Another Encouragement to Read the Bible

Last night, while reading Jeremiah, I made an interesting connection to the Gospels and realized that I had not done that in quite some time. God hadn't been giving me that same illumination because I hadn't been reading His Word as often. And it was a strange, saddening thought . . .

Until I realized that I ought only to be encouraged to read the Bible more, because the Bible is then what I remember and the Bible is then what God uses. The more I read it, the more I love it and the more I remember. The more I love it and remember it, the more I love and honor and remember Him.

Since I want to know Jesus, I should read His Word more. Can you say the same?

Long Time, No Post

It was a sad holiday break for me this year. I lost my job and stayed pretty down until after the holidays, but I still didn't have much about which to write.

I really want to blog more this year, even though it's not a "resolution," so leave me a comment if you actually read this on a regular basis. That would be encouraging to me and help me know how to better serve you, which I would love to do!

(Ps - I'm now working at a fun gym for kids. Praise the Lord !!)

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).

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!

Losing My Passion For Passionlessness

I realized today that, to some degree, I have lost that fire that God lit under me and in me five years ago. Five years ago I began to see the Bible with new eyes, I began to hear God's Word with new ears, God gave me a new heart to love Him more than anything else, I began caring about His things and His people. But as seasons change, so does life. There are valleys and there are peaks. There are storms and there is sunshine. And as surely as the sun rises every single day, so God is faithful to His own.

A conversation today reminded me that I've been living in the past, specifically in a past rebuke that has hurt me ever since. What the people said was too broad to be helpful, and it's bothered me ever since. Ultimately, it's stifled my passion for God because I've become afraid of hurting someone else's "feelings" when I talk about Him. You see, when the Bible says, "I believed, therefore I spoke," I take it seriously. Speaking is the natural outflow of believing.

It does not matter whether people want to hear it, it doesn't matter how they feel when they hear it, it doesn't matter whether they listen or care or tell you to shut up. We who trust Jesus have a commission from Him to make disciples of all peoples by preaching His forever-true, forever-standing, never-changing Word, and to do it from a heart of love for Him and love for others.

There used to be a time - my friends remember these days well - when I was visibly and audibly excited about GOD. HE was the song in my heart and the words on my lips. Not that I didn't do wrong or say stupid things - I did all the time! - but the music of my life was obviously God and God alone.

Lately I've noticed that this kind of music, this kind of fire, is largely absent from my life. Apparently I've believed the lie that cooling down is part of growing up. Well I have a newsflash - it's NOT. Cooling off on God is not part of growing up as a Christian. Don't buy the lie. Just because we grow in Christ and His wisdom does in no way mean that we settle for half-hearted passions for Him. HE is EVERYTHING !!! Everything to the Christian! Everything to the world! Everything that we need and want and hope and pray for is found perfectly in Him!

Dear Father, help me take hold of Your one Man much tighter. May You burn Your Word in me like fire, and make me a burning and shining light for Jesus. I miss His joy in my heart, I miss His name on my lips. Please come and renew me again, I pray in Christ's name. Amen.