Day 1 – Love for the Word

By / Oct 1

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” – Colossians 3:16

Day 1 – Love for the Word

As we kick off the month of October and reflect on Pastor Appreciation Month, we are well aware of the challenges facing pastors in ministry. One of the greatest challenges is for pastors to continue to develop their love and passion for the Word amidst a world full of distractions. Today, let us pray that the Lord may grow our pastors’ love for His Word in the following ways:

  • Love for the Word
  • Commitment to know the Word
  • Renewal from the Word
  • Ability to share the Word in their daily lives
  • Trust in the truth of the Word

Prayer Prompt

Lord, I pray that my pastor (for a church member)/I (as a pastor) will grow in his love for your Word, that their passion to know you and your Word will strengthen, and that their love for your Word will pour out into their every day life…

*These prayers are a part of our series of prayers for pastors during Pastor Appreciation Month. A new prayer will release every morning throughout the month for pastors and their members to reflect on and pray.



The Local Church Is Your Spiritual Gifts Test

By / Sep 29

It is a good and noble pursuit to ask how God has gifted us to serve his church. We find a call for such assessment in Romans 12. Paul writes that believers are to “think with sober judgment” (v. 3) as they consider how to use their gifts in the body of Christ. However, the question remains how exactly we should assess spiritual gifting. How do we bring sober discernment to our modern membership classes and discipleship programs? Far too often, our answer is to hand out a survey or a spiritual gifts test and tally up the results. If you have ever taken one of these tests, you know the kinds of questions asked. “When you walk into a room, do you feel more compelled to pray with someone, stack chairs, write a check, or tell everyone else what they should do?” The test’s results might suggest that you have either the gift of encouragement, service, giving, or leadership based on how you answer. I certainly do not intend to mock these tests. I’ve taken them in the past, and they have been somewhat helpful in matching gifts with specific needs in the church.

However, the longer I’ve been in ministry, the more I’ve found how ineffective these tests are in actually discerning what a person’s spiritual gifts may be. In some ways, these tests have caused more harm than good. In this post, I want to question our use of spiritual gifts tests and suggest that we retire them altogether. However, whether you use them or not in the future, my primary goal is to highlight the place of the local church in assessing spiritual gifts accurately.

Three Reasons Spiritual Gifts Tests Do Not Work

First, the reality is that we are not sober-minded enough to spiritually assess ourselves. A person may think of themselves as a giving person. And yet, what they call “giving” may be a veiled cop-out from doing the more difficult labors in the church—such as greeting others, hosting a small group, mentoring youth, or teaching in the children’s ministry. The gift of giving requires more than a few PayPal transactions made on the first of the month. Instead, it is the evident commitment to give not just one’s money but his or her very life (time, energy, etc.) that proves the presence of the “giving” gift. I’m sure if we’d given them a spiritual gift exam, Ananias and Sapphira might have shown they had the spiritual gift of giving (Acts 5:1). Yet, the testing of their hearts revealed a very different reality. What at an initial glance might seem to be “sacrificial giving” was actually a blasphemous and prideful attempt to become self-important. It’s worth remembering that even our best actions may not be all that they seem. Therefore, we should never trust ourselves to assess ourselves.

Second, traditional spiritual gifts tests might foster complacency and, sometimes, pride. If I tested “positive” for one set of gifts, it might lead me to overlook or avoid other giftings. The idea begins to creep in that our hands are tied. “I’d help with A, B, and C, but unfortunately, God has gifted me for X, Y, and Z.” This is why Jim does not serve in the kindergarten class. Having taking a test, he seeks out more important roles because God has gifted him with the spiritual gifts of leadership and wisdom. Similarly, everyone knows that we shouldn’t ask Angelica to go on the mission trip. She’ll tell you directly that she’s not gifted with evangelism. If we’re honest, many of the traditional spiritual gifts tests reveal more about what we want to do rather than what we are gifted to do. However, true spiritual gifting sometimes means seeking out things we would not naturally want to do.

Finally, traditional spiritual gifts assessments have sometimes inadvertently provided believers justification for sin. Spiritual gifts tests tend to focus more on labeling a person’s actions rather than assessing their spiritual health. What I do and why I am doing it are both critical. For example, suppose in filling out a typical spiritual gifts inventory, I answer that I enjoy organizing things, leading events, or managing people. In that case, the test is sure to suggest that I might have the spiritual gift of leadership. However, it does not help me discern whether my desire to lead is healthy or truly deriving from the Spirit’s leadership. Maybe, I want to lead because I struggle with domineering over people. Why I want to lead is just as important as my propensity to lead.

However, a spiritual gifts test typically does not provide such nuances. It only affirms or suggests whether I “have” the leadership gift. The result is that I now have a verbal defense to explain why I might tend to boss other people around. “My spiritual gifts test said I have the gift of leadership.” Ultimately, a propensity to dominate over others is easily shrouded in the rhetoric of leadership gifting. This lack of motivational discernment happens in the other gifts as well. How many times have suspicion and gossip been cloaked as “discernment”? Mercy can become an excuse to avoid biblical conflict. Exhortation may become a rationale for angry tirades and accusations, and the gift of knowledge may be offered as a “justification” for a person speaking as an arrogant know-it-all.

While I readily admit that none of us employ our spiritual gifts perfectly, I think we are too quick in justifying specific sins as a misadministration of spiritual gifting. Sin is deceptive and always looks for a disguise, even if it must wear the guise of a spiritual gift. However, sin is still sin and should not be mislabeled as the inevitable downside to a few specific Spirit-borne gifts. Suspicion may cloak itself as discernment, but pull back the hood, and you’ll only find the ugly face of divisiveness. A propensity to domineer may wear the mask of leadership. Still, when the mask falls off, we do not find a true Spirit-led leader but a sinful autocrat. When it comes to true spiritual gifts (i.e., Spirit-given gifts), the Holy Spirit superintends and governs the gift. Any sin we bring to the table comes from the residual sin in our hearts, not from God’s gifts. Spiritual gifts assessments have at times been used to justify “quirkiness” that comes from various gifts instead of commending sanctification and repentance.

A Better Assessment

What if I were to tell you that there is a tried and proven spiritual gifts assessment, and it is not found on any written survey or exam? For generations, the only effective means of assessing one’s spiritual gifts has been the local church. If you want to know your gifts, then commit to serving alongside other Spirit-led Christians on a consistent basis. Proximity and exposure to ministry inevitably reveal how the Lord has uniquely equipped you to serve his people. It’s in the trenches of missional life that one’s spiritual gifts are accurately tested. An accurate assessment comes with extended time spent in the ministry, as well as a substantial number of difficulties and challenges that demonstrate the existence of a specific gift. For example, it is impossible to tell who has the gift of mercy until a person has demonstrated a consistent concern to show mercy even when helping people means sacrificing convenience. “Testing” requires challenges, and to be challenged you first have to get involved. In facing the challenges of day-to-day church life, we begin to see who we are and how God has gifted us.

In addition to engaging in ministry, we must also open ourselves up to the loving and honest evaluation of others. God’s gifts can and should be affirmed by those around us. It is by undergoing the risk of honest assessment from those who love us that we can accurately determine how God has equipped us for specific spiritual work. Is my aptitude to teach a genuine gift or is it a cloaked means to build a platform? Do I truly have the gift of giving, or am I using it as a smokescreen to fund my laziness? Has God truly gifted me with exhortation, or am I just using that term “gift” as a license to berate others? The only way of knowing is by committing ourselves to the risky and, oftentimes, painful business of gospel-centered community. When we allow ourselves to be surrounded by people who are not all that impressed by what we do or easily duped by our façade, we can finally differentiate the dross of sin from the true spiritual gift. That said, the local church is your spiritual gifts test. It is only by being members of the body that we find out what specific function—whether it be an eye, a hand, or a foot—we play in the body (1 Corinthians 12:12-10).

Take all the paper exams you want; but until you finally commit yourself to a body of believers, you will never know how God has gifted you to serve them.



The Good News of Great Joy

By / Sep 29

Ultimate

I want you to see what is ultimate, true, and good in your life. And before you jump to conclusions, let me just say – it’s not you. Ultimately, what is most important in your life is not your home or health, your family or finances. These things are certainly important, but the universe will go on if these things don’t. What is ultimate is God Himself. And while much could be said about God, what must be said is that He is completely satisfied in Himself, filled with life, as a communion of three persons, a unity of three – or Trinity. The Trinity is not a complex math problem or philosophical conundrum; it simply means that the Father loves the Son in the Spirit.[1] And because God, as Trinity, is complete in Himself, He needs nothing to make Himself happier or more satisfied or more complete; He always is full of life and full of love.

The Father’s love for the Son is so full in fact, that it overflowed to create all things after the likeness of His Son – so that the whole world would be filled with the beauty of the Son! Each aspect of creation perfectly reflects the Son’s resplendence in its own unique way. In this way, the Father was showcasing what He admires most, His Son! The world would be filled with perfect reflections of the Son, the very image of God, and the Son would be magnified throughout the world as His excellencies shine forth to the ends of the earth through all things. The Father intended all of creation to be a gift to the Son, expressing His deep delight in the Son and displaying in great detail the intricate beauty inherent in the Son through creation.[2]

And, when He created all things, we can know that His actions were completely altruistic – or completely unselfish – because there is nothing that creation could have offered Him that He didn’t already have. He simply desired everyone to see and everything to show how good it was to love the Son.

And the Bible says the Son acted with the Father in creation, working inseparably with the Father and the Spirit. His creative work was fueled by love, because He knew that in creation the great love of the Father would be displayed for all to see, and everyone would know how great it was to be loved by the Father. And the pinnacle of creation was man and woman, Adam and Eve. They were designed to be God’s representatives on earth to carry out this divine mandate of establishing His garden paradise as the beautiful showroom where the full display of His love would be evident for all to see. Adam and Eve were meant to extend this paradise to the ends of the earth so the whole world would be filled with the image of God as they bore fruit and multiplied and cultivated the earth in light of this divine mandate; and in turn, all would experience the magnitude of His love.

This is what is ultimate, that we would find our life in the divine life of God, participating in the very life and love of the Trinity.

And this is the way the story of time began.

Adam, having received His command, was placed in the garden to begin his good work. Upon successful completion of his mission, he as mankind’s representative would usher all of humanity into an eternal age of knowing and enjoying God as their source and foundation for eternal bliss and happiness, like we were meant to.

If he failed, though, and disobeyed the High King’s command, the punishment was exile – separation from Him who is the source of all things good, true, and beautiful, which would result in death – not only for Him, but for all His posterity and descendants after Him. As they say, “As goes the king, so goes the people.” And if our experience tells us anything about reality, we know which path our representative took (the same one we would have!).

True

In a cosmic rebellion, Adam and Eve committed treason against God as High King. Refusing to enjoy eternal communion with God as their source of all things good and happy, they took their happiness into their own hands. They failed to realize though, that the happiness they sought was unattainable apart from Him. God designed humans in such a way that all that our heart most truly desires can only be satisfied through communion with Him. Fullness of life can only be found in Him; and now, Adam and Eve had detached all of mankind from the only source of life.

This reminds me of learning to drive stick shift on the bush roads of Madagascar. Our vehicle was designed to be operated in a specific way; only then would its purpose truly flourish. No matter how hard I tried to shift the stick to the next gear, the subsequent grinding noise told me that I was only damaging the vehicle (and frustrating the stew out of myself!). My failure to operate the vehicle the way it was designed had twin effects: an internal dissatisfaction and a path toward destruction for the vehicle (which I can unfortunately attest).

The same is true of our lives. God designed our lives to be lived in a specific way – namely, in communion with Him – and only in this way will we experience human flourishing. All other paths lead to a lack of fulfillment, dissatisfaction, and ultimately the destruction of death.

Adam and Eve failed to realize that their mistake not only plunged them into separation from God, but, as the representatives for all mankind, they plunged the entire human race into separation. If we probe our hearts enough, we intuitively know that we are cut from the same cloth as Adam and Eve, constantly seeking to base our happiness and source of life on things much lesser than communion with God.

And since God is holy, sinners cannot dwell in His presence and live. Just as a bright light extinguishes all the darkness in a room, God would effectively extinguish, so to speak, all sinners if brought into His presence.

To say it another way, the severity of our punishment for sin is in direct proportion to the value of the One sinned against.

For example, say I keyed a car. My action of scratching a brand-new BMW at the car dealer would invoke a greater punishment than the same action against a beater at the junk yard. In a much more infinite way, then, the slightest sin against the One who is most holy and infinitely valuable would rightly invoke an equally infinite punishment. The punishment fits the crime.

So infinite is our punishment in fact, that our finite selves can’t hope to pay it back to God for our redemption. Our problem is God-sized; and a God-sized problem requires a God-sized solution.

This is where the good news comes in.

Good

The good news is Jesus Christ Himself. Out of no obligation in Himself or to us, God sent Jesus Christ into this world to save sinners. Up to this point, mankind had only seen one representative – the first man, Adam. But now the King Himself was coming into the world to renew all things and establish His Kingdom as He intended in the beginning. God was coming into the world to give us a new and better representative, One who wouldn’t fail us and could restore us to the communion with God we were designed for.

This was the God-man, Jesus Christ. As truly God, born of a virgin, He possessed the infinite value we needed for a hope of redemption; and as truly man, He could identify with us and suffer and die for us. Only He could pay the infinite price we owed!

Jesus Christ came into this world so that – in His life, death, resurrection, and ascension – we could be made one with God again. He was restoring us to the life and happiness we experienced with Him in the garden, and continuing His original plan for this world to be filled with the glory of God.

The saying remains true with this new representative, “As goes the King, so goes the people.” But rather than coming under this new representative by birth, as with Adam, we become His people by faith. And through faith in this representative, we are redeemed. All that is true of Jesus becomes true of us. His perfect life and status of righteousness becomes ours. His death on the cross and its payment for sin becomes ours. His resurrection from the dead and inherent power for a new life becomes ours. His ascension to heaven and presence before God becomes ours. Again, all that is true of Jesus becomes true of us by faith. And all that was true of me; namely my sin and debt and shame, were taken by Christ, paid for, and jettisoned from my life.

Just like a marriage between a prince and a pauper, He takes my debt and shame and gives me His status as a child, access to His bank accounts, and brings me into His home.

And He does all of this by the gift of faith and repentance.

Response

Rather than merely an intellectual exercise as some may claim or a matter of willpower, faith is seeing and savoring all the excellencies of God in Christ and resigning yourself completely from all other pursuits for worth, value, and purpose. When you see this for the first time, you begin to realize, “He is all my heart has been longing for.” And rather than trying to continue on in life with your old operating system bent on performing or pretending your way toward an exhausted emptiness, you simply collapse into faith in Jesus and allow Him to be for you all your heart most deeply desires and needs.

This experience of saving faith is so formative that the Bible speaks of it as a new birth. In other words, when this happens for you and you see these things to be not only true, but true for you (and good!), you respond, “my life as I know it is over.” In a very real sense, your old life dies.

And you begin to realize, that “far from this being a sad state of affairs, this turns out to be the best news you’ve ever heard. Nobody can blame a corpse, especially not the corpse itself. Once dead, we are free from the blame speakers and guilt spreaders forever and fire from the messes we’ve made of our own lives. And in this state, God raised the dead, not on the condition of reform, but by sheer grace.”[3]

These phrases the Bible uses – new birth, life from death, sight to the blind – all describe the reality that everything from now on will be different as we live life in light of this glorious, good news.

And now, with this new faith, we follow this man Jesus Christ in all of life. Our new operating principle for life is called faith as a disciple (or apprentice) of Jesus. In other words, a disciple of Jesus is someone who is learning to submit all of life under the leadership of Jesus.[4]

And so, faith is not merely a one-moment decision that impacts eternity, but it’s a life of trust – a moment-by-moment turning to God in trust in our normal, everyday experiences.

The reality is – if you try to build your joy on anything less than Jesus, you will never experience the happiness you desire. But if you reject building your joy on anything less than Him, which the Bible calls idolatry, and instead yield to Him, you will then find the joy you were after in the first place in abundance.

This is the good news of the gospel.

As I’ve heard Tim Keller say before, ultimately, “the gospel is this – that I am more sinful than I ever dared imagine, but more loved and accepted in Christ than I ever dared hope.”[5]

And if you’ve never believed that before, I want to invite you to rest in Jesus who by virtue of His atoning death, is able to forgive and save all those who put their trust in Him. If you haven’t done that, your representative is still Adam – the first man – and your future is an eternal separation from the source of life and all things good.

You need Jesus. And He offers Himself to you. And if you would receive Him today by trusting in Him, you are promised all the benefits of His death secured for His people, and life forever with Him.

In possessing Christ through faith, you possess all things – a new family, a new identity, a new life, a new status, a new power, and so much more. Christ is all your heart most deeply desires, so come to Him by faith and find Him to satisfy every longing you could possibly have.

–

[1] Inspired from Glen Scrivener’s 3-2-1 Gospel Presentation

[2] Inspired from Michael Reeves, Delighting in the Trinity

[3] Robert Farrar Capon, The Romance of the Word

[4] Jeff Vanderstelt, on several occasions

[5] Tim Keller, on several occasions



Zion’s Cultural Heritage

By / Sep 28

During my college years I traveled extensively, as a result I experienced a variety of cultures. The hospitality of Egypt, with cups full of Maghrebi, mint tea heavily laden with sugar; or the extended Italian meals that feature aperitivo, first and second Piatti, followed by a strong digestivo. I danced with Malawians at the celebration of a wedding, listening to the steady rhythm of a musical heritage built on drumbeat. I was captivated by history and fables woven seamlessly together in the dim lighting of an Irish pub. I have celebrated my own inherited culture over meals of the strange fish and potato heavy food of Norway, and listened to my grandmother reciting nursery rhymes in German. Though varied, these cultures are all cultivated by the same basic elements: food, music, and story.

In these cross-cultural experiences I also had the delight of worshiping alongside brothers and sisters in Christ. It was there I saw the thread of a common culture that superseded any national boundaries. I listened to Arabic hymns, shared the Lord’s supper alongside my Malawian brothers and sisters, and heard the word of God preached in Italian. I found more in common with brothers and sisters across the world than with those who do not know Christ within my own neighborhood.

Why is this? How could I stand in a church in Cairo, without a word spoken in English, and feel just as at home as when I stand in my church in North Carolina? How could I listen to hymns sung in a tongue I did not comprehend and yet understand the tone of worship beneath them? It is because we in the church have a shared cultural identity. We too have all three elements of culture: food, music, and story. Our food is the blood and body of Christ. Our music is the psalms, as well as hymns, new and old. Our story is the unfolding plan of redemptive history, culminating in the person and work of Jesus Christ, our Savior. We are truly a city set on a hill (Matthew 5:14). We are a new people. We are a new nation with its own unique culture. We are Zion. This new national heritage supersedes the disparate backgrounds of its multicultural members. In Christ we are truly citizens of a different kingdom. This new culture in Christ ties us to centuries of Christians before us and is indifferent to borders or ethnicities, and it will exist into eternity. We ought to treasure it above all else, and joyfully cultivate it and pass it on with more zeal than our genetic heritage.

Does this mean that our past cultures disappear? Is my individual cultural heritage absorbed and eradicated as I put on the new cultural identity of the church? Certainly not. But it ought to be rightly ordered, well beneath my new citizenship in Zion. This is the beautiful truth that Peter helps us understand:


    But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. 1 Peter 2:9-10

Often when we think of the church’s culture, we think of our more recent history in the west. Western civilization owes much to the extension of the church’s cultural heritage; our hospitals, schools, concern for the disenfranchised, and ethical foundation exist because of the church’s obedience to Christ and resulting influence. Yet, while the western world has produced a powerful expression of church culture, the essential components have existed long before. Our church culture predates western civilization. We hail back to ancestry from the beginning of time. We are Adam’s descendants, the man who walked with God. We tell the story of his fall, and the subsequent epic of God’s rescue. We are the offspring of Eve, the mother of all living, and like our mother we know enmity with the wicked one. We have Abraham as our father, and are his heirs by faith (Romans 4:16). We are of the line of the noble and courageous midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, who feared God and so defied Pharaoh, refusing to murder babies at their birth. We sing Moses’ song, and Mary’s Magnificat. We pray King David’s prayers through the Psalms as we too toil and struggle in our walk with God. We call the martyr Stephen our brother–marveling at his steadfastness and love for his enemies as they stoned him to death. We sympathize with Peter’s rashness and failures, yet aim to follow his lead in repentance and fearlessly following Christ. We share kinship with Titus’ mother and grandmother, women, who through their faith and mothering care, helped prepare him for the pastorate.

Perpetua is our sister and we seek to emulate her courage in facing the Roman arena where she was torn apart by wild beasts for her refusal to denounce Christ. We stand in the tradition of Augustine, intellectually brightening our faith and countering the claims of culture; and Marguerite de Navarre who leveraged her position to protect persecuted Christians and paved the way for religious liberty in France. Ours is a legacy that follows the Englishman, Hudson Taylor, in his faithful founding of the China Inland Mission; and Pandita Ramabai, our sister in Christ who sought to share the gospel in her home country, India, and abolish the dehumanizing caste system. We recite creeds and confessions written by brothers long dead (but now alive again with Christ). We sing songs written centuries before us, and we add to our musical legacy with hymns and songs of our own. Our cultural food is the Bread of Life himself, the meal we share in remembrance of him.

We, as God’s people, have a fully developed, time-honored culture that exists in our food, music and story. And we are known by this cultural identity. As we cultivate and impart this culture to the next generation it ought to do what every living and thriving culture does: spread and extend into all facets of life.

Our culture ought to invoke work that is centered in humble service, that has its eyes set on the kingdom to come. It ought to expose a love that is rooted in the One who loved us first, compelling a deep love for one another that extends beyond ethnic or familial bonds, recognizing the brothers and sisters of the faith as our eternal family. It ought to lead to a death that is resolved in its submission to the authority of God, following a life lived in service to others, and at peace with any circumstance, including profound suffering or persecution. As Christ said, we will be known for our love for one another (John 13:35). Our heritage, our loyalty, our love must be for Christ’s church before all else.

This is our culture. It is the culture of every individual who makes up the community of the church, whether Cree or Malawian, Palestinian or Norwegian, Chinese or Mexican, British or Russian, Indonesian or Brazilian. The church’s ability to retain her distinctive culture, otherworldly in its single-minded kingdom aims, and united across national and ethnic lines in its devotion to the King of kings, will breathe life into the world around us simply by doing what the church is called to do: obeying and worshiping our God. As we sing songs new and old, continually tell the story of our redemption, and regularly remember Christ in the bread and cup, we will flourish and grow. We will be a city set on a hill, a light that cannot be extinguished.



Episode 179: Cameron Cole on Gospel-Centered Youth Ministry

By / Sep 28

On this episode of the FTC Podcast, Jared Wilson visits with Cameron Cole, chairman of Rooted Ministries, about the state of student ministry in American evangelicalism and what greater gospel-centrality in these ministries would look like.



Surgeons of the Soul

By / Sep 27

One day when we lived in New York City, I was in a hurry to get from one meeting to the next. The first step to getting there was to descend to the lobby from the twenty-eighth floor of the building where my first meeting took place. I was joined on the elevator by a mother and her young daughter, who smiled at me and said, “Watch this!” Then, with a mischievous look on her face she proceeded to press every single button on the elevator wall like Buddy the Elf.

Needless to say, I was late to my next meeting. Thirty-five minutes late, to be exact. But even worse than being late was when the girl’s mother looked at me, after her little cherub punched the buttons that would cause the elevator to stop at every floor between us and the lobby, one by one—and said to me, “Isn’t she just the cutest thing you’ve ever seen?”

Everything in me wanted to say, “Truthfully, ma’am, right now your daughter is the furthest thing from that.” Instead, I held my tongue and offered a weak, disingenuous smile.

Several years later, I am still mystified by the mother’s response to her daughter’s act. Why didn’t the mother stop the little girl from pushing all those buttons? Why didn’t she treat it as an opportunity to teach her child about self-control, sensitivity to others, and the value of time? Furthermore, why didn’t I—though a stranger to both of them—do the mother a small kindness by responding honestly, “Well, since you asked, I wonder if you might think differently about her actions if you knew that as a result, I’m now going to be very late to an important meeting.”

I passed up this opportunity to help a young mother parent her (possibly spoiled) daughter in a healthier way in the same way we all pass up such opportunities on a regular basis: We don’t see them as opportunities. Truth be told, most of us don’t value this kind of redemptive truth-telling because we are cowardly. The drive to be liked compels us to not rock the boat, even when rocking the boat can potentially keep the boat from sinking.

I wonder if this is why so many Christians don’t regularly tell others about the good news of the gospel. We have such good news in our possession of grace, truth, beauty, and everlasting Paradise offered to all who anchor their trust in the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Is it because we don’t think it will be received as good news? Are we afraid it will offend someone and rock the boat? Consider, however, the following words from atheist, illusionist, and comedian, Penn Jillette:

“I don’t respect people who don’t proselytize. I don’t respect that at all. If you believe that there’s a heaven and hell and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life or whatever, and you think that it’s not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkward… How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?” [1]

If an outspoken atheist would take issue with the lack of courage that prevents many Christians from speaking the truth about God and about life, how much more should those of us who are Christians take issue with the same? And yet, this isn’t always the case.

While none of us wants to run around telling other people what’s wrong with them, it is a mistake to think that never offering critique—especially a humble one—is a loving thing. In fact, sometimes love requires that we stand up and in humble boldness speak hard words to those whom we love. I believe this is what David and Paul both meant—at least in part—when they said that believers should be angry, but sin not (Psalm 4:4; Ephesians 4:26).

Anger toward sin in particular, though a negative emotion, should be motivated by positive love for those caught in it—similar to a surgeon who uses a scalpel on a patient with cancer. The surgeon will cut into the patient not because she is against the patient, but because she is for him. Passionate for his restoration to health and longevity, she is against—even angry toward—the cancer that could cut his life short.

In a similar way, there is an appropriate and necessary anger that must be nurtured in our hearts toward the sin in ourselves and others. As we channel our anger in this way—as we correct and rebuke one another not as with a sword to destroy, but as with a scalpel to heal—we become channels of God’s love toward one another. Yes, love and anger go together. Both are necessary for the redemptive exchange that must take place between flawed sinners when one or both is “caught” in transgression (Galatians 6:1-2). Consider these words from Rebecca Manly Pippert:

“We tend to be taken aback by the thought that God could be angry… We take pride in our tolerance of the excesses of others. So what is God’s problem… But love detests what destroys the beloved. Real love stands against the deception, the lie, the sin that destroys… ‘the more a father loves his son, the more he hates in him the drunkard, the liar, the traitor…’ Anger isn’t the opposite of love. Hate is, and the final form of hate is indifference… To be truly good one has to be outraged by evil.”[2]

Over the years, as a pastor I have had to preach hard words against the sin and foolishness to which we are all susceptible. As one who is called to preach the word of God “in season and out of season” (2 Timothy 4:2) and to use God-breathed Scripture to “teach, correct, rebuke, and train” my flock in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16-17), confronting sin is not an optional endeavor.

In my role as pastor—and also in my life as a Christian—over the years I have also had to arrange private meetings, and in some more serious and ongoing cases, group interventions, to challenge behaviors that dishonor God, that damage community, and that disorient those who are caught in transgression.

These uncomfortable occasions have challenged sins like gossip, slander, divisiveness, aggression, sexual immorality, marital unfaithfulness, financial impropriety, greed, narcissism, and more. In some of these conversations, God has worked to bring about repentance in those I have confronted. In other conversations, the other person responded in kind—opening my eyes to things that I, too, have needed to repent of. And sadly, other conversations have led to strained or even broken relationships.

I suppose what I’m trying to say here is that the “faithful wounds” God sometimes calls us to inflict on one another as mutual “surgeons of the soul”—always as with a healing scalpel and never as with an injurious sword—can sometimes create further relational strain.

And yet, because God’s thoughts and ways are higher than ours, we must hold out hope that God remains at work. We must also remember that it is an unspeakable privilege to participate with God in one another’s redemption stories, for “he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins” (James 5:20).

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published at scottsauls.com. 



My Only Comfort

By / Sep 27

My back hurts almost all the time now. It starts when I wake up. I turn on my left side to stop the alarm from waking my wife and notice the slight twinge of discomfort. If I am not careful, laying there on my pillow with my head tilted the wrong way will prepare me for a day of nagging ache.

I suppose this is part of what it means to grow old. Pain comes more quickly—if it ever really leaves. Like the birds of morning and the crickets of night, the noise of pain exists in an ever-present state, sitting in the background of everything else going on. The difference, of course, is no one considers the pain beautiful. No one stops to listen to the pain. What’s the point? It only makes it stronger.

When I finally put that first foot on the floor and rouse myself from the warmth and comfort of the bed, the pain moves to my heels. When I sit down with my coffee to read in my leather chair, the back pain returns. It is dulled only by the thoughts racing through my brain of the upcoming day. The meetings, the problems, the conversations, the projects, all of it sitting on my shoulders. I am Atlas without the strength to bear it.

However, even a bad day for me is a better day by far than most in the world both now and before. I am, after all, starting my day in a warm bed and with hot coffee. I drive a nice car to a well-paying job with enough challenges for a lifetime. I am surrounded by people who require only my attention and effort. I go home to a big family with a good dinner. Seven months out of twelve, Major League Baseball is in season. It is not a bad life. Not by a long shot.

But the pain is still there. Life is good, but it is not easy.

The right attitude would help, I’m sure. Gratitude would make a world of difference, I know. I get there sometimes. I force myself into it. But it doesn’t remove the ache. It doesn’t solve the problems. Seeing the good side doesn’t make the bad side less real. It doesn’t shine it up enough to camouflage it from the rest of life. Even the best days have some bad in them. Even the biggest laughs hurt if you go on long enough. I am grateful for all the varied gifts each day prepares and delivers. I am not depressed—at least, I don’t think I am. I still know well the feeling of hope and joy. But the sun sets on the best of days. All things are full of good, yes, but also of weariness. Life goes on. We age, we hurt, we die, and nothing will stop that progression.

I have no doubt what I have said so far is true. We all feel it. If you don’t yet, it’s probably because you’re not old enough. Give it time. This world reveals itself for the broken thing it is.

Is there any wisdom in what I am saying? That is the real question. Do I see things as they are and live within those boundaries, or am I merely complaining about things that I have no reason to?

The Preacher of Ecclesiastes is my only hope in answering that question. As far as I know, I have not said anything he did not say. In fact, I have held back. I have not (yet, anyway) proclaimed it all meaningless (Eccl. 12:8). I have not (yet, anyway) made much of the vanity of it all. God knows deeper than I ever will the truth of the matter.

Perhaps you have felt the way I do right now. Where do we go then, when the days are an endless cycle of discomfort, and we look ahead only to greater pain in the future? Our best days, we sense in some way or another, may be behind us. I will never move the way I did in my youth. A good night’s sleep is something I’d gladly pay for if I could, but I can’t. A great restaurant will eventually disappoint. A sunrise in all its beauty only reminds me of the day ahead full of toil and trouble. What is the point of it all? When it ends up in the coffin, what can life amount to?

The answer is difficult to find. Hope in an increasingly hopeless world is shrouded in mystery. But it is there. It is real. It is available. It is a gift—and that is the thing we must all remember. Hope is not something we can muster up from within. Our greatest hopes are never enough for the bigness of our hearts. Life will always let us down. We must look beyond ourselves, this world, and all we see and touch and smell and hear and taste. The hope that props up the world is not visible to our earthly eyes. No wonder it’s hard to see.

Our only comfort in life is that we may belong to another. If we are our own, our demise is a welcome thing. Finally, the trouble is ended. The pain will stop. But if we are not our own, our problems lie in the hands of someone else. We have an end to which we are headed. There is a solution to all our problems. There is one who cares even when we struggle to anymore. There is one who makes it all matter, who gives it all deep meaning.

The Heidelberg Catechism is ultimately right. What is your only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death—to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ.

My faithful Savior. Though everything else ultimately will, Jesus will not let me down. I am his, and he doesn’t fail.



Missing God’s Word While Preaching God’s Words

By / Sep 26

Did you know that the Bible never refers to itself as God’s Word?

Before you tear your robes and stone me for heresy, I do believe that “all scripture is God-breathed and profitable” (2 Tim. 3:16). And I do believe that the words we find in our Bibles are indeed God’s words.

But God’s words are different from God’s Word. If we read God’s words in the Bible, we see the term God’s “Word” consistently referring to two things.

  • God’s “Word” is God’s overarching message—-His history-long self-revelation (like God’s sayings, decrees, prophecies, etc.; e.g. Matt. 7:24; John 14:10).
  • God’s “Word” is Jesus—the incarnate Word (e.g. John 1:1-14; Col. 1:19).

Of course, the Bible is a primary means by which we can know God’s message and God’s Son, but we must distinguish between the two concepts.

Because God’s words, rightly read, point us toward God’s Word.

This “words/Word” distinction may seem like a matter of semantics. But in truth, it is a vital distinction for every follower of Jesus—for both a theological reason and a practical one.

A Theological Understanding of God’s Word

Theologically, rightly defining God’s Word helps us rightly understand God. And as we do, His message and His Son become even more glorious. For example:

  • “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth,” Jesus prays (John 17:17). While Scripture is true and helpful, only Jesus sanctifies us. This happens as we increasingly rely on Him, as His Spirit leads us to apply the truth of His good news to all of life.
  • “The word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow…” says Hebrews 4:12 (NIV). This verse is often understood to be about the Bible itself. But the chapter explains how God’s people enter God’s rest. The Bible doesn’t work so we can rest; God does! Hebrews 4:13-16 clearly describes our reliance on Jesus in our weakness: He is our high priest; in Him alone we have confidence. Because of Jesus, not the Bible, we rest in God’s grace, now and forever. Further, by His Spirit, Jesus is the “active” presence of God in the world today! Our faith in Jesus is humanity’s dividing line (“double-edged sword”).
  • Hebrews 4:12 also says that the Word “judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.” The Bible shows the standard by which God will judge, but Jesus—God’s Word—is our judge. The Bible can’t know our heart; Jesus does. This verse is about Jesus and the good news of the gospel, not about Scripture itself.

Again, I firmly believe that God inspired the words of the Bible and that regularly engaging with the Bible is a vital aspect of Christian living. But we must rightly understand what the Bible says about God’s Word, His message, and His Son lest we attribute to the Bible itself that which rightly belongs to the Father, Son, and Spirit.

A Practical Understanding of God’s Word

As any good theology should, a right interpretation of “Word” overflows into our life and ministry. Practically, every time we preach—or even read—the Bible, this distinction invites us to seek God’s Word, even as we read God’s words. I once heard someone say that the Bible is simply a windshield; our goal is to look through it to see God clearly. If we become obsessed with the windshield, we miss what really matters.

For example, when the Apostle Paul exhorts Timothy to “preach the word” (2 Tim. 4:2), he doesn’t just mean to “help people understand the literal words on the page,” even though that’s today’s common interpretation. Rather, and with a proper grasp of the Greek in which he wrote his letter, Paul charges his protégé, “Preach THE Word! Preach the heart of God’s message [as Paul did; see Acts 20:27]! Preach the gospel! Preach Jesus!” It’s not enough to exposit a biblical text and explain its face-value meaning. Rather, we must preach the good news of Jesus—the one message—from every text. (This concept and the Bible’s use of rhéma and logos are fleshed out in my Reading the Bible, Missing the Gospel [Moody Publishers, 2022].)

In this example and dozens of others, understanding God’s Word matters, for life and ministry. So we can ask two questions as we read the words of the Bible to find God’s Word through them:

  • First, how does every story, command, and verse in the passage fit within God’s larger, history-long message?
  • Second, how does every story, command, and verse we read point us to Jesus?

If we fail to look through the Bible’s words to God’s Word, we can read or teach the Bible in a way that it becomes about “me” (my knowledge, my emotions, my self-improvement) or a new Law (my ability to obey or follow rules [which we know we can’t do!]). There are commands, knowledge, and emotion in the Bible. But these flow out of God’s message (God’s revealed Word) and are exemplified by Jesus and empowered by His Spirit in us (God’s incarnate Word).

Jesus’ Understanding of God’s Word

Perhaps Jesus’ own words are the best place to close. In rebuking religious leaders of His day, He explains the difference between their study of God’s words and the power of God’s Word. Though these leaders’ entire lives revolved around studying Scripture, Jesus claims in John 5:37-38, “[God’s] voice you have never heard, his form you have never seen, and you do not have his word abiding in you, for you do not believe the one whom he has sent.” In other words, “you’re missing God’s true revelation, though you study His words.”

Then comes the pinnacle of His charge: “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me” (John 5:39, italics mine). Even Jesus affirms that God’s words themselves are insufficient for true life! But God’s words point toward God’s Word, who DOES give life. If we miss that, we too read the Bible but miss its message. Even as we read the Bible, could Jesus charge us alongside these leaders, “you refuse to come to me that you may have life” (John 5:40)?

Jesus is the Word of God. Jesus is the source of life. Jesus is the culmination of every Bible verse, command, and story’s meaning. Jesus is the heart of God’s message, and Jesus is the source of true life. So when we go to the Bible, every time we read or teach, let us not only seek to understand the words of Scripture themselves. Rather, let us seek, know, and rely on the one true Word, who is revealed by the Bible’s words.



One-to-One Bible Reading in Missions

By / Sep 23

I first read David Helm’s book One to One Bible Reading: a Simple Guide for Every Christian, when I was preparing to serve in East Asia. I believe the approach to discipleship that Helm promotes in the book lends to missionary work. I think that there are a few ways that O2O is uniquely suited to the cross-cultural mission context.

The Bible is Proven to be True, Relevant, and Applicable Across all Cultures

Throughout the time I have served in different cross-cultural contexts, I have learned that language is not the only difference between a cross-cultural missionary and the people among whom they live and serve. Missionaries are required to learn an entirely new way of living due to the unique culture and values of the people. A missionary serving cross-culturally experiences a variety of differences in values, thought-processes, struggles, temptations and worldviews in their new culture. Whether for good or bad, the majority of discipleship material is written from a western perspective. The applications a businessman in Boston, Massachusetts draws from particular texts of Scripture may be vastly different from those drawn from a herdsman living in the steppes of Mongolia or a hunter in the jungles of Brazil reading the same biblical text. However, the Bible speaks truthfully across all cultures in the world throughout all time because it is the very word of God. By using the Bible as the central resource in discipleship, a missionary can be confident that the material they are using is true, relevant, and applicable in the life of the person they are discipling.

O2O Bible Reading Prevents Culture Transfer

One of the dangers of a missionary crossing cultures is the temptation to bring their cultures values and teach them as Biblical truths. To be fair, there are many things that America values that should be transferred into another culture. These include things like hospitality, work-ethic, and discipline. However, these things should be brought into another culture not because they are American, but rather because they are Biblical (ie 1 Peter 4:9, Colossians 3:23-24, 1 Corinthians 9:27). There are many things that American culture values that are not necessarily biblical. Things like individualism, punctuality, and dating prior to marriage. These things are not bad, but should not be taught as Biblical truth in a context that does not value these things. By keeping the Bible at the center of discipleship a missionary can protect themself from teaching their particular culture as Biblical truth.

O2O Bible Reading Gives a Missionary Confidence When Opposing a Cultural Values

The Bible often does confront cultural values. A missionary friend of mine was explaining to me the difficulties of serving in a primarily hindu culture. The biggest difficulty they had was opposing and overcoming the hindu “caste” system. What made things more difficult was that other missionaries around them were against opposing this cultural value and rather focused their ministry on reaching one particular caste. This missionary stated that it was very tempting to do the same. Why try to overcome this barrier when it would be easier to focus on the Brahmin caste and avoid opposing their worldview by teaching that Brahmins needed to accept those of the lower castes? However, my friend also understood that the teaching of the Bible opposed the caste system (ie James 2:1-13), and this knowledge gave him the courage and confidence to stand against it as well.

O2O Bible Reading Promotes Indigenous Churches

The goal of a cross-cultural missionary is (or should be) to plant or to come alongside indigenous churches. An indigenous church is one that is self-supporting, self-governing, and self-propagating. O2O Bible Reading lends itself to promoting indigenous churches in all three of these ways.

Self-Supporting – A self-supporting church is one that is able to rely only on its own financial resources to provide for its needs. Because O2O Bible Reading does not require anything other than a Bible for discipleship, it frees a church from any financial need for discipleship resources.

Self-Governing – a self-governing church is one whose elders and deacons are local, national believers who are biblically qualified to be in that role. A self-governing church is able to recognize and appoint those in the congregation who are biblically qualified to lead it. A congregation with a culture of O2O Bible Reading will be able to evaluate believers who are qualified within the church and appoint them as leaders and to equip them to govern the church biblically.

Self-Propagating – A self-propagating church is one that is able to make disciples and to plant other healthy churches from within its own congregation. A church rooted in O2O Bible Reading will equip its people to make and grow disciples and to plant healthy churches through the reading of God’s Word together.

While other discipleship methods can be helpful, O2O Bible Reading is particularly and uniquely suited for discipleship and church planting in a cross-cultural context.



Michael Kelley On Our Fear of The Boring

By / Sep 23