Perspective for the Current Crisis

Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand
and marked off the heavens with a span,
enclosed the dust of the earth in a measure
and weighed the mountains in scales
and the hills in a balance?
Who has measured the Spirit of the Lord,
or what man shows him his counsel?
Whom did he consult,
and who made him understand?
Who taught him the path of justice,
and taught him knowledge,
and showed him the way of understanding?
Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket,
and are accounted as the dust on the scales;
behold, he takes up the coastlands like fine dust.
Lebanon would not suffice for fuel,
nor are its beasts enough for a burnt offering.
All the nations are as nothing before him,
they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.
To whom then will you liken God,
or what likeness compare with him?
An idol! A craftsman casts it,
and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
and casts for it silver chains.
He who is too impoverished for an offering
chooses wood that will not rot;
he seeks out a skillful craftsman
to set up an idol that will not move.
Do you not know? Do you not hear?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,
and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;
who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;
who brings princes to nothing,
and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.
Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,
scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows on them, and they wither,
and the tempest carries them off like stubble.
To whom then will you compare me,
that I should be like him? says the Holy One.
Lift up your eyes on high and see:
who created these?
He who brings out their host by number,
calling them all by name,
by the greatness of his might,
and because he is strong in power
not one is missing.

Isaiah 40:12-26

Dawkins Always Disappoints

There is a very helpful post at Christian Thinker proving once again that Richard Dawkins may be a good scientist but he is a dismal philosopher.

Here is Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion:

If you were born in Arkansas and you think Christianity is true and Islam is false, knowing full well that you would think the opposite if you had been born in Afghanistan, you are the victim of childhood indoctrination.

Before we take this quote too seriously, we should consider the fact that this is the same Richard Dawkins who claimed that raising a child Catholic is worse than sexually abusing him. Credibility issues aside, what can we make of statements like the one above? This sort of reasoning is very prevalent in the writings of the new atheism of Dawkins, Harris, et al. But this is a typical Dawkinsian non-argument. There is no there there. What is the point of such statements other than to offer intellectual kudos to those who already disbelieve in any particular religion?

Consider the following variation on the above quote:

If you were born in Arkansas and you think representative democracy is the best form of government and that Islamic theocracy is the worst, knowing full well that you would think the opposite if you had been born in Afghanistan, you are the victim of childhood indoctrination.

Or how about this one:

If you were born in 1980 and you think the world is round instead of flat, knowing full well that you would think the opposite if you had been born in 1089, you are the victim of childhood indoctrination.

If you can understand the silliness of the two latter statements, you should be able to understand the silliness of the first.

Read the entire post HERE.

Common Grace and Learning

Engaging God's World is a wonderful book by Cornelius Plantinga. Dr. Plantinga, one of the foremost philosphers in the country is also President of Calvin Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan. In the preface, Plantiga provides a wonderful connection between our learning and how we love God.

"Thoughtful Christians know that if we obey the Bible's great commandment to love God with our whole mind, as well as with everything else, then we will study the splendor of God's creation in the hope of grasping part of the ingenuity and grace that form it. One way to love God is to know and love God's work. Learning is therefore a spiritual calling: properly done, it attaches us to God. In addition, the learned person has, so to speak, more to be Christian with. The person who studies chemistry, for example, can enter into God's enthusiasm for the dynamic possibilities of material reality. The student who examines one of the great movements of history has moved into position to praise the goodness of God, or to lament the mystery of evil, or to explore the places where these things intertwine. Further, from persistent study of history a student may develop good judgment, a feature of wisdom that helps us lead a faithful human life in the midst of a confusing world. And, of course, chemistry and history are only two samples from the wide menu of good things to learn...

"This thoroughgoing vision of Christian higher education may be traced to John Calvin, and to others before him, but its nearer proponent for Calvin College was Abraham Kuyper (1837-1920), an extraordinary Dutch theologian, newspaper editor, and prime minister. Kuyper took a large view of the Lordship of Jesus Christ, assuming that when Scripture says God has made Jesus Christ 'the head over all things' (Eph. 1:22), 'all' means what is says. Thus Kuyper's most famous saying: 'There is not a square inch on the whole plain of human existence over which Christ, who is Lord over all, does not proclaim: This is Mine!' As generations have seen, the implication is staggeringly clear: those who follow Christ must bring all the parts and passions of their lives - including education - under the Lordship of Christ."

- Cornelius Plantinga

Uncomfortable Grace

When you get a chance read Lost in the Middle by Paul Tripp.

Who is my neighbor?

In the parable of The Good Samaritan Jesus is offering a kind of quiet polemic against the prevailing notion of the day that your neighbor, those who were the proper objects of your charity were those who were within your own sphere of culture, ethnicity, and religion.

As Jesus tells the parable he moves his listeners toward the introduction of an extraordinary individual whose identity will stagger the expert in the law.

“But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion” (v. 33).

The striking contrast set up in this parable revolves around the Samaritan’s compassion. The contrast is not between Jew and Samaritan. It is not between cleric and layman. These are the contrasts the people would probably have anticipated. Rather the contrast is between the dreadful lack of involvement and care on the part of the priest and the Levite and the extraordinary compassion shown by this outsider.

The compassion of the Samaritan that shows the shocking immorality displayed by the priest and the Levite. We rightly speak out against the immorality of abortion and sexual perversion. But where is our outrage against our own pattern of neglect toward the wounded and outcast?

What would have made this story so unsettling to the expert in the law (and everyone else) is that Jesus was saying that this "unclean" Samaritan was reflecting the compassion and love of God in a way that the religious leaders of Israel did not. We might have expected a parable telling how a Jew should show love to anybody, even to a Samaritan, but in fact Jesus shows how even a Samaritan may be nearer to the kingdom than a pious, but uncharitable, Jew.

The lawyer asked, ‘Who is my neighbour (i.e. the person whom I should help)?’ Jesus suggests that the real question is rather ‘Do I behave as a neighbour (i.e. a person who helps others)?’ D.A. Carson writes, “Failure to keep the commandment springs not from lack of information but from lack of love. It was not fresh knowledge that the lawyer needed, but a new heart—in plain English, conversion.”[1] How much more responsibility do we have who live on this side of the cross! We know things about the compassion and love of God which the priest and Levite had not yet seen.

Love for neighbor (the kind of love the Samaritan showed toward a stranger) is not the means by which we enter heaven. It is, however the responsibility of those who have received by God’s mercy the promise of heaven. The priest and Levite are proof that faithfulness to a creed is not enough if it locked away in a heart that lacks the compassion and love of God.

The Parable of the Good Samaritan Jesus is undermining the importance of status in the community of God’s people. Status in the kingdom of God has nothing to do with clerical titles or educational achievements. Status in God’s kingdom has to do with sacrificial love and humble service.

We also need to infer from this parable that the reality of salvation by grace alone through faith alone apart from any of our good works does not relieve us of the responsibility to do good works for the glory of God and the good of our fellow man. This is not about good works for the sake of our justification before God. It’s about good works joyfully offered because God in his lavish grace has justified us through the good work of Christ.

Jesus' parable is not meant to draw us into the drudgery of legalism. It is meant to coax us into the joy of lavishing compassion upon others as God has lavished compassion upon us.

The parable of The Good Samaritan is a wonderful invitation to us to search our hearts to see whether or not the compassion of God is being reproduced in our own lives. It can serve as a diagnostic tool, if you like, to determine the practical reality of our conversion or lack thereof.

Jesus asks the expert in the law a question: “Which one was the neighbor?” The man can’t even bring himself to say, “The Samaritan.” So he says, “The one who had compassion.” And in putting it like that, ironically, the reality is underscored all the more. God’s people will be recognized by their love; their compassion.

[1]Carson, D. A.: New Bible Commentary : 21st Century Edition. 4th ed. Leicester, England; Downers Grove, Ill., USA : Inter-Varsity Press, 1994, S. Lk 10:25

The Gospel and Deeds of Mercy

Don Carson has a good article in the latest edition of Themelios.

In many parts of the evangelical world, one hears a new debate—or, more precisely, new chapters in an old debate—regarding the precise place that "deeds of mercy" ought to have in Christian witness. I am not talking about the perennial debate between left-wing and right-wing economic solutions, that is, between those who think there will be more social justice and less poverty if the government takes a greater share of the nationally produced wealth and distributes it more equitably, and those who think there will be more social justice and less poverty where government legislation offers carrot-and-stick incentives to help people get off welfare rolls and become less dependent on initiative-killing generosity, while providing a safety net for those truly incapable of helping themselves. I am talking, rather, about the debate between those Christians who say that we should primarily be about the business of heralding the gospel and planting churches, and those who say that our responsibility as Christians extends to the relief of oppression, suffering, and poverty in all their forms.

Carson goes on to challenge Christians to keep in mind our calling to make the Gospel plain in all of its joy and sobriety. Deeds of mercy are a vital complement to the proclamation of the Gospel. If we neglect the Gospel, however, then we cease to be the church and we rob people of the news of eternity's greatest deed of mercy.

As long as you are prepared to plead with men and women to be reconciled to God and to flee the coming wrath, you are preserving something that is central in the Bible, something that is intimately and irrefragably tied to the gospel itself—and those who want to shunt such themes aside and focus only on the relief of present suffering will not want to have much to do with you. Thus you will be free to preach and teach the whole counsel of God and to relieve all suffering, temporal and eternal, without being drawn into endless alliances in which people never focus on anything beyond threescore years and ten.

Read the entire article HERE.

Taming the Tongue

At the Desiring God National Conference Sinclair Ferguson presented a stiring and God-exalting challenge. It came in the form of resolutions drawn directly from the book of James.

Read it. Love it. Live it.

James 1:5 To ask God for wisdom to speak and with a single mind
James 1:9-10 To boast only in exaltation in Christ, & humiliation in world
James 1:13 To set a watch over my mouth
James 1:19 To be constantly quick to hear, slow to speak
James 2:1-4 To learn the gospel way of speaking to poor and the rich
James 2:12 To speak always in the consciousness of the final judgment
James 2:16 To never stand on anyone’s face with my words
James 3:14 To never claim as reality something I do not experience
James 4:1 To resist quarrelsome words in order to mortify a quarrelsome heart
James 4:11 To never speak evil of another
James 4:13 To never boast in what I will accomplish
James 4:15 To always speak as one subject to the providences of God
James 5:9 To never grumble, knowing that the Judge is at the door
James 5:12 To never allow anything but total integrity in my speech
James 5:13 To speak to God in prayer whenever I suffer
James 5:14 To sing praises to God whenever I am cheerful
James 5:14 To ask for the prayers of others when I am sick
James 5:15 To confess it freely whenever I have failed
James 5:15 To pray with and for one another when I am together with others
James 5:19 To speak words of restoration when I see another wander

Take time to listen to Dr. Ferguson's message HERE.

Dr. Michael Horton

Take advantage of this great resource.

One of the blessings of the internet is that it provides Christians with access to wonderful teaching that once was limited to seminary students. Michael Horton is a wonderful gift to the church. His books range from the academic to the pastoral. I believe you will find his teaching to be challenging and edifying.

Why are so many quitting church?

A new book by Washington Times reporter Julia Duin examines the reasons behind why so many professing Christians are choosing to leave the church. The book Quiting Church promises to be an interesting and perhaps sobering study.

Duin writes:

There are paradoxes in this story, too. In recent decades, thriving megachurches have dominated the landscape, offering media-friendly services and chatty sermons in gigantic sanctuaries that give seekers a cushion of anonymity. But in 2007, the influential Willow Creek Community Church near Chicago found that many older members said they are now spiritually "stalled" or "dissatisfied."

Duin is convinced many evangelical churches are also struggling to deal with rising numbers of single adults and single-parent families. In 2005, a University of Virginia researcher found that 32 percent of married men and 38 percent of married women are churchgoers. But only 15 percent of single men and 23 percent of single women go to church.

There's another reality that is hard to put into statistics, said Duin.

Many believers have grown tired of quickie services, PowerPoint answers and pop lyrics. Many "quitters" she interviewed were yearning for intimate, down-to-earth churches where pastors and people knew their names. They'd been born again. Now they wanted to know how to face the doubts and pains of daily life. They wanted real spiritual growth.

Many candid believers, said Duin, "are perplexed and disappointed with God" and they found that when they asked tough questions, they "were not getting meaningful answers from their churches. In fact, they were encouraged not to talk about their pain. ...

The Spurgeon Fellowship Journal

Check out this issue of The Spurgeon Fellowship Journal. Good Stuff!

One article by Arturo Azurdia entitled "Is Methodology Neutral?" is particularly interesting (even important).

He writes:

Consider the nature of your calling, my brothers. The preacher brings to a fallen humanity the testimony of God centered on the redemptive work of Jesus Christ, a work that by nature shatters all human self-sufficiency. To employ methods, in turn, that reflect the wizardry of men is to eviscerate the gospel of its own content. If God has supremely disclosed Himself in the cross, and if following Jesus Christ means dying daily, then to adopt a style of ministry that is triumphalistic, designed to impress, and calculated to win acclaim is a serious contradiction of the gospel; perhaps, even, anti-Christian.

Just For Fun

La chance compilation
Uploaded by bunch11

J.I. Packer and John Piper on the ESV Study Bible

I have already ordered MY COPY. Click HERE to learn more.

Music Break

The Call was one of the best bands of 80's and early 90's. This song is from Reconciled.

My Sin for His Righteousness

“My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.”

The day before he died, J. Gresham Machen, founder of Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia sent a telegram to his friend and colleague John Murray that read simply, “So thankful for the active obedience of Christ; no hope without it.” The “active obedience of Christ” is a reference to the perfect obedience of Jesus during his life as God incarnate. The words of the familiar hymn quoted above are an appropriate meditation on the fact that we are not only cleansed from our sin by the atoning death of Jesus but are credited with the righteousness of Jesus as well.

Both cleansing from sin through Christ’s death and the imputation of his active obedience are essential elements of our being justified before God. Most so-called evangelicals will not quibble with the first point. It is rather the second element, imputation that causes some stir. The controversy is due, at least in part to the fact that imputation and substitution are doctrines that belong together. Penal substitution, the doctrine that Christ bore our sins on the cross and received in himself the punishment we deserved, though clearly biblical, is always under attack by those who desire a moral example theology of the cross. In the words of Steve Chalk, an influential leader in the emergent church movement has written that the doctrine of penal substitution is “divine child abuse.”

Scripture, however, is rich in the language and imagery of substitution and imputation. When the priest symbolically imputed the sins of the people upon the scapegoat he was acting as a shadow of the substance to come in Christ’s work of imputation. Indeed the entire old covenant sacrificial system bore graphic testimony to the substitutionary work of God’s coming Messiah.

The prophets bore witness to the realities of substitution and imputation. Isaiah wrote, “We considered him stricken by God…The punishment that brought us peace was upon him…The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all…For the transgressions of my people he was stricken…It was the Lord’s will to crush him…The Lord makes his life a guilt offering (53:4-10).

In Romans chapter four Paul offers powerful commentary on Genesis 15:6: “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.” Paul writes, “Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but his due. And to the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Rom. 4:4-5).

In chapter five Paul continues the theme of justification through the atoning death and active righteousness of Christ. “Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life” (vv. 9-10).

Louis Berkhof wrote of both the “negative” and “positive” realities of our justification. On the negative side is “the remission of sins on the ground of the atoning work of Christ.” Berkhof was right to point out that Scripture makes it clear that “justification is more than mere pardon.” What is needed is “the active obedience of Christ” (Systematic Theology, 515).

Jonathan Edwards wrote that in justification God accepts “a person as having both a negative, and positive righteousness belonging to him.” Edwards’ reference to “positive righteousness” does not mean that the man or woman justified before God has come to embody perfect righteousness in their behavior. Rather, Edwards is pointing to the reality of imputation. God justifies sinners by crediting the righteousness of His beloved Son to them.

The Church of Rome grievously errs when it teaches that God infuses righteousness into sinners and then justifies them on the basis of their good deeds. This is a denial of the biblical doctrine of justification. It is why the doctrine of justification by grace alone through faith alone has been and continues to be anathema in the Roman Catholic Church.

The Heidelberg Catechism of 1563 states well the radical grace reflected in the biblical doctrines of substitution and imputation:
Question 60: How art thou righteous before God?
Answer: Only by true faith in Jesus Christ; that is, although my conscience accuse me that I have grievously sinned against all the commandments of God, and have never kept any of them, and that I am still prone always to all evil, yet God, without any merit of mine, of mere grace, grants and imputes to me the perfect satisfaction, righteousness, and holiness of Christ, as if I had never committed nor had any sin, and had myself accomplished all the obedience which Christ has fulfilled for me, if only I accept such benefit with a believing heart.

O Christ, what burdens bowed Thy head!
Our load was laid on Thee;
Thou stoodest in the sinner’s stead,
Didst bear all ill for me.
A victim led, Thy blood was shed;
Now there’s no load for me.

The Holy One did hide His face;
O Christ, ‘twas hid from Thee:
Dumb darkness wrapped Thy soul a space,
The darkness due to me.
But now that face of radiant grace
Shines forth in light on me.

Christianity and Politics

Take time to listen to this round table discussion on The White Horse Inn concerning Christianity and politics.

Out of Pocket

I am taking the next few days off. I'll be back in touch sometime after the weekend.

Blessings,

todd

Politicians - Stop Using Jesus!

Nothing against them but Jesus was NOT a community organizer (whatever that is). He is Messiah, King, Lord, Servant, Sacrifice, and Savior. He did not come to make bad men good or good men better. He came to make dead men live.

I wish that politicians would stop dragging the name of Jesus through the political sewer. It is fine for a politician to profess faith in Christ (if it's genuine) but beyond that they should give expression to their faith by how they lead and serve. Their dalliances into theology are embarrassing at best, blasphemous at worst.

I am convinced that if Jesus walked the earth today He would refuse to associate himself with any political party. He would not campaign for Democrats or Republicans. It's quite possible that Jesus would prepare a whip just in case any of these yo yo's came into a church spouting their sentimental and self-aggrandizing platitudes.

Time To Panic?

Too often Christians respond to time of crisis with little discernable difference from those who do not know hope in Christ. This helpful post from Justin Taylor is designed to assist us in thinking biblically about the present banking crisis.

I think it is appropriate to pray for the economy. After all, God said to Jeremiah, "Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare" (Jeremiah 29:7). When the economy is strong, people are able to work and support their families, believers have greater opportunities for generosity, and many benefit from this common grace.

We can pray for integrity and wisdom for government officials who are faced with the incredibly complex task of regulating investment securities and banks in a way that is transparent and serves all of the varied stakeholders. We can pray that those who are willing to work will be able to find gainful employment. We can pray that greed would be restrained at all levels, from the leaders on Wall Street to individual families tempted to live beyond their means. We can pray for ourselves that we will participate in the national economy that keeps in mind the time is short and the present form of this world is passing away (1 Corinthians 7: 29-31).

- David Kotter

Music Break

Gotta love The Band!

This is from "The Last Waltz" the greatest concert film ever made.

Londonistan

I read this over at Reformation 21:

"According to The Sunday Times (9/14/08), the British government has incorporated Islamic law into the British legal system by establishing five sharia courts. The judgments of these courts are now enforceable with the full power of British law, running all the way up through the High Court. This is only the latest step in the Islamicization of Britain. The results will be especially damaging to women, since many of the disputes that end up before sharia tribunals are domestic, and the rights of women are dramatically restricted under Islamic law."

- Phil Ryken