Thought for the Week

Comforting

2012-01-24T21:15:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's thought comes from Charles Haddon Spurgeon -- a man who is often called, "The Prince of Preachers" and still considered by many to be one of the greatest preachers who ever lived.

He was a British Baptist of Calvinist persuasion who lived and ministered in London during the last half of the 1800's (born 1832 / converted to Christ 1850 / died 1892). He preached at the same church for almost 40 years, and did so twice every Sunday to crowds of at least 6000 people. Nearly 25,000 copies of the printed versions of his sermons sold every week, and for many years they were cabled to New York every Monday morning to be reprinted in leading newspapers across the United States.

Were it not for his generous giving to missions, and the pastor's college, and the two orphanages, and the widow's home he started (as well as regular gifts to help pastors struggling in smaller churches), he could have been one of England's wealthiest men. Yet he chose not to be -- dying with little more than a modest home and enough to care for his widowed wife.

German preacher and theologian, Helmut Thielicke even goes so far as to say to preachers (and those aspiring to be preachers): "I am almost tempted to shout out to those who are serving the eternal Word as preachers, and to those who are preparing to do so, in what I hope will be productive hyperbole: Sell all that you have (not least of all some of your stock of current sermonic literature) and buy Spurgeon (even if you have to grub through the second-hand bookstores to find it)."

This selection has to do with God's grace to help us in our times of struggle, hardship and trial. And lest you hear it as mere pious advice from a pampered saint, you need to know Spurgeon experienced many disappointments, frequent depressions and the crippling pain of gout for the last 20 years of his life. Yet it is precisely because he did suffer that Russell Conwell (a contemporary of Spurgeon whose own legacy includes Gordon-Conwell Seminary) could write of the effect of his sermons on others: "No man in this (19th) century has ever healed so many people as Mr. Spurgeon."

This selection comes from, "C. H. Spurgeon - Beside Still Waters / Words of Comfort for the Soul," an excellent devotional book by Roy H. Clarke. He has read over 2000 of Spurgeon's sermons and done us the great service of editing and updating many portions into today's language. Enjoy.

"Believer, here are four comforts when you face severe trials.

1.) There is no curse in your cross. It may be as heavy as a ton of sorrow, but there is not a single ounce of curse. 'Whom the LORD loves, He chastens, and punishes every son whom He receives. If you endure chastening, God deals with you as sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten' (Heb. 12:6-7). The God of love, who inflicts our sorrows, is as good when He chastens as when He caresses.

2.) Your trials are assigned by divine wisdom and love. He who weighs the mountains in the scales (Is. 40:12) measures your troubles, and will not let you endure one grain more than His infinite wisdom determines. The devil may be turned loose on you (as he was on Job, or Peter in Lk. 22:31-32), but remember, he is a defeated enemy. Everything that you suffer is the appointment of wisdom, ruled by love.

3.) When you bear the cross, God gives special comforts that He never gives to the healthy. Dark caverns do not keep miners from searching for diamonds. You need never fear suffering if you remember it will richly bless your soul. The nightingale only sings at night, and there are promises that only sing when we are in trouble. It is in the cellar of affliction that the fine wine of the kingdom is aged and stored. You will never see Christ's face so clearly as when all others turn their back on you.

4.) Trials bring you nearer to God. Yet there are times when our faith staggers and we fail to leave our worldly cares with Him. Like Martha, we worry about many things (Luke 10:41). But Jesus says, 'Come My child and trust Me. Come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in our time of need' (Heb. 4:16)."

May his words encourage and bring healing to you as well,

Pastor Jeff

Suffering and God's Presence

2012-01-17T22:15:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thoughts' come to you from four different authors -- J. C. Ryle, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Jean-Nicholas Grou and Morton Kelsey (I believe). The first two have to do with God's purpose in our struggles, difficulties and sufferings. The last two have to do with nurturing the health of our inward lives by finding consistent, ongoing contact with the God who is always there. Enjoy.

J. C. Ryle - "We live in such a fair and pleasant world -- we are surrounded with so much that is smiling and joyful -- that if we were not frequently obliged to taste of sickness and trial or disappointments, we should forget our heavenly home and pitch our tents here on the outskirts of Sodom.

Therefore it is that God's people pass through great tribulations; therefore it is they are often called upon to suffer the sting of affliction and anxiety, or weep over the grave of those whom they have loved as their own soul. It is their Father's hand that chasten's them, and it is thus that He weans their affection from the things below and fixes them on Himself. It is thus He trains them for eternity, and cuts the threads one by one that bind their wavering hearts to earth.

No doubt such chastening is grevious for the time, but still it brings many a hidden grace to light, and cuts down many a secret sprout of evil. We shall see those who have suffered most shining among the brightest stars in the assembly of heaven. The purest gold is that which has been longest in the refiner's furnace. The brightest diamond is often that which has required the most grinding and polishing. Yet our light affliction endureth but for a moment, and it works in us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory (II Cor. 4:17)."

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones - "We have to be humbled. So [God] puts us in the fire of affliction, in the crucible of purification. God has only one object: to get rid of the dross and to refine the gold. But in our childishness we listen to the devil and we grumble and complain. 'Why is this happening to me? I am trying to be a good Christian; look at those other people.'

I trust that we shall never speak in that way again, thus falling victim to the wiles of the devil. Cannot you see that in all this, God, as your Father, is manifesting His love to you and revealing His great and gracious and glorious purpose with respect to you? He intends to make you perfect, 'without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing' (Eph. 5:27). But first he must rid you of very much rubbish."

Jean-Nicolas Grou - "We know in general that prayer is a religious act, but when it comes to actually praying, we easily forget that it is a supernatural act which is therefore beyond our own strength and can only be performed by the inspiration and help of grace. As St. Paul says: 'Not that we are competent to claim anything for ourselves, but our competency comes from God' (II Cor. 3:5)...

Why do people try so hard to enflame their imagination as if prayer depended on their own efforts, as if it were not necessary that God's action should govern and direct their prayer? Since prayer is a supernatural act, we must earnestly ask God to produce it in us, and then we must perform it tranquilly under his guidance. We must draw down divine grace... and then co-operate with it, without interfering with its effects. If God does not teach us, we shall never know thoroughly the nature of prayer...

Prayer is a wholly spiritual act, addressed to God who is the Supreme Spirit, the Spirit who sees all things and is present in all things. As St. Augustine says, 'God is closer to us than we are to ourselves.' Knowing this is the essence of prayer. The posture of our body and the words we use have little significance in themselves, and are only pleasing to God as they express the feelings of the heart. For it is the heart that prays, it is to the voice of the heart that God listens, and it is the heart that he answers... Why do we pray so much with our lips and so little with our heart?... Why do we not lay open our heart to God and beg him to put in it whatever is most pleasing to him? Who could call it a bad method [of prayer] if it springs from humility, from a deep sense of our own inability, and from a lively faith and trust in God? Such is the method suggested by the Holy Spirit to those souls who ask him to teach them how to pray."

The following 'thought' was scribbled on a note I found in my files (I believe it may be by Morton Kelsey) - "Unless the members of a church are finding some encounter of their own with God, their act of joining together for religious services usually becomes one more meaningless activity, merely the ritual indulgence of a nice habit.

One can sense the immense difference in a congregation where a considerable number of the people are finding consistent personal contact with God on their own, apart from the group.

The first step in finding such contact with God is learning to be alone and quiet. Most of modern life is a studied attempt to avoid ever being alone. Yet constant activity, without time for reflection and prayer, is spiritual suicide."

In the Bonds of Christian Affection,

Pastor Jeff

Don't Give Up!

2012-01-11T21:09:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes from John Piper in a book entitled: "The Roots of Endurance." In the book Piper looks at the uncanny commitment, perseverance and endurance demonstrated in the lives of three great men:

1.) John Newton, former slave trader and author of the beloved song, "Amazing Grace."

2.) William Wilberforce, the man almost single-handedly responsible for abolishing slavery in the British empire. He worked relentlessly for 46 years in the British Parliament to abolish the slave trade (against tremendous opposition, insults, and threats), even though his legislation was defeated eleven times between 1787 and 1807. His battle to abolish it entirely throughout every colony did not pass until three days before his death in 1833. He was a man of immense fortitude and strength of resolve.

3.) Charles Simeon, who pastored of Trinity Church at Cambridge University in England for 54 years (1782-1836).

Our quote for today is in reference to Simeon. It contrasts him and us. Piper's initial cultural critique (I believe) is right on the mark for many -- uncomfortably so. Enjoy!

"I know I am" (says Piper of himself), "in great measure, a child of my times. And one of the pervasive marks of our times is emotional fragility. It hangs in the air we breathe. We break easily. Our marriages break easily. Our faith breaks easily. Our happiness breaks easily. And our commitment to the church breaks easily. We are easily disheartened, and it seems we have little capacity for surviving and thriving in the face of criticism and opposition.

A typical emotional response to trouble in the church is to think, 'If that's the way they feel about me, then I'll just find another church.' We see very few healthy, happy examples today whose lives spell out in flesh and blood the rugged words, 'Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds' (James 1:2).

When historians list the character traits of America in the last third of the twentieth century, commitment, constancy, tenacity, endurance, patience, resolve, and perseverance will not be on the list. The list will begin with an all-consuming interest in self-esteem. It will be followed by the subheadings of self-assertiveness, self-enhancement, and self-realization. And if we think that we are not children of our times, let us simply test ourselves to see how we respond when people reject our ideas or spurn our good efforts or misconstrue our best intentions. We all need some help here.

We are surrounded by, and are part of, a society of emotionally fragile quitters. The spirit of the age is too much in us. We need to spend time with the kind of people -- people whether dead or alive -- whose lives prove there is another way to live. Scripture says, 'be imitators of those who by faith and patience inherit the promises' (Hebrews 6:12). So I want to hold up for us the faith and patient endurance of Charles Simeon for our inspiration and imitation."

What did Simeon endure?

He turned down a fortune from a family member in order to be able to preach the Gospel. He was at Cambridge University for three years before he found even one other believer on campus!

He so desired to preach the Gospel at Cambridge, and be an evangelical witness in that place, that he worked as an assistant at the church for five years hoping to be appointed lecturer (pastor/preacher). Yet after those first five years, he was passed over for another, and had to wait another seven years before he was chosen to be lecturer -- a position which gave him the opportunity to practice what he believed was the threefold purpose of preaching: "To humble the sinner, To exalt the Saviour, To promote holiness."

When he was finally assigned the pastorate, he endured years of cruel treatment from his congregation, "for his biblical preaching and uncompromising stand as an evangelical." Because of resistance from members,"he started an evening service for the townspeople, but the church wardens locked the doors while the people stood waiting in the street. Once he had the doors opened by a locksmith, but when it happened again, he dropped the service."

The members of the church, "locked their pews on Sunday mornings. They refused to come, and refused to let others sit in their pews. When Simeon set up chairs in the aisles, nooks and corners at his own expense, the wardens took them out and threw them into the church yard... When he tried to visit from house to house, hardly a door would open to him. This situation lasted 10 years."

Even after he'd been there 30 years (at age 53) people still gave him trouble.

He was slandered. People intentionally, repeatedly and rudely disrupted the services. And on several occasions, "stones were thrown at the windows.... On one occasion a band of students waited by his usual exit to assault him, but providentially he took another way home that day.... Students who were awakened and converted by his preaching were soon ostracized and ridiculed."

Yet he persevered with a smile. He was gentle and full of grace, never harsh or rude. Said Wilberforce, "How full he is of love, and of the desire to promote the spiritual benefit of others. Oh that I might copy him, as he Christ."

Long after most people today would have given up and moved on, he pressed on -- for the sake of the Gospel. And the fruit of his years of patient perseverance were students and townsfolk converted to Christ and discipled in Christ, as well as others who headed into the ministry, and others off to the mission field. Henry Martyn, the great missionary to India, was converted and mentored by Simeon, and within five years of arriving on the field had translated the New Testament into Urdu, Persian, and supervised its translation into Arabic.

If you are going through rough waters, and are thinking of giving up, you might want to pick up Piper's book. It's an inspiring read to say the least!

In the Service of Christ, who left us the example of enduring great opposition from sinful men (Heb. 12:3), Pastor Jeff

On Prayer

2012-01-05T21:36:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

Since our church is setting aside this Thursday, December 15, as a day of fasting and prayer, this week's 'thought' has to do with fasting and prayer. I know its the season for celebration, parties and feasting, but as a church we felt led to spend a day fasting and seeking God in prayer. Any who can, or would like to join us in that endeavor, are more than welcome to do so.

Therefore, since prayer is our church's focus for this week, I wanted to send out some thoughts on prayer and one on fasting by various Christian authors. I hope they will encourage you in your pursuit of claiming what E. M. Bounds calls, our "immeasurable inheritance." Enjoy.

"None can believe how powerful prayer is, and what it is able to effect, but those who have learned it by experience." Martin Luther

"Faith is the essential quality in the heart of any person who desires to communicate with God. He must believe and stretch out the hand of faith for that which he cannot see or prove. Prayer is actually faith claiming and taking hold of its immeasurable inheritance... Moreover, when faith ceases to pray it ceases to live.

Faith does the impossible because it lets God undertake for us, and nothing is impossible with God... Only God can move mountains, but faith and prayer move God... Faith in Christ is the basis of all working and all praying. All wonderful works depend on wonderful praying, and all praying is done in the name of Jesus Christ... All other conditions are of little value. Everything else is given up except Jesus. The name of Christ -- the Person of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ -- must be supremely sovereign in the hour of prayer." E. M. Bounds

"The first thing Jesus teaches His disciples is that they must have a secret place of prayer. Jesus says, 'And when you pray, go into your closet..." Every one must have a solitary spot where he can be alone with his God... That spot may be anywhere. It may change from day to day if we have to change our abode... There alone, but there most surely, Jesus comes to us to teach us to pray... The first thing in this closet-prayer is: I must meet my Father. The light that shines in the closet must be the light of the Father's countenance. The fresh air from heaven with which Jesus would have it filled, the atmosphere in which I am to breathe and pray, is God's Father-love, God's infinite Fatherliness. Thus each thought or petition we breathe out will be simple, hearty, childlike trust in the Father. This is how the Master teaches us to pray. He brings us into the Father's living presence." Andrew Murray

"Upright Christians pray without ceasing. Though they pray not always with their mouths, yet their hearts pray continually, whether asleep or awake, for the sigh of the true Christian is a prayer." Martin Luther

"The power of the Church to truly bless rests on intercession -- asking and receiving heavenly gifts to carry to men. Because this is so, it is no wonder that where we put our trust in our own diligence and effort, and work more than pray, the presence and power of God are not seen in our work as we would wish... It is difficult to conceive how much we ourselves and the Church will gain if, with our whole heart, we accept the post of honor God is offering us when He calls us to the ministry of intercession." Andrew Murray

"We live is a day characterized by the multiplication of man's machinery and the diminution of God's power. The great cry of our day is work, work, work; organize, organize, organize; give us some new society, tell us some new methods, devise some new machinery. But the great need of our day is prayer, more prayer and better prayer." R. A. Torrey

"Prayer is not overcoming God's reluctance, it is laying hold of God's willingness." Richard Trench

"'There are moments when, whatever be the attitude or position of the body, the soul is on its knees.' Prayer, then, is an attitude of the heart that humbles itself before the living God, silently declaring to Him, 'I Need Thee." Victor Hugo / Dick Eastman

"The heart of an effective witness is devotion to Jesus Christ. This devotion finds its greatest expression in prayer. It is kept alive through the continual practice of prayer." William Krutza

"In Ephesians 3:20, Paul seeks to express the inexhaustible potential of prayer: "Now to Him that is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or think, according to the power that is at work in us." The power that works in and through our prayers is the Holy Spirit... There is indeed only one limit to God's omnipotence and that is God's eternal righteousness. Fasting will never change the righteous standards of God. If something is outside the will of God, fasting will never put it inside the will of God. If it is wrong and sinful, it is still wrong and sinful no matter how long a person may fast.

There is an example of this in II Samuel chapter 12. David committed adultery. Out of this a child born. God said that part of the judgment was that the child would die. David fasted for seven days, but the child still died. Fasting seven days did not change God's righteous judgment on David's sinful act. If a thing is wrong, fasting will not make it right. Nothing will do that. Fasting is neither a gimmick nor a cure-all. God does not deal in such things. God has made full provision for the total well-being of His people in every area of their lives -- spiritual, physical and material. Fasting is one part of this total provision. Fasting is not a substitute for any other part of God's provision. Conversely, no other part of God's provision is a substitute for fasting." Derek Prince

May the Master, as Murray states, "teach us to pray" and "bring us into the Father's living presence."

In His Service, Pastor Jeff

Prayer

2012-01-03T20:47:00.000-08:00

Greetings to all and a Happy New Year as well!

As we begin the new year, I wanted to share a prayer I came across in my reading for today. It's by William Barclay and is found in "A Barclay Prayer Book." Though it was not written with the New Year in mind, it struck me as the one I wanted to pray for myself as this year begins. I thought I might offer it to you as well, since he so beautifully expresses many of the ongoing desires of a Christian's heart. Enjoy.

"Give us this night, O God, as we worship you:

Your truth to tell us what we ought to believe and what we ought to do, Your strength to make us able to face the things which by ourselves we cannot do; Your love that we may love you as you have first loved us, and may love our fellow men and women as you love them.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Lord Jesus, you were tempted; help us when we are tempted.

When we are tempted, help us:

Always to remember those who love us and trust us and believe in us, and whose hearts would be broken if we brought disgrace upon ourselves; Never to do anything which would bring us regret, remorse and shame to follow it; Never to do anything which we would have to hide, and about which we should be ashamed if others should know; Never to do anything which would injure anyone else; Always to remember that whatever we say or do, you hear and see it.

Save us from ever being carried away by the heat, or the impulse, or the passion of the moment, and so forgetting the consequences of the things we do.

Help us never to disobey our conscience and never to do anything which would take away our self-respect.

Help us to make:

Our pleasure such that we would never wish to hide it; Our work such that we never need to be ashamed of it; Our conduct to others such that we will never regret it.

At all times keep:

Our thoughts pure and our words true; Our actions honorable and our bodies clean.

Help us so to live that we can take everything in life and show it to you.

O heavenly Father, in whom we live and move and have our being, we humbly pray Thee so to govern and guide us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our daily life we may never forget you, but remember that we are ever walking in your sight: through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

From the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, of Your goodness give us your love to inspire us, your Spirit to guide us, and your power to protect us. And in Your mercy receive us, now and ever. Amen."

May His richest blessings be upon you as you enter this new year. And may all the above be true of you.

In His Service, Pastor Jeff

Not Enough

2011-12-13T21:12:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes from a book I picked up at a local "bargain basement" for a couple bucks. It's by a lady named Tammy Maltby, and is entitled: "Confessions of a Good Christian Girl -- The Secrets Women Keep and the Grace that Saves Them." It caught my attention because as I skimmed through it I found that she was tremendously honest and transparent and cut through a lot of the religious facades people put on to hide the reality of their human brokenness.

She speaks of how earnest ('good') Christian women stuggle to deal with things like suicidal thoughts, sexual brokenness, family violence and abuse, broken relationships, divorce and addiction. And she offers good practical advice about the grace which alone can heal it. In fact, it almost seems like a female version of the book, "Red Like Blood" by Joe Coffey and Bob Bevington (which is also a very captivating and helpful read for the same reasons).

Although the book is addressed to women, the selection I chose can apply across the board to anyone who has ever wrestled with a sense of inadequacy, or what she calls feeling like we're "not enough" -- an inner sense that pushes us to the driven-type-behaviors we often use (and even justify) in our attempts to mask our sense of lack, or make it appear to outsiders like we're just plain good motivated people.

I hope you find it helpful. And if you do have a Women's Study Group that wants to go through a book that helps you to take a good, hard, honest look inside, and shoot for healing and transformation instead of reverting to the common forms of religious pretending, it might be a good book for you to look at. Enjoy.

"The entire message of the Bible, as I see it, has to do with how God sees us. And the Bible has both good news and bad news about that. The truth is that were not enough -- because we're incomplete and imperfect and weak. Because we're sinful and rebellious. Because we're supposed to work together and we just can't get along. Because we need God desperately and we forget that reality on an hourly basis. We're so inadequate, in fact, that it's downright pitiful.

And that's the bad news... Because the truth is we will never be enough. We're mortal. We have limited physical endurance and emotional strength and intellectual capability. We're fallible and make mistakes. We need help and encouragement. We feel inadequate, in other words, because we are inadequate. God's made us that way. God created us for relationship, to depend on one another. He gave us different, complimentary gifts that are supposed to work together like the parts of the body do (see I Cor. 12:12-31). He called us to love each other, to support each other, to encourage each other, to carry each other's burdens -- to be an interdependent community, not a universe of independent superstars. And He calls us into fellowship with Him too. It's part of our nature to feel restless and incomplete if we're not connecting to God and depending on Him. So in the economy of God, 'not enough' is not really an issue. What is an issue is our skewed thinking about who we are and what's expected of us -- when our 'not enough' reality turns into frantic attempts at self-sufficiency...

But here's the good news -- and it's amazingly good. Even in the midst of our inadequate, lying, sinning reality, God loves us passionately. Tenderly. Enthusiastically. With a Father's care and tenderness. He sees so much potential. He wants so much for us. For thousands of years He's been pursuing us, making it possible for us to draw near to Him. He even sent His Son to save us -- not because of our efforts, but simply because we're His.

That's hard to understand, I know. Believe me -- I know! I still struggle with my compulsive, workaholic tendencies. I still wrestle with the pain my inadequacies cause me and those I love. I'm still ashamed to be 'not enough,' and I keep bustling around to rectify the situation when what I really need to be doing is turning to Jesus...

Our inadequacies, our failures, our 'not enough' issues are simply beside the point when it comes to the Father's love. Yes, He has His standards. Yes, He wants to help us be more like Him. Yes, He has work for us all to do, and I believe He delights in our hard work and creativity when it's combined with obedience and honest truth. But even if we never did a thing, our Father would still love us. He continues to love us when we fail, when we run from Him, when our thinking is skewed and our intentions are all wrong. Even when we persist in thinking we can never be enough through our own efforts.

We must sound so silly as we huff and puff and whine and wheeze and try harder and harder and wallow in our worries. But if we let Him, He can love us back to sanity. He'll give us rest. Even better, He'll give us peace. Remember what He said to the woman with the issue of blood? He told her to go in peace. He said the same thing to the Luke 7 woman, the notorious sinner who annointed His feet with perfume. And I believe that's His word to us... who try and try and still don't feel like we're enough. That word of 'peace' means 'nothing missing, nothing broken.' It means being whole, enough, sufficient. It means being able to relax, not strive, because we're so confident that we're loved. It means doing all our work with a changed perception. An attitude of grateful, peaceful confidence. Because we're His children. Because, to Him, we are never anything less than beloved."

As you enter each day, remember the words I often share from the pulpit: "As God's grace-adopted children, we work FROM acceptance, never FOR acceptance." And that little change makes a big difference! In fact, maybe a little daily reminder of her advice would be helpful as well: Begin each day by reminding yourself: I can relax, not strive, because I know I am loved. I am confident of His love. I am His child. And in Him, I am never anything less than beloved.

To the further glory of His grace, Pastor Jeff

Everything Starts from God's Side

2011-12-05T18:46:00.001-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes to you from James S. Stewart (not the actor). He was the professor of New Testament at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and chaplain to the Queen in Scotland. His book on preaching, entitled "Heralds of God," is one of the best I have ever read, and "Preaching Magazine" ranked him the best preacher of the twentieth century -- right up there with Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. He was a man of deep and passionate Christian faith and I have always found his insights fresh and helpful.

This one comes from his book about the apostle Paul (now long out of print) -- "A Man in Christ." It has to do with the distinguishing mark of the Christian faith -- grace -- and what God's grace is really all about. Enjoy.

"In Paul's thinking grace -- that is to say, the divine initiative -- was fundamental. Everything in religion that matters starts from God's side. Even faith and penitence and prayer -- three attitudes of soul which might appear to originate in man and to be human virtues -- are, if we believe Paul, nothing of the kind: they are God's creation, God's gift. Faith is because it is evoked by the action of God in revealing Himself as worthy of all trust, penitence because it is produced by that divine reaction to sin of which the cross is the culmination, and, prayer because when 'we know not what we should pray for as we ought... the Spirit makes intercession for us.'

In the words of Baron von Hugel, 'The passion and hunger for God comes from God, and God answers it with Christ.' Man's intelligence and will and heart and conscience never initiate anything in religion; and over the best moral and spiritual triumphs of this life the saints can only cry, 'Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but unto Your name be the glory.' In this sense at least, Schleiermacher was right when he defined religion as an absolute dependence. Of ourselves we can do nothing. There is no Creator but God.

'And every virtue we possess,

And every victory won,

And every thought of holiness,

Are His alone.'

This is the meaning of grace, and this is the inmost secret of reconciliation. It is hardly likely that a Gospel so annihilating to human pride will ever be popular with an age conscious of its own enlightenment and trusting in its own initiative for world-redemption and the building of the new Jerusalem upon earth. Nor will Paul ever be persona grata with those -- and there are many of them -- who seek, by a punctilious observance of religious ordinances, to screen from their souls, and from others, the stern and disturbing fact that their first necessity is to have God change radically their whole attitude to Himself.

If Paul's doctrine of reconciliation means anything, then the religion that is tinged with self-satisfaction is, even when it bears the Christian name, a thing downright heathen. The man who thinks that his own deeds and character are doing God credit, and that they have a claim on God's favor, is the victim of a disastrous illusion. To spiritual pride of every degree nothing more devasting than Paul's evangelicalism could be conceived. Where religion walks clothed in the garments of moralism his Gospel will always be anathema.

But it does not matter. It is the Gospel of God and there is no other. It is the very Gospel of Jesus, who proclaimed God's initiative first and last, yes, who was Himself God's initiative become flesh; whose eyes were like a flame of fire to those who would try to propitiate God by their gifts and offerings and character; whose face smiled the welcome of heaven to those who confessed they had no standing before God as all; who did not wait till sinners sought Him but went forth to seek them first; who lived to bring the gift of reconciliation near to men; who died to put it in their hands. No man who is too proud to be infinitely in debt to God will ever be a Christian. God gives forever, forever man receives.

Is it incomprehensible that the holy God should thus deal with unworthy man? No, for as Barth pointedly remarks, 'only when grace is recognized to be incomprehensible is it grace.' For me, Paul would say, religion began on the day when I ceased straining and striving and struggling for heaven's favor, and was content to bow my head and accept the gift I could never earn. 'It is all the doing of the God who has reconciled me to Himself through Christ.' "

Who could disagree? To the proud and self-righteous, or those with a self-esteem that makes them think they can actually curry the favor of God by their efforts and moral strivings, the Gospel comes as a message to be patronized -- a nice "religious ideal" to be brushed aside in the pursuit of more worthy human will-efforts. But to the one who knows their sin has erradicated any possibility of attaining a right standing before God on the basis of their morality, character or religious duties, the Gospel is good news beyond description. For Jesus does, "smile the welcome of heaven to those who confess they have no standing before God as all." There is more hope of the favor of God for the person who despairs of ever attaining it by their efforts, than for the one who clings to the vain notion of placing their confidence (for salvation) in their own efforts or righteousness (Luke 18:9-14).

To the glory of His grace, Pastor Jeff

How is God Like?

2011-12-01T20:11:00.001-08:00

Greetings All,

This week's thought comes from A. W. Tozer's book "The Knowledge of the Holy." It has to do with the most important subject anyone can think about or speak about -- the existence, the Being, and the true nature of God. When I first read this quote years ago it struck me as being true beyond question and has since guided all that I seek to do in the ministry (though I still fail in various ways). There are few quotes I have gone back to and used as often as this one, simply because I feel it is so "right on." It speaks for itself, and I trust that like myself, you will find it is true in your own life and in the lives of others you know. It is lengthy, but well worth your time and earnest consideration! Enjoy!

"What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. The history of mankind will probably show that no people has ever risen above its religion, and man's spiritual history will positively demonstrate that no religion has ever been greater than its idea of God. Worship is pure or base as the worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God. For this reason the gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at any time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like.

We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God. This is true not only of the individual Christian, but of the company of Christians that composes the Church. Always the most revealing thing about the Church is her idea of God, just as her most significant message is what she says about Him or leaves unsaid, for her silence is often more eloquent than her speech. She can never escape delf-disclosure of her witness concerning God. Were we able to extract from any man a complete answer to the question, 'What comes into your mind when you think about God?' we might predict with certainty the spiritual future of that man. Were we able to know exactly what our most influential religious leaders think of God today, we might be able with some precision to foretell where the Church will stand tomorrow...

That our idea of God correspond as nearly as possible to the true being of God is of immense importance to us. Compared with our actual thoughts about Him, our creedal statements are of little consequence. Our real idea of God may lie buried under the rubbish of conventional religious notions and may require an intelligent and vigorous search before it is finally unearthed and exposed for what it is. Only after an ordeal of painful self-probing are we likely to discover what we actually believe about God...

It is my opinion that the [current] Christian conception of God... is so decadent as to be utterly beneath the dignity of the Most High God and actually to constitute for professed believers something amounting to a moral calamity. All the problems of heaven and earth, though they were to confront us together and at once, would be nothing compared with the overwhelming problem of God: That He is, what He is like, and what we as moral beings must do about Him... Among the sins to which the human heart is prone, hardly any other is more hateful to God than idolatry, for idolatry is at bottom a libel on His character. The idolatrous heart assumes that God is other than He is -- in itself a monstrous sin -- and substitutes for the true God one made after its own likeness. Always this god will conform to the image of the one who created it and will be base or pure, cruel or kind, according to the moral state of the mind from which it emerges. A god begotten in the shadows of a fallen heart will quite naturally be no true likeness of the true God. 'You thought,' said the Lord to the wicked man in the psalm, 'that I was altogether like you.'

...Perverted notions about God soon rot the religion in which they appear. The long career of Israel demonstrates this clearly enough, and the long history of the Church confirms it. So necessary to the Church is a lofty concept of God that when that concept in any measure declines, the Church with her worship and her moral standards declines along with it. The first step down for any church is taken when it surrenders its high opinion of God. Before the Christian Church goes into eclipse anywhere there must first be a corrupting of her simple basic theology. She simply gets a wrong answer to the question, 'What is God like?' and goes on from there. Though she may continue to cling to a sound nominal creed, her practical working creed has become false. The masses of her adherents come to believe that God is different from what He actually is; and that is heresy of the most insidious and deadly kind.

Therefore, the heaviest obligation lying upon the Christian Church today is to purify and elevate her concept of God until it is once more worthy of Him -- and of her. In all her prayers and labors this should have first place. We do the greatest service to the next generation of Christians by passing on to them, undimmed and undiminished, that noble concept of God which we received from our Hebrew and Christian fathers of generations past. This will prove of greater value to them than anything [else]."

With prayers that the Church of this generation would retrieve its lofty and majestic understanding of God (as put forth in the Bible), and would fall prostate in adoring worship before our thrice holy God in whose presence even the angels cover their faces. May it be so, Pastor Jeff

Abandoned

2011-11-25T20:11:00.001-08:00

Greetings All,

This weeks 'thought' comes to you from a classic written in 1659 by two Dutch pastors: Gisbertus Voetius and Johannes Hoornbeeck. It's title, "Spiritual Desertion," speaks of the common Christian experience its pages address.

Both authors affirm the words of Thomas A'Kempis who states: "I have never known a godly person who did not at times sense the removal of grace." Says Hoornbeeck, "All those who want to live a godly life in Christ have to expect such oppressions" (ie: times when the soul feels like it has been deserted by God). They affirm the quote of Otto Casmannus who wrote: "No one becomes saved who is not trained in this battle, before, or in death."

Anyone who has merely read their Bibles knows how common such an experience is, since they will have read the words of such people as: Job (Job 6-7); David (in Psalm 13, 32, 38, 39, 42, 44); Asaph (Psalm 77); Heman (Psalm 88); Jeremiah (Jer. 15:15-20); Paul (II Cor. 1:8-10); Peter (Luke 22:62) and even Jesus Himself (Matt. 27:46).

Most all believers - if they are honest and don't feel the need to play the part of the superChristian - will admit to wrestling with this common experience to one degree or another, at one time or another. Thus I offer their words as comfort to those who may be in that place of feeling deserted by God, or may know a friend who is in that place.

I have taken the liberty to cut and paste, update the language, paraphrase awkward sentences and insert explanatory phrases. I trust you will find the thoughts helpful. Enjoy.

"No matter how great and heavy you feel your trial and abandonment may be, it is not a complete, total abandonment from God. It is not an abandonment of all grace, but only the feeling of grace. You do not feel the grace as you would like. But really, is it so serious to miss this feeling when you keep the greatest--the grace itself? You do not really lose God. As with your stomach or your heart, even though you do not always consciously feel them, don't you still have them?

What do you think -- can that feeling not become somewhat shocked, darkened and burdened?... If not, think about Christ! Consider (although he did not deserve this) that the feeling of his Father's grace was becoulded and burdened completely -- for you! And since this suffering you experience concerns only the feeling of grace, and you have kept what is of greatest weight and all that counts for your salvation, can you not be satisified and comforted? Since God left you so much, and especially that which is of greatest weight, should you be ungrateful when you miss only that which is off less importance [the mere loss of feeling his grace and presence]?...

God cannot completely leave you. He shall not and will not do so. God's gracious favor and salvation cannot be destroyed... That God's grace in the soul cannot be destroyed is shown in I John 3:9, 'for his seed remains in him'; or John 10:28: 'I give them eternal life and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand'; or John 14:17, 'He sends another Comforter who will abide with you forever'; or John 6:39-40, 'This is the will of the Father who sent me, that I shall lose none of those that he has given me, but raise them up on the last day. And this is the will of him who sent me, that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.' Or consider as well Psalm 37:24: 'Though the righteous fall, he shall not be cast away, for the Lord upholds his hand.' [We see the same in Philippians 1:6 and Romans 8:28-39.]

The beleaguered soul cannot reach such a state that it would be rejected by God or could completely fall from grace. After all, it earlier shared in God's grace and bore the certain evidences of such grace. The beleaguered soul must remember this -- it may not have a righteous and strong desire for grace now, but it truly enjoyed this grace earlier.

The soul can draw comfort from this knowledge: Whatever happens, even if heaven and earth were moved, yes, even if the terrors of hell sneered at this one soul, yet it would be kept and would surely remain God's possession, even if it went through the valley of the shadow of death... In view of what you experienced earlier, you can calmly go into the future because what you are going through now is only a temporary black cloud for the hour of trial. And since God never regrets that he granted his grace to us, you will soon again have what you desire so heartily.

The saints of old comforted their souls in present times of spiritual desertion by reflecting back on former days of grace. In light of the fact that his soul was downcast, one of the 'Sons of Korah' asks in Psalm 42:2 -'Where can I go to meet with God?' He confesses that his tears have been his food day and night, and that people are asking him, 'Where is your God?' And what does he do to comfort himself? 'He says these words: 'These things I remember as I pour out my soul; how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of thanksgiving among the festive throng.'

Former proofs of grace stand as anchors for the soul and comfort us during present states of affliction when we suffer the sense of God's absence. Remember this: God never leaves your soul completely, even though it may appear that he, for a time, hides his face, and you do not experience the feeling of his loving favor. Truly the Lord does not forsake his beloved; they are kept unto eternity...

Consider as well that these trials [of desertion] come only to God's children. Other burdens are general -- many of the same things happen to the righteous and the ungodly. But this cross is sanctified only for the pious; for God's beloved. Other people do not know this cross; it is foreign to them. The believer has many burdens in common with unbelievers; but the sense of abandonment by God is one he does not have in common with them... And thus when one experiences this sense of abandonment, we can judge that his state with God is good. For only God's children are chastized with this rod."

I conclude with the words of a song which helped me when I was going through one such extended time of desertion. They are from the group "Selah" who sing to the struggling soul: "Hang on, a little bit longer... my God will never let you down." Such times do end, although when you're stuck in the midst of one of them its easy wonder if (or when) they will.

With you in those occasional times of struggle,

Pastor Jeff

Don't Give it up

2011-11-17T12:38:00.001-08:00

Greetings All,

Today's 'thought' addresses an increasingly prevalent problem in modern church circles--lack of church attendance. It is taken from Phillip Yancey's book, "Church: Why Bother?" and it begins with the question,"Is church really necessary for a believing Christian?"

In days gone by church attendance used to be considered somewhat "mandatory." Not always in a "legalistic" sense (as some people are quick to reply), but in a truly devoted, committed, testimony to the world, I need this, I benefit from this, God commands it sense. The Lord's Day used to be seen as the Lord's Day and not just the Lord's hour, or worse, his 45 minutes or half hour -- something one fits in among a multitude of other equally pressing (or in reality, not so pressing) commitments and desires.

And because it was the Lord's Day, they understood that at least part of it was to be spent in the House of the Lord; the House of Worship, or the "Meeting House" as it was called in early New England to differentiate from the "church" (which is the people of God and not the building they meet in).

Hebrews 10:25 made it clear: "Do not forsake the gathering together of yourselves, as is the habit of some..." The reason? It was a time to gather together in a world often hostile to the faith and encourage one another. The word encourage is a compound word from "en" (meaning "in") and cour (meaning "heart") and essentially means to "infuse with courage" or "infuse the heart with strength to go on." Gathering with others for worship, fellowship, instruction, prayer and praise encourages both us and them to keep our gaze focused on Christ, grow in Him and persevere in the faith.

This thought addresses why many people (including the author at one point) do not do so. It also offers some food for thought and reasons to reconsider going back if you have forsaken gathering together with others for worship on Sunday morning. I have also inserted a related section from Yancey's book, "What's So Amazing About Grace?" I trust you will find them helpful. Enjoy.

"Is church really necessary for a believing Christian? Winston Churchill once said that he related to the church rather like a flying buttress: he supported it from the outside.

I tried that stategy for a while, after I had come to believe...and had committed myself to God. I am not alone. Far fewer people attend church on Sunday than claim to follow Christ. Some of them have stories similar to mine: they feel burned or even betrayed by a former church experience. Other simply 'get nothing out of church.' Following Jesus is one thing; following other Christians into a sanctuary on Sunday moring is quite another. Why bother? As the poet Anne Sexton put it:

'They pounded nails into his hands,

After that, well, after that everyone

wore hats...' (men might add ties)

As I reflect on my pilgrimage I can see that many barriers kept me away from church. First was hypocrisy. The atheistic philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche was once asked what made him so negative toward Christians. He replied, 'I would believe in their salvation if they looked a little more like people who have been saved.'

Scarred by the absolutist fundamentalism of my childhood, I too approached church warily. On Sunday mornings Christians dressed up in fine clothes and smiled at each other, but I knew from personal experience that such a facade could cloak a meaner spirit. I had a knee-jerk reaction against anything that smacked of hypocrisy until one day the question occurred to me, 'What would church look like if every member were just like me?' Properly humbled, I began concentrating on my own spirituality, not everyone else's.

God is the ultimate judge of hypocrisy in the church, I decided; I would leave such judgment in God's capable hands. When I did so I began to relax and grow softer and more forgiving of others. After all, who has a perfect spouse, or perfect parents or children? We do not give up on the institution of family because of its imperfections -- why give up on the church?...

What changed my attitude toward church? A skeptic might say that I lowered my expectations somewhere along the way, or perhaps I 'got used to' church just as, after numerous false starts, I got used to opera. Yet I sense something else at work: church has filled in me a need that could not be met in any other way. Saint John of the Cross wrote: 'The virtuous soul that is alone... is like the burning coal that is alone. It will grow colder rather than hotter.' I believe he is right. Christianity is not a purely intellectual faith. It can only be lived in community. Perhaps for this reason I never entirely gave up on church. At a deep level I sense that church contains something I desperately need. Whenever I abandon church for a time, I find that I am the one who suffers. My faith fades, and the crusty shell of lovelessness grows over me again. I grow colder instead of hotter. And so my journeys away from church have always circled back inside."

It was Billy Graham, I believe, who used to tell people that if they found the perfect church they shouldn't join it, for then it would no longer be perfect. Yet believing that requires that we maintain an honest inwardly focused gaze directed at our own imperfections and shortcomings, rather than the typical outward gaze that looks for the imperfections and shortcomings of others and then upon finding them (which one can always easily do) uses them for an excuse to leave or neglect attending church.

One thing might help the defection rate, though. And that is if the church focused on being the church Christ called it to be. We can never erradicate things people will use as an excuse to avoid church, since as Yancey admits, the problem really rested in us and not others. But it would help erradicate some of them if we followed his advice given in this second quote:

"'In the world Christians are a colony of the true home,' said Bonhoeffer. Perhaps Christians should work harder toward establishing colonies of the kingdom that point to our true home... If the world despises a notorious sinner, the church will love her. If the world cuts off aid to the poor and the suffering, the church will offer food and healing. If the world oppresses, the church will raise up the oppressed. If the world shames the outcast, the church will proclaim God's reconciling love. If the world seeks profit and self-fulfillment, the church seeks sacrifice and service. If the world demands retribution, the church dispenses grace. If the world splinters into factions, the church joins together in unity. If the world destroys enemies, the church loves them. That, at least, is the vision of the church in the New Testament: a colony of heaven in a hostile world."

With prayers that we might display such subversive behavior,

Pastor Jeff

Addicted

2011-11-14T21:20:00.001-08:00

Greetings All,

This weeks 'thought' comes from a very helpful, insightful and pastorally written book which I've been reading the last few days in regard to helping people with addictions. It's called "Addiction and Grace - Love and Spirituality in the Healing of Addictions," by Gerald G. May, M.D. I highly recommend it for anyone who is struggling with addictions or knows someone struggling with addiction. After all, most of us know someone close to us (a child, parent, relative or friend) who struggles with addiction. And I know that when it comes to addiction, we usually tend to think in terms that limit it to alcohol and drugs, or in a broader sense, alcohol, street drugs, prescription drugs, pornography, promiscuity, gambling, computer gaming, etc.

Yet as Dr. May points out, most all of us have addictive behaviors of one sort or another, to one degree or another. They come in the form of habits we can't break, or things we just can't seem to stop doing no matter how hard we try. He breaks them down into two categories: 1.) Attraction addictions (things like anger, approval, attractiveness, eating, lying, stealing, coffee, comparing one's self to others, competition, computers, envy, gossiping, nail biting, pimple squeezing, seductiveness, self-esteem, sports, etc.) and 2.) Aversion (fear) addictions (flying, being fat, being abnormal or tricked, closed in places, commitment, conflict, disapproval, germs, intimacy, public speaking, snakes, vulnerability, etc.). And to his own credit the author himself admits to struggling with 14 out of the 160+ addictions he lists.

And his premise is this: "No addiction is good; no attachment is beneficial... some are more destructive than others; alcoholism cannot be compared with chocolate addiction in degrees of destructiveness... But if we accept that there are differences in the degree of tragedy imposed upon us by our addictions, we must also recognize what they have in common -- they impede human freedom and diminish the human spirit."

This selection has to do with the false sense of victory that sets us up to fall again. It can be seen as an explanation of the process Paul describes in Galatians 5:1: "Let him who thinks he stands beware lest he fall." Enjoy.

"I Can Handle It"

"If, instead of failing, the person temporarily succeeds in stopping the addictive behavior, the greatest mind trick of all comes into play. It starts out very normally, with the natural joyfulness of liberation. 'I can do it! I have done it. And it wasn't even that difficult! Why, I actually don't even have any desire for a drink anymore. I'm free!' Before long, the natural joy will undergo a malignant change; it will be replaced by pride.

The fall begins, in a day or a week or a few months, with the recurrence of an impulse to have a drink or a fix (or eat a candy bar, look at porn, gossip, or judge another...). It comes subtly and innocuously, certainly not as a conscious desire to resume the whole pattern of addictive behavior, just to engage in it once. Sometimes the desire appears unconscious. 'I don't know what happened, I honestly don't. Everything was going so well...' The downfall can seem for all the world like a demonically mystical happening. 'It was as if there was another person inside of me I didn't even know was there. [Rom. 7:14-20] All the time I was feeling so good about my success, he was in there waiting for the chance to take over. And in a moment when I wasn't looking and my guard was down, he did.'

More often, the desire to have a drink, a pill, or a snort just gently surfaces in awareness like a harmless little notion. 'A drink would sure taste good now.' 'Boy, if I weren't straight, this would sure be the time to get high.' Or it may come more philosophically: 'I haven't had a single pill for three weeks now. I wonder what it would be like. I bet it would be different now that I have no desire for it and I'm no longer hooked on it.' These impulses have a subtle but exceedingly important effect upon the person's feeling of success. The joyful sense of, 'I'm free' is changing to 'I can handle it.' For a while, 'I can handle it' means the person feels she can fight off any impulses to engage in the addictive behavior. Before long, however, 'I can handle it' means she thinks she can engage in the addictive behavior without becoming enslaved to it again. People have even been known to drink to celebrate their success at stopping drinking. The brillance of this masterful mind trick is now evident; the pure joy of success and freedom has been transformed into an excuse for renewed failure and enslavement. Even after the failure occurs, one can continue to believe one is somehow handling it. 'I'm moderating it.' 'I only drink on social occasions where it would be embarrassing to say no.' 'I only have one drink before supper.' 'I only take a pill or two on weekends.' 'It's not the occasional beer that gets me in trouble, but the hard stuff.' On and on the tactics go, until again, it becomes painfully obvious that one is not handling it at all. Whenever 'I can handle it' surfaces, the fall follows.

The fall is tragic in the classical sense -- an abject crashing down after the pinnacles of pride have been attained. Once recognized, it brings guilt, remorse, and shame in bitter proportion to the pride that preceded it. Self-respect disappears. Suicide is considered. Without even the will to resist, the use of the chemical (or whatever the addiction or fix) increases dramatically, further impairing judgment. A critically dangerous situation results. Through the haze of intoxication and depression, the mind continues to battle with itself... Desperately seeking a way out, unrealistic schemes are hatched. 'If I could just get a hundred thousand dollars, my life would be different.' 'I'm going to leave everything and start life all over again in another country.' These grow into proportions that can only be called psychotic [blaming our problems and lack of control so completely on other people that we want to hurt them]... Fortunately, not all major chemical addictions progress to this degree of devastation. But all of our addictions, even our non-substance addictions, share similar dynamics... Addiction to power, money, or relationships can drive people to distort reality just as much as can addiction to alcohol or narcotics....

Addiction cannot be defeated by the human will acting on its own, nor by the human will opting out and turning everything over to the divine will. Instead, the power of grace flows most fully when the human will chooses to act in harmony with the divine will. In practical terms, this means staying in a situation, being willing to confront it as it is, remaining responsible for the choices one makes in response to it, but at the same time turning to God's grace, protection, and guidance as the ground for one's choices and behavior. It is the difference between testing God by avoiding one's own responsibilities and trusting God as one acts responsibly. Responsible human freedom thus becomes authentic spiritual surrender, and authentic spiritual surrender is nothing other than responsible human freedom. Here, in the condition of humble dignity, the power of addiction can be overcome."

The Bible speaks often of addictive or enslaving type behaviors. After all, addiction is a consequence of sin, though it manifests itself differently in each one of us. In that sense we are all recovering addicts. As Jesus said, "Truly, truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin" (John 8:34). A modern translation might be: "Everyone who commits sin is addicted to sin." And if we take that as true (as I hope you do) that would include every one of us except Jesus Himself. And if we understand that we are all addicts (to different things and different degrees) it would go a long way to prevent us from pointing the condemning finger, kill the spirit of self-righteousness in us, and bring a degree of humility to our interactions with others -- all others. In other words, it would go a long way to flood our countenance and all our interactions with a spirit of grace -- the only thing that can really help heal addictions -- ours, as well as those of others.

To that end we need to pray, Pastor Jeff

Perfection

2011-11-08T16:45:00.000-08:00

Greetings All,

Today I thought I would give you some thoughts on "perfection" or "perfectionism." I should warn you right from the start that I believe perfection is unattainable in this life, and that perfectionism (as an overall life-principle) is the cause of much despair, frustration and joylessness in the lives of people.

I have had to encourage many a despairing person to either lower their perfectionistic standards, or accept the fact that they will never experience joy, since setting absurdly high standards of perfection always causes us to see only the flaws, or mistakes, or the things that need to be fixed (whether it be in us, or the things we do, or in others, or the things they do). Perfectionists do not tend to be happy campers. I speak as a recovering perfectionist myself, who would have to agree with Hugh Prather when he said: "Perfectionism is slow death.”

If I understand the Bible correctly, since the fall of man perfection has walked the face of the earth once and only once, and that was in the person of Jesus. All others "have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." We are to grow and mature and pursue Christlikeness, but we will never even approach attaining such perfection in this life (I John 1:8-9). In fact, coming to admit our imperfections, as well as our inability to ever reach perfection in this life, is the first step on the path to salvation, and one of the main steps in the process of sanctification.

We can miss the purpose of Christ's perfection if we think it is only an example or ideal for us to pursue. Richard Sibbes, the great Puritan divine, put it so well when he once wrote: "What is the Gospel itself but a merciful moderation, in which Christ's obedience is esteemed ours, and our sins laid upon Him; wherein God, from being our judge, becomes our Father, pardoning our sins and accepting our obedience, though feeble and blemished... The law requires personal, perpetual, and perfect obedience... but under the covenant of grace it must have an evangelical mitigation. A sincere endeavor proportionable to grace is received and accepted." Jesus lived our perfection for us, and God counts His perfection as if it were ours if we will only trust in Him. That's the wonder of the Gospel.

The following thoughts, taken from many sources, offer many varied insights into the quest for human perfection. Enjoy.

"We shall never come to the perfect man till we come to the perfect world."

Matthew Henry

"This is the very perfection of a man -- to find out his own imperfections... If you should say, 'It is enough, I have reached perfection,' all is lost, since it is the function of perfection to make one know one's own imperfections. ”

St. Augustine

“People throw away what they could have by insisting on perfection, which they cannot have,

and looking for it where they will never find it.”

Edith Schaffer

"It is right to be contented with what we have, but never with what we are."

Sir James Mackintosh

"The search for perfection begins with detecting imperfection.”

Anonymous

"Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable. However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable.”

Lord Chesterfield

"Ideals are like the stars -- we never reach them, but like the mariners of old traversing the sea

we chart our course by them."

Carl Schurz

"The biblical demand for perfection (under the law) was meant to drive us away from looking to ourselves for salvation and lead us right into the arms of Jesus."

With hope that you will find your resting place there, Pastor Jeff

2011-11-01T12:44:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

I once jokingly told someone, "Every so often I need a good dose of C. S. Lewis to get me thinking." I offer these thoughts, taken from some of his books, for that purpose.

Lazy minds drift into giving pat answers. Pat answers frequently seem trite and can even offend someone looking for answers with substantial content. Lewis rarely gave them. He seems to have taken the scriptural command seriously when it tells us: "Love the Lord our God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind..." To neglect using all the powers of a sanctified intellect to earnestly wrestle with the deep issues of our faith is to fail to love God as He commands or as we should. Given that greatest of all commands,the Christian faith, of all faiths, should never (biblically speaking) be accused of being "anti-intellectual" or furthered by people who "hide their heads in the sand."

In this regard, Lewis (along with Ravi Zacharias, Os Guiness, Josh McDowell, Tim Keller and many others) has been an invaluable resource. I offer these thoughts not simply for you to read, but for you to ponder, interact with, and be challenged by. Enjoy.

"The infinite value of each human soul is not a Christian doctrine. God did not die for man because of some value he perceived in him. The value of each human soul considered simply in itself, out of relation to God, is zero. As St. Paul writes, to have died for valuable men would have been not divine, but merely heroic (Rom. 5:7); but God died for sinners. He loved us not because we were lovable, but because He is love." (The Weight of Glory, pg. 115).

Lewis is right. Let us not put the locus of saving merit in us. To say that each human soul is of infinite worth conveys the idea that we human beings are indeed "worthy" and have such high value before God that in some sense He owes us salvation. "I'm worth it," as the commercial says. In some ways, we could even make the case that God would be unjust not to save such infinitely valuable people.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"God is not merely good, but goodness. Goodness is not merely divine, but God."

"There is but one good; that is God. Everything else is good when it looks to Him and bad when it turns from Him. And the higher and mightier it is in the natural order, the more demoniac [sic] it will be if it rebels. It's not out of bad mice or bad fleas you make demons, but out of bad archangels."

"The more we believe that God hurts only to heal, the less we can believe that there is any use in begging for tenderness. A cruel man might be bribed -- might grow tired of his vile sport -- might have a temporary fit of mercy, as alcoholics have fits of sobriety. BUT suppose [instead] that what you are up against is a surgeon whose intentions are wholly good. The kinder and more conscientious he is, the more inexorably he will go on cutting. If he yeilded to your entreaties, if he stopped before the operation was complete, all the pain up to that point would have been useless. But is it credible that such extremities of torture should be necessary for us? Well, take your choice. The tortures occur. If they are unnecessary, then there is no God, or a bad one. If there is a good God, then these tortues are necessary. For no even modestly good Being could possibly inflict or permit them if they weren't."

(Christian Reflections, pg. 80 / The Great Divorce, pg. 97 / A Grief Observed, pp. 49-50)

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"The Scotch catechism says that man's chief end is "to glorify God and enjoy Him forever." But we shall then know that these are one and the same thing. Fully to enjoy is to glorify. In commanding us to glorify Him, God is inviting us to enjoy Him."

(Reflections on the Psalms, pg. 96-97)

Are you "glorifying" Him? Often it comes through more in your everyday attitudes than any specific actions. We can pray and study the Bible and do many religious or spiritual things without enjoying or delighting in God. The question is, do we delight in the God we pray to, or enjoy the God we serve? Do others view us as someone who does them because we should, or someone who enjoys the God we do them for?

John Piper, picking up on this last thought from C. S. Lewis, made these two statements to be his guiding truths for life: "The chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying Him forever," and "God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him." The questions we must honestly ask are: Do we find our greatest delight and enjoyment in God, and are we supremely content and satisfied in Him?

With the desire for His blessings upon your week,

Pastor Jeff

On the Puritans

2011-10-13T14:39:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's "thought" has to do with a group of people who are often wrongly maligned and accused of being or doing things they did not do (or at least not to the degree people say). They are the Puritans. We've been studying them for a couple weeks now in our adult Sunday school class and approaching our study from the standpoint of, "What the Puritans were really like, as opposed to what people often say or think they were like." What we've found is that the gap between the two is often huge. I discovered that same thing when I did my doctoral dissertation on the Puritans and actually started reading them, instead of what others (like Nathaniel Hawthorne) said about them.

In this regard I highly recommend Leland Ryken's book: "Worldly Saints: The Puritans As They Really Were." If you love history as opposed to fiction, it's a treasure trove of quotes from actual Puritans sermons and books showing what they really believed. And with Thanksgiving coming up shortly (for those of you in the U.S. anyway!), it would be a great way to clear up many of the common misunderstandings (both secular and religious in origin) and at least give them a fair shake -- especially since the Pilgrims were themselves Puritans.

These thoughts come from two sources: J.I. Packer's book, "A Quest for Godliness - The Puritan Vision of the Christian Life," and from Edmund S. Morgan's book, "The Puritan Family." The quotes (I believe) rightly sumarize the Puritans, though you (if you've swallowed Hawthorne's warped perspective hook, line, and sinker) may find what they say a bit surprising. If so, maybe its a good time to go out and purchase a few books! In addition to Ryken's book, J. I. Packer's list of other authors (stated below) would be a good place to start. I offer these thoughts to challenge common modern day misconceptions often held by people who have interestingly never once read a Puritan author!

Enjoy.

J. I. Packer writes:

"Taught by Perry Miller, William Haller, Marshall Knappen, Percy Scholes, Edmund Morgan and a host of more recent researchers, informed folk now acknowledge that the typical Puritans were not wild men... The belief that the Puritans, even if they were responsible citizens, were comic and pathetic in equal degree, being naive and superstitious, primitive and gullible, super-serious, over-scrupulous, majoring in minors and unable and unwilling to relax, dies hard. (Knowledge, alas, travels slowly in some quarters.)

What do the Puritans have to offer us?

"The answer, in one word, is maturity. Maturity is a compound of wisdom, goodwill, resilience, and creativity. The Puritans exemplified maturity; we don't. We are spiritual dwarfs. A much-travelled leader, a native American (be it said), has declared that he finds North American Protestantism, man-centered, manipulative, success-oriented, self-indulgent and sentimental, as it blatantly is, to be 3,000 miles wide and half an inch deep. The Puritans, by contrast, as a body, were giants. They were great souls serving a great God. In them clear-headed passion and warm-hearted compassion combined. Visionary and practical, idealistic and realistic too, goal-oriented and methodical, they were great believers, great hopers, great doers and great sufferers. But their sufferings, on both sides of the ocean (in old England from the authorities and in New England from the elements), seasoned and ripened them until they gained a stature that was nothing short of heroic.

Ease and luxury, such as our affluence brings us today, do not make for maturity; hardship and struggle however do, and the Puritans' battles against the spiritual and climatic wilderness in which God set them, produced a virility of character, undaunted and unsinkable, rising above discouragement and fears, for which the true precedents and models are men like Moses, and Nehemiah, and Peter after Pentecost, and the apostle Paul.

Spiritual warfare made the Puritans what they were. They accepted conflict as their calling, seeing themselves as their Lord's soldier-pilgrims, just as in Bunyan's allegory, and not expecting to be able to advance a single step without opposition of one sort or another. Wrote John Geree, in his tract, The Character of an Old English Puritan or Nonconformist (1646): 'His whole life he accounted a warfare, wherein Christ was his captain, his arms, prayers and tears. The Cross was his Banner, and his word [motto] was, Vinicit qui patitur [He who suffers conquers].'

The Puritans lost, more or less, every public battle that they fought. Those who stayed in England did not change the Church of England as they hoped to do, nor did they revive more than a minority of its adherents... Those who crossed the Atlantic failed to establish a New Jerusalem in New England; for the first fifty years their little colonies barely survived. They hung on by the skin of their teeth.... [Yet] It was out of this constant furnace-experience that their maturity was wrought and their wisdom concerning discipleship was refined. George Whitfield, the evangelist, wrote of them as follows: 'Ministers never write or preach so well as when under the cross; the Spirit of Christ and of glory then rests upon them. It was this, no doubt, that made the Puritans such burning and shining lights... Though dead, by their writings they yet speak; a peculiar unction attends them even to this very hour."

Edmund S. Morgan writes:

"In a thousand sermons they repeated to their congregations that religion was not morality, that righteousness in society was not righteousness before God, that salvation, not civilization, was the chief goal of man, and that salvation was unattainable by good behavior. Only faith in Christ could bring redemption from the sin of Adam, and faith was the free gift of God, not to be won by human efforts. 'Not man, but God alone is the author of regeneration,' they insisted, 'so men are altogether passive in their conversion, and the Eternal Spirit is the only principal Agent therein.' ...

[God] provided not only salvation but also the faith for which salvation was the reward. Faith was not attainable by mere human volition. It was a belief inspired by the Almighty in those whom He wished to save. And with it came sanctification, a gradual restoration of the faculty for obedience. As long as a man remained on earth, the restoration must be incomplete, but as soon as it began, the man would demonstrate the fact in his outward behavior. He would, so far as possible, love his neighbors and endeavor to obey the laws of God. He would be, in Puritan terms, a 'visible saint.' "

With prayers that you'll take the time to research such statements more fully, and if you disagree with them, then prove them false by actually reading Puritan authors such as Richard Sibbes, Thomas Watson, Christopher Love, William Gurnall, John Bunyan, Thomas Boston, William Bridge, Thomas Brooks, Stephen Charnock, John Owen, Jeremiah Burroughs, and the like,

Pastor Jeff

2011-09-27T22:28:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's thought is a Thanksgiving Meditation. It was written by John Piper. I once used it in a message I preached on worship, and how we are called to "magnify" God's name. To "magnify" means to make bigger, or to increase in size. And please don't hear me wrong: I'm not at all suggesting that we can ever make the infinite God "larger" than He actually is! God is greater and more majestic than our minds will ever be able to comprehend, and nothing we do can change Him in the least.

Yet, as Donald McCullough rightly pointed out in his book, "The Trivialization of God," humanity does have a nearly unstoppable tendency to shrink or trivialize God -- in our understanding -- since the thought of His granduer, majesty, might and immensity tends to make us feel insignificant, trivial and powerless by comparison.

I share his meditation with you because it does (in my estimation) "magnify" the Lord. In fact, my initial impulse after reading it for the first time was to bend the knee in heartfelt worship. It does make one feel humbled. It spawns a sense of awe. What he says is truly amazing when you think of it -- and its only one of God's many, many, common, but truly great works. Enjoy.

The Great Work of God - Rain

"But as for me, I would seek God, and place my cause before Him who does great and unsearchable things; wonders without number. He gives rain on the earth, and sends water on the fields."
Job 5:8-10
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If you said to someone: "My God does great and unsearchable things; He does wonders without number," and they responded, "Really? Like what?" Would you say, "Rain"?...

"God does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number. He gives rain on the earth." In Job's mind, rain really is one of the great, unsearchable wonders that God does. But is rain a great and unsearchable wonder wrought by God?

Picture yourself as a farmer in the Near East, far from any lake or stream. A few wells keep the family and animals supplied with water. But if the crops are to grow and the family is to be fed from month to month, water has to come on the fields from another source. From where? Well, the sky. The sky? Water will come out of the clear blue sky? Well, not exactly.

Water will have to be carried in the sky from the Mediterranean Sea, over several hundred miles and then be poured out from the sky onto the fields. Carried? How much does it weigh? Well, if one inch of rain falls on one square mile of farmland during the night, that would be 27,878,400 cubic feet of water, which is 206,300,160 gallons, which is 1,650,501,280 pounds of water.

That's heavy. So how does it get up in the sky and stay up there if it's so heavy? Well, it gets up there by evaporation. Really? That's a nice word. What's it mean? It means that the water sort of stops being water for a while so it can go up and not down. I see. Then how does it get down? Well, condensation happens. What's that? The water starts becoming water again by gathering around little dust particles between .00001 and .0001 centimeters wide. That's small.

What about the salt? Salt? Yes, the Mediterranean Sea is salt water. That would kill the crops. What about the salt? Well, the salt has to be taken out. Oh. So the sky picks up a billion pounds of water from the sea and takes out the salt and then carries it for three hundred miles and then dumps it on the farm?

Well it doesn't dump it. If it dumped a billion pounds of water on the farm, the wheat would be crushed. So the sky dribbles the billion pounds water down in little drops. And they have to be big enough to fall for one mile or so without evaporating, and small enough to keep from crushing the wheat stalks.

How do all these microscopic specks of water that weigh a billion pounds get heavy enough to fall (if that's the way to ask the question)? Well, it's called coalescence. What's that? It means the specks of water start bumping into each other and join up and get bigger. And when they are big enough, they fall. Just like that? Well, not exactly, because they would just bounce off each other instead of joining up, if there were no electric field present. What? Never mind. Take my word for it.

I think, instead, I will just take Job's word for it. I still don't see why drops ever get to the ground, because if they start falling as soon as they are heavier than air, they would be too small not to evaporate on the way down, but if they wait to come down, what holds them up till they are big enough not to evaporate? Yes, I am sure there is a name for that too. But I am satisfied now that, by any name, this is a great and unsearchable thing that God has done. I think I should be thankful - lots more thankful than I am.

Grateful to God for the wonder of rain,

Pastor John

How anyone can hear that and NOT want to worship is beyond me! And that doesn't include what I would call the even greater works of God -- such as the creation of the earth, or the universe, with its many stars and galaxies. The most current estimates guess that there are 100 to 200 billion galaxies in the universe, each of which has hundreds of billions of stars. A recent German super-computer simulation puts that number even higher: 500 billion. That would mean one galaxy for every star in the Milky Way!

Or consider our sun. It's 870,000 miles in diameter. You could fit one million planet earths inside the sun. It has flames that have shot out 250,000 miles from its surface! Those are such huge numbers that it’s hard for us to even get a sense of the scale. Yet our sun is a dwarf in comparison to the gargantuan star, Eta Carinae, located approximately 7,500 light years away from us. It has a diameter 800 times the size of our sun or 696,000,000 miles in diameter! It is 4 million times as bright as our own sun, and so large that it casts off 500 times the mass of the earth every year!

Again, what does one do when they consider such things? The best thing to do is remember what Paul tells us in Romans 1:20: "God's invisible qualities -- His eternal power and divine nature -- have been clearly seen and understood by what He has made..." Considering all these facts about the creation tells us something about God's immensity, power, knowledge and wisdom.

And even more humbling than all that is the thought that God, as Creator, exceeds in power, breadth, might and majesty, all that He has made. He is, as one has put it, greater than the sum total of everything He has made.

Wow! How can one not be moved to worship?

In the hopes that you are, Pastor Jeff

Various Thoughts

2011-09-27T08:46:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

I suppose I should change this week's mailing from 'thought for the week' to 'thoughts for the week'. Sometimes its nice to read one continuous thought. Other times its nice to read many and dwell on one or two that seem to speak to where we are at more directly. I hope one or more of these non-connected thoughts may be helpful to you! Enjoy.

"The Gospels do not explain the resurrection; the resurrection explains the Gospels. Belief in the resurrection is not an appendage to the Christian faith; it is the Christian faith."

J. S. Whale

"There are as many paths to Christ as there are feet to tread them, but there is only one way to God."

A. Lindsay Glegg

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"Whenever we take what God has done or made and put it in the place of himself, we become idolaters."

Oswald Sanders

"A man's 'god' is that for which he lives, for which he is prepared to give his time, his energy, his money, that which stimulates him and rouses him, excites and enthuses him."

Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

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"The first mark of the gift of faith is the love of truth."

F. Andrews

"Faith is a gift which can be given or withdrawn; it is infused into us, not produced by us."

Robert Benson

"Fear imprisons, faith liberates. Fear paralyzes, faith empowers. Fear disheartens, faith encourages. Fear sickens, faith heals. Fear makes useless, faith makes serviceable -- and, most of all, fear puts hopelessness at the heart of life, while faith rejoices in its God."

H. E. Fosdick

"I do not want merely to possess faith; I want a faith that possesses me."

Charles Kingley

"Faith is reason at rest in God."

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

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"Better to love God and die unknown than to love the world and be a hero; better to be content with poverty than to die a slave to wealth; better to have taken some risks and lost than to have done nothing and succeeded at it; better to have lost some battles than to have retreated from the war; better to have failed when serving God than to have succeeded when serving the devil. What a tragedy to climb the ladder of success, only to discover that the ladder was leaning against the wrong wall."

Erwin W. Lutzer

"God does not call us to be successful, He calls us to be faithful... a faithful life is a successful life... 'It is required that those who who have been given a trust must prove faithful' (I Cor. 4:2)... Faithfulness, my wife and I have learned, is possible for all believers, regardless of the size of a person's ministry."

R. Kent Hughes

"One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the highest peaks."

G. K. Chesterton

Hope one of them spoke to where you are at! In Him, Pastor Jeff

True Worship

2011-09-14T08:14:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

In the life of every Christian there are certain books that propel us forward spiritually simply by supplying a missing piece of the puzzle entitled: "How to live the Christian life." Today's excerpt comes from a book that served that function in my life. To use the words of Os Guiness in describing this book, it is, "Mind-hammering and heart-warming." The author is John Piper, and the title of the book is, "Desiring God -- Meditations of a Christian Hedonist."

Simply reading the introduction and first chapter of this book resolved for me a long standing struggle with why God commands us to praise, adore, magnify and exalt his name. Initially (because we tend to think in relation to people who would do such a thing) it seems somewhat "egotistical" of God to command us to worship him. Yet I finished reading those two sections saying: "Of course! He must command us to! It would be wrong for him not to command us to worship him."

If you've ever struggled with similar thoughts, simply read those two sections and it should erase them from your mind, and not only show you how nonsensical they are, but (as Piper points out) that "for [God], self-exaltation is the highest virtue." I'll leave it to you to read the book and find out why!

Today's thought comes from the chapter on "Worship." (Another chapter which alone would justify the cost of the book!) I trust you'll find it both encouraging and challenging. Enjoy.

"These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me." (Is. 29:13)

"The hour is coming, and now is, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth,

for such the Father seeks to worship him." (John 4:23)

"Worship must be vital and real in the heart, and worship must rest on a true perception of God. There must be spirit and there must be truth... Worshiping in spirit is the opposite of worshiping in merely external ways. It is the opposite of empty formalism and traditionalism. Worshiping in truth is the opposite of worship based on an inadequate view of God. Worshiping must have heart and head. Worship must engage emotions and thought.

Truth without emotion produces dead orthodoxy and a church full (or half-full) of artificial admirers (like people who write generic anniversary cards for a living). On the other hand, emotion without truth produces empty frenzy and cultivates shallow people who refuse the discipline of rigorous thought. But true worship comes from people who are deeply emotional and who love deep and sound doctrine. Strong affections for God rooted in truth are the bone and marrow of biblical worship.

Perhaps we can tie things together with this picture: The fuel of worship is the truth of God, the furnace of worship is the spirit of man, and the heat of worship is the vital affections of reverence, contrition, trust, gratitude and joy. But there is something missing from this picture. There is furnace, fuel and heat, but no fire... There must be ignition and fire. This is the Holy Spirit...

Now we can complete our picture. The fuel of worship is a true vision of the greatness of God; the fire that makes the fuel burn white hot is the quickening of the Holy Spirit; the furnace made alive and warm by the flame of truth is our renewed spirit; and the resulting heat of our affections is powerful worship, pushing its way out in confessions, longings, acclamations, tears, songs, shouts, bowed heads, lifted hands and obedient lives....

Worship is authentic when affections for God arise in the heart as an end in themselves... If God's reality is displayed to us in his Word or his world, and we do not then feel in our heart any grief or longing or hope or fear or awe or joy or gratitude or confidence, then we may dutifully sing and pray and recite and gesture as much as we like, but it will not be real worship. We cannot honor God if our 'heart is far from him.' Worship is a way of gladly reflecting back to God the radiance of his worth. This cannot be done by mere acts of duty. It can be done only when spontaneous affections arise in the heart.

Consider the analogy of a wedding anniversary. Mine is on December 21. Suppose on this day I bring home a dozen long-stemmed roses for Noel. When she meets me at the door I hold out the roses, and she says, 'O Johnny, they're beautiful, thank you,' and gives me a big hug. Then suppose I hold up my hand and say matter-of-factly, 'Don't mention it, it's my duty.'

What happens? Is not the exercise of duty a noble thing? Do not we honor those we dutifully serve? Not much. Not if there's no heart in it. Dutiful roses are a contradiction of terms. If I am not moved by a spontaneous affection for her as a person, the roses do not honor her. In fact they belittle her. They are a very thin covering for the fact that she does not have the worth or beauty in my eyes to kindle affection...

Edward Carnell put it this way...'Unless a spontaneous affection for my person motivates you, your overtures are stripped of all moral value"...

The real duty of worship is not the outward duty to say or do the liturgy. It is the inward duty, the command -- 'Delight yourself in the Lord (Ps. 37:4). "Be glad in the LORD and rejoice!' (Psalm 32:11)... If I take my wife out for the evening on our anniversary and she asks me, 'why do you do this?' the answer that honors her most is, 'Because nothing makes me happier tonight than to be with you.' 'It's my duty' is a dishonor to her. 'It's my joy' is an honor.' How shall we honor God in worship? By saying, 'It's my duty"? Or by saying, 'It's my joy?' "

With prayers to the end that our worship will always be authentic, Pastor Jeff

Truth

2011-09-07T09:52:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's thought comes from one of my favorite authors -- J. I. Packer. It is found in his classic work, Knowing God. Not that copies sold guarantees good content, but it has sold more than three million copies worldwide and is considered by many to be a book that should be a reference book on the shelf of every serious Christian. In fact, if you are looking for a book to use for a discipleship class for new believers, or a discussion group for Christians of any age or maturity level, this one should be high on the list. It is filled with tremendously helpful insights into the Gospel and Christian living.

Today's thought has to do with truth. But not just truth as "brute objective facts." It has to do with truth as a revelation of the person of God. It speaks of how truth is personal (better yet, how truth is a Person -- as Jesus reminded us when He said, "I AM the truth..." ). And it shows how truth heeded brings immense benfits into people's lives. I found it a good reminder. I trust you will as well. Enjoy.

"Truth in the Bible is a quality of persons primarily, and of propositions only secondarily. It means stability, reliability, firmness, trustworthiness, the quality of a person who is entirely self-consistent, sincere, realistic, undeceived. God is such a person: truth, in this sense, is his nature, and he has not got it in him to be anything else.

That is why he cannot lie (Tit 1:2; Num 23:19; I Sam 15:29; Heb. 6:18). That is why his words to us are true, and cannot be other than true. They are the index of reality. They show us things as they really are, and as they will be for us in the future, depending on whether we heed God's words to us or not...

Psalm 119:151 says, 'All your commands are true.' Why are they so described? First, because they have stability and permanence as setting forth what God wants to see in human lives in every age. And second, because they tell us the unchanging truth about our own nature. For this is the purpose of God's law: it gives us a working definition of true humanity. It shows us what we were made to be, teaches us how to be truly human, and warns us against moral self-destruction. This is a matter of great importance, and one which calls for much consideration at the present time.

We are familiar with the thought that our bodies are like machines, needing the right routine of food, rest and exercise if they are to run efficiently, and liable, if filled up with the wrong fuel -- alcohol, drugs, poison -- to lose their power of healthy functioning and ultimately to 'seize up' entirely in physical death.

What we are slower to grasp is that God wishes us to think of our souls in a similar way. As rational persons, we were made to bear God's moral image--that is, our souls were made to 'run' on the practice of worship, law-keeping, truthfulness, honesty, discipline, self-control, and service to God and our fellow human beings. If we abandon these practices, not only do we incur guilt before God; we also progressively destroy our own souls. Conscience atrophies, the sense of shame dries up, one's capacity for truthfulness, loyalty and honesty is eaten away, and one's character disintegrates. One not only becomes desperately miserable; one is steadily being dehumanized. This is one aspect of spiritual death.

Richard Baxter was right to formulate the alternatives as 'A Saint or a Brute.' That, ultimately, is the only choice, and everyone, sooner or later, consciously or unconsciously opts for one or the other. Nowadays some will maintain, in the name of humanism, that the 'Puritan' sexual morality of the Bible is contrary to the attainment of true human maturity, and that a little more license makes for richer living. Of this ideology we would only say that the proper name for it is not humanism, but brutism. Sexual laxity does not make you more human, but less so. It brutalizes you and tears your soul to pieces. The same is true wherever any of God's commandments are disregarded. We are only living truly human lives just so far as we are laboring to keep God's commandments; and no further."

Much of our culture's 'live for the moment, run on your feelings, indulge every pleasure, give in to every urge, and focus on the sensual instead of the eternal' has led to damaged souls, personal frustration, disillusionment, broken homes and marriages, and dysfunction in all levels of society. We have forgotten (or chosen to ignore the fact) that order, and limits, and consistency, and virtue, and self-humbling worship, and self-discipline, and self-restraint are 'exercises' the soul needs to be trained in in order to be healthy and strong and weather the storms of life. And because they are so neccessary to health in life and society, it should come as no surprise that the Bible -- which encourages them all -- should do so.

Packer is right. People almost universally seem to know the routines needed to keep their bodies healthy and fit -- as if that were the most important thing. Yet they so often fail to apply those same principles to the soul. We take so much care of the temporal, the decaying, and that which will pass away, and tend to ignore (to a large extent) the things most valuable and eternal.

In the long run (in the light of eternity) it would be far wiser for us to train the eternal soul to be fit and godly, than to train the perishable body to have a mere decade or more of slightly better mobility and a little more energy. Quality of life in this life has all but replaced the Christian emphasis on preparation for eternal life.

But, of course, such a change in priority and the paradigm shift it requires, would mean really believing that the things eternal and invisible far outweigh the things temporal and visible -- and that would require a radical counter-culture stance in nearly every way. Hopefully, though, care for what matters most will win out, and you will make the necessary changes regardless of being counted in the minority when you do. It will never be otherwise, for narrow is the way that leads to life, and wide is the way that leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13).

With concern for what really matters, Pastor Jeff

Give up!!!

2011-08-31T05:07:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

It's been an interesting couple weeks here in Pennsylvania. An earthquake, followed by a hurricane minged with spot tornados. I thought it was a good illustration of what life often feels like when schedules get overloaded, pressures build up, and unexpected events occur to thwart our plans or disrupt our lives. It throws us totally off kilter for a while.

This week's thought can help in this regard, since such disruptions can sometimes lead to sin on our part (creatures of habit don't tend to respond well when their lives are turned upside down). The thought comes from Harry L. Kraus Jr. in his book, "Domesticated Jesus." In it he gives guidance in regard to how we can navigate through the constant conflictive battle with sin -- and actually make progress. I found it a helpful reminder of the most basic weapon of our warfare, and hope it will be of help to you as well. I know the problem is multifaceted, and thus demands greater explanation (for which you need to buy the book!). But it does expose false solutions to the problem and puts us back on the right track. Enjoy.

Winning Over Sin

"The sad thing is that many Christians today have remained infants in their understanding of how to win the battle over sin. They have accepted salvation by grace but walk forward fighting against sin as if they have to do it on their own. Week after week they hear messages from the pulpit that reinforce the pick-me-up-by-the-bootstraps mentality. Pray more. Witness more. Get more disciplined about growth. So they limp along, trying and failing, feeling guilty, then falling into the trap of some comforting sinful behavior to ease their guilt. 'I'll just fall again. I might as well give up.'

That would be a wonderful place to start. We have failed a generation of American Christians who have embraced a self-made-man concept of faith. We have allowed a strong work ethic to poison our faith. Christians who worship at the altar of humanism are destined to a life of struggle with the mud of sin constantly clinging to their boots.

What Sunday school teacher wouldn't be proud of students who proclaimed that they were going to work harder, pray harder, and make every effort not to fall into sin? Alas, John Wayne, not Jesus, has become our Lord.

It is God's job to work. Our job is to rest. Paul would be exasperated with our pitiful attempts to be perfect by our own efforts. What would his letter look like to us? "Oh foolish Americans, who has bewitched you?"

We don't need to pray more, witness more, and memorize more. God asks us to set our minds on him. In essence, to love him more. Walking in the Spirit doesn't have to remain weird and super-spiritual. It is centered in relationship and the knowledge that the Spirit of God is indwelling us as a result of the cross. We need to stop focusing on our sin and focus on the one who died to bury our sin in the sea of forgetfulness. And in focusing on him, we find the desires for sin becoming less and our desire to love him growing.

I can imagine that some of you are reading these words and thinking, 'It can't be that easy.' But it is. Dear brother or sister, meditate on Galatians 2:19-20 and II Corinthians 3:18. Victory is ours if we only give up and realize that our strength is immaterial. It is Christ in us who wins over sin, and he gets the glory in the process.

We began by grace, and by grace we will be victorious over sin. For some of us who have been discouraged by our inability to win over sin, this is nothing short of the most liberating news of all. Go forward in grace, just as it was by grace you have been saved.

For some of you, the pattern of fail, repent, promise to do better, fail and repent has become a way of life, pushing you toward the precipice of hopelessness. We can't be victorious. But Christ in us can be... Let the first temptation prod you into the arms of Christ and an acknowledgment of your need. Helplessness is where we begin. Run to the ABC's [Acknowledging our need / Believing the Gospel / Communing with Christ]. A life of peace, where God's love has saturated our hearts; a life of walking in the Spirit, beckons. Find yourself weak enough to embrace it!"

What else needs to be said? The Gospel works! The Gospel is the power of salvation. It's also the only source of true sanctification. We begin by grace, we continue to live in grace, and we will finish the race by grace. Even when Paul says in Phil. 2:13, "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling" (a verse I often hear quoted by the opponents of grace alone) he is quick to add as a clarification, "for it is God who works in you both to will and to do His good pleasure."

As von Hugel once said: "God is always previous."

He is always the Initiator, and we are always the responders to His divine initiative. That's the way grace works (even when we mistakenly think we're the one's doing the initiating).

With prayers that we might better learn what it means to rest in His power and fight sin by grace,

Pastor Jeff

Obeying because of Grace

2011-08-17T11:20:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

Today's thought comes from a book I picked up to read for the second time while I was on vacation (the reason you haven't heard from me for a while)! The author is Jerry Sittser and the book's title is, "The Will of God as a Way of Life." Without question it is the best book I have ever read in the subject of God's will. Sittser is not only a biblical theologian, but also an avid historian who weaves his knowledge of both subjects together with great insight, wisdom and skill. It is a book one would do well to have on their shelf as a resource to turn to time and again.

This selection comes from the chapter entitled: Living in the Wonder of the Present Moment. It speaks of God's radical grace and the harm it does to us when we take advantage of it. I pass it along as both a comfort to the struggling, and a warning to those who may be in that place of presuming upon the grace they have received. Enjoy.

"We need God's grace to do his will. Without that, we remain prisoners to our past and future, dominated by regret and bitterness or by fear and worry. Grace changes everything. It draws us back to God, placing us at the center of his will, no matter what we have done or how bad the circumstances. No one is so sinful as to be beyond God's grace. We can be alcoholics, prostitutes, embezzlers, abusers, liars, or murderers. What we have done matters little; what God has done matters a great deal.

Once we turn to him in sincere repentance and faith, we become recipients of God's inexhaustible grace. Neither past sins, however regrettable, nor future circumstances, however unwanted, can cut us off from God's grace once we truly repent and turn to God. We could be sick from a lifetime of smoking, flat broke from bad investments, on trial for past crimes. It doesn't matter. The past is over, but God is alive and well. Once we turn to him we are immediately in the center of his will. God will begin that very moment to work redemption in our lives, writing a story that will end in triumph. He will bring the consequences of the past upon us in the form of a blessing. There is no place so distant from God that he is not present. There is no deed so bad that God cannot or will not forgive... God's grace is that radical.

But we must be wary of presumption. It is easy to take advantage of God's grace and put off doing his will. If grace is always available to me, we may think to ourselves, then why not continue to sin? If we can always return to God and do his will, no matter what we have done, then why be in a hurry to do his will in the first place? Why not just enjoy the pleasures of sin and turn to God at a more convenient time? How do we find motivation to do God's will if the threat of forever missing that will is removed?

There are two reasons why we should avoid presumption. First, presumption is spiritually dangerous. True, choosing to pursue a course of action contrary to God's will does not change his mind about us. God will always love us, always forgive us, and always welcome us home again, no matter how wayward we have been. But disobedience can change our minds about God. Spurning grace and disobeying God hardens the heart. Every time we disobey God, assuming that at some later time we can return to him, we will find it increasingly difficult to return at all. We will begin to doubt our own sincerity, lose our capacity to discern right from wrong, and question the authenticity of our own repentance. We will become like a lover who takes advantage of the goodness of his beloved so often that he loses all capacity to know what real love is.

In The Pilgrim's Progress the main character, Christian, visits Interpreter's House on his way to the Celestial City. There he is taught a parable about hardness of heart. He sees a man in an iron cage. This man despairs because he has sinned against God and does not believe God will forgive him. But God has not locked him in that cage of despair. He has locked himself in. He does not really despair of God, although that is what he claims; he despairs of himself. He has presumed on the grace and goodness of God once too often. God will forgive him, but he can no longer repent. Presumption is dangerous because it turns us away from God.

Second, presumption is foolish. As I tell my children, 'I will always love you because you are my children. That is what parents do.' But how I express that love depends on how they respond to my love. They can receive love the easy way, or they can receive it the hard way. If they choose to disobey me, they must face the consequences. They will have to go to their rooms, miss social activities with their friends, or do extra chores. My love for them will not change, but the way they experience it will. They will experience it as discipline..."

With continued prayers for your growth in grace, Pastor Jeff

Urgent vs Important

2011-07-19T19:43:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes to you from a little booklet called "The Tyranny of the Urgent," by Charles E. Hummel. It should speak to most in North America and Europe, though the spread of the - "must keep busy, must produce, and must always achieve more to have true meaning in my life" - mentality, has moved far beyond the borders of those two areas to infect places that used to be more relational and laid back in their approach to life.

This nearly universal persuasion in the West--that being busy, or always being in a hurry adds meaning to our lives--actually robs us of the more important things of life, such as depth, intimacy, satisfaction, and fulfillment in our relationships with God and others. After all, how can we relate to God or others on anything more than a superficial level if we never slow down long enough to put aside the tyranny of the next pressing task or appointment, focus of the person in front of us, listen attentively to what they are really trying to say, and then share with them (from an engaged heart) in return?

Merely sending off a rushed text or a tweet as we hurry to our next appointment may make us feel superficially connected, but it won't bring about the degree of intimacy the heart craves. Superficial interactions lead to superficial relationships and superficial relationships lead to a superficial life -- which is not God's intention for anyone.

Yet avoiding the trap of non-stop busyness, and breaking free from the addictive adrenalin rush that keeps us locked into that hurried pace, requires an earnest re-evaluation of what's important (in light of eternity), and a counter-cultural reorientation of both our priorities and schedules! In this sense Mr. Hummel offers some very sound advice. Enjoy.

"Have you ever wished for a thrity hour day? Surely this extra time would relieve the tremendous pressure under which we live. Our lives leave a trail of unfinished tasks. Unanswered letters, unvisited friends, and unread books haunt quiet moments when we stop to evaluate what we have accomplished. We desperately need relief. But would a longer day really solve our problem?...

When we stop long enough to think about it, we realize that our dilemma goes deeper than shortage of time. It is basically a problem of priorities... As an experienced factory manager once said to me, 'Your greatest danger is letting the urgent things crowd out the important.' He didn't realize how hard his advice hit. It has often returned to haunt and rebuke me by raising the critical problem of priorities...

Freedom from the tyranny of the urgent is found not only in the example of our Lord, but also in his promise. In a vigorous debate with the Pharisees in Jerusalem, Jesus said to those who believed in him, 'If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free...I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin... If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.' Many of us have experienced Christ's deliverance from the penalty and power of sin in our lives. Are we also letting him free us from the tyranny of the urgent? In this message he points the way: 'If you hold to my teaching.' This is the path to freedom, continuing day by day to meditate on the Scriptures and gain our Lord's perspective.

P. T. Forsyth once said: 'The worst sin is prayerlessness.' Does this statement surprise us? We usually think of murder and adultery as among the worst offenses against God and humanity. But the root of all sin is self-sufficiency, or independence from the rule of God. When we fail to wait prayerfully for God's guidance and strength, we are saying with our actions, if not with our words, that we do not need him. How much of our service is actually a 'going it alone'?

The opposite of such independence is prayer in which we acknowledge our need of God's guidance and empowerment. In this respect we have seen the example set by Jesus in the Gospels. He lived and served in complete dependence on his Father. Contrary to popular views, such dependence does not limit or repress human personality. We are never so fully personal -- free to become our true selves -- as when we are living in complete dependence on God."

Have you stopped to distinguish between the urgent and the important and made the important the priority? Do you do what is pressing when you really need to be doing is what is primary and crucial. I will never forget Martin Luther's famous words when he was swamped one day with a huge load of tasks: "I have so much to do today," he said, "that I need to spend the first three hours in prayer." What a word to the wise! So often we tend to use some pressing task or an overloaded schedule as a reason to skip our time of prayer, whereas Luther used it as a reminder of his need to pray all the more, and even pray longer than he normally did. That's probably because we tend to forget where our strength comes from. Many I've spoken with have confused the adrenalin rush of busyness and the accompanying sense of 'accomplishment pleasure' with the power of God and the strength He gives -- that is until they crash.

We would do well to remember that ongoing strength and focus and a right perspective on life come from time spent in His presence. That communion with God sustains the soul and uplifts the wearied spirit. That godliness is far more important than productivity. That God is far more interested in who we become than what we accomplish. That being still and knowing He is God is far more beneficial to the soul than simply being busy.

After all, as the Scripture declares, "The joy of the Lord is our strength" -- a joy conveyed to us (to renew and sustain us) as we spend time in the presence of the One who loves and delights in us -- even when we aren't doing, rushing, achieving or accomplishing anything!

Are you busy? Maybe its time to spend the next three hours in prayer.

Pastor Jeff

Resisting Temptation

2011-07-11T20:24:00.001-07:00

Greetings All,

Today's 'thought' comes to you from Ravi Zacharias, and is found in his book: "Cries of the Heart." It has to do with the lure of illicit pleasure, the human proclivity toward immediate gratification, and the choice between giving in to the call of sinful pleasure or resisiting it.

Nothing is more sure in our world today than the fact that we will all face temptation, which will confront us in the form of choices -- day in and day out for the rest of our lives. In fact, there are people who make it their life's work to tempt you since it pays off monetarily for them if they do. And thus they will not relent. If one scheme doesn't work, they will dream up another, and another, and another, until they find a way to wear you down. Their livelihood depends on it!

This means that resisting temptation will never be a one time thing. It must become the ongoing, life-long determination of the Spirit-birthed soul. It must become the personal and habitual resolve of anyone whose goal is to live for God, and thus live a godly life. Zacharias is right -- too many people give up too easily in the fight against temptation.

Living for pleasure and immediate gratification is to be expected among people without a view toward eternity. If this life is all there is, and nothing more, then hedonism makes sense (I Cor. 15:32). Unfortunately, this same attitude is also far too common among those who claim to believe in eternity and belong to Christ. Zacharias' words, therefore, are well worth our consideration. Enjoy.

"Turning aside from immediate gratification is one of the most difficult things to do. But this is where the battle is often won or lost. In blunt terms we are called upon to be strong in our wills at resisting illicit pleasures.

As a rule, many have so surrendered their wills to a state of weakness that they have lost sight of their capacity for strength. It is far better, goes the old adage, to shun the bait than to struggle in the snare. Learn to say 'no' and to mean it -- not just for the sake of saying no, but because life has been defined for its ultimate purpose (that of living to the honor of the God who has created us). If we do not resist and instead go the easy way of succumbing, there will be a price to be paid some day.

During the Vietnam war, one of its heroes was an American soldier by the name of Lance Sijan. Today, a dormitory at the Air Force Academy in Colorado is named after him... On November 9, 1967, Sijan was flying an F-4 on his fifty-third combat mission, when, owing to a faulty fuse that triggered an explosion in his aircraft, he crashed on the border of Laos. He could have been rescued as his comrades flew near looking for him. But he lay low, and did not draw them to his spot, because the enemy was too close and he did not want his companions to risk their lives. Over the next forty-five days, he crawled three miles. He tried to survive on leaves and the bark of trees. Finally caught and put into solitary confinement, he was tortured to extract secrets. Those who could overhear what was happening ached for him deeply, but they were proud beyond measure at his unbreakable will and his determination not to betray his trust. There was nothing his tormentors could do to dent his courage and his commitment to his country. Such is the material of which true heros are made.

If it is possible for men and women to serve their country with such unyielding honor, can we not also serve the Lord our God with a will that resists fleeting and illicit pleasures? In fact, in the thirty-fifth chapter of Jeremiah God raises this very question. He asks His people to take note of the discipline some show to earthly causes. How much more ought we to be unflinching in our commitment to God Himself.

The well-known talk-show counselor Laura Schlesinger, responding to a male caller who claimed he had an addiction to a certain lifestyle, bluntly restated his problem. 'It's not an addiction problem you have,' she told him. 'It is a character problem.' None of us like to hear that, but it is the strength of our will to serve Him that reveals the character we possess."

To his last thought we might also add: It is the strength of our love for Christ that determines the degree to which we attempt to resist temptation. For if we are all too quick to give into the sin God calls us to resist, we must honestly ask ourselves if we truly love Him, since in the end, our devotion and commitment and determination to resist sin are very much tied into the degree of love we have for Christ (John 15:7-15). Loves solidifies our resolve. It heightens our determination. It determines our priorities. Love finds reasons to be faithful, while a lack of love looks for and settles for excuses not to be.

Ravi is right: If only Christians could love and honor their God, and be as determined not to betray Him, as that soldier was not to betray his friends and his country. A few such souls would be an inspration to us all.

Along the same lines I once listened to a man who spoke on this same topic of "character." I don't remember his name, or anything else he said, except this one statement: "A person's character is not defined by what he does when others are watching, but by what he does when he knows no one will ever find out."

He was right. True character is a matter of one's heart, and will, and resolve, when they know they will never be found out by any other human being. Or maybe we could say, when they know that the only audience they will ever be seen by is the ever-present audience of One.

In absolute dependence upon His grace, which for His honor will strengthen us for the battle against temptation,

Pastor Jeff

Being Pruned

2011-06-22T07:33:00.001-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's thought comes to you from the well-known devotional writer Andrew Murray (1828-1917). This particular selection is found in his book "The True Vine," which is a verse by verse expostion of John 15:1-16. A missionary to South Africa with the Dutch Reformed Church, Murray reacted against the deadening effects of raw rationalism and a Christianity that offered no vital experience with Christ and the Holy Spirit.

Murray has a special place in my own spiritual life, for he "discipled" me (in a way) in my first two years as a Christian. One week before I headed off to the Dominican Republic as a missionary (shortly after my conversion in 1980), I realized I needed some Christian literature to bring with me for that two year mission stint. And since I literally had no money at the time, and only a week before I left the U.S., I prayed earnestly for the Lord to supply some funds for the purpose of buying those books. Two days later a check for $55 came in the mail!

I then took the money, went to a local Christian bookstore in Marion, Indiana (totally ignorant of what Christian literature was good and what was not), and spent every dollar on books. I bought two by A.B. Simpson, one by F.B. Meyer, and SIX by Andrew Murray (Like Christ / The Spirit of Christ / Abide in Christ (his most popular) / Absolute Surrender / and With Andrew Murray in the School of Prayer).

All of Murray's books are set up in devotional style, with short 2-3 page chapters, making them very easy to read, contemplate and digest. This thought has to do with God pruning us so as to bring forth greater fruit in His service. Enjoy.

"He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit, He prunes, so it will be even more fruitful." (John 15:2)

"I look out my window on large vineyards. The chief care of the vinedresser is the pruning. You may have a trellis vine rooting so deep in good soil that it needs neither digging, nor manuring, nor watering, but pruning it cannot dispense with, if it is to bear good fruit. Some trees need only occasional pruning; others bear perfect fruit without any; but the vine must have it. And here at the very outset of this parable, our Lord tells us the one work the Father does to the branch that bears fruit -- He prunes it that it may bear even more fruit.

Consider a moment what this pruning is. It is not the removal of weeds or thorns or anything from outside that may hinder the growth. No, it is the cutting off of the long shoots of the previous year's growth. The removal of something that comes from within, that has been produced by the life of the vine itself. It is the removal of something that is a proof of the vigor of its life.

The more vigorous the previous years growth has been, the greater the need for the pruning. It is the honest, healthy wood of the vine that has to be cut away. And why? Because it would consume too much of the sap to fill all the long shoots of last year's growth. The sap must be saved up and used for the fruit alone...

What a solemn, precious lesson! It is not to sin only that the cleansing and pruning of the Husbandman here refers. It is also to our religious activity [to growth spawned by the presence and activity of the Holy Spirit in our lives] as it is developed in the very act of bearing fruit. It is this that must be cut down and cleansed away. We must, in working for God, use our natural gifts of wisdom, or eloquence, or influence, or zeal. And yet, they are ever in danger of being unduly developed, and then trusted in. And so, after each season of work, God has to bring us to the end of ourselves, to the consciousness of our helplessness and the danger of all that is man, to feel that He is all and we are nothing. All that is to be left of us is just enough to recieve the power of the life-giving sap of the Holy Spirit.

What is of man must be reduced to its very lowest measure. All that is inconsistent with entire devotion to Christ's service must be removed. The more perfect the cleansing and cutting away of all that is of the self, the less surface over which the Holy Spirit [like the sap] needs to spread. The less there is of us, the more intense can be the concentration of our whole being to be entirely at the disposal of the Spirit."

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Then he ends with this prayer: "O our holy Husbandman, cleanse and cut away all that there is in us that could make a fair show, or could become a source of self-confidence and self-glorying. Lord, keep us very low, that no flesh may glory in Your presence. We trust You to do Your work."

So often we think that we must always be building upon, or leaving intact, all the growth of the past. We can be led to think that the healthy shoots that grew during past year's of vigorous spiritual growth should never be snipped or pruned. It almost seems counter-intuitive (to someone who has never farmed) to cut back the branches that grew so strong and high during rich and precious seasons of growth! I myself have often suffered from the false belief that fruit of a more precious and useful nature will grow on branches that sprouted long in my previous years of growth.

But this passage tells us otherwise. Past growth (though good and necessary at the time it grew) can actually be a deterrent to the production of richer and sweeter fruit in the present. The sap of the Spirit, if we understand Jesus, is diluted and weakened and wasted when it flows through lengthy branches of past growth all over again. As with grape vines, you want the sap to go directly to the new year's fruit, to sweeten it and make it more lucious and nutritious.

Though we don't often pause to think of it, I fear that many Christians (myself included) have frequently placed their trust in their growth, instead of the Lord who produced it. Or, as I have also seen, people sometimes cling to past experiences with God, or become content to live in the memory of those past times of growth, when what the Chief Vinedresser desires to do is come and prune them away (painful as it may be), that we may have new and better growth. Old growth is not pruned because it is bad, but because we don't want the sap of the Holy Spirit to be diluted and diminished in its intensity by having to flow through that now unnecessary old growth.

Just as pruned vines produce the best fruit, so also there is a habitual need for less of us, and more of Him. Instead of glorying in our growth, every so often we need to ask God to prune away the past season's growth, that we may be better able to bear lucious fruit for God in this present season of our lives.

With prayers that that pruning may not be too painful! Pastor Jeff

Are You Saved?

2011-06-18T18:47:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

A dear friend passed away this morning. He was a wonderful man, as was his wife Joanne who passed away not too long ago. I was the first to arrive on the scene at his house, and did CPR for about 20 minutes or so, before the ambulance workers arrived and said there was nothing more that could be done. Hard as it was, it was a comfort to know that Gary was a born again believer who had just told me a couple weeks back that he was ready whenever the Lord might call him home. I send this thought out in honor of him. He will be dearly missed.

It comes from J. C. Ryle (May 10, 1816 - June 10, 1900). He was the first Anglican Bishop of Liverpool, England. The son of a wealthy banker, he was destined for a career in politics before choosing a path of ordained ministry. He was born again while listening to someone read Ephesians 2 in church in 1838. He sensed a spiritual awakening take place in his soul at that time, and only 4 years later was ordained. For 38 years he was a parish vicar and leader of the evangelical party in the Church of England. His most popular book is entitled: Holiness.

This 'thought' comes from a message entitled: "Are You Born Again?" Ryle asks the question because many who claim to be born again, are not, and such a delusion can lead to a false sense of security regarding one's eternal destiny, a heart and conscience numbed to the proddings of the Holy Spirit, and a misleading profession or Christian testimony.

I send it out for your consideration under the assumption that some of the 300+ people who receive this thought each week, or some that you know, may benefit from considering what he has to say. I am never more conscious of how important it is that one be born again, until I come face to face with death. For apart from that gracious, effectual, life-changing work of the Spirit of God in the heart, there can be no salvation. As Jesus said, "You MUST be born again." I give it for your self-examination.

"Are you born again? This is one of life's most important questions. Jesus Christ said: 'Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.' (John 3:3). It is not enough to reply, 'I belong to a church; I suppose I am a Christian.' Thousands of nominal Christians show none of the signs of being born again which the Scriptures have given us. These are listed in the First Epistle of John.

NO HABITUAL SINNING

1.) John wrote: 'No one who is born of God will continue to sin; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God' (I John 3:9). 'We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin' (I John 5:18). A person who has been born again (or regenerated) does not habitually commit sin... There was probably a time when he did not think about whether his actions were sinful or not, and he did no always feel grieved after doing evil. There was no quarrel between him and sin. They were friends. But the true Christian hates sin, flees from it, fights against it, considers it his greatest plague, resents the burden of its presence, mourns when he falls under its influence, and longs to be completely delivered from it. Sin no longer pleases him; it has become a horrible thing which he hates. However, he cannot eliminate its presence within him. If he said that he had no sin, he would be lying (I John 1:8). But he can say that he hates sin and that the great desire of his soul is not to commit sin at all. He cannot prevent bad thoughts from entering his mind, or shortcomings and defects from appearing in both his words and his actions... But he can truly say, in the sight of God, that these things cause him grief and sorrow... Are YOU born again?

BELIEVING IN CHRIST

2.) John wrote: 'Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God' (I John 5:1). A person who is born again (or regenerated) believes that Jesus Christ is the only Saviour who can pardon his soul, that He is the divine person appointed by God the Father for this very purpose, and that besides Him there is no Saviour at all. In himself he sees nothing but unworthiness. But he has full confidence in Christ, and trusting in Him, he believes that his sins are forgiven. He believes that, because he has accepted Christ's finished work and death on the cross, he is considered righteous in God's sight, and he may look forward to death and judgment without alarm. He may have fears and doubts. He may sometimes tell you that he feels as if he had no faith at all. But ask him if he is willing to trust in anything instead of Christ, and see what he will say. Ask him if he will rest his hope of eternal life on his own goodness, his own works, his prayers, his minister, or his church, and listen to his reply. Are YOU born again?

PRACTICING RIGHTEOUSNESS

3.) John wrote: 'You know that everyone who does what is right has been born of Him' (I John 2:29). The person who has been born again (or regenerated) is a holy person. He endeavors to live according to God's will, to do the things that please God and to avoid the things God hates. He wishes to continually look to Christ as his example as well as his Saviour and to prove himself to be Christ's friend by doing whatever He commands. He knows he is not perfect. He is painfully aware of his indwelling corruption. He finds an evil principle within himself that is constantly warring against grace and trying to draw him away from God. But he does not consent to it, though he cannot prevent its presence. Though he may sometimes feel so low that he questions whether or not he is a Christian at all, he will be able to say with John Newton (writer of "Amazing Grace") 'I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I want to be, I am not what I hope to be in another world; but still I am not what I once used to be, and by the grace of God I am what I am.' Are YOU born again?

LOVING OTHER CHRISTIANS

4.) John wrote: 'We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren' (I John 3:14). A person who is born again has a special love for all true disciples of Christ. Like his Father in heaven, he loves all people with a great general love, but he has a special love for those who share his faith in Christ. Like his Lord and Saviour, he loves the worst of sinners and could weep over them; but he has a peculiar love for those who are believers. He is never so much at home as when he is in their company... They may be very different from himself in many ways -- in rank, station and wealth. But that does not matter. They are his Father's sons and daughters and he cannot help loving them. Are YOU born again?

OVERCOMING THE WORLD

5.) John wrote: 'Everyone who is born of God overcomes the world' (I John 5:4). A person who is born again does not use the world's opinion as his standard of right and wrong. He does not mind going against the world's ways, ideas and customs. What men think or say no longer concerns him. He overcomes the love of the world. He finds no pleasure in things which seem to bring happiness to most people. To him they seem foolish... He loves God's praise more than man's praise. He fears offending God more than offending man. It is unimportant to him whether he is blamed or praised -- his first aim is to please God. Are YOU born again?

KEEPING ONESELF

6.) John says, "The one who is born again keeps himself' (I John 5:18). The person who is born again is careful to watch over his own soul. He tries not only to avoid sin but also to avoid everything which may lead to it. He is careful about the company he keeps. He knows that evil conversations corrupt the heart and that evil is more catching than good, just as a disease is more infectious than health. He is careful about the use of his time; his cheif desire is to spend it profitably. He desires to live like a soldier in an enemy country -- to wear his armor continually and to be prepared for temptation. He is diligent to be a watchful, humble, prayerful man. Are YOU born again?

There is a vast difference in the depth and disctinctness of these marks in different people. In some they are faint and hardly noticable. Some of the marks may be more visible in one individual than another. Seldom are all equally evident in any one person. But still, after every allowance, here we find boldly painted six of the marks of being born of God. How should we react to these things? We can logically come to only one conclusion -- only those who are born again have these 6 characteristics, and those who do not have these marks (admitting there is a difference in the depth and distinctness of these marks in each person) are not born again. This seems to be the conclusion the apostle intended us to come to. Are YOU born again?"

If you have taken these things to heart and found yourself lacking; if the Holy Spirit has made you distinctly aware of your need for salvation, and the only Savior, then heed the words of the apostle Paul: "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved." (Acts 16:30-31).

Or Peter's words on Pentecost: "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. This promise is for you, and your children, and all who are far off -- for all whom the Lord our God will call."

When God calls, respond and do not delay. "Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near." (Isaiah 55:6) "Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts." (Hebrews 3:7-8). Come by faith and trust Christ now.

In the Service of the Gospel, Pastor Jeff

Repentance

2011-06-10T09:03:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes to you from Howard Hendricks and is found in a book entitled, "Practical Christianity." The book is filled with of hundreds of short articles written by well-known Christian leaders, dealing with everything from the nature of God, to forgiveness, to growth in godliness, to prayer and marriage and missions. This article is entitled: "What Happens When I Sin." I trust you will find it helpful. Enjoy.

"The theological definition of sin is any lack of conformity to the will of God. Most theologians would distinguish between two kinds of sin. One is the sin of omission -- the things we fail to do. The other is the sin of commission -- the things we do that are wrong.

When the word sin is used in the New Testament, it means 'to miss the mark.' The mark it misses is God. Our sin may involve other people, but our real sin is against God. David realized this when he said, 'Against you, you only, have I sinned' (Psalm 51:4). In one sense that was not true. He sinned against Bathsheba and Uriah, he sinned against the nation, he sinned against himself. But he realized that his sin was ultimately against God.

When I sin, fellowship with my heavenly Father is broken. There is a difference between fellowship being broken and a relationship being severed. If I offend my wife, I break the fellowship, but I don't break the marriage relationship. We may not talk for a day, but we are still married. In the same way sin affects my fellowship with God, but not my relationship with Him.

When we sin, we have only two options -- we can cover it, or we can confess it. 'If we say we don't sin, we make God a liar and the truth is not in us' (I John 1:10). To confess our sins we need to follow the ABC's: Admission - admitting we have sinned; Brokenness - agreeing with God about our sin (how wrong it truly is); and Change - turning away from our sin in repentance. We have not truly confessed our sins until we stop them. If we continue to practice our sins, we are just playing games. We have to change our habit patterns...

If we want freedom from sin, we have to answer the question: 'How badly do I want to respond to what God says?' If I want to respond, that is exactly what will happen. We are free to choose, but we are not free to escape the consequences. A person on the tenth floor of a building is free to jump out the window, but once he jumps out the window, he is a slave to the law of gravity that will dash him on the concrete below.

Christian living is a matter of right choices and decisions. We must remember, however, that though the choice is ours, the power is God's... We are all bound to sin, because we are all sinners. The question is not, 'When will we stop sinning?' but, 'What can we learn from our failures?' When we realize we can't conquer sin -- only God can -- then we have discovered the essence of the Christian life. The Christian life is not difficult; it is impossible. It is a supernatural life. When I try, I fail; but when I trust, God succeeds."

As a new Christian (back in 1980) a good friend in the Dominican Republic once told me: "If you can't bring yourself to want to give up a certain sin, then the first step is simply to pray that God would change your heart and make you want to do so. Pray to Him in all honesty and say, 'I don't really want to give it up, please God, make me want to.'"

I would add something to my friends advice that I have also found helpful. Instead of simply asking that God would make us want to be done with a certain sin, we can also pray: "God make me want to by making my sin as detestable and repulsive and sickening to me as it is to You." Or again, "Father, show me how very much the Lord Jesus had to suffer to pay the penalty for these sins of mine." When God answers both those prayers, I believe you will have very little problem turning from the sins that seem so precious to you now that you can't bring yourself to even want to let go of them.

With earnest prayers that we as God's people will come to hate sin as much as He does, Pastor Jeff

Accepted by Grace

2011-06-07T17:21:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This weeks 'thought' comes to you from a recently published book entitled, "Red Like Blood," by Joe Coffey and Bob Bevington. The subtitle is "Confrontations with Grace" -- and that's exactly what the book is about -- the uncanny nature of God's grace as he works in the life of a pastor's kid and a prodigal who strayed far from God.

Derek Thomas of Reformed Theological Seminary sums up this book well when he writes: "It is difficult to exaggerate the usefulness of this book in communicating what grace means in the lives of individuals." And I would add, there are few books as candid and real and transparent as this one -- which may make some Christians a bit uneasy if they prefer a more sanitized expression of faith and trust in Christ.

Yet, if you have an unbelieving friend who wants to see if Christianity is real, and wants to know if Christians will jump down into the trenches of life with them and get a little mud on their clothes in order to rescue the lost or straying, this is the book for them. Likewise, after you read the book, the authors would like to hear from you on their blog, which you can access by going to: www.RedLikeBlood.com Enjoy.

(This particular selection is by Bob, the "prodigal," who is now an eye doctor)

"I have found that I am like a balloon. I inflate quite easily, meaning it doesn't take much to make me feel like I am better than everyone else. It never has. And I am never more dangerous than when I am feeling good about me.

was flying high in the sixth grade because of school and sports and mostly because I had the cutest girlfriend on the face of the earth. One day our bald and muscular gym teacher, Mr. Boyle, picked me as his partner to take on the entire sixth grade in dodgeball. That alone started my balloon inflating. And when we actually beat them three times in a row, my balloon couldn't have possibly held more air.

I proceeded to the locker room, found the weakest kid in the school, and repeatedly snapped him with a towel while the other kids laughed. He was naked and wet from the shower. That kid was known for only one thing -- a very bad case of psoriasis or eczema or both. Scaly brown skin covered most of his body. Ironically, he also had the misfortune of having a matching name, Mark Weltyde. When I was done tormenting him with the towel, I christened him, Marks of Welted Hyde.

As soon as I walked out of the locker room, Mr. Boyle called me into his office. I cringe when I think of how cocky I was in this next part. I actually sauntered into his office, saluted, and said, "Bob Bevington reporting for duty, sir!" I must have thought he wanted to talk about us taking on the sixth grade in a tug-of-war. Instead, he told me he was ashamed to find out how I treated Mark. My balloon instantly popped and my body went limp. He told me to think about it, and I've done so for more than forty years. But amazingly I still inflate almost as fast as ever.

I have never forgotten Mark or Mr. Boyle or what an ass I can be. I apologized to Mark within the hour, but not the way I would today. For the next couple years, I attempted to make up for the locker room episode by treating Mark like a brother. I protected him from all lurking dangers. And I grew to like him. He was gentle and kind. And he could be funny. I wish I could find him. If you can help me with that, I'd appreciate it..."

Then he goes on to speak of one of his regular patients who was distraught over the fact that her grandson was in prison (a Christian man who had never really done anything terribly wrong) for shaking his baby son to death. He continues:

"I immediately had a flashback. The wee hours of a night twenty years prior when, exhausted and sleep-deprived and angry because Rita refused to get up, I stormed into the nursery and found myself within a hair's breadth of shaking my own son.

I exchanged letters with that young man while he was in jail awaiting his sentencing. He said he didn't mean to do it. He said he was ready to accept the consequences, which was a good thing, because he got life in prison with no chance of parole for fifteen years. His wife divorced him, sued him, and swore he would never see their two other children. There, but for the grace of God, go I. And I shudder to know it's true.

The world is broken and you and I are broken for the same reason: sin. Our sins fly under the banner of a Declaration of Independence from God. They are acts of cosmic treason in which we disregard God and put other gods in his place. I began consciously worshipping other gods at eleven and have been rotating gods in ever since.

Ultimately our displays of sin reveal the fact that although we say we love God, we love ourselves more. We fail to uphold his glory because we want it for ourselves.

Our default mode is self-centeredness and not God-centeredness. Our sins throw us out of tune, out of touch, and eventually out of joy and out of hope because we are not doing what we were created to do. We're sad and disappointed, and our relationships are messy. Our happiness, pleasure, and contentment are either artificial or short-lived or both. And collectively we account for the brokenness of the world.

Only Jesus lived a sinless life, so only Jesus was perfectly whole. Jesus never failed to love the Father. Jesus never hid any secret objects of worship in the rafters of his basement. He never inflated like a balloon. He could look his enemies in the eye and say, 'I always do the things that are pleasing to the Father.' Jesus hung on the cross where his body was broken so that our souls could be made whole. Not only was his body broken for us, his relationship with the Father was broken as well. Why? So that our relationship with a holy God could be restored forever. We are accepted, approved, and blessed by God on behalf of another -- Jesus, Son of God and Son of Man. He's my Savior. He's my hope. Even if I had shaken my son to death and spent the rest of my life in prison, he's my hope."

The Good News is that He can be your Savior and your hope, as well. You can be "accepted and approved and blessed by God," not because you deserve it (no one does) but because the Sinless One bore the guilt, and took upon Himself both the condemnation and punishment of all who would ever believe in Jesus.

"He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree," says I Peter 2:24, "that we might die to sins and live to righteousness -- by His wounds you have been healed." (See also Isaiah 52:13-53:12)

"Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved," says the apostle Paul in Acts 16:31. Look to Him, lean on Him, trust in Him, cast the full weight of your lost soul upon Him alone to save you and all that He purchased for the ungodly will become your personal and eternal possession. Your past will be erased, and your future secured, regardless of what that past may include.

In the Service of the Gospel, Pastor Jeff

Dependent

2011-06-01T17:17:00.000-07:00

Greetings All,

This week's 'thought' comes from the well-known American pastor/theologian/evangelist/philosopher and first president of Princeton Univeristy, Jonathan Edwards -- one of the greatest minds ever to grace the American scene.

Professor Martin Marty of the University of Chicago put it all in a somewhat humorous perspective when he began his address to a crowd of 4000 people (representing a cumulative minimum of about 20,000 years of PhD research) by saying: "Never in the history of Christianity has more brain power been assembled in one room -- than when Jonathan Edwards sat alone in his study in North Hampton (Massachusetts)!" Anything written by Jonathan Edwards is well worth reading -- sometimes two, three or four times!

This thought comes from the first piece of literature he ever published: "God Glorified in Man's Dependence." It was a message preached to ministers in Boston on July 8, 1731, when Edwards was only 28 years old. It was at the urging of those who heard it that it was published. The first time I read it, it changed my whole view of the Christian life. I still consider it the best sermon ever preached.

I offer you small segments of the message. It is based in I Cor. 1:29-31: "It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God -- that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, let him who boasts boast in the Lord." Enjoy.

"The redeemed have all from the GRACE of God. It was of mere grace that God gave us his only-begotten Son... He gave him to us in a low and afflicted state; and not only so, but as slain, that he might be a feast for our souls. The grace of God in bestowing this gift is most free. It was what God was under no obligation to bestow. He might have rejected fallen man, as he did the fallen angels. It was what we never did any thing to merit; it was given while we were yet enemies, and before we had so much as repented. It was from the love of God who saw no excellency in us to attract it... it is from mere grace that the benefits of Christ are applied to such and such particular persons...

The redeemed receive all from the POWER of God. Man's redemption is spoken of as a work of wonderful power as well as grace... We are dependent on God's power through every step of our redemption. We are dependent on the power of God to convert us, and give us faith in Jesus Christ, and make us a new creature... It is by God's power that we are preserved in a state of grace. I Pet. 1:5, 'Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.'

As grace is at first from God, so it is continually from him, and maintained by him... Men are dependent on the power of God for every exercise of grace, and for carrying on His work in the heart, for subduing sin and corruption, inreasing holy principles, and enabling us to bring forth fruit unto good works. Man is dependent on divine power for bringing grace to its perfection, and in making the soul amiable in Christ's glorious likeness, and the filling of it with a satisfying joy and blessedness...

We are dependent on God for all, as we have ALL through him. God is the medium of it, as well as the author and fountain of it. All we have -- wisdom, the pardon of sin, deliverance from hell, acceptance into God's favour, grace and holiness, true comfort and happiness, eternal life and glory, is from God by a Mediator, and this Mediator (Christ) is God... We have an absolute dependence upon Him because from him we receive all... Our blessings are what we have by purchase; and the purchase is made by God... Yea, God is both the purchaser and the price, for Christ, who is God, purchased these blessings for us, by offering himself as the price of our salvation... Even the righteousness that we are dependent on is not in ourselves, but in God. We are saved through the righteousness of Christ; He is made unto us righteousness; and therefore the prophet calls him 'the LORD our righteousness' (Jer. 23:6).

The redeemed have all their good IN God. We not only have it of him, and through him, but it consists in him; he is all our good...

God himself is the great good which the redeemed are brought to the possession and enjoyment of by redemption. He is the highest good, and the sum of all that good which Christ purchased. God is the inheritance of the saints; he is the portion of their souls. God is their wealth and treasure, their food, their life, their dwelling place, their ornament and diadem, and their everlasting honor and glory. They have none in heaven but God. He is the great good which the redeemed are received to at death, and which they are to rise to at the end of the world. The Lord is the light of the heavenly Jerusalem; the 'river of life' that runs through it, and 'the tree of life' that grows in the midst of it. The glorious excellencies and beauty of God will be what will ever entertain the minds of the saints, and the love of God will be their everlasting feast...

Our dependence on God glorifies him by displaying his all-sufficiency. So much as the dependence of the creature is on God, so much the greater does the creature's emptiness in himself appear; and so much the greater the creature's emptiness, so much the greater must the fulness of the Being be who supplies him...

The more men exalt themselves, so much the less will they surely be disposed to exalt God. It is certainly what God aims at in the disposition of things in redemption (if we allow the Scriptures to be a revelation of God's mind) that God should appear full, and man in himself empty; that God should appear all, and man nothing. It is God's declared design that others should not 'glory in his presence'... So much the more man 'glories (about himself) in God's presence' so much the less glory is ascribed to God...
Whatever scheme is inconsistent with our entire dependence on God for all, and of having all from him, through him, and in him, it is repugnant to the design and tenor of the gospel, and robs it of that which God accounts its lustre and glory...
It is the delight of a believing soul to abase itself and exalt God alone. That is the language of Psalm 115:1, 'Not unto us, O LORD, not unto us, but unto your name be the glory'... Man is naturally and exceedingly prone to exalt himself, and depend on his own power and goodness, as though from himself he could expect happiness... But this doctrine should teach us to exalt God alone. 'Let him that glorieth glory in the LORD' (I Cor. 1:31)."

We don't often think of it, since nearly every worldly philosophy encourages us to be self-sufficient and self-reliant, yet the more we come to see and understand and acknowledge our complete dependence on God for all, the more glory it brings to the One who is our inexhaustible and all-sufficient supply.

As T. Prince and W. Cooper wrote in the introduction to Edward's sermon only two months after it was preached: "It is the very soul of piety to apprehend that all our springs are in him; the springs of our present grace and comfort, and our future glory and blessedness; and that they all entirely flow through Christ, by the efficacious influence of the Holy Spirit."

And then they offer this prayer: "We hope [these doctrines] will never grow unfashionable among us; for, we are well assured, if those which we call the doctrines of grace ever come to be condemned or disrelished, vital piety will proportionably languish and wear away."

They obviously have become 'disrelished," and as a result "vital piety" has "proportionably languished." But my hope is that you would join me (and them!) in praying they will come to be relished once again.

In Him, Pastor Jeff