Only Natural from 4.11.16
Personal Matters
How many Perth congregations will join in the International Day of Prayer for the persecuted Church this week? This is not an attempt to publicise an event, but a warning that our failure to empathetically embrace the sufferings of afflicted Christians means we cannot experience the sort of heavenly comfort they do. As Paul teaches, “we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort.” (2 Cor 1:7). The Western Church’s resistance to suffering is a clear sign that we have allowed popular culture to confuse us as to the very meaning of what it is to be human. We no longer understand what is “only natural” to our humanity. During my own lifetime abominations such as rampant greed, abortion, sex outside of marriage and homosexuality have been accepted as “natural” behaviours. At one level this is a predictable outcome of the influence of Darwinian theories of the evolution of human nature, but the root causes of such a radical redefinition of humanness go back to Eden.
The Pain of Life
Most Christians believe Eden was a totally pain-free paradise because we unconsciously subscribe to the principles of the Panadol ad, “When pain is gone, life takes its place.” Surely however when Adam heard the LORD warn with a tragic tone of voice, ““in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die.””, this was not a pleasant experience for him (Gen 2:17). Certainly the God’s utterance concerning the singleness of the first man, ““It is not good that the man should be alone”” shows Adam was experiencing a painful loneliness which could only be healed by the later joy of marriage (Gen 2:18, 23-24). Finally, the punishment meted out to the fallen Eve, ““I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing”” indicates childbirth would have brought suffering to a mother even in a sinless world (Gen 3:16 cf. John 16:21). Suffering was a natural part of what it meant to be human in a world created “very good” but not yet perfected in love (Gen 1:31). Satan’s great lie is to deny that suffering is part of a plan for a greater good, for he presents humanity’s pain as essentially evil. The temptation, ““you will be like God, knowing good and evil.””, is an enticement to be like a deity who is pain free in every way (Gen 3:5). With complete mastery over the experience of good-and-evil such humanity would be set free from every wrestling of conscience and could never experience guilt or shame. There would be no need to ever feel bad about anything we ever think or do, such aspirations come close to the dreams of our culture. Embracing this devilish vision in Eden meant denying God as the author of a very good creation and relentlessly seeking to escape his message about what it truly means to be human.
Inescapable Word
Whereas God has irretrievably given Satan over to a nature that feels it can do no wrong and is completely morally blinded (John 8:44), the Lord never stops speaking to us through nature; “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge.” (Ps 19:1-2 cf. Ps 104). God’s “invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made.” (Rom 1:20). How remarkable it is then that in an age when the average Westerner is exposed more than ever to the beauties of creation through cheap air travel we have never been so blind to the glory of the Lord of the world. Not wanting to embrace our call to “share in the divine nature” we have exalted our version of humanity as the ultimate image of glory, one we can recreate at our pleasure (Rom 1:23; 2 Pet 1:4). Today men and women are not only encouraged to discover themselves but to make themselves who they want to be. In consequence the wrath of God has handed over our culture to exchanging natural created relationships for the unnatural, with no pangs of conscience (Rom 1:26-27). With no moral witness to the guilt and shame of a sinful life that deserves to die there seems to be no space for a gospel of forgiveness in a society like ours (Rom 1:32). Only a revelation of the true nature of God in Christ can deliver possibly us.
The Nature of God
To strip our understanding of the nature of God of his experience of suffering is to be deceived (Rev 22:3). From eternity the Lamb of God was prepared to suffer for the salvation of humanity (1 Pet 1:20; Rev 13:8). The truth of God’s nature is clarified through his visible suffering for us in Christ. It is because Jesus was “in very nature God….he emptied himself…death on a cross” (Phil 2:6ff.). It is intrinsic to Christ’s nature as the God who loves to suffer for the greater glory of others; “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13; 1 John 4:8). If it is natural for the Son to suffer for the glory of his Father in the salvation of the world why is Jesus’ experience of Gethsemane so traumatic (John 12:27-28; 17:1-4)? He is after all “the man of sorrows” (Isa 53:3; Mark 14:34). True as this may be it is absolutely unnatural for God or humans to suffer alone, and this is the agony Jesus must endure for our sins on the cross. This makes the cry of dereliction; ““My God…why have you forsaken me?””, the final revelation of the nature of God as unconditional love (Mark 15:34). Yet the Father could not allow his Son to remain alone. Jesus’ resurrection from the dead establishes a new creation in which suffering through love for the good of others is understood as the deepest truth of “nature” (Gal 5:6; 6:15).
Christian Nature
In Christ we share in a divine nature that existed from eternity solely for others (2 Pet 1:4). In his victory over sin, Satan and death Jesus frees us from every guilty fear that links pain with God’s punishment and teaches us the meaning of human nature is love of others (1 John 4:17-18). Our old fallen humanity resisted suffering as evil and unnatural, but in Christ we see that to suffer for the good of others is the most natural thing for a Christian to do. “I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake….to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps….it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake,” (Col 1:24; 1 Pet 2:21; Phil 1:29). To embrace Christ-likeness means to accept that it is natural to suffer for the good of others. But who will teach such things amongst us?
Conclusion
Past generations of Christians wrestled deeply in their consciences with the suffering of the world, their own afflictions and most significantly with the sufferings of Christ. As they did this, aided by the Spirit, they came to a fresh realisation of what it means to be human (Rom 1 Cor 2:10). Such wrestlings of conscience are almost absent from the Western Church. This is why we cannot understand the Persecuted Church who know intimately that suffering is a revelation of the true nature of what it means to be human. Our form of Church cannot be revived until it breaks free from the self-centredness of a culture that aggressively opposes the truth that from birth to death suffering is an essential dimension of what it means to be created in the image of God in Christ. The purpose of what it means to be human is hidden in heaven where Christ is who has taken his humanity into God for us (Col 2:3; 3:1-2). Such great revelations are ours for the asking; as long as we do not ask for ourselves (James 4:2-3).