What You Do With Jesus Isn't As Important As What He will Do With You

Matthew 7:21-23

²¹ “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. ²² On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ ²³ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

The question is often asked these days; “What will you do with Jesus?”

I am aware that this is an earnest question asked in a desire to compel the lost to come to a conclusion about who Christ was and what He claimed about Himself. It puts me in mind of Lewis’ trichotomy, Jesus was either a liar, a lunatic or He was Lord; but He could not be all of them. I freely confess that the claims that Christ made about Himself demand that we must come to a conclusion about who He is. Yet I am not convinced that the best question to ask is “What will you do with Jesus?”

In all honesty I am not terribly concerned with what people will do with Jesus. I know this sounds a bit lax; and maybe it is; and I may need to repent of this later (Sorry that was my nod to Mark Driscoll), but I am just not terribly concerned with what the lost world does with Him. In fact, judging from what most of the professing Church does with Christ; my greater concerns are with them. Sadly we live in a day and age where all too many people who claim Christianity as their religion have done terrible things with Jesus. They have made Him their buddy; their homeboy; their BFF; their boyfriend; their husband; their personal genie; their excuser; and even in some cases their lover. 

Consider this scene from the book The Shack (I am paraphrasing the account for the sake of time.) The “protagonist” is walking along the shore of a lake with the author’s version of Christ and he begins to curse. He realizes after a moment that he is cursing in front of Jesus and looks at Him almost sheepishly. To His surprise Jesus is chuckling at his indiscretion and waves it off as no big deal because men’s curse words are of no consequence to God. I am pretty certain that there is no scenario that any godly person could ever imagine where they would even utter so much as “shoot” in the presence of Christ if for some reason He happened to be walking along side of them.

Consider Ann Voskamp’s overly sexualized familiarity with Christ in her book One Thousand Gifts; where she speaks in lascivious terms about Jesus; or the godhead in general. (I will not give the explicit examples here because having read them it makes me terribly uncomfortable to even mention them.) Consider the movement within evangelical Christianity that has single women buying wedding rings and wearing them and telling anyone willing to listen that Jesus is their husband. This may sound proper; but it isn’t. Furthermore it has its roots in Roman Catholicism where we see nuns wearing wedding rings because they are married to Jesus. Jesus is not the husband of individual believers. Jesus is the Groom of the Church. Individuals make up the Church and in unity with the Body of Christ we are united to Christ in that marriage. For anyone to claim that they are married to Christ individually is blasphemous, and bordering on grotesque when one considers the implications of what it means for a couple to be married. The communion between Christ and His Bride is no doubt intimate, more intimate than any physical relationship between a man and woman. Make no mistake; the woman or man even, who claims that they are individually married to Christ is failing to understand this well.

I do not argue against the theological reality that Jesus is the friend of sinners; but when we take him from the context of “He who lays down his life for his friends” and put Him into the context of being our BFF over-and-against being a mighty Savior and Lord; we cheapen what it is that He accomplished in laying His life down. Bear with me here; understand what it is I am saying; we have become all together all too familiar with Christ. This is not to say that we know Him too well. No believer will ever know too much of Christ. It is to say that we have come to treat Him as if He is one of us. We appear to read statements such as “he was like us in every way…” and stop there. We behave in such a way so as to appear as if He isn’t our Lord and that He does not have the right to command us or demand our obedience and submission. Can you imagine your best earthly friend looking at you and telling you to bow your knee to them? 

I will freely confess that as good of friends as I have in this world; not one of them is a better friend to me than my wife. She is the one who lives alongside me every day. She is the one who watches my struggles and my sins as they work up to the surface of my very being. She is as close to being a BFF as I will ever have. She calls me on my sins and encourages me when I am down and tells me when I am doing well. She however is not Christ, and if I walked into my house some night after being on duty all day and heard her say “Submit. Bow your knee.” I would laugh at her. Then I would probably gauge the level of seriousness she said it with and prepare the proper rebuke if need be. Yet if the Friend of Sinners came to me right now He would not need to tell me to bow my knee, I would fall on my face and worship; because He is worthy and my knees should bow. No BFF in the world is worthy of such a reaction. No person in this world is worthy of such a reaction or response. Only the Lamb of God deserves this response from those He has made His friends.

So no, I am not terribly concerned with what the world or what the broader Church will do with Jesus. Because I have already observed with my own eyes the shambles they have made of Him. Not that they have actually done anything with Him. No, instead they have built up a false Christ. They have taken Jesus, the Christ of the Bible, and so twisted and bent him that he no longer resembles what Scripture teaches of him. They have molded Him into their image instead of being shaped into His. 

So the Jesus believed in today by so many is not the real Christ and what is done with him is done with no fear of retribution. Yet the true Christ, the Christ of Scripture, is not the powerless creation of those polluted juvenile minds with pornographic visions filling pulpits in your local mega-church. He is not the limp-wristed milquetoast effeminate man that the pantywaisted liberal churches have made Him out to be. He is not this gentle “unoffendable” God who makes no demands and accepts you just as you are; and then leaves you comfortable in your culturally acceptable sins. Christ is not some purpose driven marketing exec bent on helping you fulfill your dreams. Christ is not some social justice communitarian community organizer come to change the world with his message of equality for all, contrary to wretched films such as Son of God. Not at all; not in the least. 

The true Christ of Scripture is a noble man. He is the God-man with all the power of heaven and the authority of the King of creation. He speaks and things happen. He says be still and the raging waves of the sea stop. He cries out to the oceans and they devour the evil and the land they live on. He commands legions of angels; and unlike his first advent when He willingly chose to not call on the angels to rescue Him; when He returns again this time He will come with a sword and with fire and legions of warrior angels to slaughter His enemies. He is coming to execute the vengeance of God and to bring such horrific retribution against His unrepentant enemies that when He is done the battlefield will be filled with the bodies of His enemies and the blood will flow freely (Revelation 19). This is the Jesus we are talking about.

 

This is the same Jesus who came and lived peacefully with the publicans and sinners and drove the religious and culturally elite from out of the temple with a whip made of leather and rocks and bits of broken pottery. Not once, but twice. This is the same Jesus who was silent before His accusers and yet cried out for their very forgiveness upon the cross that they had hung Him on.

So forgive me if I don’t seem terribly interested in what you, I or anyone else is going to do with Jesus. Here is another aspect of this thought; Jesus never asks His followers or the crowds this question either. The closest He comes is when He asks the disciples “Who do people say that I am?” The answers vary from a prophet to the resurrected John. So even back then, with Christ walking and talking with them, most people still missed it and got it twisted. Yet when Jesus asks the disciples “Ah, but who do you say that I am?” Peter replies with the only viable answer “Truly you are the Christ.” 

What more can any of us say? He is truly the Christ, The Anointed One, and the Son of the Living God! It just doesn’t matter what any of us do with Him. Make no mistake everyone will give an account for what they say about Him and what they believe about Him. But we ultimately cannot do anything with Christ. He is not ours to command or to give direction to. The better question; the question that we should be asking of others and of ourselves is this “What is Jesus going to do with you?”

For those who have bowed their knees in repentance and faith Jesus will be their Savior and their friend and He will be their rewarder. To those who have spent their lives in rebellion and war against Him; Jesus will be their judge and executioner. He will do with them as He wills. This means these rebels will suffer eternal hellfire suffering under the unmitigated unabated wrath of the Father.

This is the reality of what we have to deal with. This is the question that we should be asking everyone that we share the Gospel with. What will Jesus do with you? Any answer that we are given in reply to this question will lead us to ask “Why do you believe that? What makes you think that?” See the point is that getting the answer to the question “What will Jesus do with you?” wrong is tragic. At the end of Matthew 7 we see what this looks like. 

Jesus describes a horrible and terrifying scene for us. He tells us that at the appointed time many, not a few, not a handful, but many, will come to Him and cry out to Him “Lord Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, cast out demons in your name, heal the sick in your name? Didn’t we do all sorts of great things in your name?” They come to Him making stupendous claims about what they did with Him. Yet that is not what matters. What matters is that He doesn’t know them; He never did. He casts them away from His presence into eternal judgment crying out to them “Get away from me, I never knew you; you workers of lawlessness.”

These are startling and staggering words and they come about due to a misapprehension of the Gospel. They are a result of asking the wrong things and making the wrong inferences. We have to get this right. It is imperative that we ask the right question. Literally to hell with the man-centered appeal to humanity’s personal desires. Instead we should be calling on humanity, our co-workers, our neighbors, our siblings, our parents, and even our spouses to answer the right question rightly. “What is it that Jesus will do with you?” Because in the end, what they have done with Him, reflects what they believe about Him and is indicative of what He will do with them in turn…

Soli Deo Gloria!

-Todd

The Utmost of Ends in the Pursuit of God

The pursuit of God in all areas of life is the utmost of ends. It is the goal that all Believers should aspire too.The thought or idea that a genuine child of God can be separated from the pursuit of Him as they go about their daily lives is foreign to the Scriptures that so many of us spend our time pouring over.

To find within ourselves the ability to mark off or encapsulate areas of our lives as distinctly different from our pursuit of God is to say to Him that we are not desperately in need of Him in all things. This was the entire ministry of Christ as He walked the earth; to point all He encountered to a passionate pursuit of the God of creation. This was His meaning with His words "If you love me keep my commandments", "The greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all of your heart, mind, soul and strength."

This pursuit is to consume us in all things. Are you a spouse? Be the spouse you are taught to be in Scripture by going hard after God. Are you a parent? Be the parent you are taught to be in Scripture by going hard after God. Are you a son or a daughter? Be the child you are taught to be in Scripture by going hard after God. Are you an employee? Be the employee that you are taught to be in Scripture by going hard after God.

Yet make no mistake, the pursuit of God is not mere religious moralism. It is not deific piety. It is a bending of the knee to the authoritative Word of God and recognition of the reality that all we need to is contained in Scripture. I practice my religion in vain if I merely work toward behavior modification in myself and others. One does not need Christ to be a stellar employee. But to be a stellar employee who's good works cause others, even the lost and spiritually dead of the world, to glorify God requires the imputation of the righteousness of Christ.

When the world praises the "good deeds" of a non-believer they are praising the self-centered works of a self-righteous person. But when the world praises the good works of the child of God, whether they are aware of it or not, whether they care to acknowledge it or not, they are praising God.God is the one who receives the glory when you hear "Job well done." There is no need for you to say to the non-believer "Praise God". They already have.

This is the difference in how we pursue God. We are not to spend every moment of every day wondering how to see God in each thing. We do not need to look for calculated times to say to ourselves, or even to others, "Now this I will do for the Lord." Every action we take should be done with this in mind. This is the meaning of Paul in his letter to the Church in Corinth when he wrote "In all that you do, do it all to the glory of God."

Our pursuit of God is meant to move us into a lifestyle of constant action. And we are to understand that all actions we take are to be done as spiritual work unto the Lord. There are no common daily tasks that are not permeated by our faith in God, our trust in Christ for salvation. The daily work of a minister or pastor are equally as spiritual as the work of a day laborer or a doctor. One is no more highly esteemed than the other. While God places a very high expectation on those whom He has called to shepherd, He does not value them or their work anymore than the work of the rest of His sheep. Because He has ordained them each to the work it is they do.

Just as marriage is a powerful image of the Gospel. So salvation is a powerful image of God's view of mankind. yes He did indeed call Abraham and make a special people out of him, but he also brought many people from out of the lands of the gentiles and pagans. So it is with those whom He calls to specific vocations. The man He has called to full time shepherding is no more called or sent than the woman who stays at home and labors to raise her children and manage her household. The believing trash collector is every bit as called to his vocation as is the seminary professor.

Each of these, and all of the Church Universal, is called to do what they are doing. So, outside of those behaviors and occupations which are by their very nature violations of God's law, all activities are meant by Him to be pursued to His glory.

Yet we must understand this, an unregenerate, God hating heathen is not pursuing God in even "good Christian" acts. The unbeliever who reads the Bible and sees a command and then performs that act, is in reality heaping up condemnation on himself. This is because he is doing this thing to appease God. Yet God is not pleased or appeased in the acts done to cover over our natural state. In Hebrews we are taught that the blood of bulls and goats do not satisfy Him, so it is with the acts of self-righteous merit done by the unbeliever.

So even a minister or shepherd who believes that they are doing good, yet is not truly converted, is in grave sin. This is not to say that God does not work through that person. It is to say however that they are not pleasing God. Consider Joseph's brothers. They were in grievous sin and yet God planned and worked through their evil. So it was with Judas. So it is with the multiple stories of street preachers who in sharing Gospel have come to understand that they themselves were not saved.

True pursuit of God- active seeking of Him- comes as a product of the realization of salvation through Christ alone. So even pursuing God is a gift to the saved. However, or because of this, the one who professes Christ as Savior and Lord, but does not pursue Him in that way, is not saved.

So this leads to a strange dichotomy. On the one hand you have a man or woman who is giving the appearance of of being spiritually alive, doing good works and claiming God, but is yet unconverted and is only behaving as they are to appease the God that they fear. On the other hand you have the man or woman who gives lip service to being a believer. They claim to be spiritually alive in Christ; yet they have no drive to actually pursue Him. And while the activities are vastly different neither is actually pursuing God.

What it the cause of this? What leads to such misapprehensions of what it means to pursue God? In both examples it is the presentation of a less-than-sufficient or incomplete Gospel. A gospel that according to Paul in Galatians is accursed. These people who suffer from these faulty views of what it means to pursue God, or believe pursuing Him is not necessary at all, do so, not from a lack of hearing about God, but from a lack of hearing the true Gospel and it caters to their own wicked designs.

These people are the same as the unregenerate heathens of the of the world who have never heard of Christ. They are justly deserving of condemnation and remain under the just wrath of God. They truly have no one to blame but themselves for their current state. Yet unlike the heathens who have never heard the Gospel, these folks are burdened with the poor theology of the theologically inept and the willful deceivers they heard this false gospel from.

The theologically inept are the untrained and and uninformed believers. These are the folks who have zeal without knowledge. Passion without clarity. This could be a man, who takes on the mantle of leader or teacher without the proper training or guidance from his elders. Maybe his elders even look at his zeal and encourage him to this end thinking he is prepared without using their discernment. While the intention is well meant it is fraught with danger and pitfalls and in the end often leads to death.

The willful deceiver is the one who knows that what he or she is teaching is a lie and perversion. Consider all of those holding themselves up as pastrixes or prophetesses today. These women are self-deceived believing that they are called to an office that God has not ordained for them. To ascend to this office they must twist and taint scripture with abandon and this wicked habit continues from there on. Because of this, every message they deliver must take on the tainting of scripture that these women wallow in. So even a presentation of the true Gospel by one of them becomes a happy coincidence and not a matter of design.

So the same can be said for all of the deniers of the Biblical Doctrine of the Trinity. Oneness Pentecostals, modalist like TD Jakes, Jehovah Witnesses and the Mormons all fall into this camp. But worse yet these folks can never preach the true Gospel even by accident because they believe in a false Christ.

In the end the theologically inept often times preaches the same false gospel message as do the willful deceivers. It is a gospel of earned righteousness. It paints a picture of a god who grants desires no matter what those desires may entail. It is a message of universal love that would never allow any person to go to hell. It preaches about a god who accepts all people just as they are with no requirement to change. What does not matter in this is the intent. All that matters is the end.

The theologically inept may mean well while the willful deceiver intends to drag people to hell, but a bullet to the head from a genuinely nice guy kills just the same as a bullet to the head from a notorious hit-man.

So what is the solution to this disastrous problem? How do we remedy the outcome of the false gospel preached by so many today? Are the individuals who have been victimized by these problems, who think they are pursuing God but in reality pursuing their own ends, salvageable so-to-speak? The answer is yes.
No one this side of eternity is beyond hope of redemption.

The answer is to proclaim the Gospel to them.
Proclaim it to them constantly.
Proclaim it with authority because the God of all creation stands behind His words and promises that His word will accomplish what is is sent to do.

Along with this we must remember that it is not our end to ensure results, but to remain faithful. When we boldly preach the Gospel we are also laboring to make disciples. In the making of disciples we are pursuing God and and compelling others to do the same.

While we pursue God in the making of disciples we are working to ensure that we are also not causing the same problems we have been seeking to remedy. Paul used the phrase "follow me as I follow Christ"; this is a compelling thought. It points us to a reality in which we go before those we are leading. We are walking a trail, following a path laid out by Christ and carrying the light of Scripture as we go.

The amazing thought in this is that the path we are on isn't simply the footsteps of Christ, but the deep furrows of His Cross. The humbling thought in this is that that furrow that was made by His Cross is so deep that once we are in it and walking we cannot get out of it. There are no fatal missteps precipitous cliffs with a fall to our death. He has gone on before us lighting the path He has made at His own great expanse and suffering. As He leads us He cries out "Pick up your cross, follow me. Come to me all of you who are heavy laden and weary and I will give you rest."

The promise of God is that pursuit of God is a guarantee that we will reach Him through the work of Christ. And as hard as it may be in the pursuing it is a joy for us!
Soli Deo Gloria!
-Todd