Proper Christian Hatred

One of the most frequent ethical exhortations in the Bible is for God’s people to love – him, fellow Christians, and others (even praying for our enemies).  But there is an object of hatred that is proper in the Christian life.  We can and should hate Satan and his kingdom of darkness. 

Satan is a murderer who is so full of lies that he cannot speak the truth (John 8.44).  He is Christ’s sworn enemy (Gen. 3.15, Lk. 4.2, Heb. 2.14, 1 Jn. 3.8, etc.).  He is the Christian’s sworn enemy (1 Pet. 5.8).  He is the church’s sworn enemy (2 Cor. 2.11).  Satan wants to destroy God’s kingdom and his evil and dark heart is absolutely and in every way opposed to everything good, pure, and noble (Luke 8.12, Acts 5.3, 13.10, etc.).  Therefore, it is right and proper for Christians to hate and detest Satan.  Biblically, there is “a time to hate” and we are called to “hate evil” (Ecc. 3.8, Amos 5.15).  In fact, the fear of the LORD is the hatred of evil (Prov. 8.13, cf. Ps. 139.21).

William Ames said it this way: “With our entire heart and all our strength we ought to be against the kingdom of the devil….” (A Sketch of the Christian’s Catechism, 212).

The WLC Q/A 191 says that in the second petition of the Lord’s Prayer we are praying “that the kingdom of sin and Satan may be destroyed.”  Likewise, the HC Q/A 123 says the second petition is a prayer that God would “destroy the devil’s work.”  In the sixth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, we are praying that “Satan [be] trodden under our feet” (WLC 195).  It is good and right for us to pray fervently against Satan’s temptation and his wicked work. 

Thomas Watson wrote that the Christian “must offer violence to Satan. …We must offer violence to Satan by faith.  …There is a lion in the way but we must resolve upon fighting.  …Faith is a heroic grace; it is said, above all, to quench the fiery darts of Satan.  Faith resists the devil.  …Faith holds the promise in one hand and Christ in the other.” (Heaven Taken by Storm, ch. 10).

Martin Luther, as many of you may know, struggled intensely against Satan’s temptations and assaults. 

“The devil forever and a day would very much like to have us stray from the right way.  He knows very well that whoever believes in Christ will be saved.  That is why he tries with might and main and all manner of tricks to mislead us” (Sermons, 7.298).

The devil’s temptations are very real.  He tries to get us to lust, lie, doubt the promises of grace, and ignore God’s word.  If he would have his way, we’d all be literally doomed.  But Christ is much stronger than Satan and his horde.  He dealt the death blow to Satan on the cross and in the resurrection, and one day he’ll return to finish him off by throwing him into the pit of hell forever (Rev. 20.10).   This truth should make a great cheer rise up in our hearts already; part of the gospel is that Jesus will win total and eternal victory over Satan. 

So when Satan tempts you, with true love for Christ and deep hatred for the devil, you can tell him that you realize now he might win a few skirmishes here and there.  And you can tell him you hate him with every fiber of your Christian being.  You can tell him to leave you alone because you’ve been baptized and you have Christ as your Savior and Protector.  Finally, because of Christ’s certain victory, you can tell him to go to hell where he belongs.  You, however, belong to Christ, body and soul, and not even Satan can snatch you from his hand.  The battle may be hard, tear-filled, and bloody, but victory is certain.  Keep fighting!  God will soon crush Satan underfoot (Rom. 16.20).

rev shane lems

Jesus Keeps His Sheep

 In his commentary on the Lord’s Prayer, Thomas Watson has a great discussion of the preservation of the saints (a.k.a. the “P” in TULIP or the last part of the Canons of Dort).  He says “a saint’s perseverance is built upon three immutable pillars.”

1) Upon God’s eternal love.  We are inconstant in our love to God; but he is not so in his love to us.  ‘I have loved thee with an everlasting love;’ with a love of eternity (Jer. 31.3).  When once the sunshine of God’s electing love is risen upon the soul, it never sets finally.

2) Upon the covenant of grace.  It is a firm, impregnable covenant; as you read in [2 Sam. 23.5] ‘God hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure.’  This covenant is inviolable, it cannot be broken; indeed, sin may break the peace of the covenant, but it cannot break the bond of the covenant.

3) Upon the mystical union.  Believers are incorporated into Christ, they are knit to him as members of the head, by the nerve and ligament of faith, so that they cannot be broken off (Eph. 5.23).  As it is impossible to sever the yeast and the dough when they are once mingled, so it is impossible when Christ and believers are united to be separated, even by the power of death or hell .

Well said; reminds me of the answer of the Westminster Larger Catechism that has to do with the perseverance of the saints (Q/A 79).  I’ve put the numbers in the text to more clearly show the reasons saints are preserved:

“True believers, by reason of the 1) unchangeable love of God,
and 2) his decree
and 3) covenant to give them perseverance,
4) their inseparable union with Christ,
5) his continual intercession for them,
and 6) the Spirit and seed of God abiding in them,
can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace,
but are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.”

The above quotes by Thomas Watson, which I edited slightly, are found on pages 131-132 of The Lord’s Prayer.

shane lems

Quotes On Listening

Studying James 1.19-25 this week led me to think long and hard about the virtue of good listening – specifically listening to God’s Word (v 22; cf Ecc. 5.1-2, Prov 10.19, etc).  It is so hard to be a good listener in our noisy and entertainment-driven culture of texting and images.  I enjoy movies and music, but I also try to enjoy these things in moderation because I know they slowly kill my skill of listening to the Word.  Here are a few great quotes I found on listening which I though our readers would appreciate.

“Today…much ‘church work’ makes congregants so busy that they have scant time and little capacity for listening.  …Loving God and other people depends on getting to know them intimately by listening to them ‘with the ear of the heart.’” (Schultz, 78-9).

An old monastery had these words carved into the stone wall: “Do not speak unless you can improve upon the silence.” (Schultz, 78)

“The Word comes not to the chatterer but to him who holds his tongue. … Silence is the simple stillness of the individual under the Word of God.  We are silent before hearing the Word because our thoughts are already directed to the Word, as a child is quiet when he enters his father’s room.” (Bonhoeffer, 79).

“The listener is not permitted to suppose that the preached words are for anyone other than himself or herself.” (Peterson, 11).

“Doubtless, no one can be a true disciple of God, except he hears him in silence…. He (James) would…have us to correct and restrain our forwardness, that we may not, as it commonly happens, unseasonably interrupt God, and that as long as he opens his sacred mouth, we may open to him our hearts and our ears, and not prevent him to speak.” (Calvin on James 1.19).

“When we have heard a sermon, we should look up to Christ and beg his blessing upon it that it may not return void, but accomplish the work for which it was sent and be powerful and efficacious for the good of our souls.” (Love, 147).

“When we come to the Word preached, we come to a matter of the highest importance; therefore we should stir up ourselves and hear with the greatest devotion. … The devil is not one who refuses to come to church; he attends, but not with any good intent; he takes away the Word from men,” so “regard” and “remember” the Word. (Watson, 16-17).

“Why are we such poor listeners?  Today one of the major reasons is that we are so busy.  Our busyness substitutes frenzy for conversation and wrecks our relationships.  It fills our calendars and empties our lives of the ability to listen to anything that turns us away from our little gods.” (Hughes, 64).

“As real hearers we are indeed taken prisoner by this Word.  We surrender to it.  Inevitably, therefore, the totality of our existence is evidence of what we have heard.” (Barth, CD II.2, p. 365).

“It is required of those that hear the word preached that they attend upon it with diligence, preparation, and prayer; examine what they hear by the scriptures, receive the truth with faith, love, meekness, and readiness of mind, as the word of God; meditate, and confer of it; hide it in their hearts, and bring forth the fruit of it in their lives.” (WLC 160).

Solae aures sunt organa Chistiani – “The ears alone are the organs of a Christian man, for he is justified and declared to be a Christian, not because of the works of any member but because of faith. (Luther, quoted in Webb, p. 144)

shane lems

sunnyside, wa

The Westminster Assembly Project: Announcement

This is good news for students of theology and church history, especially those of us with a Presbyterian “bent.”  Reformation Heritage Books (RHB) and The Westminster Assembly Project have teamed up to publish some older documents from the theologically fruitful Westminster Assembly and some of its delegates.  Go here for more info – and stay tuned!

Note: The Westminster Assembly Project website is here.

shane lems

sunnyside wa

Prayer as a Means of Grace?

The Westminster Standards (Presbyterian Confessions) and the Three Forms of Unity (Reformed Confessions) are so very close in so very many ways. One area that some have highlighted a difference is the point where the WCF calls prayer a means of grace while the Heidelberg does not go that far.

For example, the Westminster Larger Catechism says the outward and ordinary means that Christ uses to communicate his blessings include all his ordinances, especially the word, sacraments, and prayer – all of these [his ordinances] are made effectual to the elect for their salvation (Q/A 154). The Heidelberg, a bit differently, says that prayer is the most important part of the thankfulness that God requires from us, and that God only gives grace and his Spirit to those who pray asking and thanking God for these gifts (Q/A 116). Prayer is in the third section of the Heidelberg, the “Christian living” or “gratitude” section and not in the word/sacraments section (the middle section on “grace” or “salvation”).

Though these differences should certainly not drive a wedge between the two confessions, it is interesting to think about. In his section on the means of grace in Reformed Dogmatics IV, Herman Bavinck is helpful. He said there is a certain sense in which the means of grace are broader, or wider, than just preaching and the sacraments: faith, conversion, struggles against sin, and prayer are included. However, it is better, noted Bavinck, to define the means of grace as objective, “external, humanly perceptible actions and signs that Christ has given his church and with which he has linked the communication of his grace” (RD IV.447-8). In other words, broadly speaking there are more than two means of grace, yet narrowly there are just two.

Bavinck used this “broad” and “narrow” concept in keeping with the Reformed scholastics. Richard Muller, in his excellent Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1985), also notes this distinction. Under stricte (strictly or tightly), and late (loosely or generally), Muller said that the scholastics purposely and knowingly used definitions very precisely sometimes, while generally other times (p. 290). Perhaps this is helpful in our discussions of the means of grace. Were the Westminster divines speaking strictly or loosely? Would utilizing these distinctions help “harmonize” the two confessions?

shane lems

sunnyside wa