Hypothetical Harry Must Die (part 1)
His name is Hypothetical Harry. Now, I have never met this clown, nor do I care to except for the fact that he has been trailing me like a ghost for the past 20 years. Whenever the glorious news of our freedom in Christ is preached, I always here about Hypothetical Harry. Harry hears the good news that He is unconditionally loved, completely forgiven and eternally secure in Christ. He hears that Jesus paid it all and we cannot add anything to our complete righteousness in Christ. Our behavior will not and cannot change a thing. Because his behavior will never change God’s unconditional love and standing with the Father, Harry does something like this. He commits adultery all the time, drinks, steals and lies, kills his parents, “does whatever he wants”; doesn’t go to church(well, that can’t be held against him), and “still gets to go to heaven.” Whenever I am confronted with Hypothetical Harry, I tell the person asking about Harry not to worry about Harry but to take the good news of God’s grace to heart and apply it to their lives; to draw near to God and receive His abundant love on a daily basis. However, Harry will just not go away. I have decided that Hypothetical Harry must die!
There are several reasons why Hypothetical Harry has gotten away with his shenanigans all of these years, (and what I mean when I say all of these years is thousands of years). Paul addressed Harry back in Romans 6. But let’s not go there yet.
The first reason Harry lives is the fact that his fans only equate salvation with going to heaven when you die. In other words, salvation is only escape from punishment. And to take it further, the thought is that the fear of punishment is what will keep us from sinning. And if fear of punishment is needed to keep us from sinning, then our salvation is not really salvation at all because we were supposed to be saved from God’s punishment in the first place. So, we are back to square one! What Harry’s fans really believe is that we have probationary live—that Jesus plus our good behavior is what saves us from eternal punishment. There is no other way to explain it. Salvation from eternal punishment is really good news and I embrace it; however, that is only the first P of salvation. Jesus came to save us from the Penalty of sin, the Power of sin, and the Presence of Sin. Each one is an essential part of the other.
The penalty of sin is death. When Adam and Eve sinned, spiritual and physical death occurred. Immediately, Adam died spiritually; his spirit was no longer joined to God. We are born spiritually dead. Physical death also occurred but this is a long process we call aging. While living in these sin cursed bodies in this sin cursed world with a dead spirit, we “are separated from the life of God and darkened in our understanding”. The separation from the life of God defines our spiritual death. In order to be spiritually alive, we have to be filled with the Spirit of God; God is the source of all Life. We are saved from eternal death. At the Final Judgment found in Revelation 20, there are only two types of people there – dead and alive. That is how God sees us, either dead or alive.
11Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. 14Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. 15If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.”
Notice that death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. There is no mention of people being thrown into the lake of fire. This lake of fire is the final judgment. There is not a lot of information about what happens here except they are thrown into the lake of fire. But I know one thing; God is not marching back and forth on a stage waving His Bible around about all of this. I think our modern Christian culture has drawn its idea of Hell more from Dante’s Inferno than it has the Scriptures. One thing is for sure. The death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ has saved us from this penalty and we don’t ever have to fear the 2nd death! We are eternally forgiven and secure. Now, this is where Hypo Harry comes in. People only equate salvation with escape from punishment. Yes, Harry will escape this judgment no matter what if God has saved him through Jesus Christ’s work; however, Harry will be miserable during his earthly life. He will be divorced, in jail, he is an orphan with no friends, and Bubba thinks he is cute. Get the picture? Harry is wretched and miserable.
Now Harry could have avoided all of this if he realized that Christ saves us from the power of sin. This will be addressed in part 2, but for now, give Harry a quick funeral and rejoice in your eternal security.....
Comments
Jesus doesn't tell us not to commit adultery because he's some kinda spoil-sport... He's saying that living adultery-free is the truest and most fully human way of living. As we become more like Christ, we become more fully human. As we engage in sex with our neighbor's wife, or engage in sex with anything that moves, we are becoming less human (less like Christ) and more like an animal.
Focusing on the afterlife becomes unbalanced, and the unbalance results in forgetting to live more abundantly today.
And the insidious underlying belief, if we're not careful, is that the only thing that keeps us from having sex with the neighbor is that God said NOT to.
We focus on the eternal consequences, (which are significant), and forget the temporal consequences (which are also very significant).
And in the post death life we will experience... it's important to remember that there WILL be varying results... the rewards in eternity aren't equal between people. The guy who repents on his death bed we ALL believe inherits eternal life... but his reward will be significantly different than say martyred saint.
-vern-
Recognize first that men represent spiritual beings and women represent humanity in the Scriptures and in their respective roles in the natural. This is why fornication is so closely associated with false religion. False religion in the natural is the use of human sexuality against the rules of biblical sexuality (fornication) in the same way that false religion in the spiritual is the mis-use of God's redemption in Christ alone by asserting that 'new life' is attainable through some other method than Christ's obedience, death on the Cross of Christ and the Christ/Bride relationship.
Adultery likewise represents Satan coming between Christ and His Bride and Jehovah and His Bride (Israel) in the spiritual where another man comes between the husband and wife in the natural. Men in adultery play the role of Satan. Women in adultery play the role of the unfaithful bride as Israel was often portrayed.
In short, the Biblical 'focus' on sexual control is because sex and reproduction represent the Cross of Christ and any mis-use of the gift of 'new life' is the natural type of the spiritual reality that is anti-Christ and anti-redemption.
GourmetDan