"Dead Men Tell No Tales"
I am sure that many of you will recognize the title of this post as being spoken by Cotton's Parrot in the "Pirates Of The Caribbean." Whatever your take on the movie may have been, this is a deeply theological statement and one that I want to unpack from Scripture. I believe that this is one of the most misunderstood Biblical teachings, and the implications of misunderstanding this teaching are huge for our understanding of the gospel.
Ephesians 2:1a&4-6 says, "And you were dead in your sins and trespasses ... But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved - and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
The Apostle Paul spells out for us just how bad a state we were in - we were dead. To be sure this is not to say that we were "mostly dead" but completely and totally dead. Certainly Paul is speaking of spiritual death but the point is that just as "Dead men tell no tales" spiritually dead men are completely incapable of any spiritual activity. In Romans Paul would say of the whole unbelieving world, "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands, no one seeks God. All have turned aside; ... no one ever does good, not even one."
I recently heard an illustration used to explain our salvation: Our coming to faith is like the Lord having us over for dinner. He chooses the steak, seasons the steak, cooks the steak, and even puts it on our plates for us. Then He places it before us, but He doesn't stop there, He also cuts off a piece and with His fork He places it in our mouths. Our job is simply to chew the steak.
Now all illustrations and metaphors break down at one point or another, especially when pressed, but this illustration left me wondering, "How do dead men chew?" Again if we take Paul's words at face value it would seem that we are dead, not "mostly dead" but truly and totally dead. If "Dead men tell no tales" then clearly "Dead men chew no food!"
This is where we begin to see how so much of the church today has a huge problem with their theology. Our Western culture has been so overcome by the influence of humanism and the beliefs that we are basically good people, that we consistently try to lessen this dreadful verdict that Scripture passes on the human condition. As we have seen the Bible does not speak flatteringly about our fallen nature, but we have been saturated with the ideas that we are good people just needing a bit of improvement and so we have begun to allow this influence even to color our understanding of how salvation works.
Perhaps a brief sketch of this will help us to better understand our current predicament. In the late 4th century AD a man named Pelagius argued along the lines that men are not depraved and incapable of good, but rather that they each had a choice. They could choose to do good or to do evil, but the choice truly was theirs. Augustine battled against this arguing that Scripture clearly shows us that humans are anything but good, and in 431 at the Council of Ephesus 'Pelagianism' was officially condemned as a heresy.
Whether we realize it or not this heresy is alive and well today. Sure we don't say it the same way and we have softened it a great deal, but its implications live on. At its core Pelagianism softens the "deadness" of man, making us only prone to sin but not in bondage to it. It is this logic that leads us to think that while we are not prone to spiritual things, on some level we are still capable of choosing and acting in a positive way - or in other words that we somehow contribute to our salvation. Hence we hear illustrations that lead us to believe that while we are incapable of choosing, seasoning, cooking, serving, cutting, and even putting food in our mouth, we are still capable of chewing it. However, as we have seen, this is in stark contrast to what the Apostle Paul wrote.
So far we have seen that none are righteous, we are all dead in our sins and trespasses, but that faith is required for salvation. The question now facing us is, "Then how can we ever hope to be saved?" Christians are, for the most part, well aware that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone. In fact, in this same chapter of Ephesians Paul goes on to say that very thing. The question we should see glaring at us is, "If we are dead, how do we exercise faith?" Or to put it another way, if "Dead men tell no tales, and chew no food" then how could they possibly believe and place faith in Jesus Christ?
This issue is answered by Paul beginning in vs 4 of our passage when he says, "But God...." Jesus dealt with this same issue when He said to the disciples that asked who could be saved, "With man it is impossible, but with God all things are possible." We cannot add in anyway to our being born again, it is a work of God alone as Paul goes on to say that even though we were dead, God made us alive together with Christ Jesus. You see the church at large has bought into the Pelagian lie that we are not completely dead and so it is only AFTER we place faith in Christ that we are brought from death to life, but this is in stark contrast to what Paul and Jesus taught. Both Paul and Jesus (and the rest of the Biblical authors in fact) clearly teach that it is God ALONE that brings us from death to life. We were all dead, BUT GOD brought us from death to life and then gives us the very faith that is to be placed in God. Paul goes on to say this in verse 8, "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God." This is saying that the whole package of salvation by grace through faith is a gift of God. The author of the Hebrews gets at this same point when he wrote about Jesus being the "author and perfecter" of our faith.
The truth is that we are completely, totally, and absolutely dead; utterly incapable of telling tales, chewing food, and placing faith in anyone. We don't need God to do most of the work, we need to be brought from death to life, and this is exactly what Paul says that God does for us by making us alive together with Christ Jesus.
The final question is, "How are we brought from death to life?" In Romans 10:17 Paul says,"So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." Based on the context of the letter, chapter, and immediate verses it is clear that this "word of Christ" is the gospel, the Good News that "...Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." (Rom 10:4) We see then that the Holy Spirit uses the preaching of the gospel to make us alive and to create faith in us enabling us to respond to call of repentance.
Finally notice that the message of the gospel itself is a message of God doing for us what we could never hope to do for ourselves. Because Jesus lived the life that we should have lived, died the death that we should have died, and rose again to new life, we too have been given new life in Him. It is God that has "raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus," and He has done so without any help or partnership from us.
Ephesians 2:1a&4-6 says, "And you were dead in your sins and trespasses ... But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved - and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
The Apostle Paul spells out for us just how bad a state we were in - we were dead. To be sure this is not to say that we were "mostly dead" but completely and totally dead. Certainly Paul is speaking of spiritual death but the point is that just as "Dead men tell no tales" spiritually dead men are completely incapable of any spiritual activity. In Romans Paul would say of the whole unbelieving world, "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands, no one seeks God. All have turned aside; ... no one ever does good, not even one."
I recently heard an illustration used to explain our salvation: Our coming to faith is like the Lord having us over for dinner. He chooses the steak, seasons the steak, cooks the steak, and even puts it on our plates for us. Then He places it before us, but He doesn't stop there, He also cuts off a piece and with His fork He places it in our mouths. Our job is simply to chew the steak.
Now all illustrations and metaphors break down at one point or another, especially when pressed, but this illustration left me wondering, "How do dead men chew?" Again if we take Paul's words at face value it would seem that we are dead, not "mostly dead" but truly and totally dead. If "Dead men tell no tales" then clearly "Dead men chew no food!"
This is where we begin to see how so much of the church today has a huge problem with their theology. Our Western culture has been so overcome by the influence of humanism and the beliefs that we are basically good people, that we consistently try to lessen this dreadful verdict that Scripture passes on the human condition. As we have seen the Bible does not speak flatteringly about our fallen nature, but we have been saturated with the ideas that we are good people just needing a bit of improvement and so we have begun to allow this influence even to color our understanding of how salvation works.
Perhaps a brief sketch of this will help us to better understand our current predicament. In the late 4th century AD a man named Pelagius argued along the lines that men are not depraved and incapable of good, but rather that they each had a choice. They could choose to do good or to do evil, but the choice truly was theirs. Augustine battled against this arguing that Scripture clearly shows us that humans are anything but good, and in 431 at the Council of Ephesus 'Pelagianism' was officially condemned as a heresy.
Whether we realize it or not this heresy is alive and well today. Sure we don't say it the same way and we have softened it a great deal, but its implications live on. At its core Pelagianism softens the "deadness" of man, making us only prone to sin but not in bondage to it. It is this logic that leads us to think that while we are not prone to spiritual things, on some level we are still capable of choosing and acting in a positive way - or in other words that we somehow contribute to our salvation. Hence we hear illustrations that lead us to believe that while we are incapable of choosing, seasoning, cooking, serving, cutting, and even putting food in our mouth, we are still capable of chewing it. However, as we have seen, this is in stark contrast to what the Apostle Paul wrote.
So far we have seen that none are righteous, we are all dead in our sins and trespasses, but that faith is required for salvation. The question now facing us is, "Then how can we ever hope to be saved?" Christians are, for the most part, well aware that we are saved by grace alone through faith alone. In fact, in this same chapter of Ephesians Paul goes on to say that very thing. The question we should see glaring at us is, "If we are dead, how do we exercise faith?" Or to put it another way, if "Dead men tell no tales, and chew no food" then how could they possibly believe and place faith in Jesus Christ?
This issue is answered by Paul beginning in vs 4 of our passage when he says, "But God...." Jesus dealt with this same issue when He said to the disciples that asked who could be saved, "With man it is impossible, but with God all things are possible." We cannot add in anyway to our being born again, it is a work of God alone as Paul goes on to say that even though we were dead, God made us alive together with Christ Jesus. You see the church at large has bought into the Pelagian lie that we are not completely dead and so it is only AFTER we place faith in Christ that we are brought from death to life, but this is in stark contrast to what Paul and Jesus taught. Both Paul and Jesus (and the rest of the Biblical authors in fact) clearly teach that it is God ALONE that brings us from death to life. We were all dead, BUT GOD brought us from death to life and then gives us the very faith that is to be placed in God. Paul goes on to say this in verse 8, "For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God." This is saying that the whole package of salvation by grace through faith is a gift of God. The author of the Hebrews gets at this same point when he wrote about Jesus being the "author and perfecter" of our faith.
The truth is that we are completely, totally, and absolutely dead; utterly incapable of telling tales, chewing food, and placing faith in anyone. We don't need God to do most of the work, we need to be brought from death to life, and this is exactly what Paul says that God does for us by making us alive together with Christ Jesus.
The final question is, "How are we brought from death to life?" In Romans 10:17 Paul says,"So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ." Based on the context of the letter, chapter, and immediate verses it is clear that this "word of Christ" is the gospel, the Good News that "...Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." (Rom 10:4) We see then that the Holy Spirit uses the preaching of the gospel to make us alive and to create faith in us enabling us to respond to call of repentance.
Finally notice that the message of the gospel itself is a message of God doing for us what we could never hope to do for ourselves. Because Jesus lived the life that we should have lived, died the death that we should have died, and rose again to new life, we too have been given new life in Him. It is God that has "raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus," and He has done so without any help or partnership from us.
Wow! This is fantastic, SO encouraging and really pulled together several points I've been reading and struggle on my own to put into words. :D Thank for for this post!
ReplyDeleteSo glad you were blessed. This is so key for us to understand, and thankfully it is so freeing once we come to understand it! love you.
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