Once in Norway a Christian brother directed my attention to a strange word which I´d never noticed before.  He quoted from Ex 28:38:  “….and Aron shall bear any guilt of the holy things that the people of Israel shall concecrate as their holy gifts.” His point was that even to the the most holy gifts of grace which the Lord has given us for holy service, we must shamefully admit that sin and guilt would somehow cleave to those gifts.

That word stayed with me.   I could certainly say Amen to that. Yes, the gifts the Lord has given us are holy and pure, but I personally find it also true what the noble Matthew Henry says in his commentary, “We cannot but be conscious to ourselves of much iniquity cleaving even to our holy things (gifts).”  The holy apostle James says, “We all stumble in many ways.” (Jam. 3:2).  He says, “we”, including himself. 

But James and myself and every follower of Christ avail ourselves of the same High Priest, Christ, of which Aron was a type.  We are under the same blood and have the same sin bearer.  The more I think of it the more I humbly rejoice.  A friend of mine once said from the pulpit, “I hide my face in my hands in guilt and shame, but still I will testify of Him!”  Every honest child of God knows that feeling, don´t you think?

I recently “chastised” our Lutheran bishops publicly in the newspaper for celebrating themselves with a lavish party, an excess of alcohol (13-15 strong drinks per head) and the most expensive hotels at the expense of the state, in other words not their own money.  And the bill was enormous. Even a business man wouldn´t dare to present such a bill to his accounts department.  They thought that was okay, however.  The same bishops would then from the pulpit next Sunday sanctimoniously preach discipleship as followers of Jesus.  That is hypocrisy.  A gentleman wrote to me, “How can you say that?  Are you perfect yourself?”  No, I´m not perfect.  James and John the Baptist weren´t either.  But there are times when as an imperfect servant of Christ you are called upon to expose the hypocrisy.  Isn´t that what those men did?  Isn´t that what the old prophets did?

And yet we don´t feel worthy.  “Who is competent for these things?”  (2 Cor. 2:16).  Even though we live under the rod of chastisement ourselves in self-judgment, the sin of our people should be exposed, and that includes “reverend” bishops.

Oh, let us not be cowards.  Our boldness is not based on moral self-righteousness, but on the work of our High Priest, our perfect sin bearer.  So we have every reason “to fan into flame the gift of God” (2 Tim. 1:6) which the Lord has given us despite the consciousness “of much iniquity cleaving to our most holy gifts” (M. Henry).

-jn-

Febr. 9, 2010