Wandering Stars: A Meditation on Jude, for the Last Sunday of the Church Year

Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto

you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write

unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend

for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.

For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were

before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men,

turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and

denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ…

Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran

greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished

in the gainsaying of Core. These are spots in your

feasts of charity, when they feast with you, feeding

themselves without fear: clouds they are without water,

carried about of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without

fruit, twice dead, plucked up by the roots; Raging

waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering

stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness forever.

In the ancient world, navigation was a bit more fundamental than our GPS and voice navigation systems of today.  Assuming the weather would cooperate, the sun provided a pretty good navigational reference during the day, and the stars provided an even more precise navigational reference in the evening.  If at sea in the darkness, the stars can be charted for your location on the globe, and you can use them to make your journey safely to your destination.  Of course, not everything that shines in the evening sky is reliable—while stars are relatively fixed points of reference, the planets and various other things up there will wander on you, making them poor choices for navigation.  If your captain or navigator attempted to traverse a long journey across the sea and used the wrong navigational points in the sky, you’d likely end up lost, shipwrecked, or drowned.

This image is taken up, in part, by St. Jude in his short epistle.  He calls the false teachers in the Church “wandering stars,” which signifies how dangerous it is to use them as a reference point for traversing this life.  Like all people, we find our way into this world not by our own choice or design, but by the creative act of God working through our parents.  Once here, we begin a long journey fraught with peril, navigating the world into which we are born, trying to avoid disaster and reach eternal life.  God, knowing our situation as fallen creatures, gives to us His Word to call, gather, keep, guide, and protect us through the journey back to Himself.  Those who preach to us God’s Word faithfully in its fullness—the full implications and aspirations of the Holy Law, together with the full sweetness and life of the Holy Gospel—give to us God’s navigational reference points for how to pass through this temporal world without losing the things eternal.  Without those witnesses to God’s Word, we would be lost and listing on the high seas of this life, drifting unguided to our eventual destruction.  If we are sitting here today by grace through faith in Christ alone for our salvation, then we have God to thank for those He sent to us to bear His Word, and keep us tethered to Him.

Unfortunately, there are also those who creep in unawares, and teach people things other than the Word of God.  They give to people false hopes and false promises, turning the grace of God into immorality and pride.  They teach people to put their trust in the words and schemes and works of men, knowing that all the words of men are doomed by sin and corruption.  They create strange stories and self justifying mantras, pleasantly confirming people in their native unbelief and wicked lifestyles.  These false teachers are dangerous, not only because the eternal darkness of hell is their coming abode, but because they are leading their hearers to the same deadly destination.  They themselves are headed for shipwreck, even as they lead others to their own watery graves.

But false teachers would have no pulpit to preach in, if not for our native desire to hear them.  Our fallen nature loves to hear excuses for why we should believe in ourselves rather than God, and which confirm us in the sins we enjoy.  That twisted human nature we inherited from our first parents is always oriented to pride, with a concupiscence that yearns for false teaching… and for lives lived in accordance with it.  False teachers would be much fewer in number and far shorter of influence, if we did not tolerate them to teach in the Church of God.  But from the parishioner to the pastor who yield to their darker nature and grant such wandering stars a platform to spread their deadly errors, arises the blight of deadly heresies running rampant throughout the Church and the world—bringing people of every stripe and kind to perdition.

If our hope alone rested in these human teachers, our hope would be futile.  There is no preacher who has not himself erred, and no people whose itching ears have not gotten the better of them at some time or another.  Our confidence is not in the teacher, but in the Word he brings and teaches.  That Word of Christ which we hold in the Holy Scriptures, raises up teachers to bear witness, and through those broken and fallen witnesses Christ calls broken and fallen people to faith and repentance.  There in the Word we hear our Savior preaching to us the full calamity of our sins, and the full satisfaction for that calamity He has suffered for us on His Cross.  There in the living Word, the Spirit works to bring all to repent of wickedness, and cling to the promise of Jesus’ forgiveness unto everlasting life.

To the false teacher, who has embraced Higher Criticism or any other model of theological interpretation that allows you the license to lay aside the Scriptures and lead a life of unrepentance and unbelief, the Word of God speaks your doom—repent!

To the false student, who prefers the teachings of Enthusiasts and Pietists that allow them to pretend direct revelations from God apart from the Holy Scriptures, to set aside the Law of God so that you may replace it with one of your own creation, the Word of God speaks your destruction—repent!

And to all those who will hear Him, to every sinner of every kind under heaven both teacher and student, who falls down in contrition before the holiness of His Law and is drawn up by the grace of His Gospel as they are given to us in Holy Scripture, the Word of God speaks to you of comfort, peace, joy, and salvation.  For it is His Word which grants repentance and faith unto forgiveness and life, and is for His people the Bright and Morning Star which never leads astray.

Now unto him that is able to keep you from

falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of

his glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God

our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power,

both now and ever. Amen.

Do you see these great buildings? A Meditation on Mark 13, for the 25th Sunday after Pentecost

 

And as he went out of the temple, one of his

disciples saith unto him, Master, see what manner of stones

and what buildings are here!  And Jesus answering

said unto him, Seest thou these great buildings? there shall

not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

There is a great and enduring temptation to see the edifices of man as eternal, or at least the things in which we should trust in our own time and place.  To see the great cathedrals of Europe, or the great monuments of our Republic, with their splendors cast in stone, wood, metal, and glass, is to see some of the great artistic achievements of mankind.  I remember walking through the ancient cathedral of St. Mark in Venice, and at the same time, noticing the much older city all around it, and the majesty of the place was breathtaking.  Roman canals, roads, and bridges were still in use many centuries after their construction, with their engineering and artistic prowess still visible.  Such buildings and monuments give a sense of constancy which endures beyond a single generation, and provides grounding in a contemporary culture driven by short lived passions and fads.

But in the end, such great monuments are still only of human construction.  From the great pyramids of Egypt still standing 3000 years after their building, to the cathedral of Notre Dame, to the Lincoln Memorial, each is a wonder built by human hands.  It is easy to forget that while modern human hands (and those hands of humanly controlled manufacturing robots) craft many things that are useful today and tomorrow are cast into the rubbish heap, those same hands are capable of crafting places and monuments which endure even across millennia.  And yet like the men and women who build them, such works of human hands are bound by time… eventually destined to fall and decay, some in shorter and some in longer horizons.

As His disciples were walking through Jerusalem, they took a moment to express their awe of the city to Jesus.  Lest His disciples place their hope and trust in such beautiful but passing things, Jesus began an apocalyptic discourse which must have been shocking to His hearers.  The city of Jerusalem was the City of David, which he conquered nearly 1000 years before, and featured prominently in the prophecy of the Old Testament.  While it had been harassed by many nations in its history, eventually destroyed by the Babylonians in the 6^th century BC and rebuilt again later that same century, and even at Jesus’ time was a Roman vassal state without true independence, Jesus’ disciples wanted to find something enduring they could hold onto in those sacred and ancient stones.  And yet, as the bedazzling of their eyes by the works of human hands was pierced by the Word of God, they could see that it isn’t man, his cities, his temples, nor his monuments which endure, but God alone.

Indeed, Jesus describes the fall of Jerusalem, which in an immediate sense happened around 70 AD, as Jewish rebels were destroyed by Roman armies, and the people were scattered so that they might not ever build it again.  But what was immediate in that prophecy paled in comparison to the Last Day Jesus warned His disciples of, in which all the works of man—and even all creation—would be brought before God Almighty and judged forever.  In that Last Day there would be nothing left of the monuments of men, nothing left of their cleverness or artistry, as the very elements of the universe dissolved in the purging fire of God’s eternal justice.  For on that Last Day, all the hearts of all mankind would be revealed before the all seeing eyes of their Creator, and all the works of men would be revealed for the corrupt and prideful things they are.  On that Last Day, all the pretensions of man and all the images he has crafted to give himself a sense of permanence and endurance would be stripped away, and they will stand before the only Holy and Eternal God to give account for their lives—every thought, word, and deed, of things done and left undone.

Jesus warns His disciples not to be dismayed or distracted by the calamities they might mistake for that Last Day.  Earthquakes and floods; wars and rumors of wars; nations rising against nations; parents and children betraying each other to death; the persecution of the saints of God by the corrupt governments and religious institutions of the earth; false christs and false prophets proliferating across the globe, deceiving many, and trying to draw away even the Elect; all these things would be only the beginning of the end, and all these things we have seen across the centuries even unto our own times.  Should the Lord tarry, they are things which will be seen by our children and our grandchildren, as they mark the great persecution of Christ and His Church in every age.  The wickedness of a fallen world will ever be persecuting the Word of Christ, and those called into His eternal fellowship by it.

But it is Christ and His Word which endures forever, and not the works of men.  Jesus takes our eyes from the gaudy and prideful crafts of human hands, as transiently beautiful as they may be, and fixes them rather upon Him.  For it is Jesus, the Word of God Made Flesh, who would give Himself as the ransom of salvation for all who would trust in Him; Jesus, who would pass through the Last Day of God’s great and terrible judgment on our behalf, bringing back to us peace and forgiveness and reconciliation with God; Jesus who would endure death and the grave, returning to give us His victorious resurrection and eternal life; Jesus who would establish His Church by His Word of this Holy Gospel, calling all mankind to faith and repentance; Jesus who would remain with His Church by His Word through every persecution, famine, war, and tumult, preserving His people by grace through faith in Him; Jesus who would meet every believer at the portal of their own death, and welcome them into His eternal and blessed embrace; Jesus who would, at the end of all things, come upon the clouds of glory on that Last Day to gather His Elect from every corner under heaven, that they be not consumed by the fires of judgment He has already born for them in His own body.

And so to you, dear Christian, comes the Word of Jesus, to give you comfort, strength, and courage in these days.  Do not be dismayed by the teetering edifices of man, be they political or ecclesiastical, for no work of man endures forever—rather they come and they go, rising and falling like the ocean’s tides.  But the Word of Christ to you is certain and sure, and will endure even when the last distant star flutters its last dying light.  It is a Word of forgiveness and hope, of salvation and love written irrevocably in the Holy Blood of Jesus.  It is a Word which by His Holy Spirit gives you the faith to believe in Him, though everything in heaven and earth give way.  It is a Word that proceeds forth from the finished work of Jesus to call even unto you, that you might turn from the ways of death in which there is only destruction, and live in Him forever by His wondrous grace.   By this Word of Christ’s Gospel, you are called to sing with the Psalmist (16), and with the whole People of God in every age before and yet to come:

I have set the LORD always before me:

because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.

Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth:

my flesh also shall rest in hope.

For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell;

neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.

Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is

fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.

Amen.

Beware the Pretentiously Pious: A Meditation on Mark 12, for the 24th Sunday after Pentecost

And he said unto them in his doctrine, Beware of

the scribes, which love to go in long clothing, and love

salutations in the marketplaces, And the chief seats

in the synagogues, and the uppermost rooms at feasts:

Which devour widows’ houses, and for a pretence

make long prayers: these shall receive greater damnation.

There may be nothing more irritating in the all the world, than a pretentiously pious longwinded prayer.  They come in many forms in various Christian traditions, from the generally Evangelical prayers that ramble on with a never ending use of the word “just” (as in, “Lord, we just want to…”) to high liturgical prayers that are more like a droning recitation of political objectives, seminary courses, or world history.  But what may make them so grindingly obnoxious is that while they use language that pretends to address God, they are really all about highlighting the one who is praying.  From the manipulative opening, “Now everyone repeat after me…” to the coercive ending, “And all God’s people said, AMEN!”  these prayers reveal far more about the sinful heart of the one speaking them, than they do about the God to whom they are ostensibly addressed.

Pretentious piety goes well beyond prayer, though.  It is found in the vestments of clergy who want to be singled out and elevated in improper ways—from infinitely intricate adornments whose origins are lost in the Middle Ages, to expensive business suits belonging more in board rooms than sanctuaries, to designer t-shirts, Hawaiian shirts, polo shirts, or any other hipster garb that belongs in bistros, coffee houses, or bars.  It shows up in affectations of every kind, from those which drape the pastor, to that which drapes the sanctuary, and even to that which drapes the laity.

Have you ever heard the argument, “I’m wearing my best for God today?”  Really?  If so, why aren’t those expensive, intricate, or hipster clothes left at the altar during the offering, so they may be given to others in need of good clothing?  Are you a lady whose dress is chosen really for the attraction of men or for looking superior to other women?  Are you a man whose dress is really for the attraction of women, or for looking superior to other men?  Do you dress rebelliously in immodest or derelict attire, with the real intention of showing yourself better, cooler, or more righteous than those around you?

In truth, the pride of our fallen nature inspires us all to pretentious piety—shows of godliness that really aren’t oriented to God, but rather to propping up ourselves and our image.  We make pompous claims about everything from the associations we keep to the titles we claim, each with a dark and sinister motivation of bolstering our own claims to deity over our fellow man.  It is a darkness in ourselves we cannot escape in this life, an inclination toward evil that clings to our fallen nature with ghoulish tenacity.

Lest we be tempted to think this sin is of little consequence, we have our Lord’s clear condemnation pronounced upon us:  for these shall receive greater damnation.  To all the pompous windbags, all the pious sounding/acting/praying/dressing/prancing twits who presume to take the good things of God and turn them into religious self justification for their own pride and wickedness, let the Law of God from Christ’s own lips sink deep into your sin-soaked heart.  Not just hell, which is bad enough, but greater damnation is yours, because your pride and selfishness is not content to simply pervert the things of men, but you pervert even the holy things of God.

As the Word Made Flesh so often does, He preaches the holiness of His Law with all its weight and severity.  We know that no matter how pious we may make ourselves to look before our neighbors, before God Almighty who sees through every pretention we stand condemned by our sinful hearts.  The sin is not in prayer, or vestments, or suits, or t-shirts, or anything else in all creation which our Lord created good.  The sin is in us, as we corrupt every good thing we touch with our hands and our minds.  It is we who are fallen, we who cannot escape the deadly poison of sin coursing through our fallen nature, and we who are so desperately in need of salvation from the lowest depths of hell we have justly earned.

Thanks be to God, that He has not left us to die in these our sins.  For the same Jesus who speaks the terror of His Holy Law, also bears in His very person not only our sins, but the just punishment due to us all.  For you and for me, for the pretentiously pious who have been given the holy things of God and yet twist them to our own pride, Christ has suffered and died, taking the lowest dregs of eternal hell upon His immaculate Body that we might not perish eternally.  There in His Holy Cross, our Savior bears the weight of our eternal curse, and stands between His fallen creation and the righteous wrath of the Father.  And having taken all that wrath of sin and hell for every soul that shall ever live, He turns to us and offers us His peace, forgiveness, life, and salvation:  the free gift of His Grace by faith in Him alone, which calls to us with a sweetness unsurpassed by human lips.  This Word of Gospel is the cure for our sin, our inspiration to rise each day toward holiness, to show forth a selfless love which reflects His love, and a humility which reflects His humility.  Where the Law left us broken and sorrowful in the knowledge of our sin, the Gospel lifts us from our penitent contrition into new and eternal lives of faith and repentance, born from above by His Water and Spirit.

Broken by His Law and yet inspired by His Gospel, we take courage and comfort with the Psalmist of 146, singing forever to our Savior and our God:

Praise ye the LORD. Praise the LORD, O my soul.

While I live will I praise the LORD:

I will sing praises unto my God while I have any being.

Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom

there is no help. His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth;

in that very day his thoughts perish.

Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help,

Whose hope is in the LORD his God:

Amen.