And the river keeps flowing
Posted on January 19th, 2010
The last entry is dated 2008. The child I was waiting to arrive when I wrote that entry is now 18 months old.
Lots going on. Lots happened in the last 18 months.
We’ll see whether or not I pick up the mantle again and carry this on.
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A River in the Night
Posted on July 18th, 2008
Wow, time slips by quickly. Has it really been over a month since I wrote anything for this site? Proves my blogging inconsistency. I’ll go for a week or two in a row posting regularly, then stop for an endless time while other things in life take priority.
Like having a child. Still waiting for that, though. Due date’s in three days, so any day now they can come!
Anyway, I am still here, still in ministry, still pondering how to do this thing and live life in a God-honoring way. And still reading books. Just not the ones I have in the sidebar at the moment…that’s the next update!
Hopefully, I’ll post more later. In the meantime, back to whatever it was I was doing before.
Tags: books, Life, parenting
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Psalm 18:1-24
Posted on June 11th, 2008
An awesome, humbling portrait of one man’s experience of God’s salvation. There’s a picture of the sufficiency and security of God for salvation at the beginning, then David expresses his immense need for help. He was at the point of death, with nothing in view to save him from his certain destruction. He then describes God’s passion for desiring to help David, to save him from his troubles. The anger and emotion attributed to God as He leaves heaven to descend to earth and care for the one He loves is inspiring for anyone who has been in the depths and wonders if there is any who loves me, any who cares whether I exist: God cares.
Verses 16-19 describe the actual salvation that David experienced. It is entirely God’s doing. David’s enemy had no hope of stopping God’s plan to save David. And there was nothing that David did of his own that saved him. God plucked him from his misery. God saved. Sounds like Paul’s salvation by grace through faith. As the hymn writer says, “Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to Thy cross I cling.”
The last set of verses, 20-24, are a struggle for me, though. There David says that God dealth with him according to David’s righteousness, and that he had upheld God’s statutes – there was no fault on him. Where does this righteousness come from? Is it a righteousness credited to David somewhere along the way, as Genesis 15 says that righteousness was credited to Abraham? Is it akin to the righteousness we have by means of the blood of Jesus?
Since finishing Jerry Bridges’ The Pursuit of Holiness, I have been struggling with this – and the Bible passages I’m reading seem to keep bringing it up. What is my role? David could say he was blameless before God. I cannot do the same. Yet, I believe that Christ’s work is sufficient for my sin, that there is nothing that I can do other than bring what Isaiah called “filthy rags.” I feel a calling to live a holier life, and I struggle with the areas I know fall short that I cannot seem to change.
Pray for me. And I’ll be praying for you.
Tags: grace, holiness, Psalms, righteousness, salvation, sin
Filed under Life, Old Testament, Ponderings | 1 Comment »
Psalm 17
Posted on June 10th, 2008
I have mentioned Powered by 4 before, here.
I’m not up to a daily reading yet, but I have been reading most days of the week, especially when I go int othe office at church. The whole goal of Powerd by 4 is to get people to read the Bible 4 times a week. Of course, the ideal is daily, but it gives us who struggle with maintaining a consistency in Bible reading a starting point. If you find yourself struggling in the discipling of Bible reading, I encourage you to check out their plan. They send out a daily e-mail. It’s great for me, because there is not a day that goes by that I don’t check my e-mail. Why I can be so faithful with checking e-mail and reading blogs but not sitting down for even 10 minutes to read and reflect on Scripture without a gimmick I cannot explain.
Anyway, after reading through Genesis 12-50, the daily readings have moved on to Psalms. We read the first ten Psalms before diving into Genesis, and we picked up with Psalm 11 after finishing the story of Joseph. Today’s reading is Psalm 17.
What a psalm! David is praying to God, and tells God that he knows that God can examine him and find nothing to fault David for. There is absolutely no way that I could say such a thing, and that is painful to admit. Old struggles rear their heads, things that I have fought in the past and am tired of fighting, so I just give in. And I justify them as “normal,” because I see so much of it around me, so many people who condone the things that I know are wrong. I look out and find comfort that I am not alone in my struggle. I find comfort by those who would find value in what in my heart of hearts I know is wrong. And I rely on the blood of Jesus to recover old sins that I succumb to again.
Not quite an example of Christian virtue.
David goes on in the psalm to ask God to save him from his enemies, and David speaks of his enemies as those who have looked to the world for their wealth and riches. They spend all of their energy in the here and now, looking to the next generation to “carry their legacy.” Do we not do the same thing?
David calls us to a higher standard: “As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness.” (Psalm 17:15)
I love the hymn “Face to Face,” where we sing about that day when we shall meet Jesus face to face after this world is through and we are part of the new creation. It will be a glorious day. I should be living for that, not for the good of the next generation. Not dwelling on the pleasures of the here and now that are fleeting. Eternity looms. God awaits.
And I’m too busy succumbing to old passions.
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Pagan Christianity
Posted on May 26th, 2008
Despite my eagerness in reading this book to find out about the origin of many of the practices of the modern church, I must say that book has left me wanting something different. I would have preferred a book that offered the historical developments and then a biblical portrait of what a church could look like. The book delivers well on the former, but fails on the latter. I wound up giving up on the book after chapter three.
I gave up after realizing that the authors were prooftexting their model of what the church should look like, selectively choosing from 1 Corinthians 14:26-33, with no explanation about why they leave out verse 34 from their model (the women be silent verse).
I hope one day to be able to read the other chapters. I think it is interesting to know how practices developed, but the authors are simply too interesting in damning anyone who thinks they can worship or honor God through them. I guess God cannot use cultural differences or developments to honor himself, at least according to Viola and Barna.
Tags: Book review, church practices, history, Worship
Filed under Book Reflection, Church & Theology | 1 Comment »