March 2012
109 posts
“The mold in which a key is made would be a strange thing, if you had never seen a key: and the key itself a strange thing if you had never seen a lock. Your soul has a curious shape because it is a hollow made to fit a particular swelling in the infinite contours of the divine substance, or a key to unlock one of the doors in the house with many mansions.
Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it — made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.” —C.S. Lewis
Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it — made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.” —C.S. Lewis
"The Satanic Ideology of Photoshop" →
thegospelcoalition.org
A great article by Mike Cosper at The Gospel Coalition.
Excerpt:
A cover photo for Intelligent Life magazine caused a small stir recently because it dared the unthinkable: show a celebrity’s actual face. Cate Blanchett, 42, appears on the cover in little makeup, her smile lines and wrinkles un-retouched. She looks less like an Hollywood star and more like a dignified human being, like someone you might see drinking tea at a neighborhood Starbucks.
To the flesh-and-blood human being, whose body ages and whose face wrinkles, these ageless icons whisper, “You’re not good enough. You too fat, too old, too thin, too flat, to curved, too poor, too pale, too tan. Your Maker has held out on you. You’re a fading, dying thing that doesn’t measure up … but you won’t surely die. Follow me, and you can be young, beautiful, and successful forever.”
They hold forth an impossible standard of beauty, and consumers religiously pursue that standard—this dress, that makeup, this Botox, that surgical enhancement, this lipo, that diet, this tuck, that lift—on and on it goes like a sacred pilgrimage where ageless beauty can be yours for a pound of flesh. It rebuts the Creator who made us fearfully and wonderfully, numbering our hairs and our days, and called grey hair our glory because it signifies a life wisely lived (Proverbs 16:31).
Continue Reading at The Gospel Coalition
The Better Version Of Yourself: Before You Stopped Asking The Hard Questions →
thewayeverlasting.com
I love the intensity of a person who is seeking the truth. The openness, the curiosity, the humility, the sudden flash of understanding, the questions. There’s an endless thirst there that is admirable, stirring, almost naive, bursting with wonder.
It has nothing to do with being Atheist-Muslim-Hindu-Jewish-Buddhist-Pagan-Wiccan-Christian-Whatever.
It has everything to do with posture, attitude, the ferociousness of sculpting out a fresh identity, the fascination of a soul on fire, connecting new things for the first time and still treating old things like they’re new. The discipline, the digging deep, the thrill of revelation and epiphany.
There’s a deep sadness over people who lose that spark. I see it in their eyes. It’s not so much that they don’t care for the truth — but that they lost interest in seeking it. They call it too hard, or too much, or settle for something less. In turn they’d rather not hear anything about themselves either: good, bad, or ugly.
The walls rise, the fog drops, and the fire is put out. A wasted mind.
At some point they just gave up; their conversations full of shallow, surface, thoughtless, bland statements that have nothing to do with anything. The only urgency is for what time the movie starts.
I can’t help but think, You used to be a better version of yourself.
“Most of us spend our lives on an uphill climb trying to overcome our own lot in life. Jesus came down that hill, brushing aside the universe, to grab us so we could share his mountaintop view.”
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How can you tell when you're actually living out your faith? Is it simply the fruits of the spirit gradually becoming apparent in your daily routine or does it look more radical?
So it looks we’ve set up a conflict here between fruits and radical living. In other words: Is the Christian life just about personal holiness? Or should I be fighting crime and rescuing slaves and beating up dictators?
Let’s be clear: The American church absolutely loves the whole personal holiness thing. Almost every Christian book in your bookstore is about transformation, renewing your mind, a better you, “Gospel Centrality,” fixing your heart, tending to your emotions, and a bunch of other self-involved disciplines. Not all these are bad, but the focus is obvious.
Even missional work in America is considered a personal holiness thing. I’ve heard it preached, “In the end you’ll grow closer to God and see what He’s doing for you.” Again, not really wrong, but you see the implication.
We’ve very much disconnected God’s saving grace with His call to glorify His name. When we stick a wedge between Grace and Glory, we’ve lost the Gospel. A lot of theologians want to set up Jesus and Paul like they were saying different things, but NO, they were not. Jesus and Paul would both say Jesus is both the Gate and the Road.
I’ll put it simply, in sort of a rhyme:
The saving truth of God’s grace, the story of the cross, our redemption = LEADS TO = Empowerment for the glory of God, our sacred mission.
Most of us are in love with Jesus’ words but not so much his mission. We like meditation and transformation and revelation but not suffering with Jesus for the sake of the Gospel. We do not intuitively embrace suffering for Jesus. Therefore, you get the comfortable confines of an American church. It is absolutely insane to think the majority of Americans understand the NT church; it’s freaking crazy out there.
So to answer your question: I’m not sure what particular convictions the Holy Spirit has given you about your journey, but the fruits of the Spirit will include you actually fulfilling the Great Commission.
I’m not saying it’s 50-50 — I do believe that we must be resting in the glory of the Good News to really understand our purpose and His Story, so Prayer-Praise-Scripture is super-essential. Then as you seek for yourself all the fruits of a God-centered holiness — the love, joy, peace, purity, and all the goodness in Him — this also means you’re Going, Making Disciples, and Giving for the Gospel.
Please don’t disconnect those things, and also check your heart that you’re not merely “doing to do.” I believe God actually does care more about who you’re becoming, but out of your being will emerge the faithful doing.
Confusing Nostalgia With First Love: You’re Growing More Than You Think →
thewayeverlasting.com
A lot of preachers tell you, “Remember when you first came to Jesus? Remember how awesome that was? Wasn’t there a time when you were more spiritually high than today? And look at you now.”
I understand what they’re saying. They always quote Revelation 2:4-5, because that’s a scary book with a scary name with scary verses. What they mean is: You’ve grown cold to this whole thing, it’s become a routine to pray and praise, you’ve seen all the Christmas plays and Easter revivals, you’re getting jaded to the dress-your-best on Sunday thing. So get back to where you were.
Wasn’t there a time when you were more spiritually high than today?
Well — of course. But that’s a dumb question, graded on a dumb scale, assuming dumb emotions are equivalent to “first love.” We can look back on the glory days of Sunday school and call that legit, but a lot of times we’re confusing childlike faith with childish feelings.
My Lovely Neighbors
I rode my new bike around the neighborhood. It got awkward when a guy walked out his front door like he was expecting Chinese food. I think he flicked me off. Sorry that Chow Chang Wah is taking so long. Don’t be mad, bro.
““Your real, new self (which is Christ’s and also yours, and yours just because it is His) will not come as long as you are looking for it. It will come when you are looking for Him. Does that sound strange? The same principle holds, you know, for more everyday matters. Even in social life, you will never make a good impression on other people until you stop thinking about what sort of impression you are making. Even in literature and art, no man who bothers about originality will ever be original whereas if you simply try to tell the truth (without caring twopence how often it has been told before) you will, nine times out of ten, become original without ever having noticed it. The principle runs through all life from top to bottom, Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose your life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and favourite wishes every day and death of your whole body in the end submit with every fibre of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will be really yours. Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in.””
—C.S. Lewis
is it necessary to repent to the person you were gossiping about? I am feeling convicted for gossiping because one of my friends did something really out of character and dangerous, and our other friend was saying how she doesn't know how to handle it, and it became a gossip fest about how we can't believe she did that. I now realize that was an ugly thing for me to do. I want to repent, but is it necessary for me to tell her what happened? I think it may end up doing more harm than good
This is a tough one with real concerns, but short answer: Of course.
Nearly any time I have talked about someone, I’ve told them. I understand you want to protect your friend and I followed that same logic for years. But one way or another it will come around to your friend, and it’s better if it’s you.
Here’s the main thing: If you repent towards your friend and go through that awkward, sick-in-the-stomach, possibly-friendship-breaking season, then you will most likely never gossip about a friend again.
Confessing sin to a real live breathing person is what keeps us in check, because you see what sin actually does to people. It’s devastating.
Yes, you might lose your friend. But if she is your friend, she will forgive you. If not, then it becomes her deal.
If you keep it to yourself, sure it’s safer, but it neither changes the fact that you did it nor will you ever find peace about it (unless you numb your conscience with other things, which is an equally bad road). Pray, tell your friend, apologize, expect the worst. Honesty is the only policy.
Hi, what made you decide to follow Jesus? God bless you.
Thanks for asking. It’s been a long, crazy, wonderful journey. I’ll point you to some posts:
Your podcasts are amazing, you have a gift! I downloaded almost all of them on iTunes and they have helped me so much. I can really relate to them and, I just can't even begin to explain how they have strengthend my relatinonship with Christ and got me threw rough times. Also! Your love for Christ and others is mind blowing. I hope my relationship with Christ will one day be as strong as yours is with Him. :) God bless you!
This is just about the nicest thing I’ve ever heard. I’m super-insecure about preaching and get pretty much zero response from my people every week (it’s okay, they’re mostly passive Asians and I don’t expect applause, and I love them no matter what), so this is quite a surprising encouragement. Thank you and I’m blessed we’re on this journey together. :)
The Obvious Truth: Scripture, Our First And Final Challenge, And Why You're Not The Exception →
thewayeverlasting.com
I get tons of questions that are ploys for justifying a preconceived opinion. A Trojan horse assault as if I can’t see the motive inside.
Questions like:
I don’t lust when I masturbate. I think of farming equipment. Why can’t I?
My boyfriend and I are sleeping together, we’re going to get married anyway. Why is it wrong?
What sexual activities are a sin? Isn’t oral sex morally better than intercourse? Can’t it help calm down my urges?
My parents won’t shut up. Why should I obey them?
I can prove that the Bible condones homosexuality. Why do you hate gay people?
Allow me the humility to ask you: What is the obvious truth? I mean the downright, stripped down, all-ugly, no-nonsense, bottom line truth?
If you were to step outside your own body, just a single step back, to observe your own Facebook page and daily schedule and secret activities and moods and attitudes and intentions and goals, to stand over your body while you do the things you do — wouldn’t you see a lot of rationalization and excuses and denial?
Just switch out your name with another name, keep it the exact same situation, and you’d say that person was denying what’s happening in front of them (if not, you’ve proved my point). Totally blind. Then step back inside your own body: what do you see now?
When Jesus said, “No adultery,” he didn’t also say, Except if you really love each other and keep it oral sex and if you only think about shovels and lawnmowers. There are not a bunch of escape clauses and emergency exits and exceptions. Would there be exceptions to certain things? Sure, I suppose, but you’re not it.
“At the very least we must remember where we came from: complete darkness, a world of swirling pain, a cesspool of death and self-centered ego. When we know the depth of our sin, there’s no way we cannot be compassionate towards the lost. When we know the cost of our rescue, it’s impossible not to love with the same love.”
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“So we want to ask that God would continue to stir up in us a heart for the nations, a passion for the nations and an open-handedness that says, “I want to be a part of what God’s doing here, what God’s accomplishing here and how He’s going to save and work here.” We want to more and more push all our chips in on the great drama that is unfolding and that we’ve been invited to, the great love story that encompasses the universe, the conquering of evil once and for all in Jesus Christ, the invitation to come be a part of something infinitely larger then ourselves.”
—Matt Chandler
Burying Your Burdens →
newlightchurch.libsyn.com
This was our unforgiveness.
At church on Sunday, I preached on why we should forgive. After service, we wrote the names of those we wanted to forgive, wrote down the debt we thought they owed us, and put those notes in a wooden cigar box. We poured lighter fluid on it and burned it out back.
As a wise man once said, “Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and hoping it kills the other guy.”
You can listen to the sermon here.
Hey church: Love you guys. We burned this thing but forgiveness is a daily, continual, willful decision. Don’t run, but confront it with Christ. The debt is canceled: move on to new life.
When Does Doctrine Become Idolatry?
Anonymous asked:
Do you think it is possible for good theology to become an idol? And if so, what is the balance between loving good theology and doctrine and “idolizing” it?
Not only is this possible, but it happens all the time.
With the Reformed Calvinist movement taking off with Gospel-Centered Idolatry — oops, I mean “Centrality” — and pragmatic cold-hearted preachers who care more about theology than people, it’s no wonder that people outside the church hate on the church. There’s a ridiculous amount of inhouse fighting and 95% of it is straight up stupid. It’s over secondary, tertiary, barely-important matters.
You’ve noticed a new quickness with accusations of heresy and blasphemy, when most of the blogosphere has no idea what that means. Most of that is just self-promotion and trolling. I’ve been called a lying witch abortionist by a so-called Christian (over this post on my other blog). Like my good friend Unka Glen says, if you’ve pissed off a “religious” dude then you’re probably doing something right.
A major consequence of this whole flag-raising garbage is becoming a Gatekeeper of Theology, where you think you get it and no one else does. That’s categorizing into an elitist caste system, which the Gospel came to utterly destroy.
I say this without apology: guys like Ken Silva at Apprising Ministries plus a handful of bloggers at The Gospel Coalition are almost certainly going to hell. I’m not kidding, and I say that with absolute grief and sickness in my stomach. It doesn’t matter how many “good things” they do or how well they raise their family, because it’s so obvious they’re dividing the church — and no good works can make up for that. Jesus loves them and so do I, but they have to stop the nonsense.
Here’s a test. Question: Is Jesus coming back to rapture the saints before or after the tribulation of the saints? Answer: Jesus is going to come back, so how about shut your mouth and stop splitting your church over this and just obey the IT IS WRITTEN.
Because when Jesus comes back, all these Q&A conferences and theology camps and Reformed Calvinist snobs and loveless theologians won’t give a crap about tiny doctrinal differences. Jesus is coming back with a sword sticking out of his face, his head on fire, a tattoo up on his thigh, holding seven stars in his hand, riding a warhorse and his robe dipped in the blood of fools he just killed, and you’re arguing over what?
In the words of a much wiser man — at least about secondary doctrine — That’s just like, your opinion, man.
But please also allow me the humility to say that doctrine does matter. I praise God for humble scholars, hard-working theologians, and intelligent pastors who can think light years ahead of others. While I wouldn’t hang out with all of them (pretty much only C.S. Lewis, who by all accounts had an awesome personality and pranked all his friends), I definitely appreciate their exhaustive work. To some degree, they’ve helped us all think clearer about the Bible. And we can’t simply “be virtuous,” but also must have correct thoughts about God.
The best way to balance good theology is to recognize where it belongs. More specifically, where it belongs for you. If it’s pushing you towards a greater love for God AND for people, then good. If it’s not, then there’s a deeper issue going in your heart where information is somehow more important to you than revelation and transformation.
I was a victim of Seminary Syndrome, coming out a clone of hyper-conservative values and an uptight exegetical mentality. I totally loved my seminary years and all the professors there, but they don’t teach you how to love people, or even how to confront someone in their sin. In the end, if your study of theology is not aiding you into loving people with truth, then forget it. Put down the books, dig into the Bible, get serious in prayer, and ask God to uppercut your soul. While you’re at it, go serve the poor and knock on doors with the Bible. That’ll humble you real quick.
What do you do when your best friend who is also a Christian, starts going the wrong path? My instinct is to try and stick it out with them. I've tried lovingly confronting him. he did not get mad but he is not looking at it as a struggle, he wants it. He is now an active homosexual, and it's just sort of going downwards. I ask because in the bible it says not to have fellowship with those Christians who accept their sin or something like that. This scares me, because I don't want to cut him off
This is just about the worst feeling in the world — when your friend walks away from truth, regardless of what sin he chooses — and I’m sorry to hear about it. Please let me point you to three posts with similar questions:
My Stubborn Unbelieving Friend
My Friend Doesn’t Care, Now What?
My Friend Turned Atheist, Now What?
The passage you’re referring to about “no fellowship with sinning Christians” is 1 Corinthians 5, which is a difficult one. I do think 1 Corinthians 5 needs to be balanced with other Scripture, specifically those about patience, kindness, and helping out a sinning brother. Because the absolute last resort is to cut off a fellow Christian who’s in active sin. Otherwise none of us would be “qualified” for church.
I don’t want to water down 1 Cor. 5 either (how could I? It’s God’s Word), yet exhort you to be sensitive enough to work out some of the “extra room” questions.
Is there “extra room” in your friend’s heart to hear the truth from you? Is there any extra room where you think you can reach him at all? Is there extra room for your church to approach him in love and seek his best? What about challenging your own heart in the process?
If he is totally ignoring you, dismissing you, cutting you off, and flaunting his stuff at church, you might consider the non-fellowship thing. But even then, by the power of that Holy Spirit, do everything you can to love your friend with the truth. Don’t give up. Please pursue him and pray for yourself. Your instinct is correct.
