Friday, October 24, 2008

Luther's Prayer at the Diet of Worms

This is Martin Luther's prayer the night that he was given to think over whether he would recant his 95 theses.

O God, Almighty God everlasting! how dreadful is the world! behold how its mouth opens to swallow me up, and how small is my faith in Thee! . . . Oh! the weakness of the flesh, and the power of Satan! If I am to depend upon any strength of this world - all is over . . . The knell is struck . . . Sentence is gone forth . . . O God! O God! O thou, my God! help me against the wisdom of this world. Do this, I beseech thee; thou shouldst do this . . . by thy own mighty power . . . The work is not mine, but Thine. I have no business here . . . I have nothing to contend for with these great men of the world! I would gladly pass my days in happiness and peace. But the cause is Thine . . . And it is righteous and everlasting! O Lord! help me! O faithful and unchangeable God! I lean not upon man. It were vain! Whatever is of man is totering, whtaever proceeds from him must fail. My God! my God! dost thou not hear? My God! art thou no longer living? Nay, thou canst not die. Thou dost but hide Thyself. Thou hast chosen me for this work. I know it! . . . Therefore, O God, accomplish thine own will! Forsake me not, for the sake of thy well-beloved Son, Jesus Christ, my defence, my buckler, and my stronghold.
Lord - where art thou? . . . My God, where art thou? . . . Come! I pray thee, I am ready . . . Behold me prepared to lay down my life for thy truth . . . suffering like a lamb. For the cause is holy. It is thine own! . . . I will not let thee go! no, nor yet for all eternity! And though the world should be thronged with devils - and this body, which is the work of thine hands, should be cast forth, trodden under foot, cut in pieces, . . . consumed to ashes, my soul is thine. Yes, I have thine own word to assure me of it. My soul belongs to thee, and will abide with thee forever! Amen! O God send help! . . . Amen!
- Martin Luther

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

A Call to Christian Mourning

Something which has become more and more troubling to me of late is the lack of seriousness in the Christian society around me. I don't mean seriousness with respect to godly living (although that is certainly an even weightier matter), but a seriousness in attitude and in the general perspective on life. I know that at times I have been confronted in my prayers and meditations with such a reality of hell and of the wretchedness and desperateness of the corruption of my own soul and of the whole creation that I have been totally wrecked and overwhelmed. It is not hard to pray when you come to this point, the hard thing is unbending your knees. I have always thought that, in spite of my better judgment, it must not be right to dwell too much on these matters since they lead only to a state of lament and, save for the grace of God, depression. And afterall, the Christian life is one characterized with joy and love, the fruits of the Spirit, not all this morbidness, right?

Yet, as I have been personally studying and meditating on the Sermon on the Mount, Martyn Lloyd-Jones asked the question that overhauled all of this.

How many times does Scripture record Jesus laughing?

Well, I guess the answer is that I can't think of any, and if he is asking this as a loaded question then obviously he has done his homework, and so the answer is that Scripture never mentions Him lauging at all. Of course, everyone knows that He wept - at the tomb of Lazarus, over the coming destruction of Jerusalem, and at Gethsemane. But apparently laughter did not characterize His life.

That's all fine, but rather than argue too much out of Scriptural silence, lets consider what it actually says explicitly about the nature of the Christian mindset with respect to joy and mourning. In particular, our Lord says most strikingly, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Matthew 5:4). So if we properly understand the Beatitudes to describe the character of a Christian, what he is rather than what he does, we must believe that an outstanding attribute of the Christian is a spirit of mourning. Look at them in order, they all address the spirit - a spirit of poverty, a spirit of mourning, a spirit of meekness. These characteristics all find their magnificent apex and culmination in Christ. We find Him mourning over Lazarus, not because he had died (for he would soon be raised), but over the tragedy of the fallen world. And similarly, we find Him, even in the heat of His indignation against impenitent Israel, lamenting bitterly over them with motherly affection. Christ's was a spirit of mourning. Indeed, could a compassionate God dwell in the midst of a crooked and perverse world with any other spirit than one of mourning and lamentation?

And it is not only this one example that leads to this conclusion. James commands sinners to, "Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom." And Paul commands bishops to be, "sober-minded," older men to be, "sober, reverent, temperate," older women to be, "reverent in behavior," young men to be, "sober-minded . . . in doctrine showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility" (Titus 1:8, 2:2-3, 6-7). The Christian attitude should be characterized by mourning, sobriety, and reverence. We might follow up Lloyd-Jones's question with, "How many times does the New Testament command us to laugh?" I have never found it. It does warn us to avoid course jesting (Ephesians 5:4). And it does command us to mourn. So how much time do we spend mourning, and how much in jesting?

Now, are we to conclude from this that Christians ought to wear frowns and constantly go about in sorrow and mourning? Certainly not, but we should realize that to be a Christian is not to be an idealist, but to become a super-realist. The true Christian stares the tragic realities of a fallen world in the face squarely and still finds joy - but only in Christ. The true Christian in his consideration of the true state of things is broken and exceedingly sorrowful, and yet is comforted by the "consolation in Christ, the comfort of love, the fellowship of love, and by mercy and affection" (Philippians 2:1). The Christian's joy does not come from burying his head in the sand and ignoring the falleness, perversity, and desperateness of the world - his joy comes exclusively from Christ.

My prayer is that this generation of Christians would be sober-minded, have hearts broken and burdened - that we would have our minds set on heavenly things, that we would esteem Christ's sacrifice and yearn for Him to receive His due glory for it. When we are truly burdened in our hearts for the state of our own hearts and for the state of all that we see around us, we will truly mourn, and when we truly mourn, we will truly receive Christ's blessing. "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted." Amen and amen!

Soli Deo Gloria