May 9, 2012

A Christian Guide to Reading Books

by Jesse Johnson

Christians are readers. We love books because we love truth, and truth is conveyed through propositional statements. We love to think because our minds are in service to God, who invented thought. We love to reason, because the author of reason is the one who gave us logic. We love emotions, because they are often a reflection of the passions that God designed us to express.

Christians read devotionals to increase our devotion to God. We read systematic theologies to challenge our thinking, and to teach us about God. We read novels because we understand the human experience through opened eyes and a sympathetic heart. We appreciate beauty in story because we are participants in the most profound story ever told.

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May 8, 2012

Driscoll vs. Calvin, Doctrine vs. the Spirit

by Eric Davis

 

A few days ago, a short YouTube came out called, “Don’t Elevate Doctrine above the Holy Spirit.” It’s a clip from Mark Driscoll’s sermon on Revelation 2:1-7 preached at the ancient Celsus Library in Ephesus. Apart from the excerpt on youtube, there are some helpful things said at various points in the sermon. However, the portion in the video is a perfect example of a wider error often seen in the church today: the pitting of “doctrine” (cue ominous music) against the work of the Spirit in the heart.

In Driscoll’s latest hit, he warns against the supposed consequences of elevating doctrine over the Holy Spirit with statements such as: “You don’t need to pray much anymore, because you have a theology that tells you what to do. You don’t have to listen to the Holy Spirit anymore, because you have a theology that directs all your steps. I’m not saying we avoid our doctrinal clarity, but we still need to be filled with the Holy Spirit.” He proposes that “cessationism…[is] a clever way of saying, we don’t need him [the Holy Spirit] like we used to.” One of the repercussions of cessationism, he says, is that “Christianity goes from a relationship we enjoy to a belief system we adhere to.”

Whatever cessationism is, it’s anything but these things (see Nate Busenitz’s article here for helpful clarification on what cessationism is not).

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May 7, 2012

Why Family Time is a Pastor’s Job Description

by Clint Archer

 

As a pastor I find it helpful to think of my family time, not as competing with my ministry, but as part of fulfilling my job description.

I don’t mean that family time feels like work to me! And I realize that  everyone with a family wants more time with them, but their job interferes. Why should it be any different for those in ministry?

The reason is that pastors’ schedules come with hybrid categories that are unique.

On most Christians’ calendars there are activities which fall into at least four categories: Work, Family, Church, Personal. What is unique about the pastor’s schedule is that his activities are more tightly interwoven than most. Every work activity is also a church activity. The pastor’s personal devotional time is very closely linked to his ability to be effective in his work and his church ministry.

In the same way that a travel writer doesn’t consider touring abroad to be a relaxing vacation, a pastor doesn’t always consider it recreation to “hang out” with the flock.

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May 4, 2012

Learning to Suffer Well: Acknowledging Sin’s Role in Suffering

by Mike Riccardi

Earlier this week, I met with a prospective seminary student for lunch. As is common for first-time meetings at Grace Community Church, our discussion began with testimonies of how the Lord saved us. This particular brother had a Christian friend whose very welcoming family often shared the Gospel with him and invited him to church. As friendly and as clear as they were, though, the seed of the Gospel fell on fallow ground—until the father of the family had contracted a life-threatening illness. When this young man saw how the family responded to suffering with such confidence, joy, and peace, his heart began to pay attention to the Source of that steadfastness. He began to read his Bible with greater earnestness and listen to the sermons he heard in church with greater interest. Eventually, the Lord saved him.

I tell that story because it only further legitimizes the need for Christians to learn how to suffer well—how to suffer righteously. I mentioned in last week’s post how necessary it is to be equipped with a theology of suffering while not yet in the midst of a particular trial. The fact of the matter is, the heat of an intensely trying time often clouds our vision and our judgment, so that we fail to act the way we know we should. We respond to suffering sinfully because we have not prepared to suffer righteously beforehand, when our vision is clear.

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May 3, 2012

Martyn Lloyd-Jones on the Gift of Prophecy

by Nathan Busenitz

Was Martyn Lloyd-Jones a continuationist?

“Although charismatics and Pentecostals have both claimed him as an advocate of their views, a careful reading of ML-J establishes that they have misunderstood him.” So states Dr. Eryl Davies in his Themelios article entitled, Dr D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: An Introduction.

Davies substantiates his statement (in part) by pointing to a section of Lloyd-Jones’s Christian Unity in which the Doctor (as he is often called) elaborates on the nature of New Testament prophecy.

Here’s what Lloyd-Jones said:

A prophet was a person to whom truth was imparted by the Holy Spirit.  . . .  A revelation or message or some insight into truth came to them, and, filled with the Spirit, they were able to make utterances which were of benefit and profit to the Church. Surely it is clear that this again was temporary, and for this good reason, that in those early days of the Church there were no New Testament Scriptures, the Truth had not yet been expounded in written words.  Continue Reading…

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May 2, 2012

Overcoming Spiritual Stagnation

by Wyatt Graham

A dark room that reeks of the musty smell that accompanies rot. Alone here, your mind wanders nowhere yet everywhere at the same time. A feeling of dread, loneliness or something wriggles through your bones. A sucking feeling in your gut tips you off that you are hungry but you are not sure. It might just be anxiety. All of this happened because of a keen experience of separation from God. A sort of spiritual anxiety. The Puritans described this feeling with the phrase, “the dark night of the soul.” They knew well about the malady of spiritual depression.

Spiritual stagnation is a problem that will bombard everyone at one point or another. Depression, fears and anxiety gush out, because we feel “separated” from God, from grace. We feel alone, sinful, dirty and unloved—or perhaps unloving.

Part of reason spiritual depression occurs, I am convinced, is because we have a wrong view of Biblical Change. We go to God and ask for ways to overcome our problems, our worries. We look to ourselves and our problems and then to God’s word for helps to our problems. Being lost in our issues, we seek help from God.

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