Friends: There is a chance I may have been wrong about "no sports" in heaven …God had good reasons for creating us as He did.  Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #915

May 28, 2023

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Sporting Chance

By Bob Walters

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” - Proverbs 3:5-6

A couple months ago in this space I floated an interrogative for consideration, “Are there sports in heaven?” (Link “#907-Sporting Spirit,” 4-2-24).

Though on its surface the question appears rhetorical, it nonetheless speaks to the potential differences of the Kingdom “here” vs. the Kingdom “there.”  My general thought was that heaven – though unknown – will be perfect in ways we cannot imagine and that our humanity will be completed in ways only our full, divine life in Christ can reveal. The mystery will be lifted.

I think that’s what Genesis 1:27 means: “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” To me there is some logic in thinking that life in this earthly realm – fallen, prideful, greedy, sinful … you know the list – requires our constant comparison and scoring system with each other. I.e., life as a scorebook, not the book of life.

Love – divine love, agape love – isn’t about worldly comparison, or being better at something than someone else, or winning worldly accolades.  God’s love, in humans is about humility, righteousness, sacrifice and living life in Christ’s image with full faith in Jesus’s identity as Savior, Messiah, Christ, Son of God, fully human, fully God.  It’s living with love for God and others, not jealousy of God and others.

The first depiction is Christlikeness; the second one is Satan.  Satan knows all that we know about Christ – probably more – but Satan lacks love, and there4 is the difference.  God is love, while Satan hates God, undermines humanity, and is jealous of all creation that loves God, and vice versa.

But I digress.  My earlier point was that sports would be unnecessary in heaven, or if we played sports or competed it would be for the joy of human expression of God’s image.  Not “I win!” or “We’re Number One!” but “We are one in Christ, and look at these gifts of expression and talent. Praise God!”

It occurs to me a good church is like that: shared love, creativity, joy, and sacrifice.

So, in a nutshell, God’s image, which humans fully attain in heaven with Christ, doesn’t require competition because that life and our humanity has become perfect.

God’s judgment, righteousness, and love, yes.  Human competition, no. Joy, yes.  Pain, no.

Now, I’m still convinced heaven will be perfect, but I’m not so sure I was right about competition; competition may be part of God’s original design. Enter Edith Stein, and hear me out.

Stein’s is a name that rang a bell when I encountered it last week in a First Things article, but I didn’t remember why or where I had heard it.  Turns out she was an early 20^th century German Jewish philosopher (1891-1942) and her story is fascinating.

Born a German orthodox Jew in an area that is now Poland, Stein as a teenager renounced her faith, became an atheist, and then while studying at Germany’s famed Göttingen University, converted to Catholicism. She became a Carmelite nun, philosopher, and spiritual writer executed in 1942 by the Nazis at Auschwitz because of her Jewish roots. She was later canonized by the Church as a saint and martyr, and is one of the six patron saints of Europe.

That biographical snippet aside, the article I read was (LINK) Masculinity Is Tragic, a relatively brief but highly relevant observation about modern “therapeutic masculinity” that undermines man’s natural, i.e., God-ordained, tendencies (modern feminists will hate the article; Jordan Peterson fans will love it).  Quoting Stein in her 1931 essay/lecture, Separate Vocations for Men and Women:

“Man was called by his original God-given vocation to be master of the created world. Hence, his body and soul are equipped to conquer it.” (KC Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker … call your office.)

Article author James Diddams adds, “Masculinity requires competition, against oneself and others … victory and mastery mean nothing without the risk of defeat.” Diddams calls Christ the “archetype of perfected humanity” – remember what I said about heaven and perfection? – “and presents the fullest model of masculinity.”  

“There will still be men and women in the new heaven and earth with masculine and feminine features,” Diddams adds, “but those natures will be sanctified, transcending even their prelapsarian [before the fall] perfection.”  Sure.  If God created us as heirs in his image, why would the end, I mean, eternity, be different from the beginning? Diddams writes a compelling refutation of “modern” masculinity.

Everyone’s image of heaven is unique, and as I mentioned in my previous column (#907), friend and pastor Dave Faust insists that whatever is out there in eternity with Jesus waiting for us, we won’t be disappointed. As for me I don’t think I’d mind hearing, beyond the pearly gates, a nice rousing, “Play Ball!”

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) highly recommends the FT article (link) and recently ordered a Butker jersey.

Friends:  It’s my birthday week, the last week of school, Indianapolis 500 weekend coming up with family in town, Memorial Day, summer beckons … why not say something outrageous about the Cross of Christ? See the column below. Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #914

May 21, 2024

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Cross Off 70

By Bob Walters

“The days of our years are three-score years and ten ...” – Psalm 90:10

There you have it.  Psalm 90 says we will live 70 years. If I wake up Thursday morning, May 23, I will have proven the Bible correct, celebrating the big Seven-O.

Psalm 90 goes on to say that strength may give us 80 years, but the whole of Psalm 90 is not about the glories of old age but the pitifulness of our overall lives.  God’s been watching us, the psalmist – believed to be Moses – says, and God is not impressed. Our days are “toil and trouble,” Moses prays, “… and they are soon gone.”

Shortly thereafter, he entreats of God, “…teach us to number our days so that we may get a heart of wisdom” (90:14). God delivered that “heart of wisdom” fifteen hundred years later in the living, human and divine person of His Son, Jesus Christ.

Jesus is our “heart of wisdom.”  Living a long life will not give us wisdom; not the kind of wisdom for which the psalmist pleads: the wisdom of God, not the wisdom of man.  It is one of a gazillion Old Testament phrases that speaks directly to man’s only source of relationship with the wisdom of God, and of God Himself: Jesus Christ.

The Old Testament, throughout, sets us up to know and appreciate Christ.

The New Testament reveals the new life and covenant in the wisdom of Christ.

James 1:5 says that if any of us lacks wisdom, to ask God for it, “…who gives generously to all without reproach.”  God gave us Jesus Christ so we would pursue wisdom – in Christ – that transcends this life and bridges into eternity. And we traverse that evil-to-good bridge by the grace of the person of Christ, who actually is the bridge.

And speaking of that bridge, as I wander ever closer to the next bridge from this life to eternity, for my birthday I thought I’d say something true, but maybe outrageous.

Here goes.  Not long ago I was watching a Bible expositor draw that familiar sketch of the Cross spanning a chasm between the world and heaven, death and life, dark and light, evil and good. Condemnation, fear, guilt, sin, lies, and hell on the left; salvation, love, grace, forgiveness, truth, and the Kingdom of God on the right. 

Let me first say: “A wise man’s heart inclines to the right, but the heart of a fool to the left.” says Ecclesiastes 10:2.  But that theological drawing of the left-to-right bridge over the chasm to transcendent God?  That bridge is not the cross of Christ; that bridge is the person of Christ. Our relationship with God – salvation – depends on Christ alone.

Somehow, dependably, most of humanity loves the dark and hates the light, says Jesus (John 3:19).  We go left when the Bible says go right. Our hearts and deeds are evil, Jesus is saying.  And we prefer they remain unknown, in the dark, on the cross.

But … we are not saved by the cross. We are not saved by the Bible.  We are not saved by church. We are not saved by baptism.  We are saved by the person of Jesus Christ: His love, His grace, His obedience, and the blood of His covenant with God.

The other stuff is important: the tools of our knowing. The cross is an example.  The Bible is our guidebook.  The church is His body. Baptism is the gift of signing on to the promises of Jesus – heart, mind, body, and soul.  But salvation.  O! … salvation.

Salvation is a relationship with a real person, Jesus, and comes from no earthly relic, event, idea, or deed. The supremacy and sufficiency of Christ is unchallenged

In the Holy Spirit, we know that our salvation resides in Christ alone. Outrageous!

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) knows his birthdate – “5-23-1954” – better now than at any previous time of his life because of how often healthcare providers ask for it.  Psalm 90, by the way, is considered the oldest Psalm as the Jews wandered Sinai.  P.S. – I have written much about the Cross since beginning this weekly column / blog in November 2006. Here are 12 on the Cross, in order, my blog search button says are the best. Click on the number to see the column. #812 and #640 are my favorites (on PCs it's "control-click" on the link).

650 4-30-19 – Life Beyond the Cross (Preparing for eternity)

651 5-7-19 – Living at the Cross (The Cross is closer than we think)

652 5-14-19 – At the Foot of the Cross (Jesus lives; how do we live?

812 6-5-22 – Person to Person *** (The saving personhood of Jesus)

640 2-19-19 – Cross Purposes *** (Purpose of the Cross)

692 2-17-20 – Close Call (Church)

862 5-23-23 – Just Like That (Lessons of the Cross, and last year’s birthday)

750 3-29-21 – Father, Forgive Them (Jesus on the Cross)

663 7-30-19 – For My Sake (Understanding the Cross)

287 5-15-12 – Sin and God’s Saving’s Plan (My sins on the Cross)

527 12-20-16 – The Cross, Christmas, and Freedom (Strength of the Cross)

393 5-25-14 – Defining Moments (Importance of the Cross, and my 60^th birthday)

 

Friends: Heaven and hell are real, and we've probably seen glimpses of them in this life. See the column below.  Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #913

May 14, 2024

Common Christianity / Uncommon Christianity

Almost Heaven

By Bob Walters

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.” – Ephesians 1:3

Heaven isn’t that far away.

Christians see glimpses of it all the time; just like we routinely see glimpses of hell. Seeing heaven is as easy as accepting the saving grace of Jesus Christ; hell is no more distant than the sin nature of humanity.  We think heaven and hell are the exclusive province of the “afterlife.”  I beg to disagree.

Heavenly realms and hellish despair are eternal, and here we are living in the present. The “present” being the place, C.S. Lewis wrote, “where eternity touches time.”

Thanks to Jesus, we do not live – in this life – apart from eternal God.  We can certainly refuse to believe in God, and many ridicule the idea of Jesus Christ dying for our sins to restore fallen humanity’s relationship with its loving Creator God. But neither my faith, nor another’s disbelief, has any effect on the fact and truth of God, or Jesus.

God is Who He is regardless of what any of us think.  The truth that our faith in Jesus opens our lives, spirits, minds, and souls to a Godly, “heavenly” experience in the here and now is perhaps the most overlooked gift a Christian has.

Ephesians 1:3, above, is Paul’s greeting in his letter to Ephesus.  It was the first Bible verse I memorized upon coming to faith a few years back, probably because it spoke in my heart of a constant spiritual lift that faith in Jesus provides. Did it mean spiritual blessings after we die? No … I learned that as an heir in Christ, death no longer is the province of “blessings” but of sonship with God Almighty through the will of Jesus.

Once we get to heaven, I am saying, we no longer discern blessings; only love.

I once read a devotional by Ray Stedman about the verse. It spoke of “heavenly realms” as “… a reference to the invisible realities of our life now … realities that certainly reach into eternity but are something to be experienced in ones inner life, ones thought life, where we feel conflict and pressure; struggle and disaster. Dark spirits can frighten us, but the ‘heavenlies’ are not only a realm of conflict but also where God reaches us at the seat of our intellect, emotions, and our will.”

I’d venture that most Christians have had these deep-seated experiences, even if they weren’t sure what to make of them.  I wasn’t sure, but then as faith grew and life wrapped securely around Jesus, another of Paul’s great lines clicked: “Pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17).  When we live life as a prayer – as a constant relationship with and faith in Jesus – we live each day, in grace, touching blessed heavenly realms.

Knowing these realms is the experiential bedrock of my faith.  It is an experience I assume of, and share with, other Christians.  Yet they are realms impossible to explain to a nonbeliever.  This living part of our faith is so personal in Christ, and so convincing.

“How do you know?” is, I believe, among Satan’s favorite questions.  The hell and doubt we discern amid our mortality can dependably be laid at the fiery altar of sin.  The peace, strength, and comfort we know in Christ are real, often invisible, and loving.

Never read “heavenly realms” as something out in space somewhere, beyond the grasp of our daily, living faith. These blessings are ours now in our inner experience.

And they come to us, Stedman assures, “in one great package in Christ.”

“Be not afraid,” Jesus constantly advises. Heaven is as close as our love.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) deeply appreciates the “thin spaces” communion meditation Ed Simcox did a few years ago; places where heaven and earth nearly meet. His new book, He Leadeth Me, includes that meditation (p. 224) and is available at the E91 Church bookstore, Indianapolis. BTW, the song bouncing around in your head because of this column’s title is “Take Me Home, Country Roads” by John Denver (1971).

Friends: No prisoner of shyness or doubt, the dependable advice and leadership of Ed Simcox has been a blessing to nearly 50 years of Indiana Christians. And now, he’s written a book, He Leadeth Me. See the column below. Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #912

May 7, 2024

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Led by Faith

By Bob Walters

“Do you play golf?” “No, I visit prisons.” – Ed Simcox, from his new book, He Leadeth Me

A few years ago, a friend of mine – a Christian – was serving a federal prison sentence for business fraud complicity, and I had no idea how to encourage him.

Hence, I did the most normal thing I could think of: ask Ed Simcox for advice.

Ed’s advice – as a longtime board member of Prison Fellowship Ministries – was heartfelt, immediate, and simple: write letters to your friend.  Mail “on the inside” is treasured, Ed said.  So, for nearly two years I wrote weekly personal letters to my friend, and sent along a copy of my weekly column until his early parole – thank you, Covid.  Amid few positives of the pandemic, my friend’s early return home was one of them.

“Ed Simcox” is one of those Indiana names that rings a bell with most, let’s say, more mature Hoosiers, even if they can’t quite place specifics or where they heard it.  Ed, an attorney and perennial state Republican Party organizer and leader, was Indiana’s 55^th Secretary of State (elected, not appointed) from 1978-1986.

I know Ed from church, East 91^st Street Christian Church here in Indianapolis, where he has served multiple terms as an elder, elder chairman, fundraiser, Sunday school teacher, and frequent presenter of the church’s weekly communion meditation. Each meditation Ed presents is a master class on the body and blood of Christ.

But that’s local stuff. Ed has served in the big game of state, national, and international Christian issues.  He was a 29-year executive board member of Chuck Colson’s international Prison Fellowship Ministries, the longest serving board member in the organization’s history. I was thankful to lean on his counsel with my friend in trouble.

Ed, given his years of service, understandably affords Prison Fellowship Ministries top billing in the compilation of his life’s work, but there is so much more.  

He was the long-time chair of the annual Indiana Leadership Prayer Breakfast. He also chaired the 1999 Indianapolis Billy Graham Crusade, and was one of only a handful of Hoosiers, along with Vice President and Mrs. Mike Pence, who attended Graham’s North Carolina funeral, March 2, 2018.

Ed is a humble guy with a humbling CV.  Political, Christian, career, and legal entries abound. He was president of the Indiana Energy Association from 1986-2010, has been bestowed by Indiana governors eight – eight! – elite Sagamore of the Wabash citations for various leadership accomplishments. Ed was on Pence’s personal prayer team during his 2016 presidential election and subsequent term as vice president. 

Ed’s just-out book, He Leadeth Me – the title an obvious nod to Psalm 23:3, “He leadeth me beside still waters…” (KJV) – more-or-less chronicles Ed’s enormous leadership talents.  But the book isn’t about that.  It is a loving offering of his gifts for writing deeply perceptive Christian devotionals, meditations, and speeches.

The book is a gold mine of quotes and stories – highly relatable, often famous, and always intriguing – through the Kingdom lens of one of Christ’s front line soldiers.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) is among the E91 communion meditation presenters (so is his wife Pam), but Ed is one of the guys they save for special occasions (Easter, Christmas, etc.), along with Ken Nelson, Rick Justice, and John Samples.  When any of them speak, Walters takes notes.