As most of you know, I took this beautiful woman as my bride on the tenth of this month. It's impossible to get married without doing some reflection, unless you're in Vegas. We were not, so I spent some quality time thinking it all through. God used that time to teach me some tremendous truths about Himself, His relationship with us, and the Second Coming of Christ. I know it probably sounds strange that I would learn about the Second Coming by reflecting on marriage, but keep reading and hopefully you'll understand.
The most obvious thing that was apparent to me about God in this whole process was His grace. By giving me Micah, He gave me a gift more precious than I could have ever thought to ask for. It is clear to both of us that He has been preparing us for each other throughout our whole lives up to this point. Even when neither of us knew that the other existed, He was graciously and lovingly working to mold each of us to match the other. He was laboring meticulously to bring us joy while we sat blindly unaware. What a great God He is to give us so much when we deserve nothing more than to die in our sin.
But God has also helped me to understand that this gift of each other has a higher purpose, which is to paint a picture of the relationship between Christ and the Church. Ephesians 5:22-33 has more to say about marriage than I have time to comment on right now, but the key verse is 32: "This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church." The "mystery" here is marriage. When Christ came and gave himself up for those whom he would eternally save we found out what marriage had meant all along. Marriage was established by God in the garden of Eden and throughout all humanity to give us a picture of how Christ loves those whom he saves. This fact not only helps me to praise God for what He has done to save us, but also gives me a life-long challenge of making our marriage conform to its antecedent. It is my job to love Micah "as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish." (Eph. 5:25-27)
It was by thinking through this picture in the weeks leading up to the wedding, reading more Scripture, and considering my personal experience of it all that I gained a much greater understanding of the eschatological nature of marriage, particularly the wedding itself. I had a special advantage over most men in this thought process in that Micah and I have always been a long-distance couple. As the wedding drew close and closer I yearned more and more for her to be with me in a final sense, but she was still hundreds of miles away. The promise of having this woman whom I loved so much finally coming to live with me was so fantastic that a part of me had trouble believing that it could ever come to fruition. But the days kept passing, and before I knew it I was standing at the steps of the sanctuary watching my bride dressed in spotless white walking toward me to become mine for as long as we both shall live. We pledged our love and devotion to each other in a covenant before God, and she came at last to live in my house.
In the same way, the Church is the bride of Christ, yet the groom is not yet here. We are already his, but we have not yet experienced the fullness of his love by dwelling with him in person. We are in a sort of long-distance relationship with our Savior. As we wait for Christ's return we are waiting for the greatest wedding of all time, the wedding about which all other weddings were created. We have been apart from Christ for so long that it seems like it can't be true that he will ever return, but we also know that his promise is true. There will be a day when he will come upon the clouds and greet us face to face. We will all stand before the great white throne, and those whom he has washed whiter than snow with his blood will be separated from those covered in filth. Then he will take us, the Church, as his bride and live with us in person for eternity in the New Jerusalem.
Not only does this wedding image make sense, but there is ample language in the New Testament to show us that it is God's intent. In the parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25, the coming of Christ is announced as, "Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him," and is pictured as a wedding feast in which Christ marries the wise virgins. The kingdom of heaven is also pictured as a wedding feast in Matthew 22 and it's synoptic parallels. Perhaps the most clear reference is in Revelation 19:6-9, where the Second Coming is unmistakably referred to at length as a wedding. "Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready; it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure--for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints" (7-8). It's not hard to see from all this that God made human weddings as a picture of Christ's future return.
Of course all this is fun an exciting for Christians to think about, but it also taught me a lot about what our attitude toward the Second Coming should be. I have never looked forward to anything as much as I looked forward to marrying Micah, and I probably never will again (although I'm sure the birth of a child in a few years will come close). God gave me a firm conviction that my longing for Christ's return ought to be even greater than my longing was to take Micah as my wife. Surely Christ himself is yearning to win the final victory over death and dwell with us forever; we ought likewise to yearn for the same thing. Our Savior, who is near in Spirit but far in his resurrected body, will soon come to live with us forever. We should follow his lead in praying with fervor daily, "Thy kingdom come!"
Thursday, June 22, 2006
Friday, June 02, 2006
"Missional"? What?
Today I learned about the North American Mission Board's new Missional Network, and it made me wonder what actually makes a person or a church "missional". I've been hearing and reading that word a lot lately, but nobody seems to ever say what it actually means. After going on a small quest around the spectacular world of cyberspace, I stumbled upon perhaps the best explanation anywhere of being "missional", which was written by Tim Keller. Based mostly on his explanation of the missional movement and also on some personal observations about it, here are what I think are its positive and negative aspects:
The Good:
-It helps alert Christians in America that we are no longer living in a Christian society. America is following Europe's lead in relegating Christianity to the annals of history. In a society that is increasingly post-Christian, we can no longer act as though it were Christian. We must approach our culture with understandable language and without presuppositions of what they ought to know about Christ.
-It shows us that we have to get to know our culture and not assume that everyone is just like us.
-It emphasizes (in theory) becoming counter-cultural. Whereas in the past Christianity was a part of our collective identity as Americans, we now see a need for living in a way that distinguishes us radically from the culture around us.
-There is a strong emphasis on social justice, which has been severely neglected in Evangelicalism. It shows us that standing up for the weak, the poor, and the oppressed does not mean that we have to embrace liberal theology.
-It seeks to establish churches that are not defined as "white", "black", "hispanic", etc. Just as Paul taught so clearly that divisions between Christian Jews and Christian Gentiles were sinful, the missional movement teaches the same about the racial divisions of today's Church.
The Not-So-Good:
-There is a destructive confusion between humility and self-deprecation. At times it is difficult to see whether the missional movement stands for anything at all because it is so focused on tearing down stereotypes and criticizing the mistakes of Christianity's past. It is hard to tell what a missional church is, but it is easy to tell what it doesn't want to be--traditional. All this is done in the name of humility, but is it really humility if you are criticizing a stereotype rather than yourself? And even if you do criticize yourself, is that the same thing as humility? No, it's not. Humility is submission of our own will to God's, not open proclamation of our failures to do so.
-There is also a dangerous emphasis on tolerance. How can we be thoroughly tolerant and radically counter-cultural simultaneously? Perhaps the answer is that the missional movement does not actually want to be as counter-cultural as it says it does.
-There is so much emphasis on familiarity with the culture that it risks leading Christians to "love the world" in the way 1 John 2:15-17 warns us against. I agree that we must know what our society is watching, reading, listening to, etc., but we are not to embrace those things. In this respect the missional movement walks a very thin line between what it calls "cultural relevance" and sin.
-There seems to be a fear of rejection and persecution, both of which the New Testament encourages us to embrace as we stand for the truth. This fear could potentially compromise the saving message of the Gospel.
-There is an overemphasis on unity across denominations. Even the heretic John Shelby Spong has said, "Unity is a virtue in the church, but not the supreme one. Truth is higher." If the pastor of the United Church of Christ down the street doesn't believe in the virgin birth, our job is to preach the Gospel to him and not to partner with him.
-There is a de-emphasis of Christian doctrine for the sake of emphasizing methodology. As history has shown, that leaves churches wide open for heretical teachings to creep in.
-The word "missional" itself is too easily confused with "missions". Being missional and doing missions are not the same thing, but if someone criticizes the missional movement they can be painted as "anti-missions". A new name is in order. Any suggestions?
The Good:
-It helps alert Christians in America that we are no longer living in a Christian society. America is following Europe's lead in relegating Christianity to the annals of history. In a society that is increasingly post-Christian, we can no longer act as though it were Christian. We must approach our culture with understandable language and without presuppositions of what they ought to know about Christ.
-It shows us that we have to get to know our culture and not assume that everyone is just like us.
-It emphasizes (in theory) becoming counter-cultural. Whereas in the past Christianity was a part of our collective identity as Americans, we now see a need for living in a way that distinguishes us radically from the culture around us.
-There is a strong emphasis on social justice, which has been severely neglected in Evangelicalism. It shows us that standing up for the weak, the poor, and the oppressed does not mean that we have to embrace liberal theology.
-It seeks to establish churches that are not defined as "white", "black", "hispanic", etc. Just as Paul taught so clearly that divisions between Christian Jews and Christian Gentiles were sinful, the missional movement teaches the same about the racial divisions of today's Church.
The Not-So-Good:
-There is a destructive confusion between humility and self-deprecation. At times it is difficult to see whether the missional movement stands for anything at all because it is so focused on tearing down stereotypes and criticizing the mistakes of Christianity's past. It is hard to tell what a missional church is, but it is easy to tell what it doesn't want to be--traditional. All this is done in the name of humility, but is it really humility if you are criticizing a stereotype rather than yourself? And even if you do criticize yourself, is that the same thing as humility? No, it's not. Humility is submission of our own will to God's, not open proclamation of our failures to do so.
-There is also a dangerous emphasis on tolerance. How can we be thoroughly tolerant and radically counter-cultural simultaneously? Perhaps the answer is that the missional movement does not actually want to be as counter-cultural as it says it does.
-There is so much emphasis on familiarity with the culture that it risks leading Christians to "love the world" in the way 1 John 2:15-17 warns us against. I agree that we must know what our society is watching, reading, listening to, etc., but we are not to embrace those things. In this respect the missional movement walks a very thin line between what it calls "cultural relevance" and sin.
-There seems to be a fear of rejection and persecution, both of which the New Testament encourages us to embrace as we stand for the truth. This fear could potentially compromise the saving message of the Gospel.
-There is an overemphasis on unity across denominations. Even the heretic John Shelby Spong has said, "Unity is a virtue in the church, but not the supreme one. Truth is higher." If the pastor of the United Church of Christ down the street doesn't believe in the virgin birth, our job is to preach the Gospel to him and not to partner with him.
-There is a de-emphasis of Christian doctrine for the sake of emphasizing methodology. As history has shown, that leaves churches wide open for heretical teachings to creep in.
-The word "missional" itself is too easily confused with "missions". Being missional and doing missions are not the same thing, but if someone criticizes the missional movement they can be painted as "anti-missions". A new name is in order. Any suggestions?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
