The Fulcrum Of World History

From The Christian Reader:

The Fulcrum of World History


by Eric Rauch



Every year, in late March or early April, Christians around the world commemorate the death and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Although we have come to call the Friday before Resurrection Sunday “Good Friday,” we must keep in mind that there would be nothing good about the Friday without the Sunday. The only reason that we can refer to Friday as being “good” is because of the empty tomb and risen Lord that followed it. In other words, you can’t have a Good Friday without a better Sunday. Likewise, we must remember that Christ is the central focus of both Friday and Sunday, and every other day for that matter. Without Christ, Friday and Sunday would just be two more days of the week and we would still be dead in sins and trespasses.



The person and work of Christ is the hinge point for the entire Bible. As Saint Augustine famously declared: “The New is in the Old concealed, and the Old is in the New revealed.” What he meant by this is that the Bible is a complete book; the Old Testament cannot be rightly understood without the New Testament, and the New Testament cannot be rightly understood without the Old. Jesus Christ is the center-point of history, and not only according to the calendar. The Bible teaches from the very beginning that the “seed of the woman” would crush the head of the deceptive intruder in the garden (Genesis 3:15). This promise from the mouth of God Himself serves as the overarching prophecy of the entire Bible, achieving its fulfillment thousands of years later, outside the city walls of Jerusalem. The Bible revolves around Jesus Christ—the writings of the New Testament connect numerous Old Testament references to His earthly ministry, finding their true meaning in Him. We learn from the book of Hebrews that the entire Old Covenant system looked ahead to Christ, it was merely a shadow of the reality to come (Heb. 7-10). Jesus Christ is the fulcrum of world history. His short life changed the world forever.



In our daily lives, we tend to forget this pretty quickly. We get caught up in the mundane and the trivial far too easily, forgetting that they are merely distractions in a world that has been, and is being, redeemed by what Christ accomplished nearly 2000 years ago. Try as we might to avoid it, we get sidetracked and bogged down by these diversions. This is nothing new, the author of Hebrews addressed this, commending us to keep focused on what really matters:



Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart (Hebrews 12:1-3).





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Jonathan Edwards also understood this tendency of the human heart. His teaching, preaching, and writing often focused on the internal struggle that is constantly raging within, what the apostle Paul referred to as the war between the law of his mind and the law of sin in his body (Romans 7). This life-long process—known as sanctification—is a heart and mind issue. Proverbs tells us that as a man thinks in his heart, so he is (Prov. 23:7). In other words, proper thinking is the first line of defense to sinful tendencies. If we can keep our minds focused on Christ, temptation will have a harder time gaining a foothold in our hearts. To this end, Devotions from the Pen of Jonathan Edwards provides helpful short devotions to foster better thinking—thinking directed toward Christ.



Containing 120 page-length devotionals, this book is one that you will want to have sitting right next to your Bible. Although each one can be read in a minute or so, Edwards’ dense writing style does not waste words in getting to the point. Always convicting and always relevant, Edwards knows where the problem lies and begins there; this is not light reading for the faint of heart. If you are wanting feel-good stories to begin your day, you will need to keep looking. But if you are serious about wrestling with the inner man and furthering your sanctification by feeding your mind, this is the devotional for you. Edwards would not buy into modern psycho-babble about making us feel better about ourselves. He understood that we need to be honest and put ourselves into our proper place first, and let God and His Word do the work.



Here’s an example from one of the devotionals, based on Isaiah 51:8:



This work is a work that God carries on from the fall of man to the end of the world. The work of redemption and the work of salvation are the same thing. What is sometimes in Scripture called God’s saving His people is in other places called His redeeming them. So Christ is called both the Savior and Redeemer of His people…The work of redemption is sometimes understood, in a more limited sense, for the purchase of salvation; for so the word strictly signifies a purchase of deliverance. And if we take the word in this restrained sense, the work of redemption was not so long in doing. But it was begun and finished with Christ’s humiliation. It was all wrought while Christ was upon earth. It was begun with Christ’s incarnation, carried on through Christ’s life, and finished with His death, which ended in His resurrection. But sometimes the work of redemption is taken more largely, including all that God works or accomplishes tending to this end; not only the purchasing of redemption, but also all God’s works that are properly preparatory to the purchase, or as applying the purchase and accomplishing the success of it. All that Christ does in this affair as Mediator, in any of His offices—either of Prophet, Priest, or King, either when He was in this world in His human nature, before, or since—is all but one work, one design. (“The Work of Redemption,” p. 14)



Edwards believed that Christianity was a faith to be practiced with the mind fully-engaged. He had no time for emotional piousness, he was convinced that Christianity was an active faith—a religion to inform and motivate action. For Edwards, the primary example of this was Jesus Himself, Who came not just to give His life, but to live it. The devotionals found in this book are not only perfect examples of how Edwards thought, but also how he lived. He lived convinced of the words of Jesus in John 10:10: “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” Perhaps by reading Devotions from the Pen of Jonathan Edwards, we also will become ignited by the flames of allegiance that lit him; becoming a new generation of thinkers and doers, committed to the whole Christ, the Savior and the Redeemer of His people.