A little more than a decade ago Charlie offered to take me for a ride in his airplane. Charlie was in his early 80s, and he had built the airplane himself after selling a couple of others he had also built. In other words, he knew what he was doing, and because of his years of flying, he was an experienced and confident pilot. When Charlie offered to take me on a half hour flight to another town (2 hours by car), I took him up on his offer.

The plane was small, a two-seater, one behind the other. I sat in the back seat, my legs on either side of Charlie’s seat which was in front of me. There was a joystick that was uncomfortably close to my belly, and the canopy that covered us was made of thin plexiglass. The wings seemed to be little longer than my arms, and I guessed the steel body was less than a millimetre thick. As we took off, we were not more than 10 feet into the air, and I realized I was in trouble. As we quickly climbed, my fear of heights began to manifest itself. By the time we had reached 2000 feet, the maximum there because of proximity to the Toronto airport, I was terrified. Charlie, sensing my fear, asked me three times over if I wanted to return, and three times I refused. However, when he asked the fourth time, I could not refuse, and knowing that if I got out of the airplane at our destination, I would never get back in. We returned, and we landed about 15 minutes later.

Charlie invited me to the small airport lounge for a cup of coffee, and we discussed why I had become so afraid. He had experienced this before, and he told me that it was because I had to put my life in the hands of another. I assured him that I thought he had done a good job building the plane and I found him to be a competent pilot, but it was still difficult for me to put my life in his hands and my body in his plane. My fear of heights was the real problem, and as competent as he and the airplane were, my fear could not be overcome by trust.

This past Sunday in the catechism class, we talked about growing in our faith, and I used this illustration to talk about what faith is. Faith is putting our lives into the hands of another. It is one thing to say that we believe, it is often another thing to put what we believe into practice. There is a song that contains these words, “Faith begins by letting go, giving up what had seemed sure, taking risks and pressing on, though the way feels less secure: pilgrimage both right and odd, trusting all our life to God.” When we put our faith in God, we also are making the commitment to follow him where he leads and to live in a way that pleases him. This kind of lifestyle might feel odd, and following Jesus may take us places where we would not go if we relied on ourselves. Living faithfully, in fact, can be a little bit scary.

While our ability to believe in Jesus Christ is a gift of the Holy Spirit, we also have a responsibility to cause our faith to grow, and there are several methods we can use to do exactly that. The first would be to know who God is and understand what he has done. I am fully convinced that the first cause of little faith is a lack of understanding of who God is. The best way to know God, of course, is to turn to his revelation of himself and listen again to the stories of what he has done and hear again the promises he made to us. I would never have gotten into the airplane if I didn’t trust Charlie. (I did ask around to see what others thought, and they gave good reports.) In the same way, we are not going to trust God if we don’t really know who God is or what he can do. Thus, if we feel our faith is weak, a good starting point might be to discover again who God is.

But when we have done that, we also need to practice our faith. I could probably overcome my fear of flying in little planes (big ones don’t bother me) if I would do it more often. It is one thing to say that I believe that an airplane and its pilot are qualified to take my high off the ground, but it is another thing to feel confident. Head knowledge is great, but experience makes head knowledge real. If we want our faith to grow, we need to step out in faith. The song that I just mentioned tells us that we need to live as God called us to live, caring for others, often sacrificing ourselves to do God’s work so that we can learn experientially that God is faithful. I am sure that I am not alone when I say that I know a lot about God from the Bible but I don’t always live as if what I know is true. When called by God to live selflessly, to perhaps give up the sure and tested way, we find that difficult, so difficult that we may well ignore God’s calling on our lives. Saying we are Christians and living the Christian life may become two different things for us, and, of course, that is not at all what God expects from us.

Faith in God means that we put our lives in his hands, and we make ourselves willing to do and be whatever it is that he asks. Is that a frightening prospect? Yes, it is. But, again, this becomes more and more possible if we have been learning about who God is, what he has done for us, and what he promises to do. If we can trust that God is faithful, we are far more likely to be able to step out in faith. We might think of growing in faith as an upward spiral in which, as we learn more about God, we intentionally put our lives in his hands, and, as we do, we experience that he is faithful. As we experience his faithfulness, we come to know him more, and as we know him more, our faith grows. Our faith should never stop growing, and it never will stop growing as we put our lives into God’s hands, trusting that he will be faithful to who he is and what he has promised.

Why are you here? This question seems too open-ended, and if asked the question we will try to narrow down the “here.” Is “here” being on earth or is “here” being in the room where you are now sitting? Depending on how we define “here” will determine how we answer the question, “Why are you here?”

Genesis 3 gives us the account of Adam and Eve’s fall into sin. They ate the forbidden fruit, discovered they were naked and made rudimentary clothes for themselves, sewing fig leaves together. As evening fell, they heard the footsteps of the Lord God as he walked in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid among the trees of the garden. Although we can be sure God knew where they were, he called out, “Where are you?” Adam and Eve could have responded with the obvious answer, “We’re over here, hiding among the trees,” to which God could have replied, “And why are you there?” Adam seems to have anticipated God’s obvious second question and he answers it first: “We heard you in the garden, and because I was naked, I was afraid.” God’s interrogation continues: Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat the forbidden fruit? What is this that you have done? Adam and Eve’s answers were unsatisfactory. Adam blamed Eve, and Eve blamed the serpent. And, as we know from the opening verses of Genesis 3, God had made the serpent. Was Eve inadvertently blaming God?

If we go back to God’s first question, it is as if he is asking, “Why are you here?” What are the circumstances that led you to this situation? Adam and Eve refuse to take responsibility for what had happened, not repenting of their sin, but we know it was only because they disobeyed God and ate the fruit that they found themselves in their new and undesirable situation. Even though they refused to take responsibility, it is evident that they were where they were because of what they did, not because of what God had done.

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree when it comes to refusing to take responsibility, for we can be found doing the same. Increasingly we lay the blame at the feet of others or upon circumstances or even on God. Psychology does a good job of helping us understand why people behave as they do, but psychology can also go a step further and use that understanding to say that we have little choice in the matter. We are victims of circumstance, we are told, and no one should judge us for acting as we do. In other words, we have used science as a justification to pass the blame so that we can excuse ourselves of sin. We tend to be quite like Adam and Eve, blaming others. Yet, we cannot avoid the reality that we must shoulder the blame ourselves. We are “here” because of what we have done.

A Christian can also ask the question, “Why am I here?” Why am I part of God’s family? Why have I been brought close to God? Why am I not hiding from him anymore? Strangely, many people, though they are loathe to accept responsibility for sin, are quite happy to accept credit for why they have been brought close to God. “I have lived a pretty good life.” “God accepts me as I am.” “I’ve made some good decisions, including the decision to follow Jesus.” It is ironic that while we have little desire to take responsibility for what leads us to hide from God, we are quite happy to be at least partial responsible for being close to God.

If we are honest, however, we would have to admit that we are here, in Christ, not because of what we did but because of what God has done. We were “there” because of what we did, and we are “here” because of what God has done. God cannot be blamed because we hide ourselves from him, but he can be praised for calling us back to himself.

I find God’s response to human sin to be quite profound. His “Where are you?” is designed to have us confront our present reality, but it also begs the question, “And why is it that you are where you are?” If we are distant from God, we can blame no one but ourselves. If we have become close to God, it is because God sought us out, asked his Son to carry our blame, and drew us back to himself. The “Where are you?” is a probing question, but it is also a question that God asks us so that we can be confronted with our sin but, at the same time, be drawn back to his presence. When we ask the question, “Why am I here?” let’s be sure to take responsibility for what our contribution to our situation is and give God credit for his.

There is a big difference between two similar words: description and prescription. When we have a sore back, for example, the doctor, after doing all the necessary tests, describes the problem by saying that an injury from years ago has caused deterioration in one of the disks, and that is what is causing the pain. A description often leads to a prescription: surgery will most probably correct the problem. We have little problem differentiating between description and prescription, especially when it comes to our health.

When it comes to how we use the Bible, however, we seem to have more trouble. When reading the Bible, we have to ask ourselves if what we are reading is description or prescription. For example, we read numerous times that the Israelites went to battle against neighbouring nations, often taking over their territory, confiscating their possessions and making them slaves. Some, when they read these stories, which are entirely description, want to make them prescriptive. During the time of the crusades, about 1000 years ago, these descriptive passages were used by church leaders to rally the people, and thousands joined ragtag armies to go and “liberate” Jerusalem from the “infidels.” Not only were people misled in their quest to Christianize Jerusalem, but on the way, sadly, they also killed many innocent people, causing great harm to the name of Christ and of Christianity in general. This is one example of making biblical description in prescription, and there are many, many more.

The Bible is not only descriptive; it also contains prescriptive passages. The 10 Commandments, for example, are prescriptive. They prescribe a certain kind of behaviour, one that Jesus says is rooted in love for God and neighbour. Paul’s letter, likewise, are full of prescription, calling us to live in a way that is worthy of the calling we have received.

When we read the Bible, there are two pitfalls we must avoid. As was already mentioned, when we confuse description for prescription, we run into serious problems, for we tend toward randomness. One rather common example is the current trend to base diets on food described in the Bible, calling it a biblical diet. This is random, for seldom do we see people using biblical descriptions of transportation or battle armaments as prescriptive. We don’t go to battle with spears and swords or walk or ride donkeys because we say that these are better because they are described in the Bible. Even more dangerous is to take someone’s actions as prescriptive. We may emulate David as he writes and plays music that honours the Lord, but do we follow him as he and his men annihilate entire villages so that no one remains who can say who led the attack? If we make descriptive passages prescriptive, we must do so consistently, and we will find that to be impossible.

A second error which we must avoid is making prescriptive for them prescriptive for us. As an example, the Bible says that the Israelites may not mix two kinds of thread together as they weave cloth for a garment. That is prescriptive for them, but if we make it prescriptive for us, most of us are sinning at this very moment, for almost all of our clothing is made up of a combination of fibres. We end up becoming random in our choice of which prescriptions we will obey because we tend to focus on some and ignore all the rest. Another prescription which we have ignored completely is “Greet one another with a holy kiss,” a command that appears several times in Paul’s letters. I haven’t seen that happen lately, not even in the council room on a Sunday morning, although we do shake hands.

When thinking about a prescriptive passage, we always need to ask the question, “To whom is this addressed, and what is the situation that it is addressing?” Further, we must ask, “Is this prescription meant to be universal or situational?” It is not always easy to find the right answer, although some helpful attempts have been made. For example, many people will say that we can divide the various commands (prescriptions) in the Old Testament into three categories: religious, civil, and moral. They go on to say that religious commands have been fulfilled in Christ (sacrifices, etc.), that civil commands are only for the nation of Israel (boundary stones, etc.) but that moral commands (don’t murder) are still in force. It is convenient to differentiate biblical prescriptions in this way, but it is also artificial, for the Bible does not recognize or practice this.

The best way to determine whether a prescription is still in force is to seek to understand it in its context and determine its force for the people then. For example, greeting one another with a holy kiss is a way of expressing unity, something that we can replace with a handshake. Commands about dress (women wearing head coverings or men having short hair – Jesus probably had short hair) also have some cultural background, and we must make sure that we understand as completely as possible the reason these commands were given in that culture and place before we apply them universally to all people. This does take some hard work and careful research, recognizing that while we can gain insight into most of the prescriptions in the Bible, we cannot into all of them. We simply are too removed from that culture and place.

So, to summarize, we should never make descriptive passages into prescription for us. That is a blatant misuse of Scripture and can create all sorts of problems. And second, when the Bible prescribes something, we must be careful that we understand fully what the force of scope of the command is before we apply it to our situation. All of this requires serious Bible study, something that we should always be ready to do.

The phrase, “six degrees of separation,” was coined in the early part of the last century and is based on the idea that we can socially connect ourselves to any other person in the world through a series of about six relationships. For example, the theory states that any of us might be able to connect ourselves to the Prime Minister of Australia through a series of relatives, friends, neighbours, or colleagues. Each relationship has to be two-way, meaning that both persons have to be able to identify each other. Thus, I cannot use King Charles as a connection because I suspect he doesn’t know who I am. Studies have been done recently that support this theory, saying that it is most probable that a farmer living in a remote area of Southern Alberta can be connected to a Buddhist monk living in a remote region of Tibet through a series of a mere six relationship connections.

Because we are so interconnected, perhaps instead of using the phrase “six degrees of separation” we should replace it with “six degrees of closeness or interconnectedness.” We are closer to each other than we might think.

Perhaps we are even closer to each other today even with our rapidly growing world population than we were 100 years ago when the world population was just a fraction of what it is today. In the last century or so, the migration of people from across vast distances has become quite common. Even in a village like Nobleford we can run into people from several continents, Africa, Europe, Asia and South America, for example, who have immigrated to Canada in recent years. They connect us immediately to their homes, decreasing the number of steps needed to connect ourselves to people in distant lands. So, while we may not know the person in China who built our smart phone or have any idea who the Vietnamese person was who sewed together the parts of the shirt we are wearing, we can be rather certain that somehow we are connected to them with as few as six relationships.

This is interesting information, and for those of us who love finding connections between people, it can even be rather thrilling to think that there is a network of relationships which join every single person in the world to everyone else. But there is another side and that is one that asks what our responsibility is to others. We want our friends to do well. We also hope that the friends of our friends do well as well, even if we don’t know them. If a friend of a friend has financial needs because of an illness, we might contribute a few dollars to support them. It is the right thing to do after all. But what about a friend of a friend of a friend? Do we want them to thrive as well? Where may we stop? Is a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of friend of a friend too distant? That is how close the most distant person in the world is to us. Do we feel any sort of responsibility to them? Should we be concerned about their needs? Should we offer to help because we are connected to them?

When Scripture teaches us to love our neighbours, it is easy to limit that love to those who are in close physical proximity to us. In other words, our neighbours are only those who we know personally. Jesus had other ideas. When he was asked who he considered our neighbours to be, he told the story of the Good Samaritan. To fully understand that story, we need to know that not only did the Jews dislike the Samaritans, but that Samaritans had every reason to dislike the Jews. The Jewish people had done much to harm the Samaritans. They surrounded the region of Samaria with Galilee to the north and Judea to the south, thus potentially limiting trade and access to resources. They would not develop friendships with Samaritans, avoiding them whenever possible. And, sadly, Jews would not allow Samaritans to come close to God, excluding them from the temple even when the Samaritans claimed to (and did) worship the same God. When the Samaritans built their own temple a couple of centuries before Jesus walked this earth, the Jews attacked it and tore it down. The Samaritans had every right to dislike the Jews and even desire the worst for them. Yet, as Jesus tells the story, this unknown Samaritan man helped the injured man (most likely a Jew, for this was Jewish territory) by tending to him and paying for his ongoing care. While both Jews and Samaritans worked hard at keeping themselves separate from each other, this Samaritan saw the injured man to be his neighbour, and he did whatever it took to care for him. In telling this story Jesus widened the definition of “neighbour” to include everyone within it even when there is no direct connection. Our interconnectedness serves to reinforce the relationships we have with each other and thus moves us to accept responsibility for each other. Every other person on this planet is our neighbour and therefore we are obligated to show our concern for them.

Thankfully, many Christians have shown a deep concern for our neighbours. One of the biggest problems facing the vast majority of people who struggle is the lack of opportunity. Large western corporations pretend to bring opportunity to the developing world by moving their manufacturing facilities there, but the opportunities they provide often involve long hours, low pay, and poor and unsafe working conditions and tend to profit the corporation and not the worker. On the other hand, Christians have found ways to provide opportunities which have a lasting impact and profound impact on others. For example, I know someone who was involved with an organization called “Farmer to Farmer,” in which farmers from the West shared some of their expertise with struggling farmers, often providing them with small operating loans so that they could improve their buildings and buy equipment. As the loan was repaid, that money, in turn, was loaned to other farmers. Unlike some “helping” which is nothing more than a handout, Farmer to Farmer helped by giving opportunities, and over time, the farmers began to thrive. These efforts often take a lot of time to bear fruit, but when they do it is generally fruit that will last.

The beautiful thing about becoming involved in the lives of others is that the six degrees of separation becomes a personal connection as the farmers came to know each other through personal interaction. Not all of us can develop a personal connection with someone who is six degrees away, but we can certainly support those who do. Even one degree of separation is better than six. The positive side to loving our neighbours is that the separation between us and our six-degree separated neighbour is closed, and we become a close community. For me, as a person who loves finding connections, being able to cut down the six degrees of separation to one or two degrees of closeness is a foretaste of heaven. Being able to do that by loving our neighbour, no matter how distant, is not only a obligation and calling; it is a pleasure and privilege.

Recently someone asked me what version of the Bible is the best translation. We have the New International Version in our church pews and on the overhead, but the translation we use is not the latest NIV. The one we use was published in 1984 while the most current version of the NIV was published in 2011, for it was felt that an update in the translation was needed. In addition to the NIV, we have multiple translations available to us that are all different from each other. How can we know which one we should use? There are several things we should consider when choosing a translation.

First, we must consider the text of the original languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek). Since the original manuscripts have not survived, all we are left with are copies (and often copies of copies of copies). Thankfully, we have many copies from various places allowing scholars to compare the variety of variant readings and make very careful decisions about which readings are the most likely to have been the original. Variant readings do not often change the core meaning of the text, but it is important to get as close as possible to the words that the biblical authors used. Thankfully, because of centuries of good scholarly work, we can be confident that the texts we now use in the original languages are reliable. Nevertheless, some versions of the Bible rely on older, less reliable manuscripts. (The King James Version is one of those versions, having been produced in 1611 at a time when access to the best original language texts was not yet available, but even that text is reliable enough to give us no reason for concern.)

The work of ensuring that we have an accurate original language text continues and while we can anticipate some minor change, we can be assured that what we have is faithful to the original. That being said, translators have to make sure that they understand the original language and make themselves aware of the different meanings and nuances of a word. Some Hebrew and Greek words have different meanings, depending on the context. English is the same, for the sentence, “That man is gay,” means something very different depending on whether we are reading a sentence written in 1953 or 2023. Translators must be certain that they understand the meaning of the words they are translating. While the text of the original language remains stable, there is often discussion about the exact meaning of a particular word. (The word that is translated in Romans 3:25 as “sacrifice of atonement” is one of the words that evokes much discussion.) Again, we can be thankful that scholars generally agree on the meaning and usage of most of the Hebrew and Greek words. Even at that, we recognize that all translation is interpretive, meaning that the translators have begun the process of interpreting the Bible for us.

Translators not only have to be versant in the original language, but they must also be aware of nuances and meanings of words in English. As we are well aware, the English language changes over time (Shakespeare is difficult to read for most of us), and our language has regional differences (cars in England have boots and bonnets). This poses a challenge, for translators must choose language that their contemporaries will understand. This is one of the reasons that there are many translations available to us, and some of them have been updated more than once. What translators want to do is ensure that when we read our English translations, we understand the meaning as it was meant to be understood.

In translation work, translators must decide on a philosophy of translation, and their philosophy normally falls somewhere on a scale. On one of the scale we have more literal translations and on the other we have what some call a dynamic equivalent translation. In a more literal translation (no translation is fully literal), the original languages are translated word for word. Thus, in the King James Version, for example, we find the expression “bowels of mercy,” which is a literal rendering of the Greek. However, that makes very little sense to any of us, and we might miss the meaning of what was originally written. Thus, someone who is interested in getting the meaning across might decide to abandon literalism and substitute an equivalent idea and in the NIV, we find the word, “compassion.” That word we understand, although it might not get quite to the heart of the Greek word. In either a literal (word for word) translation or a dynamic equivalent (idea for idea) translation, there is always going to be a lack of precision in the translations, simply because we speak a different language. A literal translation can easily be misunderstood (and often is), but a dynamic translation can be a little looser than we might desire. Translations on both ends of the scale have benefits, but they also have their drawbacks.

It is important that when we choose a translation, we understand the intentions of the translators. If the translators tend toward literalism, we must not complain that their language is hard to understand and often difficult to read. On the other hand, when a translator intends to translate idea by idea, we ought not complain that their choices don’t necessarily reflect the depth or breadth of what was originally written. We must allow the translations to do what they were intended to do and appreciate them for that.

So, what do we do? There are several options. The first is to learn the original languages. I have studied both Hebrew and Greek, and I have a basic proficiency in them. However, I am far from fluent in either language, and must rely heavily on the work of others both in the meaning of the original word and way I should translate it. On my bookshelf is a 10-volume dictionary containing a discussion about the meaning of most of the Greek words used in the Bible. When I turn to these books, I must still decide which meaning and nuance is the best way for us to understand the word. Again, to do that well, I must rely heavily on scholars who are far more fluent in these languages.

The second option is to read several different translations. Most of us won’t learn the original languages, but most of also have access to different translations. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to do some reading about the intentions of the translators so that we can best understand what to expect as we use their translation. When choosing several translations, it is best to pick one which is quite literal (e.g. New King James Version), one that tends toward dynamic equivalency (e.g. New Living Translation), and one that is somewhere in the middle (e.g. New International Version). If you can understand another modern language, reading a Bible in that language can also be helpful.

Sometimes we hear people say that they will read only one translation of the Bible to the rejection of all the rest. For them, all the rest aren’t good enough. That is probably a short-sighted decision, for those who read only one version are not getting the whole picture. While all of us have a preferred translation, it is helpful to appreciate other translations, for by reading them in parallel, we will gain a better understanding of what the original authors intended. While we may become confused by all the translations available to us, we also should be thankful for them. I grew up having only the KJV available to me, and while the words and phrases became familiar, my Bible was about as easy to understand as Shakespeare, and for good reason, for Shakespeare’s plays were produced at about the same time as the KJV. Today, access to many translations gives us a better understanding of God’s revelation, and that really is our goal. Let’s use the tools God has given us and be thankful for those who made them available to us.

Sometimes, when a public figure is caught in wrongdoing, they acknowledge what they did and they express sorrow or repentance. We can be cynical about their apology because we might believe that they would never have “repented” if they had not been caught. We wonder if they truly are sorry for their wrongdoing. We also wonder if their repentance is a result of their wanting to maintain their office, and “repenting” of wrongdoing is a way to gain support of those who put them in their office (usually voters).

Contrast this to someone who has wronged another and has not yet been found out and probably would get away with what they did. Perhaps it’s a contractor who has mistakenly overcharged his client for materials and when he discovers the error he can’t sleep at night. He goes to this client with a cheque, seeking to right the wrong.

There are two similar words that are used to describe these scenarios. The first is attrition. Attrition is sorrow for sin merely out of fear of punishment or a sense of shame. The public figure wants to avoid the fallout of denying his wrongdoing by lying, so he admits to being guilty, hoping to avoid further harm to himself. This is attrition. The word used to identify what the contractor did is not attrition, but, rather, contrition. Contrition is a brokenness of spirit or sorrow for sin with the intent of not sinning again. We might say that contrition is the result of internal struggle while attrition describes situations created by external circumstances.

Let’s consider these two words in relationship to the gospel. Both attrition and contrition result in faith in Jesus Christ, but one is more believable than the other.

In the Middle Ages, it was quite common for the church to preach a gospel based on attrition. Hell was a very popular subject, and much of what we think we know about hell comes from the imaginations of writers and artists and not from Scripture. Dante’s Inferno, for example is a 14th century poem which describes in great detail 10 levels of hell and/or purgatory, the most severe being the level reserved for the devil and his demons. The church used images such as these to scare people to the point that they would profess faith in Jesus Christ and commitment to the church. This kind of teaching was used as a means to encourage people to put their faith in Jesus Christ centuries ago, and it has not lost its attractiveness today. Sometimes we hear Christians saying to those who do not believe in Jesus: you don’t want to spend eternity in hell do you? Belief in Jesus becomes a means for one to escape punishment. It is a gospel of attrition, a gospel which uses the motivation of escaping hell as a way to get people to believe.

A gospel of contrition appears to be quite different. Instead of showing people a vision of what hell could be and offering them a means of escape, a gospel of contrition reveals to people a holy, powerful, just, loving and gracious God who we have offended with our sin. Instead of emphasizing the consequences of remaining steeped in sin (a one-way ticket to hell), the presenter of the gospel talks about God’s love and grace for this world, love and grace shown to us in spite of our sin, and it calls people to repent and put their faith in Jesus Christ who came to this world to die for us (the ultimate act of grace) so that we could be restored to God.

Which method of evangelism is better? We might be pragmatic and say that it doesn’t matter too much, as long as people put their faith in Jesus Christ. There is some truth to that. But just as we might be a little skeptical about someone’s repentance when they are sorrowful only when caught, so we might be skeptical about whether someone truly believes in Jesus or if they are merely trying to avoid eternity in hell or gain a life of bliss in heaven. While we shouldn’t question anyone’s profession of Jesus, regardless of why they professed, it is harder to believe that a faith based on attrition is real. It sounds too much like they could have faith only because they are looking after themselves and their own eternal wellbeing.

On the other hand, when someone comes to faith because of who God is and responds to his grace and love, their faith seems much more credible. As a way of comparison, we might know a beautiful young woman who married a rather ugly guy who happened to be very rich, and we would question her motives. On the other hand, we can believe it is true love when a beautiful young woman marries an ugly poor guy. Why else would she want to spend the rest of her life with him? In the same way, when someone puts their faith in Jesus Christ because of who he is even without fully knowing the benefits we receive from him, we can believe that they believe because they truly love Jesus.

This may be reflected in our motivations for how we behave as well. If we obey God’s commands because we are afraid of what might happen to us, we are obeying out of fear. If, on the other hand, we live obedient lives because we know God and his grace and love for us, we are obeying out of love. Being fearful of God and loving God might result in the very same behaviour, but the reasons behind that behaviour are vastly different.

Several times in the last years people have commented to me that pastors don’t often speak of hell from the pulpit. There may be good reason for that, for we want to avoid a gospel of attrition wherein we scare people into believing and, instead, preach a gospel of contrition where people come to know their sin and see it in the light of God’s grace and love, and fall before him in faith because of who he is and what he has done. The gospel of contrition tends to last while the gospel of attrition needs to be reinforced. To continue to mention hell as a punishment (or heaven as a reward) is to rely on a gospel of attrition. To preach Christ crucified is to bring people to Christ because of who Christ is. It is quite likely that someone who comes to faith because of contrition would believe even if there was no such thing as hell or heaven. They would believe simply because of who God is, with no regard for their own wellbeing.

True, pastors may need to mention hell more often. We cannot avoid this biblical topic. But should hell (or heaven) be mentioned as a way to motivate people to correct behaviour and move them to faith? There may be a place for that, but it does seem that the gospel of contrition is more effective and perhaps even more biblical.

Attrition versus Contrition: In attrition, we regret sin and seek God primarily from a perspective of fear for our fate: eternal loss of God is, obviously, existential failure, while eternal Beatitude is existential fulfillment. In contrition, we regret sin and seek God primarily from a perspective of love for God: sin is ingratitude to God, whom one “should (and wants to) love above all things.”

Our mirrors today are so well-crafted that they reflect, almost without a flaw, whatever is before them. There are two things that can change the image that is reflected from a mirror: the mirror becomes distorted or broken in some way, or the image before the mirror changes.

In Genesis 1, we learn that when God created humankind, male and female, in his image. Of course, God is invisible, but when he created us, he created us to be an image of himself. In a sense, at creation humanity was a reflection of God. (We could spend a lot of time reviewing all that has been said about the image of God and what it is that we reflect, but that goes far beyond the point of this blog.) Again, God created human beings in such a way that we were meant to reflect his image. God meant himself to be seen in his image bearers.

We do not have to read much further into Genesis to discover that the image that we reflect has become distorted. A mirror that is smashed into hundreds of pieces still reflects that which is before it, but it does so improperly. Likewise, a mirror that has become warped will reflect an image, but the image will be distorted, often mocking that which it is meant to reflect. (We think of curved mirrors in fun houses as an example.) As image bearers of God, because of sin, we no longer faithfully reflect who God is. The images people see of God in us are broken and distorted, and although something of God may be seen in us, they can’t see what God intended to be seen had sin not entered the world.

But what if we move the mirror so that it is no longer facing God? In the Old Testament, the people began to worship other gods, the gods of the nations around them. In effect what they were doing was point themselves at something other than the Lord, and they began to reflect that image to the world. They became image bearers, not of the God who had created all things but, rather, of the gods they themselves had created. Not only was the image that they reflected distorted and broken, but it also didn’t reflect anything of our Creator God at all. What we might say, then, is that the god we worship becomes the image that others see in us. If we worship the Lord, then even though we reflect a broken image, it is still an image of the Lord. If we worship other gods, the image we project resembles the other gods.

In the second commandment, we are told that we may not make an image of any created thing for the intention of worshipping it. The commandment is broad enough to include not only images of other gods but also images of the Lord. There is good reason for this. In the Golden Calf narrative (Exodus 32ff.), the Israelites construct a statue of a calf and they proclaim that this image represented the gods (or, perhaps, God) who had brought them out of Egypt. At first it appears that they have switched gods, but in verse 5 of that same chapter, Aaron declares that there will be a “festival to the Lord,” indicating that this golden calf was probably meant to represent the Lord.

We can understand why the people would have wanted such an image. The golden calf (picture a muscular yearling bull) depicted that their God (god) had power. Already he had displayed that power when he defeated the Egyptians and freed the Israelites, but the Israelites were unsure of the future, and they wanted to be assured that the God (god) they followed would lead them onward to the Promised Land and provide them a home there after displacing those who already lived in the Land. A yearling bull (bulls were among the most powerful animals of the time) seemed to be a perfect image by which the Israelites could gain assurance. Who doesn’t want a powerful God?

But there was one thing they didn’t consider. When they made the golden calf, they were hoping to say that they would appear powerful to their enemies, that the image they reflected to the world was powerful because their God (god) was powerful. The nations would see them with their god, and they would be afraid. But the thing that they didn’t consider was this: by making God into a statue, they had also made him unresponsive. It doesn’t matter how much they prayed, sacrificed, pleaded, threatened, cajoled or otherwise tried to convince the golden calf to respond, it would remain unmoving and unresponsive. And that is not who God is.

It is because the Israelites made this image, that God begins to use a term that sticks with them through the centuries: they are stiff-necked. Stiff-necked is not stubborn, although it can be that; it is better thought of as being unresponsive. The covenant God had made with his people involved their response of service and obedience, but they were doing nothing of that. They had become like the statue of the calf, unresponsive and uncaring, refusing to be thankful to the Lord for what he had done for them. Most of the times that the phrase, “stiff-necked,” is used in the Bible, it is used in reference to the casting of the golden calf. It becomes a way for God (or his spokespeople, the prophets) to say that the people are not responding to God’s covenant as they had promised to.

As we know, the Golden Calf narrative follows upon God’s covenant with Israel in which he promised to provide for his people, as long as they heeded his voice. In building the calf, they had decided to ignore God (be stiff-necked). In not responding to God, they neglected to love God or their neighbour. They had become unresponsive to the covenant, thus rendering it null and void. It was only because our gracious God decided to keep the covenant in spite of their being stiff-necked that he did not abandon them. It is because of sin, in fact, that God the Father sent a new image-bearer to be his reflection in this world. Jesus, who is the exact image of God, became what we could not be, making God known to this broken world.

The God we worship is not unresponsive as was the golden calf. Our God not only responds to our needs when we ask him for help, but more often than not he anticipates our needs and provides for us long before we even think of asking. When it comes to our salvation, God’s, “I will save you,” came long before our “Save us.” And when it comes to daily needs, if God didn’t provide for us even before we asked, we would be a worse situation that we could imagine.

Because we worship a God who is responsive to our needs, we begin to reflect that responsiveness in the way we treat others as well. Thus, the apostles would agree that it is somewhat ludicrous for us to say that we love God while at the same time doing nothing to care for our neighbours. God’s responsiveness causes us to become responsive as well as we worship him.

Perhaps one way to determine if it is truly God that we worship is to ask this question: is the image I am presenting an image of grace, love, and provision? Or am I uncaring about the needs of others? If the latter is the case, perhaps it is not the God of the Bible that we are worshipping.

Sometimes our actions show our faith better than our words. In fact, what we do often shows how much faith we have. Following are several examples, one from the Bible and several from our lives.

In 1 Samuel 17 we read the story about David and Goliath. In that story as David runs forward to challenge Goliath, he picks up 5 stones. Have you ever wondered why he picked up 5 stones and not just one? Did David really believe that if he missed with the first stone that Goliath would give him the chance to sling another at him? Goliath had a shield bearer who would have provided the giant with protection from any subsequent stones, so David had to knock Goliath out with the first stone, or else he would be killed.

So, why 5 stones? In 2 Sameul 21:15-22, we read that David’s mighty men fought and killed four men who were descendants of Rapha from Gath. Goliath was from Gath, and Rapha, while a proper name in verse 22, also means “giant.” It seems that when David went out to meet Goliath, he had in mind that not only would he kill Goliath, but he would also put to death his four sons. Thus, the act of picking up 5 stones was not so that he could try again if he missed the first time, but, rather, as a way of saying to Goliath, “I am so confident that God has given you into my hands that I am picking up these other stones to say that you will have no descendants.” Picking up 5 stones was David’s act of faith in the Lord.

In our times, we can also see acts of faith. Most cemeteries (but not all) are arranged in such a way that those who are buried there, should they be able to sit up, would face east. Tradition has it that Jesus, when he returns, will return from the east. When Jesus returns, Scripture teaches, those who have put their faith in him will be raised to new life, and it has become a tradition that those who die in the Lord, when they are raised to new life will see Jesus coming on the clouds. Being buried in such a way is an act of faith, faith that God will raise his children to eternal life.

This does not mean, of course, that if cemeteries are arranged differently, the designers were mocking God. Maybe they just didn’t know the tradition or maybe the topography didn’t lend itself to a different arrangement. It also doesn’t mean that those who choose cremation are dismissing the teaching of the resurrection, for one does not have to be buried in the traditional way to prove their faith. Nevertheless, those who do anticipate the resurrection might choose, as a sign of their faith, to be buried in such a way so that when they rise from the grave, the first person they will see is Jesus.

Perhaps one example that might apply to our routine decisions. As followers of Jesus Christ, we know that we are called to give of what we have to support the ministry of the church and to help others. The Bible teaches that we are to give first to the work of the Lord and then trust that God will provide for us until the next paycheque. There are many who write out their cheques to the church and to charities as soon as they receive their salary, for they are confident that as they give what they have committed themselves to give, God will provide for the rest of their needs. Those who give from what they have left over after expenses, on the other hand, might be showing that they don’t really trust the Lord to provide for their daily needs.

Perhaps you can think of other examples of how our actions show our faith more than our words. In fact, it is often the case that our actions do speak out our faith far more than our words. If we truly take God at his word, it is likely that the way we live our lives will speak our faith more strongly than our words.

A few negative examples are also helpful. Superstitions are often an unspoken display of a lack of faith or of faith in someone or something other than the Lord. Knocking on wood is a remnant of the pagan practice of summoning powerful gods who lived in trees. Avoiding walking under a ladder is a superstitious way of avoiding offending the Triune God. (The lines formed by the ladder, the ground, and the wall were thought to represent the Trinity.) Avoiding stepping on cracks is rooted in the belief that a crack in the pavement might be filled with evil forces. While we might not know the origin of these superstitious practices when we engage in them, we are revealing that perhaps our faith might not be as firmly rooted in our Lord Jesus Christ as we might profess. Even if we may not know the origin of superstitions, we know that we are doing something to gain “good luck” or avoid “bad luck.” Sometimes, our actions speak the truth of our hearts, even when we don’t intend that to happen.

When David picked up the 5 stones, he knew what he was doing. He was not confident in himself at that moment, but, rather, fully aware of his dependence on God. He was so sure that God would help him defeat Goliath that he was able to pick up 4 extra stones, stones he would never have been able to use against Goliath. His seemingly insignificant action revealed where his heart was. May it be that our actions do the same.