Sorrowful, Yet Always Rejoicing

I love the phrase "sorrowful yet always rejoicing".   It speaks to me so clearly of the nature of the Christian life and I'd like it as a banner across my own life and the life of my church.   As we walk through this broken, fallen world, where we only see the first fruits of the age to come breaking in from time to time (O that we would see more of the "now" in the midst of the "not yet") - there is sorrow.  There just is. There  is pain and sadness and you have to perform all manner of interpretive gymnastics with the Bible in order to be able to say otherwise. And yet....and yet there is another reality - there is rejoicing.   We rejoice because God in Christ has come to us to hold us, lift us and ultimately save us.   So we rejoice even in the midst of the trials because of the Good News that God is for us and that He has delivered us, He is delievering us and He will deliver is.

This blog post from  Trillia Newbell describes her perspective on this twin theme of joy and pain.

I have walked this earth a short 34 years, but in that time I have experienced a wide range of various trials. As a young child my parents struggled financially resulting in the occasional electricity being shut off and visits to a relative’s home. During my freshman year of college I was the victim of sexual assault (not rape thankfully). A few months later my father passed away from his battle with cancer. As a young adult I have experienced four miscarriages, general health issues, and recently the sudden loss of my oldest sister.
 

And yet, I am joyful; but not without sorrow.

Real Pain

Trials of any kind bring a rush of emotions and potentially pain. The pain is real. The sorrow is real. Trials are hard to endure at times. God never once promised this Christian life would be without trials. On the contrary, as it has been said before, all one needs to do is live long enough and surely trials will arrive.

Thankfully we have a Savior who relates to our suffering. Jesus is aware of and acquainted with the grief of man. He is acquainted with my grief and your grief. The God-Man endured trials and temptation but is without sin (Hebrews 4:15). He faced agony to the point of sweating blood (Luke 22:44).

On his way to the cross Jesus sat and prayed to his Father, if it were God’s will, to take the cup of His wrath away. And yet we know that Jesus willingly drank that cup and he hung on the cross. And in his final moments on the cross, Mark records him saying, “’Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?’ which means, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’” (Mark 15:34).

His pain and suffering was for a purpose — the redemption of the world. He endured great pain. Pain I can only imagine, pain and wrath on my behalf.


Purposeful Pain

Like Jesus — our pain has a purpose. The believer knows that there’s a great and glorious purpose in trials. Suffering is designed to purify our faith. Peter comforted the Christians in Asia Minor by reminding them (thus reminding me) of the great purpose of suffering. He writes, “In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith — more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire — may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:6–7).

Any trial or suffering I endure is a testing of the genuineness of my faith. And in The Suffering of Man and the Sovereignty of God, Charles Spurgeon addresses the genuine faith of Job tested by fire and how his faith only reflects the faith that we all desire to have. He writes, “In what better way can the believer reveal his loyalty to his Lord? He evidently follows his Master, not in fair weather only, but in the foulest and roughest ways” (121).

The beauty of faith is that it isn’t derived from me. God graciously gives me faith to believe his promises to sustain me to the end. He gives me faith to trust that he is with me in my days of trouble. All good things, including the faith to endure trails is from him (James 1:17). So though trials may come, I can be confident that he will give me the sustaining grace for them.

And I Rejoice


I can rejoice in suffering because I know I have a living hope. I know that my hope will bring me to an eternal glory. I will one day rise and be with Christ forever. I can rejoice in suffering today because I know that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put me to shame, because God's love has been poured into my heart through the Holy Spirit who has been given to me (Romans 5:3–5).

 
So though I have experienced various trials, my hope is in Christ. I rejoice during these trials in my living hope, knowing that nothing — no great trial, no pain or sorrow, and no one — shall separate me from the love of God.


Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, 'For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.'
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:35–39)

The Slaughter of Innocence

This post from a guy I was at college with, Brian Draper, makes a really important point about the nature of evil in the world and the impact of the the incarnation.  ‘The coming of Jesus was... a dangerous mission, a great invasion, a daring raid into enemy territory.' (John Eldredge).  It's a reminder that Christmas is about cosmic warfare, barbed wire and bullets if you will, and not just a season for sentimentality.


When Herod realised that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi. Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: ‘A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.’
Matthew 2:16-17
Lest we forget, one episode of the Christmas story is always written out of the school plays. In fact, the good news of great joy to all people spelled near immediate disaster for parents in Bethlehem, whose little boys were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Once the Magi had given Herod the slip, he tried, in evil fury, to snuff out the threat of a newborn King of the Jews. Scholars believe that in a town of around 1,000, such as Bethlehem was back then, there’d have been around 20 children killed.

20 children.

John Eldredge reminds us that humanity is a battleground. ‘I am staggered,’ he writes, ‘by the level of naivety that most people live with regarding evil. They don’t take it seriously. They don’t live as if the story has a Villain. Not the devil prancing about in red tights, carrying a pitchfork, but the incarnation of the very worst of every enemy you’ve met in every other story. Dear God – the Holocaust, child prostitution, terrorist bombings, genocidal governments. What is it going to take for us to take evil seriously?’

‘One of the things that surprised me,’ wrote C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity, ‘when I first read the New Testament seriously was that it talked so much about a Dark Power in the universe – a mighty evil spirit who was held to be the Power behind death, disease, and sin... Christianity agrees... this is a universe at war.’

We are painfully, dreadfully reminded – since the events of last week in Newtown, Connecticut – that the advent of Christ is not, in fact, a kitsch nativity scene in a mall in mid-winter; nor a sentimental moment for the kids to shine, as the star, or Mary, or Joseph, in the play, lovely though that is... but a crucial moment in a battle played out both on a cosmic scale and in our own hearts. ‘The coming of Jesus was... a dangerous mission,’ says Eldredge, ‘a great invasion, a daring raid into enemy territory.’

And lest we forget, advent has nothing to do with the triumph of religion, nor the vindication of our own belief system, but the incarnation of the very best of every hero we’ve met in every other story, fighting for us. Dear God – what is it going to take for us to take this seriously?

Dear God. Dear God.
Brian Draper

The Invincible, Irrefutable Joy

This post by Tony Reinke has inspired me to take off the shelf my unread (by me) copy of Eric Metax's biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. His book Life Together impacted me hugely and the fact that this one man had such an influence at such a young age (he died ages 39) inspires me to want to reach for more myself.  

When the Nazis padlocked the doors of the Confessing Church seminaries in Germany in the Autumn of 1937, Dietrich Bonhoeffer took theological training underground and opened his own seminary in Finkenwalde. Before the Gestapo shut it down in 1939, Bonhoeffer managed to train 67 seminary students.(1) These 67 seminarians and Bonhoeffer formed a band of brothers that could not be torn apart, although some of them were arrested, some were dispersed by the Nazi oppression, and several were conscripted into army service and spread across the globe by World War II(2)

Bonhoeffer was on the Nazi watch list. He was tracked closely and he was eventually forbidden to publish or preach or lecture. So to stay in touch with his former students and pastor friends, and to continue their pastoral training, Bonhoeffer resorted to a form of circular letter. First, he typed and carbon-copied each post, then he added a handwritten greeting and signature. These “personal letters” were more like theological articles published under the nose of the Nazis and distributed to his Finkenwalde brotherhood and to other closely connected pastor-friends. At its height these “personal letters” were distributed to 150 readers.(3)

In the fury of the Führer, pastors in the Confessing Church had been stripped of any official identity, and many were pressed into the military and forced to fight for the very Nazis they hated. Seeing no way around it, many volunteered for military service. The “illegal pastors” that didn’t join willingly were branded by the Gestapo as “unemployed,” a label that rushed a conscripted soldier to the very front lines of the escalating war.(4) Needless to say, the lifespan of pastors connected to Bonhoeffer and the Confessing Church was not long under Hitler.

Yet in spite of the scattering of the Finkenwalde seminarians, Bonhoeffer worked tirelessly to track the activities of his friends, to keep the circle informed of the latest news of their brotherhood, and to provide encouragement to them. And so Bonhoeffer turned to these circular letters, often opening them with the latest news of whom among them had been killed in the war.

During the Advent of 1942, just a few months before he was finally arrested and sent off to a Nazi prison — where he would be tried and then eventually killed — Bonhoeffer drafted and distributed one final circular letter to his Finkenwalde seminarians.

What do you say to dispersed and lonely pastors, who are serving illegally in secrecy? What do you say to friends forced into Nazi military service? How do you comfort the brotherhood when they learn friends have died in the forsaken war? How do you address the daily anxiety, the persecutions, the threats, and the loneliness felt by the scattered fellowship?

Bonhoeffer was aware that the real danger of the horrific daily anxiety, the constant threat of death, and the unceasing war, was how these forces conspire to callous and deaden the soul’s affections. Shepherds with such disheartened souls were of little use in leading God’s thirsty people to springs of joy.

This was one of the many battles Bonhoeffer fought in the final years of his life. One theater was a battle against Hitler. Another theater was a battle for his friends. The battle was against acedia in their hearts, against the temptation to spiritual apathy and sloth, and against the temptation to simply surrender to all of the pressures. Bonhoeffer had his own plan for taking down Hitler, but to battle the lethargy in his friends, Bonhoeffer pointed their thoughts towards Advent and to the believer’s joy in Christ.

Such a joy is fitting for suffering. “The joy of God,” he wrote to them, “has gone through the poverty of the manger and the agony of the cross; that is why it is invincible, irrefutable.”

What follows is Bonhoeffer’s final circular letter to his friends, written on November 29, 1942.

Dear Brother …,

At the beginning of a letter that in this solemn hour is meant to call you all to true joy, there necessarily stand the names of those brothers who have died since I last wrote to you: P. Wälde, W. Brandenburg, Hermann Schröder, R. Lynker, Erwin Schutz, K. Rhode, Alfred Viol, Kurt Onnasch, Fritz’s second brother; in addition to them, and presumably known to many of you, Major von Wedemeyer and his oldest son, Max.

“Everlasting joy shall be upon their heads” [Isaiah 35:10]. We are glad for them; indeed, should we say that we sometimes secretly envy them? From early times the Christian church has considered acedia — the melancholy of the heart, or “resignation” — to be one of the mortal sins. “Serve the Lord with joy” [Psalm 100:2] — thus do the scriptures call out to us. For this our life has been given to us, and for this it has been preserved for us unto the present hour.

This joy, which no one shall take from us, belongs not only to those who have been called home but also to us who are alive. We are one with them in this joy, but never in melancholy. How are we going to be able to help those who have become joyless and discouraged if we ourselves are not borne along by courage and joy? Nothing contrived or forced is intended here, but something bestowed and free.

Joy abides with God, and it comes down from God and embraces spirit, soul, and body; and where this joy has seized a person, there it spreads, there it carries one away, there it bursts open closed doors.

A sort of joy exists that knows nothing at all of the heart’s pain, anguish, and dread; it does not last; it can only numb a person for the moment. The joy of God has gone through the poverty of the manger and the agony of the cross; that is why it is invincible, irrefutable. It does not deny the anguish, when it is there, but finds God in the midst of it, in fact precisely there; it does not deny grave sin but finds forgiveness precisely in this way; it looks death straight in the eye, but it finds life precisely within it.

What matters is this joy that has overcome. It alone is credible; it alone helps and heals. The joy of our companions who have been called home is also the joy of those who have overcome — the Risen One bears the marks of the cross on his body. We still stand in daily overcoming; they have overcome for all time. God alone knows how far away or near at hand we stand to the final overcoming in which our own death may be made joy for us.

Some among us suffer greatly because they are internally deadening themselves against so much suffering, such as these war years bring in their wake. One person said to me recently, “I pray every day that I may not become numb.” That is by all means a good prayer.

And yet we must guard ourselves against confusing ourselves with Christ. Christ endured all suffering and all human guilt himself in full measure — indeed, this was what made him Christ, that he and he alone bore it all. But Christ was able to suffer along with others because he was simultaneously able to redeem from suffering. Out of his love and power to redeem people came his power to suffer with them.

We are not called to take upon ourselves the suffering of all the world; by ourselves we are fundamentally not able to suffer with others at all, because we are not able to redeem. But the wish to suffer with them by one’s own power will inevitably be crushed into resignation. We are called only to gaze full of joy at the One who in reality suffered with us and became the Redeemer.

Full of joy, we are enabled to believe that there was and is One to whom no human suffering or sin is foreign and who in deepest love accomplished our redemption. Only in such joy in Christ the Redeemer shall we be preserved from hardening ourselves where human suffering encounters us.(5)

We can imagine it was this joy Bonhoeffer clung to after his arrest and during his 18 months in Tegel, a lonely Nazi interrogation prison. The living conditions there were putrid. It was often rocked by bombing raids, day and night. Bonhoeffer suffered from the loneliness of separation from his fiancée and his family. He was weakened by physical ills in his body and haunted by occasional suicidal thoughts from his tortured mind.(6) Surely it was this invincible joy from God, in Christ, that preserved his life in the Tegel prison and provided him hope for the worst, which for him was still yet to come.


1 Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, vol. 15, Theological Education Underground, 1937–1940 (Fortress Press, 2012), 5.

2 Bonhoeffer wrote Life Together to explain how closely and intentionally these 68 men pursued fellowship together.

3 Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works, vol. 16, Conspiracy and Imprisonment: 1940–1945 (Fortress, 2006), 105.

4 Ibid., 6.

5 Ibid., 377–378.

6 Eberhard Bethge, Dietrich Bonhoeffer: A Biography (Fortress, 2000), 799, 831–833.

Fear of Faith? Derren Brown

Baptist minister Jonathan Vaughan-Davies reflects on Derren Brown's latest programme, in which faith is put under the microscope.  This article originally appeared in the Baptist Times.

Last Friday night the illusionist Derren Brown finished the second of his latest two-part specials with a show called Fear and Faith. The week before he had been exploring the benefits of a new military-tested drug called: Rumyodin; which he claimed had been develop a noticeable reduction in levels of fear and anxiety.

A group of four applicants for the show were told they were to be the first members of the public to be tested on. Each member of the test group all suffered from forms of anxiety, ranging from a fear of heights (and bridges in particular), to fear of being out in public.
Early on in the show Derren let us into the secret that Rumyodin (an anagram of: 'your mind') was nothing more than a sugar tablet; and that this was an experiment into something called: The Placebo Effect, namely the power of 'your mind' to fool you into thinking that something is having a positive effect on you. In reality it is only the belief you have invested in the Placebo that is causing the changes you are experiencing: you will attribute signs of improvement to that Placebo, interpreting it as successful and thus multiplying its effect.
In the case of Derren's dummy drug Rumyodin; it worked, and seemingly to quite a startling effect, with the show ending at the concert of an actress who was previously terrified of singing in public.
The second episode saw Derren explore what he believes to the world's biggest example of the Placebo Effect: God. Could faith really work in the same way that a Placebo works? Do believers convince themselves of things that aren't real? Do Christians make connections between events that aren't there to fool themselves about God's activity and designs on their lives? Is it really just all in your mind?
There is no denying that Placebos exist, and can have a powerful and positive effect on people. But does faith in the Supernatural, the believing in Jesus, function in the same way?
Derren claimed he was going to explore this further, by attempting to give an unwitting volunteer, a self-professed atheist called Natalie, a 'genuine conversion experience' by purely psychological manipulation. She worked in a scientific field as a stem-cell specialist and said herself that she could not imagine ever becoming a believer. The show followed Derren's 'experiments' in the power of belief, and Natalie's journey.
Here are some of my observations as I watched the show:
1. The Power of personality
Fear and Faith was dressed up in the guise of a scientific look at the nature of belief; when in fact in was made for entertainment purposes. The so-called "experiments" were nothing of the sort, any genuine scientist would be aware of things like The Experimenter's bias (cue a quick Wiki-search) where subjects unconsciously desire to produce the answers, effects or results of the Experimenter.
Put simply, none of us are objective; we have an inbuilt tendency to want to please or impress particularly those seen in authority (such as those conducting scientific research, or popular TV personalities).
With the pressure of being on TV, and with Derren so well known for psychological illusion and manipulation by its applicants and audience, the potential for Experimenter's bias must surely be much higher even than in normal settings. The truth is that Derren Brown has himself become a type of Placebo - people have invested a lot of belief in the techniques he claims to have. And to quote a friendly neighbourhood superhero: with great 'power' (albeit placebo power) should come great responsibility...
2. Placebos don't disprove the effects of the genuine
Derren's attempts to give Natalie a 'genuine conversion experience' (spoiler alert!) did appear to have worked, depending on how you define conversion - which we'll come onto next. She was left alone in a large church following a fifteen minute conversation with Derren, and as she stood up and looked at the stained glass window she burst into tears, held her hands in a praying position and repeatedly uttered: 'I'm sorry...!', 'Thank you!', and 'Why couldn't I have had this all my life?'
But the ability to produce similar results through different means doesn't prove or disprove anything. In the case of Rumyodin Derren cannot claim that because his fake formula produced those effects - no other drug can, has or will ever exist that will have the ability to do that legitimately.
The same is true of faith - the ability to deliberately mislead and manipulate groups of followers for personal glory and gain (in the cases of cults for example), does not means that all religious leaders are doing that, consciously or not. Nor can false religion disprove the existence of God, any more than a fake Van Gogh painting sold at auction could disprove that the original masterpiece exists!
3. The definition of a 'Genuine Conversion Experience'?
Natalie's experience on the show was clearly a moving one. Before being fully debriefed (in an interview filmed in front of a studio audience), she described it as, 'all the love in the world had been thrown at me - always available, but pushed away.' She also said it was as though her 'spectrum of experience had been broadened - the high end of emotion extended... the technical way for defining that can only be: supernatural.'
I thought she looked utterly deflated and devastated as Derren revealed that it was he that been playing God with her mind and her emotions, and encouraged her not to attach anything religious to what he hoped she would take away as a powerful and positive emotional experience.
As powerful and profound as our feelings are, faith is not purely an emotional reaction. We thank God for our feelings, and that we can experience His love and power; but we certainly don't depend on experience alone.
Blatantly missing from Natalie's conversion was any understanding of God's nature, the cross, the forgiveness of sin, and our need to respond with everything within us to the call of Jesus to follow Him. She may have been duped into going from a standpoint of 'There probably is no God' to 'There probably is one now', but that vital and important step is only the first baby step into a lifetime of walking by faith and growing in maturity of belief.

4. Reasons for Belief
Having left Natalie dazed and confused by what she was now having to process, one of Derren's closing comments was that if believers were honest, they believe in God because it makes them happy. This sweeping generalisation is overly-simplistic at best and misleading at worst; something that the entire episode was particularly guilty of, having earlier reduced the huge and important area of the psychology of religion into a minute-long summary, complete with a cartoon designed for those who couldn't follow the jargon.
The truth is that, as a pastor, I sometimes spend time with people whose faith is not making them happy at that point in their lives; some are living with unanswered prayers in their lives, some are applying the teachings of Jesus to their situations and making some tough choices about what that means for them, others are considering callings that will lead them to sacrifice things they hold to be precious. From my experience, faith doesn't just survive these times - it thrives, as God proves Himself to be "an ever-present help" right in the midst of heartache, pain and fear.
Knowing Jesus brings the deepest sense of contentment and genuine rest for our souls, but to really know Jesus means exploring His claims, examining the cross and the resurrection, and ultimately making a decision about who He is by what you do with the rest of your life, and where you invest the whole of your trust. To claim it's because it gives people a nice, warm fuzzy feeling inside is simply inaccurate, and highly dismissive of years of scholarship and research.
5. The Need for Discernment
In the final analysis, we all know people can be deceived, and that none of us is immune to manipulation. All we can do as believers is recognise the loopholes in our understanding, to look into the blind-spots in our faith, and to prayerfully examine them before God and with others. This kind of honest questioning can lead to a deeper place of commitment, to a place where our faith is not borrowed from those who lead us to faith or who teach us, but truly ours because we have fought to "work out our salvation with fear and trembling..."

To borrow Derren's medical analogy once more; trained medical professionals will be aware of the dangers of The Placebo Effect. A Doctor who takes time to discern between a placebo and genuine improvement would not be called a liberal, callous or misleading practitioner, but a good, robust and caring one. The desire of every true child of God is for genuine encounter with the Real, Resurrected and Reigning Lord Jesus - both for themselves and for others.

In John's Gospel, facing an aggressive crowd Jesus says: "Do not believe me unless I do what my Father does." (John 10:37); don't believe the media-hype or hard-nosed critic, don't focus on the frothy excitement or the knee-jerk rejection, don't even believe me "unless I do the works of the Father..." In others words, come a take look and discern for yourselves and see if I demonstrate what only the Son of God would be capable of doing.
And what we do see in Jesus is an entirely unique message. The history of religion is like a broken record; There is a God, but to earn their favour or avoid their anger, they must be appeased or impressed.

Jesus did not come to start another religion but invite us to a relationship that is not based on what we can do, but based solely on what He has done for us at the cross. The unique claim of the New Testament, is that when we couldn't find God, He Himself came down to us - when we couldn't save ourselves, He Himself became the very sacrifice to pay the price! These ideas were so new in the history of human thought; so radical and so scandalous they began to turn the world upside down, and continue to do so all over the world.
Is our faith a placebo? The truth is simply this that left to our own devices, humanity could not have come up a God as good and as gracious as one we see in Jesus. Derren had to admit on a few occasions that we are all 'born with a hardwired inbuilt tendency to believe...'
I wonder why that is?

Jonathan Vaughan-Davies is the minister of Bethel Baptist Church, in Whitchurch, Cardiff.
He is the author and presenter of a DVD-based six-part introduction to the Christian faith called Question, designed to help seekers explore questions often asked early on in people's journey of faith and available through the Baptist Union of Great Britain website.

Worshiping at the Altar of Family

This post from Kristin Kluck caught my attention.  I think she makes a really interesting point and one I'm not hearing made elsewhere.

When visiting a number of Reformed churches in the last few months, we've noticed a significant trend. These churches are bursting with children---lots of biological children, of course, but also a good number of adopted and even foster kids. This is a great thing, all those kids, even if we are a little extra sensitive, due to our status as Dreaded Infertile Couple. But we've gotten used to this baby boom---the infant dedication/baptism/rose-on-the-piano acknowledgements, the romper-room-kindergarten-classroom atmosphere in the sanctuary, the baby showers. And lest we sound too much like curmudgeons, we assure you that God has helped to heal the pain of infertility through the adoptions of our two sons (and used those same two wiggly, loud, preciously infuriating boys to confirm that we were not, ever, meant to be parents of a huge family).

But perhaps this sensitivity to the "normal" family experience of marriage at 21 with five kids by age 30 (five is the new two) has given us some perspective that may have escaped the Normals. It came to me this Sunday while sitting behind a family with six or seven kids and listening to the pastor talk about the things we sacrifice to God's agenda. He was talking about how the disciples had ambition for the wrong thing---power in an earthly kingdom. He went on to apply that faulty expectation to misplaced ambitions in our lives: wealth, power, and fame. He clarified that these things are not inherently, incurably wrong, and some devoted Christians do indeed gain wealth, power, and fame. But he spoke of the lust for them, the chasing after them, the have-to-have-them, the sum-total-of-my-being, as being the problem. He quoted David Powlison: "good gifts, bad gods." True, powerful, and convicting words.
And it struck me that those examples---wealth, power, fame---are primarily idolized by men. Sure, women may want some of those things. But more often men fantasize about being the richest guy, the prodigy in their field, wielding power and influencing people, being known and respected. A family may support him off to the side, but he's longing for the accolades, the respect, the riches. But I found myself, while he described the feelings of idolatry---the sense that this is my whole life, this is what I live for, this is what I dream of, this is what completes me and gives me significance---thinking that, for me, this is family.
This stuff of many women's fantasies includes an adoring, faithful spouse; attractive, obedient kids; people who depend on you, love you, give you a reason to get out of bed, regularly stand up and sing your praises. And it is idolatry, just like money, power, and fame. It's the thing that causes the mom in your women's Bible study to post the 67th picture of her daughter's birthday party on Facebook. It's the reason for the magazine-quality family pictures all over the house. It's why the mother-of-the-bride obsesses about her daughter's wedding and treats it like a part-time job. It's (at least in part) why Christmas letters get sent and then end up making their recipients feel mad and competitive.
Gift or God?

What makes it even trickier and more confusing is the value the Bible places on family. It is the building block of a just and moral society. It is a hedge of protection for the traditionally vulnerable children and women. The Bible has much to say about the blessing of a godly spouse and a houseful of children and includes lots of good directives on how to keep those relationships healthy and godly. Parents are charged with the precious task of directing and guiding our children's hearts towards God, so it is easy to think of family as an unqualified good. "Family values" is practically synonymous with "orthodox Christian."

If so, then why do I feel so convicted, sometimes, about worshiping at the altar of family?
Isn't family still a gift, not a god? Isn't it still something that can be elevated into first place, which should be reserved for God alone? I think we see the problem in our reactions to the hardships of family life---fractured relationships with parents, wayward or difficult children, marriages that are anything less than Christian-movie quality. We take it personally. We feel somehow personally affronted or shafted by God, as though the Perfect Family were our birthright as Christians. And when I say "we," I mean "I." It's a personal battle, waged mostly silently by other families and friends.
Churches encourage our husbands daily to not make idols out of their careers, and to not look at porn. But how are we, as wives, encouraging and exhorting one another not to make idols out of perhaps our greatest gifts: our families?

A Theology of Disability

What is "normal"? What is "able bodied" To what extent do we make God in our image and simply end up with a better version of ourselves?

I found this article on the BMS World Mission site very thought provoking.

http://www.bmsworldmission.org/sites/default/files/resources/theology%20of%20disability.pdf

Why Was Jesus Unintimidated by Pilate?

How can we be confident and comforted as we live for Christ? Does it have to do with favourable external circumstances or can we be joy-filled, peaceful and secure in situations that rage against us. In this blog post John Piper ponders the lessons of Pilate’s authority over Jesus.

Pilate said to Jesus, “You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?” Jesus answered him, “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above.” (John 19:10–11)

Pilate's authority to crucify Jesus did not intimidate Jesus.

Why not?

Not because Pilate was lying. Not because he didn’t have authority to crucify Jesus. He did.

Rather this authority did not intimidate Jesus because it was derivative. Jesus said, “It was given to you from above.” Which means it is really authoritative. Not less. But more.

So how is this not intimidating? Pilate not only has authority to kill Jesus. But he has God-given authority to kill him.

This does not intimidate Jesus because Pilate’s authority over Jesus is subordinate to God’s authority over Pilate. Jesus gets his comfort at this moment not because Pilate’s will is powerless, but because Pilate’s will is guided. Not because Jesus isn’t in the hands of Pilate’s fear, but because Pilate is in the hands of Jesus’s Father.

Which means that our comfort comes not from the powerlessness of our enemies, but from our Father’s sovereign rule over their power. This is the point of Romans 8:25–37. Tribulation and distress and persecution and famine and nakedness and danger and sword cannot separate us from Christ because “in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8:35–37).

Pilate (and all Jesus’s adversaries — and ours) meant it for evil. But God meant it for good (Genesis 50:20). All Jesus’s enemies gathered together with their God-given authority “to do whatever God’s hand and God’s plan had predestined to take place” (Acts 4:28). They sinned. But through their sinning God saved.

Therefore, do not be intimidated by your adversaries who can only kill the body. Not only because this is all they can do (Luke 12:4), but also because it is done under the watchful hand of your Father.

Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? And not one of them is forgotten before God. Why, even the hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows. (Luke 12:6–7).

Pilate has authority. Herod has authority. Soldiers have authority. Satan has authority. But none is independent. All their authority is derivative. All of it is subordinate to God’s will. Fear not. You are precious to your sovereign Father. Far more precious than the unforgotten birds.

Olympic Challenge

In 1Corinthians 9:24-27 Paul puts out the challenge to run the race of the Christian life well - like we want to win the prize.
On the last two Sundays we've been reflecting on this challenge and asking what the prize is, why how we run matters, what running well is and is not, how the gospel makes it possible and the role others can play in helping us (the spiritual equivalent of a running club, team, partner and coach.)

We've also used Will Rochfort's drawing to help us identify where we are when it comes to "the race"? Are we just about to start, have we been knocked down? Are we exhausted? Are we aimless and distracted? Are we looking like we're going to finish strong or are we only just going to make it over the line? Or, are we in the stands not quite sure still whether we want to get in the race at all? And then, critically, we asked what will help us to take the next step towards running well, what do we need?

It's been a big challenge but one, I hope, which also encourages us knowing that there is a prize; the crown of righteousness which comes to those saved by Christ and the prize of the "well done good and faithful servant" offered to all who have run well and finished strong.

Check out Olympic Challenge Part 1 http://bit.ly/Rt2rsa
Part 2 http://bit.ly/O1mA4X

The God's of Olympus

I thought this piece from LICC was thought provoking about the way in which we view sport in general and the Olympics in particular. I've been bothered for a while with the way people (politicians especially) look to the Olympics as a panacea. There's only one thing that's going to fix things......

Whatever you do, don’t utter the proverbial, ‘It’s only a game’. If you listen to politicians and administrators, the Olympics are the most important thing to happen to London, indeed the nation, in a generation. It’s about national morale and a major business venture. Sport has become socially, politically and economically useful.

But the affective power of sport is usually greater than the effective power of sport. As it happens, no recent summer games have produced proven significant economic benefits to the host city or country. Research also suggests it’s unlikely that the games will yield any increase in sports participation.

As for the claim that sport can make us better people, the evidence is that more often than not it correlates with anti-social behaviour. And as much as it brings people together, sport can also provide a patina of legitimacy for authoritarian regimes (e.g., Bahrain Grand Prix) or another venue for deep divides to be revealed, with athletes from some countries kept away from others in secluded areas.

So why do we indulge these sporting myths? There are, perhaps, two reasons.

First, a distorted Protestant work ethic continues to write itself large across our culture. Every human practice, we think, has to demonstrate its utility to justify itself. As historian Christopher Lasch says: ‘The degradation of sport... consists not in its being taken too seriously but in its subjection to some ulterior purpose, such as profit-making, patriotism, moral training, or the pursuit of health.’ Sport used to belong to the domain of leisure. Now it has been turned into work. We’ve managed to make it less fun than it should be.

Second, sport has begun to overtake us. For some Londoners, this has literally become the case with the building of the sport-industrial complex, and anxieties about certain freedoms being curtailed. The theologian Karl Barth placed sport – along with fashion and transport – amongst those powers of human creativity which threaten to overcome and enslave as much as liberate. Care must be taken that we do not become subject to their law, and their power, which we have released.

Rightly the Olympics will provide opprtunities for connection and celebration. But we will do well to value sport for its intrinsic worth and reclaim it for the common good rather than reduce it to a tool of politics or economics. Enjoy the games, but don’t believe the hype.

Paul BickleyPaul Bickley is the Director of Political Programme for Theos and co-author of the Theos report Give us our Ball Back: Reclaiming Sport for the Common Good (2012), which explores more fully the issues raised above.

The Effect of Aging on Sanctification

In this five-minute video John Piper shares about some expected and unexpected ways that aging has worked in his experience of sanctification.

http://bit.ly/RMJL4h

Miracles

"Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see." C. S. Lewis

Christ is Our Treasure Not Our Homes

I'm trying to see where the gospel can make a difference to our everyday lives; what's going to make us distinctly different as followers of Jesus. As John Ortberg warns us, in the absence of authentic distinctiveness we often opt for weirdness but there is a better way......by showing that our security and worth is in Christ, that He is our treasure we live differently and glorify God. Christine Hoover's post gives a great example from the world of domesticity....

Christ Is Our Treasure, Not Our Homes
By Christine Hoover Jun 26, 2012






The home exists for Christ. Our marriages, our children, our physical spaces — all these are means of joyful response to Him. Through the home, we treasure Christ and show others how to treasure Him also (Titus 2:3–5; Prov. 31:10–31).


Too often, however, we treasure the home more than we treasure Christ. As a result, what He has given as a blessing and an avenue of sanctification becomes a means of achievement or accomplishment, where our well-behaved children or our organizational abilities are an indication of our value and our righteousness. Our homes become a matter of pride, self-elevation, or comparison. And we cling to our treasure, thinking that the home is under our control, that it’s ours to possess, that we have somehow created and cultivated something special.

The temptation to treasure the home is especially intense on good days, when our children are playing nicely together, when we’re unified with our spouse, or when the house is bright and clean and everything is in order.

But on bad days? When a child throws a fit or disrespects another adult, or when communication is crossways? When the dishwasher leaks all over the kitchen floor or an appointment is forgotten? When a harsh word is spoken or priorities have been shoved aside? What about the days when life is thrown wildly off-kilter?

When the home is the treasure above Christ and our value is entwined with the circumstances of our home, the bad days are unsettling, even devastating.
On the bad days, we recognize the home acting similarly to the Law:

· Our treasure, the home, speaks urgent, ever-changing, and unending demands for perfection that can never be fulfilled. (Galatians 3:10)
· Our treasure, the home, causes us to value and conform to what pleases others or earns their respect rather than what pleases God. (Colossians 2:20-22)
· Our treasure, the home, with its perfectionistic, image-maintaining urgencies, cannot bring life to our hearts and our families. (Galatians 3:21)

If we treasure our home as our righteousness, we subtly teach our children that behavior matters more than the attitudes of the heart, that a clean home matters more than relationships, that we are superior to others, or that we must cling to and control the things we love rather than trust God with them.

The good news is that even when we treasure our home more than we treasure Christ, our failings act as a tutor to bring us to Christ, the true Treasure, and to show us that we are incapable of righteousness apart from Him (Galatians 3:24). We recognize in our failings that we need something apart from ourselves to make a home as God intended, that something being the grace and power of Christ.

When Christ is our treasure, our homes consist of love, grace, and utter dependence on the Holy Spirit. We don’t chase self-righteousness, and we don’t cling to treasures that, despite all their goodness, can still be lost. We cling tightly to the only Treasure that cannot be stolen or tarnished, Christ Himself.

Solo Scriptura?

The cry of the Protestant Reformation was "Sola Scriptura!"- Scripture alone! It was a rejection of papal authority and the idea that the ultimate authority for knowing the mind and character of God lay outside the Bible.

But have we replaced this with "Solo Scriptura" - Scripture interpreted all on my own? This is the idea that all I need is a Bible and the Holy Spirit and I'm away. But this is fraught with danger as you can see from all the craziness that people have got into over the history of the Church.

Scripture is indeed our ultimate authority but we need to listen to tradition and the view of others. Scripture should always be interpreted in the context of community.

And so if we come up with an idea about God that no one has ever come up with before.....it might be worth talking to others!

Charles Spurgeon offered this critique of those who prefer the Solo Scriptura approach to hearing God:

It seems odd, that certain men who think so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves should think so little of what he had revealed to others.....

A useful warning to us to listen to one another as we seek to follow Jesus.

Fake Love, Fake War: Why So Many Men Are Addicted to Internet Porn and Video Games

Fake Love, Fake War: Why So Many Men Are Addicted to Internet Porn and Video Games
By Russell Moore


You know the guy I'm talking about. He spends hours into the night playing video games and surfing for pornography. He fears he's a loser. And he has no idea just how much of a loser he is. For some time now, studies have shown us that porn and gaming can become compulsive and addicting. What we too often don't recognize, though, is why.

In a new book, The Demise of Guys: Why Boys Are Struggling and What We Can Do About It, psychologists Philip Zimbardo and Nikita Duncan say we may lose an entire generation of men to pornography and video gaming addictions. Their concern isn't about morality, but instead about the nature of these addictions in reshaping the patten of desires necessary for community.
If you're addicted to sugar or tequila or heroin you want more and more of that substance. But porn and video games both are built on novelty, on the quest for newer and different experiences. That's why you rarely find a man addicted to a single pornographic image. He's entrapped in an ever-expanding kaleidoscope.
There's a key difference between porn and gaming. Pornography can't be consumed in moderation because it is, by definition, immoral. A video game can be a harmless diversion along the lines of a low-stakes athletic competition. But the compulsive form of gaming shares a key element with porn: both are meant to simulate something, something for which men long.

Pornography promises orgasm without intimacy. Video warfare promises adrenaline without danger. The arousal that makes these so attractive is ultimately spiritual to the core.
Satan isn't a creator but a plagiarist. His power is parasitic, latching on to good impulses and directing them toward his own purpose. God intends a man to feel the wildness of sexuality in the self-giving union with his wife. And a man is meant to, when necessary, fight for his family, his people, for the weak and vulnerable who are being oppressed.
The drive to the ecstasy of just love and to the valor of just war are gospel matters. The sexual union pictures the cosmic mystery of the union of Christ and his church. The call to fight is grounded in a God who protects his people, a Shepherd Christ who grabs his sheep from the jaws of the wolves.
When these drives are directed toward the illusion of ever-expanding novelty, they kill joy. The search for a mate is good, but blessedness isn't in the parade of novelty before Adam. It is in finding the one who is fitted for him, and living with her in the mission of cultivating the next generation. When necessary, it is right to fight. But God's warfare isn't forever novel. It ends in a supper, and in a perpetual peace.
Moreover, these addictions foster the seemingly opposite vices of passivity and hyper-aggression. The porn addict becomes a lecherous loser, with one-flesh union supplanted by masturbatory isolation. The video game addict becomes a pugilistic coward, with other-protecting courage supplanted by aggression with no chance of losing one's life. In both cases, one seeks the sensation of being a real lover or a real fighter, but venting one's reproductive or adrenal glands over pixilated images, not flesh and blood for which one is responsible.
Zimbardo and Duncan are right, this is a generation mired in fake love and fake war, and that is dangerous. A man who learns to be a lover through porn will simultaneously love everyone and no one. A man obsessed with violent gaming can learn to fight everyone and no one.
The answer to both addictions is to fight arousal with arousal. Set forth the gospel vision of a Christ who loves his bride and who fights to save her. And then let's train our young men to follow Christ by learning to love a real woman, sometimes by fighting his own desires and the spirit beings who would eat him up. Let's teach our men to make love, and to make war . . . for real.

An Unusual Means of Grace

Louise and I went into our respective days yesterday feeling extremely under appreciated in an area of our work.  It was an unusual feeling and the circumstances for us being in that place were quite different but the way we felt was strikingy similar.  Although we both ended up joking about "what a pair we are" and the fact that  "no one understands do they" we felt pretty flat. 

So, later in the day when I was visiting a young professional couple in their 30's (relevant details I think for the story....generally these kinds of people don't do what they did, sorry if that's typecasting) Mrs "X" says "I've baked you and Louise a cake just to say we really appreciate all you do........"

That never happens.   Not like that.

If ever there was one, this was a means of grace to us.

He sees....He notices....He responds.....

It was only a cake (albeit an incredible one that my kids didn't let touch the sides) but the Lord used it to minister to us deeply.

Our Conversation with other Christians

What do we talk about when we meet other Christ followers....anything other than our walk with God it would seem.   Rarely do we discuss our scripture reading, times of prayer and other aspects of our life with God.   But it hasnt always been this way.   J I Packer writes of the Puritans and of how they spoke about their walk with God. I think it's challenging:

Communion with God was a great thing; to evangelicals today it is a comparatively small thing. The Puritans were concerned about communion with God in a way that we are not. The measure of our unconcern is the little that we say about it. When Christians meet, they talk to each other about their Christian work and Christian interests, their Christian acquaintances, the state of the churches, and the problems of theology—but rarely of their daily experience of God.

I Get This!!!

Travelling

Apropos of nothing.....

I have been in many places, but I've never been in Cahoots. Apparently, you can't go alone. You have to be in Cahoots with someone.

I've also never been in Cognito, but I hear no one recognizes you there so it must be a good place to go if you want some privacy.

I have, however, been in Sane. They don't have an airport. You have to bedriven there. I have made several trips there, thanks to my friends, familyand work.

I would like to go to Conclusions, but you have to jump, and I'm not toomuch on physical activity anymore.

I have also been in Doubt. Some people visit often, I think. I'm not sure.

I've been in Flexible, and I have to say, it felt as if I hadn't gotten very far.

Sometimes, I find myself in Capable. I don't know how I got there, and I go there more often as I'm getting older.

One of my favorite places to be is in Suspense! It really gets the adrenalin flowing and pumps up the old heart!

Jesus Also Had Unbelieving Family Members

When we've got family members who don't share our faith it's really painful.   It's not like one person likes gardening and someone else likes golf.  It's  a whole different worldview that has implication for eternity.  I thought this article by Jon Bloom gives a really encouraging perspective that I certainly hadn't come across before.
Do you, like me, have family members who do not believe in Jesus? If so, we are in good company. So did Jesus. And I think this is meant to give us hope.
According to the Apostle John, “not even his brothers believed in him” (John 7:5). That’s incredible. Those who had lived with Jesus for 30 years really did not know him. Not one of Jesus’ brothers is mentioned as a disciple during his pre-crucifixion ministry. But after his resurrection and ascension, there they are in the upper room worshipping him as God (Acts 1:14).
Why didn’t they believe? And what made them change?
The Bible doesn’t answer the first question. But I’ll bet it was difficult to have Jesus for a brother.
First, Jesus would have been without peer in intellect and wisdom. He was astounding temple rabbis by age 12 (Luke 2:42, 47). A sinful, fallen, gifted sibling can be a hard act to follow. Imagine a perfect, gifted sibling.

Second, Jesus’ consistent and extraordinary moral character must have made him odd and unnerving to be around. His siblings would have grown increasingly self-conscious around him, aware of their own sinful, self-obsessed motives and behaviour, while noting that Jesus didn’t seem to exhibit any himself. For sinners, that could be hard to live with.
Third, Jesus was deeply and uniquely loved by Mary and Joseph. How could they not have treated him differently? They knew he was the Lord. Imagine their extraordinary trust in and deference to Jesus as he grew older. No doubt the siblings would have perceived a dimension to the relationship between the oldest child and their parents that was different from what they experienced.
And when swapping family stories it would have been hard to match a star appearing at your brother’s birth.

Jesus out-classed his siblings in every category. How could anyone with an active sin nature not resent being eclipsed by such a phenom-brother? Familiarity breeds contempt when pride rules the heart.
More pain than we know must have been behind Jesus’ words, “a prophet is not without honor except in his hometown and in his own household” (Matthew 13:57).
So as we assess the role our weak, stumbling witness plays in our family members’ unbelief, let’s remember Jesus — not even a perfect witness guarantees that loved ones will see and embrace the gospel. We must humble ourselves and repent when we sin. But let’s remember that the god of this world and indwelling sin is what blinds the minds of unbelievers (2 Corinthians 4:4).
The story of Jesus’ brothers can actually give us hope for our loved ones. At the time his brothers claimed that Jesus was “out of his mind” (Mark 3:21), it must have appeared very unlikely that they would ever become his disciples. But eventually they did! And not only followers, but leaders and martyrs in the early church.
The God who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” shone in their hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of their brother, Jesus (2 Corinthians 4:6).


So take heart! Don’t give up praying for unbelieving family members. Don’t take their resistance as the final word. They may yet believe, and be used significantly in the kingdom!
And while they resist, or if they have died apparently unbelieving, we can trust them to the Judge of all the earth who will be perfectly just (Genesis 18:25). Jesus does not promise that every parent, sibling, or child of a Christian will believe, but does painfully promise that some families will divide over him (Matthew 10:34-39). We can trust him when it happens.
It is moving to hear James refer to his brother as “our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory” (James 2:1). Can you imagine what this phrase meant for James? The Lord of glory had once slept beside him, ate at his dinner table, played with his friends, spoke to him like a brother, endured his unbelief, paid the debt of his sin, and then brought him to faith.


It may have taken 20-30 years of faithful, prayerful witness by the Son of God, but the miracle occurred: his brothers believed. May the Lord of glory grant the same grace to our beloved unbelievers.

The Best Trips Last a Lifetime

Am so loving the new Halfords advert: The Best Trips Last a Lifetime
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtjDai7H2-E   

Free Martyn Lloyd-Jones Sermons

Martyn Lloyd-Jones is widely regarded as the greatest English speaking preacher of the last century and one of the greatest preachers of all time.  His decision to quit a promising career in medicine in his mid 20's in order to pastor a small chapel in South Wales was so extraordinary that it made the front page of the national press.  This decision, unbelievably foolish in the eyes of the world, proved to demonstrate the wisdom and greatness of God as Lloyd-Jones went on to have an incredible impact on literally millions of people all over the world.

In celebration of 30 years of the Martyn Lloyd Jones Recording Trust, set up to restore, promote and distribute the audio sermons of "The Doctor" the Trust have decided to release every single sermon they have, on line and for free.   This is an incredible move and will be a huge blessing to many.  

Visit http://bit.ly/eqxMYF to find out more. 

Religion V Gospel

I was sent this link recently - love it!

We've got to be continually aware of the creeping insidiousness (is that a word?) of religion. we lapse so easily into the elder-brotherishness of Luke 15

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IAhDGYlpqY&feature=related

Doubting with Confidence

On Sunday we were talking about John the Baptiser. Jesus was having a massive go at people for being unbelievably childish....wanting God to dance to their tune "you're too serious"/"you're not serious enough" etc...and he holds John up as a great example of an authentic follower.

In fact he said that no one greater had ever walked the face of the planet. That's a pretty bold claim to make and it certainly gets your attention. (I remember listening to Gordon Ramsey on Desert Island Discs and hearing him say that his all time favourite book about the world of catering was Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. That got my attention so I bought the book and took it on holiday in the sure knowledge I'd get to hear someone really worth listening to.) But then we hear that John, for all this tremendous accolade, was full of doubt, confusion and disappointment.

"Go and find Jesus", he tells two of his own followers, "and ascertain whether he really is the One because it sure doesn't feel like it from this prison cell in Machaerus Fortress...." He wants to know what on earth is going on. Don't we all face that. "God, what are you doing with all the power you have because I don't get it!"

Jesus doesn't offer any explanation for the confusing stuff but simply says, "Look at what I am doing not what I'm not - you know the stuff you think I should be doing." Jesus lists the things he's doing and invites John to focus on that. The lesson is simple. it's OK to have doubts and confusion about the stuff that we see around us but we need to focus on what Jesus is doing and supremely on what he has done on the Cross.

Verse 23 of chapter 7 is a stinger: Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me or...

Blessed is the person who doesn’t give up on God because they’re disappointed with the way I choose to operate.

How many of us give up or are tempted to give up on God because he doesn't dance to our tune delivering what we think he should. The antidote....focus on the amazing grace of God shown to us in the Cross, the work he has done.

Game-Changer

"Based on what we know of God, what would God expect of us".

That was the question Nigel put to us the other Sunday morning and it's an absolute stonker! Rightly understood and rightly applied, with faith-ful confidence, humility, wisdom and courage it is, as they say, a game-changer.

All we do, everything we say, think, believe....it should all come out of what we know of God and the grace he has shown us in Jesus. When we've got that properly squared away and we're living "under this" then what God expects is pretty obvious and the implications huge.

We get sidelined for a promotion or we miss out on something we think we deserve:
based on what we know of God....we feel the pain and the disappointment but trust that God is totally for us and he will provide what we need.

We're let down by someone close to us, we feel hurt and betrayed:
based on what we know of God....we feel the pain, the sadness and the anger but remember that we serve one who experienced all the betrayal we have experienced and the knowledge of this helps us to forgive, extending grace instead of hate and we move on.

We suffer a financial loss and we're not sure what the future may hold:
based on what we know of God.....we feel the fear and the anxiety but we believe that if God did not spare his own Son but gave him for us he will, therefore, certainly supply all our needs.

We see someone screw their life up through a series of ridiculous life-style choices:
based on what we know of God....we acknowledge the brokenness and the wrong choices that led to it but we realise that if God extended radical grace to us when we deserved utter condemnation we can never, ever disdain or disparage another person.

We feel disappointed with ourselves and our repeated failures to be who we want to be:
based on what we know of God....we make our confession, naming our sin (where appropriate) but rejoice in the fact that God accepts us at our worst (and this is all by grace) and so we move forward with confidence.

We feel really rather pleased that we're doing so well for God:
based on what we know of God.....we give thanks for what he has enabled us to do but we remember that any good in us is only by his grace and that without his undeserved intervention in our lives we would be nothing (at best). And so, we move forward with humility.

The work of God in Christ - the gospel - changes everything. It means we do the radical, unexpected thing. The stuff of Luke 6 and Matthew 5-7 in fact.

Either Way.....

I was talking with someone in our church last week who has cancer. It's lying quite low, not terribly advanced...but it's there....and it shouldn't be.

It was noticeable that they didn't seem terribly troubled and were seemingly relaxed about the forthcoming oncology appointment. I pushed and poked around a little, as you do as a Pastor, trying to discover more about where this peace was coming from. I asked at one point whether there was any trace of anxiety at all. "None at all", came the reply.

"And why do you think that is?" After all, no matter how confident we are in God, no matter what wonderful track record we have of His sufficient grace, we wouldn't begrudge someone a smidgen of worry, would we.

"Because either, way I win."

You cant argue with that.

Not when the Apostle Paul said much the same (Phil. 1:21).

And this person meant it. They really did.

Very humbling. A testimony to God's grace indeed.

Be Yourself

I was talking with someone the day before yesterday about the need we all have to be the people God has made us to be. There are certain roles we have to fulfill but within that we need to be true to ourselves....that sort of conversation.

The next day I came across this extract from one of CH Spurgeon's lectures (another Spurgeon quote I'm afraid!) that both encouraged and challenged me. (Usual caveats about culturally-bound sexist language apply)

There is not only a work ordained for each man, but each man is fitted for his work. Men are not cast in moulds by the thousand; we are each one distinct from his fellow. When each of us was made, the mould was broken;—a very satisfactory circumstance in the case of some men, and I greatly question whether it is not an advantage, in the case of us all.

If we are, however, vessels for the Master's use, we ought to have no choice about what vessel we may be. There was a cup which stood upon the communion table when our Lord ate that passover which He had so desired to eat with His disciples before He suffered; and, assuredly, that cup was honored when it was put to His lips, and then passed to the apostles. Who would not be like that cup? But there was a basin also which the Master took, into which He poured water, and washed the disciples' feet.

I protest that I have no choice whether to be the chalice or the basin. Fain would I be whichever the Lord wills so long as He will but use me. But this is plain,—the cup would have made a very insufficient basin, and the basin would have been a very improper cup for the communion feast. So you, my brother, may be the cup, and I will be the basin; but let the cup be a cup, and the basin a basin, and each one of us just what he is fitted to be. Be yourself, dear brother, for, if you are not yourself, you cannot be anybody else; and so, you see, you must be nobody.

How you prevent this becoming a liscence for being obnoxious....I am what I am.....this is me/my style/my personality...... I don't know. Still - worth reflecting on.

A New Year Thought

It's a been a while.....

I thought I'd break this extended blog fast with a quote from Spurgeon that has encouraged me at the begining of the New Year.

I've always got mixed feelings about NY because you look ahead and you just have no idea what's going to happen. Will I be celebrating and rejoicing or weeping and mourning? You just don't know! It's a good thing we don't know what lies ahead....had I known what was ahead last year I....well I've no idea, let's just say that it's a pretty good thing I was clueless!

But God knows, He really does, and that truth is indeed the pillow upon which I rest my ahead.

Anyway here's CHS:

But here is the joy, here is the peace of Christians, that our salvation is a finished one!
We have not a farthing to pay to complete the ransom of our souls.
We have not a stitch to set to finish the robe of our salvation.
We have not an act to perform, a prayer to offer, a tear to weep, a thought to think in order to finish the work of our redemption!
I know that all these things shall be worked in us and, that by the Spirit of God we shall be made to do them — but all that shall not be with any view to the completion of our salvation — that was finished in the Person of the bleeding Lamb of Calvary! . . .

Either Christ completed all that was necessary for your salvation, or he did not!
If he did finish it, then rest in him and be glad, and say, "I am secure forever because my salvation is finished. I have nothing to do but to live to the honor of him who has completely saved me by his Grace, his blood, his righteousness.