Category: encouragement

Only Something To Be Given

by Andrew Micah, posted in calling, encouragement, exhortation, gospel, Uncategorized

“What a revolution would come over the world–the world of starving bodies at home and starving souls abroad, if something like this were the standard of giving; if God’s people ventured on “making themselves poor” as Jesus did, for the sake of the need around; if the “I”–“me”–“mine” were  practically delivered up, no longer to be recognized when they clash with those needs.

The hour of this new dying is clearly defined to the dandelion globe: it is marked by detachment. There is no sense of wrenching: it stands ready, holding up its little life, not knowing when or where or how the wind that bloweth where it listeth may carry it away. It holds itself no longer for its own keeping, only as something to be given: a breath does the rest, turning the “readiness to will” into “performance.” (2 Cor. 8. 11.) And to a soul that through “deaths oft” has been brought to this point, even acts that look as if they must involve an effort, become something natural, spontaneous, full of a “heavenly involuntariness,” so simply as they are the outcome of the indwelling love of Christ.

Shall we not ask God to convict us, as to where lies the hindrance to this self-emptying? It is not alone mere selfishness, in the ordinary sense, that prevents it; long after this has been cleansed away by the Precious Blood there may remain, unrecognized, the self-life in more subtle forms. It may co-exist with much that looks like sacrifice; there may be much of usefulness and of outward self-denial, and yet below the surface may remain a clinging to our own judgment, a confidence in our own resources, an unconscious taking of our own way, even in God’s service.” –Lilias Trotter (1853-1928),  Parables of the Cross

The Discipline of Studying God’s Word, part 1: A Practical Theology

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, exhortation, reflection

Yesterday I published a post on this blog attempting to broadly answer the question of what spiritual discipline is. This morning I sat down with the intention of gathering and presenting some insights from a particular passage of scripture that I’ve been studying this week, and quickly found myself sidetracked by my own introduction into a discussion on the subject of how we can discipline ourselves in the study of God’s word. It seems that I’m being led into a series of posts on spiritual disciplines, so I might as well fall into the work. I hope that what follows here will offer helpful direction, both in terms of profound perspective, and in terms of practical guidance. This article, part 1, focuses on the motivation and the mindset of being disciplined in studying scripture.

Please understand that when I write about spiritual disciplines, I’m not writing as a master or a mentor in these things. Much of what I’ll cover in this series involves disciplines that I am currently establishing in my life for the very first time, or that I am re-establishing after a period of partial or complete neglect. I’m speaking to exhort and encourage myself as much as I am anyone who reads these posts. There’s an implicit accountability in putting thoughts on record like this which I hope will be helpful to me. One of the best ways to learn something is to teach it, and oh how I need to learn. So walk with me as I walk towards the fullness of fellowship with God in Christ.

I’d like to start our discussion of the study of God’s word by considering together a brief passage of God’s word that offers to us a whole implied practical theology of obtaining and growing in wisdom. Five years ago, in the spring and summer of 2015, I made a serious attempt at memorizing several extended portions of Scripture: James, Ephesians, and the first ten chapters of Proverbs. There was a period of a few weeks when I could in fact recite all of the above from the King James Bible. Since that time, I’ve gone through three changes of preferred translation (NKJV to NIV and now ESV), and I have not diligently maintained my word-for-word memory of those passages of Scripture. But the time and effort that I put into the attempt of memorizing has brought tremendous yields in my relationship with God and my knowledge of His word, and some of the most precious yields have come through familiarity with this following passage, from the book of Proverbs:

“My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you,
making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding;
yes, if you call out for insight, and raise your voice for understanding,
if you seek it like silver, and search for it as for hidden treasures,
then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God.

For the LORD gives wisdom; out of his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
guarding the paths of justice, and preserving the way of his saints.
Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path;
for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you.”
(Proverbs 2:1-10, ESV)

WISDOM IS A GIFT OF THE FATHER

The first thing we should take note of here is that wisdom is already being conveyed to us in the context of a relationship. It’s something we are given before it is something we go out and find. When Proverbs says, “my son,” it’s not just a wishful imagining of what fathers would or could or should do with their children. It’s our Father addressing us as His children (Hebrews 12:5). This is important because many of us had fathers who did next to nothing to teach us wisdom. They may have been completely absent. They may have attempted to impart some life lessons, but those lessons were fleshly and deeply flawed. But even those of us who were fortunate enough to have fully present and intentional fathers who walked with God and trained us to walk with Him still grew up without the complete nourishment that we needed, because in the work of the very best fathers there is a great distance between what was intended and what was actually accomplished by their discipline and discipleship (Hebrews 12:10). The good news is, those of us who still need fathering (which is all of us) are offered an intimate relationship with a perfect heavenly Father who listens to us, knows us, watches over us, walks with us, speaks to us, affirms us, corrects us, enjoys us, and delights in us. It is in this relationship, secured by the blood of Jesus Christ, that God speaks to us as children.

What this means is that studying God’s word is not something that we do to earn the right to think of ourselves as children of God. The right to be and think of ourselves as children of God is something that is given to us as we receive the person and work of Jesus Christ through faith in the message of His gospel, because it is in the moment that we first believe in Jesus that we are born into God’s family by the power of His Holy Spirit (John 1:12-13). Apart from the question of faith in the finished work of Jesus, what we are doing right now with God’s commandments, His story, and His testimonies doesn’t ultimately have any bearing on whether we are children of God in this moment. It does, however, have bearing on whether or not we are good children who increase the joy of our Father’s heart by walking in truth (cf. Proverbs 17:25, 3 John 1:4).

God’s good promise to us is that He will give us words that we can receive. He will give us commandments that we can treasure. He will provide us with wisdom that we can make our ears attentive to. He will offer us understanding that we can incline our hearts to. We do not have to worry that He will turn His eyes, His voice, or His heart away from us. But in the way that He relates to us, He leaves room for us to reciprocate and respond to His attention to us with our own attention to Him. He will discipline us if He has to (Proverbs 3:11-12), but He would much rather not (cf. Psalm 32:8-9) because He is kind and does not afflict us from His heart (Lamentations 3:33).

In all of this, there is a strong appeal to the free will of the liberated child of God. Those of us who treasure and emphasize the truth of God’s absolute sovereignty in salvation and in human events–who call ourselves reformed, Calvinists, monergists, or what have you (and I am firmly one of them, because the word of God persuades me)–are in danger of setting aside these appeals that Scripture makes to an implicitly free will. “Obedience to the faith” (cf. Acts 6:7, Romans 1:5, 16:26)–both to the truth of God’s absolute sovereignty and the truth of our responsibility–must take priority over exploring the paradoxes and resolving the apparent contradictions in sound doctrine. There is a place for such inquiry, but only if we are stewarding well the truth that we have been already given by considering and obeying its implications: first, that God is totally sovereign, and second, that we are totally responsible and capable of free moral action as those who have been set free by the work of Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit (cf. Galatians 3:2, 5:22-24) from the power and curse of sin. There is a particularly strong element of synergy between the work of God and the exercise of our free will in the process of our sanctification, and we dismiss it to our own loss. Christians who do not often think of themselves as free moral agents become atrophied in their character because they expect God to do for us things that God is only willing to do with us, in partnership with our own struggling and laboring (Colossians 1:29). Like Paul in Galatians, Proverbs presents us with a choice: what will you do with your freedom? (Galatians 5:13) Our insistence upon our own constructions of God’s sovereignty can take a very disrespectful turn when we put the question back on God. We do not like it when our children talk back to us, and we should not expect that God likes it when we talk back to Him. So let’s be humble before God, our creator, our sovereign Lord, our almighty Redeemer, and our great Father. Let’s take His words to heart with sweet and trusting simplicity, believing that as we treasure His commandments, we will gradually arrive at a deeper vision of the beauty of His sovereignty than would otherwise be attainable. We must plead with God to incline our hearts after His word and keep us from wandering (Psalm 119:32-40); but we must also hear and obey when He tells us to incline our own hearts.

I’m inclined, as I’m sure many of you are also inclined, to fear and feel insecure whenever God makes an appeal to my responsibility to choose Him. I deeply feel the instability of my own affections, the weakness of my own will, the incessant tendency of my mind towards distraction. Let our hearts take comfort! Our God is the God who spoke to fathers, “these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.” (Deuteronomy 6:6-7, ESV) He did not ask any one of us to be a better Father than He is. He created men as fathers and sons from His own eternal Fatherhood and Sonship. The words that He commands us are on His heart. He will teach them diligently to us. He will talk of them when we sit in our houses, when we walk by the way, when we lie down, and when we rise up. He is already speaking to us. What are we doing with the treasures of His truth that God abundantly showers on us moment by moment and day by day? Are we receiving them and treasuring them up in our hearts? Are we forcing our ears to pay attention and wrestling our minds into love and obedience? We must access the power of the Holy Spirit to engage and discipline our own minds and hearts in the pursuit of God’s wisdom, and then trust that when our own effort grows weak, He will be near with His loving discipline to supply us with the motivation to “lift the drooping hands and strengthen the weak knees, and make straight paths for our feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.” (Hebrews 12:13-14) Our self-discipline must fully rest in and respond to the promise of God’s discipline of us. It is one hundred percent up to Him to be our Father, and He is one hundred percent up to the task. It’s up to us to be His children, and He has given us everything that we need for life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3). We are fully equipped to learn and grow as God’s children. What are we doing with what the Father has given to us?

DESPERATE ACTION, DESPERATE DEPENDENCE

There is a paradox in these verses that we must grapple with in the passage that I quoted at the beginning. The Father’s words are freely given and His commandments are abundantly provided for us. He is not stingy with His counsel, measuring out a word or two for every few thousand tears of agonized prayer. He is always speaking to us, even when we’re not listening. At the same time, we are called to engage with God’s words and commandments in a way that can only be described as diligent urgency. The kind of listening that the Father requires of us is much more like digging for hidden treasure than it is like gathering treasure in baskets as it falls from the sky. It is as every bit as much like pounding on the door of your friend (Luke 11:5-13) as it is like opening the door for your friend (Revelation 3:20). God will come to our door, but there is an intimacy with Him and with His thoughts that only happens when we go to His door, and refuse to be denied. Gaining wisdom is a process that involves both searching and crying out:

“yes, if you call out for insight, and raise your voice for understanding,
if you seek it like silver, and search for it as for hidden treasures,
then you will understand the fear of the LORD and find the knowledge of God.”
(Proverbs 2:3-5)

There is both urgency of action here and urgency of prayer. We do not merely work hard at studying God’s word, and then say a prayer at the end and hope that it amounts to something. Nor do we spend all of our time in prayer, and flip through our Bibles until we land on something that strikes us. We must couple desperate dependence on God in prayer with desperate action. That is the way to know God. It involves persistent labor and passionate pleading. Hard work and the humility of absolute helplessness. We must savor the truth in our minds every moment, and utterly despair of knowing anything apart from the guiding, leading, enabling, and preserving work of the Holy Spirit.

It is true that all of our striving after godliness must proceed from resting in the promises of God, even as our whole lives as natural creatures proceed from rest in the works of God in creation, and our whole lives as new creatures in Christ proceed from rest in His finished works. But in our carefulness against the wrong kind of striving we have done much harm if we eliminate striving altogether. The kingdom of heaven belongs not to the self-assured and contented but to the poor in spirit (Matthew 5:3), and one integral part of what it means to be poor in spirit is a refusal to settle into the idleness of spiritual complacency. If God gave me all of His Word for this life only (and I do believe He did), then it is essential that I know His Word for this life. This implies a willingness to study hard, to discipline my mind, to memorize, to ask good questions, and to wrestle with those questions until they are answered.

Another integral part of what it means to be poor in spirit is the understanding that without the illumination of the Holy Spirit, all of my efforts to know and understand God, His word, and His work will amount to worse than nothing. It is the LORD who gives wisdom, and He rewards the humble hard worker who turns from the pursuit of immediate pleasure and even a little of his own dignity for the enduring satisfaction that can only be found in knowing God.

We must be willing to take vengeance on the things that crowd God’s word out of our minds, even things that are not bad in and of themselves. There is value in games and shows and social gatherings, in public and private recreational pursuits that refresh the mind, broaden the imagination, and provide us with a relational context in which we can encourage one another. There is value in work that provides for the needs of our bodies and those who depend on us. But these things must be made to serve the true purpose of our lives, not the other way around (cf. Matthew 6:25). To know and serve God is the true purpose of our lives, to be always after the fullest realization of His experiential righteousness in us and His kingdom through us that is possible in this present age (Matthew 6:33).

As a rule, whenever God admonishes us in Scripture to pray briefly and with calm assurance, it is with regard to the needs of the body and the practical concerns of life; whenever God encourages us to pray long and hard, with great emotion and desperate insistence, it is with regard to the things of His kingdom, to His righteousness in us, to the baptism and gifts of His Spirit, to the building up of the church in love, the increase of God’s praise, and the work of justice. Whenever God admonishes us to do only what is necessary, it is in providing for our bodies and sorting out the daily obligations of mundane life; but when He admonishes us to apply ourselves with all heart and soul, it is with regard to knowing Him in our work and making Him known through it. Try out these rules for yourself on the Word of God, and see if they do not give you some light. Let us then only pray for our needs as much as we must in order to un-burden our cares on the heart of God, and pray as much as we can to take His cares upon our heart, for as we do this we will be lifted beyond the momentary concerns of sustaining our own existence to the great and noble calling for which we have been made to exist, and which is the measure of our human lives: knowing God and having friendship with Him in His work of crucified love (John 15:15). And for this purpose, let us study and strive to know the word of God. Let us disturb the quiet of our hearts with loud inward cries and diligent seeking. Let us not be content until we have found this one thing: the knowledge of God. And what I have found is that the more I know God, the more I crave to know Him. Surrender to the hunger. Let it have its way with you. Let it do with your life what ever it will, turning it upside down, consuming your free time, and taking away your appetite for unworthy things. Starve the relationships that are built on trivial things and wrestle your way into real Christian fellowship. Protect your time spent with God in His word; show steadfast gentleness toward others and take savage vengeance on the flesh (cf. I Corinthians 9:27). It’s worth it.

~Andrew

I have stilled and quieted my soul

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, reflection, theology

“O LORD, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
Like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, hope in the LORD
from this time forth and forevermore.” (Psalm 131)

Sometimes, I have a hard time with the sovereignty of God.

Let me explain. I’m a Calvinist. Calvinism is, to me, something that you really can’t argue against from the word of God. Romans chapter 9 lays a forceful axe-blow to any attempt. I’m not a Calvinist because I want it to be true, or because I need it to be true, or because it satisfies any psychological or emotional demand of my heart. Quite the opposite. I know that there is comfort to be found in knowing that your relationship with God was meant to be, and that because it was meant to be you can trust that something even greater than your own unbelief is at work to save and redeem you. That should provide great comfort and rest to a believer, and it is for that purpose that the New Testament makes use of the doctrines of election and predestination. Maybe I’m not very spiritual, but there are times when I am much more troubled by these teachings of Scripture than I am comforted.

My fear is not that some people get to heaven and some don’t. My fear is not even that some people are chosen by God and some are not. My fear is that some people who want the love of God more than anything else will be turned away from it. My fear is that some of those who take hold of the Father-love of God, knowing that it is their only hope, will be disqualified because of some secret, arbitrary decision of God. These are the things that my mind worries over when I have questions about God. I am a child in desperate need of the Father. If I accomplish anything in my spiritual life, it will be because I have come to God as a broken and hungry person who deeply knew that only the love of the Father was able to redeem me, keep me safe, give me life, and show me the way to glory. And sometimes the sovereignty of God seems to cut against the security I’ve found instead of working towards it.

When we hear about the sovereignty of God, we are sometimes tempted to think of God as this post-traumatic Harvey Dent who delights in arbitrarily destroying or pardoning people as they cringe before Him. If we’re the wrong kind of “spiritual,” we’ll try accept that image of God without questioning in an effort to be good enough to win God’s favor. But the character of God as revealed in His word is not that of a cosmic Two-Face. He’s not on a power trip, He’s not trying to resolve any insecurities about His control of human events, and He has nothing to prove to Himself, to us, or to the angels. All that He does, He does in love towards those that He loves. And in order to form any kind of real attachment with God as our Father, we need to take this truth deeply into our hearts and souls.

Perhaps if I was a mature Christian, I wouldn’t worry about the sovereignty of God. Perhaps I would know, as I see more clearly in the light of day, that no-one is able to come to God and take hold of His Father-love by faith unless God has first awakened him from spiritual death and established that longing in his heart. Perhaps I would know that the offer of the Gospel is freely for all, that there is no need for me to know anything about the secret will of God, but only to answer honestly the question, “are you thirsty?” come to the living water, and drink my fill. “Whoever comes to me I will never cast out,” (John 6:37) Jesus says. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.” (Matthew 7:7). Peering into God’s secret will and knowing what He has chosen is not a precondition. That’s impossible for anyone. What is possible is to come the Father and take hold of His love. What is possible is to ask Him for redemption and adoption through the finished work of Jesus, and for the security of knowing that I belong to Him no matter what. The love of the Father is mine if I want it and that He will never say no to anyone who comes to Him in this way. That is His promise. But sometimes, like last night, I forget all of that. I get overwhelmed with things that are way over my head.

I’m preparing a teaching series on the subject of worship right now, which I will be sharing at a local young adults’ ministry. In the course of my preparations last night, I began pondering how to explain the sovereignty of God in the context of worship–how it is that we can be inspired to worship God by the truths of His sovereignty. And in part because of my prideful insistence on making sense of everything, and in part because of my compassion for people who I know struggle with the same questions–people I’ll be speaking to–I got a little out of my depth. At 10:30 last night my mind was racing. I said some very honest and very frightened things to God. And the passage of Scripture that He brought to mind was the one that I quoted at the beginning of this post.

Sometimes God is not just a Father. Sometimes He is exactly who I need Him to be: a mother who holds this little child on His lap, comforts me, reminds me what’s true, and doesn’t let me go until I’m ready to get up. That’s how I came to Him last night, and that’s who He was to me. His way isn’t just to settle me down, but to help me remember the things that I know are true so that I’m able to gain some strength and control over my own emotions. And this is what He spoke to me: “Whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink.” “Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat.” He reminded me that the wonder is not that He would make a “vessel of wrath” from the clay of human flesh, but that something so lost and depraved could be transformed into a vessel of mercy. He reminded me that He endures with great patience the “vessels of wrath,” that even in reprobation there is cost to Himself for the sake of those He loves. And today, I am not wavering in unbelief, but growing strong in faith. And I am beginning to understand how God’s sovereignty can provoke me to worship. Not as the cringing benefactor of a cosmic coin-flip, but as a desperately loved child of God. He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, and hell has no hallelujahs for His ears. There are no songs in the book of Psalms of tormented people adoring God for His justice. (Psalm 6:5, 30:9, 88:11, 115:9) But He delights in showing mercy to those He loves, and through His patience and His justice He makes it known to us who are being saved, so that we might rest and delight in His love.

Two thoughts from this morning’s time with God

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, reflection, theology

John 17:18 says, “As You sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” God sent Jesus into the world to put the heart and character of the Father on display; to seek and save the lost; to work towards the ultimate restoring of all things; to do great works testifying to the coming hope of salvation in Him; to prophesy; to seek out the cross; to suffer and give of Himself, so that through His suffering many would be made whole, and through His poverty many would be made rich. As the Father sent Jesus, so Jesus has sent us.

The next verse says, “And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.” Literally, “And for their sake I set myself apart, that they also may be set apart in truth.” (John 17:19) It was never in us to consecrate ourselves or set ourselves apart to God. The life that Jesus lived in the flesh He lived to make us holy, to consecrate us, to set us apart by His perfect obedience. It was all for us that He lived a holy life, so that we could be called holy, not by works that we have done, but by works that He has done, which He willed to us when He gave His life as an offering for sin on the cross. We are God’s holy people, and through the acceptance provided by the finished work of Jesus, we are transformed so that our character aligns with our identity.

Some thoughts about God’s passion for our goodness

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, exhortation, family of God, grace

“Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the heart.” (Proverbs 21:2)

As people with a propensity to sin, we spend a great deal of time and mental/emotional energy trying to protect ourselves from being found out as sinners. We fall short of God’s glory every day in the words we say and the things we do. And even though as believers in Jesus we know that our failures to do and be good have been completely covered by His blood, so often we try to stand in our own righteousness instead of just giving it up for the better covering we receive from God by the finished work of the cross.

One of the ways that we do this is by legalistic self-justification. We treat God’s commandments like an arbitrary set of technical rules that prescribe exactly how much goodness we need to get by, or how little goodness we can get away with. And the tragedy in this is that we trade God’s invitation to know Him deeply and share in His passionately good nature for a program by which we can get something out of God that we want–respect, vindication, and the right to be blessed.

God’s reason for giving us rules for life is not that He has some pet peeves that He doesn’t want to be bothered with. It’s not that He’s trying to shore up His reputation as a certain kind of God by establishing blessings for good behavior and consequences for bad behavior. He’s not carrying out some drudgery on behalf of the universe. God made people because He wanted (not needed) to share His glory and goodness with creatures. He created us in His image so that our lives could reflect the beauty of His infinitely good character, and so that we could experience the deep satisfaction and joy in being like Him. And His rules reveal to us what it means to be like Him. They are intended to expose the ways that we fall short so that we’re humbled before God and come to Him for mercy and transforming grace so that we can be restored to that created purpose–to know Him in His passionate goodness, and to share in that goodness with Him.

God’s not looking for people who carefully navigate life according to a set of arbitrary rules. He’s not looking for people who color inside the lines. He’s looking for people who want to commune with Him in His goodness, with all that means. Faithfulness. Mercy. Beauty. Joy. Abundant generosity. Uncompromising justice. Long-suffering love. And who out of that passion for the goodness that is only found in Him, seek to know Him through obedience to His commandments. God’s question as He examines our lives is not “did you do all the things,” but “what are you seeking?”

So often in interpersonal conflicts we examine and debate the finer points of the law instead of readily admitting our obvious failure to love, to seek good, to truly forgive, to prioritize justice and mercy. But God is looking for people who, instead of saving up counterfeit goodness to buy our way into His love and the respect of other people, openly declare our bankruptcy of goodness so that we can receive His own goodness. (Matt. 5:3) He’s looking for people who, in response to a genuine awareness of the purity of God’s heart and ways, genuinely grieve their failures to live in His likeness. (5:4). He’s looking for people who don’t selfishly insist on their rights, but surrender them when they stand in the way of blessing others. (5:5) He’s looking for people whose lives are controlled by one ruling hunger, one burning thirst: to see, understand, and celebrate His goodness, and be transformed into the likeness of Him. (5:6) He doesn’t care if we’re able to explain our actions as outwardly conforming to His rules. He cares about what’s in our hearts. And He’s bursting with desire to fill us with His fullness through the gift of His Holy Spirit and supply what is lacking in our hearts. He’s so passionately committed to this relationship with us where we see how beautiful He is and that beauty lives in us that He pursues us with discipline, with hardships and trials that help us to see what’s really in our hearts so that we’ll cry out for transformation. He loves us. Why would God share His goodness and His likeness with us for any other reason than that He loves us? This is why He searches our hearts. This is why He doesn’t give us a pass for our technical rule-keeping.

There was once a rich young man who came to Jesus with the claim that he had perfectly kept the law. This man was as much a failure in living up to the glory of God as the rest of us. His legalistic self-justification blinded him to that reality. Jesus could have exposed him, as I think many of us would, by challenging his assertions about his own goodness. “Have you really never committed murder? Hatred is the same as murder. Have you always kept all your promises? Have you really never helped yourself to that which wasn’t yours? Have you really never bent the truth to satisfy your own desires at the expense of others?” But Jesus does not ask these questions. His reply might catch us, as it did this rich young man, completely off guard. “Go, sell all you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” This was not a self-satisfied “gotcha” moment on Jesus’ part. The gospel says that “Jesus, looking on him, loved him.” Jesus was also not advocating self-denial as a way of buying eternal life. He was offering the young man an invitation to share in His own divine goodness. Before He took on flesh, Jesus had greater possessions than anyone. He had all the riches of Heaven. And He emptied Himself of all of it to seek and save the lost. What is more, He spent His entire earthly life saving up enough righteousness to buy our way into heaven. On the cross, He made Himself poor in terms of righteousness so that we could be rich. He exposed Himself to all the abandonment and suffering that was rightfully ours in our guilty, self-inflicted moral poverty so that we could receive the riches of His righteousness, and with them eternal life. Paul says, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you by His poverty might become rich.” (2 Corinthians 8:9) Jesus wasn’t asking the rich young man to do anything that He Himself hadn’t done. He was exposing how the young man’s heart was unlike the heart of God revealed in Himself, and offering him transformation. Thank God that when presented with the choice (speaking in human terms) to give up all that He had to purchase salvation for poor sinners, Jesus didn’t “go away sorrowful”! But this young man would not follow Jesus, because his righteousness was of an entirely different kind than the righteousness of Jesus. The righteousness of the young man was about measuring up. The righteousness of Jesus is about emptying self, about embracing emptiness and suffering to bring fullness and rest to someone else, about offering everything that He has to bless the unworthy with love. How can we not wonder to realize that the very things which God imposed upon us as the penalties for our failure to obey are the same things that He willingly took upon Himself to demonstrate His perfect love? Are we hearing what God is saying in this?

When God made us in His image, He made us to bear the weight of His glorious, self-giving goodness. Jesus is the “image of the invisible God.” (Colossians 1:15) When we fell short of God’s likeness, He moved toward us in love. And the first thing He did was to get our picture of God straight. We were supposed to be the picture of God to ourselves, each other, and all creation. We failed. Jesus came to do that. And He did it by carrying a cross. He set the record straight about who God is. God doesn’t “measure up.” He pours Himself out. The character of God as revealed in the work of Christ is the “new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” that we are called and welcomed into by the finished work of Christ. Simply put, we’ve got to stop trying to figure out how little goodness we can get away with and start seeing every relationship, every gift, every situation, every moment as an opportunity and an invitation to be like Him. That’s what God is looking for. It’s not about a standard that we must live up to so much as it is an identity, a calling, and the burden of God’s desire which will either destroy or glorify us. And if by faith we take shelter in the finished work of Christ, we will certainly not be destroyed, but glorified. In the process, we will surely suffer loss of all that it is no loss to lose, all that is not like Him. And that also is a gift.

It is no light thing to be loved by God. It is no easy thing to be wanted by Him. It is a gentle yoke, yes, but it is a scourging gentleness. We have a name and an identity and a destiny to live up to, and all the resources of the Spirit sufficient to that calling. He has canceled all our debts, and He will never release us from His jealous longing for our glory in His goodness. And that is why, even though He has made peace with us, He makes war with our legalistic self-justification. He wants so much more for us, and that is why we’re not going to have it our way.

Encouragement for Pastors

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, exhortation, reflection

God spoke to my heart today through Psalm 127: “Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain. It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for He gives to His beloved sleep.” (v. 1-2) He specifically called my attention to pastors.

There are many pastors today who are overworked and under-rested in caring for the flock of God. There is an epidemic of pastoral burnout, exhaustion, and loneliness. But God is speaking to that through these words from Psalm 127. God is inviting those who care for His house, which is God’s church (I Timothy 3:5, I Peter 2:4-5) to rest in His promise: He is building His church! He says: “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” (Matthew 16:18)

When those who labor in God’s house receive this promise, they can receive rest. If God is not working to build His church, then why are we working? How can we hope to accomplish anything if God is not laboring with us? But if God is working to build His church, we can participate with Him, trusting that He will make good use of our efforts. And if God is working to build His church, then when God tells us to rest, we can rest. There’s no reason, God says, to get up early and go to bed late on behalf of Him and His work. He is working, and you don’t have to overwork yourself. Whatever mindset we bring to ministry that doesn’t build on confidence in God’s work and doesn’t accept God’s provision of rest is not from God. Sometimes we need to repent of our unbelief and go to bed! “Faith without works is dead,” and sometimes you need to put your faith into action by getting a good night’s sleep, and by creating rhythms of rest and patterns of self-care.

God didn’t make a mistake when He ordered our lives so that we have to budget time and energy to take care of our own needs in order to be rested and healthy and clean and fed and cared for. He wants us to understand that we are important to Him too! Live for others, but accept God’s guidance towards rest. What if we believed God, and saw our work more as a gift from Him than a gift to Him? He blesses us by inviting us to share in the sacrificial work that He is doing. If you’re struggling to labor faithfully in ministry today, God loves your sacrificial heart! He also wants you to receive the rest He has provided for you. Ask Him today. “Father, help me to see the rest that You have provided for me.”

God bless and strengthen you in serving His people!

-Andy

Scripture quotations are from the ESV Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (r) ), copyright (c) 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Blessed is the Man

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, reflection, theology

I had an epiphany a couple of weeks ago about Psalm 1. I’ve been spending a lot of time lately in the Psalms (which I feel is appropriate for a worship leader). It’s really important that the theology through which we interpret the Psalms is robust and biblical. The New Testament reads so much of the Psalms as prophetic about the person and work of Jesus Christ. I’ve been praying to be able see the Psalms through new eyes in light of this.

“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

I came to Psalm 1 having just spent some time with John 15, and it hit me that the blessed man who is the subject of this Psalm isn’t just a godly person generally, but the Lord Jesus. Our acceptance with God and our assurance of blessing doesn’t come from our obedience. Instead, it comes from the obedience of Jesus, whose whole human life was lived in the pursuit of God’s righteousness. He is the true tree that bears good fruit, and we can’t bear good fruit unless we abide in Him–meaning, unless our hope of life and acceptance with God is His finished work for us. Our rootedness isn’t in our obedience (although obedience by faith strengthens our faith) but in our union with Jesus. He is the head, we are the body. We are one with Him spiritually. This is why Jesus considers things done for or against His people as things done for or against Him. (Matthew 25:31-45). This is why when Jesus confronted Saul on the Damascus road, he didn’t say, “Saul, why are you persecuting my people,” but, “Saul, why are you persecuting ME?” There is a legal covenantal union in heaven between us and Jesus. We are blessed in Him.

I am planted by streams of water and I am able to bear fruit not because I try really hard to listen and obey (although that’s important) but because Jesus planted me firmly in Him. I am rooted and grounded in love through my union with Jesus.

-Andy

A definition of faith

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, theology, Uncategorized

Faith is not a means by which we earn things from God through our own effort and force of will to believe. Faith is trusting in the Father to give us what Jesus has earned for us and what we could never earn for ourselves–including the strength to believe that the Holy Spirit supplies.

From The Rare Jewel by Burroughs: Enjoying earthly blessings as children of God

by Andrew Micah, posted in culture, encouragement, theology, Uncategorized

I mentioned on the blog on Saturday that I read a book last week called The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment by the Puritan pastor Jeremiah Burroughs. I want to quote a passage from that book which really struck me in how it encourages us to interpret our experience of temporal blessings on this earth in terms of the realities of eternal life and eternal death. This is from chapter 3:

“A godly man may very well be content, though he has only a little, for what he does have he has by right of Jesus Christ, by the purchase of Jesus Christ. He has a right to it, a different kind of right to that which a wicked man can have to what he has. Wicked men have certain outward things; I do not say they are usurpers of what they have; they have a right to it, and that before God, but how? It is a right by mere donation, that is, God by his free bounty gives it to them; but the right that the saints have is a right of purchase: it is paid for, and it is their own, and they may in a holy manner and holy way claim whatever they have need of.”

Unbelievers, he says, can own things in a sense. You can say of someone who doesn’t have Jesus, “this is his wife, this is his house,” etc. But these things aren’t properly his because his relationship with the giver of all good things is fundamentally broken. Whatever state of blessedness an lost person enjoys is doomed to fall away from him permanently one day. But there is something different in the relationship that a child of God has with God’s blessings.

Burroughs continues, “a child of God has not a right merely by donation; what he has is his own, through the purchase of Christ. Every bit of bread you eat, if you are a godly man or woman, Jesus Christ has bought it for you.

You go to market and buy your meat and drink with your money, but know that before you buy it, or pay money, Christ has bought it at the hand of God the Father with his blood. You have it at the hands of men for money, but Christ has bought it at the hand of his Father by his blood. Certainly it is a great deal better and sweeter now, though it is but a little.“What a thought, that the blessings we experience in this life are actually something which are ours by right in Jesus Christ! Here’s an idea that is rarely conveyed by modern preachers. Burroughs can say this because he understands two very important theological truths: one, that God is the author and giver of every good thing, and two, that those of us who are in Christ have a rightful claim on God’s blessing.

For some folks this sounds too proud of a way to talk about the blessing of God. They would say that everything God gives them is an unmerited gift of grace and not a response to any rightful claim of theirs. This would be true if we were all left to our own works, our own resumes, and our own reputation in our relationship to God. In and of ourselves, the only thing we have any right to claim for ourselves from God is the punishment that our sin deserves, which Paul calls “the wages of sin” in Romans 3:23.

So when Paul goes on in the early part of Romans chapter 4 to say that “to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation,” he is making a point about what attitude we should have toward God’s blessings. In this world, a person who does work under a contract can lay claim to his wages as one who has a right to them. The employer can’t act as though he’s doing anything generous or magnanimous by paying up; he’s just paying what he owes the worker. What Paul is saying is that the salvation that God offers us in Jesus doesn’t operate on these terms, because we are all already sinners who fall short of God’s glory. We haven’t earned our salvation. How, then, does it end up that we have any rightful claim upon God’s blessings?

It’s because of what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:21 when he lays out for us the great legal exchange that has taken place between us and Jesus on the cross in these terms: “For our sake [God] made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” Jesus didn’t just become sin for us on the cross; we became His righteousness before God.

We know that Jesus lived a perfect life. He “knew no sin.” Because of Jesus’ perfect life, He has a claim on God’s blessings by way of right. Jesus deserves God’s blessing. But He willingly abandoned that condition on the cross so that we could have it, so that He could be punished in our place, and so that we, in His place, could claim God’s blessings as though we had all lived perfect lives. When we say that we are saved by grace, not works, lest any man should boast, what we mean is that we are saved by Jesus’ good works which are put to our account by God’s free grace instead of being saved by our works. We didn’t do anything to earn the rights of access to God and His blessings that we have, but they are absolutely ours, now and forever, by faith in Jesus. If salvation was just God being good to us in spite of no good we’ve done, there would be no firmness to our present and eternal hope.

And while we do not experience in this life the perfection of blessing which Jesus earned for us in His perfect life and gave to us on the cross, we do experience a kind of firstfruits of our eternal inheritance in Jesus. Even if we have less than the people around us who are not in Christ, we can actually get our hopes up and really get into and enjoy God’s blessings, because we know that for us, while earthly blessings may come and go, whatever we do have is (as Burroughs goes on to say) “an earnest penny for all the glory that is reserved” for us. That is to say, it’s a down payment on our eternal inheritance.

What a better way to look at music and marriage and good food and all the things we have to enjoy on earth than to a. try to find the ultimate fulfillment of our hopes in them or b. deny ourselves or despise what God has given us in this life because we are concerned with “heavenly” things! There is a “foretaste of glory divine” in earthly blessings, and we can consider them ours by right through the rights that grace has given us.

How does all of this help us in contentment? Should knowing that God’s blessings are ours by right in Jesus make us more demanding of immediate blessing? I would think not. If we can see our eternal inheritance not set up against but instead through the smallest of earthly blessings, how can we not be content, even though our earthly blessings may be small, as God has through them conveyed a sight, however dim, of what we will enjoy for eternity? (I want to explore these thoughts further both in comparison and contrast to so-called “prosperity Gospel” teachings, but that will have to wait for another time.)

Burroughs concludes:

“Just as every affliction that the wicked have here is but the beginning of sorrows, and forerunner of those eternal sorrows that they are likely to have hereafter in Hell, so every comfort you have is a forerunner of those eternal mercies you shall have with God in Heaven. Not only are the consolations of God’s Spirit the forerunners of those eternal comforts you shall have in Heaven, but when you sit at your table, and rejoice with your wife and children and friends, you may look upon every one of those but as a forerunner, yea the very earnest penny of eternal life to you. Now if this is so, it is no marvel that a Christian is contented, but this is a mystery to the wicked. I have what I have from the love of God, and I have it sanctified to me by God, and I have it free of cost from God by the purchase of the blood of Jesus Christ, and I have it as a forerunner of those eternal mercies that are reserved for me; and in this my soul rejoices. There is a secret dew of God’s goodness and blessing upon him in his estate that others have not.”

~Andrew

Notice: Scripture quotations, unless otherwise stated, are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. May not copy or download more than 500 consecutive verses of the ESV Bible or more than one half of any book of the ESV Bible.

An encouraging word from the trenches

by Andrew Micah, posted in encouragement, exhortation, spiritual warfare, Uncategorized

In the midst of temptation and trial we are often tempted to complain to God, “I’m only human.” We have a high priest, it is true, who can sympathize with our human weakness. He was tempted in every way that we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15). It is also true that God knows our frame, and remembers that we are made of dust (Psalm 103:14). But the other thing, and what I want to highlight right now, is that we are not “only human” in the sense of being left to only fallen human* resources in the fight against sin and Satan and circumstances. Paul tells us in Colossians 1:29 that he strives “with all HIS energy that HE powerfully works within me.” When we are tempted to say “I can’t do this,” the reality is that we CAN, but only through Christ who strengthens us (Philippians 4:13). God wants us to know, not just intellectually, but experientially, “what is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His great might that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead” (Eph. 1:19-20, ESV).

~Andrew

*I also want to point out as a side note that it really isn’t quite correct to say “I’m only human” when talking about our tendency to sin. Human does not equal sinful. God’s original intention and design for humanness was to represent Him, to bear His image. The human race has become sinful, but there is nothing human, really, about sin. Sin is the opposite of true humanness, because it’s the undoing of God’s image in us.