Judges 2:1-3 1 Corinthians 15:20-26 John 16:5-15
Why Do We Exist?
A philosopher was once approached by one of his students. “Teacher,” the student said, “I’m no longer sure that I exist. Please, tell me, do I exist?” Without so much as an upward glance, the philosopher replied, “Who wants to know?”
Asking the right questions is part of growing up to maturity. As Proverbs 18:15 says, “An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.” God created us to be inquisitive, to seek knowledge, to pursue the truth. But, all too often, rather than discovering and creating a biblically inspired masterpiece ourselves through careful studious dialogue with the Word and the Holy Spirit, we opt for blindly following a paint-by-numbers lifestyle that is handed out to us by others that ultimately makes us forget why we exist as the Church.
Last week we spoke about the blindness of the world, but today I’d like us to think about the blindness of way too many believers.
Prominent 20th-century Jewish theologian and philosopher, Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote in the introduction of his book, God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism: “It is customary to blame secular science and anti-religious philosophy for the eclipse of religion in modern society. It would be more honest to blame religion for its own defeats. Religion declined not because it was refuted, but because it became irrelevant, dull, oppressive, insipid. When faith is completely replaced by creed, worship by discipline, love by habit; when the crisis of today is ignored because of the splendour of the past; when faith becomes an heirloom rather than a living fountain; when religion speaks only in the name of authority rather than with the voice of compassion--its message becomes meaningless.”
In this work, Heschel discusses the nature of religious experience and criticizes the ways in which organized religion can sometimes become stagnant and disconnected from its spiritual roots. He argues that religion loses its relevance and vitality when it becomes overly focused on ritual, authority, and tradition at the expense of genuine spiritual experience and moral engagement.
While this may certainly be true of Judaism, is it not, at least in part, equally true of the modern Church? Have we perhaps forgotten that it is not about what we believe as much it is about whom we believe? To understand life, it is necessary to understand certain things about our Creator…and the best way to get to know our Creator is by getting to know Jesus because he is the clearest portrait we have of God…he is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. (Hebrews 1:3)
Recent research from the Cultural Research Centre at Arizona Christian University, specifically the American Worldview Inventory 2024, revealed that only 4% of American adults and 6% of self-identified Christians hold a fully consistent biblical worldview…with most Americans embracing a syncretistic approach, blending elements from various worldviews to form a personalized belief system.
To bring this closer to home, according to Joep de Hart and Pepijn van Houwelingen’s study on Christians in the Netherlands: “Where certain tenets of faith are still endorsed, they are endorsed selectively, with little willingness to embrace Christian doctrines in their entirety.”
The Scriptures reveal a God who is near…a God who is intimately involved in every aspect of his creation, ever moving towards restoring what had largely been lost in the Garden of Eden. But like the believer who limits God to the realm of ritual and rules the disciples seemed to have had an inadequate view of what Jesus was doing and what he would be doing in and through his followers, post-ascension. For the most part, 1st Century Judaism had retreated into the synagogues, the Temple, their oral laws, and their ethnocentric nationalism, and so one is not surprised when the Jewish followers of Jesus asked if he had come to restore the kingdom to Israel (Acts 1:6).
When Jesus first started to speak about leaving them, they peppered him with questions, but when his answers did not follow the paint-by-numbers system, they stopped. Which explains why he said in verse 5, “None of you ask me, ‘Where are you going?’” They had asked. He had explained. But because his explanations did not fit within the confines of their inadequate theology, they had not understood and consequently they shut down.
Jesus appears to indicate that the reason why they stopped asking questions was due to their sorrowful response to his earlier statements. What were they sorry about? More than likely they were sorrowful because he did not fit into the box they had assembled for the Messiah. He was leaving…which meant he was not about to overthrow the Roman oppressors and reestablish Israel to its former glory under David and Solomon. According to them, their Rabbi had missed his socio-religious cues and rather than exchanging their truncated nationalistic vision for his global vision, they stopped learning. It is hard to think outside the box when the box is of your own making.
In an attempt to help them step out from their trenches, Jesus then explained that what he had just told them about his leaving was actually to their advantage because his ascension would indicate the beginning of his universal reign. It would declare that, as the obedient second Adam, he had overturned what the disobedient first Adam had done. You see, by believing Satan rather than God, our collective ancestors had lost their right to exercise dominion over creation, but because of his humble and submissive life and death, Jesus, the God/Man, won back all authority in both heaven and earth and reissued the original creation mandate to bring the whole earth back into subjection to him (Matthew 28:18-20). And by pouring out the breath of God on his followers, Jesus would essentially create a renewed and renewing humanity with him being the new head and chief cornerstone of the new creation.
You see, like Adam, the followers of Jesus were meant to conquer and rule…not by the sword, but by the Spirit. Sadly, a failure to obey would result in a similar fate as that of Israel of old…compromise would lead to assimilation, to syncretism, and eventually to capitulation. Of course, the question had always been how such a tiny group of people could do what God required…the Israelites asked that question…the judges asked that question…but what Jesus was trying to get his disciples to understand here was that God’s people are never alone in their assignment.
Through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, the world is confronted with an absolute authority given to Jesus by virtue of his victory on the cross. And this confrontation comes in the form of a conviction…a conviction focussing on three main areas. Sin, righteousness, and judgement.
The world may think that they sit in judgement of God and his people, but in reality, the truth is quite the reverse. The work of the Holy Spirit in and through the Church is in many ways the trial of the world. The call to the dock is a summons to repentance.
As the Church proclaims by word and deed the truth of the Gospel, so the world hears the evidence against them. In the light of the truth as opposed to the lie they have embraced; their sin is exposed for what it is. The victory of the second Adam clearly points to the failure of the first. Only a fool would claim that there is not something wrong with the world. The brokenness of humanity is clearly evident in every one of us. We all malfunction at some or other point.
But the proclamation of the Gospel exposes this glitch in the matrix, so to speak…it exposes sin for what it is…a rejection of the truth, not the ignorance of it. As Augustine apparently once said: “He who denies the existence of God, has some reason for wishing that God did not exist.” The world rejects truth because truth demands change, and the world is not willing to change. When the Gospel is proclaimed, their blatant rejection is exposed, and the world is convicted of its sin.
Through the living testimony of the Church, the world’s inadequacy and insufficiency is revealed. The great cry of the Enlightenment was the seemingly infinite potential of humanity. As man had come of age, they thought, nothing could stop him now. But one global calamity after another dispelled that myth. We have been forced to look deep into the abyss of human depravity as we continue to butcher each other with a cruelty that reeks of sulphur.
The so-called “innocence” or “rightness” of humanity is revealed as nothing but an empty lie. Righteousness is something that can only come through the cross of Jesus. Because his sinless sacrifice cancelled the penalty for sin, his righteousness is gifted to all who believe in him. The preaching of the Church declares a righteousness that can only be received, never attained.
The final area of conviction lies in the realm of judgement itself. The Gospel claims an exclusivity as far as salvation is concerned. No one can come to the Father except through the Son. By rejecting the free offer of salvation through Jesus alone, the world resigns itself to judgement.
I think it really is a no-brainer to say that to resist God is futile. The ruler of this world was conquered at the cross…the principalities and powers of darkness were defeated and publicly humiliated. No matter what the devil may do today, his cause is lost. So, by rejecting Jesus the world willingly submits to following an impotent fool for a god. What’s more, this submissive affiliation implicates the world in the judgement that took place at the cross. By siding with Satan, the world becomes equally guilty of the murder of Jesus (see Acts 5:30).
Now, the world might well ask, What authority do we have to say such things? In an age when tolerance means an inability to say anything of consequence, what gives the Church the right to confront the world with absolute truth?
Well, basically, we have the authority to preach the Gospel because what we proclaim is the word of the Creator and Owner of all that exists. If the Church faithfully declares the word of God as revealed in the Scriptures, then we are his messengers and ambassadors. But we enter into perilous waters when we begin to proclaim our own word. Then we strip ourselves of his authority and open ourselves, not only to ridicule and mockery, but also prosecution and condemnation.
As Paul said in Galatians 1:8, “But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other Gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed.” In other words, let him be lumped together with the devil and his followers. A false representation of the Gospel, even if it has the best of intentions as its motive, carries the highest penalty of all as it is akin to murder of the soul. We do not have the liberty to change the Gospel in our attempt to make it more palatable to the world.
Not even the Holy Spirit speaks on his own authority! He only speaks what he hears! The Holy Spirit does not suffer from celebrity status syndrome! His role, as ours, is to point the world to Jesus whether they accept him or not. As he is the Spirit of truth, he only reveals what is true, and, according to John 14:6, Jesus is the truth…but, according to Jesus in his high priestly prayer in John 17:17-19, it is God’s Word that is truth. While I do not wish to deify the Bible, I do think that it is impossible to separate what has been spoken from the speaker himself. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why John started his Gospel with the Word…in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Nevertheless, my point it that a Gospel that deviates from that Word is no Gospel at all. A denial of what is revealed in Scripture and in Jesus robs the message of its efficacy. There are many warnings in Scripture that tell us not to remove or add to God’s Word. Deuteronomy 4:2, “You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you.” Proverbs 30:5-6, “Every word of God proves true; he is a shield to those who take refuge in him. Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar.” Matthew 5:19, “Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”
The Holy Spirit is not free to lead the Church in a new direction to suit the whims and fancies of the world. His task is to glorify Jesus and to take what is his and the Father’s and declare it to us. And as he guides us in the truth, we would do well to do the same. Also, as the truth will offend because it convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment, so we should be prepared for a scornful or even a hostile response, but fear of such a response should not temper our proclamation of the truth. We must proclaim what we have received…no more and certainly no less.
However, it is important to note also that it is not our task to convict the world…that is the task of the Holy Spirit. It is our task to proclaim what he reveals to us in and through the Word. For this reason, the study and proclamation of God’s Word must always be directed by the same Holy Spirit who inspired it in the first place.
Like our philosophy student whose faulty reasoning led him to ask a self-answering and self-evident question, it may be that our misdirected foci and our selective and syncretistic approach to a faith devoid of a genuine spiritual experience with a living God, has rendered us impotent and therefore incapable of fulfilling our Lord’s Commission despite having the most powerful force in all the universe living within us. Sadly, like the Israelites of old, the Church has largely failed to make disciples of the nations because it has forgotten the God who is with us…the God who has supplied us with all we need to complete the task… the God who leads us in all truth and who speaks to and through us, convicting the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment.
We have forgotten that our God has chosen to bring about change through us, his Body, the Church as we have embraced a defeatist theology by retreating from the frontlines, begging God to remove us from the very place in which we are meant to shine as his light bearers.
So much of what we say and do as the Church speaks of a decisive victory…but we live as if we are still in slavery. Every time we participate in the Eucharistic meal of Jesus, we are proclaiming his death…we are proclaiming his triumph over sin, death, and the devil…we are proclaiming his current universal reign until he comes again after he has placed all his enemies under his feet through the work of his heirs and co-regents.
What questions are we asking, dearest beloved brethren? Are we asking why we exist? Why we are here on planet earth? Why we are here in North-Holland? Or are we as resigned as the disciples and have stopped asking?
If you are still astute enough to pursue the truth, I would like you to ponder a very simple question: Do you exist? If you are asking for guidance in truth, who is it that wants to know? Who are you in Jesus? Once you can answer those questions you will know why we are here in planet earth…why we are here in North Holland…why we, as the Church, exist.
Shall we pray?
© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2024
Thank you, Johann🙏🏼❤️
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