suffering, futility, sin and hope — John Piper

Sermon text: Romans 8:18–25

"The meaning of all the misery in the world is that sin is horrific. All natural evil is a statement about the horror of moral evil. If you see a suffering in the world that is unspeakably horrible, let it make you shudder at how unspeakably horrible sin is against an infinitely holy God. The meaning of futility and the meaning of corruption and the meaning of our groaning is that sin – falling short of the glory of God – is ghastly, hideous, repulsive beyond imagination.

Unless you have some sense of the infinite holiness of God and the unspeakable outrage of sin against this God, you will inevitably see the futility and suffering of the universe as an overreaction. But in fact the point of our miseries, our futility, our corruption, our groaning is to teach us the horror of sin. And the preciousness of redemption and hope."

— John Piper, Subjected to Futility in Hope, Part 1

Without absolutes, morals as morals cease to exist — Francis A. Schaeffer

"From the biblical answer flow four important facts.

Firstly, the God who is there is a good God.

Secondly, there is a hope of a solution to the dilemma of man.

Thirdly, there is a sufficient basis for morals. Nobody has ever discovered a way of having real “morals” without a moral absolute. If there is no moral absolute, we are left with hedonism (doing what I like) or some form of the social contract theory (what is best for society as a whole is right). However, neither of these alternatives corresponds to the moral motions that men have. Talk to people long enough and deeply enough, and you will find that they consider some things are really right and some things are really wrong.  Without absolutes, morals as morals cease to exist, and humanistic man starting from himself is unable to find the absolute he needs.  But because the God of the Bible is there, real morals exist.  Within this framework I can say one action is right and another wrong, without talking nonsense.

Fourthly, there is an adequate reason for fighting wrong.  The Christian never faces the dilemma posed in Camus’ book La Peste.  It simply is not true that he either has to side with the doctor against God by fighting the plague, or join with the priest on God’s side and thus be much less than human by not fighting the plague. If this were an either-or choice in life, it would indeed be terrible. But the Christian is not confined to such a choice.  Let us go to the tomb of Lazarus.  As Jesus stood there, He not only wept, but He was angry.  The exegesis of the Greek of the passages John 11:33 and 38 is clear. Jesus, standing in front of the tomb of Lazarus, was angry at death and at the abnormality of the world the destruction and distress caused by sin.  In Camus’ words, Christ hated the plague.  He claimed to be God and He could hate the plague without hating Himself as God.

A Christian can fight what is wrong in the world with compassion and know that as he hates these things, God hates them too.  God hates them to the high price of the death of Christ.

But if I live in a world of nonabsolutes and would fight social injustice on the mood of the moment, how can I establish what social justice is?  What criterion do I have to distinguish between right and wrong so that I can know what I should be fighting?  Is it not possible that I could in fact acquiesce in evil and stamp out good?  The word love cannot tell me how to discern, for within the humanistic framework love can have no defined meaning.  But once I comprehend that the Christ who came to die to end “the plague” both wept and was angry at the plague’s effects, I have a reason for fighting that does not rest merely on my momentary disposition, or the shifting consensus of men.

But the Christian also needs to be challenged at this point.  The fact that he alone has a sufficient standard by which to fight evil, does not mean that he will so fight.  The Christian is the real radical of our generation, for he stands against the monolithic, modern concept of truth as relative.  But too often, instead of being the radical, standing against the shifting sands of relativism, he subsides into merely maintaining the status quo.  If it is true that evil is evil, that God hates it to the point of the cross, and that there is a moral law fixed in what God is in Himself, then Christians should be the first into the field against what is wrong — including man’s inhumanity to man."

— Francis A. Schaeffer (1982). The complete works of Francis A. Schaeffer: a Christian worldview. Westchester, IL: Crossway Books.

love your enemies — St. Augustine

“And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” — Matthew 6:12

“…You have enemies. For who can live on this earth without them? Take heed to yourselves, love them. In no way can your enemy so hurt you by his violence, as you hurt yourself if you love him not. For he may injure your estate, or flocks, or house, or your man-servant, or your maid-servant, or your son, or your wife; or at most, if such power be given him, your body. But can he injure your soul, as you can yourself? Reach forward, dearly beloved, I beseech you, to this perfection. But have I given you this power? He only has given it to whom you say, “Your will be done as in heaven so in earth” (Matthew 6:10). Yet let it not seem impossible to you. I know, I have known by experience, that there are Christian men who do love their enemies. If it seem to you impossible, you will not do it. Believe then first that it can be done, and pray that the will of God may be done in you. For what good can your neighbor’s ill do you? If he had no ill, he would not even be your enemy. Wish him well then, that he may end his ill, and he will be your enemy no longer. For it is not the human nature in him that is at enmity with you, but his sin. Is he therefore your enemy, because he has a soul and body? In this he is as you are: you have a soul, and so has he: you have a body, and so has he. He is of the same substance as you are; you were made both out of the same earth, and quickened by the same Lord…” — St. Augustine

Men's Inhumanity To God — Jonathan Edwards

"Men will not bear that others should behave themselves with such pride and arrogance towards them as they do towards God… Men will not bear to be treated by their neighbors with that disregard and contempt with which they treat the Most High… Men will not bear such disobedience in those that are under [their] authority as they are commonly guilty of towards God. When men are vested with authority and command over others, they expect to be obeyed… Men will not endure to be treated by men with such injustice—in withholding and abusing what is committed to their trust—[as] they are guilty of towards God. Men received from God all the faculties of their minds, [their] senses, members, [and] all their worldly possessions: committed to them by God to be improved for him. Lent things require that they be returned, but how is God robbed!… Men commonly treat the Most High with such unfaithfulness as they will not bear one from another… Men will not bear such ingratitude one from another as they are guilty of towards God. Ingratitude is a thing that is in a peculiar manner resented amongst men… Men would exceedingly resent such obstinacy in injuriousness and ill treatment from their fellow creatures as they are guilty of towards God… So that this is really the case, owing to two things: first, a low thought of [God and Jesus Christ]; second, a magnifying [of] themselves. Were it not for these things, men would not object against the justice of that eternal punishment that God threatens… I would hence exhort to praise to God for his patience, forgiveness, and grace to us who have treated him so ill. 'Tis because the Lord is God and not man (Hosea 11:9). Such as are the subject of the saving mercy of God in Christ, you have reason to confess that God's ways of dealing with you are not as your ways, nor his thoughts [as your thoughts] (Isaiah 55:7–9)…"

— Jonathan Edwards, Men's Inhumanity To God

http://edwards.yale.edu/archive?path=aHR0cDovL2Vkd2FyZHMueWFsZS5lZHUvY2dpLWJpbi9uZXdwaGlsby9nZXRvYmplY3QucGw/Yy4yNDoyNC53amVv

“the LORD has called for a famine” - 2 Kings 8:1

“the LORD has called for a famine” - 2 Kings 8:1 — “This is the Scripture mode of representing those heavy calamities brought upon a land or a single habitation, and which sheds upon the sorrows and distresses of life a peculiar light, that is highly consolatory to the children of God. Viewed in this light, famine, pestilence, and war, and every other calamity, constitute an army, ever ready to come and go, to advance and retreat, at the Almighty’s command, but which, without His permission, can assail none… Sometimes they are employed to punish, and are the instruments of Divine justice; sometimes to awaken, and to restore sobriety to the intoxicated; sometimes to embitter sin, and to force sinners to a throne of grace; sometimes for the trial of the saints, and to kindle around them a refining fire; whatever may be the purpose for which they are employed, they never return, till, like the word of God, they have accomplished the thing whereunto they were sent. No one, therefore, when afflicted, has simply to do with his afflictions, but, above all, with Him who has appointed them; he is not to content himself with complaining, and thinking how they can be removed; but is to consider why they have been sent, and to decipher the obscure handwriting…”

— F.W. Krummacher, The restitution

sin of loving or fearing any creature above its worth — John Flavel

“It is a great sin to love or fear any creature above its worth, as if it were master of all our temporal & eternal comforts… To trust in any creature as it had God’s power to help us, or to fear any creature as if it had God’s power to hurt us, is exceedingly sinful. It provokes God… It is a sinful & dangerous mistake to give to a creature that trust & dependence that belongs to God alone… We are inclined to a sinful trust and dependence upon each other, & to inordinate fear and dread of each other. We act as if the creature were god rather than a man, a spirit rather than flesh… God rebukes this sin in His own people: “I, I am he who comforts you; who are you that you are afraid of man who dies, of the son of man who is made like grass, and have forgotten the LORD, your Maker…?” (Isaiah 51:12-13a). It is evident that fear exalts people and belittles God. It thinks upon a person’s harmful power so much that it forgets God’s saving power.”

— John Flavel, Triumphing Over Sinful Fear