Some theological thought on CWM "Chichi no Namida(The Tears of The Father)"
Some theological thought on CWM "Chichi no Namida(The Tears of The Father)"
In Japanese Churches, so called CWM(Contemporary Worship Music) are widely used. Some CWM are theologically dangerous. Here is an example:One of the most popular CWMs in Japan is "Chichi no Namida(The Tears of The Father)"Original song is in Japanese. Here I tried to do its English translation.
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"Chichi no Namida(The Tears of The Father)"
1.
The sorrow of the Father is filling our hearts,
He put His beloved Son on the cross;
Men's sins are like flaming fire,
Without knowing love, days are passing.
2.
What the Father was watching was
His beloved Son bruised
bearing the sins of men on Himself
asking "Father forgive them."
The fountain overflowing from the Cross
Is the Tears of The Father,
The fountain overflowing from the Cross
Is the Love of Jesus.
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-----Let's look at the Westminster Confession of Faith with some proof texts.----------
Chapter X I OF JUSTIFICATION
III. Christ, by his obedience and death, did fully discharge the debt of all those that are thus justified, and did make a proper, real, and full satisfaction to his Fatherfs justice in their behalf.[6] Yet, inasmuch as he was given by the Father for them;[7] and his obedience and satisfaction accepted in their stead;[8] and both, freely, not for anything in them; their justification is only of free grace;[9] that both the exact justice and rich grace of God might be glorified in the justification of sinners.[10]
[6] Isaiah 53:4-6, 10-12. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.... Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors.
[7] Romans 8:32. He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? [8] 2 Corinthians 5:21. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
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-----When we take a close look at "Chichi no namida," Isaiah 53:10 would be one of the key verses, so we would like to see the comments on this verse by Matthew Henry and John Gill. --------------
"Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him"(Isaiah 53:10)
He submitted to the frowns of Heaven (v. 10): Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him, to put him to pain, or torment, or grief. The scripture nowhere says that Christ in his sufferings underwent the wrath of God; but it says here, (1.) That the Lord bruised him, not only permitted men to bruise him, but awakened his own sword against him, Zech. xiii. 7. They esteemed him smitten of God for some very great sin of his own (v. 4); now it was true that he was smitten of God, but it was for our sin; the Lord bruised him, for he did not spare him, but delivered him up for us all, Rom. viii. 32. He it was that put the bitter cup into his hand, and obliged him to drink it (John xviii. 11), having laid upon him our iniquity. He it was that made him sin and a curse for us, and turned to ashes all his burnt-offering, in token of the acceptance of it, Ps. xx. 3. (2.)
(Matthew Henry Commentary on the Whole Bible )
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"Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him"(Isaiah 53:10) The sufferings of Christ are signified by his being "bruised"; See Gill on "Isa 53:5", and as it was foretold he should have his heel bruised by the serpent, Ge 3:15, but here it is ascribed to the Lord: he was bruised in body, when buffeted and scourged, and nailed to the cross; and was bruised and broken in spirit, when the sins of his people were laid on him, and the wrath of God came upon him for them: the Lord had a hand in his sufferings; he not only permitted them, but they were according to the counsel of his will; they were predetermined by him, Ac 2:23
(Exposition of the Old and New Testaments by John Gill)
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We should keep the propitiatory nature of the Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;" (Romans 3:25) Jesus Christ is the great propitiation, or propitiatory sacrifice, typified by the hilasterion, or mercy-seat, under the law. He is our throne of grace, in and through whom atonement is made for sin, and our persons and performances are accepted of God, 1 John ii. 2. He is all in all in our reconciliation, not only the maker, but the matter of it--our priest, our sacrifice, our altar, our all. God was in Christ as in his mercy-seat, reconciling the world unto himself. God hath set him forth to be so. God, the party offended, makes the first overtures towards a reconciliation, appoints the days-man; proetheto--fore-ordained him to this, in the counsels of his love from eternity, appointed, anointed him to it, qualified him for it, and has exhibited him to a guilty world as their propitiation. See Matt. iii. 17, and xvii. 5. That by faith in his blood we become interested in this propitiation. Christ is the propitiation; there is the healing plaster provided. Faith is the applying of this plaster to the wounded soul. And this faith in the business of justification hath a special regard to the blood of Christ, as that which made the atonement; for such was the divine appointment that without blood there should be no remission, and no blood but his would do it effectually. Here may be an allusion to the sprinkling of the blood of the sacrifices under the law, as Exod. xxiv. 8. Faith is the bunch of hyssop, and the blood of Christ is the blood of sprinkling......
........That God does in all this declare his righteousness. This he insists upon with a great deal of emphasis: To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness. It is repeated, as that which has in it something surprising. He declares his righteousness, First, In the propitiation itself. Never was there such a demonstration of the justice and holiness of God as there was in the death of Christ. It appears that he hates sin, when nothing less than the blood of Christ would satisfy for it. Finding sin, though but imputed, upon his own Son, he did not spare him, because he had made himself sin for us, 2 Cor. v. 21. The iniquities of us all being laid upon him, though he was the Son of his love, yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him, Isa. liii. 10. Secondly, In the pardon upon that propitiation; so it follows, by way of explication: That he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth. Mercy and truth are so met together, righteousness and peace have so kissed each other, that it is now become not only an act of grace and mercy, but an act of righteousness, in God, to pardon the sins of penitent believers, having accepted the satisfaction that Christ by dying made to his justice for them. It would not comport with his justice to demand the debt of the principal when the surety has paid it and he has accepted that payment in full satisfaction. See 1 John i. 9. He is just, that is, faithful to his word.
(Matthew Henry Commentary on the Whole Bible)
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---------Also we would like to share the comment by Matthew Henry on Matthew 27:46.-------
"And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? " (Matthew 27:46) That our Lord Jesus was, in his sufferings, for a time, forsaken by his Father. So he saith himself, who we are sure was under no mistake concerning his own case. .......but his Father forsook him; that is, First, He delivered him up into the hands of his enemies, and did not appear to deliver him out of their hands. He let loose the powers of darkness against him, and suffered them to do their worst, worse than against Job. Now was that scripture fulfilled (Job xvi. 11), God hath turned me over into the hands of the wicked; and no angel is sent from heaven to deliver him, no friend on earth raised up to appear for him. Secondly, He withdrew from him the present comfortable sense of his complacency in him. When his soul was first troubled, he had a voice from heaven to comfort him (John xii. 27, 28); when he was in his agony in the garden, there appeared an angel from heaven strengthening him; but now he had neither the one nor the other. God hid his face from him, and for awhile withdrew his rod and staff in the darksome valley. God forsook him, not as he forsook Saul, leaving him to an endless despair, but as sometimes he forsook David, leaving him to a present despondency. Thirdly, He let out upon his soul an afflicting sense of his wrath against man for sin. Christ was made Sin for us, a Curse for us; and therefore, though God loved him as a Son, he frowned upon him as a Surety. These impressions he was pleased to admit, and to waive that resistance of them which he could have made; because he would accommodate himself to this part of his undertaking, as he had done to all the rest, when it was in his power to have avoided it. That Christ's being forsaken of his Father was the most grievous of his sufferings, and that which he complained most of. Here he laid the most doleful accents; he did not say, "Why am I scourged? And why spit upon? And why nailed to the cross?" Nor did he say to his disciples, when they turned their back upon him, Why have ye forsaken me? But when his Father stood at a distance, he cried out thus; for this as it that put wormwood and gall into the affliction and misery. This brought the waters into the soul, Ps. lxix. 1-3.
(Matthew Henry Commentary on the Whole Bible)
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------------CONCLUSION-------------
We cannot deny that the Lord Jesus Christ was the beloved Son of the Father God. "And lo, a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased(Matt. 3:17)" But at the crucifixion, we see no such description in the Bible. Rather the wrath of the Father God is manifested on the Cross, and our Lord Jesus Christ was the propitiation so that the justice of God could be satisfied. Christ's atonement was vicarious. "He took the place of sinners, that their guilt was imputed , and their punishment transferred , to Him. .. The sufferings of Christ were not just the sympathetic sufferings of a friend, but the substitutionary sufferings of the Lamb of God for the sin of the world"---Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology(W.B. Eerdmans 1996), p 376 Can we find some description of "the tears of the Father" or some verses that could be proof texts for asserting that the wrath of the Father was somewhat weakened at the time when the Lord Jesus cried in Matthew 27:46 in the Bible? When people sing "The fountain overflowing from the Cross is the Tears of The Father," aren't there any possibilities that a kind of sentimentalism is nurtured and thus it paves the way to the wrong doctrines? Would it not be possible that we weaken, lessen, or even demean the significance of the Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ if we allow this kind of sentimentalism? It seems to me that the author/composer of this song is exceeding the limit(What we call Regulative Principle which is nothing but Sola Scriptura principle) by adding something humanistic and sentimental to the Crucifixion. In doing so he would water down the significance of the propitiatory sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.(Which is almost heretic!)
Copyright © 2006 Shu Suzuki
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18.06.2006.