Let the Little Children Come

By / Jun 11

Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (Matthew 19:14; NIV). We have the opportunity to cultivate in children a joyful anticipation of Heaven. The Bible’s teaching about Heaven can help children endure a world filled with difficulties and sorrow. As children grow up, they begin to wonder about death. What will happen when I die? What happened to Grandma or Grandpa? To these questions, the gospel provides a rich source of comfort and hope.

Many pious descriptions of Heaven are simply unappealing—sitting on clouds, strumming harps, endless Sunday school lessons. In contrast, the Bible’s many descriptions of Heaven are exhilarating! The physical nature of Jesus’ Resurrection means believers will enjoy immortality in an embodied existence in a real place, not a ghostly existence in an ephemeral nether sphere. The Bible describes the coming Kingdom of Heaven in concrete terms—but of course, the concrete in Heaven is gold!

Once, when my son was little, he made an inference in line with biblical teaching. He said, “In Heaven, sharks don’t bite; they lick.” His comment is consistent with Isaiah’s prophecy, “The wolf and the lamb will graze together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox” (Isaiah 65:25; NASB). While scholars debate whether or not this prophecy refers to the Millennial Kingdom, we can be confident that such descriptions find perfect consummation in the eternal New Heavens and New Earth.

Let’s encourage our children to look forward to the imminent return of the King of Heaven and to pray, “Come, Lord Jesus!” (Revelation 22:20).

Editor’s note: The above article is an excerpted from “A Word to Parents and Teachers” in Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers: Heaven, by Joey Allen (published 2025 by New Leaf Press). Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers: Heaven, Jesus, and The Church are now available for purchase.



Christ Is an Unconquerable Savior

By / Jun 6

Editor’s note: This summer, we’re sharing articles aimed at encouraging pastors, ministry leaders, and church members in living and serving in light of Christ’s coming Kingdom. To hear more on this topic from Jared C. Wilson and other key leaders, register to join us for the 2025 For the Church National Conference, “Kingdom Come: Ministry in Light of Glory.”

The following article was originally published at ftc.co on March 7, 2022.

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Because Jesus is God, we can know that he is able to save. But we are encouraged not just that Christ is able to save, but in knowing that he has actually exercised his ability to save us.

In other words, to say that God is able to save isn’t exactly the good news, because God is able to do many things that he nevertheless chooses not to do. Whenever he says “no” to one of our prayers, for instance, we should not construe him to mean that he’s saying “I can’t” (unless we’re asking him to sin or otherwise act against his nature).

I’m thinking along the lines of the old Carl Henry saying: “It’s only good news if it gets there in time.”

That Christ is able to save is no benefit to those who do not find themselves taking refuge in him!

Well, Christ is an able Savior, and because he’s always on time—indeed, he has authored time itself—he’s an unconquerable Savior.

Look, for instance, at John 17:9–19, where in his “high priestly prayer,” Jesus turns from praying for himself to praying for his friends. Christ’s interceding on the sinner’s behalf is good news, and here it rises to the surface of his prayer in wonderful relief:

“I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, which you have given me. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost except the son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. But now I am coming to you, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have my joy fulfilled in themselves. I have given them your word, and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.”

He has given us the only kind of life he has within himself: eternal life.

The primary facet of eternal life on display in verses 9–18 is the eternality of it, the forever protection Christians have by Christ himself. Review from the passage, for instance:

v. 10 = “all mine are yours, and yours are mine,” meaning we belong to God

v. 11 = the Father is keeping us

v. 12 = he has guarded us, and not one of us has been lost

v. 15 = “keep them from the evil one”

vv. 16–17 = “sanctify them” (or set them apart)

All of this points to the safety we have in Jesus!

Even the loss of the “son of destruction,” a reference to Judas, in verse 12 is not an indication of Christ’s conquerability, since he notes that Judas’s destruction was according to the divine plan (“that the Scripture be fulfilled”). In other words, Judas didn’t slip through the cracks. Jesus isn’t a pretty good Savior, about to finish 11 out of 12. No, he kept all that were given to him. None of them was lost. Nobody slips through the cracks. If you are saved, you are unconquerably saved.

The obvious doctrinal connections here are to eternal security and the perseverance of the saints. But there are shades here of what’s more explicit in John 17:21–22, where we get a glimpse into the doctrine of mystical union with Christ.

“…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them…”

The gospel gem of union with Christ is perhaps the major facet of the gospel uniting the whole of the New Testament. It is implicitly proclaimed every time we see phrases like “in him” or “in Christ” or “with him”—to be found in Christ, to be raised with Christ, to move and live and have our being “in Christ,” to be crucified with Christ and seated with him in the heavenly places, to be hidden with Christ in God.

In John 15, Jesus tells his disciples that they are the branches and he is the vine, and that they must “remain in him” or “abide in him.” This is all doctrine of union talk.

And in John 17, the picture being displayed shows us that Christ doesn’t just advocate for us as a defense attorney—though he does that too—but he actually grafts us into himself. But further: by faith, the sinner saved by grace is spiritually inextricable from Jesus. His Spirit indwells us. And we are said to dwell in him.

How is this—that he would be, spiritually speaking, inside of us? And we would also be, spiritually speaking, inside of him?

Well, think of the temple in the ancient days. The holiest of holies was the place where God’s presence specially dwelled. But it would not be accurate to say God’s wholeness was solely located in that physical space. God is omnipresent. He can’t not be omnipresent. So God was outside the temple and everywhere. But also he dwelled specially in the temple. This is a corollary to the indwelling presence of Christ in believers. We are in him. But he is also specially in us.

Think of a Matryoshka doll. You know, those Russian nesting dolls, where you open it up and there’s an increasingly smaller doll inside? Well, picture just three. The middle one is us. We are inside Christ, so that when you open him up, you find us. And when you open us up, you find him again.

We belong to God. The Father is keeping us. He has guarded us, and not one of us will be lost. He is keeping us from the evil one. He has sanctified us.

Speaking of Russia: Recently, as Russian invaders entered Ukrainian soil, I saw a photo online said to be of a group of Ukrainian Christians in a circle in Kharviv Square joined in prayer. And I was struck by two things in contemplating that photo. The first thing I was struck by was the sheer vulnerability of them. For seven or eight human beings armed with nothing but winter coats are no match for small arms fire, much less heavy artillery. But the second thing I was struck by was the sheer power of them. For Christians, to be found in Christ, to be guarded and kept by him is—in all the ways that ultimately and eternally matter—to be unconquerable.

Richard Sibbes says, “The Christian is an impregnable fortress. The Christian is a man who cannot be conquered.”

Oh, we can be killed. But we cannot be conquered.

As Paul says in Colossians 3:3, “Our life is hidden with Christ in God.” If we are hidden with Christ in God, we are as secure as Christ is. Now, how secure do you think Christ is?

Jesus says, “I have guarded them”! (v. 12)

Now, of course, we need to be sober-minded. We will endure hardship in this life. In verse 15, Jesus plainly says, “I do not ask that you take them out of the world,” only that we be “kept from the evil one.”

Nobody gets out of here alive. Even the Christian must die. But dying isn’t the worst thing that can happen to you. Dying after you die is the worst thing that can happen to you. But for those who are united to Christ by faith—we have unconquerable, eternal life.



On Life and Doctrine

By / Jun 5

For every gospel minister, the New Testament letters of 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus are to be lifelong companions. The Pastoral Epistles are letters we return to again and again, guiding us on our journey of life and ministry. Indeed, I know of no better way to ensure ministerial faithfulness than for the minister to live in these three books.

For a quarter century, these books have been just that for me. Over the years, I’ve read through the Pastoral Epistles once a month on average. And every time I do, my faith is strengthened, my ministry is sharpened, and my calling is renewed.

The Pastoral Epistles are the apostle Paul’s words of instruction and encouragement to his son-in-the-faith Timothy and his ministry colleague Titus. But these three letters speak beyond these two men—they speak to all, in every time and place, who’ve entered the ministerial ranks.

Most ministers are familiar with the broad contours of these three books, and many of us can point to key verses for inspiration and accountability. I presume that’s the case for you too. Like me, you likely resonate with Paul’s call to “preach the word in season and out of season,” to “fight the good fight of faith,” and to “finish the course” of ministry (2 Tim. 4:2–5; 1 Tim. 6:12; 2 Tim. 4:7).

Similarly, we periodically return to the qualifications for pastoral ministry as found in 1 Timothy 3:1–7 and Titus 1:6–9, and well we should. In these passages, we find God’s enduring qualifications for ministers, qualifications that remain regardless of one’s generation or context of service.

Yet there’s one, often overlooked, verse that has captivated me more than any other. I reflect on it often, returning to it again and again as a compass for my life and ministry. I do so because of the stark warning and promising reward this verse contains. First Timothy 4:16 charges us to “Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things, for as you do this you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you.”

This verse ties together an entire section of apostolic admonition that runs from 4:6 through 4:16. And it’s pregnant with ministerial promise. Let’s carefully reflect on this verse’s every word, and note its every component. As we do, we’ll see where we’re going in the chapters ahead.

First, notice the close link between the inward and the outward, the private and the public. The minister’s internal life validates and strengthens his external ministry. The sequence is essential.

“Pay close attention to” means to be mindful of or to be attentive to. It carries the idea of focus, of fixed concentration. It’s not that the minister thinks of nothing else; it’s that he thinks on what follows above all else. If he gets nothing else right, he gets his life and doctrine right.

Ours is an age preoccupied with self. One’s self-image, visible appearance, public identity, and one’s self-expression are all focal points of our time. But that’s not the point of this text. Our text refers to your inner person. Man looks at the outward appearance, God looks at the heart.1

“Yourself” refers to one’s heart, one’s inner person, one’s true spiritual man. We can think of one’s personal holiness, one’s Christlikeness, one’s godliness. The importance of one’s inner person is a theme that runs throughout Scripture. And that’s because who one is inwardly is who one really is. That is why Proverbs 4:23 insists the reader “Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life” (emphasis added).

“Your teaching” means one’s doctrine, that which one believes and espouses. Paul uses this word some nineteen times in his New Testament letters and fifteen times in the Pastoral Epistles. Doctrine is the lifeblood of the minister and of the church, thus it recurringly appears in the Pastoral Epistles.

By “your teaching” the apostle is not personalizing it to Timothy, nor to any other minister. It’s not our truth, it’s God’s truth. Thus, the minister’s goal is to be faithful to the full array of Christian truth as found in Holy Scripture. Indeed, the minister is a workman, studying so that he might rightly divide the Word of God.

“Persevere in these things” indicates the minister’s life and teaching must be of ongoing concern. It is not enough for the minister to have been found faithful in this regard. The minister is to be faithful. As the minister does so, he verifies his fitness for ministry. Not just in the future, but in the present. To borrow an example from the medical field, we aren’t to settle for an annual check-up. We need a daily evaluation.

As we persevere in these things, we “ensure,” or give evidence of, what is unseen—that our lives and ministries are approved by God. Though our calling to Christ and to the ministry—from start to finish—is from the Lord, Paul charges us to steward our lives and teachings as though our ministerial legitimacy depends on our faithfulness. Paul isn’t conflicted, rather he’s a compatibilist. The apostle sees no conflict between God’s sovereignty and the minister’s responsibility, both are compatible in the mind of God.

By “salvation” Paul gets to the heart of the matter. He does not mince words. To be saved means to be saved from God’s impending wrath. The goal for every Christ-follower is to be saved from that wrath, and for every minister to shield his congregation from that wrath. For those in Christ, God’s justice has been satisfied through Christ’s payment, thus no need for our own.

The way—the only way—to ensure this goal is through faithful gospel ministry, which is upheld by guarding your life and doctrine. This ensures salvation for “yourself” and “for those who hear you.” Note, it’s not one’s followers, but one’s hearers. This reminds us of the minister’s central task—to preach and teach the Word of God.

Gospel proclamation is God’s chosen means of converting the lost. As Paul argued elsewhere, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the “word of Christ.”2 Rightly knowing, believing, and proclaiming the gospel is essential for salvation, on both the teaching and receiving end.

Thus, you see how rich this one verse truly is. It is indeed pregnant with ministerial promise. It comes with a stark word of warning, but also a rich word of reward. It behooves every minister to guard his life and his doctrine. It behooves you to guard yours.

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  1. 1 Samuel 16:7: “But the Lord said to Samuel, ‘Do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for God sees not as man sees, since a man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.’”

  2. Romans 10:17: “So faith comes from hearing, and hear- ing by the word of Christ.”

Editor’s note: This post is excerpted with permission from Letters to My Students, Volume 3: On Life and Doctrine, by Jason K. Allen. Copyright 2025, B&H Publishing.



The Boldest Prayer in the Bible

By / May 30

Editor’s note: The following article was adapted by the author from his book Pour Out Your Heart: Discovering Joy, Strength, and Intimacy with God through Prayer (pp. 99, 102–107). Pour Out Your Heart is available now from B&H Publishing and wherever books are sold.

In the Scriptures, God gives his people a surprising and uncomfortable amount of participation in his eternal purposes. He often waits to fulfill his plans until he can fulfill them through us. He waits till we pray.

God is in no discernible hurry. He instead moves in our hearts to seek him, desire his kingdom on earth, and boldly ask for his glory to cover the earth. Our prayers literally do change the world. God has ordained this unexpected and strange pathway to his glory, and indeed, he is the one who gets the glory in the end.

We know Moses as the great leader of Israel, and we know him as one of the Old Testament’s preeminent prophets too. But have we considered the remarkable prayer life of Moses?

Moses’s Bold Request(s)

God would often draw Moses to himself for days at a time, revealing himself and his will to Moses. In Exodus 32, the Israelites get tired of waiting for Moses to come down from the mountain, and they quickly spiral into corruption and make a golden calf out of their gold jewelry. Moses is distraught over their sin, and knowing God to be holy and righteous, fears that Israel might be completely wiped out. Moses goes directly to the Lord in prayer and asks that God forgive their sin (32:32). God responds that he will punish them for their sin but agrees not to totally destroy his people (32:33–35).

God tells Moses he will still give the Israelites the promised land, but he will not personally lead them anymore—the pillar of cloud, representing his presence, would not remain with them. He will instead send an angel to go before them (33:1–3). So, Moses’s first prayer has been granted, but he’s not done yet.

Moses approaches God a second time in the tent of meeting. It’s here that we learn that God would regularly speak to Moses face to face, as one talks with a friend (33:11). In this prayer conversation, Moses makes his second request, citing God’s own character and goodness first. He prays, “Remember that this nation is your people” (33:13). He’s appealing to God’s own faithfulness and steadfast love. Moses continues, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here” (33:15). He’s saying: If you don’t personally come with us, God, what is the point of any of it? It’s not enough to send an angel. We want you, God!

Now, this is a bold second request, and we might fear that God will respond with anger. We might tell Moses he should be content with his first request being answered. But one answered prayer has a way of increasing our faith and boldness. So Moses makes this second request, and it seems to delight God even more. God responds, “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name” (33:17). Prayer number two is also answered.

Now, I played basketball every day through high school and college, and I can tell you this. If I made a three pointer, it made me want to shoot another three. And if I made two threes? You couldn’t stop me from taking a third. I tell my boys the same thing: If you’re hot, it’s no time for meekness; keep shooting! I think Moses is thinking essentially the same thing now. He’s two for two. In the language of NBA Jam, he’s heating up. Why not go for three?

With a preposterous boldness, Moses makes a third request, and it’s the most audacious one yet. “Now show me your glory” (33:18).

Can you believe it? Moses asks to see God in all his glory. But no one can see God and live (33:20)! Has Moses lost his mind? Or is he perhaps as close to the heart of God that he’s ever been? Is he actually asking God for the exact sort of thing that God wants to give?

Indeed, God’s response tells us everything. He will do it. He will allow his goodness to pass in front of Moses, but God will not show his face—because Moses would not survive that one (33:19–23). The following day, Moses prepares himself and returns up the mountain. It says that “the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him… And he passed in front of Moses,” proclaiming his name (34:5–6). All because Moses dared to ask.

Boldness, indeed. Moses has moved from intercession to petition with this third request, but he’s not shifting gears too much. He is asking God to be who he is in some particular way. Moses is bringing God’s own character and goodness before him, seeking more of his presence and power. He’s asking God to do the very thing that he wants to do. And God delights to answer each and every request.

Discovering the Power of Intercession

Intercession is the most dynamic and yet most overlooked form of prayer in today’s church. More than just “praying for others,” intercession compels God to be who he is in a particular place and time.

We know that God is faithful; in intercession, we ask him to be faithful to in a certain way to a particular person. We know that God is loving; in intercession, we ask him to reveal his love to our friend or coworker. Intercessory prayer begins with an acknowledgement of God’s greatness and compassion then calls on God to apply his character and power to someone who needs it most. In this way, we’re seeking to compel our good Father to action not by our own credibility but by his.

Here’s what that can look like.

Father, you have promised that your glory will cover the earth (Hab. 2:14); will you reveal yourself now in Columbia, Missouri? Glorify yourself in this particular time and city!

Lord Jesus, you are the friend of sinners (Matt. 11:19); my friend Eric doesn’t know you and is resistant to your good news; will you break through his stubborn heart and reveal your love to him?

Lord, you are the God of healing (Ps. 103:3); will you heal my friend Jamie of her chronic illness? Let yourself be glorified by showing that you still heal the sick and brokenhearted today!

Lord Jesus, there is much spiritual opposition against our church leaders right now, but you came to disarm all rulers and principalities of evil (Col. 2:15). Will you defend and protect us against the attacks of the enemy against us?

Father, you are just and merciful, a God who delights in justice, hates wrongdoing, and loves the stranger (Ps 86:15; Is. 61:8; Lev. 19:34); will you now defend the refugees in our city and overthrow the system of injustice that works against them?

Intercessory prayer is one of the means by which God moves history forward. In his infinite wisdom and patience, he often waits to fulfill his purposes until we pray. He could do everything without us, no doubt. But because he loves us and cherishes relationship with us, he often delays the fulfillment of his promises until we pray specifically and earnestly. He doesn’t need us, but he wants us to be involved.

Intercessory prayer becomes our joy as we experience the thrill of answered prayer. Reading the stories of Moses—not to mention the accounts of Elijah and others—it seems clear that we are not asking God for too much, but too little.

If we’re not asking for much in prayer, we don’t get much from God. Jesus said, “Ask and you shall receive.” James added, “You don’t have because you don’t ask.” Perhaps we’re afraid God won’t answer. Or perhaps we’re more afraid he will answer!

In intercessory prayer, we’re asking God to change the world. We’re asking him to make it a more just, more God-aware, more beautiful place. We’re asking him to change our friends’ hearts and lives. We’re seeking his justice to roll like a river. We’re asking him to be who he is in some particular way. And God delights in these prayers!

“Therefore, let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16, CSB).



Great Commission Direction

By / May 29

Why should Southern Baptist churches cooperate?

This is one question I ask students taking the required Baptist history class I teach. I ask it because every generation of students asks it, or will ask it, or needs to ask it, and I want them to know how I answer it and have arrived at my answer with cheerful conviction.

While many Protestant and Evangelical churches are like-minded and share the same core convictions about doctrine and missions as the Baptists, for those preparing to serve and lead Baptist churches, my course is designed to help them understand, develop, and defend their convictions about the ecclesial tradition to which their church is connected.

The Baptist movement began in England as small groups of men and women met to establish themselves in churches and then sought fellowship with other churches around common beliefs and practice. This early confessional cooperation grew out of, and centered on, the Reformation program of doctrinal renewal which emerged from the study of the Bible and led to the recovery of the biblical gospel message. As these Baptist churches gained strength, they crossed to the New World and grew into a fleet of churches sailing together, united in doctrine and headed in Great Commission direction.

A Fleet Sailing Together

The picture of churches as ships sailing is fitting for our understanding of the value of intercongregational cooperation as it conveys, first, that they are not the only ships at sea. There are many churches, of course, but not all have set sail, and not all are headed in the direction of global evangelism. Thus, it is helpful for churches to find partners who agree not only in their design and beliefs but also in their shared trajectory. Not all churches aiming to fulfill the Great Commission are Baptist churches, and wherever possible Baptist churches can and should sail with those with whom they can unite in evangelism and missions. Celebrating and encouraging other evangelical churches in this shared task is not something Baptist churches have always done well in their history, but when understood in these terms, they could find value in mutual encouragement. Likewise, as Baptist churches seek to start new churches to add to their fleet, they will find safe harbor and maximized mission when they work with other Baptist churches who not only are sailing in the same direction but also are united on the kinds of churches they are seeking to fund and start together at the ends of the earth.

Second, the picture conveys that these ships do need to tend to their own vessels to maximize speed and stay on course. To stay afloat in the world for gospel proclamation, Baptist churches have found the need to prioritize their own doctrinal and congregational health. These ships will, no doubt, encounter storms without and conflict within. A church that has lost its first love may also lose the Spirit’s enabling wind power behind it. Baptist churches at sea need to minimize any hindrance that would pull them off course.

Third, this picture conveys that individuals can serve and live on one ship at a time. While circumstance may dictate the need for believers to change churches, for most the norm is continuing to serve on the ship where one is placed. When a sailor is counting on the buoyancy of his ship for his life and safe travel, he is far more likely to look after the health and heading of the ship. It is the picture of foolishness to see sailors lounging on the top deck complaining about their ship, or envying another ship nearby, when their own is languishing due to their lack of effort. Thus, Baptist churches are more likely to be strengthened, revitalized, and steered back on course when their members are focused on thankfulness for the ship on which they have been placed, the fleet of which they are a part, and using their gifts to help keep that ship, and fleet, on course.

Why should Southern Baptist churches cooperate? This chapter aims to show that from their beginnings, Baptist churches found they needed other churches to maintain their own doctrinal health and to accomplish the shared mission given to all churches. Despite their faults and blind spots, from small groups in seventeenth-century England to the first national Baptist denomination in the United States in the nineteenth century, Baptist churches have persevered to hold intercongregational cooperation in doctrinal confession and missionary endeavor as a key distinctive. As I love to tell my students, this story is worthy of retelling to inspire ongoing renewal of Baptist churches of the present and future as they carry out the same mission. With that intent in view, in this chapter I will tell the story of Baptist beginnings.

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Editor’s note: This post is excerpted with permission from A Unity of Purpose, edited by Tony Wolfe and W. Madison Grace II; excerpt by Jason G. Duesing. Copyright 2025, B&H Publishing.



Living in Light of Jesus’s Return

By / May 23

Editor’s note: This summer, we’re sharing articles aimed at encouraging pastors, ministry leaders, and church members in living and serving in light of Christ’s coming Kingdom. To hear more on this topic from Jason K. Allen and other key leaders, register to join us for the 2025 For the Church National Conference, “Kingdom Come: Ministry in Light of Glory.”

The following article originally appeared in the May 2013 edition of SBC Life, and was originally published at ftc.co on November 30, 2016.

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“There are two days in my calendar: this day and that day,” quipped Martin Luther in reference to Christ’s second coming. We have come a long way since Luther’s statement, with most believers erring dramatically in one of two directions.

Second coming sensationalists are the most egregious, and widely lamented, offenders. They predict the timing of Jesus’ return; but, of course, they do so in vain. Jesus stated no man knows the day or hour of his return. The most infamous prognosticator in recent years has been Harold Camping, who on multiple occasions has predicted the specific date of Jesus’ return, thus embarrassing himself—and the name of Christ—before a watching world.

As irresponsible as Camping and his ilk are, one can argue the greater danger facing the church is not hyper-expectancy about Jesus’ return, but a slumbering church that acts as though Jesus isn’t returning at all. This seems especially to be the case in the year 2013. Twenty years ago, sermons and literature on the second coming were plentiful, but such interest seems to have gone the way of the el Camino car or the waterbed, an out of style fad from a previous generation.

This ought not be the case, for evangelicals are a second coming people. Though we hold differing positions on both the millennium and on the tribulation, we are unified on the literal and soon-coming return of Christ. For Christians, though, the most important questions to ask are not if Jesus will return—that is settled—and not when he will return, that is unknowable. The most helpful question to ask is: “So what?”

Jesus’ second coming is not an abstract doctrine with no bearing on the Christian life. Rather, the New Testament refers to Jesus’ return with applicability. The Bible is replete with references to Jesus’ second coming. These passages come not as an eschatological data dump, but as a forthcoming event that is to shape a Christian’s life. The Pauline corpus speaks with special relevance. Paul frequently references, and even elaborates on, the timing and circumstances of Christ’s return. In studying Paul’s many references to the second coming, one finds that the Apostle gives special emphasis not only to Jesus’ return, but to the church’s posture as the bride in waiting. What Jesus will do and when he will do it are not unimportant considerations, but they are not the most urgent. The most pressing consideration for believers is how we should live in light of his impending return.

An Expectant Hope

In Titus 2:13, Paul describes Jesus’ second coming as the church’s “blessed hope.” For most Christians throughout church history, expecting the second coming was more than the hope of moving from a good life to a more perfect eternal state. Rather, it was a yearning for deliverance from pestilence and war, a yearning for deliverance from death and destruction, and a yearning for deliverance from poverty and persecution, or even deliverance from martyrdom.

In the Western world, Christianity in the 21st century finds most believers enjoying life in relative comfort. Religious freedom, modern medicine, bourgeois lifestyle, and other modern-day conveniences have proven to bring not only earthly comfort but also spiritual complacency. This comfort often diminishes our yearning for Jesus’ return.

This complacency is frequently found in the local church as well. Many congregations act as though Christ’s return would interrupt their building program or contravene their long-range strategic plan. Too many young adults seem content for material pursuit, while senior adults are too busy enjoying retirement to long for Christ’s return. I sense that for many Christians today, heaven is too distant, eternity too abstract, and Jesus’ return too theoretical. In complete contrast, we need to live life on a first-century footing, yearning for something so beautiful and eternally satisfying—to see Jesus and be made like him—that it eclipses and transcends all other longings and expectations.

A Sanctified Life

In expounding upon Jesus’ return, Paul frequently references the church’s need to prepare individual’s lives to see Jesus. In fact, Paul calls the church to live as “sons of light and sons of the day, not as of the night or of darkness” (I Thessalonians 5:5), in anticipation of Jesus’ return. Truth be known, if our longing is not right, our living will not be right either.

Few things focus one’s life like impending judgment. This is why Jonathan Edwards resolved “never to do anything, which I should be afraid to do, if I expected it would not be above an hour, before I should hear the last trumpet” (Resolutions of a Saintly Scholar). Therefore, it is urgent that we recover a robust and expectant eschatology. As we do, we will find that a healthy anticipation of Jesus’ return infuses the Christian life with focus and urgency, proving to accelerate growth in the spiritual disciplines.

Cause and effect can be difficult to disentangle, but in the New Testament there is a clear correlation between anticipating Christ’s return and living a more sanctified Christian life. Expecting to meet Jesus occurs with a sober intention to purify one’s life, and the call to purify one’s life occurs in concert with anticipating Jesus’ return. This is why one preacher famously said we should live as though “Christ died yesterday, rose from the grave today, and is coming back tomorrow.”

A Renewed Witness

The more Christians contemplate Jesus’ return—and the final judgment associated with it—the more we will be renewed in our evangelistic witness. This is rooted in the gospel and the Great Commission itself. The lost urgently need to hear of Christ before they meet him. After all, as Peter reminds us, God has delayed Christ’s return and final judgment to allow time for a greater harvest of souls. Peter writes, “The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

The second coming of Jesus and the renewal of our personal witness is precisely where the inerrancy of Scripture and the exclusivity of the gospel intersect. To embrace the total truthfulness of God’s Word—including the soon-coming return of Christ and the corresponding truth that all must repent and believe in Jesus to be saved—should propel us into a renewed fervor for the Great Commission. The Christian who confesses Jesus is coming and that salvation is found only in his name must be dynamic, not static, in his witness.

Conclusion

The church’s attention to Jesus’ return seems to be seasonal, with interest rising and falling based upon a host of issues, most especially current geo-political events. The need of the hour is not for more end-times speculation or an unhealthy preoccupation with the sequence of eschatological events. Such interests should give way to an eschatological anticipation that impacts how we live the Christian life until he returns.

Perhaps there should be a touch of Harold Camping in us all: hoping, yearning, and even expecting Jesus’ return. Until he comes, we find ourselves with the saints of the ages, longing for the day when the kingdom of this world becomes the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and praying with the saints of the ages, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”



Mom as Unsung Disciple-Maker

By / May 9

I work at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, where we are unabashedly and full-throatedly “For the Church.” We have only this one note to strike to the glory of God. We don’t shy away from this. Along with this territory comes a necessary gravity towards training up steely, carnivorous preacher types. We’re cranking these men off the assembly line like gospel-built locomotives from a Chevy factory somewhere in Detroit. We’re catapulting them off our campus into the sin-dark corners of the earth, to ungospeled regions of North America, and into rural, dying churches. These are hardy, gospel-saturated, manly expository machines.

But what I’ve noticed over my time at Midwestern is that behind most of these expository machines is often an even more impressive wife! She’s often the steel spine of this dude! Usually she’s also a mom with kids in tow. What’s more, these amazing mom-wives have quite literally given their lives away for the gospel ministry, thus evidencing Jesus as their obvious Lord. They are the often unsung heroes of ministry. They have unflinchingly run headlong into the supposed storm of our culture, that is, what America calls an “identity crisis.”  They hear regularly from feminists, family, culture, and even their own self-condemning inner voice, “Stay-at-home-mom, huh?” “So, why did I send you to college, then?” “Why would you waste your life like that?” “So you’re going to give up your career to wipe snotty noses!” “Don’t lose your dreams following your man around!”

If it’s true, and it is, that the first shall be last and the last first, there are going to be a lot of moms who wind up first in the ultimate line. My suspicion is that they’re going to have some fairly heavy crowns to cast before their Lord (cf. Revelation 4:10).

If you’ve ever had occasion to run into one of these selfless, majestic mom-creatures, you know they are no normal “moms.”  It’s sort of like bumping into velvet steel! They live their lives by their Lord’s leave. They don’t know when or where they’ll receive their deployment orders, but go they will. These are disciples of Christ, gospel soldiers of which the world is not worthy. They don’t talk about following Jesus in theory. No, they do it every day in an Ephesians 5 way. They are blazing a trail, with their husband at the helm, and they’re eager to glorify God with all their minutes, pennies, and tears. They’re wicked smart—no mindless drones here. No, these are calculated, sharp, and cunning Kingdom women. They walk a road in life that is peppered with geographical moves, hard good-byes, and at times dark loneliness. But yet they abide! They stay the course.

This post is written in praise of these majestic mom-creatures. I salute you, mom! I raise my metaphorical Southern Baptist grape juice glass to you. You’re God’s beauteous, gospel-bearing feet that occupy his deployed boots-on-the-ground!

What I want to do in the rest of this post is to help you see the evangelistic and/or discipleship thread that streams through all the normalcy of everyday mom life. My aim is to transform in your mind what seems to be merely normal into the eternal. I am intentionally conflating the categories of evangelism and discipleship because in the theater of the home, they often collapse on themselves to the visible eye (Deuteronomy 6:7–9). The category would be most strongly expressed through “the fear of the Lord.” That is what you are doing, moms; you are teaching your children to fear the Lord above all else.

Manners

Mom, the raw materials of the Kingdom are sitting before you in all their diaper-bound, sticky-fingered, snot-prone glory. As you teach them to use a fork properly, to say “please,” to wipe their mouth, and not to burp aloud, you are laying the groundwork for Christian hospitality, that most important reality to the Christian faith, the field upon which Christians relate to one another in homes.

Hospitality is one of the most important means by which Christians are viewed as an attractively peculiar people in this world. It is how we care for one another. It is also how we bring a lost world into our homes to see a loving, well-ordered household. Hospitality is the oft-viewed theater in which the world becomes convinced that the gospel powerfully changes people. You, dear mom, are laying the groundwork for your child’s hospitality, not to mention that you are constantly doing hospitality yourself. Imagine if your child never learned these basic manners! They would be a social pariah. You may think what you are doing is the height of normalcy, but the Bible would say you are the mechanism of God’s great boon of discipleship.

Feeding

What Deuteronomy 8 teaches us is that God brought Israel out into the desert, at least in part, to show them their utter dependence upon him as their guiding Shepherd. They had no food or water without God providing it. Not one ounce! This is likened to your feeding of the five children! They are helpless without you. They are not even equipped to fend for themselves without you. Ultimately, you are one of the many building blocks that God is using to teach your children their dependence upon him for everything. You may even be the most important building block in that particular foundation. They are helpless outside the help of the Lord. And you are the hinge point, daily, that stands between that knowledge of God and your child. You’re a living parable of the care and sustenance we have in the Father, as well as a parable of our utter reliance upon him. So, when you repeat to your baby one hundred times over, “Here comes the airplane!” you are evangelizing and discipling.  You are teaching them the fear of the Lord. Just like Israel, it’s not really about the bread; it’s about God.

Sleep

When you teach, or better yet, enforce, your children to adhere to a sleep schedule, you are upholding the long-prescribed practice of Sabbath rest. It’s through sleep that God gets at our finitude. Sleep is an acknowledgement of our humanness. It’s one of the ways we maintain the Creator/creature distinction. We are unarguably dependent upon the Lord. Set in the DNA of your child is the need for Sabbath, and you are helping them to see that. You are helping them to realize their absolute dependence upon their good Creator for provision and all things good.

No

The world has realities that are bigger than we are and that stand outside us. Realities such as these: Adultery brings utter destruction. Cops have the power to arrest you. There are consequences for your choices. If you ride your bike into the road, you can be killed. If you jump off the counter, it’s highly likely you’ll be maimed. When you teach your child to understand these realities using the word, the truth vehicle, “no,” you are evangelizing and discipling. Maybe it is more proper to say you are laying the groundwork for the Holy Spirit to convict and enliven (salvation), but evangelizing and discipling you are, nonetheless.

The concepts your children associate with “no” are the very foundational building blocks that God uses to help lost image-bearers grasp their need for his forgiveness. This is the fodder of regeneration. The realities that accompany the concept of “no” are often how God displays our need for Christ’s substitutionary cross work in our stead. You’re teaching them the Law, mom. You’re “doing Torah.” Don’t fall to the sin of minimizing your role. These children are the future inhabiters of the New Heavens and the New Earth! These are the future justice-makers, lawyers, teachers, counselors, preachers, moms, and dads. Take heart, dear struggling mom; you are pointing the way to the narrow road. You are indispensable as a means of God’s grace in your children’s lives.

Alphabet

Mom, you will be the precious touchpoint between your child and his or her reading the Word of God! The mechanics of learning to read are the eventual lens through which your child’s eyes will be opened to the basics of the world and to the magnificent universes of knowledge that rest in God, just waiting to be discovered. Imagine all the frontiers they’ll discover in God! You are the foundation of this. Imagine what they would miss if you didn’t teach them A, B, C, D, E…. Again, A, B, C, D, E. Never lose heart. God is using you to shape the inhabiters of eternity. Those little pudgy-faced gremlins are actually immortal, and you’ve been called before the foundation of the earth to be a tool in the hands of God to mint them into his image.

Abortion

Mom, with every wiped nose, you stand in utter defiance of the abortion culture. Our age has tragically fallen into the sin of slaughtering image-bearers. We as a nation, and notion, have called light darkness. We have attempted to construe blessings as curses. But you, mom, stand against this every day. With every hug, every meal, every answered question, you are picketing Planned Parenthood. You don’t simply espouse sanctity of life; you live it! So teach the elementary principles of logic to those babies to the glory of God. Answer a thousand and one seemingly aimless questions to the glory of God. Adopt too many children to the glory of God. Clean up dropped bowls of food 37½ times to the glory of God. The world needs you to be the most glorious mother you can possibly be—the world needs your mothering, in a manner of speaking.

Teaching and Transforming

So, moms, you are a bright-shining city on a hill. You are the means by which God unleashes his compassion on the world. And by the grace of God and the love of Christ, you will stand resurrected before your Lord and Savior something different than you currently are, not that what you are isn’t already the stuff of amazement; but know that God is transforming you. God is discipling you as you disciple your children. He is running you through the gauntlet of motherhood with great purpose. He is changing you as your children change before your eyes. And your children are the next era of the Kingdom.

__________

Editor’s note: This article was originally published at For the Church on October 31, 2016.



The One Life Dream That Makes a Girl Blush

By / May 7

Editor’s note: We’re celebrating 10 years of FTC.co this spring. The article below is one of the most read articles in our history, originally published on March 22, 2019. We’re thankful for our readers and for the many authors who have contributed to our mission to provide gospel-centered resources for the Church.

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Because of my work, I sit down regularly with single young women. Single young women who want nothing more than a wedding ring, the kids, the house, the whole lot. And mind you, their wishes are never wicked or wrong. What they desire is not evil. What they hope for isn’t silly. They are not glassy-eyed about their future. They are not sitting across from me wondering where Prince Charming is. They are faithful young women. Hard-working. Funny. Beautiful. Smart. And they have done well to steward what they have up to this point.

And yet, I see it. When the water is poured again and they lean back after a dish is served to their friends. When they take a breath and their shoulders slump a little. After they’ve told me all of they’ve said of their current life, their work, their time, their goals. They don’t want to say it, for fear that admitting it will make them look weak.

“I know it’s silly,” one girl said. “I know. But…” She hesitated, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I really just want to be married. To raise some kids. To take care of a home.” She’s almost embarrassed by the time she’s finished saying the sentiment. As if admitting it has made any impressive strength and wit she had fade away into a pile of proverbial laundry and dishes. As if she’s ashamed for wanting something so “trivial” and simple. “Is that silly? I mean, it’s really all I really want to do.”

We’ve gone so far down the road of feminism that we’ve forgotten how to proudly be feminine. You want to carry a child in your bones and lay down your life for them for more than 18 years? You want to lay down your life and learn to die to self for the rest of your life? You want to serve someone with all your heart, body, and soul? You want to master the art of cooking for a crowd and have clean clothes and end each day knowing that there’s a group of people who look to you as one of their anchors and rocks? You want to work your tired body from dawn to dusk for love?

How silly it is not. How trivial is no way to describe it.

I wish we loved the strength it takes for a woman to become a wife and a mother. We marvel at her physical strength when she births a child. But we forget what invisible strength she shows when she lays down her life for her home every day after that. Social media spends all its energy telling women to remember who they are, to fight for their sacred spaces, to become the women they want to be. All things that feel confusing when you’re holding a newborn baby and learning to forget your self-centeredness, to allow others into your personal space, and to become the woman that you are becoming and not who you thought you’d be.

I wish that as a culture we understood what happens in those four walls when two adults decide to sacrifice for one another, be good stewards of their money, welcome in guests, and raise a generation to know the heritage of the Lord. I wish we called it more than a contract, an agreement, or even a commitment to vows. I wish we called it holy, beautiful, other-worldly.

We’ve tried to make it easy. We’ve updated our lives with gadgets and gizmos aplenty. We’ve made our machines smarter. We’ve made our cleaning supplies more time efficient. We’ve scrubbed the hard work right out the door. We don’t even need to meal plan or grocery shop anymore. Fresh groceries can show up at our door, pre-measured, pre-planned, ready to go to the table within 30 minutes.

We’ve turned our properties into museums. Instead of well-loved they are well-liked on social media and we’ve forgotten how to create a home; instead we curate a scene for those who will never step foot through our door. We’ve replaced hard conversations with texts.

We’ve told husbands and wives that the primary goal of their marriage is their own happiness. We’ve sold them the lie that once it gets hard, tired, menial, once it gets weary, someone raises their voice, or someone says something they regret, that we can get out with a white flag that says, “This just isn’t for me anymore.”

We’ve made love about sex. And sex about self.

When a woman says she wants to make dinner for her family, we crack a joke about June Cleaver and we laugh because who wants to waste their time with that? When a woman says she wants to stay home and raise children, we give a curt smile and say, “But what do you really want to do with your life?” And should she decide to pursue that, other women will be the first to look down their noses at her, tell her she’s not adding anything, that she’s slowing down progress.

As if giving up your life for others isn’t an incredible thing. We applaud heroes on the battlefield, social justice workers on the borderlines, desperate souls who risk everything for the ones they love.

But marriage? Motherhood? Small living? Psh. *eye roll* It’s 2019, right?

As if the woman who chooses such things has given up. As if her internal engine doesn’t weary. As if she’s not feeling incredibly alone because all of her 9–5 friends have opted for happy hours and bursting bank accounts while she empties herself for souls who need every ounce of her life.

Children have become the last resort. The final hurrah for a marriage that spends years “finding itself.” Career trumps caretaker. Independence is king. Personal happiness above that insane idea of laying it all down.

This is not to say that those who can’t have children, don’t have children, or aren’t married are inherently wrong. I’m just wondering if we have to speak so condescendingly about those who have said the hard “Yes” to the humbling and long-term work of marriage and family. Can we stop acting like they’ve chosen a simple and silly life? Can we stop talking about children like they’re soul-sucking, dream-killing, money-grabbing leeches on society? Can we stop treating wives and moms with the eye-rolling disdain that says, “Only the simple-minded woman would choose such an outdated path”?

We all buy into this narrative so much that when a 21-year-old girl sits across the table from me and tells me that she wants to be a mother, she blushes and gives a thousand caveats as to why she knows it’s not the optimal choice.

And yet—here’s what I know to be true. I’m nearly 36. I’ve carried two children in these bones and I’ve nursed them, held them, and wept over them, and because of them, I’ve planned meals for more than 10 years now for hungry bellies and bottomless pits. I’ve had seasons of scratching the bottom of empty bank accounts and seasons where I’ve forgotten to worry about money at all. I’ve forgotten myself entirely and sometimes thought of myself only and always too much.

Everyone in their 30s is talking about a rebirth and I’m still learning how to die.

But the souls that move in bodies in and around my home? They are a legacy and an investment that I do not ever regret giving it all for. When I’m weary and feeling empty, when my life goals feel lifetimes away and my body isn’t the one I hoped I’d have, I can promise you that I wouldn’t give them up for a thousand trips around the world, a perfect waistline, or a name linked to fame.

The world can forget me, but they will not.

Last summer, while the kids chased fireflies and the men smoked pipes, while the bonfire’s flames licked the edge of the summer sky, my friend turned to me and said: “Do you ever feel like you found the secret to happiness?” Her long legs crossed, a toddler tucked on her lap, she smiled. “You know—you see all these people out there chasing happiness? Adventure? Purpose? And do you think we’ve found it? Right here in our simple homes, good husbands, these kids…” she trailed off.

“I do think we’ve found it. It’s all right here,” I nodded back.

So, my dear friends, as the poet Wendell Berry said:

“…every day do something

that won’t compute. Love the Lord.

Love the world. Work for nothing.

Take all that you have and be poor.

Love someone who does not deserve it.”

And don’t blush for saying that’s all you really wanted anyway.



Why It’s Good to Be a Needy Person

By / Apr 16

Editor’s note: The following article was adapted by the author from his book Pour Out Your Heart: Discovering Joy, Strength, and Intimacy with God through Prayer (pp. 33–41). Pour Out Your Heart is available now from B&H Publishing and wherever books are sold.

I don’t watch much TV these days, so I rarely see any commercials anymore. But even I noticed that commercials in mid-2020 took on a totally new tone. This was, of course, in the midst of the Covid pandemic, and large corporations were scrambling to maintain their sales during a national lockdown. Let me remind you of the basic commercial script during these months.

Let’s say the product is Reese’s peanut butter cups. The scene opens with dramatic, inspiring music. There’s a sunrise, or sunset, we’re not sure. Children are dancing. They’re talking with grandma by video. Parents are smiling from their laptops. And the narrator, in a deep and reassuring voice, says: “In these uncertain times…now more than ever…we are resilient, we will make it through…nothing can stop us…Reese’s. You can eat them at home.”

Whatever the product, the message was the same. But immediately, an internal inconsistency was evident. “Nothing can stop us,” they would say. Well, Covid can stop us. “We will make it through.” Well, not everyone.

This was the problem revealed: We are needy creatures, and life is far more fragile than we realize. Denying this will do us no good. Trying to motivate ourselves to overcome is sure to run out of steam. For millions of people, Covid meant the death of loved ones, losing their jobs, financial hardship, strained relationships, political strife, church conflict, and persistent despair. (A more honest commercial would have been: “Everything is awful. There’s not much to say. But Reese’s might help you feel better for a few minutes.”)

To be “a needy person” is one of the great insults of our performance-based, success-oriented culture. But the truth is that we are creatures of need. There will never be a time when we are no longer in need.

And believe it or not, that’s a good thing. Jesus invites us—commands us, even—to acknowledge our need and bring it to God.

Why We’re Needy Creatures

We were designed to have needs long before sin and all its effects entered the world. Adam and Eve needed God for life. They needed God for provision. They needed God’s world as a home—a habitat in which they could live, move, multiply, and cultivate good things. To be needy, then, is not the same as being sinful. Further, even Jesus, in his humanity, experienced need.

When the Son of God came to earth, he came in need. He didn’t descend in glory. He didn’t come as a young adult, strong and well-educated and self-sufficient. He came as a baby. He spent nine months in Mary’s womb. He was completely dependent on others, like all other babies. Luke 2 says “he grew in wisdom and stature” as a young man. He was needy and dependent because he was fully human—as well as fully divine. He needed his Father’s presence; he needed food, water, and rest.

Not only did Jesus exhibit human neediness, he taught it. In his parables and teachings, Jesus shows us our need. Remember Jesus’s Beatitudes? If we could distill them down, they’d be this, simply put: Blessed are the needy, for they will be satisfied. In fact, it seems like Jesus came especially for those with the most significant, immediate needs (Luke 4:18–19).

To be human is to be in need. To resist your neediness is to dehumanize yourself and reject God’s design. We reject our neediness often out of pride, but also because we have a low view of our physical world, which is the environment by which God meets so many of our needs.

Being a Christian is not first about being a good person like Jesus. It’s about being the kind of needy, broken person that Jesus loves to forgive and heal and restore.  The needy receive forgiveness and respond in love. The proud tragically secure their own future—life without God. It’s haunting that Jesus lets the rich young ruler walk away from him; Jesus doesn’t pursue him (Matt. 19:16–22). Why? The young man has no need of Jesus. Or rather, he has no awareness of his need.

Could it be that Jesus doesn’t reluctantly meet our needs, but that he actually delights in meeting our needs? As the pastor Jon Tyson has said, “Jesus is drawn to your need.”

Jesus Is Drawn to Your Need

On one occasion, Jesus is moving through a crowd, and a synagogue ruler named Jairus approaches him and begs Jesus to heal his only daughter (Luke 8:42). Jesus is making his way through the crowd, headed for Jairus’s house, when a woman with great need interrupts him—she had had a chronic health issue for twelve years—and reaches out to touch Jesus’s clothes. Why? “Because she had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment. For she said, ‘If I touch even his garments, I will be made well’” (Mark 5:27–28). The result?

“Immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease” (Mark 5:29). Instantly, Jesus realizes power has gone out from him, and he stops to ask who had touched him. When the woman sees she can hide no longer, in a moment of great shame, she reveals her condition and approaches Jesus “with fear and trembling… and fell down before him, and told him the whole truth” (Mark 5:33). And—don’t miss this—she doesn’t do this in private. The crowds are still around. When she falls in front of Jesus and explains why she is making physical contact with him, we see that she “declared in the presence of all the people why she had touched him” (Luke 8:47). She is doing this in front of a massive gathering of people who will look down on her for her uncleanness and neediness. And yet Jesus raises her up out of her shame and says, “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be healed from your affliction” (Mark 5:34).

Now, pause and recognize the difference between these two individuals. Jairus was a man, a respected leader of the synagogue, a pillar of the Jewish community. This woman, who is not named in the story, is likely older, unmarried or widowed, and lacks any social status; even more, she’s chronically ill and unclean. Jairus stands at the center of Jewish life with so much influence; this woman cowers outside of it, with none. You’d expect Christ to be more drawn to Jairus’s need—after all, healing the daughter of a synagogue ruler would certainly circulate the news of Jesus like wildfire. Not to mention, Jairus isn’t the infected one. He’s still in good standing before the community. If the aim is ultimately to spread the good news and reveal Jesus as the divine Son of God, pushing past this woman and getting a move on to Jairus’s house would be the efficient and effective method for ministry growth. Draw near to the one in good standing—the guy with influence—right?

This woman, on the other hand, is the infected one. When Jesus realizes power has gone out from him, he could have just moved on to the more important ministry with the more important person on his schedule for the day. Why stop? Especially with such a “better” ministry opportunity waiting for him at Jairus’s house? And once he discovers the identity of the person who touched him, why address her further?  She got what she wanted, after all. Why linger even longer—long enough to call her daughter, and bless her in the sight of the crowd?

Because Jesus is drawn to need—in all its forms and from all kinds of people. And he can meet more than one at a time. He can be on his way to meeting one and make time to be interrupted by another. So, on the days you feel like your need isn’t as important as the next person’s, remember this woman and tell yourself the truth: Jesus is drawn to need, and he likes when you interrupt him with yours.

More than that, he’ll bless you for coming to him and telling him the whole truth about your needs. Of course, Jesus is the only one who can meet our deepest need—our need of forgiveness and salvation. But he’s drawn to all our needs because he is drawn to us in love.

When we come to Jesus with great need, he responds by giving us his full attention. It doesn’t matter where we stand in society. When we muster up all the faith we can, though we struggle to believe, Jesus stands ready to respond. When we realize we can hide no longer, he is ready to embrace us.

It’s good to be a needy person. Jesus loves to meet your needs.



Harnessing the Winds of Revival

By / Apr 7

Editor’s note: This article is taken from the introduction to C. H. Spurgeon’s Sermons (Expanding Ministry—Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit: 1861 to 1876, Volumes 7–22) in vol. 7, pp. v–vii and pp. xiv–xv. Used by permission of Reformation Heritage Books. This collection is now available for purchase.

The first seven years (1854–1861) of C. H. Spurgeon’s ministry in London were accompanied by a surprising revival. No one could have expected it. Through a nineteen-year-old country preacher, a dying congregation was revitalized, and hundreds—perhaps thousands—were converted under his ministry during those early years. Though only a few dozen were in attendance when Spurgeon first arrived at New Park Street in 1853, by 1861 membership was at 1,473, with thousands more regularly attending.

But revival also brought its challenges. During those years Spurgeon warned his congregation, “If the Lord sends his Spirit like a hurricane, it is ours to deal with skill with the sails lest the hurricane should wreck us by driving us upon some fell rock that may do us serious injury.”[1] Spurgeon had seen churches shipwrecked in the winds of revival.[2] One church boasted of taking in a hundred or so new members in a year, only to excommunicate eighty of them the following year for “disorderly conduct and forsaking the truth.”[3] Other churches were happy to swell their ranks but gave no thought as to how to disciple or engage their people in ministry.[4] Some self-proclaimed revivalists had begun resorting to new tactics and emotionalism, hoping to fabricate the work of the Spirit.[5] Even as Spurgeon experienced a revival in his church, he refused to compromise his theological and ecclesiological convictions. “Take care, ye that are officers in the church, when ye see the people stirred up, that ye exercise still a holy caution, lest the church become lowered in its standard of piety by the admission of persons not truly saved.”[6]

At the same time, Spurgeon did not want to let the winds of revival simply pass by. There was such a response to his preaching that he contemplated at one point becoming a traveling evangelist. But in his experience of itinerant preaching, it was hard to know what the long-term effect was. While preaching in an open field in Wales, Spurgeon describes how “the Spirit of God was poured upon us, and men and women were swayed to and fro under the Heavenly message.” Still, once the meeting ended, the people went their separate ways, and he would never see them again.[7]

While one must be careful not to let the winds destroy the ship, the skillful sailor will look for ways to harness that wind. But how does one harness the hurricane winds of revival? Spurgeon believed it was through the church. As converts gave credible professions of faith, they were brought into the membership of the church, where they could be cared for by the elders and discipled under the ministry of the word. Not only that, but these church members were then engaged in the work of ministry, in both caring for one another and bringing the gospel to the lost around them. Spurgeon’s effort to harness the winds of revival was represented by the building and opening of the Metropolitan Tabernacle in 1861. This magnificent new building that seated six thousand would become the base of operations for Spurgeon’s ministry for the next thirty years.

If the New Park Street Pulpit tells the story of a revival in London, then the Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit tells the story of the harnessing of that revival through an established and expanding church ministry. Like the previous volumes, they are a collection of the published Sunday morning sermons that were being preached week by week at the Metropolitan Tabernacle and then collected into a single volume at the end of each year. But just as God uses the preaching of the word to revive His people, He also uses it to sustain them and send them out. These sermons were the lifeblood of the Metropolitan Tabernacle, establishing that congregation in the word and providing the spiritual vitality needed for all the endeavors that would flow out of it.

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The stories from Spurgeon’s ministry are remarkable: the vast audiences, the sermons published, the pastors trained, the churches planted, the orphans fed, the missionaries sent out, and the battles fought, all on a vast scale that is hard to imagine. Truly, it was a surprising work of God. It must be remembered, however, that Spurgeon did not do all that alone. He was surrounded in this work by his congregation. These sermons are a reminder that what motivated and sustained these congregational efforts was not human creativity or industry but God working powerfully through the preaching of the gospel. Through these gospel-rich sermons, God brought many to repentance and faith, uniting them to the church and motivating their service.

Church growth experts today will have thousands of new ideas on how to grow a church and keep people engaged. Some of those ideas may be useful. But not if they come at the expense of this one central call of the minister: preach Christ. Spurgeon’s fruitful ministry stands as a stirring commendation to the power of faithful gospel preaching. That’s not to say we can ever presume a particular kind of result. Spurgeon’s story was a surprising and unique work of God in a particular historical context.

Still, those who preach the gospel faithfully can pray and expect that God’s word will not return void. In his one thousandth published sermon, from the parable of the prodigal son, Spurgeon stated the aim of his sermon, once again echoing his words at the opening of the Tabernacle and continuing in the themes that he had already preached thousands of times before:

My desire this morning shall be to put plainly before every sinner here the exceeding abundance of the grace of God in Christ Jesus, hoping that the Lord will find out those who are his sons, and that they may catch at these words, and as they hear of the abundance of the bread in the Father’s house, may say, “I will arise and go to my Father.”[8]

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[1] C. H. Spurgeon, New Park Street Pulpit (1855–1916; repr., Grand Rapids: Refor- mation Heritage Books, 2024), 4:167.

[2] Though in some of these cases, Spurgeon would have questioned whether a real, Spirit-wrought revival took place at all.

[3] Spurgeon, New Park Street Pulpit, 2:76.

[4] Spurgeon states, “Alas! there is such a thing as having a large addition to the church of men that are of no use whatever. Many an army has swelled its ranks with recruits, who have in no way whatever contributed to its might.” New Park Street Pulpit, 2:76.

[5] Spurgeon recounts, “I have heard of the people crowding in the morning, the afternoon, and the evening, to hear some noted revivalist, and under his preach- ing some have screamed, have shrieked, have fallen down on the floor, have rolled themselves in convulsions, and afterwards, when he has set a form for penitents, employing one or two decoy ducks to run out from the rest and make a confession of sin, hundreds have come forward, impressed by that one sermon, and declared that they were, there and then, turned from the error of their ways.” New Park Street Pulpit, 4:162.

[6] Spurgeon, New Park Street Pulpit, 4:167.

[7] C. H. Spurgeon, C. H. Spurgeon’s Autobiography: Compiled from His Diary, Letters, and Records, by His Wife and His Private Secretary (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1897–1900), 2:93–94.

[8] Spurgeon, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 17:386–87.