Authenticity is a big deal. When you buy something, particularly something precious, you want to be sure you are getting what you paid for. Whether it is a house, a car, a watch, a computer or anything else, if it’s not the real deal then you are getting ripped off. Some time ago, I bought some microphones on eBay that appeared to be genuine; I very quickly discovered, through their poor performance and the rate at which they fell apart, that they were not.

Rolex manufacture very expensive, very valuable watches. In order to give their customers confidence that what they are buying is a genuine Rolex, and not some copy that has been cheaply manufactured, they embed all kinds of tell-tale signs that are very difficult to fake. Similarly in this country, as in others, our currency is marked with special security features that are very difficult to emulate. So long as you know what to look for, it is very easy to spot a fake, and thus to judge between what is valuable and what is not.

Over the course of this term we have been delving in to the world of the early church, as recorded by Luke in the book of Acts. They certainly weren’t perfect, as tonight’s passage highlights… but they were authentic. As you read through, ask yourself, “What are the signs of an authentic church?” Then ask, “Is our church authentic?”

The Choosing of the Seven
In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.

So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.¹

The authentic church deals with problems

I rate perfection as one of the biggest problems Australians face today. Not so much its absence, and certainly not its presence… but just that we expect it. We are always in search of the perfect latté, the perfect tan, the perfect teacher, the perfect job, the perfect holiday. If it’s not perfect then it is not good enough: if the service is slow we don’t go back; if we aren’t good at something first time then it ‘wasn’t meant to be’ and we move on.

We take this attitude into our relationships. It comes as no surprise to us to hear that the official divorce rate in Australia is that just over 40% of marriages in this country end in divorce. Australian social researcher Hugh Mackay traces this, in part, to what he calls our “cult of perfectionism”.² As he says, our expectations “can infect our experience of love and happiness by introducing the gnawing doubt that this isn’t as good as it should be; that perfect bliss is eluding us; that romantic love should never fade; that we should be able to establish perfect (or even excellent) relationships without too much hard work.”³ And so whenever we come across evidence to reinforce our doubts, when disappointment inevitably comes our way, it is easier to conclude that this is not the real deal; we deserve better.⁴

As if that weren’t enough, many Christians apply the same reasoning to their churches; they won’t commit to a church that is anything less than perfect. If the music is too loud or the wrong style; the congregation too big or too small; the sermons too long or too short then it is not perfect, and therefore cannot be an authentic church.⁵

Well, it is clear from tonight’s text that the church in Jerusalem was not perfect. Very early in their life together a problem arose. Luke wastes no words in getting to the point: In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Grecian Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food (1).

The church was the Centrelink of its day – if you were getting any kind of welfare payment at all, then you were getting it from the church. In particular if you were a widow without family to support you then you were utterly reliant upon the church for your livelihood. So it’s a big deal if certain groups in the church are missing out. Luke is not entirely clear whether the complaint was actually justified, he simply notes that the complaint arose. And in some ways it doesn’t really matter as it is the result that is important: the church was divided, split into factions and arguing with one another.

Do you think we face these kind of issues in our church today? You bet we do! How often have you heard someone complaining, “Why do they have to do that?” Or, “I wish this was different.” You might have even done it yourself – I’m pretty sure I have. And sometimes those whinges become a little more significant, gain a little bit of support from someone else, and someone else again. Meanwhile, someone else is arguing the other side of your case and before you can blink you have 2 or more factions, each absolutely adamant that they are in the right and unwilling to budge.

When I was leading youth group at another church, we had a new youth pastor come to our church. He had some new and exciting ideas about how the youth group should be run. Chief among them was that the youth group should be divided in to two groups: a senior and a junior high school group, much the way that we have Zion and the Cross here at St John’s. There were 2 main reactions to this. Some were interested to explore this new idea and see where it led. Others were convinced that this would be the worst thing ever, and opposed it every way that they could. As a result, the group, already intentionally divided into smaller groups, further divided; and ultimately disintegrated altogether, eventually culminating in most group members leaving to go and join other groups.

Unlike us, however, the church in Jerusalem didn’t have the option of just moving down the street to Trinity Baptist Church, or All Saints Uniting, or even Christian City Church Jerusalem. For good or ill, they were all in it together. So how did they deal with their problems?

Here’s how it went down: So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn the responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word (2-4).

It sometimes amazes me how quickly a big problem can be dealt with when you take it to the right people. If you have a busted up car, you take it to the panel beater, not the dentist; if your dog is sick you go to the vet, not the butcher; and no matter how good a photographer your neighbour is, you don’t necessarily ask them to fix your plumbing. Well, the same is true in this case: the problem (perhaps straight away, perhaps eventually, we can’t say for certain) reached the ears of the apostles – the only ones with the authority and respect to not only come up with a solution but also put it into practice.

I think we can learn a lot from that. How often have you seen something wrong, or something you didn’t agree with, and done nothing about it? Or perhaps just had a quiet whinge to your friend, your family or your Bible study group? Let me tell you that, unless you take it to the right person or people, nothing is going to happen. Let’s say you have a suggestion for how we can improve things here at the 7pm service. You could tell your friend about it, or your mum, or your work-mate… but whilst they might give you a pat on the back and tell you what a good idea it is, chances are that they are not going to be able to do much more than that. If, on the other hand, you raised it with Jake, or with the 7pm team, then there is a much better chance that something will be done about it. At the very least, your idea will be considered by those who have the ability to make a decision.

Coming back to the passage, the first thing to note about the apostles’ response is that they recognised there was a problem. It would have been all too easy to simply say, “We don’t have time for this now,” or “This is not terribly important in the scheme of things,” either of which would no doubt have been true. The apostles, however, accepted that this was a problem – if not the stated issue of food distribution which, as already mentioned, may have been an issue in perception rather than reality, then certainly that there was division and factionalism.

Let’s be very clear about one thing here: conflict by itself is not a problem. Actually it’s a normal part of any group of people. A community without conflict is more than likely a community that has given in to apathy. But when conflict causes us to turn away from our purpose as a community, that is when it becomes a problem. As Jesus said, “Any kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and a house divided against itself will fall.” ⁶

The sign of a truly healthy and authentic church is that it deals with its conflict. No denying that it is there; no sweeping it under the carpet; no suppression of the minority in the name of democracy. This last one is probably the most common in today’s church – it is all too easy to put it to a vote and leave it at that, whilst not really meeting the needs of some people just because they are in the minority.

Finally, having decided upon a course of action – a decision, by the way, no doubt reached through a great deal of prayer – they implemented it. They stood up, presented their plan, and asked the disciples to follow their lead. They were committed to dealing with the issue, and dealing with it quickly – and in this commitment they demonstrated their love for all of those involved. It is this love at the heart of our conflict-resolution that makes the authentic church distinct from any other organisation. Clearly Jesus’ words still rang in their hearts: “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”⁷

What kind of church are we? Do we:

• Take our problems to the people that can deal with them?
• Recognise and accept that there is an issue, rather than ignoring it and hoping it will go away?
• Follow through and deal with the problem, rather than just endlessly talking about it?

The authentic church focuses on its calling

There is an interesting verse in the middle of this story: “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables” (2). For the record, I don’t think the apostles had anything against waiters and waitresses! When you sat down to a meal in those days, it was the head of the household’s responsibility to distribute the food – a very important and prestigious job.⁸ Nevertheless, the apostles are quite clear that what they have been called to is even more important – so important, in fact, that they cannot afford to be distracted.

When you go to see a doctor, you want them to be focused on the most important thing first. No point your doctor pouring all their energy into healing your acne if you are dying of liver disease in the meantime. The same is true in the church. In this case, the distribution of food was important… but the ministry of teaching and preaching God’s word was even more important. So the apostles chose to pursue what they had been called to, and to seek others whom God would raise up to meet the practical needs of mouths to feed.

And others were found, men who were full of the Spirit and wisdom (3), men whose passion and gifting combined to allow them to serve in this way. And by stepping up to take responsibility for that, they freed the apostles up to pursue their main calling of prayer and the ministry of the word (4).

That is why we, as a church, employ Sue and Graham: they use their gifts to deal with things that would otherwise prove a distraction to Rod and to Jake. That is why we have wardens and parish councillors; why we have a variety of people leading services and preaching; why we form teams of people to take responsibility for areas of our church life, rather than just relying on Rod and Jake to do it. And by doing so, we free them up to pursue their vital calling to preach and to teach God’s word.

God gives us gifts in order to bless the whole church. Whilst we don’t have time to pursue this now, I encourage you to ponder what gift or gifts he has placed in you and how you can use them to strengthen our church. Even when it looks as though everything is ‘covered’ and under control, speak up anyway; it may be that in exercising your gift, you will free someone else up to exercise gifts in other areas.

Let me make this a little more concrete with an example from my life. Many of you will know that for some years I acted as the webmaster for this church. I enjoyed doing it, but it took up quite a lot of my time, meaning that I was unable to properly devote that time to other important things: my wife, my job, music ministry etc. Then Patty came along and took that role over, and all of a sudden I was able to focus on those other things. And as a result we as a church were strengthened in our ministry. If Patty had sat back and said, “Well, Tim is doing a good job, I don’t need to get involved,” then we would all have missed out: Patty on the opportunity to grow and develop his gift in IT; me in being able to focus on the other priorities in my life; and the church as a whole because less would have been achieved, and we would have been less effective in our overall ministry. So please, even if you are thinking to yourself, “There are so many service leaders or musicians or preachers or scripture teachers or… there’s no need for one more,” or, “I’m not really sure I have that gift anyway”… please talk to someone! You getting involved makes us all stronger!

Once you have identified what your gift and your calling is you will need to develop and grow it, and you also need to guard from being distracted. This is what the apostles were doing. They knew that they were meant to be preaching the gospel and so they could not afford to be distracted by the details of allocating food day by day. Perhaps you have been blessed with one gift, one special gift that God has given you to serve the church with… if so, use it! Perhaps you have been blessed with a number of gifts… my advice to you is to ask God to show you which one he wants you to be focusing on at the moment and use and develop that gift. God may call you to use different gifts over time, but for now focus on the one that he has put in front of you.

To me, this is one of the most powerful signs of an authentic church: church members are enabled and encouraged to use their gifts to strengthen the church. And the result of this is that the church as a whole is better able to focus on its main priority: spreading the gospel.

• What are you called to? Are you pursuing, developing, growing and protecting that calling? Are you focused on it?
• Does our church enable and encourage people to use their gifts in Christ’s service?
• Does our church prioritise sharing the gospel?

The authentic church grows

If you watched any of the election coverage last night, you’ll know that some people love statistics. We count votes, then calculate margins and swings and all kinds of other things that tell us how successful each candidate and party is in getting people on board with their message. The tricky thing with statistics, though, is that they can be very easy to collect, but much harder to interpret. For example, does the fact that Labor had such an overwhelming victory at the polls yesterday mean that the Australian public genuinely approves of their policy? Or were they just sick of the old government, and Labor were the best of a bad lot? We are at risk of the same issues when we start thinking about church growth.

Luke starts and ends this passage with growth: In those days when the number of disciples was increasing… (1) and So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith (7). The word ‘so’ there is important, as it suggests that the word of God spread as a consequence of the story just told. In other words, a church that deals with divisions in a God-honouring and loving way, a church that focuses on its mission, will eventually see growth.

Notice I said ‘eventually’. One of the easiest traps that we can fall into is that of playing numbers games – our church is increasing faster than the church down the road, so we must be a healthier church. Whilst this may be true, it is not necessarily so. For example, if I offered money to people to come to St. John’s, we might see an increase in the number of people showing up on Sundays, but that is not really what I would call growth. Sometimes you might find church numbers dropping off immediately before a huge growth spurt.

Of course, there other kinds of growth that having nothing at all to do with the number of people attending a church, and which are much more difficult to measure than a simple head count can achieve: are church members growing in the way they understand and act out the Christian life?

Growth is a useful indicator in combination with the other marks of authenticity that we have already looked at, but not so useful on its own. It’s very easy to collect statistics, but much harder to interpret them – to ask the difficult questions like “Why is this so?”, “What does it mean?” and “What should we do about it?”

Part of being an authentic church is asking these hard questions.

• Is our church growing? If so, is it growing for the right reasons?
• Are members of our church growing into more mature, God-honouring Christians?

The authentic church is full of authentic Christians

So there you have it: the authentic church. Committed to dispatching division; minding its mission; and going for growth. Whilst these are not the only requirements for an authentic church, they are certainly good signs that a church is healthy.

But what is true for a church is also true for a Christian; after all, churches are made up of Christians. How can I expect my church to deal with arguments if I cannot overcome my differences with others? If my mission is out of focus, is it reasonable to expect my church to be focused? How will my church grow unless I am growing?

Take some time and look over your list of problems in the church… do you have stuff you need to deal with first? Are the church’s problems your problems too? You bet they are!

The best sign of an authentic church? It is full of authentic Christians. Are you one of them?

Endnotes

1. Acts 6:1-7
2. Mackay, Advance Australia… Where? (Hachette 2007) pp. 176ff.
3. Ibid. p. 177
4. Of course, the wedding day is ultimate evidence of “the cult of perfectionism” in full flight: dress, hair, limo, location, video, photos. Mackay quotes the average wedding today as costing more than $30, 000! (Ibid. p. 179)
5. A good friend of mine, when asked what it would take to keep him at a church he was visiting, responded, “1000 virgins”!
6. Luke 11:17
7. John 13:35
8. cf. Jesus’ role at the Last Supper

Let me tell you about my job.

I build control systems. A control system is just a computer system that allows you to have an overview of some other system: it gathers information about what state your traffic lights are in; it shows you where your trains are; it gives you a ‘big picture’ of what state all your equipment is in. And, having this big picture, you are able to make decisions, and implement plans: that train is running late, so we will let this one through ahead of it; the generator has been running for too long, so we should swap over to the backup; the electronic road sign is faulty, so we should send someone to repair it.

For many Christians, this is the picture they have of wisdom. They desire wisdom because they believe that it will help them to understand the big picture, and to act accordingly. This is an attractive idea, of course, because it lets us fool ourselves into believing that we can have control over our lives, if only we have enough wisdom.

But I don’t believe that this is what the Bible teaches about wisdom at all.

Respected theologian J. I. Packer, in his book Knowing God, describes wisdom as like learning to drive a car. You don’t need to know why there is a car parked in your lane, or why the driver in front of you is braking; you just need to know how to respond correctly to those situations.

The fact is that, as we go through life, we will not understand everything that happens, nor will we have the ‘big picture’. We have to trust God for those things. Instead, if we are to be wise, we must learn how to respond to the problems, situations and obstacles in our path in a wise, godly way. That’s what wisdom is.

How do we become wise? Well, drivers have instructors, and so do we.

“If you love me, you will obey what I command. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever — the Spirit of truth… All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.”

- John 14:15-17, 25-26

Jesus promised that, even though he was going away, he would ask the Father to send the Holy Spirit to us, in order that he might teach us all things. The Holy Spirit teaches us and reminds us of all the things that Jesus has said… and this is what leads to wisdom. If you like, the Bible is our road rules manual, whilst the Spirit is the one who instructs us how those rules apply in our current situation. The only difference is that our instructor promises to stay with us always.

Last time we looked at the work of the Holy Spirit in transforming us from sinners to saints (‘sanctification’). It is important to understand, however, that sanctification is not the reason that we are in right relationship with God; rather it is a sign, a symptom if you will, that we already are.

But what about that first step, of entering into relationship with God. How does that happen? Does the Holy Spirit have a role there too? The Apostle Paul certainly thought so.

Writing to the Corinthian church, Paul starts out by challenging those who were contending amongst themselves how genuine their Christianity was: some argued that, because they followed Paul, the guy who planted their church, they were the purest; others that, because they listened to Apollos, the latest preaching sensation, they were the most up-to-date; still others tried to convince their fellows that because they followed Cephas (Peter), Jesus’ own apostle, they were the most authentic; and, of course, some claimed that they only followed Christ, not requiring the intervention of any man or woman.

But Paul wouldn’t have a bar of such petty squabbles. “Is Christ divided?” he asks,

Was Paul crucified for you? Were you baptized into the name of Paul?… For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel – not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

- 1 Corinthians 1:13, 17-18

The message is clear – we don’t become Christians because of the ‘wisdom’ of those who preach, nor by our own ‘wisdom’, for human wisdom would consider the message of Christ to be foolishness: who could accept God becoming man, let alone dying on a cross as a sacrifice for us? Just in case we miss the point, Paul goes on to drive it home for the next chapter and a half!

The kind of wisdom that we need to understand Christ’s message of salvation comes only from the Spirit. “We speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began… but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit” (1 Corinthians 2:7, 10). Before we can believe on Christ and be saved, the Spirit must work in our hearts and our minds, and so allow us to understand God’s wisdom.

Paul illustrates this idea with a beautiful metaphor:

I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building.

- 1 Corinthians 3:6-9

I believe that there are two important principles here. Firstly, faith in Jesus is not something we have to do in order to be a Christian; rather it is the gift of God, delivered by his Spirit, that allows us to believe on Christ. This is sometimes referred to as ‘regeneration’. Don’t be fooled into thinking that you require some Pentecost-like experience of the Spirit in order to be a ‘real’ Christian, or even to experience the Spirit’s work first-hand in your life; the fact is that, if you are a Christian, you have experienced the single most powerful work of the Spirit that you can or will ever experience… it is his signature work.

The second principle is this: when we share the gospel, our ‘success’ or ‘failure’ has nothing to do with us. Respected theologian J. I. Packer puts it like this:

It is not for us to imagine that we can prove the truth of Christianity by our own arguments; nobody can prove the truth of Christianity save the Holy Spirit, by his own almighty work of renewing the blinded heart. It is the sovereign prerogative of Christ’s Spirit to convince men’s consciences of the truth of Christ’s gospel; and Christ’s human witnesses must learn to ground their hopes of success, not on clever presentation of the truth by man, but on powerful demonstration of the truth by the Spirit.

- J. I. Packer, Knowing God

We can plant and water the seeds of the gospel, but unless God causes them to grow there is nothing more we can do. No amount of doing will bring your friends, family and co-workers into the kingdom; we must pray, therefore, that God will act through his Spirit to bring regeneration to their hearts.

When I was at uni I had a Coke addiction (the wholesome bubbly soft-drink kind, rather than the narcotic kind ). I used to consume some ridiculous quantity per day – breakfast, lunch, dinner or any time in between. I’d squeeze one in between lectures, and often have one in my hand as I travelled from place to place. I’d get on the train for a 2 hour train trip and consume 1.25 litres… and then get another one on the far end! In one night, preparing an end-of-semester lab report, I consumed 5.25 litres of Coke… about 8am the next morning I stumbled up campus to hand it in, before returning to my college room, laying down on my bed and convulsing for a while, as my stomach acids did their work! (Don’t try this at home, kids.)

There came a time when I decided that I should try to ‘de-tox’. Quite apart from the amount of money I was spending, my sleeping patterns were really starting to suffer, to the point where I never actually felt ‘rested’ – the pall of fatigue hung over me all the time. So I decided to go cold-turkey.

The trouble was, however, that not drinking Coke had all kinds of consequences: the first and most obvious was that I started to experience crippling headaches. These lasted a week or so, after which I began to feel better. ‘The worst is over,’ I thought… but I was wrong.

You see, I had overcome the physical cravings, but the habits of several years were still ingrained: in my head, I ‘needed’ Coke in order to study; I would enter a take-away shop and head directly for the refrigerator; drinks tables at parties and weddings were particularly tempting, because I could convince myself that so long as I didn’t have to pay for it… etc.

Sin works the same way. The Apostle Paul says:

We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

- Romans 7:14-20

Why do we continue to sin, even after we become followers of Christ? I believe (and this is only my opinion, as I am not sure that the Bible is entirely clear on this point) that it is because we have been freed from the power of sin but not yet the habit of sin.

Jesus, through his sacrifice on the Cross, has conquered sin; he has dealt with the consequences of sin; as a result we can be in a right relationship with God. The physical cravings for sin have been overcome. We are now in Christ, rather than in the world.

However we are not yet made perfect. We still fall back into old habits. The patterns of my old life are so deeply intertwined with who I am, where I go, who I hang out with, and the way I think that they slip past my guard… before I know it I have reverted to the old way, even though in my head I know better.

As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.

- Proverbs 26:11

There is an entire industry of so-called ‘self-help’ books, showing you how to reform our lives in various ways: seven habits for more effective living; overcoming temptation in 32.5 easy steps; how psycho-therapy changed my life etc. Groups like Alcoholics Anonymous and others offer twelve-step programs to assist people in overcoming addiction, and these are no doubt valuable. On the whole, however, we human beings are not good at reforming ourselves; when it comes to sin, ‘self-help’ is actually ‘no-help’.

Fortunately for us, there is a better way. God is the only person with a proven track record when it comes to turning lives around. He offers believers his Holy Spirit to effect transformational change in our lives. (Oh, if you want the fancy-schmancy word for this process, it is ‘sanctification’.)

Hi, my name is Tim, and I am a sinner. If you, like me, are struggling to overcome the addiction of sin then the best thing you can do is cry out to God and ask him to work in your life to destroy the habits that lead you back to your old life. That is the kind of prayer that God loves to answer! The next best thing you can do is ask a Christian friend to support you, and to hold you accountable. There is no shame in asking for help – after all, we are all sinners here!

Take a moment to stop and consider the difference between a window and a mirror.

A window, of course, is something you look through. It allows you to see out; obstacles, hazards, scenery, people – it’s all on display if you care to look. On the other hand, a mirror allows you to see only one thing: you. No matter how close to or far away from it you get, you will always be in the picture somehow.

Both are made out of glass. But a mirror has a thin layer of silver behind it, that makes all the difference between seeing other people and seeing only yourself.

Sin is like that. No matter how thin (or thick!) its presence in our lives, it spreads itself out so that instead of being able to see the needs, desires and gifts of others, we see only ourselves. At best, we might see someone else in the picture, but only in relation to ourselves… How can they help me? Am I better or worse than they are? What will I gain from helping them?

Pray that God will turn your mirrors into windows, and that he will allow you, like Alice, to step through the looking glass!

That night the king could not sleep; so he ordered the book of the chronicles, the record of his reign, to be brought in and read to him. 2 It was found recorded there that Mordecai had exposed Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king’s officers who guarded the doorway, who had conspired to assassinate King Xerxes.

“What honor and recognition has Mordecai received for this?” the king asked.

“Nothing has been done for him,” his attendants answered.

The king said, “Who is in the court?” Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the palace to speak to the king about hanging Mordecai on the gallows he had erected for him.

His attendants answered, “Haman is standing in the court.”

“Bring him in,” the king ordered.

When Haman entered, the king asked him, “What should be done for the man the king delights to honor?”

Now Haman thought to himself, “Who is there that the king would rather honor than me?” So he answered the king, “For the man the king delights to honor, have them bring a royal robe the king has worn and a horse the king has ridden, one with a royal crest placed on its head. Then let the robe and horse be entrusted to one of the king’s most noble princes. Let them robe the man the king delights to honor, and lead him on the horse through the city streets, proclaiming before him, ‘This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!’ “

“Go at once,” the king commanded Haman. “Get the robe and the horse and do just as you have suggested for Mordecai the Jew, who sits at the king’s gate. Do not neglect anything you have recommended.”

So Haman got the robe and the horse. He robed Mordecai, and led him on horseback through the city streets, proclaiming before him, “This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!”

Afterward Mordecai returned to the king’s gate. But Haman rushed home, with his head covered in grief, and told Zeresh his wife and all his friends everything that had happened to him.

His advisers and his wife Zeresh said to him, “Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him—you will surely come to ruin!” While they were still talking with him, the king’s eunuchs arrived and hurried Haman away to the banquet Esther had prepared.

Jesus famously taught that we should do unto others only what we would want them to do unto us, the so-called ‘golden rule.’ This biblical episode, however, illustrates a slightly different principle: seek for yourself only what you would be willing to offer to others. Haman wanted the king’s recognition and honour, but was chagrined when he was asked to be the instrument by which this was conveyed to Mordecai.

Do you rejoice when your friends (or your enemies!) receive the things which you long for? Or do you become consumed with envy? Is it wrong to desire the good gifts of God? No, of course not. Is it wrong to want them so much that we cannot celebrate when someone else receives them? I believe that the Bible says yes. We can be disappointed, sure, but if that disappointment becomes a wedge between us and our neighbour then we have crossed over into sin.

God’s delight

In the 18th and 19th Centuries it was quite fashionable to view God as being a watchmaker who, having brought about a magnificent creation, wound it up and left it to work according to its own principles.¹ That is, he invented the world, he put in place the laws of physics, chemistry, biology and everything else that makes it ‘tick’… and then he left it to its own devices.

But this is a long way from the God that the Bible presents to us. Jesus tells us that he knows when each sparrow falls,² that no raven goes unfed nor lily unclothed.³ Is this a description of a God who is disconnected and uninvolved? Does this sound like a God who does not care about the fate of his creation?

Check out God’s words to Job:

Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said:

“Who is this that darkens my counsel
with words without knowledge?

Brace yourself like a man;
I will question you,
and you shall answer me.

“Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?
Tell me, if you understand.

Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set,
or who laid its cornerstone-

while the morning stars sang together
and all the angels shouted for joy?

“Who shut up the sea behind doors
when it burst forth from the womb,

when I made the clouds its garment
and wrapped it in thick darkness,

when I fixed limits for it
and set its doors and bars in place,

when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;
here is where your proud waves halt’?

“Have you ever given orders to the morning,
or shown the dawn its place,

that it might take the earth by the edges
and shake the wicked out of it?⁴

And again:

“Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?
Do you watch when the doe bears her fawn?
Do you count the months till they bear?
Do you know the time they give birth?

They crouch down and bring forth their young;
their labor pains are ended.

Their young thrive and grow strong in the wilds;
they leave and do not return.

“Who let the wild donkey go free?
Who untied his ropes?

I gave him the wasteland as his home,
the salt flats as his habitat.

He laughs at the commotion in the town;
he does not hear a driver’s shout.

He ranges the hills for his pasture
and searches for any green thing.⁵

God’s solution to Job’s problems is not a stinging rebuke for his lack of faith; nor is it a reasoned argument about why he needs to suffer. God calls on Job to look up and to look around at the world that God has created, a world which itself points back to God; the Creation that reminds us of the Creator. The Apostle Paul puts it like this: “since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”⁶

God delights in his world, great and small. We are invited to enjoy the creation and to delight in it as God does. Again and again, God invites Job to consider, to wonder, to rejoice and to reflect on the splendour of what he has created.

The trouble is that we have become consumers rather than lovers; our delight has turned to greed, our service to exploitation.

Created to protect and serve

Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

A river watering the garden flowed from Eden; from there it was separated into four headwaters. The name of the first is the Pishon; it winds through the entire land of Havilah, where there is gold. (The gold of that land is good; aromatic resin and onyx are also there.) The name of the second river is the Gihon; it winds through the entire land of Cush. The name of the third river is the Tigris; it runs along the east side of Asshur. And the fourth river is the Euphrates.

The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”⁷

Adam and Eve were created to “work [the Garden] and take care of it” – to protect and to serve. In return, they were given the run of the place, and God provided “trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.”

The Garden centred around the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, not the man and his wife, perhaps to remind Adam and Eve that the garden was not theirs: God’s plan was one of interdependence, of relationship; that is what makes what follows even more tragic.

First Eve and then Adam reach out and take from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, the only tree which God had put off-limits, and in doing so sought to place themselves at the centre of the garden.

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.⁸

This is the first recorded example of humankind exploiting the environment for their own benefit, rather than working to enjoy it and protect it; sadly it is but the first of many.

The consequences were catastrophic, not only for Adam and Eve, not just for the human race, but for the whole of creation:

To Adam [God] said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’

“Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.

It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.

By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return.”⁹

God’s creation has been corrupted. Not for nothing does the Apostle Paul write, “[w]e know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.”¹⁰ However, just a paragraph earlier, he writes, “[t]he creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.”¹¹ Christians look forward to the day when God’s new creation dawns, when he will make all things new.¹²

Some Christians take this to extremes, though, claiming that the degradation of this world is OK, because it means that that day of new creation will come all the quicker. This is (literally) rubbish! If God grieves over each sparrow that falls and each lily that dies, can you imagine how offended he is by our wilful and persistent destruction of the world that he has entrusted to our care?

No, Christians should be leading the charge towards protecting and serving our environment.

This is easy to say; but how can we do this? Where do we start?

Tending the Garden

There are many things that can be said here, but let me highlight a few of the common ones that we can all do in order to preserve this world that God has entrusted to our care.

Broadly speaking, Jack Johnson has the right idea when he says “we gotta learn to reduce, reuse, recycle” – in that order. Recycling is good… but reusing is better. Reusing is good… but reduction is better!

Appliances

• Refrigerator: The single household appliance that uses the most energy is the refrigerator. So let me ask, do you really need that second fridge? If you only use the second one when you’re having a party, why not consider turning it off and unplugging it the rest of the time? Do you need one that big?
• Lights: The next biggest energy consumer is electric lighting. Some simple ways of reducing the amount of energy you use:
  • Use compact fluorescents – traditional incandescent bulbs waste about 90% of their energy as heat.
  • Turn off the lights when you’re out of the room for more than 60 seconds.
• Televisions: The third biggest power user is the television. Even when they’re not on, most televisions are still drawing power in order to be able to turn on in response to a remote. Consider turning them off at the wall. Other ways to save power here are to watch less (!) and to not fall asleep with them on!!
• Audio equipment: The U.S. Government has published statistics that show that Americans spend more money to power audio equipment when they’re off than when on! Again, consider turning off at the wall.
• Computers: Turn off when not in use. Laptops use about half the power of desktops.
• Microwaves: Whilst microwaves draw a large current, they do so only for a short time. Don’t be shy about using them to precook food – in that way you can cut down on using larger (less efficient) appliances like ovens.

Transport

If you drive a car, make sure the tyres are inflated correctly. Having under-inflated tyres will reduce your fuel efficiency by up to 10% !

On the subject of fuels, ethanol based-fuels are better for the environment (less emissions), but have impacts in other areas. This is because much ethanol used for fuel is derived from corn, a staple food around the world, and so an increase in demand for corn can have a devastating effect on the global poor, so think carefully.

The new seatbelt

Many years ago seatbelts in cars were unheard of; then they were an optional extra; required by law; and, finally, so common-place that to not wear one makes us feel as though something is wrong.

We need to promote the same kind of mentality regarding the environment. This will involve a transformational change… and there is only one who has ever been good at transformational change – God. Ultimately we need to realise that any solution that relies entirely upon our own efforts is doomed to fail. Our natural sinfulness will lead us to take short-cuts, to seek our own advantage, to leave it for someone else to deal with. If we want to see our world changed for the better, if we want to see God’s creation restored to the point where God once again declares it ‘Very Good,’ then we must first seek transformation of ourselves. We must once again become God’s caretakers, his gardeners, people who delight in and protect the world God has entrusted to our care rather than consuming and exploiting it; and this kind of transformation can come only through the saving work of Jesus. Jesus’ sacrifice, his blood, his death on the Cross on our behalf, is the only means by which we can be recreated – reborn – as the people God wants us to be.

Endnotes

1. See, for example, William Paley’s Natural Theology.
2. Matt 10:29
3. Luke 12:24,27
4. Job 38:1-13
5. Job 39:1-8
6. Rom 1:20
7. Gen 2:8-17
8. Gen 3:6
9. Gen 3:17-19, emphasis added.
10. Rom 8:22
11. Rom 8:19-21
12. Rev 21:5

This was a training course I ran in September 2007 for i.d, the young adults’ ministry of St John’s, Sutherland.

• Week 1 – Why I am a protestant Christian
• Week 2 – Why I am a reformed Christian
• Week 3 – Why I am an evangelical Christian

I presented a series of sermons along the same lines in July 2010:

• What is a protestant Christian?
• What is a reformed Christian?
• What is an evangelical Christian?

Introduction

On Sunday the 3rd of February, 1788, Richard Johnson preached the very first Christian sermon on Australian soil. Johnson had been appointed as chaplain for NSW and travelled with the First Fleet. His appointment was in no small part due to the influence exerted by two remarkable and influential men, William Wilberforce and John Newton, who believed it very important that the chaplain for this important expedition should be a committed evangelical Christian.But why were Wilberforce and Newton so keen to have an evangelical presence in NSW? And why was Johnson willing to up and transplant himself from a comfortable life in England for the sake of enduring the privations of sailing to the other side of the world?

This week we will explore these questions and more.

However, the evangelical story does not begin with Johnson, nor even with Wilberforce or Newton. Unlike the protestant and reformed innovations, the evangelical movement cannot really be linked to one man in particular. There were so many great leaders: Jonathan Edwards in America; Ebenezer and Ralph Erskine in Scotland; Howel Harris in Wales; and George Whitefield, William Wilberforce and John Newton in England. However, if I were to select one person as being representative of the movement as a whole, it would be John Wesley.

John Wesley

Toward the end of January 1736, the good ship Simmonds, bound for Savannah, Georgia, sailed into a series of violent Atlantic storms. The wind roared; the ship cracked and quivered; the waves lashed the deck.

A young, slightly built Anglican minister on board was frozen in fear. John Wesley had preached the gospel of eternal salvation to others, but he was afraid to die. He was deeply awed, however, by a company of Moravian Brethren from Herrnhut. As the sea broke over the deck of the vessel, splitting the mainsail in pieces, the Moravians calmly sang their psalms to God.

Afterward, Wesley asked one of the Germans if he was frightened.

“No,” he replied. “Weren’t your women and children afraid?” Wesley asked.

“No,” said the Moravian, “our women and children are not afraid to die.”

“This,” Wesley wrote in his Journal, “was the most glorious day I have ever seen.”

At that “glorious” moment Wesley was a most unlikely candidate for leadership in a spiritual awakening soon to shake England to its moorings. He had a form of godliness, but had yet to find its power.¹

John Wesley was born in Epworth, England. He was the fifteenth of nineteen children. At the age of five, John was rescued from the burning rectory where he lived. This escape made a deep impression on his mind; and he regarded himself as providentially set apart, as a “brand plucked from the burning.”² The Wesley children’s early education was given by their parents in the Epworth rectory. Each child, including the girls, was taught to read as soon as they could walk and talk. In 1713 John was admitted to the Charterhouse School, London, where he lived the studious, methodical, and (for a while) religious life in which he had been trained at home.

At seventeen he was off to Oxford University where he studied first at Christ Church and later at Lincoln College. He found little there to stimulate either mind or soul, but took the opportunity to read widely, including such books as Jeremy Taylor’s Holy Living, Thomas à Kemipis’ Imitation of Christ and William Law’s Serious Call to a Holy Life. These men, he said, “convinced me of the absolute impossibility of being half a Christian. I determined, through His grace, to be all devoted to God.” So he listed his weaknesses and developed rules to overcome them.

In 1726 Wesley was elected a fellow of Lincoln College. This gave him not only academic standing at the University but assured him of a steady income. Two years later he was ordained to the Anglican ministry and returned to Epworth for a time to serve as his father’s assistant.

When he resumed his duties at Oxford, he found that his brother, Charles, alarmed at the spread of deism at the University, had assembled a little band of students determined to take their religion seriously. John proved to be just the leader they needed. Under his direction they drew up a plan of study and rule of life that stressed prayer, Bible reading, and frequent attendance at Holy Communion.

The little group soon attracted attention and some derision from the lax undergraduates. Holy Club, they called them; Bible moths, Methodists, and Reforming Club. The Methodist label is one that stuck.

The members of that little society were ardent but restless souls. They found fresh enthusiasm when a townsman or new student joined them, such as the bright and brash undergraduate from Pembroke College, George Whitefield. But they were constantly in search of ways to make their lives conform to the practice of early Christians. They gave to the poor and they visited the imprisoned. But John was quick to confess that he lacked the inward peace of a true Christian. God must have something more in mind.

Then came the invitation to Georgia. A friend, Dr. John Burton, suggested that both John and Charles could serve God in the new colony led by General James Oglethorpe. Charles could be the General’s secretary and John a chaplain to the colony. John welcomed a chance to preach to the Indians so the brothers boarded the Simmons in October with youthful idealism and missionary zeal, totally unaware of the storms on sea and soul just ahead.

The whole Georgia episode proved to be a fiasco. John discovered that the noble American savages were “gluttons, thieves, liars and murderers.” And his white congregation were not fond of his strict high church ways and his prohibition of fancy dresses and gold jewelry in church.

John’s frustrations were compounded by his pitiful love affair with Sophy Hopkey, the eighteen-year-old niece of Savannah’s chief magistrate. Wesley was so mixed up emotionally and spiritually that he didn’t know his own mind. Sophy finally resolved the affair by eloping with John’s rival. The jilted lover then barred her from Holy Communion, and her incensed husband sued John for defaming Sophy’s character. The trial dragged out and after six months of harassment, Wesley fled the colony in disgust.

On his way home, he had a chance to ponder the whole experience. “I went to America,” he wrote, “to convert the Indians, but, oh, who shall convert me?”

Wesley returned to England depressed and beaten. On the night of May 24, 1738, at a Moravian meeting in Aldersgate Street, London, in which he heard a reading of Luther’s preface to the Epistle to the Romans, and penned the now famous line “I felt my heart strangely warmed.” This completely changed the character and method of his ministry.

Though his understanding of both justification and assurance matured, he never stopped preaching the importance of faith for salvation and the witness of God’s Spirit with the spirit of the believer that they were, indeed, a child of God. His unorthodox teachings, however, meant that he was excluded from preaching in most parish churches.

Wesley’s Oxford friend, the evangelist George Whitefield, was also excluded from the churches of Bristol. In February of 1739, he went to the neighbouring village of Kingswood and preached in the open air to a company of miners. Wesley hesitated to accept Whitefield’s invitation to copy this bold step. Overcoming his reservations, he preached his first sermon in the open air, near Bristol, in April of that year.

He was still unhappy about the idea of field preaching, and would have thought, “till very lately,” such a method of saving souls as “almost a sin.” These open-air services were very successful, however, and he never again hesitated to preach in any place where an assembly could be gotten together. More than once he used his father’s tombstone at Epworth as a pulpit! He continued for fifty years — entering churches when he was invited, and taking his stand in the fields, in halls, cottages, and chapels, when the churches would not receive him.

Wesley travelled constantly, generally on horseback, preaching two or three times a day. In fact, by Wesley’s own estimate, he averaged 8000 miles of travel per year, most of it on horseback! He rose at four in the morning, lived simply and methodically, and was never idle if he could help it. He formed societies, opened chapels, examined and commissioned preachers, administered aid charities, prescribed for the sick and superintended schools and orphanages. He received at least £20,000 for his publications, but used little of it for himself. His charities were limited only by his means, and he died a poor man.

All of this activity had one cause: Wesley’s renewed understanding of the importance and preeminence of the Gospel.

The Gospel

The partnership between Wesley and Whitefield was a strange one. Although they had similar backgrounds, their theological viewpoints were wildly different. On the one hand, Whitefield was a staunch Calvinist, subscribing to all of the beliefs we learned about last week; on the other, Wesley was an Arminian, believing, for example, that man is capable of overcoming their own sinfulness enough to be able to turn to God – anathema to a Calvinist. They put aside these differences, however, in order to preach the Gospel.

This renewed Gospel focus led to one of the great missionary movements of all time. The Society for Missions to Africa and the East (later renamed the Church Mission Society) was formed in 1799 by a group of activist evangelicals. Other voluntary societies, including the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) and the Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children were also established by evangelicals. Much of the social work that was done by these societies was accompanied by Christian witness and evangelism. In this, they followed Christ’s example – he who preached God’s kingdom come and then worked to see that fulfilled here on earth by caring for the sick, the poor and the outcast.

One of the big battles that evangelicals had to overcome was the perception in society that Christianity was only useful for the purpose of teaching morals (this idea is known as moralism). Most people were baptised as infants, and so considered themselves to be Christians by default. As a result, so it was thought, the Church needed only to preach morality. Wesley, perhaps largely because of his own experience, held to the importance of all people undergoing ‘conversion’ and being born-again.

Assurance of Salvation

Wesley believed that all Christians have a faith which implies an assurance of God’s forgiving love, and that one should feel that assurance, or the “witness of the Spirit”. This understanding is grounded in Paul’s affirmation, “…ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father. The same Spirit beareth witness with our spirits, that we are the children of God…” (Romans 8:15-16, Wesley’s translation). This experience was mirrored for Wesley in his Aldersgate experience wherein he “knew” he was loved by God and that his sins were forgiven.

I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation, and an assurance was given me that He had taken my sin, even mine.³

The Bible

Broadly speaking, there are 4 categories of belief about the source of authority for the church:

• The Bible
• Tradition
• Personal Experience
• Reason

Different groups have different emphases on each of these – for example, as we learned when looked at protestantism, the Catholic church emphasises the role of tradition, and the teachings of the church, to be equal with Scripture. Other churches see the personal experience of the Holy Spirit’s work in your life as being the determining force for that life; hence you are encouraged to always seek the Spirit’s leading before taking action.

John Wesley believed that the living core of the Christian faith was revealed in Scripture, illumined by tradition, vivified in personal experience, and confirmed by reason. Scripture, Wesley argued, is primary, revealing the Word of God ‘so far as it is necessary for our salvation.’ For Wesley, Tradition, Reason, and Experience do not form additional “sources” for theological truth, for he believed that the Bible was the sole source of truth about God, but rather these form a matrix for interpreting the Bible. Therefore, while the Bible is the sole source of truth, Tradition forms a “lens” through which we view and interpret the Bible. But unlike the Bible, Tradition is not an infallible instrument, and it must be balanced and tested by Reason and Experience. Reason is the means by which we may evaluate and even challenge the assumptions of Tradition.

But for Wesley, the chief test of the “truth and nothing but the whole truth” of a particular interpretation of scripture is how it is seen in practical application in one’s Experience. Always the pragmatist, Wesley believed that Experience formed the best evidence, after Scripture, for the truthfulness of a particular theological view. He believed Scriptural truths are to be primarily lived, rather than simply thought about or merely believed. Thus, how a particular interpretation of scripture is lived out is the best and most viable test of our theology.

This primacy of Scripture is one of the central tenets of evangelical belief.

Conclusion

John Wesley was one of many leading the evangelical charge in the 18th Century, and many have followed in his footsteps since. His great contributions to Christianity were a renewed emphasis on Scriptural authority, and an appreciation for the need for conversion.

Richard Johnson faced a great struggle as the first chaplain of NSW. Governor Phillip demanded that Johnson should teach the convicts and soldiers good morals; Johnson wanted to preach the gospel… and so that is exactly what he did. And that is why Wilberforce and Newton fought so hard to have an evangelical aboard the First Fleet.

And that is why I am an evangelical Christian.

Endnotes

1. Shelley, “A Brand from the Burning” in Church History in Plain Language (2nd Edition, Thomas Nelson, 1995) p. 331.
2. cf. Zech 3:2.
3. Wesley’s Journal

Introduction

Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel? Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?¹

With these words, Queen Elizabeth II was entrusted with the responsibility for preserving the Church and the Gospel within the boundaries of her domain. But what do those words mean – “the Protestant Reformed Religion”?

We looked at what it means to be a protestant last week, and religion seems fairly straightforward, but what does it mean to be reformed?

No, it’s not like being a “reformed prisoner” or a “reformed alcoholic”.

Instead, the word ‘reformed’ in this context has to do with being an heir of the teachings of John Calvin.

John Calvin

When Gerard Calvin and his wife Jeanne became parents of a little boy in northern France in 1509, they could not have known that he was destined to become one of the truly great men of all time. They named him Jean. In French his name is Jean Calvin; in the Latinized form, Joannes Calvinus; but we know him as John Calvin.

John Calvin was born July 10, 1509 in Noyon in Picardy, 60 miles northeast of Paris. Upon reaching his teenage years, he began formal studies towards becoming a Roman Catholic priest. He studied theology at Paris from 1523 to 1528, and did quite well. But he became increasingly disillusioned with the corrupt Catholicism of the day, and decided to study law instead. So he transferred to Orleans and Bourges for studies towards becoming a lawyer (1528 to 1532).

But his heart was still restless, until at last it found its rest in God through true conversion in 1533. He left Roman Catholicism forever. But these were dangerous days for those who left Rome. Heavy persecution dogged the French Protestants, and Calvin himself was imprisoned for a short time from 1534 to 1535. So he decided to leave France.

His goal was to move to Basel, Switzerland, and take up a quiet and secluded life of study and writing. It was never to be. Passing through Geneva, he met the leader of, the Swiss French Reformation, Guillaume Farel, who was immediately so impressed with young Calvin that he cautioned him with God’s punishment if he did not stay in Geneva to preach and teach. Calvin stayed.

In 1536 Calvin published the first edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion. It was immediately hailed throughout Europe as the finest systematic theology by a Protestant Reformer. It was to be his literary masterpiece and he later edited and expanded it several times through his lifetime.

Calvin and Farel immediately began the reformation of the church in Geneva. They proposed a confession and oath for the city and its citizenry. All citizens were required to take the oath of faith or leave Geneva. Virtually all Genevans accepted. But when in 1538 Calvin called for the church to have authority to fence the Lord’s Table by excommunicating all those living in public sin, both he and Farel were exiled by the City Council.

So Calvin went to Strassbourg in southern Germany near France. There he pastored the French-speaking congregation and lectured in the theological academy. He became a close friend of Martin Bucer, who would have a profound influence on Calvin’s theology. Calvin would stay in Strassbourg for 3 years until the Geneva City Council changed its mind and agreed that Calvin and Farel were right after all. Yet it would be nearly 20 years until the church formally had the right to excommunicate citizens living in known sin.

It was in Strassbourg that Calvin met his wife. Actually, Bucer and Farel had twice tried to match Calvin with a prospective wife, unsuccessfully. A certain Anabaptist had converted to Reformed thinking under Calvin’s theology, but he soon caught and died of the Plague. Some time later, his widow would become Mrs. John Calvin. Her name was Idelette de Bure. She brought 2 children with her, a teenage boy and a young girl. John and Idelette had only one child themselves, but he died shortly afterwards. Idelette herself was constantly in ill health, and she died in 1549 after only 9 years of marriage. Calvin never remarried. And he too was in continual ill health.

From 1541 Calvin spent almost all of his life in Geneva. In addition to his preaching and teaching duties he organized a school system for the children of Geneva, a system of charity for the poor and elderly; Calvin even designed the public sewer system of Geneva when the City Council couldn’t agree on a plan.

One of his main goals was a truly godly society. He viewed the Church and State on equal levels – separate in some areas, related in others. Before Calvin, Geneva was notorious throughout Europe for its profligacy; after Calvin, it became one of the godliest cities the world has ever known. Calvin’s theology of the godly society gave rise to the modern ideas of the democratic republic, the Free Enterprise economic system popularly called Capitalism, and the Protestant Work Ethic. They were put into practice in Geneva. The plan worked.

In 1555, Geneva became the refuge of Protestant refugees from all around Europe, particularly Great Britain. These English and Scottish leaders sat under Calvin’s teaching and brought that theology back with them when they returned to solidify the English and Scottish Reformations. Another major milestone in Calvin’s life was the establishment of the Academy of Geneva in 1559, which later became the University of Geneva. But for all this, his main calling was to be a pastor and a theologian.

The ‘Five Points’ of Calvinism

Whilst he never formulated them in these words, John Calvin’s most famous teachings are traditionally remembered using the mnemonic TULIP: Total Depravity; Unconditional Election; Limited Atonement; Irresistible Grace; and Perseverance of the Saints.

Total Depravity

Man, by his fall into a state of sin, has wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation: so as, a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto.²

Total depravity is the fallen state of man as a result of original sin. The doctrine of total depravity teaches that people are by nature not inclined to love God with their whole heart, mind, or strength, as he requires, but rather all are inclined to serve their own interests over those of their neighbor and to reject the rule of God. Even religion and philanthropy are destructive to the extent that these originate from a human imagination, passions, and will.

Therefore, in Reformed Theology, God must predestine individuals for salvation since man is incapable of choosing God.

Total depravity does not mean, however, that people are as evil as possible. As Wayne Grudem points out:

Scripture is not denying that unbelievers can do good in human society in some senses. But it is denying that they can do any spiritual good or be good in terms of a relationship with God. Apart from the work of Christ in our lives, we are like all other unbelievers who are “darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart” (Eph. 4:18).³

This may seem like a harsh call, but Calvin nevertheless taught optimism concerning God’s love for what he has made and God’s ability to accomplish the ultimate good that he intends for his creation. In particular, in the process of salvation, it is argued that God overcomes man’s inability with his divine grace and enables men and women to choose to follow him. After all, “with man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”⁴ And this brings us to the idea of election.

For further reading, see:

• Genesis 6:5: “The LORD saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.”
• Psalms 51:5: “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.”
• Jeremiah 13:23: “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil.”
• Mark 7:21-23: “For from within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evil things come from inside and make a man ‘unclean’.”
• John 3:19: “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved the darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.”
• John 6:64-65: “[Jesus said,] ‘Yet there are some of you who do not believe.’ (For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe, and who would betray him.) He went on to say, ‘This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.'”
• John 8:34: “Jesus replied, ‘I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.'”
• Romans 3:10-11: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one understands, no one who seeks God.”
• Romans 8:6-8: “The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.”
• 1 Corinthians 2:14: “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
• Ephesians 2:1-3: “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath.”

Unconditional Election

As Scripture, then, clearly shows, we say that God once established by his eternal and unchangeable plan those whom he long before determined once for all to receive into salvation, and those whom, on the other hand, he would devote to destruction.⁵

In Protestant theology, election is considered to be one aspect of predestination in which God selects certain individuals to be saved. Those elected receive mercy, while those not elected, the reprobate, receive justice.

In Calvinism, this election is called “unconditional” because his choice to save someone does not hinge on anything inherent in the person or on any act that the person performs or belief that the person exercises. Indeed the influence of sin has so inhibited our ability to act righteously that no one is willing or able to come to or follow God apart from God first regenerating the person’s heart to give them the ability to love him. Hence, God’s choice in election is and can only be based solely on God’s own independent and sovereign will and not upon the foreseen actions of man.

The Reformed position is frequently contrasted with the Arminian doctrine of conditional election in which God’s eternal choice to save a person is conditioned on God’s certain foreknowledge of future events, namely, that certain individuals would exercise faith and trust in response to God’s offer of salvation.

For more:

• John 15:16: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit – fruit that will last.”
• Romans 9:15-16: “For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.”
• Ephesians 1:4-5: “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will.”
• 2 Timothy 1:9: “[God] has saved us and called us to a holy life – not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace.”

Limited Atonement

The doctrine of the limited scope (or extent) of the atonement is intimately tied up with the doctrine of the nature of the atonement. It also has much to do with the general Calvinist scheme of predestination. Calvinists advocate the satisfaction theory (also known as punishment theory) of the atonement, which developed in the writings of Anselm of Canterbury and Thomas Aquinas. In brief, the Calvinistic refinement of this theory states that the atonement of Christ literally pays the penalty incurred by the sins of men — that is, Christ receives the wrath of God for specific sins and thereby cancels the judgment they had incurred. Since, Calvinists argue, it would be unjust for God to pay the penalty for men’s sins and then still condemn them for those sins, all those whose sins were propitiated must necessarily be saved.

The Calvinist view of predestination teaches that God chose a group of people, who would not and could not choose him, to be saved apart from their works or their cooperation, and those people are compelled by God’s irresistible grace to accept the offer of the salvation achieved in the atonement of Christ. Since in this scheme God knows precisely who the elect are, Christ needn’t atone for sins other than those of the elect.

The Calvinist atonement is thus called definite because it certainly secures the salvation of those for whom Christ died, and it is called limited in its extent because it effects salvation for the elect only. Calvinists do not believe the power of the atonement is limited in any way, which is to say that no sin is too great to be expiated by Christ’s sacrifice, in their view.

On a practical level, this doctrine is not emphasized in Calvinist churches except in comparison to other salvific schemes, and when it is taught, the primary use of this and the other doctrines of predestination is the assurance of believers. To that end, they apply this doctrine especially to try to strengthen the belief that “Christ died for me,” as in the words of St. Paul, “I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me“⁶. In fact, contrary to what one might expect on the basis of this doctrine, Calvinists believe they can freely and sincerely offer salvation to everyone on God’s behalf since they themselves do not know which people are counted among the elect and since they see themselves as God’s instruments in bringing about the salvation of other members of the elect.

The classic Bible passage cited to prove a limited extent to the atonement is the tenth chapter of the Gospel of John in which Jesus uses Ancient Near Eastern shepherding practices as a metaphor for his relationship to his followers. A shepherd of those times would call his sheep from a mix of flocks, and his sheep would hearken to his voice and follow, while the sheep of other flocks would ignore any but their own shepherd’s voice (John 10:1-5). In that context, Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me,…and I lay down my life for the sheep” (vv. 14-15), and he tells the Pharisees that they “do not believe because [they] are not [his] sheep” (v. 26). He continues, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.” (vv. 27-28). Since Calvinists and nearly all Christians believe that not all have eternal life with God, Calvinists conclude that either Jesus was wrong in saying that he would lose none of his sheep (a conclusion they reject) or that Jesus must not have died for everyone.

Irresistible Grace

According to Calvinism, those who obtain salvation do so, not by their own “free” will, but because of the sovereign discriminating grace of God. That is, men yield to grace, not finally because their consciences were more tender or their faith more tenacious than that of other men. Rather, the willingness and ability to do God’s will, are evidence of God’s own faithfulness to save men from the power and the penalty of sin, and since man is so corrupt that he will not decide and cannot be wooed to follow after God, God must powerfully intervene. In short, Calvinism argues that regeneration must precede faith.

Calvin says of this intervention that “it is not violent, so as to compel men by external force; but still it is a powerful impulse of the Holy Spirit, which makes men willing who formerly were unwilling and reluctant,”⁷ and John Gill says that “this act of drawing is an act of power, yet not of force.

See, for example:

• John 6:37,39: “All that the Father gives me will come to me…. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up on the last day.”
• John 6:44–45: “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him…. Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.”
• John 6:65: “[N]o one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.”

Perseverance of the Saints

The perseverance of the saints means that all those who are truly born again will be kept by God’s power and will persevere as Christians until the end of their lives, and that only those who persevere until the end have been truly born again.

The Reformed tradition has consistently seen the doctrine of perseverance as a natural consequence to its general scheme of predestination in which God has chosen some men and women for salvation and has cleared them of their guilty status by atoning for their sins through Jesus’ sacrifice. According to these Calvinists, God has irresistibly drawn the elect to put their faith in himself for salvation by regenerating their hearts and convincing them of their need. Therefore, they continue, since God has made satisfaction for the sins of the elect, they can no longer be condemned for them, and through the help of the Holy Spirit, they must necessarily persevere as Christians and in the end be saved.

Traditional Calvinists also believe that all who are born again and justified before God necessarily and inexorably proceed to sanctification. Indeed, failure to proceed to sanctification in their view is evidence that the person in question was not one of the elect to begin with. The suggestion is that after God has regenerated someone, the person’s will cannot reverse its course. It is argued that God has changed that person in ways that are outside of his or her own ability to alter fundamentally, and he or she will therefore persevere in the faith.

On a practical level, Calvinists do not claim to know who is elect and who is not, and the only guide they have are the verbal testimony and good works (or “fruit”) of each individual. Any who “fall away” (that is, do not persevere unto death) must not have been truly converted to begin with, though Calvinists don’t claim to know with certainty who did and who did not persevere.

• John 6:37-40: “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”
• John 10:28-29: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.”
• Romans 5:9-10: “Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!”
• Romans 8:31-39: “What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
  “For your sake we face death all day long;
  we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
• Romans 11:29: “[F]or God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
• 1 Corinthians 1:4-9: “I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way – in all your speaking and in all your knowledge – because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.”
• Ephesians 1:13-14:”And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession – to the praise of his glory.”
• Philippians 1:6: “[B]eing confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
• 1 Peter 1:5: “[The elect] are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.”
• Jude 24: “[God] is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy.”

The Lord’s Supper

The Roman Catholic Church of Calvin’s day (and indeed to this day) had 7 ‘sacraments’ – that is, rites, first implemented by Jesus, which are sacred. They were: baptism; confirmation; the eucharist (what we would call communion or the Lord’s Supper); confession; ordination; anointing of the sick (for those who are terminally ill, you may have heard this referred to as ‘last rites’); and marriage.

Martin Luther, John Calvin and other reformers argued that there was only biblical evidence for 2 of these – baptism and the Lord’s Supper. However, they were by no means in total agreement about what these actually meant. Luther and Calvin, for example, disagreed about what happens when we take communion: Luther believed that, whilst not actually being Christ’s body and blood (as Catholics believe), the bread and the wine by which we celebrate the Lord’s Supper somehow mystically link us to his body and blood, allowing us to participate in his death and thus in his life; Calvin, on the other hand, argued that the bread and the wine were rather a symbol, giving a visible sign of the fact that Christ himself was truly present. This latter view is the one that is held in the Anglican Church:

The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is Faith.⁸

Conclusion

Few men other than the Lord Jesus himself have had a more significant impact on Christian thinking than John Calvin. His influence can be felt every time we take communion. His understanding of God’s Sovereignty was a precious gift to a church infatuated with its own sense of control; it reminds us that the world exists around God, not God around the world. Some of his teachings are hard to understand or accept – yet they ring true with Scripture over and over again.

And that is why I am a reformed Christian.

Endnotes

1. Archbishop of Canterbury to Queen Elizabeth II at her coronation, 1953
2. Westminster Confession of Faith
3. Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (IVP, 1994) p. 497.
4. Matthew 19:26
5. Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion III.xxi.7.
6. Gal. 2:20, emphasis added
7. Calvin, Commentary on John’s Gospel 6:44.
8. Article 28 of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion.