The book of Lamentations, 1:1-6, came up in the lectionary last week. I have never preached on Lamentations before, but the images the author uses to give voice to his despair fit within a broader theme I was encountering during the weekend. When discussing our Bible School with some friends recently, they were perplexed that most of our students would come from “Zionist” churches, the name typically used for African Independent Churches (AICs) in southern Africa. Although there is a range of spirituality within Zionism (not to be confused, by the way, with the movement of the same name with regard to the modern state of Israel), the dominant perception of outsiders is that it is sub-Christian, consisting of churches whose members “worship the dead” in line with ancestral traditions of Africa. Members of New Pentecostal or Charismatic churches often regard Zionists as “unsaved”. The problem with all this is not that certain Zionists do not in fact do what certain Charismatics say that they do; the problem is that often the language of “saved” and “unsaved” comes across as the attempt of the one who uses such categories to justify himself—something which can never be done not at the expense of others. A second problem, furthermore, is that this language of salvation is often intended by these who employ it within a very specific sense; if preaching or teaching, albeit thoroughly biblical and Christ-centered, does not lead directly to a short ceremony whereby one can “raise their hands” to accept Christ and be led in a prayer of repentance, it does not lead to salvation. Hence, one of our friends asked us whether “we ever discuss at our Bible School things like salvation”; my internal reaction was that, if we are not teaching salvation, we might as well pack our bags and leave South Africa. Indeed, salvation is the gospel, but the gospel is much bigger than many people understand.
Whereas the comments of many Christians tie salvation to a specific ceremony, pledge, or formula, the Bible consistently speaks of it as a way of life that never ends. Although it is the culture in “saved” churches here for every testimony to begin with the phrase, “I am saved”, the Bible speaks of salvation in the present and future tenses as well as the past. “In hope you were saved”. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” “For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life” (Rom. 8:24; Php. 2:12; Rom. 5:10).
If salvation, therefore, has not one but at least three tenses, it follows that that which happened to us in the past must somehow work itself out in the present so as to be effective in the future. If that which happened in the past does not work itself out—within us to whom it has happened—it will not work in the end. If we do not work out that which we are, we will cease to be.
We will be, in the words of Lamentations, like “the city that once was full of people”, now “lonely” (1:1). Or like the nation, once “a princess among the provinces”, now a “vassal” (1:1). Or like “the roads to Zion”, once full of festival-goers, now deserted (1:4). Or like “the princes of Zion”, once well-fed, now “stags that find no pasture” (1:6).
If we do not intentionally seek to live the life of Jesus “daily” (Lk. 9:23), we can expect our status to change. Though God has taken the initiative to change our status from bad to good, from weak to powerful, from enemies to friends, we must—even now, every day—pray for the “clean heart,” the “right spirit”, the “joy of salvation”, lest we lose that which is most precious and become that which we do not want to be (Rom. 5:6-10; Ps. 51:10-12).
-Joe
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