Dying to Serve

"We can imagine no higher degree of perfection than that which is here set before us. To take patiently whatever God sends, - to like nothing but what God likes, - to wish nothing but what God approves, - to prefer pain, if it please God to send it, to ease, if God does not think fit to bestow it, - to lie passive under God's hand, and to know no will but His, - this is the highest stand at which we can aim, and of this our Lord's conduct in Gethsemane is a perfect pattern.

"Let us strive and labour to have 'the mind that was in Christ' in this matter. Let us daily pray and endeavour to be enabled to mortify our self-will. - It is for our happiness to do so.

Nothing brings us so much misery on earth as having our own way. - it is the best proof of real grace to do so. Knowledge, and gifts, and convictions, and feelings, and wishes, are all very uncertain evidences. They are often to be found in unconverted persons. But a continually increasing disposition to submit our own wills to the will of God, is a far more healthy symptom. It is a sign that we are really 'growing in grace, and in the knowledge of Jesus Christ."

JC Ryle, Expository Thoughts on Mark, from Mark 14:32-42

We learned from Sunday's message that true living consists in serving others. Whenever we find that hard, let us not forget Gethsemane and that Jesus humble obedience in that moment is our great example but also forms the basis for our ability to serve Him and others.

He who finds a wife

Proverbs 18:22

He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord

9 years ago today, the Lord provided me with a good thing, a great thing in my wife Melanie and I have been blessed by favor from the Lord through her consistently through these last nine years.

It is amazing and humbling that Mel has joyfully followed me as we have trusted the Lord through what my calling and ministry life would look like. I am doing what I love and feel called to do, and she is giving up desires, dreams, lovingly and joyfully to follow a sinner like me.

She regularly prays for me, shares how God is using me to teach her and care for her.

She is patient with me as I learn to trust God and grow in being a more godly husband to her and for her. She does an amazing job caring for our daughter, caring for the ladies in our church and is an example to me in numerous ways.

I am convinced that when we meet our Savior one day, there will be many more crowns awaiting her for the sacrifices she has made through these 9 years and for the simple and yet joy filled ways she has served and followed the Savior.

I am blessed she is in my life and I am blessed to call her my wife.

His Presence in our Troubles

"We make a mistake when we measure our potential to deal with difficulty by the size and duration of the problem. We should be measuring our potential according to the size of God's provision and the promise of his eternal presence. Even in the deepest difficulty, we are never without resources. We are never alone." Timothy Lane and Paul Tripp, Relationships a Mess Worth Making, 40

This quote is given within the context of understanding relational issues and struggles we will face but it holds equally true in all the difficulties of life.

Whatever struggle, burden, trial or hardship we are facing, I pray you remember that God's presence and promises go with you in the midst.

Closing the Gap

We live in an information age and in many ways it is a blessing. With the click of a button, we can download sermons, order great theological books and end up on blogs [like the one you are reading right now]. All of these tools can be helpful as they give us more information, more insight in the Christian life that we are called to live. But James 1:22 warns us of the problem that can happen when we simply become information gatherers

"But be doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves."

So what are we to do? How do we avoid being hearers only. Well, one thing we do at church is provide the context called care groups. Care groups are a mid-week meeting that allows us the opportunity to digest and walk through the sermon together. And really, this is how I would describe the care group context, it is helping us close the gap between theology and practice. Because again being in an information age, the problem is not more information. No, instead it is learning in community to apply what we already know and in doing, help us to be doers of the Word and not hearers only.

Because as Iain H. Murray in describing John Calvin's [which is really James 1:22 at work] understanding of doctrine said,

"Truth is only rightly believed to the extent that it is embodied in life." taken from John Calvin, A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine and Doxology, xvi

Or again as Calvin said himself in his Institutes,

"We have given the first place to the doctrine in which our religion is contained, since our salvation begins with it. But it must enter into our hearts and pass into our daily conduct and so transform us into itself so as not to prove unfruitful." [Instititues 3.6.4]

Care groups are simply one of those contexts that help doctrine pass into daily conduct and close that gap from information to practice.

The Human Element of Scripture

When we read through the gospels, perhaps if you like me, one element of the story that we can overlook is the human element at work.
I was reminded of this recently, reading Mark 7:24-30. There we see the historical account of a woman coming to Jesus to ask for healing for her daughter, and as JC Ryle describes,

"The woman who came to our Lord, in the history now before us, must doubtless have been in deep affliction. She saw a beloved child possessed by an unclean spirit. She saw her in a condition in which no teaching could reach the mind, and no medicine could heal the body, - a condition only one degree better than death itself...She prays for one who could not pray for herself, and never rests till her prayer is granted." JC Ryle, Expository Thoughts on Mark, 145

Imagine being this mother, at the end of her rope, with nowhere else to turn for help.

The Scriptures are full of these accounts of real people, facing real struggles and how God cares for them and loves them in the midst. So let us not forget that element as we read the Bible and see real people facing real struggles and take heart that we are not alone in the trials and hardships we face, others have walked before us, and God continues to walk with us.

Holiness is Hard Work

"Deep within the American psyche is the 1960's Romantic idea, originally from Emerson and Rousseau, that if something doesn't feel natural, it isn't real. We think spiritual things - if done right - should just flow. But if you have a disability, nothing flows, especially in the beginning."

Paul A Miller, A Praying Life, 222

As we set out our deliberate prayers for the year, there can be this temptation to think that these things should just come naturally or that this work of change and growth is just too hard and too much work. As Miller describes in the context of using prayer tools, the disability we have as Christians is sin and thus everything related to holiness will come with work as we battle against the sin that remains in us.

But as we set out to grow in areas of prayer, encouragement, service and evangelism in the year ahead, remember two things

1. The battle is proof that God is working in you as the Spirit wars against our sin in the pursuit of holiness
2. Jesus through His death and resurrection gives us access to His strength and wisdom that will help us grow

But as we go forward, let us not think that this pursuit will be a a cakewalk and let's not give up when the opposition comes and might that form one of our encouragements for each other as we walk through this year together.

Figuring out Prayer Paralyzes Prayer

Lord willing come the fall we are going to do a book club starting with this book and I hope through these quotes, that I am wetting your appetite.

Paul Miller again in his book, A Praying Life says that one of the reasons that we don't pray more is because we try to figure out prayer and the result is that in trying to figure out how prayer works, we don't pray,

"Prayer is strikingly intimate. As soon as you take a specific answer to prayer and try to figure out what caused it, you lose God. We simply cannot see the casual connections between our prayer and what happens."

He goes on to say,

"The only way to know how prayer works is to have complete knowledge and control of the past, present, and future. In other words, you can figure out how prayer works if you are God."

So today, let us know not try and figure out how prayer works, instead let's pray and trust and rejoice as He answers.