Reformed Church | Pottsville Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But what does this mean? Is appearance everything? Are the glamour magazines to be believed? No, beauty comes in many different shapes, sizes, and proportions. God has made everything (and everyone) beautiful in its time. The discerning eye finds beauty in every form. We know this instinctively. Yet, we don’t believe it about ourselves.

Our fallenness has given us a creaturely discontent with the Creator’s genius. But who are the most beautiful people you know? And why are they beautiful? Is it the proportion of their face, their coloring, or the shape of their features? No, their beauty appears by contrast — kindness when others are cruel, resilience in the midst of adversity, joy when sorrow is the order of the day. Beauty radiates through contrast not conformity. God delights to create beauty through contrast.

He created a world of contrasts. Contrasts which give, even this fallen, groaning, creation a beauty that leaves poets speechless. He began with light and made the world responsive to it. Light creates color and contour, clarity and, yet, concealment. Lighting gives everything perspective. And changing light reveals something new in the familiar. Lighting and contrast are foundational to visual beauty. Through lighting and shading artists breathe life into their work.

But as with all things God made, sensory experience has an analog with spiritual truth. Spiritual truth in scripture is often taught by way of contrast. The Bible tells the triumphal story of how God rescues us from sin, self, and Satan. But the story only becomes compelling when we realize our desperate condition. Until we grasp how bad we are, we cannot see how good the good news is.

The Fall plunged us into irrecoverable ruin. And until we are convinced of this, we will never seek Christ and find redemption. The beauty of the gospel can only be appreciated in contrast to the ugliness of our condition apart from Christ. Our forefathers expressed it this way in the Westminster Larger Catechism.

Q. 27. What misery did the fall bring on mankind?
A. The fall brought on mankind the loss of communion with God and his displeasure and curse, so that we are by nature children of wrath, slaves to Satan, and justly liable to all the punishments of this world and that which is to come.
Q. 28. What are the punishments of sin in this world?
A. The punishments of sin in this world are either inward, as a blindness of mind, a reprobate sense, strong delusions, hardness of heart, horror of conscience, and vile affections; or outward, as the curse of God on the creatures for our sakes, and all the other evils that befall us in our bodies, names, states, relations, and employment, together with death itself.
Q. 29. What are the punishments of sin in the world to come?
A. The punishments of sin in the world to come are everlasting separation from the comforting presence of God, and very grievous torments in soul and body, without intermission, in the fire of hell forever.
Westminster Larger Catechism in Modern English

Our condition is stark. Our ruin is total. Every faculty of our being, every dimension of our life, every moment of our existence from now until all eternity is utterly ruined. We go through life with a nagging sense of misery. We try to cover it with fig leaves – experience, pleasure, education, accomplishment, possessions. We know, instinctively, the truth of our forefather’s words. But misery is not the last word.

The first chapter of Ephesians is a literary masterpiece. In one long breath, Paul extols the beauty and richness of God’s grace to those who are ‘in Christ.’ The Ephesian church faced severe crises internally and externally. False teaching and persecution were leading many to ‘abandon their first love.’ So, God pulls back the curtain to show them the truth of their situation ‘in Christ.’ And to drive the point home, he reminds them of what life was like outside of Christ. In this great contrast we find a clear and concise picture of our lost condition.

Join us this season as we walk through the Westminster Shorter Catechism, Questions 19-23, and consider, ‘why and how Jesus became man in order to save us from ourselves.’ This week we begin in Ephesians 2:1-3, 12 by examining the misery of the condition into which the Fall and our own sin have brought us.

Join us as we see that God calls us to return as well. We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. You can also download the order of service.

Gift giving at our house was never a time for surprises. Our gifts were so predictable we would could have dispensed with wrapping paper altogether. My parents assured me they wanted the same things at every gifting opportunity. For Christmas, my mother received chocolate-covered cherries and a flip calendar refill and my father a new can of Borkum-Riff. At Father’s Day, my sisters and I would collaborate on new white dress shirt. After the presentation of home-made cards and crafts, we would present our gift. He would shake it and feel of it, then carefully, and with great suspense, open the package revealing to no one’s surprise a white Van Heusen dress shirt.

Though it was Sunday, my father would never wear his new shirt on the day it was received. We would implore him to, as a matter of ritual. But he was unmoved. He would lovingly place the unopened shirt in a special draw in his closet and declare, “I will save that one for my funeral.” Why he felt the need to say this, I never knew. He would, of course, eventually wear the shirt. But we never noticed exactly when. As far as we knew, he had indeed saved it for his funeral. But, if so, that would have been his only funeral plan.

My father was not a procrastinator. He was a planner. He loved to plan and organize. Long after my sisters and I moved out, he would mail us detailed agendas of any road trip he might take. He had files of files and lists of lists. He was always a man with a plan. Except, that is, when it came to funeral planning. He had absolutely no interest in thinking about those things. Any suggestion regarding funeral planning was met with swift rebuttal and redirection.

But as a pastor I have noticed how helpful advanced funeral planning is for a grieving family. From decisions about burial places and furnishings, to the logistics of services, down to the music and readings – all these things give you the opportunity to make sure what matters most is shared with those who matter most as they grieve. The thoughts shared at a funeral set the trajectory of grief and establish hope beyond the grave – hope that this is not the end, but only the end of the beginning, hope that there is more to come.

At first glance, it seems that Jesus’ burial arrangements were anything but planned. The only clear preparation the gospels refer to is the anointing of Jesus at Bethany by Mary, the sister of Lazarus. Victims of crucifixion could be claimed by their family for burial, but if not, they were thrown unceremoniously into unmarked graves. The circumstances of Jesus death made it virtually impossible for his family to claim his body. But as Good Friday ebbs away toward the Sabbath, events unfold which reveal that Jesus’ Heavenly Father had providentially made remarkable plans for his funeral, plans foretold hundreds of years before by the prophet Isaiah, who wrote, “And they made his grave … with a rich man in his death.” (Isaiah 53:9).

Jesus burial established a remarkable trajectory of hope for all who believe in him. Had Jesus been tossed into a Roman burial pit, many clear and compelling proofs of the resurrection would not have been possible. But in God’s advanced funeral planning for His Only Begotten Son, he is buried in a prominent place, in a grave secure from unseen access, in a new, unused tomb, wrapped in graveclothes that would be abandoned, and sealed and guarded tenaciously by his enemies. God works through the courage of Joseph of Arimathea and the cowardice of the religious leaders to assure us that Christ is risen indeed. Every detail of Jesus’ burial furnishes forensic proof of the resurrection and assures us of our own redemption.

Join us on Facebook Live at 10:30 am this Lord’s Day, April 5, as we examine Luke 23:50-56 and consider amazing importance of the death and burial of the Lord Jesus. For updates on our current plans for worship while practicing social distancing go to our post, COVID 19 Update.