Ed Goode's blog

Walking with God

2011-11-10T09:23:00.002-05:00

If we learn one thing from Exodus 13-17, it is, as Alec Motyer says, that walking with God is no primrose path. We are so keen for our lives to be a straight road from A to B. Everything in the culture around us is designed to move us towards ease and leisure, to make the journey as smooth as possible. Walking with God, however, is a strange path, with hairpins and road closed ahead signs.

Think about the path Israel took to get out of Egypt. Not the most direct route, as God wanted to protect them from war along the way. Although we're not even sure whether or not Israel knew that at the time. The they find themselves between the rock of the Egyptian army and the hard place of the Red Sea. If that was us, if we found ourselves backed into a fearful corner, we'd assume we must be out of the will of God. We'd think we'd got it wrong or been disobedient. Israel were there, because they'd obeyed!

If we found ourselves in the wilderness with no food, or no water, we might think the same thing. Plenty of Egyptian gold, but not a drop to drink. Where had Israel gone wrong? Nowhere, not yet anyway. They grumble and complain, and twice God provides.

My favourite verse in this passage is 13:21 'and the LORD went before them by day...and by night.' How can we face the trials of life? How can we face another time in the wilderness, another journey interrupted by a road closed sign? Because God is with us. Jesus said He'd never leave us, He is with us by His Word and through His Spirit. He's with us always. And how do we know? Because of what happens in Exodus 17.

Come Exodus 17 it's time to fight the Amalekites. Moses, Aaron and Hur climb the hill, and as long as Moses arms are stretched out, God's people prevail. God's people are in the valley, but the battle is won on the hill. Today, in the valley, our battle has been won by God's man, His arms stretched out on a hill. We will prevail because He did not. We will not be condemned because He was.

Walking with God is no primrose path, no stroll along the beach front. But it can be done, because God is with us, and that's enough.

Luke 14:26

2011-11-05T12:33:00.000-04:00

One thing i love about Luke's Gospel is the order in which he arranges his material to make his point. In Luke 15 for example, we see the parable of the lost coin, the lost sheep and the lost son. That's why we don't hear about Heaven rejoicing when the younger son comes home. It's because of this orderly approach, along with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that stops us believing the doctor has made a mistake in Luke 14:26.

Is sounds like he might have done though doesn't it. Jesus tells us that if we don't hate our fathers and mothers, wives, children, brothers and sisters, even our lives, we can not be His disciples. We want to stop and say 'hang on,' we're supposed to love our wives like Christ loves the church. How am i supposed to 'hate' my wife and family. Because Jesus makes it sound like I have to.

I think 1 Corinthians 7:29 might shed some light on it. '...let those who have wives live as though they had none.' Now Paul obviously is not telling us to ignore our wives, live with another woman and hit the dating scene. But we still have the question, as we do with Luke 14:26 about what that verse really means.

I think Jesus, and Paul, are talking about priorities of the heart. We should so love Jesus, that it makes the love we have for the rest of our lives look like hate. We should be so taken up with spiritual matters (because the time has grown short) that it makes our commitment to the rest of our lives look minimal.

I think there's two ways to do that, one wrong and easy, and one hard and right. It would be easy, especially when you get paid to preach the Gospel, to run your mind back over the week and say 'of course my commitment to Jesus makes my commitment to sports look like hate, i was at my desk for x hours last week.' It's easy to work at it isn't it? To tot up our hours of Bible study, prayer etc against the time we got to spend watching tv. But what's going on in our hearts? What's going on in my heart. Am I more warmed by the Gospel, or by the thought of a big win this afternoon? Am i more excited about the big game on tv tonight, or Sunday School tomorrow?

Here's my favourite part, at least from the verse in 1 Corinthians. The more i live as if i had no wife, the more i live with my heart focused on the time to come, to better husband i become. The more the priorities of my heart are removed from the world, the better servant in the world I'll be...

Book Review: Awaiting a Savior

2011-10-28T00:00:00.000-04:00

Awaiting a Savior is the newest book from Cruciform Press. Cruciform are unique in that for a small fee they will send you a short, gospel focused book each month, tackling a range of issues covering both the theological and the practical. Although, those two are really one of course!

This month's book is written by Aaron Armstrong who 'is a writer for an international Christian ministry focused on the needs of the poor.' It's no surprise then that this book tackles the issue of poverty, and the right Christian response to it.

Personally, this book couldn't have come at a better time for me. I currently serve at a church which is one the busiest road in Greenville, not quite downtown, but within walking distance. Over the last six months the number of people walking in off the street needing help has skyrocketed. How do we think about and help this people in a way that best helps them and glorifies Christ?

This book taught me three things.

Poverty is not just material
A very Biblical and easy to forget point. Poverty is not less than not having enough money to pay rent, or buy bread, but it is more than that. Poverty exists in the hearts and minds of people, not just in their bank balance. Poverty is a spiritual matter. Buying someone a meal or helping them pay a bill may in some cases be the least helpful thing we can do.

Poverty is a result of sin
Jesus says the poor will always be with us. Which is an encouragement, and a warning against being overwhelmed by needs. But what the world needs is not better programs or a fairer distribution of the wealth, although that would be a start, but Christ. Corrupt institutions will be corrupt until they are blinded by the Gospel. The ground will be hard work until the day Christ returns, people will sin against one another until the end of time. All this should be a motivation to help those in need.

But sin also affects our response. How much of the cultural and 'celebrity' response to sin is a quest for God's glory, and how much of it about personalities and success? Do we want Christ magnified in the world, or do we want to be the generation that ends poverty?

The Gospel is the answer
What the world needs is Christians who are committed to Jesus, and therefore live lives that are flooded with the ethical implications of the Gospel. People who love Jesus and therefore poor out their lives into others. This will be the start of the answer.

The end of the answer, though, will be Jesus. This book ends with a wonderful chapter on the new creation. No tears, no sin, no poverty. This is the answer that will solve every problem and cure poverty forever.

This book is practical and full of grace. I loved the practical suggestions at the end, and the way the author tackles the guilt associated with our giving throughout the book. Follow the link at the top of the blog, subscribe to Cruciform and enjoy!

Three Videos on Jonathan Edwards

2011-10-26T00:00:00.000-04:00

Jonathan Edwards is one of my historical heroes. John Piper once said of him that he was 'so far ahead of his time we can barely have said that we've caught up yet,' and while that might be slightly hyperbolic it makes the point.

In these three videos Owen Strachan introduces Edwards, talks about his life, his controversies and his legacy. Edwards stirs me, i hope he does the same for you!

God in Creation

2011-10-25T00:00:00.000-04:00

My friend Logan Wolf has planted a church in Provo, Utah, the beating heart of Mormon country. Each week he shares his latest sermon summary online:

What is 'The Gospel'

2011-10-24T00:00:00.000-04:00

What is the Gospel? That's a pretty important question isn't it? How would you define the Gospel? Something God does or something we do? Something to do or something done? Something for us or something for them? So how can we define what 'the Gospel' is?

The Gospel is an announcement.
The Gospel is an announcement of Good News.
The Gospel is an announcement of the Good News that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Is that last statement right on it's own though? Is it good news that Jesus Christ is Lord? Everything within us wants to say 'yes!' but this part of the Gospel is the part that needs explanation. That Jesus Christ is Lord is not good news, if you regard Jesus Christ as your biggest enemy, which we do before we are saved. The news that your biggest enemy is the untouchable Lord of the universe is not good news!

To get the Gospel right, to get to the heart of what makes the good news good, we have to understand what sort of Lord Jesus is. Is Jesus mean and demanding? is He like Molech and Chemosh who want your children? Is He like the gods of the 21st century who want your life, penny by penny, piece by piece? That doesn't sound like good news to me.

We must proclaim Jesus as the Lord of life, the Lord of love, the Lord who gives Himself for us. There is no other Lord like this, anywhere, ever. We see God's love in creation and in history. In creation, because it is not only functional but beautiful. We don't just have air to breath, we have sunsets to see. We don't just have food to sustain us, we have steak. Creation is a display of the superabundant love of God. We also see God's love in history. In the birth of Seth, in the passover, in the return from exile, in the giving of Christ and the spread of the Gospel.

But we don't see what sort of Lord Jesus is, if we miss seeing Him on the cross. The Gospel, doesn't make sense unless we see Jesus dying for our sins. The Gospel doesn't make sense unless we see our enemy paying the debts we owe Him, so that he can be our King. The Gospel doesn't make sense unless we know that Jesus died for us, rose again for us and now rules at God's right hand for us.

The cross is the beating heart of the Gospel, none of it makes sense without calvary, without the blood of the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.

Exodus 12

2011-10-21T09:14:00.001-04:00

I love Exodus 12. It might be my single favourite chapter in the Bible. We were there in Teen Church on Wednesday, as we try and cover 40 chapters of Exodus in eight weeks before Christmas. It's going to be tight!

I love Exodus 12 because i love it's drama. The Bible is literature par excellence, and Exodus 12 is no different. It brings us to the climax of the drama playing out between YHWH and the gods of Egypt, between Moses and Pharaoh, and between Egypt and Israel. Nine plagues have only served to harden Pharaoh's heart and probably worsen conditions for Israel. Then YHWH gives Moses and Aaron some complex and particular dinner plans. What's that all about.

Find an unblemished lamb, it has to correspond to the number of people in your house, kill it in the dark, and apply it's blood outside of you. Then have faith that God's judgement will pass over you. And people say it's hard to find Jesus in the Old Testament!

The lamb is perfect, no broken bones, no blemishes. Just as Jesus was sinless, and His bones unbroken when He was taken down from the cross.

The firstborn son looked at the slain lamb on the dinner table and could reflect, 'he died and now i won't.' As we can look at the cross and thank God saying, 'He died, and now i won't.'

Israel's biggest problem went from being how to escape Egypt to how to escape God. Just like our physical problems are bought into relief by our spiritual sickness.

The blood was outside the house, just like our righteousness is outside of us. It didn't matter how well or poorly behaved the firstborn in the house was that night, as long as the blood was on the door. And today, God is no more or less favourable towards you based on your performance, if you're covered by the blood of the ultimate passover lamb.

Before God passed over, Israel couldn't leave Egypt, now they could not stay. Before our eyes are opened to behold the glory of God in Christ, we can not stay in bondage to our old master. Why stay in the dungeon when the door is open?

Spurgeon says 'it's blood, blood, blood, blood, that saves us.' It's impossible to read Exodus 12 and forget that life giving truth.

Another Brick in the Wall

2011-10-19T08:13:00.000-04:00

Peter Mead shares that most preachers overestimate what can be achieved in one sermon, but massively underestimate what can be achieved through consistent biblical preaching over the months and years. It's easy to feel like that sometimes isn't it? You prep and you pray and you preach...and nothing seems to happen. No doves descending, no tearful reconciliation, no revival and reformation sweeping your town. Just conversations about where to head for lunch (although, those are sometimes just as encouraging!)

So we long for instant transformation, we long for results, and we should. But we forget that our time is not God's time, and that, as Peter says, we must not forget what can be achieved over the months and the years of faithfulness to the Word.

Apropos of all that, i wanted to share with you last night's notes from our Teen Bible Study on Proverbs 1. No lightening flashes, no thunder, no voices from behind the veil, just (hopefully) another step in the road of faithfulness, another brick in the building that exists for all of our joy.

Proverbs 1

V1-7
What is the aim of the book of Proverbs?

Who needs the knowledge that comes from Proverbs?

What is the definition of knowledge according to verse 7?

How would you define 'the fear of the Lord?'

V8-19
How is this teaching described in v8-9?

How would you contrast this attractive picture with the motivation of sinners?

Why should we not listen to sinners invitations?

V20-33
How is wisdom portrayed?

What does she do?

How should this help us make our decisions?

What happens if we obey and listen to wisdom? (v23)

What happens if we don't?

How can we constantly remember the riches and curses of Proverbs 1?

Grace in Unexpected Places

2011-10-17T08:13:00.001-04:00

Numbers 14 tells the sad story of the people's rebellion and God's judgement. A lack of faith in the promises of the Promised Land lead to God promising judgement on His people. Then Israel tries to prove themselves to God, marching up to take the hill country, before they are routed by the Amalekites and the Canaanites.

In view of all that, Numbers 15:2 is a surprising verse. God says to Moses 'speak to the people of Israel and say to them, 'when you come into the land which you inhabit, which i am giving you...' God's grace continues to roll His plan for history forward. His people have just turned their back on the promise, and then ignored His warnings not to fight. If you or I were God, then Numbers 15 would look very different, but our God is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He teaches the Israelites what to do with their sacrifices, He teaches them how to deal with unintentional sins. He is still God, and He still rules by His Word, so a Sabbath breaker is stoned to death, but not before we see His grace, not before we realize that His purposes will be accomplished.

This morning, i am glad that the sovereign, holy, God does not rely on me. That His plans for the world are not dependent on my success, my obedience or my effort. They depend on Him, on His Word and on His power to keep it. Israel totally fails, but God says, 'when you come into the land.' You and I totally fail, but God says 'there is now no condemnation.'

There is a rich, satisfying loveliness to this grace isn't there? There is a father, holding His arms out to His children saying 'it's ok, come back...' there is a husband holding his hand out to his beloved saying 'i will bare this...' And bare it He did. You can not make sense of the God speaks in the Old Testament without reference to the God who dies in the New. How could God be so gracious to this rebellious people? How can He forgive the firstborn who has messed up so? Because one day The Firstborn will come and pay for it, one day God's anger at His people will be transferred onto His Son so that we can go free.

We don't need to 'read Jesus into' the Old Testament, He is it's focus, it's key. The unexpected grace doesn't make sense without Him.

The Week in Numbers

2011-10-15T14:17:00.000-04:00

Let me share with you some numbers that have caused me to rejoice this week.

Ten
Each Wednesday after school and before church we take our youth group out to go door to door sharing the Gospel. The numbers we've had go has bounced around half a dozen most of the time, but this week we had ten teenagers take an hour of their afternoon to go and knock on strangers doors and tell them about Jesus. It's almost my favourite hour of the week.

Twenty
We had twenty teenagers in Teen Church on Wednesday. When we arrived at Trinity 50 weeks ago there were maybe six or eight teens at church on Wednesday, then we hit our nadir just before Christmas with four. Those numbers have been slowly growing in 2011, and we hit 20, which feels significant, this week. The next challenge is to bump that again and i'm praying we'll be around 25 regularly by Christmas.

Thirteen
last week rachel started a high school girls Bible study on Friday mornings before school. School starts at 745 (!) so the Bible study starts at 715 (!!). Yesterday, her birthday, thirteen girls showed up. I think that's amazing. They looked together at Revelation 4 and 5, and ate donuts. I'd call that a double portion of blessing! This was twice the number Rachel was expecting yesterday morning.

So What About Numbers?
Numbers aren't the only thing, but they are an important thing. We're praying for fruit in each of these young people, not just that they'd come and fill a space for a meeting. But numbers aren't just numbers are they? They're people. People who need to hear the Gospel for salvation and discipleship. The more people that hear the Gospel, the better. Also, these numbers are people created to give glory to Jesus. Father, hallowed by your name ought to be our prayer before every sermon, Bible study, quiet time, before every day. Twenty people worshipping Jesus on a Wednesday night isn't enough, He is worthy of the worship of billions. But twenty is better than 5, and in that we rejoice.

The Challenge of Preaching Long Passages

2011-10-13T07:46:00.000-04:00

One minute, i'm promising myself that i'll try and find something constructive to say on these pages at least a couple of times a week, and then...almost a month passes and nothing! But that's ok. Here's what i'm learning about preaching long passages of scripture.

We're currently three weeks into an eight week series on Exodus in Teen Church. So far we've looked at 1-3:10, 3:11-7:7 and last night, 7:8-10:29, following the chapter outline in Alec Motyer's BST. I'm enjoying the challenge of preaching longer sections of scripture, and hopefully our teenagers are enjoying listening...the jury might still be out on that one!

Themes
I guess it's impossible in a 25-35 minute window to 'expose' every verse of passages that long, so the preaching is slightly more thematic. Last night, for example, we looked at God and the plagues, God and Pharaoh and God and the people. As much as i enjoy examining the trees of Paul's letters, Moses forests look pretty good from up here. There's a great advantage, i think, in looking at bigger chunks of scripture sometimes. It catches us up in the story, it reminds us that the Bible is not merely basic instructions before leaving earth, but in fact, the drama of the three personed God and His people and an invitation to step inside.

On Reading
The first two nights i didn't read our whole passage before preaching. Last night i did, and it took fifteen minutes! Nothing wrong with that, except my voice was almost gone before i started to preach! We'll sit down and watch a tv show for 15 minutes, i'll watch an american football game for three hours without getting bored! Reading, out loud, long passages of scripture stretches us mentally and spiritually. It helps us to see the themes, and makes us think about how we can spend our time better. And you know what? The Bible really is beautiful. It's great literature, and we should enjoy it as such. God gave us a book, a story. Let's read it!

On the Loveliness of God
The God of Exodus is fierce and holy, but loving and gentle. This is a God we see breaking into time and space because He knows His people and their needs. How can we not be attracted by the grace of God who persists with Moses? Or stand in awe of the God who sends palpable darkness? Or the God who fights for His firstborn? Reading, preaching, drinking large portions of scriptures warms our hearts up to this God, shows us the drama in the dogma and the dogma in the drama, draws us close to God and He works, and works, and works for His people.

From The Old That We Travel To The New

2011-09-24T07:34:00.001-04:00

What strange sensual creatures we are.

I've started drinking tea again recently, partly because we're out of coffee and partly because tea is so evocative. Electric kettles are hard to come by in the States, so we have one that get's heated up by our stove. It's boiling whistle reminds me of our old holiday home in Newlyn, the home my maternal grandfather was born in. Walks on the beach, Cornish pasties and lobster pots, that's all i can hear.

I leave my tea bag in, which takes me right back to 87 London Street. Reading Family Church celebrates it's tenth anniversary soon, and i am ever thankful for the impact of that church, those men on my life. The year i spent working there was full of happy moments and serious moments, as any Gospel work should be. 'Black and tea bag in please Karen. Cheers.'

And the taste. English breakfast. A bit of spice, some bitterness rolling around my tongue. Such a good taste, such memories...

Why this flood of nostalgia? Two things i think. First of all i realized that in the time since i've was a fresher at Reading, i could have completed my degree nearly three times! Eight years, was it really eight years? My first night at Reading was Lawrie Sanchez's last night in charge of Wycombe Wanderers.

My parents are moving house next month. I lived in four family homes in England. Willoughbys Walk, which i don't remember. Sunnycroft, which i remember, but like a dream. Lower Farm, a lovely old civil war farm house in Chinnor, where i showed up barely out of nursery and left attending one of the finest state schools in the country. And Lacey House, where i passed my GCSEs, A Levels and graduated. I wasn't even a teenager when i arrived. The last time i left, i was married and i lived in a different country.

So what of all this? What of cups of tea and old houses? What of 9.30 eastern on Saturdays, when my mind always drifts to Hilbottom Road, terrible hot chocolate and Keith Ryan, who never seemed to run, but was always in the right place?

We are a strange and sensual people, but we worship ever such a gracious God. We need to believe the Gospel, but to believe something, we need to do more than see it, we need to eat it. What does a broken body look like? A bit like this torn piece of bread. What does shed blood look like? This grape juice. Bite it, chew it, hold it and swallow it. Taste the Gospel. Taste the reality of God in our mess, our gritty lives, a God who hovers over chaos and makes it good, a God who redeems our memories and shows us why we have them. The God who came in a body just like ours, who once was 26, just like me. The God who is there, the God who appeals to our senses and then tells us to look for a city to come. A better and abiding one.

Sight, smell, memories. The bread, the cup, the pool. We need these things because we are a physical people. We need these things to stoke our faith. Then we need to follow the trickle all the way to the ocean, to stop staring at the signpost, and follow where it leads...

When We Misunderstand God (Luke 15)

2011-09-22T11:24:00.003-04:00

I've been doing some work on Luke 15 this week in preparation for preaching next Wednesday morning. The more i think about the two sons, the more i think that they have the same problem, and their father deals with it in the same way.

The younger son is the one who is told to do his duty, says no, but then does it. He thinks his dad is no fun. He thinks there's more enjoyment to be had 'out there,' away from his family and his responsibilities. The bright lights of Vegas glitter at his home in the desert. Because he misunderstands his father, his fathers love for him, the enjoyment of life with him, his whole life faces in the wrong direction. Away from a loving relationship with his dad, and towards a fruitless pursuit of 'harlots' as the NKJV delicately puts it.

The older son is the one who says he'll do what he's told, but hates it all the time. He think his dad is no fun as well. All work and no play; 'these many years i have been serving you.' He thinks his relationship with his dad is based upon work, upon effort, upon slaving. All his dad wants is him. And he ends up in a worse place than his brother. Sat on the step, missing the party of his dad's grace.

Of all the words that come to mind when we describe God, words like holy, just, loving, how far down the list does 'enjoyable' come? Do we think of God as fun, do we think of spending time with God as enjoyable, as better than the alternative? Do we think of God as happy, or just sternly always right?

The father deals with both his sons in the same way as well. He loses his dignity, and leaves the camp to bring them in. This rich, dignified old man runs down the road when he sees his younger son come into view. He flings his arms around his smelly, unclean son. No dignity, outside the camp. At the end of the chapter we find the father again outside the camp, again losing his dignity trying to reason his older son into the house. Instead of crouching in the dust he could have stood and commanded his boy inside, but instead he sat beside him, and talked to him.

The father here is so full of loving, so full of a spreading goodness that he can not help himself going out, losing his dignity and bringing his sons in. Our God is so full of goodness, enjoyment, love and fellowship that He comes and dies in our place, with no dignity, outside the camp.

Misunderstand this about God, and everything else will be wrong.

1 Thessalonians and The Will of God

2011-09-17T09:47:00.001-04:00

I wonder how much ink has been spilt over the subject of finding God's will for your life. Yet, despite all the books written there seem to be basically two camps. Love God and do whatever you want, and if you pick up the wrong tube of toothpaste you're probably outside of God's will for your life. It'll relieve you, dear reader, to know that i take the former, Biblical approach.

I was reading 1 Thessalonians this morning, and in chapter 4 we have the most succinct summary of the Bible's position on God's will in the Bible. Verse 3 says 'for this is the will of God for you: your sanctification...' What is God's will for you and me? That we are sanctified, that we grow in holiness, that we become more like His Son. For the Thessalonians it meant to steer clear of sexual immorality and not avenge themselves as the gentiles do.

But what does it mean for us? Well it's meaning bleeds into every decision we have to make. Where shall i go to college? Wherever will help us grow in our relationship with God the most. Was it 'God's will' that i went to Reading University? With perfect hindsight, knowing all that God did while i was there i can say a hearty yes, but when did God will i should go there? When i passed my A-levels? When i was born? When the university was founded? I don't think so. Would i have been 'out of God's will' if i'd gone to York or Warwick like i'd intended? My life would have been radically different now, but out of God's will? Again, i don't think so.

Will that relationship sanctify you? If so, then go for it, if not, then you'd probably better hang back. But use your brain and your Bible, don't just look for a random Bible verse, with or without her name in it! That job, that tv show, that film, that music. 1 Thessalonians 4:3 covers most of it. Love God, and do whatever you want that will help you love God more.

God calls us first and foremost to holiness. To grow closer to Him, to spend our Talents on Him, to live our lives for Him. Most of the time this doesn't involve an active, single decision that we make, but the direction of our hearts, the source of our please. Love God, pursue holiness, and your decisions will honour Him.

David Brainerd Vs The 21st Century

2011-09-12T08:34:00.002-04:00

I've just started to read Jonathan Edwards' book 'The Life of David Brainerd.' I spied it on our music minister's shelf, and fell upon it like a hungry miser gobbling up some shiny piece of gold. Normally spending time with Edwards' makes me feel like Caesar looking at a statue of Alexander the Great, and this is no different. This time, i'm also overwhelmed by Brainerd's story of his conversion.

He grew up with no saving faith, and yet developed a deep conviction of sin. He knew he was lost and laboured to be in the right with God. He prayed, he studied the Bible, he was all about works righteousness, but it looked very impressive. It struck me as i was reading this weekend, that if the unsaved David Brainerd had been in my youth group, i probably would have thought the world of him.

What else do ask for from our teenagers...from our adults most of the time, than that they spend time in the Word, spend time in prayer, and are broken for sin? My answer most of the time is 'not much.' Now, Brainerd is known for his melancholy disposition and he grew up in a totally different age to us, but there's still lessons to be learnt from his conversion. Too often i'm guilty of looking at the fruit and assuming the tree. Too often i'm happy if i can get our teenagers in church, in the Word, and in prayer. And, as we learn from Brainerd, that's just not enough. Listen to what happened as and when He was saved;

'as i was walking through a thick, dark grove, unspeakable glory seemed to open to the view and apprehension of my soul. I do not mean any external brightness...but it was a new view or apprehension of God, such as i never had before...I knew that i never seen anything comparably to it for excellency and beauty...it appeared to be divine glory that i beheld. My soul rejoiced with joy unspeakable to see such a God, such a divine Being, and i was inwardly pleased and satisfied that He should be God over all for ever and ever. My soul was so captivated by the excellency, loveliness, greatness and other perfections of God that i was even swallowed up in Him, at least to the degree that i had no thought, at first, of my own salvation and scare reflected that there was such a creature as myself.'

Isn't that wonderful? Isn't that unheard of today. So instead of asking about religious action, i need to be asking about religious affections! Does the sovereignty of God seem sweet to you today? Do you see Him as glorious and satisfying today? Is your soul rejoicing in your salvation today? Then i won't have to search for the fruits, they'll be evident. I need this breeze from the centuries to remind me that though fruit is good, i need to look for the tree first...

Tabernacaling

2011-09-06T07:54:00.001-04:00

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us

John 1:14

Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle

Exodus 40:34

The Old Testament has it all. Great stories, great wars, great heroes and great villains. But we must never forget that these things happened for our instruction, these things happened so that we might know Jesus better. It's almost like we need to see the shadows to fully understand what the shape is we're looking at.

The incarnation of Jesus, God's Word in human flesh was the most stunning, the most gracious, the most 'i can barely wrap my mind around it,' event in history. Until, that is, the Son of God died on the cross and then walked out of His own grave. But the incarnation should stagger us every time we think about it. It staggered me this weekend as i thought about the end of Exodus.

I've been enjoying Alec Motyer's BST on Exodus in the last couple of weeks, getting ready to start a series on it with our teenagers at church by the end of September. The last ten chapters of Exodus have to be some of the most dramatic in the Bible. Israel gets it's first real awareness of the problem of sin, that sin is in here, that sin is personally destructive. What led them to create the Golden Calf? They wanted something they could see, something tangible. Moses was gone, and with Him their link to YHWH. So the Golden Calf leapt out of the flames.

Following Moses intercession, something even more incredible happens. YHWH knows that His people need something tangible, even Moses wasn't going to go unless He could see his Lord going before Him. So the Lord tells Him to build a tent, a tabernacle, so that He could dwell among His people. Tabernacle didn't mean anything special, every one of the Lord's people lived in a tabernacle. Here was YHWH, for His people's good, for their journey through the wilderness, in His grace, coming to live with His people. Living in a tent, identifying totally with them.

Jesus' incarnation is amazing and terrifying. Amazing because here is God with us, terrifying because we are sinful men.The glory of the Lord, leading His people home to Israel was the same. Glorious and terrible. Awesome in the very best meaning in the word.

Without being irreverent or funny, sometimes it's like the New Testament is the words and the Old Testament is the picture. What does John 1:14 mean? It means what happened at Sinai has happened again, only better, and finally. The glory of God and the Word of God descended, not in smoke, fire and stone, but in flesh and blood. He dwelt among us, He lived like us, He was tired, hungry and ultimately betrayed.

Pictures are helpful, but they need words to explain them. Without the end of Exodus, we'll struggle to grasp the glory of John 1:14. Without John 1:14, the end of Exodus becomes a diverting religious story. Put them together and you get the glory of God in the Son of God, tabernacaling for us, and dying for the sins of the Exodus people. And dying for our sins...

Thinking About Reading The Bible

2011-09-05T09:24:00.000-04:00

How do you read the Bible? I am convinced that careful and systematic Bible reading is vital to the Christian life. I mean, how can it not be. It's in the Bible we hear God's voice, in the Bible that we see the light of the glory of God shining in the face of Christ, which changes us from the inside out.

So how do you read the Bible? A chapter a day? A few verses a day? With a pen and an notebook? Old Testament and then New Testament? I don't think there is a 'right' way to read the Bible, but there are some wrong ways. I don't think we should just flop the Bible open at random and see 'what God has to say to me today.' I don't think we should forget about Corinth when we read 1st or 2nd Corinthians, text + context = meaning.

For about a year now i've been following Grant Horner's Bible reading plan. At the moment i'm reading Matthew, Leviticus. Revelation, James, Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Judges, Isaiah and Acts. I switched around a couple of the lists when i started, but i can't remember why now. According to the man himself, this plan works best when you're moving fairly quickly through the text, rather than stopping there and then for further prayer. Depending on how awake I am and how much attention i'm paying the reading takes me about 35 to 40 minutes. This normally leaves me plenty of time for facebook/twitter/prayer/coffee in the mornings.

I think this plan some major strengths and at least one weakness. I love covering so much scripture in one go, i love seeing so many different parts of God's redemption plan in the morning, seeing new bridges between different places in the Bible. Also, because the lists are all different lengths, you never read the same parts of the Bible at the same time more than once. I've also found, in the last year that it's helped my memory of scripture more. I'm able to recall specific verses or threads in the Bible more easily than i could. I guess just because i'm reading more.

There are some weaknesses though, of course. Sometimes ten chapters feels like a feast, sometimes it's like trying to drink from a water cannon. Sometimes you just need to stop and think about a passage rather than move straight on, of course, there's nothing stopping you pausing for a time, but i always want to keep moving. I guess this brings me to the second weakness. Having a list to work through each morning gives the 'old man' a great opportunity to turn Bible reading into a legal chore. Now, of course, this is a potential danger with everything we do as a Christian but perhaps even more so when there's a list next to you. I guess i just need more grace to remember that i am in fact the boss of the lists, not the other way around.

Overall, i'm enjoying the reading plan, and i think i'm going to keep going with it. I think the long term rewards will be worth the short term legal risks. I love the Bible, and this plan is feeding that love much more than it makes it a chore. I just need to remember that Christ brings me to the Father, not my effort in the morning.

So, how do you read the Bible?

MacArthur, The YRR and Talking Underwater

2011-09-01T07:48:00.003-04:00

Australians have this wonderful phrase, 'talking underwater.' It means you don't know what you're talking about of you're not making much sense. Like when you tell that one day England will produce that worlds finest test side (ha! take that!). I probably should have called my blog talking underwater when i think about it.

Over the last few months John MacArthur has been writing blog articles directed at the 'Young, Restless and Reformed,' movement. Now before i start i need to say that i really do respect John MacArthur. How does a young man not respect someone who has been at the same church for nearly forty years, and has preached verse by verse through the entire New Testament. And i really thank God for what we call in shorthand, the YRR. Men who love the Gospel planting churches that preach the Gospel. Men not much older than me. How does one not get excited about the resurgence of these things in the USA? I'm 26, so i guess that makes me young. I believe that the Bible is God's final word on faith and practice, so i guess that makes me Reformed. I've never understood the restless part though. It conjures up images of young men with trendy facial hair and ESVs roaming the streets doesn't it?

Some of MacArthur's articles have been home runs, sometimes he's ground out to first, sometimes he's just swung and missed. There are two excellent responses that i've benefited from as well, but the more i think about it, the more i think these articles demonstrate nothing as much as the generational and practical gap that exists in so much of American Christianity.

How much does what we practice matter? Very much. Faith without works is dead. But do works include what you wear on a Sunday morning? MacArthur is always immaculately turned out, so it's hard to hear him say he doesn't care about fashion. There shouldn't be an evangelical in the universe that has a 'dress code,' but most churches dress is pretty homogeneous, one way or the other. And one way or the other, i think that's ok.

But more importantly, are we loving widows and orphans? Are we good news to the poor? Are we looking outside our own circles to bring others in? Aren't those the things that actually matter? Aren't those the works that validate our faith?

Here is my fear for the American evangelical church. Much good has been done, much good is yet to be done. We must contend for sound doctrine, we must watch our life. We must not risk chasms by making secondary issues primary ones. The combination of church/state separation, a pioneer spirit and more money than you can shake a stick at means that starting a church in America is fairly easy, comparatively speaking. So everything has become a primary issue, and there are churches on every corner. We have to get beyond those days.

We can not tear ourselves apart over things that don't matter all that much, because when we do, not only do we forget the important things, but those who are outside of church will probably never hear them...

The God Who Breaks In For His People

2011-08-22T07:54:00.003-04:00

Can you tell the story of Exodus 1-12 as the story of the God who breaks in for us? I'm loving reading Exodus at the moment. The God we meet in Exodus is loving, jealous and fierce. Just like we need Him to be, just like He always is.

God's people, as was promised to Abraham are in slavery in Egypt. They cry out to God and He remembers, He knows. And because of that He breaks in for His people. He breaks in to break them out. He breaks in, and becomes their biggest problem and their only solution.

God breaks in at the burning bush in chapter 3. Moses has gone from being a prince in a super power to being an outcast shepherd in the middle of nowhere. God calls Him to go and be His mouth, His man, and break His people free from Egyptian oppression. The Lord is now Moses biggest problem. Before the burning bush Moses could not leave Midian, now He can not stay. Despite His excuses and protestations, God is gracious, and Moses obeys.

Then the famous face off. The battle being the gods of Egypt and the great I AM. The gods of mens hearts and the God of the universe. Pharaoh is unmoved by the mighty signs that Moses performs, so again, in chapter 12, God breaks in for His people. Kill a lamb, He tells them, splatter the blood on the doorposts (where one day the law will go, law after blood) so that when i come and free my firstborn, your firstborn will be protected.

The people are dressed in readiness, and the Angel of the Lord sweeps though Egypt, and there is death in every household. The Lord is their biggest problem. No longer are their worries about how to escape from Egyptian oppression, how are we going to escape from the Lord? How can we stand before Life Himself? The Lord is their only solution. Death will come to every house, so make sure that what dies in your house is a lamb, and make sure His red blood is outside in the dark, where only the Lord can see it.

God breaks in for His people. Jesus saved His people out of Egypt, Jesus burned and did not consume the bush, Jesus pass over the houses with the slain lambs. God breaks in for His people thousands of years later, but this time, Jesus is the lamb who is slain. His blood, our salvation is outside of us, in the dark on our doorposts. But there it must be. God is our biggest problem and our only solution. We need to cling to the ultimate Passover lamb.

Blessed Be The Name

2011-08-15T07:53:00.002-04:00

How can we live well? In a world that naturally moves toward comfort and leisure, how can we face life and suffering differently? Those are some of the questions posed, and eventually answered, in the book of Job, which we started looking at in my High School Sunday school class this weekend.

Job must be one of the most mysterious books in the Bible. If we accept him as an historical figure (which we should) and the Bible account of what happened at face value (which we must) it leaves us with some very difficult questions. How can God, who is of purer eyes than to behold evil contain Himself when the devil in in his presence? Is this normative or narrative? We want to say narrative, but if we say that, why does this only happen in Job 1 and nowhere else? Questions, questions. Like Ecclesiastes and Proverbs, i think Job is int he Bible to warn us against thinking that life to too simply, to help us avoid drawing straight lines between good deeds and good circumstances.

Job is prepare to suffer well. Here is a man who loves God and hates evil. One of the richest men who lived at that time, he did not make the mistake of Israel and forget about God in the midst of his blessings. In fact he worshiped God for his wealth and his family. He sounds like a man who bought his children up well. He fear God and was therefore prepared to suffer well. Or, at least as prepared as anyone.

What was Job's theology of suffering? We don't know. He did have a strong and rich theology of the sovereignty of God which we see at the end of chapter one. Hearing in minutes that he's gone from being a rich man with a huge family, to a man with nothing, he turns and remembers that God is in control. Blessed be the name he even says! God gives, and God has taken away.

Then God takes off the last of satan's restraints and allows him to cover Job's body in painful sores. You can almost sympathise with Job's wife in this situation. Job you've lost your family, your business and now all you can do is sit on the ground and scrape yourself. Forget about God, curse God and die. Charming woman, but like i said, we can see her point.

Unless...unless just God, by Himself, and all He is for us in Jesus is enough for us. Unless, like Job, before his friends muddy the water we see a good God ruling the world in behalf of His beloved. If we don't see these things, if our bruised reeds are not supported by a tire iron of faith, we won't live well. We'll curse God and die.

Job 1 and 2 by themselves don't make a lot of sense. Just like our lives often don't. To grasp what's happening on Job we have to plug it in to the rest of the Bible. And often, the only way we can make sense of our lives under the sun is to plug them into scripture, to remember both the goodness and the Godness of God, and then to try and say with Job, 'blessed by the name of the Lord.'

After Preaching

2011-08-11T08:10:00.003-04:00

The thirty to sixty minutes after i've finished preaching must be some of the most discouraging times i ever experience. I'm not sure it's always been like that, but certainly for as long i can remember.

Part of it is obvious fleshly stuff. One minute you're exhorting people with the greatest truths in the universe, and then you come home and empty the dishwasher. I guess that's the closest i'll ever come to feeling like a professional footballer. One minute you're being watched by millions and thousands are singing your name, the next, your sat in a car just like Joe Public. part of these feelings are just a clear lack of sanctification, and that's obviously something that needs work.

But are these struggles legitimate? I guess these feelings are a mixture of things. A feeling of total inadequacy soon sets in. Last night we looked at John 17:6-19. Did i even scratch the surface? Did I get it? Did i communicate it? Was i visibly rejoicing in what i was saying or did it sound like a lecture? Who is sufficient for these things.

Part of it is frustration. Breathless and heartbroken someone called it. Breathless, like the Queen of Sheba, over the greatness of the revelation of God. Heartbroken over the lack of warmth, not only in my listeners hearts, but my own and over my failure to scale the heights in any passage.

And lastly, i guess, because when i'm preaching i feel close to God. When i preach i feel like i'm worshiping. Like Eric Liddell, when i preach, i feel God's pleasure. Then i drive home, off the valley, back into the mountain. I love to sing, loudly and badly, i love to study and read, but communicating the Gospel for the glory of God is my raison d'etre (yours too, by the way!) and i feel like the do this best when i'm preaching. Which might be more of a commentary on how i do it the rest of the time more than anything else.

I know God doesn't love me more when or because i preach, that if i never stood behind a pulpit again God is enough for me in Jesus. So why these struggles? is it just me?

Something More Sure

2011-08-10T14:31:00.003-04:00

I don't think we really need to try very hard to make Christianity difficult and stunning. I think we just have to pay attention when we read the Bible. If i had been with Peter on that mountain when Jesus was transfigured, i'd have wanted to make a tent as well. What else can possibly have mattered in life when you've seen something like that. Moses and Elijah talking with Jesus, a voice from Heaven. The rest of your life has got to seem a little bit mundane in comparison doesn't it?

But if served Peter well later on. When the significance of the event had been revealed to Him, He was able to say in 2 Peter 1:16-18 that he did not come up with a myth, but He had seen and heard Jesus receive glory and honour from the Father. That's a pretty good peg on which to hang your hat isn't it? A showstopper in doctrinal debates (unless they're with Paul!) and a validation everywhere he went. I've seen, i've heard.

It's the next verse, 1 Peter 1:19 that is difficult, and stunning. He says 'we have something more sure...' Hang on Peter, like a photo? An autograph? Well sort of '...the prophetic word, to which you would do well to pay attention.' Ever wish you could have seen the Transfiguration? You can, just open your Bible. Ever wish you could see Jesus in all His glory? You can, just open your Bible. Ever wish you could be sure about what Peter is saying? You can be more sure, don't trust his report, trust the Bible.

We're told the Bible is like a lamp shining in a dark place. Just like Jesus on the mountain, His clothes whiter than anyone could bleach them. When Moses saw the face of God his face shone, when we see the glory of God in the face of Christ in the Word, our hearts shine, we are sanctified in the truth.

I probably wouldn't have dozed off, or been distracted by my phone if i'd witnessed Jesus talking with Moses and Elijah. I'd have wanted to erect that tent with Peter. Now we can, camping in the Word, seeing the Word made flesh, being changed inside and out.

To have the Bible in our hands is something more sure than to have seen the Transfiguration. Stunning!

The Fall of the Family and the Failure of the Church

2011-08-08T20:02:00.003-04:00

I don't know what the written press are saying at home at the moment. I guess it's easy to point the finger at the coalition who seem to be failing to solve people's real problems, easy to point the finger at the Labour party, under whose government most of the rioters were educated. If you'll allow me to speak frankly, anyone trying to make party political ground out of the present situation is missing the point, willfully or other wise.

Today i tweeted that these riots are the sad result of a profound and prolonged attack on the family unit. Not because there weren't riots before now, but because in the past at least, riots have seemed to be sparked by something legitimate, whether against poll tax, or the closure of the mines or police racism. Most of the children on the streets at the moment seem happy to smash in a window and steal some trainers. Any attempt to connect the actions of the last couple of nights to the real grievances in Tottenham seem to fail almost by definition.

So whose fault is the fall of the family? Why are there teenagers roaming the streets of London, with neither respect for the police nor fear of God? I think it's my fault, and i think it's the Churches fault. When did we, the British, evangelical, global church quit on the family unit?

When did we get sucked in by the cultural tide diminishing the role of the family? When did we forget to take a stand against absentee fathers (whether physically present or not), when did we stop showing teenagers that Jesus is better than illicit sex, when did we become so irrelevant to the world at large? Are we afraid of being labelled as old fashioned? If this is the 'new fashion,' then please, call me as old fashioned as you can. When did we dilute the Gospel to such an extent that it become so anaemic?

How has this happened on our watch?

Yes, we must pray for London. As i sat on my couch this morning i reflected that we've spent most of the year praying for peace in the Middle East, and to pray for the same in London is deeply humbling. We must pray for London. And we must pray for us. Pray for the church to rise up and be the head and not the tail, pray for the church to hold out Jesus to young and old as the only hope, pray that we'd do something for goodness sake. If we believe in the heart changing Gospel, and we believe that the church is the hope of the world, and we believe in a good God working everything out together for good, then this is our time.

So is there hope for the church, for our capital, for our youth? Oh yes, let me take you to the garden, and show you the folded grave clothes, let me show you the scars that comfort and the wounds that heal. Then let's go and show others, those left hopeless and disenfranchised, not by a government, but by their own hearts. Those who can be healed, not by gold and silver but by water and Spirit.

The Church must arise. If we don't, how can we expect anyone else to...

Not Moses, Not Us, But Jesus

2011-08-06T14:46:00.002-04:00

I'm hoping that Exodus will be the next book we look at together in our Wednesday nigh Teen Church. I'm thinking nine messages which should take us from the end of September to after Thanksgiving. I've spent the last couple of days punting around in the first three chapters.

In Exodus 1-3 we learn that God is a God of plans and purpose. God told Abraham that 400 years would have to pass before His people could enter the promised land, and that during those 400 years they would be oppressed in a land that was not their own. And that's exactly what happened. When a ruler arose who did not know Joseph or feel a debt to his family he oppressed the Hebrews. By slave labour, planned genocide and nationalistic paranoia he plans to put down God's people. I love the artistry of God's Word. We don't know the name of the King of Egypt, but we know the names of Shiphrah and Puah, brave midwives who did God's work and kept Hebrew boys safe. At the start of chapter 2 we see the case in point as another 'vigorous' Hebrew woman gives birth.

Can you imagine being a Hebrew in these days? Comforted by the stories of your ancestors and their God you're left clinging to the hope that these are not just stories, but real hopes to cling to. How many generations had passed since Joseph? Three? Four? Half a dozen. But God's people were faithful. When Moses referred to God as 'The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,' the people didn't need any further identification, they knew who this God was. God sometimes allows us behind the curtain, but often not. We see this all over the Bible, in the decline of the Kingdom and in the lives of Ruth and Naomi. God was silent, but His people were faithful in these hard days.

Finally, in these days of opposition and oppression, God shows up. This had been the plan all along and at the end of chapter two we meet the mystery of answered prayer head on. God 'knew,' He had an intimate knowledge of His people's circumstances once they cried out to Him. How gracious God is to include our answered prayers in His plans. God has a passion for His people, His firstborn son, and He won't let them rot in Egypt. He calls and commissions Moses for duty. Unlikely Moses the fleeing murdered, but likely Moses, the one who has spent forty units of time in the wilderness and has unique access to the courts of the King, and He sends him to rescue His people.

And so that stage is set, the face off between the Lord and the gods of Egypt is ready to go. But lets not overlook, in the excitement of getting to the plagues and the Passover, that in chapters 1-3 we read and see the Gospel. God's people overwhelmed by foreign oppressors in a foreign land, far from home. God's chosen servant coming out of the wilderness to redeem God's people. God's unique leader, who'll get them wet and lead them into the wilderness, where they'll hear God's voice on the mountain.

But the hero of the book isn't Moses and his leadership, or the Hebrews and their faithfulness, it's Jesus. Jesus who saves His people out of Egypt, and who does it yesterday, and today, and forever...

Behind The Wall And On The Wall

2011-08-02T13:34:00.003-04:00

2 Kings 18-19 is one of my favourite parts of the Old Testament. Sennacherib's face off with the God of Israel is reminiscent of 'Pharaoh's Folly,' the early chapters of Exodus. Sennacherib has a point, none of the other gods of the nations could stand his advance, what chance has the god of tiny Judah? The difference of course is that Judah's God is the God who is there.

Two conversations take place in this incident, one on the wall, and one behind the wall. On the wall the army commanders face off, with the Rabshekah making his proud claims against the God of Israel, and demanding terms of surrender. Behind the wall God's people consult, and pray and trust. One conversation with an alien and opposed culture, one with the God of the universe, the success of the former depending on the fact the latter is happening at all.

In the church, we must have both these conversations. We must be on the wall, our ears open to the questions and taunts of an alien and opposed culture. We can not shut ourselves off from the questions of the 21st century. We have to listen, both to the questions that people have and the answers they come up with, if we are to bring the Gospel into the lives and culture all around us. We must stand on the wall, we must listen, and we must proclaim. We must be faithful in proclaiming the Gospel and in sharing our lives. We must be ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. We can't be hidden behind the walls, hoping that if we ignore the problem it will go away.

On the other hand, we must be having conversations behind the wall as well. We must be teaching and learning and preaching and praying behind the wall. We simply can not let all our attention and focus be on what's happening over there. We have to keep telling 'the old, old story,' we have to bring up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. We have to celebrate the Lord's Supper and baptize. The church needs thinkers and authors too. We need people behind the wall feeding and informing our conversations on the wall. We must be strong and confident behind the wall, so that when we walk out of our church buildings, we're able to hope and listen and answer.

The local church has to hold these two in a tight tension. Teaching and reaching. We have to remember that the church exists for Jesus Christ and no one else, and for His sake, open the doors and combat a dying culture. We mustn't either settle for either being a church full of knowledge but empty of salvation, neither must our zeal for evangelism leave our churches faith paper thin. We must focus on what happens behind the wall, so that we can focus on what happens on the wall.

How John Stott Influenced Me

2011-07-28T10:22:00.000-04:00

I never met John Stott, and never heard him preach, and yet his influence is so wide and far reaching that I still owe him a lot when I think about it. Here are four ways I can think of that ‘Uncle John’ influenced me.

John Stott was a British Evangelical, and so am I

John worked at the church around the corner from where he was born for all of his professional life. From there his preaching and his writing, his humility by itself would shape the course of British evangelicalism. Mark Driscoll called him one of the four horseman of 20^th century evangelicalism(*he means that as a complement!). Stott molded the course of British evangelicals, and as the head influences the body in a hundred ways he influenced me.

John Stott wrote some of the most foundational books of the twentieth century

A friend gave me his BST Commentary on Romans half way through my second year at Reading. It was, as advertised, pure gold on every page.’ John wrote one the best and clearest books on the cross there is; ‘the cross of Christ.’ I read it during my year as a Relay worker when the most recent wave of controversy blew up over penal substitution. It was a deep and rich experience to read someone so wise be so confident in the foundation of our faith. His book on ‘The Incomparable Christ,’ is also warm and rich and challenging. I love reading, because I can have a conversation with a man I’ve never met, I love reading because I can meet John Stott, sit and learn from him.

John Stott’s work with UCCF helped shape the student movement in England

It is impossible to overstate what I owe to the ministry of UCCF, and I know that indirectly and directly John helped shape what made UCCF so helpful and effective.

John Stott ran well and finished well.

This quiet and humble man, single for his whole life was poured out in the service of his Savior. He is a great example of Hebrews 13:7 ‘remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith.’ I hope and pray that he, and his God would influence me in this way as well

What We (sadly) Should Learn From The Mormons

2011-07-27T14:01:00.003-04:00

What are you normally doing at 430am? Exactly, 430 for most of us is still a good while before we flail around looking for the snooze button or stumble out of bed in search of coffee. What are some, if not most Mormon teens doing at 430 in the morning?

Getting ready for seminary. No really! According to 'Almost Christian' by Kenda Dean, the reason the Mormon Church does a good job of holding onto it's teens when they reach adulthood is because they are committed to teaching them the doctrine and history of their faith. I love this idea, but it's one that should shame us. How can we have let a sect be more passionate about teaching the young than we are?

Mormonism is some ways has a natural advantage over evangelicalism. A huge missions agency, a multi million dollar university, a very light approach to sin, and it's morally teachings, which appeal to our fallen state more than grace does. But still, there is a lot to learn and be challenged by as we look at their approach.

Someone once described most 'youth groups' in the west as holding bays with Pizza. Good at drawing a crowd and entertaining teens, but terrible at translating them into adult church members. As a youth pastor that's my passion. Not that we would have 150 kids in our youth room (trailer) on a Wednesday night, but that in ten years the faithful ones we have now are still faithful. Preaching, ushering, deaconing, bringing up their kids in the faith. When did the church stop teaching it's young the fundamentals of the faith in a structured way? Why are we just hoping they'll catch it? If we want our kids to grow up to be the next David Beckham we don't just drive passed Old Trafford a couple of times a year and hope that'll do the trick, we never wait for our teenagers to catch maths or grammar (at least my parents didn't!) so why the lackadaisical approach to what's much more important?

There is a mission field 'out there' which must be reached. But the closest and most divinely appointed mission field is our churches, in our youth groups and nurseries. Sadly, we have to learn from the Mormons as we reach the next generation.

Paul Aims At The Affections

2011-07-25T10:36:00.003-04:00

Corinth and Thebes, the two ancient cities that all classics students hold in contempt. Thebes? Always surrendering. When Xerxes and his Persian Army marched on the Greek Confederacy Thebes didn't put up a fight, despite it's proximity to Athens. Corinth? Too showy, too debauched, just too happy to swim along in the middle. Athens and Sparta, now there's two ancient cities to get the blood pumping, Corinth and Thebes? No thanks.

But Corinth, for all it's failure to live up to the Greek ideal was full of Christians. Christians living in an immoral environment, Christians living in a culture that was opposed to them. How should they survive? In our post Christian world, where even in the Christ haunted Carolinas,serious crimes are skyrocketing (Greenville is a pleasant, middle income, low unemployment university town, with a church on every corner. Over the weekend there were three separate armed robberies, and one incident where four people were shot). How did they live for Christ then? How do we live for Christ now? What does Paul tell us about these things.

Paul aims at the affections.

Paul calls us to be apart from the world in 2 Corinthians 6. He reminds us that Christ and Belial have no fellowship, so we should not be 'unequally yoked,' with unbelievers. Paul tells us not to gain our identity from our relationships with people who don't love Christ. Don't be identified with them, don't let them influence your worldview. He tells us that we're the temple of the living God, the temple of God doesn't play host to idol worship. Or at least when it does, the people are sent into exile. How do we do this, how do we pull ourselves apart from the world and it's idols?

Paul answers by combining a breath taking sweep of the Old Testament from Leviticus, Exodus, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Zephaniah, 2 Samuel and Hosea to say, we are pulled apart from the world because our God walks among us. We are different because we have a different God, a God who lives and breathes, a God who loves and gives. A God who, crucially, will be a Father to us, and we His sons and daughters. For we are all sons of God though faith in Jesus Christ. We're all invited into the party of his grace when in disobedience we sit outside sulking.

What can fellowship and yoking with unbelievers offer us more that these things? Paul says 'look at what you have in Christ, look at the God you follow, look at the God who goes out for you, and come out for Him.' Let Jesus rule your heart and your affections and you will be separate from the world.

Separatism, according to Paul doesn't mean, in the first instance, 'not doing what they do,' it means 'not loving what they love, not worshiping who they worship.' This will necessarily issue in different choices of leisure and entertainment from the world but if these choices are made apart from a growing love for Christ and response to the Gospel, what good are they? None at all.

Paul aims at the affections to change the lives of the Corinthians. We must do the same. We must so read, so preach and so understand the Gospel that it makes the most thrilling entertainments of the world look like an uncooked egg white.

Sons and daughters of our Father, that's got to be enough!

Preaching Tomorrow

2011-07-23T21:11:00.003-04:00

My Master God,

I am desired to preach today,

but go weak and needy to my task;

Yet I long that people might be edified

with divine truth,

that an honest testimony might be borne

for thee;

Give me assistance in preaching and prayer,

with heart uplifted for grace and unction.

Present to my view things pertinent to

my subject,

with fullness of matter and clarity of thought,

proper expressions, fluency, fervency,

a feeling sense of the things I preach,

and grace to apply them to men’s consciences.

Keep me conscious all the while of my defects,

and let me not gloat in pride over

my performance.

Help me to offer a testimony for thyself,

and to leave sinners inexcusable in neglecting

thy mercy.

Give me freedom to open the sorrows of thy people,

and to set before them comforting considerations.

Attend with power the truth preached,

and awaken the attention of my slothful audience.

May thy people be refreshed, melted, convicted,

comforted,

and help me to use the strongest arguments

drawn from Christ’s incarnation and sufferings,

that men might be made holy.

I myself need thy support, comfort, strength,

holiness,

that I might be a pure channel of thy grace,

and be able to do something for thee;

Give me then refreshment among thy people,

and help me not to treat excellent matter

in a defective way,

or bear a broken testimony to so worthy

a Redeemer,

or be harsh in treating of Christ’s death,

its design and end,

from lack of warmth and fervency.

And keep me in tune with thee

as I do this work.

('A Minister's Preaching' from 'The Valley Of Vision')

Book Review: License To Kill

2011-07-23T11:54:00.002-04:00

What is ‘Licensed to Kill’?

Licensed to Kill is a book from Cruciform Press

I’ve mentioned them here a couple of times before, but they’re always worth another nod, because i really do like what Cruciform Press are doing. They publish just one book a month, but that book is ‘short, clear, concise and Gospel focussed.’ Their books look the same, feel the same and are all about the same length, and for all that they benefit greatly. They even do subscriptions, so the first week of every month a new book turns up unbidden. It’s a great idea.

Licensed to Kill is a book about sin.

John Owen said ‘be killing sin or sin will be killing you,’ and that’s very much the theme of this book. Licensed to Kill is a field manuel for mortifying sin. The chapters define mortification, the nature of sin, why sin is so deadly and what we can do about it. It cuts to the heart of our pretense but at the same time graciously points us to the root anc center of all our hope, Jesus.

Licensed to Kill is a book about you.

Because it’s a book about sin, it’s also a book about you. Sin is that honey covered poisen, that secret deadly weapon, that hidden disease. We must be killing it. All of us, you as well as me. Because of that, we can all benefit from reading this book. There is no one alive who doesn’t need all the help he can fighting against sin. The fight against sin is a fight for joy, a fight for our lives. It’s a fight we need help to engage in.

Licensed to Kill is a book about the Gospel.

One thing i really appreciated about this book is how, at the end of every chapter, the reader is pointed back to the Gospel. Not in a forced, ‘by the way Jesus died toi save you’ way, but in a way that almost sneaks up on you. In each chapter we’re lead almost to despair (rightly so) about our sin, and at the end the author lifts our heads and tells us of our Saviour. It manages to be both practical and overflowing with grace at the same time.

Practice and grace. Thats what we need to mortify sin, and both of those are found in this excellent book.

The Local Church Is Where It's At

2011-07-22T11:15:00.003-04:00

I'm thankful that God has always put men (and women) in my life who are passionate about the local Church. I think this is a passion better caught than taught, although even paying cursory attention to the Bible should teach us about how important the Church is. After being a Christian, and being a husband, i count having the word 'pastor' in my job description as the greatest privilege of my life. I think the best way to learn about the Church is to spend time in one and around one, and here are some things i'm learning.

Prayer is the engine of the local church. I think it was Terry Virgo who described the Newfrontiers prayer and fasting meetings as 'going under the hood' of Newfrontiers, and we can say the same about any prayer meeting at any local church. Prayer is the engine. Whether it's Tuesday mornings at IHOP, or Wednesday evenings at church, or every morning when men and women are alone with their coffee and their God, the local church survives on prayer.

Without solid preaching, there is no point in meeting. If the local Church is just about doing stuff, then i want off the bus. I could care less about doing stuff. But if our activity is fed by a diet of steady, Christ exalting teaching, then our activity will reflect that. The Word is the foundation of the Church, and what a great and fearful thing it is to get up and try to exposit every Sunday. Great, fearful, and wholly necessary.

Our opinion of the local Church directly reflects our opinion of Jesus. There's no such thing in the Bible as a Christian who doesn't love and seek out fellowship of other Christians, and fellowship in an ordered regular manner at that. One of the joys of my recent explorations in the Song has been to see how deep and real Jesus love for His bride is. I come from a generation of church hoppers, a generation of conference goers who don't want to commitment and accountability of the local Church. This won't do!

Last, but certainly not least, the local Church is built on volunteers. Three pastoral staff and an office manager do not a ministry team make. We need Deacons who care for the sick, people who visit and turn up early to play music, people who stay kate to make sure all the doors are locked, people who leave work and come straight to Church to help out with VBS, some to count people, someone to collect money. All these people are volunteers, all these people serve their Lord and their church, and without them, the local Church could not run as it does.

It's a beautiful thing the local church...won't you commit to one?

What I Learnt From Reading An Old Book

2011-07-16T18:30:00.003-04:00

A few days after finishing Machen's work 'Christianity and Liberalism,' i've had a few thoughts swirling around that i wanted to share. These are in no real order.

We should heed Lewis's advice, and read old books. They often really are better, if only proved by the fact they've stood the test of time. Machen is clear in his prose and passionate in his argument. He is not effected by anything that effects you and me. He wasn't distracted by Facebook while he was writing, neither did he worry about being misquoted on Larry King. He just sat in his room and wrote. Somehow I think this really makes a difference. It's easy to romanticize the past but in this instance though i think it's fair. I also find it fascinating to read about the dilemma's of the day. Who knew that the public/private school debate in Michigan was causing such a stir? It's just good to enter a different world for a while.

Speaking of different worlds, that's where Christians and Liberals end up. Through the book Machen refers to these two as different religions, rather than Liberals being a part of Christianity. Consider, however, Liberals have a different view of God, a different view of man, a different view of God and Man, a different view of the Church and a different view of sin. How can we say that Liberalism is anything else than a different religion? This doesn't mean we need to go around splitting churches down the middle, but it does mean we need to be vigilant. In love we need to be aware of those in our churches who might have a totally unbiblical view of the world. We need to ever be speaking the truth in love, ever be remembering that the most loving thing we can do is speak the truth. This is particularly important for me to remember working with teenagers. It's easy to imagine that all our Christian schooled, good upbringing kids need is life lessons. But they don't. They need their hearts and their minds filled with the Gospel of the glory of the grace of God. They need to be reminded about free grace every week, or their hearts will grow cold, dark, and from there, Liberal. They're just like you and me.

Eventually, my biggest take away from this book is to always remember that man exists for God, not the other way around, and we must always live, play, work and preach with this at the forefront of our hearts.

After A Day On Google +

2011-07-15T10:43:00.003-04:00

Curiosity finally got the better of me.

I had decided not to try and get a Google+ invite, decided that there was enough to distract me from work/life already, and that i didn't need anything. But yesterday, i succumbed, asked for an invite and decided to have a poke around on Google+. Here's what i thought about it.

First of all a caveat. There are only two people i know currently using Google+, so perhaps i'm missing the best of most of the features it offers. The big sellers seem to be 'circles' and the video chat/hang out thing. Circles allow us to share information only with certain groups people we're friends with, and the video chat/hang out thing allows us to, well...video chat and hang out with people. The idea of circles is that not all your friends are interested in everything you're interested in. They don't want to see all your interactions.

Maybe i'm in the minority here, but this idea doesn't resonate with me at all. I have a friend on Facebook i probably haven't seen for eight years. He plays in a professional clarinet group. I'm sure, if he was on + i wouldn't be in his clarinet circle. The thing is, i really enjoy his updates from a world i don't know anything about. They are part of who he is. None of us, surely, think of ourselves in different circles do we? We're the same person in every walk of life we enjoy. I don't like the idea that we're supposed to segregate different aspects of ourselves off. It just doesn't ring true to life.

I already mentioned earlier that i only have two 'friends' on +. I have around 650 on Facebook. Years of links and photos as well. Do we really have the energy to build another social network profile somewhere else? Why are we supposed to bother? I can see what my friends are sharing and liking on Facebook, i can follow people i've never met on Twitter, what is Google+ offering me that I don't already have? I couldn't think of anything, apart from perhaps the +1 feature, which makes it easier to share links. But that's not enough to rival Facebook is it?

Google+ is shiny, clean and new. They've never sold your information to a theme park company in Indiana for profit. Not yet anyway. But that really seems to be about all it has going for it at the moment. Maybe in six months i'll look back on this and laugh at my premature reaction to Google+, but right now, i don't know what it's for, i don't know what extras it offers me, and i'm really not sure why i should bother!

See you on Facebook!

Christianity and Liberalism (7)

2011-07-14T09:21:00.002-04:00

In the final chapter of Machen's book he deals with the Christian view of the church and the Liberal view of the church. It shouldn't surprise us how different these views are, since Christians and Liberals differ on their view of sin, God, man and salvation, it's no wonder they differ on their view of what the church is for.

This is a book of it's time. If it were written today this chapter might be more about the implementation of different programmes, whether drama can take the place of preaching, and what we do about membership. Machen was writing in the early twenties, ten years before he formed 'The Independent Board for Presbyterian Missions.' Now that might not sound important, but it was the root of the split in the Presbyterian church in the USA into the PCA, the PC (USA) and the OPC. I don't really know the difference between the first two, but it was this action that lead to Machen breaking away and forming the OPC. Sadly, i've never seen an OPC church in North Carolina, so i've got no idea whether the Presbyterians around here are evangelical or not. But i digress.

The first part of this chapter covers what might be called 'the morality of church appointments.' Is it ok for someone to be ordained in a church if he is then going to ignore everything that church stands for? Is it ok for churches to use historical language to mean something new? Who should cede in a time of schism? Liberals for the sake of honesty or Christians for the sake of truth? I said this chapter was a chapter of it's day, and it is, but has that day really ended now? When we look at the Anglican church in the UK and the Episcopal and even Lutheran Church in the US don't we see the very same questions being asked today? What are evangelicals in these churches supposed to do? Sure of their denominational convictions, they can't just join the local baptist church so what should they do in the interim?

Machen offers four pieces of advice.

We should 'encourage those who are engaged in the spiritual and intellectual struggle.' We should oppose the proclamation and defence of the faith, but remember that there is no point in proclaiming what we are not defending.

Secondly 'Christian officers in the church should perform their duty in deciding on the qualifications of candidates for ministry.' Perform their duty is the key phrase. Those who govern churches have a solemn responsibility to be true to the past, not to hope that a young man will 'grow into' his faith.

Thirdly, 'Christian officers should show their loyalty to Christ in their capacity as members of individual congregations.' Simply put, it's not enough that a man 'never denied' the cross, or that he can preach well. What is the content of his preaching? This is a call for increased church integrity.

And last, Machen says 'most important of all - there must be a renewal of Christian education.' Here i agree with him wholeheartedly. Every Christian in every generation has the responsibility, the privilege to know the Scriptures and to apply them. Not just seminarians but everyone. Christian doctrine does sound weird until we get it into our hearts. Grace sounds ridiculous because we are built for law. We have to know the Bible, if we are to live, breath and defend the Bible.

Machen finishes his work like this: 'Is there no refuge from strife, is there no place where a man can prepare for the battle of life? Is there no place where two or three can gather in Jesus name...to forget (everything else and) unite in overflowing gratitude at the foot of the cross? If there be such a place, then that be the house of God and the gate of Heaven. And from under the threshold of that house will go forth a river that will revive the weary world.'

The Radiance of His Glory

2011-07-11T08:17:00.003-04:00

Hebrews 1:3 says of Jesus 'He is the radiance of the glory of God.' That must be one of the most extraordinary verses in the Bible.

It means that guy, the homeless traveler from the middle of nowhere, the guy sitting worn out on the well in the bad part of town, the one walking to Jerusalem filled with frustration because of the faithlessness of His people, we have to look at Him and say 'there He goes, the radiance of the glory of God.' People looked at Him and their faces didn't shine, no one was hidden into a cave when He walked passed, in fact they cried out to Him and He healed them...He touched them with His hands and they lived.

He was humble and gentle. He rode on a donkey and washed people's feet. Him! The radiance of God's glory.

When I compare that to me, it's like a slap in the face, like i'm being woken up by cold water. If i was the radiance of the glory of God, i'd have an orchestra follow me around, i'd be turning houses into gold, i might even fly from place to place. From an eternal perspective, i am totally insignificant and yet i desire all the glory i can get from life. Jesus stands astride history, eternally significant, and He rode on a tiny donkey.

Christianity and Liberalism (6)

2011-07-09T08:45:00.002-04:00

This week is less a review of the latest chapter of Christianity and Liberalism, and more the things that it made me think as i was reading.

So far Machen has covered the differences in the beliefs between Christians and Liberals in four different areas; doctrine, God and Man, Christ and the Bible. It becomes clear reading this eighty year old book that then, as now, Liberals were keen to remove everything from faith that caused offence in the modern world. The problem is, when you worship a guy who got murdered, it's hard to lose the offence and keep the truth.

Piper says that the command 'you must be born again,' is either deluded or devastating, and Machen pre-empts that spirit in this chapter, 'salvation.' Why do Liberals and Christians differ on their view of salvation? At the core, because 'Christians believe man exists for God, Liberals believe God exists for man.' The problems that Machen deals with in this chapter are the same now as they were then. We're told that the orthodox view of the cross is too dependent on history, that the orthodox view of the cross makes God into a cold, distant monster and that the orthodox view of the cross produces too low a view of man.

Is the evangelical view of the cross too dependent on history? Well, it does depend on history. Our salvation depends on the death and resurrection of a guy who lived over two thousand years ago. If those things are not that matter of historical fact, then Christianity is the biggest waste of time known to man. These things don't negate present experience though. Real Christianity changes a man from the inside out, real Christianity is experienced in 2011AD because of what happened around 33AD. Ironically, the liberals hope for social change and the betterment of society can only take place when we have a fully orbed experience of the historical truth of Christianity.

The cross makes God a monster though doesn't it? It makes Him cold and uninterested until some sacrifice is made. A love that depends on a brutal sacrifice is not a love to be trust or enjoyed, so we're told. You have to conclude that the only way Liberals can believe these things it because they completely miss what the Bible teaches about God. God is love, everything that God does is motivated by love. Everything, including providing the sacrifice that brings His people back to Him. Who sent Jesus? God. Who is Jesus? God. The cross of Christ is a trinitarian movement only understood in those terms. If we miss what the Bible teaches about the Trinity, we'll never understand what happened at Calvary, and yes, God might look cold and distant. Embrace the spreading love of the Trinity, and the only response left to the cross will be thankful praise.

Finally, Liberals tell us that an orthodox view of the cross has too low a view of man. The truth is that the liberal view of the cross has too low a view of God. A God who is not holy dealing with man who is not that bad. Liberals will tell you the answer is inside and the problems outside, the Bible teaches exactly the opposite. This view doesn't crush man, but liberates him. We are liberated from constant failure to trust our ever holy substitute. We're liberated from dead morality to enjoy the freedom of grace. Much better.

Simply, liberal Christianity misses the joy of the truth. We meet Jesus in scripture, a fierce mountain lion, when we domesticate Him for the 21st century we lose Him altogether. Much better to be with the real Jesus, to live and speak for Him. He's not safe, but He is good.

What does it look like to read The Song as allegory?

2011-07-04T09:59:00.003-04:00

What does it mean to say that the Song of Songs is presented as an allegory? Does it mean that every image and suggestion in the poem is up for grabs? Does it mean that any reader at and time in any place can bring his meaning to the text and it be perfectly valid? No. It means that we read the Song with respect to it's genre. We read Exodus as history, we read Romans like a letter, and as we read those books, we make sure that our application of the text comes from that framework. We're not looking for an Egyptian jewish baby floating down the Nile, because Exodus is not a book of prophecy, we don't look for liturgical direction in Romans 1, because it's a letter. Just so with the Song.

The Song of Sons drips with Biblical allusion. It's as if every turn of phrase, every image the poet used she's just come across in her quiet times. It's not a throwaway poem accidentally placed in our Bibles, but a allegory that fits perfectly into the overall story of the Bible. Let me share my three favourite examples of this.

In chapter one we meet a woman who desires a deeper intimacy with her lover, who seems to be the King. The problem is she is 'dark', tanned, she's been out in the sun working because she's been disciplined by her brothers. She's been working for them and so she's not had time to work on her self. She is unworthy, tanned skin and an unkept vineyard. But she still describes herself as lovely. Why? Presumably because the King sees her as lovely. This dark, unworthy farm hand is called the most beautiful among women by the King. The King who has just been identified as the Son of David. The Davidic Shepherd/King invites his unworthy bride to His pasture for communion with Him. Amen.

In chapter 3 we meet the bride searching for her beloved. She describes him as 'the one who my soul loves,' or, according to Ellen Davis 'the One whom my whole-being loves.' Not much of a description is it. But who is it that Israel was supposed to love with all her soul, all her whole being? Deuteronomy 6:5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul and all your mind (all your whole being). Israel's whole being was to love the Lord. Everything about Israel was supposed to love her Lord. Have you seen Him who my soul loves? Yes, in the bush, the smoke and fire, the Temple, the cross, behind you in the garden Mary. There is the one whom Israel is to love with her whole soul. It's hard to believe our poet would quote from the most significant part of the Law, and not expect us to read her poem as an allegory.

Thirdly, Song 5:4 says 'My beloved put His hand to the latch, my heart was thrilled within me.' It seems simple enough doesn't it? I get excited when Rachel comes home too. Jeremiah 31:20 has God's heart yearning for Ephraim, for His people who He can not give up. God yearns for His beloved, and here, at last, the beloved yearns for Him as well. God comes to His people, and instead of worshipping the moon, or leaping over a threshold they are thrilled to see Him. Instead of ignoring Him, or running off with other lovers they wait, and they're thrilled. If we lose this, then there is nowhere in the Old Testament where God and His people are happily married. Nowhere do we meet a happy wife, enjoying the benefits and love of her husband, satisfied in his love. Is Israel is not thrilled when God Incarnate puts His hand to the latch, then we're left with a story devoid of high points, devoid of hope. And the Bible is a book full of hope.

Christianity and Liberalism (5)

2011-07-02T10:38:00.001-04:00

The next chapter of Christianity and Liberalism deals with the person of Jesus Christ. It's a bit of a surprise in some ways that Machen took five chapters to get here, but when dealing with a religion that looks like Christianity but isn't, there's a lot of ground work to do. Machen has covered the different approaches to doctrine, sin and the Bible, now, in what i think is the best chapter so far, he turns his attention to our bridegroom and his purpose and identity.

Why did Jesus Christ come? Is He the object of our faith or the example of our faith? Or, are we supposed to have faith in Jesus, or faith in God like Jesus had faith in God. There was no doubt that Jesus had a great and vibrant faith in God, no doubt that He is a great example of faith, but is that all He is? Machen says no, for two main reasons. The first being that Jesus teachings and His person are totally caught up in one another. He taught about Himself. How great of an example can a person be when he thinks he'll judge the universe. We think of Lewis's mad, bad, or God here. Jesus never intended to leave us wondering whether or not He was a great teacher. Secondly, what a discouraging example He is. Did the Lord come to love or to leave us eternally discouraged. Seeing Jesus as an example is like a sunday league centre forward imaging he's failed if he doesn't play like Wayne Rooney. Christ has to be the object our our faith.

Machen describes Jesus as a 'supernatural' person. That is we have no Jesus left if we, in liberal fashion, strip Him of His miracles. He's be easier to believe in, but there would nothing left worth believing in. Christianity must accept the full blooded Christ of the Bible, Jesus exactly as He is presented to us in the Gospel if we want a faith worth proclaiming. Who wants another mere teacher? Who needs someone who taught some good stuff and got killed. Machen says that if we make Jesus a 'natural' man, He still remains the fairest flower of humanity, but He has been cut off from His root.

The question ultimately becomes, 'what do we think of sin?' Is sin a bad habit that can be fixed by example and exhortation? Or is sin a deep rooted sickness that must be extracted by a Doctor/Saviour with His scalpel/Spirit? If we need an example, no wonder we reject the supernatural and make Jesus and example. But we must cling to the supernatural, there is no Christ, and therefore no Saviour without them. This is where Christianity and liberalism diverge.

Machen beings his conclusion:

Reject the miracles and you have in Jesus the fairest flower of humanity who made such an impression among His followers that after His death they could not believed he had perished but experienced hallucinations in which they thought they saw Him risen from the dead; accept the miracles and you have a saviour who came voluntarily into this world for our salvation, suffered for our sins on the cross and was raised by the power of God and whoever lives to make intercession for us. The difference between these two views is the difference between two highly diverse religions.

Which would you rather? Which do we need?

Lovers, Lebanon and Pomegranates

2011-06-30T08:26:00.006-04:00

Continuing to think through a Christocentric reading of the Song, here are the latest thoughts (not all my own) to have tumbled free.

Pomegranates

4:9-5:1 seems to be a fairly simple exchange of complements between lovers. Until we notice in 5:1 that the groom ' ate my honeycomb with my honey and drank my wine with my milk,' which is strange because 1) The bride never mentioned these items as being in the garden and 2) Hello land flowing with milk and honey. Again we're left to say 'the poet couldn't possibly have written that without expecting us to think...' Also, of all the wonderful things mentioned in the bride's garden, only one is actually found in Israel; pomegranates. Where are they most remarkably found? The 'most striking feature to greet visitors on their way inot the temple was a lattice work of 200 bronze (pomegranates). This garden is the promised land, flowing with milk and honey, it's the temple full of pomegranates, the Garden of Eden was the first Temple where God and man met...who are we supposed to think these lovers are? That's what is meant by 'the Song is presented as an allegory.'

Lebanon

4:8 is hard regardless of how we approach it. If it were an invitation to Lebanon, it would make sense, as Lebanon was viewed as a romantic paradise, if we were reading Isaiah or Jeremiah it would make sense because to be called away from Lebanon would be to be called away from idol worship. But it's the Song inviting us away from Lebanon. Jenson thinks that we're missing a key, and he's probably right, but what about the end of verse 8, what about the dens of lions and the mountains of leopards? Perhaps the poet is saying 'it is good to be engaged, good to be with your lover here, good to be in Lebanon, the seat of Solomon's splendour, but there are still lions and leopards here, the ultimate marriage, to the true and better Son of David will be better and safer. Maybe.

Lovers

One common objection to this reading of the Song is that it makes God a prude. We don't like to think about God talking about sex like this, so we make it about the church. I want to suggest the opposite argument. We make it about human love, because we're uncomfortable with thinking about God's love in erotic terms. We don't like to think about God talking about sex like this, so we make it about human love. But if the Church really is the Bride of Christ, and if we are to understand human marriage like this, then we should expect God to desire his Church in this way. We should expect to see eros in the Bible as well as agape, and there's a whole bunch of eros in the Song. The church is both bride and sister. The love between Christ and the Church is a 'one flesh' love, because it's a marriage, and it's a love that is not contingent on their behavior, because they are brother and sister. Agape and eros, and we should expect both to be exposed in the Bible.

I'm starting to understand what it means that the Song is the most Biblical of books. It's Biblical because it's about God's love for His people. A passionate, jealous, unbreakable love. It's Biblical because it talks about the security of the Church in her lovers embrace. It's Biblical because it is brimming with allusions to the rest of scripture. It's Biblical because it understands human love. It understands that human love should be wonderful, affectionate, passionate and strong. Ultimately though, love between a man and love hangs on love between Christ and the Church. The Song tells us that this is the foundational love, this is the love that never fails.

Christianity and Liberalism (4)

2011-06-28T17:02:00.002-04:00

Since i'm already a little bit behind, and for the sake of time, i just wanted to share with you my favourite quote from this weeks (or actually last weeks) chapter of Christianity and Liberalism. Chapter four talks about the role of the Bible. The Bible and experience, the word of man and the Word of God. Machen tells us that the Bible is the root from which the flower of Christian experience grows.

In the conclusion, he compares faith in the Word of God to the scepticism that dependence on man's word produces.

'Let it not be said that dependence on a book is a dead or an artificial thing. The Reformation of the sixteenth century was based upon a book, and yet it set the world aflame. Dependence on man's word would be slavish, but dependence on God's Word is life. Dark and gloomy would be the world if we were left to our own devices and had no blessed word of God. The Bible, to the Christian, is no burdensome law, but the very magna carta of Christian obedience.'

Song 8:6-7

2011-06-28T07:15:00.002-04:00

I think this was my favourite part of the Song to spend some time in. Lets not lose the beauty of it, the depth of it's imagery about our relationship with God. There are heights to be climbed here that give such an amazing view of the rest of scripture. It might take more work, but the views are great!

What should we do with chapter eight of the Song? It’s lack of flow in our Bibles is not cleared up by going back to the original language. Jenson says it appears as either ‘a repository of an editors frustration,’ somewhere to place all the left over parts of poetry that fits or ‘that they are dialogue for a drama or liturgy.’ He goes with the former idea, but whichever it is, it does not unduly effect our reading of these two verses, regarded as the climax of the Song.

Poem and Man

The woman requests to be the ‘seal’ of her lover. In our day of writing and typing we’ve lost some of the significance of what this means. In the days when all handwriting looked more or less the same, a mans seal was the sure mark of his identity. No one could be sure he was who he said he was without his seal. This is no simile, the woman wants to be the seal of the man, she wants to be intrinsic to his identity. She wants them to be ‘one flesh.’ But how can this be a reasonable, or even realistic request, how can one person be indispensible to the very identity of another?

The end of verse 6 and 7 give the womans reason. These are classic Hebrew prose that could be lifted straight from the Psalms or the Proverbs. Strong and fierce go together, as do death and grave. What about jealousy and love though? Is love jealous? You’d better believe that real love is jealous. I, the LORD your God am a jealous God. (Ex 20:5)

Death is absolute. It can not be negotiated with, and takes a man when it pleases. So too love, argues our woman. Her claim of love, her claim of ‘sealship’ is not up for discussion. The grave is fierce and will not give up those whom it claims, so too jealous love. All this merely explains the woman’s claim it doesn’t justify it. We know that love, no matter how strong, loses to death in the end. The woman’s claims only make sense if, in some way, love can defeat death. Only! Her claims are too audacious to be merely human, the scope of the poet is too broad to be captured by a man and a woman. Here the poet sees a love that will overcome death. Not a human love, a love deeper, wider, fiercer and more jealous than death. The poet talks about a love that can not be undone by either death, or natural disaster or finances. We know from bitter experience that this can’t be a human love. This claim to love is too much to be human, as is the love that is the foundation for the whole song. Again, any human application hangs on the divine.

God and Man

Jenson suggests that a second look at the Hebrews yields the intended allegory for these verses. Death is not only the taker of life, but also the proper name for the Canaanite God that Baal, the fertility god battles with. Sheol is grave, but also the catch all name for the Judaic underworld. Flame is also the name of the Canaanite god of pestilence. Love is the flame of flames, which this god is not. The ‘many waters’ that do not defeat love are another reminder of the Jews’ relationship with the sea, a place of chaos and carnage. Simply, verse 6 and 7 take us back into the battle between the LORD and the false gods of Canaan.

The love these verses speak of can only be the victorious love of Israel’s God. The woman as Israel says here ‘we can not be separated by death or disaster because of your love, which is better than that of the false god’s.’ The fact that jealous love defeats death is central to the Old Testament. Jealous is a personal name of God (Ex 34:14). We may not like the idea of a jealous God, but the fact is that our salvation and sanctification relies on it. Here we celebrate God’s victory over the false god’s of the nations: death, disaster, chaos and material gain.

Our thoughts must naturally be drawn to the resurrection. Here a jealous God walks out of the grave for us all, here we become His seal. Jesus died for us, we rise with Him, in fact He can not complete the final resurrection without us! Bernard of Clairvaux says ‘He loved us before we existed, and went beyond that to love us when we resisted.’ Jesus will not share us with any other god, we are His seal and He will jealously defend us.

This is utterly wonderful isn’t it? The climax of the Song is the climax of the passion. Jealous love conquers the grave for His bride, who becomes an eternal part of who He is. See, yet again, the depth of Christ’s love for the Church, see again the depths of His commitment to His bride. Rejoice and bathe, Christian, in the love that God has for us, a love not to be overcome by disaster or even death. A lover who will not watch us go into the night. Compare this with Liberal love, a love that has God letting us go. No thank you, give me the jealous love that keeps me. Give me the jealous God of the Bible.

Woman and Man

What more can be said? We must compare the two types of human love, giving, and desire. The two types of love that found the Song, and indeed the Bible.

Love is giving, but whatever we give to our lover, we are the greatest gift, as God is the Gospel. Love is rioted in desire, but the only way we do not consume our lover is to plug into the story of the Gospel.

If it were not for Christ’s death on the cross, we might be well advised to steer clear of love. Love will causes us to give ourselves away and cause us to consume another, antithetical to a post modern way of thinking. We remember Christ’s love. At the cross we see Christ’s gift and desire leading us into the grave and out again. On the first Easter we see jealous love, giving love and desiring love working in perfect harmony. The passion means we can risk giving ourselves to our lover and taking them wholly for ourselves. Here we meet death, but only death as the portal to new life. Where ever love occurs, it only occurs because our Trinitarian God and His love for sinners makes it possible. With that knowledge we can sing the Song and joyfully give ourselves to another, making another a part of who we are, safe in the knowledge that all we are doing is following in the footsteps of the One who has rescued us to life, through exactly this kind of death.

There is much richness here isn’t there? Good, deep, physical, Gospel love flows though these verses. This beautiful picture of human love is only possible because of God’s love for sinners. The human application is only possible because of the Christocentric one. In that we rejoice and love. Human love will sometimes scare us, often times swallow us whole, but that’s ok. It’s just an echo of the God who was swallowed whole by love, only to begin the wedding preparations three days later.

Five Goals I'll Never Forget

2011-06-27T08:18:00.003-04:00

On Friday #onegoalillneverforget was a trending topic on Twitter. I don't know how many goals i've Wycombe Wanderers score, it's one of those things i'm always meaning to sit down and work out, along with the games i've seen them win and the grounds i've seen them play at. Maybe one day. Predictably, i couldn't narrow it down to one goal, so here are five goals i'll never forget, with some honourable mentions...

Paul Emblen, Lincoln City (a) Division 2, May 1999

How will anyone ever forget the run that Sanchez took us on towards the end of the 98/99 season? It's a shame it all ended so bitterly, but from the distance of a decade I can look back and enjoy what he achieved. After we'd been to lost Reading at the end of March, we were (i think) 3 points adrift at the bottom of the league, and five points from safety. And then...we started to win, and win away from home, all the more remarkable. We went to Bristol Rovers, Macclesfield, Wrexham and Manchester City and picked up twelve points, as well as a vital draw at Stoke. A nervy, horrible, draw at home with Blackpool set up a midweek game at home to play-off chasing Wigan before our last day trip to Lincoln. Time has probably improved our display, but i don't think i've ever seen us play better, and we won 2-1 from being 1-0 down. So to Lincoln, knowing a win would keep us up. I don't remember much about the game. We hit the post, should have had a penalty, but this, i remember like it was yesterday. Sean Devine takes a pass wide left, clips in a cross, in one go paying off his transfer fee, and there's Paul Emblen rising to meet the ball...the net bulges, and the 2000 Wycombe fans behind the far goal go crazy. We'd done it, we'd escaped relegation, and Paul Emblen was written into Wycombe Wanderers history.

Steve Brown, Colchester United (h) Division 2 April 2000

For reasons too involved to cover here, ColU are the enemy. And when you're fifteen years old, beating them means everything, especially since they had cheated us out of a point at Layer Road earlier that season. Mr Wycombe Wanderers, Keith Ryan, playing out of position as a striker had given us a two goal lead, when late, late in the game the ball breaks perfectly to Steve Brown, 25...30 yards out. It seems like the whole ground yells 'hit it!' and he does, and it flies sweetly in the net in front of the Wycombe fans. Pick that out son, Wycombe 3 ColU 0, very nice indeed.

Steve Brown, Wimbledon (h) FA Cup 5th Round February 2001

Before 2001 we'd never got passed the 3rd round of the FA Cup. Then we beat Grimsby in a replay, then we knocked off Wolves in round 4, and here we are in February, when i'm supposed to be thinking about my GCSE's, all i can think about is this game. We down 2 nil, and to be honest, i switched off a little bit. Started to enjoy the occasion, enjoy being in the FA Cup in February. And then Michael Simpson scored, and fifteen minutes later, we get an indirect free kick, six yards out. Brownie drills it, it comes back out to Chris Vinnicome who gently plays it back to Brownie, unmarked at the far post who touches it in. 2-2, and we're still alive. Here's the special thing about that goal though; Steve Brown was offside. It wasn't even close. He was offside, i was offside...the whole town was offside. The linesman mumbled something about 'phases of play'a rule that i haven't off heard before or since. I'll never forget that goal...or what happened next.

Paul McCarthy, Wimbledon (a) FA Cup 5th Round Replay, February 2001

When we left for this game i was fifteen, by the time i got home i was 16. It was that sort of night. If there has ever been a more magical, dramatic game in our history...well there simply can't have been. Thousands of words could be written about shoot outs, last minute penalty saves, missing the kick off, as many Wycombe fans as Wimbledon fans, sendings off, Jason Cousins roaring celebration as the game ended three hours after it started. Right at the end of extra time, one goal behind, one last chance, the ball comes across to Dannie Bulman on the edge of Wimbledon's box, he swipes at it and it breaks perfectly for Macca to slide home. He was a centre back, so who knows what he was doing there. It was one of those times when your brain can not handle what your eyes are telling it. I grabbed my dad and just started screaming. It was all i could do. It still gives me goosebumps.

Keith Ryan, Liverpool (Villa Park) FA Cup Semi Final, April 2001.

As hard as i try, i just can't remember Roy Essandoh's goal against Leicester, the goal that got us here. I remember Paul McCarthy's opener, i remember the aftermath of Roy's goal, but not the goal itself. Do Rhino at Villa Park it is. What an odd day. Some people still call it the greatest day in our history, and maybe it was. But we still lost a semi final i was sure we were going to win. There were 19500 Wycombe fans at Villa Park that day. Just to give that some context we took 127 Wycombe fans to Swansea next Tuesday night for a Division 2 game. Yeh, 126 plus me. After an even first half, Liverpool has taken a heartbreaking two goal lead. A long ball comes towards to Holte End, Guy Whittingham (or maybe Essandoh) flicks it on, and Rhino balloons it over Westerveld to pull one back. Maybe we can still do this, hope is cruel thing to give to a football supporter. To this day i'm glad it was Keith that scored. He was one of the nicest men in pro sports, always happy to spend a few minutes talking to a star struck fan in Wycombe High Street. He deserved it, and maybe one day i'll think about that day without getting upset.

Honourable Mentions

Dave Carroll, Bury (a), Division 2, April 2001.

Dave is the greatest player in the history of the game, we were just lucky he played for us. This was his 100th goal for us.

Jermaine Easter, Chelsea (h) League Cup Semi Final first leg, January 2007

The League Cup run was remarkable, as was drawing at home with Chelsea. I remember this goal taking forever to cross the line, but it was manic when it did!

Dave Carroll, PNE (Wembley) Division 3 play off final, May 1994

I don't really remember this goal, but i should. Dave beats three or four Preston men, (beats? more like he turns them inside out and back again) and fires us into the first lead of the game.

Song 5:9-16

2011-06-24T18:38:00.000-04:00

Last time we saw the groom, the voice of God, praising His bride. Today, in 5:9-16 we see the bride return the favour.

Poem and Man

This poem is a clear answer to the perhaps slightly aggressive question asked in verse 8, ‘what is your beloved more than any other man?’ Why is this guy making you love-sick? Surely a question that many women have asked of their friends down the years. The bride responds with beautiful poetry… He is ruddy, he is radiant, he glows. Every part of his body is the ideal, the perfection. Among ten thousand men there is no one like him. We can pause here to observe some horrible analogizing to try and give the Song a more modern sexuality. One commentator has concluded that ‘his body is polished ivory (v14) is a simile for ‘his member is a tusk of ivory.’ As amusing as it is awful, and proof that not all poor analogy belongs in one camp.

Interestingly ‘his legs are alabaster columns set on bases of gold,’ (v15). It’s as if the bride is pointing to the ideal statue of manhood and saying ‘this is the man I love, this is the man that makes me sick!’ More than the physical, the man’s mouth is sweet, his speech is lovely and perfect and alluring. He’s no quiet strong man, but he lavishes praise on his bride, as we’ve seen. Finally, the groom is perfect in love and company, as a lover and friend, their attraction is mental as well as physical.

God and Man

Gregory of Nyssa says ‘all these similes of beauty do not point to the unseen and ungraspable things of deity, but rather to what was revealed in the history of salvation, when God the Word was seen on earth…and put on human nature.’ Jesus is the most beautiful, the most distinguished among then thousand men. Beautiful in love, in purpose, in righteousness according to the law.

The church sings the praises of her Groom. Last time we saw that it was impossible to love Christ but not the church. This time we see why, the church is the earthly organ that communicates her love of Christ. Jesus wants His bride because it is His bride that manifests, shares and communicates to Him, and to the world her love to Him. There is terrible analogy here as well, Honorius of Autun has the ivory body as referring to Jesus ‘belt of chastity.’ Not much better than the opposite alternative really!

Jesus Christ, God Incarnate, the man who was God, is the desire and delight of the church. In her right state she can not get enough of Him, and her delight issues forth in praise that answers the question of verse 9, ‘what makes your God so special?’ The church can not help but join the Trinitarian spreading goodness as she communicates God to the world. This is the role of the church, not to entertain, not to provide a social scene, not even just to do good works, but to commend Jesus to a world that needs Him. The world says ‘there’s nothing special, divine or wise in your God,’ like the bride in verse 15 pointing to the statue of the ideal man, we must point to the cross and show the world the ideal God. He is all we need.

We must not, again, over look the physical nature of both the Song and the way of salvation. Our faith doesn’t rest in what we feel or believe, but in real historical events that happened. Just as the bride’s man has a body, so does our Savior. He gives us bread and wine, and covers us with water to declare physically the Gospel. The sacraments, rightly understood, do away with the need for ‘Gospel drama’ forever. God knows we need physical presentations, so He’s given them to us!

Woman and Man

Jenson says ‘the woman provides analogies of Israel’s and the church’s devotion to the Lord by her adoration of his body and by her hanging on his word.’ Again, the Christocentric reading of the Song gives us permission, gives us a vocabulary, to express our love for one another. It sets the guidelines and guardrails firmly in place to express our feelings for our spouses.

How? Where love between a man and a woman is not at some point grasped as a reflection of, and a part of the story about, God’s love for His people there is much danger. We love (anything at all) because He first loved us. Without reference to God human love either becomes idolatrous or rife with hopeless rhetoric. Without God we either do that or we end up treating the object of our affections as a deity. Which is obviously idolatry plain and simple. Human love, outside of the love of God is groundless, and eventually will be found to be so.

Without God as the reference point for our human affections, all that is left is a gaping void. Our hearts are restless until we find rest in Him. Human love is a divine gift, but without reference to the Giver, it will destroy us from the inside out. Love is hard, and misunderstood without God, and so we have a multi billion dollar sex industry. What everyone wants is love and purpose, that’s what we were designed for. That’s what we find in God alone, but the pursuit of these things apart from God will destroy us.

The Song knows this, and it is not so cruel as to cut us off from all joy and hope by cutting off human love from the love which it reflects.

Song 4:1-7

2011-06-23T14:31:00.001-04:00

Poem and Man

There are no problems finding the theme in 4:1-7. The man’s theme is the beauty of his bride (v1). Perhaps her teeth are like a ‘flock of shorn ewes…and not one among them has been lost,’ (v3) because they are all there. Probably a rare thing when most tooth problems would have been dealt with by simply taking them out! If there ever was a ‘Tower of David,’ (v4) it’s been totally lost to us today. It’s probably used to communicate grandeur and importance, again beauty, rather than anything else. There were no ‘mountains of myrrh’ or ‘hills of frankincense,’ they had to be imported. We assume from the general progression down the bride’s body that this refers either to the stomach or the ‘modestly covered’ parts of the body (2 Cor 12:23). We notice though that the poet shies away from overt sexual references, because the theme is beauty. The man loves his bride, sings over her, delights in her (Zeph 3:17). He’s not ashamed of the physicality of his attraction.

God and Man

The voice of the man must be the direct address of God, if we follow an allegorical reading. But this poses a difficult question, ‘does, or to what extent does, God desire us, or His Church?’ We agree with the New Testament’s teaching that God loves us even as we are sinners. Filthy and with nothing to attract us to Him. He justifies (beautifies) us even though He knows we are neither just nor beautiful. Does this reading of the Song suggest then that God loves us because of something in us He finds lovely? If we read it that way we must either throw away the allegory, or throw away the Song.

So what is the answer? Well, the answer is the God is not a lump of divine stuff. He is Trinity. There is no difference between what God thinks and what God says. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was God. We hear a difference between the beauty attributed to us, and the beauty we do not have and we hear a problem. God’s Word, however, is both with the creator and is the creator. There is a deep, rich, wise complexity in God. God’s very Word tells us that His Bride is good and beautiful and righteous, and if we struggle to comprehend that, then the problem is not with God. The Church wears white to her wedding, not because she is pure and sinless, but she has been mad, pure and sinless. Jesus labours to present us spotless and without blemish having washed us with His Word! (Eph 5:26-27). We are very dark but invited to the pasture (Song 1:5, 8). We are simul iujust et peccator.

Christian friend, see the church, with all her problems, all her difficulties, all her failings, as God does, as beautiful. See the church as the bride perfect for her big day. It’s easy, and trendy, to bash the church and talk down to her and on her. Imagine how you’d feel if someone talked about your wife in that way? They love Jesus but not the Church? Impossible.

Woman and Man

The human body is beautiful. Ah, but we only think that because we are human. Really? Show me a non human and his discourse on the ugliness of the human body. Even when the connection between beauty and sex is broken, ignored and disfigured, we must not follow the ‘baleful hermeneutic’ of much modern and post modern thought that trashes the human body. This is just blasphemy, and most of that intentional. God looked at man and woman and said it was very good. How dare we disagree? Disfigured by sin? Yes. Sinful to the core? Yes. But created beautiful.

Beauty, according to Immanuel Kant is ‘the unlaborious coincidence of the actual and the ideal.’ Beauty is a kind of realized eschatology. It shows us what it ought to be by what it is, it gives us a glimpse of the ‘present glow of the sheer goodness that will be present at the end.’ Much like CS Lewis’ ‘stabs of joy,’ when we see and (almost) feel beauty, it’s as if for a moment we’ve been transported, and the only way we realize it’s happening is when it’s over. One day it will never end. Regarding human beauty for it’s own sake is at the same time a rest from, and a refreshment, of sexual desire. Sexual attraction is a gift from one spouse to another and from God to both. It is sacred and pure. Sex can be used in a multitude of ghastly, sinful, life destroying packages, but we must never shy away from what it actually is, and who thought of it first.

Jenson concludes: ‘if God can find us beautiful, that is the least we can do for the one we love.’

To conclude, we must note that this application between husband and wife actually hangs on the allegorical reading, and say with all our hearts ‘amen!’

Song 2:1-7

2011-06-22T14:47:00.002-04:00

Having finally conquered the wireless internet here, i though i'd share the fruit of yesterday morning's study in Song 2:1-7. More throughout the several days hopefully!

In these studies on the Song, greatly helped by Robert Jenson, I’ll follow his presentation of the material. How the poem progresses, what it tells us about our relationship with God, and what it tells us about human love. Basically: Poem and man, God and man, man and woman.

Poem and Man

The opening verses of chapter 2 are an exchange of compliments. We have to assume that the ESV has the speaking parts right and say that the man compares himself to a rose in verse 1. He then looks at his bride and sees her as the only thing of beauty in his eyes, the only lily in the brambles.

She returns these compliments in verse 3. To her, the whole world is made up of barren trees, he is the only fruitful one. He is the only one who provides what she needs. The second half of verse 3 and verse 4 have to be read as talking about physical desire and fulfillment. Without ascribing meaning to every jot and tittle we see desire and fulfillment plainly spoken of. The man takes her to some sort of banqueting hall, somewhere designed for a party, and with his banners, lets everyone know how he loves her. She is so overwhelmed by this love that she needs sustenance. A happy, fulfilled scene greets us in chapter 2.

I don’t think the poet meant this intimate scene to be viewed publically, so we have to read verses 6 and 7 as happening later on, as a memory being told in the present tense. What the bride says to her ladies in waiting is another question. Either don’t wake up my husband until he’s ready, or don’t wake me up and ruin this physical bliss, or don’t fall in love too soon. And how is this vow made by gazelles and does of the field? Jenson suggests that this is perhaps one further step of analogy removed from the later Jewish practice of swearing by the temple, or the gold or the Torah. Again, as we are reading a poem, we can simply enjoy the beautiful imagery if we want to.

God and Man

Bernard of Clairvaux says ‘uniquely among the trees of the forest, the Lord Jesus is a tree who bares fruit, and that according to His humanity.’ Amen. Jesus came, with a body, to serve. We worship and physical God, Jesus had hands and a nose and a mouth. He came to serve us and to save us, he fruit is borne to us according to His humanity. But was Israel ever lovesick for her Lord? We have to remember that the prophets spoke ‘not only for the Lord to His people, but for the people to the Lord.’ (Jenson) The first returned Jews were lovesick for a Temple, the Jews in the diaspora were sick for any sort of Temple.

Origen, living after the incarnation of Christ, brings us even closer. He says ‘when (the church) has been pierced through and through by the loveable javelin of knowing Him, she can only long for Him day and night…and have no inclination or desire…for anything except Him.’ This is a wonderful picture of what our love for Jesus should be like. One day in His house is better than a thousand elsewhere, He alone is the eternal thirstquencher. Once we’ve been pierced by His gentle darts, nothing else seems as good, as sweet, as satisfying.

When we are close to Him, in the banqueting hall, intimate with Him, nothing else will ever be the same again. And our hearts long for that closeness again, as a bride for her husband.

Which bring us to the embrace, and makes us ask ourselves ‘could faithful Old Testament believers be happy with the idea that then Lord had a body?’ Well, if we throw out all the physical metaphors and similies of God in the Old Testament, we really throw out most of what the Old Testament says about God. Even at the start God walked in the cool of the day. For Christians the incarnation settles the matter. The New Testament teaches that we are the body of Christ, and that He lives in us. I think all of us have a suspicion that matter is bad and spirit is good. Something that we’ve picked up from living in the 21^st century. The Song, with it’s visual and vibrant depictions of our bridegroom, dismisses such notions, however. God embraces His Church, depicting this embrace with the metaphor of physical love. And it is good.

Let us long to be sick with the love of our Saviour, let us place ourselves where we can pierced with those lovely darts, let us pray for a heart that sees nothing lovely anywhere else.

Woman and Man.

Jenson follows on from the last point: it’s hard for the reader to escape ‘how very bodily that love is which the Song proposes as an analogy for the love between God and His people. We might have the idea that our love would be better if it was not bodily, but the Song does not agree. The heart may be where human love flows from, but the heart issues through the actions of the lips and hands. The lovers in the Song are ‘incurable romantics’ who have escaped the modern notion that any unconditional declarations of love and foolish, and that any romantic notions must be hidden in layers of irony and pastiche. And good for them, we have to say. Easy for us to observe then, not only how scripture addresses the whole of life, but how scripture speaks to what most people would regard as something deeply private. And just how far we’ve fallen from the ideals of the Bible. We must, it seems, maintain the value of impractical and historically contingent love. Just the sort of love that God has for His people. A love that gets in the way, a love that often makes no sense, but a love that is true and real and deep. Our eyes of faith should see through the atheistic attempts to be ‘cool,’ and to trust our romantic impulses.

Simply, we learn here, to love well, because God loves well, not to fear or look down on the physical, because it was that which God came to save.

The Wilds

2011-06-20T06:23:00.001-04:00

Rachel and I, along with some children and parents from our church, are headed here for a week, for 'Junior Boot Camp,' so blogging oppotunitoes will be at a minimum. Do pray for us whiel we're there, i'm looking forward to time with my wife, with our church people, and doing some more work on the Song!

What is a Plain Reading of the Song?

2011-06-18T10:20:00.005-04:00

Observation, observation, observation. Three keys to good Bible reading. Find the meaning of the text, go via Corinth, take off your twenty first century glasses before you apply. These are things we must do with every book, and every page of the Bible. There's no gnostic secrets hidden in the Word. Jesus reveals Himself to us through prayer and study.

The plain meaning of the Song is clearly the celebration of erotic love right? Anything else is 'allegorical' (boo, hiss). But what if a plain reading of the Song invites the allegory, or better, spiritual reading of the Song? That is Robert Jenson's conclusion in the introduction to his 'Interpretations' commentary on the Song. Most the thoughts that follow (the good ones) are his.

What's the history of this book? Well our author is clearly immersed in canonical literature, which means that much of it must have existed as it does today when the book was written. This may exclude authorship by Solomon (which also excludes the idea that it was written specifically about one of Solomon's weddings, contra some of the wilder allegorical interpretations) but it doesn't have to. Surely the wisest man in the world would have known his Pentateuch? If, however, we can rule out Solomon as the author it means that Solomon takes on prophetic significance as the 'Son of David.'

So when we read the Song we see a series of love poems between a man and a woman, and most modern commentators leave it as that. But we must consider that every other book of the Bible tells the story of God's love for His people. God is love, after all. The Song presents a 'theology of human sexuality,' but much more than that, if we take it on it's own terms. It was the unanimous opinion of Jewish and pre modern Christian thought that these poems belong in the Bible because it communicates the love of God for His people, and vice versa.

Doesn't reading the Song allegorically squash the original meaning if the Song? Aren't we reading back into scripture? Martin Luther answers that question talking about Aaron. When we say that Aaron is a type of Christ, we don't mean that there wasn't an important, historical figure called Aaron. We mean that the historical, important Aaron tells us something of the why and the what of Christ. Furthermore, it's one thing to beware allegorization of historical narrative, quite another when the text we read seems to be presented for allegorization, as with the Song. If the Church Fathers were right, then the allegorical reading is in fact the plain sense meaning. Parts of the Song are in fact, much more plausible, as a theological allegory.

We must remember that we are dealing with poetry, and so need to be on the look out for choices of simile and metaphor, allusions to the rest of Scripture, and plays on words. There are times when it seems like 'the text itself is prodding us to theological reading. We are compelled to think that 'the poet can hardly of written... without expecting the reader to think of...' It seems that whoever made the decision to collect the Song with the canon intended it to be read theologically. Otherwise it's place in the canon makes no sense. A theological reading is appropriate if the text fits into the account of the Lord and His people as told by the rest of Scripture.

As we read the Song we must observe how the story itself progresses, we must then imbibe the metaphors, similes, word plays and allusions which take us into the story of God and His people. We must observe what we can learn about the beauty of human sexuality, but not stop there. We must remember that God came as flesh and bone, that the sacraments of the church are physical, and these physical truths from our physical world are filled with and given meaning by the theology behind them.

Just like the Song itself!

He Is Our Only True Good (Song 1:1-8)

2011-06-16T18:21:00.002-04:00

Spend fifty minutes enjoying Daniel Newman preach the Gospel from Song of Songs chapter one. And if you haven't got fifty minutes, watch from eight till about fourteen, where Newman describes and defends a 'spiritual' reading of the Song, or read his notes, here.

Sermon: Song of Songs 1:1-8 - Dr. Daniel Newman from Canon Wired on Vimeo.

Christianity and Liberalism (3)

2011-06-16T08:22:00.002-04:00

God and man. Get your belief about these two in line with the truth, and we're well on our way to believing and enjoying Christianity. Get your belief about these two wrong and you're sailing your ship towards Port Liberalism.

God and man is the title of chapter three in Machen's 'Christianity and Liberalism.' This week our author his work proper, showing the differences between what Christianity is and what liberalism teaches. Tozer said that what we think about God is the most important thing in our lives. CS Lewis (i think) said that it what God thinks about us that is the most important thing in our lives. Given the truth in both those statements, it makes sense that Machen starts here.

Just Know God

Machen says that Liberalism makes it's first mistake when it seperates knowing about God (doctrine or theology or call it what you will) with experiencing God. We need no theory, only practice. No creed but Christ perhaps. But if Christianity loses any doctrinal foundation and is based on 'what I believe in my heart,' it loses all it's claims to moral absolutes.

Just Know Jesus?

Machen then points his guns at preaching that says we just need to 'be acquainted with God only through Jesus.' He says that this belief has a look of loyalty to our Lord, but misses the point. For this statement to make sense we must have some idea of what we mean by God, we must get to know God the same way Jesus appeared to know Him whilst on earth... in the Scriptures. 'How profound was our Lord's use of prophets and psalmists.'

We Must Know Man

One of the loftiest ideals in the Liberal preaching is the universal fatherhood of God and it's corollary the universal brotherhood of man. Liberal-anity claims these beliefs while still claiming Jesus of Nazareth as their own. What does Machen say? 'It is very strange how intelliget persons can speak in this way...For the plain fact is that the universal Fatherhood of God formed no part whatever of Jesus teaching.'

We must hold a high view of the holiness and otherness of God. The God revealed in Jesus yes, but the God revealed in the Scriptures. The God who has absolutes. Having spent some time with Richard Sibbes recently, it's hard not to compare Liberal christianity with his joy soaked affectionate reading of the Bible. Liberalism is so cold, so pale and empty. Like an uncooked egg white when we're offered our choice of Cadbury's finest. It exists purely to impress the world and make Christianity seem more 'acceptable' but all it does is strip us of joy, peace and certainty. Much better to come to the lovely, robust, red blooded Christ of the Scriptures and find life in Him.

He Stands and Knocks (Song of Songs 5)

2011-06-15T12:50:00.003-04:00

Jesus knocks on the door of the church that has forgotten Him. They're busy with programmes, meetings, and the 'stuff' of church life, and it looks good, but they've forgotten about Him. They're sleepy, but Jesus is gracious. They're not missing Him, but He's missing them. This gracious and sad picture comes right out of Revelation 3...and Song of Songs 5:2:

My beloved is knocking. 'Open to me my sister, my love, my dove, my perfect one.'

In our sleepy state, lulled by sin, by the cares of the world, by the distractions of pleasure, we may fall asleep, but wonderfully, Jesus comes early in the morning (His head wet with dew) and knocks, so that we might answer. How does Jesus knock? In seven ways, according to Richard Sibbes sermon 'Knowing the voice of Jesus.'

1) Jesus condescends to speak to us in a way we can understand.

Sometimes when you're at the door, knocking is enough, sometimes we need to shout as well. Jesus speaks to us the way we need to hear. He speaks by His Word and His works. He speaks by the benefits and mercies of His love and by His correcting us.

2) Jesus speaks that we should open to Him.

Jesus doesn't come for His amusement or because He's got nothing better to do, Jesus comes and knocks because He wants us to open the door. He wants in our hearts as He has in Heaven.

3) Jesus uses examples to knock at our hearts

Other people are God's speeches to us. The good examples of God's grace at work, the bad of God's justice. Why is church involvement so important? Because Jesus uses people around you to knock at your heart.

4) Jesus uses His ministers to knock at our hearts.

What a privilege i have twice a week to open God's Word with a room full of teenagers. What a privilege i have every week to sit under great preaching. preachers are God's gift to the church to stir and awaken the affections, to move our mind and our heart towards Him. What an awesome responsibility.

5) The Spirit goes with the Word.

And my prayer every Sunday morning and Wednesday night? Father send your Spirit to remove the veil when your Word is preached. The Word works by the Spirit, the Spirit enlivens the Word. The preacher can not bring about the new birth, only the Word blown by the Spirit.

6) Jesus has given us a conscience.

Sibbes calls our conscience 'a little god within us to do His office.' What is our conscience but a gracious gift? Is there a better feeling than to see our affections changed and our conscience rescued from the dead works of which we are now ashamed? Augustine said 'God spoke in my and i knew it not.' He means the conscience, together with the Spirit stirred him up to leave his sinful life.

7) The Trinity comes.

Sibbes says 'when Christ knocks, all three persons may be said to do in.' God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. When Christ beseeches the Father beseeches, when Christ stoops the Father stoops. Jesus is sent and does all by His Father's command and commission. Father, Son and Holy Spirit knock at our hearts and say 'open my love, my dove, my perfect one,' but Christ especially by His Spirit, because it is His office.

Buy The Sunshine of the Gospel, a collection of Sibbes sermons edited by Dave Bish

Book Review: Smooth Stones By Joe Coffey

2011-06-13T08:10:00.003-04:00

Over the weekend i read 'Smooth Stones,' a book on apologetics by Joe Coffey, a pastor in Hudson, Ohio. Ohio, if you've never been there, is genuinely the most boring place in America. I once spent several hours driving west to east across mid Ohio and did not see one thing. Not. One. Thing. Luckily, this lack of stimulus has not rubbed off on our author, who has written an engaging and helpful book.

Smooth Stones is published by Cruciform Press, who are, in their own words 'a Gospel centered book publishing company...for Christians in the 21st Century.' Cruciform publish one book a month, with a standard design, look, length and feel, and published both on paper and electronically. And for just $6.50 a month you can subscribe and they'll send you a new book every month. The stuff dreams are made of eh? You can find out much more about Cruciform here.

So back to our book. It's subtitle is 'Bringing down the giant question of apologetics.' In six, short, easy to read yet well thought out and detailed chapters, Coffey deals with some of the biggest objections to our faith. Is there a God? Does science disprove God existence? Is the Bible authentic and true, The question of evil and suffering, Aren't all religions the same and Is Jesus for real. As i said, the chapters manage to be short, but also give a useful introduction to these issues.

I appreciated Coffey's Gospel focus throughout the book, particularly in the two epilogues, one for Christians and one for non-Christians. Also very helpful was the emphasis on the heart of the apologist. There are as many strong arguments in defence of the Gospel as their are claims against it. But very few people will be simply argued into the Kingdom. Those who are saved are not more clever, and when we share the Gospel we must not give the impression that we are. We must approach friends and co-workers as we really are. Sinners saved by grace, a broken people being slowly mended, the lost who have been found. Not as the spiritual elite.

If you're looking for a short book that introduces some of the key areas for apologetics today, and you want to support a publishing house with a Gospel vision, you could do an awful lot worse than this book!

You can buy it in many forms here.

My Song is Love Unknown

2011-06-11T07:53:00.003-04:00

Take 16 minutes this saturday and bathe in Tony Sumpter's love saturated Bible overview, here's a goosebump inducing taster:

We had never seen Him before, but He wasn’t how we had expected Him, how we imagined Him. He looked too young for starters, barely grown. He wasn’t handsome like we thought. And when we asked Him who He was, He ran out into the Jordan River and stood in the middle of the stream and smiled. John piled the water up over him, and a dove came down and for a moment we heard His song, like a low rumble. Remember? He called to us. The other men inside laughed at Him, but then He went on. Watch, He said, as He made His magic. He played with a brood of vipers, and He turned water into blood-red wine. Remember? He asked. And He went walking across the sea like it was nothing, like it was dry ground, and later, with a flick of His wrist, He pushed a legion of demons into the sea. He sang us His song on a mountain, and gave us bread in the wilderness, bread for thousands. Remember? He asked. Remember, how I love you?

Listen to it here, and read along here. (ht Dave Bish)

My Best Friend's Wedding

2011-06-11T07:25:00.003-04:00

My best friend had been thinking about this day for as long as they could remember. From when my best friend was little, it had been the favourite game, the go to dress up and the most anticipated moment.

My best friend fell in love with a spouse, and a church. My best friend planned and budgeted and work hard to make the special day a success, one that everyone would remember. My best friend made sure that everyone knew Who was being honoured the most on that day, even if no one could see Him. My best friend worked at the guest list, the music, the food, and the decorations, all while graduating from college. In the busiest time of my best friend's life, their life flourished and shone. My best friend had met someone to share life with forever, and couldn't wait to start the adventure.

My best friend looked beautiful the day of the wedding. All the stress and the planning was worth it on that sunny day, with family and friends all around. It really was a day no one would ever forget.

Especially me. I'll never forget when i saw my best friend walk into the church. I'll never forget the doors opening and the sun creating a perfect silhouette. I had the best view of that moment, and that's why i'll never forget my best friend's wedding. Because two years ago tomorrow, my best friend married me!

Christianity and Liberalism (2)

2011-06-09T11:28:00.002-04:00

Today sees the end of the second week of Reading the Classics Together, organized by Tim Challies. We're reading through J.Greham Machen's work, Christianity and Liberalism. Here is what struck me most from chapter two, entitled 'Doctrine.'

There is a solid history to our faith

This chapter is like a second introduction, with Machen giving an overview of the importance of doctrine as he seeks to 'set forth the teachings of Christianity in contrast with the teachings of the chief modern rival of Christianity' (p45). The liberals against whom Machen is writing are seeking to redefine Christianity apart from it's history. Machen points out that 'in no branch of science would there be any real advance if every generation started fresh with no dependence on what passed generations had achieved.' (p39) Yet in theology this approach is popular. Machen starts with Paul, and asks where he got his teaching from. It was passed onto him by the early church (1 Corinthians 15:3), which goes against liberal thinking that Paul somehow changed the message of Christianity. But what about the early church? Surely they got the message that Jesus wanted to preach wrong? But according the Machen the only significant difference is that 'Jesus proclaimed the event as coming, the disciples proclaimed part of it at least as already passed,' (p27). So contra liberal thinking of Jesus as some kind of humanitarian philosopher and the church as betraying His message, when we open our Bibles there is a solid line of history from Paul to Jesus.

Even at His most 'ethical' Jesus was no mere ethicist.

Machen points to the Sermon on the Mount as the place where liberal thinking finds their Jesus. But even there, there is no escaping Jesus the Messiah. Prophets stood and warned 'thus saith the Lord,' Jesus stood and taught 'but i say to you.' Not very ethical. Even at when we want Him to be teaching pure morality, Jesus keeps pointing our attention to Him. If we just have Jesus as a good teacher, a dead, good teacher, we are still, says Machen in the 'gloom of those sad days' between Jesus death and resurrection. We can not relate to a dead teacher in the ground. We need a risen Jesus, we need to step into the 'warmth and joy of Pentecost.' (p35) Machen finishes by saying that Christianity is indeed a life. But not a life severed from doctrine. Not a life built on feelings.

My Two Favourite Quotes

'What is it that forms the content of that primitive early teaching (of the Jerusalem church)? Is it a general principle of the fatherliness of God or the brotherliness of man? Is it vague admiration from the character of Jesus such as prevails in the early church? Nothing could be further from the fact. 'Christ died for our sins,' said the early church. 'According to the scriptures He was buried, He was raised again on the third day according to the scriptures.' From the beginning the Christian Gospel...consisted in something that had happened. ...and when the meaning of that happening was set forth, there was Christian doctrine. 'Christ died,' that is history, 'Christ died for our sins,' that is doctrine. Without these two elements, joined in an absolutely dissoluble union, there is no Christianity. (p23)

Here is found the most fundamental difference between Christianity and liberalism - liberalism is altogether in the imperative mood, whereas Christianity begins with a triumphant indicative. Liberalism appeals to mans will, whereas Christianity announces, first, a gracious act of God. (p39)

Because We Love We Are Legal (more on the Song)

2011-06-08T08:54:00.004-04:00

Why do we struggle so much with a Christocentric reading of the Song of Songs? How is that in four hundred years the prevailing attitudes about this book have turned on their head? I've turned fully 180 degrees thinking about these things in the last couple of years, so i'm not saying that any of these things are true of you Mike Shaw, Hughbo, Jesuslover, Revd Richardson and Marcus, i'm saying they were true of me.

1) I was a chronological snob. This is a CS Lewis term, but it serves us well. Technology moves in a relentlessly forward direction. Car with keys are better than cars with handles, cars with handles better than horses. Twenty years ago you needed a sherpa to carry a cell phone, now i can fit two in my pocket. But there is no theological Steve Jobs. Some schools of thought peaked hundreds of years ago, and i think this is one such school. Now older is not necessarily better (that's still chronological snobbery) but neither is it automatically worse. I don't subscribe to the 'the prophets wrote better than they knew' school, they just wrote better than we give them credit for knowing!

2) I viewed salvation first as a legal agreement, not a marriage. Now salvation is a legal agreement, we are declared righteous in the court room and given the benefits of the heir to the throne. Amen! But the church is the bride of Christ. There is a legal piece of paper thats state my wife and i are married, but that's not the foundation of our relationship. Because we love we are legal! And God is love. Paul wasn't hunting around like James May looking for a metaphor about Christ's relationship to the church and just happened upon marriage. Marriage exists to demonstrate that relationship. I really don't think this was an idea that escaped Soloman. I needed, on the whole, to leave the courtroom and come to the wedding feast. To stop seeing God on the horizon, and know Him in my heart.

3) I wanted to honour the original intent. But this is really a subset of the first two points. It's so clearly about marriage right? Then we'll go to Christ from there. Just like we cross the Red Sea and then we talk about how Christ redeems us from our slave masters. If, however we accept Soloman's authorship could we not view Proverbs and Ecclesiastes as painting a picture of our self love and love of the world, why did he suddenly insert an excursus on marriage? The answer is that he didn't, but using language he loved and was familiar with, he told us about the solution to our love of the world and our love of ourselves; the abundant, staggering love of God for His people. We do not know better simply because we live in 2011!

That said, of course it's useful in talking about marriage. Rachel is mine and i am hers. I hope she views me as distinguished among ten thousand men. But God gave us the Song, first of all, so that we would understand the depth and beauty of our Gospel union with Him.

Here's the link to Daniel Newman's excellent stuff again

Andy Evans is also starting to work through the Song

Here's some stuff i wrote a couple of years ago

And you should read Dave Bish's work on the Song, at root, he's responsible for all this!

Thoughts on The Song of Songs

2011-06-07T09:41:00.005-04:00

Here are some thoughts, apropos of a short exchange on Facebook, about the Song of Songs.

The Song is one of my favourite books of the Bible, and the more i think about it and read it, the more i am convinced it's primarily about Christ and His relationship with the church. Or maybe even better, the Son of David and his Ideal Bride. But it comes to the same thing. I also think we lose something of the depths of the Gospel if we fail to view this book in this way. Just like we'd lose some of the depths of the Gospel if we read Galatians as being primarily about eating bacon, or Exodus as being about extreme desert survival.

So here, in particular oder, apart from the one in which i think of them is why i think we should read the Song this way.

1) The Bible is a book about the Father seeking out a bride for His Son. Why does everything exist? For this reason, so that we can know the Father through intimacy with the Son. Reading the Song Christocentrically (it's a word now!) fits far better into the flow of the story of the Bible.

2) Amos wrote about Heaven as a farm, Ezekiel as a temple. Why wouldn't Soloman wax lyrical about the coming King in terms he was familiar with?

3) You have to do odd things to the text to make it speak of human relationships first. Why do vineyards and gardens and trees become anatomical parts? Why can't a garden be a garden? And a vineyard a vineyard. Do we meet gardens and vineyards elsewhere in the Old Testament?

4) I think if the Song was about Soloman going to court, and being let off the punishment due his treason against the King, we'd have no problem reading it Christocentrically. (still a word!) I want to/hope to blog about this more in the coming days, how God reveals Himself as love, and yet we think of Him as law, about how our affections must drive our will and not the other way around. The Bible ends with a wedding feast, it doesn't end at the judgement. I don't think John was given his revelation in a haphazard, meaningless manner.

5) This mystery is profound and Paul says it refers to what?

6) Look at some of the imagery in the Song. What is that coming up from the wilderness like columns of smoke? (3:6) The wilderness! A column of smoke! A. Column. Of. Smoke! I mean what do we want, the groom to say he burns like a bush as he looks for his beloved?! The groom seeks, the groom is rejected, the groom wins his bride and they are united. The bride longs for the day when she and her groom are united forever. The final verse reads 'make haste my beloved, and be like a gazelle or a young stag on the mountains of spices.' What is that if not 'come Lord Jesus!'

7) I don't believe we do violence to the text reading it this way, i think we allow the text to burst forth in its glorious colour. We can still learn about human marriage from it, but again, what is marriage about? I am married so i can learn (slowly) and demonstrate (poorly) to a watching world the glories of Christ love for the church.

I really think we need this emphasis in the church today. Yes, Christians have a personal relationship with Christ, but that's not all we have. We have a relationship with our church, and Christ is coming back for His church. Your personal relationship isn't all there is. If you want a real relationship with Jesus, you'd better fling yourself into the local church. And boy, does Jesus ever love the church! Why would you not want to be involved?

You can read far more helpful and coherent thoughts here and here

1 Thessalonians 3:11-12

2011-06-06T20:15:00.002-04:00

Mondays mornings struggle aren't they? After my regular nap/coma on Sunday afternoon, and having a hundred ideas and or struggles that have arisen during the day, i always find it hard to sleep on Sunday night and get up on Monday morning. The sad result of that is that my prayer time is impaired, as, like the older brother i am, i try to get in ten chapters of the Bible and head to work in time for our staff meeting.

But the wonderful thing is, the Word will always catch you and stop you. Even though i rushed through my prayer time this morning, there was a delicious treat coming. There is such warmth in 1 Thessalonians isn't there? I love the prayer at the end of chapter three:

May the Lord make you increase and abound in love, for one another and for all, as we do for you so that He might establish your hearts blameless in holiness before Him.

1 Thessalonians 3:11-12

Isn't that a great thing to pray for your church on a Monday morning? Would my church and your church love those inside the walls and outside the walls, and out of that God given love would we be sanctified together. It's all there, community, love, outward focus. It's wonderful Trinitarian, and wonderfully churchy. The concern is that we grow in love, not law keeping, love, not works, love not effort. God's concern is to make the church reflect Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Community, love and outward focus.

It stopped me in my tracks this morning, and helped me to pray that God would do His work with His church, and what a wonderful work it is!

Christianity and Liberalism (1)

2011-06-02T10:29:00.002-04:00

Tim Challies has been doing 'Reading the Classics Together' for some time. I've participated in the last two, reading Dallimore's biography of Spurgeon, and RC Sproul's 'Holiness of God' both of which i highly recommend. When it was announced that this time we'd be reading Machen's 'Christianity and Liberalism,' together, i jumped at the chance to join in. Machen has fascinated me for a while. Surely one of the most significant churchmen of the 20th century (how many others founded a denomination and a seminary in that time?) all while preferring the company of books to people, and working himself into an early grave. Yet it seems widely forgotten by evanglicals today.

Christianity and Liberalism is his magnum opus, and i wanted to share some thoughts before heading over to Challies and reading his (and then coming back over here and changing mine so they agree with the wiser heads over there!)

The Title

I love the title, Christianity and Liberalism. Those are, at root, two different things. Orthodox Christianity, built on the historic facts of Christ's life, death and ressurection, as revealed in God's Word, as against Liberalism, built on, well whatever it's proponents feel they can get away with in the current generation. The virgin birth comes under attack? Let's get rid of it. People don't like the idea that Jesus was fully God and fully man? We don't lose anything if we lose that. Machen was writing in 1923, but sadly his thesis is just as relevant today.

Robust

This was the word that stood out to me as i read chapter one. Robust. Christians must continue with a robust preaching, of the robustly held truths found in the robustly believed Bible. Anything short of that, any concession to culture for mere acceptance, is the top of a slippery slope. I'd just finished reading Michael Horton's 'Christless Christianity' before i started this (it's good, but a bit like being repeatedly hit in the mouth) and it's sad to see the lax approach to the Truth Machen warned about taking route in 21st century Christianity. We need to be robust in what we believe, in teaching what we believe and knowing why we believe it.

My Favourite Quotes

'the type of religion which rejoices in the sound of pious phrases, regardless of their meanings, or shrinks from controversial matters, will never stand the shocks of life. In the things of religion, as in other spheres, the things about which mean are agreed are apt to be the things least worth holding. The really important things are the things are the things about which men will fight.'

'But the Christian religion that is meant is certainly not the religion of the modern liberal church, but a message of divine grace...destined to burst forth once more in God's good time in a new reformation and bring light and freedom to mankind. What that message is can only be made clear, as is often the case, only by way of exclusion, by way of contrast. ...we hope to be able to show what Christianity is in order that men may be led to turn from the weak and beggarly elements and have recourse again to the grace of God.'

Amen.

It was For Freedom That You Were Set Free (John 8:31-36)

2011-06-01T10:59:00.002-04:00

In John 8:31-32 Jesus says ‘if you abide in my words, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’ Abiding in the Word of God is the pathway to freedom. What abide mean? It just means to continue in a relationship with. Jesus says that if we continue in a relationship with His Word, then we are truly His disciples, then we are free.

So is Jesus saying that we’re saved by reading the Bible? No! Jesus always teaches what the rest of the Bible teaches, that we’re only saved by faith in Him, by faith in His life, death and resurrection. We’re not saved by reading the Bible, but regular Bible reading is the pathway to freedom. If you are worried about whether you are truly a disciple of Jesus, then looking at your relationship with the Bible is a good place to start. Do you know what the Bible says about life? Do you know what the Bible says about God? Do you try and read the Bible regularly? Even fifteen minutes every day? What do you think of when you think of the Bible? A dusty old book that makes you feel guilty for not trying harder to read it, or our source of access to all the joy in the world?

Why is the Bible such a big deal? Why does Jesus think it’s so important? Why is it the pathway to freedom? Well the Bible is God’s Word, it’s His voice, His thoughts. If we didn’t have the Bible we’d pay any amount of money to posses it, but having it, we ignore it. Scripture reveals divine truth. In it we meet Jesus Christ who is the truth. The Bible is our only rock in a world of sinking sand. Secondly, most Christians who have ever lived would have loved to have the access to the Bible that we have. Safely able to read it in our own language. The greatest benefit of speaking English is that we have such easy access to the Bible in good translations. In England, when we crown a new King or Queen, they are presented with a Bible, and told that it is the most valuable thing the world can give. This is true!

And finally, we should read the Bible because of what we’ve heard Jesus tell us in verse 32, because it will set us free.

It sounds good doesn’t it? But free from what? The Jews listening to Jesus react in about the same way many of us would to being offered freedom. Look at verse 33 ‘we are the offspring of Abraham, and have never been enslaved to anyone, how is it that you say ‘you will become free?’’ It’s hard to think about needing to be free isn’t it? It’s hard to imagine being slaves to anyone or anything. The Jews tells Jesus they’d never been enslaved, which is totally nonsense, since though their history they’d been enslaved to the Egyptians, Babylonians and Romans, as well as many other kingdoms. Just like them, we may not feel like slaves, but we are. Look at verse 34, ‘truly truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.’

Before we’re saved, sin is our master. We wake up and do what sin tells us, we spend our day following it’s commands. But it’s even worse than that. Our sin is not the things we do, it’s who we are. My problem is not that I do bad things, but that I am bad. Until Jesus saves us, we know no better. As we’ll see in a minute, there is no way to be free from this slavery unless Jesus saves us. But let’s not be like the Jews Jesus meets here. Let’s not pretend to be free and miss what Jesus offers us.

Finally, we see in verses 35-36, the promise of freedom. In the few days I’ve been preparing this, these verses have been so exciting to me. Slaves were common in Jesus day, which explains why He uses them to illustrate our problem. He says ‘the slave does not remain in the house forever, the son remains forever.’ Sons and slaves looked the same on the outside, but were very different in reality. There would come a time when the slave would be removed from the house, and the son would stay, and get all the benefits of his family’s riches. This is what happens at the judgement. Sons are welcomed home, and slaves are removed forever. Jesus is saying, make sure you’re a son, make sure my word is abiding in you, and finally, make sure the Son sets you free.

How can you be free? Verse 36 tells us: ‘so if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.’ There was a system in the Roman world whereby slaves could be freed from service by a family member. The former slave would then be able to enjoy all the benefits of freedom. The only way for us to be free from sin is to admit our danger, abide in the word, and put our faith in Jesus. Only Jesus has the power to release those who are enslaved to sin.

My Peace I Leave With You

2011-05-30T18:13:00.004-04:00

Imagine those three years as Jesus disciples. From the moment you wake up, to the moment you close your eyes there's excitement, there's action, there's scriptures being fulfilled, there's love. You had your doubts at first, but now you're sure, this is God's anointed and you're on your way to Jerusalem to clear out the Romans and rebuild the Kingdom of God.

But then Jesus starts talking about going away, about being arrested, about being killed. Everything that you've built your life around for the last three years seems to be collapsing around you. In your darker moments you wonder whether leaving your job and your family was worth it. But you were so sure...

In that context the words of Jesus in John 14:18 become even more sweet: 'I will not leave you as orphans,' Jesus won't abandon them, there is hope. Jesus will come to them after His resurrection, and He will leave three things with them, that will help them forever.

Jesus Leaves God's Spirit

If Jesus is leaving, how will His disciples be anything other than orphans? Because the Father will send the Spirit in Jesus name. The Spirit will help them, and reassure them that as Jesus is in the Father, He is in them, and they are in Him. The Holy Spirit will communicate to them that they are caught up in the intra trinitarian relationship of God. The Spirit will live in them, and catch them up Himself in that relationship. He will remind them of everything they need to know, and Jesus Himself says that it's better for them that he goes away so that the Spirit can come. How can Jesus followers be alone when the very Spirit of God lives in them?

Jesus Leaves God's Word

Regular, unfettered access to the Bible is the greatest privilege the English language affords it's speakers. We can read, study and memorize God's Word in a good translation and in our own tongue. We can hide it in our hearts with ease, we can buy it freely. If we didn't have it, we'd pay all the money in the world to posses it, and yet, possesing it, we often ignore it. If we keep the Word, Father and Son will come to us, and make their home with us! Isn't that amazing! In our darkest times spiritually and materially, we are never alone if we are within reach of God's Word. And because the Holy Spirit has reminded the authors of what to say, we can read it and lean on it with the confidence that we have in God Himself.

Jesus Leaves God's Peace

In John 14:27 Jesus says 'peace i leave with you, my peace i give to you.' This is not a worldly peace, not a peace based on promotion, pay raises and bonuses. Not a peace built on something that could vanish like the mist tomorrow. It is God's peace. The peace that comes knowing that whatever people around you mean for evil, God means it for good. The peace that comes from knowing that God's plans are to prosper you. The peace that comes from knowing that whatever happens in life, God is working it out for your good. This peace is mediated by the Spirit through the Word. This peace is shared and enflamed in the local church.

Christians, don't live like orphans. Don't be alone, worried and hopeless. Bathe in God's Spirit, trust in God's Word and accept God's peace. Live as you are, caught up in the love of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

A People Interrupted

2011-05-27T12:27:00.003-04:00

What are Christians? When everything is boiled down to it's essence, what is it that makes Christians who there are? Are Christians moralists, who believe that good works bring them up to God, and God down to them? Are they mysticists who don't need history or facts, but put their trust in what they feel in their hearts? Well, whatever the right answer should be, it seems that we see more and more of the last two examples today. I think that two of the less significant Js in the Bible, Jonah and Josiah tech us that what Christians should be at least are interrupted-ists.

Christians are a people whose lives have been invaded and interrupted by the God who spoke the universe into being. People who recognize themselves as poor and naked and hopeless, and look for food, clothing and hope in the Son of God. People who realize that even of their best days, their best efforts flowing from the purest of motives are filthy rags. Christians are people whose lives have been interrupted by historical events and their proclamation and application to them.

Jonah was interrupted. Happy as a Jew, happy as one of God's people, he gets sent to Nineveh, and flees instead to Tarsish, essentially the end of the world. But he interrupted the sailors on the boat, and then he finally interrupted Ninevah. One line of recorded prophecy and the whole city repents. They know they are poor and naked and they fling themselves before the mercy of God, who relents.

Josiah was interrupted. A boy King with a good heart, he is presented with the Word of God and is terrified. He rips his clothes and turns his country upside down so that it can once again be the right way up. He saddles up his horse and rides around destroying the high places and the asherim, the temples of false worship.

God's Word interrupted them. They were invaded from the outside.

The worst pastoral mess we know Paul had to deal with was in Corinth. Sexual immorality, believers taking each other to court, participation in pagan rituals, and yet at the start of both his letters to the Corinthian church, he thanks God for them. Why? Because in the midst of their sin and arrogance, they at least were orthodox, if not exactly orthoprax.

The harshest criticism Paul writes is reserved for the Galatians. No word of thanks for them at the beginning, but disbelief they've so quickly abandoned the Gospel that saved them. They've quit being interrupted, now they're making their own rules. This is, at heart, far more dangerous than moral failure. The Galatians are sailing toward a port where they will no longer be a church.

Christians are a people interrupted. We need the Bible to interrupt us, to take us away from the moralism and mysticism that so easily distracts us. We need the church to remind us of these things, to minister them to us. The New Testament knows nothing of unchurched Christians, not because it's in favour of organized religion or institutions (although it very much is!) but because we need regular interruptions. And we need to interrupt others!

Let's not settle for a Christianity we can explain away. Let's not be happy with 'knowing in our hearts,' lets remember, and herald the old, old, historic story. Let's be interrupted.

What Does Jesus offer? (John 7:38)

2011-05-25T13:53:00.001-04:00

If you asked 100 people what Jesus offered, I wonder if anyone would answer with this. Jesus offers us rivers of living water. Most of us would say ‘Jesus gives me a way to Heaven when I die,’ or ‘Jesus saves me from sin,’ or other ways of saying that. Most of us would answer this question based around what we want or need.

John tells us that Jesus is talking about the Holy Spirit in verse 39. This is one of those times that reading John’s Gospel is like watching a DVD with the editors commentary. John says, no one really understood what Jesus meant at the time, but He was talking about the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is sent into our hearts when we get saved. He comforts us and He helps us and He directs our attention to Jesus. The Holy Spirit is a river of life flowing out of us.

But what does it mean that the Holy Spirit is like a river, or flows like a river out of our hearts, according to Jesus? Well, what do rivers do? Rivers provide nourishment, rivers helped cities trade with each other in the days before cars, rivers provide a focal point. Rivers do not exist for themselves. The rivers in our hearts should flow out of us and into other people. They should flow away from us for the benefit of other people.

So Jesus not only offers us the opportunity to be helped, to be nourished and quenched by giving us the Holy Spirit, He also gives us the opportunity and the responsibility to help and nourish and serve others. This is what should happen to us when we get saved. When the Holy Spirit comes and lives inside us, we should be more concerned about other people, we should be thinking of and looking for ways to serve them. Each of us has a personal relationship with Jesus. But that’s not all you have, you also have a relationship with others, which is meant to reflect Jesus love for you. This is why being part of a local church is so important. Jesus didn’t just save you, He saved the Church. Jesus isn’t just coming back for you, He’s coming back for the Church.

He wants a bride not a harem.

On Being Married and On Preaching

2011-05-24T11:13:00.002-04:00

Spurgeon (possibly) once said (something like) 'if for some reason i was denied entry into Heaven, but could still choose my eternal state, i'd choose the feeling i get when i preach the Gospel.' This is the internal side of what John Piper describes as 'expository exultation,' preaching as worship, preaching as joyful heralding with your mouth. If i've got what Spurgeon said right, he's talking about what goes on in your heart when that happens.

It's all at once the strangest feeling i know and the most natural. Part of me is shy and introverted and freaked out by standing and talking in front of a group of people, (and that's before we consider James 3:1) but part of me feels like a bird in flight. This is why i've got a tongue, and a mouth, and the Holy Spirit in me opening my heart to the glory of God in the face of Christ. This is my raison d'etre, this is why i'm alive. Even when i'm under prepared, even when i'm tired and fighting the urge to call out people who i know aren't listening. Even when i'm distracted, this is how it feels inside. It feels good. This is when i know i'm really preaching, when, for all the weirdness, for all the awkwardness, it feels like a well oiled machine. Expository exultation.

Being married is like this as well isn't it? It's weird living with Rachel, but at the same time it's the most normal thing in the world. The strangest and most natural thing i do at the end of every day is come home to my bride. I remember the first time i held her hand (before we were married but don't tell the in-laws ok?) it just felt normal, odd, and normal. The more time we spent together, the stranger and more normal it got. She became my best friend, we fell in love, and got married. In about half an hour she'll walk into my office and we'll eat lunch together. It is and was wonderful. It is and was strange. Every time i get up to preach, and every time we sit down for dinner it surprises me, and it warms my heart. Yes, this is why i'm alive.

I'm not saying this is how it should be, or even that it's Biblical, (but it think it is, on both counts) but that's how it is right now, and by the grace of God, I intend it to be that way until age parts me and my voice, and death me and my wife.

Crazy Man in Desert Builds Boat

2011-05-23T08:00:00.005-04:00

I'm sure 'crazy boat in the desert man' would have been a trending topic of Twitter all day. I'm sure people would have organized atheist parties, i'm sure the news teams would have been hounding Noah's families for days beforehand. I'm sure many would have sat in the seat of mockers.

I'm sure it would have been just like it was on Saturday when the Heavens opened and the rain fell for forty days and nights. I'm sure it will be like that when the end actually comes.

That's the problem on the Monday that was never supposed to happen, isn't it? One day, we know the end will come, our Redeemer will walk on the Earth, one day the scoffers will be wrong and the predictors right. Say and believe what you want about Family Radio and their supporters, this morning, it's hard not to feel a bit sorry for them. And hard not to be warned by them. At six pm eastern this Saturday i was at a 16th birthday party at church. No flash of light, no earthquake, no trumpet. But you knew that! But as 6pm turned into 630, and eventually Saturday into Sunday, came the realization that the end was not today, not yet. But one day closer than it had been on Friday.

With the increased interest in these things, now is a great time for us all to reflect on what the Bible says about the end. Are we supposed to max out our credit cards like some of Camping's followers did? Take the vacation of a life time, because we've always wanted to see the Grand Canyon?

Romans 13 is probably one of my favourite chapters of the Bible. Paul reminds us in verse 12 that the night is far gone. We're closer to the end than we used to be, so we'd better wake from sleep and walk properly. This has to be our response to Harold Camping doesn't it? We know the end really will come, we know people really will scoff when it's near, but we also know it didn't come on Saturday. So let's be warned, walk in the day time, and make no provision for the flesh. And pray for Camping's followers, that they would having saving, redeeming faith in Christ.

Friday Links

2011-05-20T11:26:00.002-04:00

Another quick wee has drawn to a close, can you believe it's May 20th already? One month today we'll load up the church bus and take a small group of kids to The Wilds, one week today, our Christian school finishes for the academic year. It's crazy. Here's the best from some other people's blogs this week:

A non-assembled assembly.

Jonathan Leeman examines some arguments in favour of multi-site churches and shares his point of view. This is a tough one isn't it? The Bible is quiet, so we must tread carefully, but i'd want to say that a relationship between the Pastor and his people is paramount in any experience of 'church.'

Can romance novels hurt your heart?

Dr Russell Moore digs into this important and controversial question. Obviously, pornography and romance novels are not morally equivalent, but do they leave the same unrealistic and unfulfilled expectations? Do romance novels strengthen our faith and our marriages?

Guidelines for finding Christ in the Old Testament.

Jared Wilson shares his thoughts. All the Bible is about Jesus, and it's all Christian. Nehemiah isn't part of the 'Jewish scriptures,' it's part of the Christian scriptures! Nevertheless, there are dangers in preaching Christ from the Old Testament, and Wilson helps us to dismantle them. I found this very helpful and challenging.

Rachel and I are headed to Raleigh this afternoon to stimulate the local economy...enjoy your Friday!

Lunchtime

2011-05-18T14:19:00.003-04:00

Let me tell you about lunchtime.

Normally i'll start getting hungry around 11. This morning we had a delayed staff meeting, then i had to go and pick up the moneypit on wheels that is our car from the mechanics, and then i had to finally nail myself down and write my talk for teen church tonight (i even turned by blackberry on silent and closed tweetdeck, such was my eagerness to get done). By 11 i was hungry, by 1130 i was sizing up my books to see which one could serve as a tasty snack. At 1145 Rachel showed up fresh from a morning of teaching. To say i was anticipating her arrival and our departure would be an understatement.

We chose McAllisters, take a right, go five minutes down the road and take a left at the light. I was starving. I ordered the Spud max, surely the greatest thing man has ever achieved with humble potato. We sat down and i tired to stop knawing on my arm while we told each other about our morning. I was more ready to eat than i'd been since...well since breakfast!

Finally my potato and her sandwich arrived. All conversation was on hold while we tucked in. Nothing was going to get in the way of our lunch, for the moment at least.

What should our Christian lives be like? They should be like an early lunchtime, they should be like the satisfaction of our grumbling stomachs and watering mouths. Jesus tells us that He is the bread of life, (John6:35) that we need to come to Him and feast. This suggests as complete, regular and full commitment to Jesus as we have to food. He is as important to our spiritual health as food is to our physical health.

But am i like that? Do i hunger for His presence when i wake up? Or seek other things out first? Do i want to catch up with the headlines or catch up with God first thing? When i sit and read, do i let other things distract me, things that would never take away my attention from a plate of food? I don't always know. It's an upsetting book, this Bible.

It Is I - Do Not Be Afraid

2011-05-16T17:56:00.004-04:00

I love the 'I AM' sayings that John records. I AM the door, I AM the gate, I AM the good shepherd. I love how it connects Jesus with the Old Testament, i love that every time Jesus says I AM He is drawing us back the great history of our faith, and the great things God did for His people in times past.

According to RC Sproul, in his very excellent St Andrews commentary on John's Gospel, the best way to translate Jesus when He says I AM is 'I AM I AM.' He says ego eimi, I AM Who I AM, the door, or I AM who I AM, the good shepherd. There is, also according to Sproul, one I AM saying that we miss in the English. In John 6:20, when Jesus walks on walks on water towards His disciples. The water is flooding in the boat, the difference between the Sea of Galilee and the wood of the craft is quickly disappearing. The seasoned fishermen in the boat are terrified, so goodness knows how Matthew the land loving tax collector was feeling.

And here comes Jesus, 'ego eimi, do not be afraid.' It is I AM who I AM, do not be afraid.' What does Jesus say? What do His Words carry with Him? The power of God through the ages, against the power of the storm and the fear of His followers. It is I, the burning bush, do not be scared, don't worry, it is the pillar of smoke and fire, the Angel of the Lord, do not be afraid. Can you here His love? The outstretched hand of a father helping His child, the warm embrace of a bridegroom for His beloved? It is I, the God of the Universe, do not be afraid.

This is historical narrative, it really happened. But isn't it also a great parable? As soon as Jesus got in the boat they were at their destination (verse 21). Jesus, the Son of Man, the good shepherd, the great I AM will get us through life's storms. He doesn't take us out of them, He will get us through them. How do we know? Because He is ego eimi, He is I AM who I AM, and in His embrace we rest.

The King's English

2011-05-13T16:11:00.001-04:00

I can't imagine many people who end up here won't have seen this elsewhere, but it's too wonderful not to share/watch again:

What Doesn't Scare The Enemy

2011-05-13T13:02:00.003-04:00

The Devil doesn't mind 'family values' as long as what we ultimately value is the family. Satan doesn't mind 'social justice' as long as you see justice as something that is primarily social. Satan doesn't tremble at a 'Christian worldview' as long as what you want to view is the world. Satan doesn't even mind born again Christianity as long as it is preached apart from the blood of the cross and the life of the resurrection.

Pastors, Satan doesn't mind you preaching the decrees of God with fervor and passion, reconciling all the tensions between sovereignty and freedom as long as you don't preach the Gospel. Homeschool moms, Satan doesn't mind if your kids can recite the catechism and translate battle hymn of the republic from English to Latin as long as they don't hear the Gospel. Churches, Satan doesn't care if your people vote for pro-life candidates, stay married, have sex with whom they are supposed to and tear up at all the praise choruses as long as they don't see the only power that cancels condemnation - the Gospel of Christ crucified. Satan so fears that Gospel, he is willing to sacrifice his entire empire just to stave it off. He still is.

Tempted and Tried, Russell D. Moore, P154

Moore is talking in the context of Jesus being tempted to bow down and worship the Devil, receiving all the kingdoms of the earth in return. In that moment, Jesus could have repaired every marriage and healed every disease. The churches would have been filled with moral people. Life would have been easy, and great, until death came, and the condemnation still hung over us.

Last summer i read the Eric Metaxas biography of Bonhoeffer. One thing that struck me above everything else was the danger of a church that has become focussed on nationalism and patriotism, not the Gospel. The devil doesn't fear morality, or patriotism, or people being in church, or giving their money every sunday. He doesn't fear teenagers being fed a steady diet of pizza and warm, fuzzy devotions. He fears the Gospel, and this is why the Gospel simply has to be central to everything we do. It's our only hope of escaping condemnation, and our only hope of gaining victory over the Devil.

Book Review: Tempted And Tried

2011-05-09T09:01:00.003-04:00

Where would the blogosphere be without Tim Challies? Well, i don't know, but my bookshelves would be less well stocked. Tempted and Tried by Russell Moore is the latest in a long line of books that Tim has brought to my attention, and i'm glad he did.

In Tempted and Tried, Russell Moore walks us slowly though Jesus temptation in the desert, and makes broad, cutting applications that bridge the gap from Jesus int he desert to you and me today. Actually, the biggest victory this book wins is showing the reader that there is no gap. From Eve in the Garden, through Israel in the wilderness and Jesus in the desert to today, the Devil has not changed his tactics. He hasn't needed to. He assaults our ego, our appetites, our desire for protection and vindication and freedom. He's done it to every man, and he did it to The Man.

Moore is an excellent user of words. He weaves personal examples and pastoral stories into the book, without leaving you feeling like he's just filling up space. He also nails the temptation in the desert in it's Biblical context as well. Moore shows us Jesus as the second Adam, and the second Israel, the perfect Son of God and our perfect substitute, rather than our example of fighter verse memorization. Adam fell to temptation, Israel fell in the wilderness, but Jesus overcomes temptation in the wilderness. He subdues to wilderness, and the Devil flees from Him. And in that is all our hope.

I had, i think, four major take aways from this book.

1) I've sort of forgotten how to read. A lot of what i've read this years have either been sermons collected into books, or collections of essays. There is nothing wrong with either of those things. But at the end of the first chapter of Tempted and Tried i was left thinking, where is the punch, where is the conclusion, and i had to remind myself that there were another 150 pages to go. Moore is a great writer, and to read a book, written as a book, was a refreshing treat. This is something i need to pursue.

2) My second take away was this. As valuable and as vital as learning fighter verses to deal with our weaknesses is, there is much value in learning the contours of the Biblical narrative. This is how God gave us the Bible. We start in a Garden, we end in the Garden, we meet Adam, Israel and Jesus. And Jesus is the focal point, He is the centre, He is the aim and goal and direction of all of scripture. The Bible isn't a collection of verses strung together, it's a story. We must learn the story, because in the story there is depth, and richness and hope.

3) At the base of every temptation is an appeal to our instinct, an appeal to our happiness. The devil either wants us to act like animals to be happy, or gods. He comes and says either 'if it feels good do it,' or 'you're autonomous, forget God and do what you want.' But we're neither animals nor gods but men. Jesus came as a man, got baptised, and headed off dripping wet to fight the Devil. Just like you and me. And because He overcame, so can we.

4) Which leads me to point number four. Our only hope is found in our union with Jesus. Galatians 3:26 tells us '...in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God though faith.' Isn't that a sweet thought. That when you're tempted, where ever it is, you are unified with Jesus, and this is our hope. Not trying harder, not doing better, but growing closer. Deepen your union with Jesus, and you won't want to go near her door, live in the light of the Gospel, and the darkness will seem less safe, and the light more joyful.

There are whole chunks of this book i hope to quote here in the next couple of days to encourage you to buy it. Go and buy it anyway, i can't think of a believer who wouldn't benefit from reading this book.

Oreos Baked in Cookie Dough

2011-05-07T09:54:00.001-04:00

Exactly what it sounds like!

Segregation

2011-05-06T18:31:00.003-04:00

What's the biggest difference between English sports and US sports? Everything, but for these purposes, segregation. Every football ground in the UK has an 'away end' where the huddled hundreds who have spent the day on the M6 gather, hoping they haven't been wasting their time and their money. But in baseball, american football, basketball and hockey, there is no such thing. Look at a picture of the Super Bowl and you'll see Packers fans and Steelers fans right next to each other. If you see Manchester City fans next to Stoke fans at the FA Cup final in a few weeks you know one party has got tickets illegally.

Separation, segregation, these are the themes that run though Psalm 50. In verses 1-15 God is talking to His people, talking in judgement. But from verse 16 onwards, God talks to the unbeliever, to the one who hates discipline and forgets God.

Why does God sit in judgement on His people? Not for the sacrifices (v8), or not just for the sacrifices. Offering sacrifices at the Temple was good, and right and mandated. So what was the problem? They had started to rely on the sacrifice for their relationship with God. They had forgotten who God was (v12-13) so God no longer accepted their offering (v10). They forgot that the offering God wanted was thanksgiving and reliance (v15).

Was this the problem the church at Ephesus had? They could 'do church' well. They worked, they persevered, they couldn't stand false teaching whether from individuals or from a group. They looked great to everyone. But they forgot their first love.

Isn't that awful? Isn't it terrifying that you can do church well, teach Sunday school, lead the service, enjoy the growth in your own heart, and of your teen group, create Facebook links to blogs denouncing the Nicolatians, and do all of it having forgotten about Jesus.

In Psalm 50 people forget about Jesus, and 'do Temple' bringing their sacrifices because they think they do God a favour. In Ephesus people forgot about Jesus and 'do church' forgetting that every breath they take they get from Him. And in both cases it looks good. And in both cases it's terrible.

We need to remember, I need to remember, that i am gloriously insignificant. The church coped without me, it'll cope after me. The Kingdom did just fine before i showed up. Jesus is what i need to focus on. My relationship with Him, not how good my ministry looks. I need to pray that God would keep His promise to give me a heart of flesh, that the Spirit would keep me from stumbling, and that though all these things, my heart would be warm to my first love.

The Sword and The Prayer

2011-05-04T07:52:00.003-04:00

I'm currently following and enjoying Grant Horner's Bible Reading Plan. Seeing such a broad sweep of redemption history every morning is exciting and invigorating. Each days readings don't have a theme or a link by design, but since the Bible is one book, one story with one hero, it's not surprising when themes emerge from the readings each day. Actually, one of the most exciting things about it is that the more i read, the more my eyes are opened to see the themes that are there.

This morning i read Matthew 15, Genesis 9, Jude, Ephesians 3, Psalm 48, Proverbs 11, Job 2, Hosea 12, 2 Chronicles 14 and Acts 23. What a feast. In Jude, Ephesians, Psalm 48 and 2 Chronicles God taught me about prayer.

In Jude 24, we're told that God is able to keep us from stumbling and present us blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy. Now there's a prayer request! In Ephesians 3:20 we're reminded that God can do far more abundantly that all we ask or think. Now there's a reason to pray! In Psalm 48:3 we're told that in the citadels of Zion God is a fortress. In the human fortress God is the fortress. And we're told to walk around Zion, get to know her and tell her glories to the next generation, saying, this is our God forever and ever. I love that Psalm. So we have the request, the motivation and something like what happens when we pray (God's protection becomes our protection). Then in 2 Chronicles 14:11 we see King Asa tie it all together.

Faced with an overwhelming army Asa cries out 'help us God, for there is none like you...for we rely on you...for there is none like you.' He prays to the fortress, to the One who can help him more than he can imagine, to the One who can keep him from stumbling, and then he picks up his sword.

We have to pray like this. Remember God's mighty love and His loving might, and then go to work. Pray like everything depends on the prayer, work like everything depends on the work. Asa was given a mighty victory, but he didn't pray and stand still. He prayed and He fought.

God is able to keep us from stumbling, to keep us safe, to fight for us. So let's get up and walk, lets get up and work, let's get up and fight.

For God So Loved The World...He Went To Samaria

2011-05-03T12:23:00.006-04:00

Hundreds of things divide us. Millions. You from me, us from people the other side of the world, everyone alive today from everyone that was alive 150 years ago. But all the things that divide us are as nothing compared to what unites us. What unites us?

Jesus is after us.

I love the contrasts between Jesus meeting in John 3 and Jesus meeting in John 4. In John 3 Jesus meets a Jewish man, a member of the religious elite, a respected member of society. In John 4 Jesus meets a Samaritan woman, an outcast, a woman riddled with sin. So hated she had to go out of town, in the heat of the day, by herself to get water. Quite the contrast.

But so what? Well, so John 4:4: '(Jesus) had to pass through Samaria.' Jesus didn't take the route that was favored at the time, the longer but 'cleaner' route between Galilee and Jerusalem. He had to go to Samaria, He had to meet this woman. He was after her. Even as He offers her living water and she mentions His lack of a bucket, even as she lies about her adultery, He does not give up the chase. He is the hound of Heaven, and your blood is in His nose.

God is a chasing God, and invading God, a never giving up the scent God. Why? Because as John also tells us: God is love. His love doesn't manifest in letting us go, in fact, that's His judgement. His love doesn't look like waiting and hoping, His love doesn't look like presenting us with the evidence and sitting back, His love looks like chasing us, demanding a decision.

For God so loved that world, that He'll chase it to the ends of the Earth. Even to a sinful, unclean, Samaritan woman. Even to you and me.

Don't (just) Pray For Freedom

2011-05-02T11:10:00.004-04:00

'If loving you if wrong i don't want to be right,' So intoned Maxi Jazz on the fourth track from Faithless's breakthrough album Reverence, and as he did, he summed up the feelings of a generation. I don't much care for truth, all i want is to feel good before i die.

Even though we might not care for the truth, we will care for pleasure. As John Piper says rightly, everyone wants to be free, no one wants to be a slave. We might not care for right and wrong any more, but we all think of ourselves as free individuals. Free to sin, free to rebel, free to be wrong, but free nonetheless.

We pursue what enslaves us, we run after it, because it gives us pleasure. We might agree that gossip is wrong, but we love the rush it gives us. We might hate what pornography does to marriages, but we love how it makes us feel. Sin feels good. That's its power. No one sins because it makes them miserable (even though eventually, in five seconds or five decades it will) we sin because we like it. We are pleasure seekers.

There's a section in The Screwtape Letters, where one of the characters admits that they've stolen pleasure from Heaven, from God. Hell and all it's forces can not produce pleasure, they can only take something good and turn it to evil ends. This tidbit, tucked away in the middle of the book, might be the most seminal piece of information there is about how to wage war with sin.

Ultimately regarding sanctification in our life, and in the lives of others as breaking free from sin will fail. Not because we don't want to be free, but because we don't want to lose our pleasure. But what, as Dr Piper asks in the above video, if we could have our pleasure and lose our sin? Then we'd be all for it.

This is why Psalm 16:11, and the truth that flows all the way through the Bible that God is glorified when we are satisfied, that our highest joy is in His highest glory, has to be key to our fight against sin. Sin is rule breaking so don't break the rules, sin is slavery so be free will only get us so far. How about 'the pleasures of sin are as nothing compared to the pleasures available at Jesus right hand.' How about 'be a real pleasure seeker and come the Christ.' How about forsake your tiny, childish joys and drink in the joy that you were made for?

Then we'll say with Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:8-9 that even though we are riddled with thorns, even though we are weak, we can rejoice, because Christ is glorified, and in that truth, even the greatest pleasure in sin looks like a pile of dust next to Everest.

How Facebook Changes Us

2011-04-25T19:57:00.003-04:00

This is the article that's going in this months inaugural parents newsletter, for which we still don't have a name! Suggestions?

History will probably record Facebook as the first phenomena of the 21st Century. The social networking website has five hundred million members. 500,000,000! In 2011, it seems everyone above the age of about 12 has a Facebook account. While the website itself is neither good nor bad, it is worth considering how it is affecting our young people, and how we can serve our teenagers in their surfing.

Facebook blurs the line between private and public.

It’s tempting to share personal information much more freely than five years ago. But everything we write on Facebook can be seen by everyone, and is there forever. Are we helping our young people think through what they post? Are we helping them to discern between what’s for them and what’s for everyone?

Facebook can encourage secret sin.

When i was in high school and i wanted a photo of a girl i liked, i had to ask her for one (which may explain why i remained single throughout most of my teen years!) Now if i’m 14 years old and on Facebook, with a few clicks i can access hundreds of photos of anyone i want. This can be dangerous. Do we know what pictures our teenage girls are sharing? Do we know who or what our teenage boys are looking at? Are our teenagers pursuing edification and excellence in their online relationships?

Facebook is a constant distraction.

I have a program called TweetDeck on my laptop, which organizes all my friends Facebook and twitter updates in one place, and makes a noise when a new one comes though. The geek in me loves it, but if i need to do something serious, i have to turn it off. How much information that we gather on Facebook is necessary, and how much of it is just noise? Is it making our hearts and minds shallow? Does it cause our teens to live online more than offline?

Facebook disconnects us.

Ironically, for a website that is driven by networking, Facebook actually disconnects us from the real world. How can we think about whether they are sacrificing real flesh and blood relationships for their online ones? Do our teens live in a world that is constantly demanding quick updates rather than thoughtful conversation?

As i said to start, Facebook is not the problem. People are the problem. The desire of my heart is to see our teens grow in their relationship with Jesus, and deepen their relationships with each other. Facebook can be a great help or hinderance to both those things. Parents, if you’re on Facebook, be friends with your kids, or better still, sign into their account once in a while and see what’s going on behind the scenes. They might not like it now, but they’ll thank you when they’re older.

How Do You Scare Someone Who Has Died? (sermon jams)

2011-04-24T16:05:00.001-04:00

HT Adrian Warnock

It's Not Saturday Any More

2011-04-23T08:06:00.002-04:00

We can only really guess what the first Easter Saturday was like for the disciples. Scripture doesn't tell us, so we have to conclude that it's not important, but we can imagine what some of the twelve were going through.

Peter and Judas, for their own reasons, seek solitude, bitterly replaying the events of the last few hours. John, heartbroken after the death of his leader and his hope, doing his best to put on a brave face and look after Mary, determined to keep his last promise. Some of the others, maybe making their plans to slip out of the city and head back north, time to go home and start fishing again, hoping their families will forgive their madness. Some of them worrying about their near blasphemy. How could they even begin to believe that a man just like them could be YHWH?

Saturday was a dreadful day for the disciples, but sometimes, even with our understanding of what happened on Good Friday, we still live there. We still live like it's Saturday. We know Jesus has died for our sins, we know that we are not guilty before God, acquitted in His court and welcomed in His Kingdom, but we feel like we're missing something. Battles with sin still rage and are lost. The struggle for joy seems to gain no ground, we struggle with assurance. In our hearts it Saturday, Jesus has died, but thats it.

But Easter doesn't finish on Saturday. It finishes where it starts, when Jesus walks out of the tomb on the first Easter Sunday. Now, not only are we not guilty, we're innocent of sin! Now we don't need to fight against sin by ourselves, the live we live in the flesh we live by faith in the Son of God (Galatians 2:20). By His power and not our own. The Holy Spirit comes forth because of Sunday, He lives in us, inflames our joy in Jesus and our interest in the scriptures.

All because of Sunday.

If our hearts are dry, if the scriptures are dusty, if prayer is a battle, if gadgets give us more joy than time with Him, maybe it's still Saturday in our hearts. But it's not Saturday any more, it's Sunday, the tomb is empty, and our Redeemer lives.

Saturday was awful, Sunday is glorious beyond words. Make sure you know what day it is...

Good Friday Thoughts

2011-04-22T06:09:00.003-04:00

Mark would have been a great director, but you'd need the editor's commentary turned on. Mark 15:38 takes us away from the awesome, savage, precious events on Calvary, and tells us that in the middle of the Temple, a curtain has been torn in two.

So what, we want to ask, the Son of God has been killed, stay on task Mark! Who, as it was happening would even have noticed it, among the chaos of Passover preparation and the trio of blasphemers and murderers dying on the cross?

What is this curtain that Mark is so distracted by?

The late parts of 1 Chronicles and the start of 2 Chronicles are becoming one of my favourite parts of the Bible. God's King reigns peacefully on God's throne, God's people are faithful, and David's son is building a place where man and God can meet. It's a great foretaste of the future. 2 Chronicles 3:14 tells us that 'he made the veil of blue and purple and crimson fabrics and fine linen, and he worked cherubim onto it.' The veil, the curtain was what stopped people seeing inside the Holy of Holies. It stopped people seeing the manifest glory of God that appeared on the Day of Atonement. In short it separated man and God, and reminded man that he was separate from God. He couldn't just stroll up to God and make His requests, there was a problem, a barrier that only blood could cross. And only once a year.

But what does it mean that cherubim were worked into it? Genesis has the answer (doesn't it always?!) Genesis 3:24 tells us that 'cherubim and a flaming sword turned every way to guard the tree of life.' Adam and Eve had been removed from God's presence, and the cherubim guarded stopped them from every coming back there. Soloman worked cherubim into the veil to remind his people of their sin, to remind them of their separation from God. And wooden cherubim guarded the inside of the Holy of Holies, their wings spanning the whole area.

Man was separated from God by a curtain, and on Good Friday, the curtain tore and fell. Jesus blood was enough, not for one man once a year, but for all of us, forever. Jesus ascended and sat down, His work completed. This was the best Friday!

And yet, Good Friday, with it's savagery, blood, curtains, separation and darkness, is probably the tonic we need for our 21st century hubris. Simply by virtue of being alive in 2011, it's assumed we can stroll up to God. He doesn't mind our sin, He tolerates our failings, don't be so intolerant, it's 2011 man. But there are problems, there was a curtain, and only Jesus blood can tear it down.

Only Jesus blood can tear it down. Remember the awe and brutality of Good Friday, and may it grow ever more precious to you. And me.

Happy Endings

2011-03-26T18:29:00.004-04:00

Young men, there are two things no one will ever tell you about life after marriage.

1) Christmas will become a big deal. I don't think, before i got married, i ever independently bought a Christmas decoration. I like Christmas, obviously, but decorations were always the realm of parents and female friends. Now, if we see something we (Rachel) like in August, we pick it up. We even visited a Christmas shop during our anniversary (in June!) last year, and we (Rachel) are planning to head back there next time we're in Manteo. But it's ok, i love my wife.

2) You will watch movies that you never imagined you would. You'll become particularly familiar with the work of Nicholas Sparks, who only has one story line, but has dressed it up so many ways that he now owns the biggest house in Craven County. (True story. To be fair though i've heard some interviews with Sparks, and he seems like a good guy.) My two favourite movie scenes? The beach landing in Saving Private Ryan (guns) and the lobby scene in the first Matrix (guns). Mrs Goode, not so much. We agree on some films, 500 Days of Summer and Sherlock Holmes recently, but not that often.

I used to tease Rachel because she just likes movies with happy endings, but now i've come to see that not only is she right to like happy endings, but that she's more in touch with reality because of it.

Tolkien says: (the happy ending) denies universal final defeat, and insofar as evangeliom, giving a fleeting glimpse of Joy, joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief...When the sudden 'turn' comes we get a piercing glimpse of joy, and hearts desire, that more a moment passes outside the frame, rends indeed the very web of story, and lets a gleam come through.

Happy endings are true endings. Because Jesus has come, and lived, and died and lived, happy endings are true endings. How will the universe end? Happily ever after. Is that wishful thinking? No, go and put your hands in His wounds, talk to the eye witnesses. If the resurrection isn't true, we're to be pitied more than all men, but it is true, s0 we can look forward to the happiest of happy ending.

Happy endings are true endings. We saw Morning Glory last week. Girl from nowhere gets dream job in city, she's given a tough deadline to make things come together in the face of adversity and...well you get the rest. It was a happy ending, and a true ending. We like happy endings because, as Tolkien said, they touch us somewhere deep, somewhere real, somewhere almost primal. Because they're true. Because in the wedding supper of the lamb, time itself has the happiest of endings.

Reading Family Church on BBC Radio

2011-03-25T09:19:00.002-04:00

Click here to listen to about eight minutes telling the story of Reading Family Church, from the faith show on BBC Radio Berkshire. I had several happy, happy years at RFC, and it many ways, it's still home.

It's great to hear the progress they've making, and inspiring to remember their faith filled adventure.

Perfect Beauty and Consuming Fire

2011-03-23T12:54:00.004-04:00

I don't find it easy talking about God's wrath. And neither should anyone. It should make us shiver, and weep and pray. But as we talk about it, as we deal seriously and sensitively and Biblically with this issue, we should realize that as much as we take away from God's wrath, that's how much we take away from God's love.

If God is a God of love, He must, by neccesity be a God that is also wrathful. Think of it this way. If God is not angry with your sin, He doesn't need to pay anything to ransom you from it. If Jesus death on the cross was exclusively an example, or a victory, then God's love is a concept, and there is no way to prove the depth and warmth of His feelings towards His people. If God has paid nothing to get you, how can we ever know for sure how He feels for us? But if God has sent His Son, and His Son has knelt and sweat blood as He faced the furnace of God's anger at you and me and did not turn back but went to the cross. Then we know that God does love us, then we have a place to look a rock on which to stand in the storms of life.

In the worst moments of my life, as i watched my wife of four months fight to stay alive in the back of our wrecked Toyota, as i watched the blood coming out of her ears and her eyes rolling back in her head, i was (honestly, honestly) filled with this ridiculous peace. Why? Because i knew that whether she lived or died, she was going to be alright, and so was I. I knew God loved me because of the cross. He dealt with my biggest problem, and Rachel's biggest problem, by sending His Son to atone for my evil.

We rob God of love as much as we rob Him of wrath.

CS Lewis, in Letters to Malcolm, deals with the 'civilizing' analogy that God's wrath is like a live electrical wire: my dear Malcolm, what do you supposed you have gained by substituting the image of a live wire for that of an angered majesty. You have shut us all up in despair, for the angry can forgive, but electricity can't. Turn God's wrath into mere enlightened disapproval and you turn His love into mere humanitarianism. The perfect beauty and the consuming fire both vanish. We have instead a judicious headmistress or a conscientious magistrate. Liberalizing and civilizing analogies will only lead us astray.'

Preaching to Children

2011-03-09T10:42:00.003-05:00

The opportunity to regularly open the Word of God and expose it for the glory of God is one of the great privileges of my life. One of the coolest things about working at a church-with-a-school is the chance to do this in our chapel services, with all our school kids. All that is to say, here are some things i'm learning about preaching to kids.

Children are important.

Your spiritual growth isn't more important or necessary at 87, 27 or 7. Everyone needs to hear and respond to the Gospel, and elementary kids are no different. Whether you work with college students, high schoolers or young kids, you think that age is the vital age, and you're right, because every age is vital.

Children need the truth.

What does your average eight year old need to know? Be nice to your friends and obey your parents? Well, yeh, thats a valid application from some passages, but not all of them. Let's not get all semi palagian just because we're talking to people born in the 21st century. Kids need to hear about the vastness of God, the depth of His love and the horror of our sin. Just like the rest of us.

Children don't (just) need entertaining.

There's value to using entertainment to engage children as far as it goes, but not if the puppet or balloon show is all they remember. I do work harder with immediate application when i'm preaching at elementary chapel, but that's probably just a sign i need to work harder at application all around. There's enough vacuous fluff aimed at kids these days, don't add Bible teaching to the list.

Children aren't stupid.

Children can understand what substitutionary atonement is as long as you don't use those words to describe it. Same with incarnation or sanctification. The worse thing we can do when we're talking to children is treat them like tiny, stupid adults. They're not. They're children with growing minds and hungry hearts. I probably work in more stories when i'm preaching to children than when i'm with teens or adults, but not at the expense of anything valuable. Hopefully!

So am i learning really? People are the same no matter where they live, or how old they are. Lost, desperate, sinful and in need of a Saviour. Jesus has come to be just that, i don't want to hide Him behind stories and entertainment.

A Saturday Selection

2011-03-05T15:25:00.003-05:00

Here are three things i've enjoyed on the internet this week:

Dan Phillips talks about the challenges, parameters and cautions of 'Christ in the Old Testament'

This sometimes feels like the dilemma of "finding" Christ in the Old Testament. We're given the impression that He's in there, all over the place; but when we look, we see dead animals, dead Canaanites, long lists of names, tales of mostly mediocre-to-nasty monarchs, plus excruciating details seemingly meant for contractors, engineers, and/or butchers. Sure looks like that to us... but should we say it looks like "Jesus," anyway? For the candy?

Cat Hare talks about the beauty of reading, a piece that must have been as much fun to write as it was to read.

As you open the front cover and allow the spine to make little crackles, you press your nose against the pages and breathe deeply in. You are perhaps in-hailing a master piece. You feel the pages beneath your fingertips and notice the rough indents. You turn to the first page with its beaming Chapter One while the carefully chosen words dance in front of you.

And Challies reminds us that we're all obsessed with Facebook.

The World Is Obsessed With Facebook from Alex Trimpe on Vimeo.

Faith and Feelings 2

2011-03-04T10:27:00.004-05:00

Read Part One.

But what about the second statement?

We can not and must not base our relationship with Jesus on the way we feel. Why not? Colossians 2:13-15 has the answer.

Why and how are you alive? God made you alive. You didn't do it. Outside of you, before you, God did something that, regardless of how you feel this morning, made you alive. What did He do? Sent His Son to cancel the record of debt, by nailing it to the cross. What was nailed to the cross? Our record of debt. Who was nailed to the cross? Jesus. God made Him who knew no sin to be sin. Jesus took our sin, was nailed to the cross, suffered and died for it, and then rose three days later, overcoming death.

Your sin, Jesus flesh.

Outside you, before you.

Can the way you feel bring Jesus down from the cross. Can your mood, good or bad, punish Him or you any less? Of course not. What saved you is the matter of objective, historical fact, not subjective, transitory mood. Hows your relationship with God? It'd could not be better. Seriously, it could not be better. There is nothing standing in the way of it. You are a co-heir with Christ. As the father says to the older brother in Luke 15, all that is his is ours. Not because of how you feel, but because Jesus died.

Our faith should fuel the flames of our feelings. We should feel our hearts warm, our spirits sore as we see the majesty, grace, love ands justice of God. We should be relieved that these things do not depend on us. We should look at Jesus, bringing Peter back into the boat after he fell into the waves, and thank God that He will not let us fall when we emphasize our feelings.

Psalm 42:5-6 is a sure guide here. Why are you downcast within me soul? I'm not listening to you, i'm talking to you. You've no business feeling like this. Hope in God, remember what God has done. Take the ointment of the Gospel and bathe in it a while. Then feelings, you will serve me well. The feelings, you will respond as you should, to these great facts.

Feelings are essential, and non essential. Facts must be our master. And we must work them into our blood so that our feelings always follow.

Faith and Feelings 1

2011-03-04T10:11:00.002-05:00

Feelings are an essential part of the Christian life.

Feelings are not an essential part of the Christian life.

Those two statements say the opposite thing, and yet the Bible seems to hold them together in tension almost all the way through. Emotions and feelings are such a normal and human part of life that to ignore them as part of our faith would seem to make us less than human. Emotions though, are so hopelessly unreliable, that to base anything objective upon them is only going to leave us in a constant state of flux.

The Bible appeals to our desire for pleasure. Psalm 16:11 tells us that there are 'pleasures forever' at God's right hand. Jesus tells us that if we drink of Him, we'll never thirst again. Paul tells the Corinthians that he works for their joy, David prays, in Psalm 51, that the joy of his salvation might be restored to him. God has made us, in His image, with the capacity for extreme and varied pleasure. So feelings must be an essential part of the Christian life right? But our feelings can mess us around. We can be happy in sin. We can wake up in one morning happy and the next depressed for no real reason. Some people are more probe to depression, some are more prone to be positive. It can't be that God wants those with a depressed outlook to be less sure of their salvation than those with a sunny outlook can He?

The two accounts of Peter getting out of a boat in the Gospels give us such a good example of the role feelings can play, and the role feeling should play in our faith. Jesus walks across the water in the storm. Peter sees the Lord who He loves: 'Lord, if its you, call me out on the water.' Peter strides out confidently, but then his feelings take over, and he begins to sink. We mustn't let our feelings overwhelm our faith. After the resurrection the disciples are fishing. A man approaches 'it is the Lord!' exclaims Peter, and without a second thought he flings himself into the water and runs to Jesus. He knew enough about Jesus to know he needed to be close to Him, and close to Him he got.

Our faith shouldn't be dry. It shouldn't be full of ritual and going through the motions. Our feelings about Jesus should make us leap out of our fishing boats and run to shore to be near Him. In relation to our faith, our feelings are excellent servants, but appalling masters.

This is getting long, so i'll explore the other side of the coin in a later post...

False Teachers Are Always 'Nice' (John Piper)

2011-03-01T09:02:00.002-05:00

Today, i'm heading with Rachel's dad to Mount Calvary Christian School, where he is preaching at Chapel, having lunch in Snow Hill (where there is neither snow, nor hills) with the state rep from Child Evangelisation Fellowship, and then coming back to paint the football/soccer field, and prepare for our first football/soccer game of the season. All while keeping a close eye on events in Derbyshire.

All this is to say, i want to write something helpful (for me at least!) on faith and feelings, but if i tried in nine minutes, it'd be a botch job. So here's a John Piper clip, from February last year, on false teachers. Which will be much more edifying anyway!

You ain't in Lycia anymore...

2011-02-28T07:54:00.005-05:00

One of the best things about this weekend's Coastal Carolina Youth Conference was the adults session, lead by David Ulrich, from the wonderfully named Lake Waccamaw, North Carolina. David took us through the book of Acts, with a particular emphasis on the apostles interaction and reaction to the culture around them, in about ninety minutes. It was, by nature, as rushed as it was helpful. My Bible reading plan takes me through Acts every twenty eight days. I've just started reading it through for the fourth time (i think) and i feel like i'm beginning to get to grips with it.

One of the most helpful parts of the session was where we spent a little bit of time unpacking chapter 21:17-26. Paul had been among the Gentile churches for a few years now, and he returns to Jerusalem. James hears about God's work among the Gentiles and rejoices, Paul hears about God's work among the Jews in Jerusalem and rejoices. As an aside, 'many thousands' in Jerusalem at that time must have been a significant minority, if not a majority.

Then, at the end of verse 20 and into 21 comes the showdown. James tells Paul, 'listen, in Jerusalem our Christians are zealous for the law, and they've got a bad idea about your approach to the law. What are we going to do?' Basically James is telling Paul that nothing has changed since Acts 15. What would you expect Luke to tell us next? That Paul opposed James to his face, like Peter in Galatia. But instead, he takes a vow, purifies himself, and goes to the temple. What ever is going on here?

First of all, we have to see that as long as the Gospel was believed, observance of the Old Testament law was not an issue. This wasn't akin either to idol worship, or the ice cold legalism in Galatia. It didn't swing either into licence or legalism. The culture of law keeping had submitted to the Gospel. James rejoiced that Gentiles were being saved, he knew they weren't keeping the law, these Christians did not believe that their law keeping saved them.

Secondly, and what struck me the most, was the example that Paul gives us about Christians and culture. We can keep any part, of any culture, as long as it doesn't counter the letter to the Gentiles in Acts 15. That is, any part, of any culture that isn't idolatrous, immoral or inhuman. The problem in Galatia was that the law had become and idol, the problem in Corinth was that the cults had prostitutes. Neither of these things are an issue in Acts 21.

This is why i should, shouldn't and do, wear a coat and tie to church. There is no one culture that Jesus would show up in tomorrow and say 'yeh, this is it,' not even here in the Bible belt. God is no respecter of persons. At the loving, warm, mission minded, conservative Baptist church that i serve at at the moment, it's broadly expected that the men, particularly the leaders, wear a coat and tie on Sunday morning. Not everyone does, not everyone has to, but because of Acts 21, i do. I used to go to church in shorts and flip flops. was that wrong? A thousand times no. Does Jesus love me more now i dress like a lawyer on a Sunday morning? A million times no.

What we see in Acts 21 is the pendulum of Christian liberty swinging both ways. Christian liberty means, as long as you have Gospel central, and right, everything else is negotiable. Turn the lights down and the amps up if you want, or put on a tie and open up your hymnal. As long as the Gospel is central and preached, love Jesus and do what you want.

The centrality of the Gospel is important above all things. James rejoices of the salvation of law breaking Gentiles. Paul observes the law in Jerusalem. In all things they are bound only by the Gospel. In all things we must, must, be bound, only by the Gospel...

Let's pray for Rob Bell...and us

2011-02-27T20:37:00.003-05:00

The most trouble i ever got into as a blogger was when i wrote about Rob Bell. I reviewed, unfavourably, a few of Rob Bell's Nooma clips. A few people agreed, and then some people disagreed, and then more people disagreed, and then someone accused me of blaspheming the Holy Spirit because i didn't think Rob Bell, was like, the new Martin Luther, or something, so at that point i sort of gave up. But in view of Bell's apparent slide into, or at least closer to universalism, i wanted to share some things that i've been thinking.

1) We need to pray those that are thinking these things about Rob Bell are wrong.

Let's pray that we're just plain wrong. That Rob's video and all that goes along with it is just a terrible marketing ploy and he defends and proclaims the Gospel as a leader of a church should. It's simple, lets pray we've got the wrong end of the stick.

2) We need to pray for Rob Bell himself.

Is he a universalist? It's hard to say, and that's the problem. I hope you wouldn't need to speak to me about these things for more than a few minutes before you knew i wasn't. But what does he mean when he says that 'love wins' or that a 'loving God would never send anyone to hell'? We need to pray that he would clarify his position and as he does he would stand on the scriptural testimony about eternal destinations.

3) We need to pray for Mars Hill Church.

We need to pray for the leaders in the church that they would humbly and Biblically challenge their Pastor, and that the members would be Bereans when it comes to what they hear. Just like we all need to really.

4) We need to pray for the young people influenced by Rob Bell

I think, if Rob and i ever met, we'd get on pretty well. I am genuinely drawn to his warmth and conversationality in his videos. I'd like to hang out in Starbucks with him. But his sneering, popularist cynicism about some of the things the Bible clearly teaches makes me want to run headlong into the nearest wall. Will many be saved? Well, the way is narrow. Can we say for certain who is in Heaven and hell? No, but you either crown Jesus or kill Him, no one 'just' respects Him. Lets pray for the young people who love Rob Bell and his books, that they would grow in discernment, keep the good and reject the bad.

5) And we need to pray for evangelicalism

We need to pray for ourselves. That we would watch our life and doctrine, that we would beware over the slippery road that starts with doubting or bending the scriptures and ends here. And we need to pray we would take the Gospel seriously, and it's communication seriously. Oh, it's just a book promo, it's just a video clip, it's just a book...it's just the Gospel he's horsing around with. Just the eternal destination of many. Can we pray that we would have a renewed seriousness and earnestness about these things.

You can read Justin Taylor's comments here, and some wise reaction from Josh John here.

Bring The Books

2011-02-24T18:52:00.003-05:00

In accordance with one of Paul's last wishes, i mainly asked for books for my recent birthday. And, hooray, books were received! Here's what they are, and why i'm excited to read them:

Spiritual Depression: D.Martyn Lloyd Jones

This is a classic. A collection of the 'Doctors' sermons on the theme of spiritual depression. Lloyd-Jones makes the case that unhappy Christians is one of the things that stifles the great commission and draws people away from Christ. Christian joy was the fuel that fired the spread of the early church, and this book points the way to the cure for 'doldrum Christianity.' I want to read this not only for myself, but also to be better equipped to help those who struggle in the fight for joy.

The Sunshine of the Gospel: Dave Bish/Richard Sibbes

It's been a privilege to watch and listen and see Bish pursue 66 book Christianity in all of his life over the seven years i've known him, and follow a few steps behind. To discover the puritans is to discover a rich stream of deep Christian joy. This book makes one of the foremost, Richard Sibbes, more accessible to today. Seven sermons with slightly update language with the aim of introducing old truths to new people.

Grounded in the Gospel: J.I Packer and Gary Parrett

Us North American Brits have got to stick together! But more than that, if the Lord blesses us with Children the future, they will be thoroughly catechized. This is a way of passing on truth that has passed out of vogue in the last few generations, but in this book, the two authors aim to make the case for a recovery of catechises for the sake of the joy and the depth of modern evangelicalism.

Don't Call it a Comeback: ed Kevin DeYoung

This is a book with contributions from who you might call the rising stars in the Young Restless and Reformed movement. Tim Challies, Ted Kluck and Darrin Patrick, among others, all contribute to this effort to introduce new Christians, young Christians and underdiscipled Christians to the essentials of the faith. Also, i'm not going to lie, i like it because of the cool cover (IVPUK take note). Finally, it's recommended by Don Carson, why haven't you bought it yet?!

No Other Gospel: Josh Moody

This book is subtitled '31 reasons from Galatians why justification is the only Gospel'. The Gospel? Justification by faith? Galatians? Thirty one reasons?! Did your heart just skip a beat? In this book Josh Moody takes 31 chapters to go verse by verse through Galatians and defend the historic Gospel. I have a feeling this will end up in my 'books to read to warm up my heart first thing in the morning' pile.

Revelation 21:2

2011-02-23T09:47:00.002-05:00

This is a snippet of what i'm preaching at Teen Church tonight, from Revelation 21:1-4. I'm very excited about it!

But there’s another wonderful application from verse 2. It’s easy, in some ways today, to get downhearted about the state of the global church isn’t it? To see numbers in decline, to see liberalism on the increase, giving on the wane and commitment going downhill. What’s the future of the church, we have to ask ourselves. Well this is the where the church is headed…to meet Jesus, to be with Him forever spotless and blameless. This is the destiny of the real church, this is where we are headed. So when you find yourself discouraged about the church, remember where it will end. Remember our glorious future, remember the wedding that we are headed for.

But also, can you see the importance of the church in Jesus mind and heart. If there is a trendy sin to commit these days, it is to run down the church. If you go to the religious books section of Barnes and Nobles you’ll see books with titles like ‘they love Jesus but not the Church,’ or ‘why men hate going to church.’ You can not love Jesus if you do not love the church. You do not love Jesus if you can not love the church. What is the church? The bride of Christ! Husbands, how would you feel if someone who said they loved you was constantly saying how awful your wife was? Saying you like Jesus but not the church is like saying you like Ed but you can’t stand Rachel. If some people said the things about my bride that they say about Christ’s bride, I’d have a hard time believing they liked me very much. Don’t speak ill about the church, and expect your relationship with Jesus not to suffer.

In which I turn 26

2011-02-21T11:30:00.002-05:00

It's President's Day here today, which means that (some) banks (some) schools and (some) post offices are closed. Most importantly our church office is closed and so is the High School where Rachel teaches, affording us that most valuable of commodities, time together. It's also very sunny, slightly breezy and nearly 80 degrees outside, which always makes one feel better about life!

So what's life like on the precipice of my 27th year? I attend and serve at a church that i love, have found myself married to a women whom i love more every day, and who is without a shadow of a doubt the best person i've ever met, i get to live in a good sized town between beaches and cities in a country that God loved so much that He made it the third best on earth, and i happen to live in an age which makes maintaining relationships easier than ever before.

Yet in the midst of this material blessing, i was reminded this morning that '(i am) a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes,' that though in the white western world 26 is not even close to middle aged (right?) i'm here for a moment, and then i'm gone forever. At the moment i'm reading the Bible from ten places at once, which i mostly really enjoy. The readings aren't supposed to coincide, but this being the Bible, they inevitably do from time to time.

I read Luke's account of the Sermon on the Mount, and was reminded about what life looks like when we hear the Words of God and do them, then i witnessed Moses failing to do this in Numbers 20, and the results for he and Aaron shortly afterwards. Revelation 16 showed me the ultimate folly of ignoring God's Word, and James 4 wrapped it all up, warning me and reminding me that there is nothing permanent or certain in my life except His Word.

So what's my birthday prayer? Plenty of things, i tend to pray the four Ms, me, marriage and family, ministry and missions, but today my prayer, is that for the next twenty six years and beyond i would not just hear the Words of God but do them, and my house would be built on the solid rock of His everlasting promises...

Instruments in the Redeemers Hands

2011-02-11T13:09:00.004-05:00

There are some books that you buy, on the hope as it were, and then they sit on your bookshelf, regarded but under appreciated for years, and then, when you read them, you wonder what in the world took you so long! One such book for me is 'Instruments in the Redeemers Hands' by Paul Tripp. Paul Tripp is a Christian counselor, as well as being holder of possibly the finest moustache in evangelicalism. You can find out more about him here, this was the first of his many books that i've read.

The books subtitle is 'people in need of change helping people in need to change,' and that's a great way to sum the book up. We all live with the effects of the fall in us and around us. Because of that, we all need help, to a greater or lesser degree, from the Christian celebrity preacher to the newest believer. This book helps unpack the Biblical idea that every Christian is a counselor, and every Christian needs counselling. This is one reason that we have the local church. Our Christian lives are not meant to be lived in isolation. Under Jesus Christ, we need people, and under Jesus Christ, they need us. Christians are family, brothers and sisters, and we should know each other, love each other, speak to each other, and encourage each other to do God's will as such.

This book is a sponge soaked in the Gospel, which drips grace filled, practical advice. Among a number of others, there were two big take aways for me.

I was taught and reminded that my relationships don't belong to me. I don't have a wife, or a family, or friends to serve my every need, but to play a part in the process of my sanctification. Before Rachel and I got married, we went through several hours of wedding prep sessions to help us understand the Bible's position on marriage, our roles and responsibilities in it, and things like that. Well there is a sense in that every thing we do in life is marriage prep, as we get ready to see Jesus, the Bridegroom at the end of the time, following His eternal cherishing and nourishing of the church. So we need to stop looking at our friendships as portals of service, and start seeing them as arenas where we can serve. How can i play a part in that persons sanctification? How well do i know what this brother is struggling with? How can i pursue a friendship that builds up for an eternity rather than one that just passes time now?

Secondly, it's easy to think that when a friend comes to us for help that we've done our job by just quoting a few relevant verses of scripture to them. But the issues go much deeper than that. We must aim at heart change, not new choices. Sin is worship theft, we sin because we have a faulty view of God, or because we functionally worship a false god. Scripture memory isn't the remedy to these ill, we must be plugged into the story of redemption once more. We must help people see who they are in Christ, where they are going in Christ and how they'll get there in Christ. We must work and pray for a heart change from which will flow out a changed life. This Christ exulting goal has to be the aim of all personal ministry.

It's good and clear and helpful and all about the Gospel...go buy!

Riffing in Genesis 3

2011-02-09T09:34:00.005-05:00

I've probably spent 10-12 hours in the last two and a half days staring at Genesis 3 in preparation for Teen Church tonight. I'm very excited to get up behind the music stand and in front of the keyboard and preach to our teenagers tonight. If you happen to be awake around midnight, English friends, do pray for me, it's wonderful and terrible thing to preach.

All this time has helped me to slow down and see things that are obvious, but that i miss when i just skim through it in regular Bible reading.

God in Genesis 1-2:14 is Elohim, (the almighty, the creator) but from 2:14 onwards we meet the LORD God (YHWH Elohim). So Moses wanted to make the point that Israel's covenant God was also the Creator God, but also, Genesis 1-2:14 Elohim = Creator= God the Father, and 2:14 onwards = the talking, walking, judging God = Jesus...right?
Just as important as going 'via Corinth' when reading Paul's letters is going via the desert when reading Genesis. Chapter one is to remind Israel that their God is the creator, and is in charge, and that is the right thing to follow the cloud across the desert. Genesis 3 demonstrates why the desert is hot, why they're thirsty, and sick and unhappy, and why they were slaves in Egypt, even though they are God's people. This should affect, and even help, the way we apply Genesis.
Male headship runs strong though Genesis 3. God calls Adam in the cool of the day, Adam's judgement runs longer than Eve's, Adam's sin is that 'you have listened to the voice of your wife,' Adam's judgement concerns work, Eve's concerns childbirth.
If you want to throw away Genesis 1-3, please just go ahead and throw away the rest of the Bible. If Adam and Eve's real life, flesh and blood existence was enough for Jesus and Paul it really should be enough for us. Yes, Genesis 1 is probably written poetically, but so is Psalm 51, and no one wants to doubt that David committed sin with Bathsheba.
Conversely, if you can believe Genesis 1:1, the rest of the Bible shouldn't be too hard to handle.
Paying close attention to Genesis 1-3, and even to chapter 5, where we meet Seth, the offspring, helps me reading the rest of Genesis, and the rest of the Bible. Seth, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, David, Jesus. Glory!

Why do bad things happen to good people?

2011-02-07T08:27:00.002-05:00

Why do bad things happen to good people? Why is it the sweet Godly old man contracting a degenerative disease, and not the difficult ninety year old who has never darkened the door of a church? Why is it the newly married 21 year old who's life hung in the balance after a car wreck, whilst those who plan the death's of thousands carry on with apparent immunity?

Why do bad things happen to good people? Whether we like to admit it or not, whether our theology allows for it, this question is never far from our minds, and it constantly bubbles under the surface of our cultures approach to the world. We live in a world full of Eliphazs, who, in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, will say the the innocent prosper and the wicked suffer. When something happens that falls outside of those categories, we don't seem to have the tools to cope.

The church must be equipped to deal with these questions, both from without, as people who don't know Jesus struggle to impute meaning into meaninglessness, and from within, as people church goers who think of Jesus as a cosmic vending machine are struck by tragedy. So what do we say?

We have to point out, gently and carefully, that no one is good. That we've all sinned and come short of the glory of God. That Jesus told the rich young man that only God was good. Only God. Not one of us. Our question is the wrong way around. We need to ask, why are there tender moments with the ones we love, why is there smell and sizzle of steak, why are there last minute winners away from home on a Tuesday night? Why do good things happen to bad people? Because God is full of mercy and grace. Because there was only One who was Good, and He stood in our place.

Imagine there was a man in your town who perfectly kept God's law? What would you imagine his life would be like? He'd live in a nice part of town, because God would have given him a big house, his kids would go to a good school and excel at sports, he'd be popular, perhaps even a local celebrity. We expect people who obey God to be blessed don't we?

But what does the Bible tell us happened to the only One who kept God's law? He had no home of His own, no regular income, he was deserted by His friends and left to die naked and alone. Why? Because instead of receiving the rewards due for keeping God's law, He took the curses that should hit us. Why? Because God, in His love for us, His passion for holy glory and desire to give His Son and people sent Him as the only answer. Why did the bad thing happen to the good person? So that for all eternity God might do good to those who only deserve bad.

This matters on a cold Monday in February, not because Jesus is the only answer in a kids church sort of way, but because Jesus really is the only answer, the only provision of meaning, and God's great hope that in the winter of our lives, spring is always just around the corner.

County Strong: Choose love not fame

2011-01-28T17:48:00.004-05:00

Some movies we've watched have been simply an entertaining way to escape the summer heat, some movies one or both of us wanted to see because they drew us into their worlds, even in the adverts, and some movies have snuck up and made us think.

Country Strong, with Gwyneth Paltrow, falls into this last category. Rachel and I saw it this afternoon, and, unexpectedly, it's kept us talking and thinking about it. It tells the story of a country music superstar leaving rehab and trying to put her career back together in front of the eyes of her thousands of fans, and with the interests of a selfish husband and a self interested support act behind her.

The spoken and unspoken refrain that runs through the movie is 'choose love, not fame,' and that's what some of the characters end up doing. This is a redemption story, but it makes it clear that redemption is not something that we can do for ourselves. The hero is not inside us, those who chose fame and not love lost, those who chose love, well, the didn't win exactly, but they lost less.

Choose love not fame. Find your meaning in someone else, not yourself. The way Mark presents this news is so low key you almost miss it. In Mark 1:15 Jesus says 'the Kingdom of God is near, repent and believe the Good News.' Here is the Someone Else we need. Here is the man who is God announcing that the Kingdom of Heaven is breaking into Earth, that He has come for His people. John tells us that He came because He loved us. He tells us that God is love, and that He demonstrates His love by being the propitiation for our sins in 1 John 4:8-9. The message of the New Testament is that this is our only hope. That we must choose love, this love, rather than searching in ourselves for something that simply isn't there.

When i preach, this must be my message. The people listening to me don't need a system, or principles, they need a person. I don't need a new way of doing things, i need a person. I need Jesus.

Choose love not fame for redemption. Look outside yourself, to the one who is love, away from from yourself to Him, who made you for Himself.

I gotta pack back full of tracts plus i keep a Johnny Mac

2011-01-25T10:46:00.003-05:00

About a week ago, Challies wrote about 'The Strange Phenomena of White Middle-Aged Pastors Listening to Rap Music.' Some of the comments there are thoughtful, some provocative, and some remind us that you can't spell Fundamentalist without the third and fourth syllables.

I don't really have anything to add, except that it's impossible not to observe some of the beauty of the Gospel when you see John Piper interview Lecrae. Where else would a nearly seventy year old speaker and author from Minnesota find friendship and common ground with a rapper in his twenties from Atlanta? Not many places i'd wager.

I don't own a Lecrae album, i've never really been 'in to' rap music apart from a brief phase when i was about fifteen when Eminem and Dr Dre were fairly heavily rotated. I think it's a good thing that my bedroom in those days was in the attic above the spare room, a long way from civilization!

Nevertheless, i've really enjoyed the song that Challies shared, as well as Trip Lee rapping through Philippians courtesy of Timmy Brister in the last couple of days, and i leave them here for your potential encouragement and edification.

What was Grandad thinking?

2011-01-24T07:55:00.004-05:00

This weekend marked the 38th anniversary of Roe vs Wade, a ruling by the US Supreme Court that extended the fourteenth amendment to include a woman's right to choose to have an abortion.

Churches all over America will have marked this event in different ways. For us, we had two joint Sunday School classes, for teens and adults, taught by ladies from the Carolina Pregnancy Center here in Greenville, and then Rachel's Dad preached from Psalm 139, a message full of the terror of abortion and the unparalleled hope we have in Jesus. At the end of our morning meeting we baptised two newly believing adults, and so celebrated natural birth and spiritual birth all in one go. It was a good morning.

Perhaps the biggest impression this weekend made on me was about the differences between the church here and the church at home. As an outsider, we often think of the American Church as too politicized (and goodness me, when people are comparing Glenn Beck to George Whitfield, it clearly is) but i wonder if top level political engagement is something the church in the UK shies away from too often.

I don't know what my local MP's view is on abortion, i don't know why less coverage is given to it politically at home than in the States, all i do know is this. I don't want my cultural blind spots to be so obvious that my great grandchildren can hardly believe it.

My biggest problem with Jonathan Edwards, the biggest problem with Edwards is that he owned slaves. Slaves! Think of it, the man who wrote the Religious Affections owned people like he owned tables. It's barely comprehensible when you think about it for long enough. But we call need grace to cover our cultural blind spots don't we? I know there will be enough in my life that will make my grandchildren tell their kids 'grandad was a faithful guy, but let me tell you some of the whacked out stuff he did.' I don't know what our generation will be scoffed at for in 150 years, but i really don't want it to be that we sat idly by while babies were being aborted all around us. It's easy to point the finger at doctors, clinics, policies, irresponsible men and helpless mothers, but the answer starts with us.

There's no silver bullet here, no single thing that we can all do to solve the problem, we can always do more. But since we know it's possibly the problem of our day, can we all at least give, and pray and do something?

EDIT: The incomparable Al Mohler has constructed an epic regarding our pro abortion President.

Psalm 103

2011-01-18T13:04:00.003-05:00

Bless the Lord oh my soul, all that is within me bless His holy name.

I don't know what sort of a day you're having dear reader. Whether it's better than the one you imagined when you opened your eyes this morning or worse, whether it's been marked by tragedy, or the biggest difficulty has been changing your clothes after breakfast because you small like bacon. I don't know what sort of a day David was having when he penned Psalm 103 either, but i know that whatever sort of a day he was having, and whatever sort of a day you're having, This Psalm is for that day. It's for everyday.

'David,' he says to himself 'bless the Lord.' He talks to himself and tells himself to to praise God. Why? Not because of his circumstances, but because of his benefits. Praise the Lord because of the benefits of the Lord. Which are? Verses 3-7 give us a quick list: Your iniquity is forgiven, your diseases are healed, your life is redeemed, you are crowned with steadfast love and mercy, you're satisfied with good, your youth will be renewed, righteousness and justice will be worked on your behalf. What was important for David, and important to us was verse 7. God revealed Himself to Moses. He is not a new, modern, flash in the pan deity. This is God! A God with an impressive track record, a God that can be trusted.

So remember the Lord's benefits, but above all, remember the biggie. He does not deal with us according to our sins or repay us according to our iniquities. Why not? Because as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. How far apart are east and west? They never meet. East and west never meet. You will never meet the consequences of your sin! North and south meet at the North Pole and the South Pole, but east and west? Never. Nowhere.

Everything else the Lord has done for us, everything else the church should stand for, should center around this. That our sins are forgiven, removed, never to meet us. God is now our Father, who shows compassion on us.

The greatest thing in the world is to know God. But the greatest obstacle in the world to the greatest thing in the world? You and me. We need our sins forgiven, we need our sins removed. Jesus Christ has done this, suffering outside the city, the ultimate Azazel and removed our sins far from us. As far as they could be.

Whatever today is like, whatever tomorrow is like, where ever we are ten years from now, this will still be true, and Jesus will still be uniquely worthy of all our praise.

Pat Robertson and (my) original sin

2011-01-12T09:46:00.005-05:00

It's impossible to watch the video of Pat Robertson's annual new years predictions, without thinking 'wow, Pat Roberson's god likes him a whole bunch.' The 2011 version can basically be broken down into 'God told me everyone else will be in trouble, but it will be a good year for my concerns.' Frank Turk has done a great job of verbalising the issues that this videos raise, so i won't do more of that here, short of registering my wonder that the lady interviewing him kept a straight face all the way though.

Pat Robertson's god likes him a whole bunch. But you know what? Ed Goode's god likes me a whole bunch. He doesn't think my sins are as serious as yours, he never chides me, he always agrees with what i'm thinking, and understands that, even though my prayers aren't always Biblical, the extenuating circumstances always over rule God's eternal Word. Obviously.

Prideful, blinding sin is rampant in my heart, just like Pat Roberson's.

I think so much of the nature and extent of sin was bought home to me again thinking about John Piper's leave of absence, from which he has recently returned. John Piper sins. I know that. He has to watch his life, as well as his doctrine. I know that too. But it hammered home in my heart that sin is such a serious, deadly disease, that we can never imagine we are any better off than we are. We must maintain low views of ourselves, and high views of God through His Word. Piper's leave of absence taught me that. If he has sin patterns that are so serious that he feels the need to step away from his church and pulpit for eight months, how can i imagine i'm any different? How can i assume my life doesn't need serious attention, that my marriage doesn't need all my strength, that my sanctification is something other than one Spirit wrought miracle after another.

My sin crouches at my door and desires to posses me. I'd better learn from Pat Robertson, that without serious, constant attention, it will blind me, and make me a fool. I'd better learn also from John Piper, that whatever acclaim comes my way, how ever long i'm married for, it's always after me, and i must always be on guard.