Random Monday Musings

January 29, 2007

Joe,

Thanks for keeping things rolling the last few days, it is very nice to have this be a ‘conversation’ between two friends rather than the monologue it has been over the past few weeks. Then I went away and left you to do a monologue with yourself!

The title of this post suggests that I am still getting back in the swing of the things after the retreat this past weekend, and I probably won’t be fully in ‘blog-mode’ until tomorrow (whatever being in blog-mode means!). But I did want to thank you for your informative posts over the last couple of days and for getting us back into the gospel of John! Good stuff, brother, on the glorious workings of the Triune God.

Also, I had intended to put that Mohler article up and it slipped my mind, but we were exactly on the same page with that one. Reading is often scoffed at by people who think that Christians should just get out there and do something rather than fill their minds with information. But I trust it’s your conviction too that right actions that honor Christ will flow out of the apprehension of right thinking about Him. And if our thinking does not manifest itself in acts of love, then we haven’t learned as we need to!

The retreat was quite a blessing, to my own soul and I hope to many of our students. Preaching five messages was incredibly humbling. Because there was so much to prepare, I felt totally unprepared going into most of the messages. I mean, I did do preparation, but it is a lot different when five messages are going through the brain than just the one that is usually burning within me. My mind was all over the place and as I stood up before the group at the beginning of each session, I was truly desperate for God to speak through me because I knew that in and of myself, I had nothing.

And of course, that is a great place to be: utterly dependent on the Almighty and desperate for His mercy. Each session, He came through in a mighty way, and it was encouraging to know that it had nothing to do with me, and all to do with Him and His glorious grace. Of course, time will tell what the enduring fruit is in the students who heard the challenge to ‘run in such a way as to win the prize.’ But I know that I was blessed in seeing God glorify Himself by sustaining me physically and spiritually through a couple of draining days. Thanks to all those who were praying for me.

I also had a hearty Amen for you in the area of the Lord’s Supper. We finished the retreat yesterday morning by taking the Lord’s Supper together, and it was a sweet and sobering time. Those two words do not fit together well in the bulk of our culture, but in the eyes of the Kingdom some of the sweetest things in life are also very sobering. Life is indeed serious. Joyful, but serious.

Anyway, yesterday was the first time I was able to lead the time of communion and it was a great blessing. It is true that the Lord’s Supper can become such a routine that it loses its spiritual beauty and wonder. But God really opened my eyes yesterday to see what a staggering thing it is to be able to ‘proclaim the Lord’s death’ in the taking of the elements. It was for me, a highlight of the weekend, and a great way to keep the Cross at the center of a weekend which had to do in large part with our response to God in the pursuit of Him.

Even in our daily pursuit, we are utterly dependent on the Cross: “Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own” (Phil. 3:12). We run hard after God not because it is the way of obtaining favor with Him, but because Christ has made us His own by faith alone. And even that faith was a God-given gift! The pursuit of God is the evidence of salvation, not the means of obtaining salvation. So to run the race we must keep our eyes firmly fixed on the saving work of Christ crucified for sinners. The Lord’s Supper was a great reminder of that yesterday.

Alright, these have truly been some random musings, but I wanted to at least get up an update and thank you for your prayers. I may be taking it easy on the blog the rest of the day, but I am grateful that you have been making up for lost time the last couple of days!

Talk to you later, brother,

Larry

Posted by Larry | Filed Under Random Musings 

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