, 27–28; 17:9, 12, 22; 18:11; 19:28; 20:18, 28; 24:27, 30, 37, 39, 44; 25:13, 31; 26:2, 24, 45, 64; Mark 2:10, 28; 8:31, 38; 9:9, 12, 31; 10:33, 45; 13:26, 34; 14:21, 41, 62; Luke 5:24; 6:5; 7:34; 9:22, 26, 44, 56, 58; 11:30; 12:8, 10, 40; 17:22, 24, 26, 30; 18:8, 31; 19:10; 21:27, 36; 22:22, 48, 69; 24:7; John 1:51; 3:13–14; 5:27; 6:27, 53, 62; 8:28; 12:23, 34; 13:31; Acts 7:56; Hebrews 2:6; Revelation 1:13; 14:14) show how impossible it is to reduce the Lord Jesus to the mere prophet or teacher affirmed in Islam and secular humanism, since even in the anti-supernaturalist myth “Q” Christ still is the God-Man?–TR
The Ugliness That Is The New Beauty and In Stark Contrast to the True Beauty of the Throne Room of God
One could call the throne room of God the operations center for all the universe. It is also a model or paradigm for man for beauty, truth, and goodness. Hebrews calls it the “true tabernacle” (Hebrews 8:2), an example for the earthly one (Hebrews 8:2). Just like man was made in the image of God or in His likeness, the earthly tabernacle mimicked the heavenly tabernacle as seen in Hebrews 8-9.
The throne room of God is visited or mentioned several times in the Bible and it is where the special presence of God is. Since beauty is the glory of God or the beauty of His holiness, then the throne room of God is a template for an understanding of beauty.
The beauty is the coherent wholeness of the throne room, the composition or symphony of all of the parts, but also the individual aspects making up that whole. God is beautiful, which is to say that His holiness, majesty, and glory are beautiful. However, as beauty relates to the aesthetic of God’s holiness, it is the order, symmetry, proportion, brilliance, harmony, arrangement, splendor, accuracy, and completeness of it. These qualities are beautiful and then beauty is found in the imitation of these qualities.
Objective beauty is that the object is beautiful in itself. It isn’t based upon the perspective of the subject either seeing, hearing, or experiencing the qualities of it. It doesn’t matter what you feel. It is beautiful if you never existed. God’s throne room existed before man existed. Beauty existed before man could have a perspective, a like or a dislike.
When the taste of the subject determines beauty, it elevates the subject. Value comes down to what someone thinks or feels. The subject becomes the measurement. The true beauty starts with God. All beauty is judged based upon God. Taste should conform to God. If not, then the subject becomes the basis of value and in the way the creature is worshiped, not the Creator.
To rebel against God is to rebel against the nature of God, which is beautiful. Ugliness is both rebellion and a symptom of a rebellious heart. It violates the nature of God. It is a characteristic of this world.
Someone whose taste clashes with the beauty of God wants something different than God, therefore, a different god. He may conform his god to what he likes or wants, but it isn’t God. He’s not worshiping God. His rebellion against the nature of God manifests itself in his taste. He doesn’t like what God likes. This will not be hidden. It will be seen.
If your taste doesn’t fit into the throne room of God, it’s not going to be there in the future either. You don’t live a life congruent with the ugliness of this earth and have any kind of yearning for the actual throne room of God. You won’t bring anything you like there. If you don’t like the taste of heaven, then you should consider whether you are going to be there. Why would you want to be there?
In scripture Jesus Christ is in the throne room of God in many instances. He’s the one on the throne for Isaiah in Isaiah 6. He’s in the throne room at the Father’s right hand in Psalm 110. He’s in the throne room, of course, in Revelation 4-5. Jesus is in that throne room right now as you read this. You can say that you follow Him, but when your life wouldn’t and so doesn’t like Who He is, His beauty, because you choose the ugliness of this sin-cursed world, then you aren’t following Him. You can attack me about that, as the messenger, but that won’t change it either. Even though Jesus isn’t in His heavenly throne room in Revelation 1, John describes what He would be like there.
12 And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; 13 And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. 14 His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; 15 And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. 16 And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength. 17 And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead.. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: 18 I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.
Beauty is to be beheld, but what makes it beautiful is not based upon the response of the one seeing or hearing it. What is beautiful is beautiful no matter what the acknowledgement, but the response is informative. In verse 17 John says that when he saw Jesus, He fell at His feet as dead. John fell prostrate before the Lord in great fear. Jesus’ “countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength” (v. 16). He looks into the eyes of the Judge of the entire earth, which were like “a flame of fire” (v. 14). Awe and reverence are the appropriate responses to the beauty of Jesus Christ. He was in the presence of the glory of Jesus, and his penetrating judgment, the beauty of his purity, justice, and truth.
I included back to verse 12 in this description because Jesus is in the midst of His assemblies, His churches, which are the seven golden candlesticks. A Christ follower doesn’t arbitrarily follow Jesus on the earth, but in one of His churches. You aren’t following Jesus outside of a true church, which today is His earthly temple (1 Cor 3:16-17), symbolized by a golden candlestick, one of the pieces of the temple in the Old Testament to imitate the shining light of God in the heavenly temple. A true church shines with the doctrinal and moral light of Christ.
At no time does He or would He ever appear like anyone either attending or performing at a popular music concert, and at no time would any true believer treat Him like that. It is not appropriate. Jesus can and does condescend to us, but our responsibility to Him is reverence as God. The coarsening of the imagination of beauty has been a major cause for the profaning of Jesus Christ, treating Him in a common or casual fashion, which is not how John treats Him and partly because of how Jesus appears in His glory. In Isaiah 6, totally holy angels cover their faces and feet in reverence of His holiness. Jesus Himself is dressed in a garment down to His feet, much like ones God fashioned for Adam and Eve, and immodesty of any kind is not compatible with His holiness.
I understand that the throne room of God is unlike any place on earth. It is the most beautiful place anywhere, more beautiful than anything or anyone, but one we can only attempt to imagine by reading what scripture says about it. Still, however, it is a model for imitation for the earthly temple, something that Solomon understood when he built his temple in Jerusalem, but also what God designed into the tabernacle in the wilderness. Much was put into the beauty of the entire structure and its parts.
One can also read the beauty of the text of the songs sung to God the Father and the Son throughout scripture, but including in the throne room of God in Revelation 4-5. George Frederick Handel used that text for the lyrics of his oratorio, the Messiah. It too is a model to imitate for beauty, since beauty is imitative.
The effervescent light at the throne of God is the red jasper stone, the translucent white sardine stone, and an emerald light rainbow round about it. Men in pure white robes and crowns of gold sit at every one of twenty four of their own thrones encircling the throne. There are seven lamps burning before the throne and lightnings and thunder proceeding from it. Before the throne is a sea of crystal like glass from which would bounce reflections of all the other colors and hues. Four awesome beasts are too before and behind the throne in the likeness of four different creatures with six wings apiece, flying and chanting or singing, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.”
In this description of God’s throne room are many varied aspects of the beauty of God at their most resplendent in a symphony of color, light, creatures, and sound, all of which speak of the majesty of a holy God. Many chapters are given to the building of the tabernacle and then the temple of the Old Testament to imitate this scene. This is the nature of beauty. A departure from that is the on ramp to the broad road to destruction and the fastest lane from any way back to the narrow road that leads to life eternal. Anyone reading this should be warned about the fascination and allurement of this world’s ugliness, drawing them forever astray from the presence of God.
The ugliness of a sin-cursed world and cooperative false religion stands in stark contrast to the overall beauty and the beautiful aspects of the throne room of God and then its imitation on earth by those truly God’s people. In my second post, I compared true beauty on earth, mimesis, imitation, with poiesis, the expression of self, but also with diegesis, in which so-called beauty is revealed through the perspective of the narrator or storyteller. Men love themselves. What else occurs though is men who love themselves conflating their desires or taste into what God wants. What makes something beautiful to them in their own imaginations is their taste, what they like.
The center of the universe isn’t in the belly of a man (read here and here), but in the throne room of God. Beauty doesn’t start with a perspective ruined by sin or even from the experience of a professing believer. Man’s heart is deceitful and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). At best, he sees through a glass darkly (1 Corinthians 13:12). He should doubt his own perspective. Imitation is a matter of faith, which pleases God (Hebrews 11:6).
Millennial, who ghosts his parents, because your own taste supersedes all other, consider that you perhaps will continue to ghost them right into eternity. The boundaries you set up to protect your own lifestyle will still be a boundary, much like the one between the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16. You want a great gulf and a great gulf you will get. Hell is the ultimate in ugly, but it will be for everyone who prefers his taste above God’s.
The world is not intended by God to mirror the imaginations of men’s hearts. It should look like the throne room of God and then a Paradise regained. With that in mind, the church turns the world upside down, not the world turning the church upside down. Churches have capitulated to the world, using its allures to conform to the belly of man, bringing the uglification of the church. It not only is not acceptable to God, but it is the further downfall of man.
God’s Name Jehovah: What Does It Mean?
I thought that the classical statement below on the significance of the name Jehovah in the very helpful 17th century systematic theology The Christian’s Reasonable Service by Wilhemus á Brakel, theologian of the Dutch Nadere Reformatie or Further/Second Reformation, which was comparable to English Puritanism, was worth reprinting and thinking about. I have reproduced it from one of the appendixes of my essay on the inspiration of the Hebrew vowel points:
[I]t has pleased the Lord to give Himself a name by which He wishes to be called—a name which would indicate His essence, the manner of His existence, and the plurality of divine Persons. The name which is indicative of His essence is יְהוָֹה or Jehovah, it being abbreviated as יָהּ or Jah. The name which is indicative of the trinity of Persons is אֱלֹהִים or Elohim. Often there is a coalescence of these two words resulting in יֱהוִה or Jehovi. The consonants of this word constitute the name Jehovah, whereas the vowel marks produce the name Elohim. Very frequently these two names are placed side by side in the following manner: Jehovah Elohim, to reveal that God is one in essence and three in His Persons.
The Jews do not pronounce the name Jehovah. This practice of not using the name Jehovah initially was perhaps an expression of reverence, but later became superstitious in nature. In its place they use the name אֲדֹנָי or Adonai, a name by which the Lord is frequently called in His Word. Its meaning is “Lord.” When this word is used in reference to men, it is written with the letter patach, which is the short “a” vowel. When it is used in reference to the Lord, however, the letter kametz is used, which is the long “a” vowel. As a result all the vowels of the name Jehovah are present. To accomplish this the vowel “e” is changed into a chatef-patach which is the shortest “a” vowel, referred to as the guttural letter aleph. Our translators, to give expression to the name Jehovah, use the name Lord, which is similar to the Greek word kurios, the latter being a translation of Adonai rather than Jehovah. In Rev 1:4 and 16:5 the apostle John translates the name Jehovah as follows: “Him which is, and which was, and which is to come.” This one word has reference primarily to being or essence, while having the chronological connotation of past, present, and future. In this way this name refers to an eternal being, and therefore the translation of the name Jehovah in the French Bible is l’Eternel, that is, the Eternal One.
The name Jehovah is not to be found at all in the New Testament, which certainly would have been the case if it had been a prerequisite to preserve the name Jehovah in all languages. . . . Even though the transliteration of Hebrew words would conflict with the common elegance of the Greek language, it is nevertheless not impossible. Since they can pronounce the names Jesus, Hosanna, Levi, Abraham, and Hallelujah, they are obviously capable of pronouncing the name Jehovah. . . . Jehovah is not a common name, such as “angel” or “man”—names which can be assigned to many by virtue of being of equal status. On the contrary, it is a proper Name which uniquely belongs to God and thus to no one else, as is true of the name of every creature, each of which has his own name. (Wilhemus á Brakel, The Christian’s Reasonable Service, vol. 1, ed. Joel R. Beeke, trans. Bartel Elshout [Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 1992] 84-85)
May you be edified as you meditate upon Jehovah and His wonderful Name.
–TDR
The Belly or the Bowels
The word “bowels” is used in the King James Version of the Bible, translating the Greek word, splankna, which is used eleven times in the New Testament. Here are related ones (9 of the 11):
2 Corinthians 6:12, Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels.
2 Corinthians 7:15 And his inward affection is more abundant toward you, whilst he remembereth the obedience of you all, how with fear and trembling ye received him.
Philippians 1:8 For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.
Philippians 2:1 If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies,
Colossians 3:12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;
Philemon 1:7 For we have great joy and consolation in thy love, because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother.
Philemon 1:12 Whom I have sent again: thou therefore receive him, that is, mine own bowels:
Philemon 1:20 Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord: refresh my bowels in the Lord.
1 John 3:17 But whoso hath this world’s good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?
A modern reader is not usually familiar with that concept, bowels or affections, in scripture. The reason is it is a premodern conception. You can read it in writings from the pre-New Testament and New Testament era. Predmodern theologians, like Jonathan Edwards, talked and wrote about it. From the above usage, it is common, not remote. It is also authoritative, a divine understanding, not just a cultural one, as some moderns might think or report.
The New Testament contrasts splankna with the word, “belly,” the Greek word koilia, which is used twenty-two times in the New Testament. Here are the related ones (4 of these):
Mark 7:19 Because it entereth not into his heart, but into the belly, and goeth out into the draught, purging all meats?
Romans 16:18 For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.
1 Corinthians 6:13 Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.
Philippians 3:19 Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)
The word emotion is a relatively new word, and its current connotations have emerged from a secular worldview. For a time spanning the ancient Greeks, Romans, and early Christian era into the eighteenth century, men spoke of the affections and the passions, not of the emotions. The Greeks spoke of the passions: the feelings that emerged from the “gut” or koilia. These were described as the impulsive, sensual and even animalistic urges and appetites. Amongst these might be lust, envy, cowardice, rage, hilarity, gluttony, laziness, revelry, and so on. For them, these were to be governed very strictly, and for later Christians – many of them mortified altogether. They also spoke of the affections that emerged from the chest, or steithos, and the affections that emerged from the spleen, or splanchna. For them, these were the noble and gracious feelings which produced nobility, courage, honour, reverence, joy, mercy, kindness, patience. The Greeks taught that the passions always won over the intellect in any contest, unless the intellect was supported by the affections. To put it another way: a man’s affections guide his mind’s decisions, a truth that the Bible teaches (Prov 9:10).This understanding of differences of feelings prevailed for centuries. Certainly not all used the terms identically, but there was general agreement that the affections were to be differentiated from the passions, and that Christians in particular should seek to mortify ‘passions’ and ‘inordinate affection’ (Colossians 3:5 [note the 17th century terminology coming out in the KJV]), while pursuing affections set on things above (Col 3:2). Jonathan Edwards’ magisterial work Religious Affections brought a kind of cohesiveness to the discussion. For him, the affections were the inclinations of a person towards objects of desire. The type of object determined the type of desire. A man is moved in his will by his affections, which operate through a renewed mind. The passions, for Edwards, were the more impulsive and less governed feelings.
One important philosophical shift that occurred as a result of the Enlightenment and had significant impact on broader culture was the emergence of the naturalistic category of “emotion.” When theologians and philosophers prior to the Age of Reason spoke about human sensibilities, they used nuanced categories of “affections of the soul,” such as love, joy, and peace, and “appetites (or passions) of the body,” like hunger, sexual desire, and anger. This conception of human faculties appears all the way back in Greek philosophers, who used the metaphors of the splankna (chest) to designate the noble affections and the koilia (belly) for the base appetites. In the New Testament, the apostle Paul employed such categories as well, urging Christians to put on the “affections” (splankna) of compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience (Col 3:12) and describing enemies of Christ as those whose “god is their belly (koilia)” (Phil 3:19).This way of understanding human sensibility dominated Christian thought and philosophy from the Patristic period through the Reformation. The affections were the core of spirituality and were to be nurtured, developed, and encouraged; the appetites, while not evil (in contrast to Gnosticism), must be kept under control lest they overpower the intellect. Theologians believed that the Bible taught a holistic dualism where material and immaterial combined to composed man; thus, while the body and spirit are both good and constantly interact and influence one another, and physical expression is part of the way God created his people, biblical worship should aim at cultivating both the intellect and affections as well as calming the passions.
The problem is that when the passions are set in conflict with the mind, the passions will always win. A man may know that it is wrong to hit another man, but if he is angry, that knowledge alone will not stop him from reacting wrongly. It is only when his knowledge is supported by noble affections that he can overcome his passions. As C. S. Lewis says, “The head rules the belly through the chest.” This is true for faith. Faith is not mere belief in facts. That alone would not move a person to a righteous life. Faith is belief combined with the affection of trust. When belief is supported by trust, a person will be able to overcome his sinful urges.
The Pretence of Christian Liberty
You like that title? It’s not original. It comes from the London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689) [21:3]:
They who upon pretence of Christian liberty do practice any sin, or cherish any sinful lust, as they do thereby pervert the main design of the grace of the gospel to their own destruction, so they wholly destroy the end of Christian liberty, which is, that being delivered out of the hands of all our enemies, we might serve the Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our lives. (Romans 6:1, 2; Galatians 5:13; 2 Peter 2:18, 21)
In case you complain about those Baptist boogie men, as if whatever experience you’ve had or have been deceived into thinking you have had as an excuse that could nullify scriptural teaching, something almost identical is in the Westminster Confession of Faith (20:3).
I’m pointing out this one item in the the LBC and WCF because it is the historic position of the church, it isn’t new, the contradiction of it is a big problem today, and it also disclaims the idea that this is a pet peeve or a recent obsession. I also like the language, “pervert the main design of the grace of the gospel,” and, “destroy the end of Christian liberty.”
Using foul language or gestures is a pretence of Christian liberty. You don’t have liberty to do that as a Christian. That isn’t salvation. The female showing her naked thighs is a pretence of Christian liberty. Playing and promoting profane music, worldly and carnal, is a pretence of Christian liberty. We have liberty to “serve the Lord without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our lives.” These previous examples in this paragraph and many others represent the perverting “the main design of the grace of the gospel to their own destruction.”
I would add that calling on professing believers to destroy their idols, stop imitating the world, deny worldly lust, abstain from fleshly lust, cover their nakedness, and stop glorying in their shame is not “contrary to the word,” “not contained in it,” or betraying “true liberty of conscience” (LBCF 21.3). Contrariwise, God saved us from these things. The doing of them and claiming Christian liberty is but a pretense. In other words, it is pretend liberty, concocted in the imagination of the doer by which he or she can live for himself or herself and still call himself or herself a Christian.
Scripture teaches what the LBC calls “liberty of conscience.” The idea here is that a believer is expressed by the words (21:1), “their yielding obedience unto Him, not out of slavish fear, but a child-like love and willing mind.” This is still “yielding obedience unto Him.” It isn’t liberty to sin against God, but to do so with “a childlike love and willing mind.” It matters why we do what we do. Subjecting people to other than scriptural mandates inhibits God-honoring motivation for service.
Further investigation into the teaching of scripture upon the conscience reveals that the conscience is in part protected by rare subjugation to merely human ordinances. Even performing according to Divine design, a conscience will still respond to non-biblical or unbiblical edicts. A conscience can be harmed by adding to or taking away from what scripture teaches. Paul argues in 1 Corinthians 8 and 10 for the freedom of conscience. A pretence of Christian liberty is not that. A Christian wants his conscience warning him against idolatry, foul language, shameful behavior, nakedness, worldliness, irreverence, and lust.
Why David’s Life Would Matter
The background of Psalm 30, written by King David, was his numbering of Israel. 2 Samuel 24 and 1 Chronicles 21 mention the event. God offered David his choice of punishments: three years of famine, three months of war with Israel’s enemies, or three days of pestilence. David chose pestilence. About 70,000 people died in three days.
I cried to thee, O Lord; and unto the Lord I made supplication. What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the pit? Shall the dust praise thee? shall it declare thy truth? Hear, O Lord, and have mercy upon me: Lord, be thou my helper.
The Vitality of Obedience to Authority: The Lord Jesus Christ Sets the Example of Obedience to Authority
Every facet of God’s Word relates to authority and with God at the Top. Even in the model prayer, the Lord Jesus Christ references the height of God the Father, “which art in heaven.” The Lord Jesus sets Himself under the Father, which also doesn’t in any way diminish Him. Just the opposite, He is elevated by His submission. God the Father gave the Son a name above every name, because He had made Himself of no reputation (Philippians 2:5-8).
Work your way through scripture and see how authority weaves itself into the most basic relationships. Adam abdicated headship and Eve ate the tree, bringing the fall, spoiling the relationship between the man and the woman. Authority is at the root of it. In 1 Corinthians 11, Paul stops and spends a large chunk of space about symbols of male headship, the woman a headcovering and long hair, the man without the headcovering and with short hair, to support God’s design. The model is the Father and the Son at the beginning of the chapter. A few chapters previous (7), if a father wants to keep his virgin daughter from marriage to stay at home, he has the authority to do so, and she should submit, which is also laid out in Numbers in the Old Testament.
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