The Resurrection Seed
This article is excerpted from our latest release A Guide for Holy Week: The Last Days of King Jesus. Get your copy today!
The events of holy week were a roller coaster ending in a terrifying dip into darkness. The Savior was killed. He was buried by Joseph of Arimathea in his own tomb.
His followers were dejected, but even in the midst of this hopeless there was a seed of hope. It lay dormant for three days, but it sprout soon enough.
But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”—and that he had said these things to her. – John 20:11-18 (see also Matt. 28:1-10, Mk. 16:1-8, Lk. 24:1-12)
The Apostle John shares a story of mistaken identity. Mary and other women arrive at Jesus’s tomb on the morning of his resurrection. The synoptics recall the women conversing among themselves to the effect of “Who’s going to roll the stone away?” But when they get there, the stone is already rolled back and as one might expect they are afraid and confused. Now the synoptics and John’s gospel report that the women went into the tomb and an angel reports Jesus’s resurrection. John then fills in the story with additional details.
The women leave and tell the disciples about the empty tomb. Mary Magdalene returns with the disciples who see the empty tomb, and as the men are leaving, she stays and weeps outside the tomb. Jesus (unknown to her) approaches her, “‘Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?’” As is often the case after the resurrection, Jesus is unrecognized in his risen state. She replies, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” What I love is his simple reply to her. Jesus says, “Mary” and immediately she knows. He’s her Lord. This scene is so intimate. You can sense the care Jesus has for Mary.
Part of what makes this passage compelling is Mary’s mistaking Jesus when we all know it’s him. Even though the section is short, I always find myself screaming, “It’s him Mary! He’s alive!” John tells us she thinks he’s the gardener. She’s wrong in a way, but in another way she’s profoundly right.
God places Adam and Even in the garden to tend it. They failed. Sin enters the world. Time passes. Lots of time. Humankind fails miserably at pleasing God. We constantly screw things up, but the promise (Gen. 3:15). The Seed would come!
Jesus finally does arrives and enters the Garden Tomb. He crushes the serpent’s head, not before the serpent bites his heel and Jesus dies. It’s a death blow for both. However, Jesus doesn’t stay dead. While the writhing serpent will still cause chaos until his final breath, the King, a man named Jesus, now sits on the throne of his Father in heaven. And at the end of all things, God’s temple, an eschatological temple-garden, will arrive and all things will be made new--including us.
How is all of this good news for us this season of holy week?
Jesus is the the eschatological Gardener. He plants our bodies into the ground and one day those resurrection seeds will grow into a tall a tree. Paul reminds the Corinthians of this truth,
But someone will ask, “How are the dead raised? With what kind of body do they come?” You foolish person! What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. And what you sow is not the body that is to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of wheat or of some other grain. But God gives it a body as he has chosen, and to each kind of seed its own body. For not all flesh is the same, but there is one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. – 1 Corinthians 15:35-38
Our bodies are seeds. We will die and be planted. We will rise up—just like Jesus, the first fruit of the resurrection. So as we meditate on the death and resurrection of Jesus this week, fear not saints. He did rise, and we will rise with him. We are the resurrection seed and he is the gardener.
One with the Father, Ancient of Days, Through the Spirit who clothes faith with certainty. Honor and blessing, glory and praise To the King crowned with pow'r and authority! And we are raised with Him, Death is dead, love has won, Christ has conquered; And we shall reign with Him, For He lives: Christ is risen from the dead! – “See What a Morning (Resurrection Hymn)”
Mathew B. Sims is the Editor-in-Chief at Exercise.com and has authored, edited, and contributed to several books including A Household Gospel, We Believe: Creeds, Confessions, & Catechisms for Worship, A Guide for Advent, Make, Mature, Multiply, and A Guide for Holy Week. Mathew, LeAnn (his wife), and his daughters Claire, Maddy, and Adele live in Taylors, SC at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains with their Airdale Terrier. They attend Downtown Presbyterian Church (PCA). Visit MathewBryanSims.com!
New Book Release | A Guide for Holy Week: The Last Days of King Jesus
Today, we release the newest book from GCD Books A Guide for Holy Week: The Last Days of King Jesus—which is a compilation effort from our writing team as well as some of our favorite freelance contributors. Here’s a description of the book:
Between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday, the drama of redemption unfolds in a powerful way. For centuries, Christians have meditated through the duration of Holy Week on the suffering and passion of Jesus. Each reflection generates a sense of wonder at both the person who suffered and the meaning of his suffering. From the midst of Jesus’s crucifixion is encapsulated powerful statements that unfold the mystery of his nature and suffering.
Walk with us through the Holy Week and reflect on the work of grace that Jesus brought about through his life, death, and resurrection. This collection of essays, Scripture meditations, and songs will serve you during Holy Week as you seek to grow as a disciple of Jesus.
We’re also offering a giveaway! Purchase a paperback or digital copy of Jonathan K. Dodson and Brad Watson’s Raised? Finding Jesus by Doubting the Resurrection and email info@gospelcentereddiscipleship.com proof of purchase, and we will send you a FREE digital copy of A Guide for Holy Week.
You can buy a digital copy for $4.99 or a paperback copy for $8.99. Here’s an excerpt from the introduction by Joshua Torrey. We’ll have another full excerpt Thursday!
Mathew B. Sims, Managing Editor
My wife and I recently celebrated the birth of our fourth child. The arrival of our third girl was marked with extra joy as my place of employment recently extended the policy on Paternity Leave from 14 days to 30 days. The children had dad in the home for thirty-two straight days.
In spite of this nice treat, I missed one thing about work—returning home to thundering applause. All right, so maybe it isn’t always thundering, but it’s usually noticeably loud. Most of my children stop in the middle of their tasks and express some form of welcome. The two-year-old rushes to the door shouting daddy”demanding I pick her up even when my hands are full.
Like my own children when I arrive home, Jerusalem erupts in thunderous worship when Jesus enters. Christ’s Triumphant Entry into Jerusalem is a story most Christians know. During Palm Sunday, a lot of churches have their children involved in some rendition of palm leaf waving in church. But much like my arrival home from work is for my older (more distracted) children, many Christians treat the story of Jesus entering Jerusalem as the reigning King like it’s boring. Yet, if we stop, this event which kicks off holy week is an exciting story. Let’s revel in Christ to get a glimpse of that.
Christ’s Kingship and House
I am not an animal person. I can handle dogs and cats but that’s my limit. While the idea of farming and being among wildlife is mentally enticing, I know it is not a viable reality—I’m a city boy. So the idea of Christ requesting an obnoxious donkey always makes me laugh a little. And yet, “The Lord needs” it to fulfill Scripture (Matt. 21:5). Jesus rides into Jerusalem to thunderous applause as the reigning King of Israel,
This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying,
The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them. They brought the donkey and the colt and put on them their cloaks, and he sat on them. Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” And when he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred up, saying, “Who is this?” And the crowds said, “This is the prophet Jesus, from Nazareth of Galilee.” – Matthew 21:4-11
Christ does not become King when he ascends to Heaven. He does not become King when he is raised from the dead. The “holy week” leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion is something akin to a kingly inauguration. The Virgin Mary carried Christ into the “city of David” (Lk. 2:4). The donkey carried Christ into the city of King David (2 Sam. 5:9). The people’s praise reflects this truth. The praise for their King comes from Psalms 118 as they acknowledge the “Son of David.” Imagine the raucous nature of this event. How uncivilized and esoteric the expression must have been to leave the entire city wondering who this Jesus Christ was! Like my children when I return home, the children of Jerusalem could not help but scream and shout “Hosanna to the Son of David!” (Matt. 21:15).
Yet, for all the expressions of joy and excitement, this King did not have a place to “lay his head” (Matt. 8:20). He did not have a palace within Jerusalem. He had no throne to ascend. In fact, the narrative indicates that Jesus leaves the city every evening to find shelter (Matt. 21:17-18). So where does the King go upon his triumphal entry? Here, Jesus turns the kingship motif in a divinely messianic direction. The King returns to the temple and calls it “My house” (Matt. 21:12-13). Psalm 118 echoes that this too was a fulfillment of Scripture,
The Occupants of the Lord’s House
When I’m smothered upon entering my home after work, it takes an act of Herculean strength to set down bags and food containers while picking up children. With children in tow, I visit the restroom and the fridge for a beer. Eventually, as the king of my castle, I collapse onto the couch. Or if I am being good, I get to work in the kitchen.
As King, Christ gets right to work in his house. One can imagine the confusion of the Temple occupants as Jesus rifles through tossed tables and chairs. “Money-changers” were taking advantage of people in Jerusalem for the feast. Christ cleans his house of these “robbers” and makes space for the his people. And the “wonderful things” that Christ did was to allow the blind, lame, and young into the temple with him,
And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.”
And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the children crying out in the temple, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” they were indignant – Matthew 21:12-15
The people the King brings into his house are the rejected and outcast. In this regard, Christ reflects the mercy of King David who brought Jonathan’s crippled son Mephibosheth to his house and table (2 Sam. 9). The King of Israel, in lieu of his pending crucifixion, brings the young and the broken into his house (Matt. 21:14-16). These events set the stage for holy week and result in the plot to kill Jesus (Matt. 26:1-5).
And doesn’t Jesus do this still today? As we celebrate the Passion of our Savior, are we not reminded that the joyous entry into Jerusalem still pales in comparison to the triumphant procession that awaits us all in the final resurrection? Christ would tell multiple parables about the people who would reside in his house. And these parables, though originally about Jews, apply to us today. We are the people on the roadside in Christ’s parable of the wedding feast (Matt. 22:8-10). Or more pertinently, we are those who reject God (Matt. 21:29) only to be found the obedient son due to the King’s mercy and grace (Matt. 21:28-32; 43-44). So what kind of obedience does our King demand?
Obedience Fit for The King
What does discipleship under the reigning King look like? Thankfully the events of holy week illuminate our path. An underdeveloped event of holy week is the testing of Christ on paying taxes. Most individuals use this passage to communicate some type of political statement, but our Lord used it as a decisively non-political teaching moment,
Then the Pharisees went and plotted how to entangle him in his words. And they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are true and teach the way of God truthfully, and you do not care about anyone's opinion, for you are not swayed by appearances. Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?” But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why put me to the test, you hypocrites? Show me the coin for the tax.” And they brought him a denarius. And Jesus said to them, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?” They said, “Caesar's.” Then he said to them, “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.” When they heard it, they marveled. And they left him and went away. – Matthew 22:15-22
The Pharisees enter this scene infuriated with Jesus. They have been upset since his entry into the city and are now looking to get a political conviction out of him. But in the middle of this curious question about politics and taxes, Jesus Christ makes a statement about rendering obedience to the true King. Christ’s answer to render taxes unto Caesar is based upon the coins bearing his image. If it bears the image, it is owed to that ruler. Christ’s insight is that men are made in God’s image (Gen. 1:26). Render your money to the local authority, but render your allegiance and obedience to your God. It is on the heels of this indictment that obedience is owed to our True King that Jesus condemns the religious “obedience” of the Pharisees (Matt. 23:1-36).
Over the course of Christ’s final week, the Pharisees prove that they do not understand how they bear the image of God and owe obedience to Christ. Further, in a moment of profound irony, they offer Christ the ultimate image bearer to Caesar (Col. 1:15). All of this convoluted rejection of Jesus is set in contrast to the final anointing of Christ. The Gospel of Matthew places the Pharisees’ decision to kill Jesus right alongside the anointing of Christ for his death (Matt. 26:1-13),
Now when Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, a woman came up to him with an alabaster flask of very expensive ointment, and she poured it on his head as he reclined at table. And when the disciples saw it, they were indignant, saying, “Why this waste? For this could have been sold for a large sum and given to the poor.” But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you trouble the woman? For she has done a beautiful thing to me. For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. In pouring this ointment on my body, she has done it to prepare me for burial. Truly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.” – Matthew 26:6-13
Much like Christ’s triumphal entry, the story of Christ’s anointing often loses its impact to our religious ears. Yet, our Lord says that wherever the “gospel is proclaimed” so also this act by this woman will be remembered. In contrast to the Pharisees plotting to kill Jesus, this woman anoints him for death. In contrast to the Pharisees rejecting the broken and weary, this woman humbles herself to anoint a soon-to-be-dead-man. Even the disciples of Jesus are unable to see that she has sought the greater gift of her King’s impending death.
Holy week teaches that obedience fit for our King ust revel in his death. We are to celebrate his triumphal entry into heaven. We are to celebrate his conquest of death. And all of this is done by the simple means of the Lord’s Supper. Christian discipleship in holy week focuses on the death, burial, and resurrection of the King. It is to proclaim “Hosanna in the highest” and his resurrection every Sunday in corporate worship.
And when we do this each Sunday, we are waiting for the final return of Jesus Christ. Then we, not unlike my small children, will rejoice and be glad at the return of their King. We will shout and laugh. We will joyously run to our King because our obedience is found by resting in him.
Joshua Torrey is a computer chip designer and editor of Torrey Gazette. He lives with his wife Alaina and their children (Kenzie, Judah, Olivia, and Cora) in Austin, Texas. Together they serve their local body—Redeemer Presbyterian Church. He authored The Lord's Prayer: A Family Devotion and edited John Calvin's Geneva Catechism and contributed to GCD Books’s An Advent Guide and A Guide for Holy Week.
All You Have to Offer
The weight of disappointment was so heavy my knees almost collapsed. My feet wearily stumbled down the steps on the side of the stage. My eyes burned with tears, and I couldn’t shake the image of the young blonde girl in the front row, just looking up at me with confusion. Her confusion communicated more to me than words could. Confusion. That’s what I offered her. I had heard of people blowing opportunities, being embarrassed by what they said on stage, or fumbling over their words. It wasn’t just that I was embarrassed, it was that I had one chance to authentically lead these students towards worship, and instead I used it as a platform. On the way up that stage, each step was a question of what I could offer them.
“Will I be relatable?”
“What’s a captivating story?”
“How can I add humor to this piece?”
Marketing Me
I needed to manipulate my stories enough to make them fit. If only I could manufacture some laughter, then maybe they’d like me enough to listen. My attention was on my heart, my stories, and my wisdom. I bought the lie that if I marketed myself just right, then I would make an impact. I was tricked into believing that I had more to offer than Jesus. Instead of him, my audience got confusion. That’s what I left them with.
“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.” – John 15: 4
We don’t reject God, but we do forget him. We forget that he can use us in supernaturally powerful ways, so we settle. We settle for what we’ve always done, or what we have always seen. I don’t know what it looks like for you to abide, but crazy awesome things happen in ministry when we do. It’s easier for people to abide during their quiet time, then during ministry. For some reason, we feel like it’s too risky to offer all that God gives us. When we prepare, we think of the message we need to give and withhold the one we need to receive. We don’t let God speak into the moment. That’s what I did, and it’s what I’ll never do again.
Offer Them Your Own Intimacy with God
I looked up from my feet just high enough to see my friends gathered around a table at the back of the dark auditorium. My heart grieved as it sent shameful pulses throughout my body. My thoughts considered the circumstances, as I longed to walk past them, through the auditorium, and out the back doors of the church. The mere thought of looking into their faces after what I just did sent a shiver of fear down my spine.
Could I walk home?
Would that make things worse?
The darkness around me helped, it comforted me like a blanket in my shame and disappointment. The bright fluorescent church lights were too much, as long as I stayed away from them I’d be okay. Maybe if I really did kneel down I could forget her confused face, surely that would help. My boyfriend speaks at things like this far more often that I do, and he knew me well enough to recognize my shame. His hand touched my head as he pulled me into an embrace. I couldn’t look at him, but he took me outside and onto a big couch in the foyer. As he told me a story about the first time he bombed an opportunity like this, he explained the same regret that I was feeling. The piece that was more than just embarrassment, but an authentic aching for what I failed to give. He explained this quote, passed down from generations of pastors far wiser than us, and said “All you have to offer them is your own intimacy with God.”
That’s it. That’s what I failed to give, and it’s what I failed to prepare with. I didn’t prepare my heart for intimacy with God. My attention was on the stories that would connect with these students, not with the Spirit that could connect with these students. I didn’t consider the God closest to my heart, but settled for the words I wanted to sell. When I tried to manufacture impact, I gave and received confusion. I can’t settle to offer to other people anything less than the intimacy that God has offered to me.
The good news is that God doesn’t see me as a failure. He isn’t disappointed or ashamed of me. He is patient and gracious in my shortcoming, which reminds me that Jesus is the only One who carries the mantle of perfection. He gently reminds me that faithfulness is enough. This faithfulness is a raw, unfiltered, unrelenting belief that Jesus is worthy.
The Church is Not the Marketplace
There is a biblical story that resonates in my own. A story of people who believed they had the right to sell offerings in God’s Church. People who wanted to market their craft for many people, and manufacture offerings acceptable to God.
In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables. – John 2:14
He said to them, "The Scriptures declare, 'My Temple will be called a house of prayer,' but you have turned it into a den of thieves!" – Matthew 21:13
His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” – John 2:17
We are deceived when we believe we can do anything without the power of the Holy Spirit. We have to stop believing we can pull anything across the line, because Jesus can and will flip some tables if we begin to manufacture stuff in the house of God.
The temple is a place of offering, not bartering. A place of worship, not a place of market. How would our ministry change if we were consumed with zeal for the Lord? How would the way that we disciple, communicate, teach, write, and counsel be transformed? Manipulative stories, lofty knowledge, judgemental bias, and counterfeit emotion are not acceptable.
These offerings will be thrown out, overturned, and confused. God only wants our heart, and if we can genuinely offer him that, then I think people notice a difference in us. People are more likely to follow a leader who is authentically surrendered, then a leader who is perfect. We settle for ourselves when we barter for good stories and catchy phrases. We transform lives when we offer God’s intimate Word.
I won’t forget the palpable look of confusion on the young girl's face. I think about it often before I speak, not because I need to feel shame, but because it reminds me of what I have to offer. By myself, I leave people confused. If I offer the intimacy of God’s powerful Spirit, then I have the grace to transform people’s paradigms, beliefs, and lives.
I believe that Jesus is raising an authentic generation who desire authentic intimacy with God. I believe that if we’re faithful to disciple people with the authentic intimacy of God, we will see a growth of healthy disciple makers. Ask yourself these questions,
- Are you leading your family, your church, your ministry in this way?
- What kind of leverage do you have to share your intimacy with God?
- How can you let your heart be what you offer in discipleship?
- How can your intimacy lead others to greater intimacy with the Lord?
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Chelsea Vaughn (@chelsea725) has served a ministry she helped start in the DFW Metroplex since she graduated from college. She received her undergraduate degree at Dallas Baptist University in Communication Theory. She does freelance writing, editing, and speaking for various organizations and non-profits. She hopes to spend her life using her gift for communication to reach culture and communities with the love of Jesus.
Two Shall Become One—Now and Not Yet
“Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.”
Over the years, I’ve had the joy of officiating a number of wedding ceremonies where we celebrate two people committing to the journey of oneness. Often during the ceremony, I will read, or refer, to the passage above from Genesis. Then, usually towards the end of the ceremony, I have the privilege of pronouncing a new identity over the couple. No longer are they two individuals, but one. In that moment there is a new, present reality for them.
NOW OR NOT YET?
However, recently the language God uses in Genesis struck me; “They shall become one flesh.” It sounds more like a promise than a pronouncement. The two shall become one. Not, the two are now one. The oneness here that God speaks of seems like a future to be realized, more than a present reality.
In an honest moment, this feels like my journey in marriage too. My wife and I have been married for almost 12 years, and we have not arrived at oneness yet. I don’t believe it took very long after our wedding ceremony for us to realize that although we had been pronounced one we didn’t feel or live out oneness very well.
NOW AND NOT YET?
So, which is it? Once married, are two souls one? Or, in the journey of marriage do two souls progressively become one? Yes. Both.
When I graduated college with a degree in accounting, was I an accountant? In some ways, yes; and in many ways, not yet. When I was ordained in ministry, was I a pastor? In some sense yes; and in many ways, I still had a lot to learn. When I was pronounced married, was I a husband united to my wife? Yes, and yet there was a journey of cultivating oneness ahead of us.
COVENANT TO CULTIVATE
When we think of cultivating in the agricultural sense, we think of creating an environment suitable for the growth of something; we think of caring for something so that it can flourish. Do we think of cultivating oneness in our marriage so that two people can flourish?
What my wife and I have realized in our twelve short years of journeying together is that our marriage covenant is a commitment to cultivating oneness between us. One of the main aims of our love and marriage is oneness.
And that journey has been hard, yet good. It has been challenging and rewarding. It has been a journey filled with joy and sadness; fear and love. Now we are more in love and closer to oneness than we’ve ever been. How have we arrived here?
CULTIVATING ONENESS
Perhaps it is helpful to offer two things that we have found beneficial. One is a bigger, annual event; and the other is an everyday journey. But the thought here is that oneness is something that we need to continually cultivate. Oneness doesn’t happen without work.
– Annual Retreat
From the beginning, we have taken two to three days every year to retreat, to get away from the regular rhythms of life so we can assess how we are doing as husband and wife. This time allows us to re-engage the daily rigors of marriage afresh. With children, we’ve realized how critical this intentional time is for us. Yes, it is hard to make the time. But, without a retreat, we would either remain stagnant in our journey, or we would drift apart. To cultivate oneness between two people, we need intentionality.
We’ve helped coach numerous couples through installing this time in their marriages. The important thing is to make this a priority and begin. The idea of retreating is more daunting than actually retreating. We spend time on each of these retreats relaxing, enjoying each other, and also having honest conversations about our marriage.
– Regular Confession and Forgiveness
I am reticent to write this because I don’t want to imply or give the impression that we do this daily, or do this well. We have struggled our way through this. We still do. Times of honest confession, matched with forgiveness are turbulent waters for us. At the same time, I am not sure there has been anything in our marriage that has brought us closer together than when we confess to each other and forgive one another.
The journey of oneness is really hard. Marriage is the union of two broken people, who are called to bear one another’s burdens.
Genesis tells us the fruit of two becoming one is that both can be naked and unashamed in the presence of the other. Nakedness—physically, spiritually and emotionally—all without shame. I don’t know about you, but this is not natural for us. Being naked and unashamed before the other, or truly being known, by each other is fraught with fear and shame. If my wife really knows who I am, how I feel, and what I think—certainly, she will reject me. Right? Far too often, we paralyze ourselves by listening to this voice. And the more we listen to it, the more we allow fear to cultivate isolation.
The greater voice that we must hear is one that reinforces our commitment to love. Love is greater than fear. Our marriage covenant to each other is a commitment to forgive one another. Forgiveness cultivates oneness because it cultivates a safe place to be vulnerable. Forgiveness replaces the fear of rejection with the security of acceptance. As spouses, are we cultivating an environment that encourages us to confess to one another because of our willingness to forgive one another?
Often forgiveness is hard. It takes time. Our willingness or ability to forgive each other is rooted ultimately in the faith that Christ has already forgiven us. My role as a husband to my wife is not to withhold forgiveness, but to point her to the forgiveness Christ has already secured for her. Likewise, when my wife, who knows my brokenness more acutely and intimately than anyone else, forgives me—the truth of Christ’s forgiveness gets pushed into the depths of my soul even more.
One of the greatest roles we play as a spouse is the role of reminding each other of Christ’s forgiveness through the act of offering our forgiveness.
Forgiveness points us to Christ and cultivates security, safety, love, and oneness between us. It begins to remove fear from one of our greatest longings—to be really known by another person.
THE SECRET SAUCE
Why is this journey so hard? Why is this so difficult for us? I think because we cling to our individual lives. Self-preservation too often motivates us more than self-denial.
The secret sauce to becoming one is death. Sacrificial death. It is dying to one’s self for the sake of the other. To arrive at oneness with our spouses requires each of us to die to our former, individual selves.
NOW AND NOT YET
This is why the phrase “two shall become one” is beautiful. Yes, it is a present reality. This new identity is the foundation of our marriage covenant that keeps us grounded. Here we remain steadfast when the going gets tough. And some days, this reality and truth must trump our feelings.
At the same time, the phrase calls us to a life of cultivating oneness. It points to the promise of a future reality that compels us to keep laying down our life for the other’s sake. In so doing, we have found we flourish. We don’t lose our love for each other, but we deepen our love. We find it safer and more secure. We move closer to oneness.
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Paul Gordon has been following Jesus in faith for about 25 years. He’s been married to Nicole for 11 years and he has one daughter and one son. He has been serving in pastoral ministry since 2009 after he completed the pastoral development process at Terra Nova. Paul is now transitioning to being the Lead Church Planter for Terra Nova Berkshires and the Executive Pastor for the Terra Nova Network.
An Honest Confession of a Contrite Heart
I have a confession to make: I love me. Out of this fixation of self flows a daily desire to build, fight, protect, and expand my own kingdom. I love me and my kingdom. It’s simply the natural inclination of my heart. I see it in my politics. I observe it in my desire to manipulate people to do stuff I want them to do in the name of serving Jesus. I feel it when, in false humility, I reject compliments for a well-written blog, a nugget of wisdom I may have dropped during a conversation, or preached a sermon that may have resonated gospel rhythms in the heart of the very individual paying me said compliment. Every day and in every possible way, my heart is hard at work trying to convince me that I am, well, awesome. It is in this space of self-deception that sin does its finest work in me. And without fail, whenever I choose my own kingdom, I am always left empty and wanting. In perhaps one of the greatest sermons ever preached, The Expulsive Power of a New Affection, Thomas Chalmers surmised that there must be a greater love, a greater affection placed in the regenerate heart that usurps the rule and reign of all lesser loves. Chalmers attested:
It is then, that a love paramount to the love of the world, and at length expulsive of it, first arises in the regenerated bosom. It is when released from the spirit of bondage with which love cannot dwell, and when admitted into the number of God’s children through the faith that is in Christ Jesus, the spirit of adoption is poured upon us—it is then that the heart, brought under the mastery of one great and predominant affection, is delivered from the tyranny of its former desires, in the only way in which deliverance is possible. And that faith which is revealed to us from heaven, as indispensable to a sinner’s justification in the sight of God, is also the instrument of the greatest of all moral and spiritual achievements on a nature dead to the influence, and beyond the reach of every other application.
You see, if I am uncomfortably transparent with you, I must confess that my heart is a tyrant in need of a new affection placed in it daily. Frankly, so is yours. Our desires must come under the rule and reign of a greater love, a love that dethrones all others, with self above all being dealt the final death blow.
As I have journeyed towards the daily discipline of dying to self, I have found that the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew 6.9-13 plays a crucial role in properly orienting my affections godward. As it has served me well, I extend the invitation to you to pray with me in the same way.
OUR FATHER, WHO IS IN HEAVEN (Matthew 6.9a)
I confess to you, Father, today I do not believe you are my Father. I am fully aware that you are Father to the hurting, to the broken, and to those who you have freed through the work of Jesus to love you.
It is available to everyone you have freed, and it is available in abundance. You have freed me, but I do not feel free. I feel trapped by my own sin. I feel unlovable. And I feel as though I do not love you. I know these things aren’t true, but they feel true. I feel the weight of it today.
Would you help my unbelief? Would you help me to understand that you are my Father and you love me right now? Father, overwhelm me with the love I first felt when the gospel was the best news I had ever heard.
HALLOWED BE YOUR NAME (Matthew 6.9b)
Father, only you make your name holy. You do not need me to do that. I need you to do that on my behalf. If holiness isn’t your nature and you are not about the business of making your name revered, then Jesus died in my place for nothing. I’ll never be holy without the work and the person of Jesus.
I cannot work enough to please you. It’s a fool’s errand I run every day. And it has left me wanting. I confess that my most sacred moments are riddled with my own sins of lust, power, need for approval, and pride. And my pride tries to convince me daily that I can achieve holiness apart from the finished work of Jesus. I am not holy. I am the furthest thing from it.
Today, I need the good news that Jesus took my sin and clothed me in all of his righteousness. Without Jesus’s intervention, I will never see you, Father. And if I never see you, I’ll always be self-deceived. Oh, make my heart believe!
YOUR KINGDOM COME, YOUR WILL BE DONE ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN (Matthew 6.10)
Father, I confess that I say I want your kingdom. Truth is, I want my kingdom. I want it every day. It burns inside me. I want, I want, I want, I want, I want…. I want all the advantages and benefits of the rule and reign of your heavenly kingdom here on earth, but I want to be king.
Yet, my heart is often foolish, always steeped in its own selfish ambition, greed, and lust for control. My heart craves it. And it isn’t good news—not for me, not for those who love me, and it is utterly damning news for those I say I love. I’m a crummy king. I repent.
Jesus, give me the faith to believe that your kindly rule has dealt the death blow to the curse of sin's tyrannical kingdom that is prone to rule my wondering heart.
GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD, AND FORGIVE US OUR DEBTS AS WE ALSO HAVE FORGIVEN OUR DEBTORS (Matthew 6.11-12)
It is my sin that causes me to perish. I glut myself on so many different sources of bread that aren’t life giving. I eat my fill of death. Only you give life Father through Jesus. Forgive me for seeking satisfaction in everything else but you.
The sin debt I owed with my life is the sin debt Jesus paid with his life. Through the person and work with Jesus, by the regenerating power of Holy Spirit, I have been united with you in death and in life. You have clothed me with the very same dignity and honor that I have so longed to thieve, doing so without restraint.
Father, change my heart towards other glory thieves. Grant me the compassion to invite those who have sinned against me to the same table of mercy that you have extended to me in your gospel. It is our only hope for you are the gospel and in it, you give us what we truly need: All of yourself.
Let us, smiling sinners who have been forgiven of so much, glut ourselves on the Living Bread—the very finished work of Jesus on our behalf.
AND LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION, BUT DELIVER US FROM EVIL (THE EVIL ONE) (Matthew 6.13)
Father, one of the greatest sins of my heart is my quick protest when convicted of sin that the enemy forced my hand. If I am being honest, I was undone before I engaged. I confess that there is darkness in my heart, a darkness that longs for my kingdom. I beg you not to lead me into the temptation of believing my kingdom is better.
Rather, protect me from the craftiness of the evil one who is desperately trying to convince me that I am okay. Deliver me from myself, oh God. Free me through believing and resting in the finished work of Jesus on my behalf.
A so very amen in the precious, beautiful, wonderful and gracious name of the one true King, Jesus.
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Scott Fitzgerald Scott Fitzgerald is the Executive Pastor of Metro Church of Northwest Arkansas. He is currently pursuing his MDiv at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and blogs at thethrillofhope.com.
God Saves Sinners
“God saves sinners.” That’s the truest sentence I know. I believe it’s the truest sentence in all the world. And that’s really, really good news for a sinner like me.
Someone recently asked what I thought I’d be doing now, at thirty, if Jesus hadn’t saved me. That’s easy, whatever (old Whitney would add “the hell”) I wanted. Even if it meant my own destruction.
You see, before Christ, I was your classic “sinner” type. I was young, wild, and worldly in every sense of the term. I lived for myself and for the moment. Everything I did served those two ends. By seventh grade, I was getting drunk in the backyard on cheap vodka and Kool-Aid. By eighth, I was messing around with guys in the back seat of their cars. By ninth, well, I was just getting started. As each year passed I threw off more and more inhibitions to discover new paths of pleasure.
In theological terms, I was a sinner. Of course, mentored by MTV’s The Real World and the magazine Cosmopolitan, I didn’t know that. But it was true. I was dead in my sins, I was following the course of the world, I was living in the passions of my flesh, and I was carrying out the desires of my body and mind (Eph. 2:1-3). What I thought was the path of life (i.e., living for myself) was actually the road to death. I was on a fast track to destroying my life and didn’t even know it.
But then the wildest thing happened, God saved me—MTV-watching, mini-skirt wearing, boy-crazed, foul-mouthed me. To this day, I’m shocked as I think back on my salvation experience.
The Scope of His Salvation
One day my cousin, a youth pastor at the time, showed up on my doorstep as if out of thin air. He inserted himself into my life, relentlessly telling me about how God saves sinners through Jesus. He picked me up for church on Wednesday’s and Sunday’s and talked to me about Jesus as we listened to Relient K.
At the same time, what I valued most was stripped from me. I made a mess of my relationships through lots of sin. I became disenchanted with the perpetual pursuit of beauty. My hedonistic activities stopped delivering on their promises. I felt empty. Bottomlessly empty. When I sinned to get that quick pleasure, I actually felt worse. It was miserable! For the first time in my life, I wasn’t enjoying sin.
Not only was I not enjoying my sin as I had before, I started to realize that I was a sinner, both by nature and by choice. And it bothered me. I felt guilty. The gospel messages I heard at the time told me that apart from Jesus’s work I was condemned before God. My inner conscious confirmed that this was true. It’s like I saw this big gap between me, the shallow, self-absorbed sinner and God, the perfect, righteous Judge of all the earth. There was nothing I could do to bridge the gap and I knew it. I was definitely a sinner and my sin separated me from God.
But 1 Timothy 1:15 says, “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.” Oh, how those words pierced my soul. Indeed, I was a sinner, but it turns out that Jesus Christ came to save people just like me—sinners. He saves whores and addicts, he saves old people and young people, he saves black people and white people, he saves broken people and abused people, he saves shallow people and prideful people, and he saves rich people and poor people.
But how could this be true?!
The Power of Jesus’s Blood
It’s true because Jesus came and lived the perfect life that sinners couldn’t live then died the death that sinners deserved to die. On the cross, he substituted himself in the place of sinners and poured out his blood as an atoning sacrifice for sin. God accepted this payment for sin and raised Jesus to life on the third day proving that his work was sufficient. When sinners look to Jesus and his work, they are forgiven. His precious blood has the power to cleanse them from all sin and shame.
That summer I learned that there was power in the blood of Jesus. Power to save me from Satan, sin, and death. Power even to save me from myself! The words of the apostle John, “the blood of Jesus his [God’s] Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 Jn. 1:7) seemed too good to be true. And yet, it was true. Not because I deserved to be saved, but because the merciful, gracious God delights to save sinners through the blood of Jesus.
This lavish grace overwhelmed me. I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to give into the powerful conviction of God’s Spirit. It didn’t matter if I had to change my life or leave my sin. I had to be close to Jesus! I responded to the gospel in faith and repentance. I turned away from my sin and self and turned to God by trusting in Jesus’ work and was baptized in my local church.
There were a lot of up’s and down’s but, somewhere along the way, God saved me that summer. He gave me a new heart and a new life and a new story. And now I know…that I know…that I know God saves sinners. It’s the truest truth in all the world.
The Truest Truth
What’s the truest sentence you believe, the one you think to be true? The one that undergirds and defines your life? Take a few minutes and think through your story. How would you sum up what you believe most in one sentence?
I have to ask, do you know it to be true? Are you 100 percent positive that it is the truest truth in all the world?
It’s quite unfashionable today for anyone to act as though they have the market on truth, but much like my cousin inserting himself into my life to share God’s truth with me, I’m going to (with much humility and trepidation!) insert myself into yours and offer you the truest truth— “God saves sinners.” He really does. Through Jesus, God can save the dirtiest of sinners.
That’s why I shared my story. If he can save me, he can save anyone. I don’t enjoy airing before the world the embarrassing, shameful things I did, but I do enjoy sharing Jesus and his salvation. Christ Jesus really did “come into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost” (1 Tim. 1:15). The sentence, “God saves sinners” is as real and true to me as the air I breathe. I know it to be true because it is God’s truth, the final and authoritative truth.
And I want you to know it too. If you are staring at that monstrous gap like I was, wondering how in the world you could ever make your way to God because of your sin, you need to know that God has made a way for you through Jesus. The apostle Paul declares that, “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8).
Oh, how I want you to know that! To know that there is power in the blood of Jesus to save you and cleanse you from all of your sin and shame. There is power to give you a new heart, a new life, and a new start. All who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus will be saved. And isn’t that really good news for sinners like you and me?
The Way Forward
If you have never looked to Jesus in repentance and faith, I pray that you will consider the sentence, “God saves sinners.” Think on it. Ask friends or family about it. Find a local church and listen to what they have to say about it. Read more articles about it. Better yet, open up the Gospel of John in the Bible and read all about it. Pray and ask God to reveal the truth to you. If this is true, then ask him to help you believe it.
If you are a Christian, I pray that you will continue to share the gospel with people who don’t know it. I often think about how my cousin was loving enough to confront me with the truth. Let’s be loving enough to share God’s truth with others. Be bold knowing that God’s Spirit is at work in people’s lives, just like he was mine, preparing them to receive the word of truth. It is his work that brings them to saving faith. You just get to share the good news, so share it boldly!
If you don’t know where to start, share your story with them. Tell people how Jesus saved you. Talk about how loving and merciful God is. You could even send this article and ask to talk about it afterwards. Ask what they think about the sentence, “God saves sinners” and dialogue about it. Most of all, always share that there is hope for all who will repent of sin and look to Jesus because God saves sinners.
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Whitney Woollard is passionate about equipping others to read and study God’s Word well resulting maturing affection for Christ and his glorious gospel message. She holds a Bachelors of Science in Biblical Studies from Moody Bible Institute and a Masters of Arts in Biblical and Theological Studies from Western Seminary. Whitney and her husband Neal currently live in Portland, OR where they call Hinson Baptist Church home. Visit her writing homepage whitneywoollard.com.
God Has Come to Be With Us
Emmanuel is not not merely “God sent to us” or God doing something for us, God healing us, or even God speaking to us. Emmanuel goes beyond some function of God to his presence. God with us. This is actually the entire trajectory of the Christian Bible and the message of Christianity: Humanity can only thrive, be what it was supposed to be, healed and whole if it is with God. God with us . . . this is the blessing, this is what made the holy-lands holy, the chosen people chosen: God’s dwelling presence among his people, in that place.
Moses and burning bush, pillar of fire from heaven, and as Sharad so eloquently taught on last week, God in the whisper to the downtrodden. God’s redemption is about nothing less that estranged refugees being brought home yet again in the presence of God, with us. God’s resurrection is about nothing less than the sick and dying meeting the power of life in God’s presence.
This is the power of the name given Jesus: Emmanuel, God with us. This is the line that makes the restoration and recreation of the world in Rev 22 worthwhile at all: “The dwelling place of God has become the dwelling place of humanity.” God with us.
This is what Jesus came to be and came to make possible. Everything that was done was bringing that hope into reality. The healing of the sick, the teaching of the way to abundant life, the combating evil, the seeing, the hearing, and the touching the downtrodden, the oppressed, the heartbroken, the world crying out for a savior was experiencing the savior with us, in our world. The Incarnation is God with the depressed, the sick, the tired, the unorganized, the humble, the poor, the downcast.
Jesus said: “Blessed are the poor, the merciful, the mourners, the hungry, the pure, the peacemakers, the persecuted: for there’s is the kingdom of God and they shall see God and be satisfied.” Jesus clearly came for the humble.
GOD WITH THE AMBITIOUS?
What about the ambitious? What about the put-together? The task oriented achiever? What about the driven? The proud? What does it mean for God to come to us in our ambition? Does he come? Is he even needed?
Ambition put plainly: the drive to achieve goals, to move up, to better our lives, our standing, or our perceived self. The belief that we can make things better, at least for ourselves. Ambition is the deep belief that we can gain what we must and gain the things we desire: Whether it is a new position, new possession, or a new persona. Does God come to this person? More direct, does God come to us?
This is what Eugene Peterson wrote on the subject:
The one temptation that is dressed-up to the point of acceptance, with special flourishing in America, is ambition. Our culture encourages and rewards ambition without qualification. We are surrounded by a way of life in which betterment is understood as expansion, as acquisition, as fame. Everyone wants to get more. To be on top, no matter what it is the top of, is admired. There is nothing resent about this temptation. It is the oldest sin in the book, the one that got Adam thrown out of the garden and Lucifer tossed out of heaven. What is fairly new about it is the general admiration and approval it receives.
Our hearts and minds struggle to see this pride as an issue at all. This ambition, after all, is what New Year’s is all about: make some plans to improve your house, your body, and your life. Then, go after it. This is what it means to be American, and it works out well, doesn’t it?
This my own personal, seemingly, lifelong struggle: the drive to achieve, produce, and make a name for myself is what got me where I am. I pursued this life and took initiative to do and be what I wanted, without ambition, I wouldn’t have this life. To which Peterson responds:
It is difficult to recognize pride as a sin when it is held up on every side as a virtue, urged as profitable and rewarded as achievement.
This celebrated “virtue” gives credence to the struggle. That’s exactly what it is, a struggle to be self-sufficient. That’s what this life has really been all about. Our attempts to escape the pain of dependence on others. Or rather, the messing up of our lives, or even further still: our ambition is to rid ourselves of the pain of being let down by others. Our ambition is a shield from an unreliable world.
Only, sporadically, we take time and effort to step into this unreliable world and improve it. We step outside of our lives to help others gain what we have gained. This makes us feel even more secure.
AT GREAT COST GOD’S PRESENCE COMES
How does God with us sound in those ears? Is God’s presence necessary? How does the incarnation of God with us fill, engulf, transform, and bring hope to the self-filled, the self-engulfed, the self-improved, the self-reliant?
In our sickness we might think: “Yeah! God is here to help me make myself and my world better.” Or, in our ugliest: “God’s presence is the cherry on top of a pretty well made cake, if I have to say so myself.”
You might think: “God’s presence probably passes over people like that, God moves on to the ones who really need him.” But not so, God comes to the ambitious.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. – Philippians 2:3-8
Each of the four gospels of Jesus spend a disproportionate amount of time with Jesus speaking to the pharisees, the epitome of: “Let’s help God do something wonderful by fixing ourselves, by ambitiously making ourselves whole and helping others do the same.” Jesus engages them, he goes to them, he directs teachings and even piles of stories to them. Perhaps the best story is the one about a father and two sons, famously referred to as the Prodigal Son.
The hinge of this story for the ambitious is at the end, after the younger son has returned and been welcomed home, the story focuses in on the older brother and his stewing over his newly, and for the second time, lost inheritance. His plan was working and the father didn’t keep his end of the bargain—aside, this is usually how we know where our ambitions lay, when we are angry at God for his withdrawal or withholding of their success. This son refuses to partake in the party with his father and brother because his way of achieving acceptance, security, and success has been vanquished.
And yet, the father goes to him. The father walks to him and leaves his party to sit down next to the pouter and ask: “Why are you angry?” After hearing his sons pain of dashed dreams and worthiness the father says: “But I’ve been with you the whole time . . . this whole time you’ve had me, me with you is the blessing."
Though he was in the form of God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of man, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.
God with the ambitious is found in Jesus giving up equality with God, emptying himself, taking our form which always leads to death, but Jesus goes further to the humiliating and wretched death on a cross. God comes to the ambitious, not with a more powerful voice or a show of power, but by being like us, by being a servant. By dying. By coming to our hurried and overwhelmed lives asking, listening, and speaking.
GOD WITH US INTERRUPTS AND EXPOSES
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
God comes to the ambitious, the same as he comes to the meek and persecuted: he comes bringing life, he comes with death, he comes to you with glory. His coming into your world induces worship of someone other than yourself.
He comes the same, but the impact is different. To the naked, hungry, and burdened his coming is like a much need rob, a much needed meal, and a quick rest. To the ambitious, prideful, and self-confident he comes like a wake-up call: “You are naked, hungry, thirsty, and burdened. You are in chains.” In the same way that the younger brother’s arrival home exposed the older brother’s ambition and self-bondage, Jesus’ inescapable arrival in the world exposes you.
"God with us" interrupts our ambition and exposes our fantasy, our lie, our bondage.
– God With Us Interrupts and Exposes Our Fantasy
The fantasy is you can somehow attain a world of security, peace, and prosperity for yourself. The fantasy of a world and each person in it conspiring to give you what you need or directly conspiring against you. Jesus’ arrival in the world alerts you that none of that is true.
The world is not about you: it’s about him, everything is made in and for him. His power and love is what sustains everything. Your feeble attempts to manipulate the ones you love, scheme to get the response, things, and relationships, prove to be nothing short of fantasy.
– God With Us Interrupts and Exposes The Lie
It exposes the lie: I can save myself. I can save them. I can save us. If I love enough, if I live well, if I do my bit I can save everyone. God with us awakes us to the terrifying mystery, power, and salvation and it isn't you! It's Jesus. God is with us to free us from the self-deception that we are God, too.
This reminds me of the Empire Strikes Back: Luke Skywalker abandons his training with Yoda to save Han, Leia, Chewy, C3PO in the cloud city. He goes full of belief that he can not only single handedly break into the city and find them, but also rescue them from Vader and hundreds of storm troopers. Upon arrival, he realizes the whole thing was a trap. His friends were only in danger because of his ambition to be the savior. His predictable desire to play hero is what created their horror. He also arrives to the reality, that it was a lie: he can’t save them.
God with us, destroys that lie. Why? Because we see the true savior and he looks nothing like us. We see Jesus with all his humility, grace, love, and power to pull back death by stepping into it. The incarnation shows us what real humanity looks like as much as it shows us what God is like. We see ourselves truly and God truly.
– God With Us Liberates Us from Bondage
Last, it frees us from bondage. We live in a cage of our own making. We are confined by our ability to love, forgive, and move. From the bondage, we are welcomed home to be with God. We are bound up in chains and don't even know it. The incarnation breaks these chains and ushers us into reality.
Similarly to the moment when Neo is awoken out of the Matrix to experience life as it really is not as it is nicely constructed to be. Except for us, instead of being liberated into a dark, metallic, and gloomy world, we are awoken into a world in which the God of heaven has condescended to make our gloomy world thrive.
This is the power of the gospel. This is the message of the gospel. This is the beginning of humility. This is very thing Paul is exhorting the Philippians in. God with us, is the only remedy to pride. This is the only invitation back to humility. The 19th century South African pastor, Andrew Murray describes this so well in his classic work, Humility:
When God created the universe, it was with the one object of making the creature partaker of His perfection and blessedness, and so showing forth in it the glory of His love and wisdom and power. God wished to reveal Himself in and through created beings by communicating to them as much of His own goodness and glory as they were capable of receiving. But this communication was not giving to the creature something with it could possess in itself, a certain life or goodness of which it had the charge and disposal. By no means. But as God is the ever-living, ever present, ever-acting One, who upholds all things by the Word of His power, and in whom all things exist, the relation of the creature to God could only be one of unceasing, absolute, universal dependence. . . . As truly as God by his power once created, so truly by that same power must God every moment maintain.
The life God bestows is imparted not once for all, but each moment continuously by the unceasing operation of His mighty power. Humility, the place of entire dependence on God, is, from the very nature of things, the first duty and highest virtue. And so, pride, or the loss of this humility, is the root of every sin and evil. It was the first sin. The first evil. In sin we lose humility.
Hence it follows that nothing can be our redemption but the restoration of the lost humility, the original and the only true relation of the creature to its God. And so Jesus came to bring humility back to earth, to make us partakers of it, and by it to save us. In heaven He humbled Himself to become man. The humility we see in Him possessed Him in heaven; it brought Him, He brought it, from there.
Here on earth, “He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death;” His humility gave his death its value and so became our redemption. And now the salvation he imparts in nothing less and nothing else than a communication of His own life and death, His own disposition and spirit, and His own humility as the ground and root of his relation to God and His redeeming work. Jesus to the place and fulfilled the destiny of man as a creature by His life of perfect humility. His humility is our salvation. His salvation is our humility. (emphasis mine)
God with us is our ransom. God with us is our liberation. The proclamation that God has come into your world means that you are not the God of it. At the conclusion, Paul says, “every knee will bow and confess Jesus as lord.”
Our response to this salvation and liberation through Christ’s humility will and is nothing less than worship. In that “one day” Paul describes, our confession will likely be this sort of prayer. May this be our confession, our hope, the beginning of our adoration of Jesus, God with us:
Jesus, you are worthy [we are not], our Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for you have created all things and for your pleasure they are and were created...Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing! — Revelation 4:11, 5:11
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Brad Watson (@bradawatson) serves as a pastor of Bread&Wine Communities where he develops and teaches leaders how to form communities that love God and serve the city. Brad is the author of Raised?, Called Together: A Guide to Forming Missional Communities, and Sent Together: How the Gospel Sends Leaders to Start Missional Communities. He lives in southeast Portland with his wife and their two daughters. You can read more from Brad at www.bradawatson.com.
Connecting Prayer to Mission
This article is adapted from our latest release Small Town Mission: A Guide for Mission-Driven Communities. Get your copy today! —
What does the Bible say about the connection of prayer and mission? Here are some thoughts about it based on Ephesians 6:19-20 and Colossians 4:2-4.
Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should. – Ephesians 6:19–20
Paul asked his friends to pray also for me, then he went on to detail how they could specifically pray for his mission. Stop right there. Did you see what Paul did? Paul, of all people, asked his friends to pray for his mission! If you know anything about Paul, he seems like the kind of guy who was naturally talented at sharing his faith and wasn’t fearful at all when sharing the gospel.
Paul realized that, even on his best day, he desperately needed his friends to pray for him and for the grace of God to empower his mission. Think of the most naturally talented evangelist in your church. Just like Paul, that man or woman is in desperate need of the grace of God and for others to pray for them. The same is true for us. What friends should you start sharing prayer requests with for the sake of your mission?
Paul goes on to ask his friends to pray that God would give him words to say whenever he opens his mouth to talk about the mystery of the gospel (Paul calls it a mystery because until this point people in the Old Testament didn’t know when or under what circumstances Jesus was going to arrive). This is interesting because Paul’s sermons in the book of Acts were phenomenal, he was an incredibly talented public speaker, and he was awesome at advancing the mission.
But even with all his natural talent, Paul was convinced that he needed God to give him words whenever he opened his mouth to talk about the gospel. Paul knew that fruitful and effective words only come from God. This makes me breathe a sigh of relief because it’s comforting to know that powerful and effective words don’t come directly from my natural talent, but directly from the grace of God in response to prayer. This is good news for those of us who aren’t naturally talented at sharing our faith.
Paul then twice asks his friends to pray that he would fearlessly declare and make known the gospel. The Greek word for fearlessly means “to have a free and fearless confidence” and it’s the same Greek word that is used for boldness in Acts 4:29. Proverbs 29:25 says, “Fear of man is a snare but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe.”
In this proverb, the fear of man is contrasted with trusting the Lord. Fear, in the biblical sense of the word, includes being afraid of someone but it also extends to holding someone in awe, being controlled or mastered by people, worshiping people, or using them for our personal sense of value, dignity, and worth.
In other words, the fear of man can be summed up in five simple words—we replace God with people. Instead of fearing the Lord, we fear people.
Think of if it this way: Jesus is the only one who should sit on the throne of your heart and mind. But when we fear people, somebody other than Jesus sits on that throne. Consequently, we care about that person’s approval of us at least as much as much as God’s approval. We want to please and appease them and we want them to never leave us nor forsake us. You know what that’s called? Worship. That’s because the most important relationship we have is with whoever sits on that throne.
The fear of man will paralyze your mission because you can’t witness to someone that you’re trying to worship. Do you see how worship and mission are so deeply intertwined with each other? The most basic solution for the fear of man is the fear of the Lord. That’s why, like Paul, we need friends who will pray for us to be fearless in our mission and have God as the only one competing for the throne of our heart and mind.
Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. – Colossians 4:2-4
Paul urges his friends to devote themselves to prayer. “Devote” is such an intense word! Would your closest friends say you’re devoted to prayer? Keep in mind that being devoted to prayer isn’t necessarily the same thing as being devoted to God, which is kind of like when someone is devoted to talking but doesn’t pay attention to the person they’re talking to. I think we all know people like that.
If you ever do a brief study on how Jesus prayed you’ll quickly notice that when he prayed he focused his attention on the Father. This is often in contrast with how many of us pray because we usually focus on prayer instead of the Father, which is kind of like focusing on the windshield when you’re driving instead of focusing on the road. Those are the kind of people who cause accidents!
We’re also to be watchful and thankful in the midst of being devoted to prayer. At the very least, being watchful and thankful is the opposite of going through the motions. Do you tend to go through the motions in life? If so, then you’re probably going to miss lots of opportunities for mission. That’s why it isn’t a coincidence that Paul immediately proceeds to ask his friends to pray that God would open a door and provide opportunities for him to share the gospel.
Is that the kind of request you ask your friends to pray for, or do you usually just ask them to pray for things like your Aunt Ethel’s broken hip? I mean no offense towards Ethel or her hip, but are tragedies and physical health the only things we’re called to pray for?
Look at your church’s prayer chain; I can almost guarantee that it’s filled with prayer requests concerning tragedies and physical health. It’s obviously good and right for us to pray for these things, but when was the last time your church’s prayer chain overflowed with prayer requests like those in this passage? According to this passage, we are missing opportunities to share the gospel when we fail to pray for open doors. When it comes to prayer requests, are there imbalances like this that should we repent of?
Lastly, Paul asks his friends to pray that he would proclaim the gospel clearly. We should be eager to explain the gospel in a way that our non-Christian friends can understand. Unfortunately, many Christians talk about spiritual topics in a way that doesn’t make sense to the average non-Christian.
Often it’s like we’re speaking Klingon to them. This is unfortunate because almost no one understands Klingon except Klingons. Similarly, nobody understands Christian lingo and clichés except Christians. We also must conclude from this passage that clearly proclaiming the gospel is something that we should actively be praying about.
This is crucial to remember because it’s easy to think that the biggest reason why our mission isn’t going well is because we don’t know how to share our faith. While I certainly think that many of us would benefit from being better trained in how to share our faith, this passage leads us to believe that being trained will amount to nothing if we aren’t devoted to praying.
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Aaron Morrow (M.A. Moody Bible Institute) is one of the pastors of River City Church in Dubuque, Iowa, which was planted in 2016. He and his wife Becky have three daughters named Leah, Maggie, and Gracie.
The Gospel and How We Grow
This article is adapted from our latest release Renew: How the Gospel Makes Us New. Get your copy today! —
Our culture has many approaches to helping people change. Pick a topic, and do a quick search online. You will see thousands of suggested ways to overcome a struggle. We all have our approaches. Do you want to know what your own personal “theology” of change is? Easy. When you see someone caught in a struggle, how do you complete this sentence: “If only they would __________”? Whatever you fill in the blank with exposes how you think people change.
The Morality Approach
Many Christians fill in that blank with something like “try harder.” This approach is the morality-based approach to change in which discipleship strategies are aimed at equipping us to understand God’s commands to live rightly, then we should simply do what is expected of us. In fact, the word “should” shows up a lot in this approach.
Growth is equated with obedience and measured based on performance (usually in pass/fail terms). The role of a disciple-maker in this strategy is similar to being a boss—communicate expectations and point out needed correction. The gospel rarely shows up in this approach beyond a type of gap-filler that bridges the difference between our performance and God’s expectations. This try-harder strategy often leaves us utterly defeated and ashamed.
The Therapeutic Approach
Others embrace the therapeutic approach to how people change. In fact, this one may be the most popular model today in our churches today. With the therapeutic approach, we try to understand how our life experiences shape or misshape us and contribute to our own dysfunctional behavior (which is rarely called sin).
Our role in the therapeutic model is to apply wisdom principles (usually a blend of man-centered approaches and biblical proof texts) to enable us to overcome our problems. Growth comes about with “break-throughs” and deeper insight into you, with our disciple-makers acting like quasi-therapists (or the more popular term “life coach.”).
The therapeutic model focuses on felt needs and wants you to become a better you. It tends to celebrate confession without ever pointing to repentance. Like the morality-based approach to change, the therapeutic model puts you in the driver’s seat. The gospel is applicable only in a general sense. We have the good news of God’s love but no bad news that brought about our need for good news in the first place.
The Hyper-Grace Approach
This approach calls into question the very idea of spiritual growth, seeing growth as something that may or may not even happen. This is the hyper-grace approach (“let go, let God”). The focus here is on God’s unconditional approval of us as we are, without regard to whether we ever change. This approach may mention the grace of God, but it is a very anemic grace that rarely calls a man or woman to come and die. It espouses a half Gospel that justifies but never empowers us to be sanctified.
An Incomplete Approach
Each of these approaches has some parts that are true. God’s Word does indeed give us a template for living, and throughout Scripture there are numerous exhortations for us to engage in personal effort to live rightly. And it is also true that the wounds we receive from the sins of others affect and can shape our own sin tendencies. And it is also true that, in Christ (an important qualifier), we are loved by God independent of our growth as a Christian.
Yet all of the above approaches to growth are incomplete and, at some level, plain wrong. If we have the ability to overcome sin only through our own effort, then Jesus died for no reason. And our wounds are not our greatest problem – it’s our own sin. No wisdom of man can overcome that problem. And God clearly cares about our growth. In fact, Romans 8:29 says that he has predestined us to be conformed to the image of his son. Because sin causes so much suffering in us, it would be unloving of God to not care about our daily fight against sin. God loves us, and he wants us to grow and to experience victory in our fight against sin. In fact, Scripture says he wants us to be dead to sin (Romans 6:11).
The Gospel Approach
What then is the distinctly Christian model for how people change? One that is built around and upon the gospel. Only the gospel provides us with practical, effective and God-glorifying means to change. The gospel is the good news concerning all that has been accomplished for you through the life, death, resurrection, ascension and ongoing reign of Jesus Christ and applied to you through the regenerating and indwelling work of the Holy Spirit. And because of the good news we have the heart and the means to be changed.
As disciple-makers, we constantly toggle our conversations between gospel need and gospel provision. The fact that sin is our fundamental struggle in this life is our most basic gospel need. It is sin that causes brokenness in us and chaos within the rest of creation. We lack any real power on our own to control our sin, just like we lack any real power to undue the futility that sin has caused in creation. The same dark force that makes you want to look at porn is also what causes tornadoes to rip through subdivisions and tsunamis to submerge islands. No part of the created realm has been untouched by sin. A disciple-maker is clear that the fight against sin is a spiritual battle that requires spiritual weapons. We cannot use our self-will to overcome sin.
For the person who does not have saving faith in Jesus Christ, who does not have the Spirit of God living in them, the greatest gospel need is for conversion to occur. Any discussion of change which side-steps this most crucial need deprives a person of our greatest advocate (Christ) and the only means by which we can truly change (his grace). So a disciple-maker begins the change conversation with this fundamental need.
But believers also have an ongoing gospel need. Yes, because of our faith in Christ, we have been brought from death to life and the Spirit of God now lives in us. We are no longer enemies of God, but have been reckoned righteous by the goodness of Christ himself. The Apostle Paul sums this up by declaring that because of the work of the gospel we are now a “new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17). Yet, we still have old sin tendencies as well. The “flesh” still inhabits us and leads us astray. Believers, therefore, have not moved past their need for the gospel. But many Christians struggle to see how the gospel plays a practical role in their ongoing growth.
Here’s what I mean. Christians share a confessed hope that after we die on some glorious day in the future Christ will return and he will instantly bring our dead, decayed bodies back to life into a glorious state. We know it sounds far-fetched. But we believe it by faith and are certain it is true. If we don’t believe it, Paul says we are to be pitied the most. But it is true!
So, knowing that we have already believed what may seem the hardest to believe, what if I were to tell you that the same gospel which assures you of a bodily resurrection also promises you the means to fight against every day sin? Do you believe that is true in the same way you believe the resurrection is true? Sadly, too many Christians would say that the God who resurrects dead bodies offers no practical help with porn, broken marriages, anger, alcohol abuse, etc.
But what does scripture say about God’s willingness to meet your Gospel need to fight against sin? Paul writes this is in Ephesians 1:19-20:
And what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.
Paul is telling us that the same power that resurrected Jesus and vindicated him before God and seated him at God’s right hand is now available to us. The power of God, his grace, brings the dead back to life and enables the believer to fight against sin and to grow up into the image of our savior. God graciously meets our gospel need with gospel provision. As disciple-makers, that is the primary content of our proclamation. “Your needs have been met in Christ Jesus—all of them.” Denying that truth leads to sin.
Fundamentally, our role as disciple-makers is not to be a life coach or a therapist. It is to be evangelists. We share the good news with those who have never heard it, but we also remind those who have received it that they must never move on from it. We must stress the need to repent of all of our ways that we reject God’s promises to us and to once again have faith that all we need for life and godliness has been given to us in Christ (2 Pt. 1:3).
That is how people really change. And that glorifies God.
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Jim Hudson (MA, JD) serves as a pastor and elder at Fellowship Bible Church in Little Rock, Arkansas. His ministry passion is to help others see the wonderful truth that through the Gospel we have all we need for life and godliness. Jim lives in Little Rock with his wife Leigh. While they have no children of their own, in Christ they have many spiritual children and grandchildren.
New Book Release | Renew: How the Gospel Makes Us New by Jim Hudson
Today, we release the newest book from GCD Books—Jim Hudson’s Renew: How the Gospel Makes Us New. Too often we limit the power of the gospel to its blessings for us in the afterlife. We fail to see how the power of God, which raised Jesus from the dead, fuels our day-to-day battle against sin in this life. Renew shows us the grace of God is able to change us now.
For those looking to break specific sinful habits and temptations as well as those looking to gain a better grasp of how a Christian grows Renew speaks to the power of the gospel today.
You can buy a digital copy from the GCD Bookstore for $4.99 or get paperback for $8.99. Here’s a bit about the book from the introduction. We'll have a full excerpt Thursday!
Mathew B. Sims, Managing Editor
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So how exactly do we grow spiritually? Is it simply a case of willpower and conquering our sin through perseverance and effort? In many parts of Christianity that is exactly what is believed. Growth is simply equated with obedience. We read the Bible and go to church to understand how we are supposed to live rightly and then our job as Christians is to try and do just that. God’s grace is rarely mentioned here.
In other parts of the Christian church, the therapeutic model is what is taught as the model for change/growth. Under the therapeutic model we try to understand how our wounds and dysfunctional family systems hinder our God views and contribute to our own dysfunctional behavior (which is rarely called sin). Our role is to apply wisdom principles (usually a blend of man-centered approaches and biblical proof texts) to enable us to overcome our problems. God’s grace is hard to find here too.
Still other approaches call into question the very idea of spiritual growth, seeing growth as something that may or may not even happen. This is the “let go, let God” approach. The focus here is on God’s unconditional approval of us as we are, without regard to whether we ever change. This approach may mention the grace of God, but it is a very anemic grace that lacks any power. Instead, it is a false grace that can often lead to permissiveness.
Each of these approaches has some parts that are true. God’s word does indeed give us a template for living, and throughout Scripture there are exhortations for us to engage in personal effort to live rightly. And it is also true that the wounds we receive from the sins of others affect us and can shape our own sin tendencies. And it is also true that, in Christ (an important caveat), we are loved by God apart from our growth as a Christian.
Yet all of the above approaches to growth are incomplete and, at some level, plain wrong. If we have the ability to overcome sin through our own effort, then Jesus died for no reason. And our wounds are not our greatest problem—it’s our own sin. No wisdom of man can overcome that problem. And God clearly cares about our growth. In fact, Romans 8:29 says that he has predestined us to be conformed to the image of his son. It would be unloving of God to not care about our daily fight against sin because it causes so much suffering in us. Because God loves us, he wants us to grow and to experience victory in our fight against sin. In fact, the Bible says he wants us to be dead to sin (Rom. 6:11).
This study is aimed at showing how the gospel, the means by which God initially brings us to salvation, is also the means by which God continues to save us for our ongoing growth, which the bible calls “sanctification.” Because of our faith in the completed and perfect work of Jesus Christ (through his life, death and resurrection), the power of God (grace) has been made available to us to fight against sin, to grow into the image of Christ and in so doing to glorify God. My hope for you is that through this study you will see how much God loves you and all that he has done for you in Christ. That will in turn cause you to love him more and love your sin less. Love God and hate sin. That is how we grow.
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Jim Hudson (MA, JD) serves as a pastor and elder at Fellowship Bible Church in Little Rock, Arkansas. His ministry passion is to help others see the wonderful truth that through the Gospel we have all we need for life and godliness. Jim lives in Little Rock with his wife Leigh. While they have no children of their own, in Christ they have many spiritual children and grandchildren.
The Importance of Coaching
Church planters, think about your leaders. Maybe it’s your ministry team leaders or small group leaders or other pastors in your denomination or network. Take a moment to think about their giftedness, abilities, and skill. Consider their maturity level, ministry experience, and aptitude. Reflect on their personality and strengths. Now if I gave you a blank whiteboard and asked you to start brainstorming a list of all of the characteristics for all of the leaders you lead, it wouldn’t take you long to fill up every square inch, would it? Most likely you are working with a large group of leaders with an even more sizeable collection of attributes and experiences.
As you know, this is how God designed his church. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 12:4-6,
There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.
The leaders you lead are unique and as Paul reminds us in the rest of the chapter, this uniqueness is important for the body’s health and effectiveness. God has designed the church to flourish and be effective in it’s calling through its unique gifts being used in various ministry roles. However, this uniqueness is also what makes leading leaders such a challenge. How does one go about effectively equipping and empowering a group of people with such diversity?
In the church, our approach is typically to provide teaching and instruction then delegate responsibilities and tasks, which makes sense when you think about it. We have a lot to do, especially in the early stages of church planting, and this methodology allows us the opportunity to maximize our time and resources. Not only that, but this is how most of us were taught so it’s natural we would do this with others. But we can’t treat every leader the same. If we are going to train leaders so they are equipped to carry out their God-given roles, using their unique God-given gifts then we cannot rely on direction and delegation alone.
Enter Coaching
Now coaching enters the conversation. The word coach develops in fifteenth century Hungary town called Kocs (pronounced “kotch”) where carriages were made to transport people and mail from one place to another. These carriages made their way into England in the nineteenth century and soon after took on the additional meaning of a private tutor or sports trainer. Coaching most basically is transporting a person from point A to point B in some area of life.
My introduction to coaching came when Acts 29 hired Bob Logan to train church planters in our network. He defines coaching as “the process of coming alongside a person to help them discover a greater agenda for their life and work, and to see that agenda become a reality.” Coaching allows you to meet them where they currently are, in their experience, giftedness, development, and calling, then walk alongside them to help them advance to the next point on their journey. Instead of just giving the same direction and delegation for every leader with the hope that they will be able to apply and practice, you are recognizing both the unique place God has them currently and the direction he wants them to go.
Ongoing & Intentional
Keith Webb, author of The Coach Model for Christian Leaders, says coaching is “an ongoing intentional conversation that empowers a person or group to fully live out God’s calling.” Notice the words “ongoing” and “intentional.” Coaching requires more than random or one-time conversations. It is a process of multiple discussions honing in on that leaders unique situation.
One more thing needs to be mentioned for coaching in a Christian context. It’s very easy to focus only on what you do and ignore who you are, yet both are vital for a disciple. In John 15, Jesus mentions “bearing fruit” seven times, so achievement does matter, but it must be noted that it is always intended to flow out of abiding in Christ. Doing is important, but it should always flow out of being.
As we coach our leaders, we must keep this in mind. Especially in the early stages of church planting when the demands of ministry and the daily to-do list feels insurmountable. The temptation will be to focus solely on doing that is motivated entirely through the direct and delegate model. But if you can take the time to walk alongside leaders, coaching them through the current leg of their journey as a leader and disciple, you will not only be building into their effectiveness, but you will also be developing leaders who are able to do this with others—which is paramount for a healthy, growing church plant.
Coaching in Context
What might coaching practically look like in your context? While there isn’t time to discuss coaching in-depth for every context, I’d like to suggest a few best practices that can be applied immediately. You don’t need extensive training as a coach for these, just a little practice and experimentation, and you’ll grow in proficiency and effectiveness.
– First, a coach needs to connect personally with the leader they are coaching.
The coaching relationship is one to cultivate, not a project to manage. As you walk together, take the opportunity to get to know them. Hear their story. Listen for passions. Look for giftedness. Remember what they’ve said. Take an interest in them.
– Second, ask powerful questions that help both of you listen to what the Holy Spirit is saying.
Questions will help you unearth what’s right, wrong, missing, or confused currently in the leader’s life. Ask questions that help a leader think deeply. A great example of this is with your children. How many times have you asked, “How was your day” and gotten the same answer: “Fine”? Try reshaping the question to “What was something you learned today?” or “What was the favorite part of your day?” and see if you don’t get a deeper response.
Here’s an example of asking a question in an increasingly more powerful way:
- Are you happy with your ministry?
- How do you feel about your ministry?
- What about your ministry do you find most satisfying?
- How does your ministry connect to God’s calling in your life?
– Third, practice active listening.
Active listening involves paying attention to the person, not just what they are saying. Non-verbal communication can be just as telling as verbal. You will also need to defer judgment. Listen to all of what they are saying and hold off on forming an opinion or response until they are finished. Finally, listen to gain clarity by repeating what was said to make sure you have received it correctly and asking follow up questions to gain understanding.
As discoveries are made and obstacles are overcome, we must chart a plan. A coach works with the leader to set a course and clear action to move forward. Coaching takes a person from point A to B, so figure out where B is and the path to get there. Force them to be specific and realistic, so that, when they leave the conversation, they know where they are going and have a very clear and attainable plan to get there.
Use powerful questions and active listening as your primary tool so you aren’t telling them how to get there. There might be times to step in and put on the mentoring hat, but don’t do that too quickly. Help them to think through their path forward.
– Finally, celebrate new discoveries, steps taken, and markers hit.
A good coach will stop the leader along the journey to celebrate development and draw attention and hopefully affection to God whose gracious leading has made it all possible.
Jethro and Moses
To tie some of the above together, let’s see how these principles were practiced in the interaction between Jethro and Moses (Ex. 18). Often when pastors teach this passage, they emphasize the direction Jethro gives and the work Moses does in response.
However, if you pay attention to how the story unfolds you’ll notice that Jethro uses many coaching principles to help Moses lead God’s people more effectively.
- V7-8 – Jethro takes the time to listen to Moses share all that God had done through him and for the people.
- V9-12 – They take time to celebrate and worship God together
- V13 – Jethro watches Moses do his work
- V14-16 – Jethro asks him a penetrating question about his work and why he is doing all the work alone.
- V17-23 – He then works with Moses to come up with a solution that will be more sustainable and will allow others to share the weight of the work.
- V24-26 – Moses put the plan into action.
- V27 – Only after the plan was in motion did Jethro depart.
Church planter, think again about the leaders in your church, networks, or denomination under your care. As Jethro’s involvement in Moses’ life shows, coaching is an instrumental tool for helping others develop in their unique gifting and growth while also helping them move forward in the calling God has placed on their life. Who might you begin doing this with today?
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Jason Roberts is the founding Pastor of Crosscurrent Church, an Acts 29 church in Virginia Beach, VA. Fourteen years ago while working for Spanish River Church in Boca Raton, FL, God began to lay the church planting calling on his heart and after some time of investigation and holy arm twisting, he packed up the family, moved back to “the Beach” and planted in the fall of 2002. For the past eight years, he has also given considerable time to coaching and training church planters and pastors. This past fall he transitioned into the corporate world where he now works as an Executive Coach for CACI, International, coaching senior and mid-level managers at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard. He still lives in Virginia Beach, with his wife of 23 years, Aimee and his five children.
Jesus Christ as Family Heirloom
In the heightened success of enlightenment thinking, individualism has ruled the day. This approach expresses itself in renewed expressions of individualistic ethics, politics, and religion. Hedonism rules the day. Libertarian politics is increasing among young voters. Self-centered deism has become the political drug of western culture. This trend is true of not only liberal Christianity but also conservative tradiations.
Yet, in the bible, community is important. Family so is crucial because God establishes his redemptive relationship via them. God himself is the most precious family tradition:
I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. – Genesis 17:7-8
Family Traditions
Family traditions are a treasure. In my family, the gift of music is important. Nothing has worked its way into our veins like a good melody or rhythm.
My children have learned this organically. They dance in circles at the oddest hours. From the oldest to the youngest, music and movement boils in their blood. It is a family tradition. In a much greater way, the covenant kingdom of Jesus Christ must be a long-standing family heirloom.
In fact, all of God’s covenants are family traditions. For instance, the kingdom of David, via Judah, can be traced all the way to the concluding life of Jacob in Egypt (Gen. 49:8-11). It finds itself reiterated by even the pagan prophet Balak (Num. 24:17-19). In this instance, long before God’s promise to David (2 Sam. 7), God had prepared an everlasting kingdom as part of the covenant fulfillment to Abraham and Jacob.
Back to the Torrey family, it might be like one of my grandchildren becoming a significant country musician because God has promised it to their grandfather. Of course, God didn’t make that promise to me, but I wouldn’t be surprised if one my children did turn to music because the tradition has been in the works since my grandfather.
Even to Your Children
In the covenants, God attaches his promises to offspring—even in the new covenant,
“And as for me, this is my covenant with them,” says the Lord: “My Spirit that is upon you, and my words that I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouth of your offspring, or out of the mouth of your children's offspring,” says the Lord, “from this time forth and forevermore” – Isaiah 59:21
When Jesus Christ appears on the scene, he is the fulfillment of two millenniums of promises (Matt. 1; Rom. 1:3). He fulfills the promises to Abraham and David in a tied knot that is the new covenant. Our God is fundamentally a cross-generational covenantal God.
He chooses to work within families via his covenants. He binds himself to promises. He alone ensures those promises are fulfilled. He is not the abstract deistic god. He forever remains active in history. He manifests his kingdom in miraculous ways.
Fulfilled in Christ
As C.S. Lewis alluded to—our God is no tame lion. Yet, he is always good and faithful. His kingdom is a covenantal kingdom promised and decreed by the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
Yet, it is also fulfilled in the birth and crucifixion of Christ. It is a tumultuous, not tame, history, yet the end is good. It should not surprise us that this covenant kingdom and promise were deeply ingrained in the conscience of Israel.
It was these promises that were sung by Israel in their worship (Ps. 2:7-12). The whole identity of their culture and people were focused on these promises. When their covenant redemption was fulfilled in Christ’s baptism (Matt 3:17) and transfiguration (Matt 17:5), history was shaken. But their history did not stop.
That this covenant kingdom is passed through the church is also a miracle—the book of Acts emphasizes this. Not only does the kingdom pass to the Gentiles, but it still passes to their children (Acts 2:39). The promised kingdom, as the prophet Isaiah foretold, is passed to our children’s children.
They all become the covenant community under King Jesus. This truth is refreshing and challenging—Our children belong to the covenant Savior from the beginning.
Our Heavenly Father’s Inheritance
In Proverbs, Solomon says, “A good man leaves an inheritance to his children's children” (Prov. 13:22). Would it not be foolish and shortsighted to exclude their spiritual, covenantal inheritance? Our Heavenly Father’s inheritance is very good. And Scriptures challenges us at every step to leave a spiritual inheritance for our children.
The opening petition of the Lord’s Prayer “Thy kingdom come” reminds us that our God has established his covenant kingdom from the foundation of the earth. Not merely over geography but also over all of time and space. It stretches across nations. It also stretches across time within households. Our God will not be denied despite our unfaithfulness (Rom. 3:4; 9:6).
God’s promises and election founded in Jesus Christ will be true. The gospel is not found in a nefarious god—who demands good works—but a covenantal Father who bestows out of his abundant blessings. This kingdom has come and we pray it come in greater glory.
A gospel that points to Christ’s kingdom glorifies God by acknowledging his promises to generation after generation. We admonish our children to follow hard after the promises of God and pray for this kingdom to bring glory to God the Father.
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Joshua Torrey is a New Mexico boy in an Austin, TX world. He is husband to Alaina and father to Kenzie & Judah and spends his free time studying for the edification of his household. These studies include the intricacies of hockey, football, curling, beer, and theology. You can follow him @benNuwn and read his theological musings and running commentary of the Scriptures at The Torrey Gazette.
It’s Time to Tell the World!
When I was in high school, I was on the Junior Varsity drama team. Though we thought we were Oscar-worthy, it became clear one night why we were JV. In an epic performance of a murder mystery, we arrived at our last act and the unspeakable happened. Literally the unspeakable happened—We forgot our lines.
Seriously, all of us forgot our lines. Awkwardly staring at each other, we fumbled along, creating a story to reveal the actual murderer. I’m just glad we all remembered who that was.
As ridiculous as it was to be on stage with no lines, we can easily do the same in life. We live as if we don’t know what our role is and cannot remember our lines. Yet, you and I live in the last act before the end, and we do have a role. When we remember the time in which we live and our part, it helps us speak our lines.
You and I are entering the drama of history in the middle of the story. We must look back at the beginning of the Act in which we live to grasp the plot line. It’s there we find our instructions.
Act 3: Jesus is Risen
Terrified and confused, the disciples of Jesus gathered after his death (Lk. 24). Some claimed he had risen, but many were still devastated that the man who they believed was the hope of the world had died.
Their terror only intensified when Jesus stood among them. He spoke of peace and belief, but shock and doubt felt more natural. Yet as Jesus talked, touched, and ate, the realization that he truly was alive sank in. If Jesus had risen from the dead, his body and blood were the sacrifice for their sin, just as he had spoken. He had beaten death. Nothing would be the same.
Jesus kept speaking.
These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled – Luke 24:44
Jesus reminds the disciples that this is exactly what he said would happen. I imagine they started to get red in the cheeks as they realized they should have known this. Several times he had said he was going to suffer, be rejected, die, and rise—exactly as the Scriptures said it would happen.
Jesus said this was in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms. Each section of the Hebrew Scriptures pointed to him. The Bible told the story of the previous Acts of history:
- In Act 1, God had created all things right.
- In Act 2, God’s treasured people had rebelled against God, choosing their own false wisdom and receiving death and curses as a result.
- But Act 3 began instantly as God pursued his people with a rescue plan to offer forgiveness and restoration. Scene after scene of Act 3, people have faith and then fail. Yet, God’s faithfulness never failed.
Jesus opened the disciples’ minds to the history unfolding before them. Finally, they understood that Jesus was the pinnacle of all that God had told the world he was doing. Jesus was the rescue plan of God to save his people from their sin, corruption, brokenness, and rebellion. Thus, repentance and forgiveness could be proclaimed to everyone (Lk. 24:45-47). Jesus had done it.
Act 4: You are Witnesses
The forgiveness and freedom provided by Jesus must have felt transformative and overwhelming. And the “opening their minds to understand the Scriptures” was doubtlessly simultaneously disorienting and renewing. These men and women would never be the same. Grace had come.
But here’s the kicker: Jesus now had a role for them.
In the next Act of history, God would continue to pursue and save his people, but he would do it through his transformed people speaking. “You are witnesses,” he said (Lk. 24:48).
Today we think of witnesses as someone who saw something. We use the term to refer to someone who witnessed a crime and has a choice of whether or not she’s going to testify before a court. Sometimes in the cheesy crime dramas I watch, she’s too scared, so she doesn’t speak about what she saw. That’s not what the word means in the Bible. It’s not someone who has seen. It’s someone who has seen and speaks. A witness always speaks. A witness testifies.
When Jesus tells his disciples that they are witnesses, he’s not stating the obvious that they have seen him. He’s giving them a role. This is their part in the narrative. They are people who speak about what God has done.
But he didn’t leave them alone to do this. This wasn’t by the power and might of humanity that this message would go forth, because let’s be honest that would fail miserably. Rather, God himself would empower them (Lk. 24:49). The Holy Spirit, who has been promised to all of God’s people in the last days, was finally coming. He would empower them to speak. This is what God would do now in the next Act of history.
We Live in Act 4
Those same truths that Jesus told his disciples as they trembled on Resurrection Sunday he has also spoken to us.
- He was the rescue plan of God to save his people from their sin.
- He is risen.
- He is the pinnacle of all God has said in the Scriptures.
- You are witnesses.
- You are empowered by the Spirit of God.
While you and I did not stand before the risen Christ, we have witnessed his work in the Bible and in our lives. We know that the resurrection changes everything. We believe that Jesus is the rescue plan from all of Scripture. We were not there at Pentecost, but the Holy Spirit dwells in those of who know Jesus. And he is no less powerful than he was that day.
You live in the last act when God is using his church to proclaim this good news. You know your role, so remember your lines.
Now it’s time to tell the world.
—
Taylor Turkington has worked for a church in the Portland area for the last six years, teaching, discipling, and training. She loves being involved in the equipping and encouraging of people for the work God has given them. Before her church life, Taylor worked as a missionary in Eastern Europe and graduated from Western Seminary with an M.A. in Biblical and Theological Studies. Currently, Taylor is a student at Western in the D.Min. program. She loves teaching the Bible and speaks at seminars, retreats, and conferences. Taylor is a co-founder and co-director of the Verity Fellowship.
Adapted from “Do You Know Your Lines?” Used with permission.
3 Traps of the Undiscerning Heart
We live in the Information Age, a time in which the opportunities and avenues to learn are endless. I have taken advantage of many of these mediums myself: I read every day, listen to podcasts, read blogs, get my news from broadcast networks and Twitter alike, even getting alerts on my cell phone. I am saturated with information on a daily basis. And while we can certainly say that these are blessings of God’s common grace, sometimes being flooded with information is to our detriment. Think of the last time you did that often-regrettable act of engaging in a lengthy Facebook debate. Or, perhaps you were just a witness to one. What do we see in those conversations? Two things. First, we see tons of information. People using reasonings to justify their positions. It is clear that many attempt to research and gather ammunition as they type their argument. Their 1500-word diatribes are chock-full of points and observations, and yet, we all know that very it is rare for such engagements to ever “move the ball forward.” How can a people who value information so much be so appalled at the amount of information we are tossing back and forth?
It’s not the full-stop answer, but I think a significant reason many of us find ourselves unsatisfied with the results of such information-heavy debate is that we are missing the practice of Christian discernment in these conversations. What if a commitment to discernment in our engagement with others, in how we both take in information and how we disseminate it, is the way forward?
Discernment, in short, is knowledge filtered. In one of Paul's most winsome epistles, Paul prays for the church at Philippi that their “love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment" (Phil. 1:9). I hang on that word "discernment" every time I read that verse.
What does Paul mean? It is a word only used a handful of times in Scripture, with a few of those occurrences from Paul's pen. The words used to describe the Greek word epignosis are "precise, correct, divine, ethical" knowledge. Paul prays for an abundance of knowledge, but he further clarifies what he means in using epignosis.
Paul didn't use this word much, but it is clear that he valued the concept of discernment in discipleship. He calls us to "test everything" (1 Thes. 5:21), taking "every thought captive" (2 Cor. 10:5), and "guarding the good deposit" of knowledge against falling into falsehood (1 Tim. 6:20).
Despite this, discussion on the importance of discernment doesn't make its way much to pulpits or small group lessons. We talk quite a bit about knowledge, but we often don't make the leap, like Paul did, to epignosis. One way we mature as disciples is to continually practice discernment (Heb 5:14).
And if we don't take the time to do so, we fall into various traps that are difficult to get out of. Here are three particular pitfalls we face if we fail to prioritize discernment in the Christian life:
1. We Lose Our Output Filter
The first trap of the undiscerning heart is that we lose our "output filter." A heart that does not recognize the benefit of precise or correct knowledge will be prone to jumping hastily into pointless conversations. The classic way we refer to this is "speaking without thinking." Our social media patterns certainly don't help in this regard. There is no, "Are you sure you want to tweet this?" warning. The undiscerning heart often has a foot-in-mouth tendency.
Training ourselves in discernment, however, will help us think more critically, weighing our words, and speak with conviction. Facebook tells us to react, but as Christians, we should be willing to let our speech "always be gracious, seasoned with salt" (Col. 4:6). We need output filters.
2. We Lose Our Input Filter
Not only does the undiscerning heart lose its output filter, but it also loses its "input filter." We should think about discernment in terms of what goes out, but we also must consider what comes in. You've heard this sometimes referenced as "what goes in must come out."
I watched a controversy unfold between two different theological camps over a certain doctrinal matter. The most intriguing yet saddening part of the conflict was the unflinching affirmations made by both sides. It appeared neither side was open to learning. Instead of using discernment, we often blanket accept what trusted pastors and teachers say simply because their name is tied to it.
Even the most respected teachers possess flawed beliefs. We must be cautious of allowing certain teachers to replace the authority of the gospel. Further, ascribing infallibility to any teacher, regardless of camp, diminishes the beauty of the Bible’s true infallibility. My faith is strengthened when I can admit that John Calvin was wrong at times. I need an input filter, just like I need an output filter.
3. We Diminish the Wisdom of God
Finally, lacking an output and input filter in our lives can cause us to diminish the wisdom of God. The undiscerning heart trusts its own judgments and leaves no room for the judgment of an omniscient God. They would disagree with men like J.I. Packer, who says, “[God] alone is naturally and entirely and invariably wise” (emphasis mine).
The act of discerning involves going back to a standard. When you go swimming in a lake, and want to determine which direction you’ve drifted, you look back for a fixed object, like a light house or tree. This fixed object acts like a standard. Similarly, in order for us to find our bearings and exercise discernment with our knowledge, we must go back to the pure standard of the wisdom of God.
Our wisdom is folly compared to God’s wisdom (1 Cor. 3:19). When we lack discernment, we run free from God’s standard, losing sight of his thoughts (Ps. 139:23).
Discernment is Discipleship
In the act of discernment, we grow as disciples. This growth happens by depending on God’s Word as our ultimate source of truth and wisdom.
When shaped by this Word, we become more careful guardians of our hearts. We are tossed to and fro less, and exercise caution when we engage, rebuke, teach, and exhort.
Just think how much richer your life would be if you practiced more discernment. Consider how much this would bless others. Tighten up your input and output filter. Take the harder, more tedious route of of filtering information, and you’ll grow in Pauline discernment.
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Zach Barnhart currently serves as Student Pastor of Northlake Church in Lago Vista, TX. He holds a Bachelor of Science from Middle Tennessee State University, and is currently studying at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, seeking a Master of Theological Studies degree. He is married to his wife, Hannah. You can follow Zach on Twitter @zachbarnhart_ or check out his personal blog, Cultivated.
An Interview with the Pop Song Professor
Sean Nolan, GCD Staff Writer: Clifford Stumme, tell us about yourself. I’m an adjunct professor at Liberty University and also direct the undergrad writing center. I met my wife, April, while swing dancing. And when I’m not teaching or juggling, I’m known by some as the “Pop Song Professor,” because I analyze the meanings of pop songs on my website of the same name.
GCD: Do your students know you are an internet celebrity?
Perhaps one of the most surreal moments of my life was when a student recognized my name because of my website.
GCD: What was your childhood like?
I grew up in a pretty conservative home with three siblings. My dad was in the army, so we moved all over the country and even lived in Japan for a while.
Perhaps most interesting is that my family wasn’t interested in music when I was a kid. I thought people who walked around with iPods were strange. Over time I was introduced to various types of music and was interested in finding out what the lyrics meant, but I was unable to find a lot of information to explain the song meanings. My fascination with music sort of cut against the grain of my upbringing.
GCD: Who are your favorite pop artists?
Billy Joel, 21 Pilots, Jason Mraz, Sufjan Stevens, Taylor Swift, and the Chainsmokers. I love Mike Posner and the vulnerability he displayed in his single “I Took a Pill in Ibiza.”
GCD: If a tree falls in the woods, will a hipster buy its album?
(Laughing) Yeah, that’s the question. On that note, I do enjoy myself a little Passion Pit, Foster the People, and a little-known band that hipsters will appreciate called Kishi Bashi.
GCD: Do you see an intersection between discipleship and your analysis of pop music?
I see it in both a practical as well as an abstract level. On the practical side, I interact with people who are struggling with something and have latched on to a song’s lyrics to give them hope. That provides a good foundation for developing a relationship and having opportunities to share the gospel or talk about deeper things.
That leads into the more abstract side, in which I think anytime we share truth in love we are discipling people. If, as Augustine said, “all truth is God’s truth,” and I’m telling the truth through the means of a song, then it’s God’s truth that’s being shared. I try not to be too preachy, but to let the words speak for themselves while I get out of the way. People aren’t convinced by argument, but by love. Music speaks to people on that level.
GCD: In what ways do you see music as a discipling influence on children? For good or ill?
Plato once posited that one of the big purposes of literature, music, and art is to teach people things. So in that sense, music serves the purpose of discipling its listeners and influencing a civilization. If music is not made with the intent of expressing either truth or beauty, I am suspicious of it. Then it ends up being preachy. I like exploring the influence that culture has on music and music upon culture. In more recent years, art and music have become such commercial ventures that the product is more important than the art-form which doesn’t always have the best outcome. I wish that music shaped culture more than culture shaped music, but that is not so much the case any more.
To look at a negative relationship between music and culture, we could explore just about any song by Pitbull. While I don’t think he has an agenda to teach people to get drunk and have illicit sex, I think his music is popular because he’s simply bringing attention to what the culture is already focused on. His music holds a mirror up to culture, he sings about what he sees and people like his songs because he sings about what they are already doing.
GCD: What are your thoughts on the current state of Christian music?
There are some really good artists out there. However, my belief is that there is more power in specificity than in a “vague struggle,” which unfortunately tends to make more money. When we create cleaned-up songs that don’t mention specific struggles, I don’t think they present truth or beauty which is what I look for in songs I listen to. If an artist references a lot of external stressors and never mentions internal struggles it’s hard for others to empathize with it as a genuine human experience. I’m looking for music that relates to the human experience. We also need less Christian music about water (laughs), there seems to be a corner on it and I’m not sure it’s a genuinely relatable topic. Some responsibility can be assumed by the audience though for consuming it and not demanding something more authentic.
GCD: Coldplay or Mumford & Sons?
Mumford & Sons, although my wife would say Coldplay. I like that they both share personal struggles though. I recently did a podcast about Mumford & Sons. God is often mentioned in his music which is also a plus for me and it’s powerful in that it deals with doubt and relatable experiences for all humans. There’s speculation over whether he is a Christian or not, but I’m not sure we have to put everyone who sings a song under a microscope and try to identify where they stand with their faith. I think Christians have a tendency to do that because it makes them feel safe, but I’m not sure it matters for the outcome of the music itself and particularly for whether what they say is true or not.
GCD: Who’d win in a fight Justin Bieber or Michael Jackson?
The one who still has a heartbeat, obviously (laughs). If we’re talking about who I think is better, Jackson is probably better although Bieber has his whole career ahead of him still.
GCD: When it comes to interpreting a song’s meaning, what’s more important: the artist’s intended meaning or the subjective meaning assigned by the listener?
From time to time, someone will comment on my site and tell me how they prefer their own meaning to the author’s meaning. It doesn’t really bother me though. While I believe it’s really important that we try to understand the author’s intended meaning when it comes to Scripture, when it comes to human works of art I’m less rigid. If someone finds comfort in a particular interpretation of a pop song—even if it varies from the artist’s meaning—where’s the danger in that? I’m not going to try and spoil their fun.
C.S. Lewis has a short book called An Experiment in Criticism, where he argues that we should always try to understand an original author’s meaning because there’s a strong possibility it could be better than our own. He says, on the other hand, that we might as well also have both so long as they aren’t contradictory. The truth is that bringing our own context to the songs we hear is inevitable as no two people share the same life experiences. 21 Pilots also wrote about this very phenomena in their song “Kitchen Sink.”
GCD: How does the gospel shape how you interact with pop music?
It pushes me to look for something beautiful or something true even in songs that are may not be true or content that may not be beautiful. The gospel is a message of love, and I think that the most important aspect is going into this with love towards the artist and not condemning those who are listening to this music. It’s about servanthood with writing these blog posts. I try remove myself from it as much as possible in order to serve my audience. My hope is that they think deeply about the songs they look up.
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Sean Nolan (B.S. and M.A., Summit University) is the Family Life Pastor at Christ Fellowship Church in Fallston, Maryland. Prior to that, he served at a church plant in Troy, New York for seven years and taught Hermeneutics to ninth and tenth graders. He is married to Hannah and is father to Knox and Hazel. He blogs at Family Life Pastor.
You can read all of Sean’s articles here.
Praying in the Midst of Pain
Ishinomaki City is a world-renowned fishing port of about 250,000 people. Local pastors tell me there are only about 30-40 Christians in the entire city. Ishinomaki lies on the East Coast of Japan and is nestled up against the Pacific Ocean. In March 2011, a 9.0 earthquake struck near Tokyo pulsing a massive tidal wave through the region. Abe San, a local pastor, guides me through the wreckage. We explore a middle school about a mile away from the coast. This site was the city’s safe zone where people were encouraged to take refuge in the event of a tsunami. But the wave reached this building too. Every floor is completely blown out and destroyed. Hundreds died here. Thousands died throughout the city.
As I choke on tears, I ask Abe, “When people ask you, ‘Where was God in the tsunami?’ what do you tell them?” I tell them, “He was with them. He is with them now.”
An hour later, we find ourselves at a new building that has risen from the rubble. A church. There are some Japanese characters on the wall and for some reason I can’t stop staring. “Abe San, what does this say?” He tells me it reads: “Jesus wept.”
Does Jesus still weep? I’m convinced he does. Our individual presuppositions about how God relates to us in the midst of pain carry immense weight when as we consider how to pray, how to counsel, and how to preach.
Pondering Prayer
When a prayer slips out of your mouth, where does it go? And when it arrives at its destination, what effect does it have?
At the risk of speaking rather mechanically, we might describe prayer as the interplay between two wills: our will and God’s will. Only one of the wills in this dialogue is flawless. Thus, prayer is, in large part, an exercise in aligning our hearts with the heart of God.
This was true in Jesus’ life. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed, “Not my will but yours be done.” Did Jesus will something other than God willed? Yes and no. Jesus was anxious about the physical torture and moment of spiritual death that loomed over him. He hoped there might be another way. But what Jesus desired more than escaping the suffering was the will of the Father. He was willing to bend his will to God’s will.
Prayer is bending our will to God’s will. But it is also more than that. Sometimes, when it does not conflict with his ultimate purposes, God bends his will to our will. This is nothing less than staggering.
Consider the story of Moses’ intercession (Exod 32). God is burning with fury against Israel. He tells Moses, “Leave me alone so that I can kill these guys. Then I will rebuild a nation that follows me out of you” (v.10). But Moses intercedes and prays, “You’ve done the work to rescue them. That’s clear. So what will the surrounding nations think of you if you kill them? Fulfill your promise to Abraham.” Then the Lord “relented” (v.14). The same word is used several other places in Scripture to describe God’s attitude towards actions he has taken or was planning to take.
What should we make of this? Is God confused? Short sighted? Blinded by rage? No. When we consider the scope of Scripture, the best way to summarize the interplay of God’s will and human will is to say: God does not change in his plans and purposes for humanity, but he does change in regard to his attitudes, emotions, actions, and responses. He is both impassible and impassioned.
By definition, a real relationship experiences progress. As intimacy grows it manifests externally. In our relationship with God the flow is simple: God reveals his goodness, we respond by treasuring him more deeply, surrendering more fully, and expressing our true selves in prayer.
But this flow is not one way. When we treasure him, surrender to him, and express our true heart in prayer, God is pleased. He is more pleased than he would be if we were cheating on him with false lovers, withholding parts of our life from his rule, or ignoring him. In other words, God responds to our response to his revelation.
So how does this understanding impact personal prayer and discipleship efforts? It means that every discipleship conversation and every prayer is a life or death conversation. God is inviting me to find life and significance through belonging to him in Christ while my flesh, the broken stories of culture, and demonic forces are inviting me down the trail of death. God’s deepest agenda—and his greatest glory—are when I embrace life under his rule.
Praying in the Middle of Complex Pain
How about suffering in the life of a disciple? What is the cause and purpose behind it?
- Sometimes God ordains suffering in our lives in order to accomplish his greater purposes. Joseph and Jesus are clear examples of God purposing evil for his own glory. In our own life, he may orchestrate tests or trials that put us back on the path of life (Rev 3:19).
- Sometimes God allows us to suffer by living out our union with Jesus and identifying in his suffering (Col 1:24, 1 Pt 2:21, 3:14). While he wills our obedience, he does not will the evil done to us by persecutors. For example, Jesus is pleased with the faithfulness of the Philadelphian believers, but he is angry with their persecutors (Rev 3:8-9). Similarly, Jesus was angry with Saul for killing Christians and asked him to stop (Acts 9).
- Sometimes God permits us to suffer at the hands of our own foolishness or the sin of others (1 Pt 3:17, 4:15). The sluggard in Proverbs is a prime example of both self-harm and harm to others.
- Sometimes suffering is orchestrated by Satan and his forces although this cannot occur without God’s permission. Job is the best example.
- Sometimes suffering occurs randomly through the outworking of existing natural laws within a cursed creation.
When discipling another, we must take into account a variety of causes for suffering. God is not the lone cause. Neither is Satan the lone cause. Personal sin is not the sole cause. Neither is the sin of others the sole cause. Often the suffering may involve multiple, complex factors which are impossible to dissect. So how are we to respond in the face of suffering?
Whatever the cause, God’s will in the midst of all our suffering is that we would allow the Holy Spirit to draw our hearts to the beauty of Jesus. God wills to free us from the need to find an explanation for our suffering. Jesus is our answer. Our attempts to categorize, moralize, or interpret our pain only negate our ability to experience the presence of God in the midst of our suffering.
Prayer then ought to be our biblically informed, imaginative exploration of how to best receive the life and character of God in the midst of present circumstances. Prayer also includes the responsiveness of God to these requests. As we draw near to God, he draws near to us and infuses our life with his life. This is his ultimate desire whether we find ourselves in the bitter winter of suffering or the warmth of blessing.
We are Real Cause and Effect Beings
An indispensable part of what it means to be a rational, moral being is that our actions have real cause and effect. God is the ultimate cause. But he is not the only cause. God created other cause and effect beings. Our choices mean something because they either contribute to or oppose God’s good purposes for this world. That is what it means to have free will.
So is God responsible for evil and suffering? On a few occasions in the biblical text, he has claimed to be, but it is antithetical to the message of Scripture to teach that God universally wills, causes, or desires evil in our world.
God hates evil and evildoers. He weeps with those who weep and mourns with those who mourn. He is near to the brokenhearted. He is angry with the pain and injustice of our world. That is precisely why the Father, the Son, and the Spirit partnered together to relocate the Son into our neighborhood. The Son is now a past and present co-sufferer with us (Heb 2:18, Acts 9, Col 1:24). The Son comforts us in our affliction. He does not afflict us and then comfort us. Only a being with multiple personality disorder could do so.
Some might level the objection that if God is truly all-wise, all-powerful, and all-loving, he will prevent certain heinous actions. The flaw in this logic is that God is not God in a vacuum. God is God in the universe he has created. And in this universe he has voluntarily limited himself in order to open up the possibility of authentic relationship with humans.
What does that mean for you and me? It means that somehow our prayers matter to him. When I respond to his self-revelation and open up a conversation, an infinite being actually changes the level and nature of his interactivity with both the world and me.
Jesus urges us to seek the Father by saying, “Knock and the door will be opened to you.” The clear picture is that the sound of my knock brings the Father to the door and he answers. If I don’t knock he won’t answer. If I don’t knock he will just keep doing what he is doing in the kitchen or in the living room.
James’ letter is chalk full of the astounding cause and effect our prayers have upon God’s attitudes and actions. In chapter 4, James rebukes the believers for their evil desires. They are fighting with each other and their prayers are prayers for God to satisfy their evil desires. The clear implication (which is a statement of fact by Jesus in John 15:7), is that when we pray in alignment with God’s will and purposes, he is delighted to respond.
United with the Suffering Servant and the King of Shalom
Whether you find yourself in times of darkness or times of blessing, God’s invitation is the same. Let go of “Why?” questions, and instead fixate on the central issue of “Who?”
For the Christian, our lives have been united with the Suffering Servant who loved us and gave himself for us. Through union with Jesus, you have been invited into the joyful life of the Trinity. And our hope is found in the comfort of God’s life-giving presence and in the shalom-filled future he has promised for us and our world.
—
Dr. Sean Post leads a one-year discipleship experience for young adults called Adelphia. He has authored three books. His great joys in life are spending time with his wife and three kids, eating great food, and CrossFit.
Words that Change the World: A Vision for GCD in 2017
Somewhere along the line, I've heard it said that words have the power to change the world. Words themselves do not change the world. It is their power constructed together as sentences, paragraphs, essays, and even books. John Piper puts it this way, "One sentence or paragraph may lodge itself so powerfully in our mind that its effect is enormous when all else is forgotten." We've somehow forgotten that the pen is mightier than the sword. This reality stands all the taller when we realize that Christianity is a Word-based faith. The substance of our faith isn't banked on emotion, imagery, icon, or even religious ritual and tradition. The content of our faith is anchored on words; God-breathed, inspired words that tell us of the Word incarnate. The Christian faith is one that is utterly dependent on words.
The reality is this, if we don't have the Word of God, we don't have any clue of how to know or approach God. Furthermore, we know nothing real of our poor condition (except a twinge of guilt here or there), and we know nothing actual of our means of redemption through Christ Jesus. Without the Word, we are utterly doomed.
Even the concept of "gospel" requires words. Gospel means "good news." It is a proclamation of something exceptional, something transformative, beautiful and true. Good news is a declaration of love, hope, and joy!
To say we have a gospel means to say we have good words that will change everything. For that reason, gospel-centered discipleship requires formation through engagement with words. Making, maturing, and multiplying disciples of Jesus requires language; sentences and paragraphs that embrace the inspired and incarnate Word and by God's Spirit transform us into the image of Christ.
For six years now GCD has been about the work of publishing this sort of content. Our mission is to publish resources to make, mature, and multiply disciples of Jesus. More than just creating content, however, we've embraced the mission of cultivating the gifting and talent of developing writers and editors who can harness the power of words to change the world.
By God’s grace, we will not only continue in that mission but expand our means to accomplish that mission. In my opinion, the future of GCD is bright. Specifically, our vision reveals itself in three things:
1. New Releases
We are looking forward to releasing more books this year than we have ever released before. Our staff writers, as well as various other contributors, have written excellent resources for discipleship that we are excited to release in 2017.
Through our website, we will continue to publish free content on a regular basis that will be useful not just for individuals, but for leaders, churches, small groups, and overseas missionaries in the work of discipleship. Here are a few of the forthcoming titles to be released this year:
- ReNew: How the Gospel Makes us New by Jim Hudson
- Gospel Creativity by the GCD Staff Writers
- Pattern: Walking in the Ways of Jesus by Jeremy Writebol
2. Writer and Editor Development
Beyond just publishing books and articles we want to be on the leading edge of cultivating the gifting and voice of these writers. The publishing industry can be an impenetrable fortress in which only those with the key of prestige can unlock.
We believe that gifted writers exist outside of this fortress and want to see their voice and leadership cultivated to make more disciples of Jesus. Through our staff writer community, a developing writers forum, and other opportunities for cultivation we want to raise up thoughtful disciples who can use the gifts of writing and communication for the glory of God and the making of more disciples.
3. Gospel Impact
At the end of the day we do not merely want to publish books and essays that produce more information on the internet. My prayer is that beautiful gospel-impact would happen in the lives of our readers, writers, staff, and leadership. My prayer is that everything we publish this year would resonate through eternity with the depth and warmth of the gospel. I pray that God would use every article and book to transform lives powerfully.
If these ambitions inspire and excite you in making disciples, I would love to connect with you and walk together in the making, maturing and multiplying disciples of Jesus through the written word. Check our Contact Page where you can learn more about submitting an article and our guidelines or pitching a book proposal our way.
We’re adamant that the written word can change the world, and we’re eager to grow and flourish in seeing the word of King Jesus — the gospel — be the centerpiece of that transformation. Will you join us in praying for GCD and partnering with us to make, mature, and multiply disciples of Jesus?
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Jeremy Writebol is the Executive Director of GCD. He is the husband of Stephanie and father of Allison and Ethan. He serves as the lead campus pastor of Woodside Bible Church in Plymouth, MI. He is also an author and contributor to several GCD Books including everPresent and Make, Mature, Multiply. He writes personally at jwritebol.net.
You can read all of Jeremy’s articles here.
Introducing Our New Executive Director, Jeremy Writebol
My work with Gospel Centered Discipleship started five years ago in the fall of 2012. When I came on board, we were a vibrant, adventurous, humble ministry that had published hundreds of articles and three e-books. Before I announce a transition in leadership, I want to celebrate what God has done through our ministry. Since then, we’ve published over 1,000 articles that address many practical areas of discipleship, from a uniquely gospel-centered perspective. We have also published 14 books, many of which have reached the top selling book in their category on Amazon.
Over the last two years, we’ve fostered a writer’s group to help prepare the next generation of writers, leaders, and practitioners. This developing writer’s team has created several influential series: Learning from Our Church Fathers, The Gospel of Mathew, The Word, and the Lord’s Prayer.
GCD remains committed to to creating and curating resources that help local churches, community groups, or discipleship groups to make, mature, and multiply disciples of Jesus.
- Practitioner Created – All of our resources and articles come from people who actually make disciples. Their stories and wisdom come from the front lines.
- Long Form Articles – We are committed to writing long-form articles in a “short-form” age. Our aim is to foster thoughtful reflection in our readers.
- Writer Development – We see writers, not merely as content generators, but as disciples of Jesus who are honing their craft in service of the church.
So, what’s next? I’m excited to announce that we’ve hired Jeremy Writebol as our new Executive Director. Jeremy is the author of everPresent and has written numerous articles for GCD, Christ & Pop Culture, and For the Church. His experience as a pastor in established churches, church plants, and most recently as a campus pastor in a multi-site, regional mega-church will strengthen our organization. He has a great gift for communication, administration, and vision.
Please join me in welcoming Jeremy Writebol (@jwritebol) as the Executive Director of Gospel-Centered Discipleship. I know he will serve you well. Be on the lookout for his vision for the future of our ministry.
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Brad Watson (@bradawatson) serves as a pastor of Bread&Wine Communities where he develops and teaches leaders how to form communities that love God and serve the city. Brad is the author of Raised?, Called Together: A Guide to Forming Missional Communities, and Sent Together: How the Gospel Sends Leaders to Start Missional Communities. He lives in southeast Portland with his wife and their two daughters. You can read more from Brad at www.bradawatson.com.
Loving Refugees
None of the things God calls us to do are safe, in fact, almost all of his commands are dangerous. One, they require us to give of ourselves in ways that tear away our core ideas of value, security, and identity. Two, we become aware of the presence and grace of God which is overwhelming and troubling because he lovingly heals us of things we didn't know were sick, he touches wounds we didn’t know we had, and he showers us with grace that transforms.
Loving Our Neighbors, Including the Refugee
One of these dangerous commands is to love our neighbors as ourselves, including refugees and asylum seekers. Moses first delivers the command to love our neighbors, Jesus reiterates it through his words and life, and the Apostle Paul points to it’s utmost importance in Galatians 5:14: “The whole law is fulfilled in one statement: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
But who is your neighbor? How far does that command go? What does that really look like? Surely, he only means the people in my sphere of influence! Jesus was asked this very question in Luke 10:
“But who is my neighbor?
In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii[e] and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”
The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”
Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
In this parable, Jesus describes how we become neighbors who love our neighbors. We see them, we have compassion for their pain, we go to them, we touch them, we use our resources, and we take care of them. We take our finances. We cover their expenses.
But Jesus also shows us who our neighbors are: the attacked, the naked, the beaten, and the left for dead. Not only are we are called to love the vulnerable, they are also the distant. The Jewish man and the Samaritan stood on opposite spectrums of worldview, ethnic background, culture, and most deeply religion. And yet, Jesus gives this vivid story as the answer to: Who is my neighbor?
Jesus, out of love for us, demands we love our neighbors (all of them, even the most difficult and different). This often appears in our lives as caring for orphans (all of them, even the difficult and different), caring for the widow (all of them, even the difficult and the different), and welcoming the refugee or stranger (all of them, even the difficult and the different). God has intentionally called us to step into present and physical ways of loving the different and the other. This is how we learn to receive the love of God, love God in return, and love one-another.
Loving neighbors is also how we participate in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. Jesus is the good Samaritan. God, seeing a broken, beaten, naked, isolated, and dying humanity, sent his son into the world. Jesus, forsaking heaven, came into our peril.
Jesus saw us, had compassion on us, came to us, and took our wounds on himself. Jesus paid the price with his death, reimbursing sin with his own victorious resurrection. When we forsake the command to love our neighbors, we are rejecting the story of Jesus saving the world.
I'm not a foreign policy expert and don't know what a secular government ought to do, but I know what the Church is called to do, and we don't need the government to do it: sacrificially love the refugee (the old, young, Muslim, Arab, Christian). This is how Christ came to us, even when we were opposed to him.
Loving the Refugee as the Image of God
“We ought to love refugees because they are our neighbors, but also because the Bible teaches us to value them since, like us, they are made in the image of God.” — Seeking Refuge
Who are the refugees, asylum seekers, and strangers in your neighborhood, city, or town? They are overlooked, unheard, isolated, and pushed to the fringes of your city’s culture. Your city daily welcomes refugees and immigrants who are hoping to build a life and experience freedom. They arrive from the most severe trauma, persecution, and hardship. Refugees leave everything behind including family and culture. After years in a camp, they come needing to learn a new language, build a résumé, get a job, and care for their children in the process. These are the people your city uses and ignores—the poor and powerless.
Jesus pursued the stranger because they were created in his image and he loved them. These people were welcomed into Jesus’ community as his beloved and as his disciples. I believe Jesus calls his people to not only meet needs (cloth, visit, and feed) but also welcome into relationship. Jesus healed people and fed them, but the most powerful expressions of his love for them was when he invited them to his dinner table.
One of the big challenges (and big opportunities) with this loving pursuit is how far the vulnerable are kept away from many in the church today. Tim Chester describes this reality well in his book Unreached:
“Friendship evangelism is great, but it does not enable the gospel to travel beyond our social networks, unless there are intentional attempts to build friendships with people who are not like us.”
John Mark Hobbins, of London City Mission, adds:
“Many people live in networks which take precedence over their address, and many churches have grown because of this. But the reality for many people living in social housing or in cheap- er housing is that their address is very likely to define their daily life.”
In other words, if you were to engage in a life of mission to the marginalized, you would have to plan it, prepare for it, and strategically change your life to create avenues of engagement. All of that just to break through social, economic, and physical geographic barriers and get to a place where you could share life with the oppressed. To love a refugee in your city you would likely have to shift your schedule, change your commute, and start a relationship without verbal communication.
Mission to refugees and asylum seekers requires a concerted and collective effort towards unlikely friendships and distant neighbors. Loving the vulnerable also requires communities: you have to work at it and do it together. This mission requires a giving of yourself and a loving of the other in your city.
Actually Loving Refugees as Neighbors
There are many ways to begin (you can read about how our community built relationship with a Burmese refugee family for some ideas). A few things you should know as you do a basic google search:
- Every city has organizations to help settle refugees. They are underfunded and overworked. Their biggest need is people to show up and befriend refugees.
- Every city has English classes for people trying to pass the citizenship test, and for people wanting to improve their work prospects.
- Every city has children of refugees who need mentors, tutors, and friends to help them navigate a world and system their parents don’t understand.
- Many refugees are at risk of human trafficking, entering the foster care system, scams, and a myriad of other abuses.
- Financial help is an obvious way to begin loving people. World Vision is one of the best.
- There’s a lot to learn, one of the best non-fiction books to understanding refugee care is: Seeking Refuge by Stephan Bauman, Matthew Soerens, and Dr. Issam Smeir.
Be Courageous in Faith
Christian ethic (loving God, loving neighbor, and loving one another) is profoundly based on God's care for us eternally. We can be brave with our love of the other because even if the worst happens, Jesus remains king, and we are heirs and citizens of heaven.
Our hope is in resurrection not in safe borders, immigration policy, or in our country’s desire to welcome refugees. Our hope is global because Christ’s power is globally working his redemption and restoration into every corner of society.
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Brad Watson (@bradawatson) serves as a pastor of Bread&Wine Communities where he develops and teaches leaders how to form communities that love God and serve the city. Brad is the author of Raised?, Called Together: A Guide to Forming Missional Communities, and Sent Together: How the Gospel Sends Leaders to Start Missional Communities. He lives in southeast Portland with his wife and their two daughters. You can read more from Brad at www.bradawatson.com.
The Faith of a Church Unified
I remember parking at this enormous Episcopal church on an early Saturday morning thinking, “There are so many other places I’d like to be right now.” The rain was beating down so hard on my windshield that I honestly wondered if it may break through. I had a dress and black flats on, which is a terrible combo to run through the rain in. My faith was low and my self pity was high. I tried to keep telling myself it was an honor to be asked to speak here, but I was really hoping my counterpart would carry the weight in this one. I eventually approached the front steps and sloshed my dripping self in through the massive stain glass doors. As I found my friend, he looked like he had experienced a similarly defeating morning.
We were escorted to a room behind stage so that we could be prayed for. As we got closer, I could hear loud singing and prayers being spoken aloud. I giggled to myself, out of an awkward insecure place that didn’t know how to process my feelings. It was a jumbled mix of fear and shame for my current state that swirled into a hopeful desperation for whatever they were experiencing in there.
We got a half second to receive the overwhelming overflow of their faith before they broke into celebration of our presence, they pulled us to the center of the room and began praying over us. They prayed for our hearts to be unified as we spoke, for our minds to be engaged with the holy Scriptures and truth, and for our mouths to speak words led only by the Holy Spirit.
My eyes filled with joyful yet convicted tears as I was flushed with borrowed faith. This was the faith that showed itself later that day in front of a crowd. Our influence was a direct result of the fasting and prayer of these people. Freedom was experienced because of their selfless intercession for a couple broken vessels.
The Faith of the Community
This story is not told often, but people experience this same thing every day. It’s often someone else who gets us through whenever we’re face to face with defeat, sorrow, anger, or injustice. Their faith is what reminds us of our own, or better yet, their faith is what stirs up our own. When we forget who we are, what we believe, and how we endure—our people remind us.
It’s often how we have strength to keep moving. I’d even say, it’s one of the best ways we can share in Christ’s victory. That’s more than a reminder of the gospel; it’s an imitation of the gospel.
The Faith of Esther's Friends
This story is found in Scripture, probably more than once, but it’s often overshadowed by the glorious triumph. Esther is the victor of her story found in the Old Testament. We think of her as a queen of deep graceful courage.
We commend and celebrate her faith to beckon the King’s attention and command the freedom of her people. Her faith can’t be disregarded by any means, but let’s look at the text closer.
The Faith of Mordecai
In Esther 2:5-7 we meet a man by the name of Mordecai. These verses describe his family line, but most importantly that he took Esther into his family—how he raised, provided, and shepherded her as his own daughter.
It was because of Mordecai, that Esther even had a safe place to call home. In verse 11, after Esther is taken as wife by the King, we hear of Mordecai again. We learn that he faithfully walks by the palace gates every single day to see and fellowship with his daughter. He doesn’t abandon his responsibility but he increases it.
The Faith of the Other Women
Following this passage, we find Esther 4:12-17 where she is challenged to speak on behalf of the Jews. Mordecai has urged her to do so, and she finally relents. However, her strength here is rooted and grounded less in her own faith and more in Mordecai and the young women appointed to her.
As Esther struggles to accept the mantle given to her, the young women dig deep into fasting and prayer. It is my firm belief that they actually lay the ground for her to walk on. If Esther was not surrounded by these people, she would not have the audacity required to boldly approach the King’s throne.
Don't Forsake the Mission
This is so crucial to the practice of our faith, the value we place on community, and to the daily walking out of life. If we forsake the unity of believers, then we will eventually forsake the mission of God. It is one thing to make mention of how we need each other, but lives change when we begin to believe that we can’t accomplish the call of God without one another.
We must know one another deeply enough to encourage our giftings, challenge our weaknesses, and exhort us into God’s personal call. The truth is, even that’s not enough. We have to join together for the work of the ministry. The Church (not the gathering but the people) need leadership, gifts of mercy, prayer, service, evangelism, generosity, gifts of healing, encouragement, wisdom, worship, teaching, and the list goes on. If one of these is subtracted, then something is missing and needs will be unmet.
To be totally honest, that makes me fearful. It scares me to know that if believers aren’t walking in their God-given gifts and identity, then other people are going to suffer. If we aren’t functioning as a body, then we won’t be working as a body. We will be broken, lacking, and divided. And honestly, most of our churches look more like this then like healthy, fruitful, growing bodies. Numbers don’t do what gifting does.
The Freedom of Walking Together
Connecting these thoughts, if we humbly acknowledge our insufficiency then we can more confidently walk in our ability. We experience grace in the dependence and faith of God’s people. If we are walking like him, serving like him, and loving like him then we will look more like him too. This lifestyle leads to freedom, not just for us but for many. It happened for Esther, and it will happen for us. People will be set free when we live how the Church is called to.
First, know your gifting. Find an online test, ask your loved ones, seek wisdom from your church leaders, or even take a class. These tools will help you discover and grow in your personal gift set.
Second, it’s essential to know the gifts of your community. Where do people suffer and where do they thrive?
Third, seek and even create opportunities to practice your gifting with one another. How and when can your community come together to meet needs? These needs are more than service, but needs of prayer, leadership, healing, wisdom, etc. Look closely and ensure that the right people are flexing in the right ways.
Last, invite people into the folds of your community. Let disciples of Christ learn from watching your community share in the difficulty and the celebrations of life.
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Chelsea Vaughn (@chelsea725) has served a ministry she helped start in the DFW Metroplex since she graduated from college. She received her undergraduate degree at Dallas Baptist University in Communication Theory. She does freelance writing, editing, and speaking for various organizations and non-profits. She hopes to spend her life using her gift for communication to reach culture and communities with the love of Jesus.
You can read all of Chelsea’s article here.