Here, let me clear up the false assumption: you were never once pure.  Scripture teaches us that we were all born impure.  From the moment you were conceived in your mamma’s belly, you were tainted.  You were born a cute, cuddly sinner—a rebel against God.  Here’s how King David, the “man after God’s heart,” clears up our assumption, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” (Psalm 51:5).  Or let’s let Jeremiah take a crack at it, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).  Or, let’s hear from Saint Paul, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23).  Or, again, “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.  All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” (Romans 3:10-12).  I remember taking a private, Greek reading course with Dr. Don Carson in his office.  The first passage he had me learn was Romans 3.  Not only did I better understand my moral depravity after this, but also my intellectual depravity!

After reading all of these Scriptures, I hope you begin to realize that you never started off pure.  Your soul was sinful, deceitful, sick, fallen, unrighteous, and worthless, to name a few.  I know what you’re thinking, I should write Hallmark cards.  Nevertheless, I’d bet you a six-pack (of Cream Soda) and a pizza that the way these verses describe humanity is exactly how you feel.

Worthless, fallen, deceitful, sick, sinful, etc.  Is this how you feel?  Welcome to earth, for that’s how it feels to be a sinner.  Sinners, because of their sin, feel worthless.  Sinners, because of their sin, feel sick.  You get the idea?

Why do I belabor this point?  Unless we clear up this false assumption, then you’ll be under the delusion that there’s something that you can do to cleanse your own conscience.  But there’s not anything that you can do to cleanse your own conscience and make the guilt go away.  If you try, you’ll wind up being like Lady MacBeth, constantly scrubbing your hands to get rid of all the guilty spots, but never being able to do so.  “Out damn spot!”  The book of Hebrews makes it clear that human acts, even if they are religious ones, like offering a bull or goat on the altar, can never cleanse the conscience (see Hebrews 9:13-14 and 10:1-22).

With the assumption cleared up, we’re able to see that there’s nothing that you can do to make the guilt and shame go away.

Your help must come from outside of yourself.  The church Reformer, Martin Luther, called this “alien righteousness.”  We need a righteousness that comes from outside of us, that is alien to us.  We are totally depraved, as discussed above, and unless we have someone else’s righteousness land on our lives, then we’ll forever remain how we are.  You’ll never get rid of your faults, sin, shame, sickness, and wickedness, on your own.

Before I move on, I also have to say that just because we’re totally sinful, does not mean that we’re as bad as we possibly could be.  To say so, would be untrue.  I am not as bad as I could be.  I could be a lot worse, and so could you.  Though we are born into sin, we do not do every sin possible.  We all eat from the sin-buffet, but we do not eat all of the food at the sin-buffet, all at once.

So how do I become pure again?  There are two steps.  First, repent and turn to Jesus.  And second, repent and turn to Jesus.

I’ll take the first one first.  The first step in becoming pure is to turn to an irrevocable source of purity.  God gave his Son Jesus Christ to us in order to forgive us our sins and make us pure.  “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.” (Romans 3:21-22).  God gives the most precious gift to those who trust in Jesus: righteousness.  Think of righteousness as “right-ness with a smile.”  Along with righteousness come a clear conscience and purity.  When God looks at those who are hiding beneath the blood of Jesus, he sees nothing but pure souls.  Jesus is our source of alien righteousness.

Jesus justifies us, in other words.  Justify basically means to “righteousify” or “purify.”  We are instantaneously cleansed and called “not guilty.”  Jesus absorbed all of your sin on the cross.  Your notice of charges, which Roman soldiers nailed above the heads of all crucified criminals, was placed above Jesus’ head.  Jesus died beneath your notice of charges.  Every sexual sin you’ve ever committed was charged to Jesus.  He died for them all, absorbing all the punishment that they deserved.

Jesus was punished for all of your sins and there remains no punishment for your sins.  Want to know how I know?  The resurrection is the proof!  After Jesus got done absorbing all of the punishment for your sins and bearing the complete wrath of God toward unrighteousness, he was free to go.  Jesus only remained in death so long as there were sins to keep him there.  But after he consumed all of the sins that the world had to offer, he didn’t need to remain in death anymore; he was free to rise.  Thus, the resurrection is standing proof that there’s nothing more to pay for the sins of the world.  They are “paid in full.”  As Paul says in Romans 4:25, Jesus “was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.”

If he were not raised, then we would have no proof that all the penalties had been paid; since he has been raised, we have confidence that there is nothing more to pay for our sins, either by Jesus or by us.  Do you comprehend the sweetness of that?  Jesus has been fully punished for your sins and there is nothing left for you to pay.  The wrath of God struck down and landed on Jesus, not you.  You are free to go.  You, who were once dead, have been made alive.

“And you, who were dead in trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt [notice of charges] that stood against us with its legal demands.  This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.” (Colossians 2:13-14).

The second step is like the first, repent and turn to Jesus.  You need to repent every day of your life.  Every day of your life, you need to turn from self and turn to Savior.  You need to turn away from sin and turn toward God.  You must live beneath the banner of the blood, trusting in Jesus for your joy.

Just like God will justify you through Jesus, so will he sanctify you through Jesus.  To sanctify means to “make holy.”  While justification is instantaneous, sanctification is a lifelong process.  God continues to work on us for the rest of our lives, making us holier and holier.  Here’s God’s wish for us, as we struggle with sin: “Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.  He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.” (1 Thessalonians 5:23-24).

Did you notice who will sanctify us and make us blameless?  That’s right, God will!  God will continue to make you pure in spirit, in soul, and in body, as the verse says.  God will keep you blameless, in other words.  When you are face to face with God after you die, you will still be blameless.  God will look at you, despite all of your sins, and he will say, “You are blameless!”  Why?  Because God first looked at his Son and said, “I blame you, Jesus, for all of their sin!”

Keep turning to God, relying on the gift of Jesus.  When you sin, turn to God.  He will keep you blameless, trust him.  Remember, you have no righteousness of your own to enter into the equation.  It all comes from Jesus.

Don’t sit and sulk, but stand and seek.  “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9).  Confess your sins to God, and he WILL forgive you.  There is no forgiveness outside of his.  Keep turning to God.  The measure of your righteousness is not determined by the good works you are able to do, but the bad works you are able to repent of.

Don’t forget about verse ten, “If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” (1 John 1:10).  Don’t assume you once were pure, you were not.  Instead, turn to God through Jesus Christ and he will make you pure.

© Samuel Kee, 2012

Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, “He has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.”  I love this verse.  It reveals that every person is searching for eternity.  We’re all aching to find life, purpose, significance, and meaning.  Yet, oftentimes, we search for the infinite among the finite.  So we get frustrated and, instead of changing course, we just speed up.  We continue to look for the infinite among the finite.  We get bigger possessions, demand louder applause, search for a deeper love.  But, as the verse says, we cannot find eternity among earthly pursuits.  “He cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to end.”  From the beginning of time to the end of time, you’ll never be able to find the eternal in your earthly pursuits.  No matter how long or hard you look, you’ll never be satisfied by the things of this world.  God has played a trick on you.  He has put a hunger in your heart that will never go away, until you’ve tasted the Bread of Life.  You’ll continue to ache, even if you have all that this world has to offer.  The converse is true, too: the beggar will be satisfied if he finds God, though his shirt is torn and he has only one shoe.

Get a realistic view of life: there is God and there is suffering—and don’t ever confuse the two.  What war are you going through right now?  May your war give you clear eyes, enabling you to see that we are no longer in Paradise, but Paradise needs to be our pursuit.

© Samuel Kee, 2012

Here’s a video that I did with Steve Hiller from Unlocking the Bible. The Trinity is one of the major distinctives of the Christian faith. In the video, I describe the Trinity and then give some implications of it.

As I say in the video, I’ve heard several stories of cancer recently–more than usual. They’ve been heart-wrenching to learn about. This video is a small attempt to bring some sense to our suffering. It’s not meant to be a robust argument for the problem of evil in this world, but a pastoral one. I’ve come to realize that one of the best ways to encourage a weary soul is to point to the care and power of God. This video contains thoughts on Aslan from the Chronicles of Narnia, the small verse “Jesus wept,” and three reasons for comfort.

While this can be very helpful, it can also be very toxic.  There’s a line from Coldplay’s song Fix You that says, “When you try your best but you don’t succeed.  When you get what you want but not what you need.”  I find this very telling.  It doesn’t take too much brainpower to comprehend that our needs are different than our wants and that too much of the latter can destroy us.  For example, though I may want an endless supply of cash, fame, or buffets, these are probably not what I need—unless I really want to be stingy, secluded, or stout.  Ironically, too much of any “freedom” actually leads to imprisonment.  You become a slave to what you want the most and are free to get.  And if you’re the slave, the object of your desire is your taskmaster, oftentimes working you to death.

I say all of this simply to bring us to the point of admitting that what I want and what I need are two different things.  Further, what I actually need might be something that I currently have no interest in or desires for.  You might want me to present a solution that does not involve God or the Bible or any form of religion, but is that what you need?  Maybe your life is the way it is, because you’ve been chasing after what you wanted and have never found what you actually needed.

Google, I love you, but you leave us with gaping blind spots.  You keep the spotlight on ourselves, while the surrounding world of possibilities remains in the dark, unsearched.  You give me more of me, which is not what I need.  I need a solution that is outside of me, unlike me, and not so narrow-minded.  I don’t need more of my same biases, ethnocentrism, and gender stereotypes.  I don’t need to be electrocuted by the cultural brainwave, as it zaps away the deep and ancient, leaving me only with the shallow and modern.

So let me transport you out of the clutches of Google, out of the grip of cultural ethnocentrism, and out of the grasp of pop-culture, i-This and i-That.  We’re going to a place and time that are far away, to a strange people in a strange land, bearing the weight of a strange situation.  We’re going to ancient Israel, to a voice crying in the wilderness, nearly 2,500 years ago.  Here we will find a people who have been taken captive by an oppressive nation in the 6^th Century B.C.  They have been conquered, captured, and enslaved, and they’re not sure if they will ever make it home again.  They don’t know if anyone really cares, if God is really there, or if they even have a prayer.

They’re surrounded by a culture that glorifies war and spends its spare time hunting.  They are urban, religious, and violent.  For fun, the kings will release lions into an arena and chase them with a spears and chariots.  For worship, sons and daughters were burned to death in order to make sacrifices that pleased the gods.

Welcome to Babylon.

Though ancient Israel is very different than us, if you look closely, beneath the surface, you’ll see the ink of the same tattoos.  You’ll see the scars of the same struggles and the fears of the same battle.  You’ll see yourself.

I am taking you deep into a Hebrew book of the Bible called Isaiah, which was written both to condemn sin and comfort sinners.  The plot line of Isaiah goes something like this: Though God’s people fail, God’s Servant will prevail.  How did they fail?  On two levels.  First, they failed to stay true to their God.  They were blind (Isaiah 42:19), inattentive (Isaiah 42:20), falling short (Isaiah 42:21), radically disobedient (Isaiah 42:24), and insensitive (Isaiah 42:25).  Second, they failed in the sense that their homeland was destroyed.  Now they find themselves in Babylon, being defeated, dominated, discouraged, and displaced.  They feel every sharp and lonely edge of the word “exile.”

Though God’s people fail, God’s Servant will prevail.  Isaiah, notwithstanding the present circumstances, tells his people their circumstances do not have the last say.  I found the mouthful of a word “notwithstanding” to be an ocean of comfort.  It means “despite the fact” or “though you would have expected this to be the case, actually this is the case.”  Though you are in exile, hope is very real.  Despite the fact that your scars are very real and painful, God has not left you.

Notwithstanding the sharks, your rescue is close.

Written on your soul by the very finger of God is a tattoo that says, “You are mine.”  In the four chapters that follow, we’ll learn that you are God’s through creation, formation, redemption, and calling.  Here’s how Isaiah puts it in Isaiah 43:1:

But now thus says the LORD,

he who created you, O Jacob,

he who formed you, O Israel:

“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;

I have called you by name, you are mine.

The little phrase “but now” means notwithstanding all the reasons you think that God is bogus or against you, he is actually laying claim to you.  Notwithstanding your scars, there is a stain that runs deeper, which says “You Are Mine.”  This is the first soul tattoo, written on every person who reads these words and even on those who don’t.  Despite your expectations and experiences, God has copyrighted you as his own masterpiece.

God looks at you and says, “You are mine.”  He’s put this tattoo on your soul, so that you will never forget it.

© Samuel Kee, 2012

At first, you might think that facing sharks for 47 days would be worse than losing your dignity.  You may think that nearly starving to death, seeing your friends slaughtered, or being attacked by a fighter plane while you’re floating in an unarmed raft, is worse than anything else that you can endure.  Louis had suffered all of that, and what he discovered, as documented by Laura Hillenbrand in her 2010 novel Unbroken, was unbelievable.  Zamperini experienced that the loss of dignity is worse than anything else he had gone through.  At least when he was starving, he still retained his humanity.  At least when he was fighting the sharks, he was still fighting.  When his enemies began to spit on him, put his face in feces, and treat him like an animal, he nearly broke.  Nothing else caused him to ponder suicide like the loss of his dignity.

In order to survive, humans need essentials like air, food, water, shelter, clothing—and dignity.  Dignity is necessary to human survival and flourishing.  It’s at the baseline, along with common nutrients.  Without it, the human soul dies.  And when your soul is dead, your body longs to follow.  Dignity, therefore, is essential to humanity.  To take away someone’s dignity is to discard their humanity, to trample their life and worth in the muck.  You can’t live on as a human if you do not have your humanity.

People get tattoos for many reasons.  But there’s one common theme: each tattoo tells a story.  Tattoos are a way of permanently recording one’s sense of humanity, lest we forget.  With permanent ink, we remember a feeling, an experience, a love, a victory, a loss.  All the stuff that makes us feel our humanity, bringing it right to the surface.  Believe it or not, tattoos are an attempt to maintain one’s dignity.  They’re a powerful metaphor for one’s quest to find dignity that will not go away, that no storm can wash out.  Tattoos are tributes and trophies to what it means to be human, to be me.

But the sharks still circle, the bullets still fly, and the enemies still spit.  What then?  Is it possible, in other words, to find a source of dignity that runs deeper than our scars?  What if I were to tell you that everyone has tattoos?  But these tattoos are not necessarily on your skin, in plain sight.  These tattoos are stains that run much deeper, so deep that they’re untouchable.  They are stories written on your soul, which nothing can harass away.

They are soul tattoos.

And the best place to see them is exile.  You have your own POW camps and your own prison guards, as do I.  The metanarrative, the overarching story, of humanity is that of exile.  We are all displaced, discouraged, defeated, and dominated.  We’re all adrift in the middle of a shark infested ocean, crying out to be rescued from drowning, waiting for someone to throw us a lifeline.

It is in this place of desperation, where we see the stains that run deeper than the scars.  Here we’re given clarity, having every other noisy obstacle removed.  We’re stripped of everything that enables us to remain self-dependent and blind.  Believe it or not, only when some of the things we cherish are removed, can we begin to see clearly.  Only when we lose ourselves, can we find ourselves.  Then we are able to see the tattoos on our souls that tell us of our beginning, purpose, worth, calling, and love.

I have this crazy idea that tattooed on your soul are permanent stories of who you are, which you must see if you’re going to have true dignity.  And they don’t come from what you’ve been able to accomplish or what has been handed to you by others.  These tattoos come from another hand, which has some tattoos of its own.

In the ancient Hebrew book of Isaiah, we read about some tattoos that are on the very hands of God.  Here’s what it says,

“Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.”

(Isaiah 49:16)

This verse recalls the Hebrew practice of drawing pictures on the skin by puncturing its surface.  The symbolism of such a practice is best represented by modern day tattoos.  It seems that God has tattooed the names of his people on his hands.  This is a good place to start.  We must start by seeing God’s tattoos if we’re going to be able to see our own.

From the same Hebrew book, we will discover our own tattoos, punctured into our souls.  Each tattoo is a story from God, an eternity of dignity in a world of insanity.  As your lungs take in each breath, I want you to start entraining your thoughts to these soul tattoos, found in Isaiah 43:1-7.

[Inhale.]

You are mine.

[Exhale.]

[Inhale.]

I will be with you.

[Exhale.]

[Inhale.]

I love you.

[Exhale.]

[Inhale.]

I created you for my glory.

[Exhale.]

© Samuel Kee, 2012

You don’t see the treasure that is you, you see only the junk that gets mixed up in our lives.  It’s the stuff that’s there, in everybody’s life, but it’s not who you are.  Other people shove their junk in your path; you even add yours to theirs.  But that doesn’t define who you are; it just gives us all something to do.

You are the treasure, can’t you see it?  God made a bold move to earth in order to snatch you up for himself.  He gave away his Son in order to provide a way for you to return home.  And something’s worth is defined by what someone is willing to give away in order to get it.  God has his special eye on you, for he is a real treasure-hunter.  And you are his treasure.

© Samuel Kee, 2012

One day, another king learned of your slavery.  He was called the King of Heaven.  He knew what it would cost to free you from the King of Sin.  It seemed almost too much to bear, but the King of Heaven made up his mind.  He went home to his wife and son.  He played games with his son for hours, took him for ice cream, and read him a story before bed.  In bed, the man held his son in his arms for hours—until daybreak.

At daybreak, he took his son to the King of Sin.  The bloodthirsty king smiled with wretched delight.  He seized the boy and dragged him into the camp.  When the boy looked to his dad for help, his dad turned his face away.  The boy felt so alone, as he was led into the camp.  The King of Sin unlocked your chains and let you go.  You walked out, right past the boy, who was walking in, bravely.  The King of Sin took your chains and locked them around the boy.  The King of Heaven opened his arms wide and welcomed you home.  The King of Sin reached for some nails.  The King of Heaven reached for a ring.  A moment later, you heard a loud scream from inside the camp, as the King of Heaven plunged a ring around your finger.

The King of Heaven looks with delight at you; you look with delight at him.  You know what it cost to free you; and you weren’t about to disappoint him.  You walk home with him, hand-in-hand.  As you go, you pass another king, a most dreadful one, like the King of Sin.  He motions to you.  You look at his hand and see that he is holding another chain, beckoning for you to put it on.  You shudder with horror and grip the King of Heaven’s hand even tighter.  You say to him, “I will never leave you.”  He says back to you, “I will never let go of you.”  For once, you believe it.

That wasn’t the only chain offered to you.  Every day of your life, a new king held out his chain to you.  And every day of your life, you have to choose to stay close to your king.  Not only because of what it cost him to free you, but also because of the love he gives you.  All other kings rule by chains, but only yours rules with a ring.

© Samuel Kee, 2012

Time Magazine

Immediately, this reminded me of a controversial bit of Scripture in the book of Isaiah, one where God is likened to a mother.  Here what God says to his people:

“Can a woman forget her nursing child, that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb?  Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.”  (Isaiah 49:15).

Go ahead and ask a mother who’s breastfeeding her child, “Will you forget about your baby?” and see what she says.  She’d laugh at you, peering down at her child and respond something like, “As if that would ever happen!”  To be a mother is to be someone who feels deeply and sacrificially for a child.

But even our most attached mothers will only nurse for a few years, before they call it quits.  That’s the part that astounds me about this verse.  This verse says that long after Jamie forgets about her children, God will still be caring for them.

Long after the best mom on earth forgets about intimately nourishing and caring for her children, God will still be mothering his.  Call it “attachment parenting.”

God is deeply attached to you.  Long after this world lets you down, God will still have you in his arms, pressed against his heart.  He will not let go of you.

Either you are his child, or not.  If someone asked me, “Are you the child of John and Victoria?” I would respond either yes or no.  There’s no in between, no guessing.  Being a child is not a matter of feeling or opinion; rather, it’s a legal standing.  When God calls you his child, either you are or you aren’t.  It’s not a matter of feeling or opinion.  It doesn’t depend on how you’ve performed that day or whether you’ve been a good kid or not.  At the end of the day, do you belong to God?  Is he your Mother?  Is he your Father?  Are you his child?

How do you become God’s child?  By asking Jesus Christ to become your brother.  Jesus gives us the right to become children of God (John 1:12).  Jesus puts us into the embrace of a divine Parent who will never stop caring for us.  So, you need to take stock and see if the gods you’re embracing love like this God loves.  Whose arms are you seeking right now?  Is it a person, a relationship, an idea, a possession, a goal?  Take a hard look at the things you’re giving ultimate status to, and ask them, “Are you God enough?”

© Samuel Kee, 2012

Since Louis was in charge, he gave the other men instructions about the chocolate bars, to which they agreed.  They would wait to start eating the bars until the next day, and even then, they’d only eat a little piece.

When the sun rose the next day, after a night of warding off sharks in the Pacific and caring for the wounded in his raft, Louis gets out the food rations.  Astonished, the rations are gone.  He frantically searches, but cannot find them.  Then he looks at one of his comrades, Mac.  As it turns out, Mac had eaten all of the chocolate during the night.  Now, they were completely out.

Little did Mac know that they would be adrift at sea for 46 days. 

So often, we want to know why God allows certain things to happen in our lives.  We want to know why God is slow on answering our prayers—if he does at all.  We don’t understand his ways and his rules.  We find him unfair.  After all, we, like Mac, are hungry.  We think we know what’s best for us, so we do what is right in our own eyes. 

And you can’t blame a guy like Mac, either.  For all he knew, they would be rescued the next day.  Especially after the trauma of warfare and of a plane crash in the middle of the Pacific—not to mention the sharks—what harm would eating chocolate do?  It seemed like a reasonable thing to do.

But the commander knows best.  He is able to see the bigger picture, the contingencies and complexities of it all.  How much more does God see!  He is the Commander of our souls, who has perfect sight.  God sees it all.  Not only does he know what’s best for us, but also he knows when.  And, you’ve got to trust that God will give you enough to sustain you for the day, usually no more. 

As you drift, trust in your Commander.  His plan is always the best, for he knows every wave, shark, and sleepless night that you’ll endure.  He will give you one piece of grace at a time, and it will be sweet. 

He will sustain your soul, whether in life or in death.

© Samuel Kee, 2012