Presbyterian church wellsboro

God’s measured displeasure (Romans 1:18)

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Romans 1:18

You probably had textbooks in school. For me, they were bricks in my bag, but for many students today they might be a bit lighter and electronic. The textbooks in my day included a glossary in the back. Whenever a glossary term appeared in the text, they were bolded. Those bolded terms signaled to the reader, “If you don’t know what this word means, please look it up in the glossary.”

We need to do the same thing with the term “wrath of God,” which appears frequently in the Bible. Many have misread this term thinking it means that God flies off the handle from time to time, overwhelmed in a flurry of angry passion against you or me. However, if we look at how this term is used of God throughout the Bible, we find the term means something different.

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Why did Jesus die for you and me?  (Romans 1:18-3:20)

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Romans 1:18-3:20

Do you want a three-word definition of the gospel that even a two-year-old could remember? Jesus saves sinners.

If we are not sinners, the gospel message is not good news at all. It would be predicated on a lie, and Jesus would have died for nothing. That is why the Apostle Paul spends from chapter 1 verse 18 to chapter 3 verse 20 in his Letter to the Romans giving a preface to the gospel message. For just as the author of a book will state why he or she went about the effort of writing a book in the preface, so the Apostle states why the All-knowing, Almighty, and Holy God wrote the gospel into his eternal plan for restoring his world. It is as if the Apostle, like a specialist in precious jewels, lays down a black cloth, so that when he places the diamond of the gospel upon it, we will see it in all its multi-faceted splendor.

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We become what we worship (Romans 1:5)

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Romans 1:5

The Apostle Paul wrote the gospel “to bring about the obedience of the faith for the sake of [Jesus Christ’s] name among the nations (Romans 1:5; 16:26).” Many Christians have a reduced understanding of the gospel message. They see it as a ticket to heaven and little more. While the gospel comes for free to all who repent of their sin and receive both forgiveness from sins and Christ’s righteousness, it nevertheless makes demands on our lives. Those who receive it do not remain stagnant, simply awaiting the city of gold. The gospel takes root in them and begins to produce fruit now.

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The Resurrection Message Will Overcome (Matthew 28:11-15)

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Matthew 28:11-15

People today no longer look for an alternative historical narrative for the empty tomb of Jesus of Nazareth to try to disprove it. Back then a historical event demanded an explanation.

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Hope in the hour of deepest darkness (Matthew 27:57-61)

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Matthew 27:57-61

Hebert Fingarette taught philosophy at the University of California for many years. He wrote several books on a range of subjects including death. In his book on death, he stated that you should not be afraid, concerned, or anything about death. You are not going to suffer after you die, he asserted, because you will not exist then.

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We must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ (Ecclesiastes 12:14)

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Ecclesiastes 12:14

God will judge every deed. We must all – me, you, every person who ever lived – appear before the judgement seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive the due for what we have done while living on this earth, whether good or evil (2 Corinthians 5:10).

In the blink of an eye, all our deeds will be laid bare naked before us, even the evil we did not know we were doing. Whether you are the Ukrainian President Zelensky trying to fight for the survival of your country or the Russian President Putin trying to usurp another country’s sovereignty, we will all be appalled when the lid is ripped open and our deeds and motivations exposed for what they really were. At that moment the only words we will be able to utter will be: “I am not worthy, Lord, send me into the abyss. I am unworthy to enter the gates of your glorious kingdom, for I am a sinful man (I am a sinful woman) and the only thing I deserve is to be dammed forever.”

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The fear of God leads to joyful obedience (Ecclesiastes 12:13)

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Ecclesiastes 12:13

The Book of Ecclesiastes takes the reader for a ride. You might find yourself lost in all the loops. For this reason, the divinely inspired editor gives a summary statement at the end: “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of humanity (Ecclesiastes 12:13).”

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The Word of God holds to the highest standards of form and content (Ecclesiastes 12:10-11)

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Ecclesiastes 12:10-11

“The Preacher sought to find words of delight, and uprightly he wrote words of truth (Ecclesiastes 12:10).” What types of words do you seek out? The Preacher in the Book of Ecclesiastes sought words that met the highest standards of both form and content.

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Cherish the givenness of things (Ecclesiastes 12:1-8)

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Ecclesiastes 12:1-8

The anthropologist Ernest Becker wrote in his Pulitzer Prize-winning “The Denial of Death,” “The idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else; it is the mainspring of human activity – activity designed largely to avoid the fatality of death, to overcome it by denying…that it is the final destiny.”

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Only One can fulfill your inbuilt longing for lasting significance (Ecclesiastes 2:1-11)

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Ecclesiastes 2:1-11

The pursuit of pleasure in our society has reached an Epicurean high. We endlessly grasp for those things that will give us a sense of inward tranquility and happiness. We have largely succeeded. We have more material goods and means of obtaining pleasure than most other countries in the world. So how come our gain largely has led to pain? Why do more people suffer from anxiety, loneliness, and discontentment than at almost any other time in our history? You can’t blame the pandemic. Statistics were already on the rise before that. The pandemic only exacerbated what were already upward trending problems.  

The Preacher in the Book of Ecclesiastes exposed the myth that the pursuit of pleasure can fulfill our longing for lasting significance.

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