The Conundrum Of Human Fallenness

We launched the new series of BC2AD at Grace Community Church in Auburn last night. I don’t usually bring this problem up in the first session, but I’ve found in the past that students need a head start to begin figuring out this perplexing riddle. Here it is: Scripture tells us clearly that we have all inherited a sin problem from Adam, so,

1. What is “fallenness”?
2. How is it passed down from generation to generation?
3. Why didn’t Jesus get it?

One of our ladies came to me after class and suggested that perhaps the problem is passed down by the male of our species. That sounds sexist to me, though, ha, ha, so I look forward to what others will have to say as we touch on this problem from time to time in our next few sessions.

BC2AD On Target For Starting Jan 5, 2010!

Our new cycle of BC2AD begins soon at Grace Community Church in Auburn, WA.

Though we didn't formally hold the BC2AD course in 2009, I am never mentally far away from the material. Since BC2AD covers the entire Bible and Christian History, all the other courses I teach are in a sense segments of BC2AD. The beauty of this is that whatever I teach, and whatever I research, eventually feeds into the BC2AD material. BC2AD students benefit from the "cream" of my ongoing studies.

So, what have I been working on lately? Well, most recently I've been doing major research on how the early severing of the Church from all things Jewish (by AD 160), and the prevalence of Mystery Religions in the early Christian centuries, shaped the church Fathers' understanding of Christian baptism. Losing touch with the Hebraic background of Christian baptism, while also thinking in the mental categories of the magic-infused worldview of Hellenism, led the Fathers rapidly into a sacramental understanding of baptism, according to which water baptism actually regenerates the believer. Some Christian denominations have not yet recovered from the early misconceptions of the Fathers, but an understanding of the Ante-Nicene evolution of Christian doctrine can help us avoid false interpretations of Scripture today!

FREEDOM!

Remember that there are two aspects of biblical redemption:

1. Redemption of a person sold into bondage (Lev 25.47-49)
2. Redemption of property sold to another landlord (Lev 25.23-26)

In both cases, a person can redeem himself or his own property if he has a windfall and can afford to. The person who cannot afford his own redemption must rely upon a kinsman-redeemer.

In the eschatological parallels to these laws, we realize that we needed a Redeemer, because in Adam we had “sold out,” as Christine Bender put it. We had sold ourselves into bondage to sin, and “sold out” our dominion over the earth to Satan. We needed a Redeemer who was both a kinsman (i.e., born of a woman, born under law, Gal 4.4), and someone who could afford the redemption price of a perfect life sacrificed in death -- and yet live. Jesus Christ, uniquely brought these qualities together in one person as the sinless God-Man.

It’s because Jesus Christ has successfully paid the redemption price on Golgotha, that we can be set free and expect to win our spiritual warfare. Because of Christ’s redemption we can expect demons to obey us when we cast them out of our friends or command them to stop blinding our loved ones (Col 2.15; 2Co 4.4), and we can expect to see cities transformed as we apply ourselves to reclaiming the land for God’s kingdom (Mat. 6.9). Hallelujah!

These wonderful truths generated two brilliant questions as we concluded our class session:

1. Stephanie Dupea asked, “How then could Jesus and his disciples cast out demons before the crucifixion?”
2. Bill Siems asked, “Could Adam have redeemed Eve before he also ate the fruit?”

Wow! Before I comment on these questions, please send me your thoughts, or post them here on our BC2AD blog by clicking the n comments link below.

Lex Rex

Among other things last night, we talked about “the rule of law.” The rule of law is something we enjoy and take for granted in our country. The rule of law means that even the highest human authorities in our nation are themselves subject to the law and cannot break it with impunity. It’s because of the rule of law that we don’t have to fear police officers raping us or governors confiscating our land for themselves.

But much of the world during much of history did not enjoy the rule of law. Most nations had laws, but often the kings and governors were themselves above the law. The king was law (Rex Lex) rather than the Law being king (Lex Rex). This changed for the nation of Israel when God gave them the rule of law at Sinai. Even Moses and Aaron, along with the judges and kings that would follow, were subject to the law of Israel given by God. The rule of law doesn’t mean that kings always obey the law, only that even kings are subject to penalties when they break the law. Thus, king David suffered a severe penalty for breaking the law in the incident of Bathsheba and her husband Uriah.

Things also changed for the better in Media-Persia when it was decided that once a king made a law, that law could not be changed, that is, the king could not change his mind and alter or amend the law (Dan 6.15). Depending upon his political and military clout at the time, however, a king of Persia could still break his own laws with impunity.

This latter scenario was finally addressed in England with the Magna Carta. English noblemen forced the king to sign this big document, giving them the right to make war on the king if the king were to break his own laws. This finally established the rule of law (Lex Rex) in England, and our nation inherited this blessing.

However, the rule of law only makes sense if there is an ultimate law Giver! Israel understood the ultimate law Giver to be the God of Sinai. The Persians (like Hammurabi in Babylon) understood their own gods to be the ultimate law givers. At the time of the Magna Carta England still assumed the biblical God as the ultimate law Giver, and of course the United States inherited this assumed biblical basis for law. It is symptomatic of our present culture’s blindness, therefore, that while we continue to enjoy the rule of law (eroding though it is), we are so ready to discard the law Giver upon which the rule of law ultimately depends!

Rise up, O God, and defend your cause;
remember how fools mock you all day long.
Psa 74.22

What Is Fallenness?

If you missed our Numbers session last night (Jan. 29th), you missed a foundational discussion on the matter of original sin. The question was: What is fallenness (our propensity to sin), how is it passed down from Adam, and why didn’t Jesus get it?

Several people mentioned that “sin is a choice.” We soon realized, however, that though sins often involve choices, that fact doesn’t explain why “all have sinned” (Rom 3.23). If fallenness were only a matter of each individual choosing to sin, it would (theoretically) be possible to have some people in the world who had never sinned; each individual would be born sinless like Adam and Eve and then get to choose one way or the other.

But David confessed to having been “sinful at birth” (Psa 51.5), and Paul confirms that even infants sin (because even infants die – Rom 5.12). So we had to ask if fallenness was like a germ that gets passed down from generation to generation. The germ theory fails to explain why Jesus didn’t “catch it,” though. Someone suggested that sin (fallenness) is passed down through the human father and Jesus didn’t “catch it” because He had no human father. Well, we Christian men aren’t going to stand for this kind of sexist thinking! (I’m kidding.) But frankly, there is no biblical basis for the “germ” theory. It’s true that fallenness derives from our relationship to Adam (1Co 15.21,22), and it’s also true that Jesus, though a true son of Adam, was not born in a fallen state (1Jo 3.5), but nowhere does the Bible present fallenness as a disease that is transmitted by a biological (or spiritual) substance. So, if it’s not a “germ,” what is fallenness?

I didn’t hear anyone mention the Augustinian view of original sin last night. That view states that we all sinned seminally (biologically) while we were still “in Adam” in the garden of Eden. Nor did I hear mention of the Reformation era Federal theory which states that God simply imputes sin to the whole race because their federal head (Adam) sinned. These two longstanding and orthodox ideas unfortunately raise more questions than they answer (neither of them explains why Jesus was not born fallen).

So, what is fallenness? Rick Dupea won the Dove Bar award last night for explaining that fallenness is a spiritual deficiency. The moment that Adam and Eve sinned, they died spiritually. That component of the human person that was designed to respond to God and sit in the driver’s seat of man’s whole nature, the spirit, died. That spiritual death rendered Adam and Eve forever unable to bequeath a living, vibrant spirit to their progeny. Everyone — but Jesus — has since been born with a deadness of spirit, a deadness that is only deepened each time the unregenerate person sins. That’s why Paul describes the human condition apart from Christ as being “dead in [our] transgressions and in the uncircumcision of [our] flesh” (Col 2.13). That’s also why the cure for human fallenness begins with the new birth; “no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of ... the Spirit.... the Spirit gives birth to spirit” (John 3.5,6).

Why wasn’t Jesus born fallen, with a propensity to sin? Because though His mother was unable to give Him spiritual life, His Father, God, was able to fill Him with vibrant spiritual life from birth!

Dan Thompson asked an important follow-up question: If the new birth of the spirit is the cure to human fallenness, why can’t born-again parents give birth to sinless children? This is a great question. The observed fact that even the children of born-again parents are sinful, tells us that there’s more to the story. We realize that the new birth is not the whole cure for the fall of man, but only the beginning of the cure. Though our spirit is born again, we still inhabit fallen bodies and still battle with the flesh. The rest of the cure awaits the Resurrection (Romans 8.23)!

This discussion was foundational because in coming BC2AD sessions it will help us understand a number of other biblical truths. For example, a clear understanding of our fallenness and its cure will eventually help us more fully grasp what happened (and what didn’t happen) when the Holy Spirit was poured out on the day of Pentecost. I look forward to that discussion!

What The LORD Passed Over

Exodus 12.23 explains the dynamic of the Passover event:

When the LORD goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.

I've emphasized the words in this verse which state that it is the doorway that the LORD would pass over, in the sense of entering the house and passing through the blood in a sign of covenant kinship.

However, the Scripture uses the idea of passing over in a couple of different ways. In an earlier verse, Exo 12.13, God emphasizes that He will pass over (in the sense of upon) the Israelites themselves (the Hebrew is aleichem, as in the familiar greeting shalom aleichem, Peace be upon you). This meaning of God's passing over is beautifully reiterated in Isaiah 31.5 (NIV):

Like birds hovering overhead,
the LORD Almighty will shield Jerusalem;
he will shield it and deliver it,
he will 'pass over ' it and will rescue it.

Looking back to the original Passover in Egypt, this second idea pictures the LORD passing over each covenant home and hovering there like a great, shielding canopy.

Thank you, LORD!

To Teach Warfare (Judges 3.1-4)

Our most recent discussion of warfare insights from Joshua and Judges produced the following thoughts from our group meeting in Gig Harbor:

1. God's battle plan is often counter-intuitive. Who would have thought to conquer Jericho by marching around it blowing trumpets and shouting?
2. God is willing to give us specific instructions on how to approach a battle.
3. These first two points imply the necessity of being able to hear from God. While the Scriptures remain our touchstone by which we test all things (Isaiah 8.20), there are times in the spiritual battle when we must receive specific instructions from God for our unique circumstances. In those times God is able to make His will known to us through counsel, signs or prophetic revelation.
4. Winning the battle requires that God's agenda be preeminent in our hearts and minds. Any selfish human motives or goals will jeopardize the battle's outcome.
5. It is our faith that overcomes the world (1John 5.4). Without faith we can neither please God (Hebrews 11.6) nor win our spiritual battles. It behooves us, then, to understand what faith is!
6. The principle of consecration looms large in the historical books. We cannot expect to win spiritual battles if we are not holy, that is, if we have not made certain that we are in a personal spiritual state that is pleasing to God. True consecration before a strategic battle requires self-examination, repentance where called for and time spent listening to God.
7. There is a defensive action that can be summarized by the idea of "locking our doors." Just as chains and dead bolts can keep unwanted troublemakers from entering our physical homes, appropriate safeguards can keep immoral influences from polluting our spiritual landscape.