Keeping promises and being like God
(The following was inspired by and is heavily indebted to a lecture by Dr. Christine Pohl at ATS.)
In Romans, Paul talks a lot about the righteousness of God. The righteousness of God can be understood as God’s faithfulness to the covenant, or “promise,” he has made. So, God keeping his promises is what makes him righteous. That’s exactly what faithful means: keeping promises. In Philippians 1, Paul says that the fruit of God’s righteousness, God’s promise kept to us, comes through Jesus. So, we can say that Jesus doesn’t just keep his promises, but he himself is God’s promise kept to us! God’s promise to humanity not to abandon us is kept because Jesus has come to us.
So, what does this imply for our lives? Speaking about about keeping promises, Lewis Smedes said, “If you have a ship you will not desert; if you have people you will not forsake, if you have a cause you will not abandon, then you are like God.” He went on. Promises are what reach into an unpredictable future and make something secure; promises grasp the unknown and make something known. God, in and through Jesus, reached into the future with a promise to us and now reaches into our futures with his promises to remain faithful—to remain a person who keeps his promises. What are the promises we need to keep? Are there ships we are close to deserting? People we’re close to forsaking? Remember that even though promise keeping is extremely hard, it’s something God takes most seriously himself and keeping promises makes us like him.
In Romans, Paul talks a lot about the righteousness of God. The righteousness of God can be understood as God’s faithfulness to the covenant, or “promise,” he has made. So, God keeping his promises is what makes him righteous. That’s exactly what faithful means: keeping promises. In Philippians 1, Paul says that the fruit of God’s righteousness, God’s promise kept to us, comes through Jesus. So, we can say that Jesus doesn’t just keep his promises, but he himself is God’s promise kept to us! God’s promise to humanity not to abandon us is kept because Jesus has come to us.
So, what does this imply for our lives? Speaking about about keeping promises, Lewis Smedes said, “If you have a ship you will not desert; if you have people you will not forsake, if you have a cause you will not abandon, then you are like God.” He went on. Promises are what reach into an unpredictable future and make something secure; promises grasp the unknown and make something known. God, in and through Jesus, reached into the future with a promise to us and now reaches into our futures with his promises to remain faithful—to remain a person who keeps his promises. What are the promises we need to keep? Are there ships we are close to deserting? People we’re close to forsaking? Remember that even though promise keeping is extremely hard, it’s something God takes most seriously himself and keeping promises makes us like him.
posted by Aaron Perry at
9:47 AM
9 Comments:
I've had two semester's worth of Dr. Pohl lectures and I don't ever recall NOT being challenged and edified.
Sorry to be the fly in the ointment. Well, I'm not really. I have to ask whether this is really true? I mean, this sounds just like a reading of Romans that the good Bishop of Durham would repudiate.
God does not forsake his people utterly. God does keep his promises. Yes. But God does send his people in to exile--that is, he does forsake them for a while. Cf. the names of HOsea's children, among other prophetic passages in the OT.
And while God does keep his promises, he does so in a way that his people do not expect and in a way that makes them jealous and in a way that provokes their unbelief and therefore self-inflicted exclusion from the covenant.
Isn't that what the "Jewish Gospel for the Gentiles designed to make Jews jealous" is all about?
SGFMB
sgfmb, hmmm, i am wondering where i excluded that read in my post. i think my reading is quite faithful (to both NTs!), if incomplete (which i readily admit). the provacation of unbelief is one precisely because of the myopic (ethno-centric) vision of Israel. loving their vocation until it's a vocation they do not want and refusing even to be spared it through the work of their Messiah is only strange because of the confusion of God's people--and one the church, imo, is in danger of having if we stick to an other-wordly, spiritual religion.
what do you think? (i also think it's faithful to Boersma where exile is for judgment which is for repentance! btw, just finished REvelation tonight and how JOhn ends the sixth trumpet with no repentance, gives an interlude of the faithful suffering of GOd's people and a vision for the story of God's redemption, and closes that section, before the seventh trumpet with **repentance.** oh, that John the Seer...always being clever and hopeful and rather sly!)
very timely read for me, AP. it's good to remember that God keeps His promises and I especially like the insight that Jesus is, in fact The Promise Himself. A thought from something SGFMB said: it may not always appear that God is faithful in His behavior (with Israel esp.) but it is His goodness that allowed Israel to run itself into the ground without Him that He may bring them back to Him in the end. He sees the end result of each situation and will be faithful to, in the end, fulfill His promise. We just get confused or frustrated or filled with unbelief in the process b/c we assume we should be able figure God out. :) My two cents.
laura, say more about God bringing Israel back in the end...
ap......huh?
hey laura, you wrote, "but it is His goodness that allowed Israel to run itself into the ground without Him that He may bring them back to Him in the end." i was curious what you meant.
hmmmm. i meant that in the times when God seemingly abandoned Israel in the OT (due to their sin and idolatry) and let foreign armies invade their land, left Israel to worship their gods, and ruin their lives and nation it was b/c God knew that in the end Israel would so destroy themselves that they would again realize their need for God. They would cry out to Him for help and He would answer, rescuing and restoring His people again. He knew the only way to win Israel back was to let them go down the path of destruction. It might seem heartless, but it is His goodness that motivated it all. God knew the end result would be a rescued/returned Israel unto Himself. Does that make sense?
yes, it makes sense. and right in line w/ what sgfmb said.
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