Justin Taylor wrote the following post on his blog at The Gospel Coalition. I am sure copying another post in full is against blogging rules, but we will worry about that later. If you are like me, clicking off the site you are currently on is less than attractive for some reason. If you are not like me and want to read the post on Justin’s actual blog you can click here. So, just to be clear, everything below here is from Justin Taylor.

What Is Love?

The above video was posted on one of the blogs I like to read. Since Joel Osteen is currently one of the most influential preachers in the world, I wanted to post the video and offer a brief response. The point of the response is not so much that Osteen is a complete charlatan but more that we must not accept everything someone teaches but check it with Scripture as the Bereans were commended for in Acts 17.

Before you read the rest of the post, perhaps take some time on your own to think through what Joel Osteen is teaching and ask, “Does this square with Scripture?”

So, here’s the deal. There is nothing in Scripture that says God’s motivation for the Old Testament dietary laws are based on the healthy benefits of such laws. Rather, the point was to provide an object lesson for being set apart – for holiness. There is plenty in Scripture that speaks to the fact that laws such as the cleanliness code had a temporary function that was fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Jesus takes a radically different approach to the dietary laws than does Mr. Osteen in Mark 7.14-23. Peter, the Apostle, tried to take Joel’s approach to interpreting these same passages and was rebuked by God for it as recorded in Acts 10.9-16. The problem is not that Mr. Osteen is wrong about the health benefits of pork but that he is wrong in how he interprets Scripture. To say we must or should refrain from eating pork is, oddly enough, to deny Scripture; because, such moralistic teaching misses the (perhaps) subtle point of the teaching in Leviticus 11 and the blatantly obvious teaching in Mark and Acts. Further, if I can, as Mr. Osteen seems to teach, please God by not eating pork, then I don’t need a Savior to die in my place (see Galatians 3.15-29). When we draw a strong line of demarcation between the Old and New Testaments so that the Old Testament is not about a gracious redemption through the promised Messiah and the New Testament is not the same story as the Old Testament but something fundamentally different, then we miss the point of the Bible, of the law, of the gospel, and of Jesus’ death on the cross.

“Mrs. Bagby was not a Cumberland Presbyterian but a member of the U.S. or Southern Presbyterian Church. I too am now a member of the Southern Church. I say nothing against the Cumberlands. They broke with the Presbyterian Church because they did not believe a preacher needed a lot of formal education. That is all right but they are not sound on Election. They do not fully accept it. I confess it is a hard doctrine, running contrary to our earthly ideas of fair play, but I can see no way around it. Read I Corinthians 6:13 and II Timothy 1:9, 10. Also I Peter 1:2, 19, 20 and Romans 11:7. There you have it. It was good enough for Paul and Silas and it is good enough for me. It is good enough for you too.”

True Grit, Charles Portis

Annie, my wife, and I have been looking at houses for the last year-and-a-half. We love old houses. With five kids, there is only so much fixing up that is realistic, so there are a few issues that we ask about in every house we consider. One of the issues we always check is the foundation. It is simple really, if the foundation is not good, then the house is not good.

Long ago, a foundation was begun with the setting of the cornerstone. At some point, the advances in modern construction moved the cornerstone from its functional use to a ceremonial use marking the date and architect of the building. Nonetheless, the principle of a cornerstone is plain. The cornerstone was set first and then all the other foundation stones were set in reference to it. By extension, you could say the rest of the building was built in reference to this first stone set. The cornerstone is the standard for the rest of the building.

In 1 Peter 2.6-8, Peter quotes three Old Testament passages applying each of these passages to Christ. All three of these passages deal with cornerstones or a stone as the standard. He writes,

⁶For it stands in Scripture:
“Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone,
a cornerstone chosen and precious,
and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”
⁷So the honor is for you who believe, but for those who do not believe,
“The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone,”
⁸and
“A stone of stumbling,
and a rock of offense.”
They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do (ESV).

Peter’s message to the elect exiles to whom he writes is that Christ is the cornerstone on which their faith and life are to be built. Peter’s audience in this letter was Christians who had been exiled to a new and foreign land paganism and idolatry were the norm. In such a land, the opportunities to compromise one’s faith for the sake of some fleeting temporal security would have been many. Peter wrote to encourage these believers in the security and hope they had in Christ. He wanted them to know that a hope in Christ was a well placed hope and that a hope in anything else was like erecting a building around a poorly set or shaped cornerstone, it was doomed to fall.

Isaiah’s message to the people of Ephraim and Jerusalem was essentially the same. He writes,

¹⁵Because you have said, “We have made a covenant with death,
and with Sheol we have an agreement,
when the overwhelming whip passes through
it will not come to us,
for we have made lies our refuge,
and in falsehood we have taken shelter”;
¹⁶therefore thus says the Lord GOD,
“Behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion,
a stone, a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation:
‘Whoever believes will not be in haste.’
¹⁷And I will make justice the line,
and righteousness the plumb line;
and hail will sweep away the refuge of lies,
and waters will overwhelm the shelter.”

The people of Ephraim and Jerusalem, acting in their pride, found their hope and in security in their vain attempts to establish their own name. They had built on a misshapen and poorly set cornerstone, and God was foretelling, through Isaiah, the coming destruction. Peter’s letter to the elect exiles is written that they may avoid a similar fate.

In our day, there are multiple opportunities to compromise everyday. We are constantly faced with the illusion of and temptation of self-security. Occasionally, as with the recent economic downturn, we get an honest look at the instability of our foundation. However, the issue for the people of Ephraim and Jerusalem was not simply that their foundation was weak; the issue was that it was sin. Failure to acknowledge God as the true and living God is sin. Finding our security and hope in something outside of the God’s plan of redemption through Jesus Christ and him alone, is idolatry and sin. The reason the walls built on this misshapen and poorly set cornerstone are doomed to fall is because the cornerstone is fundamentally flawed and our use of it reveals the fundamental problem of our heart, we are sinful idolaters.

We can learn much from the Peter’s letter to these elect exiles in Asia Minor. We would do well to hear and heed Peter’s encouragement to live in this world with Christ as our cornerstone rather than the misshapen and poorly set options the world has to offer, yet we must recognize this is not a passage given merely to self-help. Peter’s use of the cornerstone metaphor from Isaiah and Psalms is a call to repent of our idolatrous and sinful attempts to find security in something other than Christ.

The Abrahamic Covenant is found in Genesis 12, 15, and 17.  One of the divine promises in this covenant is that God would give the land of Canaan to Abraham and his offspring after him.  To be sure, the final fulfillment of this promise is the New Heaven and New Earth and the New Jerusalem found in Revelation 21-22; however, there was also, for a time, a physical fulfillment of the promises of the Abrahamic Covenant.  The first fulfillment of the land promise in the Abrahamic Covenant is found in Genesis 23, which records the death and burial of Abraham’s wife, Sarah.

Abraham and Sarah had left their homeland years before to live as sojourners in the land that God had promised to them.  Now, Sarah has died and Abraham found himself still as a sojourner with no place to bury his wife.  Through a brief negotiation and the city gate, Abraham is able to buy a field with a cave in it in order to bury Sarah, his wife, in the land of Canaan.

One interesting note about the structure of Genesis 23 is that it is bookended by references to Sarah in Canaan.  Genesis 23.2 states, “And Sarah died at Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her” (ESV).  Genesis 23.19 states, “After this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah east of Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan” (ESV).  These bookends, or inclusio, along with the many geographical and people group references bring the location of this story to the forefront.  Indeed, Moses is highlighting that God was at work, even through the tragedy and sadness of a spouse’s death, to fulfill his promise to Abraham.  It was through Sarah’s death and the subsequent purchase of the land for an eternal burial plot, that Abraham acquired his first small, token piece of the Promised Land.

Genesis 23 reminds us that our God is faithful and sovereign in keeping his word.  There is great comfort in knowing that God is faithful and sovereign when suffering comes.  We can know that though the reason for our suffering may not be fully understood, it is not in vain.  Indeed the greatest comfort in tragedy is not the removal of pain, but the knowledge that God is working out his good, pleasing, and perfect will for his own glory.

Such was the case with Christ as well.  Too often, we think Christ went to the cross willingly and therefore painlessly.  This is not the case.  While Christ did go willingly, it was with great anguish.  Matthew records Jesus prayer to his Father seeking the cup of bearing the sins of his people to pass.  However, Christ took comfort and was encouraged to press on, knowing it was his Father’s will.

Repeatedly, throughout Scripture, God uses some tragedy or point of suffering in order to advance his plan of redemption.  Now as the church, the body and bride of Jesus Christ, presses on in the work to which God has called us and suffers for this work, may we be comforted and strengthened not by the removal of pain, but the knowledge that we are doing our Father’s will.

Many sins are combated by developing an understanding of what it means for people to be created in the image of God.  Most of the various “isms” having to do with individuals – racism, sexism, ageism, elitism, classism, etc. – are combated with a proper biblical understanding of man as bearing God’s image.  James makes this point when he writes of the human tongue, “It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.  With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God” (James 3.8-9, ESV).

Michael Horton, in the seventh chapter, “How Pro-Life Are We Really?,” of his book The Law of Perfect Freedom rightly argues 1) that this image of God principle is the basis for the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder,” and 2) that murder is what is at play not only when we physically take a life, but also when we slight our neighbor in any number of ways.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us a divine commentary on the sixth commandment.  Matthew records his words.  “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’  But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire” (Matthew 5.21-22, ESV).

When we step back and look at our lives and the attitudes we have toward those who are not like us, we often find a slighting of the image of God in our heart.  We must recognize this as the sin that it is and be driven by the law to the wonderful grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, for it is only in him that our murderous, hearts, hands, mouths, and minds can be redeemed.

In 1 Peter, Peter is writing to elect exiles, Christians who had been forcefully displaced from their homeland to the area now known Asia Minor for the sake of expanding the Roman Empire.  Throughout the book, Peter’s call to these elect exiles is to find their hope in Jesus Christ because God has caused them to be born again in Christ.  After laying out the foundation of their faith in the opening few verses, Peter begins to instruct his readers on what it means to live in light of Gospel as elect exiles.  In verses 22-25, Peter commands the elect exiles to “love one another from a pure heart.”

Throughout the New Testament, the biblical authors present love as a necessary bi-product of our redemption.  Jesus states, “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13.35, ESV).  At the end of his section on spiritual gifts in 1 Corinthians, Paul writes, “And I will show you a still more excellent way” (1 Corinthians 12.31, ESV).  Paul then launches into his famous discourse on love, the “still more excellent way,” which ends by writing, “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13.13, ESV).  When Paul encourages believers to walk in the Spirit rather than the flesh, he gives the fruit of the Spirit – “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Galatians 5.22-23, ESV).  Notice that the first fruit Paul lists is love.  Paul tells Timothy, his “true child in the faith,” “The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1.5, ESV).  Finally, John writes, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.  Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love” (1 John 4.7-8, ESV).  Therefore, Peter, in accord with the rest of the New Testament, instructs the elect exiles to love in response to the Gospel.

All of these verses beg the question, “What is love?”  Paul answers this question writing, “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends” (1 Corinthians 13.4-8a, ESV).

I have often heard people talk about love as a risky proposition; I am sure that I have even talked about it in that way.  However, risk seems to be a fundamentally flawed way of thinking about love.  When we think of love in terms of risk, what we are really saying is, “If I love, I might not be loved back.  If I love, I might get hurt.  Therefore, love is risky.”  Of course, we act as if we think it is a risk worth taking saying, “It is better to have love and lost than to never have loved at all (or it is better to have been loved and lost than never to have been loved at all).”  The reason this understanding of love is flawed is that it is selfish.  When we view love as a risk we are thinking in terms of what we might or might not get back.  We are still, to some degree, unsatisfied if we are not loved back.  The problem with this kind of thinking is that we often will not be loved back.  Eventually, the risk outweighs the return, so we quit loving.

The explanation of love that Paul gives is different.  Rather than understanding love in terms of risk, Paul understands love in terms of self-denial, sacrifice, and service.  The Gospel is necessary for this type of love, for only in Christ do we have such freedom from our flesh that this altruistic love is possible.  The Gospel says we are sinners with no hope before God except through Jesus Christ.  The hope we have through Jesus Christ is only because, “For our sake, He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5.21, ESV).  Because Jesus died for sin as a substitute for all those who are united to Him by faith, then those who are united to Christ by faith have their sins forgiven and are made new creatures.

Only in Christ do we submit to the reality that all things are for God’s glory and love in accord with that reality.  As long as we find our hope in the flesh and the things of this world, we will be unable to deny ourselves and the things of this world for the sake of loving – it will simply be too risky.  Yet, when we find our hope in God and how He has worked out redemption for His people through Jesus Christ, we can rest in the certain hope that we have in Christ and love, even those who harm us, selflessly, sacrificially, and joyfully.

Peter and the other biblical authors see this as a necessary outcome of faith because of the union with Christ underlying our faith.  If we are united to Jesus Christ by faith, and Jesus Christ is God, and God is love, then on what grounds do we fail to love with the love of Christ?

The Westminster Shorter Catechism offers the following exposition of the fifth commandment.

“Q. 63. Which is the fifth commandment?  A. The fifth commandment is, ‘Honour thy father and thy mother:  that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.’

“Q. 64. What is required in the fifth commandment?  A. The fifth commandment requireth the preserving the honor, and performing the duties, belonging to everyone in their several places and relations, as superiors, inferiors, or equals.

“Q. 65. What is forbidden in the fifth commandment?  A. The fifth commandment forbiddeth the neglecting of, or doing anything against, the honor and duty which belongeth to everyone in their several places and relations.

“Q. 66. What is the reason annexed to the fifth commandment?  A. The reason annexed to the fifth commandment is a promise of long life and prosperity (as far as it shall serve for God’s glory and their own good) to all such as keep this commandment.”

That we are to honor our parents is perfectly clear from this commandment; however, the Westminster Divines pushed past honoring parents to honoring “everyone in their several places and relations.”  The Westminster application of course increases the weight of the fifth commandment.  In many ways, Michael Horton’s treatment of this command parallels the Westminster Divines treatment, but Horton, writing a book, had more room to develop the argument for this broader understanding of the fifth commandment.

Horton approaches his argument, in part, by unpacking the family table found in Ephesians 6.  In dealing with Ephesians 6.6-8 he writes, “To serve our earthly superiors is to serve our heavenly Superior; therefore, our attention, efficiency, and diligence are to be motivated not by whether the boss shows enough respect for our work, but by the fact that God our heavenly Father is pleased when we help build a good car or house, use our time at work efficiently, or read and pray with our family.  We can endure many of the frustrations of working conditions when we realize that the dignity of our work is measured by God’s satisfaction, not merely by our employer’s” (Horton, 138).  Following this exposition, Horton goes on to deal with the Youthism, Nowism, Pretentiousness, and Me-ism that plague our culture and rail against honoring others, especially elders.  Essentially, in each of these sections, Dr. Horton is saying we need to get over ourselves.  Whether we are talking about honoring our parents, boss, friends, or anyone else humility is required.

1Pet. 1:17-19 ¹⁷And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, ¹⁸knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, ¹⁹but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.

Peter tells us that Jesus has ransomed his people from futility.  What does it mean to be ransomed?  R.L. Hubbard writes that redemption, a closely related biblical concept, “involves the release of people, animals, or property from bondage through outside help” (Hubbard, New Dictionary of Biblical Theology, “Redemption”).  Through the outside help of Jesus Christ, we have been ransomed, or redeemed, from the futility of this world.  The blood of Jesus Christ was the ransom payment for his people.

When the only hope that we have is in this world, the pattern of our life is determined by the standards and influences of this world.  When we have been ransomed by the precious blood of Christ, the pattern of our life should no longer be determined by the futile patterns of this world.  If we have been bought with the blood of Christ, ransomed from the futility of our former life, let us not bind ourselves again to such vanity, to such sin.

Michael Horton’s fourth chapter, “Guarding God’s Reputation,” deals with the third commandment.  What is the third commandment?  “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold guiltless anyone who takes his name in vain”  (Exodus 20.7, ESV).

In typical style, Horton drives straight to the heart of the matter, pointing out that it is neither the misuse of God’s name by non-Christians nor the absence of the exaltation of God’s name in the public square that is the greatest issue, but the misuse of God’s name by Christians and the absence of God’s name in church.  He asks “Why should Christians lament the day when the Ten Commandments were taken down from the wall in the classroom when few of them can name these decrees themselves” (Horton, 96)?  There are a great many parallels between the church in 2010 and the Israelites of the Old Testament on this very issue.  With this sobering analysis laid out, Horton turns to Hosea to show how God prosecuted the Israelites for their failure to hallow his name.

Horton breaks down our violations of the third commandment into four categories:  Using God; Hypocrisy Heresy and Error; and Blasphemy.  It is easy enough to see these categories and think we have nothing to worry about; however, Horton does an excellent job of working through these issues in order to show us our own deficiencies.  One statement I found particularly pertinent was “It is easy to use God’s name instead of fearing it” (Horton, 100).  This thought left me asking myself, “Why do I pray?”  Do I invoke Jesus name in prayer in order to seek my own will or the will of God?

There are many other great points in this chapter.  What are your thoughts?