If you want to engage more in learning about, experiencing, and practicing Gospel Transformation, a must-read is Instruments in the Redeemer's Hands by Paul David Tripp. Next to the Bible, this may be the best book I've ever read.
Another of my top 5 that has recently come out and speaks clearly to many of the problems in the American Church and American Culture is Total Truth by Nancy Pearcey. AWESOME!!!
If you want to know the others in my top 5:
Knowing God by J.I. Packer
A Quest for Godliness by J. I. Packer
Not the Way It's Supposed to Be by Cornelius Plantinga
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Some Thoughts on the Church
As Joe Novenson once said, "The church may be a whore, but she is God's wife and your mother."
G.K. Chesterton: "The church has gone to the dogs at least 5 times, and each time it is the dogs that came back dead."
Jesus seemed to think that the church was pretty important to His whole plan (Matthew 16:17-19 and John 17:21-26).
The church today is radically messed up but abuse doesn't point us to disuse but to proper use. We are called to engage with others in living out the Truth as revealed in God's Word and to seek out a church that is pursuing that. Christ calls us to this (John 17:21-26), even as He prays for it.
To gripe or abandon the local church without pursuing misses the point and reveals that we are more concerned with our pain and desires than with God's passion and desires. Or as Madonna has said recently, "When you turn over an apple cart, all you have is a mess of apples on the floor and how does that help anything."
G.K. Chesterton: "The church has gone to the dogs at least 5 times, and each time it is the dogs that came back dead."
Jesus seemed to think that the church was pretty important to His whole plan (Matthew 16:17-19 and John 17:21-26).
The church today is radically messed up but abuse doesn't point us to disuse but to proper use. We are called to engage with others in living out the Truth as revealed in God's Word and to seek out a church that is pursuing that. Christ calls us to this (John 17:21-26), even as He prays for it.
To gripe or abandon the local church without pursuing misses the point and reveals that we are more concerned with our pain and desires than with God's passion and desires. Or as Madonna has said recently, "When you turn over an apple cart, all you have is a mess of apples on the floor and how does that help anything."
More on Gospel-Driven Motives
LOC said in response to my earlier blog on motives...
"But Can we ever REALLY do anything motivated by anything other than selfishness in the end?Even when we do things anoymously our hearts are deceiving and full of evil. "
My answer:
A resounding Yes...Paul says it (1Cor 13) and I have experienced it that love for God and others rather than selfishness can and should be the motivation for the good things we do, as a result of a transformed heart, which is a response to the Gospel (God free love and grace towards us) and the work of the Spirit to change our heart. I am not saying that we can have absolutely pure motives, nor am I saying we should navel-gaze to try and figure out our "true" motivation anytime we do things. But to say that what pleases God are kind actions driven by Gospel-driven motivation. Anything less should drive us to God so that He might graciously change us. 1Tim1:5 "But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith."Now it is just as wrong to have a Gospel transformed heart and to do nothing (I would actually say this is impossible, for a Gospel-transformed heart moves us to action). Also I would agree with CS Lewis that showing kindness, even while wrestling with poor motives, often can be the instrument through which God transforms our motives and attitude. But I ramble. May we run to God continually to experience His grace that we might embody that grace in our actions and our motivations.
"But Can we ever REALLY do anything motivated by anything other than selfishness in the end?Even when we do things anoymously our hearts are deceiving and full of evil. "
My answer:
A resounding Yes...Paul says it (1Cor 13) and I have experienced it that love for God and others rather than selfishness can and should be the motivation for the good things we do, as a result of a transformed heart, which is a response to the Gospel (God free love and grace towards us) and the work of the Spirit to change our heart. I am not saying that we can have absolutely pure motives, nor am I saying we should navel-gaze to try and figure out our "true" motivation anytime we do things. But to say that what pleases God are kind actions driven by Gospel-driven motivation. Anything less should drive us to God so that He might graciously change us. 1Tim1:5 "But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith."Now it is just as wrong to have a Gospel transformed heart and to do nothing (I would actually say this is impossible, for a Gospel-transformed heart moves us to action). Also I would agree with CS Lewis that showing kindness, even while wrestling with poor motives, often can be the instrument through which God transforms our motives and attitude. But I ramble. May we run to God continually to experience His grace that we might embody that grace in our actions and our motivations.
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Thoughts on and Longings for the Beautiful Community of the Church
"Church" in the Bible is actually "ekklesia" in the greek meaning assembly/the gathered ones. Through the NT writers direction, church is the gathering of believers for the sharing of life and worship of God (both in corporate liturgical worship and the corporate living wholly for God).
The thing that strikes me about many who object to seeing the church in this way is that so many of them seem so caught up into American individualism that they fail to see God's enormous blessing that the Scripture promises (Ps 133) for being a part of a vital community of believers (admittedly most American churches lack both the real vitality and real community) and of God's calling to be a part of a larger body to worship God (John 17:20-24; 1Pet 2:4-10).
How can we exhibit the unity that Jesus is praying for, the barrier-breaking unity that Jesus says will testify to the reality of the Gospel (Jn 17.20-26), if we just get together with a couple of our friends who we naturally like or who are just like us.?
I will be the first to agree that many corporate gatherings (churches) have become emptied out of what God intended it to be.
But one thing is clear throughout Scripture that God calls us to worship Him corporately (Ps 92, 84, 1Pet 2:4-10) and more than that to be a corporate witness of love and grace and truth (John 17:20-24, 1Pet 2:4-10). Too often people have taken the "where two or three are gathered" and used that to say that is corporate worship. That verse is actually talking about church discipline and refers to the witnesses necessary to represent God before another believer who is living in sin. The Scriptures really aren't interested in setting up a strict guideline for how many qualify as a gathering, but the nature of corporate gatherings from the Bible would definitely point us that this gathering should be larger than an individual or than an individual family.
Not only is this where God's call is, but being a part of biblical community of real relationships, real worship, real engagement with God, church-being (as Marva Dawn calls it), what God has intended the church to be, is the greatest privilege and blessing that we can receive here on earth, the only real and enduring taste of heaven when we can find it.
Ps 133 "Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity.... for there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore."
I am a pastor and I ache for these real relationships, real engagement, and real worship here in Shreveport. I have experienced this in the past and am pursuing it whole-heartedly here. As for me, I will pour out my life in pursuing real community and self-sacrificial sharing in worship that I might join together with others to reflect God's only-Gospel-possible glory and that I might drink deeply from the blessings found there.
May we seek out churches, other believers, and pastors, who are desiring and pursuing God's call for the church. We who earnestly hunger for this must join together in being the church! May God provide this for you.
The thing that strikes me about many who object to seeing the church in this way is that so many of them seem so caught up into American individualism that they fail to see God's enormous blessing that the Scripture promises (Ps 133) for being a part of a vital community of believers (admittedly most American churches lack both the real vitality and real community) and of God's calling to be a part of a larger body to worship God (John 17:20-24; 1Pet 2:4-10).
How can we exhibit the unity that Jesus is praying for, the barrier-breaking unity that Jesus says will testify to the reality of the Gospel (Jn 17.20-26), if we just get together with a couple of our friends who we naturally like or who are just like us.?
I will be the first to agree that many corporate gatherings (churches) have become emptied out of what God intended it to be.
But one thing is clear throughout Scripture that God calls us to worship Him corporately (Ps 92, 84, 1Pet 2:4-10) and more than that to be a corporate witness of love and grace and truth (John 17:20-24, 1Pet 2:4-10). Too often people have taken the "where two or three are gathered" and used that to say that is corporate worship. That verse is actually talking about church discipline and refers to the witnesses necessary to represent God before another believer who is living in sin. The Scriptures really aren't interested in setting up a strict guideline for how many qualify as a gathering, but the nature of corporate gatherings from the Bible would definitely point us that this gathering should be larger than an individual or than an individual family.
Not only is this where God's call is, but being a part of biblical community of real relationships, real worship, real engagement with God, church-being (as Marva Dawn calls it), what God has intended the church to be, is the greatest privilege and blessing that we can receive here on earth, the only real and enduring taste of heaven when we can find it.
Ps 133 "Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity.... for there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore."
I am a pastor and I ache for these real relationships, real engagement, and real worship here in Shreveport. I have experienced this in the past and am pursuing it whole-heartedly here. As for me, I will pour out my life in pursuing real community and self-sacrificial sharing in worship that I might join together with others to reflect God's only-Gospel-possible glory and that I might drink deeply from the blessings found there.
May we seek out churches, other believers, and pastors, who are desiring and pursuing God's call for the church. We who earnestly hunger for this must join together in being the church! May God provide this for you.
Can bad motives cause "do-gooding" to be sin?
Anonymous asks in response to one of my earlier posts:
Anyway, I was curious about how "to do good without it being driven by love is sin." Do you mean that good deeds motivated by pride or a desire to be rewarded or in order to get ahead are a sin? What about good deeds out of a sense of obligation? Just curious.
Because according to Scriptures motives are as important to God as the acts themselves. Or to say it another way, transformation from God is seen more in a radical change of motives than it is in just a change of actions.
1Corinthians 13:1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
Matthew 6:1 "Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven. 2 "So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.
In Matthew 6, Jesus is exposing the Pharisees' hypocrisy and while he never calls their outward acts driven by self-centered motives "sin", he portrayal of them speaks even more strongly in that direction, as seen in
Matthew 23:25 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence.
26 "You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.
27 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.
28 "So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Romans 14:23 "whatever is not from faith is sin."
Cain's offering in Genesis 4 was not received by God why? We don't know for sure but it seems to flow from not being given of the first fruits (he gave leftovers; his heart was not fully behind the gift/act.)
Righteousness in the Biblical faith is more than what is done (though not less). It is rooted in a response to God leading to love for God and love for men. Anything less than that is sin.
Having said that, I don’t mean we shouldn’t do acts of kindness if we lack love. [When we are faced with a less than loving motive (only in glory will our motives be 100% pure) and the opportunity to show kindness, we should still show kindness.] I do mean that our lack of love exposes our sinful condition and should lead us to repentance before God, acknowledging that our non-love-driven “good deeds” are less than what pleases God and looking for Him to so transform us by His Spirit into Christ’s likeness that we would truly love.
Biblical Christianity is more about joyously pleasing God than it is about being good people. As a matter of fact, "do-gooding" often is aimed at distancing ourselves from real lived-out dependence on Christ’s intercession for us (which is the heart of the Christian Gospel), by trying to feel better about ourselves or offer God a sacrifice less than what He has already provided. To see more of what I am talking about read John Piper’s Desiring God [online at http://desiringgod.org/dg/id1.htm].
Anyway, I was curious about how "to do good without it being driven by love is sin." Do you mean that good deeds motivated by pride or a desire to be rewarded or in order to get ahead are a sin? What about good deeds out of a sense of obligation? Just curious.
My answer:
Because according to Scriptures motives are as important to God as the acts themselves. Or to say it another way, transformation from God is seen more in a radical change of motives than it is in just a change of actions.
1Corinthians 13:1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
Matthew 6:1 "Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven. 2 "So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.
In Matthew 6, Jesus is exposing the Pharisees' hypocrisy and while he never calls their outward acts driven by self-centered motives "sin", he portrayal of them speaks even more strongly in that direction, as seen in
Matthew 23:25 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence.
26 "You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.
27 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.
28 "So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Romans 14:23 "whatever is not from faith is sin."
Cain's offering in Genesis 4 was not received by God why? We don't know for sure but it seems to flow from not being given of the first fruits (he gave leftovers; his heart was not fully behind the gift/act.)
Righteousness in the Biblical faith is more than what is done (though not less). It is rooted in a response to God leading to love for God and love for men. Anything less than that is sin.
Having said that, I don’t mean we shouldn’t do acts of kindness if we lack love. [When we are faced with a less than loving motive (only in glory will our motives be 100% pure) and the opportunity to show kindness, we should still show kindness.] I do mean that our lack of love exposes our sinful condition and should lead us to repentance before God, acknowledging that our non-love-driven “good deeds” are less than what pleases God and looking for Him to so transform us by His Spirit into Christ’s likeness that we would truly love.
Biblical Christianity is more about joyously pleasing God than it is about being good people. As a matter of fact, "do-gooding" often is aimed at distancing ourselves from real lived-out dependence on Christ’s intercession for us (which is the heart of the Christian Gospel), by trying to feel better about ourselves or offer God a sacrifice less than what He has already provided. To see more of what I am talking about read John Piper’s Desiring God [online at http://desiringgod.org/dg/id1.htm].
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