Why Do We Suffer?

I want to speak to you on a topic about which every single person reading this is intimately familiar.  This topic transcends age limitations, cultural barriers, educational boundaries, and mental abilities.  It is at once both familiar and despised by every human being from the cooing infant to the slobbering drunkard to the bedfast senior.  The topic on my mind is pain.  Suffering, we might say.  Anguish, torment, and discomfort.  These concepts and the experiences that present them to us are the meat and the drink of our lives.  Suffering is inescapable and it comes to us all.  We instinctively avoid it with every fiber of our beings.  Torment is unilaterally shunned by all people regardless of station in life.  It is only those who have particular mental debilitations that delight in pain.  For the vast majority of humanity, suffering is vigorously bemoaned when it comes and is eagerly escaped from as soon as possible.

It was not always this way.  Although the Bible is not explicitly clear on this, I believe that in the original creation, prior to man’s descent into depravity, rebellion, and sin, there was no pain.  Genesis 1:31 provides us with the concluding summary statement of the work of creation that God had done: And God saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good.  I think that in the phrase “very good” we find the implication that the troubles, problems, and failures that we live with every day were nonexistent.  Furthermore, even if that point is arguable, another is not.  That is, that in the new creation that God will bring about, after the destruction of this present corrupted universe, pain, death, and everything that goes along with them will be completely eradicated once and for all.  

Revelation 21:3-4 makes this abundantly clear: And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man.  He will dwell with them, and they will be His people, and God Himself will be with them as their God.  He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

So, those who are in Christ have a wonderfully exciting, pain free, joy filled future to look forward to.  But that future is not yet.  For the time being we remain on this cursed earth with all of its troubles and turmoils.  And in that context, we must ask a critically important question.  Namely, does God provide any instructions about how we are to confront the tribulation that comes to us in life?  Are there guidelines, rules, and best practices we can take with us as we rush headlong into the lion’s jaws of this painful mortal coil?  More importantly, for the follower of Christ, is there a reason for our suffering?  Is the pain of this life just random chance, heaped in greater measure on the heads of some or lesser measure upon the heads of others, purely by the whim of fate?

The Bible provides a comprehensive answer to these questions.  It can be found, among other places, in the book of 2^nd Corinthians.  This book is a letter that was written by the Apostle Paul to a small house church of 1^st century Christians living in the city of Corinth, Greece.  It is one of at least four letters that Paul wrote to this church, only two of which have been preserved in Scripture.  This letter is particularly adept at handling the questions we want to throw at it relating to suffering.  The reason is that the first eight chapters are dominated by the issue we are raising today, with additional commentary scattered throughout the remaining five chapters.  That is, how should Christians relate to, respond to, and view trials and pressures that face them in life?

Although much of the book deals with this topic, for the sake of time we will focus primarily on just a very small portion of it.  Specifically, in chapter 1, verses 3 and 4 Paul opens with a summary statement that clarifies the message he wants to present and that he will expand upon throughout the rest of the book.  The text reads as follows: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.  Let us examine this text in detail and draw our conclusions from it as well as from supporting passages found throughout the letter.

The very first phrase is critically important and we dare not skip over it.  Paul writes “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  Blessed is the Greek “eulogetos”.  It is the word we get our modern English word eulogy from.  Perhaps it strikes you as odd that Paul would confer a word upon the Lord that you may have only ever heard associated with funerals.  It is true that eulogies are often delivered to commemorate the life of a person who has recently died.  However, in the best sense of the word it is not necessarily restricted to the realm of death.  It merely means to praise someone.  To eulogize a person is to extoll their virtues and rejoice in their accomplishments.  It is to heap wishes for success and praise upon their heads.  Aside from the funereal connotations of a eulogy, a person might be eulogized while living.  Perhaps they are graduating from school or retiring from a career.  In such cases a good friend, relative, or co-worker might give a eulogy for them.

In a Biblical context, eulogetos means to bless someone else.  It means they are adorable to you.  You consider them to be elegant and have fine speech.  This person is to be reverenced.  They might even be consecrated; meaning set apart for a special task.  The person speaking such a blessing upon another is, in effect, invoking a benediction upon them.  A wonderful example of this is Aaron’s benediction that he was commanded to speak to the people of Israel in Numbers 6:24-27: The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.

Why does Paul begin this way, by confering a blessing upon the Lord?  Is this just the apostle’s customary salutation that he always uses?  In a modern context we might ask, is Paul doing a quick copy/paste from one of his other letters?  It is true that he, as well as the other biblical writers, often begin in a very similar manner to what we find in 2^nd Corinthians.  However, in this case I think there is a deeper level of reasoning and meaning behind Paul’s choice of words.

To put it succinctly, I think he is modeling the correct perspective for the Corinthians.  He knows the material he is about to cover.  It is difficult subject matter.  Suffering, confrontations and divisions within the church, false apostles, and strained relations between himself and the believers are just a few of the weighty and sobering topics Paul is about to get into.  I think he knows very well that human tendency when confronted with such things is to view them with negativity, derision, and frustration.  So, he wants to establish the baseline of a proper world view right off the bat.  Namely, that God is blessed and all that that entails, as mentioned above.  Paul knows that in order to properly assess the difficulties in their lives, these Corinthian Christians must have a proper and correct view of who God is.  And so Paul provides answers to questions that have not even been verbalized yet.

First, who is this God that Paul desires to eulogize?  He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.  This is a critically important concept to understand.  Paul was a Jew.  Although he was writing to a Gentile church, undoubtedly there were some Christian Jews in the mix.  Furthermore, regardless of audience, Paul was as thoroughly Jewish as it was possible to be.  His Hebrew culture and heritage were steeped in the traditions and customs of his ancestors.  Here is the point.  Israelite society was intensely patriarchal.  This means that family units were large and insular.  Multiple generations existed either together or in very close proximity to each other.  They were closely knit together through the medium of living life together.  The family was of paramount importance to a Jew.  And the eldest living father, or the patriarch, was the literal ruler of this little clan.  The father called all the shots and the family literally either rose or fell on his shoulders.  If the father was successful, the family was successful.  If the father bungled things, particularly in regard to wickedness, then the whole family would often go down with him.

This is drastically different from American culture.  We live in a society where men have often been emotionally emasculated.  In an effort to distort God’s design for marriage relationships in which the husband and wife are equally valuable yet have distinct and defined roles and responsibilities, a liberal culture that refuses to accept the sovereign will of the Lord has worked overtime to dispute and disrupt any possibility of a patriarchal society.  To be sure, often throughout human history patriarchalism has been mismanaged and poorly implemented.  But that is due to the sinful heart of man, not problems with God’s design.

So, we need to recognize the cultural distance between ourselves and the apostle Paul.  And we need to recognize that when Paul identifies God as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, he is elevating God to a tremendous degree.  Because if Christ is the absolute Master and Overlord of the church, then God the Father, in His trinitarian role as Father, is of equally exalted status.

That brings me to the other aspect of the title that Paul uses for God here.  In a patriarchal society such as Israel, the son, particularly the firstborn son, was exceedingly important.  He was the very image of his father.  He portrayed his father’s character and reputation in public.  If the son was to behave poorly or dishonestly, it reflected back on his father in a very real and potentially disastrous manner.  It was much more visceral than in our society.  In our culture, if a child is misbehaved, sure, the parents suffer some level of reproach.  But not like this.  In Hebrew culture, the actions of the son were literally seen as equal to the actions of the father.

This means that Paul is also ascribing incredible value to the Son, Jesus.  He is making the claim that Jesus of Nazareth, in his person as the Son of God, carries the literal reputation of God the Father on His shoulders.  There is an intrinsically communal, harmonious, and circular quality to the relationship between Father and Son.  The One is the image of the Other.  The Other is the reputation of the One.  They are both the exact imprint of an identical nature.

Oh, how much richness and depth are inherent in every line of Scripture!  And Paul is not even finished yet in introducing the Lord in this letter.  Next, he identifies God as the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort.  This is the only place in the New Testament where these particular titles are given to God.  Why does Paul include two different descriptors here?  By examining the nuances between them I think we can ascertain the apostle’s intent.

Here are our clues.  Mercies is plural while comfort is singular.  Also, comfort has the modifier “all” attached to it.  Furthermore, Paul associates mercies with fatherhood while relating comfort to godhood.  What is he trying to tell us?  I think Paul’s meaning is at once both simple and profound.

The plurality of mercies conveys the idea of a multiplicity of actions.  In other words, Paul is not talking about a general sense or idea of mercy in an abstract manner.  He has in mind specific acts of mercy that are carried out by God.  We are to see the Lord as personal and interactive.  I think Paul uses the word father because he wants us to have in mind an earthly human father who is involved in the lives of his children.  This man’s family can instantly call to mind any number of concrete examples of the interpersonal quality of their relationship with their father.  Just so with God, in Paul’s mind, as He walks with us and cares for us through His inexhaustible compassion.

On the other hand, the singularity of comfort seems to point to a more general and less well defined yet an ultimately more comprehensive covering of comfort.  Paul’s use of the modifying adjective “all” reinforces this idea.  It is not merely that the Lord is a source of comfort, perhaps one of many such sources.  Rather, Paul seems to be saying that all comfort that occurs flows from God.  In fact, I think Paul’s point is that no true comfort exists apart from God.  The fact that he associates “God” with “all comfort” adds to the image that is developing in our minds.  A father is seen as intimate and personal, yet ultimately limited in scope and capacity.  Conversely, a god is considered to be aloof yet all powerful and in control.

I think what Paul is getting at is that the Lord God of Israel synthesizes these two disparate aspects of compassion in His own person.  He is a tender Father who cares for our every individual need for mercy.  But He is also an all-powerful God who is in complete sovereign control of His creation.  This God orders and directs the wide-angle lens of all comfort in the entire world at all times while simultaneously interacting with His children in a tender and loving, individual and specific manner.

Why does Paul take such pains and go to such lengths to be sure our understanding of God in His capacity as a comforter is clear and accurate?  Because he wants us to truly believe in our bones that God has our backs.  He knows that we must have an image of God as the completely sufficient and totally unique foundation of any mercy, compassion, and comfort that we will ever receive.  If we fail to grasp this truth of God’s character then the rest of Paul’s message about suffering is going to fall on deaf ears.

The reason is that his answer about why we suffer and what comfort God provides in the midst of that suffering may not be what our self focused flesh wants to hear.  Paul needs us to be completely focused upon the Lord so that the impact of his message can penetrate deeply into our minds and radically alter our perspective on both our own lives and the rest of the world around us.

We begin to see the answers to our questions emerge in verse 4.  We need to pause for a while on the very first phrase: who comforts us in all our affliction.  The word affliction is “thlipsis” in Greek.  It is variously translated as oppression, tribulation, or distress in our English Bibles.  But, the best sense of the word is that of a pressing, a pressing together, or pressure.  Imagine a heavy object such as an anvil being placed upon a wooden table.  The weight is considerable, yet the table holds.  Then another anvil is added, doubling the pressure that gravity is bringing to bear upon the wood beneath.  Then another anvil and another.  Eventually, the wooden legs of the table exceed their structural tolerance due to the extreme pressure, and the whole thing collapses.

This is the image that Paul himself puts forth just a few verses later when he uses the same word, “thlipsis”, in verse 8: For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia.  For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself.  Paul never reveals exactly what the nature of this affliction was.  But he makes it painfully obvious that the pressure he felt, the weight of tribulation, was pressing in upon his soul with a crushing force, even unto the point of despair.  This is the image in Paul’s mind as he writes that God will comfort us in our affliction.

Notice also that, again, the apostle inserts the adjective “all” before the word affliction.  Be very clear in your mind, as Paul is, that there is no pressure, no turmoil, no struggle, and no burden sufficient to exceed the all-consuming mercy and compassion of God.  That being said, an important question presents itself immediately to our minds.  Namely, how does God provide this comfort?  In what manner does He comfort us?  To find the answer to that question we need look no further than Paul’s own example again, conveniently chronicled in this same letter.

In chapter 12, verses 1 to 6, the apostle describes an experience he had at some point during his ministry.  He was caught up to heaven, whether in vision form or in the flesh he was not sure.  While enjoying this heavenly experience Paul saw and heard things of incredible power and glory.  He does not say what he witnessed.  In fact, he states that it cannot be told.  Then, in verse 7 Paul describes the Lord’s act of forced humility upon his life: So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harrass me, to keep me from becoming conceited.

Just as with the vision, Paul never says what this “thorn in the flesh” was.  But he does chronicle his response to it, in verse 8: Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me.  Make no mistake.  Whatever this thorn was in Paul’s life, he did not like it.  He desired to have it gone as soon as possible.  The apostle was not some kind of super saint who was so spiritual that he was beyond the realm of human frailty.  Quite the opposite, in fact.  Paul was very much an ordinary man, probably much like us in many ways.

Just like we would be prone to, he begged God to take away the thorn that had been given to him.  And it is in the Lord’s response to Paul’s request that we find the nature of God’s brand of comfort.  In verse 9 Paul writes: But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.”  That is all.  No promises to wipe away the pain of our burdens.  No assurances that we will not have to endure them long.  No guarantees of ease and contentment.  All that God gave Paul was a simple promise that the grace of God would sustain him.  All that God vows to us is that He will walk with us through the pain.  He will hold our hand when we are afraid.  He will put His arm around us when we stumble.  And He will carry us when we fall and cannot go on any longer.  God never promises us that He will remove us from our troubles.  He simply guarantees that He will bear them with us.

This is the message that our flesh often does not want to hear.  We desire peace.  We long for an easy life, free from trouble.  We sometimes come to God with an erroneous assumption that because we are Christians He will supernaturally clear the road for us so that we can drive straight through without any hassle of traffic or road blocks.

However, this is not at all the way God works and not remotely what He has promised His children.  Furthermore, although our flesh rails against it, it is not what we need either.  Moving back to chapter 1 and the heavy burden Paul endured to the point of death, we find his own “post game” commentary on what he had suffered, in verses 9 and 10: Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death.  But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.  He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and He will deliver us.  On Him we have set our hope that He will deliver us again.

The point of Paul’s affliction and the reason behind our suffering is the same.  It is to give the Lord an opportunity to comfort us in the midst of it.  The comfort He gives is the assurance that He will not forsake us.  Rather, He will guide us and nurture us through the pain.  This process of divine hand holding is the very thing that builds our trust, strengthens our belief, and straightens our spines to face ever greater tests of faith in the Lord our God.  If God were to magically warp us out of the tribulation, this transformation of character would never happen.  Furthermore, we would never come to experientially know the incredible surpassing power of God’s comforting hand.

As incredible as all that is to consider, it remains only half of the answer to our original question.  We asked, “Why do we suffer?”  And we have seen that the answer is, in part, so that God will have an opportunity to demonstrate His inexhaustible capacity to comfort, for the purpose of producing men and women of steel who trust Him implicitly, even unto death.  But there is another angle to our suffering.  There is another factor that must be considered.  It is found in the remainder of verse 4: so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.

This is the utterly compelling reality of the communal aspect of our suffering.  We are afflicted for the sake of ministry!  The New Testament overwhelmingly presents an image of the Christian life in which people are born again, adopted into the family of God, and placed by Him into fellowship with a spiritual family of local fellow adoptees.  The expectation then becomes service and ministry to this new found family.

We can see this in Paul’s own chronicle of his life in this very letter.  In chapter 1, verses 12 to 15 the apostle writes: For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God, and supremely so toward you.  For we are not writing to you anything other than what you read and understand and I hope you will fully understand – just as you did partially understand us – that on the day of our Lord Jesus you will boast of us as we will boast of you.  Because I was sure of this, I wanted to come to you first, so that you might have a second experience of grace.

Paul so highly regarded this group of spiritual brothers and sisters in Corinth that he counted his time among them as well as the letters he had written them to be outpourings of the grace of God, channeled through himself.  Furthermore, he fully intended to boast righteously in the testimony of the power of God in their lives, just as he expected them to boast in his life.  This was not mere words for Paul.  He desired to back up his conviction with physical visits, because he knew that time spent together in fellowship would only increase the grace experienced by both parties.

The result of such a spiritually uplifting relationship between Christians can be seen in chapter 3, verses 1 to 3: Are we beginning to commend ourselves again?  Or do we need, as some do, letters of commendation to you, or from you?  You yourselves are our letter of recommendation, written on our hearts, to be known and read by all.  And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

The incredible design of the church is that we pour ourselves into ministry to our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We invest in their spiritual growth just as they invest in ours.  And over time, the fruit of that ministry to each other becomes the greatest testimonial in the world of the power of God that works in and through us.  We cease to require words on paper to commend our efforts.  God Himself commends us through the medium of the many powerfully Spirit filled Christians we have touched with our service to both them and to Christ.

This is the pattern, the expectation, and even the commandment of how a Christian is to live.  And, backing up to chapter 1, verse 4 again, we see that the affliction we endure is the equipment we require in order to accomplish this task of ministry.  When we suffer we are being taught how to trust God.  We are being instructed with “on the job training” in how to commit ourselves to Him and Him alone fully and completely.  With this rigorous education under our belts, and with our tools close at hand, we then carry these lessons forward into ministry and service to the saints of the living God in whatever Christian relationships the Lord places us in, with the local church being a major emphasis of our efforts.

The astonishing, and frankly counter cultural, doctrine being taught here by Paul is that the life of a Christian has a single purpose.  There is only one unifying and underlying goal that should be driving every Christian forward in a never ending pursuit of the life and character of Christ.  That is ministry.  Our lives are for ministry.  Our salvation is given to us so that we can minister.  Our sanctification is carried forward by the Holy Spirit so that we can minister more effectively. 

Consider Paul’s evaluation of what he had endured and how it related to the Corinthian church, in verses 5 to 7: For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.  If we are afflicted it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer.  Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.

Paul’s estimation of his suffering is that it is for other Christian’s comfort and salvation.  His understanding of the comfort he receives from God is that that too is for others; for their future comfort that can only come from their own experience of suffering in which they are trained to trust God through the circumstances they face.  Our purpose in life then becomes the training of others in how to trust the Lord through the most horrible pressures and tribulations imaginable.  And in a glorious pattern that truly comes full circle, the comfort that God has promised He will provide is miraculously given through other believers.  We actually become a part of the Lord fulfilling His divine promise to comfort Christians in all their afflictions.  A Christian who is committed to ministry and service is a veritable conduit of grace.

Do you see the pattern that is emerging here?  It is a perspective that is unwaveringly focused outward rather than inward.  When we suffer our eyes are to be locked onto Christ rather than ourselves for sustenance.  When we are comforted our focus is to be upon the incredible mercies of God.  When we are at peace our hearts are to be seeking after others so that we can pour into them what God first poured into us.

This is the Christian life.  If you are reading this and everything I am writing is foreign to you, then I deeply apologize.  Because, you have completely misunderstood what it means to be a follower of Christ.  You have bought the shrink wrapped commercial brand of Christianity that has been sold in the United States and other countries for years.  You have succumbed to the lie that “church” is a place to go once per week so that you can be entertained or to have your spiritual gas tank filled up to get you through the rest of the week in which walking with Christ is the furthest thing from your mind.

And, sadly, you have so far missed the glorious product of a life lived like what Paul is describing in 2^nd Corinthians.  The end result of all this suffering, comfort, and service is an indestructible Christian whose faith is like steel.  I want to leave you with three lengthy passages, all from 2^nd Corinthians, that work together to paint a portrait of the life of a believer that is built on the solid rock of their faith in Christ.

Chapter 4, verses 6 to 10 begins the narrative by describing our triumph against all odds of our frail bodies and afflicted souls: For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.  We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.  There is no power in the universe that can crush the spirit of a born again Christian who is clinging to Christ as the source of their strength and who is committed to embracing their suffering as the means of their sanctification.

Chapter 5, verses 1 to 4 expand the view to include the focus of our future desires: For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.  For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked.  For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened – not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. 

There is only one type of complaint that is permissible for a Christian when they suffer.  It is that they long to be free of the suffering so that they can be at home with the Lord in heaven.  Our desire for suffering to end must not be bound up in a wish for a good life here on earth.  Such a life does not exist, except inasmuch as it is lived for service and ministry like what Paul has been describing.  Our gaze must remain fixed heavenward at all times, especially in the midst of our trials.

Chapter 6, verses 1 to 10 is the longest passage of all.  But it is crucial to complete our understanding of Paul’s message here: Working together with Him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain.  For He says, “In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.”  Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.  We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry, but as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: by great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger; by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, the Holy Spirit, genuine love; by truthful speech, and the power of God; with the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and for the left; through honor and dishonor, through slander and praise.  We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.

A Christian who lives continually in the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, who clings to God as their only source of comfort in their afflictions, and who expends their energy in service to others to teach them these same principles becomes an invulnerable fortress of faith that Satan will break himself to pieces on before he puts a dent or a chink in the outer walls.

Paul’s heart was wide open to these Corinthian believers.  He professes as much in the next three verses: We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians; our heart is wide open.  You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted in your own affections.  In return (I speak as to children) widen your hearts also.  Dear reader, will you widen your heart today to the glorious life that awaits you on the other side of your afflictions and through the course of the life of ministry that God has called you to?

The Heart of the Law

Have you ever contemplated the incredible power of words?  The process of taking sounds formed by specific combinations of lip shape, tongue activity, and the movement of air, crafting those sounds into a recognizable library of letters, arranging those letters into particular sequences called words, and placing those words deliberately into the structure of a sentence, is truly an awe-inspiring ability that God has granted to mankind.  Verbal speech is one of the hallmarks that sets man apart from the animal kingdom.  However, with this unique and noteworthy ability comes great power and therefore a great burden of restraint.  Our words have the power to help or to hurt.  They can build up the soul.  Or they can tear down the psyche.  They inflict wounds that are arguably more deadly than physical ones, and without question more insidious, because the damage cannot be seen.  But, a crushed spirit is just as real as a broken arm. 

Beyond that, words have the incredible capacity to conjur up images in the human mind.  These images can be either implanted fresh or recalled from memory.  For example, the title of this essay is “The Heart of the Law.”  That word, law, has probably already done its work in your mind, instantaneously, as you read it.  Perhaps you associate law with rules, structure, judgment, or even oppression.  For those among us trained as attorneys, law may bring to mind countless hours of study or grueling testing or even stress filled courtroom scenes played out in the theater of the mind’s eye.

In the context of the biblical record there is another angle to the word law.  For a Christian, often when we hear law in the context of the Scriptures our thoughts travel immediately to The Law; the covenant that the Lord God made with the descendants of Jacob at Mt. Sinai, delivered through God’s servant, Moses.  This Law towers above all others for the rest of Scripture.  Through both the Old and New Testaments, the human writers of the Bible refer to the Law of Moses repeatedly, in various contextual situations and manners of application.

Because of how well known this Law is to Christians, they probably bring many pre-conceived notions to bear on it.  Some may find it to be outdated.  Others would consider the Law non-applicable.  Still more would perhaps find it harsh in many of its aspects.  Those well versed in the letters of Paul might say that the Law is capable of bringing only death.

But I believe there is a characteristic of the Law of Moses, the Law of God, that we may tend to overlook as we consider its relevance for our lives and our relation to it.  Namely, I believe the Scripture is clear that the very heart of the Law, the foundation upon which it is built, the soul that gives life to its component parts, is love.  The heart of the Law is not rules.  It is not judgment.  It is not death.  It is not even holiness, although holiness is critically important to the Law.  No, the heart of the Law is love.

To demonstrate this, we will consider the source material.  The book of Deuteronomy is one of the five building blocks that make up the Pentateuch, or the first five books of both the Hebrew and English Bibles.  This is an excellent place to look in order to find out what really makes the Mosaic Law tick.  The name Deuteronomy means “second law” in the Greek.  This book is Moses’s attempt, as the nation camped on the plains of Moab, just prior to his death and the entry of his countrymen into the Promised Land, to summarize, recount, and even provide commentary upon the entirety of the Sinai Covenant.

The Law as a whole was essentially the constitution for the nation of Israel.  But it was also a record of the contract or covenant between the Lord and His chosen people.  In this capacity, it stands as an indelible historical account of the interaction between the Hebrews and their God.  Furthermore, Deuteronomy, because it is a sort of second look at the whole of the Law, encapsulates within just a few chapters an overall summary of this divine and human relationship.

For example, in chapter 7 we find that the Law began with the Lord Himself.  In verses 6 to 8 we read the following: “For you are a people holy to the LORD your God.  The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for His treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.  It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set His love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that He swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”

Moses is telling the Israelites that it was not for any reason in and of themselves that God chose them.  Rather, it was purely because He loved them.  He loved the Hebrews and desired to keep the oath He had sworn to their forefathers.  It was because of God’s love and His faithfulness to His own covenants that He rescued them from slavery in Egypt and made them a people holy unto Himself.

This is a magnificent picture of salvation.  In fact, it is the standard and only mode of redemptive interaction between God and mankind, His wayward rebel children.  We are hopelessly lost and enslaved to sin.  But just as God “redeemed Israel from the house of slavery” solely because He loved them, so He sent His only begotten Son into the world that He loved, so that the world might be redeemed through Him.

Furthermore, it is by no means due to any righteousness or loveliness in us that He does this.  Again, Moses tells the tale in chapter 9, verses 4 and 5: “Do not say in your heart, after the LORD your God has thrust them out before you, ‘It is because of my righteousness that the LORD has brought me in to possess this land,’ whereas it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is driving them out before you.  Not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart are you going in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out from before you, and that He may confirm the word that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and to Jacob.”

It was not the uprightness of the Hebrews that caused God to give them the land of Canaan so that they could go in to possess it.  It was because of the wickedness of the Canaanite nations that He did it.  The Israelites were just as wicked and stubborn as the nations they destroyed.  Moses makes this painfully clear in verses 6 through 12 of the same chapter.  So, in a very real sense, it was not about Israel at all.  They were just the tool in the hand of the Lord to, one the one hand administer justice and judgment against the evils of man, and on the other hand to enable God to glorify Himself and demonstrate His faithfulness in the fulfillment of His promises to the patriarchs.

In the same way, those who come to faith in Christ now do not do so because of any spark of holiness within themselves.  A Christian, who has trusted Christ as his Lord and Savior, only does so because God loved him and set His favor on him and called him to repentance and quickened his heart so that he might believe.  We should never delude ourselves into thinking that we came to Christ of our own accord.  The truth is that Christ came to us through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  All we did is respond to His irresistible call with inevitable faith and repentance.  There are many New Testament passages that teach this accurate view of salvation unequivocally.  But it is utterly compelling to me that the foundation of this crucial New Covenant teaching is presented here in Deuteronomy as the very nucleus of the Mosaic Law.

Amazingly, there is more to it!  The love that God initiates upon those He chooses produces a love in the one so chosen that can then in turn be directed back at God.  This is unmistakable from the text as the clear motivation for obedience and the upholding of the statutes and commands of the Lord.  In chapter 6, verse 5 we read that Israel was to love the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, and might.  It is fascinating that this is the very factor that will enable the people to keep the Law.  Apart from a genuine love for God it is impossible to remain faithful to His statutes. 

The sequence in chapter 6 builds from one layer to the next like a house rising up from its foundation.  The love for God in verse 5 produces the binding of His commands on the heart in verse 6.  In turn, the treasuring of God’s commands in the heart results in the desire to teach those commands to children in verse 7a.  In fact, the worshiper of God falls so much in love with the Lord and with His ways that they begin to think about them and talk about them at home, on the road, when they lie down, and when they stand up (verse 7b).  The lover of God begins to immerse him or herself in the law of God so thoroughly that they create reminders for themselves because they want to luxuriate in the richness and splendor of the holiness of God that is revealed in His law.  So, they do things like writing statutes on the doorframes of their homes.  They put up plaques on the gates of their property.  They carry the commands with them wherever they go because they never want to be far from them (verses 8 and 9).

So, the heart of The Law of Moses, the Law of God, is love.  Jesus Himself taught this.  In Matthew 22:37-38, in response to the question “Which is the great commandment in the Law?” Christ responded, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”  Jesus was not teaching something new.  What He was doing was fulfilling and upholding and explaining the real point of the Law to a people who had grossly distorted it in their own minds for centuries.  Are we sometimes guilty of doing the same injustice to the Mosaic Law?  Do we make the mistake of thinking that the Law is not important to us because we are under the New Covenant in Christ’s blood?  Nothing could be further from the truth. 

In short, the love of God that He is pleased to bestow on a human being produces a love within the heart of man that causes him to strain until his dying breath to return that same love back to God in ever increasing measure.  Obedience to God’s commands flows smoothly and naturally from this wellspring of devotion.  Thus, obedience does not produce acceptance.  On the contrary, acceptance produces obedience through love.  This is the heart of the Sinai Covenant and it is the same heart that beats within the breast of the New Covenant.

When Christians Are Atheists

I recently read a statement from a Christian Bible teacher.  This statement was uttered at a summer youth camp during a Q and A session with the kids.  When I read it, I was somewhat mesmerized by what was contained in this single line of text.  I pondered it, analyzing it in an attempt to figure out whether I agreed with the thought behind it.  The statement is as follows, slightly modified by me, but still carrying the same message as the original: At the moment of sin, every Christian is an atheist.

Clearly, this is a provocative thing to say.  After all, are not Christians and Atheists polar opposites of each other?  Is it not true that they represent two camps at the furthest extremes of morality, ethics, and purpose in life, both sides locked in a titanic struggle for the hearts and minds of the culture?  This description of Christians and Atheists is certainly how the issues between the two have been phrased by myself in the past as well as other Christians I am in acquaintance with.  And if such a state of affairs is accurate, then how can a statement like the one above be correct?

In an effort to answer these questions I want to begin by establishing some baselines.  I think it is important to define our terms to ensure that your starting point is the same as mine.  Whether your ending point will be the same, only time will tell and will be up to you to determine.

The first term I want to define is Christian.  Here is what I do not mean when I say Christian: A professor of his belief in the religion of Christ; in a general sense, the word Christian includes all who are born in a Christian country or of Christian parents.  Although I found this definition in a dictionary, I do not believe it correctly establishes what the Bible teaches about being a Christian.  It is true that a Christian must profess of his or her belief in Christ.  So that part is at least accurate.  But one’s Christianity must not end there if one is to be labeled a Christian by God’s own word, the Bible.  And being born into a Christian home or in a Christian country most certainly does not make one a Christian.

On that note, what does the Bible itself say about Christians?  Two passages strike me as important because they are two of only three in the Bible to actually use the word Christian.  The first is 1^st Peter 4:16: Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.  The Apostle Peter is communicating here that those who follow Christ must suffer.  Their suffering must be precisely because of their Christianity.  This is contrasted with the list in the previous verse of murderers, thieves, evildoers, or meddlers.  In other words, if you are going to be a Christian you will suffer for your faith in Christ. 

But the amazing part of this is that you are expected to glorify God in the midst of that suffering.  A Christian is one who takes every stone and arrow thrown at him by a fallen world full of sin, and converts those missiles of destruction intended to kill, into psalms of thanksgiving and praise about the glory of God.

Another important passage is Acts 11:19-26.  This section of Acts details the activities of the early Christians who were scattered throughout Israel and the Mediterranean following the martyrdom of Stephen in chapter 7.  The passage lists three characteristics of a Christian, in addition to the ones we have already seen in 1^st Peter.  They are: the preaching of the gospel, faithfulness to God, and persevering with a steadfast purpose.

So then, what we are presented with in the Bible as an image of a Christian is one who suffers for their faith, proclaims the good news of Jesus, is faithful to the Lord, perseveres through trials, and does all of this for the glory of God.  These factors combine to lead into a much better dictionary definition of a Christian: A real disciple of Christ; one who believes in the truth of the Christian religion, and studies to follow the example, and obey the precepts, of Christ; a believer in Christ who is characterized by real piety.  To state it another way I will turn to the words of John Calvin, who defined piety in this way: reverence joined with love of God which the knowledge of His benefits induces.  This is what I mean when I say Christian.

With that in mind, what do I mean by atheist or atheism?  As before, I will begin by stating what I do not mean.  The dictionary defines atheism as: The disbelief of the existence of a God, or Supreme Intelligent Being.  Odds are that is the understanding of atheism that you have had to this point.  It was how I would have defined it myself prior to this study.  But I have now come to believe that, although atheism as described above is the cultural and even perhaps the Christian view of it, I now believe that this is a false definition that is flatly contradicted by the Bible.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that the cultural definition and understanding of atheism is impossible.  But in order to argue my case I cannot turn to a dictionary, because none of them that I could find present what the Bible does about this notion of a disbelief in the existence of God.  In light of that, I will go straight to Scripture.

First, consider the words of Solomon in Ecclesiastes 3:11: He has made everything beautiful in its time.  Also, He has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.  The word eternity in this verse has the idea of everlasting or a long time.  The idea is that man instinctively knows there is something grander and greater in the universe, a majestic backdrop of divine work which stretches across the corridors of time and encompasses all of creation.  Yet, in spite of this inherent knowledge, man, by himself, cannot put his finger on this concept of eternity.  Therefore, the first point is that man knows something bigger than himself exists.

Second, ponder the sermon that Paul preached to the men of Athens at the Areopagus, also known as Mars Hill, in Acts chapter 17.  In verses 26 to 28 we read: And He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward Him and find Him.  Yet He is actually not far from each one of us, for “In Him we live and move and have our being.”

In his address Paul used the word “zetein”, rendered in English as “seek”.  It means to desire or look for.  It is the same word used of Herod in Matthew 2:13.  An angel of the Lord is communicating to Joseph via dream.  In this dream Joseph is told that Herod is about to “search” for the child, to destroy Him.  The context is not a casual search.  It is a desperate straining after something, exerting all of one’s resources in the quest to obtain it.  So according to Paul, man knows there is something out there that he desperately wants to find, but he does not know where to find it.  Therefore, he searches for it earnestly and quite desperately.

For the next two points we will travel to the book of Romans.  In chapter 1, verses 18 and 19, we find: For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.  For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.  When Paul wrote that what can be known about God is plain he used the same word that Luke used in Acts 4:16.  In that verse, the Sanhedrin, or the Jewish ruling council, is discussing what to do with Peter and John.  The apostles have just healed a lame man, in the temple, in the sight of all the people there.  Not only that, but they did it in the name of Jesus.  The rulers of the Jews, being fiercely opposed to any talk of Jesus as being the Messiah of Israel, are furious with Peter and John because there is no way they can deny that a miracle has just been performed through them.  The power of God, working through the discples of Jesus, has become “plain” to everyone.

Carrying that understanding back to Romans 1:19 we can draw the following conclusion.  The knowledge of God in creation is not merely obvious or easily understood.  It is in fact completely visible and unilaterally known by everyone.  Furthermore, this knowledge is implicitly written on the heart of every human being who has ever lived.  Romans 2:14-15 tells the tale: For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law.  They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them.

From this we can clearly see that the heart of man, even apart from details of God’s law, confirms the existence of that law.  Because of this, men at times feel the pangs of conscience and at other times suppress or ignore the inner condemnation they experience.  This creates in them a spirit of instability in which they are perpetually unsettled within their very own souls.

We might think that these facts, once presented to a sinner, would compell them to repent and turn to God.  However, the Bible paints an image of man in which he is hopelessly and helplessly compelled by his own nature to rebel against and run from God.  The first three verses of Psalm 14 are a devastating litany of madness directed against the heart of fallen man: The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.”  They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds; there is none who does good.  The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God.  They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one. 

It is instructive to note that the English word fool in verse 1 is the Hebrew word nabal.  Astute Bible readers will recognize this as the name of the man in 1^st Samuel 25 who rejected David’s request for aid, even after David and his men had protected this man Nabal’s business interests.  Verse 3 of that chapter describes Nabal as harsh and badly behaved.  In verse 25 Nabal’s wife, Abigail, is not even that kind to her husband.  She calls him a worthless fellow.

This, then, is the charge against men who reject the clear knowledge of God in creation and in their own hearts.  They suppress the built-in awareness of God’s presence and work in history.  Even in the face of their instinctiveness perception of their creator they resist and reject even their own hearts and minds within themselves.  As was Nabal, such people are completely worthless.

The final nail in the coffin of cultural atheism is found in Ephesians 2:12.  This is the only occurrence in the Greek testament of the word “atheos”.  If that word looks familiar it is because it is the word we get our English atheism from.  “Atheos” simply means without God.  Look at it in its biblical context: Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God (atheos) in the world.

Thus, the biblical word that we get our modern word atheism from has no association with a denial of God’s existence.  It simply means to be without God, apart from God, or alienated from God.

All of these points combine to provide us with what I believe is a much more accurate definition of atheism: A delusional worldview characterized by classical insanity; that is, a denial of the plain evidence of one’s own senses and a determined refutation of the facts of reality.  This repudiation of truth is demonstrated by a ludicrous opposition to the pre-programmed awareness of and desire for God that He created in the heart of every human.  The result is full blown rebellion and alienation from the very source of that which is instinctively sought after.

This is nothing less than a mass hallucination by the greater portion of the entire human race who stand apart from God.  It is a group psychosis that feeds upon itself in an insane effort to authenticate and validate a fiction that is impossible to believe.  Alcuin, an 8^th century English scholar in the court of Charlemagne, said: The riotous tumult of the crowd is always very close to madness.  In the deepest recesses of every sinner’s heart, regardless of how much suppression is layered on top of it, is a conviction that they are wrong.

This understanding of atheism leads me back to my original proposition.  At the moment of sin, every Christian is an atheist.  If atheism is a refusal to acknowledge that which is apparent, then that is exactly what Christians do when they sin.  They convince themselves, at least in that moment, that the promises of God are lies, the statutes of God are not relevant to them, and the will of God for their life is not best.

Let us examine a case study in Scripture to see this borne out.  In the 10^th chapter of 1^st Corinthians, Paul warns believers against idolatry.  As his example he uses the Israelites, under the leadership of Moses, who left Egypt and traveled to Sinai.  He points out that every one of them was a recipient of the grace of God in their release from bondage, their deliverance from the Egyptian army at the shore of the Red Sea, and their consumption of food both spiritual and physical in the wilderness.

In verse 7 the apostle instructs us: Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.”  This is a reference to Exodus 32 where the children of Israel sinned against the Lord and worshipped a golden calf.  What must have been particularly galling to God about this was that the stated intention of the people was to worship the Lord.  Yet the manner in which they went about it flatly contradicted the specific instructions He had just given them.

God told them in Exodus 19:5-6 that if they would obey Him they would be His people, a treasured possession of His among all people on the earth.  Yet they considered His promises lies because they immediately disobeyed the Lord as soon as they thought His back was turned.  He had commanded them not to worship Him by making an image of anything in the entire created order.  This was command number 2 of the 10 commandments, found in Exodus 20:4.  Yet the people felt that this statute was unnecessary because they desired something to look at and fix their eyes upon.  God had commanded them to approach Him with reverence and awe.  Moses’s instructions were to consecrate the people for three days.  They were to wash their clothes so as to be as presentable as possible before the Lord.  They were not to have sexual relations during this time.  And they were to make their hearts ready to be in the presence of Almighty God.  Yet the people decided that God’s will in how they were to approach Him was not best.  The verse that Paul quoted back in 1^st Corinthians is Exodus 32:6, which records that: they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings.  And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.

The point is this.  When Christians sin they are doing the very same thing the Hebrews did.  They convince themselves, at least in that moment, that the promises of God are lies, the statutes of God are not necessary, and the will of God is not best.  I will pull just one example out of the hat that probably everyone reading this is guilty of.  Colossians 4:6 teaches: Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.  And Colossians 3:16 instructs: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

The sobering reality of Scripture is that when we violate these simple instructions of inter-personal conduct, or any other statutes of the Lord, we are deluding ourselves into ignoring the bald faced truth of God that we have been taught from the Bible.  Although we may not be guilty of the same crimes, in the moment of sin, or in the time leading up to sin if it is premeditated, we are guilty of the same corrupt philosophy as the pimp and the prostitute in the red-light district in Hong Kong, the human trafficker in Sudan, and the rapist in Springfield, Illinois.  At that moment, although we would hotly deny such a charge, we are acting like atheists.

Injustice in Joshua?

The book of Joshua records the military campaign of Israel, under the command of Joshua, in which they conquered the land of Canaan.  In the process numerous cities were destroyed, many people were killed, and the land was left reeling from the Hebrew onslaught.  Critics of the Bible have often used this historical account as ammunition in their efforts to discredit and cast aspersion upon Christianity in general and God in particular.  In response to the issue of whether the Israelites, and God through them, were justified in their brutal conquest of Canaan, a number of points need to be addressed.

I believe the very first item of importance for the Christian who finds themselves in this situation must happen prior to entering into the verbal discussion.  That is, they need to settle in their minds and accept the possibility that, apart from the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit, odds are they will ultimately be disagreed with.  At the end of the day, no matter what evidence is presented and regardless of the conviction of the argument, a modern-day critic of the Biblical record is going to have a tough time reconciling what happened in Joshua with their cultural worldview.

That being said, I believe a solid defense and explanation can and should be offered.  I think it begins with the Israelites themselves before we even get to the question of the conquests.  In Joshua chapter 7 we read of Israel’s first defeat after crossing the Jordan.  They are repulsed by the army of Ai.  After inquiring of the Lord Joshua learns that someone has disobeyed the command of God in the recent sacking of Jericho.  And it is God’s anger over this disobedience that has resulted in His allowing Israel to be defeated by Ai.  Ultimately, it is determined that a man named Achan is the thief who stole items God had ordered destroyed.  And here is where it gets interesting.  Achan is executed for his crime.  But not only the man himself but also his family is killed alongside him.

The initial reaction to this is that it is both incongruous with the Law of God, and it is unfair.  The apparent incongruity comes from the previous book, Deuteronomy.  In chapter 24 verse 16 God says that fathers should not be puth to death because of something their children have done.  Likewise, children should not be put to death on account of their fathers.  With that in mind, why does the Lord now come along and instruct Joshua to execute Achan’s entire family for his sin?

I think the answer lies in examining the particulars of the case.  Achan reveals that the items he stole are buried in the ground inside his tent.  It seems less than credible to suppose that his family was not aware of this.  And if they were it would make them complicit in his crime.  Even if they were not the ones to take the items, if they knew about it and said nothing then they were just as guilty for the deaths of the people who died in the first assault on Ai.  In that context, God was not being unjust at all in ordering the death of the whole bunch.

Moving on from that point we come to the one that most critics will probably camp on; that of the wholesale slaughter and destruction of the native Canaanites as Israel conquered each city.  Reading Joshua in a vacuum, without considering the rest of Scripture, could certainly lead one to conclude that the Israelites were a murderous, bloodthirsty people in thrall to a genocidal, wicked God.  After all, the author of Joshua clinically records the events without much in the way of commentary.

But by examining what God reveals in other parts of the Bible, a picture begins to emerge of an evil group of people who, to coin a phrase, “had it coming”.  In Genesis 9:25 Noah pronounced a curse on the descendants of Ham, his youngest son, due to the dishonor he had shown his father.  Those descendants were the Canaanites.  They were a wicked people, steeped in cruel and sadistic religious practices. 

Perhaps the most infamous of these was the ritualistic child sacrifice to Moloch that was done by the Canaanite peoples.  Infant children would be literally burned to death in the heated metal arms of this bull headed false god.  It was this despicable practice that would later be one of the proverbial “straws that broke the camel’s back” when Manasseh, king of Judah, subjected his own sons to this hideous death and caused God’s patience to run out, thus condemning the entire nation to death, enslavement, and/or exile (2 Ki. 21:1-16).

This is just one example.  We could go on for pages in describing the evil of the Canaanites.  But the point is that we live in a created order where personal responsibility is unavoidable and punishment will always come calling in the end.  It was the wickedness of the Canaanites that doomed them to destruction (Deut. 9:4-5).  In fact, after taking the time to understand the people the Israelites faced in battle, far from being unjust in decreeing their deaths, God would actually have been unjust if He did not decree their deaths.

Theology in Numbers

One of the covenantal promises that God made to Abraham back in Genesis 12 was that he would be made into a nation by the Lord’s sovereign hand.  The Lord God would take this man, who was childless, and grant him such an abundance of offspring that they would grow beyond the confines of merely a single family into such vast numbers that they would have to be re-classified as a nation of people.  And every single one of them would be directly descended from Abraham.

Here in the book of Numbers, we find another step in that process.  God commands Moses to number the people.  Now obviously, this was not for the Lord’s benefit in terms of gaining knowledge He did not possess.  He knew perfectly well exactly how many Hebrews were encamped at Sinai.  The point of this census was so that the Israelites would know how many they were.  He wanted to demonstrate visibly to them that He had gloriously fulfilled His promise to His servant Abraham.  And in the process, God’s intention, as it always is, was for greater glory to be ascribed and worship to be given to Him.

Not content to limit the revelation of His character to the fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant alone, we find that throughout the book of Numbers God is continually unveiling nuances of Himself to His chosen people, and in turn the modern Bible reader today.  A few examples of this revelation are as follows.

In chapter 3, verses 39 to 51, the Lord instructs Moses about the redemption of the firstborn.  God had staked a claim to the firstborn male of every household in Israel, both of men and of animals.  He demanded that every firstborn was to be consecrated to Him as His due.  But rather than take the firstborn of every family in the nation, God decreed that He would instead take the entire tribe of the Levites as His.  The Lord was so serious about this that when a discrepancy was found in the count He exacted the precise cost of the difference from the people.  The firstborn of every home in all Israel numbered 22,273.  But the entire tribe of the Levites was only 22,000.  Meaning that if God took the Levites instead of the firstborn of every household He would be short 273 people. 

The human tendency might be to overlook this seemingly minor detail.  Not so with the Lord.  He instructed Moses to take five shekels per head for the 273-person difference, and give that sum to Aaron and his sons as a redemption price.  I think this demonstrates a truth about God’s character.  First, He is inhumanly precise.  The Lord God does not fudge numbers.  He does not estimate.  He does not guess.  He perfectly and accurately orders every piece of His creation.  Secondly, what is His is very important to Him.  The honor He is due, represented here by the consecration of the firstborn, is of such significance to God that He extracted the exact price from the Israelites so as to make sure He received every drop of glory that was His by right.  If God takes His honor so seriously, then we had better be extremely careful not to play games with our Christian walk.  There is no room for nominal Christianity in the body of Christ.

Then in chapter 6 we read of the instructions regarding a special Nazirite vow that people could make to God.  Particularly in verses 2 to 8 of this chapter, God outlines exactly how a Nazirite should behave, what they should look like, and what they should eat.  The requirements are stringent.  And they would have immediately set someone apart and made them quite noticeable to everyone around them.  There would have been no mistaking that a Hebrew had taken the vow of the Nazirite.  I think this is noteworthy, because it demonstrates that God is holy and He demands holiness from His followers. 

In this context, holiness points to uniqueness and purity.  The Nazirite was to avoid grapes so as to stay far away from the potential for drunken loss of self-control that could have come with wine consumption.  Rather, they were to be pure in their lifestyle even as God is perfectly pure.  The Nazirite was to leave his hair uncut and avoid all contact with the dead, even those of his own family.  This was to demonstrate that he was separate and unique from the normal mass of humanity.  In the same way, God is inherently separated and unique, or transcendent, over all created things.  And those who would serve and follow after Him must order themselves according to His standard of measure.  This means, for the Christian, that they must be righteous where the world is unrighteous and pure where the world is unclean.

Later, in chapter 11, there is frankly an astonishing account of God’s patience with His servants, in particular Moses.  The Israelites have complained once again, and Moses is tired of dealing with it.  He begins to focus on himself and elevate his private concerns and feelings over and above the Lord.  In verses 11 to 15 of this chapter, and then again in verses 21 and 22, Moses displays an incredible level of arrogance and rebelliousness.  He essentially throws a temper tantrum right to God’s face, even going so far as to accuse Him of being unfair, creating straw man arguments to artificially tear down, and questioning God’s ability to work miracles.

What is most shocking to me about this incident is God’s response.  Here is the most holy and sacred being that exists, and He is getting symbolically slapped in the face and spit upon by one who is hopelessly contaminated with sinful evil.  Moses, by all rights, should not have even been allowed to be on the same continent as the Lord’s presence, let alone 10 feet away from Him inside the tent of meeting.  Yet, in spite of the rank injustice of the situation, God responds patiently and kindly to His childish servant.  When I think of how impatient and unkind I am to other people, at the slightest infraction of what I believe I deserve, I am ashamed of my behavior.  If God can display this level of compassion toward us, how much more should we strive to be compassionate toward others.

Finally, in chapter 15 God describes the process of dealing with unintentional sins.  In other words, when a person commits a sin but they did not realize it at the time.  In spite of the oversight, God still demands that appropriate sacrifices be offered to Him so as to make atonement for their error.  I find this to be distinctly different from how humans often operate.  A phrase I have heard many times from people, in response to the breaking of a rule or a mistake that has been made, is “it’s not like I meant to do it.”  Such a response does not track with God’s perspective of sin.  Clearly, here in Numbers 15 as well as throughout the Bible, if a sin has been committed the sinner is at fault, regardless of whether they meant to sin or not.  The obvious implication for us is that our sin is serious, God takes it seriously, He demands repentance, and a failure to do so leaves us in a very precarious position indeed.

All of these examples plus many more throughout Numbers and beyond form the great heartbeat of the Scriptures.  That is, they are a window through which the diligent reader can begin, in some small measure, to comprehend the character and nature of God.  This is the very essence of theology; to know and understand God.

A Foundation for Israel

Not only does the book of Genesis provide a foundation for the rest of Scripture, but it also provides a foundation for the nation of Israel.  As we read of the lives of the men and women in the families of the Hebrews who were descended from Abraham we see God begin to weave the threads of their experiences and their shared history into patterns and themes that will be repeated and reinforced as the centuries of history flow by.

Arguably the most obvious of the ways in which God did this is in His provision of Jacob’s male children.  Each of these twelve men, alternately delivered by Leah, Rachel, Bilhah, and Zilpah (Gen. 29:31-30:24, 35:16-18), would go on to serve as the progenitor of one of the twelve tribes of Israel. 

In addition to this, God deliberately kept the Hebrews in the land of Canaan until He was ready for them to sojourn in Egypt and be grown into a mighty nation in a peaceful and prosperous land.  Limiting our scope to chapters 26 to 50, we see this first with Isaac in Genesis 26:1-5 when God commanded him not to leave Canaan in the face of a famine.  Then again in Genesis 31:13 Jacob is specifically directed to return to Canaan after his time with Laban in Haran.  I think this had the effect of making the land of Canaan somewhat of an ancestral home for the fledgling nation of Israel.  Although prior to their conquests under Joshua they were always strangers and aliens there, God provided them with an initial seed plot of land.  This was the cave of Machpelah where Abraham, Sarah, and later Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob, and Leah were buried.  So, I think, although certainly not from the perspective of the native Canaanites, and probably not even from the perspective of the Hebrews who crossed the Jordan later, there is a sense in which, by going to Canaan, the Jews were going home.

Another way in which God set the tone for the future nation of Israel in the latter half of Genesis is the way in which He prospered them materially.  Abraham had already been blessed with great wealth.  And in chapters 26 to 50 we see first Isaac (Gen. 26:12-14), then Jacob (Gen. 30:43), and eventually Joseph (Gen. 41:40-45) rise to the heights of earthly welfare and success.  All this divine orchestrating of events had the additional effect of placing the Hebrew people in Egypt, following Joseph’s lead.  Thus, the way was paved for them to walk out of slavery hundreds of years later, overflowing with wealth and possessions.  The foreshadowing we see in Genesis and then Exodus would be repeated numerous times throughout Israel’s history as God worked to cause His chosen people to prosper, even in the face of humanly insurmountable obstacles.

I think there is yet another way in which God weaves a thread of Israel’s future into the patriarchal history of Genesis.  In chapter 32 we read of Jacob’s nocturnal struggle with God.  Following this event, and seemingly based purely on Jacob’s tenacity, the Lord gives him a new name; Israel.  Obviously, this would go on to become the name of the nation itself.  So, in one sense there is clearly a foundational element to Jacob’s name change.  But on a deeper level, what God is really doing is forecasting the tumultuous relationship He knew that He would have with Abraham’s descendants.  Israel means “he strives with God”.  No better prophetic name could have been chosen by the Lord with which to name His rebellious, obstinate, and stiff-necked chosen people.

Finally, I think there is an over-arching theme that runs through Genesis 26-50 that will continue to be evident and pervasive for the rest of the Bible.  That is, God does not make His decisions of who to use and who to discard according to human wisdom.  Instead of the best and the brightest, God chooses the worst and the dimmest.  The mightiest heroes of Scripture were the ones who were initially the least, or the second, or the most treacherous. 

The first hint we see of this pattern is the Lord choosing Jacob over Esau.  Even before the twins were born, God declared to Rebekah that He was going to make her younger child the stronger of the two (Gen. 25:23), in complete defiance of traditional ancient middle eastern custom.  This family habit of nonconformity was carried on with Joseph.  He, although the least of all his brothers save Benjamin, was chosen by God to be the supreme instrument of the salvation of the family via his position as ruler of Egypt (Gen. 45:5-8).  Finally, and perhaps most significantly although least obviously, we find that Judah, although not the firstborn of Jacob’s sons, was prophesied to have pre-eminence over them (Gen. 49:3-4, 8-12).

I do not think the importance of this last point can be overstated.  From a biological perspective, it was the line of Judah that would eventually give birth to the greatest of Israel’s leaders, beginning with David and ending with the Messiah, Jesus.  So, from a genealogical perspective, the elevation of Judah over his brothers was Messianic in nature.  But beyond that, this pattern of God using the lesser of men to accomplish His purposes would see its ultimate fulfillment in the first advent of Christ as the suffering servant that Isaiah speaks of (Isa. 53).  Christ did not initially come in great power and honor.  He came first in humility, in shame, in poverty (Lk. 9:58), and in apparent inglorious defeat at the cross.

However, through this most ignoble of servants God would accomplish the greatest work of redemption the world has ever seen.  Therefore, I think the aspect of God’s choice of the least of men to accomplish the best of purposes, that we see repeatedly in the nation of Israel, is perhaps the most powerfully messianic pattern of them all.