Sunday, July 19, 2020

If only the Lord knew what we know. . .

One of the stranger things that this pandemic has brought to light is our tendency to judge God according to the standard of today's science and to suggest that the Lord has suffered from a lack of wisdom and knowledge that we routinely enjoy today.

Individual cups are largely the result of fears that the risk of transmitting disease or something less harmful but equally distasteful.  The chalice has to go because it is unclean or at least less sanitary than individual cups.  If only the Lord had known what we know with all our science and studies and testing, He would surely have begun where we have ended up and there would be no chalice at all.  While there were many who harbored such an opinion before COVID 19, that number has surely increased and the unqualified wisdom of science is pitted against the institution of our Lord with the suggestion that we know more than Jesus knew in the Upper Room.

The dangers of gluten have brought many to the conclusion that wheat in the bread of the Lord's Supper is untenable and unkind to the many with gluten allergies.  No matter that the issue of gluten allergies is inflated by those who simply follow fads and trends and in those fads and trends gluten has become a bad things today.  However, the real danger here is not gluten but the idea that the Lord was deficient in His knowledge and if He had only known what we know, He would have used some other bread for His supper.

And of course that brings us to the whole issue of alcohol.  Wine is simply unsuitable for a Sacrament (or ordinance) in which children, pregnant women, nursing mothers, recovering alcoholics, folks on certain medicines, and those who simply do not like the smell or taste of wine are being asked to take and drink.  If only the Lord had known what a danger alcohol is and how many prefer something else, He would surely have ditched the wine and turned Cana's jugs into Gatorade or smart water or something else that was healthy and tasty.

Don't even start me on incense!  Why would God have commanded the use of incense when smoke is a danger to the lungs and so many are allergic to it!  Why, indeed!  If only the Lord had known what we know, He would have commanded the use of those Glade scents that only gently linger in the air and offer a variety of scents that would appeal to the broader population than incense.  No, let us all agree that the Lord was simply naive or ignorant in His choice of incense.

I think you get my drift.  But that is the problem.  Is the Lord so ignorant and naive that He did not know better than to choose or use things that we would come to find as harmful or dangerous?  Or could there be another problem here?  Could it be that we have come to believe in science more than even God's Word?  Could it be that this is another way in which we have placed our reason above God's Truth?  Could it be that we have decided that preference is the same as science and elevated our own desires above the saving will and purpose of God?

Everyone of us knows that life post-COVID 19 will be different.  Some of those differences will be temporary, lasting only as long as our memory of the virus is fresh and its threat more recent.  Others will last longer as we have adjusted ourselves to the changed landscape of a virus and our fears.  I expect most households will keep a bit more toilet paper on hand, not to mention masks and hand sanitizer!  I expect that we will be more reluctant to extend the hand to shake, especially with strangers.  I expect that some folks who have switched to individual cups because of the corona virus will make their temporary choice permanent.  I expect that some of the goofy things we did in a time of emergency will become more permanent and we have not heard the last of Facebook live streamed services and Zoom meetings.  I expect that the needle for many folks will have been advanced a bit more toward caution and suspicion of the historic practices of the Church.  Some of these we will tolerate but we dare not make our peace with the idea that if Jesus had known better He would have done things differently.  There is no hope for salvation in a Savior whose wisdom and vision is as limited as ours.  There is no promise of deliverance in a Lord who was a mere creature of His era and could not have foreseen a world as we know it.  There is no Gospel left in a Savior and His sacrifice that have been rendered quaint by the passage of time and our own inflated wisdom and scientific ways.  We will have to deal with this -- not simply as a national church issuing a position paper but as pastors who daily deal with a people who are tempted by what passes as science to believe that we know more than the Son of God knew.  So be warned, my friends, for the days are coming when the itching ears of our people will hear the voice of the world more clearly than they hear the voice of God in His Word.


760 What God Ordains Is Always Good

1 What God ordains is always good:
    His will is just and holy.
As He directs my life for me,
    I follow meek and lowly.
        My God indeed
        In ev’ry need
Knows well how He will shield me;
To Him, then, I will yield me.

2 What God ordains is always good:
    He never will deceive me;
He leads me in His righteous way,
    And never will He leave me.
        I take content
        What He has sent;
His hand that sends me sadness
Will turn my tears to gladness.

3 What God ordains is always good:
    His loving thought attends me;
No poison can be in the cup
    That my physician sends me.
        My God is true;
        Each morning new
I trust His grace unending,
My life to Him commending.

4 What God ordains is always good:
    He is my friend and Father;
He suffers naught to do me harm
    Though many storms may gather.
        Now I may know
        Both joy and woe;
Someday I shall see clearly
That He has loved me dearly.

5 What God ordains is always good:
    Though I the cup am drinking
Which savors now of bitterness,
    I take it without shrinking.
        For after grief
        God gives relief,
My heart with comfort filling
And all my sorrow stilling.

6 What God ordains is always good:
    This truth remains unshaken.
Though sorrow, need, or death be mine,
    I shall not be forsaken.
        I fear no harm,
        For with His arm
He shall embrace and shield me;
So to my God I yield me.

6 comments:

Janis Williams said...

It all boils down to the fact that Jesus is God. I’m not sure I would commune with bread made from Darnel (that fits with today’s Gospel reading!), or commune on wine laced with arsenic, but gluten and a swallow of inexpensive wine with sulfites is not enough to harm anyone but the person with serious allergies. I will commune from the chalice as long as faithful pastors present it, and eat that bite of gluten (I am GF, BTW), knowing there is NO poison in the cup or the bread.

Our Lord offers us the medicine of immortality; His Very Self. Let us not retreat from what we know to be True.

Carl Vehse said...

Rev. Peters:"Don't even start me on incense! Why would God have commanded the use of incense when smoke is a danger to the lungs and so many are allergic to it! Why, indeed!"

Since you have reopened the discussion on incense from a March blog, in which after posting four of your own comments, you then arbitrarily shut down the blog, the following comments apply to this and that blog.

First, Rev. Peters claims, "Lev. 16 clearly shows that the Lord prescribes, orders, and commands the use of incense."

Second, it was Martin Luther, not I, who stated in 1523, "Sixth, the Gospel lesson follows, for which we neither prohibit nor prescribe candles or incense. Let these things be free."(LW, 53, p. 25)

Third, it is misleading and wrong to reference Old Testament ceremonical law as if to imply it were still prescribed and commanded for Christians in 1523 or today. In addition to Martin Luther, there are other similar explanations made by J.T. Mueller (Christian Dogmatics, p. 212) and in Luther's Small Catechism with Explanation (CPH, 2017, p. 54).

As for why God would have commanded the ceremonial use of incense for the Israelites, unless the Holy Spirit reveals God's reasoning in Holy Scripture, His will for that remains as part of Deus absconditus.

Pastor Peters said...

So, Mr. Strickert, did Israel invent the use of incense in an effort to please God or did God prescribe it? If God prescribed it, what is the issue you have with it?

What Luther said may be true enough on paper but we all know that the Lutherans who read it insist that "free" means not here, not now, and not ever or I will go to another church. The freedom which Luther ascribes here has been turned into an aversion and your response shows it.

No one said that everything required of the Old Testament worship was required now but to suggest that God somehow did not know what He was doing or made a mistake or grew tired of incense and therefore, in freedom, it can be relegated to the trash heap of yesterday's piety is something that cannot go unchallenged.

Why God commanded incense or circumcision or bread and wine or whatever is not now nor has it ever been the issue. The obedience of faith trusts God's Word and wisdom and that is that.

And yes, Mr. Strickert, this is my blog and if I want to limit comments I may just as you are certainly free not to read it. You sound as if I am duty bound to let you complain predictably. I am not. You are welcome to read and comment within reason but I am also free to post whatever comments I wish to allow.

BTW you may also want to read
https://aleteia.org/2020/06/02/how-incense-at-mass-might-reduce-airborne-diseases/

If you disagree with that link, post your comments there, please.

Carl Vehse said...

Rev. Peters: So, Mr. Strickert, did Israel invent the use of incense in an effort to please God or did God prescribe it? If God prescribed it, what is the issue you have with it?

Based on the statement by Martin Luther, and references to J.T. Mueller and Luther's Small Catechism with Explanation, the issue is that it is misleading and wrong to reference Old Testament ceremonical law as if to imply it were still prescribed and commanded for Christians in 1523 or today.

Rev. Peters: What Luther said may be true enough on paper but we all know that the Lutherans who read it insist that "free" means not here, not now, and not ever or I will go to another church.

When Martin Luther stated in 1523, "Sixth, the Gospel lesson follows, for which we neither prohibit nor prescribe candles or incense. Let these things be free" (LW, 53, p. 25), this means that Lutherans are free to choose to be members in an orthodox Lutheran congregation that uses incense or to be members in an orthodox Lutheran congregation that does not use incense.

Rev. Peters: No one said that everything required of the Old Testament worship was required now but to suggest that God somehow did not know what He was doing or made a mistake or grew tired of incense and therefore, in freedom, it can be relegated to the trash heap of yesterday's piety is something that cannot go unchallenged.

No one, including me, said, suggested, or implied that God somehow did not know what He was doing or made a mistake or grew tired of incense and therefore, in freedom, it can be relegated to the trash heap of yesterday's piety is something that cannot go unchallenged.

Carl Vehse said...

Rev. Peters: Why God commanded incense or circumcision or bread and wine or whatever is not now nor has it ever been the issue. The obedience of faith trusts God's Word and wisdom and that is that.

The issue is not about the elements in the Lord's Supper, but rather your previous claim (with present tense verbs), "Lev. 16 clearly shows that the Lord prescribes, orders, and commands the use of incense," which failed to distinguish what is stated in Luther's Small Catechism with Explanation (CPH, 2017, p. 54): "Only the moral law was written on the human hearts and continues to apply to all people. People are confused by the Bible and even misuse it when they fail to realize that the Old Testament ceremonies and ceremonial law (which applied to Israel and an be hard to comprehend) do not apply to Christians, or anyone else, since Christ's death and resurrection."

Rev. Peters: BTW you may also want to read
https://aleteia.org/2020/06/02/how-incense-at-mass-might-reduce-airborne-diseases/


Whether or not, in a church environment, concentrations of burnt incense fumes can kill significant percentages of certain bacteria, fungi or virus, while at the same time not causing harmful effects on the respiratory system or to those who suffer from asthma and other similar respiratory problems is a separate issue to whether today incense is (or is not) prohibited or prescribed by God.

Pastor Peters said...

Mr. Strickert, When Luther's Pastor made decisions Luther was not sure he would have made (elimination of the elevation), even the mighty Luther did not pack up his bags and find a new congregation. That is my point. There is no freedom in personal preference because for the sake of survival nearly every congregation will succumb to the need to make sure people are voting for them with their pocketbooks. If people disagreed but remained in the congregation, then the freedom of which Luther spoke (not the freedom of the individual here but the freedom of the church to use or not to use) would remain. You well know that the number of Lutheran congregations even occasionally using incense is statistically insignificant. So why is this such a hot button issue for you? When my parish uses incense we also have another service at which incense is not used and the numbers show half the people come to the incense. We are not arbitrary or indifferent to people but neither do we allow the almighty individual preference, which you should also be against, to rule the day.

In case you missed it, the whole point of my post was simply that we know better than God and how that has manifested itself in our decision that incense is and was always bad for the health, the chalice should be removed, etc... I would think that instead of rushing to insist incense is optional, you might agree with the main premise of the post.

BTW I doubt that Luther would have much positive to say about people voting with their pocketbook or moving their membership around every time they find something they dislike (which is hardly ever a doctrinal aberration that should be rightfully noted but is nearly always a matter of personal preference and taste). Such a thing would be abhorrent to Luther and you and I both know that. To suggest that Luther was champion of the idea that people are the arbiters of what practices are free is a misreading of Luther. Luther's congregation, remember, was supported by the Prince and was not subject to the autonomy of the offering plate and decisions on free matters were not made by the person in the pew but by the church and its jurisdiction. But again, you are not ignorant, you know that.