Tolle Lege: Father, Son, & Holy Spirit

Sometimes it’s nice to read a book when you leave unimpressed with the writing style and creativity of the author. I don’t think Ware a person personally devoid of creativity; I think he was very purposeful in his writing style. While many are looking for creative and innovative ways of expressing the Trinity (The Shack) it is refreshing to read a simple, biblical, historical, traditional, and creedal expression of the Trinity. Ware’s Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is written such that the ordinary layman will have no problems digesting it.

And the three members of the Godhead work together in harmony. Not in unison, but in harmony. “Unison” expresses a form of unity, yet it has no texture and richness. “Harmony,” however, communicates the idea of unified expression but only through differing yet complementary parts. You have different voices in different pitches. One carries the melody, but just one. Others carry the strains of harmony to fill out and complement the melody. If you think that only one part matters, you are sorely mistaken. For again, to achieve the kind of textured and rich unity that harmony accomplishes, all the parts are important. Yet each part has to be an expression of the same score, the same composition, expressing the mind of the composer.

The beauty of harmony is a beauty of diversity without discord, of distinctiveness without disarray, of complexity without cacophony.

So it is with the Trinity: it is God’s unified nature expressed richly and beautifully in the three equal and full possessions and manifestations of that one nature, with each “voice” contributing variously, yet with complete unity and identity of nature or essence. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are not identical Persons, but they are harmonious in accomplishing the one undivided purpose, one undivided goal, one common work, since they each possess fully the one, undivided divine essence. So, unity and difference, identity and distinction-this marks the triune nature of God most centrally. Just how this identity and distinction gets worked out among the Persons of the Godhead, and what this means to the lives of us who are made in his image-these questions are what will occupy us through the remaining chapters of our study.

To insist on egalitarian relationships where God has designs structures of authority and submission is to indicate, even implicitly, that we just don’t like the very authority-submission structures that characterize who God is, and that characterize his good and wise created design for us. But when we see that this structure of authority-submission pictures God himself – that the members of the Trinity exist eternally as equal in their essence but distinct in the taxis that marks their distinct roles – then we realize that what we have chafed at is, at heart, the very nature of God himself.

We are images of God in order to image God…

No competition, no jealousy, no bitterness, and no dispute exist among these Persons. Here in the Trinity, rather, we see hierarchy without hubris, authority with no oppression, submission that is not servile, and love that pervades ever aspect of the divine life. Unity and diversity, identity and distinction, sameness and difference, melody and harmony – these are the qualities that mark the rich texture of the life of the one God who is three.

Isaiah 61 & 2nd & 3rd Generation Christians

One of my favorite chapters in Minority Report warns how forgetting history disempowers us. Today we fail to recognize false teaching because we are unaware of the heresies that the church condemned in the past. The Shack would not have been tolerated by Athanasius or the rest of the council of Nicaea.

*****

Do you remember David Platt speaking about his mission trip to China a couple of years ago at student life? These Chinese Christian would stealthily travel for miles to a remote location, sitting on small uncomfortable chairs in a room lit by one bulb chairs to hear the word of God taught for hours a day, weeks at a time. There would always be someone on guard, as they were risking their lives to hear the Word of God, evidently to these Chinese Christian the rewards of studying the Bible outweighed the risk.

Let’s say a few migrate to the United States. Every time they now gather an atmosphere of joy and thanksgiving abounds. They are deeply thankful to God for the freedoms they now enjoy. But a shift slowly takes place. The second generation vaguely remembers the past, it has become a shadow, and as the shadow grows, the light of yesterday shines less brightly. With the third generation the shadow of the past is all that remains, and their joy is less for it.

You cannot survive of the faith of your fathers, it must be your own. Their history must become your reality. Do you see yourself as the captive Jew in this text? The Hebrew who has sinned greatly against God, who has been driven out from the His presence, outside the place of His blessing? Do you see how sin has devastated you, placed you in bondage, abused you, and left you in tattered slave garments? Or have you always assumed His saving love and mercy?

A beautiful headdress only comes to those who have covered their heads with the ashes of repentance. A bright, healthy face shining with joy belongs to those who have mourned and wept over sin. Those who are clothed with praise are those who first wore the clothes of a desperate beggar.

Is the history of the saints your history? Is the faith once delivered to the saints your faith?  If this text does not come as the most joyful of news, if you do not leap at the concepts of liberation and freedom – then perhaps liberation and freedom are not yours.

John Owen and MP3 Sermons

Listen to mp3 sermons. You will be rewarded. So many blessed teachers are available online for free it would be a shame not to sit under their preaching. Recently I recommended Piper’s biographical message on John Paton. This would be a great way to start. As I was reading through John Owen on Indwelling Sin this morning I thought the 17th century Puritan could give us some advice on listening to mp3 sermons. The help came from chapter nine of his treatise where he offers prayer and meditation as primary ways of fighting indwelling sin.

1) Don’t expect your flesh to leap with joy. “There is an aversion, as hath been declared, in the law of sin (indwelling sin) unto the immediate communion with God.” Would you rather listen to Coldplay or Sinclair Ferguson while you exercise? Sure one may pump you up, but which one will leave you with fuel for long meditation bearing joy?

2) What you lack in duration make up for in frequency. “Some are discouraged because their minds do not regularly supply them with thoughts to carry on their meditations, through the weakness or imperfections of their own inventions. Let this be supplied by frequent returns of the mind unto the subject proposed to be meditated upon, whereby new senses will still be supplied unto it.” I rarely listen to a sermon in one sitting. Mostly I listen in the mornings for approximately fifteen minutes while I take care of the dogs and eat breakfast. I listen while I do chores, walk the dogs, and work outside. All are short, stolen, precious moments.

3) Worship. This is my favorite line from the chapter:

Meditate of God with God; that is, when we would undertake thoughts and meditations of God, his excellencies, his properties, his glory, his majesty, his love, his goodness, let it be done in a way of speaking unto God, in a deep humiliation and abasement of our souls before him. This will fix the mind, and draw it forth from one thing to another, to give glory unto God in a due manner, and affect the soul until it be brought into that holy admiration of God and delight in him which is acceptable unto him. My meaning is, that it be done in a way of prayer and praise,-speaking unto God.

Begin your listening with a prayer. Pray that worship happen in your mind and heart. Pray that you have discernment to take in only what is scriptural. Pray that you have humility to learn and repent. Don’t just listen to the sermon; listen to the sermon fellowshipping with God.

Recommendations (iTunes links):

Students and adults:
John Piper
Matt Chandler
Mark Driscoll
Don’t Waste Your Life

Adults:
Sinclair Ferguson
Allister Begg
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Tolle Lege: Minority Report

Carl Trueman is the Dean of Faculty and professor of historical theology and church history at Westminster Theological Seminary. He blogs at Reformation 21. His book Minority Report is a collection of various articles and blog posts. As a foreign national he offers some great critiques of American culture; this alongside his pleas for a healthy love of church history make the book a good read. I would recommend you read his blog first to sample. If you buy the book I would advise you to read section 2 first as I think it he more enjoyable and accessible part of the book.

Yet evangelicals in our anti-historical mode seem prone to one of the two tendencies noted above: an idolatry of the new and the novel, with the concomitant disrespect for anything traditional; or nostalgia for the past which is little more than an idolatry of the old and the traditional. Both are disempowering: the first leaves the church as a free-floating, anarchic entity which is doomed to reinvent Christianity anew every Sunday, and prone to being subverted and taken over by any charismatic (in the non-theological sense!) leader of group which cares to flex its muscle; the second leaves the church bound to its past as its leaders care to write that past and thus unable to engage critically with her own tradition. Humble and critical engagement with history is thus imperative for history, and we would be arrogant simply to ignore the past as irrelevant; critical, because history has been made by sinful, fallen, and thus deeply fallible human beings, and thus is no pure and straightforward revelation of God. It is this balance of humility and criticism that we must strike if we are to truly benefit from history.

Tolle Lege: John G. Paton: Missionary to the New Hebrides

I am going to start a new category of posts identified by “[b:]” in their title. This will be a humble attempt to share and refresh my memory of books that I have recently read that were spiritually nourishing. They will not function as reviews as I am not qualified and lack the time. My comments will be few and the quotes many.

John Paton: Missionary to the New Hebrides

John Paton was born on May 24, 18:64 and died January 28, 1907 at 82 years of age. He was a missionary to the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu, think Survivor 2004) where he first ministered courageously on the cannibal, warring island of Tanna. He saw little fruit there in his lifetime, however mighty seeds were planted. There he lost his wife, fellow missionaries, assistants, and his few earthly possessions. He then labored on the small island of Aniwa where He saw the mighty arm of God’s salvation in many souls. I highly recommend the book; although the 500 pages can be intimidating, know that missionary biographies function as the “action thrillers” of Christian biography, and they don’t get much better than this.

Here are some snippets:

Recollecting his Sunday experiences as a child: They went to church, full of beautiful expectancy of spirit – their souls were on the outlook for God; they returned from the church, ready and even anxious to exchange ideas as to what they had heard and received of the things of life. I have to bear my testimony that religion was presented to us with a great deal of intellectual freshness, and that it did not repel us, but kindled our spiritual interest. The talks we heard were, however, genuine; not the make-believe of religious conversation, but the sincere outcome of their own personalities. That, perhaps, makes all the difference betwixt talk that attracts and talk that drives away.

While sitting in a coconut tree evading murderous natives: Being entirely at the mercy of such doubtful and vacillating friends, I, though perplexed, felt it best to obey. I climbed into the tree and was left there alone in the bush. The hours I spent there live all before me as if it were but of yesterday. I heard the frequent discharging of muskets, and the yells of the Savages. Yet I sat there among the branches, as safe as in the arms of Jesus. Never, in all my sorrows, did my Lord draw nearer to me, and speak more soothingly in my soul, than when the moonlight flickered among those chestnut leaves, and the night air played on my throbbing brow, as I told all my heart to Jesus. Alone, yet not alone! If it be to glorify my God, I will not grudge to spend many nights alone in such a tree, to feel again my Savior’s spiritual presence, to enjoy His consoling fellowship. If thus thrown back upon your own soul, alone, all alone, in the midnight, in the bush, in the very embrace of death itself, have you a Friend that will not fail you then?

On his Scottish Christian heritage: I am more proud that the blood of Martyrs is in my veins, and their truths in my heart, than other men can be of noble pedigree or royal names.

Oh that I had my life to begin again! I would consecrate it anew to Jesus in seeking the conversion of the remaining Cannibals on the New Hebrides. But since that may not be, may He help me to use every moment and every power still left to me to carry forward to the utmost that beloved work…. And should the record of my poor and broken life lead any one to consecrate himself to Mission work at Home or Abroad that he may win souls for Jesus, or should it even deepen the Missionary spirit in those who already know and serve the Redeemer of us all – for this also, and for all through which He has led me by His loving and gracious guidance, I shall, unto the endless ages of Eternity, bless and adore my beloved Master and Savior and Lord, to whom be glory for ever and ever.

I also highly recommend John Piper’s biographical message on John Paton.

Isaiah 58 & Suggestions

Adopt a child from Compassion, as a family or with a group of students. They also work with you so that you can visit your sponsored child.If you are thinking about a career as a doctor, nurse, dentist etc. start looking for ways to donate you time now for medical missions and the poor.

If you are a pilot donate you skill, time, and plane to the mission field.

Write a card to encourage and uplift those in difficult times.

Spend less and give more to your church and charities.

Visit a nursing home, orphanage, or widows.

Develop a relationship with a missionary. Pray for him. Send him gifts. Ask what you can do to help.

Volunteer at John 3:16 and support the Food Bank.

Befriend the friendless person at school or work that no one else will.

If you want to go into law volunteer your services for the needy in your area and abroad with someone like IJM.

Mow your neighbor’s lawn when they are gone for vacation.

Listen to the hurt, depressed, grieving, and lonely.

And most of all seek that they might know and forever enjoy the one true God. For what good is it if we seek the healing of the body while they loose their soul. It is good to patch the hole in the kitchen wall, it is better to put out the violent fire threatening the whole house, it is best to do both. Pray over their souls. Listen to their thoughts and beliefs. Share the blessed gospel of Jesus Christ.

Any other suggestions?

Isaiah 57:14-21 & peace

What I think and feel are not the greatest gauges. For instance in my opinion there is a type of person who mows their lawn in very few clothes thinking they are really cute when they are not. If it is a woman she may be in a bathing suit or sports bra; if a man it is short shorts, a mesh shirt, or no shirt. The only reason I think thus of such persons is because I know I have caught myself at times thinking I was pretty cool only to look back and realize I was a goob. How do we know if we stand in genuine peace with God or are only self deluding our own souls? Here is a rehash of the four ways John Owen gives in “The Mortification of Sin“.

1) Men certainly speak peace to themselves when their so doing is not attended with the greatest detestation imaginable of that sin in reference whereunto they speak peace to themselves, with abhorency of themselves for it.

Sam likes to eat facial tissue and toilet paper. Last night Bethany was in her chair reading her bible and I was in my chair reading John Paton and Sam thought we were so engrossed in our reading that we wouldn’t notice his swapping a used tissue sitting on an end table. He quickly put it down, sorry only that he had been caught. Occasionally I will come down from my shower in the morning to find the tissue box on the floor with a slobbery tissue hanging out the box. Yeah, I’m sure you will now never again use a tissue when you visit our casa. Do we want forgiveness while still harboring a love and a desire for sin in our heart? Not that sin is no longer enticing, but is there a hatred for sin now alongside it?

2) When men measure out peace to themselves upon the conclusions that their convictions and rational principles will carry them out unto, this is a false peace and will not abide.

Is the act of repentance nothing more than a mental, cerebral exercise whereby we follow a formula we knkow we are supposed to follow? Is there true spiritual conviction, or are you simply wanting to escape a guilty conscience and feel better about yourself, looking for a prescription so that you can go on about your own business? Do you want to cease sinning, kill the sin, make right your wrongs, and walk in obedience, or do you merely desire a relieve conscience?

3) We speak peace to ourselves when we do it slightly.

“Oops…I’m sorry, I won’t do it again”, said with a slight grin and tiny laugh after “accidently” hurting our friend. Do we see our sins as cosmic treason or comical oopses?

4) Whoever speaks peace to himself upon any one account, and at the same time hath another evil of no less importance lying upon his spirit, about which he hath had no dealing with God, that man cries “Peace” when there is none.

When you cry out in repentance seeking forgiveness and peace, do you hate all sin as sin? Do you see God as holy and long to obey Him perfectly in all your life or only wish to get rid of this nagging sin because of its irritating side effects?

Do you seek peace with God so that you may fellowship with him, or only peace within your own soul?

Heroes Have Faults

I am very big on having spiritual heroes.  Some of mine are alive; e.g. John Piper, D.A. Carson, C.J. Mahaney, and R.C. Sproul.  Many are dead; e.g. Jonathan Edwards, John Owen, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, and John G. Paton.  I think you should have both kinds.  A.W. Tozer is amongst the dead ones.  The largest part of his ministry was spent pastoring the Southside Alliance Church in Chicago.  We will be reading his classic work “The Knowledge of the Holy” this year in the Non-Raking Book Club.  This was the first Tozer book I had ever read and I was instantly a fan after reading lines like these:

What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.

If we insist upon trying to imagine Him, we end up with an idol, made not with hands but with thoughts; and an idol of the mind is as offensive to God as an idol of the hand.

The simplicity, reverence, and humility with which Tozer passionately deals with God’s attributes is admirable.  Part of my passion to make sure all of my sermons and ministry give a glimpse of God stems from this book.  So I was giddy to find out that a Tozer biography had been produced and quickly added it to my wish list.  I have not read Lyle Dorsett’s “A Passion for God” yet but have read a couple of reviews.  The reviews focus in on Tozer’s failure to let his love for God spill over into his love for his family.  It appears that in his pursuit of God he neglected his family.  (If God is properly pursued it should lead to deeper love for family, seeking to lead them to the God you love and deeper fellowship together in Christ.)

Tozer had faults.  I have faults.  Be gracious to your leaders.  We mess up.  The gracious thing is not to pass over my sins, but to lovingly, humbly, and prayerfully come to me.  I want to know my faults and sins.  I don’t want to know your personal opinions or complaints.  But please if you see any ways that my life is inconsistent or mars the gospel, rebuke me.  This would be the most loving thing you could do for me, and I pray that i will have the grace and wisdom to thank you for it.

HT: Between Two Worlds & Challies

Isaiah 55 & My Way

The wisdom of this world:

My Way by Paul Anka and Frank Sinatra

And now, the end is near, and so I face, the final curtain.
My friend, I’ll say it clear,
I’ll state my case, of which I’m certain.
I’ve lived, a life that’s full, I’ve traveled each and every highway.
And more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Regrets, I’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention.
I did, what I had to do, and saw it through, without exemption.
I planned, each charted course, each careful step, along the byway,
and more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Yes, there were times, I’m sure you knew,
When I bit off, more than I could chew.
But through it all, when there was doubt,
I ate it up, and spit it out.
I faced it all, and I stood tall,
and did it my way.

I’ve loved, I’ve laughed and cried,
I’ve had my fill; my share of losing.
And now, as tears subside, I find it all so amusing.
To think, I did all that, and may I say — not in a shy way,
“Oh no, oh no not me,
I did it my way”.

For what is a man, what has he got?
If not himself, then he has naught.
To say the things, he truly feels,
And not the words, of one who kneels.
The record shows, I took the blows —
And did it my way!
I did it my way.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vua8wka5Cys]

The Wisdom of God:

My Savior, My God by Aaron Shust

 

I am not skilled to understand

What God has willed, what God has planned

I only know at His right hand

Stands one who is my Savior

 

I take Him at His word and deed

Christ died to save me; this I read

And in my heart I find a need

Of Him to be my savior

 

That He would leave His place on high

And come for sinful man to die

You count it strange, so once did I

Before I knew my Savior

 

My Savior loves, My Savior lives

My Savior’s always there for me

My God: He was, my God; He is

My God is always gonna be

 

Yes, living, dying, let me bring

My strength, my solace from this spring;

That He who lives to be my King

Once died to be my Savior

 

That He would leave His place on high

And come for sinful man to die

You count it strange, so once did I

Before I knew my Savior

[www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvBG-FVbGFs]

And I, when I came to you, brothers, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with lofty speech or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God. – 1 Corinthians 2:1-5