The Key to the Dream

In his book, The Real American Dream, Andrew Delbanco recounts attending several meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous.

At one such meeting, he sat listening to a sharply dressed young man who spoke passionately about how others had wronged him, how they had taken advantage of him, how he was continually the victim of others’ attacks. Now, he would get his revenge.

He spoke of “believing in himself,” “taking control of his life,” “toughing it out.” It was obvious that his pride was wounded. As this man continued to talk, another man quietly leaned over to Delbanco and said, “I used to feel that way too, before I achieved low self-esteem.” He realized that pride is the enemy of hope.

My problem, your problem, David’s problem--we see it over and over in the Psalms, particularly Psalm 51--is that because of sin we all have a wrecked relationship with God, other people, and the whole created order.

But there is a sense in which the recognition of the reality of sin is good news--very good news. We are not helpless victims of blind psychological, biological, or cosmological forces. We are not being swept along by some aimless, mindless current. We are fallen, sinful humans for whom there is hope!

We must confess our sins to God and receive His grace through faith alone, in Christ alone. That’s our hope: “Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling.”

Memorial Day

This weekend, as we remember those men and women who have made such significant sacrifices for our nation, we offer some sobering words for Memorial Day from one of our greatest generals and leaders.

General Omar Nelson Bradley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed an Armistice Day Luncheon of the Boston Chamber of Commerce on November 10, 1948. His words were profound and prophetic. Here is an excerpt:

"We have too many men of science; too few men of God. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Man is stumbling blindly through spiritual darkness while toying with the precarious secrets of life and death. The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about killing than we know about living."

"Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord" (Psalm 33:12 ESV).

"I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way" (1 Tim. 2:1-2 ESV).

Mr. Smooth-it-away

In the mid-1800s, Nathaniel Hawthorne, certainly no Evangelical Christian, turned his back on the radical, progressive literati of his age when he published the "The Celestial Railroad." Written after the manner of Bunyan’s, Pilgrim’s Progress and Lewis’s, The Great Divorce, Hawthorne envisions a train-load of passengers bound for the Celestial City from the City of Destruction, to heaven from hell. The un-named pilgrim's guide is "Mr. Smooth-it-away."

The train departs packed with “parties of the first gentry and most respectable people in the neighborhood” and "characters of deserved eminence—magistrates, politicians, and men of wealth." The fashionable ladies are "well fitted to adorn the most elevated circles of the Celestial City." All of their burdens are safely tucked away out of sight in the baggage car. It would be unbecoming to show them in public and bear them on their backs.

They arrive at their destination with lightning speed. Along the way, the swiftness of the journey is enhanced by the new bridge that spans the Slough of Despond. The foundation for the new bridge is built with "volumes of French philosophy and German rationalism; tracts, sermons, and essays of modern clergymen; extracts from Plato, Confucius, and various Hindu sages together with a few ingenious commentaries upon texts of Scripture,--all of which by some scientific process, have been converted into a mass like granite." The train speeds through the tunnel cut through Hill Difficulty and over the land-fill that was the Valley of Humiliation. It simply bypasses Interpreter’s house and Palace Beautiful. Interpreter has nothing to say to enlightened moderns and the ladies of Palace Beautiful--Miss Prudence, Miss Piety, and Miss Charity—are now just “old maids, every soul of them—prim, starched, dry, and angular."

The pilgrims especially enjoy their long stay at Vanity Fair. They are amazed to see "that almost every street has its church." They meet "Rev. Mr. Shallow-deep, the Rev. Mr. Stumble-at-truth, that fine old clerical character the Rev. Mr. This-today, who expects shortly to resign his pulpit to the Rev. Mr. That-tomorrow; together with the Rev. Mr. Bewilderment, the Rev. Mr. Clog-the-spirit, and, last and greatest, the Rev. Dr. Wind-of-doctrine." Vanity Fair evidences "wonderful improvements in ethics, religion, and literature." Some of the travelers are tempted to end their pilgrimage then and there.

Finally, having boarded the ferry boat en route to his final destination, the pilgrim narrator looks back and, to his great shock, sees Mr. Smooth-it-away waving goodbye from the shore-line: "Don't you go over to the Celestial City?" he asks. "Oh, no!" answers Smooth-it-away. "And then did my excellent friend Mr. Smooth-it-away laugh outright, in the midst of which cachinnation a smoke-wreath issued from his mouth and nostrils, while a twinkle of lurid flame darted out of either eye, proving indubitably that his heart was all of a red blaze. The impudent fiend!" Smooth-it-away denies the existence of sin and hell while "he felt its fiery tortures raging within his breast."

Hawthorne’s picture is prophetic. Sin is out of style. Hell is inappropriate. Pastors and professors who deny these doctrines lead their followers over the precipice.

Remember the words of the Apostle Paul: “if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved” (Romans 10:9).