It’s funny how you can read a verse over and over again throughout the course of your life and all of a sudden one day it pops out of the page like you’d never seen it before. That happened to me the other day as I was reading Proverbs 18:1 – “Whoever isolates himself seeks his own desire; he breaks out against all sound judgment.”
One of the clearest signs that a member of my congregation is being severely tempted by sin is that I don’t see them around the church anymore. After all who wants to be in a place that talks about sin as if it’s a bad thing when you’re enjoying it so much. You see sin is inherently anti-social, it naturally draws our attention in upon ourselves and drags us out of community with other believers.
So what’s the solution to the temptation to isolate ourselves and pursue our own desires? In a word “community.” We desperately need to be engaged in an authentic community that simply will not let us go when we try to isolate ourselves and “break out against all sound judgment.”
August 16 2010 | Devotional | No Comments »
The other day I took one of my Junior Highers out to get ice cream. We looked intently at all of the flavors, made our choices, and sat down to enjoy ourselves. This was the first time that I’d spent much time with this particular young man so I started asking lots of questions about what he liked to do, where he went to school, what his family was like, etc. What followed was an hour long conversation that broke my heart in almost every way. In the same matter of fact tone that you might tell someone about what you did yesterday he began to relay to me the broken details of his life. Divorce, parental drug abuse, multiple siblings spread all over the state, CPS, and countless other tragedies made up the tapestry of this young man’s life. The only consistent thing seemed to be the complete instability that characterized his day to day experience.
As we finished our ice cream and made our way outside I couldn’t help but think about how broken this young man’s life was, and he’s only 12. Something inside of me wanted to cry out, “This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be! Children are meant to live with both of their parents, to be raised to know and fear the Lord, to have security knowing that mom and dad love them and love each other.” The problem is that life is broken and so nothing is the way that it’s supposed to be, including this young man’s life.
Paul Tripp writes about this brokenness in his book, Broken Down House:
“The brokenness around you affects you in different ways at different times. Sometimes you have to deal with personal hurt. Sometimes you grow angry that things do not function as they were designed to. Sometimes you are overwhelmed with feeling sad or lost in the face of this world’s pitiful condition. Sometimes you get tired of the effort it takes to live in a broken-down house, and you just want to quit. At every point and every moment, your life is messier and more complicated than it really ought to be because everything is so much more difficult in such a terribly broken world.”
How do we respond to life in this broken world? Should we close our eyes to the suffering around us and try to insulate ourselves from the brokenness? Should we allow our hearts to become numb or indifferent with apathy? Should we just lay down and cry? Here’s a summary of Tripp’s response:
- Determine to be honest about the world we live in. In other words, don’t try to cover up the brokenness of the world we live in.
- Let yourself mourn. This world is a broken place full of pain and it is appropriate for us to mourn over that.
- Fight to be dissatisfied. Do not allow the day to day drone of this broken world lull you into being satisfied with it’s brokenness.
- Be glad. While this world is broken, Emmanuel has come to restore that which has been lost.
- Live with anticipation. By an extraordinary act of God’s grace, all his blood-bought children are guaranteed to be part of a much better neighborhood. Someday we will all live in the New Jerusalem on a street called Shalom, where brokenness will be no more.
February 08 2010 | Devotional | No Comments »
I began reading Respectable Sins by Jerry Bridges back in September with the youth staff and just finished it a couple of weeks ago. By most standards that is a really long time to read a 175 page book with large font, but for me it was perfect because it allowed me to soak in and digest what Bridges was saying on a week by week basis and to search my heart in repentance as I continued to find “respectable sins” that I was previously unaware of.
Respectable Sins is, as Bridges writes “about sin – not the obvious sins of our culture but the subtle sins of believers.” Through 21 chapters Bridges takes the reader on a journey through their own hearts helping them to see the “respectable sins” therein. Some of these sins include ungodliness, anxiety and frustration, pride, selfishness, impatience and irritability, sins of the tongue and many more. I rarely found a chapter which did not send me straight to my wife in order to confess what I had just seen for the first time and to ask her to pray for me and keep me accountable. Through each of these chapters Bridges uses penetrating questions and powerful gospel truths to convict and encourage Christians to put off their respectable sins.
Respectable Sins is one of the best books that I have ever read on sin and sanctification. I highly recommend it.
December 13 2008 | Blog | No Comments »
A few months ago one of my students asked if I would help support their Volley Ball team by signing up for a magazine or two. As I looked through the options, I was reminded of something I used to do for my old youth group, which was to read through popular teen magazines to keep up on what was going on in pop culture and to have some idea what they were reading themselves. So, with fear and trepidation I signed up to receive the popular teen magazine “Seventeen.”
I’ve never been very impressed by Seventeen Magazine, primarily because there’s hardly anything to read in the magazine. It’s essentially a collection of random pictures and advertisement, with little to no substance whatsoever. However, every once in a while they will have an article (article, referring to a page with at least 2 paragraphs on it) that catches my attention. On Monday, I received my first copy of Seventeen magazine and set about reading it. As I made my way through the countless pictures of fluffy bunnies, and airbrushed male and female models I found a section on health where girls ask questions and get responses from the staffers at Seventeen. The following is the question that caught my attention:
When I start hooking up with a guy I like, my body feels good, but then I start feeling guilty about what we’re doing. Is this normal?
The response shocked me:
Isn’t it weird how our bodies give us two totally opposite signals? You’re maturing, so it’s exciting to be physically close with a guy, but you might feel guilty if you were taught that sexual contact is scary or even “bad.” To have a stress- and guilt-free hookup, tell him how far you want to go before you’re in the moment (“I like kissing you, but that’s all I’m ready for right now”). That way, you’ll be in control, so you won’t feel uncomfortable.”
What a perfect example of the wisdom of this age. The author is almost certain that there can’t be something actually wrong about “hooking up” with a guy (which can mean anything from holding hands to oral sex), her chief concern is how to avoid feeling “uncomfortable” and achieve a “guilt-free hookup”. The simple truth is that sin comes with consequences and one of those consequences, at least for a time, is guilt. Sadly, at the rate this young woman is going her conscience will soon lose its ability to warn her of the grave spiritual danger she is in. In contrast to Seventeen’s advice, the message of the cross tells us that there is a reason we feel guilty, it’s because we are guilty and are in desperate need of a Savior to take away our sins and impute to us the righteousness of Christ. 2 Corinthians 5:21 – “He made Him, who knew no sin, to be sin on our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
December 20 2007 | Devotional | 3 Comments »
The following is taken from Thomas Watson’s book “The Beatitudes.” I was so moved by this quote this morning that I decided to share it in the hopes that it will touch your heart.
View sin in the red glass of Christ’s sufferings.The least sin cost His blood. Would you take a true view of sin? Go to Golgotha! Jesus Christ poured out His soul, as an offering for sin! Read the greatness of your sin–in the deepness of Christ’s wounds! Let not Satan cast such a mist before your eyes–that you cannot see sin in its right colors! Remember, not only do great sins carry men to hell—but lesser sins as well. “The wages of sin is death!” Every sin is damnable. There is death and hell in every sin. The least sin without repentance–will be a lock and bolt to shut men out of heaven.
December 13 2007 | Blog | No Comments »
The title of this post may be a little bit of a surprise to some of you, because the T in TULIP is not traditionally known as “Total Inability” but rather as “Total Depravity”. In recent years there have been a number of reformed theologians who have opted for this “inability” instead of “depravity” because it seems to be a much clearer explanation of what the Bible teaches about the condition of man’s heart and his inability to respond to God.
The doctrine of “Total Inability” teaches that man is completely and totally unable to respond to God, due to the fact that man is spiritually dead. It is not as if all men are as evil as they could possibly be, but all men are equally dead. It may be best to think of this concept as a battlefield. After a major battle scores of dead bodies are to be found upon the field. Some of these bodies were simply struck by a stray bullet that hit the right place, resulting in death but no major dismemberment; others were struck by large caliber weapons resulting in major disfiguration. In the same way, not all men have been as damaged by the effects of sin, but all are equally dead.
Man’s spiritual death is to be found throughout the pages of Scripture, the following is merely a smattering of passages that teach the fact that man is spiritually dead.
Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned-
Colossians 2:13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh…
Psalm 58:3 The wicked are estranged from the womb; they go astray from birth, speaking lies.
Jeremiah 13:23 Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? Then also you can do good who are accustomed to do evil.
Romans 3:10-12 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
Genesis 6:5 The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
To be dead is to be unable to respond to anything. I’ve been in crematoriums, where the remains of human beings are being burned and stored. One thing is for sure in a house of the dead, they are completely unable to respond to anything. In the same way, man is totally unable to respond to God b/c man is spiritually dead.
Total Inability is the foundational doctrine upon which all of the Doctrines of Grace rest. It is because of man’s total inability to respond to God that God must be the one initiating salvation through election.
John MacArthur uses the following illustration to show the relationship between Total Inability and Unconditional Election. To deny the doctrine of election, after understanding the doctrine of Total Inability, would be like looking at a man caught in a series of rapids and totally unable to free himself and then calling out “Listen, I’ve got good news for you.” “If you can get out of there, we can help dry you off.” What the man needs is a power far greater than himself to reach in, lift him out of his desperate situation and save him.
October 22 2007 | Doctrines of Grace | No Comments »
