A Disciple's Renewal

O my Saviour,
     help me.
I am so slow to learn, so prone to forget, so weak to climb;
I am in the foothills when I should be on the heights;
I am pained by my graceless heart,
     my poverty of love,
     my sloth in the heavenly race,
     my sullied conscience,
     my wasted hours,
     my unspent opportunities.
I am blind while light shines around me:
     take the scales from my eyes,
     grind to dust the evil heart of unbelief.
Make it my chiefest joy to study thee
     meditate on thee,
     gaze on thee,
     sit like Mary at thy feet,
     lean like John on thy breast,
     appeal like Peter to thy love,
     count like Paul all things dung.
Give me increase and progress in grace so that there may be
     more decision in my character,
     more vigour in my purposes,
     more elevation in my life,
     more fervour in my devotion,
     more constancy in my zeal.
As I have a position in the world,
     keep me from making the world my position;
May I never seek in the creature
     what can be found only in the creator.
Let not faith cease from seeking thee until it vanishes into sight.
Ride forth in me, thou king of kings and lord of lords,
that I may live victoriously, and in victory attain my end.
Amen and amen.


"A Disciple's Renewal" from The Valley of Vision:  A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions, ed. Arthur Bennett

What keeps Don Carson motivated to do what he does?

HT:  The Gospel Coalition

Just what is Christian growth?

This is a question that has been occupying my mind alot recently.  This short video, featuring Coral Ridge's Tullian Tchividjian and Knox Seminary's Jono Linebaugh, gives some surprising but, I believe, very helpful answers.  Watch and learn.

HT: Tullian's blog at TGC

The Boss does 'Gospel'

Wadaya goin' to do with that little light of yours?

Charles, bring us home!

To infinity and beyond

It seems that there are some infinities that are bigger than other infinities ...

Now, here are some more infinitely staggering Gospel thoughts to get your heads and hearts around...


Psalm 139: 17-18a   
How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!
    How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ Were I to count them,
    they would outnumber the grains of sand.

Ephesians 3: 16-19
I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.


HT: TGC

Jesus' cross: the opening and the emptying of the full heart of God

"But for a crucified Saviour, there could be no possible return to God; in no other way could He, consistently with the holiness and rectitude of the Divine government, with what He owes to Himself as a just and holy God, receive a poor, wandering, returning sinner. Mere repentance and humiliation for and confession of sin could entitle the soul to no act of pardon. The obedience and death of the Lord Jesus laid the foundation and opened the way for the exercise of this great and sovereign act of grace. 

"The cross of Jesus displays the most awful exhibition of God’s hatred of sin, and at the same time the most august manifestation of His readiness to pardon it. Pardon, full and free, is written out in every drop of blood that is seen, is proclaimed in every groan that is heard, and shines in the very prodigy of mercy that closes the solemn scene upon the cross. Oh blessed door of return, open and never shut to the wanderer from God! how glorious, how free, how accessible! 

"Here the sinful, the vile, the guilty, the unworthy, the poor, the penniless may come. Here, too, the weary spirit may bring its burden, the broken spirit its sorrow, the guilty spirit its sin, the backsliding spirit its wandering. All are welcome here. The death of Jesus was the opening and the emptying of the full heart of God; it was the outgushing of that ocean of infinite mercy that heaved, and panted, and longed for an outlet; it was God showing how He could love a poor guilty sinner. What more could He have done than this? what stronger proof, what richer gift, what costlier boon could He have given in attestation of that love? 

"Now, it is the simple belief of this that brings the tide of joy down into the soul; it is faith’s view of this that dissolves the adamant, rends asunder the flinty rock, smites down the pyramid of self-righteousness, lays the rebellious will in the dust, and enfolds the repenting, believing soul in the very arms of free, rich, and sovereign love."

Octavius Winslow: Personal Declension and Revival of Religion in the Soul 

We need practical theism

Francis Schaeffer at L'Abri
c. 1971

When, back in the 1950's, Francis and Edith Schaeffer began to think through the foundational principles of L'Abri in Switzerland as a Biblical/Christian apologetic community, they stated their purpose as:  "To show forth by demonstration, in our life and work, the existence of God."

Josh Moody, Senior Pastor of College Church, Wheaton, has been similarly writing about the necessity of the apologetic character of the local church to be clearly and purposefully manifest.  In his recent book on Galatians, No Other Gospel he says (p.19):

"It seems to me that the great difference between practical theism and practical atheism is the church of the living God. Jesus is alive, and we can’t keep that a secret. It is not okay to think, When they get to know us, they’ll realize that Jesus is alive. It has to be front and center in our worship, our smiles, our greetings, our interaction, our preaching — in everything we do, Jesus is alive. Church is not an evangelical golf club. It is the church of the living God, and we need to indicate that. We don’t want to give the impression that Jesus died and went to heaven in 1950. He’s still alive and doing things today. A church that decides it has ‘arrived’ is a breath away from dying. Pride comes before a fall. We need practical theism, a resurrection theology, the power of the Spirit through the Word of God."

HT:  OFI

Gaugin: Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

 HT: BW
Young Calvin is right.  French post-impressionist painter, Paul Gaugin, did raise these fundamental world-view questions in a famous painting you can view here. As the Wikipedia article (yeah, I know ...) demonstrates, it is important to begin to get young people thinking about these foundational life issues early.
Which brings me nicely to the recent talk I gave at the Reality 3:16 seminar, where we looked at Paul's letter to the Colossians as a plea for the Christians there not to become distracted through faulty self-indulgent spirituality, nor to become monastically introverted by being intimidated or dismissive of the prevailing pluralistic imperial cult.  Instead, they should have confidence in "this [Christ-centred worldview] Gospel" that has already fruitfully impacted their own lives (Col. 1: 4-6) and, following the example of Epaphras and Paul and others (1:7; 4:2-4, 7-14), live wisely - with paradoxical humble boldness - by sharing this message with others (4:5-6). 
 Adapted from some insights from Voddie Baucham, at the heart of the message was an encouragement to see how Paul highlights the glory of the supremacy and sufficiency of Jesus Christ (1: 13-21) as the answer to humanity's deepest questions.  This can provide a framework for Gospel Worldview evangelism:

• Who am I?  My identity is intimately bound to my relationship the Creator of all things, Jesus Christ.  My life has significance since I am the crowning glory of the creative activity of God, both bearing God's image and with a capacity to know Him
• Why am I here? My life has purpose and meaning, because God, in His grace, has made me with the intention that I should bring glory to Him.  God has created us that we might experience, delight, spread and ultimately share in the glory of God.
• What's wrong with the world? "I am" (GK Chesterton).  We are alienated from God, enemies with Him through evil behaviour, God-glory denying and defying sinners, who need to be forgiven and rescued from this kingdom of darkness (Col 1).
• How can it be put right?  Not more education, not more governance. Jesus! (Col 1: 13-14, 20, 22)
• How will it all end?  The antithesis of our culture's sense of meaningless and despair is the certain "hope of glory" that is held out for all those who embrace this Gospel of Christ (1: 23, 27).
• What time is it?  It's time to believe and persevere in "this" Gospel (1: 23, 28-29), and make the most of every opportunity to prayerfully and lovingly share this life changing truth with those who hold to a different, and therefore wrong, view of reality (4: 2-6).