Civilization with God?

"The Christian belief system, which the Christian knows to be grounded in divine revelation, is relevant to all of life. For unbelieving multitudes in our times, the recent modern defection from God known in His self revelation has turned the whole of life into shambles. Ours is the first society in modern history to have ventured to erect a civilization on godless foundations; it may well be the last....

"...even the classic ancient Greek philosophers still warn us through their extant writings that no stable society can be built apart from durable truth and good and that any eclipse of these realities robs human survival of meaning and worth. Their writings are not the last word, however. Echoing from Creation to Calvary to Consummation, God’s eternal Word invites a parched humanity to the Well that never runs dry, to the Water of Life that alone truly and fully quenches the thirst of stricken pilgrims."


-- Carl Henry, quoted by Greg Alan Thornbury, "Recovering Classic Evangelicalism: Applying the Wisdom and Vision of Carl F. H. Henry"

"What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution"

“Jesus Christ our Lord, moved by a love that was determined to do everything necessary to save us, endured and exhausted the destructive divine judgment for which we were otherwise inescapably destined, and so won us forgiveness, adoption and glory. To affirm penal substitution is to say that believers are in debt to Christ specifically for this, and that this is the mainspring of all their joy, peace and praise both now and for eternity.”

-J. I. Packer, “What Did the Cross Achieve? The Logic of Penal Substitution,” Tyndale Bulletin 25 (1974): 25.

Our Deepest Need

“The deepest need of men is not food and clothing and shelter, important as they are. It is God. We have mistaken the nature of poverty and thought it was economic poverty. No, it is poverty of soul, deprivation of God’s re-creating, loving peace. Peer into poverty and see if we are really getting down to our deepest needs in our economic salvation schemes. These are important. But they lie farther along the road, secondary steps toward world reconstruction. The primary step is a holy life, transformed and radiant in the glory of God.”

-- Thomas R. Kelly, A Testament of Devotion (New York, 1941), page 123

The Essence of True Humility

"Because the essence of gospel-humility is not thinking more of myself or thinking less of myself, it is thinking of myself less.

"Gospel-humility is not needing to think about myself. Not needing to connect things with myself. It is an end to thoughts such as, ‘I’m in this room with these people, does that make me look good? Do I want to be here?’

"True gospel-humility means I stop connecting every experience, every conversation, with myself. In fact, I stop thinking about myself. The freedom of self-forgetfulness. The blessed rest that only self-forgetfulness brings."

-- Tim Keller, "The Freedom of Self-forgetfulness"

"Gabriel cannot love Jesus as a forgiven man will do...."

"Gabriel cannot love Jesus as a forgiven man will do..."

"We are now capable of a joy which unfallen spirits could not have known: the bliss of pardoned sin, the heaven of deep conscious obligation to eternal mercy.

"The bonds which bind redeemed ones to their God are the strongest which exist. I believe that forgiven sinners will have a love to God and to his Christ such as cherubim and seraphim never felt; Gabriel cannot love Jesus as a forgiven man will do.

"Those who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb will be nearer and dearer to him, and he will be nearer and dearer to them, than all the ministering spirits before the throne."

— Charles Spurgeon
"Honey from a Lion"

The Spirit Versus the Guerrilla Forces of the Flesh

"A deep spiritual walk with God does not usually happen immediately after conversion. When the Holy Spirit invades the enemy territory of our lives and sets up Jesus Christ as King in the capital city of our heart, his strategy for conquering the rebel forces of the flesh that keep up their guerrilla warfare is different for each person. It may be fast or slow. God’s clean up operations are very strange."

-- John Piper,  "The Danger of Being Merely Human"

"Confronting Civil Government" -- John Murray (1898 -- 1975)

Confronting Civil Government—John Murray (1898 – 1975)

John Murray, a native Scotsman, was the first professor of Systematic Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary (U.S.A.) and a minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. He was a scholarly exegete and profound theologian whose teaching and publications strengthened evangelicals in the battle with modernism during the twentieth century. In this extract, from a document entitled “The Relation of Church and State,” Murray provides ministers with helpful instruction on how to avoid being party political, whilst at the same time preaching directly on political issues. Murray begins by outlining the primary focus of the Church’s involvement in the political arena—the proclamation of the divine Word in all its fullness. The Church is not to do the job of the state, but it is to critique the state from a biblical standpoint.

"To the church is committed the task of proclaiming the whole counsel of God and, therefore, the counsel of God as it bears upon the responsibility of all person and institutions. While the church is not to discharge the functions of other institutions such as the state and the family, nevertheless it is charged to define what the functions of these institutions are, and the lines of demarcation by which they are distinguished. It is also charged to declare and inculcate the duties which devolve upon them. Consequently when the civil magistrate trespasses the limits of his authority, it is incumbent upon the church to expose and condemn such a violation of his authority. When laws are proposed or enacted which are contrary to the law of God, it is the duty of the church to oppose them and expose their iniquity. When the civil magistrate fails to exercise his God-given authority in the protection and promotion of the obligations, rights, and liberties of the citizens, the church has the right and duty to condemn such inaction, and by its proclamation of the counsel of God to confront the civil magistrate with his responsibility and promote the correction of such neglect. The functions of the civil magistrate, therefore, come within the scope of the church’s proclamation in every respect in which the Word of God bears upon the proper or improper discharge of these functions, and it is only misconception of what is involved in the proclamation of the whole counsel of God that leads to the notion that the church has no concern with the political sphere."

Murray further distinguishes between the Church’s role in proclaiming the nature of the political reality and the duties of citizens (whether Christian or not) in actually organizing community political life.

"When it is maintained that the church is concerned with civic affairs, is under obligation to examine political measures in the light of the Word of God, and is required to declare its judgements accordingly, the distinction between this activity on the part of the church and political activity must be recognized. To put the matter bluntly, the church is not to engage in politics. Its members must do so, but only in their capacity as citizens of the state, not as members of the church. The church is not to create or foster political parties or blocs. The proclamation of the church may indeed induce the members of the church and others to affiliate themselves, in their capacity as citizens, with one party rather than with another or, perhaps, to form a political party for the promotion of good politics. If the proclamation of the church is sound, the church has no need to be ashamed of the influence its proclamation exerts in this direction, nor does it need to be troubled by the charge that may be levelled against it to the effect that it is engaged in politics. In such circumstances the church must be prepared to pay the price for its faithful witness to the political implications of the message committed to it."

-- from www.kairosjournal.org    -- for this specific article, go here

"Health and Wealth Gospel"-Lite?

A brief excerpt that gives the essence of this honest, Biblically wise article on suffering:  "...I was forced to acknowledge that God had never promised me that my life would be pain free, or that I would never endure the common hardships of being human in a broken world. I realized it would not be fair to hold God accountable to promises he never actually made...."

He is interceding for you....

"If I could hear Christ praying for me in the next room, I would not fear a million enemies." -- R.M. M'Cheyne (Romans 8:34)

This Love Won't Let You Down

"The love of Jesus is the love you have been looking for all of your life. This is the only love that can’t let you down. This is bombproof love. Not friend-love, not personal acclaim, not married love, and not even romantic love— it is this love that you are after, underneath all your pursuit of those others. And if this love of active obedience is an active reality in your life, you will be a person of integrity; you will be a person of prayer; you will be kind to people who mistreat you. If you have this love you will be a little more like him. Look at him dying in the dark for you. Let it melt you into his likeness."

-- Tim Keller, "The Obedient Master" from Encounters with Jesus series

"Nobody can preach a better gospel...."

"When Charles Spurgeon once was late for a preaching appointment, his grandfather, growing concerned for the impatient crowd, took the pulpit to begin the service. A bit of a way’s into his teaching, Charles finally entered the back door. His grandfather interrupted his own sermon to say, “Here comes my grandson. . . . He can preach the gospel better than I can, but you cannot preach a better gospel, can you, Charles?” 1

"The important thing is not whether you can call down thunder and set hearts aflame with your words, but whether you have personally felt the thunder and flame of the gospel’s word. Lots of people can preach the gospel better than you; but nobody can preach a better gospel than you if yours is the true one. We are all on level ground at the foot of the cross. The question is, can you talk about it plainly and personally?..."

-- Jared C. Wilson, "The Pastor's Justification: Applying the Work of Christ in Your Life and Ministry" (Crossway. Kindle Edition.)

How Faith Speaks

"The man who has faith is the man who is no longer looking at himself, and no longer looking to himself. He no longer looks at anything he once was. He does not look at what he is now. He does not look at what he hopes to be as the result of his own efforts. He looks entirely to the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work, and he rests on that alone.

"He has ceased to say, ‘Ah yes, I have committed terrible sins but I have done this and that.’ He stops saying that. If he goes on saying that, he has not got faith.

"Faith speaks in an entirely different manner and makes a man say, ‘Yes, I have sinned grievously, I have lived a life of sin, yet I know that I am a child of God because I am not resting on any righteousness of my own; my righteousness is in Jesus Christ, and God has put that to my account.’ "

— Martyn Lloyd-Jones, quoted by Tim Keller in
"The Message of Romans"

Is His Glory God's Only Goal?

A well thought out meditation from Christopher Morgan:

This excerpt gives the main idea, but read the entire article...

"...While there is a healthy resurgence in teaching that glory is God's ultimate end, many inadvertently equate God's ultimate end with God's comprehensive motivation... As a result, we rarely hear that God often acts with multiple ends in mind...."

When will I get there?

"The reality is that ... there is no promised land until the Promised Land of the real heaven. We always think things will finally be . . . well, final when we get 'there,' wherever 'there' is for us. But there is no there. There’s only here. Because once you get there, there becomes here, and there’s a new there. On and on it will go until our discontentment with ourselves is shaped by the contentment found in Christ and our yearning for this-worldly 'theres' is conquered by the vision of the everlasting 'there.'”

-- Jared C. Wilson

"How to Keep Millennials in the Church?"

This essay from Brent McCraken says some very important things.