A Call to Rest
June 24, 2008 | Leave a Comment
Lar,
Great job keeping up with the blogging as of late. I have been more than a little scattered lately and know that I have been taking on too many things. And trusting in completing those things rather than in the Savior. My various functional gods have certainly left me worn out and rest has been difficult to come by. But I read something tonight that helped me gain much needed perspective. It didn’t change everything right away. Still hasn’t, but it served as a needed exhortation to trust in Jesus Christ and not in what I do (or, as has been much more accurate as of late, what I fail to do).
It’s a poem I wrote about 2 years ago, entitled, “A Call to Rest.” I wrote another poem designed to be read in the morning about 2 months prior to this one (entitled, “A Call to Battle”). It’s a good one, I believe, but after consistently failing to embody all that I exhorted myself to in the first, I felt compelled one night to write the following words. I am glad that I did. For even though I had to answer ‘No’ (more or less) to every question I posed, I was greatly encouraged by the final exhortation. When down, it is good to be reminded of good news!
This day is now in closing,
It is prime-time to reflect:
Did you fight for joy in Jesus
Or live just like the rest?
Did you heed the call to battle?
Fight the fight of faith?
Walk by God the Spirit?
Struggle by His grace?
Did you pursue His glory
Or chase after your own?
Did earthly comforts capture you
Or joys of your heavenly home?
Did you wait upon His Person?
Seek His will and word?
Stretch your heart unto the nations
Who’ve never seen nor heard?
Did you embrace the trials,
No matter large or small
And see God in the details
Working good within them all?
All this is to ask simply,
Were you faithful with your lot?
Did the beauty of your Savior
Shine bright or did it not?
No matter your honest answer,
Think one thing before you rest:
If your hope is all in Jesus,
He’s now your righteousness.
Let no boasting rise within you,
Save in the cross of Christ,
And no sorrow overtake you,
For Christ is now your life.
This day is done and over,
What you missed, God only knows,
Throw your head upon the pillow,
Trusting Christ—your soul’s repose.
Reasonable Delay
April 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment
Lar,
I just figured I would post a little picture explaining why I have been missing the past few days. Her name, as you know, is Naomi Kathryn and she was born on Sunday at 5:30 pm (Turkish time). Lord willing, I will be back soon. God shows Himself faithful time and again brother. I have also seen as of late the way in which the Lord oftentimes prepares us for blessing by showing us we don’t deserve it! I am certainly unworthy of all the blessings I receive, but praise God for the work on Christ, in whom all the promises of God find their ‘Yes.’
Boasting in Him,
Joe
Little Laz (Lord Willing)
November 24, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
You are now free to fill in Blog Nation as to why you have to amend the second paragraph of the ‘What is this Blog?’ page.
Hope you guys are having a nice time with the Cochran’s!
Larry
Wow
November 15, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
That is stunning. The ‘Your Best Life Now’ board game? I know I have been writing a lot lately, but that leaves me speechless. And to think that people would actually pay $35 for it? Stunningly horrifying. If ever there was a ’super-apostle’ (See 2 Cor. 11), I think Osteen is it. I thought the millions of Jabez products a few years ago was crazy, but this is taking the use of godliness as a means of financial gain to entirely new heights.
Lord, have mercy on us.
Larry
Gone…
October 31, 2006 | Leave a Comment
I’m heading to the shore for a four-day spiritual retreat (a lovely birthday gift from my wife), so there will likely be no blogging from me until Saturday or Sunday.
I’m sure Joe can faithfully satisfy our hungry readers (all three of them).
Larry
Mercy
August 17, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Well, I must confess that today is a day in which I really don’t feel like writing anything on this blog. But Joe is in the midst of having to preach four times in five days, so I don’t expect that we’ll be hearing from him too much until next week. Unless of course he chooses to do what I do, which is use his notes from sermons to keep the blog going!
Anyway, Michelle and I have been reading through Job together, and today we read chapter 7. As we read, we were struck by the incredible mercy of God, that He did not simply strike Job dead because of his grumbling against the Almighty! Job says to God, “I loathe my life; I would not live forever. Leave me alone, for my days are a breath….If I sin, what do I do to you, you watcher of mankind? Why have you made me your mark? Why have I become a burden to you?” (7:16, 20).
I just can’t imagine being in a place spiritually where I would say to God, “Leave me alone.” I know I have had days where it felt like God had left me alone, but to actually ask God to leave you alone? You see how low Job’s condition really was.
And it just makes me marvel that God does not simply kill him right on the spot! It is amazing that He doesn’t kill us all on the spot! For to some degree, we have all grumbled at the providence of God at some point in our lives. I mean, when we grumble about a traffic back-up, what are we really doing but grumbling against our Maker, who works all things (even traffic jams!) after the counsel of His will? In a thousand ways every day, we receive blessing from His merciful hand. Yet the second something goes wrong (and granted, Job’s plight truly was terrible) we complain.
I walked away from Job 7 this morning marveling at God’s mercy, knowing that to whatever extent Job was guilty of sin here, I am 10,000 times more guilty. And only when we know the depth of our guilt can we truly delight in the riches of His grace.
Thankful for the One whose mercies are new every morning,
Larry
A Reminder
August 16, 2006 | Leave a Comment
INDIA 
(Compass Direct)
(Gospel for Asia)
In July, three students from a Gospel for Asia Bible College in Maharashtra were hospitalized after being attacked and severely beaten by a group of anti-Christian extremists. A month later, two pastors’ wives were stripped and beaten before a village council for their faith in Christ. Both incidents are evidence of the growing oppression of Christians in central India, reports Gospel for Asia President K.P. Yohannan. The three students, along with a few Christians from a local church, were returning from sharing the gospel in a neighboring village when they were attacked. The Hindu fundamentalists beat the believers with belts and large sticks, and pummeled them with their fists. A group of local residents saw the attack and intervened to break up the beating and rescue the believers. The pastors’ wives in Chhattisgarh state were “dragged before the community council, stripped naked and beaten for accepting Jesus and following Him,” reported GFA regional leader M.A. Lalachan.
“Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.” (Hebrews 13:3)
Forgive us, Father, for forgetting far too often.
Piper on Preaching
August 15, 2006 | Leave a Comment
One of the ways in which gracious affections (to use Edwards’ term again) are awakened in the hearts of His people is through the wonderful gift of preaching. And here lies another reason why the affections are so neglected and minimized in this day, because the vital importance of preaching is being marginalized in this day. People do not want to hear someone yell, it is reasoned, and so “seeker-sensitive” churches use other ways to make people feel comfortable. But there is something unmistakably beautiful about the glorious truth of Scripture being preached by a man “dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty, and holiness of God” (to quote George Whitefield). John Piper had this to say about the urgent need for a revival of powerful preaching at the Together for the Gospel Conference this past April:
“God did not ordain the cross of Christ or create the lake of fire in order to communicate the insignificance of belittling his glory. The death of the Son of God and the damnation of unrepentant human beings are the loudest shouts under heaven that God is infinitely holy, and sin is infinitely offensive, and wrath is infinitely just, and grace is infinitely precious, and our brief life—and the life of every person in your church and in your community—leads to everlasting joy or everlasting suffering. If our preaching does not carry the weight of these things to our people, what will? Veggie Tales? Radio? Television? Discussion groups? Emergent conversations?
“God planned for his Son to be crucified (Revelation 13:8; 2 Timothy 1:9) and for hell to be terrible (Matthew 25:41) so that we would have the clearest witnesses possible to what is at stake when we preach. What gives preaching its seriousness is that the mantle of the preacher is soaked with the blood of Jesus and singed with fire of hell.”
That’s well said, John! If anyone is reading this, nothing would make me happier than for you to pray consistently that God would mold me into such a preacher. Who knows what God could do with a few thousand men who were so burdened for the realities of heaven and hell that every sermon was “soaked with the blood of Jesus and singed with the fire of hell”?
To read Piper’s manuscript of the message in which this quote came from, click here. To Download the message for $2, see the Sovereign Grace Ministries Online Store. You can also snoop around there to get the regular audio version for $5.
Larry
Last Thoughts on Religious Affections (at least for now!)
August 15, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
What a feast the Religious Affections is! My day off of reading became a day of saturating myself with the thought of Edwards. I read 60-70 pages yesterday, and my heart was truly soaring. I am seeing something in how he is writing, an area that he emphasizes, which we would be wise to likewise emphasize: that just because you have affections for God does not mean you are truly born again.
I think that is why some people are very hesitant to embrace the centrality of the affections in the Christian life. This goes back to what we were talking about the other day, with why people are a bit “afraid” to embrace a ministry like John Piper’s or Jonathan Edwards. We often talk about the necessity of affections, and that if you do not have strong feelings for God, you cannot be assured that you really know Him. Right thinking about God and external obedience to God’s commands does not automatically make you a believer, if something profound has not happened in your heart which gives you a taste for the spiritual beauty of Christ.
We talk a lot about that, and well we should, given how much the Bible says about it! But far less do we say: Just because you have those strong emotions, and just because you cry at prayer meetings and shout joyfully your praises to God, etc. this does not necessarily make you a Christian. Edwards does a masterful job of showing that many “religious affections” cannot be used to determine whether a person is truly born again. Maybe the reason why so many people are hesitant to embrace the role of the emotions, is because they hear so many talk about spiritual experiences in which their hearts were greatly affected, yet the bulk of their lives reveal that no miracle of grace has really happened in their lives.
But Edwards uses much more balance in his presentation than we do! We say so often, you must feel, delight, treasure, rejoice, etc. And yes, we must! But Edwards shows biblically how to distinguish between “gracious” affections (ie. those that result truly from the work of the Spirit in salvation) and “natural” affections, which a person may have to a strong degree for God and Christ, and yet not truly be in the household of faith.
This post has probably generated more questions than answers, but hopefully that points readers to Edwards’ work. It really is a must read! To those who have only read books written in the 20th or 21st century it may take some slowing down in reading, but his language really is not that difficult for those who are willing to think. And what could be more important to think about, than discerning what the heart of a true Christian looks like!
Grateful to God for the great saints that have walked before us,
Larry
Great Edwards Quote
August 14, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Sorry, but I had to interrupt my personal reading party to share this great quote from Religious Affections. I suggest you read it slowly two or three times, then pray earnestly that God’s people would be full of both heat and light!
“Although to true religion there must indeed be something else besides affection; yet true religion consists so much in the affections, that there can be no true religion without them. He who has no religious affection, is in a state of spiritual death, and is wholly destitute of the powerful, quickening, saving influences of the Spirit of God upon his heart. As there is no true religion where there is nothing else but affection, so there is no true religion where there is no religious affection. As on the one hand, there must be light in the understanding, as well as an affected fervent heart; where there is heat without light, there can be nothing divine or heavenly in that heart; so on the other hand, where there is a kind of light without heat, a head stored with notions and speculations, with a cold and unaffected heart, there can be nothing divine in that light, that knowledge is no true spiritual knowledge of divine things. If the great things of religion are rightly understood, they will affect the heart. The reason why men are not affected by such infinitely great, important, glorious, and wonderful things, as they often hear and read of, in the Word of God, is undoubtedly because they are blind; if they were not so, it would be impossible, and utterly inconsistent with human nature, that their hearts should be otherwise than strongly impressed, and greatly moved by such things.”
Larry
Human Worth and the Necessity of Fellowship
August 14, 2006 | 1 Comment
As I wrote last night, the heart of my message from Psalm 139 was to show that God has uniquely fashioned each and every human being to reflect His infinite worth in a way that only that person can. No one else in the history of the world — past, present, or future, can display the glory of God the way each of us can. This truth is simply astounding!
And this truth has such huge implications for our every day relationships with family, friends, co-workers, especially those brothers and sisters who join us in the household of faith. If it is true that each of us was fearfully and wonderfully made to reflect the worth of God, then it is true that each of us has the ability to reflect the worth of God to our neighbor in a way that no one else can. Should this truth not transform the importance we place on relationships with other people, and should it not cause us to examine what our relationships are really built upon?
Should we not, then, saturate these relationships with the things that really matter in life? Should we not read Scripture together, and pray together, and share our hearts’ desires and dreams and fears and life experiences together? How often we waste this remarkable gift that God has given us, that He has put people in our lives who can reflect the glory of Christ to us in a way that no one else can! At the end of The Weight of Glory, CS Lewis says,
“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations…There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal…Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbor he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.”
What a heavy truth this is! Each of us has breath in our lungs to reflect the glory of God to one another, and we have been knitted together intimately and lovingly by God Almighty for that high calling. So what shall we do when we get together, watch movies together and eat food and talk about mindless triviality? The people we encounter daily (in all of life, but especially, I believe, in the household of faith) have been fashioned in the image of God, to reflect the infinite worth of the God that we claim to love and worship. Can we really treat one another with such indifference, or ascribe worth to each other based on the things that Jesus calls an abomination? How silly, that we should complement one another on our hair or outfit or athletic ability, and not affirm the things that really matter: passion for Christ and zealous ministry for the sake of making Him known!
It is folly to ignore one another and get excited about sun rises, because next to Jesus Christ Himself, nothing in all of creation bears witness to the glory of God more than the people we encounter every day. Let’s pursue fellowship together like we really believe that! And I thank you, Joe, for being one person in my life who constantly reminds me of how much is at stake in the relationships that we have.
Larry
More on Religious Affections
August 14, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
You are right in saying Monday is my day off, but I don’t know if I would call it my blogging day! I do have a nice, three-hour chunk of time set aside for some reading, which I am quite excited about. Religious Affections, Biblical Eldership and finishing Spiritual Depression are how the day is to be spent, followed by some time with Michelle.
Before I posted about fellowship as I had said I would, I wanted to add a bit to what you had said regarding the affections and why Edwards’ thesis that true religion consists much in holy affections seems to be ignored by so many who esteem Edwards as a great man of God and theologian.
You had posed the question, “could it be that one main reason why we don’t emphasize the centrality of religious affections in the Christian life is because we have so little of them?”
I think you are exactly right, Joe. The thesis that Edwards works out in this volume, and the heart of John Piper’s message (who is really just re-stating Edwards’ theology for today’s generation) is extremely threatening to nominal Christianity. There are, I believe, millions of professing Christians who have made a “decision” to follow Jesus, have cleaned up gross immorality (like excessive drinking and such things) from their lives, go to church weekly and put their tithes in the offering plate, even spend time in daily devotions, and yet their hearts do not burn with a passion for Jesus Christ. He is not their highest delight, as Edwards says, “the cream of all their pleasures”. Now these people are working very hard to convince themselves and others that they are not nominal Christians. And by and large, they do a good job of it. They feel comfortable and secure in delighting in the things of the world and having a relationship with Jesus on the side as well.
But then a guy like Edwards or Piper comes along (or far more importantly, King David and the Apostle Paul and Peter and Jesus Himself!) and levels a knockout punch to dead religious ritual that is devoid of pleasure in the Person and work of Jesus Christ:
“One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.” (Psalm 27:4)
“As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.” (Psalm 42:1)
“But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:7-8)
“Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory,” (1 Peter 1:8)
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” (Matthew 13:44)
“You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said: “ ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”” (Matthew 15:7-9)
And you know full well, I could go on and on with these texts. They are devastating to nominal Christianity that does all the right things yet lacks an inner fire for the glories of Jesus Christ. That is the essence of what the New Birth brings, a totally new disposition that sees and savors beauty in the face of Christ when once there was nothing but boredom and indifference.
But so many people do not want to hear this; they only want to hear that they are comfortable and heaven-bound because they have acknowledged some facts about Jesus that has left no impression on their souls. Revive Your people, O God, and birth in us a delight in Christ that makes all else the world offers look like refuse in the light of You!
For the sake of space, I’ll save my thoughts on fellowship for the next post!
Satisfy us this morning, Lord, with You and Your steadfast love,
Larry
God’s Worth and Ours
August 13, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Well, I guess Joe had too many milkshakes today to get anything up, so I wanted to at least post something so he wouldn’t feel like we’ve failed Blog Nation.
The title of this post was the title of my message tonight, and I took my text from Psalm 139. Specifically the words, “I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” It is astounding to consider that God Almighty fashioned each of us intimately and uniquely in a way that we alone can put on display the infinite wealth of His glory for the enjoyment of others. May this, and not our attainment of worldly accolades that Jesus finds unimpressive and irrelevant, be the foundation of our sense of worth.
It is a remarkable thing to consider that with the vast beauty of sunsets and trees and flowers and oceans, that when God wanted to create something “in His image”, something that would represent Him and display Him more than any other part of creation, He chose to create us.
My prayer is that this truth would not compel us to get excited about ourselves, but to pour our lives out in striving to make every second of our lives reflect His incomparable worth.
Tomorrow I want to write a bit about the implications of this truth of being uniquely made in His image for our fellowship with one another as believers.
Humbled at being fearfully and wonderfully made,
Larry
Missions for His Name’s Sake
August 12, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
That’s good stuff, brother. So good that I don’t have the time to post all that I want to say in response! So that I will not forget, let me say what I hope to get back to in the next couple of days: 1. the beauty of fellowship, 2. Music constantly being on around us. Now I am asking for some grace tomorrow because Sunday is always a long day with preaching. But I hope that by Monday I’ll be able to address those two things.
But I wanted to say something in response to the article you posted for our enjoyment. It was indeed well said, and funny because I just picked up the Religious Affections yesterday to begin re-reading it. I love Edwards’ thesis: True religion consists much in holy affections.
Specifically, the article helped me apply the Chambers quote to the area of missions. Why do we preach the gospel to others? Why do we travel to far-away countries to share the love of Christ? If I’m understanding Chambers right, the answer is not, “Because we want people to be saved.” Certainly we do want people to be saved, but I don’t think that is the deepest, most fundamental answer for preaching the gospel. The deepest reason is, that the glory of God might be heralded among all peoples and the knowledge of glory might fill the earth as the waters cover the sea. And of course, it doesn’t really matter what Chambers says in the end, it matters what the Word of God say! The Scriptural battle call to missions is,
“For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts.” (Malachi 1:11)
“Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!…Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns!” (Psalm 96:3, 10)
This is so subtle, but so deeply important for us to get right! And it seems as I look even at the landscape of the American Church, that we are not getting it right. The glory of God, seen most vividly in the cross of Christ, has tragically become a means to some other end: self-esteem, peace of mind, a sense of purpose and hope, health and wealth, escape from hell, etc. Instead, the glory of God must be the center of all things, our only hope of everlasting joy.
There is sweet fellowship with you brother, in that both of our hearts are jealous for that one glorious end for which all things were made. From Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to Him be glory forever and ever. Amen! May we expend our energies exploring, expositing, and extolling the glories of Jesus Christ (Sinclair Ferguson’s words, not mine!)
With you not in body, but in spirit,
Larry
Oswald Chambers Getting it Done!
August 12, 2006 | Leave a Comment
Joe,
Blog Nation welcomes you back. I trust you’ll have a milkshake for me in State College!
Many thanks to a friend who will remain nameless (that his praise might be from God, and not men) who made me aware of a terrific quote from Oswald Chambers. I’ve not read anything from him in a few years and I’m not sure where this quote comes from, but what a word it is for the contemporary American Evangelical Church:
“Whenever the passion for souls obscures the passion for Christ, Satan has come in as an angel of light.”
The enemy is indeed crafty, and I fear that this is exactly the mentality that has infiltrated the church these days. In our desire to get people saved, we have watered down the gospel to the point that passion for Jesus Christ is not even necessary. I fear that the result is that millions of people in this country are thinking they have become Christians because they have prayed a prayer “accepting Jesus into their hearts”, who have not a hint of delight in the supremacy of Christ. They will be among the ones who hear Jesus say on the last day, “Depart from Me, you evildoers. I never knew you.” (See Matthew 7:21-23).
Father, forbid that in being passionate about souls, passion for Your name and renown would vanish from our churches. Bring a great revival of true Christianity to our churches, whereby millions of people would see and be stunned at the riches of Your glory in the face of Christ. Such a revival will happen only when Christ and His cross are proclaimed with a fire that is inexplicable in the eyes of the world. Guard our churches, Father, that the salvation of souls would never replace the supremacy of the Savior. Let us rejoice in the salvation of Your elect first and foremost because it is to the praise of Your glorious grace. May the name and renown of Jesus Christ be the desire of our souls. Amen.
Jealous for the hallowing of God’s Name,
Larry
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