"If I want to see churches planted out from our church and others, why invest so much time and energy in defending and explaining the historic Protestant vision of justification as the imputation of Christ's righteousness? I have answered this already but will say again, I think we have enough churches being planted by means of music, drama, creative scheduling, sprightly narrative, and marketing savvy. And there are too few that are God-centered, truth-treasuring, Bible-saturated, Christ-exalting, cross-focused, Spirit-dependent, prayer-soaked, soul-winning, justice-pursuing congregations with a wartime mindset ready to lay down their lives for the salvation of the nations and the neighborhoods. There is a blood-earnest joy that sustains a church like this, and it comes only by embracing Christ-crucified as our righteousness."
Showing posts with label missions/evangelism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label missions/evangelism. Show all posts
Thursday, June 26, 2008
John Piper on Returning to Doctrinally Focused Local Church Planting
This quote comes from his 2002 book "Counted Righteous in Christ: Should We Abandon the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness?" Here (pg. 33-34) he considers the centrality of doctrine in local church planting in contrast with the contemporary marketing schemes of many plants. He sets the righteousness that comes through faith in Christ as the doctrinal cornerstone of fervently biblical church planting -
Monday, June 9, 2008
The Supremacy of Christ for Righteousness: A Look at Philippians 3:4-7
Upon reading Philippians 3:4-6 one might wonder why Paul so engages in what he deems foolish boasting. But much can be said of his tactic when fully thought out. For it appears that Judaizers (Jewish Christians who insisted that Gentile Christians submit to the law of Moses and the rite of circumcision *1) had crept into the church at Philippi heralding a false gospel much like that of those in Galatians. Their gospel was that of an insufficient Christ. It was Jesus plus something, or better yet, circumcision and law with a side of Jesus.
But why does Paul then seemingly join them? Perhaps they would say much of themselves and then retort to claiming the insufficiency of Paul in accordance with their human standards. In conjunction with that, Paul certainly wanted to show them that there was no saving value in mere external inheritance or religious accolade. Therefore, instead of shying away, he meets them head on. He confronts their arrogance and foolish boasting on the basis of a hypothetical - if (and I reiterate, if) there is any saving value in what you say or standardize or lay as yokes upon mens necks, and you boast in those things as your ticket to heaven, I have more to boast in than you - though such boasting is foolishness!
It is an oddly awesome tactic of retort and witness of Christ. In explanation of this Calvin writes:
"He does not speak of the disposition exercised by him, but he intimates, that he has also ground of glorying, if he were inclined to imitate their folly. The meaning therefore is, 'My glorying, indeed, is placed in Christ, but, were it warrantable to glory in the flesh, I have also no want of materials.' And from this we learn in what manner to reprove the arrogance of those who glory in something apart from Christ. If we are ourselves in possession of those very things in which they glory, let us not allow them to triumph ove Christ by an unseemly boasting, without retorting upon them also our grounds of glorying, that they may understand that it is not through envy that we reckon of no value, nay, even voluntarily renounce those things on which they set the highest value. Let, however, the conclusion be always of this nature - that all confidence in the flesh is vain and preposterous." (*2)
I find his words helpful. That if Christians have lived such exemplary external lives prior to knowing Christ, then it is leverage to be used in sharing the Gospel, so that when an unbeliever confronts us with his outward heritage and fleshly accolades as a defense against condemnation and an advantage or basis of salvation and self-glorying, we may with confidence reply, "this is a foolish thing to boast in, but on the hypothetical argument that the externalities of religion are the basis of salvation, then I have more reason to boast in the flesh than you (if in fact we do!): "I was born into a religous home, professedly Christian; I was baptized as an infant; I was confirmed at the age of 13; I partook of the sacraments regularly; as to my life, I was not the prototypical teenager - I never partied, had sex, or gave my parents mental breakdowns, etc." And then having triumphed (albeit foolishly), humbly and adamantly state, "but whatever gain I had I counted as loss for the sake of Christ," that is, every fleshly advantage I had, I forfeited that I might have Christ, for what is a man's righteousness before God's righteousness? What, indeed, would be the reason for me to hold on to an approximation, which is external only, when in the Gospel, perfection is offered me through faith in Christ, and perfection, internally and externally, before God and men is what is required; and this Christ is for me! He alone was pleasing to the Father in Himself, and no man could condemn Him of sin either.
My fleshly advantages were (in truth) hindrances to me in coming to that which God required of me, when I made those advantages my boast and the basis of my eternal security. Christ's rightousness does not fall short. So let us say to them that our pre-Christian lives were more exemplary, if in fact they were, but that such boasting is foolishness, for no man attains to the righteousness of God but through faith in Christ - therefore, all that I considered gain (and if you are witnessing - "all that you right now consider gain for yourself unto eternal life") I count as loss! Why? For the sake of gaining Christ, the righteousness of God for me, the sinner. May the supremacy and the sufficiency of Christ's person and work ever be our solid foundation, hope, and boast.
*1: Hughes, R. Kent; Preaching the Word Commentary on Philippians; pg. 123.
*2: Calvin, John; Calvin's Commentaries; Philippians; pgs. 89-90.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Paul Washer Confronts American Christianity
A reality check for the American church culture. Shocking, dramatic, needed - sharing the truth in love - at a youth conference!
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Reflections on the Providence of God
In studying the epistle to the Philippians God has amazed me with the incomprehensible grandeur of His providential workings in the salvation of His elect and the begetting of the church. There was a point in time on the "finished" side of the cross and resurrection when men and women who would be involved in the Philippian church were as of yet completely ignorant and unsuspecting of God's gracious intervention. They slept, arose, learned, played, ate, drank, and breathed in the normalities and typical occurrences of life. None of them, however, did any of those things with the conscious awareness of God. None of them were awakened by the urgency of spending time with Jesus.
Saul spent his days in vigorous study and murderous threats against God's Church. In the same day, Lydia, perhaps, frequented the waters nearby seeking to fish out the shellfish for the purple dye found within its throat, and selling her goods to others. Meanwhile, a slave girl with a spirit of divination would sit in front of men and women to tell them their fortunes, bringing in the cash for her owners. At the same time, a jailer played the role of family man, while working the graveyard shift at the prison. And the inmates that he watched endured the same daily grind of survival, incarceration, and hopelessness. And what of the young man from Lystra, Timothy; what youthful endeavors did he day after day after day attend to?
Each of these persons, diverse in ethnicity, age, religion, presuppositions, backgrounds, and monetary class attended to their typical day, deeds, and conversations without the slightest bit of knowledge that God had in eternity past ordained and was now effecting the circumstances whereby within a short time all of them would come face to face with the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ in the preaching of the Gospel. For God's providence is plain from the biblical account, that:
Accordingly, God met Saul on his way to Damascus to persecute the disciples there, but Christ converted him to defend what he formerly threatened, Acts 9:1-19.
God then called Saul, a Hebrew of Hebrews, to be His instrument to carry His name unto the Gentiles - and kings and the children of Israel, Acts 9:15.
Having called Saul as an instrument to the Gentile nations, God refined and glorified Himself in that calling in Antioch of Pisidia. For after he had preached the Gospel to the Jews there, and the next Sabbath had come, a great many Gentiles attended, to which the Jews became jealous and contradicted what Paul was saying; therefore, Paul responds by telling them their condemning fault and blindness, for the Gentiles were included, and thus, Paul sought it all the more eagerly, Acts 13.
God brought Paul to the habitation of Timothy on his second missionary journey, having apparently already converted the boy, and thus Paul was inclined to have Timothy accompany him, Acts 16:1-5.
God then directed their missionary endeavor. He, in infinite wisdom and purpose, forbid them from their own human endeavors and re-routed them to Macedonia, by which the Gospel was destined to enter Europe; and it must be believed that God's intention was thus to save those who were currently unsuspecting and presumably going about their daily order even still, unaware that the Gospel would soon be among them in effectual power, Acts 16:6-10.
And God's providence is especially seen here, once they arrive in Philippi, for many things happen here to advance the Gospel that can only be attributed to the grace and glory of God's providential workings; thus,
1. Paul seeking a synagogue on the Sabbath found none, but rather a congregation of Gentile women who being proselytes had gathered for prayer just outside the city gates. Hereby, God greeted Lydia in the Gospel, "(opening) her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul," Acts 16:14. Lydia believed and her household as well, being baptized and bearing immediate fruit, Acts 16:15.
2. That in the course of their ministry they attracted a demonic tag along, a slave girl who doubled as a fortune teller. For many days she did this, crying out, "These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation," whereupon Paul, becoming annoyed of the correlation between God's kingdom and that of darkness, commanded the spirit to come out in the name of Jesus, and in a display of glory, the girl was healed, Acts 16:16-24.
3. But God's providence not yet being satisfied in the place made use of the previous occurrence to enrage her owners and eventually the greater crowd, so that Paul and Silas were stripped, beaten with rods, and imprisoned, whereby the Gospel now came face to face with the unsuspecting inmates and a third shift jailer.
a. Here the inmates, having no doubt caught wind of these missionaries and the beating that they had incurred, yet heard them praying and singing hymns to God (Acts 16:25) - they were listening to them! They exhibited by the exceeding grace of God the true joy of authentic believers, who with chains on their feet and wrists and lashes on their back yet rejoice in the midst of suffering because of their love for and joy in Christ Jesus and His Gospel. So it must have been a convincing thing when by a prison shaking, shackle loosening earthquake God opened the prison doors and unfastened everyone's bonds, that He could and would do the same for them spiritually in Christ.
b. And now the jailer thinking himself under the death sentence and aiming to commit himself to an "honorable death", found that he need not, for Paul cried out to him that he had not lost the inmates presence. Thus having certainly witnessed much of their partnership in the Gospel, fell on his knees and asked with much earnestness, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" Upon hearing the remedy of Christ, he believed, his household also, was baptized and bore fruit, Acts 16:25-34.
By these evidences, God's providence founded the church at Philippi - for God converted the means of the Gospel (Paul), and by the means, which He sovereignly directed to Philippi, and also by many providential workings and effectual grace, brought a host of people into the covenant of Christ, who until that glorious intervention neither sought Him nor desired Him nor considered Him for themselves.
And how this is the case of our own salvation! That God had set many things in motion that we were unaware of until they presented themselves in order to secure our salvation and, by our conversion, the salvation of others still, right now, unsuspecting!
What heights of grace and glory do these realities of God set before us? I did not awaken one morning and think to myself that today I will "give my life to the Lord." I attended to my typical days, my regular activities, my ordered vanities, the same conversations, all with not even a symblance of a thought or affection Godwards. I was dead in my sins and trespasses. But God, in His marvelous providence set many divers things in motion and at their fullness of time, the Gospel of God and the power of His effectual call found me, not vice versa! For I grew up in what cannot properly be titled a "church", though I did not know it; I attended youth service, but due to sin heard nothing; I slept, ate, and drank; I went to school, watched television, and played basketball with imaginary people guarding me; and I am certain that what God had ordained in eternity past was already being carried out, but of those innumerable things I cannot know, but I do know that He caused a young girls father to transfer from out of state, a girl that I would begin to date in high school, a girl who was a believer in Christ whom I had apparently fooled into thinking that I was as well, so that by her invitation I stepped out of my "church" for the first time and into her Southern Baptist affiliated church, whereupon I heard the Gospel for the first time, God's Spirit beating within my chest and opening up the eyes of my heart to see sin, judgment, its abiding principle, consequence, and the eternality of that consequence; two months later at that same church at a youth service, the Gospel was heralded once more by which God opened my heart to the comfort of Christ as the resolution to the conflict that I had internally been dealing with from the previous encounter - and then at somewhere between the two o'clock and three o'clock hour of the night God, Himself, re-created me in Christ! God did this work! God, in His gracious providence, saved me in and through my Lord Jesus Christ! God wonderfully intervened - and guess what (?) I didn't think that God had violated my right of free will either like so many today, and if He did, then thank God for that in Jesus' name!
Brothers and sisters, praise your God today for His providential work in your life. And know that if these things be so, and they are, that there are many even today whom you will come in contact with who are unsuspecting of God's intervention; that you are not only greeting them with yourself, but with the Gospel of Christ within you; by you God makes his appeal to the unsuspecting sinner. This is how He has decided to make use of His children - and it is glorious calling that we have to "proclaim the excellencies of Him who called (us) out of darkness into His marvelous light," 1 Peter 2:9. Let us beseech God that we might recognize the opportunities in a given day to come under the excellency of His providence and, by His will, be the providential means of Christ to the one who even now least suspects to meet the Lord of glory! In Jesus' name. Amen.
Saul spent his days in vigorous study and murderous threats against God's Church. In the same day, Lydia, perhaps, frequented the waters nearby seeking to fish out the shellfish for the purple dye found within its throat, and selling her goods to others. Meanwhile, a slave girl with a spirit of divination would sit in front of men and women to tell them their fortunes, bringing in the cash for her owners. At the same time, a jailer played the role of family man, while working the graveyard shift at the prison. And the inmates that he watched endured the same daily grind of survival, incarceration, and hopelessness. And what of the young man from Lystra, Timothy; what youthful endeavors did he day after day after day attend to?
Each of these persons, diverse in ethnicity, age, religion, presuppositions, backgrounds, and monetary class attended to their typical day, deeds, and conversations without the slightest bit of knowledge that God had in eternity past ordained and was now effecting the circumstances whereby within a short time all of them would come face to face with the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ in the preaching of the Gospel. For God's providence is plain from the biblical account, that:
Accordingly, God met Saul on his way to Damascus to persecute the disciples there, but Christ converted him to defend what he formerly threatened, Acts 9:1-19.
God then called Saul, a Hebrew of Hebrews, to be His instrument to carry His name unto the Gentiles - and kings and the children of Israel, Acts 9:15.
Having called Saul as an instrument to the Gentile nations, God refined and glorified Himself in that calling in Antioch of Pisidia. For after he had preached the Gospel to the Jews there, and the next Sabbath had come, a great many Gentiles attended, to which the Jews became jealous and contradicted what Paul was saying; therefore, Paul responds by telling them their condemning fault and blindness, for the Gentiles were included, and thus, Paul sought it all the more eagerly, Acts 13.
God brought Paul to the habitation of Timothy on his second missionary journey, having apparently already converted the boy, and thus Paul was inclined to have Timothy accompany him, Acts 16:1-5.
God then directed their missionary endeavor. He, in infinite wisdom and purpose, forbid them from their own human endeavors and re-routed them to Macedonia, by which the Gospel was destined to enter Europe; and it must be believed that God's intention was thus to save those who were currently unsuspecting and presumably going about their daily order even still, unaware that the Gospel would soon be among them in effectual power, Acts 16:6-10.
And God's providence is especially seen here, once they arrive in Philippi, for many things happen here to advance the Gospel that can only be attributed to the grace and glory of God's providential workings; thus,
1. Paul seeking a synagogue on the Sabbath found none, but rather a congregation of Gentile women who being proselytes had gathered for prayer just outside the city gates. Hereby, God greeted Lydia in the Gospel, "(opening) her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul," Acts 16:14. Lydia believed and her household as well, being baptized and bearing immediate fruit, Acts 16:15.
2. That in the course of their ministry they attracted a demonic tag along, a slave girl who doubled as a fortune teller. For many days she did this, crying out, "These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation," whereupon Paul, becoming annoyed of the correlation between God's kingdom and that of darkness, commanded the spirit to come out in the name of Jesus, and in a display of glory, the girl was healed, Acts 16:16-24.
3. But God's providence not yet being satisfied in the place made use of the previous occurrence to enrage her owners and eventually the greater crowd, so that Paul and Silas were stripped, beaten with rods, and imprisoned, whereby the Gospel now came face to face with the unsuspecting inmates and a third shift jailer.
a. Here the inmates, having no doubt caught wind of these missionaries and the beating that they had incurred, yet heard them praying and singing hymns to God (Acts 16:25) - they were listening to them! They exhibited by the exceeding grace of God the true joy of authentic believers, who with chains on their feet and wrists and lashes on their back yet rejoice in the midst of suffering because of their love for and joy in Christ Jesus and His Gospel. So it must have been a convincing thing when by a prison shaking, shackle loosening earthquake God opened the prison doors and unfastened everyone's bonds, that He could and would do the same for them spiritually in Christ.
b. And now the jailer thinking himself under the death sentence and aiming to commit himself to an "honorable death", found that he need not, for Paul cried out to him that he had not lost the inmates presence. Thus having certainly witnessed much of their partnership in the Gospel, fell on his knees and asked with much earnestness, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" Upon hearing the remedy of Christ, he believed, his household also, was baptized and bore fruit, Acts 16:25-34.
By these evidences, God's providence founded the church at Philippi - for God converted the means of the Gospel (Paul), and by the means, which He sovereignly directed to Philippi, and also by many providential workings and effectual grace, brought a host of people into the covenant of Christ, who until that glorious intervention neither sought Him nor desired Him nor considered Him for themselves.
And how this is the case of our own salvation! That God had set many things in motion that we were unaware of until they presented themselves in order to secure our salvation and, by our conversion, the salvation of others still, right now, unsuspecting!
What heights of grace and glory do these realities of God set before us? I did not awaken one morning and think to myself that today I will "give my life to the Lord." I attended to my typical days, my regular activities, my ordered vanities, the same conversations, all with not even a symblance of a thought or affection Godwards. I was dead in my sins and trespasses. But God, in His marvelous providence set many divers things in motion and at their fullness of time, the Gospel of God and the power of His effectual call found me, not vice versa! For I grew up in what cannot properly be titled a "church", though I did not know it; I attended youth service, but due to sin heard nothing; I slept, ate, and drank; I went to school, watched television, and played basketball with imaginary people guarding me; and I am certain that what God had ordained in eternity past was already being carried out, but of those innumerable things I cannot know, but I do know that He caused a young girls father to transfer from out of state, a girl that I would begin to date in high school, a girl who was a believer in Christ whom I had apparently fooled into thinking that I was as well, so that by her invitation I stepped out of my "church" for the first time and into her Southern Baptist affiliated church, whereupon I heard the Gospel for the first time, God's Spirit beating within my chest and opening up the eyes of my heart to see sin, judgment, its abiding principle, consequence, and the eternality of that consequence; two months later at that same church at a youth service, the Gospel was heralded once more by which God opened my heart to the comfort of Christ as the resolution to the conflict that I had internally been dealing with from the previous encounter - and then at somewhere between the two o'clock and three o'clock hour of the night God, Himself, re-created me in Christ! God did this work! God, in His gracious providence, saved me in and through my Lord Jesus Christ! God wonderfully intervened - and guess what (?) I didn't think that God had violated my right of free will either like so many today, and if He did, then thank God for that in Jesus' name!
Brothers and sisters, praise your God today for His providential work in your life. And know that if these things be so, and they are, that there are many even today whom you will come in contact with who are unsuspecting of God's intervention; that you are not only greeting them with yourself, but with the Gospel of Christ within you; by you God makes his appeal to the unsuspecting sinner. This is how He has decided to make use of His children - and it is glorious calling that we have to "proclaim the excellencies of Him who called (us) out of darkness into His marvelous light," 1 Peter 2:9. Let us beseech God that we might recognize the opportunities in a given day to come under the excellency of His providence and, by His will, be the providential means of Christ to the one who even now least suspects to meet the Lord of glory! In Jesus' name. Amen.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
American Idol Fashions An American Idol
I do not regularly watch American Idol, mainly for the reasons associated with its name, where teenagers and young men and women become in a short period of time the posterized idols of millions of Americans. But I happened to catch the end of last Wednesday's edition deemed "American Idol Gives Back".
The entirety of the show was devoted to philanthropic ideals and the social gospel. They raised money for the poor, they devoted funds for relief efforts, they built homes and provided medicines for the diseased and homeless. Included in the efforts were big-screen stars Brad Pitt, Ben Stiller, and singers, Mariah Carey and Alicia Keys, among others.
I applaud their philanthropy, but I wonder if something can be truly philanthropic without having Christ as its end, without seeing the nations drawn to rejoice in God. In a sense, it is a shameful thing upon the Church that those who reject Christ would do more philanthropic things than those who know Christ and therefore know the ultimate end of such endeavors, which is that Christ be glorified. We ought to be engaged in feeding the world, in providing for the homeless, in sharing a glass of pure water with those who travel miles for a mud hole - and we ought to do it in a way that declares our distinctive love for them, but that in no way leaves them satisfied by those things alone without being confronted with Him who satisfies all things and that completely so! In other words, meeting the physical needs of people should be a priority of the Church, but passionately secondary; for in all things and in every way we ought to endeavor to take every illness, every hunger, every thirst, every impoverishment, every ideology, etc., captive and make it obedient to Christ, that they may be truly satisfied in Him alone, and overflowing with the pure Gospel that leads to a God-entranced passion in all things.
But aside from "Idols" giving back edition, I was taken back by the stamp that they put on their efforts when they sang the older contemporary Christian song - "Shout to the Lord". Here are the essential lyrics to the song:
"My Jesus, My Savior Lord there is none like
You All of my days, I want to praise
The wonders of Your mighty love
My Comfort, My Shelter
Tower of refuge and strength
Let every breath, all that I am
Never cease to worship You
(Chorus)
Shout to the Lord, all the earth
Let us sing. Power and majesty, praise to the King.
Mountains bow down and the seas will roar
At the sound of Your name
I sing for joy at the work of Your hands
Forever I'll love you, forever I'll stand
Nothing compares to the promise I have in YOU!"
I found myself wondering "why?" or "how?" or "what?" or "really!?" The contestants joined in with a "gospel" choir, Ryan Seacrest "passionately" called out the name of the song, and off they went into vanity, and blasphemy, idolatry, and pluralism - and five seconds afterwards, they had to make sure that Ben Stiller (presumedly Jewish) received twenty seconds in which he was "bleeped" out four or five times!
Did they truly listen to what they were singing? They took out the name of Jesus and replaced it with "My Shepherd, My Savior" to avoid religious repercussions and make sure that anyone in the place could put the name of their god in the place of "Shepherd". On what can only be described as a secular (and often godless) sing-a-long the house rocked with "Let every breath, all that I am, never cease to worship you...nothing compares to the promise I have in YOU!" And they fashioned a god for themselves, for though they sang the words (with the previously mentioned exception) of a Christian song, the biblical God and the exclusivity of the name of Jesus Christ were certainly not intended. This was the "god" of all people and faith structures and religions and spiritualities, the "god" who helps people and gives people material things and is outworking himself through Brad Pitt, and Mariah Carey, etc., the "god" within the self and the collaborative efforts of creatures (human beings).
I wonder, if no money had been raised, no homes built, or a tragic disaster had thwarted the night when "American Idol gave back"; if touching stories had been left untold, if everyone had been stripped of everything they had, from Ben Stiller to the African child - stomach protruding from starvation and diarrhea, would they have stayed on course, would they have still sang the "praises of His name", would they have collaborated to "shout to the Lord...to worship Him...to sing for joy at the work of His hands", would they have still considered the "promise" that we have in Christ alone to be beyond comparison? Do they even know what the promise is?
In the end, American Idol fashioned an American idol - the "everything goes good and everybody walks away ignorantly happy" god; the god who "makes me feel better inside, gives me fuzzy feelings, and allows me to go to bed at night without a true care in the world." This god is the false god of the cosmos that everyone can tolerate so long as he does what he is supposed to do - which of course is in accordance with our will - and throw in a little world peace on the side so long as we can be recognized for it. It was a display of the god of consumerism, for though in appearance the acts were cloaked in sacrifice, yet, the acts were consumed with mammon and good will as its ends, and that is necessary in every missionary endeavor, but it is only missionary when the money is a means to something greater - the propagation of the Gospel of Christ and the joy of the nations in Jehovah through Jesus.
Positively, what happened last Wednesday is an opening for the true Gospel of Christ, where God is the Treasure even in the midst of pain, loss, sickness, and despair, where we are satisfied in God and rejoice in the suffering that comes in the preaching and promoting of the biblical Gospel. Moreover, revealed is the depraved knowledge that every person has of the one True and Living God, and the Truth that they have suppressed in their ungodliness and unrighteousness. The Word of God holds true - God has made Himself plain to them and they are without excuse, because they have traded in His glory for images "resembling mortal man". And one must wonder, what might that song have testified to in their own suppressive hearts? They sang "Shout to the Lord", and harmonized in praise of His "wonders", "mighty love", "comfort", "shelter", "power", "majesty", "kingship", "worth", "creative works", "name", and "incomparable promise"!
"For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For (because) although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man..." Romans 1:19-23.
In consideration of these things, I wish that I might have been there on stage with them, given a great boldness to witness of God in the way that Paul did in Athens in the Areopagus address having observed the suppressed knowledge of God manifest in idolatry, "Men of Athens (America), I perceive that in every way you are very religious (and/or spiritual). For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, 'To the unknown god.' What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you," Acts 17:22-23 (through 31 for the awesome entirety). And where Paul starts with them - in the center of their culture - associating with them, binding what they worship in shadows with Him who is God, so he ends, and so we should endeavor to end by proclaiming God's nearness to sinners (27), God's self-definition, God's own terms of salvation (29), God's command for all people to repent (30), the Day of God's righteous judgment and the man whom God has appointed as the standard of judgment, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord (31).
Therefore, let us boldly endeavor to share the true Gospel, to associate with sinners in a way that communicates clearly that Gospel, which casts down their shadow gods, and God willing, exalts the true God through faith in Jesus Christ. And let us go with the Great Commission in the great expectation that when we go with the Gospel, that Christ is there with us, and we pray in the regenerating, saving power of the Holy Spirit.
Let us truly sing and "shout to the Lord", and declare to those so idolizing American Idol's god, that what you worship as unknown, Him we now proclaim to you. God be glorified in Jesus' name. Amen.
The entirety of the show was devoted to philanthropic ideals and the social gospel. They raised money for the poor, they devoted funds for relief efforts, they built homes and provided medicines for the diseased and homeless. Included in the efforts were big-screen stars Brad Pitt, Ben Stiller, and singers, Mariah Carey and Alicia Keys, among others.
I applaud their philanthropy, but I wonder if something can be truly philanthropic without having Christ as its end, without seeing the nations drawn to rejoice in God. In a sense, it is a shameful thing upon the Church that those who reject Christ would do more philanthropic things than those who know Christ and therefore know the ultimate end of such endeavors, which is that Christ be glorified. We ought to be engaged in feeding the world, in providing for the homeless, in sharing a glass of pure water with those who travel miles for a mud hole - and we ought to do it in a way that declares our distinctive love for them, but that in no way leaves them satisfied by those things alone without being confronted with Him who satisfies all things and that completely so! In other words, meeting the physical needs of people should be a priority of the Church, but passionately secondary; for in all things and in every way we ought to endeavor to take every illness, every hunger, every thirst, every impoverishment, every ideology, etc., captive and make it obedient to Christ, that they may be truly satisfied in Him alone, and overflowing with the pure Gospel that leads to a God-entranced passion in all things.
But aside from "Idols" giving back edition, I was taken back by the stamp that they put on their efforts when they sang the older contemporary Christian song - "Shout to the Lord". Here are the essential lyrics to the song:
"My Jesus, My Savior Lord there is none like
You All of my days, I want to praise
The wonders of Your mighty love
My Comfort, My Shelter
Tower of refuge and strength
Let every breath, all that I am
Never cease to worship You
(Chorus)
Shout to the Lord, all the earth
Let us sing. Power and majesty, praise to the King.
Mountains bow down and the seas will roar
At the sound of Your name
I sing for joy at the work of Your hands
Forever I'll love you, forever I'll stand
Nothing compares to the promise I have in YOU!"
I found myself wondering "why?" or "how?" or "what?" or "really!?" The contestants joined in with a "gospel" choir, Ryan Seacrest "passionately" called out the name of the song, and off they went into vanity, and blasphemy, idolatry, and pluralism - and five seconds afterwards, they had to make sure that Ben Stiller (presumedly Jewish) received twenty seconds in which he was "bleeped" out four or five times!
Did they truly listen to what they were singing? They took out the name of Jesus and replaced it with "My Shepherd, My Savior" to avoid religious repercussions and make sure that anyone in the place could put the name of their god in the place of "Shepherd". On what can only be described as a secular (and often godless) sing-a-long the house rocked with "Let every breath, all that I am, never cease to worship you...nothing compares to the promise I have in YOU!" And they fashioned a god for themselves, for though they sang the words (with the previously mentioned exception) of a Christian song, the biblical God and the exclusivity of the name of Jesus Christ were certainly not intended. This was the "god" of all people and faith structures and religions and spiritualities, the "god" who helps people and gives people material things and is outworking himself through Brad Pitt, and Mariah Carey, etc., the "god" within the self and the collaborative efforts of creatures (human beings).
I wonder, if no money had been raised, no homes built, or a tragic disaster had thwarted the night when "American Idol gave back"; if touching stories had been left untold, if everyone had been stripped of everything they had, from Ben Stiller to the African child - stomach protruding from starvation and diarrhea, would they have stayed on course, would they have still sang the "praises of His name", would they have collaborated to "shout to the Lord...to worship Him...to sing for joy at the work of His hands", would they have still considered the "promise" that we have in Christ alone to be beyond comparison? Do they even know what the promise is?
In the end, American Idol fashioned an American idol - the "everything goes good and everybody walks away ignorantly happy" god; the god who "makes me feel better inside, gives me fuzzy feelings, and allows me to go to bed at night without a true care in the world." This god is the false god of the cosmos that everyone can tolerate so long as he does what he is supposed to do - which of course is in accordance with our will - and throw in a little world peace on the side so long as we can be recognized for it. It was a display of the god of consumerism, for though in appearance the acts were cloaked in sacrifice, yet, the acts were consumed with mammon and good will as its ends, and that is necessary in every missionary endeavor, but it is only missionary when the money is a means to something greater - the propagation of the Gospel of Christ and the joy of the nations in Jehovah through Jesus.
Positively, what happened last Wednesday is an opening for the true Gospel of Christ, where God is the Treasure even in the midst of pain, loss, sickness, and despair, where we are satisfied in God and rejoice in the suffering that comes in the preaching and promoting of the biblical Gospel. Moreover, revealed is the depraved knowledge that every person has of the one True and Living God, and the Truth that they have suppressed in their ungodliness and unrighteousness. The Word of God holds true - God has made Himself plain to them and they are without excuse, because they have traded in His glory for images "resembling mortal man". And one must wonder, what might that song have testified to in their own suppressive hearts? They sang "Shout to the Lord", and harmonized in praise of His "wonders", "mighty love", "comfort", "shelter", "power", "majesty", "kingship", "worth", "creative works", "name", and "incomparable promise"!
"For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For (because) although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man..." Romans 1:19-23.
In consideration of these things, I wish that I might have been there on stage with them, given a great boldness to witness of God in the way that Paul did in Athens in the Areopagus address having observed the suppressed knowledge of God manifest in idolatry, "Men of Athens (America), I perceive that in every way you are very religious (and/or spiritual). For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, 'To the unknown god.' What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you," Acts 17:22-23 (through 31 for the awesome entirety). And where Paul starts with them - in the center of their culture - associating with them, binding what they worship in shadows with Him who is God, so he ends, and so we should endeavor to end by proclaiming God's nearness to sinners (27), God's self-definition, God's own terms of salvation (29), God's command for all people to repent (30), the Day of God's righteous judgment and the man whom God has appointed as the standard of judgment, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord (31).
Therefore, let us boldly endeavor to share the true Gospel, to associate with sinners in a way that communicates clearly that Gospel, which casts down their shadow gods, and God willing, exalts the true God through faith in Jesus Christ. And let us go with the Great Commission in the great expectation that when we go with the Gospel, that Christ is there with us, and we pray in the regenerating, saving power of the Holy Spirit.
Let us truly sing and "shout to the Lord", and declare to those so idolizing American Idol's god, that what you worship as unknown, Him we now proclaim to you. God be glorified in Jesus' name. Amen.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Good Article by Kyle Vaughn from "The Resurgence" website
"The Digital Age--A New Dark Age? A Look At How Christianity Can Speak To Those Lost In A Storm of Information"
Great article with information on the Enlightenment, postmodern, and post-literate movements, how these movements have impacted the Church and how Christianity masters the reason - faith paradigm, the highest knowledge being that of God, the understanding of ourselves being in Him, as well as our salvation. Truth as it is revealed by God in Christ reigns preeminently.
Great article with information on the Enlightenment, postmodern, and post-literate movements, how these movements have impacted the Church and how Christianity masters the reason - faith paradigm, the highest knowledge being that of God, the understanding of ourselves being in Him, as well as our salvation. Truth as it is revealed by God in Christ reigns preeminently.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Agreeableness Not Synonymous With Regeneration
I have observed that the general and secular culture of the South is noticeably, and often frustratingly, aligned with the "churchy" culture of the Southern states. The secular culture is quite agreeable to the church culture and the church culture seems to be quite content with reflecting that culture and quite indifferent towards molding it. The Gospel is met with much agreement, but little conversion. As with most dichotomies, this is simultaneously advantageous for the church provided the church is appropriately opportunistic, while being an eternal threat both to the accountability of the church's evangelical identity and to the immortal souls of those deceived by their agreeable nature to the things of Christ when we do not make use of the opportunity so given.
With regards to the Church of the living God, we need to mortify our "churchiness" and become the Church. Contentment in the way of things current will ultimately lead to the condemnation of souls, not the salvation of them. We ought not to be content with the agreeableness of the lost, and we should not rest at ease until their eyes are spiritually opened and they are given the Divine breath of life accompanied by the evidence of spiritual sneezes removing the clog of spiritual and agreeable deception. Being agreeable to the Gospel is not synonymous with being regenerate of God, although we ought to be thankful for what agreeableness exists, for though it serves too deceive a soul, yet the reality of it is often the impression of God upon the same soul, and we ought to, therefore, be encouraged and emboldened to move forward with the Gospel in hopes of true conversion to Christ. We must push forward upon this soul, not settling until the habit of sin and the ritual of agreeableness has been broken, thrown down to the ground in contrition, and lifted back up through a real and genuine faith in Jesus Christ. The Gospel is relevant, the word of the cross is the power of God to those who are being saved, who are called of God, and we must persist and persuade and be in earnest with agreeable souls until God swallows them up, drowns them in the spittle of His holy Law, and revives them by the CPR of the Gospel, imputing to them His holy breath of life through faith in Christ.
We are thankful for those churches who are bringing in the people in groves and we hope that God will make salvific use of whatever is imparted that honors Him, but the fear is that in many of these there may not be much imparted to those souls that truly honors God or converts anyone to Christ - perhaps they are converted to the creation of human atmospheres which masquerade as the presence of God, or perhaps they are converted to a man who speaks with great charisma about the "God within a box", and that is quite comfortable to both the preacher and the lost soul; it just doesn't do much to seed and water and convert souls to Christ!
It is the earnestness and passion of the Church that will be the means of true conversion. Our aim is not to make converts to an agreeable nature, a cushy and comfortable nature over against the warnings and threatenings and punishment of just and eternal torments; our aim is to win souls to Christ for the sake of His name among all the nations. This is the exhortation of Spurgeon from the text of 2 Kings 4:29-37, when Elisha came to the Shunamite women's house and found her son lying dead on the bed, he stretched himself over the child and the child's flesh became warm - this, I would say, is that good kind of agreeable nature, but it is not enough to satisfy us - for Elisha got up and stretched himself out again over the child and then the child sneezed seven times and opened his eyes - ah, then he was alive, the breath of life causing him to sneeze, and when he has so spiritually sneezed and had eyes opened, then we shall rest in regeneration. Spurgeon writes more ably, "The result of the prophet's work soon appeared: 'the flesh of the child waxed warm.' How pleased Elisha must have been; but I do not find that his pleasure and satisfaction caused him to relax his exertions. Never be satisfied...with finding your children in a barely hopeful state. Did a girl come to you, and cry, 'Teacher, pray for me'? Be glad, for this is a fair token; but look for more. Did you observe tears in a boy's eyes when you were speaking of the love of Christ? Be thankful for it that the flesh is waxing warm, but do not stop there. Can you relax your exertions now? Bethink you, you have not yet gained your end! It is life you want, not warmth alone...not mere conviction, but conversion...not only impression, but regeneration, - life, life from God, the life of Jesus...nothing less must content you." (from "The Soul Winner"; pages 157-158.)
The Church must be just that; the Christian must be just that; and when they are, Christ will be just that in the conversion of the lost soul. If our petitions with the Gospel are met with agreeableness, do not be fooled into thinking them saved, lest with that agreeableness comes the agreeable fruit of faith. If you observe them and their life stands in stark opposition to their agreeable nature, then thank God that at least their flesh is perhaps "waxed warm", but do not cease in our holy endeavor and end of seeing the soul saved, brought to God through faith in Christ. Watch them "sneeze", and "open their eyes", then we shall recognize new life. Again, agreeableness is not synonymous with regeneration, with being born of God. Work up a sweat in earnestness, plead with the lost soul until they see through their agreeableness into the deadness of the testimony of their lives, and when they presume themselves dead, then with more zeal, stretch out over them the Gospel of Christ.
And this is not the south only, but a great percentage of America is agreeable to the notion of Christianity and of "believing in God", and that is well and good, and ought to be a thing very hopeful for us so long as we then walk through the open door of that statistic with the Gospel of Christ in heart and hand to see them converted. But until the end is met by the grace of God the cultural agreeableness to the belief in a God is insufficient, for even the demons "believe in God" and they shutter, but it avails nothing to believe what demons and the devil, himself, believes, when God believes in God rightly, if one does not believe rightly in Christ exclusively through whom God is truly revealed and known. Again, agreeableness is not synonymous with regeneration, but it is hopeful for those who aim to see the lost soul saved and reunited to God.
In conclusion, an agreeable nature to the things of God can be both damning and the advantageous hope of conversion, the finger print of God on a life, the great chasm between the two possibilities being bridged only by the zeal of Christians to share the full Gospel of Christ with an earnestness that transcends agreement and confronts the culturally deceived with sin, righteousness, self-control, and the coming judgment (Acts 24:25). Only then, like Felix, will the agreeable become "alarmed." We must seek to alarm the agreeable, to sound off in the soul, that culture, heritage, positive thinking, self-improvement projects, regular church attendance, or singing in the choir, and the like, does not save anybody. And only when they become alarmed, having their agreeableness set against spiritual deadness, are they set to be comforted with Christ. We do not seek an agreeableness in the lost soul, dear Christians, we seek the life of God imputed, we seek conversion, we seek true righteousness. May this be our passion and earnest plea to God in Jesus' name.
With regards to the Church of the living God, we need to mortify our "churchiness" and become the Church. Contentment in the way of things current will ultimately lead to the condemnation of souls, not the salvation of them. We ought not to be content with the agreeableness of the lost, and we should not rest at ease until their eyes are spiritually opened and they are given the Divine breath of life accompanied by the evidence of spiritual sneezes removing the clog of spiritual and agreeable deception. Being agreeable to the Gospel is not synonymous with being regenerate of God, although we ought to be thankful for what agreeableness exists, for though it serves too deceive a soul, yet the reality of it is often the impression of God upon the same soul, and we ought to, therefore, be encouraged and emboldened to move forward with the Gospel in hopes of true conversion to Christ. We must push forward upon this soul, not settling until the habit of sin and the ritual of agreeableness has been broken, thrown down to the ground in contrition, and lifted back up through a real and genuine faith in Jesus Christ. The Gospel is relevant, the word of the cross is the power of God to those who are being saved, who are called of God, and we must persist and persuade and be in earnest with agreeable souls until God swallows them up, drowns them in the spittle of His holy Law, and revives them by the CPR of the Gospel, imputing to them His holy breath of life through faith in Christ.
We are thankful for those churches who are bringing in the people in groves and we hope that God will make salvific use of whatever is imparted that honors Him, but the fear is that in many of these there may not be much imparted to those souls that truly honors God or converts anyone to Christ - perhaps they are converted to the creation of human atmospheres which masquerade as the presence of God, or perhaps they are converted to a man who speaks with great charisma about the "God within a box", and that is quite comfortable to both the preacher and the lost soul; it just doesn't do much to seed and water and convert souls to Christ!
It is the earnestness and passion of the Church that will be the means of true conversion. Our aim is not to make converts to an agreeable nature, a cushy and comfortable nature over against the warnings and threatenings and punishment of just and eternal torments; our aim is to win souls to Christ for the sake of His name among all the nations. This is the exhortation of Spurgeon from the text of 2 Kings 4:29-37, when Elisha came to the Shunamite women's house and found her son lying dead on the bed, he stretched himself over the child and the child's flesh became warm - this, I would say, is that good kind of agreeable nature, but it is not enough to satisfy us - for Elisha got up and stretched himself out again over the child and then the child sneezed seven times and opened his eyes - ah, then he was alive, the breath of life causing him to sneeze, and when he has so spiritually sneezed and had eyes opened, then we shall rest in regeneration. Spurgeon writes more ably, "The result of the prophet's work soon appeared: 'the flesh of the child waxed warm.' How pleased Elisha must have been; but I do not find that his pleasure and satisfaction caused him to relax his exertions. Never be satisfied...with finding your children in a barely hopeful state. Did a girl come to you, and cry, 'Teacher, pray for me'? Be glad, for this is a fair token; but look for more. Did you observe tears in a boy's eyes when you were speaking of the love of Christ? Be thankful for it that the flesh is waxing warm, but do not stop there. Can you relax your exertions now? Bethink you, you have not yet gained your end! It is life you want, not warmth alone...not mere conviction, but conversion...not only impression, but regeneration, - life, life from God, the life of Jesus...nothing less must content you." (from "The Soul Winner"; pages 157-158.)
The Church must be just that; the Christian must be just that; and when they are, Christ will be just that in the conversion of the lost soul. If our petitions with the Gospel are met with agreeableness, do not be fooled into thinking them saved, lest with that agreeableness comes the agreeable fruit of faith. If you observe them and their life stands in stark opposition to their agreeable nature, then thank God that at least their flesh is perhaps "waxed warm", but do not cease in our holy endeavor and end of seeing the soul saved, brought to God through faith in Christ. Watch them "sneeze", and "open their eyes", then we shall recognize new life. Again, agreeableness is not synonymous with regeneration, with being born of God. Work up a sweat in earnestness, plead with the lost soul until they see through their agreeableness into the deadness of the testimony of their lives, and when they presume themselves dead, then with more zeal, stretch out over them the Gospel of Christ.
And this is not the south only, but a great percentage of America is agreeable to the notion of Christianity and of "believing in God", and that is well and good, and ought to be a thing very hopeful for us so long as we then walk through the open door of that statistic with the Gospel of Christ in heart and hand to see them converted. But until the end is met by the grace of God the cultural agreeableness to the belief in a God is insufficient, for even the demons "believe in God" and they shutter, but it avails nothing to believe what demons and the devil, himself, believes, when God believes in God rightly, if one does not believe rightly in Christ exclusively through whom God is truly revealed and known. Again, agreeableness is not synonymous with regeneration, but it is hopeful for those who aim to see the lost soul saved and reunited to God.
In conclusion, an agreeable nature to the things of God can be both damning and the advantageous hope of conversion, the finger print of God on a life, the great chasm between the two possibilities being bridged only by the zeal of Christians to share the full Gospel of Christ with an earnestness that transcends agreement and confronts the culturally deceived with sin, righteousness, self-control, and the coming judgment (Acts 24:25). Only then, like Felix, will the agreeable become "alarmed." We must seek to alarm the agreeable, to sound off in the soul, that culture, heritage, positive thinking, self-improvement projects, regular church attendance, or singing in the choir, and the like, does not save anybody. And only when they become alarmed, having their agreeableness set against spiritual deadness, are they set to be comforted with Christ. We do not seek an agreeableness in the lost soul, dear Christians, we seek the life of God imputed, we seek conversion, we seek true righteousness. May this be our passion and earnest plea to God in Jesus' name.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Is Evangelism the Means of Contagious Joy?
I believe it is! I would not make it exclusive, but perhaps, preeminently important, as Paul addressed it, "For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received..." (1 Cor. 15: 3). Many of those people who now live outside of Christ would so deny Him because of the depravity of joy in those who profess to know Him. While many professing Christians sneer at the thought of sharing the Gospel with the lost, it is this means, this sharing of faith in Christ for righteousness and the observance of God working in and through those means in that moment of testimony to bring about regeneration and conversion in a human soul that, then, comes back to us and radiates with in our souls and overflows out from our hearts and tongues a zealous joy in God and in His sovereign kindness.
I am aware of many Christians who vouch that they experience a joyless relationship with Christ, which is a great tragedy and worthy of wonder. Could it be that the Christian who keeps to his or herself, that remains quite smug, irritable, agitated, unhappy, joyless, and complaining, is so depraved of Christian joy because he or she does not share the Christian joy, i.e., the Gospel of Christ for righteousness, eternal life, and reconciliation with God?
By the measure of our withholding the good news, shall we miss out on God's will, God's purpose and plan, God's means of salvation, God's heart and desire, God's exaltation as Sovereign Joy, the assurance that God hears our prayers and works by them by which we are made glad and assured that we were in agreement with God's passion, and the happiness and rejoicing that comes with the salvation of one lost soul - indeed, we join with the host of heaven to praise God and rejoice at the salvation of one - unless we keep silent and hide God's salvific balm.
How shall we expect an unbeliever to be favorable to our Gospel propagation but by the grace and mercy of God on us and them, when with our lives we give evidence of believing the worst news and not the greatest news? Will we complain incessantly and then speak of Christ? Will we grumble and sigh and then share the good news? Shall we never laugh, never smile, never love and expect the lost to be regenerated at our mention of the law of God which in the moment shines more brightly upon us who know the truth but do not practice it with joy?
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the LORD's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it," Psalm 118:22-23. This is more than the well-known children's song! It is the Christian's daily joy - to rejoice and be glad in the LORD's day of salvation in Christ!
If this is the case, not only are Christians not sharing the Gospel with words, but we are being a hindrance to the Gospel that we would share by our joylessness. But the joy that testifies is found in the sharing of the Gospel with words.
Perhaps it is because one so seldom shares the Gospel that one has so little evangelical happiness to bear and witness of in the ebb and flow of one's typical day and conversation. For I find that to pray expectantly that God would come down in your place of work, school, etc. with regenerative power, and then to have the prayer answered when the opportunity to share the Gospel comes, and to have your fear converted to boldness, and to see the miracle of God's grace working a favorable impression, providing the hope of conversion, and yet more, God sovereignly brings another at that moment to invest in the Gospel discussion, and to find that the two are in the same family and that they actually become earnest for more conversation, and agree to meet again, so that when they leave, my soul desires nothing more but to praise God to Whom salvation belongs and to rejoice with great gladness at the hope of conversion and the awesome mercy and benignity and power of God; and I find myself, then, as it were regenerated again, converted to joy and it transforms my countenance towards all things and everybody to one of contagious and evangelical happiness. And so now my happiness also testifies of God, rather than my banal bitterness.
Dear Christian, do you desire joy, then do not withhold it, that is, the Gospel of joy! The new language of the Christian is Christ-ian, it is the Gospel, and the endeavor is to take all things captive to Christ. If you swallow the Gospel and speak of it not, it will become bitter to you and not sweet. Have you truly tasted and seen that God is good? That the Gospel is great? That the enjoyment of God is the chief end of man? Speak up! For the sake of the name of Christ and the obedience of faith, speak up! And you will find, as I did today, and hope to always find, that to share the Gospel with the lost will go beyond the witness of words to that of a joyful and satisfied life in God. When you share the Gospel, the Spirit of God will lavish you with a joy that transforms your attitude, your day, your life because you will be doing that which is both the source and appropriation of true joy in Him.
Dear Christian, do you yearn for joy and happiness, then share the Gospel with others and observe your God work in it; aim preeminently at the salvation of souls, and when one is saved, the joy of spiritual child-bearing will overwhelm you, and that joy will serve to witness as well to the glory of God. Could the absence of evangelism in your daily practice be the root of your joylessness - Scripture, logic, and experience affirm me in exclaiming, "Yes!" When we share our joy with others, we are made joyful in their joy and in God's amazing grace. Therefore, speak up, watch God work, and observe the contagious joy of the person set ablaze with daily evangelical prowess and passion.
I am aware of many Christians who vouch that they experience a joyless relationship with Christ, which is a great tragedy and worthy of wonder. Could it be that the Christian who keeps to his or herself, that remains quite smug, irritable, agitated, unhappy, joyless, and complaining, is so depraved of Christian joy because he or she does not share the Christian joy, i.e., the Gospel of Christ for righteousness, eternal life, and reconciliation with God?
By the measure of our withholding the good news, shall we miss out on God's will, God's purpose and plan, God's means of salvation, God's heart and desire, God's exaltation as Sovereign Joy, the assurance that God hears our prayers and works by them by which we are made glad and assured that we were in agreement with God's passion, and the happiness and rejoicing that comes with the salvation of one lost soul - indeed, we join with the host of heaven to praise God and rejoice at the salvation of one - unless we keep silent and hide God's salvific balm.
How shall we expect an unbeliever to be favorable to our Gospel propagation but by the grace and mercy of God on us and them, when with our lives we give evidence of believing the worst news and not the greatest news? Will we complain incessantly and then speak of Christ? Will we grumble and sigh and then share the good news? Shall we never laugh, never smile, never love and expect the lost to be regenerated at our mention of the law of God which in the moment shines more brightly upon us who know the truth but do not practice it with joy?
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the LORD's doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it," Psalm 118:22-23. This is more than the well-known children's song! It is the Christian's daily joy - to rejoice and be glad in the LORD's day of salvation in Christ!
If this is the case, not only are Christians not sharing the Gospel with words, but we are being a hindrance to the Gospel that we would share by our joylessness. But the joy that testifies is found in the sharing of the Gospel with words.
Perhaps it is because one so seldom shares the Gospel that one has so little evangelical happiness to bear and witness of in the ebb and flow of one's typical day and conversation. For I find that to pray expectantly that God would come down in your place of work, school, etc. with regenerative power, and then to have the prayer answered when the opportunity to share the Gospel comes, and to have your fear converted to boldness, and to see the miracle of God's grace working a favorable impression, providing the hope of conversion, and yet more, God sovereignly brings another at that moment to invest in the Gospel discussion, and to find that the two are in the same family and that they actually become earnest for more conversation, and agree to meet again, so that when they leave, my soul desires nothing more but to praise God to Whom salvation belongs and to rejoice with great gladness at the hope of conversion and the awesome mercy and benignity and power of God; and I find myself, then, as it were regenerated again, converted to joy and it transforms my countenance towards all things and everybody to one of contagious and evangelical happiness. And so now my happiness also testifies of God, rather than my banal bitterness.
Dear Christian, do you desire joy, then do not withhold it, that is, the Gospel of joy! The new language of the Christian is Christ-ian, it is the Gospel, and the endeavor is to take all things captive to Christ. If you swallow the Gospel and speak of it not, it will become bitter to you and not sweet. Have you truly tasted and seen that God is good? That the Gospel is great? That the enjoyment of God is the chief end of man? Speak up! For the sake of the name of Christ and the obedience of faith, speak up! And you will find, as I did today, and hope to always find, that to share the Gospel with the lost will go beyond the witness of words to that of a joyful and satisfied life in God. When you share the Gospel, the Spirit of God will lavish you with a joy that transforms your attitude, your day, your life because you will be doing that which is both the source and appropriation of true joy in Him.
Dear Christian, do you yearn for joy and happiness, then share the Gospel with others and observe your God work in it; aim preeminently at the salvation of souls, and when one is saved, the joy of spiritual child-bearing will overwhelm you, and that joy will serve to witness as well to the glory of God. Could the absence of evangelism in your daily practice be the root of your joylessness - Scripture, logic, and experience affirm me in exclaiming, "Yes!" When we share our joy with others, we are made joyful in their joy and in God's amazing grace. Therefore, speak up, watch God work, and observe the contagious joy of the person set ablaze with daily evangelical prowess and passion.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Spurgeon on "The Soul Winner" and His "One Business"
"It is a grand thing to see a man thoroughly possessed with one master-passion. Such a man is sure to be strong, and if the master-principle be excellent, he is sure to be excellent, too. The man of one object is a man indeed. Lives with many aims are like water trickling through innumerable streams, none of which are wide enough or deep enough to float the merest cockleshell of a boat; but a life with one object is like a mighty river flowing between its banks, bearing to the ocean a multitude of ships, and spreading fertility on either side. Give me a man not only with a great object in his soul, but thoroughly possessed by it, his powers all concentrated, and himself on fire with vehement zeal for his supreme object, and you have put before me one of the greatest sources of power which the world can produce. Give me a man engrossed with holy love as to his heart, and filled with some masterly celestial thought as to his brain, and such a man will be known wherever his lot may be cast, and I venture to prophesy that his name will be remembered long after the place of his sepulchre shall be forgotten."
-pg. 249 of "The Soul Winner"
"Now observe, brethren, if I, or you, or any of us, or all of us, shall have spent our lives merely in amusing men, or educating men, or moralizing men, when we shall come to give in our account at the last great day, we shall be in a very sorry condition, and we shall have but a very sorry record to render; for of what avail will it be to a man to be educated when he comes to be damned? Of what service will it be to him to have been amused when the trumpet sounds, and heaven and earth are shaking, and the pit opens wide her jaws of fire, and swallows up the soul unsaved? Or what avail even to have moralized a man if still he is on the left hand of the Judge, and if still, 'Depart, ye cursed,' shall be his portion? Blood-red with the murder of men's souls will be the skirts of professing Christians, unless the drift, and end, and aim of all their work has been to 'save some.'"
-pg. 254 of "The Soul Winner"
-pg. 249 of "The Soul Winner"
"Now observe, brethren, if I, or you, or any of us, or all of us, shall have spent our lives merely in amusing men, or educating men, or moralizing men, when we shall come to give in our account at the last great day, we shall be in a very sorry condition, and we shall have but a very sorry record to render; for of what avail will it be to a man to be educated when he comes to be damned? Of what service will it be to him to have been amused when the trumpet sounds, and heaven and earth are shaking, and the pit opens wide her jaws of fire, and swallows up the soul unsaved? Or what avail even to have moralized a man if still he is on the left hand of the Judge, and if still, 'Depart, ye cursed,' shall be his portion? Blood-red with the murder of men's souls will be the skirts of professing Christians, unless the drift, and end, and aim of all their work has been to 'save some.'"
-pg. 254 of "The Soul Winner"
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
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.
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.
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
God Glorified In Martyrdom: Lament For Ms. Mizzel
We do not have to venture farther than the Cross of Christ to understand that the world rejects and hates in an angry and murderous fashion the Truth as it is in God, revealed in His Son, Jesus Christ by faith. And so, in time, was the fate of the prophets before Christ, though Christ was before them and in them and indicating His time through them. And, each apostle was also martyred with the exception of John, who were it not for the Divine intervention of God would have suffered the same blessed end. And each of these, our Lord and every lover of Christ and His Gospel from the beginning (Abel) have met persecution for His name's sake; and each for the proclamation of God's Word, and men have not been able to bear it. The response of the human heart to God's Word is murderous rage (See John 8:39-47, specifically the connection between vv. 40, 43).
I recently posted for prayer on behalf of one Ms. Mizzel, a missionary to Afghanistan. She and her driver were both kidnapped by Afghani rebels and the latest report on their condition from her organization is that they have been murdered - martyred for the sake of Christ. They still have not found them, nor have they heard from their kidnappers; thus, I would hold out the assurance that God knows what they do not in either case; but, the report is of martyrdom, and so Ms. Mizzel has followed in the blessed foot steps of the prophets and the apostles and those who have perished under the title of Christian martyr, losing her life for the sake of Christ and thus finding her life in Christ.
While this is lamentable, such lamentation grows up into the great missionary passion for Christ and His Gospel, such burden transforms Gospel anxiety into Gospel boldness. As it is certain that her imprisonment was for Christ, and served to advance the Gospel, so it is certain that the seed of her life for Christ has not yet reached its full maturity in progression. The prayer is that God will now give exceeding growth in the souls of those both near and far from this martyrdom in the area of love and passion and care for the souls that she spent her life reaching. That we would been given a double portion of her sacrificial heart, and affection for Jesus Christ.
Jim Elliot once pondered, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." Our Lord said it thus, "If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?" (Luke 9:23-25) Ms. Mizzel lived for eternal life, that greatest gain, and in so doing, reckoned herself not her own but Christ's. And for what? Because God is the greatest treasure, and thus the supreme desire is to share Him with the nations within the preaching of Christ and Him crucified! And in so far as we cling and pursue and love Him, so what may cost us our temporal life becomes a blip and less than nothing.
Let us lament, but let us rejoice in hope of the glory of God and the knowledge of it being spread unto all the nations, and by no greater and blessed means than the martyrdom of His adopted children who, I pray, live in earnest pursuit of the knowledge of Christ and the heralding of His Gospel. God be glorified in the seeds of Your saints! Amen.
I recently posted for prayer on behalf of one Ms. Mizzel, a missionary to Afghanistan. She and her driver were both kidnapped by Afghani rebels and the latest report on their condition from her organization is that they have been murdered - martyred for the sake of Christ. They still have not found them, nor have they heard from their kidnappers; thus, I would hold out the assurance that God knows what they do not in either case; but, the report is of martyrdom, and so Ms. Mizzel has followed in the blessed foot steps of the prophets and the apostles and those who have perished under the title of Christian martyr, losing her life for the sake of Christ and thus finding her life in Christ.
While this is lamentable, such lamentation grows up into the great missionary passion for Christ and His Gospel, such burden transforms Gospel anxiety into Gospel boldness. As it is certain that her imprisonment was for Christ, and served to advance the Gospel, so it is certain that the seed of her life for Christ has not yet reached its full maturity in progression. The prayer is that God will now give exceeding growth in the souls of those both near and far from this martyrdom in the area of love and passion and care for the souls that she spent her life reaching. That we would been given a double portion of her sacrificial heart, and affection for Jesus Christ.
Jim Elliot once pondered, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." Our Lord said it thus, "If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?" (Luke 9:23-25) Ms. Mizzel lived for eternal life, that greatest gain, and in so doing, reckoned herself not her own but Christ's. And for what? Because God is the greatest treasure, and thus the supreme desire is to share Him with the nations within the preaching of Christ and Him crucified! And in so far as we cling and pursue and love Him, so what may cost us our temporal life becomes a blip and less than nothing.
Let us lament, but let us rejoice in hope of the glory of God and the knowledge of it being spread unto all the nations, and by no greater and blessed means than the martyrdom of His adopted children who, I pray, live in earnest pursuit of the knowledge of Christ and the heralding of His Gospel. God be glorified in the seeds of Your saints! Amen.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
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.
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.
Sunday, February 24, 2008
The Acid of the Word?
"I see where you are coming from now...But I must go because I cannot endure what you are saying to me...what you are saying to me feels like acid being poured over my flesh." This was the response that I recently received from a philosopher when I addressed her on her playing field with six verses of Jesus Christ. This is a somewhat graphic response to the internal medicine of God's Word, albeit typical from a sinner initially reached with Gospel conversation. What does one do when confronted by a secular philosopher (or any educated sinner), well-educated and well-traveled? What if this philosopher engages you in a conversation about truth and knowledge? Will you be able to address the person on their level, where they are, and raise them up to where Christ is? And how are you to do this? Know God's Word! Speak God's Word! Live God's Word! Share God's Word:
"For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.' Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater (philosopher) of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through (human) wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe," 1 Corinthians 1:18-21. Again, I say, know God's Word!
Recently, I was confronted by an elderly woman about knowledge, seeking to impart her wisdom to me. Her theory was one of proper growth in knowledge. That human knowledge is the highest sort of knowledge; that if one is to truly make the most of their short time on earth, and to advance in this world, one must take advantage of every sort of human knowledge already available to them apart from the knowledge that they have attained for themselves by their own study. If someone else has already attained the knowledge, then it is not necessary for me to do the leg work on it; all that I must do is listen and learn and grow. And while there is some validity to listening and learning from others, yet her philosophy was centered on humanism; she did not believe in a knowledge that transcends the natural level, or the human intuition. All that we need to know or can know is attainable for us via study or other beings, and the world around us.
So I responded. If knowledge is to be had, then ought we not to pursue that greatest sort of knowledge, that highest knowledge, which is of God the Father in heaven through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And this knowledge does in fact transcend the natural man's ability to discern. If she had here admitted as much to be true, she would have necessarily had to forsake the foundation of her worldview and lifestyle and philosophical presuppositions. If God is the Sovereign of the universe, the Creator, the Almighty and Free Potter, the Alpha and Omega, and yet, the Author and Perfecter of faith, a Savior, a Lord that would willingly sacrifice Himself on a Roman cross for sinners, rebel enemies of this Almighty King; if God is Who is says He is, then to know Him is the highest and greatest sort of knowledge. Both reason and Scripture attest to this. For from the Fall, no one has known Him lest He reveal Himself to us through His eternal Son, Jesus Christ.
I quoted John 17:3 to this person. Here Jesus defines eternal life: "This is eternal life, that they know You the One True God, and Him Whom You have sent, Jesus Christ." This "know"ledge of the One True God through faith in Jesus Christ is a transcendent sort of knowledge; it goes beyond the earthly realm and penetrates into the heights of eternal glory; no man has ascended into heaven except He who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven (John 3:13), and so God had to reveal these sort of truths because of the inability and exclusivity of man from heaven and, hence, the knowledge of spiritual things relating to the joyful reign of God in the soul and in glory and above all earthly powers.
Stunned to silence, I progressed with her to John 3:3, 5-8, and spoke to her the words of Christ to Nicodemus, who was likewise well-educated and experienced in his field, and yet, Christ breaks in upon his natural worldview and undoes any thought that Nicodemus had it all figured out. "Unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God...unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." And just as Nicodemus was undone by these words, so the soul that God appointed to me for Gospel conversation was undone.
In an instance, her calm, cool, philosophical conjectures were turned to sarcasm, and inward rage, an inferno of pride. This educated, well-traveled philosopher was overwhelmed at the hearing of six verses of Holy Writ, Jesus Christ, the Word of God. Her intellect succumbed to her emotion, for her the lostness of her soul had been engaged by the Savior of the universe. Her philosophy bowed the knee to her religious ancestry, which I am sure was a last resort. What is more, she claimed Judaism! She was Jewish! Here I am by the appointment of God in a conversation with a philosopher who, herself, initiated our time together, and we are speaking about knowledge, and I have just quoted to her the words of Jesus, a Jew, to the Pharisee, Nicodemus, a Jew, about his need for a spiritual new birth without which he and all of his discernment are but "flesh", all of his natural knowledge falls short of that knowledge which saves and thereby transcends human understanding because the saving knowledge stands on the right side of faith, whereby the disciple of Christ is equipped with the lens of faith, the mind of Christ, the ministry of the Holy Spirit that we may initmately know God and worship Him.
To these things, she replied, "I see where you are coming from now...But I must go because I cannot endure what you are saying to me...what you are saying to me feels like acid being poured over my flesh." Six verses of Jesus Christ she could not endure and now I remember why - "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart"; and it is a terrible imagery that she gave, though she considered not the spiritual truth of it - "The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned"! Acid on the flesh! What she meant in a physical fashion holds true in the spiritual realm; for though she meant it as illustration, yet her description was quite true of what she was inwardly experiencing - the Word of Christ was reverberating in her soul, like a hammer smashing through her hardness of heart, breaking down philosophical presuppositions, acting as a restraining agent, and I pray the womb of regeneration. She was confronted with the laver of the Word of God, and she called it acid. But, as acid will certainly eat away at the flesh, so the Word of God, in a sense, does the same, as it eats away, restrains, and cleanses that spiritual carnality that the Bible deems "the flesh".
I hope to see her quite often over the next several months. I find myself both greatly burdened for her because of her blindness, and I am thereby exceedingly earnest to continue to pursue her for the sake of the name of Christ; and though I stand burdened and hungry to share with her, I also stand in amazement at the power of God's Word, it's piercing, penetrating, lively, active, dividing, restraining, and saving power and the promise of God that it will not return to Him void when He has sent it out. Moreover, my great hope is that those six verses of Christ might continue to rain down upon the soils of her heart, softening her to the seed of the Gospel in due time, and that as Nicodemus was with Christ in the end, so in the end Christ will be in her and she in Him to the glory of our God. It is sufficient to conclude with this for now, that God's Word is awesome and powerful both to convict and to save; that the therefore, let we who love God through Christ attend to this Word with a great urgency in proportion to the urgent condition of the lost in this world, for the Word of the cross is the power of God to those who are being saved. Amen.
"For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, 'I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.' Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater (philosopher) of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through (human) wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe," 1 Corinthians 1:18-21. Again, I say, know God's Word!
Recently, I was confronted by an elderly woman about knowledge, seeking to impart her wisdom to me. Her theory was one of proper growth in knowledge. That human knowledge is the highest sort of knowledge; that if one is to truly make the most of their short time on earth, and to advance in this world, one must take advantage of every sort of human knowledge already available to them apart from the knowledge that they have attained for themselves by their own study. If someone else has already attained the knowledge, then it is not necessary for me to do the leg work on it; all that I must do is listen and learn and grow. And while there is some validity to listening and learning from others, yet her philosophy was centered on humanism; she did not believe in a knowledge that transcends the natural level, or the human intuition. All that we need to know or can know is attainable for us via study or other beings, and the world around us.
So I responded. If knowledge is to be had, then ought we not to pursue that greatest sort of knowledge, that highest knowledge, which is of God the Father in heaven through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And this knowledge does in fact transcend the natural man's ability to discern. If she had here admitted as much to be true, she would have necessarily had to forsake the foundation of her worldview and lifestyle and philosophical presuppositions. If God is the Sovereign of the universe, the Creator, the Almighty and Free Potter, the Alpha and Omega, and yet, the Author and Perfecter of faith, a Savior, a Lord that would willingly sacrifice Himself on a Roman cross for sinners, rebel enemies of this Almighty King; if God is Who is says He is, then to know Him is the highest and greatest sort of knowledge. Both reason and Scripture attest to this. For from the Fall, no one has known Him lest He reveal Himself to us through His eternal Son, Jesus Christ.
I quoted John 17:3 to this person. Here Jesus defines eternal life: "This is eternal life, that they know You the One True God, and Him Whom You have sent, Jesus Christ." This "know"ledge of the One True God through faith in Jesus Christ is a transcendent sort of knowledge; it goes beyond the earthly realm and penetrates into the heights of eternal glory; no man has ascended into heaven except He who descended from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven (John 3:13), and so God had to reveal these sort of truths because of the inability and exclusivity of man from heaven and, hence, the knowledge of spiritual things relating to the joyful reign of God in the soul and in glory and above all earthly powers.
Stunned to silence, I progressed with her to John 3:3, 5-8, and spoke to her the words of Christ to Nicodemus, who was likewise well-educated and experienced in his field, and yet, Christ breaks in upon his natural worldview and undoes any thought that Nicodemus had it all figured out. "Unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God...unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." And just as Nicodemus was undone by these words, so the soul that God appointed to me for Gospel conversation was undone.
In an instance, her calm, cool, philosophical conjectures were turned to sarcasm, and inward rage, an inferno of pride. This educated, well-traveled philosopher was overwhelmed at the hearing of six verses of Holy Writ, Jesus Christ, the Word of God. Her intellect succumbed to her emotion, for her the lostness of her soul had been engaged by the Savior of the universe. Her philosophy bowed the knee to her religious ancestry, which I am sure was a last resort. What is more, she claimed Judaism! She was Jewish! Here I am by the appointment of God in a conversation with a philosopher who, herself, initiated our time together, and we are speaking about knowledge, and I have just quoted to her the words of Jesus, a Jew, to the Pharisee, Nicodemus, a Jew, about his need for a spiritual new birth without which he and all of his discernment are but "flesh", all of his natural knowledge falls short of that knowledge which saves and thereby transcends human understanding because the saving knowledge stands on the right side of faith, whereby the disciple of Christ is equipped with the lens of faith, the mind of Christ, the ministry of the Holy Spirit that we may initmately know God and worship Him.
To these things, she replied, "I see where you are coming from now...But I must go because I cannot endure what you are saying to me...what you are saying to me feels like acid being poured over my flesh." Six verses of Jesus Christ she could not endure and now I remember why - "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart"; and it is a terrible imagery that she gave, though she considered not the spiritual truth of it - "The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned"! Acid on the flesh! What she meant in a physical fashion holds true in the spiritual realm; for though she meant it as illustration, yet her description was quite true of what she was inwardly experiencing - the Word of Christ was reverberating in her soul, like a hammer smashing through her hardness of heart, breaking down philosophical presuppositions, acting as a restraining agent, and I pray the womb of regeneration. She was confronted with the laver of the Word of God, and she called it acid. But, as acid will certainly eat away at the flesh, so the Word of God, in a sense, does the same, as it eats away, restrains, and cleanses that spiritual carnality that the Bible deems "the flesh".
I hope to see her quite often over the next several months. I find myself both greatly burdened for her because of her blindness, and I am thereby exceedingly earnest to continue to pursue her for the sake of the name of Christ; and though I stand burdened and hungry to share with her, I also stand in amazement at the power of God's Word, it's piercing, penetrating, lively, active, dividing, restraining, and saving power and the promise of God that it will not return to Him void when He has sent it out. Moreover, my great hope is that those six verses of Christ might continue to rain down upon the soils of her heart, softening her to the seed of the Gospel in due time, and that as Nicodemus was with Christ in the end, so in the end Christ will be in her and she in Him to the glory of our God. It is sufficient to conclude with this for now, that God's Word is awesome and powerful both to convict and to save; that the therefore, let we who love God through Christ attend to this Word with a great urgency in proportion to the urgent condition of the lost in this world, for the Word of the cross is the power of God to those who are being saved. Amen.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
The Sovereignty of God: What About Evangelism?
If God is Sovereign over His salvation, then what of human responsibility? What of human accountability? What of evangelism and prayer and holiness and the rest of the means of conversion? In essence, what about me? Where do I fit in to this redemptive plan?
In these questions and the like stands a prominent problem. I do not here intend to type with an expansive keyboard about the aforementioned thoughts, but only to address this problem quite briefly that I see in the questions such as these that I have encountered from the lips of genuine, Jesus-loving Christians. Allow me, first, to address the problem, then the Scriptural support in contrast with the problem.
The problem is cultural individualism. At some point we grow out of a Christ-centeredness and become immersed in a self-centered culture, and as it pervades and permeates and flavors the thinking and affections of the body of Christ, so we digress back into an Ephesian state of affairs. We have continued in Christian activity but abandoned the right context for them, namely, our preeminent love for Christ. Many have come to view evangelism and prayer as things that we do because God is rendered disabled if we do not so engage, rather than the activities of a heart set ablaze by and for Christ.
The thought is that we are something, we are special, we are really awesome and on the cutting edge, and indeed, many churches today in this contemporary scene would boast in as much. But in so far as we adhere to this, we move away from the glory and beauty and honor due Christ. The apostle Paul knew of his inadequacy, his insufficiency for Christian ministry, and he made his boast Christ and Him crucified. And it is not that we should focus so much on our own inadequacy or insufficiency for these things as much as this is a cry for us to return to a vivid love of the adequacy and sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ for these things. For it is in a radical love and passionate dependency upon Christ's sufficiency to save rather than our own that will advance the Gospel most truly and powerfully.
Must we evangelize? Must we pray? Must we live holy lives? Must we venture into distant islands? Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! But if God were not the Lord of the harvest, all of our laboring would amount to something, just not sound, biblical born again Christians. If the Lord does not build the house, the laborers labor in vain (Ps 127:1). Must we labor? Absolutely! But our labor is met with worth and fruit because it is built by and upon God. I would emphatically state that God does need you and me to evangelize and pray, etc.; but, more than this, God wants us to do these things, and be assured of this, that unless we do these things the Gospel will not be advanced. But this is not to assume a human-centered advancement as if God is handicapped without you. God has made a donkey speak with greater wisdom than a man, angels attest of His glory, and if you do not delight in these means of conversion, then God will give mouths of praise to rocks, and they will cry out to sinners. God does not need you; but He enlists you for Himself, not to evangelize from a dutiful, human-centered soul, but from a soul that delights in Christ, delights in God, delights in what has been accomplished for you, and delights to share with others this Gospel of God's grace in Christ Jesus.
It is necessity, rightly considered, that we must adhere to, and this necessity belongs to active decree, not human exaltation. That is, if one begins to think themselves a necessity in the scheme of Gospel propagation because their complacency would thwart the plan and purpose of God, or that the omnipotent God would somehow become paralyzed by our sloth from saving sinners, then our understanding of our role is unbiblical. However, if when we say that God needs us to bear testimony of Christ unto the lost, and by that need, we mean that God in His infinite wisdom has actively ordained that His redeemed would proclaim the excellencies of our Redeemer, and that He has ordained that our sharing of the Gospel and our going to the nations and our praying for the lost is the sole and chosen means of propagating His grace and that His ordained end of saving sinners will not be accomplished without the means of conversion that He has decreed, then, indeed, God needs us to be the means of conversion. But, again, our necessity in the kingdom of God is an ordained necessity. In infinite wisdom, God chose to save sinners like you and me, and then to send us to those still in their sins. He could have ordained another way, but He did not! God's need is not due to a shortcoming of His ability as if He could not save apart from men; rather, the need is one that God chose as the means to the end of salvation.
One would do well to consider our Gospel endeavor as a thing necessary because it is what God has ordained as the means to His ends, but with that felt-necessity we ought to be humbled, not puffed up with pride; the need that we have expressed is better stated to be the desire of God and the overflow of the soul satisfied in Jesus Christ to the point where we are a continual aroma of Jesus to all men. The need is synonomous with an active desire on God's part, a "want" if you will may be more accurate, and so we ought to "want" to go to the nations armed with the Gospel.
I urge you to reconsider your motives in these things. As God has appointed ends, God has appointed means to those ends, and it is certain that if you do not participate in these things that God will enlist another who will delightfully do them, and you might consider again the state of your soul, as the father of modern missions, William Carey (a Calvinist), would write in his Enquiry, "conscientious activity therein (evangelism, etc) would form one of the strongest proofs that we are the subjects of grace." In other words, Gospel activity is one of the greatest evidences of your personal conversion. Spurgeon would add, "if you have no great desire to see the lost saved, then you yourself are not saved." Carey had two missionary motives that I believe we must keep in mind: "love for and obedience to the God who had redeemed him, and the state of the world without Christ. It is because of this twofold consideration that the people of God are obliged 'to use every lawful method to spread the knowledge of his name'" (Carey and the Missionary Vision, Webber, pg. 21).
In Romans 10:13-17, we are blessed with a wonderful text of God's missionary strategy:
"For 'everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!' But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, 'Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?' So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ."
Hearing the Gospel is the means of faith. And God has sent preachers to proclaim and live this Gospel before all men unto the end of conversion. These are called the 'means of grace' without which no one would be "believe" and "call on the name of the Lord". We must go with the Gospel. This is our loving obedience for God and His grace, and our in depth awareness of the state of the sinner, made practical. We must go with the Gospel of grace. But be assured of this, though we go, if God does not there meet our endeavor by appointment and grace, our audience will reject the message because their own natural desire is to do just that. There were many that the disciples met on the road, stopping from door to door, and yet were greeted with rejection and scorn. Our encouragement in these things is that not all will reject; some will believe, and when they do give glory to God for their faith.
We are vessels of mercy, Beloved, garbage cans with the greatest Treasure within for the purpose of delighting in God, losing our lives by comparison to that delight, and moving actively with the Gospel. But we are vessels, garbage cans in the Greek (2 Cor. 4:7). We are not the mercy within; we are not the Treasure that saves; this is the Lord Jesus Christ, to "show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us."
There is a greater motivation inherent in God's sovereign rule and grace than in self-centered, human-empowering, demigod forming, individual exalting evangelistic methods. What becomes of Christ if one goes in this direction? Why need Him if we can do it? What of His power if He necessarily needs us? He is lost in the noise of human logic, philosophy, and pride. I would contend that God is sovereign in salvation, that He overcomes in power the rebellious faculties of the human soul, and that the whole of salvation belongs to God; and that we as the redeemed bride of Christ have been plucked out of the harvest by the Lord of the harvest to be commissioned by Him to be placed back in it for His glory and the means of grace unto the conversion of others still in the soils of the world. And this is a delight for us! God saves! God saves! God saves! And He does it through the Lord Jesus Christ alone! Because of this let us go more boldly with the Gospel of grace!
"Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord," 1 Corinthians 1:31. Soli Deo Gloria!
In these questions and the like stands a prominent problem. I do not here intend to type with an expansive keyboard about the aforementioned thoughts, but only to address this problem quite briefly that I see in the questions such as these that I have encountered from the lips of genuine, Jesus-loving Christians. Allow me, first, to address the problem, then the Scriptural support in contrast with the problem.
The problem is cultural individualism. At some point we grow out of a Christ-centeredness and become immersed in a self-centered culture, and as it pervades and permeates and flavors the thinking and affections of the body of Christ, so we digress back into an Ephesian state of affairs. We have continued in Christian activity but abandoned the right context for them, namely, our preeminent love for Christ. Many have come to view evangelism and prayer as things that we do because God is rendered disabled if we do not so engage, rather than the activities of a heart set ablaze by and for Christ.
The thought is that we are something, we are special, we are really awesome and on the cutting edge, and indeed, many churches today in this contemporary scene would boast in as much. But in so far as we adhere to this, we move away from the glory and beauty and honor due Christ. The apostle Paul knew of his inadequacy, his insufficiency for Christian ministry, and he made his boast Christ and Him crucified. And it is not that we should focus so much on our own inadequacy or insufficiency for these things as much as this is a cry for us to return to a vivid love of the adequacy and sufficiency of the Lord Jesus Christ for these things. For it is in a radical love and passionate dependency upon Christ's sufficiency to save rather than our own that will advance the Gospel most truly and powerfully.
Must we evangelize? Must we pray? Must we live holy lives? Must we venture into distant islands? Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! But if God were not the Lord of the harvest, all of our laboring would amount to something, just not sound, biblical born again Christians. If the Lord does not build the house, the laborers labor in vain (Ps 127:1). Must we labor? Absolutely! But our labor is met with worth and fruit because it is built by and upon God. I would emphatically state that God does need you and me to evangelize and pray, etc.; but, more than this, God wants us to do these things, and be assured of this, that unless we do these things the Gospel will not be advanced. But this is not to assume a human-centered advancement as if God is handicapped without you. God has made a donkey speak with greater wisdom than a man, angels attest of His glory, and if you do not delight in these means of conversion, then God will give mouths of praise to rocks, and they will cry out to sinners. God does not need you; but He enlists you for Himself, not to evangelize from a dutiful, human-centered soul, but from a soul that delights in Christ, delights in God, delights in what has been accomplished for you, and delights to share with others this Gospel of God's grace in Christ Jesus.
It is necessity, rightly considered, that we must adhere to, and this necessity belongs to active decree, not human exaltation. That is, if one begins to think themselves a necessity in the scheme of Gospel propagation because their complacency would thwart the plan and purpose of God, or that the omnipotent God would somehow become paralyzed by our sloth from saving sinners, then our understanding of our role is unbiblical. However, if when we say that God needs us to bear testimony of Christ unto the lost, and by that need, we mean that God in His infinite wisdom has actively ordained that His redeemed would proclaim the excellencies of our Redeemer, and that He has ordained that our sharing of the Gospel and our going to the nations and our praying for the lost is the sole and chosen means of propagating His grace and that His ordained end of saving sinners will not be accomplished without the means of conversion that He has decreed, then, indeed, God needs us to be the means of conversion. But, again, our necessity in the kingdom of God is an ordained necessity. In infinite wisdom, God chose to save sinners like you and me, and then to send us to those still in their sins. He could have ordained another way, but He did not! God's need is not due to a shortcoming of His ability as if He could not save apart from men; rather, the need is one that God chose as the means to the end of salvation.
One would do well to consider our Gospel endeavor as a thing necessary because it is what God has ordained as the means to His ends, but with that felt-necessity we ought to be humbled, not puffed up with pride; the need that we have expressed is better stated to be the desire of God and the overflow of the soul satisfied in Jesus Christ to the point where we are a continual aroma of Jesus to all men. The need is synonomous with an active desire on God's part, a "want" if you will may be more accurate, and so we ought to "want" to go to the nations armed with the Gospel.
I urge you to reconsider your motives in these things. As God has appointed ends, God has appointed means to those ends, and it is certain that if you do not participate in these things that God will enlist another who will delightfully do them, and you might consider again the state of your soul, as the father of modern missions, William Carey (a Calvinist), would write in his Enquiry, "conscientious activity therein (evangelism, etc) would form one of the strongest proofs that we are the subjects of grace." In other words, Gospel activity is one of the greatest evidences of your personal conversion. Spurgeon would add, "if you have no great desire to see the lost saved, then you yourself are not saved." Carey had two missionary motives that I believe we must keep in mind: "love for and obedience to the God who had redeemed him, and the state of the world without Christ. It is because of this twofold consideration that the people of God are obliged 'to use every lawful method to spread the knowledge of his name'" (Carey and the Missionary Vision, Webber, pg. 21).
In Romans 10:13-17, we are blessed with a wonderful text of God's missionary strategy:
"For 'everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!' But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, 'Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?' So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ."
Hearing the Gospel is the means of faith. And God has sent preachers to proclaim and live this Gospel before all men unto the end of conversion. These are called the 'means of grace' without which no one would be "believe" and "call on the name of the Lord". We must go with the Gospel. This is our loving obedience for God and His grace, and our in depth awareness of the state of the sinner, made practical. We must go with the Gospel of grace. But be assured of this, though we go, if God does not there meet our endeavor by appointment and grace, our audience will reject the message because their own natural desire is to do just that. There were many that the disciples met on the road, stopping from door to door, and yet were greeted with rejection and scorn. Our encouragement in these things is that not all will reject; some will believe, and when they do give glory to God for their faith.
We are vessels of mercy, Beloved, garbage cans with the greatest Treasure within for the purpose of delighting in God, losing our lives by comparison to that delight, and moving actively with the Gospel. But we are vessels, garbage cans in the Greek (2 Cor. 4:7). We are not the mercy within; we are not the Treasure that saves; this is the Lord Jesus Christ, to "show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us."
There is a greater motivation inherent in God's sovereign rule and grace than in self-centered, human-empowering, demigod forming, individual exalting evangelistic methods. What becomes of Christ if one goes in this direction? Why need Him if we can do it? What of His power if He necessarily needs us? He is lost in the noise of human logic, philosophy, and pride. I would contend that God is sovereign in salvation, that He overcomes in power the rebellious faculties of the human soul, and that the whole of salvation belongs to God; and that we as the redeemed bride of Christ have been plucked out of the harvest by the Lord of the harvest to be commissioned by Him to be placed back in it for His glory and the means of grace unto the conversion of others still in the soils of the world. And this is a delight for us! God saves! God saves! God saves! And He does it through the Lord Jesus Christ alone! Because of this let us go more boldly with the Gospel of grace!
"Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord," 1 Corinthians 1:31. Soli Deo Gloria!
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Christ-Centeredness at the Coffee Shop
I sit and sip and God seems to appoint. Over the past weeks, God has not failed to bring someone to my table. I doubt that they come because of the intensity of my natural draw. Perhaps it is because they see the many books scattered about me, an organized chaos of sorts. Perhaps they come to simply enjoy a nice chai latte, and having nothing else to do at the moment, they engage me either directly or indirectly through another conversation. Or, most likely, God appoints a time, a place, a person, and having already provided the beautiful means of salvation through a crucified Christ, so He provides the boldness to witness of it. I do not mean all of this to be juxtaposed against "the Great Commission Christian (crucifying) any hesitation to proclaim the Gospel to any sinner in any place at any time, (Russ Moore)" or the necessity of confrontational evangelism, but rather the grace of God in also providentially granting opportunities to witness on a daily basis.
All of this considered, God has not failed to provide a soul to engage. Some have been unbelievers looking to enter into religious discussions. Some have been brothers and sisters in Christ who are looking for comfort everywhere and in everything and in everyway other than by nearness to Christ. Still others have been young men and women divided over doctrines and truth and reality, contemporary and traditional stigmas, and the various ways of "doing church". And others are heart broken mothers desiring more for their disgruntled teens and not knowing exactly what to do or where to find answers. The coffee shop is a true microcosm of the world, a great bundle of independencies and self-centeredness and complacencies towards the things of God.
So what do we evangelicals offer to these in the coffee shop, or anywhere else in the world? Our own Laodicean state? Our vested self-righteousness? An impure Gospel that is no Gospel? A vision of a God that is co-equal with His creation, or, worse still, trumped by the power of the "almighty" decisiveness of men? Prosperity? Large crowds? Cool atmospheres? Entertaining light shows and rock concerts? A personal witness so corrupted by our carelessness that it has become like the salt that is good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled under by the feet of those still unsaved?
People are not idiots within their personal arenas, in general. Most are strong upon their convictions and what they believe to be true. They will fight for what they hold most closely to their hearts. So, again, what do we offer to the 73 year old retiree from Milwaukee, Wisconsin who holds to orthodox Roman Catholicism; to the mother frantic over the state of her lost 15 year old; to your own father whose religiosity condemns him before God and hardens him in unbelief; to the artsy 18 year old atheist self-worshipper; to the college group confessedly confused over right, wrong, truth, error, etc.; to the brother or sister in Christ who is soul-deep in biblical error, being led by wolves in sheeps clothing?
I commend quite passionately, Jesus Christ, the Lord. Offer an air-tight presentation of the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ, the awesome glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the holiness demanded within the words of Jesus Christ, the righteousness offered in the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ, a worldview that exalts the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of Glory, a personal radical passion for Your Savior, Jesus Christ, a Christosoteric position on salvation, the absolute reality that Jesus Christ stands this day to comfort, to save, to sanctify, and all of this to the glory of God and the accomplishment of the most perfect plan of redemption devised within the very throne room of the Almighty, our God. By your closeness to the Word of God and the fragrance of Christ that permeates your attitude and words and love towards them, make them so full of Jesus that they are hungry for nothing else and sick of themselves. Herein, Christ will be truly sweet, and the Gospel the power of God to save.
And a bit of testimony: As God has provided the time, the people, and the Word of Christ, so God has been pleased to flavor each that I have had the privilege of speaking with. So, wherever you are, whoever God gives to you, make Jesus Christ and Him crucified the sole intent of your conversation. Center all upon Him, His work, His satisfaction. Do not stray from the Word of God. For in proportion to your straying from it, so you will stray from Christ, for they are one and the same, and so will the soul given to your charge in that moment miss out on a conversation - not with you, but with Christ in you. A man recently told me of the sure torment that he would face should he now perish, and asked me for comfort from it, that he wanted what I had; I told him, "What I have is Jesus Christ because Christ gave Himself to me and for me. I cannot comfort you...but Jesus Christ can! Believe in Jesus Christ! Turn from sin and believe in Jesus Christ! Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!" Sinners need not a teacher to indoctrinate them on the caveats of theology, nor do they need Christians to engage them with anything less (enculturated Christian practices designed to woo the sinner) than the biblical Christ which seems to be the "in" thing right now, for the former sounds to them like "blah, blah, blah", and the latter is more dangerous in that it fails to confront them with the greatest problem in the universe, i.e., a sinner before a wrathful and holy God, and the need for immediate salvation (it rather seems to comfort the sinner in their practices because the Christian is willing to engage with them in the like practices); sinners need a Savior, and as the carriers of this Treasure, we must centralize Jesus Christ exclusively for He is the greatest solution in the universe unto the glory of God!
All of this considered, God has not failed to provide a soul to engage. Some have been unbelievers looking to enter into religious discussions. Some have been brothers and sisters in Christ who are looking for comfort everywhere and in everything and in everyway other than by nearness to Christ. Still others have been young men and women divided over doctrines and truth and reality, contemporary and traditional stigmas, and the various ways of "doing church". And others are heart broken mothers desiring more for their disgruntled teens and not knowing exactly what to do or where to find answers. The coffee shop is a true microcosm of the world, a great bundle of independencies and self-centeredness and complacencies towards the things of God.
So what do we evangelicals offer to these in the coffee shop, or anywhere else in the world? Our own Laodicean state? Our vested self-righteousness? An impure Gospel that is no Gospel? A vision of a God that is co-equal with His creation, or, worse still, trumped by the power of the "almighty" decisiveness of men? Prosperity? Large crowds? Cool atmospheres? Entertaining light shows and rock concerts? A personal witness so corrupted by our carelessness that it has become like the salt that is good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled under by the feet of those still unsaved?
People are not idiots within their personal arenas, in general. Most are strong upon their convictions and what they believe to be true. They will fight for what they hold most closely to their hearts. So, again, what do we offer to the 73 year old retiree from Milwaukee, Wisconsin who holds to orthodox Roman Catholicism; to the mother frantic over the state of her lost 15 year old; to your own father whose religiosity condemns him before God and hardens him in unbelief; to the artsy 18 year old atheist self-worshipper; to the college group confessedly confused over right, wrong, truth, error, etc.; to the brother or sister in Christ who is soul-deep in biblical error, being led by wolves in sheeps clothing?
I commend quite passionately, Jesus Christ, the Lord. Offer an air-tight presentation of the pure Gospel of Jesus Christ, the awesome glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the holiness demanded within the words of Jesus Christ, the righteousness offered in the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ, a worldview that exalts the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of Glory, a personal radical passion for Your Savior, Jesus Christ, a Christosoteric position on salvation, the absolute reality that Jesus Christ stands this day to comfort, to save, to sanctify, and all of this to the glory of God and the accomplishment of the most perfect plan of redemption devised within the very throne room of the Almighty, our God. By your closeness to the Word of God and the fragrance of Christ that permeates your attitude and words and love towards them, make them so full of Jesus that they are hungry for nothing else and sick of themselves. Herein, Christ will be truly sweet, and the Gospel the power of God to save.
And a bit of testimony: As God has provided the time, the people, and the Word of Christ, so God has been pleased to flavor each that I have had the privilege of speaking with. So, wherever you are, whoever God gives to you, make Jesus Christ and Him crucified the sole intent of your conversation. Center all upon Him, His work, His satisfaction. Do not stray from the Word of God. For in proportion to your straying from it, so you will stray from Christ, for they are one and the same, and so will the soul given to your charge in that moment miss out on a conversation - not with you, but with Christ in you. A man recently told me of the sure torment that he would face should he now perish, and asked me for comfort from it, that he wanted what I had; I told him, "What I have is Jesus Christ because Christ gave Himself to me and for me. I cannot comfort you...but Jesus Christ can! Believe in Jesus Christ! Turn from sin and believe in Jesus Christ! Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!" Sinners need not a teacher to indoctrinate them on the caveats of theology, nor do they need Christians to engage them with anything less (enculturated Christian practices designed to woo the sinner) than the biblical Christ which seems to be the "in" thing right now, for the former sounds to them like "blah, blah, blah", and the latter is more dangerous in that it fails to confront them with the greatest problem in the universe, i.e., a sinner before a wrathful and holy God, and the need for immediate salvation (it rather seems to comfort the sinner in their practices because the Christian is willing to engage with them in the like practices); sinners need a Savior, and as the carriers of this Treasure, we must centralize Jesus Christ exclusively for He is the greatest solution in the universe unto the glory of God!
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