A One Year Anniversary Tribute to my Pastor

A One Year Anniversary Tribute to my Pastor
One year ago this week my family and I left our little flock at Waverly Hall Baptist Church in the booming metropolis of Waverly Hall (population 700 minus 6), packed up and moved to Athens, GA to become a part of Crossway Fellowship Church where one of my dearest friends - Paul Cooke - is the pastor.

To date I have been in a lawsuit over two years. In July 2004, I and the deacons who so faithfully served Christ alongside me, were sued by half our congregation because we were Calvinists. Four petitions were issued and three church conferences held in order to accomplish one thing: the removal of the gospel and its influences from that local church. In a stunning yet unsurprising rejection of our church bylaws and its clear instructions to follow the principles of Matthew 18 in resolving their offense with the leadership, half the congregation took out a restraining order against the leadership so we would stop attempting to reconcile with them. After attempting reconciliation for six weeks, the only biblical response to give a restraining order is church discipline. And for the first step in this direction we were slapped with a lawsuit.

That's about as simple as it gets. Perhaps its an oversimplification. It probably is. There is much history behind this church with 14 pastors in 40 years. That one statement alone probably tells more history than the stories of all 14 men combined. In a church where the biblical gospel has not been preached either in full or at all, there grew a congregation, most of whom are probably cultural Christians, who do not truly know Christ, do not crave the pure spiritual milk of God's Word, and worse yet have no desire to acquire either.

For them, the local church is a place where their names are recorded in a roll book, etched on a stain glass window, embossed in a hymn book, placarded on the back of a pew, and stamped on the inside of every church library book. They are Roman Catholics in a very Baptistic sense, for they fight to this day, using the non-profit code of law as their guide, to retain their membership in that local church out of some superstitious yet genuine fear of losing something eternal should they lose their membership. In some strange way, they act and believe as if the Lamb's Book of Life is connected to the Waverly Hall Baptist Church Roll Book. But that will not be the roll which is called up yonder.

In our fight for the gospel, my family and I wearied. We wearied quickly. The existing leadership, still in place, were much stronger. They had been there longer, some significantly so, than we. I thought I could stick it out to the end. But it became clear that we simply could not do that. The toll it took on my wife and kids, not to mention the rest of the children in the local church, including the Christian school our church ran, was beyond measure and beyond words.

Thankfully, amid an equally troubling journey which ran parallel to this one, I met my pastor, Paul Cooke. While wading the deep waters of becoming a gospel-centered charismatic, and while attempting to guide a fledgling flock through the legal-infested waters of anti-gospel sentiments and actions, the Lord brought my pastor into my family's life. And our lives have never been the same.

The personal issues that developed amid this lawsuit, as well as the other ones which were there all along and just didn't surface until I went through the lawsuit, were too much to handle alone. Despair set in. Depression hung over me like a constant Seattle rainstorm. I needed a guide to weather it. And weather it we have. Thanks to my dearest brother, Paul.

While reading Richard Baxter tonight on Directions for Handling Despair, I came across this paragraph which stirred my soul afresh with thanksgiving for the man God has given my family to be our pastor. I offer this to Lord as a prayer of gratitude, and I offer it to Paul as a tribute of his faithfulness to love and care for us when no other pastor in the country cared for us as consistently and persistently as did he.

"Understand how necessary a faithful minister of Christ is, in such cases of danger and difficulty, to be a guide to your consciences; and open your case truly to them, and place so much confidence in their judgment of your state as their office, and abilities, and faithfulness do require, and set not up your timorous, darkened, perplexed judgments above theirs, in cases where they are fitter to judge. Such a guide is necessary, both as appointed by Christ who is the author of his office, and in regard of the greatness, and danger, and difficulty of your case. Do you not feel that you are insufficient for yourselves, and that you have need of help? sure a soul that is tempted to despair may easily feel it. You are very proud, or blindly self-conceited, if you do not. And you may easily know that Christ that appointed them their office, as far as reason will allow. And where there is no office, yet ability and faithfulness deserve and require credit of themselves. Why else do you trust physicians and lawyers, and all artificers, in their several professions and arts, as far as they are reputed able and faithful? I know no man is to believed as infallible as God is; but man is to be believed as man; and if you will use and trust your spiritual guide bu so far as you use and trust your physician or lawyer, you will find the great benefit, if you choose aright."

By God's undeserving grace and continuing mercy, we chose aright. Thank you Paul and Darby for continuing to be that right choice for us.

The ECM and the Gospel: A Potential Problem and Definite Solution

The ECM and the Gospel:

A Potential Problem and Definite Solution

Traveling is hard on my knees. They sit in one place for more than three hours and they start to scream at me for a break. So on my pilgrimage to Nashville for company training I stop at the Krystal's in Murfreesboro, TN. This is where I give in to my craving, which occurs about once every two months, for "gut grenades" as I have come to call them. The food products here taste so good but are so terribly bad for my intestinal system....and probably for everyone else's intestinal system were I to consult a doc about it. (Click on the square hamburger to see the menu...be careful not to lust.)

So here I sit, where the free Wi-Fi transmission travels about as slow as a cold front in the Gobi Desert, listening to "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" by Cindi Lauper (involuntarily, of course), awaiting on the manager to personally deliver my #1 Combo with a small chili and a hot apple turnover.

You can tell I'm a hardcore blogger, though not like my dear friends John Schroeder (Blogotional) or Adrian Warnock. They are hardcore in a different way - sitting close to a computer most of the day where they can post their thoughts periodically throughout the day. Me? I travel all week long and have to wait to each evening to blog...or when I'm on the road on an "off day" and can stop along the way. The problem with traveling is that my mind is like a sponge, taking it all in, and eventually needing a squeeze before I go crazy. Stopping on a lengthy road trip at Krystal to blog on my most recent thoughts is just such an attempt to maintain sanity amid this kind of job with my kind of brain.

On today's menu is the Emergent Church....yes...again. Today? Combo #24. Evidently, this is the most blogged about topic on my blog...numbering 23 posts so far. Yet thankfully, the sheer number of other posts reveal that this does not consume all of my feeble intellectual efforts.

My focus in this post is to point out a probable root cause for some (or much?) of the philosophy that guides the Emergent conversation and a biblical solution for it. To get right to the point and without Emergent, first-person documentation to back it up right here in Krystal's, my perception and observation is that so much of Emergent conversation is just that...a conversation....a journey as it is often described. As such, there is an inherent and deep connection to skepticism and cynicism, especially with regard to the most popularly reflected forms of the local church in American or Western culture.

Much of this simply stems from the ordinary, inherent sinfulness rooted in each individual from birth. And my guess is that given this already present condition, an opportunity arises in neo-orthodoxy theology (remixed in our generation) for our sinful hearts to find a way to not have to submit to authority. I think that my statement is pretty accurate, especially given the sometimes very overt rebellious attitude that some in the ECM have displayed toward the sound doctrine that has been passed down to us since the early church.

Now, my purpose in this post is not to criticize or analyze this particular feature of the ECM or Emergent conversation. I've already done that in the other 23 posts. Instead, I'd simply like to offer a possible explanation as to why this exists, other than the one called depravity which I've already suggested.

Here's what I'm thinking, hurrying it up as the indigestion quickly sets in. I'm thinking that some of this exists due to the intangible nature of what the Bible calls for and talks about. Let's see if I can briefly explain this.

Consider first that tangible things are those which I can perceive with my five senses. Consider second, that there are two parts to perception: a reality and a proposition that correlates with that reality. There are two and a half plain cheese Krystal's left on my tray is a proposition. The reality to which that proposition correlates are tangible, edible, and tasty plain cheese Krystals (two and a half of them to be exact). However, if there were not these items on my tray, then the proposition would be called into question, right? If I can't see them how do I know they are there.

Could it be then with the ECM and Emergent conversation that part of the skepticism and cynicism toward "modernism" and its theological constructs is because the reality to which our/my propositions argue is largely intangible? And could it not stand to reason then that if they are intangible, hard to perceive with our senses, if not impossible, that they are argued or outright rejected.

Not all of it is intangible, of course. There are very specific responses and obligations God makes upon us in the Scriptures that can be touched, seen, heard, felt, etc. Feeding the poor, clothing the naked, caring for the homeless, speaking an encouraging word, greeting others with holy affections, etc. are all very tangible expressions of godliness. But to make my point, they stem from and are motivated by intangible expressions of the gospel in the human heart. And the gospel in the human heart is also an intangible teaching, doctrine, set of truths, etc. as told to us in the Bible.

So it could stand to reason then that according to the last paragraph, about two-thirds of the Christian life is intangible, unable to be perceived by the five senses. And it is focal point of the teaching, instruction, explanations, or arguments of this two-thirds around which so much of the controversy between the emergent conversation and their supposedly "modernistic" opponents is surrounded. The gospel as a doctrine, and any other kind of biblical teaching for that matter is not something that we can taste, feel, hear, see, or smell. Therefore, in the minds of those on the emergent journey, could it not be that this is at least a possible reason why they react against any certainty that someone claims to have about it all?

If so, what's the solution. The burgers are now cold and I'm ready to arrive at the destination of my own journey (something oddly enough that my emergent friends also strongly react against). The solution is found in Jesus' reply to Thomas in John 20:29. “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who haven’t seen me and yet believe anyway” (NLT). In other words, those of you who have believed Me because you perceived me with your senses are happy. But those who believe in Me yet do not perceive Me with their senses are even happier and more satisfied.

Belief is intangible, and according to Jesus it does not have to rest on tangibility. It rests simply on the testimony of others who themselves tangibly experienced Jesus Christ. This is certainly the case of the apostle John, isn't it? He wrote at the beginning of his first epistle, “The one who existed from the beginning is the one we have heard and seen. We saw him with our own hands. He is Jesus Christ. The Word of life. This one who is life from God was shown to us, and we have seen Him…And now we testify and announce to you that he is the one who is eternal life. He was with the Father, and then he was shown to us. We are telling you about what we ourselves have actually seen and heard, so that you may fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ” (1 John 1:1-3, NLT).

John and his friends saw Jesus, heard him, touched and handled him, and now teach others about him....others who could not and would not ever perceive Jesus in the same way John and the disciples did. His testimony was enough for the believers in Ephesus to whom he was writing. His own testimony provided certitude amid the intangible nature of the truth he was testifying to. And if they believed it, they were more blessed than the apostle John was! So faith is the answer! Belief is what it's all about!

Problem is, this faith –which is saving faith, by the way – is rooted in the preaching of the Scriptures, an unfortunate turn of theological events for the one on the emergent journey. For the Scriptures and the way we see them are the things always up for grabs along the journey. Therefore, the faith that saves is a faith always out of reach. According to an emergent, we cannot know with certainty what the Bible is really saying. And that hearkens back to my original point that the intangibility of what the Bible is really saying makes it difficult for an emergent person to perceive it and accept it….because that perception and acceptance comes only by faith…saving faith.

The only solution for the emergent person then is to step off his “journey” and onto the narrow road walked by Christian in The Pilgrim’s Progress. It is a road one enters by the narrow gate (the wicket gate), opened by the gospel (Evangelist), and headed inevitably toward heaven (the Jordan River). The gospel is the counsel one receives along the way. The gospel gives the answers to all the questions asked. The gospel solves any problem along the way. And it does all of this and more only because of the saving faith that Christian places in it, believing it is what it claims to be, never questioning it, or expressing desire to re-examine it. In fact, Christian’s path along the narrow road is the polar opposite of the journey along which the emergent ‘Christians’ are traveling now.

In the end, a firm resolve to lay aside the inherent rebellious nature of our hearts, and an equally firm resolve to find happiness and satisfaction in an intangible saving faith, formulated in an intangible theology handed down by the apostles through the early church and passed down to us to this day, and placed in an unseen Jesus Christ are the only solutions. They are solutions, however, to problems that many emergents cannot see, do not acknowledge, or reject altogether. In rejecting what has been passed down to them in the apostolic faith, and choosing instead to re-examine it all and put it all back together again aright, they dangerously unhand and discard the very thing that can give meaning and fulfillment and satisfaction to their “journey” and provide them with an actual destination.

May the Lord give us more opportunities to speak together with them on eternal matters like these.

The Missing Gospel-Centrality Local Church-Mindedness in the Media

Missing Gospel-Centrality and

Local Church-Mindedness

in the Media

Big "duh" on that one. My wife and I were trying to enjoy a little television last night. She found a favorite show to watch - Diagnosis Murder. I quickly turned it. The "cheese factor" is too high for me. This yielded a verbal blow, sarcastically and facetiously, of course, that I just don't like clean television. She threw Walker Texas Ranger in there as another example of clean television that I didn't like. Perhaps a post on what constitutes the "cheese factor" later.

As I took command, mounted my couch cushion, gripped the remote with much authority and purposefulness, I began surfing the 23 channels we have on basic cable. On channel 2 (ABC, I believe) was a show about the AIDS crisis in black America. After listening for about 45 minutes on the absolute foolishness of the proposed and supposed solutions, I was dumbfounded. Arguing about whether or not to swap dirty needles with clean ones, and to make that a formal program federally funded is mind-blowing. And a group of ladies talking about the need for religion and spirituality in the black family as a means of help is mega-short circuited when one of those ladies is talking about having her boyfriend tested for AIDS before she has sex with him. That shows great care for herself and for her boyfriend, another lady said. It's all an absolute mess...a reflection of nothing else but Romans 1:18-32 in action, especially given the amount of time spent on last night's show talking about "down-lows", or black men who are married but have homosexual lovers. Hearing the solutions batted around between various groups of men and women was even more frustration. They need the gospel!!! And we must take it to them!!!

But who are the "we"? It certainly wasn't the group of three I saw on TBN last night, while surfing a religious networking wave. There was a younger couple interviewing John Maxwell. The couple evidently produced the new movie coming out called One Night With the King. When they talked about their desire to impact the culture for Christ, and when they asked Maxwell to give his input on how we can do that, Maxwell's response caused me to injure once more our very fragile remote control. His response was basically this: if we are going to impact the culture for Christ it is not going to be through the local church on a Sunday morning; it's going to have to be through the arts, music, and other reflections of culture that people live in today. So there it is from one of America's greatest religious leaders today in the business world. The local church on a Sunday morning is not going to make it happen. And you know what? I think he's right.

That's why I asked, "who are the 'we'?" Because if the "we" are cultural, nominal Christians who frankly have never understood the gospel, then yes, "we" will be unable to fight the AIDS threat within the black community with the gospel. And yes, we will be unable to impact culture in arts and music with the gospel.

The disconnect was clear to me last night. Whether it is in the secular media or the "Christian" media, there is a missing gospel-centrality and local church-mindedness everywhere I turn.

The gospel is the birthplace of the local church. The local church is rooted in it. If a local church is not rooted in the gospel, then biblically, it cannot be a local church. I think that's about as simple as anyone can put it.

Further, the gospel is the ground in which the local church is rooted. Everyone who belongs in a local church should be rooted in the gospel. If a person is not rooted in the gospel through their local church, then biblically, they probably are not a real Christian. I think that's about as simple as anyone can put it.

Additionally, the gospel is the root of the local church, which means that everything the local church does will be about the gospel, its message, its methods, its aims and goals, its promises, its end result, etc. If a local church and the persons within it do not make their aim in life the gospel itself, then biblically speaking, they do not believe it or have saving faith in it. Again, that's about as simple as it gets.

The local church is simply a local fountain through which and out of which the gospel flows and spews forth into a community. The local church is like Old Faithful, regularly, consistently, persistently spewing the gospel day by day by day to everyone who is close by. And every person within the local church who is a true believer is a little Old Faithful. This is truly the only way that we will impact culture in arts and music and whatever else. This is truly the only way we will impact the black community so that homosexuality and AIDS will disappear from within our local communities.

If we don't have the gospel right, and if we are not local church-minded, we will never impact anybody with anything of eternal value and significance.

Oh yeah...did I mention how the fellow on TBN summed up the book of Esther for his new movie? It was about a little minority girl who saved her people and impacted the world. No, I didn't get that part wrong. And this is but another reflection of how really, really, really deplorable and abysmal many "Christians" understanding of the gospel is. I thought Esther was about God once again rescuing His people from certain death, continuing to fulfill His promises to Israel, in order to make His name great among the nations of the earth? Ah...but that's for another post.

Gospel Motivations: Emotions and Worship

Gospel Motivations:

Emotions and Worship

Earlier this year I posted on Gospel Motivations: Rejecting Temptation - Is "Just Say No" Enough? The point in that post was to differentiate between seemingly harmonious yet actually competing motivations when it comes to rejecting temptation. I can "just say no" but is that also the same thing as saying "yes" to Christ? A person can "just say no" to drugs, for example. But are they doing so because their passion is to have real joy in Jesus as opposed to empty joy in the world? Or is it because they simply realize that drugs are bad for your health, marriage, and job life? The difference is huge, isn't it?

I was listening to the new Passion '06 CD - Everything Glorious - which I just purchased today. The opener by Chris Tomlin - Awesome is the Lord Most High - was moving. As my emotions were stirred a thought came to mind while I embarked on my next two hour road trip to Greenville, SC. I recall reading Robert Murray M'Cheyne's Memiors sometime ago and an entry came to mind. It's been a few years, and I don't have the book here with me, but my recollection of the entry seems lucid enough because it has stayed with me for some time, giving me much food for thought. (Please leave a comment if you remember the entry date and/or page number).

M'Cheyne recorded that while being in worship one Lord's Day his emotions were deeply moved along with his soul. And like any good puritanistic pastor, that alone gave him much pause for thought. I seem to remember him writing that he refused to judge the depth of his worship when accompanied by music. His reasoning is also typical of puritan times. Music naturally moves the soul, so the only way to judge one's true depth of worship is to do so without music. Remove the stimulus, in other words, and see what remains.

I remember reading that several years ago and going, "Wow! That's deep. That's how I need to think"...something very typical for me when reading the Puritans. The depth of argumentation sometimes speaks louder than the argument itself, I find. Applying M'Cheyne's course of action has proven difficult and often depressing. I have found in fact that music does stir my soul, and that when I am listening to it and singing along, especially in corporate worship, more of my heart is engaging in worship to the Lord. And when I try to worship without it, my heart is not so quickly inclined toward to the Lord. By M'Cheyne's thought, my worship isn't very deep then, is it?

While driving earlier today I asked myself, "Self, what is the real difference between non-believers screaming and hollering during The Earth's Rotation Around the Sun, during a Wolfmother concert, and believers screaming and hollering during the opening song 'Indescribable' at the Chris Tomlin Live from Austin Music Hall concert?" Both are jumping up and down, both are having a great time, both are experiencing an amazing amount of energy. Unbelievers hold up lighters, while believers hold up cell phones. But that's about the only difference!

Both saved and lost persons experience things in the same ways: through taste, touch, smell, sound, and sight. Both have religious perception same ways: through intellect and emotion. It is in this part of our soul - the intellect and emotions - that the fundamental difference arises between Christians and non-Christians.

Jonathan Edwards in his monumentally helpful work Religious Affections writes in three parts on the relationship between affections and religious beliefs. Part I introduces the general relationship between affections and religious belief. Part II identifies certain criteria that do not prove or disprove the a true “religious” affection. Part III identifies certain criteria that do point to true religious affections.

Edwards believed that the soul has two related elements: perception and inclination. In short, you are inclined toward that which you perceive as helpful and beneficial to you. One author put it this way: "Perception refers to the human ability to receive and interpret data. Inclination refers to one’s affective response to received data and is either positive or negative."[1] Per Edwards himself,

"Indeed, the liking or inclination of the soul to something, if it is intense and vigorous, is the very thing which we call the affection of love, and the same degree of dislike and disinclination is what we mean by hatred. So it is the degree to which the will is active, either toward or against something, that makes it an affection" [2], (p. 7).

Edwards goes on to make the main premise of his book clear from the outset: the affections are where it's at. In my own words, affections are that part of us which engages our minds in the truth about God and our spirits in love for God. Ever notice that the doctrinal, heady parts of Paul's letter are written before all the stuff he tells us to do? That's because the truth about God (perception) influences the way we feel toward God (inclination).

What this means is that the affections are that part of us that separates believers from non-believers. And for M'Cheyne's thought...well, as much as I hate to disagree with such an incredibly gifted individual as he, I must. Music in worship stimulates my the affections of my heart with truth so that I am more inclined toward God. That means that the difference between me screaming, hollering, jumping up and down, and throwing my hands up in a worship service, and the unbeliever doing the same during a rock concert is all of the sudden obviously clear: my heart perceives God as the subject which inclines my heart to want to throw myself into worshiping Him; while the unbeliever perceives the world as the subject, inclining his heart to throw himself into worshiping that. In short, we may act the same, but we are not worshiping the same thing. The emphasis then is not on the behavior as much as the object of our worship.

The gospel is the motivation behind my behavior in worship. The love of God for me in Christ, and His birth, life, death, and resurrection for me make me love Him more. These truths make me want more of Him in my life. The gospel in music makes me want to be with Him face to face. It makes me want to go to heaven to see Him. And when the music fades, as Matt Redman's song "The Heart of Worship" goes, the emotional excitement may fade also. But the fact that my mind still perceives God as the object of my worship means that God is still retained as the source of my joy and not the world.

The music which is played alongside the truths I sing are merely a vehicle which is used to drive me to my destination (God) in the truth (the Gospel). And since the gospel drives that music, there is a clear difference between that music and the music of the world. The one produces joy and the other produces noise. And interestingly enough, where the gospel ceases to be the motivating factor behind a musical tone or set, the difference is clear to those who love the gospel. That "Christian" music is also nothing but noise...a clanging cymbal...because it lacks love...a love for the Savior as its heartbeat.

So today, while I thank God for M'Cheyne's introspection in light of God's holiness, I also thank God for Jonathan Edwards' extrospection in light of the gospel. And I thank God for Chris Tomlin, Charlie Hall, and David Crowder, and especially Sovereign Grace Music, all who seem to excel in accompanying the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ with music that stirs the soul, empassions the heart, and excites a crowd of believers who are ready to behold their Savior!

The Gospel Tells us to Fight Death with Life and Death

The Gospel Tells us to

Fight Death with Life and Death

Are We Raising Our Children

to Die for King Jesus

The video links I watched this morning were sobering. Videos, clips, sound bites, and quotes can all be the same much of the time - quoting people out of context to make our point. That's dishonest. I don't know for sure if that's what's happened here, but given what I hear, I'm sure it's not. In Children of the Future Jihad, Mahmoud Amadinejad and Nuclear Threats, and Suicide Cartoon, death is the greatest victory for a Muslim...death, that is, in martyrdom while destroying the enemies, whether they be America or Israel.

I can see, from a fleshly standpoint, how so many conservative, republican Christians would rise up in anger against such violence. It is wrong. It is sinful. It is outrageous. It must be stopped. But the talk show hosts fume with fleshliness so that the only response preached creates an environment of hatred, retaliation, and vengeance. The conservative, republican, right-winged "Christian" media is teaching us to respond with anti-gospel sentiments and actions towards our enemies. I'm afraid they and those who listen to them are fueling a third-world war.

It becomes clear to any thinking person that killing a Muslim accomplishes nothing. Those who think, eat, drink, and live jihad are like ants...where one is stamped out, twenty more storm out of the hole. Their theology and philosophy are engrained upon their hearts so that they cannot be stopped with equal killing force. It would literally be impossible to accomplish this. Yet, ironically, if they are allowed to commit their jihad against others, those others must be defended with equal force. It is unethical to allow the murder of an innocent person at the hands of a cruel killer.

So if they cannot be stopped with the same equal killing force (because it only bolsters their belief in their cause), yet if they must be stopped with equal force (in order to protect the lives of innocent people), how do cross-centered, gospel-loving Christians respond?

We fight, but with life and death.
We fight their death, while embracing our own.
We fight their death, with the life Jesus promised.
Christians, like Muslims, are not afraid to die. We too are taught that in death there is victory over sin and death. Jesus taught us to expect it, reminding us that if the Master suffered, the servants will suffer also. And Jesus' theology is found in Paul, who himself wrote in 1 Corinthians 15 that the gospel and particularly the resurrection of Jesus Christ should affect us in such a way that we look foolish to the world for the things we do. And indeed we would be foolish were it not for that gospel truth. Kill us and we'll simply rise from the dead.

Yet Christians do not fight with weapons of this world, do we? We are fighting against the enemy behind this radical theology of Islam. We must look beyond their angry, grimmaced faces to the enemies who are causing their mindless murder: sin and Satan. Both sin and Satan are working in complete harmony together, the one feeding off the other, in order to create a world-wide fighting force that Christians in the free-world must face one day. While Christians in Sudan and Chechnya face this threat, Christians in first-world countries are largely unaffected.

When they come for us...when they come against us, how will we fight them? The gospel teaches us to fight them with life and death. Live a gospel-centered life before them.

• "For to this you have been called, because Jesus Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in His steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly" (1 Peter 2:21-23).
• "Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles" (Matt. 5:39-41).
• "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven" (Matt. 7:44-45).
• "Repay no one evil for evil" (Rom. 12:17a)
• "Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God..." (Rom. 12:19)
• "If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, given him something to drink...(Rom. 12:20).
• "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Rom. 12:21).

Show them love and compassion in return for their evil...treating them with kindness when facing a beheading...displaying gentleness when they threaten to cut us to pieces...praying for them because they don't know what they're doing (like Jesus and Stephen) while they are praying to Allah for the strength to kill us.

And should the time come when we in the free West are threatened with death yet have in hand the opportunity to defend ourselves, may we remember that they are not ready for heaven, but we are. May we fight death with our death, entrusting that our God may yet give them another opportunity to repent so that they would not perish.

While the blood that a Muslim spills only fuels more bloodshed...the blood that a cross-centered Christian spills only fuels forgiveness, repentance, change, transformation, love, and overall, the gospel.

Teach the gospel to your children while they teach jihad to theirs. And may they be able to recite the truth of the gospel more loudly than Islamic children recite theirs. For in the end, that only thing that will separate the willing death of our children for their Savior from the willing death of the Muslim for Allah is the truth for which our children die. It is the true truth. They believe in a truth that teaches their entrance to heaven following a violent death experienced during murder. We believe in a truth that teaches our entrance to heaven following a willing and loving and forgiving death experienced during a murder. God cherishes the latter and not the former. And that is the gospel truth because our Savior said it, lived it, and died it.

How to Treat Others With Whom You Disagree

How to Treat Others With Whom You Disagree

The solution to this ordinary problem is really very simple...if we apply the gospel. Too often the tendency is to lower our esteem of them, or our opinion of them, our respect of them. But the gospel teaches us to treat others as God treats us in Christ.

When God looks at me, He sees Christ. Justification is in full force when I sin, for God sees me and treats me as one who is right with Him. In the same way, applying justification to others with whom we disagree means that when I look at that person, I choose to see Christ. Choosing to see them as God sees them eliminates or circumvents the faulty faculty of human reasoning and emotion. That part of us is fallen, and it reasons that since they disagree with us, our feelings are offended or altered in such a way that we don't feel the same way about them anymore, nor do we feel the same way toward them. Instantaneously, our fallen souls lower the esteem we formerly had for that person, and a new behavior toward them emanates.

But if we can capture our hearts in that moment, before our sinful heart begins to follow its natural habit...and if at that moment we can apply the doctrine of justification to our view of that person, purposing in our heart to view them just as God Himself does - as much as is humanly possible - our relationships cannot help but remain fully in tact.

Try this next time you find yourself disagreeing with a brother or sister in Christ, especially over something that gets your feathers ruffled...something that makes you irritated...something that hurts your feelings...something that offends you. Repeat to yourself the gospel truths about how God views you.

• You've been made right God through Christ.
• God has forgiven you of all your sin - past, present, and future because of Christ.
• God has poured out the riches of His blessings on you in Christ.
• You have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ.
• You've been reconciled to the Father and made His friend.
• He has promised His eternal love and favor toward you because of Christ.
• He will never allow anything to remove you from His preserving Hand.

Now, apply these same gospel truths to the one with whom you disagree, the one who offends or irritates. Repeat them to yourself about the other person. Repeat them several times if need be. The purpose is to repeat them so that the truth will settle into the recesses of your heart and mind, and so that know you will acknowledge, perceive, know, and treat the other person as God does. For it is only in so doing that we will remain united in spirit toward one another as Eph. 4:3 commands us.

Am I a Bad Mom if I Don't Homeschool My Kids?

Am I a Bad Mom if

I Don't Homeschool My Kids?

How the Gospel Influences

Parenting Standards

I'm doing my work this morning at Jittery Joe's...my favorite coffee shop...simply because it's one mile behind my house and Fourbucks (a.k.a. Starbucks) is about 15-20 minutes away.

While working on a project a mom with her 3 year old son walked into the shop and stopped by my table to say hello. Her children attend school where mine attend - a local Christian school here in Watkinsville, GA.

She inquired about how long we'd been attending the school, where we moved from, etc. She asked if were were homeschooling last year and I replied that we were, but that we found it difficult at this season in our lives. Heading back to Christian school was better for us right now.

She expressed to me that homeschooling was always on the forefront of her mind. She prayed constantly for the Lord to reveal to her when she should start. I replied that it just wasn't working for us since keeping the little ones constructively busy while educating the older ones was a bit more of a challenge than we could handle. In addition, maintaining a structure was important for their educational lives, given their individual personalities.

The response was telling - one that revealed an absence of the gospel...much like the absences I experience almost every single day. She responded that she was driving over to the shop and feeling guilty. The guilt, she said, was coming from that feeling that homeschooling was the best thing for her kids. If she wasn't giving them the best, she felt guilt.

What an opportunity to apply the gospel! I comforted her by letting her know that God makes no obligations anywhere in the Scriptures about how we educate our children. It's just not there in as explicit a manner as some would like to think. What is clear is in Ephesians 6 where God says we are to raise our children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I told this mom that with this command as our guiding principle, choosing a method of education which best equips us to do fulfill this obligation is our task. Christian school was doing that for her right now.

The gospel application is clear: God has released us and set us free from man-made traditions and human obligations which create a false sense of guilt. The gospel comfort for the mom this morning was in this truth: there is no condemnation because the Spirit of life in Christ has set her free from the law of sin, death, and guilt. Guilt for sin is gone...and false guilt for sin that is not committed is destroyed. The only obligations God makes on this mom and her husband are the ones spoken of by Jesus Christ, and homeschooling isn't one of them.

In response she immediately reflected a sigh of relief and joy broke out on her face. She responded that this was a divine appointment since she had been driving over here with guilt over the fact that she wasn't homeschooling. Another soul was set free from another element of bondage for another day by the same gospel.

Homeschooling is not the gospel. It is not the good news and those who believe it is are following another gospel. And homeschooling plus Jesus is not the gospel. There is no goodness in the news that in addition to following Jesus we must also homeschool our kids. Jesus Christ and His work for us is the gospel. That's the good news. And it's goodness produced joy in this dear woman today. It's news brings joy and it returns a sense of fulfillment in her parenting of the one little one that God has remaining in her home today.

Other Helpful Posts For This Topic:

• Beware of Sneaky Legalism
• Jesus Plus??
• Principalizing Scripture: A Trend Away From the Gospel
• How Does the Gospel Find Expression in Your Local Church?

The Gospel is a Better Fence Than the Consequences of Sin

The Gospel is a Better Fence Than the Consequences of Sin

For some time there was this sense in my Christian walk that I was being kept at bay from indulging myself in an ocean of sinful desires. What kept me at bay was the fence I stood behind. From my perspective, letting honesty speak, that fence was the fear of the consequences that would come upon me if I did jump into that ocean of sinful desire. In all honesty, I was scared to death of the aftermath. From God's perspective, however, that fence was His mercy. His Law and the effect it had on my conscience was His mercy to keep me not only from the earthly consequences of sin, but the eternal ones too.

I sensed the Lord's burden last week for other believers who find themselves in this condition of life right now. God would say to you to put that ocean and fence to your back and turn your gaze to heaven. It is from there that God can and will fill your heart, and it is in there (in heaven) that He desires you to indulge yourself.

What an awful state of life to be in, then, living the Christian life with a distant longing for sinful desires, while the only thing that keeps you away from it is your fear of what might happen if you do. While Law and fear of consequences are God's mercy, they are not God's best. There is no substance to such a life. Don't live another day simply being held back from your sinful desires by your fear of what will happen to you if you do sin. Instead, live from this moment onward fighting to turn your eyes and heart away from that ocean to heaven, begging King Jesus to capture your attention and enrapture your heart with His desires.

Jesus wants you to live by joy and not by fear.

Gospel-Centered Blogs

There aren't many out there that solely focus on the gospel. But Rick Pidcock of Living Worship recently listed the few that are. With the exception of Mark Lauterbach's Gospel-Driven Life, this is about it. Thanks Rick for including me in a group like this!

Taking Advantage of the Gospel, But Not Taking it for Granted

Taking Advantage of the Gospel...

But Not Taking it For Granted

Tension fills the Christian life. Only the honest believer who has embraced this truth is equipped to function along the way of the cross. I have come to see tension as one of the most important fundamentals of doing theology. Without an embracing of tension, one's theology is only tenuous. The ever-increasing and maturing ability to hold two seemingly competing or difficult truths in our hands at one time is the mark, I believe, of theological maturity. It is too easy to lean heavily toward one set of truths or another, depending on which set strikes our fancy. One day I hope to write a book on these tensions which fill our daily lives.

One of those tensions is applying the gospel to our sin. The gospel speaks of good news that is infinite in depth of love and breadth of forgiveness. God promises it to us under any circumstances and in any condition. There is no sin too great. No sin or history of sinfulness is a match for forgiveness. So when you sin…take advantage of the gospel!!!

But don't take it for granted. This comes from the double-mindedness that wants heaven and the beauties of Christ, but also wants to sin. This attitude leads to liscentiousness…that attitude which says that if God's grace is in fact infinite, then don't worry about sin, cause after all God will forgive it! It treats 1 John 1:9 as a "signature verse," as if confession is nothing more than sticking a check in front of God and asking Him to sign it without asking any questions. It gives no serious thought to repentance, to acknowledging the sobriety and necessity of self-control, self-discipline, and self-denial.

Take advantage of God's grace in the gospel, but don't take it for granted. Run to Jesus when you sin, just like Peter jumped the boat to swim to Jesus on shore. But don't indulge in sin while following Jesus, just like Judas maintained a covetous and thievous heart for money and power while folloing Jesus for three years. The cross is a tool God has given us to forgive sin, not enjoy it; to repent from it, not indulge in it; to defeat it, not ignore it.

The failure to properly embrace and handle this very tension has caused many who hear of the doctrines of grace, for example, to reject them. In their thinking, if the "U" in TULIP were true, then unconditional election would make us tend towards taking grace for granted. The failure in logic comes in at precisely this point: because it is true, unconditional election can't be true. The same argument would apply with the "P" for perseverance of the saints. If God will unfailingly keep us and preserve us from falling away, then the thought is that we will be tempted to just go out and do whatever the heck we want to. True again. The temptation will be there. But False again. That temptation does not necessarily mean that the "P" is not biblical.

Paul foresaw this error in logic in Romans 6, didn't he? He began the chapter with what he knew would be a very logical argument regarding the infinite supply of gospel grace. If God's grace is glorified and magnified because of man's sin, then the more we sin, the more God will be glorified. Right?

"Hell NO!" This is the most probable, common, modern-day, though slang translation of the strongest negation possible in the Greek language - me genoito! Accept my apologies if it offends, but try to see my goal. Paul's reasoning makes human reasoning seem illogical, showing us that it is possible to reason logically to a wrong conclusion. 1 plus 2 do not always equal 3, unless 1 and 2 have been biblically formulated.

The point is that yes! grace is infinite, always available, overwhelming, and overcoming our sin. And yes! we will be tempted to take it for granted by willfully sinning. But yes! we should take advantage of God's grace when we sin...even when we sin willfully. But no! we should not take it for granted, sinning however, whenever, and with whomever we please just because God will forgive us. Paul's case is clear enough in Romans 6 that our baptism with Christ precludes this kind of lifestyle altogether. And Romans 8 is even more clear that the Spirit of God within us won't let us get away with it.

So then, in conclusion, take advantage of the gospel, but don’t take it for granted.

Applying the Gospel to a Difficult Mother's Day Situation

Applying the Gospel to a Difficult Mother's Day Situation:

Gospel-Counsel to my Newly Converted Friend

I have a new brother...a brotha' from anotha' motha', as I now refer to him. His name is Gregory and on Easter Sunday the Lord delivered him from what appears to have been six to seven demonic spirits in a rather unusual yet biblical, supernatural clash against the gospel. He was a homeless man who came to our church during setup the day before. He came to stay with us that night, was delivered and regenerated the next day, and has been living with us ever since. Needless to say, twenty years on the streets with all the entrappings that go along with that lifestyle have not ceased to hang on like cobwebs which together we regularly seek out and tear down. One of those consequences in particular is an enstranged mother who chose several years ago to reject him as her son and today treats him with the utmost despise, even despite his miraculous change and abundance of spiritual fruit.

This presented a huge problem with mother's day rolled around last month. Gregory's predicament as a son is extremely difficult. At 49 years old he is the oldest of three, his youngest sibling being a 40 year old brother who has spent the last 20 plus years of his life in jail. Things were relatively fine between Greg and his mother until his mother reached 30 years old. She seemed to change overnight, according to Greg. She turned from being a woman of tender, motherly affection to a mother who treated her oldest son as an outcast.

Despite the checkered background Greg has had over the last 20 years, he can think of nothing in particular which would make his mother treat him, even to this day, with such disdain. He calls her regularly only to have his mother hang up on him. Gifts in the past have gone unopened, ignored, or thrown away. His heart breaks with anguish over what seemed to be an impossible situation, at least from a human perspective.

When Mother's Day was approaching I asked Greg what he intended on doing for his mother this year. He huffed with a grunted laugh, responding that whatever he did for for her would be rejected as always and just repeat the cycle of broken-heartedness and recovery. In the seconds following, however, he humbly inquired as to what I thought he ought to do. So with wisdom normally out of my reach, God's grace enabled me to respond with how the gospel applied to his situation. Here's what I explained to him.

The gospel is always focused on the Giver and the gift, and not the recipient or what he/she does with the gift. This is clearly the emphasis of the NT, and the Bible as a whole, in fact. Any positive response the recipients have toward God's gifts are in themselves a gift from God, so that the attention remains solely on God. This is what keeps the glory on God. He keeps giving no matter waht people do with those gifts. When we were helpless, when we were ungodly, when we were enemies of God, He gave His Son to us and Jesus gave His life for us (Rom. 10:6, 8, 10). And when we rejected His gift and remained His enemies, He still kept offering His gifts, didn't He?

None of us who are Christians will deny wht eventually happened though. God's persistence in giving finally won us over to the Savior. The whole force of the biblical definition of love in 1 Corinthians 13 plows us over with conviction because it reflects God. God is love (1 John 4:8). And God's love never fails (1 Cor. 13). Read the way The Message reflects this text.

In the end, I encouraged Gregoy that if this is what God did for us then we should do the same for others. By continuing to pursue his mother with acts of lovingkindness two manifestations of the gospel would well-up in his heart.

First, when such acts and attempts are rejected or ignored we gain a needed remembrance of how often we ourselves responded the same way toward God's repeated acts of love.

Second, we experience another needed remembrance of the truth that His love for us eventually defeated our rejection of His love.

It is this last truth in the gospel that gives Gregory hope. He can hope in a God who will be stopped by nothing to win over His elect, including their own willful rejections. God is greater than our sin. God is greater than my sin. God is greater than Gregory's sin. And God is greater than Gregory's mother's sin.

Pray for the gospel to take deep root in Gregory's heart. And pray for the gospel to defeat his mother's hatred with soul-satisfying true love.