Jesus and the End-Time

The Ethics of the End-Time
 Faithfulness

Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. Philippians 2:14-16
Paul exhorted the Philippians to faithfulness in the light of the coming day of Christ. They, along with many others, were Paul's lifework; how well they did "in the day of Christ" would reflect on how well he did. For in the day of Christ the real value of our work will be revealed. In that context faithfulness to duty is part of the ethics of the end-time.

Not, of course, that fear of judgment is sufficient motivation for faithfulness, but every mature person is interested in serious evaluation of his work. He does not want flattery. He does not want his work to be judged on the basis of his personality or even on the basis of his ability; he wants it judged on the basis of its real worth. He will do the work for other reasons if he is mature, but when it is done, he wants to know how good it is.

Paul makes a distinction between our selves and our work. We are God's children. We are saved by his grace. He will no more cast us out of this Kingdom because of poor work than we would throw one of our children out of the house because of a bad report card. On the other hand, he is not the sort of Father who will call bad work good work. In another place Paul made that clear:
For no other foundation can anyone lay but that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw-each man's work will become manifest; for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work which any man has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire (1 Corinthians 3:11-15).
So there will be judgment on our work. We will know in the day of Christ whether we have done well or not. But the point we often miss is that the product of our work as servants of Christ shows up in the lives of other people. This is true not only of "evangelistic" work but of virtually all work done for the sake of Christ. Whether we do the works of love or fail to do them, the effect inevitable shows up in the lives of others as well as our own. It was with that effect in mind that the late Frank Neuberg would tell us, his theological students, with great irony: "after all, brethren, you are not dentists, dealing with something important, like teeth, You're only dealing with the souls of men."

So you can see why Paul puts the performance of the Philippians so high in his concern. How well they do will show how well he did. What, then, is the mark and what is the course of faithfulness lived in the certainty of the coming day of Christ?

The mark of Christian faithfulness is the doing of duty, but it is duty performed in a certain way: "without grumbling and questioning." There are certainly non-Christians in the world who are faithful in their duties; there are even non-Christians in the world of especially sunshiny and optimistic natures who do their duties without grumbling and questioning. But that is not the point. The point is that Christians are to do their duty without grumbling and questioning whether they have sunshiny dispositions or not. When you do your duty without grumbling and questioning, even internally, then you are doing it as a free person. You freely consent to it. You are not doing it out of fear or because you have been forced; you are doing it because it is the nature of Christ in you to do it.

Robert Frost once captured what it means to have this attitude toward duty. Two out-of-work lumberjacks came upon him one day as he was splitting wood in his yard. He loved to split wood himself, and he was very good at it. He knew what they wanted. They needed work, so they wanted him to hire them to split his wood.
Nothing on either side was said.
They knew they had but to stay their stay
And all their logic would fill my head;
As that I had no right to play
With what was another man's work for gain.
My right might be love but theirs was need.
And where the two exist in twain
Theirs was the better right-agreed.

But yield who will to their separation,
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For heaven and the future's sakes.1
The Christian who can do all things without grumbling and complaining is the one who knows how to "make love and need one." What he must do is what he loves to do.

Those who succeed in this may be "blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world." We do not earn our forgiveness by being uncomplaining people. No one earns God's forgiveness. Rather, the faithful here are seen through the eyes of the crooked and perverse generation. Even the evil world finds nothing to blame in them; the light with which they shine is bright and unblemished.

This begins to have that radical and idealistic "turn the other cheek" sound to it; it is tempting to back away from it on that account. But it is, remember, an ethic of the end-time; you can stick to your duty without complaint because Jesus is coming! And the source of this faithfulness is even more than that powerful conviction; it consists in holding fast the Word of life.

These Philippians did not have the convenience of pocket-size New Testaments so that the Word of life could be carried close at hand. If they were to hold fast the Word of life, it had to be in their heads and hearts. That is the only real way to do it now; proximity to a book is not the same as clinging to its message.

It is the work of words to give structure and meaning to human life. In infancy we are talked into speech, and our understanding of the world develops with the broadening of our vocabularies. That is not the only way understanding develops, but it is the only way understanding develops, but it is the primary way. (Great music comes to us without words; but when music is taught, the teacher uses words.)

Beyond this ordinary use of words the Christians have in the Gospel the Word of life. It structures their experience with God, and from it they derive the wisdom and power to live faithfully according to the ethics of the end-time. Ministers harp about attendance at worship and Bible study, not because these are "good works" in themselves, but because through them the word of life is mediated. If Christians let go of the Word of life, they forget who they are and what they are supposed to do.

C.S. Lewis may not have intended the following as a parable of what it means to live by the Word and hold fast to it, but the story is excellent or that purpose. The lion Aslan sends the girl Jill on a quest to look for a lost prince. If she is to succeed in it she must remember four signs that Aslan tells her (in words). These signs are objects and events she must look for on her quest. Just before she goes, he gives her this exhortation:
Remember, remember, remember the Signs. Say them to yourself when you wake in the morning and when you lie down at night, and when you wake in the middle of the night. And whatever strange things happen to you, let nothing turn your mind from following the Signs. And secondly, I give you a warning. Here on the mountain I have spoken to you clearly: I will not often do so down in Narnia. Here on the mountain, the air is clear and your mind is clear; as you drop down into Narnia, the air will thicken. Take great care that it does not confuse your mind. And the Signs which you have learned here will not look at all as you expect them to look, when you meet them there. That is why it is so important to know them by heart and pay no attention to appearances. Remember the Signs and believe the Signs.2
How do you hold fast the Word of life? Remember, remember, remember. Above all remember that it is true, no matter what the circumstances may be in the midst of this crooked and perverse generation.

Faithfulness in the end-time is no easy business: but it is laid upon us. And it is possible, if we do our duty without grumbling and questioning and if we hold fast the Word of life.

1 Robert Frost, "Two Tramps in Mud Time," in Major American Writers, pp. 1634-1635.

2 C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair, Collier Books, 1971, p. 21.
Martin Luther was passionate in his opinion that God's truth should be kept constantly before the attention of God's people:
Not only do we need God's Word daily as we need our daily bread; we also must use it daily against the daily, incessant attacks and ambushed of the devil with his thousand arts…Deuteronomy 6:7,8 solemnly enjoins that we should always meditate upon his precepts whether sitting, walking, standing, lying down, or rising, and keep them before our eyes and in our hands as a constant token and sign. …Are we not most marvelous fellows, therefore, if we imagine, after reading or hearing it once, that we know it all and need not read it or study it anymore?…Let all Christians exercise themselves in the Catechism daily, and constantly put it into practice, guarding themselves with the greatest care and diligence against the poisonous infection of such security or vanity. Let them continue to read and teach, to learn and meditate and ponder. Let them never stop until they have proved by experience that they have taught the devil to death and have become wiser than God himself and all his saints.
Martin Luther, "Preface to the Large Catechism," in The Book of Concord, translated and edited by Theodore G. Tappert, Muhlenberg Press, 1959, pp. 360, 361.

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