THE IMAGE GOD BRINGS

#1 · July 30, 2003, 9:44 am

Quote from Forum Archives on July 30, 2003, 9:44 am
Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>

THE IMAGE GOD BRINGS
July 27, 2003
evening service

Text: Malachi 1:6-14

Around the year 140 AD, a much-traveled ship owner named Marcion, from
the Black Sea region, came to Rome. There, he fell under the teaching of
a gnostic leader. Gnostics, simply put, were groups who believed in God
and Christ and His revelations, but felt that they had to add more. They
held that the key to understanding Christianity lay in additional
"hidden" knowledge which, of course, only they and their followers knew.

Anyway, Marcion fell under the influence of the gnostics. From this
influence, he went on to develop some of his own peculiar beliefs about
God. Dr. Bruce Shelley, in Church History in Plain Language, writes:
"[Marcion] held that the Old Testament God was full of wrath and the
author of evil. This God, he said, was only concerned for the Jewish
people. He was prepared to destroy all other people. In contrast, the
Christian's God was a God of grace and love for all, who disclosed
himself in Jesus Christ, his Son. Because he believed that the God of the
Old Testament loved the Jews exclusively, Marcion rejected the entire Old
Testament and also those New Covenant writings that he thought favored
Jewish readers - for example Matthew, Mark, Acts, and Hebrews..." (Bruce
Shelley, Christian Theology in Plain Language, Waco: Word Books, 1985, p.
78)

Marcion's view became popular in some areas. Followers established
Marcionite churches in the Middle Eastern world. By 144 AD, though, the
established church in Rome was taking steps to declare Marcionite
teachings heretical; that is, Marcionite doctrines were considered a
false teaching and a danger to the truth of the Word of God. In response
to the Marcionite problem, and other inaccurate teachings that were
appearing, the Christian church, through a series of councils over a
period of 300 years, began the process of gathering the various Christian
writings together and formally deciding which of them would be canonized
as Scripture and which would not. The Bibles that we use today,
regardless of version, have their roots in these councils and processes
started those many centuries ago.

I talk a little about Marcion and the early Christian Church as a way of
introducing Malachis observations and warnings. The image of God is an
important theme for Christians to consider and meditate on. Gods
revealed image extends throughout all time and throughout the Old and New
Testaments. The image of God includes His holiness and righteousness and
that these are, contrary to Marcion's claims, in keeping with His
revealed nature in Jesus Christ.

We find in the time of Malachi, about 390-400 BC, a spiritual low tide.
One commentator writes: "...although the worship of the temple is being
formally carried on, the priests are so slovenly in the exercise of their
office that they are a standing disgrace to the community and an offense
to God. The people, on their part, are careless about the payment of
tithes and the appointed offerings. The disrespect which the Jews show
toward the worship of the one true God, who is in a special sense their
God, stands in marked contrast, says the prophet, to the attitude of the
'heathen,' who are reaching out after true monotheism and whose worship
is far more acceptable to him. The spiritual depression which prevails
generally is reflected also in a declining respect for marriage. Divorce
is prevalent, and frequent marriages with women of other nations and
religious backgrounds are corrupting the purity and integrity of
community life." (Robert C. Denton, The Book of Malachi, The
Interpreter's Bible, v. 6, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1956, p. 1117)

Problems like that dont sound too ancient, do they? By reading Malachi,
we quickly discover an issue in the way the people are treating God. Of
course, the sinners are offended when confronted by this. "How have we
defiled you?" "By saying that the Lord's table is contemptible. When you
bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice
crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to
your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?"

>From Leviticus and Deuteronomy, we learn about the standards for the
offerings to God. From Deuteronomy 15:21: "If an animal has a defect, is
lame or blind, or has any serious flaw, you must not sacrifice it to the
Lord your God." And yet, here was an entire nation of God's people,
including his priests, offering impure sacrifices.

Throughout the Bible, we are shown various images of Gods nature. God is
creator, redeemer, giver of life and gifts, just and loving. God is also,
in the midst of all these other attributes, holy. God is other than us;
God is the great I AM. Nothing at all exists outside of Him. Now that's
saying a lot, and it really stretches our minds beyond common thought.
But as our holy God, He demands and desires true worship from His people.
One would think that the Israelites, of all people, would never forget
that. Nor would one think that Gods redeemed today, Christians, would
forget that. Part of true worship means giving Him our best. Again in
Deuteronomy, 15:19-20, the handling of the appropriate offering is
specified: "Set apart for the Lord your God every firstborn male of your
herds and flocks. Do not put the firstborn of your oxen to work, and do
not shear the firstborn of your sheep. Each year you and your family are
to eat them in the presence of the Lord your God at the place he will
choose."

Well, we may ask ourselves, in this age so far removed from the
sacrificial requirements of Old Testament covenant, why these
specifications are so important. Why all the stress on the nature of the
offering in Deuteronomy and Malachi and other Scriptures? Is God really
so meticulously picky? Was Marcion correct in believing that the God in
the Old Testament is different than the God in the New?

We answer "no." God is not different; He is the same in both. This is the
revelation of Gods holiness. The purpose of these sacrificial
requirements was not to place a burden on the people; it was to allow the
people to express their love and devotion to their God who had redeemed
them. In its purest form, the offering to God of something as valuable as
possible stands as a symbol of the believers willing consecration of
themselves. An offering becomes a sacrifice only when it costs the
offering person something real and dear to him or her.

In 2 Samuel 24, King David was sent by God to the threshing floor of
Araunah the Jebusite. Verses 21-24, "Araunah said, 'Why has my lord the
king come to his servant?' 'To buy your threshing floor,' David answered,
'so I can build an altar to the Lord, that the plague on the people may
be stopped.' Araunah said to David, 'Let my lord the king take whatever
pleases him and offer it up. Here are the oxen for the burnt offering,
and here are threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood. O king, Araunah
gives all this to the king.' Araunah also said to him, 'May the Lord your
God accept you.' But the king replied to Araunah, 'No, I insist on paying
you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my god burnt offerings that
cost me nothing.' So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and
paid fifty shekels of silver for them."

That is no doubt one of the reasons why David was always so favored in
the Lord's sight. He had a firm grasp of God's holy image as well as
God's redemptive image and was willing to respond to both. Marcion, and
others, failed to believe that both could co-exist. Even the words of
Jesus Christ in Matthew 10:37-39, are demanding: "Anyone who loves his
father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his
son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not
take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life
will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." Do
not think that God has stopped saying this. Howard B. Grose captures this
part of Gods image:

Give of your best to the Master;
Give Him first place in your heart;
Give Him first place in your service,
Consecrate every part.
Give, and to you shall be given;
God His beloved Son gave;
Gratefully seeking to serve Him,
Give Him the best that you have.

God would not have been angry with His elect people if lame animals was
all they had. But that was not the case. They had the flocks from which
they could choose the best. Israel was a land of plenty, but the people
didn't believe it. In fact, God's people willingly lied to Him! "Cursed
is the cheat who has an acceptable male in his flock and vows to give it,
but then sacrifices a blemished animal to the Lord. For I am a great
king."

"Help us, O God," the people would cry. "Deliver us from this illness or
this plague or this calamity, and we will give to you our best. You will
have the purest lamb and bull and sheep." But when the time came to
fulfill their voluntary promises, they failed to follow through.
Suddenly, that which was promised was too valuable. Well, maybe the
commodity prices went up. Whatever couldn't be sold at the auction -
whatever was considered at last worthless to anyone - was then taken to
the temple of God for sacrifice. Small wonder God tells his people: "Try
offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he
accept you?" And then: "Oh, that one of you would shut the temple doors,
so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! I am not pleased
with you." God would rather have received no offerings than to continue
this insulting parody of honest worship.

Sadly, it continues today. Poll upon poll tell us that more than fifty
percent of America's population are born again Christians. Where, then,
is the revival and evangelistic fervor? Why do churches struggle for
attendance and contribution? Where is the support for missionaries at
home and away? Why is there more excitement generated by the opening of a
new mall than the opening of a new mission field? "Because you place
defiled food on my altar."

This is the dark side of our lives and is not the complete picture for
person or nation. The Lord's work is going on and we should - and do -
celebrate His activity and work wherever it is found. But we still need
recognize that there is still a lot of lame sacrificing going on. If we
are going to be who we say we are - Christian, God-fearing, born again,
saved - then we had better also be about the business of "bringing the
whole tithe into the storehouse."

One of Marcion's greatest errors was that he failed to recognize God's
redemptive image in the Old Testament. Through the covenant's blessing
and curse, God was always redeeming His people. Even in the midst of
withdrawing His blessings, God always looked forward to the day of
restoration of His covenant. After telling of the ruin of the land and
people in Hosea 2, the Lord declared in verses 16-23, "In that day you
will call me 'my husband': you will no longer call me 'my master.'... In
that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field and
the birds of the air and the creatures that move along the ground... I
will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I
called 'Not my loved one.' I will say to those called 'Not my people,'
'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God.'" Likewise,
Malachi writes, "My name will be great among the nations, from the rising
to the setting of the sun. In every place incense and pure offerings will
be brought to my name, because my name will be great among the nations."
Malachi appeared on the scene as a prophet during one of the worst
periods of Hebrew history as darkened souls turned away from their one,
true God. And the darkness in their souls soon descended upon the land
for four hundred years as God's blessings left His rebellious people.
Still, Malachi's vision goes beyond the destruction of curse. There also
remains God's redemptive image of the coming Lord whose name will be
magnified, honored, and worshiped by all nations.

Dr. Howard J. Jensen, formerly of the First Baptist Church of Manasquan,
New Jersey, has written: "The name denotes God's nature, character,
self-existence, spirituality, and the mysterious existence of the Trinity
in the unity of the godhead. The name denotes the harmony of all God's
attributes and the majesty of God's governing. It is a name of weight and
authority; a name to be magnified. Before it every knee shall bow. The
name declares the celebration of worship. The worship will be spiritual,
but it will be offered in 'every place.' Spiritual worship is
enlightenment; it is the result of knowledge. It must be the result of
faith, for faith 'sees' the Great Invisible. Worship must be the kindling
of the Holy Spirit. There will be living offerings. It will not be cold,
irrational service, but the service of a warm heart. Every person will
offer themselves to God and each will become a holy and purified
oblation, kindled by the fire of God. Thus through this worship there
shall be myriads of spirits everywhere, all over the world, ascending in
flames of pure devotion to God." (JBS Bulletin Cover, 8883)

As Isaac Watts has written:

Jesus shall reign where-er the sun,
Does his successive journeys run;
His kingdom spread from shore to shore,
Till moons shall wax and wane no more.

Don't we want to be a part of this kingdom? Don't we want to be a part of
this worship? Don't we want to be a part of this image that God brings?

Rev. Charles A. Layne, pastor, First Baptist Church, Bunker Hill, IN

________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit www.juno.com to sign up today!

Posted by: bhfbc <bhfbc@...>

THE IMAGE GOD BRINGS
July 27, 2003
evening service

Text: Malachi 1:6-14

Around the year 140 AD, a much-traveled ship owner named Marcion, from
the Black Sea region, came to Rome. There, he fell under the teaching of
a gnostic leader. Gnostics, simply put, were groups who believed in God
and Christ and His revelations, but felt that they had to add more. They
held that the key to understanding Christianity lay in additional
"hidden" knowledge which, of course, only they and their followers knew.

Anyway, Marcion fell under the influence of the gnostics. From this
influence, he went on to develop some of his own peculiar beliefs about
God. Dr. Bruce Shelley, in Church History in Plain Language, writes:
"[Marcion] held that the Old Testament God was full of wrath and the
author of evil. This God, he said, was only concerned for the Jewish
people. He was prepared to destroy all other people. In contrast, the
Christian's God was a God of grace and love for all, who disclosed
himself in Jesus Christ, his Son. Because he believed that the God of the
Old Testament loved the Jews exclusively, Marcion rejected the entire Old
Testament and also those New Covenant writings that he thought favored
Jewish readers - for example Matthew, Mark, Acts, and Hebrews..." (Bruce
Shelley, Christian Theology in Plain Language, Waco: Word Books, 1985, p.
78)

Marcion's view became popular in some areas. Followers established
Marcionite churches in the Middle Eastern world. By 144 AD, though, the
established church in Rome was taking steps to declare Marcionite
teachings heretical; that is, Marcionite doctrines were considered a
false teaching and a danger to the truth of the Word of God. In response
to the Marcionite problem, and other inaccurate teachings that were
appearing, the Christian church, through a series of councils over a
period of 300 years, began the process of gathering the various Christian
writings together and formally deciding which of them would be canonized
as Scripture and which would not. The Bibles that we use today,
regardless of version, have their roots in these councils and processes
started those many centuries ago.

I talk a little about Marcion and the early Christian Church as a way of
introducing Malachis observations and warnings. The image of God is an
important theme for Christians to consider and meditate on. Gods
revealed image extends throughout all time and throughout the Old and New
Testaments. The image of God includes His holiness and righteousness and
that these are, contrary to Marcion's claims, in keeping with His
revealed nature in Jesus Christ.

We find in the time of Malachi, about 390-400 BC, a spiritual low tide.
One commentator writes: "...although the worship of the temple is being
formally carried on, the priests are so slovenly in the exercise of their
office that they are a standing disgrace to the community and an offense
to God. The people, on their part, are careless about the payment of
tithes and the appointed offerings. The disrespect which the Jews show
toward the worship of the one true God, who is in a special sense their
God, stands in marked contrast, says the prophet, to the attitude of the
'heathen,' who are reaching out after true monotheism and whose worship
is far more acceptable to him. The spiritual depression which prevails
generally is reflected also in a declining respect for marriage. Divorce
is prevalent, and frequent marriages with women of other nations and
religious backgrounds are corrupting the purity and integrity of
community life." (Robert C. Denton, The Book of Malachi, The
Interpreter's Bible, v. 6, Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1956, p. 1117)

Problems like that dont sound too ancient, do they? By reading Malachi,
we quickly discover an issue in the way the people are treating God. Of
course, the sinners are offended when confronted by this. "How have we
defiled you?" "By saying that the Lord's table is contemptible. When you
bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice
crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to
your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?"

>From Leviticus and Deuteronomy, we learn about the standards for the
offerings to God. From Deuteronomy 15:21: "If an animal has a defect, is
lame or blind, or has any serious flaw, you must not sacrifice it to the
Lord your God." And yet, here was an entire nation of God's people,
including his priests, offering impure sacrifices.

Throughout the Bible, we are shown various images of Gods nature. God is
creator, redeemer, giver of life and gifts, just and loving. God is also,
in the midst of all these other attributes, holy. God is other than us;
God is the great I AM. Nothing at all exists outside of Him. Now that's
saying a lot, and it really stretches our minds beyond common thought.
But as our holy God, He demands and desires true worship from His people.
One would think that the Israelites, of all people, would never forget
that. Nor would one think that Gods redeemed today, Christians, would
forget that. Part of true worship means giving Him our best. Again in
Deuteronomy, 15:19-20, the handling of the appropriate offering is
specified: "Set apart for the Lord your God every firstborn male of your
herds and flocks. Do not put the firstborn of your oxen to work, and do
not shear the firstborn of your sheep. Each year you and your family are
to eat them in the presence of the Lord your God at the place he will
choose."

Well, we may ask ourselves, in this age so far removed from the
sacrificial requirements of Old Testament covenant, why these
specifications are so important. Why all the stress on the nature of the
offering in Deuteronomy and Malachi and other Scriptures? Is God really
so meticulously picky? Was Marcion correct in believing that the God in
the Old Testament is different than the God in the New?

We answer "no." God is not different; He is the same in both. This is the
revelation of Gods holiness. The purpose of these sacrificial
requirements was not to place a burden on the people; it was to allow the
people to express their love and devotion to their God who had redeemed
them. In its purest form, the offering to God of something as valuable as
possible stands as a symbol of the believers willing consecration of
themselves. An offering becomes a sacrifice only when it costs the
offering person something real and dear to him or her.

In 2 Samuel 24, King David was sent by God to the threshing floor of
Araunah the Jebusite. Verses 21-24, "Araunah said, 'Why has my lord the
king come to his servant?' 'To buy your threshing floor,' David answered,
'so I can build an altar to the Lord, that the plague on the people may
be stopped.' Araunah said to David, 'Let my lord the king take whatever
pleases him and offer it up. Here are the oxen for the burnt offering,
and here are threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood. O king, Araunah
gives all this to the king.' Araunah also said to him, 'May the Lord your
God accept you.' But the king replied to Araunah, 'No, I insist on paying
you for it. I will not sacrifice to the Lord my god burnt offerings that
cost me nothing.' So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and
paid fifty shekels of silver for them."

That is no doubt one of the reasons why David was always so favored in
the Lord's sight. He had a firm grasp of God's holy image as well as
God's redemptive image and was willing to respond to both. Marcion, and
others, failed to believe that both could co-exist. Even the words of
Jesus Christ in Matthew 10:37-39, are demanding: "Anyone who loves his
father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his
son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and anyone who does not
take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life
will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." Do
not think that God has stopped saying this. Howard B. Grose captures this
part of Gods image:

Give of your best to the Master;
Give Him first place in your heart;
Give Him first place in your service,
Consecrate every part.
Give, and to you shall be given;
God His beloved Son gave;
Gratefully seeking to serve Him,
Give Him the best that you have.

God would not have been angry with His elect people if lame animals was
all they had. But that was not the case. They had the flocks from which
they could choose the best. Israel was a land of plenty, but the people
didn't believe it. In fact, God's people willingly lied to Him! "Cursed
is the cheat who has an acceptable male in his flock and vows to give it,
but then sacrifices a blemished animal to the Lord. For I am a great
king."

"Help us, O God," the people would cry. "Deliver us from this illness or
this plague or this calamity, and we will give to you our best. You will
have the purest lamb and bull and sheep." But when the time came to
fulfill their voluntary promises, they failed to follow through.
Suddenly, that which was promised was too valuable. Well, maybe the
commodity prices went up. Whatever couldn't be sold at the auction -
whatever was considered at last worthless to anyone - was then taken to
the temple of God for sacrifice. Small wonder God tells his people: "Try
offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he
accept you?" And then: "Oh, that one of you would shut the temple doors,
so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! I am not pleased
with you." God would rather have received no offerings than to continue
this insulting parody of honest worship.

Sadly, it continues today. Poll upon poll tell us that more than fifty
percent of America's population are born again Christians. Where, then,
is the revival and evangelistic fervor? Why do churches struggle for
attendance and contribution? Where is the support for missionaries at
home and away? Why is there more excitement generated by the opening of a
new mall than the opening of a new mission field? "Because you place
defiled food on my altar."

This is the dark side of our lives and is not the complete picture for
person or nation. The Lord's work is going on and we should - and do -
celebrate His activity and work wherever it is found. But we still need
recognize that there is still a lot of lame sacrificing going on. If we
are going to be who we say we are - Christian, God-fearing, born again,
saved - then we had better also be about the business of "bringing the
whole tithe into the storehouse."

One of Marcion's greatest errors was that he failed to recognize God's
redemptive image in the Old Testament. Through the covenant's blessing
and curse, God was always redeeming His people. Even in the midst of
withdrawing His blessings, God always looked forward to the day of
restoration of His covenant. After telling of the ruin of the land and
people in Hosea 2, the Lord declared in verses 16-23, "In that day you
will call me 'my husband': you will no longer call me 'my master.'... In
that day I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field and
the birds of the air and the creatures that move along the ground... I
will plant her for myself in the land; I will show my love to the one I
called 'Not my loved one.' I will say to those called 'Not my people,'
'You are my people'; and they will say, 'You are my God.'" Likewise,
Malachi writes, "My name will be great among the nations, from the rising
to the setting of the sun. In every place incense and pure offerings will
be brought to my name, because my name will be great among the nations."
Malachi appeared on the scene as a prophet during one of the worst
periods of Hebrew history as darkened souls turned away from their one,
true God. And the darkness in their souls soon descended upon the land
for four hundred years as God's blessings left His rebellious people.
Still, Malachi's vision goes beyond the destruction of curse. There also
remains God's redemptive image of the coming Lord whose name will be
magnified, honored, and worshiped by all nations.

Dr. Howard J. Jensen, formerly of the First Baptist Church of Manasquan,
New Jersey, has written: "The name denotes God's nature, character,
self-existence, spirituality, and the mysterious existence of the Trinity
in the unity of the godhead. The name denotes the harmony of all God's
attributes and the majesty of God's governing. It is a name of weight and
authority; a name to be magnified. Before it every knee shall bow. The
name declares the celebration of worship. The worship will be spiritual,
but it will be offered in 'every place.' Spiritual worship is
enlightenment; it is the result of knowledge. It must be the result of
faith, for faith 'sees' the Great Invisible. Worship must be the kindling
of the Holy Spirit. There will be living offerings. It will not be cold,
irrational service, but the service of a warm heart. Every person will
offer themselves to God and each will become a holy and purified
oblation, kindled by the fire of God. Thus through this worship there
shall be myriads of spirits everywhere, all over the world, ascending in
flames of pure devotion to God." (JBS Bulletin Cover, 8883)

As Isaac Watts has written:

Jesus shall reign where-er the sun,
Does his successive journeys run;
His kingdom spread from shore to shore,
Till moons shall wax and wane no more.

Don't we want to be a part of this kingdom? Don't we want to be a part of
this worship? Don't we want to be a part of this image that God brings?

Rev. Charles A. Layne, pastor, First Baptist Church, Bunker Hill, IN

________________________________________________________________
The best thing to hit the internet in years - Juno SpeedBand!
Surf the web up to FIVE TIMES FASTER!
Only $14.95/ month - visit http://www.juno.com to sign up today!