The Blazing Glory

I was sitting in my sun room this morning with my coffee getting ready to do some reading. Snow on the ground, birds busy around the feeder, it’s icy cold out. And sunny.

I sat down at my table and found the sun was at just the right angle to shine right in my eyes. Brilliant, blazing, dominating—it was all I could see. It was uncomfortable. I shifted around—still blinded. Shifted some more—still blinded. I finally had to move into complete shadows, where I couldn’t see the sun at all. Only then could I see what was around me.

It was a Romans 1 moment, I realized.

The world is blinded by the Blazing Glory of God. It dominates the scene. Everything else fades into darkness, insignificance. But if it’s not the Sun of Righteousness (Malachi 4:2) that you hunger to see, it’s downright uncomfortable. And so you shift—you move—trying to get away from the Blazing Glory. And you keep moving, and keep shifting until you’re sitting in darkness and you can finally see the World that surrounds you. You settle for the dim reflections of glory in the created even while hiding from the Creator. You look for pleasure, comfort, security, and satisfaction in the World, shifting about so that the rocks and mountains (Revelation 6:16) continue to hide you from the Blazing Glory.

So, where are you sitting? In the darkness of the grave? Or in the presence of the Blazing Glory? And what do you long to see? The world? Or its Creator?

For with Thee is the fountain of life; In Thy light we see light. Psalm 36:9

Throwing red meat to a doctrinal dog[matist]

Look, folks, I am absolutely convinced of the power of the truth of the Bible. There has long been this utterly misplaced debate in American Christiandom that poses some sort of antithesis between knowing truth and doing truth, as though somehow the two militate against one another, or are even mutually exclusive.

That's a crock. It ain't so. In fact, there is nothing more dangerous to Christianity than zeal that is not tempered by the confines of truth, i.e., solid doctrine (see Romans 10:1-3). Many of the cults had their genesis in zeal without knowledge.

In today's modern church, zeal without knowledge produces a man-centered therapeutic Christianity that has as much foundation in secular psychobabble about self-esteem, and diverse theories of personality, as it does the Scripture. The unfortunate thing is that many of the good, godly people who support such nonsense are wholly unaware of how man-centered and idolatrous their mix of secularism and Bible actually are. Under the fallacious moniker of "all truth is God's truth" they baptize the results of psychology with same authority they acknowledge in the Scripture, and like Old Testament Israel, wind up with a messy mix of syncretism that worships Jehovah and Baal (and ultimately, self).

Okay, I feel better now. Got that off my chest. Let's get to the red meat part for doctrinal dogmatists.

E. F. Harrison in the introduction to his commentary on Romans, considers some possible purposes in Paul's letter to the Roman church. One that he makes a case for is the idea that Paul is intending to make Rome a home-base for his intended mission to Spain, much the way Antioch functioned for the first three missionary journeys. In order to do this, he needs to get the Roman church up to speed on doctrine, hence, the epistle to the Romans.

Did you catch that incredible connection? In order to make the Roman church an adequate base for missionary expansion to Spain, HE HAS TO GET THEM SOLIDLY SETTLED IN DOCTRINAL TRUTH. Let's run this past you one more time: IN ORDER THAT THEY MIGHT DO MISSIONS, HE MUST TEACH THEM TRUTH!

Wow. Incredible. I love it.

And oh, by the way: for those of us who do not like "complicated, deep sermons;" please re-read the book of Romans, and remember that this complex, in-depth message was sent to a young church that did not have near the background we do in either the Old or the New Testaments.

Maybe the problem of depth is not in the message presented, but in us as listeners. Perhaps Hebrews 5:11-14 applies to us.

Sic' 'em, Paul!