From the "New Attitude Blog" ->

Al Mohler on Personal Bible Reading.

I found it light and encouraging; a challenge to examine my daily reading and my motives. You can click on the New Attitude Blog in the right hand column under "Blogs", or click here.

Whatever Happened to Holiness?

I am becoming increasingly aware of the lack of consideration for this disposition called holiness. The name of Christ is constantly slandered by those who honor Him with their lips but trash Him with their lives. But, more than that, it seems as if those whose lives do not honor Him as Lord are completely ignorant of the dishonor; they do not tend to care, preferring to live their own lives by their own fleshly leadings without any attentiveness to the psalmist's proposition of setting Christ before us always - that is, that we might have our Lord before us, that every step we take may be evaluated in light and rememberance and reference to Him, that we might capture His mind, His affections, His aim and see and think and act as we look through that holy lens.

Perhaps it is thought that holiness is a bore, a drudgery, an ideal of the long since deceased saints of old. And the greater truth is that the one who does not practice Christian holiness is in point of fact not a Christian, for "by their fruits you shall know them." One thing certain is the thought of it as a purely human empowered thing and therefore when the reality of our unholiness hits time and time again we become vexed, discouraged, and morally complacent, giving in to the ease of the "old self". It is no doubt a complication of realities, for though holiness is a personal matter, it is a corporate matter too; and although holiness attends to the individual so that the accountability of one's own life will be the matter judged by God, yet certainly the pride of many pastors confounds the notion of internal progressive sanctity and its necessary root of Christ's holiness imputed and the precious gift of that holy principle of God's Spirit; and the sinful depravity of the world in which we live our apparently "unguarded and intoxicated" "Christian lives" attends to our corporate and personal insobriety and disciplinary laziness. It does not help that many in the church do not know exactly what holiness is, nor do they truly understand the Gospel of Christ, so that the thing called holiness is not at all a self-made disciplinary guide whereby we merit favor with God after we have "walked the aisle", but rather the overflow of the heart that has truly grasped the reality of the Gospel - that Christ fulfilled all demands of actual holiness for us so that we might rest from our self-righteous attempts through faith in Him and being infused with God's Spirit we are made alive to His principle of leadership designed to check us constantly and satisfy us both now and eternally in God preeminently, whereby, being satisfied in Him, the temptations of the world and of the flesh and of the devil, himself, are like a foul stinch that we endeavor by all means to be rid of. And if we be not rid of it then what assurance do we have that our tastes have been truly changed!? If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature! How is it possible that one can be filled with the God of the universe and not be changed by it - forever!?

But I find something else of mention - that God would call sinners holy! Have we gotten used to being called by this godly disposition? Have we grown to comfortable with the grace of this characteristic? For a sinner is a sinner and not at all a holy being. Our nature is to be unholy, opposed to God, murderous towards Christ and His saving work and testimony; we are born enemies of God, rebellious towards Him, angry fist-shakers in His glorious and patient Face; we harbor the seed of hell, of death; human beings breed sinners! We are worms, and lower than maggots in the light of His holy fire! If we were to enter His holy presence without the cloak of Christ, we would dissipate into nothing - this is why hell is a place separated from God, that our just punishment might last for all eternity! And this is our place, our wage, our very being!

It is a thing too wonderful for words that God who is transcendenly holy calls us holy, and as I see it, there is only one way in which this grace is possible - that God would dwell within the sinner! We are not holy because we are inherently holy, beloved! No, we are holy because God dwells in us, and God is Holy! 1 Peter 1:14-16 demands the Christian attention - "As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, 'You shall be holy, for I am holy,'" - to which we ought to stand silent and amazed! God demands our holiness! But how are sinners to be holy? Sinners are to be holy in this way and for this reason - the God who called you is holy! Do not depend on yourselves for this, beloved! God makes you holy, and demands your holy obedience to the imperatives of Christ and the law of Christ precisely because in Christ God fulfilled all saving holiness for you and gave Him, Jesus Christ, to you, within you, in your mind, in your heart, in your will and mouth, so that by that principle of holiness given to you through your faith in Christ, you might actually practice holiness on a daily basis! Simply put, God has fulfilled in Christ what you could not do, and filled you with Christ's Spirit, and you are a holy person, and the church a holy nation precisely because God is holy and God is in us, not because you had a natural epiphany of internal transformation via therapeutic methods, etc. Or even more simply, "you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God," to which the apostle continues, "put to death therefore what is earthly in you...you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator," Colossians 3:3, 5, 9-10. That is, being hidden with Christ in God or accounted as perfectly holy, be growing in Christ's likness, i.e., holiness in a progressive manner.

The reality of God calling sinners holy, with the full knowledge that He alone is truly and transcendently holy, is a completely humbling truth. For as it was in Luther's mind that to be truly free in the will was to be as God is - literally that to entertain the notion of true freedom one would have to be free as God is free - so it is with the disposition of holiness; only God is truly holy! Our holiness, then, is not an inherent thing (oh, the folly of every other world religion that would boast in human works), a thing we are born with, or a thing that we grow up into with age and settling, for children and grandfathers alike are wretched apart from Christ. Beloved, your holiness is a thing alien to you, given to you by the grace of God who alone is truly holy and has at His disposal the ability and power to make holy any sinner at any time by the effectual call of that sinner to repent of sin and believe in the truth as it is in Jesus Christ to the praise of His glorious grace. Our "life is hidden with Christ in God."

Moreover, death to the elemental things of the world is to be alive to the eternal things of the kingdom of God. Our participation in the cross of Christ is the precursor and necessary thing to our resurrection life in Him. By the grace of God and faith in Christ, we have "died" to the world and the world to us (Galatians 6:14), though we live in the world, which is to say that we have been made "alive" to God having been "raised with Christ" (Colossians 3:1), the outcome being that we "seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God," (Colossians 3:1). In other words, holiness consists in our death to the world, by which is meant that we have become alive to the preeminent satisfaction and triumphant joy of who God is, and who God is for us and in us and through us for His glory. All the sensualities of the world become colorless and tasteless in comparison to the new passion and desires, colors and tastes that God has given to us in Christ. Holiness is not a negative thing, beloved, but an infinitely wonderful gift of God; it is not a drudgery but a thing altogether pleasing for us to honor Him with - though He, Himself has given it to us so that He owns it altogether (1 Chronicles 29:14)!

Therefore, let us say that holiness is a thing given by God apart from our own doing; that true holiness is a preeminent satisfaction and enjoyment of and rejoicing in God through Christ whereby the overflow of the heart is to drench everything and everybody with the reflection of our Lord unto the glory of God, as it is written, "You shall be holy, (because) I am holy." To mistake these things is detrimental to the authenticity of our profession of faith. To deny them with your lifestyle is to deny that you ever truly believed. And by that reckoning, let us be fearful if our lives do not reflect Christ, and humbled and enjoyably holy if by His grace we are by these things encouraged - in Jesus' name. Amen.

"Love Is Not Always Lenient"

This phrase and the one that came after it ("love does not always let") come from the Nine Marks website, specifically in the section concerning the biblical understanding of church discipline, or mark #7 of a healthy church.

I found the information there quite helpful due to a circumstance of discipline currently in my own church by the providence of God. The truths related on this topic at the Nine Marks website served to reveal my own insobriety and carelessness in consideration of my disciplinary tactics. To this end, I highly recommend to all in the Christian vocation and laity to check out the site. You can read the "marks" by clicking on them at the top of the page.

As to the phrase that called my reflection to attention, that "love is not always lenient - love does not always let", I see uncovered an intolerable tolerance in the contemporary church, the allowance of a little leaven which leavens the whole lump, a disconnect and common sloth in the biblical injunction that the Church be a pure bride, and that we ought to endeavor by all means to carry out the multiplication of personal holiness within its members. Moreover, the disservice done to the identity of Christianity, the mindset of the many in the pews on Sunday mornings is that sin is not serious, that it is rather tolerable, that one may call himself a Christian and yet be the most miserable and wretched sinner without conviction or hesitation or repentance.

But God disciplines - and His discipline is deemed as love (Hebrews 12:5-11), the love of a Father towards a child, but when the discipline of sinning church members comes upon them, they deem it (and the disciplinary - God and the man/men of God/the Church) as unloving. As if a parent, seeing their child enjoying something that places them in grave danger and in the clutches of death, like playing in heavy traffic or being an amateur pyrotechnic, is unloving when they discipline their child not to do those things; but it is rather the opposite, that the discipline of the parent is the most loving thing that they could do in that instance and it serves to restore and save the child from certain destruction and to train them to love the obedience that brings them safely into the parents arms. This kind of discipline with this kind of intention is hardly unloving. If we are not experiencing the discipline of God, then we ought to begin to be fearful, wondering whether or not we are in fact His children, for God disciplines those whom He loves, namely, His children. But God does not let us continue in sin without correction. As Dever writes, "love is not always lenient - love does not always let."

It is a cultural ideal that love is that strict emotion by which we let others do their own thing without consideration of consequence, either temporal or eternal. This idea must not be that which drives the life of the Church. We are not to stand idly by while "brothers and sisters" in Christ "continue in sin" thinking that "grace will abound". The apostle says that this type of thinking ought not to exist in the affection of him who is rightly called "Christ-ian". "How can we who died to sin still live in it? (Romans 6:2)" And how should we be tolerant of such things as the body of Christ - unless we are not truly in Jesus Christ!? Impenitence is not the mark of an authentic believer in Christ, no, bearing fruit in keeping with repentance is (Matt. 3:8)!

But the intention of the disciplinarian cannot be anger or control or condemnation, but rather restoration, and salvation (See James 1:20 cf. 1 Corinthians 5:5b). That is, Christ is not interested in the kind of discipline exercised by the world to bring about behavioral change, where physical force is used and abused along with various other methods of violent mental technique. And Christ is no more interested in the church's adaptation to the culture and its reflecting the values of the culture with respect to the tolerance of sin than what was previously mentioned. Christ is interested in the kind of discipline that confronts the sin of a person with an attitude of humility, gentleness, compassion, and love, but intolerance, with the intention of seeing that person restored to Christ through repentance or saved through Christ by grace through faith in Him. Severity to the body and self-made religion are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh though they may have the appearance of wisdom; rather, being made alive in Christ whereby one is clothed with His righteousness and equipped with His Holy Spirit is one empowered to overcome the indulgence of that mighty evil within us called "the flesh" (See Colossians 2:20-23).

In all church discipline, truly, in everything we undertake, this is to be the aim - that sinners put on Jesus Christ; if he be a Christian, then let him repent of his sin and be restored to Christ; if he be a sinner, then let him repent as well of his personal sin and believe in Christ for righteousness that he may be saved in the last day. Therefore, let us love one another rightly - with encouragement and rebuke - knowing that loving is not always synonymous with letting, with the earnest intention of bringing each other to our Lord Jesus Christ, for He alone is able to keep us from stumbling and to present us before the presence of His glory blamelessly and with great joy (Jude 24). God be glorified in Jesus' name. Amen.

The Importance of Humility - NOW!

In the realm of religion the status quo of the day appears to be the exaltation of self. This can be both profound and purposeful, or subtle and ignorant. Either way, the flesh of every man is tempted by the lure of the pride of life, often taking the bait that snatches us out of the waters of true humility - the preeminent disposition of the faith in the Truth, Jesus Christ.

To exalt oneself is of the greatest of evils, for in that exaltation, we distract the attention and the affections of people from where they ought to be, which is towards God. That is, in our exaltation, we become a hindrance to people coming to Christ, and a stumbling block to many who may be on the cusp of conversion. Jesus alludes to this in Luke 18:9-14, providing a parable on the disposition of the justified. Jesus gives a comparison between a Pharisee with all of the outward appearance of religion and a widely recognized sinner tax collector; the one separates himself from everyone else and prayerfully thanks God that he is different, that he is not like other men in their sinful ways, that he fasts twice a week and tithes; the tax collector, in brokenness, would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!" Jesus' conclusion is that this man went home right before God, while the other who exalted himself and comforted himself by his religiosity did not; that those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and that those who humble themselves will be exalted.

The question for us is not will we be humbled, but when? Christ clearly states that every person will be humbled. The importance of this statement cannot be overemphasized, because the "when" of one's humility is the difference between eternal life and eternal destruction away from God. A man will either humble himself now, in this temporal life, and thereby be declared righteous before God - because humility before God is the outcome of the knowledge of one's sin and need for God's mercy and the realization of that mercy in the grace of Jesus Christ - or he will exalt himself now, in this temporal life, and be humbled on that day when God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus - whereby he will find himself lacking and condemned to hell. The apostle Paul would write that (because Christ supremely humbled himself even unto death on a cross) God "has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father," Philippians 2:9-11.

If it was through the Divine humility that Divine exaltation came for our Lord, how much more ought we who bear His awesome name follow Him in His pattern and method of glorifying God. The admonishment is "Delight yourself in the Lord," and not, "delight yourself in the creature." God is the only Being in the universe where self-exaltation is the most loving of directions, for when we are so directed, our souls and minds and wills are led to Him who most satisfies, indeed, to Him who alone is perfectly worthy of our delight. Jesus, in His humanity and humility, understood this, and longed to be exalted back to the fullness of that Divine delight within the fellowship of the Godhead.

Therefore, let us be humble, for God gives grace to the humble, and it is grace that we need. We ought not as Christians to put on the subtle facade of humility, a facade that proves itself false when we attempt to be humble but our attempt is made in order to be exalted by men - "ah, do you see how humble that man is, did you see his kind act, how he shuns all credit" - and hearing the praise of men the supposed act of humility actually serves to feed our pride instead. So there is a true humility and a false sense of humility. Whereas by the one our end is to be observed as humble, so by the one that is true our end is that God may be more clearly seen, that God may be more powerfully glorified, that God may exalt us in due time. It is not the exaltation of men and of the day that we seek, beloved, but rather that exaltation that comes from God in secret and in that eternal life which is to come.

It is a terrible thing in this day that many dear believers are followers of men, preachers, and teachers, rather than Jesus Christ, that men base their ministry off of themselves and their own abilities rather than upon God's Word, His Son our Lord, and the power of the Holy Spirit. The latter and better type of ministry is the one that will prove most faithful, fruitful, and true, for there, Christ is the foundation, and humility the spirit, and grace thereby reigns. The apostle Paul never introduced his letters, "Paul, a highly trained, wonderfully educated minister, having earned the equivalent of 4 Ph.D.'s in biblical theology, church history, missiology, and church education, while founding several successful church plants all over the world, come to you...", although many guest preachers and speakers are either introduced by others or self-introduced in this way. No, in his epistle to the Romans he writes, "Paul, a bondservant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God." (1:1) To the Corinthians, "What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, as the Lord assigned to each." (1 Cor. 3:5) And when he did boast he boasted in his weakness and in the power of Christ (2 Cor. 11:30, 12:9) and on the occasion that he boasted of himself he paused to say - "I am talking like a madman" (2 Cor. 11:23) - but even that was to make certain to others the authenticity of his apostleship in Christ.

Humility is the only possible disposition of the Christian who truly understands the Gospel, that they are sinners saved by grace through faith and that not of themselves, it is the gift of God, that no one should boast. The same seed of sin in them is in even the worst of sinners, but a salvation given to them by God through faith in Christ as a gift and not due to any merit in them whatsoever - they have no merit; their wage is God's eternal wrath - this realization brings us low, breaks us before God, that we dare not look up to heaven, but earnestly beat our chest and plead with God, "Be merciful to me a sinner!" And Christ assures us, we shall go home justified, and in time, exalted as adopted children of God in Christ to His glory.

May we who know Christ wear gladly the badge of a bondservant. May humility characterize us that God may be exalted. Let us not be a hindrance to others coming to Christ because of sinful self-exaltation; rather, abase yourself constantly, know the horror of your sin, and the wonder of God's salvation, and by this disposition, help others to see the surpassing value of Christ Jesus our Lord. Do not wait to be humbled before God, for then it may be to late, and you will find yourself humbled in horror of His glory; be humbled now, that through faith in Christ, Christ will declare to you, "go home justified...you shall be exalted in Me in eternal life."

The Goal of Winning Souls

5:15 a.m. came quickly this morning; the internal clock is an awful thing sometimes; nevertheless, I was up for some early morning exercise. So, I trickled my way into the trailblazer and felt blindly for my ipod. I have been working my way through a series of sermons by John Piper on evangelism from the mid-1990's. This morning's sermon was from the text, "unless you repent, you will all likewise perish," from Luke 13:1-5.

And it was quite good and edifying, as he moved upon each word of the text, whereupon he hit upon the relevancy of the text - our passion for seeing souls saved from perishing wherever we are, whenever the opportunity arises and the earnestness with which we ought to contend for them.

To emphasize this he used a quote from C.S. Lewis to emphasize what many of us, myself included, often overlook about Lewis, in short, he had a passion for evangelism! The quote that Piper uses comes from Lewis' book The Weight of Glory and the focus of the quote is the confrontation of two eternal realities that the Christian must acknowledge preeminently - the view of the human soul through the lens of eternity, through which lens we see two conditions: one, the infinite horror of the immortal soul lost in hell, and the second, the infinite beauty and splendor of the immortal soul saved in glory; the first he points out we would only imagine the sight of in our worst nightmares, while the second, if we saw that glorious soul we would be much inclined to worship it. The consideration of the Christian is the immortality of the humans with which they interact on a moment by moment basis. Lewis argues rightly that the life of nations, and cultures are like that of a gnat in comparison to the immortality of the people surrounding us even now. And yet how much of ourselves do we poor into those gnat-like aspects of reality, all the while neglecting the immortal beings whose destination and eternal makeup depend solely on the very thing that now exists within us by faith in Christ?

When Lewis was criticized for simplifying the Trinity by the use of geometric figure, he retorted with great angst and passion stating that the books that he writes, he writes for the salvation of souls! No other end did he carry in mind or heart but to in every word bring souls to Jesus Christ. And he wondered, to what end did his critic criticize?

At 5:30 in the morning, this was a wonderful word to wake up to - better than any coffee I've had recently (my Magic Stars cereal has been lacking too). It awakened my soul to a reevaluation of my goal in all things - to see the soul saved. Human beings are immortal - we will all spend eternity somewhere, either heaven or hell. This consideration alone is sufficient food for spiritual nourishment.

When we study, do we study with the immortal souls of men in mind? When we prepare sermons, do we prepare them in such ways that the souls of men might be saved, or are we more considerate of our contemporary literary style? When we enter conversation do we give thought to the entrances of the immortal soul that we might take opportunity to speak of the Gospel, that Jesus might bust in upon them? When we blog, is salvation in mind? Are we saturated with the mortality of this postmodern culture (which is necessary but only in so far as it is studied for the salvation of immortal souls) or are we saturated with the immortality of every immediate person?

In all that we do we ought to aim at the salvation of men, for it is inseparably linked to the biblical injunction to do all things to the glory of God. Lewis understood this; but more importantly, he shot live ammunition towards this goal of winning souls; and so ought we imitate this passion. God's grace be upon us in this endeavor. In Jesus' name. Amen.

"Lord, Make Me Pure But Not Yet"

This quote from Augustine's Confessions tends to be quite relevant to the state of the Christian Church today. We pray, "Lord, make me pure...but not yet." This is the honest cry of the redeemed soul pit against the wiles of the flesh. There exists a very real sense in which the Christian desires holiness, for the principle of new life is in the soul bringing the faculties into a glad submission to the Word and will of God. When one undergoes the spiritual operation of the new birth, they are given and called to live a new life - which is why many reject the notion.

But there exists in a very real sense the flesh and its correspondent desires too. We are conflicted at every point. We are like the apostle Paul when he wrote to the Romans, "I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate," 7:15. Who that belongs to Christ cannot associate with this battle?

It is a great desire that I have to promote the pursuit of the prize of Christ and eternal life in Him, to converse and teach and love in such a way that the Church's heavenly citizenship will become what it is, namely, more real and more immediate than our citizenship in this world. With the grasping of this truth, this world would be turned upside down for the glory of Christ. We would pray, "Lord, make me pure...and hedge me in by Your Spirit and Your Word," and then we might boldly guard ourselves against impurity...or sloth or worldliness or discontent or anxiety or any manner of sin. The true appropriation of the Spirit is that moment when we practice what we pray, do what we hear; we go beyond a mere profession and enter into obedience.

The problem is that we too often love the world, and neglect Christ; we take great pride in our earthly citizenship, and set aside as a light and far off thing that heavenly citizenship, and so it is easier, and a thing more appealing, to go with our flesh rather than with God's Spirit. But the Bible teaches us that our heavenly citizenship is the place of our heart, and that we ought to be growing up into it.

Read Paul's comparison of the two (Philippians 3:17-20), one who has his mind set on earthly things, the other that greatest citizenship and example:

"Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ..."

When a youth refuses to share the Gospel for fear of confrontation, although it is a common fear, the earthly mentality is yet revealed and doubled when the parent becomes a friend rather than the spiritual leader and instead of encouraging the child and teaching the child about joy and obedience, agrees with the child and places a smothering pillow over what could have become the flames of evangelical passion. The deception is evidenced everywhere: in the marketplace, in the home, at the dinner table, in the stadium, on a date, on the couch, and it infiltrates the sanctuary of God. We are lawyers and teachers who happen to be Christians instead of Christian lawyers and teachers. We advocate the sports and hobbies and clubs of our spouses and children, and this is good, but horrible when they are advocated to the negation of the worship of God on Wednesday nights or at any time. When was the last time you or I forsook the dinner table for prayer or meditation or evangelism? In the athletic arena we cheer and shout for and uplift our gladiators, but do we uplift the Son of Man with such passion? Will you argue for your favorite team and not for Christ? Student, will you perceive the passing fancy of lust a greater satisfaction than holiness, respect, and love for God and the necessary love of what is good and hatred of what is sin? And what of television? Our minds and souls are starved for the eternally Sovereign King and Almighty God but we sear the conscience with the most damnable shows that the world has to offer. And then we wake up on Sunday, late enough to powder our faces and comb our hair but not to plead with God for mercy and grace, and after the service wonder, "What is missing?" "Lord, make me pure...but not yet."

This will not do brothers and sisters - it will not do for me, nor you! The Gospel is at stake within the witness of our lives. I would rather you not profess Christ, than to profess His name and not practice it. We must take hold of what is already ours, given to us by grace - a preeminent citizenship in heaven. We are a "chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light," (1 Peter 2:9). This is our truest identity and calling...and you may be a doctor as well! We ought to take everything in our path and convert it to Christ, to the Bible, to theology, to Gospel, to God's glory. If we stumble in one place, we may lose our witness forever(Matthew 5:13).

Have you ever considered why, having been plucked from the fire as it were, God kept us on earth for a season? To bear witness of God's Word through our joy in that Word; Jesus gave us the Word, and the Word (by the Spirit) sanctifies us and separates us in a sense from the world so that Christ could say of us, "They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world," (John 17:16). And we are sent of Christ to share the Word of Christ. So long as we follow the enemy, enamored with the world, how is it that we can be what Christ says we are in Him?

Understand that when I say, "must", I do not intend to bring you under law again, for you are under grace as a believer, nor is it my aim to bring to you a legalistic system. No, rather, the must that I speak of is the must of grace, not of the law, and true grace is not without law; that is, we have a new desire, a new principle of grace in us, a new leader in the soul that compels us to love holiness and set aside the desires of the flesh. Grace is the motivation of true godliness. Remember, the Gospel is not a new set of commands for you to obey, but rather the news that none of your obedience merits a claim for you upon God or His glory, and that Christ has done what the law could not do. Therefore, the "must" that I write of, I write of with the intent of grace.

1. We must be wielded by the Holy Spirit; that is, we must follow His leadership, His Word, and in so doing, mortify and crucify the flesh with its desires. In our glad submission to Him, we are distinct from the world who is not possessed of Him. And to be possessed of Him is to be passionate for the souls of the world.
2. Quite simply, we must be drenched with Jesus Christ. Fellowship with Christ now is time spent in heaven on earth.
3. We must appropriate our heavenly citizenship. We have no reservations about appropriating our earthly citizenship in order to get what we desire. Our desires must change, or at least be raised to Christ and the glory of God. And if these things be our greatest desires, then we will appropriate that citizenship and its privileges for the attainment of those greater purposes.
4. Lastly, we must have a great earnestness about us in the pursuit of God's glory in all things. By our earnestness for heavenly things, we might win others to a like passion and the reality of our heavenly citizenship.

May God grant us the grace of awakening to the realities of His kingdom, that our praise would be that we have, indeed, prayed, "Lord, make us pure. Thank You for we have been pure!" In Christ's name. Amen.

Prayer for Ms. Mizzel: Missionary to Afghanistan

I have not met this woman. I have only heard report of her through another lady within my church and that only once, but such reports are cases of earnest prayer to our Father in heaven and belief in His Word, that God will use such circumstances to display the honor of His name and advance the Gospel of Christ.

Cyd Mizzel is a Christian missionary to Afghanistan who has been kidnapped by Afghani rebels, a woman in her early forties, never married, singularly captured, whether for being a woman or a Christian or both, no one really knows, and no one has heard any report of her situation since her imprisonment. Her church, our church, and many others have continually lifted up our prayers for her in our services over these past few weeks, and my plea here is for a continued pursuit in prayer to our God for her safety, boldness, witness, and the softening of rebel hearts to Christ. That we ought to knock on the door of God's throne room constantly for her and for them is both obvious and eternally pertinent, both privately and corporately. My hope is that God will incline our hearts to a great and timely supplication.

And she is one of many thousands, yet unknown altogether, who are suffering for the sake of the name of Jesus Christ. These have gone out with the command and offer of the Gospel to bring the nations to the obedience of faith, and we need, I need, to uplift them in prayer. Upon their return, I think that many would deem our prayers the most necessary and appreciated means of support and grace. My charge to us all is that we might shrink the disassociation that we have with many of our Christian missionaries. If our earthly sibling took up a great philanthropic cause in a foreign country and found occasion of need while amongst the nations, gasping as it were for life, both for their own and that of the individuals under their charge, would we not be moved to earnest and daily works of supplication for them and of provision to accomplish the task? How much more those whom by faith in Christ we stand united as brothers and sisters in Christ, when they enter the occasion of suffering for Christ which is the blessed grace and promise of Scripture (Phil. 1:28-30), ought we to pray for them and supply their missionary need (Phil. 2:25-30)?

Until further report upon the condition of Ms. Mizzel, and for our encouragement in suffering for the sake of Christ and the Gospel, I have found great substance from God's Word in the imprisonment epistle of the apostle Paul to heap my hope and trust upon. "Gospel imprisonment" God blesses as a seed of greatest type, bringing to tremendous fruition:

"I (Paul) want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the Gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ. And most of the brothers, having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment, are much more bold to speak the word without fear," Phil. 1:12-14.

God blesses Gospel imprisonment; imprisonment for the sake of Jesus Christ, which imprisonment had and does occur because of the proclamation of that name amongst the nations. Imprisonment "happened" to Paul because of his missionary endeavor with the Gospel of Christ. He made the primary thing the primary thing; that is, though I am sure he engaged in missionary activity, he made preaching the Gospel and defending the Gospel his utmost priority, and we ought to imitate our Lord and the apostle on this point. The solid hope that overwhelms the soul is what God does and what God imparts from the affliction of His Christ-enlisted soldiers:

1. Gospel imprisonment "advances the Gospel". When the missionary is taken captive by Christ, they are soon taken captive for Christ, and their "captivity" serves to "free" the Gospel, to advance it. God seems to use captivity both for the development of the captive, for the penetration of those normally hidden from Gospel conversation (the "imperial guards"), and for a witness to "all the rest".
2. Gospel imprisonment is "for Christ". When Christ was taken captive by the hands of men, He was thereby crucified, and God made use of the imprisonment and crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ to procure the salvation of those very same men; and so after the pattern of our Lord, Paul, and we who follow them, God uses as vessels of mercy and of Gospel propagation by the very fact of our imprisonment for that cause.
3. The maintenance of Gospel witness in the midst of Gospel inprisonment God uses mightily to bring many under Gospel conviction so that all know that the captivity is "for Christ".
4. Gospel imprisonment advances the Gospel by emboldening the Church; by the faith of one, so the many are made bold; by the passion of the one, so the many are made passionate; by the chains of one, so the many have their tongues made free for Christ and Him crucified. The "brothers" became "confident in the Lord by" Paul's "imprisonment".
5. Gospel imprisonment removes human apprehensiveness for the Gospel. The brothers were more bold to "speak the word without fear". God-begotten boldness in one breeds God-begotten boldness in others. When one loves God more than he fears men and their attacks, others are infused with a like love that overcomes the obstacles to evangelism.
6. The knowledge that God is the Author of such things, that the imprisonment was "for Christ", encourages our faith and trust in a faithful God who works in accordance with the kind intention of His will; and this is why it is written that it is a thing "granted" or "graced" to us "that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in Him but also suffer for His sake," Phil. 1:29.
7. And so, God authorizes and makes use of Gospel imprisonment to advance the Gospel by way of the captive's witness for Christ, boldness for Christ, love for Christ, and the imputation of such godly attributes to the Church, who so emboldened and powerfully encouraged, move forward with the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Our God is an awesome God, and what He does, and how He attends to the means of His ends, are wonderful in our eyes, and they shall remain wonderful still when it is you or I that become those means of grace in the face of suffering. The Christian does not seek out suffering for the sake of suffering, but they seek the face of Christ, and so quite naturally, follows chains of some sort, whether on the wrists, or over the tongue. The challenge is to understand the truth of God's Word through Paul "that my imprisonment is for Christ", that it serves to "advance the Gospel", and the example of our Lord Jesus Christ, "In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world...I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world," John 16:33, 17:14-16.

Let us pray for Ms. Mizzel with great expectation that God will deliver her by our prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Phil:1:19), while advancing the Gospel by her imprisonment, and granting each of us a measure of her love for Christ that we may be more passionate and able to endeavor forward, boldly speaking "the word without fear". Amen.