Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
The very first fallacy theologian D. A. Carson lists in his classic book Exegetical Fallacies is “the root fallacy.” What is the root fallacy and why is it of such importance to merit being first of many potential errors we risk committing while interpreting what the Bible says and means?
The etymology of a word is its history of development over time.
In short, Dr. Carson defines the root fallacy as determining the meaning of a word in the Bible by its etymology or component parts. The etymology of a word is like its genealogy—its history of development over time. For example, consider how English words have changed over the years.
“Awful” used to mean full of awe and worthy of respect or honor. However, awful now tends to mean terrible or bad. In fact, “terrible” once had a meaning similar to “awe” and “wonder”; but the negative side of the word has won out, and today it means something extremely bad. Word meanings change over time as cultural usage redefines them.
This brings us to the root fallacy of biblical interpretation—exegetical root fallacy.
How does someone commit the error of the exegetical root fallacy?
When people try to define the meaning of a biblical word by appealing to its etymology (its history of how a word’s meaning changes over time) or to its component parts, they are committing the error of exegetical root fallacy. They are trying to say a word now means such and such because its meaning used to be such and such or because its parts mean such and such.
Using the etymology of compound words is a common case of root fallacy. Though the errors most often occur with biblical Greek words, Dr. Carson gives the example of “pineapple” to help us understand the mistake. Surely we know pineapples are not apples that grow on pines! Yet, some interpreters of Scripture have tried to define compound words in a similar way, attempting to define the meaning of words by their component parts.
We need to know how a word was used at the time the author wrote the text.
The basic problem is this: writers use words in their current context—their current meaning—not necessarily how they were used in prior times. In other words, though an author may even be aware of the history of a word’s usage (diachronic—over time), writers use words in their current meaning at the time of writing—at the time the author used it (synchronic—at that time).
“The meaning of a word is found only in its current usage in its particular context at the time it was written, not in how its meaning may have changed from the past.”
Dr. Carson uses the Greek word agape to illustrate the problem. Though the word agape may at one time have meant an incestuous type of love (agape) such as Amnon’s for his half-sister Tamar (2 Sam. 13:15, Septuagint), or the type of love (agape) Demas had for the world (2 Tim. 4:10), its usage in John 3:35 for the love (agape) between the Father and the Son Christ Jesus is quite different in meaning. The meaning of a word is found only in its current usage in its particular context at the time it was written, not in how its meaning may have changed from the past.
Using reliable Hebrew and Greek lexicons is of great help in understanding biblical words in their immediate context.
Dr. Carson summarizes his point this way:
I am simply saying that the meaning of a word cannot be reliably determined by etymology, or that a root, once discovered, always projects a certain semantic load onto any word that incorporates that root.[1]
To avoid root fallacies when interpreting the meaning of biblical words, use the help of reliable lexicons along with knowing how the same writer uses the particular word elsewhere. Then strive to understand the word in its immediate context. Your understanding of the Bible will be noticeably and fruitfully enhanced.
To learn more about exegetical fallacies, please seeExegetical Fallaciesby D. A. Carson (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 1996).
This article was originally published on January 9, 2020.
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
Modern conveniences are wonderful. When my husband and I welcomed our little one into the world, we did so in a clean private room surrounded by all the technology to track my delivery and the health of the baby, tended by a team of nurses and midwives. Not only that, but this particular hospital had a tradition of playing a lullaby for the baby as mom and child left the birthing ward and journeyed down the hallway to the private room they would occupy for the next two days as everyone was cared for. What a sweet way to celebrate the birth of precious child!
Jesus, our great high priest, was born in the flesh in a humble stable.
The birth of Jesus couldn’t have been further from this experience. Don’t even think of a clean hospital or a comfy home birth—there was not even an available bed in an inn already packed with strangers and travelers. Instead, a stable would have to do, full of smelly animals. As idealized as the picture is often painted, I can’t imagine Mary was feeling that her situation was ideal. And this child was no ordinary child, he was a high priest—one who would have received great honor and recognition, one set aside for an important and life-giving task.
The Levitical priesthood had the distinction of serving God in the tabernacle and in the temple. The high priest had special and beautiful clothing, and a unique job only he could perform before God for the people:
“Then [the High Priest] shall kill the goat of the sin offering that is for the people and bring its blood inside the veil and do with its blood as he did with the blood of the bull, sprinkling it over the mercy seat and in front of the mercy seat. Thus he shall make atonement for the Holy Place, because of the uncleannesses of the people of Israel and because of their transgressions, all their sins. And so he shall do for the tent of meeting, which dwells with them in the midst of their uncleannesses. (Lev. 16:15-16)
It was the high priest’s job to make a sacrifice and present the blood of the sacrifice before the Lord, so that his own sins and the sins of the people could be forgiven in God’s sight. This action looked forward to the time when a better high priest, one without sin and who would live forever, would offer his own blood to atone—cover with his blood—the sins of his people so they could be forgiven.
Jesus was a high priest from a better priesthood than the Levitical priesthood.
Jesus would take the death-punishment that all wickedness and every sin deserves so that those who trust in him might live forever, their sins having been forgiven. Jesus was a high priest from a better priesthood than the Levitical priesthood as he was from the priestly line of Melchizedek:
For it is witnessed of him,
“You are a priest forever,
after the order of Melchizedek.” (Heb. 7:17)
The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office, but he holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself. (Heb. 7:17, 23-27)
The baby born in the manger wasn’t wearing the well-made, beautiful clothes of a high priest; rather, he was wrapped in cleaning cloths for animals. He didn’t look glorious or important, but his job was the most important in the world—to give himself throughout his life and in his death on the cross to save a people from the righteous judgement of a good and holy God.
Jesus came to be a high priest for those who believe in him.
The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit had agreed from all eternity that they would save a sinful people, even though the price was the death of the Father’s beloved Son. Out of God’s love for us, this plan was undertaken willingly by the persons of the Trinity.
Although he was a son, [Jesus] learned obedience through what he suffered. And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek. (Heb. 4:8-10)
Believe in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, for he came to be a high priest for those who believe in him. And this baby in the manger was and will always continue to be a high priest, sent to shed his blood for the sins of his people and now living forever as proof of his perfect sacrifice.
Click below to read the entire Advent Sunday series!
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
Editor’s note: This is the third installment of a series on the Apostles’ Creed. Rev. Campbell Markham is a Presbyterian minister in Perth, Australia.
My wife loves watching Who Do You Think You Are?—the SBS TV series that looks at the lives of famous Australians. The basic idea is this: If you want to know who you are, you need to know something about your ancestors. They have shaped your life more than you can imagine. Isn’t that why so many adopted children, who love and honor their adopted parents, still yearn to know who their birth parents were?
So much of our identity—our appearance, genetics, nation of origin, language, culture, religion, status, prospects, tastes, morals, and a thousand other facts about us—are determined by our parents.
Certainly, this is true about Jesus. The Apostles’ Creed has already told us that Jesus Christ is “God’s only begotten Son, our Lord.” Every Christian looks to Jesus and says, as did Thomas, “My Lord and my God.” The next sentence of the Creed establishes his identity:
Article Three: “Who was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary.”
This is straight from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke:
Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us). (Matt. 1:18-23)
And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.” (Luke 1:30-35)
Jesus Christ, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, is truly God and truly man.
In the Old Testament, remarkable births heralded remarkable saving works of God. Thus Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Samson, and Samuel were born to barren women through God’s miraculous intervention.
God signaled the coming of the most remarkable person through his most remarkable birth miracle: the birth of Jesus, not from a barren woman but from a virgin. By doing this God made known that Jesus is:
His only begotten Son (John 3:16);
The Savior of the World (1 John 4:14); and
Immanuel, which means “God with Us” (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23).
Jesus Christ is perfect and “without sin” (Heb. 4:15).
Further, by bringing Jesus into the world in this way, God announced that Jesus is both:
Like us, being truly a human being, who lived through all the stages of human life: conception, birth, infancy, childhood, and adulthood; and
Unlike us, being without the natal corruption of sin.
King David rightly said, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps. 51:5). But Jesus Christ, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit, is perfect and “without sin” (Heb. 4:15), a “lamb without blemish or spot” (1 Pet. 1:19).
A Christian believes that Jesus is one person with two natures: one truly human nature; one truly divine nature. He is the human who could die on the cross in our stead; he is the infinite God with us, who could bear the sin of us all.
Believing this truth brings true peace and freedom.
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
Do you ever think of God’s commands as too hard? In many ways, they seem impossible. The longer we live in this fallen world, the more we see our sins, failures, and weaknesses. Try as we might, we just can’t resist temptation; we just can’t overcome our sin for good.
Sometimes, in facing a besetting sin—a sin that seems to haunt us, taunt us, and rule us—we may feel discouraged. We may want to give up the battle. We may think we just don’t have what it takes to live a life of godliness.
This is an issue Moses addressed in the book of Deuteronomy, and it gives us hope in our battle against sin.
Moses spoke about the future.
At the end of Deuteronomy, Moses renewed the covenant with God’s people. He reminded them of all God had done to rescue and redeem them. He warned them to be watchful and wary of their hearts, lest they turn from God to worship idols. Moses told them of the consequences for sin and the curses that would come upon them if they abandoned their covenant with God.
In chapter 30 of Deuteronomy, Moses spoke about the future. He told them that when they found themselves scattered among the nations as punishment for abandoning the covenant, they would need to repent and seek God’s forgiveness for sin and then the Lord would restore them. God would then transform their hearts so that they could love him with all their heart and soul.
He then reminded them that they can obey God and they have the means to do so:
“For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off.It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.” (Deut. 30:11-14)
Here are four good things to remember about God’s enabling grace when facing a besetting sin:
1. God supplies the grace to keep his commands.
The reason God’s commands are not too hard is because he supplies the grace to keep them. The same One who gives the commands also enables us to obey them. For the Israelites, that grace was “the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.”
In fact, as Paul points out while quoting this part of Deuteronomy 30 in Romans 10:6-8, our righteousness is not based on keeping the law, it is based on faith—faith in our Savior who kept the law perfectly forus and who now sanctifies us by the power of the Holy Spirit working through the word of God—that is through Scripture. Even Moses preached the gospel to Israel!
On this side of the cross, we understand more clearly that it is the Holy Spirit who brings us from death to life, who removes our heart of stone and gives us a heart of flesh. It is the Spirit who also gives us the word and enables us to understand it. He is the one who uses it with precision in our hearts,
For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” (Heb. 4:12)
2. The same grace which justifies us is the same grace that sanctifies us.
Paul tells us in Titus,
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. (Tit. 2:11-12)
The same grace which justifies us is the same grace that sanctifies us. Peter tells us that we have been given all we need to live a godly life:
His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. (2 Pet. 1:3)
Why is it not too hard to obey God’s commands? Because he enables us to do so through the power of the Spirit at work in us through God’s word and the knowledge of who Christ is and what he has done for us. The gospel tells us that Christ obeyed the law perfectly for us. His obedience is credited to us through faith. God looks at us and sees Christ’s righteousness.
3. We have the very Spirit of Christ living within us.
This is good news! God’s commands are impossible apart from Christ but are made possible through the gospel and the Spirit of Christ at work in us. This is good news when we face temptations to sin. This is good news when we are weary and weighed down by our failures. This is good news for the weak and worn and discouraged.
We have the very Spirit of Christ living within us. The same power that raised Christ from the dead is at work in us. Day by day, he is transforming us into the likeness of our Savior. While the battle is indeed hard, we are not left on our own. Christ is with us, strengthening and sustaining us to resist sin and walk in obedience. When we stumble and fall, his grace covers us.
4. God promises that the work he began in us will be completed.
Because we are united to him by faith, he is for us what we can’t be; he is righteous in our place. And he promises that the work he began in us will be completed. In eternity, we’ll shed our sin once for all and will spend forever worshiping God for his grace toward us in Christ.
Dear friend, if you find yourself facing besetting sin and thinking “It’s too hard!” turn to Christ. Repent of your sin and receive forgiveness through the gospel of grace. Rest and rely upon God’s grace for you in Christ and the work of the Spirit in you. Use the means of grace (worship, Scripture, baptism, the Lord’s supper, prayer) to resist and fight against your sin. And know that one day you will reach the finish line. The work God is doing in you will one day be complete. What a joy to look forward to—and all because of God’s enabling grace!
This article is adapted from “God’s Enabling Grace" atchristinafox.comand was originally published at Beautiful Christian Life on October 21, 2019.
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
God comes to us in the dirt. This is true in more ways than one.
God came to us as one of us—as human.
In Genesis God created Adam out of the soil:
Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. (Gen. 2:7)
God took a lowly substance, dirt, and made his image bearer. And then God, who formed man from dirt, became man. He took on our flesh, our limitations, and finitude in the person of Jesus Christ, yet without sin. He came to us as one of us—as human.
God came to us in the dirt, in the flesh, in a tangible way.
Not only does he become man, but God also suffers and comes to us as a lowly, poor child in a family of low status. He doesn't come like a king or emperor; he comes as a carpenter's son, the son of a woman who is ostracized. Jesus, who is God, was wrapped in rags used to clean animals, and rested in a feeding trough. He comes to us in the dirt, in the flesh, in a tangible way.
Jesus also comes to us in the midst of our uncleanness—the dirt of our hearts. By the Holy Spirit, those who were fleshly are born of God. The apostle John recounts:
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:12-14)
God came to dwell among us so that he might give us a new birth.
Jesus Christ came lowly to save us from our sin and filthiness.
This birth doesn't come from within you as you try to cleanse yourself; rather, it comes from God as a gift as you believe that Jesus Christ came to save you, a sinner. Jesus Christ came lowly to save you from your sin and filthiness. He became dirty and low on this earth so that you might be clean and elevated. He took on your flesh and he took on the punishment for your sin, so that you might be a child of God. God became man, so that we might share in the love of God. This Christmas remember that God became flesh, that he became a baby, so that you might be reborn.
This article is adapted from “God Comes to Us in the Dirt” from Beautiful Christian Life’s December 2021 newsletter.
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
Is there something in your past you feel ashamed about? You’re not alone. Someone once told me that one of the downsides of growing older is having more to regret, because a person has had more opportunities to mess up.
In the book of Luke, we find shame in the very first chapter.
Zechariah’s wife, Elizabeth, was barren and long past childbearing age (Luke 1:7). To be barren in Israel at that time was a sign of God’s disfavor and judgment. Yet, Zechariah and Elizabeth were upstanding Israelites who loved the Lord (Luke 1:6), and it must have been hard for them to understand why God hadn’t given them children.
Just as Elizabeth’s womb had been unfruitful, so Israel had failed to produce the fruit of righteousness that God required of it (Isa. 5:7). Where once the nation had its own autonomous king, now it was forced to bear the indignities and oppression that came with being ruled by the pagan Roman Empire under the client king Herod I (Luke 1:5).
God was working a solution to take away Israel’s shame, but he also cared about something far greater.
Then one day the angel Gabriel appeared to Zechariah and announced that Elizabeth would give birth to a son named John who would prepare the way for the coming Messiah (Luke 1:13–17). God saw the shame of Elizabeth, and he saw the shame of Israel. He had a plan all along. Even though it seemed as if God had abandoned Zechariah’s family—and the entire nation—he was working his solution to take away their shame.
Yet, God cared about something far greater than Elizabeth’s barrenness and Israel’s political oppression. God cared about the redemption of the world from sin, misery, death, and estrangement. God cared so much that he sent his Son to be born in the flesh to rescue the world (John 3:16). God was working his solution to take away our shame.
Jesus took our shame upon himself on the cross.
As was the case with Elizabeth, not everything that makes us feel ashamed is of our own doing. Yet, even under the best of circumstances, we can’t ever rid ourselves entirely of shame, because we “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). The Bible diagnoses this problem to be indwelling sin, and we all have it (Rom. 7:17-25).
Only by keeping the law perfectly and being the once-for-all sacrifice for sin could Jesus redeem us from our guilt and God’s just judgment and punishment. Jesus did all we should have done and took our shame upon himself at the cross, bearing our sin willingly out of his unfathomable love for mankind (Isa. 53:1–12; Rom. 15:3; Gal. 3:13).
In Christ, we have peace from our self-condemnation and are beloved by him.
In Christ, we have peace from our self-condemnation that accuses us daily—and more importantly, we have peace with God (Rom. 5:1). We can rest in all God has done in Christ to remove our shame and present us before himself in clean, white robes washed in the precious blood of the Lamb of God (Rev. 7:14; 22:14).
We can rejoice that Christ’s perfect righteousness is counted to us, and our sin is counted to him through faith alone, which is itself a gift from God by his grace alone (Eph. 2:8–9).
In the sight of God we matter, have infinite value, and are beloved by him. All who trust in Christ alone for salvation are God’s precious children, and Jesus’ resurrection from the dead guarantees our own future resurrection to live forever with him. Because of what Jesus did on our behalf, we too can say with Elizabeth,
Thus the Lord has done for me in the days when he looked on me, to take away my reproach among people. (Luke 1:25)
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning Beautiful Christian Life LLC may get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through its links, at no cost to you.
Growing up, butchers all seemed quite similar—big men with booming voices and Popeye forearms. Almost all had lost a finger or two on a bandsaw, and what they lacked in digits they gained in personality. They maintained a boisterously flirtatious banter with their housewife customers, rarely failing to coax out an unplanned purchase. And while they weighed cuts of meat, their fat thumbs rested quietly upon the scales. This was their habit, and they did it so unselfconsciously and with such good humor that it seemed almost mean to ask that they re-weigh the meat sans thumb. Strangely enough, those weighty thumbs made the butcher roguishly endearing, and even today people laugh at the memory of this.
But open the book of Proverbs, and you will soon see that scale tampering is not funny to God. Proverbs 11:1, “The LORD abhors dishonest scales, but accurate weights are his delight.”
Market scales are very important, and very easy to manipulate.
The merchant displays his rice at $2/kg. You pay $4 for two kilos. He puts two one-kilo weights on one side of the scale and fills up the container on the other side until the scale is even. But the scoundrel has secretly shaved some of the metal off his weights, so that though each is stamped 1 kg, they actually weigh just 990 grams. You have paid for 2 kilos, you have received 1.98 kilos.
That difference might not seem much to worry about. But if you buy rice like that every day, then by the end of the year you will have received 7.3 kg less rice than you have paid for. (Let alone the other goods you have bought.) And let’s imagine that the merchant sells rice to 200 people a day in the village. By the end of the year, every family has missed out on the nourishment of 7.3 kg of rice, while the villain has $1,460 extra in his pocket.
The Hebrew original of Proverbs 11:1 vividly describes God’s view of such behavior. Let me paraphrase in a way that brings out its emotive language:
A treacherous and deceitful scale or balance is an abomination, is detestable, is offensive to the LORD. And a safe, complete, and ‘peaceable’ (shālëm) weighing stone is his desire and delight.
The LORD is a just God.
When you use dishonest weights, you steal. You rob a person right in front of their face. And you rob them while making a spectacle of being fair to them. This offends the LORD. For he is a just God. Justice goes to the heart of who he is. If he was not just, then he would not be God.
Thus Proverbs 16:11, “Honest scales and balances are the LORD’s; all the weights in the bag are of his making.” Honest scales belong to God and are made by God in that they reflect and conform to his attributes of justice and righteousness.
Recently it was discovered that AMP Insurance had charged thousands of people for life insurance premiums, for people that they knew had died. It was not an accident. It was company policy. The Commonwealth Bank acted the same and charged a customer with fees for more than ten years after she had gone to her grave.
Such dishonesty disgusts God. So is not settling our debts or paying workers what is owed to them (Lev. 19:13; James 5:4). So is not paying the taxes and revenue you owe to the government (Luke 20:25; Rom. 13:7). So is taking more from people than what is right and fair (Luke 3:13). So is stealing (Exod. 20:15; Eph. 4:28). So is taking any kind of financial advantage over another (1 Thess. 4:6). God is righteous and just, and God’s people will want to be the same.
The Westminster Larger Catechism draws out all the implications of the Eighth Commandment, and it is worth quoting the 142nd question in full:
The sins forbidden in the eighth commandment, besides the neglect of the duties required, are, theft, robbery, manstealing, and receiving any thing that is stolen; fraudulent dealing, false weights and measures, removing land-marks, injustice and unfaithfulness in contracts between man and man, or in matters of trust; oppression, extortion, usury, bribery, vexatious lawsuits, unjust inclosures and depopulations; ingrossing commodities to enhance the price; unlawful callings, and all other unjust or sinful ways of taking or withholding from our neighbour what belongs to him, or of enriching ourselves; covetousness; inordinate prizing and affecting worldly goods; distrustful and distracting cares and studies in getting, keeping, and using them; envying at the prosperity of others; as likewise idleness, prodigality, wasteful gaming; and all other ways whereby we do unduly prejudice our own outward estate, and defrauding ourselves of the due use and comfort of that estate which God hath given us.
In short, “Better a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice” (Prov. 16:8).
Proverbs extends this condemnation of injustice to our speech.
“A truthful witness does not deceive, but a false witness pours out lies” (Prov. 14:5). “A truthful witness saves lives, but a false witness is deceitful” (Prov. 14:25). Exactly the same emotive verbs as Proverbs 11:1 are employed: “The LORD detests lying lips, but he delights in men who are truthful” (Prov. 12:22).
God is a God of truth and light, light being the Bible’s main metaphor for truth. God began creation week by making light. In the Tabernacle stood a seven-branched menorah—a symbol of God’s perfect and complete truthfulness. The apostle John declared that “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5). And twice John recorded Jesus saying “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12; 9:5). When we lie, exaggerate, and withhold the truth, we act against all that God is and loves.
God hates the exploitation of the poor.
Coming back to stealing, God is especially aggrieved by those who rob the poor:
He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God. (Prov. 14:31)
There is an ancient saying: “The poor are a gold mine.” Time and again the greedy and powerful have enriched themselves, not, like Robin Hood, by plundering the riches of other wealthy and powerful people, but by plundering the poor. Why? Those with less educational privileges are perhaps more easily deceived. Certainly, the poor have far less ability to defend themselves. And few in power care enough about the poor to be roused from their downy beds and restaurant booths to defend them.
An architect recently estimated that St. Peter’s Basilica cost $600 million to build in today’s money. Another estimated the cost of the Palace of Versailles at one billion dollars. Where was the money found? In the case of the Vatican by flogging “indulgences” to Europe’s poor (it was the fleecing of the poor just as much as the theological travesty of indulgences that upset Martin Luther). In the case of Versailles, by taxing France’s peasants. God hates this exploitation. It outrages his heart for the poor.
Jesus was born into a family so impoverished that they sacrificed a pair of doves at Jesus’ birth (Luke 2:24). The sacrifice of a pair of doves was permitted to those too poor to offer a lamb (Lev. 12:6-8). It was almost certainly the Magi’s unexpected gift of gold that funded the flight to Egypt that saved Jesus’ life (Matt. 2:11-15).
The incarnate Jesus was quite literally homeless (Luke 9:58) and reliant on charity (Luke 8:3). Though all the riches of the universe belonged to him, “for your sakes he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). Instead of plundering the poor, Jesus gave away his riches and made himself poor. He identified with the poor in order to enrich us with forgiveness and life.
It is impossible to read the Bible without seeing again and again the very special place in God’s heart for the poor, the widow, and the orphan:
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress. (James 1:27a; see also Ps. 68:5; 146:9; Isa. 1:16-17; 58:6-7)
God feels so strongly about this that he promises—in fact threatens—to personally defend the cause of the poor:
Do not move an ancient boundary stone or encroach on the fields of the fatherless, for their Defender is strong; he will take up their case against you. (Prov. 23:10-11, also 15:25; 22:22-23)
What could be more tempting than to sneak the boundary stone of a neighboring widow’s property a few feet closer to her home? She probably won’t notice. If she does it will be her word against yours. And she has no hope of winning a lawsuit against your fancy lawyers. But the Lord takes her side. He is her Redeemer and Defender. Proverbs uses legal language here: God will take up her case pro bono (literally, for the good) and will not lose. For he is strong—a word that also means hard, severe, even violent. And he is the Judge!
God will vindicate the poor.
This is the lesson of Jesus’ great and terrifying Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matt. 25:31-46). Ultimately, he himself will vindicate the poor, those who have been treated with injustice and without compassion.
This parable reminds us also that it is not only positively inflicted injustice that Jesus will severely condemn, but the passive ignoring of their plight. Proverbs 28:27 teaches similarly: “He who gives to the poor will lack nothing, but he who closes his eyes to them receives many curses.” God’s curse is a very terrible thing. It is the opposite of his blessing. It is his determination to utterly destroy. Upon whom does this curse fall? Not only upon those who afflict the poor, but also upon those who shut their eyes to their affliction. Upon those who hear about the poor and shrug their shoulders and go back to sipping their flat whites and munching their Croques Messieurs.
Do we do this? Do we shut our eyes to the poor? Are we bringing upon our heads “many curses”? If we do shut our eyes, we cannot plead the righteousness of Christ as our hope. For by shutting our eyes, we show that we lack the saving faith in Jesus that brings such righteousness and prove instead that we have turned our back on Christ:
“I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.” (Matt. 25:45; emphasis added)
This will be the appalling fate of those who are culpably ignorant and willfully blind to the fate of the poor: “Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor will also cry out and not be answered” (Prov. 21:13).
Thus, Proverbs urges open-handed generosity. “A generous man will himself be blessed, for he shares his food with the poor” (22:9), and,
One man gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty. A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed. People curse the man who hoards grain, but blessing crowns him who is willing to sell. (Prov. 11:24-26)
One need not be rich to be generous.
As the ancient Macedonian churches taught us for all time:
Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity. For I testify that they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the saints. And they did not do as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us in keeping with God's will. (2 Cor. 8:2-5)
This is the true Christian. This is the person cloaked with the righteousness of Christ. Their joy of salvation poured out even from deep poverty into a wealth of generosity. Christ did this for them, and they cannot help but do the same for others.
Has Proverbs exposed in you a heart of greed? A Christ-less heart? A faithless heart? A terrible future judgment? There is only one thing to do:
“Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.” (Luke 12:33)
This article was originally published at Beautiful Christian Life on September 29, 2018.
