The Kingdom, the Cross, and Eternal Rewards

By God’s grace the Christian receives eternal rewards. This is a wonderful truth that leaves undeserving sinners speechless. But for all the grace in this concept, we can be tempted to speak of eternal rewards in a way that’s dislocated from the death of Christ.

Salvation is by grace through faith; rewards are a bonus check of merit on top. Not so, say the reformed Dutch theologians. How do they get here?

In his parable of the talents, Jesus seems to connect eternal rewards with the kingdom. The reward for the man who turned 5 talents into 10 and the reward for the man who turned 2 into 4 was the same: “enter into the joy of your master” (Matt 25:14—30). This parable is sandwiched between two other parables about the kingdom (v. 25:1, 34) and it seems to make sense that the “joy of your master” is a synonym for the kingdom.

Why is this important? Follow the flow: Believers receive reward for fruitfulness in this life. The reward is to enter the joy of the master (the kingdom). Once the Dutch theologians connect the dots, it’s not a stretch to say the reward is the kingdom.

Take it one step further. The kingdom is offered as a package deal with salvation by grace alone:

Ephesians 2:4—6. “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus”

Colossians 1:13—14. “He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”

The Dutch guys were careful to never separate personal salvation from the receipt of eternal rewards, and protested the idea that said Christ supplies the first (salvation) and we merit the second (reward) as a bonus. Not so. Every ounce of eternal reward has been purchased by the death of Christ upon the cross. The kingdom is the reward, and the reward is all of grace.

So what is the significance of eternal rewards? A summary by J. van Genderen:

“Reward” in the New Testament means: God fulfills what he promises. It is not senseless to devote oneself to God’s cause. Those who devote their best efforts to it will also share in the victory and the glory. On the negative side, the concept of reward implies that a believer cannot and may not live as a citizen of the realm of darkness. On the positive side it says that he who lives and fights in the service of this kingdom does not do so in vain. He will reap its fruit.

One day everyone will say: My faith and my struggle, my love and my prayers have not been in vain. The LORD fulfills his promise. This has been the goal of my faith and life.

The concept of a reward underscores the necessity and the seriousness with which we are called to live holy lives. The reward itself is part of salvation… The biblical concept of reward is an encouragement from God to persevere. It is a means along the way to consummation. It is entirely a reward of grace. God sustains his own work. He crowns it. Sola gratia. [Concise Reformed Dogmatics (P&R 2008) p. 667.]

Good thoughts from the Dutch boys to ponder as we develop our theology of rewards. This model provides one thoughtful approach that preserves the grace-centeredness and the cross-centeredness of eternal rewards. Are there others?

And the beach was no more…

Few things in life are more wonderful than a warm day at the beach with the family. I love it. It’s a little paradise on earth. Except I always leave the beach tortured by one thought. The new earth—that perfect eternal home built for God’s redeemed children—will be sea-less. And that’s what I read at the end of the Bible in Revelation 21:1—“and the sea was no more.” Now, I’m not too decisive on my favorite passage of scripture, but I am clear on my least favorite.

I know this all sounds vain. You’re thinking, doesn’t he know the presence of our Savior and the Triune God and the angels and all the redeemed singing praise to our Savior will be an overwhelming joy that will make us forget all about pain and loss and beach vacations? Yes, of course I do. I anticipate the new creation for all these glorious reasons. But this doesn’t answer my lingering question: Why no seas?

So you can imagine my delight when I recently read one sentence written by G. K. Beale, an expert on the book of Revelation. He wrote: “the presence of a literal sea in the new creation would not be inconsistent with the figurative exclusion of the sea in 21:1.” In other words, the passage does not rule out the possibility of a heavenly shoreline. While Beale’s words hardly say, “pack a beach towel,” I am more hopeful that my glorified eyes (now 10/80) will gaze upon a perfect beach for eternity.

But enough silly business. Revelation 21:1 contains layers of serious figurative meaning, says Beale:

Usage elsewhere in the Apocalypse suggests various identifications [of “sea”]: (1) the origin of cosmic evil (especially in the light of OT background: so Rev. 4:6: 12:18; 13:1; 15:2), (2) the unbelieving, rebellious nations who cause tribulation for God’s people (12:18; 13:1; Isa. 57:20; cf. Rev. 17:2,6), (3) the place of the dead (20:13), (4) the primary location of the world’s idolatrous trade activity (18:10-19), (5) a literal body of water, sometimes mentioned together with “the earth,” used as a synecdoche in which the sea as a part of the old creation represents the totality of it (5:13; 7:1-3; 8:8-9; 10:2, 5-6, 8; 14:7; 16:3).

The use here probably summarizes how all these various nuances of “sea” throughout the book relate to the new creation. Therefore, it encompasses all five meanings. That is, when the new creation comes there will no longer be any threat from Satan because he will have been permanently judged and excluded from the new creation. Nor will there be any threat from rebellious nations, since they will have suffered the same fate as Satan. Neither will there be death ever again in the new world, so that there is no room for the sea as the place of the dead. There also will be no more idolatrous trade practice using the sea as its main avenue. Even the perception of the literal sea as a murky, unruly part of God’s creation is no longer appropriate in the new cosmos, since the new creation is to be characterized by peace. Literal seas separate nation from nation, and they separated John from his beloved churches, but in the new creation such a separation can be no more, since all are in close fellowship with one another and with God (e.g., 21:22-26). There will be a “lake” of fiery punishment (20:10, 14-15), but it will be located enigmatically outside the perimeters of the new heavens and earth (21:27: 22:15). Just as there must be an eternally consummated form of the new creation in which God’s people dwell, so must there be an eternally consummated form of a realm of punishment in another dimension, where unbelievers will dwell.

… the evil nuance of the sea metaphorically represents the entire range of afflictions that formerly threatened God’s people in the old world. Uppermost in John’s mind would have been tribulations resulting from oppression by the ungodly world. There will be no trial over which to weep in the final order of things. … Therefore, the presence of a literal sea in the new creation would not be inconsistent with the figurative exclusion of the sea in 21:1. [The Book of Revelation, NIGTC (Eerdmans, 1999), pp. 1042-1043]

Good thoughts to let loose in your mind when you’re driving your sunburned, sand-covered family home after a delightful weekend at the beach.

Neil Postman: Technology and Society

The late Neil Postman—author of Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985)—spoke on the topic of technology and society in Grand Rapids early in 1998. His entire presentation is available on YouTube in seven parts. Postman was something of a modern prophet and his voice is worth returning to in our technology-centered society. In this presentation he makes some important points including this one: Every new technology solves problems (for some people); but each new technological advance also generates its own set of new problems. Thoughtful points like this are littered throughout his writings and this presentation.

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 4:

Part 5:

Part 6:

Part 7:

Worldliness

“’I have crucified the world,’ says Paul.

That word, the world, is used in Scripture with varying meanings. Sometimes it stands simply for the numbers of our fellow men and women round about us. And, in that sense, God loves the world—the foolish, ailing, blundering, kindly, human, stumbling world—loves it well enough to give His Son for it. And we must learn to love it too.

But often the world means that vague, dim, ever-present, threatening mass of things inimical to the soul; the currents that sweep one away from what is high and true and unselfish; the pressure of the crowd about us tending to carry us along with it into the customary, the mean, the earthy; the throng of interests that crowd our minds and leave no room for Christ.

Whatever robs God of our allegiance, whatever cheats us out of our inheritance in Him, whatever drags us down and back, that is the world; not necessarily anything evil in itself—that is more the flesh and the devil—but just the fullness of life, the rush of things, the babble of affairs, our dreams and hopes and ambitions and desires. Matters quite harmless, even true and beautiful in themselves, can grow into one’s world.

A man’s home, says Christ, can become his world—even the wonderful gift of human love! For he may sink back luxuriously into that, grow soft and flabby and self-indulgent, and forget that those about him need his help.

Or a man’s business, it seems, can become his world; though surely we are given our talents to use and not to let them rust. Yet we can grow so one-idead, so absorbed in it, that ‘getting and spending we lay waste our powers’; and the soul forgotten, left untended, sinks and flickers, and goes out.

Our success can become our world, and we intemperate for more and more and more of it. If anything is crowding God out of your life, if anything is making you throw aside the dreams and hopes and high purposes with which you started as quite obviously impracticable, if anything is convincing you that of course Jesus’ teaching is mere poetry that can’t be taken seriously, and is not meant for literal obedience, that is the world for you. And it is through things like that that souls are mostly lost. The flesh and the devil are open enemies. But the world is far more subtle and insidious and deadly….

You, too, will have to pass through Vanity Fair; and at every booth eager hucksters will thrust their tawdry nothings into your face, and plead and press for custom. You also must meet Madam Bubble with her many-colored wares, how beautiful, and yet a touch, and they have vanished. You can’t evade the ordeal. ‘I pray,’ said Christ, ‘not that Thou shouldest take then out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil.’

We must live in the world, must do our part to keep the great earth spinning round and round. But we must not be of it, must not drift into adopting its aims, its ends, its standards, its ambitions, its methods and ways.

And not to do so is so hard.”

—Arthur John Gossip, The Galilean Accent (T&T Clark, 1926), 144—146.

The Problem of Pain

The other day I discovered a brief introduction to C.S. Lewis’ book, The Problem of Pain. In this video, author Robert Banks provides a brief description of the book’s origin and introduces Lewis’ view that pain is “God’s megaphone to awaken a sleeping world.” If you can stomach the Star Trek-like background and the quick cutaways where that background doesn’t move, you can watch the 8-minute interview here:

Source: The Problem of Pain by CPX on Vimeo.

Collision

The documentary, Collision, filmed during the debates between Douglas Wilson (Christian; right) and Christopher Hitchens (atheist; left) is now available for pre-order from Amazon ($13.99). The film will be released at the end of October. I’ve watched the film and was impressed with both the aesthetic qualities and the amount of substantive debate captured in 90 minutes. The debates between the two—which spill over into the train depot, the limo rides, the dinners and lunches—is quite engaging. The DVD is a nice complement to the book and the full debates, but it will not satisfy the viewer who wants to understand all the arguments on either side. All that said, I recommend the DVD.

Justification by Resurrection

Paul writes in Romans 4:25 that Jesus was “delivered up for [διά] our trespasses and raised for [διά] our justification.” A stunning statement that locates our justification in the resurrection of Christ.

On this passage Geerhardus Vos (1862—1949) wrote:

“… it remains worth observing, that the Apostle has incorporated this idea of the resurrection in his forensic sceme. It seems a pity that in the more prominent associations of our Easter observance so little place has been left to it [the forensic]. The Pauline remembrance of the supreme fact, so significant for redemption from sin, and the modern-Christian celebration of the feast have gradually become two quite different things. Who at the present time thinks of Easter as intended and adapted to fill the soul with a new jubilant assurance of the forgiveness of sin as the guarantee of the inheritance of eternal life?” [The Pauline Eschatology (P&R 1930/1994) p. 153]

———-

Further study:

• Richard Gaffin, Resurrection and Redemption (P&R).
• Vos, essay: “Paul’s Eschatological Concept of the Spirit,” in Redemptive History and Biblical Interpretation: The Shorter Writings of Geerhardus Vos (P&R).
• Vos, sermon: “A Sermon on 1 Corinthians 15:14”

Calvinist Witnessing [topic: humor]

I find it healthy to laugh at caricatures of Calvinism sometimes. This video was posted today on Kevin DeYoung’s (excellent) blog:

Crucifix

“The Teddy-bear exists in order that the child may endow it with imaginary life and personality and enter into a quasi-social relationship with it. That is what ‘playing with it’ means. The better this activity succeeds the less the actual appearance of the object will matter. Too close or prolonged attention to its changeless and expressionless face impedes the play. A crucifix exists in order to direct the worshipper’s thought and affections to the Passion. It had better not have any excellencies, subtleties, or originalities which will fix attention upon itself. Hence devout people may, for this purpose, prefer the crudest and emptiest icon. The emptier, the more permeable; and they want, as it were, to pass through the material image and go beyond.”

—C. S. Lewis, “How the Few and the Many Use Pictures and Music” in An Experiment in Criticism (Cambridge 1961), 17—18.

Preaching Christ

“Faith is not built by preaching introspectively (constantly challenging people to question whether they have faith); faith is not built by preaching moralistically (which has exactly the opposite effect of focusing attention on the self rather than on Christ, in whom our faith is placed); faith is not built by joining the culture wars and taking potshots at what is wrong with our culture. Faith is built by careful, thorough exposition of the person, character, and work of Christ….

We feed on Christ himself, and we do so not by some physical eating of his body, but through faith in the Christ proclaimed in Word and sacrament. These four alternatives [moralism, how-to, introspection, and social gospel] have left much of the evangelical and Reformed church malnourished. People know what they ought to do, but they are dispirited and lethargic, without the vision, drive, or impetus to live with and for Christ. And the reason for this dispirited condition is that the pulpit is largely silent about Christ. He is mentioned only as an afterthought or appendage to a sermon; in many churches, he is never proclaimed as the central point of a sermon, and surely not on a regular, weekly basis.”

—T. David Gordon, Why Johnny Can’t Preach: The Media Have Shaped the Messengers (P&R 2009) pp. 75—76, 88—89.