by A few years ago my children gave me a nickname. At first, I thought it stemmed from the awkwardness of calling me pastor/teacher at church and daddy at home but I realized it was not. It’s their affectionate name for me. I have since discovered they call me daddy when they want to know something and my eke-name when they want to do or get something. If, for example, they want to watch TV during a school week (and they know they shouldn’t), they will wait for each to finish their homework, then in unison call out my nickname to place their cheeky request. They don’t even know the meaning of the gibberish name they have given me. They only know it works to get a positive response from me. A feminine version was conjured from my nick-name for their mother but it does not work magic on her. Their mummy is not easily coerced. They have therefore stuck with mummy and pastor/teacher for now.
I thought of this as I remembered a random encounter with a friend last week. I was going to a bookshop when we bumped into each other in the streets of Nairobi. He began mumbling apologies for having not yet visited our new church plant. In the middle of the indistinct multitude of words spoken, he said he would plan to come to our altar. The word altar got my attention. It’s not the first time I have heard the phrase even in how my friend used it – that he would bring his gift to the altar. I told him he was welcome and mentioned we had a building project just in case he came and didn’t see an altar in our church he may infer we have not built it yet.
According to the Layman’s Bible Dictionary, an altar is a platform, table, or elevated structure on which sacrifices are placed as offerings. Altars were originally made of earth or rocks (Exodus 20:24-25) but they evolved into more sophisticated structures after the construction of the Tabernacle (Leviticus 9:24). They have been part of high church (Catholic, Orthodox, and Anglican…) tradition for hundreds of years.
However, the needle of the altar since the Tabernacle days has become even more suave for we today hear of family altars, the Prophet’s altar, the altar of praise, the altar of promotion, the altar of this and that. These post-modern altars are refined Old Testament high places, but unlike the Canaanites who would build their altars in literal high places (Numbers 33:52), the cool 21st Century believer has their debonair altar at the corner of their room or in the name of a low church.
In Romeo and Juliet (Act 2 Scene 2), Juliet Capulet is overheard by Romeo Montague saying to herself: ‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet’. The Montague and Capulet are two feuding families. To Juliet though, it didn’t matter if one was a Montague or Capulet. You are still the same person. Thus even if a rose flower was given a different name it would still smell sweet. Is this the same for altars? Are modern-day altars nicknames for places of change or spiritual engagement? When preachers call congregants to raise and demolish altars, are they talking about the same thing as Joshua, Asa, Hezekiah or David did or is it something else entirely? Did Jesus raise and demolish altars?
Old Testament
Altars were present before the law of Moses was given. In Exodus 34:13, God tells the Israelites to destroy the altars of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. If they didn’t, they would be led astray from their covenant with God. They didn’t destroy these high places of worship and God let the surrounding nations to colonize them (Judges 2:2-3).
Altars constructed for sacrifice to God were often built after an encounter with God. For example, Noah built an altar after the flood (Genesis 8:20), Abram built an altar after God appeared to him (Genesis 12:7), and Isaac also built after God appeared to him in Beer-sheba (Genesis 6:25). Exodus 20:24 has the Israelites directly told to build an altar for God and specific instructions of how to build it in the Tabernacle are later given in Exodus 27:1-8. King Solomon overlaid the altar with gold (1 Kings 6:22).
New Testament
The perspective of the altar is mostly analogical. There is the literal altar that Zechariah was working on as a priest (Luke 1:11) when he was told he would have a son. Jesus referred to this altar when he taught about forgiveness (Matthew 5:23-24). Paul refers to the altar when warning against idolatry (1 Corinthians 10:18). The author of Hebrews speaks of Christ’s superior sacrifice compared to sacrifices made at the Tabernacle’s altar. John tells of an altar in his vision of the throne of God (Revelation 6:9).
Perspective
The ceremonial laws of sacrificing on man-made altars were fulfilled in Christ’s life and work. We, therefore, do not need to sacrifice an animal at the altar which is made in specific dimensions. We do not build physical altars to offer sacrifice for sin or burnt offerings to please God because these were a copy of the perfect – and the perfect has appeared in Christ. And when the perfect appears, the imperfect is done away with. The altar we have is in heaven, before the throne of God, and there Christ has offered himself as a sacrifice for sin, once and for all.
But apart from the literal Old Testament sense of places for giving offerings to God, altars can today mean analogical places of change after or for meeting with God. If we are to offer to God our bodies as a living sacrifice, then in that sesne we are at an altar.
It would also appear okay to use the phrase ‘altar’ in the analogical sense as we see in the New Testament. Jesus teaching on why we should denounce hypocrisy asked, ‘And you say that to swear ‘by the altar’ is not binding, but to swear ‘by the gifts on the altar’ is binding. How blind! For which is more important—the gift on the altar or the altar that makes the gift sacred? When you swear ‘by the altar,’ you are swearing by it and by everything on it. And when you swear ‘by the Temple,’ you are swearing by it and by God, who lives in it. And when you swear ‘by heaven,’ you are swearing by the throne of God and by God, who sits on the throne. ‘ Matthew 23:18-22
The danger would be when we depart from the true gospel to behavioural/legalistic Christianity like the Galatians. The Galatians, although they had heard the true gospel of Jesus and were filled with the Holy Spirit, were trying to live the sanctified life by human effort. They were observing certain days and months in keeping with Jewish laws. If we find ourselves elevating an analogical altar above Christ, then we have made it an idol. An idol, apostle John tells us, is anything that takes the place of God in your life (1 John 5:21). It can be nothing, and as Paul presents in the book of Galatians, the “nothing” can be seen in believers who seek favour with God by observing the law like certain days/months or in this case keeping an altar.
We should denounce and bring down any altar that is elevated above the knowledge of Christ. What does this look like? Ask God to make your conscience come alive. Our sense of right and wrong usually dulls after a prolonged period of disobedience. David’s conscience began to bother him after he had asked for the census to be done. He said to the Lord “What I did was very wrong. Please forgive this foolish wickedness of mine” (2 Samuel 24:10). David repented of his sin. We should likewise repent to the LORD if we exalt altars beyond the analogical. Turn back to God. Accept his discipline for he loves you as his child. Has your call for altars offended a brother? Seek reconciliation. Invite God to heal your strained relationships. Are you headstrong that you cannot live without an altar? Look to Christ. Lamentations 3:41 says “Let us examine ourselves instead, and repent and turn again to the Lord. Let us lift our hearts and hands to him in heaven”
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