Sirach 2:15-18October 29, 2017
Hebrews 10:26-31Pastor Lori Broschat
FALLING INTO THE EVERLASTING ARMS
One day, while a man and his son Zac were out in the country, climbing around in some cliffs, he heard a voice from above him yell, "Hey Dad! Catch me!" He turned around to see Zac joyfully jumping off a rock straight at him. He had jumped and then yelled "Hey Dad!" He became an instant circus act, catching him. They both fell to the ground. For a moment after he caught him, dad could hardly talk. When he found my voice again he gasped in exasperation: "Zac! Can you give me one good reason why you did that???"
Zac responded with remarkable calmness: "Sure...because you're my Dad." His whole assurance was based in the fact that his father was trustworthy. He could live life to the hilt because Dad could be trusted.[1] What a vision of the way we should rely on God to support and protect us. But if we truly love and trust in God, are we willing to fear Him as well?
Is falling into the arms of the living God a fearful or a wonderful experience? In my high school youth group it was the trend in the 70s to do trust falls, allowing yourself to fall backwards with your eyes closed into the arms of your friends. I was never quite sure what any of that had to do with following Christ, but I do know that falling into the arms of God should be as natural as jumping into a parent’s arms.
Scripture seems to have differing opinions about this. Given that we’ve heard so much about the nature of falling this month, it’s probably best if we don’t miss anything. These words of a theologian will help start us off. “God desires our independence, which we attain when, ceasing to strive for it ourselves, we ‘fall’ back into God.”
That’s one man’s opinion, and I don’t want us to miss his point, but we’re most of the time far from the place of ceasing to strive for our independence from God. So, let’s get into our Scriptures for a better understanding, but first let’s revisit our fall journey so far. We started with the first act that scarred humanity and plunged us into sin. Then we connected with the people of Israel who came upon an obstacle to their promised land. Last week we followed the path of the devil himself from glory to destruction.
Here’s where we are today: it all started with a verse from Hebrews, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” I was intrigued, and I did some research because I wanted to discover why it’s fearful to fall into the arms of God; not just God, but the living God. That name set Him apart from the idols and gods made of wood and stone worshiped by the nations all around the people of Israel.
A living God is powerful, merciful, loving, and yes, to be feared. The term was common in the ancient world. There are around 30 occurrences of the term “living God” in Scripture, in both Old and New Testaments. In the book of Daniel, the king of Babylon was so impressed by God saving Daniel from the lions’ den he made this declaration:
“I make a decree, that in all my royal dominion people should tremble and fear before the God of Daniel:For he is the living God,enduring forever.His kingdom shall never be destroyed,and his dominion has no end.” Pretty high praise from a king who worshiped idols. Psalm 42:2 says “My soul longs for God, for the living God.”
It even became part of the identity of Jesus in the gospels; He asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
That still doesn’t answer the question of whether it’s fearful or wonderful to fall into the arms of the living God. In King David’s life, it was better than falling into the hands of men. David had committed a sin of pride against God and was convicted by his own guilt. He prayed for God to deal with him justly.
When David got up the next morning, the Lord’s word came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer: Go and tell David, this is what the Lord says: I’m offering you three punishments. Choose one of them, and that is what I will do to you.So Gad went to David and said to him, “Will three years of famine come on your land?
Or will you run from your enemies for three months while they chase you? Or will there be three days of plague in your land? Decide now what answer I should take back to the one who sent me.”“I’m in deep trouble,” David said to Gad. “Let’s fall into the Lord’s hands because his mercy is great, but don’t let me fall into human hands.”
He knew that God’s mercy was far superior to that of men. Naturally, we would conclude the same, since our mercy cannot match that of God, we would prefer His mercy over that of people. David was banking on God’s mercy even though he had to endure God’s punishment for sin. Fear of the Lord and love of the Lord manifest themselves in obedience to god’s will.
I confess that at times my level of fear of the Lord is pitifully low. Anyone else feel that way? It’s not terror God wants from us, it’s reverence and respect. Fear of the Lord is a good thing. In the passage we heard today from the apocryphal book of Sirach, it is the author’s opinion that we should all experience this view of God.
Those who fear the Lordwon’t disobey his words,and those who love him will keep his ways.Those who fear the Lordwill try to please him,and those who love him will be fully occupied with observing the Law.Those who fear the Lordwill prepare their hearts,and they will humble themselves before him.May we fall into the hands of the Lord and not into the hands of human beings,because his mercyis equal to his greatness.
Another example of someone who put their trust in God’s mercy being equal to His greatness. So that’s two votes for falling into the arms of God as a wonderful experience because of His mercy. If we are going to count on mercy, we should not waste the effects of what difficulties we experience.
A woman was going through great trials. She had had a stroke, her husband had gone blind, and then he had to be taken to the hospital where they were sure he would die. Her pastor saw her in church one Sunday and told her he was praying for her. “What are you asking God to do?” she asked, and her question startled him. “I’m asking God to help you and strengthen you,” he replied. “I appreciate that,” she said, “but pray about one more thing. Pray that I’ll have the wisdom not to waste all of this!”[2]
I suppose we need to turn our attention to the less-favored view of falling into the arms of God. Let’s be clear that this is still preferable to falling into the arms of men, but we must be prepared for what we will get if we are not careful. God will not be mocked, and He will not be played for a fool. We mustenter a reciprocal relationship with God, yet with the understanding that He far outranks us.
The book of Hebrews tells us what happens when we are not mindful of the dynamics of our relationship. If we make the decision to sin after we receive the knowledge of the truth, there isn’t a sacrifice for sins left any longer. There’s only a scary expectation of judgment and of a burning fire that’s going to devour God’s opponents. We know the one who said,Judgment is mine; I will pay people back.And he also said,The Lord will judge his people.It’s scary to fall into the hands of the living God!
If we sin on purpose even after we know the forgiveness of God, it’s as if we are calling the death of Christ a sham, a lie told to keep us faithful. The opposite of ignorance is not knowledge, but obedience. If we are not careful, we will begin to drift from the Word, will soon start to doubt the Word. Soon, we will become dull toward the Word, and become lazy in our spiritual life. This will result in despising the Word, which is what the author of Hebrews was saying.[3]
Some unenlightened soul might say, “God will forgive me, that’s His job,” but God says His job is vengeance and His privilege is judgment. This is what makes falling into His arms fearful, but only if we misuse and make useless the grace of God. The term “cheap grace” was applied to the teaching that stresses only that grace is free, so it doesn’t really matter how we live. The solution was to focus on how seriously god takes sin and on how he could only save us from it at infinite cost to himself.
A Catholic priest wrote, “Only the practice of faith can verify what we believe. Does faith permeate the whole of your life? Does it form your judgments about death, about success? Does it influence the way you read the newspaper? Do you have a divine sense of humor that sees through people and events into the unfolding plan of god? When things are turbulent on the surface of your life, do you retain a quiet calm, firmly fixed in ultimate reality?”[4]
Jesus spoke of the necessary conditions in our relationship to Him and to God the Father. “Whoever loves me will keep my word. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Whoever doesn’t love me doesn’t keep my words.” If we don’t keep His word and obey His teachings, we don’t have God in residence in our lives. The alternative is to turn ourselves back to Jesus with the unmatched enthusiasm we should have had when we first experienced Him.
The great preacher Charles Spurgeon said, “I feel that God could not be truly God if he did not punish evil; that it would be a pity that there should be a God if He did not punish sin.” I can’t argue with that logic. We wouldn’t want or serve a god who didn’t punish evil, not even if it’s the evil we do. We can’t escape it, it’s in our nature and it’s still active. There’s no off switch until Jesus returns.
But the obstacles we face every day, the walls of pride and stubbornness and apathy that we have created for ourselves, those will come tumbling down when we ask God to shout His power into our lives. When the dust settles we can see our way clear to fall into the arms of the righteous, merciful, forgiving, grace-filled, living God.
God allows us to fulfill our side of the contract however we see fit. And if we think we’ll be proud to offer to our God a life that’s a sloppy combination of greed, pride, deception and self-indulgence, well, then we’ve made a big mistake. We need to return to God a life that’s been shaped by faith, polished by charity, decorated only by the cross of Christ as a symbol of our service.[5]
Once more from the book of Hebrews to close out this sermon series on how God deals with our falls, “Watch out, brothers and sisters, so that none of you have an evil, unfaithful heart that abandons the living God.” Now that’s something fearful.
Sirach 2:15-18Common English Bible (CEB)
Those who fear the Lordwon’t disobey his words, and those who love him will keep his ways.Those who fear the Lordwill try to please him, and those who love him will be fully occupied with observing the Law.Those who fear the Lordwill prepare their hearts, and they will humble themselves before him.May we fall into the hands of the Lord and not into the hands of human beings, because his mercy is equal to his greatness.
Hebrews 10:26-31Common English Bible (CEB)
If we make the decision to sin after we receive the knowledge of the truth, there isn’t a sacrifice for sins left any longer. There’s only a scary expectation of judgment and of a burning fire that’s going to devour God’s opponents. When someone rejected the Law from Moses, they were put to death without mercy on the basis of the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment do you think is deserved by the person who walks all over God’s Son, who acts as if the blood of the covenant that made us holy is just ordinary blood, and who insults the Spirit of grace? We know the one who said,Judgment is mine; I will pay people back.And he also said,The Lord will judge his people. It’s scary to fall into the hands of the living God!
[1]
[2]Wiersbe, Warren W., The Bible Exposition Commentary, New Testament Volume II, pg. 240
[3]Ibid, pg. 315
[4]Manning, Brennan, Reflections for Ragamuffins, pg. 347