The Sword Room

In the fall of 1975 I helped a young girl, just nineteen years old then, from the remote hills of Clearwater, Idaho, carry her suitcases up to her College dorm room. In the week that followed I asked her out twice and she refused both times. Finally, when I offered to take her for her first trip to a big city, she agreed to go with me to Seattle. We had a great time and she eventually realized she liked me.

Then loved me, married me, had six kids with me, supported me in ministry, and made a great home with me in Blaine, Washington. Now that our children are adults we enjoy our time together more than ever.

When we first met she was mortified when she saw the disastrous state of my dorm room. Soon she was doing my laundry and helping me color-coordinate my clothes because she didn’t want to be seen in public with me wearing some of the ensembles I put together. To this day she buys all my clothes and still does all the laundry. There are advantages to being a dumb guy and not knowing how to fold towels and T-shirts the right way.

But I have changed so much because of her presence in my life. For example, I cannot stand a dirty kitchen. I am one of those cooks who washes each item as he uses it to avoid a mess. If I come home from work first and see a few dishes piled up I do them. If I see clutter in a room, which does not happen often, I pick it up. If it were not for her presence in my life I would be a slob.

And I would no doubt be living in a messy studio apartment somewhere with nothing in it aesthetically pleasing to the eye. As it is I live in a home that is the stuff of decorating magazine photo spreads. Connie loves antiques and has been blessed with a job where she not only buys and sells them, but has first pick of the lot at the estate sales she runs and frequents.

I learned how to do carpentry because of her. Together we built the additions to our house. We did all the framing wiring, plumbing, and roofing ourselves. I never knew how to do any of this before I met her, and I doubt if I would have ever learned without her.

She has never touched a drop of alcohol in her life, whereas I came from a background of drinking and drugging. I honestly believe the Lord brought her into my life as a restraining force, and there is no telling where my life might have led if not for her presence.

Sometimes when people visit our home they will ask her things like, “Oh, who built these nice corner shelves?” And I am proud to hear her say, “Pete made those for me.”

You might ask what it would be like if she were in my life and I had not changed in any way for the better, and I would tell you that what you are suggesting is impossible. There would be no way to have Connie in my life that long and not be a changed man.

So after writing that blog yesterday I was thinking about how to some the concept of making full proof of one’s calling and election through diligent cultivation of spiritual fruit smacks of legalism. But by way of analogy, if having a loving spouse cannot help but transform jerks like Yours Truly, how is it that we as believers could imagine having the perfect Creator and sustain-er of the universe in our lives–having rescued us from death and made us alive through the miracle of regeneration–and our lives showing no clear and obvious evidence of His presence?

Now it is not my job to make full proof of your calling and election; nor is this what the text cited in yesterday’s blog tells us to do. We are to make full proof of our own calling and election. Then again, just as it would be hard for anyone who ever knew me before and after Connie to not see the positive changes her presence has made in my life, it would be a rare thing to spend extended time around a true believer and not eventually some clear sign of Christ’s presence.

It is not my job to fruit inspect your life. I have no desire to do this. The Lord knows those who are His. Just think about it.

Wow! Just finished 1 Peter and got into 2 Peter 1 yesterday. What a wake up call for lazy slothful believers. (I admit I have been a bit of a slug lately.)

In 1:3 we are told that God’s power has granted us all the resources necessary for life and godliness. We already have all we need with the means of grace God has provided. Time to use what we’ve got.

Foremost on the list are his great and precious promises, contained in the written word of God. These are sufficient to transform us to the image of Christ and make us partakers of the divine image. We are so accustomed to think we need this or that self-help technique or tidbit of pseudo-wisdom from the realm of pagan pop psychobabble. When will we learn that the God-breathed Word is capable of rendering us complete and thoroughly equipped for every good work (2 Tim. 3:17)?

Verse 5 tells us to be diligent–literally to give urgent attention to. To make haste. Then the writer piles one Christian virtue upon another–faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. He goes on to say that if we are possessors of these qualities and growing in them we will never prove to be worthless or fruitless in the knowledge of Christ. And here the Greek construction is called an objective genetive, which simply means that Christ is the thing or person known–not a mere head full of facts about Jesus.

Want to get to know Jesus better? Get off your butt and make haste to grow in the fruit of the Spirit. The alternative is to be short-sighted and forgetful of His forgiving grace.

Grace makes haste.

Verses 10-11 tell us a bit about assurance of salvation. Want to make proof of His calling and choosing of you? Be diligent to grow in the Christlike virtues through the means of grace He has provided. In this way the entrance into His kingdom will be richly supplied.

You think this savors of works-salvation? Time to start thinking biblically. Justification is totally by faith. The writer assumes in 1:1 that his readers are saved. There is no merit involved in serving God as he has described. We serve God from the heart because we love Jesus and want to be like Him. You see, God is not dead. And when He regenerates you neither are you. The true believer might experience seasons of doubt and decline, but ultimately his faith perseveres because He who began the good work in him always sees it through to completion (Phil. 1:6). The true child of God in this way makes full proof his calling and election.

And so, my believing readers, you love Jesus and want to serve Him. Don’t you? Maybe things have been a bit rough lately, but you are not happy to stay there. Crack your Bible. Call up that brother in the Lord and talk for awhile about the things of Christ. Go on a walk alone and enjoy fellowship with Jesus. Use what ya’ got to grow in the fruit of the Spirit. Be zealous and passionate in your pursuit.

Recently at my 40th high school class celebration I was convicted at how meagre my service to the Lord has been. I prayed the The Lord would breathe into this 58 year-old guy a spirit of Caleb, who was more ready than ever to conquer in the name of Yawheh at 80 than he had been decades earlier.

Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God. For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousals, drinking parties and abominable idolatries (1 Peter 4:1-3).

There is so much in this short passage. We are to adopt the attitude Christ had while He was on earth–we are to arm ourselves with it. And just what mind-set was it that Christ had? As far as I can tell it was this: life on this earth is not about me being happy but about glorifying God and accomplishing His purpose. For Jesus this meant suffering–rejection, ridicule, physical injury, and even death. It meant self-denial and a foregoing of many of the creature comforts we take for granted.

Now when it says in our passage that he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, I can only offer my own theory about what Peter means. Affluence and idle time breed boredom and discontent. When I am in my comfort zone it is easy to think about what I want when I want it. Life is about me. We invert Jesus’ statement to say, I have come into the world not to serve, but to be served. A little suffering in the flesh–whether it be through some physical affliction or persecution–is a bucket of cold water in the face of our entitlement mentality. Life is about God and His purpose, and about serving Him and others. When we arm ourselves with this attitude it is as though we do not have time to waste on sin.

Which fits with what Peter says next about the time already past being sufficient to carry out the various lusts of the Gentiles listed. It is as though some of his readers were still dabbling in the pleasures of the old life, and Peter tells them that if they had armed themselves with Christ’s attitude they would not want to squander their remaining time in this world fulfilling the lusts of the flesh, but rather doing the will of God. Then he says that the time already past was sufficient to have wallowed in sin. Time to move on.

Peter’s words remind me of the exhortation the writer of Hebrews offers his readers:

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, for you have come to need mild and not solid food (Hebrews 5:12).

Read on in the Hebrews and 1 Peter passages and you will see that the consequences are dire for those professing believers who continue to spin their wheels. All this is very convicting to me. I have had a relatively easy life, comparatively speaking; and with that has come a degree of laziness and spiritual sloth. Others with whom I have shared these ideas say the same thing. It is not like we are asking for suffering, but we do need an attitude adjustment. Somehow we need to get it through our heads that this life is not about us. That God is not all about us. Our pleasure and happiness is not the chief end of man, but rather the glory and enjoyment of Him. Let me remind you that we are Christians, not Epicureans.

When I first got saved I was going with a girl who was an unbeliever. We had been going together for a couple years, and our relationship was not honoring to the Lord. It was as if I had one foot in the kingdom of God and the other foot in my old worldly life. The regenerate part of me hungered and thirsted for the reality of Christ, but my flesh craved its pleasures. I remember finally sitting out in my favorite place of prayer–a large rock overlooking the Kent Valley–and asking God to deliver me. He did, but in a way which resulted in some of the most intense emotional anguish I have ever experienced. But as agonizing as that period in my life was, I can tell you that never before or since has my singularity of focus ever more acute. Life was 100% about Jesus and His kingdom and righteousness.

But Satan and sin never go on vacation, and the lusts of the flesh simply morph into a different form and seek to get our focus off serving God and others and onto ourselves and what makes us happy now. It gets so old sometimes. Peter tells us that we should arm ourselves with Christ’s purpose because the time of living for our flesh is sooooooooo over. I am almost at the point where I can say, Lord, if it takes suffering of some kind to produce the needed attitude and behavioral adjustment, then so be it!

I said almost.

My mother in law is visiting us this week. She hails from a little jerkwater town in Idaho, where she attends a small Baptist congregation run by two strong stubborn females. I was surprised when she told me these two ladies think Saint Paul was  jerk and a male chauvinist. Then again, the apostle did tell women to be quiet in church (1 Cor. 14:34), to not teach or have authority over men (1 Tim. 2:11-13), and to submit to their husbands (Eph. 5:24). But one cannot help but think that if these two women are so peeved at Paul for the reasons stated, they would love to get their hands around the throat of Peter. Check this out:

Wives, likewise, be submissive to your own husbands, that even if they do not obey the word, they, without a word, may be won by the conduct of their wives, when they observe your chaste conduct accompanied by fear. Do not let your adornment be merely outward–arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel–rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God. For in this manner, in former times, the holy women who trusted in God also adorned themselves, being submissive to their own husbands, as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, whose daughters you are if you do good and are not afraid with any terror (1 Peter 3:1-6).

Last night as I lay in bed and looked over at Connie, the thought of this passage made me laugh. I do not think of her as submissive and obedient, although she does have a gentle and quiet side to her. However I can guarantee you she has never referred to me as lord. Frankly, I wouldn’t want her to. Peter even tells women to be submissive when their husbands are in disobedience to God. Passages like this have always been hard for some to accept, and ever more so now in this day of so-called progress and enlightenment. As I have meditated on the Greek text of this portion of scripture I have come up with the following ways of dealing with what it says.

1. Simply reject it outright. Basically, what we are saying when we take this option is that Peter and Paul were flat out wrong, which would implicitly mean they were in disagreement with the Lord. In that event we would have to deny that they wrote under divine inspiration–or that sometimes they did and sometimes not. At this point we open an epistemological can of worms: how can we know when a biblical writer is producing Spirit-inspired Scripture and when he is blowing air out his derriere? Existential and Neo-Orthodox thinkers, who deny the verbal inspiration and inerrancy of the Word of God, would say you must rely on the subjective inner witness of the Holy Spirit to discern when God is speaking. Surely you can see the utter confusion which results from such an approach.

2. Another solution is to say that the prohibitions and submission commands given to women are culturally conditioned. In other words God was accommodating Himself  to the culture of the day. In the ancient culture women did not enjoy as many freedoms as today, and in an attempt to avoid disruption in marriages and families as well focus on the proclamation of the gospel, God commanded women to submit to the sexist mores of that more socially primitive era. The slavery passages in the New Testament are said to be analogous. Obviously slavery is a great evil, but rather than crusade against it, Paul and Peter chose instead to encourage obedience by the slaves and fairness by their masters. The argument then proceeds as follows: we do not have slaves today, so the slave-master commands do not directly apply (not even to the employer-employee relationship, as some have mistakenly taught). Similarly, since the cultural conditions which gave rise to the commands to women to be silent and submit at church and home no longer exist, those directives no longer apply to today’s liberated women. We might also mention polygamy, but I think the point has been made.

I think both options are false, but the first has more intellectual integrity. It is unbelief plain and simple, whereas option #2 is unbelief dressed in intellectual garb and half-truth. It is true that some things in scripture are culturally conditioned. No, we do not have slaves today because slavery is illegal. But nowhere does the Bible condemn and forbid slavery per se. Rather, Scripture regulates the practice of slavery as a corrective against harsh treatment of slaves. The point is this: God does not regulate sin–He condemns it. He forbids stealing, lying, murder, adultery, fornication, and idolatry outright. The fact that He regulates such things as divorce and slavery indicates that these practices, while short of the ideal, are not always sinful in and of themselves. The same could be said for polygamy. Of course because slavery and polygamy are against the law it would be a violation of Scripture (Rom. 13) to practice either. So cultural conditioning comes into play in these cases.

However when Paul discusses the submission of women to male authority in the church and headship in the marriage relationship, he does not appeal to culture but creation (1 Corinthians 11:8-12; 1 Tim. 2:11-13). Male headship is a part of the created order. While it was perverted and marred by the introduction of sin, it was not eradicated. Therefore, as long as men are men and women are women God’s design will stand. We can deny it, ignore it, and pervert it, but we cannot get away from it.

To me the bottom line is that we must look at the spirit and intention behind the commands given to women in the New Testament. This morning I jokingly asked Connie to pour a cup of coffee for her lord. She complied and gave me a dirty look, and for a split second I thought I might be wearing my coffee instead of drinking it. But here’s the thing: she exhibits those godly qualities behind the biblical injunctions. She is no doormat, but then again she does not bark the commands either. (Strong suggestions–yes.)

Anyway, that’s all I have to say about this. I hope it will generate some lively discussion.

Last week I went to my 40 year high school reunion. The turnout was great. It’s a good thing they make everyone wear name tags at these things because otherwise no one would recognize each other. There was Roger Coleman, the kid who sat across from me at the table in kindergarten during the school year of 1958-59. I have a vivid memory of Roger throwing up what looked like beef stew all over that table. Then there was Zola, the sister of a friend. She helped me through an important rite of passage in the seventh grade: my first kiss. How unflattering to discover she doesn’t even remember it. I saw Mr. Ancheta, now in his seventies. I took his algebra class twice and squeaked through with a D the second time around. Jim Champagne and I reminisced about the time when we were water skiing and his leg got chewed up badly by the prop of the boat. Mark Louvier remembered the time I accidentally elbowed him in the gonads in wrestling practice and put him out of commission for the rest of turnout. Steve Pool, the weatherman at one of the Seattle television stations, promised to send me a DVD copy of the old senior class film he shot on Super-8 film and in which I starred as Yosemite N. Park. Of course there was my old buddy Jim G. who came with me to the event. We tried to get everyone to join us in the old cheer, “Carve ‘em up–Totems!” and it went over like a lead balloon. Hard to believe four decades have elapsed. In forty more years I will most likely be gone from this world.

There are a few from our class who have preceded me in death. People like Gary Barnett, Leonard Brusso, Lois Banks, Scott Devereaux, Debby Fay, and others. Including Lance Farmer. The picture of Lance’s smiling faced on the pictorial display of those who have passed brought back memories.

It was the evening of Wednesday, October 20, 1971, just a few months after graduation, I passed the scene of a serious car crash  at around ten o’clock near 179th and Military Road South in what is now Sea Tac Washington. A car had slid out of control while trying to make the curve at 80 mph and collided head on with a utility pole. Two of the five occupants were killed instantly. One of them was Lance, just eighteen years old and fresh out of high school. They had been drinking and smoking pot.

It was the shock of Lance’s death that got me thinking of my own mortality and eternal destiny. I was saved three days later. Saturday, October 23, 1971. Now here I was some forty years later sitting together with Jim G., a close brother in the Lord over the years. As I looked around and observed the effects of the aging process on my classmates I was struck again with the thought of my own mortality. I thought about the vanity and frivolity of life, and how without the Lord Jesus Christ my life would have been utterly meaningless.

The fact is, whether you die at age eighteen or live to be a hundred you will die. And once you do you will stand before Jesus. Ultimately there are only two kinds of people in the world–those whose sins have been washed away by the blood of Christ and those who are still in their sins. I walked away feeling a bit ashamed at how much time I have wasted selfishly. Then again I was thankful for all the blessings God has lavished upon me.

Lord, thank you for reaching down and doing for me what I could never and would never have done for myself. Help me to make the most of the days you allow me to live from here on out.

……………as we reflect on the tragedy of 9/11/2001 that we were not attacked by Muslims, but by crazy people who happened to call themselves Muslims. Like all religions, Islam is an ideology of peace at its core, teaching freedom, dignity, and equality for all.

One thing I have learned to live with is the honey-do list. From the time Eve first set foot in the garden until now we guys have had to live with them. There it is every Saturday morning on the refrigerator greeting you. But as much as we hate them I believe they are a form of general revelation and a cause for praising the Lord.

First they point to the wonder of women. When Eve showed up Adam soon learned that his better half had an eye for details that slid right past his attention. She probably said to him as my wife does to me, “You shouldn’t have to be shown–you should notice it on your own.” True enough, but as I always tell Connie, “Look, do you want it done or not? If you want it done then write it down.”

Today I fixed the little porcelain plates that cover the bolts on the toilet. A little silicone adhesive and it was done. Then the broken latch on the TV cabinet. Then out to the man cave to give it a good cleaning, all in time to get a couple racks of ribs marinated and dry-rubbed and smoking away.

Women have an eye for detail as well as beauty that puts men to shame. Not only that. If it were not for honey-do lists my Saturdays over the years would be pretty boring, especially now that the kids are raised and out of the house. I know, some people like to travel, and we do too to a certain degree. But I married a homebody and homemaker, which means honey-do lists every Saturday.

No kidding, there’s no end to the list. Before the paint is dry on one project she’s on to the next. My mind is a jumble just listening to her once she gets talking about all the jobs she has planned. Which spells perpetual work for me.

Thank God for women and honey-do lists. Life would suck without them.

In 1 Peter 1:3 we read, Blessed be the God and Father  of our Lord Jesus Christ…He then goes on to expand on that thought, but I can’t help but think his outburst of praise was brought on by the knowledge of God’s sovereign election and its implications mentioned in vv. 1-2. When one stops to ponder that he has been chosen by the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood, he cannot help but praise the Triune God of the Scripture.

But what follows Peter’s doxology in vv. 3-9 provides us with some very encouraging food for the soul. First it tells us that God caused us to be born again or regenerated. This is an active voice aorist tense in Greek, which denotes an event that happened at a past point in time and that the subject–God–performed the action. It literally says that God born-ed us again, that is to say we did not perform any of the action. The modifying phrase according to His great mercy says it all. Before we were saved we were in a dead pitiful condition, with no ability or desire to make ourselves alive. We were dead, stinking, God-hating sinners as are all unbelievers. But our eternal Father picked us up out of the gutter through no goodness or effort of our own and lavished His great mercy upon us by regenerating us.

He regenerated us to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. This is not talking about pie-in-the-sky. Our living hope begins the minute we are alive in Christ because He is our hope and He is alive. But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you (Romans 8:11). Read the context of that verse and you will see it is a promise that applies to you, the born-again believer, right now.

Now here’s where the future inheritance comes in (v. 4). Notice threefold description of our inheritance as undefiled, unblemished, and unfading. It is described as being kept or stored for us. But it is not moldering away like junk thrown into a musty attic and forgotten for decades. It is safe in God’s presence, where moth and rust cannot destroy, and thieves cannot break in and steal. The inheritance is simply life in the eternal state in glorified bodies in a new heavens and earth where righteousness dwells.

But the inheritance is not the only thing being kept: Who by the power of God are being kept through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (v. 4). It is God who keeps you by His power. The agency or instrument is faith, but remember that our faith issues forth ultimately from Him (Eph. 2:8-9). If you are trusting Jesus for your salvation and to get you through this day, stop now and give Him the glory for regenerating you and planting the seed of faith in you; for if not for His grace you would be capable of nothing other than rejecting and ignoring Him.

The salvation referred to here is future deliverance from this fallen world. There are three senses in which the Scripture uses the concept of salvation–past, present, and future. We have been saved from the penalty of sin (justification). We are being saved from the power of sin (sanctification). And one day we will be saved from the presence of sin (glorification). Glorification is in view here. Won’t it be great to be rid of that part of you that wants to rebel against God and dabble in the forbidden? No more world, flesh, and devil to contend with.

And don’t think it will be an eternal church service sitting around in robes singing, etc. We will have resurrection bodies and be living in a re-created universe. It’s gonna’ be a blast! We will not need to eat for survival, but I’m betting my bottom dollar that the BBQ will be outstanding. Oh well, I digress. My real desire today is that if your chin has been dragging these days you will take encouragement in the comforting truths of today’s passage. Think about these things and praise the Lord for His sovereign work of grace in your life; and pray for His work in the lives of others.