Monday, January 16, 2012

Only Two Religions


Decades ago, when Dr. Harry Ironside finished preaching the gospel to a university audience in California, he was approached by a student who asked:
Dr. Ironside, there are literally thousands of religions, how do we know which is true?
Ironside replied:
Well, before we can get into the question of which one is true, we need to clarify something. There are not thousands of religions. There are not even hundreds of religions. There are only two: one which tells you that salvation comes as a reward for what you have done, and one which tells you that salvation comes by what somebody else does for you. That’s Christianity. All the rest fit under the other. And if you think you can get your salvation by your own efforts, then Christianity has nothing to say to you. But if you know you need to be saved, then you are a candidate.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

You are an enemy and I'm not a Sinner

Luke 6:27-29  “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them."

“Forgiveness flounders because I exclude the enemy from the community of humans even as I exclude myself from the community of sinners. 

But no one can be in the presence of the God of the crucified Messiah for long without overcoming this double exclusion — without transposing the enemy from the sphere of the monstrous… into the sphere of shared humanity and herself from the sphere of proud innocence into the sphere of common sinfulness. When one knows [as the cross demonstrates] that the torturer will not eternally triumph over  the victim, one is free to rediscover that person’s humanity and imitate God’s love for him. And when one knows [as the cross demonstrates] that God’s love is greater than all sin, one is free to see oneself in the light of God’s justice and so rediscover one’s own sinfulness.”
     ― Miroslav Volf

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Celebrating God’s Disruptive Sovereignty

Heavenward by Scotty Smith
Remember this, keep it in mind, take it to heart, you rebels. Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: “My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.” Isa. 46:8-10
Holy and gracious Father, I offer you no pushback this morning for being addressed as a rebel. I not only rebel against your commandments, I also rebel against your gospel—for it seems too good to be true. That’s why I need a Savior as big as Jesus. My only hope is in knowing that you will complete the good work of salvation you began in me. Your purposes will stand. You do all that you please, and it pleases you to justify, transform and glorify rebels like me… Hallelujah!

Indeed, I have great hope in knowing you are God and I am not. This truth is both disruptive and comforting. Disruptive, because there are some things I’m desperate for you to do—things that make all the sense in the world to me—things that seem in line with the truth of the gospel. But they’re not going to happen. You haven’t decreed them and no amount of fasting and praying will alter the perfection of your plan… Hallelujah!

Yet your sovereignty is profoundly comforting, because there are other things for which I don’t have the faith to trust you—things I cannot imagine coming to pass. Like an ax head floating on water, pebbles taking down a giant, lepers being instantly healed, dead churches becoming gospelicious communities, again… these things happen according to your pleasure and in your timing.

Father, help me “fix it in mind and take it to heart.” You are God and you do as you please. No one can ultimately resist your will, and we’re foolish when we try. You’re not a manageable deity; you’re not predictable; you’re not programmable. You are mysterious—good, but mysterious. Hallelujah, many times over!

As I head squirm in a season of difficult decisions, I’m so thankful that you are a sovereign Father, having equal care for each of your children. I can trust you. I don’t have to panic. I don’t have to worry. I don’t have to take matters into my own hands. I don’t have to fear outcomes, “what ifs,” or “if only’s.” Second-guessing must surrender to gospel sanity.

Father, help me to want your purposes to stand more than I want life not to be messy. Help me to glory in your pleasure more than I obsess about my future. Help me to accept disruption as a necessary part of transformation. There’s no comfort like the comfort which comes from knowing you, and calling you Abba, Father. So very Amen I pray, in Jesus’ trustworthy name.

The Guy who just Gave you the Finger

This is from Russell Moore who is Dean of the School of Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Whenever I start to get discouraged about the future of the church, I remember a conversation I had a few years ago with evangelical theologian Carl F. H. Henry on what would turn out to be his last visit to Southern Seminary before his death.
Several of us were lamenting the miserable shape of the church, about so much doctrinal vacuity, vapid preaching, non-existent discipleship. We asked Dr. Henry if he saw any hope in the coming generation of evangelicals.

And I will never forget his reply.

“Why, you speak as though Christianity were genetic,” he said. “Of course, there is hope for the next generation of evangelicals. But the leaders of the next generation might not be coming from the current evangelical establishment. They are probably still pagans.”

“Who knew that Saul of Tarsus was to be the great apostle to the Gentiles?” he asked us. “Who knew that God would raise up a C.S. Lewis, a Charles Colson? They were unbelievers who, once saved by the grace of God, were mighty warriors for the faith.”
Of course, the same principle applied to Henry himself. Who knew that God would raise up a newspaperman from a nominally Lutheran family to defend the Scriptures for generations of conservative evangelicals?

The next Jonathan Edwards might be the man driving in front of you with the Darwin Fish bumper decal. The next Charles Wesley might be a misogynist, profanity-spewing hip-hop artist right now. The next Billy Graham might be passed out drunk in a fraternity house right now. The next Charles Spurgeon might be making posters for a Gay Pride March right now. The next Mother Teresa might be managing an abortion clinic right now.

But the Spirit of God can turn all that around. And seems to delight to do so. The new birth doesn’t just transform lives, creating repentance and faith; it also provides new leadership to the church, and fulfills Jesus’ promise to gift his church with everything needed for her onward march through space and time (Eph. 4:8-16).

After all, while Phillip was leading the Ethiopian eunuch to Christ, Saul of Tarsus was still a murderer.
Most of the church in any generation comes along through the slow, patient discipleship of the next generation. But just to keep us from thinking Christianity is evolutionary and “natural” (or, to use Dr. Henry’s term “genetic”), Jesus shocks his church with leadership that seems to come like a Big Bang out of nowhere.

Whenever I’m tempted to despair about the shape of American Christianity, I’m reminded that Jesus never promised the triumph of the American church; he promised the triumph of the church. Most of the church, in heaven and on earth, isn’t American. Maybe the hope of the American church is right now in Nigeria or Laos or Indonesia.

Jesus will be King, and his church will flourish. And he’ll do it in the way he chooses, by exalting the humble and humbling the exalted, and by transforming cowards and thieves and murderers into the cornerstones of his New City.

So relax.

And, be kind to that atheist in front of you on the highway, the one who just shot you an obscene gesture. He might be the one who evangelizes your grandchildren.

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Prayer for 2012

Covenant Prayer by John Wesley

I am no longer my own, but thine.
Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt;
 
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
 
Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee,
exalted for thee or brought low by thee.
 
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
 
I freely and heartily yield all things
to thy pleasure and disposal.
 
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it.
 
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven.  

Amen.