Category: Suffering & Trials

Categories
Puritans Suffering & Trials

John Owen on Perilous Seasons

Joel Beeke has a list of resources from the Puritans and their sermons during plague times, or on the subject of pestilence.

Below is a sample from a sermon by John Owen who was teaching on the topic of what he called, “perilous seasons”. Owen answers the question of why plague/pestilence seasons are so perilous. Here is what he says:

1. Because of the infection. Churches and professors are apt to be infected with it. The historians tell us of a plague at Athens, in the second and third years of the Peloponnesian war, whereof multitudes died; and of those that lived, few escaped but they lost a limb, or part of a limb – some an eye, others an arm, and others a finger – the infection was so great and terrible. And truly, brethren, where this plague comes – of the visible practice of unclean lusts under an outward profession – though men do not die, yet one loses an arm, another an eye, another a leg by it: the infection diffuses itself to the best of professors, more or less. This makes it a dangerous and perilous time. 

2. It is dangerous, because of the effects; for when predominant lusts have broken all bounds of divine light and rule, how long do you think that human rules will keep them in order? They break through all in such a season as the apostle describes. And if they come to break through all human restraints as they have broken through divine, they will fill all things with ruin and confusion. 

3. They are perilous in the consequence: which is, the judgments of God. When men do not receive the truth in the love of it, but have pleasure in unrighteousness, God will send them strong delusion, to believe a he. So II Thess. 2:10-11 is a description how the Papacy came upon the world. Men professed the truth of religion, but did not love it they loved unrighteousness and ungodliness; and God sent them Popery. That is the interpretation of the place, according to the best divines. Will you profess the truth, and at the same time love unrighteousness? The consequence is, security under superstition and ungodliness. This is the end of such a perilous season; and the like may be said as to temporal judgments, which I need not mention. 

Let us now consider what is our duty in such a perilous season:

1. We ought greatly to mourn for the public abominations of the world, and of the land of our nativity wherein we live. I would only observe that place in Ezekiel 9, God sends out His judgments, and destroys the city; but before, He sets a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof. You will find this passage referred in your books to Revelation 7:3, “Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads.” I would only observe this, that such only are the servants of God, let men profess what they will, “who mourn for the abominations that are done in the land.” The mourners in the one place are the servants of God in the other. And truly, brethren, we are certainly to blame in this matter. We have been almost well contented that men should be as wicked as they would themselves, and we sit still and see what would come of it. Christ hath been dishonored, the Spirit of God blasphemed, and God provoked against the land of our nativity; and yet we have not been affected with these things. I can truly say in sincerity, I bless God, I have sometimes labored with my own heart about it. But I am afraid we, all of us, come exceedingly short of our duty in this matter. “Rivers of waters,” saith the Psalmist, “run down mine eyes, because men keep not thy law.” Horrible profanation of the name of God, horrible abominations, which our eyes have seen, and our ears heard, and yet our hearts been unaffected with them! Do you think this is a frame of heart God requireth of us in such a season – to be regardless of all, and not to mourn for the public abominations of the land? The servants of God will mourn. I could speak, but am not free to speak, to those prejudices which keep us from mourning for public abominations; but they may be easily suggested unto all your thoughts, and particularly what they are that have kept us from attending more unto this duty of mourning for public abominations. And give me leave to say, that, according to the Scripture rule, there is no one of us can have any evidence that we shall escape outward judgments that God will bring for these abominations, if we have not been mourners for them; but that as smart a revenge, as to outward dispensations, may fall upon us as upon those that are most guilty of them, no Scripture evidence have we to the contrary. How God may deal with us, I know not. 

Sermon, 2 Timothy 3:1
Categories
Gospel Suffering & Trials

The Promise of Pruning John 15:1-5

The Promise of Pruning: A Covid Crisis Sermon | John 15:1-5| Calvary Grace
Categories
Canada Gospel Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials

Socially Distant? Get into God

Charles Spurgeon saw the effects of the plague during his ministry in London. Reflecting on the ninety-first Psalm he noted the comfort and security of the words:

no evil shall be allowed to befall you, no plague come near your tent.

(Ps 91:10)

He told a story about seeing these verses in a shop window. My friend Paul Martin wrote about this incident recently.

With the COVID-19 virus pandemic requiring people to be “socially distant” it is a good time to consider where our security lies.In Spurgeon’s commentary on Psalm 91, he addressed the question:

Get into God and you dwell in all good, and ill is banished far away. It is not because we are perfect or highly esteemed among men that we can hope for shelter in the day of evil, but because our refuge is the Eternal God, and our faith has learned to hide beneath his sheltering wing.

Treasury of David, Psalm 91.

This is the response of anyone in calamity. They get into God. They seek him, pursue him, and find refuge in him. Although they may be socially distant from others, they are secure “in Christ”.

As Spurgeon explained, there is a beautiful way that God gives comfort in calamities and security for those who are sick. Spurgeon said:

It is impossible that any ill should happen to the man who is beloved of the Lord; the most crushing calamities can only shorten his journey and hasten him to his reward. Ill to him is no ill, but only good in a mysterious form. Losses enrich him, sickness is his medicine, reproach is his honour, death is his gain. No evil in the strict sense of the word can happen to him, for everything is overruled for good. Happy is he who is in such a case. He is secure where others are in peril, he lives where others die.

Treasury of David, Psalm 91.

If you are home from work, self-quarantined, or otherwise unable to fellowship with other believers, then take this opportunity to get into God.

Categories
Ministry Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials

Coming Alongside One Another—Encouraging the Fainthearted


These are notes from a recent talk given at Calvary Grace Church’s Women’s Brunch.

1 Thess 5:14 “And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.”

It can be hard to know exactly how to help a sister who is struggling. It’s easy to say (or do) the wrong thing. Or simply say and do nothing because you don’t know what to say. 

Hurting people will tell you that a lot of well-intentioned people have said hurtful or insensitive things to them.

Ed Welch has an article on CCEF called “The Steady Stream of Foolish Words Said to Hurting People”. In it he lists 4 things we should not say when someone is suffering.

  • don’t give advice,
  • don’t try to solve the problem,
  • don’t say you are available any time but don’t offer concrete ways to help,
  • don’t try to show your empathy by talking about a similar situation in your own life, and so on. 

You may be wondering what it left to say then? This is the question that we will discuss today. 

Read 1 Thess. 5:12-14. Notice these things:

  • Final instructions to the church
  • They are instructed in vv 12-13 to respect the elders and esteem them highly because of their work
  • They are then commanded to come alongside one another and minister to each other in v 14
  • Three kinds of struggling Christians in v 14 that need our care: 
    • idle (unruly, undisciplined, not lining up with what God has for them
    • Fainthearted (discouraged, timid, anxious–perhaps in personality or because trials have been hard on them. 
    • Weak (likely moral and spiritual weakness, ie struggling with temptation, perhaps rattled by ongoing persecution–whatever the case, they are not mature in their faith) 

There are 3 different ways to help these 3 types of struggling Christians

  • Admonish the Idle 
  • Encourage the fainthearted
  • Help the weak “The verb for help (antechomai) presents a graphic picture of the support which the weak needed. It is as if Paul wrote to the stronger Christians: ‘Hold on to them’, ‘cling to them’, even ‘put your arm round’ them.”

Today we will focus on encouraging the fainthearted. This word “translates a compound of oligos (few, or little) and psuchē (life, or soul). It occurs only here in the New Testament….It may indicate a person who is “timid” as a personality trait or one who is “discouraged” at a particular turn of events.” 

This is a person who doesn’t feel courageous and full of faith. They may be going through an intense season of suffering and loss that has worn them down and caused them to become discouraged. They may be grieving. They may feel bruised or like their faith is barely there. Whatever the reason for their struggle, Paul says that these fainthearted Christians need our encouragement.

How do we encourage our fainthearted sisters? 

3 truths that our fainthearted sisters need to be reminded of.

1. Fainthearted Christians need to know God is with them. 

We can embody this truth by being physically there for our suffering friends, loving them well and listening compassionately as they tell us their struggles. Suffering people need to know that God is with them, not just in theory, but his presence is literally with them in each moment that they are suffering.  

The Psalmist says, (139)

“Where shall I go from your Spirit?

Or where shall I flee from your presence?

8If I ascend to heaven, you are there!

If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!

9If I take the wings of the morning

and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,

10even there your hand shall lead me,

and your right hand shall hold me.

11If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,

and the light about me be night,”

12even the darkness is not dark to you;

the night is bright as the day,

for darkness is as light with you.”

This is important for the sufferer to know. There is no trial too deep or place too dark that God’s presence can’t penetrate. He is fully there with them in every moment, in every place.

It doesn’t matter if we feel like God is far away or if we feel like our faith is weak. God is “actually not far from each one of us, for “‘In him we live and move and have our being’ (Acts 17:27)

When people are suffering, God can feel very far from them. Our thoughts can become confused. Is God punishing me? Is He angry at me? Am I angry at him? Why doesn’t he help me? Doesn’t he care?

Our instinct is to turn away and hide our face from God until we get our emotions figured out, but suffering Christians need to know that they can go immediately to God for help and they will find it. God wants us to come to him–even with our angry, bitter and confused thoughts. 

He’s under no illusions about the degree of our sinfulness. He pursued us when we were his enemies. He knows the depths of your sinfulness better than you do, so you might as well talk to him about it. 

God will not turn his back on you when you are swamped by sinful emotions. Because Christ died for those sins. 

Jesus cried out on the cross, “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” so that we would never have to. Christ bore God’s wrath for our sins on the cross so that our sin wouldn’t separate us from God.

Romans 8 tells us that we are spiritually joined to Christ so that there is literally nothing that can separate us from God’s love. 

Fainthearted Christians need to know that God is near to them in their suffering and even as they wrestle with their doubts. Because of Christ’s mediating work, they can (and should) bring those doubts and fears to God. Here, they will “receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Heb. 4:16). 

You don’t need a bold faith to approach God’s throne, you just need a genuine faith. You are not saved by the quality of your faith, but by the object–Clint. 

 “A weak hand can receive an expensive jewel” –Sibbes. We all have the same precious jewel of salvation. And that jewel is not diminished by the weakness of the hand that holds it.

So fainthearted Christians can freely go to God with their fears and doubts. Because of Christ, they have the same standing before God as the boldest Christian in the room.

When we are fainthearted, we may imagine there is distance between us and God. But there is none. He is right there with us in our worst trials and deepest fears.

2. Fainthearted Christians Need to Know that Christ Sympathizes with their weakness and will deal tenderly with them. 

Richard Sibbs talks about Christ’s ministry to suffering Christians in his book called The Bruised Reed. Based on Isaiah 42, he divides those who are suffering into two categories: bruised reeds and faintly burning wicks. 

Behold my servant, whom I uphold,    

my chosen, in whom my soul delights;

I have put my Spirit upon him;

    he will bring forth justice to the nations.

2 

He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice,

    or make it heard in the street;

3 

a bruised reed he will not break,

    and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;

    he will faithfully bring forth justice.

This servant —who we know is the Christ—comes to bring forth justice to the nations. And in the midst of his mission, the text says he deals tenderly with bruised reeds and faintly burning wicks.

Who are these wicks and reeds?

Bruised Reeds are being disciplined through trials. They are feeling bruised,  beaten down and weary. Faintly burning wicks are doubting Christians, perhaps struggling with assurance or anxiety. They feel timid in their faith. Their faith is there, it is not extinguished, but it’s small.  

When we are in a season of suffering, it’s easy to imagine that Christ grows tired of hearing our woes. I think we base this assumption largely on our own experience with struggling people. We might feel impatient with our children or someone in the church whose faith is barely there. We may feel exasperated. Why are they still struggling with this? Why haven’t they moved past it? We may be harsh and judgemental toward people who are in a season of bruising and faintheartedness. But Christ isn’t.

a bruised reed he will not break,

    and a faintly burning wick he will not quench;

We know that faintheartedness is not an end in itself. It is not something that a Christian should be content to stay in. God has something better for us. Faintheartedness is a symptom of the flesh at work. It is opposed to the Spirit, not something to glory in (Rom 6–What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?). We know that we are not meant to be faint-hearted Christians. However, there are seasons of life where weakness is a reality. So it’s important that we talk about it.

When Is. 42 talks about the “smoking flax” and “bruised reed”, these are descriptions of believers. When 1 Thess. 5:14 talks about the “fainthearted” in the church who need encouragement, we know that there are those among us who identify with this description. It’s important that we don’t shame fainthearted Christians into silence. 

If you are a “faintly-burning wick” here this morning, you need to know that there is hope for you, that Christ ministers to you tenderly to you and the church is here to support you.

It’s frustrating to be plagued by doubts and fears. It’s unpleasant and discouraging. But if this you, remember, that Christ will not grow impatient with you. He will not quench your faith altogether. And he will not break you if you are feeling brittle and bruised. 

Christianity is like no other religion in that you don’t have to earn God’s favour. This Suffering Servant died for our sins and rose again. He is completely unique in that he is able to sympathize with our weakness because he took on flesh. (Heb. 4:14-16) He felt every temptation we do, although he was without sin. 

He is God’s Son, 

he is the sacrifice for our sin and he is our high priest who makes intercession for us and sympathizes with us in our weakness. No other god is like him. 

If you are fainthearted here this morning, think of the advocate you have in Jesus Christ! 

Remember, “A weak hand can receive an expensive jewel”. If you have Christ, you have everything. You have access to God’s presence and every spiritual resource in Jesus Christ. Your compassionate high priest is praying for you even now.

3. Fainthearted Christians need to be reminded of God’s promises.

When I was first diagnosed with lupus, I remember feeling scared and grieving the loss of what I considered to be a normal life. And my grandmother encouraged me with God’s promise in Isaiah 41:10. She said it was a lifeline for her when she was going through her cancer treatment.

fear not, for I am with you;

    be not dismayed, for I am your God;

I will strengthen you, I will help you,

    I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Notice how God motivates fearful believers to move forward in faith.. He doesn’t say “enough already, get your act together!”. He gives 5 compelling reasons based on His provision for us. 

  • I am with you
  • I am your God
  • I will strengthen you
  • I will help you
  • I will uphold you with my righteous right hand

This is such good news for fainthearted Christians. And it gives us a clue as to how we should encourage our fainthearted sisters. They need to know that—even though they may feel like a faintly-burning-wick, they can move forward in faith because God will provide what they need.

Sometimes we feel like God’s expectations for us are larger than our actual capabilities. But God always gives us the grace to do what He requires of us. When we are fainthearted it’s easy to feel defeated by all the ways that we fail rather than feeling hopeful that God will provide what he requires of us today.  We need a shift in perspective so that we can stop fixating on our own inability to cope and instead, rest in God’s future grace toward us.

Sibbes says, “He requires no more than he gives, but gives what he requires, and accepts what he gives”.  

In other words, God doesn’t require more from you than he enables you to do. 

And what’s more…whatever you do in reliance on him, he accepts. And He is pleased with it.

Doesn’t that take the pressure off? If you are a fainthearted Christian here this morning, remember you can keep moving forward in faith—not because you are strong—but because God is strong. And he is with you and fights for you. 

Some other promises to consider:

Is. 43:1 “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;

    I have summoned you by name; you are mine.

Josh 1:9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

1 Peter 5:6-7  Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, 7 casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

Ex. 14 And Moses said to the people, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again. 14The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent.”

These promises are all based on God’s ability and His care for us. Fainthearted Christians have very little life in them. They don’t have the gumption, the strength or the resources within themselves to get their life together. 

What they do have is a strong, compassionate God. And our faintheartedness is almost a blessing in disguise because it teaches us to rely on His strength, not our own. 

When someone is in a state of anxiety, depression or faintheartedness, they will struggle to act because their feelings are so unruly. They can do all of the things: get a good night’s sleep, pray, read their bible…and still these dysfunctional emotions may barely diminish. It’s freeing for a fainthearted person to know that they don’t have to feel in control before they step forward in faith. Rather they step forward in faith because God will provide everything they need that day AND he will accept what he provides. 

4. Faint-hearted Christians need the example of other Christians who continue to press on toward the goal. 

  • Heb. 12 talks about the painful necessity of discipline in a Christian’s life. The author encourages the Hebrews to not become weary when God disciplines them. He reminds them that God disciplines his children because he loves them and it “yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”
  • Then he says, “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.”( Heb 12:12)  
  • The whole church is like a body. 
  • Think of a woman’s experience giving birth: big head, displaced tailbone, can’t stand straight, one thing out of line throws off the rest of the body. Having neck pain may be because your hip is out of line. Everything is connected in the human body.
  • Notice the whole church is to “lift drooping hands” and “strengthen your weak knees” and “make straight paths for their feet” Why? So that what is lame (read: despondent) will not be put out of joint, but be healed. 
  • “The reference to drooping hands and weak knees is familiar imagery in Jewish literature, often used to describe attitudes of discouragement and despair. Here the writer…urges these believers to press on to the goal so that those members of the church who have become despondent (lame) will notice their good example, receive fresh courage and begin to march again rather than fall even further behind. …But if healing is to come, it is not simply the responsibility of the leaders, tireless pastors though they are (13:17), but of every single member.

When the whole church presses on in faith, the lame part of the body begins to heal.  

  • When a fainthearted Christian comes to church on Sunday and is surrounded by people singing praises to God, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When a fainthearted Christian sees you trusting Christ through your trials and hardships, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When a fainthearted Christian knows you are praying for her and trusting that God will fight for her, that encourages her faith and helps her to heal.
  • When you keep speaking truth to her with patience and gentleness, that helps her to heal.

Sometimes we think, “I’m just one person, what can I do?”. But it’s the cumulative effect. When each member is striving to be faithful, the lame members are enveloped in testimonies of God’s faithfulness. They are surrounded by love, encouragement and good godly counsel. 

Fainthearted Christians will naturally want to avoid fellowship because it sort of exposes how much they are floundering. There is an unflattering contrast between the expansive faith of others and their own faintly burning wick.  

If you are fainthearted today, it is really encouraging that you are here. It takes a lot to get yourself to church and meet with other Christians. But the church is God’s gift to you, to help you heal. It protects you from going out of joint and helps you to line up again with what is healthy and good for you. 

You can help your fainthearted friends by making it as easy as possible for them to get to church and other community gatherings. Pick them up, find babysitting for their kids, etc..

Applications:

Nancie Guthrie (What Grieving People Wish You Knew About What Really Helps and What Really Hurts).–put a survey up on her website that asked grieving people wish others understood about grief. Here’s what they said:

4 things grieving people wish you knew

Here are Guthrie’s four things:

  1. How much it means for you to just show up and say something. Grief is lonely. There probably isn’t a perfect thing to say. You can’t fix the situation. Just being there (and maybe helping out a bit) helps.
  1. They don’t want to hear stories about someone else’s loss. Or your own loss. It diminishes their experience. IT takes the focus off of the grieving person and puts it on someone else. We’re trying to relate to them, but it can come across as “Your loss shouldn’t hurt so much because a lot of people have had that experience.”
  1. They want to talk about the person who they lost. Bring up the person. Use their name. You won’t make them cry, you may allow them to release some tears. They are always thinking about it in the background. 
  1. They need time and space to simply be sad. Don’t try to rush them or fix it.When you talk with people about heaven, don’t expect that it makes everything okay

If you have someone in your life who is fainthearted. Remember it’s not your job to fix them. You just need to be there for them. If they are grieving, grieve with them. Help them in practical ways. If they are anxious about the future, encourage them with God’s promises, his nearness to them and Christ’s compassionate intercession for them. 

As Paul says in 1 Thess. 5 “Be Patient with them all”. Fainthearted-ness is not a quick-fix scenario. It requires time and patience on our part. They need help and support over the long haul.

Make it as easy as possible for them to come to church and meet with God’s people so that they are surrounded by love, encouragement and good godly counsel. If that’s not possible, maybe offer to communicate with the church on their behalf so that they can be as integrated into body-life as possible. 

One of the best things we can do for our fainthearted friends is to pray for them and believe that God is able to restore to them the joy of their salvation. (Ps. 51).

Resources Consulted:

  • Commentaries:
    • John Stott
    • Raymond Brown
    • D. Michael Martin
  • Websites
    • Ed Welch
    • Nancy Guthrie
  • Books
    • Richard Sibbes
Categories
Society Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials

How to Prepare for Persecution

Albert Mohler has said: Convictions are not merely beliefs we hold; they are those beliefs that hold us.

How to prepare for persecution, we have to have this in mind. We might know what beliefs Daniel held, but what beliefs held Daniel? 

Reading Daniel 6:10 we discover that when Daniel knew that the document had been signed, he went to his house where he had windows in his upper chamber open toward Jerusalem. 
Daniel didn’t suddenly change his beliefs and his lifestyle because the persecution document had been signed. 

In fact, he continued on in his public witness, knowing that everyone would see him. 

(When you’re with clients, or with team-mates, or with certain relatives, do you hesitate to pray openly before a meal, even though you always pray before a meal? )

You see Daniel had an ordered life. He had been regularly sharpened day in day out, three times a day, repeatedly, same time, same place— and the order of his life was put to the test at this moment. 

If you are worried about the loss of cultural power or influence in society, you can calmly let go of your worry, and instead, prepare for being a Christian witness.

As David French wrote, “We want easy when Christ never promised easy. It’s time to learn to live with (somewhat) hard.”

The ability to be calm and free of anxiety when it’s hard will only come from this kind of orderly discipline of prayer.

Of course no one is calling for rote ritual. Mindless chants and euphoric mantras. This is not what is needed. Rather it is the discipline of the closet (Mat 6:6), that holds true no matter what is going on outside your door.

What you may realize is that the persecution, opposition or social shame isn’t as big of a deal as you initially feared. Or it may be significant and costly, but you will find that God has prepared you for it.

The preparation has nothing to do with political power, but everything to do with the power of the prayer closet.

image: “Praying Hands” by Albrecht Durer, 1508


Categories
Society Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials Theology

Like Augustine’s Grocery Bag

In our day Christians are being stretched. With every distraction and every demand of our full calendars, we are being stretched in all our capacities.

Who among us is not feeling spread thin by the repetitious news cycle which demands our attention second to second and so creating in us the dreaded “fear of missing out”?

Our desires are being stretched too. Careers that offered fulfilled dreams have been ended with mere severance. Or they continue to demand time and, toil yet our desire is not slaked.

All people in the West possess great convenience epitomized in the power of our fingertips on ready touchscreen apps. Who has not felt tired but wired with all of this instant power, yet less and less instant gratification?

Stretched Thin or Just Crushed?

This stretching we feel is not a capacity that we are growing in, but a sense of being flattened or crushed. Crushed by the desire for relationships. Crushed by the desire for justice. Crushed by the need for meaning.

As Douglas Murray noted in The Strange Death of Europe, “one of the notable characteristics of Western culture is precisely that it permanently fears itself to be in decline”.

This fear acts like a double-drum compactor rolling over the happiness and hope of people like they are so much asphalt. Radical calls for justice in this life show how heavy these fears can be. It is easy to be flattened with frustration that there is no sufficient justice in this world. We can agonize at the question, “why does the way of the wicked prosper?” (Jer 12:1, Psa 73:3, Job 21:7, Ecc 8:14).

At the same time, there is the weight of fear which crushes the comfortable and the privileged. It is the fear that their status and privileges will be lost. The fear of losing power, prestige or influence can turn the comfortable life into a life of panic.

In the culture wars of the West, we fear the loss of power and influence on the right, and we fear unaddressed injustice on the left. Both can be easily captive to the concerns of this-world and think little of the world to come.

Fear and Panic in Renewal Time

Christians can also get paranoid at what they see as they assume the worst. Fear rolls over them. Even as the small reformed renewal enters into its intermediate to mature stage, Christians can see the expansion of churches and the few renewed institutions in Evangelicalism and be rolled over with the fear of its collapse. It is easy to be disillusioned when someone sees the sins of their heroes within the ‘gospel-centred’ movement.

Likewise Christians can be suspicious of the visible success of the reformed renewal, and have the uneasy feeling that they must divert its strength to address the more relevant concerns of society. Then a ‘gospel-centred’ movement is no longer enough. It must also be a movement to mimic the issues in the news cycle.

Fears about losing the big conferences, the public champions, and the mass of Christian publishing can be so crushing that people can be anxious to shut down refining critiques, or overinflate the importance of the movement as if it is too big to fail.

Either way, fear dominates many of us, so that we can’t see the gospel good being done, nor see that the renewal is neither a full-on revival, nor is it heaven.

All of this kind of fearful stretching is bringing a fatigue to churches. It is not the kind of stretching that we need. Instead, today more than ever, we require a renewal of our desires. We need to be stretched heaven-ward.

Of Springs and Soap Bubbles

Our desires have lost their elasticity and vigour, because they have been attached too long and too tightly to the world that is. “This-world” desires have overstretched us and our spring is unsprung.

In the church, it started with good intentions. There was the recapturing of the doctrine of vocation, rendering to God worship through the work of one’s hands. But as Michael Allen writes in his book, Grounded in Heaven:

“Too often a desire to value the ordinary and the everyday, the mundane and the material, has not led to what ought to be common-sense to any Bible-reader: that heaven and the spiritual realm matter most highly.”

Nowadays we are trying to find meaning in our work, but struggling to suffer in it, mistakenly assuming that emphasis on “faith and work” brings more heaven on earth.

On the one hand, there has been an increase in books that revel in the ‘ordinary’. This may have started with Anne Voskamp’s best-seller and her extended meditations on ordinary things like soap bubbles. On the other hand, even the books on heaven have been reduced to “tourism” to gain lessons for what really matters, life in the now. Allen goes on to say:

“Too rarely do we speak of heavenly-mindedness, spiritual-mindedness, self-denial, or any of the terminology that has marked the ascetical tradition (in its patristic or, later, in its Reformed iterations).”

It is not to say that we shouldn’t see the dignity of God’s creation, nor value the mundane work we must do as an opportunity to glorify God according to the priesthood of all believers. But we need to re-calibrate where our strongest passions and deepest desires are directed. Are we conscious of the will of God being done in heaven first and fundamentally? Then we can reset our desires to pray that God’s will be done, “on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt 6:10).

Augustine’s Grocery Bag

Augustine offers a picture of the ways that we need to be stretched and it offers a compelling alternative to the chase-your-own-tail existence of the modern social media feed. Augustine likens our desires to something like a grocery bag. It is folded and narrow to begin with, but when it is stretched wide, it can receive a large capacity of things to put in it. He says:

“so God, by deferring our hope, stretches our desire; by the desiring, stretches the mind; by stretching, makes it more capacious.”

Our desires are to be stretched heaven-ward, to the beatific vision of being in the presence of God.

As John put it in 1 John 3:2-3, “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure.”

There is a pressing need to be stretched. Christians need to be stretched in our desires for heaven. Such stretching will deliver us from the emptiness of Your Best Life Now, and the exhaustion of the news cycle’s incessant demands.

Our fear of catastrophe can be dispelled by this invincible hope, not in movements or men, but in the Lamb and his eschatological kingdom, which shall have no end.

As Augustine said, “Let us desire therefore, my brethren, for we shall be filled.”

A version of this article was published at The Gospel Coalition Canada on April 8, 2019 under the title, Being Stretched.

image: Vittore Carpacaccio (1502)

Categories
Canada Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials

Heart Highways 

I’ve seen lots of highways. If you live in Canada it’s likely that you’ve seen lots of highways too. Our country is so large that we need highways to see each other. 

Though highway trips are long and possibly filled with car-sickness, flat tires, radiator leaks and bad hotels, the destination is worth the hassle. The people at your destination stir an affection that motivates your heart. It’s as if the highway runs through your heart. It’s a heart highway. 

For the ancients, they understood how the heart highways developed. The psalmists who were from the line of Korah recorded their heart’s destination: Zion. They wrote:

The go from strength to strength; each one appears before God in Zion” Psalm 84:7.

Like many musicians, the Korah-sons knew what it was like to be on the road. Their goal was so good, that it kept them pounding the pavement. Imagine how the longing was met with overflowing delight! They would go from, “Are we there yet?” to “We won’t wander anymore”. To be in God’s special place, Zion, welcomed with grand hospitality to be with God himself. Such a meeting would require the language of poetry and the joy of singing!

The believer is strengthened for the journey by the delight in the destination. The goal of being with God provides the strength they need to go through valleys of tears and trials (84:6). God builds into the soul his own roadworks that lead the believer to himself. The believer’s longings, desires, affections, motives and goals are so many mile markers laid in the heart that is on pilgrimage toward God. 

When the believer finds strength inside, in their heart, in the inner man (Eph 3:16; 2 Cor 4:16), it is because they have had the highway paved there. Even as they meet sorrow and trial, they are merely passing through. Their delight and joy is in a destination, just around the bend, over the hill and around the corner. 

It is the destination of being with God forever, resting at home with Him, never needing to travel again. 

Categories
Clint Reformers Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials Theology

Why Justification Ages Well

As I get older I can’t help noticing who is and who isn’t ageing well. Some look like improved versions of their younger selves. Most look like the same people only with more pounds, wrinkles, grey hair and bare scalp. Some age well others don’t.

The other thing that happens as you get older, is you receive clearer evidence that you are a sinner, not resident in heaven and not utterly sanctified. Although the Christian might look back and see the numerous sins before their conversion, they can also see how each day since would add to their sin ledger.

This becomes more important when we get criticized, confronted, and charged by other people. In accounting terms, we can have the data of our sins inputted on an accrual basis. The ledger gets longer as our age gets higher.

For all of the misunderstandings and false accusations, there will also be many exposures of sin which will be accurate and real. Without any way to deal with the accounting of our sin, our debt would continue to multiply. A record of debt stands against us with “its legal demands” (Col 2:14).

As we age, it would be crippling to have the accrual of our sins piled upon us. For those who ignore this accrual, we can see their utter arrogance as they look at themselves in a purely sunny light. But for the sinner without Christ, there is only the growing despair which the sin ledger brings. Our sins don’t age well.

Justification ages well when our sins don’t. There is an evergreen character to justification that never withers or fades. There is no sin in the believer that remains unatoned for at the cross. There is no failure of obligation that is not satisfied by the active obedience of Christ. There is no accusation from earth or heaven which cancels the verdict of God when he declares a sinner just (Ro 3:26).

If you believe in Jesus Christ alone, relying upon his blood and righteousness for the forgiveness of your sins, you have a right standing before God. Then even if you add pounds and wrinkles, you don’t have to worry about ageing badly. You can even have the accrued sins of a long life reckoned as obsolete because God’s verdict never breaks down.

On another Reformation Day, you can know and announce that your justification is ageing quite well thank you.

unsplash-logoWesley Tingey

Categories
Clint Puritans Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials Theology

Affliction as Art

No one likes affliction. We spend most of our time doing all that we can to avoid it, secure against it and make it go away.

Yet could it be that affliction can be used by God to create beauty? Can we appreciate affliction as art?

Consider that the lustre of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ shines more brilliantly against that dark backdrop of Adam’s fall into damnation. All of the other trials and triumphs of Scripture filter these contrasts with varying degrees of intensity.

Thomas Watson and the Limner

I didn’t know what a limner was when I read about one in Thomas Watson’s writing. A limner is an artist who illuminates manuscripts (like the beautiful work of the Lindisfarne Gospels). A limner can also be a portrait painter, especially of miniatures. Watson said:

As the limner mixeth with his dark shadows bright colours, so doth God mingle the dark and bright colours, his crosses and his blessings, and so causeth “all things to work together for good to them who love him.”

Puritan Gems; or Wise and Holy Sayings of the Rev Thomas Watson AM

So in Watson’s view there was a beauty that could be created using affliction in a Christian’s life. This is important for us to recognize because we can look at the dark colours only. We can forget that the afflictions are used to make the brighter blessings shine.

Monochrome Afflictions?

How frequently do our afflictions become monochrome in our sight? It is as if we are colour-blinded by the cares and sorrows of this world. But if we were to see the dark shades in something other than black and white, we would see the brilliance of God’s blessings in all their vivid tints and textures.

So the intent of these dark colours of affliction are to not to plunge into unrelenting darkness, but to celebrate the light and to point to the one who is the light (John 8:12). Even in the grand contrast of the vessels of wrath and the vessels of mercy which Paul explains in the ninth chapter of Romans, the art of comparison stands out vividly. The intent of God is to craft the dark hues which colour the vessels of wrath for a beautiful purpose. Paul says:

in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— 

Rom 9:23

The afflictions are intended to cause “the riches of his glory” to be set in contrast. But when they are compared, the conclusion is that that the glory is beyond comparison. As Paul said,

For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison

2 Cor 4:17

The wonder of Rembrandt as an artist was that he could show the brilliance of light in contrast to the dark hues. God has an artistry that is incomparable to any other ‘creative’. The darkness of affliction has to be seen as part of God’s whole canvas for our lives.

Marvel and wonder at how God is even able to create art from affliction.

unsplash-logoAndrian Valeanu

Categories
Canada Clint Pastors Spiritual Growth Suffering & Trials Theology

Do We Need Professional Counselors Instead of Pastors?

If we are immersed in a therapeutic culture, many churchgoers have a question in the back of their minds: Do I need a pastor or a professional counselor?

This is not a simple a question to answer since most evangelicals would argue that you need both. But it is helpful to see a few questions in back of the question of which is needed.

Helping Professions

First, we have to ask ourselves why someone would need to see a professional counselor. Likely it is becaue they have some problem, a habit, a behaviour or something else that they know is wrong or harmful or sinful. So in order to get assistance, many people immediately look to the most dominant ‘helping professions’ in our culture, doctors, pharmacists, therapists and counselors.

On the list of ‘helping professions’ few in society would rate pastors as very important. For Christians who have been steeped in a therapeutic culture which elevates the prowess of these other helping professions, it can seem like pastors are part of a quaint and antiquated system for dealing with problems. So to get in the back of the question about professional counselors or pastors, we have to recognize the therapeutic culture we live in.

Therapeutic Culture

Since 1993, David Wells has exposed the therapeutic culture in a series of books. Specifically, he has outlined how modernity has affected evangelical churches so that Christians desire therapy.

Wells has said that instead of therapy, we need to feel God’s weight at the centre of our lives, not the periphery:

What gives weight to God in our lives is two things. First, he has to be enthroned in the center and not merely circling on the periphery. Second, the God who is enthroned must be the God who has revealed himself in Scripture. This God is not simply the supplier of everything we want, our concierge, and our therapist dispensing comfort as we feel the need for it. He is the God of burning purity as well as of burning love. That God, as he rules our own private universe, will wrench around what happens in that universe to conform us to who he is in his character. The “god” who is there only for our needs as we define them will be a “god” who is light and skinny.

Crossway Interview with David F. Wells

So in the first place, we have to have God at the centre of all that we do, and recognize the powerful effect which modernity has on our own self-perception. We need to see how we perceive the sufficiency of God’s Word, the significance of God’s church, and the strength of God’s shepherds to care for the sheep.

The Context of Care

The second question behind the question is to ask where is the context of care which we all need to live within? There is a big difference between seeking help for problems within the church and seeking help outside the church. When the first instinct for a Christian is to look outside the church for solutions, they are declaring the utter insufficiency of God, his Word and his people. They don’t mean to do that of course. But evangelicals have cultivated church-less habits for nearly a century, so it is natural to look for expertise outside of the local church.

Yet it can be surprising to see how effective the local church context is for someone, even when they have to have help from outside the church. For example, when a young woman in my church had a medical emergency requiring medical professionals, the care and counsel of the church was still immersive for her. Even in the hospital, doctors and nurses were engaged by the church’s care as much as she was.

So the context of care must be understood clearly. There will be times when a Christian must go outside the local church for counseling and medical help. But the dominant context of care will be in the local church so that the pastoral and congregational care that a person receives will follow them.

Pastoral Care as Congregational Care

A third issue behind the question of professional counselors versus pastors, is to recognize that pastoral care is expressed not merely in one-to-one care from the pastor, but in the one-another care of the congregation for each other. In accordance with Ephesians 4:12, the pastors are to “equip the saints for the work of ministry”. If they are equipped, even as co-counselors, then that is an extension of the pastor’s counseling ministry, and makes his work more wholistic and thus more effective.

By contrast, the professional counselor enters into a counseling situation as a sole filter for the person’s problems, offering them an assessment that the counselee can either accept or reject as any consumer can when they have paid their bill.

The pastor, unlike the professional counselor, offers spiritual counsel and care for a person within the context of one-anothering by the congregation. To the covenanted church member, there can be no ‘take it or leave it’ kind of response when the counsel they received is biblical and appropriately conscience-binding. The context of care for the Christian being counseled by their fellow congregants will be an expression of meaningful church membership. This is where our view of counseling is shaped by our view of the local church and what it means to be a member.

The Place of Professional Counselors

For Christians there is still a useful place for professional counselors. Professional counselors ought to be biblical counselors. They have been biblically trained and use the Scriptures not only as a proof text, but as the interpretive mechanism for all human problems.

Certainly, the professional biblical counselor will have some subject matter expertise. But the primary way that biblical counselors differ from pastors (other than the fact that pastors, not professional counselors occupy an ecclesial office) is that biblical counselors are able to offer specialized, intensive and extended care. Pastors offer the same thing. But for people who have multiple complex sin issues, habits, and consequences to deal with, a dedicated helper can be very useful.

This is why it is helpful to encourage biblical counseling generally. When pastors recognize their large role in providing nouthetic care (1 Cor 4:14, Col 1:28, 1 Th 5:12,14, 2 Th 3:15), they will do more than be a personal counselor for people. They will cultivate a culture of one-another co-counseling. The result will be a caring context for every Christian to be helped to deal honestly with sin and the consequences of sin in their lives. Then, even if someone needs some special, intensive, extended attention from a professional biblical counselor, they are immersed within a culture with God at the centre.

All faithful professional biblical counsellors desire this pastoral/congregational context for the people they serve. And all pastors welcome the additional help that they can look to in certain situations that require more attention than their time and space allow.

So to answer the opening question, “Do we need professional counselors instead of pastors?”, no, we do not. Rather we must recapture a sense of what the local church is for (a clinic of co-counselors), what is the role of the pastor (equipping the co-counselors while modeling biblical care), and then we are in a position to value another kind of counselor (professional biblical counselor). At such a re-ordering of priorities, the professional biblical counsellor will rejoice together with the pastor and the local church.

unsplash-logoKelly Sikkema