I Am Not A Child Of Today

Pete Wilson quotes G. Campbell Morgan:

“You are to remember with the passion burning within you, that you are not the child of today, you are not of the earth, you are more than dust; you are the child of tomorrow, you are of the eternities, you are the offspring of Deity.

The measurements of your lives cannot be circumscribed by the point where blue sky kisses green earth. All the fact of your life cannot be encompassed in the one small sphere upon which you live. You belong to the infinite. If you make your fortune on the earth,– poor, sorry, silly soul,– you have made a fortune and stored it, in a place where you cannot hold it.

Make your fortune, but store it where it will greet you in the dawning of the new morning…. We cannot lay up our treasure on earth, it is not characteristic of those in His Kingdom. It was characteristic of the Pharisees. In a sense He was saying to them, “This is just another indication that you are not in My Kingdom no matter what you claim. People in My Kingdom don’t lay up treasure on earth.”

Where are you storing up treasure?

We Can Get a Cat When Mom is Dead

This is a another good post from Jon Acuff. I am worried a lot these days about Christians who are saved by faith deciding later to add "saved by works" to their resume. Doesn't this not only harm only themselves but also other struggling Christians and, even worse, non-Christians (Pre-Christians) who hear this week after week in our churches? Paul wrote: "For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law." (Romans 3:28) and "But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace." (Romans 11:6)

Here is the Post from Jon Acuff:

The other day my 6-year old daughter L.E. and I were hanging out in our home office. I was writing and she was playing “Tap Fish,” on my iPhone, a game that for the most part is just a way to teach your kids about death. Seriously, those virtual fish are more fragile than Bradford Pear trees and those things fall down in your yard if someone sneezes vigorously. (Home office? Daughter? Bradford Pear tree? Whoa, that was like a suburban dad reference hat trick!)

Out of nowhere, without looking up from the iPhone, L.E. said, “Oh hey, I became a Christian yesterday. I forgot to tell you.”

Turns out that at Vacation Bible School she had gone forward during an altar call and given her life to Christ. Wow, amazing times at the Acuff house. I was thrilled and walked into the kitchen to talk with my wife about it. Along the way I passed our 4-year old McRae coming out of the bathroom. I said to her, “Hey, I just heard L.E. is a Christian, are you a Christian?”

Without missing a beat, and with a melancholy that surpassed even that of the live in Paris version of the Counting Crows song “Round Here,” she said

“No, I’m not a Christian, I don’t pray very much.”

Now clearly, you can never really be certain what’s going to come out of a four year old’s mouth. A few months ago she said, “We can get a cat when mom is dead.” (Technically that’s true since my wife is allergic to cats.)

But when she said that, it caught me off guard because of the way it framed something I think a lot of us Christians secretly believe. Put simply, “I’m not a real Christian because I don’t do ____________ very much.”

Is it possible I am raising the only four year old in the world that believes in a works based faith? Where did I go wrong? How did the amount of prayer equate to Christianity to her?

I think the reality is that all too often we try to make grace fit the cause and effect model of life. Although she is four, McRae is certainly well versed in that principle. For instance, if she eats all her vegetables, her chances of getting a treat after dinner dramatically increase. There’s a cause and effect. There’s an action that has a consequence. This idea is drilled into us over and over again. And then we grow up, and we try to get grace to act the same way. We try to make mercy behave the same way. We try to make the gospel read the same way.

But it won’t, will it?

In grace, we get something we don’t deserve.

In grace, we get something we can’t earn by our actions.

In grace, we get something we can’t control or manufacture or manipulate.

So then what do you do when you find yourself with a list of “actions necessary to be a real Christian,” that you might have been carrying since you were four years old?

I think the only thing we can do is something I talk about all the time when I get to preach. Put simply, I think we have to believe in something that feels unbelievable, and that’s the gospel. And if I could summarize the gospel in four words, do you know what they would be?

Be sick. Be loved.

Be sick, come with your broken life or your regrets or your failed dreams or huge hopes. Just come. Like the prodigal son don’t try to get “clean enough” before you take those first few steps toward repentance.

And in that, as you be sick, know that you will be loved. In that moment God is going to love you. And change you and grow you and transform you in ways that don’t make any sense. In ways that transcend our simple human understanding of cause and effect.

That to me is the four-word gospel.

Be sick. Be loved.

Be sick. Be loved.

Be sick. Be loved.

Quote of the week - John Calvin

“There is not one little blade of grass, there is no color in this world, that is not intended to make men rejoice.”

-John Calvin

“One anothers” that I can’t find in the New Testament

Ray Ortlund writes about "One Anothers" that are not in the Bible:

Humble one another, scrutinize one another, pressure one another, embarrass one another, corner one another, interrupt one another, defeat one another, disapprove of one another, run one another’s lives, confess one another’s sins, intensify one another’s sufferings, point out one another’s failings . . . .

In a soft environment, where we settle for a false peace with present evils, we turn on one another. In a realistic environment, where we are suffering to advance the gospel, our thoughts turn to how we can stick up for one another.

“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends.” John 15:12-13

New Testament Gamble

Great Video:

Nothing Can Get Between Us and God's Love

Thoughts on Romans 8:31-29 by Rev. Jamie Jenkins of the North Georgia Conference of the United Methodist Church:

It is 2:45 A.M. and our dog needs to go outside. She just went out four hours ago before we went to bed. But she is insisting that I wake up. Why does she always come to my side of the bed?

There were a lot of dogs at the animal shelter that December day almost 11 years ago. All sizes and breeds. One beige and white border collie caught our eye. She was a pretty dog and seemed to have a calm demeanor. Looked like the perfect pet. We learned that she was about a year old and had been found tied to a tree in a wooded area of southwest Atlanta.

We named our new dog Addie since it was the first Sunday in Advent when we signed the papers and took her home. It turned out that she was not so calm (she must have been sedated) but with age her energy has subsided a little. She is a gentle dog with a sweet personality.

Addie is terrified of bad weather. The science and technology of the National Weather Service has nothing on her. The severe weather alerts on The Weather Channel are old news by the time they air. She becomes restless and begins to pace and pant long before my human senses are aware of the changing weather conditions. That is what was happening last night as she pawed at my bedside.

There is not a lot you can do to help Addie when she gets that way. She wants to be petted and would like to get in your lap, but at forty-five pounds she is not a lap dog. I guess in her mind the "danger" is wherever she is, so she wants to go somewhere else. You don't get very far trying to explain to a dog that going to another room will not provide escape from this weather condition.

We have tried every method that we know to relieve Addie's anxiety and to help us. All of the diversionary tactics and medications have provided no remedy. Loving attention does not calm her. She is scared and does not understand. I feel sorry for her so we just "ride out the storm" together. However, I must admit that it can be very irritating--especially in the middle of the night.

As I sat with Addie last night (this morning) I stroked her back and scratched her behind the ears. I spoke softly and reassured her that it was alright. That she was not really in danger. That it would get better. But no matter what I said or did, her anxiety remained. Periodically my irritation would become obvious. When this crisis was over she could lay around all day and rest but I was exhausted and needed my sleep.

At one point during our early morning vigil it occurred to me that this kind of scene was probably repeated often with God and me. There are times when I do not understand or agree with circumstances and I get fretful and fearful. My restlessness and anxiety are so real but God comes along side and tries to reassure and calm me. I wonder if God gets irritated with me when I am fearful or agitated and don't accept the comfort and reassurance that is offered? When God speaks peace to me, why do I reject it? Why are my circumstances more convincing than the reality of God's Presence?

I suspect that I am a lot like Addie, but I am certain that God is not like me. No matter how many times I have to be reminded that I am in God's hands and that God's love and grace is extended to me, I believe that God continues to patiently encourage me and love me. Regardless of the circumstances or my disposition, God is with me and for me.

"With God on our side like this, how can we lose? ... Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ's love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not back stabbing ... I'm absolutely convinced that nothing--nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable--absolutely nothing can get between us and God's love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us." (Romans 8:31-39, The Message)

I believe it. I am trying to practice it.

Quote of the Week

“You will cleanse no sin from your life that you have not first recognized as being pardoned through the cross. This is because holiness starts in the heart. The essence of holiness is not new behavior, activity, or disciplines. Holiness is new affections, new desires, and new motives that then lead to new behavior. If you don’t see your sin as completely pardoned, then your affections, desires, and motives will be wrong. You will aim to prove yourself. Your focus will be the consequences of your sin rather than hating the sin and desiring God in its place.”

- Tim Chester, You Can Change (Wheaton, Ill.; Crossway, 2010)

A Wicked Harlot Through and Through

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 5:1 ESV

I am reading a very good book on the Reformation by Michael Reeves called The Unquenchable Flame: Discovering the Heart of the Reformation

Here is a quote about Martin Luther and when he first believed in Justification by Faith alone (paraphrasing Luther's The Freedom of a Christian):

“At the heart.... is a story of a king who marries a prostitute, Luther’s allegory for the marriage of King Jesus and the wicked sinner. When they marry, the prostitute becomes, by status, a queen. It is not that she made her behavior queenly and so won the right to the king’s hand. She was and is a wicked harlot through and through. However, when the king made his marriage vow, her status changed. Thus she is, simultaneously, a prostitute at heart and a queen by status. In just the same way, Luther saw that the sinner, on accepting Christ’s promise in the gospel, is simultaneously a sinner at heart and righteous by status. What has happened is the ‘joyful exchange’ in which all that she has (her sin) she gives to him, and all that he has (his righteousness, blessedness, life and glory) he gives to her. Thus she can confidently display ‘her sins in the face of death and hell and say, “If I have sinned, yet my Christ, in whom I believe, has not sinned, and all his is mine and all mine is his”.’ This was Luther’s understanding of ‘justification by faith alone’, and it is in that security, he argued, that the harlot actually then starts to become queenly at heart.”

They Never Cry for the Mercy of the Judge.

Isaiah 42:1-3 ESV

Behold my servant, whom I uphold,

my chosen, in whom my soul delights;

I have put my Spirit upon him;

he will bring forth justice to the nations.

He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice,

or make it heard in the street;

a bruised reed he will not break,

and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;

he will faithfully bring forth justice.

Richard Sibbes - The Bruised Reed

THE GOOD EFFECTS OF BRUISING

This bruising is required before conversion that so the Spirit may make way for himself into the heart by levelling all proud, high thoughts, and that we may understand ourselves to be what indeed we are by nature. We love to wander from ourselves and to be strangers at home, till God bruises us by one cross or other, and then we `begin to think', and come home to ourselves with the prodigal (Luke 15:17).

It is a very hard thing to bring a dull and an evasive heart to cry with feeling for mercy. Our hearts, like criminals, until they be beaten from all evasions, never cry for the mercy of the judge.

Again, this bruising makes us set a high price upon Christ. Then the gospel becomes the gospel indeed; then the fig leaves of morality will do us no good. And it makes us more thankful, and, from thankfulness, more fruitful in our lives; for what makes many so cold and barren, but that bruising for sin never endeared God's grace to them?

A Little Extra Power in our Lives

Quote from Francis Chan's book Forgotten God:

Nowhere in scripture do I see “balanced life with a little bit of God added in” as an ideal for us to emulate. Yet when I look at our churches this is exactly what I see: a lot of people who have added Jesus to their lives. People who have in a sense asked Him to join them on their life journey and follow them wherever they feel they should go, rather than following Him as we are commanded.

The God of the universe is not something we can just add to our lives and keep on as we did before. The Spirit who raised Christ from the dead is not someone we can just call on when we want a little extra power in our lives. Jesus Christ did not die in order to follow us, He died and rose again so that we could forget everything else and follow Him to the cross, to true Life.

“You Show Too Much Grace”

More by Jon Acuff at Stuff Christians Like Blog:

A few weeks ago, someone online requested a DVD copy of me being sent to hell. When I told my youngest brother Bennett this, his reaction was simple:

“Oh come on! DVD? Doesn’t heaven have better technology than that at this point? At the bare minimum I have to believe they’ve got Blu-ray.”

He makes a good point. If the movies “Piranha” and “Step Up” are in 3D I assume heaven is using some sort of hologram technology. But that’s not really the point of this. The point is that someone felt I was on a bullet train to Hades. Why?

I wrote a piece for CNN about the two most common ways Christians become jerks online. In it, I argued that we’re called to love our neighbor and that includes people on the Internet. The reader who wrote me and several other people felt that in the article I came across as being “soft on sin.”

Similar to how people will accuse politicians of being “soft on crime,” sometimes Christians accuse each other of being “soft on sin.” The idea is that there needs to be justice and consequences. People have to pay the cost of their actions and learn from their mistakes. When you’re “soft on sin,” you’re giving people too many second chances, you’re not holding people accountable the right way, you’re being too gracious.

So people accused me of giving evil a free pass. Have you ever heard that before? Has there ever been an issue your friend thought you weren’t mad enough about? Or a situation where you refused to let someone keep falling when everyone told you to abandon all hope? Have you ever been accused of being soft on sin?

It’s not a new phenomenon. In the Prodigal Son story, this is essentially the argument of the older brother. When he realizes his failure of a younger brother received a party instead of punishment, he is incensed. He berates the father, lists out the younger brother’s faults and refuses to attend the party.

But here’s the thing about this approach to life. Here’s the one thing I can’t get around.

You can never out grace a God who sent his son to the cross for you.

You will never have a reaction to a situation or a sin or a person or an issue that is more loving than God. Your reaction will never, ever outweigh God’s. But don’t get that twisted, God is not soft on sin.

In fact, his wrath for sin is demonstrated best in the severity of his grace.

We don’t get casual grace. We don’t get easy grace. We don’t get cheap or soft grace.

We get severe grace. We get unyielding grace. We get Christ on the cross with nails in his hands and blood on his body grace. We get severe grace.

And the reason we do is that God is not soft on sin. He is hard on sin. He is wrathful on sin. He is all knowing and all powerful on sin. He is fire and earthquakes and showers of sulfur on sin. His wrath is undeniable on sin. Which is why it took such tremendous grace to quench it.

I’m not soft on sin. I’m not shy about repentance or consequences or hurt or suffering or pain. But when it comes to loving people, our Lord has set an incredibly high bar. So love the people no one else loves. Show grace without end. Give comfort even when it makes no sense.

And as far as the DVD copy of my trip to hell goes? I’m not concerned about emails like that.

“You’re too loving” and “you show too much grace” are insults I will forever accept.

The Gospel in Four Words

"'Come unto me,’ he says, ‘and I will give you.’ You say, ‘Lord, I cannot give you anything.’ He does not want anything. Come to Jesus, and he says, ‘I will give you.’ Not what you give to God, but what he gives to you, will be your salvation. ‘I will give you‘ — that is the gospel in four words.

Will you come and have it? It lies open before you.”

- C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of the New Testament

Zero. Gone. Poof.

From Ray Ortlund:

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1

Now. Not five years from now when you are a better Christian. Right now. At this instant.

No. None at all. Not even a little. Zero. Gone. Poof.

For those in Christ Jesus. And only because we are in him. We provide everything that deserves condemnation. He provides everything that deserves acceptance.

This is the plain message of the Bible, because God not only does not condemn us, he also doesn’t want us feeling condemned. He wants us feeling freed. Nothing like no-condemnation to get us riled up for his glory!

James Montgomery Boice, Romans (Grand Rapids, 1992), page 789: “Verse 1 is not only the theme of Romans 8. It is the theme of the entire Word of God, which is only another way of saying that it is the gospel. Indeed, it is the gospel’s very heart.”

A Poor, Drooping, Fearing, Trembling Soul

By Ray Ortlund:

The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty. Exodus 34:6-7

“Well, you say, but though God is able to help me, I fear that God is not willing to help me, and therefore I am discouraged. But be of good comfort, says the Lord, for my name isMerciful, and therefore I am willing to help you.

But you say, though the Lord is willing to help me, yet I am a poor unworthy creature and have nothing at all to move God to help me. Yet be of good comfort, for the Lord says again, My name is Gracious. I do not show mercy because you are good, but because I am good.

Oh, you say, but I have been sinning a long time, ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years. If I had come to you long ago, I might have had mercy. But I have been sinning a long time, and therefore I fear there is no mercy for me. Yet, says the Lord, be of good comfort, for my name is Slow to anger.

Oh, you say, but I have sinned extremely, so many sins that I am never able to reckon up and to humble myself for them, I have broken all my promises to God and all the vows I made to him, and therefore I am discouraged. Yet, says he, be of good comfort, for I amabounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. Are you abundant in sin? I am abundant in steadfast love. Have you broken faith with me? Yet I am abundant in faithfulness also.

Oh, but though the Lord is all this to his chosen ones like David, Abraham and Moses, yet I fear the Lord will not be this to me. Yes, says the Lord, keeping steadfast love for thousands. I have not spent all my mercy on David or on Abraham or on Paul or on Peter, but I keep mercy for thousands.

Oh, but my sins still recoil on me. I am the greatest sinner in the world, for I have sinned all kinds of sin. I fear there is no hope for me. Yet, says the Lord, be not discouraged, for I forgive iniquity and transgression and sin, even all kinds of sin. This is my name forever.

Oh, but I am afraid to lay hold on this promise, for I think this is a doctrine of license. Do not say that, says the Lord, who will by no means clear the guilty. But if there is ever a poor, drooping, fearing, trembling soul that desires to know my name, here, says the Lord, is my name by which I will be known forever.

The name of God quiets the heart against all discouragements.”

---William Bridge, A Lifting Up For The Downcast (London, 1961)