Topical Studies
What the Bible says about
Choosing Life
(From Forerunner Commentary)
Genesis 2:17
When we read in Genesis 2:17, do we not subconsciously read into it, "Yes, but He does not really mean that. He means we will eventually die"? We soften it, expecting that God will not carry through with what He literally says. The Keil-Delitzsch Commentary says about this verse, "That in the day that you eat thereof you shall die." It means as soon as he ate, he would die. The Keil-Delitzsch is a very conservative commentary. The Interpreter's Bible Commentary, which is one of the most liberal commentaries, says, "Death would follow immediately!" From one of the most conservative commentaries, Keil-Delitzsch, to one of the most liberal, The Interpreter's Bible Commentary, they agree the verse says that when they touched that tree, thus showing the intent of their heart, they would die. In the beginning, at creation, all sin is deemed as worthy of death. Every sin is a capital offense. In creation, God was not obligated in any way to give life to you or me. Life is a gift that puts us under obligation, and that obligation is stated, or at least implied very strongly, right when man is being created. God gave life to man and put him under the obligation of being the image-bearer of God (Genesis 1:26). That is why we were created. In chapter 2, we are further obligated by God's command to take of the Tree of Life, and not the other tree. The implication there is that only God knows how we are to live in order to fill our obligation to be the image-bearer of God. We have to learn that the root of sin lies in the desire of men to live their lives in self-centered independence from God. This is what keeps us from being the image-bearers of God that He intended us to be. If we deviate from this, have we not broken our obligation to God? If we deviate from this—if we go from the path, if we miss the mark—we have sinned. We have broken our obligation to mirror and reflect the holiness of God. Implied by the name “Tree of Life,” God is telling us that we do not intrinsically possess the kind of life that God has, and that if we want that kind of life, it must be added. It is added through what the Tree of Life symbolized. What if we do not meet our obligations? We forfeit the gift of life when we sin. Is God unfair if something is so clearly stated? Do we see why He commands us to choose life? He sets before us two different ways. He commands us to go in a certain direction, because if we go in the other direction we have broken our obligation to be image-bearers, and then He is not obligated any longer after that to continue our lives. He is under no obligation to continue the life that He gave to us as a gift. God is not acting unfairly nor with injustice, for the commands are very clear. When the penalty was stated to Adam and Eve, did God say, "If you sin, some day you will die"? No. The penalty is clearly stated to be instant death, just as suddenly as it fell on Nadab and Abihu, and on Ananias and Sapphira, and Uzza. Let us look at this realistically and let us not try to soften what God very clearly and literally says. He meant the death penalty in the fullest sense of the word. The only reason they lived was because it was right at that point that God extended grace. God was no longer obligated to continue their life. They had broken His Word, deviated from the path, and the just thing for God to have done would have been to kill them just as He did Uzza. That is not what He did though. Instead, He gave them mercy, and He gave them grace. There is a saying, "Justice delayed is justice denied," but not always so. In this case with Adam and Eve, the full measure of justice was delayed for grace to have time to work. We need to be thinking of this in relation to ourselves, because He is establishing a pattern. Justice was delayed so grace would have time to work. In this case, the delay of justice was not the denial of justice, but the establishing of mercy and grace. So right at the very beginning of the Book, in its third chapter, grace is introduced.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Justice and Grace
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Genesis 6:5-6
At this time in the world, we have not reached the specific level of violent conduct before the Flood, but we are moving toward it. This increasingly perilous condition stands as an indictment against all of us because we have all contributed to this menacing situation. How? It is partly motivated by our collective lack of knowledge, understanding, desire, and/or will to seek God's righteousness and pursue it as the Bible commands us to do. Many secular-minded people severely question even God's very existence, but God counters those challenges with a stern judgment of His own. Romans 1:18-20 declares that humanity is without excuse because God has made His existence known to mankind. As it is impossible for God to lie, it is a statement of fact: The proofs of His existence and overall governance are available in the observation of creation. Yet, we see no groundswell of people searching for those spiritual truths. Can today's humanity change and practice a culture of morality superior to what we see in the world? Probably, because even this nation's history shows an America with a much higher level of moral conduct among the general population. Within its histories of the Israelite peoples, the Bible shows a few instances of such a thing occurring. However, the overall chances of reformation are slim because the Bible pointedly shows us that as long as man's self-centered, anti-God nature remains driven by its resident carnality, nothing will ever change! Romans 8:7 dogmatically states that man's carnal mind, the mind he develops from birth, is antagonistic to God. It is not subject to God by nature. It has been this way since Adam and Eve. They sinned, bringing the sentence of death upon themselves almost immediately after spending time in the presence of their Creator and being instructed by Him personally. This reality is evidence of how persuasive the anti-God nature we take on at birth is. That one of their children murdered the other proves that the same nature passes on to us, their children. Immorality has almost always been the dominant way of life for mankind. The early chapters of Genesis show violence continued growing until God Himself put a stop to it by bringing the Flood on humanity. He wiped humanity out entirely except for one family of eight. With the reality of the conditions we are living through and the availability of the Bible as a resource, we are challenged to choose. God took this same approach toward ancient Israel, and His challenge remains in His Word to this day—to choose life (Deuteronomy 30:15-20). Since Jesus Christ walked the earth, history shows that no nation has had such full and easy access to the Word of God as America. Who then do we choose to believe, God or men? Even though God is not challenging the entire nation to choose now as He did Israel at that time in their history, the challenge remains for the individual citizen. If an individual sincerely desires to better his conduct before God and not follow the crowds eagerly throwing themselves into the pit reserved for those who do not want to please Him, he or she can choose life. The potential violent destruction because of America's immoral conduct deserves serious consideration and positive response. Does our conduct follow the American pattern, or does it reflect Jesus Christ's teaching? Those two ways of life are not similar in character. The choices are obvious. We have little excuse not to choose life.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Why Hebrews Was Written (Part Six)
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Genesis 6:5
Evil is the very antithesis of the eternal life that comes from knowing the Father and the Son (John 17:3). At the very beginning of the Book, mankind had to choose between life and the knowledge of good and evil—and he did not choose life! Witness the sorry record humanity has written ever since. We do not hear much about evil these days, except perhaps in the titles of Hollywood productions and video games, so it is worth considering its basic meaning. In its common usage, it always describes something bad or negative. Yet, it is not just bad in the sense that a snowstorm or an accident may be bad. Evil contains within it malignancy—something that is purposefully injurious or intentionally unkind. It is not merely unpleasant; it is miserable by design. With regard to human behavior, perhaps author M. Scott Peck, M.D. (The Road Less Travelled; People of the Lie) describes it best as "that which does harm to life or liveliness." Clearly, evil is not something Christians should choose to be associated with, let alone glorify, for "the face of LORD is against those who do evil" (I Peter 3:12; Psalm 34:12-16). Paul raises the bar even higher with his exhortation to "abstain from every form of evil" (I Thessalonians 5:22)—from everything that is against life and especially eternal life! It is evident that the rituals of Halloween, ancient and modern, do not promote life, but revel in the realm of trickery, sorcery, spiritism, and the many dark ways of the evil one. Christians should not be involved with such things. As Paul told the often-wayward Corinthians, "You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the Lord's table and of the table of demons" (I Corinthians 10:21). Just like Adam, we have to choose between life and evil; they are mutually exclusive. Jesus foretells a future resurrection, in which all will be divided into two groups that represent what they chose during their lifetimes: . . . for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice and come forth—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation. (John 5:28-29; emphasis ours) Eschewing the evil of Halloween is the easy part. The far greater challenge is to combat the evil that resides inside us (Mark 7:20-23)—evil that is promoted by Satan, evil that reached out in the Garden of Eden and has permeated the world ever since. It is seen in the way we do harm to life or liveliness in others—in cutting words, in deception, in attempts to manipulate, in self-centeredness that wounds those who encounter it, and in countless other ways. The manifestations of evil in mankind seem to be limited only by the length of his days. However, those in whom God dwells have the means "not [to] be overcome by evil, but [to] overcome evil with good" (Romans 12:21). The means is the eternal life available through our relationship with God. Eternal life is not merely length of days, but length of days without evil—that is, life of the highest quality, life as God lived it while a human. When we emulate the Life-giver, we are choosing life—and condemning evil.
David C. Grabbe
The Glorification of Evil
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Deuteronomy 29:4
This statement could be considered to be a lamentation that things would be different. However, God knew this before He entered into the Old Covenant; He was not surprised that Israel did not keep it. If anything may have grieved Him, perhaps their rebellion was worse than even He expected it would be. To get a clear picture, one only has to recall the creation of Adam and Eve and the subsequent events in the Garden. God did not create Adam and Eve with an evil heart. Every biblical writer has recognized an innocence in the initial natures of Adam and Eve. They hid themselves from God only after they sinned. "Who told you that you were naked?" God said (Genesis 3:11). They were confronted with choices and chose the evil way, to sin, and something happened to their minds after they sinned. This is very instructive. Their nature at creation was made impressionable, so that as they made choices, their minds or their dispositions became or conformed to the nature of the choices that they made. A conscience, a perspective, and a character began to be formed. I Corinthians 2:11 shows that our natural mind is strong in gathering, understanding, and using material knowledge but weak in gathering, understanding, and using spiritual knowledge. In the same manner, babies are not born evil, but they become evil as a result of the influences of life in their environments.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace, and Law (Part Eleven)
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Deuteronomy 30:15-20
One of the Bible's greatest principles is "choose life." God sets before us two ways of life—His way and the wrong way—and gives us the freedom to choose which we will follow. He commands us to choose life so that we may live fully, both now and in His Kingdom, but we can opt for the other way of sin just as readily. With the receipt of the Holy Spirit, we truly have free choice or free-moral agency. Before conversion, as the apostles wrote, we simply lived like everyone else, that is, according to the course of this world (Ephesians 2:1-3; I Peter 1:18; 4:3). Now, able to judge between the two ways of life more accurately, we have the power to decide to go God's way. It is in our choices that we sin or live righteously. James is very clear that we do not sin when tempted but "when desire has conceived" or when we choose to act on it (James 1:14-15). The sin begins with the choice and continues with the act. Thus, all sin has a spiritual basis.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Sin Is Spiritual!
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Deuteronomy 30:15-20
God is urging us to make serious and deliberate choices to propel us toward the conclusion of His purpose. He requires us to commit and make decisions. In matters of morality, remaining neutral is not an option. The issues are sharply defined: obedience, disobedience; life, death; good, evil. He especially points out that He will not tolerate idolatry. Idols are useless vanities that people choose to submit to rather than the sovereign God.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Sovereignty of God: Part Six
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Deuteronomy 30:15-20
God Almighty has given man the power to make choices regarding his ultimate destiny. As a free moral agent, man has the awesome responsibility to choose between a hapless, physio-chemical existence with a dead end or a rich and rewarding eternity as a member of God's Family. Though the choice appears easy, the challenging road to the Kingdom of God dismays many because they are unwilling to undergo the rigors of the journey. God has set before us the choice to obey or disobey, hoping we will choose obedience and giving us reasons and promises that persuade us to that end, but He wants us to make sure that it is our intention, without coercion or brainwashing on His part. It takes a free moral agent, making the right choices, to create the mind of Christ in us. Though He has a good idea how we will choose, God ultimately does not know what we will decide when given the choice. He will do all He can—short of rescinding our freedom to choose—to convince us to choose Him.
David F. Maas
Fasting: Building Spiritual Muscle
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Deuteronomy 30:19
God wants us to be fulfilled in life by following His way ("choose life," He says in Deuteronomy 30:19). He tells us what not to eat and warns us against gluttony and overdrinking. He tells us when and where to worship and who to fellowship with. His law even covers clothing, strongly urging modesty. Its principles reach into every aspect of life. Israel has been unfaithful to things similar to this and many more. God's way is alluringly confronted and challenged on every side by what the New Testament calls the "world" (Greek cosmos). Cosmos means an organized system, but one opposed to the way of God's commandment. Babylon, meaning "confusion"—confusion regarding a way of life—is the Bible's code name for that system. God charges us in Revelation 18:4 to come out of that confused system, and the only way we can do that is to quit practicing Babylon's ways of doing things in the worship of its gods. Israel, however, lives for the moment and for as much immediate gratification as possible. As a whole, she does not believe God and is afraid to pay the costs to break away and be peculiar or distinctive in a right way. She finds it easier to be like everyone else and be willingly accepted on the world's terms rather than her Husband's.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Beast and Babylon (Part Six): The Woman's Character
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1 Kings 18:21
God says choose but then burn all bridges to the former way of life. Some of us, I fear, have maintained open-ended options, contingency plans, and escape clauses in our relationship with God. Like the Laodicean, we look at our spiritual contract with a view of finding loopholes and exploiting the blessings. It is apparent that some of us still approach our calling with the attitude of "what can I get away with and still appear to be a Christian?"
David F. Maas
Spiritual Double Agents
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John 6:53
We have to choose! It is our responsibility to choose to intensify the sanctification process or to stop it. It is our choice. God says, "See, I have set before you this day life on the one hand and death on the other. Therefore, choose life!" (Deuteronomy 30:19). We can choose to go along with God's program, and if we do, we cannot hide the fruit. It will be produced. However, we can choose to reject it. It is our responsibility to make the choice.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace, and Law (Part Nine)
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Romans 9:19-24
The question Paul poses is natural for those who do not have the faith and thus have not really submitted to God. The far more important question for the converted is, "Does He not have the right to do as He pleases with us, since He is not only our Creator, but He has also purchased us from our spiritual bondage to sin through the payment of His sinless Son's lifeblood?" We therefore belong to Him, and He sees us now as both sons and slaves. God fully expects us to be slaves of righteousness even as we were once slaves to sin (Romans 6:15-23). A slave is one whose master makes his choices. The majority of us have been born into cultures where literal, physical slavery is no longer practiced. We have no direct experience with it, though most of us have at least an intellectual understanding of some aspects of it. Consider, then, the relationship between master and slave. The apostles had a good reason to use the word that means "slave" (doulos). They wanted us to understand that in our relationship with God we not only experience the joys of freedom as His children but also the serious requirement to obey as His slaves. Suppose the Master summons a slave to meet with him every seventh day for instruction and fellowship with Him and His other slaves, and the slave refuses, saying he has something more important to do. This "something more important" does not necessarily have to be working for pay. Perhaps his justification for staying away is, "I learn more studying by myself at home," or "So many 'unspiritual' people are there that I no longer feel comfortable." Suppose the Master says the slave is to pay back ten percent of his increase to Him, but the slave says, "I have other, more important things to do with my money." Once we understand this, it becomes apparent where our parent church headed in regard to sovereignty. The leaders quickly changed many doctrines—and thus the theology of the entire institution—subtly turning the tables in the relationship. They made the slave the master by giving him the right to decide what is law and what is not, as well as permission to change established priorities. This is virtually the same ploy Satan used on Adam and Eve when he said, "You will be as God." Who is the sovereign and who is the slave is one of the points Paul makes in Romans 9. Understanding that God is sovereign and we are the slaves and translating this into loving submission are essential to our relationship with Him. This absolutely requires trusting Him. Those without the faith cannot do this because they do not believe as God does. To have the faith of Christ, we must believe what Christ believes. Will anyone be in God's Kingdom who does not believe as God does? As we have experienced this life, most of us at one time or another have considered whether God is fair. Our Creator has designed experiences to bring this question to mind so we might consider as many ramifications of it as possible. We usually glean most of our information from the disasters and tragedies of human life. What we often lack are His perspective and truth. As He gives these through the revelation of Himself, we begin to perceive His loving grace, abundant generosity, infinite patience, ready forgiveness, stable oversight, and unswerving commitment to concluding His wonderful purpose successfully. Those who see Him as unfair are usually ignorant of what is really going on because they have not yet been given eyes to see that they are included in His plan. Mankind's disasters and tragedies have their roots in sin, but God did not will man to sin. Solomon writes in Ecclesiastes 7:29, "Truly, this only I have found: that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes." Mankind has chosen to bring disaster and tragedy upon himself. God is gradually removing the ignorance that holds mankind in thrall to choices that kill him. He has removed this ignorance from us already, and we are therefore free to choose life, as God commands in Deuteronomy 30:19.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Sovereignty of God: Part Six
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1 Corinthians 6:9-11
Paul is paraphrasing what Jesus said: "Obey the laws of God. Don't steal. Don't lust. Don't covet. Don't be a drunkard - because you are justified."Paul gives justification as the very reason they should obey the law of God - because they had been justified. He says, "Choose life because you have been justified." Justification is given as the reason - indeed, the obligation - for voluntarily choosing life, for choosing not to sin.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace, and Law (Part Four)
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Philippians 2:12-13
There is no question that God can save us. Of course, He can make us inheritors of "the land" and give us eternal life. All these are beyond question! He has the power to do this, and He has the will to do it. He certainly wants to do it—it is part of His purpose. Even so, we can stop the process. We can choose not to be sanctified. This is why Paul says, "Work out your own salvation." We learn from the analogy of Israel in the wilderness how the first generation of those who came out chose—they made the choice—to die in the wilderness. It was not God's purpose that they die there. He had the power to get Israel into the land. Indeed, He did it. Yet, their lack of faith, their disbelief, their stiff necks, their refusal to rid themselves of the patterns of thinking they had in Egypt, their refusal to yield, and their refusal to make the right choices (as Joshua and Caleb did) were the deciding factors in their bodies being scattered all through the wilderness. God had it written down as a lesson for us (see I Corinthians 10:1-11). He is saying, in effect, "Choose life. Don't choose to do what these people did—in lusting, tempting Me," and so forth. So, who can we possibly blame if we do not make it? Has not God called us? Has He not given us His grace? Has He not given us His Spirit, a new heart, the divine nature, access to Him, and the promise that He will never give us any trial that is too great for us? And let us not forget the additional promise in Hebrews 13:5, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." He has given us all the tools, so now the onus is on us. God is not demanding we do everything perfectly from day one, but He does want to see evidence that we want to be there! He wants to see that we are making efforts to walk the talk. He wants to see that we are not going backward. He wants to see us move off dead center and begin to grow on a steady, consistent basis—regardless of how fast it is. He wants to see that we are using and applying what He has given us, and He is willing to add whatever we lack! He will give us the gifts that we need to serve Him. If we do what He wants us to do, the changes will take place. The mainstream Christian approach leaves one with the impression that salvation is complete at the point of justification. But that is completely out of step with Colossians 1:22, where Paul writes, "if you continue in the faith . . .." The Israelites had to walk to the Promised Land, and as they walked, God prepared them to inherit the land. In this way, they became sanctified. Sanctification is what provides evidence of growth.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Covenants, Grace, and Law (Part Nine)
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Hebrews 1:10-12
Was I born into this world merely to eat and drink?—merely to dress up my body and to follow my fleshly desires wherever they might take me?—merely to talk, laugh, work, sleep, and play games?—merely to accumulate money, to travel to see all kinds of sights, to enjoy myself but never to think about time and the fact that my time on earth would end? What happens then? Hebrews 1:10-12 tells us that this earth—which appears so solid that it will endure forever—and even the heavens are growing old and will perish. II Peter 3:10 confirms this, explicitly saying that the heavens and the earth will "pass away with a great noise." They and all the works that are in it will burn away in "fervent heat." Where will we be? The works of statesmen, writers, architects, and engineers are all short-lived. Each generation watches the passing of its creative people, only to see them replaced by others with different names and different achievements as the new generation arrives. In Ecclesiastes 1:14, King Solomon, at a time of depressed contemplation on this seemingly endless and pointless process, writes, "I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and indeed, all is vanity and grasping for wind." Either Solomon did not know—or if he did know, did not believe what I know and believe—what we have been created for. Many are in the same mental state as Solomon. It is not because the opportunity to have a far better life is not available but because their priorities in life are severely misplaced, and they combine this with undervaluing what is open to them through a relationship with God. Paul writes in Romans 3:11, "There is none that seeks after God." He adds in Romans 1:20, "For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and [divine nature], so that they are without excuse." God is not hiding; mankind is ignoring. Scripture indicates that man's disregard is largely a deliberate choice, driven by terribly skewed priorities resulting from people placing little or no value on a relationship with God. Therefore, they give only passing attention to what He says that man must do with his life. God even challenges mankind: "I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19). I Peter 1:17 informs us that God "without partiality judges according to each one's work." Jesus says in Luke 12:48, "For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more." God does not show favoritism, nor does He respect the honors bestowed by men. He rewards no man's heritage, wealth, rank, position, titles, education, or beauty. He is unconcerned whether a person is a millionaire, middle-class, or poor. Because He does not see with a man's eyes, He does not value highly what man values. He measures our heart and our works against that of His Son, our Savior. What matters is how well we have done spiritually and morally with what we have been given. Those who do well will be those who value highly—as precious above all gifts—what God has given them to attain His Kingdom. Those who do well will be those who, regardless of their station in life, use those gifts to serve God and mankind to glorify God. They will use them because they have caught a vision of their worth. The apostle Paul considered our calling a prize that he pressed toward as a goal (Philippians 3:12-14). Peter refers to Jesus Christ's sacrificed blood as "precious" (I Peter 1:19). Since His shed blood has been deemed by God to be sufficient to redeem the life of everyone who has ever lived on earth, it is more valuable than all the lives of everyone who has ever lived or will live. Why? First, because of whose blood it was, a sinless God-Man. Second, because it can free us from the shackles of a pointless life that ends in death. Third, because it opens the door for us to an eternity of life with joy, peace, and accomplishment. Our Savior gives us some precious wisdom: "He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him" (John 8:29). Why did He do this? Because nothing was more valuable to Jesus Christ than His relationship with His Father and fulfilling His life's purpose. Like Him, let us seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness always (Matthew 6:33).
John W. Ritenbaugh
Nothing Is More Important
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