Moving Along

Still alive, just making my way through a busy period. God has definitely provided much grace and mercy to help me through. I made it through a crazy couple weeks of school and work, as well as New Attitude.

Things will continue to be busy. I'm still in the midst of a large project at work. However, school is winding down soon and I won't be taking another grad class next term. On the other hand, Financial Peace will be starting up again at church in a couple weeks.

The trip to New Attitude was great. I had a great time driving down with Stephanie. The conference itself was very helpful. We received fantastic teaching that helped me to gain a greater appreciation for the Bible. The family group I got to lead had great discussions. The trip back was a little exhausting, but we spent the next day at HersheyPark for Stephanie's birthday, which was a lot of fun.

I hope to get back to posting, specifically to get some thoughts out on each of the messages from New Attitude. Also, I hope to flesh out some of the ideas I'm toying around with in terms of adjusting my quiet times and other study to ensure that I am regularly not just reading but engaging with God's Word.

Counting Down The Days

Well, it's almost here. New Attitude 2008.

I'm certainly ready to go. The road trip will be fun (if somewhat long). Plenty of friends will be there to spend time with. The teaching and worship promises to be fantastic as always and I'm excited to learn more about studying God's Word. And it will be nice to have some time away from work.

I'm curious to see what God will do while we are there and how He will use what He shows us to help us to better serve in our local churches. God has been faithful even in the midst of my current busy season to provide grace (i.e. I only got paged once last week when I was on-call, amongst other displays of grace). Things are very busy again this week but I am hoping to get some time to read and pray in preparation for going to NA2008 this weekend. It definitely helps me to get the most out of my time at a conference like New Attitude when I am spending time with God in preparation.

So, hopefully I will get to spend some time preparing. Particularly, please pray that God would refresh me so that I might be able to serve well in helping to lead one of the small discussion groups that the larger community groups break out into. I know at the end of the week I am going to be tired and I'll need God's grace and strength to serve well.

If you are considering how to get the most out of your time at NA2008. The NA blog has some good tips to consider before, during and after the conference.

Idea 1

Ideas 2 & 3

Ideas 4 & 5

If you are going to the conference, hopefully we'll get to see each other. There will be time to hang out. Also, a thought that just came to me was that in the midst of these world class teachers that we will be hearing, let's take time to pray for and thank the pastors who so faithfully serve us by bringing the Word every week in our local churches.

HT: NA Blog

Busy, Busy

I haven't abandoned the blog, I'm just entering the perfect storm of business for the next month or so, particularly this week. School is getting closer to finishing up, but there is still plenty of work every week. We are in the midst of a big coding push at work that has me coming in early and leaving later. I'm on call this week. I've got community group tonight (which is very helpful). My friend Justin is coming to visit this weekend. Not to mention the week to week things I'm involved with at church and the normal day to day life responsibilities.

So, things could potentially be a little slow here for a week or so. But I hope to be back to posting regularly sometime soon. I'll certainly have some things to say about New Attitude.

For now, use the time you were reading my blog to catch up on some reading of your own. If you are anything like me, I'm sure there are plenty of books you have lying around that you've been meaning to read.

The Pilgrim and Condemnation

Last week I read through The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan. I noted down a view passages that particularly struck me and I thought I would share one today. At this point Apollyon is trying to make Christian turn back on the basis that he has sinned against his Prince at several points, even after starting his journey to the Celestial City.

APOLLYON: Thou didst faint at first setting out, when thou wast almost choked in the gulf of Despond. Thou didst attempt wrong ways to be rid of thy burden, whereas thou shouldst have stayed till thy Prince had taken it off. Thou didst sinfully sleep, and lose thy choice things. Thou wast almost persuaded also to go back at the sight of the lions. And when thou talkest of thy journey, and of what thou hast seen and heard, thou art inwardly desirous of vainglory in all that thou sayest or doest.

CHRISTIAN: All this is true, and much more which thou hast left out; but the Prince whom I serve and honor is merciful, and ready to forgive. But besides, these infirmities possessed me in thy country, for there I sucked them in, and I have groaned under them, been sorry for them, and have obtained pardon of my Prince.

When I struggle with falling into an old pattern of sin yet again, my response to the condemnation brought by Satan and the flesh should be as Christian relates here. I acknowledge that I am a sinner and it is actually worse than it seems. But then I point to the cross and my Savior, my Lord who is rich in mercy and who has pardoned all my sins by taking them upon himself at the cross. I am forgiven. And I rejoice that by God's grace, though I still struggle with these things, now I can only find my ultimate joy in God himself. As time goes on, my attraction to the things of this world will grow duller while the desire for Christ shines ever more brightly in my heart.

God's Grace and the Consequences of Sin

Excellent quote over at Of First Importance today.

“We can think of forgiveness as something real only when we hold that sin has betrayed us into a situation where we deserve to have God inflict upon us the most serious consequences, and that it is upon such a situation that God’s grace supervenes.

When the logic of the situation demands that He should take action against the sinner, and He yet takes action for him, then and only then can we speak of grace. But there is no room for grace if there is no suggestion of dire consequences merited by sin.”

- Leon Morris, The Apostolic Preaching of the Cross (London, England: The Tyndale Press, 1955), 185.

Praise God that He took action for us, by sending Christ to die on the cross, when He could have taken action against us as the just punishment for our sins.

HT: First Importance

Books Are For Reading

Tim Challies has a great post today with a quote from Mortimer Adler, author of How to Read a Book. A great reminder that what matters is to come to grips with the knowledge in the book and to know it well. With my temptation to buy many books, it's important to remember that books are for reading and not for displaying on my shelf.

A great reminder that I need to go back and finish reading Adler's book and also that its ok to mark up and dogear a book in the pursuit of gaining knowledge from it.

HT: Tim Challies

Don't Let Your Denomination Become An Idol

I recently came across an old sermon preached by C.D. Mallary at the Georgia Baptist Convention in 1859. The title of the message was "Denominational Idolotry Reproved". Though I dearly love my church and the family of churches we have in Sovereign Grace Ministries, I am aware of the dangerous temptation to identify myself more with my church, ministry or denomination than with Christ himself. This message, though preached to Baptists almost 150 years ago, gives insight and thought to this problem no matter what church, denomination or ministry you associate yourself with. There are good reproofs on overconfidence in success, in letting the truths your group focuses on outweight the core truths of the gospel and of worshipping successful leaders. I've included a bunch of quotes that were convicting and brought this issue to light. It's a great reminder that all the glory belongs to God. While I may rightly rejoice at what God might be doing in my church and in Sovereign Grace, I pray that would not produce pride but rather humility, amazement and joy at the undeserved mercy of God.

Regarding the temptation to a few minor issues outshine the whole of God's truth...

Whenever our denominational peculiarities so absorb our affections and our zeal as to crowd from their due position other portions of the divine testimony, they are made to assume in our hearts, as it were, the character of idols; and in this perverted shape, by being forced to break the due proportion and boundaries of divine truth, they invade unwittingly the just rights of God, and are the occasion of dishonor to his cause. All this is wrong.

On the tendency to forget that the truth came from God and not ourselves...

There is another way in which our denominational sentiments may be made the occasion of nourishing the idolatrous tendency of our deceitful hearts. In contending for them, we may be, to a greater or less extent, sinfully forgetful that they are God's truth. We may somewhat lose sight of the precious, golden link, which binds them to the throne of Jehovah. We may fight for them as our truth, our dogmas, rather than as the teachings of the Saviour. We may contend for personal victory. We may become, through the deceitfulness of the heart, intensely sectarian.

Being aware of glorifying our leaders instead of God...

Opposite to narrow-minded complaining jealousy, is another evil which the gospel equally condemns; a glorying in men - a disposition to call men our masters - a blind partisan zeal for bold-spirited leaders - a cringing subserviency to the authority of great names - an idolatrous reverence for those who, from whatever cause, may have risen to some peculiar denominational distinction.

Not becoming prideful when we see success...

In these things it is our privilege, our duty, to rejoice. But, beloved brethren, let our rejoicing be in the Lord. When we listen to the rehearsal of our denominational successes, our carnal pride is perhaps sometimes awakened, and we think to ourselves, what a great people we Baptists are getting to be! All this is wrong; it is grieving to the Spirit of God; it is making an idol of our denominational prosperity. And it may be that God allows many humiliating things to befall us as a people, that our pride may be humbled, and we may learn more profoundly the great lesson of inspiration "Not by might, nor by power; but by my Spirit, saith the Lord."

Being overconfident in future success...

We may hope with strong assurance for the future triumphs of truth; and we may bless God that this bright and holy day shall assuredly come. But it will be God's work, and not ours. We should be humbled to the dust that God should condescend to use us as instruments for hasting on this glorious period. But for his sovereign, almighty grace, which will accomplish its purposes in spite of all our follies and sins, we might well despair.

HT: Nathan Finn

Do You Consider Your Pastors A Gift?

This past Sunday, C.J. Mahaney was at our church to speak, particularly in light of the recent announcement from our pastoral team that we would be transitioning to a new senior pastor. C.J. preached from 1 Cor. 3:18 - 4:5 and encouraged us to receive Christian leaders as gifts from God. However, he cautioned us not to identify primarily with one leader, for in doing so we can cut ourselves off from other leaders that God intends to use as means of grace in our lives. We should avoid sinful comparisons between our leaders and guard against a preference for one over the other.

I find this can be a difficult challenge, particularly in the information age. Even for those who sit under great preaching at their churches, it's easy to download messages from Piper, Dever, Sproul and a host of others and start to compare. Not to mention the fact that we have the writings and teachings of so many great Christian leaders throughout the history of the church available to us. It's easy to go from hearing these messages in an edifying way that supplements what you are receiving in church to critiquing your local pastor for not living up to these other teachers. Obviously, I am not suggesting that you shouldn't evaluate what your pastor is preaching, but I do think it's easy to desire another teacher over the pastor that God has ordained to faithfully preach the gospel to you week after week and care specifically for your soul.

We should not be cutting ourselves off from the ways that God intends to use our pastors in our lives by preferring one over another. Rather, we should rejoice at the way God is using the specific and unique gifts of our pastors to serve our local church in a meaningful way. And we should give God the glory for the way he uses them to build us up and encourage our faith.