Running in a Relay Race

Bob Kauflin makes a point using the analogy of a relay race:

A relay race involves more than one person

In the often individualistic world of track and field, the relay is a unique race. It requires teamwork that other races don’t. The runner who crosses the finish line is integrally dependent on those who have run before him.

Likewise, we need those who have gone before us. We’re running the same race. Hebrews 11 is a clear reminder that we are but one piece of the glorious tapestry God is weaving together for His glory.

Having a relay mindset means being one of the faithful men Paul describes to Timothy (2 Tim. 2:2). What can keep you from being part of the relay team? Rarely interacting with those from another generation. Spending the majority of your time reflecting on the ideas of your peers. Criticizing any idea or practice that doesn’t rate high on the relevance or coolness meter. Only reading books that were printed in the last decade — or worse, confining your reading to the blogosphere or Twitter.

Cultivating the humility that recognizes the need for voices older and wiser than your own isn’t easy. But it’s well worth the effort.

Why So Much Talk about the Gospel?

Why do we need to be reminded of the gospel?

Dane Ortlund:

• Because the gospel is “of first importance” (1 Cor 15:3). In describing his ministry—a ministry that communicated “the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:27)—Paul described it as testifying “to the gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24).
• Because you’re going to roll out of bed tomorrow a functional Pharisee. The instincts beneath your instincts, the impulses way down deep inside you, are law, not gospel. A good night’s sleep, not a heretical sermon, is all it takes to forget the gospel of grace.
• Because the gospel is disputed and debated today. What is the gospel? What are the implications of the gospel? What is the relationship between the gospel and the kingdom of God? How does the gospel relate to growth in godliness? What is the connection between the gospel and community? These questions need answers from different people, with different voices and different backgrounds, who love the same gospel.
• Because the church is always one generation away from losing the gospel. Every generation must rediscover the glories of free grace for itself.
• Because for every book exulting in or explaining or defending the gospel, a hundred more roll off the press which, wittingly or unwittingly, distract us from that which is of first importance.
• Because the gospel is the central message of the entire Bible. Jesus said that even Moses was writing, ultimately, about him (John 5:46). The last verse of the Bible sums up the core message of the Bible: “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen” (Rev. 22:21).

Church Is Not the Place for Patriotism

Kevin DeYoung:

While patriotism can be good, the church is not a good place for patriotism.

We should pray for service men and women in our congregations. We should pray for the President. We should pray for the just cause to triumph over the evil one. We are not moral relativists. We do not believe just because all people are sinners and all nations are sinful that no person or no nation can be more righteous or more wicked than another. God may be on America’s side in some (not all) her endeavors.

But please think twice before putting on a Star Spangled gala in church this Sunday. I love to hear the national anthem and “God Bless America” and “My Country, Tis of Thee,” but not in church where the nations gather to worship the King of all peoples. I love to see the presentation of colors and salute our veterans, but these would be better at the Memorial Day parade or during a time of remembrance at the cemetery. Earthly worship should reflect the on-going worship in heaven. And while there are many Americans singing glorious songs to Jesus there, they are not singing songs about the glories of America. We must hold to the traditions of the Apostles in our worship, not the traditions of American history. The church should not ask of her people what is not required in Scripture. So how can we ask the Koreans and Chinese and Mexicans and South Africans in our churches to pledge allegiance to a flag that is not theirs? Are we gathered under the banner of Christ or another banner? Is the church of Jesus Christ–our Jewish Lord and Savior–for those draped in the red, white, and blue or for those washed in the blood of the Lamb?

In some parts of the church, every hint of patriotism makes you a jingoistic idolater. You are allowed to love every country except your own. But in other parts of the church, true religion blends too comfortably into civil religion. You are allowed to worship in our services as long as you love America as much as we do. I don’t claim to have arrived at the golden mean, but I imagine many churches could stand to think more carefully about their theology of God and country. Churches should be glad to have their members celebrate Memorial Day with gusto this Monday. We should be less sanguine about celebrating it with pomp and circumstance on Sunday.

Never Read a Bible Verse

Greg Koukl:

If there was one bit of wisdom, one rule of thumb, one single skill I could impart, one useful tip I could leave that would serve you well the rest of your life, what would it be? What is the single most important practical skill I’ve ever learned as a Christian?

Here it is: Never read a Bible verse. That’s right, never read a Bible verse. Instead, always read a paragraph at least.

When I’m on the radio, I use this simple rule to help me answer the majority of Bible questions I’m asked, even when I’m totally unfamiliar with the verse. It’s an amazingly effective technique you can use, too.

I read the paragraph, not just the verse. I take stock of the relevant material above and below. Since the context frames the verse and gives it specific meaning, I let it tell me what’s going on.

This works because of a basic rule of all communication: Meaning always flows from the top down, from the larger units to the smaller units, not the other way around. The key to the meaning of any verse comes from the paragraph, not just from the individual words.

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Our Mandate for World Evangelization

John Stott:

Our mandate for world evangelization is the whole Bible. It is to be found in the creation of God (because of which all human beings are responsible to him), in the character of God (as outgoing, loving, compassionate, not willing that any should perish, desiring that all should come to repentance), in the promises of God (that all nations will be blessed through Abraham's seed and will become the Messiah's inheritance), in the Christ of God (now exalted with universal authority, to receive universal acclaim), in the Spirit of God (who convicts of sin, witnesses to Christ, and impels the church to evangelize) and in the church of God (which is a multinational, missionary community, under orders to evangelize until Christ returns).

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Knowing Is Possible

Mike Wittmer unravels a common fallacy:

There is a lot that I could say about Granderson’s piece, but I’ll focus on this paragraph:
“One of the biggest problems with religion in general, and evangelical Christianity in particular, is the claim of having definitive answers about an infinite being. But true faith does not require us to have all of the answers.”

Did you notice the leap from “having definitive answers” to having “all of the answers”? I don’t know anyone who claims to “have all of the answers” when it comes to God. I agree with Granderson’s later statement that “If we could figure God out, he wouldn’t be that impressive.”

But why should humbly claiming that we don’t “have all of the answers” cause us to concede that we don’t have any “definitive answers about an infinite being”? If the Bible is God’s revelation, then we do possess accurate—though not comprehensive—knowledge of who God is and what he has done. To claim that we don’t is not humility but actually arrogance.

It is arrogant to come to the Bible with our minds already made up about what a loving God must do, and then seek to dismiss or question away those biblical passages which don’t fit our preconceived notions. For all of their protests about the arrogance of conservatives, it is actually theological liberals who lead the way in cramming God into their finite boxes. Contra Granderson, it is a problem to question the existence of heaven and hell, not because we need them as “the only reason to seek [God’s] face,” but because God has told us about them in Scripture. To pretend otherwise is not exactly what God would call humility.

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The Gospel Is Better than Unconditional Love

David Powlison:

What happens to the Gospel when idolatry themes are not grasped? ‘God loves you’ typically becomes a tool to meet a need for self-esteem in people who feel like failures. The particular content of the Gospel of Jesus Christ—‘grace for sinners and deliverance for the sinned-against—is down-played or even twisted into ‘unconditional acceptance for the victims of others’ lack of acceptance.’ Where ‘the Gospel’ is shared, it comes across something like this: ‘God accepts you just as you are. God had unconditional love for you.’ This is not the biblical Gospel, however. . . .

The Gospel is better than unconditional love. The Gospel says, ‘God accepts you just as Christ is. God has “contraconditional” love for you.’ Christ bears the curse you deserve. Christ is fully pleasing to the Father and gives you His own perfect goodness. Christ reigns in power, making you the Father’s child and coming close to you to begin to change what is unacceptable to God about you. God never accept me ‘as I am.’ He accepts me ‘as I am in Jesus Christ.’ The center of gravity is different. The true Gospel does not allow God’s love to be sucked into the vortex of the soul’s lust for acceptability and worth in and of itself. Rather, it radically decenters people—what the Bible calls ‘fear of the Lord’ and ‘faith’—to look outside ourselves.

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A Majority Supports Same-Sex Marriage

WORLD magazine reports:

For the first time, a Gallup poll shows that national support for same-sex marriage is the majority position: 53 percent support and only 45 percent oppose. There does not appear to be anything in the culture that would reverse that upward trend.

Read the rest here.

What Is Repentance?

What is repentance?

Charles Spurgeon:

Repentance is a discovery of the evil of sin, a mourning that we have committed it, a resolution to forsake it. It is, in fact, a change of mind of a very deep and practical character, which makes the man love what once he hated, and hate what once he loved.

J. I. Packer:

Repentance means turning from as much as you know of your sin to give as much as you know of yourself to as much as you know of your God, and as our knowledge grows at these three points so our practice of repentance has to be enlarged.

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Lies and Persecution

According to Ronald Boyd-MacMillan, chief strategy officer for Open Doors International, there are at least four lies that drive the persecution of Christians today:

1. In the Middle East, the lie is that “Christianity is a foreign religion, a Trojan horse for pro-Israel, pro-American forces.”
2. In the Asian subcontinent, the lie is that “Christianity only grows through unethical or forced conversion and wants to take over our countries by stealth.”
3. In those countries where the Marxist ideology still lingers, such as China, North Korea, Vietnam, and parts of Latin America and Africa, the lie remains this: “Christianity is for weaklings who can’t face the world on its own terms and need crutches of illusion.”
4. In the West, the lie is that “Christianity is intolerant, anti-scientific and best kept out of public life completely.”

Go here for the whole article, including two truths in light of these lies.

When the Rapture Doesn't Happen

Eric Landry:

We must be very careful about how we respond. Will we join our friends at the “Rapture Parties” that are planned for pubs and living rooms around the nation? Will we laugh at those who have spent the last several months of their lives dedicated to a true but untimely belief? What will we say on Saturday night or Sunday morning?

History teaches us that previous generations caught up in eschatological fervor often fell away from Christ when their deeply held beliefs about the end of the world didn’t pan out. While Camping must answer for his false teaching at the end of the age, Reformational Christians are facing a pastoral problem come Sunday morning: how can we apply the salve of the Gospel to the wounded sheep who will be wandering aimlessly, having discovered that what they thought was true (so true they were willing to upend their lives over it) was not? If this isn’t true, they might reason, then what other deeply held beliefs and convictions and doctrines and hopes might not be true?

It’s at this point that we need to be ready to provide a reasonable defense of our reasonable faith. Christianity is not founded upon some complex Bible code that needs years of analysis to reveal its secret. Christianity is about a man who claimed to be God, who died in full public view as a criminal, and was inexplicably raised from the dead three days later appearing to a multitude of witnesses. When his followers, who witnessed his resurrection, began speaking of it publicly, they connected the prophecies of the Old Testament to the life and death and resurrection of this man who claimed the power to forgive sins. This is the heart of the Christian faith, the message that deserves to be featured on billboards, sides of buses, and pamphlets all over the world. It is also the message that needs to be reinvested into the hearts and lives of those who found hope and meaning in Harold Camping’s latest bad idea.

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Preparing for Your Funeral

J. C. Ryle:

When we have carried you to your narrow bed, let us not have to hunt up stray words, and scraps of religion, in order to make out that you were a true believer. Let us not have to say in a hesitating way one to another, “I trust he is happy; he talked so nicely one day; and he seemed so please with a chapter in the Bible on anther occasion; and he liked such a person, who is a good man.” Let us be able to speak decidedly as to your condition. Let us have some solid proof of your repentance, your faith, and your holiness, so that none shall be able for a moment to question your state.

Depend on it, without this, those you leave behind can feel no solid comfort about your soul. We may use the form of religion at your burial, and express charitable hopes. We may meet you at the churchyard gate, and say, “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.” But this will not alter your condition! If you die without conversion to God, without repentance, and without faith–your funeral will only be the funeral of a lost soul; you had better never have been born.

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"One Anothers" Not Found in the New Testament

John 15:12-13

¹² "This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends."

Ray Ortlund, on "one anothers" you can't find in the New Testament:

Humble one another, scrutinize one another, pressure one another, embarrass one another, corner one another, interrupt one another, defeat one another, disapprove of one another, run one another’s lives, confess one another’s sins, intensify one another’s sufferings, point out one another’s failings . . . .

In a soft environment, where we settle for a false peace with present evils, we turn on one another. In a realistic environment, where we are suffering to advance the gospel, our thoughts turn to how we can stick up for one another.

Three Strands of Biblical Prayer

David Powlison on three strands of biblical prayer:

1. Sometimes we ask God to change our circumstances—heal the sick, give us daily bread, protect us from suffering and evildoers, make our political leaders just, convert our friends and family, make our work and ministries prosper, provide us with a spouse, quiet this dangerous storm, send us rain, give us a child.
2. Sometimes we ask God to change us—deepen our faith, teach us to love each other, forgive our sins, make us wise where we tend to be foolish, help us know You better, give us understanding of Scripture, teach us how to encourage others.
3. Sometimes we ask God to change everything by revealing Himself more fully on the stage of real life, magnifying the degree to which His glory and rule are obvious—Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven, be exalted above the heavens, let Your glory be over all of the earth, let Your glory fill the earth as the waters cover the sea, come Lord Jesus.

When any of these three strands of prayer gets detached from the other two, prayer tends to go sour.

If you just pray for better circumstances, then God becomes the errand boy (usually somewhat disappointing) who exists to give you your shopping list of desires and pleasures—no sanctifying purposes, no higher glory. Prayer becomes gimme, gimme, gimme.

If you only pray for personal change, then it tends to reveal an obsession with moral self improvement, a self-absorbed spirituality detached from engaging with other people and the tasks of life. Where is the longing for Christ’s kingdom to right all wrongs, not just to alleviate my sins so I don’t feel bad about myself? Prayer pursues self-centered, morally-strenuous asceticism, with little evidence of real love, trust, or joy.

If we only pray for the sweeping invasion of the kingdom, then prayers tend towards irrelevance and overgeneralization, failing to work out how the actual kingdom rights real wrongs, wipes away real tears, and removes real sins. Such prayers pursue a God who never touches ground until the last day.

Keep all three strands together in your prayer!

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The Appeal of the New Testament Letters

Here's another portion of interview by George Guthrie, author of Read the Bible for Life, speaking with Clinton Arnold on the way the New Testament letters are so appealing.

Be sure to join us for our ongoing series in the letter to the Galatians this Sunday.

The Desire to Be Your Own Savior and Lord

Tim Keller, from The Prodigal God:

What must we do, then, to be saved? To find God we must repent of the things we have done wrong, but if that is all you do, you may remain just an elder brother. To truly become a Christian we must also repent of the reasons we ever did anything right. Pharisees only repent of their sins, but Christians repent for the very roots of their righteousness, too. We must learn how to repent of the sin under all our other sins and under all our righteousness – the sin of seeking to be our own Savior and Lord. We must admit that we’ve put our ultimate hope in both our wrongdoing and right doing we have been seeking to get around God or get control of God in order to get hold of those things.

It is only when you see the desire to be your own Savior and Lord—lying beneath both your sins and your moral goodness—that you are on the verge of becoming a Christian indeed. When you realize that the antidote to being bad is not just being good, you are on the brink. If you follow through, it will change everything—how you relate to God, self, others, the world, your work, you sins, your virtue. It’s called the new birth because its so radical.

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Depression and Medicine

Should you take medicine for depression? Ed Welch offers some thoughts:

From a Christian perspective, the choice to take medication is a wisdom issue. It is rarely a matter of right or wrong. Instead, the question to ask is, “What is best and wise?” Wise people seek counsel (your physicians should be part of the group that counsels you). Wise people approach decisions prayerfully. They don’t put their hope in people or medicine but in the Lord. They recognize that medication is a blessing, when it helps, but recognize its limits.

Medication can change physical symptoms, but not spiritual ones. It might give sleep, offer physical energy, allow you to see in color, and alleviate the physical feeling of depression. But it won’t answer your spiritual doubts, fears, frustrations, or failures. If you choose to take medication, please consider letting a wise and trusted person from your church walk come along side of you. They can remind you that God is good, that you can find power to know God’s love and love others, and, yes, that joy is possible, even during depression.

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God Is Faithful

John Calvin:

Unbelief is so deeply rooted in our hearts, and we are so inclined to it, that not without hard struggle is each one able to persuade himself of what all confess with the mouth: namely, that God is faithful.

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Resisting Consumer Temptations

According to a recent study in the Wall Street Journal, 11 percent of consumer spending in the US is on nonessential goods. Ten years ago, it was 9 percent. In 1959, it was 4 percent.

It is a good thing that we are not scraping by to survive, but many of us do not use that extra to give, save, or invest. We are spending it on frivolities.

Here's John Temple on resisting consumeristic temptations:

• Do not read the glossy “good-life” magazines. These are filled with temptations to buy or consume what may not be remotely necessary. I have stopped even opening the airline magazines, which depict a way of life which is presented as normal but is not even close.
• Do not watch the “lifestyle” TV programs that extol glamorous or extravagant living.
• Hit the mute button when the commercials appear on TV and try to ignore what they are showing.
• Avoid impulse buying. When you go shopping, draw up a list of what you need to buy and wear blinders for everything else. Never buy anything from the displays at the checkouts.
• Don’t buy anything that is a bargain if you do not need it. It is no bargain if you can do without it.
• Politely decline any salesperson who comes to your door. He or she is almost always selling something that you do not need.
• Do not be tempted to have the latest in anything. This includes fashions, electronic gadgets, computers and cars. The list is endless. Keep your old one until it makes economic sense to replace it. I still wear suits that are twenty years old. They have been in and out of fashion a few times, so I am not always out of date! While ladies may be more tempted in the clothing arena, men will be subject to more pressure with gadgets and cars. Watch yourself.
• Do not spend ostentatiously. I recall a pastor’s wife noting that many people who have money often live frugal lives and shop carefully, whereas some people tend to spend freely even if they should be more careful. The writer of Proverbs knew this long ago! “One pretends to be rich, yet has nothing; another pretends to be poor, yet has great wealth” (Prov. 13:7).

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The Fight

If you have been reading You Can Change, this and the previous post (below) go well with the final chapter we discussed Sunday evening.

John Piper:

The fight is not the oppressive struggle to earn God’s final rest, but the satisfying struggle to rest in the peace that Jesus freely gives. . . .Don’t think of striving to get his favor. Think of striving with the favor of his help.

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Drifting

Don Carson:

People do not drift toward holiness.

Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord.

We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance; we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom; we drift toward superstition and call it faith. We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation; we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism; we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated.

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Letter Writing in the Ancient World

Tomorrow morning, we will begin a sermon series from Paul's letter to the Galatians.

George Guthrie interviews Clint Arnold with this question: "What was letter writing like in the ancient world?"

Don't Miss the Impact of the Spirit

I usually include a sermon outline in the worship folder for our congregation, but this is only to help you follow along, if necessary. You are free to take notes, but I don't encourage it. One reason is that the words you need to remember are already printed in your Bible, and another is well explained in the quotation below.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones:

I have often discouraged the taking of notes while I am preaching. . . . The first and primary object of preaching is not only to give information. It is, as [Jonathan] Edwards says, to produce an impression. It is the impression at the time that matters, even more than what you can remember subsequently. . . . While you are writing your notes, you may be missing something of the impact of the Spirit.

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The Kingdom of God or the Kingdom of Self

Paul Tripp:

Because sin is antisocial, it tends to dehumanize the people in our lives.

No longer are they objects of our willing affection. No, they quit being the people we find joy in loving.

Rather, they get reduced to one of two things.

They are either vehicles to help us get what we want or obstacles in the way of what we want.

When your wife is meeting the demands of your wants, needs, and feelings, you are quite excited about her, and you treat her with affection.

But when she becomes an obstacle in the way of your wants, needs, and feelings, you have a hard time hiding your disappointment, impatience, and irritation.

This is where another eloquent biblical observation comes in. It is that we are kingdom-oriented people. We always live in the service of one of two kingdoms.

We live in service of the small, personal happiness agenda of the kingdom of self, or we live in service of the huge, origin-to-destiny agenda of the kingdom of God.

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Reading about the Afterlife

Scott Lamb:

Eight? How could Walmart stock eight different books, non-fiction books to be precise, all on the topic of the afterlife?

The kind of books that Walmart sells are the kind of books that sell. The discount retailer moves a heap of books out the door by stocking titles with “buzz” already surrounding them.

Lined up face-out on the shelf, they each promised to give me something I needed to know about heaven or hell. I scanned and skimmed them, and found four variations on the theme:

Heaven exists. I’ve seen it. Or, my kid has seen it.

Heaven exists. I’ve read about it in a sacred book.

Hell exists. I spent 23 minutes there.

Hell (sort of) exists. But love wins in the end.

...

Whatever happened to secularism? The fact is, many people are reading and talking about the afterlife these days. This is consistent with survey results that report more than 80 percent of Americans believe in some sort of life after death. This belief may take Buddhist, Baptist, or Oprah Winfrey form, but the belief is out there nonetheless.

One may counter by saying that this conversation exists because these books are published, and I would agree with you to a point. On the other hand, shrewd publishers find and print books in response to existing cultural chatter and consumer desire.

Either way, Christians must not miss taking note of and acting upon this very simple leading cultural indicator: People really want to know what happens after death.

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Shallow Small Group

Our last small group meeting for this ministry year is this Sunday. Make it a good one-- not like this.

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Ambitions for God

John Stott:

Ambitions for self may be quite modest. . . . Ambitions for God, however, if they are to be worthy, can never be modest. There is something inherently inappropriate about cherishing small ambitions for God. How can we ever be content that he should acquire just a little more honour in the world? No. Once we are clear that God is King, then we long to see him crowned with glory and honour, and accorded his true place, which is the supreme place. We become ambitious for the spread of his kingdom and righteousness everywhere.

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Seeking Forgiveness

Lou Priolo:

Seeking forgiveness cannot be confused with apologizing. An apology is not the means to reconciliation (which is to say that “I’m sorry” and “Please forgive me” are not the same thing). If I apologize to a person I’ve offended and he subsequently apologizes to me, we still have not taken responsibility and truly humbled ourselves. We haven’t tied up loose ends and, to use Priolo’s term, the ball is still up in the air. Apologies are not enough. We must seek forgiveness and its fruit—reconciliation.

1. Acknowledge that you have sinned. Let the party you’ve offended know that you acknowledge wrongdoing. This is humbling but necessary. Acknowledge not only that you sin and are a sinner but that you have actually sinned against this person.
2. Identify your sin by its specific biblical name. Do not simply acknowledge generic sin but acknowledge specific sin and call it by its biblical name (which keeps you from acknowledging something society may label as sin but the Bible does not). This ensures that you have thought deeply about your sin and have seen how it fits into what the Bible calls sin.
3. Acknowledge the harm your offense caused. This is also humbling. You must acknowledge that your sin has had consequences and that you are owning up not only to the sin but also to the harmful consequences your sin brought about.
4. Demonstrate repentance by identifying an alternative biblical behavior. Show that you have truly considered your sin by explaining what you should have done instead. Show what the appropriate alternative behavior would have been.
5. Ask for forgiveness. This puts the onus on the offended party to accept your repentance and to extend forgiveness to you. It completes the reconciliation between the offender and the one who has been offended.

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Idolatry Intensifies Anxiety

Thomas Oden:

When I view a particular possibility as threatening, it imperils some value important to me. That is what I mean by threat. But suppose this threat is directed not to some modest finite value I love but to the very center of my value system, that focal value by which all my other values are viewed as valuable. Suppose my god is sex or my own physical health or the Democratic Party. If I experience one of these as under genuine threat, then I feel myself shake to the depths. In this way, idolatry intensifies anxiety.

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Is It Idolatry?

Stephen Altrogge:

How do we know if we love something too much? Where is the line between a healthy enjoyment and an idol? Idolatry is often subtle. It can creep up on us in the form of good desires, like getting married or excelling in the work place. You may have created idols for yourself if:

• You are crushed when you don’t get what you want. When that end of the year bonus you have been anticipating for months is taken from you, does it shatter your joy?
• You stake your happiness on getting what you want. All of your friends are finding their soul mates and getting married, and you can’t even find a date. Do you resign to bitter hopelessness in your singleness?
• You grumble and complain when you don’t have what you want. Are you angry with God for not creating you with the supposed external beauty that everyone around you seems to have?
• You demand what you want. Have your humble prayers for healing from a physical ailment turned to angry demands of God? Do you feel you deserve to be healed?

When good gifts (like marriage, beauty, healing, or money) turn into idols, they become terrible and consuming masters. To destroy these idols, we must put them off by the power of the Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit to give us a deep love for God that drives out all lesser loves and gives us power over our idolatrous desires, in both our thoughts and actions. Through the Holy Spirit, we find contentment.

If we have made an idol out of something good that does not need to be driven from our lives entirely, such as a desire for children, repentance comes in the form of prayer. Stop demanding that God give you children, but rather pray humbly, offering your requests to God but submitting to his all-knowing plan for your life.

Give the Desire and Reduce the Distance

This seems to go well with our study on the deaths of Abraham and Sarah from Genesis 23 and 25.

David Murray:

Why does heaven feel so far away? Why does Jesus seem so distant?

Recent research by Emily Balcetis and David Dunning indicates that the desirability of an object influences its perceived distance. Thirsty students fed with pretzels perceived a water bottle to be nearer than those who had had their thirst quenched. Other students placed in front of a $100 bill they could win for themselves perceived it to be closer than those who were told that the bill belonged to the scientist conducting the test. A third set of students had their sense of humor graded and clipped to a stand in front of them. Those given positive feedback estimated the stand to be closer than those who could see their feedback was negative. Other similar experiments confirmed the finding that desire reduces the perception of distance.

Is this why heaven often seems so far away? We don’t desire it enough?

Is this why Jesus sometimes seems so distant? We don’t desire Him enough?

But if desire reduces the distance, “Lord Jesus, give the desire and reduce the distance.”

Gossip and Flattery

Kent Hughes:

Gossip involves saying behind a person’s back

what you would never say to his or her face.

Flattery means saying to a person’s face

what you would never say behind his or her back.

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Different Responses to World Crises

Mark Lewis of EFCA TouchGlobal:

Yet our crisis response will be different in Japan from our response in Haiti—just as it has been different in every region where we’ve sent help, from tsunami-ravaged Southeast Asia to Katrina-flattened New Orleans.

Our response will be contextualized to culture. For example, members of one Japanese church we partner with have been taking large pots of clean water and washing the feet of people crammed into the shelters. In a country where the people always take off their dirty shoes upon entering a home, this is the Great Commandment being lived out in a uniquely Japanese manner. These are Jesus’ hands at work, speaking the heart language of the people.

That contextualization is spiritual as well, because people’s spiritual awareness is different in Japan than in Haiti. Not only are there few churches, and even fewer Christian leaders to help rebuild the society, but it’s also an incredibly shame-based culture. Each year, more than 30,000 people in Japan kill themselves—a number even higher than the death toll from the March 2011 tragedies themselves. The concepts of mercy, grace and forgiveness seem nonexistent.

So in Japan, we’ve got to do some pioneering work to build churches. To do so, we’re working with the Evangelical Free Church of Japan, as well as with any like-minded Christian ministry that wants to advance God’s kingdom.

In both Japan and Haiti, we want to see intentional, sustainable disciple-making movements flourish. And that happens, we’ve learned, by putting boots on the ground and engaging in long-term relationships. That’s also what we’re doing in New Orleans and Manila, Philppines; in Myanmar and Chincha, Peru.

Wherever God has opened the door for us, post-crisis, to bring that Great Commission and Great Commandment focus, we’re in it for the long haul.

The Trinity in Salvation

In Our Triune God, Philip Ryken and Michael LeFabvre explain how each person of the Trinity is involved in our salvation:

The Father: Salvation originated with the Father. Ephesians 1:3-6 tells how the Father chose us before the foundation of the world, and predetermined our adoption as this children through Jesus Christ. The Father is the administrator of salvation, and he oversees the process from beginning to end.

The Son: Salvation is brought to fruition in the Son. Everything the Father does for our salvation, he does through Christ. The work of the Son means redemption, adoption to the Father, reconciliation, sanctification, and glorification (Ephesians 1:7-12). It operates horizontally as well as vertically, and it is for Jew and Gentile alike. It is through the Son that we achieve salvation and come into full relationship with the triune God.

The Spirit: Salvation is communicated by the Holy Spirit. The Spirit changes us from the inside out, preforming the gracious act of regeneration. With this comes the gift of faith and the spiritual ability to believe in the Resurrection. Through the Holy Spirit, our salvation becomes a present reality, applicable to our lives in our own specific context. It is the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives that serves as a seal, establishing us as children of God (Ephesians 1:13-14).

Source

5 Myths, 5 Truths about Forgiveness

Sam Storms:

Five Myths about Forgiveness:

• Contrary to what many have been led to believe, forgiveness is not forgetting.
• Forgiving someone does not mean you no longer feel the pain of their offense.
• Forgiving someone who has sinned against you doesn’t mean you cease longing for justice.
• Forgiveness does not mean you are to make it easy for the offender to hurt you again.
• Forgiveness is rarely a one-time, climactic event. It is most often a life-long process.

Five Truths about Forgiveness:

• God in Christ forgave us by absorbing in himself the destructive and painful consequences of our sin against him.
• God forgave us in Christ by canceling the debt we owed him. That is to say, we are no longer held liable for our sins or in any way made to pay for them.
• Forgiving others as God has forgiven us means we resolve to revoke revenge.
• Forgiving others as God has forgiven us means that we determine to do good to them rather than evil. Read especially Romans 12:17-21.
• God forgave us in Christ by reconciling us to himself, by restoring the relationship that our sin had shattered.

Read the whole thing here.

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Daily Repentance

Jack Miller:

Be encouraged then, fellow believer. In calling you to daily repentance, the Lord Jesus is not simply giving you good advice. He is saying, ‘If you are a child of mine, you must continue to repent.’ He does not say to reform your human nature inherited from Adam. Instead, He says to ‘put to death your members which are on the earth’ (Colossians 3:5). And dying is not easy. Nor…does it all happen at one’s conversion.

Now there is grand encouragement here. The putting to death of the flesh—ongoing repentance—is not something reserved for the select few. For repentance, in the larger use of the New Testament word, incudes trust in Christ which unities the believer to the Lord in His death, burial and resurrection (Romans 6:1-11; Colossians 2:9-12, 3:1-4).

So to be in Christ is to be in possession of the power to put to death the lusts of the flesh (Colossians 3:5), to put off vicious habits like uncontrolled anger, slander and lying (Colossians 3:8-9), and to put on the qualities of love, kindness, meekness and patience which identify a person as one of the elect of God (Colossians 3:12-17).

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The Limitations of Justice in a Fallen World

Al Mohler, reflecting on the death of Osama Bin Laden:

Once again, Christians are reminded of the inherent limitations of justice in a fallen and sinful world. At our very best, we can achieve only a small proportion of adequate justice. We can convict the murderer, and we can put him to death, but we cannot being the dead back to life. We can put an end to Osama bin Ladin, but we are robbed of the satisfaction of seeing him answer for his crimes.

We did the best we could do, and that is often where we are left. We are left with a sense of sober satisfaction. This is no small comfort to all those who are still grieving — the loved ones of September 11, and the loved ones of all who have lost their lives while wearing the uniform of the United States fighting bin Ladin and the forces of terror.

But, as is always the case, we are left with a sense that a higher court is still needed. Christians know that Osama bin Ladin escaped the reach of full human justice and a trial for his crimes, but he will not escape the judgment that is to come. Bin Ladin will not escape his trial before the court of God. Until then, sober satisfaction must be enough for those still in the land of the living.

Read his entire essay for some more worthwhile thoughts.

Tragedy and Victory

Christopher Morgan, who comments on how the "internal tensions" related to the news of Osama Bin Laden's death are illuminated by the Christian doctrine of hell:

As strange as it seems, hell is depicted in the Bible both as tragedy and victory. Hell is tragic, as it is awful that people rebel against God and persistently spurn the Savior. God is “slow to anger,” “abounding in love and faithfulness” (Exod. 34:6-7), and does not take pleasure in the punishment of the wicked, just as he does not find pleasure in the existence of sin (Ezek. 18:23). Jesus likewise grieved and wept over human lostness, sin, and the impending judgment (Matt. 23:37; Luke 19:41; 23:34). The apostle Paul also shared this perspective, earnestly longing and praying for the conversion of his lost fellow-Jews, even to the point of being willing to undergo God’s wrath for them (Rom. 9:1-6; 10:1). That sinners go to hell is tragic and should break our hearts.

Yet hell is also portrayed as God’s triumph. Hell is linked to his righteous judgment and the day of Yahweh, even called “the day of God’s wrath” (Rom. 2:5). As such, hell answers (not raises) ultimate questions related to the justice of God. Through the coming wrath, judgment, and hell, God’s ultimate victory is displayed over evil, and his righteousness is vindicated. There is a “comfort” to hell (2 Thess. 1:5-11; James 5:1-6; Rev. 18-22), as its hard reality offers hope to and encourages perseverance in persecuted saints. God will judge everyone, and he will avenge his people; God will win in the end, and justice will prevail. And through his righteous judgment and ultimate victory, God will glorify himself, displaying his greatness and receiving the worship he is due (e.g., Rom. 9:22-23; Rev. 6:10, 11:15-18; 14:6-15:4; 16:5-7; 19:1-8).