“But, I’m Not Dead Yet!”
Have you ever seen the movie “Monty
Python and the Holy Grail”? There is a segment popularly referred to on YouTube
as “Bring Out Your Dead”, where a cart is being wheeled through town to pick up
dead corpses. The cart is being maneuvered through the streets to the rhythmic
chanting of a guy clanging a large iron triangle with an iron rod while yelling,
“Bring out your dead! Bring out your dead!” At one point another man appears
with the body of an old man slung over his shoulder. As he starts to heave the
guy’s body onto the cart the old man starts yelling; “But, I’m not dead!” to
which the guy collecting the dead says “He’s not dead. I can’t take him like
that.” The man carrying him argues with him telling him he is dead, and even if
he isn’t he will be soon. The poor old guy says “I’m getting better!” to which
the guy retorts, “No you are not. You’ll be stone dead in a minute”. Just
before the man with the triangle clobbers him on the hard and throws him on the
heap of bodies, the old, still very alive, man says, “I feel happy. I feel
happy. I think I’ll go for a walk” It is a strangely hilarious encounter to
listen in on as the three guys banter back and forth about the actual condition
of the old man. Clearly one of them has a lot more to lose then the other two. It
must be one of those movies that mostly only guys think is funny. I watched it
one night with a friend, while our wives were in the room. He and I were
laughing like idiots, while the occasional glances from our spouses seemed somehow
to remove all question as to whether or not we were. Imagine that? Being told
you are dead when indeed you are not.
I couldn’t help but think of that
movie while trying to get my thoughts around a quote of something Jonathan
Edwards had written. Edwards’s words struck a familiar chord when I read them
this time, in all probability because of what I have been trying to work
through since the 16th of this month. So I offer the following thoughts
in response to Edwards’s, but first the quote.
“The
ruin that the fall brought upon the soul of man consists very much in his
losing the nobler and the more benevolent principals of his nature, and falling
wholly under the power and government of self-love…Sin, like some powerful astringent
contracts his soul to the very small dimensions of selfishness; and God was
forsaken and fellow creatures forsaken and man retreated within himself.
Self-love became the absolute master of his soul, and the nobler and spiritual
principals of his being took flight and flew away.” (Future
Grace, John Piper, pg 389)
What
Jonathan Edwards is addressing seems to me to be similar to the thoughts that
have been taking shape in my mind lately, with one small twist. Where he observes
that, “… and the nobler and spiritual principals of his being took flight
and flew away.” I would make a case to say that the nobler and spiritual principals did not fly away, but rather
were deadened by the power of the law of sin and death. Of “...the
nobler and spiritual principals...” we might say, “But I’m not dead yet!”
The
power of the law of sin and death is not only a mystical, spiritual reality which
potentially can leave the eternal soul
cut off forever in hell from God, it is also like gravity in that it is a fixed
law that has objective and definite consequences now affecting every one the
moment they are born.
The
power of the law of sin and death deadens us in all our faculties to the things
of God, and frankly to the entire world around us, rendering us less alive than
God intended us to be. The objective proof of this is that it is not uncommon
to hear people who have been recently born-again say things like, “I don’t know
what happened, but the whole world seems different, more alive to me.” “Since I
was saved the grass seems more green and the sky more blue.” As odd as it is
going to sound I can tell you that I had a strange experience with rocks one
day that illustrates perfectly what I mean.
I
remember one specific, beautiful summer day, when I was driving back from
Lancaster, P.A., traveling northbound on Route 81. I drove on a section of the
road that had been craved through some very large rock formations. Because of
construction the traffic had slowed to a crawl and I found myself glancing at
the colors, shades, shapes and textures of the rocks. Suddenly I found myself
amazed at the glory of God. Something within me unexpectedly responded as never
before to the rocks, and I recall thinking to myself, “God, You are amazing.
Look at what You have done!” It was as odd, as it was both brief and real.
There
is something about the power of the law of sin and death that numbs me to the
things of God and to all life around me. It renders me inept when it comes to loving
others as I was designed to, and as I desire to. It dulls my God-given, nobler sensibilities
when it comes to extending mercy and grace that people desire and deserve, and quite
frankly, it hinders my own ability to receive the mercy and grace that others
offer to me. Because of the fall, and the power of the law of sin and death, I can
not be what God designed me to be, however, there still remains within me an
unexplainable yearning, a deep inner longing to be, which to me is proof that
the nobler and more benevolent principals
have not flown away, at all.
Romans
8:2 reveals two laws that have power over our lives. First is the law of the
Spirit of life that is in Christ, the other is the law of sin and death. Just
as the law of gravity has power to hold down everything in this world, so too
the law of sin and death has power over everything and the affect of its power
is to deaden, to make everything numb or dull to the things of God, and to God
Himself. It deadens, to use Jonathan Edwards’s words, “…the nobler and
spiritual principals…”
Maybe like me you can’t express the
numbers of times you have wondered why you feel incapable of loving better, why
there is this constant struggle to extend unobstructed, patience, mercy, grace,
or compassion to fellow human-beings. This inability to offer without inner
resistance, the nobler, Christ-like principals which everyone longs for and deserves,
can, I believe, be attributed to the remaining effects of the power of the law
of sin and death still at work within us, while the frustration I must deal
with is in some way a part of that larger frustration all creation feels, causing
it to groan while, “...waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God.”
So
here I found myself struggling a little with Jonathan Edwards when he wrote,
“…the nobler and spiritual principals of his being took flight and flew
away.” To my way of thinking they
have not flown away at all, but rather the power of the law of sin and death
has done to them what sin and death does….it paralyzes the God-given, natural, noble
and spiritual principals within us, which are still there because God made
us in His image.
Here I can’t help but think of the account
of the paralytic man whose friends lowered him to Christ through an opening
they made in someone else’s roof, (how terribly inconsiderate). Seeing the
faith and love of the man’s friends the LORD forgives his sin, and the
scriptures say, “… immediately he got up, picked up the stretcher, and went
out in front of everyone.” (The Gospel of Mark, chapter 2). This makes it
so clear. The law that has the dominant position in our lives affects more than
just the outcome of where we will spend eternity. In this man’s case Christ’s forgiveness
of his sin brought new life to his physical body. The power of the law of sin
and death was dismantled and the effects that the law had on his body were
miraculously and immediately reversed.
When the law of the life of Christ is
at work, the manifestations, or proofs, of its invisible presence is, the lame
walk, the blind see, the deaf hear and the dead are raised, and this
transformation, this reviving of a person’s life happens at every level of who
they are; body, soul and spirit. We may be, for example, emotionally crippled
or spiritually blind, but when by the new choices we make the law of the Spirit
of life in Christ comes against the embedded, camouflaged, and deceitful power
of the law of sin and death, sin loses, death is defeated and suddenly the
impossible happens, valleys of bleached, dry bones begin to rattle. Isn’t it
wonderful to know that though we are ignorant of, or may have neglected the
health of specific areas of our lives, God isn’t and hasn’t?
Humanity
was created as a fully alive entity to respond to God and all creation. To soar,
if you will, on wings of eagles, just as airplanes are created to fly. However,
when Adam and Eve sinned they opened the door to the paralyzing presence of power
of the law of sin and death. Their choices brought objective and definite consequences
that immediately affected them and the entire race. So now, when this law has control
over a person’s life, or when a believer realigns himself with it again through
faithlessness and rebellion, its affect will be to render as dead, the nobler and spiritual principals God placed
in us when He made us in His image. I may have been created to fly but I will
never get off the ground, to say nothing of soaring as if on eagle’s wings,
walking and not getting weary or running and not fainting, while I am in
alignment with the law of sin and death.
But,
here is the extraordinary news. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the proclamation that
the Kingdom of God
Yes,
man “has retreated into himself”. Yes, “Sin, like some powerful
astringent contracts his soul to the very small dimensions of selfishness; and
God was forsaken, and fellow creatures forsaken...”, but this is why Jesus
came from the Father. He came to destroy the works of the Devil, and He has.
This is why the Apostle Paul writing the church in Corinth
No
wonder John the Apostle wrote: “He who has the Son has life. He has not the
Son has not life and has entered already into condemnation.” (1 John 5:12).
But to this negative reality about the power of the law of sin and death, the
Apostle Paul, referring to the positive reality of the power of the law of life
in Christ, writes; “Therefore there is no condemnation to those who are in
Christ Jesus, because the law of the Spirit of life in Christ has set me free
from the (deadening and paralyzing) law of sin and death. (Romans
8:1-2). The smallness of self that we retreat into because of sin and death can
be enlarged again to encompass love, mercy and compassion for others, while and
because God is in the process of restoring us to His original design. All we need
to do is surrender repeatedly to the redemptive, sanctifying work of Jesus
Christ in our lives, and when we do He does the rest.
“but
those who trust in the Lord will renew their strength; they will soar on wings
like eagles; they will run and not grow weary; they will walk and not faint.” Isaiah
40:21 (Holoman)
Copyright, Gary Binghamton , NY August 22, 2011
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