GOD QUIZ
UMPIRE (AUTHORITATIVE)
DR. JIM DIXON
MATTHEW 8:5-13
JANUARY 13, 2013
In baseball, the umpire officiates the game. The word umpire comes from the old French “nonper,” which means not equal. An umpire is an arbitrator who is not equal but is above those he is serving. He has authority over them. Every sporting event needs arbitrators. Every athletic contest needs umpires. Every sporting event needs to be officiated. It is not easy. It is hard to make the right call. The Bronco game yesterday is a good case in point. I worked for years at the YMCA in La Cañada, California and in Glendale, California. I had many different responsibilities, but part of what I did was to officiate at basketball games. I officiated at kids’ basketball games and then I officiated in adult leagues. I discovered that you can get into a lot of trouble officiating in basketball. You can’t be indecisive. You can’t be confused because people get all over you. They get really mad. You have to be decisive even if you aren’t sure. You have to act confident; you have to blow that whistle at that instant, and you need to be decisive. There is no official in this human world that is always right; we all make mistakes.
How about God? Since so many of you have this view of God, that he is the umpire, that he is officiating this game called life, that he is making the calls, that he is really active and engaged, does he do it right? This view of God as authoritative is biblical. In our passage of Scripture for today in Matthew chapter 8, we have this account of Jesus with a Roman centurion in the village of Capernaum. This Roman centurion was in charge of many soldiers. The centurions were the backbone of the Roman legions. The centurions were the backbone of the Roman armies. For most of Roman history, each legion consisted of 6,000 soldiers. The Emperor of Rome would appoint a general to be in charge of each legion. Under that general were six tribunes. Those six tribunes had 1,000 men in them. Underneath the tribunes there were the centurions. There were sixty centurions in each legion. Each centurion was responsible for a century of men, a century of soldiers, 100 soldiers.
The Roman Centurion that came up to Jesus was in charge of a Roman garrison, 100 soldiers, in the region of Capernaum. He was a man of some authority. He had a servant who was very, very sick to the point he was now paralyzed and in great distress. He was probably near death. He had heard of this man called the Messiah. He had heard of Jesus the Christ. He had heard that this man was curious, that this man was Lord and had authority over all things. He went to him. It is kind of cool, it is kind of precious that this Roman centurion cared so much about his servant. He came up to Jesus and he said, “Lord, my servant is paralyzed at home and near death.” Jesus said, “Hey, I will come. I will heal him.” The centurion said some amazing things. He said, “I am not worthy for you to come into my house, but just say the word and my servant will be healed. Just say the word because I understand authority. I am a man under authority and I have soldiers under me. I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes, and I say to another ‘come’ and he comes. Just say the word.” Jesus marveled that this Roman soldier had such faith. The sons of Israel did not have so much faith. Jesus then, in a moment in time, from long-distance, healed the servant of that centurion. Authority.
The thought might occur to you, “Is this what God is like? Father, Son, and Spirit have authority. Whatever they want to do they just say the word and it is done? The umpire, the official, the one pulling the strings, the one calling the shots.” This whole story of the centurion certainly poses the question of: How does God use his authority? Why doesn’t he always do what he has power to do? There is mystery, isn’t there? What I would like to do this morning as we look at God as umpire and the authoritative view of God is to take a look at a few different arenas of life where this view of God as umpire might affect your perspective.
First of all, if you view God as umpire, it is going to affect the way you view nations. It is going to affect the way you view God dealing with nations. We know that God has authority over nations. We know that our Lord Jesus Christ has authority over nations. We have the words of Christ himself in the Olivet Discourse and the message he gave on the Mount of Olives in Matthew 25 when Jesus said that he would one day come again. He would come in power. He would come, he said, in great glory. He would come with all the angels. He said he would sit on his glorious throne and before him he would gather ta ethne, the nations. All the nations would be gathered before him. The assumption is that this is from all throughout time. He will separate them one from another. He will exercise his authority. This is an amazing statement by the Son of God. Certainly God, – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – has authority. The question is: What is he doing now? At the consummation, at the end of the world, he will sit in judgment, but what about now? Is he actively involved now? Is he working with nations now? Is he pulling strings? Is he making calls? Is he saying, ‘Go,’ ‘Come’? Is he involved? This is a matter of some controversy. I want you to know that the founders of our country had a deep belief that God was involved in their time, God was involved with America, actively involved.
I want to tell you a story. It took place in 1777. A lot of great events took place in 1777. It was in that year that the Continental Congress asked three men to form a committee for the purpose of designing the Great Seal of the United States. This was a huge responsibility, to design the Great Seal of the United States, which would represent America forever. The three men chosen by the Continental Congress were Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin. That is quite a committee! Wouldn’t it be fun to sit in the room with that group? As Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin met to shape the Great Seal of the United States, they came up with three ideas, each of them different. They thought, “Let’s just submit them all and see what happens.” They were all turned down. Can you imagine turning down Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Benjamin Franklin? That is what happened. Another committee with different guys was convened in 1780 and theirs were all turned down. Then in 1782 another committee came up with what was accepted, which is the current Great Seal of the United States. On one side is the great pyramid with the eye of providence and the other side is E pluribus unum and the great eagle.
Have you ever wondered, you probably haven’t, what did Jefferson, Adams, and Franklin come up with? What did they want to represent our country? Here is what happened: Franklin went immediately to the Bible and he had an image designed that portrayed Moses with his arms outreached, closing the Red Seas on the armies of Pharaoh, and the words “God Hates Tyranny.” Pretty good. Wouldn’t that be great if that were the Great Seal of the United States? God Hates Tyranny, Moses with his arms outstretched, closing the Red Sea on the armies of Pharaoh is pretty cool. It was rejected.
John Adams chose an image from Greek mythology. It was kind of cool too. It was an image of Hercules standing before two paths and having to make a choice. One path was the path of license, licentiousness, a path of self-indulgence. The other path was the path of self-control, a path of self-discipline. It was the moral path. Hercules needed to make this choice. That would have been a great Great Seal of the United States. Adams believed that the future of this country, the destiny of this country would be determined by what path we walked, self-indulgence or self-control, licentious or morality. All too often, we have chosen the wrong path.
What did Thomas Jefferson suggest? What did Thomas Jefferson want to be on the Great Seal of the United States? Like Franklin, Thomas Jefferson went immediately to the Bible. That might surprise you because I know you probably think, because you have been indoctrinated by intelligentsia, that Jefferson wouldn’t want to have anything to do with the Bible, certainly not at the level of government because he believed in the absolute wall of the separation between church and state. Whatever concept of separation of church and state Jefferson believed in, it is nothing like is being affirmed today.
When Jefferson was President of the United States he turned the capitol building into a place of worship. The main government building, the capitol of the United States, is where Jefferson chose to hold church services every Sunday. Every Sunday Protestant church services were held in the capitol building and Jefferson went each time. He was one of the most faithful churchgoers while President of the United States. He also, with regard to education in Virginia, expressed clearly his desire that the Bible be in every school and in every classroom. That is not exactly the current definition of church and state separation.
Jefferson, submitting what he wanted to be the Great Seal of the United States, went to the Bible and he had somebody design the image of the children of Israel marching through the wilderness, the glory cloud, described in the Bible, and the pillar of fire described in the Bible before the children of Israel. Then the words “Hitherto hath He led us.” Then he offered a second possibility, “God’s providence leads us.” The idea was that the theophany, the presence of God in the glory cloud and in the pillar of fire went before the children of Israel leading them and guiding them. I hope you understand that amongst the founders of our nation there was this firm belief that God had birthed our country and that God was guiding the country.
Many historians today will tell you that Jefferson was a deist. Many will tell you that Franklin was a deist. Some will tell you that Adams in his later years was a deist. But, if you look at what a deist is you will see it is not true. As we go through this series, as we look at people’s views of God, a deist is somebody who thinks of God as the watchmaker. A deist is somebody who thinks God just made the watch and then left it alone, left it just to run until it winds down, until it runs out. God designs the watch and just leaves. That is what a deist believes — that God created the world and then had nothing to do with it.
That is not what Jefferson believed. That is not what Franklin believed. That is not what Adams believed. They believed that at the level of nations, God was very much involved. God very much cared. In their writings they referred many times to our nation as a kind of new Israel. That is kind of a speculative concept. I think in the Bible we might think of the church as a new Israel. It is a stretch to view the United States of America as a new Israel and to view us as having entered into a clear covenant with God. I think it is true that God did raise us up. God had a plan for us. God has blessed us. If we turn our backs on God, we are in a whole lot of trouble. We have our founders in our country that believed in divine providence. They had a bit of this umpire God, this authoritative God who was pulling the strings and guiding our nation. There is something kind of cool about that.
Having said that, I am concerned because I think that some people with this view of God, this umpire view of God, this authoritative view of God, attribute everything to God. They act as though there is no freedom. They act as if God is causing everything, pulling the strings. They act as though there are no natural consequences when there ARE natural consequences. You can’t look at the nations of history and say that every ruler was raised up by God. There is nothing in the Bible to indicate that would be true. You can’t blame Adolf Hitler on God. You can’t blame Josef Stalin on God. You can’t blame Vlad the Impaler on God, or any of the other countless rulers that have abused their throne throughout history. You can’t blame atrocities on God. God is love. He is also just. He has given freedoms. He has long forbearance. Someday, all will give an account. In the meantime, he can intervene, but he is not always intervening. He doesn’t just pull every string.
When I talk to a Christian brother or sister and they say, “George Bush just got elected. It must have been God’s will.” I think some people with this umpire view of God, this authoritative view of God, go there. They don’t allow for God granting freedom. Many things happen in this world that God does not agree with. Many things happen in this world that grieve God. He has given freedom. He will one day make things right, and he will one day judge everything. In the meantime, he is always present, and he is always working, and he is always trying to use things for good, but he has really given freedom. Sometimes nations and individuals blow it. The Bible says in Romans 13, in 1 Peter 2, and in Titus 3 that it is the will of God that earthly governments exist. The Bible says that it is the will of God that earthly governments be given the sword and that they use the sword to deter evil on the earth. This is the will of God. All nations will be judged by what they do with the sword, whether they use it for good or whether they use it for evil. God doesn’t pull the strings and raise up each ruler or guide each ruler. People are responsible for their own actions. They have moral culpability. They have moral autonomy.
Secondly, I think this view of God as umpire, this authoritative view of God reflects our view of nature. I don’t know how you look at the natural world, but there is no denying biblically that God does have authority over nature. One of my favorite passages is in Matthew chapter 8, the same story is told in Mark chapter 4, and Luke chapter 8. In all three of the synoptic gospels, you have the story of Jesus on the Sea of Galilee fishing with his disciples. They are way out in the Sea of Galilee and a great storm arises. This is not uncommon, even today it is not uncommon for a great storm to arise on the Sea of Galilee. It can be very dangerous. The storm began to create waves on the sea. The boat and the boats of other fishermen began to be tossed about. The boat of Jesus and the disciples began to fill with water. The disciples began to panic. They began to fear for their lives.
Where is Jesus? He is in the boat at the stern. He is propped up on a cushion, or a huge pillow, and did not appear to be wet yet. The disciples go up to him in their panic and they say, “Master, do you not care that we perish.” The storm was just raging. All three gospel accounts tell us that Jesus stood up and rebuked the wind and he commanded the waves to cease and he said, “Peace. Be still.” There was a great calm. The waves abated, the winds ceased, and there was a great calm. Suddenly there was this tranquil scene. The disciples are just in awe, the Bible says. They looked at each other. All three accounts tell us the same thing. They said, “Who is this? Who is this that even the wind and the sea obey him?” That is authority. You see there is one who has that kind of authority: God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God has that kind of authority.
It reminds me of the story of King Canute, the Norse king who became king of England in 1016 AD. He was the only Norse king to be embraced by the British people, the English people, as a truly Christian king. King Canute loved Christ. The story is told, kind of a legend, that the king was down by the English Channel. One of his soldiers, who was very much enamored with him called him King of kings. King Canute could not stand that label being applied to him. He took the soldier and said, “Walk with me to the shore.” The soldier walked with him down to the water. King Canute raised his hands and he commanded the waves to abate, to cease their rush to the shore. Nothing happened, as you can well imagine. Then the king turned to the soldier, smiled, and said, “There is only one King of kings.” That is true. That one is surely Jesus Christ.
The question is: how often does he intervene? Is he really umping the game? Is he really officiating everything? Do you really feel that the fact that he has power to command the waves means he is controlling everything? How do you view a tsunami? How do you view a hurricane? How do you view an earthquake? How do you view a tornado? How do you view a volcanic eruption? How do you view a flood? How do you view a meteor hit? How do you view pandemic plague and pestilence? How do you view these things? Do you really think that these are all being umpired by God? Do you really think that these things are reflections of God’s authority and string pulling? If so, I think you have made it overly simple. You have made something very complex overly simple. You have even moved into some very dangerous turf and territory.
I always cringe whenever we have had a tragic national disaster, or even a tragic global disaster, because some religious leaders in the world stand up and blame God. You need to understand that God really has granted freedom. It is not just that. God has established natural laws. Nature tends to be governed by natural laws. Yes, God can intervene. Rarely he does. Nature tends to be governed by natural laws. As we grow in our knowledge and in our learning, we know certain places might be safe to live, other places not so safe to live. As we grow in our education and our learning we might understand that certain events might be soon forthcoming and we might be able to predict certain types of things and therefore prepare for certain things. Maybe we will reach the ability to have some minimal control over certain aspects of nature, but nature is governed by natural laws.
The Bible indicates, and maybe this thought has occurred to you, that these natural laws have been tampered with. These natural laws that were established by God have been tampered with. You understand that God is the creator. He created mankind. He created us in his image, the imago dei. He gave us dominion, but we have fallen and sin has corrupted our very souls. We are born genetically flawed. Everything is corrupted. The Bible tells us that it is not just mankind that is corrupted. It is not just the world of the natural; it is the world of the supernatural because God didn’t just create the natural world. He created the spiritual world, the supernatural world, not just the physical natural world.
In the spiritual world, the supernatural world he created the angelic realm and he gave freedom to the angels. They are fallen. There is spiritual warfare. There are powers, principalities, and powers of darkness. It is real. It interfaces with the physical world in some way. There is a teaching in scripture that even natural law, to some degree, has been tampered with. We have these little glimpses like in Romans 8 where we are told that the entire creation has been subjected to futility. The Greek word is mataiotes, which means failure to attain created potential or created intent. This is a very revealing, powerful word. There has been a tampering. Be very careful when you accuse God of natural disasters as though there were no natural laws, and as though natural law had not been tampered with.
Understand that God is always working to bring some good out of things. Understand that God will one day judge the world, and will one day judge each and every one of us. Understand that you will view life in your time in this world very differently from the perspective of eternity. Certainly, this view of God as umpire and God as authoritative can affect your view of nature. It also affects your view of individuals, the way you view yourself, the way you view your friends, your loved ones, your family members. If you really view God as the umpire and you have this authoritative view of God you have to be careful about the way you view even the events of your own life. How long are you going to live? Do you think God is pulling those strings? Maybe.
In 1 Kings chapter 3 you see Solomon, young and rising to power in Israel. He is going to govern the people of God and he is nervous. He feels inadequate. He is on his knees. He prays to God. What is his prayer? He prays for one thing and that one thing is wisdom. Lord, give me wisdom, wisdom from heaven, wisdom from on high, a portion of your divine wisdom that I might govern your people faithfully. God is pleased with the prayer. In this passage we read that God is very pleased with Solomon’s prayer because Solomon did not ask for longevity. He did not ask for wealth and riches. He did not ask for fame or glory. He did not ask for health or prosperity. He just asked for wisdom. God says, “What you have asked for I will grant you. What you have asked for, I will give you. I will give you a portion of my wisdom that you might lead my people. Because I am pleased, I will also give you what you did not ask for. I will give you longevity. I will give you wealth. I will give you riches. I will give you fame. I will give you glory.” You are thinking, “Wow! He really is umpire. He really is authoritative. He really can call the shots.”
Then you come to 2 Kings chapter 20 where Hezekiah is king, on his knees and he is crying as he prays. Why? Why is the king on his knees just bawling as he prays? It is because he is dying. He is sick and he is dying. The Word of the Lord had come to Isaiah the prophet and told Isaiah to go to Hezekiah and tell him that this illness is unto death and he only has a matter of days to live. His time is short. He is about to die. Hezekiah, not wanting to die and loving life, is on his knees bawling. He is crying out to God. “Lord I have loved you and I have sought to serve you well. Have mercy on me.” The word of God comes again to Isaiah to go to Hezekiah and say, “Fifteen more years. I am going to give you fifteen bonus years.” You are thinking, “Wow! That is pretty cool. God pulls a couple of strings and boom there are fifteen more years. Is that how it works?”
In Daniel chapter 5 you see Belshazzar, crowned prince of the Babylonian Empire. His father Nabonidus, who was king, was on a long-distance journey. Nabonidus was throwing a debauched party, as often he did. He and all of his friends and cronies were drunk and committing sexual immorality. They took the sacred vessels that had been captured in Jerusalem, taken from the temple, and they used them for debauchery. A divine hand appears in the banquet hall and writes on the wall. You have probably heard of that. Mene, Tekel, Parsin — Numbered. Weighed. Divided. Your days have been numbered. You have been weighed in the balances and found wanting. Your kingdom will be divided and given to the Medes and the Persians. That very night was the night his life was snuffed out.
You might be thinking, “Wow! God really is umpire. He is really authoritative. He is calling the shots. Is that true of all of us? Numbered. Weighed. Maybe divided?” Certainly, God has authority and God will judge. Understand that it is not right to think of God as pulling every string in that way. God sometimes intervenes for his eternal purposes. God sometimes does something very, very special for very special purposes. God has also given freedom. Sometimes God wants natural consequences to occur. Sometimes God wants his rewards and his punishments to wait. God is long-suffering. Oftentimes in this world God just lets men who are free be free, and he lets women who are free be free. He allows for natural consequences. You have to be very careful when you presume God has done something.
Have you read recently about the Blue Zone? The Blue Zone, according to scientists and according to medical doctors, are areas where people live longer. These are places in the world where an inordinate number of people live over a hundred years. How do you view that? Do you think God the umpire is causing that? Do you think God with his authority is causing that? Do you think there might be some free will involved? There might be some natural laws and some genetics? There might be some natural consequences involved. There has been a great deal of research regarding these Blue Zones. They have discovered that there are a lot of lifestyle issues that relate to the Blue Zones. It has to do with the way you live your life, the choices you make, the activities you are involved in, the amount of exercise you do, the amount of diet, the kind of diet, the way you value relationships, whether or not you are involved in a community of faith, and all kinds of things.
I had to laugh because there is one section where they said they found that people in the Blue Zones choose to relax every day in one of three ways. Some of them relax through prayer. Some of them relax through napping. Some of them relax through happy hour. I was thinking, “Some people do all three.” In any event, what they are trying to show is that there is human behavior that produces a natural consequence. There are genetic issues also involved. You don’t just want to attribute things automatically to God’s manipulating and pulling strings.
You can look at not just mortality but morbidity. For most of us, it is not just how long we might want to live, but how active, flexible, and able we are going to be. I think of Barb’s mom and dad. Barb’s mother had rheumatoid arthritis. She got it when she was 20 and died at 80. She had 60 years of rheumatoid arthritis. It was crippling, where over the years she was able to do less and less. And yet, God was at work I think there were genetic factors behind her rheumatoid arthritis and we know that from the family history, but God was at work. God used this in some beautiful ways in shaping some wonderful qualities of character in Barb’s mom. There is no doubt that she grew in grace as the years went by.
Barb’s dad had a stroke when he was 60. He was a man of God, and loved God. He had been a carpenter, a wonderful guy. He lived until 90 so the final 30 years of his life, he was a stroke victim. For the final 30 years of his life, he was partly paralyzed and had a hard time speaking. I remember going to the hospital in the aftermath of his stroke and just talking to him and hanging out a little bit and praying with him. I remember Barb’s dad trying to tell me something and he was having a hard time making it clear. Eventually he did. He told me he thought that God had given him the stroke. He thought God had given him the stroke because he had a job he did as a carpenter and they paid him in cash and he didn’t report it on his income tax, so God just stroked him up. I said, “Well, God wants us to be honest but I don’t think that is the right view of God here.”
God, in his love for Barb’s dad, was at work and did some great and gracious things through the years. We need to be careful. Understand that all of these views of God are overly simplistic. God is complex. Yes, God is a friend. Yes God is an umpire. Yes, God is authoritative. Yes, God is a doctor; he is benevolent. Yes, God is an architect, a designer, a painter, a judge. All of these things that we look at have elements of truth, but none of them are adequate to summarize God. God is wondrously awesome and oh, so beautiful. Be careful if you overly simplify these things.
I know some years ago I was doing a wedding in Kansas City for a friend of mine, for my doctor. He was a great guy. He was getting married at Colonial Presbyterian Church in Kansas City, Missouri, a wonderful and great church. Just recently Colonial Presbyterian Church joined us and became a sister church in the Evangelical Presbyterian denomination. The pastor of Colonial Presbyterian Church at that time was a guy by the name of Ted Nissan. Ted Nissan was a friend. He had married a gal named Joy, who had grown up in the same church as me. When I got down there to do the wedding, Ted and I did it together. It was Ted’s church. When I saw Ted, I hadn’t seen him in a long time. He gave me a hug. He said, “Let’s go talk in the office.”
As we were talking, suddenly he started crying, telling me that his wife Joy had left him. His wife had fallen in love with some guy in the church and she had left him. He felt so devalued. He felt like such a loser. He felt like he had lost his best friend. He felt like his soul had been cut in two. He was crying out to God for understanding. He said to me, “I know God did it. I know God is in charge. I know, in some sense, it had to be God’s will.” You need to understand that Ted was a strong Calvinist. I think that is the wrong view of God, the wrong understanding of God. I think this is free will misused. I think there is culpability, moral accountability for decisions made in those kinds of relational breaks. I think God loves Ted. Ted is with the Lord now. I know God loved Joy too. God is at work and in his love and his mercy he can take these things that he allowed, but did not cause, and work with them in such a way as to produce something great. In all things, he is working for good. Be careful how you take the unknown and attribute it to the divine.
Understand this as we close: This authoritative God is most active in the church. It was Jesus who said, “I will build my church and it is mine. I will build my church and the powers of hell, the powers of death, will never prevail against it.” That is why the church of Jesus Christ is 2,700,000,000 strong today. It is his. He is authoritative. He has appointed in the church pastors, the Greek word poimen, shepherd, but he is the Chief Shepherd. He has appointed bishops, the Greek word episkopos, but he is the Head Bishop. He has appointed elders, presbuteroi, but you see he is in charge of the whole deal. Prayerfully, seriously as you live out your days, seek to support the church. I am not saying that selfishly. I am not talking about Cherry Hills Community Church, although I love this place. I am talking about the church of Christ universal. I am talking about Colorado Christian University, I am talking about Valor, I am talking about Denver Theological Seminary, I am talking about YoungLife, Campus Crusade, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, all of these different ministries are serving Christ and the cause of heaven. Get involved. Experience his blessing. Let’s look to the Lord with a word of prayer.