Recently, I came across this video interview and thought it would be helpful to share with regards to how we are to read God’s Word.
Darrin Patrick, pastor of The Journey Church in St. Louis asks Dr. Bryan Chappell, president of Covenant Theological Seminary, the question: “How can I see the Gospel through the Law?” In other words, “How do I see Jesus being displayed in a commandment like ‘Do not steal’? Is this commandment given to show me primarily what Imust do – or to show me primarily what Jesus has done?”
Though this question is asked in regards to how preachers are to preach God’s Word, it is absolutely helpful in how we approach God’s Word on a daily basis in our devotionals.
“I think a lot of us need to forget about God’s will for my life. God cares more about our response to his Spirit’s leading today, in this moment, than about what we intend to do next year. In fact, the decisions we make next year will be profoundly affected by the degree to which we submit to the Spirit right now, in today’s decisions. It is easy to use the phrase ‘God’s will for my life’ as an excuse for inaction or even disobedience. It’s much less demanding to think about God’s will for your future than it is to ask Him what He wants you to do in the next ten minutes. It’s safer to commit to following him someday instead of this day. To be honest I believe part of the desire to ‘know God’s will for my life’ is birthed in fear and results in paralysis.” (120)
“God wants us to listen to his Spirit on a daily basis, and even throughout the day, as difficult and as stretching moments arise, and in the midst of the mundane. My hope is that instead of searching for ‘God’s will for my life,’ each of us would learn to seek hard after ‘the Spirit’s leading in my life today.’” (120)
“The Spirit who raised Christ from the dead is not someone we can just call on when we want a little extra power in our lives. Jesus Christ did not die in order to follow us. He died and rose again so that we could forget everything else and follow him to the cross, to true Life.” (122)
In what areas of your life right now is it evident that you are not obeying His Spirit? I would encourage us all to write them down and repent and trust in Christ for the forgiveness of those sins, and then asking God to supply you with the strength that only He can supply “in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 4:11).
This past Sunday, looking at Mark 13:32-37, I made the point that Jesus Christ is calling us to live each and every single day of our lives with the following mentality: “Today could very well be my last day here on this earth before I stand before a holy and righteous God.”
Jesus, in Mark 13:32-37 essentially says, “Be on guard, keep awake because you don’t know when I’m coming back!” Also, James, in James 4:13-17, admonishes us to not boast about tomorrow because we have absolutely no guarantee that we’ll even live to see tomorrow. Instead, we “ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that’ (James 4:15).
For Christians especially, this shouldn’t produce fear in us, but rather a deep joy because, in the end, this is a clear reminder that our good, gracious, and loving master, who paid for our freedom with his blood, is coming back (1 Corinthians 6:20; Mark 13:34-36). And because he’s coming back, we want to do everything to please our master and hear those glorious words, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ (Matthew 25:21).
And so, this is a clear principle laid out in Scripture: live each day with the mentality that today could very well be the last day on this earth before we stand before a holy and righteous God.
But the question that inevitably comes up, then, is this: “Does that mean that we don’t plan for the future? Is it wrong to plan to go to college; to get a job; have a family; etc?” Simple answer is no.
Though the Bible is clear that we should live our lives with this mentality (mentioned above), the Bible is also clear that we should plan as best as we can. For example, the book of Proverbs is filled with practical advice about planning (e.g. Proverbs 3:29, 12:20, 15:22, 21:5, etc.).
And so the issue, then, isn’t “Do we plan at all?” – because the Bible is clear that we do. But rather, “After I’ve planned, am I living each day with the mentality that says, ‘Today could very well be the last day here on this earth before I stand before a holy and righteous God?’”
In other words, do I plan with the clear understanding that God can call me even before I achieve those plans? If not, then could it be that we’re living not “to the glory of God” (1 Corinthians 10:31), but for our own?
May we live each day in anticipation of seeing our good, gracious, and loving master – who is infinitely more satisfying than even the biggest dreams that we plan.
1. Stand on the corner and scream “REPENT!” at others. If it didn’t work for Jeremiah the prophet, it won’t work for you.
2. Break into a public high school and shove gospel tracts into the lockers. Trust me on this. I’ve done it…seriously.
3. Wear a “Ready to die…ask me why” T-Shirt. I’ve done this too. It’s not effective, but it did scare people.
4. Go into a bookstore and secretly slip gospel tracts into all of the New Age/Witchcraft books. Have I done this? Maybe…okay, yes.
5. Put gospel tracts in the hands of the manequins at J.C. Pennys. While it looks like the fashion dummy is offering the gospel tract it’s the real dummy that gets thrown out of the mall. Suffice it to say that I’ve met many security guards this way and they are nothing like the guy in “Mall Cop.”
6. Use fake $100 dollar bills with “the gospel” on them to get people excited that they found a $100 dollar bill and then get them ticked off when they realize that they didn’t.
7. Go on Christian television and offer the gospel as a way to get rich on earth. Does anybody have a barf bag?
8. Sky dive from 3,000 feet into an outdoor Atheist’s convention with “John 3:16″ painted on your parachute.
9. Yell out “I love Jesus how ’bout you?” in the middle of class.
10. Any kind of Christian bumper sticker (especially if you’re a bad driver!)
Read the rest of the article here to see, then, how we are to share our faith. I hope you all are encouraged by this as I was.
Perhaps one of the most important truths that Christians must cling to is a thorough understanding of what true, biblical faith and repentance means. Greg Gilbert, in his extremely practical and simple book titled What Is the Gospel? explains just that. For the next few entries, I will be sharing some excerpts from the book. Here’s the first:
Faith Is Reliance
Faith is one of those words that’s been misused for so long that most people have no idea what it really means. Ask someone on the street to describe faith, and while you might get some respectful-sounding words, the heart of the matter will most likely be that faith is belief in the ridiculous against all evidence.
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It’s a charade, a fun and comforting game that people are free to engage in if they wish, but with no real connection to the actual world. Children believe in Santa Claus and the Easter bunny. Mystics believe in the power of stones and crystals. Crazy people believe in fairies. And Christians, well, they believe in Jesus.
Read the Bible, though, and you’ll find that faith is nothing like that caricature. Faith is not believing in something you can’t prove, as so many people define it. It is, biblically speaking, RELIANCE. A rock-solid, truth-grounded, promise-founded trust in the risen Jesus to save you from sin.
Paul tells us about the nature of faith in Romans 4, in his discussion about Abraham. here’s how he describes Abraham’s faith:
18In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” 19He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which wasas good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb. 20No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, 21fully convinced thatGod was able to do what he had promised. (Romans 4:18-21)
Despite all that was working against God’s promise – Abraham’s age, his wife’s age and barrenness – Abraham believed what God had said. He trusted in God without wavering and relied on him to accomplish his promises. Abraham’s was not a perfect faith, of course; Ishmael’s birth to Hagar proves that Abrahamat first tried to RELY on his own schemes to fulfill God’s promises. But having repented of that sin, Abraham in the end put his faith in God. He RELIED on him, as Paul says, “fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.”
The gospel of Jesus Christ calls us to do the very same thing – to put our faith in Jesus, RELY on him, and trust him to do what he has promised to do.
So this is what faith is biblically. Tomorrow, we’ll go into further detail about exactly what we are to be RELYING on Jesus for. But for the meantime, some questions to think through for yourself:
What was your understanding of faith prior to reading this? Was your “faith” in Jesus, as Gilbert puts it, like believing in the Easter bunny, Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, etc? If not, then what was it?
How does Gilbert’s explanation of faith as RELIANCE on something differ from this notion of faith as casually believing in Santa Claus, the Easter bunny, etc.?
What or who are you practically RELYING on in your life currently? That is to say, what or who, if it was not in your life right now, would you feel as if something important was missing? (i.e. friends, money, reputation, intellect, God? Bible? Affection for Christ?)
