Am I an Other-Centered Teammate?

ESPN.com's NBA blogger, Henry Abbott, wrote this line about former college basketball standout, one of tonight's lottery picks, two-time national champion at the University of Florida, Joakim Noah:

David has been using Joakim Noah, in conversations over the last two or so years, as the prime example of a great teammate. His biggest point is look: every time the TV cameras are on, there's Joakim talking up someone besides himself. And it's true. It's always: look how great Corey Brewer is. Look how great Al Horford is. Let me tell you how hard my dad worked. Stuff like that.

David is of the opinion, and I'm inclined to agree, that it's a rare player indeed who makes it his primary mission to lift up his teammates. And players like that are catalysts for teams that are teams.

I read this and realized two things very quickly:

1. I am not this kind of teammate.
I'm not often "talking up someone besides myself" or making it my "primary mission to lift up my teammates." I love basketball, and I love my summer league teammates. They are great guys. They really are. I genuinely enjoy being around them. But when someone asks me about last week's game, I say something like, "We lost. I didn't play well." I have almost nothing good to say about any specific teammates. This is terrible, and a terrible witness for Jesus.

2. This particular "great teammate" is most likely not a Christian.
I don't know Joakim Noah personally, but, from everything I've ever heard him say about his off-the-court time at UF, his life certainly doesn't show an overwhelming love for Jesus. I won't go into details, but anybody who's watched the last two NCAA men's basketball tourneys knows what I mean. Joakim is simply concerned about other things.

So I was forced to ask myself some hard questions:

• Since I love Jesus, why am I not a more loving teammate?
• Why am I not more thankful when I play basketball?
• Why don't I point out God's graces in others more often than I talk about myself?
• How have I failed to apply the word of the cross to my own life?

Lord Jesus, please apply Your Gospel to my heart by Your Spirit and make me a thankful, encouraging, loving, unifying, and humble Christian and teammate.

Recent Reading

Some good recent articles in the world of blog:

• Honest to God - Michael McKinley at the 9Marks Blog, Church Matters, takes a look at the pride and hypocrisy in his own heart, challenging us to take a look at our own, finally pointing us to the cross of Christ where we find the grace and forgiveness that empowers us to be truly honest with ourselves, each other, and God Himself.
• Thabiti's series on The Mereness of Church - Thabiti takes a look at how the Church must be simple and clear in her mission and message. These are convicting, challenging, helpful posts, as most all of Thabiti's are.
• Martin Graham's two most recent full-length posts - Fathers, Be Your Child's Advocate! and the Greatness of God and the Meaning of Tender Mercy - are both devotional and God-centered. I am often helped by this dear brother.
• Justin Taylor's three recent devotional articles - one and two from Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones on the Christian's inner life and one from Jerry Bridges on legalistic fences - are all worth the short, thoughtful read.
• Tom Ascol at the Founders Blog is keeping us up-to-date on the life of the SBC in Florida. Powerful convictions and heartfelt love abound.

Praise God for the internet! I learn so much from so many more learned men than myself, all while pointing me to the Bible and the Central Character of it!

Google Reader

Lately I've been enjoying my new (to me) Google Reader. Yes, this may seem like an advertisement for Google, but, no, I don't own any stock. I just enjoy being able to read my favorite blogs from one place as soon as they're updated. The window even reads better than most (if not all) blogs. And it's free! Check it out, and add me to your list if you like.

My list currently includes:
Church Matters
Between Two Worlds
Pure Church
Desiring God
True Hoop
Martin Graham
Founders Blog

Desiring God Book Sale !!!

From Abraham Piper at the Desiring God blog:

Every book in our store will be $5 on June 27-28, Wednesday and Thursday next week.

No limits, so spread the word.

(This sale is online only.)

So this is me spreading the word. I'm already making a wish list.

Thank God for Tom Ascol

Tom Ascol is an amazing man of God, and I barely know him. He is the pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Cape Coral, FL, and the executive director of Founders Ministries, an organization dedicated to the recovery of historic Baptist principles and the reformation of Southern Baptist churches. Tom studies hard, preaches often, blogs regularly, and loves his family - all for the glory of God.

I am thanking God today for a few specific things I have learned from Tom's writing and preaching ministry:

1. Being faithful to the Word of God is more important than anything else.
Tom has taken a lot, I mean, if you read his blog and follow his ministry, a LOT, of flak over the years because of his convictions in the Bible. He continues to persevere in love and humility despite being publicly wronged more than any minister I can think of.

2. Preaching should be Bible-built, Christ-focused, clear, and devotional.
Some of the best sermons I've ever heard are a few he preached at a Founder's Conference a few years back. (sidenote - if you haven't checked out the Founder's Ministry and their conferences, do it! God will feed your soul!)

3. Perseverance in controversy is necessary, difficult, and possible by the grace of God.
Tom keeps hammering away at the same issues - the doctrines of grace, the necessity of regenerate church membership, integrity in the SBC, repentance - year after year after year. He may never see the fruit of his labors, but I praise God for them. The Lord is surely using Tom's hard work to stoke new fire in His church.

4. Humility must be cultivated.
I'm sure Tom doesn't feel humble - I'm sure he would tell you that pride is one of his biggest struggles - but I also know that he works to cultivate humility in everything he does. In the way he writes and preaches, the way he handles his family and church, the way he responds to controversy, the way he approaches other leaders, even down the way he quickly responds to my emails, it is clear that God is working humility into this elder's life. It is a joy to see.

Well, I don't know him that well, but I follow his writing fairly well and his preaching somewhat. I am so thankful to God for Tom Ascol.

Thankful to God for People

Over on his blog, Thabiti is working on cultivating thankfulness. He has a series of posts on his gratefulness to the Sovereign God for certain people He has placed in Thabiti's life:

• I am Grateful for Mark Dever
• I am Grateful for Dave Jorge
• I Am Grateful for Dr. R. Albert Mohler
• I Am Grateful for Dr. John MacArthur
• I Am Grateful for John Piper
• I'm Grateful for Jonathan Leeman
• I'm Grateful for C.J. Mahaney

My favorite, and I think I quickly read through almost all of them, is the one on his former pastor and mentor, Mark Dever. God truly uses this man and his church, Capitol Hill Baptist, to teach and model so many truths and admirable qualities that are found in Christ yet conspicuously absent from much of His church. Lord, teach us to be thankful for Your neverending blessings in Christ, especially through His church.

ps - search Thabiti's site for discussions on preaching, ministry and ministers, race, Islam, the church, Paul's letters, and many more wonderful series. I couldn't link them all here - there's just too many. (What's the plural of "series"? "Serieses"? It's a collective noun, so I'm not sure how to pluralize it.)

The Shepherd and the Flock

By the providence of God, I have met several older pastors in my recent days here at my job. These genuine, God-loving men tend to be "walking the mall" to stay in shape in their latter years. It got me thinking: What does it look like to be a minister of God? So many men (and women, unfortunately) do it poorly that we have forgotten most of what it means to be an earthen vessel with the treasure of the Gospel and an undershepherd of God's flock, especially in the midst of such theologically-troubled and misguided church in a crooked and perverse generation.

Then, again by the providence of God, I stumbled across an excerpt of an interview with Joel R. Beeke, who is "pastor of the Heritage Netherlands Reformed Congregation in Grand Rapids, MI, president and professor of systematic theology at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, and author of numerous books including The Quest For Full Assurance and Meet The Puritans."

Here are several points worth pondering:

How should a minister keep his own heart, mind, and will from theological error?

• Keep yourself deeply immersed in the Scriptures, and pray daily to be willing to surrender all to their inerrant truth.
• Surround yourself with sound, godly colleagues and lay people who love you sufficiently to be honest with you, so that iron will sharpen iron.
• Read the best, sound, scriptural, classic books, especially those by the Reformers and Puritans, that address your mind with clarity, convict your conscience with poignancy, bend your wills with conviction, and move your feet with passion.
• Meditate on those truths preached that do your people the most good; in every case, you will discover that they are biblical truths.
• Develop the hide of a rhinoceros so that you won’t be tossed about with every criticism and wind of doctrine while maintaining the heart of a child, so that you will be a tender undershepherd to the needy.

Calvin said that ministers have two voices. One is for the sheep and the other for warding off the wolves. How have you struck the right balance in this regard in your pulpit ministry?

I suppose that one can never be absolutely certain that he is striking the right balance on this critical subject, but here are four guidelines that I find helpful:

• Pray daily for biblical balance in all areas of ministry.
• Love your sheep. Love has a way of balancing out our often imbalanced personalities. Those in error can receive much more from a minister who obviously loves them than from one who comes across as combative.
• Be patient with your sheep. Be willing to teach them the same truth repeatedly, just as the Lord has done with you (cf. Phil. 3:1; 2 Peter 3:1–2).
• Let your "voice for the sheep" always receive the primary accent of your ministry. Truth must ultimately be positive in nature to win the day with a congregation. Many ministers have focused too much on polemical and apologetical theology, often setting up and beating upon straw men in their congregation to the detriment of the flock. Polemics and apologetics must have the proper place of a minor accent in the ministry, so that no error is left unexposed.
• But the minister must expose error wisely, forthrightly, humbly, compellingly, not by lording it over the sheep (2 Tim. 4:1–2; 1 Pet. 5:2–3).

This is sound, Scriptural advice for loving the Lord Jesus and loving His people put under our care. And every believer, not just "pastors," has a ministry to hurting people who need God, be it in the church body or outside.

Is Inclusivism Compassionate?

John G. Stackhouse Jr. is a professor of theology and culture at Regent College in Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He writes in a recent Christian Vision Project essay that, "it is obvious that one does not have to know about Jesus to adopt this posture that results in salvation." Doug Wilson's response to John Stackhouse's inclusivist essay is excellent. In it, he makes the strong point that:

Ironically, this is why the inclusivist position requires us to start minimizing (in our own imaginations) how screwed up the world actually is. If we believe that millions of Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists are groping their way to God in the dark, then we have to look out at the world as though it were jammed full of good intentions. And the problem is that it isn't.

So we don't proclaim Jesus because we are fixing the problem of "not having heard about Jesus." We proclaim Jesus because we are addressing the problem of death, genocide, hatred, murder, rape, slave prostitution, senseless war, snarling greed, and as they say on television, much, much more. The problem with the inclusivist position is not that it is eager for the people to be included -- every Christian wants that. The problem is that when we define the standard downward like this, at the end of the day we find that we have included much more than the people -- we have opened the door to great wickedness as well. This may sound outlandish, but there it is. Tender-hearted accommodation leads to great hardness of heart. And a hardline conservatism at this point, ironically, is tender-hearted.

So when I feel like being compassionate, do I point people to Jesus, or do I pander around their sin? What do you do? What do you believe? Let's expose the heretic inclusivist within and kill him by the Spirit of Jesus.

(HT: JT)

PS - Stackhouse's essay is just another reminder that not every writer (especially on the internet) who has cool graphics, an ultra-hip swagger, and a penchant for nifty God-monikers is telling the truth. Deceivers can take all kinds of forms. Emergent readers beware.

Pride in the Ministry and on the Internet

Thanks to Pastor Thabiti Anyabwhile, I came across this humbling, helpful, and heart-exposing discussion on 1 Timothy 5:1-3 by Carl Trueman in an interview with the Against Heresies blog. My ministering and writing brothers, it is well-worth the read:

What signs of potential doctrinal drift and danger do you need to keep an eye out for in ministerial students?

I am increasingly convinced that pride is the root of problems among students. I was convicted recently by a minister friend quoting to me 1 Tim. 1:5-7 (ESV):

The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.

My friend made two observations about this passage. First, the drift into dubious theological discussion is here described as moral in origin: these characters have swerved from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith; that is why their theology is so dreadful. Second, their desire is not to teach but to be teachers. There is an important difference here: their focus is on their own status, not on the words they proclaim. At most, the latter are merely instrumental to getting them status and boosting their careers.

Thus, what concerns me most is that students may simply desire to be teachers. If that is their motivation, then they have already abandoned a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith, and their theology, no matter how orthodox, is just a means to an end and no sound thing. It is why I am very sceptical of the internal call to the ministry as a decisive or motivating factor in seeking ordination. Nine times out of ten, I believe that the church should first discern who should be considering the Christian ministry, not simply act as a rubber-stamp a putative internal call which an individual may think he has.

Further, such students whose first desire is to be teachers are more likely to try to catch whatever is the latest trendy wave. Orthodoxy is always doomed to seem uncreative and pedestrian in the wider arena; if the aim is to be a teacher, to be the big shot, then it is more likely that orthodoxy will be less appealing in the long run – though there are those for whom orthodoxy too is simply a means to being a celebrity.

If a prideful desire to be a teacher, to be a somebody, is the fundamental problem, then one other aspect which is increasingly problematic is the whole phenomenon of the internet. Now anyone can put their views out for public consumption, without the usual processes of accountability, peer review, careful editing timely reflection etc. which is the norm in the scholarly world and has also been the tradition in the more theologically responsible parts of the Christian publishing industry. The internet has few quality controls and feeds narcissism. Again, I have a friend, a minister in a North American Presbyterian denomination who says that, as he reads many blogs, his overwhelming feeling is one of sadness as he sees men seriously undermining their future ministry through the venom they pour out on others. I think he is right.

Of course, all young theologians and aspiring church leaders say stupid and unpleasant things. I still blush about comments I made 15 or twenty years ago which now seem arrogant and offensive, and certainly unworthy of a Christian. But for those of us who are older, the sins of our youth are thankfully now long vanished from the public sphere; yet such sins committed today can live on indefinitely in cyberspace. I shudder for those who have not yet grasped this basic fact and who say some frightful things on the internet which will come back to haunt them the very first time a church googles their name as part of doing routine background checks on a potential ministerial candidate. But more than that: I shudder at the kind of self-appointed arrogance among ministerial candidates and recently-minted graduates which the internet can foster and intensify.

Paul’s words to Timothy seem prophetic in times such as ours. Students should cultivate pure hearts, good consciences, and a sincere faith. That way they will safeguard their theology from becoming idle speculation.

Wow. So why do I write? Why do you? Do you and I want to speak and teach God's truth so that others may be encouraged and built up and saved in Christ? Or do we want to be teachers? Do I love the status, the name, the feeling, more than I love God? Do you? Oh, brothers, may our souls make their boast in the Lord Jesus(Psalm 34:2).

"What the World Eats"

Great photo-essay on Time magazine's website showing exactly what different families of the world eat on a weekly basis.

(HT: JT)

My Bad Theology of Forgiveness

Reading Pastor Chris Braun's excellent article on atonement and forgiveness, I realized that I have been believing and practicing a false theology of forgiveness. It goes like this - when I feel ready, then I will forgive.

What I fail to see is that the cross is absolutely nothing like this, and it demands absolutely nothing short of completely committed forgiveness from me, the believer. God made a plan, He acted on it, and He forgave! Once and for all! All of His chosen!

God forgive me for thinking that my forgiveness of someone else is dependent on my feelings more than the cross where You forgave me! May I not read such therapeutic, flimsy-handed "feelings" into the atoning death of my Lord!

I Am an Idolater

and I am ashamed.

I have taken part in such idolatry as our American prosperity "gospel", and I alone am to blame for it. Not just "American Christianity" or "evangelicalism" or the "prosperity gospel movement," - ME. Me first. I am to blame.

Please, most gracious God, forgive me for loving Your gifts more than You, and forgive our country's churches for this false gospel. Amen.

A Tiny Heartbeat

I was playing with our daughter tonight,
and I leaned over and listened to her little heart beat -
it was quieter than her breaths,
and softer than her thumping feet;

but, oh, what a joy!
oh, what hand divine!
could make not only big hearts but tiny ones,
with one word, in a moment of time!

The Gospel Coalition

I need to print this out, because it looks like good reading.

The website will be here soon.

(HT: JT)