Efficacious Preaching

On the efficacy of preaching, Michael Horton insists "It is effective because God has promised to dispense his saving grace then and there by the Spirit, and it grows organically out of the logic of the message itself because it is an announcement of something that has been accomplished by God, rather than an incentive to get sinners to save themselves by sheer force of will or effort. It is good news, not good advice, good production value, or good ideas."

Horton elaborates on this good news: ". . . we can always count on God being where he has promised to meet us . . . . The power of the Spirit is linked to a promise; namely, a promise that faith comes by hearing the gospel preached (Rom. 10:8, 17)" (A Better Way: Rediscovering the Drama of God-Centered Worship, 64-65).

Charles Spurgeon Wants You To Pray Like Luther

"The secret of Luther's power lay in the same direction [the endeavor of prevailing with God for men in prayer]. Theodorus [a friend of Luther] said of him: "I overheard him in prayer, but, good God, with what life and spirit did he pray! It was with so much reverence, as if here speaking to God, yet with so much confidence as if he were speaking to his friend." My brethren, let me beseech you to be men of prayer. Great talents you may never have, but you will do well enough without them if you abound in intercession" (C. H. Spurgeon, Lectures to My Students, 45).

Family Resemblance: Sanctification and Holiness

"If men have no likeness to the Father in heaven, it is vain to talk of their being His "sons." If we know nothing of holiness we may flatter ourselves as we please, but we have not got the Holy Spirit dwelling in us: we are dead, and must be brought to life again--we are lost, and must be found. "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they," and they only, "are the sons of God." (Rom. viii. 14.) We must show by our lives the family we belong to.--We must let men see by our good conversation that we are indeed the children of the Holy One, or our son-ship is but an empty name" (J. C. Ryle, Holiness, 42).

Dominion Religion

"With this expression of spirituality [what the author calls "dominion religion" - a form of spirituality that is derived from application of Genesis 1:28] there is a desire to develop the world for the benefit of others and the glory of God. This development occurs as God's people are serious about applying His Word to very area of life. It also involves a willingness to make sacrifices to further His kingdom. Although Christians have held this view during much of history, only a minority of Christians seem to be aware of it today. most Christians, at least in America, are of the escapist variety. They see the value of their faith as it applies to their own personal piety, but don't seem to expect it to have much influence in the world. The kind of change our world needs will only come about with a change in worldview where men do not seek power over one another, but seek power of God to build His kingdom together [CCS: This kingdom building is a liturgical endeavor at its root--involving both worldview and worship.]. There's only one spiritual option out there today that can bring this about, and it's the practice of dominion spirituality" (David Bostrom, Get Dominion: You've Been Called to Fulfill a Mission, 73).

Christian Faith As Prayer

"So Lord, Teach Us presents the Christian faith not as a set of beliefs but rather as a prayer that you must learn to pray. Along the way, we will discuss doctrines, but Christian doctrines are like prayer, a set of practices. The doctrines are meant to help us pray, "Our Father. . . ." This book is shaped by the Lord's Prayer because the prayer is a mark of the journey called Christian. The prayer names the danger you will face as well as providing the help--the necessary skills--you will need for negotiating the dangers of the journey. Christianity means conflict. We never forget, as we pray, that the one who taught us to pray in this way was crucified" (William H. Willimon & Stanley Hauerwas, Lord, Teach Us: The Lord's Prayer and the Christian Life, 15).

Fishing for Men

Charles Spurgeon on fishing for men: "I sometimes hear of persons getting very angry after a gospel sermon, and I say to myself, "I am not sorry for it." Sometimes when we are fishing the fish gets the hook into its mouth. He pulls hard at the line; if he were dead, he would not; but he is a live fish, worth the getting; and though he runs away for a while, with the hook in his jaws, he cannot escape. His very wriggling and his anger show that he has got the hook, and the hook has got him. Have the landing-net ready; we shall land him by and by. Give him more line; let him spend his strength, and then we will land him, and he shall belong to Christ forever" (Spurgeon's Sermon Illustrations, 56).

Reminds me that we all go to Christ kicking and screaming, wriggling and flopping. There is no other way, for we are, after all, saved by grace. At first, we are angry, we don't like the gospel and we don't like gospel sermons. But then God regenerates us, he gives us a new heart and new desires. Thus, the gospel becomes sweet to us, gospel sermons become sweet to us. Our anger is changed to joy unspeakable.

Prayer is a Letter

"We must direct our prayer, as we direct our speech to the person we have business with. The Bible is a letter God hath sent to us; prayer is a letter we send to him" (Matthew Henry, Directions for Daily Communion with God).

American Date

"The Classic American Date: go see a movie together. Our culture is so film-saturated that this invitation is the easiest and most natural one to make" (Grant Horner, Meaning at the Movies: Becoming a Discerning Viewer, 145).

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Ain't that the truth. My wife and I went on our "first date" on December 12, 2004--we watched Ocean's Twelve.

Hollywood and Movies: "Self-Portraits . . . Strangest Form of Art"

"This [Sunset Boulevard] is one of the darkest films ever produced in Hollywood, undoubtedly because Hollywood is the subject, and Hollywood is people. Self-portraits are always the strangest form of art. They always tell the truth even while they lie. The title of the film comes from the famous street winding through the northern Los Angeles hills and down to the Pacific Ocean. The road is curvy, hilly, and very heavily used--in other words, it is dangerous. . . . This story about the film industry and what it can do to the human soul is absolutely blistering, even six decades after its release. It deals with the arts of screenwriting, directing, and acting; shows the costs and temptations of becoming famous and rich; delineates the manipulation by others and self so endemic to the artistic and business world that is Hollywood; brutally snickers at Hollywood wackiness; and calculates the cost of selling the soul for an image. Fame is shown for what it really is: the temporary acclamation of people who eventually turn on you and then laugh at you, pity you--or both. The message is simple: Hollywood kills" (Grant Horner, Meaning at the Movies: Becoming a Discerning Viewer, 184-185).

Word of God: Creates Faith

"The Word [God's word of salvation], all-powerful in its effect and salvific in its benefit, creates the faith that receives it" (Thomas J. Davis, This Is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 58).

Redeemed From Curse of the Law

"The curse of the law. "Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us" (Gal. 3:13). The curse of the law is its penal sanction. This is essentially the wrath or curse of God, the displeasure which rests upon every infraction of the law's demand. "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them" (Gal. 3:10). Without deliverance from this curse there could be no salvation. It is from this curse that Christ has purchased his people and the price of the purchase was that he himself became a curse. He became so identified with the curse resting on his people that the whole of it in all its unrelieved intensity became his. That curse he bore and that curse he exhausted. That was the price paid for this redemption and the liberty secured for the beneficiaries is that there is no more curse" (John Murray, Redemption - Accomplished and Applied, 44).

Meditation: Not "Think, Think, Think"

Christians are called to mediate on Scripture (see Psalm 1), but we don't mediate on Scripture the way Winnie the Pooh tries to conjure up ideas for how to find honey: "Think, think, think." Rather, we mediate on Scripture with the Holy Spirit. We don't say, "Think, think, think." We say, "Teach me, teach me, teach me."

As Donald S. Whitney notes, "Meditation must always involve two people -- the Christian and the Holy Spirit. Praying over a text is the invitation for the Holy Spirit to hold His divine light over the words of Scripture to show you what you cannot see without Him" (Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, 55).

Praying and Reading

What to pray while reading Scripture: "Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of thy law" (Psalm 119:18).

Sweet Poison of False Infinite

"He [Professor Weston, i.e. the antagonist] was a man obsessed with the idea which is at this moment circulating all over our planet in obscure works of "scientifiction," in little Interplanetary Societies and rocketry Clubs, and between the covers of monstrous magazines, ignored or mocked by the intellectuals, but ready, if ever the power is put into its hands, to open a new chapter of misery for the universe. It is the idea that humanity, having now sufficiently corrupted the planet where it arose, must at all costs contrive to seed itself over a larger area: that the vast astronomical distances which are God's quarantine regulations, must somehow be overcome. This for a start. But beyond this lies the sweet poison of the false infinite -- the wild dream that planet after planet, system after system, in the end galaxy after galaxy, can be forced to sustain, everywhere and for ever, the sort of life which is contained in the loins of our own species -- a dream begotten by the hatred of death upon the fear of true immortality, fondled in secret by thousands of ignorant men and hundreds who are not ignorant. The destruction or enslavement of other species in the universe, if such there are, is to these minds a welcome corollary" (C. S. Lewis, Perelandra, 81-82).

God Revealing Godself: The Heart of All Theology

"[A]t the heart of all theology for Luther is God and how one knows God; or perhaps better said, one must start all theology with understanding how it is that God reveals Godself" (Thomas J. Davis, This Is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 58).

The Community of Love

"Luther did not do away with the notion of good works, works of love; he repositioned good works so that they follow necessarily from the working of the Word. Good works do not effect salvation; they are its flowering. The communio sanctorum, the community of love, is thus a necessary result of the Word" (Thomas J. Davis, This Is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 58).

How to Wash Your Hair in Outer Space

I spend very, very little time in the land of YouTube. However, this was too cool to pass up. Enjoyed this with my kiddos.

Two Parts of Gospel Communication

"Christianity is enshrined in the life: but it is proclaimed by the lips. If there is a failure in either respect the gospel cannot be communicated" (Michael Green, Evangelism in the Early Church, 194).

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One of my pastors back in Indiana use to say, "You need to wear your theology." In the quote above, Michael Green is saying the same thing. There are two parts to Gospel Communication: 1) Life and life-style and works -- aka, one's agenda/what you do, and 2) the words and speech that dance on your lips -- aka, one's creed and confession/what you proclaim. That is, you need to wear/live what you believe (your theology). Therefore, Gospel Communication consists of two parts, and the twain ought not to be separated.

Guide and Tone for Prayer

"God must be the guide of your desires, and the ground of your expectations in prayer. . . . Keep your voice in tune for prayer, and let all your language be a pure language, that you may be fit to call on the name of the Lord, Zeph. iii. 9 (From Directions for Daily Communion with God by Matthew Henry).

Matthew Henry on Prayer and Business, and Their Relation

"Let not any other business hinder our saying what we have to say to God. We have business with a friend, perhaps, but we cannot do it, because we have not leisure; we have something else to do, which we think more needful; but we cannot say so concerning the business we have to do with God; for that is without doubt the one thing needful, to which every thing else must be made to truckle and give way. It is not at all necessary to our happiness that we be great in the world, or raise estates to such a pitch. But it absolutely necessary that we make our peace with God, that we obtain his favour, and keep ourselves in his love. Therefore no business for the world will serve to excuse our attendance upon God; but, on the contrary, the more important our worldly business is, the more need we have to apply ourselves to God by prayer for his blessing upon it, and so take him along with us in it. The closer we keep to prayer, and to God in prayer, the more will all our affairs prosper" (from Directions for Daily Communion with God).

Eucharistic Model, Again

Thomas J. Davis quoting Martin Luther: "Now this is the fruit, that even as we have eaten and drunk, and say the same words to our neighbor, Take, eat, and drink . . . meaning to offer yourself with all your life, even as Christ did with all that he had" (This Is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 56).

Do Not Tithe Your Children

"The first and basic premise of paganism, socialism, and Molech worship is its claim that the state owns the child. The basic premise of the public schools is this claim of ownership, a fact some parents are encountering in the courts. It is the essence of paganism to claim first the lives of the children, then the properties of the people." (Excerpt from reprint from R. J. Rushdoony's The Roots of Reconstruction, 9-10.)

 

Social Collateral: A Great and Power Thing

Here is a thoughtful article by Peter Leithart; he is commenting on Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956, and his closing thoughts are quite compelling: social collateral (the matrix and benefits created by social institutions) is greater and more powerful than raw free enterprise (the market).

Leithart says that the former, not the latter, serves as a better bulwark to tyranny. Surely, for some, this is a controversial statement.

Eucharistic Model

"What God has done for the individual in eucharistic celebration then becomes the model for how the believer acts toward others" (Thomas J. Davis, This is My Body: The Presence of Christ in Reformation Thought, 55).

The Shorter Catechism: Q.1

The answer to the first question ("What is the chief end of man?") from The Shorter Catechism is the paradigmatic compound sentence, "Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever."

This "chief end" is the design at back the master narrative of humanity. As A. W. Tozer said, "God formed us for himself. . . . God formed us for His pleasure, and so formed us that we as well as He can in divine communion enjoy the sweet and mysterious mingling of kindred personalities. He meant us to see Him and live with Him and draw our life from His smile" (see The Pursuit of God, Chapter 3).

Put on Christ

"[W]e are repeatedly told to "put on Christ" or to "clothe" ourselves with Christ. This is the costume of our new character. Instead of the fig leaves that, as children of Adam and Eve, we used to cover up our shame, God has provided the sacrificial clothing of Jesus Christ and his perfect righteousness, foreshadowed when he clothed Adam and Eve" (Michael Horton, A Better Way: Rediscovering the Drama of God-Centered Worship, 56).