So says Paul in 2 Corinthians 13:5. And if you are in the faith, does your life bear the fruit of the Spirit and the marks of the cross? How do you relate to others in church? Does your life reflect the unity Paul writes about in Ephesians 4?
I have been struck by the discord in the American church--even within the small, warm church I attend. I know I contribute to it. May I be forgiven for my sin, and may we all evaluate our hearts and love toward one another.
Many excellent blog posts have been written regarding these things, and they are well worth the read. Does any of this sound like a struggle in your life?
What Do Pharisees Do?
What Is Real?
The Scoffer
How to Rescue Your Church in Three Weeks
You and Your Pastor
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Paul, the Weak Apostle
Look at what is before your eyes. If anyone is confident that he is Christ's, let him remind himself that just as he is Christ's, so also are we. For even if I boast a little too much of our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up and not for destroying you, I will not be ashamed. I do not want to appear to be frightening you with my letters. For they say, “His letters are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech of no account.” Let such a person understand that what we say by letter when absent, we do when present. Not that we dare to classify or compare ourselves with some of those who are commending themselves. But when they measure themselves by one another and compare themselves with one another, they are without understanding. [2 Corinthians 10:7-12]How does a leader gain his authority? Why should any Christian accept the word, the action and direction of a man of God? Must he earn it?
The Corinthian church was struggling with Paul's ministry as an apostle through the attack of so-called "super-apostles." These men presumed a position higher than the Lord's apostles and attacked the work of Paul by many fronts. [2 Cor 11-12] They accused him of not being genuine since he didn't charge for his "uneloquent" preaching. They claimed he wasn't really an apostle because he couldn't produce his letters of recommendation the way they could [2 Cor 3:1]. These men were boasting about appearance instead of what was in the heart [2 Cor 5:12].
Paul responded by saying that if he so desired, he would actually have plenty of pedigree in which to boast. But he did not stand on that, and actually said that it would be madness--pure folly--to place confidence in those things [2 Cor 11:16-29, 2 Cor 12:1-11].
Whom, then, should we follow? Those whom the Lord has called. If you place your trust in a man because of his accomplishments, you will ultimately be disappointed. More importantly, you are following a different gospel--one opposed to Jesus Christ. No man is sufficient in himself, and that's as true for spiritual work and office as much as it's true for salvation.
Paul gives severe warning for the kind of leader who stands on his on commendation (and after writing his letter will be having words with them [2 Cor 10:2, 2 Cor 13:2-3]):
For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is no surprise if his servants, also, disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds. [2 Cor 11:13-15]A leader's basis and very sufficiency must be in Christ. Just as we are saved in Christ alone, so any Christian leads in Christ alone. For God did not call the strong and the powerful, but the weak and dependent. This is true for salvation (Mark 2:17, Matt 5); this is true for service. The Corinthian church should have known this, but they forgot the message Paul gave them in his previous letter:
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” [1 Cor 1:27-31]A leader does not command authority on his own basis, nor on the basis of his works, nor on the basis of man's commendation. No, his only confidence and sufficiency is in Christ alone, by the call of God alone:
Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. [2 Corinthians 3:4-6]
For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends. [2 Corinthians 10:18]What type of leader do you desire? Whom will you follow? Saul, or David? Hananiah, or Jeremiah? Caesar, or Christ?
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
New Humility
But what we suffer from to-day is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved
from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was
never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about
the truth; this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert
is exactly the part he ought not to assert himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he
ought not to doubt—the Divine Reason. Huxley preached a humility content to learn from
Nature. But the new sceptic is so humble that he doubts if he can even learn. Thus we should
be wrong if we had said hastily that there is no humility typical of our time. The truth is that
there is a real humility typical of our time; but it so happens that it is practically a more
poisonous humility than the wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur
that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going
on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him
work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make
him stop working altogether.
G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy, 1908
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Colossians 4:18- A Warning About Eisegesis
My wife and I were in the car listening to the radio during a short trip through town. In the brief minutes we listened to the program on the air, the teacher made a comment, roughly paraphrased:
We talked about it a bit after that, but I thought this particular issue was interesting because I think we can reasonably know what Paul was getting at by his statement. In 2 Thessalonians 2, Paul writes, "Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come." There apparently had been a problem through Paul's ministry that people would write forged Pauline letters to promote aberrant theology. History teaches that this was a problem for the church, and sometimes the violations came from within church leadership. So Paul would typically sign his letters even if he hadn't put pen to paper for all he had authored [2 Thess 3:17].
There is another instance of Paul mentioning his own handwriting in Galatians 6, "See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand." Hopefully a good Bible teacher knows about this reference (and similar ones in 1 Corinthians 16 and Philemon), or would have the decency to look it up. Galatians was most likely written well before Paul was in jail (probably before the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15). There is no reason to think that prison would do anything to Paul's hands if he had been writing letters in this manner before he was in jail and continued to write while in chains. Of course it's possible this teacher is right, but it's not likely, and you certainly cannot discern that from the context of Paul's letters.
The truly ironic part of this bad Bible lesson is that it commits a similar error that Paul was trying to protect against! The spiritual lesson was not of Paul, but by guessing at what Paul was really saying, it crafted a new doctrine that could be passed off with Paul's authority.
This is an important lesson about Bible study. We must let Scripture interpret Scripture. We do not have the authority to impose our meaning on it because a spiritual lesson fits well in our framework. We may not write on behalf of Paul. The best sign of genuineness we may have as we teach is to say what Paul said, and not more.
Paul said [in Col 4:18], " I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you. " We're not sure exactly why he wrote this, but it could be that he had a problem with his hands because he was in prison, and by writing this letter he was showing them that through God you can receive grace to overcome your physical constraints.At this my wife piped up, "I wish these teachers would stop making up spiritual meanings when it's not there in the Bible."
We talked about it a bit after that, but I thought this particular issue was interesting because I think we can reasonably know what Paul was getting at by his statement. In 2 Thessalonians 2, Paul writes, "Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come." There apparently had been a problem through Paul's ministry that people would write forged Pauline letters to promote aberrant theology. History teaches that this was a problem for the church, and sometimes the violations came from within church leadership. So Paul would typically sign his letters even if he hadn't put pen to paper for all he had authored [2 Thess 3:17].
There is another instance of Paul mentioning his own handwriting in Galatians 6, "See with what large letters I am writing to you with my own hand." Hopefully a good Bible teacher knows about this reference (and similar ones in 1 Corinthians 16 and Philemon), or would have the decency to look it up. Galatians was most likely written well before Paul was in jail (probably before the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15). There is no reason to think that prison would do anything to Paul's hands if he had been writing letters in this manner before he was in jail and continued to write while in chains. Of course it's possible this teacher is right, but it's not likely, and you certainly cannot discern that from the context of Paul's letters.
The truly ironic part of this bad Bible lesson is that it commits a similar error that Paul was trying to protect against! The spiritual lesson was not of Paul, but by guessing at what Paul was really saying, it crafted a new doctrine that could be passed off with Paul's authority.
This is an important lesson about Bible study. We must let Scripture interpret Scripture. We do not have the authority to impose our meaning on it because a spiritual lesson fits well in our framework. We may not write on behalf of Paul. The best sign of genuineness we may have as we teach is to say what Paul said, and not more.
Friday, June 29, 2012
Tempting Jesus
During a VBS lesson this week, the teacher gave a lesson on the temptation of Jesus found in Matthew 4. While speaking about the 3rd temptation, an astute 4th or 5th grader asked a very insightful question.
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’”
Satan's Offer
Satan probably doesn't know quite what this temptation means to the God-man; he can only think of himself. There is some sense in which Satan has dominion over the earth, though it is ordained and limited by God's absolute sovereignty.
Satan's Dominion: 2 Cor 4:4, Eph 2:2
Christ's Victory: Luke 10:17-18, Col 2:14-15, John 12:31
He is asking Jesus to commit the very same sin that brought his fall. Satan wants to be exalted above God, and that is the essence of Satan's offer: he will trade his hollow scepter for the golden crown.
Jesus' Temptation
How could this actually be a temptation for Jesus? Jesus knows he will be king over all:
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high [Hebrews 1:1-3].
But of the Son he says,
“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.
You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions” [Hebrews 1:8-9].
But the glory that leads the Son of God to that eternal kingship is through the cross. The reality of the crucifixion, of bearing God's wrath, of dying for the sins of world had a deep impact on the soul of Jesus. He asked the Father if there was any other way [Matt 26:39]. The Son of God and the Son of Man would truly be crushed.
And so the real temptation before Jesus was a short-cut. He could claim dominion over what God was giving him without taking the path of pain, reproach and death. If he made a simple concession, he could be king now.
Jesus knew God's Word, God's will and lived to fulfill his Father's will. And because Jesus worshiped and served the Lord our God only, he could be our substitute and offer God's kingdom to his followers.
I am thankful for VBS and the thoughtful children we've been blessed with. I pray that God would grant and grow a child-like faith in all of them.
If Jesus is God and is already in control of all things, then how could Satan tempt him to be king? Wasn't he already king?Here is the text of Matthew 4:8-9:
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’”
Satan's Offer
Satan probably doesn't know quite what this temptation means to the God-man; he can only think of himself. There is some sense in which Satan has dominion over the earth, though it is ordained and limited by God's absolute sovereignty.
Satan's Dominion: 2 Cor 4:4, Eph 2:2
Christ's Victory: Luke 10:17-18, Col 2:14-15, John 12:31
He is asking Jesus to commit the very same sin that brought his fall. Satan wants to be exalted above God, and that is the essence of Satan's offer: he will trade his hollow scepter for the golden crown.
Jesus' Temptation
How could this actually be a temptation for Jesus? Jesus knows he will be king over all:
Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high [Hebrews 1:1-3].
But of the Son he says,
“Your throne, O God, is forever and ever,
the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom.
You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;
therefore God, your God, has anointed you
with the oil of gladness beyond your companions” [Hebrews 1:8-9].
But the glory that leads the Son of God to that eternal kingship is through the cross. The reality of the crucifixion, of bearing God's wrath, of dying for the sins of world had a deep impact on the soul of Jesus. He asked the Father if there was any other way [Matt 26:39]. The Son of God and the Son of Man would truly be crushed.
And so the real temptation before Jesus was a short-cut. He could claim dominion over what God was giving him without taking the path of pain, reproach and death. If he made a simple concession, he could be king now.
Jesus knew God's Word, God's will and lived to fulfill his Father's will. And because Jesus worshiped and served the Lord our God only, he could be our substitute and offer God's kingdom to his followers.
I am thankful for VBS and the thoughtful children we've been blessed with. I pray that God would grant and grow a child-like faith in all of them.
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
Fierce Wolves
Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted [perverse] things, to draw away the disciples after them. [Acts 20:28-30]
What are these ‘perverse things’ which are a disturbance and a danger to the church? One of the major characteristics of false prophets in the Old Testament was their amoral optimism, their denial that God was the God of judgment as well as of steadfast love and mercy. They were guilty, Jeremiah said to the people, of ‘filling you with vain hopes … They say continually to those who despise the word of the Lord, “It shall be well with you”; and to everyone who stubbornly follows his own heart they say, “No evil shall come upon you.” ’ Similarly, God complains: ‘They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace.’ Such talk was, to say the least, a grave disservice to the people of God. It gave them a false sense of security. It lulled them to sleep in their sins. It failed to warn them of the impending judgment of God or tell them how to escape it.
Stott, J. R. W., & Stott, J. R. W. (1985). The message of the Sermon on the mount (Matthew 5-7) : Christian
counter-culture. The Bible speaks today (199). Leicester [Leicestershire;
Downers Grove, Ill., U.S.A.: Inter-varsity Press.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Criticism
Participating in church leadership exposes you to an order of magnitude more criticism than normal. There are many encouraging resources for those enduring the hardship of excessive criticism.
C.J. Mahaney
His book, Humility: True Greatness
John Newton
Whoever . . . has tasted of the love Christ, and has known, by his own experience, the need and the worth of redemption, is enabled, Yea, he is constrained, to love his fellow creatures. He loves them at first sight; and, if the providence of God commits a dispensation of the gospel, and care of souls to him, he will feel the warmest emotions of friendship and tenderness, while he beseeches them by the tender mercies of God, and even while he warns them by his terrors.
I have been thirty years forming my own views; and, in the course of this time, some of my hills have sunk, and some of my valleys have risen: but, how unreasonable within me to expect all this should take place in another person; and that, in the course of a year or two. (And Piper spoke to the men asking them if they expected people to change because "they attended my class" on that subject for two weeks)
Of all people who engage in controversy, we, who are called Calvinists, are most expressly bound by our own principles to the exercise of gentleness and moderation. . . . The Scriptural maximum, that "The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God," is verified by daily observation. If our zeal is embittered by expressions of anger, invective, or scorn, we may think we are doing service to the cause of truth, when in reality we shall only bring it into discredit. [And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kindly to every one, an apt teacher, forbearing, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant that they will repent and come to know the truth, and they may escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will." (2 Timothy 2:24, rsv)]
As to your opponent, I wish, that, before you set pen to paper against him, and during the whole time you are preparing your answer, you may commend him by earnest prayer to the Lord's teaching and blessing. This practice will have a direct tendency to conciliate your heart to love and pity him; and such a disposition will have a good influence upon every page you write. . . . [If he is a believer,] in a little while you will meet in heaven; he will then be dearer to you than the nearest friend you have upon earth is to you now. Anticipate that period in your thoughts. . . . [If he is an unconverted person,] he is a more proper object of your compassion than your anger. Alas! "He knows not what he does." But you know who has made you to differ.
C.H. Spurgeon
5. For Spurgeon a key to his perseverance in preaching through adversity was that he had settled who he was and would not be paralyzed with external criticism or internal second-guessing.
One of the great perils of living under continual criticism is that this is a constant call for you to be other than what you are. And, in fact, a humble saint always wants to be a better person than he is. But there is a great danger here of losing your bearings in sea of self-doubt. Not knowing who you are. Not being able to say with Paul, "By the grace of God I am what I am" (1 Cor. 15:10). Spurgeon felt this danger keenly.
In comparing one ministerial identity with another he reminded other pastors that at the last supper there was a chalice for drinking the wine and there was a basin for washing feet. Then he said,
"I protest that I have no choice whether to be the chalice or the basin. Fain would I be whichever the Lord wills so long as He will but use me ... So you, my brother, you may be the cup, and I will be the basin; but let the cup be a cup, and the basin a basin, and each one of us just what he is fitted to be. Be yourself, dear brother, for, if you are not yourself, you cannot be anybody else; and so, you see, you must be nobody ... Do not be a mere copyist, a borrower, a spoiler of other men's notes. Say what God has said to you, and say it in your own way; and when it is so said, plead personally for the Lord's blessing upon it" (see note 69).
And I would add, plead personally the Lord's purifying blood upon it too, because none of our best labors is untainted. But the danger is to let the truth paralyze you with fear of man and doubt of self.
Eleven years later in 1886 he struck the same anvil again:
Friend, be true to your own destiny! One man would make a splendid preacher of downright hard-hitting Saxon; why must he ruin himself by cultivating an ornate style? ... Apollos has the gift of eloquence; why must he copy blunt Cephas? Every man in his own order" (see note 70).
Spurgeon illustrates with his own struggle to be responsive to criticism during the Downgrade controversy. For a season he tried to adapt his language to the critics. But there came a time when he had to be what he was.
"I have found it utterly impossible to please, let me say or do what I will. One becomes somewhat indifferent when dealing with those whom every word offends. I notice that, when I have measured my words, and weight my sentences most carefully, I have then offended most; while some of my stronger utterances have passed unnoticed. Therefore, I am comparatively careless as to how my expressions may be received, and only anxious that they may be in themselves just and true" (see note 71).
If we are to survive and go on preaching in an atmosphere of controversy, there comes a point where you have done your best to weight the claims of your critics and take them to heart and must now say, "By the grace of God, I am what I am." And bring an end to the deranging second-guessing that threatens to destroy the very soul.
C.S. Lewis
"It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which,if you say it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilites, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit — immortal horrors or everlasting splendors." [From The Weight of Glory]
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)