From Ground To Glory

Basketball, Ethnicity, and the Gospel

2010-08-25T15:42:00.000-04:00

Originally posted over at the Project Antioch blog
--------

There’s been some excitement this past summer over Jeremy Lin’s one-year contract with the Warriors. As a fellow Asian American, I’m looking forward to seeing how he’s going to perform and I hope he does well (unless he’s playing against the Rockets). It’s pretty cool to watch someone play in the NBA with whom you can identify so closely, and I do hope he’ll get to play. However, purely as a basketball fan, I’m a bit more skeptical. I’ve seen the highlights, and its not clear to me how good he’s going to be in the NBA.

So what does that mean for me, an Asian American basketball fan? Well, it means that even though I’m glad to have the 2nd Asian American ever in the NBA, I’m still going to be a fan of the game. It means that if I had to choose, I would still rather watch Lebron dunking on the competition or Kobe taking over a game, than Lin playing his game. It means unless he has an amazing year, I wouldn’t want Lin voted on the All Star team simply because all the Asian Americans rallied to vote him in. As a fan of the game, basketball talent matters more ultimately than where he’s from.

What’s my point in all this? Well, as an Asian American Christian, I find that this sort of thinking applies also. In the past few years, I’ve heard grumblings here and there about the lack of of Asian American representation at conferences, in books being written, etc… Some have asked, why do these venues always seem to have Caucasian preachers up on stage, rather than people of other backgrounds? Now, I understand that here in America, in our diversity, we have a special opportunity to display the power of the Gospel for all peoples. This can be a wonderful testimony to the truth of the Gospel.

But as a Christian living in a world where the Gospel is so often assumed, adjusted, misunderstood, and rejected, I don’t want to take faithfulness to the Gospel for granted. Just because I’m at a “Christian” conference or walking into a “Christian” bookstore, I don’t want to automatically assume that everything I encounter is going to be faithful to God’s Word. What this means is that as a Christian, I’m not going to be excited simply because there’s an Asian American up on stage speaking. Rather, I am much more concerned to have someone (anyone!) who will preach the Gospel faithfully and powerfully, than for someone of a particular ethnic representation. What this also means is that I’m going to be far more excited for faithful Gospel preaching that happens in the tiniest house church, than for Gospel-less teaching in the largest of venues. In the end, as a Christian, what matters to me is the Gospel, faithfully and powerfully held out to a dying world.

When asked about how important his Asian American identity was, Jeremy Lin got it right: “You know, it’s important but not as important as my being a Christian. That’s first and foremost the most important thing to me when it comes to my identity.” And the way we make this clear is by prioritizing the Gospel over everything else.

The Praise of the Redeemed - Psalm 103

2010-06-12T17:48:00.000-04:00

I preached on Psalm 103 at Capitol Hill Baptist Church a few weeks ago. It is one of the sweetest psalms of the entire Psalter and it was a joy to meditate on this text. My introduction:

How has God been good to you? What reason do you have to praise God this morning?

For some of us, what immediately come to mind are God’s many blessings in our lives. Even as I stand here, looking at this congregation through which I have been so richly blessed these past few years, I’m amazed at God’s kindness to me. Even while being so far from home, God has blessed me with a new family, with numerous fathers and mothers and sisters and brothers, all who have blessed me and encouraged me in countless ways. And as I think on how God has so richly blessed me, I can’t help but give thanks and praise to Him, and I know many of you could testify the same.

But I’m guessing there are others, for whom such thoughts do not come so easily. God’s providence has been difficult for you lately. You might be facing loneliness, sickness, loss of loved ones, unemployment… And in the midst of this, God’s goodness seems distant. It’s challenging to come here and sing of Him, “who wondrous things hath done”. Though in your mind you know you’re supposed to believe that God is good, it’s not always evident how God has been good to you. And so your heart is silent in singing His praises, or worse, you are struggling with anger and bitterness when you think of God.

And for others, if it’s not trials and hardships that are keeping you from praising God, then perhaps it’s simply apathy, or distraction. You’ve sung some words this morning, but your mind is on other things… work, people, lunch. And the only reason you’re here is because someone else invited you, or because you’ve always gone to church on Sundays. You’re not sure why anyone would want to praise God.

And so I ask you again, friends, what reason do you have to praise God this morning?

This morning we come to Psalm 103, one of the loveliest psalms in the entire Bible. And as we look at this passage, the question we should ask ourselves is: Why should I praise God? Has He given me any reason to do so?

Listen to the rest here.

Enjoying my kindle

2010-02-17T22:57:00.000-05:00

Yes, I've hacked my Kindle and put John Owen (and others) on my screensaver.

Once I found out that the iPad wouldn't be a viable e-reader solution because of the backlit screen, I decided to take a chance on the Kindle. I've now owned my Kindle DX for almost a month now, and I'm loving it. Three things have made it well worth the money:

1) Free (or almost free) books - If you love classic Christian books, there are tons available for free. Some of my best free finds so far:

The Bruised Reed - Richard Sibbes
The Christian in Complete Armour - William Gurnall
The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne - Andrew Bonar
Commentary on Galatians - Martin Luther
Communion with God & The Glory of Christ - John Owen
Farewell Sermons - Edmund Calamy
Institutes of the Christian Religion - John Calvin
John G. Paton Autobiography
Lectures to my Students - Spurgeon
Life & Letters of Henry Martyn - John Sargent
Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices - Thomas Brooks
The Saints' Everlasting Rest - Richard Baxter
The Works of Jonathan Edwards (2 Volume; 99 cents on Amazon)

Places to look for free books would be on Amazon, ccel.org, archive.org (ridiculous amount of free stuff, but not all good quality), and books.google.com. The list above is just the beginning, but I'm pretty sure I've already made up the price of the Kindle with these books, and other works will only become more available as digitizing technology continues to improve.

2) Portable library - The problem with building a library is that I have to be in my study in order to read my books. If I want to go somewhere else to read, I have to plan ahead and pick a few books to bring along. With the Kindle, I'm just finding myself reading more, since I'm carrying an entire library with me where I go, and chances are pretty good that there's something in there that I want to read. I'm curious to see if this will last, but for now, it's provided a big boost to my reading.

3) Clipping - This is the killer function for me on the Kindle. As a preacher, one of the things I want to do is keep a searchable quotes file from my reading, where I'm recording useful quotes, anecdotes, illustrations, etc... that I can use in the future. The problem is that once I've read a book, I've not been very disciplined at going back through to type out all the stuff I've marked. Now with the Kindle, as I'm reading, I can "clip" sections of the book, which will automatically dump the clipped text into my quotes file. This is so convenient, that it has made me want to re-read some of my old books so I can start clipping useful text, and reluctant to read my actual books since it doubles the work I'll have to do in keeping my quotes file. This makes my Kindle not only an enjoyable reading experience, but also a productive one!

God Relents - Jonah 3-4

2009-08-10T07:46:00.005-04:00

Once again, this Sunday I had the opportunity to preach at Chesterbrook Taiwanese Presbyterian and finish out the book of Jonah. It was a joy to meditate on God's compassion for the lost, even while exhorting the church in their evangelism and missions. From my introduction:

God loves everybody. That’s a popular sentiment these days. Most people would affirm that statement. Find a random person on the street and ask them, does “God love everybody?” and if that person believes in God, then the answer you’ll likely hear is, “Yes, of course, God loves everybody.” And we would agree with that.

But what do people mean when they say that God loves everybody? Do they understand that God’s love to be the sovereign care of a personal Creator, who knows us and desires a relationship with us and cares about how we live? Or would it be more of an impersonal, benevolent spiritual force, that supports us no matter what we do?

Living in a self-consumed culture such as ours, when people affirm that God loves everybody, I wonder who “everybody” includes. Most definitely, “everybody” includes the person in question. And that’s usually about as far as people think it through. But I’d love to ask a few questions: Does everybody include only people who are like you, who think the way you think, and live the way you live?

Or does God also love those who strongly disagree with you? Those who annoy you every time you see them? Those whom you find unlovely and repulsive? Even those whom you hate? Does God personally love them even as much as He loves you? If so, what does that say about God? Does that lessen your appreciation for His love?

Listen to the sermon here.

Christ and the Church

2009-06-15T21:16:00.002-04:00

St. Chrysostom, commenting on Ephesians 5:25:

Do you wish that your wife would submit to you as the Church does to Christ? Then care for her, as Christ does the Church; and if it is necessary that you should give your life for her, or be cut into pieces a thousand times, or endure anything whatsoever, then refuse it not; yes, for if you were to suffer in these dreadful ways for your wife, you still would not have done what Christ did for you. For you did this for one with whom you were already united; but he did it for her who, until then, had only rejected him and hated him.

God Pursues - Jonah 1-2

2009-06-09T09:51:00.002-04:00

This past Sunday, I had the opportunity to preach at Chesterbrook Taiwanese Presbyterian Church from Jonah 1-2. It was sweet to meditate on how God pursues us even in our disobedience. An excerpt:

Of course, for humans, running away is usually far more sophisticated than simply taking off on our two feet. Sure there are bullies that can chase us, but too often, our fears are far more complicated: Sickness, loneliness, stress, frustration… all these are things that hound us, and so we spend much of our lives inventing ways to run away from these things. Whether it’s procrastination, or the Internet, or romantic fantasies, or alcohol… For so many people, life consists entirely of finding new ways to escape from the realities of life.

But as much as we may be running from a thousand things, the Bible really describes our lives in much simpler terms: We are either running away from God, or running to Him. That’s basically what it boils down to. We are either running away from God, or running to Him. So which one are you? I think if we’re honest with ourselves, we have to admit that too often our lives are characterized by a running away from God. In all the things we are running away from, we are ultimately running away from God and running to ourselves.

Well this morning we’ll be looking at a prophet who also decided to run away from God, and what we’re going to find is that even more important than the fact that we run, is the fact that God pursues.

LIsten to the sermon here.

Psalm 15

2008-05-25T23:15:00.003-04:00

I had the privilege of preaching from Psalm 15 this morning. An excerpt from my manuscript:

Here in Psalm 15, we encounter a description of what God expects of those who would dwell with Him. God is not just giving us suggestions or recommendations. Rather, He requires a kind of character from those who would live with Him. God is a holy God and anyone whose life does not bear these marks will ultimately be rejected by Him.

And this is an astonishing truth: God cares about how we live. Given all that is going on in the world today (global warming, bio-genetic engineering, political upheavals), isn’t it amazing to think that the God of the Universe is concerned about how you live? And He’s not so much concerned about your professional resume, or your financial portfolio, or your academic background…but rather He’s deeply concerned about the character of your life. Your decisions, your actions, your words matter to God. And the life you live now will have implications into eternity for your relationship with God.

Listen to the rest here.

Guilt: Fact or Feeling?

2008-03-31T21:30:00.000-04:00

An important distinction that we need to make as Christians is the difference between the fact of guilt and the feeling of guilt. The world today acknowledges that people struggle with feelings of guilt. So much of secular counseling is designed strictly to help people get over such feelings, whether by medication, self-affirming thoughts, or other techniques, without any attempt to address the reality of guilt in people’s lives. Yet these remedies fail to treat the root problem.

We see in God’s Word that shame (feeling of guilt) entered this world not as a result of chemical imbalance or behavioral disorder, but as a result of our sinful rebellion against God. The feeling of guilt resulted from the fact of guilt. As sinners, we not only feel guilty, but we, in fact, are guilty, before God and before men. And as such, we deserve God’s just judgment for our guilt.

This is why the cross is so precious. At the cross, Jesus Christ has born the punishment and death that we deserved for our sins. And being raised from the dead, He has proven victorious over our guilt, so that now, by repentance and faith in Christ, we may receive forgiveness from our sins. In Christ, God has provided true healing for all the shame of our sins. As you head out this week, rejoice that your guilt has been truly and decisively dealt with in Christ. And as you rejoice, proclaim this message of God’s grace to a world struggling with guilt.

God's covenants and human failure

2008-01-24T14:20:00.000-05:00

2 Samuel peaks when [God] entrusts his kingdom forever to the house of David. [But the next section] of 2 Samuel tests that covenant. God’s other covenants – the Noahic, Abrahamic, Sinaitic, and new – are immediately tested by the failure of its beneficiaries: Noah got drunk; Abraham in unbelief fathered a child by Hagar; Israel worshiped a golden calf; Peter denied Jesus Christ. Shortly after the David covenant, David took away a wife’s purity and murdered her husband, but in spite of David’s gross sin and its contribution to his psychological decline, God’s unconditional covenant with David stands. David’s sin and spiritual funk point to a greater son of David, the Son of God whose eternal person sits on the heavenly throne of which David’s earthly throne in Jerusalem is a type. He fulfills the Davidic covenant.

An Old Testament Theology, Waltke, pg. 654-655

"Christians" and ethnic diversity

2007-08-23T11:14:00.000-04:00

Perhaps Luke's most fundamental purpose in the Book of Acts is to help Christians answer the question "Who are we?" Two thousand years of church history sometimes prevents us from seeing just how basic that question was for the first believers. As long as Jews only were among the faithful, it could always be thought that this new group was just another sect of Jews who had some crazy notion about who the Messiah was. But as soon as Samaritans and Gentiles began entering the picture, identity with Judaism ceased to be an option. Something new had come into being - in continuity with the old, of course, but distinct from it as well. Luke, of course, leaves us in no doubt about whether the inclusion of Gentiles and the casting loose from temple and Torah were directed by God. And so a new name has to be coined to identify this new group: "Christians," followers of Christ (11:26).

An Introduction to the New Testament, Carson, Moo, pg. 325

Luke 13:14

2007-08-15T12:29:00.000-04:00

14 But the synagogue official, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, began saying to the crowd in response, “There are six days in which work should be done; so come during them and get healed, and not on the Sabbath day.” - Luke 13:14

Whenever I read this, I am struck by just how legalistic and heartless this official was. It makes me wonder how anyone can be so merciless?

But then I remember, oh wait... that's me. That's so often my own self-righteous attitude. I'm just a lot better than the synagogue official at hiding it.

Ephesians 1-3 pt. 4

2007-08-05T17:46:00.000-04:00

Below is part 4 of 4 of a sermon I preached on 7/22/07 on Ephesians 1-3

The glory of God displayed in the future of the Church

Well, we’ve seen how God has displayed the glory of His grace in the past, we’ve seen how God is displaying the glory of His grace in our present lives, now let’s briefly consider how God promises to continue display the glory of His grace for the rest of eternity. The key verse I want us to think about is Ephesians 2:7. Look with me beginning in verse 2:4:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

Do you see the amazing statement that Paul is making here? God has saved us why? So that we might be in bondage to Him? So that we would have to pay Him back? No, so that for the rest of eternity, God might show the riches of His grace to us, by pouring out His kindness to us in Christ Jesus. God’s design for all the coming ages is that His people would be the recipients of His infinite grace, as a display of His glory! If you are a Christian here today, this is your glorious and guaranteed inheritance! This is what every moment of your life is bringing you one step closer to!

God’s purpose for the church is that through us, we might be the means for God to display the glory of His grace. From beginning to end, from eternity past to eternity future, this is what we were created for. God, because of His love, has appointed your life is to be an object lesson to the universe of just how glorious and gracious God really is. Every blessing you receive, every sin that forgiven, every bad situation turned for your good, and an eternity of joy to come, all these things exist as for your good and for God’s glory. I love the last verse of Amazing Grace:

“When we’ve been there ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun,
we’ve no less days to sing God’s grace, than when we’ve first begun.”

Conclusion: Application

In closing, I want us to think about two implications of all this for our prayer lives and for our evangelism.

First, for our prayer lives: We’ve just spent the past 40 minutes or so discussing weighty, glorious truths and I hope that the Holy Spirit has been working in your heart and opening your eyes to see wonderful glimpses of the glory of God. But in about 30 minutes from now, you’re going to be hungry and you’re probably going to be thinking what’s for lunch. Pretty soon you’ll be back home and you’ll see the pile of bills that need to be paid, and the stuff that needs to get done once again. And before you know it, it’ll be Monday morning and you’ll be back in the grind of the week, and all these glorious truths that are currently occupying your mind will be pushed aside.

My point in saying all this is not to discourage you, but simply to confess with you the fact that our capacity for joy is often so small, that we are often unable to hold onto these great and glorious truths. We’ve spent so much of our time with sitcoms, and YouTube, and games on our cell phones, and sports, and all the other little pleasures in life, that our capacity for joy has shrunk and we’re so easily satisfied by all these tiny, eentsy-wintsy pleasures. And so when we come to Church and encounter the waterfall of God’s glory, we are able to hold on to only so little, before that little bit gets pushed out by the other things in life.

So what do we do? We pray the way Paul prays. Look at chapter 3, beginning in verse 14:

14 For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

What an amazing prayer! Paul is praying that God would grant us the strength that we need in order to comprehend the greatness of the love of Christ for us! It takes spiritual, God-given strength for us grasp just how great God’s love for us, and not only to grasp it, but to know this love, to internalize it, and to be filled with all the fullness of God every moment of our lives. Brothers and sisters, the fight of faith in the Christian life is the fight to comprehend the unfathomable grace that God has for sinners like us! Pray that God would grant you strength to have this kind of faith. Make this your prayer for yourself! Make this your prayer for your family! Make this your prayer for your church! If you will commit to praying this way and devote yourselves to meditating on God’s glory in the Word, God will cause your heart’s capacity for joy to grow so that the little distractions or pleasures of this world will no longer affect you like they used to, but instead you will be filled with a greater love and joy in God Himself.

And finally, the implication of all this for our evangelism: If our purpose in this world is to display the glory of God’s grace, oh how important it is that we verbally proclaim the Gospel in everything that we do! When people look at our lives, the last thing we want them to think is, “Wow, look at how joyful this person is, look at how well-behaved his children are, look at how honest and hard-working he is, what a great guy! He must really have it all figured out!” Or when visitors walk into this church, the last thing we want them to think is, “Wow, this place is full of happy, successful, hard-working, morally upright people. I could never be as good as them.” If this is what people are thinking when they look at our lives, then we have failed in our purpose to display God’s grace. The only way we will be able to begin to do justice to what God has done in our lives is by clearly communicating the Gospel. People must understand that we were at one point under the same condemnation of guilt that all people are under. In fact, our sin was so bad, that only the death of the holy Son of God was sufficient to pay God’s punishment for our sin. Yet this is exactly what God has freely provided for us, so that now everything good in our life is only possible through of the grace of God in Jesus Christ. Left to ourselves, we are not morally superior people, we are not cleverer, or more virtuous, or more righteous. Left to ourselves, we are as spiritual dead and as enslaved to sin as anyone. The only thing that has made us to differ has nothing to do with us, and has everything to do with God’s grace. It is God who has saved us. Therefore, brothers and sisters, preach the Gospel. Make the Gospel crystal clear in all your relationships with non-Christians. Make the Gospel crystal clear in every church program, in every community service, in every worship service. In everything that we do, may it be known that we are a people who have been saved by grace through faith; that our salvation is not of our doing, but is a gift of God, not a result of our works, so that no one may boast and God may get all the glory.

Ephesians 1-3 pt. 3

2007-08-04T09:51:00.000-04:00

Below is part 3 of 4 of a sermon I preached on 7/22/07 on Ephesians 1-3

The glory of God displayed in our present lives

Well, God’s purpose of displaying His glory is not limited to things God has done in the past, but also includes what He has done and is doing in our lifetimes. Look at chapter two, beginning in verse 1:

Eph. 2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.

We’ve seen reflected on how God has satisfied the punishment of sin through the death of Jesus Christ, but here in verses 1-3 we see that our problem with sin goes far deeper that we ever imagined. Our problem with sin goes right down to the core of our heart. Paul describes us as being “dead” in our trespasses and sins. Of course, he’s not speaking of a physical death, but a spiritual deadness. It means that we had no desire for God, no love for God, and not even the ability to generate those things within us. This is why Paul describes us being enslaved to “the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind”. Not only that, but the “prince of the power of the air”, Satan, was also at work to ensure that we would remain enslaved to sin. We see in verse 3 that our condition was “like the rest of mankind”. We might look at the drug dealer or terrorist or dropout and think, “My life isn’t so bad”. But the truth is that all of us, left to ourselves, were at one point under the same deathly bondage to sin as they are. And as a result, all of us were by nature children of wrath; we were destined for God’s everlasting wrath.

But in verse 4, we see two amazing words: “But God”. We have made a mess of our lives, but now God steps in the picture. Read with me beginning in verse 4:

But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Rather than treating us as our sins deserved, God loved us and made us alive together with Christ. He exchanged our heart of stone for a heart of flesh. He opened our blind eyes to see the glory of Christ and trust in Him. He caused us to be born again. All these phrases are different pictures that the Bible gives us to describe God’s transformation of the human heart so that it no longer hates God, but is now able to love and trust God. God has raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places so that our affections and our longings are no longer here on earth, but are now focused on Christ. He is the one whom we follow and serve. How is this possible? Is it because God has seen something lovable or good in us? Look at vs. 8 - “For by grace, you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast”. No, there is no boasting in our salvation. There was nothing in us that earned God’s approval, but God has saved us by His sheer grace. So my dear friends, put to death your human instinct to earn God’s approval and rest in a salvation that has been wrought entirely by God.

Yes, our condition was infinitely terrible…BUT GOD! Yes, we were dead in our trespasses and sins, BUT GOD made us alive together with Christ! Yes, we once followed the prince of the power of the air, BUT GOD raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly places! Yes, we were once destined for eternal wrath, BUT GOD saved us so that now He might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus!

Well as we keep reading chapter 2, we see that God’s glory is not limited to our individual salvation, but is also shown in the way He has created a Church by bringing people together under Christ. Look at verse 11:

Eph. 2:11 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— 12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing the law of commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.

One of the effects of our sin was not only that we were separated from God, but that we were separated from each other. We see in the Old Testament that God’s intention from the beginning was for the people of this world to reflect the glory of God in their unity, but instead, because of sin, humanity ended up using their unity to cooperate in their rebellion against God. So in judgment, God confused peoples’ languages and the world splintered into thousands of different tribes and nations.

Yet, God remained faithful to His plan, and decided to show His grace to the nation of Israel, and it was through this nation that He promised bless all the nations of the earth. It was to this nation that God made all His promises for salvation and blessing, but as we see history progress throughout the Old Testament, its not entirely clear how exactly these promises would be passed on to the rest of the world, especially since so many of Israel’s laws were designed to separate them from the rest of the world. In the Old Testament, we see that the fundamental division within humanity was between Jews and Gentiles, between those who had the promises of God, and those who didn’t.

But now in Jesus Christ, we see God’s amazing promises fulfilled. Through Christ, God has united Jews and Gentiles into one, tearing down “the dividing wall of hostility”. How exactly has he done that? Look at verse 15: “by abolishing the law of commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two (i.e. Jew and Gentile), so making peace.” Through the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the way we get to God is no longer through the law of commandments and ordinances, but simply through faith in Christ. Therefore, the law that once separated Israel from the rest of the world has been fulfilled in Christ. And now through the Gospel, within the Church, God is creating a new humanity, whose primary identity, primary allegiance, is not any ethnicity, or culture, or political party, but rather is their identity with Christ. In the Church, God is beginning to undo the effects of sin by uniting all of humanity under Christ.

Now, I want to be clear that the unity within the Church is very different from the kind of pluralistic, relativistic unity that the world advocates. The unity of the Church is based on a message, namely the Gospel. This is why Paul emphasizes in verse 20 that “we are built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone”. In other words, the only true unity that we’ll find is grounded on the testimony and teaching of the apostles about who Jesus Christ is and what He accomplished. Be careful of anyone who would compromise Biblical truth in the name of unity. Unity without truth is a false unity. The only true unity that we’ll ever find is a unity that is based on a true faith in Jesus Christ. In the Church today, we are seeing the fruits of the amazing wisdom of God in orchestrating redemptive history to destroy the dividing walls of this world and to create a glorious new People comprised of men and women from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

Pride as heresy

2007-08-02T18:19:00.000-04:00

While I'm posting my sermons, Carl Trueman offers a timely reminder:

I was talking with someone last week about a well-known theological personality. `I don't think he wants to be a heretic' was my friend's comment. `No,' I responded `I think the problem is he wants to be a big shot.' It reminded me of the reflections of another friend on a New Testament passage which I cited in a recent email exchange with Martin Downes:

1 Tim. 1:5-7 (here I use the ESV):

The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.

My friend made two observations about this passage. First, the drift into dubious theological discussion is here described as moral in origin: these characters have swerved from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith; that is why their theology is so dreadful. Second, their desire is not to teach but to be teachers. There is an important difference here: their focus is on their own status, not on the words they proclaim. At most, the latter are merely instrumental to getting them status and boosting their careers.

Thus, what concerns me most is that students may simply desire to be teachers. If that is their motivation, then they have already abandoned a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith, and their theology, no matter how orthodox, is just a means to an end and no sound thing. It is why I am very sceptical of the internal call to the ministry as a decisive or motivating factor in seeking ordination. Nine times out of ten, I believe that the church should first discern who should be considering the Christian ministry, not simply act as a rubber-stamp for a putative internal call which an individual may think he has.

Further, such students whose first desire is to be teachers are more likely to try to catch whatever is the latest trendy wave. Orthodoxy is always doomed to seem uncreative and pedestrian in the wider arena; if the aim is to be a teacher, to be the big shot, then it is more likely that orthodoxy will be less appealing in the long run – though there are those for whom orthodoxy too is simply a means to being a celebrity.

In this sense, orthodoxy can be heresy as well.

Ephesians 1-3 pt. 2

2007-08-02T08:29:00.000-04:00

Below is part 2 of 4 of a sermon I preached on 7/22/07 on Ephesians 1-3

The glory of God displayed in the past

So how has God done this? How has He displayed His glory through the Church? We’re going to walk through Ephesians 1 and 2 and we’re going to look at what God has done in the past, what he is doing in the present, and what He promises to do in the future. So first, let’s look at what God has done in the past. Look with me in chapter 1, beginning in verse 3:

Eph. 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4 even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love 5 he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. 7 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, 8 which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight 9 making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ 10 as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
Eph. 1:11 In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will

Here we see that God’s actions towards the church didn’t simply begin at Genesis 1 in the creation of the world, but rather, God chose us “before the foundation of the world”. This is what verse 5 is referring to when it talks about how “in love, [God] predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ”. In other words, before the world even existed, God had freely decided those whom He would adopt into His family, simply because of His love for them.

Now this is a difficult teaching isn’t it? This teaching of God’s unconditional choosing runs counter to our most basic human instinct. Human instinct teaches us, “God loves you if you are a good person. God is angry at you if you’re not.” We are naturally wired to want to work for God’s approval. But fundamentally, what is at the root of this instinct is our desire to be in control of our destiny, to be our own masters, our own gods. But friends, we are not our own gods. We are creatures, created by God. Now, I’m not saying that our actions or our decisions don’t matter… they absolutely do matter, and we’re going to see very soon that they matter a lot! But along with that, I also want to affirm what this passage seems to be affirming, namely that at the end of the day, when we get to the very bottom of things, it is God who has chosen us. It is God who has acted first.

Now, I have to confess that so much of this is still a mystery to me and I don’t claim to understand everything about all that works, (and if you have any questions about this, I would love to talk to you more afterwards). But even though I don’t understand everything, I want to be careful to affirm everything that Scripture seems to affirm, and not limit my understanding of God simply to the things that I can understand with my brain.

Well, we can be pretty sure that this is what Paul is getting at when we ask the question: What attribute is God looking to magnify in all this? Verse 6: “to the praise of His glorious grace”. As we said earlier, the reason why God has decided to make our adoption ultimately dependent on His love, rather than our worth or our decision, is because His ultimate goal in all this is to display just how amazing His grace is. If there is any thought process that we can rightly imagine in the mind of God in His predestining, it’s probably the question, “Whom can I predestine that will most display just how generous and gracious I am?” Therefore, it’s no wonder that Paul writes in 1 Cor. 1:26-28:

26 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. 27 But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; 28 God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, 29 so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

Another indicator that God’s predestining was based on grace and not on anything we do is the phrase “in him”: vs. 4 – “He chose us in him”. This is clearly referring to Jesus Christ in verse 3. What this means is that if there was any good that God saw when he chose us, it was not any good in us, but in Christ. When God chose undeserving sinners to be adopted into His family, He did so with an eye to what Christ accomplished on the cross. This is why our adoption in verse 5 is “through Jesus Christ”. How did Jesus Christ make our adoption possible? Look at verse 7 “In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace.”

What are these trespasses that we see here? They refer to the fact that all of us here are sinners. All of us have rebelled against God and refused His Lordship over our lives, and instead, have lived according to our own ideas of what is good and right. As a result, not only have our lives been corrupted, but this entire world has fallen into a corrupt and wicked state, and what used to be a beautiful and clear reflection of God’s glory, has now become a muddy, filthy cesspool of evil that brings insult to the glory of its Creator. So what will God do? Will He look the other way and allow His glory to be trampled on? Or will He vindicate Himself and bring destruction to these rebels?

Well, like we saw earlier, God is committed to His glory and He will not let sin go unpunished. But instead of simply obliterating all of His enemies at once, God did something really amazing. God Himself stepped into human history, by sending His Son Jesus Christ into the world. Jesus Christ was born into this world and grew up, and lived a life of perfect obedience and love to God and man. He was the only perfect, sinless human that has ever lived on this earth (the kind of people that we should’ve been). And yet, at the end of his life, instead of receiving the honor and reward he should have received, he was falsely condemned and crucified on a cross. And there, on the cross, God laid on him the sins of His people, and Jesus Christ received the punishment and death that our sins deserved. On the cross, we see the full display of God’s hatred for evil and sin, in the fact that the only sacrifice sufficient to satisfy God’s judgment of sin was the death of the infinitely worthy Son of God.

But Christ did not remain dead. Three days after His death, God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, proving that the punishment of sin has been fully paid by Christ’s sacrifice. Death has been defeated. God’s wrath has been spent. And now to those who will repent of their sins, and place their trust in Christ by faith, God promises to count Christ’s work as accomplished on their behalf, to forgive them of their sins and adopt them into His family.

If you are a non-Christian here this morning, if you understand nothing else in this sermon, I hope you’ll understand this message. Jesus Christ has come to save sinners from the wrath of God by suffering in their place. And the way you are connected to this gracious work is not by your efforts, or your own self-righteousness, but simply by turning away from your sin and trusting in Christ by faith. If you have any questions about what that means, please make it your business to talk to me or someone here today.

And if you are a Christian here, as we think about all the ways that our salvation is rooted in what God has done for us in the past, do you see what an awesome foundation this is? The next time you are wavering with doubts, or struggling with sins and unsure of whether or not God really loves you, rather than looking to yourself for comfort, place your hope and your trust in God and recognize that your salvation is ultimately not rooted in what you have done, but in what God has done for you. This is what it means to rest in God and to hope in God.

Ephesians 1-3 pt. 1

2007-08-01T14:02:00.000-04:00

Below is part 1 of 4 of a sermon I recently preached on Ephesians 1-3

Have you ever had one of those mornings where you wake up, you pull yourself out of bed, and as you think about the coming day or week or months or years… all you feel is the emptiness or meaninglessness of it all? All you see before you is an endless string of more classes or projects or spreadsheets or chores. And as you think about all these things that you are so busy doing, you wonder, What is the point of all this? Does what I do really matter at all? Where is my life going? Sadly, this kind of thinking can often creep into many areas of our lives, from our work, to our families, to our ministries, to our spiritual disciplines, and even into our church life. Every once in awhile you might get a glimpse of something great in what you’re doing, but then you wake up, and everything once again seems so small and insignificant.

My brothers and sisters, we were not made to live this way. God intends for us to know that regardless of what situation we are in, our lives were meant to be part of something significant and that every step we take is one step closer to a glorious and wonderful future.

For the next two Sundays we are going to be studying the book of Ephesians and the truths contained in Ephesians are the remedy for our despair and fears. Paul’s goal in writing this letter is to help us take a step back from our daily activities and responsibilities, and see a big and glorious picture of all that God is doing. And when our hearts are captivated by this awesome picture, we’ll begin to see that the things that we once thought were so hopeless and meaningless, actually have incredible significance in God’s purposes, and we will be able to re-enter our everyday lives armed with these glorious truths.

This morning we’ll be looking at Ephesians 1-3. For my sermon today, I have four main points: First, I want us to look at God’s purpose for the Church. Second, I want us to look at what God has done for the Church in the past. Third, what God is doing through the Church in this present age. Fourth, what God promises to do for the Church in the future. And then, I want to wrap all this up by helping us think of what implications this might have for our lives.

The purpose of the Church

So first, I want us to begin w/ the big picture: What is God’s purpose for the Church? To find the answer to this, we’re going to have to go towards the end of chapter 3. Look with me at Ephesians 3, beginning in vs. 8:

Eph. 3:8 To me, though I am the very least of all the saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, 9 and to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God who created all things, 10 so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. 11 This was according to the eternal purpose that he has realized in Christ Jesus our Lord, 12 in whom we have boldness and access with confidence through our faith in him.

We’re very soon going to see in chapters 1 and 2, God has been actively involved in the creation and salvation of the His people, the Church, stretching from before the foundation of the world, going forward to all the ages to come. But what is the point of all this? What is His purpose for the church? Vs. 10: “so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places”. The reason why God has gone through all the trouble of creating this world and redeeming a particular people called the Church, is because He desires to display the glory of His wisdom through the Church to the watching universe. Paul gives this same concept in chapter one, verse 5:

5 he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace,

We’re going to talk about this word “predestined” later, but for now, notice what “the purpose of His will” is, namely “the praise of his glorious grace”. The reason God has predestined us for adoption in Christ is so that through His dealings with us His glorious grace would be shown and praised. So I ask again, what is the purpose of the Church? For anyone who is a Christian here today, what is the meaning or the purpose of your life, both individually and as a corporate body? The answer: You exist to glorify God. If you have ever wondered, “What is the meaning of life?” This is your answer: God has created you ultimately so that through His relationship with you, His glory might be displayed.

Now, how are we to think about God creating us in order to glorify Himself? I mean, if any one of us to made it our ambition to show off our own greatness, we would quickly be accused of being conceited or shallow or foolish. So why is it any different with God? Well, it’s different for two reasons. First, it is right for God’s greatest purpose to be the exaltation of His own glory. There is no higher value, no greater perfection in this world than God Himself. So if God were to pursue anything besides His own glory, then He would not be pursuing that which is of the greatest value, but rather something imperfect and inferior. If He were to do so, He would not be a perfect God. In essence, He would be committing the sin of idolatry, namely pursuing that which is not of the highest worth. Therefore, it is only right and good for the God of the Universe to make the pursuit of His own glory His highest priority.

But not only is it right, but it is also extremely loving for God to do so. Because God is a perfectly good God, it is a wonderful thing that He would seek to display His glory in the world. For example, think about God’s wisdom… it is loving that God would seek to display the glory of His wisdom in this world. We don’t want to live in a world dominated by disorder or foolishness or chaos. Rather, we want to live in a world ordered by reason and laws and authority established by God’s wisdom. Or think about God’s justice… it is loving that God would seek to display the glory of His justice in the world. We don’t want to live in a world where evil and injustice prevails, but we want to live in a world where God will get the final word and He will see to it that injustice is ultimately defeated and His justice is displayed. I could go on and talk about all the other attributes of God (His power, His patience, His kindness, His holiness), how it is to our blessing that God would seek to display those attributes in this world. So brothers and sisters, rejoice that we have a God that loves to magnify His glory in this world. Everything good, everything that we love and enjoy that exists in this world is a result of God’s passion to display His glory in this world.

And here’s the amazing thing: Right in the middle of this great purpose of God to glorify Himself is the Church. God has chosen the Church, God has chosen us, specifically, to be the exhibition, the object-lesson, to the watching universe, of just how great He is. This is the purpose of the Church.

Attraction

2007-07-17T23:00:00.001-04:00

Michael Lawrence has written an excellent two-part series on the theme of attraction. Here, he addresses issues that deal with some sinful attitudes in my life... really convicting stuff. His introduction to part 1 of the series:

How many times have I talked to a single guy who wants to get married, only to hear him say that he knows lots of great women? He admits these women have godly characters and fantastic personalities. But he's not dating any of them. When I ask why not, the reply comes with a sigh. "I'm just not attracted to them." Pity the single Christian man with high standards and good taste. He can't help it he's single. The godly women he knows just aren't beautiful enough.

This is not just a Christian problem. Debra Dickerson, an African-American writer for Salon magazine, reflected on her sense of sadness after watching the brazenly crude and essentially misogynistic movie, The Wedding Crashers. (It came out a couple of years ago, and I sincerely hope you didn't see it.) Was she depressed at the way women were viewed simply as objects of lust, trophies to be won, conquests to be notched? Unfortunately not. She was depressed because, "by the end of the parade of weddings crashed and women laid, the crashers had seduced their way through every culture and every ethnicity but mine.... Why didn't they want to seduce me, too?" she asks. The answer, left painfully unspoken, was that they didn't find her ethnicity beautiful. While the judgment that black is not beautiful is patently false, that knowledge did not ease Dickerson's pain at being implicitly labeled "undesirable."

The Problem of Attraction

What do immoral wedding crashers, Debra Dickerson, and single Christian men have in common here? They're all operating on the assumption that beauty is altogether in the eye of the beholder. All of us are attracted to beauty. But this assumption says that none of us can help who or what we find beautiful. It's just something that happens. We like what we like, and who's to say why? At a superficial level — the color of hair, the shape of a face — there is some truth to that old adage. One of the reasons that I married my own wife is that I found her beautiful. I didn't need friends or strangers to tell me she was beautiful. I knew she was beautiful and I was attracted to her beauty.

But when we move beyond the accidents of appearance, to the roots of our desire and the motivation for marrying this woman rather than that one, the old adage is both false and dangerous. False, because it defines the beauty of the women around us by the distorted and inadequate measure of our own taste and desires. Dangerous, because it creates in us, as men, a passivity toward beauty. Beauty becomes a thing that the woman we're dating, or thinking about dating, either has or doesn't have. And we are the unimpeachable judge and jury. As long as she is beautiful in our eyes, we appreciate and savor and pursue that beauty. When that beauty fades, our desire slackens and our pursuit turns elsewhere. Like art critics at a gallery, our gaze is captured only until something more interesting appears. We are responders, not producers, without obligation or responsibility. After all, we can't help who we're attracted to. Or can we?

Read the rest here: part 1, part 2

How to glorify God when questioning Him: Principles from Habakkuk

2007-06-21T10:49:00.001-04:00

In Scripture (and in real life), we have many examples where people question God out of unbelief and thereby incur His displeasure. Yet, there are also some examples where people question God in such a way, to which He is pleased to respond. Habakkuk is a such an example for how we can express our questions to God in a way that glorifies Him.

When questioning God, acknowledge what God has revealed about Himself to be true.

Your eyes are too pure to approve evil,
And You can not look on wickedness with favor.
Why do You look with favor
On those who deal treacherously?
Why are You silent when the wicked swallow up
Those more righteous than they? - vs. 1:13

Habakkuk was living in the midst of great wickedness and injustice, both from within Israel and from the coming Babylonians. And yet, he did not give in to the temptation of denying God's holy, just character. Nor did he give in to the temptation of denying God's sovereign control over this world. Rather, Habakkuk persevered in faith in what God had revealed about His own character to be true, even though the circumstances around him seemed to tell him otherwise. Habakkuk lived by faith in God's Word being true even though he could not perfectly understand how a holy and sovereign God could permit such evil.

Likewise, when encountering circumstances we do not understand, we must first acknowledge those truths that we do understand to be true from God's Word. When calamity strikes and everything seems to be falling apart, we must first remember that because of Christ, God is now our loving Father, who ordains all things for our good. As we continue struggling with sin in this life and become discouraged, we must first trust in the truth that Christ came to save sinners and that He promises to forgive all those who repent and come to Him in faith. When our future is unclear and a thousand questions fill our minds, we must rest in a God who knows all things and is in control of all things. Glorify God in your questioning by acknowledging what God has revealed to be true.

When questioning God, make the glory of God your highest concern.

LORD, I have heard the report about You and I fear.
O LORD, revive Your work in the midst of the years,
In the midst of the years make it known;
In wrath remember mercy. - vs. 3:2

What first initiated Habakkuk's concern wasn't just wickedness in the world in general, but particularly wickedness and injustice among the people of God (vs. 1:2-4). Israel was supposed to a special display of God's glory and kingdom in this world. Israel was supposed to be a light to the nations in the way the lived out God's law. But instead, we see that Israel became as wicked as the surrounding nations and failed in this task. For Habakkuk, this was a terrible evil and it had to be addressed by God. For God to fail to address Israel's rebellion would be for Him to deny His own Word, His own authority. At the heart of Habakkuk's plea was his concern for God to defend His Name, to vindicate His promises before the watching world.

Likewise, when we question God, we must also have God's glory as our ultimate concern. Yet, often I fear that Christians struggle with this concept because they think of God's glory in an ethereal, abstract sense. But the amazing truth that we see in Scripture is that God, in making a covenant with His people, has graciously tied His glory to our good. Therefore, when we plead our case before God, we can do so in a way that understands our welfare to be connected to His reputation, to His name. To behold the glory of God is the highest joy of the Christian. So glorify God in your questioning by making His glory your greatest concern.

When questioning God, be persistent in your prayers.

How long, O LORD, will I call for help,
And You will not hear?
I cry out to You, “Violence!”
Yet You do not save. - vs. 1:2

Habakkuk's complaint in this verse did not come on a whim. Rather, it is the fruit if a much longer period in his life when he has repeatedly seen injustice in this world and has had his heart grieved by it. He has been praying to God and questioning Him for a long period of time, and even though God has not yet answered, Habakkuk has persevered in his prayers.

This perseverance in itself is pleasing to God. Jesus reminds us of this in Luke 18 with the parable of the persistent widow. Yet as I reflect on my own life, what is striking is not the simply the challenge of persevering in prayer itself. I've often persevered in prayer over the course of years for many things: a new job, relationships, a certain problem... But what is striking is that Habakkuk has persevered in prayer over the injustice that he sees around Him... over the way God's name is being blasphemed among the nations because of the wickedness of Israel. These are the things that grieve Habakkuk's heart and consume his prayers. I don't know if I've ever had a persistent portion of my life where I was given over to such prayers. May God create in us a similar, lasting, persevering concern for eternal, rather than temporal, matters.

When questioning God, have a heart of total dependence on Him

Are You not from everlasting,
O LORD, my God, my Holy One?
We will not die. - vs. 1:12

The reason Habakkuk has so long persevered in His questioning is because God was His only hope for life. Habakkuk had built His life on the hope that the God of Israel is the one true God and that He would one day establish His Kingdom in this world and set all things to right. This was something that only God could bring about. Habakkuk had no plan B, no contingency plan, no exit strategy. If God somehow failed to keep His promises to do this, then Habakkuk would be undone. This kind of wholehearted dependence should also mark every Christian.

And so, like Habakkuk, as we watch the news, as we encounter difficulties, as we see the fallen-ness of the world around us, we must understand that our only hope is the truth of the Gospel. Namely, that God has reconciled sinners to Himself through faith in the blood of His Son. There is no plan B, no contingency plan, no exit strategy. If the Gospel is false, then we are all undone. But if the Gospel is true, then like Habakkuk, we can look forward with the eyes of faith to the day when God will indeed establish His kingdom here on earth and set all things to right. It is when we do so, that we can rejoice with Habakkuk:

Though the fig tree should not blossom
And there be no fruit on the vines,
Though the yield of the olive should fail
And the fields produce no food,
Though the flock should be cut off from the fold
And there be no cattle in the stalls,

Yet I will exult in the LORD,
I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. - vs. 3:17-18

Five Priorities for Mercy Ministries

2007-06-12T21:51:00.001-04:00

One of the ways churches, Christian organizations, campus ministries, etc. are trying to stay relevant today is by redirecting their outreach efforts to mercy ministries, rather than more "traditional" forms of outreach. Whether it is homeless outreach, or poverty-relief work, or raising AIDS awareness, Christians are increasingly looking to these mercy ministries as ways to engage the world about the truth of the Gospel. And without a doubt, much good has come from these efforts. These ministries have not only allowed non-Christians to see the Gospel lived out, but have also provided new venues for Christians to live out their discipleship to Christ.

But these new ministry efforts have not come without challenges to the Christian faith, particularly to the message of the Gospel. One reason this is so is because these mercy ministries are often so evidently good to the watching world. Any observing non-Christian will likely consider a church's effort to care for the homeless a good, admirable thing to do. And yet, if we are to be faithful to Scripture, we know that the Christian understanding of what is good and admirable is to be very different from what a non-Christian considers good and admirable. Moreover, we know that the Gospel is far more than receivng a meal, or a handout, or free health care. The Gospel is about sinners under the wrath of God being reconciled to God through the death of His Son. How can church seek to engage in mercy ministries without compromising the Gospel? Allow me to suggest five priorities that we need to maintain, if we are to do mercy ministries in a distinctively Christian way:

- Maintain the priority of the Gospel

"1CO 15:3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep."

A popular saying these days is, "Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary use words." I can appreciate the call for Christians to live a life consistent with the Gospel at all times. However, I could not disagree more with the premise of this statement. The Gospel cannot be preached without words. The Good News is ultimately not a lifestyle, but it is news. It is a message rooted in historical events involving specifically, the life and death of a Jesus Christ, and more broadly, God's redemptive work throughout human history. But this is not just any message, but this is an extremely offensive message to the world. It speaks of a perfect, holy God, Who has placed demands on every area of our lives. It speaks of our utter sinfulness, God's eternal wrath against our sin, and our utter inability to save ourselves. It speaks of the bloody death of the Son of God who died in our place for our sins. It speaks of the need to continually turn away from sin, trust in Christ, and live under His lordship. As we seek to show mercy to the poor and oppressed, we must be careful to understand that the Gospel is only proclaimed when this message is proclaimed.

- Maintain the priority of evangelism

"RO 10:14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?"

If the Gospel is a message, then it is no wonder that the means God has appointed for salvation of sinners is the preaching of the Gospel. It is through the hearing of the Gospel that God chooses to work in the human heart to produce repentance and faith. In other words, apart from the preaching of the Gospel, no one will hear the Gospel. And if they do not hear, they will not believe in God. And if they do not believe, they will not call on God for help. Therefore, as churches look to engage in mercy ministries, they must maintain the priority of evangelism. To feed a person a meal but do nothing to care for his soul, is ultimately to fail to love that person. Does this mean we have to verbally speak the Gospel every single time we do an act of mercy? I don't think so. But I do think that it means that we must always be deliberately moving towards a proclamation of the Gospel in every act of mercy. Mercy ministries ultimately exist to commend our proclamation of the Gospel. John Piper puts it well when he describes his church's goal in mercy ministries: "We seek to alleviate all suffering, especially eternal suffering".

- Maintain the priority of the spiritual

"2COR 4:18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

One of the things that stands out in all of Paul's exhortations is not simply the emphasis to do good to others, but more specifically, to do spiritual good to others. As Christians, we are ultimately to be more concerned for a person's spiritual needs than his temporal needs. We do this because we know that God is the greatest joy in the universe. Therefore, the greatest, most loving good that we could do to another person is to bring them closer to God, to help them enjoy God more. This is ultimately how Christ has loved us and this is how we must love others, if we are to imitate His love. As we seek to do good to other people, we must remember that doing physical good is only temporary, but doing spiirtual good to others is of eternal value.

- Maintain the priority of the Church

"GAL 6:Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers."

As Christians, we have a greater responsibility to other Christians. We see this modeled in the New Testament church, where believers gave sacrificially to care not just for any poor, but particularly those within her walls. Why are we called to show particular love to the body of Christ? Because the unique love that Christ's disciples show to each other is the church's distinctive witness to the Gospel. Many secular organizations can engage in mercy ministries. But only the church can engage in the kind of Spirit-wrought, Christ-like love for those within her covenant community. The church's unique testimony to the Gospel exists nowhere else in the world, except in the church. This love produces a unity within the body of Christ that trascends all human boundaries (Gal. 3:28). This unity displays to the world the truth of the Gospel and God's coming judgment for all those who reject it (Phil. 1:27-28). This love shows to the world that our unity comes not from ourselves, but from Christ (John 13:34-35). Again and again, the "one another" commands throughout the New Testament remind us of the priority of our relationship with other Christians. And again and again, we see in the New Testament that the way Christians love and care for one another is the church's testimony to the truth of the Gospel. Therefore, even as we seek to commend the Gospel in serving all people, let us be especially vigilant to preserve this unique testimony by growing in our love for one another.

- Maintain the priority of Christ

"MT 26:11 The poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me."

Many today are quick to point to Jesus' compassion for the poor and oppressed, and there is no doubt that Jesus did indeed show special concern for the suffering. However, to paint Christ simply as one who taught us to care for the poor and do good to others, is a far too shallow picture of him. When we dig deeper in the Gospels, we find that Christ did not primarily come to feed the poor and heal the sick, but came first and foremost, to ransom sinners through His life, death and resurrection. When we dig deeper, we find that we cannot come to Christ with our notions of what is good and right, but rather he calls us to die to ourselves and follow Him. When we dig deeper, we find that Christ's greatest passion was not the good of man, but the glory of God. Therefore, as churches pursue mercy ministries, they must do so in a uniquely Christ-like way. That is to say, they must do so in a way that seeks to proclaim the truth of the Gospel, to call people to true discipleship, and to bring glory to God in all things.

2007-05-18T10:37:00.000-04:00

Andrew Peterson has written a beautiful meditation on the eight days leading up to Easter Sunday.

Read it here: http://www.andrew-peterson.com/journals.php?q=2&y=2007

2007-05-17T09:34:00.001-04:00

“Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” - Matt. 26:41

I've been struck recently by this comment that Christ makes to his disciples at Gethsemane when they are falling asleep on him. Here he is, facing the most difficult trial of his life yet, not only in terms of physical torture, but also as he is about to drink the cup of the wrath of God for all the sins of the world from the beginning to the end of time. So he asks his disciples to pray... but instead finding them praying, he returns to find them sleeping. And how does he respond?

"The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."

What a merciful statement! Rather than blasting them for their weakness and laziness, He graciously comments on God's work that is evident in their lives ("the spirit is willing"), and acknowledges His sympathy of their weakness ("the flesh is weak"). Rather, than giving up on them, He encourages them to persevere, even as they have failed and are currently failing. In the moment when Christ was in greatest agony, His disciples failed to support him... and yet Christ still has a gracious word for them.

As the failing sinner that I so often am, this is a great encouragement: The Great Physician came not for the healthy, but for the sick. And the One who neither slumbers nor sleeps on us (Ps. 121:3) came not for perfect disciples, but for those who struggle to stay awake.

Thorns

2007-04-07T09:18:00.000-04:00

Michael Lawrence gave a powerful Good Friday meditation last night. Below is my summary of it:

Matt. 27:29 And after twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on His head, and a reed in His right hand; and they knelt down before Him and mocked Him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!”

When the Roman soldiers placed a crown of thorns of Jesus' head, their intent wasn't simply pain. After all, Jesus had already been flogged and beaten. Rather, they wanted to make a point. Jesus had claimed to be a king, when there was only one king, Caesar. Caesar wore a crown of laurels covered in gold, signifying his dominion over the Roman empire. For this impostor king, they would find him a crown of thorns, in order to show the utter ridiculousness of his claims. But what the soldiers never realized was that this crown of thorns was the most fitting crown he could have worn.

Throughout Scripture, we see that thorns are a picture of futility and frustration, and are good for nothing except to be burned. Unlike the rest of the plants and trees, thorns were not created on the third day of creation. God's creation of the world consisted only of that which was good. It was only when Adam rejected God's authority and chose his own way by eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, that God curses the ground with thorns. Indeed, with Adam's sin, he has begun a new path of independence away from God. It is only then, that God curses the ground with a new plant, namely thorns and thistles. Adam's rebellion produces something new in God's creation and the futility and worthlessness of these newly-created thorns and thistles become a powerful picture of the futility and worthlessness created by sin. This picture is replayed everyday in our lives, when we sow the seeds of our sin and reap a harvest of frustration and heartache.

And it was for sinners, wallowing in this world of cursed futility, that Jesus Christ came to save. The King to whom all allegiance is owed, came to bear the curse that rebels deserved for their rebellion against Him. The One who wore a crown of infinite glory, laid it aside in order to wear a crown of thorns on his brow. And on the cross, "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us". And in doing so, He ushers in a new Kingdom where those who will place their trust in him will one day inherit a world free of all thorns and thistles.... a Kingdom where we will one day wear not a crown of thorns, but a crown of glory... a Kingdom where we will no longer rebel against our King, but will lay our crowns down at His feet.

Heb. 2:9 But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

How would anyone ever disprove Christianity?

2007-03-28T09:58:00.000-04:00

1 The fool has said in his heart, “There is no God.”
They are corrupt, they have committed abominable deeds;
There is no one who does good.

2 The LORD has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men
To see if there are any who understand,
Who seek after God.

3 They have all turned aside, together they have become corrupt;
There is no one who does good, not even one.

Psalm 14:1-3

All the controversy regarding Cameron's "Jesus tomb" reminds me of a conversation my OT professor had with an atheist friend that he shared with us. They had previously engaged in many friendly and spirited discussions on Christianity and one day his friend called him up saying he had a question that would stump the professor. He seemed pretty excited and this is what he asked: "How would anyone ever disprove Christianity?"

Now that is a good question.

So my professor thought about it for some time and pondered what archaeological evidence people could come up with that might prove that Christianity is false (including finding the "Jesus tomb"). But even if such a thing were to happen, it would be impossible to prove that the tomb and corpse really belonged to Jesus and etc, etc... But then finally, he thought of something.

He said to his atheist friend, "If scientists can ever bring about the next level of evolution, where we are living together in perfect patience, kindness, self-control, self-lessness, harmony... or to make it even simpler, where we're not destroying each other and stealing from each other and defrauding each other (as has been the case since the beginning of human history; just look at the past century), then Christianity is false." (Of course, his friend was a sharp guy, so he had to throw in the necessary disclaimers, for example, you can't drug up people.)

I think my OT professor was right on. If ever we are able to get to a point where sin is no longer a problem, then Christianity will have proven to be a sham and the gospel will have been a terrible lie... but if my life is any indication of the human condition, I'm pretty sure sin will remain until Christ returns. In any case, if Cameron really wants to try to disprove Christianity, he should stop wasting his time on this tomb and work on bringing about this next level of evolution... or better yet, he should stop wasting his time altogether before its too late.

Jesus of the Scars

2007-02-25T22:11:00.001-05:00

One of the most difficult questions in the world that a Christian must face is the question of a good, loving, sovereign God and the existence of evil in this world. How is it that a good, loving, and sovereign God can allow, and even ordain, evil and suffering of the most extreme magnitude to exist in this world? I have studied much on this issue and have found many helpful truths by careful Bible study, listening to sermons, reading theological book... but at the end of the day, I have to confess that so much of this is beyond my understanding. This is even more so when I, or someone close to me, undergoes suffering. In the midst of grief, the fight of faith is often the most difficult.

However, there is one thing of which I am certain. The only way I can begin to grapple with the problem of evil and suffering is by first coming to the cross of Jesus Christ. There, the same good, loving, and sovereign God became man and entered into the very experience of evil and suffering that we experience in this world.

Edward Shillito was an English Congregationalist minister who survived the horrors of artillery, machine guns, and trench warfare during World War I. As he reflected on his experience, he found peace only when he considered the suffering and death of Christ and he wrote the poem below, entitled "Jesus of the Scars". As you read this, I hope you also will look to the suffering Savior, and there, find peace in the midst of the suffering in your life.

If we have never sought, we seek Thee now;
Thine eyes burn through the dark, our only stars;
We must have sight of thorn-pricks on Thy brow;
We must have Thee, O Jesus of the Scars.

The heavens frighten us; they are too calm;
In all the universe we have no place;
Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?
Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars we claim Thy grace.

If when the doors are shut, Thou drawest near,
Only reveal those hands, that side of Thine;
We know to-day what wounds are, have no fear,
Show us Thy Scars, we know the countersign.

The other gods were strong; but Thou wast weak;
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,
And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone.

Perspective

2007-02-08T07:48:00.000-05:00

I had lunch with an Iranian pastor today and among many other things, I got to hear him share about how hard it has been to learn to forgive as a Christian. Before the revolution, his father worked as a security officer for the king and when the revolution happened, his family lost everything and barely had food to eat. He and his family became a Christian after that time, and this doubled the hardship they experienced. He shared about how his brother-in-law was once going to work late at night and was stopped by a patrol. While reaching for his ID, they shot him and killed him, leaving his sister a widow with three children. In order to reclaim the body, the government demanded payment for the bullets, demanding an inexorbitant price for each bullet. As poor as they were, they were never able to reclaim the body. On another occasion, his nephew became extremely sick and yet his family could not afford to purchase medical care for him and he died a slow, painful death. He shared many other stories like this. He confessed his struggle to forgive those who had so harmed his family, and how he often refused to witness to government workers because he hated them and desired their damnation. But by God's grace, after many years, he has learned to forgive them and even to pray for their salvation. It is still not easy, and he is still growing in this, but God is clearly at work in his life. It was powerful to see the emotion in his eyes as he shared all this. Today, as a pastor of a local church, he also seeks to help members of his congregation to forgive those who have persecuted them. Most recently, he is working with a mother whose Christian son was tortured to the point of kidney failure, encouraging her to find forgiveness and peace in Christ.

Pray for the Christians in Iran.

Loving God, loving His people

2006-12-13T09:36:00.000-05:00

One of the surprising themes in the New Testament is how love for God is shown by love for His people. Oftentimes, we limit our ideas of what it means to love God to privatized experiences: longer quiet times, giving more money, an emotional rush during worship singing, etc... Now, these things all certainly can be aspects of true affection for God. But the Bible presents to us a much more tangible, corporate picture of what it means to love God:

If anyone says, "I love God," yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. - 1 John 4:20

God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them. - Heb. 6:10

"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.' - Matt. 25:40

We also see this theme repeated throughout the New Testament in all the "one another" commands. Our love for Christ is reflected in our obedience to His commands (John 14:15) and His command is that we love one another. We love God by loving His people. Which is why it makes sense that when Paul was persecuting Christians, Christ asked him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?"

What is striking in these verses, however, is that their message goes against any popular notions of Christianity. The world is comfortable with a Christianity that advocates a general love for all people. It is not comfortable with a Christianity that promotes a specific love for God's people. The most fundamental reason for this is that it implies that there is such a body as "God's people" and those who are not in this body are not "God's people". This strikes at the root of the inclusivism, relativism, and pluralism of our age.

Of course, this does not mean that we have no obligation to love non-Christians (Matt. 5:43-48). However, it does mean that the evidence of a heart transformed to love God will be our love for other Christians (1 John 4:20). It means that the way we persevere in faith is by showing love to other Christians (Heb. 6:10). It means that what will distinguish Christian love from general philanthropy is our special care and concern for persecuted Christians (Matt. 25:40).

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. - 1 John 4:11

"I am a king"

2006-12-04T11:53:00.000-05:00

When Christ uttered, in the judgment hall of Pilate, the remarkable words - "I am a king" (John 18:37), he pronounced a sentiment fraught with unspeakable dignity and power. His enemies might deride his pretensions and express their mockery of his claim, by presenting him with a crown of thorns, a reed, and a purple robe, and nailing him to the cross; but in the eyes of unfallen intelligences, he was a king. A higher power presided over that derisive ceremony, and converted it into a real coronation. That crown of thorns was indeed the diadem of empire; that purple robe was the badge of royalty; that fragile reed was the symbol of unbounded power; and that cross the throne of dominion which shall never end.

- J.L. Reynolds, Church Polity of the Kingdom of Christ, in Polity, Dever, Mark, p. 298.

The Offence of the Cross Ceasing

2006-11-29T11:06:00.000-05:00

Further proof that there's nothing new under the sun. He could very well be describing much of today's preaching.

Leave out the holy character of God, the holy excellence of his law, the holy condemnation to which transgressors are doomed, the holy loveliness of the Saviour’s character, the doctrine, and the holy tempers and conduct of all true believers: then dress up a scheme of religion of this unholy sort: represent mankind as in a pitiable condition, rather through misfortune than by crime: speak much of Christ’s bleeding love to them, of his agonies in the garden and on the cross; without shewing the need or the nature of the satisfaction for sin: speak of his present glory, and of his compassion for poor sinners; of the freeness with which he dispenses pardons; of the privileges which believers enjoy here, and of the happiness and glory reserved for them hereafter: clog this with nothing about regeneration and sanctification, or represent holiness as somewhat else than conformity to the holy character and law of God: and you make up a plausible gospel, calculated to humour the pride, soothe the consciences, engage the hearts, and raise the affections of natural men, who love nobody but themselves.

And now no wonder if this gospel (which has nothing in it affronting, offensive, or unpalatable, but is perfectly suited to the carnal unhumbled sinner, and helps him to quiet his conscience, dismiss his fears, and encourage his hopes,) incur no opposition amongst ignorant persons, who inquire not into the reason of things; meet with a hearty welcome, and make numbers of supposed converts, who live and die as full as they can hold of joy and confidence, without any fears or conflicts. ...

What wonder if, when all the offensive part is left out, the gospel gives no offence? What wonder if, when it is made suitable to carnal minds, carnal minds fall in love with it? What wonder if, when it is evidently calculated to fill the unrenewed mind with false confidence and joy, it has this effect? What wonder if, when the true character of God is unknown, and a false character of him is framed in the fancy,--a God all love and no justice, very fond of such believers, as his favourites,--they have very warm affections towards him?

I would not give needless offence. Let this matter be weighed according to its importance. Let the word of God be examined impartially. I cannot but avow my fears that Satan has propagated much of this false religion, among many widely different classes of religious professors; and it shines so brightly in the eyes of numbers, who ‘take all for gold that glitters’, that, unless the fallacy be detected, it bids fair to be the prevailing religion in many places.

Thomas Scott, Letter and Papers, edited by John Stott (London: Seeley, 1824, pp. 441-444)

The chief dangers to Christianity

2006-11-28T08:48:00.000-05:00

The chief dangers to Christianity do not come from the anti-Christian systems. Mohammedanism has never made inroads upon Christianity save by the sword. Nobody fears that Christianity will be swallowed up by Buddhism. It is corrupt forms of Christianity itself which menace from time to time the life of Christianity. Why make much of minor points of difference between those who serve the one Christ? Because a pure gospel is worth preserving; and is not only worth preserving, but is logically (and logic will always work itself out in history) the only saving gospel.

- Benjamin Warfield, 1894, Selected Shorter Writings, vol. 2, p. 665-6.

What I will be doing this Thanksgiving

2006-11-22T11:09:00.000-05:00

Unfortunately, I will be spending Thanksgiving away from my family this year, but I'll have the opportunity to spend it with the Devers. Mark describes a few Thanksgiving traditions:

We will, before we eat, sing a hymn or two. We will read a psalm and pray. When people sit down with their food, I will read some early thanksgiving proclamations from the 17th century, perhaps from the revolutionary period, from Lincoln, and the current year's. (Each year the president makes a thanksgiving proclamation, which you can print out from the White House's website.) I'll read a little about the history of Thanksgiving, and ask a few questions about it. (Like, how did it get moved from the last Thursday in November to the fourth?) My wife generally lays out 3 corns on each plate before dessert to remind us of the thanksgiving for surviving the first winter at Plymouth. We go around 3 times, each expressing something that we're thankful for. This time ranges from serious to light and back again. And then we pray. All of this is interspersed with lots of conversation (and eating) and likely some games for those who want to stay around into the evening. (And, ok, maybe we do watch Mr. Bean's Christmas special.)

Good times

2006-11-15T08:58:00.000-05:00

This year's ETS annual meeting is in Washington, DC, and a lot of pastors and theologians are here in town. Last night, several students from TBI spent the night at CHBC, and the staff and interns got to have dinner with them, followed by a great interview between Mark and John Piper and a time for Q&A, where they discussed topics like N.T. Wright on justification, the term "missional", the church and social action, the church and culture, abortion, congregationalism, church growth, and several other very interesting topics. Hopefully, 9Marks will be releasing this interview soon.

Growing Healthy Asian American Churches - Book Review

2006-11-10T12:51:00.000-05:00

I've written a short review of Growing Healthy Asian American Churches, edited by Peter Cha, Steven Kang (whose office is right next to David Wells' at GCTS) and Helen Lee. My introduction:

The dilemma for ethnic churches is a familiar one: Immigrants move to a foreign country in search of opportunities. They are drawn to other immigrants who share the same language and culture, and plant churches together so that they can worship in their native tongue and cultural context, and raise their families in these churches. But the difficulty begins with the next generation, as their children begin losing the traditional culture, replacing it with the local culture. Even as the ethnic church continues to provide a familiar community for new immigrants, it becomes decreasingly relevant for each passing generation. How will the church deal with these two increasingly different groups under one roof? How can the church ensure that it is built on biblical truth, rather than a particular culture? How does an ethnic church fit into the bigger picture of what God is doing? These and many other difficulties face Asian American churches today.

Read the rest here.

N.T. Wright and the New Creation

2006-10-21T14:30:00.000-04:00

Thoughts and summary from the N.T. Wright lecture in Georgetown this past Friday:

- He is an excellent, gifted communicator.

- New Creation theology, which is the idea that Christ in his resurrection has initiated a New Creation, informs ALL his theology and reading and thinking and application.

- As Christians, we are to live out this New Creation and even to bring this New Creation as we seek to restore the world to God's original design.

- N.T. is very ecumenical, urging Catholics, Orthodox, Pentecostals, Baptists all to work together as Christians. Something is up w/ his Pauline theology, because these different denominations hold very different understandings of justification and for him to consider them all as within the bounds of Christianity is confusing.

- The main purpose of the Church to live out New Creation.

- What about missions? Missions can be preaching the Gospel or it can be doing good works of New Creation, which would be a form of communicating the Gospel. We do good works so that people can ask why. Then we explain our story. He quoted St. Francis' "Preach the Gospel, and if necessary use words".

- We can work w/ other faiths, but some faiths can't embrace New Creation theology (for example, Buddhists), and so there will be disagreement. Again, his New Creation theology dominates his thinking.

- Repeated this theme of how God "deals", "defeats" evil at the cross. But he never clearly explains what that means. His New Creation theology causes him to emphasize Christ's resurrection and what that accomplishes more than his death.

- His treatment of worship, Israel, the temple, is excellent. If you like his stuff here, you should read David Peterson's Engaging with God, which is a great Biblical Theology on worship.

- Repeatedly, N.T. emphasizes on the importance of living out New Creation by fighting global warming (He got worked up on this one), fighting AIDS, or digging wells in Africa. Two comments:

1) These are all good things, and it would be a good thing for Christians to be active in them. However, it makes me wonder that the things he is advocating are the exact same things that Bono and Oprah and Apple and the rest of our culture is promoting. I'm curious... why doesn't he urge Christians to fight abortion? Why doesn't he urge churches to help persecuted pastors in Vietnam?

2) Pastorally, these are just not very helpful applications. In speaking to a group of 200+ young adults about living out your New Creation by digging wells in Africa or fighting global warming, maybe only 5 in that group has the freedom, resources, and ability to do this. By saying stuff like this, he is allowing these Christians to be affirmed in their faith and feel good that it can make a difference in the world, while at the same time not being really challenged to do anything. After all, with a task as huge and distant as fighting global warming, how can I do anything about that? Pastorally, he would do better to confront people more directly about their sin and challenging them to live out their New Creation more directly. Challenge people to invite a homeless man to dinner in your home and share the Gospel with Him. Live out your New Creation by turning of the television and spending your evenings building relationships and having spiritual conversations with co-workers. Live out the New Creation by getting rid of the pornography or taking advantage of your girlfriend, but working towards purity. Husbands love your wives and wives submit to your husbands. Disciple your children and stop neglecting them. Drive the senior citizens in your church to church on Sundays. Build relationships with your neighbors and those different from you. And as you do these things, should the Lord give you opportunity, certainly do your best to play a part in helping the environment or fighting poverty.

- At the book signing, I asked NT, "I appreciate your emphasis on New Creation. As I'm looking in the Bible, both OT and NT, and trying to understand this, I consistently only see the language of New Creation, Restoration, Redemption being used to describe the immediate work of God in history. Can you point out some parts of the Bible that might help me understand how New Creation, Restoration, Redemption are to be the work of Christians or the Church?"

He seemed a bit surprised, because every one else before me was basically gushing and telling him how much they loved him. He said that we are the agents of God's New Creation, not that we do it by ourselves, but with the Spirit. (I already knew that he thought this. He clearly doesn't believe that we do this New Creation by human effort. But this doesn't answer my question, because I'm saying that it seems that the Bible teaches that God doesn't use human means for New Creation/Restoration/Redemption, but rather always works those things immediately.)

Then he told me to look in the "Resurrection narratives" and "Romans 12:1-2". I'm not sure how these passages support a human role in New Creation/Restoration/Redemption.

Then I asked him, "So in these passages, does our work constitute the New Creation?" He said our work is a signpost to the New Creation. Then he told me to read his book.

If our work is to be a signpost to New Creation, but not the agent of the New Creation itself, then why all the emphasis on New Creation? If all he's advocating is the Lordship of Christ, the transforming, sanctifying work of the Spirit, which results in our good works in every area of life, then why the confusing language of Christians bring about a New Creation, which is really not a New Creation, but only a signpost to the coming New Creation?

The Nature of Worship

2006-10-19T11:44:00.000-04:00

Before we can start thinking about worship practically, we must be able to discuss the nature of worship theologically. On the most basic level, the object of Christian worship is God Himself and those who participate in worship are humans. Therefore, in our understanding of the nature of worship, we should have both a divine and a human component. There are four aspects of the nature of worship that are fundamental to our understanding of worship: God’s initiative/human response, God’s enabling/human dependence, God’s governance/human obedience, and God’s glory/human joy.

First, Christian worship is possible only by God’s initiative. This truth is made evident from the very beginning at creation. Man does not initiate a relationship with God. Rather, God, as the only eternal Being, creates man in order that he might know God and enjoy Him in all of life. God’s initiative in our worship is only made clearer as we progress on through redemptive history. In Israel’s history, we see how God initiates a covenant with Abraham, an idol-worshiper, in order that he might worship and follow the true God instead. We see how God initiates and carries out Israel’s deliverance from slavery in Egypt, so that they might worship Him in the desert. We could go on to discuss the giving of the Law, invasion of Canaan, God’s repeated deliverances, the temple, the prophets, and many other ways in which God initiates Israel’s worship. All of these various acts of initiative, however, ultimately point to the greatest act of divine initiative, namely God sending His Son as a payment for our sins, so that we might be reconciled to Him and worship Him forever. Worship is possible only because of Jesus Christ and His life of obedience, death and resurrection. The Gospel must be the foundation of true worship. Any attempt to worship God that is not built on God’s initiative is false worship.

This has many implications for the nature of worship, but perhaps most significantly, this means that only Christians have the privilege of worshiping God. If worship is only possible by God’s initiative, then only those who have responded in faith to God’s initiative in Christ can offer true worship. No worship can be offered apart from the Gospel. Therefore, worship should never be viewed as an activity that we have invented or orchestrated by our own wisdom or goodness. Rather, worship is always our grateful response in faith to God’s work in our lives to bring us to Himself. Worship is the human response to God’s initiative in saving us.

Second, Christian worship is enabled by God. This is a theme repeated throughout Scripture. Peterson writes, “New-covenant worship is essentially the engagement with God that he has made possible through the revelation of himself in Jesus Christ and the life he has made available through the Holy Spirit” [1]. On the cross, Christ opened the way so that we might worship God. Yet, because of our sin, we need God’s enablement in our lives to worship Him. This enabling is described in Scripture as the Holy Spirit’s work to cause us to be born again (John 3:5), to exchange our hearts of stone for hearts of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26), and to open our blind eyes to the glory of God in the face of Christ (2 Cor. 4:6). But this enabling happens not only at conversion, but also throughout the Christian life. Even after we have been regenerated, we continue to need the Spirit’s work in conforming us to Christ-likeness, in reminding us of the truths of the gospel, in causing us to grow in our knowledge of God, and in fostering love and unity among Christians. God continues to work in our lives in order that we might be enabled to offer up acceptable worship to Him.

This means that as Christians, when we approach God in worship, we come with an attitude of humble dependence on Him. Whether worshiping corporately or in the day-to-day events of life, we must remember that worship is not our supplying God with what he lacks, or something we muster up from our own resources. Rather, as we seek to magnify God in worship, we are dependent on the Holy Spirit’s merciful work in revealing to us the glory of Christ in the Word. Because the Holy Spirit works particularly through the Word, the way we express our dependence on God in worship is by centering all of our worship on Scripture and incorporating constant prayer. The nature of Christian worship requires human dependence on God’s enablement of our worship.

Third, Christian worship is governed by God. More specifically, God has established in His Word how we are to worship Him corporately. God cares about how we worship, because our worship reflects who He is. Duncan writes, “Corporate worship informs our understanding of God… Form impacts content. The means of worship influences the worshipers’ apprehension of God” [2]. How Christians worship God when they gather speaks volumes, both to us and to the world, about who God is. Therefore, God is careful to govern our corporate worship, so that it might more accurately reflect His glory. This is why we see God jealously punishing those who defy His Word and attempt to form their worship after human traditions. Worship that is not governed by God is in vain (Is. 29:13).

For Christians, this means that worship, including corporate worship, requires wholehearted obedience to God’s Word. Though sincerity, emotions, and affections are all good and important in worship, apart from obedience to the Word of God, they will not produce worship that is pleasing to God. Because of sin’s deceitfulness and our inclination towards idolatry, it is especially important that we carefully evaluate our worship according to God’s Word. As with all obedience, our submission to God in worship brings glory to Him. “The way in which we follow his commands for worship is a reflection of our knowledge of God and how seriously we take him” [3]. The success of our corporate worship should be guided and evaluated by our faithfulness to God’s Word. The nature of worship is such that it is governed by God and requires human obedience to God’s governance.

Finally, worship exists for God’s glory. The ultimate reason for why God has saved us from His wrath and set us apart for worship is because of His passion for His glory (Ex. 32:11-14, Is. 43:6-7). Human history exists to display the glory of God’s grace in the Gospel, through the lives of the people He has called to Himself through His Son. It is ultimately not because of any goodness or desirability in us that we are worshipers of God, but because God seeks to display His glory. Therefore, Christian worship exists for the glory of God, and since Christian worship encompasses all of life (Rom. 12:1), all of life is for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31). True worship will always seek to highlight the glory of God, and this glory is particularly expressed in the Gospel. The three previous points about God’s initiative, enablement and governance are particularly important for our theology of worship because they ground our worship in the Gospel, which brings all glory to God.

Since worship is to be a display of God’s glory, then worship must be the most satisfying and fulfilling activity in which our souls may participate. Worship that is joyless or ritualistic is not true worship. Nor is worship that finds its satisfaction in styles, or music, or creativity, or anything other than the glory of God, true worship. We also must be careful that we do not worship for any other purpose (i.e.: unity in church, better health, success at work, wisdom in life, etc…) other than enjoying God. We engage with God for God’s sake, in order that we might enjoy Him. Although God requires our joy in Him in our worship, this isn’t anything that we can spontaneously generate within ourselves. Therefore, the other aspects of worship are closely connected with this one. Worship requires our response to God’s initiative in the Gospel, our dependence on His enablement through the Spirit, our obedience to God’s governance in His Word, so that we might be satisfied in beholding His glory and worshiping Him.

[1] Engaging With God, David Peterson, pg. 100.
[2] Give Praise to God, J. Ligon Dunca, pg. 52.
[3] ibid., p. 35

Weddings at CHBC

2006-10-07T12:43:00.000-04:00

One of the ways CHBC is being counter-cultural in this part of the country is in the number of weddings every year. With an average age of 29 and teaching that consistently honors the institution of marriage, it's not a surprise that many of the single members here are pursuing marriage. But what I've come to appreciate is not only the number of weddings, but the deliberate-ness of how they do weddings here in order to communicate biblical truths. Here are a few observations:

- In one of the Sunday evening services leading up to the wedding, the bride and groom-to-be will always come up to the front and share prayer requests with the whole community about how they can be praying for the wedding ceremony and for the upcoming marriage. Usually, the focus is more on spiritual concerns than temporal concerns, including unsaved relatives that will be attending the ceremony.

- A wedding ceremony is considered a gathering of the Capitol Hill Baptist Church, meaning that the entire church membership is always invited to attend weddings of church members.

- Something I learned is that when escorting ladies, men are always supposed to escort with their left arms, in order to keep their right arms free in order to draw their swords in case of any danger.

- Modesty seems to be a consistent theme in the dress of the ladies in the wedding party.

- The ceremony is very much a worship service and will include congregational singing (rarely "special music"), prayer, and preaching, along with the processional, vows and other more traditional elements of a wedding.

- During the sermon, the entire wedding party actually sits down in the pews in the front row, and the pastor gets behind the pulpit to preach. This is to emphasize the fact that he is proclaiming the truth of God's Word. The message is especially directed to the couple, but also to the congregation.

- In the two services I've attended, I've found the wedding sermon to be particularly Gospel-centered and Christ-exalting, focusing on the example of the love of Christ for the Church, in His patient, personal, sacrificial love for her.

- The wedding vows taken in the ceremony are strongly encouraged to be the same from marriage to marriage. The pastors discourage individualized wedding vows, because they want to emphasize the commonality of marriage, how it is instituted by God for all His people and not something that we create. Therefore, the commitment that one person makes in his marriage is the same commitment that other married people have made, to which they must all hold each other accountable.

- After the wedding ceremony, there is usually a nice reception in the West Hall with food and fellowship. There the bride and groom can partake in other wedding activities that might be more culturally related. (For example, if there is a Chinese couple, they might serve tea to their parents... or like the last wedding I went to, where the bride and groomed used a two-man saw to saw through a piece of lumber) Since CHBC has a pretty diverse congregation, this is always a fun time.

- For each wedding reception, at least 20-25 church members will volunteer to help with various tasks, like serving food at the reception, setup, clean up, etc...

- There is no garter toss, due to the potentially immodest nature of it. As a result, there has also slowly been a doing away with the bouquet toss as well, much to the relief of many of the single women. After all, as one of the deaconesses described it, "It can be humiliating for a 35 year old single woman to have to go up in front of everyone to catch a bouquet from a 25 year old bride."

21st century evangelism

2006-10-02T20:17:00.000-04:00

Saw this posted up on the wall of a church down the street:

I see at least three mistakes here:

A category confusion of evangelism and conversion - In writing, "21st century Evangelism: Conversation, not Conversion", they have confused two concepts which should never be confused. Evangelism is the God-given responsibility to Christians and to the church to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ. Conversion is the supernatural work of God to regenerate hearts that are spiritually dead. If we ever confuse these two concepts, it will either result in apathy and disobedience (when we think that evangelism is the work of God), or in coercion and violence (when we think that conversion is the work of man). Clearly, either of these errors will lead to terrible results. We must have a right understanding of evangelism and conversion as two distinct activities.

Evangelism is more than conversation - Evangelism certainly can (and should) involve conversation and interaction. In fact, it is important that we understand where others are coming from and to treat them with dignity and respect. However, ultimately, evangelism is not a two-way dialogue concerning what is the truth. Ultimately, evangelism is a faithful proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, according to His revelation. In this day and age, such a proclamation might be considered arrogant or dogmatic, but true humility is not trying to make the Word of God more palatable to human tastes, but humbly accepting the Word of God and faithfully proclaiming it. True humility is submitting to the Word of God. Therefore, we must measure true success in evangelism as faithfulness to the Gospel.

"Conversation, Not Conversion" - Though true success in evangelism is faithfulness to the Gospel, our heart's desire is that God would save sinners, not simply to have a meaningful conversation. Now, theological liberalism's desire for "conversation" is not necessarily a bad thing, and certainly God can use conversations. But we must not be content with simply that. We must understand that a "conversation" will not save anyone from God's wrath. "Conversation" will not help anyone put their sinful nature to death. "Conversation" will not open spiritually blind eyes to the glory of God's grace displayed at the cross. What is needed is the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit to exchange our hearts of stone for a heart of flesh. Therefore, we absolutely need conversion. As Christ said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

An honest insight from an unbeliever

2006-09-26T09:18:00.000-04:00

This past Sunday, Thabiti preached a powerful sermon on Psalm 119, which is considered by many Puritans as one of the hidden treasures of the Bible. In his introduction, he quoted Sam Harris' new book, "Letter to a Christian Nation", in which Harris provides an honest insight as a non-believer:

We agree, for instance, that if one of us is right, the other is wrong. The Bible is either the word of God, or it isn't. Either Jesus offers humanity the one, true path to salvation (John 14:6), or he does not. We agree that to be a true Christian is to believe that all other faiths are mistaken, and profoundly so. If Christianity is correct, and I persist in my unbelief, I should expect to suffer the torments of hell. Worse still, I have persuaded others, and many close to me, to reject the very idea of God. They too will languish in "eternal fire" (Matthew 25:41). If the basic doctrine of Christianity is correct, I have misused my life in the worst conceivable way.

...

I have written elsewhere about the problems I see with religious liberalism and religious moderation. Here, we need only observe that the issue is both simpler and more urgent than the liberals and moderates generally admit. Either the Bible is just an ordinary book, written by mortals, or it isn't. Either Christ was divine, or he was not. If the Bible is an ordinary book, and Christ was an ordinary man, the history of Christian theology is the story of bookish men parsing a collective delusion. If the basic tenets of Christianity are true, then there are some very grim surprises in store for nonbelievers like myself. You understand this. At least half of the American population understands this. So let us be honest with ourselves: in the fullness of time, one side is really going to win this argument, and the other side is really going to lose.

Either Psalm 119 is true, or it is not. What will you stake your life on?

More: Mohler blogs on Harris' new book

God's love for His enemies

2006-09-19T08:55:00.000-04:00

Jonathan Edwards is most notorious for his sermon, Sinners in the Hands on an Angry God, but there are other sermons that are even harder on sinners. Consider this passage from Men Naturally Are God's Enemies:

Some natural men are such “dogs” as to do things, if they had opportunity, which they do not imagine it is in their hearts to do. You object against your having a moral hatred against God; that you never felt any desire to dethrone him. But one reason has been, that it has always been conceived so impossible by you. But if the throne of God were within your reach, and you knew it, it would not be safe one hour. Who knows what thoughts would presently arise in your heart by such an opportunity, and what disposition would be raised up in your heart. Who would trust your heart, that there would not presently be such thoughts as these, though they are enough to make one tremble to mention them? “Now I have opportunity to set my self at liberty — that I need not be kept in continual slavery by the strict law of God. — Then I may take my liberty to walk in that way I like best, and need not be continually in such slavish fear of God’s displeasure. And God has not done well by me in many instances. He has done most unjustly by me, in holding me bound to destruction for unbelief, and other things which I cannot help. — He has shown mercy to others, and not to me. I have now an opportunity to deliver myself, and there can be no danger of my being hurt for it. There will be nothing for us to be terrified about, and so keep us in slavery.”

Who would trust your heart, that such thoughts would not arise? Or others much more horrid and too dreadful to be mentioned? And therefore I forbear. Those natural men are foolishly insensible of what is in their own hearts, who think there would be no danger of any such workings of heart, if they knew they had opportunity.

This is a stunning insight into my own heart. Oftentimes, my sinner's heart deceives me by keeping me in just the right amount guilt as to make me discouraged and yet think I can improve, but not so much as to be desperate for God's mercy and aware of my need of a Savior. But sermons like this strip away these sinful lies. In unveiling the human condition, however, Edwards' purpose is not simply to discourage us, but to present Christ and His precious, gracious salvation in the Gospel.

How wonderful is the love that is manifested in giving Christ to die for us. For this is love to enemies. “While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.” How wonderful was the love of God the Father, in giving such a gift to those who not only could not be profitable to him, but were his enemies, and to so great a degree! They had great enmity against him; yet so did he love them, that he gave his own Son to lay down his life, in order to save their lives. Though they had enmity that sought to pull God down from his throne; yet he so loved them, that he sent down Christ from heaven, from his throne there, to be in the form of a servant; and instead of a throne of glory, gave him to be nailed to the cross, and to be laid in the grave, that so we might be brought to a throne of glory.

How wonderful was the love of Christ, in thus exercising dying love towards his enemies! He loved those that hated him, with hatred that sought to take away his life, so as voluntarily to lay down his life, that they might have life through him. “Herein is love; not that we loved him, but that he loved us, and laid down his life for us.”

Print out the sermon and read it when you get home tonight. It will humble you and encourage you.

Reaching the next generation

2006-09-06T08:29:00.000-04:00

Seeker-sensitive strategy for reaching the next generation:

Mr. Warren preaches in sandals and a Hawaiian shirt, and he encourages ministers to banish church traditions such as hymns, choirs, and pews. He and his followers use "praise team" singers, backed by rock bands playing contemporary Christian songs. His sermons rarely linger on self-denial and fighting sin, instead focusing on healing modern American angst, such as troubled marriages and stress... He figured they might find God if they could sit in theater-style auditorium and listen to live pop music and sermons that could help them with ennui and personal problems.

A Popular Strategy for Church Growth Splits Congregants; The Wall Street Journal, Tues. 09/05/2006, A1.

9Marks' strategy for reaching the next generation:

I visited Capitol Hill Baptist in January. The church kicked off with Sunday school, which really should have been called Sunday seminary. Class options included a survey of New Testament and a systematic theology lesson on theories of the Atonement.
Such rigor can be expected from a church led by Dever, who earned a Ph.D. from Cambridge studying the Puritans. He embodies the pastoral theologians who are leading young people toward Reformed theology. He has cultivated a church community in the Puritan mold - unquestionably demanding and disciplined. And the church attracts a very young crowd. Its 525 members average 29 years old. Dever mockingly rejected my suggestion that they aim to attract an under-30 crowd. "Yes, that's why we sing those hymns and have a [55-minute] sermon." Dever smiled. "We're seriously calibrated for the 18th century."

Young, Restless, Reformed; Christianity Today, Sept. 2006, p. 38.

Compassion ministries and the gospel

2006-09-04T16:19:00.000-04:00

This past weekend at CHBC, Mark spoke on the theme of compassion from Ruth 2. After discussing the various ways compassion is expressed in that passage of Scripture, he went on to draw out implications for this on how Christians should think about compassion, particularly for the Christian, the State and the Church. This is a hot issue in evangelicalism today as people like Tim Keller, and to a greater extreme, N.T. Wright, are advocating (potentially) new understandings of how compassion ministry should fit with our understanding of the Gospel.

We had some good discussion on the sermon yesterday and here are some thoughts that are helping me solidify my thinking:

- Perhaps the easier inclination for Christians is towards expressing compassion through various church programs, which can be good and helpful. Particularly for subarbanites who do not have many in need around them, they are a great opportunity for them to show compassion. Yet, for others, the danger is that on our way to the mercy ministry activity, we trip over neighbors who are struggling to make ends meet and need our compassion. Perhaps the emphasis these days should be more on developing personal, individual relationships where we can express compassion to those around us who are struggling, rather than more programmatic ways to do mercy ministry. What's the relationship between teaching on individual compassion actions and corporate compassion ministries? How can the church teach on this in a balanced way so that our participation in mercy ministry programs doesn't just become an action item in order to relieve our guilty consciences? I'm still thinking through these questions.

- Much of the discussion of mercy ministries has been grounded in deep theological understandings of the kingdom of God. In the New Testament, we see that among individual Christians, as they are gathered in local churches, we are beginning to see a reversal of the effects of the Fall. We see this powerfully in the Holy Spirit's work to regenerate the human heart and cause Christians to grow in Christ-likeness. But this is also happening not only spiritually, but in very physical, practical ways. For example, one way this is expressed in the NT church is in Paul's instructions that there are not to be any poor and in need from within the church and that widows and orphans are to be cared for. We see churches cooperating generously to support each other so that there is equality and all are provided for (2 Cor. 8). But notice, these sorts of instructions are for the local church only. Notice how Paul doesn't go on a moral crusade in the city of Corinth, but rather only commands the church to be sexually pure.

1 Cor. 5:9 I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people; 10 I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers, or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world. 11 But actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any so-called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a swindler—not even to eat with such a one. 12 For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Do you not judge those who are within the church? 13 But those who are outside, God judges. Remove the wicked man from among yourselves.

The kingdom of God certainly has broken into this fallen world and we are to see this in the local church, in the lives of those who have been transformed by the Holy Spirit.

- One of the more powerful points in the sermon is that the local church is the only institution that has been uniquely commissioned by God with the task of spreading the gospel. There are ways that the gospel is uniquely and powerfully displayed through the preaching of the Word and the ordinances and through the unity and love of the congregation in the local church. So if the church fails to do mercy ministries, there can always be other organizations to do it. But if the local church were to somehow lose the gospel, this unique display of its message will be lost.

- Therefore, whatever the church does, it should only do it subservient to the gospel. Mercy ministry is important in so far as it commends the gospel. This doesn't mean you have to go through a gospel presentation and press for a decision every time you buy a homeless person a lunch, or tutor a child. But if your motivation to help a person is only to fix his hunger or his grades, without giving thought to his eternal condition, you will not truly help him. So in all you do, strive to build relationships, act in ways that commend the gospel, be purposeful in your language to point to Christ... in other words, act in ways that will be strategic so that you can express your convinction of people's greatest need, namely a savior from their sins.

Listen to the sermon and join the conversation.

Entertainment and Evangelism

2006-09-02T22:42:00.000-04:00

The Gospel is inherently and irreducibly confrontational. It cuts against our perceived righteousness and self-sufficiency, demanding that we forsake cherished sin and trust in someone else to justify us. Entertainment is therefore a problematic medium for communicating the Gospel, because it nearly always obscures the most difficult aspects of it - the cost of repentance, the cross of discipleship, the narrowness of the Way. Some will disagree, arguing that drama can give unbelievers a helpful visual image of the Gospel. But we have already been given such visual images. They are the ordinances of baptism and the Lord's Supper and the transformed lives of our Christian brothers and sisters.

The Deliberate Church, pg. 55.

Miscellanious

2006-08-28T19:28:00.000-04:00

- CHBC is now podcasting. Here is a wealth of sermons that will enrich your soul for you to listen to on your commute to work. I would personally recommend Mark's latest sermon on Ruth, Mike Gilbart-Smith's sermon from Philemon, and Michael Lawrence's series on Biblical Theology from this summer.

- This past Saturday, I was hanging out in Mark's study writing while he's working on his sermon and it gets to be about 10:45PM and he asks me, "Do you want to go downstairs and play a video game?" So we go down and we play this game on Xbox which is a 1st person shooter where you control these robots and go around trying to destroy each other. And he absolutely demolished me all night. He said he's had Al Mohler, Lig Duncan and even Iain Murray down there playing the game (supposedly Lig was the best). The following night, after service review, two more interns joined us and we went at it again. This time, I was barely able to win one match, but Mark still pretty much dominated.

- Every week, a few of the interns help out in Mark's archives, where we sort and organize books, magazines, journals and other documents that can't fit in his study. This past week, I got to file some of his old correspondence. It was cool to see how much communication and mutual encouragement there is between the different pastors and theologians. I even got to see Piper's first letter to Mark way back in the mid 90's.

- The Christian Ministry by Charles Bridges is excellent... easily my favorite book of the internship so far. If anyone feels the Lord leading him into full-time pastoral ministry, this is a must read. It might make you re-consider whether you are really called to the ministry, but better that you ask those sorts of questions now than later.

- Anybody check out the T4G blog lately? =)

Road trip to Cary, NC

2006-08-20T23:52:00.000-04:00

This past weekend Mark taught in Cary, NC at a conference for Shepherd's Theological Seminary and preached on Sunday at Colonial Baptist Church. A few interns had the opportunity to go with him. But first, we took a 4 hour detour to Newport News, VA, to visit Jack Hamilton's house:

Jack Hamilton is a retired Baptist preacher, who owns and sells a huge collection of Christian books. His books aren't cheap, but you'll find rare books that you won't find anywhere else. We found an early 1800's copy of Pilgrim's Progress, still in good condition. His price? $150... time to carefully put it back on the shelf.

The books above with tags are particularly older books. These are shots of just a few of his rooms. The basement in particular is just lined with books. It is a veritable book lover's paradise.

Next stop was Durham, NC, at Duke University, which has probably one of the prettiest (if not the prettiest) campuses I've seen. The chapel alone is sets it apart from anything else i've seen on a college campus in America.

Duke Divinity School's chapel. I liked the open and airy feel of it and I bet the Puritans would've too.

We found one door open and though we weren't able to take a picture of the court itself because it was being waxed, we were able able to take some other pictures.

We got to run a table at the conference. It was great to meet and talk with pastors, seminary students, elders, deacons, and faithful church members about what God was doing in their ministries and teaching them.

There were many great things discussed at the conference relating to church polity, church membership, church discipline, etc... Can you imagine taking a whole Saturday off to talk about these things? Doesn't sound too exciting... yet, it was a real blessing to see and hear how much the pastors and leaders and seminary students were encouraged and excited to learn not only about what these practices are, but how biblical and do-able they are and how they reflect the glory of God. MP3s from the talks should be made available shortly on the Shepherd's Seminary website. A snippet from my notes from Mark's talk on elders and congregationalism:

Elders should be marked by a careful use of authority, understanding the church belongs not to them, but to Christ. We are undershepherds. Authority given to humans is to reflect God's ultimate, good authority over us. Yet, throughout all of history is the theme of authority given for good, and the temptation to abuse it. To abuse God-given authority is particularly evil because it terribly undermines the gospel and God's authority. Authority was a gift given to be a blessing, but when it is turned into an evil, self-serving thing, it is particularly heinous and Satanic. This abuse has led to our distrust of authority, but it was meant to be a gift to us, to reflect God's good authority over us. Authority and love are supposed to be tied together.

Two fundamental mistakes of liberalism

2006-08-17T22:21:00.000-04:00

On May 21, 1922 in First Presbyterian Church, New York City, Harry Emerson Fosdick preached one of his most famous sermons, entitled, "Shall the Fundamentalists Win?" This sermon is a great example of classic theological liberalism. Read his arguments and then take some time to consider what he's saying. This kind of thinking and reasoning is rife in our culture and even many of our churches. Below is my response:

After reading Harry E. Fosdick’s sermon, Shall the Fundamentalists Win?, I am much more inclined to be sympathetic towards the fundamentalists’ attitude regarding biblical separation! In this sermon, Fosdick presents his case against the “intolerant” spirit of the fundamentalists by explaining the progressive nature of liberalism’s teachings and arguing for the supremacy of the subjective. There is so much in this sermon that can be (and should be) refuted, but I want to focus my critique on these two major themes, which he draws on repeatedly, namely the theme of progression and the supremacy of subjective feelings over objective truth.

Throughout his sermon, one theme that Fosdick continually repeats in order to defend liberalism is the theme of progression. He argues, “Jesus had not simply a historic, but a contemporary God, speaking now, working now, leading his people now from partial into fuller truth. Jesus believed in the progressiveness of revelation” (p. 1). He claims this is what is going on in liberalism, namely “new knowledge has come into man’s possession” (p. 1-2) and this has led to a fuller revelation of what Christianity really is all about. There are a couple things wrong about this assumption. First, it is based on a wrong view of the nature of man. Fosdick bases the current progress of revelation on the progress that science has made in his day, but in doing this, he is assuming that science is an objective and reliable source of truth, always working for the good of man. He describes scientists inviting young men to think and explore the universe, “for science is an intellectual adventure for truth” (p. 7). Moreover, in countering against the physical second coming of Christ, he states, “Development is God’s way of working out his will” (p. 6). He describes how human development of God’s grace working out in life and institutions will ultimately bring about Christ’s reign. In all this, Fosdick naïvely assumes that humans are innately good and have the ability, reasoning, and understanding to make the best choices for the good of mankind. Clearly, this sermon was written before World War II, which ended up destroying much of liberalism’s confidence in human goodness. The very same sin nature that resided in the cruelest soldiers and most wicked leaders also resides in the brightest modern scientists and most upright mayors. Humans will never be able to progress towards utopia apart from the supernatural work of God because we will always be corrupted by sin.

Second, this theme of progression has a misunderstanding of who Christ is. When Fosdick repeats this theme, he implies that we must improve on what has been revealed to us in history. What he doesn’t understand is that Jesus Christ is the climax of all history. When he quotes Heb. 1:1-2, he is using this verse to support the idea that Christ is an incomplete past revelation relative to the fuller present one, which is the exact opposite of the intended message! What we see taught in Scripture is that God’s decisive and final word to man regarding who He is and how we are to know Him is Jesus Christ. Therefore, to speak of a progressive revelation is to misunderstand who the Bible says Jesus Christ is. Fosdick tries to illustrate this by pointing to the Muslims as being chained to a fixed revelation (p. 4). Interestingly however, the Muslims have made the exact same mistake as the liberals in that they claim their Koran is a fuller revelation of God. They believe God first revealed Himself in the Old Testament to the Jews, then in the New Testament to the Christians, and finally in the Koran to the Muslims. What is wrong with Islam and liberalism is that though they both generally acknowledge the New Testament as being from God, they fail to understand its central message of the supremacy of Christ in all of history.

A second major theme throughout Fosdick’s sermon is the supremacy of the subjective over objective truth. Throughout the sermon, he justifies liberal Christians by describing the sincerity of their hearts. He describes them as “reverent Christians”, desiring “intellectual and spiritual integrity, that they might really love the Lord their God…with all their mind” (p. 2), “who may make us… ashamed by the sincerity of their devotion” (p. 6). Because of their sincerity, Fosdick argues that it would be a tragedy to “shut the door of the Christian fellowship against such” (p. 6), regardless of what they believe. When proposing a new view of the virgin birth, the only requirement that Fosdick makes is that “anybody has a right to hold these opinions, or any others, if he is sincerely convinced of them” (p. 3). The mistake Fosdick makes in all this is that sincerity is no substitute for truth. One can be truly sincere in their devotion and truly desire to accomplish what is right and good, but if their zeal is not informed by truth, they will be sincerely wrong. We can see this powerfully illustrated in the Jews, who had “a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge”. And when Paul prays for them, he’s not simply praying for their maturity or growth, but he is praying for their salvation (Rom. 10:1-2). Surely, having pure and sincere motives can be good, but sincerity apart from true knowledge will not save anyone.

Another area in which we see this theme is in the primacy Fosdick gives to love over objective truth. Fosdick pleads with his hearers for “the cause of magnanimity and liberality and tolerance of spirit” (p. 1). He acknowledges that there are many opinions out in the world regarding the truth, and more important than all of these opinions are “courtesy and kindliness and tolerance and humility and fairness… Opinions may be mistaken; love never is” (p. 7). He bemoans how the church is caught up in this controversy rather than showing love to the many who are “perishing for the lack of the weightier matters of the law, justice, and mercy and faith” (p. 8). On the other hand, “the worst kind of church that can possibly be offered… is an intolerant church” (p. 7). He immediately dismisses the actions of the fundamentalists as being un-Christ-like (p. 5) because of their intolerant and unloving spirit. Now, it might very well be true that the fundamentalists are not acting in accordance with Christ’s will. But what is wrong with Fosdick’s thinking is that love cannot be separated from objective truth. It is not enough to say that love is never mistaken. Rather, in the most powerful description of love, the apostle Paul writes, “(love) does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth” (1 Cor. 13:6). True love will not show tolerance towards what is unrighteous or false or harmful. It would be unloving to be tolerant towards a lifestyle of drug addiction and alcoholism. It would be unloving to encourage people to believe in lies. It might be true that the fundamentalists are being overly divisive in their separation, but the liberals have taken to the opposite extreme in accepting all opinions as good in the name of love and tolerance. In doing so, they also have been divisive, in that they have separated love from objective truth.

The two major themes of liberalism presented in this sermon, namely progression and subjective feelings over objective truth, clearly fail to accurately represent the teaching of the New Testament and in fact, present ideas that are foreign to the counsel of Scripture. This inclines me to think that J. Gresham Machen was right when he wrote, “Liberalism on the one hand and the religion of the historic church on the other are not two varieties of the same religion, but two distinct religions proceeding from altogether separate roots.”[1]

[1] Ned. B. Stonehouse, J. Gresham Machen: A Biographical Memoir (Edinburgh: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1987), p. 342.

Pragmatism in the church

2006-08-13T14:49:00.000-04:00

Is it okay if I make some broad generalizations here based on some of my observations?

Mark Dever asked me last week what I thought the advantages/disadvantages of a Chinese Church over an American church were and vice-versa. I mentioned that one of the things I could see being improved in the Chinese church was how our actions were measured more by pragmatism than by trying to be deliberately Biblical. But he responded, "But isn't pragmatism also a problem of the American church?"

So I thought it about it some more and I realized that though American churches and Chinese churches can both be very pragmatic, but this pragmatism will look very different, because Chinese congregations and American congregations will look very different. Think about some of generalizations we can make about Chinese culture (particulary among overseas born congregations):

- more submissive and respecting of authority
- disciplined and consistent in performing what they consider their duty
- place a higher value in performing public duties, in order to save face
- prefer avoiding public controversy

What about American culture today?

- more individualistic and assertive
- proactive in either fixing what they consider to be problems
- enamored with new and exciting technologies and entertainments
- higher expectations of leaders to earn their trust

So with such different congregations, pragmaticism will look very different among Chinese and American churches. For Chinese congregations, pastors will tend to employ a minimalistic approach. As long as they keep the status quo, as long as church gets "done", then people will keep coming because they are supposed to. On the other hand, for American congregations, pragmatic pastors will need a very active approach. It will involve keeping up with the latest fads, creating new programs every month, fashioning worship services to suit people's tastes, fitting the church with the latest technologies and conveniences, and so on. Both are opposite approaches, yet both come out of pragmatism. Interestingly, as more and more American-born Chinese grow up influenced by American culture, the minimalist approach to church will be increasingly frustrating for them. The results of this can usually be seen in ABC youth growing up in a Chinese church, heading off to college and experiencing an exciting, dynamic church, and then coming back to their home church and feeling alienated and frustrated by it.

The solution to all this isn't more pragmatism, but rather to repent of pragmatism and to pursue Biblical faithfulness in our ecclesiology. God intends to display the glory of His holiness and love through the church and I believe that Scripture actually teaches church leaders how to build churches that display God's glory.

For more info on a biblical vision for Christ's church, visit www.9marks.org

The incompatibility of the gospel and race prejudice

2006-08-10T23:46:00.000-04:00

Francis J. Grimke was a Presbyterian, African-American pastor that preached powerfully against race prejudice in the early 1900's. One of our assignments in the internship has been to read a very powerful sermon that he preached in 1910 regarding Christianity and race prejudice. Although I very much agreed with his message, I regret that he did not rightly emphasize the importance of the gospel in fighting race prejudice. Below is my response to his article:

Dr. Francis J. Grimke’s sermon is a powerful message regarding the incompatibility of Christianity and race prejudice, and a call to all Christians to fight against this evil. Grimke does a great job in describing the wicked nature of race prejudice. One of the more interesting things to me about his description of race prejudice in 1910 is just how overt, and yet deceptive, it was. Race prejudice caused white Christians to segregate their churches, reject blacks from church memberships, and refuse to live with any blacks in their communities. These are clear demonstrations of race prejudice, and yet, at the same time, there were “meetings by day, and meetings by night, preaching services, prayer meetings, revival meetings, religious conventions…” and even “great missionary meetings for the conversion of the world, for carrying the gospel to the ends of the earth” (p. 12). In other words, even while living in such seemingly obvious sin, they continued to practice their religion as if nothing was wrong. It is astonishing to think of how these Christians could have had a passion for missions and longed for conversion of the heathen (perhaps even those in Africa), yet while being deceived by sin into maintaining race prejudice in their lives! Sin can be so deceptive in our lives, even when it is blatant, and this was certainly the case with race prejudice in 1910.

I strongly agreed with the main points of Grimke’s sermon regarding the evil of race prejudice, the incompatibility of Christianity and race prejudice, and the need for Christian action. This is a message that still needs to be sounded today, not only for race prejudice, but also for many other forms of prejudice. However, I do think that Grimke’s message could have been made more powerful on a couple of points.

Grimke is absolutely right to press the fact that Christianity is utterly incompatible with race prejudice. You cannot live in unrepentant race prejudice and claim to be a Christian at the same time (p. 5). However, the reason he gives for why this is true does not hit at the heart of the matter. He claims that everything about the character of the Christian religion is opposed to race prejudice, namely “the character of Jesus Christ, and… the great principles of the Christian religion, such as the Fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, the Gold Rule, loving one’s neighbor as one’s self, following things that make for peace and edification, and the unity of all believers in Christ” (p. 1). All these things are true and certainly do oppose race prejudice, but Grimke fails to mention an even more fundamental truth to the Christian religion that strikes to the core of race prejudice, namely the gospel of grace. The fundamental reason why racial prejudice does not accord with the Christian faith is because of the message of the grace of God in the gospel. This gospel declares to us that all of us at one point were separate from God because of our sin and the only thing we have earned for ourselves is everlasting wrath. Yet God, in His mercy, sent His Son to die and bear that wrath of God in the place of all sinners who will turn from their sin and trust in Him. Additionally, God freely and graciously provided the Holy Spirit in order that we might be able to do so and keep doing so. On top of that, we have been given pastors, Christian friends, Bibles, opportunities to hear the gospel, healthy minds to understand the gospel, and thousands of other graces that were purchased by Christ’s blood and have worked together to bring our sinful souls to God. In light of the infinite wickedness of our sin and the infinite grace of God shown in our salvation, how can we look at anyone who is lost and not feel compassion? God has saved us from everlasting judgment into everlasting joy not according to our race, or our riches, or our righteousness, but freely and unconditionally. Having received God’s grace in this way, can we then deny someone fellowship in our churches or put up barriers to the gospel because of the color of one’s skin or the appearance of his clothes? It would be as ridiculous as strangling a debtor who owes you ten bucks when you have been forgiven of a million dollar debt (Matt. 18:28). Race prejudice, or any other kind of prejudice, is ultimately non-Christian because it is utterly incompatible with the message of the gospel. Therefore, a life that has truly received the grace of God in the gospel cannot, and ultimately will not, live in race prejudice.

Clearly, this has great implications for how we should respond to race prejudice. Grimke is right about the need to speak out against race prejudice as Jesus spoke out against it and to fight against race prejudice as Jesus fought against it. However, I don’t think that is the place to start. If a Christian or a church is struggling with race prejudice, you begin counteracting this by preaching the gospel to them. If they are living in prejudice, then there must be some aspect of the gospel that they have not fully grasped. Perhaps they haven’t grasped the unconditional nature of grace, or what it means to repent and believe, or how the lordship of Christ affects our everyday lives. Regardless of where the deficiency is, the first step must be a continual and thorough instruction of the whole gospel, because the Holy Spirit most powerfully works to transform people to Christ-likeness through their beholding the glory of God in the gospel. It is only when we have been transformed by the Spirit that we will be enabled to speak as Christ spoke and to love as Christ loved.

How should we think about the role of the church in social activism and fighting race prejudice? Grimke emphasizes the impact that Christianity should have on the world. He writes, “Christianity is not clay in the hands of the world-spirit to be molded by it; but is itself to be the molder of public sentiment and everything else… The mission of the church, of Christian men and women is to mould, not to be moulded by encircling influences of evil” (p. 12). I do agree that Christians have a role to play in this world in fighting for social justice and living out the kingdom of God through their public involvement. However, we must be careful to recognize that our mission is not simply to influence the world to behave in a way that is loving and peaceful, even though that would be a good and gracious thing. Rather, the mission of the church is to proclaim the gospel and to call people to repentance and reconciliation with God and this is the only way race prejudice can truly be overcome. Therefore, even though we will fight injustice and exert our influence in the world in order to overcome race prejudice, we do so recognizing that this evil will only be truly overcome in the invisible church, where the kingdom of God has been manifested in the lives of sinners saved by grace. Christianity as an institution cannot bring about the sanctification needed to defeat race prejudice, but only the Holy Spirit working through the gospel of Jesus Christ in the lives of individuals.

Today, race prejudice is no longer as blatant as it was in 1910. By God’s common grace, many reforms have been made in this culture to oppose race prejudice. Yet there still remains a need and a longing among many (both inside and outside the church) for greater racial reconciliation and social justice. What this tells me is that though race prejudice might not be as blatant as it once was, it still continues to harm lives and communities, and to deceive people into thinking everything is fine. The danger for us in the church is to think that the battle has ended, but Grimke’s challenge, combined with the message of the gospel of grace, is as applicable today as it was a hundred years ago.

Note: Grimke's sermon is out of print, but Lord willing, it will be included in a volume of sermons called The Faithful Preacher: Recapturing the Vision of Three Pioneering African-American Pastors (Crossway) next Spring.

Gracious promises

2006-08-06T16:04:00.000-04:00

This fall, I will be taking a semester off from my seminary studies in order to take part in the internship program at Capitol Hill Baptist Church. In addition to the many great books I get to read, papers I get to write, and time I get to spend with the pastors and elders and brothers and sisters here at this church, one of the things I'm most looking forward to is simply sitting under five months of solid, Biblical preaching every Sunday. If this morning is any indication of what is in store, then I am in for a treat.

Michael Lawrence finished his series on Biblical Theology this morning, ending with the theme of Promise in the Bible. My favorite part was when he highlighted the fact that when God makes promises, He always makes them by grace and unconditionally. When He made the promise to Adam that the seed of the woman would crush the seed of the serpent in Gen. 3, this was a promise made in grace, right after they had sinned and rebelled against God. When God called Abram out of Ur and promised to bless him and make him a blessing to all nations, Abram was an idolater. When God called Moses and promised to make him into the human deliverer of His people, Moses was a fugitive and a murderer. When God called the people of Israel to Himself as His chosen nation, they were a rabble of helpless slaves. When God chose David to be His anointed, and promised that through him the Messiah was to come and rule forever, David was a mere shepherd boy, the youngest of many brothers, and would go on to one day be a murderer and an adulterer. And what about you? Did God choose you and make His promises in Christ to you because of your goodness or your works? No. God's promises are made to undeserving sinners by His grace, unconditionally. All we deserve from God is everlasting ruin because of our sin. Never presume that God owes us salvation, nor despair in unbelief because of your sinfulness. Rather, believe in the amazing gracious promises that He has made in Christ... Very, very good stuff. You can download and listen to the entire five-part series here. It will edify your soul.

Reading list for my CHBC internship this fall

2006-08-05T17:12:00.000-04:00

If you are looking for some reading to help you grow in your understanding of the local church or of reformed worship or of pastoral ministry, there are several good places to start in this list.

- When People are Big and God is Small by Ed Welch
- Princes, Pastors and People by Doran & Durston
- Theology of the Reformers by Timothy George
- Biblical Separation by Bob Jones University (article)
- Shall the Fundamentalists Win? by Harry E. Fosdick (sermon)
- Christianity and Race Prejudice by Francis J. Grimke (sermon)
- A Display of God's Glory by Mark Dever (booklet)
- 9 Marks of a Healthy Church by Dever (booklet)
- Reformation of the Church by John Murray
- Christian Ministry by Charles Bridges
- The Bruised Reed by Richard Sibbes
- Polity by Dever
- Nine Marks of a Healthy Church by Dever
- The Worship of the American Puritans by Horton Davies
- Deliberate Church by Dever
- Worship by the Book by DA Carson & others
- Give Praise to God by Ligon Duncan & others
- Engaging with God by David Peterson
- 9Marks Worship Interview w/ Bob Kauflin and Lig Duncan
- Growing Health Asian American Churches by Cha, Kang and Lee
- Transformation: How Glocal Churches Transform Lives and the World by Bob Roberts Jr.
- Evangelicalism Divided: A Record of Crucial Change in the Years 1950 to 2000 by Iain Murray
- Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church: Understanding a Movement and Its Implications by DA Carson

Follow up letter for my East Asia mission trip

2006-08-03T19:34:00.000-04:00

As you know, I had the opportunity of spending the past two weeks in East Asia teaching English and sharing the gospel with students. In the end, we had the blessing of seeing a few students respond positively to our message, along with many others willing to listen. It would be easy to write a report describing the success we had, but it would also be an incomplete picture. The truth of the matter is that God worked out things for good not because of our skill and strength, but in spite of our weaknesses and sinfulness. During my time over there, I read through 2 Corinthians and was reminded of the sufficiency of God’s grace and how His power is made perfect in weakness (12:9). Because of this, Paul made up his mind to only boast of the things that show his weakness (11:30), so that the power of God might be magnified. My hope is that in sharing about my trip, you also would see that it was the power of God ultimately at work.

Weakness in teaching – As one who has never really taught English before, I was expected to go in and teach a class of sixteen middle–high school students. These parents had paid a substantial amount of money for their children to take this class, so there were high expectations. In the end, by God’s grace, my partner and I were actually able to plan lessons that were educational, interactive and fun for the kids, which allowed them to learn about the language and culture, as well as make friends. The principal who hired us ended up being very pleased with our work. This was certainly an answered prayer and hopefully will open the door for future ministry opportunities.

Weakness in patience – Our days were very long. We woke up at 7, had group devotions at 8, taught from 9-12, had lunch with students from 12-2, taught again from 2-4, hung out with students from 4-6 (sometimes later), then had evening de-brief from 7-8 (sometimes later), and then after a shower, began lesson planning for the next day, which usually took at least a couple of hours. This, compounded with jet lag, stomach problems, record-high temperatures, and inconsistent times in the Word, tested the limits of my endurance. Often times, I found myself grumbling and complaining in my heart. Sadly, this resulted in a less willing heart for serving my team and my students. As I look back on the trip, I am greatly humbled and realize that I still have so far to go in my sanctification. In spite of all my theological and ministry training, much of my contentment is still dependent on earthly comforts rather than on God. Knowing this, I am particularly grateful to God for what little ministry He accomplished through my efforts.

Weakness in sharing the gospel – My teammate Dan shared with me in the beginning how he has never had a gift for evangelism, and this is something also true for me. I am often timid and at a loss for words when it comes to sharing the gospel. In addition to my personal weaknesses, I was given the younger class, which meant that their English wasn’t as good and it would be more difficult to start spiritual conversations. However, I ended up having the opportunity to impact them through a couple of ways. First, I had many opportunities to hang out with my students outside of class. We roller-skated, went to the video game arcade, played ping-pong, played basketball, and ate together a lot. As a result of these times, we were able to discuss many things, from church, to life in America, to their future aspirations, and occasionally, even share the gospel. Most significantly though, God used these times to develop a mutual friendship, which gave them their first first-hand, real-life relationship with a Christian. By the end of the trip, it was clear that part of our impact was not only our message but the life that we shared with them. Second, one of our lessons was on Christmas, so I wrote a Christmas pageant, with different parts for all the students in my class to act out. As I introduced to them the Christmas story, how God sent His Son to be Savior of the world, it was amazing to see how engaged the students were. They were especially interested in the wise men from the East. I was able to explain to them that this was my favorite story in the world, because I believed it to be a true story that actually happened in human history. Therefore, I concluded, it is important that we come to understand who this child really is. This changed many students’ perspectives on what they once considered an Americanized holiday. Finally, before we left, we were able to pass out Bibles and children’s Bible storybooks to every one of our students. Because I was able to build relationships with some students from the older class, I was also able to hand out many Bibles to those students. Many of the students received the Bibles with much excitement and shared with their friends, resulting in more coming to me wanting Bibles. One of the students recently emailed me, writing, “I have begun to read the Bible. It's really a long story, isn't it? Maybe after reading this, I'll have a new understanding of Christians and Christ Jesus.” My hope is that all my students will open these books and read and understand that the reason we loved them is because God first loved us in Christ. The work is now left to the local Christians and missionaries. May God give them wisdom in following up with these students.

Weakness in the church – One of the advantages of working with a long-term missionary is that we got to meet local Christians. In the past, when I have met local Christians, I have often been amazed at their perseverance through sufferings, their passion for God, and their discipline in the Word. Yet this time, I saw a different side to the local church over there. I met young Christians struggling with immorality, relationships and abuse. I heard older Christians bemoaning the lack of leadership and adequate teaching, and the danger of cults. But in spite of all this, I also saw in the lives of these few Christians that Christ is still being preached and the Holy Spirit continues to work. I had the privilege of hearing one Christian lady share the story of how her husband was recently converted after a long time of prayer for him. I saw missionaries working together with local ministers to discipline and care for the local congregation. And in meeting these Christians, the biggest blessing was to experience the immediate, mutual love we had for one another because of our unity in Jesus Christ. These are our brothers and sisters, with whom we will spend eternity. Let us ever be praying Eph. 3:14-21 for Christians all over the world.

In 2 Corinthians, Paul encourages the Corinthian church in their prayer, ministry and giving by pointing them to the thanksgiving that will result to God because of their faithful labor (2 Cor. 1:11, 4:15, 9:11-15). As I have shared, there is already so much that we have to be thankful for as a result of this trip. But oh, may the thanksgiving not end there! My prayer and hope is that through the ripple effects of our ministry, giving and continued prayers, many more students would turn to God and be saved, resulting in overflowing thanksgivings to God. To God be all the glory.

Pandas

2006-07-26T10:34:00.000-04:00

Just got back from my trip to East Asia. I'll share some more once I get over this jet lag. In the meanwhile, here's a video from the Panda zoo in one of the cities we visited.

Video Hosting - Upload Video - Video Sharing

Thoughts on Ephesians 5:22-6:9 - Substance and Shadows

2006-06-30T12:13:00.000-04:00

The message of Ephesians 5:22-6:9 is particularly challenging in the increasingly egalitarian American church and entirely egalitarian American culture. How are we to teach within the church the truth that God has created men and women, husbands and wives, with distinctive, God-given roles, when the sexual confusion of our culture does all it can to destroy all boundaries and eliminate all distinctions? We need to begin by pointing to the truth that human relationships were never meant to be the substance of the matter, but from the beginning, they were always to be shadows pointing to the truth. When we think that human relationships are social structures or norms that we have created, then they will always be up for revision. But when we realize the truth that human relationships are not the end in and of themselves, but point to a greater truth, then we will be careful to order them accordingly.

So where do we begin teaching this truth in the church in the midst of so much confusion? We begin by pointing to the substance. Take Ephesians 5:22-6:9 as an example. Before we begin teaching about the roles God has established within these relationships, we must first teach the truths to which these relationships point. If you are a Christian, you are first and foremost, and always, a slave, a child and a wife. If you are a Christian, regardless of your occupational position, you are first and foremost, and always, a servant of Christ. If you are a Christian, regardless of your familial status, you are first and foremost, and always, a child of God. And if you are Christian, regardless of your marital status, you are first and foremost. and always, the bride of Christ. These are the most important roles in our lives that we must understand first. We must first come to understand the glad submission and humble joy that comes from being a servant of God, a child of God, and the bride of Christ. Now, it is also true that God will use these earthly relationships to teach us about our heavenly relationship. But ultimately, as Christians, we must be allow our relationship with God, revealed most clearly in the Word, to inform and instruct us in how we are to conduct our relationships here on earth. As Christians, we must be realize that our relationships on earth, especially these three, are a visual representation to the world of our relationship with God and, therefore, it is our duty and our privilege, whether you are a husband or a wife, a father or a son, a master or a servant, to humbly and truthfully live out the roles that God has given us. Knowing these truths, Paul writes,

5:22 Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. 24 But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything.

5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. 28 So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; 29 for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, 30 because we are members of His body. 31 FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND SHALL BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH. 32 This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the church. 33 Nevertheless, each individual among you also is to love his own wife even as himself, and the wife must see to it that she respects her husband.

6:1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 HONOR YOUR FATHER AND MOTHER (which is the first commandment with a promise), 3 SO THAT IT MAY BE WELL WITH YOU, AND THAT YOU MAY LIVE LONG ON THE EARTH.

6:4 Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

6:5 Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ; 6 not by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart. 7 With good will render service, as to the Lord, and not to men, 8 knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free.

6:9 And masters, do the same things to them, and give up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.

Thoughts from my grandpa's funeral

2006-06-12T17:46:00.000-04:00

- It is sad how little I knew of my grandpa. Though I saw him consistently throughout my childhood and even after I returned from college, language and cultural barriers often separated us. It makes me sad to think of how easily I allowed these barriers to discourage me from building a more significant relationship with him. Yet these barriers will one day be removed.

- There closes another relationship my life. There is nothing more I can say to him, or kindness I can show to him, or encouragement I can write to him, on this side of eternity. The finality of death never ceases to astonish me!

- I really wish I could know what my grandpa was thinking, experiencing, struggling with, worried about, enjoying, etc... when he was my age. More importantly, I wish I could hear him share about things that God taught him through circumstances, in the Bible, through ministry, through mistakes he made, through risks he took... I resolved to be more disciplined in keeping my journal, for the sake of my descendants (Lord willing) whom I will never meet.

- One of my older cousins shared about how when he was little, he asked my grandpa why he wore a watch, and my grandpa solemnly responded, "My grandson... you must understand that time is very precious. It is a gift from God and we must use it well."

- After my grandpa's funeral, at dinner, I met my newborn niece for the first time, Amelia. And so it goes... one generation passes on, and another one comes. And my generation must one day pass on as well. Approximately 100 years from now, every single person that is alive today will be dead and gone, and an entirely new population of people will be on this earth. Indeed, time is very precious.

- What an unnatural thing it is to see a body separated from its soul. This body I am looking at once belonged to my grandpa. One day it will be raised up and will again belong to him. But for now, it lies lifeless, and my grandfather must exist in an unnatural, disembodied existence. Yes, it is better to be "away from the body and at home with the Lord". But at the same time, I know he awaits the day when he will put on his heavenly body that he "may not be found naked" (2 Cor. 5:2-9).

- What a sobering picture of the terribleness of sin is death. Ultimately, death is not a result of old age, or sickness, or accident, but of sin. God warned Adam that he would die the day he disobeyed. And it was true. We died when Adam sinned, and now we must receive its wages (Rom. 6:23). I sin everyday, and often don't give a second thought. But may I wake up and see here in the tears, in the coldness, in the stripping of all life, the true nature of sin.

- But what a difference the gospel makes! It is the difference between the worst possible event to the best possible event. Christ died to decisively break the power of sin and overcome death by offering himself as a substitution in place of all sinners who will embrace him by faith. Had this not been the case, this funeral would truly be the most horrific event imaginable: Everything good, everything enjoyable, everything pleasurable in the world, would have ended with my grandfather's death, forever. And he would soon have to stand before a holy Judge to give an account for his sins, without anyone to cover him.

- But because of Christ, he is clothed with his perfect righteousness, so that this death is a finishing of the race and a receiving of the fulfillment of God's promises. Instead of it being the most horrific event imaginable, because of Christ, it now becomes the most wonderful event possible: Every good, every joy, every pleasure that my grandfather experienced, will come back to him ten-thousandfold in the presence of Christ, increasing forever. And he will now spend eternity in joy with the One for whom he was made.

- The week before my grandpa left, we gathered together as a family to sing and share and pray for each other. My grandpa shared a story about when he used to work for Gideon's International in Taiwan (he did this for over 20 years!) and distribute Bibles to military personnel, in schools, in hospitals, etc... In one occasion, he was passing out a Bible to a junkie, and some of his co-workers told him not to, because he would just use the pages of the Bible to roll tobacco so he could smoke it. Many of these junkies would find discarded cigarette butts and collect scraps of leftover tobacco and make their own cigarettes. But my grandpa insisted and handed him a New Testament, knowing that the Word of God is powerful to change lives. Sure enough, the junkie took the Bible and began tearing pages to roll his cigarettes, but when he came to the page where Christ rose from the dead, he found that he could no longer tear the page anymore, and had to find out who this book was talking about, because he had never heard of anyone rising from the dead! And so he found a pastor, who shared with him the gospel and he believed. My grandpa told this story at least 6-7 times that night (each time forgetting he already had told it), and every time he would say with passion and emphasis, "Jesus Christ rose from the dead!" Though at his age, his faculties, his sense of logic, his memory were all diminished, his faith in the death and resurrection of Christ for sinners remained unshaken. And it is because Christ rose again that this dead body will one day also be raised in glory. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

McLaren Interview

2006-05-12T02:17:00.000-04:00

Recently, Brian McLaren conducted an interview (link) with Leif Hansen, where they discussed several issues pertaining to very important teachings in Christianity. Now, before I go further, I want to make the clear disclaimer that I do not know Brian McLaren, nor have I ever had a chance to sit down with him to try to understand his point of views, nor have I read all his writings or listened to his sermons. Moreover, I understand that in an interview like this, overstatements are likely to be made in order to emphasize a point. Nonetheless, I would like to interact with a few comments that McLaren made, in order to try to bring some balance and maybe foster more discussion.

"I think anybody who would sit for five minutes and ponder the reality of hell as it’s commonly understood would either—I can say, lose their minds. I think if you actually faced it and what is really being said, I think you would—any person who faced it, really opened themselves up to it and the horror of it for five minutes would come out mentally damaged. And the result of that would either be that they, I think, would hate God—And I’ve met a lot of people who have this—the fundamentalists are right in their understanding of hell and so they, as a result, hate God. Or they become an atheist. They just say it’s better to not believe in God than to have to believe in that kind of God. Or they become a raving fundamentalist who’d be grabbing people on the street and shaking them and you know, saying you better repent."

Right off the bat, I find it unfair for McLaren to imply that those who hold to an orthodox understanding of the doctrine of hell either have not faced the horror of hell for more than five minutes, or must inevitably become "a raving fundamentalist" who grabs people and demands their repentance. Surely this is an unhelpful caricature, because rather than dealing with the issue, he resorts to poking fun and generalizing. Also the dichotomy of either hating God or becoming an atheist is just not true. There are many genuine, God-loving Christians who are convinced that the Bible teaches there is a hell.

"I think that creates a rational problem. And is that rationally sensible? Would it be—Does it make sense for a good being to create creatures who will experience infinite torture, infinite time, infinite—you know, never be numbed in their consciousness? I mean, how would you even create a universe where that sort of thing could happen? It just sounds—It really raises some questions about the goodness of God. And that, to me, is the deepest issue. You know, John said in First John, God is light and in God there is no darkness at all. And I what I have to believe is that very few of us actually believe that. We all have the suspicion that there is a dark side to God. And that God isn’t truly, truly good."

I find it encouraging that McLaren has really wrestled with the weight of the eternality of hell. He is right in that it really is the most horrific reality imaginable. Yet, I wonder if he believes in a reality that is the opposite of it, namely infinitely wonderful and beautiful and glorious, namely the glory of God? If so, there is a starting point for understanding such a thing as the infinite heinousness of a crime against this glory, and the infinite punishment that this crime would incur. My main point is that there certainly can be a rational basis for explaining why hell exists. Also, I would be interested McLaren provide a definition of what it means for God to be good and what it means for God to be light and how God being good or being light precludes the existence of hell.

"a wonderful new book has just come out. I just got my copy yesterday. By a friend of mine in England named Andrew Perriman. It’s called The Coming of the Son of Man. And he is doing some things that N. T. Wright has hinted at and delved into a bit. But he is going even farther to show how we understand so much of that biblical language of destruction. And one way to summarize what Andrew Perriman is saying is to say that either the primary or maybe the only eschatological horizon that Jesus is talking about and the apostles are talking about, it’s not the end of the world. It’s the end of the world as they knew it. Which meant the end of Judaism as they knew it, which meant the end of the temple system and the priestly system as they knew it. And I think Andrew makes a very strong case for this in his book The Coming of the Son of Man
...

What they’re basically saying is Jesus isn’t talking about—That’s not even what He’s talking about. He’s telling the Jewish leaders of His day, that judgment is coming. And that if they choose a path of violence, if they reject His path of peace, if they choose to stay on the path they’re on, that there’s going to be a horrible consequence to it. And what they would say is it happened, AD 67. The Jewish people rejected Jesus—the Jewish leaders rejected Jesus’ message of peace and reconciliation. They chose the path of the zealots, which was the path of violent revolution. When they engaged in violence the Romans responded in violence and crushed them. And so, in the great Jewish war, AD 67 to 70, Jerusalem was destroyed. Not one stone was left on another. You know, all of those things that Jesus said would happen, happened. And that His language of hell fire and language of Ghenna and all that language, was fulfilled in what would happen at that time, AD 67 to 70. And I think there is a very strong case to be made for that.
...

I think, first of all, I think it makes a huge difference whether you believe that that violence is waiting for everybody or whether you think that violence actually was focussed on AD 67 to 70. I mean, and I would just encourage people who are listening to this, for the next couple years, as you’re reading the Gospels, to be open to the possibility that that might be what Jesus was talking about. It’s really interesting, and this is what Andrew Perriman does very well in this brand new book, he really engages with Paul. Second Thessalonians and the others places in the New Testament that are pretty fiery, you know. And he makes a very strong case that the eschatological horizon for them—you know, all of these are written before AD 67. And so when Paul says, it’s coming very soon. Or Jesus says, this generation will not pass—in this reading, it turns out that they’re right. That the generation didn’t pass and it was very soon. It was literally a couple of years from when Paul was writing and this would happen. So what you do when that happens, suddenly, those Scriptures, it’s almost like an explosion that’s already happened. And it doesn’t make sense for us to keep talking about that explosion happening."

I agree that there are several prophetic passages that refer to the destruction in AD 67, and McLaren highlights a few of these that are particularly so (Schreiner's New Testament Theology that's coming out soon has a really good section on this). I haven't read Perriman's book, but it sounds very interesting. However, in reading the NT, I don't find it convincing that all the passages that warn about hell can be said to be about the destruction in AD 67. I don't know if that is the argument that Perriman makes, but if it is, he definitely has his work cut out for him. For example, some passages that come to mind that would not seem to be speaking about AD 67, but about an eschatological punishment

Matt. 10:28 “Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. - Jesus is specifically speaking of the act of God to destroy both body and soul in hell, and human beings not being able to do that here on earth. But if Jesus meant AD 67, then this would be nonsense, because AD 67 was a destruction wrought by Roman soldiers and therefore, they could not destroy the soul.

Heb. 6:7 For ground that drinks the rain which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God; 8 but if it yields thorns and thistles, it is worthless and close to being cursed, and it ends up being burned.
Heb. 6:9 But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that accompany salvation, though we are speaking in this way. - I take the burning (and other warning passages) to be speaking about an eschatological punishment, because it is clearly contrasted with an eschatological reward throughout the book of Hebrews (entering a rest, an abiding city, Sabbath, etc...).

" a primary meaning of the cross is that the kingdom of God doesn’t come like the kingdoms of the this world, by inflicting violence and coercing people. But that the kingdom of God comes through suffering and willing, voluntary sacrifice. But in an ironic way, the doctrine of hell basically says, no, that that’s not really true. That in the end, God gets His way through coercion and violence and intimidation and domination, just like every other kingdom does. The cross isn’t the center then. The cross is almost a distraction and false advertising for God.
...
I heard one well-known Christian leader, who—I won’t mention his name, just to protect his reputation. Cause some people would use this against him. But I heard him say it like this: The traditional understanding says that God asks of us something that God is incapable of Himself. God asks us to forgive people. But God is incapable of forgiving. God can’t forgive unless He punishes somebody in place of the person He was going to forgive. God doesn’t say things to you—Forgive your wife, and then go kick the dog to vent your anger. God asks you to actually forgive."

It's fascinating how Piper highlighted the fact that the cross and hell are the two greatest shouts in all the universe as to the greatness of the glory of God. And here, in McLaren's theology, by minimizing substitutionary atonement, and doing away w/ hell, he is able to create a God who is much less glorious and much more understandable. His point about forgiveness is interesting, but unconvincing. When we forgive another person, there is still a party that suffers, namely the one who does the forgiving. This party, rather than satisfying themselves by inflicting justice, is willing to bear the suffering and return forgiveness and love. And is this not what God did on the cross when He forgave us our sins? He Himself bore our sins on His body in order to bring us to Himself.

Unfortunately, McLaren totally misrepresents the traditional (substitutionary) understanding of the cross by his comment about kicking the dog. Sadly, I know that this is not his best articulation of the substitutionary understanding of the atonement, but he probably intentionally made this gross misrepresentation to further his point.

"one of the questions I could raise that might be helpful for you and other people thinking about this, is to say, what is the problem with sin? What’s so bad about sin? Now, I can just imagine some people quoting—See, McLaren doesn’t think sin is a problem. I take sin really, seriously. But here’s the problem, If I were to make this sort of analogy or parable. When I had little children, if one of my little children—Let’s say my son Brett, was beating up on his little brother, Trevor. Now, Trevor is bigger. But back then—What was the problem? Was the problem that I don’t want my younger son to get hurt and I don’t want my older son to be a bully. I want my older son to be a good person. I want my younger son to be a good person. I want them to have a great relationship. Then the problem of sin is what it does to my family and what it does to my boys, you know. That’s the problem with sin.

...
And so now it seems to me the entire Christian theology has shifted so now the problem is, how can we keep me from killing Brett? And I don’t think that’s the kind of God that we serve. I think the problem is God wants His children to get along with each other. He wants them to be good people. Because He’s good. And His vision for creation is that they’ll love each other and be good to each other and enjoy each other and have a lot of fun together.

So sin is incredibly serious. But I think we have shifted why it’s so important. Can I say it one more way to say the same thing is—The problem is, why does sin matter to God? And I think what has happened is through the influence of Ansolm and maybe not even really Ansolm, but the way Ansolm was interpreted by later people—We have a vision that the real problem is God wants to kill us all. And we’ve got to somehow solve that problem. And what that does to me, Leif, that is so significant, is that it then minimizes the concern about injustice between human beings. That becomes a peripheral concern. But what if that’s God’s real concern, from beginning to end, see?"

I definitely agree that one of the terrible consequences of sin is that it destroys the relationships that we have with each other and this is something for which the gospel must provide a solution. However, to say that the main problem of sin is the marring of human relationships is unconvicing. There are many, many passages in the Bible that McLaren would need to address before this is a plausible explanation of the problem of sin. Again and again, I find that the consistent witness of the Bible is that sin is first and foremost about evil done against God, not against man. The evil of sin is ultimately that it dishonors God, it rejects His rightful Lordship, it belittles His glory. I think one of the clearest pictures of this is in the Fall of man. This was not an act of rebellion of Adam against Eve... if anything Adam joined Eve and they were both unified in their sin. Rather, this was a clear rebellion against the command of God and His Lordship.

Again, I don't doubt that many of McLaren's statements were purposefully overstated in order for him to make a point, but unfortunately, it is quite possible that many can read his overstatements and go right on agreeing without giving it a second thought. Hopefully that won't be the case for any of us, regardless of who we read.

"Lighten up, Jesus"

2006-05-05T23:46:00.000-04:00

John Piper, from his sermon at the Together for the Gospel conference last week, powerfully articulates the need for seriousness in preaching:

That is my longing for our day—and for you. That God would raise up thousands of broken-hearted, Bible-saturated preachers who are dominated by a sense of the greatness and the majesty and the holiness of God, revealed in the gospel of Christ crucified and risen and reigning with absolute authority over every nation and every army and every false religion and every terrorist and every tsunami and every cancer cell, and every galaxy in the universe.

God did not ordain the cross of Christ or create the lake of fire in order to communicate the insignificance of belittling his glory. The death of the Son of God and the damnation of unrepentant human beings are the loudest shouts under heaven that God is infinitely holy, and sin is infinitely offensive, and wrath is infinitely just, and grace is infinitely precious, and our brief life—and the life of every person in your church and in your community—leads to everlasting joy or everlasting suffering. If our preaching does not carry the weight of these things to our people, what will? Veggie Tales? Radio? Television? Discussion groups? Emergent conversations?

God planned for his Son to be crucified (Revelation 13:8; 2 Timothy 1:9) and for hell to be terrible (Matthew 25:41) so that we would have the clearest witnesses possible to what is at stake when we preach. What gives preaching its seriousness is that the mantle of the preacher is soaked with the blood of Jesus and singed with fire of hell. That’s the mantle that turns mere talkers into preachers. Yet tragically some of the most prominent evangelical voices today diminish the horror of the cross and the horror of hell—the one stripped of its power to bear our punishment, and the other demythologized into self-dehumanization and the social miseries of this world.

Oh that the rising generations would see that the world is not overrun with a sense of seriousness about God. There is no surplus in the church of a sense of God’s glory. There is no excess of earnestness in the church about heaven and hell and sin and salvation. And therefore the joy of many Christians is paper thin. By the millions people are amusing themselves to death with DVDs, and 107-inch TV screens, and games on their cell phones, and slapstick worship, while the spokesmen of a massive world religion write letters to the West in major publications saying, “The first thing we are calling you to is Islam . . . It is the religion of enjoining the good and forbidding the evil with the hand, tongue and heart. It is the religion of jihad in the way of Allah so that Allah’s Word and religion reign Supreme.” And then these spokesmen publicly bless suicide bombers who blow up children in front of Falafel shops and call it the way to paradise. This is the world in which we preach.

And yet incomprehensibly, in this Christ-diminishing, soul-destroying age, books and seminars and divinity schools and church growth specialists are bent on saying to young pastors, “Lighten up.” “Get funny.” “Do something amusing.” To this I ask, Where is the spirit of Jesus? “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 16:24-25). “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell” (Matthew 5:29). “Any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33). “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26). “Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead” (Matthew 8:22). “Whoever would be first among you must be slave of all” (Mark 10:44). “Fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matthew 10:28). “Some of you they will put to death . . . But not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your lives” (Luke 21:16-19).

Would the church growth counsel to Jesus be, “Lighten up, Jesus. Do something amusing.” And to the young pastor: “Whatever you do, young pastor, don’t be like the Jesus of the Gospels. Lighten up.” From my perspective, which feels very close to eternity these days, that message to pastors sounds increasingly insane.

What a difference Jesus Christ makes

2006-05-01T20:56:00.000-04:00

The greatest, most amazing gift in the world is the loving promise of the omnipotent, omnipresent God to work for your good:

Psa. 139
7 Where can I go from Your Spirit?
Or where can I flee from Your presence?

8 If I ascend to heaven, You are there;
If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there.

9 If I take the wings of the dawn,
If I dwell in the remotest part of the sea,

10 Even there Your hand will lead me,
And Your right hand will lay hold of me.

11 If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me,
And the light around me will be night,”

12 Even the darkness is not dark to You,
And the night is as bright as the day.
Darkness and light are alike to You.

Conversely, the most horrific and terrible situation in the world is one where the omnipotent, omnipresent God swears to do all He can to punish you for your sin:

Amos 9
1 I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and He said,
“Smite the capitals so that the thresholds will shake,
And break them on the heads of them all!
Then I will slay the rest of them with the sword;
They will not have a fugitive who will flee,
Or a refugee who will escape.

2 “Though they dig into Sheol,
From there will My hand take them;
And though they ascend to heaven,
From there will I bring them down.

3 “Though they hide on the summit of Carmel,
I will search them out and take them from there;
And though they conceal themselves from My sight on the floor of the sea,
From there I will command the serpent and it will bite them.

4 “And though they go into captivity before their enemies,
From there I will command the sword that it slay them,
And I will set My eyes against them for evil and not for good.”

Oh, what a difference Jesus Christ makes! The change he brings into our lives is from the most wretched, worst imaginable plight possible, into the most wonderful guaranteed promises beyond our wildest dreams. How precious is the cross of Christ, that reconciles sinners to God, that turns children of wrath into sons and daughters of God, that makes enemies of God into heirs with Christ. What a difference Jesus Christ makes!

Thunder Over Louisville 2006

2006-04-24T13:19:00.000-04:00

A clip I took from the largest fireworks display in America this past Saturday.

Video Hosting - Upload Video - Photo Sharing

Killing two lies (fear and pride) with one truth (God's sovereignty)

2006-04-20T16:26:00.000-04:00

Psa. 50:11 “I know every bird of the mountains,
And everything that moves in the field is Mine."

Matt. 6:26 “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them."

Matt. 10:29 “Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father."

Luke 12:6 “Are not five sparrows sold for two cents? Yet not one of them is forgotten before God."

Matt. 10:31 “So do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows."

The glory of repetition

2006-04-20T16:19:00.000-04:00

Doug Wilson writes,

Remember the glory of routine. The sun comes up every morning, and when it did so this morning, it did not come up tired and listless, muttering something about six thousand years of this.

The thing which keeps us from exulting in repetitive actions is simply this – sin. We are called to a life of cycles, and this is to be our glory. The pattern of inscrutable repetitions that is set out in the book of Ecclesiastes is something which the righteous, righteous only by grace, can enjoy. This enjoyment is wisdom in a world of vanity.

And this includes our worship. We gather here, again, to do many of the same things, again, and it would be easy to drift off the point. We have a call to worship. We confess our sins. We sing. We pray. We hear the sermon. We eat.

The sinful mind thinks that repetition is the signal to stop thinking, and wander off to something else. But the wise know that repetition is the signal to think about the need for repetition, and the nature of it, and the kindness resident in it.

Take to remember – this service of worship to God is glory to Him, and it is food for us. And a hungry man does not complain about the repetitive nature of the act of eating.

A Good Friday meditation

2006-04-14T15:58:00.000-04:00

The Bible presents the atonement as a diamond, having many different facets to its glory. On this Good Friday, we would do well to spend time meditating on some of these.

1) Penal Substitution - I believe this is the heart of gospel and the one aspect of the atonement on which all others are built. When Christ died on the cross, he died in our place and the death was necessary because the judgment he took upon himself was the judgment of a holy God against our sin (i.e. penal). He took our sin and its penalty upon himself. God cannot overlook sin. Either we pay for our own sin, or He provides a substitution.

Gen. 22:1-14, Levi. 4-7, Isaiah 53:4-10, Mk. 10:45, Matt. 20:28, John 10:11-15, Gal. 3:13, Heb. 2:9, Rom. 5:6, 8, 8:32, 2 Cor. 5:21, Gal. 2:20, Eph. 5:2, 25, 1 Tim. 2:6, Titus 2:14, 1 Peter 3:18, Heb. 7:26-27, 1 Pet. 2:24, 1 John 2:2

2) Sacrifice - This is included in the very notion of substitution. Christ gives himself as a sacrifice for our sin. Leviticus established a system of blood sacrifice for sin. Yet not just any lamb would do. The lamb had to be blameless, pointing to the sinlessness of Christ. Yet we see that the blood of bulls does not take away sin (Heb. 10:4), so how is it that God forgave sin in the OT? The OT sacrifices are legally tied to the future coming of Christ, apart from which the sacrifices are of no avail. If the blood of bull of goats will do, then why send a savior. Therefore, they are efficacious only in being tied to a future payment, which is in itself fully efficacious.

A helpful example I have heard is buying with a credit card. When we "buy" with credit, we don't actually pay any money, but we sign a legal agreement to a future payment that is so binding because we pledge ourselves to a future payment. Yet, apart from that future payment, the signing means nothing. All the value is in the future payment. Similarly, God forgives sin only on the basis of the future sacrifice that He knows is coming. The wages of sin is death and we owe death for our sin. Animal sacrifices are not adequate. So how is God just in forgiving OT sin? Only in the cross of Christ.

Heb. 9:22, 26, Eph. 1:7, Titus 2:14, 1 Pet. 1:17-20, 2:21-24, 3:18, 1 John 3:5, John 1:29

3) Redemption - Christ’s giving his life as the payment price needed to secure our release from the bondage and guilt of sin. Christ is the one who redeemed you, purchased you. To be a Christian is to belong to one who has bought you and owns you. It is important that we realize that this purchase is made to God. The ransom payment is not to Satan. This would wrongly imply Satan’s autonomous authority. Rather, God’s payment was to God. God’s mercy and love devised a means by which He could pay what God’s justice and holiness demanded.

Heb. 9:14-15, 1 Cor. 6:20, Gal. 3:13, 2 Pet. 2:1, Rev. 5:9, Luke 24:21, Titus 2:14, 1 Pet. 1:18-19

4) Propitiation - This is the appeasement or satisfaction of God’s wrath against sin because of Christ’s payment for our sin and guilt by his death on the cross. So propitiation has implicit substitution. The bad news of the Bible is as bad as it gets: God is wrathful towards us as guilty sinners. The good news of the Bible is as good as it can be: God’s wrath is propitiated, satisfied in the death of another on our behalf.

Rom. 3:25, Heb. 2:17, 1 John 2:2, 4:10

5) Expiation - This is the removal from us sinners of the liability or necessity to suffer sin’s penalty. This is accomplished by the death of Christ. Yet this is only appropriated, efficacious by faith.

2 Cor. 5:17-21, Col. 2:13-14

6) Reconciliation - Through the atonement, there is a change of relationship where alienation and enmity are replaced by peace and acceptance. Before the cross, we were haters toward God (unreasonably so) and He is wrathful towards us (righteously so). So there was needed some kind of intervention to deal with our alienation. So who intervenes? God, the offended party! God sent His Son to remove the enmity between us and God. And now our relationship with God is marked by peace and acceptance.

Yet we see that reconciliation through the cross happens not only horizontally but vertically (Eph. 2:16). The power of the gospel is demonstrated in reconciling those who were at enmity w/ God and those who were at enmity with each other. Therefore, social reconciliation is part and parcel with the gospel. Church planting that never gets out of homogenous church growth is one that doesn’t get the gospel. Horizontal and vertical reconciliation goes together.

Rom. 5:10, 2 Cor. 5:17-20, Eph. 2:16, Col. 1:20-22

7) Christus Victor - Through the cross, Christ is the victor over the powers of darkness, sin, Satan. He reigns over all his (and our) enemies as the victor by his death on the cross.

John 12:28-32, 1 Cor. 15:22-28, Eph. 1:19-23, Col. 2:13-15, Heb. 2:14-15, Rev. 19, 20

8) Moral and Spiritual Example - The death of Christ serves as the greatest example of love for us to follow. Some evangelicals have given this up because this is the liberals’ main view of the atonement. They turn this into all of the cross. Yet, we must not forget that this is a biblical point, just not all there is!

Phil. 2:5ff, 1 Pet. 2:21ff

Why Christ had to die - To bring in a new covenant

2006-04-12T14:05:00.000-04:00

This verse is a great description of the transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant and why Christ had to die.

Heb. 9:15 For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

In the Old Covenant ("first covenant") there were two covenant partners, God and Israel. To breach the terms of this covenant was deserving of death. Now, all of Israel sinned against God, yet, many sinners of old trusted God and were counted righteous in spite of their sins. So before God could establish the New Covenant, God had the outstanding debt of death from the transgressions under the Old Covenant. Therefore, Christ had to die to pay for these deaths before the New Covenant could be established. Christ satisfies the terms of the Old Covenant by dying for sinners and in doing so, He can now establish and be the mediator of a new covenant (Jer. 31:31ff).

Why we need to fight sin - pt. 2

2006-04-11T22:38:00.000-04:00

4) “Mortification of sin is one main reason why the Spirit and the new nature are given unto us, that we may have a principle within whereby to oppose sin and lust.”

What is this new nature that Owen is talking about? If you’re a Christian, the Bible says that we have been regenerated and given a new nature. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, the old has gone, the new has come.” What this new nature entails is that God gives us a new heart that loves Him and hates sin. Now notice, I’m saying a new heart. I’m not even talking about new behaviors or new actions. God does something so much deeper than that. Christianity is NOT about behavior modification. Christianity is not about being forced to do what you hate to do and not doing what you love to do. Christianity is about a person being born again by the Holy Spirit so that you no longer love sin and no longer love this world, but now love God and love the things of God. And that’s the only way it will happen... no amount of willpower, or gritting of teeth will overcome sin. You have to be born again.

Jer. 31:33-34 - this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 34 And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord.

Ezekiel 36:26-27 - 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

And so, God give us a new heart, and He gives us His Spirit, to help us fight our flesh. And this is the struggle between the Spirit and the flesh that we read about in Romans 6 and Galatians 5. If you are a Christian here today, there is a battle going on right now between the Spirit and the flesh in you. And so we must decide who we are going to ally with in this fight:

“Now this is, first, the most unjust and unreasonable thing in the world; when two combatants are engaged, to bind one and keep him from doing his utmost, and to leave the other at liberty to would him at his pleasure: and second, the foolishest thing in the world to bind him who fights for our eternal condition, and to let him alone who seeks and violently attempts our everlasting ruin. The contest is for our lives and souls.”

Brothers and sisters, if you are in Christ, then that means that God has given you graces and gifts to help you to destroy the sin in your life. And what a gift this is! He has given us the Holy Spirit! Knowing this, how hard should we make sure that we make use of Whom we have received. These gifts and graces were given to us to use and to exercise, not to bury in the ground. If we are not daily mortifying sin by the Spirit, then we are sinning against the goodness, kindness, wisdom, grace and love of God, who has given us all that we need to fight sin.

5) "Negligence in this duty will lead to the deterioration of our souls."

The Bible teaches that when we sin, we harden our hearts against God. There is a real effect that sin has so that the more we sin, the more our soul becomes hardened towards God, and indifferent towards God, and the harder it becomes for us to love the things of God and enjoy His presence. We are not playing games here. There is a real effect of sin on our souls, if you are a human being, Christian or non-Christians. Christians are not immune to the effects of sin on our souls. This is a sobering truth.

The Bible teaches us that there is a point where a soul, through continuous, repeated sin, can become so atrophied and so hardened to God, that he will not be able to repent any longer from sin, and will no longer be able to love the things of God anymore. Oh, this is a dreadful state to be in! It’s not a one time thing, but it’s a process by which the soul and the heart, through a lifestyle of sinfulness, becomes so hardened that it no longer can turn to God and repent any longer and therefore is beyond forgiveness.

Hebrews 3:12-14 - 12 Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. 13 But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.

1 John 5:16-17 - 16 If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask, and God will give him life—to those who commit sins that do not lead to death. There is sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that. 17 All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that does not lead to death.

Hebrews 12:15-17 - 15 See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled; 16 that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, who sold his birthright for a single meal. 17 For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears.

This is a terrifying reality. The Bible warns of this condition that all of us could potentially reach. Yes, Jesus says, if you repent you will be forgiven of your sins. That offer still stands and is absolutely true. But there is a condition of the heart that exists where a person can become so hardened in their sin, that repentance is no longer possible. And if you do reach this position, as much as you might desire repentance, as much as you might be terrified on your deathbed, you will no longer be able to genuinely repent and be saved.

Question: Does that mean that you can lose your salvation? No! The Bible assures us that for those whom God has saved, He will keep them because of His faithfulness. He will keep them from reaching that point of hardness.

So if you do reach that point of hardness, what that proves is that you were never saved to begin with.

1 John 2:19 - 19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.

If 10, 20, 30 years, from now, you see me, and I am no longer walking in my faith, that I’ve left my wife and kids, and I’m living lecherously and in drunkenness, with no regard for the things of God, and no desire for the His glory or His kingdom… then what that will mean is that all this presently is a charade. It will prove that I was never really a Christian. All the worship leading? It was a love for the spotlight. And all this teaching is a love for the praise of men. Oh how I need to be watchful that I don’t make a shipwreck of my faith and so prove that I was never in Christ to begin with!

Question: So is there no assurance of salvation? This is such a difficult question that I struggled with for the longest time. The reason is because for the longest time, I thought assurance of salvation was mechanical. I prayed a prayer when I was seven, I signed a card, I filled out a form, I got a church membership, I’m saved! I’m finished! But that’s not how assurance of salvation works. True assurance of salvation, a true inward, spiritual confidence of your election and adoption into God’s family, is a gift of the Holy Spirit. And this gift of assurance of salvation is only for those who by faith in God’s promises are persevering in their faith, by the Spirit. It’s not about mechanical mind games. It’s when you are persevering in obedience and love for God and you are sure that He is faithful and will keep you forever. It is possible for a true Christian to be struggling with sin and go through a season of doubt and insecurity. Yet for the true Christian, God will use the fear of hell and fear of falling away, to bring the Christian back to a life of perseverance and holiness. But there is nothing sweeter than the assurance you have of God’s keeping promises over your life, when you are, by grace, and by the Spirit, walking with God.

We need to be ever watchful against sin, because it really has a soul-destroying effect. Oh how vital it is that we daily be mortifying sin in our lives.

6) "Growing in grace and holiness and conformity to our Lord Jesus Christ is impossible without mortification of sin."

I imagine all of us desire to be like Christ. We want to ultimately become loving people, holy people, and sacrificial, brave, merciful, compassionate people. No one wants at the end of his life to be known as selfish, or cowardly. Yet, no matter how much you spend your life giving money to the poor, teaching the Word of God in you small group or in a Sunday school class, or sharing the Gospel with the people around, or going overseas on mission trips, if you don’t daily mortify the sinful nature in you, then all those things will be in vain.

“Let not that man think he makes any progress in holiness, who walks not over the neck of his lusts. He, who doth not kill sin in his way, takes no steps towards his journey’s end.”

Why we need to fight sin - pt. 1

2006-04-10T21:38:00.000-04:00

The book I have read the most is probably The Mortification of Sin by John Owen, which I have made a custom of reading at least once a year. It is a short book, that can be read in one sitting, but it contains some of the most profound insights into the human nature, the nature of sin, and how we can fight sin. In one chapter, Owen gives us six reasons on the necessity of mortification (the killing) of sin. Here are the first three:

1) “Indwelling sin always abides whilst we are in this world; therefore it is always to be mortified.”

There is no such thing as perfect holiness, perfect obedience, perfect service, here on earth. If anyone thinks that he is perfect, he probably never knew to begin with what it means to be perfect in obedience to any one of God’s commands. Or perhaps, those that would talk about perfectionism don’t know the difference between good and evil, or they deny the teaching of original, indwelling sin, and they bring down the power of Christ in a believer’s life and they re-define holiness and perfection to something that is so weak and watered down that it is attainable by human power.

Regardless how one might invent an earthly perfection that the Gospel never teaches, the Bible clearly affirms that during all our days on earth, we will never attain to moral perfection. Therefore, we will not dare to be wise above what the Bible teaches, and so we say with John Owen that “indwelling sin lives in us in some measure and degree while we are in this world.”

12 Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. – Phil. 3:12

Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. – 2 Cor. 4:16

12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. – 1 Cor. 13:12

17 For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. – Gal. 5:17

8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. – 1 John 1:8

Rom 7:24, Phil. 3:21, Gal. 6:9, Heb 12:1, 2 Cor. 7:1, etc…

2) “Sin does not only still abide in us, but is still acting, still laboring to bring forth the deeds of the flesh.”

If sin were to leave us alone to run after God as hard as we wanted, then okay, we would not have to fight sin. But, we know from the Bible that this indwelling sin nature is ever out to kill us, out to destroy us.

“As sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be most quiet, and its waters are for the most part deep when they are still, so ought our contrivances against it to be vigorous at all times, in all conditions, even where there is least suspicion”

In other words, our sinful nature is always hard at work to destroy us, even at moments when we feel that we are safe and secure and there is no way we can fall into temptation... And sure enough, I know from experience that it’s those times that I think “I’m safe from temptation for now”, when I am most prone to fall.

Which one of us can ever say that we ever did anything with God or for God, and indwelling sin did not have a hand in corrupting our actions? As fallen creatures, this is the battle that we will have to fight on earth, for the rest of our days. Therefore, because sin will always be acting, if we are not always mortifying sin, then we are in huge peril. John Owen brings up the point that if you were in a boxing match against a powerful enemy, and all you did was stand still and let him pound you, you would be in huge danger! And sin is more dangerous that the most powerful boxer in the world… it is subtle, strong, watchful, and always at work in the business of killing our souls, and if we are lazy or careless or slothful or foolish in our fight against it, then what can we expect but ruin? We have to protect ourselves, and we have to fight back.

“There is not a day but sin foils or is foiled, prevails or is prevailed on; and it will be so, while we live in this world.”

If ever you can get sin to stop raging and fighting within you, then you no longer have to fight. But we know from the Bible (and from experience), that from 8 years old, to 18, to 25, to 35, to 85 years old, sin will ever be trying to destroy you, so we must fight back.

3) “Sin will not only be striving, acting, rebelling, troubling, disquieting; but, if let alone, if not continually mortified, will bring forth great, cursed scandalous, soul-destroying sins.”

19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. – Galatians 5:19-21

These are the kinds of things that sin is ever trying to bring forth in our life. It is not just trying to bring forth small white lies and "insignificant" sins... no, it’s working to bring forth the greatest kinds of God-blaspheming, scandalous, destructive evils that it can. Think about King David… do you really think he realized that his lingering over to look at Bathsheba from the roof of his house would lead to committing adultery, killing a man, trampling on the goodness of God, and destroying his family? Of course not, but the sinful nature that dwelled in him was aiming for all that, and he walked right into it. John Owen writes,

“Sin aims always at the utmost: every time it rises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin of that kind. Every unclean thought of glance would be adultery, if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression; every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its fullness…. Every rise of lust, might it have its course, would come to the height of villainy. It is like the grave, that is never satisfied. And herein lies no small share of the deceitfulness of sin… It is modest, as it were, in its first motions and proposals; but having once got footing in the heart by them, it constantly makes good its ground, and presses on to some further degrees in the same kind.

This acting and pressing forward, makes the soul take little notice of what an entrance is already made to a falling off from God. It thinks all is indifferently well, if there be no further progress. And so far as the soul is made insensible to any sin,… so far it is hardened. But sin is still pressing forward, because it has no bounds but utter relinquishment of God, and opposition to him. The only reason it proceeds towards its height by degrees, gaining ground by slowly hardening our hearts, is not from its nature, but its deceitfulness.”

Oh, how this should make us tremble. This is probably one of the most frightening statements about sin that I have ever read and I know it’s so true. Sin always aims at the utmost… For every lust, if sin were to be given free reign, it would surely lead to fornication, adultery, or rape. For every thought of anger or revenge or jealousy, if sin were to be given free reign, it would lead to murder, or oppression, or assault. Think about all the Christian leaders that fell to adultery, fell to greed, or financial ruin. I assure you that sin in all its deceitfulness, did not begin by proposing them to a scandalous sin right away. But sin began with a glance, a dissatisfied thought about their own life, a lingering fantasy, a click of a mouse... and through these sins that the pastor thought he had under control, a hardening of the heart begins and slowly the person becomes more bold and brazen in his endeavors. He lies to his wife, he spends more time with a certain person than he should, he writes letters, he re-schedules meetings, and before you know it, his heart is hard and there is no conviction of sin and he makes shipwreck of his faith, leaving a trail of carnage and blood and destruction in his wake.

Why do we have to fight sin? Because sin is not just out to make us into naughty people. Sin is out to destroy us and to destroy our relationship with God and to undermine God’s kingdom on earth.

Paul on homosexuality

2006-04-04T20:19:00.000-04:00

I have been corresponding with a friend on the subject of homosexuality. In our day and age, it is imperative that we have clear understanding of what the Bible teaches regarding this topic, because people are going to ask. A good place to start is Paul's letter to the Romans, where speaks on this subject at length.

Rom. 1:24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. 25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

Rom. 1:26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

There is much that could be gleaned from these passages and Piper's sermons (1, 2) on these passages are helpful. However, I would like to focus on the main point that Paul is making here and it is stunning. In verse 25, man has "exchanged the truth of God for a life" and "worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator". Here, man has given himself to idolatry, and has dishonored God. Even though God made us to worship Him and serve Him (Rom. 1:19-20), we have turned away from Him and given ourselves to idols and lies. Notice, at the root of all sin is self-pride and self-worship. Idolatry and self-worship is fundamentally unnatural. As a result of this, God gave us over to a sin that would be an outward display of our inward unnatural idolatry, namely our abandoning of our natural sexual functions for the unnatural (vs. 24, 26-27). And notice the tragic irony: Just as our idolatry is rooted in self-worship, so is homosexuality a form of self-worship, in that men are inflamed with lust for men, and women for women. All this is unnatural and a departure from God's original created order from Genesis 1-2 that men and women are made to have sex with each other.

There are scholars that argue that Paul was referring to specific forms of homosexuality, such as pederasty (a sexual relationship between an older man and young boy), heterosexuals acting as homosexuals, or homosexual relationships that are not monogamous. Yet, knowing Paul's Jewish background, I am not convinced by their arguments. Thomas Schreiner states it well:

Nevertheless, there is little doubt that Paul condemns all forms of homosexuality. Some in the Greco-Roman world defended and even celebrated homosexuality. But the Jewish tradition is unanimous in condemning it (cf. Gen. 19:1-28; Lev. 18:22; 20:13; Deut. 23:17-18; Wis 14:26; T Levi 17.11; T. Naph. 3:3-4, Sib. Or. 3:596-600; Ag. Ap. 2.24, 37; Spec. Laws 3.7). No evidence exists to the contrary. The most natural way of interpreting Paul is to interpret him in continuity with his Jewish tradition. The burden of proof certainly lies on those who see some window for the acceptability of homosexuality in Paul. To read the text as if some exceptions exists is eisegesis. The text contains a general condemnation, with no indication that some forms of homosexuality are acceptable. Nowhere else in Jewish tradition, in the New Testament, or in Paul is there any hint that the practice would ever be admissible. (Schreiner; Paul, Apostle of God's Glory in Christ, p. 317)

Clearly, the apostle Paul teaches that all forms of homosexuality are sinful. Whether or not we believe he is right is another issue, at the very least, let us acknowledge that this is what he teaches!

Yet, when people ask what we believe, communicating this single point is not enough. Paul does not end his letter in Romans 1:25! Paul's point in establishing Romans 1 (and 2-3) is to prepare the way for the Good News of Romans 3:23-26:

23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; 25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; 26 for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

In communicating the sinfulness of homosexuality, we could make two terrible mistakes. First, we could fail to communicate the hope of the gospel. Our goal in speaking the truth about the sin in our lives is not to leave people condemned and hopeless in their sin. Our goal is ultimately to bring people to a place where they see their guilt before God, so that the news of a sin-bearing Savior will sound like the good news that it is. Second, we could fail by demanding change in the homosexual person before they can receive gospel. The forgiveness of the gospel must be held out freely, to be freely received without any pre-requisite change in the lives of sinners. Sanctification comes after justification. Obedience comes after faith. To expect otherwise would be a futile works-based righteousness. This is the pattern that we see in Paul. It is only after the gospel has been freely offered and received, that Paul gives this command to those who once gave their bodies to dishonor (Rom. 1:24):

Rom. 12:1 Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

Helpful resources: Thoughts on Homosexuality from Dan's blog, www.albertmohler.com (tons of thoughtful articles and commentaries), Desiring God, Sex and the Supremacy of Christ Resources

"I did not come to abolish but to fulfill"

2006-04-03T00:33:00.000-04:00

Within the nations of Israel, rules had to be enacted to place some restraint on less than perfect situations. Divorce was inevitable, so the woman who became its victim might at least receive a certificate indicating her unmarried status so that she could marry again. Violance was unavoidable, so retribution for the injury one had incurred might at least be limited to nothing more harmful than what one had experienced - an eye (and no more) for an eye; a tooth (and no more) for a tooth. The "law of the LORD" was indeed "perfect" for these less than perfect situations in a theocracy that included both the godly and those whose hearts were corrupt.

In contrast, Matthew believed that Jesus was assembling a new people who were "pure in heart" (5:8). For such a people the humane foundation that lay beneath the Mosaic law could be brought to the surface and the Mosaic law brought to its fulfillment. In the situation Jesus envisioned, the only court would be the eschatological judgment of God, and the maximum punishment would not be physical death but hell itself (5:22, 29-30). Evidence in this court would not be outward, physical violations of normal societal statutes but the intentions of the heart (5:22, 28; cf. 6:21; 12:34; 13:15; 15:8, 18; 19:8)

Since Jesus did not define this new people as a political entity, the only standard that mattered would be God's ultimate standard. There should not only be no murder, but none of the hate-filled anger that produces murder (5:21-22). There should not only be no adultery, but there should be no lust, which leads to adultery (5:27-30). Marriage should be the institutionalization of the permanent bonding of two people into one flesh through sexual intercourse, and one's marriage should only be declared a failure if one's spouse was sexually unfaithful (19:3-9; cf. 5:31-32). Disciples of Jesus must not merely limit to a reasonable level of vengeance that they take against those who harm them, but they must do their enemies no violance at all (5:38-42).

This is the sense, therefore, in which Jesus fulfilled the law and in which none of it passed away in his teaching. The Mosaic law had legislated love for God and neighbor in the less than perfect situation of a theocraacy. With the coming of Jesus, God's law could be reduced to its fundamental principles since Jesus' disciples were called upon to "be perfect...as your heavenly Father is perfect" (5:48). (Thielman, Frank, Theology of the New Testament, pg. 88-89)

Understanding why Christ had to die

2006-03-30T22:23:00.000-05:00

One of the topics we are covering in Systematic Theology this semester is the atonement. When it comes to the atonement, one of the doctrines that is being heavily challenged these days is the the doctrine of substitutionary atonement, namely that Christ died as a substitute for sinners. Many people are trying to replace a substitutionary view of the atonement with other explanations of why Christ had to die. Now, I wouldn't disagree that there is more to Christ's death than a substitution to pay for sin. However, certainly the death of Christ is not less than that. In fact, I believe that the substitutionary atonement is at the heart of the gospel, and therefore, must be vigorously cherished and defended. Dr. Ware provided a very helpful outline that lays a basic theological foundation for substitutionary atonement and explaining why Christ had to die. I hope this will serve to strengthen your convictions.

A. Three Necessary Theological Factors

1) Humanity's Sin - All humans have sinned. This is true of us universally (Rom. 3:23). Sin brings guilt and condemnation (Gen. 2:17, Rom. 5:16-18, 6:23, Eph. 2:3). We are totally unable to rid ourselves of our own sin (Gal. 2:16, 2:21).

2) God's Holiness - Unlike us, God is holy. God is righteous, we are not, and therefore, God’s just wrath must come to us. God will not and cannot accept a sinner, because He is holy. The holiness of God results in God necessarily judging sin. Because God is holy, His nature is such that it must judge sin!

(Comment: So far, in points one and two, we do not yet require a cross. God can easily resolve points one and two by punishing our sin. If this were the end of the story, hell would do just fine.)

3) God's Mercy - God, in His mercy, loved us. (Eph. 2:1-4) This is the deciding factor of why there must be a cross. With this third point, God must now devise a means where the standards of His holiness are not compromised, and yet He may justify the ungodly (Rom. 4:5).

B. Necessity of Maintaining both God's Holiness and Mercy

1) Absolute Necessity of God's Holiness - God has no choice but to uphold the standards of His holiness, or He would not be God. If He were for one moment let sin go unpunished, He would fail to be the upholder of justice and fail to be God. The necessity of God's holiness is absolute.

2) Contingent Necessity of God's Mercy - On the other hand, the necessity of God's mercy is not absolute, but contingent. "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated... I will have mercy on whom I have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." (Rom. 9:13-15) Notice, there is no verse like that with holiness! (i.e. "With Dan I've been holy, but with Patrick I've been unholy") Holiness and mercy are not parallel realities in God.

C. The Cross as the Full Expression of God's Holiness and Mercy

1) Holiness Vindicated - God does not sweep sin under the carpet, but pays for it. Every last bit of our sin is paid by His Son. Think of all the sin of all your life that you have ever committed, every lust, hate, selfishness, pride, disobedience, apathy, greed,... Think of every last drop of sin ever committed, compacted in a moment of judgment, and feel the weight of what you deserve to pay before God.

Now, compound that with the glorious truth that "(God) made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf." (2 Cor. 5:21) This is staggering. For the holiness of God to be vindicated, every bit of his holy judgment must be borne by His Son, and that is exactly what happened at the cross. The justice of God is satisfied at the cross.

2) Mercy Expressed - The substitution above is the heart of the gospel. Mercy can now be extended to us precisely because the justice of God is satisfied.

D. Conclusion: The Atonement as God's Self-Satisfaction through Self-Substitution - God substitutes Himself in His Son for His satisfaction. This is the gospel and our hope and the glory of the cross.

Thoughts on John 15:1-11 - pt. 4

2006-03-30T17:10:00.000-05:00

What happens when we abide in Christ?
Positive Motivation

- Those who abide in Christ bear fruit (vs. 5) – The truth is that at the end of the day, all of us deeply long to be fruitful people. Nobody wants to come to the end of their lives, (or even to the end of a year) and look back and see that they lived a selfish, unsacrificial, unloving, cowardly, and shameful life. All of us want to be able to look back on our years and see that we have lived with boldness and love and big-heartedness and generosity and honor. This can only truly happen when we abide in Christ. Only then are we freed to live fruitful lives.

- Those who abide in Christ have their prayers answered (vs. 7) – When we abide in Christ, our desires become aligned with the will of God and our prayers are powerfully answered. Much like the first point, we all want to pray prayers that make a difference in this world. If we abide in Christ, our prayers will not only be answered, but they will be prayers that matter. "Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." Psalm 37:4

- We glorify God and prove to be Christ’s disciples. (vs. 8) – Our bearing fruit doesn’t earn our salvation but rather proves that we have been saved by God (vs. 15:16). In other words, when we are abiding in Christ and bearing fruit, it proves that God is at work in us to make us bear fruit. Our obedience is a result of abiding in Christ. And if we abide in Christ, we will obey his commands, not as slaves, but as friends (vs. 15:15), because we know that Christ loves us. When we obey God with such willingness and gladness, God is glorified.

- His joy is in us and our joy is made full. (vs. 11) – Why? Beause we remain with the Vine! We remain with Christ and in the care of the vinedresser, our Father. This is what we were made for. The main reason being cast into the fire is terrible is not because of the burning, although that is terrible, but it is because we are separated from the Vine. When we abide in Christ we are no longer slaves, but we are friends and our joy is made full. We have a taste of this joy here on earth... just enough to know that it is real. But the day is coming when we will have the entire banquet and on that day we will drink the fruit of the vine together with Christ.

Thoughts on John 15:1-11 - pt. 3

2006-03-28T22:20:00.000-05:00

How do we abide in Christ?

- We abide in Christ by believing in the gospel. By believe, I don't mean merely an intellectual acknowledgment of facts. Rather, I mean to hope in the gospel, to trust in it, to depend on it.

- Some might expect that my answer here would be, "We abide in Christ by praying and reading the Bible." Now, those two things can be very helpful means to abiding in Christ, but the reason I didn’t name them primarily is because you can pray and read the Bible in such a way as to think that those things somehow commend you to God. If you prayed and read the Bible hoping that your actions would get you right with God, you would not be abiding in Christ. You would be abiding in your own self-righteousness and would have no basis for a relationship with God. Therefore, the very first thing we must do is to believe in the truth of the Gospel and to place our trust, our hope in it. We must gladly and eagerly bank all your hope in Jesus Christ and what he has done, for a right relationship with God.

- Now, we would not know the promises of the gospel and the trustworthiness of God to keep his promises apart from reading the Bible. And we wouldn't be able to confess ours sins and express our faith to God and plead for His aid apart from prayer. So prayer and reading the Bible are vitally important. But even as we perform these spiritual disciplines, we must remember that they do not earn us any righteousness. Christ alone is all our righteousness and it is faith alone that connects us to Him. Spiritual disciplines rather are means that God has appointed to help strengthen and increase our faith in order that we might abide in Christ. Doing spiritual disciplines are not in themselves abiding in Christ. Trusting in Christ is abiding in Christ. Spiritual disciplines help us to abide in Christ, by reminding us of how much we need Him and how helpless we are and how trustworthy He is. So if you are having a hard time trusting in Christ, a hard time living in a daily awareness of the glory of the cross, then my encouragement is to pray and read your Bible. Read and pray with the goal of seeing how weak and sinful and needy you are, and how beautiful and trustworthy and sufficient Jesus Christ is for all your needs.

Thoughts on John 15:1-11 - pt. 2

2006-03-27T17:10:00.000-05:00

What does it mean to abide in Christ?

- The key command of this passage is to abide in Christ (vs. 4). “Abide in me... As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me.” If you don’t want to taken away and cast into the fire, you’ve got to remain in Christ, to stay connected to him… but what does that mean?

– Abiding in Christ is specifically abiding in the love that Christ has for us (vs. 9). Jesus gives us the command to abide in him, but then he clarifies what he means in verse 9. As the Father has loved Christ, so has he loved us; and the command is to abide in His love for us. Notice, this is not a command to give love to Christ, but to receive his love for us. Abiding is mainly a receptive action. So abiding in Christ is not primarily our doing something for Jesus Christ, but rather it is our action of resting in the love that Christ has for us. It is a receiving of his love for us.

– What is the love Christ has for us? We see Christ’s love most clearly in the gospel; Jesus Christ points to his laying down his life for sinners/friends (vs. 13). To abide in Christ is to live a life of continuous dependence on what Christ has done for us in the Gospel.

- This helps us make sense of vs. 4. We see that abiding in Christ is a mutual relationship. “Abide in Me and I in you.” When we abide in Christ by trusting in him, he also comes and dwells in us and loves us and reciprocates that relationship to us. Christianity is a real two way relationship, initiated by God. God first loved us in sending his Son, and this results in a real relationship in which we abide in the love of Christ and Christ abides in our love for him.

What are the challenges of abiding in the love of Christ?

1) Habitual sin – We all struggle with sin and when we are sinning, the last thing we care about is Christ and the cross. When we are driven by sin, although we know in our brains that Christ suffered and died for sinners so that we would be holy, our hearts could give a flip about that and we would much rather enjoy our sin. Sin makes us forget Christ.

2) Guilt – And then to make it worse, after we have sinned, Satan will use guilt to fill us with doubt about whether God will forgive us for the thousandth time. How often do we struggle with guilt, and instead of turning to God right away for forgiveness in Christ, we think, “I better beat myself up for a few days and clean up my act and not sin and then God will hear my prayer”? That is a lie. That kind of thinking is not abiding in the love of Christ, but depending on yourself.

3) Apathy – There are just seasons of your life when you are just dry and apathetic towards God. During these seasons, sin is not a big deal and so the gospel is not a big deal. It’s just hard to get excited about the truths of the Bible ‘cause you don’t feel the reality of spiritual truths and eternity. During these seasons of our lives, it is hard to abide in Christ.

4) Blessing - Even during times of blessings, it also can be a challenge to abide in Christ. When everything is going well, our flesh can become proud and think that all these things are accomplished by our own obedience and wisdom, which will keep us from having a heart that recognizes that all we have is from Christ.

There are many, many more... pride, persecution, suffering, doubt, distractions, busy-ness... the list can go on and on. The bottom line is that we as humans in our flesh are wired to be independent, instead of dependent and abiding in Christ. This is why for even those who are abiding in Christ, there must be a constant pruning (vs. 2) in order that we might bear more fruit. Abiding in Christ is a battle we must fight everyday.

Thoughts on John 15:1-11 - pt. 1

2006-03-27T00:12:00.000-05:00

John 15:1 “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. 2 “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. 3 “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. 4 “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. 5 “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. 6 “If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. 7 “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples. 9 “Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. 10 “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. 11 “These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.

Who are these branches?
Are the branches all the people in the world? Or are they a specific group of people? I don't think this passage is speaking to every person in the world, because it would make little sense to think of a Muslim overseas who has never heard the gospel being connected to Christ, the vine. We know from the context, that Jesus is specifically addressing the disciples. I understand the branches to be those in verse 3 who have heard the word of Christ and have, in a sense, been cleansed by it and are connected to him through it, because they know the truth. Jesus here is speaking to the disciples, but notice, that among the disciples there are true believers and a false believer, namely Judas. There is indeed a branch that did not abide in Christ. So I understand the branches to be those who have received the Gospel and are in the visible church, whether they are true Christians or not. This passage is to all professing followers of Christ.

Why would I want to abide in Christ?
Negative Motivation

1) We can bear no fruit unless we “abide in Christ” (vs. 4) - Bearing fruit means living a life of obedience to Christ's commands and thus, a life that glorifies God (vs. 12, vs. 8). Therefore, not bearing fruit is the opposite, namely a life of disobedience that brings dishonor to God. If we do not abide in Christ, it is impossible for us to bear fruit (vs. 5).

2) Every branch that does not bear fruit is taken away (vs. 2) - Not abiding in Christ will result in sin (not bearing fruit), which will result in being further separated from Christ (taken away). Sin, apart from the grace of God, always leads to more sin. Disobedience, apart from the grace of God, always begets more disobedience. There is a hardening effect of sin that will cause one to be drawn further away from God. Anyone who has fallen into habitual, repetitive sin knows the bondage of sin, which makes one powerless to fight it.

3) The branches thrown away are “cast into the fire and they are burned” (vs. 6) - I understand Jesus to be speaking here ultimately of hell. There are a lot of other parables that use this kind of language throughout the gospels, referring to hell. Some might argue that this is a refining fire, but branches do not get refined in fire. They are burned and destroyed. So what we’re talking about here is of eternal importance. Abiding in Christ is not optional for branches but matters more than anything else in life.

Sprinkling babies

2006-03-23T15:08:00.000-05:00

Dan (my Presbyterian friend) and I have been recently discussing the issue of infant baptism and he has posted our arguments for and against it on his website. You can read them here:

Part 1 - Intro

Part 2 - Arguments for Infant Baptism

Part 3 - Arguments for Believer's Baptism (or against Infant Baptism)

I'll also let Mark Dever, a Baptist, weigh in on this discussion with his brief summary of five reasons against infant baptism:

1) Nobody disagrees with believer baptism. The debated point is infant baptism.
2) There are no clear examples in the New Testament of infant baptism.
3) There is no clear teaching on infant baptism in the New Testament.
4) The New Testament nowhere teaches a parallel of physical circumcision with physical baptism. In fact, Colossians 2 exactly parallels spiritual circumcision with physical baptism, that is, the circumcision of the heart with physical baptism. This would support the idea of baptizing only those who give evidence of being born again.
5) Historically, infant baptism is not in the New Testament, and it is not in the Didache, and early second-century manual of Christian worship. There is no certain record of it in the first century, or even in the second century. In the third century, there is certain record of infant baptism, but it is not the infant baptism which some of our Reformed Protestant friends teach. It is rather what the Roman Catholic church now teaches-that baptism actually effects our being born again, our regeneration, our salvation. The idea of infant baptism that some of our reformed Protestant friends teach, in fact, does not appear until after other Protestants in the 1520's have re-introduced the practice of believer baptism. It is really Huldrich Zwingli who pioneers the idea of an infant baptism that is not salvific or regenerating.

(From A Display of God's Glory 2nd ed., pg. 52)

Weekender quotes

2006-03-20T23:29:00.000-05:00

Quotes from the Weekender Conference I attended this past weekend (which I would heartily recommend to all pastors and lay leaders... if you're interested, I would be glad to tell you more):

"Don't try to reform anything you don't love." - Matt Schmucker quoting Al Mohler on the danger of unloving pastors.

"How we live matters... more specifically, we are claiming that it is dangerous for the Christian to attempt to live outside the church and it is positively encouraging and good to live inside the church, to grow up in Christ within the family of God just like children grow up in a family." - Matt during the membership classes for prospective members

"A lot of people accuse us of not being humble. Let me tell you our understanding of humility. Humility is going to the Word of God and doing all you can to understand what it teaches. And once you understand it, you hold on to it and obey it and preach it with boldness regardless of whatever opposition you face. That's being humble." - Matt

"Seminaries make academics. Churches make pastors." - Michael Lawrence on the need for churches to train pastors

"All the worldly divisions in our congregation are an opportunity to preach the Gospel in our cooperation."
"If you ever doubt the limits of God's love, look in the mirror and realize that if God loved you, a sinner, then his love must be limitless." - Mark Dever in the sermon on Sunday

"There's no such thing as a closed country. You can preach anywhere you want. There's just no guarantee that you'll preach a second time." - Mark during the session on sermon preparation

Gunter Klein on the kingdom of God

2006-03-15T17:13:00.000-05:00

One of the things I'm learning in my NT Theology class is that you don't have to agree with everything a person writes in order to benefit from their work. Take for example Gunter Klein. He is a Bultmannian, being influenced by existentialism and the enlightenment and denying the historicity of the Bible. Yet he makes some very helpful comments on Jesus' view of the kingdom of God:

"(Jesus) projected no socio-political programs, he did not demonize the structure of society . . . and he did not call for revolution. This is not to say that he was for a moment blind to the repressiveness of his day."

He warned of the dangers of riches and power, but he did not call for an attack on the structures. Instead, he called for the payment of taxes, even to Caeasar. This is certainly not what the Zealots would've said.

"(In the command to pay taxes to Caesar,) Jesus sovereignly declares as irrelevant what apparently was the most explosive political question of his day; he even goes so far as to downgrade it to a trifle by referring to God's proprietary rights. But it is precisely God's claim which makes us aware that his rule will not prevail by man changing any kind of structures but only by man changing himself and by preparing him for God's coming."

To think that Christ's "kingdom of God" was focused on social structures primarily would be to miss Jesus' point.

Klein's Lutheran heritage also helped him see evil as being in the heart of man.

Locating evil in social structures "conflicts with Jesus' proclamation which so uncompromisingly located evil in man's heart."

It is not the transformation of social structures but the message of the gospel "which puts an end to man's self-idolatry and frees him for a new obedience."

Klein talks about how we can see transformation in individuals, but asks "can it ever be said of a structure that in it Satan has been overthrown by Christ"? Individuals are under Christ's lordship, but to apply this to structures would result in Constantinianism. But Klein strikes a balance:

"This is not to give the false impression that the condition of the world is unimportant. To the contrary 'the conversion of the individual as such brings about changes within the world.'"

So he's not a fundamentalist, but sounds very evangelical! Evangelicals see that political involvement is important...yet isn't the greatest change agent conversion through the gospel? Isn't the conversion of the heart the only way for the world to really be changed?

"(It does not agree) with the exuberance of some ranting revolutionary to build the kingdom of god. It seeks change because it has perceived God's mercy, yet it knows full well that changing structures does not bring salvation any closer."

"(Revolutionary ideology) leads to that fatal misunderstanding which says that Christ is gathering 'the dispossessed so they together might overthrow the mighty.' What here is laced with Christian terms and so unashamedly ideologized is the very opposite of love and would only succeed in perpetuating human conflict."

I think this is very insightful and right. Thoughts like this will become more and more relevant in the coming future. Be aware of overly naive, simplistic, utopian appropriations of Christ's teachings on the kingdom of God.

Opposite misconception

2006-03-15T00:12:00.000-05:00

One of the themes we see in the New Testament is how Jesus' contemporaries failed to understand him. When Jesus came preaching that the kingdom of God was at hand, his Jewish hearers understood this to mean that Jesus was going to drive out the Roman rulers, win a great military victory for Israel and usher in the complete fulfillment of all of God's promises. But Jesus' inauguration of his kingdom was not as a warrior king, but as a servant king. He was anointed with the Spirit of God not to wage war in the streets, but to heal the weak and deliver the oppressed and encourage the downcast. Jesus' entrance into Jerusalem was on a donkey, fulfilling the prophecy of the arrival of a humble king. We see again and again that Jesus was a king contrary to the expectations of many and very different from the kings of his day. He did not establish his kingship by winning wars, rather he triumphed through suffering. When a disciple sliced off the ear of one his enemies, Jesus rebuked him and healed his captor. Even though at any moment, he could have called down twelve legions of angels to assist him, Jesus submitted to the cross in order to fulfill the Scriptures. It is astonishing how misunderstood Jesus was by so many of the Jews.

Sure enough, Scripture promises that Christ will come back one day, not to serve, but to reign. Yet, how ironic it is that as he was misunderstood in his first coming, from the looks of it, so also will he be misunderstood by so many on his second coming, except this time, they will have the opposite misconception about Christ. Liberals (in all denominations), health and wealth proponents, humanists, universalists, open theists, the Jesus seminar, emergents and many other camps in the church teach a Jesus who does not condemn, does not judge and does not impose his will on others. They are not anticipating a Jesus who is passionate for the glory of God and full of wrath over the sin of this world. How shocked will they be on the day when Christ is revealed, this time not as a servant on a donkey, but a king on a warhorse, ready to judge and wage war against his enemies. Instead of finding a Jesus that approves of their lifestyles and worldliness, they will meet a warrior-king who has come at last to establish his kingdom on earth and fulfill his covenant to Abraham.

In the reckless raging fury

2006-03-12T23:49:00.000-05:00

The Love of God
Rich Mullins

There's a wideness in God's mercy
I cannot find in my own
And He keeps His fire burning
To melt this heart of stone
Keeps me aching with a yearning
Keeps me glad to have been caught
In the reckless raging fury
That they call the love of God

Rich Mullins' description of the love of God has been a painfully accurate one in the life of my church. Piper defines the love of God as "his doing whatever needs to be done, at whatever cost, so that we will see and be satisfied with the glory of God in Jesus Christ." In the past two weeks, we have seen one of our college students diagnosed with a brain tumor and another one of our youth pass away painfully after a long battle with cancer. And oh, how we have grieved as a church over this. When one member suffers, all other members suffer with it. If Piper is right, then the love of God has been nothing but reckless and nothing but raging in the life of my church.

Now I've seen no band of angels
But I've heard the soldiers' songs
Love hangs over them like a banner
Love within them leads them on
To the battle on the journey
And it's never gonna stop
Ever widening their mercies
And the fury of His love

Yet in the midst of this suffering, I have heard the parents testify to their hope in God with trembling and tears. I have seen Christians brothers and sisters supporting one another with the courage of soldiers on a battlefield. And flying over these acts of hope and faith is the banner of the love of God. "Because of the Lord's great love, we are not consumed." "Though He slay me, yet will I hope in Him." If the love of God is a raging, reckless fury, then may He keep this band of Christians in the center of the storm.

Joy and sorrow are this ocean
And in their every ebb and flow
Now the Lord a door has opened
That all Hell could never close
Here I'm tested and made worthy
Tossed about but lifted up
In the reckless raging fury
That they call the love of God

Relief pitching and marital counseling

2006-03-09T21:21:00.000-05:00

If I ever should become a pastor someday, one of the most intimidating thoughts is having to do marital counseling. Dan Phillips makes a good comparison and gives some solid advice:

Some of the hardest, scariest, most dangerous, heart-wrenching work pastors do is marital counseling. (I can hear the Amen's from where I sit.)

The pastor is very much like baseball's relief pitcher. He's not called into action when everything is going great, as a rule. No, the manager waves for him when it's the bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, score tied, and the opposition's power-hitter about to approach the plate.

Similarly, couples often come into the study grim-faced, tight-lipped, angry, bringing years of entrenched patterns of behavior, scar tissue, grudges, and angry memories. Bottom of the ninth. Bases loaded. The breathless crowd leans forward.

And ol' Pastor Bud is supposed to fix everything.

So he tries gamely, God help him. Depending on his orientation, maybe he talks about boundaries, or love language; maybe he tries to teach the husband to think and talk more like a woman. He carries some Bible water around, trying to put out this and that fire -- some of them raging, some of them long-smoldering, like the volcanic belly of Mount St. Helens.

But what if he didn't? What if he did something totally different?

Read the rest here.

What do you have that you did not receive?

2006-03-09T15:25:00.000-05:00

There are truths in the Bible that are so powerful that they would transform our lives if we would only believe them. One such truth is how God is the Giver of everything we have:

The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things - Acts 17:24-25

What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it? - 1 Cor. 4:7

Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow. - James 1:17

This truth is one of the most powerful antidotes to the poison of pride in our lives. What do we have that we did not receive? NOTHING. Everything we have, our talents, our strength, our minds, our relationships, our possessions, our ministries, and every breath we take has been given to us. But make no mistake about it, we have received all these things as gifts, coming down from our heavenly Father. They are not payments that we have earned, but are gifts that have been given undeservingly.

And how undeserving we are! These gifts were not given to obedient children who do what they are supposed to do. They were given to rebellious, ungrateful children. In our sin, the only thing we have earned is death and destruction. Yet, we have received, and continue to receive, grace upon grace. I like C.J. Mahaney's response whenever people ask how he's doing: "Better than I deserve." Every second of life that we experience that is not hell is a gift of grace from God. This will be true for every second of all eternity.

Oh, if we would only believe this truth, that everything we have is an undeserved gift from God! It would create in us so much thankfulness, joy, humility, love, courage... and destroy so much of our envy, pride, complaining, insecurity, and a thousand other sins. May God be pleased to give us the gift of knowing Him as our all-sufficient Giver.

I had no idea it was this bad

2006-03-01T22:20:00.000-05:00

Mark 14:36 And He was saying, “Abba! Father! All things are possible for You; remove this cup from Me; yet not what I will, but what You will.”

It is astonishing to think that there was no other way for our salvation than the cross of Christ. If ever there was a prayer from the Son that the Father would have been pleased to answer, it would have been this one. All things were possible for God, yet it was not possible for Him to effect our salvation without Christ going to the cross.

The horror of sin is never so fully manifest until we realize what it took for God to bring victory over and forgiveness of our sin. The horror of sin is seen to be what it is when we realize what the cure required was, namely the death of the perfect Son of God himself. The severity of a sickness is seen in how radical a treatment is required, and never has there been a disease requiring so great a remedy as our sin. Sin is so utterly terrible that Jesus Christ, the God of the Universe, could bring our healing through nothing less than His own blood.

There is a teaching today that doesn't look at the cross of Christ this way. It teaches that the death of Christ displays not the wickedness of our sin, but the greatness of our worth. In other words, Christ's life was a fair market exchange for our friendship. We are so valuable in God's eyes that He was willing to give His own Son to bring us to Himself!

This is almost blasphemous.

The atonement does not show us our worth, but the cost of our guilt before God. The greatness of the atonement corresponds to the greatness of my guilt before God. Why is 100 billion years of hell insufficient punishment? It is insufficient because that much suffering is not enough to pay for my infinite guilt before the glory of an infinite God. This is why hell is an eternal torment. Oh, how great is our guilt, our debt that only the infinitely precious blood of Christ is sufficient to satisfy the wrath of God.

Throughout human history, in the current events, in our personal lives, we see many, many examples of how terrible and evil sin is. Yet, it is not until we come to the cross of Christ that we finally and fully see just how terrible sin is. It was only when I was struck with the truth that my sin could only be paid for by the death of the Son of God that I realized the full wickedness of my sin.

Before the cross, I had no idea it was this bad.
________________

But aren't we valuable to God? Yes, you and I are valuable to God, but to equate our worth with the Son of God is blasphemy. Jesus puts it this way, "You are more valuable than many sparrows." We are more valuable than many sparrows... Let us be humbly grateful for that.

7 reasons to study the gospels (or why Paul isn't enough)

2006-02-27T21:45:00.000-05:00

We, as evangelicals, love Paul. We love doctrines and justification and theology, and Paul provides a clear map of the theological landscape. The gospels on the other hand... well, we like it when Jesus takes out the Pharisees, walks on water... but what’s with all the parables? Or with the Sermon on the Mount? And how exactly do we apply the stories of Jesus to our lives?

When it comes to doctrinal formulation, we often prefer Paul to the gospels. Yet, here are seven reasons why Paul is not enough:

(1) The centrality of the gospels – The gospels have been central to the church and God’s people throughout the centuries. The prayers, the language, have all been from the gospels. Only recently in evangelicalism has Paul become so central.

(2) Different discourses of truth – Propositional doctrine is important and necessary (as in Paul), but it is not the only way. Narrative truth is also important and necessary, and in fact, is the way God has chosen to communicate the most! It's like different kinds of maps: topographical maps, road maps, property line maps, etc… None of them contradict, but compliment each other. They are all different discourses of truth. So the Bible is a like a book of maps. It communicates truth, through a variety of maps.

(3) Paul presupposes the story of Jesus – The story of Jesus forms the basis of what the apostles go on to preach. We cannot truly understand the doctrines that Paul is teaching without understanding the gospels.

(4) The Jesus traditions are the oldest – They are certainly older than the epistles. The earliest writings are the epistles, but the gospels are a much earlier oral tradition.

(5) Encountering the risen Jesus in the text of the gospels – Encountering Jesus in the flesh makes us realize that we can’t always categorize reality into neat little boxes. As important as doctrinal statements are (and they are important), they are not the same as encountering a Jesus that is still alive and present with us.

(6) We are story people – In the fabric of our being, story is how we make sense of life. Stories are crucial to who we are. They can create life and hope and vision in us that abstract propositions cannot. When Jesus tells stories of two men that go to pray, the Pharisee and the tax collector: this is more powerful than the summary we can make of it (i.e.: “God forgives humble sinners”). This is not to pit propositional truth against narrative truth. Both are needed.

(7) We get a direct sense of the Bible’s story line – Through the Gospels we understand the flow of history, fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

Should I be reading this blog?

2006-02-18T23:47:00.000-05:00

As human beings, one of our most basic needs that God has implanted in us is the need for interaction. So it's no surprise that so much of the development of new technologies has centered around the function of communication. In ages past, communication happened mainly through word of mouth. These days, more and more options for communication are made available to us everyday: cell phones, instant messaging, chat rooms, blogs, message boards, video-conferencing, podcasting, file-sharing, and many others, each with their own wireless and mobile variations. Of course, this increase of communication options has been a blessing in many ways. A cell phone is really an amazing convenience during an emergency. Email and instant messaging have been effective ways of keeping in touch with distant friends. Blogs can be a great medium for learning from the thoughts and experiences of others.

But with the increase of all these methods of communication also comes the need for greater discernment. Is my time being spent productively by reading these blogs (including this one)? Is the phone an adequate venue for discussing deep, emotional matters? How much should I share about my life on the internet? And the questions are multiplied particularly for Christians as we seek to incorporate the Christian life with this technology. Is a message board the right place to carry on a theological debate? Can I forward this email I received from a church member to the pastor? Should I try to share the gospel with my friend over IM? How do I educate youth about the spiritual dangers of the internet? Questions like these are questions that must be thought through and addressed for the first time from a Christian worldview by our generation. Along with each new option in communication comes the need to be more discerning and wise in how we think about and rightly use these technologies. As Christians, we must be careful that we do not simply adopt the mindset of our culture that readily embraces every new technology. Rather, we must carefully seek wisdom from God in prayer and regularly examine our attitudes and our actions in using these technologies against the truth revealed in God's Word.

Unfortunately, there are no easy answers to this challenge. But be encouraged... this is a challenge that Christians have had to face with wisdom and discernment from the beginning and all through history. Let's follow the example of Apostle John, who understood how to use the technology of his day:

Though I have many things to write to you, I do not want to do so with paper and ink; but I hope to come to you and speak face to face, so that your joy may be made full. - 2 John 12

A helpful resource for Christian thinking about the issues of our day (such as this one) is www.albertmohler.com.

A picture of the coming kingdom

2006-02-18T09:36:00.000-05:00

Then it shall come about when the LORD your God brings you into the land which He swore to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to give you, great and splendid cities which you did not build, and houses full of all good things which you did not fill, and hewn cisterns which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant, and you eat and are satisfied, then watch yourself, that you do not forget the LORD... - Deut. 6:10-12

When I read these verses, I think about all the work that went into cultivating the land by the Canaanites. Apparently, when Israel possessed the Promised Land, they were not possessing a vast wilderness, but beautiful cities with well-developed infrastructures and technology. However, before Joshua arrived, all these cities and cisterns and vineyards and orchards existed for godless, worldly reasons. But once Israel possessed them, they would exist for the satisfaction of the people of God as a display of the glory of God's covenant faithfulness to Abraham.

And this is a shadow, a picture of the coming kingdom of God. We will one day live in a new heaven and a new earth (Is. 65:17, Rev. 21:1), but that doesn't mean that we will be living on a different earth. The Bible does not teach a re-creation of the world, but a redemption of this world (Rom. 8:20-21). Yes, on the Day of Judgment there will be fire (2 Peter 3:10) and the evil of this world will be judged. But as Israel did not devastate the land of Canaan, but removed all of its godless influences, so this fire will not be a fire of annihilation, but a fire of cleasing. And what will remain will be "great and splendid cities which you did not build, and houses full of all good things which you did not fill, and hewn cisterns which you did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which you did not plant" to be possessed by the True Israel. All the amazing technology, scientific research, artistic achievements and thousands of other cultural developments will be redeemed from their present evil purposes and exist for everlasting satisfaction of the people of God, for the glory of God.

I wish I had this perspective as I was working as a consultant! If only I realized that my work was not in vain, but would one day be redeemed for the new world. For the people of God working as accountants, programmers, consultants, doctors, teachers, engineers, laborers, and every other profession, as much as your work enables the advancement of God's cultural mandate (Gen. 1:28) to subdue and rule the earth for His glory, this work, however small and insignificant it might seem now, will one day be redeemed. Though today, it might seem that all our labor only serves to line the pockets of godless men and promote the goals of corrupt corporations, the day is coming when all the evil of this world will be judged and what will remain will be all the good that your labor (and the labor of the enemies of God!) produced.

Anthony Hoekema puts it well:

This all means a lot for us now. If there is continuity as well as discontinuity between this earth and the new earth, we must work hard to develop our gifts and talents, and to come as close as we can to producing, in the strength of the Spirit, a Christian culture today. Through our kingdom service, the building materials for the new earth are now being gathered. Bibles are being translated, peoples are being evangelized, believers are being renewed, and cultures are being transformed. Only eternity will reveal the full significance of what has been done for Christ here on earth.

A scintillating future awaits us—not a future of disembodied existence, but everlasting life in glorified bodies on the new earth. Compared with the immeasurable span of eternity, this present life is but a passing moment, a fleeting sigh.

Therefore, take heart and know that your work on this earth is not in vain, but rather matters greatly. And as we work, we wait in hope for the return of Joshua, who will once again lead Israel to redeem their Land. Come, Lord Jesus!

Idolizing relationships

2006-02-12T22:35:00.000-05:00

Dr. Mark Coppenger wrote a good article in our school newspaper entitled, "When marriage isn't God's will: idolizing relationships". A snippet:

I never stop marveling at the way in which those who profess Christ will barge ahead with romances and even marriage plans where the Bible gives them no encouragement whatsoever. When the "love" bug bites, they will toss aside scruples, ignore Scripture, alienate their believing friends, horrify their family, and embarrass the church. They will even fornicate and cohabitate as they slide into marriage. And though they may make a gesture or two toward breaking it off, they'll then mope around as martyrs, only to spring back into each other's arms at the slightest prompting from their fevered brows. As a ministerial colleague volunteered last week, there's virtually no talking them out of it.

Why is this so? I can think of two reasons right off: relationship idolatry and mission deficit.

...

Which brings me to Lottie Moon, the namesake of Southern Baptists' annual offering for International Missions. She was engaged to Crawford Toy, a rising star in the universe of Baptist, and indeed American, academia. But when she found his treatment of Scripture objectionable, she walked away from the relationship and chose a life of sacrificial solitude half a world away. Consider this passage from Irwin Hyatt's book, "Our Ordered Lives Confess: Three 19th Century Missionaries in East Shantung" (Harvard, 1976), found at the SBC website:

"Professor Toy, as he had now become, wrote reproposing marriage and suggesting mission work together in Japan. … He was known as a brilliant linguist and theologian. Following the Civil War he had studied in Europe, where he was exposed to Darwinian theory and to 'the new ideas of the German scholars' on Old Testament history and inspiration. … Her conclusion was that … evolution was for her an 'untenable position.' … Later in China, heated letters arrive, and 'The temptation is great.' The professor, however, now espouses theories that 'do not square with God's Word.' Rejecting C.H. Toy, Harvard and glory, Miss Moon says, 'My cross is loneliness. …'"

Of course, Lottie Moon was concerned with relationships, but those that mattered most were with her Lord and with the Chinese people to whom He sent her on mission. She could have consorted and snuggled with Professor Toy in Massachusetts or Japan, but she knew that he was not her soulmate on mission for the Lord. This was quite enough to end that romance and free her for heroic service in Christ.

Those seeking marriage outside the counsel of God often quote the Genesis verse that says it was not good for Adam to be alone. I've just passed the life-sized portrait of Lottie Moon, hanging in Southern Seminary's Honeycutt Center, and I've been reminded that she was not at all alone. Standing around her are five Chinese beneficiaries of her life, prepared to say, "Thank you, Miss Moon" (and not "Mrs. Toy").

A helpful reminder... read the rest here.

Luther and Bibleworks

2006-02-09T21:16:00.000-05:00

As I'm saving up some money to buy the latest revision of Bibleworks that will soon be released, I consider the words of Martin Luther on the academic advantages of his day and the responsibility that accompanies them:

It is a sin and shame not to know our own book or to understand the speech and words of our God; it is a still greater sin and loss that we do not study languages, especially in these days when God is offering and giving us men and books and every facility and inducement to this study, and desires his Bible to be an open book. O how happy the dear fathers would have been if they had our opportunity to study the languages and come thus prepared to the Holy Scriptures! What great toil and effort it cost them to gather up a few crumbs, while we with half the labor — yes, almost without any labor at all — can acquire the whole loaf! O how their effort puts our indolence to shame.

In Luther's day, he had none of the technological advantages of our day. When he wrote, he had to write with quills and ink (dip and scratch, dip and scratch), which is amazing considering the massive amounts of correspondence (no email!), treatises, papers, and sermons that he wrote. Of course in his studies, all he had were texts... no electronic commentaries, no instantaneous word searches, no parsings of Greek or Hebrew texts. Yet, here he is celebrating the amazing advantages that he has over our early church fathers. I wonder what he would say today...

We walk by faith, not by sight

2006-02-07T23:18:00.000-05:00

“we walk by faith not by sight” – 2 Cor. 5:7

Isn’t it amazing how much there is that we as Christians believe in, but cannot see? This statement by Paul comes in the midst of a discussion on the future hope of believers. Presently, we do not see the redemption of our bodies (Romans 8:23-25), but instead, our existence is marked by groaning and affliction. Though God promises that we have been justified and cleansed and liberated from sin, we still feel very strongly the corruption of our remaining sinful nature. And though the kingdom of God has come, we do not yet see the redemption of the world (Rom. 8:20-21), but instead, we experience the futility of creation in all manners of hurricanes and earthquakes and other natural disasters. What we see with our eyes contradicts our future hope and suggests to us that our hope is an illusion. This is the challenge of walking by faith.

Yet this challenge of faith is no different from the one faced by Abraham, the father of the faithful (Rom. 4:16). The circumstances he faced in his life should have surely quenched any hope of having a child through Sarah. He was nearly a hundred years old and Sarah’s womb was as good as dead (Rom. 4:19). Yet, in faith Abraham believed that God could do the impossible and that He would be true to His Word. This challenge of faith also no different than the one faced by Christ, who looked to the joy set before him (Hebrews 12:2), even as he was preparing to walk the Calvary road leading to a cross and a tomb. And as a result of his faithful obedience to the Father, the Author and Perfecter of our faith did not remain in death, but overcame death and rose to sit at the right hand of the throne of God.

And so today, we, who are of the faith of Abraham, look at our groaning bodies, and our stumbling lives and this fallen world, and against all odds, we ground our hope in the resurrection of Christ, and we cast ourselves on God, Who will one day do the impossible. We walk by faith, not by sight.

January Book Review

2006-02-01T18:17:00.000-05:00

The Universe Next Door by James Sire - A helpful, informative tour of 8 different worldviews (Theism, Deism, Naturalism, Nihilism, Existentialism, Eastern Pantheistic Monism, New Age, Postmodernism), examining their claims, explaining their positions and critiquing their arguments. I've come to realize that before you can begin talking to non-Christians about God, you have to be able to understand (as well as critique) their worldview first. This is a good place to start.

Faith & Reason by Ronald Nash - Argues for the rationality of a Theistic worldview from a reformed perspective. Excellent book to give to a high school student struggling with doubts, or the Christian university freshman who's taken his first philosophy class and feels overwhelmed.

Life's Ultimate Questions by Ronald Nash - Covers some of the same material from Faith & Reason, but goes deeper. He tackles philosophy from a historical perspective and also deals with contemporary issues. This was my introduction to Plato, Aristotle, and Plotinus, which was fascinating to see how these philosophers tried so hard to understand this world, when we take for granted so much of the truth that is revealed in the Bible.

Prince Caspian by CS Lewis - Didn't like it very much. Too much talking, not enough action.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by CS Lewis - Probably the best one in the Chronicles for me so far... definitely up there with The Magician's Nephew.

Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose - I'm a big fan of WWII history, so I really enjoyed the mini-series, which was based on this book. As always, the book goes more in-depth than the movie, and this is the case with this book. Thanks to my sister for this great gift!

God's Greater Glory by Bruce Ware - Since I had Ware for Systematic Theology, a lot of the material was familiar to me, but it's still a great treatment of God's sovereignty. He provides clear, reasonable and convincing Biblical defenses to the most popular theological challenges to God's sovereignty (i.e.: the problem of evil, free will, etc...).

Adam and Jesus

2006-01-30T00:11:00.000-05:00

But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. - Genesis 3:4-6

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. - Philippians 2:5-8

"The contrast of Jesus with Adam is striking since Adam in the garden strove to be equal to God and thus rejected God's lordship in eating of the fruit of the tree. Christ, on the contrary, though possessing equality with God (in this respect he differs from Adam), did not use his status as a means of enriching himself. Indeed, precisely because he was in the form of God and was equal to God, he refused to use his position as a means of self-aggandizement. He used his status as a platform for giving and self-surrender, not as a bridgehead for praise and self-exaltation. The cross, not the crown, was his path to glory." (Schreiner; Paul, Apostle of God's Glory in Christ; p. 172)

Show yourself a man

2006-01-24T00:24:00.000-05:00

Southern Seminary has an excellent quarterly magazine called The Tie. The Winter 2005 edition is entitled "Show Yourself a Man" (taken from 1 Kings 2:2) and focuses on the topic of biblical masculinity and other related topics. It contains several great articles written by Al Mohler and other seminary professors. The leading article is from Randy Stinson, who paints an encouraging and helpful picture of biblical masculinity. Here's an excerpt from his article on ways one can cultivate this masculinity:

Do the hardest task first
Attacking your hardest task of the day without delay will build your resistance to passivity. Waiting until the end of the day only reinforces your sinful tendencies toward passivity.

Make the hard phone call first
While this is similar to the first suggestion, it deals more with passivity within interpersonal relationships. Some men are willing to do the hard task first, but avoid difficult situations involving other people.

Run to the battle
One only needs to consider the life of the Apostle Paul to see that conflict is a regular feature of the Christian life. Men who think all conflict should be avoided, or who refuse to engage with those who would harm the body of Christ or their family, not only model passivity but fail in the area of protection.

Do your work now as opposed to later
From term papers to tax filing, the man who is cultivating biblical masculinity will not allow these things to rule him. He will exercise dominion over them by doing them in a timely manner.

Keep your domain in order
While most of us on occasion have a messy desk or car trunk, a life that is characterized by disorder is evidence of passivity. Your home, dorm room, garage, office and car should bear the mark of your masculinity as you subdue it and keep it in order.

Kill a bear or a lion
In other words, do something that is a challenge for you. It may actually be to kill a bear or a lion, but it may be a health challenge like running a triathlon or a marathon. It may be something as basic as riding a roller coaster or as edgy as snorkeling with sharks. It may involve debating the atheist at work or starting a Bible study at home. It may mean you need to finally share the gospel with your lost friend or deal with a family conflict that you have allowed to go on for too long.

Read the article here.

Praising God with lyre and sword

2006-01-23T11:20:00.000-05:00

A meditation on Psalm 149

1 Praise the LORD!
Sing to the LORD a new song,
And His praise in the congregation of the godly ones.

2 Let Israel be glad in his Maker;
Let the sons of Zion rejoice in their King.

When Israel demanded that Samuel find them a human king, God punished them for rejecting Him as King. Yet, isn't it interesting how this psalm was written during the reign of a king, namely King David. A good king will always point his people to worship the true King.

3 Let them praise His name with dancing;
Let them sing praises to Him with timbrel and lyre.

To praise God is to be glad in Him and to rejoice in Him (vs.2). This is the heart of what it means to praise God. The actions of singing and dancing and playing music (vs.3) are different outward expressions of this inward reality.

4 For the LORD takes pleasure in His people;
He will beautify the afflicted ones with salvation.

And amazingly, the reason we are even able to enjoy God is because we have a God who likewise takes pleasure in His people (vs.4a). But lest you think that His pleasure in us is due to some innate quality in us, see that it is God who beautifies His people with salvation (vs.4b). Left to ourselves, we are marred and afflicted by sin and rebellion, but Christ washes us and sanctifies us with the water of His word and presents us to Himself as beautiful and holy, without spot or wrinkle (Eph. 5:25-27).

5 Let the godly ones exult in glory;
Let them sing for joy on their beds.

6 Let the high praises of God be in their mouth,

Having been saved from our afflictions by God and brought into a relationship with Him, it is supremely fitting that the praise of God is ever to be in our mouths and in our hearts.

Now, when I read this in my Bible this morning, the psalm ended on this note on the current page and continued on the next page as follows:

And a two-edged sword in their hand,

7 To execute vengeance on the nations
And punishment on the peoples,

8 To bind their kings with chains
And their nobles with fetters of iron,

9 To execute on them the judgment written;
This is an honor for all His godly ones.
Praise the LORD!

I had to check twice to see that I didn't skip a page! How in the world does this part of the psalm fit with the rest? What does this section have to do with praising God? I had to think about this for quite some time, but in the end, this is what I came up with:

Praising God in a fallen world means that it is not only to be an occasion for celebration, but also an occasion for war. The children of Israel lived in a land surrounded by pagan nations that worshiped false gods and sacrificed their children and promoted wickedness. And just like the saints of old, if we are to love God in such a world, this will not only mean rejoicing in the truth, but hating evil (1 Cor. 13:6). In praising God, we must take up not only the timbrel and lyre, but also the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. Praising God in a world of sin requires not only putting on the garments of praise (Is. 61:3), but also putting on the armor of God (Eph. 6:11) and waging war against sin and injustice and oppression and standing before kings and governors to bear witness to the truth (Mk. 13:9). And praising God in this world will be expressed not only in music and dancing, but very possibly in suffering and even the laying down of your life.

But the promise of the word of God is this: the life of praise to God will not be silenced by the grave, but will one day be raised again and will sit on a throne with Christ and execute judgment on the world with Him (vs.9, 1 Cor. 6:2). And this also will be to the praise of His name.

Blog thoughts

2006-01-21T21:01:00.000-05:00

Mark Dever comments on the lightness of blogs, and I couldn't agree more.

Added: Russell Moore also shares his thoughts on some of the dangers of blogging. Good stuff as always.

My take on all this: As Christians, as with all things (including how we spend our time and what we read), we must be discerning.

Good day for reading

2006-01-19T19:01:00.000-05:00

Speaking of sermons and songs...

2006-01-18T10:31:00.000-05:00

In our media-saturated culture today, there is a movement within the church to place a greater emphasis on music, multimedia, drama, and other forms of art over the preaching of the Word of God. This makes sense, since we are immersed in a culture that values subjectivity over solid, objective truth. Now, there's nothing wrong with art itself, but when it takes a function that it was never intended to fulfill, we are left with confusion.

“Even though it is true that every kind of nonverbal expression possesses uniqueness, it is likewise true that no form of nonverbal expression can do what words can do. A jazz riff can no more articulate a methodology for day trading than a Bach fugue can explain substitutionary atonement. So every form of nonverbal expression, instead of going beyond what words can do, simply goes its own way, just as words go their way in doing what no other form of expression can do. And since truth is the most important thing that we can articulate, and since words are a better vehicle for this than any other existing form of expression, the word remains preeminent among all other forms.” (p. 193) - Harold Best, Unceasing Worship

Favorite audio from 2005

2006-01-10T17:48:00.000-05:00

A lot of people post about their favorite books, so why not share my top three favorite sermons and albums from 2005 (I've included how long each sermon is so you can have an idea of how much time to allocate for listening to one):

Sermons:

The Suffering of Christ and the Sovereignty of God (44:27) by John Piper - 10/9/2005 - Desiring God National Conference - One of the most powerful sermons I have heard from John Piper yet, where he describes how suffering is an integral part of God's eternal purpose of displaying the glory of His grace.

Beyond a Veggie Tales Gospel: The Bones of Joseph, the Kingdom of Christ, and the Story We Tell (34:04) by Russell Moore - 8/25/05 - SBTS Chapel Service - Dr. Moore talks about how important (and joyful) it is for our preaching and ministry to see our Christian lives as an ongoing part of redemptive history.

The Almost Inevitable Ruin of Every Minister... and How to Avoid It (37:42) by Don Whitney - 9/15/05 - SBTS Chapel Service - For all those who are in some type of vacational ministry or are contemplating in being in one, this is a must-hear (and even if you're not, it is still a powerful sermon). Dr. Whitney reminds us of the importance of spiritual disciplines and the joys that await those who practice them, and the perils for those who neglect them.

Albums:

Worship God Live by Sovereign Grace Ministries - These guys continue putting out rich, God-centered worship songs and this album is no exception. Favorite song on this album is God Moves, which is William Cowper's famous hymn set to new music.

New Irish Hymns #4: Hymns for the Life of the Church by Keith and Kristin Getty - This couple played in a concert here at SBTS this past fall along with Stuart Townend (In Christ Alone, How Deep the Father's Love for Us). They are supported by a local church back at home (somewhere in Europe) so that they can devote all their time to writing new, powerful, gospel-saturated, Christ-exalting hymns for the church. Favorite hymn on this album: The Power of the Cross

The Far Country by Andrew Peterson - Not as great as Love and Thunder but still very, very good. Andrew Peterson remains (in my opinion) the best Christian lyricist these days and in this album, he uses those talents to sing about our journey on earth to the far country. Little Boy Heart Alive and Lay Me Down are worth the price of the album.

An educational genealogy

2006-01-09T22:31:00.000-05:00

My Christian Philosophy professor passed out this handout today:

The Distinguished Educational Genealogy
Of the students at
The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
Showing a direct line to John Calvin (1509-1564)
(originally partially compiled by Richard Gardiner, Class of 1995,
at Princeton Theological Seminary)
Dr. JAMES PARKER, III is a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary, who, while a student at Princeton, sat at the feet of:
Dr. BRUCE M. METZGER, who as a graduate of the seminary (class of 1933), was a student of:
Dr. JOHN ALEXANDER MACKAY, who was also a graduate of the seminary (class of 1915), was a student of:
Dr. BENJAMIN B. WARFIELD, who was also a graduate of the seminary (1876), being a student of:
Dr. CHARLES HODGE, a Princeton Seminary graduate (1819) who, for many years sat at the feet of:
Dr. ARCHIBALD ALEXANDER, who was the pupil of:
WILLIAM GRAHAM, a graduate of the College of New Jersey (Princeton University) in the year 1773, and as such, was under the tutelage of:
Dr. SAMUEL STANHOPE SMITH, who was himself tutored in the same College by:
Dr. JONATHAN EDWARDS, JR., who obviously sat at the feet of:
JONATHAN EDWARDS, the third president of Princeton, being educated at both Yale (A.M., 1773) and as an apprentice to his grandfather:
SOLOMON STODDARD, of Northampton, Massachusetts, who was educated at Harvard College (A.B., 1662) at the feet of:
Dr. CHARLES CHAUNCY, an immigrant to this country, having been trained at Trinity College, Cambridge University, at the feet of:
ARCHBISHOP JAMES USSHER, the celebrated Hebraic scholar who was a pupil of:
WALTER TRAVERS, the Puritan divine at Christ’s College, Cambridge (an associate of Thomas Cartwright and William Perkins) who traveled to Geneva to come under the instruction of:
THEODORE BEZA, the heir of the Reformed movement of his mentor and friend:
JOHN CALVIN.

As I consider this amazing heritage that I have joined, I am reminded of Hebrews 13:7-8:

Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you; and considering the result of their conduct, imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.

The reason I can imitate the faith of these heroes is because Jesus Christ is always and forever faithful and unchanging. May He grant me the grace to be faithful to the God of my educational forefathers.

Side note for my friend Dan: Before you leave a comment about the large number of Presbyterian theologians in this list, I can also take the latter part through a more Baptist route. =)

All of the professors teaching at SBTS today who graduated from SBTS sat under the teaching of:
Dr. JOHN PAULHILL, who was a student of:
Dr. A.T. ROBERTSON, the famous Greek professor, having studied under:
Dr. JAMES P. BOYCE, who was one of the founders of Southern Seminary, having sat under:
Dr. CHARLES HODGE.

The happy life

2005-12-31T18:00:00.000-05:00

Augustine on the relationship of love and the happy life:

A man is not happy if he does not have what he loves; or if he has what he loves and it is hurtful; or if he does not love what he has, even though it is perfectly good. The happy life is when that which is man's chief good is both loved and possessed.

This is simple to understand and yet so profound. How hard is it for us to live according to this truth! How often do I love what is hurtful! How often do I not love Him whom I have, even though He is perfect! Yet in spite of all my shortcomings, the gospel reminds me daily that man's greatest good, namely God Himself, has been given freely and unconditionally through Christ for me to have and love and enjoy.

The key to a happy life in 2006 is this:"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind."

And most of all...

2005-12-17T00:45:00.000-05:00

"Oh, that the almighty God would help us see and savor the supremacy of his Son. Give yourself to this. Give yourself to this. Pray that God would show you these things in His word. Swim in the Bible every day. Don't give it a little touch as you head off to do what you really like to do. Swim in the Bible every day! It is an ocean of bright glorious, weighty, all-satisfying truth about the one for whom you were made. Use the means of grace. Like God-centered, Christ-exalting books! Don’t go home without books to help you in this. Get John Owen on the Glories of Christ and the Mortification of Sin. Get Mahaney on the Cross and the glory of God in marriage. Get Powlison with his new eyes. Get Patterson on waiting and serving. Get Edwards on anything!

Get Noel Piper in the little book: "Mommy loves you and daddy loves and your cousins love you and your brother loves you and your sister loves you and your friends love you and MOST OF ALL... you know what that is? That is a translation for a three year old of the supremacy of Christ! Most of all JESUS loves you! Not most of all you're the most important person. But most of all JESUS loves you. Don't go home without Christ-centered, Bible-saturated, God-exalting books! Give yourself to being what God created you to be. And with all your getting—whatever it takes—get the all-satisfying supremacy of Christ at the center of your life."

- John Piper in Sex and the Supremacy of Christ, pt. 2

The Promise of Meditation

2005-12-12T18:41:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite lectures from this past semester was from my Spiritual Disciplines class with Dr. Don Whitney on the topic of Scripture meditation. Meditation is deep thinking (whatever deep thinking is for you) on the truths and spiritual realities revealed in Scripture or on life from a Scriptural perspective for the purposes of understanding, application, and prayer. You can start with Scripture and take it to life (i.e. How does Romans 8 apply to my life?) or you can start with life and you bring it to Scripture (i.e. What should I think about this hurricane? How can I think Biblically about this hurricane? It is because of sin and the Fall. It reminds me about God’s wrath and the wrath to come...from which we are delivered in Christ. What should a Christian do now? etc...)

The command to meditate on God's Word is seen throughout the Bible, but there is a special promise that God gives for those who will meditate on His Word.

Josh. 1:8 This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

Joshua was a much busier man than all of us. And yet, God expected him to meditate on the Word of God day and night. This doesn’t mean Joshua walked around with a scroll in his hands, nor is this just unrealistic and pietistic language. This means Joshua most likely spent one portion of his day in Scripture and then spent the rest of the day bringing it to mind through meditation.

Back in those days, prosperity and success was viewed as materialistic (ie: this is the presumption in the Book of Job). But as we get in the NT, we begin to see that true prosperity and success is heavenly treasure and Christ-likeness. In Joshua 1:8 we see an wonderful promise:

Meditation --> Obedience --> God's blessing

Obedience doesn’t earn God’s blessing. But unless we are obedient, we cannot expect God’s blessing. And according to Joshua 1:8, it is meditation that leads to obedience. The reason for this is because when we disobey, it’s not because we don’t know what to do. It is because we don’t have the desire, the passion to do it. Scripture is a fire and we get light and heat from it. If we want to warm ourselves from our coldness to God, we must linger by the fire and let it warm us to our bones and the way we do that is by meditation. It is meditation that leads to obedience and obedience that leads to God's blessing. This pattern is in many places through Scripture. For example, Psalm 1:

Psa. 1:1 Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
Psa. 1:2 but his delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
Psa. 1:3 He is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.

Again meditation on God's law day and night, results in fruitfulness (i.e. obedience) and therefore in everything he does he prospers (God's blessing).

Now if this is David writing, how did he meditate on God’s Word “day and night” when he had so much else to do? It’s not by walking around with a Bible in his face throughout the day. It was by at least once a day being in the Word, meditating on it, and then going about the day with the “taste” of the Word in his life.

The key to fruitfulness in this life, to living a life that makes a difference and glorifies God, is by meditation. Meditation will lead to Christ-likeness and obedience and that will lead to a life of that will make a difference.

One more passage:

James 1:25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer (or reader) but an effectual doer, this man (the doer) will be blessed in what he does.

Looking intently at the perfect law (Meditation), leads to one becoming an effectual doer (Obedience), which leads to being blessed in what one does (God's blessing). Meditating on God's Word is something every Christian can do. You don't need to go to seminary to benefit from God's Word! Anyone can do it and if we will do it in faith and perseverance, the Bible promises great rewards.

A pastoral reminder

2005-12-06T22:34:00.000-05:00

It seems these days that many people around me are contemplating entering into full time ministry. But the theme of this year's Bethlehem Conference for Pastors, How Must a Pastor Die? The Cost of Caring Like Jesus, offers us (especially me) an important reminder.

It says something about what I think the world needs from the Christian church. It isn’t the power of political influence. It is the power of being willing to take up our cross and suffer with Jesus on the Calvary Road. “If when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps” (1 Peter 2:20-22). I don’t think church-growth and church-planting seminars should wave the banner: “Come have fun working for Jesus,” but “Come discover the meaning of ‘sorrowful yet always rejoicing’ (2 Corinthians 6:10).”

We have never seen anything like this

2005-12-04T23:54:00.000-05:00

When He had come back to Capernaum several days afterward, it was heard that He was at home. And many were gathered together, so that there was no longer room, not even near the door; and He was speaking the word to them. And they came, bringing to Him a paralytic, carried by four men. Being unable to get to Him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Him; and when they had dug an opening, they let down the pallet on which the paralytic was lying. And Jesus seeing their faith said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

I've heard this passage taught many times and every time, the speakers have emphasized the faith of the paralytic (and his friends) in believing that Jesus could heal the paralysis. But if this is all their faith consisted of, then how is it that this is a saving faith? How is it that Jesus, seeing their faith, can say, "Son, your sins are forgiven"? No, their faith had to be more than simply in Jesus' power to heal... But what was it exactly?

To answer that question, we must first understand the context in which the paralytic and his four friends lived. They lived in a highly theistic society, under the teachings and traditions of the Old Testament law. Yet this law had been greatly twisted, so that one of the teachings of that time was that physical suffering was a direct result of personal sin. If someone became blind or leprous or blind, the explanation given was that this was a punishment from God for some terrible sin that they (or their relative) had committed. We see this kind of thinking when the disciples ask Jesus, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?” (John 9:2) You can imagine the anguish that this must be for an afflicted person who grew up in this theistic society, being rightly taught about a holy, perfect God and His righteous requirements. He would interpret these afflictions to mean the worst possible thing in the world... that God has rejected him. Not only is he doomed to a life of poverty because of his sickness or disability, but now that the temple (and the society) considers him unclean, he is unable to keep God's laws for sacrifices and is also doomed to an eternity of hopelessness and suffering. This is the plight of the paralytic.

But now, his friends have brought him word of a Jesus of Nazareth, who has come in the power of God, fulfilling the messianic prophecies. And by the grace of God, the paralytic and his friends believe that he is none other than the promised Christ, who has come to take away the sin of God's people. If anyone can save this paralytic, it is him. Indeed, the faith of the paralytic and his friends was not merely that Jesus was someone with great healing powers, but that Jesus was none other than the Son of God, the Messiah, who has come to deliver the people of God. And these five placed their hope in Jesus Christ to save them from their sin, determined to do whatever it would take to meet him in the hope that he might somehow restore the paralytic to God.

This is why when Jesus sees their faith, he can say, "Your sins are forgiven". Imagine the tremendous joy of the paralytic in hearing these words for the first time in his life... God has not rejected him but has forgiven his sins!

But some of the scribes were sitting there and reasoning in their hearts, “Why does this man speak that way? He is blaspheming; who can forgive sins but God alone?” Immediately Jesus, aware in His spirit that they were reasoning that way within themselves, said to them, “Why are you reasoning about these things in your hearts? “Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven’; or to say, ‘Get up, and pick up your pallet and walk’? “But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—He *said to the paralytic, “I say to you, get up, pick up your pallet and go home.” And he got up and immediately picked up the pallet and went out in the sight of everyone, so that they were all amazed and were glorifying God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this.” - Mark 2:1-11

Again, we have a tendency to see the healing as what is amazing about this story, but notice two things here:

1) The healing of the paralytic was performed only to confirm that the he had the power to forgive sins. The forgiving of sins is primary. The healing of the body is secondary. One day this body will get old and crippled and die, but our souls will live forever*, either in the presence of God in joy, or away from His presence in misery. On that day, the forgiveness of sins will be infinitely more precious than a lifetime of health. Jesus' power to heal exists primarily to help us to believe in his power to forgive sins.

2) Yes, healings are amazing, but nothing is more amazing than the fact that Jesus has the authority to forgive sins. Think about it... It means that Jesus has the power to absolve sinners of guilt from a lifetime of sins performed against an infinitely holy and wrathful God. It means he has the power to cancel the debt of eternal suffering owed by the sinner for trampling on the infinite value of the glory of God. Of course, the only reason this authority is possible is because Jesus himself paid that debt with his own life.

It is because of his sacrifice that we are amazed and can glorify God, saying, "We have never seen anything like this."

*Note: My friend Dan pointed out to me that we believe in a physical resurrection in a new heaven and new earth, and that is totally right. I indeed affirm the Biblical teaching that we will not be etherial spirits floating around in heaven, but that we will experience a physical resurrection and once again have physical bodies that will be glorious and immortal. But what I want stress is that we are not to look for those bodies here today. Rather we are to wait for them in faith in the coming age. And by then, this body of dishonor (1 Cor. 15:43) will be long gone.

Getting old

2005-11-30T23:20:00.000-05:00

Carl Trueman laments the aging of his favorite rock stars over at Reformation21 blog:

the shortness of time: is Clapton really in his sixties? Is Ginger Baker really suffering from arthritis? And has Jack Bruce really had a liver transplant? The music is still marvellous, and better than anything being pumped out by the synthetic stars of today, but the men are old and wrinkled, shadows of their former selves. Nothing is so disturbing to the human mind as seeing the golden icons of yesterday going grey and fading away. Mortality is an unbearable thought, and old age is that most hideous reminder of the one thing we all hate and fear -- the fact that we are not god. No wonder that the we spend so much of our lives and our money pretending that we are not getting old.

But cheer up -- the word of the Lord lasts forever.

If only it were that easy. =)

Awareness of sin

2005-11-28T21:56:00.000-05:00

The book of 1 John contains a list of the evidences of a life that has been changed by the Holy Spirit and one of the evidences is an awareness of our sinfulness before God.

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. - 1 John 1:8

But is this awareness of sin merely something that we must deal with when we first become a Christian? Is sin (and the gospel) simply "beginner's Christianity" and then after you have felt guilty about sin for one or two years, you move past that to bigger and better things? After all, this sure seems to be the case from today's preaching. Sure once or twice a year, there will be "evangelistic" Sundays where the pastor will preach about sin and the gospel. But once you get that over with, you can now go on to spend the rest of the year talking about purpose and self-esteem and gifts and relationships. From the lack of preaching about sin in our pulpits today, it is no wonder that the church has become less aware of sin.

But Spurgeon once noticed that this was not the case with the Apostle Paul. In one of his first apostolic letters, he writes to the Corinthians,

For I am the least of the apostles, and not fit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. - 1 Cor. 15:9

Many years later, having grown as an apostle and led many people to Christ and planted several churches, Paul writes to the Ephesians,

To me, the very least of all saints, this grace was given, to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ - Eph. 3:8

And finally, towards the end of his life, not knowing what will happen to him, Paul writes to Timothy,

It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. - 1 Tim. 1:15

From "the least of the apostles", to "the very least of all the saints", to the chief of sinners... As Paul grew in maturity, fruitfulness, gifts, revelations, and intimacy with Jesus Christ that most of us will never experience here on earth, he also grew in his awareness of his sinfulness, until at the end of his life, rather than being proud, he considers himself the worst of sinners. And having become so aware of his sinfulness, he now loves the grace of God in the gospel more than ever before.

This is why we as Christians can never "get over" our sinfulness. If we "get over" our sinfulness, then we will also "get over" the preciousness of the gospel. And if we "get over" the gospel, that means we no longer have God as our greatest treasure.

Thankful for the love of God...Why?

2005-11-23T11:15:00.000-05:00

In this Thanksgiving season, we must remember the fundamental reason for why we should be thankful for the love of God. In one of my favorite sermons of all time, John Piper preaches,

"Thankful for the Love of God. Why?" And you might think, "That is so obvious. What's the point? It's plain why. To be loved is a wonderful thing. You don't need any explanation, do you?" And my answer is it's not obvious why we should be thankful for the love of God. It's not. When you're loved, you're given something that is good for you, usually at significant cost to another. And the better it is for you, the more love and the more cost to the lover, the more love you feel. But it isn't obvious what that gift is. It isn't obvious why the love that God gives us and leads us into is good for us.

Let me get at it by comparing the issue of forgiveness. Why should you care about being forgiven? That's not obvious either. Take a husband who has wronged a wife, perhaps even abused or just spoken cruelly, and he wants forgiveness, and he asks for it. Is that a good thing? Maybe. The question is, "Why does he want forgiveness?" Is it because his conscience is killing him and he is losing sleep at night? Is it because he's getting an ulcer because of the tension in the air? Is it because he's starting to be afraid maybe even for his life because she is so angry at him that he is not sure he wants to go to sleep next to her? Are those the reasons why he might want forgiveness? If so, I say there is no virtue in this. It is not obvious why you might want to be forgiven.

Of course, another alternative would be that he misses his wife. There is such an alienation; there's such a distance between them. They can scarcely talk with each other. He wants her back. He loves her. He misses her. She doesn't talk the way she used to talk. She doesn't touch the way she used to touch. Is that good? That's good. That's real good.

You see, it is not obvious to say, "I want you to forgive me, God; I want you to love me." Maybe it's good, and maybe it's not. So I asked that question.... "Thankful for the love of God - but why?" What's your answer? Why do you want God to love you this morning? It might be a good answer, and it might be a bad answer. Why do you want God to forgive you this morning? It might be a good answer, and it might be a bad answer.

...

The love of God for you is the work of God at great cost to give you the gift of Jesus Christ to enjoy forever and all that he is for you in him. It is not mainly about escape from hell, though that is precious beyond words. It is not mainly about a conscience that is clear, though that is precious beyond words. It is not mainly about all the ways he heals your mind and heals your body and heals your relationships, though that is precious beyond words. But these are not the main thing. The main thing is 1 Peter 3:18 - "Christ suffered once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring us to God." To bring us to God!

Thankful for the love of God. Why? Because at great cost to himself, it brings us to God. It brings us to the splendor behind all splendor. You think the Alps or the Rockies are something? Do you think the Grand Canyon is something? You young people, do you think your favorite music group is something? These are echoes of splendor. And, of course, we all know - or maybe we don't - that there's a massive obstacle between us and God, and it is called sin. And the essence of sin is this: exchanging the glory of God for his gifts and creation. You are offered God for your fellowship forever, and you lay it aside and you take his gifts and say, "No thank you. I'm not interested in fellowship with you and enjoying you and being satisfied with you. I want your gifts - wife, child, the applause of men, health. That's what I want."

...

So I'm closing by asking you, "Would you want to be in heaven if Jesus weren't there?" You could have all the health you wanted. You could have all the relationships with friends you wanted. You could have a clean conscience. You could have your favorite toys and recreation - just no Jesus. Would you want to be there? A woman came forward in our church two weeks ago whose tears were just running down her face. She quoted me that question that I had asked and she said, "Yeah, I would. I would, and I'm scared of myself." She was honest, and we need to be honest.

God's love is his doing everything it takes, even the death of his Son, in order to so work in you that you would stop feeling loved by being made much of and start feeling loved by the enjoyment of making much of him forever in all that you do.

So, this is good news, and I pray that you will see it. He came to his own and his own received him not (John 1:11). But to as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the children of God (John 1:12). And if children, then heirs, heirs of God (Romans 8:17). Whom have we in heaven but thee? And on earth there is nothing that we desire besides thee. Our flesh and our heart may fail, but you are the strength of our heart, and you are our portion forever (Psalm 73:25-26). You're our inheritance forever.

Listen to the full sermon here or read it here.