No Tar or Feathers

Yesterday was a homeschooler skating party at our local Roller Dome. I am happy to say that I survived the ordeal of seeing other homeschoolers that I annoyed and offended with my posts on Mel Gibson's movie, The Passion of Christ

It probably helps that I usually only show up to one or two meetings a year, which means that most of the other homeschoolers don't know me by sight. And to be truthful, these ladies are very gracious people who, though annoyed with me for ruffling their ecclesiastical feathers, wouldn't think of plucking any out to stick into tar attached to my skin.

I enjoy the love of others and popularity as much as anyone. I hate making others mad at me or seriously annoyed. And I am, by nature a coward. Any of the times that I have been able to maintain a stiff defense of what I believe the truth to be is because God has enabled me to stand, rather than allowing me to melt into a puddle of non-resistance. Being quiet is easy, but is it faithful? One of the violations of the ninth commandment is being silent when speaking the truth is called for.

Since this movie and its implications are still on my mind, I thought I would expand a bit further on what I am thinking.

The current motivating philosophy of much of the evangelistic methods of mainstream Christianity seems to be pragmatism. Christianity is just another competing interest for modern man, and if we are going to get in there and rescue anyone, we had better be using the best methods that have been proven to work by market research. So you have the Willow Creek and Saddleback churches which design their programs to be "seeker sensitive." Entertainment reigns and offense is eliminated as much as possible. The preaching of the Gospel is condensed to 15 or 20 minutes of sound bites that won't overwhelm the listener and lots of humour, jokes, and anectdotes are thrown in, in order to keep everyone's attention. Some churches use movies to keep their audience with them. And some use the movies as the basis of the sermon. I recently read about one so-called preacher who used the trials of Frodo and Sam on their way to Mordor as the basis of three of his sermons.

I don't doubt for a moment that God uses people and things in spite of the lack of purity in them or the corrupt sin nature that exists in all of us. God used the false prophet Balaam, a man hired by Israel's enemies, to call down blessings upon the Israelites despite his intentions to curse them. Though God blessed Israel through this means, we should not presume to think that it is ok for us to ask other false prophets to do the same with the same happy results. We are to govern our lives by God's precepts, not his providences.

Gibson's movie attempts to picture One, who cannot be pictured/ portrayed or impersonated by an actor. Jesus was God and man, two distinct natures in one person; the truth incarnate. Since we are unable to represent him, we are not even to attempt to represent him. Is it a true depiction of one who is truth himself? How do you know?

How have we been commanded to spread the historical event and the signifigance of Christ crucified? Aurally. Orally. Preaching. Reading Scripture. Not visually. Since Christ cannot truly be depicted by man's art of any variety, the same necessarily become a lie and or an idol - a representation of God who cannot be represented. Consider the many so-called pictures of "Jesus" that you have seen over the years. Some portray him as a middle-eastern Jew, some as a blond-haired, blue-eyed Anglo-Saxon, others as a pansy. The danger we are most liable to falling into is making Christ after our own image. All images that we make, whether on celluloid film or in Sunday School papers or flannelgraphs, detract from the glory of our risen Lord and are nothing but lies. Christ gave us two visual representations of Himself for remembering Him by: baptism and the elements of the Lord's Supper. Let us be content with these.

I do not deny that there may be some who are drawn to the Gospel through this movie. Though God may and often does, sovereignly move upon men's hearts in ways that we don't understand, He has told us how we are to spread the Gospel: through the preaching and hearing of God's Word. What is of greater concern to me is that many more people will be lured into committing the sin of idolatry, which I contend is precisely what a movie or play that tries to portray Christ does. The first commandment tells us which God to worship. The second, tells us how to worship that God. When we insist on introducing things into worship that God has not ordained, or when we insist on actually violating what He specifically commanded us not to do, then in effect we are telling God that His ways are not good enough and that a lot of what man devises (Acts 17:29) needs to be added in order for the Gospel to be effective.

Over and over in Scripture, God defines idolatry to be not only the worship of false gods, but also includes the false worship of the true God. When God demands a blood sacrifice, it doesn't do to offer him fruits and vegetables, no matter how sincere the attempt, as Cain found to his dismay. When God forbids us to make any representation of Him, we should heed his words instead of looking to our own sincerity of motives. We should not look to our methods of spreading the Gospel and do a head count as though sheer numbers determine its viability or success. Instead we should be looking at our ways and means and asking ourselves if they are obedient to what God has commanded.

When Saul took the cattle that God had designated for destruction upon the pretext of saving it to sacrifice to Him, his reply through the prophet Samuel was,

"Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubborness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He also has rejected you from being king."

Somber words. Sincerity in disobedience does not please the Lord.

Giving people the Gospel should not be a constant search for a more and more clever ways that grab the attention in order to "close the deal." And we should not interpret an emotional response or apparently good intentions as evidence of true repentance and faith in Christ.

"Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, "Lord Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, "I NEVER knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!" Matt. 7:21-23

Prophesying, casting out demons, and doing wonders for Christ's sake are not good enough, according to Christ, if you are not doing the will of the Father.

Is this movie one that is sure to move people to tears and great emotional response? By all accounts this is so. And that is precisely where its danger lies. I greatly fear that there will be many who will be deceived into believing that the fact that many are moved emotionally is the same thing as seeing them saved. Again, let us look at what Scripture says:

"A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them. Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root they withered away. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them. But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop; some a hundred fold, some sixty, and some thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear....

"Therefore hear the parable of the sower: When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside. But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles. Now he who received seed among thorns is he who hears the word and the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. But he who received sseed on good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and porduces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty." ( Matt. 13: 3-9; 18-23)

Now in the above portion of Scripture we have four instances of seed being sown, but only one of those plots of ground produced *lasting* fruit. One type didn't even have a chance to sprout, two others sprouted and gave the appearance of conversion, but in the end, they were false professions. These sort of verses should trouble us into looking at our own hearts and asking, "Lord am I one of the deceived who will think I did great things in your Name only to find I was wrong? Am I one of those who has a stony ground or thorns in my heart?" I fear that there are many who warm church pews these days, thinking that they are safe because they had an emotional response to a movie or sermon or because they said, "the sinner's prayer" or answered an altar call.

We are told in Romans 6:1,2 " What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live longer therein?"

Dare we say that the means God instituted are not efficacious or good enough?