Category Archives: Bible Reflection

Grace in Every Book of the Bible

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Dane Ortlund:

There is always a danger of squeezing the Bible into a mold we bring to it rather than letting the Bible mold us. And, there could hardly be more diversity within the Protestant canon–diverse genres, historical settings, authors, literary levels, ages of history.

But while the Bible is not uniform, it is unified. The many books of the one Bible are not like the many pennies in the one jar. The pennies in the jar look the same, yet are disconnected; the books of the Bible (like the organs of a body) look different, yet are interconnected. As the past two generations’ recovery of biblical theology has shown time and again, certain motifs course through the Scripture from start to end, tying the whole thing together into a coherent tapestry–kingdom, temple, people of God, creation/new creation, and so on.

Yet underneath and undergirding all of these, it seems to me, is the motif of God’s grace, his favor and love to the undeserving. Don’t we see the grace of God in every book of the Bible? (NT books include the single verse that best crystallizes the point.)

Genesis shows God’s grace to a universally wicked world as he enters into relationship with a sinful family line (Abraham) and promises to bless the world through him.

Exodus shows God’s grace to his enslaved people in bringing them out of Egyptian bondage.

Leviticus shows God’s grace in providing his people with a sacrificial system to atone for their sins.

Numbers shows God’s grace in patiently sustaining his grumbling people in the wilderness and bringing them to the border of the promised land not because of them but in spite of them.

Deuteronomy shows God’s grace in giving the people the new land ‘not because of your righteousness’ (ch. 9).

Joshua shows God’s grace in giving Israel victory after victory in their conquest of the land with neither superior numbers nor superior obedience on Israel’s part.
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Taking It Personally

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If we were to personalize the early verses of Ephesians chapter 1, it might read something like this:

God is your Father. You live in Christ. He has already blessed you with all the riches of heaven. He chose you to belong to Christ. His purpose is to make you holy and blameless in His sight. He has an amazing love for you. Because of this love He chose to adopt you as His child. He gave you the faith to make this possible. All this is the work of His glorious grace. Through this grace all that belongs to Christ is yours. You have been redeemed and all your sins have been forgiven because He purchased you for Himself with His blood. Now you belong to Him. He continues to lavish His grace upon you. He has given you wisdom that enables you to understand the wonderful ways in which He has blessed you. He has made His will known to you because you live in Christ. It was always God’s plan that you should belong to Him. He works out everything in your life so that His will and purpose for you is completely fulfilled. Your hope is in Christ so that you can live for His praise and glory. He placed you in Christ when you responded with faith to the gospel of salvation. He has placed His personal seal upon you – the promised gift of the Holy Spirit. His Spirit guarantees your inheritance and keeps you living in the power of His redeeming love. He wants you to love your fellow saints. He imparts to you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation of who He is and what He has done for you, so that you come to know Him better. He fills you with light so that you can know and fulfil His purpose for you and enjoy the riches of your glorious inheritance. He wants you to know His power working in you because you believe in Him, a power so great that it cannot be compared with any other power. The power that raised Jesus from the dead is in you. You live in the One who reigns above every other power. God has placed everything under His feet, the One in whom you live. He wants the fullness of His life to fill your life in every way.

– Colin Urquhart

For the Sake of God’s Name

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Justin Taylor writes: Paul Miller made a comment that has stuck with me: he mentioned that he’s recently been noting the number of things in the Psalmists’ prayers that he doesn’t say in his own prayers.

With that in mind, note the basis upon which these prayers are made:

Jeremiah 14:7
Though our iniquities testify against us,
act, O LORD, for your name’s sake;
for our backslidings are many;
we have sinned against you.

Jeremiah 14:21
Do not spurn us, for your name’s sake;
do not dishonor your glorious throne;
remember and do not break your covenant with us.

Daniel 9:19
O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive.
O Lord, pay attention and act.
Delay not, for your own sake, O my God, because your city and your people are called by your name.

A few observations about this phrase as found in God’s word:

1. The name of God is God’s revelation of himself.

2. In the phrase “for the sake of God’s name,” “name” is essentially synonymous with “praise” and “glory.” Isaiah 48:9 puts “the sake of my name” parallel with “the sake of my praise.” Isaiah 48:11 puts “my name” on the same level as “my glory.”

3. God’s great name can be glorified or profaned (see especially Ezekiel 20).

4. God works for both his glory and our good (compare, for example, Rom. 8:28 and Rom. 11:36), but the Bible puts a priority on God’s interest over ours as the basis for his action (frequently saying “not for our sake” but for “your sake”).

5. In our prayers we should appeal to God, reminding God of what he cannot forget: to do all things for the glory and praise of his great name.

The following is not quite exhaustive, but here is a catalog of the main uses of the phrase in the Bible.

1 Samuel 12:22
For the LORD will not forsake his people, for his great name’s sake, because it has pleased the Lord to make you a people for himself.

Psalm 23:3
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness1
for his name’s sake.

Psalm 25:11
For your name’s sake, O LORD,
pardon my guilt, for it is great.

Psalm 31:3
For you are my rock and my fortress;
and for your name’s sake you lead me and guide me;

Psalm 79:9
Help us, O God of our salvation,
for the glory of your name;
deliver us, and atone for our sins,
for your name’s sake!

Psalm 106:8
Yet he saved them for his name’s sake,
that he might make known his mighty power.

Psalm 109:21
But you, O God my Lord,
deal on my behalf for your name’s sake;
because your steadfast love is good, deliver me!

Psalm 143:11
For your name’s sake, O LORD, preserve my life!
In your righteousness bring my soul out of trouble!

Isaiah 48:9, 11
For my name’s sake I defer my anger,
for the sake of my praise I restrain it for you,
that I may not cut you off. . . .
For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it,
for how should my name be profaned?
My glory I will not give to another.

Ezekiel 20:9
But I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations among whom they lived, in whose sight I made myself known to them in bringing them out of the land of Egypt.

Ezekiel 20:14
But I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations, in whose sight I had brought them out.

Ezekiel 20:22
But I withheld my hand and acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations, in whose sight I had brought them out.

Ezekiel 20:44
And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I deal with you for my name’s sake, not according to your evil ways, nor according to your corrupt deeds, O house of Israel, declares the Lord GOD.

Ezekiel 36:22
Thus says the Lord GOD: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came.

The New Testament also uses this language, with Jesus frequently applying it to his own name.

Matthew 10:22
. . . and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.

Matthew 19:29
And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life.

Matthew 24:9
Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake.

Acts 9:16
For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.

Romans 1:5
through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations.

1 John 2:12
I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for his name’s sake.

3 John 1:7
For they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles.

Revelation 2:3
I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary.

Paul’s Reason for Enduring

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The following is a short meditation by Dr. James White.

For this reason I endure all things for the sake of the elect, so that they also might experience the salvation which is in Christ Jesus, and with it, eternal glory. (2 Timothy 2:10 – translation by Dr. James White)

The context is important. 2 Timothy is Paul’s farewell letter to Timothy. You don’t waste words when writing your farewell to a dearly beloved son in the faith. He is encouraging Timothy to be strong. He calls Timothy to “share in suffering” with him (2:3), to compete, work hard, and remember Jesus Christ. Then, in verse 9, he mentions his own suffering as a criminal for the gospel. This is the context lying behind Paul’s statement that he “endures.”

Endures what?

Everything. All the opposition and attacks and beatings and imprisonment and long days of toil and labor–he endured it all for what reason?

Oh, surely, we could say “the glory of God,” but that isn’t Paul’s answer here. Instead, he says he endures all of this “for the sake of the elect.”

Many may wish this term did not appear in Scripture, but it is right there – “the elect,” “the chosen ones.” Paul uses the same term in Romans 8:33 “Who will bring a charge against God’s elect?”, and significantly in Colossians 3:12: “So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.”

Notice that Paul refers to the professing believers in Colossae as “those who have been chosen of God.” Not those who chose God (they did that, but they did so as a result of being chosen by Him: the Christian gospel is God-centered, not man-centered!). It is important to see the source of the “choosing” in election here: “chosen of God.” God chooses. God disposes. God is sovereign in this matter.

And so back in 2 Timothy 2:10, Paul endures the sufferings of his apostleship “for the sake of the elect,” but the reason he does so should not be missed, “so that they also might experience the salvation which is in Christ Jesus, and with it, eternal glory.”

Paul sees his sufferings, his ministry, his tireless work, as means God has used to bring His elect to salvation. As I have said many times, God ordains the ends as well as the means. Preaching, teaching, ministering, defending the faith–all are means used by God to bring His elect to salvation. Just a few more quick notes:

1) Why preach if the identity and number of elect was fixed in eternity? Arminians ask this all the time. Because it is our glorious privilege to be used of God in His service as the means by which He brings His elect unto Himself! We who have heard the Master’s call and been raised from spiritual death should long to be used of God to bring others into His kingdom, just as He used those in the faith before us to bring us the life-giving message of the gospel.

2) The interface of the divine decree (“the elect” here clearly refers to a specific people, chosen by God, not merely “foreseen down the corridors of time”) with its outworking in time (seen in Paul’s activity and suffering) is seen. Is God dependent upon Paul? Surely not in the eternal perspective of His decree. But we cannot “see” that decree. We have God’s prescriptive will plainly revealed to us: preach the gospel to every person! Fight the good fight! Endure persecution as a slave of Jesus Christ! We know God will save His elect, and we know those who truly respond to our message do so only by grace. This gives us boldness to proclaim God’s command to repent to all men everywhere.

3) The elect come to Christ. Almost every passage that speaks of the gospel’s specificity in the New Testament likewise denies the concept of inclusivism or pluralism. The salvation the elect obtain is “in Christ Jesus” and in Him alone. It is simply ridiculous to think that Paul includes in this the idea of some kind of “secret, ignorant disciple who clings to falsehood but is really in Christ anyway.” Such is purely wishful thinking on the part of modern neo-evangelicals who are ashamed of the exclusivity of the claims of Christ.

Faith – Either a Divine Gift or a Human Fraud

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Justification is by grace alone through faith in Christ alone, all to God’s glory alone. The Bible teaches that this faith that justifies is a GIFT from God (Eph 2:8,9; Phil 1:29) and not merely the product of man’s unregenerate nature which is still spiritually dead towards God in sin.

If faith is a merely a human choice, then it can be lost. This is true of a false and fraudulent kind of faith, which is temporarily enamored with the blessings of the kingdom (the idea of guilt removed, peace for a troubled conscience and such like) but which never can be characterized by a true and lasting love for the biblical Christ and the biblical Gospel.

In contrast, true saving faith is God’s gift to His elect people and is characterized by its enduring nature. Those who have made a profession of faith in Christ and walk away, never had the real thing. They never belonged to Him (1 John 2:19).

Insights into the Tabernacle

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“And the Word became flesh, we’re likely to zip right by it with little fanfare. We read that Jesus “dwelt” among us, and when we think of the idea of “dwelling” we just think of “hanging out.” But there’s much more going on in what John is saying than it sounds to us English-speakers. He uses a peculiar word here. There are more common Greek words for “to dwell,” but he chooses sk?no?. Now, the word sk?n? in Greek means “tent,” and sk?no? is the verb form. So we could render it, “to pitch a tent.” John tells us that this Word became flesh and pitched his tent among us.

That’s a weird way to talk, isn’t it? Especially since we don’t have any Scripture that tells us that Jesus actually pitched any literal tent during his time on Earth. Why say it this way? He’s got at least two other words that he could use here. But John uses this particular word because he wants his readers—who would be familiar with the history of Israel—to recall the tabernacle, the tent of meeting (Ex 27:21), where God met with the Israelites in the Old Testament.
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Psalm 22

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Psalm 22 is what theologians refer to as a Messianic Psalm. Though written by David it refers to events that transcend his own life and were fulfilled in the life, and especially the death (crucifixion) of Messiah. This is possible because as 2 Peter 1:21 tells us, “men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

When Jesus cried out “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me” two things were taking place, neither of which was contradictory. Firstly Jesus was feeling the full force of being forsaken by His Father, as sin was placed upon Him and He bore the Father’s just wrath for it in our place.

Secondly, just as in our culture, if someone were to say “Amazing Grace how sweet the sound” we know that these words are not being said at random, but we are being reminded of a familiar hymn. The Book of Psalms was the inspired song book of the Jews and for Jesus to quote the first line of Psalm 22 it was a thunderously loud message to all who heard it that He Himself was fulfilling the words of the entire Psalm as he hung there in agony on the cross.

Speaking of the Gentiles, David wrote in verse 16, “For dogs encompass me; a company of evildoers encircles me; they have pierced my hands and feet.” There is nothing to suggest any of this happened in the life of David, but were fulfilled around a thousand years later by Christ at the crucifixion. What is more than interesting is that when David penned these words, crucifixion was not even invented as a form of torture and death. Sceptics grope for an answer as to why David could write of such things but the believer’s confidence is that only God could have been the source of these words, which is itself a wonderful testimony to the Divine inspiration of Scripture. David was “carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

The same can be said about verse 18, when David wrote, “they divide my garments among them, and for my clothing they cast lots.” There’s nothing to suggest this happened to David, but it did happen to Messiah and Jesus is once again alerting us to that by quoting the opening words of the Psalm. The crucifixion of Christ was not an accidental, haphazard occurence. As the early Church prayed to God in Acts 4, “for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.”

Jesus was never more in the will of God than when He hung on the cross as our sinless sin bearing Substitute. By raising Him from the dead God testified that He was indeed His Son and validified all His claims as to what His death had accomplished. Paul tells us, He “was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord..” (Romans 1:3, 4)

Watch now as Ryan Ferguson delivers a memorized dramatic recitation of Psalm 22 from the ESV Bible.

When God says “I will…”

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“I WILL sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I WILL cleanse you. And I WILL give you a new heart, and a new spirit I WILL put within you. And I WILL remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I WILL put my Spirit within you, and CAUSE YOU to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” – Ezekiel 36:25-27

So you fell! So what? Run, Christian, Run!

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Phil 3:12 Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. 13 Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Heb 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith…

After training for this event for months and months, Heather Dorniden faced the unexpected when another racer cut her off – she fell very hard. But when you see what happens next, you’ll be amazed and inspired.

Monopoly Money and the Righteousness of God

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Romans 10: 1 Brothers, but not according to knowledge. 3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

In reading through his commentary on these verses, Dr. James Montgomery Boice used a number of illustrations, one of which particularly caught my attention:

“… a platoon of American soldiers is captured by soldiers from the north during the Vietnam War and put in a prisoner of war camp. The American soldiers have no money and have to barter for whatever one soldier has and another soldier wants, which is not a very satisfactory arrangement. But one day a CARE package arrives, and in it is a game of Monopoly. The soldiers are delighted, not because of the game but because of the money. They divide it up, each man getting an equal number of white, pink, green, blue, beige, and gold bills (except for the sergeant, who gets an extra $500). Now, whenever one soldier has an extra cigarette and a second soldier wants it, the first can sell it to him for $100, or whatever. The money is very useful.

In any group of Americans there is always one who is a born capitalist, and this group is no exception. The capitalistic soldier knows how to buy low and sell high, and as a result of his dealing it is not long before he has accumulated nearly all the money in the camp.

About this time there is a prisoner of war exchange, and this platoon of soldiers is air-lifted to Danang and then to a base in the Hawaiian Islands. Now long after this, our capitalistic solider arrives home in San Francisco. The first thing he does after greeting his family is go downtown to the Wells Fargo Bank, make his way to the clerk dealing with new accounts, and tell her that he wants to open an account in the bank. “That’s good,’ the teller says. “We like to see servicemen coming to the Wells Fargo. How much money would you like to start your account with?”

The soldier responds by pushing his Monopoly money across the counter. “1,534,281,” he says. The teller takes one look at it and calls the manager, because it is obvious to her that the soldier is suffering brain damage from his confinement.

The Monopoly money might have helped this man get along very well in the prisoner of war camp, and even in America it could be used to play games. But it is no use at all in the world of American commerce. In that world you need genuine American greenbacks from the U.S. Treasury.”

… the righteousness of God and the righteousness of human beings are different things… Yet I admit that I worry about one thing… Illustrations like this tend to trivialize the issue. They even make the distinction seem fun, when actually the matter is deadly serious, and the failure to distinguish our righteousness has fatal consequences.”

– Romans Commentary, Volume 3, p. 1159-1161

Selah!