We're Changing, God is Unchanging - What Good News!

Haha, look at this guy. John Piper at age 31. It was his 30th anniversary a day ago since he became the pastor at Bethlehem Baptist Church and left the world of academics for preaching the glory of Christ. It's hard to imagine someone that I so highly respect and admire at 31, an age where people are still trying to grow up and battle their youthful pride. Piper recounts a story from his seminary days, where he goes up to his professor to argue about human free will and drops a pen defiantly to prove his point saying, "I (not God) dropped it."

Pictures of old people when they were young always makes you consider the weight and reality of time. Time always passes, and people are always changing - either more in accordance to the image of Christ or more in sync with their depraved nature. I was not the same person I was five years ago, nor will I be the same person in five years (even if I choose to go back to the same childish ways). I mean imagine me at 28 acting like I did at 18 - I wouldn't be immature in the sense of an 18 year old, but that immaturity is at an even greater degree because I'm physically 28! Everything changes, from fashion to internet socializing sites (remember friendster?). But if we try to define ourselves in reference to any of these things that sway to and fro on the waves of time, there's no hope for any constancy. Only Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). He is the only firm foundation that we can rely on.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German Protestant Christian who was part of the Nazi resistance in World War II, sheds some light on the illusory constancy of this world and the absolute constancy of God in The Cost of Discipleship:

The disciple is dragged out of his relative security into a life of absolute insecurity (that is, in truth, into the absolute security and safety of the fellowship of Jesus), from a life which is observable and calculable (it is, in fact, quite incalculable) into a life where everything is unobservable and fortuitous (that is, into one which is necessary and calculable), out of the realm of finite (which is in truth the infinite) into the realm of infinite possibilities (which is one liberating reality).

How this world so convincingly tells us to put our hope in a nice job or a good husband or wife and when it comes down to it, our own good deeds based on our own standards of good! But we know from the recent recession that finances are never secure; I know from my past relationships that people fail you; and I know from my daily battle with sin that my playing arithmetic with my good and bad deeds will never add up. So often we're so myopic and fail to see beyond ourselves in our actions and the circumstances of our lives - when we succeed and things are going well, we pat ourselves on the back and sink into a contented apathy, and when we fail and things are going badly, we despair like the entire world is falling apart around us. We're so centered on ourselves when we ourselves are always changing that it's no surprise when the gospel according to ourselves fails us.

But the gospel is not according to our "self." What kind of good news is dependent upon uncertain circumstances or inconstant action? The gospel is completely outside of ourselves. It's the good news that the unchanging God has stepped into the ever-changing and fluctuating history of man to accomplish a work that will stand completely on its own! When Paul describes "the gospel preached to you" in 1 Corinthians 15 he says, "Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures." There is no talk whatsoever about anything we did to be rid of our sins and be reconciled with God. Rather, Christ died in our place and was raised by God to be the first-fruit and the hope of our future resurrection. And the fact that it was all "in accordance with the Scriptures" means God is truly unchanging and faithful to his promises, "For all the promises of God find their Yes in [Christ]" (2 Co. 1:20). The only "we," "us," or "our" in the gospel is that we are the recipients of a work done outside of us.

Thus the Bible says, "Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith" (Hebrews 12:2). The only thing we do is to fix our eyes and look at what Christ has done, just as the Israelites looked to the bronze serpent to be healed. Jesus is the author and begins our faith, and he, not we, is the perfecter and finisher of it. He doesn't give us faith and ask us to finish it with our obedience. Jesus creates faith and leads us to continue putting our faith in what Christ has done. From this and only this comes the good fruit of obedience from faith. Jesus is the "rock that is higher than I" (Psalm 61:2) and we must look beyond the rock (really quicksand) of ourselves, to the firm rock and refuge that is Christ.

I remember praying once to God crying out, "Abba, Father!" and I had to stop and think about what it meant to call God my "father." I think parents only naturally have certain expectations and standards for their children as they grow up. Unfortunately children tend to correlate parental love with their obedience or their measuring up to a set standard. And I too often superimpose this image of my earthly father or mother upon the heavenly Father. God loves me but has certain expectations of me. Too bad He calls us to be holy, as He is holy. What an infinitely difficult standard to measure up to. There are some days when I feel like I'm doing well at being holy and I feel loved, and some days when I'm sucking it up and I feel God doesn't love me.

But then I pictured myself not as the twenty-something-year-old Eric, but the seven-year-old Eric. I remembered giving my dad a card for Father's Day where I drew a picture of him behind his office desk. I remembered doing stupid things like parting my hair like an old Korean man, putting on an old pair of my dad's glasses, and wearing shorts and a wife beater to be just like him. The card had no real aesthetic value - you certainly wouldn't see my portrait of my dad in the Getty - but it was the fact my dad loved me which made the card count for anything. When I put on clothes to look like my dad, I'm not a mirror-image of a man; I am small boy trying my hardest to imitate the person I so highly admire. My dad had no requirements for a seven-year-old Eric to earn his love. My dad just loved me because I was his son, completely independent of the crappy artwork on Father's Day cards.

God's love always wants us to change and be transformed into the holy image of his Son, yet God's love is always grounded in the obedience of Christ which lead to our adoption as sons and daughters of God. And I believe God loves us always with the same kind of love (but even more infinitely) that an earthly father has for an child who can produce no real beautiful work or measure up to any real standards.

If Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever, that means the love that God had for me when I was justified by grace through faith in Christ and adopted as his son is the same as the love he has for me now as I am being saved by grace and sanctified and conformed into the image of his Son. And the endless love that God will have for me on that day when all things are made new and my will, desire and actions are made into the likeness of Christ is the same as the love he has for me today, and the day I put my faith in Christ.

I am changing. I am being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another (2 Co. 3:18), but this is because of what God did, what God is doing, and what God will do, not what I did, what I am doing, and what I will do. I'll have good days where I love God and seek him with all my heart and I'll have bad days where He might be the last thing I want. But when I look back to two thousand years ago at what God did through Christ, what hope I have for the future!

Dedicated to Mom and Dad who show me through their love, even if dimly as imperfect humans, the love of God that is unchanging and neverending.


*** edit ***
I've received some complaints that this post is confusing or all over the place and it's true. If I wanted the post to be a little more coherent, I probably never would have talked about John Piper. This post was originally just titled "John Piper" when I found an old picture of him and I wanted to comment on it.
Think of it more as Eric's thought process or thought progression. This is literally how I think about things. So I'll give a little outline map through my thoughts:
1. John Piper - Look how young he is, ha ha. (Originally where I wanted to stop).
2. Hmm, I wonder what he was like when he was younger. Because it's hard to imagine godly men when they were young and sinful right?
3. Man people sure do change a lot - it's actually pretty depressing.
4. Hmm, how does God's immutability or unchanging-ness play into the picture?
5. Oh yeah, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said something cool about the uncertainty and changing nature of a life apart from God. Let's put that in there.
6. So how does the gospel play into this thought about man's mutability and God's immutability? (How the gospel plays into anything in life is always a great question.)
7. The good news of the gospel is planted firmly in something God did in the past, not what we do now to earn salvation.
8. If through the gospel we become children of God, how is God's unchanging nature good news to our fickle nature, even if we're now saved?
9. Hmm, the love of parents for their children even as they grow older seems like a good example.
10. Let's just throw in the picture of me and my parents for good measure. And it reminds me about being loved as a kid. Oh, I should rename my post now.

I'm always a spur of the moment kind of writer, and I was already late for class so I just posted it. I don't think I'll ever go back and revise this into a nice focused piece of writing - but the themes, thoughts and ideas will probably show up in the future in some form or another. Just a good reminder not to post unorganized posts again. =)