Thomas Goodwin on the Necessity of Illumination

“…no man’s or men’s private understandings, without the aid of that public secretary of heaven, can understand them…he only hid the treasures of knowledge in that field, and he only knows where they lie; what an advantage is it then by prayer to unlock God’s breast, obtain the key of knowledge that unlocks God’s study, and can direct to all his notes and his paper.” 

-Quoted from JI Packer, The Quest for Godliness

Review of The Story of Christianity by Justo L. Gonzalez

Author: Justo Gonzalez
Pages: 880
Publisher: Prince Press
Price: 15.99
Genre: History

Quick Summary:
Originally 2 volumes, this highly readable church history is now available in one volume. This book is an often required text book for church history classes at both the seminary and college level. Volume 1 covers from the churches beginnings up to the Protestant Reformation. Volume 2 covers from the Protestant Reformation up to modern times. Gonzalez also gives much needed attention to the expansion of Christianity into Central and South America.
What I Liked:
Many consider church history to be boring. Sadly, there are many “boring” church history books; the Story of Christianity is not one of them. Gonzalez writes in such a way to not only inform but make the stories come alive. He allows the reader to consider the difficulties and opportunities that the church had to reckon with at each stage of history. The reader is introduced to key historical figures within the church and in secular society. As you read through each section of church history you really have a feel for the social climate. Gonzalez is an excellent writer and a credible historian.
What I Disliked:
There are two minor things that keep this from being a 5 star book. The first is that Gonzalez at times will interject opinion. Of course every historian must make opinions at various points. The historian is often making an interpretive decision by including one story and not another. However, at times Gonzalez will raise issues or put forth an opinion that does not flow smoothly into the narrative. Secondly, the book does a great job of telling a story but often lacks chronology. Within each section Gonzalez is concerned with telling the story but sometimes as he looks at the story from various angles the chronology is lost.
Should You Buy It:
Even if this is not required for a class this would be a welcome addition to any home library. Studying church history is an important and much needed discipline. If you need a church history survey book there are few better than Gonzalez.  Buy it for only 15.99.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

“Gospel-Sounding” Legalism

Do you ever hear something that you know is wrong but you cannot quite put your finger on it?  Have you ever had a conversation with someone where you knew you disagreed but you could not put your finger on what exactly the difference was?  I think I may have figured out what rubs me the wrong way so often in Christian circles.  We have a way of sounding biblical, looking Christian, speaking of Jesus while somehow subverting the gospel. 

Take for instance notes I found from a conference on tackling fear, worry, and anxiety.  It starts with the basics.  It is theologically sound on who God is.  It continues with a sound view of the importance of Scripture.  If we are going to tackle fear, worry, and anxiety we need to know who God is.  So, get in the Word. The entire speech (sermon) centers around this premise—know God.  Then it closes by saying if we know Christ, if we stay in His Word, then we will know the truth.  If we know the truth then we will be free from worry, anxiety, stress, etc. 

So, what’s the problem? 

All of the things that were stated are true.  At least they are true in a sense.  The problem with such teaching/preaching is that it starts in the wrong spot.  It is a misdiagnosis and a foundational misunderstanding of who Jesus is and what exactly He has already accomplished and intends to fully accomplish in redemption. 

The problem with such teaching is that it does not go far enough.  It applies cold medicine to cure cancer.  Better yet, it puts cancer into remission but you still die from it years later.  The problem is that many people that would disagree with Joel Osteen actually live based on the same smiley premise: your best life is now.  

God does indeed intend to conquer your fear, worry, and anxiety.  But He does not conquer your fear, worry, and anxiety by leaving you an owner’s manual, providing you the resources, setting an example, and then saying "get it done”.  He conquers your fear, worry, and anxiety by ACTUALLY conquering your fear, worry, and anxiety. 

There are principally two ways to encourage others in casting out fear, worry, and anxiety (or any other vice) and replacing it with assurance, trust, and rest.  I adapt this from Tim Keller.  The first one says I obey, therefore I conquer fear, worry, and anxiety.  (Or you can even make it sound gospel centered—“I obey the principles God graciously set forth, therefore God conquers fear, worry, and anxiety”).  The second one says Christ has conquered fear, worry, and anxiety, therefore I live in rest (therefore, I obey). 

Some day you will no longer fear.  Your best life is not now—no matter how many “biblical principles” you apply.  You will struggle with fear, anxiety, and worry this side of our complete redemption.  But that does not mean that you sit passively by and just wait until Jesus comes down on a cloud, blows a trumpet, and calls you home.  You respond to His work and you live in it. 

Whether you follow these principles or not really has nothing to do with whether you will ultimately be without fear, worry, and anxiety.  Those are conquered—eventually because of the work of Christ you will not have them.  Following these “biblical principles” are ways that you live in what Christ has already purchased.  It is a subtle difference but it is a difference between defeated, dead, and devilish faith and victorious, lively, and biblical faith. 

So, how do you preach/teach to conquer fear and worry?  You start with the work of Christ.  And every “biblical principle” that you give explodes out of this one glorious truth. 

Monday’s Ministry Musing: Why Weighty Preaching is Not Bad but Actually Necessary

I am reading through T. David Gordon’s critique of today’s preaching: Why Johnny Can’t Preach.  This quote may in fact be used by the Lord to rescue me from trite “current” preaching.  Speaking of what type of minister our media saturated culture produces, Gordon writes:

Ministers who are not at home with what is significant; ministers whose attention span is less than that of a four-year old in the 1940’s, who race around like the rest of us, constantly distracted by sounds and images of inconsequential trivialities, and out of touch with what is weighty.  It is not surprising that their sermons, and the alleged worship that surrounds them, are often trifling, thoughtless, uninspiring, and mundane.  It is not surprising that their sermons are mindlessly practical, in the “how-to” sense.  It is also not surprising that their sermons tend to be moralistic, sentimentalistic, or slavishly drafted into the so-called culture wars.  The great seriousness of the reality of being human, the dreadful seriousness of the coming judgment of God, the sheer insignificance of the present in light of eternity—realities that once were the subtext of virtually every sermon—have now disappeared, and have been replaced by one triviality after another.

I hope you read that.  Especially if you are a preacher of the gospel. 
Any person that knows me has come to understand that I greatly appreciate men like Jonathan Edwards, John Piper, the Puritans, and John Newton.  These men were/are weighty in their preaching.  I have been greatly influence by what Thomas Boston communicated in The Art of Manfishing, “If you believe that the wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God, you can not speak to them as if you were telling a story.”  And so my preaching has taken upon a certain gravity. 
Weighty preaching leads to a problem, though; especially, if you struggle with a desire to be a people pleaser.  The problem with weighty preaching is that the congregation lives in the same world that Gordon describes for the preacher: preoccupied with the insignificant and unimportant.  Neither the preacher nor the congregation really wants to come face to face with the significant and important.  
To buck this trend might mean to be thought of as, “too deep”.  Weighty preaching will cause people to have to chew and digest so you may not see instant results.  In order to really preach a text with weight you will have to feel that text—and that often hurts.  Not to mention to really feel a text means to know it, so this means more time.  There really is no “big secret” to preaching weighty, so you may not be seen as cutting edge.  Creation, fall, and redemption might get a little old.  People may get sick of hearing that the only remedy is the gospel.  It will be tempting to offer other solutions, to not beat the same drum.  You might lose a few people. 
People will flock to flashy; but what they really need is weighty.  We cannot afford to entertain, merely inform, and make certain that the people enjoy our sermons.  I am not calling for boring sermons where lazy or unbroken and untouched men “preach the text” but refuse to let themselves be broken under it.  I hunger to be broken by the sermons that I preach, to preach them passionately, and to preach as a dying man to dying men and women. 
Lord rescue us from the trivial and enthrall our hearts with that which is weighty! 

Reason #376 Why You Need the Puritans

Because they write amazing stuff like this:

I would not [lack] the sweet experience of the consolations of God for all the bitterness of affliction; nay, whether God come to his children with a rod or a crown, if he come himself with it, it is well.  Welcome, welcome Jesus, what way soever thou come, if we can get a sight of thee.  And sure I am, it is better to be sick, providing Christ come to the bed-side, and draw aside the curtains, and say, ‘Courage, I am they salvation’, than to enjoy health, being lusty and strong, and never to be visited of God.  -Samuel Rutherford.