Reminder: Your Refuge and Your Rock

The eternal God is your dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms. (Deuteronomy 33:27a)

If you are in Christ, you have a Home with an omnipotently strong Foundation. You have a Refuge and a Rock.

Your Home is an eternally unchanging, always reliable, never-leaving-nor-forsaking Person. You have this Home because He delivered you from the "house of slavery," the "domain of darkness," and drew you into Himself, transferring you to the kingdom of his beloved Son.

He did that deliverance with a mighty arm. Those everlasting arms that did the rescuing are still underneath you. Your feet are set not on the shifting sand of vocational or investment or social or relational or educational or physical-appearance success. They are set on the everlastingly rock-solid and omnipotently strong arms of your Deliverer who is committed to carrying you all the way Home.

Moses reminded me this morning. Thought I'd pass it along. 

What If An Abortion Doctor Was Killed In The Act?

Justin Taylor posted this provocative quote on Monday:

“Suppose, in the encounter between doctor and child [in an abortion], the child won half of the time, and killed the doctor in self-defense—something he would have every right to do.

“Very few doctors would perform abortions.

“They perform them now only because of their absolute power over a small, fragile, helpless victim.”

—Stephen D. Schwarz, The Moral Question of Abortion (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1990), 143.

Cited in Francis J. Beckwith, Defending Life, p. 228

In case you've never seen it, he also posted it with this picture:  

* Just to be clear: the title of this post and the quote above should not be taken to imply that killing a doctor who performs abortions is morally justifiable for a Christian citizen. It is not. We condemn the bombing of abortion clinics and the murder of abortion doctors along with condemning the practice of abortion.

A Dying Orphan Alive Forevermore

Orphaned at nine in a hospital while battling Ewing's Sarcoma. Adopted by a family whose daughter was often on the same unit battling a similar cancer. Adopted by God through the loving witness of his adoptive parents. Brought Home to His Father on Sept. 7, 2011. Prepare to weep for sorrow, and joy, and the beauty of God's grace that is stronger than our sin and stronger than death.

You can also read or listen to the message John Piper preached at Victor's funeral service. It's very powerful and very instructive for learning how to deal with the fear of death by the power of the cross.

HT: JT (and Bill Hughes)

Live The Gospel Rhythm

There is a kind of rhythm to the Christian life. You could call it gospel breathing. Inhale (believe). Exhale (repent). Breathe in. Breathe out. We must die and live. We must die to live. Daily.

And [Jesus] said to all, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. (Luke 9:23-26)

Cornelius Plantinga unpacks this daily rhythm of mortification and vivification in very helpful and practical terms.

Everybody wants liberty. The problem is that everybody wants it on his own terms. But salvation doesn’t work that way. God doesn’t save people (from slavery, from addiction, from sin and shame) and then cut them loose to do what they want, because without the guidance of God “doing what we want” is a recipe for falling right back into slavery.

So, to prevent a relapse, God preserves those who die and rise with Christ in baptism.... How? The Spirit of God empowers believers to “keep the rhythm going” where dying and rising are concerned. Yielding to the Spirit of God, a believer seeks the death of her old self and the resurrection of her new self. That is, she puts her arrogance to death and raises her humility to life. She puts envy to death and raises gratitude to life. She puts rage to death and raises gentleness to life. When she breaks this good rhythm for a time, she confesses her sins, which is another form of dying because it kills us to admit we are in the wrong. What’s wonderful is that when a person goes through the “little death” of confession to imitate Jesus’ big death at Golgotha, she also rises toward new life, like Jesus walking out of his tomb. Confession of sin is an enormously freeing thing to do.

Once reformed, a Christian life needs continual reformation. Even our reforms need reforming, and especially when we grow proud of them or despairing of them. And the central rhythm of reform is dying and rising with Christ, practiced over and over till it becomes a way of being.

Take compassion as an example of dying and rising. A compassionate Christian feels distress at another’s suffering and wants to relieve it. His willingness to “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15) represents the death of scorn (“He made his own bed; let him lie in it.”) and the death of aloofness (“Why should I care about people tortured by a military dictator in some country I can’t even pronounce?”). Compassion represents the death of our old self, with its emotional stinginess, and the birth of our new self, with its emotional generosity. The compassionate person unites with Jesus Christ in “losing his life to find it” by getting out of his shell and into the full range of the world’s joys and sorrows.

Meanwhile, the recipient of compassion gains vitality too. Love vivifies us. … If the givers and receivers of compassion are believers, they will connect their exchange to the suffering love of the Son of God, who did not remain aloof, but made himself vulnerable “for us and for our salvation.” 

(Engaging God’s World, 83-87, emphasis added)

Grace and Peace

For those of you who attended last night's class with Jeff Stark, did you wake up this morning with grace and peace ringing in your ears? Have you made your "Grace and Peace" note card yet with Gal. 1:3-5 on it?

Jerry Bridges says a helpful "Amen" to the gospel grace and peace Jeff was infusing into the atmosphere last night:

I cannot emphasize too strongly the importance of living our Christian lives each day in the atmosphere of the gospel. The gospel is not just for unbelievers. It is also for us, because we are still sinners – saved sinners to be sure, but still sinners in need of the daily assurance of God’s forgiveness through Christ. As we experience His love through forgiveness, our hearts are drawn to Him in this filial fear, and we stand amazed at His love.

– Jerry Bridges, The Joy of Fearing God, 124 (emphasis added).

Grace and peace today. Grace and peace.

HT: DH

Balm For The Battered Soul

When you are wrestling with “soul-trouble,” Charles Spurgeon, who battled deeply with depression, offers the following wise advice:

• Should the power of depression be more than ordinary, think not that all is over with your usefulness.
• Even if the enemy’s foot be on your neck, expect to rise and overthrow him.
• Cast the burden of the present, along with the sin of the past and the fear of the future, upon the Lord, who forsakes not his saints.
• Put no trust in frames and feelings.
• Care more for a grain of faith than a ton of excitement
• Be not surprised when friends fail you: it is a failing world.
• Be content to be nothing, for that is what you are.
• Set small store by present rewards; be grateful for earnests by the way, but look for the recompensing joy hereafter.
• Any simpleton can follow the narrow path in the light: faith’s rare wisdom enables us to march on in the dark with infallible accuracy, since she places her hand in that of her Great Guide. 

From Lectures To My Students.

Parables of Growth

In childhood, you think the sun (or the moon) revolves around you. "Daddy, why is the sun following us everywhere we go?

In adulthood, you know that you revolve around the sun.

In childhood, you think that large objects far away are small objects. (With pointer and thumb only a centimeter apart) "That airplane is only this big!"

In adulthood, you know that large objects far away only appear small because you are so small and so far away.

In childhood, you think that not-so-big things are really big.

In adulthood, you return to those so-big-as-a-child things and realize they are not so big.

"...until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children..." Ephesians 4:13-14

Glorious Gospel Paradoxes

Christ knew the nakedness of Adam, but by this shame he was clothing his people in righteousness (Gal 3:27).

Adam had made a grave of a garden, but Christ would make a garden of a grave (Luke 24:5).

—Warren A. Gage, The Gospel of Genesis: Studies in Protology and Eschatology (Eisenbrauns, 1984), 46-47.

HT: JT

"Getting Out"

I mentioned yesterday I would post a link to the message on The Exodus by Tim Keller. I can't recommend it highly enough. You can find it here.

In case you want to ponder it some more, here's the story I shared of Keller's time 40 years ago in R.C. Sproul's living room listening to Old Testament scholar Alec Motyer. Sproul asked Motyer to share something about the connection between the Old Testament and the New. Here's one of the things he said:

Think about what an Israelite would say on the way to Canaan having come out of the Red Sea. Here’s what an Israelite would say. If you said “Who are you?”, he would say, “I was in a foreign land under the sentence of death, in bondage, but I took shelter under the blood of the Lamb, and our mediator led us out and we crossed over, and now we are on our way to the promised land but we are not there yet. But he’s given us his law to make us a community, and he’s given us the tabernacle because you have to live by grace and forgiveness. And his presence is in our midst and he’s going to stay with us until we get home.

How Do You Feel About The Commands of God?

What do the commands of God usually feel like to you? I know, I know, it's doesn't matter how you feel about them. you must obey them. Of course.

But the commands of God are not supposed to be a burden. His yoke is easy and his burden is light. His commands are not burdensome.

It matters how you feel about the commands of God because your disposition toward the commands of God betrays what you think about the character of God. It re:flects the temperature of your love toward God.

Think about it this way. When a couple gets married, they make vows. They promise, for instance, to be faithful. Do you think it matters how a husband feels about the command to remain faithful? If you were the wife, would it matter to you? Does he honor you if he feels like that command is a burden? Does he honor you if he feels like that command is a joy and delight? Does it matter?

Must we obey the commands of God? Absolutely! Must we take heed to how we feel about the commands of God (and the God of the commands)? Absolutely!

Here's one helpful reminder from Deuteronomy 10:12-13 that we need to keep preaching to our hearts -- esp. when we don't feel like it's true:

And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments and statutes of the LORD, which I am commanding you today for your good?

All (you might need to say that again) of the commands of God are for your good. Do you believe that? It really matters that you do.