In the late eighties, or maybe it was the early nineties, I got caught up in a particular cultural fad for about 2 weeks. Everybody between the ages of seven and seventeen was wearing homemade bracelets and necklaces. These treasured items were sometimes woven together by the loving hands of one's fifth grade girlfriend or often times by one's own skillful and creative hands. Many young people wore a whole slew of these decorative woven thread on their wrists and a few around their neck as well. I recall with amusement making my own share of these bracelets. I would borrow a hardback book from our stash of kids books, as well as a few rolls of thread from my mom's sewing basket and begin working on my masterpiece. The way I was taught involved taping the three different colored threads to the top of a book and then weaving them together with braiding skill. Do to the fact that I grew up in a family of five boys I hadn't spent very much time braiding much of anything, so the skill had to be learned until I was pretty adept at the basic three strand weave (I don't know if that's the official name for it, but then again, I grew up in the ball, bat, and bug land of five boys).All this to say, I am still fascinated by things that are woven together...different parts pulled together to form a creative, artistic, colorful, unified whole.
This is one reason I love the Bible. The reality is, -- and this phrase, "the reality is", is about three more personal uses away from being a banned phrase in my speech repertoire because my daughter has informed me that I overuse it...and now that I've been alerted to it I find she is right -- understanding the Bible is like tracing the treads of a massive, beautiful tapestry thread by thread in order to discover how they all connect. The unity of the Bible is astounding with over 40 authors involved over a period of thousands of years!And somehow (divine inspiration I would argue), each author's part ties in so deeply, so significantly to all the other parts the result is a beautiful, organic tapestry, a picture, a story of redemption.
So, here is one such biblical weave that I preached on yesterday and am still meditating upon today.
I think it's interesting how the Apostle Paul weaves the work of Christ (the gospel) and godliness together in I Timothy 3:14-4:10. So that the glory of Christ (3:16 & 4:10) is tied right in with godly christian conduct as a part of church community (3:15), biblical clarity in dealing with issues of false teaching (4:5), and the personal intense pursuit of godliness in a believer's life (4:7-8).
This intrigues me especially because our vision as a local church is to spread a passion for the glory of Christ by making disciples in our communities, Savannah and the world! So in this text I see a connection between lifting high the truth of Jesus Christ (as the truth that is on display on that one big church pillar in 3:15) and the truth of Jesus Christ being lifted high more personally in our own hearts, homes, and churches.
I think it's a temptation to disconnect a noble idea (and gloriously biblical one as well, I might add) like "spreading a passion for the glory of Christ" from pursuing the knowledge of Jesus Christ in our hearts and homes. I think it's also a very real temptation to disconnect the idea of "spreading a passion for the glory of Christ" from zealous discipleship in our local churches. But this is a mistake. In fact, it's a really big mistake.
We must get this through our muddled minds, even if it means making a t-shirt with this forthcoming caption and sleeping in it every night:
We will not spread a passion for the glory of Christ until a passion for the glory of Christ spreads within our own hearts, homes and church.
Paul tells us that the mystery of godliness is found in the very open and clear life, work, death and resurrection of Christ (3:16). The mystery of God's saving work on behalf of all the peoples of the earth is finally made plain with the coming of King Jesus as Savior and Lord of all!
This reality, this truth is not only the way of salvation for sinners but the way of godliness for saints. If we are in Christ we have been remade, but the remaking is not done until Christ comes back and fixes all that is broken in us. In the meantime, we press onward in the way of godliness or the way of righteousness. But how do we progress, how do we become godly biblical people?
Of course, there are many good biblical ways to answer that, but I am trying to go right to heart of it. Since Jesus did all that was necessary to open the way of godliness for all people who trust in his saving work, it makes good biblical sense to say that he continues to do all that is necessary for our continued progress on this godly way.
But how does he do this? Or better yet, does this mean that we just sit around and wait for Christ to make us holy, to make us more godly? Here's how Paul might say it, "For to this end we strive, because we have our hope set on the living God..." (I Timothy 4:10) or "For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me" (Colossians 1:29).
Like Paul we must train, fight and even suffer for personal godliness (I Timothy 4:7-8) and for the godliness of others in the power of hope in God. We hope in God as we fight for godliness in our own hearts and lives. We struggle and suffer for the godliness of our kids, our friends, our neighbors...Why? Because our hope is in God, that's why, and Jesus is the Savior of all men!
This is what it looks like, what it feels like to have a passion for Christ spreading within our own hearts and homes! So let us pray and persevere for godliness! May the threads of a godly personal passion for Christ's glory and the ongoing spread of this glory in our world be woven together so that all might behold the glory of the One Savior and King of the world!
Amen.
