A Cornerstone, Not a Hurdle

As I was running on the treadmill at the Healtplex yesterday, I saw the news ticker at the bottom of one of the news stations talking about Rowan Williams the Archbishop of Canterbury's, which is the head of the Anglican Church, critiques on the birth of Jesus. In a story in the London Times he states that the Three Wise Men were probably not kings and there were probably more than three. All of this is fine and does not violate Scripture. In fact it is what is afforded in Scripture according to Matthew's Gospel.

Where Williams begins to stumble is when he says that New Christians need not believe in the "hurdle" of the Virgin Birth before they could be signed up to be Christians. While I may agree to some point with the statement, the fact is that Williams sounds a lot like Rob Bell in de-emphasizing the importance of the Virgin Birth. Both make it seem that the Virgin Birth is not essential to the Christian faith, when indeed it a cornerstone belief in orthodox Christianity.

As Mark Driscoll puts it, "Would we really lose anything if there wasn't a Virgin Birth? Yea, we'd lose Jesus."

Without Jesus being born from a Virgin the prophecy of God's word in Isaiah 7:14:

"Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel."

wouldn't be fulfilled and therefore, Christ wouldn't really be the Christ and we would still be in our sins.

This is not a minor issue, but rather a foundation truth of the Christian faith. I pray that as the time to celebrate Christ's birth comes closer this would be savored by Christians more and more. I pray that in all of it the glory of God would be revealed.

Things I am Thankful For

Here are some things that I am thankful for on this Thanksgiving:

- My wonderful family
- Chipotle
- The men of the Jungle: Ryan, Mike, Mark, Jeff, Dan, James, and Josh
- John Piper, Tim Keller, and Mark Driscoll and their sermons
- Edgewood High School
- My co-leaders Matt, Shannon, Andrea, and Cara
- Fairfield Young Life and the leaders there
- The MMV
- The Oaks Community Church
- SDS Thursday night special
- The Office
- Kevin Jamison for always challenging me to grow deeper in Christ
- Bryan Lopina for being the example to me of what a Christian looks like
- John Bagen for his passion for Young Life and the area
- Joey Haker, Eric Kirby, and Brian Knapp and our Bible study
- The girls of the Treehouse and LDV
- Wednesday Night Bible Study and the men in it
- Marshall Segal for being an encouragement and friend that I can grow deeper with
- Friends
- The Bible
- Jesus Christ and His death, resurrection, and saving act on the Cross

Wisdom from Owen

I came across this John Owen quote in the introduction of his book The Mortification of Sin:

"Set faith at work on Christ for the killing of thy sin. His blood is the great sovereign remedy for sin-sick souls. Live in this, and thou wilt die a conqueror; yea, thou wilt, through the good providence of God, live to see thy lust dead at thy feet."

Amen.

Pride

I came across this story under Yahoo!'s odd news section that is unfortunately a sign of just how deep a man's pride can really be.

To sum up the article a man was kicked by an ostrich in front of some females who laughed at him and as a result the man ended up shooting the ostrich because it had wounded his pride and made him look bad in front of the ladies.

While, I certainly can rush to judgement on this person because this is certainly and outrageous story, I should actually think back and reflect on how I use my pride to justify myself before others. Do I always have to be right in every argument? Do I always have to put things down that I don't like or agree with? These and many other questions are question that we (and especially myself) need to ask on a daily basis.

All of Life

I have been thinking a lot lately on the concept of all of life being one of repentance. This has really been on my mind since I presented a discussion on Martin Luther's 95 Theses in my Reformation class. The first of these these said that all of life should be repentance instead of just ceremonial penances that the Church of the day practiced.

This has me thinking of a lot of things that I need to personally repent of and just take to the Cross. I realize that my pride will often prevent me from doing this and in doing so I allow my love of being right and love of sin to take precedent over the gospel in my life.

The great news is that Christ has died for these sins and is drawing us to repentance in Him, though we need to be killing sin before it kills us to quote Owen. In doing this I press on in perseverance to the day of Christ Jesus which hopefully will come quickly.

Jacob's View of the Holiness of God

I was reading in Genesis the other when something that Jacob said caught my attention. It was after he had wrestled with God at the end of Chapter 32 when he said:

"I have seen God face to face, yet my life has been preserved." Genesis 32:30

In this verse Jacob realizes that He was allowed to see God and out of God's mercy He is still alive afterward. I believed that the reason that Jacob is so astonished at this is because by seeing God's face he realizes his vast shortcomings before God. He realizes how small he is in comparison, as well as, how holy God is and how sinful he is. The fact that even by seeing God one was supposed to die is quite a remarkable statement about the perfection of God.

I pray that I realize more and more everyday how holy God really is and how utterly sinful I really am. I pray this so that the cross of Christ will become bigger and more powerful in my own life. I also pray this prayer for everyone. I pray it because when viewing this the gospel is of utter importance to each and every person. As Spurgeon said, "When your sin is small, Your savior will be small also."

Something to Make You Smile

I came across this article on the front page of Yahoo!. Once you read the article you will find why this is so fascinating that this actually made the front page of a major website.

The article is about a man winning the Wolrd Air Guitar Championship. Yes this is real. Here is the story.

One of the highlights of the article reads:

"Apart from the glory, he received a custom-made Flying Finn electric guitar worth $3,400"

Have a good Saturday.

Convicting Quote

I hears this quote the other night while I was listening to the revival hymn (which if you haven't heard you should).

It says:

"We're in grave danger when we let accomplishment become the basis for our confidence."

This quote only shows me more that all they have to boast in is Jesus Christ.

Currahee

Tonight I had the honor of watching Band of Brothers with some guys from Edgewood. We watched the first episode entitled Currahee. For those who haven't seen the Band of Brothers series I highly recommend it. Anyways, there are many things one can garner from each episode such as leadership insights, fellowship, and much more.

One thing that hit me tonight was the great things that can happen when men are united for a cause. We all know that the men of Easy Company helped wipe out Hitler and the Nazi regime. The closing scene watching the men fly out to make the jumps on D-Day can be pretty inspiring and just shows how much the men were willing to sacrifice for the cause.

One can only imagine what the world would be like if Christian men sought the Lord and united in the cause for the glory of His cross.

The meaning of Currahee is "We stand alone". For us, Christian men, we stand alone, distinct from this world, and through God's initiative look to usher in His kingdom into this world.

Family Ties

I came across this article on Yahoo! and found it to be quite an interesting read.

The article's main point was that people between the ages of 13-24 base much of their happiness off of their relationship with their family. This is interesting because many of the things that supposed offer happiness, such as money, were shown according to the poll not to be a basis for happiness of young people.

This study only furthers the need for Godly men and women to raise good families whose center is built upon the gospel. While I do not know much about being a parent I hope that parents can teach their kids to place the Lord first in their lives and have them look to God for their acceptance and that parental acceptance would not become such a huge idol in teenagers lives as it has been in mine.

The Seriousness of Sin

I came across this quote from D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones while reading through his Studies in the Sermon on the Mount. In it he describes what he views as the final explanation for the state of the Church (which he wrote in the late fifties early sixties, but still applies, if not even more so today):

"I cannot help feeling that the final explanation of the state of the Church today is a defective sense of sin and a defective doctrine of sin. Coupled with that, of course, is a failure to understand the true nature of Christian joy."

I cannot help but agree with Lloyd-Jones in his assesment that the Church does not have a correct view or doctrine of sin. This coupled with our society's emphasis on the self further leads churches to not even preach on sin and instead exchange the message of the gospel for one of behavior modification. The more we realize how sinful we as human beings truly are the more conviction of our sin we will experience. However, also as Lloyd-Jones points out in another quote it is only when we have this deep conviction of sin can we ever realize our need for a Savior. This conviction leads to conversion.

Probably the greatest tragedy in no longer preaching sin or having a correct doctrine of sin is that as a result we no longer have a correct view of what was accomplished by Christ on the cross. When one takes sin seriously he also realizes how glorious the cross is. When we see our sin the cross is our only hope. I can only pray that I will continously be able to say as the Apostle did when he wrote,

"But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ" -Philippians 3:7&8

The Achievements of Men

In the wake of Barry Bonds breaking Hank Aaron's home run record I have been reflecting on my own feelings towards the record and sports in general as well as society's.

While I certainly do believe that Bonds cheated and used steroids to pass Aaron on the all-time home run list I found myself getting wrapped up in my own feelings of resentment towards the record being broken. While I do not believe that having a negative opinion of the record is necessarily a bad thing, for me I found myself being more concerned with that perceived injustice than many other injustices worldwide.

This is probably because sports is such an idol in my life and American culture in general. I love sports, but I feel that to a certain extent they have given the men in our culture an excuse from spending more time with their families or church and have distracted their attention away from God. How many men's, myself included, top priority on Sunday is to watch their favorite football team play rather than living for the glory of God? Additionally, sports provide so much room for boasting in the self rather than in the Cross of Christ. We see them as an escape from reality, a chance to be the hero on the field rather than seeing that Christ is the true hero in our lives and only in Him will change in this world ever be effected.

While I will still continure to love and enjoy sports I need to make sure I do not place them above the gospel. I guess all of this should make me realize that I need to concentrate more on what God has achieved rather than what man has done.

Truth from Piper

"The quest for holiness is the quest for satisfaction in God. And satisfaction in God is a divine gift of sovereign joy. It is sovereign because, in its fullness, it triumphs over all contestants for the heart." - Dr. John Piper

Deuteronomy 9:4

"Do not say in your heart when the Lord your God ahs driven them out before you, 'Because of my righteousness the Lord has brought me in to possess this land; but it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is dispossessing them before you."

This verse speaks much truth into my life because it shows that we should not believe ourselves to be righteous in anything except that through which Christ has done in us. While the verse does talk about the Lord driving out the other nations for Israel this was still in the midst where Israel was still disobeying God. All cultures are broken and God redeems those and chooses to use those according to His will. Let us all not seek our own righteousness but God's.

Article on Sharing Christ

I was browsing articles on The Resurgence website and read this interesting one about sharing Christ with people written by Ed Stetzer. The article is here, but here is one passage that I found particularly profound:

"Yes, scripture shows that we share Christ, starting with people's understanding, interests, and needs. But we cannot and must not end there, for their needs can only really be met (whether they realize it or not) by meeting Jesus.

Many seem to have lost confidence in that gospel. It is easier to tell people to come to church and live a good life, but that is not the gospel. The gospel is about words that can make us uncomfortable: creation, Jesus, sin, repentance, forgiveness, and transformation, to name just a few. Hard words, but harder still to forget them. To share Christ, we have to go beyond formulas that fit on napkins. The Gospel is not a doodle. Isn't God's story of redemption and reconciliation for His creation bigger than what can fit on a napkin? People are searching—but they are searching for something more than fire insurance or "five steps to financial freedom."

In reading this passage it highlights the fact that we as Christians do not realize how desperate people are to have a purpose in life. In this we sometimes foolishly fail to present the whole gospel to people and and instead only present a quick fix or even a false gospel. We must never fail in presenting the whole gospel to the world. In doing so we glorify God and will constantly be focused on His gospel (which is never a bad thing).

Growing Up

This summer has been very challenging to me in many aspects. I feel that I am learning things (sometime the hard way) and getting glimpses of what life will be like once I am done being a full-time student (which that time is rapidly approaching more and more).

One thing that has started becoming more and more apparent as life continues is that one's group of friends starts to dwindle, but also becomes closer. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but something that seems to happen as everyone grows busier and busier. However, I still feel that the Lord has blessed me with some great mentors and people to run alongside with in the faith.

Secondly the Lord has been revealing to me what life as a Christian will look like once I am out in the real world and probably have an 8 or 8 to 5 job. He has shown that He will have to take precedent in my Life and I will have to set aside specific amounts of time to spend with Him daily. This hasn't been easy for me and at some points I have definitely found my relationship with Him to be taking a hit.

Third, I need to pray more and be constantly bowing before the Lord in humble submission. Leader weekend was a great example of this for me.

Lastly, I feel that the topic of being a man of the Lord has been almost an hourly thought on my mind. While I am still learning a great deal about what God calls men to be in terms of their relationships to women, the world, and the church I feel confident that God will teach me and work in me to form me to the man He wants me to be.

I guess this has been a season for learning (whether willingly or not). I just need to take refuge in God and know that He is in control. The other day I "randomly" turned to Psalm 62 and found much comfort in what David writes in verses 5-8,

"My soul, wait in silence for God only, For my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, My stronghold; I shall not be shaken. On God my salvation and my glory rest; The rock of my strength, my refuges is in God. Trust in Him at all times, O people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us."

Wise Words From A Wise Man

I was reading in book I got through Desiring God's 5 dollar book sale called the The Legacy of Sovereign Joy: God's Triumphant Grace in the Lives of Augustine, Luther, and Calvin. It details the lives of three of the most influential men in Church history. I came across a quote by John Calvin that he recorded about a month before he died when he was looking back at his life and reflecting on some of his sins (many believe it was his response to his role in the death of Michael Servetus). It reads:

"With my whole soul I embrace the mercy which [God] has exercised towards me through Jesus Christ, atoning for my sins with the merits of his death and passion, that in this way he might satisfy for all my crimes and faults, and blot them from his remembrance.... I confess I have failed innumerable times to execute my office properly, and had not He, of His boundless goodness, assisted me, all that zeal had been fleeting and vain.... For all these reasons, I testify and declare that I trust to no other security for my salvation than this, and this only, viz., that as God is the Father of mercy, he will show himself such a Father to me, who acknowledge myself to be a miserable sinner."

Calvin knew that only in Christ could He find forgiveness and life. He had a big view of God and small view of man. I pray that my view of God would be ever increasing and my view of myself would continuously decrease.

"The Secret"

I was reading Yahoo's front page when I saw a headline about the new hit self-help book and DVD The Secret coming under attack from critics within the medical community and other walks of life. Here is the article.

For people who have not heard about the book The Secret what it is is a self-help book and DVD as well as a lifestyle that claims if you think positive thoughts about something you want to happen to you or something you want to have then that thing will happen to you or you will receive whatever you have been thinking about. The author of the book, Rhonda Byrne, says that the "law of attraction" is what governs our universe and this is what gives people what they want if they think about it enough. She states that the law of attraction is:

"The law of attraction says that like attracts like, and when you think and feel what you want to attract on the inside, the law will use people, circumstances and events to magnetize what you want to you, and magnetize you to it."

Although the are some pretty comical things about The Secret such as its "law of attraction" claim and one of its main proponents and advocates in the DVD being 5 hours short of a behavioral science degree (you would think you would want someone with a degree in the field advocating for the concept), the whole Secret phenomenon is very sad and troubling.

While I would hope that most people would find the claim that our universe is governed by a "law of attraction" to be ludicrous, judging by the sales figures, coming from the "Oprah (cult) effect", this unfortunately does not seem to be the case. Furthermore, The Secret represents the love of materialism and our desire to place creations before the Creator as well as people's desperate attempts to find happiness, worth, and joy in their lives.

Sadly though, even those within the Church, who are supposed to be the beacon of hope for people, are buying into the Secret's philosophy. The prosperity gospel is preached from the pulpits every Sunday in America. Many popular pastors teach and write almost the exact same concepts that can be found in The Secret except they use Jesus as the giver of prosperity instead of this mythical "law of attraction". In doing so they take the focus on God in the gospel and shift it to be what can He give to man. In doing so they take away hope for people and replace it with temporary material items that become the idols in people's lives. In doing so they avoid necessary topics such as man's sin because they are afraid that people will not like them and that they believe the gospel will be more attractive to outside people. What good is a false gospel to sinners? The glorious gospel of Christ taking on man's sin when He had no sin, satisfying God's wrath, defeating the devil and death and then imputing His righteousness to His people so that they would become the righteousness of God in Him is watered down into nothing more than a get-rich quick formula. The prosperity gospel is no gospel at all.

I pray that we as Christians would re-focus our lives and messages as to what the gospel is and preach nothing else.

"For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified."- 1st Corinthians 2:2

A Little Luther

I came across this quote from Martin Luther while reading The Cross of Christ today. It references 2nd Corinthians 5:21 which is probably my favorite verse in the Bible.

Luther says while writing to a friend in distress over his sin:

"Learn to know Christ and Him crucified. Learn to sing to Him and say, 'Lord Jesus, you are my righteousness, I am your sin. You took on you what was mine; yet set on me what was yours. You became what you were not, that I might become what I was not."

Amen.

Knowing Ourselves

I love this passage from a current book that I am reading:

"And if we fail to recognize within the Scriptures our Master's voice speaking his infallible truth to us from his world to ur world, we destroy ourselves not only epistemically (knowledgably) but also personally, for we abandon the only foundation for the certainty of knowledge and the only "meaning base" by which we may truly know the One infinite, personal God and thereby oursleves as persons of dignity and worth." - Dr. Robert L. Reymond A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith

While this passge is deep I feel that it hits on many issues that are central to the Christian faith such as one's view of Scripture, where we derive knowledge from, and how we as humans are truly able to know oursleves.

First, Reymond points out that by ignoring or not realizing the infallible truth spoken to us by God through the Scripture found in the Bible, we ultimately ruin the foundation on which we derive our knowledge. He argues that since the foundation for all knowledge comes from God by not recognizing his voice through the Scriptures we annihilate our ability to fully understand who God created us to be.

This passage is also important in regards to the overacrhing theme of the passage and the chapter that it is found in and that is what is our view of Scirpture? Do we believe that the Bible is of divine origin? Do we believe that it is infallible and inerrant? I feel that what our stance on Scripture is one of the most important things that we can ever decide in our lives. Personally, I feel that the Bible is the inspirder and inerrant Word of God given by God. There is much Scripture to support this claim (such as Exodus 4 and 7, Jeremiah, 1st Corinthians 2:6-13, and 2nd Timothy 3:16, etc.) which we explored to its fullest extent which radically change one's life.

I pray that we all will know where e come down on Scripture and examine it with other Scripture to see if it contradicts itself (which I believe it does not) and whether it will have authority over our lives (which I hope it does).

John Piper is Bad

For those of you who haven't seen this it is pretty awesome.

Romans 3:24-26

Here are three of my favorite verses:

24 Being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; 25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forebearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; 26 for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. - Romans 3:24-26

There is so much deep biblical truth here most of which I will never fully comprehend. Mainly I just want to comment on how great it is for God to be both just and our justifier. He is holy, but in His great love and mercy, in order to display His glory, He declares us right before Him through faith in Christ. I thank Him everyday and pray that I would be able to better understand the depths of His justification.

A Bigger View of God and Scripture

As I return from a great weekend of fellowship with some of my closest friends and the most faithful people I know I know that God has moved and changed me. There were many good times over the weekend highlighted by great conversations and an hour long prayer session with our area that closed with 'Glory' on Sunday night. This time I believe brought our area of Young Life leaders much closer to one another through the working on the Holy Spirit.

However, I would be remiss not to further examine some of the points of the weekend that I found distressing and in some cases particularly alarming. It seems as though God may have been communicating through another speaker in the weekend when he read 2nd Timothy 4:3-4 which states:

3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, 4 and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths. (NASB).

There seems to be continuing movements that propagate a low view of God and a complete disregard for the authority and inerrancy of Scripture. In this case the analogy of Christ being our bridegroom and the Church being His bride was extremely misrepresented. The claim was that Christ was our groom and each of us individually was His bride. While this point may seem rather trivial it in fact has much larger implications such as a correct view of God and the respect for the authority of the Bible in our lives.

To begin, the argument that we are all individually the Bride of Christ can be easily refuted by a correct rendering of the Scriptures on the matter. For example, the book of Song of Solomon is not written about the relationship of God to the Church, but rather a love relationship between a man and woman. This can be evidenced in the close parallels found mainly in Proverbs 5:15-20, 6:24-29, and 7:6-23.

Second, Scripture cannot be taken and twisted to mean things that we want them to mean. We must study Scripture and then form our lives around what is found in God's Word. One example of Scripture being twisted in order to fit God into the belief held by the speaker was the interpretation of Psalm 139 and specifically verses 17&18. In the Psalm David is describing how the Lord is everywhere and knows everything. Verse 17 & 18 read:

17 How precious also are your thoughts to me, O God! How vast is the sum of them! 18 If I should count them, they would outnumber the sand. When I awake, I am still with You. (NASB).

17 How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! 18 Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you. (NIV)

The claim was that God thoughts were constantly about us and that He was watching us sleep in some sort of stalkerish manner. While I do not deny that God can watch us sleep I do not believe that portraying God as a helpless being who sits above obsessing over us is scripturally accurate. The more important point however, is that it is clear from verse 17 that David is talking about how precious God's thoughts are to Him and not How precious David's thoughts and actions are to God. The NIV reads almost exactly the same way so there was surely nothing lost in the translation.

A second piece of Scripture that was vastly twisted was the parable to the costly pearl. It reads in Matthew chapter 13 verses 45&46:

45 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls, 46 and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it. (NASB).

While the correct interpretation of this passage, that the kingdom of heaven should be the most valuable thing in our life and that we should give up everything for it, was mentioned a more dangerous thought and even larger problem was proposed. The idea claimed that we were the pearl and that God had sold everything to gain us. The phrase "flip the Scripture around" was literally uttered from the stage. Once again we cannot do damage to the text to make it fit with our views. If Jesus wanted to say that we were the pearl He would have when He first said it. Scripture points to us being anything but a pearl in saying, "There is none righteous, not even one" (Romans 3:10), and "every intent of the thoughts of man's heart was only evil continually" (Genesis 6:5) and many other verses point to our sinful nature.

Another disturbing point was that God was compared to as a middle-school boy who gets butterflies in His stomach when He is about to talk to us or even approach us. This is troublesome on many levels beginning with the belief that God is insufficient without us. This is simpy not true. God does not need us. He says that He stones could be used to cry out about the Lord (Luke 19:40). Additionally this view of God does not strike fear in anyone seeing that God is made out to be very effeminate and weak. And the belief that if we are individually the bride of Christ, which as stated above we are not, means that everyone will be in a wedding dress it is no wonder why men are not coming to church or stepping up and becoming God-fearing men who will lead the next generation of Christians.

Lastly, the reason why I care about this so much is that a person is put in front of a group of 600 or so leaders of High School students and preaches a very man-centered secondary analogy and believes it is the pinnacle of Scripture interpretation. This is Gnosticism of the secret knowledge form. But becasue he is speaking and in a position of authority it is as though it should be taken as truth. Furthermore many people will not do their own research because they believe that speaker has been responsible and true to the Word. If you are praying that something is not heresy in front of 600 people you should not be teaching it in front of 600 people.

I pray that God may show us truth in all of this and that we may grow in our faith in Him. To Him be the glory in everything.

End of the Year

Crazy how the year goes by so fast. Crazy how two years of college have been completed. It's been a pretty good school year with lots of good times and some hard times as well. I am grateful for those who have been part of my life for this past year. I thank my friends for being the amazing people that they are and being a great encouragement.

Here is my first post on my blog! It comes with Lauren Clinger a.k.a. Cling Kong and Kelly C. Barron a.k.a. KGB eating lunch with me at King Cafe. They say hi to you people who are reading and they also approve of this blog. In case people were wondering where the blog title comes from, it can be found in a Sufjan Stevens song called John Wayne Gacy, Jr. The lyrics go:

And in my best behavior

I am really just like him

Look beneath the floor boards

For the secrets I have hid

I think that basically says it best about all of our lives. We all in our best behavior and deeds are still sinners that stand condemned before God. The only way that we this can change is by the saving grace of God found in Jesus Christ.