Truth

Greetings All,

This weeks thought comes from an article I found stuffed in a reference book I went to look in yesterday! The article is by Tim Keller and can be found in The Journal of Biblical Counseling, Volume 14, Number 1, 1995. It is entitled "Preaching to the Secular Mind." If you haven't been introduced to Tim Keller, you are missing out on some really good material. He is (in my humble opinion) one of the best preachers alive today. This thought is just a small sampling of his material, more of which can be accessed through his website: (http://www.redeemer.com/) I can't recommend him highly enough! Enjoy.

"The case for truth. Though Christian communicators to postmodern people must lead with a theme of relevance, they must very quickly make a case for truth. The postmodern person can enjoy teaching that shows how practical Christian ethics are. But unless there is a confrontation about the whole idea of objective truth (the real basis of Christian morality) the hearer will just pick and choose whatever appears to work at the time. He or she may appear to be very receptive and even converted, but at a profound level, the self is still judging the good instead of the good judging the self.

You must say something like this: 'The startling claim of the gospel is that you will only 'find yourself' if you want something more than to find yourself. Christ will only 'work' for you if you are true to Him whether He works for you or not. You must not come to Him because He is fulfilling (although He is) or empowering (though He will) but because He is true. If you seek to meet Him in order to get your needs met, you will not meet Him or get your needs met. That is a primitive form of magic, in which you appease the cranky deity and use him as a means, while your real end is your goals and your agenda. To become a Christian is not to get help for your agenda, but it is a whole new agenda -- the will of God. You must obey Him because you owe Him your life, because He is your Creator and Redeemer."

As I mentioned in my sermon this past Sunday:

"Christianity doesn't work for those who merely dabble in it half-heartedly. It doesn't refresh the soul of the one who merely sticks their toes into its life-giving waters, like one sitting at the edge of a pool who never jumps in. The call to follow Christ is a call to immerse oneself in the life and will of God!. It's a call to dive into the living waters head first and stay in (or stay under) until the old man drowns and the new man rises to life out of the seed of the old! Jesus said, 'Unless a seed falls into the ground and dies...' Christianity doesn't 'work' until one believes and recognizes the truth that "when Jesus died on the cross, our old sinful self died with Him." Until we internalize the fact that we were 'crucified with Christ, and no longer live, but Christ lives in us' -- using us to do His will. Until the old self is crucified, says J. Penn-Lewis, "It may be safely affirmed that the self is still the dominating factor in our lives." And as long as self is, it is we that we are really following, and not Christ."

With blessings upon your celebration of Thanksgiving and your contemplations of Christ, who is the truth, and our source of life, Pastor Jeff

Creation - Revelation - Salvation

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes to you from John R. W. Stott in the opening paragraphs of his book, "Basic Christianity." I have been leading a Thursday night discipleship group using the IVP Study based on this book, and called "Christ - Basic Christianity." The words he writes are a needed reminder in a world that often thinks that we determine our own destiny; are the "captain of our souls," and thus the initiators when it comes to the search for God and salvation. Enjoy.

"'In the beginning God.' The first four words of the Bible are more than an introduction to the creation story or to the book of Genesis. They supply the key which opens our understanding to the Bible as a whole. They tell us that the religion of the Bible is a religion of the initiative of God.

You can never take God by surprise. You can never anticipate him. He always makes the first move. He is always there 'in the beginning.' Before man existed, God acted. Before man stirs himself to seek God, God has sought man. In the Bible we do not see man groping after God; we see God reaching after man. Many people visualize a God who sits comfortably on a distant throne, remote, aloof, uninterested, and indifferent to the needs of mortals, until, it may be, they can badger him into taking action on their behalf. Such a view is wholly false. The Bible reveals a God who, long before it even occurs to man to turn to him, while man is still lost in darkness and sunk in sin, takes the initiative, rises from his throne, lays aside his glory, and stoops to seek until he finds him.

This sovereign, anticipating activity of God is seen in many ways. He has taken the initiative in creation, bringing the universe and its contents into existence... He has taken the initiative in revelation, making known to mankind both his nature and his will... (and) He has taken the initiative in salvation, coming in Jesus Christ to set men and women free from their sins... God has created. God has spoken. God has acted. These three statements of God's initiative in three different spheres form the summary of the religion of the Bible...

Christianity is not just pious talk. It is neither a collection of religious ideas nor a catalogue of rules. It is a 'gospel' (i.e. good news) -- in Pauls words 'the gospel of God... concerning his Son... Jesus Christ our Lord.' It is not primarily an invitation to man to do anything; it is supremely a declaration of what God has done in Christ for human beings like ourselves."

Years beforehand A. W. Tozer had said nearly the same thing in his book, The Pursuit of God:

"Before a man can seek God, God must have sought the man... We pursue God because, and only because, He has first put an urge within us that spurs us to that pursuit. 'No one can come to me,' said our Lord, 'except the Father which has sent me draw him,' and it is this very prevenient drawing that takes from us every vestige of credit for the act of coming. The impulse to pursue God originates with God, but the outworking of that impulse is our following hard after Him, all the time we are pursuing him we are already in His hand: 'Thy right hand upholdeth me' (Ps. 63:8). In this divine 'upholding' and human 'following' there is no contradiction. All is of God, for as von Hugel teaches, God is always previous. In practice, however, (that is, where God's previous working meets man's present response) man must pursue God."

He truly is, as Francis Thompson once wrote, The Hound of Heaven. To His name be the glory for all that He has done and continues to do.

May your trust be in Him, Pastor Jeff

Loving

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes from Alexander Strauch's recent book "Love or Die - Christ's Wake up Call to the Church." It's based in Christ's admonition to the church of Ephesus found in Rev. 2:4: "Yet this I hold against you: You have abandoned the love you had at first."

Those who have studied the passage know it is bi-directional in orientation. They have abandoned or forsaken their first love for Jesus, and the first love that they had for each other as believers. (Some even think the second aspect of our love for each other is the dominant one being addressed in the text). Strauch rightly (I believe) addresses it as speaking to both. His insights are a needed challenge to all Christians. If you can get a copy of the book it is well worth the read (and its small - less than 100 pages)! Enjoy.

"When I think of what it means to guard our love, one image that comes to mind is of an advertisement for a wedding dress. The caption read, 'Love him, but love your dress more.' I think this captures a temptation we sometimes face in our love relationship with Christ. We love him, but do we love the material possessions and blessings he gives more? Are we tempted to 'love Christ, but love our home more?' To 'love Christ, but love our money and securities more?' To 'love Christ, but love our business more?' To 'love Christ, but love our Christian ministry more?' Because of the ever-present temptation to love something else more than Christ, we must be very vigilant to guard our love for Christ.

Every true believer loves Christ because not to love him means that one is not a believer. The Holy Spirit, who regenerates and indwells us, also moves us to love Christ. As believers, however, we can act selfishly and disobediently. We can let our love grow cold. Our love for Christ can be weakened by neglect, sin, worldly distractions, or false teaching (2 Cor. 11:2-4), so we must learn to guard it well... In his classic devotional, My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers sets before us the only correct priority to guide and guard us: 'Jesus taught that a disciple has to make his relationship to God the dominating concentration of his life, and to be cafefully careless about everything else in comparison to that.'

[Yet] If we must jealously guard our love for Christ, we need also to guard our love for people. Just as the Holy Spirit moves us to love Christ, he motivates us to sacrificially love others... As the eighteenth-century evangelist Henry Moorehouse observed in a letter to a friend, 'Love seems in so many hearts to have gone to sleep.' When love goes to sleep, we grow cold and unfeeling toward people. We love material possessions and personal comforts more than people. We love our work more than people. We become bitter toward people because our feelings have been hurt. We become weary in serving selfish, ungrateful people and become content to show love only to those who are agreeable to us. We become lazy and complacent about love. We neglect our duty to love the unlovely and the disagreeable...

For those who have drifted far from the Christian spirit of love, Jesus says to wake up, remember from where you have fallen, repent of your sin, and do the deeds of love you once did (Rev. 2:5). In order to avoid becoming like the Ephesian Christians who needed to repent of their loss of love, heed the practical advice of Jonathan Edwards: 'A Christian should at all times keep a strong guard against everything that tends to overthrow or corrupt or undermine a spirit of love. That which hinders love to men, will hinder love to God.... If love is the sum of Christianity, surely those things which overthrow love are exceedingly unbecoming [to] Christians.'"

In re-reading this 'thought' for typos before sending it out, I have sensed the unpleasant sting of conviction in my own conscience. It is so easy to love the loveable, and so hard to love the unloveable. Yet, when I fall into that trap, what I need to do is pause, remember God's love toward me, and remind myself how it is "unmerited favor" (a love given to me when I was not only ungodly, but His enemy - Rom. 5:6-10).

I must call to mind how often He has showered me with grace even when I was the most ornery, contrary and unloveable, and then, being humbled, I must do what I now need to do - repent, get my priorities straight again, and do the things I did at first. Maybe you sense the need to do the same?

With prayers for God's continued blessings on your life, Pastor Jeff

In Times of Struggle

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes from a book by J. I. Packer, entitled "A Grief Sanctified - Passing Through Grief to Peace and Joy." It deals with the Puritan Richard Baxter and his grief at the loss of his earthly love - his wife Margaret.

Though 20 years younger than Baxter, she was converted through his preaching, became his bride on April 29, 1662, worked tirelessly with him in the ministry at Kidderminster, England, and died 19 years later on June 14, 1681 at the age of 45. (He was 65 years old when she passed and survived her by another 10 years.) Our 'thought' is actually a "covenant" she wrote in poetic form just before her death, pledging herself once again unreservedly to God (as she had done at her conversion).

Since committing ourselves to God is something we need all do, and revisit, or reaffirm at various times of spiritual struggle, I felt it may be a reminder for all to take a moment to do the same (remembering as you do the point she so poignantly makes in the third stanza - whatever you hold back from Him you lose, and whatever you are willing to lose for Him you save). Enjoy.

"My whole though broken heart, O Lord,

From henceforth shall be Thine,

And here I do my vow record:

This hand, these words are mine.

All that I have, without reserve,

I offer here to Thee;

Thy will and honor all shall serve,

That Thou bestow'dst on me.

All my exceptions saved I lose;

All that I lose I save:

The treasure of Thy love I choose,

And Thou art all I crave.

My God, Thou hast my heart and hand;

I all to Thee resign.

I'll ever to this covenant stand,

Though flesh hereat repine.

I know that Thou wast willing first,

And then made me consent,
Having thus loved me at the worst,

Thou wilt not now repent.

Now I have quit all self-pretense,

Take charge of what's Thine own.
My life, my health, and my defense,

Now lie on Thee alone.

Christ leads me through no darker rooms

Than He went through before;

He that into God's kingdom comes

Must enter by this door.

Come, Lord, when grace hath made me meet

Thy blessed face to see;

For if Thy work on earth be sweet,

What will Thy glory be?

Then I shall end my sad complaints,

And weary sin full days,

And join with the triumphant saints

That sing Jehovah's praise.

My knowledge of that life is small;

The eye of faith is dim:

But it's enough that Christ knows all,

And I shall be with him."

What are you going through? What struggles are you facing? Sickness? Hardship? Financial loss? The loss of a dearly loved one? The possible loss of your own life? They are all times where we need to recommit ourselves unreservedly to following the Christ who "loved us at our worst," and "will not now repent" (stanza 5). He will not turn away from loving us. Let us not, by the grace He gives, turn away from loving Him.

In the Bonds of Christian Service,
Pastor Jeff