Category Archives: Jesus Christ

Jesus is the Messiah! True or False?

Is Jesus of Nazareth the Christ (Messiah/anointed one) as claimed in orthodox Christianity?

By Spencer D Gear

A.  Introduction

At Easter time in some Western countries, the mass media love to seek out historical Jesus’ experts who rattle the theological cage. “Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Messiah,” is hardly an attention grabber for the populace! But this type of statement could get people involved in a discussion: “We have no way of knowing whether Jesus thought of himself as the Messiah or as the Son of God in some special sense” (Marcus Borg  1994:29). A headline for Borg’s challenge could be:

Jesus was no messiah.

Then add this problem: Who believes what the Bible says anyway? Even if the Bible supports orthodox Christianity’s view of Jesus as the Christ/Messiah, what’s the point of promoting this when the Bible is an unreliable document according to many? “Jesus’ burial by his friends was totally fictional and unhistorical”, wrote historical Jesus’ scholar, John Crossan (1994:160).

Another historical Jesus’ expert says that the Gospels “can no longer be viewed as the trustworthy accounts of unique and stupendous historical events at the foundation of the Christian faith. The gospels must now be seen as the result of early Christian mythmaking” (Burton Mack 1993:10). A great newspaper heading for Mack’s view could be:

The mythical Bible: Fantasy at work

Is Jesus the Messiah? David Layman (2009) gave the crass answer, “Bloody unlikely”. Part of his reasoning was:

“The ecumenical creeds (Nicene, Apostles’, Athanasian) or Reformation confessions (Augsburg, Heidelberg, Westminster) nowhere declared belief in the messianic identity of Jesus to be an article of faith. Indeed when the Heidelberg Catechism had an opportunity to make the connection, it twice went out of its way to avoid it… ‘Why is he called CHRIST, that is, the ANOINTED ONE?’ It answered that Christ is ‘ordained by God the Father and anointed with the Holy Spirit.’ Christ had a three-fold ministry, prophet, priest and king, but the kingly authority (where one would expect some interpretation of his messianic identity) was given a spiritualized explanation: Christ is ‘governing up by his Word and Spirit and defending and sustaining us in the redemption he has won for us'” (Layman 2009).

Is the absence of specific statements about the Messiah in these historic creeds and confessions a stumbling block to the affirmation of Jesus the Christ/Messiah in orthodox Christianity?

One of two main schools of Gnosticism that attacked orthodox Christian doctrines in the first couple of centuries of the Christian era was Cerinthianism, named after Cerinthus (ca A.D. 100), who, according to Irenaeus (Against Heresies 26.1), was educated in the wisdom of Egypt. It is reported that he taught in Asia Minor (Turkey) but no further details are known of his birth location. Some contend that he was a contemporary of the apostle John.

One of the beliefs of the heretical Cerinthians was that “the Christ” came upon Jesus at his baptism, granting him power for ministry but it departed before Christ’s crucifixion. It was only a man who died on the cross and rose again. This theology invalidates the need for Christ’s atoning work (Keathley III n.d.). A current headline for this heresy could be:

Jesus zapped for practical reasons.

Before we can examine the truth or otherwise of the orthodox Christian claim of Jesus of Nazareth as the Christ/Messiah, we have to address one main issue: the reliability of the Bible as a document providing the truth about Jesus Christ.

B.  Myth or truth: How do we determine if the Bible is true or false historically?

Fortunately, others have done the hard yards for us. Craig Blomberg (1987) wrote that if we wanted to evaluate the historical accuracy of the Gospels, “we assume from the outset that its testimony is reliable and then to consider the force of various objections which might cause a person to change his or her mind”. However, he notes that much critical scholarship “inverts this process altogether by assuming the gospels to be unreliable” (246).

1. How do you prove any historical document to be reliable?

Four criteria are commonly used by historians (based on Blomberg 1987:247):

  1. “Multiple attestation or forms”. Is the report in more than one Gospel and is there independent testimony outside of the Bible?
  2. “Palestinian environment or language”. This examines how the Greek text is related to a literal translation of a Jewish original. Or, if events and teaching reflect concepts from first century Palestine, then there is no need to seek a Greek (Hellenistic) church for the origins of the document.
  3. “Dissimilarity”. This is an unusual criterion which examines the Gospel’s picture of Jesus and how it might differ from some ancient Jewish belief or differ from some things that were happening in early Christianity. “Because Jesus seemed to stand out so much from his contemporaries and because his first followers so easily deviated from his very demanding requirements, this criterion has appealed to many as the most helpful” (Blomberg 1987:247).
  4. “Coherence”. If material harmonizes with material from the other three criteria, it may be accepted as authentic and reliable.

When we apply these tests to the Bible, what do we find?

“The gospels may be accepted as trustworthy accounts of what Jesus did and said. One cannot hope to prove the accuracy of every detail on purely historical grounds alone; there is simply not enough data available for that. But as investigation proceeds, the evidence becomes sufficient for one to declare that what can be checked is accurate, so that it is entirely proper to believe that what cannot be checked is probably accurate as well” (Blomberg 1987:254)

If the Gospels are given the same close historical investigation as any other documents from history, the Gospels will be shown to be reliable documents.  It is to these trustworthy documents that we turn to find the evidence for Jesus of Nazareth’s claims to be the Christ/Messiah.

C.  The Bible’s teaching on Jesus the Messiah, the Christ

In everyday language, what are the meanings of Messiah and Christ? How are the terms used in the New Testament?

“Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son” (1 John 2:22 ESV).[1] This verse is in a section of John’s epistles that warns against antichrists who were challenging the church when John wrote this general letter to churches that were being threatened in Asia Minor (Turkey today) towards the end of the first century A.D.

In the region of Caesarea Philippi, Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” (Matt. 16:13). Some said he was John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah or another one of the prophets. The bold “Simon Peter replied, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God'” (Matt. 16:16).

At Jesus’ trial before his execution, he appeared before Caiaphas, the high priest, along with the scribes and elders. The chief priests and the whole Council were trying to uncover false testimony against Jesus to give them reason to execute him. Many false witnesses presented their evidence. The high priest asked for Jesus’ response. Matthew records, “But Jesus remained silent. And the high priest said to him, ‘I adjure you by the living God, tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God.’ Jesus said to him, ‘You have said so. But I tell you, from now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power and coming on the clouds of heaven'” (Matt. 26:63-64). Jesus admitted that he Himself is “the Christ”.

When Jesus called his first disciples, Andrew told his brother, Simon Peter, “We have found the Messiah (which means Christ)” (John 1:41).

The scene is Jesus at the well with the woman of Samaria who was there to draw some water and Jesus engaged her in conversation. “The woman said to him, ‘I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.’ Jesus said to her, ‘I who speak to you am he'” (John 4:25-26).

Again, Jesus admits to a female stranger that he is the Messiah, the Christ. This is an amazing situation because in the socio-cultural context of the first century Jewish and Greco-Roman world, men not only regarded women negatively but also held them responsible for most sin, especially for sexually temptation. Jesus did not see women this way when he chose to declare to a woman his Messiahship and that he is the Christ.

The circumstances involved the death of Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, and Jesus’ raising him from the dead. The Jews tried to console Lazarus’s sisters, Martha and Mary, following Lazarus’s death. Jesus told the sisters and those who had gathered that Lazarus would rise again and that Jesus is the resurrection and the life and those who believe in him, even though they die, continue to live. After Jesus declared that death was not the end, Martha responded: ‘Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world'” (John 11:27).

In the midst of devastating grief, Martha affirmed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.

Those Scriptures refer to various circumstances in which Jesus Himself and others support the view that Jesus is the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of God. What do these terms mean?

The Greek, christos, translated as “Christ” appears 531 times in the NT, based on the Nestle-Aland 26th edition of the Greek NT (Hurtado 1991:106). The description of Jesus as the “Christ” in the Gospels reflects the Jewish origins of Christianity. Jesus is portrayed as the Christ, the anointed One, the Messianic hope of Israel. But the scriptural references above also present the Christ, the Messiah, as the son of God (eg John 10:36), a phrase that “modern scholarship holds … is used of Jesus … as the Messianic king. But in John 5:18, 10:33, 36 the claim of sonship is clearly intended to denote deity” (Thiessen 1949:142).

Christos had no Greek cultural significance. It is from the ancient Jews that Christians obtain the meaning of “the Christ, the Messiah”. Christos is the NT equivalent of the Hebrew, mashiach, from which “Messiah” is derived, meaning anointed (with oil). For the Jews, the person anointed with oil often referred to somebody appointed to a special office such as king or priest as seen in passages such as Ex. 28:41 (Aaron & his sons); 1 Sam. 9:15-16; 10:1 (Saul); 1 Sam. 16:3, 12-13 (David); and 1 Chron. 29:22 (Zadok and Solomon). These passages indicate that these people were chosen by God and others, to perform a special mission.

Mashiach, in the OT, is used especially for the anointing of the Israelite kings (see 1 Sam. 24:6; 2 Sam. 1:14) but there is an application to God’s Messiah in Dan. 9:25-26:

“Know therefore and understand that from the going out of the word to restore and build Jerusalem to the coming of an anointed one, aprince, there shall be seven weeks. Then for sixty-two weeks it shall be built again with squares and moat, but in a troubled time after the sixty-two weeks, an anointed one shall be cut off and shall have nothing. And the people of the prince who is to come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. Its end shall come with a flood, and to the end there shall be war. Desolations are decreed”.

This “anointed one”, according to the context in Dan. 9:24 will “bring in everlasting righteousness” or “bring in righteousness of ages”, a righteousness that contrasts with sin (Wood 1973:249). This anointed one could not follow in the steps of the Israelite leaders who historically had led the people into sin, then spiritual renewal, followed by a return to sin. This anointed one would bring in “everlasting righteousness”.

Leon Wood notes that the Hebrew terms “anointed one” and “prince” in Dan. 9:25-26 are “applied to various leaders in the Old Testament, but here they clearly refer to Christ. He is the supreme Messiah and Prince; no one else fits the chronology developed in the text” (1973:251).

There is a special application of “the Anointed” in Psalm 2:2, “The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed”. The phrase, “the kings of the earth”, is common one in the Psalms (see also Ps. 76:12; 138:4; 148:11) and refers to rulers of kingdoms that are separate from the kingdom of God.

Many commentators regard the entire second psalm as “typically Messianic”, and apply it to Jesus, while others want to deny this messianic connection.

We conclude that the NT use of the term, “Messiah”, in John 1:41 and 4:25 is associated with Old Testament usage and not simply a reference to the apocryphal Book of Enoch 48:10.

The Christian view of Jesus the Messiah (i.e. the Christ) focuses on the question asked of the disciples by Jesus, as recorded in Matthew 16: “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” (v. 13). Then he became specific to them: “But who do you say that I am?” (v. 15). Simon Peter’s response was, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (v. 16). Jesus’ answer was that flesh and blood did not reveal this to Peter but it was revealed by “my Father who is in heaven” (v. 17).

D.  Orthodox Christianity’s teaching on Jesus the Messiah, the Christ

“Orthodoxy is a myth” according to the liberal theologian and philosopher of religion, John Hick (1978:ix-x). To the contrary, the view adopted in this article is that orthodox Christianity refers to

“right belief, as opposed to heresy or heterodoxy. The term is not biblical; no secular or Christian writer uses it before the second century…. The word [orthodoxy] expresses the idea that certain statements accurately embody the revealed truth content of Christianity and are therefore in their own nature normative for the universal church” (Packer 1984:808).

As Packer explains, it is rooted in the biblical teaching that the Gospel has “specific factual and theological content” (1 Cor. 15:1-11; Gal. 1:6-9; 1 Tim. 6:3; 2 Tim. 4:3-4) and that there can be no fellowship between those who accept orthodoxy and those who pursue heterodoxy (see 1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7-11). Orthodox Christian teaching had to be defended in the second century, precipitated by the threat of Gnosticism and other errors affecting the biblical understanding of the Trinity and Christology (Packer 1984:808).

1. Messiah in orthodox theology

Historically, what have been the statements from orthodox theologians and Bible teachers about Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, the Anointed One?

St. Jerome (A.D. 347-420) wrote in his commentary on Daniel 7:13,

“And behold, there came One with the clouds of heaven like unto the Son of man.” He who was described in the dream of Nebuchadnezzar as a rock cut without hands, which also grew to be a large mountain, and which smashed the earthenware, the iron, the bronze, the silver, and the gold is now introduced as the very person of the Son of man, so as to indicate in the case of the Son of God how He took upon Himself human flesh; according to the statement which we read in the Acts of the Apostles: ‘Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up towards heaven? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him going into heaven'(Acts 1:11)”.

Contemporary Reformed theologian, Wayne Grudem, affirms and expands Jerome’s explanation, writing that it is striking that the One who is described as a “son of man” who came “with the clouds of heaven” according to Dan. 7:13-14, refers to

“someone who had heavenly origin and who was given eternal rule over the whole world. The high priests did not miss the point of this passage when Jesus said, ‘Hereafter you will see the Son of man seated on the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven‘ (Matt. 26:46). The reference to Daniel 7:13-14 was unmistakable, and the high priest and his council knew that Jesus was claiming to be the eternal world ruler of heavenly origin spoken of in Daniel’s vision. Immediately they said, ‘He has uttered blasphemy…. He deserves death’ (Matt. 26:65-66)” (Grudem 1994:546, emphasis in original).

 

The Nicene Creed, representative of one of the most well used doctrinal summaries in Christianity, was developed at the first ecumenical Council of the church at Nicaea in A.D. 325. Part of the Nicene Creed declares this of Christ: “We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father” (creeds.net).

This creed was a promotion of sound doctrine, developed in response to the crises of the Arian controversy. Arius, a heretic from the Libyan region, taught the deity of Christ but his Christology was that God created Christ and there was a time when Christ did not exist. The Arian anti-Trinitarian doctrine was corrected in the statement of the Nicene Creed, although the words Messiah and anointed are not included. Pertinent to the content of this article, the Nicene Creed declares Jesus as the Christ (which is the meaning of Messiah), the only Son of God. It was not needed to affirm Him as “Messiah” as “Christ” covers that designation.

In his treatise, “On the Trinity”, St. Augustine of Hippo in the early fifth century referred to Acts 10:38 when he stated, “In the Acts of the Apostles it is more plainly written of Him [the Lord Jesus Christ], because God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit. Certainly not with visible oil but with the gift of grace…” (XV.26.46).

Martin Luther, in an anti-Semitic document, “On the Jews and their lies, 1543“, spoke of the Jews having no hope until “they are forced to confess that the Messiah has come, and that he is our Jesus”.

John Calvin, in his commentary on Luke 24:26, wrote, “There is no room to doubt that our Lord discoursed to them [the two on the road to Emmaus] about the office of Messiah, as it is described by the Prophets, that they might not take offense at his death”.

Jacob Arminius (1560-1609) affirmed the orthodox doctrine of Christ as Messiah:

“The word ‘Christ,’ denotes an anointed person, who is called … ‘the Messiah,’ by the Hebrews…. It is proper, that he who was eminently styled ‘the Messiah’ should be anointed with the Holy Spirit, indeed ‘above all his fellows,’ (or those who were partakers of the same blessings,) (Psalm xlv,7)” (Arminius 1977:549)

Another historical Protestant confession, The Westminster Confession of Faith‘s statement (ch. 7), “Of God’s covenant with man“, stated that this covenant

“was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances delivered to the people of the Jews, all foreshadowing Christ to come, Heb 8:1-10:39 Ro 4:11 Col 2:11,12 1Co 5:7 which were for that time sufficient and efficacious, through the operation of the spirit, to instruct and build up the elect in faith in the promised Messiah, 1Co 10:1-4 Heb 11:13 Joh 8:56 by whom they had full remission of sins, and eternal salvation; and is called the Old Testament”.

Alfred Edersheim‘s 1500 pages on The life and times of Jesus the Messiah (1971), first published in 1883, set forth the orthodox doctrine that “the Gospels be regarded as four different aspects in which the Evangelists viewed the historical Jesus of Nazareth as the fulfilment of the Divine promise of old, the Messiah of Israel and the Saviour of man” (xi).

The Catholic Encyclopedia‘s article on “Messiah” promotes the orthodox doctrine on Jesus, the Messiah and Saviour:

“For those who, before the Christian dispensation, sought to interpret the ancient prophecies, some single aspect of the Messiah sufficed to fill the whole view. We, in the light of the Christian revelation, see realized and harmonized in Our Lord all the conflicting Messianic hopes, all the visions of the prophets. He is at once the Suffering Servant and the Davidic King, the Judge of mankind and its Saviour, true Son of Man and God with us. On Him is laid the iniquity of us all, and on Him, as God incarnate, rests the Spirit of Jahveh, the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding, the Spirit of Counsel and Fortitude, the Spirit of Knowledge and Piety, and the Fear of the Lord”.

In contemporary theology, the following are samples of orthodox Messianic statements regarding Jesus.

Reformed theologian, R. C. Sproul, explains that

“the title Christ is so often given to Jesus that people often mistake it for his last name. It is, however, not a name, but a title that refers to his position and work as Messiah. The term Christ comes from the Greek Christos, which is used to translate the Hebrew word for Messiah. Both Christ and Messiah mean ‘Anointed One'” (1992:103).

Arminian theologian, Henry C. Thiessen, in the mid twentieth-century wrote that the “son of man” name “is used prophetically of Christ in Dan. 7:13; cf. Matt. 16:28. That this name was regarded by the Jews as referring to the Messiah is evident from the fact that the high priest rent his garment when Christ applied this prophecy in Daniel to Himself (Matt. 26:64, 65) (Thiessen 1949:302).

Roman Catholic, Rev. Bertrand L. Conway, C.S.P, in his sermon, “Christ the true Messiah“, briefly expounded the Gospel passages that teach the orthodox doctrine of Christ, the Messiah. He “sketched the Gospel witness to the Messiahship of Jesus the Son of God. It is important for us to know it well, in view of the modern denial of the unbeliever, and the Jew”.

Orthodox Christian commentator, H. C. Leupold, regards Psalm 2 as a description of “the ultimate victory of the Lord’s anointed…. This psalm sets forth the basic truth concerning the Messiah and His kingdom” and gives due prominence to the Messianic truth, which looms large in the psalms” (1959:41). Leupold not only regards this psalm as “directly Messianic” but also “from beginning to end [it is] an out-and-out prophecy about the Christ” (42).

E.  Conclusion

There have been heterodox and orthodox promotions regarding Christ, the Messiah, throughout the history of the church. The contemporary denigration of the Messiah is keeping pace with historical statements that date back almost two millennia.

Nevertheless, the orthodox doctrine of the Messiah, from predictive prophecy in the Old Testament, New Testament declaration, and the teaching of orthodoxy throughout church history, has been that Jesus Christ, whose incarnation is associated with the city of Nazareth, is the Messiah, the Anointed One. The Christos (Christ) is the Messiah (based on the Hebrew understanding of mashiach) and he shed his blood for the sins of the world as a vicarious atonement on the Golgotha cross in Jerusalem in approximately A. D. 30.

F. Works consulted

Arminius, J. 1977. The writings of James Arminius, vol. 1. Translated from the Latin by J. Nichols. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House.

Blomberg, C. L. 1987. The historical reliability of the Gospels. Leicester, England: Inter-Varsity Press.

Borg, M. J. 1994. Meeting Jesus again for the first time: The historical Jesus and the heart of contemporary faith. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco.

Crossan, J. D. 1994. Jesus: A revolutionary biography. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco.

Edersheim, A. 1971 (one vol. edn.). The life and times of Jesus the Messiah. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Grudem, W. 1994. Systematic theology: An introduction to biblical doctrine. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House.

Hick, J. (ed) 1978. The myth of God incarnate. London: SCM.

Hurtado, L. W. 1991. Christ, in Green, J. B; McKnight S. & Marshall I. H. (eds), Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospels, 106-117. Downers Grove, Illinois/Leicester, England: InterVarsity Press.

Keathley III, J. H. n.d. The supremacy of the person of Christ (Col. 1:15-18). bible.org, Paul’s letter to the Colossians: An exegetical and devotional commentary. Available at: http://bible.org/seriespage/supremacy-person-christ-col-115-18#P848_264818 [Accessed 1 April 2010].

Layman, D. 2009, Is Jesus the Messiah? First Things (Spengler blogs) 22 August. Available at: http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/spengler/2009/08/22/is-jesus-the-messiah/ [Accessed 28 March 2010].

Leupold, H. C. 1959. Exposition of the Psalms. London: Evangelical Press.

Mack, B. L. 1993. The lost gospel: The book of Q & Christian origins. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco.

Packer, J. I. 1984. Orthodoxy, in Elwell, W. A. (ed), Evangelical dictionary of theology, 808. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House.

Sproul, R. C. 1992. Essential truths of the Christian faith. Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

Thiessen, H. C. 1949. Introductory lectures in systematic theology. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Wood, L. 1973. A commentary on Daniel. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House.

Notes:

[1] The Bible translation used is, The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (ESV) 2001. Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway Bibles.

 

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 6 August 2016.

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Easter: God’s solution to our greatest need (1 Peter 3:18)

(mega tsunami, Indonesia 2004, public domain)

By Spencer D Gear

1. Introduction

The deadliest tsunami of all time hit the Indian Ocean on 26th December 2004. “In the aftermath of the quake, resultant tsunami waves … killed over 280,000 people in towns and villages along the coast of the Indian Ocean. Over 3 million of survivors have [had] their livelihoods destroyed.”[1]

The death toll in the earthquake in Haiti was expected to be over 100,000 according to the Haitan Prime Minister.[2]

Is our greatest need to end all earthquakes and tidal waves of the enormity of tsunamis?

What about curing all paedophiles, all diseases such as HIV and Hepatitis C?

What about stopping war and violence around the world? If we could solve the conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, the Middle East, the Sudan, North Korea, would that provide the solution to our greatest need?

What about the tragedy of murder and suicide in our own country? What is the world’s greatest need? What is your greatest need?

I’d like to share a verse from Scripture with you that, if practised, would help to put an end to war, violence and sexual abuse. It helps us to understand why tsunamis, earthquakes and the September 11 2001 disaster happened.

It causes us to reflect on what is wrong with our world and what can be done about it. The verse I am referring to is: 1 Peter 3:18, “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit” (NIV).

The title of this message is: “Easter: God’s solution to our greatest need.”

This verse shows us what is wrong with our world and proclaims the solution. Here we see:

  • The greatest problem with our world;
  • The greatest need of individuals and our world.
  • And the solution to the greatest problem;

2. The greatest problem with our world

This verse uses two words that describe our greatest problem, but we don’t want to hear them. I don’t expect that you’ll hear them too often on the radio or TV. Some of you may object with me this morning for even mentioning them. But unless we understand the greatest problem, we will never know the greatest solution. If we don’t understand what is really wrong with our world, we won’t want to seek the best way to solve it.The greatest problem is NOT:

  • Osama Bin Laden[3] and Al-Qaeda[4],
  • the Americans and their Allies in Iraq; OR
  • paedophilia, murder and violence around the world.

These are symptoms of the greatest problem.

Those two words that spell out the greatest problem with our world from this verse are:

a. Sin, and

b. Unrighteousness

We don’t like to be told we are sinners, but if we don’t understand that every human being since the time of Adam and Eve has been born sinners, we won’t understand the solution.

What does it mean that we are sinners? Most of us think that the meaning is simple: We do wrong. That’s only part of the answer. Those of us with a long association with the church can easily rush over this greatest problem in the whole world. Briefly, let’s talk about

A. SIN

In this 1973 book by a secular Jewish psychiatrist, Karl Menninger, Whatever Became of Sin, he wrote this:

In all of the laments and reproaches made by our seers and prophets, one misses any mention of “sin,” a word which used to be a veritable watchword of prophets. It was a word once in everyone’s mind, but now rarely if ever heard. Does that mean that no sin is involved in all our troubles . . ? Is no one any longer guilty of anything? . . Anxiety and depression we all acknowledge, and even vague guilt feelings; but has no one committed any sins?[5]

Menninger says that “the sinful act” includes “an implicitly aggressive quality—a ruthlessness, a hurting, a breaking away from God and from the rest of humanity, a partial alienation, or act of rebellion. . . sin has a willful, defiant, or disloyal quality; someone is defiled or offended or hurt.”[6]

These are amazing statements from a secular psychiatrist. Karl Menninger pushed the boundaries of what is wrong with our city, our country, the world – what is wrong with you and me.

Our text agrees that the major problem is “sin.” SIN, with a big “I” in the middle.

Too often we think of “sin” as an act of wrongdoing like telling a lie, stealing, killing somebody, sexually abusing a child. Sin includes wrong actions such as those, BUT its fundamental understanding in the Scriptures is “a state of alienation from God. For the great prophets of Israel, sin is much more than the violation of “[7] something that is forbidden or breaking some external law.

Sin indicates a breaking “of a personal relationship with God, a betrayal of the trust he places in us.”[8] Here are a couple of examples.

Isa. 6:5, “‘Woe to me!’ I cried. ‘I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.'”

Luke 5:8, “When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, ‘Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!'”

The British evangelist, Michael Green, put it this way:

“What would you think of a doctor who, on discovering you had a tumor buried deep in your body, responded, ‘Take two aspirin and you’ll be just fine.’?

“How about a fireman who responded to the fire alarm by saying, ‘It’ll probably burn itself out soon enough,’ or a policeman who, on arriving at the scene of a robbery, merely shook his head and said, ‘Boys will be boys’!

“In each case the response is inappropriate to the situation. Is your response to sin also inappropriate.”[9]

Our greatest problem is not only that we are alienated from God, but that the sinful acts that come out of this alienation, flow from deep within all of us. Jeremiah put it as straight as you can get: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (ESV)

So, SIN is a state of alienation from God and this comes from deep within all of us.

And this SIN is associated with:

B. UNRIGHTEOUSNESS

What does it mean for all of us to be unrighteous? “Righteous” or “just” is based on the Hebrew word meaning “straight” or “right.” “The corresponding Greek term[10] in Greek society referred to that which is in accordance with law or social norm.”[11] For example, the God of Israel, asks, “Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Gen. 18:25).

If righteous means to do what is right and in accordance with the law, what do you think unrighteousness might mean? The opposite: To fail to do what is correct and to do what is against the law.

Here’s the BIGGEST problem: We all are sinners by nature, alienated from God, and we DO what is wrong and against the law – against the law of God, against the law of the land, and even against the law of our own consciences.

Unless we understand the GREATEST problem, we will not grasp the GREATEST solution celebrated at Easter. We will not understand the wickedness in our world if we miss the meaning of these two words: SIN and UNRIGHTEOUSNESS.

That great British Baptist preacher of the 19th century, C. H. Spurgeon, often told this story:

“A cruel king called one of his subjects into his presence and asked him his occupation. The man responded, ‘I’m a blacksmith.’ The ruler then ordered him to go and make a chain of a certain length.

“The man obeyed, returning after several months to show it to the monarch. Instead of receiving praise for what he had done, however, he was instructed to make the chain twice as long.

“When that assignment was completed, the blacksmith presented his work to the king, but again was commanded, ‘Go back and double its length.’ This procedure was repeated several times. At last the wicked tyrant directed the man to be bound in the chains of his own making and cast into a fiery furnace.”[12]

We are like that cruel king because sin takes a dreadful toll in our lives. Rom. 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death. . .” In the verse we are considering in 1 Peter, it says, “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous.” Why was it necessary for the righteous one, Christ, to die for the sins of the unrighteous?

  • Since sin means we are alienated from God;
  • Since unrighteousness means that we do wrong and crooked things,
  • that tells us something about our greatest need. This verse from First Peter nails it:

3. Your greatest need . . .

is “to bring you to God.” Wait a minute, you might be saying: “I haven’t the faintest interest in God.” In fact, I’m of the Perry Como vintage and I believe “Love Makes the World God Round,” and my greatest need is LOVE. Or if you’re of the Madonna vintage, “Love [still] Makes the World Go Round.”

Just a moment folks. Who or what makes the world go round? Who is the one “who gives food to every creature. His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of heaven. His love endures forever” (Ps. 136:25-26)?

There would be no understanding of “love” without the one whose love endures forever and the one who provides food for every creature, sends rain on the just and the unjust, and who sustains this world – in spite of its sin and unrighteousness.

We think our greatest need is love, human love. Our biggest need is not to deal with war, tsunamis, Sept. 11, cancer, crime, our job and our family.

God says that your greatest need is to be in fellowship with God himself – your greatest need is for somebody “to bring you to God.” The greatest issue is that we are cut off from Almighty God, our Creator and Sustainer.

If this greatest need and greatest problem are NOT solved, then the anger of God will rest on us and our eternity will be miserable.

Please understand what this would mean. If we were in fellowship, companionship, friendship, in love with the Lord of the Universe, we would not want to tear one another apart, violate one another, and do violence in our world. We would want to love as God loves.

You see, no matter whether you have been raised in deepest, darkest Africa or deepest, darkest Bundaberg, you know that God exists. How do I know? God tells us in Rom. 1:20, “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse” (TNIV).

Deep down within you and me, our conscience convicts us of the existence of God. But we feel out of step with him. The Bible puts it that we are “alienated from God.” Augustine of Hippo, Northern Africa, was a sexually immoral man who indulged his passions in his youth, fathering an illegitimate child.[13] He eventually obtained a reputation to be called, St. Augustine, and described this alienation in the 4th century in his book, Confessions. In that book he wrote: “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you”.[14]

Our greatest need is for somebody who can bring us to God. We are rebels who don’t want anything to do with God but our greatest need is to be in relationship with the Lord God of the universe.

How can that happen? I’m glad you asked. That leads us to what this verse tells us about.

4. The greatest solution to our greatest need

If sin and doing wrong are our problems, we too often think of better security, more police, bigger prisons, tougher penalties, better parenting.

If you don’t understand the greatest problem with our world and reject the greatest need that we have, you won’t be interested in the greatest solution to our personal problems and the world’s problems.

A T Easter, we are directed to the greatest solution and it has nothing to do with police, prisons and security: “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit.”

These are the steps to the greatest solution.

  • Christ suffered for sins;
  • Christ, the righteous one suffered for us, the unrighteous;
  • Christ died on the cross and rose again from the dead.

A. Step One: Christ suffered for sins once for all; [15]

What’s the deal about Christ’s suffering “once for all”? Understand what happened for the Jews in the OT. If they wanted to be right before God and have their sins forgiven, “God set up a system by which the people of Israel could make atonement for their sins. To atone is to make amends, to set things right.”[16] God’s law was that “the high priest entered the Most Holy Place once a year to sprinkle blood [of animals] as an atonement for the sins of the people (Lev. 16:3-34: Heb. 9:7, 25).”[17] To set things right between the Jews and God, blood was sprinkled on the altar only once a year.

When Jesus Christ suffered on the cross, he provided the blood atonement, not once a year, but once for all people for all time, so there is no need to wait for this once a year sacrifice. You can set things right with God any day at any time because “Christ suffered for sins once for all” times. This is wonderful news of freedom from sin and easy access to God.

You might ask: “Why does any blood have to be shed? That sounds gruesome to me.” We need to understand that when it comes to dealing with sin and unrighteousness, we don’t set the rules. God does.

That’s step one from this verse: Christ suffered for sins once for all.

B. Step 2: Christ, the righteous one suffered for us, the unrighteous.

This is God’s justice in action. There are no unfair, unjust sentences with God.

When Peter was preaching to the Jews in the Temple at Jerusalem, according to Acts 3:14, he said, “You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you.” He was speaking of Christ, “the Holy and Righteous One.”

Jesus is “righteous.” He’s without sin. We are unrighteous – with sin deep within us and in the behaviour we do. How is it possible for us, the unrighteous, to enter the presence of the totally righteous and holy God?

This is how God does it. God set in place this wonderful solution to our greatest problem. This is how he says it in 2 Cor. 5:21, “God made him who had no sin to be sin [or a sin offering] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

So, what’s the effect of this? Simon Kistemaker summarised this beautifully when he wrote:

Jesus’ sacrificial death is to enable us to enter God’s presence. Jesus opens the way to the throne of God, introduces us to the Father, and re-establishes for us an intimate relationship with the Father. By removing sin as the cause of our alienation from God, Jesus provides access to God and makes us acceptable in his sight.[18]

This is what is means to be justified by faith – to be declared righteous before God. For all those who place their total trust in Jesus Christ by faith, they now have a friendly relationship with God, “are acceptable to him and have assurance that he is favorably disposed toward us.”[19]

The third step in this greatest of all solutions is:

C. Step 3: Christ did this by dying on the cross and rising again from the dead.

I Peter 3:18, “He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit.”

We must always keep these two actions together: Christ’s death and Christ’s resurrection.

The resurrection shows that God was satisfied with Christ’s substitutionary death on the cross. This means that God will be satisfied to have you, if you become a believer, in his presence because of Christ’s death and resurrection. We know that when Christ died on the cross that he continued to live in a new realm. How do we know that? To the repentant thief who was crucified alongside Christ on the cross, Jesus said, “Today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43).

Then Christ was resurrected three days later, transformed into a new “spiritual body” that didn’t have the limitations of his fleshly body.

God said a big YES to Christ’s death as a substitute for our sins by raising him from the dead.

5. Conclusion

Let’s pull this all together, based on 1 Peter 3:18. That verse again, “For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit.“

a. The greatest problem with our world is not tsunamis, Sept. 11, crime, violence & sexual abuse. Our greatest problem is defined by two words that you probably won’t hear on TV tonight: SIN (a state of alienation from God) and UNRIGHTEOUSNESS (sinful actions that we do).

b. The greatest need of all people is not to solve the teenage rebellion or broken relations, to find peace in the Middle East, Iraq, the Sudan, or in downtown Bundaberg, but that greatest need is to deal with our alienation from God. How can we ever have a relationship with the holy, righteous God of the universe?

c. The greatest solution, that you won’t read in tomorrow’s newspaper, is found in 3 steps that are linked together:

  • First, Christ suffered for sins once for all;
  • Second, the righteous one suffered for us, the unrighteous;
  • Third, Christ did this by dying on the cross and rising again from the dead.

I would be remiss if I did not offer this challenge. This message is wasted if you do not respond.

  • How are you going to deal with the biggest problem you have – your sin and unrighteousness?
  • Since your greatest need is to be in relationship with God and you are alienated from him, what will you do about that today?
  • What’s the point of the greatest solution: Christ suffered for your sins, the righteous for the unrighteous by dying on the cross and rising again from the dead?
  • What’s the meaning of all this if you don’t repent of your sin and trust Christ alone as your Lord and Saviour?
  • How can you do that? The Bible says:

“Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord” (Acts 3:19).

“Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (John 1:12).

If you repent and receive Christ by faith, what will happen to you?

  • “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Cor. 5:17 TNIV).
  • Won’t you receive the greatest solution today? If you want to know more, please speak with me after the service.

Chuck Swindoll once said:

If our greatest need had been information,

God would have sent us an educator.

If our greatest need had been technology,

God would have sent us a scientist.

If our greatest need had been money,

God would have sent us an economist.

If our greatest need had been pleasure,

God would have sent us an entertainer.

But our greatest need was forgiveness,

So God sent us [the][20] Savior.[21]

Notes:

[1] Dr. T. Matthew Ciolek (ed.), “2004 tsunami disaster: Scholarly and factual analyses,” updated 22 January 2020, Asian Studies WWW Virtual Library, available at: http://www.ciolek.com/WWWVLPages/AsiaPages/Tsunami-Analyses.html [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[2] “Death toll in Haiti expected to be over 100,000 says Prime Minister”, Gather News, 13 January 2010, available at: http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474977993233&grpId=3659174697244816 [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[3] See “Osama Bin Laden”, Wikipedia, available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osama_bin_Laden [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[4] “Al-Qaeda”, Wikipedia, available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[5] Karl Menninger 1973, Whatever Became of Sin, Bantam Books, New York, p. 15.

[6] Ibid., p. 22.

[7] D. G. Bloesch 1984, ‘Sin’, in Walter A. Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, p. 1012.

[8] Ibid.

[9] Michael P. Green (ed.) 1982, Illustrations for Biblical Preaching, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, p. 346.

[10] Dikaios.

[11] D. W. Diehl 1984, ‘Righteous’, in Walter A. Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, p. 952.

[12] ‘Sin’s Deadly Wages’, Our Daily Bread, Saturday, December 28, 1996. Also available as Richard W. De Haan, ‘Sin’s Deadly Wages’, Sermonettes, available at: http://www.nccg.org/Sermonette-16.html [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[13] Earle E. Cairns 1954, 1981, Christianity through the Centuries (rev. & enl.), Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, p. 146.

[14] Confessions of Saint Augustine, 1.1 (I have modernised the language), available at: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/augustine/confessions.iv.html [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[15] Some of the following information is summarised and changed, but based on Pastor John Piper, May 18, 1997, Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota, “What is Baptism and Does It Save? 1 Peter 3:18-22,”, available at: http://www.soundofgrace.com/piper97/5-18-97.htm [Accessed 23 January 2010].

[16] R. C. Sproul 1992, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith, Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois, p. 173.

[17] Simon J. Kistemaker 1987, New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Epistles of Peter and of the Epistle of Jude, Evangelical Press, Welwyn, Hertfordshire, p. 139.

[18] Ibid., p. 139.

[19] Thayer, p. 544, cited in Kistemaker, p. 139.

[20] The original said, “a”.

[21] Charles R. Swindoll 1998, Swindoll’s Ultimate Book of Illustrations & Quotes, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, p. 315.

 

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 9 October 2015.

 

What a combination! Easter eggs and crucifixion

Easter Calvary

By Spencer D Gear

Easter is the time for Easter eggs but it has other ingredients that make it an attractive season. Of course, there’s the long weekend, plenty of sport on television and the opportunity for gorging lots of chocolate. Talk about options!

At Easter, according to The Age (13 November 2008) newspaper, “Australians will munch their way through about 200 million Easter eggs. We hold the title of being the highest per capita consumers of chocolate Easter goods in the world”.

In the UK around £200 million pounds is spent on 80 million Easter eggs every year. What about Australia? According to the Brisbane Courier-Mail of 15 March 2011, “Research conducted for the CMA [Confectionery Manufacturers’ Association] has found $230 million is spent annually in Australia and New Zealand on Easter sweets”. The Courier-Mail found that in 2011, Easter egg prices soared by 20%.

But why are there special eggs at Easter? Eggs symbolise new life and fertility. This religious festival comes with little to frighten anyone in this era of religious extremism. Who could ever be offended by a cute chocolate bunny?

But there’s a paradox here. Have you thought how strange it is that Easter eggs are identified with one of the most horrific ways of killing a person? This is the time of remembering the most famous death by crucifixion in history – Jesus Christ.

To be crucified for crime, the victim was lying on the cross on the ground and held down. He was nailed on that cross with crude, rough nails.

Then he was lifted up on the cross and it was dropped into a hole in the ground. He experienced unimaginable thirst and found it difficult to breathe.

Medical doctor, C. Truman Davis MD,[1] explained that as fatigue came to the arms and cramps to the muscles, the victim experienced deep throbbing pain.

There were hours of pain, cramps, and partial suffocation as tissue was torn from the person’s lacerated back as it moved up and down on the rough timber. This trauma impacted the chest and began to compress the heart.

To make it worse, the crowds would mock the victim.

But how does our culture remember Christ’s crucifixion at Easter? With eggs and jewellery. It’s almost impossible to walk down the street without seeing a version of the cross. Generally it’s on a chain around somebody’s neck or as ear rings. This is a far cry from the actual Easter event.

Malcolm Muggeridge,[2] the famous British media personality, soldier-spy and later Christian convert, called this death the most famous one in history. He said that no other death than Christ’s has aroused one-hundredth part of the interest or been remembered with one-hundredth part of the intensity of concern.

We are continuously confronted with troubles. Troubles in war, families and even in our own souls.

Into the midst of this repulsion in our world, at Easter we remember the Jesus of the cross who died for our sins and was resurrected. Why? So that we can have the opportunity to be set free from the guilt of our souls.

At Easter we remember that there can be new life in Christ. Hence the association with eggs!

Louis M. Lepeaux,[3] French philosopher, politician and bitter opponent of Christ at the time of the French Revolution, once started a religion that he hoped would be superior to Christianity. He sought the counsel of the great French diplomat and statesman, Charles Maurice Talleyrand.

Talleyrand’s advice was perceptive: “I recommend that you get yourself crucified and then die, but be sure to rise again on the third day.”

Why should you bother to embrace the Christian message this Easter?

The Christ of the cross changed the agnostic, Malcolm Muggeridge, into an active Christian who published Jesus Rediscovered.[4] Millions of people have made the same life-changing commitment and discovered the joy that Muggeridge found.

This is what we remember at Easter. He is the Jesus who died, was resurrected and changes people’s lives.

Endnotes:

[1] C. Truman Davis MD, “A physician examines the crucifixion,” available from: http://www.thecross-photo.com/Dr_C._Truman_Davis_Analyzes_the_Crucifixion.htm [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[2] Seeing through the eye: Malcolm Muggeridge on faith, available from Google Books [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[3] The story is told in Rt. Rev. John Paterson, Bishop of Auckland, Sunday 14th May, 2006, “150th anniversary of Devonport Parish,” available from: http://www.holytrinity.gen.nz/Pages/sermons/150sesquicelebrate.htm [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[4] Available online at: http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/mugridge/jred/jredcont.htm [Accessed 2 January 2010].

 

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 13 October 2015.

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Whytehouse designs

Torn between life and death

By Spencer D Gear

Why is it that many of us will do many things to live longer but others want to end life now?

We go on diets to reduce the strain on our hearts and the cholesterol from the fatty foods that we eat.

A recent study in the USA found that if people want to be healthy and live longer, they should consume less red and processed meat.[1]

The research of half a million American middle-aged and elderly people who consumed four ounces of red meat a day (an amount equivalent to a small hamburger), found that there was a 30% higher chance that they would die in the next 10 years.

Most of these would die of heart disease and cancer. The risk was increased through eating sausage, cold meats and other processed meats.

But this desire to try to avoid death, is also seen in some treatments of cancer. In spite of severe side effects of chemotherapy, such as fever, chills & sweats, abnormal bleeding, severe vomiting, constipation, diarrhoea and abdominal pain, patients want to live longer to spend more time with their relatives and friends.

Why is it that we have this love of life and need to prolong the date of death? Could it be connected with our culture’s deep fear of death?

“I want to be with my loved ones who have gone before, but I’m not sure about that,” are among the comments I hear.

For others, life has become a burden and ending life sooner than later sounds like a good release. The euthanasia movement in Australia, Europe and the USA is pushing this line. “To die with dignity” sounds like a reasonable and responsible way of thinking until one sees how euthanasia is happening in countries such as Holland.

The recent series of articles in The Times (UK) demonstrates this continuing push for euthanasia and assisted suicide.[2] The Dutch experience shows that this push will not be limited to the terminally ill. After a three year inquiry, the Dutch Medical Association (as reported in the British Medical Journal) wants more freedom to kill. The report stated that “doctors can help patients who ask for help to die even though they may not be ill but ‘suffering through living.'”[3]

Some experience this ambivalence: Extend life as much as possible but end life if it becomes unbearable.

This is where the Easter message of the resurrected Christ has particular application. We do not have to guess about what happens at death. Here there is an opportunity of knowing why life must end and what lies beyond the grave. The physical resurrection of all human beings after death is firmly grounded in Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, which we celebrate on Easter Sunday.

Jesus Christ himself affirms this. After raising a man from the dead, he said, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”[4]

He demonstrated the reality of this through his own resurrection from the dead, which was a turning point in human history.

Because of Christ’s physical resurrection from the dead, there is a solid biblical, theological and historical basis for the belief that the souls of both believers and unbelievers survive death and will be raised again.

There is no reason for the believers in Christ to fear death as they are eternally redeemed. Are those who push for euthanasia certain of the destiny of those for whom they push for “death with dignity”?

Endnotes:

[1] Rob Stein, The Washington Post, 24 March 2009, “Daily red meat raises chances of dying early,” available from: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/23/AR2009032301626.html [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[2] A. C. Grayling, The Times (UK), 31 March 2009, “Allowing people to arrange their death is a simple act of kindness”, available from: Timesonline at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article6005023.ece [Accessed 2 January 2010]. See other euthanasia & assisted suicide stories linked to this article.

[3] Tony Sheldon, British Medical Journal News roundup, Extract, 18 January 2005, “Dutch euthanasia law should apply to patients ‘suffering through living’ report says,” available from: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/330/7482/61 [Accessed 2 January 2010]. Sheldon’s full article may be viewed at: http://www.lists.opn.org/pipermail/right-to-die_lists.opn.org/2005-January/000555.html [2 January 2010]. I was alerted to this information by Weblog: Christianity Today, “Dutch doctors want to kill the healthy,” 13 March 2006, available from: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/januaryweb-only/51.0.html [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[4] John 11:25-26.

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 29 October 2016.

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Easter: Fact or fiction?

happy Easter bunny

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By Spencer D Gear

Australia has horrific levels of domestic violence. Surveys of women attending general medical practice in Australia reveal varying partner abuse rates of 8.0% (1999) and 28% (1996) in a 12-month period.[1] One study of police figures revealed that women are over eight times more likely to be victims than males.[2]

Family breakdown seems to be happening in epidemic proportions. Other personal and social ills are devastating our land – sexual abuse, drug and alcohol addiction. These are symptoms of what the first Easter events came to help to address.

Do any of these natural and social disasters have anything to do with the Christ of Easter? What’s the purpose of Easter beyond a 4-day holiday?

Today there are some spicy and conflicting statements made about the reality or myth of the Christian story of Christ’s death and resurrection. Did it happen or is this a Christian invention?

There are doubters galore both inside and outside of the church. They range from an agnostic’s letter to The Fraser Coast Chronicle,[3] which stated, “Whether Christ existed is open to conjecture. Was he the son of God? What God?” to John Cornwell in The Weekend Australian Magazine, “Did Jesus really rise from the dead?”[4](Easter 2005).

His conclusion was that “however compelling the story, however authentic the feel of the evidence, in the final analysis it comes down to a decision to believe or not to believe.”[5] The “feel” of the evidence is radically different from actual evidence. Having faith in the “feel” sounds a bit out in space to me.

Former Anglican bishop of North Sydney, classical historian, and now visiting fellow in ancient history at Macquarie University, Sydney, Dr. Paul Barnett, has examined the evidence carefully over a lifetime of research. He has concluded that “Jesus of Nazareth, the historical Jesus, became through death, bodily resurrection and ascension the Christ of faith.”[6]

This led to the spread of Christianity worldwide, he says: “Jesus the Christ, crucified but risen and glorified, is the engine that drove the missionaries who established churches in Palestine, Syria, Asia Minor and Greece, who in providing for the needs of those churches wrote the documents that came to constitute the New Testament.”[7]

Barnett elsewhere shows how the history of early Christianity and secular history intersect, proving that “the history of early Christianity is, indeed, genuinely historical and not ‘mythical’ in character.”[8]

Apparitions of risen Jesus: Crossan

Yet, John Dominic Crossan of the Jesus Seminar (now, there’s a group of doubters!), speaks of “the apparitions of the risen Jesus.” An apparition is a phantom, a ghost. Jesus’ resurrected body was not real flesh according to him but “the resurrection is a matter of Christian faith.”[9] So, in Crossan’s view, the resurrection of Christ was really a spiritual resurrection among believers – whatever that means!

What actually happened to the body of Jesus and does it matter? Crossan wrote that “Jesus’ burial by his friends was totally fictional and unhistorical. He was buried, if buried at all, by his enemies, and the necessarily shallow grave would have been easy prey for scavenging animals.”[10]

New Testament scholar, Dr. N.T. Wright, disagrees, has debated Crossan, and in 2003 completed an 817-page defence of the authenticity of Christ’s resurrection. He considers that discussion about the resurrection must be seen “as a historical problem.”[11]

Why is there such resistance by both unbelievers and some people in the church to the Easter faith of Christians? Wright believes the underlying cause in the contemporary and ancient world is in what T. F. Torrance regards as “the sheer horror that some people have for the being and action of God himself in space and time.”[12] People are God haters or evaders.

Richard Ostling of Associated Press regards Wright’s work as “the most monumental defense of the Easter heritage in decades. It marches through a clearly organized case that confronts every major doubt about Easter, ancient and modern.”[13]

As for the recent claims in James Cameron’s TV documentary, “The Lost Tomb of Jesus,” that the bones of Jesus are in the ossuary, the archaeologist who found the tomb said that Cameron’s interpretation was “nonsense.”

Israeli archaeologist, Amos Kloner, who was one of the first to examine the tomb when it was discovered near Jerusalem in 1980, claims that the names on the side of the coffin were common in the first century. He told BBC News, “I don’t accept the news that it was used by Jesus or his family. The documentary filmmakers are using it to sell their film.”[14]

Kloner told the Jerusalem Post that “it makes a great story for a TV film. But it’s completely impossible. It’s nonsense. There is no likelihood that Jesus and his relatives had a family tomb. They were a Galilee family with no ties in Jerusalem. The Talpiot tomb belonged to a middle class family from the 1st century CE.”[15]

Why all the fuss? Does it matter? If Christ were mere fiction and the Christians throughout the last 2,000 years have based their faith on such a myth, all Christians had better leave the churches and give up on their faith. They are on a foundation of belief that is no more substantial than belief in Mickey Mouse.

No resurrection, no fuss?

In fact, if Christ’s resurrection did not take place, the apostle Paul told the Corinthian church that “your faith is futile and you are still in your sins.” They might as well eat, drink and be merry if Christ’s death and resurrection did not happen in real time and history.

But the apostle Paul was confident: “Christ has been raised from the dead.” This was not some ethereal, mystical event. The physical resurrection of Jesus was proven by an empty tomb and Jesus’ appearing to the 12 apostles and over 500 believers at one time.

It is further demonstrated by the explosive spread of Christianity across the first century Roman Empire and then around the world. Today there are about 6 billion people in the world made up of 24,000 different people groups.

Christianity Now and Then

The United States Center for World Mission estimates that there are 800 million people “who have been born again into a relationship with Jesus Christ.” Another 1.37 billion consider themselves Christian because they come from a Christian culture.[16]

In A.D. 100, it was estimated that only one in every 360 people was an active Christian believer. In the year 2000, it was 1 in 9.3. Because of the propagation of a myth? Hardly![17]

It’s not just the presence of Christians around the world that makes a difference in addressing some of the social and welfare needs (see Matthew ch. 25), but the truth that the living Christ changes people. Slave owners such as John Newton (author of “Amazing Grace”?) were changed from the inside out. Lawyer, Watergate hatchet-man and criminal, Chuck Colson, has been so revolutionised by the living Christ that he and his team have a world-wide ministry to prisoners.

Imagine what would happen to the epidemic of family violence and drug and alcohol abuse, if the living Jesus were taken seriously all year round by the majority of us!

Louis M. Lepeaux, French politician and bitter opponent of Christ at the time of the French Revolution, once started a religion that he hoped would improve on Christianity. He discussed the dismal situation with his friend, Talleyrand. “There is one plan you might like to try,” said his friend. “Why not be crucified and then rise again on the third day?”[18]

For a challenge to the resurrection of Jesus Christ, see the ““William Lane Craig and Bart Ehrman debate: Is there historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus?””

Endnotes:

[1] Kelsey Hegarty, Elizabeth D Hindmarsh and Marisa T Gille 2000, “Domestic violence in Australia: definition, prevalence and nature of presentation in clinical practice,” Medical Journal of Australia, 173, pp. 363-367, available from: http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/173_07_021000/hegarty/hegarty.html#refbody12[Accessed 31 March 2007]..

[2] Cited in ibid.

[3] John A. Neve 2007, “Search for Salvation”, Letters to the Editor, The Fraser Coast Chronicle, March 28, p. 6.

[4] John Cornwell 2005, “Did Jesus Really Rise from the Dead? The Case of the Empty Tomb,” The Weekend Australian Magazine, March 26-27, pp. 24-32.

[5] Ibid., p. 32.

[6] Paul Barnett 1999, Jesus & the Rise of Early Christianity, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove Illinois, p.41, p. 20.

[7] Ibid., p. 418.

[8] Paul W. Barnett 1997, Jesus and the Logic of History, Apollos, Leicester, England, p. 120.

[9] John Dominic Crossan 1995, Who Killed Jesus? HarperSanFrancisco, San Francisco, p. 189.

[10] John Dominic Crossan 1994, Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography, HarperSanFrancisco, San Francisco, p. 160.

[11] N. T. Wright 2003, The Resurrection of the Son of God, Fortress Press, Minneapolis, p. 14.

[12] Ibid, p. 736.

[13] In Wright, 2003, introduction; also available from Richard N. Ostling, Book Review, Associated Press, Courier Post Online, Saturday, 19 April 2003, at: http://www.christendom-awake.org/pages/resurrection/wright_resurrection.htm [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[14] “Jesus tomb found, says film-maker,” BBC News, 26 February 2007, available from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6397373.stm [Accessed 31 March 2007].

[15] David Horovitz 2007, “Kloner: A Great Story but Nonsense,” The Jerusalem Post, 27 February, Available at: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1171894527185&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[16] Ralph D. Winter, et. al. n.d. (ca. A.D. 2000), “The Amazing Countdown Facts,” United States Center for World Mission, [Accessed 2 January 2010].

[17] Ibid.

[18] Cited in David Holloway 1999, “The Good News at Athens: Acts 27,” a sermon preached at Jesmond Parish Church, 28 March 1999, available at: http://www.church.org.uk/resources/sermondetailpf.asp?serId=341 [Accessed 2 January 2010].

 

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 13 October 2015.

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Easter and the healthy committing suicide

By Spencer D Gear

At Easter seasons, we are faced with a situation where the eternal consequences of death are ignored and the promotion of suicide is glorified. Those of us who have spent years trying to prevent suicide receive a lethal message from this Swiss lawyer.

Here’s the situation. There should be virtually no restrictions on helping people to commit suicide. These are the comments from human rights lawyer, Ludwig Minelli, from the Dignatas Swiss clinic that offers help to people to kill themselves. That is what Minelli told BBC radio in the UK on 2 April 2009. This article stated:

The founder of Swiss right-to-die organisation Dignitas has defended helping Britons, including some psychiatric patients, kill themselves.

Ludwig Minelli told the BBC suicide was a “marvellous possibility” and he wants the assisted suicide law clarified for the healthy partners of dying people.

Former Labour Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt said his comments showed the need for a change in UK laws.

More than 100 Britons, mostly terminally ill, have died at Dignitas.

In his first broadcast interview for five years, Mr Minelli told BBC Radio 4’s The Report that failed suicide attempts created problems and heavy costs for the UK’s National Health Service.

He said: “I have a totally different attitude to suicide. I say suicide is a marvellous marvellous possibility given to a human being.”

This controversial comment has come from the organisation that runs a clinic in Switzerland that has assisted almost 900 people to kill themselves, about 100 of them being British. Fortunately, Swiss psychiatrists are not recommending this clinic.

The British newspaper, The Guardian (4 April 2009), reported that Minelli saw assisted suicide as “a very good possibility to escape a situation you can’t alter.” But he went way beyond this recommendation to cold-heartedly suggest that attempted suicide makes good business sense because of its burden on the costs of health care.

“For 50 suicide attempts you have one suicide and the others are failing with heavy costs on the National Health Service,” he told the BBC. “They are terribly hurt afterwards. Sometimes you have to put them in institutions for 50 years, very costly.”

For those of us who have spent many years counselling those who are troubled by the issues of life and the family, Minelli’s kind of comment is like a kick in the guts. This lawyer is advocating that attempted suicide is such a financial burden on the health system that these people should be done away with.

Ultimately, what’s the difference in consequences between the ethics of Minelli and Hitler?

For my exposition on the deleterious consequences of euthanasia, see: “Voluntary Active Euthanasia – a compassionate solution to those in pain?”

Dignatas and the euthanasia advocates in Holland are demonstrating the slippery slope that happens when those who begin with the desire to assist suicide of the terminally ill, ends up advocating much more.

Herbert Hendin MD, Professor of Psychiatry at New York Medical College, and medical director of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, stated in 1995: “Over the past two decades, the Netherlands has moved from assisted suicide to euthanasia, from euthanasia for the terminally ill to euthanasia for the chronically ill, from euthanasia for physical illness to euthanasia for psychological distress and from voluntary euthanasia to nonvoluntary and involuntary euthanasia.”[1]

See also Herbert Hendin MD, The Case Against Physician-Assisted Suicide: For the Right to End-of-Life Care (Psychiatric Times, February 01, 2004).

At this Easter season we need to consider another dimension. Among the advocates of assisted suicide and euthanasia, an important factor seems to be overlooked.

What happens one second after you die? Where will you be? Is death the very end and the body and soul are obliterated? Talk of heaven or hell seems to be missing from this lethal advocacy for assisted suicide.

Worldviews have consequences. Worldviews of death need to be opposed by those who believe in eternal life and eternal punishment. Death does not end it all and Christ’s resurrection demonstrated this: “If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins” (First Corinthians chapter 15).

Endnotes:

[1] “Argument: Euthanasia creates a slippery slope to legal murder,” Available at: http://wiki.idebate.org/en/index.php/Argument:_Euthanasia_creates_a_slippery_slope_to_legal_murder [Accessed 2 January 2010].

 

Copyright (c) 2010 Spencer D. Gear.  This document last updated at date: 9 October 2015.

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Christmas, Torture and Church Growth

The Christian Martyrs’ Last Prayer, by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1883) [courtesy Wikipedia]

By Spencer D Gear

To serve Jesus Christ openly in your community today in the Western world may come with flack, resistance and even discrimination in the workplace. But it is not a patch on what is happening worldwide to the Christians who are being tortured, even murdered, for their faith.

Why is it that followers of Messiah, the “Prince of Peace,” attract so much resistance? Jesus gave a clue when he addressed his disciples: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid” (John 14:27).

Christian peace is based on a relationship with the King of Kings and is not related to external circumstances. Then add the fact that to be a Christian means submission to the Master’s will. This is not a popular notion. Nor is it politically correct.

As we move into a new year, it is right that we reflect on what is happening to persecuted Christians worldwide.

Ma Yuqin is a Chinese woman who was interrogated by the Chinese police but she would not be tortured to confess. “She never broke when she was tortured with beatings and electrical shocks. Even when she was close to death, she refused to disclose the names of members of her congregation or sign a statement renouncing her Christian faith,” wrote Nicholas Kristof in his column in The New York Times.[1]

The physical torture almost killed her but it was the mental anguish that was worse. She could hear the sounds of her son being tortured in the room next door. Both could hear each other’s screams. There were incentives for them to betray their friends and their faith. “It broke my heart to hear my son’s cries,” said Ma, but it did not break her faith in Christ.

Chinese citizens are burned with cigarettes, beaten with clubs, and some lose their lives. Why? They are Christian worshippers of God.

Instead of turning people away from Christianity, the result has been the growth of the church. Tens of millions of Chinese have embraced Christ and the church. It is just as predicted by church leader of the second century, Tertullian, “Nor does your cruelty, however exquisite, avail you; it is rather a temptation to us. The oftener we are mown down by you, the more in number we grow; the blood of Christians is seed.“[2]

The Christian organisation, Open Doors, that ministers to the persecuted, assesses the level of persecution of Christians around the world. Top of the list is North Korea. Keston Institute, a British-based human rights group, says that people found with a Bible in North Korea are “detained, tortured, sent to a re-education camp, or summarily executed.”[3] Number two on the list is Saudi Arabia where arrests, torture, and prison are common. To convert from Islam to another religion in Saudi can bring the death penalty.

Numbers three and four on the list of persecutors are the Marxist countries of Laos and Vietnam. The Keston Institute was watching Russia, Belarus and Uzbekistan with concern.

People today are cynical about zealots who die for their faith. However, these persecuted Christians are not dying to kill the unbelievers, as with suicide bombers, but die in service of “the Prince of Peace,” Jesus Christ. These martyrs die not to slaughter others, but so that others might be saved.

The sufferings of the church in China and the Sudan rival that of those who died under Nero in Rome, in Hitler’s Germany, and in Russia under Stalin. Missions’ strategist, David Barrett, estimates that there have been as many Christian martyrs in the 20th century as in all of the previous 19 centuries combined. This article was more sceptical. It stated:

World Christian Encyclopedia, produced by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary outside Boston declares there have been some 70 million Christian martyrs in history, and more than 45 million in the 20th century. In evangelical circles one often hears the claim that there were more Christian martyrs in the 20th century than in all previous centuries combined.[4]

How should we respond? As we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, who died to save us, we should pray for Ma Yuqin in China and the many others worldwide who are suffering for their faith. The Scriptures exhort us: “Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body” (Hebrews 13:3).

Notes:

[1] “God and China,” 26 November 2002, available at: http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/26/opinion/god-and-china.html?pagewanted=1 [Accessed 1 January 2010].

[2] Tertullian, Apologeticus (or Apologeticum) Adversus Gentes Pro Christianis, Chapter 50, available at: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf03.iv.iii.l.html [Accessed 1 January 2010].

[3]Charles Colson, Breakpoint, 8 November 2002, “Remembering the Mistreated: Prayer for Persecuted Beliebvers,” available at: http://www.thechristiannews.com/breakpoint/bp11-8-02.html [Accessed 1 January 2010].

[4] Jason Myassee, Christian Century 29 July 2008, “How martyrs are made: Stories of the faithful,” available at: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1058/is_15_125/ai_n27982019/ [Accessed 1 January 2010].

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 13 October 2015.

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The solar eclipse & the baby in the manger[1]


solar eclipse (Wikipedia)

By Spencer D Gear

On Wednesday, 4th December 2002, a total eclipse of the sun was visible from within a narrow corridor across the Southern Hemisphere. The path of the moon’s shadow began in the South Atlantic ocean and crossed southern Africa. After moving across the southern Indian Ocean, the path sweeps through southern Australia where the eclipse ended at sunset.[2]

A shadow passed over the South Australian town of Ceduna[3] and other parts of inland Australia. For just 31 seconds, the sun’s raw glare disappeared for 31 seconds. The cause was the moon as it passed between the sun and earth. It was a total solar eclipse.[4]

The next solar eclipse to be viewed over Australia will be on November 13, 2012, viewed from Darwin and Cairns.[5]

The first Christmas day just over 2002 years ago and the total eclipse have a remarkable connection. You read correctly!

The Lord Jesus Christ, the beloved Son of God, created all things “in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (The Bible’s Book of Colossians 1:16-17).

Jesus Christ’s involvement with the remarkable events of a total eclipse came about because that first Christmas day was not the first day that Jesus existed. The Person in the manger has always existed. All things today “hold together” in the universe because of Christ’s sustaining power.

Christ is not a part of creation. He is not a created being. He is the Creator and Sustainer of all things in the universe.

The Bible’s Book of Hebrews 1:2 speaks of Jesus, the Son, “through whom he made the universe.”

Think of what this means. The baby in the manger is the one who created this immense universe with the ability for a solar eclipse.

Think with me on the enormity of the universe. It causes me to bow before the living Lord, the truly a majestic, all-powerful God.

It has been explained this way: A hollow ball the size of our sun would, for example, hold 1,200,000 planets the size of the earth–with room for 4,300,000 more

globes the size of our moon! The nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is five times larger than the sun. One of the stars visible in the constellation Orion is Betelguese. It is 248 times larger than the sun. Arcturus is ten times larger than that!

No wonder Job expressed his awe of God this way: ‘How should man be just with God? If he will contend with him . . . which maketh Arcturus, Orion, and Pleiades’ (Job 9:1-2, 9, King James Version).

A ray of light travels at approximately 300,000 km per second, so a beam of light from earth will reach the moon in a second and a half. Mercury could be reached in 4.5 minutes. It would take about 35 minutes to reach Jupiter, about an hour to get to Saturn, but it would take 4 years and 4 months to get to the nearest star.

For light to travel only to the edge of the galaxy, the Milky Way, would take about 100,000 years. Count the stars as you travel and you would find about a hundred billion in the Milky Way alone. If you wanted to explore other galaxies, you would have literally billions to choose from. The size of the universe is incomprehensible.[6]

Who made all of this? Scientists want us to believe it came about by a naturalistic Big Bang explosion that eventually formed a primordial swamp, etc.

This doesn’t explain it satisfactorily to me. God created it. Every last corner of it. Who? The One who became the baby in Bethlehem. He made everything.

More than that. The Bible’s Book of Hebrews 1: 3 confirms that He is “sustaining all things by his powerful word.”

Without the real God-man, Jesus, this whole world would fall apart. The solar eclipse would not be possible. He is actively involved in sustaining this world. Your next breath cannot be guaranteed without the sustaining power of Jesus.

Yet, how do we treat Him? With a tip of the hat at Christmas time, maybe! But really, Santa, reindeer, snow, tinsel and materialistic things take pride of place. The Saviour, Creator and Sustainer of the universe, Jesus himself, is an embarrassment to a world that needs a reason for a public holiday.

This solar eclipse should be enough to bring us to our senses at this Christmas season. The baby in the manger is God in human flesh.

What child is this? This has been poignantly expressed by the poet:

Some say He was just a good teacher,

but good teachers don’t claim to be God.

Some say He was merely a good example,

but good examples don’t mingle with prostitutes and sinners.

Some say He was a madman,

but madmen don’t speak the way He spoke.

Some say He was a crazed fanatic,

but crazed fanatics don’t draw children to themselves or attract men of intellect like Paul or Luke to be their followers.

Some say He was a religious phoney,

but phonies don’t rise from the dead.

Some say He was a phantom,

but phantoms can’t give their flesh and blood to be crucified.

Some say He was only a myth,

but myths don’t set the calendar for history.”[7]

This Jesus of eternity, Bethlehem and the cross of Golgotha has been called: the ideal man, an example of religion, the foremost pattern of virtue, the greatest of all men, the finest teacher who ever lived.

These descriptions give some idea of his character, but they don’t approach the full truth. I think the apostle Thomas stated it beautifully when he saw Jesus after the resurrection and exclaimed the truth: “My Lord and My God” (John 20:28).

Notes

[1] This was a Christmas devotional that I, Spencer Gear, presented to the Bundaberg Ministers’ Association (Bundaberg, Qld., Australia) for its December 2002 meeting.

[2] NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, “Eclipse Home Page: Total Solar Eclipse of 2002 December 04”, available at:: http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEmono/TSE2002/TSE2002.html [Accessed 1 January 2010].

[3] See the “Ceduna Total Eclipse Report” [Accessed 1 January 2010].

[4] “Total solar eclipse 2002: Eclipse science,” http://www.csiro.au/helix/eclipse/solar/index.html [Accessed 4 December 2002]. However, on 1 January 2010 this URL was not available.

[5] Ibid., also http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEpath/SEpath2001/SE2012Nov13T.html. [Accessed 4 December 2002]. However, on 1 January 2010 this URL was not available.

[6]John F. MacArthur Jr. 1989, God with Us: The Miracle of Christmas. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Books, p. 93.

[7]Ibid.,, p. 83.

 

Copyright © 2010 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 13 October 2015.

Baptism and Salvation: I Peter 3:21

(public domain)

By Spencer D Gear

Does baptism save?

It seems as though this issue is clear – people need to be baptised to receive salvation. The Scriptures state that: “Baptism that now saves you” (I Peter 3:21) and Jesus is alleged to have stated, “”Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved” (Mark 16:16).

This sounds clear enough, doesn’t it? In fact, I was interacting with Jeremy on a theological bulletin board. He stated: “Recent theology cannot make the truth of 1 Peter 3:21 go away — Baptism now saves you. This is a great and precious promise. Christians throughout all ages have found great comfort in that fact that their salvation did not rest on them, but on God who had chosen them through baptism. I do believe in baptismal regeneration and in infant baptism.”[1]

Baptismal regeneration is the theology that states: “Baptism is necessary for salvation.” This view is supported by “Roman Catholic teaching. . . Although there are different nuances in their teaching, such a position is held by many Episcopalians, many Lutherans, and by the Churches of Christ” (Grudem 1999, n10, p. 384).

Does 1 Peter 3:21 teach baptism as a necessity for salvation, i.e. baptismal regeneration? Let’s take a read:

I Peter 3:21 states: “And this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also–not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge[2] of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (NIV).

The ESV reads: “Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”

Mark 16:16 states, as the words of Jesus, “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” (NIV).

Let me say up front that I Peter 3:21 is a difficult verse to interpret because:

  • It is a challenge to know exactly what Peter is saying in connecting “save” with the waters of Noah’s flood;
  • Elsewhere in the Scripture we know that salvation is by faith alone through Christ alone (see below);
  • In other places, the Bible teaches salvation and repentance prior to baptism;
  • Some verses used to support baptismal regeneration have better explanations.

Mark 16:16 does not teach baptismal regeneration

This verse is fairly easily dealt with on two counts:

1. Mark 16:9-20, the long ending of Mark, is not included in the earliest manuscripts of the New Testament, so I am confident in not including it as part of the canon of Scripture. Mark 16:16 was a teaching that crept into the early church, but it is not original to Mark. See the explanations by Bruce Metzger (1964/1968/1992, pp. 227-228) and Walter W. Wessel (1984, pp. 792-793) in Appendix I.

2. Mark 16:16 states that “Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” There is nothing in this statement about those who believe and are not baptised. In fact, we know that Jesus said to the dying thief on the cross, who did not have an opportunity to be baptised: “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise” (Luke 23:43). “It is simply absence of belief, not of baptism, which is correlated with condemnation” (Erickson 1985, p. 1098). Grudem (1999) contends that

it is doubtful whether this verse [Mark 16:16] should be used in support of a theological position at all, since there are many manuscripts that do not have this verse (or Mark 16:9-20), and it seems most likely that this verse was not in the gospel as Mark originally wrote it (n11, p. 384).

We also know that a Christian’s justification by faith, when he/she is declared righteous before God, happens at the point of faith in Christ and not at the time of baptism (see Rom. 3:20, 26, 28; 5:1; 8:30; 10:4, 10; Gal. 2:16; 3:24).

We’ll get to 1 Peter 3:21 shortly, but it is important to note that

The Bible teaches belief BEFORE baptism

We see belief or trust in Christ prior to baptism in passages such as the following:

1. Those who were baptised must be able to be discipled and taught to be obedient to Christ’s commands (Matt. 28:19-20).

2. One of the most profound examples is the thief on the cross. In Luke 23:42-43 we read of the thief asking Jesus, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus’ response was: “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise.” Obviously baptism was not compulsory for a person to enter into heaven.

3. Acts 2:38 gives the apostolic command: “Peter replied, ‘Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.'”

4. Acts 2:41 affirms that belief precedes baptism: “Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.”

5. In Acts 10:47-48, those who were baptised were those who had “received the Holy Spirit just as we have.” This is hardly the language to support baptism for a an infant. It is the language of believers’ baptism.

Old Testament believers were saved without being baptised. Therefore, we should expect that salvation, without baptism, is seen in the New Testament.

Church historian, Earle E. Cairns, stated that for the early church, baptism was “an act of initiation into the Christian church [and] was usually performed at Easter or Pentecost . . . Baptism was normally by immersion; on occasion affusion, or pouring, was practiced. [There was the debate over] infant baptism which Tertullian opposed and Cyprian supported . . .” (Cairns 1954/1981, p. 119).

It was Martin Luther who rediscovered that “the just shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:17 KJV) or, “The righteous will live by faith” (NIV), which is a quote from Hab. 2:4. This is affirmed by Rom. 4:4-5; Titus 3:5-7 and Acts 16:31. The Scriptures do not support the view that the just shall live by faith and baptism. It could not be stated any cleared in Eph. 2:8-9, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith–and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God–not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Household baptisms

Sometimes the view is given that “I Corinthians 1: 16; Acts 11: 14, 16: 15, 33, 18: 8; these passages all refer to households being baptized. What an opponent of infant baptism must do is explain how they arrive at the conclusion that there were no infants or young children in these households. If infants were not intended to be baptized they would be excluded in the text, but we have no reason to believe that they are. In short there is nothing to exclude infants from baptism in the Bible.” This was Andy’s view when I interacted with him on the bulletin board.[3]

Let’s examine these examples provided by Andy.

1. “Household” baptism that was used by him to support infant baptism – 1 Cor. 1:16, which reads, “I did baptize also the household of Stephanas.” If we read that verse alone we could be led to think that this included infants and those who had not believed and these people could be members of households.

However, this is clarified in 1 Cor. 16:15 where we read that “the household of Stephanas were the first converts in Achaia, and that they have devoted themselves to the service of the saints.” This verse clearly supports the opposite of infant baptism. They were Christian converts when they were baptised. They were not infants who were incapable of believing. They were converts to the Christian faith. Faith precedes baptism.

3. Acts 11:14 reads: “He [Peter] will bring you a message through which you and all

your household will be saved.” This is very clear. The “message” will be brought through which the “household will be saved.” The baptism referred to is not water baptism but the baptism in the Holy Spirit (11:16).

4. Acts 16:15 records what happened with Lydia who was “a worshiper of God” and “the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul” (16:14). Chapter 16:15 records, “When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. ‘If you consider me a believer in the Lord,’ she said, ‘come and stay at my house.’ And she persuaded us.”

It is clear here that Lydia was a believer (“the Lord opened her heart”) when she was baptised as she affirms, “if you consider me a believer in the Lord.” It is not stated directly here that the “household” believed, but the precedent is set elsewhere in the Scripture that “households” that were baptised had previously believed. This is also consistent with the New Testament principle that faith alone in Christ alone is what brings eternal salvation.

5. In Acts 18:8, we have another example of “household” baptism. This verse states that “Crispus, the synagogue ruler, and his entire household believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptized.” Again, baptism happens after belief in the Lord is experienced and this applies to believing “households.” Therefore, infant belief is not possible.

First Peter 3:21

This verse states, “And this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also–not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge[4] of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ” (NIV).

Let me state upfront that this is a most difficult verse to interpret because of the analogy of Scripture which refutes what this verse seems to be saying on the surface, “baptism that now saves you also.” This is especially in light of Colossians 2:12, “. . . having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.” The key is “your faith in the power of God” and not through faith in water baptism. That’s what makes interpretation of 1 Peter 3:21 a challenging task.

Remember Andy’s words to me? “Baptism now saves you. This is a great and precious promise” and that Christians through the centuries have been comforted by the “God who had chosen them through baptism. I do believe in baptismal regeneration and in infant baptism.”[5]

What are the issues from this verse that seem, on the surface, to teach that “baptism now saves you”?

1. What is the context?

In vv. 18-19, the context is the death of Christ for sins, the “righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God” (v. 19), the resurrection (“made alive by the Spirit”, v. 18), and Noah, the ark, and eight people being saved through the flood (v. 20).

It is this flood that is used in some association with baptism.

2. What does it means that “water symbolizes baptism”?

The word translated, “symbolizes,” in the NIV is the Greek, antitypos. “Baptism is an antitype . . . or counterpart of the type” (Blum 1981, p. 242). There is some kind of resemblance between the waters of the flood and baptism What is it? Baptism is a copy, representation or fulfilment of the Old Testament judgment that happened through the great flood.

The text allows for a resemblance between the flood and baptism. That is, as the flood waters cleansed the earth of man’s wickedness, so the water of baptism indicates man’s cleansing from sin. As the flood separated Noah and his family from the wicked world of their day, so baptism separates believers from the evil world of our day. Baptism, then, is the counterpart of the flood (Kistemaker 1987, p. 147).

3. In what sense can baptism be understood as that which “saves you”?

Does baptism bring salvation to the person baptised? In what sense can “save” be used here? We know from both Old and New Testaments that sins can be washed away.

  • · Psalm 51:2, ” Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.”
  • Ezekiel 36:25, “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols.”
  • Ananias told the apostle Paul to “get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name” (Acts 22:16).
  • Titus 3:5, “He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.”

How can baptism save?

Baptism is a symbol for cleansing the believer from sin, but Scripture does not teach that baptismal water saves a person. Rather, a believer is saved because of Christ’s atoning death on the cross and his resurrection from the grave (Rom. 6:4). Baptism is a symbol of the shed blood of Christ that cleanses the believer from sin” (Kistemaker 1987, p. 148).

This becomes clear through the next statement that baptism is “not the removal of dirt from the body.” That’s an obvious analogy to reject. But baptism is “the pledge of a good conscience toward God.”

4. How is baptism related to “the pledge of a good conscience toward God” (NIV)?

There are two ways of understanding, “pledge,” subjective, as in the NIV, or objective, as in the ESV, “as an appeal to God for a good conscience.”

As in the NIV, the subjective meaning of “pledge” is that “we look at baptism from our point of view and express ourselves subjectively.” There is a majority of translators who prefer the subjective approach, where “pledge” means “response.” “In short, the believer receives not only the sign of baptism with water; he also responds by ‘keeping a clear conscience’ (see v. 16)” (Kistemaker 1987, p. 148). This kind of translation is supported by the KJV, NKJV, RV, ASV, NEB, Phillips, GNB, JB, NAB and NIV. So, baptism is the proper response of somebody who is already related to God through faith.

The objective meaning is that of the believer making an “appeal to God for a good conscience.” By appealing to God to help us, “we see the importance of baptism objectively. Without God’s aid we are unable to make a pledge to serve him” (Kistemaker 1987, p. 148). This type of translation is supported by the RSV, NRSV, ESV, MLB, NASB, Moffatt and ISV. In supporting the objective sense, Grudem (1994) interprets “but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience” to mean “an inward, spiritual transaction between God and the individual, a transaction symbolized by the outward ceremony of baptism.” Grudem states that

we could paraphrase Peter’s statement by saying, “Baptism now saves you—not the outward physical ceremony of baptism but the inward spiritual reality which baptism represents.” In this way, Peter guards against any view of baptism that would attribute automatic saving power to the physical ceremony itself (p. 974).

This seems the most satisfactory kind of explanation of a very difficult passage, to be in line with the scriptural emphasis of salvation through faith alone, trusting in Christ alone.

5. How can baptism that “saves you” be linked to “saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ”?

This further indicates that the baptism which “saves you” is associated with the “the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” Thus, it is an analogy of baptism, associating it with eternal salvation through Christ, through the resurrection of Christ. See verses such as 1 Cor. 15:3-4 and 1 Peter 1:3 for affirmations of the link between salvation and the death and resurrection of Christ.

What does Acts 22:16 mean?

The verse, being the words of Ananias, reads, “And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.” This is a more extensive statement than that in Acts 9:16. However, according to Acts 9:17, the “scales fell from his eyes” (the equivalent of belief) before he was baptised (9:18).

So, does baptism “wash your sins away,” thus making belief unnecessary? Is this a verse in support of baptismal regeneration?

While Acts 22:16 refers to Paul’s baptism, the apostle clearly distinguished between the gospel and baptism: “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel–not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power” (1 Cor. 1:17). It is the gospel that “is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:17), so baptism cannot have a salvific effect. Paul’s experience from Acts 9:17-18 involved a spiritual experience before baptism, so to “be baptized and wash your sins away” (Acts 22:16) cannot refer to baptismal regeneration.

Norman Geisler rightly concludes that “baptism then, like confession, is not a condition for eternal life but a manifestation of it. Baptism is a work that flows from the faith that alone brings salvation through the gospel” (2004, p. 498).

Examples from Church History

An example from the early church fathers was Justin Martyr (ca. 100-165), who wrote: “As many as are persuaded and believe that what we teach and say is true, … are brought by us where there is water, and are regenerated [born-again] in the same manner in which we were ourselves regenerated” (Schaff, n.d., First Apology, Chapter LXI). The regenerated were baptised.

Professor of Church History & Historical Theology, Geoffrey W. Bromiley, summarised the biblical and historical evidence:

The patristic statements linking infant baptism with the apostles are fragmentary and unconvincing in the earlier stages . . . Examples of believers’ baptism are common in the first centuries, and a continuing, if suppressed, witness has always been borne to this requirement . . . The development of infant baptism seems to be linked with the incursion of pagan notions and practices. Finally, there is evidence of greater evangelistic incisiveness and evangelical purity of doctrine where [believers’ baptism] is recognized to be the baptism of the NT (Bromiley 1984, p. 116).

The facts are: The Bible (including the Apostles) and the Church established in the New Testament practised believers’ baptism. Why the change to paedobaptism?

This is not the place for a comprehensive documentation and assessment of the baptismal practices throughout church history. However, this we can note:

During the fifth century the towering figure of Augustine of Hippo with his powerful reassertion of the doctrine of original guilt settled the issue for a thousand years. Paedobaptism became the norm, and as by then the great expansion of the church among adults had run its course, adult baptism became increasingly rare and almost unknown. With the decline of adult baptism went, too, the decline of the catechumenate, as instruction before baptism was replaced, of necessity, with instruction after baptism. Yet that instruction became increasingly strange to modern ears. For although baptized infants grew up believing that their baptism had brought them forgiveness, eternal life, membership of the church and entry into the family of God, their position in that family became increasingly insecure. In time, a vast system of priests, penances and pilgrimages was needed to preserve their spiritual lives, while even after the intercession of saints, the assistance of Mary, the prayers of the church and the indulgences of the pope, centuries in purgatory still awaited them after death before their souls were cleansed from sin and prepared for heaven” (Bridge & Phypers 1977, pp. 82-83).

Appendix I

1. Bruce Metzger

Bruce Metzger, who has had a long and distinguished career in the discipline of textual criticism, which attempts “to determine the original text of the biblical books” (Erickson 1985, p. 83), states that:

The long ending [of Mark 16:9-20] in an expanded form existed, so Jerome tells us, in Greek copies current in his day, and since the discovery of W earlier this [20th] century we now have the Greek text of this expansion . . .

None of these four endings commends itself as original. The obvious and pervasive apocryphal flavour of the expansion [ie the long ending] . . , as well as the extremely limited basis of evidence supporting it, condemns it as a totally secondary accretion.

The long ending [ie Mark 16:9-20, as in the Textus Receptus and, therefore, translated in the King James Version of the Bible], though present in a variety of witnesses, some of them ancient, must also be judged by internal evidence to be secondary. For example, the presence of seventeen non-Marcan words or words used in a non-Marcan sense; the lack of a smooth juncture between verses 8 and 9 (the subject in vs. 9 is the women, whereas Jesus is the presumed subject in vs. 9); and the way in which Mary is identified in verse 9 even though she has been mentioned previously (vs. 1) – all these features indicate that the section was added by someone who knew a form of Mark which ended abruptly with verse 8 and who wished to provide a more appropriate conclusion. An Armenian manuscript of the Gospels, copied A.D. 989 (see Plate XIVb) contains a brief rubic of two words in the space at the end of the lat line of verse 8 and before the last twelve verses, namely Ariston eritsou (‘of the Presbyter Ariston’). Many have interpreted this as a reference to Ariston, a contemporary of Papias in the early second century and traditionally a disciple of John the Apostle. But the probability that an Armenian rubricator would have access to historically valuable tradition on this point is almost nil, especially if, as has been argued, the rubric was added in the thirteenth or fourteenth century.

The internal evidence of the so-called intermediate ending . . . is decidedly against its being genuine. Besides containing a high percentage of non-Marcan words, its rhetorical tone differs totally from the simple style of Mark’s Gospel. The mouth-filling phrase at the close (‘the sacred and imperishable message of eternal salvation’) betrays the hand of a later Greek theologian. [See Appendix II for a translation of this “intermediate ending.”]

Thus we are left with the short ending, witnessed by the earliest Greek, versional, and patristic evidence. Both external and internal considerations lead one to conclude that the original text of the Second Gospel, as known today, closes at xvi. 8″ (Metzger 1964/1968/1992, pp. 227-228).

2. Walter W. Wessel

External and especially internal evidence make it difficult to escape the conclusion that vv. 9-20 [of Mark 16] were originally not a part of the Gospel of Mark.

One further question arises: Did mark actually intend to end his Gospel at 16:8? If he did not, then either (1) the Gospel was never completed, or (2) the last page was lost before it was multiplied by copyists. . .

Thus the best solution seems to be that Mark did write an ending to his Gospel but that it was lost in the early transmission of the text. The endings we now possess represent attempts by the church to supply what was obviously lacking” (Wessel 1984, pp. 792-793).

Appendix II

The intermediate ending is translated by Metzger: “But they reported briefly to Peter and those with him all that they had been told. And after this Jesus himself sent out by means of them, from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation.” Metzger stated that this intermediate reading “is present in several uncial manuscripts of the seventh, eighth and ninth centuries . . . as well as in a few minuscule manuscripts . . . and several ancient versions” (1964/1968/1992, p. 226).

References:

Blum, Edwin A. 1981, ‘1 Peter’, in Frank E. Gaebelein (ed.), The Expositor’s Bible Commentary (vol. 12), Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, pp. 207-254.

Bridge, D. & Phypers, D. 1977, The Water That Divides: The Baptism Debate, InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, IL.

Bromiley, G. W. 1984, ‘Baptism, Believers”, in W. A. Elwell (ed.), Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, MI.

Cairns, E. E. 1954, 1981, Christianity through the Centuries (rev. enl. ed.), Zondervan Publishing House, Grand Rapids, MI.

Erickson, Millard J. 1985, Christian Theology, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Geisler, Norman 2004, Systematic Theology: Sin, Salvation (vol. 3), Bethany House , Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Grudem, Wayne 1994, Systematic Theology: An introduction to Biblical Doctrine, Inter-Varsity Press, Leicester, England.

Grudem, Wayne 1999, Bible Doctrine: Essential Teachings of the Christian Faith, Inter-Varsity Press, Leicester, England.

Kistemaker, Simon J. 1987, New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Epistles of Peter and of the Epistle of Jude, Evangelical Press, Welwyn, Hertfordshire.

Metzger, Bruce M. 1964, 1968, 1992, The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, Oxford University Press, New York, Oxford.

Schaff, P. n.d., The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus‘, Polycarp, ‘Christian Baptism’, Available from: http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/anf01/htm/viii.ii.lxi.htm [17 March 2005].

Wessel, Walter W. 1984, ‘Mark’, in Frank E. Gaebelein (ed.), The Expositor’s Bible Commentary (vol. 8), Regency Reference Library (Zondervan Publishing House), Grand Rapids, Michigan, pp. 601-793.

Notes:

[1] Jeremy Jack’s response to OzSpen, “Christian History Project,” Open Issues, Trinity College of the Bible & Theological Seminary, TDelta forum, 12.51 am, 12 March 2005, at: http://go.compuserve.com/Trinity?MSG=116364 [17 March 2005]. This post is no longer available online.

[2] Or, “response.”

[3] Trinity Seminary’s Tdelta forum, ‘Christian History Project’, (Open Issues), Jeremy Jack’s response to OzSpen, 11.25 am, 11 March 2005, Available from, http://go.compuserve.com/Trinity?MSG=116354 [17 March 2005]. This post is no longer available online.

[4] Or, “response.”

[5] See footnote no. 1 above.

Copyright (c) 2009 Spencer D. Gear.  This document is free content.  You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the Open Content License (OPL) version 1.0, or (at your option) any later version.  This document last updated at Date: 25 June 2015.

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Are there degrees of punishment in hell?[1]

By Spencer D Gear

Hell is Real

(image courtesy ChristArt)

Some people object to the doctrine of hell, saying that it is not something a loving God would do. I do some blogging[2] on the Christian Fellowship Forum and there is a Seventh-Day Adventist, Harold, on that Forum. He wrote to me:

“Malachi states that the dead are ashes…. God states that there will be no tears in Heaven. Can you honestly state that you can stand there and know that some of your loved ones are burning and not shed a tear?  How can you? Is YOUR God that cruel?”[3]

He goes on further to give another emotional response that is not based on the exegesis of the biblical text:

“Eternal punishment  simply means that the results of it are permanent. They last forever.  Stick a piece of paper in a can. Light it. It burns ‘up’.  FOREVER. It is gone. Forever.
“What would the purpose be for God to punish anyone for the sin of one short lifetime?  They have thrown away their chance to be with God, forever. They are lost. They know that. Now. Why put them through something you wouldn’t do to a dog?
Your ‘doctrine’ has driven people to leave the church, some even to the point of suicide.  Is that God’s plan? THINK.”[4]

Others ask the honest question, “How can a God of love make eternal hell the punishment for all unbelievers?” Some have committed horrendous crimes and engaged in disgusting immorality, while others have not done that. Is it fair for God to treat all people in hell the same and give them equal punishment?

This very brief article is an attempt to answer this latter question, “Are there degrees of punishment in hell?”

1. Since God is “the righteous Judge” (2 Tim. 4:8), we would expect that sinners would be punished according to the extent of their sin. This is what the Bible affirms.

2. Matthew 10:14-15 states, “And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town. Truly, I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town” (ESV).

So it will be more tolerable on the day of judgment for Sodom and Gomorrah than for those who do not welcome and listen to the apostles. This is an amazing statement: it is going to be fairer for those who committed sexual immorality in Sodom & Gomorrah than for those who rejected the gospel. What is this saying about punishment in hell?

3. A similar affirmation of degrees of punishment can be found in Matthew 11:21-24,

“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. 22 But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon on the day of judgment than for you. 23 And you, Capernaum, will you be lifted to the heavens? No, you will go down to Hades. For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Sodom, it would have remained to this day. 24 But I tell you that it will be more bearable for Sodom on the day of judgment than for you”  (NIV).

4. Luke 12:47-48 speaks of many blows and few blows: “And that servant who knew his master’s will but did not get ready or act according to his will, will receive a severe beating. But the one who did not know, and did what deserved a beating, will receive a light beating. Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required, and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more” (ESV).

The lesson is that where one has greater privileges, there will be greater responsibilities. J. C. Ryle warned: “The saddest road to hell is that which runs under the pulpit, past the Bible and through the midst of warnings and invitations.”[5]

5. When Jesus criticised the religious leaders at his time on earth, he said that “such men will be punished more severely” (NIV, see Mark 12:38-40). This clearly indicates degrees of punishment in hell.

6. John’s vision of the judgment against “Babylon” (Rev. 18:1-7) indicates degree of punishment in proportion to sin committed.

7. Other verses to contemplate include Mark 9:42 and Romans 2:5. John Blanchard writes: “Every day the sinner lives, every selfish penny he makes, every unholy pleasure he enjoys, every ungrateful breath he takes, are storing up God’s anger against him.”[6]

8. We need to remember that:

a. Only God’s kind of justice will be experienced in hell;

b. There will be degrees of punishment, but

c. That is nothing to gloat about because punishment in hell is eternal, no matter what it is like.

A red herring logical fallacy of infinite punishment for a finite sin

Those who claim that hell is an infinite punishment for finite sin, commit a red herring logical fallacy. This article, ‘Is hell an infinite punishment?’ shows the red herring nature of this kind of argumentation.

This article of mine, “Are there degrees of punishment in hell?’ also demonstrates the false nature of the infinite punishment vs. finite sin view.

The seriousness of sin against the Almighty God is what sends unbelievers to hell.  Degrees of punishment in hell do not lessen the eternal dimensions of hell and its suffering.  For a more detailed assessment of God’s view of hell, see my article, “Hell & Judgment.”

Notes:

[1] Many of the ideas in this article were suggested by Blanchard (1993:182ff). My article here was a response to a question by Claudette on the TDELTA Forum, “Are there degrees of punishment in hell?” This was posted about Thursday, 27 September 2001. This forum is not available to a public audience.  It is restricted to the students of Trinity Theological Seminary, Newburgh IN (where I was studying at the time).  For further support of degrees of punishment in hell, see Morey (1984:250); Peterson (1995:198-200). See also Peterson’s Index.

[2] I’m ozspen.

[3] Christian Fellowship Forum, Public Affairs, “Climate change worst scientific scandal,” 18 December 2009, #182, available at: http://community.compuserve.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?tsn=180&nav=messages&webtag=ws-fellowship&tid=119873 (Accessed 25 December 2009).

[4] Harold to ozspen (me), Christian Fellowship Forum, ibid. #190, 20 December 2009, available at: http://community.compuserve.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?tsn=180&nav=messages&webtag=ws-fellowship&tid=119873 (Accessed 25 December 2009).

[5] In Blanchard (1993:183).

[6] Blanchard (1993:185). This comment is based on what Blanchard considers are the “terrifying words” (p. 185) of Roman 2:5.

 

Works consulted

Blanchard, J 1993. Whatever Happened to Hell? Darlington, Co. Durham, England: Evangelical Press.

Morey, R A 1984. Death and the Afterlife. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Bethany House Publishers.

Peterson, R A 1995. Hell on Trial: The Case for Eternal Punishment. Phillipsburg, New Jersey: P&R Publishing,

 

Copyright © 2013 Spencer D. Gear. This document last updated at Date: 9 December 2017.

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