This is Tim Hoelzel’s favorite topic. I think he got it from the Westminster Standards. The righteousness offered us in the gospel is one from outside ourselves, not our own but imputed to us, reckoned to be ours, declared to be ours, not on the basis of our actual actions or righteousness but on the basis of the declaration of the God of all. How very much we need a righteousness not our own. My shower experience helped me realize we are also in need of alien wisdom and alien knowledge. How very much indeed we need a righteousness not our own. Isn’t it true we also need a mind not our own?  Left to our own righteousness we are lost. Is it not true that left to our own thoughts we are fools? How good of God that we have received the mind of Christ, and that while no man knows the thoughts of a man but the spirit that is within him, we have received the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God.

We praise Thee, O God!
For Thy Spirit of light,
Who hath shown us our Savior,
And scattered our night.

Jeremy Taylor tells a story of Diogenes, the famous street philosopher who is said to have slept in a tub in the streets of Athens. Late one night Diogenes saw a man stepping out of the dark doorway of a notorious tavern. The young man recognized the famous philosopher and as their eyes met he stepped nervously back into the shadow of the doorway hoping not to be recognized himself. Diogenes called out to him saying, ‘Quanta magis intraveris, tanto magis eris in caupona.’ The more you step back, the farther into the whorehouse you go.

Isn’t it better to do good by admitting our evil than to continue as we are by denying there’s a problem? Who would rather keep a good reputation than gain a good heart? The wisdom of Diogenes is that he who denies his sin still retains what he counts to be his shame.

This distinction between the rationalist who reads a text by the power of his own mind, and the Christian who has the mind of Christ in his reading of scripture has been the main theme of my epistemological thinking for a couple years.

I had a new thought yesterday. I noted that Donald Hall, in his book “Queer Theories” seems to suggest that the body of knowledge he calls queer theory would be essentially unchanged if it ceased to be a primarily white upper-middle class phenomenon and a plurality of voices were included from other cultures and classes. The choir may grow larger but he seemed to suggest that the tune would be unchanged. I pointed this out to my classmates as a major epistemological failure. The church, I was thinking, was composed of people representing all the world’s cultures. Her doctrines are framed by members from all eras, nations, cultures, classes, etc. I had the sense that the church had wisdom epistemologically that was lacking in the “queer theory” of Mr. Hall. I, as a white upper-middle class American member of the church understand that I have a theology that must be changed through an encounter with my fellow members whose cultural, national, gendered and class background are different from mine, and who are able to see things I miss. Hall seemed to acknowledge the need for “diversity,” but missed its epistemological significance. I pointed this out to the class and folks agreed.

After the fact, I realized that my understanding of “having the mind of Christ” left no room for other church members from varying backgrounds to teach or sharpen me or my white American church. What do third-world theologians, for example, have to offer me if I already have the mind of Christ?

Is it possible that it is not I, but we the Church universal, who have the mind of Christ? That we need to sharpen and lovingly share our wisdom with each other in order to participate fully in the blessing of receiving the mind of Christ? Is it possible that my personal theology or that of my church is not the mind of Christ, but that in the collective scriptural learning or those who are and have been truly members of Christ’s Church we have the mind of Chrsit?

For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. ‘For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.

This seems to be the way people explain their own experiences. Some feel they’ve been gay their whole lives as if it were something they were born with, while others feel it was a choice. Why should we be threatened by either alternative? Both seem very much in keeping with the Biblical account of our nature and our choices. Why have many Christians so heavily invested themselves in a view of homosexuality that insists it can only be a choice?

Just a thought.

“A devil, a born devil, on whose nature
Nurture can never stick;”
~Prospero in The Tempest

I love God.

I love people.

So does He.

This is why I get utterly furious when I learn about pastoral sex scandals and folks using God as a tool to take advantage of the unsuspecting.

So, as the world now knows, Earl Paulk, the so-called “Archbishop,” the great founder of the “Tabernacle of the Holy Spirit,” is the unholy father of his nephew by his own brother’s wife. Also, it seems he manipulated another woman into sleeping with him many times over the course of more than a decade by convincing her it was her only path to salvation. What does he make of the warning of scripture that those who become teachers face a stricter judgment? What of the words of our Lord who warned/promised that what is whispered in secret will soon be proclaimed from the housetops? Has he no fear?

When I read of such great wickedness it makes me long for the justice of God who will deliver his people from such great enemies of their souls.

Aparently Mona Brewer was a member of the church’s music ministry when she was invited to meet Paulk in his office to chat. She felt it was a great honor to meet the “prophet” in person.

“Nobody got to do that. I mean, he was awesome. I mean, everybody wanted to talk to him. And he just invited me to his office to talk to him for a few minutes. And that was really incredible.”

When she entered his office she was told to remove her clothes because he would “have to love her.” Brewer later said the following about how Paulk justified his abuse.

“He said, ‘you know, the adultery issue was for the little ones.’ It was for the — the people, the, you know, commoners. It wasn’t for people who God elevated and trusted with special things like this, relationships like this. And that’s the way he explained it to me.”

The only part of this story that I took any pleasure in at all was that when Brewer’s husband found out what his pastors had done with his wife he invited them for a visit and confronted them. When they tried to justify their evil he decked them both. True story. There’s the photos.

I wish Brewer would have never taken her clothes off for this pervert in the first place, but rather warned him about the wrath of a holy God upon men who do such things. It reminds me of The Green Mile where John Coffey says with tears on his face, ‘He killed them with their love.’

I pray so earnestly that God will deliver his church from such men. I pray he will keep me and all his kids from doing such evil. I long to always live the sort of life that I can be filled with hope by our Lord’s promise that what is hidden will be revealed and what is whispered will be shouted from rooftops. Oh that it will be always my good deeds that are done in secret and not wickedness.

There is one other part of this story I really delighted in. Mrs. Brewer’s faith in God was not crushed through this ordeal. Her last words in her CNN interview with Paula Zahn were “I know that God vindicates the righteous.”

How I long for her vindication and that of all God’s righteous ones. God deliver your people from such evil and swiftly deliver evildoers unto justice.

As I said in another place about Benny Hinn, deeds like Paulk’s remove all the difficulty for me in the doctrine of a literal and eternal Hell.

As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” These things I remember, as I pour out my soul: how I would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival. Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you from the land of Jordan and of Hermon, from Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep at the roar of your waterfalls; all your breakers and your waves have gone over me. By day the LORD commands his steadfast love, and at night his song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. I say to God, my rock: “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” As with a deadly wound in my bones, my adversaries taunt me, while they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?” Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, My salvation and my God.

Here’s the sermon, or use this link to download the MP3 (29.5MB)

[qt:http://garrettperks.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/1-13-08.mp3]

We do a great deal of wondering about what God’s will is. Books are written in droves on the topic. What these passages teach me is that I do not become who God wants me to be by thinking about who He wants me to be and then trying to be that way.

Often as I worship, as I am enjoying God the most, or put another way, when I am abiding most richly in the Vine, I find that I am changed. The strange thing is that I am usually surprised by what I am changed to. God makes me into someone quite different than what I expected.

What this proves to me is that I never could have gotten there by thinking about who God wanted me to be and trying to be that way. I never would have thought of what God intended. I think the difference between trying to figure out who God wants us to be and then to be that way on the one hand and simply worshiping and seeing who we become on the other hand is the difference between leaning on our own understanding or else turning away from evil by fearing the Lord. Put another way it is the difference between law and grace, work and faith.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart,
and do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make straight your paths.
Be not wise in your own eyes;
fear the LORD, and turn away from evil.

I think I learned more from preparing this sermon than I’ve learned from preparing any other of my sermons. I learned not just about my material, most of it I’ve already been learning, but I learned a lot about me and how I must lead and preach. It was the most worshipful and enjoyable time I’ve had preparing a sermon.

Here it is.

[qt:http://garrettperks.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/garrett_perks_12-30-07.mp3]

Or, you can download it here.

attention to earthly things bends my soul away from the knowledge of things above;
earthly love extinguishes in me delight in heavenly things.
The habit of vice has wiped away in me the knowledge of true good.

This is from Anselm again, from his Prayer to St. Nicholas. OK, it’s funny to think of a guy praying to Santa Claus, but Nicholas was actually a third century bishop in the city of Myra. Anyhow, it’s interesting how in these lines Anselm predates the postmodern observation that our beliefs and what we take to be our knowledge often does not correspond to what is objective or to absolute truth, but is rather an imprint left on us by our experiences and our desires. His knowledge of true good he says is wiped away when he habitually sins and delight in and attention to earthly things bends him from true knowledge. The truth is that when we want to continue in sin it blinds us to an understanding of truth and when we do the evil it blinds us to understanding as well. Through a prophet God speaks saying, ‘I will bring distress on mankind, so that they shall walk like the blind, because they have sinned against the Lord.” What is the meaning of that proverb that ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom’ and ‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge?’ Finally, Isaiah tells the people of Israel ‘We hope for light, and behold, darkness, and for brightness, but we walk in gloom. We grope for the wall like the blind; we grope like those who have no eyes; we stumble at noon as in the twilight…For our transgressions are multiplied before you, and our sins testify against us; for our transgressions are with us, and we know our iniquities…

Isn’t it true that in those places where we know we are committing sin if we willfully persist it blinds us to understanding truth.

The runaway returns
and asks forgiveness for his errors and disobedience,
He shows to the good and healing shepherd
the gashes of wounds, and the bites of wolves,
which he ran into when he strayed,
and the neglected sore places
that he has had for a long time.
He begs him to have mercy while there is still life in him,
and he prays more by showing his need
to the merciful shepherd
than by any beseeching.

It ocurred to me how great a mercy it is that God continually rescues us from sin. Imagine a man who goes for a hike in the woods and is attacked by a mountain lion. He is injured, bleeding and unable to escape to safety. Imagine his gratitude if he were rescued from death.

When we sin and God does not abandon us fully to our sin but grants us the sweet gift of repentance, how much more grateful ought we to be. Is it not true that our enemy roams about like a lion, roaring in search of an opportunity to destroy us? We are spiritually weak apart from God and subject to all sorts of temptations. Are we in our weakness more able to escape our enemy than a wounded man is able to escape a mountain lion? Certainly not. It is true as the scripture proclaims that all good things come from God and repentance is among these good things. He lovingly grants it to His own when they have strayed into sin.

Forbid that we should presume upon this love. I long to be like Anselm in begging for mercy while there is still life in me. The fruit of sin is death as Paul says in Romans and my sins are no exception. I am so grateful that God has mercy on me when I wander into sin before my sin accomplishes its goal of killing me. There are those to whom God has not granted repentance and mercy when they have wandered into sin and it has killed them. They become like Esau and can find no means of repentance though they seek it with tears. What a horrifying fate.

I ought to be so grateful when I sin and I’m not abandoned to my sin but granted repentance instead. Likewise, I need to all the more fear to sin, since there are many who have been destroyed by sins that aren’t any greater than my own when they found no place to repent of them.

How merciful that we have Jesus, an advocate with the Judge. He is willing to receive all who come to him. What hope do we than have but to be fully convinced that if we are to be rescued from our great enemy it must be by Christ, to look to Him to rescue us, and to trust that he will by no means turn us away or abandon us. As Paul tells us, if we deny Christ, He also will deny us; yet if we are faithless, Christ will still be faithful for He cannot deny Himself.