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Doctrine is simply the teaching we need to know from the Bible. God gave us Scripture to teach us certain things about him, what he has done, and what he continues to do in the world.
Sound doctrine helps us stay on target regarding what the Bible teaches, why we believe it, and how to live to God's glory in daily life. Here are seven reasons why doctrine matters for every Christian.
1. Doctrine explains why we can rest in the finished work of Christ.
We can read the Bible but still not fully understand why certain events happened in the biblical story or why God included certain books. Doctrine helps us to understand the problem—humanity’s guilty and sinful state—as well as God’s solution—his sending of his only begotten Son to live the perfectly obedient life on our behalf and be the perfect once-and-for-all sacrifice for our sin. Through doctrine we learn that all who trust in Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone shall be saved (Rom. 3:23; 5:12–21; Eph. 2:8–9).
Furthermore, if we don’t read all the “to-do’s” in the Bible in context, we might mistakenly think we are right with God by our own obedience and kind deeds. Doctrine helps us to know that we are only right with God based on the finished work of Christ. Doctrine also shows us why it is important for Christians to try with all their might to keep God’s commands as their rightful sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving to their Savior.
2. Doctrine helps us understand how God is a relational God.
When we learn about the Trinity and how God is one in essence and three in persons, we can have confidence that God is not some stoic figure who made the world but doesn’t care for or love it. The love between the persons of the Trinity (Matt. 3:17; John 14:31; Gal. 4:6) overflows to God’s creation, even to the point that the Father gave his only begotten Son to accomplish salvation for fallen humans. Doctrine instructs us regarding the Holy Spirit’s work in salvation as he convicts people of their sin and conforms them to the image of Christ (Rom. 5:5).
3. Doctrine explains why we feel empty apart from God.
God made us for a purpose, and that purpose is to glorify him and enjoy him forever! This is why we can never feel fulfilled apart from him. God made us to have a joyful relationship with him, but we can’t apart from Christ because of God’s utter holiness and our guilt and indwelling sin. Even though we are different kinds of beings and we cannot reach up to God no matter how hard we try, he condescends to be in a loving relationship with us in Christ—and this is glorious!
4. Doctrine teaches us how to worship God.
Doctrine helps us to worship God with more joy, because we can better comprehend how Israel’s creed (“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one”) is true and at the same time recognize that the Father is God, Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God (Psalm 139:7–8; John 10:30; 1 Cor. 8:6).
When we hear God’s Word rightly preached, partake in the Sacraments, pray, and sing songs of worship, doctrine explains to us that we are always approaching our heavenly Father in Jesus’ name (because of his work on our behalf) by the Holy Spirit (who indwells and sanctifies us).
5. Doctrine guides us in how to love God and our neighbor.
Because doctrine teaches us that our right standing before God is based on Christ’s work and not our own, we don’t have to view our good deeds as ways to make God love us better. We also don’t have to worry about being popular or esteemed before people. God already loves us fully in Christ, and that’s all the love any of us ever needs. We are God’s children, and our inheritance is secure.
We can love God and our neighbor not based on a need to perform but rather out of tremendous gratitude for all God has done for us and as our rightful duty as his children. Doctrine reminds us that it is God’s will for us to grow in holiness and be conformed to the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29).
6. Doctrine teaches us that our hope is not in vain.
We don’t have to worry about whether or not the Bible is true. Through learning about the major covenants of the Bible and the amazing continuity of Scripture, we can only marvel that everything we read about in Genesis, Exodus, Joshua, and the rest of the books of the Bible is inextricably linked together by God’s promise in Christ.
It seems impossible for so many different authors over such a long period of time to write sixty-six books that all point to God’s redemptive plan to redeem the world; yet, this is exactly what we find in the Bible, because the Holy Spirit inspired the authors (2 Tim. 3:16; 2 Pet. 1:21).
From Genesis 3:15, where God promises to send the Seed who will crush the head of the serpent, to Revelation 22, where we learn that the Lamb of God shall sit on God’s throne forever, God’s Word gives us knowledge of the hope that will never disappoint Christians. This hope is based on the fact of the bodily resurrection of Christ, who shall return one day to consummate his kingdom (1 Cor. 15:12–28).
7. Doctrine helps us to pick up our cross and follow our King.
Because doctrine teaches us the great truths we need to know, we can pick up our cross and follow Christ (Matt. 16:24). We don’t need to be afraid—no matter what God allows in our life—because we know he has a plan and his plan is good.
We also know God is great as well as good, and we can trust him even when the world doesn’t seem to make sense. We don’t need to regret anything that we are leaving behind, because God has something far better for us than anything this world can ever offer: peace with him and everlasting life in his presence.
Don’t let anyone lead you to believe doctrine is unimportant, irrelevant, or confusing. We must always be diligent to seek out sound doctrinal teaching and learn how to distinguish biblical truth from error, just as the Bereans did (Acts 17:11). Doctrine is essential because it helps us to understand the biblical truths we need to know to have lasting joy, peace, and confidence in Christ.
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Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Isa. 41:10)
My son loves the book Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. He knows the story quite well. Not only has he had us read it to him at least twice, but he has watched the Pilgrim's Progress movie from Keith and Kristyn Getty about three times!
The devil wants us to be overcome with despair.
One of the darker scenes in Bunyan's story is when Christian and Hopeful are trapped in the Dungeon of Doubting Castle. There they are faced daily with the hardships of their present circumstances—their sin in leaving the Way and the daily temptation to forsake of life. They hear voices encouraging them to do away with themselves, that their lives are not worth living.
These are the lies of the evil one, his deception. The spiritual darkness is heavy and bleak. But finally the two pilgrims realize that the Giant Despair cannot kill them, and that they have had the key to their escape all along. The key is hope in the promises of God.
God wants us to be filled with lasting hope.
The Deceiver had Christian and Hopeful looking at their own mistakes and sins, wrapped up in their failings and contemplating the hardships of their present circumstances. With this inward turn of the heart, they were trapped and dragged down nearly to death.
The men had forgotten all the times the King of the Celestial City had protected them, was faithful to them, and guided them. Their eyes had turned from the King to their own miserable circumstances and sin. Let us all be aware and on guard for this particular wile of the devil.
God is always faithful to us, and he always keeps his promises to us.
Our King has been, is, and will always be faithful to us, even when we sin terribly. A way of escape is always there. We are never without hope, for we have the Spirit dwelling inside us and Jesus has promised, "'And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age'" (Matt. 28:20).
Therefore, dear Christian, fight against the devious attempts of Satan to darken your heart and mind to God's goodness. Instead, keep your eyes on your King, recite his mercies daily to yourself, and know that your Shepherd is always with you.
This article is was originally published in the BCL October 2022 newsletter “The Devil’s Schemes.”
Ferdinand Pauwels [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
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1. Martin Luther was concerned with reform, not breaking away from Rome.
October 31, 1517, is the day Protestants celebrate each year as “Reformation Day.” Yet, when Martin Luther mailed his 95 Theses to the archbishop of Mainz, Albert of Brandenburg, (no, he probably did not actually nail them to the door!) he did not consider himself a Protestant, but rather a Roman Catholic seeking conversation and reform concerning the abusive selling of indulgences.
2. The Reformation was traditional.
Luther hoped Rome would agree with the 95 Theses, repent for the selling and commercialization of grace (indulgences), and make correction. As Luther wrote in Thesis 62, “The true treasure of the church is the most holy Gospel of the glory and grace of God,” which had traditionally been held by the church as indisputable.
3. At the heart of the Reformation was the belief that the Word alone is authoritative.
In 1518, the pope declared Luther’s theses in conflict with the teaching of the church—why? In part because of the content concerning indulgences and the church’s treasury of merit, but also because the theses were seen as questioning the Pope’s authority. Was the Pope authoritative alongside the Word of God, or was Scripture the sole authority over the tradition of the church? Luther chose to stand on the sole authority of the Word of God, and for this he was eventually excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church by Pope Leo X and outlawed as a heretic by Charles V at the Diet of Worms (1521).
4. The Reformation was not individualistic, nor was it the achievement of one man.
Even at the Diet of Worms, Luther’s hope was not separation from Rome, but repentance. Luther argued that Rome had broken from the historic and traditional beliefs held by the church. In this, Luther did not stand alone but on the shoulders of believers who came before him in the history of the church who proclaimed the same truths of the gospel—that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Likewise, the Reformation was not Luther’s personal achievement but rather the product of the Word. As Luther said, “I simply taught, preached, and wrote God’s Word; otherwise I did nothing. And while I slept [cf. Mark 4:26-29], or drank Wittenberg beer with my friends Philip and Amsdorf, the Word so greatly weakened the papacy that no prince or emperor ever inflicted such losses upon it. I did nothing; the Word did everything.”
5. The Reformation was the product of the word preached, taught, read—and sung!
Ever hear the hymn “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God?” It’s one of Luther’s most popular hymns today, based on Psalm 46 and written in German instead of Latin, which was the language of the Roman church. Writing hymns in the language of the people gave worship back to the people so they could lift their voices in song and praise. The Reformation was a reformation of worship—and was literally sung into being! If you sing today in your churches, rather than simply hearing polyphonic Latin, you have the Reformation to thank.
6. Luther claimed the “cloaca” was the site of his Reformation discovery.
“The Spiritus Sanctus gave me this realization in the cloaca,” Luther declared; however, he probably did not mean in the toilet, as some suggest. Historians argue that it is unlikely he actually had the Reformation discovery at that very moment in the cloaca and point to several stages of breakthrough in Luther’s life rather than one ultimate breakthrough. This being so, we should not miss Luther’s point, which he meant to be theological rather than a historical statement. Even for us today, but especially in medieval times, the cloaca is a place of filth, degradation, and fleshly humiliation. Luther associated it with the devil. Yet here, into the filth of sin, Christ came, taking on man’s flesh, and thus there is no place unholy for his presence. It is in the darkest, lowest, and most degrading places that Christ is present and powerful. Yet, the devil cannot become flesh, and thus even the cloaca reveals his powerlessness. Only Christ is victorious over sin and darkness.
7. Luther taught us to “sin boldy”—or did he?
This may not mean what you think. In a letter to Melanchthon, Luther wrote,
If you are a preacher of mercy, do not preach an imaginary but the true mercy. If the mercy is true, you must therefore bear the true, not an imaginary sin. God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong, but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world.
In other words, Luther taught us to be bold when we confess our sins to God, for Christ’s sacrifice is greater than our sin, and made only for sinners.
8. The doctrine of justification was central to the Reformation.
Rome prioritized sanctification and taught that justification comes through sanctification, making the two indistinguishable. This conception of soteriology can be seen particularly in the Roman Catholic view that salvation is by both grace and cooperation with grace. Only with both is salvation possible. By contrast, the Reformers stated that salvation is by grace alone, and thus it is an alien righteousness—Christ’s righteousness alone imputed to us, declaring us justified once and for all in the sight of God. Christ lived and died for his people, his sacrifice sufficient to atone for our sins, his righteousness now our righteousness. In this, salvation is not merely possible, but actual; the work we could not do was finished already by Christ and given freely to us. This doctrine of justification has been called by many the doctrine by which the Church stands or falls.
9. The Reformation teaches us to look outward, rather than inward, for truth.
Rome was all about looking inward. But if justification is by an alien righteousness—that is, extra nos—our salvation does not come from within ourselves, but from without—from God. Do you want to know what is true about yourself, dear Christian? Look outward—look to Christ. Christ is the truest picture of your identity, and his righteousness is what God sees every time he looks at you. Luther himself would not even trust his own conscience but looked outward to the “alien Word,” the gospel preached to him from outside.
10. The Reformation was a reformation of prayer.
You are probably familiar with the quote attributed to Luther in which he says, “I have so much to do today that I shall spend three hours in prayer to get it all done.” While it is debated whether Luther really said this, he certainly exhibited it, and he helped many others learn to pray by pointing them to the Lord’s Prayer. As in everything else, the Word of God was the authority for how to pray. The whole point of the Reformation was that humans cannot save themselves, but must depend entirely upon God for deliverance. The Reformers exhibited this dependence on God in their prayer lives where they sought the Lord through his Word for daily help.
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I’m not certain how many “Left Behind” films there have been so far, but since the 1970s there have been several evangelical thrillers—beginning with A Thief In the Night—based on the eschatology of John Nelson Darby (1800–82) et al. They anticipate a “secret rapture” of believers as part of a complex of events associated with the “end times.”
As a young and newly converted evangelical, I was quickly introduced to the evangelical pop sub-culture that included Contemporary Christian Music (CCM). In 1969 the famous CCM artist Larry Norman released “I Wish We’d All Been Ready.” (Whatever one makes of his theology, Keaggy is an amazing guitarist.)
The premise of the song is that Jesus will come and believers will be taken secretly to be with him, and, in this scheme, the rapture will be followed by a period of tribulation. The imagery behind “left behind” is taken from Matthew 24:36-44:
“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only. For as were the days of Noah, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day when Noah entered the ark, and they were unaware until the flood came and swept them all away, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two men will be in the field; one will be taken and one left. Two women will be grinding at the mill; one will be taken and one left. Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”
If we read the passage slowly and carefully, however, we will see that, in context, to be taken is not a good thing—it is not to go be with the Lord in the air. No, to be taken is a bad thing.
People should want to be left behind.
Observe the comparison. Our Lord begins with Noah. Who, in that episode was “taken” and who left behind? Noah and his family were left behind and everyone else is “taken, swept away” in the floodwaters of judgment. That establishes the pattern and the analogy that informs the rest of the passage. “So it will be when the Son of Man comes.” Two men are working. One will be taken and the other left. Two women are making bread. One will be taken and the other left. Following the analogy with Noah, one does not want to be taken because that is to be destroyed. One wants to be left behind. The popular view of Jesus’ discourse in Matthew 24 reverses the analogy that our Lord made.
Will Christ’s return be secret?
Let’s consider another passage that fuels the plausibility of a “secret rapture,” i.e., the notion that, as part of a complex of end-times events, our Lord will take believers out of this world bodily ahead of a period of tribulation.
In 1 Thessalonians 4 the apostle Paul speaks directly to the nature of Christ’s return. He explains to the Thessalonians that it will not be secret, that they would not miss his return. Beginning in verse 13 he turns to the resurrection of the body:
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. (1 Thess. 4:13-14)
Our bodily resurrection is directly linked to Jesus. Because he was raised bodily, so shall we also be raised bodily. Notice the last clause: “even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him.” This bringing occurs at his return. Paul explains more beginning in verse 15:
For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. (1 Thess. 4:15-18)
When Jesus returns, those who have already died will be brought with him as a great, royal entourage. Those believers who are alive on the earth will rise to meet the returning Lord after the bodily resurrection of those who have already died. Notice how the Lord returns: with a “a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God” (v. 16). This shout and this trumpet are not secret. The imagery here is that of a conquering king arriving at a city.
The only “rapture” according to Scripture will be quite public and quite noisy.
The residents of the city, just as today, go out to meet the arriving dignitary. When the President of the United States flies to a state or a city, the mayor and the governor go to meet him. There is fanfare, e.g., “Hail to the Chief.” It is not a secret. It is public, visible, and even noisy. He comes into the city with a motorcade, with motor officers driving at high speeds to block off intersections and to provide security. This is the sort of image that Paul paints for the Thessalonian Christians who worried Jesus might have returned and they might have missed it. For example, Hymenaeus and Philetus (1 Tim. 1:18-19; 2 Tim. 2:15–18) had been telling people that the resurrection had already happened and that they had missed it.
Those who talk about a secret rapture are not making quite the same mistake, but they create the same sort of anxiety among believers when they warn them about “missing” the so-called “secret rapture.” The only “rapture” (being taken up) about which Scripture knows is quite public and quite noisy.
Prior to the rise of dispensational teaching in the 19th century, most Christians expected to suffer.
Remember, the notion that believers will be taken bodily out of the world before tribulation is an idea that was hardly known among Christians until the 19th century. Dispensational Premillennialism, on which the secret rapture theory is built, was also unknown among Christians until the 19th century. Prior to the rise of Dispensationalism, most Christians expected to suffer in this life until Christ’s second coming.
Indeed, there’s no clear, unequivocal teaching in the New Testament that would lead one to think that believers will be taken suddenly in their bodies out of the world ahead of suffering and persecution. Consider these points:
Our Lord came to suffer and die. He was not delivered bodily until after he suffered and died (Matt. 16:21). He called his disciples to take up his cross and to follow him (Matt. 16:24). To be sure, that cross is usually figurative, but frequently it has been literal and especially in the ancient, pre-Constantinian, world.
The apostles rejoiced at the privilege of being counted worthy to suffer for the name of Jesus (Acts 5:41).
When the apostle Paul was given new life and called to ministry, he was called to a life of suffering (Acts 9:16; 2 Cor. 11).
Paul taught explicitly that the ordinary pattern of the Christian life is suffering and then glory (Rom. 8:16–17).
He wrote to the Philippian congregation that it had been granted to them not only to believe but also to suffer for Christ’s sake—suffering for Christ’s sake is a gift! (Phil. 1:29).
Peter wrote to the congregations of Asia Minor (Turkey) that suffering for Christ’s sake is a given and that when they suffer it must be for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of righteousness, not because they did stupid, illegal things (1 Pet. 2:19–21). When we suffer for Christ’s sake, we are blessed. When we are arrested for his sake—a thought that today does not seem nearly so foreign and remote as it once did—we should be prepared to give an answer for the hope that lies within us. We should shame the pagans by our good behavior and thus imitate Christ (1 Pet. 3:13–18; 4:16).
When we are insulted or arrested or suffer for Christ’s sake, that is evidence that the church is God’s holy temple, on which the Spirit of God and of glory rests (1 Pet. 4:14–19). For Peter it was not a question if Christians shall suffer but when. His is a theology of the cross (as opposed to a theology of glory and triumph in this life).
The letters to the seven churches in Asia Minor (Rev. 1–3) were written to suffering congregations circa 93 AD. On this see Colin Hemer’s excellent book, The Letters to the Seven Churches. The major burden of the Revelation was to help Christians understand the nature of existence between the ascension and return of our Lord. How can it be that Christ is now reigning with the Father, departed believers, and the angels, and yet Christians on the earth suffer so grievously? The apostle John explains the nature of inter-adventual history in a series of seven parallel, highly symbolic visions.
The 1st century church suffered under Nero and Domitian. The early post-apostolic church suffered under Trajan, Decius, and other rulers. Christians were regularly arrested, questioned, required to renounce Christ and affirm “Caesar is Lord” and pour out a drink offering. When they did not, they were put to death horribly. The Martyrdom of Polycarp narrates the dignified way he faced his death for the sake of Christ in the mid-2nd century. In his epistles (2nd century), Ignatius begged the churches (especially the Roman congregation) not to intervene in his martyrdom.
The return of Christ will be single, bodily, visible, noisy, conclusive, and final.
Prior to the rise of Dispensational Premillennialism, the church expected to suffer and for that suffering to be relieved, as Peter writes, by the single, bodily, visible, noisy, conclusive, final return of Christ. Peter likens it to the Noahic flood. There are no such floods today in the interim, but there will be another even greater, final cosmic flood of judgment (2 Pet. 2:4–6). Noah was mocked, relatively few people listened, and then the flood came. So it will be when the Son of Man comes (Matt. 24).
From where then do so many evangelicals get the idea that believers will be taken bodily out of the world (raptured) invisibly, suddenly, before the alleged seven-year tribulation preceding the alleged millennial reign of Christ and the saints on the earth, the reinstitution of priestly sacrifices in Jerusalem, etc.? The whole scheme hangs on a single point: the notion of two parallel peoples of God: Jews and Christians—on the notion that the dividing wall that Paul says was destroyed in Christ’s body, on the cross, still remains.
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace. (Eph. 2:13–15)
There is no separate parallel people of God apart from Christ.
There are Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians, but there is no separate parallel people of God apart from Christ. If your eschatology has a dividing wall, you have a problem with the plain teaching of the word of God.
Scripture may be said to teach a rapture, of sorts, but certainly not the sort of rapture that is portrayed in the various Left Behind books and movies. Paul wrote to the Thessalonian congregation:
But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep. For this we declare to you by a word from the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words. (1 Thess. 4:13–18)
Scripture knows nothing about two or three returns of Christ.
Some in the Thessalonian congregation were concerned about the return of Christ and whether perhaps they had missed it—as is suggested today by a form of what is known as preterism. Paul wants them to know that they have not missed Christ’s return. When Christ returns it will not be partial, nor will it be multiple. Scripture knows nothing about two or three returns of Christ. When he returns it shall not be secret. It will be noisy, visible, and obvious to all. When it comes it will be with a great cry from the heavens. Royal trumpets will announce his arrival.
Christ’s first advent was quiet and was missed by most of the world. Such a disappointment he was to their expectations of earthly conquest that, ultimately, even those who saw him chose to call for Bar-Abbas instead of Jesus. This time there will be no ambiguity. Those who want to see earthly conquest and visible royal power shall have it. The believers who have already died before Christ’s return shall be raised bodily, visibly. Believers who are alive on the earth shall be visibly, bodily taken up to be with him and with the believers who’ve gone before.
Jesus is coming again, bodily, visibly, gloriously, and finally.
One assumption of the pre-millennial, pre-tribulation, secret-rapture theory is that Jesus then returns to heaven and takes the raptured with him, but 1 Thessalonians 4 says nothing of the sort. The imagery of the royal, conquering king leads us to think quite the opposite. Kings do not approach a conquered city and then withdraw. They enter, and those in the city come out to meet them. That’s all the “rapture” is in this case—believers being taken up to escort their glorious King.
The Left Behind properties (books, novels, etc.) may be good business, but they are poor biblical exegesis, poor biblical theology, poor systematic theology, and quite out of accord with the expectations of the historic Christian church. Jesus is coming again, bodily, visibly, gloriously, and finally. It won’t be secret. As it was in the days of Noah, two will be working and one will be taken in judgment; and the other, the believer, will be left behind in peace and fellowship with his Savior who, for the joy set before him, despising the shame of the cross, endured it our sake (Heb. 12:2).
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When we are faced with problems in our relationships, our sinful natures want to place fault with the other person while minimizing or even completely ignoring our personal responsibility for the situation. How can honest self-reflection contribute to improving our relationships?
Taking time to appreciate the other person’s perspective can help us to move forward in a positive direction.
The Protestant Reformation theologian John Calvin reminds us of our selfish tendency as sinful beings to justify ourselves over others:
“We are all so blinded and upset by self-love that everyone imagines he has a just right to exalt himself and to undervalue all others in comparison to self.” — John Calvin, Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life, chapter II:IV.
In the midst of relationship problems, be humble, examine yourself, pray, and think of ways to grow in godly character. As difficult as it is to do, we need to self-reflect and consider how our own perspectives, values, expectations, personal history, and selfish desires have contributed to the present troubled relationship.
We also need to take time to reflect on the perspectives, values, expectations, and personal history of the other person as well, and how those factors may have also contributed to the relationship problems. It’s good to ask ourselves whether we have truly loved this person as an image-bearer of God.
In our prayers we humbly ask for God’s help to heal our relationships.
Humbly ask the other person for forgiveness for any wrongs you have done to him or her. Think of ways, both big and small, to encourage improvements in the relationship and try not to dwell on the ways you want the other person to improve.
As we pray to God we humbly acknowledge that we are in God’s story, not the other way around. In prayer we lift up our sins, worries, hurts, disappointments, and anxieties to our Creator who is all-knowing, all-present, and all-powerful.
Recognizing our limits helps us to rest in God’s sovereignty as to the future outcome of the relationship.
In our prayers we ask for God’s help to heal our relationships because of our love for God and our fellow image-bearers. In his letter to the Ephesian church the apostle Paul exhorts fellow believers to remember how God has forgiven us in Christ:
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. — Ephesians 4:31-32
As we pray for forgiveness and a heart to forgive others, we also recognize that we can only control so much in our relationships and God is sovereign in all things. Rejoice that God is in control of all things, including our relationships, and even in seemingly hopeless situations he can bring restoration.
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Paul told the Corinthians that he and his apostolic associates were wise to Satan’s deceptive schemes (2 Cor. 2:11). The apostle knew Satan was a formidable enemy who had millennia of experience tempting and deceiving God’s image-bearers; but he also knew he had been given insight into the way his enemy operated.
Following Paul’s example, it is vital—a matter of life and death—to understand Satan’s strategies and, specifically, the ways he will tempt us to sin. Scripture gives us crucial intel of our enemy’s strategies and the content of his arsenal. Be on guard against these 17 custom-made temptations—crafted just for you:
1. His first strategy will be to get you to doubt God’s word (Gen. 3:1).
2. He will then lure you away from fellowship (Heb. 3:12-15) and away from church (Prov. 18:1; Heb. 10:23-24).
3. He will exploit your natural proclivities and tempt you to run to extremes (Matt. 26:33-35).
4. He will tempt you to care too much for your reputation (Luke 6:26) or too little (1 Tim. 3:7).
5. He will tempt you to prize your ministry over your family (1 Tim. 3:4-5) and your personal life (1 Tim. 4:16), or he will tempt you to value your family over Christ (Luke 14:26).
6. He will tempt you to rely on your own resources (1 Chron. 21:1; John 15:6), to avoid suffering (Matt. 16:22-23), or to compromise your convictions to evade persecution (Gal. 6:12).
7. He will tempt you with unbelief (Matt. 13:19; cf. Ps. 3:1) and despair (Ps. 73).
8. He will tempt you to trust your own righteousness (Luke 18:9-14), even the smallest sliver (Gal. 1:8-9; 5:1-4).
9. He will tempt you with money (Matt. 13:22; 26:15; 1 Tim. 6:9), fame (Matt. 4:6; John 5:44), sexual pleasure (1 Cor. 7:5; 10:8; 1 Tim. 5:1), or a life of selfish ease (Luke 12:13-21).
10. He will tempt you to grasp for authority (1 Tim. 3:6; 3 John 1:9), to mistake harshness with good leadership (2 Tim. 2:24) or selfish ambition with wisdom (James 3:14-16).
11. He will bring about physical difficulty in order to tempt you to curse God (Job 1:1-22).
12. He will tempt you to believe false doctrine (2 Cor. 11:14) and try to deceive you with lies (2 Tim. 2:13-14).
13. He will accuse you and tempt you to doubt the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement (Rev. 12:10).
14. He will tempt you to grasp at satisfying your God-given desires rather than valuing God supremely and trusting God for the fulfillment of those desires (Matt. 4:4).
15. He will tempt you to get your inheritance now rather than suffering and waiting for God’s timing (Matt. 4:9).
16. He will tempt you to vindicate yourself in front of an unbelieving world (Matt. 4:6), or he will tempt you to do righteous deeds for the praise of men (Acts 5:3; cf. Matt. 6:1).
17. If you think you are ever out of harm’s way, you are a fool. Your enemy is on the constant prowl (1 Pet. 5:8); and once you think you are immune to one set of temptations, he will nail you with another kind (1 Cor. 10:13).
That is why you must be always watchful in prayer (Col. 4:2), asking your Father for safe passage through this temptation-filled world (Matt. 6:13; 18:7) and for help to remain firm in the Scriptures (Ps. 119:11). If you’ve been caught off guard (Ps. 119:176), cry out to God (Ps. 116:1-6), repent (Luke 3:8; Acts 26:20), and warn others of how subtle and treacherous the enemy is (Luke 22:31; 2 Pet. 2:1-22).
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I have been a Presbyterian pastor for twenty-five years, the last three of which I was privileged to serve as an aged-care chaplain. I ministered in three Presbyterian nursing homes with a community of 220 residents, some 400 staff, and hundreds of family members. As I wrap up this ministry to return to parish, I want to share both some of the challenges I experienced and some of the solutions to these challenges that became apparent to me over those brief three years.
This is not intended to be a professional or academic paper: I do not engage here with scholarly literature, nor do I intend to tie my thoughts to doctrinal studies. These are simply “lessons learned”—lessons that I hope may assist others who labor in the same ministry.
I lost count over the past three years of how many Christians said to me: “Those old people must be very open to the gospel, as close to death as they are.” It’s a plausible idea, but not at all true to my experience. I did not at all find nursing home residents more open to the gospel, but generally less so than those younger in years with more years of life ahead of them. I begin by describing three challenges to bringing the gospel to the frail elderly, and five possible responses to those challenges. I conclude with a word about how all people serve God, no matter how frail and incapacitated they are.
Challenge One: Fading Senses
Nursing home dining rooms are surprisingly hushed. You might expect to hear happy chatter over a meal, something like the buzz and hum of a college cafeteria. In fact the only people talking are staff serving the meals. This is because the frail elderly find communication challenging and exhausting even in a quiet and cosy tête-à-tête, let alone amidst the din of a bustling dining room.
The first challenge to sharing the gospel with nursing home residents is their damaged communication receptors. A recent study found that:
Eighty percent of eighty-year-olds are hard of hearing. This usually affects their ability to understand what people are saying more than the range of tones they can hear, and they can hear low frequencies better than high frequencies. That’s why people with age-related hearing loss find it particularly difficult to follow conversations in noisy environments.[1]
Eyesight also begins to fail. Many residents are legally blind and almost all find it difficult to read without glasses, or difficult to read the words on a page at all. Even if a resident’s eyesight is strong, they may not have the strength to hold up a book for any length of time.
In any case, it requires energy to take in and comprehend what a person or book is saying; and aged-care residents do not have much energy.
These are the kind of physical hindrances to taking in information that are described in Ecclesiastes 12:
Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near of which you will say, “I have no pleasure in them”; before the sun and the light and the moon and the stars are darkened and the clouds return after the rain, in the day when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong men are bent [loss of limb strength], and the grinders cease because they are few [loss of teeth], and those who look through the windows are dimmed [loss of sight], and the doors on the street are shut—when the sound of the grinding is low, and one rises up at the sound of a bird, and all the daughters of song are brought low [loss of hearing]. (Eccl. 12:1-4)
Solomon suggests that we should come to God before our bodies and communication receptors deteriorate and break with age. The fading of the senses is the first challenge to be overcome in aged-care chaplaincy.
Challenge Two: Stoic Adaption
As people age their abilities and functions decrease and their aches and pains increase.
Eyes grow dimmer, ears grow duller, teeth grow fewer. Necks and backs weaken, knee and shoulder joints wear out and need replacing. The digestive system becomes less robust, and people are more susceptible to diarrhea or constipation. Bladder and bowel functions fail, and sanitary pads are required. Swallowing becomes more difficult, and food and drink must be mashed or thickened lest it go down “the wrong way,” causing infection in the lungs. Hearts beat less sturdily, brain function clouds and darkens.
What I have observed, as the parts of people’s bodies begin to weaken and break, is that people adapt. I have watched people adapt from walking sticks to walking frames, and then to wheelchairs, and then to reclining chairs, and then fulltime to their beds. I have watched people adapt from solid food to pureed food to liquid food. People adapt from leaky bladders to complete loss of function. People adapt from having all of their teeth to some teeth to no teeth at all. People adapt to losing their speech, or the loss of control or movement on one side of the body after a stroke. As the body conks out people don’t naturally cry out to God; we just adapt. And the same happens with pain. We learn to cope with the new pain in our neck, back, knees, shoulders, or teeth. We don’t often cry out in prayer. We just take more medication and learn to cope.
The impression I have is that death itself is just one more stage of deterioration to cope with and perhaps not the worst because “you are not there to feel it.” And if people have a vague idea that they will face God and judgment and perhaps even hell, then they expect to adapt and deal with that as well.
Like Camus’ version of Sisyphus, we scrounge meaning in the heroic acceptance of life’s pains and absurd meaninglessness. Back of all lurks groundless hope. Shattered men hope to return to home and work; lonely women hope that families will come and visit; everyone hopes that life after death “will work out, somehow.”
Perhaps if we plunged directly from full health to massive deterioration—such as is experienced in a catastrophic accident—then we might be shocked into crying out. Instead, most people experience creeping normality. We allow the camel of pain to poke his nose into the tent, then his head, then his neck and shoulders, until the whole obnoxious beast is in the tent and we can’t get rid of it. So we just learn to live with bodily disintegration.
When we presume that nursing home residents must be more open to the gospel, we might think that this is because as they begin to lose function, and as they begin to accumulate bodily pains, and as they draw closer to the final breakdown of death, that they will turn more keenly to God for his help in overcoming these disabilities—in some small measure in the short term, and completely at the end of time. But if the Spirit does not move us to repentance, then we just stoically adapt to each downward step of deterioration.
Challenge Three: Hard Hearts
Aging is both distilling and concreting. People seem to grow into more concentrated versions of themselves, and harder versions. As a rule, lewd men grow lewder, crankier women grow crankier. Gentlemen grow more gallant, ladies more considerate. Those who have lived for money, or their ego, or their family, or for widows and orphans, die with the same obsessions.
With the thief of the cross we are shown one deathbed conversion. One deathbed conversion so as not to lose hope, but only one so as not to presume. As a rule, people who have lived without God die without God.
This hardening applies to the realm of ideas. As we age it becomes more difficult to understand a new idea, more difficult still to analyze it, and almost impossible to accept it. Old dogs don’t learn new tricks. A vintage car cannot, like a Tesla, follow satnav directions. A vintage TV cannot display a movie in technicolor and surround sound. Vintage minds and hearts struggle to assimilate and love new ideas. Even if we were religiously and morally neutral it would be extremely difficult to understand—let alone to embrace—something so stupendous and spiritual and counterintuitive as the gospel of grace.
But we are not neutral. Our spirits are as crooked as a medieval alleyway; our hearts are as hostile to God as a Jack Russell Terrier to a shadowy stranger. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jer. 17:9). We are “futile in our thinking and our foolish hearts are darkened” (Rom. 1:21). We would rather bow before a block of painted wood than to our living Creator. In fact, our hearts are dead to God: we are as capable of responding to God’s voice as a buried corpse to birdsongs in the cemetery garden.
Even if every other gateway—those of hearing, sight, energy, mental capacity, and a willingness and ability to learn new ideas—lay open, our God-hating hearts, dead in our sins and transgressions, seal us off from God like the grave from the living. This for aged-care residents is the third, greatest, and—by nature—invincible barrier to receiving Christ as Savior.
How might a nursing home chaplain respond to challenges such as these?
Response One: Exaggerated Communication
If ears are dull, then we must speak more loudly, slowly, and deliberately. Prior to the twentieth century, actors, politicians, and preachers, lacking public address technology, had to learn to speak from their diaphragms (not their throats), to project, and to enunciate every consonant and vowel. Public speakers had to be loud and powerful, had to cultivate resonant and sonorous tones. (Echoes persist with our present-day Shakespearean actors and archbishops of Canterbury.) We must borrow at least some of these old public-speaking techniques if we are going to be heard by the very elderly.
And if we give the frail-aged things to read, then we must use very large fonts with serifs, which clarify the letters and make it easy for the eye to track across the page. Handouts must be light enough to hold and easy to handle. I produced weekly twelve-page church handout booklets in 24-point Times New Roman font, with distinct pictures on each opening that I could use to help people find their place: “Please turn to page 5; if you can see a kangaroo paw then you know you’re on the right page.”
Similarly, when I play hymns, I play them fortissimo. If the songs sound a little inappropriately loud for the setting, then it is probably about right.
Physical materials must be exaggeratedly loud and clear; but so must the matter. The frail-aged do not have the energy for long addresses, so sermons must be concise. Abstractions are similarly wearying, so sermons must be concrete. Grey and muted tones will be neither seen nor heard: everything must be colorful, vivid, bold, and loud. More Berlioz than Debussy; more Norman Rockwell than Monet. In short, the aged-care chaplain must draw on all the techniques of the classic children’s talk: short, sharp, pointed, vivid, memorable, and never without an object lesson or two.
Response Two: Familiar Texts
Given how difficult it is for the frail elderly to take in and accept new information, it is vital to bring them texts that are well known. People with dementia may not remember what they had for lunch, but they may very well remember a song or poem or reading from the 1940s. We must lean hard on those old familiar texts.
The Lord’s Prayer is first among these. I prayed it many times every day and very often the person with whom I prayed spontaneously joined me in this prayer. I found the most familiar text to be the Traditional Ecumenical Version, which uses the words “trespasses” instead of “debts,” and “temptation” instead of “trial.” I had to remember that Roman Catholics do not end the prayer with the doxology: “For thine be the kingdom.…”
The Lord’s Prayer is also a launchpad for invaluable pastoral counsel: including the importance of relying on the Lord for daily provision of help and strength; the importance of seeking and extending forgiveness; and our ultimate hope that he will deliver us from evil—both personal evil and the ravages of sin—and will deliver us to a new heaven and earth without injustice, pain, tears, and death.
The twenty-third Psalm is another familiar and very precious text. I have read it innumerable times and drawn attention to Jesus as our Good Shepherd, who loves his sheep and laid down his life for his sheep, and who is present with his sheep with help and comfort even in “the valley of the shadow of death” (Ps. 23:4).
John 3:16 is also quite well known and is of course a very moving and powerful summation of the gospel. I quoted it often in my sermons, prayers, and one-on-one conversations.
When it comes to content, as hymn writer Kate Hankey urged:
Tell me the old, old story
Of unseen things above,
Of Jesus and His glory,
Of Jesus and His love.
Tell me the story simply,
As to a little child;
For I am weak and weary,
And helpless and defiled. (“Tell Me the Old, Old Story”)
Response Three: Repetition
I was led, early in my adult Christian life, to disdain the use of the Anglican Prayer book as archaic, dull, and heartlessly repetitious. How could anyone say something with meaning if they have to say it every week? I have since learned that it is possible to say the same things or different things with either meaning or empty formalism, or with something on the spectrum between these two poles. Successful engagement with liturgy depends less upon novelty or familiarity than upon the preparation of the heart and mind.
Without doubt there is power in repetition for those near the beginning and end of their lives. Rote learning is necessary for the young, and a comforting reinforcement for the old. Having seen the value of liturgical repetition, I intend to use much more of it when I return to parish.
Thus I settled on a simple weekly liturgy drawing from a limited number of texts: a Call to Worship (Psalm 34:1-3 or Psalm 100), a hymn, the weekly reading, a prayer of confession (the same every week), a second hymn, a message, a response by praying the Lord’s Prayer or reciting the Apostles’ Creed, a final hymn, and then the benediction (2 Cor. 13:14).
I also found myself drawing from a pool of only about ten hymns: “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”; “This is My Father’s World”; “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross”; “All Things Bright and Beautiful”; “The Lord’s My Shepherd”; “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms”; “There is a Fountain”; “Jesus Loves Me This I Know”; “How Great Thou Art”; and, of course, “Amazing Grace.”
No one ever complained, “Not that one again!” People were delighted to sing these great old songs over and over, and I believe that the wonderful message of these hymns sank in more deeply through repetition. (Chris Rice’s marvellous CD, Untitled Hymn: A Collection of Hymns, was a great help to me here. His versions are bright, clear, very singable, and uplifting.)
I aimed to bring short (five-to-seven minute), sharp, and concrete messages from whatever reading I had chosen for the week but found myself saying over and again, like a tolling church bell on Sunday morning, that “We must put ourselves in the loving arms of the Good Shepherd,” and that “Jesus Christ died on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins, and rose from the grave to give us everlasting life.”
Response Four: Participation
Many years ago a well-known Anglican writer—on holiday at the time—visited our church in Hobart. Months later he published an article recording his impressions of his church visits. While he commended the faithful preaching of the churches he had attended, he lamented the lack of congregational participation. Presbyterian congregations, deprived of the call and response of The Book of Common Prayer, seemed far too passive to him. I have come to think that he is right.
In an effort to rouse the elderly congregants from their weariness of body, mind, and spirit, I began inviting them to join with me in reading out the Prayer of Confession, and then the Call to Worship, and finally the Benediction too. In fact our penchant for reading silently is a late invention. The ancients typically read and prayed out loud, which engages far more of the mind and spirit than passive listening and silent mental recitation. As a result you are brought closer to understanding the meaning of the text and then, hopefully, to owning the meaning. Between the hymn singing and out-loud Scripture readings and prayers, my little congregations had very little opportunity to zone out and doze off.
Congregational participation is something else that I intend to bring much more into parish ministry.
Response Five: Kindness and Consideration
What drew vast crowds around our Lord? Yes, his arresting and authoritative teaching. Yes, his acts of power. Yes, the prospect of bread. Yet the gospels also speak again and again about his compassion—literally his “bowels of compassion”—his manifest love welling up from the core of his being.
The frail elderly have typically endured some ninety years in an often cold and jagged world. Many have lived through poverty and war. Too many have had to bury a child. Many have endured disappointment, betrayal, tragedy, and injury to the body and spirit. All of us have inflicted others with some measure of these evils.
To such curse-ravaged souls the chaplain can and must bring the love and compassion of Christ. This cannot be fabricated. Even the dullest eyes see instinctively through the mask of the play-acting hypokritēs. We must learn to look at these ancient and ruined bodies and souls through the eyes of Christ: as made in the imago dei, as fallen in Adam, as culpable rebels receiving their just punishment for sin and equally as victims suffering from the disease of sin, and as slaves suffering under the chains of sin. We must be moved to tears also for the fate of those who will die in their sin, without the saving white robe of Christ’s righteousness.
Although the barriers to the gospel are many and high, we begin to break down these barriers when we come with the compassion of Christ.
But loving sentiments must be backed up with loving practicalities. “Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?” (James 2:15-16). Let us bring the clothes of patient listening and the daily food of reliability—of being there week-in and week-out, at the times we say we are going to be there. There is a man, not a Christian, who waits all week for his twenty-five-minute chat with me before church on Thursday morning. After two months of these chats he began to come to church. This has happened time and again—routine patient conversations turning into church attendance. Who knows what God does in the hearts of these people who come under his Word?
Love also means putting aside our native embarrassment or squeamishness when ministering to people. At first, I would stop praying or reading with a person when a caregiver came into the room. I soon realized that I would get very little done if I paused every encounter for every interruption. Later I realized how powerful these encounters could be for the caring staff, most of whom are not Christians. Your out-loud prayer and Bible reading is likely the only prayer and Scripture that they have yet heard. Your prayerful references to sin, atonement, divine forgiveness, heaven, hell, the cross, resurrection, Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit, and Jesus Christ, are likely the only time these people ever hear a word about these divine truths and titles. “You are the light of the world.” You bring the Spirit and presence of Christ. You are, I say with reverence, the nearest incarnation of the Incarnate Christ that many of these people will ever experience.
It is essential to nurture good relationships with nursing home staff, not only for their sake but also for the sake of your chaplaincy work. Very few residents can get to church if the staff do not help them up in the morning and feed and wash and dress them on time. Most often you need the staff to physically help people, bound to their reclining beds and wheelchairs, to church services. Staff can either hobble your ministry or help to make it flourish. So be kind and respectful to them, encourage them and thank them for their work, and assist them when appropriate to help move and feed people. I pray for them and their families out loud in our weekly services: “Lord, thank you for the good people who work here; for the cooks, cleaners, nurses, carers, managers, and others who work so hard to care for our residents. May you give them strength and skill and love in their hearts. Bless them and their families, as they are a blessing to our residents.”
It is widely known that nursing homes are crushingly lonely places. Of the two-hundred-plus residents I cared for, only a handful had daily or every-other-day visits. Only a third had regular visitors. Dozens had no visitors at all. There were many reasons for this neglect: some had families who lived away; some had harmed their families in times past; and every family of a resident was busy with other things. Chaplains and volunteers bring the most precious gift of all: the gift of a listening ear, of someone who cares, of presence. When Christ agonized in the Garden of Gethsemane, an angel appeared from heaven, “strengthening him” (Luke 22:43). May we, like visiting angels come to strengthen the struggling, win the hearts of residents and their care-givers and families.
If the ultimate blockage to the gospel is spiritual, then of course the most powerful thing we can do for those to whom we minister is to pray for them: that the Lord will take away hearts of stone, and that he will give them hearts of flesh. That he will make the dry bones live. That he will open blind eyes to see Christ.
Finally: Service and the Widow’s Mite
I sit with a man born during World War Two. Now deep in his eighties, he is laid quite low by an incurable disease. When his body was fit and strong he delighted to serve God and others. Now with every passing day others must do more and more for him: showering and dressing him, cooking and cleaning for him. Soon caregivers will have to lift him from bed to chair and his food and drink to his lips.
He implores me, eyes wide, hands open, a cloud on his brow: “How can I serve God now?”
How precious to him—and to others whose hearts are rent by a sense of uselessness—is the history of the Widow’s Mites, of the woman who gave only a tiny fraction of what the rich merchants were giving to the Temple treasury. Jesus said,
“Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.” (Mark 12:43-44)
Jesus could not be clearer. When it comes to serving God, it is not the amount of money, muscle power, or mental ability that counts. What counts is the posture of the heart. In God’s balance the widow’s mites outweighed the merchants’ bulging bags of silver and gold. They gave a part of their surplus; they made no sacrifice to self. But the widow sacrificed everything for others.
This is how Jesus served us on the cross. He gave all of his heart, mind, and body. He gave up his dignity and lifeblood. Like the widow, he “put in everything.”
Those who have by faith received Jesus’ sacrifice—whose sins are forgiven and whose eternal life has already begun—will long to serve God and others in the same way. Has God blessed you with physical strength? Education? A trade? Professional skills? Oratory? Teaching ability? Leadership? Property? Money? Thoughtfulness? The ability to encourage? Kind words and deeds? Prayerfulness? Just as Christ has given his all for you, you will learn to give your all to him and to others.
And never forget this: God will use us to serve him and others, no matter our abilities or disabilities, our capacities or incapacities, our wealth or our destitution.
Yes, God uses the exhausted, the sick, the crippled, victims of dementia, and the dying to serve himself and others. He even uses our dead body for his service, as a memento mori (a reminder of our mortality), and by drawing out the loving service of those who bury our remains.
That is one reason why, until Jesus returns, “the poor you will always have with you” (Matt. 26:11). There will always be those who give and those who receive, and both will serve God in their complementary ways. The sick and disabled and poor will be God’s beautiful instruments, through whom God will teach others to love.
As the great French preacher Adolphe Monod taught from his own deathbed, from his own agony and helplessness:
You would think that the suffering would be excluded from the privilege of glorifying God, absorbed as they are by the sadnesses and pains of life. Not at all! These are the ones who are especially called to glorify God. They find in their sufferings, as they found in their atoned sins, the greatest way of giving glory to the One who has taught us to say: “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2Co 12:10).
What consolation for those who suffer, to be able to say: I can by my sufferings—that I bear patiently and peacefully, while waiting for that which will be joyful and glorious—I can, by these sufferings, give to God a glory that I could not have otherwise given to him. What infinite sweetness the suffering find in this thought!
It is above all because of this that suffering becomes privilege. Yes, to suffer is a privilege for the Christian. To suffer a lot is a special privilege.[2]
We live in a society deeply infected with Darwinism. The doctrine of “survival of the fittest” makes us think that the vigorous are more valuable, more worthy of surviving, than the weak. In a godless world, it is, as Nietzsche taught, “the will to power” that matters. The most valuable are those who most assert their will and strength upon others.
How wonderful, by contrast to this cold and cruel calculus, is the true Christian mindset: that we all, bearing the imago dei, are invested with incalculable honor and glory, no matter what our physical or mental condition.
We offer our mites to him. And he will take our frail, aging, and dying bodies, our weak and declining minds, our disability, our dementia, our final breaths—and even our lifeless bodies—and he will use them to love and to serve others, and to bring glory to his name.
And then in heaven—with renewed bodies and abundant life—we will serve him and one another perfectly, and with perfect joy, forever.
May we love Christ in the persons of the very aged with this spirit and with this hope.
[1] National Library of Medicine. “Hearing loss and deafness: Normal hearing and impaired hearing.” Created: May 15, 2008; Last Update: November 30, 2017. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK390300.
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In that extremely complex and, at times, hard to understand section of the apostle Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, we come across the comparison between the married and the unmarried (1 Cor. 7). In short, the apostle insists that marriage is good (and the norm), but that it brings with it a division of attention. Those who are married have a preoccupation with their spouse. Those who are unmarried are free to more fully “care about the things of the Lord” while “the married man cares about…how to please his wife” and “the married woman cares about…how to please her husband.”
This forces Christian husbands to ask the question, “What does it look like to biblically care about the needs of my wife?” This is a question that I feel as though I am just beginning to learn how to answer eleven years into marriage. While there is no silver bullet, there are many things that the Scriptures teach us in order to help guide the process of learning to love your spouse. Here are seven basic biblical ways that the married man can seek to please his wife:
1. Lead her in worship.
Whether this occurs one-on-one or in the context of family worship, a godly husband will seek to “wash his wife with the water of the word” and to lead her “to the throne of grace” that they might together receive grace and mercy to help in time of need. A man who truly loves his wife will want to sing God’s praises with his wife and to encourage her with God’s word.
This is the most foundational way that a godly husband can love and serve his wife. Everything else in the marriage is secondary to—and will necessary wax and wane commensurate with—this all-important calling. God has given a believing husband his wife so that he might shepherd her soul to glory.
2. Carry her burdens.
One of the apostolic words to husbands regarding the way in which they are to love their wives is that they are to “dwell with them with understanding” (1 Pet. 3:7). A loving husband will seek to be gentle toward his wife. A truly loving husband will seek to listen to his wife as she relays her burdens. He will be patient with her when she seems to be folding under the pressures of life. He will seek to understand why she is struggling even when he doesn’t have the same burdens.
3. Provide for her.
A man who truly loves his wife will be a man who labors diligently to provide for his wife. The loving husband will be a hard-working husband. This doesn’t mean that he will make lots of money; but it does mean that his priority is to “provide for his own” (1 Tim. 5:8). He will work as many jobs as might be necessary in order to provide for his wife. Being a provider is something to which a loving husband must be committed.
4. Serve her in the home.
I don’t know if it is possible for someone to hate folding laundry as much as I hate folding laundry. My soul has a holy (and, often, an unholy) hatred of it. When I recognize, however, that my wife is tired from bearing my burdens, taking our kids to school, teaching one of our sons at home, doing the shopping, driving the boys to different events, and caring for many, many, many other things in our home and lives, one of the most loving things that I can do for her is to fold the five laundry baskets full of clothes.
Doing the laundry, cleaning the dishes, repairing things in the home, pressure washing the house, taking her car to get the oil changed, etc., are some of the very tangible ways that a godly husband can learn to love and serve his wife in the home.
5. Praise her in public.
One of the things that has not often been pointed out about Proverbs 31 is that it actually tells us quite a number of things about the godly husband—and does not speak merely about the godly wife. The godly husband is sitting at the gates of the city—as a leader in the community. He is working diligently for his wife and children. But, he is also doing something at the city gates. He is praising his wife for all of her qualities to the other leaders in the city. The Proverb concludes with these words: “let her own works praise her in the gates” (Prov. 31:31). A loving husband will sing the praises of his wife in public (unless she is adamant that she doesn’t like it when he does so).
6. Show her affection.
It almost goes without saying that a loving husband will be affectionate with his wife. This certainly includes spending time alone with her. It may take the form of regular date nights away from the children. I usually find that it is one of the best things for our marriage when my wife and I are able to pull away from the busyness and cares of life to spend time together to foster our love for one another. Of course, it also means not withholding the sexual intimacy that is her God-given right. It should seem strange for us to find the apostle Paul commanding husbands with the following admonition: “Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her…” (1 Cor. 7:3). However, life in this selfish and fallen world necessitates such a command. A godly husband should commit to nurturing intimacy and affection with his wife.
7. Be transparent with her.
I have never met a woman who didn’t long to have a husband she could trust. How could anyone in their right mind enjoy living with someone that they couldn’t trust? A godly husband will talk often and openly with his wife. He will be transparent with her about finances, activities, and struggles.
Surely, a measure of propriety and wisdom is needed when seeking to approach the issue of personal struggles with lust. As a rule, however, a man who wants to truly love and serve his wife will be a man who is open and honest with her. The words of James 5:16 apply to the marriage relationship no less than to our other relations in the church: “Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed.”
All of these things must, of course, be pursued in the context of our own relationship with Christ. It is only through union with Jesus—in his death and resurrection—that you will ever be able to begin to love and care for your wife in these ways. When we fail (and we will most certainly fail), we go back to the Lord in brokenness and contrition. We confess our sin to him and ask him for grace to grow in these areas.
We must meditate often on the fact that Jesus has done all of these things for us as the Heavenly Bridegroom of our souls. He leads us in worship on a daily and weekly basis (Eph. 5:25-27; Heb. 2:10-13); he carries our burdens and sorrows (Matt. 11:28-30); he constantly provides for our spiritual and material needs (Matt. 7:7); he serves us in his church (Mark 10:45; Luke 12:37; John 13:1-17); he speaks well of us, even though we are sinful and often wander (Song of Songs 1:15; 4:1, 7); he is intimate with us in communion (John 13:25; 21:20); and he is open with us about all of his and his Father’s works (Matt. 13:11; John 15:15).
Brothers, we must learn to live out of our union with Christ and to listen to all that his word teaches us about our responsibilities as husbands if we are to ever truly care for the needs of our wives.
