Reflections on Geerhardus Vos’s Message on “Heavenly Mindedness”
from Hebrews 11:9 – 10:
This is the
goodly company of patriarchs and prophets and saints, who endured the reproach
of Christ, of whom the world was not worthy, who form the line of succession
through which the promises passed, who now compose the cloud of witnesses
that encompass our mortal strife, men of whom God is not ashamed to be
called their God, with whom the Savior Himself is associated as the leader and
finisher of the same faith. G. Vos
We “have” a
great cloud of witnesses surrounding us; we “have come” to Mount Zion and the
heavenly Jerusalem”. While there is undoubtably a more complete experience of
these things yet to come, the Scripture is clear that this is also to be our
present experience.
If we read
Hebrews, and indeed the Bible, as primarily history, we will miss the
invitation of salvation and of communion with God and the saints. If we
fail to know what we call the Old Testament, we will fail to enjoy the company
of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in our present pilgrimage. Why speak and sing of
the “communion of saints” if we do not desire to experience this transcendent
communion?
In Vos’s
message, The Wonderful Tree, based on Hosea 14:8, he says concerning the
union of God and man, “There is an inner sanctuary of
communion, where all else disappears from sight, and the believer shut in
with God gazes upon His loveliness…” Vos later speaks of a “sweet privacy and
inwardness which forms the most precious possession of every pious soul.”
Vos makes the
point in The Wonderful Tree that, “There is even such as thing as
worshipping one’s religion instead of one’s God.”
Now I want to
carefully, I hope, tread on some ground on which I may be misunderstood.
Is it possible
that we are worshipping our religion instead of our Lord Jesus Christ? Is it
possible that we are more concerned with identifying with Paul, Apollos, or
Cephas rather than with Jesus Christ (in the sense of 1 Cor. 1:12)? Do we
realize the constraints, some subtle and some not, inherent in our adoption of religious
and cultural paradigms that move beyond the Nicene Creed (that is, the Basic
and Mere Christianity of our faith)?
I am not
suggesting that we should not have distinctive expressions and understandings
of our faith, but I am suggesting that if we are not aware of our propensity to
allow these expressions and understandings to limit our Scriptural experience with
the Trinity and communion with the saints – both the saints here and those who
have gone before us – that we run the danger of closing ourselves off from
growth in Christ and with one another.
I suppose we
require some examples. In my pastoring, pulpit supply, and interim pastoring
experience; as well as in my general experience with Christians, I have consistently
found that church members often think of themselves as Baptists, Presbyterians,
Congregationalists, Assembly of God, and the like before they think of
themselves as members of the Body of Christ – if they think of the Body of Christ
at all. Not only that, but they often think of themselves as members of a group
within a group – for instance, a sister in Christ recently told me not that she
was just a Presbyterian, but that she was PCA.
If we allow this
type of thinking to define us, which it usually does, then our perspectives on
the Kingdom are necessarily limited and the possibilities of communing with
saints on earth who have different flavors are lessened. If we cannot commune
with the saints on earth, how can we possibility know communion with the saints
who have gone before us? How can we possibly sense the great cloud of
witnesses?
To take this
another step; when we cut ourselves off from the historical life-flow of the
Church of Jesus Christ, from the Apostolic and Church Fathers, and from those who
lived for Christ and in Christ between then and today, we once again limit our
openness to the communion of the saints for we (speaking to Protestants) act as if the Church began during the
Reformation, or during one of the times of renewal since the Reformation. Among
other things, we fail to recognize that the Reformers were rooted in the Church
Fathers as well as the Bible. While many of us may not hold to Apostolic
Succession in terms of individual prelates, we should all hold to Apostolic
Succession in terms of both doctrine and the manner in which doctrine was
fashioned and articulated. When we cut ourselves off from Apostolic
Succession in this latter sense, we limit our consciousness of the great cloud
of witnesses who have gone before us.
Then there are
those who say, “I’m a New Testament Christian and I don’t need the Old
Testament.” In addition to that being a heretical teaching worthy of Marcion,
it once again cuts us off from the cloud of witnesses we see in Hebrews 12:1. Sadly,
whether we say it or not, many of us live as if the Old Testament doesn’t
matter – it isn’t likely that we can behold Jesus Christ in the New Testament
if we don’t behold Him in the Old Testament – you might as well try to fly a
plane with only one wing.
Let me return to
a quote from Vos above, “And finally my hearers, from this falls some light
upon the mystery that a finite creature can receive and possess the infinite
God…when we try to resolve the figure into the thing itself, the reality
grows so great and deep that it transcends our minds, and we must resign ourselves
to an experience without understanding.”
While this may
be troubling to the mind birthed from the Enlightenment, wedded to the natural
man’s rationalization (see 1 Corinthians Chapter 2), what might we
expect when we encounter the I AM THAT I AM? The man or woman who encounters the
Holy One often has nothing to say, because there are places where words fail
us. There are also encounters so sacred, so holy, that to speak of them is to
profane them.
Of course, there
are those who merchandise experiences and who make certain experiences the
litmus test of fellowship and spirituality. This is childish at best, and
heretical at worst. The Word of God in Christ is our standard, not our
experience of that Word (in the sense in which I’m writing). Certainly, the
Word is ever and always transformative, but its transformative work in me may
not have the form that it has in you.
Above Vos speaks
of an inner sanctuary of communion, do we respect this in one another, or
do we insist, whether explicitly or implicitly, on conformity of experience? George
MacDonald wrote of each one of us having a special place in God, and therefore
a special and particular expression of our God – one that is for God’s glory
and the blessing of others. Do we make it our goal to bring the best out of
each other, which is who we are in Christ and who Christ is in us, or do we
insist on caricaturing the communion of the saints into something created in
our own image and our own tastes?
We are not called
to journey on this pilgrimage alone. We are surrounded by a great cloud of
witnesses, from whom we can gain strength and encouragement. Perhaps we cannot
explain the fulness of this wonderful fellowship, perhaps we cannot explain any
of it – but we are most assuredly called to experience it in our Lord
Jesus Christ.
The next time
you receive the Bread and Wine, consider that in partaking of Christ you are
partaking of His Body and of that Great Cloud of Witnesses.
No comments:
Post a Comment