I'm Moving My Blog Over to Wordpress

For those of you who actually visit my blog, I will be moving my blog over to WordPress. Mainly because it is a much more advanced blogging system and makes Blogger look like a dinosaur. I'll post when everything is moved so you can update your links

The web address is natepaschall.wordpress.com (basically the same as now, but with "wordpress" instead of "blogspot")

John Piper - Courage and the Gospel

The following is a quote from John Piper's sermon from the Gospel Coalition this year. This was probably the most personally significant message I have ever heard from Piper. I encourage you to go watch it online or download it and listen to it.

Your salvation, your calling into a life of courage, and speaking, and suffering is not based on, according to, anything you think, feel, do or act. Now the reason I say it so radically and rule out everything he thinks, everything he feels, everything he does because... he rules out that it is not according to works but according to God's grace - the contrast is, "Timothy, I want to strip you of every possible reliance for salvation, calling, power, grace, boldness, courage, shamelessness, speaking - I want to strip you of every expectation that those things are ultimately dependent on you, in any sense at all... When Christ died for you, Timothy, to become your punishment, and your perfection, and rose again and abolished death and brought everlasting life to light, he manifested in that, that gospel... that his eternal purpose was to be gracious to you, from all eternity."

Home Church - Part 2

What the biblical evidence demonstrates is not that there is a "better" method of doing church. The biblical evidence, if I may be so bold, is "amethod", that is to say, it fails in any sense to provide a "method" for how church is to be done. This must be distinguished from "anti-method" that some may think I am implying. I am not "anti-method, nor would I say that I myself am amethod. But as far as the scripture demonstrates, it does not directly bear witness to any "favored" manner of doing church. The NT has no comment on whether the Home Church structure is good or bad. Even the existence of a Home Church structure is at best implied and almost all of our evidence for it comes from later sources.

I use amethod and anti-method to help make a distinguishing mark that is often muddied in discussions about church structuring, especially when it comes to Home Church proponents. The bible is not anti-method, for their are basic and fundamental contours demonstrated in the NT that help give shape to what forms a healthy gathering of believers. Structures such as Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Shepherds, Pastors, Elders, Teachers, and so on, in order to build the church. There are other structures I do not wish to elaborate, for this is outside of my current purpose. But what must be clear is that when "doing" church, there certainly must be structure and organization. Paul argues against and exhorts the Corinthian church for their disorganized worship services. The NT is not anti-method.

There are many who believe that simply meeting in a home and talking about Jesus is "church". Certainly Christians spending time together do constitute those in the CHURCH, or the Bride of Christ, but this is a categorical mistake to say that they are "having church". There is certainly something altogether different about Christians meeting intentionally together to celebrate Christ himself, not simply to hang out and have a meal. Many confuse this anti-method and believe almost to a degree that church must instead be spontaneous and even unorganized, for this is an attempt, they would argue, to place constraint upon the work of the Holy Spirit. They take the bible's amethodological standpoint and conclude that since no sincere, outlined method is offered in the bible, therefore any and all method or structure is bad or negative. That is, they concluded that the bible must be then anti-method. Rejecting structure, they become anti-method and thereby condemn any structure unlike their own. If professed believers meet together in an institutional organization, it is at once denounced and refuted as even anti-scriptural. What has happened with these forms is that they themselves have committed the very fallacy that they condemn other believers for doing themselves. In condemning other believers for committing themselves to an institutional structure (e.g., church membership) and moving toward anti-method or anti-structure, they become themselves anti-scriptural, in an ironic twist.

What must be held in tension is that the bible does not prescribe any "set" method for doing church, outside of basic structuring. There were other forms that existed at the time of the early church, both home and institutional, and neither must be appealed to as the divine mandate for doing church.

The tables also must be turned in the other direction, towards a more organized or institutional type structuring. It must be noted that it is scarce that any of a more organized or institutional type would appeal directly to the Early Church or the book of Acts itself for defense. More organized and institutional churches look for support elsewhere. Whether this is good or bad must be weighed on other factors. It is not my concern to discern whether this is so, but only my concern to show that the current appeal to the "Early Church," especially as found in the book of Acts is not fundamentally what we should "model" ourselves after, at least not in an organizing fashion. There are other central components that all churches, whether in a home, a building or even institution, must hold on to. Their commitment to those central components must not be surrendered, and when a church, whether it be in a home or institution, commits and lives out those central components, its healthiness will be apparent.

What must be kept in mind when doing and participating in a church environment is that the Early Church serves as a guide but not a model. We cannot model ourselves directly after the Early Church, for in doing so we become anachronistic, neglecting the current context of our time, where different needs (though ultimately the same) are to be met. We cannot assume that what worked in the 1st century will necessarily work in the 21st century, and vice versa. The Early Church had a specific context and needs that needed to be met and we have a specific context and needs to be met. The church of the 21st century must constantly be aware of these needs. This is not to say that the church must be a constantly morphing entity, as many in the postmodern movement are suggesting. At the rate that things are changing today a church may become outdated in a matter of years. There certainly needs to be constants that are maintained regardless of time and cultural changes. Culture must not determine structure. But Structure must adapt to culture. A church in America is certainly going to look different in some respect than a church in China, but these differences must be minimal at best. Scripture is the same in all cultures, Jesus is the same in every human situation, though his application may vary. Some contexts may need certain emphases. Paul emphasized different things to the Jews than to his Roman and Greek worshipping audiences. So also must we reflect this on some level.

What must contribute to the shape of the church is the necessities of that situation. As a church in a persecuted region might necessarily be forced to go underground and meet in house-churches, a church in a free society like America or Europe may be much better suited to a public congregational meeting. What must guide these decisions is the needs of the situation. It is the goal of those who create and implement church structures to correctly apprehend these needs and focus church praxis to meet those needs.

Home Church - Part 1

Many believe that we should follow the NT teaching about how the church is to be structured in a highly literalistic sense. It is not any wonder that many Pre-Millennial advocates are trending towards this direction. The often highly-literalistic sense with which the scripture is read is consistent with their methodology. These proponents believe that a more "organic" church model is what is best (good luck trying to understand "organic") and that churches should be highly localized cell-groups (a.k.a., the Home Church). They argue this based upon the fact that this was the model of the early church.

A presupposition of this mindset is an idealization of the "Early Church". That is to say, that if things are brought back to the "Early Church" model then church has a higher probability of functioning healthier. Never mind that this is a "model", which might very well be the latest spinoff of the well known and loathed "business-as-church" approach. Methodology has been the central components of what drive these movements, not necessity (I will explain what I mean by "necessity" in a moment). What may very well be driving this movement is the very same thing that drove the previous movements: success -  though, albeit, in a healthier model. What seems to be motivating much of the current discussion around the Cell-Group model is its affinity with the Early Church. The Early Church functioned as an efficient mode of worship, evangelism, teaching, preaching, encouragement, exhortation, need-meeting, etc., and is what is understood to be used in the NT. But I believe there is something that can very easily undercut any notion that this should be "The Model" to be used for church.

The very fact that we have New Testament Epistles should argue and show that even this Cell-Group model has its pitfalls and dangers. In fact, the Cell-Group model itself could not prevent any of the disasters that  plagued the Church in its infancy and we should not expect the Cell-Group model to prevent any of these disasters today. 1 Corinthians and the Epistles contained within Revelation (i.e., the letters to the 7 churches) should demonstrate that church government/structure has about as much efficacy in preventing false-teaching, apostasy and sin from entering the church as setting up a chain-link fence around a military base in enemy territory. Not to downplay the strengths of such an approach to church structuring. But I do believe we mustn't be naive about how we approach church, thinking that, "Well that's how they did it in the bible, so that's how we should do it."

Behind every church structuring and ordering their lies people. The problem that has plagued our generation in church governing is not its structure. The problem that has plagued our generation is those who have been appointed. If there is a weak church, I dare suspect that it is not due to an insufficiency in programs or structuring (though I mustn't commit the same fallacy in the opposite direction, of saying structure is irrelevant). The majority of the time (not always) poor church praxis is often attributable to those who rule in the church. Poor leadership in the Pastoral, Elder, Clergy or any other type for that matter will inevitably result in an unhealthy church dynamic. Poor leadership will often result in many of the dilemmas that the modern church faces.

Early I stated that what drives much of the movements we see is methodology, not necessity. The mentality is that if something fails, then what needs change is the method in which things are done. People aren't being reached? New method. Needs aren't being met? New method. Poor teaching? New method. Lack of involvement in church? New method. How this methodology/necessity contrast plays out is that what must be seen is that the environments in the NT for church, i.e., Home Churches, were created out of necessity. It was not after long, deep reflection on the failure of the Sanhedrin and Temple to facilitate and meet the needs of the people that the Christian church reacted and the "Home Church Movement" grew. I believe this is a failure to understand the context and situation of what was really occurring in the conception of the church.

There are 3 primary factors that I believe led to the Home Church "model" (if that's what you would like to call it). I have not done sustained reflection on this in the NT, so these may very well be naive as well, but I believe there is some validity to the arguments. 

1) Rapid Growth: one of the primary markers of the early Christian church is its explosion onto the scene. Within a matter of decades, Christianity became one of the dominate and influential religions in the Roman Empire. From a miniscule origin in the corner of one of the greatest world-superpowers that have ever existed, the Christian faith spread from Jerusalem to Rome in a matter of 3 decades. This is unheard of in history. Never at such a pace has any ideology taken root and influenced such a vast area, especially given the hostility towards its advancement (see point 3). Christianity explosion can be see in that it began affecting entire economies within its second decade (see Acts 19:23ff). Because of this rapid growth, there had to be some way of meeting together and facilitating what was occurring. This growth was occurring across national, cultural, economic, and social boundaries. In order to best facilitate this growth, cell-groups (home churches) were the best mode of managing this growth. A home church could be multiplied at unhindered rates, expanding into other homes in the nearby area, not limited by static buildings which could be outgrown within a few years. The difficulty posed by obtaining a static building was apparent in the persecution (point 3) and also in that such an action would be difficult in itself to accomplish in the Roman world (point 2). Having church at a house was a necessary move, not a "strategic" or "methodological" move.

2) Location: What one must consider is that the environment of the 1st century church was not the same of the 21st century. Many do not consider that during this time, the ability to obtain a meeting location such as a building solely dedicated to a church was not as simple as it is today. This is, I believe, a common oversight in our modern situation. We fail to consider that many, if not all, of 1st century Christians were converts. That is to say, they had a previous location of worship, often in a pagan temple, but now they were left without a "place" to worship, or at least a central location. If there was no place built for people to go worship, then they naturally would have to meet in homes. Building a church building was not as simple as raising funds and hiring a contractor. Nor was it as simple as renting out a school or hotel building. Either you worshipped in the fields or you went to someone's house, often one of the wealthier converts (cf. Lydia or Aquila and Priscilla). Location of church establishments in homes was done out of necessity, not because it was necessarily the best way to meet peoples spiritual and physical needs. People needed a place to meet and since they couldn't meet in public places (because there were none) they met in homes. Again, having churches in homes was done out of necessity, not a "strategic" or "methodological" move.

3) Persecution: I do not need to give examples of this from scripture. Just read the NT and you will see that the early church, from the moment of conception, was persecuted. Because of this persecution, public meeting was dangerous and even deadly. Christianity was often perceived and condemned for being anti-Caesar/Rome and even atheistic (because they did not acknowledge the Roman gods or other gods). Public meeting, at least in a fashion similar to what may be done at a pagan temple, could be considered as a subversion of Roman authority, since Christianity proclaims a different King than Caesar, a different Kingdom than Rome, and even a different Law. Meeting in homes was a necessary move in order to minimize persecution. Open and public meeting often led to scattering and dissemination of the church, so Home Churches were established out of necessity. This was not always the case and not every location was hostile to Christianity, but by and large, this is what I believe to be the primary reason that Home Churches were established.

These are just a few reasons of the necessity for the early church meeting in home churches. There is no evidence for long reflection on Church methodology (insofar as we may attribute modern structuring methodology). Instead, we see basic elements of structuring and organization in the NT, but little, if any beyond that. The discussion upon whether Acts is normative or not misses the point. To read Acts as a model for doing church misreads Acts. If we are to look for church-structuring, we are better off reading Paul who outlines and discusses church matters in much more detail.

There are other things that are frequently neglected as well when considering the early church. Not all of the meetings were Home Churches. In fact, one may argue that the church in Jerusalem was much more like a 3rd or 4th century "high-church" structure, based upon scriptural evidence, than a home church. The Home-Church structure was not the only model in existence at the time of the writing of the NT. This is an often overlooked fact.

A second consideration is one much more inconspicuous. It has to do with fundamental dynamics of human relationships. Society and human interaction is often structured and organized hierarchically. This is due in part from the fall. Unless there is a clear structure of organization and authority, sin is able to run unabated. Clear (though not necessarily complex) structure, organization and authority is part of how God has designed the world and is stamped upon not only how natural creation has been made, but also is central to human interaction. Government is not simply a product of the fall, but is part of human nature. The fact that there will be a City in the end should argue that, even in heaven, there will be clear delegation of authority and structure.

Sobriety in Judgment - By William Perkins

“Sobriety in judgment, is, when a man either suspendeth his opinion of his neighbors sayings or doings, or else speaketh as charitably as he can, by saying as little as may be, if the things be evil: or by interpreting all in better part, if the speech or action be doubtful. Therefore do thus: despise not thy neighbor, but think thy self as bad a sinner, and that the like defects may befall thee. If thou canst not excuse his doing, excuse his intent, which may be good: or if the deed be evil, think it was done of ignorance: if thou canst no way excuse him, think some great temptation befell him, and that thou shouldest be worse, if the like temptation befell thee: and give God thanks, that the like as yet hath not befallen thee. Despise not a man being a sinner, for though he be evil today, he may turn tomorrow"

The Economy of Heaven

3 notes

1) I did not proof read this

2) I've been reading Puritan writings, so excuse the "old-english" flavor. It helps me think.

3) This is a sort of continuation/digression of my previous post, "Treasures in Heaven"

Heaven will surely have an economy, but its trade will look much different that what we find on earth. There will be the poor in heaven, that is, those who spent their life on earth in a manner that was often contrary to the gospel and inconsistent with their Lord's demands, and so when they arrive at heaven to receive their reward, it will surely be smaller than other men who lived faithfully to the Lord.

There will also be the rich in heaven, those who while upon earth honored the Lord as best they could and sought to promote him in all their ways, thoughts and duties. They will come to heaven and will certainly receive a greater reward than those who lived unprofitably and unfaithfully.

But this is where the economy of heaven will be so unlike that of what is on earth. On earth, being poor is despised for two reasons: 1) because you depend on others; 2) because you cannot enjoy the fruits of the earth. The reason these two are despised are because, as the first - because man in sin is autonomous and loves only himself and so to be in dependence upon another is loathsome; there is nothing more desired than to be free of other men and live by your own rules and own dictates. The poor are not so - they are the slaves of those who pay them. As the second, man only loves their own pleasure and seeks it for themselves alone to enjoy. All their profit and goods are accumulated for themselves, they spend on themselves and hoard to themselves. The fruits of the earth are only used in light of their own persons. And so poverty is a hated thing.

But heaven is of another sort. In heaven there surely will be an economy and graduation of gifts and blessings. This has always been so among God's creation: the angels, the plants, the animals, and even among spiritual gifts. Here, we long for prestige and position. There we will long for grace. The rich man in heaven will have no account in the things themselves that God blesses him with, for they are only given that he might share with him who has less. And so those who are rich will see that the good things given are to be used to be shared. It will not be otherwise. It wouldn't even enter into a heavenly man's mind to use what God has blessed him with only for himself. In heaven, if a man has an apple and another man has none, it will be beyond instinct to share. And the man who has less in heaven is the recipient of grace and goodness from those whom God has blessed more for their faithfulness.

But it is more than this. Those whom God blesses richly will be delighted in sharing because this is the center of the likeness of God. God's goodness consists in the giving of himself, that is, in pouring out himself for others at whatever cost to himself. So it can be said that "God is good" and furthermore, that "God is Love" - because all of what God does is itself good: it is the outpouring of himself upon his creatures, in his Son and Spirit. And so the rich will feel it the greatest pleasure in all of heaven to share those gifts which God has given to them. Whatever knowledge God has revealed to them they will see it of greatest pleasure, not to dwell on those thoughts alone, but to share them with his companions.

And the poor in heaven, if they may be called such, will be the recipients of grace, and so they will ever be humbled by the greatest gifts that are shared and given to them. Their joy will be that God has so graciously allowed and permitted them to receive from others of what God has given. And their receiving of grace will be a parable and a story to the rich, that is, it will be the gift of the poor to the rich that all are under the grace of God; the rich will see by their sharing with the poor that they are the same as the poor, that they all are alike beneficiaries of God's grace. And so the poor will be like the rich, that they have shared by their poverty with the rich, and all will be rich, and so full of God's grace.

This whole economy is founded and rooted in the person and nature of God, which is clearly seen in Christ, "who thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took on him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient to death, even the death of the cross. Why God also has highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name"

Christ, being the clear expression of God, teaches us what it means to be God. It is not that God is self-hoarding, as we sinners are, but self-giving, even to such a degree that he would give his most valuable possession. And Christ, who is this possession, teaches us even more what it means to be God. Christ gave of himself infinitely to sinners, withholding not even his own life for us and instead was spent for our sakes. In this God is seen and this is the nature of what heaven will mirror. There must be degrees of order in heaven among men or else there would be no sharing among us, which is to mirror God. And because we are created in his image, this may very well be the center of what it means to be made in his image, that is, to share what good things God has bestowed upon us with others who have not what God has bestowed upon ourselves

(Digression: this is contrary to modern understandings of the imago dei, where by it we understand our freedom. Instead, I would see that the imago dei means that we are not free, but instead slaves of each other but not slavery in a negative sense. We are slaves in that, when correctly oriented to God, we cannot but help give ourselves to others - we are a slave to them, we serve them at every opportunity that we might. And in this we find our freedom, in our slavery to each other. It may even, in some sense, be said that God is our slave, that is, that he cannot but help to pour out himself and serve us at every opportunity. Christ said as much when he said, "the Son of man came not to be served, but to serve and give his life a ransom". Freedom then consists not in what we are able to choose for ourselves and the exercise of this power and faculty, but instead, freedom consists in the "death" of ourselves, that is in free abandonment of all our goods for the sake of others.)

And so the economy of heaven will be one of perpetual growth towards God, in and through the Church, who through the gradation of roles and gifts will still yet ever expand into the infinite expanse of God, the rich building the poor, and the poor building the rich. And so our joy will ever be increasing because, through one another we experience the grace and goodness of God. Our joy will be endless yet expanding infinitely, each moment better than the last, yet more humbling than the last, for what ever we have received we will share.

It is through this that God will be glorified in his Church. It will be the demonstration of his grace to all his heavenly hosts of his grace, mercy, love and goodness. And the Church, which will every increase in its joy, will fill heaven even more with the praises and glory of God, and we will be the delight of heavenly creatures, the ones  in whom "angels long to look" because in us, they see the grace of God poured out in such a unique fashion and manner that it fills their eyes with wonder. And the Church, the sinners made saints, will become the central dwelling place of God and all heaven will stand in wonder and awe at this wondrous dwelling place that God has created for himself.

Blaise Pascal on "The Theatre"

11. All great amusements are dangerous to the Christian life; but among all those which the world has invented there is none more to be feared than the theatre. It is a representation of the passions so natural and so delicate that it excites them and gives birth to them in our hearts, and, above all, to that of love, principally when it is represented as very chaste and virtuous. For the more innocent it appears to innocent souls, the more they are likely to be touched by it. Its violence pleases our self-love, which immediately forms a desire to produce the same effects which are seen so well represented; and, at the same time, we make ourselves a conscience founded on the propriety of the feelings which we see there, by which the fear of pure souls is removed, since they imagine that it cannot hurt their purity to love with a love which seems to them so reasonable. 

So we depart from the theatre with our heart so filled with all the beauty and tenderness of love, the soul and the mind so persuaded of its innocence, that we are quite ready to receive its first impressions, or rather to seek an opportunity of awakening them in the heart of another, in order that we may receive the same pleasures and the same sacrifices which we have seen so well represented in the theatre.

- Blaise Pascal, Pensees, § 1.11

I Cannot Love As I Ought To Love

The central problem that I am learning of my heart is not that I will fight against the sin of my heart, that is, fight against evil desires. The fundamental problem that I see myself encountering on a regular (weekly, daily, hourly and minute-by-minute) basis is the lack of desire that I have. I have desires for all sorts of things. I have desires for my own well-being, my own prosperity, my own pleasure, my own laughter, my own happiness. But I find myself so often fighting. Fighting against evil and sinful desires, trying to suppress them .

But for what? What am I fighting for? That i may simply stop? That I may one day stand alone and say, "Behold! world! I have arrived! I no longer do evil things!"

This is evil

It is not that I spend my money on myself and on my pleasures that needs to stop. It's not that my words need to stop being crass, vulgar and evil. It's not that my thoughts need to stop dwelling on evil things. It's not that my actions towards others need to stop being hurtful, prideful, and destructive.

It's not that I need to spend my money on others, its not that I need to encourage others, it's not that i need to have good thoughts, it's not that I need to start helping others, lifting others up and being constructive in my actions.

I can do all of the above and my heart may never change

The problem is that I find that the desire isn't there. In fact, its deeper than this: i don't have a longing. I am not carried away with doing good to others. I don't love to do so. In fact, i find the opposite - I don't want to do good to others. I don't want to think about others. I don't want to help others. I only want to think about myself, I only want to help myself.

What I need is new desires. I need not simply to give my money, but want to. I don't simply need to speak well of others, but want to, I need not simply think well of others, but enjoy doing so, i need not simply to help others and be constructive, I need to want to.

And this is where the cross finds me in my soul and tears me straight out of every comfort I insulate myself in and thrusts itself before my eyes. The cross doesn't tell me to stop spending money on myself and start giving money to the poor. The cross doesn't tell me to stop slandering others and start speaking kind words. The cross doesn't tell me to stop thinking wicked things and start thinking good things. The cross doesn't tell me to stop being destructive and start being constructive. In fact, the cross doesn't tell me to love God and to love my neighbor. The cross doesn't tell me to be a good person. 

The cross tells me that I'm not a good person. Even more, the cross tells me I am a very evil person. The cross says, "You are evil, you are wicked, you don't do any good, you're a liar, you're deceitful, you steal, you covet, you lust, you murder, you hate. You're despicable, deceived, rejected. You're full of poison. You are worthless, vile, destructive." 

The cross is the only thing that shows me who I really am and what my heart really looks like. The cross is brutally honest. 

But Jesus does not stop.

The cross comes and finds me and says, "You're a sinner, and I died for you. You didn't ask me to, you didn't want me to, but i did."

The cross tells me, "you are nothing what you could be and you will never become what you ought to be, so I will make you what you ought to be."

The cross tells me, "where you have no desire, I desire. Where you do not want, I want. Where you have no love, I have love. Where you are weak, there I am strong. Where you fail, I succeed."

Because of the cross I can look at my neighbor and with full honesty say to their face, "I will never love you as you need me to. I will never provide, never speak, never think of you as your needs demand and for what you are worth." But at that same moment I can say to them, "Jesus loves you."

I can say to them, "I can't love you as you need. I am not able to. I have not the strength nor the perseverance, not the sustained desire nor the depth of desire to do so. But I can offer you the love of Jesus because only he will love you as you need."

This is the place that we must come to in our lives. We must realize our utter inability to love as we ought to, to desire as we need to. We must realize that we cannot do what we are supposed to do as we are supposed to do it.

We must realize that we can't love anyone. You must realize that you don't really and truly love anyone. The reason that we must come to this place is because if we think that in our own strength that we can really love somebody then we are destined to a life of failure, depression, self-righteousness and sorrow. We will always fail to do what we strive to do. We will become depressed and full of sorrow because we will see that we continually fail to love as we ought to. And at the very same moment we will become self-righteous because when we succeed in loving people the way that we think we ought to, we will be happy with ourselves and what we did.

 The fact that we don't really and truly love others is evident in the fact that just one failure to do so makes clear that we don't truly love them as we ought or think we do. And what is unconscionable is that we actually think we do. We actually think that we love others. We think we love our family, we think we love our spouses, we think we love our friends, we think we love our co-workers, we think we love our enemies. But we really don't love them. We only love them until it gets in the way of what we want. And at that moment we show that we don't really love.

This is why the cross is life and death, this is why the cross is so vital to our lives. Because although in every moment we fail to truly love as we ought, and in every moment we fail to desire another's good as we ought, Jesus does. And unless we have the cross, then we can never truly love each other.

The cross shows me another who wants to help me because He has a good heart. Jesus wants to. It's not that he needs to. Jesus is not obligated to help me. No one coerces him. He has pity on me. He has grace towards me. He looks and feels.

The cross shows me of one who actually does desire my good. 

We must come to the cross and say to Jesus, "I have failed. I cannot love. I am unloving." When we come to the cross we find the only one who will ever love us as we need. In fact, we find the only one who truly loves me even though I am sinner. It is at the cross that these words are exchanged

"I do not love"

and

"I love you"

We cannot manufacture a desire to love. No amount of self-convincing, no amount of self-deprication, no amount of self-conjured-up motivation will ever bring us to really love anyone. We must come to the cross of Jesus and there we must say,

"I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives [with reference to] me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Gal 2:20)

It is from there that every act of love becomes an act of faith. Every time I move to love somebody I am living in the faith that Jesus alone can truly love this person and that he alone truly desires to do so. It is Jesus who lives in my place and the life I live is only lived because he lives in reference to everything I will ever do. No action will ever be good enough. I may grow and learn to love better but what we must always understand is that the love I have to offer will never be good enough. It is only Jesus' love that is good enough and so if we are not loving others through faith in Jesus then we are not truly loving others.

You cannot say to your brother or your sister or your mother in your own strength that you truly love them. You can only say that in the strength that Christ supplies, that only in the love that Christ gives and poured out on the cross can you love them. And this and this alone is perfect love. It's not that we must learn to love as Jesus loved, we must learn to love through Jesus' love. We must not look at Jesus and simply see an example, we must look at Jesus and see that he is the source.

Yes, I do not love as I ought, yes i often live for myself in negligence of others. Yes, I fail to help others as I ought to. And of these I confess. But Christ is sufficient for me, and it is only through the strength that Christ supplies that I will ever be able to love any other person as they need to be.

"In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his one and only Son into the world, so that we might live through him"

1 John 4:9

"I can do all things through him who strengthens me"

Philippians 4:13

When I am Most Near God - A Puritan Quote

And truly, when I am most near God, I have no greater request then this for myself and you, that God would use any means to make us see things really as they are, and pound our hearts all to pieces, and make indeed sin most bitter, and Christ most sweet; that we might both be humbled and comforted to purpose

Jonathan Mitchel, A discourse of the Glory, 3

Treasures in Heaven

Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Matthew 6:19-21

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

Revelation 3:20

Those whose treasure on earth is God himself, when they arrive in heaven, will not anticipate the lavishing of external things. They will not stand in heaven and await some external reward, as if God were going to give them more loot and booty to enjoy, like our Christmases. Instead, those whose treasure on earth is God himself, upon standing before the throne of God awaiting their will reward, will request nothing more than to have more of God himself. They will not cry out for a greater position in heaven, they will not cry out for more possessions or a greater plot of land in the kingdom. Instead, they will cry to God for him to divulge himself to them and cease to relent until he does so. The greatest blessing and gift they desire is the outpouring of God himself into their hearts and being overwhelmed with the gift of himself. They will say, "If i may but have a greater capacity to enjoy you, to look upon you in your holiness and beauty, to have the sides of my heart pressed outward so that there may be more space to receive you."

In heaven, this will be poured out through the gift of His Son and yet still mediated by the Spirit of God. On this earth our experience of God's Son mediated by the Spirit is often hidden to our eyes or is a scarce experience. It is not as if upon entering heaven's courts that the presence of the indwelling Spirit will depart now that we look upon Christ with our own eyes. Nor will Christ himself cease to be the object we look upon in heaven as if the Father now was the central object alone that our gaze is fixed upon. The presence of the Spirit will be released in a dimension that cannot be fathomed or grasped in this age. The release and outpouring of the Spirit that will come when we enter through heaven's gates will open our eyes to the Lamb that was slain, and in that moment we will stand in utter amazement as we behold the Lamb of God, seeing the wounds that bought us are still present upon his flesh. The Spirit will grant us to see Christ, and it is in and through Jesus Christ that we will see our God and Father because Christ is himself the "image of the invisible God" in whom "the fulness of deity dwells".

This is the request that will fall from the lips of those who have entered courts, to taste nothing else but the beauty, glory and holiness of God and to have their hearts enlarged to do so.

To think that any upon this earth who do not now delight in God will for a moment enjoy the place of heaven is such an absurd notion and has yet to understand heaven's true prize. If one has no capacity upon the earth to enjoy and delight in God, then heaven will be hell to such a person. They would enter into the place where there is no light in the sky "because the glory of God gives it light", where the centerpiece is the throne of God where he sits and is worshipped. Any man who cannot delight in such a place now would find such a place to be a repulsive, hellish torment. God's unabated holy presence will be the most abhorrent thing to such a person. Even in their present experience on earth it is still an abhorrent thing. Humanity flees, as if it were a flock of great birds, from God's presence and holiness even now, what would cause one to think that they could at any chance enjoy such a place as heaven?

Many Christians will be shocked at the place of heaven's when they arrive. They will not be raptured with its beautiful streets, its wonderful walls, its clear streams and fruitful trees. All such things, though beautiful they may be, will only be the pathways through which they travel to arrive at the throne to worship and to be filled. They will realize that the notion they entertained of heaven being a place of gaiety, conversing with old friends and honored saints, of sportiveness and humor, though such things will occur, that this is not what heaven's great prize is. All believers will see with what great insufficiency they loved and devoted themselves to God on earth. They will see that every moment upon the earth was often spent in delight of things apart from God. They will see that it has truly been the grace of God and grace alone that has sustained them to reach heaven's shore, for on account of their paltry devotion given to God on earth they should have been cast into hell, but God, by his grace, sustained them and made them grow.

And it will be that when walking through those gates we will not turn our face to our brothers and sisters, or stare upon the walls as if they were the location of joy, but we will run unashamed until we reach the throne, and there we will cast ourselves down before God in joy. And there, with our brothers and sisters we will rejoice, there with the honored saints we will sing, there we will look with our eyes and see rightly the world that God has created and see that it is good, and there we will see by his creation how truly good our God is. And we will want nothing more than for God himself to "come in to us eat with us"

Heaven stands as a place of boundless joy in God himself, what does this remark of our present time on earth?

Worship Through Music

"This people draw near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their heart is far from me"

Isaiah 29:13

Worship with music is the consummation, not the beginning of worship. The christian life is one where worship begins in the home and in the heart, it has been carried along all week and finds is ultimate consummation and expression in singing of words. For this is quite evident what singing is: the overflow of the heart. How can a heart sing which has been dead and wanton all week? How can a heart come before God to rejoice and sing praise when it has been in negligence of him all week. If you wonder that your singing is so cold the root is not far off but dwells within your own self. It is not simply because the music is not stirring enough, or not loud enough, or the lights not dim enough. It is because all week you have not been living in worship of God with your conduct. You have given God no honor or glory in you behavior, in your conversations, in your reading, your writing, your learning, your working, your resting, your enjoyments. You have spent yourself on the world and your soul feels it deep within itself. And so there is no amount of singing that will bring your soul out of this state.

Men have made elaborate services in an attempt to draw the soul out of this state. The flesh is an easy subject to manipulate. Satan has been at work for millennia tempting the flesh because it is so easily enraptured with delights. But all these fashions and intricacies that surround our modern "worship services" are but a veneer for the deadness, coldness and silliness that fills our lives. We must have loud music lest we feel this coldness. We must have dimmed lights, lest the light expose our loose conduct and ill-spent days. We must have music that woos and swoons our emotions because we could not for the life of ourselves sing out of the abundance of our hearts. No wonder so many complain of the music played in worship services today. Every man wars for his preference because he scarce can sing a song that is not in his own emotional language. And if he comes to a "worship service" with a "musical dialect" differing from his own, no wonder he is silent, no wonder he is out of place. His heart has no room for rejoicing. It is not the sounds themselves, but the deadness and coldness of his heart that has no room for rejoicing. We manipulate the worship service in such a manner so that it so well suits our fancies that when we walk out we speak of how great we "feel", when all the while we should have walked out of such a service and spoke of how terrible we feel because we have spurned our Savior all week long, we have neglected him and enjoyed this world itself in exclusion to him.

No wonder the older generations were vehement against the introduction and multiplication of instruments in their services. Though they wrongly attached to an outward thing the inward movement of the heart, that is, that "simple" music wrought a contrite heart. But they saw at work the degeneration of true worship. They came to services and instead of being in the presence of other Christians whose hearts were ready and prepared to worship God, they were in a multitude of dead, impenitent, wayward sinners whose hearts had but a faint beating after the good gifts of God. Such sinners came after living a week spent in front of the worldly entertainments and could scarce be lifted out of their worldly stupor and so, in needing to have their minds assuaged that they were not nearly as vile as they felt, they called for emotional and moving music, they colored the lights, they dimmed them, they raised the volume, and all this was done to drown out the violence of their hearts. This was what lay beneath the outcry of the older generation. They came to a service of simplicity, of rather quietness, where it was not to be pleasured by music but to bring the abundance of their hearts before God in praise to him. They did not need loud, amplified, banging instruments to do this. They could simply, without any instrument whatsoever, bring their voices to God in praise and this alone was sufficient.

We would be foolish men and women to think that in order to have a true service of worship we must return again to these simple forms of music. This would simply be to introduce a form Pharisaism into the church, that is to say, that "we would be better if we did such things, that our worship would be holier if it were simpler." We mustn't fall into this trap that many are falling into today. They think that it is the mere reintroduction of "old hymns" that will produce a "worshipping church". This is folly. You may put before your congregation the greatest panoply of history's hymns and songs, even David's, Asaph's and the Sons of Korah's psalms themselves, and it would scarce raise the deadness of the hearts of those who move their lips and vocal chords. We have become clanging gongs and cymbals. We make a noise with our mouth but there is no truth behind our words. We praise our Creator once on Sunday morning, and praise our own creation on Sunday evening and for the following six days as well.

We have so identified worship with "time". We speak of "moments of worship". How many times have our lips said, "we had a great time of worship". But Scripture does not think of worship in such manners. Worship is conduct, the manner of your life, the way in which you live before God. Time is irrelevant to worship. Jesus says that the "true worshipers will worship in spirit and in truth" not "in words and songs". Both spirit and truth respect the manner in which you life your life. The words you speak and songs you sing are not the essence of worship, they are not even the expression of worship. The expression of worship is "doxology, a giving of glory, praise, honour, and homage to God... all true piety is worship - Godliness is worship" (J.I. Packer, A Quest for Godliness, p. 249). Songs and words are only then the expression of that worship. If you lack the former, the life, then the latter, the song, will be vain and empty. God looks upon the songs sung by thousands today and sees it all as silliness. He sees a myriad of clanging gongs, who come to him but for a moment in the week and venerate and invoke his name, and then all week malign him with their entertainments, their time, their pursuits, their behaviors, and their joys.

What we need today is not better "worship services", that is better, more up-to-date music in our services. What we need is prophetic worship services, that draw out mens' hearts and expose them to their vileness and vanity that they live in. We need our hearts to be exposed on Sunday morning to how we have been living in rebellion against our Creator for the last six days, how we have esteemed entertainment as more pleasurable that him, as worth more of our time than to spend our time in learning and understanding of him. Our country is in great need of repentance concerning their "worship". We have "exchanged the glory of the immortal God" for entertaining, emotional, stirring music, so that we do not have to truly confront the majestic glory of God. Were we for but a moment walk into the presence of God in a worship service we would be struck down and tremble. No man enters the presence of God flippantly. No man comes into the presence of God awaiting an "experience". Such a man will only walk away terrified, and cry out with Israel, "do not let God speak to us, lest we die." We have erected a barrier between ourselves and God so that we do not have to experience the deep disquietness that resides in our hearts, lest we truly "experience" him and are brought down on our faces. We have set this veneer over our services, and of this veneer we must repent.

But there is a deeper repentance that must occur among our congregations. We must repent of the lives we have lived in the other six days. We must repent of the lives we have spent in worship of "images resembling mortal man, and birds and animals and creeping things.". We must repent of the lives we have spent in omitting worship of the true Creator. We have neglected him with our conduct, we have failed to "regard as holy what is holy", we have failed to "be holy, because he is holy". We must repent of this life lived apart from God and not before God and there we must "draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need". We must grip the feet of our Savior and confess our sins to him and find him alone to be our only hope, our only peace, our only joy. It is then, and only then, that we will begin to truly worship our Creator. It is then, and only then, that we will be able to sing and make music to God.

"New" Calvinism...

The topic of "New Calvinism" or the "New Calvinists" is gaining steam in the Evangelical culture. I am an ardent supporter of Calvinism and have taken to believe Calvin's teachings as my own (yes, including "limited atonement" and so-called "double-predestination") so Calvinism's growth good news. Good doctrine (as I see Calvinism is) is crucial for the Christian life, unlike guys like Rob Bell who see it as a child's toy to "jump" on and be launched into orbit, not knowing from whence you left nor to where you shall return. The growth of Calvinism is surely a positive thing.

But (i know, it was all building up to that word...)

Calvinism isn't new. I don't care about "New" Calvinism. Infact, Calvinism is older than Arminianism (i.e., we're all a bunch of free-willing agents, whom God has no (or little) sovereignty over, and God is subject to our choices and decisions and it would be wrong of him to impose himself upon us in any form). It's not like Calvinism died out for a hundred years. There's been plenty of Calvinist men & women since the "Calvinist" movement of the 18th & 19th centuries. It's just that bad and pathetic teaching has won the day for the most part in the greater evangelical church. The reason why it's "New" is because all the Calvinists, who generally were slow to embrace cultural change (since Evangelicalism went through radical changes prior to WWI & WWII) are finally catching on. They're using computers, putting up websites, blogging (like myself) and becoming savvy about how to reach the new culture for Christ. It's not that it's "New" Calvinism. It's that its "Old" Calvinism catching up with the times.

"If it's new, it must be cool. Just like the new Apple product..." I hope people don't become Calvinists because its the latest fad in Evangelicalism. I hope through wrestling with weighty (to borrow John Piper's word) doctrines, like predestination or God's sovereignty and man's free-will (or lack there of), they come to own the tenants of Calvinism because they see that it is actually what the bible teaches, not simply because it's what some hip preacher or buddy is espousing it. There would be nothing worse than to see a generation of Christians toss aside good doctrine because it "didn't work" or "got old".

So "New" Calvinism can keep it's silly moniker, but I'm much more of the pursuasion that what our culture needs isn't to get one more "new" thing. What our culture needs is solid, old, durable, "weighty", enduring, Truth (yes, with a capital T). Our culture needs old men to come and sit next to them and tell them old stories and old things about what has stood the test of time. Our culture needs old books to come and confront them since so much of the garb in Evangelical Christianity is weightless, shapeless, mushy and sappy.

So I say, bring on the "Old" Calvinism, and give it to me strong. Make my weak knees strong, and as the Old Testament says, "gird up your loins".

So, "gird up yer' loins, son, and go and drink some of that hearty draught they call Calvinism. It'll put hair on yer' chest and steel in your belly. You don't want to be walkin' around like one of those silly, flimsy boys that are runnin' 'round with their hands all limp. It'll make you a warrior."

My Savior Came in the Greatest Hour

(I wrote music to this as well, hopefully I can record and upload it)



My Savior Came in the Greatest Hour

Christ has tread the stormy gales
Spread his life on wood and nails
When the darkest hour had come
He proclaimed the battle won

My victory in him is sealed
His death and blood have brought the end
To Sin and Satan's reign and power
My Savior came in the greatest hour

I was buried deep in death
My flesh surrendered all its breath
To the pleasures of this world
But Jesus snatched me from its hold

He drew me up when he was raised
From death's dark grip to Heaven's joys
One day soon I'll rise to Christ
And look on him who is my life

So I shall live this life on earth
Fixed on him to obey his word
Forsake the comfort of this life
All to Christ who for me died

My victory in him is sealed
His death and blood have brought the end
To Sin and Satan's reign and power
My Savior came in the greatest hour

The Pursuit of Truth and the Role of Humility In It

If you aren't interested in "interpretation" of the bible, you might skip the first three paragraphs. But they also might help. Either way, hopefully this post can help.

In interpretation, the role of humility is paramount. Before any study may be commenced, humility must go before, during and after the study. This is because one may not bring their notions, positions and conclusions to the text in hopes to find them there. They must, in a sense, hold their notions beside or next to the text, in comparison to it. They must not hold them over, or under the text.

The example of a classroom of students working together to understand the meaning of the text comes to mind. The teacher assigns the class, for the remaining period, to research the meaning of a word in its given context. Each student, to the best of his ability, is to use whatever tools he has to ascertain the meaning of the text. After the students have come to their conclusions of the text, they are to compare them publicly, with the teacher functioning as the adjudicator. If one student comes closest to the intending meaning of the text, this will generally be apparent. Yet if another student seems inclined to a different interpretation and remains insistent on such an interpretation, then one may investigate the motives of this student. Is their goal to arrive at the truth of the text, or merely to have his interpretation go through?

This example may help demonstrate the necessity of approaching interpretation with utmost humility. One must not force their interpretation if it is a strain to do so. One must see Truth as the ultimate goal, not one's own interpretation or body of interpretation as the triumphing party. If their is disagreement with the meaning that is emerging between the text and the interpreter's position, then it is the utmost responsibility of the interpreter to bring their position in line with the meaning of the text and to not equivocate, suppress, or ignore the meaning, or worse yet, force an interpretation upon the text because the interpretation does not fall in line with their position.

This rule may apply in any discussion of understanding. One must restrain their judgment of a certain view until one has sufficiently understood the view. One must be humble in how they listen to another, especially those of differing views of them. One must first seek to understand. If a man passes judgment on a person before understanding what they mean and their position, then they may commit the greatest of errors in arriving at truth. This is not to say that one must restrain judgment altogether, as many today are in the habit of doing. This is a great trap. Truth, ultimate truth, is the goal of all discussions. It is not merely to "discuss" a matter or to simply "ask questions". This is foolishness and a waste of time. World leaders do not meet merely to "discuss matters" with each other and then feel good that they "discussed the matter". Their ideas have consequences and it is therefore the goal of the leader to understand their opponent (if that is the case) and then to pass judgment, whether that is declaring agreement or disagreement and then declare the ensuing consequences of agreement or disagreement. So it must also be in any discussion we have about a matter. If we disagree, we must out of necessity for Truth, pass judgment upon the other's ideas. To not pass judgment is to make a mockery of Truth. In fact, passing judgment is humility in its consummation. Humility is not the withholding of judgment as many suppose today, but it is the withholding of judgment until one may fairly make a judgment about the other's position. It is true humility because it submits to the other person that there is truth and to reject truth is dangerous and can have severe consequences for doing so. Arrogance, on the other hand, is when, after one fairly understands the other's position, refrains from offering their judgment of the other's position. This is a mockery of the other person by showing that coming to the truth of the matter is useless. You state a matter of the dignity of the other person when you refrain from passing judgment. If the person were of value, you would help them arrive at the truth by declaring your judgment on their error. But if you refrain from giving your judgment, you allow them to continue in their ignorance or foolishness while you have in your hand the tools that would bring them healing. This is the greatest arrogance and must be fought against with great vigilance. To be a doctor who has the ability to rescue a dying man and to yet refrain from doing so because you do not want to "impose yourself" upon the man is the most inhumane and arrogant moves any human ever can make.

Another significant step in humility is to hold one's ideas not simply in competition with another person, but also to, as best as possible, to learn from another person. Certainly there are occasional times when what one may glean from another is minimal, and in extreme circumstances and albeit rare, may learn nothing, but this must not restrain you from listening to the other party in an effort to actually learn from them. In nearly everything anyone is saying there is an element of truth. Nearly all lies are built on a distortion of truth, and often in an idea there may very well be an element of truth. The humble dialoguer may draw this out in the discussion and use it to help the other person arrive at the truth. If one relegates everything that the person has to say automatically to the realm of uselessness and error then the discussion itself will quickly become useless itself. Only after being exposed (and often lengthy exposure) to another's ideas may one draw conclusions about another's ideas. Though this is not always the case, since some ideas are replicated and the same error may be reproduced and spotted quickly, we must be careful of assuming that this is the case. As one reflects and gleans from what another says, they make themselves not only wiser for doing so, but also a more useful combatant in the discussion, putting himself on a much better footing for bringing the other person to the truth.

The final step in humility is to admit one's errors if they become exposed, whether another person brings them to light, or, through reason, your own conscience becomes aware of them. If one does not expose the error it will remain and often be entrenched, though forgotten, and later affect multiple lines of thought and reasoning. It will ultimately impair one's ability to arrive at the truth. Humility's goal is to arrive at the truth, and so will flee from error seeing that it is a great hinderance to arriving at truth.

This is why, as some have masked, wittingly but erroneously, by saying, for example, "there are many who have right doctrine but are arrogant, but i would rather have wrong doctrine and be humble than to be arrogant and have right doctrine." One must see this as nearly the most arrogant statement about knowledge that a person can make. It is merely the other side of arrogance of the person who actually appears arrogant and has right doctrine. As was noted, a truly humble person will flee from error. A humble person will see what danger there is in believing error and see that there is nothing more ruinous to them than to have significant erroneous thoughts. A humble person will strive to know the truth, not run from it. A humble person will love the truth, not despise it. A humble person will seek the right use of truth, not neglect it because another person has abused truth. You must be aware that you cannot be truly humble until you have rightly come to the truth. If a person has good "doctrine" or "theology" yet is not humble in their appropriation and use of it then we may conclude that they have not yet rightly come to the truth: this was the error of the Pharisees. Yet if a person has wrong doctrine but assumes this is of no harm to themselves because they refrain from judging another's position, then they are not humble either. This was the error of the Gentiles whom Paul spoke with.

To be a truly humble person you must love truth. And to be able to know the truth you must love humility.