Joyful Ministry

Sunday's sermon was from Luke 10, when Jesus sends out 70 (or 72, depending on translation) to visit various towns and prepare His way. The tone of the whole text (v. 1-24) is joy. From this joyful text, I drew out five lessons for ministry. Not just better ministry, but joyful ministry. I hope they might encourage you as you serve Christ this week. Some of you know this, but the word ministry most often simply means "service", so this should apply to every Christian.

1. Know your purpose - Jesus sent the disciples out to prepare the way for Him. So they went out to their ministry with a clear sense of purpose. The great thing here is that this is our purpose as well: whatever God has called you to, you are preparing the way for the return of Christ. Whether raising covenant children, building houses, running a company or preaching sermons, we are all working to bring all things under the lordship of Jesus in preparation for His return. What is key, then, is remembering it.

2. Begin with prayer - The first thing Jesus told these laborers to do? Pray for more laborers. When we pray, we give honor to Jesus as the only one who can do it. When we pray, we remember that the fields are white for harvest and we simply cannot do it all. Let's commit to this, then: beginning every ministry, every service, every day with prayer.

3. Confidence creates vulnerability - Jesus then tells these disciples that they are going out as "lambs in the midst of wolves." A cheery thought. But then he makes it even harder by telling them, "Don't take your overnight bag or your credit cards or any extra footwear." Why this strange command? Because Jesus expects them to have such confidence in the gospel they are preaching that they are willing to be vulnerable. There is no effective and joyful service to God which doesn't require vulnerability and real risk. To be up for that risk, we must continue to develop confidence and faith in the gospel.

4. Don't be distracted - Jesus tells them, "Don't greet anyone on the road"...not because he wants them to be rude, but because they are to be urgent in their task. What is sapping you of your sense of urgency in ministry? Where does the life and priority of the church fall in your priority scheme? Sometimes, even good things can rob us of heaven-centered urgency, like greeting someone on the road. But we must focus on Jesus and maintain the radical urgency of those who are preparing his way.

5. Keep Jesus' sovereignty in view - Jesus finishes thier commission by telling them what to do when people accept the message (heal & proclaim the nearness of the kingdom) and when people reject the message (condemn & proclaim the nearness of the kingdom). Rather than take John and James' approach of calling down heaven's fire on the infidels, Jesus' disciples are to preach and give warning and let Jesus take care of the rebellious on the last day. Serving Christ without a conscious appreciation of his sovereignty leads to crippling failures and prideful victories.

The days are evil but my ipod isn't

A while back, I bought an 80-gig ipod. At the time, I really hoped it wouldn't be a waste of money; in fact, I had hopes of it being a help and blessing to my spiritual life. Towards that hope, I have delved into the world of podcasting: investigating, subscribing, unsubscribing and listening to a lot of different podcasts. In the end, I'm very happy with what I'm able to listen to every week. I thought some of you may be interested in this list of my regular downloads.

Preachers
-Joel Beeke
-Mark Driscoll
-Sinclair Ferguson
-Thabiti Anyabwile
-Ted Donnelly
-R.C. Sproul (Renewing Your Mind)
-Alistair Begg (Truth for Life)
-Several RPCNA Pastors (see reformedvoice.com)

Lectures
-Covenant seminary's church history
-Covenant seminary's preaching class
-Sovereign Grace Leadership Series

Fun/Humor
-NPR's Car Talk
-Best of YouTube

Culture/Music/Other
-This American Life
-NPR's live concert podcast
-NPR's All Songs Considered
-NPR's Science Friday
-Mahalo Daily
-Paste Culture Club
-National Geographic's Wild Chronicles
-Grammar Girl

What am I missing? What podcasts help you or encourage you in some way?

Sermons

The internet is pretty nifty. Our sermons are hosted at sermonaudio.com, but now they have a little widget, which you should see in the right hand column under "recent sermons." Visitors to the sight will be able to listen to the sermons by simply pressing the play button. If you want to download it, you'll still need to click the title of the sermon to go to its specific page. I'll try to post our newest sermon there every week.

A Prayer for Preachers

O Spirit of God, may you then waken my mind and tongue as a loud-shouting clarion of truth, so that all may rejoice, who are united in spirit to the entire Godhead.
-St. Gregory of Nazianzus, poem 1.1.1 De Filio

More from Bonhoeffer

When Bonhoeffer wrote The Cost of Discipleship, he was struggling to call the Lutheran church to wake up and prepare for to do battle with national socialism. His prescription went much deeper than mere laziness. He blamed it on poor theology masked with good theology. I read this paragraph with my mouth open (people at the coffee shop think I'm a little weird anyway); it is bracing prophecy, a powerful tonic even today.

We Lutherans have gathered like eagles round the carcase of cheap grace, and there we have drunk of the poison which has killed the life of following Christ. It is true, of course, that we have paid the doctrine of pure grace divine honours unparalleled in Christendom, in fact we have exalted that doctrine to the position of God himself. Everywhere Luther's formula has been repeated, but its truth perverted into self-deception. So long as our Church holds the correct doctrine of justification, there is no doubt whatever that she is a justified Church! So they said, thinking that we must vindicate our Lutheran heritage by making this grace available on the cheapest and easiest terms. To be "Lutheran" must mean that we leave the following of Christ to legalists, Calvinists and enthusiasts - and all this for the sake of grace. We justified the world, and condemned as heretics those who tried to follow Christ. The result was that a nation became Christian and Lutheran, but at the cost of true discipleship. The price it was called upon to pay was all too cheap. Cheap grace had won the day.

I'm not convinced this exalting of the doctrine of free grace is the problem in reformed churches today, but this is a clear warning: we are not justified by the doctrine of justification. We are justified by Jesus. A misplaced focus will give birth to a host of errors and sins.

Bonhoeffer, Luther & Cheap Grace

For our next book club, I'm reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship. In light of Bonhoeffer's historical context (the degeneration of the German confessional church giving way to Nazi control) and our own context (good reformed theology not always have the effect it ought to have), I thought his discussion about the reformer Martin Luther and cheap versus costly grace was fascinating. Here are some interesting quotes that struck me.

The grace which gave itself to [Martin Luther] was a costly grace, and it shattered his whole existence. Once more he must leave his nets and follow. The first time was when he entered the monastery, when he had left everything behind except his pious self. This time even that was taken from him.
...
[Before Luther left the monastery for the secular world] the Christian life had been the achievement of a few choice spirits under the exceptionally favourable conditions of monasticism; now it is a duty laid on every Christian living in the world.
...
The only man who has the right to say that he is justified by grace alone is the man who has left all to follow Christ. Such a man knows that the call to discipleship is a gift of grace, and that the call is inseparable from the grace. But those who try to use this grace as a dispensation from following Christ are simply deceiving themselves.

Probably not

My lovely wife is out shopping, all four kids are in bed and relatively quiet. I'm back to studying and suddenly wondered, "Is God relieved when I go to sleep at night, just so He can have some peace and quiet?" 

Yeah, I didn't think so either. If only I were that obnoxiously constant in my prayers and singing. 

Now another thing pops to mind: during dinner tonight, I was trying to have a civilized conversation with said wife and #3 called out continually, "mama! mama! mama! mama! MAMA! MAMA!" So, I gave him whatever it was he wanted. No, God doesn't grant prayer requests because he's tired of me, but he loves that spirit, that continual cry until I receive from him the desire he's planted in me. 

pssst, new links (look right)

I'm almost 30

I'm listening to Bruce Hornsby on Pandora right now. And I really like it. Perhaps adulthood has its perks. Like not being required to hate piano pop anymore. Billy Joel, watch out.

Koran, round 1

For this month's book club, I decided to read through the Koran. This was the first time I have done so. Though I hesitate to record my thoughts (picture an Islamic book club reading through the Bible for the first time...), here are some things that stuck out to my on my first reading.

Compared to the Bible, I was surprised at how little of the Koran is made up of history stories. There are some stories in the Koran, but not many. And the ones that are there are, by and large, re-told stories from the first five books of the Bible. This re-telling often adds or changes details (like Jesus speaking to Mary while he was still an infant); the changes are sometimes incidental, but other times constitute a major rearranging of the ideas of the Biblical story.

Some things were noticeable because of their absence. In the Koran, I found no trace of regeneration of internal conversion. And, despite claiming repeatedly that Allah is a merciful god, there is no sense given of how he forgives. That is, there's no sense of atonement. In the place of atonement is a strong theology of merit, of inheriting Allah's favor and eternal happiness through our good works. More broadly, there is a great sense of religion, but no great sense of redemption. Despite the reality of sin, there is no overarcing storyline of salvation.

There are other parts of the Koran which, if we read them without knowing who wrote them, could have been written by Christians. The Last Day, the resurrection, monotheism (only one god-ism), the reality of heaven and hell, the sovereignty of god - these are themes we have in common with the Koran. It's good to know these, to keep us from caricaturizing and to help us in our outreach.

Finally, there is not nearly as much violence in the Koran as I guessed there might be. I've heard that some of the harsher jihad teachings come from the Hadith (the recording of Muhammad's life and sayings) rather than the Koran. I only came across a few passages which tended toward a violent mindset and none of those were any harsher than what we could pull out of our Old Testament.

Again, these are my observations based on a first time reading. So take them with some salt pinches and feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken!

Puny

I can't speak for other preachers, but one of the things that runs through my mind right before I preach is, "How can I preach? Why should these people listen to me? So many of these people are more advanced than I in their walks with Christ. Some here are more obedient to God's Word than I am." But even this is part of God's blueprint, even using weak and imperfect men. Yes, the character of the preacher is important; but even his weakness is part of God's plan. This quote from John Calvin came across my desk today and is a helpful addition to the recent discussion on the primacy of preaching.

This is the best and most useful exercise in humility, when (God) accustoms us to obey his Word, even though it be preached through men like us and sometimes even by those of lower worth than we. If he spoke from heaven, it would not be surprising if his sacred oracles were to be reverently received without delay by the ears and minds of all. For who would not dread the presence of His power? Who would not be stricken down at the sight of such great majesty? Who would not be confounded at such boundless splendor? But when a puny man risen from the dust speaks in God's name, at this point we best evidence our piety and obedience toward God if we show ourselves teachable toward his minister, although he excels us in nothing. (4.3.1)

It's not easy

Poet Stephen Dunn, from an interview in Books & Culture by Aaron Rench, speaking about how poetry brings us closer to reality:

To get the world right is a hard-won thing. It's not easily done.

I feel the truth of this daily. This understanding the world rightly. It is a fight.

Honor to whom honor is owed

Our presbytery met last week in Orlando, Florida. Presbytery accomplishes a lot of good and necessary work, but the most significant thing we did last week was to honor the lifetime ministry work of Dr. Roy Blackwood. Dr. Blackwood officially requested, and was granted, that his resignation as senior pastor at Second RPC in Indianapolis be received. Although that part of the evening was a very sad occasion, the receiving of his resignation was followed by Pastor Keith Magill giving a long testimony concerning Dr. Blackwood's ministry and work. For me, three things shone through the evening.

First, the amount of work God has used Dr. Blackwood to accomplish is truly amazing. When he began pastoring in the 1950's, there was only one Reformed Presbyterian Church in Indiana. Now there are nine, all of which have the stamp of his passion and ministry upon them. Even our new church, Immanuel, owes honor to Dr. Blackwood; though he did not participate in the planting of this congregation, he helped plant our mother church and he helped instill the vision in that session and in our presbytery for continual church planting.

Second, the testimony of so many men and women include how Jesus used Dr. Blackwood in their lives. Several of the pastors spoke at a reception, revealing how Dr. Blackwood's passion for the church as a whole was equaled (if not surpassed) by his love for people as individuals. He was and remains a disciple-maker, calling and training many men for the pastorate and many more for lives devoted to Christ in other vocations.

Third, and perhaps the most moving, was Dr. Blackwood's reason for resigning his pastorate. His dear wife, Margie, was able to be there that evening with us and he recognized her commitment to and help for his ministry. This resounds in so many pastors' hearts, that "without her, I could not have done any of it." Fact is, Mrs. Blackwood needs more and more help these days. And Dr. Blackwood resigned in order to receive his promotion to taking care of her full time, this helpmate who took care of him for so many decades of ministry.

I'm sure Dr. Blackwood doesn't read blogs. If he did, he probably wouldn't like this post. At least not unless I end it the right way, by giving the honor to Christ rather than to Roy. This is his greatest testimony to me, that in everything, Jesus should receive the glory. It's not Roy's church or your church or my church. It's Jesus' church.

Just once more

To conclude my part of this discussion, here are some quotes from John Calvin in the Institutes, book four, chapters five and six. Some quick notes: if this is getting old, I'm sorry and I'm almost done. If this discussion feels off-balanced by not addressing the preacher's responsibility, I agree and hope to write more about that soon. Finally, these quotes from Calvin are meant to inform the idea and are not aimed at anyone in particular.

On Ephesians 4:10-13: We see how God, who could in a moment perfect his own, nevertheless desires them to grow up into manhood solely under the education of the church. We see the way set for it: the preaching of the heavenly doctrine has been enjoined upon the pastors. We see that all are brought under the same regulation, that with a gentle and teachable spirit they may allow themselves to be governed by teachers appointed to this function.

On God's giving interpeters to His people (Mal. 2:7): This is doubly useful. On the one hand, he proves our obedience by a very good test when we hear his ministers speaking just as if he himself spoke. On the other, he also provides for our weakness in that he prefers to address us in human fashion through interpreters in order to draw us to himself, rather than to thunder at us and drive us away.

To those who think the authority of the Word is belittled when handled with authority by men: For, although God's power is not bound to outward means, he has nonetheless bound us to this ordinary manner of teaching. Fanatical men, refusing to hold fast to it, entangle themselves in many deadly snares. Many are led either by pride, dislike, or rivalry to the conviction that they can profit enough from private reading and meditation; hence they despise public assemblies and deem preaching superfluous...In order, then, that pure simplicity of faith may flourish among us, let us not be reluctant to use this exercise of religion which God, by ordaining it, has shown us to be necessary and highly approved.

What follows in chapter six is a great portion discussing the balance of believing the primacy of preaching yet giving full credit to God who "claims for himself alone both the beginnings of faith and its entire course."

More on the primacy of preaching

I do want to continue the discussion from the last post. Not having much time to write, let me point your attention to this article from Keith Mathison, critiquing the doctrine of solo Scriptura (vs. the reformed doctrine of sola Scriptura). Those on the other side of the debate are holding to a form of this, not the full-blown solo Scriptura, but a form of it, and thus ought to wrestle with Mathison's conclusion. (thanks to Jeff for the link)

Not only has solo scriptura contributed heavily to this division and sectarianism, it can offer no possible solution. Solo scriptura is the ecclesiastical equivalent of a nation with a constitution but no court of law to interpret that constitution. Both can lead to chaos. At best solo scriptura can offer an abstract doctrinal statement to the effect that “Scripture” is the sole authority. But using Scripture alone, it cannot tell us what “Scripture” is or what it means. It simply cannot resolve differences of interpretation, and the result is more and more division and schism. The resolution of theological differences requires the possibility of authoritatively defining the propositional doctrinal content of Christianity, and it requires the possibility of an authoritative ecclesiastical “Supreme Court." Since neither of these possibilities are allowed within the framework of solo scriptura, there can be no possibility of solution.

Solo scriptura also undermines the legitimate ecclesiastical authority established by Christ. It negates the duty to submit to those who rule over you, because it removes the possibility of an authoritative teaching office in the Church. To place any kind of real hermeneutical authority in an elder or teacher undermines the doctrine of solo scriptura. Those adherents of solo scriptura who do have pastors and teachers to whom they look for leadership do so under the stipulation that the individual is to evaluate the leader’s teaching by Scripture first. What this means in practice is that the individual is to measure his teacher’s interpretation of Scripture against his own interpretation of Scripture. The playing field is leveled when neither the ecumenical creeds nor the Church has any more authority than the individual believer, but Christ did not establish a level playing field. He did not establish a democracy. He established a Church in which men and women are given different gifts, some of which involve a special gift of teaching and leading. These elders have responsibility for the flock and a certain authority over it. Scripture would not call us to submit to those who had no real authority over us (Heb. 13:17; Acts 20:28). [emphasis mine]

Elsewhere in the article, Mathison points out that those who appeal to the Bereans of Acts 17 as Scriptural evidence of the primacy of the individual over the preached Word ought to realize that Acts 17 comes after Acts 15, where the council of the church decided what the Scriptures taught regarding circumcision and handed their decision down as authoritative. Again, the Scriptures lead us to seek balance. Real authority, the primacy of preaching yet maintaining the practice of submissive discernment.

Especially Preaching

The shorter catechism (#89) says that the Spirit of God makes "the reading, but especially the preaching of the Word an effectual means of convincing and converting sinners, and of building them up in holiness and comfort, through faith, unto salvation." What follows is an attempt to justify the idea of "especially" in the catechism.

Please know that I do not mean to lessen the importance of private and family worship, but to rescue the importance of corporate worship and the preaching of the Word from the depths to which it has sunk.

First, some Biblical thoughts:

Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:11 that Jesus gave pastors and teachers (or, more literally, pastor-teachers) to His people. Why? V. 14 - so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. In other words, Jesus gave pastor-teachers because we need them. Because on our own, we would be blown every which way and would not reach maturity in Christ. The fact that Jesus gives preachers - and that we didn't come up with this idea on our own - means that our responsibility to the preaching we receive on Sunday mornings is a responsibility we have to Jesus, the giver of the gift. Contrary to popular thought, it was Jesus' opinion that we do need preachers to understand the Word of God. Not as mediators, but as teachers. And not that we are ignorant on our own, but that we won't normally achieve the maturity and protection Jesus has planned for us apart from the church's preaching and teaching.

In Acts 17:11 we see the Bereans searching the Scriptures for themselves. But the Bereans aren't solitary Christians deciding for themselves and by themselves what the Scriptures say. They are searching the Scriptures for a purpose: to make sure what they heard from the preachers was true. What prompted their searching was their receiving the Word with joy and their hope to find these things to be true. In other words, this isn't a picture of individualized Christianity, reading and living the Bible on their own. What set these Jews apart, what made them "more noble than those in Thessalonica" was the eagerness with which they received the Word, eagerness proved by their devotion to understand and double-check what they were about to obey. I would argue these Jews did exactly what I exhorted our congregation to do: watch how you hear! (Luke 8:18) Along the same lines, note the testimony of the Thessalonican church (1 Thess. 4:5), the Colossian church (Col. 1:5)

Many of the promises we have regarding the Word of God come in relation to the Word of God proclaimed and preached. See Romans 10:10-15 - justification comes by faith (10) and faith comes by hearing the Word preached (14).

Also helpful here is Paul's instructions to Timothy regarding his preaching. 2 Timothy 4:2 is well-known by every preacher: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. Why such a strong instruction? Because the "time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions." In other words, because we are sinners, we can't be trusted to read, study, understand and obey God's Word entirely on our own. Personal study shouldn't be neglected, but the noetic effects of sin - sin's ongoing brain damage - necessitate the giving of authoritative teaching. Not infallible, but authoritative. "But" some will say,"don't preachers have the same problems I do?" Yes, which is why the Bereans' discernment was totally warranted and why the painful process of ordination is so vital. This isn't a call to turn off our minds and consciences, but a call to joyful, expectant submission.

Yes, pastors are imperfect people; just ask my friends. Yes, we make mistakes. Two weeks ago I found myself repenting of something I had said from the pulpit. This is why we have sessions overseeing the pulpit, guarding the people from the preacher's mistakes. But at root here is the attitude we bring to worship: do we come to worship with an expectation of hearing God's Word from the preacher and obeying what we hear or do we come with great reservation? Do we recognize worship as the highlight of our union with Christ or as a possibly helpful time of encouragement? Do we view our preacher-in-his-preaching primarily as one more imperfect man or as Jesus' gift to me?

This post is too long to continue. I hope to write again about the historical nature of this question and my own testimony regarding it.

*note: this post was edited on Feb. 25 to reflect some of the ways the discussion in the comments have helped clarify my thinking. None of the edits were changes to my central arguments.

**Thanks for all the comments. For now, I've decided to hide them all, because we seemed to reach the end of what was helpful. If you have a question about this, feel free to email or call. -Jared

Watch How You Hear

Yesterday I preached on the parbable of the sower and the seeds from Luke 8. The only command in the passage is Jesus' admonition to "take care how you hear" or, more literally, "watch how you hear." My exhortation to the congregation was the same: take a look at how you hear sermons. Do some evaluation.

Toward that end, I'd like to offer some evaluation questions to use as a mirror. I really don't think faithfully hearing sermons means being able to answer all of these questions, but they should give a good idea of how we're doing. These questions are designed to lead to living Scripture; this is on purpose, because Jesus wants us to be those who hear God's Word and do it. (Luke 8:21)

• What passage was the sermon from?
• What was the story or main thought of the passage?
• What was the main point of the sermon?
• What subpoints, illustrations, exhortations struck me most?
• What applications did the preacher draw from the text?
• Is there any reason to think this application is a bad idea or somehow unbiblical?
• If not, what is my plan for implementing this application? How will I know when I've done it or at least in process of doing it?
• How can our church family live out this application together?
• What other applications should I draw from the sermon? What is my plan?
• How should this part of Scripture change the way I pray?
• How can I use the sermon and its applications in discipling my children this week?
• How will living out what I've heard change how I treat my wife, husband, children, friends, parents, etc.?

These questions would be a nice outline for discussion over Sunday dinner or a good way to spend some of your private and family worship through the week.

Would you add any questions to this list?

Down in my heart

#1: We're going to go to heaven when we die, aren't we?

Me: Yup. 'Cause we belong to God and trust in Jesus.

#1: We're all going to die, aren't we?

Me: Yup.

#1: But I won't die, because I've got lots of schoolwork to do. In my heart.

God 1, Jared 0

One year

Sunday was Immanuel RPC's first anniversary as an organized congregation. During our evening service, we spent time giving thanks to God for His many mercies toward us over the past year. Some highlights include a wonderful sense of unity, great ministry from families to families, financial blessings, fifty-two weeks of sitting together under God's Word in worship, some good evangelism and outreach events, the mom's group and the grad fellowship group.

Near the top of my list for thanksgiving is the servant attitude of so many people at Immanuel. Especially the young men and women. Our junior high and senior high men are always willing and excited to serve; they find ways to help on Sundays. And our young ladies have been incredible encouragements to those of us with young children!

Glory be to God! May He give us another year of worshipping and serving Jesus Christ, who is God with us.