Holiness

5 Questions To Ask During Your Devotions

In my experience, many people don’t do daily devotions because they don’t know how to do them. Do they drop their Bible to see where it randomly opens to? Do they choose a book and simply read through it? Do they pick up a devotional book and see where it leads them?

One of the best pieces of advice that I got was when I was in college. I was told (I cannot remember who it was from) to go through a book of the Bible and ask five questions of every passage that I read. these are the five questions:

  1. What is the main point of this section of Scripture?
    The first thing I need to do is to understand what God is saying rather than what I think it means. It does me no good to have my own interpretation but rather I need to seek what God’s point of this passage is. That means that I need to pray about what He is saying and ask Him to bring it to my mind.

  2. What does this text say about God?
    The Bible is primarily a book about God revealing Himself to us. Salvation is primarily about us being restored to a relationship with God so that we can enjoy Him. The purpose of creation is for God to proclaim His Glory. Everything must be first and foremost about God and His glory. We are not the purpose of the Bible. The devotionals that focus only on us and applying truths to our lives are vastly off the path. The Bible is about God. So, that means that I need to ask every time what this particular passage is saying about God. Who is He? What has He done? How is this describing Him? How is He revealing Himself to these particular people in that particular time? How do I see this aspect of God in my life today? If we miss this question then we miss God and therefore the whole point of the Bible.

  3. What does this text say about Man?
    The Bible is primarily about God but it is also about God’s relationship with Man. How does God relate to Man? What state is Man in? What does this text say about sin? What does this say about living out the image of God? What does this text say about us living in a community? We need to know what this text is telling us about ourselves. We need the good, the bad, and the ugly (even if the ugly is REALLY ugly).

  4. What does this text say about Salvation?
    It is not enough to read the Bible to be convicting. Our devotional duty isn’t done merely when we feel bad for how we have lived. We need to run to the Cross. Whether in the Old Testament or the New Testament, what does this text tell me about how I need to be saved? What does this text tell me about how I am saved by Jesus? What really happened on the Cross? What did Jesus’ death accomplish? How does God bring me to Himself?

  5. What does this text say about Sanctification?
    Jesus’ death didn’t merely purchase our conversion but it also purchased our living the Christian life. How does this text show me what godly living is? What commands are in this text? What is obedience according to this text? There is a tendency in Reformed circles today to forget that God still commands Christians. The Law does not merely lead us to the Cross but the Law also shows us how we can live a life pleasing to God. Christians are still supposed to obey the Law. God’s Law shows us what God delights in and God’s Law shows us what the good life really is. We cannot forget this last question but we also cannot seek to fulfill this on our own power. We must prayerfully ask the Holy Spirit to enable us to live this way and when we fail we must ask the Spirit to help us repent. The Cross doesn’t cancel our need to obey but rather empowers our obedience.

One Of The Most Convicting Blog Posts I've Ever Read

My wife finds great blog posts from other people that I miss throughout the week. This very well might be a gift from the Lord because she often finds articles and blogs that are spot-on for what I am looking for.

While preparing to preach from Romans 14-16 in a couple of weeks I have been looking into the topic of peacemaking in the church. As this is on the horizon, my wife sent me a blog post from Kevin DeYoung that perfectly fits the bill for what I was looking for. The title of the blog post is “Distinguishing Marks of a Quarrelsome Person”. The following are some of the marks that are included on DeYoung’s list of 12.

1. You defend every conviction with the same degree of intensity. There are no secondary or tertiary issues. Everything is primary. You’ve never met a hill you wouldn’t die on.

2. You are quick to speak and slow to listen. You rarely ask questions and when you do it is to accuse or to continue prosecuting your case. You are not looking to learn, you are looking to defend, dominate, and destroy.

4. You are incapable of seeing nuances, and you do not believe in qualifying statements. Everything in life is black and white without any gray.

7. You are unable to sympathize with your opponents. You forget that sinners are also sufferers. You lose the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes.

8. Your first instinct is to criticize; your last instinct is to encourage. Quarrelsome people almost always see others in need of rebuke, rarely in need of refreshing.

11. You are always in the trenches with hand grenades strapped to your chest, never in the cafeteria with ice cream and ping pong. I remember years ago talking to a returning serviceman in my church who told me sheepishly that his job in Iraq was to drive an armed convoy for the ice cream truck. It was extremely dangerous, escorting the vehicle through bomb infested territory. This was brave, honorable work. And important: Even soldiers need ice cream once in a while. The amp doesn’t have to be cranked to 11 all the time. Seriousness about God is not the same as pathological seriousness about everything. Remember G. K. Chesterton: “We have to feel the universe at once as an ogre’s castle, to be stormed, and yet as our own cottage, to which we can return to at evening.”

This article is a fabulous and convicting read but certainly, one that will rightly humble us. For the full article, click here.

Quote of the Day

This quote from Francis Grimke (1850-1937) comes from Caleb Cangelosi’s compilation of Grimke’s “Meditations On Preaching”. This is not necessarily about preaching but rather it is a quote that I think strikes at the heart of our culture today.

The man to be respected and held in high estimation is not the one whose home is expensively furnished but the one whose soul is arrayed in the beautiful garments of righteousness, however meager his material resources may be. It is the man of upright character, of sterling worth, that is to be respected and honored.

Satan's Will for Your Life

How does God want His children to live? The answer is found in the pages of the Bible, particularly his "holy and righteous and good" commandments (Romans 7:12). But how does Satan want you to live? In a way contrary to the commandments of God, of course. If you took each of the ten commandments and turned it inside out, like a photo negative (remember those??), what would you get? I think you'd get something that looked like this...