Cairn (Joshua 4:1-7)

I posted a few pictures above, and you can see there’s one commonality among all of them. In each one, you can see that the trophy is the center of attention. Now, hold on. No, this is not me treating to toot my own horn. I’m going somewhere with this. This trophy is not just about a win, a victory or a championship. This trophy reminds me of an important spiritual discipline that the Bible commands all Christians to follow.

I invite you to open your Bibles to the book of Joshua. The book of Joshua is the sixth book of the Bible, right after the book of Deuteronomy. In fact, the story in the book of Joshua picks off right after the story in Deuteronomy. The book of Deuteronomy closes with the death of Moses, and the book of Joshua opens with Joshua taking the reigns as leader. Joshua’s leadership role, however, differs from the leadership role Moses has. Whereas Moses was the lawgiver, Joshua is a general, although the book of Joshua will constantly remind its reader that God is ultimately the commander-in-chief. You might be familiar with the military strategy of “divide and conquer,” utilized by Philip II of Macedonia (Alexander the Great’s father), Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte. Joshua’s military strategy was the complete opposite. Joshua conquered, then he divided. The reader can clearly see Joshua’s military strategy by the arrangement of the book. The first half of the book, chapters 1-12, focus on the conquest part, and the second half, chapters 13-24, focus on the dividing part. Since this passage comes from Joshua chapter 4, this passage comes the “conquering” half and will deal with that aspect.

Before we dive into chapter 4, let me quickly summarize the previous chapter, chapter 3, to set the context for chapter 4. At the start of chapter 3, we find Joshua and the Israelites camped at the Jordan River, near Shittim (pronounced “Sheetim”). This specific location of Jordan is key. Just like any major river, at some points you talk about its width in terms of feet, at other points, you talk about its width in terms of yards, and still yet at other points you talk about its width in terms of miles. This is one of the points you talk about it in terms of miles. Furthermore, Joshua chapter 3 informs the reader the setting takes place in the middle of the Jordan River’s flood season. Tack on another mile or two to the Jordan River’s width. If the distance alone wasn’t already a factor, the depth of the water would be. In non-flood stages, the Jordan River’s depth at this certain location is at least 3 feet deep, but now that Jordan River is in its peak flood stage, we’re talking closer to 12 feet. Joshua and Israelites truly have a problem on their hands. Here the Israelites stand at the door of the land that God has promised them, but they cannot enter, for the flood waters stand in the way.

Knowing the dire problem of the situation, Joshua commands the Israelites to consecrate themselves, or make themselves both physically and spiritually clean, so the people may petition the Lord. After the people of Israel consecrate themselves, the Lord instructs Joshua (my paraphrase), “Have the priests take up the ark of the covenant. Next, have the priests, bearing the ark of the covenant, march toward the Jordan. Then I will perform a miracle that will make it clear that I am the true living God on all the earth.” The priests take up the ark, they march towards the Jordan, and sure enough, once the first priest puts his foot in the Jordan – WHOOSH! – the waters of the Jordan River split and they heap up into a wall of water. One wall of water stands by the town of Adam, and the other wall of water stands at the mouth of the Jordan River, where the Jordan dumps its water in to the Dead Sea. Furthermore, Joshua 3 emphasizes that the Israelites crossed over a dry ground. Not a molecule of H₂0 remained on the Jordan’s riverbed. Once again, God has provided a solution to Israel’s problems.

Now if you’re just here looking for a good story, this is where the story ends. We’ve hit the climax, the exciting part of the story, with the Lord using his supernatural power to perform a miracle. We have a solution to our problem. The problem was the Israelites could not enter the Promised Land, and the solution was God parting the Jordan, allowing Israel to cross over into the Promised Land. But I believe that Joshua 4 serves an epilogue that gives us that timeless truth than everyone can apply to their lives, no matter where you live on this earth. So without further ado, let’s look at Joshua 4:1-7.

¹When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, ² “Take twelve men from the people, from each tribe a man, ³ and command them, saying, ‘Take twelve stones from here out of the midst of the Jordan, from the very place where the priests’ feet stood firmly, and bring them over with you and lay them down in the place where you lodge tonight.” ⁴ Then Joshua called the twelve men from the people of Israel, whom he had appointed, a man from each tribe. ⁵ And Joshua said to them, “Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel, ⁶ that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’ ⁷ then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.”

I’m going to stop at verse 7, for time’s sake. The rest of the chapter goes on to say that the Israelites did as Joshua commanded, and then it finishes by summarizing chapters 3 and 4. But don’t let my summarization of the rest of the chapter undermine what’s going on in the rest of chapter. A continuous theme that runs throughout the whole book of Joshua is that when Israel obeys, God blesses Israel with victory. When Israel doesn’t obey, whether that means doing the complete opposite or slightly veering off of their instruction, then they find themselves cursed and defeated. The repetition demonstrates that Israel is obedient, which will bring about much needed blessing for the first battle in chapter 6, the famous battle against Jericho.

Now let’s break down the Joshua 4:1-7. The paragraph opens, “When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan…” As I explained, this repetition reminds the reader that Israel obeyed completely, therefore God blessed them with safe voyage into the Promised Land. It also reminds us that the events of chapter 4 will pick up right after chapter 3 left off. After every person crosses over the Lord instructs Joshua to call together the twelve men, one from each tribe, who were specially consecrated in chapter 3. Since the twelve men were one from each tribe, you can tell these men were meant to be representatives of their respective tribe. Once Joshua calls these 12 representatives over, the Lord tells Joshua to pass on the message to them that they are to go back in the Jordan River, to the middle part where the priests stood with the ark of the covenant, each one is to bring back a stone, and they together are to bring those stones back to their new campground on the other bank of the Jordan River.

Now let’s pause here. Let’s put ourselves in the Israel’s shoes. How do you think they crossed the Jordan River? You don’t have to imagine too hard, for if we would have read on, Joshua 4:10b tells us the people crossed over “in haste.” They hurried over as fast as possible. While researching this passage, it didn’t take me long to find some modern-day skeptics, who had their doubts that something supernatural happened, who explain it away as natural science (I’m not saying God couldn’t use science. He could have very well used science. It’s doubting it was a miracle that I’m not OK with). I don’t think only modern-day skeptics struggle with what they hear about in Joshua 4. I bet right then and there, some of the people witnessing might have been skeptics, having doubts. How do we know this is from God? How do we know this isn’t some freak act of nature? Do we even know how long it’s going to last? For if you believed it was of God, you’d expect God to make sure everyone would get across, but if you don’t believe it’s from God, you don’t know how long it will last. Not knowing how long it will last, but at the same time, wanting to take advantage of it, you dart over to the other side. Now that everyone is safely to the other side, Joshua calls these 12 representatives of the tribes, and he tells them to go back! All the thoughts that must have gone through their mind. I even wonder if one of them really wanted object out loud. Yet, all these men go back. They lay down all their fears, and instead, they pick up faith. What great faith these men had! This faith allowed those men to put their fears aside and march back into the dried up Jordan River to pick up a stone, just as the Lord commanded. (The humorous side of me imagines one of representatives looking over the stones in the middle of the Jordan River, thinking to himself, “I could pick that one… no, that one will break my back even trying to pick it up. I could pick that one, but if I do, Joshua just going to send me right back in for another…”) If the men’s faith or God’s power wasn’t enough to encourage the men to go back in the Jordan River, the importance of the stone should be.

When the men come back with the stone representing their tribe, Joshua’s commands in Joshua 4:3 say “lay them down.” The Hebrew is הִנַּחְתֶּ֣ם (hinnahtem). The root of the word simply means “rest,” but in the case of this specific verb tense in Joshua 4:3, it means “cause them to rest.” This has a lot of significance. For starters, these stones would represent the Israelites. No longer would the Israelites wander from land to land; rather, God would cause the Israelites to rest in the Promised Land. More importantly, the verse explains that these stones the 12 representatives gathered were not simply thrown together in a heap. They were placed by design for a purpose

What was this purpose? It was not to be worshipped. That’s why God kept it simply to a heap of rocks, not some artistic form, like a statue. It was not to build an altar on which the people of Israelites sacrificed animals to God. Rather, these stones formed a memorial. The memorial was to remind the Israelites how good the Lord was them. When they were in a tough bind, the Lord provided a way. The memorial was intended to attest to a specific event. It wasn’t just “The Lord provided,” but moreso “When the Israelites were unable to enter the promised land because of the flooded Jordan River, God outstretched his almighty hand to defy the powers of nature and he divided the waters of the Jordan ensuring Israel had safe voyage into the promise land.” It was supposed to create a good story! The memorial was supposed to also spark up conversation about the Lord. In verse 6, the ESV reads the question the children might ask as, “What do these stones mean to you?” but a more literal translation of the Hebrew says, “What is it to you?” When the younger generations would ask such a question in the future, the old generation should take the responsibility to emphasize the importance of the memorial, almost to the point of stopping everything they were doing to do so.

Once again, I invite you think back to the Old Testament times, but not during the times of the events in Joshua. Think back to years, decades or even centuries after the events happened. An Israelite farmer now owns the land on which this memorial sits. One day, the farmer tells his son, “Son, I’ve been prayer extra hard during the past winter that God would give us a bountiful harvest this upcoming year. I believe that the Lord will answer that prayer, but we got to do our part as well. So on this first day of spring, first thing is first. We have to clear the land of all the debris the winter storms brought in over the winter. So you start at one end, I’ll start at the other, and we’ll meet each other in the middle.” The son sighs, for one can only get so excited about doing lawn work, but he listens to his father’s instructs and begins doing his work, picking up sticks, stones and leaves, and moving them off the land. Going from one end to another, the farmer’s son eventually comes across this memorial, but to him, it’s just a heap of rocks. The farmer’s son lets out a loud groan, thinking to himself, “Great! Now I got to pick up large rocks! They look so heavy!” So he begins. He picks up the first rock, and with much struggling - SPLOOSH! – the first rock goes back into the Jordan River. While trying to get a grip on the second rock, the son all of a sudden hears a loud yell. It’s from his father, running toward him, franticly waving his arms. The boy rolls his eyes his and groans again, thinking to himself, “Great, what I have done wrong this time? Am I using the wrong lifting technique?” When the farmer finally gets there, he yells to his son, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” The son replies, “I’m clearing the land, just like you asked me to do.” All the father can franticly say is, “Not those!” “Why Dad?” the son asks. “What are these rocks to you, that they are so important, that you run down and freak out when you see one move?” The father replies with his own question, “Son, have I ever told you about the time Lord helped our people here?” The son shakes his head no. “Well, son,” the father says, “have a seat. Let me tell you about what the Lord did here.”

That’s exactly what the heap of rocks was supposed to do. It was supposed to remind people when they saw it. In a time when writing was scarce, people needed images to remind them of significant events that happened in history. It was supposed spur on a good story, making the event even harder to forget. It was supposed to have importance. This wasn’t something the father would say to the son, “Long story. I’ll tell you at dinner after work.” It was so important, the people would stop whatever they were doing, sit down and discuss it

This heap of rocks has a proper term. It’s cairn, coming from the Scottish language. Cairns can found in many cultural throughout several different time periods. The debate rages on it origins. Some claim Yahweh founded this idea, and as other cultures encountered God-fearing cultures they adopted this practice, even if they didn’t worship the one true God. Others claim that God saw his creation practicing this idea of cairns, and wanting to relate his creation and speak their language, he joined in on creating cairns. No matter what its origins or what cultured practiced it, the meaning still stayed the same. Cairn were stone landmarks, meant to serve as memorial to remind people of something special that happened. They were to invite people remember, share stories and celebrate. And I might I add one more thing to that list. Cairns, in the Biblical sense, were to encourage Yahweh worshippers to put their faith in Yahweh and have hope that he would act the same way again when his people needed him.

So how do we, living in 21^st century America, practice what we learned in Joshua 4:1-7? I guess we could set up a heap of stones either inside or outside our homes, but that would be very much so against popular trends of interior decorating or landscaping alike. Rather, I propose 3 more realistic ways to practice this spiritual discipline.

First, while I would not suggest building a heap of rocks inside or outside your home, I would suggest decorating your home with keepsakes that will remind you of what the Lord has done for you. If you were to walk upstairs into my wife and my apartment (we have a 2^nd story apartment), the first thing you would see is a photo canvas of one of our wedding pictures. In fact, we have 2 of them (and I will admit, my laziness has not allowed me to hang the second one up). We also have many other photos hanging up from our engagement and our first anniversary. When I see these photos, it reminds me to praise God for how he has helped our marriage nurture. They also remind me the commitment I made to be faithful to my wife. This goes beyond just not committing adultery. When my boss calls me at home, asking me either to fill in for a co-worker who has called off on Sunday, or to go paintballing with my co-workers on a Saturday, I look upon those pictures, remember my vows, and say back, “At the wedding, I made a commitment: my wife comes first. Last weekend, I made a commitment that the upcoming weekend would be all for her. So I’m going to have to say no.” In the same way, I invite you hang up things that will remind you about how God has worked in your life. You’ll find out that not only will it remind you of how God faithfully acted in the past, but you’ll find yourselves looking for God in the same way in the future.

Second, celebrate holidays! God merely did not use cairns to help the people remember significant event. God also used holidays. In Leviticus 23, God commanded the Israelites to celebrate 6 holidays (I’m not including the Sabbath on that list, just annual holidays). Let me emphasize the word again: commanded. Celebrating the 6 holidays in Leviticus 23 were not optional; they were mandatory. Now let me be clear that some things did change with the New Covenant. In Colossians 2:16, Paul says that no one should judge you in regards to which festival you celebrate, so Christians are not required to celebrate those 6 festivals in Leviticus 23 (although I think the churches that do celebrate them are cool). But I don’t believe that means that the command to celebrate is null and void. Quaker pastor and writer Richard J. Foster has well convinced me in his book, The Celebration of Discipline, that celebration is a spiritual discipline all Christians need to celebrate. So we need to celebrate Christian holidays. Yeah, I know it can be difficult to celebrate the religious holidays with the commercialism that surrounds them. Besides, shouldn’t we be living out the meaning of the holiday every day? For example, when it comes to Easter, shouldn’t we be living out the hope of the resurrection every day? True, but I believe that holidays serve as a reminder (there’s that word again) to get us back on track. Going back to our example, when Easter rolls around every year, it should make us think, “Have I been living out the hope of the resurrection recently?” If the answer is no, Easter should be the day that you will start thinking about the resurrection and putting your hope in it.

And the spiritual disciple of celebration does not need to be confined to holidays established on the calendar. You can make up your own holidays. A few years ago, if you were to ask me what significance October 4 had, I would say none because it really didn’t have significance. Now it does have a lot of significance, for October 4 is my wife and my anniversary, and we do something to commemorate it. Of course, that’s an anniversary, it’s a big event in life, you should commemorate it. But it can be smaller things, too. On a day that the Lord did something for you in the past, commemorate that day. Do something to celebrate what happened, even if it just means lifting up a prayer of thanks. By celebrating days as special, we keep alive the memories of what the Lord has done for us.

Third, share a testimony. As I said earlier, seeing cairns should lead to telling stories. I consider myself a Mennonite, and I attend a Mennonite church. The Mennonites have a rich history of sharing testimonies. Previously in Mennonite history, most Mennonite church pastors were not seminary trained and ordained. A lot of Mennonite pastors were selected merely by prayer and lots. The few Mennonite pastors who were seminary trained and ordained were traveling pastors, traveling from town to town, church to church, spreading the gospel message. In either case, the question would arise, “How do we know what the pastor preaches is Biblical truth?” How do we know that the pastor selected from prayer and lots is speaking Biblical truth? He has not received seminary training, nor has anyone made sure he’s doing his daily devotions. How do we know the traveling pastor is speaking Biblical truth? We do not know him. For all we know he’s a conman, and this is elaborate hoax to collect the offering plate money. So the Mennonite denomination formulated a plan of testimony sharing. After the pastor would preach, the church service would have a time for the elders to get up a share a testimony of how the sermon applied to something that happened to them in the past or how they could use the sermon in the present or future. If an elder did not get up and share a testimony, it meant the pastor’s sermon did not speak Biblical truth. If an elder did get up and share a testimony, it validated the spiritual truth behind the sermon. And of course, the more elders that got up the better. I can imagine that this time following the sermon was a nerve-racking one for the pastor!

So take the time to share your testimonies. It doesn’t have to be constrained to just church, small group, prayer group or Bible study. Share testimonies at school and work. Share testimonies at the dinner table. Share testimonies when you visit someone. Share testimonies when you’re just hanging out. Tell everyone what the Lord has done for you. Not only will you give God the glory for doing so, but if someone else was in a situation you were in, it will encourage that person to seek the Lord for the answer, knowing that the Lord helped you.

In closing, let me practice what I preach. Let me explain to you why that ACC Tournament Championship trophy is my cairn. Going into that ACC Tournament, this Spring City team had just finished the 8-week season in 6^th place in League. While that might sound good, our final point average was 82, two quiz outs and a little more. So with that unimpressive point average, we were, well, to parody a Judy Blume book title, a “tale of a sixth place nobody.” Going into that tournament, our 7-quizzer quiz team had 2 quizzers out of state, and out of the 5 quizzers remaining, 1 quizzer only got 4 questions right all year and 1 quizzer just got back from baseball camp, so one could only guess how much studying he had. It looked like we were right in line to continue our average of 82 points, which would get a few wins in the round robin portion of the tournament, but that would be about it.

Our first match of the tournament was against Neffsville 1. We had a lot of errors, but since Neffsville 1 was, nicely put, a below average team, we easily won 120-45. Our second match was against Reading 1. In that match, we got over 5 errors, causing us to lose points. Somehow, it was still close, but Reading 1 beat us by a matter of 5 points. The close loss left us devastated. It really knocked off our game. Our next match, we got a bunch of errors, and yet we somehow won. Then came our next match, and once again, we got a lot of errors, but somehow, we won.

Then it came down to the last round in the round robin. In our round robin ground, only 3 teams had a winning record: 1^st place Petra 2, who was 4-0, 2^nd place Reading 1, who was 3-1, and 3^rd place Spring City, who was 3-1 (Reading 1 had the tiebreaker due to head-to-head results). The last 2 matches were Spring City vs. Petra 2, and Reading 1 vs. Neffsville 1, who was the below average season team who was still winless at the time. The only way we could make the playoffs is if Spring City won against undefeated Petra 2, and Reading 1 loss to winless Neffsville 1. It was not looking good.

That match against Petra 2 didn’t look good either. Our top quizzer of the year errored out during it. Somehow, we managed to stay afloat. It came down to the last question, question 15. We were down by 10. The quizmaster asked the question, and Petra 2’s top quizzer buzzed in. I thought it was over at that point. She answers, “Eljiah…No! Elisha!” The quizmaster responds, “No, I’m sorry, I have to take your first answer.” Who does the bonus go to? Of course it’s that quizzer who only got 4 questions right the whole year! But after thinking about it, she realized what the Petra 2 quizzer did wrong. She quietly answered, “Elisha?” She was right, sending the match into overtime, where we won with a team bonus.

After our win, the whole team rushed toward the standings board to see the results of the match between Reading 1 and Neffsville 1. They were still in the match. All we could do was pace and pray. I even remember vowing to my teammates, “If Neffsville 1 wins this match, I will hug them all.” Then the record keeper out. He walked to our group’s board. He drew the tally mark. I was the first one to see. When I saw the results, I yelled them out loud. I yelled...."NEFFSVILLE WON!!" The boys (including me) went wild. We jumped up and down, we high-fived, we fist bumped, we chest bumped, we screamed, we yelled, "WE'RE NUMBER ONE! WE’RE NUMBER ONE!” Our friends from other teams joined in our madness. Meanwhile, our coaches still walking their way back to the standings boards kept bumping into other coaches congratulating them. They kept wondering why they were getting congratulated. They figured it out once they saw the commotion their quiz team was causing.

But it doesn’t end there. Due to tiebreakers, we actually went from 3^rd to 1^st in our group. Because we finished 1^st in our group, our first playoff match was against a team that finished 2^nd in their group, and from what I heard, they barely finished 2^nd. In that match, we got 5 errors, but we got 5 errors, but we won with team bonus. Since the playoffs are a simple single elimination playoff tree, you know your next match ins against 1 of 2 teams. During the whole playoffs, it seemed like every time the underdog won, meaning we were playing the underdog next, giving us the advantage, all the way to the final match against Goods 1. Now rumor had it that this team had the perfect match during the season: 5 quiz outs and a team bonus. We had the best match we had all night. We got the first 6 questions right, limited ourselves to 2 errors (the least amount of errors we had all day), got team bonuses and 2 quiz out, giving us the win, and earning us that championship trophy.

But this is where it becomes more than just a win, a victory or a championship. See, our coaches, the Deitricks would always do more than just coach us how to win matches. They mentored us so we could spiritually grow. This year, Dave would always talk about favor, as in “seeking God’s favor.” I didn’t fully grasp what it meant, so I didn’t fully know what to do with it. So I could do is I took it to heart and began putting my quizzing fate in God’s hands. Whatever happened was God’s will, so I prayed hard that the Lord would help me do my best. Now, after this tournament, I understood. There was no way with so many errors (36, to be exact) we should have won so many matches. There is no way that we should have beaten the undefeated and always formidable Petra 2. There is no way a winless Neffsville 1 should have won over Reading 1. There is no way we should have gotten such an easy path to the final match. But there is a way. It’s called God’s favor. On that I learned, just like the Israelites would learn in the book of Joshua, that God favors the one who surrenders their will to God’s will and who obeys what God has commanded them. So every time I look upon that trophy I remember how God has shown me favor in the past, and it encourages me to seek God’s favor in the future.

We didn’t just take home a trophy that night. We were allowed to take home the giant playoff bracket. Just like the trophy, that is at the Spring City church, but it is wrapped in the corner of the youth Sunday school room. There’s some good theology there. Just like the trophy, it is made of earthly materials and will go to the big bonfire in the end when Jesus returns. But this trophy reminds that I don’t have to wait until Jesus returns to see him in action. This trophy reminds me Jesus is active in the present, and I can expect him to continually act all the way to his return.

Is the Jesus of Suburbia the Jesus of Nazareth? (Jeremiah 17:9)

I want to start off with a story you might have heard of, or some form of it, for multiple versions of it exist on the internet. A five-year-old girl was having one of those trouble-filled days with her mother. It seemed they spent the day arguing back and forth. No matter what the mother asked her to do, the young girl would always stomp her foot and scream loudly, “NO!” Finally, the mom had enough. "Jane, go sit in the corner, right now! Your time does not start until you sit in that chair, and don’t you dare stand up until I tell you to!" The little girl, fists clenched, stomped over to the small, wooden chair in the corner and plopped down in it. Arms crossed, she looked back at her mother with the dirtiest look and said, "Mom, I am sitting down on the outside, but I am standing up on the inside!"

Parents here probably can relate to this story, for they might have had similar experiences disciplining their children. Other people, parents or not, might be able to relate if they are willing to admit they were that child! Of course, I couldn’t think of any time I was that child (although if you asked my parents, they could probably tell you). Being the good big brother I am, though, I could think of a time my little sister did. It was Halloween 2001. At my sister’s elementary school on Halloween, the kids would have this Halloween parade, where the kids would dress up in their Halloween costumes and march around the school. Family would come in to watch the parade. For some reason unknown to me, my sister, that year, wanted to be Cleopatra for Halloween, perhaps because the Cleopatra costume came with makeup. For whatever reasons my mom had (I’m pretty sure they were good ones), she instructed my sister not to put on the makeup. I remember at that breakfast my mom told my sister over and over again not to put on the makeup on, and my sister said over and over again she would not. That afternoon, my mom invited to come along to the elementary school’s Halloween parade, since my middle school had the day off. We waited patiently for the fourth graders. When my sister came around the corner…well, let’s just say she looked as good as a nine-year-old putting on makeup for the first time could look.

What drives a person to act this way? Some simply credit it to immaturity. After all, the examples I just gave you all were of children. But let’s be honest. We’ve seen adults act like this, too, perhaps at work. How can even mature adults act like this? I bet the prophet Jeremiah wondered the same thing, for God provides an answer to the question in Jeremiah 17:9.

Please turn in your Bibles to Jeremiah 17:9. While you’re turning there, I am going to put the verse in context. Remember, I’m big into context. Personally, I believe that so many bad interpretations of the Bible and bad theologies started as a Bible verse taken out of context. We, in our western minds, like dissecting things (like that frog in 6^th grade). We like breaking things down and analyzing each piece. There’s some good to that, but to borrow from a metaphor I hear commonly at my seminary, we sometimes spend so much time staring at the tree, we forgot that we’re standing in a forest, with other trees around us, and we forget how that tree is a part of the forest. Before we break down and analyze Jeremiah 17:9, I want to put Jeremiah 17:9 in 3 contexts: the far context, the near context and the immediate context. First, we’ll look at the far context. How does Jeremiah 17:9 contribute to the whole Bible? Second, we’ll look at the near context. How does Jeremiah 17:9 contribute to the book of Jeremiah? Third, we’ll look at the immediate context. How does Jeremiah 17:9 contribute Jeremiah 17?

In the far context of the whole Bible, Jeremiah 17:9 will help Bible readers better understand humanity’s struggle with rebellion towards their God. The Bible has clearly established that God is holy, just, faithful and loving. He looks out for his Bible. These attributes of God alone should provide enough reason to trust in God and follow his commands. Yet throughout the whole Bible, Bible readers can see people throughout history make choices that side them against God. Think about the famous stories of the Bible. Why did Adam and Eve choose to eat the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, when God clearly commanded them, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” Why did the people of Israel choose to wander 40 years in the desert rather than enter the land God promised them, a land flowing of milk and honey? Yeah, there were some bad spies who convinced the Israelites that the people there were as tall as giants, but hadn’t God told them that he would take care of it, and hadn’t God proven it with the way he dealt with Egypt? Why did the new nation of Israel, during the time of the Judges, keep going to back to the idolatrous way by worshipping the pagan gods, even though they knew it would lead to the foreign nations conquering and enslaving them? This isn’t just before Jeremiah’s time, for it happened after Jeremiah’s time, too. The biggest example yet is in the New Testament. Why would the Pharisees and Sadducees, who were the teachers of the law, the experts of the law and the masters of law, have the long-awaited Messiah right in front of their faces, and yet they deemed him a blasphemer deserving death? If you ever wondered any of those questions, Jeremiah 17:9 will provide an answer.

In the near context, Jeremiah 17:9 plays a crucial role in preparing Jeremiah for what he’ll face in rest of the book of Jeremiah. Over the years, Jeremiah has received the title of “the weeping prophet” from Bible scholars and church layman alike, for a number of reasons. Mainly, the title comes from the bad news he always has to deliver and how Jeremiah responds to it. Indeed, after receiving his first batch of bad news, Jeremiah says in Jeremiah 9:1, “Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!” I call Jeremiah the weeping prophet, not just due to the bad news Jeremiah has to give the people, but I believe the way the people received the news must have caused Jeremiah to weep as well. Just take a look at these 3 instances. In Jeremiah ch. 27&28, Jeremiah goes out to the people of Judah and preaches, “Because of your sin, God has handed you over to King Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians, and you will serve them!” How do the people of Judah respond? Out of them arise false prophets and sorcerers (more like “fortune tellers”). They preach to the people, “It’s not that bad. At the worse, King Nebuchadnezzar will be around for 2 years. But after that, it’s peace and restoration!” Of course, the people favor the latter and no one will take Jeremiah seriously. Then, in chapter 38, Jeremiah proclaims to Zedekiah, the King of Judah, “If you want King Nebuchadnezzar to spare you, your family or any of household, just surrender and the Lord will take care of you. If you do not surrender, however, you will face utter destruction, and so will your family and household. Of course, King Zedekiah and his household don’t take too kindly to this. They throw Jeremiah into a muddy cistern, and Zedekiah and his family attempt to flee anyway. Long story short, Jeremiah gets out of the cistern. Zedekiah witnesses his two sons murdered in front of him, and then King Nebuchadnezzar blinds Zedekiah so the last thing Zedekiah sees is his sons dying. Once King Nebuchadnezzar takes away the upper class citizens of Jerusalem, Jeremiah gathers the leaders of the lower class remnant and says to them in chapter 42, “Stay here, and God will take care you. Just whatever you do, don’t go down to Egypt, for if you do, Nebuchadnezzar will follow you down there, and you will be walking into your own demise.” In chapter 43, the people respond to Jeremiah, “No, you’re wrong, God did not tell you that. We’re going down to Egypt, and we’re taking you along as our good luck charm, you like it or not.” Jeremiah almost literally goes to Egypt kicking and screaming, and he stays there until he dies. Sure enough, King Nebuchadnezzar decides to continue his campaign right into Egypt, and the Jews who fled to Egypt find themselves right in the middle of it again. Poor Jeremiah! God has granted Jeremiah one of the most precious gifts of his time, to be the mouthpiece for God, and the people do the opposite of what Jeremiah says. Fortunate for Jeremiah, God prepared Jeremiah ahead of time with Jeremiah 17:9.

In the immediate context, Jeremiah 17:9 answers Jeremiah 17:5-10. In this section of the book of Jeremiah, the Lord reminds Judah about the covenant they entered with him. Prior to Jeremiah 17:5, God exposes Judah for breaking the conditions of the covenant. Now comes the time for the Lord to remind Judah that those conditions came with a promise of blessing to those obeyed and curses those who did not. In Jeremiah 17:5-8, the Lord contrasts the man who trusts in man and the man who trusts in the Lord with an illustration of a shrub in the desert and a tree planted by water. Just like nothing good ever happens to a shrub in the desert, the man who trusts in man is cursed, and no good will come to him. Just like the tree planted near water, the man who trusts in the Lord bless. He will continue to reap blessings, even when hard times comes, like a well-watered tree will continue to produce, even during a heat wave or drought. From this illustration, the right answer should be clear. You’d want to be like that well-watered tree, that tree planted near water, so you could always reap the blessings. Therefore, you should want to put your trust in the Lord so you could reap his blessings. Yet Judah had chosen to be like the shrub in the desert by choosing to trust in man. Soon, this illustration would become quite literal, as the invading Babylonians would destroy that land so badly, that even the most fertile lands would look like barren deserts. Clearly, from this illustration, choosing the desert shrub is the wrong answer! Why would anyone choose that, knowing it will lead only to curses?

The answer to the far context, the near context and the immediate context all come to answer in Jeremiah 17:9. It all comes back to the heart. Jeremiah 17:9 describes what the heart is like that causes it to act this way. First, it says it is “deceptive,” or in the Hebrew, עָקֹב (aqob). Yes, this is Hebrew root from which get Jacob. If you recall, the name Jacob literally means “grasps at heel,” but metaphorically means “deceiver.” Think back to Jacob in the book of Genesis. How did Jacob get the birthright? By taking advantage of his brother’s weakened state of hunger. How did Jacob get the blessing? By tricking his father Issac to believing he was Esau, even making sure he felt like Esau, smelt like Esau, and had stew that tasted like Esau. That’s what your heart does to you! It takes advantage of your weakness to get you to do the wrong thing. It gets you to go out of way to do something you don’t even want to do, just to satisfy the sin.

Second, Jeremiah 17:9 describes the heart as אָנַשׁ (ʾānašh). The New American Standard Bible and the English Standard Version definitely have the most literal translation of the word. It means “to be sick” or “to be ill,” but in the case, the Hebrew tense is in the absolute, meaning there’s an emphasis on the word, almost to an extreme, hence the “desperately” part. It’s almost like chronic illness, a sickness that has no cure, hence why the NIV says, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.” But keep in mind this isn’t a medical heart illness, like coronary heart disease or a heart palpitation. No, this is an inner heart disease, a spiritual heart disease. That’s why this time I turn to the King James Version’s interpretation of Jeremiah 17:9. The KJV says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” The heart desires and yearns to that which is selfish and wicked, even if it brings about harm to others and self. It has no desire to be healed. It only wants more sin.

After understanding how depraved the heart really is, you might wonder aloud the rhetorical question the ends verse 9. “Who can understand the heart?” Sin has corrupted the heart. Since the heart is so deceitful, no person can even trust his or her own heart. That’s where the Lord steps in. The Lord can understand the heart, for he is the omniscient God who can search it and test. God cannot be deceived, for not even the worst heart can hide evil intentions from the Lord. Only a holy God can therefore be trusted, for he has not been corrupted or deceived by evil.

And may I be clear this isn’t an intellect vs. emotions kind of thing. As much as I would like to say this verse is promotion us to abandon our emotions and feelings for strict intellectual thought, being the intellectual thinker I am, it is not. In this passage, the “heart” is verse 9 is paralleled to the “mind” (Actually, the Hebrew word literally translates to “the kidneys.” You might be tempted to laugh at that, but if you think about, how much medical research proven that the heart’s job is to solely work with the blood in our circulatory system, and yet we still use it as a metaphor for the source of our emotions.) in verse 10, which means they are treated as synonyms. In the original audience’s context, in the Hebrew context, the people of Judah would not have separated intellect and emotions like we do, but have understood both heart and mind as synonyms symbolizing the inner being. Still, for our context, the parallel reminds us that the sinful nature infects both the head and heart alike.

Someone who would have understood this the doctrine of sin nature would be Aurelius Augustine, the Bishop of Hippo. Augustine struggled with what has been described as “every man’s battle.” Augustine struggled with lust, making him very relatable to every man. Now usually people don’t ask questions like, “Why does God allow suffering?” or “Why do bad things happen to good people?” until the bad or evil thing happens to them. Not for Augustine. Augustine recognized that he was the evil, and he needed to know how to stop. Augustine tried many worldly philosophies attempting to solve his questions, but they could not. The best solution came from the Scripture. In his studies of the Scriptures, Augustine learned a lot about sin. For example, he learned how sin was the absence of good. Most importantly, he learned that his fallen heart had enslaved him to sin. If Augustine knew about drugs like we do in the 21^st century, he would have described our sin nature just like a drug addiction. Just like the drug addict will lie, cheat and steal to get his or her fix, so they sinful nature will commit all kinds of sinful act to get his or her selfish wants, even if it destroys him or her.

Now I know what I am preaching right now would be a hard message for the non-Christians, those outside church. Psychologists, psychiatrists, sociologists and anthropologists would all say that all people are born good and all throughout their lives are generally good people. Yeah, they will admit people do bad things, but they account those bad things as good people doing the wrong thing, almost like “mistakes,” but still call them good people. Only a few people can truly receive the title of “evil,” like Nebuchadnezzar, Nero, Genghis Khan, Napoleon Bonaparte, Adolf Hitler, Josef Stalin, Pol Pot, Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. Yet I am going to a bold statement. In all honesty, I really think that Americans of the past two centuries, the 20^th and 21^st centuries, don’t really believe this, and I have both a classical example and a more modern example to prove my point.

Who has read the book The Coral Island by R.M. Ballaytne, whether that be in a college, high school or middle school literature class? Written in 1857, the book is about 3 British boys, eighteen-year-old Jack, fifteen-year-old Ralph and thirteen-year-old Peter, who all get shipwrecked all alone on an island in the Pacific Ocean. Despite having little modern technology, they are able to create a self-sustaining lifestyle on the island, adequately providing themselves with food and shelter. Life is idyllic and idealistic on the island. It is almost as if they made their own little utopian society with the three of them thereon the island. Eventually they decide it is time to leave the island with the boat they have made. They come upon another nearby island, where they meet a barbaric and savage Polynesian tribe. Through teaching Victorian-era manners and ideals, however, these 3 young men are able to civilize the whole village. Once again, the boys leave the island and come ashore on another island. Here, they run into Christian missionaries, who have struggled to convert the native polytheist to Christianity. Again, once the boys teach the native people proper Victorian etiquette, the missionaries can successfully convert the Polynesian polytheists to Christianity. I’m betting a lot of you never read this books, and I think there’s a reason for that.

But who has read The Lord of the Flies by William Golding, even if it is in a college, high school or middle school literature? This book was written in response to The Coral Island. William Golding read The Coral Island and thought to himself, “No, that’s not how it would happen.” He wrote his book, The Lord of the Flies, as a response, almost a satire, of The Coral Island, even giving the main characters the same name. In the same way, Jack, Ralph and the other boys find themselves stranded on an inhabited island. Instead of working together to form a self-sustaining society, they argue with each other, they curse at each other, they bully each other, and even near the end (spoiler alert!) they begin to kill each other! By the end, the last “good” boy is merely trying to survive from the other boys on the island!

I bet a lot of you have read The Lord of the Flies, at least a lot more than The Coral Island. Indeed, The Lord of the Flies seems to be more popular than The Coral Island. One reason some books become more popular than others is because of how relatable they are. With popular books, we can relate with the character and their life more than in the unpopular books, where we can’t relate to the characters. The Coral Island is unpopular because we can’t relate to that experience; The Lord of the Flies is popular because we can relate to that story. We have no experiences of everyone coming together to create a greater good, yet we can name the countless experiences where people have turned on us, betrayed us, and caused stress and conflict just to get what they wanted. See, people really don’t believe that good-at-heart philosophy. They too recognize the heart is sick with evil.

But The Coral Island was written in the late 1800s, and The Lord of the Flies was written in the early 1900s. What about the 21^st century? Maybe we’ve matured or culture ourselves so we are working together for good. Let’s use less of a classic example and more of modern example. In the late 1980s, three teenagers in Los Angeles came together to form a punk rock band which the world would come to known as Green Day. At first, their songs were about typical things that caused 90’s teenagers angst: parents, teachers, school, work, friends and girlfriends. Eventually, everyone got tired of their music, including the band themselves! In 2005, instead of the typical songs, lead singer Billie Joe wanted to create album that told of story from his life. This album would become known as American Idiot. To date, this is their most popular album, so popular, it became a tour, a live album and even a music. Let’s take a look at it.

 

The first track serves as a prologue of the story of the album, and it sets the scene. The song “American Idiot describes how the main character sees the world he is in. American is run by politics and the media, all driven by agendas and bias. They tell the American people what to believe in how to act. They use propaganda as a tool, and it only leads to a paranoid people. In the end, it turns all Americans into American Idiots, hence the title of the album and the song title [“American Idiot”].

The second track of the album introduces the main character. Billie Joe Armstrong gives him the name “Jesus of Suburbia.” Armstrong has carefully chosen the name, as the first part of the song uses Biblical imagery to describe his main character. The lines “the bible of none of the above” and “No one died for my sins in hell” describe the Jesus of Suburbia as a self-centered and self-righteous egotist. He says/sings, “There’s nothing wrong with me. This is the way I’m supposed to be,” yet he seeks answers for the problems of life. He starts his search in his hometown, following the adage “home is where your heart is,” but it only leads to disappointment. Singing “…everyone’s heart doesn’t beat the same, we’re beating out of time,” he says there is no connection in relation.  He sings, “Like the holy scriptures of a shopping mall /And so it seemed to confess / It didn't say much / But it only confirmed that / The center  of the earth / Is the end of the world.” He means that no one knows the answer any better than he does, and he concludes that listening to one another then just make everything worse.  So the Jesus of Suburbia denounces his home city, concluding it to dead and damned [“Jesus of Suburbia” Part 2 – City of the Damned]. What hurts Jesus of Suburbia is that no one seems to care, even looking upon the dirty faces of lost children. Jesus of Suburbia denounces them again, calling them liars, hypocrites, and the worse, “hearts recycled but never saved.” He condemns their beliefs as “make believe,” and therefore he doesn’t believe. So he replies in the song, “If you don’t care, then neither do I!” At the end of part 3, subtitled “I Don’t Care,” two phrases describe the Jesus of Suburbia: not believing and not caring [“Jesus of Suburbia” Part 3 – I Don’t Care.” Jesus of Suburbia cries out for help, hoping someone can give him therapeutic advice, but no one answers, further reinforcing his belief that no one cares about anyone but himself or herself [“Jesus of Suburbia” – Part 4 Dearly Beloved] Because of his home city’s lack of concern, Jesus of Suburbia concludes he will never find his answer in his home city. To stay and die there would be tragic because he’d never have his answers. So he runs away, and leaves the city behind, to find out what he really believes [“Jesus of Suburbia” – Part 5 Tales of Another Broken Home].

Jesus leaves his home city for the big city. The big city give him new life. For Jesus of Suburbia to be in the big city, it’s like his life is one big holiday, one big vacation (In British English and Australian English, the words “holiday” and “vacation” can be used as synonyms)[“Holiday”]. Yet when the emotional high of new beginnings settles down, Jesus of Suburbia then experiences an emotional hangover. Despite being in a big city, he realizes he is all alone. The only companion is his own shadow. He still longs for someone to find him and give him his answers [“Boulevard of Broken Dreams”].

Upon realizing he is alone, the Jesus of Suburbia begins to have his doubts. Things seem to be no different. Whether he’s in his home city where he is metaphorically alone (no one cares),  or the big city where he’s literally alone, he ends up alone either way. Doubts enter his mind, “The Jesus of Suburbia is a lie.” He repetitious scream, “Are we, we are, are we, we are the waiting” has him thinking, “What am I waiting for?” He feels like he’s waiting for something that will never happen, something that will never come true, a fairy tale [“Are We The Waiting”].When all of a sudden, lo and behold, another character enters the story. Billie Joe gives him the name St. Jimmy. St. Jimmy describes himself as “the needle in the vein of establishment,” “the product of war and fear that we’ve been victimized” and twice “I'm the patron saint of the denial, with an angel face and a taste for suicidal. St. Jimmy seems to be the typical bad boy. He interests are in crime, gangs, sex, drugs and rock and roll [“St. Jimmy”].

St. Jimmy convinces Jesus of Suburbia to take the same route as he does. Jesus of Suburbia follows St. Jimmy’s footsteps. He takes drugs to numb the pain his problems have caused [“Give Me Novocain”]. It appears that Jesus of Suburbia will fall into a slump he will never get out off, when all of a sudden a new character appears out of nowhere. Armstrong gives her the name Whatserface, which will make more sense by the end of the album. The singer describes Whatserface as a rebel, a saint, salt of the earth, dangerous, vigilante, missing link on the brink of destruction, the symbol of resistance and the mother of all bombs. Her path of life involves liberating people of the old way of thinking and starting a revolution of new thinking [“She’s A Rebel”].

Jesus of Suburbia falls in love with Whatserface. The two enter some kind of relationship, whether it be friendship or a romantic one. Either way, Jesus of Suburbia falls deeper in love with her, both with who she is and what she does. Unlike the people of his home city, Whatserface legitimately cares for people. Jesus of Suburbia finds Whatserface to be an extraordinary girl. Yet problems arise in their relationship. [“Extraordinary Girl”]. It’s not her; it’s him. In “Letterbomb,” a letter from Whatserface to Jesus of Suburbia ending the relationship, Whatserface confronts him with his problems. For Whatserface, Jesus of Suburbia not only represents the problems in the city she’s trying to solve, he seems to be contributing to them. The climax of the song, and the album, comes near the end of the song. Whatserface says/sings, “You're not the Jesus of Suburbia. The St. Jimmy is a figment of your father's rage and your mother's love, made me the idiot America.” This reveals so much. For the first time, the listener realizes that St. Jimmy isn’t real. St. Jimmy either been a schizophrenic hallucination or a bipolar alter ego. On top of that, Whatserface calls out the main character for daring to call himself the Jesus of Suburbia. His whole title, “son of rage and love,” was from his father’s rage and his mother’s love, and both of them were formed by the American Idiot condemned at the beginning of the album. If the main character really was the “Jesus of Suburbia,” he would be doing more like what Whatserface was. Ultimately, Whatserface blames Jesus of Suburbia for the city’s problems. She decides to take the same path Jesus of Suburbia (we’ll still call the main character that until the end to prevent further confusion) took at the beginning of the album and leave the city behind, and leave Jesus of Suburbia behid with him [“Letterbomb”].

In the song “Wake Me Up When September Ends,” Jesus of Suburbia realizes that he still had some innocence in him, and now he lost the last bit of innocence. His innocence led him to think that he could find the perfect answer to all his problems. His innocence led him to believe that the big city and the “holiday feeling” could give him the answer.  His naïve innocence led him to follow St. Jimmy’s path of sex, drugs and rock and roll for an answer. Instead of gaining from his innocence, those events resulted in losing innocence. And ultimately, he loses Whatserface as a result.

In the beginning of the song “Homecoming,” Jesus of Suburbia finds himself alone once again, with doubt. St. Jimmy makes another appearance. He argues that Whatserface was wrong. He blames other people, mainly Jesus of Suburbia’s mother and father, and offers the solution, returning to the world of sex, drugs and rock and roll. Jesus of Suburbia faces a challenge. He can either return to St. Jimmy or start all over and try again. The end of part 1 of the song sums up the decision: “St. Jimmy died today. He blew his brains out into the bay. In my state of mind, my own private suicide.” St. Jimmy’s metaphorical suicide represents that Jesus of Suburbia acknowledged St. Jimmy was not real, but a part of Jesus of Suburbia, a part that needed to stop [“Homecoming” Part 1 - The Death of St. Jimmy]. Yet it comes at a cost. St. Jimmy at least made Jesus of Suburbia felt like he had company. After killing St. Jimmy, Jesus of Suburbia comes to an even harder realization that he is alone, and no one cares. Aiming to really become his namesake, Jesus of Suburbia signs up for community service (Part 2 is called East 12^th Street. East 12^th street is where Billie Joe Armstrong had to do community service after his DUI arrest). The job is not as life changing as Jesus of Suburbia hoped, as he is only doing paperwork. He finds himself wishing again to get out [“Homecoming” Part 2 - East 12^th Street]. Yet Whatsername’s word won’t get out of his head, “Nobody likes you. Everyone left you. They're all out without you havin fun.” Not only can he not get her words out of his head, he can’t her out of his head. He finds himself constantly missing her, hoping she’ll come back [“Homecoming” Part 3 – Nobody Likes You]. Going back to his old life in the big city isn’t an option. In a postcard from a friend, Jesus of Suburbia learns that his friend Tunny has sobered up and cleaned himself up, which allowed him to start a famous and successful rock band. His friend asks Jesus of Suburbia to get off his case and leave him alone [Homecoming Part 4 – Rock and Roll Girlfriend]. So Jesus of Suburbia decides to return to his home city. Running away has not solved his problem. When he left home, his problems followed him, and the big city made them worse. Neither the holiday feeling of the big city or St. Jimmy’s lifestyle gave him the answer. Jesus of Suburbia gives up on finding the answers out there and just goes home. Yet, Jesus of Suburbia still can’t get Whatsername’s words out of his head, “Nobody likes you. Everyone left you. They're all out without you havin fun.” [“Homecoming” Part 5 – We’re Coming Home Again].

The last song, “Whatserface,” takes place years after the previous song “Homecoming.” It would seem that Jesus of Suburbia has changed to be like Whatserface, which would be liberating people from the old way of thinking to start a revolution of new thinking. This is why Jesus of Suburbia says/sings in the last line of the last song of the album “Forgetting you, but not the time.” While Jesus of Suburbia might have forgotten the girl’s name, hence calling her “Whatserface,” he has not forgotten her personality and what she stands for. He lives on her legacy by living out that lifestyle himself. Yet he can’t help but miss her and wish she was back [“Whatserface”].

Now that we have all observed a summary of the story in American Idiot, let’s make some interpretations. Now that we have a full view of the story, the listener comes to recognize that St. Jimmy was never a real person. I’d like to go further and say that the Jesus of Suburbia is not a real person either. Jesus of Suburbia too is a name given to describe the personality of a character. Then who is the main character? The album does not say. The musical, which goes by the same name, gives the main character the name “Johnny,” so let’s call him Johnny.

So what does Jesus of Suburbia and St. Jimmy have to do with the main character, Johnny, if each one is not the main character himself? For that, you need to know some Freud. In Freud’s model of the psyche, Freud said that the ego was mediator between the super ego and the id. The id is the part of the self that drives the instinctual drives, desires, wants and needs. Of course, Freud being Freud, is was about sex and power. The super ego is the critical and moral side of the self. In short, the ego is made up of the balance between id and superego. What does this have to with American Idiot? I believe the Freudian psyche model accurately describes what is happening to the ego of Johnny. The super ego is the Jesus of Suburbia. Johnny’s superego, Jesus of Suburbia, is not happy with American being idiots. He wants change. The id is St. Jimmy. Sex, drugs, and punk rock are examples of things the id goes after. The whole story is about this battle between Johnny’s id and super ego to comprise his ego. At first, it’s Johnny’s super ego which pushes him to not accept unbelieving unsympathetic society he’s grown up in. Then the id steps in under the name of St. Jimmy, telling Billie the answer is in sex, drugs and rock and roll. Johnny listens to him, but his problems only become worse.

There it is again. We see again the heart’s tendency to lean towards the evil and lean away from the good. Johnny found it easier to listen to St. Jimmy, but found it hard to listen to Jesus of Suburbia. I believe this album became so popular because people could relate on how easy it is to evil and how hard it is to do good. Also, we notice another key aspect everyone can relate to: the struggle part. For years, people have tried to explain what this struggle could be.

Sigmund Freud tried to explain this is in terms of id, superego and ego. For Freud, the id is the selfish wants and desires that demands “I want it now,” the superego is the altruistic, utilitarian and moralistic side that informs you, “That’s not right,” and the ego is the real you, the compromise between the superego and the id. While Freud might have been onto something, I don’t like his conclusions. For starters, a Jew gone atheist does not belong in the church. Most importantly, Freud’s ego consists of a compromise between the selfish and the altruistic, the good and the evil. Freud’s philosophy states that the ego finds a moral excuse to act immorally. The Bible clearly teaches that no action is moral unless our thoughts and feelings are also moral.

The media tries to explain it, mainly in children’s cartoons. It is portrayed in the imagery of a “shoulder angel” and a “shoulder demon.” The shoulder angel whispers into one ear the right, good thing to do, and the shoulder demon whispers into the other ear the mean, selfish things to do. My favorite example of this comes from the Disney animated film The Emperor’s New Groove. While this may help explain to children moral decisions and moral dilemmas, I wouldn’t build a theology around it. This illustration makes it look like the shoulder angel and shoulder demon have equal strength and an equal opportunity to influence the person. The Bible makes it clear that the person with the deceitful heart is enslaved to do evil, unless the Almighty God intervenes, which we will get to now.

So how should Christians respond to this doctrine of the sinful nature?

First, people should admit and confess their sinful nature. There’s a saying that goes something along the lines of, “The greatest lie the Devil ever told was convincing people that he didn’t exist.” I would say along those lines that the next greatest lie that the Devil ever told was convincing people that they are good. When people are convinced they are good, even the most basic sense, they refuse to work on better themselves when they do sin. This is even harder for Christians. We know are process of sanctification, the process of becoming less sinful and more holy, yet that doesn’t mean we don’t deal with temptation or sin. That’s where we can get tripped up. We can allow the devil to convince us, “Well, you’re born again and you’re in the process of sanctification, so that thought/feeling must be right.” We must put our guard up. If Judah might have confessed their sin and guilt, God might have spared them from Nebuchadnezzar, but that would have required humility, which Judah did not have. Let us humble ourselves to admit our sin and confess we cannot do anything along.

Second, people need to receive the cure. If you read Jeremiah 17:9 in the New International Version, it reads, “The heart is deceitful and beyond all cure.” I get what they’re doing here. They are attempting to explain that absolute adjective form, which the English Standard Version explains as “desperately.” I don’t like their interpretive move because, simply put, there is a cure. Jeremiah may have given a lot of bad news, but Jeremiah did give some good news. Jereiah got to foresee the New Covenant in Jeremiah 31. Specifically, in Jeremiah 31:33,34, the Lord says, “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” There is a cure, and his name is Jesus. Jesus was both a rebel and a saint. He rebelled against the legalistic religiosity of Pharisees and the Sadducees, and yet he did not break a sing law, staying holy. Christ’s death and resurrection ushered in the New Covenant that Jeremiah foresaw. Instead of a heart bent towards to sin and evil, the New Covenant gives us a heart towards holiness. How is that possible? The prophet Ezekiel, a contemporary of Jeremiah, also saw the New Covenant. In Ezekiel 36:26 God announces that he will give those in the New Covenant a new heart. Only a brand new heart can break this addiction to sin and allow sanctify ourselves. That heart can only come through Jesus. If you haven’t called on Jesus, believe in him, and you will get your new heart.

Third, we must remove all sin in our lives. Sin is destructive, both to the individual and the corporate. If we don’t rid our lives of sin, it will only lead to destructive results. Romans 8:13 says, “For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” I like how John Owens, a Puritan preacher, said it, “Be killing sin or it will be killing you.”

Fourth, what we about the sinful nature of the heart should lead to praise God for his grace and mercy. Now I am getting back to those still struggling with this teaching. Those struggling with this doctrine might be thinking right now, “What about non-profit organizations, like the Red Cross? Are you really trying to convince me that they are evil?” I would not say they are evil, but I will not say that the goodness they create is a goodness that comes from their own heart. I credit that goodness to the grace and mercy of our Lord God. All things good can only come our Heavenly Father (James 1). When we credit goodness to humanity’s own head, heart and hands, we rob God of praise he deserves. Let us praise God bringing goodness down to earth through his grace and mercy, even when it seems like humanity is doing the opposite.

Cemteries Came Alive!

³ For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, ⁴ that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, ⁵ and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. ⁶ Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷ Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. ⁸ Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me [Paul] …¹² Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³ But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴ And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. ¹⁵ We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. ¹⁶ For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁷ And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. ¹⁹ If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. ²⁰ But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. -1 Corinthians 15:3-8,12-20 ESV

Today, we join millions of Christians across this nation, if not across the whole world, celebrating the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Today, millions of Christian gather together at sunrise to worship the risen Jesus, meeting at parks, at beaches, at mountains, and even at cemeteries. Yes, you heard me right, cemeteries. Doesn’t sound right for Easter, does it? Cemeteries are something we associate more with Halloween than with Easter.

Christians meeting in cemeteries for church shouldn’t sound like a foreign idea. It’s a rich part of church history. While recent studies may show that Christians didn’t meet in the catacombs in Rome as we thought, early Christians did indeed meet in cemeteries. At first, it was just for practical reasons. During times of persecution, Christians met in cemeteries because cemeteries lied outside the city limits and would not catch the attention of the authorities. Also, with the growing faith, Christians needed a bigger place to come together and worship. What bigger a space than cemetery. But as time went by, meeting in a cemetery to have a deeper meaning.

⁵² The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, ⁵³ and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many. -Matthew 27:52,53 ESV

These two verses are commonly forgot in the crucifixion and resurrection story, probably because only Matthew mentions this part of the story, and he really doesn’t put a lot of attention or detail. Who are these “saints” or, as the Greek literally puts it, “holy ones”? Are they Old Testament heroes of the faith? Maybe they aren’t. After all, if Moses or Elijah was to resurrect, walk into the city and say, “Hey, I’m Moses” or “Hey, I’m Elijah,” how could they really prove it? Even today with all our forensic science, we too would have a hard time proving the identity of someone before the time Christ, whether dead or alive. Then perhaps maybe these saints or “holy ones” are people living in the first century A.D. who believed in Jesus as the Messiah and died during Christ’s ministry, like Simeon or Anna from the Christmas story. But then again, the Jews living in Israel today will tell you they know the final resting place of all those Old Testament heroes. They’ve clearly marked, or should I say “decorated,” the tomb of Samuel (trust me, I’ve been there). So maybe it could be those Old Testament heroes. Either way, the truth remains. Upon Christ’s death, the tombs broke open. Upon Christ’s resurrection, the residents of the tombs came alive. The life-giving spirit has given life to those who were dead!

All the early Christians knew what this meant. No longer was death to be feared as the eternal separator and end to all. Their Lord, Savior and God had overcome death once. Now the Christians had hope. They knew by believing in Jesus, they too could look forward to overcoming death and coming back to life, just like the saints and holy ones who had also died and come back to life when Jesus died and came back to life. The early Christians lived out this truth daily in their lives. The laid hands and prayed healing on those who had communicable and fatal diseases. They preached the word of God where the word of God was banned, and they were martyred as a result. Most pertinent to my introduction, Christians worshiped in cemeteries, believing that they were worshipping side-by-side with their brothers and sisters in Christ who were not dead but merely just sleeping until Christ’s return. In fact, cemetery in Greek is koimeteria, which literally means “sleeping place.”

Part of my Easter tradition consists of calling my grandfather to wish him a happy Easter. My grandfather, turning 86 years old this June, is well aware of how close to death. I’m not ashamed or embarrassed to say such, for every holiday he reminds of how close to death he is. Despite being as healthy as an 86 year old can be, he’ll still say something like, “I’m not sure if I’ll be alive when you graduate from seminary or when you sister gets married” or he’ll tell me, “I’m just taking it one day at a time, for I might die tomorrow.” One time he even told me he was just waiting to die! As you can imagine, these calls become quite depressing. Yet when it comes to time to end the call, my grandfather never lets me say “goodbye.” He always says, “No, Graham, do not say ‘goodbye,’ for this is not goodbye. Say ‘so long for now,’ for this is until we talk again.” When Jesus rose from the dead, he removed all the “goodbyes.” He gave us hope that this is not the end, but the best is yet to come. So next time you walk by or drive by a cemetery, remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and then remember, this is not “goodbye,” this is just so long for now.

The Atonement: A Multifaceted Diamond

Introduction

The Merriam-Website Dictionary defines the term “multifaceted” as “having many facets or aspects.” When most people think of the word “multifaceted,” they probably think of diamonds, and rightfully so. Facets have an important role in shaping the diamond. The more facets a diamond contains, the more the diamond will shine, and the more beautiful the diamond will look.

 

The Merriam-Website Dictionary defines the term “atonement” as “the reconciliation of God and mankind through the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ.” Since Jesus found the church in the first century, the church has always recognized the death of Jesus on the cross as an act atonement, unifying the broken relationship between God and humanity. How the death of Jesus on the cross has brought atonement has not been as well defined. As church history has changed, so has its theology on the atonement. With every change in atonement comes controversy. Some Christians try to hold on to the older theory, while other Christians embrace the new theory, and it brings about debate, sometimes vicious. Instead of debating, Christian should discuss. Christians should not see these different, contrasting theories, but rather view them as different facets of the same diamond. When Christians can see these theories as multiple facets the diamond of the atonement, the gospel of cross will shine, and it will help Christians see the cross as beautiful, not as abusive or violent. This paper seeks to help Christians appreciate each facet of the atonement diamond by backing each theory with Scripture, observing each theory in its historical context, and providing an example of an exemplary church leader who held the theory.

Recapitulation Theory

 

Possibly one of the first fully developed atonement theologies comes the Early Church Father Irenaeus. Irenaeus believed in the recapitulation theory of the cross. Irenaeus saw Jesus as divine God taking on human history when he became a man. Jesus differs from humanity, however, due to his sinless nature. Therefore, Jesus obeyed whereas Adam and humanity disobeyed, and Jesus succeeds whereas Adam and humanity failed. In essence, Jesus exchanged his sinless life with humanity’s sinful life, thus reversing humanity’s fallen history. For Irenaeus, this culminates at the cross. Whereas Adam brought disobedience by eating from the tree, Jesus brought obedience by dying on the tree. The Scriptures would defend Irenaeus’s view. Romans 5:19 says, “For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.” 2 Corinthians 5:17 states, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” Paul would have agreed with Iraenaeus that those who believe in Jesus God declares as righteous as Jesus, for Jesus took on humanity’s sinfulness as a man. Therefore, the recapitulation theory, which Irenaeus first developed, stands in line with the Scriptures, and Christians need to see this important aspect while gazing upon the cross.

Ransom Theory

 

Shortly after, Origen developed his theory, which would become known as the ransom theory. Origen knew the Bible said Jesus paid a ransom for humanity. Mark 10:45 states, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” 1 Peter 1:18-19 declares, “knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.” Origen struggled, however, to understand who Jesus paid this ransom to. For Origen, it did not make sense that Jesus, God the Son, would have to pay ransom to God the Father. It would be as if God paid ransom to himself. Origen concluded the ransom had to be paid to Satan. At the fall, Adam handed over humanity to the devil. If the Lord wanted humanity back, God had to pay with the life of Jesus, just as the devil had expected. Out of his own pride, however, Satan did not expect Jesus to overpower him. Satan could not grasp Jesus, and so Jesus escaped from Satan’s bonds. Therefore, Satan lost everything, both humanity and Jesus.

 

While Origen receives the credit for developing the theory, ransom theory underwent many revisions during those early years of the church. Gregory of Nyssa positively described ransom theory as divine deception, for the whole ordeal completely fooled Satan. Of his ignorance, Satan did not see Jesus as divine, but instead, Satan saw Jesus as a perfect or near-perfect human because of his righteousness and performance of miracles. Satan wanted Jesus, and he offered God Jesus in exchange for humanity. When Satan received the payment of Jesus, he learned of the divinity of Jesus, which lead to his downhill. Gregory uses a fishing analogy to illustrate his view. The fish believes he receives a free meal by chomping down on the worm, the but hook inside the worm leads to his demise.

 

John of Damascus liked Gregory of Nyssa’s fishing analogy, but he hated Origen’s belief that Jesus paid the ransom to Satan. Instead, John of Damascus proposed that Jesus did indeed paid the ransom to the God the Father. Ever since Adam sinned against God, God handed humanity over to death. When Jesus died on the cross, and he paid the ransom to the Father and tricked death, which could not hold Jesus and his divine nature. This view understand the Scriptures that Origen focused on, while keeping God sovereign over Satan.

Satisfaction Theory

 

The Middle Ages brought about a new outlook on the atonement. In the Middle Ages, the people of Europe lived in a feudal system. Lords would let serfs live on and farm the land, and in return, the serfs would pay the lords back with a percentage of the harvest. This rate could fluxuate, depending on how much honor or dishonor the serf gave the lord. If the serf dishonored the lord, the lord would require the serf to pay a higher price, almost too high to afford. Anselm, living in the Middle Ages, saw the cross in light of this context. The sin of humanity brought dishonor to God. Therefore, humanity owes God a payment in order to restore his honor. Indeed, the sinner cannot afford the payment of sin. No amount of righteous acts could undo all the evil that the entire human race had committed. Even the death of the all humanity would not fulfill the payment. Thus, man cannot pay the price, but only God can. The one paying needs to be both God and man. As God, he can make the payment. As human, he represents the party in debt. Since Jesus had both a divine and human nature, only Jesus could pay the price. By dying on the cross, Jesus paid a price he did not have to pay. Because of his love for humanity, he gifted the reward to all who believe him. Anselm, in feudal context, saw Jesus on the cross as propitiation, as described in Romans 3:25-26.

Moral Influence Theory

 

While a majority of Christians in the Middle Ages held to Anselm’s satisfaction theory, not everyone appreciated as much. Abelard did not like Anselm’s recent satisfaction theory, nor he did like the older ransom theory. Instead, Abelard opted for the moral influence theory. According to Abelard, Jesus came to inspire humanity to love God. Jesus demonstrated how this love should look all throughout his life, but that demonstration of love culminated with his death on the cross. When Abelard looked upon the cross, he did not see a payment for sin, but he saw Jesus display God’s love, which in turn would encourage humanity to love God in return, even it means death. Abelard saw Jesus on the cross as an act of love, just like Paul said in Romans 5:8, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” In turn, Aberland encouraged his listeners to follow Christ’s example, even to death, as Peter commands in 1 Peter 2:21.

Penal Substitution Theory

 

During the Reformation, the Reformers developed a new theory of the atonement, although it contained many similarities to Anselm’s satisfaction theory. The Reformers disagreed with Anselm on the idea that humanity’s sin brought dishonor to God. In all God’s sovereignty and greatness, nothing could cause God to lose his honor, not even humanity’s sin. Rather, the Reformers laid the foundation of their theory on God’s view of justice. The just God gave humanity the law, defining the difference between holiness and sinfulness. The law reveals God as holy and humanity as sinful. The holy God exercises his wrathful judgment towards sin by punishing sinners with death. Just like Anselm, the Reformers declare the human race as helpless to pay the penalty, but the hope of salvation lies in Jesus. As both God and man, Jesus became the perfect sacrifice. He took on God’s wrathful judgment against sin, so humanity would not have to. He died, so humanity may live eternally. Jesus substituted himself for humanity, taking on the punishment for sin, so humanity would not have to, just as Hebrews 9:6-15 explains.

Christ as Victor Theory

 

 

Although its roots began during the period of the early church fathers, Gustaf Aulen made the Christ as Victor, or Christus Victor, popular in the twentieth century. J. Denny Weaver would make it popular again in the twenty-first century with his book The Nonviolent Atonement. As the name hints, this view of the cross centers around the idea of victory. The Fall enslaved humanity to the evil powers of the world, such as the Law, sin, death, Satan and his demons. When Aulen looks upon the cross, he sees Jesus victorious over the Law, sin, death, Satan, demons and all worldly. Aulen reinterprets Irenaeus’s recapitulation theory, Origen’s ransom theory and the Reformers’ penal substitution theory to prove that through history the church has held to the Christ as victor theory. While anyone could easily question Aulen’s reinterpretation of church history, the Scriptures back Aulen’s theology. Colossians 2:15 tells the reader, “ He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.” Hebrews 2:14-15 informs the reader, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,  and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.” Indeed, after the cross, Jesus stood victorius.

Healing Theory

 

Bruce Reichenbach, in the book The Nature of the Atonement: Four Views, offers a fresh, new view of the cross for the twenty-first century. This new view Reichenbach calls the healing view, or the healing theory. Reichenbach uses the whole Bible to develop his theory. First, Reichenbach defines humanity’s fallen nature as a sickness. Reichenbach proves this by showing a consistency between sickness and sin in the Old Testament. Staying in the Old Testament, Reichenbach defends God’s role as healer, and then he shows how God invited the priests into this role of healing with the Levitical law. To wrap up the Old Testament, Reichenbach focuses in on Messianic prophecies that describe the Messiah as a healer removing disease. Turing to the New Testament, Reichenbach turns right to Jesus. He emphasizes the healing miracles of Jesus because he sees those miracles as displaying Jesus as God the healer and the priest aiding in the healing. Therefore, when the Gospel narratives climax at the crucifixion, Reichenbach sees the ultimate healing, the healing of humanity’s sin. Jesus takes on the virus of sin. The virus of sin kills Jesus, but not permanently, for the healer cannot die. Therefore, Jesus cures humanity of sin and brings peace through his healing on the cross.

Conclusion

Christians need to view the atonement as multifaceted, for the Bible views the atonement as multifaceted. In Romans 5:19 and 2 Corinthians 5:21, Paul defines the atonement as recapitulation, for on the cross Jesus exchanges places with humanity. Humanity becomes pefect and Jesus becomes sin, taking the punishment for sin. In Mark 10:45 and 1 Peter 1:18-19, both Mark and Peter call Jesus on the cross as paying the ransom so the slaves of sin may become the slaves of Christ. In Romans 3:25-26 and 1 John 2:2, both Paul and John label the cross as propitiation, satisfying the dishonor humanity’s sin brought upon God. In Romans 5:8 and 1 Peter 2:20-21, both Paul and Peter see the cross as moral influence, for Jesus becomes an example of love and obedience, even unto suffering and death. From reading Hebrew 6:9-15, the first century Christians would have called the cross penal substitution, for they would have seen Jesus become the perfect sacrifice to pay God’s wrathful judgment towards sin, just like the sacrifices in Leviticus did. From reading Colossians 2:15 and Hebrews 2:14-15, Paul and other Christians of the first would have gazed up on the cross and acknowledged Jesus as victorious over sin, death, Satan and all the evil powers of the world. Since the Bible talks about all these views, Christians can conclude that the Bible sees the atonement as multifaceted.

 

 

Not only did first century church hold all these theologies of atonement, but the church continued to hold these theologies throughout history, sometimes emphasizing one point over another. During the centuries of the early church fathers, Irenaeus saw the atonement as recapitulation. During that same time period, Origen, Gregory of Nyssa and John of Damascus looked up the atonement as payment of a ransom. When the Middle Ages came, Anselm emphasized the satisfaction theory because focused on the wrongdoing on humanity’s sin on God’s honor, whereas Abelard emphasized the moral influence theory because he focused in on God’s love. The Reformers at the time of the Reformation drew towards the idea of humanity’s sin as the object of a holy God’s wrath, so they developed the penal substitution theory. When the twentieth and twenty-first century arrived, Christians wanted to think less of violence and more on overcoming worldly powers, so Gustaf Aulen and J. Denny Weaver reminded the church that the atonement displays Christ as the victor of those evil, worldly powers. At some point in time in history, the church has held at least one of these views, if not more. Therefore, history provides a testimony of the importance of each facet. Some Christians in the church talk about returning the good days of the first century church. While this belief lacks respect for church history, it would be helpful for the church when it comes its theology of the atonement, for it will gives the church a more complete picture of the atonement.