No Secrets

“But in these final days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom he also created the material universe.” Hebrews 1:2

It is said that we all remember where we were when President Kennedy was shot. For the generation that followed his assassination, perhaps the same can be said about the day the New York Twin Towers fell, perhaps always to be known as “9/11”. I was in second grade when the news hit the country that the President had been shot in Dallas while riding in now infamous black Cadillac convertible. Strangely enough, what I remember most is that school was canceled for at least one day, maybe two, and I spent much of that day off coloring.

My mom, on the other hand, reacted, well…like my mom. I think I inherited her depth of emotion and ability to empathize deeply. About the same age as Jackie Kennedy, Mom imagined the pain and grief she must have felt, sitting alongside her husband, his bloody head in her lap.

Mom was no shy about grand gestures; she wrote the First Lady a letter. I do not remember its contents, and Mom did not make a copy. But, I remember the one she received back. It had an honored place in the very front of our maroon, vinyl photo album for the next three decades. An expression of thanks on Presidential stationery, Kennedy’s signature graced the bottom of the letter. We all knew it was either a machined signature or signed by a secretary, but we showed off our treasure nonetheless. We had heard from Jackie Kennedy!

I like to think I’m in the inner circle. It does my ego good when asked for my opinion on one of the few subjects I may have partially mastered. We all know the look. We share a special tidbit of knowledge, perhaps starting with the famous introduction, “Did you know…”, and then we drop our mysterious insight into the conversation. When the eyebrows go up and the mouths gape just a bit, we are happy we shared our hidden knowledge with the group.

It is a sad thing, though, when this creeps into Christianity. One of the early heresies to infect the followers of Jesus was “Gnosticism”. Apart from a number of idiosyncrasies, Gnosticism taught there were secrets to knowing God. The more of the secrets you uncovered, the more spiritual you were. You could truly awe the uninitiated by your superior knowledge as you plucked words from Scripture, connected them with other “magic” words and show the “spiritual” connections.

In my opinion, we find much of this “secret knowledge” in popular teachings and books on the Second Coming. Whole books are written hinged on a single verse, or single interpretation, and are swallowed hook, line and sinker by the undiscerning. This has happened so much so, that many who have been in the church since the 1970s can’t read the book of Revelation without quoting either “The Late Great Planet Earth” or the “Left Behind” series. Most recently “The Harbinger” has made the rounds claiming secret understandings of Bible prophecy, and applying them to the United States. (If the reader wants to know more, Google a few book reviews.)

Without naming anymore names (I’m probably in enough hot water already), here’s what frustrates me about the “secret knowledge” bit. We are told quite plainly that God has spoken “in these final days” in one particular way. He has spoken to us by His Son. There is no secret. There are no magic words or new interpretations of old Scripture to uncover. God has spoken “in His Son”!

And, to underline the weight of this communication, the writer of Hebrews describes the Son as “heir of all things” and the one through whom the material universe was created. In other words, there is no higher authority. We can take it to the bank, we need no other words. The word God spoke in Christ is true for “these last days”. That word has not been altered.

Though we may say it in any number of ways, the truth does not change. God was in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them, reconciling all things to Himself! There is no need for future prophets. There is no need for present day people to uncover new mysteries. There is no late-day prophesy that says anything different that what God spoke through His Son.

The world is changing at lightning speed around us, and I think that causes some Christians to fear. It may even cause us to jump the gun, announce the world is over, and start packing it up for the hills, because God’s ready to judge America (or any other nation). I completely understand this thinking. But, it all makes me wonder: what, then did the cross mean?

Whatever is going to take place immediately before (or after) Jesus’ return, the statement God make in His Son remains true today. The judgment for sin is at the cross. God deals with individuals and their response to that message. So, if we do think things are coming to a head, let’s not look for new mysteries to solve, let’s be resolved to share the same Message God spoke once for all through His Son.