Choices

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." (1 Cor 10:31)

Did I make the right choice in light of eternity? This is the question I keep asking myself as I reflect over the last several days. Subconsciously it is the criteria I have used as I have had to make decisions this week.

I was faced with competing interest several times this week. Competing interest that could not be compromised or worked into a both/and outcome. We all face these same situations, where we must make choices and live with the rewards and consequences of that decision. When we can't have it both ways what criteria do we use to decide our choice? For me my goal is always to make the choice that is best in light of eternity.

When I say in light of eternity I mean when the life we live on this earth is over and we must stand before the Holy Triune God of heaven and earth, which choice will be the one we want to explain to God and why we made it. As we stand at the beginning of eternity (from our perspective here on earth) which choices is going to please God the most, which choice will he respond to, "Well done my good and faithful servant. When you had to choice between what looked best for you or what I had asked you to do, you choice my will over yours."

Of course the catch in such a criteria requires knowledge of God's will as revealed in Scripture and His calling in our life at that moment. In essence it is a measure of spiritual maturity. So what we really end up asking when we ask, "Did I make the right choice?" Is this, "How spiritually mature am I now?"

Did my choices this week reflect a spiritually mature Christian, walking and living in light of eternity? Only time will tell. And because the criterion is in light of eternity I may have to wait until eternity to find out. Waiting until eternity to find out is part of my maturing as a child of God.

So I'll patiently wait to see if I made the right choices this week. And if I have to wait until eternity to find out, then I'll accept that as part of God's plan and work to mature me.

Understanding Our Sinfulness

“Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths” (Gen 3:7).

Do we really understand the fullness of our sinful state? Apart from the working of God’s Holy Spirit it is impossible to understand just how awful our sinfulness is. The reason I know this is because Adam and Eve didn’t understand the fullness of their sin when they ate from the Tree of Knowledge.

If ever there where two humans who truly understood the fullness of God it had to be Adam and Eve before they sinned. Before they were sinners they saw God and experienced Him in ways no other person could imagine, except Jesus. They saw Him in His glory like none of us have. They knew Him in an intimate way that none of us can. Yet when they sinned by disobeying God’s command not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, the only concern they had was that they were naked. Hello!! You just disobeyed God and the only thing you can think about is that you don’t have any clothes on! This one sentence in Genesis 3:7 shows that they did not understand the fullness of their sin when they disobeyed God.

So I ask you my friends, if Adam and Eve didn’t understand how serious and how grievous their sin was on their own, how can you and I possibly understand how sinful we are on our own? We can’t. And because we can’t, we need a working of the Holy Spirit to understand just how sinful we are. Our hearts are deceitful; they are always trying to deceive us about how grievous and offensive we are to God when we sin. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jer 17:9)

So what? So what that we don’t understand how sinful we are? We cannot appreciate how much God sacrificed (John 3:16), we cannot fully grasp how deep the Father’s love for us (I John 3:1), we cannot see how glorious Christ death on the Cross is (II Cor 3:16-18) until we understand how wretched and sinful we are. Until we see our sinfulness as it really is, we will never appreciate the gift of God’s grace and mercy of salvation through Jesus Christ! That’s the “so what.”

Here is a very important point. We don’t seek to understand how sinful we are, or help others to see how sinful they are, to lower our self image or be masochistic. The reason we seek to understand how sinful we are is so we can see how blessed and beautiful Jesus is, how loving God is. We need to understand our sinfulness so we can see God’s glory better and brighter.

“Lord, help me to see my sinfulness and understand how offensive I am to you when I sin. Oh Holy Spirit let me see just how bright and beautiful the triune God is by knowing how sin stained I am. Then Lord, warm my heart and soul with the fullness of your love for me through Christ death on the Cross and the forgiveness of my sins, in Jesus name, amen.

Paying Attention in God’s Word

“Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law” (Psalm 119:18).

How often do I open God’s Word and read it and “behold wondrous things?” Almost every time I read I see something wondrous in Scripture. The question we should ask is, “Why don’t I behold something wondrous every time?” Is it really possible we can open the God-breathed Word of our Father (1 Tim 3:16) and not find something wondrous there? Then why don’t we see it?

The beginning of this answer is in verse 17, “Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word.” To behold wondrous things in God’s law is God dealing bountifully with us. So why would God not deal bountifully with us each time we open the Bible? Can God deal bountifully with someone who has unconfessed, unrepentant sin in their life? If I come to God’s Word with sin I have not confessed and repented of, then I open the Bible and read it, should I be surprised the words fall upon my mind, heart and soul with an icy coldness of indifference? God will convict us of our unconfessed sin when we read His Word, but He will not deal bountifully with us to behold wondrous things out of His law.

The other reason we may not always see something wondrous every time we read Scripture is our carelessness. In 1 Kings 19 we are told of the prophet Elijah meeting God at the opening of a cave. Four different environmental events occur and God is only in one of them. First is the powerful wind that can split rocks, then an earthquake, then a fire, and finally the sound of a soft whisper. God was not in the wind, earthquake or the fire, but only in the soft whisper. If God was only in a soft whisper with Elijah, where might he be with us? In the soft whisper of his word.

Perhaps when we read the Bible and do not behold something wondrous it is because we are in the whirlwind of activity. Maybe we are in the earthquake of rumbling and noisy distractions. Maybe we are in the consuming fire of preoccupation. Perhaps God is speaking in the soft whisper of His written word and we will only behold something wondrous if we are concentrating enough to hear His whisper. Why might God be so restrained in his communication to require our undivided attention? Because he will not share our devotion and His attention with anyone or anything, “I am the LORD; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols” (Isaiah 42:8).

Therefore, let us each and everyone cast away all that distracts us or will compete with God for our attention and listening ear when we open His word. Then let us each and everyone expect to behold something wondrous out of His law.

Just a few days after my meditating on this verse, Dr. Albert Mohler wrote a timely and penetrative article on distractions and attentiveness in our modern culture. You can read it at the link below.
http://www.albertmohler.com/blog_read.php?id=1155

The Value of Scripture Memory

“I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you” (Psalm 119:11).

Ignorance of the law is no excuse. Most everyone has heard this phrase used numerous times in their lives, especially if they are holding a speeding ticket in their hand because the speed limit changed and you did not notice it. In Psalm 119:11 we see the same principle at work. Ignorance will not suffice as an excuse for not obeying God’s law. We have God’s expectations for us in our hands. If we choose not to look at it we are still responsible for its contents. Temptations to sin against God are not excused away by ignorance of God’s expectations. John Calvin said about this verse in his commentary on Psalms,

“This psalm not being composed for the personal and peculiar use of the author only, we may therefore understand, that as frequently as David sets before us his own example, under this model he points out the course we ought to pursue. Here we are informed that we are well fortified against the stratagems of Satan when God’s law is deeply seated in our hearts. For unless it have a fast and firm hold there, we will readily fall into sin. Among scholars, those whose knowledge is confined to books, if they have not the book always before them, readily discover their ignorance; in like manner, if we do not imbibe the doctrine of God, and are well acquainted with it, Satan will easily surprise and entangle us in his meshes. Our true safeguard, then, lies not in a slender knowledge of his law, or in a careless perusal of it, but in hiding it deeply in our hearts. Here we are reminded, that however men may be convinced of their own wisdom, they are yet destitute of all right judgment, except as far as they have God as their teacher.”

All of what Calvin said is true, still, I think a more positive attitude is driving the Psalmist in making this confession, and for us exhortation. I desire to please my wife, one of the ways I do that is I have forced my mind to remember items, either concrete or abstract, that matter to her which are not particularly important to me. Because I love her I have hidden her interest in my heart so I might be able to please her. I think the same is occurring here.

The Psalmist is storing God’s Word in his heart so he will not sin against God, not only because of the pragmatic nature of not facing judgment, but also because he desires to please God by obeying God. You cannot please God with your actions and thoughts unless you know what God’s desires are. Storing them in our hearts is the mechanism that makes it possible for us to know what will please God with our thoughts and actions at any given moment.

Yet there is more than just knowing how to please God here. When we store God’s Word in our hearts we are conforming our heart and mind to the heart and mind of God. One of our desires is to become like Christ and God the Father. We are to be progressively growing in Godliness, this means we will grow into men and women who think like God and Christ. The only way we can know what God thinks, and change our hearts and minds to think and believe as He thinks and believes, is to store God’s Word in both our hearts and our minds.

So out of love and a desire to please God let us say and do as Calvin, let us “imbibe the doctrine of God” and hide “it deeply in our hearts.”

The Goal of Psalm 119

This sumer I am meditating on Psalm 119. Each week I will post a meditation from this important and large Psalm, Psalm 119 is the largest chapter in the Bible.

“With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments!” (Psalm 119:10)
All throughout this psalm the idea of God’s Word is brought up over and over. In just the first sixteen verses a reference is made to God’s Word in every verse. The emphasis over and over is knowing God’s Word so that the psalmist may obey God and fulfill his law. How though can anyone perfectly keep God’s law? (vs 1) Or, seek God with his whole heart? No one can. That is no one except Christ.

Christ is the only human who has ever completely kept God’s law. That is why he is the only ultimate fulfillment of this psalm. It is also why he is the only acceptable substitute for our sins. We can look to our redeemer, not only as our redeemer, but as the perfect fulfillment and model of living out Psalm 119. Recognizing this brings us into a very important understanding of our motivation for fulfilling Psalm 119 in our individual and corporate lives.

Unlike those living before Christ or unbelievers since Christ, we are not condemned by the law as believers in Jesus Christ. Christ’s sacrifice on the cross breaks the condemning power of the law over us. Instead of looking to God’s Word as an impossible standard to keep, we now look to it as the guide to living a life that is pleasing to God because we are under the saving grace of Christ’s work on the Cross and we are recreated creatures living in the power of the Holy Spirit (2 Cor 5:17). Of course we will not keep the law perfectly because we are still fallen humans with a sin nature. However, instead of our sins condemning us to an eternal separation from God, we are able to be reconciled to God and be forgiven of our sins through Christ’s death on the Cross.

This then is our motivation for knowing God’s Word and obeying it: that we, as adopted children, may please our heavenly Father. We obey, not attempting to earn His love through our obedience, but to show our love to Him through our obedience. So let us with David say and do, “With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments!”

Short Report on My Mission Trip

I returned home from West Africa almost a week ago at 1:30 am on Sunday April 13, 2008. I arrived with a cold, by Sunday afternoon the cold had become bronchitis, so I was down for the first half of the week. This is why I am so late in getting a message to everyone about my return and how the trip went. I am feeling much better now.

The mission trip to West Africa was excellent! God poured out his Spirit in every way. It would take too long to list all that we saw God do during our week there, so I will give only a few highlights.

We were in the country of Niger working with IMB missionaries Brad & Sally Womble. For the safety of the believers where we worked I will not use the actual village name or any individual’s name.

First, as Amy emailed many of you during the middle of my trip, God blessed us with seeing fruit from our labors right away. We spent the whole week in the village of Dayton. God just did a special work there in pulling back the darkness that has hung over that village and allowing his light to shine in for one full week. On the very first day, in the first hour, at the first presentation of the gospel we made in Dayton a man named Alfred came up and said, “I want to become a follower of Jesus. Can you show me how?” In this region the culture is Muslim with a strong adherence to the spirit worship of the past. Being a Christian is a difficult life choice and inevitably leads to societal and economic persecution. In this village before we arrived there were only 4 believers, 3 of which were baptized, so adding even one believer was a huge event. Alfred began attending the discipleship class that day and never missed a session.

Each day two teams of 4 went out and did evangelism in the village, while two others stayed at the home of Brazilian missionaries living in the village holding a discipleship class for the believers of the village. At the beginning of the first day 5 people were at the discipleship class, by the end of the first day there were 8. On the second day the 8 returned and by the end of the second day there were 13. Those numbers may not sound significant, but the missionaries were not sure if anyone would come any of the 5 days we held the class before we started. Because of working in the field and other needs the numbers dropped off toward the end of the week, but we still maintained a solid core of 8-10.

Dayton was a place of deep dark evil just a year ago. It took 6 years to get permission from the Chief to come into the village and teach about Jesus. Even then opposition and resistance were strong. We were told more than once that you could “feel the evil around you when walked the streets of Dayton.” When we walked the streets every hundred yards or so we would see dead chickens with their heads cut-off, but still having all their parts and feathers attached. This is an impoverished area with a high degree of malnutrition and starvation. We were constantly being asked for food. The people of Dayton are far too hungry to kill chickens and just throw them in the streets. These chickens had been animal sacrifices in spirit worship. Despite their hunger individuals would not touch them for fear of reprisals by the evil spirits they sacrificed to. This is to give you a picture of the spiritual state of Dayton.

Understanding the Spiritual nature of Dayton is important to understand my next statement. Each of our teams the whole time were in Dayton never faced any opposition or resistance in our presenting the story of the Bible and Jesus. In fact the residents were very attentive and listened eagerly. We were told that normally as you began to tell the biblical story the crowd would diminish and loose interest. In our case, the crowds listened attentively and always got bigger! Most of the time we would find a small group of 5-8 people and begin to tell them the story of the Bible, by the time we finished the group would be 25-30. On the last day I was doing Bible storying our last group swelled to around 50 people. It was like this the whole week. Our translators, who are very experienced in this kind of work and in this village, were amazed as well as the missionaries.

The highest highlight of our trip was holding a baptism at the end of the week. On our last day in Dayton Alfred and a woman who had come to faith a few weeks earlier named Susan, decided to be baptized. So in the yard of the Brazilians a pit was dug, then black plastic was laid in it to hold the water. The night before the Brazilians and some others spent two hours hauling water from the village well to have enough to baptize Alfred and Sally. We saw Alfred come to faith on our first day in the village and baptized on our last day there.
It is important to understand that baptism in that culture is a huge line in the sand. Alfred and Susan were already receiving persecution before by simply becoming Christians. However, when you are baptized the gloves come-off and the persecution becomes even more intense. So Susan and Alfred’s act was far more significant than most of us can comprehend here in America.

There is so much more I could share. Each day had an amazing occurrence of its own. Notice also that I have not mentioned anything about my own personal experiences and how I was affected nor any of our team. I suppose it would take a small book to recount all that happened in Niger.

Don’t Let Your Bible Reading Turn Into Visual Muzak

“But his delight is in the law of the LORD and on his law he meditates day and night” (Psa 1:2).

Do you know what “muzak” is? It is the music that you hear and becomes so familiar to you that you don’t pay attention to it, it is just background music. The best example of muzak is elevator music. It is playing while you ride the elevator but you don’t even hear it. We can let our Bible reading turn into visual muzak.

We start to read a passage that we are very familiar with and because we know what is coming we start to think of other things. Our minds drift and before we know it the words of Scripture are just background noise in our minds. In our fast paced “hurry-up and get to the next thing” world falling into this trap is easy. How do we avoid this trap?

We have to be intentional to keep from letting our Bible reading becoming muzak. First, we take a moment, as we open our Bibles, to set our mind on hearing God speak. The Bible is God speaking to us. Mentally we should set our attention on hearing Him as if we were reading a letter from a friend.

Second, when we get to passage we are familiar with, one were we are tempted to start drifting mentally, we should read it differently. We could read it out loud. The act of speaking a passage out loud focuses our attention on the words differently than when we read silently. If we are physically in a situation where reading the passage out loud is not feasible, then read it silently focusing on the punctuation. Physically pause at commas, take longer pauses at semicolons and colon, and come to a complete rest at periods. If the sentence has an exclamation mark reread it with the emphasis of an exclamation mark.

Thirdly we can pray through the passage. This is more difficult with narrative Scripture like OT history or the gospels, but even with these we can form a prayer from the main point of the narrative. For example in Mark 5:1-20 we have the account of Jesus and the demon possessed man. From just a quick reading of this passage we see that Jesus has authority over demons and evil spirits. We can pray thanking God that he gave Jesus authority over devils and evil spirits. A more purposeful reading of the passage would uncover other truths from this event in Jesus’ life, like we are supposed to go and tell others what Christ has done for us, 5:19-20. If you would like another example of praying through Scripture go to the blog immediately after this one on Personalizing Isaiah 53.

Our strength and closeness to Christ in our daily walk is directly tied to the intake of Scripture. Don’t let Satan and his minions use the fast paced life you live as a tool for separating you from your Lord by letting Scripture reading become muzak. Bring your Bible reading to the forefront of your attention.

Personalizing Isaiah 53

“Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. . . . But of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors” (Isaiah 53:4-6, 11-12).

When we read passages about Christ’s suffering and paying the penalty for our sins it is often easy to distant ourselves from those words. “Jesus paid the penalty for peoples sins.” We can fool ourselves into seeing us individually as not the causes of his suffering but a generic group which we are part of but at a distant. Such an attitude results in our emotionally and psychologically separating Jesus’ suffering from any responsibility on our part. When this attitude develops in our minds we need to personalize the suffering of Christ to bring us back to the reality he suffered for us. Take the passage above from Isaiah 53:4-6, and 11-12, take the words “he” and “him” and substitute “Jesus” or “Christ”; where “our”, “their”, or “they” occur substitute “my” or “mine”; where “I” occurs substitute “God”. Now it reads like this.

“Surely Jesus has borne my griefs and carried my sorrows; yet I esteemed Christ stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But Jesus was wounded for my transgressions; he was crushed for my iniquities; upon Christ was the chastisement that brought me peace, and with Christ’s stripes I am healed. Like sheep I have gone astray; I have turned to my own way; and the LORD has laid on Christ all my iniquity. . . . Out of the anguish of Jesus’ soul he shall see and be satisfied; by Christ’s knowledge shall the righteous one, God’s servant, make me to be accounted righteous, and Jesus shall bear my iniquities. Therefore God will divide Jesus a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because Jesus poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet Christ bore my sin, and makes intercession for a transgressors, like me.”

You cannot get away from the gravity of your (my) sin that caused Christ’s suffering when Isaiah 54 becomes this personal. Nor can you (I) escape the beauty and depth of Christ’s love and passion for you (me)! Yes personalizing Isaiah 53 can be painful to see the reality of my sin being the cause of Christ’s suffering; however, it also can be joyously uplifting and the impetuous of praising Him because I see afresh the depth and richness of his love for me.

Why To Hope In God’s Word

“But you are near, O LORD, and all your commandments are true. Long have I known from your testimonies that you have founded them forever. (Psalm 119:151-152).

In this passage of Psalm 119, that begins with verse 145, the Psalmist is calling on God to save him from the oppression of evil doers. He places his hope completely upon God’s promises and steadfast love (vs 149). The question is, “Why did the Psalmist place his hope in God’s Word?” What is it the Psalmist sees that tells him he can place his hope in God’s Word? The answer comes in the last two verses of this passage.

The Psalmist knows that God’s commandments have been established forever. Since the beginning of time until the farthest reach of eternity God’s Word will stand. It is on this bedrock that the Psalmist builds his hope for deliverance and salvation. All in this world will pass away, but the Psalmist tells us that God’s Word will not pass away, it will last forever. Included in God’s Word that will last forever are His commandments and promises. Notice something very important about the Psalmist’s hope.

The Psalmist hope is built on personal knowledge of God’s Word. The Psalmist is not blindly trusting in some unknown promise or commandments. The Psalmist has built his hope upon God’s Word through personal knowledge of it. Read verse 148, “My eyes are awake before the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promise.” The Psalmist does not just blindly go along hoping in God based on minimal knowledge of the words of others. The Psalmist has personal knowledge of God’s promises and commandments because he reads them himself!

If we wish to have a confident hope like the Psalmist in Psalm 119, then we must be wiling to base our hope upon the same foundation he had. We must place our hope in the eternal nature of God’s Word. We must believe they are eternal and we must have read them for ourselves.

Praying in a Presidential Election Year

“First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Tim 2:2).

In the second chapter of 1 Timothy Paul gives a serious of instructions pertaining to public worship and gathering of the early church. These instructions follow the admonition of Paul to Timothy in 1:18, “This charge I entrust to you.” Notice that the first charge Paul calls Timothy to carryout is prayer. The context would suggest these were the issues Paul wanted Timothy to address in public prayer, although obviously they would apply to private prayer as well. Given the historical context of Paul’s letter to Timothy, while on his fourth missionary journey after being released from his first Roman imprisonment, Paul’s call for prayer for all people especially kings and those in authority shows his awareness that the attitude of civil authorities could be a blessing or a curse upon the church. So we can clearly see that we are to pray for civil leaders from Paul’s instruction to Timothy. How do we pray for our leaders today?

Our prayers must always be eternally focused, just like Paul’s. Our prayers must first and foremost center upon the saving work of Christ in our individual leaders souls. Nothing is more important than any person entering the Kingdom of God. Nothing is as transforming in the life of a person than a personal relationship with Christ and the regeneration they experience making them a “new creation.” Nothing will transform our civic leaders to do the right thing more than the transforming work of the Holy Spirit in their heart, mind and soul. We should intercede on their behalf for a gracious work in their hearts.

Our supplications to God for our civic leaders should also include the surrounding them with aides that have wise discernment and gifted insights. Martin Luther said, “It is better to be ruled by a competent Muslim than an incompetent Christian.” Not only should we pray that God will give our civic leaders wisdom and insight, but that He would also surround them with equally talented staff.

One of the components of our prayers that is often overlooked is thanksgiving. We should thank God for our leaders. It is easy to make fun of our leaders and deride their decisions. Often they are faced with choices that are not easy and clear to make, especially the President. We should be thankful to God that He has placed them in the office they have. If you believe in the absolute sovereignty of God, that the Bible so clearly teaches, you know that no individual civic leader serves in any office without God having placed him or her there, “For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God” (Rom 13:1). If their decisions appear to be contrary to what we think is right, we know that God will use them and their service for bringing about His glory and ultimate plan for humanity. This is cause for thanksgiving even if their actions are against us.

With a better understanding of Paul’s view of prayer for civic leaders let us commit to biblical model of praying for our leaders and the next President of the United States.