Whenever God determines to do a great thing,
He first sets his people to pray.
– Charles Spurgeon
Author: Brian
Follower of Jesus, Husband, Dad, Grandpa, and Pastor
All We Really Need To Know
The fact is, of course, that the New Testament never promises anyone a life of psychological wholeness or offers a guarantee of the consumer’s satisfaction with Christ. To the contrary, it offers the prospect of indignities, loss, damage, disease, and pain. The faithful in Scripture were scorned, beaten, imprisoned, shipwrecked, and executed. The gospel offers no promise that contemporary believers will be spared these experiences, that they will be able to settle down to the sanitized comfort of an inner life freed of stresses, pains, and ambiguities; it simply promises that through Christ, God will walk with us in all the dark places of life, that he has the power and the will to invest his promises with reality, and that even the shadows are made to serve his glory and our best interests. A therapeutic culture will be inclined to view such promises as something of a disappointment; those who understand that reality is at heart moral because God is centrally holy will be satisfied that this is all they really need to know.
– David Wells in God in the Wasteland
Sermon Songs: Isaiah 27
A living hope of great freedom
From evil and all sin
Pardon from sin for all who come
In hope of salvation
A living hope of belonging
To God who cares for me
With joyful hearts to Him we’ll sing
For all eternity
– From a sermon on Isaiah 27
(To the tune of “Amazing Grace”)
Full of Grace and Truth
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory,
glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
– John 1:14 (ESV)
Jesus was full of grace and truth, but we tend to lean in one direction or another.
We may lean toward a graceless truth: We look with disgust at sinners. We are quick to condemn someone who fails to live up to the truth – we become the judge, jury, and executioner. Somehow we lose sight of our own failure to live out the truth, our own need of grace.
Or we may lean toward a truthless grace. We treat sin as if it were no big deal. We are quick to excuse sin. It doesn’t matter what anyone does. We easily compromise truth in the name of freedom. Somehow we lose sight of God’s commands, and his expectation of obedience.
But Jesus was full of grace and truth. He confronts our graceless truth and our truthless grace. He graciously reaches out to sinners with forgiveness, even as he calls them to live out the truth.
The world doesn’t need our self-righteous condemnation nor our irrelevant affirmation.
The world needs grace and truth. The world needs Jesus. Just like us.
Declaring the Glory
Tahquamenon Falls in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula
The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
– Psalm 19:1
For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature,
have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,
in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.
– Romans 1:20
Blog Break
Forgot to post this Friday. I am now on my annual August break from blogging. Hope to see you again at the end of the month!
Declaring the Glory
Mosquito Falls in Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula
The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
– Psalm 19:1
For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature,
have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,
in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.
– Romans 1:20
The Grace of Giving
The grace of giving has nothing to do with being well off. It is not dictated by ability. It is a willingness to give. Giving is viewed as a privilege. It is joyously enthusiastic and pleads for the opportunity to give more.
– R. Kent Hughes in Disciplines of a Godly Man
The Discipline of Giving
The Men’s Discipleship Group at my church went through R. Kent Hughes book, Disciplines of a Godly Man this past year. It was a good study. One discipline Hughes focused on was giving. He calls for a disciplined understanding of giving and a disciplined act of giving.
Disciplined Understanding of Giving
- Giving is not a meritorious work.
- Giving does bring blessing.
- Giving which pleases God is generous and sacrificial.
- Giving should never be decided casually or flippantly, but through serious prayer.
Disciplined Act of Giving
- The act of giving should be accompanied by offering oneself to the Lord.
- Everyone should at least consider the first 10 percent as a starting point in giving – a minimum.
- Your giving ought to be regular.
- You must begin giving now.
- Giving should not only be regular, but responsive to need, spontaneous.
- Your giving should be joyous.
Prayer Quote of the Week
Fear not
because your prayer is stammering,
your words feeble,
and your language poor.
Jesus can understand you.
– J. C. Ryle
Brian J. Mikul 