Sermon Notes: Now Are We The Sons Of God

Last Sunday I had the privilege of preaching at my local church. Here are my sermon notes complete with random mental doodlings and notes-to-self.

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1st John 3:1-3

1. Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. 2. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. 3. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.

I want to share with you something that has absolutely changed my outlook on life. It’s changed my view of myself, my identity, my purpose and my progress. I hope it will do the same for you. Identity – knowing who were are and how we fit into the universe – is one of the most powerful forces in the world. It effects how we live and in many cases how we die. Therefore, having a biblical understanding of who we are is vital. This is a huge topic however I want to explore one element of our identity as believers in Jesus Christ.

Pray.

A New Identity (Verse 1)

According Verse 1 the Father bestows love upon us. John has a lot to say about love. And before we go any further this is a theme that needs to be explored. Elsewhere John says that God is Love. This is a huge statement. According to John, love isn’t just something God does. It’s something He is. This is huge. It also created a bit of a predicament. Love is something one person has for another and therefore love cannot exist with only one person. So, this raises the question, who did God love prior to creation.

Well, fkr the Christian this is really no problem at all. We believe in One God eternally existent in Three Persons. How’s that work? I have no idea. But that’s okay. If God were only as big as our brain He wouldn’t be worth the time of day. He won’t really be God.

For the sake of this discussion, I just want you to understand that the reality of the Holy Trinity is what allows John to say that God is Love. For love to exist you need three things – a Lover (someone who does the loving), a Beloved (the object of that love) and then from the love between the Lover and the Beloved will proceed the spirit of that relationship.

Thus, before time began, God the Father loved God the Son. And from eternity past Love Itself has proceeded from their relationship in such reality and intensity that it’s an actual person – the Person of the Holy Spirit. Example of Jesus’ Baptism.

So, what does all this have to do with us? Actually, it has everything to do with us. This love is the reason we exist. The awesome love that existed in the Triune God went on the road, if you will. Love existed within the Triune God from eternity past. And then it boiled over and the God of Love began creating things. The climax of His creation was, of course, man.

“And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” (Genesis 1:26) Note the plurality of the pronouns. The Triune God determined to create a creature in the His Image who would therefore be able to enjoy the fellowship of love that is Himself. Relationship is the reason the universe exists.

But of course man’s rebellion ruined all that. Now, you and I are, in our natural/normal state, outside of the relationship of God. We can’t fellowship with God. We can’t enjoy the splendor that is Himself. And since we’re severed from Love Himself we find that our love for others is also plagued with selfishness and sin. We cannot truly communicate with the Father. In our natural condition, we are enemies of God – enemies of Love Himself.

But this brings us to 1st John 3. Read Verse 1. He doesn’t just bestow love upon us. He bestows a particular manner of love; the type of love that gives us a new identity. In love, God gives us a new identity. He makes us sons of God, just as Christ is the Son of God.

In the Bible, sonship means more than simply being someone’s offspring. It’s a defining characteristic of how you are. To a point, we still recognize this in our culture. Every time I write my full name I’m reminded that I’m not just Josh, I’m Josh Stilwell. Or, other way to say this is that I’m the child of a Stilwell. Like it or not, this is a part of my identity. PDI illustration.

Moreover, the Bible speaks of being a son as a matter of identity. For example, throughout the Scriptures wicked mean are referred to as sons of Belial. Now, this doesn’t mean that their dad’s name was Belial. Rather, it means that Belial is what characterizes them. In the biblical lexicon to say that so-and-so is a son of such-and-such is to say that so-and-so is like such-and-such.

Look at what Jesus said to the corrupt religious leaders in John 8:44: “You are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” Christ equated sonship with identity. He told his enemies that their father was the devil and so the behaved like the devil.

So, when John says that we’re sons of God it’s not just a label or a position. It’s a change of identity. He’s saying that in Christ you are no longer like your father the devil or your father Adam. You’re now a son of God. You’re now like God. Your identity is now wrapped up in God.
It was John how talked so much about being born again in his Gospel. In birth we’re a new person. Now longer bound to our sinful flesh. Rather, now you’re a son of God.

Elsewhere, John tells us that this glorious blessing is acquired through faith in Christ. John 1:12: “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” And when we put our faith in Christ we become bound to Him.

“And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ;” (Romans 8:17)
Our identity is now linked to that of Christ. Everything Christ is we are to lesser degrees. He’s the King of kings and the High Priest Forever, we’re kings and priests unto God (Revelation 1:6). He’s the Only Begotten Son of God, we’re adopted sons of God. Through Christ, we enter this triangle of love. So, in Christ, the Father looks at us – sinful creatures – and says, “This is my beloved son” and gives us His Holy Spirit. The Father is our Lover. We share in Christ’s status as the Beloved. And the Spirit energizes and secures that relationship.

This is a truly awesome thing. The triune fellowship becomes a foursome. God saw fit to bring us into this relationship. Now the Father stands before us, the object of our affections. Christ stands beside us, as our Holy Brother to whom we owe everything. The Spirit dwells within us sealing us to Himself.

How awesome is this! Frail mortal creatures are invited by God to share in this dynamic, breathtaking, intimate relationship that was within the Triune God since before the world began! Illustration of prayer.

But, if you’re like me you don’t always feel like a child of God. You don’t always feel that intimacy that maybe you think you should. I don’t feel like I’m like God. I don’t sense that identity is bound to His. So why is that? If we’re children of God why it is that it sometimes seems like such a distant reality?

Well, John offers us an explanation for that as well as a hope. A hope that is found in a new destiny.

A New Destiny (Verse 2)

Read Verse 2a. So, John assures that we are now sons of God. That’s a present-tense statement of fact. If you’ve put your faith in Jesus Christ you are right now a child of God. However, he also tells us that it “doth not yet appear what we shall be”. So, even though you’re are at this very moment of a child of the living God not all of the practical realities of this status have been fully realized yet.

You still live in a sin cursed universe with a sin cursed body influenced by our adversary. Therefore, the full effects of beings a child of God are not yet fully realized. But, thankfully, John doesn’t stop there. Read Verse 2b.

This is the assurance that all believers have. When we see our Lord and Savior we will be like Him. We will be sons of God is the fullest sense. Not just positionally or in some abstract metaphoric sense. We shall really truly be like Him. And that means, among other things, that this glorious relationship with the Father will be realized an even greater level.

“For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.” Romans 8:29

As a believer it is your preordained destiny to look like Jesus. As sons of God, when we see Jesus we will look like the Son of God. The goals, as stated in Romans 8:29, is so that Jesus might be the first born of many brethren. Big brother illustration of Christ protecting and looking out for us.

This is what Jesus came to give us. He didn’t just save us from hell. He gave us a new identity – His identity. The Son of God became man so that men become sons of God. He took our place on the cross so that we might share in His place before the Father.

So, remember this next time you’re struggling with temptation or feel that you’ve suffered spiritual defeat. Your victory is secure and immutable. You will be like Christ. Your destiny is now bound to His. And so, like Him, you shall be victorious.

But, wait, you might be saying. If my victory is so certain – if it’s practically a done deal that I will be like Jesus – than can’t I just kick back and relax? Why do I have to worry about laboring so much to be like Christ right now? Can I sin that grace may abound?

John actually argues for the exact opposite. Rather than being a hindrance to our sanctification, the certainty of our destiny is actually presented as motivation for our sanctification.

A New Priority (verse 3)

Read Verse 3. John is telling us that something is to change in the person who has this hope. In the Bible, indicatives always fuels imperatives. Reality motivates practice. We have a new reality. Our identity is now in God. We are children of God called upon to live accordingly and one day that identity will be fully realized. The individual who knows that one day he will be like Jesus Christ is to live differently than the person who doesn’t know or accept that. The person who understands that he will one day look like Christ we behave as if he already does.
Because we as believers are promised that one day we will be pure like Christ we are to live pure lives now. We are to stretch out our arms and reach for our destiny. We are to live in accordance with our destiny right now.

There is a sense in which we are, as C.S. Lewis described it, “dressing up like Christ.” We are to behave like full fledged children of God, in anticipation of one day experiencing that to its fullest. This “pretending” to already be like Christ affects really every element of the Christian life. Even our prayer life. Jesus taught us to address God as He would address God – as our Father. We are to overcome temptation because that’s what Jesus did. We are to submit to the Father even unto death, because that’s what sons of God do. In our everyday lives, we are to be pure as Christ is pure.

In short this means that we are to behave, not like ourselves, but like our Holy Brother. And the incredible thing is that when we start behaving as if we were like Jesus eventually we really truly become like Jesus. We’re like a little boy who dressed up in his daddy’s clothes and then one day wakes up to discover that he is very much like his dad. Or, to keep with my earlier illustration, we’re little kids tagging along with our Big Brother. I would sometimes get annoyed when my little siblings tried to follow me around and do everything I did. But our Eldest Brother, Jesus Christ, wants us to be imitating Him. He wants us to follow the path He has trailed. And as we imitate Christ we become more and more like Him in reality. There are certain traits that my younger siblings picked up from me. But, eventually those traits become just a natural part of who they were, and not just imitation.

Now if this whole idea of pretending that we may become seems a little odd to you, remember that most things in life actually work that way. For example, have you ever been in a situation where you had to be friendly to a person you don’t real feel very friendly towards? But you know that the right thing to do is to be friendly and so you do. But as you pretend to be friendly you discover that you sudden feel friendlier in actuality. Pretense becomes reality.

Thus, because we have the hope of being like pure Jesus Christ we are to live that way now. Though John teaches that this will not be fully realized until we see Christ, he also teaches us to begin living as if it’s true right now.

So, because we’ve been made sons of God let us be mindful of that reality. Sonship is a blessing of justification and a means of sanctification. Let us not take for granted to blessing of knowing God and being invited into this relationship with Him. But let us also remember that the full practical realization of our sonship has not been fulfilled. Therefore, we must labor to be pure as Christ is pure with the hope that when we see Him we shall be like Him. We need to behave like the children of God that we are.

7 Christian Fantasy Books That You May Never Have Heard Of But Should Totally Read

Many of you may know that I'm an absolute sucker for quality fantasy fiction (by quality I mean that Twilight doesn't count). I'm eagerly anticipating The Hobbit movie(s) and have always appriciate the imagination is takes to create these works.

But I've also learned a great deal from many fantasy writers. Because it deals almost by definition with the supernatural, fantasy is probably the most inherently spiritual genre. While this means that it can be very dangerous when done badly (Satanism, paganism and so on) it also means that fantasy can be a powerful tool is exploring Christian truth.

Christians have a long history in the genre. The Lord of the Rings and The Chronicles of Narnia are of course the bulwarks of the Christian fantasy - one the standard of allegory and the other the standard of Christian applicability. While these two works are definitely the best known, there are many other like works that I think deserve some attention. I'd like to direct you to my personal favorites.


From John Bunyan:


I was first introduced to this style of writing when my Sunday school class read The Pilgrim's Progress. Since then my mind has been captivated by the educational and inspiration power of allegory. But it's only been recently that I've been introduced to two other allegories written by the Baptist preacher. The Life and Death of Mr. Badman is the reverse of The Pilgrim's Progress. Holy War is a mind blowing tale of God's benevolent conquest over the human heart.


From George MacDonald:

C.S. Lewis referred to George MacDonald as his master. It was while reading Phantastes that a young atheist Lewis was confronted with holiness. He would later say that MacDonald baptized his imagination. I would recommend starting your explanation of MacDonald by reading The Princess and the Goblins and the sequel, The Princess and Curdie. In these books you can definitely see the inspiration for Lewis' writing style. Likewise, the goblins of The Princess and the Goblins served as the inspiration for Tolkien's orcs.


From C.S. Lewis:


Of course, there's the basic Narnia stories which every human being on the planet should read. However, Lewis also wrote many other fiction stories. The Screwtape Letters is a classic that will make you laugh out loud when it's not scaring you to death. In it, Lewis provides many insights into human nature and spiritual warfare. But Lewis believed Til We Have Faces to be his very best work and I can't say that I disagree. The characters are rich, the writing style engrossing and the plot mind blowing. But you have to stick with because it all "clicks" at the very end.


From J.R.R. Tolkien:


The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are absolute must-reads. However, for someone looking to dig deeper, The Silmarillion is a good read. In this massive postmortem work, the professor is much more overt about his Christian faith. Valaquenta (a sub-section of the book) begins, "In the beginning Eru, the One, who in the Elvish tongue is named Iluvatar, made the Ainur of his thought; and they made a great Music before him." If you don't want to read the whole thing just read Of Beren and Luthien. It was Tolkien's personal favorite, inspired in part by his own marriage and the first one he showed to his best friend, C.S. Lewis. It is also pay tribute to through the relationship between Aragorn and Arwen in The Lord of the Rings.

These are some of my favorite which I hope you'll enjoy too. I'd love to hear from you as well. What are some of your favorites?

C.S. Lewis On Queen Elizabeth II

On June 2nd, 1953, an Englishman sat watching the coronation of his queen. Due to his dislike for crowds, he had decided to take advantage of the accesability first fully televised coronation. This Englishman was C.S. Lewis and a month later he expressed his thoughts on the event in a letter to a friend (Letters, 3:343):

"You know, over here people did not get that fairy-tale feeling about the coronation. What impressed most who saw it was the fact that the Queen herself appeared to be quite overwhelmed by the sacramental side of it. Hence, in the spectators, a feeling of (one hardly knows how to describe it) — awe — pity — pathos — mystery.

The pressing of that huge, heavy crown on that small, young head becomes a sort of symbol of the situation of humanity itself: humanity called by God to be His vice-regent and high priest on earth, yet feeling so inadequate. As if He said, ‘In my inexorable love I shall lay upon the dust that you are glories and dangers and responsibilities beyond your understanding.’

Do you see what I mean? One has missed the whole point unless one feels that we have all been crowned and that coronation is somehow, if splendid, a tragic splendor."

In Defense of Magic

Most of you know that I'm a bit of a fantasy nerd. I have an entire bookshelf dedicated to Lewis and Tolkien. One of the reasons I'm so fond of fantasy is that I believe it to be the most inherently spiritual genre. It deals with the supernatural almost by definition. This is both it's biggest strength and weakness. When done correctly it can powerfully portray biblical truths in a way that no lecture could. The imagination helps to link the mind and the heart. As I've written about before, I believe that good Christian fantasy is essentially theology in 3D. It's no coincidence that the founders of the genre (Bunyan, MacDonald, Lewis, Tolkien, Williams, ect.) were all Christians. However, when it's done wrong, the genre can be very pagan and almost satanic.

For this reason, many Christians have rejected the genre and "magic" altogether. Now, there's certainly a concern that needs to be raised about the misuse of magic. J.R.R. Tolkien himself disapproved of his friend Charles William's use of occult imagery. However, I feel that it's an overreaction to dismiss all stories that deal with the supernatural. I'm not trying to molest anyone conscience. If your conscience doesn't all you to read about Gandalf the White than don't read about Gandalf the White. However, I would like to explain why my conscience not only allows me to read about "magic" but rejoices in it.

Or rather, I'm going to allow a couple of men a lot smarter than I explain it. The following is a couple of videos done by theologian Doug Wilson and his son, novelist Nate Wilson. The first one lays the ground work and talks about (among other things) the difference between "Gandalf wizards" and "Harry Potter wizards". The second one is a follow up video that answers some objections raised to the first interview.

I found them well worth my time and I hope you too enjoy them.

The Atheist C.S. Lewis: Filth and Strain

I recently came across a collection of poems entitled Spirits in Bondage. Though written under the pen name of Clive Hamilton, these are the first published works of C.S. Lewis. However, I was struck by how un-Lewisian they were. This is because the poems were written directly after the First World War, an era that deeply scarred the young Lewis and sealed his turning from the Christainity of his youth to the militant atheism of his middle years.

The later C.S. Lewis would be characterized by joy and wit. Even a causual reading of his works will reveal to the reader that the author was a happy man. However, the godless Lewis was anything but happy. I desire to share one of these poems with you in order to illustrate the hopelessness of a world without God. Reading this poem made me very greatful for the God who is. It caused me to realize that He alone is my hope and without Him the world is a cruel place. Even as an atheist Lewis understood this (at least in part). Though the first lines of the peom expressly deny the existence of anything outside of the physical universe, the poem is interestingly titled "Satan Speaks". In other words, if there is no God than all that's left is Satan (i.e. Evil and Cruelty).

"Satan Speaks:

I am Nature, the Mighty Mother,
I am the law: ye have none other.

I am the flower and the dewdrop fresh,
I am the lust in your itching flesh.

I am the battle's filth and strain,
I am the widow's empty pain.

I am the sea to smother your breath,
I am the bomb, the falling death.

I am the fact and the crushing reason
To thwart your fantasy's new-born treason.

I am the spider making her net,
I am the beast with jaws blood-wet.

I am a wolf that follows the sun
And I will catch him ere day be done."

All is vanity of vanities. All is Satan. Unless God is real. Thus the later Lewis would discover that in the worship of God joy could be found and completed: "I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation."

Butterflies and Growingdown

When did the extraordinary become so ordinary?

I distinctly remember the day when my maturing mind had reached a point where the simple things no longer captivated my attention. I was about ten when one of my siblings came running in from outside, panting and exclaiming over the sighting of a butterfly. Hurriedly, so as not to miss of second of beholding that incarnate wonder called butterfly, my siblings raced outside to take in the six-legged spectacle. And I was left standing in the kitchen wondering what the big deal was.

In five months, I'll be leaving the teenage years forever. I've learned a lot since the day the butterfly ceased to impress me. I've graduated from high school. I'm pursuing higher education. My room is now host to a library that seems to breed like a rabbit. And yet, I feel like the whole thing has been nothing more than a journey to take me back to the place where I marvel at butterflies again. It's as if I'm not growing up so much as I'm growing down.

All my studies and books and projects have led me to a conclusion that seemed self-evident at age six. There's no such thing as "ordinary". All things are beautiful and awe-inspiring because every single thing that exists was created for a cosmic purpose.

C.S. Lewis stated: "Art has no survival value but gives survival value." Human beings are the only creatures who make things simply for the pleasure of making them. The bird makes a nest to keep warm. The ape catches ants with a stick because he's hungry. But human beings building gorgeous cathedrals and painting beautiful paintings and create stirring songs for no other reason than that we get pleasure from them. Where did this irrational artisticness come from?

Speaking of Christ, Paul said that not only were all things created by Him but they were created for Him (Colossians 1:16). Moreover, the Twenty-four Elders in Revelation proclaimed that all things were created for His pleasure (Revelation 4:11). Take a look around you some time. Look at the blades of grass, the grains of sand, the creeping insects, the flying birds, the floating particles of dust. Look at the details, the glamorous markings of a meticulous Artist. All these things were created for the pleasure of Jesus.

Notice His care for the seemingly unimportant things. No one notes nor cares when you smash a bee or kick the sand. But look at the beauty the Artist put into even these insignificant things. These ordinary things. What grand purpose do they have if not to give the Artist pleasure?

Look at every floating speck of dust. To get that tiny speck there are innumerable combinations of molecules which are made up atoms which are made of elections and neutrons and smaller and smaller we go. Scientists keep finding smaller and smaller particles. Trillions of relationships unseen by humans but delightful to God.

Existence itself is just an immeasurable series of distinct persons forming a single substance which than come together to form another single substance. A billion shadows of the Triune Jehovah. Were it not for the existence of an artistic God the universe would be a scary place.

You and I are just snowflakes in a blizzard, unnoticeable amidst a billion other snowflakes. We could melt at any moment and no one would notice the difference. But each snowflake is a unique display of unreplicable beauty that causes the observant heart to soar and fills its Creator with delight.

At the end of the day, getting to be a part of God's blizzard makes being a melting snowflake worth it. We get to be a drop of paint on His canvass; a letter in His novel; a note in His symphony.

Every time we gaze in wonder at what He's made, we are sharing in the pleasures of God. We get to gaze in wonder at the glories of His masterpiece. Like delighted children, we can marvel at the simplest things because they were created for the pleasure of an awesome God. Life is worth it all just to be a part of His beautiful artistry.

When did the ordinary become so extraordinary?

In Praise of Dead Englishmen Who Wrote Fairy Tales

or A Brief Hagiography of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien

G.K. Chesterton said, “Fairy Tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten." It's because of this that I have become immeasurably grateful to a couple of dead Englishmen who wrote such fairy tales.

These men, of course, are C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. I'm extremely grateful to these two men because they did what few theologians or preachers have been able to accomplish. Through speculative fiction they used the imagination to unite the heart and the mind. C.S. Lewis spoke of the "disarming" effect that such literature has on people. He should know. Though he wrote many works on theology and reality, he never really came into his own until he wrote a children's book for his goddaughter Lucy.

But for me, Tolkien was really my introduction into such literature. Now, I must confess that I watched Peter Jackson's movies before I read the books. However, I quickly fell in love with Tolkien's style and content. But, for me, The Lord of the Rings is more than just classic literature. It's theology in 3D. An author's work is always an expression of his soul. And Professor Tolkien's worldview comes through bright and clear in his works. I never really understood total depravity until I read about the damning effects of the Ring. Philio love didn't "click" until I was taken by the friendship of Frodo and Sam. Courage and self-sacrifice came to life for me when I first read The Return of the King.

Some Christians will complain about how dark Tolkien's works are. But, it's important to understand what he was getting at. Through the darkness there are always maintained a slim glimmer of hope and those who grabbed onto that hope made it to the other side. Like all good fairy tales, Tolkien showed us that the dragons of a fallen world could be beaten. In The Silmarillion, he says, "Among the tales of sorrow and of ruin that come down to us from the darkness of those days there are yet some in which amid the weeping there is joy and under the shadow of death light that endures."

But perhaps the reason I love Tolkien the most is because of the impact he had on Lewis. When Lewis and Tolkien met at Oxford, Lewis was a devote atheist. His mother had died at a young age and he had seen many horrors while fighting in World War I (something Tolkien could relate to). Lewis taught medieval literature and wanted to believe that the Bible was just another myth. But, because of his intellect, he simply couldn't. He knew that there was something about Christianity that didn't match the stuff he lectured students about.

One day, Lewis and Tolkien spent all evening walking around a pond, arguing about the truthfulness of Christ's claims. During the course of the exchange, Tolkien commented that Christianity was the "true myth". For some reason, that phrase spoke to Lewis and by the next day we was, in his own words, a reluctant convert.

I cannot even begin to tell you of the impact Lewis has had on my life. To this day, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the only book I've finished in a single day (though I love to read, I'm rather slow at it). Again, the ability to put biblical truths in "3D" had a profound impact on me when I was younger.

Lately, I've become fasinated with his other writings. Screwtape Letters, The Four Loves and Mere Christainity are books that, in my not-so-humble opinion, every human being should read. His logical manner of examining truth and wittily then applying it to practical living is phenomenal. Through Lewis, I learned many practical things, such as the nature of humility and chastity.

But perhaps the thing I'm most grateful for is that he taught me that I need never be afraid of truth. Because, to the Christian, Truth is a Person and a Person whose not ashamed to call us brethren (Hebrews 2:10-12). Therefore, we can always go deeper and deeper into Truth and find fulfillment and satisfaction. He brought into profound light that God is the chief end of all things.

And that's why I wrote this piece. Not just to come out of the closet as a fantasy nerd, but to express thankfulness to two dead guys who helped draw me into a deeper relationship with the God of universe in a way that no lecture could.

Why Is God A "He"?

So, lately I've been thinking a lot about this particular issue. It's come up in several of the books I've had to read for school. But the tipping point was this video with Mark Driscoll and Doug Wilson*:



So, this does raise the question: Why is that - The Shack not withstanding - God is consistently referenced as male in the Scriptures? It's God the Father and God the Son. Likewise, male pronouns are always used to describe God the Spirit. For our family members who believe that gender is merely biological this makes absolutely no sense. After all, God is a spirit. He doesn't have an anatomical structure and therefore speaking of God in terms of male or female is ludicrous. Right? Well, apparently the Holy Spirit doesn't think so, because He inspired the holy men to portray God in male terms.

So, how do we explain this? Well, it becomes a lot easier when recognize that gender is a symbol for something greater. After all, God loves matter, as C.S. Lewis said, and He uses matter to convey truths about Himself.

Elisabeth Elliot, the wife of martyred missionary Jim Elliot and one of the greatest writers and speakers of her generation, does an excellent job of arguing this position in her classic The Mark of a Man:

"Psychologists sometimes describe belief in God as a father as nothing more than a projection of the sterotyped father. It never seems to occur to them that if two things are alike, one ought to ask whether the first is copied from the second or the second from the first. Why should it not be at least as logical to assume that human fathers are copies of the Original? Those who take the Bible as their rule see God as the archetype. From Him are derived all ideas of what fathers ought to be."

The argument goes that the genders are symbols of something much greater than biology. The functions of the genders actually reflects the nature of God. Within the Trinity there is equality, love, unity and other-centrality but there is also structure, order, submission and, yes, authority (I know, that's a naughty word in our culture but just bare with me). Therefore, this same dichotomy is mirrored in the relationships between the genders.

Those who hold to this view also recognize that consistently throughout Scripture - literally from Genesis to Revelation - men are given the responsibility of initiation. That brings us back to original question of why God is always portrayed as male.

C.S. Lewis said, "God is so masculine that all creation is feminine by comparison." What could he possibly mean by that? He meant that God is the Ultimate Initiator. He initiates our salvation, our sanctification - shoot! - He initiated our very existence. The fate of every human being is decided by how we respond the initiation of God. Therefore, we are all feminine (responders) in comparison to the Initiating God.

But I can almost hear people saying, "What a chauvinist! He actually thinks that men are like God!" No, no, no! Sure, lots of men think they're God, but God knows better. This isn't about men, this is about God. My goal in this post is not to spark a debate over gender roles. If I wanted to do that I would have started off with loads of bible passages and quotes from Greek experts. What I want to do is point you to marvelous design of God.

When men act like men and women act like women, we're actually displaying the very nature of God. It's a like a painting, showing the majesty of the Real Thing. Or a song that causes emotions to rise up unbidden. Or a monument which testifies to the greatness of an awesome God. Gender is a work of art, giving us hints at the beautiful character of the Artist. Praise His name!

I know that this has been a very quick summary of very deep and intense issue, but if you get nothing else out of this, pay attention to this: Gender isn't about biology. Like everything else, it's about God.

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*I always feel the need to say that just because I link to someone doesn't mean I necessarily endorse everything about that person.

The Fate of Christian Fantasy

There are two very important things that you should know about me. I love to read and I love to write. Since I was very young I have loved telling and writing stories. My pet genre is speculative fiction - which is a swiping term which includes everything the least bit abnormal. Therefore, I've been keeping a close eye on the Christian fantasy industry.

Remember, epic fantasy - at least as we know it today - has its roots in Christian authorship. There was a time when it was unheard of for a fantasy novel not to have Christian worldview. But, the devil has this tendency to hijack our stuff. As a result, many Christians have given up on fantasy.

Of course, it doesn't help that we as men have stopped paying attention literature. In fact, bookworm often has an inherently feminine flavor. As a result, prairie romances dominate Christian bookstores. It's been a long time since we've seen a big, quality Christian fantasy hit the shelves.

The exception would be people like Ted Dekker. His Books of History Chronicles - a trinity series which includes the Circle Series, Paradise Trilogy and the Lost Books novels - has been widely successful. However, Dekker had already made a name for himself in the thriller department before he decided to try his hand at fantasy. It's extremely hard for new authors to get fantasy published.

However, all is not lost. Having been rejected by the bookstores, many authors are turning to the Internet to sell their work, with varying levels of success. Jay L. Young self-published his Heroes of Old series, which I've heard is a cross between the Bible and X-Men (yeah, I had to think about that for a bit too). Young's series has seen a tremendous level of success for a self-published book. A friend of mine, Adrianne Redding, self-published a beautiful book called RoseBeast (learn more)And some smaller publishers, namely Marcher Lords, have devoted themselves to Christian fantasy.

What does all this mean? It means that there are a growing number of people out there who are hungry for a meaty portion of Christian fantasy and, if necessary, they're willing to go follow some unorthodox roads to get it. With the movement rapidly catching on, it may not be long before we see Christian fantasy hit the mainstream once again.

So, how knows, maybe the days of Tolkien and Lewis may yet return.