"Priority, Prosperity, Posterity"
Sanctity of Human Life Sunday, Feb.1/04
Psalm 128
Treasuring Life
"Sanctity of Human Life Sunday" celebrates the fact that all human life, from conception through to natural death, is a sacred gift from God to be treasured and promoted. This doctrine is founded on Scriptures which say that God created people in His very own image (Gen.1:27); He formed us in our mother's womb (Ps.139:13; Is.44:2); God ordained all our days before one of them came to be (Ps.139:16); that gray hair is the splendour of old people (Prov.20:29); and God has promised to sustain us "even to your old age and gray hairs" (Is.46:4).
There is a price tag attached to this teaching. It means society does not have the authority to dispose of lives of the weak or powerless or handicapped who might be viewed as having less "usefulness" or "quality of life". This applies equally to young unborn babies, those with debilitating illnesses, and seniors in hospitals or nursing homes. Each life has inherent worth from conception on, because they are a unique person in God's sight. The intrinsic value a person has is often hidden to the eyes of those who don't know them well.
Elsa Kok writes, "Esther was in her 70s when I met her. She had a heart defect, and cancer was spreading through her body. She wasn't going to live much longer. Some might say that Esther didn't have much value. Her "usefulness", some would comment, had diminished. Not to me. I knew Esther when I was 23 years old. I was recently divorced and caring for my baby daughter alone. I felt scared, worthless and unbearably lonely. Then Esther came into my life. Her wry sense of humour drew me to her, and her love for me seemed unfailing. She had no patience for the ways I berated myself. Instead, she saw only good and assured me I had a bright future. Esther is no longer here, but the future she envisioned for me has come to pass. Without her belief in me, my journey to well-being would have taken much longer. God used her gifts until the very end of her life."
Psalm 128 has been known as the "marriage prayer" because it was often sung at Israelite weddings. It's not one usually associated with sanctity of human life, but when you look at it carefully, it carries a very pro-life ring about the value of children as a gift from God. For married and singles alike, it instructs on Priority, Prosperity, and Posterity as the means to a truly fulfilling life.
Priority
Making God a personal priority is urged in v1: "Blessed are all who fear the Lord, who walk in His ways"; and v4, "Thus is the man blessed who fears the Lord." In the Biblical worldview, there are basically two kinds of people in the world: those who acknowledge God, and those who don't. "Fear the Lord" in Hebrew is yare, fearing, reverent, afraid; to stand in awe of, honour, respect. It's rescued from being a trembling-in-your-boots kind of fear by God's loving nature. Ps.103(13,17), the Lord has compassion and love on those who fear Him. Added meaning to the word "fear" is provided by other psalms, where the couplet structure of Hebrew poetry expands on the significance of the first line by the difference in the second. For example, Ps.112:1, the person who fears the Lord "finds great delight in His commands". Ps.147:11, those who fear God "put their hope in His unfailing love".
Psalm 38 has a whole section elaborating on what it means to fear the Lord. Look at vv8-14. Our custom these days is usually to put the title at the top of something or the front cover of the book, but Hebrew authors often put the title of a section in the middle, as the NIV Study Bible notes. So the title of this section at v11 is "I will teach you the fear of the Lord." The rest of the passage spells out more what this means. v8, taste the Lord's goodness, take refuge in Him; v10, seek Him; v13, don't speak evil or lies; v14, turn from evil, do good, pursue peace. That's how a healthy respect for God, our Sovereign eternal Judge, will work itself out.
Putting God first by revering Him isn't important only in the Old Testament. Peter quotes part of these verses in 1Pet.3:10-11, then adds in vv14-15: "Don't fear what they fear; do not be frightened; but in your hearts, set apart Christ as Lord." Revere Him, stand in awe of Him continually, don't fall for the priorities worldly people have. Keep the Lord Jesus your focus. Do that, keep God as your priority, and it will help you not to fall into the trap Peter warns against in v9: "Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing..." Honouring Jesus as Lord in our heart helps us not get trapped in an "evil for evil" relationship. Without God in your life, if you're just trying to manage by yourself, when people fail you or treat you poorly as someone inevitably will, the natural fallen tendency is to lash out and "get even", make them hurt as they've hurt you. But if Jesus is most important to us, if we want more than anything else to please Him, giving Him absolute Lordship in our hearts, His grace in forgiving us all our sin by His death on the cross helps us forgive others the evil and insults they dump on us. So, "fear the Lord" is the PRIORITY that can save us from the selfish bug.
Prosperity
RRSP season is upon us once again. People have had a month to pay off some of the Christmas expenses and so are starting to think about putting a little more toward their retirement nest egg. Mutual funds are hot items again, having performed quite a bit better in recent months that a year ago. But Scripture reminds us that true prosperity comes from making the Lord our priority, not from investing in even the best analyst's picks of mutual funds. Material wealth fluctuates and eventually slips forever beyond our grasp when we die. But living to please God earns eternal dividends.
The second verse of Psalm 128 mentions prosperity: "You will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours." What's it mean to "eat the fruit of your labour"? To reap the harvest of what you sow; when you work hard at something, to see the reward for doing it. The opposite is frustration, investing a lot of energy in something only to see it flop. Somewhere there's a disconnection between your input and your outget.
This frustration of those who rebel against God is shown in various ways in the Bible. In Genesis 4(12), the curse of Cain for killing his brother Abel is that when he works the ground, it will no longer yield its crops. There's a disconnect between the effort and the effect. In Deuteronomy 28(39), one of the threatened curses of disobedience is that the Israelites will plant and cultivate vineyards but God will send worms so they don't get to drink the wine or gather the grapes. In Isaiah 62(8), enemies get the grain and wine for which the Jews have toiled; chapter 65(22) prophesies a time of blessing when they will no longer plant and others eat. Haggai (2:17; 1:6) told the people that because they hadn't honoured God by rebuilding the temple, the Lord had struck them with blight, mildew, and hail; they planted much but harvested little, they'd earned wages only to put them in purses with holes in them. So in the Old Testament, when people refused to make God a priority, He used pests, enemies, and diseases to discipline them and erode the blessing which should have resulted from their labour. There was a disconnect, a sabotaging of their efforts; their labour turned out to be frustrated and futile.
In the New Testament, the apostle Paul expresses positively this principle that God blesses work that's done for Him. 1Cor.15:58 says, "Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain." Not futile or pointless; what's done for Jesus pays off. So in the psalm, the faithful "will eat the fruit of their labour."
We need only to think of the 1001 ways folks squander their paycheque to see the ways labour and reward are disconnected today. For some, it's too easy to stop off at the bar or beer store and spend a big chunk of their wages in alcohol before the cheque even gets home. For others, slot machines or lottery tickets are the big money-drain. Other homes are plagued by maxed-out credit cards and exorbitant interest rates, the result of yielding to tempting offers of "no money down and 99 years to pay". When God is not our priority, the idols to which we've given ground will show up quite quickly as soon as we get some disposable income in hand. Honouring God with our spending helps us eat the fruit of our labour.
Note also v5, "May the LORD bless you from Zion all the days of your life; may you see the prosperity of Jerusalem..." Both verses 2 and 5 mention PROSPERITY. Is this talking about Winnebagos and Caribbean cruises? Let's guard against the deception of what's called "prosperity theology". The Hebrew word translated "prosperity" means good, pleasant, a benefit, for one's welfare. In other words, things will "go well" for you - just well, not necessarily luxuriously.
Is there any hint of "prosperity theology" in the New Testament? In Eph.1(3) Paul writes that God "has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ." Our Father's blessing of us is primarily spiritual not material. The apostles knew hunger and adversity. In Romans 8(18) Paul considers "our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us." He spoke of "groaning inwardly" and "weakness"; trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger, and sword. But God's blessing came through in spite of the hardships, for, as v37 says, "in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us."
Did the Lord Jesus preach prosperity? After the encounter with the rich young ruler, Jesus commented how hard it is for the rich to enter the Kingdom of God. It's hard to let go of the one to receive the other. Yet to those who left homes and fields for the His sake and the gospel, He promised they'd receive a hundred times as much of these things - with persecutions; "and in the age to come, eternal life." (Mk.10:23,29f) So for Christians our ultimate security is not related to Jerusalem as it was for the Psalmist, but our final hope and treasure lies in God's eternal Kingdom -- Christ's "well done, good and faithful servant; enter into the joy of your Master" (Mt.25:21).
Posterity
The final aspect of the picture of blessing Psalm 128 presents is found in vv3,6: "Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your sons will be like olive shoots around your table...may you live to see your children’s children." This can be called POSTERITY, the generations that come after. On this Sanctity of Human Life Sunday, it is these verses that are most strongly pro-life, challenging the attitude of selfishness and materialism that engulfs so much of the developed world today.
Grapevines (the wife) and olives (the sons) were basic to Israel's security and prosperity; they were Palestine's chief exports. Our Canadian equivalent might be wheat and forest products. Olives actually provided three sorts of staples: wood, fruit, and oil. So the picture here of the family around the table symbolizes security and productivity.
V3 likens the wife to a "fruitful vine". Grapevines produce best when they have support, such as wires to keep them up off the ground. The "husbandman" carefully trains the vines along the supports and prunes them to produce fruit rather than excess unusable growth. To husbands this choice of imagery implies that our wives need our support, our nurture, in order to thrive and be most fruitful. Neglect forces them to become "woody" and tough in order to support and protect themselves; that takes energy away from blossoms and fruit.
The children are "like olive shoots around your table", springing up like suckers at the base of a tree. The image is prolific, several shoots. Psalm 127 (especially vv3-5, just before) notes that children are a reward from the Lord, like arrows; "Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them." Pro-life, valuing and promoting children. The Geneva Bible comments on this verse, "Because God's favour appears in no outward thing more than in the increase of children, He promises to enrich the faithful with this gift."
There is a tendency amongst couples in the developed world today to have fewer children than in previous generations. The effect of such an attitude becomes quite dramatic and negative on the whole society over time, both in numbers and social conditions for retirees. Canada's birth rate in 2001 was only 1.51 babies per woman of child-bearing age - well below replacement level. In Russia, the birthrate is only 1.2 children per family; this, coupled with a rise in the death rate due to widespread alcoholism and the spread of disease and poverty, is decimating the nation. Russia's population is expected to drop by 20 million over the next decade. It's expected to fall from 149 million today to just 90 million by the year 2050, a cut of 40%. In Japan, the population is expected to peak in 2006, then decline by 27 million (or 21%) to about 100 million by 2050. Hungary's population will drop from 10 million in the year 2000 to only 6 million by 2040, another 40% drop.
Such depopulation has grave implications for pensioners. In Europe, it looks like there will be one worker for each retired person by 2050. The declined population has already led to reductions in social services, and angry demonstrations in France, Austria, and Italy. The United Kingdom has announced it will raise the retirement age from 65 to 70 to combat the ominous drain in pension funds caused by its low birth rate. In Italy, pensions paid to the elderly will rise from one-third of the government's spending today to 60% by 2050, when Italians over 60 years of age will constitute half the population. In October the government announced an increase in the retirement age, which resulted in a nation-wide strike that paralysed the country for a day.
God meant children to be viewed as a blessing, a reward and heritage from Him. But the media and materialistic pressures of society are not family-friendly. Reality magazine comments, "Couples are in the midst of an historic revolution that is weakening the family and devaluing the role of children in people's lives. A relentless drive for consumer-gratification and self-fulfilment has taken the world down a path that threatens its very existence. Dropping marriage rates, increased divorce, and high abortion rates are the symptoms of this illness. People used to regard the birth of a child as a priceless gift. Now parents, both of whom often work outside the home, complain about the complications of organizing their day around school hours and other inconveniences incompatible with their affluent lifestyle. Parents argue that they are having only one child to provide that child with the "best" of everything - schools, toys, clothes - but no brothers or sisters with whom to share his/her life."
That's blunt and tough talk about an issue that is generally regarded as a private matter. But it does remind us our individual decisions affect all of society. There's no need to be judgmental toward couples who don't have more kids than the norm; often there are other factors such as age, genetics, or medical reasons outsiders know nothing about. But Christian parents who can have kids (and those considering marriage) should pray carefully about the "target" for their number of "arrows", and be influenced by Biblical attitudes rather than societal views and materialistic thinking.
What about singles and couples who can't have children? Jesus calls us to be "fruitful" and leave a posterity in another sense. In John 15(8,16) He said the Father is glorified if we bear much fruit; Christians are appointed to "bear fruit, fruit that will last". The context here would interpret "fruit" as loving actions as well as discipleship.
Did Jesus have kids? Biologically speaking, no, He exercised the gift of celibacy. But what a posterity, nevertheless, spiritually speaking! The author of Hebrews (2:13) talks about the "many sons" God brought to glory through Jesus, and applies these words to Him: "Here am I, and the children God has given Me." The apostle Paul also was unmarried, but spiritual "begetting" was his main occupation. He wrote to the Corinthians (1Cor.4:15), "In Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel." Elsewhere he calls Titus and Onesimus his "sons" and talks of being "in the pains of childbirth" until Christ is formed in those he's discipling (Titus 1:4; Phm.1:10; Gal.4:19). So even if you're not in a position to have biological children, any believer can be producing spiritual "offspring" for the Lord. That's a true posterity that will outlast any earthly accumulations; you'll have your "kids" with you in heaven!
Visibly Honouring God's Gift of Life in a Family
Brian Doerksen lives in Abbotsford, British Columbia, and has written well-known praise choruses such as "Come, Now is the Time to Worship" and "Refiner's Fire". In 1999, in opposition to the gloom-filled predictions about the new millennium, he planted a grove of 12 trees on a hill beside his house as a visible reminder of the godly heritage he was establishing in his children (he has 6). He researched trees that would match his family members' personalities and be suited to the BC climate.
Some examples of the trees he picked: for Mercy Rose, age 8 - a Morgan red maple. Doerksen explains, "This tree is red all year. It's like God's endless mercy, the quality we see in our daughter's life." Benjamin, 12, is the most severely affected of 3 children who suffer from Fragile X Syndrome, a genetic condition causing varying degrees of mental retardation. For him there is a yellow-flowered tulip tree. "Its flowers are fragrant and fragile like his life, but in its maturity, it's incredibly strong." For Esther, 13, a katsura with heart-shaped leaves that change colour about 6 times a year. Her father explains, "Esther is our child with the artistic flair. She loves music, acting, and changing her clothes several times a day." For Joyce, Brian's wife, there is a legacy sugar maple. He says, "From her flows sweet love and provision for our family." (Awww!)
Adam Villiers was the victim of a botched abortion; he weighed barely two pounds at birth. His birth mother abandoned him, and later his adoptive father left the home. The Doerksens befriended Adam, who's now 26, and there's a tree for him, too. "The black gum is the smallest in the grove, the rarest and most fragile. It's a slow grower but spectacular when mature." What a beautiful and profound way to celebrate each family member and praise God for their unique and valuable lives!
Grace Fox who wrote the article quotes Brian Doerksen: "I want to live my life based on what God says is true." Then she adds, "The grove reminds him that God is in control of his life and the lives of his children." Let's pray.