ESV Gospel Transformation Bible

I love Bryan Chapell. I love the English Standard Version of the Bible. I love the Christ-centered, gospel-grounded understanding that I've come to have of the overarching narrative of the Scriptures.

For all these reasons and many more--including (but not limited to) the involvement of Dane Ortlund and Scotty Smith--I can't wait to see the ESV Gospel Transformation Bible. Check out the video below.

What Motivates You?

Galatians 2:11-14 discusses Paul's confrontation of Peter over Peter's refusal to eat with gentiles. I saw a great post yesterday from Dane Ortlund dealing with this passage. In it he says,

Now how does Paul handle this? Certainly, he rebukes Peter—'I opposed him to his face' (2:11). 

Yet how does Paul do this? What is his diagnosis?

Paul identifies Peter’s error as gospel error. 'I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel' (2:14). What was Peter’s mistake? Gospel leakage.

But in what way was Peter's heart leaking out gospel? How specifically was he not believing the gospel?

The text tells us: 'fearing the circumcision party' (2:12). Fear. That was what drove Peter.

To sum up: Paul says Peter feared other men, causing him to not walk in step with the gospel, causing him to introduce all kinds of dysfunction into his relationships with other people.

Click here to read the entire post, and may we all be motivated by the gospel as opposed to fear.

Dane Ortlund on Staying Christian in Seminary

You may have noticed in the right sidebar of my blog that there is a section called "Most Popular Posts." At the top of the list, you'll find that of all the posts I've written, the one that has gotten the most traffic is my post entitled Seminary Doesn't Need to Kill Your Faith. It was a response to a series that Desiring God had started entitled How to Stay a Christian in Seminary and focused on the fact that far from being a place of spiritual turmoil, Covenant Theological Seminary was a sweet foretaste of heaven for me.

Fellow Covenant alum Dane Ortlund wrote a post yesterday entitled Staying Christian in Seminary in conjunction with the Desiring God series. In it he suggests that among the many good words of advice, there are two things in particular that the seminary student should remember:

1. You are justified by another.
2. You are strong in weakness.

In both of these, much is made of God's grace, and our need to be in performance-mode is minimized. If you are a seminary student, I highly recommend you read Dane's entire post. In fact, the gospel-centeredness of this post is so rich that it would benefit you greatly even if seminary is the last place you expect to find yourself.

Dane Ortlund on Receiving Criticism

Fellow Covenant Seminary alum Dane Ortlund had a great post on dealing with criticism yesterday at his blog, Strawberry-Rhubarb Theology. In it he shared two wrong ways to receive it ("overtly reject consideration of it" or "reject consideration of the critique inwardly, while receiving it outwardly"), before moving on to the appropriate way to deal with critical words from Christian brothers and sisters:

Receive the critical words, consider them. Fill your heart with a sense of God's undentable delight in you as his son or daughter, filter the criticism through wisdom, ponder what has been said, leave behind what was sincere but wrong as far as you can tell, seek the counsel of others if needed, remember that Christ's blood covers all offenses, and redirect your life accordingly.

The whole post is well worth reading as it is full of gospel-empowered wisdom and humility. Click here to check it out.

For Whom Are You Working?

Dane Ortlund had a brief but insightful post yesterday at his blog, Strawberry-Rhubarb Theology.  In it he pointed the reader to the following two passages of Scripture from the Gospel of Mark:

Mark 8:33, "Get behind me, Satan!" (spoken by Jesus to the Simon Peter), and Mark 9:38-39, where we find the disciples saying, "'Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us.' But Jesus said, 'Do not stop him.'"

Dane then wisely observed,

Even the chief apostle, the one on whom Jesus founded the church, is capable of falling into patterns of thinking that align with Satan rather than God (Mark 8). Yet shortly later, the disciples are concerned that strangers are casting out demons in Jesus’ name (Mark 9).

In Mark 8 we learn that the work of Satan can be done by those close to Jesus. In Mark 9 we learn that the work of God can be done by those far from Jesus.

May we all remember this lesson and pray that we might humbly and consistently walk in the good works that God has prepared for us (Ephesians 2:10).

Reducing the Bible to One Sentence

Dane Ortlund had a really neat post over at his blog today.  He asked a number of prominent pastors and theologians an interesting question and compiled their answers for our perusal.  The question: "What's the message of the Bible in one sentence?"

Among the answers I really enjoyed were the following:

Kevin DeYoung: A holy God sends his righteous Son to die for unrighteous sinners so we can be holy and live happily with God forever.

George Robertson: The Bible is the record of God's promise of and deliverance through Jesus Christ.

Jay Sklar: The first sentence that comes to mind is that of my colleague Michael D. Williams, who describes the Bible's story about the world as follows: God made it, we broke it, Jesus fixes it!

Erik Thoennes: The main message of the Bible is that the one true God is displaying his glory primarily in redeeming and restoring his fallen creation by fulfilling his covenant promises and commands through the glorious person and atoning work of Christ.

Doug Wilson: Scripture tells us the story of how a Garden is transformed into a Garden City, but only after a dragon had turned that Garden into a howling wilderness, a haunt of owls and jackals, which lasted until an appointed warrior came to slay the dragon, giving up his life in the process, but with his blood effecting the transformation of the wilderness into the Garden City.

You can read the whole post here.

Be True To Your School

The Beach Boys once sang, in all of their brilliant harmonies, "Be True to Your School."  It can not be debated; I have heeded this command.

I still follow my high school's football and basketball teams as closely as I can from 568 miles away.  I have read about them in the online edition of my hometown's newspaper, exchanged text messages with friends and family members while they were at games, watched games streamed live on the internet and even once upgraded my TV package so that I would have the station that was carrying a game in which my high school was playing.  As a matter of fact, the color scheme of this blog is inspired by the orange and black of the Webster Groves Statesmen.

I still show the same type of support for my college as well.  Each Saturday during football season, you're sure to find me decked out in my Mizzou black and gold, watching the game if the Tigers happen to be on TV, or listening to the radio broadcast online if that's the best I can do. More Saturdays than I'd like to admit have been made or ruined on the basis of a Tiger football game.

As much as I am committed to my high school and college though, I am perhaps even more enthusiastic in my support of my other alma mater.  I have often told others that my three years at Covenant Theological Seminary provided me with a foretaste of heaven.  Thanks to both the teaching in the classrooms and the atmosphere that is cultivated, an ethos of grace pervades the campus.

Dane Ortlund captured my thoughts perfectly when he recently wrote about Covenant:

Every institution is filled with nothing but sinners. We are fallen, and our schools reflect that. And when I left three years ago, the school's overall sin-meter dropped considerably. But the norm is for institutions, even seminaries, to contain islands of grace amidst an ocean of self. Covenant is the only school I've ever set foot on that contains, in the mercy of God, islands of self amid an ocean of grace.

I shake my head with wonder at God's kindness to this institution.

Covenant recently released a number of faculty videos on YouTube that help communicate what makes Covenant so special.  I've included four below from some of the professors who had a particular impact on me.

The Grace of God in All of Scripture

I saw a wonderful post yesterday from fellow Covenant Theological Seminary alum Dane Ortlund.  In it he states,

(C)ertain motifs course through the Scripture from start to end, tying the whole thing together into a coherent tapestry--kingdom, temple, people of God, creation/new creation, and so on. Yet underneath and undergirding all of these, it seems to me, is the motif of God's grace, his favor and love to the undeserving. Don't we see the grace of God in every book of the Bible?

He then begins to demonstrate the prominence of grace in each of the Bible's 66 books:

Genesis shows God’s grace to a universally wicked world as he enters into relationship with a sinful family line (Abraham) and promises to bless the world through him.

Exodus shows God’s grace to his enslaved people in bringing them out of Egyptian bondage.

Leviticus shows God’s grace in providing his people with a sacrificial system to atone for their sins...

I recommend that you click here to see the whole list. It truly is an impressive homage to the grace of God.