Josh Shank 12/28/17 Josh Shank 12/28/17

GCD’s Top Articles of 2017

Quantity doesn’t always correspond to quality, especially on the Internet. The prolific nature of click-bait posts and listicles swirling around the blogosphere make deep, quality articles quite rare. Yet, sometimes, articles that have a broad readership indicate that a powerful idea or formative truth has been shared. As I surveyed the last year’s worth of articles for GCD, it has been apparent to me that the most-viewed and most-read articles have been pieces of exceptional quality that have helped to shape and inform the lives of thousands. More than merely discussing the latest theological trends or how-to’s of specific methods, the top articles at GCD this year reflect the need for resources that are thoughtful, emotional, and practical for Christ-centered formation.

They reflect our ambition to produce resources to make, mature, and multiply disciples of Jesus.

Several of these articles came from our excellent team of Staff Writers. A handful are excerpts from recent publications by various publishers released in 2017. We’ve also included a list of our own publications in 2017 and invite you to pick them up if you have not had an opportunity.

On behalf of the GCD Team, thank you for a great 2017, and we look forward to bringing you another year full of gospel-centered resources.

GCD BOOKS PUBLISHED IN 2017

Renew by Jim Hudson

A Guide For Holy Week by GCD Contributors

Sent Together (Second Edition) by Brad Watson

Gospel Glories A to Z by Kelly Havrilla

That Word Above All Earthly Powers by GCD Contributors

Christopher DiVietro 12/26/17 Christopher DiVietro 12/26/17

Endure Today for the Joy of Tomorrow

Seth Godin recently wrote:

“For the creator who seeks to make something new, something better, something important, everywhere you look is something unsatisfying.

The dissatisfaction is fuel. Knowing you can improve it, realizing that you can and will make things better—the side effect is that today isn't what it could be.

You can't ignore the dissatisfaction, can't pretend the situation doesn't exist, not if you want to improve things.

Living in dissatisfaction today is the price we pay for the obligation to improve things tomorrow.”

But there’s a problem, isn’t there? If living in dissatisfaction today is the price we pay for the obligation to improve things tomorrow, how many “tomorrow’s" do we have to face before improvement comes? Improvement hardly ever comes on our own timetable.

Just walking through the halls of our churches, it’s easy to grow discouraged over the things we want to change. Each Thursday when I plan my following week, it seems I never have enough time to work on the growing list of “long-term vision” items I want to pray through and work towards.

THE SLOW MARCH TOWARD THE FUTURE

Take solace in the reality that we aren’t alone in our slow march towards the future. Growing takes time.

A technology curator recently said, when commemorating the 10-year anniversary of the iPhone:

“Anything that is going to become a billion dollar industry in the next 10 years is already 10 years old. . . . That completely changes how we should approach innovation. There is no invention out of the blue, but prospecting, mining, refining and then goldsmithing to create something that's worth more than its weight in gold.”

We forget what existence was like before the iPhone, and, even then, we probably take its advent for granted. Think about your everyday usage of a smartphone. Whether you’re scrolling through a feed, posting a photo, or using an app, so much of your daily life has been shaped by this invention. Even though we live in the world shaped by the iPhone, we rarely stop to think about the decades of research, innovation, and failure that had to occur to make the iPhone’s world-changing release possible.

Just like the iPhone and other innovations, our churches won’t change overnight. Yet we so often think this is how change will (or should) happen. This leads us to make some unwise decisions. For example, we see things as we want them to be instead of as they are, and expect our people to do the same; we think our people will receive change with joy; we think we’ll refine and processes and introduce new procedures with instantaneous success.

Why do we expect these kinds of results with so little time and friction? We are so unwilling to be dissatisfied that we’ve fooled ourselves into thinking that change will be easy and painless.

The real issue is our endurance and perseverance; our inability to live in dissatisfaction today so we can see satisfaction tomorrow. Instead of seeing dissatisfaction as fuel for a change we pray is coming, we see it as a frustration that warrants complaining.

So how do we endure? How do we continue to recast the vision, continue to garner support, and stay positive through it all? We look to Jesus.

JESUS’ ENDURANCE AND TENACITY

In Jesus, we find a model of endurance and tenacity. One of the most striking examples of this is found in John’s account of Jesus before Pilate. Jesus appears so resolute, so firm. There’s not even a hint of doubt or uncertainty.

John 18:33-35 explains,

“So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, ‘Are you the King of the Jews?’ Jesus answered, ‘Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?’ Pilate answered, ‘Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?’”

Jesus’ answers are so tenacious that he threatens to put Pilate on the defensive. Jesus is steadfast in his resolve to endure the cross. What fuels his steadfastness and resolve?

John 18:36-37 continues,

“Jesus answered, ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.’ Then Pilate said to him, ‘So you are a king?’ Jesus answered, ‘You say that I am a king.’”

Here we see the key to Jesus’ endurance and tenacity: Jesus kept his eyes on the Kingdom and the will of the Father instead of the present opposition. In his exchange with Pontius Pilate, Jesus stands firm. He sternly responds, declaring the audacious claims of his other-worldly kingdom. Knowing the cost. Knowing Pilate’s defense. Knowing the coming verdict from the crowd.

Yet he does so with joy.

ENDURANCE TODAY LEADS TO JOY TOMORROW

Hebrews 12:2 tells us we are “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

When we look to Jesus, we see he was resolute before Pilate—before the cross—for the joy set before him. Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was to come.

What was the content of that joy? After verse 2, we read “Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted” (Heb. 12:3). The joy set before Jesus—the joy for which he endured hostility and the cross—was that you and I might not grow weary or fainthearted.

Jesus’ joy in enduring the cross is an example encouraging us to endure: “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed” (Heb. 12:12-13).

Jesus was pleased to endure the cross to lift our drooping hands, strengthen our weak knees, and make our paths straight.

THE PLEASURE OF ENDURANCE

Jesus was pleased to endure the cross to strengthen our hands for the work of ministry—so work with patience, with fervor, with tenacity, and with perspective.

Jesus was pleased to endure the cross to strengthen our knees to continue praying—so pray with patience, with intensity, and with great expectation

Jesus was pleased to endure the cross to make the paths of our feet straight—so establish plans, processes, and procedures within your church, and trust the Lord to bear fruit.

Hebrews 2:13-14 appears to allude to Isaiah 35:3-4: “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart, ‘Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.’”

Trust that as you work, as you pray, and as you plan, the Lord will respond with graciousness and favor.

What was the joy set before Jesus? The joy for which he endured the cross? Our perseverance. Our ability to endure. Our ability to press on; not growing faint or weary; not having drooping hands or weak knees or walking crooked paths.

Jesus’ willingly endured the cross for the joy of helping us endure and persevere, work patiently, wait for his timing, and seeing us live beyond worldly satisfaction.

Chris DiVietro is husband to Liz and daddy to Aletheia, Judah, and Evangeline. Chris is senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Reading, Pa and has a PhD in Organizational Leadership. Chris is happy to be back living in the north after five hot years in South Carolina.

Justin Huffman 12/24/17 Justin Huffman 12/24/17

The Marvelous Condescension of Christmas

“Yes,” said Queen Lucy. “In our world too, a stable once had something inside it that was bigger than our whole world.”

These words from Narnian adventurer Lucy Pevensie in C.S. Lewis’ The Last Battle articulate well the irony and majesty of the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. Only the wisdom of the Creator and Lord of the universe could turn our notions of normal on their ear in such a profound way, revealing to us a manger whose “inside is bigger than its outside.” It seems he delights in astounding his creatures with his infinite ability to exceed and confound their expectations.

No doubt the news of Christ’s birth came as a jaw-dropping, thrill-inducing revelation to those shepherds so long ago: “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11). The very God whom Solomon had described as uncontainable, even by the heavens, confined himself to the womb of a woman? How could it be?

But, while the physical wonder of what God accomplished in the Incarnation is colossal in its display of power and wisdom, that is not even the point of the angel’s announcement to the shepherds—it is simply the paper on which an even more marvelous proclamation is embossed forever.

UNTO YOU IS BORN

If I put myself in the sandals of the shepherds, I cannot help but notice that there is a special message, a stunning declaration embedded in this announcement. It is “unto me” that a Savior has been born! Unto me? Surely there must be some mistake. Why would God go through all that trouble just for me? Surely there is some greater person for whom this announcement is meant. Did the angel take a wrong turn on his way to the king’s palace or the temple in Jerusalem?

I’m a nobody. How could this historic pronouncement be meant for me? Yet there the light is, and now the whole choir of angels is singing. It must be true!

And, indeed, it is true. For our sake, not only does the God of the universe wield kingdoms, topple obstacles, and overcome adversaries—he sacrifices his very best, his very dearest. God sent his only begotten Son into the world to die for little, unimportant, who’s-ever-heard-of-them individuals. As a result, whosoever believes in him will not perish but will have everlasting life.

It is “unto you” that a Savior was sent, that a baby was born, that the Christ was crucified.

A SAVIOR WHO IS CHRIST THE LORD

When most of us see a manger scene, our response to the reminder of what God became for us is limited to a placid, “Oh, isn’t the little baby Jesus sweet! How precious that Jesus was once an infant, so weak and helpless.” While it is appropriate to marvel at the smallness of the parcel into which God packed our Redeemer, let us not get the wrong idea about this child. He is Lord.

Paul tells us in Colossians 1:17 that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was “before all things,” and in him “all things hold together.” One of the greatest wonders of the Incarnation is that somehow the very baby that Mary held was at the same time holding her together, along with the rest of the universe.

The hand that rocks this cradle doesn’t rule the world—but the baby in the cradle does! The little finger that held hers was also holding the Roman Empire, guiding the Arctic Tern in its migration from Africa to Antarctica, and keeping Mars in its orbit around the Sun.

Just because Jesus became an infant human doesn’t mean he ever gave up being Lord. This is the clear implication of the angel’s announcement: “unto you is born a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” Jesus Christ—the Alpha and Omega, the same yesterday and today and forever—ruled and sustained the universe from his cradle. No wonder the magi who would later come to see him would fall down and worship him—they knew they were in the presence of the Majesty, even when he was cloaked in familiarity.

LYING IN A MANGER

If we pretend we have never heard the story of the Incarnation, doubtless this is among the most shocking statements in all of the Bible. The fact that angels would herald the birth of the God-man is no great surprise—surely he deserved that and more. That others would come to worship him is also to be expected—certainly, the Christ is worthy and demanding of such reverence. But here is the rest of the royal birth announcement: “you will find the baby”—where?—“lying in a cattle trough” (Luke 2:12).

A cattle trough? As if the humiliation of becoming human and living among sinners was not enough! Surely he deserves to be born into one of the palaces he has sustained, or even just a nice, middle-class apartment.

But no. The Son of God was born into the world and had only a trough for his cradle.

MARVELLOUS CONDESCENSION

What marvelous condescension we see in Christmas! Condescension to come at all, condescension to become a human, and condescension to live his life in abject poverty and rejection. Surely such a Savior is to be praised; such a Christ is to be followed.

How can we who take his name on ourselves as Christians and expect a life of lavender and rose petals? Surely to follow this Lord means following him in all his glorious and voluntary humiliation, suffering, and sacrifice for the glory of God.

The shepherds who heard the angels’ doxology responded by saying to one another, “Let us go … and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.” What is your response? Do you want to look further into this matter of God becoming a man? Is your appetite whetted for more of this exalted Lord who humiliates himself for our sake?

Let’s hurry into his presence and beg for a greater glimpse of him this Christmas season.

Justin Huffman has pastored in the States for over 15 years, authored the “Daily Devotion” app (iTunes/Android) which now has over half a million downloads, and recently published a book with Day One: Grow: the Command to Ever-Expanding Joy. He has also written articles for For the Church, Servants of Grace, and Fathom Magazine. He blogs at justinhuffman.org.

Sean Nolan 12/21/17 Sean Nolan 12/21/17

God Says to the Daisies, ‘Do It Again’: An Interview with Erik Guzman

I was given a copy of Erik Guzman’s The Seed: A True Myth, this summer by Greg Dutcher from These Go To Eleven (we do, after all, share an office). While I generally don’t read much fiction, I was captivated by the description of the story Erik was trying to tell. The subtitle hinted that he was aspiring to do what the greats like Lewis and Tolkien do so well: pull us into the gospel narrative of redemption through a work of epic fiction. His book moved me the way the classic “true myths” should. I hope it, too, will one day be a classic. After I left Erik a favorable review on Amazon he reached out to thank me, so I asked if he’d be willing to share with us at GCD more about the process leading up to The Seed. Here is an abridged version of that conversation.

Erik Guzman, tell us a little about yourself:

My title is VP of communication/executive producer for Key Life. I started here 20 years ago as the talk show producer for Steve Brown. I would describe myself as a struggling believer. I’d describe the ministry of Key Life as one of grace to struggling believers. My role within that ministry is a support role to Steve as well as the other figures of Key Life. More recently I’ve made the foray into writing with both my book The Seed, as well as a mini book, The Gift of Addiction (both books published by New Growth Press in 2016).

I’ve been married for 23 years and together we have 3 children: two daughters (17 and 15) and one son (12).

Can you clarify what you mean by “struggling believer?”

Maybe a good entry point into what I mean is found in a recent article I wrote called, “I Suck at Not Believing in God." Sometimes I find myself thinking life would be easier if I didn’t believe in God. Things matter when you believe in God; people that bear his image matter. That can be traumatic and painful when you’re in relationship with others. Your life matters, you will leave a legacy, for better or for worse.

If life was just snuffed out like a candle, if we all died in a supernova and nothing mattered in eternity, I’d live my life free of the burden of caring about God and others. But the fact is, I can’t shake believing in God. I believe in Jesus, and the Orthodox Christian faith found in the Bible. I think the summary of that belief is that Jesus came to offer grace to struggling believers such as me.

That gives me hope in all my struggles. At the end of the day, it’s not about my performance, but his performance on my behalf. I’m not in control, but he is. When things go wrong, my hope is in the ultimate redemption and reconciliation of creation. I’ve found freedom in living transparently with struggle, whether that be an addiction, mental disorder, or the need to take medication to stabilize my mood.

What has your experience been with sharing your struggles so openly?

Before I found my place in the ministry at Key Life, I really struggled to fit into church culture. I worked hard at it. But now I’m really a product of Steve’s teaching and also find a security in my sense of identity as a son of God. And also a sense of security in my job. I feel free to be myself and not lose my job.

I also struggle with a sense of calling. I don’t know if it’s right or wrong. I have a sense that I’m called to be an open screw-up so I can point to Jesus and his love. Not in some trivial way that glorifies it, but in which the darkness in my own life can point to the light of Christ. If someone can look at me and say, “This guy doesn’t have it together, and he’s found hope in Christ? Maybe Jesus is worth looking into,” I consider it a win. I struggle with this at times, though maybe I’m just making a fool out of myself.

At times I think I get away with a lot because I’m not ordained; because people don’t expect that I should know better. We put pastors up on pedestals too often, and that’s a trap for them and for us.

So, tell us about your book, The Seed.

It took me about 8 years of on-and-off writing and frequent revisions to write The Seed. It’s based on this idea of the “love fractal.”

Fractals are everywhere, all through nature. And at some point, it occurred to me that they could be used as a metaphor or an image for the body of Christ and the life of God in the world. The way he creates us in his image and there’s this reproduction, much like in a fractal, it just clicked for me. I thought it a useful metaphor for what we are a part of. If we see them all throughout the world, perhaps God has a sort of “fractal mind” as he is the one who designed everything.

Originally, this idea started as an illustration that was going to be in Steve Brown’s book Three Free Sins. The big point there was that self-righteousness is the mark of the fall. Wherever you find it, whether it be self-love, or self-indulgence that rejects the companionship and input of others. Since everyone knew Steve but not me, they ended up publishing the book without my part but Steve loved the idea and kept encouraging me to work on it. That’s how The Seed was born.

Who are your influences as a writer?

I love C.S. Lewis’ science fiction trilogy, particularly Perelandra, but growing up I didn’t read a lot. The first book I ever really read was Cujo by Stephen King. During the weirder phase of my life, I was reading Carlos Castaneda, Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull, and a lot of New Age drug trip stuff like Hunter S. Thompson.

Later in life, I got into Tolkien, Kurt Vonnegut, and Aldous Huxley. Currently, I’m reading King’s Dark Tower series and particularly love The Gunslinger.

My book also had a lot of musical influence in Pink Floyd’s “The Wall.” It was the soundtrack of my adolescence and hung on even as I got older. Building your own prison is a theme in the book, and also in my life.

When I read The Seed, the thing I love is that it is a retelling of the gospel as a story. Do you see this as a tool for discipleship in drawing others into the story of God?

That was really my hope from the beginning. For believers, that they’d see the gospel anew in a fresh way that would impact their hearts in ways it maybe hadn’t before.

I was also hoping to draw in unbelievers who might normally dismiss Christianity, thinking they know what it is only to read this and then ask them if they’d ever thought of the Christian message in this sort of way. I was hoping to wake people up with my words.

Propositional truths might reach our heads, but an engaging story has the power to stir our hearts to worship when it’s seasoned with the truth about God. I wanted more than mental assent, but to tweak people’s hearts to respond to God’s love.

What would you say to someone critical of the way you portray God in the book, in particular, someone charging the depiction of his love as too feminine?

I think if you take a look at what the Bible says marriage symbolizes, and even more the way Jesus prays for his church to be one, and for us to be in him and him in us, it seems the Bible goes even farther than I did. Some might try to sexualize that, but I wouldn’t do that. Even more, we can go farther and say it’s not just God and his people, but eventually all of creation that will be reunited with him.

We’ve been given the message of reconciliation; there is no barrier between man and God, if man is willing to enter into that relationship through Jesus. The gospel is an invitation into a relationship with the Trinity. The Christian is filled with the Spirit of God, is a member of the body of Christ, and looks upon the Father who gazes upon him in acceptance and union.

The critic of this is not thinking too much of this, but too little. He’s probably been influenced more by culture’s view of sex than the Bible’s and doesn’t see the beauty of the gospel. It’s more than a sum of body parts. I don’t want to trivialize the meaning of man being reconciled to God in that way.

I wish more people would talk about the mind-blowing truth of man being reconciled to God. It’s so much more than simply being forgiven. While that’s a part of it, it’s certainly more than that. The Christian aim should be to become more and more one with his creator, and I think authors should be giving more attention to that aim.

Another thing I loved from the book was the laughter you depict between the person of God. What was your thought process for including laughter in the divine persona?

I love to laugh, and something about laughter brings you outside of yourself. Anne Lamott called it “carbonated holiness.” There’s something transcendent about laughter. You can often rise above darkness or tragedy by laughing about it. I grew up watching comedians attempt to do that.

I once saw Charlie Jones (of Peculiar People), do this bit as G.K. Chesterton, and I remember this line:

“Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, ‘Do it again’; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, ‘Do it again’ to the sun; and every evening, ‘Do it again’ to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.”

It makes me wonder: Have we all grown tired and weary from the fall and lost our sense of humor? But God, as a fountain of life, does he take joy and laughter in his creation? I tend to think so. That’s the kind of God I wanted to depict in my work. He enjoys his creation and delights in their laughter and laughs with them.

Any future writing projects?

I sometimes say the biggest problem with my book is that everyone hasn’t read it. It’s been discouraging at times. When writing it, everything was so palpable in terms of the creativity of God and the enormity of his plan for reconciling the world. I was convinced I’d change the world. But it hasn’t made the splash I would’ve hoped for. So when I’ve tried to write more I’ve been burdened by the self-doubt.

I have been dabbling with the idea of a sort of sequel to The Seed, but with such a twist that it wouldn’t even be discernible until a long way in. The idea there being that maybe The Seed hasn’t caught on because it’s so niche that it doesn’t appeal to a secular audience.

Steve Brown has encouraged me by saying, “If you never do anything else after this, this is enough.” Which has been really good to hear.

Would you rather have legs as long as your fingers? Or fingers as long as your legs?

Probably legs as long as my fingers. Because I’d miss having the use of my fingers, but could do without reasonably sized legs.

Erik Guzman, thank you for your time and for your labor in writing a book that truly is a “true myth” and draws us into the story that God is telling.

You can find out more about Erik and Key Life at their website where you can also purchase his books.

Sean Nolan (B.S. and M.A., Clarks Summit University) is the Family Life Pastor at Christ Fellowship Church in Forest Hill, 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 raising an army of toddlers. He blogs at Family Life Pastor.

James Williams 12/19/17 James Williams 12/19/17

Do You Love Your Friends Enough to Hurt Them?

Most of us know the popular slogan "Friends don't let friends drive drunk." It's a simple phrase that's been around since the early 80s.

With just a few words, the phrase carries much meaning. The subject, "friends," shows that we’re talking about people who care. What do these friends do? They don't let their friends drive drunk. Why would they step in to stop this behavior? Is it because they're hateful and arrogant? Is it because they're judgmental people who need to mind their own business? Are they controlling people who want everyone to act like them? No.

True friends stop their friends because driving drunk can be destructive and life-ending. A friend who truly cares will do what they can to stop this from happening.

When we think of using our words in our friendships with believers, we often think of Ephesians 4:29: "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear." What are words that build up? Does that mean we only speak "positive" words? Does that mean we only say things that will be well received and make the person feel good?

Tucked away in the midst of many wise sayings, Proverbs 27:5-6 gives us some insight: "Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy."

OPEN REBUKE IS BETTER THAN HIDDEN LOVE

In our culture, someone who speaks against a person's behavior is seen as hateful, while the one who keeps his words to himself is praised as a loving person. Unfortunately, this understanding has crept into the church as well. Our individualism has set up walls that even our Christian friends dare not cross.

Asking someone how their job is going is acceptable, even praiseworthy. But asking someone about a sin in their life is considered "crossing the line," and the solution is to "mind your own business."

God's Word teaches that open rebuke is better than hidden love, though. James 5:29 states, "Let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins." We are told in the first verse of Galatians 6: "Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness."

Admonishing others is difficult, and we can easily talk ourselves out of doing it. We tell ourselves that it won't work or that what they are doing is "not that bad." At times, we're guilty of underestimating the destructive power of sin.

The Destructiveness of Sin

Sin is a destructive cancer. It kills and destroys. It takes good relationships and tears them apart. It takes peaceful situations and makes them divisive and chaotic. It takes individuals made in the image of God and leads them down a path of everlasting destruction.

If we don't understand the destructiveness of sin, we'll never see the need to lovingly rebuke our friends. If we think they are just "choosing a different path," we might keep quiet, but if we see they are on a path to destruction, perhaps that will motivate us to speak up. Someone who doesn't believe drunk driving is that dangerous might let their friend do it, but someone who recognizes the danger will try to stop them at all costs.

As believers, if we don’t see the destructive nature of sin, we might not speak words of truth our friend needs to hear.

Faithful are the Wounds of a Friend

Nobody likes to be called out. It doesn't feel good; it wounds. Scripture doesn't shy away from this reality or try to sugar-coat it. This is why many interpret correction as harmful or hateful. But, if done in love with the goal of repentance and healing, it can be a most loving act. Wounds from a friend can be trusted.

Proverbs warns us against rebuking everybody (Prov. 9:8), but true friends are a means of grace the Lord uses to bless, encourage, and even rebuke us. True friends are those who are willing to wound us in order to help us see our sin and point us to Christ.

I’ll never forget receiving a call from a church member who was broken-hearted after finding out his wife was having an affair. As a twenty-two-year-old pastor, I had no prior experience handling such a situation. It would have been much easier to step back and do nothing. However, by the Lord’s grace, that’s not what happened. We set up a meeting with the wife, told her we loved her, and reminded her of the mercy and grace of the gospel of Christ. Though she already knew, we told her that she was in sin and needed to confess and repent before the Lord.

These types of meeting don’t always go well, but in this case, the Spirit worked powerfully. She was convicted of her sin and immediately took the proper steps toward repentance with many sisters in Christ at her side, and her marriage was restored!

I’ve also been on the receiving end of such rebuke. While blinded to my own sin, I’ve had brothers in Christ hold me accountable and love me enough to confront me. While I didn’t like it at the time, I look back and am grateful to God for their boldness and love toward me.

True Friends Love Enough to Wound

Since most of us don't like confrontation, having to speak out at the risk of being rejected or losing a friend makes it even more horrifying. So, what would possess us to do something we hate when there's so much to lose?

Love.

If my friend is in sin, and I truly believe that their sin is destroying them, stealing their joy, and robbing God of his glory, then I am willing to face my fears of rejection and awkward conversation to address this issue.

To lay down our preferences for the good of others is love . . . and only those who are truly our friends are willing to do it.

If we are going to have a culture of speaking truth to one another in this way, then we must be willing and ready to receive it. Since we're all sinners, there will come a time where we are the ones in sin. If our friends confront us, it will hurt, but we must be willing to trust the wounding of our friends. We may not agree or understand at first, but we must fight to be receptive and willing to learn. Being defensive and attacking does not encourage a culture of openness with our friends.

PROFUSE ARE THE KISSES OF AN ENEMY

True friends love us enough to wound us, but what do our enemies do? They flatter us.

They tell us what we want to hear and make us feel good about it. They aren't concerned about our good and they will only speak with their best interests in mind. They know well the old adage “flattery will get you everywhere,” and they use it to their advantage. In the Old Testament, we read about false prophets who told the king the message he wanted to hear (2 Chron. 18:4-7). The New Testament also warns us to beware such people: “For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naïve” (Rom.16:18).

It's easy to understand how we can get confused as to who our true friends are. It's counterintuitive to say the one who wounds might be the true friend while the one who flatters could be the enemy.

THE GREATEST FRIEND

Friendships are a gift from the Lord and a means of grace, but there is one friend who truly sticks closer than a brother. Jesus, the lover of our soul, knows exactly what we need. He willingly laid down his life for our sin, thus showing there’s nothing he won’t spare for his children. He's able to provide encouragement at just the right time, and he loves us enough to wound us when we need to be rebuked. We know that the Lord disciplines those whom he loves (Heb. 12), and this is done out of care and concern for our soul to train us in righteousness, thus, we can trust him.

Sometimes, he might provide a needed correction through the words of a faithful friend who's willing to speak the truth. Other times, he might be doing that very thing through us in the life of someone else.

Are we willing to be used by the Lord this way? We speak often of encouraging one another, but are we just as willing to be used when "building up" our brother or sister means giving a loving rebuke?

For the good of our friends and the glory of God, let us be willing to encourage and admonish one another with our words. As one commentator has said, "Flattery kisses and slays; friendship wounds and saves."

“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another” (Prov. 27:17).

James Williams has served as an Associate Pastor at FBC Atlanta, TX for four years. He is married to Jenny and they currently have four children in their home (three biological, one in foster care). He is in the dissertation stage of a PhD in Systematic Theology. You can follow James on Twitter or his church’s blog where he writes regularly.

Robin McGee 12/17/17 Robin McGee 12/17/17

Is it Possible to Be Content with My Calling?

In the fall of 2013, I was visiting a local park with my four-year-old and two-year-old in tow when I saw a mom with a newborn baby and felt a sudden, overwhelming relief that I was “over” that baby phase. Earlier that summer, I had come to an emphatic decision that we would not have any more children. Being a notoriously open-ended person, this was a rare, clear decision. Little did I know, I would become pregnant within the month.

A BABY

To say I cried about my pregnancy is an understatement. It took months of processing with friends to even come around to the idea that having another baby could be a good thing. It sounded like terribly tedious work. And though it might seem obvious that this was God’s calling for me, I couldn’t quite accept it.

When little Rosie was born, I delighted in her. But I also delighted in knowing I was only two years away from potty training and “normalcy.” Those next two years, however, turned out to be some of the hardest of my life.

On the outside, my life may have looked fine. I participated in church community groups, discipleship groups, and women’s bible studies. I was an involved parent and had pulled my eldest out of public school and started homeschooling.

A BREAKDOWN

But on the inside, I felt like I was dying. The addition of a baby to homeschooling and full-time care for three kids under five felt like more than I could physically and emotionally bear. I felt like I had lost my worth, my dignity, and my hope. How could God be calling me to this? I remember many times cleaning up after my five-year-old, three-year-old and baby thinking, The sole purpose of my life is picking things up and putting them down again, like Sisyphus, pointlessly pushing a boulder up a hill only to have it fall down again. What was the point?

There were times I would wander all over the house and say over and over again, “I hate my life; I hate me.”

So I started clawing at anything that promised what I was craving: worth, significance, meaning, and purpose. I threw myself into homeschooling classes, curriculums, and co-ops. I revived my doula business. I planned ministry events.

But as I attempted to busy myself, my body started shutting down. A trip to the doctor to address the fatigue ruled out major illness but hinted at depression. It was a wake-up call. I finally surrendered my crusade for meaning and purpose, submitted to my husband and stopped homeschooling (after the 100th time he asked, “Why are you doing this?”) I took a break from some responsibilities and my body slowly healed. My kids started school. I made some new friends and visited some old ones. I started seeing glimmers of hope all around.

But my questions lingered: “Why did God allow this? What is my life for?”

A WILDERNESS

Around this time, I read a very helpful article that started to give me a picture of what God might be up to:

“Time and again, God calls his people to himself by leading them out of the familiar and into a wilderness. In this wilderness, the urgent needs of survival require a radical assessment of their identity and what their life is really about… In every case God brings his people to a point in which they have to reckon with their identity as his children. They can live for their own agendas, wants and needs, or choose to trust in their Heavenly Father.”–Winston Smith, ‘The Hunger Games: Appetite and Identity’

God was leading me through a wilderness. It was full of service and mundane repetition. He had given me a good gift—the task and the joy of serving a child—but it had become a burden because I insisted on pursuing other agendas, wants, and needs. God had brought me very deliberately to this point to reckon with my identity and my agenda. He obliterated my “felt need” to be recognized and to use my talents. He shut the doors to easy escapism and freedom from responsibility. He pressed the gas pedal on the effort needed to serve my family.

My response was to fight and question God for bringing me on this path—being a wife, being a mom, being . . . everything that I was. My flailing for meaning and pursuit of other activities actually drained my resources for my true calling. Suffering was compounded by sin. And in the wilderness, I so often chose escapism, depression, anger, self-pity, regret, selfishness, indulgence, sensuality, sulking, isolation, and fear.

But I knew, as a daughter of my Heavenly Father, there must be a better way than demanding my own agenda, living for my wants or needs of recognition, success, or escape. How could I learn to trust my Heavenly Father?

AN ENCOUNTER WITH JESUS

In May of this year, I had a dream. In the dream, I was taking my two-year-old into our shower. She had poop in her diaper and on her fingers and she had smeared it all over her face. In my frustration, I muttered, "Why did you do this? You know better. Ugh!"

Then, suddenly, Jesus was there to my right, in a white robe on the threshold of the shower. I was aware it was Jesus, but didn’t dare look at his face. I just stared at the ground, frozen.

Then he spoke to me with clear, authoritative, and kind words. I was so mesmerized and giddy by Jesus’ presence that I didn’t even remember exactly what he said! He was speaking words of truth over me about who I was in him—a beloved daughter. He spoke to me about my identity. He was so kind, and his words so true. His presence was full of intensity and wonder and joy. His glory was magnetic. And I was filled with so much love for him. Not just love, but adoration and worship.

My heart melted, and in a puddle of tears and love, I blurted out, “I will clean up poop for the rest of my life if you want me to. I’ll do it for you!” It seemed to be the only natural response to give him anything he’d ask for.

Then I woke up.

ANSWERS TO THE WHY

This encounter with Jesus was so richly layered with meaning. Jesus Christ is present with me in every moment (Matt. 28:20). He prays over me (Rom. 8:34). He sees me and speaks to me (John 10:3). His words are truth (John 18:37). He has absolute authority and it is a good authority (Matt. 28:18). He is beautiful and wonderful, and our worship songs don’t go far enough to describe him!

But it took me days to realize that in this dream were the answers to the questions I had been asking: Why did he lead me into this wilderness? What is my purpose? Who am I?

In the midst of a poop- and frustration-filled scene, Jesus’ presence changed the “why” of it all. His presence transformed a dirty task into a complete joy because I knew it was the King of the Universe who was asking me to do it. And this King of the Universe was so full of glory and radiance that to be asked by him to have any job on this earth was a complete privilege and not a frustration.

Now, imagine if the King of the Universe came to you and personally asked you to do the earthly work you are currently doing—because he has done just that! In God’s complete control, he has appointed your earthly tasks, work, and relationships. It isn’t appointed in some impersonal or vague way, but Jesus asks you, “Will you do this, for me?”

Paul’s exhortation to the Colossians captures this: “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving” (Col. 3:23-24). Your work, even your mundane work, is a personal service to the Lord of all.

REMEMBERING WHO CALLED ME

So much in the previous two years—the homeschooling, the fantasizing, the jobs, and, dare I say, the ministry events—was a confused scramble for identity and purpose. What God had given me—a baby—was an opportunity to work and serve, not just a helpless infant, but Jesus Christ himself! The job didn’t give me money or worldly glamour. It didn’t require my “skills” or talents. But it was a gateway to joy and purpose.

And Jesus isn’t asking us to serve when he hasn’t. This King of the Universe, our master, is the ultimate servant. “For even the Son of man did not come to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).

Jesus Himself went into the wilderness. He was tempted. But he was keenly aware of the Father’s will and calling for him. While he was physically run down, Jesus returned Satan’s lies with truth. Jesus could have used his earthly fame for comfort, money, a plush life, and demands for others to serve him. But his Father’s will and calling was his food—his sustenance—and he didn’t forget it in the wilderness or afterward. For the joy set before him, he served and served until the dust of humiliation and execution on a cross (Heb. 12:2). And by this service, we have new life!

Remember to whom and for whom you are working. Joyful contentment is possible even in the most ordinary work and dirty jobs when you realize it is the King of the Universe you are serving. If you find yourself in a wilderness, God is intimately present with you and has appointed this journey so that Jesus Christ will be magnified in your life. And his countenance and beauty are so wonderfully beyond compare, it will give you the strength for any work or service to your family and community until you see him face-to-face.

Robin McGee lives in Austin, TX with her husband and three daughters. She spends most of her days loving and serving her family and church. She enjoys singing, playing the piano and researching.

Jeremy Linneman 12/14/17 Jeremy Linneman 12/14/17

Rhythms of Life-Giving Groups: Word and Prayer

When Jesus spoke, people listened. He didn’t come to put an end to the Old Testament law but instead to “fulfill” it—to bring it to completion and fullness by rooting God’s ways in the hearts of God’s people. In our community groups, we can encourage one another in a number of spiritual rhythms—Bible study, confession, prayer, and so on. But how might our small groups actually learn together how to meditate on God’s Word?

THE RHYTHM OF SCRIPTURE

Our community groups can go beyond increasing knowledge to actually cultivate and practice devotional Scripture reading together. Devotional Scripture reading, or biblical meditation, has often been described as a middle road between reading and prayer: Our minds are engaged in God’s Word, yet our words come directly from our heart and are expressed to our Father in prayer. This is a reading for the purpose of increased fellowship with God together.

Learning to Meditate Together

For centuries biblical meditation has been practiced both individually and communally, and we can restore this practice in our small groups today. The church fathers spoke of “descending with the mind into the heart”—a helpful phrase describing biblical meditation. Meditation engages the mind by focusing it on God’s Word. In the midst of a thousand concerns and thoughts, it directs our minds to stillness on God’s Word in his presence. Like a centripetal force, meditating on Scripture slowly pulls us inward toward the center of communion with God.

The best place to begin Scripture meditation, whether individually or in a group, is with the Book of Psalms. We must remember the Psalms were written for congregational use; they were penned to be read aloud, sung aloud, and prayed aloud with others. As Eugene Peterson once noted, just as a farmer uses tools to cultivate the ground and produce crops, so we can use our prayers to stir up our hearts and become more like Christ.

In other words, if our prayers are tools, the Psalms are our toolbox. God has given us 150 rich, impassioned songs and prayers for our devotional life. Unlike any other genre of the Scriptures, the psalms enable us to express ourselves, understand our own hearts, find perspective for our circumstances, give language to our emotions, and pray God’s Word back to him.

In our group prayer, we can pray the psalms to our Father in a powerful way—together, we can descend with our minds into our hearts.

Here are two recommendations for making the most of these prayers.

First Reading: Content and Meaning

Gather your group and introduce the topic of biblical meditation. Before beginning your reading and prayer time, ask the Lord to bless your time of reflection together.

In this first reading, read the psalm aloud. Since it was written to be read (or sung) aloud, there’s likely a natural rhythm and flow to it. The first time through, get a feel for the psalm’s content and pause for a moment whenever you see the word Selah. After the first reading, take about five minutes to ask basic questions about the psalm’s content and meaning. What was the psalm’s original context? Was the psalmist primarily writing a private prayer or a congregational song? How would you put the message of the psalm into your own words?

Second Reading: Application and Meditation

Remind one another that the goal of devotional reading is increased fellowship with God, not merely understanding the psalm. With a basic understanding of the psalm’s content and meaning, now read the psalm aloud again, this time more slowly and with longer pauses. As one person reads the psalm, the rest of the group can follow along in their Bibles or simply close their eyes and listen. The goal is to personally absorb the psalmist’s prayer as much as possible. When you reach a Selah, pause for a few moments and reflect silently on the previous stanza.

After this second reading, take twenty to thirty minutes to discuss the psalm’s movements in a more personal way. How do you resonate with the psalmist’s cries for help? Where do you see yourself similarly in need of God? What aspects of your life are driving you to seek refuge in the Father?

THE RHYTHM OF PRAYER

Descending Into the Heart

After your discussion time, close with prayer together. A great exercise for our prayer lives is to learn to reword and then pray the psalm aloud. Take turns doing this, putting the most significant or applicable part of the psalm into your own words and praying it to our Father. Use the language of the psalm and add your own requests, praise, and prayer for others. (This exercise will be awkward the first time or two, but don’t get discouraged.)

In our groups, we have found new life in this historic pattern. Slow, meditative reading of Scripture, heart-level discussion and application, and deep personal prayer have drawn us closer to God and to one another. Groups can practice this kind of Bible-based prayer with visitors and non-Christians present, so long as it’s explained well. We’ve found that outsiders expect us to be doing spiritual things, and are refreshed by a group of people who long to be more deeply connected to God’s presence.

Prayer Together

Of course, prayer in community group doesn’t always feel this majestic. In most community groups I’ve been a part of or led, prayer has become just a way of listing others’ needs out loud to God. We try hard to summarize Frank’s work situation, try not to be condescending as we pray for Jim and Amy’s struggling marriage, and make sure we “lift up” Sue’s second cousin’s knee soreness. My goodness, this doesn’t feel significant at all.

So, why is praying together important as a community group?

Think back to Jesus’s life and ministry again. In his famous teaching on prayer in Matthew 6:5-15, it’s important to note that the Lord’s Prayer seems to be instructing us in a prayer that we could offer together: “Our Father… Give us… Forgive us… Lead us…” Prayer certainly can and should be practiced in private, but it’s instructive that the pattern our Lord gives us in his most famous prayer is a shared prayer.

In the same way, our heavenly Father wants us to come to him together with our needs and problems. Following the pattern of the Lord’s Prayer, we have the opportunity to pray for each other’s needs and so intercede on their behalf. As we pray for others in their presence, they feel God’s love and presence. Similarly, we can pray boldly together for God to advance his kingdom and then live that prayer by faith together.

Think about it: Where did you learn how to pray? Probably from watching another person praying for you or around you. I learned prayer from my father around the dinner table, from my earliest community group leader when we blessed dinner, from my wife when our sons have been sick, from my pastors when we have gathered to plead with God for renewal in our midst.

Praying together is an essential aspect of community life and, along with the other rhythms and practices, it enables a life of growth in Christ.

Jeremy Linneman is lead pastor of Trinity Community Church in Columbia, Missouri. He was previously a community pastor of Sojourn Community Church in Louisville, Kentucky for seven years. Jeremy's recent writing projects include Life-Giving Groups; How to Grow Healthy, Multiplying Community Groups and the Grace is Greater Small Group Kit. He and his wife, Jessie, have three sons and spend most of their free time outdoors.

Mike Phay 12/12/17 Mike Phay 12/12/17

Your Tongue Needs Open Heart Surgery

Where I live people are pretty familiar with wildfires. This summer, multiple factors, such as high temperatures and minimal precipitation, created perfect conditions for dozens of fires to rage not only in Oregon, but throughout the Pacific Northwest. However familiar we are with wildfire, it’s fairly rare for most residents to actually see a wildfire. This summer, we became very familiar with the effects of these fires, as smoke and ash obscured our skies and choked our lungs for weeks on end. This year, one single lightning strike in Southern Oregon smoldered as a relatively small wildfire for a full month before quickly swelling into a massive conflagration that torched over 190,000 acres, forced thousands to evacuate, burnt several homes, and cost over $61 million to fight. All from one single spark. And this paled in comparison to the loss of property and life caused by the recent fires in Northern California.

So when we read of “how great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!” and, “the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness” (Jas. 3:5b-6a), the words not only hit home, but cause me to step back, look at the destructive and noxious capacity of these fires, and say, “My words can be like that?!”

As physically devastating as a fire might be, our words carry even more destructive capacity. Unlike wildfires, words have an inherent moral element: a capacity for right or wrong in their form, content, and effect. Our words have eternal significance because they influence, shape, and impact, not just mere mortals, they affect those who are made in God’s image.

Like fire, the effects of our words aren’t just direct and immediate, but long-term and wide-ranging. Hurtful words may smolder for days, weeks, even years—affecting a root of bitterness that slowly grows into hatred, branches into aggression, blooms into rage, and eventually bears the toxic fruit of relational destruction. Like smoke that chokes and blinds, the effects of our words can be far-reaching and noxious.

TONGUES OF FIRE

The tongue is a “world of unrighteousness.” Not a thimble-full or an ant-farm, but a world—literally, a “cosmos” of unrighteousness. There is a cosmic abundance of sin, iniquity, and unrighteousness that awaits entrance into the world through the gate of the human tongue, which taps into this wicked cosmos like an electrical cord into an outlet, allowing vileness and iniquity to flow through us and into the world.

The tongue, then, is a kind of gate; a gate through which the fires of hell itself make their way into our world. And we are the gatekeepers.

Also inherent in the phrase “world of unrighteousness,” is the inordinate capacity of the tongue in proportion to its relatively tiny size. As John Calvin wrote: “A slender portion of flesh contains in it the whole world of iniquity.” What other part of the body has this kind of influence and wide-ranging effect: “staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life and set on fire by hell” (Jas. 3:6)?

We not only unleash hell into the world through our tongues, we also unwittingly place ourselves in the path of the flames. In the end, each of us will, as Jesus said, “give account for every careless word [we] speak, for by [our] words [we] will be justified, and by [our] words [we] will be condemned” (Matt. 13:36b-37).

“For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue” (Jas. 3:7-8). The Message translation puts it like this: “This is scary. You can tame a tiger, but you can’t tame a tongue—it’s never been done.”

The picture is getting more and more desolate and hopeless. How will we ever be able to live a counter-cultural life of love and obedience to Christ if we can’t even get our mouths under control? It seems impossible.

HEART SURGERY IS THE CURE FOR A HELLISH TONGUE

The best move might just be for all of us to go ahead and cut our tongues out. Which reminds me of one of Jesus’ starker and oft-ignored commands. And, I would add, one of the places where he talks about hell, as well:

"And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.” (Matt. 18:8-9)

Replace “hand,” “foot,” or “eye” with “tongue,” and you get the point.

Curiously, I have yet to meet a believer who is missing a hand because they are prone to violence, or who is missing a foot or an eye because they can’t seem to keep themselves out of adult bookstores. But I don’t think this is a sign of disobedience as much as a sign of Jesus’ true intentions in these verses. The point here isn’t that we should be hacking off body parts in order to be saved from hell. Jesus is using hyperbole—a form of exaggeration—to make the point that it isn’t these body parts that make us sin. Rather, it is our sinful hearts, for “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matt. 13:34b).

And this really is the issue: the “cosmos of unrighteousness” which the tongue taps into is the cosmos of the human heart. The tongue, as Jesus makes clear, doesn’t control itself. Rather, the tongue is controlled by the heart, the moral seat of our desires, will, and emotions.

So, left to ourselves, it seems we are out of luck. Left to ourselves, we will destroy one another with our tongues, and eventually destroy ourselves. Left to ourselves, we will light the world on fire and die in our self-made inferno.

But let’s remember one important gospel truth: We are not left to ourselves.

Yes, we are rotten to the core. Yes, our tongues are often out of control. And, yes, when our tongues are out of control, we can bet that underneath it all our hearts are out of control. The Scriptures are clear that none of our hearts are right, so the answer isn't that we need to have our tongues cut out. The answer isn’t even that we need to work really hard at controlling our tongues.

The answer is that we need someone to cut the sin out of our hearts. We need a heart surgeon.

A SKILLED AND FAITHFUL SURGEON

Thankfully, there is a surgeon who can and does specialize in transforming dead, sin-drenched, hateful, slanderous, deceitful hearts into hearts that can submit to God and overflow with love. So verse 8 of James chapter 3—“no human being can tame the tongue”—is not a sad descent into a pessimistic fatalism, but an invitation to confess our dependence and need. A way out is implied, and it’s a path requiring God-driven, Spirit-empowered heart change. As God promised:

“I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” (Ezek. 36:26-27)

When my dad had open heart surgery several years ago, the procedure didn’t affect the way that he spoke or chose to use words. It didn’t affect the clarity of his speech or clean up his language. In modern medicine, brain surgery is much more likely to have these kinds of effects on speech. What his surgery did do for him was to give him a new perspective on his own mortality, which has had effects on different areas of his life, including his relationships.

The heart surgery God desires to perform on each of us will be no less painful or invasive than a surgeon cracking open a chest and rearranging arteries. But the effects of this kind of Spirit-led, transformative surgery will bear fruit in deeper and more eternal ways—including a tamed tongue that spends less time sparking wildfires, and more time being a balm for burnt souls.

Mike Phay serve as Lead Pastor at FBC Prineville (Oregon) and as an Affiliate Professor at Kilns College in Bend, OR. He has been married to Keri for 20 years and they have five amazing kids (Emma, Caleb, Halle, Maggie, and Daisy). He loves books and coffee, preferably at the same time.

Justin Huffman 12/10/17 Justin Huffman 12/10/17

Practice What He Preached: Imitating the Goodness of Jesus

Have you ever wondered what made Jesus so effective in reaching out and helping others? Granted, he knew the Scriptures backwards and forwards and applied God’s Word perfectly to each person’s situation. But what made people willing to listen to him in the first place? How did they know they could trust him, that he had their best interests at heart?

The people Jesus encountered had countless religious teachers and counselors available to them, yet you don’t see the multitudes swarming to them for advice or help. There was something about Jesus that, even as he maintained an uncompromising standard, drew people to him in droves. Publicans, prostitutes, even some of the Pharisees—sinners of every description flocked to Jesus for help and spiritual healing.

It was the goodness of Jesus, as much as anything else, that made his ministry so effective.

GOOD MINISTRY

Jesus’ popularity was clearly due in part to the wisdom with which he spoke. The multitudes were constantly marveling at the authority and understanding so clearly displayed in his teaching. Yet even this does not explain what made untouchable, despicable sinners huddle up with Jesus at the dinner table and converse so eagerly with him.

The goodness of Jesus was at least as much of a draw for people as the content of his message. They could see—anyone could see—that Jesus lived a very different life than the pompous Pharisees and Sadducees. This man practiced what he preached.

It was also clear, from his actions as well as his words, that Jesus had a genuine, consistent, and intense compassion for the pain of those around him. This man wept with those who were weeping, went to those who were lame, waited for those who were blind, and sought out those who were overlooked.

Scripture makes it plain that goodness is one of the absolute essentials for real ministry. Whether in private or in public, whether declaring the gospel from the pulpit or sharing it in the break room—any ministry must flow out of good living, good motives, and good counsel in order to be Christ-honoring and personally useful.

This is the unmistakable implication of Paul’s words to the Romans: “I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another” (Rom. 15:14, emphasis added).

The confidence Paul expressed in the church’s ability to instruct and edify one another was grounded, first of all, in the goodness that was displayed in their lives.

GOOD LIVING

We cannot help others draw closer to God if we are not ourselves maintaining a close walk with God. As elementary as this may sound, it is widely ignored in many modern approaches to church organization and growth. People who have experienced little, or no, sanctification themselves are put in positions of leadership in Sunday School classes, small groups, or even public preaching.

Several years ago, I actually had a preacher sit across from me and tell me he was unrepentant for some well-known sexual sins in his life because he felt he could not possibly minister effectively if he did not understand the sinners among whom he labored. He said if he was living in sin himself he would be able to reach out to and help other sinners.

Apparently, this man did not consider the best example of ministry in the whole Bible—Jesus Christ himself. According to this man’s criteria, Jesus could not have had a useful ministry because he rubbed shoulders with sinners his whole life without ever sinning.

Of course, this is ridiculous, because Jesus’ life is to be our model. Any other philosophy of ministry results in one drowning man or woman trying to save another. Neither will be helped.

The Bible makes it clear that personal virtue, or goodness, is necessary for even Scriptural knowledge to be useful. Peter exhorts us that the first thing we need to add to our God-given faith is personal virtue—and then, to that virtue, we are to add knowledge (2 Pet. 1:5).

Paul expressed his desire that the church at Colossae be filled with knowledge so that they might “walk in a manner worthy of the Lord” (Col. 1:9-10). Knowledge and goodness go hand in hand.

Paul’s language of “goodness”—especially being filled with goodness—might sound strange to those who feel they are great sinners and unworthy of the least of God’s mercy. But God’s mercy is exactly where this goodness comes from.

Paul tells us in Galatians that goodness is a fruit of the Spirit ( Gal. 5:22), and, again in Ephesians, that the fruit of the Spirit is “is found in all that is good and right and true” (Eph. 5:9).

Sanctification and growth in godliness is not something we can aspire to on our own, yet it is clearly expected of us and should be displayed in us. Paul shared his prayer request with the church at Philippi, that they would be “filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God” (Phil. 1:11).

The fruits of godliness, including good living, can only come by Jesus Christ, but they are expected from us in order that God might receive praise and glory through us.

GOOD MOTIVES

However, the idea of goodness carries with it more than just right living. Even the Pharisees could put on a show of “good works.” Goodness also carries with it the idea of right motives. In other words, the person who is trying to encourage, admonish, or advise another must be clearly doing so out of a desire for that person’s good.

This seemingly obvious criterion is broken daily in households all over the world. Husbands hurl instructions or expectations at their wives or children and wonder why they are not well-received in the midst of their tirade. Wives criticize and belittle their husbands, then are surprised when they do not see any change in behavior.

The problem is that knowledge without genuine love—without good motives—is utterly unprofitable (1 Cor. 8:1). We cannot realistically expect to help anyone if our advice and counsel are not flowing from a deep, Christ-centered love and desire for the other’s good.

One of the pastors under whom I grew up used to remind us as up-and-coming leaders in the church that people will listen to you only if they already know that you love them. However, if they do know you love them, they will follow you almost anywhere and receive almost any criticism. How many young ministers need to remember this maxim!

Our goal, then, with any counsel we give, should be the good of the person to whom we are speaking and, ultimately, the glory of God. Our goal for each other, in other words, should be the same goal God has for us. As Paul prayed in 2 Thessalonians 1:11, our hope for each other should be that God will “fulfill every resolve for good and every work of faith by his power,” in each of us.

GOOD COUNSEL

Despite living a godly life and desiring the good of someone, many saints have failed to actually share helpful counsel when it was needed. This is because good counsel does not always feel or sound good to the listener. Since every one of us struggles with a people-pleasing nature to some extent, we sometimes hesitate to share what we know needs to be said simply because we know it will not be easy or pleasant to hear.

Goodness sometimes requires that we be stern, share unwelcome advice, or even “wound” a loved one for their own good. The writer of Proverbs, however, reminds us that “faithful are the wounds of a friend; profuse are the kisses of an enemy” (Prov. 27:6).

As much as we may be tempted at times just to say, “Everything is going to be alright,” or “things will get better soon,” this is simply not always the case. Sometimes drastic, personal change is needed before things can turn around for the better.

If a person doesn’t stop spending more than he or she makes, they will not get out of debt; if a couple continues to fight and wrangle over every little thing, their marriage will not improve; if parents do not correct their child, their relationship with the child will only get worse.

Goodness, then, does not always look like a warm and fuzzy hug or an encouraging slap on the back (though it might include these). Goodness is a personal investment in the glory of God, which overflows in a desire to help others draw closer to God, no matter what challenges we may have to face to achieve this end.

Personal goodness, coupled with an intimate knowledge of God’s good word, equips us to help the many hurting people that need the goodness of God so desperately in their lives.

Truly good ministry must flow out of good living, good motives, and good counsel in order to be Christ-honoring and personally useful.

Paul David Tripp 12/7/17 Paul David Tripp 12/7/17

That Awkward Moment When Shame Entered the World

We’ve all had weird, awkward moments with others. You probably hate those moments as much as I do. You say something but it doesn’t come out right, and what comes out is embarrassing. Your embarrassing little quip is then followed by what is probably a few seconds, but seems like an eternity of strained silence. You then feel the need to explain, but you just end up digging a deeper hole for yourself. You wish one of your listeners would rise to your rescue, but no one does. Finally something else happens that grabs everybody’s attention, and the horribly awkward moment ends. But it doesn’t really end for you; you carry it with you for the rest of the night. In fact, it is the pain of the moment that wakes you up the next morning. A few years later, that awkward moment has morphed into a humorous moment, and you retell the story over and over again to the delight and amusement of your friends.

THE FIRST AWKWARD MOMENT

I want you to think today about the most horribly awkward moment in human history. This one wasn’t a minor moment of embarrassment, and it will never morph into a humorous story. As you read the account, you know you are dealing with something so shocking and out of place that the world will never be the same again. Every time I read this account, I want to weep. Every time I think about it, I am hit with the painful thought that it really did happen and that we still see its results in our lives today. When you read it, you better know that this is not the way things were meant to be, or you will never understand the biblical story, and Christmas will never make the kind of sense that it should make to you.

Here is the Bible’s account:

And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man and said to him, “Where are you?” And he said, “I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.” He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” (Gen. 3:8–13)

Adam and Eve had just endured the first awkward, embarrassing, shame-inducing moment between them. For the first time they realized that they were without clothing, and they felt instant shame. This is an immediate clue that their disobedience had destroyed their innocence, and human relationships would never be the same again. But that sad and shameful moment pales in comparison to what happened next.

THE AWKWARDNESS OF SIN

God was walking through the garden, and rather than being filled with awe and joy at the thought of his presence, Adam and Eve were filled with fear. Their reaction was weird, awkward, and unusual. They had been designed for intimate, moment-by-moment, loving, and worshipful communion with him. They were made to delight in God and he in them. They were created to live in an unbreakable bond of love with him. So their reaction seems strange and out of place. It tells us that something has gone drastically wrong.

God notices that they have not approached him with the usual expectant joy, and so he calls out to them, inquiring where they are. Adam answers and confesses that he was naked and afraid. The effects of sin are immediate and catastrophic. The bond between God and mankind has been broken. Fear has replaced love. Hiding has replaced communion. Adam and Eve have not only damaged their spirituality, but have lost a huge chunk of their humanity. It is a tragedy of historic and universal proportion. Made to live in the center of God’s love, people hide from him. In the psyche of every human being since lives this weird and uncomfortable battle between hunger for God and a desire to hide from him.

JESUS HAS BROKEN THE AWKWARDNESS

Sin has broken the most important relationship in all of life, the relationship between people and their Creator. This separation alters everything in each of our lives. That’s why it is so wonderful and encouraging to know that Jesus came to earth to be the Prince of Peace. Through his life, death, and resurrection, he would make peace between God and us. By his righteous life, he would earn our acceptance with God and purchase our right to be God’s children.

It is this vertical peace that then allows us to live in peace and harmony with one another. The fearful awkwardness between us and God has been forever broken by Jesus, so we can run with confidence into God’s presence and know that he will never turn us away.

Content taken from Come, Let Us Adore Him: A Daily Advent Devotional by Paul David Tripp, ©2017. Used by permission of Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, Il 60187, www.crossway.org.

Paul David Tripp is the president of Paul Tripp Ministries, a nonprofit organization. He has been married for many years to Luella and they have four grown children. For more information and resources visit paultrippministries.org.

Zach Barnhart 12/5/17 Zach Barnhart 12/5/17

Just Say 'Thanks'

In this season we call “the holidays,” sandwiched between Thanksgiving and Christmas, many Americans find themselves see-sawing with gratitude. In the midst of the hustle and bustle of the holidays, there are subtle exhortations calling us to be thankful, while others call us to be thankless. We watch ourselves rock back and forth between gratefulness and criticism, contentedness and dissatisfaction. The holiday season seems to be broken because such a season has virtually no bearing on how our society lives the other eleven months of the year. Social media is filled, not with gratefulness, but with animosity, hostility, divisiveness, impatience, and critique. Save a few days of the year where we sprinkle in heartfelt posts, most of our social media feeds are saturated with thanklessness.

Some of us have lost all of the thanksgiving in our Thanksgiving (and the days that follow), despite what the Instagram posts might say. But the Christian need not lose heart. Holidays, despite whatever they represent culturally, are powerful opportunities for us to remember, reflect, and, most of all, to recover Christian thankfulness, propelling us into the year to come.

The same God who can make dry bones live can revive even a dead consumerist back to his glory and praise.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO GIVE THANKS?

Most of us, Christian or not, know we ought to be thankful. As Andrew Peterson poetically puts it, “Don’t you want to thank someone?” The question then becomes, How do we begin to work that thankfulness out in our lives to the praise of God’s glory and grace?

Perhaps we should go a little deeper: What does it mean to give thanks at all?

I turned to the Bible for wisdom in answering this question, and I was amazed at what I found. A quick search through the ESV Bible shows that there are well over 100 instances in which the words “give thanks,” “grateful,” “thankfulness,” or “thanksgiving” occur. But that’s not the amazing part.

What’s amazing is how these verses describe what it means to express gratitude and thankfulness. Time and time again, the biblical authors make the act of thanksgiving primarily something we say. There are too many examples to list them all, but consider this brief list:

Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever! Say also: “Save us, O God of our salvation, and gather and deliver us from among the nations, that we may give thanks to your holy name and glory in your praise.” (1 16:34-35).
When all the people of Israel saw the fire come down and the glory of the LORD on the temple, they bowed down with their faces to the ground on the pavement and worshiped and gavethanks to the LORD, saying, “For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.” (2 Chr. 7:3)
And they sang responsively, praising and giving thanksto the LORD (Ezra 3:11)
Then I brought the leaders of Judah up onto the wall and appointed two great choirs that gave thanks. (Neh. 12:31)
The LORD is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts, and I am helped; my heart exults, and with my song I give thanks to him. (Ps. 28:7)
At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children. (Matt. 11:25)
And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. (Lk. 2:38)
If you give thanks with your spirit, how can anyone in the position of an outsider say “Amen” to your thanksgiving when he does not know what you are saying? (1 Cor. 14:16)
And the twenty-four elders who sit on their thrones before God fell on their faces and worshiped God, saying, “We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was, for you have taken your great power and begun to reign. (Rev. 11:16-17)

Of course, Scripture tells us of other ways humans can give thanks to God. There are thank offerings, which were ritual sacrifices performed in the Old Testament (2 Chr. 29:31). The act of bowing reverently before Christ’s feet was considered an act of thanksgiving (Lk. 17:16). We can give thanks in our hearts (Col. 3:16). Even eating and honoring God in our eating is an act of thanksgiving (Rom. 14:6), so bring on the Christmas cookies!

The point, however, is that most often the way to express the gratitude and thanksgiving we feel in our hearts is by voicing it. Perhaps it’s through song, praying aloud, or simply making it public knowledge with our mouths that we are grateful. Voiced gratitude was a common expression of one’s devotion and love for God in biblical times, and it has become a bit lost on us.

HOW CAN I EXPRESS GRATITUDE TO GOD?

I know in my own life how often I reflect a spirit of taking God’s blessings, whether spiritual or tangible, totally for granted. I know his love for me and am reminded of it often, but do I thank him for it? Does the world know that I am grateful for what he has done for me?

We don’t have the same kind of privilege the biblical authors did, able to display for the world to see that they were indeed grateful to God through written letters and books. But we can voice our gratitude in a myriad of ways. A gratefulness to God for who he is, for who he has made us to be, and what he has given us will lead to a holiday season loaded with so much more than food and football and family interaction—namely meaning and significance.

How do we practically express our gratefulness to God the way David did? Not many of us have his poetic talent, and even less of us can play the harp as he did. What hope is there for us to voice our thanks? Here are four ways, in this season and beyond, for us to practice the discipline of spoken gratitude.

FOUR WAYS TO PRACTICE THE DISCIPLINE OF SPOKEN GRATITUDE

Pray as a family, and don’t forget to praise. Too often, prayer time in our lives morphs into a laundry list of things we need help with. We should make our requests known to God, yes, but prayer is more than this. Chiefly, it is an opportunity to praise. There is a reason Jesus began the Lord’s Prayer with, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name” (Matt. 6:9). Praise took pride of place in his prayer, as it should in ours. And, not to mention, modeling this pattern of prayer for our children is an easy way to disciple them.

Share your testimony, and don’t forget the present. Stories are a profound way we communicate the goodness of God, and when we tell stories to one another we help others feel thankful to God. Importantly, we should not just tell others about our past story, highlighting just what God did for us at sixteen at Bible camp. We should show others how God is leading and teaching us today, and what we are learning. Becoming aware of one another’s stories makes us grateful to God for his work in us and in others.

Get creative, and don’t forget who gifted you. Write a poem, lyrics to a song, a journal entry, or create something that communicates gratitude. You never know how your creative influence could invite someone into their own vocal gratitude to God. God has given you gifts to use to proclaim his excellencies, so use them! Don’t put too much pressure on yourself to “perform,” either. God loves when his children color for him, even when it's a scribbled mess. He takes pride in their art and displays it on his heavenly fridge.

Remember that everything is God’s gift, and don’t forget the greatest of them. Matt Chandler once remarked that under common grace, every man can enjoy a steak (or a turkey, to keep it relevant), but only the Christian can turn that simple human enjoyment into deep, lasting gratitude. With every bite of a wonderful meal, every intricacy of creation, and every hug from a family member, one truth abides for the Christian: “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (Jas. 1:17). And the greatest of these perfect gifts is the salvation of our souls, the gospel that is such good news that we ought to burst with gratitude.

Be thankful this holiday season. And if you're not sure where to start, just say "thanks."

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.

Gerry Breshears with Whitney Woollard 12/3/17 Gerry Breshears with Whitney Woollard 12/3/17

Biblical Authority as Relationship, Not Rulebook

Editor's note: The following is an excerpt from our latest book, That Word Above All Earthly Powers, written by Gerry Breshears with Whitney Woollard (Whitney is one of our staff writers). If you like this article, then be sure to pick up a paperback or Kindle copy.

Our generation has a problem with authority—we don’t trust it and, quite frankly, we don’t like it. This presents unique challenges in speaking to the Bible’s authority, a concept rejected by many as antiquated and stifling. How can an ancient document have the right to command me to any belief or action in the twenty-first century? And how can, or perhaps why should, any book bind my conscience in all matters of faith, life and practice?

These are legitimate questions to be dealt with well as Christians engage a world that is increasingly shaped by anti-authority sentiments. The idea that someone should do this or that simply “because the Bible says so” no longer holds up. It may work in a Christian bubble or conservative movement, but not in the world. Besides, those whom we call to follow Jesus need to know what makes the Bible authoritative and what that authority means for their new life in Christ. This is particularly important as we disciple them in the Word of God and instruct them to submit their entire lives to it. Obviously, no small call.

To help us towards that end, we’ve asked Gerry Breshears, Ph.D., professor of theology and chairman of biblical and theological studies at Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon to share his approach to the Bible and its authority. A work this size can hardly be comprehensive. Yet, Gerry and I (Whitney) have highlighted key pieces to consider when working with the Bible as an authoritative document binding upon God’s people.

WHAT MAKES THE BIBLE AUTHORITATIVE?

You have to start here. Ask yourself, “What is it that makes the Bible authoritative?” Of course, a significant piece is that it’s God’s Word, it’s inspired text. This is what theologians call the doctrine of inspiration: That work of God wherein he providentially prepared and moved the human authors enabling them to receive and communicate according to their individual personalities and styles the truth he would have his people know for his glory and human salvation.

A whole book could be written explaining inspiration but, in short, it means that God speaks to us through his Word. The Holy Spirit “carried along” the authors of Scripture in such a way that their words were God’s very words (see 2 Peter 1:19-21). They were literally “breathed out” by him so that we could receive salvation, learn truth about him and his world, and understand how to live God’s way in order to enjoy his best for our lives (see 2 Timothy 3:15-17).

The implication of this doctrine is that when we read the Bible, we are actually reading the words of God! Pretty profound, huh? Therein lies a significant piece of its authority. Far from being a book that gives “basic instructions before leaving earth,” the Bible, as God’s Word, has divine authority because God has authority in your life as the one who alone created the universe and rules over all. This is not authority as “Bible” but authority as that which comes from the triune God (who, to be clear, is God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit not God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Bible). It’s authoritative because it’s God’s words.

But what’s the nature of that authority? Inspiration tells you God has the right to command you to do something simply because he is the authoritative God who has spoken to you through his Word. But if we stop here we end up back where we started — “just do this because the Bible says so” — never understanding the God revealed in the Bible. Isn’t that the simplistic argument our generation has rejected? Moreover, isn’t it what the sufferers of authoritarianism, dogmatic fundamentalism, and spiritual abuse have cast off? So, it seems to us that inspiration is a key piece of the Bible’s authority but it’s not the entire picture.

A FULLER PICTURE OF THE BIBLE’S AUTHORITY

To get this picture we need to look at the nature of the God who speaks through the Bible. Gerry goes to Exodus 14 where God redeems his people from the hand of the Egyptians with an outstretched arm as they cross the red sea on dry land. You get the song of triumph by Moses, Miriam, and company in Exodus 15 where together they praise God for his redemptive work. Unfortunately, the story doesn’t end at this high point. You turn to Exodus 16 and the people are already grumbling about having no food. What does God do? He provides food. In Exodus 17 they’re grumbling about having no water. What does God do? He provides water.

Then at the end of Exodus 17 the Amalekites attack Israel and you get that interesting battle where the Israelites are winning so long as Aaron and Hur are holding up Moses’ hands. You see that God is with Israel and he protects them from their enemies. After their victory God tells Moses, “Write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua” (Exodus 17:14). This is the first command to anyone in Scripture to write something down. Which means it’s pretty important. What was Moses to write down and recite? A bunch of rules? Actually, no. He was to write down all the ways that God had redeemed, provided for, and protected his people. So that’s the first thing—God is there to redeem, provide for, and protect people who don’t deserve it.

Then in Exodus 19 God invites the people, the grumblers of chapters 16 and 17, into a covenantal relationship. This covenant is ratified in Exodus 24 when Moses takes the elders up onto the mountain and draws near to the Lord. After he does the sacrifice and sprinkles the blood he comes to the people and tells them “all the words of the Lord and all the rules” (Exodus 24:3). In verse four we see Moses write down all these words, thus getting more written Scripture. Now you see that God is not only the one who redeems, provides for, and protects, but he’s also the God who initiates and invites covenant relationship with humans. The invitation to relationship comes first and the “rules” of that relationship (i.e., the law which the Israelites understood to be authoritative) come after. When you put the pieces together the following theme emerges in regards to the Bible’s authority:

The Bible is authoritative because it comes from God (inspiration) and he has the right to command us to do things and tell us how to relate to him not only because he is the God of the universe, but also because he is the God who redeems, provides for, and protects, and he wants to have a good relationship with us.

THE BIBLE AS A COVENANT DOCUMENT

So you see the Bible is not a book of rules that you try to obey to get into heaven when you die or feel guilty about when you break. Rather, it’s a covenantal document written by people telling the story of God acting in history to redeem and protect his people. It recounts how God invites people into a covenant relationship – like a marriage – with rules of relationship so we can have an intimate relationship with him and become a people characterized by faithfulness, generosity and justice.

Think of it as a father in a loving relationship with his kids. Or a spouse in a faithful marriage to his wife. Don’t think rulebook used by teacher in a classroom. It’s not that. It’s a covenantal God who has redeemed and provided for us through Jesus the Messiah and will protect us until his return. Thus, the Bible is the binding covenant document given by this God so we can know and receive Jesus, learn how to live for him, and be sent out on mission with him.

If people are going to reject the authority of the Bible (and many will), let’s make sure they’re rejecting the Bible rather than some pop-cultural view of God that hands us a rulebook with impossibly high standards to get his kicks and giggles from watching us fail. That’s a distorted, unbiblical view. The God who gave his own Son to be in relationship with you is the same God who gave you the inspired Word so you could know him and enjoy good relationship with him.

Does this mean that the Bible is all relationship and no rules? Of course not. Look back at Exodus 24:3. Moses was to write down all the words and all the rules of the Lord. The Bible does have rules (or “commands”) that help navigate our walk with Jesus just as every good relationship comes with rules.

THE “RULES” OF RELATIONSHIP

If you’ve ever read the Bible you’ve come across rules. The infamous ones are known as the ten commandments. You shall have no other gods before me, you shall not make for yourself a carved image, you shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, and so forth. Almost everyone is familiar with these commands. But often they’re taken out the context of Israel’s story. These rules were given by God after he redeemed them and entered into covenant with them. They were the positive things God put into place to help humans cultivate a happy relationship with him and others.

Before you balk at this idea, consider how we see this in marriage or family. We all have rules that help make our relationships work. Gerry’s rule for his sweetheart Sherry is “Thou shalt not touch thy husband at night unless thou is having a nightmare and needs to be touched.” The reason being, once he’s awake he’s up for the night. Or, “Thou shalt kiss thy wife whenever she walkest into the house.” When a husband gets adequate sleep or a wife gets lots of kisses it makes for a happy marriage. See, happy rules! But they are rules.

A lot of the Bible is like that. A covenantal God giving rules to his people so that they can be in a happy relationship with him and others. For example, the command not to commit adultery is put in place so a husband and wife can enjoy fruitful, faithful intimacy with each other. It is an authoritative rule God’s people are to live by but it’s a good rule that protects a marriage. It’s for our benefit!

I (Whitney) remember a time right after my conversion when I was “hanging out” with a boy I had crushed on for years. It was finally happening! Then one morning I opened by Bible to 1 Corinthians 6:18 (all new to me, by the way) and came across these words: “Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body.” The Spirit gripped my conscience with those words. I realized this was a boundary marker or a “rule” that I needed to live by. Immediately I broke it off. I see now how those words were for my benefit from a loving father. To this day I thank God for that rule.

The point is, when we reject the Bible’s authority we’re rejecting the very things that have been put in place by a loving God for our good. Far from being that which stifles our “true selves,” the rules in the Bible set us free to be fully human. The Bible teaches us how to cultivate a heart that loves Jesus and Jesus’ people and how to walk with him in a way that nourishes our souls. It warns us to run from those things which hurt us or vandalize the image of God in others. It trains us to become people of justice and mercy and righteousness. It gives us guidance on how to carry out his mission in his world.

Submitting to the Bible’s authority is actually a good and beautiful thing. As Gerry helpfully teaches, accepting God’s authority in Scripture means loving him, taking his values to heart, obeying his commands, embracing his promises, declaring those promises in life and word wherever we go. Isn’t this something we, as believers, should desire not reject? Shouldn’t his words bind our consciences in all matters of faith, life and practice?

BUT, WAIT, WHAT ABOUT…?

If you accept our proposition, that as the inspired Word of God the Bible alone is the final authority for all matters of faith and life and what it teaches comes with divine authority because it is the covenant document of God’s redemptive relationship with his people, you may still have some questions. Namely, what do you do with all the parts of Scripture that isn’t commands or rules? How do you “obey” a narrative or submit to a song? And is all the Bible equally authoritative and binding on your life as it was for the original hearers? Plus, why are there so many issues in your life that the Bible doesn’t speak to? Good questions! Here are some points to consider when thinking about the Bible’s authority in your life:

1. HOW CAN NARRATIVES AND PSALMS BE AUTHORITATIVE?

The Bible is one big story. It’s the story of God acting to save people from sin, self, and Satan, to judge and condemn evil and sin in the world and to set people free to be fully human, just like Jesus. Genres like narrative or psalms are authoritative in the fact that they help us learn that story, show us the character of God, and reveal his purposes for his world. We see that the whole story points towards the true Hero, Jesus, and teaches us how to receive his salvation and then live like him. As we read the Bible, we are called to live in a way that is consistent with God’s redemptive purposes in Christ, its characters and themes revealed, and the directions that have been set up in the story. For example, as we navigate relationships with broken people we follow the narrative of Jesus who loves and serves the prostitute who is under the death penalty even as he calls her to repentance. That’s something we learn through narrative. Or, like the psalmist, we choose to trust in God’s stated outcome even though we have not seen it come to pass yet. So, even though these texts aren’t strictly “legal” we can submit to them by following the mission and character of God revealed in them.

2. IS ALL THE BIBLE EQUALLY AUTHORITATIVE?

All the Bible is equally God’s Word, but there are parts that were written for a particular era which give us broader principles to apply but are not directly binding. For example, the Mosaic covenant was given to Israel after the Abrahamic covenant until the Messiah came and the New Covenant was inaugurated. In Galatians 3:19-4:7 Paul explains how the law acted as a “babysitter” or a “guardian” to help keep Israel until the fulfillment of the Abrahamic covenant. Now that Jesus, Abraham’s offspring, has come and inaugurated the New Covenant promises, we are no longer under the Mosaic code. Gerry ate bacon for breakfast the day we met about this article. I (Whitney) ate sausage. We’re okay to do that. However, much in the law of Moses is a part of the bigger picture of biblical morality and reveals to us what the divine priorities are. We would do well to apply culturally appropriate applications from the principles set forth in those texts. Of course, this will require the hard work of good interpretation which we encourage you to do.

3. WHY ARE THERE SO MANY ISSUES WHERE THE BIBLE DOES NOT TELL US WHAT TO DO?

There are a lot of specifics in our daily life that just aren’t addressed in the Bible. So how do we submit to its authority in areas that seem unclear? Well, first off, what the Bible prescribes we must believe and do. This is the black and white stuff. Faith in Jesus and repentance of sin is the only way to the Father (see John 14:6). Looking at porn is a sin (see Matthew 15:18-20). Being a part of a vibrant faith community is a must (see Hebrews 10:25). Next, what the Bible describes we should follow as closely as possible. The book of Acts is a great example. It’s a descriptive narrative telling us how the gospel spread to the ends of the earth. As we engage the same mission, we should follow the disciples in the book of Acts as closely as possible. Finally, when the Bible is silent, he intended to give us freedom to be Spirit-led and wise. This pertains to issues like who you should marry, if you should take that job offer, if you should move your family overseas, and so forth. The Bible didn’t tell me (Whitney) to marry Neal. Rather, it shaped the values I was looking for in a spouse. When I met Neal I saw that he loved Jesus, had integrity, and was missionally-minded, so I married him! A lot of life is lived in this area. You seek wisdom and guidance from God and people, pray for the Spirit’s leading and then make a decision. The authority of the Bible sets you free to make decisions, it shouldn’t paralyze you.

READ YOUR BIBLE!

One final admonition from us—read the Bible! What a treasure we have in our hands. At any moment we can open the Bible and hear the voice of God. In a culture that is growing increasingly confused, we can go to the Bible and receive authoritative words with clarity and confidence knowing that it comes from a loving Father who wants his kids to have a good relationship with him.

So take up and read.

Read the Scriptures in the context of the whole story and in the context of the worshipping, serving body of Christ, as well as privately and devotionally, for the sake of joining God’s gospel work in the world. Then together, with the Spirit’s help, submit your life to God’s Word in all matters of faith and life and experience the joy that comes from faithful submission.

Gerry Breshears has been professor of theology at Western Seminary since 1980. In addition to teaching and lecturing at a number of colleges and seminaries around the world, he speaks in many churches. He ministers with a wide variety of people and issues in the pastoral side of his life. He works in leadership in the Evangelical Theological Society nationally and regionally, including having served as national president. Gerry and his wife, Sherry, have two sons, Donn and David, and a daughter, Cyndee, and four wonderful grandchildren. He is an elder and a member of the preaching team at Grace Community Church of Gresham, Oregon.

Whitney Woollard is a writer, speaker, and Bible teacher. She serves as a staff writer at Gospel-Centered Discipleship and contributes to various ministries, including YouVersion, 9Marks, and the Bible Project. She holds her M.A. in biblical and theological studies from Western Seminary and loves sharing her passion for the Word with others. She has been married to Neal for over ten years and together they serve Jesus at Hinson Baptist Church in Portland, Oregon. You can contact her at www.whitneywoollard.com.

Todd Wilson 11/30/17 Todd Wilson 11/30/17

Male or Female: Fidelity to Your Sexuality

Let’s probe a bit further into what it means that God created us male and female. But before we do that, we should take a small step back and consider something even more basic. Each of us is created either male or female. This may seem so obvious that it’s not worth stating, but given the challenges we face, it does need to be pointed out. It’s the clearest thing we can say about being created in the image of God. All of us are either one or the other. The tragic developmental anomaly of intersex notwithstanding, there really is no third option; there is just this basic dual reality.

SEXUALITY AS VOCATION

When God created you in his image as male or female, he called you to a certain way of life—as either a male or a female. By virtue of being created in the image of God as male or female, you have a call on your life; you have a vocation. It is your most basic vocation, your most fundamental job in life: to joyfully embrace and faithfully embody your sexuality—whether male or female—for the good of others. God’s first call on our lives is to acknowledge rather than deny our sexuality. We are to rejoice in it rather than seek to downplay it. We are to lean into it fully rather than avoid it entirely. We are to use our sexuality to bless others rather than neglect it to the loss of others. And we are to embrace its limits rather than try to transcend it.

There is always the temptation to depart from God’s call on our lives as either male or female, to downplay or even deviate from who God has made us to be. Tragic things happen when we begin to despise our own sexuality and the bodies God has given us. When we fail to thank God for who he has made us to be and allow ingratitude to define our attitude toward God, the results can be very serious and sad. This is what Paul describes in Romans 1:21, where both men and women find their lives going off the rails in sexual ways, precisely because they failed to honor God or give him thanks.

Melinda Selmys, in her book Sexual Authenticity, describes how for years she wrestled with her own sexuality. She was a professed, practicing lesbian who underwent a profound transformation and eventually got married to a man. She explains how significant change came when she began to come to terms with her own sexuality and with who God had made her to be as a woman:

"I realized that my own sex was not inferior, that its strengths throughout the ages had always been strengths, that its contributions to the world were not second-class or insignificant. It was here, in this, that the cracks opened enough that I could risk falling in love with a man. Suddenly, I was not an interloper on his territory, trying to seize his castles and make them my own.

I had my own kingdom, my own square of land, my own integrity. I did not need to demand power: I had it. I did not need to take something of value away from him and hold it to ransom: I had valuable things of my own. At last, I understood something of who I was. Not lesbian. Not bisexual. Not gay. Not straight, either. But a woman, made in the image and likeness of God. In possession of myself, with the right and the ability to give the gift of myself to another, sincerely, in love."

To be created in the image of God as male and female means that each of us is either male or female. We are called to embrace who God has made us to be, whether male or female. We must be faithful to our calling as male or female and must own who we are sexually as one of God’s greatest gifts to us—for the good of others.

MALE AND FEMALE: COMPLEMENTARITY IN OUR SEXUALITY

The truth that God has made us male and female is very good news. God not only created two genders, male and female, with unique and glorious and mysterious differences; he made these two genders complementary. They don’t simply fit side by side, like peanut butter and jelly; they fit together in an interlocking pattern like puzzle pieces. They have been created for each other, to complete each other in the most profound sorts of ways. This means that to be faithful to your own sexuality, whether male or female, you can’t idolize your own sex—as though your sex is the be-all and end-all of the human race. Sure, there’s a place for donning the “Girls Rule” T-shirt or descending into the “man cave.” Yes, there’s a place for same-sex friendships and even a little “bromance.” But the relationships we have with those of our own sex should not replace or exclude the beautiful dynamic at work when we relate to those of the opposite sex.

We need opposite-sex relationships not only to complement and strengthen the other sex but to learn more about our own sex. Women learn who they are as women by interacting with other women but also with men. So, too, men learn who they are by interacting not only with other men but with women as well. Interaction with the opposite sex is essential to our growth and self-understanding as creatures made in God’s image as male and female. Karl Barth put it brilliantly: “It is always in relation to their opposite that man and woman are what they are in themselves."

Think about what this means practically. You won’t grow into the kind of person God wants you to become if you don’t have meaningful relationships with those of the opposite sex. You can’t, because the opposite sex isn’t just some strange creature from another planet, but it is God’s gift to you, as your complement, whether you are male or female.

Of course, one of the most obvious ways this interaction between the two sexes takes place is in marriage. But that’s not the only place we interact meaningfully (even if not sexually) with the opposite gender. If you are a man, you interact with the opposite sex all the time—mothers, sisters, friends, employers or employees, teachers, coaches, classmates, neighbors, aunts, cousins. So too, if you are a woman, you encounter men all the time—fathers, brothers, friends, employers or employees, teachers, coaches, classmates, neighbors, uncles, cousins.

Don’t overlook these opportunities to learn about what it means to be who God has called you to be, whether male or female. We should grow to appreciate the distinctive yet complementary strengths males and females bring to every task, whether planning a party, running a business, cheering from the sidelines of a soccer game, or raising a family. We should not only appreciate but be dazzled by these complementary differences.

Todd Wilson (PhD, Cambridge University) has spent over a decade in pastoral ministry and is currently the Senior Pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, Illinois. He is the cofounder and chairman of The Center for Pastor Theologians, a ministry dedicated to resourcing pastor theologians. Todd has authored or edited a number of books including Real Christian: Bearing the Marks of Authentic Faith and The Pastor Theologian: Resurrecting an Ancient Vision. Todd is married to Katie, and they have seven children.

Mike Phay 11/28/17 Mike Phay 11/28/17

Lead with Your Ears

“The most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen. Just listen. Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention.” —Rachel Naomi Remen

Research suggests the average person listens at a 25 percent rate of efficiency, which means most of us aren’t very good listeners.

One reason for our attention deficit is that the media we’re immersed in—especially social media and the ubiquitous smartphone—is shaping us. The more immersed we are, the shorter our attention spans become.

As a result, we are more attuned to the visual rather than the aural. Smartphones lure us into believing we can relationally “multitask”—we think we can give a portion of our attention to virtual relationships through our screens, while simultaneously acting like we’re truly listening to the flesh-and-blood person right in front of us. Even when not actively engaged with a screen, our attention and minds are often drawn to our devices and away from whatever, or whomever, is in front of us.

We live in and are increasingly being shaped by an age of distraction that makes listening a lost art. Which means a good listener is one of the rarest and most beautiful things in the world today.

LISTENING IS AN ACT OF LOVE

In one of the earliest Christian writings, Jesus’ half-brother James makes listening to others a priority: “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger” (James 1:19).

James directs his readers to open their ears rather than their mouths. “Be quick to hear,” he says (emphasis mine). This quickness is not an indication of speed, but of priority. In other words: listening is of primary importance, so it should be done first. There should be a sense of urgency to our listening, and it should consistently be our intuitive, default, automatic posture toward others.

The research cited above suggests this is not the case for most of us. How about with you?

Are you a good listener? Where does your mind go as people speak with you in conversation? Are you more interested in hearing or being heard? Do you attend to those in your presence, or are you constantly distracted by the ever-present virtual world on your smartphone? Do you respond to those who are angry at or critical of you with a “soft answer,” or with a reflection of their anger?

Our first response to others should always be with our ears rather than with our mouths. In the command “be quick to hear,” James is essentially calling us to “lead with our ears.”

There is no better way to misjudge or misunderstand someone than by failing to listen to them. This failure to listen often leads to, as James warns against, a quick tongue and a sharp temper. But listening is an act of love in which the other person’s interests are put in front of one’s own.

Listening is an essential part of what psychologist and spiritual director David Benner calls “soul hospitality”—the creation of space and safety for someone to be themselves, to be welcomed, to be loved, and to share their innermost self.

As with the hospitality of an open home or an open table, soul hospitality requires at least two things: reception and attentive presence.

RECEPTION

The ear is an organ of reception. It does not produce anything but simply receives. This is the perfect organ for providing hospitality because it gives deference to the speaker, offering space for them to be heard. Benner writes, “the essence of hospitality is taking another person into my space, into my life.”

It is intuitive to think of hospitality as generosity—as giving something of substance to someone—and listening tends to follow this general pattern. In this model, listening becomes a necessary but over-rated launching pad for response formulation.

In these cases, most conversational energy is given over to what will be said next, rather than what’s being said now. The posture taken by the purported listener is therefore not one of reception but of provision. It is a position of power rather than humility.

But soul hospitality, which includes true listening, “is more demanding than giving advice, money or some other form of help,” Benner goes on to say. It is an act of humility.

The assumption for the truly hospitable listener is that the other person has much more to give. The most appropriate posture to take, then, is one of reception. And reception’s proper response? Gratitude.

Providing hospitality while also being the one to show gratitude is counter-intuitive. Yet truly hospitable people are often the most grateful people, blessed beyond measure at the grace-filled presence of their guests.

For this reason, reception is not equivalent to consumption. It is not a receiving into the self for the sake of the self. It is not self-centered at all. As an act of love, reception is focused on and for the other.

ATTENTIVE PRESENCE

Leading with an open ear, although it implies reception does not equate to passivity. It includes the giving of a gift: the gift of attentive presence.

Like reception, attentive presence is another act of love and humility. Benner again: “To be present to you means that I must be prepared, temporarily, to be absent to me.” To be “absent to me” is to set aside thoughts, responsibilities, text messages, emails, and a plethora of other distractions that play tug-of-war with our attention.

If hospitality implies space-making, then attentive presence requires boundary-setting and the removal of distractions for a time, creating an opportunity to be present and attentive to the person whose image-of-God-bearing soul has been entrusted to the listener in this sacred space and time.

The command to listen is not easy. It takes something from us, especially when it is met with sin or anger. It is difficult to attentively listen when what is being spoken is emotion-laden and dripping with hostility. Attentive presence requires the difficult work of self-differentiation from attack, blame, or anger in order to truly listen. The natural response to emotionally furious assaults is often tantamount to an explosive chemical reaction.

But God would call us instead to the attentive, humble, loving response of the open ear—not only when it’s pleasant and congenial, but, even more importantly, when it’s inconvenient, tense, and downright difficult.

FIRST, LISTEN TO GOD

To serve others by leading with an open ear is to quickly recognize our great need for God. When shortfalls, inadequacy, and inability are easily recognized, we must make haste to run to his grace.

To have any hope of being receptive and attentively present to others, we must begin with attentiveness to God’s voice. As James goes on to say: “Therefore . . . receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls” (James 1:21).

First, we must listen to God, which takes place when we prayerfully and humbly attend to his voice. To become familiar with God’s voice is to listen to how he has chosen to speak to us in the Scriptures. As we listen to God, we will find ourselves crying out to the One who is quick to hear: “I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry” (Psalm 40:1).

God is quick to listen and will attend to the poor and needy sinner who comes to him asking for grace in their time of need.

You cannot become someone who is quick to hear unless you first call upon the One who inclines his ear to you. Truly it is from him that we learn to listen.

Lore Ferguson 11/26/17 Lore Ferguson 11/26/17

When the Words of My Mouth are Pleasing Mostly to Me

I've always been a fast thinker, deducing concepts, abstracts, illustrations, and material quickly—on almost everything except math. Sadly, that quick thinking gave me a smart mouth, and I don't mean a studied, intelligent, and wise mouth. I mean the kind that got slapped, taped shut, and soap stuffed in it regularly when I was younger. I could not bridle my tongue. I was a melancholy girl, prone to long spouts of reading and ruminating, and saving up zingers to drop at the moment of maximum potential. One of my parents' favorite disciplines was to make me write the book of James by hand in a series of black and white composition books. I wish I'd saved them.

To this day I both shudder and cling to the book of James because it holds so much gold for a wily, unbridled tongue like mine.

KNOWING ENOUGH ABOUT GOD TO SHUDDER

Beginning in my late teens and into my twenties, I began to realize the way to gain friends and influence people was not to speak words of death to or about them. I have always been interested in outcomes and results, especially when they seem to benefit me. I learned to unbridle my tongue with good ideas, principles, formulas, and carnal wisdom.

If there was a question, I wanted to have the answer. If there was a weakness, I wanted to be the healer. If there was a puzzle, I wanted to figure it out. I wanted to be the go-to girl—if you need wisdom, gentleness, friendship, pity, a listening ear? Go to Lore.

I didn't realize how pervasively this pride had grown in my life and heart, though, filling all my joints and marrow with the belief that I had enough of the answers or the right amount of gentleness or the perfect principles for someone's problems. I was okay if people saw me as the solution, even as I pointed to Christ as the ultimate solution. I was the conduit, but he was the water. Surely folks could see that?

The problem is, folks don't see that, not unless you hit them over the head with it, and I wasn't about to do that and lose their respect. I wanted to tickle their ears, not box them.

WISDOM COMES FROM THE WORD

One of the things that drew me to my husband Nate, before I even met him, was his Bible. I walked past him often enough in our coffee shop, he always sat there with his open Bible counseling men. His Bible was so underlined and scribbled in I thought, "Well, here's a guy who loves the Word." One of our first conversations was about a heated and polarizing issue, and he sat across from me with his Bible gently responding to all of my questions and points with Scripture.

He just never wandered far from what the Word said about anything.

As I began to know him and move toward marriage with him, I saw this come out in the way he led our relationship, the ways he interacted with others, the ways he spoke and didn't speak, the ways he shared his sin and the brokenness of his former marriage, the ways he ministered to men, the ways he walked in discipline situations, the ways he submitted to our pastors and elders, and so much more.

He was a man who for many years simply read the Word or about the Word, but in the past few years he had become a man who was empowered with, immersed in, captured by, and full of the Word of God.

None of this changed in our marriage. In fact, I've seen even more up close and personal how he doesn't offer counsel, wisdom, good ideas about anything unless they're drenched in the Word of God. He has learned the way to truly bridle his tongue is to put on the reins and bit of the Word—to let the words of God direct, lead, and guide him in the direction he goes.

I am so challenged by this. I want to be more like this. I know at the end of every day when he asks me about my day, the folks I saw, the people I prayed with, the counsel I gave, the counsel I received, we're going to have a conversation about whether and how Scripture influenced the words spoken.

I have spent decades trying to figure out how to bridle my tongue, going from one extreme to the other, from utter silence to rampant zingers. This discipline of letting the Word of God be my bit and reins for a bridled tongue is the only thing that's changing me, really, from the inside out.

HOW TO LET THE WORD BECOME YOUR BIT

Read the Proverbs. I've been sitting in the book of Proverbs for weeks now, originally because I'd encouraged a friend to get in it, but now because I'm just so convicted about my tongue in my own life. You can't read five verses without stumbling across one dealing with the mouth, wisdom, the tongue, speaking, or being foolish. I've been getting wrecked in my own heart about my tongue and the pride in me.

Read the book of James. Write the book of James. Get the book of James inside you. Eat the book of James.

Ask the Holy Spirit to convict you. Ask him to convict you immediately when your words are coarse, unkind, gossipy, idle, unforgiving, or rooted in pride. And then, this is important, repent for your actions in the moment. This is really hard for me. I feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit seventy times a day and can't even count on one finger how many times that actually drives me to repent in the moment.

Trust the Holy Spirit to do the work, not you. It's not your job to share the tidbit you think will make all the difference, especially if your desire is simply to be heard. Zack Eswine said, "It's not our job to finish what Jesus has left unfinished," in regard to our desire to sweep up, clean up, or tie up loose ends. Leave room for the Holy Spirit.

Before giving counsel, ask lots of questions. Ask what in Scripture is comforting, convicting, teaching, leading, guiding the person with whom you're speaking. Ask how the Holy Spirit is comforting them. Often times your questions will lead them to remember the power of Scripture and the ministry of the Holy Spirit—the sources to which and whom they can always go.

If you're someone who is quiet, maybe you need to speak up. If you're someone who's quiet and only thinks the zingers, find Scripture that's life-giving and speak it in the situation. Sometimes opening your mouth is the way your tongue is bridled. Ask the Lord to increase your empathy and love for people, to help you be patient, even in your listening. Sometimes your courage to speak Scripture in a situation will be the thing that changes you and the person with whom you're speaking.

If you're someone who is not quiet, maybe you need to remain quiet. If you're someone who's quiet and says the zingers, maybe a fast from speaking is in order. A time of intentionally crafted silence, full of reading the Word, studying the Word, repentance, asking the Holy Spirit to convict you, change you, and help you to see your words are not the answer to everything.

Friends, I'm convicted as I write this even more. I want the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart to be pleasing to God. I want to see my words and heart meditations as they are, being heard by the God of the universe, the Father who loves me, the Son who died for me, and the Spirit who is saying things too deep for words on my behalf.

My zingers and smart-mouth and good ideas are like filthy rags to this God.

I want to please my Father, and the best way to do that is to fill my mouth with the words he's given me in his Word.

Lore Ferguson Wilbert is a writer, thinker, and learner. She blogs at sayable.net, and you can follow her on Twitter or on Instagram. She has a husband named Nathan and lives in Flower Mound, Texas.

Josh Shank 11/23/17 Josh Shank 11/23/17

Featured Book | A Guide for Advent: The Arrival of King Jesus

As the season of Advent comes into view, we wanted to invite our readers to pick up our resource, A Guide for Advent: The Arrival of King Jesus. With essays that will help you focus on the meaning and anticipation of the Advent season, this guide will help you walk closer to Christ as the day we celebrate his birth draws close. Enjoy this excerpt from our Executive Director, Jeremy Writebol, and pick up the ebook or paperback in time for the first Sunday of Advent, December 3.

The Greatest Fear 

What is the single greatest fear that most people have about the Advent season, especially Christmas Day? I doubt it has to do with finding the perfect gift. Nor does it seem like the inevitable holiday weight-gain would rank as the greatest fear. Debates over religion and politics at the dinner table might earn a higher rank but even those fights are nothing compared to a deeper fear of the soul.

I believe it to be the lack of presence. Not a lack of presents (or gifts) but a lack of presence. No one wants to be alone during this season. We sing songs about being home for Christmas. Many Christmas films riff on the theme of being separated from family and loved ones at Christmas. We cower at the thought of waking up to ourselves with no lit tree, no joyful laughter, and with nobody to share the day. Consider the very ghosts that haunted Scrooge in Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol, they haunted him with lonely Christmases. Studies indicate that depression hits widows and widowers deepest at the holidays. I can almost guess that a full 98% of people reading this article would prefer to have someone, even if they didn’t really like them, to be with on Christmas over spending it with no one at all.

What is it about Advent that reveals this fear in almost all of us? If we look at the very nature of what it means we will find the very reason being physically alone during this season troubles so many. At its core it is more than just remembering the coming of God into our existence, Advent is about the actual presence of God in our existence. It’s the one season that reminds us that God is with us. So, when we consider a season that tells us God is with us and yet functionally experience it in loneliness a massive discord hits. The discord, for most, isn’t with God. It’s within ourselves. We should be experiencing presence. We should be with others and God should be with us.

Presence on the Way

Four hundred years is a long time to wait. The United States of America has barely existed for half of that time. It would be nearly impossible to understand the absence and silence from God for that amount of time. However, that is exactly where the people of Israel were. National culture and identity would go through an immense rewriting if it had been four hundred years since you had a prophetic word from the national center of worship activity. Certainly brief and dim glimpses of recovery and hope came and recharged everyone’s expectations but they were just that, brief and dim. Sure, they had the prophetic words of old to lean on. Isaiah did promise Emmanuel, even if that was seven hundred years ago.

Then, rumors started cropping up. Angelic visitations occurred. Barren old women conceived. Kings from the East traveled West. A nation immigrated within itself because of a census. A virgin was with child. Then, the rumors died down. Things went back to normal for another thirty years until a shabbily dressed man like Elijah began to speak for God in the wilderness. He was no respecter of persons and called kings, priests, and publicans to repent. A nation finally received a prophetic word: “The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world is present. God is with us. Emmanuel has come.”

Yes, Emmanuel, God with us. He was attested to be God by his words and works by doing things only God could do. God with us possessing authority to drive out sin, devils, and death. God with us doing justice, loving the outcast and the stranger. God with us dinning with the drunkards, the harlots, and the sinners. God with us clothed in the material flesh of our bodies. Emmanuel experienced the physical limitations, pains, and agonies of our condition. God with us bearing the wrath of God in our place for our offenses against God and taking our very own death-blow. God with us being laid in a tomb dead for three days, he, God with us, was miraculously raised to glorious new life again by the power of God–securing resurrection life for all who trust in him. God with us sent his eternal presence to indwell and empower us for lives of glory and mission. He hasn’t left us, in fact, God with us has come, became flesh, and lived in our very domain and gifted us his eternal presence so we would always be with him.

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 That Word Above All Earthly Powers. He writes personally at jwritebol.net.

Andy Bauer 11/21/17 Andy Bauer 11/21/17

Finding Thankfulness Amidst a Trial by Fire

On the night of October 8th, fires were sparked that would ravage my community in Sonoma County, California. That first night the fires burned with unreal and terrifying speed, sweeping over the wooded, sparsely populated hills, and into the very heart of Santa Rosa, a city of over 150,000. The fires continued to burn out of control for over a week. Nearly 8,000 structures were lost, most of them homes, displacing thousands of residents in an area already experiencing a housing shortage. Over forty people lost their lives.

Rebuilding will take years. An uncertain future faces our community. Will there be enough housing? Will there be enough jobs? Is it worth rebuilding? Will this happen again?

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, those of us living in Sonoma County are learning how to be thankful in the midst of unspeakable tragedy.

WHAT IS THERE TO BE THANKFUL FOR?

No one in Sonoma County was unaffected on a personal level, including me. My family evacuated our home three different times, though our home survived. The fire was stopped a mere 500 feet from my parents’ house. My aunt and uncle, three of my co-workers, and several friends lost their homes.

In such circumstances, “What is there to be thankful for?” seems a legitimate question.

Yet, in spite of the catastrophe, there are reasons for thankfulness. While any loss of life is tragic, if not for the work of first-responders evacuating those in fire zones as the world burned around them, the losses would have been much higher.

That first night, neighborhoods engulfed in flames threatened two Santa Rosa hospitals directly across the street. Firefighters were able to stop the fires from crossing the roads, keeping those vital facilities from being lost. There are countless stories of everyday citizens warning and rescuing their neighbors, defending their neighborhoods against the fires, and saving their homes. For these acts of heroism and selflessness, we can be thankful.

There is one act, in particular, I’m especially thankful for—one I am convinced saved not only my church, but possibly my home as well.

THE KIND OF HEROIC ACT WE CAN ALL BE THANKFUL FOR

Pete Halpin is the Facilities Manager of my home church, Santa Rosa Bible Church. I first met Pete several years ago when he and his family moved into the house next to the church property. They began attending our church, and, right away, Pete struck me as one of the friendliest people I’d ever met. We got to know each other over the years through pick-up basketball games, church functions, and a missions trip to Ecuador.

A few years ago, Pete became the Facilities Manager for the church. He was a great guy for the job, and he could never beat that commute: open the back gate, and he’s at work. As someone who also once worked at the church and lived on the other side of the fence from the property, I could attest to the convenience. I had long since moved from that close proximity, but not by much; I still live less than a quarter-mile from the church campus.

The night of October 8th, with the fire rapidly approaching, Pete, his wife, and one of his sons loaded up three cars and evacuated. Before they made it even a couple blocks, the engine in the car Pete was driving, an older car he was working to restore, began to knock. Evacuation is no time to deal with an unreliable vehicle, so Pete abandoned the car on the road. When he did, he suddenly remembered his 79-year old neighbor. Unsure if the neighbor was aware of what was happening, Pete sent his family on their way and went back to check on the neighbor. Once he determined the neighbor was safe, Pete went back to his house.

That’s when the embers began to fall into Pete’s backyard. Because of the severe winds earlier in the night, the yard was covered with a blanket of dry redwood needles. Pete put out spot fires in the yard ignited by the flying embers. He promised his wife he would not risk his life to save property, but as the embers continued to drop and the fire burned ever closer, now visible on the ridge north of the house, it was a promise that was getting harder to keep. Finally, it was time to go.

But before he could, a feeling came over Pete. A calm that told him he was supposed to be there at that moment. Pete has described himself as an anxious person, but in the midst of this crisis, he felt a divine peace overcome him.

He had to check on the church.

ENTERTAINING UNAWARE ANGELS

He crossed the parking lot to the church building and began assessing the situation. On the northern end of the campus, closest to the fire, Pete saw a spot fire burning behind the maintenance shop. Besides the threat to the shop itself, the area behind the shop was a storage area for all sorts of combustible materials. Pete emptied six fire extinguishers putting out the fire.

While battling the flames, he encountered two men wearing backpacks skulking behind the shop. Surprised to see anybody else there in the face of an impending inferno in the middle of the night, Pete asked who they were. After a brief hesitation, they said they were there to help. Pete didn’t hesitate and put them to work. He had them attach hoses to the spigots and help him move vehicles away from the fence line where it appeared the houses directly on the other side were already engulfed. Pete asked them to help him hook a trailer up to a truck to pull it away from the fence. The two men kept saying they had to leave. Pete yelled, “No! You need to help me move this trailer!” The two stayed and helped before fleeing.

It wasn’t until later, when things calmed down, that Pete realized what he had missed earlier in the tension of the moment. The two men were probably looters who, already in those early moments of the tragedy, had been out preying on the victims. Thanks to Pete, the cowards were forced into service for something good.

After hearing this story, a friend of mine expressed disappointment that Pete was not actually, as Hebrews 13:2 says, “entertaining angels unawares.” I pointed out the verse still applied; the two were just unaware they were angels.

With the fire behind the shop extinguished, no other buildings on the campus were in immediate danger. Fires burned portions of the neighborhood on three sides of the campus but never made it across any of the streets onto the property. If the shop, which contained fuel and chemicals for the various vehicles and tools used to maintain the grounds, had caught fire, it is entirely conceivable that the rest of the church would have burned. If the church had caught fire, there is the very real possibility it would have spread to the houses and many trees in the surrounding neighborhoods, including mine. It could have pulled fire-fighting resources away from the fire that was stopped less than 500 feet from my parents’ house, allowing that fire to spread further.

It’s not a stretch for me to say that, thanks to Pete, my church, my home, my parents home, and maybe my entire neighborhood was saved.

WHAT THANKFULNESS REALLY LOOKS LIKE

Almost a month after that terrible night, my church family met in the auditorium which had been saved by the Lord through Pete’s actions. An opportunity for testimony was given.

A long-time member stood to give her’s. She is 80 years old; her husband is 90. They lost a beautiful home in which they had lived for decades, along with everything in it. The first words out of her mouth during that testimony were, “I am so thankful we lost our house”; said without an iota of bitterness or false sentiment. She was thankful for the opportunities her and her husband’s loss had given them to share Jesus with people.

Such a comment would seem out of the ordinary, given the circumstances. But that has not been the case among those in my church family who lost everything. Time and time again, I hear them say how thankful they are; thankful that although their things are gone, they are safe; thankful for the support of their brothers and sisters in Christ in their time of need; thankful to be a light in a dark time; thankful for the opportunity to serve others who are in the same situation.

LEARNING TO BE THANKFUL

1 Thessalonians 5:18 tells us to “give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” This is often easier said than done. In times like these, are there moments when doubt and despair creep into our thoughts? Of course.

But, if we go back to God’s command in Philippians 4:6, to “not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God,” we know he will listen. We know his plans for us are for good and not for evil (Jeremiah 29:11). That plan may not be what we thought it should or would be. No one wants to hear that God’s plan for their life is for their house to burn down. But we can be thankful that his plan, while it may not be clear to us all at once, is perfect, and is for our greater good.

For those of us in Sonoma County, this is a trial by fire in the most literal sense. I am thankful for what God is doing in my hometown and how his people are responding.

Andy Bauer, husband and father of two, is a police officer in Sonoma County, California. He attends the Santa Rosa Bible Church, where his father, Chris Bauer, serves as Lead Pastor.

Matt Tebbe 11/19/17 Matt Tebbe 11/19/17

What Does Mission Look Like in the Suburbs?

“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.” – Karl Marx

I was at a church conference, listening to an impassioned young pastor talk about the work he does in inner-city high schools in his neighborhood:

“Everyone should be getting in on this. It’s the greatest need in our city. Young men without fathers need attentive, compassionate, strong men to pour into their lives and mentor them.”

I listened to him with a mixture of admiration and annoyance. I admired how he’d discerned local mission in his neighborhood and galvanized his community to action. Men putting their lives on the line for young men stirred my heart and excited my mind.

But I was also annoyed (and feeling more than a bit guilty about being annoyed). What if my neighborhood doesn’t have the same problems as your inner city neighborhood?

Does mission in the suburbs count, too?

THE BEST PLACE TO LIVE?

The city where I am living and planting a church (Fishers, Indiana) was recently named the BEST place to live (in all of America!) by Money Magazine (based on factors that a magazine named MONEY would base it on: healthy economy, affordable homes, and a “high quality of life”).

This is a very different environment from inner-city realities described by the young pastor above. So what does mission look like in the affluent suburbs? Should we drive 30 minutes to mentor high school teens in a more impoverished area?

What does mission look like here in the suburbs?

THE HIDDEN PAIN OF THE SUBURBS

My friend and co-pastor Ben says that mission in the suburbs is more difficult to discern because the needs we see most quickly are those that contrast with the American Dream (poverty, homelessness, crime, etc.). But the American Dream isn’t the same thing as the Kingdom of God.

The needs in the suburbs are just as pressing, but it takes some discernment to see them because they’re hidden under the veneer of the apparent fulfillment of the American Dream.

Our church has been inhabiting and praying for our suburban city for three years now. And we’ve noticed a glaring issue largely left untouched and ignored by the affluent, active culture of our city: there seems to bea deep well of unprocessed sadness, unfinished grief, sorrow, and relational pain that people carry with them on a day to day basis.

One recent study suggests that loneliness is rampant, and it’s just as dangerous to our health as obesity. And unlike poverty, homelessness, and hunger, most people who are chronically sad don’t know it. They can’t identify what’s actually haunting them.

AFFLUENCE AND ACTIVITY NUMB US

Part of the reason we don’t know we’re sad is that the affluence and relentless activity of the suburbs insulate us from having to feel our pain. We’ve generally got enough money and power to find a way to numb the pain if we ever start feeling it.

Lonely? Watch another Netflix show, refresh your Facebook pic of your family to see how many likes you’ve received, kill off that box of cookies.
Ugly? Get free botox from your neighbor, start a gym membership and lose that weight, buy more expensive (and flattering) clothing.
Hurting from a relationship? Eat, drink and be merry; change churches; just begin to ignore that awkward relationship.
Insignificant at work? Find your significance in your kids' performance, or your meticulously cared for lawn, or your car.
Stressed out and unable to cope? Pop open another bottle of wine, plan a guys’ weekend, play another round of golf, download another mobile phone game.

CHURCH DOESN'T HELP (MOST OF THE TIME)

And our suburban churches aren’t helping.

Worship services are often called “celebrations.” Preachers regularly tell people that the answer to their unhappiness is to “just praise God!” Our liturgies are full of thanksgiving, praise, and exhortation, but often bereft of lament, mourning, and weeping. Our Christian radio stations are full of “positive and encouraging” programming, implying that to be a Christian is to be happy, positive, smiling, and put together.

If Karl Marx thought the religion of his day was the “opium of the people,” there’s a case to be made that the kind of Pop Christianity described above is the opium of the American suburbs.

Drop the kids off at childcare, get emotionally moved by awesome music, listen to an inspirational message about God that tells you to try harder and do more, and God is good all the time and all the time God is good . . . and come back next week for your next spiritual hit!

But none of this frenetic spiritual activity really heals us. It just keeps us sedated and unaware of our immense sadness and pain. Church just becomes another activity to distract me from my pain.

RECKONING WITH REALITY

Instead of this kind of happy-clappy faith, the suburbs desperately need a faithful Christian witness of how to lament pain and evil in our world.

One of our foundational assumptions about life (because we see Jesus make this assumption over and over in his dealings with people) is that God is so real he most fully meets us where we really are.

We need a reckoning with reality, a dealing with “what is,” a rhythm that makes way for healing, and a robust community with which to journey.

We need the emotional safety to name what’s actually going on, a pruning of distractions to become aware of how we are really doing, language to describe “I think that feeling of loneliness and anxiety is really just sadness that I haven’t dealt with yet.”

LEARNING A LITURGY OF LAMENT

Mission in the suburbs can begin with learning to lament. And thankfully, even though most of us aren’t practiced in it, the Bible is filled with lament, especially the Psalms. Lots of Psalms are mainly lament!

Our church gatherings must make room for lament because this is the only thing that can heal our sadness.

We can start with sadness for our own life tragedies: relational ruin, personal trauma, individual sin. And we can enter into solidarity with the suffering of the world as well: victims of natural disasters, systemic oppression, the principalities and powers of racial and economic injustice, broken families, physical and emotional abuse.

Healing and restoration happen when we move beyond merely “standing up for” or “speaking out against” things. Underneath speaking and standing, we find the aching need to suffer in solidarity with actual people.

GROWING ROBUST CHURCH COMMUNITIES

Loneliness and isolation are the privileges of affluence. In the suburbs, we live in large castles of independent self-sufficiency, closing ourselves off to connection and dependence on others.

Much of our pain in the suburbs is due to past and present relationships that are not healthy. If relationships have caused us pain, it will be relationships that play a role in our healing.

Our discipleship must be built on creating relationships of emotional and spiritual safety. At a minimum, this means cultivating a culture where:

Shame is dethroned through regular confession and proclamation of good news.
The worst thing about me can be brought into light in community because the grace and truth of Jesus Christ are trusted and celebrated.
People can share pain without others dismissing, denying, ghosting, fixing, or gas lighting.
We learn how to be present to others pain; suffering solidarity with each other.
Hope and healing are held together with despair and pain.

This isn’t easy, of course. Most people have to pay professionals $125 an hour to receive this kind of relationship and care. And of course, professional counseling is important and good and necessary. It’s just sad that it’s often the only place people experience this kind of care.

What if we can create a fabric of community that is able to bear more and more suffering as we learn to name our own in community?

In the suburbs, creating spaces where it’s safe for people to learn to lament is mission, because it addresses one of the hidden ways the kingdom of God needs to come to the suburbs.

Matt Tebbe has been a coach, communicator, and consultant for over 4 years with churches in North America. He holds a Masters of Divinity from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and has worked as an adjunct professor at Trinity College. Matt co-founded Gravity Leadership and is planting a church (The Table) in the northeast suburbs of Indianapolis, where he and his wife Sharon live with their children Deacon and Celeste. You can follow him on Twitter or check out Gravity Leadership for more of his work.

Skye Jethani 11/16/17 Skye Jethani 11/16/17

The Wastefulness of God

EFFECTIVE. EFFICIENT. PRACTICAL. It is remarkable how often one hears these words in the world of Church, Inc. Their frequency may reflect our desire to be wise stewards of the resources God has entrusted to us, or they may reflect the influence of a culture that strives for control and values ROI (return on investment) above all else. I suspect both motivations are at play. Scripture rightly warns us to be careful with money. It is a tempting master broadcasting a siren promise of omnipotence—the power to control one’s life and circumstances. We have all heard the heartbreaking stories of pastors lured into wealth’s maelstrom. We have also heard the stories of ministries that simply mismanaged their finances and slowly, quietly disappeared beneath a tide of debt. Regularly telling these tales of woe keeps church leaders vigilant. They provoke us to be effective, efficient, and practical. But might these values carry a hidden danger, perhaps even more perilous than wealth?

When efficiency becomes an unquestioned value within Church, Inc., we risk embracing the ungodly ethic of utilitarianism. Rather than seeing people as inherently valuable regardless of their usefulness, we begin to wonder how we might extract more money, volunteer energy, missional output, or influence from them. Our goal as pastors shifts from serving and equipping to extracting and using. Rather than asking how we might love someone, we wonder how we might leverage them, and we can hide these ungodly motivations from others (and even from ourselves) by appealing to the universally celebrated virtue of stewardship. After all, isn’t it poor stewardship to have a CEO sitting in the pews every week and not utilize his wealth and leadership capacity for the church? And would a good steward invest the church’s resources into young adults who are too transient to become leaders and too poor to give back?

We condemn our culture for devaluing human life it deems useless—the unborn, the elderly, the mentally disabled, the immigrant, the poor, etc.—yet the same utilitarian values of efficiency and practicality that fuel these societal sins are no less common within the church. As ministers of the gospel of Christ, we must stand boldly against the popular belief that everything and everyone exists to be useful. We must remember that in His grace God has created some things not to be used, but simply to behold. After all, the Lord not only created a garden for the man and woman with every tree that was useful for food, but also every tree that was beautiful to the eye (Gen. 2:9). Sometimes we are the most like God when we are being the most impractical.

The graceful, “wasteful” nature of God was revealed shortly before Jesus’ death. While reclining at a table, a woman poured a very expensive ask of oil upon His feet. When His disciples saw this, they were appalled. Like many church leaders today, they could only see through the lens of practicality. “This ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor,” said Judas, and the disciples rebuked the woman.

“Leave her alone,” Jesus shot back. “Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me.”

For those who believe that the beautiful must submit to the practical, it is impossible to view the woman’s action as anything but wasteful. The disciples saw the spilled oil as a lost opportunity. To them the oil was only a commodity to be utilized and exchanged for a measurable outcome. What they interpreted as a waste, however, Jesus saw as priceless. He recognized the spilled oil as beautiful, impractical worship. True worship can never be wasteful because it seeks no return on investment. True worship is never a transaction. It is always a gift—an extravagant, “wasteful” gift.

Perhaps our captivity to efficiency, like that of the disciples, explains the dismissive posture many pastors have toward the arts. Sure, we appreciate beautiful architecture, music, and paintings if they serve the practical goal of communicating a biblical truth or drawing people through the church’s doors. But art for art’s sake? How could that possibly glorify Christ? Why would that be a wise investment?

Artists who cultivate beauty in the world remind us that the most precious things are often the least useful. Artists provoke us to see the world differently—not simply as a bundle of resources to be used, but as a gift to be received. Therefore, the creative arts serve as a model of God’s grace, and how the church affirms and celebrates the vocations of artists is likely to inform its vision of God. As Andy Crouch said, “If we have a utilitarian attitude toward art, if we require it to justify itself in terms of its usefulness to our ends, it is very likely that we will end up with the same attitude toward worship, and ultimately toward God.”

To combat the utilitarianism of our culture, and to foster a right vision of God, perhaps the church needs to learn to be more wasteful rather than less. Maybe there is a time for the voices of practicality to remain silent as the artists prophetically call us back to extravagant worship, to behold God rather than to use Him. And maybe it is good to embrace the impracticality of having young children, the mentally handicapped, and other “useless” people in our worship gatherings as a way of valuing what the world discards, detoxifying such ungodly values from our own souls.

And perhaps the church should spend money on what the world deems impractical and wasteful. When the voices of the world cry out in protest against the church, as they inevitably will, maybe the voice of Jesus will speak in defense of His precious, often useless bride: “Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me.”

Skye Jethani is an author, speaker, consultant and ordained pastor. He also serves as the co-host of the popular Phil Vischer Podcast, a weekly show that blends astute cultural and theological insights with comical conversation. Skye has authored three books, The Divine Commodity: Discovering a Faith Beyond Consumer Christianity, WITH: Reimagining the Way You Relate to God, and Futureville. Skye and his wife Amanda have three children: Zoe, Isaac, and Lucy and reside in Wheaton, IL.

Rhonda Maydwell 11/14/17 Rhonda Maydwell 11/14/17

A Tale of Talents

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I have never met a writer who does not have some ambition to have his or her words read and appreciated by others—and I am no exception. Words have been bursting out of me since I was a small child. As I have walked with the Lord, I have come to see my love for words as a gift (that is not to call myself gifted, a title I would bestow upon the likes of Flannery O’Connor and Marilynne Robinson).

This gift, or talent, of mine, is much like the talents God gives to anyone—he gives it; I choose what to do with it. Recently I had time to reflect on gifts and talents when answering a question submitted to GotQuestions.org about a troubling verse. The verse in question was: “Why didn't you deposit my money in the bank? At least I could have gotten some interest on it” Matthew 25:27 (NLT).

I could understand why this verse could throw a reader off—it sounds like someone is a little money-hungry! Not exactly the kind of principle we expect to learn in the Bible.

Each of the Bible translations said the same thing here, but I thought the New Living Translation perhaps made the intent more readily apparent. Before we look at this verse, we need to summarize the parable from which Jesus was teaching a valuable lesson.

A TALE OF TALENTS

The Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30) is told by Jesus to illustrate that anything good we possess is a gift from God, and is intended to be used for his glory and the advancement of his kingdom. In Biblical times, talents were a form of money.

The word serves as a nice metaphor to our modern ears because God gives us many gifts that we may then put to use for his kingdom—such as talents, skills, blessings, and opportunities.

In the story, Jesus tells of a man who is going away for a bit and has three servants. He knows they have different abilities, so he divides eight talents (coins) between the three servants so they may work to increase the master’s money using their own abilities. He gives Servant One five talents, Servant Two two talents, and Servant Three one talent.

We should pause to consider these different amounts. Wouldn’t it have been fairer to give them all the same amount?

No, and here is why: We are all created uniquely, with different characteristics, gifts, and talents. As Christians, each of us is also at a different point in his or her faith journey. A person who has just received Christ likely doesn’t have the same level of study, understanding, or maturity as someone who has been a Christian for many years, and who is actively pursuing greater knowledge of God and deeper faith and understanding.

A MODERN PARABLE

Let’s look at a modern metaphor to better understand this concept.

If the CEO of a company hoped to grow a sum of money, would he or she be more likely give it to the mailroom clerk or the chief financial officer (CFO) to invest?

What this CEO might do is to give a large chunk of the money to the CFO who has a lot of experience with handling money and is known to be loyal to the CEO, and of the same mind to advance the company to its fullest potential. He or she might then give smaller amounts to those who show promise, in order that they might grow in confidence and execution of their tasks without overwhelming them with responsibility for which they are not yet prepared.

In our parable, God has given the bulk of the responsibility to the servant we will call CFO, one who has proven trustworthy, faithful, and effective. He gives the middle amount to one of his new accountants—one who has had proper training, has proven eager to please, and is ready for an opportunity with more responsibility.

Finally, God has given the smallest amount to the mail clerk who regularly shows up for work, has never had too much responsibility, but is someone the CEO is willing to invest in by providing the means and the mechanism (in this case, a coin) for doing good things.

So what do the CFO, accountant, and mail clerk do? The CFO and accountant both double the master’s money. Returning to the Biblical parable, they have trusted in the principles they learned from knowing God, obeying his commands, and following his ways. Often the Lord’s ways are very countercultural and seem bizarre to our way of thinking, so it is through faith that we can actually put them to use.

The CFO and accountant are greatly rewarded with the words every Christian longs to hear from his or her Father: “Well done good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21).

Notice both the CFO and the accountant are rewarded with yet more responsibility because they have proven themselves with the smaller amounts they received from the CEO. They are ready for advancement.

The mail clerk, however, does not grow the master’s money. He reveals his heart when he tells the master he knew him to be “a hard man, reaping what you do not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed” (Matthew 21:24).

Ouch! He tells God he is greedy and wants more than he has worked for and deserves. He does not believe God is the one who created the earth, all living things, and his very life. He does not believe God gave him everything good in his life. He reveals no desire to serve the Lord. He believes God to be impossible to please, and that he would be working in vain to try and do so. It makes me sad to think about someone misunderstanding and misrepresenting my Lord.

God then calls out the servant’s hard heart. If he would have just put the money in the bank he could have at least earned a few extra pennies—something you might expect someone truly afraid of the master to do. This servant, however, had no desire to advance the kingdom, and, by choice, does nothing with the master’s gift or opportunity. Thus, God rightly takes the talent back and sends this man to the eternity he chose for himself. It’s a very sad day.

THE PRIVILEGE OF SERVING THE MASTER

In explaining this parable and the third servant’s outcome, commentator Matthew Henry points out there is nothing good in any of us, except what comes from God. All we own on our own is our sin. We must understand that we were created by God with a purpose. He created you and me for his great pleasure and to build the kingdom.

Henry states: “It is the real Christian's liberty and privilege to be employed as his Redeemer's servant, in promoting his glory, and the good of his people: the love of Christ constrains him to live no longer to himself, but to him that died for him, and rose again.”

Servants One and Two chose to believe in God’s goodness, his plan, and to work with the gifts he had given them to fulfill his purpose in their lives. Servant Three refused.

Servants One and Two were promoted and rewarded and will continue to do good things for God and His people—most important of all, sharing the good news of Jesus Christ who has a plan for their lives too! Servant Three refused to believe, promote, or even do even the least amount possible to serve God.

GIVING IT BACK

As a young woman, my writing reached only an audience of family and teachers. I became a Christian as an adult, and it took me many years of studying God and loving him to start to sense my place in His Kingdom, and that my compulsion to write might play a small part in that.

Since college, my audience has gradually grown, sometimes one person at a time, as I answer the biblical and spiritual questions of others. I consider this an awesome way to contribute my talent in God’s Kingdom. Occasionally my writing has reached a broader audience, but I am determined that anything I contribute will be something that honors my God. More than commercial success, I pray for opportunities to give my God-given talent back to him ten-fold.

WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH YOUR TALENT?

The application for you and me rests in how we answer these questions. Who do we believe created us? For what purpose? Do we recognize the gifts, talents, blessings, and opportunities God has given us? What are we willing to do with them? Where do we draw the line? Ultimately, do we trust our lives to God?

Friend, I pray you know God as your creator. I pray you have given him access to your entire being—that you have availed all of your life to the advancement of his Kingdom and to fulfill his purpose in you. His requirements will always stretch you, but will never be more than he knows you can accomplish.

Once started on a path of serving the Lord, your opportunities will increase in responsibility and frequency as you continue to show faithfulness. Does this mean you and I will always be perfect? No. Our journey will be filled with days when we stumble or outright fail. We are not the mail clerk on those days; we are CFOs who accept failure as part of the process, learn and grow from our mistakes, and keep on pressing forward until the day we land at the feet of our Father. He will look down on us with love and utter the words, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Rhonda Maydwell is a staff writer for GotQuestions.org, and co-author and copy editor of the recently published, 7 Women, 7 Words, a collection of faith-filled essays based on seven common words from seven different perspectives. She is a wife, mother of two, and grandmother to Georgia Kate.

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