Psalm 103

The watch says I have five minutes.

We were in Psalm 103 today in church—a rare appearance by the associate pastor in the pulpit.

There is a lot in the Psalm, one of my favorites. I can only concentrate in these limited moments on the uses of the law (how it pains me to pass by the first five verses!). Ray Ortlund talks about four different applications in preaching the law, and two of them are subtly displayed in the Psalm: the second one whereby the law confronts us with our own sin, and the fourth, in which the law gives us a promise for who we will be.

In vv. 7–9, David reminds us that God gave Moses the Law. As Luther reminds us, the law always accuses (lex semper accusat) because we are always lawbreaking. The law never justifies because the mirror it holds up to us shows that we are sinful; we need even to repent for the good things we do. So in verse nine, the NET translators write, "[The LORD] does not always accuse...."

The Psalm, then, associates the iniquities God forgives us of (vv. 3,10,12, et c.) with the giving of the law.

Vv. 17,18 almost confront us again: God extends his covenant mercy to those who follow him faithfully and keep his covenant and commandments. But we already know that we do not. The lesson of the Old Testament is just this.

The promise is hidden a bit in the eschatological commands that end the Psalm, where the Psalmist enjoins all of creation to worship God. From Romans 8, we know that all creation doesn't do this: rather, it "groans in travail" (v. 22) waiting for the redemption of our bodies and the revelation of God's glory.

It is when God is fully revealed in us that the promise of the law is fulfilled in our hearts and actions, when we are finally redeemed from the body of this death; what a promise to look forward to!

There's more here. I've overstayed my time.

Holy Saturday

Have no fears then. Now that the common Savior of all has died on our behalf, we who believe in Christ no longer die as men died in time past, in fulfillment of the threat of the law. That condemnation has come to an end; and now that, by the grace of the resurrection, corruption has been banished and done away, we are loosed from our mortal bodies in God's good time for each, so that we may obtain thereby a better resurrection. Like seeds cast into the earth, we do not perish in our dissolution, but like them shall rise again, death having been brought to nothing by the grace of the Savior. That is why blessed Paul, through whom we all have surety of the resurrection, says: "This corruptible must put on incorruption and this mortal must put on immortality; but when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, 'Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is thy sting? O Grave, where is thy victory?'"

(Athanasius, On the Incarnation, 21; language slightly updated)

No Kivengere quotes this year, nor yet the usual Petra video of He Came, He Saw, He Conquered, which should be required listening for anyone. (Since I only post once a year anymore, it seems, just scroll down.)

Rather: a reminder that in the tomb, God is still sovereign. Though dead, he works death backwards, and he unmakes death. If in death, how much more in life?

In A Brief History of Thought, Luc Ferry rightly describes death as anything in our lives that is irreversible, whether it be the biological termination of our lives or the holiday at the sea we can visit only in memory. But the gospel gainsays death entirely, and it proves it by the historical bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the grave.

Athanasius reminds us elsewhere that the resurrection secures eternal life for all—we are all immortal. But this is a sobering thought, for hell as well as heaven is full of immortals. As C. S. Lewis once wrote:

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously - no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption.

It is a solemn day, but a day of joyful expectation. Can you imagine it? To arrive at the empty tomb?

Holy Saturday

What a discovery!  You mean this man who is hanging on the cross is a king?  The cross is his throne? The thorns his crown? This shattered body is a kingly body? A naked body, covered with the robes of a king?  Glory overcame the despair of this criminal.  And the king said, "Don't you wait for long.  Today, you and me are going to share paradise."

He was buried and he resurrected.  What does that do?  The death overcame the guilt and the sin and the separation. What does the resurrection do?  My goodness, it delivers!  The last enemy of mankind is death.  It makes men tremble; it makes clever men weep. It is the point of departure, the dead end of the road.  Jesus entered the realm of death: three days in battle down there. And in the grip with that terrible enemy of mankind, he killed death, disarmed it, opened the grave.

Jesus came out of the grave triumphant, glorious.  Do you think he came alone?  Not a bit!  He came with you!  The head came out, and so the limbs came with him.  You are there!  I know you say, "Bishop, I am not that type."  Jesus knows very well he died for that type! The kind of you, with all the things that make you tremble, with all the limitations of the human being.  Jesus took you when he rose from the dead, because when he died, he gripped you.

(Selections from Festo Kivengeri, in his sermon The Triumph of God's Glory)