Closer Than a Brother

Closer Than a Brother.  What a blessing it is when one’s brother is a friend and one’s friend is a brother. It is, however, rare. Solomon hints at the same, rare dynamic of friendship and brotherhood: “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother” (Prov. 18:24). In modern parlance, we could adequately paraphrase his wisdom this way: gaining many followers ironically works against making close friends.

Did Solomon think of his own brothers when he wrote this proverb? The brothers were not buddies in David’s household, which was generationally like David’s frayed relationships with his own brothers (1 Sam. 17:28). Nearly half of Solomon’s brothers were dead before his first anniversary as monarch: Amnon (killed by his half-brother, Absalom), Chileab (never mentioned again, presumed to have died prematurely), Absalom (killed by his uncle, Joab), Adonijah (executed by his half-brother, Solomon), and Solomon’s older brother, Shimeah, who died in infancy because of David’s sin (1 Chr. 3:5),. Furthermore, Solomon was sequestered from the rest of his brothers to live in the women’s quarters while growing up for his own safety against the pernicious threat of fratricide (2 Sam. 12:25). Even doing simple math, a 50% death rate among Solomon’s brothers constitutes a royal epidemic.

Except for Andrew and Simon (Peter), James and John, Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, and occasionally Aaron and Moses, no other groups of siblings are portrayed in Scripture as being friendly toward one another. Cain killed his brother Abel. Esau vowed to kill his lying brother, Jacob. Joseph’s ten older brothers conspired to kill him but relented at the last moment and instead sold him into slavery. At times, Aaron helped his younger brother, Moses, but also sought to overthrow him in league with their sister, Miriam. David’s three eldest brothers (Eliab, Abinidab, and Shammah [Shimea]) were overtly overlooked and seemingly bore a grudge against their youngest brother. Absalom avenged the rape of his sister, Tamar, by killing her assailant, their half-brother, Amnon. Adonijah attempted to usurp Solomon’s throne and was officially executed. Many of the kings and queens of Israel and Judah were complicit in the murder of their brothers and sons within their own royal ambitions. Even in the parables, brothers are often described as contrary: the parables of the Two Sons and the Prodigal Son. Jesus’ own half-brothers not only disbelieved in him but came to collect him forcibly when they thought he was becoming a nuisance (Mark 6:3).

Yet by his gospel of grace, Jesus wiped all sibling rivalries away forever when he said, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God" (John 20:17). Christ forged a new brotherhood based on faith in himself and became what Solomon could only speculate, "A friend that sticks closer than a brother" (Prov. 18:24). "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13). 

From the Heart

From the Heart.  The Father, as viewed through the parable of the prodigal son, wants reunification with his wayward sons (Luke 15:20). In the parable, both sons were lost, but only the younger brother who repented “was found” (Luke 15:24). Jesus wants reconciliation so deeply that he “gives his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). The Spirit cries out within the hearts of the redeemed “as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons” for the fullest expression of restoration physically, spiritually, and eternally (Rom. 8:23). God is peace; God wants peace.

God wants relational peace with his creation and provides it vertically (1 Tim. 2:4). God also wants relational peace among his creation and enables it horizontally. “Forgive your brother from the heart” (Matt. 18:35). “Love your enemies, and do good, and lend expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful” (Luke 6:35-36). Love, goodness, help, kindness, and mercy are God’s attributes. We who have been transformed by God resemble God over time. Paul explained this sanctifying principle as the “fruit of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22). We display the fruit of the Spirit as evidence that God is present in our hearts. His sap, so to speak, flows through our veins, bearing his fruit: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Gal. 5:22-23).

Forgiveness makes similar lists as further evidence that God is present in our heart: “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Eph. 4:32). “Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony” (Col. 3:12-14). These attributes are the signs of eternal life, the evidence, the fruit.

The gap between our willingness to forgive, love, and bear with others, and God’s willingness to forgive, love, and bear with us is infinitely wide, but the spark is the same. At redemption by the decree of the Father, the accomplishment of the Son, and the application of the Spirit, Christians begin to want the same things that God wants. The transformation of our desires is a slow miracle, cultivated by spiritual growth, yet even slow miracles are still miraculous. Remembering our utter inability before believing in Christ to change what our hearts wanted reminds us again that “we love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

Even when encountering disbelief in others and their unwillingness to receive the forgiveness that we extend to them, just as we received it from Christ, it is still a fruit of the spirit. Another’s rejection of forgiveness does not spoil its miracle. We can legitimately forgive others (e.g., a one-way road) even if the reconciliation of the relationship is not restored (e.g., a two-way road). Love can be genuine even when it is unrequited; especially when it is unrequited. Mercy is no less merciful though it might be distrusted by the intended recipient. It is the desire for reconciliation that comes from God, because God is the Great Reconciler. 

Do Not Withhold Good

Do Not Withhold Good.  Being labeled do-good-er, goody-two-shoes, and goody-goody are not compliments. Ranging from clueless to sanctimonious—a do-gooder is the kind of person who consciously or unconsciously looks down on others who stray from the status quo and often tattles to the teacher at first chance about bad behavior. While allowing for these negative stereotypes, and there are many, when does doing good become a bad quality? An evaluation of good or bad stems from the reason a person has for doing good—at the heart.

If the heart’s motive for a good deed is to leverage his or her pious reputation to gain an advantage socially, then doing good becomes do-gooding (negative), as different as night is from day. If the heart’s motive for a good deed is to benefit others (positive), then the person who is doing good is doing well, even if misunderstood. At the surface level of cultural perception, do-gooding looks like doing good. But in the depth of the heart where Christ is dwelling, doing good to others is functionally an overflow of love for God. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind … You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:37, 39). Self may be deluded, and others can be fooled, but God is ever aware which of our actions are, or are not, “from the heart” (Matt. 18:35).

Once the personal motivation for doing good is settled (which is easier said than done), then the biblical scope of doing good widens out dramatically. Whichever directions the arrows of doing good proceed, they share their origin in God. God is the first, best, and most at doing good, yet without do-gooding. “You are good and do good” (Psa. 119:68). “No one is good but God alone” (Mark 10:18). “Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil” (Luke 6:35). If we do right by doing good, then “it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13).

However, a danger exists. Paul alerts the church that weariness is a possible result of doing good. “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith” (Gal. 6:9-10). “As for you, brothers, do not grow weary in doing good” (2 Thess. 3:13). A need does not constitute a call. We must love all but we cannot save any. There is one Messiah; he needs no one’s assistance. He permits and enables us to serve others in his name and power as a joy. In this tender space, being fully aware of our limitations, God applies a double caveat to our good deeds: “Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it” (Prov. 3:27). Some good deeds stray beyond God’s wisdom. Some good deeds drift beyond our strength.

Unless the Lord Builds a House

Unless the Lord Builds the House.  

 

¹ Unless the LORD builds the house,

            those who build it labor in vain.

Unless the LORD watches over the city,

            the watchman stays awake in vain.

² It is in vain that you rise up early

                        and go late to rest,

                        eating the bread of anxious toil;

            for he gives to his beloved sleep.

³ Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD,

            the fruit of the womb a reward.

⁴ Like arrows in the hand of a warrior

            are the children of one's youth.

⁵ Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!

He shall not be put to shame

            when he speaks with his enemies in the gate (Psa. 127:1-5).

We Trust in the Name of the Lord Our God

We Trust in the Name of the Lord Our God.  Our national identity, deep-seated patriotism, the American Dream, and all things red, white, and blue are in vogue again this week as we celebrate our country’s birthday. Except for the precise date which didn’t account for the final form of the Declaration of Independence to be rewritten in duplicate for signing, John Adams was correct when he wrote to his wife, Abigail on July 3, 1776, that a new day had dawned:

 

The Second of July 1776 will be the most memorable Epocha in the History of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this time forward forever more.

 

It is easy to forget now how uncertain the whole messy ordeal of independence was in separating from the world’s only superpower, Britain. Nothing was certain except the resolve of those patriots who envisioned independence and the reluctance of Britain to allow it. The Americans’ faith in God was resolute and their grasp of the political ramifications was vast.

Our country is still quite young at 248 years old. By contrast, Israel’s national identity stretches back to approximately 1050 b.c. when the tribes selected their first king, Saul. When Saul rejected God’s word, he was deposed by the least likely candidate for king—a shepherd boy in Bethlehem, the youngest of Jesse’s sons, David. When David was ascending and Saul was descending, all by God’s decree, Saul nevertheless mobilized his entire political and military might to hunt and kill David and prevent his victory. But Saul’s legacy was disbelief.

It was during his time of running from Saul that David wrote many of his psalms. Yet, David’s words were not his possessions, precisely; the author was God. And since God exists outside of time, God’s word transcends time. Innumerable generals and kings, fathers and mothers, peasants and merchants, shepherds and politicians, including the American forefathers, have repeated David’s words, especially when their own words and wisdom fell short. They appealed to heaven to make sense on earth with phrases such as this: “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God” (Psa. 20:7).

It was not superiority in military equipment or tactics that brought David to his throne or America to its establishment as one nation under God. It is God, not men, who moves the pieces on his geo-political chess board as he sees fit. If we look to our culture for our identity or trust in our country for our security, then we look too low indeed. “The Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom he will and sets over it the lowliest of men” (Dan. 4:17).