There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. —Soren Kierkegaard. "…truth is true even if nobody believes it, and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. That is why truth does not yield to opinion, fashion, numbers, office, or sincerity–it is simply true and that is the end of it" – Os Guinness, Time for Truth, pg.39. “He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” – Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
We must likewise pray that God will be reconciled to us, that we may obtain his favor and blessing and gracious acceptance.
That we may be at peace with God and his anger may be turned away from us.
Being justified by faith, let me have peace with God through my Lord Jesus Christ, and through him let me have access into that grace in which believers stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Romans 5:1-2(ESV)
Be not a terror to me, for you are my refuge in the day of disaster. Jeremiah 17:17(ESV)
In Christ Jesus let me, who once was far off, be brought near by the blood of Christ; for he himself is his people’s peace, who has broken down the dividing wall of hostility between us, that he might reconcile us to God through his cross, thereby killing the hostility, and so making peace. Through him, therefore, let me, who has made myself a stranger and an alien, become a fellow citizen with the saints and a member of the household of God. Ephesians 2:13-19(ESV)
You have no wrath: would that you had thorns and briers to battle? You would burn them up together; yes, you would burn them up together; but you have encouraged me to lay hold of your protection, that I make peace, and have promised that I shall make peace. Isaiah 27:4-5(ESV) O let me therefore agree with you and be at peace, that thereby good may come to me. Job 22:21(ESV)
Heal me, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved, for you are my praise. Jeremiah 17:14(ESV) Do not be angry with me forever but revive me again, that I may rejoice in you. Show me your steadfast love, O LORD, and grant me your salvation. Psalm 85:5-7(ESV)
Nehemiah 9:1-37 In this week’s study we see that sorrow for sin and repentance came in response to hearing God’s Word read and preached.
Theme
“If My People”
Today we begin with the third part of the Levites’ prayer.
3. An appeal for God’s mercy in the present distress (vv. 32-37). As the litany of the people’s sins has built to a climax, so have the repeated affirmations of God’s patience, goodness and mercy. It is to these blessed characteristics of God that the final section of the prayer now makes eloquent appeal.
Do you feel the need to confess your sin to God? If so, the prayer of the Levites in Jerusalem in the days of Nehemiah is a model confession. It is how to find spiritual blessing again.
What do we need to do? The answer is no mystery. Second Chronicles 7:14 states it clearly: “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” These are the steps to God’s blessing.
1. We must humble ourselves. By nature we are not humble. We are proud and feel a need for nothing. It is only when we come before God that we are genuinely humbled, for it is then, and then only, that we see ourselves as the sinful and rebellious creatures we really are.
2. We must pray. We do not naturally pray either. Why? Because we believe we are self-sufficient. This is why God often has to bring us very low. It is often only in the depths of life, when everything is crumbling around us, that we are willing to turn from ourselves to God and ask Him for the help we need.
3. We must seek God’s face. To seek God’s face means to seek His favor, rather than the favor of the world around us, and to seek His will rather than our own. To seek God’s face means a radical change in the use of our time, talents, resources and our lifestyle.
4. We must turn from our wicked ways. If we do not think we have wicked ways, we will not turn from them—and we are fooling ourselves. But when God brings the reality of our sin home to us, we will find ourselves distressed by sin and unwilling to rest until we confess it to God, find His forgiveness and turn from everything that is displeasing to Him. Everything! Not just the “great” sins. Not just the sins that have obviously gotten us into trouble or that offend others. All sins. God does not ask for fifty percent of what we are or look only for sixty percent (or seventy percent) righteousness. He wants all of us, and He insists on genuine holiness. We cannot serve God and sin too.
Is it hard to repent? It certainly is! Nothing is harder or goes more against the grain of our sinful natures. But it is necessary for personal happiness and God’s blessing. The promise is that, if we will repent of our sins, then God will hear from heaven (He never turns a deaf ear to the repentant), forgive our sin (how much we need it) and heal our land.
Study Questions
What does the third part of the Levites’ prayer do?
From 2 Chronicles 7, what are the four steps to receiving God’s blessing?
Application
Application: Read 2 Chronicles 7:14 again. How can you practice the four items found there?
Key Point: God does not ask for fifty percent of what we are or look only for sixty percent (or seventy percent) righteousness. He wants all of us, and He insists on genuine holiness. We cannot serve God and sin too.
For Further Study: Download and listen for free to James Boice’s message, “A Psalm of Repentance.” (Discount will be applied at checkout.)
When Waban, ruler of the Natick people, complained that no matter what they did, they could never please the English nor be considered their equals, Daniel Gookin could only reply, “Waban, you know all Indians are not good; some carry it rudely, some are drunkards, others steal, others lie and break their promises, and otherwise wicked. So ‘t is with Englishmen; all are not good, but some are bad, and will carry it rudely; and this we must expect, while we are in this world; therefore, let us be patient and quiet, and leave this case to God, and wait upon him in a way of well-doing, patience, meekness, and humility; and God will bring a good issue in the end, as you have seen and experienced.”[1]
Gookin himself was pained by the mistreatment of Native Americans, particularly when thousands of them, even those who had converted to Christianity and adopted English customs, were killed or sold into slavery during and after King Phillip’s war. That’s when he wrote his Historical Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians in New England. He hoped to set the record straight in the face of the prevailing narrative of his day. But his book was published only in 1836, 149 years after his death.
An Officer and a Missionary
Gookin was born in Ireland in 1612 to a Puritan family. Little is known about his early years. He emigrated to Virginia where his father had lands but later moved to Boston with his second wife Mary (nothing is known about his first wife). From 1644 to 1648, they lived in Roxbury under the ministry of John Eliot, who is today known as “the apostle to the American Indians” and the editor of the first Bible published on American soil – a Bible in the Algonquin language.
Highly appreciated in the colonies, Gookin assumed positions of responsibility in the local government, which included diplomatic relations with England. He spent a brief period in England during the 1630’s where Oliver Cromwell commissioned him to recruit colonists for Jamaica.
After returning to Massachusetts. he became involved in Eliot’s mission to the local natives, whom Eliot had organized into “Praying Towns.” Like Eliot, Gookin learned the native language, although he believed – as did most missionaries at that time – that Christianity and Western language and culture had to be taught together.
In 1656, he was appointed as superintendent of these Praying Indians, which included maintaining law and order and facilitating relations with the European colonists. It was an unpaid task which included many travels.
During this time, he wrote his eight-book Historical Collections of the Indians of North America, divided into twelve chapters and addressed to the King of England, describing the known history and customs of the Native Americans together with their conversion and their valuable assistance to the colonists, and to raise awareness of their ongoing evangelization.
A Fervent Hope
Under Eliot’s preaching, many natives had already converted to Christianity. Baffled by the natives’ views of a sovereign deity and a life of eternal happiness or misery after death, together with their purification rites and food taboos, he wondered if they might be a remnant of the lost tribes of Israel.
Gookin was impressed by the progress these natives had made in their knowledge of the gospel. “There is none of the praying Indians, young or old, but can readily answer any question of the catechism,” he wrote. “Which, I believe, is more than can be said of many thousands of English people.”[2]
While his views of Native Americans were still informed by Western standards, he believed that the only difference was that Europeans were “born and bred among civilized and Christian nations.” Now, he said, the colonists had an opportunity to “behold the real fulfilling of those precious promises made to Jesus Christ, that God will give him the heathen for his inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for his possession.”[3]
Besides asking the English Crown for prayers and material support toward the evangelization of the natives, Gookin expressed his wish “that the English nation which dwell among them may live so holily and honestly that by their good conversation all stumbling block; may be removed out of the way of the Indians in their travel towards the heavenly Canaan, and such gracious examples set before them that they may more and more be induced to obedience to the yoke of our Lord Jesus Christ.”[4]
Facing Opposition
But Gookin’s words fell mostly on deaf ears as the majority of Europeans preferred to adhere to a narrative of violent and treacherous natives who should be viewed with suspicion, disarmed, and confined to reservations.
Also, as historian Matthew J. Tuininga noted, Gookin’s warning “came too late. Although many Algonquians had accepted Christianity, there were already many stumbling blocks in their way of seeking a heavenly Canaan. Within a year, Gookin’s hope of an integrated society would be shattered amid the fulcrum of war. Many colonists would abandon all thought of a heavenly Canaan that included Indians, instead envisioning an earthly Canaan whose first people needed to be destroyed.”[5]
In spite of Eliot’s and Gookin’s pleading with the authorities to avoid fighting, the conflict was inevitable and the infamous King Philip’s War marked the end of many Praying Towns.
Gookin was often threatened for his continued support of those whom the colonists saw as enemies and his exposé of the injustice of magistrates and the violence of mobs. Once, when he narrowly survived drowning in the bay, some expressed their regret that he had not died. Many called him an “Irish dog” and several other epithets that cannot be repeated on this website. “God rot his soul,” some people said. “If I could meet him alone, I would pistol him. I wish my knife and sizers were in his heart. He is the devil’s interpreter.”[6]
But Gookin was not done speaking and writing.
By the time he finished writing his Historical Account of the Doings and Sufferings of the Christian Indians, other accounts of King Philip’s War had been published in England, authored by respected writers such as Increase Mather, Thomas Wheeler, William Hubbard, some of whom Gookin mentions in his book. But while these authors emphasized the battles and victories of the Europeans, Gookin emphasized the faith and faithfulness of the Christian Indians.
Gookin ended his account with the hope that his words may do some good. “There are many other things, that I might have recorded, concerning these poor, despised sheep of Christ,” he wrote. “But I fear that which I have already written will be thought (by some) impertinent and tedious. But when I call to mind, that great and worthy men have taken much pains to record, and others to read, the seeming small and little concerns of the children of God; as well in the historical books of Scripture, as other histories of the primitive times of Christianity, and of the doings and sufferings of the poor saints of God; I do encourage my heart in God, that He will accept, in Christ, this mean labor of mine, touching these poor despised men; yet such as are, through the grace of Christ, the first professors, confessors, if I may not say martyrs, of the Christian religion among the poor Indians in America.”[7]
Legacy
Gookin continued his duties until his death on 19 March 1687. Eliot commented that “he died poor, but full of good works, and greatly beneficent to the Indians, and bewailed by them to this day.”[8]
Eliot commented that Gookin’s account was just “enough to give wise men a taste of what hath passed. Leave the rest unto the day of judgment, when all the contrivances and actings of men shall be opened before the all-seeing eye of our glorious judge.” Regretting his failure to keep a similar account, he prayed, “Lord pardon all my many omissions.”[9]
Gookin’s Historical Account sat in England for over 150 until it was recovered by the American Antiquarian Society and appreciated as the only account of the plight of Native Americans until and through King Phillip’s War.
If Gookin’s contemporaries were not prepared to reflect on his account, we are. And while these stories grieve us as much as they grieved him, we have the advantage of seeing how God has preserved his church despite Christians’ failings and misapplications. As W. Robert Godfrey once said in one of his lectures, unlike worldly movements such as Nazism or Stalinism, which acted in conformity to their manifestos, the errors in Church history, as heinous as they have been, have always stemmed from a misunderstanding of Scriptures and a corruption of true Christianity.
And, as Matthew Tuininga points out in his book, “Many Indians rejected Christianity and still do. But for others, Christianity became the key ingredient that held their communities together and enabled them to preserve their culture. They lamented, and still lament, the injustices and tragedies that devastated their people and the way Christianity was used to justify it. Yet, thet were thankful for the gospel and the hope it provided, not to mention the material goods Europeans brought. Many practiced Christianity in ways that preserved their communities and culture, embracing the core tenets of the faith Puritans proclaimed while rejecting assumptions of English cultural superiority or white supremacy. The resilience of these communities, despite everything that has happened to them, is nothing short of remarkable”[10]
[5] Matthew J. Tuininga, The Wars of the Lord: The Puritan Conquest of America’s First People, Oxford University Press, 2025, 194.
[6] Frederick William Gookin, Daniel Gookin, 1612-1687:Assistant and Major General of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Chicago, Privately printed, 1912, 153.
The value of shame is a topic that stirs debate. Is shame helpful or harmful? There’s no denying it’s an unpleasant emotion. Part of the confusion comes from how often shame is tangled up with guilt—two words used interchangeably, yet fundamentally different. Consider the dictionary: one definition describes “a feeling of worry or unhappiness that you have because you have done something wrong, such as causing harm to another person.” Another calls it “an uncomfortable feeling that you get when you have done something wrong or embarrassing, or when someone close to you has.” The first is guilt; the second, shame. If you didn’t know better, you might assume they’re the same. But psychology draws a clear line between them.
Guilt and shame are both self-conscious emotions, but guilt is “characterized by a painful appraisal of having done (or thought) something that is wrong and often by a readiness to take action designed to undo or mitigate this wrong.” Shame, on the other hand, involves a strong fear of one’s deeds being exposed to judgment or ridicule. As psychologist Paul Ekman points out, “No audience is needed for feelings of guilt, no one else need know, for the guilty person is his own judge. Not so for shame. The humiliation of shame requires disapproval or ridicule by others. If no one ever learns of a misdeed there will be no shame, but there still might be guilt.” Shame is public; guilt is private. You can feel both at once, but it’s just as common to experience one without the other.
The distinction is crucial. Guilt is action-focused; shame is person-focused. Researchers say “shame is about the self” while “guilt is about things in the real world—acts or failures to act, events for which one bears responsibility.” Counselor John Bradshaw captured it this way: “Guilt says I’ve done something wrong; shame says there is something wrong with me. Guilt says I’ve made a mistake; shame says I am a mistake. Guilt says what I did was not good; shame says I am no good.”
These differences run deeper than language—they’re wired into our brains. While guilt and shame share some neural networks, their patterns diverge. Guilt arises when our actions clash with our conscience. Shame is triggered when we believe our reputation has been harmed. Both are universal, cutting across race, ethnicity, and sex. But the way we respond to each matters greatly. Guilt makes us wrestle with what we’ve done; shame makes us wrestle with who we are.
This difference shapes our lives. Shame, especially, can be destructive. Those who feel shame often see themselves as fundamentally flawed, unredeemable. Researchers call shame a “maladaptive” emotion. It changes us: people who feel shame avoid eye contact, struggle with self-esteem, and conceal what they consider personal flaws. They may turn to alcohol or drugs to escape their self-perception. Shame can spiral into depression, anxiety, insomnia, eating disorders, substance abuse, aggression, and self-harm. It can even sabotage our own efforts, as when someone avoids studying for a test—not wanting to risk failing and confirming their self-image as a failure.
The consequences are especially dire for young people. Long-term studies show that kids who experience shame are more likely to have more sexual partners, use more drugs, and get into more trouble with the law. Shame often accompanies law-breaking; those who commit crimes frequently carry both guilt and shame, fearing their actions have branded them forever.
Worse, shame is not always “earned.” Many feel shame for things entirely beyond their control: their appearance, their weight, their neighborhood, their upbringing. Some even carry shame for how they were raised. Carl Jung called shame “a soul eating emotion.” It’s a powerful poison, and its effects run deep.
Yet, guilt is often misunderstood as equally harmful. Popular culture is full of warnings: “Guilt is the worst enemy of true happiness and self-esteem,” “Guilt is a destructive and ultimately pointless emotion,” “Guilt steals our joy, hinders our productivity, interrupts our peace, harms our relationships, and worst of all, makes us self-focused.” But these descriptions often confuse guilt with shame. Psychologists see guilt differently. Guilt is a “moral and adaptive emotion,” the “guardian of our goodness.” When we break a moral code, guilt helps us recognize and correct our behavior. It motivates us to repair relationships and restore trust. Far from being useless, guilt is a signpost that something needs to change.
Guilt’s benefits show up early. Children motivated by guilt, not shame, are more likely to make amends and restore friendships. Guilt is key to developing a conscience. Adolescents who feel guilt without shame are less likely to be delinquent or depressed. For adults, guilt prompts us to manage anger, reflect on our actions, and repair relationships—especially with those closest to us. Guilt, unlike shame, is linked to empathy. It helps us cooperate, share, and rein in our worst impulses. As one researcher put it, “It’s incredibly important to nurture empathy, but I think it’s equally important to promote guilt.” When we feel appropriate guilt for our actions, we move toward better behavior.
In the end, humans flourish when we use guilt to acknowledge wrongdoing, correct our course, and restore relationships. Shame, on the other hand, eats away at the soul. The difference is not just academic—it’s the key to healing, growth, and genuine connection.
Can you imagine God saying, I will love you when you are a sinner before you get saved, but after you get saved, if you sin, I am going to stop loving you? That is a lie straight from the pit of hell, and that is where it needs to return.
Salvation is the most wonderful gift God has offered us. I don’t know if we will ever be able to fully understand how amazing our salvation really is until we get to heaven. At that time, we will have all eternity to enjoy the wonder of the salvation Jesus purchased for us on the cross. Until that time, however, we must live on this earth, and we must deal with our enemy, Satan.
The Bible calls him a liar and the father of lies. When he is lying, that is his native language. One area Satan loves to lie to us about is our salvation. Since he cannot steal our salvation from us, and he knows that, he goes after our testimony and our effectiveness. If he can get you to doubt your salvation or the fact that God loves you, then he can make you ineffective in your witness for Jesus while you are on this earth. For that reason, it behooves you to make sure you fight back against the lies of Satan so you can walk in this wondrous salvation Jesus secured for you.
If there is one lie Satan loves trying to convince you of is that God does not love you anymore. Nothing could be further from the truth. Here is one thing the Bible tells us about God’s love.
But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. – Romans 5:8
Let’s try to understand this verse a little better. Think about this. God loved you when you were a sinner at your absolute worst. He showed you this love by sending Christ to die for you. You put your trust in Christ for salvation. After you get saved you sin and because of this, God says I am going to stop loving you now.
Does that make any sense at all? The answer is clearly no. Can you imagine God saying, I will love you when you are a sinner before you get saved, but after you get saved, if you sin, I am going to stop loving you? That is a lie straight from the pit of hell, and that is where it needs to return. God will never stop loving you. Period. His love for you is unchanging, unwavering, and unending. God chose to love you when you were a sinner, and he will not stop loving you now. This is not meant to give you a license to sin but to remind you that if you sin, God’s love for you has not stopped.
2. God Has a Limited Amount of Forgiveness for You and You Have Used All Yours Up
2. God Has a Limited Amount of Forgiveness for You and You Have Used All Yours Up
SLIDE 2 OF 6
Along with Satan trying to convince you God does not love you anymore is the lie to convince you that there is no more forgiveness for you. Please tell me where in Scripture God says once you commit too many sins, He will stop forgiving you. If he did that, then none of us would have any hope because all of us have sinned before we came to Christ and even after.
In Matthew 18, Peter asks Jesus how many times one should forgive their brother. Peter thought he was being generous by saying seven because, at that time, there was a teaching that basically said three strikes and you are out. Jesus destroyed Peter’s idea by saying not seven times, but seventy times seven. What he was saying is you should never run out of forgiveness for your brother who sins against you. For Jesus to say this meant Jesus lived it. That’s why a reservoir of forgiveness is always available for you when you come to Jesus in repentance.
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. Lamentations 3:22-23 (ESV)
The last time I checked, the sun came up this morning, so there is forgiveness available for you if you need it.
3. If You Doubt Your Salvation, You Are Not Really Saved
3. If You Doubt Your Salvation, You Are Not Really Saved
SLIDE 3 OF 6
Sad to say, sometimes as Christians we don’t allow room for doubt. By this I mean if someone asks questions or becomes unsure of something, our first response is often to throw stones and question their faith. This plays right into Satan’s hands. It is not uncommon or even unusual to have questions or doubts. This does not mean you have lost your faith or your salvation. Let me prove this to you from scripture.
Jesus told the world that there was no greater man born of a woman than John the Baptist (Matt. 11:11). He was the forerunner of Jesus. He was filled with the Spirit while in his mother’s womb. He is the one who baptized Jesus and declared to the world that he was the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. However, later in John’s life, he found himself in a prison cell. During this time, John asked an astounding question. Before you read this question, just remember all John did and who John was. Here is the question.
When John, who was in prison, heard about the deeds of the Messiah, he sent his disciples to ask him, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?” – Matthew 11:2-3
Wasn’t this the same John who had declared Jesus the lamb of God and who had said he must increase and I must decrease? Yes, it was. Yet, here we see that even John had moments of doubt. What we discover about Jesus’ love in this section of Scripture is that Jesus didn’t rebuke John; he reassured him.
Jesus replied, “Go back and report to John what you hear and see: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor. Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.” – Matthew 11:4-6
If you have moments of doubt in your walk, that does not mean you have lost your salvation. It simply means you have doubts or questions you need to work through. Trust me, Jesus is okay with that and don’t allow anyone else, especially Satan, to tell you otherwise.
4. You Have to Earn Your Way Back Into God’s Favor if You Sin
4. You Have to Earn Your Way Back Into God’s Favor if You Sin
SLIDE 4 OF 6
Another lie Satan likes to use is to get you to believe that if you have sinned, then you have to earn your way back into God’s favor. Your sin caused you to lose God’s favor, now you need to get it back. You must do something to get him to love you again. Not only is this a lie, it is impossible. There is nothing you can ever do to win God’s favor or make him love you more. Yet, if you fall into this trap, it will cause you to move into works-based salvation, and works-based doesn’t work. You have been saved by God’s grace, and everything that happens after that happens by his grace as well. If you couldn’t earn your salvation to begin with, what makes you think you can re-earn it? The simple answer is you can’t, so stop trying to.
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. – Ephesians 2:8-9
5. Your Salvation Depends on Your Ability to Be Perfect
5. Your Salvation Depends on Your Ability to Be Perfect
SLIDE 5 OF 6
If your salvation depended on your ability to be perfect, then none of us would be saved. Not Paul, not Peter, not any other hero of the faith. We would all be lost. God does not expect us to be perfect, but he expects us to be holy. These things may often be confused but they are not the same thing. To be perfect is to live without fault and without ever sinning again. Try as we may to avoid sin, there will be times when we fall short. To be holy means we have been set apart for God’s use. This is something we can do. If you should fall short of God’s standard, then don’t allow Satan to make you believe you are not good enough because you don’t do everything right. Your salvation is not based on your perfection but on Jesus’ perfection. He did for you what you could not do for yourself. So, if the devil comes at you with this, simply remind him that you are not perfect, but Jesus is, and your salvation is based on that.
The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is He on behalf of whom I said, ‘After me comes a Man who has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.’ I did not recognize Him, but so that He might be manifested to Israel, I came baptizing in water.” John testified saying, “I have seen the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven, and He remained upon Him. I did not recognize Him, but He who sent me to baptize in water said to me, ‘He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.’ I myself have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God.” (1:29–34)
The phrase the next day introduces a sequence of days, which continues in verses 35, 43, and 2:1. Apparently, the events from John’s interview with the delegation from Jerusalem (vv. 19–28) to the miracle at Cana (2:1–11) spanned one week. On the day after he spoke to the delegation, John saw Jesus coming to him. Faithful to his duty as a herald, and defining a momentous redemptive moment, John immediately called the crowd’s attention to Him, exclaiming “Behold, the Lamb of God.” That title, used only in John’s writings (cf. v. 36; Rev. 5:6; 6:9; 7:10, 17; 14:4, 10; 15:3; 17:14; 19:9; 21:22–23; 22:1, 3), is the first in a string of titles given to Jesus in the remaining verses of this chapter; the rest include Rabbi (vv. 38, 49), Messiah (v. 41), Son of God (vv. 34, 49), King of Israel (v. 49), Son of Man (v. 51), and “Him of whom Moses in the Law and also the Prophets wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph” (v. 45). That was not a guess on John’s part, but was revelation from God that was absolutely true, as the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus proved. The concept of a sacrificial Lamb was a familiar one to the Jewish people. All through Israel’s history God had revealed clearly that sin and separation from Him could be removed only by blood sacrifices (cf. Lev. 17:11). No forgiveness of sin could be granted by God apart from an acceptable substitute dying as a sacrifice. They knew of Abraham’s confidence that God would provide a lamb to offer in place of Isaac (Gen. 22:7–8). A lamb was sacrificed at Passover (Ex. 12:1–36; Mark 14:12), in the daily sacrifices in the tabernacle and later in the temple (Ex. 29:38–42), and as a sin offering by individuals (Lev. 5:5–7). God also made it clear that none of those sacrifices were sufficient to take away sin (cf. Isa. 1:11). They were also aware that Isaiah’s prophecy likened Messiah to “a lamb that is led to slaughter” (Isa. 53:7; cf. Acts 8:32; 1 Peter 1:19). Though Israel sought a Messiah who would be a prophet, king, and conqueror, God had to send them a Lamb. And He did. The title Lamb of God foreshadows Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice on the cross for the sin of the world. With this brief statement, the prophet John made it clear that the Messiah had come to deal with sin. The Old Testament is filled with the reality that the problem is sin and it is at the very heart of every person (Jer. 17:9). All men, even those who received the revelation of God in Scripture (the Jews), were sinful and incapable of changing the future or the present, or of repaying God for the sins of the past. Paul’s familiar indictment of human sinfulness in Romans 3:11–12 is based on Old Testament revelation. As noted in the discussion of 1:9–11 in chapter 2 of this volume, kosmos (world) has a variety of meanings in the New Testament. Here it refers to humanity in general, to all people without distinction, transcending all national, racial, and ethnic boundaries. The use of the singular term sin with the collective noun world reveals that as sin is worldwide, so Jesus’ sacrifice is sufficient for all people without distinction (cf. 1 John 2:2). But though His sacrificial death is sufficient for the sins of everyone (cf. 3:16; 4:42; 6:51; 1 Tim. 2:6; Heb. 2:9; 1 John 4:14), it is efficacious only for those who savingly believe in Him (3:15–16, 18, 36; 5:24; 6:40; 11:25–26; 20:31; Luke 8:12; Acts 10:43; 13:39; 16:31; Rom. 1:16; 3:21–24; 4:3–5; 10:9–10; 1 Cor. 1:21; Gal. 3:6–9, 22; Eph. 1:13; 1 John 5:1; 10–13). This verse does not teach universalism, the false doctrine that everyone will be saved. That such is not the case is obvious, since the Bible teaches that most people will suffer eternal punishment in hell (Matt. 25:41, 46; 2 Thess. 1:9; Rev. 14:9–11; 20:11–15; cf. Ezek. 18:4, 20; Matt. 7:13–14; Luke 13:23–24; John 8:24), and only a few will be saved (Matt. 7:13–14). John for the third time (cf. vv. 15, 27) stressed his subordinate role to Jesus, the eternal Word who had become a Man, acknowledging, “This is He on behalf of whom I said, ‘After me comes a Man who has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.’ ” John was created. Jesus’ higher rank was infinite. He was the One who created everything (1:1–3), including John. Though John was actually born before Jesus, Jesus existed before him. And though John was a relative of Jesus’ (probably His cousin), since their mothers were related (Luke 1:36), he still did not recognize Him as the Messiah until he baptized Him, so that He might be manifested to Israel. For that most significant of all John’s baptisms, he declared, “I came baptizing in water,” though he was reluctant to baptize Jesus (Matt. 3:14). It was at Jesus’ baptism that God, who sent John to baptize in water, fully revealed Jesus as the Messiah through a prearranged sign. John testified saying, “I have seen the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven, and He remained upon Him” (cf. Matt. 3:16; Mark 1:10; Luke 3:22). That sign was supernatural proof of Jesus’ messiahship, because God had told John, “He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.” Like Peter (Matt. 16:17), John understood who Jesus truly was only through divine revelation. That Jesus is far greater than John is reinforced in that He baptizes in the Holy Spirit. For the sixth time in his gospel (cf. 1:7, 8, 15, 19, 32), John the apostle refers to the Baptist’s witness to Christ, recording his affirmation, “I myself have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God.” As noted in chapter 1 of this volume, witness, or testifying, is thematic in this gospel. John’s testimony in verse 34 is a fitting conclusion to this section, as the narrative makes the transition from him to Jesus. Although believers are in a limited sense children of God (Matt. 5:9; Rom. 8:14, 19; Gal. 3:26; cf. John 1:12; 11:52; Rom. 8:16, 21; 9:8; Phil. 2:15; 1 John 3:1–2, 10), Jesus is uniquely the Son of God in that He alone shares the same nature as the Father (1:1; 5:16–30; 10:30–33; 14:9; 17:11; 1 John 5:20). To his first emphasis—Messiah is here—John added an equally compelling exhortation: Recognize Him for who He is—the Son of God, the Messiah, the ultimate sacrificial Lamb for the sin of the world.
MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (2006). John 1–11 (pp. 55–57). Moody Press.
Witnessing to Jesus Christ
John 1:29–34
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel.” Then John gave this testimony: “I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him. I would not have known him, except that the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’ I have seen and I testify that this is the Son of God.”
How can a believer witness to Jesus Christ? It is an important question, not only because each of us is called upon to witness (as we have already seen) but also because the expansion of the gospel in our time (as in all ages of the Christian church) depends in no small measure upon whether or not we will do it and, if we do, how well. We have already looked at the first great principle for being a witness: the witness must recognize that he has no independent importance in himself. The evangelist expresses this in the case of John the Baptist, whose witness has been the basis of our story, by reminding us that he was not the Light. This teaches us, among other things, that a Christian will never be an effective witness if he is placing either himself or his own needs first in his thinking. Our own needs possess a certain degree of importance, of course. But we will never be able to focus on the needs of others if our own needs dominate us. For one thing, there is a sense in which our own needs are already met, whether we recognize it or not, for Paul wrote to the Philippians, saying, “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:19). Our needs are met in Christ, and we have little to testify of if we do not see that clearly. Besides, we cannot really show love to the other person, which is the essence of witnessing, if we are not placing his needs before our own. All that is true. Yet, we must go on from this point to see that our recognizing that we are not the Light is not in itself witnessing. That is only the first and preliminary principle.
A Verbal Witness
The second great principle for witnessing is that we must bear witness to the Light, and this means that we must witness verbally. Our witness must move out of the area of life and into the area of words. If it does not, we will be like the young man who went from a Christian home to a secular college. His parents were concerned how he would make out. So when he arrived home at Christmas they asked him anxiously, “How did you get along?” He answered, “Oh, I got along great. No one even knows that I’m a Christian.” I am not denying the importance of the Christian life, of course. There must be the kind of upright character and true commitment to Christ that will back up the witness by words. We will see more about this in our next study. But, important as it is, the living of the Christian life by itself is not enough for a complete witness; there must also be a verbal witness. We can easily see why this must be so. For one thing, a nonverbal witness is at best merely puzzling to the non-Christian, and it can be totally misunderstood. Some time ago, after I had mentioned witnessing in the context of a message I was giving in a church other than my own, a woman came up to me to tell how she was bearing a witness in her place of employment. She apparently worked in a large office. Just that morning, so she said, as she was going out to lunch, one of the other workers handed her fifty cents and asked her to pick up a packet of cigarettes for him. What did she do? She returned the money, saying that she did not believe in smoking. She said to me that she believed God had helped her to bear a witness for Christ in that situation. I do not want to be too hard on this woman. She had a right, if she wished, to disapprove of smoking. In view of the warnings being given in our day about smoking, probably more non-Christians than ever before are taking this position. Still, the point that I want to make here is that in this case the “witness” to Christ that the woman thought she was giving was really no witness at all. For had I been the man who had asked the favor and been refused, I would probably have considered her rude and never even have thought of her views in terms of Christianity. The second reason why a nonverbal witness is inadequate is that, if it is effective at all, it should lead to a verbal witness. That is, if you are attempting to honor Christ by the way you are living, the things you are doing should lead to conversation about Jesus Christ and what he has meant in your experience. Someone will say, “Oh, but isn’t it true that many persons have been led to Jesus Christ by means of the conduct of some Christian?” That is quite true; many have! The conduct of Christians has been an important step, even an essential step, in the salvation of many thousands of persons. But I am convinced that the matter has never stopped on that level and that these thousands would never have come to Christ unless the witness through the lives of Christians had not moved beyond actions at some point to a consideration of the person and claims of Jesus Christ as these truths were presented to them verbally. People who have greatly moved the world for Christ have been ready to speak at any opportunity. In his book Henceforth, Hugh E. Hopkins tells of Douglas Thornton, an English believer who was being seen off at a railway station in Egypt. With some difficulty his friend found him an empty compartment on the train: “An empty compartment!” Thornton exclaimed. “Why, man, I want to fish.” He moved into a crowded compartment. It is also recorded that, when exploring the Great Pyramid on the outskirts of Cairo, Thornton redeemed the time by evangelizing the guide who was then crawling up a narrow passage on his hands and knees behind him. We find another example in the conversion experience of John Wesley, the father of the Methodist church. Wesley had been a preacher for years before he was genuinely born again, and during this time (as might be expected) his ministry was a failure. After a particularly discouraging experience in the United States, as he was returning from Georgia to England by ship, he came into contact with a body of Moravian Christians. He was very much impressed with the calm they maintained in the midst of a storm at sea. It was not on the ship, however, but later at a meeting in the little chapel at Aldersgate in London, while someone was reading from Luther’s exposition of the letter to the Galatians, that Wesley “felt his heart strangely warmed” and was converted. After that he became one of the greatest evangelists in church history. A verbal witness is a true witness. Thus, throughout the Gospel of John, the stories of those who are reached by Jesus Christ almost without exception end with a spoken profession of their belief. The man born blind is last seen in an attitude of worship, voicing the confession: “Lord, I believe” (John 9:38). The woman of Samaria grows in her understanding of Jesus. At the beginning of the narrative she regards him merely as a Jew (John 4:9). In verse 12 she raises the possibility that he may be greater than the patriarch Jacob. In verse 19 she calls him a prophet. The conclusion comes in her testimony to her neighbors when she argues that he is the Messiah (v. 29). In the same way John the Baptist testifies to the One who takes away the sin of the world.
The Message
Now, if we are to bear a witness to Jesus Christ, clearly we must know something about him. And this means that we must have a message. What is our message? The major parts of the answer to this question are suggested in our story. They are: 1) a witness to who Jesus Christ is; 2) a witness to what he has done; and 3) a witness to how a man or woman can come to know him personally. First, we witness to who Jesus Christ is. John did this when he testified, “This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me’ ” (v. 30). Again, “I have seen and I testify that this is the Son of God” (v. 34). This is where we begin in our witness, because most of the points of Christian doctrine gain their significance from the fact that Jesus Christ is God. If Christ were only a man, then his death on the cross might have been inspiring as an example or a means by which we are excited to good works. We might say, “I never want such a tragedy to happen again” and become a great social worker. But if this is all that Christ is, then his death was in no sense an atonement; he did not die for our sin, and we are still under the condemnation of God and are still the children of wrath. In the same way, if he is not God, then we have no living God to worship, for we cannot know God apart from Jesus Christ. As you begin to witness, let me suggest that you begin here. Begin with Christ’s claims about himself. You might refer to John 5:18, which tells us that Jesus “was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.” He said, “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30). He told the disciples: “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). Most non-Christians have never actually faced these claims, and many have never even heard them. Second, we witness to what Jesus Christ has done. In one sense, of course, this is an overwhelming topic. For if Jesus is God, then all that God has done, and does, Christ does. He has been active in the creation of the world, in guiding the history of redemption, in giving us the Old and New Testaments, in helping us today in temptation, and in other things. Yet there is a sense in which the work of Christ focuses on something much more limited and therefore much easier to share. The focus of Christ’s work is to be found in his death on the cross. Hence, we want to share the meaning of his death when we try to tell others about him. In his day, John the Baptist did this by reference to the Jewish sacrifices. He said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (v. 29). Have you ever given thought to what must have been involved in that statement—for John and for his hearers? For centuries Israel had known all about the sacrificial lamb. They had learned about it first from the story of Abraham, who was the father of their nation. At God’s command Abraham had been going up the mountain to sacrifice his son Isaac when Isaac had turned to him and asked, “Father, … Behold the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb?” Abraham had answered, “My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering.” And God did! Israel had also known about the lamb as a result of the institution of the Passover. On that occasion the blood of the lamb on the doorposts of the house was the sign for the angel of death to pass by. Moreover, they knew that daily in the services of the temple lambs and goats were sacrificed. They knew that in every instance the sacrifices meant the death of an innocent substitute in place of the one who had sinned. On this basis John the Baptist came along and exclaimed, “Look, the Lamb of God.” He recognized that the sacrifices were to be fulfilled in Jesus and that he would bear our sin as Isaiah had said. “Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows.… he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed” (Isa. 53:4–5). I like to think, as many other commentators have suggested, that as John identified Jesus as the sin-bearing Lamb, there may have been passing by the flocks of lambs that were driven up to the walls of Jerusalem each year to serve as sacrificial lambs for the Passover. The Passover feast was not far off (John 2:12–13). Perhaps John was led to refer to Jesus in this fashion because it showed vividly that he was able to deliver from death those who believed on him. Do you believe that? Jesus is able to deliver us from death today. There is that final death, the second death, which is the separation of the soul of the individual from God. He delivers from that. But there are also the little deaths that we experience daily because of our natural alienation from God. Jesus is the answer to those deaths also. If you are a Christian, it is your privilege to tell others of the means by which sin is removed—through faith in the person and death of Jesus Christ—and that the one who believes in him is given new life, peace, joy, and freedom of access to God. Finally, we also witness to the way in which a person can come to know and trust Jesus for himself. John did it by pointing to the fact that Jesus is the giver of the Spirit. He said, “I would not have known him, except that the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down and remain is he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit’ ” (v. 33). What does that mean? It means that Jesus Christ was the One who would give of his Spirit to those who should follow him. Or, to put it another way, it means that Jesus would come to live within the lives of his followers. Thus, when we bear witness to Jesus today, we talk not only of who Jesus is and of what he has done but also of how a person can come to have him enter his life and fill it.
Opening the Door
Someone will ask, “You say that Christ must enter our lives, but you have not told us how that can happen. How does that happen?” The answer is that it happens by faith as we “receive” him or “open” the doors of our lives to his knocking. One statement of that principle occurs in this same chapter in the verse that says: “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (v. 12). Another verse is Revelation 3:20: “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” According to these verses there are two steps to the process. There is the step in which we first “hear” his voice or “believe” in him. Then there is the step in which we “receive him” or “open” to his call. We do this by praying. We say, “Lord Jesus Christ, I admit that I am a sinner and in need of the salvation that you bring to men. I believe that you died for me, so that my sin is atoned for and borne away forever. I now open the door and invite you into my life and ask that you will cleanse me and rule my life forever. Amen.” It is as simple as that, but it must be a definite commitment. The act itself is indispensable. Have you done that? If you have not, you are not a real Christian. It is not enough merely to know about Christ; you must belong to him. On the other hand, if you have done that, then let me ask whether you have ever invited another person to make the same commitment. I can tell you on the basis of my own experience—and that of many others—that there are few joys equal to that which is ours when the invitation is given to believe in Jesus and the person to whom we are witnessing responds and comes to him.
Boice, J. M. (2005). The Gospel of John: an expositional commentary (pp. 109–114). Baker Books.
And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the beau shall be seen in the cloud.Genesis 9:14
Just now clouds are plentiful enough, but we are not afraid that the world will be destroyed by a deluge. We see the rainbow often enough to prevent our having any such fears. The covenant which the Lord made with Noah stands fast, and we have no doubts about it. Why, then, should we think that the clouds of’ trouble, which now darken our sky, will end in our destruction? Let us dismiss such groundless and dishonoring fears.
Faith always sees the bow of covenant promise whenever sense sees the cloud of affliction. God has a bow with which He might shoot out His arrows of destruction. But see, it is turned upward! It is a bow without an arrow or a string; it is a bow hung out for show, no longer used for war. It is a bow of many colors, expressing joy and delight, and not a bow blood-red with slaughter or black with anger. Let us be of good courage. Never does God so darken our sky as to leave His covenant without a witness, and even if He did, we would trust Him since He cannot change or lie or in any other way fail to keep His covenant of peace. Until the waters go over the earth again, we shall have no reason for doubting our God.
The most pressing question we face today is that of the Psalmist: “What is man?” So urgent is the question of man that the question of God has re-emerged among our intellectual and cultural leaders. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Niall Ferguson, Paul Kingsnorth, and Russell Brand have all recently professed faith. Tom Holland and Elon Musk have commented on the importance of Christianity to culture. Most surprisingly, Richard Dawkins has claimed the mantle of “cultural Christian,” though he subsequently assured the world that reports of his spiritual evolution had been greatly exaggerated.
This development is not unprecedented. In 1950, Partisan Review ran a series titled “Religion and the Intellectuals.” The authors included Hannah Arendt, W. H. Auden, I. A. Richards, John Dewey, Robert Graves, A. J. Ayer, Sidney Hook, and Paul Tillich. The editors’ introduction could describe our own moment:
One of the most significant tendencies of our time, especially in this decade, has been the new turn toward religion among intellectuals and the growing disfavor with which secular attitudes and perspectives are now regarded in not a few circles that lay claim to the leadership of culture. There is no doubt that the number of intellectuals professing religious sympathies, beliefs, or doctrines is greater now than it was ten or twenty years ago, and that this number is continually increasing or becoming more articulate. If we seek to relate our period to the recent past, the first decades of this century begin to look like decades of triumphant naturalism; and if the present tendency continues, the mid-century years may go down in history as the years of conversion and return.
That last claim now looks wide of the mark. As significant as that revival of elite sympathy for religion might then have seemed, it did not initiate a long-term change in the overall direction of the West or the cultural fortunes of Christianity.
It is too early to know whether today’s revival will prove more than a fad. But like the earlier one, it indicates something about its context. Today, as in the aftermath of World War II, what it means to be human is contested. Those who perceive this are seeking a stable foundation for an answer, and they are seeking it in religion. The turn to theological matters is one response to an anthropological problem.
It was likewise in 1950, as the world emerged from the slaughter of war, facing the realities of the Holocaust and the spread of communism. Technology, too, posed new challenges. As Sartre commented, the advent of atomic weapons placed human beings in an unprecedented situation: They had to decide to continue to exist. Today the question of what it means to be human is, if anything, more vexed. Yet the shift in the rhetoric surrounding religion offers a glimmer of cultural and political hope.
To adapt a phrase from Nietzsche, the problem in our modern world is that man is dead and we have killed him. The concept of human nature is no longer subject to any kind of consensus, with obvious and catastrophic implications for society. Man has been abolished. So what has led to this abolition? Four causes suggest themselves: Human nature has been dismantled, disenchanted, disembodied, and desecrated.
The dismantling has various causes. The Christianity that shaped western societies’ anthropology was teleological, exemplified by the thought of Thomas Aquinas and summarized in the first question-and-answer of the Westminster Shorter Catechism: “What is the chief end of man? Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.” Humanity was defined by a purpose that transcended the desires of any individual. Man had ends that defined him, some natural, some supernatural. But teleology has been rare in western thinking for generations. As science restricted its consideration of causes to the efficient and the material, understandings of the significance of the world, and therefore of human nature, were transformed. The most obvious examples are theories of evolution that eschew final causality. As they have shaped the modern cultural mindset, they have dismantled the notion of human exceptionalism. When man has no God-given end, he has no stable or distinct nature. In killing God, we kill man.
The point was made by Nietzsche in his critique of Kant. One could not murder God and then expect human nature to do the late God’s work for him. If God had died, so had the notion that human beings were made in his image. Nietzsche’s program was pursued with vigor in the twentieth century by Michel Foucault, who dismantled the notion of human beings as self-constituting, rational agents. He saw them as the hapless products of networks of discursive power relations, a view that now rings out from countless university seminar rooms and underpins the rhetoric of identity politics, left and right.
The irony is that man’s very brilliance—instanced by his intellectual curiosity, analytical abilities, and technological achievements—is what enables him to assert his unexceptional status. Confusion over the question “What is a woman?” has generated headlines in recent years, but it is the result of deeper confusion over the question “What does it mean to be human?” The answer seems to be: “We don’t know whether it means anything at all. Man is a directionless clump of animated cells, drifting through time and space.”
The disenchantment of human nature has many causes and takes many forms. Georg Lukács’s concept of reification points to some of them. The industrialized society and the bureaucratized state treat people as commodities, interchangeable with one another, lacking intrinsic value as individual persons. Industrialization detached labor from community significance. But blaming industrial capitalism alone is tendentious Marxism. The ideologies of the left have also played a role. The sexual revolution, that progressive watershed, has arguably done more than anything to turn people into things. And pornography, the most consistent iteration of the logic of the revolution, makes sex into a commodity, turning the actors on the screen into objects for consumers.
Then there is the transformation of abortion from an evil into a regrettable necessity and then into a right to be celebrated. Society’s moral imagination has been shaped by the logic of the sexual revolution, in which children are deemed accidental to sex; the humanity of the child in the womb has thus been stripped of its mysterious personhood. Much the same is accomplished by reproductive technologies such as in vitro fertilization (IVF) and surrogacy. Though these phenomena witness to the good, indeed very human, desire to have children, they also propose children as things, as consumer items made to order, not begotten in mystery. Motherhood too is transformed, with egg donation and surrogacy turning women into service providers or reproductive machines.
Recent reports that the United Kingdom is on the verge of being able to manufacture sperms and eggs in the laboratory are a harbinger of what is to come. Gene editing, embryo screening, and the commercialization of fertility all tend to the disenchantment and commodification of human life. The term “designer babies” reflects a plausible concept. Human beings, once begotten through the sexual union of two persons, are set to become consumer products. Persons have become things.
The third element of our culture of dehumanization is that of disembodiment. Radical feminism since de Beauvoir has tended to treat women’s bodies and procreative functions as problems that must be solved if sexual equality is to be achieved. This has been reinforced by technologies that subvert natural bodily ends, treating them as bugs rather than features. The body is a hindrance to liberation of the self.
Disembodiment is not restricted to sexual matters. The more our interactions are mediated by technology, whether Uber apps or social media sites, the less important our bodies become. Never in human history has life required less actual, physical, interpersonal engagement. The ascendancy of chatbots, AI, and robotics will only compound this. I can order a meal, ride in a taxi, even have a romantic conversation without ever having to engage another person.
The convenience hides the cost. George Orwell once sent an angry note to a publisher, denouncing Stephen Spender for his homosexuality. Eight months later, he wrote to Spender to apologize. Spender wondered what had led to this change of heart. The answer was that in the interim, Orwell had encountered Spender in person. He explained:
Even if when I met you I had not happened to like you, I should have been bound to change my attitude, because when you meet anyone in the flesh you realise immediately that he is a human being and not a sort of caricature embodying certain ideas.
Meeting Spender in real life humanized him. He became a person, not simply an idea. We might add that it also humanized Orwell. Bodily interaction is key here: Looking into the eyes of another person involves a degree of communion; it reveals that person as a human being, such as we are ourselves. Bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, to borrow biblical language.
Today social media have universalized disembodied social interaction and perhaps made it normative for interpersonal engagement. Disembodied interaction often reduces interlocutors to the sum of the opinions they express and thereby turns them from real persons into aggregates of ideological fragments. No wonder social media can prove to be a cesspool.
The consequences are not restricted to social media. Part of what makes surrogacy plausible is the assumption that the experience of pregnancy is of little importance to the relationship of mother and child—that the maternal bond occurs postpartum. One might object that adoption assumes the same, but the cases are not parallel. In adoption, a couple takes the place of biological parents who should be there but for some reason are not. It presents itself not as a normative model for parenting, but as compensation for a privation. Surrogacy introduces a new model of what a parent is—a model in which gestation is accidental. And it reinforces the transformation of the body into a commodity.
The transgender issue is also pertinent, given that it involves a psychologized view of identity that marginalizes the sexed nature of the body and also the belief that bodies are simply raw material. Such ideas are plausible partly because of the way in which society’s intuitions about embodiment have been shaped by technology.
And then, once again, there is pornography. I noted above its role in disenchanting human nature. It also serves to disembody it—perhaps a counter-intuitive claim, given the central role of bodies in pornography. But pornography separates sex from relationships, indeed from physical contact with another person. Consumers enjoy that quintessentially embodied form of human behavior in a manner that detaches them from any of the ordinary concomitants of sex, from personal hygiene to the effort involved in romantic relationships, not to mention marriage.
Pornography also points to the fourth element of the modern assault on human nature: Human nature has been desecrated. Sex has historically been regarded as having sacred connotations. The Torah deals with sexual matters in terms of cleanness and uncleanness. The Qur’an prescribes postcoital washings. Paul in the New Testament sees sex as a matter of great importance, such that a man’s use of a prostitute involves a fundamental disruption of his humanity and his relationship to the church. To consider sex sacred makes sense, for in creating new life, it is the act that makes humans most like God. The sexual revolution did not simply make sex into recreation; it stripped it, and therefore the human nature of which it is a central part, of its sacredness.
The concept of desecration helps to clarify the delight some people take in the dismantling, disenchanting, and disembodiment of human nature, which those categories in themselves cannot explain. To wish abortion to be “safe, legal, and rare” is to hold a disenchanted view of human nature. But to glory in it as a “reproductive right” bespeaks an exhilaration that only transgression can deliver. Current pro-abortion politics are the politics of transgression, specifically the transgression of what was once considered sacred.
The same applies to death. Cultures have typically surrounded the end of life, no less than its beginning, with sacred significance. The Torah’s approach to sex and cleanness has parallels in its regulation of the treatment of dead bodies. Even today, our laws against the abuse of corpses often use the language of desecration. And yet western societies are making great efforts to transform death from a mystery into a medical procedure—a procedure that governs not just late-stage terminal illness but old age in general, depression, indeed any condition that can be presented as burdensome to the individual, the family, or even the state.
Human nature has been demolished, disenchanted, disembodied, and desecrated. The results are the cause of much of the moral chaos that characterizes contemporary Western societies. The Psalmist’s question “What is man?” was originally meant to express wonder at his undeserved status before God. In our mouths, it expresses our nothingness.
This brings us to the continuity between orthodox Christians and cultural Christians: a shared desire to respond to the chaos on the basis of a stable anthropology, a retrieval of what it means to be human. How can this be done? The question is difficult, because of at least two challenges, which I note here merely as matter for future discussion. First, there is the fact that, whatever its theoretical origins in nineteenth- and twentieth-century thought, as a practical matter the abolition of man has been accomplished by means of technological developments on which we all now depend. The concept of human nature has become negotiable because it seems inseparable from, and largely subject to, the technologies by which we relate to the world and to each other. Nor can we simply withdraw from this technological context. Modern-day anchorites might call us to do so, but it is worth remembering that Simon Stylites could stand at the top of his pole only because other, lesser mortals produced and supplied the food that kept him alive. We must find ways to recover human nature that do not present an unrealistic romanticism as normative for the majority of people.
Second, there is the fact that a lack of social consensus on the existence of God, let alone on religious dogma and practice, precludes consensus on any view of human nature grounded in the divine image. This lack of consensus is a problem, since the response to the desecration of human nature must be its consecration, and consecration must occur in a religious context. Given the secularity of our contemporary context, Christians must be modest about what we can achieve.
Nonetheless, some progress can be made on the first three elements of the anthropological crisis. The Christian distinction between natural and supernatural ends is helpful here. The two cannot be absolutely separated in Christian theology, but evidence suggests that on at least some natural ends, consensus between the religious and the nonreligious can be reached. The revival of interest in religion among intellectuals, even where it is pragmatic rather than dogmatic, witnesses to a shared intuition that our cultural problems arise from anthropological confusion. That fact should encourage us. It may not amount to a return to Christian civilization, if ever there truly was such a thing. But it may mark an era in which discussion of a new humanism can be pursued by both the religious and the nonreligious.
It is no surprise to Christians that attempts to deny human nature end up either in confusion or subject to a dialectical transformation into the opposite of what was intended. Those confusions and transformations are visible to many secular thinkers, too. Therefore, pointing out the failure of secular policies to deliver on their promises is useful in building a humanist alliance and in putting anti-humanists on the defensive. Such immanent critique is a way of making space for genuine dialogue and constructive policy formulation.
Transgender ideology is a good example. At its heart lies an obvious contradiction: It authorizes disembodiment in its denial of the relevance of sexed physiology to gender identity; yet it insists on the transformation of the body, if an individual is to be authentically who he or she really is. The body is simultaneously of no importance and of overwhelming importance. Further, allowing psychological states to determine identity risks incoherence. Why cannot a man be a wolf, for example, if he is convinced that that is what he is? Yet can a human being self-consciously be a wolf, when one attribute of wolfness is unconsciousness of one’s wolfish essence?
The trans issue also exacerbates a strange contradiction within the culture of death. In at least two cases in Canada, depressed individuals have been refused medically assisted deaths after having undergone gender transition surgery. The surgeries had left these individuals in physical and mental pain, but their requests for medically assisted death were refused. We thus note the contradiction generated by progressivism’s commitment both to trans ideology and assisted suicide, for to grant medically assisted death in these cases would be to acknowledge that gender transition does not always resolve gender dysphoria. It would seem that in our progressive Animal Farm, some causes of suffering are more equal than others.
The issue of biological men competing in women’s sports has gripped the public imagination, since its focus on fairness circumvents the issue that makes trans ideology plausible to so many: its foundation in psychologized selfhood and happiness. The sports issue thus offers the opportunity for highlighting the importance of embodiment. Which is more plausible—the prose of a Judith Butler, the libertarianism of the ACLU, or that picture of Riley Gaines standing on a podium beside a man posing as a woman? The case for a new humanism is there made incarnate.
The transgender issue is connected to IVF. President Trump’s actions regarding transgenderism are most welcome, but his promotion of IVF suggests that these policies are not driven by a coherent anthropology. The Trump administration is not wrestling with the broader question: What status should we grant biological limitations in an era of Promethean technology? Disappointing as the inconsistency is, it offers a chance for serious discussion about why these policy decisions are inconsistent.
The sexual revolution is also ripe for critique. Its intention was to liberate, but it has ended up turning everyone into objects. Easy access to the pill was sold as good news for women, but men have gained, too, from the promiscuity it enabled. And, despite the claims of some feminists, pornography is bad news for women, with its exploitative labor practices and transformation of the sexual expectations of its users.
Much of this has recently been pointed out by Mary Harrington and Louise Perry, writers who use secular arguments and evidence. Their work protests both the disembodiment of human nature and its disenchantment, seeing in the sexual revolution a prime example of promises betrayed and humans dehumanized. Likewise, when Jonathan Haidt warns of the effects of social media on young people, he speaks not in religious terms, but from an understanding that human nature is not infinitely pliable. There is the work of David Berlinski, an avowedly secular thinker. There is support across traditional political divides for anti-pornography initiatives. Many parents are becoming skeptical of the role of screens and smartphones in the lives of children. Combine these developments with the renewed interest among intellectuals in Christianity and its cultural influence, and the moment may have arrived for a new humanism. We need not wait for consensus on religious premises before starting these discussions. We need only point to the internal contradictions and the catastrophic consequences of our modern anti-humanist ways.
None of this is to say that a new humanism will certainly emerge in this earthly city. We may not win the day, and one who puts on his armor should not boast as one who takes it off. But there are signs that the anti-humanism of our age is overreaching by pressing the dismantling, disenchantment, and disembodiment of human nature to extremes. Many are realizing that we can fight human nature for only so long. It remains to be seen whether we will self-destruct or a new consensus on what it means to be human will shape our political discourse, our social policies, and our communities. The struggle for our cultural and political future is not best understood as a struggle between right and left, conservative and progressive, but as one between humanists and anti-humanists. And given the lateness of the day, I submit that the hour for advocating a new humanism is upon us.
“Preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct” (1 Peter 1:13–15).
God’s agenda for our lives is for us to be holy, just as he is holy. This holiness is the fruit of what we think or trust and what we desire or worship. We’ve seen that sinful behavior and negative emotions arise when we believe lies about God instead of trusting God’s Word. So Peter tells us to “prepare [our] minds for action.” We’re to fill our minds with truth and battle with our unbelieving thoughts. Peter also tells us not to “conform to the passions” we had when in our “former ignorance” (see also 1 Peter 2:11). The other thing going on in our hearts is that we desire, worship, and treasure. We sin because we desire or worship idols instead of worshipping God.
We Desire or Worship Idols Instead of Worshipping God
We don’t often think of ourselves as worshipping idols because we think of idols in terms of statues and shrines. But God tells the leaders of Israel that they “have taken their idols into their hearts” (Ezek. 14:3). We shouldn’t look down on the Israelites for worshipping idols. We should instead see a mirror of our own hearts.
John Calvin says, “Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.”1 God says, “My people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water.” As a result, they “go after other gods to [their] own harm” and “to their own shame” (Jer. 2:13; 7:6, 19). An idol is anything we look to instead of God for living water. Our double sin is, first, rejecting the truth of God’s greatness and goodness and, second, placing our affections elsewhere.
A god is whatever we expect to provide all good and in which we take refuge in all distress. . . . Whatever you set your heart on and put your trust in, that, I tell you, is your true god. (Martin Luther)2
Idolatry may not involve explicit denials of God’s existence or character. It may well come in the form of an over-attachment to something that is, in itself, perfectly good. . . . An idol can be a physical object, a property, a person, an activity, a role, an institution, a hope, an image, an idea, a pleasure, a hero—anything that can substitute for God. (Richard Keyes)3
Our idols are those things we count on to give our lives meaning. They are the things of which we say, “I need this to make me happy,” or “If I don’t have this my life is worthless and meaningless.” (Tim Keller)4
The New Testament way of talking about idolatry is “sinful desires.” Literally, it is “the lusts of the flesh.” “Lusts” here is not just sexual desire, but all sinful desire. And “flesh” is not talking about our bodies, but about our sinful natures—the bias toward sin that we have from birth. Paul describes “covetousness” or greed as “idolatry” (Col. 3:5). Your idol is whatever you’re greedy for. It may be money, approval, sex, or power. David Powlison says, “If ‘idolatry’ is the characteristic and summary Old Testament word for our drift from God, then ‘desires’ is the characteristic and summary New Testament word for the same drift. Both are shorthand for the problem of human beings.”5 In other words, “sinful desires of the flesh” is another way of talking about the idols of the heart. Tim Stafford says:
The “flesh”—that is, our lives without God—urgently desires many things. It wants power. It wants pleasure. It wants wealth. It wants status and admiration. None of these is wrong in itself. And nothing would be wrong with liking these things. But desire, or lust, is more than liking. It is the will to possess. Lust turns good things into objects of worship. And that is why lust, or covetousness, is so closely linked to another biblical word: idolatry. What we lust for we worship. We may joke about our lusts, but our behavior shows a more fundamental allegiance. We look to our idols to give us what we need—to make our lives rich and purposeful.6
“For where your treasure is,” says Jesus, “there your heart will be also” (Matt. 6:21). Whatever you treasure most is the thing that has your heart and controls your life. The process is described well by our English word captivated. We’re made captive by our desires. Our hearts are captured. We confuse free-willed with self-willed. We think we’re free when we break away from God, but we become enslaved by our own sinful desires. “Whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved” (2 Peter 2:19). “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money” (Matt. 6:24). We serve whatever our hearts desire most. If that desire is for God and his glory, then God is our master. But if our desire is, for example, for money, then money is our master, and that’s idolatry.
God’s agenda for our lives is for us to be holy, just as he is holy.
“When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate” (Gen. 3:6). “Good . . . delight . . . desired.” Eve thought the fruit could give her more than God, and so she desired the fruit. That desire controlled her heart and determined her behavior. This was true of the first sin, and it’s true of all subsequent sin. “Each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death” (James 1:14–15). Sin begins with desire. We’re not sinners because we commit sinful acts. We commit sinful acts because we’re sinners, born with a bias to sin, enslaved by our sinful desires. That’s why we can’t change ourselves simply by changing our behavior. We need God to change us by renewing our hearts and giving us new desires.
Every sin begins in the heart with a sinful desire. “God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen” (Rom. 1:24–25). We’ve seen how sin arises because we exchange the truth about God for a lie. Now we see that sin also arises because God gives us over to the sinful desires of our hearts. It arises when we worship or desire created things rather than the Creator. Our double problem is that we believe lies rather than believing God and worship idols rather than worshipping God.
Desire is at the helm of our lives. It determines our behavior. We always do what we want to do. The question is, which of our desires is strongest at any given moment? An alcoholic may desire or want a drink but refrains from having one. It looks as if he’s not doing what he wants. But what has happened is that another desire (perhaps the desire to avoid shame or losing his family) has trumped the desire for a drink. He’s still doing what he wants; it’s just that the desire for a drink is no longer his biggest desire.7 We excuse ourselves by thinking that we want to be good but are the victims of other factors (circumstances, history, biology, ill health, and so on). But the Bible’s radical view of sin tells us that we are responsible. We always do what we want to do.
But this also gives us hope. In Romans 7, Paul describes someone who says, “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing” (Rom. 7:19). At first sight this might seem to contradict what we’ve been saying. Here is someone who doesn’t do what he wants to do. But the reason he doesn’t follow his good desires is that his sinful desires are stronger and therefore controlling (Rom. 1:24–26; 7:23–25). The answer is, says Paul, the Holy Spirit and the new desires he gives: Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. . . .
Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. (Rom. 8:5, 8–9, NIV)
This understanding humbles us, but it also gives us hope for change. We are changed by faith as we look upon the glory of God and so find him more desirable than anything sin might offer. By faith and through the Spirit, the desire for God trumps the desire for sin.
Notes:
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Vol. 1, trans. F. L. Battles, ed. J. T. McNeil (Philadelphia: Westminster/SCM, 1961), 1.11.8.
Paraphrased from Martin Luther on the first commandment, in The Larger Catechism, Part 1.
Cited in Os Guinness and John Seel, No God but God (Chicago: Moody Press, 1992), 33.
Tim Keller, Church of the Redeemer, Apprenticeship Manual, Unit 2.4.
David Powlison, “Idols of the Heart and ‘Vanity Fair,’” Journal of Biblical Counseling, 13.2. (Winter 1995), 36.
Tim Stafford, “Serious about Lust,” Journal of Biblical Counseling, 13:3 (Spring 1995), 5.
This argument is from Jonathan Edwards, “The Freedom of the Will,” in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, 2 vols. (Ball, Arnold & Co., 1840), 1:1.2.
Tim Chester (PhD, University of Wales) is director of theological studies and lecturer in spiritual formation at Crosslands. He has over 25 years of experience in pastoral ministry, as well as being the author or coauthor of over forty books, including A Meal with Jesus; Reforming Joy; and, with Michael Reeves, Why the Reformation Still Matters.
Justification and sanctification, though related, are different gifts. The most serious, and potentially damning, errors surface when the two are not carefully distinguished.
We have to remember that the vine dresser loves the vine, and the vinedresser loves the branches. And his pruning is not just hacking away or lopping off things carelessly, but he’s very, careful.
Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me.” That exclusive claim has offended people for 2,000 years. In this video, watch a real conversation unfold as God’s standard is held up through the Ten Commandments, the reality of judgment, and the hope of forgiveness through the cross of Christ.
LIVE THIS FRIDAY, 10/03/2025, @ 3PM EDT How We React to Sin / Identity in Christ is Vital – Pastor Patrick Hines Reformed Christian Podcast
A biblical study on how we can react better to sin in ourselves and sin committed against us by others simply by understanding our identity in Christ if we do know Him as our Lord and Savior.
But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw there a man not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And he was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ For many are called, but few are chosen.” (22:11–14)
The fourth and last scene in the parable focuses on an intruder into the wedding feast, who did not belong because he was not dressed in wedding clothes. The man obviously had been included in the general invitation, because the king made no restrictions as to who was invited, having instructed his slaves to call both the evil and good wherever they might be found. He was not a party crasher who came without an invitation, but he had come improperly dressed, and he obviously stood out in the great wedding hall, in stark contrast to all the other dinner guests. At first reading, one wonders how any of those who accepted the king’s invitation could have been expected to come properly attired. They had been rounded up from every part of the land, and many had been taken off the streets. Even if they had time to dress properly, they had no clothes befitting such an occasion as the wedding of the king’s son. But the fact that all of the dinner guests except that one man were dressed in wedding clothes indicates that the king had made provision for such clothes. It would have been a moral mockery, especially for such an obviously kind and gracious ruler, to invite even the most wicked people in the land to come to the feast and then exclude one poor fellow because he had no proper clothes to wear. That man was fully accountable for being improperly dressed, but the gracious king nevertheless gave him an opportunity to justify himself, asking with undeserved respect, “Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?” Had the man had a good reason, he would certainly have mentioned it immediately But he was speechless, unable to offer the king even the feeblest excuse. It is therefore obvious that he could have come in wedding clothes had he been willing. Until that point the man had been utterly presumptuous, thinking he could come to the king’s feast on his own terms, in any clothes he wanted. He was proud and self-willed, thoughtless of the others, and, worst of all, insulting to the king. Arrogantly defying royal protocol, he was determined to “be himself.” But his arrogance was short-lived. When, as the king knew in advance, the man could not excuse himself, the king said to the servants, “Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” The binding of hand and foot probably represents prevention of the man’s resisting as well as prevention of his returning. By that time it was night, and although the wedding hall would be well lighted, it was dark outside. The man was permanently expelled from the presence of the king and of the king’s people into the outer darkness. He would have great regret and remorse, and, with everyone else in that place, he would experience perpetual weeping and gnashing of teeth. But though he had a great opportunity, he had never had, and did not now have, the godly sorrow that leads to repentance and salvation (2 Cor. 7:10). Since Cain’s first attempt to please God by offering his self-appointed sacrifice, men have been trying to come to the Lord on their own terms. They may fellowship with believers, join the church, become active in the leadership, give generously to its support, and speak of devotion to God. Like the tares among the wheat, they freely coexist for a while with God’s people. But in the day of judgment their falsehood will become obvious and their removal certain. Some will dare to say to God “on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then [Christ] will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness’ ” (Matt. 7:22–23). The proper wedding garment of a true believer is God-imputed righteousness, without which no one can enter or live in the kingdom. Unless a person’s righteousness exceeds the hypocritical self-righteousness that typified the scribes and Pharisees, he “shall not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:20). The only acceptable wedding garment is the genuine “sanctification without which no one will see the Lord” (Heb. 12:14). Many of Jesus’ Jewish hearers that day would have recalled the beautiful passage from Isaiah which declares, “I will rejoice greatly in the Lord, my soul will exult in my God; for He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness” (Isa. 61:10). Sincere Jews knew that, contrary to the man-made, legalistic traditions of their rabbis, God not only requires inner righteousness of men but He also offers it as a gift. God’s eyes, of course, can see into men’s hearts to know whether their righteousness is of their own making or His granting. But even outwardly a true believer’s life will evidence right living and reflect right thinking. The Lord not only imputes but imparts righteousness to His children. Only He can see the internal righteousness that He imputes, but everyone can see the external righteousness that He imparts. A child of God is characterized by a holy life. Peter made that fact clear when he described salvation as “obedience to the truth” which has “purified your souls” (1 Pet. 1:22). Just before Jesus declared that prophesying, casting out demons, and performing miracles in His name may be false evidence of salvation, He had said that true evidence of salvation will always be apparent. A person’s spiritual condition will be manifested in the fruit of his living. “Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes, nor figs from thistles, are they?” He had asked rhetorically. “Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit” (Matt. 7:16–17, 21–23). A holy, godly life cannot help bearing righteous fruit, because it is the natural outgrowth of the work of the Spirit within (Gal. 5:22–23). Jesus surely would have been pleased had one of His hearers interrupted and asked, “How can I be clothed in the proper garment? What can I do to keep from being cast into the outer darkness like that man?” He no doubt would have said to that person as He had said many times before in various ways, “Come to Me, that you may have life” (John 5:40). As Paul explained to the Corinthians, God made Christ “who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Cor. 5:21). That is the wedding garment that God demands and His Son provides. Jesus did not ask the Jewish leaders to comment on this parable as He had done with the previous two, where in each case they condemned themselves by their answers (21:31–32, 40–45). He knew they would not be trapped again, because it was now obvious that the whole thrust of the parables was to condemn them. Their only purpose, now heating up to a fury, was to trap and condemn Him to death (22:15; cf. 21:46). Consequently, the Lord closed with the simple but sobering statement, Many are called, but few are chosen. That phrase reflects the scriptural balance between God’s sovereignty and man’s will. The invitations to the wedding feast went out to many, representative of everyone to whom the gospel message is sent. But few of those who heard the call were willing to accept it and thereby be among the chosen. The gospel invitation is sent to everyone, because it is not the Father’s will that a single person be excluded from His kingdom and perish in the outer darkness of hell (2 Pet. 3:9). But not everyone wants God, and many who claim to want Him do not want Him on His terms. Those who are saved enter God’s kingdom because of their willing acceptance of His sovereign, gracious provision. Those who are lost are excluded from the kingdom because of their willing rejection of that same sovereign grace.
MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1985–1989). Matthew (Vol. 3, pp. 310–313). Moody Press.
Great emphasis is placed on the man’s own responsibility and guilt. Does this mean now that the others—those who did accept the robe and are wearing it—have themselves to thank for their deed of obedience? Not at all: 14. For many are called, but few chosen. The gospel call goes forth far and wide. It reaches ever so many. Most of them are like the man in the parable: they hear but do not heed. In comparison with those many that are lost there are but few that are saved, that is, few that are chosen from eternity to inherit life everlasting. Salvation, then, in the final analysis, is not a human accomplishment but the gift of God’s sovereign grace. Cf. Luke 12:32; John 6:39, 44; Eph. 1:4. The question is asked, “Just what is meant by the wedding robe, apart from which everlasting blessedness is impossible?” Passages illustrating the figurative use of a robe or garment are found in both the Old and the New Testament. See Job 29:14; Ps. 132:9; Isa. 11:5; 61:10; Rom. 13:14; Gal. 3:27; Eph. 4:22, 24; Col. 3:8–14; Rev. 19:8; to mention only a few. The charge to put on such a robe cannot mean that a person should base his hope for salvation on his own goodness or moral fitness, for this would be contrary to all of Scripture’s teaching (Job 9:2; Isa. 64:6; Rom. 3:9–18, 23, 24; Eph. 2:8; Rev. 7:14). Does this mean, then, that the wedding garment is to be limited to “the imputed righteousness which is ours by faith”? Not at all. God not only imputes but also imparts righteousness to the sinner whom he pleases to save. Although these two must be distinguished, they must not be separated. Careful study of those passages in Scripture (see above: the list beginning with Job 29:14) that mention the robe with which the sinner must be clothed makes it clear that not only guilt must be forgiven but also the old way of life must be laid aside and the new life to the glory of God must take its place. Briefly, the sinner must, by God’s grace, “put on Christ” (Gal. 3:27). There must be a complete turnabout, a thorough-going renewal or “conversion,” exactly as Jesus himself had taught (Matt. 4:17), and as the apostles after him were going to teach. The one thought of the parable, then, is this: “Accept God’s gracious invitation, lest while others enter into glory you be lost. But remember that membership in the visible church does not guarantee salvation. Complete renewal (including both justification and sanctification), the putting on of Christ, is what is necessary.”
Hendriksen, W., & Kistemaker, S. J. (1953–2001). Exposition of the Gospel According to Matthew (Vol. 9, pp. 798–799). Baker Book House.
“We are, heart and soul, friends to the freedom of the press. It is however, the prostituted companion of liberty, and somehow or other, we know not how, its efficient auxiliary. It follows the substance like its shade; but while a man walks erect, he may observe that his shadow is almost always in the dirt. It corrupts, it deceives, it inflames.” —Fisher Ames (1807)
FDA approves new generic form of drug used in 63% of abortions: “The most pro-life president in our nation’s history,” as Donald Trump refers to himself, must have been asleep at the wheel on this one. Mifepristone is a drug available by mail in most of the U.S. that kills preborn babies by starvation and also harms mothers. The first Trump administration approved a generic form of the drug, and on Tuesday, it approved a second generic form. HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon complained that the FDA has very little discretion in approving generic drugs, as long as evidence is provided that proves they are identical to the name brand. Evita Solutions, which secured the approval, is dedicated to providing abortions to everyone “regardless of where they live.” Mifepristone is especially dangerous because it can be mailed to a home and taken without oversight.
Apple yanks ICE-tracking app: The anti-immigration enforcement app ICEBlock, which gave users the location of ICE agents, has been removed from Apple’s App Store. Apple explained that it had done so as a result of “information we’ve received from law enforcement about the safety risks associated” with the app. Attorney General Pam Bondi heralded the news, explaining, “ICEBlock is designed to put ICE agents at risk just for doing their jobs, and violence against law enforcement is an intolerable red line that cannot be crossed.” This reality was demonstrated last week when an individual who expressed animus toward immigration enforcement used a similar app when he targeted and shot at an ICE facility in Dallas, killing two detainees and injuring two others. Despite the attack, the app’s developer, Joshua Aaron, denied that his app had harmed any law enforcement officers.
“Armed conflict” with cartels: On Thursday, the Trump administration officially notified Congress in a memo that the U.S. is engaged “in a non-international armed conflict” with drug cartels that have recently been officially designated as “terrorist organizations.” The memo highlights the U.S. military’s strike against a cartel boat transporting illicit drugs last month, defending the action as in keeping with Donald Trump’s “constitutional authority as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive to conduct foreign relations.” This memo appears to be in response to a number of lawmakers, mostly Democrats, who have accused Trump of exceeding his powers in using the military to attack drug cartels. The memo contends that these cartels have “grown more armed, well-organized, and violent” and “have the financial means, sophistication, and paramilitary capabilities needed to operate with impunity.” Furthermore, much of this “narco-terrorism” is tied to Nicolas Maduro’s regime in Venezuela.
Conservative journalist arrested outside Portland ICE facility during clash with antifa: Conservative journalist Nick Sortor’s coverage of antifa’s antics outside a Portland ICE facility led to him being taken into custody. Sortor was posting videos of antifa shouting at ICE and ICE-friendly citizens when antifa turned on him. Fox News’s Bill Melugin spoke to Sortor following his arrest and learned that antifa surrounded Sortor, pushing him to the ground and throwing a punch. Sortor defended himself and then disengaged, walking over to Portland police officers, where he was surprised to be arrested. Sortor and two others were charged with second-degree disorderly conduct. Sortor has since been released from custody.
Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Ed: On Wednesday, the Trump administration unveiled a 10-point initiative aimed at refocusing America’s institutions of higher education on academic excellence. Dubbed the “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education,” the plan offers “substantial and meaningful federal grants” to universities that sign onto it. The compact includes requiring schools to ban all race- or sex-based admissions and hiring practices, placing a five-year freeze on tuition, limiting international students to 15% of undergraduate enrollment, requiring the SAT or a similar test for application, and eliminating grade inflation. Furthermore, the initiative calls for schools to ensure a “vibrant marketplace of ideas on campus,” while also eliminating departments that “purposefully punish, belittle, and even spark violence against conservative ideas.” The memo has been sent to nine universities thus far.
Hanoi Jane relaunches her father’s free speech group: Henry Fonda first launched the Committee for the First Amendment in an attempt to protect communist subversives in Hollywood, so it’s no surprise that his daughter Jane has resurrected the group in response to Jimmy Kimmel’s non-cancellation. The committee released a statement alleging that the current government is engaged in a campaign to silence critics “in government, the media, judiciary, academia, and the entertainment industry.” The committee correctly points out that free speech is not a partisan issue, but one wonders where it was when Big Tech bowed to Biden administration pressure to silence any opinion that strayed from The Narrative™. White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson pointed out that far from being censorious, Donald Trump has been the victim of censorship and supports free speech, calling the group’s allegations “laughable.”
Americans’ trust in the media keeps falling: Democrats age 50 and above trust the media, but no one else does. Every group of Republicans has a majority distrust in the media, and even young Democrats don’t trust them. In 2021, 40% of respondents had a “great deal” or “fair amount” of trust in mainstream media; last year, that number fell to 31%, and this year it’s down to 28% with no end in sight. Asked about confidence in the media, seven in 10 U.S. adults have “not very much” or “none at all.” Republican trust in the media has fallen to a staggering 8%.
Greenpeace looks to EU court to avoid paying U.S. jury verdict: In May, a North Dakota jury ruled in favor of Energy Transfer, a Dallas-based energy company, in its lawsuit against Greenpeace over the environmentalist activist organization’s year-long efforts to block the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline. The jury awarded Energy Transfer a $667 million verdict, a sum that effectively bankrupts Greenpeace, leading to its shuttering. In an effort to stave off elimination, Greenpeace International filed a countersuit based on a new law established by the European Union. That law is designed to protect activists from “strategic lawsuits against public participation.” Greenpeace has taken its case to a Dutch court, hoping to void the U.S. verdict. However, according to Brady Pelton, vice president and general counsel for the North Dakota Petroleum Council, “Whatever the outcome in the Netherlands, it cannot overturn the North Dakota judgment.”
Headlines
Kavanaugh’s attempted assassin to be sentenced today (The Hill)
U.S. to provide Ukraine with intelligence for missile strikes deep inside Russia (WSJ)
Bari Weiss to lead CBS News as part of major shakeup (NY Post)
Trump admin cancels one of Gavin Newsom’s favorite green energy grants (Washington Free Beacon)
Walmart will no longer use synthetic food dyes in store-brand products (Not the Bee)
Church of England names Sarah Mullally first woman Archbishop of Canterbury (Fox News)
Humor: Dems call for commonsense sombrero control (Babylon Bee)
Democrats can always count on their propagandists in the Leftmedia to advocate the party line.
In the case of the ongoing government shutdown, the media has generally dutifully blamed Republicans, who, they note, control both chambers of Congress and the White House (never mind that pesky Senate filibuster Democrats want to abolish except when they can use it). After this reporting, they poll viewers asking who to blame. Viewers regurgitate what they’re told, and then the media can report that more Americans blame Republicans than Democrats. That’s what we call pollaganda.
But there are some cracks in the unified facade.
Before I get to that, one example of Democrat propaganda is former Clintonista George Stephanopoulos, who regularly uses his platform on ABC to challenge Republicans and aid Democrats. This week, he conducted back-to-back interviews with House Speaker Mike Johnson and Democrat Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries.
Predictably, Stephanopoulos pressed Johnson with loaded questions like this doozy: “The Democratic proposal is designed to prevent millions of Americans from losing their health insurance, losing Medicaid coverage, or paying higher healthcare premiums. Why are you against that?”
Translation: When did you stop beating your wife?
Johnson shook his head and then replied, “That’s an absurd statement.” He proceeded to explain how Democrats’ proposed changes to the clean continuing resolution would, in fact, allow illegal aliens back on the healthcare dole. I gave a more detailed explanation yesterday while reviewing the hilarious sombrero memes.
In any case, Stephanopoulos was antagonistic — which is his right as a journalist — for the entire interview. He was completely different, however, when it came time to talk to Hakeem Jeffries. He tossed softballs without offering a single challenge in response. He closed by worrying that “Democrats will get blamed for the shutdown and the unity’s going to erode.”
Now, back to those cracks.
Jake Tapper, who spent four years covering for Joe Biden’s cognitive decline before cashing in to write a book about how everyone else covered it up, was not nearly as kind to Jeffries as Stephanopoulos was. Granted, he began by agreeing with Jeffries that “it’s a lie” for Republicans to say that Democrats “want to give health insurance to undocumented immigrants.” But he also acknowledged that Democrats are playing semantics games, and that, actually, Republicans have a point.
What you support does bring back funding for emergency Medicaid to hospitals, some of which does pay for undocumented immigrants and people who don’t have health insurance. And also, there is this provision, and it’s not about undocumented immigrants. It’s about people with asylum seekers and people with temporary protected status, et cetera, et cetera, but about their ability to get Medicaid. So they’re noncitizens. They’re not undocumented. They’re not illegal. Why even include that in a bill, knowing that they’re going to seize right upon that and use that to message?
That’s typical weaselly language to put the ultimate blame on the GOP for the fact that Democrats changed the legal status of aliens in order to give them benefits, but still. It wasn’t a softball, and he didn’t let Jeffries get away with dodging the question, asking, “Do you not think that the provisions that provide healthcare for noncitizens muddies that message?”
CBS host Tony Dokoupil attempted to ask Senator Elizabeth Warren roughly the same question, but Warren steamrolled him in response. To his credit, he stuck to the question about “a restoration of Medicaid benefits for certain noncitizens,” though: “Why put it in there? Why is it worth it?”
On Wednesday, Politico ran an article by Adam Wren reporting on the Democrats’ pathetic attempt to livestream the shutdown, as well as “other cringe moments” in their marathon. Wren could hardly believe how lame the Democrats were in their efforts, and he found it equally disastrous how few Americans tuned in to that livestream — often just over a hundred people.
Another Politico reporter, Rachael Bade, posted a rhetorical bomb on X: “DEMOCRATS shut the government down. Not Republicans. Small technicality, I know. (Facts are funny things!)” Left-wingers in the comments went insane.
Fox News isn’t left-wing, of course, but it probably wins the award for the funniest challenge to a Democrat this week.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen falsely asserted, “I haven’t heard anybody in my party saying that illegal immigrants should get access to the health insurance marketplace.”
“I’m so glad you said that,” replied Fox’s Lawrence Jones. “Actually, I have some tape…” And then he proceeded to roll the tape from a 2019 Democrat presidential debate in which every single candidate on stage, including Joe Biden, raised their hands when asked if their healthcare plan included coverage for illegals.
Devastating.
The truth is that Democrats offer all sorts of incentives for illegal aliens, including health coverage by whatever magic wand-waving is necessary to make them eligible. Then they deny that’s what they’re doing when confronted with the fact that such policies aren’t terribly popular with Americans.
While Democrats conspire to pass out “free” goodies to illegals, we all remember how they fined every American who didn’t buy health insurance and then patted themselves on the back for their “compassion.”
Douglas Andrews: The FBI Dumps ADL and SPLC Haters — Once-proud fighters against racial, ethnic, and religious bigotry, the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center have since lost their way, and the FBI has rightly ended its partnership.
Emmy Griffin: Mass Somali Immigration Fraud: Deport Ilhan Omar! — Immigration fraud is being investigated at scale in Minneapolis, and one can only hope the allegations surrounding Rep. Omar are settled one way or another.
Thomas Gallatin: Behind Christianity Today’s Leftist Drift — The once-great conservative Christian evangelical publication, founded by Billy Graham, has increasingly shifted to the left. To explain why, follow the money.
Brian Mark Weber: Is TrumpRx a Good Idea? — President Donald Trump announced a deal with Pfizer to provide discounts on prescription drugs. If successful, Americans needing a break will welcome it.
Mark Alexander: Profiles of Valor: LTC George Hardy (USAF) — “Someone was looking out over me. I feel it. Someone up there likes me, and I was able to make it out alright.”
Ron Helle: Faintly — My experience over the years is that I need to make the effort to get alone and quiet my anxious mind if I am to hear the whisper of God.
J.K. Rowling Has Had It! — Grab the popcorn as we untangle “The Witch Trials” featuring author J.K. Rowling and actress Emma Watson.
What Is a Fascist? — Patriot Post Managing Editor Nate Jackson interviews with Greg Seltz, host of “The Drive Home Show,” about the true definition of fascism.
Dems Get Trump-Trolled — A meme meant to satirize the absurd lengths Democrats would go to for votes caused the Left to hyperventilate.
How We Got Iran’s Nuclear Secrets — Yossi Cohen, a former Mossad director, gives his perspective on Israel’s current war with Hamas.
SHORT CUTS
Non Compos Mentis
“There’s a hypocrisy with certain Christians who are ‘pro-life,’ but they will pull that electric chair switch. They are pro-life, but they have their AR-15s in their cabinet. They are pro-life, but they don’t mind immigrant families being torn from each other. They are pro-life, but they don’t care about little children’s subsidies being taken away from them. That is not pro-life.” —”The View” co-host Sunny Hostin
Demagogue
“In Minneapolis, we don’t look at them as undocumented immigrants. We look at them as our neighbors. We love them. They make our city a better place.” —Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey
Extreme Projection
“For decades, Republicans have consistently shut the government down as part of their efforts to try to extract and jam their extreme right-wing agenda down the throats of the American people.” —House Democrat Leader Hakeem Jeffries
For the Record
“You’d need an Excel spreadsheet to keep track of all the Senate Democrats’ demands for reopening the government. It’s totally unserious — and it’s all about politics.” —Sen. John Kennedy
“Total federal spending in fiscal 2019, the last before COVID, was $4.45 trillion. In fiscal 2024, it was $6.75 trillion. That is an increase of 52% in just five years. It is a situation that is not, as they say, sustainable. And that is what the current shutdown showdown is about.” —Byron York
Belly Laugh of the Day
“If Democrats really cared about furloughed workers, they’d give them some of Pelosi’s stock tips.” —Jimmy Failla
Observations
“It should not surprise us … that as Christianity is gradually eroded as a cultural foundation, humans become disposable rather than indispensable, and the value of life becomes transactional rather than transcendent; about money rather than morals.” —Laura Hollis
“It’s comical that liberal journalists consider themselves as the guardians of democracy — a major part of Western civilization — but appear so supportive of … tyrannical Islamism.” —Tim Graham
Law and Order
“The idea that there is a square inch of block in this city where a citizen doesn’t feel safe is unacceptable. This is Memphis, this is the United States of America, and all that bulls**t is done. It’s over. It’s finished.” —White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Stephen Miller
And Last…
“Pundits accused Secretary of War Pete Hegseth of ‘fat shaming’ our troops and generals. Well, the only tanks in the military should be weapons, not people who look like tanks!” —Gary Bauer
ON THIS DAY in 1789, President George Washington issued the first Proclamation of a National Day of Thanksgiving and Prayer to Almighty God. “Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the Providence of Almighty God,” he wrote, “we may … unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations.”
Please join us in prayer for our nation — that righteous leaders would rise and prevail and we would be united as Americans. Pray for the protection of our uniformed Military Patriots, Veterans, First Responders, and their families. Lift up your Patriot Post team and our mission to support and defend our legacy of American Liberty and our Republic’s Founding Principles, in order that the fires of freedom would be ignited in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.
Deal must be reached or “ALL HELL WILL BREAK OUT.”
Hostages must be released — alive and the bodies of the dead.
Trump: Hamas is “surrounded and militarily trapped,” but given one last chance.
These savages deserve no mercy. Hamas has been given too many chances. Stop rewarding butchery and annihilationism.
President Trump gives Hamas a 6pm Sunday deadline to agree to a deal… or else
POTUS: “An Agreement must be reached with Hamas by Sunday Evening at SIX (6) P.M., Washington, D.C. time. Every Country has signed on! If this LAST CHANCE agreement is not reached, all HELL, like no… pic.twitter.com/ulHopceaQR
DONALD TRUMP
Trump puts Hamas on notice with deadline to accept Gaza peace deal
President issues Hamas ultimatum on Truth Social with Sunday evening deadline
By Bonny Chu, Fox News, October 3, 2025:
⚠️ TRUMP GIVES HAMAS A DEADLINE: SUNDAY 6 PM (WASHINGTON)
• Deal must be reached or “ALL HELL WILL BREAK OUT.”
• Hostages must be released — alive & the bodies of the dead.
Trump: Hamas is “surrounded and militarily trapped,” but given one last chance.
Former senior policy advisor Kiron Skinner on President Trump’s executive order vowing to defend Qatar, why Hamas is ‘isolated’ in the region and news that the U.S. will provide Ukraine with intelligence for missile strikes deep inside Russia.
NEWPresident Donald Trump issued a blistering public warning to Hamas on Friday, saying the “ruthless” terrorist group will be “hunted down, and killed” unless they release the remaing Israeli hostages and reach an agreement by Sunday evening.
“They will be given one last chance” Trump said in a post on Truth Social. “THIS DEAL ALSO SPARES THE LIVES OF ALL REMAINING HAMAS FIGHTERS!”
He added that innocent Palestinians should immediately move out of areas at risk of “potentially great future death,” saying those who relocate would be cared for by relief efforts.
Seafarers in the Mediterranean can breathe a sigh of relief, as that mangy scourge of the high seas, Greta Thunberg, has been arrested after she was among the passengers of the 39-vessel flotilla intercepted by Israeli forces.
Laura Ingraham, Jesse Watters, Sean Hannity and Greg Gutfeld bring Fox News viewers their fresh takes on the top news of the day. #foxnews #news #us #fox #media #usa #politics #government #governmentshutdown #mikejohnson #hakeemjeffries #political #politicalnews #democraticparty #democrats #democrat #aoc #alexandriaocasiocortez #nancypelosi #chuckschumer
Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich slams the Democratic Party for causing the government shutdown on ‘Jesse Watters Primetime.’ #fox #foxnews #usnews #news #media #usa #us #democrats #governmentshutdown #congress #politics #jessewatters #primetime #washingtondc #capitolhill #budgetfight #political #politicalnews #democraticparty #democrat
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NEWS: A deadly attack outside a UK synagogue is declared a terrorist incident, with officials warning of rising antisemitism. Plus, “Duck Dynasty’s” Uncle Si is hospitalized but recovering.
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FOCUS STORY: Former meteorologist Arch Kennedy opens up about leaving a gay lifestyle behind after an encounter with Jesus transformed his life.
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MAIN THING: Once known as clean and safe, Minneapolis now struggles with crime, homelessness, and dwindling police ranks — Dale Hurd reports.
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LAST THING: Psalm 34:15 reminds us: “The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are attentive to their cry.”
Israeli leaders reacted strongly to the terror attack on a British synagogue on the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Lawmakers in Washington remain deadlocked on day 3 of the Government shutdown as some federal employees’ risk facing permanent layoffs. America’s National Parks are hosting record numbers of visitors. Tourists from across the Nation and the world come to experience natural wonders in all their beauty. Devon Franklin is making waves over at Netflix with his latest film. He partnered up with Tyler Perry to bring the story of Ruth & Boaz to the small screen.
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