Crucified Hearts

Thoughts from my reading today…

Regarding “even” Barnabas’ defection from gospel practice, along with Peter at Antioch, G. Walter Hansen says this in his commentary on Galatians 2.11-14:

“We should never underestimate the emotional power of national pride and racial ties. We should not be surprised that the Jewish Christians in Antioch put their own Jewish interests above the welfare of the church. Throughout the history of the church, conflicts and divisions have occurred because Christians have been more deeply influenced by their national interests or racial identity than their Christian convictions. Whenever we identify ourselves as American Christians, or British Christians, or Chinese Christians, or German Christians, we must be aware that being American, British, Chinese or German may easily become more important to us than being Christian.”

G. Walter Hansen, Galatians, The IVP New Testament Commentary Series (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1994), Ga 2:13.

The text he comments on says this:

“But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision. The rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy, with the result that even Barnabas was carried away by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of all, “If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?” Gal. 2.11-14

In Hansen’s quote we see the obvious application for us today in the heart-wrenching, rapid rise of Christian Nationalism throughout the world. Populist groups, churches in name only, especially in the whiter shade of pale, smear the name of Christ with their racist, bigoted religious adultery, going to bed with partisan political lovers. Denying the grace that bought them…

“It has happened to them according to the true proverb, “A dog returns to its own vomit,” and, “A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.” 2 Peter 2.22

How can those professing redemption of the ungodly, their redemption by the blood of Christ, deny the same grace to those who are often so less guilty of pride and arrogance themselves?

Where does this fear and loathing of the “alien” come from, fear of the immigrant, the “other ones”, the mass of “them” who at great risk to themselves and their families, are seeking to escape poverty, sickness, and death in the land where they were born?

It comes from the coveting spirit who, indulging itsgreed, would have all things for itself, refusing to share, refusing the very law of Christ that says, “count others better than yourselves”.

Is it any wonder that if “even Barnabas” and the apostle Peter could defame the grace of Christ in bigotry, Christians of greater ignorance and less experience are betrayed by their peers into dishonoring the blood that bought them out of slavery?

Thankfully,we have the assurance that Barnabas and Peter, when confronted by the apostle Paul, repented of their duplicitous sin.

Grace, what great grace, that sins of the most notable among us may be forgiven when conviction takes hold of the stained heart and repentance is granted, yet again, to the hurting and hurtful soul.

The gospel is under constant attack in a multitude of deceptions and seductions by the devil, who has gone out to make war with those who bear the banner of Christ, who uphold the law and the gospel as they are in Jesus. Every day brings this threat to the pure church of faith, that she would betray her Lord, changing her name to Babylon, the mother of whores.

A last call to Babylon marks the end of this age in the soon coming of Christ.

“I heard another voice from heaven, saying, “Come out of her, my people, so that you will not participate in her sins and receive of her plagues; for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. Pay her back even as she has paid, and give back to her double according to her deeds; in the cup which she has mixed, mix twice as much for her. To the degree that she glorified herself and lived sensuously, to the same degree give her torment and mourning; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as a queen and I am not a widow, and will never see mourning.’ For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong.”
Rev. 18.4-8

Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat! But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

2 Peter 3.11-18