I Have Reserved to Myself

Reading in Rom 11.4, this morning. "But what saith the answer of God unto him? 'I have reserved to myself 7000 men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal.'"

The thing that strikes me about this passage is that, from the men who had not bowed the knee's perspective, they had remained faithful to God. From God's perspective, it was God who had "reserved to myself 7000 men." Which statement is true? Had the men remained faithful or had God reserved them faithfully?

Depending on one's perspective, both statements are true. It is true that the men had remained faithful to God. It is also true that the underlying cause for that faithfulness was that God had reserved the men to himself. The men acted faithfully; God kept them faithful.

What comes out of this is our understanding that, even when we stay faithful to God, we have nothing to boast about. All praise and glory for our faithfulness should rightfully go to him.

The Means to (True) Life...

...is endurance in the faith, according to Christ at Luke 21.19. By your endurance you will gain your lives. Simple and to the point. Christ must not mean physical endurance, as if to say, if you endure like a marathon runner endures you will gain your lives, because then the Christian life would be about working out and who could become a contest of the physically fittest. We can rule that out because Paul said bodily exercise profits little. Christ must mean that by endurance in the faith you will gain your lives (or souls, or inner lives).

BDAG defines lives as seat and center of the inner human life in its many and varied aspects, soul and further as, the seat and center of life that transcends the earthly. Christ is then not speaking of physical life, but of eternal life. NET puts it most succinctly: By your endurance is a call to remain faithful, because trusting in Jesus is the means to life.

The Necessity of Devotional Theology

In Hosea 4.1, this morning, where the necessity of theology is clearly laid out. God chastises his own people because there is no faithfulness or steadfast love or knowledge of God in the land. I take from this that one cannot be faithful to God without knowledge of him. Nor is it legitimate to have a knowledge of God and not be faithful to him. These are two equal and opposite errors into which men fall.

If we do not have a robust, devotional, committed knowledge of God, then we cannot be faithful to him.

B. B. Warfield, in addressing the old saw about people who would rather be on their knees praying for ten minutes then studying theology for ten hours retorted: What? On your knees for ten hours with your books. Just so.

Faithful and Just Works

In Psalms 111.7 this morning where the psalmist describes God's works as faithful and just. Considering the context, I believe that the writer is thinking, not so much of God's act of creation, as he is his acts of faithfulness and redemption for his people. In the same verse the psalmist says that his precepts are trustworthy and in verse 9, he sent redemption to his people.

The cool thing here is that, all of the faithful and just works that God has done are available to me!

An Anchor in the Storm

Paul tells the Thessalonians in 2 Thess 3.3, that in contrast to wicked and evil men (who are not faithful), God is faithful. This is such a solid anchor of truth for us to lash ourselves to in the inevitable storms of life. God's character is that he is faithful. We can rely upon that. We can believe it. We can count on it.