Luke 1:1-4 (A Devotional Commentary)

Intro

No one is like Jesus. The man that lived 2,000 years ago has everything to do with us today. God deserves to be praised by the whole host of angels and the elect for all eternity merely for the fact that He preserved for us the Gospel according to Luke. Here, we see Jesus the Son of God who came for sinners and sufferers. No, Luke is not the only Gospel account but there are those distinct flavors that Luke gives us that leave us in a holy awe. Luke loves to set forth a Jesus who comes for the poor, broken, outcast, and sinner. He loves to highlight biblical-theological themes such as the Sabbath, the Gentiles, and the Holy Spirit. Beale & Gladd, in The Story Retold, say that the purpose of Luke is to show that Jesus is “the Spirit-anointed king, [who] overthrows Satan and his minions that enslave Israel and the nations in bondage of sin” (Beale & Gladd p. 100).

In this devotional commentary, I have decided not to comment on every word or phrase but simply those that seem to stand out and contribute to the main point of the text. The goal is that you might be able to take this and use it for your own devotions. I have tried to provide some exegetical insights but in such a way that is edifying. In other words, I’m trying to ask the question, “Why does it matter that this word is written in this way?” After the commentary, I have written an application section that you can use to apply to your own life.

Commentary

• (v1) Luke writes with certainty that the things of Jesus happened. It’s almost as if he takes it for granted that they’re historical. There is no sense of questioning whether these things happened or not. It’s a matter of what they mean and what they mean for the world. This word for “have been accomplished” is a perfect passive participle meaning that what has definitely happened in the past has everything to do with us today. In other words, the things of Jesus that happened thirty years prior still have massive consequences for Luke, his audience, and even us today. It’s like he’s saying, “Buckle up because everything that I am about to tell you about what was accomplished back then has everything to do with you right now.”

• (v2) The fact that Luke mentions that there were eyewitness accounts strengthens what he is trying to say. There is no doubt that these things happened. It’s not a matter of if they happened but rather how will we respond to them? Luke lived in an eyewitness world. That was their main source of documenting historical events. It was a reliable way of telling the truth. These eyewitness accounts were not to be hidden so that no one could back up what Luke was saying. They were to be sought out, as Luke himself sought them out, in order for everyone to see that this really is true. Remember, as Joshua Foer talks about in Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, that the art of memory recall was essentially a virtuous trait back then. It was something people highly valued. “A strong memory was seen as the greatest virtue since it represented the internalization of a universe of external knowledge…Indeed, the single most common theme in the lives of the saints—besides their superhuman goodness—is their often extraordinary memories” (Foer p. 96). In other words, if you had a good memory of true events then you were a very important person.

• (v2) These “ministers” are more so “servants” of the word. They serve the truth to us like faithful butlers in the master’s house. 

• (v3) “It seemed good to me also” → This seems to piggyback off of the fact that there were others who “served” the word. Luke is wanting to serve as well. He is not doing this for selfish gain or political power. Indeed, this would most likely only endanger his life. When he says “it seemed good”, he means really that “it seemed best”. What could possibly be better than writing down an account of the most important person who ever lived on this earth? Even more so, what could be better than to write a Gospel account of the only Savior for wretched sinners? It’s so good that we could look over and over and over at Luke’s Gospel account and never get bored. 

• (v3) Also, notice this. Luke says that he has followed all things closely for some time. What does he mean? The BDAG lexicon says this word has been used in phrases such as: “to pay careful attention to something in a segment of time, to follow a thing, to follow a course of events, to take note of”; “one well acquainted with the affairs from the very beginning”; “I bring my charges as one who has accurate knowledge and has followed everything”; “personal acquaintance as opposed to information secured second-hand”. Isn’t that beautiful? Luke is saying that he is not making this stuff up. This word is a perfect, active, participle which conveys to us, once again, that these are past events that have everything to do with us in the future. This Gospel account is not just a history book in which people may approach it with a “take it or leave it” mentality. You are confronted with its truth. You are compelled to make a decision. You are face to face with the ultimate reality of all things. How awesome must this Jesus be?

• (v4) Why is Luke writing to Theophilus? He wants him to have “an orderly account...that you may have certainty”. Theophilus seems to have heard some of this already but Luke is giving him more certainty that it’s true. Luke thinks it’s worth all his hard work to compile this account so that Theophilus might have a thorough understanding of Jesus. Luke wants him to grow in his knowledge of Jesus. Isn’t that eternal life (Jn. 17:3)? Our problem is not that we know too much. Our problem is that we know too little about Jesus. We need to grow in our knowledge of Jesus!

Application

Isn’t this where spiritual warfare from the dark lord can come in? He can tell us that the works of Jesus back then don’t apply to us today. He can say, “That was just for them back then. You’re a different case. You can’t trust what you see in this gospel account.” Doesn’t the world tell us the same thing?

Doesn’t the world say, “How can you know that’s true? You can’t trust that Bible. Our Enlightenment gurus have already shown us that the Bible isn’t accurate.”

Isn’t this also what the flesh tells us? We throw our own doubts and unbelief in the mix as well. “Jesus may have forgiven that woman in Luke 7:36-50 but I don’t know if He will forgive me. I know Jesus told the parable of the Father running after His sinful children in Luke 15 but I don’t know if that applies to me today. I’ve done too much. I’ve used my last straw.”

Don’t you see how important these verses are for us? These things have everything to do with us today. They don’t wait for us in heaven. They apply to this life and this realm. It applies in this world with these people. In other words, by faith, you can claim these. Even more so, by faith, you must claim these! They are yours in Christ! The dark lord knows they are yours and that’s why he wants to keep you thinking that “maybe, just maybe” they don’t apply to you. 

6 Reasons Why We Need A Reformation In The Sports World

Few things are as untamed by Christians as sports. Few areas of life have the gospel unapplied to it like sports. We are desperate for thoughtful Christians to reform their approach to sports. Without wasting any more time, here are 6 reasons why:

1. Prosperity Gospel
   Much of the “Christianity” and “gospel” that is presented in the sports world is of a genie-like God (more like “god”) who wants nothing more than for you and your team to be successful. He wants you to stay safe and uninjured. He wants you to win every game and always be a good sport. And, of course, He likes your team more than He likes the other team—but, we’re still going to be nice to them.
   I’ve been around it, heard it, and still witness it. From parents to team chaplains, from players to coaches, this is rampant in the sports world. It’s amazing how evangelicals so quickly adopt a sports version of the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel as soon as they step onto the field.

   When is the last time you’ve heard a pregame prayer when someone prayed: Father, do whatever it takes tonight to cause us to be less self-reliant and more dependent on you. Do whatever it takes to make an eternal impact on our souls. If we win, if we play well, don’t let it take away our love for Christ. If we lose, if we don’t play well, expose our idols and cause us to love each other even when we lose.
   Often times, not all the time, far more work is done for eternity when someone gets hurt, plays bad, or gets benched. One of the most dangerous things for someone’s heart is if they always succeed, only win, and are nothing but beloved by the fans.
   For high school sports, it’s often the parents (and even Christian parents sometimes) who can be the worst. God is always good when their children are doing well. Yes and amen when God gives us victory! But, when we lose, God isn’t talked about. If He is, it’s often in a pseudo-Christian way of thinking that God wants us to suffer a little loss first before He puts our team and career back on top. We don’t like a God who allows us to lose every game.

2. Identity Issues
   I have seen teammates who put their identity in sports react in different ways whenever sports fails them. First, they go off the deep end into alcohol, pain killers, sex, or other drugs. Second, they dig even deeper demanding that sports satisfy them. They cannot stand to think of life without sports or without succeeding in sports. Third, they fall into despair and anxiety quicker than the dew evaporates in a New Orleans summer. Fourth, they are bitter towards teammates and slander them in front of others. Fifth, they have no clue who they are whenever sports are done.
   Countless athletes and coaches put their identity in their performance (only another form of works-righteousness). I have been there numerous times too. One of the best things that God can ever do to an athlete is to strip them of their athletic identity so that they must cling to Christ. When is the last time you’ve seen a Christian coach encourage one of his players who has been struggling on the field and yet simultaneously is growing in shifting his or her identity from sports to Christ?
   When I was at Tulane, I went through a “chiseling” season in my identity. I went from being the number one receiver the year before to immediately being the number seven receiver under a new head coach. My performance was my idol. I was my performance on the field. I idolized sports. Then, God broke me.
   Why did this happen? Ultimately, because God loved me so much that He sent His Son to die for me, and therefore He would also send the Spirit to purge sin out of me. At one point, my prosperity gospel believing coach looked at me and said, “You’re not a Christian! I’m a Christian.”
   Safe to say, I was losing everything of a self-made identity in that season. Jesus loved me so much that He stripped it away so that I would have to learn to look away from myself and onto Him. I have seen so many other solid Christian men go through these seasons as well. Are we going to encourage this?

3. Horrendous Pre-Game Sermons
   I was beyond blessed to sit under a BCM Pastor, Corey Olivier (who was also our team chaplain at Tulane), for four years. Corey preached the gospel. And when I say Corey preached the gospel, I mean it. I also had the great opportunity to spend four months with Jack Easterby, team chaplain of the New England Patriots, in 2014. That man also preached the gospel. Week-in and week-out, these men showed us Jesus. But, here is the truth: Not everyone does this.
   I have been around other team chaplains, seen clips of, and heard from other people about the vast majority of what’s preached in sports circles. It’s an offense to God. To put it bluntly, it’s turning the gospel into a whoring mechanism after sports glory. That’s strong but that’s how bad it is.
   There are men who prostitute God’s Word for their own agenda to get “amens”, head nods, and retweets. Athletes LOVE it whenever they can take something in Scripture as a guarantee that they will win or have a successful career. These “sermons” are some of the most man-centered things I have ever heard. There have been men who twist Scripture to say what it clearly doesn’t say in order to pump up the team they preach to.
   Praise God for men like Corey and Jack! We need more of them. We need men who are saturated with the biblical gospel who proclaim a true gospel and make gospel-centered applications. We need more men who will proclaim a God who is so infinite that all of our sports must be centered around Him.

4. Horrendous Pre-Game Prayers

   When I was in High School, I was playing travel basketball for a couple of years. We had a phenomenal basketball coach. But, before each game, he did something that unfortunately is done all too often. He would lead us in the Lord’s Prayer and immediately after begin to curse and take God’s name in vain to pump us up.
   I have been in so many circles where people use the Lord’s Prayer as if it’s a cult-like chant rather than a somber and holy moment to speak to our loving and Holy Father. There are many in the sports world who quote the Lord’s Prayer as if it’s some magic incantation that will guarantee them Samson-like strength to defeat their opposition.
   Because God isn’t seen as God, many pray to a god who might manipulate the game in their favor for their glory. It’s quite the scene to see adamant unbelievers who want nothing to do with Jesus pray the prayer that He Himself modeled for us before every game. Even Christian athletes themselves use that prayer as if it’s a magic potion. These prayers are far more about us and far less about Christ.

5. Missing the Point
   Sports exist for the glory of Christ. The joy of playing sports should trace us back to a greater joy of knowing Jesus. The lessons we learn in sports are lessons that we should use for growing in the Christian life. The trials we go through and the perseverance we learn in sports should be training for persevering in Christ.
   Everything about sports is meant for us to grow in Christ. If we’re not growing in Christ while playing sports then we’re not doing sports rightly. Coaches aren’t taking advantage of what they should take advantage of. Athletes are not applying the lessons to their walk with Jesus the way they should. We’re missing the whole point of sports if there is no Christ in sports.

6. Missing Church
   I wonder how much our church attendance might go up this Fall. I wonder how many college students might actually wake up on Sunday morning. I wonder how many parents won’t have to travel to sports tournaments weekend after weekend this year. It’s amazing how we are so determined to never miss a game or be late to practice but we’re fine showing up late to church or just catching up on a podcast later. It’s amazing how zealous parents are for their child to make the baseball or cheerleading team but could care less if they go to youth group or Sunday school (it’s clearly too much to ask for Sunday evening worship). How will we ever teach our kids what it means to be a Christian if we only teach them over and over that church is optional?

   ***Parents, are you more concerned with your child’s growth in sports than you are in their growth in Christ? You can tell by how much time, money, and passion that you put in sports compared to what you put in the Christian life.***

   It’s amazing how many of us are more influenced during the week by what happens on Saturdays in the Fall than by what we hear proclaimed from God’s Word on Sunday.

   Scenario: It’s Tuesday afternoon. The coffee is wearing off. You’re almost done with a second workday in the week. Do you find yourself remembering the score of the game on Saturday? Could you summarize the game to a co-worker who didn’t see it? Can you remember the stats of how many yards your team’s quarterback threw for? Let’s try another test. Can you remember what text was the preacher preached from this past Sunday (a more recent event)? Could you summarize the sermon to a co-worker whose curious about Christianity? Can you remember what the preacher said about how that text changes the way you live on this Tuesday afternoon?
   It’s not only about physically missing church. It’s about spiritually missing church. You sat in the pews going through the motions because you’re preoccupied with reminiscing last night’s game and what it means for you and your team this week. We love to spend more time talking about church at sports than talking about Christ at church.
   And here is the thing: I am part of this problem.
   

I love sports. We should love sports. We should care deeply about sports. But, sports is not God. Every game matters. Every loss, win, injury, touchdown, timeout, roars from the crowd, boos from the fans, and joy experienced from an upset win matters. God is sovereign over every single detail of everything in the sports world. But, He is sovereign over it for His glory. He is jealous for His glory, not ours. In other words, if we’re not taking advantage of the entirety of sports for our glorifying God and knowing God’s love for us then we’re idolizing sports. We’re not using it for what it’s meant for.

How many are led away from Christ in the name of a “Christ” who cares more about their sports career or their team winning than he does with them knowing Him!

Lord Jesus, come quickly!

The Invitation of Jesus

The Story of Invitation

God is a God of invitations. Virtually every book of the Bible could be summarized with one command in response to who He is: “Come to God.” The contents of each book either are saying it, implying it, or wanting you to come to the conclusion in light of what was written.

To be sure, when I say invitation, I don’t mean that God is a “take it or leave it” type of God. His invitation is a kingly command. It comes with the highest of authorities. It contains the most wondrous of destinations. It has the utmost aroma of love to it. To reject this invitation is a death sentence. It is an offense to His glory, to His reward, to His grace, to His love, and to Him. Rejecting God’s invitation is rejecting God. It is the epitome of foolishness and wickedness. To accept this invitation is life in the highest sense.

God created with an overflowing invitation for man to have a relationship with Him. He was the One who initiated that relationship. Even immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, God quickly invited them to come to Him for covering. As we trace the story of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, we see that it is God inviting sinners over and over to come to have fellowship with Him even as He draws near to them.

Think of the story of Moses. God initiates the invitation. He sees His people in captivity and bondage and He sends Moses to “invite” them out into the wilderness to live with Him. The story of Joshua is similar. We see a people who don’t have a home. God is still passionate about His invitation for them to come and dwell with Him not merely in a land but in a relationship.

The story of Judges and Ruth shows what inevitably happens to us when we reject such an invitation. Nevertheless, this didn’t take away God’s heart for His people. The story of David, Solomon, and the history of Israel and Judah reveals the same message. God is inviting His people into a covenant relationship with Him. Even when He removes His people from the land there is still a covenant promise in Jeremiah 31 that God has not forsaken His people. Ezra and Nehemiah, Zechariah and Malachi were all calling the people to return to God. It’s an invitation!

Then, it “seemed” as if God didn’t care. Silence filled the prophetic office. The covenant appeared to be nullified. Silence vibrated through the spiritual air. Was God finally tired of inviting His people?

The Inviting God in the Flesh

Here is where we meet Matthew 11:28. Remember who Jesus is. Jesus is the God of the Old Testament in the flesh. He is not a different God. How serious was God about inviting His people into a relationship with Him? He was so serious that the Son took on flesh and was born of the virgin Mary into poverty. In other words, He invited Himself into our world.

He went from the throne to homelessness. He went from a crown of glory to a crown of thorns. He went from unapproachable glory to being spit upon while carrying His cross. In other words, He invited Himself into our world.

It’s this Jesus in Matthew 11:28 who sounds exactly like Isaiah 55:1 when He says, “Come.”

Why does a President, Governor, or Mayor invite someone to a meal or a meeting? Most of the time, it is to get business done or for their own public appearance. The invitation goes to someone who is important or to someone who can further their cause or power. Even if one of these men or women invites someone they don’t agree with, it is still for their political purpose and pursuit of peace.

When is the last time you heard or saw someone in one of these offices pull up in their limousine to a downtown gas station and invite a homeless man to come to eat an extravagant meal? When is the last time you saw someone in one of these offices go to the lowest of the low or the societal reject and ask to be their friend? If this happens once or twice, you might read some heart-warming news stories. If this happens consistently, you will probably begin to be suspicious or get worried about the competency of the person in power.

But, this is exactly what Jesus does. From the moment He started His public ministry, He was constantly inviting poor sinners to come to Him. He was tenaciously tender in His invitations to the worst of the worst. “Come” must have been one of Jesus’ favorite words.

Authoritative and Gracious

The marvelous feature of this invitation is that out of his overwhelming authority (v. 27) Jesus encourages the burdened to come to him because he is “gentle and humble in heart.”

D.A. Carson

Matthew intends to paint the picture of a Jesus who is the King of Kings and also someone who is the most approachable Person in the history of humanity. He wants to show you someone of such unrivaled authority and yet unimaginable grace. It’s this Jesus who we see go from preaching the Sermon on the Mount that leaves people astonished at his authority (7:28-29) to coming down the mountain to touch an unclean leper.

Matter of fact, the leper cautiously comes and kneels down before Jesus and takes a gamble to see if Jesus would be willing to heal him. Jesus meets this man at the location of his unbelief. “Lord, if you will (or, we could make it more clear: “if you are willing”), you can make me clean.” Jesus responds with, “I am willing; be clean.”

Jesus is pulsating with passion for poor sinners. If all you knew was the Old Testament, and you knew it well, then you would immediately identify this Jesus as being someone similar to that same God. Indeed, the Holy Spirit awakens us to show us that He is the same God.

Isn’t this what we see in Isaiah 55:1? “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.” The same God of Isaiah is the same God here!

Jesus vs Others

Other religions say, “Go and do.” Jesus says, “Stop doing and come.” Other worldviews say, “Do good and then come.” Jesus says, “You are not good and will never be good. Therefore, come to me for I am good.” Even Christians who forget the heart of Jesus fall back into the default works-righteousness mode. They tell themselves, “I must keep up a performance so that Jesus will still accept me.” Jesus says, “You have failed more times than you even know. That’s why you must not stay away from me any longer and come to me.”

When you play the game of Monopoly, there is a “community chest” card you can draw that says, “GO TO JAIL. Go directly to jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.” Jesus is saying something similar. “Come to me. Come directly to me. Do not try to deal with your sins on your own. Do not try to beat yourself up enough over your sin before coming to me. Do not try to go and do enough good deeds before coming to me. Come directly to me. Waste no time in this. Do not linger. Do not hesitate. Do not worry about my response. Come to me.”

You know you’re growing in the Christian life the quicker you run to Jesus when you’re convicted of your sin, when you’re ashamed of your mistakes, and when you’re exhausted from trying to be good enough. Go to Jesus.

He is not saying, “Just come to this worldview.” Or, “just approve these doctrines.” Or, “just be apart of this community.” Or, “just pick up some of this grace.” He is saying, “Come to me.” The destination is Him! In Him, you will find all you need. If you miss Him, you miss everything. Everything outside of Jesus is counterfeit. Jesus is the real thing.

What Makes A Christian A Christian

The reason someone is a Christian is that they have Christ. Romans 5 tells us that our fundamental problem is that we were enemies with God. We were cut off. We were estranged. We were irreconciled.

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—but God shows His love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us… For if while were were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life.

Romans 5:6-8, 10

So weak that we could never make it to God. So ungodly that we didn’t even want God. Such sinners that we can’t be in His presence. Such enemies that the very thought of Him made us boil in anger.

This is when Jesus died for us.

But, you also see what happened because Jesus died for us, right? It’s because of Jesus’ death that He bridged the gap. This isn’t a bridge where we are able to come to God on our own power but a bridge where God comes to us! He is so eager to invite us to Him that He comes all the way to us to grab our hands to bring us home with Him.

In high school, one of the most interesting sights was during football and basketball games at half time. The home cheerleaders would almost always run across the field or court, grab the hands of the other cheerleaders and bring them over to their side to have a short time of fellowship with them. This is a picture of the invitation of God to us. He desires to be with us. He desires to bring us to Him. He won’t live without us.

This is the Jesus of Matthew 11:28. Jesus must have been overflowing with love when He said, “Come to me.” It was His most natural invitation.

The Heart of Jesus for You

This is Jesus’ heart for you. It’s an inviting heart, not a stingy heart. He doesn’t give you a spiritual stiff arm but extends His arms as wide as they were extended on the Cross. He is pleading for you to wait no longer. There are no steps before coming to Jesus. The first and only step is to come to Him! This He enables you to do.

If Jesus is truly good, if Jesus is truly wise, if Jesus is truly loving, then if He invites you to Himself He is saying that He is where you find all you need. Jesus would be sinning if He invited you anywhere else. Jesus would be the biggest fool if He told you to go to someone or something else. Jesus would be the most hateful being in all creation if He persuaded you to go to some other destination than Himself. Jesus is who you need.

Spiritual Warfare: Forgetting Our Identity and Standing in Christ

Discerning the dark lord’s tactics

The moment we remind ourselves of our identity in Christ, especially that of our righteous standing, the dark lord swoops in to say, “No you’re not.” It isn’t always that blunt. His responses can be:

• “You have to first live a holy life.”

• “Well...not quite yet. You need to do just a tad more and then you’re good.”

• “You should doubt that because of what you did in the past.”

• “You still haven’t repented or confessed enough of this sin.”

• “You forgot about this sin in your life. You need to deal with that first before you can truly embrace this identity and standing.”

• “You’re only semi-holy. Other people are truly holy. You’re on a lower level and that level isn’t sufficient.”

• “Don’t you see all your mess? Are you telling me that Jesus just decided to forget about that? You think you can really call yourself holy?”

• “If other people knew what I know about you then you would never be able to call yourself holy.”

• “You say that it only matters what Jesus says but, let’s be honest, it really matters that the super-spiritually mature people declare you holy. And, if you are not like them then I don’t know how you’ll ever be holy.”

He is skillfully subtle. You must remember that everything the dark lord does is filled with some level of truth. He never comes to you flying the flag of hell so that you clearly know it’s him. He wants to sound like the Holy Spirit. He wants to sound like Scripture. He wants to sound like your conscience that is in line with the truth.

When Jesus was tempted, why was it so difficult for Him? The dark lord was skillfully subtle. He is a professional pretender and provoker. He knows what he is doing. When you forget that, you’ll be overwhelmed. He approached Jesus the same way. He used the truth, not outright obvious lies. He sought to go after Jesus’ affections, desires, and wants. He wasn’t trying to knock down the front door. He tried to sneak through the back door quietly and friendly.

This is how the dark lord uses truth to attack you:

• He uses a truth out of context.

• He applies truth to an extreme.

• He uses a half-truth.

Notice that he is always using truth. He manipulates truth. This is what he does with us whenever we try to embrace our righteous standing in Christ. He uses beautiful truths about confession, pursuing holiness, and repentance and he just ever so slightly tweaks them. 

He often does this by taking a common Christian cliche and makes it sound so right but applies it so wrongly. Did you notice above how he whispers these lies? He is using the truth about confession, holiness, and repentance but in extreme ways, out of context ways, or half-truth ways.

He wants to do anything he can to keep you from saying, “Yes! This is who I am in Christ.” He wants to get you to default into a works-righteousness mindset. He loves to put the Ten Commandments before “I am the LORD your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” (Ex. 20:2).

He says that you’re not doing enough. You are not enough. You haven’t dealt with this sin sufficiently. If you don’t deal with the sin to the fullest extent then you’re quenching the Spirit. Oh, you don’t want to quench the Spirit. That’s a big time sin! He is the Holy Spirit. You better be holy like Him or He might leave you. You have to make sure you deal with your past perfectly or else that righteous standing should be called into question. Did you just remember some way in which you just sinned recently? Did you just remember that one horrible sin from the past? Well, if you want to be able to say, “I am righteous before God” then you better go and make sure you deal with it to its fullest extent first.

The ways in which he attacks here are endless. He aligns his army to attack us here more than anywhere else. He knows that if we embrace Christ then he must retreat. He wants to keep us thinking that we have to earn Him. He wants to get us to go back to trying to be good enough. He wants to keep us focused on doing enough before resting in Jesus.

How to fight by faith

Why does the dark lord want to keep you from embracing your righteous standing before God? Because if you knew who you were in Christ, if you really knew, then you would assault his kingdom with more force than 10,000 angels. When we know who we are in Christ, we experience joy and not shame. Joy, as Martyn Lloyd-Jones often said, is what the world needs to see in Christians. 

The dark lord wants to keep you in shame as you see your sin. If he can keep you in shame and keep you focused more on your sin than Jesus than he knows you’ll be timid to walk in faith. He knows you’ll be scared to be bold He knows you’ll be too ashamed to share your faith. He knows that if he can keep you focused on your sin then you’ll stay in the Slough of Despond (or spiritual depression as Martyn Lloyd-Jones called it) rather than moving closer to Jesus. Knowing your identity in Christ, your righteous standing before God is what casts away the cold darkness of shame.

How do we fight? We fight with God’s Word. This is why the doctrines of inspiration, inerrancy, and sufficiency are so crucial to the Christian faith. Is the Bible God’s Word? If it is, that is our reality. Our feelings aren’t our reality. Our conscience isn’t always our reality. Our personality tests aren’t our reality. God’s Word is our reality. God makes an authoritative statement about who we are in Christ. This is not sometimes true and sometimes false. It is always true. We need Scripture to rework our thoughts and to readjust our feelings. 

This is actually what the Psalms do. The Psalms are not a book merely about learning how to express our emotions to God. Rather, the Psalms are about expressing to God what we really feel and then learning to realign our feelings, affections, emotions with God’s truth. It is a collection of the Christian’s experience of living a life of faith in a fallen world par excellence. 

If you notice in Psalms 32 and 51, the two most popular psalms about confession of sin, they both move so quickly from conviction and confession to the reality of who they are by God’s grace. They do not stay in this phase of trying to beat themselves up. They do not say, “I cannot embrace God’s grace until I deal with this sin to its fullest extent. I cannot experience God’s grace until I make things totally right. I cannot draw near to God unless I first handle this on my own.” They move towards God’s grace and their righteous standing.

Must we deal with our sins? Yes. But, the subtle danger is to think that we must do that before embracing God’s grace. It’s only when we embrace God’s grace that we are enabled to deal with sin. God’s grace is not merely for forgiveness but for our ability to walk in His ways. Anything that keeps us from coming to God is a form of works-righteousness. 

I was once told that “we will never find closure if we merely seek justice; We will only find closure if we rest in grace.” Is this hyper-grace? Is this antinomianism? No. Grace is not opposed to justice. Grace comes through justice. But, if we seek to only rely on justice then we will never be able to rest.

Why is this? If we only seek to justly deal with our sins then we will never find an ending. We are so deeply depraved, so deeply shattered, so littered and polluted with sin that we will never come to the bottom of it. If we have the mindset that we cannot rest in grace until we deal with our sins in totality then we aren’t actually acting in obedience and in faith. We’re disobeying God because we’re not running to Jesus.

Typically, the people who are afraid of being antinomian are usually those who are struggling with legalism. Those who are afraid of being legalistic are usually those who are struggling with antinomianism. Every person has a default leaning and all of us go through seasons where we struggle with each one. As Sinclair Feguson’s book The Whole Christ says, the only way to fix this problem is to embrace the whole Christ. You don’t fix legalism by embracing more antinomianism. You don’t fix antinomianism by embracing more legalism. You embrace Christ!

We have made so many mistakes. We have sinned so much. If you think that you have to go back and deal with every instance of sin then you will never rest. Every memory will cripple you with shame. Every reminder will overwhelm you with guilt. It is not quenching the Spirit to rest in grace and embrace forgiveness in Christ. It is obedience. 

As Chase Maxey, Executive Director and Counselor with BCTM Ministries, once asked me, “Who told you that you were so much stronger than the Holy Spirit?” The dark lord tempts us to think we’re quenching the Spirit at times by taking that truth from 1 Thessalonians out of context, to its extreme, or making it a half-truth.

To be sure, the dark lord can use even this truth to keep us from our holy duties before God. He can take this out of its own context or take it to its extreme or half-truth. This does not mean we ignore our sins. This does not mean we don’t repent or confess. As Paul says in Romans 6:1-2, “Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!” It means that if we have the mindset that we have to turn over every stone and make everything right in our lives then we are no longer resting in Christ’s atonement but we are trying to atone for ourselves.

It is obedience to rest in grace. It is obedience to stop trying to fix and start resting. When God wants you to deal with something in your life, He will give you the opportunity and the power to do so. Look how patient He was towards Jonah. Look how He took His time to work in Jonah’s heart. He will do it with you too. What you must do is rest in your righteous standing. You must hold onto this righteousness in Christ. You must let that determine your reality.

Every time we repent of something, at some point we must stop confessing and saying “sorry”. If we think we must continue to confess our past over and over then we aren’t trusting that God is faith and just to forgive and cleanse us (1 Jn. 1:9). Jesus never said, “Go and fix your past.” Rather, He often said in one way or another, “Go and sin no more” (Mk. 5:34; Lk. 7:50; 17:19; 18:13-14; 18:42; Jn. 5:14; 8:11). He knows that fixing our past isn’t the answer. He knows we can’t re-live or re-write our pasts. He knows we must move forward living differently.

We seek holiness because we are holy. We seek to progressively grow in holiness because we are already positionally holy (Rom. 1:7; Eph. 1:1; 5:3; Col. 1:2,12; 3:12; Heb. 2:11; Jude 3; Rev. 13:7). We don’t receive the position of holiness because we worked hard to become holy. God graciously brought us into the definitive position and that compels us to go and live in light of who we are.

We fight by getting the gospel logic straight in our heads. We fight by embracing God’s grace. We fight by dismantling the attacks of the dark lord and his minions. We fight by resting in Christ.

The Reason Why Your Personal Ministry Is Pivotal For The People

Matthew gave an incredible view of Jesus’ own ministry. He shows us the preaching ministry of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. He shows us the teaching ministry of Jesus in such places as Matthew 21-22 where Jesus speaks about the Temple, his authority, and different parables. He shows us the healing ministry of Jesus in chapters 8-9 where Jesus heals ten times in only two chapters. What we see is that Jesus’ ministry is one of preaching, teaching, and healing.

Jesus’ Ministry Through The Disciples

In Matthew 10:1-15 (particularly in verses 1 and 7), we see Jesus send the disciples out on mission. They were to go about to minister to the people as well. But, whose ministry would this be? Was it their own ministry? No. The ministry is not theirs but rather it is Jesus’ ministry through them.

When Jesus sends them, he sends them out to proclaim the same gospel and to heal the same broken people. Jesus sends us out to do His ministry as well. No, this is not only ministry work for paid church staff or really committed volunteers. All Christians are sent out to do ministry (Mt. 28:16-20; Eph. 4:12). If you are a Christian, you have a ministry. But, here is the thing. It’s not your ministry. It’s Jesus’ ministry through you.

The reason Jesus gives you the gifts that He gives you and the reason Jesus has you living in the place where you are living is that He seeks to minister to the people around you. It’s His ministry, not yours. He desires to reach those people much more than you ever will. Do you have the gift of teaching? Do you have the gift of service? Do you have the gift of compassion? What gifts do you have? He wants to use your gifts, the gifts He has given you, to bring those people to Him.

The Ministry of Jesus Through You

You might be thinking, “I don’t have any supernatural gifts but only natural gifts.” You need to remember that these gifts have been given to you by God our Creator. We are to do all things for the glory of God and the mission of Christ. Are you a doctor? Are you a lawyer? Are you a stay at home parent? Are you great at administration? Are you passionate about hosting others at your home? Do you have finances that you can wisely give to the ministries that need your help? What are your gifts?

These gifts are for the ministry of Jesus. It is not your ministry; it’s Jesus’ ministry through you! This means that you can have complete confidence that where you are and who surrounds you that Jesus is there and He is at work. You can have the boldness to go out into your work, neighborhood, school, and community because you know you have been equipped by the Holy Spirit. You can get excited because no one is more passionate about the ministry than God Himself! Your ministry is not yours. It’s Jesus’ ministry.

The Church Needs YOU

That’s what makes your personal ministry pivotal for the people. Jesus has equipped you with the gifts He wants you to have so that He can minister in that way through you. Here is why that’s encouraging. No gift is small or insignificant. The world may say that there are more important gifts than others but that’s not true. As Francis Schaeffer says, “There are no small people.”

In our celebrity culture, we are lead astray by thinking that only the “up-front” gifts are what builds the church. God loves working in the small and humble gifts. He loves working in the ordinary day-to-day acts. He does more in the “small acts of kindness and love” than some do with their more public gifts. We need people like Martha who find their primary calling in serving others. Not everyone is called to speak, write, and lead. Everyone is called to something. Jesus doesn’t need celebrities. He uses you.

What if you having people over for a nice dinner and godly conversation is one of the ways in which God builds His kingdom through you? What if Jesus wants to minister to others through you by your giving a Christian book to someone? What if Jesus desires to change someone’s life simply through your godly character and counsel as a school teacher? Don’t underestimate Him.

How might this encourage you? How does this make you bold? How does this motivate you to use your gifts? Ministry is not about us. It’s about Him. It’s about Jesus showing His glory through the gifts He has given us. Jesus wants to minister through you. That’s the reason why ministry, the ministry of Jesus through you, is pivotal for the people.

What Jesus' Earthly Father Teaches Us About "Cancel Culture"

No one is safe. No one can hide their past forever. If you have messed up, everyone will eventually know about it. Whatever you do you better make sure you don’t get on anyone’s bad side so that they don’t dig up your dirt. That’s what our world is telling us right now.

I remember seeing a comment on social media after Alabama Wide Receiver Henry Ruggs ran a stunningly fast 40 yard dash (4.27 seconds!!!). Ruggs had dominated at the NFL Combine to establish himself as a sure top pick in the 2020 NFL Draft. When the news of Ruggs’ time was released, there was one person who posted on social media (very sarcastically I would add) a statement like this:

Well, now it’s time to go back through his entire Twitter history to see what dirt we can pull up on him so that we can make him look like he has questionable character.

This is “Cancel Culture” and this guy nailed it with that summary. Cancel Culture is unraveling society right now. It is highly destructive. In actuality, it is really just a power play by others to get what they want by hanging people’s faults over their heads. This is what Cancel Culture does:

• If someone disagrees with you just go and dig up their dirt and show it to the world.

• If someone has done something wrong make sure you show them no mercy.

• If someone has messed up in the past make sure they live in fear that you might blackmail them.

• If someone has sinned in a way that isn’t socially acceptable make sure they go to the bottom of our society and never influence anyone ever.

• No matter if someone has changed and confessed, destroy them for the one instance they slipped up.

What Happens In Response To A Cancel Culture

It’s no wonder then that iGen is the generation with the most anxiety and depression that we have seen in a long time. It’s no wonder that shame is the most crippling and debilitating sensation in our culture today. It’s no wonder that millions live in fear of “being found out” or being misrepresented. Youth are living in a mental hell every day hoping that their shameful past might not revisit them.

We are at a point in history where we are pulling out our spiritual mircoscopes to find the specks in others eyes and proclaiming them to be unforgivable sins. We are throwing out the proverbial baby with the bath water. If our culture had a self-given name it might be the name from Hosea 1:6 “No Mercy”. It’s not the name of us not receiving mercy from God but rather the name we bestow on ourselves as we relate to each other.

If a forefather was an ardent follower of Christ and yet still had slaves (even if he did treat them well for the most part in that system), we must refuse to let him teach us anything today. If a politician messed up sexually in the past then we must “out” him and tear down his entire life (even if he has confessed and sought forgiveness). If a coach, teacher, pastor, businessman, doctor, writer, celebrity, or whoever has done anything, said anything, or failed to support something then we must start an outrage to ruin their lives. It doesn’t matter what good things they have done. It doesn’t matter what benefits they have brought to our society. If they are not perfect in our eyes then we must shatter them into thousands of irrepairable pieces. Oh, and let’s make sure we get their friends and families and anyone who associates with them as well. We demand perfect. Even in the Church, we demand that our forefathers and foremothers in the faith be more perfect than Jesus Himself (as if that is possible!) or else we will seek to destroy anything they stand for.

It’s not unbelievers alone who do this. Plenty of Christians do this. We do this with politics, sports, denominations, and friendships. We post on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in hopes that we might add to the destruction of another. Do we realize that God Almighty will judge us for everything we post, repost, and like on social media? His judgment will be even more strict than our culture.

Safe No More

No one is safe. No one is secure. The Internet is your worst enemy. If you messed up in college, you better watch out. If you said something racially insensitive, sexually discriminating, or politically incorrect then you’re essential done for in this society. It doesn’t matter if you’re genuinely sorry. It doesn’t matter if it was 45 years ago. It doesn’t matter if you have repented and changed. It doesn’t matter if the other person has forgiven you. Once you’ve sinned in this country, you’re damned for eternity. Get ready to experience social hell.

If we had a choice, we would create our own pits of despair and round all those people up so that we don’t have to live amongst them or be influenced by them. We would punish them. We would shame them. We would make them look out into our world with jealousy. We would want them to never bring their disease into our culture ever again. Oh wait, that’s what we’re already doing on social media.

No wonder there is a lot of suicide today.

This is what Cancel Culture feels like. Once again, if we’re not careful, we’ll shame ourselves into our very own self-destruction. No one can stand for long under this. This is where an evolutionary worldview has brought us. We should have evolved by now. We should be better. We should be past this. This is 2020 people!

No one wants to remember the fact that we are sinners living in a sinful world. Matter of fact, the only sin is to say that there is such thing as sin.

What Does 1st Century Jerusalem Have To Do With 21st Century America?

What does the Bible have to do with this? Everything.

I heard something phenomenal the other day from RTS professor Miles Van Pelt (I mean, who hasn’t heard something phenomenal from him?). He said something that rocked my world.

You’ll never find closure if you only seek justice. You’ll only find closure if you rest in grace.

If I had a Twitter still, I would tweet that. It’s almost worth it to create a Twitter and just tweet that one thing right now. Did you read that? He said, “You’ll never find closure if you only seek justice. You’ll only find closure if you rest in grace.”

Right now, our culture has gotten rid of all grace and mercy. There is only justice and wrath.

Listen. Justice is crucial. Let’s make no mistake about that. Justice is central to a society and it’s central to Christianity. Justice is an attribute of God. God would not be God if He were not just. But, justice is not the only thing we receive. Justice is not the only attribute of God. Grace is what we receive. Grace is what we need.

Can I just say something? What our country needs most is the grace of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are fools if we think our country is Christian. We are fools if we think our churches know enough of the gospel (let alone our country). What our churches and country needs most is the grace of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We don’t need less gospel; we need more gospel.

So, where do we see this grace in the Bible that might apply to the Cancel Culture?

Jesus’ Earthly Father

In Matthew 1:19, we find something absolutely stunning. I’ve read over this portion of Scripture hundreds of times. I’ve never seen what I just saw. Thanks to Roy Ciampa in Devotions on the Greek New Testament: 52 Reflections to Inspire & Instruct, I saw the light in a dark world.

And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

Matthew 1:19

This verse is not necessarily a verse you tell your kids to memorize. It’s not the verse you might post as your “Verse of the Day” post. It’s not the verse you would get framed or put on your Christmas cards. It’s probably not the choice text for you if you had to teach a Bible study. Let me tell you something. There is more light in this one verse than there is in 10,000 Suns. Let me show you.

Joseph thought Mary had broken their engagement by sinning sexually. We now know that she obviously didn’t and Joseph would soon realize that too. But, there was a point when he looked at her pregnant belly and was heart broken that she had an affair. After all, virgin births are not a natural event! It required a miracle for the Son of God to come into this world! If she was pregnant and he wasn’t the one who slept with her then it must’ve been another man.

Joseph was torn over this. He was heart broken, ashamed, anxious, and in despair. Some of you might know this pain. But, here is the thing about Joseph. He was a just man (lit. “being righteous”). So, what would a righteous man (who obviously cares deeply about justice) do in the face of someone committing great sin against him?

To be sure, I am not saying that Mary wasn’t a virgin. I am not saying that Mary slept with someone else. We are only looking at this through the experience of Joseph before he received word from the angel (v20-25) that Mary was going to be the virgin who would fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah 7:14.

Responding To Sin With Righteous Compassion

How would righteous Joseph respond in the face of such heinous sin? I know what our culture would do. Our culture would put on a shame show. They would parade her sin and guilt on Twitter, Instagram, Tik Tok, and Facebook. Late night talk show hosts would include her in their jokes. She would turn into a “meme” of shame. Some Christians would unfortunately wag their heads at her as if she weren’t a Christian at all. “If she was really a Christian then she would’ve never put herself in that situation.”

If Mary lived in the U.S. today and eventually decided to run for a political office, her childhood friends who didn’t agree with her political views would find her medical records and show them off to the world like she is the worst human walking since Adolf Hitler.

How was righteous Joseph going to respond? Well, we can see more clearly how he might when we look at the next phrase. Joseph was righteous and unwilling to put her to shame. Joseph didn’t have two opposing qualities in himself that were fighting over what to do in this situation. There wasn’t the “good angel and bad angel” or the “righteous angel and the compassionate angel” on either shoulder whispering to him what he should do. “Should I do what would be culturally acceptable during these times and make it publicly known to the proper Jewish and Romans authorities? Should I write her off and start a campaign to have her removed from the Temple? Should I expose what she has done to everyone I know so that all might shame her with me? Or, should I have mercy on her? Should I keep it quiet? Should I not divulge that information?”

Joseph was not playing the either/or game. Actually, what this text is saying is that because Joseph was righteous he was also unwilling to put her to shame. It’s not about whether to show justice or compassion but rather to show justice and compassion.

To say it another way, Joseph shows his righteousness as he shows compassion for her.

The present participle (“being a just man”) indicates not that he had been righteous but (now) thought of acting unrighteously in this instance, but rather he was righteous even as he decided on his plan of action.

-Roy Ciampa

***With my emphasis to make the wording a little more clear.***

What is Ciampa saying? He is saying that the Bible is saying that because Joseph was righteous he was also compassionate. And look at the context. Joseph thought that Mary had sinned greatly! And what did this righteous man decide to do in the face of great sin? He decided not to put her to shame but rather to show her compassion.

The Gospel of Justice and Grace

My friends, this is the gospel. This is what Jesus does to us. In the face of such horrendous sin and betrayal against the King of Glory, He came to earth and died in our place out of compassion. Jesus didn’t “cancel” us. He came to us. He had compassion on us.

The gospel of Matthew seeks to transform our understanding of the true nature of righteousness in light of its redefinition by Jesus and by Matthew’s telling of his story. In this gospel it becomes clear that for Jesus (and Matthew), mercy and compassion are not at odds with righteousness, but are crucial marks of righteousness, just as they are in the Old Testament. Jesus demands not the same righteousness as the scribes and Pharisees but a greater righteousness (5:20), one that will lead his disciples to show mercy to the least of his brothers (25:34-40). Jesus emphasized the theme of Hosea 6:6 [that] God prefers mercy over sacrifice (Matt. 9:13; 12:7), and he demonstrated what that preference looks like by befriending tax collectors and sinners. His sacrifice on the cross is about extending mercy to us sinners rather than leaving us to our own destruction.

-Roy Ciampa

This is what Joseph is doing. In the face of great sin, he is acting righteously! He is pressing into righteous living. He is living out what Jesus would live out. He is imaging God the Redeemer. That is why he decided to treat her with dignity, love, compassion, and grace. He cared about justice and grace and he realized that justice and grace are not rivals but best friends.

How This Could Change Our Culture

People are dying for hope. Everyone has sinned. Everyone has baggage. Everyone has said horrible things. Everyone has treated someone in unspeakable ways. No one is exempt. Was Paul not clear enough about this in Romans 3:10-12 when he said:

None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.

The people who do the most shaming tend to have a lot of shame. The people who point out the specks in others eyes tend to have logs in their own. We’re all truly depraved and soaked in sin. When we forget that we get into these spiritual shame shows so that we can make ourselves feel better.

Here is where the gospel comes in. The gospel says that we are worse than we could ever dare admit and yet more loved than we could ever imagine. This gospel is a gospel of grace and righteousness. Jesus didn’t sacrifice justice in order to give us grace. He gave us grace through justice. He went to the Cross to absorb the wrath we deserved for our sins so that we might receive grace and compassion. That is how we can have spiritual closure.

Repentant Sinners In Heaven

Our country, believers and unbelievers, are holding their breaths hoping that maybe they can just make it to the end of their lives without their worst mistakes being exposed. We mentally and emotionally murder others a thousand times over whenever we hold their sin over their heads. We destroy them time and time again whenever we don’t accept someone’s confession or genuine repentance. We sever all hopes of change whenever we fail to celebrate the work of change that the Holy Spirit has done in us.

Did we forget that former sinners will be in heaven? Jesus came for the sick sinners and not for the healthy self-righteous ones. There will be former racists and rapists in heaven. There will be former sexual abusers and drug abusers in heaven. There will be former slave traders in heaven. There will be former Nazis and Neo-Nazis in heaven. There will be former murderers, drunks, hookers, atheists, homosexuals, liars, cheaters, swindlers, and anarchists who will be in heaven. There are scores of people who once lived this way who have now found life and grace in Jesus Christ. He took their wrath. He dealt with their sin. Who in the world are we to shame them with what they repent from?

They are not only being sanctified right now but they will be so glorified that even those in heaven who were victims of their sinful lifestyle on earth will see so much beauty in them because of the work of the Holy Spirit within. The bond of joy and friendship between former enemies will be stronger than any friendship on this earth. This is what Jesus does to saved sinners.

We need Christians who proclaim this gospel. This country is DYING for hope. Don’t believe me? Just any youth you know who have been through or have had friends go through these social shame fests whenever they fail in the smallest way. Just go into our schools and ask middle and high schools students what their biggest fears are. Just read literature of youth culture and see the staggering stats and interviews that talk about this issue.

We can learn a lot from Joseph here. We need to learn a lot. Only grace can transform us. Only Jesus can make us new by the power of the Spirit.

Spiritual Warfare: When Satan Tempts You That There Is Sin Left Undone

Discerning the dark lord’s tactics

The dark lord is relentless in his attacking the saints. He has you right where he wants you if you think that you’re not going to be attacked by him. One of the ways in which he moves under the radar and sneaks in the shadows of our conscience is by tempting us to think that there is sin left unrepented of or left unconfessed in our lives. 

He knows that the gospel compels us to repent and have faith (Mt. 4:17). He knows that Romans 6:1-2 says, “Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?” He knows that Psalm 32:1-3 says, “Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, who sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.” Let’s be clear: the dark lord knows more of the content of Scripture than we do and he seeks to use it against us.

The dark lord loves to take Scripture out of context or to its unbiblical extremes (see the temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4:1-11). He knows that we would not fret if he came to us with wildly contrasting temptations that clearly aren’t biblical. He likes to take that which is good and distort it. One of the ways in which he does so is by taking the command of our Lord to repent and uses it to torment us with the thought that we have some sin left unrepented of.

Now, to be sure, there really might be some sin left unrepented of. We need to discern what is conviction versus what is condemnation. Condemnation has no hope. Condemnation only points out the bad and never gives you grace. There is always work to do. There is never any rest, joy, and peace in Christ. You are always under the Law. You are always to be ashamed. The Holy Spirit is always pointing out where you have failed. This is not how our gracious Lord and His Spirit acts towards us. As the hymn writer says, “When Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look and see Him there who made an end to all my sin.”

The Extremes He Takes Us To

One of the extremes in which the dark lord does this is by hounding us with the thought that we have not repented enough. There is something in our past that we haven’t confessed. There is something that we have only halfway repented of. Or, there is some element of something that we have not confessed in its absolute fullness.

It sounds awfully close to the truth doesn’t it? Of course we must repent and live a life of constant repenting! Of course we must confess our sins and seek to hide nothing from the Lord (1 John 1:8-10)! He will take this good and life-giving truth and use it to condemn and drain the life out of us. He will take God-centered proclamations of the gospel and turn them into man-centered efforts to make ourselves clean. This, as Paul says to the Galatians, is not the gospel!

As long as he can convince you that you cannot rest in Christ until this particular sin is drained completely dry then he has you where he wants you. He will continue to hold the law over you time after time and keep showing you that there is more to do. He knows that the law never quits condemning sinners. There is always confession that falls short. There is always repentance, even in the best saints, that falls short. There has never been anyone anywhere who has ever fully and completely repented or confessed the depths of their sin. 

Take Martin Luther for example. He would confess his sins for hours upon hours a day because the law was ever before his face. The dark lord sought to convince him that there was more to do and that he couldn’t rest in the grace of Christ until he had dealt with it exhaustively.

He wants you to think that until you express absolutely every feeling, every emotion, every detail, and every instance of such sin that you are under God’s wrath. When he hounds a saint with this, he causes the saint to fret and worry about whether they have done enough. They can’t rest because if they do then they must be quenching the Spirit who must be giving them this thought.

How to fight by faith

You will forever have duties left undone if you think Jesus won’t accept you until you have dealt with everything fully and perfectly. The antidote is first and foremost to soak in the finality of the Cross. In John 19:30 Jesus cries, “It is finished.” This one Greek word, tetelestai, has a lifetime of meaning in it. Think about it. Jesus did not have to say this right before He died. Why would He exert this final portion of His physical, mental, emotional, and even spiritual energy to say this one word before dying? He did it to confirm to us of His work on our behalf. As they say, “Last words are lasting words.”

When Jesus says it is finished He means it. Robert Mounce says, 

“This one word summary of Jesus’ life and death is perhaps the single most important statement in all of Scripture. The word means ‘to complete,’ ‘to bring to perfection.’ Jesus had fully done the work God the Father sent him to do… But the tense of the verb, the ‘perfect’ tense, brings out even more of what Jesus was saying. The perfect describes an action that was fully completed and has consequences at the time of speaking… Because Jesus fully completed his task, the ongoing effects are that you and I are offered the free gift of salvation so that we can be with him forever.”

What does Mounce mean by this? He means that there is nothing left undone in the work of Jesus. There is nothing that we need to go and do first in order to be saved. There will never be enough confession. There will never be enough repentance. You will absolutely never feel as sorry and convicted as you should about your sin. You cannot rest in your work. You must rest and trust in the finality of the atonement of Christ for all your sin (past, present, and future). 

Knowing What The Truth Really Is

We must have a robust doctrine and understanding of repentance and confession so that when someone tells us something differently we can spot it out. There is the common story that you might have heard about how the FBI detects counterfeit currency. They spend so much time looking at the real thing that when they see the counterfeit they know it immediately. We too must spend much time looking at Christ and looking at the reality of what the Bible says about repentance and confession so that when the dark lord tempts us to go back into slavery we can detect it.

Paul dealt with something similar to this with the Galatians. He knew that any subtle change to the gospel made it no gospel at all. The addition of anything to Christ and the gospel made Him no Savior and the gospel no good news. There is nothing but faith in Christ that saves us. It is out of that faith that we overflow into repentance. Indeed, faith and repentance are two sides of the same coin. That is why Jesus would say “repent and believe” and not “repent and then believe”. The dark lord will draw too much of a division between repentance and faith. He wants you to think that you must repent enough before you can have saving faith and free forgiveness (which would not be free at all!). It is another form of works-righteousness.

What Does It Mean To Confess?

In 1 John, the apostle John is writing to people who have been infiltrated by false teachers. He seeks to show them what it means to be truly saved. It’s only true Christians that admit and confess their sin. Christians do not think they are without sin. They are to declare, acknowledge, and to say the same thing about their sin as God says about their sin. They are to confess their sin not merely for confession sake but to express their need for Jesus on their behalf. This is the ongoing lifestyle of the believer. It is not a one time thing. This tells us that there is always something to confess and repent of. We are deceiving ourselves and being deceived if we think we have confessed and dealt with everything.

Like a sound apologetic argument, we can actually use the dark lord’s attacks on us against him. He says that we must always be confessing our sins and we can agree. He says that there is sin left undone and we can agree. It’s the very fact that we can’t confess everything that we must rest in Christ on our behalf. It’s the very fact that we can’t repent of everything to the fullest extent that we must look to Jesus to find peace of mind.

Now, to be sure, we must not use this as a biblical excuse to not confess or to shirk our Christian duty before God. Trust me, the dark lord will use this also to deceive you. We must deal with sin but we also must know when we simply cannot do enough and we must lay down and rest at the Cross. 

The Holy Spirit knows our frame. He knows that this is a lifestyle that lasts a lifetime. He doesn’t put believers on a “doomsday” countdown clock which tells us that if we don’t deal with everything exhaustively then we are inevitably going to fall under God’s displeasure and harsh discipline.

How God Looks Out For Us

Think about how God speaks about this in the Old Testament. Leviticus 4 is a chapter that is all about sacrifices for sinners who sin unintentionally. There are those who may not even realize that their actions or thoughts were actually sin and yet God provides a sacrifice for them. Wouldn’t it be horrible if we were only forgiven for the sins we knew of? Calvin talks about these sacrifices as follows:

Moses does not refer to those transgressions into which we are ensnared, when we are led astray by the appearance of rectitude, so as to think ourselves without blame; but to those of which we take no heed, and whereby our minds are not pricked; or to those sudden falls, wherein the infirmity of the flesh so stifles the reason and the judgment as to blind the sinner.

And isn’t Christ the ultimate fulfillment of Leviticus 4? Isn’t He the true sacrifice? Isn’t He of so much more worth and value as a substitute on your behalf? Doesn’t He give you a positive righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21)? Oh, Christ is capable of covering all your sins! He is enough for you! He has ended the war. He has taken away your guilt and shame. He no longer points the finger at you but welcomes you with open arms.

Why does this matter to you in the midst of such a daunting and exhausting fight? Because God knows your frame. He knows that there is always sin that we leave undone. He knows there is a grand difference between our actively running away from Him (like Jonah) and our negligence, ignorance, or just flat out spiritual exhaustion. Our Lord knows that we can’t bear to see all of our sin all at once. He knows we can’t repent of everything at once. He knows that repentance itself is not our restitution or atonement. He knows that we cannot merely focus on the faults and the failures in our lives. Where would be the good news in that? Besides, we are built up in faith when we take our eyes off of ourselves and place them about the righteousness we have in Christ. 

The Path of the Gospel

This is where the dark lord attacks. He tries to do anything to take your eyes off of Christ. In Psalm 73, he almost had the psalmist forsake God and the covenant community by taking his eyes off Yahweh and placing them upon his circumstances and the world. It was when the psalmist returned to the temple that his sight of reality was restored. The same is true of us in our spiritual warfare. When we take our eyes long enough off God and place them upon us there is a temptation to do away with the gospel. Satan doesn’t want us to see the grace we have in Jesus. He doesn’t want us to realize that our sins are dealt with in Christ. He doesn’t want us to realize that Jesus is enough for us. He wants us to either do nothing with our sin or try to do everything with our sin. That is no salvation at all!

As always, the path of the gospel is a narrow path with ditches on either side. The dark lord lassos us from either side trying to pull us down into either extreme. He will either make us hound ourselves with condemnation until every aspect of the totality of our guilt is dealt with (as if that were somehow possible) or he will tempt us to ignore it all and continue to live as if we have no sin. Do not let the dark lord hire you to be his own co-accuser against you.

He will dress himself as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14) and make it sound as if he is the Holy Spirit. After all, he knows the Spirit will convict us concerning sin (Jn. 16:8). He wants to sound like the Spirit so that we fear the thought of saying “no” to the Spirit if we seek to stop and rest in Christ. He will tempt us to think that we are quenching the Spirit (1 Thess. 5:19; Eph. 4:30). But think about this, would Jesus invite us into a salvation of Sabbath rest (Mt. 11:28-30) and simultaneously say that we must always be on the sin-hunt in our lives? No, my friend. He wants you to rest. Trust Him. He will bring you to conviction in His timing and He will help you to confess and repent. You can rest in Him.

Spiritual Warfare: When Satan Wants Your To Re-Live Your Past

One of the most common ways in which the dark lord attacks sinners in Christ is by making them re-live their past mistakes. He does this by bringing up memories (which we will discuss how he does so later) and tempts them to be entrapped by these memories like a caged animal. His tactics are to bring up an event or memory in which the saint-sinner is reminded of some particular sin that they have committed or even that which has been committed against them.

In the case of those who have sinned, the dark lord will tempt you to re-live the event as if you are on trial. He recruits you to be his co-prosecutor against your own soul. He paints God in such a picture as if He is a ruthless judge who is not yet quite finished with you and your past. If you have done something wrong, he will plague you with some thoughts of:

1. No hope for grace

2. Guilt for presuming upon God’s forgiveness

3. Others finding out and wanting to publicly deal with you so as to shame you

4. God’s discipline hanging over your head to strike at you when you least expect it; this discipline doesn’t look like loving fatherly discipline (Heb. 12:7-11), it looks like condemnation.

5. That you have committed an unforgivable sin. It may not be the unforgivable sin but he will paint it in such a way that it seems like no man could recover a relationship with God after such an act.

6. Your past makes you unusable to God in the Great Commission

7. You should never feel at ease until you have paid your penalty

By re-living your past, the dark lord wants to keep you from forgetting what lies behind (Phil. 3:13-14). He wants to keep you from remembering what your current identity is in Christ (Rom. 6). He wants to keep you from living by faith (Gal. 2:20). He wants to keep you from rising up from the depths of despair to go out in the peace of knowing your faith has saved you (Lk. 7:50). 

What Re-Living the Past Does

He wants you to be trapped by the past. He wants you to dwell on your sin. Dwelling on sin causes you to skip out on seeing your Savior. He knows that the longer you dwell upon the glory of Jesus Christ that you will become more like Him (2 Cor. 3:18) and, therefore, more able to tear down his armies and thwart his tactics. You must remember that this is war! There is no neutral ground. There is never any “no man’s land”. As long as you are on this earth, the dark lord and his forces will seek you out. 

He will pull up a specific memory from your past and until you defeat him there he will continue to hound you with that thought. “Am I innocent? Did I really do that? If this went public, what would people think? Is God going to ‘get me back’ for this? Have I really dealt with this sin as I should?” But be sure, once you have fought off that one memory, he will bring up another.

When you realize that you have sinned (however greatly but especially in those times of great sin), the dark lord will show you more of your depravity than you have ever realized before. He will make you feel as if you are the epitome of sin. He will make you feel as if no one has a more evil, darkened, and hardened heart like you. You are an abnormal sinner. You are a hopeless sinner. You are a graceless sinner. 

He will tempt you to think that no other Christians have sinned this way in the past and even if they did they dealt with it far better than you have. Before they went to heaven (if they were going to get to heaven), they went back and fixed everything! The dark lord will tell you “You have depended too much on the free forgiveness of Jesus and haven’t quite turned over every stone to truly repent of this. What you need to do”, the dark lord wants you to think, “is to go back and split every hair to make sure you get the justice you deserve. Your repentance from such acts and thoughts are not enough. Your seeking others for help is not enough. No matter how small, you must announce it to the world so that they can put you on trial because the courtroom of Christ is only a heavenly reality. God will never set you free until you go through the earthly courtroom.”

When Satan Pinpoints the Memory

When you look back on such an event and you realize that you have not sinned in such a way, the dark lord will tempt you to think that your thoughts of the past aren’t accurate. He will try to take things out of context and blow them out of proportion. “You forgot about this part of it. You forgot how it hurt the other person greatly. You forgot how much it offended the glory of Christ.” He will make you ask plenty of “what if” questions. Here is the thing about this, no matter how many of those “what if” questions you answer accurately and honestly there will always be more “what if” questions to come. Often times, the dark lord will only use the knowledge that you have against you for the next “what if”. What is required here is to see that this is not of God. We must call this for what it is. This is a satanic attack!

When you look back on such an event and you realize that you have sinned greatly, he will pester you. He will pinpoint his full attack upon this one spot. It is the one crack in the armor that he will keep throwing his forces at. He is like a boxer who finds the one weak spot on his opponent and he will beat you into submission by hammering that one spot. He will darken your view of the cross. He will cause you to lose all sight of forgiveness. He will make your sin much bigger than your Savior. He will grip your thought life with such force it feels as if you can never escape. It will feel more real than the very moment in which you are living. Anything that reminds you of anything remotely similar to that memory will feel like spiritual PTSD. He will fire a thousand arrows at that area of your hurt conscience. If He cannot take away your salvation, He will certainly try to take away your experience of it.

How To Fight By Faith

When you read the Bible, especially when Jesus deals with such horrible sinners with such terrible pasts, do you see our Lord (the One who hates sin more than anyone!) treating people this way? Do you hear Him giving the command for His little lambs to turn over every stone in their past until all their sin is acknowledged to the full and dealt with on this earth? Do you hear Him say, “Fix this in your past first and then you may experience my grace”? Does He who is gentle and lowly in heart (Mt. 11:28-30) seem like the type of Savior who would hound such tender souls who are overloaded by the crushing yoke of their past? Would He really be the summun bonum (Latin for “the highest good”) if He tortured His saints with their past? Why would anyone want to go from living a life where they do everything to forget their past sins to go to a “savior” who would hound them for the rest of their lives on this earth with their past? Is this freedom? Is this love? Is this forgiveness?

We must not let the dark lord determine our Christology. We must remember the study that B.B. Warfield undertook when he sought to determine the emotion that was most attached to Christ in the Scriptures. “The emotion which we should naturally expect of finding most frequently attributed to that Jesus whose whole life was a mission of mercy, and whose ministry was so marked by deeds of beneficence that it was summed up in the memory of his followers as a going through the land ‘doing good’ (Acts. xi. 38), is no doubt ‘compassion.’ In point of fact, this is the emotion which is most frequently attributed to him.” 

Does this mean that Christ doesn’t deal with our past that needs to be dealt with? No. Does this mean that Christ doesn’t call us to repent of all sin? No. It means that when He deals with our past and when He calls us to repent that He is first and foremost compassionate when He goes about it. He is not harsh, rough, and domineering. He desires us to leave our past in the past so that we might live by faith in the present. He knows that the past can entrap us in a dungeon of despair (similar to what Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress was entrapped in). He wants to boost our faith. 

How Does Christ Treat Us?

Listen, when Christ convicts us, not condemns us, we will know it. It is of a much more pure way. See how He approach Peter after He had risen from the dead (Jn. 21:15-19). Notice how He approached all the disciples after they all betrayed Him (Jn. 20:19-29). If He really wants you to deal with something, He will enable you to deal with it. He will not rub your nose in it. He will show you the grace, love, mercy, and forgiveness that you have in Him the entire time. He has dealt with our sins. You must fight to remember that this involves all of your past. 

When Christ died on the cross and rose for your justification, He meant it. In other words, He did not neglect anything. He knows it all and it’s for the past event, that past event, that He died. He wants to forgive. He desires to cleanse you. 

Are there some things from our past that we must deal with if they are left undone? Yes, but when He deals with you it is much more pastoral than the dark lord. There are many times in which things are too far gone and He desires for us to move on. It would be an act of unbelief were we to tell Jesus, “Just wait right here for a second so that I can go back and do something. Then I will follow you.” 

He places your eyes upon Him more than your past. But, once He deals with our past, He does not make us keep re-hashing it. God is not “historical” with us in that He brings up our past time and time again. Matter of fact, He bids us time and time again to go on an live in light of our full forgiveness in Christ:

1. Luke 7:50 And he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

2. Mark 5:34 "Daughter," said Jesus, "your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be free of your affliction."

3. Luke 17:19 And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”

4. Philippians 3:13 Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead

Biblical Reflection and Application

Was David supposed to re-live his memory of sleeping with Bathsheba and killing Uriah over and over even after he heard of God’s forgiveness from Nathan? Did Jesus come to Peter after He had risen from the dead and did He rub Peter’s nose in his denying Jesus three times? Was Paul to always dwell on the fact that he endorsed the stoning of Stephen? Was Jacob to keep thinking about the countless lies he told in the past? Was Sarah to remind Abraham over and over about the two times that he told others that she was his sister? Was Moses to be haunted by the Egyptian he killed or of his striking the rock? What kind of salvation would this be?

 We must remember that it is more of an act of faith and more honoring to our Lord when we forget what lies behind and press forward in faith. We need to realize that this is a great danger to our souls if we think we cannot rest in the blood of Christ but rather need to seek atonement another way. After all, when we seek to re-live our past we are hoping that we are either guiltless or we try to figure out how we can atone for our sins. Either way, that is avoiding the Cross.

Now, to be sure, there are some who can use these truths to their own sinister advantage to run away from their sin. They can use it as a “get out of jail free” card. Those souls must deal with the Lord and He will be sure to deal with them. But, these truths are for those who aren’t running away from Jesus. They want Him. They want to be free from their sins.

God Of Our Future

God promises us a future (Jer. 29:11). One piece of the fruit of the Spirit is peace, not torment (Gal. 5:22). The Christian is at peace with God (Rom. 5:1). Sin no longer has dominion over us (Rom. 6:14). There is no more condemnation for us in Christ (Rom. 8:1). The Spirit bears witness in us that we are children of God (Rom. 8:12-17). He doesn’t torture us with regret and shame from the past. For freedom Christ set us free; we must stand firm and never again take upon us the yoke of slavery (Gal. 5:1). 

Jesus always approaches people seeing their potential future in Him (Jn. 1:42, 47; Mt. 4:20). Even when He does remind someone of their past (such as the Samaritan woman in John 4), He always does so in order to quickly bring them to the source of grace. Do you really think sinners and tax collectors would flock to be with Him (Matt. 9:10; Luke 15:1) if He only reminded them time and time again of their constant failures and gave them no hope?

Jesus is far greater than we can ever imagine! Do not let those attacks from the dark lord change the reality of the heart of Christ (Mt. 11:28-30). Do not assume the worst or most harsh motives of Christ. The dark lord always tries to make himself look more gentle, loving, gracious, and approachable than Jesus. He wants to paint Jesus in rough colors. He wants you to say to yourself, “Why would I continue with Jesus if this is what life with Him is like?”

The Shortest But Most Encouraging Blog You'll Read This Week

God told Adam and Eve to get up and leave the land they were in to get out of the Garden of Eden. Years later (and 9 chapters later in Genesis 12), God tells someone else to get up and leave the land they were in. This time, it was a call for Abram to leave his life of idolatry and come to God.

Why does this matter?

Every time the minister gets up in public worship and reads the “Call to Worship”, he is preaching the gospel. Do not take the “Call to Worship” as if it is merely someone reading Scripture or just making an opening statement. You are graciously being called to return back to God! Jesus is calling you to bring the entirety of your life to Him. No matter where you are, no matter what you’ve done, no matter what you’ve gone through, you can come to God this Sunday!

Now, that right there will warm our hearts when we hear the “Call to Worship”!

Seeing Christ's Heart In Action

What's Jesus Like?

20 Quotes from Dane Ortlund's New Book "Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinner and Sufferers"

This book is awesome. This is incredible Christology with heart-warming devotion. This is a book that anyone can read. I can’t say enough about it.

Let me tell you, these 20 quotes were hard to choose. I’ve underlined over 50% of the book with many times writing “wow”, “good”, or “stunning” beside something underlined. I’ll let these 20 quotes say more than I can:

1. “Meek. Humble. Gentle. Jesus is not trigger-happy. Not harsh, reactionary, easily exasperated. He is the most understanding person in the universe. The posture most natural to him is not a pointed finger but open arms.” p.19

2. “The point in saying that Jesus is lowly is that he is accessible. For all his resplendent glory and dazzling holiness, his supreme uniqueness and otherness, no one in human history has ever been more approachable than Jesus Christ.” p.20

3. “If we are asked to say only one thing about who Jesus is, we would be honoring Jesus’s own teaching if our answer is, gentle and lowly.” p.21

4. “What helium does to a balloon, Jesus’s yoke does to his followers. We are buoyed along in life by his endless gentleness and supremely accessible loneliness. He doesn’t simply meet us at our place of need; he lives in our place of need. He never tires of sweeping us into his tender embrace. It is his very heart. It is what gets him out of bed in the morning.” p.23

5. “Time and again it is the morally disgusting, the socially reviled, the inexcusable and undeserving, who do not simply receive Christ’s mercy but to whom Christ most naturally gravitates.” p.27

6. “When we are speaking of Christ’s heart, we are not so much speaking of one attribute alongside others. We are asking who he most deeply is. What pours out of him most naturally?” p.29

7. “It is impossible for the affectionate heart of Christ to be overcelebrated, made too much of, exaggerated. It cannot be plumbed. But it is easily neglected, forgotten. We draw too little strength from it. We are not leaving behind the harsher side to Jesus as we speak of his very heart. Our sole aim is to follow the Bible’s own testimony as we tunnel in to who Jesus most surprisingly is.” p.29

8. “The same Christ who wept at the tomb of Lazarus weeps with us in our lonely despair. The same one who reached out and touched lepers puts his arm around us today when we feel misunderstood and sidelined. The Jesus who reached out and cleansed messy sinners reaches into our souls and answers our half-hearted plea for mercy with the mighty invincible cleansing of one who cannot bear to do otherwise.” p.32

9. “He does not get flustered and frustrated when we come to him for fresh forgiveness, for renewed pardon, with distress and need and emptiness. That’s the whole point. It’s what he came to heal. He went down into the horror of death and plunged out through the other side in order to provide a limitless supply of mercy and grace to his people.” p.37

10. “When you come to Christ for mercy and love and help in your anguish and perplexity and sinfulness, you are going with the flow of his own deepest wishes, not against them.” p.38

11. “Our difficulties draw out a depth of feeling in Christ beyond what we know.” p.49

12. “He doesn’t handle us roughly. He doesn’t scowl and scold. He doesn’t lash out, the way many of our parents did. And all this restraint on his part is not because he has a diluted view of our sinfulness. He knows our sinfulness far more deeply than we do. Indeed, we are aware of just the tip of the iceberg of our depravity, even in our most searching moments of self-knowledge. His restraint simply flows from his tender heart for his people.” p.54

13. “Jesus can no more bring himself to stiff-arm you than the loving father of a crying newborn can bring himself to stiff-arm his dear child. Jesus’s heart is drawn out to you. Nothing can chain his affections to heaven; his heart is too swollen with endearing love.” p.55

14. “Look to Christ. He deals gently with you. It’s the only way he knows how to be. He is the high priest to end all high priests. As long as you fix your attention on your sin, you will fail to see how you can be safe. But as long as you look to this high priest, you will fail to see how you can be in danger. Looking inside ourselves, we can anticipate only harshness from heaven. Looking out to Christ, we can anticipate only gentleness.” p.57

15. “Fallen, anxious sinners are limitless in their capacity to perceive reasons for Jesus to cast them out. We are factories of fresh resistances to Christ’s love. Even when we run out of tangible reasons to be cast out, such as specific sins or failures, we tend to retain a vague sense that, given enough time, Jesus will finally grow tired of us and hold us at arm’s length.” p.63

16. “We cannot present a reason for Christ to finally close off his heart to his own sheep. No such reason exists. Every human friend has a limit. If we offend enough, if a relationship gets damaged enough, if we betray enough times, we are cast out. The walls go up. With Christ, our sins and weaknesses are the very resumé items that qualify us to approach him. Nothing but coming to him is required—first at conversion and a thousand times thereafter until w are with him upon death.” p.64

17. “If you are part of Christ’s own body, your sins evoke his deepest heart, his compassion and pity. He takes ‘part with you’—that is, he’s on your side. He sides with you against your sin, not against you because of your sin. He hates sin. But he loves you. We understand this, says [Thomas] Goodwin, when we consider the hatred a father has against a terrible disease afflicting his child—the father hates the disease while loving the child. Indeed, at some level the presence of the disease draws out his to heart to his child all the more.” p.71

18. “The sins of those who belong to God open the floodgates of his heart of compassion for us. The dam breaks. It is not our loveliness that wins his love. It is our unloveliness.” p.75

19. “Christ’s heart is a steady reality flowing through time. It isn’t as if his heart throbbed for his people when he was on earth but has dissipated now that he is in heaven. It’s not that his heart was flowing forth in a burst of mercy that took him all the way to the cross but has now cooled down, settling back once more into kindly indifference. His heart is as drawn to his people now as ever it was in his incarnate state. And the present manifestation of his heart for his people is his constant interceding on their behalf.” p.79

20. “He rises up and defends your case, based on the merits of his own sufferings and death. Your salvation is not merely a matter of a saving formula, but of a saving person. When you sin, his strength of resolve rises all the higher. When his brothers and sisters fail and stumble, he advocates on their behalf because it is who he is. He cannot bear to leave us alone to fend for ourselves.” p.91

For the Amazon link to the book, click here.

Here are some of the endorsements on the back of the book:

“I have read no book that more carefully, thoroughly, and tenderly displays Christ’s heart.” Paul Tripp

"Written with pastoral gentleness and quiet beauty, it teases out what twenty biblical texts contribute to this portrait of the heart of Christ, all of it brought together to bring comfort, strength, and rest to believers." D.A. Carson

"Dane Ortlund masterfully handles a treasure trove of Puritan wisdom and deftly presents it to the Christian reader." Rosaria Butterfield

“My life has been transformed by the beautiful, staggering truths in this book. Dane Ortlund lifts our eyes to see Christ’s compassion-filled heart for sinners and sufferers, proving that Jesus is no reluctant savior but one who delights in showing his mercy. For any feeling bruised, weary, or empty, this is the balm for you.” Michael Reeves

“Dane Ortlund writes about what seems too good to be true―the Lord delights to show mercy to you and to me―so he works very carefully through key texts and enlists the help of saints past. I was persuaded, and I look forward to being persuaded again and again.” Ed Welch

“Dane Ortlund helps us rediscover the heart of Jesus that is the very heart of the gospel. This delightful book opens up the sheer immensity of Jesus’s tender love for us. As you immerse yourself in Christ’s very heart, you’ll find your own heart warmed at the fire of the love of God. Ortlund opens up a neglected theme among the Puritans (in bite-sized chunks that won’t overwhelm you), where you’ll discover their grasp of the beauty of Jesus’s love. Your soul needs this book. I highly recommend it.” Paul E. Miller

I Know God Is Able To Do It; But Is He Willing? (Daily Devotion)

When he came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him. And behold, a leper came to him and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” And Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I will; be clean.” And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a proof to them.”

Matthew 8:1-4

Think of the 4-5 most powerful people on the planet. These people have unparalleled authority. These people have unmatched power to get things done. Who comes to mind? Is it Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos? Is it President Donald Trump? What about Russian President Vladimir Putin? All of these men are incredibly powerful and have unsurpassed authority. But here is the question: With such power and authority, can you picture any of them stooping down to the lowest of the low?

This isn’t a dig at any of them but rather just an observation. We rarely think of the most powerful people as those who stoop down to the lowly. Take a look at Matthew 8:1-4. Up to this point in Matthew, Jesus has been seen as the greater Moses, the Divine Warrior, and the King of the already/not yet kingdom. Matthew has painted a picture of Jesus as not merely a man but God in the flesh. This person is unusual. He is unrivaled. He is at the top of all authority and power.

Mountain Theology

In Matthew 5-7, Jesus has just finished preaching the now-famous “Sermon on the Mount”. In 8:1, it says that Jesus “came down from the mountain”. Why would it say this? Surely Matthew isn’t wasting words here. So, if he isn’t, then why does he want us to be reminded that Jesus is coming down from the mountain?

Did you know that there is such a thing as mountain theology? Mountains play a crucial part in the Old and New Testament. Mountains represent the presence of God. Think about the Garden of Eden that was on a mountain. Think about Mount Sinai and Mount Zion. These high and lifted up places have always been where we have seen God’s glory.

Listen to what biblical scholar T. Desmond Alexander says: “The concept of God living on a holy mountain is a significant theme in the Old Testament. However, this same theme frames the entire Bible.” The theme is that our God is high and lifted up. There is no one so glorious and great as our God! And here is what’s awesome, God’s plan is for His people to dwell on His mountain with Him. God wants us to be in His presence. God desires to glorify His people and redeem them from their sin. That’s why the Bible begins on a mountain and ends on a mountain. Have you ever noticed that?

So, how does this relate to Matthew 8? Jesus, God in the flesh, has just gotten done proclaiming the law of the kingdom on the mountain. Does this remind you of something from the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy (Hint: see Exodus 19-20)? Matthew is saying that the same God who proclaimed the Law from the mountain in the Old Testament is the same God in the flesh here. Jesus is no ordinary man. Jesus is Yahweh in human flesh!

Mountains and Mr. Clean

Because the mountain represents God’s holy presence, it means that the mountain also represents purity and cleanliness. Everything unclean cannot dwell on the mountain in God’s presence. Now, this is where it gets REALLY cool! In Exodus, God speaks from the mountain. At the end of Exodus, God tells Moses to build a tabernacle. The tabernacle becomes the “mobile version” of the mountain. In other words, it’s where God’s holy presence is.

So, in Leviticus (the next book after Exodus) God speaks to Moses from within the tent of meeting (the “mobile mountain”). In Leviticus 13, God tells Moses about what they should do with people with leprosy. Twenty-one different times (21!!!), God tells Moses that people with leprosy are unclean. Here is what this meant for them. Because they were “ceremonially unclean”, people with leprosy had to stay away from the “clean” people. God told Moses in Leviticus 13:45 that if people with leprosy went in public that they had to cry out “Unclean! Unclean!” to warn people to stay out of the way. Could you imagine having to do that for a long time? This wasn’t a disease that was easily healed. People who got it were those who would be socially shamed by others.

“OK, Wilson. What in the world are you talking about?” Wait for it. This is so cool! Jesus, the Holy One who speaks from the mountain, is now coming down the mountain to a man with leprosy. Jesus (aka Mr. Clean himself), approaches someone unclean.

I wonder if you feel your uncleanliness. Do you see the depths of your depravity? Do you understand how dirty and shameful your sin really is? If we’re honest, we’re spiritual lepers. In God’s presence, we should have to go around saying, “Unclean! Unclean!” We don’t deserve to dwell with the God of the Mountain. We are unholy and He is Holy, Holy, Holy (Is. 6:3). Did you notice that the word “clean” or “cleansed” was used three times in this short section in Matthew 8:1-4?

So, what’s Jesus going to do? Do you see the tension here? This guy doesn’t deserve Jesus to respond to him. Jesus doesn’t have to approach him. But, He does!

Mr. Clean and Mr. Unclean

Look what the leper asks Jesus. “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” Do you notice what he’s saying? He calls Jesus “Lord”. This leper is recognizing that Jesus is not merely a man. He is more than just a man! But then he says something else. “Lord, I know you’re powerful enough to clean me but I’m not sure if you are willing to clean me. I know you’re able to do it but I’m not sure if you really want to come near someone as unclean as I am.”

Haven’t you and I been here before? It’s easy to think about God’s power and even His sovereignty at times but it’s often harder to believe in His goodness, His compassion, and His desire to help us. Don’t our cries often sound like this: “Lord, I know you’re powerful enough to provide for me but I’m not sure if you are willing. Lord, I know that you are powerful enough to forgive me of my sins but I’m not sure if you are willing. Lord, I know that you are powerful enough to turn this past mistake into some form of redemption but I struggle to believe that you’re willing.”

So, what does Jesus do? Look at v3. This is wild! Jesus reaches out His hand and TOUCHES the leper! “Jesus! You’re not supposed to do that!” But, He does. And notice how Jesus responds. “I am willing; be clean.” Why didn’t Jesus just say, “Be clean”? Why did He have to also say that He is willing?

Jesus wanted to grow this man’s faith. The man had unbelief in Jesus’ willingness to stoop down to the lowly. He saw Jesus as Lord and someone of God-sized authority and power but he doubted that Jesus would want to take His time with someone as small and unclean as a leper. So, what does Jesus do? Jesus not only touches the leper but also speaks to him. Jesus shows him that He is more willing to stoop down low than anyone could ever imagine.

Jesus is like no one else! Jesus is simultaneously the Sovereign King and also our Compassionate Savior. Jesus is the Divine Warrior who fights the strongest enemy and He is also the Prince of Peace who goes to the lowest of the low. Don’t you see how different and amazing Jesus is? No one is like Him!

Jesus really cleansed this guy. There were eyewitnesses and everything! There was no denying that this happened. There was only a matter of how they would respond to Him in light of this happening. It’s the same with us. We must respond in faith in our all-powerful, all-compassionate King. We must trust that God is not only able but He is also willing. The reason why this moment in history is recorded in Holy Scripture is that God wants you to trust that He is the most willing person to cleanse you! The God of the Mountain is also the one who comes down the mountain to transform us.

So, What?

Take all your sin and shame to Jesus. Take all of your failures and faults to God. The Holy One deeply desires to cleanse you. The greatest yearning that you have to be cleansed doesn’t compare in the slightest to God’s desire to cleanse you.

But, how does He do this? He does this by coming down the Mountain into the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Jesus came to die. Jesus came to be declared unclean so that we might be able to cry out “Clean! Clean!” If you’re a Christian, you stand in cleanliness because of the Cross and Resurrection. Not only that; you are also being practically cleansed as you walk in faith.

There is nothing in the Christian that will remain unclean. All of your life will be cleansed and you will be brought home to the Mountain. That’s your destiny because Jesus took your place! This is what Matthew wants us to see. This is the Jesus that Matthew proclaims to us. He is simultaneously the Holy One of the Mountain and also the Suffering Servant who shows compassion to the unclean. Now that’s a Savior you can trust in these times and any other time!

Top 20 Books From 2019

We are what we read. Whether on the phone, computer, iPad, e-reader, or good old fashioned books (my favorite!), we are what we read. As the Puritan John Trapp once said, “Be careful what books you read, for as water tastes of the soil it runs through, so does the soul taste of the authors that a man reads.”

I’m not going to sugar coat this, I read some awesome books this year! This was a great year of reading for me. The Lord brought so many great books across my desk this year. Some are old and some are new. All of these books were very influential to me this year.

This is not a list of books that came out this year but rather a list of the best books that I read this year. Like everyone’s top 10 list, this is certainly one that is very opinionated and subjective. Nevertheless, I hope some of these books might make it to your bedside table or your bookshelf.

1. Behold Your God: Rethinking God Biblically by John Snyder
   Life-changing. I don’t just throw that out. “Truly, Truly” this book was life-changing. Few books have shown me a bigger God. Although this is more of a study (and a DVD accompanying set if you so choose), I have come across few things that showed me the God of the Bible like this. There are certain seasons of life where certain books start that new chapter. This is one of them for me. This launched me into some of the other books that I read this year (Barrett, Gladd). The Lord used this to give me such a craving to know Him more. This book will plow, plant, and nurture your heart. It’s a phenomenal resource for daily devotions, Bible studies, or for turning it into a Sunday school lesson series. Thankfully, he has come out with another book and, word on the street is that he is working on a third study!

2. None Greater: The Undomesticated Attributes of God by Matthew Barrett
   Stunning book. The cover design (a lion staring you in the face!) really does echo the content of the book. God is seen as an “undomesticated” lion in this book. This is so enjoyable to read and so easy to follow along. As one pastor has said, “It’s easy to understand but hard to swallow.” These truths about who God is will blow your mind! It has been such a refreshing book for me to read and certainly one that I will read again in later years.

3. The Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin
   This is what my Summer Adult Sunday School class went through and this meant that I needed to go through it as well. Yes, this is a big book with many words but that shouldn’t scare you away. Calvin is devotional, clear, accessible. There is a reason why this book has been around for hundreds of years. There is a reason why the Church has poured itself over this book. This is NOT a book merely for pastors and teachers. Actually, it was written for the “common” person! This is one of the original “systematic theologies” and it is still one of the standards. Pick up Calvin and read him! Even if you only need a book to reference, buy Calvin! You’d be surprised how much you could read if you read him for only 15 minutes a day. There is no substitute for this classic.

4. From Adam and Israel To the Church: A Biblical Theology of the People of God by Benjamin L. Gladd (RTS Professor!)
   I was privileged to get an early copy from the man himself! And look, I’m at the point that I’m just going to read everything he writes. He is enjoyable, clear, applicable, and writes in such fresh ways that makes the Bible seem brand new. Every time I listen to his lectures or read his books I see the Bible in a new way. To be sure, Gladd isn’t coming up with anything new but rather pointing out to us what’s been there all along. This is a great book that totally shapes our identity as a people of God and how God has devoted Himself to us. Also, he has some awesome graphics and charts in there.

5. Romans by J.V. Fesko
   This is a book that I have written recommended to many people this year. While preparing for our Youth Large Group sermon series, I picked up this book from one our newest professor at RTS Jackson. This was a great read! I used it for my daily devotions as I read one chapter each morning. Once again, this was so clear and so accessible. I came away each day thinking, “I know this section of Romans better.” It was not only intellectually stimulating but it was also devotionally warm. Fesko makes sure to apply the text to our modern-day situation and he does so in a great way. God is big. Salvation is amazing. Holiness is beautiful. Heaven is sure. These were major takeaways for me from this excellent commentary.

6. Setting Our Affections upon Glory: Nine Sermons on the Gospel and the Church by Martyn Lloyd-Jones
   I read a lot of Lloyd-Jones. Matter of fact, I read everything of Lloyd-Jones. This is, yet again, another series of sermons that are timeless and life-changing. I want to know the God that Lloyd-Jones knew. These sermons were preached when Hurricane Camille (the second most intense tropical cyclone on record to strike the United States) was heading straight towards Pensacola and McIlwain Presbyterian Church where Martyn Lloyd-Jones was to preach. As in typical Lloyd-Jones style, this didn’t alter him at all. He was going to preach and preach he did. If you like reading the sermons of Martyn Lloyd-Jones, you should grab this book. This is a bucket of cold water for our evangelical culture today.

7. The Life and Theology of Paul by Guy Waters
   No, this is not a paid endorsement for my RTS professors. This is genuinely another book from them that I read this year that was in my top 10. The strength of Dr. Waters is doctrinal clarity. I love lists. I love orderly writing. Dr. Waters’ book is full of lists (Ex: “First,…Second,….” etc.). For me, this makes it easy to follow and also easy to use. If you want a short, accessible, yet in-depth book on the life and theology of Paul then you need to pick this one up. If you’re teaching on any of the Pauline epistles then you need to use this as a guide. This is a great resource for book studies as well. Like my other RTS professors, Waters makes you come away with a better understanding of Scripture and a clearer view of God and His marvelous salvation.

8. Revelation For You (God's Word for You) by Tim Chester
   Do you want to understand the book of Revelation in a more simple way? Get this book. This will make you want to teach a Bible study through the book of Revelation. Chester is one of my favorite modern writers and commentators. This is a great resource for devotions (as is the whole series) and this will leave you with confidence that you know the book of Revelation. I loaned this out and that person came away with the same thought!

9. 2 Samuel For You: The Triumphs and Tragedies of God's King (God's Word for You) by Tim Chester
   I could say the exact same thing as #8 but in reference to the book of 2 Samuel. Great read! Great for devotions! Read Chester.

10. Love Walked Among Us by Paul Miller
    This book will help you see another side of Jesus. It’s almost like you have a documentary camera crew following Jesus so that you can see Him up close. Things that are clear in Scripture, but frequently skimmed over, are brought to light. The compassion, honesty, and dependence of Jesus were much needed for me to see. God in the flesh was seen as beautiful! This is a great book to teach me to slow down in my Bible reading (especially in the Gospels) and to notice what the writers are actually saying.

11. The Gospel-Driven Church by Jared Wilson
    I love Jared Wilson’s books. He is a page-turner! This book is a solid addition to the many gospel-centered books coming out. In my opinion, this one has been the best one that I’ve read so far. His chapter on “The Five Metrics That Matter Most” is a reduplication and application of some of what Jonathan Edwards saw in the Great Awakening. This chapter is worth the price of the book. This is a great book not only for pastors but for the average church member. It makes you want to pursue to be more of a gospel-driven church member.

12. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
    This was my first time reading The Hobbit. I know. I know. I’m sorry for the 28-year delay. This was such a great read. Books that take you on a journey are so refreshing to read. There were several times I was reading where I could see the parallel between Bilbo’s journey to The Lonely Mountain and the Christian life. The book is better than the movie (but I definitely watched the movies afterward!).

13. Insecure: Fighting our Lesser Fears with a Greater One by John Perritt
    You just need to take an afternoon or two to read this. Yes, John is writing mainly to youth but don’t let that keep you (if you’re not a youth) from buying this. This is timeless (this will also hilariously remind you of what your teenage days used to be like!). Short, clear, applicable, and biblical. There is a reason why John’s RYM elective class this Summer was one of the biggest classes at all the conferences. There is also a reason why our Youth Ministry Fall Retreat got some much feedback (because he was the speaker!). This is a great resource for those who know they struggle with insecurity and for those who don’t acknowledge it (but trust me, after reading this you’ll realize that you do to some level). I’ve passed out all my copies by now.

14. Pursuing a Heart of Wisdom: Counseling Teenagers Biblically by John Kwasny
    Doctor, Pappa, Father, Sunday School teacher, Christian Education Director, Biblical Counselor, and lover of Chicago White Sox baseball John Kwasny has written a terrific book. There is a lot of popular psychology out there but this gets to the heart. Like Dr. Waters’ book, this is so organized and filled with lists (did I mention that I love lists?). In my opinion, I think the book’s strength is in using it as a reference book. The table of contents is divided up in such a way where you can search for issues by topic. This makes it easy to use over the years.

15. The Rhetoric Companion: A Student’s Guide to Power in Persuasion by N.D. Wilson and Douglas Wilson
    I am teaching a class at CCS on Public Speaking and I was preparing for the class I looked up several books that I could use for teaching the class. This was great! This is a solid resource that shows you the basic elements of speaking but does so from a Christian worldview. The Wilsons (father and son duo) are great writers and teachers. It is a great book to use for all ages. As someone who speaks often, I found it to be one of the more helpful books on speaking that I have read.

16. Simplicity in Preaching by J.C. Ryle
    Short, to the point, and so relevant, this was such a good read for me this year. From the back cover: This is a new and updated edition by H&E Publishing with a helpful addition by Bennett W. Rogers. The early preaching ministry of J. C. Ryle, one of the most powerful preachers of the Victorian era, was an unmitigated disaster. He struggled to keep the attention of his rural congregation, and so he embarked on a series of failed "pulpit experiments." Through this process of trial and error, Ryle learned to "crucify" his style and win the attention of his parishioners. Once he found his voice, popularity soon followed. He filled his churches to suffocation and became a sought after platform speaker. He was repeatedly chosen to be the select preacher for Oxford and Cambridge, and continued to draw large crowds well into his eighties as the Bishop of Liverpool. In Simplicity in Preaching, J. C. Ryle presents the fruit of a lifelong quest to attain a simplicity in preaching for his fellow ministers.

17. Safe and Sound: Standing Firm in Spiritual Battles by David Powlison
    This was such an encouraging book to me in the season that I read it. Outside of William Gurnall’s massive treatment on the Armor of God, this is my go-to read. This is a short book but man is it packed with power! This is why people love reading everything Powlison writes. This book shows you that spiritual warfare is real and more evident than you realize. Powlison also shows you how to fight back and how to live by the power of the Holy Spirit.

18. When People Are Big and God Is Small by Ed Welch
    There is a reason why this is a modern-day classic. If you are struggling with anxious feelings, peer-pressure, codependency, pride, shame, or anything like this then you need to get this book. It took me too long until I finally read this. This was like a fire in the middle of a cold winter.

19. Meet Generation Z: Understanding and Reaching the New Post-Christian World by James Emery White
    Although I don’t agree with several of his suggested responses to the problems of Generation Z, this was a very needed book for me to read as someone working in Youth Ministry. I think the first couple of chapters of this book will benefit any parent, pastor, or youth worker. We cannot think about today’s teenagers through the lens of, “Well, when I was that age _________ .” That doesn’t work. This is a new and different generation. We need to learn what they are like and this book helps us to do so. This is filled with showing us the good things about Generation Z but also the not so good things. The Church needs to take heed of what this generation is like because they are the future elders, deacons, pastors, leaders, and members of the Church.

20. How to Grill Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Flame-Cooked Food by Mark Bittman
    I don’t apologize for putting a cookbook in here. This thing is amazing. No, I haven’t read it from cover to cover but I have looked at every recipe and tried several of them. This is awesome. Definitely a solid Christmas gift for someone you know.

Recommended Reading During Christmas

Each year there are several books that come out dealing with the Christian theology of Christmas. While several of these are great reads there are a few that rise to the top. Here is a list of some of the most helpful books (in other words, you won’t be wasting your time if you pick one of these up):

1. Child In The Manger by Sinclair Ferguson
   See the video to the right to see what Alistair Begg says about it.
   
   ‘The best story ever told in the best possible way. Cumulatively, these chapters provide rich, rewarding and revitalizing expositions that form a perfect addition to a truly Christian, Christ-centered, Christmas.’ — DEREK W.H. THOMAS

   ‘Full of thoughtful exposition, solid theology, winsome gospel presentation, and worshipful adoration of its glorious Subject. Sinclair Ferguson just may be my very favorite pastor-theologian, and this book illustrates why. A sheer delight to read and to recommend. Read and enjoy the Christmas story as for the first time!’ — FRED G. ZASPEL

2. Hidden Christmas by Tim Keller
   From the book sleeve: Even people who are not practicing Christians think they are familiar with the story of the nativity. Every Christmas displays of Baby Jesus resting in a manger decorate lawns and churchyards, and songs about shepherds and angels fill the air. Yet despite the abundance of these Christian references in popular culture, how many of us have examined the hard edges of this biblical story? In his new book Timothy Keller takes readers on an illuminating journey into the surprising background of the nativity. By understanding the message of hope and salvation within the Bible’s account of Jesus’ birth, readers will experience the redeeming power of God’s grace in a deeper and more meaningful way.

3. Repeat the Sounding Joy by Christopher Ash

   "Simply superb. A genuine model of Christian devotional writing—warm, enriching, and exciting application drawn from insightful expository and theological reflection on the biblical text. Each of these brief chapters is an absolute delight to read. This is joyful Christmastime reading for Christians of every age and experience. Very highly recommended." — FRED ZASPEL
   "These devotionals are digestible: they will go down easily in the busy days of Advent. They are profound: they will go down deep. Most wonderfully, they are word-filled: they will feed us with the truth and beauty of the Scriptures, and of the Savior whose advent we celebrate." — KATHLEEN NIELSON

4. Come, Let Us Adore Him by Paul Tripp
   "A rare gem—great theology inspiring great devotion. This book will enrich my family’s experience of Christmas this year, and I believe it can enrich your Christmas too." — RAY ORTLUND
   “This devotional will help us remember the great love with which we have been loved. Read its pages, share it with your family. Enter into that manger scene. And breathe.” — ELYSE FITZPATRICK

Other Books Not Exclusively on Christmas but recommended reading during the Christmas season:

• Ministries of Mercy by Tim Keller
  Pastor Dean says, “Why this book? Because there’s a whole lot of suffering, depression, and other negative experiences/emotions during this time of year. This book moves us to consider how to come alongside those whom God is calling us to serve, in and outside the church.”

• A Christian’s Pocket Guide to Jesus Christ by Mark Jones
  ”This book is gold. I can't remember the last time I read such a small book that has had such an effect on me. At 76 pages I think it's worth almost memorizing! There are lots of really helpful emphases, particularly Jones's treatment of the Incarnation, Christ and the Holy Spirit, and the Threefold Office of Christ. It is Christology from above and is a very helpful introduction indeed. It could be used in a variety of contexts in church life and will leave people wanting, even craving, more. Buy and read.” — Reformation 21- The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals

The Man Who Ruined The Funeral

This past Sunday evening, I had the privilege of preaching at Trinity Presbyterian Church here in Jackson. The text was Luke 7:11-17 on the compassion of Jesus. Here is a link to the sermon audio: The Man Who Ruined The Funeral

Dear Local Church Member, What Can You Do To Support The Youth Ministry?

I was recently at a lunch with someone and he asked me a great question that not many people ask. “What can I do to support the youth ministry?” The interesting part was that this was not a youth parent who asked this question. This person was primarily asking as a church member on how to be a good fellow church member. Instead of asking him to volunteer, although we love volunteers, I gave him a quick two-fold answer that I will expand here. These answers are primarily a response to someone who would be a parent.

1. To be a church member who supports the youth ministry, teach your family to love Jesus.
   This might sound obvious but I wonder if it is obvious to the people who are around us a lot. In other words, is Jesus our primary love? Yes, insert here all of our failures because we all mess up and we all ruin our witness at some point. Still, this should not deter us from pursuing this. If you want to support the youth ministry, love Jesus in such a way that people know this about you. Fire begets fire. Passion begets passion. Have you ever been around someone who cheered for a certain sports team too much that you were enticed to cheer for them too? Have you ever been tempted into peer pressure because someone tried passionately persuading you to do something with them? Peer pressure never works if the person “selling” the argument is boring or unpassionate. Eeyore would be a terrible “peer pressurer”. If passion tends to entice and persuade people, how much more so would our youth be enticed to love Jesus if they see what Jesus means to you, how Jesus has changed you, and what hope Jesus gives you (1 Peter 3:15)? Why would anyone want to become a Christian if all they know are people who only like Jesus on Sunday morning? Without a love for Jesus, how can we expect to send students off to college who won’t get sucked into the culture of binge drinking, constant sexual hook ups, temptations for unbelief amidst an atheistic world, and peer pressure for substance abuse? How can we really expect students to go to bed on a Saturday night to go to church Sunday morning if they don’t love Jesus? How can we encourage someone to keep pursuing holiness if they don’t love Jesus? We need to make sure we come back to the most basic of foundations. What our youth need now more than ever is not all the correct answers to every apologetic, philosophic, and theological questions they are asked (although we should keep pursuing these!). Rather, what they need is to be surrounding by a church who loves Jesus in such a way that they are wooed, enticed, and persuaded to love Jesus with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. But, how can we expect our children to love Jesus if we look exactly like the culture? How can we expect our students to love Jesus if He isn’t a significant presence in our lives? How can we expect our students to love Jesus as He deserves to be loved if we don’t love Him the way He deserves? You fail. I fail. We all fail. I know that I have lived in such a way before where I was not the most attractive Christian and I made Jesus to look more ugly than more beautiful. We have all been like Peter before and epicly failed. But, here is the grace that Jesus gives us: He tells us to get back out there and keep pursuing Him and keep preaching Him. What a Savior! He isn’t looking for the healthy but for the sick who know how to keep running back to the doctor. Jesus didn’t call the rabbis and religious teachers of His day to follow Him. Jesus called the weirdos, the uneducated, and the ungifted. Jesus does not tell us to do this under our own strength but rather He empowers us to do this! If the almighty God empowers us to do this then why should we not pursue this? I briefly conclude with the first half of the answer by saying that if you want to support the youth ministry then love Jesus and teach your family to love Jesus. Without Him, there is no eternal life.

2. To be a church member who supports the youth ministry, teach your family to love the church.
   One of the biggest growing statistics is that more and more students who grow up in the church are leaving the church when they go to college. Why do they leave the church? First, they leave the church because they don’t see the importance of the church. The church, for them, is another party competing for their schedule. As long as the church is seen as just another thing to do, why should they go to church when they have homework, fraternity and sorority parties, dates, campus ministries, friends to hang out with, and class to go to? If the church is just another thing that their family did “just because” then how can we expect them to go to church when they become in charge of their own schedules? This is even seen already when students are in middle school and high school. For the most part, they don’t show up on a regular basis to youth ministry because the church is not important to them. Besides, there are games, homework, practices, Netflix, projects, hobbies, friends to be with, video games to play, rest to catch up on, and even para-church ministries (as helpful as they can be!). Of course they won’t show up when they don’t think church is important because who wants to come listen to someone preach for 35 minutes, hang out with fellow believers, and support and be supported by others going through the same struggles as you? Sure, there is an argument that can be inserted about a past history with the church, bad relationships, bad youth workers, or because the preaching stinks. Nevertheless, this is the Bride of the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. This is a community that is still learning to repent! But again, why would I want to come listen to someone talk to me about somebody name Jesus and about my soul for 35 minutes when I could be catching up on homework or staring at a screen playing Fortnite or watching another episode on Netflix if the church is not important and no one has shown me that the church is important? If my parents (or even other church members) don’t act like the church is important, why should I act like it? Secondly, they leave the church because they don’t have an accurate view of the church. The church is not important because they don’t rightly and biblically understand the church. It’s the same when students neglect youth ministry in their own local church. A lack of understanding of the what church really is shows in its being neglected. Parents, pastors, and youth workers should be teaching our children an accurate “ecclesiology” (the study of the church). You don’t have to teach an exhaustive doctrine of the church but we should teach them a robust and healthy doctrine of the church. Only when our students see the beauty, majesty, plan, purpose, identity, mission, and the worthiness of the church will they then prioritize church. The only reason why a student in college goes to class is because her teacher told her that if she doesn’t go to class then she will fail her class. In other words, the teacher showed her that there was a lot riding on her showing up to class. In much the same way, unless we show, teach, and remind (a good summary word for this is catechize which is a lost form of teaching in the Church today) our children and youth the importance and value of the church in this world, in our lives, and for the glory of God then they will not prioritize church. For the most part, our students will not go to church in college if they don’t love Jesus and if they don’t know the value of the church. The goal is not merely to go to church; the goal is to worship God in Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit as the Church which is expressed in the local church. In my own experience of being a college student and working for 5 years in youth ministry at some level, the children who grow up in a home that has not taught them the value of the church (no matter how many times they went to church or were apart of some ministry) are most likely not going to go to church when they go to college. This does not mean everyone who grows up in a family that undervalues church won’t go to church in college but there is typically a pattern. There are also children who grow up in a home where church is valued and parents love Jesus and yet they still don’t go to church. For the most part, this is my story and I am sensitive to the fact that this does happen. Nevertheless, when Proverbs 22:6 says, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it”, it cannot mean anything less than these two answers. It certainly would imply more but it never implies less and never gets beyond this. Once again, Jesus is not calling the perfect parent who is also the perfect church member to produce the perfect child. Jesus is calling the repentant sinner who belongs to a community of worshippers of God to depend on the Spirit in order to faithfully raise up children to love Him and love His Bride. Jesus doesn’t want perfect parents; He wants repentant parents and a repentant church. You and I might have failed our entire lives up to this point but as long as He has given us His Spirit we can get back up and pursue this by His power. Dear church member, if you want to support the youth ministry, love the church in such a way where others are attracted to the church.