Monthly Archives: December 2015

Jesus & the Church

Posted on by
Reply

I Will Not Leave Jesus — But I’m Done with the Church

Original source: http://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/i-will-not-leave-jesus-but-i-m-done-with-the-church

Audio Transcript

Today’s clip comes not from a sermon, but from an interview with John Piper, BC. We jump into their conversation as they were just talking about the local church, and leaders who have failed in local churches. So what do you say to someone who says, I’ll never leave Jesus, but I’ve seen the failure of a pastor and I’m done with the local church? Here’s a very short clip from the conversation.

Pastor John, what would you say to this: “I’m not walking away from Jesus, but I am done with the church. I can’t trust the leadership. I held a certain leader in high esteem. So I am not going to walk away from Jesus, but I am done with the organized aspect of church life.”

If you do that, you are walking away from Jesus.

Here is the reason: To say, “I love Jesus, but I don’t submit to his word” is a lie. “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word” (John 14:23). Jesus founded the church. I didn’t. Paul didn’t. Jesus founded the church. He established apostles to be — according to Ephesians 2:20 — the foundation of the church. And then he built it with prophets and teachers and pastors and ordained that there be a structure of local churches in the body of Christ called the church.

This is not man’s idea. There are a lot of young evangelicals who are cool, hip, and leftward-leaning who think they can substitute something for organized church. Well, I would have to look at what they are substituting and say: Are you really just creating church, trying to create church? If you are trying to create church, just create it biblically. Start a biblical church. And that means listening to your Master and his word and his apostles.

So the choice of Jesus over church implies a choice of your opinion over the Bible, because the Bible is where we meet Jesus. You can’t make Jesus up. You can’t make him up. He is the Jesus of the Bible or he is the Jesus of your imagination. If he is the Jesus of the Bible, you take the whole Jesus. You can’t carve him up in pieces. And the whole Jesus is the Jesus who loves the church. He died for the church.

Star Wars and its Worldview

Posted on by
Reply

visionDr. Peter Jones is executive director of truthXchange, a ministry that exists to recognize and respond to the rising tide of neopaganism. He has authored several books and is the teacher on the series Only Two Religions. At the ligonier website we can shrug our shoulders, since Star Wars is old news. Or we can enthusiastically introduce our grandchildren to what we might think is a beloved, harmless yarn. Or we can—and should—discover in the series an occasion to sharpen our presentation of the gospel message and help our children and grandchildren, and anyone else who might be interested, to understand the culture in which they live.

In this famous and creative saga, which we must respect for its artistic value, we find many positive ideals—bravery, friendship, love, and spirituality, and others—which help explain the success of the series. However, in examining Star Wars’ account of the mystery and nobility of human life, the Bible’s answer, in comparison, emerges with incomparably more convincing power.

The Star Wars Phenomenon

Answering questions of morality and spirituality was the goal of George Lucas when he created Star Wars. In the 1970s, in the heyday of secular humanism, people were hungry for spiritual truth. Lucas realized that stories were more powerful than intellectual theories—especially for children. He intended to produce a children’s fairy tale set in outer space as a “teaching tool” for the re-creation of “the classic cosmic mysteries.” In so doing, he influenced audiences young and old and deeply affected the last few decades of Western civilization. The new films will no doubt extend that influence into the next generations. Continue reading →

Corrective Church Discipline

Posted on by
Reply

tom-ascolCorrective Church Discipline article by Tom Ascol (original source here)

One of the most important and difficult tasks a pastor must undertake is leading his congregation to understand and obey what the Bible says about church discipline. The widespread neglect of the practice can cause even faithful Christians to be fearful of the idea. When biblical texts that give instruction on the subject are introduced it is not uncommon to hear responses that border on panic. “This will split the church.” “So then only perfect people can be members?” “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.” “I’ve been a Christian for ___ (20, 30, 40, etc.) years and have never heard of this, so why are you bringing it up now?”

Such fears can only be overcome by leading people to trust the Lord and His Word. The authority and sufficiency of Scripture are foundational not only to restoring the practice of church discipline but to every matter of faith and work in the Christian life. On that foundation the specific texts on the nature of the church and the steps of discipline must be simply and plainly taught.

To introduce church discipline I would begin with the classic passage on the subject found in Matthew 18:15-20. Any church that obeys Jesus’ words will find that most sin in the church will be effectively dealt with in private as brothers and sisters give and receive correction as they help each other follow Christ together. Repentance and forgiveness will characterize relationships—which is exactly the way life together in the body of Christ is supposed to work.

When such private efforts fail and the offender continues in sin without repentance, the matter must be told to the church. Only if he refuses to heed the admonitions of the church is he to be removed from membership, not as an act of punishment but as an expression of love for his soul and with the hope and prayer that he will come to his senses and be restored through repentance. Continue reading →

Don’t Miss Church

Posted on by
1

church08Why Church Isn’t Optional for Christians – Adapted from True Worshipers, by Bob Kauflin – original source here.

I recently heard a pastor of a large American church say matter-of-factly that the average person in his church attended one out of three Sundays. Sadly, he wasn’t saying it was a problem. He was simply making an observation.

It’s an observation that stands in stark contrast to the admonition in Hebrews 10:24-25: “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

If going to church is an item we check off our list every week, if we regularly look for excuses to skip out, if the Sunday gathering is more of an obligation than a joy, then perhaps we’ve forgotten why God thinks it’s so important.

As a reminder, let me suggest eight reasons gathering with God’s people each week is meant to be the high point of our week.

1. Jesus came to save a people, not random individuals.

From the days of Adam and Eve, God wanted a people who would declare the greatness of his name through the words and witness of their life together. God never intended our worship to be just “me and God.” That’s because our worship is the outflow of the relationships the Father, Son, and Spirit have always enjoyed.

Throughout the Old Testament God calls his people together to celebrate his goodness and renew his covenant with them (Exodus 19:6; Exodus 23:14-17). In the New Testament, Paul declares that the church is “the temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16). Elsewhere he refers to us as “God’s field, God’s building” (1 Corinthians 3:9).

Bottom line: God doesn’t give us a choice about whether we want to be in the church. If we’re Christians, we’re already part of the family. The question now is where and how we work out the details of family life.

2. We need to rehearse and be reminded of the gospel.

Robert Robinson confessed in his hymn “Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing” that he was “prone to wander.” There’s nothing we’re more prone to wander from than our reliance on the gospel — the amazing news that Jesus has come to bear our sins, endure the punishment we deserved, and reconcile us to God.

This is of “first importance” and is meant to dwell in us richly as we meet (1 Corinthians 15:1-4; Colossians 3:16). But we tend to wander from that news when we neglect to meet with the church. We meet together as redeemed saints to remind each other whose we are, how we got here, and why it matters.

3. God’s Word builds us together.

When the church gathers expectantly in one place at one time to hear God’s Word proclaimed, it’s a unique event. God himself addresses us as his people. The Spirit works in our hearts at once to convict, comfort, illumine, and exhort (1 Thessalonians 1:4-5, 2:13).

Not only are we being strengthened individually; we’re being strengthened as a body. We can thank God for opportunities to listen to downloaded messages on our own. We can thank him even more that we get to hear them with the church.

4. We were made to serve and care for one another.

The writer of Hebrews tells us we gather “to stir up one another to love and good works” (Hebrews 10:24). I’m stirred up as I benefit from the different strengths, gifts, and abilities God has given to other members of my church. I need to be stirred up regularly. So do you.

In addition, each of us has been gifted in some way to serve our local church (1 Corinthians 12:4-7; 1 Peter 4:10). Of course that serving can and should take place outside Sunday mornings. But when we don’t meet together, we limit the opportunities we have to serve each other.

5. We become more aware of God’s presence.

We don’t have to scour the Internet to locate the latest outpouring of the Spirit. We don’t have to chase experiences and manifestations of the Holy Spirit “out there” — because he’s already promised to be “right here” as we meet with our local church.

As the new temple in Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2:19-22), the church is where God’s presence is now typically encountered. Why would we want to miss out on it?

6. We demonstrate our unity in the gospel.

The scattered church throughout the week is still the church. But gathering together is a physical demonstration and reminder of our distinctness from the world and our unity in the gospel. We show that we’ve been drawn apart from the world and drawn together to God.

Most of us instinctively (sinfully?) like to be with people who are a lot like us — people who like the same music, eat at the same restaurants, and shop at the same stores. But God is glorified when people who have no visible connection or similarity joyfully meet together week after week. They do it not because they’re all the same, but because the gospel has brought them together (Romans 15:5-7).

7. We can share in the sacraments.

Another way the unifying power of the gospel is made visible when we gather is through the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper. When people are baptized, they’re publicly identifying with Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection (Romans 6:3-4). But expressing their union with Christ is paramount to expressing their union with the church. No one is baptized into Christ who isn’t also baptized into his body.

In a similar way, sharing the Lord’s Supper not only signifies our communion with Christ, but with each other (1 Corinthians 10:16-17). That’s why it doesn’t make sense to take communion on our own. The very word communion informs what’s taking place. We’re remembering that we’ve been reconciled not only to God but also to those around us.

8. We magnify God’s glory.

God’s inherent glory never increases or diminishes. But that glory is more visible when we meet together to worship him. It’s through the church that the manifold wisdom of God is put on display (Ephesians 3:10). God is glorified through his people, not simply individuals.

Even as David communed with God alone while guarding his flocks, he was inspired to write, “I will thank you in the great congregation; in the mighty throng I will praise you. (Psalm 35:18) He didn’t want to keep God’s glory to himself in the middle of a field. He wanted to share it with others.

* * *

Every Sunday morning there are dozens of voices trying to convince us there’s something better to give our time to than meeting with God’s people. Sleeping in. Cramming for an exam. Playing golf. Catching up on housework. Enjoying a late breakfast.

Don’t believe them. There are no normal Sundays. Just fresh opportunities to behold the glory of the Lord as we’re “transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18). Together.

Adoption

Posted on by
Reply

“The divine judge not only acquits, but invites the sinner home — and not just for an evening. He adopts us as his own forever and makes us heirs to all he has”

Donald Macleod – Adoption: A New Father and a New Heart (original source here)

Martin Luther, whose tormented conscience and anguished thinking launched the Protestant Reformation, once remarked, “If the doctrine of justification is lost, the whole of Christian doctrine is lost.” It is hardly surprising, then, that there is voluminous Protestant literature on justification.

The doctrine of adoption, by contrast, has been largely neglected. Yet the two are inseparably linked.

Grace Beyond and Above

Which is not to say that they are identical. Adoption is a grace beyond and above justification. In justification, God acquits sinners of all the charges against them. Indeed, he goes further still and declares that in Christ their righteousness meets the highest possible standards. They are as righteous as Christ himself (2 Corinthians 5:21). There is not a stain on their characters.

At this point, in normal human systems of justice, the accused is then simply free to go, and both he and the judge hope they will never see each other again. But the divine judge not only acquits. He invites the sinner home — and not just for an evening. He adopts us as his own forever, tells us we are to call him “Father,” and pronounces us lawful heirs to all he is and to all that he has.

Paul is the only New Testament writer who uses the term adoption, but he is not the only one who speaks of believers being God’s children. John also highlights it, particularly in 1 John 3:1. “See,” he exclaims, “what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” Yet while they speak of the same subject, the two apostles use different language, and to get anything like the full doctrine we need to look carefully at each.

Change in Status

The word adoption, like the word justification, refers not to a change in our disposition and character, but to a change on our status. It speaks of a revolution in our relationship with God. As unbelieving sinners, we were utterly alienated from him: total outsiders, as far as his family was concerned. Now we belong, and by using the term adoption, Paul is using formal legal language to remind us that our membership of our new family is absolutely secure. It can never be undone.

There is a parallel to all this in the story of Moses. The abandoned Hebrew baby, born as a slave under sentence of death, is taken into the palace by a royal princess, and formally adopted as her son. It is just so with believers in relation to God. He is committed to us. He has given us his name. He has made us his heirs, and solemnly pledged that as our heavenly Father, he will provide for us with the lavishness that befits his means as possessor of all the riches of glory (Philippians 4:19).

He has said, in effect, “From now on, you have nothing to worry about (Matthew 6:26). I will care for you (1 Peter 5:7), and if you do ever find yourself overtaken by anxiety, come and talk about it to me at once (Philippians 4:6–7). Always remember that I am your home, and that I will never disown you; and should you ever go astray, I will always take you back (Luke 15:20). My love will never let you go.”

Transformation in Heart

But adoption as a human transaction leaves the heart unchanged, and this is why the language of John is such an important complement to the language of Paul. Where Paul speaks of “adoption,” John speaks of being “born again”; and where Paul emphasises our being God’s “heirs,” John speaks of our being his “children.”

Adoption, whether in the ancient world or the modern, gave rights, but it did not transform; but when we are “born of God,” his “seed” (sperma) is in us (1 John 3:9). This is why Peter can even go so far as to say that we become partakers of the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4), while Paul declares that at the heart of God’s purpose for the universe lies his determination that one day every one of his adopted sons and daughters will be as glorious as his only begotten Son (Romans 8:28–29).

For the time being, sadly, this is not how we appear: To deny that we are sinners is to deceive ourselves (1 John 1:8). But by the time Christ returns, our likeness to our Father will be unmistakeable (1 John 3:2), and he will have no hesitation about making us stand in the full light of his glory (Jude 24). We will be his pride and joy.

A New People

Divine adoption, then, secures what no human adoption can secure. It is always accompanied by a radical and total transformation at the very core of our being. Not only have we a new status. We are new people (Ephesians 4:24).

Should we, then, just sit back passively and let grace do its work? Not for a moment! Indeed, the seed that God has implanted in us won’t let us sit back, nor will the hope that God has given us. The assurance that our destiny is to be “like him” impels us to set about purifying ourselves, and to do so with the utmost rigour, satisfied with nothing less than to be as pure as God himself (1 John 3:3).

As John sees it, the Christian believer should react to the discovery of any personal impurity with the same shock-horror as God would react to the discovery of a blemish in himself.

The Melody of Joy and Salvation

Adoption was widely practiced in the ancient world, but there was one crucial difference between secular practice and what we see in the New Testament.

In the secular world, adoption was usually for the benefit of the adoptive parents, not for the benefit of the child. For example, a farmer might want help with tilling his land, or a childless couple might want someone to look after them in old age, or an aristocrat might want someone to perpetuate the family name. In the New Testament the benefits are all the other way.

While we may be sure that adoption gives God immense satisfaction, he never adopts in order to meet some need of his own. He adopts us because he loves us, not because he needs us.

And far from exploiting us and subjecting us to a life of drudgery, he showers upon us every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3) and fills our lives with the melody of joy and salvation (Psalm 118:15).

Donald Macleod was professor of systematic theology at the Free Church of Scotland College in Edinburgh for more than 30 years. He is author of The Person of Christ and most recently Christ Crucified.

Explaining the First Sin

Posted on by
Reply

questionmarkredstandingFrom the Rob writes in to ask: “Pastor John (Piper), as someone who is reformed/Calvinist, I highly appreciate Jonathan Edwards who claims that (1) free will is doing what we desire but that (2) God gives us the desire to do good. With that being said, and keeping James 1:13 in mind, I’m having trouble understanding where Lucifer received his first desire to sin. Norman Geisler says ‘the unmistakable logical conclusion for the extreme Calvinist [is that] both Lucifer and Adam sinned because God gave them the desire to sin’ [Chosen But Free, page 36]. I would imagine that Adam received his desire to sin from Eve who received it from the serpent/Satan, but if God is sovereign over all things — including our desires — would that make him the initial author of the first desire to sin?” How do you answer this mystery?

For as many years as I can remember, I have said that among the mysteries in my theology for which I do not have an adequate answer, one of them is the question how — “how” is a key word here — how did the first sin come about?

And by the first sin, I don’t mean Adam’s first sin, I mean Satan’s first sin, the very first sin in the universe. The Bible opens not with the beginning of evil, but with the presence of unexplained evil. Man is created innocent and the serpent is already there, deceitful, manifestly opposed to the God of creation, and that is where the Bible begins. And as far as I can see, no explanation is offered in the Bible for how Satan became evil. I know there are hints that he was a perfect angel created by God.

Jude refers to angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, whom God has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day (Jude 6). And I don’t doubt that Satan was created good and fell from his proper place like Jude says, because I don’t think that evil and God are both eternal and ultimate realities. I am not a dualist. God and his goodness and wisdom and power are the only ultimate eternal realities. And evil is somehow derivative, secondary without God being a sinner. And all of that virtually all Christians agree on.

How did Satan become evil? I do not know. And it is plain to me that those who believe in ultimate self-determination of God’s creatures, like angels and humans, don’t know either. To say that Satan had free will — that is ultimate self determination — to say that Satan had free will is not an explanation for why he committed his first sin. It is a label. It is not an explanation. It is a label of a mystery. How could a perfectly good being with a perfectly good will and a perfectly good heart ever experience any imperfect impulse that would cause the will to move in the direction of sin? And the answer is, nobody knows, including those who say: Oh, it is free will. That is not an explanation. It is a name for a mystery.

john-piperSo we don’t know. The Bible doesn’t explain the how of it. So Rob quotes Norman Geisler who says, “The unmistakable, logical conclusion for the extreme Calvinist for both Lucifer and Adam that they sinned is because God gave them the desire to sin.” Now I am not sure whether I qualify for Geisler’s extreme Calvinist, but I strongly suspect that I do. But just at this point I am disagreeing with that description of me and I am saying: No, I am not driven to say God gave Lucifer his first desire to sin. That is an oversimplification of virtually everybody’s viewpoint. I do not know how Lucifer came to feel his first inclination to rebel against God.

But here is what I do know. God is sovereign. Nothing comes to pass apart from his plan, which includes things he more or less causes directly, and things he more or less permits indirectly, and there is no doubt in my mind that Satan’s fall and all of the redemptive plan of God for the glory of his grace afterwards was according to God’s eternal plan. But it is precisely at this point that the how of the causality of Satan’s first sin worked we do not know.

I have a category in my thinking, in other words, for the fact that God can see to it that something come to pass which he hates. This is what he did, for example, when he planned the crucifixion of Jesus according to Acts 4:27–28. The murder of Jesus was sinful and it was planned down to the detail by God. You can read it in the Psalms and you can read it in the New Testament. Precisely how God does that, maintaining his sinlessness and the sin of the things that comes about and the moral accountability of those who do those sins, the how of that, I do not know. But I think the Bible leads us to believe that he is sovereign over all sin and that he never sins. That is what I believe the Bible teaches. Continue reading →

Giving as an act of Worship

Posted on by
Reply

having received from Epaphroditus what you have sent, a fragrant aroma, an acceptable sacrifice, well-pleasing to God.” – Philippians 4:18

In the final phrases of Philippians 4:18, Paul describes Christian giving in the language of Old Testament sacrificial worship—language that originated all the way back in Genesis 8. After Noah and his family emerged unharmed through the flood of God’s judgment, he worshiped God: “Then Noah built an altar to Yahweh, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. Yahweh smelled the soothing aroma (same as “fragrant aroma” in Phil 4:18) and Yahweh said to Himself, ‘I will never again curse the ground on account of man…’” (Gen 8:20–21).

This was the essence of worship under the Old Covenant. God’s people were commanded to love the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, and strength (Deut 6:5 ), to worship and serve Him only (Deut 6:13; cf. Luke 4:8), and to have no other gods before Him (Exod 20:3). And a principal way in which His people demonstrated that He had occupied first place in their hearts was by offering up to Him of the firstfruits of their livestock, by dedicating animals to God that would have otherwise been used for food or for securing profit through labor. As an act of worship—as a lived-out demonstration that they regarded God as more worthy than their own possessions—like David (cf. 2 Sam 24:24), they gave God that which cost them something.

The one who recognized God’s worth above all things and thus could part gladly and even eagerly with a portion of what God had given to him. And because that was the heart attitude of a faithful worshiper who brought a sacrifice to God, when the odor of the burnt flesh of an ox or a bull or a ram ascended into the heavens, rather than a disgusting stench, the text says it reached the nostrils of God and was to Him a soothing aroma—a fragrant aroma, an acceptable sacrifice, well-pleasing to God. Continue reading →

The Begotten of the Father

Posted on by
Reply

Daniel Mann has taught at the New York School of the Bible since 1992 and blogs at www.MannsWord.blogspot.com. He is the author of Embracing the Darkness: How a Jewish, Sixties, Berkeley Radical Learned to Live with Depression, God’s Way (Xulon Press, 2004). In an article entitled “Jesus: The “Begotten” of the Father” he writes:

The letter to the Hebrews presents many teachings affirming the deity of Christ and His supremacy over the angels, Moses, and everything else that had come before Him.

However, after asserting that Jesus “made the worlds,” that He is “the brightness of [God’s] glory and the express image of His person,” and that He upholds “all things by the word of His power” (Heb. 1:2–3),1 this letter cites a controversial verse—at least controversial today—to prove that He is uniquely related to the Father as His Son: “For to which of the angels did He ever say: ‘You are My Son, today I have begotten You’?” (Heb. 1:5; quoting Ps. 2:7).

Certainly, Scripture never does refer to angels in this manner. However, this verse suggests to some that Jesus is “begotten” in the sense of being created and having a beginning in time. If this is the case, then He can’t be eternal, and therefore He can’t be God. This same “problem” is also reflected in perhaps the most famous New Testament verse: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten [monogenes in Greek] Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).

Many cults understand this verse, and others like it, to affirm that Jesus was birthed into existence. Mormon Doctrine reads, “Christ was begotten by an Immortal Father in the same way that mortal men are begotten by mortal fathers.”2

However, this is to understand the term “begotten” with our understanding and not from the perspective of scriptural usage. Hebrews 1:5 was quoted from Psalm 2, a psalm widely regarded as messianic, even among ancient Jewish authorities: “I will declare the decree: The Lord has said to Me, ‘You are My Son; Today I have begotten You’” (Ps. 2:7).

“Begotten” must be understood in the way it was originally intended, and we can determine this by examining the context. In this context, “begotten” can’t possibly mean, “to physically birth.”3 The One who is “begotten” is being addressed. He therefore already exists, even before He is “begotten.” The verse therefore can’t mean, “The Lord has said to Me… ‘Today, I am giving birth to you.’” Instead, “begotten” must mean something else. Besides, Hebrews quotes Psalm 2:7 to prove the superiority of Christ over the angels. Reference to a physical human birth could hardly demonstrate His superiority.4 Continue reading →

The New Testament’s Use of the Old Testament

Posted on by
Reply

in an artile entilted “CAN THAT BE RIGHT? THE USE OF OLD TESTAMENT PROPHECY IN THE NEW TESTAMENT” writes:

It’s Christmas season and that means renewed attention on Messianic prophecy. Ah, the familiar sounds of “a virgin shall give birth,” “the government shall be upon his shoulders,” and good ole “Bethlehem Ephrathah.” It makes a churchgoer feel all warm and cuddly inside.

And frankly, a bit confused.

If we’re honest, the way the New Testament uses the Old Testament seems a little far-fetched. I mean, we can see, just like the scribes did, that Micah 5:2 is a foretelling of the Messiah’s birth in Bethlehem (Matt. 2:1-6), but was Hosea really making a prediction about the Christ just because he happened to mention “Egypt” (Hos. 11:1) and Jesus’ family fled to Egypt (Matt. 2:15)? If we interpreted Scripture like Matthew does, we’d be chased out of our pulpits and small groups, right?

The New Testament’s use of the Old Testament is a complicated subject. Even evangelical scholars don’t agree on all the particulars of the best approach (see for example this book and D.A. Carson’s review). Still, there are several principles, clarifications, and reminders that can help us make sense of the Apostles’ seemingly willy-nilly use of the Old Testament. Continue reading →