"In the Sanctification of the Spirit, for the Obedience to Jesus Christ" ( 1 Peter 1:2 )

"Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what we suffered. And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him, being designated by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek." ( Hebrews 5:8-10 ) 

The Book of Hebrews, perhaps my favorite, is a New Testament book rich in beautiful teachings that unravel and clarify how the Jewish Old Testament priestly atonement rituals were a type and shadow of Jesus, our perfect, ultimate high priest to come. 

This is what the ESV Study Bible says concerning the theme of Hebrews: "Christ is greater than any angel, priest, or old covenant institution; thus each reader rather than leaving such a great salvation, is summoned to hold on to faith to the true rest found in Christ and to encourage others in the church to persevere." 

"He became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him." Pulled out of context this verse can be interpreted improperly to say that in order to be saved we first must obey Jesus. Read contextually within God's plan of redemption in the entirety of Scripture, we see plainly that our obedience can't save us. 

"None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God." ( Romans 3:11 ) "...for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." ( Romans 3:22 ) "All we like sheep have gone astray.." ( Isaiah 53:6 ) "For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of Law, and do them." ( Galatians 3:10 ) 

As unbelievers, we searched for a lot of things to heal us and help us, our own righteousness, even gods of our own making, none of which are the true God who formed and made us. So we need a perfect high priest. 

"But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent ( not made with hands, that is, not of this creation ) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption." ( Hebrews 9:11-12 ) 

Here's what I'm getting at: Our good works do not save us, but a new desire to obey God is placed inside of us by the Holy Spirit at the moment of our justification. We obey 'because' we are saved. This treasure is one of the proofs of our salvation. God had the plan of redemption; Jesus carried it out; the Holy Spirit connects us to it. The Godhead, Three in One. 

We fight the good fight of faith, meaning we continue to struggle with our flesh and sin, but it's different now. I really hate my sin. I'm no longer comfortable with it. The Holy Spirit convicts us, and he is replacing those inordinate, fleshy desires in our heart with a desire to obey Christ, to live for God's glory and not our own. ( We also fight against this world's system and the devil. I don't want to downplay them, but according to the New Testament as a whole, our main fight is with indwelling sin and our flesh. It addresses this struggle by far the most. ) 

"...work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure." ( Philippians 2:12 ) 

The Holy Spirit gives us a hunger for God's Word, and opens our eyes and minds to understand it. He comforts us, assures us, leads us, equips us with gifts, and teaches us. He gives us a longing to pray and a love for our new family. He gives us the power to overcome the sin in our lives. He gives us the desire, power, and strength to obey as he transforms us into the image of Christ, "from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." ( 2 Corinthians 3:18 )  

And he's with us forever. Isn't that amazing and life-giving? This truth alone is overwhelming.

Today many in the church seem to be seeking miracles of all kinds, but they've failed to realize that if they are in Christ, they are a living, breathing miracle! This truth should be celebrated. It should be at the heart of our worship! The greatest miracle that could ever happen to a person, the only one that truly matters, is God's salvation! The Holy Spirit miraculously regenerates our sinful, wayward, rebellious hearts at conversion, and yet, the church doesn't hardly mention it! Sometimes I wonder if people truly understand this astounding truth! 

It's hard to wrap our minds around the fact that obedience will naturally follow salvation instead of being the cause of it, or even the maintenance of it, in our "works righteousness mentality and culture." Deep inside of the human heart, I believe we think we must earn our way, pay our dues, so to speak, contribute somehow, but we simply can't when it comes to being acceptable in God's sight. We're powerless to overcome our sin. We can't stand. 

We need a high priest, One who is fully God and fully man, to atone for us, to offer the ultimate sacrifice on our behalf. One like us and One very much not like us. 

And when we obey Christ, we can be confident we are in Him. Even if we still struggle with our sin as Paul described that he did in his Christian walk in Romans 7, that struggle and continuing everyday in the act of repentance, asking God for forgiveness of the sin we hate, is another proof of our salvation. We know we desperately need him. Yes, that's right, another proof. We know we are bankrupt in our souls and dependent entirely upon Christ. 

"Bless are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Bless are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted." ( Matthew 5:3-4 ) 

Do you mourn over your sin? Do you yearn to obey Christ for all he has done for you? Do you still struggle with sin at times? Are you brokenhearted when you give in to sin? Do you confess your sins and earnestly ask God to forgive you and help you because you know there is no way in the whole wide world you can do this without him? Do you believe he has forgiven you in Christ? Aren't you just beyond grateful for the fellowship of the Holy Spirit? 

Is Jesus not just your Savior but your Lord? Not just the One saving you from hell, but the sovereign One you joyfully obey? 

If so:

That's the life of a believer, my Friend. 

Rejoice and stay the course! 

P.S. I hope I encouraged you to persevere. 

💜

Happy Monday / Soli Deo Gloria 

"The Way of Salvation"

"Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide, and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and many are those who enter by it. For the gate is small, and the way is narrow that leads to life, and few are those who find it." 

"No passage in all of Scripture attacks modern-day easy-believism with more force that Matthew 7:13-14. It is the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount, and it amounts to the Savior's own presentation of the way of salvation. How different it is from the trend of modern evangelism! There is no encouragement in these words for those who think they can be saved by a casual acceptance of the facts about Jesus Christ. Here our Lord brings the Sermon on the Mount to its evangelistic climax.

This passage crushes the claim of those who say the Sermon on the Mount is not the gospel, but law. In fact, these closing verses are pure gospel, with as pointed an invitation as has ever been issued. This closing lesson also debunks the opinion that the Sermon on the Mount is merely discourse on ethics for us to stand back and admire. 

Jesus is clearly not interested in bouquets for His moral teachings. And His challenge here erases any possibility that the Sermon on the Mount is truth for some prophetic tomorrow; Jesus is preaching to people in the here and now, and His message is urgent. 

Each person inevitably must make a choice, Scripture presents that choice in several ways. Through Moses, God confronted the Israelites saying, "I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live." ( Deuteronomy 30:19 ) 

Joshua challenged the Israelites as they entered the Promised Land, "Choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." ( Joshua 24:15 ) 

Elijah called for a decision on Mount Carmel: "How long will you hesitate between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him." ( 1 Kings 18:21 ) 

God told Jeremiah, "You shall say to this people, 'Thus says the Lord, "Behold I set before you the way of life and the way of death.'" ( Jeremiah 21:8 ) 

What to do with Jesus Christ is a choice each person must make, but it is not just a momentary decision. It is a once-for-all verdict with ongoing implications and eternal consequences - the ultimate decision. Jesus himself stands at the crux of each person's destiny and demands a deliberate choice of life or death, heaven or hell. 

Here, in the culmination of all He has said in the Sermon on the Mount, the Lord requires that each person choose between following the world on the easy, well-traveled road or following Him on the difficult road. You will not find a plainer statement of the gospel according to Jesus anywhere in the Scripture. 

Here are two gates, the great and the small; two roads, the broad and the narrow; two destinations, life and destruction; and two crowds, the few and the many. The Lord goes on to describe two kinds of trees, good and corrupt; two kinds of fruit, good and bad, two kinds of builders, wise and foolish; and two foundations, rock and sand. ( Matthew 7:16-27 ) 

The choices are clear-cut. He demands a decision. We all are at the crossroads, and each individual must choose which way he or she will go." 

"The Gospel According to Jesus, What Is Authentic Faith?" John MacArthur 

The Cul-de-sac

I've had a love for farmland and country living ever since I can remember; however, I began life with my childhood roots firmly planted in suburban soil. I grew up playing hopscotch and hand-clapping games with my neighborhood girlfriends until our parents called us in for dinner, an era that now seems three lifetimes ago to my older self. A life where families took their meals together and instant anything was not a thing at all, expect of course when it came to discipline, and that was delivered instantaneously if you possessed the foolhardiness to disobey or sass your elders. 

Our brick ranch sat at the end of the last road of our subdivision on a cul-de-sac. The low traffic and quiet privacy meant many of our girlfriend gatherings happened in my neck of the woods. Beyond the cul-de-sac, past our whimsical chalk designs, lay this wide open field with a farmhouse sitting at the furthest stretch.

I can remember the magical look of the frosty soil as it sparkled like little diamonds in the rising winter sun. Slowly, the field would melt and fill with wildflowers and butterflies each spring and throughout the summer. By autumn the grass would have grown long and brown, bending with the passing wind as my sisters and I hurried out the front door to catch the school bus. 

Dad would often shush us when he heard the sound of a game bird calling from the thick overgrown strands of hay. Somewhere I suspect there must have been an aging reluctant farmer digging in his boot heels in defiance of a cold-hearted, money-grubbing developer, the old timer relentlessly refusing to give up this simple, pure piece of country goodness in the middle of suburbia. 

If that was the case, I can't say that I blame him. 

In my Christian life it's taken me a bit to picture the relationship between divine sovereignty and human responsibility as one of kindred spirits. Instead, as I struggled to reconcile the two in my Bible reading, I viewed the concept as a dead end road, a barricade, a paradox, two contradictory, hard cold truths that somehow, someway existed co-eternally in an alternate universe far away from human reasoning and anything resembling a welcome mat. 

First however, I've learned that these two truths, and they are both truths, aren't a paradox at all.  A paradox by definition is actually a figure of speech, a play on words. 

Theologian J.I. Packer points out that many truths about the Christian life can be expressed as paradoxes: For instance, when we come to Christ we gain our freedom by becoming a slave to righteousness. "Paul states various paradoxes of his own Christian experience: sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything; 'when I am weak, then I am strong.'" ( 2 Corinthians 6:10, 12:10 ) 

"The point of a paradox, however, is that what creates the appearance of contradiction is not the facts, but the words." Also, and this is important, a paradox is always comprehensible. A speaker or writer casts his ideas into paradoxes in order to make them more memorable and provoke thought," Dr. Packer clarifies. 

So what of God's sovereignty and human responsibility? What are they together if not a paradox? Aren't they contradictions? The Scriptures imply, "No." Because both are biblical realities that exist together in an incomprehensible, cordial relationship right here in our neck of the universe. Not away from human reasoning, but in spite of it. 

This enigmatic friendship is known as an antinomy.  

Of all of the examples given in Scripture, and they appear to be on every page, of God's sovereignty alongside of human responsibility, I think the most often quoted is possibly from Peter's first sermon in Acts 2:23:

"..this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men." 

And again in Acts 4:27-28 Peter praying to his "Sovereign Lord" says that both Herod and Pontius Pilate along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel were gathered together "to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place." 

It was God's sovereign plan for Jesus, his holy servant whom he anointed, ( verse 27 ) to be crucified, and everyone who played a part in putting him on that Roman cross was held accountable for their actions. They were not coerced. They were guilty. How is that? I don't know. 

In another more drawn out example, Paul, anticipating the people's objections in Romans 9 to God's sovereign choice in his election and man not being let off the hook for his actions, to my disappointment, the apostle didn't present them with diagrams and charts on parchment of how God's sovereign purposes all worked themselves out through human agency. 

Paul didn't offer any explanation; only to quote what God told Moses in the Book of Exodus saying, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy." ( verses 15 & 16 ) 

"Why does he still find fault? Who can resist his will? But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, 'Why have you made me like this?' Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?" ( verse 20 & 21 ) 

"What if God desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory - " ( verse 22 & 23 ) 

Then in Romans 10 we see man's responsibility: "because if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that God raised him ( Jesus ) from the dead, you will be saved. ( verse 9 ) For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved." ( verse 10 ) 

This is just one, albeit long, example in the Scriptures, but the complex relationship between God's sovereignty and man's responsibility truly seems to appear everywhere we look in the Bible. 

When teaching on the two Charles Spurgeon used the analogy of two parallel lines that seem separate, but will converge somewhere in eternity. He stated, "No man will ever get a right view of the gospel until he knows how to look at the two lines at once," teaching we must hold both truths in our hands. We must keep them balanced. 

Later in the Book of Romans, Paul seems to abruptly stop in the midst of all of these mind-boggling thoughts and burst into doxology:

"Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor? Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen." ( Romans 11: 33-36 ) 

Even if some of God's truths are deeper than human understanding, I want to hear the whole counsel of God's Word. Don't you? Every bit of it, not just the "pleasant" and understandable parts. Unless we are reading and wrestling with all of Scripture, we will not have an accurate picture or deep, abiding relationship with the God who created us. How can we? Knowing just a little of what the Bible says about God, isn't truly knowing him at all. 

I look back on my past life and wonder if we don't want to know God because, to borrow a famous line from a movie, we can't handle the truth. It's better just to create a God of our own making, one we shrink down and tame to our level. One we can handle. One who does things our way.

I realize God says some very difficult things especially in the Old Testament, and with every major Christian doctrine there just seems to be these tensions and complexities, like the Trinity, Jesus being fully man and fully God, the virgin birth, the resurrection, Jesus saying the world will hate his followers, and the cost of everything in our lives to follow Christ, ( I don't mean to go down a rabbit trail here, but for me that's one of the proofs Christianity is true. Who in the world making up a religion would put all this hard to believe stuff in their sacred book hoping to gain disciples unless it were all true? ) but don't you want to truly know God? The God who created you? Even though we won't understand his mind and his ways. Jesus says in John 17:3 that knowing the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent is eternal life. Don't you want that? 

If the Apostle Paul, and further Jesus, didn't attempt to explain the relationship between God's sovereignty and man's responsibility, we shouldn't speculate in this area. To inflict our own imaginative, fallen ideas onto to one or either would be to damage both. 

I wouldn't even say the two are in tension together, no, they exist peacefully, as Spurgeon taught, side by side. Therefore we too should live contently and peacefully within their friendship even though we don't understand. We must believe both. Not understanding this relationship, helps to dissolve our own pride and live humbly and dependently before the God whose mind and ways are far above anything our small minds can wrap around.

This is the God we serve. 

We love him only because he first loved us. ( 1 John 4:19 ) 

He's the Creator. We're the creatures. He's perfect and holy. We're sinful. He's all-wise and all-knowing. We're not the brightest bulbs on the Christmas tree. And yet, we think our definition of good is the correct one, that goodness couldn't possibly be any other way than the way we imagine it. It's not going to always make sense to us. 

But that doesn't mean the complexities and secret things aren't still stunningly beautiful. It doesn't mean we can't marvel, standing in awe, before the glorious intricacies of our Sovereign Lord as we would at one of the natural wonders in his created world. 

Like the gorgeous field full of life and wonder at the end of my childhood cul-de-sac. 

The relationship between divine sovereignty and human responsibility isn't a killjoy, a cold-hearted road block forcing us to turn around without question or compassion. No, when we come to the end of our knowledge we should view it more like a welcoming turnaround. True, we can't travel any further, but we're not scolded and then sent away. We're invited to linger as long as we like, to marvel at the beauty. To smell the fragrance and listen to its sounds. To stand and behold from a quiet distance the secret things, at least on this side of eternity, we're not to understand. 

Where the mysterious wind swirls the tender seed and then plants it firmly in the good ground. 

💜

Divine Sovereignty

"I do not intend to spend any time at all proving to you the general truth that God is sovereign in his world. There is no need; for I know that, if you are a Christian, you believe this already. How do I know that? Because I know that, if you are a Christian, you pray; and the recognition of God's sovereignty is the basis of your prayers. 

In prayer, you ask for things and give thanks for things. Why? Because you recognize that God is the author and source of all the good that you have had already, and all the good that you hope for in the future. This is the fundamental philosophy of Christian prayer.

The prayer of a Christian is not an attempt to force God's hand, but a humble acknowledgment of helplessness and dependence. When we are on our knees, we know that it is not we who control the world; it is not in our power, therefore, to supply our needs by our own independent efforts; every good thing that we desire for ourselves and for others must be sought from God, and will come, if it comes at all, as a gift from his hands. 

If this is true even of our daily bread ( and the Lord's Prayer teaches us that it is), much more is it true of spiritual benefits. This is all luminously clear to us when we are actually praying, whatever we may be betrayed into saying in argument afterward. In effect, therefore, what we do every time we pray is to confess our own impotence and God's sovereignty. The very fact that a Christian prays is thus proof positive that he believes in the lordship of God." 

J.I. Packer "Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God" 1961

💜

"Create in me a Clean Heart"

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer." ( Psalm 19:14 ) 

Last blog entry I wrote that my sheep here at the farm eat and eat and eat. But while the dogs and I made the morning rounds, I realized that's not exactly right. Instead of sheep eating and eating and eating, the rhythm actually goes more like: eat, eat, eat, chew, chew, eat, eat, eat, chew, chew. Catchy, isn't it? 

Sheep are ruminants, meaning that they have a four-chambered stomach like cows and goats. Like cows, sheep are grazers feeding on green pastures, unlike goats which are mostly browsers preferring to stand up on their hind parts to reach vines, shrubs, and thick underbrush. In my experience, goats only eat grass as a last resort, if that's all that's available. This is interesting to me in light of what the Bible says about goats and sheep. One of the ways we know we are Christ's sheep is a craving for the pure milk of his Word. 

So most of what a sheep eats is stored in their abdominal cavity in the "rumen" - a sort of ziplock baggie for food that is quickly consumed and then saved for later. Eventually the bag "unzips" and the food is regurgitated, re-chewed, and re-swallowed. If you've heard of "cud-chewing," that's a simple definition. Since my man children originally set this blog up with the purpose of me sharing my rookie farming experiences, I thought I'd insert some livestock education today. 

Sheep chew their cud typically as they rest, not while they eat. If I suspect a sheep is sick because she's moved away from the flock, I always feel relief if I see her chewing. 

Chewing is usually a sign of a healthy sheep. 

You may think that rumination is a gross process, but I think it's fascinating how God has created his animals so unique and wonderful. I love discovering new ways I didn't see before of how the Lord's people compare with sheep. Granted that it isn't always a spiritual compliment, but it's not all bad either. 

Like sheep who graze throughout their day, God's children need to be constantly feeding on His Word, but there comes a time of contemplation. We must not undervalue this endeavor or "skip this step" in our crazy busy culture. The Scriptures have much to say about meditating on God's Word, and teach us to do so at least 18 times. 

The word "meditate" means to think deeply about something, to ponder, to consider, to mutter to one's self. 

To chew. 

"The Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night..." Joshua 1:8 

"Oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day!" Psalm 119:97

"I will ponder all your work, and meditate on your mighty deeds." Psalm 77:12

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things." Philippians 4:8 

These are just a few verses, but enough to see that according to the Scriptures, Christian meditation is not an emptying of the mind as in transcendental meditation practices; rather, it is a filling of the mind with God and his Word.

Christian meditation is also not speaking and thinking on things in an attempt to bring them to pass. 

I clarify this because many popular pastors and televangelists teach this practice of calling and thinking things into existence, which has its roots in New Age thought. I want to clarify that this is not a Christian ritual, but a dangerous practice. For everything of God, satan seems to offer us a counterfeit, doesn't he? 

When The Book of Proverbs warns us that life and death are in the power of the tongue, it is saying, as I think most of us know, our words can cause great pain or they can bring joy and upbuilding to the hearer. So we should choose them wisely, especially with children. 

False teachers will take this verse and make the leap that this means our words have the ability to create and call things into existence like God. Nothing could be further from the truth. Make no mistake, God is in a category of One. The serpent has been tempting us with that lie since Eden. 

Be careful what you eat. 

We have the ability to tear someone down or build them up with our words, not to create worlds. Attempting to use our words and thoughts to create circumstances and material objects is the New Age law of attraction and New Thought mind-over-matter, even if you try and sprinkle some Bible verses in there. It's something Christians should never engage with as Christ is the Creator of all things and all things hold together in Him alone. ( Colossians 1:15-20 ) 

And faith is not force we conjure up on our own to get God to "work" for us like his a grumpy old deity we must appease, another current teaching that has its origins in Christian Science which isn't Christian or science. Beware of this, and let's get to know our Bibles. Again, I want to reiterate this practice because so much of this false teaching splashed with a Christian veneer permeates our culture. I want to make sure people looking at the Christian faith and new believers understand that this isn't Christianity. 

We can "use" the Bible and God without actually knowing either to our detriment. 

Jesus never taught us to do this. When the disciples asked him how to pray, he taught them just that - to pray, not confess, demand, declare, decree, or use repetitive words to get God's attention, no, he taught them to humbly pray. God already knows what we need before we ask him. Prayer displays our dependence on God for all things. ( Matthew 6:9-11, Luke 11:2-4 ) 

We have many examples in Scripture of Jesus praying to his heavenly Father. 

True Christian meditation can come in between our Bible reading and our prayers. True Christian meditation is pondering and speaking God's Word, his biblical concepts and precepts, to drive them deeper into our hearts in order to know Him the one true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent. These alone are the treasures we seek. 

It's a sort of preaching to oneself, not to God, to ourselves. Say for instance, I want to know on a more intense level the love of Christ, a wonderful thing we all should desire, then I can "preach" verses to myself as I walk around the farm of what God says in his Word about the love of Christ. 

Currently I've been pondering the atonement. I've written out on index cards Scriptures pertaining to Christ's sacrificial work in an attempt to understand it better and focus on the unique work each member of the Godhead displays in the atoning work of Christ. Sometimes I reason out loud with myself like a lawyer because I'm attempting to wrap my tiny mind around this deep, deep doctrine. 

Also, I've found that Scripture memorization can be a lovely by-product of meditation as we hunger to learn and ponder these biblical treasures. 

In other words, what I'm hopefully conveying in this blog is that meditation is a sign of a healthy sheep in Christ's flock. 

But it takes times of quiet to engage our minds in this process. Times where after we've fed on God's Word we "bed down for the night" and start "chewing." Like any new habit, we must daily cultivate it into our routine, and it's going to look different for each believer because our schedules and lives differ. 

Meditation is a slow, possibly mundane and ordinary practice, one that some may not desire to develop because it's not "sexy" enough. Perhaps they're looking for something a bit more snazzy and glamorous, but God works through his providence, in quiet prayer closets, and through every-day, humble routines. This is how he mostly grows his children in these last days. 

Friends, God is looking for those who will be obedient and faithful, doing what it takes to know Him and learn his Word behind the scenes, but these quiet times of reflection and meditation are always seen by Him.

💜

And sometimes they chew on my clothing. 

"One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church" ( Part 6 )

"For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright. and godly lives in the present age..." ( Titus 2:11-12 ) 

In learning what a true church of Jesus Christ looks like, we see in the Scriptures and affirmed by church fathers, faithful and sound Bible teachers, and Reformation theologians ( and yes, even AI. It's a crazy age we live in, isn't it?) that the marks of a true church are: 1.) The true preaching of God's Word. 2.) The proper administration of the sacraments. 3.) Church discipline.  There are other components, but these are the main ones. 

Thanks for joining me in this journey. I'm learning a lot too! 

When you think of "church discipline" you might be like me and your mind goes to that well-known passage in 1 Corinthians 5 where the Apostle Paul is sharply rebuking the church for not removing a congregant who is having relations with his father's wife. In fact, they are boasting about it, and Paul says that this type of sexual immorality isn't even tolerated among pagans. 

That is certainly a form of much needed church discipline that is grossly lacking in the church today. However, I wanted to draw attention to another form, more widespread, that involves us all, all the time. Or it should anyway. 

God often refers to us in the Scripture as his sheep, and one thing I've recently taken notice of concerning this metaphor is how much time my little flock here at Healing Brook spend eating. I think they eat so much that I just take their grazing for granted. But think about that. 

Sheep eat and eat and eat, and then at dusk, satisfied and healthy, they begin to find places to bed down for the night. When they wake up in the morning, they slowly make their way back out to the sunny pasture and begin to eat again. 

Keeping this in mind, I read in our doctrinal class text book, John Frame's "Concise Systematic Theology, An Introduction to Christian Belief" that although Matthew 18:15-20 lists the steps of discipline to be taken in cases where the teaching of the church has not had its desired effect, John Frame says that the first form of church discipline is "teaching." 

That's right - church discipline goes back to the first mark of a true church, the true preaching of God's Word. I never saw this before. ( This truth is all over Titus and 1&2 Timothy which are the pastoral epistles and ones I'll rely heavily upon in these blogs.) 

Paul leaves Titus in Crete with instructions to put things in order and appoint elders in every town. Elders, Paul directs, must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught; so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it." ( Titus 1:9 ) 

Again, when I think of the term "church discipline" I think of being called into the pastor's office and getting a good scolding for engaging in gossip you know, something of that nature. But here Paul is saying that first elders ( all pastors are elders ) must be able to teach sound doctrine "then" rebuke if necessary, if someone goes off the rails into false teaching. 

Jesus told Peter in John 21 to "feed" his sheep and lambs, and to "tend" them. 

Similar to parenting, discipline takes many forms and "training" is the most often used. My grandchildren were here at the farm this past week, and this concept was reinforced to me as we, meaning all family members, continually taught the kids by instruction and action what was acceptable to God and not, good behavior and bad. Even Jonah has begun to teach his younger sisters what he has learned. It's a beautiful God-given principle to behold. 

And in the church when these biblical truths are not in place, for instance, a man sleeping with his father's wife, another form of church discipline should occur, like Paul's strong rebuke because "a little leaven leavens the whole lump." ( verse 8 ) Sometimes the unrepentant person must be put outside of the church for the good of the flock until that person repents and can be restored to fellowship. ( verse 13 ) 

John Frame goes on to say concerning teaching being the first form of discipline that the church must make clear what behavior is acceptable to God. This makes sense. And it must present the gospel in such a way as to motivate obedience. Remember that people aren't motivated by denunciations and scolding nearly as well as they are motivated by the love of Jesus for them and the joy of living a godly life." ( page 303 ) 

As Paul instructed Titus ( and Timothy ), the elders were to teach the Word and "not be arrogant or quick-tempered or a drunkard or violent or greedy for gain, but hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined." ( Titus 1:7-9 ) So God has strict instructions on how his shepherds are to care for his sheep. 

I know that some instances of church discipline are complicated and painful, so I don't want to make light of it. I'm merely saying that as lay-people, like sheep, we should desire to feed on God's Word continually, whether sitting under sound teaching and preaching in our churches or studying, examining, and meditating on Scripture ourselves. 

This training will discipline us and grow us into strong, mature sheep as well as keeping us out of the shepherd's office. Or worse, wandering from the flock. 

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Happy Monday! 

T.G.I.M. / Treasures in Heaven

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." ( Matthew 6:19-21 ) 

If there is a verse to contend against the prosperity/health-wealth gospel of our day, surely this is it; but it's so much richer than just that. 

This often quoted verse is from what has become known as Jesus's "Sermon on the Mount." What Jesus has been getting at in this sermon, and in all of his teachings, is that it's not about the surface and what things look like on the outside, it's about the heart. 

It's not about having "an appearance of godliness," but about having a new heart that only God can give to us. ( Ezekiel 36, Jeremiah 31:33, Hebrews 8:10, Psalm 51:10, 2 Timothy 3:5 ) 

We may be in Christ, bought by His precious blood, and yet these hearts are still prone to wander. This is how God works it. Like the children of Israel rescued out of slavery in Egypt by the mighty hand of God, they witnessed with their own eyes, what appears to be, the greatest miracle the biblical narrative knows. Our hearts constantly need to be directed to the love, mercy, and grace of God on our lives, lives once condemned and held in the bondage of sin, now set free by the power of the Holy Spirit, who indwells us, to the finished work of Christ. 

Do we even realize how much we depend on His keeping power? 

"Oh to grace how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be! Let that grace now, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee. Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love; here's my heart; O take and seal it; seal it for thy courts above." 

Somedays I think the greatest blessing is to know in every single detail and circumstance of our lives how very much we need Him in every way possible. 

When we are in desperate situations that cause us to remember how faithful God has been in our past, as we continue to hold onto Him for dear life, and because we know He kept not only his part of the covenant, but our part too, a bit more of our hearts are planted in heavenly soil. 

One of my "life verses" is 2 Corinthians 1:9. I read this verse for the first time over twenty years ago when I desperately needed something from God to hold onto, something that helped me make sense of the problem of evil and revealed to me that somehow, someway, God in his sovereignty had a plan I could not see or understand. I was okay with the suffering he allowed me to walk through as long as I knew it was Him and not me. 

The verse is in the context of Paul's suffering in Asia. 

"For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead." 

Have you ever felt like you received a death sentence? Like things were so difficult you spared even of life itself? If so, we can take great comfort first in knowing that Jesus not only felt this way too, but He actually served the death sentence out on a Roman cross on our behalf. Willingly. He bore the weight of our sin "for the joy set before him." ( Hebrews 12:2 ) 

Now God raises our hearts dead in trespasses and sin to new life. 

Our struggle and this knowledge of the sacrifice of Christ deepens our trust into a rich and abiding faith. What develops is not surface level, but heart changed and changing, a new life becoming what we are by the grace of God, the atoning work of Christ on our behalf, and the direction and finishing work by the power of the Holy Spirit. 

An even greater miracle than the parting of the Red Sea is a heart that only God can make new and keep for Himself. Through the trials and the joys we grow closer to Christ, our hearts become more devoted to Him than ever and our treasure chest fuller in Heaven. 

Because Christ is our treasure. 

💜

If you're owned by Great Pyrenees, you'll totally get this. lol

T.G.I.M.

"What is Christianity all about?"

I ask this question because here lately we've been looking at what it means to be a true Christian church and not a false one. We established that according to the Scriptures, and affirmed by church fathers, faithful Bible teachers and Reformation theologians, the first mark of a true church is the true preaching of God's Word followed by the proper administration of the sacraments and church discipline. Someday I hope to get to the last two, and there are others as well after these. But maybe we should back-up and ask: 

What does it even mean to be a Christian? 

What is Christianity all about? 

Some will say that it's about being a better person. Some will say that it's about family values, traditions, reaching your potential, rules, doxology, forgiveness, and the list goes on. 

Although these aren't bad things, Christianity is not about these things. Christianity is not about a system; it's about a person. Christianity is about Jesus Christ. 

It's about who He is and what He does. 

It's about what He has done for us, in our lives and in human history. Everything begins and ends with Him, and revolves around Him. As Christians, we are "Christ-centered."

All Scripture is about Him: 

"And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he ( Jesus ) interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." ( Luke 24:27 ) 

He IS the Word. ( John 1:1-5 ) 

This month in our doctrinal class at Grace Church we are taking a long look into "Christology," which simply put is the study of Christ. So all of this is fresh in my mind. 

As students of the Bible we are now examining the nature of Christ and the work of Christ, I kept thinking to myself during the lectures and discussions that I don't want these truths to ever NOT be fresh in my mind. I regret and repent of all the years they weren't. I want them to dominate my thought life always. I need them too, as followers of Christ, we all do. And they should. 

Because Christ is the essence of Christianity. As Pastor Charlie said in class, "When we talk about Jesus, we are talking about everything." 

And it is beyond heartbreaking that we live in a "Christian" culture that has forgotten this truth. Or worse, never knew what Christianity was all about to begin with - Jesus Christ. He is the beginning and the end and everything in between. 

But Jesus Christ has been replaced with a multitude of other things, and some are good things. Very good things. Like God the Holy Spirit who himself is the third person of the Godhead. But Jesus said that after He ascends, He and the Father will send the Holy Spirit to us as his followers, and "He will glorify me." ( John 16:14 ) 

The Holy Spirit always points us to Christ. He doesn't point to himself. He is with us forever, saving us and keeping us and sanctifying us, transforming us into the image of Christ. ( John 14-16 ) 

However, some have replaced Jesus with the desire for miracles, spiritual gifts, manifestations, and "moves" of the Spirit, seeking those things instead of Christ as they gather for a worship service. 

Some have removed Christ altogether because they don't think they need anyone to "save" them because deep down they think that they are already really good people in spite of their "mistakes." They don't want all that bloody sacrifice stuff. It's not necessary. In fact, it's "cosmic child abuse." 

Some have replaced Jesus with his kingdom itself, even though Jesus said that his kingdom is not of this world, removing Jesus and appointing themselves as the heroes of God's story who will exercise authority and execute "greatness" as they usher in the Kingdom of God. Foolish people who are stealing the glory of God in Christ. 

Some have replaced Jesus with their best life now, seeking health, wealth, and worldly success, instead of denying themselves, taking up their crosses and sharing in Christ's sufferings as well as his joy, so they can also share in his glory. ( Romans 8:17 ) 

And yet, they miss the beautiful truth. They fail to see and understand from the Scriptures: 

Jesus so identifies with His Church that He will share his glory with us! This is amazing. On the road to Damascus ( Acts 9 ) when Paul ( Greek for Saul ) is knocked down and blinded by the resurrected Christ, he asked Saul why he is persecuting Him? Only Saul wasn't persecuting Jesus - he was persecuting His Church. But to persecute The Church is to persecute Jesus himself because we are the Body of Christ. He is the head. ( Colossians 1:18 ) 

This is part of our inheritance in Christ's sacrifice. ( Colossians 1:12-13 ) He is the Good Shepherd, and we are his sheep. ( John 10 ) He is the vine, and we are the branches. ( John 15 ) 

And yet, in light of this astounding, bewildering truth, we want to replace Him? As if He could be replaced. ( John 15:5 )  Like the devil, we want to be just like god ourselves, calling the shots, not content with or truly understanding and living in appreciation of our glorious inheritance in Christ of redemption and forgiveness of sins. Foolish people. That's what got us in this sinful mess in the first place. 

Friends, that's why I want this to always be fresh in my mind. That's one of our fleshy struggles and temptations, isn't it? To forget Christ and remember ourselves. "He must increase, but I must decrease." ( John 3:30 )  As we go about our day today and everyday in the busyness or loneliness of our lives, where ever we are, let's constantly remind ourselves of what Christianity is all about in the first place. 

Christ. 

💜

"A City to Come"

Happy 4th of July, Friends! 

Today I have another guest blogger. I'm sharing from Chad Bird what I believe will help and bless us as Christians navigating our country's celebration today of independence. As a believer, I often feel conflicted with the holiday and my loyalty, while I do love my countrymen and appreciate my freedom and those who died for it, I love God my Creator supreme and his Law and am above all thankful for my freedom in Christ my Lord and Savior. I don't always know how to flesh this truth out - not just on July 4th, but on every day living as a Christian in an American bubble in the 21st century. 

For those of you unfamiliar with Chad Bird, he has served as a pastor, professor, and guest lecturer in Old Testament and Hebrew. He holds master's degrees from Concordia Theological Seminary and Hebrew Union College. He is a scholar in residency at 1517:

"For Christians in America to celebrate the Fourth of July is good and right. We are citizens of this nation, enjoying its privileges and embracing its responsibilities. So today, we grill our hamburgers, wave our flags, and shoot fireworks.

Yet, while we are citizens of this nation, our ultimate allegiance is to God as members of the kingdom of his Son. His reign, teachings, and ownership of us trump everything else. Christ is not a president we elect; he is the King under whose reign we live.

This means, at a bare minimum, that when the government or its leadership should ever ask us or try to force us to do something that, as citizens of Christ’s kingdom, we cannot do, our response must echo the apostles: “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29).

It also means that our beliefs, worship, priorities, loves, and overall worldview are not shaped by the American ethos but by the teachings of the Christian Scriptures.

The Epistle of Diognetus, written in the 2nd century, captures these truths beautifully when it says of Christians: 'They participate in everything as citizens, and endure everything as foreigners.'

Here is the context:

'For Christians are not distinguished from the rest of humanity by country, language, or custom. For nowhere do they live in cities of their own, nor do they speak some unusual dialect, nor do they practice an eccentric way of life. This teaching of theirs has not been discovered by the thought and reflection of ingenious people, nor do they promote any human doctrine, as some do. But while they live in both Greek and barbarian cities, as each one’s lot was cast, and follow the local customs in dress and food and other aspects of life, at the same time they demonstrate the remarkable and admittedly unusual character of their own citizenship. They live in their own countries, but only as nonresidents; they participate in everything as citizens, and endure everything as foreigners. Every foreign country is their fatherland, and every fatherland is foreign.' (Michael Holmes, The Apostolic Fathers in English).

This is a sober truth to ponder as we celebrate this day." 

💙

"For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come." ( Hebrews 13:14 ) 

One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church / Part 5

By the way, this title is found in the "Nicene Creed." I grew up until the age of twelve reciting the Apostles' Creed in Sunday worship service each week, but what I learned about the Nicene Creed and love to say about it is that it's a creed with some teeth to it. 

These two along with the Athanasian Creed are the three ecumenical ( I'm always afraid to use that word since the Charismatic Renewal Movement because the word sort of carries a different meaning for some folks, but I think the creeds can speak for themselves on this misunderstanding actually, if read. ), anyway these creeds were written in times when heresy threatened the Church. For instance, from the Nicene Creed we get a solid Christology when the false teaching that Jesus was a created being surfaced and began making the rounds.  

These creeds are not extra biblical information, no, they are our statement of faith as Christians. They are what we believe. 

They are a summary of the Scriptures and were constructed by church fathers and councils when most people did not have a Bible as we do today, and many couldn't read anyway. So reciting the creeds together in church was vital. Reciting the truths were meant to keep us on track in our faith and hold the shepherds accountable for what they were feeding Christ's sheep. So we could readily test the spirits as John instructed us in his epistle. ( 1 John 4 ) 

The creeds were to be read and taught to our children so they could be raised with sound biblical doctrine and learn to defend the Christian faith, be an effective witness of the Gospel, and disciple others.  It's sad to me that the creeds seem to have fallen out of fashion and are no longer read in many, I hate to say it, but most churches, along with the Lord's Prayer each Sunday. 

There's something so beautiful to me about a congregation reciting and confirming out loud what we believe about God and then reading the Scriptures together. There's Holy Spirit power in that as we obediently come and gather each week around Christ and his Word. 

I know speaking those doctrines summarized in the Apostles' Creed so often at such a young age along with the Lord's Prayer had a profound effect on my life. Even though I didn't come to faith in Christ for many years, those biblical, doctrinal truths never left my heart. Today it's my goal to make up for lost time and treasure them a bit more each day.

No wonder angels long to look into them. ( 1 Peter 1:12 ) 

💜

"I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible. 

And I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made; who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary and was made man; and was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried. And the third day rose again according to the Scriptures and ascended into heaven and sits at the right hand of the Father. And he will come again with glory to judge both the living and the dead, whose kingdom will have no end.

And I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, who spoke by the prophets. And I believe in one holy Christian and apostolic Church I acknowledge one Baptism for the remission of sins, and I look for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.

Amen"

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T.G.I.M. ( 6 minute read )

"One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church" Part 4 / Biblical Theology ( 6 minute read ) 

Hey, Friends, today I have a guest blogger! I am sharing a wonderful, short transcript from Barry Cooper lead pastor at Christ Community Church in Daytona, FL and who also holds a position at Ligonier Ministries. 

Since we've established that the true preaching of God's Word is the first mark of a true church I thought Pastor Cooper's words are relevant and insightful in laying a foundation of just what this true preaching will look like since last time I asked the question: How do we know we're learning the truth when we read the Bible because many teachers and preachers "use" the Bible unaware or aware for their own agendas or gain? 

This is worth the read: 

"The word Bible comes from the Greek word biblia, meaning “books.” What you hold in your hands when you hold a Bible is a library: a collection of documents.

But we shouldn’t make the mistake of thinking that this “library” is a random grab-bag or, as we say on my side of the pond, a hotch-potch. The books hang together as a whole. They’re more like single episodes in a sixty-six-episode TV season, with each “episode” developing and expanding and deepening the overall story line. The Bible as a whole has many, many themes that run all the way through it, all the way from Genesis to Revelation.

That is what biblical theology is all about: tracing those themes across the timeline of Scripture as a whole, to see how they develop.

Biblical theology is often contrasted with systematic theology. At the risk of oversimplifying, systematic theology is like reading an encyclopedia, and biblical theology is like reading a story. 

The first takes individual subjects—for example, “salvation”—and tries to summarize everything Scripture says on the subject. 

But biblical theology traces the theme of salvation as it grows and develops across Scripture from start to finish. Biblical theology recognizes that Scripture itself is not an encyclopedia. It is a story, a true story, played out across the stage of human history. Like any story, it has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and we won’t be able to understand the story as a whole if we don’t attend to all those pieces, in sequence.

Like any good story, although the biblical narrative involves many different characters, there is a hero at the heart of it all, and the story, ultimately, is about Him. Jesus Himself is clear about this when He says that all of Scripture “bears witness about me.”

After His resurrection, Jesus shows two of His disciples (on the road to Emmaus) how all of Scripture relates directly to Him. The text says that “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, [Jesus] interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.”

Now notice that Jesus began with Moses and the Prophets. He could presumably have just pointed to Himself and said, “Don’t worry about all that old stuff. I’m here now.” But no, Jesus encourages them—and us—to begin with Moses and the Prophets. That’s because if we don’t understand the “then,” we won’t properly understand the “now” or indeed the “not yet.” That is why we do biblical theology.

Read Scripture in this way, and you begin to see that there’s a progressive revelation at work, meaning that biblical truth becomes progressively clearer and clearer to us as the story develops. By the time we reach Revelation, we are able to see things in Genesis that we would have missed if we’d only had Genesis to go on. And we see things in Revelation we never would have seen had we not read Genesis first. As Augustine put it, “The New [Testament] is in the Old concealed; the Old is in the New revealed.”

Perhaps it might help us to see the value of biblical theology if we think for a moment about what might happen if we neglected it.

Let’s say I really want to understand Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (amazing book, by the way). It wouldn’t work if all I did was to dip in and out of it at random spots, pointing at individual sentences and saying, “Ah, so that’s what Jane Eyre’s all about.” It would also be unwise to start reading in the middle of the book without reference to what’s gone before. My picture of who Jane is, or who Mr. Rochester is, would be seriously impaired if I’d ignored the first nineteen chapters.

The best approach would be to read it from start to finish, to see how it unfolds as a story (that’s biblical theology). And then also, once I’ve done that, it would be good to dip in and out of it in different places to concentrate on particular themes (that would be systematic theology).

But to make sense of the “micro,” the details, we really need to get to grips with the “macro,” the overarching story of the whole book—the way the story unfolds, chapter by chapter, with each chapter building on the one before, revealing more and more about character and plot.

So it is with Scripture. And that’s why we do biblical theology."

💜

Happy Monday! 

"Stay cool in the pool," Aslan says. 😎

"One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church" Part 3 B

Yesterday I published the first part of this - I had made a couple of assertions and this part should help develop them out. I hope it makes sense. I just want to keep them short. Some friends have asked. 

So, since according to the Scriptures and biblical theologians, the first mark of a true church is the true preaching of God's Word, we need a contextual understanding of the Bible as a whole as well as that of the smaller parts that form the whole. This is of vital importance because what we believe about the Bible will determine what we believe about God. 

We were created for God, and the pursuit of our Christian lives is to know Him, the one true God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent. This is eternal life. ( John 17:3 ) Do we actually "know" him or just maybe know some things "about" him? Or worse, do we believe what the American Gospel is selling, and thus believe in a god of our own making and not the God of the Bible? 

Throughout most of the last two-thousand years of church history, Christ's church has not had access to a Bible; many folks were actually illiterate and relied on the clergy to read and teach them the Scriptures. 

The main thrust of the Reformation was the "rediscovery" of the Bible ( and justification by faith alone ) and it was William Tyndale who promised to get the Bible into the hands of a plow boy that he may know more of the Scriptures than Tyndale himself. 

Praise God. I'm very sure I don't know as much of the Scripture as Tyndale, but I'm thankful for the ultimate price he paid for God's Holy Word. By the way, historically we can see that the church has had the most growth when we faced times of greatest persecution. And I'm willing to bet this is true on an individual basis as well. 

Coinciding with the invention of the printing press, the Reformation indeed made the Bible more accessible to the common people. Sadly, today we have more Bibles available to us, especially in the western world, and yet, people are just as biblically ignorant as ever. 

Why is that? 

Every era of church history has had its unique battles and heresy to combat, but the authority, inerrancy, and sufficiency of the Scriptures has been an on-going, never-ending bombardment against Christ's church down through all ages. 

I believe the enemy's greatest attack against us is to keep God's Word out of the hands and hearts of God's children because the Bible is God's revealed Word to his us, his "special revelation." You can see how it differs from the "general revelation" we see about God in his creation. ( Romans 1:19-20 ) His written Word is specific and gives us all we need to lead a godly life. 

And the Bible is how God actually speaks to us - how we know him. Satan would love nothing more than to blind us from this truth.  

And he's hard at it. 

The progressive movement here in America in the last century within the mainline denominations has questioned severely the inerrancy, authority, and sufficiency of the Scriptures and leaves it up to the church folk to decide what parts of the Bible we would like to keep and what offensive parts to toss out as antiquated and archaic. And in doing so, out goes the core, essential doctrines of the Christian faith. Thus, out goes Christianity altogether. 

Without the core doctrines, there is no faith. You know that, right? 

And if Satan can't start a dumpster fire with the Bible, he'll move onto plan B which is a twisting of the truth, and the temptation he used on Jesus. I guess he knew he couldn't get Jesus to disregard the Scriptures, so his tactic was to contort and twist God's Word. The devil is slick. 

And Jesus is God - so he didn't fall for it.

But Eve did. 

"Did God really say......?" The serpent deceived her. 

And she bit into the lie and gave some to her husband to eat. 

And as sons and daughters of Eve, let us not become prideful. We are just as susceptible today. Look at us! There are so many false teachings masquerading as the truth in our "Christian" culture just as the Bible said would happen. 

So again, what we believe about the Bible will influence what we believe about God and ourselves. We need to think deeply about this because there are movements claiming Christianity that have actually created a god that is not the God revealed in Scripture. There's is a distant or weak and impotent god, a god that man controls or a god more like Santa Clause than the one true God. 

And it's not enough just to have the Bible and be reading it!!!! 

We MUST have the correct interpretation of the Scriptures, a.k.a. "hermeneutics." There is only one true meaning of a text. It's not, "Let's go around the circle and everyone tell what this verse means to them" kind of a thing. That's dangerous. There can be different applications, but only one original meaning that God spoke to us. It doesn't matter what it means to us - we're the creatures. What matters is what it means to God, the Creator and Sustainer of all things. The sovereign, eternal God. This is what matters. 

This is also where false teachers come into play. Remember, they "use" the Bible - that's how these wolves in sheep's wool snatch up and deceive people. There is always some truth mixed in with the error, as they also rely on their dreams and visions going beyond the Scriptures. ( Jude 8 ) We need to be aware of this, so we are not led astray. ( Matthew 24:4 ) 

A couple of weeks ago I was talking to a friend who is involved in a false movement Bible study where the author of the book they are using for the study not only rips verses out of their context to back up his false teaching, but continually tells of his dreams and visions instead of teaching the Bible. And my friend said in defense of the study, "But Rebecca, they do quote from the Bible!" 

"Exactly," I said, "So does Satan." ( Matthew 4:1-11 ) 

For example, if you've been in a church that has a misunderstanding of what it means to be created in the image of God and presents a false dichotomy of the creation story, teaching that God created man divine and you are just like Jesus, that's going to pollute your understanding of God, not to mention puffing up yourself with pride. Anything you attempt to build off of that false notion and foundation of being a little god, including your relationship with God, will end up crooked. 

So sound biblical hermeneutics is everything. "Sound interpretation leads to sound doctrine leads to sound living." 

We don't want to just possess an appearance of godliness with dead bones on the inside - that's what the American Gospel is producing. ( 2 Timothy 3:5 )  Rotten fruit is not the goal. 

But how do we know what we are learning is the truth? 

That's an important question. One we should take very seriously. 

For one thing we need to employ our God-given reasoning, common sense, and critical thinking skills. If you are in a church or movement that claims doctrine divides or that we don't need reasoning. Please grab your family and run to the nearest exit. 

Asking the question, "If God made man divine, how did Adam and Eve sin?" is just one small example of using our brains. Another one: Am I trusting this leader no matter what he spews or am I trusting what I read in the Bible? 

Or if we believe the Bible is outdated in modernity, how do we trust what we think is acceptable and not acceptable in the Scriptures when every church age has approved of all kinds of societal ills such as slavery and primogeniture at one time or another? 

Do you see what I mean? That's subjectivism. 

And for the love of all that is good in this world, we must read the Bible in context. Hijacking a verse out of God's original meaning is a common practice of false teachers. When I list a biblical reference in my blog, please, read the verses surrounding it. But better yet, read the entire chapter. I pray that my work inspires others to read and examine the Scriptures for themselves and know God better. 

There are hard things in the Bible, but we must let them stick if we are going to engage in authentic Bible study with any degree of integrity. The Bible is God's narrative, not ours. He alone says what it means. 

Lastly, and more importantly, the Holy Spirit doesn't just convict us of our sins; as I touched on briefly above, Jesus promises us that the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, will guide us in the truth. He will never deceive us. We can trust Him as we trust Christ to lead us in paths of righteousness. ( John 16:12 ) 

I know this isn't what my blog is about today, but I also want to interject quickly that the Holy Spirit equips us to serve God. Whatever is on our plate each day, no matter how daunting a task, the Holy Spirit empowers us to see us through. With joy and grace, I might add, and to the glory of God the Father. ( Philippians 1:6, 2:12, 1 Peter 4"11, Colossians 1:29 ) 

So, pray before you open your Bible each morning that the Holy Spirit will also open your mind to understand the Scriptures. ( Luke 24:13-35 ) If you aren't attending a local church, pray for God to guide you to a Gospel-centered church that is committed to the true preaching of God's Word. Don't be in a hurry. Wait for it. If we come before our Father in Heaven with a hunger and desire to understand his Word to us accurately, and this among his saints, I know that's a prayer he will answer. 

He has been answering it for me and my family, and I know he will answer it for yours. Don't give in to the enemy's attacks. Keep praying. And I'll continue on these true church essentials in the blogs to come. 

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healingbrookfarm1.blogspot.com 

Friends, I want to share some prayers for you and your family: Teach us your way, O LORD, that we may walk in your truth; unite our hearts to fear your name. ( Psalm 86:11 ) Sanctify us in the truth, your word is truth. ( John 17:17 ) Please help us to divide Scripture rightly. ( 2 Timothy 2:15 ) ( Charles Spurgeon likened this verse to hoeing straight rows in a garden. I like that analogy. )  To handle your Word with fear and trembling. ( Isaiah 66:2 ) To hide it in our hearts that we may not sin against you. ( Psalm 119:11 ) Let the word of Christ dwell in us richly. ( Colossians 3:16 )  Each morning let us awake with a hunger for the Scriptures and let us taste and see that you are good. Satisfy us with good so that our youth is renewed like the eagle's. ( Psalm 5:3, Psalm 103, Psalm 19:7-11 )  Also Psalm 119 - it's all about the Scriptures. You can pray prayers right out of the Scriptures, not just from the Psalter. Paul's epistle prayers for the Church are amazing and another favorite is Daniel's humble prayer in The Book of Daniel chapter 9. 

Amen and amen. 

"One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church" Part 3 A

The most devastating thing about the American Gospel perhaps is its avoidance of preaching on subjects deemed "unpleasant" and not "seeker friendly," such biblical doctrines as sin, God's wrath and judgement, hell, atonement, blood sacrifice, suffering, and anything else not in accordance with the "gospel of nice." And yet, to not preach or convey these biblical truths is to not proclaim the true Gospel of Christ or preach the full counsel of God's Word. So how is that truly being "nice?" 

And at a more concerning level it means to not be obedient to our Lord's command of the Great Commission, and thus not to see souls saved. 

Jesus said that when the Holy Spirit comes he will convict the world of sin, but if sin is not preached, if the human condition of being dead in our trespasses and sin as Ephesians 2:1 clearly states, is not taught, how can people be convicted of their sins, repent, and come to faith in Christ? 

"And how are they to hear without someone preaching?" ( Romans 10:14 ) 

The American church is shooting itself in the foot by insisting that the love of God, along with His kindness and goodness be taught while God's other attributes, the offensive ones, that don't typically draw a crowd, be downplayed. How does this hollowed-out message help anyone? It doesn't. In fact, it adds a greater burden to the person already looking for relief from their sin, guilt, and shame. 

God's attributes are present in God all at once, all the time. He's not like us. When we are angry we can easily forget to love. God's love isn't severed from his justice or his mercy from his wrath. 

We tend to think that God's holy wrath is directed at innocence. No, God's holy wrath is directed at evil because He IS love. His love demands that he be a just judge and execute righteous judgement against sin. And He does and will. ( Romans 1:18, 2:5 ) 

If sin isn't preached and the truth told, is the Holy Spirit even in a church service? 

I think it's a fair and important question. And further, what is the proof of the Spirit's work in someone's life? Encounters, emotions, a warm feeling inside? How can we trust these things? 

If the Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, righteousness, and judgement as Jesus says how can He be present to convict hearts if the preaching of the true Gospel as shown in the Scriptures, including man's sin and God's wrath isn't present?  ( John 16:8-15 ) I'm not trying to belabor the point, but in order for sinners to come to faith in Christ, they must first hear the word of Christ. ( Romans 10:17 ) 

And as believers, we still need to hear the Gospel message. We never get beyond it. I know, I write this a lot. But still, every sermon on any passage of Scripture will point to Christ in some way we haven't seen before. Each passage reveals more of the Godhead to us, and thus more of ourselves, so becoming an applied theology. Faith and practice. 

But we must hear the truth, and that means the whole truth, not just the parts we like, if we are to both be saved and then grow. Christ's sheep don't grow on a diet of self-help, positive confessions, pep talks, or bulletin points that more resemble a popular business model than the Word of God. 

The true Gospel is "the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes," ( Romans 1:16 ) and is the same power that transforms us into the image of Christ after our conversion. 

In my study on the denominations of Protestantism, I've learned there are three main criteria that biblical scholars, faithful Bible teachers, and Reformation theologians have agreed compose a true church from the Scriptures, ( even AI agreed lol ): 

1.) The true preaching of God's Word 

2.) The proper administration of the sacraments 

3.) The exercise of church discipline 

( These blogs are a series in response to my Roman Catholic friend who told me that his was the one true church, because we Protestants are divided into many denominations. And we are. However, another good friend in addition to my MIL educated me since that blog post that Roman Catholics actually do have denominations themselves. ) 

Spoiler alert: Christ's church is spread out all over the world, and as Saint Augustine reiterated, only God knows who are his. (2 Timothy 2:19 ) We don't. Yes, there are some evidences in a person's life, including their theology and character. However, it is very possible for a new believer to start out in a false church and eventually move to a true church. I suspect this happens a lot. 

I'll get to the second and third criteria in a later blog, but I wanted to expound some more on the first one. It's crucial the church get this one right, all of them, yes, but all other components of a true church are built off of the pure preaching of the God's Word. 

We have got to have a firm foundation on the Scriptures to ensure proper building. 

"I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word, be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching." ( 2 Timothy 4:1-2 ) 

Wow, that's strong language and a heavy exhortation coming from the Apostle Paul - who knows his time is short - to young pastor Timothy. He's charging him to preach the Word in the presence of God and Christ who is to judge us! 

With complete teaching! 

In other words, don't leave anything out. 

Paul tells the Ephesian elders in Acts 20:27 that he did not shrink from declaring to them the whole counsel of God. 

All of the Scripture must be taught. Old Testament and New Testament. We must be in churches that feed our souls if we are to be like Christ. That means even the above mentioned "uncomfortable" parts. 

We need a contextual understanding of the Bible as a whole as well as that of the smaller parts that form the whole. This is of vital importance because what we believe about the Bible will determine what we believe about God. 

I'm going to end here and post Part 3 B tomorrow because I'm attempting to keep these things short, like a 5 minute read, with hopefully small nourishing chunks for us to savor and think on in the between time. Friends, thank you for joining me and reading. 

Pops' Smoke Pit 

"One Holy Christian and Apostolic Church" Part 2

"I perceived that whatever God does endures forever; nothing can be added to it, nor anything taken from it. God has done it, so people fear before him." ( Ecclesiastes 3:14 ) 

"Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth." ( 5:2 ) 

"...then I saw all the work of God, that man cannot find out the work that is done under the sun. However much man may toil in seeking, he will not find it out. Even though a wise man claims to know, he cannot find it out." ( 8:17 ) 

The first mark of a "true church" according to the Church Fathers, faithful Bible teachers, Reformation theologians, biblical scholars, ( and even AI agreed, lol ) is: The true preaching of God's Word. ( 2 Timothy 4:1-4 ) 

And some biblical truths are not sitting on the surface of the pages of Scripture for us to reach down and gather them up into our pails like seashells scattered on the beach, but rather they are hidden beneath the shoreline waiting for us to knell in anticipation and dig for their worth. 

God has revealed himself in this way in his Word to his Church. God says who He is - not us. 

I think of the Farmer indulging in one of his favorite pass times, walking along the far reaches of the waves with his earphones on his head and his metal detector in hand, hovering it over the terrain, listening intently for the beep. 

He's also found antiquated pieces of the past at our farm, some broken and chipped, no matter, I display the vintage dishes, rusty tools, and cloudy, glass bottles on shelves in my little cabin - tangible heirlooms of those who came before me. Artifacts I can wrap my dirty fingers around and imagine more clearly the life they lived. One man's trash is another man's treasure. 

I think about that this morning as I awake in the sweet, little guest room of my son and daughter-in-law's Atlanta home for a long weekend visit, and my heart is overwhelmed with gratitude to the Farmer who will watch over the farm and my dad to make this possible for me. It's those type of treasures, like the priceless, fragmented pieces of pottery on my fireplace mantel, that I am most thankful for in this life. 

God's grace, his amazing grace. This truth is not hidden in the least. 

My personal Bible reading plan has me excavating in the Book of Ecclesiastes today, along with Proverbs and Job they are known collectively as Scripture's "wisdom literature." With this in mind, I feel it best I read at least one portion out of them daily. 

Although Solomon never directly states in Ecclesiastes that God is sovereign, the truth weaves itself through every thought and verse. Man can not escape this reality of the God who created him, from his birth to his death to everything that lies in between. To not understand this biblical truth and live in light of it is foolishness Solomon warns. 

And yet, man is not a puppet on a string; man makes decisions. He has a free will. Or does he? 

When asked which of his theological writings he would hope to survive above all others, Martin Luther replied, "The Bondage of the Will." I think it's fitting that this year marks the 500th anniversary of that book. And thankfully it has survived. 

The book was in response to the on-going, and perhaps most famous, certainly I believe most important, debate in church history, between Luther and Erasmus, at least as important as St. Augustine and Pelagius in the 4th century, over freewill and predestination. 

Luther unpacks man's depravity, sin, God's sovereign grace, and explains how even though we may seem to be free spirits, ( I'm paraphrasing a bit ) when our first parents fell, it not only effected our physical bodies in sickness and death, but their sin also tainted our free spirits - including our minds and our wills. In other words, no part of us or our agency was left untouched by the power of that first sin.

We have a will, but it is in bondage. 

If we think we are free - try not to sin. It's impossible. One may possibly make a good effort at first, but the flesh eventually caves in on itself. Read Romans 7. Contrary to what some will have you to believe, in this chapter Paul is talking about being a saint - the verbiage is present tense. 

"Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin." ( Romans 7:24&25 ) 

We are waiting for the redemption of our bodies. ( Romans 8:23 ) We are slaves to sin. We choose only in accordance with our nature. "no one seeks for God." ( Romans 3:11 ) 

Luther pointed out that if Satan rides, the will goes where Satan wills, If God rides, where God wills. Either way, there is no free choice. I know, it seems to be a hard pill to swallow, but honestly when I think about it this morning, I wouldn't want it any other way. 

J.I. Packer says in "Concise Theology: A guide to Historic Christian Beliefs" that what Augustine affirmed against Pelagius and most of the Greek Fathers is that original sin has robbed us of free will in the sense that we can choose God's way because we have no inclination Godward; our hearts are in bondage to sin, and only the grace of regeneration can free us from that slavery. 

We need God to be sovereign, and He is. Even if it were possible, do we really want man to be in charge? I do not. Look around at us. The only reason the earth doesn't crack down the center and split wide open from the power of sin is due to God's common grace and mercy over this place. 

"He has mercy over all that he has made." ( Psalm 145:9 ) "He rains on the just and the unjust" ( Matthew 5:45 ) "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy." ( Exodus 33:19, Romans 9:15 ) "His mercies are new every morning." ( Lamentations 3:23 )  

It took only one sin in the Garden of Eden to ruin all of humanity throughout the entire history of the world. Think about the power of that! 

Sin left without God's sovereign grace and mercy is hell. 

But what about our decisions?  I don't know. Even the greatest theologians couldn't thoroughly explain it. Charles Spurgeon said that the two don't need reconciled because they are friends. It's known theologically as "compatibilism" -  God's sovereignty and man's responsibility working some mysterious way together. 

Not only is this truth found in Ecclesiastes, but it cuts straight through the Scripture and spreads to every passage. 

From the life of not just Joseph, perhaps the most well-known example, but to all of the saints. And to his Son Jesus Christ as Peter tells the Jews gathered on the day of Pentecost that they were responsible for crucifying and killing Jesus. ( Acts 2 ) 

And yet it was also God's definite plan, Peter preached, without letting them off of the hook for their sin or by excusing them for being coerced. No, they were held responsible. "Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him.." ( Isaiah 53:10 ) This is the verse the Farmers says overwhelms his heart the most for the love and grace of God.  

For some, this tension between God's sovereignty and man's responsibility causes great angst, not to mention a headache, but for me, it brings great comfort. In this world that seems to be getting crazier by the minute and determined to bust hell wide open, I rest my body and spirit in the soft feather bed of this comforting doctrine.

One man's angst is another man's refreshment and joy, I guess. I thank God for his sovereignty in the midst of this messy world full of man's sinful debacles and frailty. What a hope for us to cling to. 

It's like one of those hidden treasures that has been unearthed in the red clay of Healing Brook. I love to pick it up from time to time and explore with visitors the mystery of what it means and where its been, and then place it back on the mantel to marvel at and enjoy. 

As I've pointed out before, in Christ, we are all learning and growing, and even the Church corporately, we see throughout her history, has followed in this painful and ponderous path of faith. And that doesn't happen over night. This is how God in his sovereignty has chosen to do things with his children, and we should all display grace to each other in these journeys. 

On the surface this can look like an ugly place, but the beautiful explanation is found hidden beneath the waves and beyond the clay and the sand. 

One day we will all have a new, perfect, resurrected body with a perfect will to match. For now, let's find comfort and unity together in Christ's Church in the mysterious ways he has seen fit to build us. 

Because what I do know is that while we were sinners, slaves to sin, Christ died for us, making us slaves instead to righteousness, clothed before God in His righteousness. Because of the sovereign grace of God alone, he has not allowed us to remain dead in our trespasses and sins. When we could do nothing to help ourselves, God sent his Son to do what we could never do. 

We could not unlock the shackles, but Christ has set us free. ( Galatians 5:1, John 8:36 ) 

Repent and believe. 

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"And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit,

'Why did the Gentiles rage,
and the peoples plot in vain?
The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers were gathered together,
against the Lord and against his Anointed’

for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place." ( Acts 4:24-28 ) 

"This is the end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every evil deed into judgement, with every secret thing, whether good or evil." ( Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 )