Friday, March 23, 2007

Tony Campolo on "The Hour"

Tony Campolo was on The Hour this week - you can watch the 10 minute interview here.

Quotes:
The Bible is really about helping the poor and oppressed.

Bono has done more to articulate the Christian faith than most preachers.

Jesus will judge you on whether or not you helped the poor, not on if you believed in the virgin birth.

Jesus was always partying. He loved to party!

I don't see how you can believe in capital punishment and believe in mercy.

Get to the red letters. [This referred to his ridiculous idea that we need to skip other parts of the Bible and only read the red font. In many Bibles, the red font identifies the words of Jesus.]
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Thursday, March 22, 2007

Geocoding the Bible

From http://www.esv.org

The folks at OpenBible.info have geocoded the Bible. In other words, they went through the Bible and found the latitude and longitude of nearly all the places mentioned.

They’ve produced satellite maps and KMLs (for Google Earth) for every book in the Bible that mentions a place, and KMLs for every chapter. Even better, all the data and maps are available under a Creative Commons license.

Jonah provides one of the best examples of how maps can help you study the Bible:

The map shows Joppa in modern Israel, Nineveh to the northeast in modern Iraq, and Tarshish far to the west in modern Spain.

Jonah starts out near Joppa. God tells him to go to Nineveh, so what does Jonah do? He heads to Tarshish, about as far away from Nineveh as he can get. Knowing this geography reinforces the comic aspects (in a literary sense) of Jonah’s character.

They also have an intriguing blog post (with pictures!) that highlights the changing geography over time in the Bible.

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What do you have time for?

What you make room for in your schedule reflects your true values

From Slow Leadership@ http://www.slowleadership.org

"I Don't Have Time"

What this statement actually means is either “I didn’t want to,“ or “I didn’t know how to,“ or “I spent the time doing something else more important to me.“

Lack of time is an attractive excuse, because it implies that you’re blameless—a helpless victim of stress, overwork, and external circumstances. Of course, you may object that you truly do have far too much to do and something had to be left out. But who decided what you did in the time available? Either you set those priorities yourself, or you’re the helpless slave of some all-consuming power that decides how you spend every moment of your time.

I’m much less interested in what people don’t have time for than what they do.

Lack of time is an attractive excuse, because it implies that you’re blameless.

When someone says they don’t have time for family, or friends, or hobbies, or recreation, because they have so much work, what I hear is someone telling me that work is the most important aspect of their life. It comes first. Let’s be honest, it must do, or they wouldn’t accept living the way they do. If they choose to be at their desk by 5:00 a.m. and stay until 9:00 p.m., they are making success at work the only true goal of their life.

Just about everyone goes to great lengths to make time for whatever they believe is most important. We all have the same amount of time available to us, so how we use it nearly always shows what we value most. Of course we face decisions about what to do first. Of course we have to choose between competing claims on our time. Of course we probably have more demands on us than we have time to meet them. Nevertheless, we can nearly always manage to find time for what we cannot imagine doing without.

I imagine cavemen were little different. They had to choose whether to hunt, or make pots, or paint pictures on the cave walls, or help with the children and tidy up the cave. And I expect some of them grumbled that they fully intended to make a new carrying board for the baby, but the hunting took so long, and the clan chief was such a bastard about demanding help to make a new headdress, and the dog needed more training before the next hunt. and so on and so on.

When you find yourself saying that you didn’t have time for something, take a moment to remember what you did find time for. Whatever you say to the contrary, that’s where your priorities lie at present.

When you find yourself saying that you didn’t have time for something, take a moment to remember what you did find time for.

So if you’re continually telling people that you’d like to relax more, achieve a better work/life balance, improve your education, plan to set up your own business, spend more time with your family, or generally sort out your life, but you don’t have time, you’re not telling the truth. Those things are lower down your list of priorities than whatever it is that you’re spending all that time on. So be honest with yourself. Admit who’s choosing to spend his or her time that way. And if you still want to do what you claim you want, push something else out of the way and make the time.

If you don’t have time for building the life that you say you want to live, what do you have time for?
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The Blessing is in the Doing!

by Paul Buckley @http://kingofgrace.blogspot.com

I just spent some time in James preparing a message entitled, "The Blessing is in the Doing!" It seems James central concern is for authentic faith versus hollow faith. As I meditated on this wonderful book it seemed the entire book could be understood in terms of the hearer-only versus the doer of the word. Here are 15 differences I found in James.

15 Differences Between the Doer and the Hearer Only from the book of James.
1. The doer measures maturity by his doing, not his knowing, the hearer-only measures maturity by his knowing. (James 1:22-25, 3:13-18)
2. The doer understands salvation is not merely instantaneous but also a lifelong process, the hearer-only thinks he’s done when he first believes. (James 1:21,25, 2:14-26)
3. The doer is hungry for holiness, the hearer-only sees it as of little importance. (James 1-5)
4. The doer deals in specifics, the hearer-only in vague applications. (James 1-5 i.e. speech, generosity/wealth, humility)
5. The doer is reliant on grace and very glad for it, the hearer-only knows grace but doesn’t know the fullness of its blessing because he hasn’t truly struggled for holiness. (James 1:18, 21)
6. The doer confesses sin, the hearer-only only hides it or is unaware of it. (James 3:14, 5:16)
7. The doer relies on others for his growth in Christ, the hearer-only doesn’t seek this sort of depth in relationships. (James 5:16,19-20)
8. The doer pursues fruit in speech, the hearer-only doesn’t see his need to grow in godly speech. (James 1:26, 3:1-12)
9. The doer pursues fruit in deep relationships, the hearer-only avoids relationships or keeps them shallow. (James 1-5)
10. The doer avoids pride and pursues humility, the hearer-only is blind to his pride. (James 3:13-18)
11. The doer doesn’t boast about tomorrow but recognizes his desperate and daily need for God, the hearer-only can be boastful and self-sufficient and lives for his plans. (James 4:13-17)
12. The doer is prayerful, the hearer-only doesn’t think he needs to be. (James 5:13-18)
13. The doer is sober about becoming a teacher the hearer-only is eager to tell others what he knows. (James 3:1 ff))
14. The doer understands that the test is in trials, the hearer-only fails in trials. (James 1:2-5)
15. The doer’s hope is in the future, the hearer-only seeks comfort now. (James 1:12, 21, 2:5, 5:7-11)

Don't be overwhelmed but consider 1 small step toward becoming a better doer - that is where the blessing is! And remember - doing only can be done because Jesus has already done it all - and our righteousness is already complete in Him!

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D. A. Carson MP3s

Andy Naselli @ http://anaselli.blogspot.com catologued MP3s by Dr. D. A. Carson.


The Use of the OT in the NT

Postmodernism
Emergent Church
 Evangelism
So-Called New Perspective on Paul Critiqued
Love of God
Vision of a Transcendent God
The Book of Revelation
Jesus and the Cross
 Other Sermons
Other Lectures

Christway Media

Note: Each MP3 costs $1.50. This site offers numerous individual sermons as well the following series. (The numbers in parentheses indicate the number of MP3s in the series.)
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Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Oops! Techie wipes out $38 billion fund

MSNBC

Keystroke mistake deletes data for Alaska’s oil-funded account



JUNEAU, Alaska - Perhaps you know that sinking feeling when a single keystroke accidentally destroys hours of work. Now imagine wiping out a disk drive containing an account worth $38 billion.

That’s what happened to a computer technician reformatting a disk drive at the Alaska Department of Revenue. While doing routine maintenance work, the technician accidentally deleted applicant information for an oil-funded account — one of Alaska residents’ biggest perks — and mistakenly reformatted the backup drive, as well.

There was still hope, until the department discovered its third line of defense, backup tapes, were unreadable.

“Nobody panicked, but we instantly went into planning for the worst-case scenario,” said Permanent Fund Dividend Division Director Amy Skow. The computer foul-up last July would end up costing the department more than $200,000.

Over the next few days, as the department, the division and consultants from Microsoft Corp. and Dell Inc. labored to retrieve the data, it became obvious the worst-case scenario was at hand.

Nine months worth of information concerning the yearly payout from the Alaska Permanent Fund was gone: some 800,000 electronic images that had been painstakingly scanned into the system months earlier, the 2006 paper applications that people had either mailed in or filed over the counter, and supporting documentation such as birth certificates and proof of residence.

And the only backup was the paperwork itself — stored in more than 300 cardboard boxes.

“We had to bring that paper back to the scanning room, and send it through again, and quality control it, and then you have to have a way to link that paper to that person’s file,” Skow said.

Half a dozen seasonal workers came back to assist the regular division staff, and about 70 people working overtime and weekends re-entered all the lost data by the end of August.

“They were just ready, willing and able to chip in and, in fact, we needed all of them to chip in to get all the paperwork rescanned in a timely manner so that we could meet our obligations to the public,” Skow said.

Last October and November, the department met its obligation to the public. A majority of the estimated 600,000 payments for last year’s $1,106.96 individual dividends went out on schedule, including those for 28,000 applicants who were still under review when the computer disaster struck.

Former Revenue Commissioner Bill Corbus said no one was ever blamed for the incident.

“Everybody felt very bad about it and we all learned a lesson. There was no witch hunt,” Corbus said.

According to department staff, they now have a proven and regularly tested backup and restore procedure.

The department is asking lawmakers to approve a supplemental budget request for $220,700 to cover the excess costs incurred during the six-week recovery effort, including about $128,400 in overtime and $71,800 for computer consultants.

The money would come from the permanent fund earnings, the money earmarked for the dividends. That means recipients could find their next check docked by about 37 cents.

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Kill Knut? The Twisted Logic of Animal Rights Extremists

By Albert Mohler @ http://albertmohler.com

The star attraction of the Germany's Berlin Zoo is "Knut," a three-month-old polar bear cub. Knut is popular because he is undeniably cute, but he is also the focus of controversy as well. It seems that some animal rights activists want to have him killed.

From Der Spiegel:

Everyone loves Knut. The three-month-old polar bear born in one of Berlin's zoos has become a star in the German capital and has won hearts the world over. Indeed, the exact date of his first public appearance -- likely to be made later this week -- is the subject of almost as much anticipation as the details of Britney Spears Alcoholics Anonymous love affair. It's impossible not to love the little guy, right?

Well, not quite. Animal rights activists, as SPIEGEL reported Monday, aren't so enthralled with the polar bear baby. They are concerned that Knut, who is being raised by human hand after his mother rejected him, is in danger of losing touch with the bear necessities. Some would like to see him dead.

Why?

"Raising him by hand is not appropriate to the species but rather a blatant violation of animal welfare laws," animal rights activist Frank Albrecht told the mass circulation newspaper Bild, whose front page headline Monday read "Will Sweet Knut Be Killed by Injection?"

Berlin Zoo is allowing Knut to be raised in such a way that the bear will have a behavioral disorder for the rest of his life, Albrecht believes. "In actual fact, the zoo needs to kill the bear cub," he adds.

He's not alone. Wolfram Graf-Rudolf, director of the Aachen Zoo, told the newspaper, "I don't consider it appropriate for the species that the little polar bear is being raised on a bottle." The animal will be fixated on his keeper and not be a "real" polar bear, he says. However he feels it is now too late to put Knut out of his supposed misery. "The mistake has been made. One should have had the courage to put him to sleep much earlier."

Zoo keepers started feeding Knut with a bottle after his mother rejected him. The keepers did not do this in order to tame the bear, but to save his life. Knut is the first polar bear born at the zoo in over thirty years.

Animal rights activists have added an important voice to our moral conversation. In some cases, cruel and abusive practices have been brought to light. In other cases, however, animal rights extremists deny any special status to human beings and thus deny that we should treat animals any differently than we would treat a fellow human.

As stewards of God's creation, we are charged to delight in the animals, and to rule over them. We rightly eat their flesh and use their skins and hides. We enjoy their companionship and find pleasure in the wonders of the animal kingdom. We enjoy a good zoo, where we are all children at heart.

This is the real problem with Knut and the controversy surrounding him. The decision to have a zoo -- a perfectly justifiable decision in my view -- is a decision to house and care for animals in a way that is surely different from their natural habitat. Zoos do not allow tigers to hunt and kill zebras, for example. The decision to have a zoo is a decision to face the realities of caring for the animals that are housed and born there.

Furthermore, one clear purpose of zoos is to attract and delight crowds of humans who are drawn by the excitement and pleasure of looking at cute, dangerous, exotic, and famous animals. Zoos dress up their mission statements with passages about scientific study, defending biodiversity, and other purposes -- no doubt legitimate -- but those do not explain why people are buying tickets to get in.

Animal rights extremists undercut their own message when they call for killing little Knut. The German public is nuts about him. Knut is cute -- no doubt about that. This controversy should remind Christians of our responsibility to the animal kingdom.

In addition, we should remember that human beings are alone created in God's image. Knut reflects the glory of God in his beauty, but the bear has no consciousness of this fact.

For Christians, a trip to the zoo is an exercise in observing the wonder of God's creation -- and in imagining the Creator's delight in each animal. As for this little polar bear, let's hope the animal rights activists don't have their way. Don't kill the bear.

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Messages given by D. A. Carson



Evangelism in the 21st Century (Session 1)
Evangelism in the 21st Century (Session 2)



Evangelism in the 21st Century (Session 3)









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The Stations of the Cross: Introduction

By Mark Roberts @ http://www.markdroberts.com

Introduction to the series:
The Stations of the Cross: A Devotional Guide for Lent and Holy Week

As near as I can remember, I first became aware of The Stations of the Cross while on vacation in San Francisco, California. As I visited St. Mary's Cathedral, I noticed around the sanctuary of the church a series of visual reminders of Jesus's last hours. These seemed to encourage the Catholic faithful in their personal devotion. I did not at the time realize the irony of my discovering The Stations of the Cross in San Francisco, a city named after the Catholic saint whose order had much to do with the development of devotion associated with The Stations of the Cross. Nor did I realize back then that virtually every Catholic church uses some form of The Stations of the Cross.

I became more familiar with The Stations of the Cross, also known as The Way of the Cross, or Via Crucis (Latin, way of the cross) or Via Dolorosa (Latin, way of grief), when I began going on retreats at Catholic retreat centers. All of these places for prayer feature a series of scenes that depict the passion of Christ. Often, I saw people slowly walking along The Stations of the Cross, pausing at each station for quiet meditation and prayer.

A few years ago I decided to follow The Way of the Cross at the Serra Retreat Center in Malibu, California (which, lies, ironically, within a stone's throw of Brittany Spears' house). Whereas almost all Catholic churches include the stations within the sanctuary, the Serra stations were outside in an aromatic grove of Eucalyptus trees. As I walked The Way of the Cross that day, I found myself reflecting with more intensity and emotion upon the events of Jesus's death.

In 2003, millions of people became familiar with the traditional Stations of the Cross without even knowing it. These stations provided the structure for Mel Gibson's blockbuster film, The Passion of the Christ. Little did many of us know that as Jesus fell three times while carrying His cross in the movie, or as He met His mother, that He was doing that which Roman Catholic tradition had popularized for centuries through The Stations of the Cross.

The origin of this tradition is not entirely clear, though it seems to be associated with Christian pilgrimages to Jerusalem in the early Christian centuries. (For a detailed online history, see "The Way of the Cross" in The Catholic Encyclopedia.) Yet, since the vast majority of Christians were not able to go to Jerusalem to pray in the actual location where Jesus was crucified, The Way of the Cross enabled them to engage in a mini-pilgrimmage of sorts, whereby they could focus on the key events of Jesus's last day.

In the Middle Ages, this practice got wrapped up with the granting of indulgences (remissions of temporal punishments for sins for which we have been forgiven). The whole indulgence scene became quite messy, and was in fact one of the major reasons for the Protestant Reformation. Thus it's not surprising that Protestants didn't maintain the tradition of walking The Way of the Cross as an act of devotion.

When I first followed The Stations of the Cross, I related readily to about half of the scenes. But the other half seemed odd to me because the statues depicted unfamiliar events, including: three falls of Jesus, an encounter between Jesus and His Mother, and an encounter between Jesus and a woman named Veronica. These stations were not derived directly from Scripture, but rather from ancient church tradition. Though I wasn't offended by the traditional nature of the unfamiliar scenes, since they were in no way contrary to Scripture, I found myself more drawn to the seven stations that were clearly based on the biblical record. I am, after all, a Protestant at heart, one for whom tradition can be helpful, but Scripture is the main source of my spiritual devotion.

Well, as it turns out, Pope John Paul II seems to have shared my concern about the lack of biblical foundation for the traditional Stations of the Cross, though he often celebrated these without hesitation. He was, after all, a Roman Catholic at heart. Yet in 1991 the Pope himself instituted a new series of fourteen Stations of Cross, each of which was based on Scripture alone. The chart below shows both the traditional and the revised stations (with Scripture references):

Traditional
Biblical
1. Jesus on the Mount of Olives
(Luke 22:39-46)
2. Jesus, betrayed by Judas, is arrested (Luke 22:47-48)
3. Jesus is condemned by the Sanhedrin (Luke 22:66-71)
4. Peter denies Jesus (Luke 22:54-62)
1. Jesus is condemned to death
5. Jesus is judged by Pilate
(Luke 23:13-25)
6. Jesus is scourged and crowned with thorns (Luke 22:63-65; John 19:2-3)
2. Jesus takes up his cross
7. Jesus takes up the cross
(Mark 15:20)
3. Jesus falls for the first time
4. Jesus meets his mother
5. Jesus is helped by Simon the Cyrene to carry his cross
8. Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus to carry his cross (Luke 23:26)
6. Veronica wipes the face of Jesus
7. Jesus falls for the second time
8. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
9. Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem
(Luke 23:27-31)
9. Jesus falls for the third time
10. Jesus is stripped of his garments
11. Jesus is nailed to the cross
10. Jesus is crucified (Luke 23:33, 47)
11. Jesus promises his Kingdom to the good thief (Luke 23:33-34, 39-43)
12. Jesus on the cross, his mother and his disciple (John 19:25-27)
12. Jesus dies on the cross
13. Jesus dies on the cross
(Luke 23:44-46)
13. Jesus is taken down from the cross and given to his mother
14. Jesus is laid in the tomb
14. Jesus is placed in the tomb
(Luke 23:50-54)

Last year some folks at my church decided to offer The Stations of the Cross as a devotional experience for Holy Week. For obvious reasons, we opted for the Pope's biblically-based version. My wife Linda offered to paint fourteen watercolor pictures that illustrated the passages upon which the revised stations are based. These were displayed in our church sanctuary during Holy Week, and people were invited to come, to read Scripture, to reflect, and to pray. For many members of my church and community it was a precious time of drawing near to the Lord in anticipation of Good Friday and Easter. We're going to do the same thing this year.

All readers of my blog, whether you're a member of Irvine Presbyterian Church or not, are welcome to join us for this time of quiet, personal worship. (You can find the schedule here.) But I realize that the vast majority of my blog readers won't be able to make a pilgrimage to Irvine during Holy Week. (This includes some of my own church members, such as friend who is currently serving our country in Iraq.) So, for those who can't come to our church, I'm going to do an online Stations of the Cross. Beginning tomorrow, I'll "walk" through the stations with you, one station per day (not including the weekends, usually). At this pace we'll complete the fourteen stations on Holy Saturday (which will feature the last of the stations). I'll include the Scripture passages for each station, some personal reflections and prayers, and my wife's paintings. My hope is that this online version of The Way of the Cross will enable you to enter into a deeper understanding and experience of the passion of Jesus, so that you might be ready to celebrate Easter with new joy and freedom.

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How the Gospel Gets Changed

by Kent Brandenburg @ http://www.jackhammr.org

We know the Gospel gets changed. We established that from 2 Corinthians 11 in the first article of this month. In exploring this thought, we also contended that change comes almost exclusively in two ways: change in Who Jesus is and change in what belief is. We must believe in Jesus Christ for salvation. The Lord will not justify the one who botches genuine belief or the one who falls short of a Biblical Jesus. How do these two changes happen?

False Worship

One way the saving Gospel becomes distorted is by means of false worship. True worship recognizes Who God is and gives Him what He wants. False worship either warps the identification of Who God is or offers Him something that He does not want. False worship confuses sinners on the character and nature of God. With genuine worship, since God is recognized as holy, He is presented with holy offerings. Giving Him worldly, sensual, or fleshly “worship” communicates that God Himself is wordly, sensual, or fleshly. Anyone Who receives this “God,” has gotten an imposter.

Since worldly, fleshly, or sensual worship is unacceptable to God, who is it about? It is about the one presenting it. This pragmatic ”worship” suggests that salvation is about our own entertainment, comfort, and good-feelings. The worshipper becomes sovereign over God, his personal taste becoming predominant. Justification then comes, not from turning from his own way, but from bringing Jesus along for the ride.

Corrupted Methods

Men so want to see success in the ministry that they use methods that alter the nature of the gospel. Instead of going to preach, they go to invite. Unsaved people are not interested in Scriptural exegesis and true worship, so the presentation of the Gospel almost always is customized for the audience. Since there is only one Gospel, this customization often leaves the crowd with a placebo and the church with a statistic.

Since the church is the body of Christ, people learn about Christ through the nature of His body. When the church becomes a place of fun and etertainment, the nature and character of Jesus Christ is changed in the mind of the hearers. Faith becomes self-gratification, and Jesus becomes the goody-meister.

Twisted Interpretation

Salvation isn’t praying a prayer. We are not justified through prayer. We are justified by faith. The people who call on the name of the Lord are those who understand the nature of Jesus Christ and the dire predicament they are in. Salvation isn’t walking an aisle or raising a hand. It isn’t being able to answer certain leading questions. Men have taken a few passages that mention “confess” and “call” and have turned salvation into a syllogism that concludes with “prayer equals salvation.” That misses what God says about justification by faith alone.

Arguments from Silence

Many continue the false worship, corrupt methodology, and twisted interpretation with arguments from silence. The primary argument from silence goes like this: ”The Bible doesn’t say it is wrong, so it must be right.” But God’s Word is sufficient. God does not have an entire agenda between the lines of the Bible. He has included all of it in the actual text of Scripture. When we operate outside of Scripture, we undermine the authority and suffiency of Scripture, and we threaten the very propagation of the gospel itself.

How bad do you think it is that churches and Christians damn people to Hell by their changing the Gospel? Could there be anything worse?

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Why I Am a Calvinist (Part 2)

. . . and why every Christian is a Calvinist of sorts.

By Phil Johnson @ http://www.sfpulpit.com

Spurgeon at age 23Part II: Spurgeon: “Calvinism IS the Gospel”

There are, these days, quite a few self-styled Calvinists who disagree with my assessment of Arminianism and insist that Arminianism entails an absolute denial of certain fundamental gospel truths. Those wishing to make that argument will invariably quote a famous statement by Spurgeon, taken from the chapter in his autobiography titled “A Defence of Calvinism” in which Spurgeon said this:

I have my own private opinion that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and Him crucified, unless we preach what nowadays is called Calvinism. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel, if we do not preach justification by faith, without works; nor unless we preach the sovereignty of God in His dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing, unchangeable, eternal, immutable, conquering love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel, unless we base it upon the special and particular redemption of His elect and chosen people which Christ wrought out upon the cross; nor can I comprehend a gospel which lets saints fall away after they are called, and suffers the children of God to be burned in the fires of damnation after having once believed in Jesus. Such a gospel I abhor.

I absolutely agree with what Spurgeon says there, in the sense that he meant it. And the context of that statement explains clearly what he meant. He was pointing out that the principle at the heart of all gospel truth is the same principle that drives Calvinism: “Salvation is of the Lord.” Salvation is God’s work; it’s not something we do for ourselves. That’s the truth he was defending.

Spurgeon was not saying that we ought to use the five points of Calvinism the way Campus crusade people use the “Four Spiritual Laws.” He wasn’t saying that all you ever talk about is the doctrines of election and reprobation you are faithfully preaching the gospel and the whole counsel of God. Unfortunately, I think that’s what a lot of careless Calvinists think Spurgeon meant when he said “Calvinism is the gospel.”

But if you read Spurgeon’s whole article on Calvinism, he makes very clear what he meant. In fact at the beginning of that very same paragraph—as his preface to remarking that “Calvinism is the gospel”—he wrote this:

“Salvation is of the Lord.” [Jonah 2:9.] That is just an epitome of Calvinism; it is the sum and substance of it. If anyone should ask me what I mean by a Calvinist, I should reply, “He is one who says, Salvation is of the Lord.” I cannot find in Scripture any other doctrine than this. It is the essence of the Bible. “He only is my rock and my salvation.” Tell me anything contrary to this truth, and it will be a heresy; tell me a heresy, and I shall find its essence here, that it has departed from this great, this fundamental, this rock truth, “God is my rock and my salvation.”

Did Spurgeon believe Arminianism was in error? Absolutely. So do I.

Did he believe it was damnable error? Absolutely not, and he made that clear, too.

At the peak of the Downgrade Controversy, some of Spurgeon’s critics accused him of being driven by a doctrinaire Calvinist agenda. It’s not really Modernism that Spurgeon hates, they said. It’s anything that departs from his old fashioned Calvinism. This whole controversy is a furtive campaign against Arminianism. That’s what really has Spurgeon bugged. He thinks modern Christians aren’t Calvinistic enough.

Spurgeon replied in The Sword and the Trowel with a paragraph that said this:

Certain antagonists have tried to represent the Down Grade controversy as a revival of the old feud between Calvinists and Arminians. It is nothing of the kind. Many evangelical Arminians are as earnestly on our side as men can be. We do not conceal our own Calvinism in the least; but this conflict is for truths which are common to all believers.

In another place, he was even more explicit:

We care far more for the central evangelical truths than we do for Calvinism as a system; but we believe that Calvinism has in it a conservative force which helps to hold men to the vital truth, and therefore we are sorry to see any quitting it who have once accepted it.

So he had a bone to pick with people who once affirmed the doctrines of grace and had now abandoned Calvinism in favor of new ideas that smacked of Socinianism. But he regarded evangelical Arminians as his true brethren and fellow soldiers—as long as they affirmed the doctrine of justification by faith, the principle of sola fide, the absolute authority of Scripture, the penal aspect of Christ’s atonement, and other essential gospel truths.

Speaking of Arminians in particular, he said:

Those who hold the eternal verities of salvation, and yet do not see all that we believe and embrace, are by no means the objects of our opposition: our warfare is with men who are giving up the atoning sacrifice, denying the inspiration of Holy Scripture, and casting slurs upon justification by faith. The present struggle is not a debate upon the question of Calvinism or Arminianism, but of the truth of God versus the inventions of men. All who believe the gospel should unite against that “modern thought” which is its deadly enemy.

So Spurgeon did not regard Arminians as hell bound heretics. He regarded them as brethren. Did he think they were in error? Yes? Were they guilty of gross inconsistency in their own theology? He would have answered emphatically, yes. Was their main error significant? Spurgeon did not shrink from referring to it as “heresy”—meaning unorthodox doctrine, heterodoxy, serious error. But he was very careful to make clear that he did not regard Arminianism per se as damnable heresy or utter apostasy from essential Christianity. Virtually all mainstream Calvinists from the time of the Synod of Dort until now would agree with him on every count.

For example, Gordon Clark, one of the highest of high Calvinists, said this with regard to whether Arminians are authentic Christians or not:

An Arminian may be a truly regenerate Christian; in fact, if he is truly an Arminian and not a Pelagian who happens to belong to an Arminian church, he must be a saved man. But he is not usually, and cannot consistently be assured of his salvation. The places in which his creed differs from our Confession confuse the mind, dilute the Gospel, and impair its proclamation.”

Which is to say that Arminianism is inherently inconsistent. Arminians technically affirm the fundamental, essential truths of the gospel. Then they try to build a theology on top of that which is totally inconsistent with the solid foundation they have affirmed.

I agree with that assessment of Arminianism. It’s an attempt to reconcile the sovereignty of God with human responsibility—and the Arminian method of reconciling those two truths involves a view of human free will that is inherently inconsistent with certain gospel truths every Arminian actually affirms.

In some posts yet to come, I will explain further why I believe that is the case.

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Why I Am a Calvinist (Part 1)

. . . and how every Christian is a Calvinist of sorts. John Calvin

by Phil Johnson @ http://www.sfpulpit.com/

This post is adapted from a transcript of a seminar from the 2007 Shepherds’ Conference, titled “Closet Calvinists.”

Part I: Is Arminianism damnable heresy?

I love the doctrines of grace and don’t shy away from the label “Calvinist.” I believe in the sovereignty of God. I’m convinced Scripture teaches that God is completely sovereign not only in salvation (effectually calling and granting faith to those whom He chooses); but also in every detail of the outworking of Providence. “Whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified” (Romans 8:30). And He makes “all things work together for good to those who love God, [i.e.,] to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). Quite simply, He “works all things according to the counsel of His will” (Ephesians 1:11).

That’s what people commonly mean when they speak of “Calvinism.” When I accept that label, I am not pledging allegiance to the man John Calvin. I am not affirming everything he taught, and I’m not condoning everything he did. I’m convinced Calvin was a godly man and one of the finest biblical expositors and theological minds ever, but he wasn’t always right. As a matter of fact, my own convictions are baptistic, so I am by no means one of Calvin’s devoted followers. In other words, when I accept the label “Calvinist,” it’s only for convenience’s sake. I’m not saying “I am of Calvin” in the Corinthian sense.

Furthermore, I’m not one of those who wears Calvinism like a big chip on his shoulder, daring people to fight with me about it. It’s true that I can get feisty about certain points of doctrine—especially when someone attacks a principle that goes to the heart of the gospel, like substitutionary atonement, or original sin, or justification by faith and the principle of imputed righteousness. When one of those principles is challenged, I’m ready to fight. (And I also don’t mind beating up on whatever happens to be the latest evangelical fad.)

But Calvinism isn’t one of those issues I get worked up and angry about. I’ll discuss it with you, but if you are spoiling for a fight about it, you are likely to find me hard to provoke. I spent too many years as an Arminian myself to pretend that the truth on these issues is easy and obvious.

Now, don’t get the wrong idea. I do think the truth of God’s sovereignty is clear and ultimately inescapable in Scripture. But it is a difficult truth to come to grips with, so I am sympathetic with those who struggle with it. I’m Calvinistic enough to believe that God has ordained (at least for the time being) that some of my brethren should hold Arminian opinions.

Over the years I have probably written at least twice as much material trying to tone down angry hyper Calvinists as I have arguing with Arminians. That’s not because I think hyper Calvinism is a more serious error than Arminianism. As a matter of fact, I would say the two errors are strikingly similar. But I don’t hear very many voices of caution being raised against the dangers of hyper Calvinism, and there are armies of Calvinists out there already challenging the Arminians, so I’ve tried to speak out as much as possible against the tendencies of the hypers.

QuoteThat’s why I’m probably a whole lot less militant than you might expect when it comes to attacking the errors of Arminianism. Besides, I have gotten much further answering Arminian objections with patient teaching and dispassionate, reasonable, biblical instruction—instead of angry arguments and instant anathemas.

Why not take a more passive, lenient, brotherly, approach to all theological disagreements? Because I firmly believe there are some theological errors that do deserve a firm and decisive anathema. That’s Paul’s point in Galatians 1:8-9; and it’s the same point the apostle John makes in 2 John, verses 7-11. When someone is teaching an error that fatally corrupts the truth of the gospel, “let him be anathema.”

But let me be plain here: Simple Arminianism doesn’t fall in that category. It’s not fair to pin the label of rank heresy on Arminianism, the way some of my more zealous Calvinist brethren seem prone to do. I’m talking about historic, evangelical Arminianism, of the classic and Wesleyan varieties — Arminianism, not Pelagianism, or open theism, or whatever heresy Clark Pinnock has invented this week — but true evangelical Arminianism. Arminianism is certainly wrong; and I would argue that it’s inconsistent with itself. But in my judgment, standard, garden variety Arminianism is not so fatally wrong that we need to consign our Arminian brethren to the eternal flames or even automatically refuse them fellowship in our pastors’ fraternals.

If you think I’m beginning to sound like an apologist for Arminianism, I’m definitely not that. I do think Arminianism is a profound error. Its tendencies can be truly sinister, and when it is allowed to go to seed, it does lead people into rank heresy. But what I’m saying here is that mere Arminianism itself isn’t damnable heresy. It’s just grossly inconsistent with the core gospel doctrines that Arminians themselves believe and affirm.

But as long as I’m sounding like a defender of Arminianism, let also me say this: There are plenty of ignorant and inconsistent Calvinists out there, too. With the rise of the Internet it’s easier than ever for self taught lay people to engage in theological dialogue and debate through internet forums. I think that’s mostly good, and I encourage it. But the Internet makes it easy for like minded but ignorant people to clump together and endlessly reinforce one another’s ignorance. And I fear that happens a lot.

Hyper Calvinists seem especially susceptible to that tendency, and there are nests of them here and there—especially on the Internet. And more and more frequently these days I encounter people, who have been influenced by extremism on the Internet, touting hyper Calvinist ideas and insisting that if someone is an Arminian, that person is not really a Christian at all. They equate Arminianism with sheer works salvation. They suggest that Arminianism implicitly denies the atonement. Or they insist that the God worshiped by Arminians is a totally different God from the God of Scripture.

That’s really over-the-top rhetoric—totally unnecessary—and rooted in historical ignorance. A couple of years ago, when I started my weblog, I mentioned that tendency in the first entry I posted, which was titled “Quick and Dirty Calvinism.” At the end of that post, I said this: My advice to young Calvinists is to learn theology from the historic mainstream Calvinist authors, not from blogs and discussion forums on the Internet. Some of the forums may be helpful because they direct you to more important resources. But if you think of the Internet as a surrogate for seminary, you run a very high risk of becoming unbalanced.

Read mainstream Calvinist authors, however, and you’ll have trouble finding even one who regarded Arminianism per se as damnable heresy. There’s a reason for that: It’s because while Arminianism is bafflingly inconsistent, it is not necessarily damnably erroneous. Most Arminians themselves—and I’m still speaking here of the classic and Wesleyan varieties, not Pelagianism masquerading as Arminianism—most Arminians themselves emphatically affirm gospel truth that is actually rooted in Calvinistic presuppositions.

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Singing the Psalms in Worship

By Bob Kauflin @ http://worshipmatters.blogs.com

Psalms2 I started this post last Friday as a Q&A Friday, but never finished it. Oh well...

Jacob sent me this question:

What is your take on the exclusive use of Psalms in worship?...Since the Psalms were the only Spirit-inspired songs given to the people of God, and because instrument use in the Old Testament is tied to ceremonial law (which was done away with in the New Testament), the belief is that true corporate worship in song is comprised of Psalm singing without instrumentation. Also, it is noted that there are no commands to write uninspired songs of worship in the Bible. What do you think?

The other day, Don left a comment also asking what I thought about the Psalms in worship, so I thought I'd take the opportunity to answer both questions.

Jacob is referring to "exclusive Psalmody" - the belief that Christians should only use the book of Psalms for congregational worship. Believe it or not, up until the mid-18th century, most Protestant churches practiced exclusive Psalmody. Today, it's most often associated with some Presbyterian and Reformed churches that follow the regulative principle of worship, although not all churches that adhere to the regulative principle practice exclusive psalmody.

Isaac Watts (1674-1748) was used by God in a unique way to introduce songs of praise other than Psalms to the church (although he also "Christianized" 138 of the Psalms). He felt the church should sing songs based on Scripture that were “freely composed,” including Scriptural references and subjective responses to the truths being sung. He believed that the Psalms, as valuable as they are in Christian worship, were insufficient to express the full range of Christian experience. In the Preface to his Hymns and Spiritual Songs (1707), he pointed out the value and divine nature of the Psalms, but went on to show their inadequacy for fully Christian worship:

There are a thousand Lines in it which were not made for a Saint in our Day, to assume as his own; There are also many deficiencies of Light and Glory which our Lord Jesus and his Apostles have supplied in the Writings of the New Testament; and with this Advantage I have composed these spiritual Songs which are now presented to the World.

I've never found the arguments for only singing the Psalms very compelling. Here are a few reasons why.

  1. God never tells us in Scripture to use only the Psalms when we sing his praise. The book of Revelation contains songs of praise that are distinct from the Psalms, and it's impossible to prove that Paul was only speaking of the book of Psalms when he instructed us to sing "psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs" (Col. 3:16).
  2. There are Spirit-inspired hymns of praise to God written both before and after the Psalms (Ex. 15; Lk. 1:46-55).
  3. If God allows us to pray with our own words and preach with our own words in meetings, it follows that we should be able to sing with our own words. Nowhere in Scripture does God say that we can only use his exact words when singing to him.
  4. I'm not sure God intended us to sing all of the Psalms in corporate worship. As far as we know, that wasn't the practice of the first century synagogues or churches. Many Psalms are individualistic in nature, some are filled with Old Testament temple imagery, and others call for the destruction of Israel's national enemies.
  5. Most importantly, the Psalms only foreshadow the reality of our salvation, which is Christ. They only hint at the glorious realities of the Jesus' incarnation, his perfect life, his substitutionary death, his resurrection, and his ascension to the Father's right hand. How can we not specifically celebrate so great a salvation?

There are other reasons to forego singing only the Psalms in worship. But just because we're not restricted to the Psalms doesn't mean we should never sing them. Besides, the Psalms tell us a great deal about how we should sing, pray, and relate to God.

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The Relationship of the Testaments: The Priority of the Old Testament

by Randy McKinion @ http://expositorythoughts.wordpress.com

I appreciate all that has been said in this series. I have been encouraged and challenged by post and comment alike. On behalf of the other contributors, thank you for the interaction, which I pray the Lord will use to sharpen each of us.

To a certain extent, I will not carry the conversation much further than Paul and Matt have. Instead, I would like to attack this issue from a different direction or perspective, namely from the view of 1 Corinthians 15.

According to the Scriptures: Precedence and Accordance

In my opinion, the whole discussion comes down to this question: Are we supposed (1) to read Christ “according to the Scriptures” or (2) to read the Scriptures “according to Christ”? Although I hold to (1) for many of the same reasons already expressed by my fellow writers, I have to admit that (2) is attractive, in that it would really make my teaching and preaching a lot easier. That is, first coming to a complete understanding of an OT text and then preaching Christ in light of that, is difficult (a life-long process). Moreover, sometimes it is difficult to preach/teach a text that may not apply well to the church without bending to the pressure of becoming sloppy in my own hermeneutic and forcing some interpretation that is foreign to the text before me.

With that said, in my opinion, the priority of the OT has to do with precedence. Thus, in 1 Corinthians 15, Paul is reading Christ in accordance with the OT. However, he is not changing the plain reading of the OT. Rather, he is properly understanding Christ according to the precedent laid down by a completed document.

Relating to this, I appreciate the following comment by Christopher Seitz, Word Without End: The Old Testament as Abiding Theological Witness, 60:

Far from being a problematic, outdated, or downright misguided witness to God … the Old Testament is God’s shared gift to the church, meant to guide its present life in Christ. Paul and the church understood this when they declared Jesus’ death and resurrection to be ‘in accordance with the scriptures,’ the Old Testament. Jesus understood this when he declared that he would give his life as a ransom for many. Such a death is only comprehensible against a background of Old Testament accordance.

As Seitz goes on to express, Paul was interpreting Christ according to the plans of God set out in the OT. His point is well taken. Paul was not so much concerned with pointing to a set of “proof texts” in the OT that show that the Messiah was to die, be buried, and be raised from the dead (although he believes that those texts exist); rather, Paul was expressing how Christ fit in to the purposes of God as expressed in the OT. Thus, the focus is the completed theological perspective of the OT.

Among other things, 1 Corinthians 15 establishes the principle that the NT is firmly planted upon the foundation of the Old. Few would disagree with that statement. However, I would take it one significant step forward: the NT is not only firmly planted upon the foundation of the OT, it demonstrates the correct interpretation thereof not because it reinterprets or provides a further meaning but because it presents Christ in accordance with the meaning already inherent in the First Testament.

Thus, the NT cannot be understood apart from the OT. That may seem to turn the table, per se, but again, few would disagree with that. Without the OT picture of the Messiah, for instance, the Gospels would take on a less significant role, for we would not understand why they are telling us the things they are claiming about Jesus.

According to the intricately-composed, multi-faceted Scriptures

Unfortunately, the whole issue that we are addressing here is not as clear-cut as we would all like it to be. For example, not only do we have to deal with the ways the NT writers are reading the OT, but we are forced also to deal with how OT writers are reading and interpreting other OT texts. In this sense, the NT becomes the final step in a complicated, long process of exegesis and interpretation.

With that said, therefore, my point here is that we often fail to persevere with the OT until we come to a full appreciation of its teaching. The OT is an intricately-composed, multi-faceted document, so coming to terms with its theological perspectives is difficult. As such, I suggest that the element that is often left out of this is the nature of the composition of the OT. I believe that if we give the First Testament its due process, we will discover that its message is none other than that preached and written down in the NT. Let me give you an example, which might just make our amill readers salivate but makes my point about the precedence of the OT.

In a recent German article, Martin Beck shows how the song of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2:1–10 is used by its author with theological purposes way beyond a response of thanksgiving by Hannah herself. On the compositional level of the book of Samuel, this prayer along with 2 Samuel 22 frame the book. According to Beck, the effect of these two poems to the whole provides the proper context in which to read the whole, i.e., within the context of the messianic hope expressed in these two psalms. David appears within the composition of the book as a picture of such a messianic figure. Thus, it is unnecessary, for example, to impose a Christological hermeneutic on the text of Samuel, because it already exists. Moreover, throughout the OT, such messianic compositions are clearly evident (particularly in the Psalter, e.g. Psalms 2–89, but even the Pentateuch itself). The point of this correlates well with what Paul said in his last post.

In brief, here’s my point: The relationship of the testaments is best described with a precedent/accordance understanding, but it is compounded because of the difficulties inherent in interpreting the First Testament. Recognizing theological composition within the Old may at times assist us in understanding those difficult quotations of the Old in the New that keep us baffled. I hope to offer some examples of this in a future post.

[In case your interested, here’s the information on the article. Beck, Martin. “Messiaserwartung in den Geschichtsbüchern? Bemerkungen zur Funktion des Hannaliedes (1 Sam 2:1–10) in seinen diversen literarischen Kontexten (cf. Ex 15; Dtn 32; 2 Sam 22). Auf dem Weg zur Endgestalt von Genesis bis II Regum. Festschrift Hans-Christoph Schmitt zum 65. Geburtstag, 230–51. Martin Beck and Ulrike Schorn, eds. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2006.]

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"Worship in Spirit and Truth"

WORD OF ENCOURAGEMENT

________________________________________
"WORSHIP IN SPIRIT AND TRUTH"-
REFORMED AND ALWAYS REFORMING
JOHN 4:20-24
REV. CHARLES R. BIGGS

charles-biggs-small-file.jpg

Are you Reformed in your worship? Are you Reformed and always reforming in your worship? Do you truly know what it means to worship Jesus in spirit and in truth?

In the Reformation, the people of God learned that it was not enough to merely be "Reformed" in name, but that the Church must also be "Reformed" in theology and in principle. That meant that for a congregation to call itself "Reformed" required the constant need to be consistently, ceaselessly, constantly, and carefully "REFORMING" as the people of God and returning to Scripture for answers to every question and to fully know how to be the Church of the living God (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

Since we are approaching the Lord’s Days when we celebrate Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem (Palm Sunday) as well as Christ’s glorious resurrection from the dead (Easter), it is worthwhile to remind ourselves as Christians to practice this continuous reforming, by looking once again at what the Scriptures teach us about true worship.

I realize that this can be such a controversial topic, but it must and should be continually be addressed. Just because it can be controversial and even a divisive, we still should seek by God's grace to understand what true worship is according to the Scriptures. (And if you are interested in an article that discusses traditional and contemporary worship, this is not the one! You may find insight into which worship “style” is best, but this is not a study on styles necessarily!).

There is no better place to begin to consider Jesus’ heart and mind on true worship than in John 4:20-24 in his dialogue with the sinful, Samaritan woman. There are a few points I would like to make from observing this text and these are by no means the last words on the subject, just a small attempt at understanding what this means for us as the people of God who call ourselves "Reformed".


In the context of John chapter 4, the sinful Samaritan woman has asked Jesus about the two mountains, and where is the correct place for worship (John 4:20).

First of all Jesus corrects her assumption that the Samaritans have been rightly worshipping God on Mt. Gerazim. He tells her that "salvation is from the Jews" (4:22). Jesus does not mean that all Jews will be saved (it is the Apostle John's purpose ironically to show the rejection of Jesus by the majority of the Jews and his acceptance by Samaritans in this passage and through the remainder of chapter 4).

Jesus basically tells the sinful Samaritan woman that since I am here in your midst, the Kingdom is with you, and things are changing right before your very eyes (there is a progression and shift in redemptive-history with Jesus’ coming). Therefore, to merely think about a physical location of worship, and to consider the way things have been, is not enough to consider. In fact, he says to her, "you worship what you do not know; we (meaning the Jews, including Himself) worship what we do know”.

Jesus tells her the time is coming, and is now here, where God's true worshippers will worship Him in spirit and truth. For God is seeking these kind of worshippers (John 4:23).

Let us look at a few considerations from this passage that can inform the way we worship the living God as Reformed Christians.


Worship is Christ-Centered
First of all, it is important to note that true worship is always Christ-Centered. Jesus is the Beginning and End, the Alpha and Omega of our salvation, but also of our worship. Jesus is the reason why we can truly worship the living God in the first place. He is the only Mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5), and thus the only way to the true worship of God (John 14:6). Truly, no man comes to the Father, either for salvation, or for worship apart from Jesus Who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

What Jesus is ultimately revealing to and graciously offering the sinful Samaritan woman is what he wants to reveal and to graciously offer to us today: Worship that is Christ-Centered.

Jesus is telling the woman in these verses in John 4 to get your eyes off the mountains (a local, geographical place), even the so-called traditions of your Fathers, and get your eyes, worship and focus on me. Here Jesus is physically present, not merely to discuss past theological debates about a legitimate mountain on which to worship, but he is here in the flesh to draw the sinful woman’s, (as well as our) attention to Himself alone!

How do you define and describe a “good” worship service?
Recently, I have been thinking that when people in general describe certain congregations that they visit, they speak of what made them happy, met their felt needs, or how the worship satisfied them- -apart from any mention of Who was preached, how He was preached, and what they learned from the preaching of the Word (of course you may hear how long the sermon was, but not much mention of the content).

What it seems like from this general observation is that in our time, it appears that most visitors to worship services are evaluating the service primarily on the style of worship and the feelings gained from it, over and above the priority of Who is preached, how He is preached, and what He tells His people to do. Notice in your own experience when speaking with other evangelical Christians these days if they even mention what was preached, or if they merely focus on the style of the worship and how it either appealed, or rather did not appeal to them.

These are just some thoughts from my pastoral observations, but oftentimes I hear many speaking not so much about the Christ of worship, as they do about themselves and what they got out of the worship.

We should remember as a "Reforming" people, that Christ, His Word, His Way, His Will, His Worship (as best as we can understand it) is to be central in our lives. What we desire and pray for as "Reforming" people is a worship that is primarily about Christ and His presence among us as He walks among our congregations today (Revelation 2-3).

What we hear, what we do, what we think, and even what we ultimately feel in our worship, should always be in light of Jesus and what we have heard proclaimed biblically and passionately from the pulpit each Lord's Day.


Worship is not primarily about us, but it is about God alone.

I find it strange that we mix up what rightly belongs to God and what is given by God for the benefit of man. For instance, Jesus tells us that God has given to us the Christian Sabbath for us. It is for our benefit: "Man is not made for the Sabbath, but the Sabbath for man". However, you will never find Jesus saying that "Man is not made for the worship, but the worship for man."

Yet in principle this is how some of us practically behave! We have been given the Christian Sabbath to worship the living God in a Christ-centered way because it is for our good. Yet we have not been given worship ultimately for our own good (although only good things can come from it; cf. Rom. 8:28ff).

Yet we turn this around on its head like everything else sinful man attempts to do by his own whims and when not submitted to the Word. We tend to break the Christian Sabbath, taking away what is rightly ours and for our own good (then wonder why we are such a tired, unfulfilled and busy people), and we want the worship for ourselves.

Now we don't say it that way, we say we want the worship to be fulfilling to us. But when we start out with a focus on ourselves and our own desires when we are in search of the worship of God with other Christians, we inevitably will end up only finding what suits ourselves and our own selfish desires and wants! May it never be, by God's grace.

We need to understand that it takes more than goosebumps or goosepimples standing up on the back of our necks to determine whether we are truly worshipping the living God in spirit and truth!

May we repent of this kind of thinking and turn once again to Christ by asking our Lord and Savior how we can more appropriately (biblically!) worship him, seeking to worship the Lord Jesus Christ for what He has done for us in obtaining our salvation, and thanking him gratefully by our worship, whether we feel anything for ourselves or not. May we offer ourselves to the Lord God through the Lord Jesus as we long to hear Jesus' Word, Way, Will, and Worship!

Worship is Christ-Commanded
Jesus commands us to worship him in a certain way lest we end up in our own sinfulness worshipping something, or someone other than God!

Notice what Jesus says to the sinful Samaritan woman when comparing the faulty worship tradition of the Samaritans with the Jews in verse 22: "You (plural, meaning all of the Samaritans) worship what you do not know". Jesus uses a relative pronoun: "what you do not know" rather than a personal pronoun "who you do not know". When our worship is not Christ-centered and we approach God the Father by His Spirit through Our Mediator, we worship something other than God.

It is interesting to note that whenever men seek out, even with the noble traditions of their Fathers, yet without submitting entirely to the Scriptures concerning worship, they end up at the end of the day worshipping something (or someone!!) other than the True and Living God.

In Paul's sermon at the Areopagus, while Paul was in Athens, Greece, he notices the same tendency with all men tainted by sin. When men try to worship with mere general revelation, apart from the special revelation of God in the Holy Scriptures, they end up worshipping something (or someone!!) they do not know.

Acts 17:22-23: "Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. 23 For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, 'To the unknown god.' What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you."

The Apostle Paul goes on to instruct them according to the Scriptures how God has clearly manifested Himself to them and ultimately in the revelation of Jesus Christ, the One Who can give all of those Who believe access to the God in Whom we all live, move and have our being (Acts 17:24-32).

But we should remember that even with the privilege of special revelation, and being taught in the Holy Scriptures how we must worship God, we still find a way to worship falsely rather than completely obediently. John Calvin, in his commentary on this passage from John 4 says this:

"...We are not to essay anything in religion rashly or unthinkingly. For unless there is knowledge present, it is not God that we worship but a spectre or ghost. Hence all so-called good intentions are struck by a thunderbolt, which tells us that men can do nothing but err when they are guided by their own opinion without the Word or command of God....the Samaritans took the example of the fathers as a precedent; the Jews were grounded on the commandment of God."

We must recall that Israel had God’s special revelation (Romans 9:1-6), but one of their first formal worship services (if not their first formal service!) after their redemption from Egypt, while Moses was up on the mountain getting the commandments of God, was at worst a heretical, idolatrous worship service to ultimately an "unknown god" (Exodus 32). At the very best, it was a worship perhaps directed to the true God, but not in the way He has commanded them.

Jesus is not saying here in John 4:22 that Israel's worship was always exemplary when he says "salvation is from the Jews" or "we worship what we know". He is stating that Israel was the chosen nation through which the Scriptures came that instructed them in their proper worship (even if they did not obediently comply). This is what Jesus means that "salvation is from the Jews" (compare also with Romans 9:1-6).

However, since the "time was coming, and was now here" things were changing and even the Jews who were worshipping at the Temple on the mountain in Jerusalem, that at one time was the correct place of worship, NOW the worship was to be only in and through Jesus Christ and "in spirit and truth". As Jesus showed with regards to the Temple in Jerusalem (see John chapter 2), the glory of God was manifested in flesh and because God was present with Israel in the flesh now, the glory of God was moving out of the Temple with Him!

To prevent all of God's people from worship something, or someone other than the living God revealed in Scripture, we must willingly submit to Christ's command and principles concerning worship. We must realize that in Jesus, and by His Word we are to be directed as to how we are to worship Him.

This should be sought humbly submitting under Jesus' word, realizing one's own worship style preferences and presuppositions, and prayerfully seeking wisdom to do that which is God honoring and obedience in one's congregation!

The "reforming reformation" of worship begins in each congregation with humble and prayerful Christians submitting themselves under the commands of Christ anew and seeking diligently to obey these commands no matter what the cost to the congregation.

Worship is Word-Centered Dialogue with God
Let's look at another way of understanding worship. Worship is a dialogue with God. To worship God in spirit and truth is to worship him rightly in Jesus Christ alone as he has commanded, but it is also in spirit and truth. The term "spirit and truth" focuses our attention on the spiritually truthful, and non-physical aspect of worship. In verse 24, Jesus teaches the Samaritan woman and us that God is Spirit and thus we worship Him in spirit and truth.

We should understand that in the context, Jesus is drawing the sinful Samaritan woman's attention away from the question of "where", meaning physicality or geographical location of worship, because this is passing away and changing now that the "fullness of the times" have come in Jesus. Now Jesus is focusing the woman's attention, as well as ours on the true worship more specifically directed to "Whom".

How does dialogue with God help us to understanding true worship in spirit and truth? We must remember that in order for us rightly to respond to God in worship, we must first be rightly informed of Who God is and What He teaches us in Scripture.

Who God is as Spirit, in all of his character and revealed attributes in the Scriptures, informs us as to how to worship Him. God reveals Himself in the reading, preaching, and singing of the Word of God in our worship. We dialogue, or respond back to God with our praise, prayers, petitions, and obedience to His commandments.

True worship of God is from a heart wholeheartedly captured and informed by God's Word, because of the work of God's Spirit. Thus one of the reasons why "Reforming" congregations have always placed the Word central in worship. That is why in most "Reforming" congregations historically there is a call to worship from Scripture, as well as a scriptural greeting that opens up the worship-dialogue and a benediction from Scripture closing the worship-dialogue in the formal worship service of the congregation.

In "Reforming" worship, God is greeting us with His Word at the beginning and closing with His Word at the end so that our entire worship, as well as our lives would be found in between, identified in the pages of His Story, and living in His light from morning to evening each and every day!

In "Reforming" congregations there is also a great deal of Scripture read from the Old and New Covenants each worship service, in addition to the sermon text. The focus is always on the Word of God because "God speaks", his people listen, and then we respond in obedience in reliance upon the grace of God!

It is tempting in an age of images to forget the Word-Centered quality of worship. Because many of us have been brought up on an abundance of images, it can be challenging and difficult for us to pay attention to what is read and preached through words. It can be challenging for us to be distracted very easily if we are not quickly entertained.

But this is part of our culture that we must also bring under the Lordship of Jesus! We should resist this image-centered tendency with God's help as much as any other cultural or worldly tendency that seeks to cause us to live according to the pattern of this age (Romans 12:1-2).

Seeking after Word-Centered worship is also part of our spiritual act of worship in offering ourselves up as a living sacrifice and renewing of our minds by the Word of God!

We will be unable to rightly worship because we are not rightly informed! Not only informed about Who God is, how to approach Him in Christ, understanding what He has graciously done for us, we will not be able to truly worship God because we will be seeking him in a shallow and uninformed manner, only seeking to satisfy ourselves and our own desires for what we think is real worship revealed through our feelings.

Think about it: If a congregation of Christ's sheep, instead of being Word-Centered and fed primarily on the Word, is being merely fed on a diet of short, catchy praise ditties without much theological content in their worship, then the response from these malnourished sheep will be short, catchy praise ditties without much theological content in response to God in their worship.

In other words, as the old saying goes concerning what we eat physically: "You are what you eat". So, it can be applied spiritually here with regards to worship. "We are spiritually what we eat!" Our dialogue in worship will reflect what we are hearing and learning about God and His Christ!

Yet true worship in spirit and truth, must come from the Word of God. God meets His people every Lord's Day, through the ordained minister, who stands in Christ's place, proclaiming not merely jokes, good manners, stories, and his own experiences, but proclaiming the Christ Who saves through the Word God speaks (Heb. 1:1-2).

In an age of images, we must always remember that faith does not come by images, but still comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ (Romans 10:17).

This doesn't mean we will not have to work at being Word-Centered and Word-Focused people in worship- - we will! It will take a greater amount of grace for us to pay attention to the word read, sung, and preached. We will often be tempted to find the surroundings too hot, too cold, too many children crying, too much work to do when I get home or to the office, too long of a sermon, too many songs to sing, etc.

When all we are truly and really saying if we are honest with ourselves is that it is too hard to listen to God's Word and we don't often find it as interesting as we ought because we've wasted a lot of time not listening, not paying attention, relying merely on images and stories to make the point!

Alright, then! Worship for sinful man saved by grace can be hard work, but not too hard by God's grace! God has given His Word to us, so that His people, saturated by the reading, singing, and hearing of His Word, can appropriately and honestly respond to the living God in praise, prayer, petitions and obedience!

If God has chosen to grow His people by His Word, then why do we seek anything else? If God calls His Only Begotten Son, the Incarnate Word (John 1:14), then why would we want to try and worship Him in any other way than by and through His Word that tells us about the salvation and grace that has been shown to us in Jesus??!!

Worship is wholeheartedly honest and truthful, from the heart when the Word is central and we dialogue with the living God in our worship; this is worship in Spirit and truth that Jesus is speaking of here in John 4.

Think about it! When you are convicted of sin, you respond in true repentance (that's worship in spirit and truth); when you are sad because life is upside down because of sin, you are suffering and you hear God's Word of comfort, you respond with your own sadness to God, but with living hope (that's worship in spirit and truth); when you are feeling rightfully guilty for breaking God's commandments, rather than descending introspectively into shame, you hear that God has sent a Savior who was shamed for you, and you respond in belief all over again, knowing that Jesus truly loves you and is the Savior of your soul (that's worship in spirit and truth).

If Christ is not central in worship, we will be; If Christ's commandments are not heeded with regards to worship, our ideas and traditions will be; if worship is not Word-Centered and understood as a dialogue with God, then we will not be able truly to worship in spirit and truth.

This is not a comprehensive analysis of worship from John 4:20-24 as I said earlier, but hopefully it is a help and a beginning to at least rethink the way you and your congregation do worship now. Would you say your worship is Christ-Centered, Christ-Commanded, and a true Dialogue with God in spirit and truth? I pastorally challenge you to seek the LORD and pray that He would work in and through you to become even more "Reforming" in your worship.

Don't seek to overwhelm others in your congregations with your understanding of true worship. Don't think pridefully you're the only one who understands true worship (because if you think this, you really don't understand because you are probably worshipping God insincerely while looking around you and judging those around you because you know they are wrong). Don't think this kind of biblical reformation and continual reforming can come overnight!

But neither be scared and frightened by men to tell the truth and stand for biblical truth in love! Remember love for others covers a multitude of sins. You can influence people so much more if you first live true worship, teach true worship, love true worship, and make connections with others who have never experienced true worship because they have been so concerned with themselves and their own felt needs!

If you want a comprehensive collection of balanced essays on worshipping God in spirit and truth, you should begin with a book dedicated to the memory, ministry, and work of Dr. James Montgomery Boice. The book is entitled Give Praise to God: A Vision for Reforming Worship- Celebrating the Legacy of James Montgomery Boice, Edited by Ryken, Thomas, and Duncan III (P&R, 2003). Please purchase this from www.wtsbook.org, so that you might contribute to the ongoing work at Westminster Theological Seminary.

Soli Deo Gloria!

________________________________________

For Further Reading
D. A. Carson, 'Gospel According to John'
H. Ridderbos, 'The Gospel of John: A Theological Commentary'
L. Morris, 'The Gospel According to John' (NICNT)
J. Calvin, 'Commentary on the Gospel of John'
R. Brown, 'Commentary on the Gospel of St. John'
J. Dennison, Articles on John's Gospel at www.kerux.com
J. Boice, 'Commentary on John's Gospel'
Ryken, Longman III, et al, 'Dictionary of Biblical Imagery'
Ephesians 3:20-21: "Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen."

Pastor Charles R. Biggs
Ketoctin Covenant Presbyterian Church
www.aplacefortruth.org
www.reformationtheology.com
www.sermonaudio.com/kcpc

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