Q. 2. What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him?
Q. 2. What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him?
A. The Word of God, which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him.
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“How can a young man keep his way pure? By guarding it according to your word. With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments! I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” (Ps 119:9-11)
“And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.” (1 Thess 2:13)
“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” (2 Tim 3:16-17)
“knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Pet 1:20-21)
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One of the challenges Christians face today is secularism (for a short but thoughtful study see D.A. Carson’s “Christ & Culture Revisited,” ch. 4, “Secularism, Democracy, Freedom, and Power”). Secularism is the push to confine faith and religion into private arenas, but exclude them from the public sphere. You can believe in God, they say, but God (and the Bible) has no place in discussing public policy, community life, law, ethics, or the arts. You get the idea.
In theory secularism targets all religions and faiths, but for one reason or another it especially targets the Christian faith. The reason why Christianity is often singled out to be attacked is more or less obvious. Other religions do not make such comprehensive claims about the world as the Christianity of the Bible does. We believe God created the whole world for his glory. Therefore the entire creation owes God obedience and honor. We believe the Bible’s teaching that every individual person is a sinner who falls short of God’s glory (Rom 3:23). Every individual person without an exception is spiritually lost and the only hope for them is the gospel of Jesus Christ proclaimed in the Bible (Rom 1:16). That is, a Christian who desires to honor God cannot retreat from these teachings of the Bible, give in to the pressures of secularism, and live as if God’s Word has nothing to say about public policy, community life, law, ethics, or the arts. On the contrary, God’s word speaks to everything, whether in the private arena or in the public sphere.
It seems to me, however, that many Christians have given in to the demands of secularism. It is interesting to me that the rapid rise and the spread of the charismatic movement in America roughly coincides with the growing pressure of secularism in America. Is it perhaps because Christians unknowingly bought into secularism, and turning away from the Word of God which is proclaimed in public, from shared creeds / confessions which are public by nature, and corporate worship which gather and define Christians as a public body? Instead many have chosen the private “experience of God,” with a corresponding neglect of the careful study of God’s word and theology. Maybe this is why an average Christian today has a very little sense of Church history. History, after all, is irrelevant for experience. In fact, where private experience is concerned, everything is irrelevant except the feelings generated. “Authenticity” (whether it feels like real or not to me), but not the truth, then becomes the arbiter of orthodoxy. Apparently, anything will do, except the word of God!
So, where do we go from here?
We turn to God’s word, which is able to keep us from sin (Ps 119:9-11), is the very voice of God (1 Thess 2:13, 2 Pet 1:20-21), and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work (2 Tim 3:16-17). God’s word teaches us clearly how to glorify and enjoy him. We do not need anything other than God’s word, faithfully taught and humbly received, to fulfill our life’s true purpose and live in joyful confidence before God.
So, then, love the word of God. Conform your life to Scripture. Pray that God will give your pastor grace to study his word carefully and teach it with integrity, that you will receive it humbly and so be not a hearer of the word only, but also a doer of the word.