WORSHIP
BELIEVE
DR. JIM DIXON
HEBREWS 11:6
MAY 4, 2008
In the Gospel of John, the 20th chapter, verses 30 and 31, the Apostle John writes these words. He says, “Many other signs did Jesus do in the presence of His disciples that are not written in this book, but these are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and now believing you might have life in His name.” We are to understand that the Bible is written that we might believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that believing we would have life in His name. John 3:16 tells us, “God loved the world so much that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.”
It’s impossible to worship without belief. Without faith it is impossible to please God, and he who would draw near to God must believe. So today we look at believing and what it means to believe and how believing is at the heart of worship. The word in the New Testament, the word in the Greek language for belief is the word, “pisteuo.” This word is a complex word. It has two primary meanings, and these will comprise our two important teachings this morning.
First of all, to believe means, “to give intellectual assent. It means to agree with your mind, to give intellectual assent. This word pisteuo was oftentimes used in the sense of intellectual assent.
In the last few weeks on a number of occasions we have looked at the Shema. The Shema is found in Deuteronomy, chapter 6. The Shema, we saw, was placed within phylacteries and worn by devout Jews on the forehead between their eyes. The Shema was worn in a phylactery on the left arm near the heart. The Shema was placed on the lintel of the front door. It was placed at door posts. The Shema was recited every morning by faithful Jews and the Shema was recited every evening in their prayers. The Shema was spoken to their children as they went through the course of their day. You know the Shema. “Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is One Lord. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might.”
Now, Jesus quotes the Shema. We see this in Matthew, chapter 22. We see this in Luke’s Gospel, chapter 10. Jesus quotes the Shema as being at the very heart of the Jewish faith, the very heart of the law itself given to God by Moses. But Jesus changes the Shema. Some people are shocked by that, but you look at Matthew 22 and you look at Luke 10 and Jesus quotes the Shema but He adds a word. Really, it’s not a word of change, it’s a word of explanation. It’s a word of clarification. Jesus adds the word “mind.” “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind.”
Jesus was Hebrew. He spoke daily the Aramaic language but He knew the Hebrew tongue and of course was immersed in the Hebrew culture. He probably also knew Greek. He lived in the Hellenized world, but Jesus understood that for the Jews, for the Hebrew people, the word heart did not connote simply feelings and emotion but the word heart was viewed as a symbol of the mind. The heart was viewed as the seat of the intelligence or the seat of the intellect. And so, Jesus, understanding this Hebrew use of the word “heart,” added the word “mind” as He was living in the midst of the Hellenized world. That’s very important. You shall love the Lord your God not simply with your feelings, not simply with your emotions, not even simply with your soul. You must love the Lord your God with your mind. We understand through Jesus that worship involves the mind. You can’t worship God without giving intellectual assent.
You look at God biblically and you see that God is immutable. God does not change. God is omniscient. He knows all things past, present, and future; God is omnipresent, everywhere present. God is omnipotent, having all power in heaven. And you try to grasp these concepts with your mind as you worship. You look at the divine names, from Jehovah Shammah to Jehovah Jireh, and you see the character of God. But again, you try to understand with your mind the nature the power, the awesome character of God as you worship and even as you explore theology biblically and Christology, as you look at the nature of Christ, as you see that He is fully God and fully man, Son of God and Son of Man. that Jesus is incarnate, the God-Man. You try to wrap your mind around this and it’s very difficult, but it’s all part of worship. We worship with our mind. There’s no anti-intellectualism in Christianity (or there should not be). There should be no anti-intellectualism in your Christianity. There should be no anti-intellectualism in mine, because God crafted us and created us body, soul, and spirit and He crafted our minds and wants us to worship Him with the fullness of our minds.
If you look at the Prologue of John’s Gospel, you see a title is given to Jesus. He’s called, “The Word.” “In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him. Without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life and the life was the light of man. The Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us, full of grace and truth, and we beheld His Word.” Jesus is the Word.
Now, in times past we have seen that this title in the Hebrew language is expressed through the Hebrew word “dabar.” Dabar means, “the Word.” For the Hebrew people, dabar described the creative power of God because God spoke the world into being. God spoke the universe into being. God spoke and the galactic systems appeared ex nihilo. I mean, God created matter. God created mass out of nothing. The Word of God, the power of His Word, dabar. And so, to call Jesus “The Word of God,” to call Him “Dabar” is to call Him the creative power of God.
In the Aramaic tongue this title is expressed through the term “memra.” Memra in Aramaic means, “The Word” so Jesus is the memra. Jesus is the Word of God but for the Aramaic-speaking people, memra had become a circumlocution for the divine name. The Aramaic people, many Jewish people who spoke Aramaic, were afraid to say the Tetragrammaton. They were afraid to say Jehovah, or Yahweh and so they would simply refer to God as a Memra. So, to say that Jesus is the Word of God, to say He is the Word, to say He is the Memra, is to say He is God.
But of course, the New Testament is not written in Aramaic. The New Testament is written in Greek. Most of the New Testament books were written originally in Greek. In the Greek language we understand that this title is expressed through the term, “Logos.” Jesus is the Logos, the Word.
The Greek philosophers, including Plato himself, viewed the Logos as the mind of God. This is what the Greeks called the mind of God, the Logos. To say that Jesus is the “Logos” is to say that He is the mind of God. If you want to glimpse the mind of God, you look at Jesus, the Son of God. He’s the visible image of the invisible God. “In many and various ways God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets, but now God has spoken through His Son.” He is the mind of God, the Logos. In our English language today, we get the word “logic” from this Greek word “Logos,” “the Word.” And so, Jesus is the logic of God, the mind of God, and when you look at Jesus you should look at Him with the fullness of your mind. When you study Jesus, you should study Him with the fullness of your mind. Your worship should involve logic and reason and not just emotion and not just feeling (although emotion and feeling are so much a part of our relationship with God and with Jesus). But we worship with our mind as well. No anti-intellectualism.
This is true of the Word of God written as well as Jesus, who is the Word of God living. The Word of God written is the Holy Bible, and it reaches our mind. In a sense it’s Logos and we see the mind of God here. It is part of our worship as we study this book and we study it with our minds. We can trust this book.
A couple of weeks ago I was reading in Tertullian (and I know most of you don’t ever read Tertullian, but Tertullian was one of the early church fathers). He was born in 160 AD. Tertullian died in 225 AD. We have 31 of Tertullian’s writings from all of those centuries ago. Tertullian, in one of his writings, speaks of a book he had seen, or at least some kind of a record. It was called “The Acts of Pilate,” and he quotes the acts of Pilate. As I was looking at this, I was kind of surprised. I’ve never seen The Acts of Pilate because we don’t have it anymore. Apparently, Tertullian was able to access it around the year 200 or 220 AD, but we don’t have it. Archeologists have never unearthed it. We don’t have it in any of the ancient libraries in any parts of the ancient world, but he quotes it.
As he quotes “The Acts of Pilate,” he claims that, according to “The Acts of Pilate,” Pilate wrote Tiberius, the Emperor of the Roman Empire, about Jesus. Tertullian says that according to “The Acts of Pilate,” Pilate contacted Tiberius saying that Jesus was crucified in the city of Jerusalem and that, according to reports, He had resurrected from the dead and that He was having a growing number of followers within Jerusalem and within Judea and that the movement was spreading. He told Tiberius that many were worshipping Jesus. Then Tiberius, according to “The Acts of Pilate,” suggested that maybe Jesus (and this is almost humorous) should be added to the Roman Pantheon of Gods. Supposedly, according to “The Acts of Pilate,” Tiberius took this to the Roman Senate and the Roman Senate rejected it.
Now, do I believe that “The Acts of Pilate” is a reliable source? No. I don’t know anything about “The Acts of Pilate.” Most view it as a mysterious kind of document. It might be a book. It might be a record. It might be something that Pilate did keep. We don’t know. Some people think that it has to do with the Gospel of Nicodemus, which in later centuries was called “The Acts of Pilate.” We don’t know, but the point is you look at history and some stuff you read is reliable. Other stuff you read is not reliable. Then some stuff you just don’t know. That would be true of this statement that is recorded at least allegedly in this document called “The Acts of Pilate.” We don’t know.
There were many apocryphal works that were circulating in the Christian world in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th centuries. It’s very important to understand this. So, not in the 1st century, but in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th centuries many apocryphal works began to circulate. Literally hundreds of them began to circulate. Many of them we have today and some we do not have. We just see them mentioned in other ancient records. We don’t actually have a copy of some of the ancient apocalyptic or apocryphal writings. There were also apocryphal acts. Maybe “The Acts of Pilate” was one of the apocryphal acts. We don’t know.
We do know that there were “The Acts of Paul” and “The Acts of Peter.” There were “The Acts of John.” There were “The Acts of Andrew.” There were “The Acts of Andrew and Mathias.” There were “The Acts of Philip.” These were all different books circulating in the early Christian world called “The Apocryphal Acts” and there are some people out there who would try to make you believe that the Book of Acts in the Bible is no more reliable than these apocryphal acts that were circulating in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th centuries but they’re wrong.
There are Apocryphal Gospels that were also circulating in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries and those gospels were made famous by the Da Vinci Code. And of course those gospels are called the Gnostic Gospels. There are some people who would have you believe that these Apocryphal Gospels that circulated in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries are just as reliable as the biblical gospels, the four Biblical Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. But they aren’t, because the biblical gospels have 1st century sourcing and those other gospels do not, plus those other gospels grew out of cultic communities and were pseudepigraphical. Most scholars know this stuff but they love to confuse people and they particularly want to discredit the Bible.
There were Apocryphal Epistles and there are people who would like you to believe that the Apocryphal Epistles that circulated in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5 centuries are just as reliable as the Epistles of Paul that you find in the Bible or the Epistles of James or the Epistles of Peter. But, of course, Paul wrote in the middle of the 1st century. There is no reliable scholar who would deny that. Paul wrote some of his books as early as 50 AD, perhaps 49 AD, but the Apocryphal Epistles come a hundred, two hundred, or three hundred years later and they’re all bogus.
There were apocryphal apocalyptic books so there are people who want you to believe that… For instance, there is a book called “The Apocalypse of Peter.” There is a book called “The Apocalypse of John.” There is the “Coptic Apocalypse of Peter.” There is also “The Apocalypse of Paul.” These are apocryphal apocalypses and there are some people who would want you to believe that those apocryphal apocalypses that circulated in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries are just as reliable as the Book of Revelation and The Apocalypse of John that is recorded in the Bible. Again, the evidence is just overwhelming. The evidence is just so overwhelming that these other writings came way later. They were written by cultic communities. They didn’t even grow out of Christianity. They grew out of Gnosticism, which was another faith/philosophy/religious system. But some Gnostics were fascinated with Christianity and then began to distort Christian stuff.
The Bible is unique. It is so unique in all the earth. It is so wonderful. It is God-breathed. I mean, the breath of God is upon this book. There are people out there who just don’t want you to believe. They don’t want you to give intellectual assent, but you can trust the Word of God.
By the way, the word apocryphal… I don’t want to confuse you (or maybe I already have). There are writings called the Apocrypha. The Apocrypha is a group of 14 books that you find in the Latin Vulgate Bible. You also find it in the Septuagint. It is part of the Catholic Bible. It’s not included in the Protestant Bible and it’s not included in the Jewish Bible, but the Apocrypha, those 14 books, were written in the Intertestamental Period, between the end of the Old Testament and the beginning of the New Testament. And so, the Apocrypha are 14 books that have some historic validity but they’re not what I’m talking about. The Apocryphal Epistles, The Apocryphal Acts, The Apocryphal Gospels and The Apocryphal Apocalypses are other books written way later. They’re cultic. They’re bogus and really theologically humorous. And so, I don’t want you to be deceived.
Of course, the Bible tells us that at the Eschaton, at the end of the age, “Some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceitful spirits of doctrines of demons through the pretensions of liars whose consciences are seared.” The Bible say, “The day will come when people will no longer endure sound teaching but, having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own liking and they will turn away from listening to the truth and they will wander into myths.” And that, you see, is what is happening today.
We worship God, and the gospel calls us to believe. And belief is first of all intellectual assent. We, as Christians, give intellectual assent to core Christian doctrines, core Christian truths. We give intellectual assent to the scriptures but there’s another meaning of belief. There’s another meaning of “pisteuo,” and this meaning is every bit as important (and perhaps more important). The second meaning of belief is “commitment of life” or “relinquishment of life.” If you really believe, you don’t just give intellectual assent. If you really believe, you relinquish your life. You commit your life.
I think part of the alleged controversy between the writings of Paul and the writings of James in the New Testament is bound up with this double meaning of “pisteuo.” Paul says you’re saved by faith alone. James says you’re saved by faith and works. They’re really not disagreeing with each other. James is looking at pisteuo as mere intellectual assent and Paul is looking at the full meaning of pisteuo where it’s not just intellectual assent but it’s commitment of life. And so, the disagreement is only apparent.
Some of you have heard of Charles Blondin. I think this will help us understand. Some of you have heard of Charles Blondin. I’m confident many of you haven’t, but Charles Blondin was a world-famous aerial artist and he was the greatest tightrope walker in the world. And many would say today that he was the greatest tightrope walker in the history of the world. The year was 1860 when Charles Blondin walked across Niagara Falls on a tightrope stretched 1,000 feet in length, 160 feet above the raging torrent of Niagara Falls. No one had ever done that before, and the world was stunned. Charles Blondin walked with ease across that tightrope 1,000 feet across and he did it a number of times. He came back and did it again and then again and then again. He pushed a wheelbarrow across that rope all the way. He walked across that rope all the way on stilts. Isn’t that amazing?
He walked backwards all the way across. They blindfolded him and he went all the way across. He explained it wasn’t about sight. It wasn’t visual. It was touch and feel. What an amazing man. He did this not only in Niagara Falls but in other venues, other canyons, other huge ravines. On one occasion he took a charcoal stove out in the middle and stopped there and cooked an omelet. Some people thought maybe his brain was a cooked omelet just to do the stuff that he did. He was an amazing man.
Now, there’s a story told about Charles Blondin (and I’ve heard it so many times). I’ve heard it in churches. I’ve heard it from preachers. I’ve heard more preachers tell this story and I don’t even know whether it’s true. But according to the story, Charles Blondin, on a number of occasions, would go up to people in the crowd with his wheelbarrow and say, “Do you believe I can take this wheelbarrow across the tightrope?” Almost inevitably they would say, “I believe,” and then Charles Blondin would say, “Get in the wheelbarrow.” I don’t know whether he did that. It sounds kind of like something he could have done, but it’s a great illustration of belief. It’s not just intellectual assent. It’s not just, “Do you believe I can do this?” “Yes, I believe you can do that. My mind agrees. That seems rational and reasonable given what I’ve already seen you do.” But you see, it’s more than that if you really believe. You’ve got to get in the wheelbarrow. It’s relinquishment of life. It’s commitment of life, although I must say in a sense for the Christian life and the Christian faith this is an inadequate example of the Christian life and faith because riding in a wheelbarrow is just too passive. The commitment we make to Christ is dynamic and it is active when first you believe.
I made a commitment to Christ when I was 5 years old. In a sense I renew that commitment every day, but it’s a commitment of my life to Him and to the cause of heaven on earth and to His church and kingdom. I made that commitment when I was 5 years old. You made that commitment when first you believed because believing is not just intellectual assent. It is commitment of life. We’ve seen this as we look at the words for worship. Just a few weeks ago when we looked at the words for worship, they are all active dynamic words. The one word, “Proskuneo” we saw means, “to kiss towards.” Worship is love of God and we kiss towards God. But most of the biblical words for worship are words that had to do with service—service in action, service in ministry.
And so, the primary word for worship is “latreia.” Both in Greek and in Latin, the root meaning in the Bible of Latreia means, “to serve.” “Leitourgia,” again, has the root meaning “to serve.” “Therapeia,” is another word for worship, but again its root meaning is “to serve.” If you would worship God, what must you do? Serve Him. So, worship isn’t something we merely do here on Sundays in the Worship Center. Worship is something that involves our every breath. Worship is something that consumes our life. Worship is something that involves every minute of every day. We live to serve Him, live to serve heaven, live to serve His kingdom and church. We worship. This is the deepest understanding of worship biblically. It’s tied up with the meaning of belief because belief has this active dimension. It’s not static. It’s dynamic. It’s not mere intellectual assent. It’s commitment of life in Christian service.
When you think about this Capital Stewardship Campaign that we’re talking about for the next 18 months and the giving of our gifts and these gift cards we’ve asked you to submit today… The Worship Center upgrades are all about worship, all about believing, all about whether or not we’ve committed our lives. It’s all about relinquishment of life. That’s true of every time the offering is taken. It’s all about worship. The offering is part of worship. Of course, when we offer our time it’s worship. When we offer our talents and abilities it’s worship. When we teach Sunday School it’s worship. When we give money, when we offer our treasure, it’s worship. It’s all His anyway. He’s the owner. He’s Lord. We are simply stewards. One day we will stand before Him and give an account on how we worshipped and how we believed.
There’s a very interesting verse in Isaiah 34 as we’re drawing towards the close of our message. Isaiah 34:14 is kind of a confusing verse, I think, for some people. The prophet Isaiah looks through the portals of time and he sees the future and he sees the judgement of God upon the desert nations that surround Israel. And so, in Isaiah 34, verse 14, the Prophet writes, “But by the judgement of God these desert nations surrounding Israel will become a habitation for the night hag.” That’s what the RSV says. It’s not a bad rendering of the Hebrew. In the NIV translation, and some of you have the NIV Bibles, it simply says, “night creatures” or “night creature,” but that’s an inadequate representation of the Hebrew because night creatures could be owls or any kind of nocturnal animal. But that’s not what this Hebrew word is talking about at all. In fact, perhaps the best translation is that given by the new RSV, which simply transliterates the Hebrew, “lilith.” “The desert nations surrounding Israel shall become a habitation for lilith.”
Lilith is a Hebrew word which comes from “lilu” which comes from “demon.” Lilith is female, feminine, a female demon. Of course, in the Septuagint, in the Greek rendering of the Hebrew Old Testament, Isaiah 34:14, the word “lilith” is rendered by a Greek word which means, “supernatural demonic power.” Of course, when you look in the Talmudic literature and in Rabbinical mythology “Lilith” was the name of the first wife of Adam who left him prior to Eve. This, of course, is mythology. So in Rabbinical mythology Lilith was the name of the first wife of Adam who left him and became this demonic being, with vast wings and long hair, Lilith.
Of course, Rabbinical mythology is not credible. Rabbinical mythology is to Judaism what the Gnostic Gospels are to Christianity. They’re just not reliable sources but, you see, here’s what we need to understand. Both in Judaism and in Christianity, both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, the Bible teaches us there is spiritual warfare. There is a great conflict in the heavenlies. The devil exists. He’s a fallen angelic power. He is hideous. He is called Satan, and he has minions and fallen angelic powers and a vast host of demons. There’s a battle for the souls of human beings all over the world. There’s a battle for values. There’s a battle for moral and theological truth and demonic powers are involved.
What does the devil want? What does Satan seek? What does he want from you? What does he want from me? The Bible says the devil deceives. He is called “the deceiver,” but why does he deceive us? Why does he want to do that? The Bible says that the devil oppresses and he’s an oppressor. The Bible says the devil afflicts. He’s an afflicter. Why does he do these things? The answer is clear biblically. He doesn’t want you to believe. He doesn’t want me to believe. He wants to destroy faith on earth. He doesn’t want you to give intellectual assent. He certainly doesn’t want you to commit your life. He deceives in order that you might not believe, and his deception runs through our culture and it’s meant to keep you from believing. He afflicts and he oppresses because he doesn’t want you to believe. He’s hoping that in the midst of your oppression and your affliction, whatever you are going through, you won’t believe. This is his mission statement. That’s what he’s about. But the gospel calls people all over the world to believe, both in the sense of intellectual assent and relinquishment of life. We can’t worship God unless we believe.
I would say this. I think in regard to intellectual assent it’s very possible that there can be a mixture with doubt, but the doubt that mixes with your intellectual assent cannot be so great as to keep you from commitment of life. Is that clear? I mean, if your faith is saving faith, if you have saving faith, then whatever doubts you have in the midst of your assent haven’t kept you from committing your life to Christ. That’s genuine true belief.
As we close, I want to tell a little story. Just this last Wednesday Barb and I and my brothers Gary and Greg—Gary and his wife Ann, and Greg and his wife Barb—we travel together and we were down at the Sea of Cortez this past Wednesday doing some sport fishing. The Sea of Cortez is also called the Gulf of California or the Vermillion Sea. We were there on the Sea of Cortez fishing. It was an amazing time. Our fishing boat had four lines that were going out. There’s one cat bird seat, one chair that looks like a dental chair but is less painful to sit in, where one person can reel the catch in. In our family we were almost Jewish in the sense that we seemed to kind of go by order of birth. Gary being the first-born son, the oldest, sat in the chair first. He reeled in a Mahi Mahi, a beautiful 25–30-pound Mahi Mahi. It was great eating that night.
Greg, the second-born son, sat in the chair and Greg reeled in a 150-pound marlin, which was just beautiful. We took it over the side of the boat to look at it but then it was so beautiful we put it back in and let it go. I suppose it could have been a trophy, but we weren’t interested in that. Then it was my turn, the third-born son. I sat in the chair. We’re moving up. We had the Mahi Mahi, then the big marlin. I’m thinking a great white shark is imminent. I’m sitting there but I don’t catch anything. Alas, I caught nothing. But it didn’t matter because it was all about fun and I would never claim to be a fisherman. In fact, that was the first time in my life I’ve ever gone sport fishing. My brothers would not claim to be fishermen.
Now, I wouldn’t claim to be a fisherman and my brothers would not claim to be fishermen, although they’re better than I am. I’ll tell you what we would claim. All of us would claim to be fishers of men. It was Jesus who said, “I will make you fishers of men.” He’s using men generically. There’s no gender attachment. He’s talking about people. “I will make you fishers of people. I’ll send you into the world to fish for people, men and women, and to bring them to Me in My kingdom and My church.” So we’re fishermen in the sense that we’re fishers of men. This is true of our wives. This is true of Barb and Greg’s Barb and Gary’s Ann. We’re all fishers of men and we want people to believe. We call people to believe. If you’re a Christian, you have this same call on your life: To call people to believe, to give intellectual assent to Jesus and His Word, and to relinquish your life.
So, as we conclude this worship series, we understand we can’t worship truly without belief. I want to give you a chance if you’ve never believed. Maybe you’ve got some doubt. Maybe you’ve given some intellectual assent, but you’ve never committed your life. I want to give you a chance to do that today as we close in prayer. Let’s pray.