Looking Back - Thomas Brooks

Where one thousand are destroyed by the world's frowns, ten thousand are destroyed by the world's smiles. The world, siren-like, sings us and sinks us.

~ Thomas Brooks

Contentment and Coffins

"Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world."

1 Tim 6:6-7

There is only room in the coffin for you.
Your stuff won't fit.

Looking Back - All in All

"Christ will be all in all, or nothing at all."

~ Thomas Watson

Looking Back - Revival vs. Reformation

"I dream of a new reformation - a reformation that is not simply a renewal of life but a new vision of life: a vision that yields new forms and structures in society and culture. As long as Christians restrict their Christianity to a religion, a faith that is compartmentalized and isolated from life, they can have revival but never, ever reformation. We need to hear and do the Word of God in all of our lives."

~ R.C. Sproul

Looking Back - Perspective

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

~ G. K. Chesterton

Biblical Balance not Present in Pagan Cultures

As Christians we should be well balanced on the strait and narrow path. We shouldn't be falling off the cliff on one side of the road or the cliff on the other side. Within God's Law and sovereignty we do not have to make a choice between asceticism or indulgence. We do not have to choose between extreme poverty or filthy riches. We do not have to choose between celibacy or orgy. These are all false dichotomies. We do not acknowledge a radical antithesis or contradiction between all things physical and all things spiritual. Jesus, in His incarnation and resurrection demonstrated that you can be both physical and spiritual. Within God's covenant we can glorify God and enjoy Him forever. We have been gracefully placed in the radical middle. It is the tendency of fallen man who has rejected the Creator to either worship creation or despise creation.

I was listening to a message today given by Steve Wilkins on the history of Rome where he wisely said this:

• Pagan cultures are cultures of extremes. As the implications of unbelief work themselves out in a culture the culture looses balance. The biblical balance that is characteristic of Christian cultures is not present in pagan cultures… They either renounce the world and forsake it totally or they embrace it without reservation. They despise riches or they worship them. They are cruelly barbaric or wickedly tolerant. They think nothing is humorous or they think everything is funny. They insist upon strict conformity or they scream in outrage that their individuality is hindered. They are stubbornly atheistic or incurably superstitious… The more consistent a culture becomes with unbelief the more extremes become characteristic. This is so because unbelieving cultures reject the eternal, sovereign God who is working His unchanging purposes in the earth. That distinctly Christian doctrine gives a stability that cannot be present in any unbelieving culture. That doctrine keeps us from panicking as much as it keeps us from sloth… Without stability of a sovereign God there is no stability at all.

Too Pious to Party

In a dark world full of lost souls, starving children and unreached tribes should Christians feel guilty for celebrating and rejoicing? When the world is weeping should Christians be laughing? When the world is mourning should Christians be dancing? When the world is famished should Christians be feasting? Does physical happiness refute personal holiness? Does partying contradict piety? Many Christians are confused by these questions. They tend to feel guilty and ashamed when they compare what they have to what the lost do not. When they look out at the world and see pain, persecution and poverty they feel ashamed of their own health, liberty and wealth. What is a Christian to do?

This paragraph will most certainly end with the word "but..." Christians should have a heart for the lost. We should, like Jesus, look out on the crowds with eyes of compassion. We are to mourn with those who mourn and weep with those who weep. Jesus said when we give the hungry food and drink and when we welcome the stranger and clothe the naked and when we visit the sick and those in prison we do or don't do all those things to Him (Mt 25). God's Law tells us this: "For there will never cease to be poor in the land. Therefore I command you, ‘You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in your land.’" (Duet. 15:11) We should always be proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom to the world. If we love Jesus we will feed His sheep. But...

There has always been lost souls in the world. There has always been poverty and suffering. God is sovereignly at work in history restoring what was lost at the fall. The kingdom of God is advancing and Christ will reign till all enemies are under His feet. Until it is all restored and Christ returns we will and always have had the lost, the dying, the sick, the poor and the persecuted in the world. In spite of the reality of sin in the world God wanted His people to celebrate. We don't have to, out of guilt or pity, wait till all is restored before we laugh and dance. There will always be plenty of reasons to mourn but there is also plenty of reasons to celebrate.

God's people Israel, in the Old Testament, were surrounded by pagan cultures. There was poverty, idolatry and suffering in those cultures. In that context look at what God commanded them to do: "...then you shall turn it into money and bind up the money in your hand and go to the place that the Lord your God chooses and spend the money for whatever you desire—oxen or sheep or wine or strong drink, whatever your appetite craves. And you shall eat there before the Lord your God and rejoice, you and your household." (Duet 14:25-27) Douglas Jones and Douglas Wilson, in their book "Angels in the Architecture" sarcastically commented on this verse: "Such unthriftiness. Such waste. Such gluttony. Such winebibbing. Such is a command of our holy God."

They also wrote this:

• Celebration is worshiping God with our bodies, with the material creation He has set up around us. Celebrating – whether in feasts, ceremonies, holidays, formal worship, or lovemaking –are all part of obeying God’s command to “love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength” (Duet 6:5; Mk 12:30) We are to show our love for God not just with one portion of our being (the spiritual aspect); we are to love God with our whole body, heart and strength and legs and lips.
• Complaint is the flag of ingratitude, and it waives above the center of unbelieving hearts –“when they knew God, the glorified him not as God, neither were thankful” (Rom 1:21). Yet by grace, God’s redemption in creation ought to keep us in a perpetual state of thanks which bursts out in celebration at every opportunity. Again, we are celebrating God’s dominion...

There is indeed, in time and history, "a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance" (Ecc. 3:4) "The Lord makes poor and makes rich; He brings low and lifts up." (1 Sam 2:7) Let us celebrate the Lord. We must resist the gnostic tendency to separate the physical things into the category of evil and the spiritual things into the category of good. We serve a God who clothed Himself with human flesh and after He died His body was resurrected. “Asceticism” is the doctrine that a person can attain a high spiritual and moral state by practicing rigorous self-denial and extreme abstinence. The apostle Paul made it clear that asceticism was not the answer: "These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh." (Col 2:23)

Victorious kingdom living includes celebratory kingdom feasting and dancing. It is sin that causes us to forget our blessings and fail to celebrate them: "Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and gladness of heart, for the abundance of everything, therefore you shall serve your enemies, whom the Lord will send against you, in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, and in need of everything; and He will put a yoke of iron on your neck until He has destroyed you" (Duet. 28: 47-48). We Christians sometimes have such a hard time gratefully honoring God's blessings in celebration. Yes, we should not forget about the lost but we should also not forget to celebrate the fact that we've been found! Have we become too pious to party? "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." (1 Cor 10:31)

Have to or Get to?

Whichever one of these two phrases you choose to use every day determines your attitude throughout the day toward everything. Do you say I have to or do you say I get to? There are many people who have never been able to have kids or who have lost kids to death or divorce. Do you have to teach and train and nurture and discipline and love your kids every day or do you get to? There was a time when the Bible was only written in a language that only the priests could understand and there were many who died bloody and torturous deaths making that Bible accessible to the common man. Do you have to read and study your Bible, the inspired and living Word of God, today or do you get to? Praise God we get to! There was a time when no one could go directly to the throne of God and make petitions to Him. There had to be sacrifices made, blood poured and priests interceding. Do I have to pray today or do I get to run right through that torn veil into the Holy Place and pray directly to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lord's through faith in the blood-bought righteousness of Jesus Christ my once-and-for-all sacrifice? There are so many things I don't have to do today because Jesus already did them and they never have to be done again. There are so many things I get to do today. Hallelujah!

Pilgrim or Soldier?

I was reading from Gary North's book today which you can download for free here entitled Backward Christian Soldiers. He was comparing the old Hymn "Onward Christian Soldiers" to another hymn "Wayfaring Stranger." Although most people know the soldier hymn better, today they are more likely to have the stranger attitude. Since most Christians, at least in America, travel in style, comfortable and happy, they seem to prefer the pilgrim paradigm more than the soldier one.

North gives the example of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. Christian, in the allegory, was basically just an unemployed drifter before conversion and an unemployed traveler after. He didn't seem to have any means of support or calling. Christian kind of just plods on through life. Bunyan, who was just a tinker in real life, at least contributed to the market and culture with a valuable service. Christian, in the story, seems to be more of a vagrant. I've always like Pilgrim's Progress but I think North brings up a good point here.

The pilgrim paradigm emphasizes internal and personal struggles over sin rather than external enemies. The soldier moves from boot camp and training into the battlefield where he knows he has real enemies to fight. The pilgrim is introspective and struggling constantly within himself. He is at war with his flesh but not with his external environment. All the allegorical characters of Pilgrim's Progress were external representations of internal enemies like vanity, doubt and despair. While the pilgrim is just passing through the soldier is more about conquering and dominion (overcoming evil by doing good).

Gary North gives another example from the seventeenth-century book by William Gurnall entitled The Christian in Complete Armor. North calls this book the most "detailed pilgrim manual." The book devotes over 2000 pages to every possible personal temptation imaginable except, unfortunately, the temptations of the battlefield. Gurnall didn't want to get involved with the great theological battles of his day. He insured his income as a State-certified pastor by signing the Act of Uniformity in 1662 while 2000 puritan pastors were thrown from their pulpits or thrown into jail for refusing to sign.

As North points out: "Gurnall preferred a life of irrelevance, warring with his own internal lusts, ignoring the external civil issues of his day. However harrowing his internal battles may have been, this pilgrim made his journey through his environment in comfort and relative safety." The battlefield is not safe. People get hurt and killed. They don't get paid much and they are always at risk.

We are, in one sense, pilgrims who are here today and will be gone tomorrow. But there is also a war going on between the Kingdom of light and the kingdom of darkness. We do have to fight against our internal temptations and struggles but that is for the purpose of making us better soldiers. "You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier." (2 Tim 2:3-4) The struggle within is not an end in itself. It only prepares us to fight the real battle within the culture.

We shouldn't be content to just be pilgrim survivors who lost the earth and made it through to heaven and took a few with us on the way. We must pray that we can be used by God as soldiers of Christ to bring God's will and way to our culture on earth as it is in heaven. The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Their is work to be done here and now. Christ is reigning and giving His faithful followers dominion in the earth.

TV and your BRAIN

The Modern 23rd Psalm

The TV is my Shepherd, I shall not want.
It maketh me to lie down on the sofa.
It leadeth me away from the scriptures.
It destroyeth my soul.

It leadeth me in the paths of immorality,
For the sponsors' sake.
Yea, though I walk in the shadow of my Christian duties,
There will be no interruptions,
For the handheld TV is with me.
Its cable or wireless controls,
They comfort me.

It prepareth a commercial before me,
In the presence of my carnality.
It anointeth my head with humanism.
My coveting runneth over.

Surely laziness and ignorance shall follow me,
All the days of my life,
And I shall dwell in the house of TV forever.

-Author Unknown

R. L. Dabney on Providence

We believe the Scriptures to teach, not only that God originated the whole universe, but that He bears a perpetual, active relation to it; and that these works of providence are "His most holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing all His creatures, and all their actions."

It may be said that there are, besides this, three other theories concerning God’s relation to the Universe...

• That of the Epicurean, who, though admitting an intelligent deity, supposed it inconsistent with His blessedness and perfections, to have any likings or anger, care or concern in the multiform events of the worlds...
  
• That of the Rational Deists, Socinians, and many rationalists, that God’s concern with the Universe is not universal, special and perpetual, but only general, viz: by first endowing it with general laws of action, to the operation of which each individual being is then wholly left, God only exercising a general oversight of the laws, and not of specific agents...
  
• And that of the Pantheists, who identify all seeming substances with God, by making them mere modes of His self-development; so that there is no providential relation, but an actual identity; and all the events and acts of the Universe are simply God acting.

~ R. L. Dabney

The Roots of the Emergent Church and "Relevance"

John Piper - Making A Difference

The American Dream - Don't Buy It!

Artificial Shelter

I just started teaching the high school kids (Kaila, Karissa, David, Destiny and Alex) today. We are going to meet for 3 hours a day 5 days a week and go through an intense curriculum. It is going to be so awesome teaching and learning with them! The curriculum is called "Omnibus I."

Here's a good quote from the Preface written by Douglas Wilson:

• "It is not possible to live in this world faithfully without coming into conflict with those who have no desire to live faithfully. The task of the Christian parent bringing children up to maturity in such a world is to do it in a way that equips. False protection, precisely because it does not equip, leaves a child defenseless when the inevitable day comes when that artificial shelter is removed. True protection equips. We do not want to build a fortress for our students to hide in; we want to give them a shield to carry - along with a sword."

Great Clip From A John Piper Message!

This is a great video clip from a message John Piper gave at a Pastor's conference. He contrasts our modern superficial culture with a Biblical worldview that sees the majestic supremacy of God in everything, A MUST WATCH!!!

5 Reasons for the fall of the Roman Empire

More than 200 years ago, 1787, Edward Gibbon wrote a book called Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. For 20 years he studied the Roman empire trying to find out how a nation or an empire could be so great and then suddenly collapse. How could that happen? It's hard not to think of our country when you read the five reasons he came up with.

Five reasons for the fall of the great dynasty.

• First: Rapid increase of divorce, with the undermining of the sanctity of the home, which is the basis of society.
  
• Second: Higher and higher taxes; the spending of money for bread and celebrations.
  
• Third: The mad craze for pleasure, sports becoming every year more exciting and more brutal.
  
• Fourth: The building of gigantic armaments, when the real enemy was within; the decadence of the people.
  
• Fifth: The decay of religion; faith fading into mere form, losing touch with life, and becoming impotent to guide it.

"Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people." (Pro 14:34)

"Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord..." (Psa 33:12)

"Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap." (Gal 6:7)

American Christian Worldview Problem

Less than 10% of American Christians have a biblical worldview (Teens less than 5%)

· 85% have a relativistic worldview

· 2/3 of them say they there is no such thing as absolute truth.

· Only 4 out of 10 say they are absolutely committed to the Christian faith

· 56% of churched youth say you can’t grasp the meaning of truth (Of course how do they grasp the fact that you can’t grasp the meaning of truth)

· 85% of churched youth agree with this statement: “What is right for one person in a given situation might not be right for another person who encounters the same situation” (Relativism)

· 62% agree with this statement: “Nothing can be known for certain except the things you experience in your life”

Francis Scott Key The Apologist

Francis Scott Key (August 2, 1777 – January 11, 1843) was an American lawyer, an author and a part-time poet who wrote the words to our national anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner" but he was also a great Christian apologist. No, that doesn't mean he was great at apologizing for being a Christian. It means he knew how to obey 1 Peter 3:15 "...but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense (Greek word: apologia where we get the word apologetics) to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect..." Francis Scott Key understood the folly in meeting the infidel on so-called neutral ground. He knew how to push the antithesis and force the unbeliever to be consistent with his own worldview when he wrote:

"I don't believe there are any new objections to be discovered to the truth of Christianity, though there may be some art in presenting old ones in a new dress. My faith has been greatly confirmed by the infidel writers I have read. Men may argue ingeniously against our faith, as indeed they may against anything -- but what can they say in defense of their own -- I would carry the war into their own territories, I would ask them what they believe -- if they said they believed anything, I think that they might be shown to be more full of difficulties and liable to infinitely greater objections than the system they oppose and they were credulous and unreasonable for believing it. If they said they did not believe anything, you could not, to be sure, have anything further to say to them. In that case they would be insane, or at best ill qualified to teach others what they ought to believe or disbelieve."

Waste of space?

We are so small, God is so big...






Our planet earth is a small part of a solar system that is 7.3 billion miles across. This solar system is a little speck in the galaxy called the Milky Way which is about 100,000 light years across.

Scientists know these things and they have a reverence for the universe. They stand in awe at what they see and they hear us Christians say that God created all that and he put man in one place… planet earth. (Little teeny weeny planet earth.) The skeptical scientists laugh at that and say… What’s the point of that? Seems like a lot of wasted space. All that space and man occupies this little teeny planet? Here’s the point… It would be wasted space if it were all about us.

Psalms 19:1 says, "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork." It's not all about us. The heavens are telling us about the glory of God. All that space out there with us on a tiny spec of it tells us all about our insignificance and also all about God’s glory.

Here's a couple videos for you...





To God be the glory!

God is radically God exalted. He designed the universe to be about Himself... to declare His awesome glory. Rom 3:23 says… “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Sin is all about being defined in relationship to the glory of God. If we don’t have a reverence and an awe of the glory of God we are sinning. Sin is falling short of the glory of God. No matter how hard we try, no matter how good we are… We will always fall short of the glory of God. That’s why we were in so desperate need of the cross.

Daniel In The Kings Den Pt. 1

I want to give a short summary of the book of Daniel. The book of Daniel is extremely practical and applicable to us today Chapters 1-6 deal with Daniel the Saint - his life (practical). Chapters 7-12 deal with Daniel the Prophet - (similar to Revelation) There are so many similarities to Daniel's situation and ours in America. Daniel was part of a very small remnant in the middle of a pagan culture. From the time he was a teenager until he died around the age of 90, he served under pagan kings (he worked for the government). We always hear about "Daniel in the Lion's Den" but I want to quickly look at "Daniel in the Kings Den."

Daniel and his friends were taken to Babylon in the summer of 605 BC. I want to look at 2 things: 1st – the way Babylon tactically tries to mentally enslave and pollute its captives. 2^nd, the way Daniel dealt with Babylon's tactics while remaining in Babylon.

The first thing Babylon does to seduce, corrupt and enslave God's People is attack the religion. “In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, with some of the vessels of the house of God. And he brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his god, and placed the vessels in the treasury of his god.” (Dan 1:1-2) The first thing Nebuchadnezzar did to enslave a people was to attack their religion. Maybe he knew that where “the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty." (2 Cor 3:17) Where the Spirit of the Lord is NOT, there is slavery. As Horace Greeley said, "It is impossible to enslave mentally or socially a Bible reading people. The principles of the Bible are the groundwork of human freedom."

The Babylonians understood… If you can take away their temple you can take their territory… If you can take away their religion you can take their rights… If you can take away their worship you can take their wealth… If you can take away their spirit you can take their strength… If you can take away their God you can take their government… (more to come)