Another testimony in death, this one from the Scottish preacher Robert Bruce:

Bruce was now some seventy-five years of age, his wife had been dead for several years and he was also ready for home. “I wonder why I am kept here so long,” he would say to friends. The following year, while having breakfast, his daughter, Martha, was about to prepare him another egg when he said, “Hold, daughter, hold; my Master calleth me.” He then asked that the house Bible, the Geneva Version, be brought. Unable himself to read it, he said, “Cast me up the 8th of Romans,” and he began to recite much of the second half of the chapter until he came to the last two verses: “For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” “Set my finger on these words,” he asked. “God be with you my children. I have breakfasted with you, and shall sup with my Lord Jesus this night. I die believing these words.”

—Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 56–57.

And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves; —2 Corinthians 4:3–7

The gospel is not about you. You most likely already know that. The gospel is about the glory of God in Christ. That is what God’s intent is, and it must be ours, too. Did you know that that is what the gospel is to Satan, as well? The “god of this world” hates the gospel and blinds the eyes of unbelievers to it because seeing the glory of God in Christ displayed is what liberates people from his power.

Liberator from the Blinding Work of Satan
Compare Christ’s commission to Paul in sending him out as his apostle. Christ says that he is sending Paul to the Gentiles in order “to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me” (Acts 26:18). In other words, in the ministry of the gospel through Paul the eyes of the spiritually blind are opened, light dawns in the heart, the power of Satan’s darkness is broken, faith is awakened, forgiveness of sins is received, and sanctification begins.
   In 2 Corinthians 4:7 Paul describes himself as a jar of clay with a powerful gospel inside: “We have this treasure [the gospel of the glory of Christ] in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.” His ministry is not to exalt himself. God sees to it that Paul has little ground for boasting-even among men. Afflictions and weaknesses abound (4:8–18). But that is no hindrance to letting the glory of the gospel shine. “For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake” (4:5).

Let There Be Light!
God uses weak, afflicted clay pots to carry “the surpassing power” of “the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.” What happens when these clay pots preach the gospel and offer themselves as servants? Verse 6 gives the answer: “God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” This means that in the dark and troubled heart of unbelief, God does what he did in the dark and unformed creation at the beginning of our world. He said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. So he says to the blind and dark heart, “Let there be light,” and there is light in the heart of the sinner. In this light we see the glory of God in the face of Christ.
   Notice the Parallels between [2 Corinthians 4] verses 4 and 6.

Verse 4			Verse 6
Satan blinds to			God Creates
the light			the light
of the gospel			of the knowledge
of the glory			of the glory
of Christ	>---/	/--->	of God
who is the image of God	>---/	/--->	in the face of Christ

In verse 4 Satan blinds the mind; in verse 6 God creates light in the heart. Verse 4 describes the problem; verse 6 describes the remedy. These two verses are a description of the condition of all people before conversion, and what happens in conversion to bring about salvation. More than any part of the Bible that I know of, the connections between 2 Corinthians 4:4 and 6 shed light on the ultimate meaning of good in the term good news.

The Gospel Is the Glory of Christ
Let’s be clear that we are talking about the gospel in these verses. The fact that Paul does not mention the facts of Christ’s life and death and resurrection does not mean he has left them behind. They remain the historical core of the gospel. There is no gospel without the declaration of Christ crucified for sinners and risen from the dead (1 Cor. 15:1–4). This is assumed here. When Paul speaks of “the gospel of the glory of Christ,” he means that the events of the gospel are designed by God to reveal the glory of Christ. This is not incidental to the gospel—it’s essential. The gospel would not be good news if it did not reveal the glory of Christ for us to see and savor. It is the glory of Christ that finally satisfies our soul. We are made for Christ, and Christ died so that every obstacle would be removed that keeps us from seeing and savoring the most satisfying treasure in the universe—namely, Christ, who is the image of God.
   The supreme value of the glory of Christ revealed in the gospel is what makes Satan so furious with the gospel. Satan is not mainly interested in causing us misery. He is mainly interested in making Christ look bad. He hates Christ. And he hates the glory of Christ. He will do all he can to keep people from seeing Christ as glorious. The gospel is God’s instrument for liberating people from exulting in self to exulting in Christ. Therefore Satan hates the gospel.

—John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Crossway, 2005), 60–62.

We have been hearing from David Wells on some shifts in popular thinking that have taken place in the latter half of the twentieth century. Today we’ll consider the change in our perspective of guilt and shame.

It is true that we often use the words "guilt" and "shame" interchangeably. We tend to mean the same thing by them. However, in recent years, especially in psychiatric literature, a clear difference has emerged between them. I am going to be following this distinction.

Shame

Shame is the sense of awkwardness a person feels when seen doing something, or heard saying something, he or she does not want others to know about. Shame is not necessarily “moral” in nature. A person may be ashamed about parents who come off sounding ignorant, or do not speak English, or are poor. A person may be ashamed of where he or she lives because it is in the wrong part of town. These are not moral matters, but they are still capable of making a person feel ashamed.
   This same sense, though, carries through into more clearly moral matters. A person, for example, may feel quite awkward about being caught shoplifting by a video camera, or that news somehow got out that the IRS was pursuing him or her for evading payment of taxes. The dynamic in each case, however, is the same. A person feels awkward when others know something personal he or she wished to keep hidden.

Guilt

Guilt, by contrast, happens when an external standard has been violated. In our courts each day juries pronounce defendants either innocent of the charges brought against them or guilty. In the latter case, the defendants are judged to have broken the law even though virtually all defendants deny that and plead innocent. The person who hears this verdict may not feel guilty, though many do and hide their faces. The court, however, has no interest at all in how the defendant feels. It takes no account of how ashamed the defendant may or may not be before others. The sole point in dispute is whether that person did or did not break the law as charged.
   It is the same in Christian faith. The guilt the gospel addresses is also objective in nature. It is our guilt before God's law. It is the result of our violating the standards of his character. It is all about our blameworthiness before God, not about how we feel or do not feel or whether, in the contemporary sense, we feel shame. Indeed, in America so many people think of themselves as essentially good that, from that angle, there is very little to be ashamed about.
   Shame today is what lines up our actions horizontally. Guilt is what lines them up vertically. Shame is what we feel subjectively and guilty is what we are objectively. Shame is what we feel before others. Guilty is what we are before God. Shame belongs in a psychological world and guilt belongs in a moral world.
   If shame is simply about how we see ourselves and how we feel, it is not hard to see why many psychiatrists and psychologists think of shame as a crippling, unhealthy emotion that needs to be healed. This in undoubtedly true of false shame . . . but this new approach to shame forgets that lying in the midst of many of our feelings of awkwardness are real moral perceptions. This is not false shame. This is shame for real moral reasons. To feel embarrassed because we were caught embezzling, or deceiving, or (shamelessly) self-promoting is an entirely good and healthy emotion! To argue, then, that we need to be liberated from these uncomfortable feelings, that the ultimate liberation is to become entirely shameless, is to sever our connections to the moral world entirely.

—David F. Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth Lovers, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2008), 162–163.

But that is exactly what has happened. Rather than being guilty of sins, we are now afflicted with diseases, disorders, and syndromes. And disorders, of course, cannot be disciplined or punished; they must be treated. So we coddle naughty children because it‘s not their fault, who grow to be adults who have seldom or never been held responsible for their actions, and so are unlikely to begin now.

What is worse, as sin has become syndrome, the gospel has become obsolete. We do not need forgiveness, we think; no, what we need is healing and recovery. And we are taught that healing must come from within, through positive thinking, self-forgiveness, or some such psychological mumbo-jumbo, rather than from without, as scripture plainly teaches. Oprah and Dr Phil, and yes, Dr Dobson, have replaced the Great Physician himself.

I reioyced, when they sayd to me, We wil go into the house of the Lord. (Psalme 122:1 Geneva Bible)

THE CROSS AND THE CROWN
Horatius Bonar (1808–1889)

NO blood, no altar now:
   The sacrifice is o‘er;
   No flame, no smoke, ascends on high;
      The Lamb is slain no more!
But richer blood has flowed from nobler veins,
To purge the soul from guilt, and cleanse the
         reddest stains.

   We thank Thee for the blood,
      The blood of Christ, Thy Son;
   The blood by which our peace is made,
      Our victory is won;
Great victory o’er hell, and sin, and woe,
That needs no second fight, and leaves no
         second foe.

   We thank Thee for the grace
      Descending from above,
   That overflows our widest guilt,
      The eternal Father’s love:
Love of the Father’s everlasting Son,
Love of the Holy Ghost, Jehovah, three in
         One.

   We thank Thee for the hope,
      So glad, and sure, and clear;
   It holds the drooping spirit up
      Till the long dawn appear:
Fair hope! with what a sunshine does it cheer
Our roughest path on earth, our dreariest desert
         here!

   We thank Thee for the crown
      Of glory and of life;
   ’Tis no poor with’ring wreath of earth,
      Man’s prize in mortal strife:
’Tis incorruptible as is the throne,
The kingdom of our God and his Incarnate
         Son.

—Horatius Bonar, Hymns of Faith and Hope, First Series (James Nisbet & Co., 1878).

Psalme 119:1–8
(Geneva Bible)
Aleph.
1 Blessed are those that are vpright in their way, and walke in the Lawe of the Lord.

Grace be with you, and Peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

As this is Monday, the day on which I endeavor to have something original to say for myself, I am here to say something original. Now, what shall I say? How about I mark the new year (right on time, as usual) with . . . a list! Lists! Yes, lists are a great way to start the year. Here are a few.

Books completed in 2008

• John MacArthur, The Truth War
• John Calvin, Sermons on the Beatitudes
• Richard Phillips, Jesus the Evangelist
• John Grisham, The Innocent Man — Non-fiction, and a very sad story.
• Joel Beeke, Heirs with Christ — This is an excellent, easy-to-read treatment of a neglected doctrine.
• Paul Williams, If You Could Ask God One Question — This is a good little book covering some basic theological questions. My only criticism is that it is written at such a low level that the average reader might feel a bit insulted. Set your vanity aside before reading this otherwise useful book.
• Mark Dever, What Is a Healthy Church — Distribute this little book in your church as a vaccination against Hybels-Warren Syndrome.
• Bonar/Haykin/Brooker, Christ Is All: The Piety of Horatius Bonar — I loved this book! Read it straight through in an afternoon, or use it as a daily devotional. (The same recommendation goes for this companion volume, Devoted to the Service of the Temple: Piety, Persecution, and Ministry in the Writings of Hercules Collins.)
• David McCullough, 1776
• Sinclair Ferguson, In Christ Alone
• Stephen King, Cell — Yes, I read an occasional creepy novel.
• Grudem/Ryken/Collins/Poythress/Winter, Translating Truth — Read this book, toss your NIV.
• C. John Miller, A Faith Worth Sharing — This is an excellent, practical book on personal evangelism, and a quick, easy read to boot.
• David McCullough, John Adams — John Adams is my favorite founding father. He would not like what we’ve done with the republic he loved.
• R. C. Sproul, The Truth of the Cross — A great little primer on the atonement.
• Scott Smith, A Simple Plan — Published in 1994, this is not a new book. However, if you haven’t read it, and you like an occasional novel, I highly recommend this one. This is a parable, however unintended, of the doctrine of total depravity. Never has a secular novelist captured so well the potential of the sin that dwells within “good” men. This is fiction that could easily be true.
• Joseph J. Ellis, His Excellency
• Daniel DeFoe, Robinson Crusoe — Okay, I’ll admit that I didn’t finish this one. I had read it as a kid, but this time it just didn’t seem as exciting. Once he got off the island, I lost interest. I had forgotten that the story goes on after that. Still, this is a good story of God’s sovereignty, and one that ought to be read once, at least.

Books began in 2008 (that were abandoned but will be completed eventually)

• Dever/Duncan/Mahaney/Mohler, Preaching the Cross — These are the conference sessions from Together for the Gospel 2006. I have watched them on DVD, so I have sort of finished this one. (You can download the mp3s here. Scroll down for 2006.)
• William Wilberforce, A Practical View of Christianity
• Harold Greenlee, Introduction to Textual Criticism
• Mark Dever, The Message of the Old Testament: Promises Made — A brief scan of this book, as well as its companion volume The Message of the New Testament: Promises Kept tells me that these are must-reads, and I seldom say that.

Books began in 2008 (that I am presently reading)

• J. I. Packer, Knowing God (blogged on Tuesdays) — I’ve never read this before, and I’m glad I finally am.
• F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (blogged on Wednesdays)
• Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (blogged on Thursdays) — If I was stranded on a desert island with one author, I would choose Iain Murray. Then I would just sit there entranced while he rambled on.
• John Piper, God Is the Gospel (blogged on Fridays) — If you read only one book by John Piper, read this one. If you read only one gospel-related book this year, read this one.
• David Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant (blogged on Saturdays) — In a day when relevance is supposedly of premium value, this book ought to be read by every Christian. It is relevant in the truest sense of the word, and will be for quite some time to come.
• Stephen Ambrose, D-Day June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II — “Fascinating” is an overused adjective these days, but I’ll use it here: fascinating!

Some plans for 2009

• Tentative blogging schedule:
  • Tuesdays: Follow Knowing God with The Holiness of God by R. C. Sproul.
  • Wednesdays: Follow The Canon of Scripture with How to Read the Bible as Literature by Leland Ryken.
  • Thursdays: Follow A Scottish Christian Heritage with The Faithful Preacher: Recapturing the Vision of Three Pioneering African-American Pastors by Thabiti Anyabwile.
  • Fridays: Follow God Is the Gospel with [?]
  • Saturdays: Follow The Courage to Be Protestant with [?]
  • Sundays: Finish blogging the Psalms in the Geneva Bible (Psalm 119 will be split up over the next several weeks) and begin blogging the Gospel of John (switching to the NASB), accompanied by J. C. Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on the Gospels.
  • Mondays: Try to have something more clever to say than usual. Someone who shall remain nameless because marriage is difficult enough without dragging your dirty laundry out and blogging about it says I tend to be “dry.” I’m afraid this post is not contributing toward that end.
• Make more bulleted lists, and numbered lists whenever I can justify it.
• Meet last year’s goal (of which I fell woefully short) of averaging one book per week.
• Do more Bible study (vs. just reading).
• Read a lot of history, both church and world.
• Not go Calvin-crazy due to all the quincentenary exuberance all around the web. I will, however, be reading a Calvin biography and purchasing his commentaries and the Institutes, taking advantage of an excellent deal from Solid Ground Books.

As you can see, there are a couple of question marks in the future plans. That, as you may have surmised, is because I don’t know what I will do in those instances. I hope you can tolerate the suspense.

The last three posts in this series have presented Jesus as our judge. He is holy and righteous, and has received all power and authority from the Father to judge all men. The day is coming when he will do just that. This ought to be a cause for terror in the hearts of all who have not bowed to his lordship. But for those who are his, there is another side to Christ.

Paul refers to the fact that we must all appear before Christ’s judgment seat as “the terror of the Lord” (2 Cor 5:11 KJV), and well he might. Jesus the Lord, like his Father is holy and pure; we are neither. We live under his eye, he knows our secrets, and on judgment day the whole of our past life will be played back, as it were, before him and brought under review. If we know ourselves at all, we know we are not fit to face him. What then are we to do? The New Testament answer is: Call on the coming Judge to be your present Savior. As Judge, he is the law, but as Savior he is the gospel. Run from him now, and you will meet him as Judge then—and without hope. Seek him now, and you will find him (for “he that seeketh findeth”), and you will then discover that you are looking forward to that future meeting with joy, knowing that there is now “no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom 8:1). So—
   Whilst I draw this fleeting breath;
   When my eyelids close in death;
   When I soar through tracts unknown,
   See thee on thy judment-throne;
   Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
   Let me hide myself in thee.

—J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 146–147.

The Acts of the Apostles is a book that doesn’t quite fit with the other New Testament books. It’s not a Gospel, nor is it a doctrinal treatise like the Epistles. It’s just a bit of history sandwiched in between. That is not to say that it’s any less important than the rest of the Bible (Pentecost, anyone?); it’s just a bit different, and, I think, is probably rather neglected at times.

In the early days of the forming of the New Testament canon, the place of Acts was undetermined. The Gospels had been collected and bound in codex (book) form early in the second century AD. The Pauline Epistles comprised a second, separate collection. The book of Acts brought the two together.

The gospel collection was authoritative because it preserved the words of Jesus, than whom the church know no higher authority. The Pauline collection was authoritative because it preserved the teaching of one whose authority as the apostle of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles was acknowledged (except by those who refused to recognize his commission) as second only to the Lord’s. The bringing together of these two collections into something approximating the New Testament as we know it was facilitated by another document which linked the one to the other. This document was the Acts of the Apostles, which had been severed from its natural companion, the Gospel of Luke, when that gospel was incorporated in the fourfold collection. Acts had thereafter to play a part of its own, and an important part it proved to be. ‘A canon which comprised only the four Gospels and Pauline Epistles’, said Harnack, ‘would have at best an edifice of two wings without the central structure, and therefore incomplete and uninhabitable’ [A. Harnack, History of Dogma, E. T., II (London, 1896), p. 48, n.2.].

—F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 132–133.

Thomas Chalmers (1780–1847), little known today, has been described by one biographer as “the greatest spiritual force Scotland saw in the nineteenth century.” He is credited with the recovery of Presbyterianism in Scotland, leading to the “Disruption of 1817” (a schism between Church of Scotland “moderates” and “evangelicals” over how much influence the State had in appointing ministers). Iain Murray writes that “He was at the centre of a recovery which brought the churches of Scotland from mediocrity, indifference, and unbelief to new conditions of spiritual vitality.”

But Chalmers had not always been the great man of God that he became. At the young age of eleven, he entered the University of St Andrews, and began his theological studies at fifteen with the intent of pursuing professional ministry. Of this time he wrote, “St Andrews was at this time overrun with Moderatism, under the chilling influences of which we inhaled not a distaste only but a positive contempt for all that is properly and peculiarly gospel.” Chalmers became one of these Moderates. His view of ministry was that it was a good profession for making one’s name in the world. He devoted little time to pursuits of actual ministry, often leaving preparation for preaching until Sunday morning. “After the satisfactory discharge of his parish duties,” he wrote, “a minister may enjoy five days in the week of uninterrupted leisure . . .”

In 1808, his career plans were interrupted. Intending to go to London “to get introduced into some of the literary circles,” he instead found himself at the bed-side of a sister, who soon died. Then it was the death of a beloved uncle, followed by his own severe illness, which kept him in his own room for four months. During that time, Chalmers was converted, and his life was dramatically changed. Previously, ministry had consumed little of his attention, and genuine spiritual issues none at all. His energies had been directed towards the study of science and mathematics. Murray writes:

Chalmers was to confess that he was then blind to the lesson which even those scientific studies should have taught him: ‘What, sir, is the object of mathematical science?’ he had replied. ‘Magnitude is the proportion of magnitude. But then, sir, I had forgotten two magnitudes. I thought not of the littleness of time — I recklessly thought not of the greatness of eternity.’

—Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 83.

Chalmers’s ministry was dramatically effected by his conversion. Murray quotes biographer William Hanna:

His regular and earnest study of the Bible was one of the first and most noticeable effects of Mr Chalmers’ conversion. His nearest neighbor and most frequent visitor was old John Bonthron, who, having once seen better days, was admitted to an easy and privileged familiarity, in the exercise of which one day before the memorable illness, he said to Mr Chalmers — ‘I find you aye busy, sir, with one thing or another, but come when I may, I never find you at your studies for the Sabbath.’ ‘Oh, an hour or two on the Saturday evening is quite enough for that,’ was the minister’s answer. But now the change had come, and John, on entering the manse, often found Mr. Chalmers poring eagerly over the pages of the Bible. The difference was too striking to escape notice, and with the freedom given him, which he was ready enough to use, he said, ‘I never come in now, sir, but I find you aye at your Bible.’ ‘All too little, John, all to little’, was the significant reply.

—ibid., 84–85.

The claim that Christians, Jews, and Muslims worship the same God is becoming increasingly popular. We have heard this from the secular world for as long as I can remember, but now it is no longer surprising to hear it from those who profess to be Christians, as well. The following excerpt from Piper’s God Is the Gospel shows why that claim can never be true.

Knowing the Son Means Knowing the Father
Only the Son and the Father have the capacity to know each other fully, since they have a wholly unique essence—they are God. Therefore, we cannot know them truly if it is not granted to us by a special work of grace. God the Spirit, in the service of the glory of God the Son, (John 16:14), grants us the spiritual capacity to know God the Father (John 3:6–8). Because of that new capacity to know God, the Son takes his divine prerogative to make the Father known to us. Thus Jesus says, “No one knows the Son except the Father,. And no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him” (Matt. 11:27). If the Son chooses to reveal the Father to us, then we have fellowship with both the Father and the Son through the life-giving Spirit. In this fellowship we enjoy seeing and savoring the glory of the Father and the Son.
   The Father and the Son are so inseparably one in glory and essence that knowing one implies knowing the other, and loving one implies loving the other. “Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God” (1 John 4:15). Confessing Christ, the Son of God, results in the Father’s coming to us and manifesting himself to us. The Father and the Son are so united that to have one is to have the other. “No one who denies the Son has the Father. Whoever confesses the Son has the Father also” (1 John 2:23). “Everyone who goes on ahead and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God. Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son” (2 John 9).
   There is no possibility of knowing God or having a saving relationship with God without knowing and trusting his Son. This is made clear over and over—both negatively and positively. “Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him” (John 5:23). “If you knew me, you would know my Father also” (John 8:19). “Whoever receives me receives him who sent me” (Matt. 10:40). The one who hears you hears me, and the one who rejects you rejects me, and the one who rejects me rejects him who sent me” (Luke 10:16).

—John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Crossway, 2005), 72–73.

David Wells discusses the fundamental difference between biblical Christianity and pagan spirituality, and shows that many who call themselves “Christian” and “evangelical” actually have more in common with pagan religion than with Christianity.

Christian and Pagan Paths

There are two families of spirituality in life. Within each are many differences, much as there are within human family members. But what distinguishes them most importantly is that one begins above and moves down whereas the other begins below and tries to move up (or perhaps in). One starts with God and reaches into sinful life whereas the other starts in human consciousness and tries to reach above to make connections in the divine. One is Christian and the other pagan. These are the two fundamental spiritualities in the West today.
   Throughout the Old Testament this earthy, pagan spirituality was constantly being engaged both outside and inside Israel. Readers today associate this paganism mostly with its more vivid, reprehensible episodes such as sacrificing children to Molech, or Jezebel’s flock of priests who tried to keep Baal content and whom Elijah faced off against. But beneath it all were assumptions of a spiritual kind that are often missed. These spiritual assumptions have persisted across the ages, coming down into our present moment, even though today the barbaric practices that went hand in glove with this ancient paganism in the Old Testament period have passed away.
   These spiritual assumptions were present in the New Testament period, too. The apostles confronted them. Yet the church did not really enter into a life-and-death struggle until the centuries that followed immediately on the patristic period. At stake was its very existence. Would it think of its faith as the grace of God coming from “above,” being incarnate in the Son, and conquering sin and death on the cross? And would it insist, against great cultural pressure, that there is absolutely nothing sinners can do to reach upward to God, to connect with him or to influence him, that he has had to reach down to us through his Son? Or would it allow for the possibility that sinners can reach down into themselves and find solace there in the sacred? Can they make this connection by their own religious effort? The apostles had made their argument that the real and saving spirituality was from above and not, in these ways, from below. The early church, for the most part, followed.
   This life-and-death struggle was therefore won, for the moment, by upholding the New Testament’s doctrines of incarnation, grace, atonement, and resurrection. However, this message was soon lost in the Middle Ages. Luther in the sixteenth century, followed by Calvin and the other Reformers, once again returned to Scripture and once again resounded the notes of God’s undeserved grace, coming from above, which alone enables sinners to know him. Christianity is not about sinners lifting themselves up to God but about God coming down in condescension and grace to them.
   Biblical spirituality and our contemporary spirituality are not two variations on the same theme. They are stark alternatives to each other. In the one, God reaches down in grace; in the other, the sinner reaches up (or in) in self-sufficiency. These spiritualities belong in different worlds, one moral in its fabric and the other psychological. One thinks in terms of salvation, the other of healing. One results in holiness, the other looks for wholeness. In the one, God’s sovereignty is seen in the establishment of what is spiritual; in the other, a human-seized sovereignty is at work to create its own spirituality. Between these two kinds of spirituality there can be no accord, no peace, no cooperation. The one excludes the other. This is the message we have heard from the apostles. This is the message that was recovered at the time of the Reformation. And this is the message that should be resounding in the church today.
   The church, however, is courted in every age by the alternative counterfeit spirituality, first in one form and then in another. Today the evangelical church is in a life-and-death struggle with this spiritual alternative, even as the apostles were in the New Testament period and the prophets were in the Old Testament. Today this pagan spirituality comes, not in barbaric forms of child sacrifice — assuming that abortion is more about convenience than spirituality — but in the innocent tones of popular culture. We meet it everywhere.
   Sometimes it is dressed up in sophisticated psychological language. More commonly we hear it in the everyday self-talk of our therapeutic culture. It is there in the television chatter, in the magzines near the checkout counter at the supermarket, and it is mentioned between neighbors. This understanding of being spiritual sounds plausible, compelling, innocent, and even commendable, but, let us make no mistake about it, it is lethal to biblical Christianity. That is why the biggest enigma we face today is the fact that its chief enablers are evangelical churches, especially those who are seeker-sensitive and emergent who, for different reasons, are selling spirituality disconnected from biblical truth.
   The seeker-sensitive are adapting their product to a spiritual market that believes it can have spiritual comfort with very little truth. The emergents are adapting their product to a spiritual market that is younger, postmodern, and leery about truth. But in both cases we see this strange anomaly. Here are those who think of themselves as being biblical, as being the children of the New Testament, the followers of Jesus and the apostles, embracing an alternative spirituality in order either to be successful or to be culturally cutting-edge.

—David F. Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth Lovers, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2008), 176–178.

I reioyced, when they sayd to me, We wil go into the house of the Lord. (Psalme 122:1 Geneva Bible)

Victory

O Divine Redeemer,

Great was thy goodness
in undertaking my redemption,
         in consenting to be made sin for me,
         in conquering all my foes;
Great was thy strength
   in enduring the extremities of divine wrath
   in taking away the load of my iniquities
Great was thy love
   in manifesting thyself alive,
   in showing thy sacred wounds,
      that every fear might vanish,
      and every doubt be removed;
Great was thy mercy
   in ascending to heaven
   in being crowned and enthroned
      there to intercede for me,
      there to succour me in temptation,
      there to open the eternal book,
      there to receive me finally to thyself;
Great was thy wisdom
   in devising this means of salvation;
Bathe my soul in rich consolations
   of thy resurrection life;
Great was thy grace
   in commanding me to come hand in hand
      with thee to the Father,
      to be knit to him eternally,
      to discover in him my rest,
      to find in him my peace,
      to behold his glory,
      to honor him who is alone worthy;
   in giving me the Spirit as teacher, guide,
      power,
   that I may live repenting of sin,
   conquer Satan,
   find victory in life.
When thou art absent all sorrows are here,
When thou art present all blessings are mine.

—from The Valley of Vision, Arthur Bennett, editor (Banner of Truth Trust, 2002).

Psalme 119:9–16
(Geneva Bible)
Beth.
9 Wherewith shall a yong man redresse his waie? in taking heede thereto according to thy woorde.
10 With my whole heart haue I sought thee: let me not wander from thy commandements.
11 I haue hid thy promise in mine heart, that I might not sinne against thee.
12 Blessed art thou, O Lord: teache mee thy statutes.
13 With my lippes haue I declared all the iudgements of thy mouth.
14 I haue had as great delight in the way of thy testimonies, as in all riches.
15 I will meditate in thy precepts, and consider thy waies.
16 I will delite in thy statutes, and I will not forget thy worde.

Grace be with you, and Peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

THANKS to everyone who contributed their captions. After much deliberation, a winner was chosen late last night. The winner is J. Eric Lewis, whose winning caption can be found where captions belong, directly below the picture. Eric, if you will email me your mailing address, I‘ll get the book out to you pronto.

I’ve got a stack of books I’ve been meaning to give away, but I keep forgetting to remember to not forget to do it; so today I’m giving one away. I’ve been trying, without much success, to think of creative and fun ways to select winners. I don’t know how well today’s contest qualifies in that way, but in the end, someone will get a book.

Here’s what you do: caption the following handsome image of yours truly. A panel of unbiased judges (seriously — not just me) will choose their favorite caption. The winner gets a book. And that book is The Truth of the Cross by R. C. Sproul. I’ll leave it open for a week, and update this post next Monday with the winner.

So here you go — caption me.

The winning caption:
“Good. Now, where is that bowl and those fiddlers?”
(I don‘t get it)

Mrs Thirsty Theologian’s entry:
Aren’t I pretentious?

Just as we cannot know Jesus as Savior until we have first come to terms with him as Judge (see previous posts in this series), we cannot fully appreciate the goodness of God without an understanding of his wrath. But you will not hear much about the wrath of God from many pulpits today. Few home Bible studies will spend much time exploring the topic of wrath. Yet Scripture speaks more of God’s wrath than of his love. Considering that fact, shouldn’t it command more of our attention than we give it? Packer writes:

No doubt it is true that the subject of divine wrath has in the past been handled speculatively, irreverently, even malevolently. No doubt there have been some who have preached on wrath and damnation with tearless eyes and no pain in their hearts. No doubt the sight of small sects cheerfully consigning the whole word, apart from themselves, to hell has disgusted many. Yet if we would know God, it is vital that we face the truth concerning his wrath, however unfashionable it may be, and however strong our initial prejudices against it. Otherwise we shall not understand the gospel of salvation from wrath, nor the propitiatory achievement of the cross, nor the wonder of the redeeming love of God, nor shall we understand the hand of God in history and God’s present dealings with our own people; nor shall we be able to make head or tail of the blood of Revelation; nor will our evangelism have the urgency enjoyed by Jude—“save some, by snatching them out of the fire” (Jude 23 RSV). Neither our knowledge of God nor our service to him will be in accord with the Word.

The wrath of God [wrote A. W. Pink] is a perfection of the Divine character on which we need to meditate frequently. First, that our hearts may be duly impressed by God’s detestation of sin. We are ever prone to regard sin lightly, to gloss over its hideousness, to make excuses for sin. But the more we study and ponder God’s abhorrence of sin and his frightful vengeance upon it, the more likely are we to realize its heinousness. Second, to beget a true fear in our souls for God. “Let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:28, 29). We cannot serve Him “acceptably” unless there is due “reverence” for His awful Majesty and “godly fear” of His righteous anger, and these are best promoted by frequently calling to mind that “our God is an consuming fire.” Third, to draw our soul in fervent praise [to Jesus Christ] for having delivered us from “the wrath to come” (1 Thess. 1:10). Our readiness or our reluctancy to meditate upon the wrath of God becomes a sure test of how our hearts really stand affected towards Him (The Attributes of God, p. 77).

Pink is right. If we would truly know God, and be know of him, we should ask him to teach us here and now to reckon with the solemn reality of his wrath.

—J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 156–157.

The first known listing of the twenty-seven books we now recognize as the New Testament is found in the thirty-ninth festal letter (announcing the date of Easter in AD 367) of Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria.

Again, we must not hesitate to name the books of the New Testament. They are as follows:

   Four gospels—according to Matthew, according to Mark, according to Luke, according to John.
   Then after these the acts of the Apostles and the seven so-called catholic epistles of the apostles, as follows: one of James, two of Peter, three of John and, after these one of Jude.
   Next to these are fourteen epistles of the apostle Paul, written in order an follows: First to the Romans; then two to the Corinthians, and after these to the Galatians and next that to the Ephesians; then to the Philippians; then to the Colossians and two to the Thessalonians and that to the Hebrews. Next are two to Timothy, one to Titus, and last the one to Philemon.
   Moreover, John’s Apocalypse.

These are the ‘springs of salvation’, so that one who is thirsty may be satisfied with the oracles which are in them. In these alone is the teaching of true religion proclaimed as good news. Let no one add to these or take anything from them. For concerning these our Lord confounded the Sadducees when he said, ‘You are wrong because you don not know the scriptures.’ and he reproved the Jews, saying, ‘You search the scriptures, because . . . it is they that bear witness to me.’
   But for the sake of greater accuracy I must needs, as I write, add this: there are other books outside this, which are not indeed included in the canon, but have been appointed for the time of the fathers to be read to those who are recent converts to our company and which to be instructed in the word of true religion. These are . . . the so-called Teaching of the Apostles and the Shepherd. But while the former are included in the canon and the latter are read [in church], no mention is to be made of the apocryphal works. They are the invention of heretics, who write according to their own will, and gratuitously assign and add to them dates so that, offering them as ancient writings, they may have an excuse for leading the simple astray.

—Athanasius, quoted in F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 208–209.

Athanasius lists the canonical books without distinguishing some as deserving higher status than others, as had always been done before. It is especially worth noting that “John’s Apocalypse” (Revelation) is simply listed without comment, as previous church fathers had often listed it, so to speak, with an asterisk.

Iain Murray Summarizes some of Thomas Chalmers’ thoughts on the work of the ministry:

   1. The governing principle upon which the strength of all ministerial duties depends is regard for the approval of God. If a minister lacks that principle his public work will be dominated by regard for himself or for the approbation of men. Where that principle is truly present it will operate first in the sphere of the preacher’s own inner life; he will not ‘strenuously urge sanctification’ without attending to that duty himself. His primary concern in all things must be to see that God approves him. ‘By far the most effective ingredient of good preaching’, he writes, ‘is the personal piety of the preacher himself.’ ‘How little must the presence of God be felt in that place, where the high functions of the pulpit are degraded into a stipulated exchange of entertainment, on the one side, and of admiration on the other! and surely it were a sight to make angels weep when a weak and vapouring mortal, surrounded by his fellow sinners, and hastening to the grave and the judgment along with them, finds it a dearer object to his bosom to regale his hearers by the exhibition of himself, than to do, in plain earnest, the work of his Master.’
   2. Ministers should never rest satisfied without growth in personal holiness of life. Chalmers’ private diary reveals a great deal of this: ‘Advance the power and life of religion in my own heart’ was his prayer. To friends he writes in similar terms: ‘Pray unceasingly for the progress of His work in your heart . . . Strike the high aim of being perfect even as God is perfect . . . Never let go your aspirings . . . Oh! with what unceasing progress towards perfection should we be enabled to advance did we cast all self-seeking and self-confidence away from us — did we consent be altogether guided by His strength, and be altogether accepted in His pure and unspotted righteousness.’
   Andrew Bonar, one of Chalmers’ students, used to repeat a saying heard when he was entering the ministry: ‘Remember that very few men, and very few ministers, keep up to the end the edge that was on their spirit at the first.’ It was a warning which could well have been heard from Chalmers. The prayerfulness and the desires after greater holiness which marked his early Christian life were with him to the end.
   3. Ministers must give themselves wholly to their true work: ‘Be assured that a single and undivided attention to the peculiar work of a Christian minister is the way of peace and of pleasantness.’ One of the greatest struggles which Chalmers ever had was to break free from the many secular duties and activities which had come to be expected of ministers. For him it was imperative, if the church was to be revived, that preachers should be left to concentrate exclusively upon their proper calling. In Glasgow he had found that ministers were continually required to be at funerals (four at one funeral was considered a ‘respectable number’), at committees of all the societies, at public functions of every kind, and so on. At one committee meeting, for example, arranged on behalf of the Town Hospital, he found himself with an honoured place among ‘some of the gravest of city ministers, and some of the wisest of the city merchants’ to engage in a solemn and, at length, warm discussion on whether pork broth or ox-head should be served to the inmates of the Hospital! After such experiences at that time in his life he wrote: ‘I am gradually separating myself from all this trash, and long to establish it as a doctrine that the life of a town minister should be what the life of a country minister might be, and his entire time disposable to the purposes to the purposes to which the Apostles gave themselves wholly, that is, the ministry of the word and prayer.’ Speaking again of the secular duties to which so many ministers had given in, and which turned a preacher from being ‘a dispenser of the bread of life into a mere dispenser of human benefits’, he says, ‘This I have set my face against, and though I have a great deal of opposition to encounter, yet I am persuaded that I will have the solid countenance and approbation of all who value the pure objects of the Christian ministry.’
   4. A minister must deal directly with the men concerning their need of salvation. ‘Let us pray for that most desirable wisdom, the wisdom of winning souls.’ ‘A single human being called out of darkness, though he lived in putrid lane of obscurity, is a brighter testimony than all the applause of the fashionable.’ This meant plain, direct preaching to the heart and conscience. Commending Alleine’s Alarm, he warned against the ‘diseased touchiness’ of the age which disliked the urgent preaching of repentance. He told his prospective candidates for the ministry that their work must ot be to show their hearers the consistency between geology and the Bible, rather these hearers must be won ‘by entering into the chambers of their consciences and telling them of that sin which is their ruin and of that Saviour who alone can hush the alarms of nature’.

—Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 94–96.

It is a great indication of the hubris of men that the Roman Catholic religion avers that the authority of Scripture has been given it by ecclesiastical decree. Calvin, of course, agrees with me:

Not the Church but the Spirit Confirms the Word
As John Calvin pondered the basis of our confidence in the gospel, he was dismayed that the Roman Catholic Church made the authority of the Word dependent on the authority of the church:

A most pernicious error widely prevails that Scripture has only so much weight as is conceded to it by the consent of the church. As if the eternal and inviolable truth of God depended upon the decision of men! [John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Westminster Press, 1960), 1:75 (I.vii.1).]

   How then shall we know for sure that the gospel is the word of God? How shall we be sure, not the just that these things happened, but that the biblical meaning given to the great events of the gospel is the true meaning—God’s meaning? Calvin continues:

The testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason. For as God is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the Word will not then find acceptance in men’s hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit therefore who has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrated into our hearts to persuade us that the faithfully proclaimed what had been divinely commanded . . . because until he illumines their minds, they ever waver among many doubts! [Ibid. 79 (I.vii.4).]

—John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Crossway, 2005), 78–79.

Postmodern man is an independent sort. He does not want to be told what to do or be confronted with audacious claims of objective truth. He wants to choose his own truth and form his own religion, and be free to alter them as he goes, according to whatever suits him at the moment. He values spirituality, but hates religion.

[I]in America, 78 percent of people say they are spiritual. When solving life's dilemmas, 56 percent say they are more likely to rely on themselves than on an outside power like the God of the Bible. And 40 percent claim specifically to be spiritual but not religious. The same change has occurred in Britain. A study looking at the decade from 1990 to 2000 found that during this time weekly church attendance dropped from 28 percent to 8 percent but those who said they had spiritual experiences rose from 48 percent to 76 percent. There clearly has been a surge in spiritual appetite that is either hostile to religion or, at least, has lost confidence in institutionalized religion.
   Religion as we typically understand it is a publicly practiced matter. It is about attendance in a church, synagogue, or mosque; about public praying and teaching; about accepting the disciplines of the believing community; and about respecting the boundaries of its belief. This new spirituality is about the private search for meaning, a search for connection to something larger than the self. It is in fact a self-constructed spirituality.
   Why is that? The answer, quite simply, is that postmoderns trust direct experience but distrust what is mediated. What comes through others is subject to all the suspicions that are activated the moment they start to speak to us. What are their motives for speaking to me? What's in it for them? Are they using words to manipulate me? These are the thoughts that arise in the cloud of doubt and distrust when postmoderns engage religious matters. By contrast, spirituality that is inward, rising within the self, arising from the perceptions of our own selves, is not something coming to us secondhand from others. It is innocent, untouched, unscathed, unpolluted. It is real. We can trust ourselves but we cannot trust others! We are unsuspicious about ourselves but highly suspicious of others!
   In the United States, 80 percent believe that a person should arrive at his or her own beliefs independent of any external authority such as a church. Indeed, 60 percent say that since we all have God within us, churches are unnecessary. And in a generational slice that was made, 53 percent of boomers think it is more important to be alone and meditate than to worship with others.

—David F. Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth Lovers, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2008), 179–180.

How different this is from biblical, Christian faith! At the foundation of Christian faith is the knowledge that we cannot trust ourselves, that in us “dwelleth no good thing” (Romans 7:18). This is no self-discovered religion. We can only put our trust in a mediated relationship with a God who is outside and above us. God has revealed himself through the Scriptures, has given us a mediator in Christ, and ordained that we be shepherded within the fellowship of the Church. Until postmodern man sees his true nature and learns to distrust himself, he is without hope.

I reioyced, when they sayd to me, We wil go into the house of the Lord. (Psalme 122:1 Geneva Bible)

HYMN 23 Part 2. (L. M.)
A hopeful youth falling short of heaven. Mark x. 21.
Isaac Watts (1674-1748)

MUST all the charms of nature, then,
So hopeless to salvation prove?
Can hell demand, can heav’n condemn,
The man whom Jesus deigns to love?

The man who sought the ways of truth,
Paid friends and neighbors all their due;
A modest, sober, lovely youth,
And thought he wanted nothing new.

But mark the change; thus spake the Lord—
“Come, part with earth for heav’n today:”
The youth, astonished at the word,
In silent sadness went his way.

Poor virtues that he boasted so,
This test unable to endure;
Let Christ, and grace, and glory go,
To make his land and money sure!

Ah, foolish choice of treasures here!
Ah, fatal love of tempting gold!
Must this base world be bought so dear?
Are life and heav’n so cheaply sold?

In vain the charms of nature shine,
If this vile passion govern me:
Transform my soul, O love divine!
And make me part with all for thee.

—from The Psalms & Hymns of Isaac Watts. Hymns and Spiritual Songs. Book I: Collected from the Holy Scriptures

Psalme 119:17–24
(Geneva Bible)
Gimmel.

Grace be with you, and Peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

This post is a follow-up to this one. Warning: This post will be polemic, dogmatic, and offensive to many people. I will be stating unequivocally that circumcision is an affront to God and an implicit rejection of the gospel, and that infant circumcision, committed by over half1 of American parents of boys, is a gross, violent assault against the most helpless of victims and ought never to be considered2 by anyone, least of all Christians.

My little preface might give the impression that I am hostile toward parents who have circumcised their sons. That is not the case. In fact, I pity them. I believe the remorse they will feel, if and when they recognize their error, is more grievous than the loss of a foreskin. And I know they had good intentions. Well, at least many of them did. I know some parents circumcise for stupid, foolish reasons, such as wanting Junior to look like Dad, but many others are honestly under the illusion that they are doing a good thing for their sons. No one lets out an evil laugh and says, “I think I’ll mutilate my son’s genitals today.” As I have told my children (those who are old enough to discuss such things), circumcision is only practiced by those who don’t know any better. If that describes you, I hope to help you to know better.

The question of whether or not to circumcise might be considered a “disputable matter.” Scripture gives no direct command against it, does it? Well, let’s look at Scripture. What is the first reference to the foreskin in the Bible? It is not, as you might think after checking your concordance, Genesis 17. It is Genesis 1, in which God created man. You won’t find “foreskin” there, but neither will you find “hand” or “foot”; and I think we can safely assume that Adam was created with all of those parts. What I am getting at here is a natural law. That is, if God created it that way, it should be assumed that he wanted it that way.3 Only a direct word from God should cause us to alter his creation.

“But,” you might answer, “God did command it.” Yes, he did; but let’s not ignore context. To whom did he issue that command, and when? The command was given to a specific people: Abraham and his descendants, and no one else. If you are not a Jew, this command never applied to you. The command was given for a specific time: the dispensation of the Old Covenant. On this, Scripture is quite explicit. Circumcision, like the Jewish dietary restrictions, is not for New Testament Christians. So there is no biblical justification for the practice. In fact, Scripture has some harsh words for those who say otherwise: “You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you . . . ?” (Galatians 2—3); “I wish that those who are troubling you would even mutilate themselves” (Galatians 5). Why does Paul speak so harshly on this issue? Because this is a gospel issue. Attempting to make a biblical case, that is, presuming to speak for God, in favor of circumcision is a repudiation of the gospel. “You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified? This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Galatians 3:1–3). This is no disputable matter.

Just briefly, I want to address the claims that circumcision is a healthy, beneficial procedure. While it is beyond the scope of this article to debunk those claims, I will say that those claims are highly disputed, and if they are a part of your reasoning, I encourage you to approach them with skepticism. However — and this is why I am not expending the time and energy to argue this point more fully — in the end, I intend to say that these alleged benefits ought to be irrelevant when considering routine infant circumcision. Furthermore, standing over and against the alleged good of circumcision is the fact that it is a risky operation which can and does result in permanent sexual disability and even death. How risky is it? Seriously — does that matter? Are you willing to take odds on the very real possibility of maiming your son with a botched, elective, surgery?

While you’re thinking of the elective nature of circumcision, consider for a moment what the act of circumcision is. I’m going to use blunt, graphic language, because I really want you to think about it. When your son undergoes circumcision, a doctor takes a knife an cuts off part of his penis. His foreskin is not a superfluous appendage to his penis — it is a functioning part of it. It is a normal part of a healthy penis, and it serves a purpose (purposes, in fact). And the doctor cuts it off. Dwell on that for a moment. I want to fix in your mind just how brutal an assault this is.4 A part of your son’s genitals is cut off. Keep that in mind . . .

. . . as I come to my conclusion. Let’s pretend now that all the alleged benefits of circumcision are true. Let’s also pretend that there is no risk involved, that no child has ever been sexually maimed by a bungled circumcision. Does not each man have a right to choose for himself whether or not he will be circumcised? Parents, that is not your foreskin! This is not a decision you can make, like dictating what your child will wear. When your son grows to be a man, he will no longer have to suffer with your poor fashion sense! But he will have to live with your decision, which should have been his, if you circumcise him.

I hope one day circumcision will be a thing of the past, especially among Christians. In fact, I would like to see it outlawed. But all I can do is reason with you, and plead with you to leave your sons intact.

There is quite a bit more I could have said about this, but I think I prefer to leave it at that. I will be willing to pursue it further, if anyone wants, in the comments.

1The good news is that the number is steadily decreasing. “The intact rate among newborn males in the U.S. has increased from 15 percent in 1965 to 44.5 percent in 2006. This is an increase of 294 percent.” (source).

2This post is concerned only with circumcision under normal circumstances. Situations involving birth defects that may require circumcision as a corrective measure are not in view here.

3Feel free to apply this principle to any other body modification, as well.

4A valid question to ask here is, how can I condemn circumcision in such pejorative terms, when God himself instituted it? Am I not accusing God of brutality, as well? By no means! That which is a crime when committed by men may be entirely within the wisdom and justice of God to do, e.g., God kills, and he is not a murderer. Man may kill only under circumstances that God has circumscribed.

The Apostle Paul, in Romans 11, instructs us to “Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God.” “The crucial word here,” writes Packer, “is and.” We must be aware of these two aspects of God’s character, neglecting neither, dwelling on neither alone, but contemplating them side by side.

God’s Goodness
Goodness, in God as in human beings, means something admirable, attractive and praiseworthy. When the biblical writers call God good. They are thinking in general of all themoral qualities which prompt his people to call him perfect, and in particular of the generosity which moves them to call him merciful and gracious and to speak of his love. . . .
   The Bible is constantly ringing the changes on the theme of the moral perfection of God, as declared in his own words and verified in the experience of his people. When God stood with Moses on Sinai and “proclaimed the name [that is, the revealed character] of the Lord [that is, God as his peoples Jehovah, the sovereign Savior who says of himself, “I am what I am” in the covenant of grace],” what he said was this, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slaw to anger abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished” (Ex 34:6–7). And this proclaiming of God’s moral perfection was carried out as the fulfillment of his promise to -make all his goodness pass before Moses (Ex 33:19). All the particular perfections that are mentioned here, and all that go with them—God’s truthfulness and trustworthiness, his unfailing justice and wisdom, his tenderness, forbearance and entire adequacy to all who penitently seek his help, his noble kindness in offering believers the exalted destiny of fellowship with him in holiness and love—these things together make up God’s goodness in the overall sense of the sum total of his revealed excellencies.
   . . .
. . . Within the cluster of God’s moral perfections there is one in particular to which the term goodness points—the quality which God especially singled out from the whole when, proclaiming “all his goodness” to Moses, he spoke of himself as “abundant in goodness and truth” (Ex 34:6 KJV). This is the quality of generosity. Generosity means a disposition to give to others in a way that has no mercenary motive, and is not limited by what the recipients deserve but constantly goes beyond it. Generosity expresses the simple wish that others should have what they need to make them happy. Generosity is, so to speak, the focal point of God’s moral perfection; it is the quality which determines how God’s other excellencies are to be displayed.
   . . .

God’s Severity
What, now of God’s severity? The word Paul uses in Romans 11:22 means literally “cutting off”; it denotes God’s decisive withdrawal of his goodness from those who have spurned it. It reminds us of a fact about God which he himself declared when he proclaimed his name to Moses; namely, that though he is “abounding in love and faithfulness,” he “does not leave the guilty unpunished”—that is, the obstinate and impenitent guilty (Ex 34:6–7). The act of severity to which Paul referred was God’s rejection of Israel as a body—breaking them off from his olive tree, of which they were the natural branches—because they did not believe the gospel of Jesus Christ. Israel had presumed on God’s goodness, while disregarding the concrete manifestation of goodness in his Son; and God’s reaction had been swift—he had cut Israel off. Paul takes occasion from this to warn his Gentile Christians readers that if they should lapse as Israel had lapsed, God would cut them off too. “You stand fast only thorough faith. So do not become proud, but stand in awe. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither ill he spare you” (Rom 11:20–21 RSV).
   The principle which Paul is applying here is that behind every display of divine goodness stands a threat of severity in judgment if that goodness is scorned. If we do not let it draw us to God in gratitude and responsive love, we have only ourselves to blame when God turns against us.
   . . .
   But God is not impatient in his severity; just the reverse. He is “slow to anger” “(Neh 9:17; Ps 103:8; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jon 4:2) and “longsuffering” (Ex 34:6; Num 14:18; Ps 86:15 KJV). The Bible makes much of the patience and forbearance of God in postponing merited judgments in order to extend the day of grace to give more opportunity for repentance. Peter reminds us how, when the earth was corrupt and crying out for judgment, nevertheless “the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah” (1 Pet 3:20 KJV)—a reference, probably, to the hundred and twenty years’ respite (as it seems to have been) that is mentioned in Genesis 6:3.
   . . .

Our Response
From the above line of thought we can learn at least three lessons.
   1. Appreciate the goodness of God. Count your blessings. Learn not to take natural benefits, endowments and pleasures for granted; learn to thank God for them all. Do not slight the Bible nor the gospel of Jesus Christ, by and attitude of casualness toward either. The Bible shows you a Savior who suffered and died in order that we sinners might be reconciled to God; Calvary is the measure of the goodness of God; lay it to heart. Ask yourself the psalmist’s question —“How can I Repay the Lord of all his goodness to me?” Seek grace to give his answer—“I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord. . . . O Lord, truly I am your servant; . . . I will fulfill my vows to the Lord” (Ps 116:12–18).
   2. Appreciate the patience of God. Think how he has born with you, and still bears with you, when so much in your life is unworthy of him and you have so richly deserve his rejection. Learn to marvel at his patience and seek grace to imitate it in your dealings with others; and try not to try his patience any more.
   3. Appreciate the discipline of God. He is both your upholder and, in the last analysis, your environment. All things come of him, and you have tasted his goodness ever day of your life. Has this experience led you to repentance and faith in Christ? If not, you are trifling with God and stand under the threat of his severity. But if, now, he (in Whitefield’s phrase ) puts thorns in your bed, it is only to awaken you from the sleep of spiritual death—to make you rise up to seek his mercy.
   Or if you are a true believer, and he still puts thorns on your bed, it is only to keep you from falling into the somnolence of complacency and to ensure that you “continue in his goodness” be letting your sense of need bring you back constantly in self-abasement and faith to seek his face. This kindly discipline, in which God’s severity touches us for a moment in the context of his goodness, is meant to keep us form having to bear the full brunt of that severity apart form that context. It is a discipline of love, and it must be received accordingly. “My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline” (Heb 12:5). “It was good for me to be afflicted so that I might learn your decrees” (Ps 119:71).

—J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 163–166.

CONTEXT! That is the cry of many a frustrated exegete when challenged with faulty interpretations of scripture. One cannot hope to interpret any scriptural text properly without a basic understanding of its context, historically, and within the whole counsel of God. F. F. Bruce, concluding his book The Canon of Scripture, writes:

   It is not enough to say ‘the Bible says . . .’ without at the same time considering to whom the Bible says it, and in what circumstances. One sometimes meets people who, in discussing the life to come, quote Ecclesiastes 9:5, ‘the dead know nothing’, as though that were the Bible’s last word on the subject, as though Jesus’ death and resurrection had not given his people a new and living hope to which the author of Ecclesiastes was a stranger.
   Canonical exegesis does not absolve the reader from the duty of understanding the scriptures in their historical setting. Indeed, it reinforces that duty. Each part of the canon makes its contribution to the whole, but that contribution cannot be properly appreciated unless attention is paid to the historical setting of each part in relation to the whole. Historical criticism, rightly applied, is as necessary for canonical exegesis as it is for the exegesis of the separate biblical documents. Each separate document may take on fuller meaning in the context of the wider canon to which it now belongs, but that fuller meaning cannot be logically unrelated to its meaning in (precanonical) context. A study, for example, of the biblical doctrine of election could not be undertaken it there were no Bible, no canon of scripture; but it would be worthless unless it took into account the historical sequence of the relevant subject-matter.
   This is bound up with what is often called progressive revelation. That the biblical revelation is progressive is obvious when one considers that it was given in the course of history until, ‘when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son’ (Gal. 4:4). To call it progressive, however, may be misleading if that adjective suggests that every stage in the revelation is more ‘advanced’ than the stages which historically preceded it. If one thinks again of the doctrine of election, the principle of election implied in God’s call of Abraham, according to the narrative of Genesis 12:1–3, is more ethically and religiously ‘advanced’ than many of the ideas on the subject cherished by some of Abraham’s descendants at later stages in their history. (The principle revealed in the call of Abraham, that some are elected in order that others through them may be blessed, has not always been borne in mind by those who thought of themselves as the elect of God.)
   To adapt words of Paul, the reader of scripture should say, ‘I will read with the Spirit and I will read with the mind also.’ The inclusion of each scripture in the canon of all scripture helps one in the understanding of each scripture, but at the same time, since each scripture makes its contribution to all scripture, the understanding of all scripture is impossible without the understanding of each scripture.

—F. F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture (InterVarsity Press, 1988), 296–297.

The Holy Spirit is seen by many as a source of extra-biblical revelation to those who are “sensitive to the Spirit’s leading.” The spiritually mature, those who are “spirit-filled,” may receive a “word from the Lord,” a “word of knowledge,” or just some added insight that can’t be had simply by reading the Bible. But the Spirit does not work that way. He uses a tool given for this purpose: the sword of the Spirit. Thomas Chalmers wrote:

   The Holy Spirit’s office, as defined by the Bible itself, is not to make known to us any truths which are not contained in the Bible; but to make clear to our understandings the truths which are contained in it. He opens our understandings to understand the Scriptures. The Word of God is called the sword of the Spirit. It is the instrument by which the Spirit worketh. He does not tell us any thing that is out of the record; but all that is within it he sends home, with clearness and effect, upon the mind . . .

—Thomas Chalmers, quoted in Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 101.

Continuing from last week’s entry from Piper’s God Is the Gospel (and very much in tune with yesterday’s post on Thomas Chalmers), in which we saw that the Word of God is confirmed by none other than his own Spirit, we will now see how that happens, and how it does not. Piper writes:

The Unmistakable Majesty of God Manifest in the Word
But how does this persuasion happen? Is it by the Spirit telling us a new fact—namely, the whisper, “This book is true”? Do we hear a voice? That is not the way it happens. The glory of God in the gospel does not need another witness of that sort. How then does the internal testimony of the Spirit work in conjunction with the glory of God in the gospel? What does the Spirit do?
   The answer is not that the Spirit gives us added revelation to what is in Scripture, but that he awakens us, as from the dead, to see and taste the divine reality of the glory of Christ in the gospel. (Recall the seeing of 2 Corinthians 4:4, 6.) This sight authenticates the gospel as God’s own Word. Calvin says, “Our Heavenly Father, revealing his majesty [in the gospel], lifts reverence for Scripture above the realm of controversy” [Institutes, 1:92 (I.vi.13).]. This is the key for Calvin: the witness of the gospel is the immediate, unassailable, life-giving revelation to the mind of the majesty of od manifest in the Word itself—not in new revelation about it.
   We are almost at the bottom of this experience of the internal testimony of the Spirit. Here are the words that will take us deeper.

Therefore illumined by [the Spirit’s] power, we believe neither by our own [note this!] nor by anyone else’s judgment that Scripture is from God; but above human judgment we affirm with utter certainty (just as if we were gazing upon the majesty of god himself) that it has flowed to us from the very mouth of God by the ministry of men. [John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Westminster Press, 1960), 1:80 (I.vii.5).]

—John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Crossway, 2005), 79.

During the last few decades, it has been decided that we have been “doing church” all wrong. That is the reason for the cultural decline in religiosity, and the consequential rise in numbers of the “unchurched.” If we could only find the right way to “do church,” surely people would want to be a part of it. And so a number of “experts” have been “rethinking the church.” According to David Wells, this is energy misdirected. “It is not the church we need to rethink,” he writes. “Rather, it is our thoughts about the church that need to be rethought.”

   In my view, so much of this rethinking confuses rethinking the nature of the church with rethinking its performance. For the multitude of pragmatists who are leading churches in America today, these are one and the same thing. The church is nothing but its performance. There is nothing to be said about the church that cannot be reduced to how it is doing, and that is a matter for constant inventories, poll taking, daily calculations, and strategizing.
   I beg to differ. These are two entirely different matters. We intrude into what is not our business when, in our earnest pursuit of success in the church, which we think we can manufacture, we confuse its performance with its nature. Let me explain.
   The church is not our creation. It is not our business. We are not called upon to manage it. It is not there for us to advance our careers in it. It is not there for our own success. It is not a business. The church, in fact, was never our idea in the first place. No, it is not the church we need to rethink.
   Rather it is our thoughts about the church that need to be rethought. It is the church’s faithfulness that needs to be reexamined. It is its faithfulness to who it is in Christ, its faithfulness in living out its life in the world, that should be occupying us,. The church, after all, is not under our management but under God’s sovereign care, and what he sees as health is very often rather different from what we imagine its health to be.
   The church, let us remember, is called the “church of God” (Gal. 1:13; 1 Cor. 15:9). Churches are “the churches of Christ” (Rom. 16.16) because they are his, bought by his precious blood. Christ not only constituted the church (Math. 16:18), but God has given us the blueprint of its life in Scripture. What we need to do, then, first and foremost, is to replicates his thoughts about it. We need to ask ourselves how well, or how badly, we are realizing our life in Christ in the church, how far and how well churches stand out as the outposts of the kingdom of God in our particular culture.

—David F. Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth Lovers, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2008), 222–223.

I reioyced, when they sayd to me, We wil go into the house of the Lord. (Psalme 122:1 Geneva Bible)

HYMN XIV
JEHOVAH–ROPHI, I am the Lord that healeth thee. Ex. xv.
by William Cowper (1731–1800)

HEAL us, Emmanuel, here we are,
   Waiting to feel thy touch;
Deep wounded souls to thee repair,
   And, Savior we are such.

Our faith is feeble we confess,
   We faintly trust thy word;
But wilt thou pity us the less?
   Be that far from thee, Lord!

Remember him who once apply’d
   With trembling for relief;
“Lord, I believe, with tears he cry’d,
   help my unbelief.”

She too, who touch’d thee in the press,
   And healing virtue stole;
Was answer’d, “Daughter, go in peace,
   Thy faith hath made thee whole.”

Conceal’d amid the gath’ring throng,
   She would have shunn’d thy view;
And if her faith was firm and strong,
   Had strong misgivings too.

Like her, with hopes and fears, we come,
   To touch thee if we may;
O! send us not despairing home,
   Send none unheal’d away.

—from Olney Hymns. Book I: On select Passages of Scripture.

Psalme 119:25–32
(Geneva Bible)
Daleth.

Grace be with you, and Peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

Mark Driscoll was interviewed on ABC’s Nightline last week. I didn’t see it. I have only read the write-up on it (click here). As usual, Driscoll said some things I could really go off on a rant about, things no Christian should say, but that’s not what I want to do today. What I want to write about is something that Driscoll did not say, or at least was not directly quoted as saying in the piece I read. It seems he probably has said it, but I can’t quote him directly. In any case, the ABC writer said it as though quoting. All clear? Good; let’s move on, then.

The phrase that caught my attention was, “Jesus was a rebel.” Whether or not Driscoll said it is not relevant; it’s not a new idea. It’s been said by those on the hippie-fringe of the church for as long as I can remember. It sounds good, it sounds cool, radical, like, you know, something hip young dudes think is, like, totally, whatever. The trouble is, it just isn’t true. Jesus was no rebel. Jesus was the most humble, submissive man ever to walk this earth. He never committed a single rebellious act or had a single rebellious thought. That would have been sin; and as you know, Jesus never sinned. If he did, the gospel is dead.

Rebellion is opposition, resistance, defiance to authority. With that in mind, was it even possible for Jesus to rebel?

When they came to Capernaum, those who collected the two-drachma tax came to Peter and said, “Does your teacher not pay the two-drachma tax?” He said, “Yes.” And when he came into the house, Jesus spoke to him first, saying, “What do you think, Simon? From whom do the kings of the earth collect customs or poll-tax, from their sons or from strangers?” When Peter said, “From strangers,” Jesus said to him, “Then the sons are exempt. However, so that we do not offend them, go to the sea and throw in a hook, and take the first fish that comes up; and when you open its mouth, you will find a shekel. Take that and give it to them for you and Me.” (Matthew 17:24–27)

We should not need to be told that God Incarnate is under no man’s authority, but from this passage, we can see from Jesus’ own words that he had no one on earth to rebel against. Yet, so that he would not cause offense, he submitted to authority that had no legitimate expectation of his obedience. Not quite the picture of a rebel, is it?

Of course, in his Trinitarian relationship with the Father, Jesus was under authority. This is an authority to which he willingly, humbly, submitted. Philippians 2:8 tells us, “Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” In his agony in Gethsemane, he prayed, “Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done.” (Luke 22:42).

The submissive spirit of Jesus is also seen in the Apostle’s teaching. Children are to be obedient to their parents (Ephesians 6:1–3; Colossians 3:20), wives to their husbands (Ephesians 5:22; Colossians 3:18; Titus 2:3–5; 1 Peter 3:1), slaves to their masters (Ephesians 6:5–8; Colossians 3:22; Titus 2:9–10), and all to their shepherds (1 Corinthians 16:15–16; Hebrews 13:17) and the civil authorities (Titus 3:1; 1 Peter 2:13–16). Only one circumstance is given in which we are to disobey any authority: when it conflicts with higher authority. When forbidden to preach, Peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:27–29).

Our Lord was not a rebel, and we are not called to be rebels. We are called to “pursue peace with all men” (Romans 12:18). That may not appeal to the postmodern crowd that values the radical and edgy, but it is what the Lord demands of us. Let us not try to be cooler than God.

Raised as an evangelical Lutheran, the doctrine of Justification has been pretty well drilled into me as the supreme doctrine of the church, with only sola Scriptura as its equal. I’m grateful for that heritage, and the foundation that was laid early in life. These doctrines are the very bedrock of my faith, and without them, I would have nothing to believe in.

In the last several months, however, another doctrine has absolutely captivated my heart. I cannot think of it without being utterly overwhelmed. Whenever I encounter it, I am stopped in my tracks and must simply sit and contemplate it at length. It is the doctrine of Adoption. I have more to say about that, but first this, from J. I. Packer:

   Sonship to God . . . Is not a natural but an adoptive sonship, and so the New Testament explicitly pictures it. . . . The Apostles proclaim that God has so loved those whom he redeemed on the cross that he has adopted them as heirs, to see and share the glory into which his only begotten son has already come. “God sent his Son . . . To redeem those under the law, that we might receive the full [adoptive] rights of sons” (Gal 4:4–5): we, that is, who were “foreordained unto adoption as sons by Jesus Christ unto himself” (Eph 1:5 RV). “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called the children of God! And that is what we are! . . .” (1 Jn 3:1–2).
   Some years ago, I wrote:

You sum up the whole of New Testament teaching in a single phrase, if you speak of it as a revelation of the Fatherhood of the holy Creator. In the same way, you sum up the whole of New Testament religion if you describe it as the knowledge of God as one’s holy Father. If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God’s child, and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ tught, everything that makes the New Testament new, and better than the Old, everything that is distinctly Christian as opposed to merely Jewish, is summed up in the knowledge of the Fatherhood of God. “Father” is the Christian name for God. (Evangelical Magazine 7, pp. 19–20)

This still seems to me wholly true, and very important. Our understanding of Christianity cannot be better than our grasp of adoption.

—J. I. Packer, Knowing God (InterVarsity Press, 1993), 201–202 [bold added]

I have a sort of mental picture of God’s adoption process. It is perhaps rather lame; I’m sure I can’t capture such profound truth in a parable of my own design.

There is a fabulously wealthy man who wants to adopt a son. It’s not that he needs to. He already has a son — and not just any son, but a son who is perfect in every way. This man is entirely happy with his natural son, and has no need of another. He loves his son, and his son loves him.

The son he wants to adopt is not just anyone, either. He knows this boy. He has seen him on several occasions. He knows this child. This child is not the typical child that most parents seek to adopt. He is no adorable, cooing baby. He is a homeless child, a loner, living in alleys and abandoned buildings. But he isn’t just any homeless child, either. He has a disease. His disease has deformed his body and twisted his mind. He is filthy, and he stinks. He is vicious and violent, entirely antisocial. He survives by scavenging and stealing. No one would want him.

The man tracks this boy down, finding him in an alley scrounging through a dumpster. He approaches the boy with a smile and an outstretched hand. The boy runs. The man follows him, tracking him to a condemned building. Cornered, the boy begins hurling debris at the man, shouting threats and obscenities.

All the while, the man looks upon him and loves him. He wants him. He wants nothing more than to take him home and lavish his wealth and affection on him. And so he does. He subdues the boy and takes him to his home. He feeds him, clothes him, and treats his illness. He loves him.

And he gives him his name and writes him into his will. This child who was nobody, with no hope, diseased and ugly, hateful and hated, is now a privileged son, heir to a fortune; and he is loved. He has been adopted.

He is me.

I love this doctrine of adoption.

Having finished The Canon of Scripture last week, I am beginning a new book in the Bibliology category: How to Read the Bible as Literature by Leland Ryken.

Getting the most from God’s Word requires more than just casual reading. It requires work, and some knowledge of interpretive methods (hermeneutics). This is because the Bible is not a simple how-to book. It does not convey its message through propositional statements alone. Oh, it contains straight-forward propositions: “You shall not murder,” for example, and “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve” are propositional statements that require no interpretation. But Scripture is also a literary work. This means that its contents are presented in various literary forms (genres) that engage the imagination and convey images and meanings that bare propositions cannot. Therefore, we cannot be satisfied with reading; we must learn to rightly interpret.

   Literature always calls for interpretation. It expresses its meaning by a certain indirection. The statement that “our neighbor is anyone in need of our help” is direct and requires no interpretation. By comparison, Jesus’ Parable of the good Samaritan requires a reader to determine what the details of the story add up to.
   The more concrete or complex a story is, the more open it becomes to interpretation. The story of David in the Old Testament illustrates this. What does the story of David communicate about God, people, and society? There is, of course, no single answer, nor is it always easy to determine exactly what truth is communicated by this or that episode in the story. It is no wonder that the story of David has elicited so many interpretations.
   Biblical poetry also requires interpretation on the part of the reader. Consider, for example, the most important of all figures of speech: metaphor and simile. These figures of speech compare one thing to another: “He is like a tree planted by streams of water” (Ps. 1:3). Exactly how is the godly person like a tree? How many of the suggested points of comparison are valid? These are questions of interpretation that metaphor and simile always place before a reader.
   If the need to interpret literature and the unavoidable differences in interpretation from one reader to another strike us as a risk, we should also note the advantages of literature as a medium. They include memorability, ability to capture a reader’s attention, affective power, and ability to do justice to the complexity and multiplicity of human life as we actually experience it.

—Leland Ryken, How to Read the Bible as Literature (Zondervan, 1984), 22–23.

Some time ago, I was asked why, if I had already read the Bible, I would want to read it again, not just once, but over and over, as long as I live? Obviously, this question came from an unbeliever. But I’m afraid many Christians feel little need for repeated readings of God’s Word. Many who have professed faith for years still have portions of their Bibles that remain unread.

Robert Moffat (1795–1883), Scottish missionary to Africa, would have been bewildered by such attitudes. Moffat dedicated his life to bringing the gospel to the Bechuana tribes of South Africa. Much of that time was spent in translating the entire Old and New Testaments into Sechuana (the native language). Yet, near the end of his life, he still felt inadequate in his knowledge of Scripture. In a letter to Mary, his wife, he wrote:

It was only yesterday, after laying down the Bible, that I wondered what kind of a mind I would have had if I had not the Book of God, the Book containing the astounding idea of ‘from everlasting to everlasting’, the development of all that is worth knowing . . . One would think, that as I have critically, and, I think, devoutly read and examined every verse, every word in the Bible, some a score of times over, I should not require to open the pages of that unspeakable and blessed Book. Alas, for the human memory! I read the Bible today with that same feeling I ever did, like the hungry seeking food, the thirsty when seeking drink, the bewildered when seeking counsel and the mourner when seeking comfort. Don’t you believe all this? For alas, I read it sometimes as a formal thing, though my heart condemns afterwards . . . I am yet astonished at my own ignorance of the Bible!

—Robert Moffat, quoted in Iain Murray, A Scottish Christian Heritage (Banner of Truth, 2006), 266–267.

Many people look for the Holy Spirit to work in spectacular, miraculous ways. But the Holy Spirit does not exist to amaze us with his power. In fact, he has no interest in doing so. His one purpose is to display the glory of Christ in the gospel. John Piper writes:

[The Holy Spirit] will not do his sanctifying work by the use of his direct divine power. He will only do it by making the glory of Christ the immediate cause of it. This is the only way he works in evangelism, and this is the only way he works in sanctification.
   In evangelism the Holy Spirit opens the eyes of sinners to see the glory of Christ who is faithfully preached in the gospel. If Christ is not preached and his glory is not exalted, the Holy Spirit does not open our eyes, for there is no glorious Christ for us to see. The Holy Spirit, we might say, flies in perfect formation be hind the jet of the Christ-exalting gospel. he does his miraculous heart-opening work to make Christ seen and savored as he is preached in the gospel. The Spirit was sent to glorify the Son of God (John 16:14), and He would not save anyone apart from drawing their attention to the glory of the Son in the gospel.
   So it is with sanctification. We are transformed into Christ’s image—that’s what sanctification is—by steadfast seeing and savoring of the glory of Christ. This too is from the Lord who is the Spirit. This is the work of the Spirit: to shine the light of truth on the glory of Christ so that we see it for what it really is, namely, infinitely precious. The work of the Holy Spirit in changing us is not to work directly on our bad habits but to make us admire Jesus Christ so much that sinful habits feel foreign and distasteful. My aim here is not to spell this out in detail, but to point it out so that the gospel does its work decisively by revealing the glory of Christ who is the image of God. Therefore, if we neglect the glory of God in Christ as the greatest gift of the gospel, we cripple the sanctifying work of the church.

—John Piper, God Is the Gospel (Crossway, 2005), 91–92.

The fads that exist in the church (using the term in its broadest possible sense) today — the seeker-sensitive and emergent movements — are largely motivated by fear. It is a fear of being unattractive to postmodern man, and so becoming irrelevant. The prevailing notion is that we must become postmodern if we are to gain an audience with the postmodern culture.

But this has never been the way God has worked. He has never called his people to blend in with the culture. On the contrary, we are a people called out of the culture to display the character of God to the culture. And we need not fear that our peculiarity will hinder God in his work of redemption.

[W]hen Paul says it is God who grows the church, he clearly is assuming that God is sovereign. God rules over all of life, bringing about his providential will, from the mighty events like the falling of empires to the most insignificant, like the falling of a sparrow. This means that within this world, kingdoms and cultures rise and fall according to his sovereign will. Paul says he has even established the nations’ boundaries (Acts 17:26).. Nothing, therefore, is more absurd than the panic that now grips the evangelical church. It is terrorized by the specter of postmodernity. Reading today’s “how-to” literature, one has to draw the conclusion that the church’s days are numbered unless we rush in to prop it up with our own know-how. God, you see, has more on his hands than he can possibly handle. Unless the church capitulates and kisses its (post)modern enemies, it is done for!
   The desperate measures being proposed for these desperate times are often little more than a case of weak knees and unbelief. We believe altogether too little in God’s sovereign control, otherwise we would not be in full retreat before the pressures and demands of the (post)modern world. We look like the soldiers of some sorry nation that are very brave when they are safe in their protected barracks but, at the first sight of an enemy, lay down their arms and run.
   The truth is that there is nothing in our postmodern world that is a serious threat, or an insurmountable obstacle, to the will of God, this is true of this saving will as well. He is as sovereign in the way he begets faith today as he is over the sparrow that flies or falls, he will grow the church. Today, we no longer seem to believe this, and want to aid his cause by our week and foolish capitulations.

—David F. Wells, The Courage to Be Protestant: Truth Lovers, Marketers, and Emergents in the Postmodern World (Eerdmans, 2008), 244.