A Word for Preachers...Mohler on the Need for Urgency in Preaching

"In all too many pulpits, God has become our next-door neighbor, our great cosmic companion, or the divine leader of our small group, rather than the holy God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Perhaps the lack of urgency in so much preaching today comes from a lack of understanding about humanity's awful predicament. The greatest problem we human beings face is not a shortage of self-esteem. It is that we have rebelled against God, and, in His holiness, God will one day hold us to horrible account for our sin.

"The gospel necessarily comes with an urgent warning, because the distinction between those who obey its call and those who disobey is not merely between a better life and a worse life. It is the difference between life and death. It is an eternal distinction, for the cost of disobedience and the coast of not hearing the gospel is eternal death.

"That is why we must preach with urgency of a dying man. It is because human beings are in desperate need of salvation. Time is short, God's wrath is certain, and eternity hangs in the balance. Moreover, there is for each of us only one way out of this predicament, and that is the salvation God Himself has won through the gospel of his Son, Jesus Christ."

Al Mohler
He Is Not Silent: Preaching in a Postmodern World

Greater Pleasure than Sin

Good friend (and speaker at the upcoming Mid-Michigan Reformation Conference) David Crabb authored a blog post today about sin. I know. What a fun topic to talk about! NOT!!!

Actually, as David recognizes in the post, if we had our druthers we probably wouldn't talk about sin at all. It is not pleasant spending time considering that which has so much power over us. And no matter how often we redouble our efforts to "try harder," it seems that those efforts always end in futility, as we are relentlessly enticed by sin's promises of pleasure (fleeting though it may be).

David writes though that there is a way to defeat sin:

The only way to defeat the pleasure of sin is by faith in the promise of God that there is a greater pleasure. Something more satisfying, more joy-giving than sin. Holiness will not come through man-made regulations or through using fear as a motivation, but through a mind captivated and controlled by Christ. Seeing Christ is what causes us to be like Him. When we see Him partially in this life, we are changed partially into His likeness. When we see Him perfectly in the life to come, we will be changed perfectly into His likeness.

Click here to read the entire post.

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom: Ted Kluck on Cynicism and Sin

"Cynicism is described accurately by Paul Miller in A Praying Life: 'Shattered optimism sets us up for the fall into defeated weariness and, eventually, cynicism. You'd think it would just leave us less optimistic, but as humans we don't do neutral well. We go from seeing the bright side of everything to seeing the dark side of everything. We feel betrayed by life.'

"And when we feel betrayed by life--and God--sin usually follows. We sin because we fundamentally distrust that God's plan will be enough to bring us the happiness (or esteem or comfort) that we crave the most. So we look to the world to provide those things. And many times, from Christians, we're just implored to 'sin less.' We buy the forty-ninth Internet filter for our computers, or take on our fifth accountability partner. Those things, mind you, are good and helpful. But like John Piper asserts in Future Grace, we must replace the sin with something greater."

Ted Kluck
Finding God in the Dark

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Luther on the Accusations of Satan

"So when the devil throws your sins in your face and declares that you deserve death and hell, tell him this: 'I admit that I deserve death and hell, what of it? For I know One who suffered and made satisfaction on my behalf. His name is Jesus Christ, Son of God, and where He is there I shall be also!'"

Martin Luther

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom...Trueman on God's Work Contra Our Sin

"Indeed, one of the most amazing things about church history is the fact that the kingdom of God progresses so often in the teeth of the immortality and infidelity of the people and their leaders. To declare, then, that the church's current problems are is not to forge an unbreakable cause-effect link between our individual behaviour and the effectiveness of the gospel. And thank God that this is so! If such a link existed, who of us here today would ever have been converted? It is only through grace that God enables sinful men and women to lead others to Christ."

Carl Trueman
Reformation: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Playing the Blame Game

“Deeply ingrained in the children of Adam is the tendency to blame some aspect of creation (and by implication the Creator) rather than their own rebellion for the misery of their creation.”

Albert Wolters
Creation Regained: Biblical Basics for a Reformational Worldview

Ryken on Self-Righteousness

"Those who are confident about their own righteousness are not justified…Unless you consider yourself the worst of sinners – knowing the sinful attitudes of your heart are as dishonoring to a perfectly holy God as any sins can be – you are still learning what it means to be a Christian, because genuine Christians are firmly convinced of the wretchedness of their sin."

Philip Ryken

1 Timothy

Wednesdays Words of Wisdom...Pascal on Original Sin

"It is, however, astonishing that the mystery most distant from our knowledge, that of the transmission of sin, should be a thing without which we can have no knowledge of ourselves. For without doubt there is nothing more shocking to our reason that to say that the sin of the first man has made culpable those who, being so remote from this source, seem incapable of participating in it. This transmission not only seems impossible to us, it even appears very unjust...Certainly nothing shocks us more harshly than this doctrine. And yet without this most incomprehensible of mysteries, we are incomprehensible to ourselves. The knot of our condition takes its twists and turns in this abyss, so that man is more unintelligible without this mystery than this mystery is unintelligible to man."

Blaise Pascal 
Pensées

The Essence of Human Nature

This cartoon is funny, while at the same time quite theologically astute in regards to the doctrine of sin.

(HT: Vitamin Z)

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom

“And lest we should adopt the opinion of the philosophers, that ignorance, which leads us into mistakes, is only an incidental evil, Paul shews that it has its root in the blindness of their heart, by which he intimates that it dwells in their very nature. The first blindness, therefore, which covers the minds of men, is the punishment of original sin; because Adam, after his revolt, was deprived of the true light iof God, in the absence of which there is nothing but fearful darkness.”

John Calvin

Wednesday's Words of Wisdom

"If mercy is true, you must therefore bear the true, not an imaginary sin. God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong, but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin, death, and the world. We will commit sins while we are here, for this life is not a place where justice resides. We, however, says Peter (2 Peter 3:13), are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth where justice will reign. It suffices that through God's glory we have recognized the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. No sin can separate us from Him, even if we were to kill or commit adultery thousands of times each day. Do you think such an exalted Lamb paid merely a small price with a meager sacrifice for our sins? Pray hard for you are quite a sinner."

                               Martin Luther

Creation Groans

I preached yesterday on Romans 8:18-27. One of the things that this passage deals with is the fact that all of creation is broken as a result of sin. Just as God cursed Adam (and all mankind with him) when Adam first sinned, so too was creation itself cursed.

Why would God do this? Donald Grey Barnhouse offers the following answer in his Commentary on Romans (Volume III, p. 129):

“This He did in order to bring forth the lessons that all of His spirit creatures could see, leaving the ruined creation as an object lesson to show that there is no path of blessing except yieldedness to the will of the Creator, and that every departure from that will means death.”

As a result, each time we do battle with weeds and thorns and thistles, and each time we hear news of hurricanes, tornadoes and earthquakes, let us be reminded of our sin. And as we are reminded of our sin, let us also be reminded of the fact that Christ Jesus has offered himself as an atonement for it.

Like his brothers in every way except for sin

Question 35 of the Heidelberg Catechism asks. “What does it mean that he ‘was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary’?” The answer it proceeds to give is, “That the eternal Son of God, who is and remains true and eternal God, took to himself, through the working of the Holy Spirit, from the flesh and blood of the virgin Mary, a truly human nature so that he might become David's true descendant, like his brothers in every way except for sin.”

As I read through Q&A 35, I was struck by the fact that Christ was “like his brothers in every way except for sin.” It is clear that two passages in the book of Hebrews had great influence on this answer:

Hebrews 2:14-18 - Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

and

Hebrews 4:14-16 - Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

What comfort we indeed have in the fact that Jesus is not some far off God, unable to relate to us, but rather has condescended to become like us, sharing in our trials and in our sufferings! A God who now bids us to do what otherwise would be unthinkable: to boldly approach his throne to find grace in our time of need.

There is one other way that Jesus is decidedly not like us. He didn’t just share in our trials and sufferings, he experienced them on our behalf. As such, he is unlike us (at least those of us who have placed our trust in him) in that we will never face the wrath of a just and holy God. This of course is precisely what happened to Jesus on the cross.

It was for our sake that he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21)…For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers (Romans 8:29)…And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another (2 Corinthians 3:18).

Oh how I long for that day when this transformation will be complete! When God not only will see me through the righteousness of Christ, but when that righteousness so fills me and flows from me that I sin no more. In that day I will be truly like my elder brother! Come, Lord Jesus!