It is what it is.

“Ballgame over! Yankees win! Theeeeeee Yankees win!”

Win Them With God

Last of a 4-5 series of posts from Kevin DeYoung over at Gospel Coalition.

Give them a God who is holy, independent, and unlike us, a God who is good, just, full of wrath and full of mercy.  Give them a God who is sovereign, powerful, tender, and true.  Give them a God with edges.  Give them an undiluted God who makes them feel cherished and safe, and small and uncomfortable too.  Give them a God who works all things after the counsel of his will and for the glory of his name.  Give them a God whose love is lavish and free.  Give them a God worthy of wonder and fear, a God big enough for all our faith, hope, and love.

 

Win Them With Holiness

From Kevin DeYoung again.

I love the line from Robert Murray M’Cheyne: “What your people need from you most is your own personal holiness.”  I’ve given that advice to others dozens of times, and I’ve repeated it to myself a hundred times.  Almost my whole philosophy of ministry is summed up in M’Cheyne’s words.  My congregation needs me to be humble before they need me to be smart.  They need me to be honest more than they need me to be a dynamic leader.  They need me to be teachable more than they need me teach at conferences.  If your walk matches your talk, if your faith costs you something, if being a Christian is more than a cultural garb, they will listen to you.

Win Them With Truth

Pt. 3 or 4 from Kevin DeYoung.

Church people are not stupid.  They are not incapable of learning.  For the most part, they simply haven’t been taught.  No one has challenged them to think a deep thought or read a difficult book.  No one has asked them to articulate their faith in biblical and theological categories.  We have expected almost nothing out of our young people, so that’s what we get.  A couple generations ago 20 year olds were getting married, starting a family, working at a real job or off somewhere fighting Nazis.  Today 35 year olds are hanging out on Facebook, looking for direction, and trying to find themselves.  We have been coddled when we should have been challenged.

As a church plant that has been striving to grow and center on Christ, the gospel and true Christian community, the time is now for us to begin the process of going deep with the Scriptures and being challenged to think deeper thoughts, make deeper connections between Old and New Testament, and glorying in the reality that our God is much bigger than we ever thought, and perhaps bigger than want.  I’m looking forward to teaching again soon.

Best Post I’ve Read In A Long Time

Ouch!  Got drilled right between the eyes with this one.  Kevin DeYoung is fast becoming one of my favorite “voices”.  Piper, Mahaney, Carson, Lloyd Jones, Mohler, Keller, Chandler, Driscoll and The rest of the T4G guys serve as my mentors and pastors through what they have written and what they preach.  DeYoung is reaching that level as well.  Here is one of his latest posts, the first in a series that no doubt will be worth reading.  I’ve pasted a couple portions of it for you here.  Take a look, and take some thought after reading.  It will be worth your time.

There have been times as a pastor where I’ve been discouraged by the slowness of growth in my congregation.  I’ve thought, “Why is that church over there so successful?  Why did they go from 150 to 1500 in three years?”  I’ve even been borderline snippy at times,  “Lord, if I get to heaven and find out there was some secret musical style or movie clip or new program I was supposed to use in order to be successful, I’m going to feel pretty bummed.”  But in my saner moments I’ve come to see two things:  One, it’s more my sin that wants success than my sanctification.  And two, the secret is that there is no secret.

We cannot pass on what we do not feel.  Whitefield blasted the church in his day because “the generality of preachers [in New England] talk of an unknown and unfelt Christ.  The reason why congregations have been so dead is because they have had dead men to preach to them.”  The next generation, every generation really, needs to hear the gospel with personal, passionate, pleading.  There is a time for dialogue, but there is also a time for declaration.  People don’t need a lecture or an oration or a discussion from the pulpit on Sunday morning.  They need to hear of the mighty deeds of God.  And they need to hear the message from someone who not only understands it, but has been captured by it.

Ancillary Benefits to the 5:30 Club

Since re-upping for the 5:30 am club,  I have found a benefit that previously did not exist.  Before when Julie and I got up for our morning time of Bible reading and communing with God, the kids were home-schooled.  We would read, pray, shower up and I’d eat and head out for work many times before the kids had risen and started their day.

With the older two in school now, and with Julie’s continued physical troubles, I am the only active member of the 5:30 club in the Miller household.  So it is now my job, and my joy to go in and wake up Parker and Mary Paige from sleep and encourage them to get ready for school.

It has been a true blessing to me.  To gently rub their backs, kiss their head or their cheek, or  make up some dorky wake up song if they seem coherant enough to laugh.  I haven’t always been the best nurturer in the family as my wife oozes with nurture and it’s been real easy to let her carry that load.

Even while Julie tries to rest and recover and get well, I still find myself grateful for this trial as now the gentler side of me has been given an opportunity to be exercised in my kids lives.  I thoroughly enjoy it, and know there is coming a day when I will look back on these days wistfully and wish they were still here.

So I wake early.  Enjoy my Lord.  Hear from Him.  Talk to Him.  And then enjoy my growing children as they wake, prepare themselves and then go out into the world. A reflection of their mom and I, and hopefully a refelction of Christ.  Good Days.  Thank you Lord.

The Political Christian?

A great reminder and thought for those who find themselves enamored with politics.  Political involvement is good.  Hope and trust in politics, political figures is not.

It is a contradiction in terms for Christian people to be giving so much of their energy to this world. Church conferences and assemblies spend most of their time in considering ‘this world’, passing resolutions about this world. But our first business is to prepare for that other world! This world is doomed. It is under the condemnation of God; it will never be made a better place. Recall how men have tried in the last hundred years to reform it, and how ministers of religion and leaders in churches have given themselves to politics. But look at the state of the Church and the world! The men who have been the greatest benefactors to this world have been such people as those in Hebrews 11 who realized that they were ‘strangers and pilgrims’ and kept their eye ‘upon the recompense of the reward’

David Martyn. Lloyd-Jones, The Christian Soldier : An Exposition of Ephesians 6:10 to 20 (Edinburgh; Carlisle, Pa.: Banner of Truth Trust, 1977), 264.

(HT) Adrian Warnock

A 5:30 Club Kindred Spirit

I knew there was a reason I really like Matt and am drawn to his preaching.  I find myself walking down several of the same paths that he talks about in this little interview.

Greeting Guests vs. Greeting Members

Great observation at Pyromaniacs on how we treat special those who are visiting our Sunday services and in a sense de-value those who attend regularly and are committed to the work of the Body.  I think he’s right.  I might have to change my verbiage this week to reflect this truth.