A Personal Relationship With God?
Religious folks often speak of having a personal relationship with God. What does that actually mean? How personal can it be? When you read those aforementioned passages from the OT, it is not easy to grasp that God even wants a relationship with us that could be described as personal. To me, a personal relationship involves “warm and fuzzy” as a part of it, a feeling of closeness in which hugs (and maybe kisses) would be expected and enjoyed. Can we have that with God? Does he even want that? I know he wants us to fear and reverence him, for the OT makes that abundantly clear, but what about the personal part? Maybe those questions don’t come into your mind. If not, good for you. They do come into my mind, which you can surely understand by knowing my background with its struggles.
Answers have come to me in stages in a variety of different ways. One of the early stages was when I developed my teaching materials on the Book of Romans. This stage started early, for I originally developed a course on Romans in my early 30’s when teaching in the same Preacher’s School I had graduated from a few years prior. I became “the” Romans teacher in the school and taught the cour se repeatedly. It was pretty much the same material later found in my booklet, “Justified,” and then still later in my book, “Romans: the Heart Set Free.”
Interestingly, the title of the booklet encapsulates almost the whole story of grace in Christ. Justified translates a Greek legal term that means “not guilty” or “innocent.” I describe justified as meaning “just-as-if-I’d never sinned.” Through the years as I taught Romans many times in many places, my view of God was pretty much on target. Some of the illustrations I “stole” and included in my printed offerings thrill my heart and bring tears to my eyes every time I read them. Through the eyes of Romans, grace abounds and is everywhere to be found!
In my later years, I’ve not taught Romans much, which has been a recent realization. As a partial result, I have struggled more with my view of God and moved back toward my early tendencies. But God allows struggles for a reason. I believe he wanted me to look for and find other ways to deepen my faith in him, his grace and his personal interest in me as his son. Maybe that’s why I ended up in the hospital. One example may leave you scratching your head—or not. I woke up one day a few years back just feeling the need for a hug from God. He is said to be our Abba, our Dad, and I needed a Daddy hug. We were at our little cottage near a lake in East Texas, where we’ve spent a lot of time since we bought it in the summer of 2016. It’s a great place for writing and I’ve written several books and many articles while looking out the windows at the lake across the street. The pandemic increased our time at the lake.
Anyway, that particular morning when I felt a strong need for a hug from God, I started thinking about ways he would give hugs. The most obvious is when he hugs us through other people. I often tell people that whatever love they feel from me, multiply it a million times and they will begin to grasp how much God loves them. He uses people as vessels to express his love, but it must be multiplied many, many times to get the real picture. When God uses others to talk to me, write to me, or literally to hug me, I often am attuned spiritually enough to the spirit world to realize that it is God giving me a hug. But how else does God give hugs? Answering prayers with a yes would be another way but there are yet others.
The way I am going to describe in the following example I would have questioned earlier in life and probably have thought it just weird. That morning, as I said, I really wanted to see or feel God. I happened to look down on the floor of our bedroom at an air vent that delivered warm air in the winter and cool air in the summer. It was summertime and the air from that vent was blowing right in my face when I was sleeping. I was good with the warm air in my face during the winter, but the cold air bothered me. I started thinking about how to solve that problem.
I could just put a cardboard box in front of it to block the airflow, but I thought some customized solution likely existed if I could just think of it. I decided to go out into the garage and see if any answer made itself evident. As I opened the back door of the detached garage, the first thing I saw was a set of shelves where I stored all sorts of things. The first shelf my eye focused on held a plastic container that I didn’t remember seeing before. I immediately thought about the air vent and its size. I grabbed the plastic container and went quickly back inside to the bedroom. The container fit over the vent perfectly. All I had to do was cut off one end and I had a customized solution to redirect the airflow.
I didn’t remember having such a container in the garage. All I know is that it was sitting in the exact place that my eyes settled on after opening the garage door, and it was the perfect solution for my need. As soon as I saw it, I felt like I had received a hug from God. I think he somehow arranged that sequence on that day when I asked him for a hug. Does that sound crazy to you? At one time it would have to me, most definitely. But since then, I have experienced many similar instances which I believe God arranged as hugs.
In an article about my cancer experiences (one of the “Roller Coaster” articles), I made the statement that God is a God who wants to be seen and can be seen. I used my favorite illustration about going from not seeing something to seeing it everywhere in amazing fashion. If you haven’t read that illustration, you should. Also on my teaching website (gordonferguson.org) is an article entitled, “I Have Lost My Faith (in Coincidences).” It’s a long article and mentions many of the events in my life prior to becoming a preacher. It actually forms an unusual prequel to my book, “My Three Lives,” and is interesting for that reason alone. But the overall emphasis of the article is that I believe God is with me and in my life every day, all day, and has been my entire life, even during the years when I wasn’t close to seeking God or anything godly. Some days I “see” him; most days I do not. But he is there whether I see him or not. I love the days when I see him and feel him, and I’m quite sure he feels the same.
Relationship is definitely the operative word. Some months ago, I was thinking about the various terms in the Bible which describe God. He is Creator. He is the Lord of lords and King of kings. He is the Judge of all mankind. Many terms are used to describe him, many of which focus only on his power and authority. These I mentioned don’t bring a relationship to mind, at least not a warm, close personal relationship. Then what should have been obvious hit me. Prior to conversion, we have a Creator/created relationship with God. He wants it to be much more than that, and in fact he provided great motivation to bring it about by becoming a man to die for those whom he created. That’s the gospel story, which is too beautiful to be believed, yet it is true and God somehow enables us to believe it. Other religions have the concept of their gods visiting planet earth in human form, as Acts 14 illustrates, but Christianity is absolutely unique in the concept of the Creator dying for the created. Simply astounding!
Once we are converted and become spiritual creations of God, the relationship is far, far different. Now God is Father, in fact Abba Father, our Dad. He is our friend. I dearly love what Jesus said along these lines to his disciples. “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you” (John 15:15). Through the apostles, he has made everything known to us as well. As we work to carry out what we call the Great Commission (Co-mission, us and him), Jesus finishes up Matthew 28 with this very appropriate promise: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” He is that friend who sticks closer than a brother (Proverbs 18:24).
What does friendship mean to you? Although there are many types and levels of friendship, the most important one is well described in Proverbs 18:24. Whoever else fits into that definition for you, I know God does. The old hymn, “My God and I,” is on target in describing the possibilities in having a real friendship with God. Just listen to these words and picture them taking place with you and God.
My God and I go in the fields together,
We walk and talk as good friends should and do;
We clasp our hands, our voices ring with laughter,
My God and I walk through the meadow’s hue.
He tells me of the years that went before me,
When heavenly plans were made for me to be;
When all was but a dream of dim conception,
To come to life, earth’s verdant glory see.
My God and I will go for aye together,
We’ll walk and talk as good friends should and do;
This earth will pass, and with it common trifles,
But God and I will go unendingly.
During those long nights in the hospital, God and I were friends. I saw him as a friend, and I talked with him as a friend. That’s why I chose the initial title for the series, “Sitting With God on the Brink of Eternity.” That’s exactly what it felt like. I didn’t know whether I was about to enter it with him or not, but we talked about it. Sometimes I wanted to go and sometimes I wanted to stay, but even when I wanted to stay, I realized that if I did, I would likely have to go through another time like that one to escape this planet. We all die. We ended our conversations much the same every night. I said that he knew what I couldn’t know, as Psalm 139:16 states: “all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.” Therefore, since knowing the time and circumstances of my death is beyond my pay grade, I just told him that I would try to get some sleep and let him worry about it (not that he worries). I think those times provided pretty good examples of real friendship.
Face to Face With God
The nights were the worst. I was having hallucinations and delusions. I imagined myself in different places, with other people present and some really strange smells as a part of it. I couldn’t sleep much at all and was thinking about death and meeting God much of the time. While I was in that condition, it brought my view of God into sharp focus. Most of my life, I have struggled with my view of God. The way I have seen him produced a fear of aging and death in me that has been very difficult to shed. I have for years explored in various ways how our view of God is developed in the first place. In the spiritual realm, little is more important than our view of God, what we believe is his view of us, and how we think the two of us should relate.
My early opinion, and a popular one, is that our view of God grows out of our view of our fathers, if we have one at home, and if not, from our view of other male authority figures in our lives. There is unquestionably validity to this theory. I remember counseling a brother who grew up with a very domineering, harsh father. His view of God was obviously faulty based on clear evidence in his life. I once asked him to take a week and come back with a very specific description of how he viewed God. He basically described God as what we call the “Clockmaker God.” In other words, God did create the world (wound it up to start it ticking) but has nothing to do with us besides watch what we do. He is uninvolved in our lives physically and emotionally. He watches us and will one day judge us on the basis of what he has observed in us. After this “god” was described, I asked him who it sounded like, and without hesitation, he said, “my dad.”
This idea of how we develop our view of God obviously has merit and for years, I thought my view of God came through this manner. My dad was very harsh in my young, most formative years. Thankfully, when I got married at age 22, it was like Daddy took off his parent’s hat and put on his friend’s hat. In the decades following until his death, we were really good friends. Evidently, it was in the Ferguson family culture that a father was responsible for his children until they were adults but not afterwards. This view would understandably have relieved a lot of Dad’s stress of feeling responsible for me prior to my marriage. But what happens to children in their most formative early years does continue to affect us. Logically, my father could have been the one who strongly influenced me to see God as harsh.
However, ongoing talks with my younger sister helped me to figure out that this wasn’t the case—a surprise to me. Pam and I are 10 ½ years different in age but think a lot the same. We definitely have a shared view of our immediate family and extended family as well. She is much nicer and gentler than I am, but we are in most ways on the same wavelength in our views. My frequent talks with her have been so helpful to me in many ways. She is a very wise and spiritual woman, the wife of a preacher. We laugh at how we grew up in a dysfunction family, including our extended family, yet I ended up a preacher and she ended up married to one. God has his ways, often mysterious ways, as the old hymn words it.
Through our talks, I eventually figured out where my view of God originated, and it wasn’t our dad. There are two parts to the answer. The first came to me when I pictured myself as a small child in the little church we attended. My dad came to church with Mother and me most of the time, but it was obvious to me even as a very young child that he was not into it. He attended to please my mother. Thus, I didn’t connect him to my concept of God. I remember (still) a man in that church who was a bit rotund and very kind, and when thinking of God, I pictured his face. Although that memory was embedded in my mind rather clearly, it was also embedded deeply enough to take some time and real concentration to dig it out. But if my earliest view of God grew out of my view of that particular kind man, how did I end up with a harsh view of God? That’s a really good question and it took me even more time to sort out the answer to that one.
The little church of which we were a part was an odd one, and legalistic to the core. My grandmother and mother bore strong witness to the truth of this statement. My grandmother dwindled down to near nothing physically before dying just short of her 89th birthday. I believe she clung to life out of fear of meeting God, given her view of him. My mother reflected the same fears. Her view of death was never like the hymn, “Safe in the Arms of Jesus.” It much more resembled the view suggested by another hymn, “There’s An All-Seeing Eye Watching You.” Yes, that is a real song. Look it up on YouTube. The lyrics leave no doubt that this all-seeing eye (God) is watching you to see if you step out of line, not watching over you to protect you or love you. That was my mother’s view of God, and it pervaded her religious views across the board. Plus, it transferred to me, regrettably. While I will forever be indebted to my mother for instilling in me the utmost respect for God and an unshakable trust in the Bible as the inspired word of God, my view of God himself has been a burden not easily changed.
To give you a practical example of what this kind of viewpoint produces, let me tell you about a conversation my mother had with me about sexual morality when I was in the 8th grade. I remember the year because of how I applied the content. In our church, sexual immorality, including sex before marriage, was pretty much viewed as the “unpardonable sin.” On that occasion, Mother basically explained it in much that way. If you had sex before marriage, you were destined for hell – no if’s and no but’s. I at once thought of my friend Ronnie. He had recently told me about having sex for the first time, and I do recall that we were in the 8th grade. I remember thinking to myself as mother continued her lecture, “Well, that’s it for Ronnie. No matter what else happens the rest of his life, he is doomed to hell.” As you can surmise, the doctrines of forgiveness and grace received little emphasis in our group.
Then to add to my problem while still fairly young, I attended what was called a “Preacher’s School” when in my upper 20’s to prepare for ministry. I loved what I learned in that school in so many ways, but we too were bent in a fairly legalistic direction. The curriculum was impressive, especially in its focus on the biblical text. We went through the entire Bible in a verse-by-verse fashion. I learned a ton of Bible in the process and loved every minute of it. However, since we dug into the entire text of the Old Testament, given my predisposition to see God as harsh, certain accounts in the OT added evidence that my view must be correct. We also studied the texts emphasizing grace, but my background blocked me from fully appreciating these types of passages. The harsh stuff stood out, and there’s plenty of it in there to stand out.
I developed a sermon early on with the different ways men sin against God, using material from the OT. Here are some of the OT figures mentioned in my lesson: Cain, Nadab and Abihu, King Saul, Uzzah and others. Perhaps you are familiar with the account of Korah, Dathan and Abiram where their sin led to God opening up the ground to swallow them and their entire families. No doubt the OT has some scary stuff in it, and whatever one’s view of God is, these accounts have to be considered and explained in a way that harmonizes with our view of the nature of God. Honestly, that is no easy task for anyone, and it proved quite formidable for me.
Five Bad Days—Then the Hospital
When I received my official diagnosis of cancer on January 5, 2022, I was surprisingly not disturbed emotionally. For one thing, a preliminary diagnosis had been suggested earlier, but remained a bit uncertain for several months. Thus, it wasn’t a new topic nor a surprising one. For another thing, I recalled hearing a lecture many decades ago about how stress affects the body and accepted the speaker’s conclusions as valid. He said that stress seeks out the weakest place in the body and manifests itself there. Given that since I was 18 years old (during a period of high stress), I had experienced issues with the part of the body where cancer eventually did manifest itself, I pretty much expected to eventually develop cancer there. In fact, I told my surgeon and oncologist that the surprise wasn’t finding out I had cancer; the surprise was that it had taken so long to develop, especially given that I am a type A (triple A actually) personality – a high stress guy. Having lived a very adventure-filled life, some of the stresses were good ones, but many were anxiety based.
After a series of interesting events about which I have written previously (“A Roller Coaster Ride With God” in two parts–on this website), I began treatment for the cancer on March 28. For three weeks, five days a week, I had a radiation treatment and took six large chemo pills daily. In spite of all of the warnings about side effects, I had none (almost). The one exception occurred during a three mile walk near the end of the three-week period, when the ball of my right foot started hurting badly. I was at the halfway point and had to limp home very slowly, then discovering a very large blister. One of the listed potential side effects of the chemo was developing sensitivity and redness on the bottom of the feet and on the palms of the hands. But other than that, I had no side effects for those initial three weeks and congratulated myself on breezing through the treatments. Pride goes before a fall.
The Sunday following those three weeks was Easter Sunday. After enjoying a meal with our son and his family, disaster struck. I have also written in some detail about this ordeal previously, so I will not include those details. Suffice it to say it was bad and unlike any sickness I have ever experienced in my entire life. I’m one of those people who just doesn’t get sick, except very rarely. My immune system is amazingly strong. I’ve traveled all over the world during different kinds of flu outbreaks and never caught any of it, nor have I ever taken flu shots (until this year). But from the evening of Easter Sunday until the next morning, my well-conditioned body was drained of body fluids and strength almost completely. My conditioning came from taking three to five mile fast paced walks at least five days per week. But on that Monday morning after my “adventure” began the previous day, I had to be helped out of the car into a wheelchair to take my last radiation treatment for some weeks.
The next five days were a blur. I slept most of the time. I was severely dehydrated, and an IV administered at a medical facility on Tuesday had no positive effect. The diarrhea was relentless. On Friday, I was back at the same medical facility and was asked a question by a Nurse Practitioner which brought me to my senses. She asked me if I thought I would be okay if I went home. She and the chemo doctor did not. It suddenly hit me that if I did go home, I would likely die. So, my wife and son and I went to the ER and I checked into the hospital for what was to become a 23 day stay.
I don’t quite know how to describe what happened emotionally and spiritually during that time. I can better describe my emotional and spiritual state than I can what prompted it. I ended up in something like a state of near euphoria during the last part of my stay. Sometime in that period, I talked on the phone to my dear old friend, Tom Jones. A few weeks later he asked if I had ever considered that I might be bipolar, based on what seemed to him like a manic state on my part. I laughed and reminded him that my tendency was typically to be depressive, not manic. The euphoric state was temporary, but it was quite interesting while it lasted. I will describe later what were likely contributing factors to it.
For the first ten of those days in the hospital, I tried eating once and promptly threw it back up—with gusto! I was diagnosed with an ileus, which means my insides were locked up and not functioning normally. The doctors were reluctant to insert a PICC and start giving me nourishment via that kind of IV (TPN). I had a low-grade fever, and they were concerned about an undetected infection. So, we waited and tested and waited and tested—for ten days. For most of that time, I was pretty much out of it. I was receiving fluids for hydration through an IV but remember being fixated on the idea of drinking a big Coke and a big strawberry drink from a big glass filled with ice.
I was obviously extremely thirsty. I remember thinking that if I could stay focused on quenching my thirst with those drinks that it might provide enough motivation to stay alive. Seriously. Also obviously, the thoughts of death were constantly present. I was later told that I had said at one time that I would have to get better to die. It was a very rough ten days. Joy (our daughter, the wife of our son, Bryan) took pictures of me at three different stages, and the latter two I eventually posted on Facebook. The first one was taken during that ten-day period and in it, I looked like I was dead. I didn’t post that one. The first time my son came into my room and saw me in that state, he thought I must have just died. So that’s what happened that led me to sitting with God on the brink of eternity.
This British word basically means to be shocked or astounded. Simon on America’s Got Talent has used the term occasionally and his face reflects the definition. I just read Roger and Marcia Lamb’s new book, “This Doesn’t Feel Like Love Either.” After reading it, the only word I could think of to describe my own feelings was gobsmacked. They wrote an earlier book without “Either” in the title after their then six-year-old son Michael had leukemia with a 15% chance of recovery and Marcia had double cancer with a 5% chance of long-term survival.
Since that time, death has struck their family in ways that have been utterly overwhelming. Roger and Marcia have lost four parents, two siblings and two of their three grown children, plus a number of other close family members. Michael wrote a chapter in the book in which he describes going from being a middle child to an only child. But this book is about far more than dealing with death, although it certainly does that. Here is what hit me and blessed me.
One, the amount of pain this family has survived with God’s help and through it all, have remained faithful to him and very active in his kingdom. They take away all of our excuses by their example. We all have pain and suffering. I’ve been dealing with cancer and many of you have been dealing with much more than that, at much younger ages. We all need to read their heartbreaking but courageous story to gain courage and faith to face our trials.
Two, the degree of vulnerability with which they both wrote was startling. God bless them for that. Nothing is more helpful to others than gut-wrenching realness. It surely left them feeling naked after exposing the inner recesses of their hearts, but it hits home and helps others in direct proportion to the amount of such exposure. I believe this book will likely save souls and probably physical lives. People are hurting and hurting badly all over this sin-ravaged world, and it probably is only going to get worse. Their book needs to be read widely. I pray that God will make that happen.
Three, the number of real-life illustrations of relational challenges in multi-generational relationships is so needed by all of us humans. They wrote about relationships with parents; siblings and friends; children; and grandchildren. From purely a relationship perspective, the book is extremely helpful. That part alone would make the book valuable, aside from the losses and how to handle them God’s way with God’s help.
Four, the abundance of practical advice given from the multitude of their experiences, plus the abundance of direction from many spot-on Bible passages, combines to provide abundant help for us as readers. My eyes filled with tears many times as I read, occasionally interrupted by out-loud laughter, but I was closer to God and stronger in faith when I finished. I want to “waste not my suffering.”
Read the book. You will be thankful you did. I promise. Post this for your FB friends. As I finished sending my written response to Roger and Marcia, my closing words were these: “Gobsmacked. Truly. Thank you. I love you.”
Update
This article was written in early August during the Vision Conference in Orlando. I didn’t attend the conference in person but did watch many of the livestream classes online. I was all set to watch Roger and Marcia teach their class but discovered that they had COVID and were unable to teach the class. As disappointing as that was, I decided to read their book and did that for the rest of the day until I finished it. Afterwards, as I communicated back and forth with Roger, I wrote the article and posted it on Facebook, along with a link to their book.
For some reason this morning, God put in on my heart to check and see if I had also posted the short article on my Bible teaching website. I had not. But what prompted me to not only post it today but add this update were two realizations. One, although I have 5,000 FB friends, I have many friends who are not on Facebook and yet read articles on my website. Two, much has happened in the Lamb family since August, to put it mildly.
Cancer Strikes Again
Michael, the only surviving child of Roger and Marcia, was diagnosed with cancer in September of this year (2022). He had survived leukemia when he was six years old, although the recovery rate for his type of leukemia was only 15% at that time. In recent years, it was discovered that he had some heart damage from that early treatment, but was currently doing well, by God’s grace. But then the cancer struck, a rare type requiring a challenging treatment regimen. He was diagnosed with Mantle Cell Lymphoma (MCL). This is a non-Hodgkin’s type of lymphoma, but within this type there are 70 different kinds. MCL is rare and only occurs in about 5% of the cases. Wow! There is a term used to describe suffering that the Lamb family illustrates all too well—disproportionate suffering. How could one family go through all they have gone through and yet the suffering intensifies? Only God knows, but thankfully, God cares like no one else possibly could.
Good News!
Michael has decided to keep us updated about his treatment through Caringbridge (caringbridge.org). In his most recent post of 12/6/22, has shared this encouraging paragraph.
Let’s get right to it… Today is the first day of my third treatment cycle for Mantle Cell Lymphoma. I started the day with the usual lab work and then met with my oncologist who we were eager to see so that she could update us with the results from the PET Scan from Friday. My doctor walked in the room and said, “The scan looks amazing” and that it shows a “complete response” to the treatment. She said that it is “as good as it gets!” and showed us a side-by-side comparison of the September pre-treatment scan next to this latest one. While the September image shows many, many areas lit up with the appearance of (stage 4) cancer and several enlarged organs, the latest one shows none of that – everything looks normal. She also said that the blood work shows “No evidence of lymphoma!” Praise God! We are thrilled to see how my body has been responding to the treatment. We know that there is a long way to go, but this is a huge step.
Please add Michael and his family to your prayer list if he and they are not already on it. Also, keep up with Michael’s progress through Caringbridge.com. It is a wonderful site through which I have followed the condition and treatment of a number of people in the past. My goal is to be as currently informed as possible regarding the condition of those for whom I pray daily (at least almost every day). Please join me in doing this for Michael and our dear Lamb family. Their faith in adversity has provided conviction and an upward call for thousands of us through the years. They deserve our prayers on an urgent and continuing basis. Let’s offer them together as God’s spiritual family!
You can find their book here: This Doesn’t Feel Like Love Either
Chapter 9 (“from the book, “Messianic Judaism”) — The Sabbath
This chapter addresses Messianic Judaism’s treatment of the Sabbath. The Messianics teach that we need to keep the Sabbath today as one of the Ten Commandments. Accordingly, members of this movement do not gather on Sunday, but on Saturday.
Seventh-Day Adventists came into existence in the nineteenth century with a similar message about the Sabbath. Here we will look at scriptures to consider this teaching, and we will conclude with some thoughts about the good aspects of keeping the Sabbath and how to interpret the fourth commandment.
Sabbatarians, those who adhere to the Sabbath as a day of rest, insist that it does not fall on Sunday, but Saturday. They are correct about the day of the week assigned to Sabbath. Historically and theologically, Sabbath was and is the seventh day of the week (Saturday, or technically sundown Friday to sundown Saturday). Although Christians have been meeting on Sunday to take communion since the very beginning, this issue became confused when, in the fourth century, the church created a Sunday Sabbath. Before Emperor Constantine, Sunday was not a legal day of rest or worship; it was a workday even for Christians who met to worship. In the early 300s, the pagan emperor Constantine, who converted to Christianity, made Sunday the legal Roman day of rest. There was no Sunday Sabbath or day off until the fourth century. This was put in place by the state, not by biblical mandate.
In the book of Acts, Paul preaches in the synagogue on Sabbath three times. Some Sabbatarians use this as evidence that Paul is still an observant Jew keeping Sabbath. They extend this further to say that his actions are a model for Christian practice. However, the Bible does not tell us exactly what Paul thought about the Sabbath. His purpose was to preach to Jews first, and then to the Gentiles. Sabbath would be the optimal time to preach to the largest audience of Jews, unlike, say, Tuesday or Thursday. The early church evangelized on the Sabbath because they always wanted to reach out to those who were familiar with the Scriptures, the original sons and daughters of Abraham, who could serve as a kind of beachhead providing leadership and stability in the faith. The Gentiles were grafted into the olive tree, so to speak.
What does Scripture reveal about the significance of Sunday? The early Christians had a reason for feeling differently about Sunday compared to Saturday or Friday. Jesus appeared after his resurrection on Sunday morning, and again that Sunday evening (John 20:19). He was also seen the next Sunday. The church began on Pentecost, a Sunday (Acts 2:1). In Acts 20:7, it says that the Christians gathered to break bread on the first day of the week, though they were not legalistic about this: since they did not break bread until after midnight, it occurred on Monday. 1 Corinthians 16:2 also uses “first day” wording, this time regarding monetary collections. In Revelation 1:10, John the revelator says he was in the Spirit on “the Lord’s Day.” That word “Lord’s Day” in modern Greek, kyriakē, is the same word as in the book of Revelation: the word for Sunday.
Sabbath was not changed from Saturday to Sunday in the early church teaching or practice. Rather, Sunday only became a so-called Sabbath three hundred years later, when church and politics started overlapping in the fourth century. “The Lord’s Day” was always Sunday.
Even if Sunday was always, historically, the Christian day of worship, do Christians still need to observe the Sabbath? Many maintain that the Sabbath originated and was observed in the beginning of creation, even observed by Adam. An ancient Jewish text, The Book of Jubilees, claims that Adam was born circumcised and kept all the festivals and feasts. Adam and his wife being the only humans in creation, this task seems quite challenging. There is no biblical evidence of a Sabbath prior to the time of Moses. Before Moses delivered the children of Israel from cruel bondage in Egypt, Hebrew slaves were not allowed a day of rest. In Egyptian history, there was no weekend, and the work week may have been ten days long. For the few days when the Nile flooded each summer, work ceased, but there was no “day off.” We indirectly thank the Torah for the weekend. The prayer in Nehemiah 9:13–14 makes the mosaic origin of Sabbath explicit:
“You came down on Mount Sinai; you spoke to them from heaven. You gave them regulations and laws that are just and right, and decrees and commands that are good. You made known to them your holy Sabbath and gave them commands, decrees and laws through your servant Moses.”
While the concept of Sabbath, God’s rest on the seventh day, may be traced back to the creation narrative, we must not infer that its observance was instituted before Scripture makes it explicit.
The writings of the church fathers support the view that early Christians met on Sundays to take communion and to worship. They also confirm that Sabbath does not need to be observed by Christians. The three comments from church fathers included below are typical. One is by Ignatius of Antioch in Syria, who was martyred soon after the year 100. He says this: “If then, those who had lived in antiquated customs came to newness of hope, no longer keeping the sabbath but living in accordance with the Lord’s Day—on which also our life arose through Him… how shall we be able to live apart from him?”27
He uses that phrase “the Lord’s Day,” kyriakē, the Greek word for Sunday. “No longer keeping the sabbath but living in accordance with the Lord’s Day” clearly indicates that Sunday worship was not the same as the Sabbath, even in the early church.
The Epistle of Barnabas is also an early-second-century text. Here he quotes from the Prophets and offers commentary:
Moreover God says to the Jews, “Your new moons and Sabbaths I cannot endure.” You see how he says, “The present Sabbaths are not acceptable to me, but the sabbath which I have made in which, when I rested from all things, I will make the beginning of the eighth day, which is the beginning of another world.” Wherefore, we [Christians] keep the eighth day for joy, on which also Jesus arose from the dead and when he appeared ascended into heaven.28
Barnabas describes the day of worship as the eighth day, the day after the Sabbath. Although we say that Sunday is the first day of the week, from another perspective (in many other passages) it was viewed as the eighth day.
Justin Martyr, the Samaritan philosopher who became a Christian and was martyred in the middle of the second century, also addresses the significance of Sunday worship:
But Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God, having wrought a change in the darkness and matter, made the world; and Jesus Christ our Saviour on the same day rose from the dead. For He was crucified on the day before that of Saturn (Saturday); and on the day after that of Saturn, which is the day of the Sun, having appeared to His apostles and disciples, He taught them these things, which we have submitted to you also for your consideration.29
According to Justin Martyr, Sunday gained its theological importance as the day that Jesus rose from the dead and the day that he ascended.
It is unlikely that the generation after the apostles forgot the truth about the Sabbath. For Messianic Judaism to be correct, because it is refuted by all the abundant evidence of the second century, the generation of the apostles would have had to have lost the theological thread completely. We looked at Ignatius: Ignatius was a disciple of the apostle John, and he says we no longer keep the Sabbath, but live in accordance with Sunday. The Epistle of Barnabas is very early, perhaps even from the first century. It says that they celebrated on the eighth day: Sunday, not Saturday.
The Sabbath receives no emphasis at all in the New Testament documents themselves. If it is mandatory or preferable for Christians to keep the Sabbath, it is odd that Paul mentions the Sabbath only once, in Colossians 2:16. In that verse, he asserts that Sabbath observance is not required and that believers should not be judged on keeping the Sabbath or religious festivals. In Galatians 4:8–11, Paul is upset because the Jewish calendar is creeping back into the church, so that they are observing special days, months, seasons, and years. Therefore, according to Colossians 2 and Galatians 4, Sabbath days, Sabbath years, Jubilee years, new moon celebrations, and festivals must not be emphasized. Although they remind us of their fulfillment in Jesus and they are not forbidden, these rituals and special days are not meant to be the rhythm or focal points of the new covenant.
Some Messianics might counter that the New Testament did not emphasize these holidays because everyone knew you had to obey the commandments. Yet most of the Old Testament commands do not carry over, and historically, the church’s demographic makeup was becoming increasingly Gentile. Chapter 3 illustrates how some regulations could only be followed if you were living in Israel.
While primary sources offer a compelling and consistent explanation of the biblical and early church view of the Sabbath and Sunday worship, some readers may still feel unbalanced with the lack of symmetry regarding the Ten Commandments. For uniformity, it seems correct that either they should all be repudiated or, if they are not repudiated, then all ten should be required. For nine of those commandments, from the first, to worship the one God, and the second, to have no idols, all the way to the tenth, not to covet, each one is repeated in the New Testament. There is a flagrant and obvious exception in the fourth commandment: to remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. The truth is asymmetric: four of the first five apply, and all five of the second five apply. While I yearn for symmetry, the fourth commandment is repealed according to the New Testament and the early church.
There are other examples of such asymmetries in Scripture, which does not remove the authority or poetry of God’s word. We have the twelve tribes, except that the tribe of Joseph splits into Ephraim and Manasseh; there are eleven and two half-tribes. The Levites’ tribe does not have a territory; this is not a tidy picture. In the New Testament, there are the twelve apostles, then eleven, then twelve again. When Paul comes as “one abnormally born” the chosen group totals thirteen apostles.
The above examples should reduce our discomfort with the incongruencies around the Ten Commandments, or the Decalogue. The most important instructions found in Leviticus 19 and Deuteronomy 6 are not in the Decalogue. Additionally, we have not just one version of the Ten Commandments, but two, or maybe three versions if we include Exodus 34. Consider also that the fourth commandment is the only particularly Jewish commandment.
We see irregularities biblically with various numbers, but also in nature and mathematics. The number of lunar cycles in a solar year is not even. A lunar cycle is normally less than one month, so the cycles do not fit roundly within a year. We have eight major planets and dwarf planets and other entities in our solar system. The Earth is the only one, as far as we know, that is inhabited. Would it be better if they were all inhabited or not? Mathematics has irrational numbers like π and e. You might argue for balance because it feels more pleasing to have all ten commandments, but the world is full of anomalies. Arguments from symmetry have an aesthetic appeal, but they have no logical power. Whether seven, nine, or ten commandments apply today, that must be determined by careful Bible study, not by preference for elegance or simplicity or tradition.
Christianity is a continuation and a fulfillment of Judaism, yet there is also a disjunction. In the new covenant, Christians did not have to observe circumcision, eat kosher, or stay in one land and go three times a year to Jerusalem. Even early Christian leaders had difficulty grasping how the new covenant relates to the old, and what to do with the Old Testament scriptures now that we have the inspired New Testament scriptures. The Sabbath, like many other Old Testament components, belongs to the world of shadows that faded once Christ came. We are called to embrace substance, reality—not shadow (Colossians 2:17). Living in Jesus today is fulfilling the Sabbath. It is a life of rest and peace in Christ, as well as a life of love in all we do.
Sabbath may not be required, even though we appreciate the theological principle. Hebrew informs us that there is still a sabbath for Christians, although it is not a weekly day of rest (Hebrews 4:9). We do not have to execute those who violate the Sabbath. We do not have to cease our work every seventh year. We do not return all acquired property every seven times seven years. Still, there is a spiritual principle for us to implement that hints at the freedom Moses brought when he led a slave nation out of bondage. We are not machines. Constant work crushes the spirit, wears us down. We need to set aside time for the Lord. For Torah-observing Jews, Sabbath (Shabbat) was a quiet family time, a time for prayer and study of the word, especially the Torah. That dominated the day. The Jerusalem Talmud, written a few centuries after Jesus, taught that the Sabbaths were given to Israel in order that they might study Torah. Setting aside a day each week to focus on family and Bible study rather than work is a wonderful idea. Shabbat is rest, yet not laziness. In the creation account, the Lord rests from his labor on the seventh day. The text does not say that God was tired or that he was not doing anything at all. Jesus said, “My Father is always at his work to this very day” (John 5:17). He is still working. The seventh day was rest, not laziness; devotion to God, not work. It was for study and prayer.
You may know people who truly believe that one day is more special than another, who hold the Sabbath as binding. Or they may have a view about Easter or a Jewish festival. Romans 14:4–6 guides us in these situations. To paraphrase, “Yes, we can proclaim the truth, but we do not have the right to judge someone else’s servant. We need to be gracious and understanding with those who have a different view about holy days.” We have seen abundant evidence that the early church did not observe the Sabbath as a Christian ordinance. That was part of the first covenant, but not the second.30
“What are you learning?” is one of my favorite conversation starters. The response I get often tells me a lot about my conversation partner.
I love to learn. There is so much to discover, big and small things, about others, about life, and even about myself. My love of learning translates to a lifestyle of listening to others, reading, being curious, and, when I am at my best, being humble.
In fact, humility is the foundation of a learner’s spirit, and it is essential to anyone who strives to follow Jesus and wear the badge of “disciple.” A disciple is a learner, and it is impossible to be a disciple without the recognition that I have something to learn. I need the humility to see my shortcomings, inexperience, biases, pride, defensiveness, misunderstandings, and more.
Biblically, there are many ways to learn: from history (Romans 15:4), from making mistakes (Proverbs 26:11-12), from discipline and correction (Proverbs 12:1), from others (Proverbs 12:15), and through effort/intentionality (Proverbs 4:5). Proverbs has a lot to say about humility and learning; in fact, the language of Proverbs chapters one to seven is that of a parent teaching a child. God wants us to be the children and to learn from Wisdom. Jesus further emphasizes the illustration in Matthew 18:1-4 (all quotations are from the NRSV):
At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” 2 He called a child, whom he put among them, 3 and said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 4 Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. 5 Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.
Learning From History
For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. Romans 15:4
There is an oft quoted saying by the Spanish philosopher George Santayana: “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Winston Churchill memorialized and modified it in writing as, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
This is applicable to the importance of reading the Old Testament well, but also in understanding both world history and church history. There are many dark chapters in church history, but during most of those dark chapters the church did not see the darkness. Crusades, indulgences, corrupt power structures, defending slavery, racism, sexism, and humanism have all plagued the church at different times, and some of these are still issues today.
What is difficult during each era is the defensive confidence that the status quo is enlightened; we have learned what there is to learn from the past, and those who question today’s norms are to be condemned and ostracized, or at a minimum, marginalized. It takes humility and a learner’s spirit to consider that we may have more to learn, and that the status quo may be off the mark.
Learning from Making Mistakes
Like a dog that returns to its vomit
is a fool who reverts to his folly.
12 Do you see people wise in their own eyes?
There is more hope for fools than for them. Proverbs 26:11-12
Many of us are experiential learners. We only learn when we try or do and mess up. We touch the hot stove and learn. The continual challenge then is to take responsibility for what happened and reflect. There is an increasingly influential way of thinking that if things do not work out favorably for me it is because someone else did something wrong. In other words, if something does not work out it is because I am a victim. We blame circumstances, leaders, friends, and family members. And God. It is a lot of work to take responsibility for our mistakes and many of us do not want to put the time and energy into both owning them and working to address them.
Learning from Discipline and Correction
Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge,
but those who hate to be rebuked are stupid. Proverbs 12:1
Sometimes, this is just learning from life. This year I decided to talk to a Christian counselor about my life and persistent character challenges. We had many sessions to talk about my premature birth, early childhood lack of attachment to my mother, my upbringing, alcoholism in the family, the early death of my mother and my failure to mourn, and my struggle with being emotionally rigid, easily aggravated, and excessively ordering my environment. As we were working through the early issues, I was beginning to believe that my struggles were all explainable: look at what happened to me!
But there came a point when talking about relationships in my immediate family that the counselor changed his tone and became a bit more direct. He said, “Jim, the problem is you value control and your own comfortability more than the relationship.” His words, though stunning, immediately rang true. Sure, my family history lent itself to my struggle, but it is not an excuse, and I am responsible for who I am today and will be tomorrow. Discipline and correction are uncomfortable, and I even find the process of change disorienting. While giving up on my control strategies I have begun to lose things and forget things, but hopefully I am more present in the moment, and I sense the quality of my relationships improving.
Learning from Others
Fools think their own way is right,
but the wise listen to advice. Proverbs 12:15
Whom I am willing to learn from is a significant indicator of my humility and learner’s spirit. I see a trainer twice a week who is 28 years old. He teaches me about fitness, and both encourages and challenges me. I have a tennis coach who is 20 years younger than me. He knows more about doubles tennis strategy and develops drills to help me improve; when he gives me an encouragement or correction, I take it seriously. My wife is an overcomer and a natural leader, with strong qualities that I lack; I watch and learn every day. My adult children are all in their thirty’s; the three boys are professionals and leaders, with experience and perspective that I do not have, and I learn from them continually. I am frequently amazed and inspired by women leaders who have emotional maturity and a gift at connecting with others; I want to be more like them.
One of the challenges some of us have is that we are quite selective about who we are willing to learn from, and what we are willing to question, consider, or reflect upon. We may have a hierarchal view of learning, have sacred self-interests, or a discomfort with anything that is not highly certain. Think of the challenges others had in changing their minds about the shape of the planet, slavery, the rights of women to vote, and basic civil rights for people of color.
The big challenge Jesus had with the religious ruling class of his day was that they were not willing to learn from him, and there was so much to learn! They had the defensive confidence that the status quo of their time was enlightened. Jesus was disruptive, a troublemaker, someone to be marginalized. They couldn’t discredit him, or kick him out of their circle, so they killed him. God knew this to be the case and worked his redemptive plan out of the cross, but let me ask a question: is it possible that I am more like the religious ruling class of Jesus’ day than I care to admit? If Jesus came into my church today, would I see him as disruptive if he had something to say about the way I am living, leading, and treating others?
Learning from Effort and Intentionality
Get wisdom; get insight: do not forget nor turn away
from the words of my mouth. Proverbs 4:5
Are you a learner? If so, what have you changed your mind about recently? I heard Gordon Ferguson speak after bouncing back from almost dying from cancer and its treatment protocol. It was remarkable to hear him talk (just before turning 80) about how his view of God has shifted, and how he is learning how to trust and be ready for his transition when it does finally come. What a significant change of thinking about perhaps the most important topic on the planet: how we view God. His recent experience was the trigger, but he also took that experience and reflected and studied and came to some new conclusions. That is humility and learning. It takes effort and intentionality.
I have had to do quite a bit of work the last few years to learn how to better read the Bible, become more aware of my cultural biases, to be more open to feedback and correction, and to tackle my persistent character flaws and sins. I am also beginning to grapple with the concept of retirement (or evolving!) and what that might look like. It takes significant thought, effort, and energy, and I am committed to it.
The default, however, is to be lazy and defend the status quo, to have a defensive confidence that is inflexible and unwilling to learn and change. I contest that you cannot call yourself a disciple if you are living in this default state.
What are you learning? How are you growing? Are you willing to change your mind if you get added information or a new perspective?
I love Psalm 25. David was in distress; he had a pervasive confidence, but it was in God, not himself. Look at the language of learning and humility and trust in this psalm and be inspired to imitate this heart. Below are verses 1-9, but I encourage you to meditate on the entire psalm.
Psalm 25
Prayer for Guidance and for Deliverance
Of David.
1 To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.
2 O my God, in you I trust;
do not let me be put to shame;
do not let my enemies exult over me.
3 Do not let those who wait for you be put to shame;
let them be ashamed who are wantonly treacherous.
4 Make me to know your ways, O Lord;
teach me your paths.
5 Lead me in your truth and teach me,
for you are the God of my salvation;
for you I wait all day long.
6 Be mindful of your mercy, O Lord, and of your steadfast love,
for they have been from of old.
7 Do not remember the sins of my youth or my transgressions;
according to your steadfast love remember me,
for the sake of your goodness, O Lord!
8 Good and upright is the Lord;
therefore he instructs sinners in the way.
9 He leads the humble in what is right
and teaches the humble his way.
