The Christian should always be looking at that

(The Christian's) whole out look upon everything that happens to (him) should be governed by three things: my realization of who i am, my consciousness of where i am going, and me knowledge of what awaits me when i get there. You will find this argument in many places in Scripture. The apostle Paul once put it like this, 'our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;while we look not at the things that are seen but at the things that are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.' (2 Corinthians 4:17-18) The Christian should always be looking at that.

Martin Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, Vol 1, P 144

We Have No Authority Save This Book

There is nothing more important in Christian life than the way in which we approach the Bible, and the way in which we read it. It is our textbook, it is our only source, our only authority. We know nothing about God and the Christian life in a true sense apart from what we read in the Bible. We can draw various deductions from nature (and possibly by mystical experiences) by which we can arrive at a belief in a supreme creator. But i think it is agreed by all Christians, and it has been traditional throughout the long history of the Church, that we have no authority save this book. We can not rely solely on subjective experiences, because there are evil spirits as well as good spirits; there are counterfeit experiences. Here, in the Bible is our sole authority. 

D.Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, Vol I, P10

Why Does Each Gospel Sound Different?

The first four books of the New Testament report the same Gospel account, but from four different perspectives. They give the same message with differing but perfectly harmonious emphases. Matthew presents Jesus as the sovereign, whereas Mark presents Him in the extreme opposite role as servant. Luke presents Him as the Son of Man, whereas John presents Him as the Son of God. The same Jesus is shown to be both sovereign God and servant man.  

In presenting the sovereignty of Jesus, Matthew begins his Gospel with the genealogy of the Lord - going back to Abraham, the father of the Hebrew people through King David, Israel model King. In presenting Jesus' servanthood, Mark gives no genealogy at all, because a servant's lineage is irrelevant. In presenting Jesus as the Son of Man, Luke traces his genealogy back to the first man, Adam. In presenting Jesus as the divine Son of God, John gives no human genealogy or birth and childhood narratives. He opens up his Gospel, by giving, as it were, Jesus divine genealogy: 'in the beginning was the Word, as the Word was with God, and the Word was God.' 

John MacArthur, Matthew 1-7, pp xi-xii

The Power in Preaching

Keep close to the eternal source of spiritual vision. Imagination finds it's inspiration and power in the upper room today in the same way as on the wonderful day of Pentecost; expectant waiting, continual prayer, reflection upon the word of the Gospel - these were in the background. And what happened? Tongues of fire and a rushing wind were it's open symbols, and the coming of the Holy Spirit it's explanation. By the power of the Spirit these things happened, a great realization, an overwhelming spiritual energy and power of utterance. Their eyes were opened as they saw Reality as it had never been seen before. The invisible spiritual world became more real than the upper room. It was no longer remote or future. They were even now under the ruling authority of God more than the Romans or the Sanhedrin. From that time on their imaginations - their power to see and to relate facts were given unclouded vision, their wills the strength of rushing wind, their speech the warmth and glow of fire. That is how the Spirit of God always responds to the open heart. Rhetoric, logic, psychology are the channels and instruments of preaching, the Spirit of God is the source of power, as His Word if the message of life.

John Broadus, On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, P233

Belief

In respect to the whole matter of evidence and belief, it is important to remember the relationship between belief and disbelief. As regards many truths of Christianity, he who disregards them is compelled to believe something that takes their place. He who cannot accept difficulties, real or alleged, in the Christian evidences must not forget the difficulties of infidelity.We must believe something, must believe something about the problem of religion, and if we go away from Christ, 'to whom shall we go?'

John Broadus, On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, P155

Preaching's Objective

Perhaps the first objective of preaching is to please God. A sermon should first be an offering to God. A minister studies God's Word, prepares a message, and then first gives it to God in an act of worship. This has implications for discipline and preparation. A second objective is the salvation of souls. Jesus came to seek and save the lost. The preacher tries to bring a saving Gospel and lost souls together. He is also to edify the church and to help his people mature in Christ through his preaching.

On the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons, John Broadus, Pp49-50

Preach The Cross

Preach the cross then, as God's all sufficient answer to men's perpetual question, 'how can i win salvation?' 'How can i achieve self conquest?' There are people in our congregations today who are asking that question, just as Saul of Tarsus asked it in the lecture theatre of Gamaliel, just as Luther asked it in the monastery of Erfurt, just as John Wesley asked it in the holy club at Oxford. laboriously these men hewed out (to use Jeremiah's figure) their own broken cisterns, toiling to store up their creditable achievements, their charities, austerities and penances. But for Saul, Luther and Wesley the day came when the answer to their question, 'how can i win salvation?' was answered from the throne of God. The answer was 'you can't! Take it at the cross for nothing, or not at all.' 

James S. Stewart, Heralds of God. P 85

To Worship

To worship is to quicken the conscience with the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagination with the beauty of God, to open the heart to the love of God, to devote the will to the purpose of God.

James S. Stewart, Heralds of God, P73

True Wisdom is a Precious Jewel

How foolish a thing it is for men to lean on their own understanding, and trust their own hearts. If we are so blind, then our own wisdom is not to be depended upon; and that advice of the wise man is most reasonable, 'trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not on your own understanding.' 'And he that trusteth in in his own heart is a fool.' They therefore are fools, who trust to their own wisdom, and will question  the mysterious doctrines of religion; because they can not see through them, and will not trust to the infinite wisdom of God.

Let us therefore become fools; be sensible of our own blindness and folly. There is a treasure of wisdom contained in that one sentence, 'if any among you seems wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may become wise.' Seeing our own ignorance and blindness is the first step towards having true knowledge,' if any man thinketh he knowest anything, he knoweth nothing as he ought to know.

Let us ask wisdom of God. If we are so blind in ourselves, then knowledge is not to be sought out of our own stock, but must be sought from some other source. And we have nowhere else to go for it, but to the fountain of light and wisdom. True wisdom is a precious jewel; none of our fellow creatures can give it to us, neither can we buy it with nay price we have to give. It is the sovereign gift of God. The way to obtain it is to go to Him, sensible of our weakness and blindness and misery on that account. 'If any lack wisdom, let Him ask of God.' 

Jonathan Edwards, Man's Natural Blindness in Religion, Works Vol 2 Pp 255-256

The Kingdom of God is like

The Kingdom apparently exists in ever changing resemblances. Jesus does not say what it is, only what it's like.

It's like a tiny seed. It's like a big tree. It's like something inside of you. Like a pearl you'd give everything to possess, like wheat growing in weeds, like a camel going through the eye of the needle. Like the way the world looks to children. Like making wise use of the master's money. Like getting a day's pay for an hour's work. Like a crooked magistrate fixing things in your favour. Like a narrow gate, a difficult road, a lamp on a stand. Like a wedding party. Like a wedding party where all the original guests have been dis-invited and replaced by random passers-by. Like yeast in dough. Like treasure, like a harvest, like a door that opens whenever you knock. Or like a door you have to bang on for hours in the middle of the night until a grumpy neighbour wakes up and gives you a loaf. 

The Kingdom is - whatever all these likenesses have in common. The Kingdom, it seems to be saying, is something that can only be grasped in comparisons, because the world contains no actual examples of it. And yet the world winks and shines the with possibility of it.

Unapologetic, Francis Spufford, Pp124-125

God's Revealing Word

As a whole the Scriptures are God's revealing Word. Only in the infiniteness of inner relationships, in the connection of Old and New Testaments, of promise and fulfillment, sacrifice and law, law and Gospel, cross and resurrection, faith and obedience, having and hoping, will the full witness to Jesus Christ the Lord be perceived. 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together, P51

Read The Story

Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of the circumcision. For we are the circumcision, which follow God in the flesh and rejoice in Jesus Christ and have no confidence in the flesh.

Philippians 3:2-3.

This is not the apostle saying, 'there are dogs out there, i know who they are, but i'm not saying,' this is Paul saying beware of the dogs. But in order to be aware of them, you have to be able to identify them. How do you do that? It's not by putting on hyper-spiritual glasses which allow you to see the essential dogginess at the core of their heart. You see it on the basis of their evil works, their demand for circumcision and so on. You read the story.

Can such judgement ever be wrong? Well of course they can. That does not mean we are warned away from making them. The straight line we use to keep ourselves from wronging others in such things is to be steeped in the narrative of Scripture. We test drive our responses with novels and movies. Practice reading stories, because that's what your life is. So the end of the whole endeavor is to live our lives to the fullest, reading our own story rightly. And there is no way to do this without making conclusions about the internal, spiritual conditions of others.

Douglas Wilson, Against The Church. P128

A Resurrection Mission

It is perfectly clear then that the first Christian missionaries did not come forward with an exhortation; they did not say, 'Jesus of Nazareth lived a wonderful life of filial piety, and we call upon our hearers to yield yourselves, as we have, to the spell of that life.' Certainly that is what modern historians would have expected the first Christian missionaries to say, but it must be recognized as a matter of fact that they said nothing of the sort. Conceivably, the first disciples of Jesus, after the catastrophe of His death, might have engaged themselves in some quiet meditation on His teaching. They might have said to themselves that 'Our Father who are in Heaven,' was a good way of addressing God, even though the One who taught them to do it was dead. They might have clung to the ethical principles of Jesus and cherished the hope that the one who enunciated such principles might have had some personal existence beyond the grave.

Such reflections might have seemed very natural to the modern man, but to Peter, James and John, the certainly never occurred. Jesus had raised in them high hopes, and those hopes were destroyed by the cross; and reflections on the general principles of religion and ethics were powerless to revive them again. The disciples of Jesus had evidently been inferior to their master in every possible way; they had not understood His spiritual teaching; but even in the hour of solemn crisis had quarrled over great places in the Kingdom. What hope was there that such men could succeed when their Master had failed? Even when He had been with them, they were powerless; now that He was taken from them, what little power they may have had was gone.

Yet those same, weak, discouraged men, within a few days of the death of their Master, instituted the most important spiritual movement the world has ever seen. What had produced this astonishing change? What had transformed the weak and cowardly disciples into the spiritual conquerors of the world? Evidently it was not the mere memory of Jesus life, for the was a source of sadness, not of joy. Evidently the disciples of Jesus, within the few days between the crucifixion and the beginning of their work in Jerusalem had received some new equipment for their task. What that new equipment was, at leas the outstanding and eternal element in it, (to say nothing of the endowment which Christian men believe to have received at Pentecost) is perfectly plain. The great weapon with which the disciples of Jesus set out to conquer the world was not a mere comprehension of eternal principles; it was a historical message, an account of something that had happened, it was the message, 'He is risen!'

But the message of the resurrection was not isolated, it was connected with Jesus' death, seen now, to be not a failure but a triumphant act of divine grace; it was connected with the entire appearance of Jesus on the Earth.

J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism, Pp23-25

So Monday Doesn't Have to be All Bad

No wonder that what is divine is powerful and effectual, for it has omnipotence on it's side. If God dwells in the heart, and is vitally connected to it, He will show that He is God by the efficacy of His operations. Christ is not in the heart of the saint as in a tomb, as a dead saviour that does nothing, but as one in a temple, who is alive from the dead. For in the heart where Christ savingly is, there He exerts Himself after the power of His endless life that He received at His resurrection. Thus every saint who is the subject of the benefit of Christ's sufferings is made to know and experience the power of His resurrection. The Spirit of Christ, which is the immediate spring of life in the heart is all life, all power to act, 2 Corinthians 2:4, 'in the demonstration of Spirit and all power.'... and thus it is that holy affection have a governing power in man's life.

Jonathan Edwards, The Religions Affections

In The Complete Works, Volume 1

P317

How Can I Be Happy?

I found this in an old John Wesley devotional book i was given this week.

Happy is He that has the God of Jehovah for his help, whose hope is in the Lord His God

Psalm 146:5

As there is but one God in Heaven above and on Earth beneath, so there is only one happiness for created beings, either in Heaven or Earth. This one God made our heart for Himself, and we can not rest, until we rest in Him. It is true that while we are in the vigor of youth and health; while our blood dances in our veins, while the world smiles upon us and we have all the conveniences, yea, superfluities of life, we frequently have pleasing dreams and enjoy a kind of happiness. But it can not continue, it flies away like a shadow, and even while it does it is not solid or substantial; it does not satisfy the soul. We still pant after something else, something that we have not. Give a man everything that this world can give and yet amidst our plenty something still to me, to thee to him is wanting. That something is neither more, nor less than the knowledge and love of God, without which no spirit can be happy, in Heaven or on Earth.

Devotions and Prayers of John Wesley, P38

Live on Nothing but Mercy (Jeremiah Burroughs)

The following is an excerpt from 'Of Lovers and Whores,' a selection of Jeremiah Burroughs' sermons on Hosea, compiled and published by my friend Dave Bish. He has two other books of heart warming Puritan sermons published, which i highly recommend to you. Find them here.

Let us learn to wonder at these riches of mercy in Christ and exercise much faith about them. Certainly we would thrive in godliness much more if we exercised our faith in the bowels [heart] of God in Christ.

Fruit like apricots and May cherries that grow up by a wall and enjoy the warm beams of the sun are sooner ripe and have more sweetness than those which grow in shady places.Grass shaded by the trees in orchards are sour. So the fruit which Christians bring forth under discouragements and despairing thoughts is very sour. Some things they do because conscience compels them to duty, but it is sour fruit. Though it is better to do what conscience requires than not, yet merely to follow conscience is sour grass.

When a Christian can by faith set himself before the sunshine of these mercies of God in Christ and continually live in the midst continually in the beams of that grace he grows ripe sooner and the fruit is sweeter.

You can easily know whether the Sun of righteousness shines on you. Does your fruit grow ripe? Is it sweet fruit? Those who talk of mercy and of Christ and have His name in their mouths but bring forth sour and crabbed fruit are not in the Sun; they are blind and cannot discern it, and are but a light of their own fancy in a heart of their own making.

In Ephesians 3:18-19 the apostle prays that the Ephesians 'may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth ' of the riches of God in Christ. The philosophers tell us of only three dimensions, but there are four.

What fruit is this, 'to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God.' Here is the effect of it, when we know the breadth and length and depth and height of God's love, and have that knowledge by the Spirit of God, that surpasses mental knowledge, then we are filled with the fullness of God.

Here now is a glorious Christian, a Christian filled with the fullness of God. Do you want this to be so of you? Learn to exercise faith much about the infinite riches of mercy of God in Christ.  f. This will fill you with the fullness of God. You complain of barrenness and emptiness in your hearts and lives, it is because you give little heed to this.

God betroths Himself to the church in mercies, in bowels. let us learn when we are in any trouble to plead with God for bowels of mercy. Isaiah 63:15, 'look down from Heaven, and behold from the habitiation of your holiness and you glory, where is your zeal and your strength, the sound of your bowels, and your mercy towards me? Are they restrained?' Lord, have you not said you will betroth your church to yourself in bowels? Where is the sounding of your heart? Lord, let us have your heart, from which you have betrothed us through Christ.

Oh what confusion there will be one day for those who have missed these mercies of God, in which the Lord has betrothed Himself to the Church. Will you content yourself with crumbs, with the fruits of His general bounty and patience, when you hear of the glorious mercies in Jesus Christ? These things should raise our hearts, so that we protest as Luther did; 'I protest that God shall not put me off with the things of the world, with my portion here. Oh no the Lord has shown me greater riches, and though i am unworthy of any, yet, as i know His mercy is free, why should i not have my portion in these glorious things?

Come in then, come in, oh sinful soul. Be in love with Jesus Christ and the ways of godliness. Know that all these mercies are tendered to your soul this day, to break your heart, even that hard heart of yours.And they are free for you as any. There is nothing more pleasing to God than for you to be taken with the glory of His riches in mercy. You cannot perform any duty acceptable to God as this, to have your heart broken on the consideration of his heart, to have your heart yearn again and come in and join with this infinite ocean of mercy. Breathe the element of mercy, live by nothing but mercy.

Nothing Thrills Like the Gospel

One of the marks of Gospel wakefulness is the the failure of anything else to thrill the soul like the Gospel. When the heart enjoys Christ and savours His power, sin grows bitter. Even good gifts that God made recede to their proper flavours. Good things that we have made 'god things' don't cease to be good; in fact they continue to provide pleasures and satisfactions but they keep their proper functions and blessings in service to the common grace the God of glory ascribed to them. 

Gospel wakefulness doesn't lead to asceticism. It does not lead to a withdrawal from society and simple pleasures into a monastic regimen. Rather, Gospel wakefulness is foremost about orienting your spiritual system around the sun. When the sun is the center of the solar system, the planets don't cease to exist. In fact they exist more securely, more beautifully, in their proper positions and proportions. With God at the centre of your universe of worship, with the Gospel at the centre of your life all other good gifts -peoples and pleasures, thoughts and things - take their proper place and proportion in our lives. They are more pleasing and enjoyable because they give the pleasures they are designed to give and no more. 

Gospel Wakefulness, Jared C. Wilson, Pp 59-60

We are not our own

We are not our own, let not our will or reason, therefore, sway our plans and deeds. 

We are not our own: let us therefore not see it as our goal to seek what is expedient for us according to our flesh.

We are not our own: in so far as we can, let us therefore forget ourselves and all that it ours.

Conversely, we are God's. Let us therefore live for Him and die for Him. 

We are God's let His wisdom and rule therefore rule all our decisions.

We are God's. Let all the parts of our lives strive towards Him as our lawful goal.

Oh how much has that man profited who, having been taught that he is not his own has taken away reason and rule from his dominion and given it to God! For, as consulting our self-interest is the pestilence that leads to our destruction, so the sole haven of salvation is to be wise in nothing through ourselves but to follow the leading of the Lord alone. 

Calvin's Institutes, 3.7.2

And what a gift of God that we have this leading. When the Bible is open, God speaks. God speaks in, from and through the Bible and shows us the way to go, the way of wisdom, the way that results from the fear of Him, that is the beginning of wisdom.

Sure, the Bible doesn't give us answers for every single question of life, it doesn't tell us who to marry, or what job to work, but, as the drops fill the bucket, we grow in wisdom, and we learn to walk in it's paths, in His paths.

Real Security

The cruel man desires to be feared, because of his cruelty, but who is to be feared, except the one God? What can be taken away from your power? Who can rob You of Your power, and how and where would they do it? The enticements of the sensual pretend to be love, yet what is more enticing than your love? Nor is any love more wholesome and refreshing than the love of your truth, for it is bright and beautiful above all things. Curiosity creates a desire for knowledge, sometimes concealed under the covering of simplicity and ignorance, yet there is no being that has a true simplicity as yours and none are as innocent as you. Thus a sinner is harmed by his own sinful deeds.

Human laziness pretends to want to rest, yet where is rest except in You Lord?

Luxury of life desires to be called plenty and abundance, but you are the fulness and unfailing abundance of incorruptible joy.

Extravagant philanthropy displays a show of liberality, but you are the most lavish giver of all good things.

Avarice desires to possess all things, but you possess all things.

Envy contends for excellence, but what is more excellent than you?

Anger seeks revenge, but who is more vengeful than you?

Fear shrinks back from the unfamiliar and sudden changes that threaten what he loves, he is afraid for his security and the security of those he loves, but what can happen that is unfamiliar or sudden to you? Or who can deprive you of what you love? Where can real security be found except in you? Grief mourns for the things it loved which have been taken from it, but nothing can be taken from you.

Augustine's Confessions, 1971 Ed. P 14

Saturday

Saturday must've been the worst day. Trying to quietly observe the Sabbath, whilst making sense of yesterday's events would've been a struggle, to sat the least. We know that at least two of the disciples were making escape plans, maybe others were planning to leave at sunset, hoping their old lives would except them back.

But today, Easter Saturday, we know only hope because of the cross, when the disciples knew only despair. Hear these words from John Piper, from 'Faith in Future Grace.'

God strips every pain of it's destructive power. You must believe this, or you will not thrive, or maybe even survive as a Christian, in the pressures and temptations of modern life.

There is so much pain, so many setbacks and discouragements, so many controversies and pressures. I do not know where i would turn if i did not believe that almighty God is taking every setback and every discouragement and every controversy and every pressure and every pain and stripping it of it's destructive power, and making it work for the enlargement of my joy in God.

The world is ours, life is ours. Death is ours. God reigns so supremely on behalf of His people that everything that faces us in a lifetime of obedience and ministry will be subdued by the mighty hand of God and made the servant of our holiness and our everlasting joy in God.

If God is for us, and if God is God, then it is true that nothing can succeed against us. He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all will infallibly and freely with Him give us all things - all things - the world, life, death, and God Himself.

Romans 8:32 is a precious friend. The promise of God's future grace is overwhelming. But all important is the foundation. Here is a place to stand against all obstacles. God did not spare His own Son! How much more, then, will He spare nor effort to give me all that Christ died to purchase - all things, all good?

It is as sure as the certainty He loved His Son.

Future Grace, John Piper, P114