A Kingdom of Priests (1)

 

“To Him who loves us and released us from our sins by His blood – and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father – to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” (Revelation 1:5b – 6, NASB).

 

“And they sang a new song, saying, ‘Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth.” (Revelation 5:9 – 10; see also 1 Peter 2:4 – 10).

 

I want to explore what it means to be a kingdom of priests, or as Peter styles it in 1Peter 1:9, “a royal priesthood.” What does it mean for the individual, and what does it mean for us as a people?

 

The terms “priest” and “priesthood” are loaded with meaning, meaning that we tend to overlook if we are from certain Christian traditions; for while those of us who are in traditions that have vocational ministers called “priests” may indeed miss some elements of the idea that we are a Kingdom of Priests; those of us from traditions that do not have priests can miss the force, beauty, and calling of the image of Christ making us “a kingdom and priests to God.”

 

The notion that the priesthood of the believer means that we all have direct access to God and His Word, and that this is pretty much what the Bible means when we read that we are a royal priesthood, falls short of the image of the priesthood. In fact, if the idea of direct access to God and His Word is the primary idea behind the priesthood of the believer then we can wonder why use the image at all, since this reality of our union with Christ is taught throughout the New Testament, and indeed throughout the entire Bible.

 

In its Biblical context, the idea of priesthood is primarily that of a mediator between God and man, offering service to God according to God’s due order grounded in Yahweh’s Levitical sacrificial system. While priests in the Bible could certainly convey the Word of God to the people, the primary conveyors of God’s Word in the Old Testament were prophets such as Moses, Elijah, and Isaiah. The role of prophets overlapped with the role of priests in that prophets were intercessors, we see this especially in Moses and Daniel – as intercessors they stood in the gap between Yahweh and God’s covenant people, and indeed between God and the world. Jesus Christ exemplifies this calling as our High Priest and He calls us to participate with Him in His Priesthood – which is after the Order of Melchizedek (more on Melchizedek in the future).

 

Of course in David we see the coming Prophet, Priest, and King – Jesus Christ. (Perhaps more on this in the future).

 

When Protestants use the Reformation as the backdrop of their thinking about the Royal Priesthood, and when they use the Roman Catholic Church as their foil, they fail to engage the Biblical context of the priesthood of the believer, a term that may be problematic in itself. For it is Christ who has made us a Kingdom and Priests unto the Father, and not our belief (yes, yes, I know we can say that our belief comes from Christ, but I still think that lessens the impact of the Biblical language).

 

Also, when we teach the notion that we do not need the Church to interpret the Bible because we are all priests, that flies in the face of the Bible, the Fathers, and common sense. The transmission of Dominical and Apostolic teaching, and obedience thereto, is the basis of much of the New Testament; consistency, origin, and witness thereto is also the foundation of the New Testament Canon established by the Church. While I do not use the word Church in a strictly institutional sense, the fact is that the Church manifested itself through institutions…thankfully those early institutions had new wine more often than not. Furthermore, consider the formulation of the creeds, especially Nicaea and its descendants – forged in the fires of the Church. How foolish to think that an individual should go off willy-nilly and set up his or her own theological franchise. And let us not forget, that while Luther had problems with elements of Rome, that he was an Augustinian monk, rooted in Augustine – I am not aware that Luther repudiated the great Latin Father.

 

Protestants who view the Royal Priesthood in the context of the Reformation, and who use the Roman Catholic Church as a foil, do a disservice to Biblical texts on the priesthood. This is not to say that we ought not to learn from history, but it is to say that if we are not engaging the Biblical text first as the Biblical text, as the Word of God in its Biblical context, that we are falling into a trap and missing the glory, in this case, of the Royal Priesthood.

 

When I was in seminary a fellow student preached at a Presbyterian church where he was doing his mentored ministry. At the conclusion of the service he raised his hands and pronounced the benediction. Before he left the church the pastor took him aside and told him that because my friend was not ordained that he should not raise his hands in benediction. Now I ask you, is this thinking not the equivalent of maintaining a priestly caste that sits above the people? If ordination is the entrance into such a caste, then is not a Protestant (and Reformed!) duck much the same as a Roman Catholic duck?

 

I have met brothers who think that the “workman” of 2 Timothy 2:15 and the “man of God” that Paul writes of in 2 Timothy 3:17 are limited to those who are ordained – if this is so, then these verses are not for everyone, and if they are not for everyone then what about the Royal Priesthood? Do we not have a Protestant duck that looks much the same as the Roman Catholic duck?

 

If we can recover the Biblical vision and meaning of Jesus Christ making us a kingdom and priests to His Father, if we can establish a high view of this priesthood in Christ, then our sense of calling and mission will hopefully be elevated and empowered; I write “hopefully,” for then we will have a decision to make, whether to live as priests before God and man…or not.

 

In closing, one of the finest books on ministry I have ever read is by the late Bishop Fulton Sheen, The Priest Is Not His Own. While the good Bishop is, of course, writing to Roman Catholic priests, his Biblical wisdom is not only for all called to vocational ministry, but for all Christians of whatever tradition they are in. One of the central thoughts in the book is that the priest is both priest and sacrifice. Is not this a picture of our dear Lord Jesus, the Lamb of God? He is both our High Priest and our Sacrifice.

 

This was the calling of Jesus Christ, and it is also our calling in Him.

 

The Chapter 30 Diner (18)

  

“Do not slander a slave to his master, or he will curse you and you will be found guilty.” (Proverbs 30:10).

 

Why is Agur telling this to his friends? Why does it appear in this context? How are we to respond to it? What comes to your mind as you read it?

 

I am reminded of Proverbs 26:17; “Like one who takes a dog by the ears is he who passes by and meddles [infuriates himself] with strife not belonging to him.” This in turn leads to Proverbs 3:30, “Do not contend with a man without cause, if he has done you no harm.”

 

Of course, when we read “if he has done you no harm,” we also need to recall Jesus saying, “You have heard it was said, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat also” (Matthew 5:38 – 40).

 

Then we have, within the context of the Church, Paul writing in Romans 14:10 – 13, “But you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you regard your brother with contempt? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written, ‘As I live says the Lord, every knee shall bow to Me, and every tongue shall give praise to God.’ So then each one of us will give an account of himself to God. Therefore let us not judge one another anymore, but rather determine this – not to put an obstacle or a stumbling block in a brother’s way.” (See also 1 Cor. 4:5).

 

I am sure there are more facets to the above passages than I see, and there are certainly nuances to them. For example, as the Bible demonstrates, there are times when we need to judge others within the Church, as Paul clearly does in Romans and 1 Corinthians, and indeed, in most of his letters. Immature teaching is one thing, but false teaching and sinful living are another. BUT, and I think this is critical, such judgment is not for an individual to exercise so much as it is for elders. Furthermore, when individual judgment is demanded because of circumstances, it hopefully will be done on the basis of the individual’s position within the church, based on the office of the individual; for example it is the “pastor” or “bishop” or “elder” who is speaking responsibly – it is the “office” and not the individual.

 

Also, there may be times when we do need to bring the actions of an employee to the attention of an employer, just as there may be times when we need to become involved in strife not directly affecting us for reasons of equity and the protection of those who cannot protect themselves.

 

Life can be complicated and how we may respond to the above passages is not cut and dry, but we can trust our Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit to guide us through life’s mazes and complexities.

 

I think the above passages can act like a governor on an engine, they can help us keep our speed below a certain limit and ponder what we see and how we see it and how we should respond. When we err in these things it is usually because we are too quick to speak and act and not quick enough to pray, ask God’s guidance, and submit to the Holy Spirit.

 

We don’t need to have an opinion about everything, we don’t need to judge everything. Paul writes, “For what have I to do with judging outsiders?” (1 Cor. 5:12). The world is the world is the world; we are called to worship God, edify one another in Christ, and make disciples. When Christians think it is incumbent on them to analyze the world by scrutinizing every political statement and every government policy and every corporate action, they are distracted from Jesus Christ and the Gospel. Consider that Jesus said, “If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would fight.”

 

The above passages caution us not to live lives of perpetual judging. We can elevate our opinions and preferences into a sort of moral law, when they are really a simple matter of preferences and opinions – and this can be especially true when it comes to church matters, whether in a worship setting or in church governance.

 

We live in a world in rebellion against God (see Psalm 2); in a world in which no one is perfect – neither sinner (those outside Christ) nor saint (those inside Christ). We ought to have grace and mercy for everyone, we ought to make allowances whenever possible (see Matthew 5:43 – 48) and remember that we are the sons and daughters of God; we are not free to judge as we want, but we are free to show mercy and kindness and forgiveness.

 

Well, these are some of the things I see as I turn the kaleidoscope, what do you see?

 

The Glory of Sonship in the Son (1)

  

“See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him.” (1 John 3:1; all quotations are NASB unless otherwise noted).

 

“Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His into our hearts crying, “Abba! Father! Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir through God.” (Galatians 4:6 – 7; see also Romans 8:14 – 17).

 

How do we think about God? How do we think about ourselves? How do we think about our relationship with God in Christ? What is our primary image of God, our center-of-gravity image? Our center-of-gravity image of God will determine how we think about ourselves and how we view our relationship with God. This, in turn, will determine how we view our relationships with others, both within and without the Body of Christ.

 

There is a sense in which the Church does not have a witnessing problem, or an obedience problem, or a problem with loving others, or even a holiness problem; it has a problem with a center-of-gravity image of God. If our navigation is off, our destination will be off; that is, if our navigational assumptions are wrong, we will end up far wide of the mark of God’s eternal purpose for our lives.

 

The Apostle John writes, “See [Behold!] how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are…” Paul writes that our hearts cry out, “Abba Father!”

 

And yet, the questions remain; how do we see God, how do we see ourselves, how do we view our relationship with God in Christ? If the lens of our vision is off, we will not see these things with clarity.

 

There are stories of children having problems in school, of not being able to learn, of being considered “slow” or diagnosed with a learning disability; only to find out that they couldn’t see well and needed glasses. Theodore Roosevelt lived many years as a near-sighted child, being confined to seeing the world close-up; when it was realized he was near-sighted and he received glasses he could not believe the change in his world – though of course he was actually the one who changed.

 

When our mind and thinking are taught to see things a certain way it can be difficult to accept other ways of viewing life and people and God. So strong can our preconceptions be when approaching the Bible that we gloss over what we read, forcing what we read into our preconceived images and doctrines. In Jesus’ time the preconceptions of the religious leaders were so strong that they didn’t recognize the Messiah and they engineered His crucifixion – even though they knew what we call the Old Testament. They saw the Truth as not the Truth, but as a threat. The Truth made them angry, so angry that they became murderers and persecutors.

 

We can search the Scriptures, thinking that by knowing the Bible we will have eternal life, and yet miss Jesus Christ (John 5:39 – 40). We can hear the Bible read every week, and yet not “hear” what the Word of God is saying (Acts:13:27) and condemn the Truth.

 

In the eternal counsels of God, in the Trinity, before the foundation of the world, God purposed that the Son would have many brethren, many brothers and sisters. In these counsels God purposed that the Son would have a Body, a Bride; and that God would live in a living Temple.

 

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…just as He chose us in Him [Christ] before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will…” (Ephesians 1:3 – 5).

 

Note that the word “adoption” is used differently than we use it today. We will look at this in the next post. We are God’s sons and daughters not by adoption in the sense that we use the word today, but rather by new birth in Christ.

 

We see in Romans 8:29 that it is God’s desire and purpose that the Son “would be the firstborn among many brethren.” All that Romans chapters 1 – 7 cover is to lead us to our glorious sonship in the Son in Chapter 8.

 

In Hebrews Chapter 2, one of the great passages on the Incarnation, we see that the Son came to earth for His brethren, to declare the Father’s Name to them; “I will proclaim Your name to My brethren…” We also read that God’s purpose is to “bring many sons to glory,” and that “…both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one [Father]; for which reason He [Christ Jesus] is not ashamed to call them brethren.”

 

In Genesis we see a picture of Christ Jesus in Joseph, who was rejected by his brethren, sold into slavery, later put into prison, and who was then exalted to Pharoah’s side and became the source of salvation for his brethren. What the brothers meant for evil, God meant for good.

 

Yet, we also see in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy that the descendants of Jacob forgot who they were and adopted an identity of slavery, they saw themselves as beasts of burden and therefore worshipped a calf (Psalm 106:19 – 21); they exchanged the glory of God for the image of an ox that eats grass (a symbol of the flesh, the natural world and natural man).

 

The people whom Moses was sent to no longer saw themselves as sons and daughters of the covenant that Yahweh made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; instead their identity was one of slaves in slavery, working with straw and earth.

 

O dear friends, Jesus Christ has declared the Name of our Father to us, He has come to bring us into the Holy of Holies and to live there as a way of life. Christ Jesus calls us to live in intimacy within the holy Trinity, as His continuing Incarnation in this world, as His broken bread and poured out wine for this world. This is why the Apostle John can write:

 

“…what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship [koinonia] with us; and indeed our fellowship [koinonia] is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” (1 John 1:3).

 

To have koinonia with John and his friends was to have koinonia with the Father and Son.

 

 Would we write such a thing today about ourselves? About our congregations?

 

This is the same John who writes, “See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God…”

 

How do we view God? How do we see ourselves? How do we view our relationship with the Trinity?

The Chapter 30 Diner (17)

 

 

“Two things I asked of You, do not refuse me before I die; keep deception and lies far from me, give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is my portion, that I not be full and deny You and say, ‘Who is Yahweh?’ Or that I not be in want and steal, and profane the name of my God.” (Proverbs 30:7 – 9, NASB).

 

What do you see when you read these words of Agur? What do you see about Agur the man? What does this reveal about him? What does this tell us about his heart? His thinking? His desire?

 

Here is Agur, speaking to his friends Ithiel and Ucal, and in the midst of speaking to his friends Agur begins to speak to his great Friend, to God who has revealed Himself as Yahweh. When Agur has finished speaking to Yahweh he will turn his attention once again to his friends.

 

Of course, Yahweh is part of Agur’s conversation with his friends; or we might say that Agur’s conversation with Ithiel and Ucal takes place within Agur’s life in Yahweh. This is much the same as when our Lord Jesus Christ was on earth – everything He did, everything He said, He said and did in His Life in the Father (see John 5:19 and similar verses). This is our calling, this is our Life in the Vine (John 15:1ff). This is what is to be our normal Christian life – this is what we should expect when we arise every morning – for we live in Christ and Christ lives in us and this is a critical element of the Gospel – that Christ gives His Life for us and that we live in that Life as sons and daughters of the Living God – this is our birthright, this is our inheritance.

 

Just as our forefathers knew the blessedness of forgiveness prior to Jesus dying on the Cross (see Romans 4); they knew koinonia with Yahweh – yes, there was a fuller inheritance promised in Messiah yet to come, but they knew and tasted the Divine Life…and we may say that Abraham was God’s friend, that Moses spoke to Him face-to-face, and that Enoch walked with God.  

 

If you were going to write verses 7 – 9, what would you say? What do you want God to keep far from you? What do you see as a particular threat to your soul and your relationship with the Trinity?

 

Agur wanted deception and lies kept far from him. This may be deception and lies coming from others – outside himself, and it may be deception and lies within his own heart and mind – or it could be both. In my life I pray it both ways, for they are both possibilities and they can be connected; I have known deception both outside and inside myself…what about you?

 

Agur asks Yahweh to give him neither poverty nor riches because he sees them both as a threat to his relationship with God. Some of us are better at living in diverse circumstances than others, consider what Paul wrote from a Roman prison:

 

“I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need.” (Philippians 4:12).

 

Paul writes to Timothy, “Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly gives supplies us with all things to enjoy.” (1 Timothy 6:17).

 

“But godliness is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment. For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either.” (1 Tim. 5:6 – 7).

 

While Agur is concerned that he not be rich nor in poverty, we may have other situations that would pose danger to our relationship with God. As we know Christ, and as in Christ we better understand ourselves, there may be things we know we should stay away from to protect our relationship with God – and if these things come into our lives then to be “forewarned is to be forearmed.” That is, we ought to anticipate that temptations will come to try us and to draw us further into Christ.

 

This is not about sin in the sense there is nothing sinful about either poverty or riches, but our response to both can be sinful and can damage our intimacy with Christ and with one another.

 

Power, position, recognition, beauty, a car, a house, obsession with food and drink, personal appearance, success…what else can you add to this list? There are myriad situations and things that are not sinful in and of themselves, but which may be particular threats to us as individuals and as congregations.

 

For Agur, his relationship with God and his testimony for God was central to his thinking. He knew himself well enough to pray and write verses 7 – 9.

 

Many years ago I read, “He who conquers, conquers twice when he conquers himself also.” This was not, as far as I know, written by a disciple of Christ, and yet any man or woman in Christ should recognize the truth of this maxim. It is in line with, “Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall” (1Cor. 10:12).

 

I have long known the danger of success and recognition; I know how it leads to pride and self-glory. You, yourself, may have enjoyed wonderful success without this ever being a problem for you; it has been a problem for me – and I have learned that I need to be quick about giving Jesus Christ the glory and fleeing to God for a refuge from my own pride and vanity.

 

I can write, “When I do have success by Your grace, make me to fall on my face and give you glory with my next breath; deliver me from pride and vanity. Let success, the accomplishment of desires and goals, always be for Your glory and the blessing of others, let it always portray Jesus Christ. O Father, deliver me from myself.”

 

This is an example of what I would write should I play the roll of Agur.

 

What would you write?

 

The Chapter 30 Diner (16)

 

 

“Do not add to His words, or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar.” Proverbs 30:6.

 

As I pointed out in the previous post; not adding to the Word of God nor taking away from the Word of God is more than saying, “I believe the Bible is the Word of God and that nothing else written or verbally said is on the same level as the Bible.” We can mouth these words while functionally denying them. We can deceive ourselves and others into thinking that we are not adding to or taking away from God’s Word, when in practice we are doing one or the other or both.

 

I am a proponent of preaching through the books of the Bible; this is not the same as preaching through the Bible beginning with Genesis and concluding with Revelation. I believe it is pastorally important to expose congregations to various sections of the Bible on an ongoing basis to help them see the scope of Scripture, and in order to help them read and experience this scope themselves, in their marriages and families, and in their fellowship with other disciples. Above all, we want to see Jesus Christ throughout the Bible, not only prophetically in the predictive sense of that term, but sacramentally – we want to “see” and taste and receive His Presence throughout Scripture.

 

We ought to remember that the order of the Biblical books, while perhaps having a certain providence to them, is not sacred anymore than the insertion of chapters and verses in the Bible is sacred. At the same time, if we are going to teach the Bible as it was written then it seems that our primary model ought to be working through its books; seeking Christ, seeing the structure of the books, the Biblical context of the books, and honoring Biblical epistemology (see previous past), the Church, and submitting to the Holy Spirit.

Note that I included “the Church” above. I don’t for one moment believe that the idea of sola Scriptura means that we read, understand, and receive the Bible apart from the Church’s historical teaching. I used to think it did, in fact I functionally thought that sound theology began at the Reformation – I knew Church History in the sense that I knew much of the story of the Church in terms of dates and events, but I did not know the story of the Word of God in the Church.

 

An irony is that if we say “sola Scriptura” in isolation from the Church and think we are honoring the Reformation and its immediate successors, then we are mistaken. The Reformers were steeped in the Church Fathers, and, for example, we have quotations in Greek and Latin from Puritan pastors and writers who claimed descent from the Reformation. I have come to realize that if we are ignorant of the Fathers that we lack a context to appreciate much of what has been written in the Reformed or Lutheran or Anglican traditions. While we may disagree over Apostolic Succession in terms of bishops, we should not be so foolish as to discard the idea of Apostolic Succession in terms of Biblical interpretation.

 

The Bible belongs to the transcendent Church and not to me. I am not to own the Bible in a proprietary sense, the Bible is to possess and own me as a member of the Body of Christ, His Church.

 

In the Bible I find communion (koinonia) with the Trinity and with my brothers and sisters in Christ. In the Word we see Christ, we taste Christ, we embrace Christ…and are embraced by Christ. In the Word we breathe the atmosphere of the eternals, we are lifted up above the present age as we learn to live where we already are, in the heavenly places in Christ (Ephesians 2:6). We set our minds on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God (Colossians 3:1).

 

When Christ appears, Christ who is our life…a marvelous thing happens…we also appear with Him in glory (Colossians 3:4). C.S. Lewis in his essay The Weight of Glory, wrote that if we could really see the person standing next to us, that we would want to fall down and worship because we would see the glory of God in that person. Paul writes that Christ in us is our hope of glory (Colossians 1:27).

 

Seeing Christ is to be our daily experience, and as we see Christ then we are changed into His likeness from glory to glory (2 Cor. 3:17 – 18; 1 John 3:1ff; Romans 12:1ff); we appear with Him in glory and we can see one another in that glory. We eat His flesh and drink His blood (John 6), we partake of Him as our Way of Life.

 

If we are not seeing Christ throughout the Word then we are not far along on our journey of living in the Bible, we may have the raw material of Biblical knowledge, but until the Holy Spirit breathes on our understanding and enlivens our heart, until the Spirit of God reveals the things of God (1 Cor. 2), we are living far below our inheritance in our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

To unpack a passage verse by verse without seeing Jesus Christ and communicating Jesus Christ is not the equivalent of teaching the Bible…at least not as the Word of God, for the Word of God is Jesus Christ. If we cannot see the portrait of Jesus Christ then are we really teaching and unveiling (by the Holy Spirit) the Word of God, are we not then either taking away or adding to God’s Word?

 

If the Word of God is not made “present” to us in our teaching, if Jesus is not touching us and we are not touching Jesus – individually and as His People – then what do we have? We commune with Christ and with one another (in and as Christ) as we receive His Word. Just as the Communion Table is more than an individual partaking (1 Cor. 10:14 – 17), just as we partake of Jesus Christ and of one another, and just as we receive Jesus Christ as a People at the Table – likewise do we experience His Word in this fashion as we partake of the Divine Nature (2 Peter 1:2 – 4).

 

Consider Isaiah 28:13, “So the word of Yahweh to them will be, Order on order, order on order, line on line, line on line, a little here a little there, that they may go and stumble backward, be broken, snared and taken captive.” As Edward D. Young writes in his commentary on this passage, “The nation received no coherent picture, did not understand his proclamation in its fulness.” Yet how many times have I heard well – meaning Christians quote this passage as an example of how we should read and teach the Bible!

 

Show me the painting and then we can examine the brush strokes. Show me the forest and then we can examine the trees. Show me Jesus Christ in His Word, by His Word, through His Word…and may we be transformed into His image by the Holy Spirit as we live in the Trinity as His People, as the sons and daughters of the Living God.

 

 

The Chapter 30 Diner (15)

 

“Do not add to His words, or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar.” Proverbs 30:6.

 

What does this verse mean? Can we associate this verse with Revelation 22:18-19?

 

“I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book; and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the tree of life and from the holy city, which are written in this book.” Rev. 22:18-19.

 

While the context of Revelation 22:18-19 is, of course, Revelation; and while the “prophecy” it refers to, in its immediate context, is the book of Revelation; it is natural to apply these two verses to the entire Bible. While their position in the conclusion of the Bible makes this application quite natural, even if Revelation were positioned elsewhere in the order of Biblical books, it would still be natural and appropriate to see these two verses as applying to the entire Bible – for the entire Bible is a prophecy in that it is God speaking forth and revealing Himself; prophecy being a forthtelling and a foretelling.

 

Agur tells us that we should not add to the words of God, every word of God being tested. If we do add to God's words, Agur says that He will reprove us and we will be found liars.

 

What does this mean? What are the words of God? What is the Word of God that we should not add to?

 

Now I suppose that our typical response is that we should not add to the Bible, that we should not consider any other writing on the same level as the Bible, and I agree with this; but is this all that Proverbs 30:6 and Revelation 22:18-19 mean?

 

Is it enough to say, “I believe the Bible is God’s Word and there is nothing else on the same level as the Bible”? Is it enough to say this if we are misrepresenting the Bible? If we are misrepresenting what the Bible says, then are we not either adding to the Word of God or taking away from His Word? Consider that we can misrepresent the Bible by either omission or commission. That is, we can either use the words of the Bible to teach what is not in the Bible, or we can omit to teach elements of the Bible.

 

Not adding to the Word of God nor taking away from the Word of God is more than saying, “I believe the Bible is the Word of God and that nothing else written or verbally said is on the same level as the Bible.” We can mouth these words while functionally denying them. We can deceive ourselves and others into thinking that we are not adding to or taking away from God’s Word, when in practice we are doing one or the other or both.

 

What is one to do? What is a congregation to do?

 

To begin with, the Bible reveals Jesus Christ, and whatever passage we are working through, our desire ought to be to see Jesus Christ; as Augustine points out repeatedly in his expositions on the Psalms, sometimes we see the Head, sometimes we see His Body, sometimes we see the Head and the Body. Jesus’ unveiling of Himself to His disciples in Luke 24, both on the road to Emmaus and in the Upper Room, through the Law, the Prophets, and the Writings, ought to be an example and challenge in our own understanding and teaching of Scripture. If we aren’t seeing and teaching Jesus Christ then we aren’t “seeing” the Bible, for Jesus Christ is the Testimony of Scripture (John 5:39).

 

The Scriptures are Christological and sacramental, we partake of Jesus Christ when the Holy Spirit opens us to the Bible and the Bible to us.

 

We need the anointing of the Holy Spirit to see Christ in the Bible and the Bible in Christ. We cannot know the things of God without the Spirit of God, nor can we communicate the Bible to others without the Holy Spirit (see John chapters 13 – 17; 1 Corinthians 1:17 – 2:16; Acts 1:7-8). As Jesus says in John 6:63, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.”

 

We’ll pick this back up in the next post.