Romans 8:21-22 (ESV)


[21] that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. [22] For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now.


(Introduction to Pastor Todd's sermon on "Creation Groans")


In this passage Paul connects groaning with suffering. The word itself conveys the deep sort of pain that expresses itself in the inward groan that cannot be expressed in words.

Paul actually speaks of three types of groaning – the groaning of the Christian, The groaning of creation and the groaning of the Spirit. First there is the idea that following Christ will also involve a type of suffering - along with the grace of forgiveness and new life, comes the grace of identifying with his suffering. All who want to live a godly life will have persecution.
This is what Peter speaks about as the normative and typical experience of Christian living – we don’t live in the world in its present form as a place of ultimate hope and comfort.


1 Peter 1:6 (ESV)

In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, as was necessary, you have been grieved by various trials,

There is also the groaning of creation. Here Paul is personifying creation as though it too feels the weight of sin, - it too is looking with hopeful expectation of the final victory of our redemption in Christ.
This is a forgotten blessing of our redemption. We tend in evangelical circles to think of our salvation in just personal terms. This however is a glimpse in the cosmic implications of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Another truth of our redemption is that it gives us hope in regard to the future. There are great promises in relation to our salvation that is rooted in


Our Past - Christ’s death and resurrection – the surety of our sins paid for.

Our Present – the promise of the Spirit who applies the benefits of our salvation - The gospel is not simple an objective truth – we can right down and explain. It is also, by God’s mercy, a subjective and transforming reality. Is this real for you? Do you believe, merely with your mind? Has the Holy Spirit made the truth come alive and bring power and new freedom in your life – a growing freedom from your old habits and sinful ways?

There is of course groaning in the personal struggle as we wait the “full redemption of our bodies”For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us
- The groaning expressed repeatedly in this section is a groaning that is always pictured in the Bible with the pains of childbirth.

So, it is a pain that has the end result of something great. In childbirth there is the promise of great joy that comes with a new life that a woman, who endures great suffering, but later forgets the pain for the joy of her child.


(the rest of the sermon will be uploaded for listening next week....for the audio version - stay tuned)

Lessons in Idol Smashing

   

He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan).        2 Kings 18:4 (ESV) 

Hezekiah was one of Judah’s greatest kings; in fact, he is recorded in Scripture as being in the same league as David in spiritual devotion to God (2 Kings 18:3). From the beginning of his reign he showed both courage and zeal in his love for God and the purity of worship. Unlike previous administrations, he did not give half-hearted lip service to the Lord, but went so far as to remove every idol and pagan altar in the land. In a bold venture of smashing religious icons and relics, like Cromwell’s army in 17th Century England, Hezekiah was not content just to eradicate pagan influence, he honed in on home territory. The old bronze serpent, Moses fashioned had also become an obsession and favored idol. It, in a sense, was more troublesome than the fertility poles of Asherah. Those distasteful monuments were bold in-your-face pagan. Make no mistake about the pagan quality of so much of the idolatry in the open air of Judah. What was less obvious, and in many ways, a silent offense, was the work of art created by Moses at the very command of God (Num. 21:8). Yet centuries later, that sacred object became a spiritual stumbling block to true faith. Instead of worshiping and praising God who delivered his people both from Egypt and from poisonous snakes, they were attributing power and glory to a manmade object. It never takes that long, however, to move from Creator to creation in a sad descent into idolatry. We are capable of doing such a thing in minutes. That is why Hezekiah’s iconoclasm, which included the radical measure of smashing the bronze snake of Moses, is an important lesson for us to heed. Idols lie all around us, crop up almost daily and have the ability to illicit silent approval in our lives. I am not adept enough to name the ones in your life, but God is able by his Word and Spirit to probe your heart. There is a word of caution, as we look at Hezekiah’s spiritual reform. While, there is no mention of an immediate backlash against Hezekiah (being a monarch and all), you can bet your piggy bank on the wager that some folks were not happy at the destruction of such a time-honored family relic. They must have felt that Moses himself was dishonored. Of course, the whole matter was one in which God was not honored, by the false use of something once used by God for good.

Secondly, we learn that we can take good things and use them or abuse them into idols. The serpent on the pole was a picture of the Gospel, where even in John 3, Jesus said was a pointer to the great rendering of God’s mercy for us sinners and God’s hot wrath on his Son in the Cross of Christ. Don’t think that the veneration of the object was no small thing, for it missed the forest through focusing on the trees. Like, the ones who opposed Jesus in his day, there might have been a gathering of “concerned men” who were worried about the direction Hezekiah was heading. But, the spiritual renewal, however short-lived, was evidence that he was on the right path. When the Holy Spirit moves and the Gospel is being made known, the idols of our lives will have to be demolished and made history. It is an unending job, until, one day the glory of Christ himself will be known and the whole earth filled with its brilliance.

Superheroes and Christ the Victorious Hero

In the last decade several movies have been made (some with many sequels) based on the old superheroes of comic books and TV cartoons.  Some of us were kids when we got hooked on watching Batman and Robin beat up the bad guys or Spiderman help little old ladies from getting mugged.  There seemed to be a moral quality about these superheroes from the comics that reflected a boundary about goodness and evil and the need for justice.   Yet today with the sophistication of computer generated “virtual reality” and the postmodern quest for complexity of character, the Superheroes now have a dark side.  Complexity is not a bad thing or unchristian.  We know the nature of the human heart and that even among believers we do not deal with cardboard characters.   The Bible gives us the prayers of King David as well as his private lusts and public scandals.   Paul does not hide his physical weakness or his discouragement in ministry (1 Cor. 2:3).   Whitewashing heroes to make them something unreal or comical is not what biblical truth is about.  Our heroes in faith are not people with unblemished records or superhuman powers, but showed remarkable complexity of personalities.  They were very much ordinary men and women who in the midst of testing did something rather extraordinary; they believed in God (Heb.11) and they trusted in the One who save them, a righteous Redeemer. 

They were counted righteous by faith in the One who is victorious over all evil and sin.  Our redeemer, Jesus Christ is not a hero like the comic book variety, he is true and righteous.   The human longing for heroes, finds true fulfillment in the grace of Christ our Lord.