Gospel Thought: More Jesus

“We don’t need fewer trials, we need more Jesus.”  – Justin Woodall

Justin Woodall is a fellow pastor and colleague at Surfside Presbyterian Church.  A couple of days ago while we were talking, Justin said, “You know man, we don’t need fewer trials, what we need is more Jesus.”  So true.  Later Justin wrote a post on this thought.  Click here to give it a read.

Gospel Thought: Worship is recognizing and bowing before the value of God

Worship is not primarily ascribing ultimate value and lordship to God.  Worship is recognizing the ultimate value that God already possesses and bowing before the lordship that God already has.

During this spring season many of our people at Surfside PCA are going through the small group material “Not a Fan.”  This is a great study that puts emphasis on being a “follower” of Christ and not just a distant spectator.  This great study strikes at the very heart of what it means to worship God.  Worshipping God is not simply ascribing worth to Him and then walking away.  Worship “sees” the splendor of God’s value and is moved to joy.  Worship doesn’t say that “Christ is Lord” because it intellectually adds up or because everybody else says so.  Worship says Christ is Lord because it sees Christ’s scars and beholds Christ’s glory.  Worship does not simply know about the Cross, worship kisses the Cross of Jesus and finds comfort only in its shadow.

Gospel Thought – 1. Know your Friend, 2. Know your enemy, 3. Know your weaknesses

Recently I have been reading Jack Miller’s book “The Heart of a Servant Leader.”  On page 59 we read a letter that Jack wrote to a young pastor who encountered resistance to his teaching on how the grace of Christ is designed to change hearts.  Jack writes…

“One irony that strikes me is that so often people who emphasize the third use of the law (reminding believers of the mark at which we are to aim, namely Christ – Tim’s ad) are really not great law keepers themselves.  For example, I have noted that sometimes church members given heavy doses of the third use of the law have little idea of the inner nature of the law as a delighting in God.  I have also noted a tendency to exclude the tongue and a a critical spirit from consideration as well, so that you can get the irony of believers defending the law with a harshness that itself breaks the law!  What sinners we can be!But I do think that the Heidelberg Catechism (see question 32 – Tim’s ad) and the Belgic Confession have an excellent emphasis on faith and sanctification.  It is also interesting to see that (as best I can recall) the Larger Catechism speaks of the third use of the law and relates its role to breaking us and driving us to Christ.  Add that emphasis, and grace follows.  For what it is worth, here is how I see the theological emphasis of English Puritanism 1.  Know your enemy – the word, the flesh, the devil; 2 – Know your personal limitations – your own particular fleshly characteristics and habits; 3 – Know your Friend – the grace of God in Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

Gospel Thought – Repentance is a Gift from God that turns us to the Gift of God

All of Christianity is gift oriented.  Have you ever thought about that?  None of what we receive is earned or deserved.  Jesus Christ is a gift.  The Gospel is a gift.  Righteousness is a gift.  The Spirit is a gift.  The delight of the Father is a gift.  The church is a gift.  Worship is a gift.  Preaching is a gift.  The Sacraments are a gift.  Prayer is a gift.  Heaven is a gift.  Love is a gift.  Hope is a gift.  Faith is a gift.  I could keep going.  The scriptures teach that even the idea of our salvation is a gift from God.  Ephesians says that “while we were dead in our trespasses and sins, because of God’s great love for us, He mercifully brought us to life, even while we were still dead (Ephesians 2:1-5 my paraphrase).”  Wow!   Did you catch that?  We were dead, smothered in sin, captive slaves of the evil one, with no hope of even thinking to ask for help, but God brought us to life.  Many good theologians accurately teach that before we could even think to repent of our sins, God had to bring us to life first.  Ephesians 2 certainly affirms that viewpoint.  This is true of our salvation in its beginning and it is also true of our walk this moment.  And so, we repented because Christ first brought us to life.  Repentance is a response to God’s work.  So salvation and repentance are a gift from God that turn us to the gift of God.

Gospel Thought – Nothing touched by Christ’s fingers will pass away

It is more than enough that Christ should love us and call us friends.  But it is absolutely astounding that he calls us his ‘beloved.’  He is not simply interested in salvaging our lives.  His is determined to ‘glorify’ us…to perfect us in the image of Christ.  So much so, that even our worst moments, our most hideous scars, even our most atrocious actions, will be redeemed and made into something beautiful.  As His artist’s hammer chisels away at the hard wood of our sin and our flesh, he is designing something beautiful, not just of the stump, but also of the shavings.  Nothing of our true selves will be lost.  Nothing that is touched by his glorious fingers will pass away.

Gospel Thought: Worship ascribes worth to God

Worship does not ascribe worth to God in the hopes that He will live up to our proclamation.  Worship ascribes worth to God in the hopes that we will be lifted up to see His beauty.

Gospel Thought: Idolatry and Adultery

There is a direct correlation between worshiping one God and loving one wife.  In other words, Idolatry and adultery are two faces of the same coin.

Of the 10 commandments, the first is the greatest – “I am the Lord your God, have no other God’s before me.”  Not only is this the greatest command, it is the essential command.  If we could but obey this one command, then we would need no other.  If our hearts kept fidelity with God, if we truly loved Him with all our heart and with all our soul with all our strength and with all our mind; then we would naturally and without any effort keep every other command.

But, I don’t keep this command.  I do not keep fidelity with Christ.  My heart is filled with idols.  John Calvin puts it quite plainly, “Man’s nature…is a perpetual factory of idols. . . every one of us is, even from his mother’s womb, an expert in inventing idols.”¹  The Bible clearly equates our idolatry with adultery (Ezekiel 16, Jeremiah 2:23-25).  Therefore, in my idolatry, I possess the heart of a whore; the appetite of a harlot; the disposition of divorcee.  I leave the God of my salvation to chase after other lovers.

Since this is true, our repentance should primarily focus on worshiping God.  Our struggle against sin should be fueled by an endeavor to exalt Christ.  Every command of Christ that I break is essentially a symptom of breaking the greatest command.  My salvation, then, must come in the form of renewed fidelity to my Husband/King.  The rescue from my struggle against pride, anger, lust, control, pleasure, approval, laziness, fear, and shame is found in worshiping my Lord and my God.   My rescue from these idols is not found in cutting the head off the hydra only to have two heads grow back in their place.²  My deliverance from these demons is not secured by casting one demon out only to have seven demons return.³  My battle against the rat infested idolatry my heart is not won by running around the pitch black recesses of my soul with a blindfold over my eyes and a baseball bat in my hand.  No, I must come back to the first command. I must ask Christ to lift the veil from eyes once again. I must see my Husband. I must worship my King. Only the radiance of His love can renew my fidelity with Him.

So, if I want to love my wife with fidelity, then I must love my God with fidelity; because idolatry and adultery are two faces of the same coin.
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¹Quotes from Calvin – John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion and Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles

²See Hercules and the Lernaean Hydra

³See Luke 11:24-26

Gospel Thought: Christ died for my worst sin and He died for my best obedience

My best obedience to Christ is filled with weakness and imperfection.  So then, the Cross is designed to rescue me from my sin and to perfect my obedience.

On my best day…on that day and in that moment when my heart is most tuned to the grace of Jesus, on that day when I bask in the love of Christ and my soul is most inclined to obey Him, on that day when I am filled with affection for the Lord and all my desire is to serve and even die for him; on my very best day, my obedience to Christ is mixed with so much weakness and imperfection that, without the work of Christ, God could not endure to even look at it.  Wow!  That’s a sobering thought.

I believe that most Christians understand that our worst sin is worthy of hell.  We have all done things or thought things that are evil and bad and despicable to God.   The Spirit of Christ has shown us that these things are worthy of God’s wrath and we have called out to Christ to save us and cleanse us from these sins.  Yet, do we also understand that our best obedience is worthy of God’s wrath?  Examine yourself.  Scripture makes it clear that underneath the surface, my best obedience is filled with idols of approval, anger, control, self-righteousness, power, comfort, self-protection, and self-glory.  On the surface – to my eyes and to the eyes of others – I may look great.  My performance is applauded.  Yet, God sees.  God sees every motive.  He knows every impulse.  He knows my inmost thoughts.  He knows all the hidden idols that lurk within my soul.  He knows me better than I know me.  And so, even my best obedience; even my best day as a Christian, is shot through with every kind of weakness, imperfection, and idolatry.  Left by itself, my best obedience is wholly displeasing to God.

Yet, we who are in Christ can rest secure.  Hallelujah!  Jesus died for our worst sins and he died for our best obedience.

Westminster Confession XVI: “Of Good Works”

V. We cannot by our best works merit pardon of sin, or eternal life at the hand of God, by reason of the great disproportion that is between them and the glory to come; and the infinite distance that is between us and God, whom, by them, we can neither profit, nor satisfy for the debt of our former sins, but when we have done all we can, we have done but our duty, and are unprofitable servants: and because, as they are good, they proceed from His Spirit, and as they are wrought by us, they are defiled, and mixed with so much weakness and imperfection, that they cannot endure the severity of God’s judgment.

VI. Notwithstanding, the persons of believers being accepted through Christ, their good works also are accepted in Him; not as though they were in this life wholly unblamable and unreproveable in God’s sight; but that He, looking upon them in His Son, is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere, although accompanied with many weaknesses and imperfections.

Gospel Thought: Grace to Forgive, Grace to Obey

If you are in Christ Jesus, you are free. There is no condemnation in Christ (Romans 8:1). Yet, thanks be to God, He disciplines those that he loves (Hebrews 12:6).  In this we have two perspectives, and both are crucial.  Realizing that there is no condemnation in Christ guards us from embracing harsh legalism and pursuing a life of joy stealing self-righteousness.  On the other hand, realizing that we receive loving discipline from God guards us from sin and disobedience.

So then, concerning the Grace of God, It is always best to remember these two things.

1 – Grace is given to provide forgiveness, AND

2 – Grace is given to promote obedience.

Grace is never given as a means to disobey.  Grace is not simply forgiveness.  Grace should never lead us to say, “My sin is no big deal, God will forgive me.”  In the words of Paul “May it never be!” (Romans 6:1-2)  Remember: Grace provides forgiveness. Grace promotes obedience. Keeping this tension guards us from legalism on one hand and licentiousness on the other.

Gospel Thought: Come Unto Me is the first Command

How often I struggle in my flesh to obey the secondary commands of the Gospel, while forgetting the first command “Come unto me and I will give you rest… (Matthew 11:28).”

Because of my commitment to self-glory, I resist the Gospel call of Christ to come to Him.  Instead I struggle to obey every other command, and in the effort I’m crushed, angered, demoralized, filled with every demonic fear, overcome with worry, and grasping at any idol I can find to save me.  The first command is not a command at all, it is an invitation that, if resisted, guarantees our demise.

Gospel Thought: Hoping is Better than Wishing

.Hoping is much better than Wishing

Wishing Hope:  is like a road in the country. There was never a road–but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence.  Those who walk that road wish in a vacuum with no sure direction.

Confident Hope: is NOT following a road because it is well-worn and reliable, but it is using a road because it is going somewhere good, and that road is used by a well-worn and reliable guide.

Gospel Hope: comes into existence when the road we travel is the way of Christ that leads to heaven, paved by the Cross, made sure by the Resurrection, and when our reliable guide is the Holy Spirit Himself who resides within us.  “Christ in you, the Hope of Glory!”

Gospel Thought: We can’t turn from sin, unless we turn to Christ

Any attempt to turn away from sin without turning first to Christ, guarantees defeat.  We will fail (Romans 7:21-25).  This is a fleshly, worldly repentance that is without power and without hope.  Turning away from sin without first turning to Christ only turns me to even greater sin.  Turning away from sin without first turning to Christ, turns to me toward pride, self-effort, and cold religious duty.  Turning away from sin without turning to Christ, thrusts me into shame, casts me into anger, and drives me into isolation.  Turning away from sin without first turning to Christ, leads me to a cave of despair where I contemplate the hopeless prospect of cutting off my hands just after I gouge out my eyes with a spoon.

Gospel Thought: Jesus gives the desire and the power to turn from Sin

Repentance is not turning away from sin and then turning to Christ.  Repentance is turning to Christ.  Jesus gives us the desire and the power to turn from sin.  Any other approach is absolutely disastrous.