Just Keep Reading Scripture Even if Sparks Aren’t Flying

Sometimes bible reading does not produce fireworks in my soul and the audible voice of Father telling me, with precise detail, what to get done today. Sometimes those things do happen, and boy is it refreshing.

If you follow any strategy for reading Scripture you will find there are days that you slog through and just get it done. Well, there is more going on than we can often perceive. Spirit is at work making us holy, even when we sleep, so he is even more at work when we are interacting with him in his word.

Therefore, read and keep on reading. Study and keep on studying. Read and pay attention to even the family trees. It’s all inspired and useful for our training in righteousness.

I ran upon this statement about bible reading on Josh Harris’ blog that he got from his brother who quoted it from Geoffrey Thomas….whew….anyway, I put it below for you to chew on and enjoy. So, enjoy:

“Do not expect always to get an emotional charge or a feeling of quiet peace when you read the Bible. By the grace of God you may expect that to be a frequent experience, but often you will get no emotional response at all. Let the Word break over your heart and mind again and again as the years go by, and imperceptibly there will come great changes in your attitude and outlook and conduct. You will probably be the last to recognize these… Go on reading it until you can read no longer, and then you will not need the Bible any more, because when your eyes close for the last time in death, and never again read the Word of God in Scripture you will open them to the Word of God in the flesh, that same Jesus of the Bible whom you have known for so long, standing before you to take you for ever to His eternal home.” – Geoffrey Thomas, Reading the Bible

Into What Then Were You Baptized?

“John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit” – Jesus (Acts 1:5)

May 19, 2013 on the church calendar is Pentecost, which is the name Greek-speaking Jews gave for the Feast of Weeks or Shavuot in Hebrew. It marks the end of the seven week holiday between Passover and Shavuot, and was the first day on which the faithful could bring the first fruits to the Temple in Jerusalem. Shavuot/Pentecost also commemorates the giving of the Law by God to the people of Israel on Mount Sinai.

Keep in mind that the Old Testament Law was given to provide hints that would point God’s people to Christ. So went we look at the account of Pentecost in Acts 2, we see the first fruits of the kingdom in the form of about three thousand souls being baptized. And as Pentecost commemorated the giving of the Law in the Old Testament, we also see in Acts 2 something much greater was given by God to His people, namely the outpouring, or baptism of the Holy Spirit.

That is what I want us to briefly look at. The baptism of the Holy Spirit does not get much press in traditional Southern Baptist churches today, largely because we don’t understand it, and we are afraid we might go off the “Charismatic” deep end. This is a shame, because in dismissing it we miss out on the incredible power and freedom that the baptism of the Holy Spirit brings.

In fact, if you ask the typical church member what comes to their mind when they hear the word “baptism”, most often it will be act of immersion in water. But water baptism is only a symbol of the reality of spiritual baptism. We tend to overemphasize the rite of water baptism at the expense of true baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Let me try to explain: Both Mark and Luke record that, in preparing the way for Jesus’ ministry, John the Baptist preached a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. (Mk 1:4; Lk 3:3) But John himself said, “As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me [Jesus]…will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” (Matt 3:11) And just before He ascended into heaven, Jesus instructed His disciples to remain in Jerusalem until they received what the Father promised, “for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit…” (Acts 1:5)

Both John and Jesus mark a distinct difference between the two baptisms – John’s was one of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, and Jesus’ was one of the Holy Spirit. So what does that mean to be baptized in the Holy Spirit?

If we look further in the book of Acts, we come across a man named Apollos. According to Luke, he was a Jew who was eloquent and “mighty in the Scriptures. This man had been instructed in the way of the Lord; and…was speaking and teaching accurately the things concerning Jesus, being acquainted only with the baptism of John… But when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately.” (Acts 18:24-26)

So Apollos’ teachings about Jesus were accurate, but they were incomplete until Priscilla and Aquila explained to him the way of God more accurately. I think this is a good reminder for us that our doctrine about Jesus may be accurate, but it does not necessarily mean that it is complete. So what was it that Apollos’ teaching was missing? The first indication we get was that, although he was teaching accurately the things concerning Jesus, he was acquainted only with the baptism of John – one of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

It is no coincidence that Luke follows up Apollos’ story immediately with another that deals with John’s baptism. Acts 19 begins, “It happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul…came to Ephesus, and found some disciples. He said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” [Note that Luke refers to them as “disciples”, and Paul indicates that they were believers, not just God-fearing Jews] And they said to him, “No, we have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit.” And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” And they said, “Into John’s baptism.” Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in Him who was coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” When they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying.”

To be frank, I think that is where at least some, if not many of us are today. We are still in John’s baptism. Sure, we are taught that there is the Holy Spirit who is given to everyone who comes to Christ, but we are caught in the endless cycle where we sin, we repent, we acknowledge God’s forgiveness. We sin again, we repent again, we are forgiven. But just as the writer of Hebrews said, “Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works…,” (Hebrews 6:1) But that is where many of us are, laying foundation on foundation of repentance from dead works; we remain in John’s baptism.

Clearly, Scripture does not teach, nor is the writer of Hebrews saying that becoming mature means that you will no longer sin or have to repent from dead works. Repentance is a defining mark of every true believer throughout their entire journey with Christ. As long as we are in this physical body we will succumb to sins. The Apostle John makes it abundantly clear: “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.” (1 John 1:8-10)

However, as we are being sanctified, as we are pressing on to maturity in Christ, we begin to grow beyond the seemingly endless spiral where our lives are focused on sin and repentance. We begin to move toward a deeper intimacy with Christ and a powerful outworking of the Spirit through love and good deeds. We move from the “wretched man” in Romans 7 to the  freed man in Romans 8 who walks according to the Spirit.

Paul writes in Romans 6, “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death…” That, I believe, correlates to John’s baptism – repentance for the forgiveness of sins. But Paul does not stop there; he says “so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life… For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”

I believe the death correlates to John’s baptism, while the newness of life is the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The problem is that many of us acknowledge that we have died with Christ, but we have yet to leave the tomb with Him. We have yet to experience the newness of life, the new creation, the truth that “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.” (Gal 2:20) Christ in us is the baptism of the Holy Spirit, it is Christ living in us through the indwelling and power of the Holy Spirit. It is a new life; not an improvement on the old, but an “exchanged life”, as Hudson Taylor put it.

As I was studying, I came across this statement: “The baptism of the Holy Spirit is not an experience to be sought, but a truth to be believed.” That is a tragic statement. To be baptized in the Holy Spirit is to experience a new life. When Paul asked the disciples at Ephesus if they had received the Holy Spirit when they believed, his assumption was that they would know whether or not they had based on experience. Yet preachers tell us to be careful with experiencing things. We are not Stoics! God has given us emotions, feeling, senses so that we can experience Him. The baptism of the Holy Spirit is a truth that must be experienced!

John Piper spoke of the experiential reality of the Spirit, saying, “When you read the New Testament honestly, you can’t help but get the impression of a big difference from a lot of contemporary Christian experience. For them [the believers in the New Testament] the Holy Spirit was a fact of experience. For many Christians today it is a fact of doctrine… In Protestant evangelicalism [the gift of the Holy Spirit] is equated with a subconscious work of God in regeneration which you only know you have because the Bible says you do if you believe. It is easy to imagine a spiritual counselor saying to a new convert today, ‘Don’t expect to notice any difference: just believe you have received the Spirit.’ But that is far from what we see in the New Testament.”[1]

Aspiring pastors, worship leaders, and teachers, as part of your training, one of the best things you can do is to get out of your Southern Baptist (or Presbyterian, or Methodist, or…) context. I’m not saying that you need to renounce being a Southern Baptist or your Southern Baptist heritage. But I do believe it is healthy and good to experience how other godly, gospel-saturated followers of Jesus Christ worship, pray, and pursue fellowship with one another. If you go as a learner and not a critic you will find that it will broaden your view of the Holy Spirit, the church, and worship, and will increase the effectiveness of your ministry.

We too often discredit as “fringe” things we don’t understand or have never personally experienced. We are too busy being “correct.” Meanwhile, people on the “fringe” are doing mighty things for Christ and His kingdom. Scholars may wrangle over differences between terms like “baptized with the Holy Spirit”, “filled with the Holy Spirit”, “second work of grace,” and “receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Regardless, pursue the experiential reality of the Holy Spirit in your life that is firmly based on the truth of the gospel. And through the power of the Holy Spirit, do mighty things for Christ and His kingdom.

So let me ask you the same question Paul asked those disciples, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” Or are you still living in John’s baptism?

---

[1] By John Piper. ©2013 Desiring God Foundation. Website: desiringGod.org http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/how-to-receive-the-gift-of-the-holy-spirit

Mary and the Resurrection

“Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time.” – Martin Luther

It should have been just a normal Sunday. As a child, Mary Magdalene had always loved this time of year – the rebirth of the earth at spring, the warmer days, but most of all the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. She enjoyed helping her mother prepare the Passover meal, the family ceremonially cleaning out all of the leaven from the house, and especially sitting in her father’s lap as he told her how God had delivered the children of Israel from slavery in Egypt. She never tired of hearing that story.

And this Passover held so much promise. It seemed as though Jesus’ words had become more urgent, more intense, as if – like spring – something was about to be birthed. Jesus had shown Himself to be a prophet, but so much more than a prophet; a priest, and not just a priest, but a king; yes, a king. After all, a week earlier He had made a triumphant entry into Jerusalem on a donkey, just as the prophet Zechariah had foretold. Mary’s mind replayed the conversations with the others about that day. “He is the One,” they exclaimed, “who will restore Israel! The Messiah really has come!”

But that week leading up to the Passover had taken some strange turns. Jesus had been telling His closest friends that He had come to Jerusalem to die. That was certainly not the talk of a triumphant king. Yet Mary heard purpose in Jesus’ words. She would remain with this prophet regardless of the outcome. After all, the one who had delivered her from the torment of seven demons deserved her devotion.

And remain with Him she did. It still made her feel faint when she thought of Him on the cross, bloodied and gasping for air. “Tetelestai!” she heard Him shout. But what did He mean, “It has been fulfilled”?

Yes, it should have been just a normal Sunday. Instead she found herself walking in the cold of the predawn darkness to the tomb of the One who was supposed to restore Israel to the glory of King David’s reign. She was carrying the spices they had prepared on Friday, because they were commanded to rest on the Sabbath. Rest…yesterday was anything but rest. Her eyes still swollen from the tears, Mary made her way to the tomb, still unsure how she was going to remove the stone to get to the body. Consumed with grief, Mary had not noticed that the dawn had just begun to break.

When she arrived she saw that the stone had already been removed from the entrance. “So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb.” When they arrived, they saw the stone removed just as Mary told them. And in the tomb lay only the strips of linen “as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen.” The disciples “still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.” So they “went back to where they were staying.” (John 20:1-10)

But Mary remained.

As she stood weeping outside the tomb, “she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?” [At this point, nothing seemed to faze Mary, not even the presence of angels] “They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.” Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”). Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” (John 20:11-18)

St. Augustine rightly calls Mary Magdalene “the apostle to the apostles.” (Greek: apostolos: a messenger, one sent on a mission) After all, she was the one chosen to be sent with the fullness of the good news to the “sent ones.” Jesus said, “My sheep recognize my voice, and they follow me.” (John 10:27) The redeeming love that Mary recognized in Jesus’ voice is a love that preceded that moment. It was a love that had resounded throughout redemptive history; a love that extends to you and to me.

When we take communion, we are proclaiming the Lord’s death until He returns. But Jesus’ death without His resurrection would be meaningless. As Paul writes, “if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain…your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins…If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied. But now Christ has been raised from the dead.” (1 Cor 15:14, 17, 19-20)

On this depends the only hope of humanity. It is your only hope.

As we eat the bread that represents the body of the Lord Jesus that was broken for our wholeness, we eat in hope.

When we drink the cup that represents Jesus’ blood spilled for the cleansing of sins and the ushering in of a New Covenant, we drink in hope.

But our hope is not one of blind, wishful thinking. Instead, it is a resurrected Hope; a hope that is set resolutely on the only sovereign God of creation who’s Word has never and will never fail.

Jesus Christ has risen.

The Most Offensive Verse in the Bible

The most offensive verse in the Bible

 by Dan Phillips

The Exchanged Life

 “Now I saw in my dream, that the highway up which Christian was to go, was fenced on either side with a wall, and that wall was called Salvation. (Isaiah 26:1). Up this way, therefore, did burdened Christian run, but not without great difficulty, because of the load on his back.

“He ran thus till he came at a place somewhat ascending; and upon that place stood a cross, and a little below, in the bottom, a sepulcher [grave; tomb]. So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up with the cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back, and began to tumble, and so continued to do till it came to the mouth of the sepulchre, where it fell in, and I saw it no more.” (John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress)

John Bunyan paints a beautiful picture in The Pilgrim’s Progress of when the burden on Christian’s back fell off at the Cross. It is important to note that this happened well into Christian’s travels to the Celestial City. He had already encountered Evangelist who pointed him to the wicket-gate. He had run from his City of Destruction with his fingers in his ears, crying, “Life! Life! Eternal Life!”  He had begun his journey along the King’s Highway. Yet all of this still under the load of his heavy burden on his back.

Christian writers have used various terms to describe this experience of deliverance: E.M. Bounds used the term “secret of full consecration” (Essentials of Prayer); A. W. Tozer refers to the “blessedness of possessing nothing” (The Pursuit of God). Jesus himself said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit…”

But if we are really honest with ourselves, I think many (most?) of us still feel the burden on our backs. We strive and strain under our load. We live divided lives, tiptoeing across the line between sacred and secular. We say we belong to Christ, and we truly believe that in our hearts, but in truth we still live like hired hands; clocking in and clocking out – now on God’s time, now on our own. We have begun in the Spirit, but we are fighting to be perfected in the flesh.

Please do not hear words of condemnation in this. Condemning words would only bring more burden, and along with it more striving and struggling under the load to try harder and do more to find that place of peace in our hearts that seems to evade us so easily. There is a better – much better – way.

I recently read a book entitled Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret. It is a biography of Hudson Taylor written by his son and daughter-in-law, Dr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor, which tells of his life and work as a missionary in China in the latter half of the 19^th century—amazing, God-wrought, Spirit-filled work.

And yet, in 1869 – some fifteen years into this remarkable work in China – Hudson Taylor had written to his mother, “I have continually to mourn that I follow at such a distance and learn so slowly to imitate my precious Master.” The weight of the burden on his back can be felt in those words.

And then, six months later, Taylor received a letter from a fellow worker named John McCarthy:

I do wish I could have a talk with you now [he wrote], about the way of holiness. At the time you were speaking to me about it, it was the subject of all others occupying my thoughts, not from anything I had read…so much as from a consciousness of failure—a constant falling short of that which I felt should be aimed at; an unrest; a perpetual striving to find some way by which one might continually enjoy that communion, that fellowship, at times so real but more often so visionary, so far off!

Do you know, I now think that this striving, longing, hoping for better days to come is not the true way to holiness, happiness, or usefulness. It is better, no doubt, far better than being satisfied with poor attainments, but not the best way after all. I have been struck with a passage from a book…entitled Christ is All. It says, “The Lord Jesus received is holiness begun; the Lord Jesus cherished is holiness advancing; the Lord Jesus counted upon as never absent would be holiness complete…He is most holy who has most of Christ within, and joys most fully in the finished work. It is defective faith which clogs the feet and caused many to fall.”

This last sentence, I think I now fully endorse. To let my loving Savior work in me his will, my sanctification, is what I would live for by his grace. Abiding, not striving nor struggling: looking off unto him; trusting him for present power; …resting in the love of an almighty Savior, in the joy of a complete salvation. “from all sin”—this is not new, and yet ‘tis new to me. I feel as though the dawning of a glorious day had risen upon me. I hail it with trembling, yet with trust. I seem to have got to the edge only, but of a boundless sea; to have sipped only, but of that which fully satisfies. Christ literally all seems to me, now, the power, the only power for service, the only ground for unchanging joy…

How then to have our faith increased? Only by thinking of all that Jesus is and all he is for us: his life, his death, his work, he himself as revealed to us in the Word, to be the subject of our constant thoughts. Not a striving to have faith…but a looking off to the Faithful One seems all we need; a resting in the Loved One entirely, for time and for eternity.” (Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret)

“As I read, I saw it all,” Mr. Taylor wrote. “I looked to Jesus, and when I saw—oh, how the joy flowed!” (Hudson Taylor’s Spiritual Secret)

Taylor referred to this as the exchanged life. In the truest sense, it is no longer “I who live, but Christ lives in me.” Galatians 2:20

Paul writes in Colossians 3:2-4 “Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.”

It is in this release, this tumbling of our burdens off of our backs into the grave never to be seen again, where our very lives are exchanged at the cross; we are no longer hired-hands but bond-servants. Our entire life is freely given to the will of our Master. Our ears are pierced, as it were, and we become lifelong servants of love to Christ (see Deuteronomy 15:12-18). The sum of our thoughts and actions are no longer for ourselves, but for the One who purchased us with His very own blood. Therein lies all joy.

“Thus far did I come laden with my sin,
Nor could aught ease the grief that I was in,
Till I came hither. What a place is this!
Must here be the beginning of my bliss?
Must here the burden fall from off my back?
Must here the strings that bound it to me crack?
Blest cross! Blest sepulchre! Blest rather be
The Man that there was put to shame for me!”
(John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress)

Holy Spirit, may You initiate the glorious release in Jesus’ words, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30

A Soothing Aroma

Michelle and I had the opportunity to visit our daughter, Grace, who is serving on staff with the mission organization YWAM (Youth With A Mission). It was amazing to spend a week at their training base and to be surrounded by a thousand missionaries. We learned a phrase there that the students were using “being wrecked by God.” This is actually a good thing. And by the end of the week, God had wrecked Michelle and me.

One of the things that was so encouraging was to see so many college-age students in white-hot blaze of passion for the glory of Jesus Christ among all the nations. It had the excitement of a youth camp, except they were being trained to go immediately into the harvest fields. Michelle commented to Grace, “Wow, why would you ever want to leave here?” Her response was, “Mom, we are not being trained to stay, but to go!” The hand of the Lord has been on Loren Cunningham (founder of YWAM) and his work; he understands what it means to disciple.

One of the things that the Holy Spirit clearly spoke to me while at the YWAM base was that my prayers were too small. So it has been no coincidence that my Bible reading has recently led me through Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers. One of the phrases that continued to stand out to me was that the offerings presented by the priests were “soothing aromas” to the Lord (17 times in Leviticus alone). It always perplexed me why God would phrase it that way. Why would the aroma matter to Him?

Aromas were clearly important in the worship in the tabernacle. Exodus 30 describes the altar of incense that was to be placed in front of the veil that was near the ark of the testimony, where God met with the high priest. Every day, the priest was required to burn fragrant incense on it every morning and every evening at twilight. Verse 8 states, “There shall be perpetual incense before the Lord throughout your generations.”

When the high priest entered the Holy of Holies once a year, he was required to carry incense. Leviticus 16:12-13 says, “[The priest] shall take a firepan full of coals of fire from upon the altar before the Lord and two handfuls of finely ground sweet incense, and bring it inside the veil. He shall put the incense on the fire before the Lord, that the cloud of incense may cover the mercy seat that is on the ark of the testimony, otherwise he will die.”

The theme of aromas and incense was continued into the New Testament. The magi brought frankincense and myrrh (both aromatic resins used as incense) as gifts to the newborn king Jesus (Matthew 2:11). Mary anointed Jesus’ feet with costly perfume (John 12:3). Paul says that God “manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place.” (2 Corinthians 2:14), and that Christ “gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.” (Ephesians 5:2)

As I have said many times, the writer of Hebrews tells us that the earthly tabernacle in the Old Testament was a shadow and type of the true heavenly one. So what is the reality that the earthly incense was to point to?

Revelation gives us an explanation. Revelation 5:8 states, “…the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders…Each had a harp and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of God’s people.”

Revelation 8:3-5 “Another angel came and stood at the altar, holding a golden censer; and much incense was given to him, so that he might add it to the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, went up before God out of the angel’s hand. Then the angel took the censer and filled it with the fire of the altar, and threw it to the earth; and there followed peals of thunder and sounds and flashes of lightning and an earthquake.”

As I had been meditating on these things, I saw the connection and thought it interesting that our prayers are somehow stored in golden bowls in heaven. But the immense weight of it had not hit me.

And then at 4:30 in the morning the Holy Spirit woke me up, and I began thinking on these things. I pictured myself beside the altar of incense with the sweet aroma of the countless prayers of the saints – your prayers; my prayers. And then I entered into the very Holy of Holies, the throne room of God, because the veil was torn in two from top to bottom, heaven to earth, signifying that the tearing was initiated by God Himself, not man. And the smoke of the incense filled the room. Only in heaven the cloud of incense does not obscure the sight. And who do you think is there in the middle of the throne? A Lamb standing, as if slain. Our High Priest, Jesus Christ, has made a way through the torn veil (that is His body) so that we could enter into the very council of God Almighty.

Hebrews 7:24-25 says that “because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.” Our High Priest is right now in the Holy of Holies before the Father unceasingly offering up the incense of intercession for us! (Could this be the smoke that Isaiah saw in his vision? (Isaiah 6:4))

And Hebrews 4:14-16 says, “Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore let us draw near with confidence (KJV says to come boldly) to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

With confidence. Boldly. Is that how you pray? The Father wants us to pray that way. He loves to smell the sweet aroma of our prayers before Him so that He can answer them. Remember Revelation 8:5 where the angel takes the censer and throws it to earth? I take that to mean that all of the prayers that had been stored in the bowls will be answered according to God’s will and in His time. Not one prayer that is for the glory of God will be wasted.

John G. Paton (Missionary to the New Hebrides Islands of the South Pacific during the 1800’s) wrote,

Did ever mother run more quickly to protect her crying child in danger’s hour than the Lord Jesus hastens to answer believing prayer and send help to His servants in His own good time and way, so far as it shall be for their good and His glory.

And the Father loves hearing us pray His Word to Him. I hope when you pray, you have your Bible open before you, or that you use the scriptures you have memorized as points of prayer. Because the Father loves hearing His children humbly but boldly say, “You said, Lord; You said!”

You said, Lord, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.” You said, Lord; You said!

You said, Lord, that You “will not allow [me] to be tempted beyond what [I am] able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that [I] will be able to endure it.” You said, Lord; You said!

You said, “the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray earnestly the Lord of the harvest to send laborers into His harvest.” You said, Lord! You said!

So as we take communion, let us enter through the veil, that is, by way of the spilled blood and the torn body of our Savior Jesus Christ, and offer up sacrifices of prayers and praise as a sweet aroma before our Father.

When I See the Blood

Recently, my Bible reading plan led me to the book of Exodus, which records the account of the Israelites being rescued from Egyptian bondage by the hand of God through ten incredible plagues as He executed judgments “against all the gods of Egypt.” (Exodus 12:12)

I don’t know how many times I have read through the story of the exodus, and yet this time a single phrase jumped off the page and pierced my heart.

The context is during the tenth and final plague when God instructs the Israelites to sacrifice an unblemished lamb at twilight. They were then to take some of the blood and put it on the two doorpost and lintel of their front door. This was to mark their homes so that those inside would be spared from God’s judgment He was executing throughout all of Egypt.

And the Lord said, “…when I see the blood I will pass over you.”

When I see the blood I will pass over you.

And then it hit me – everything that I am physically, emotionally, and spiritually, is riding on the truth of that one phrase: “when I see the blood I will pass over you.” If that is not true, then my life is completely worthless and all would be for nothing.

What’s important to note is that God who is the omniscient Creator of the universe who knows the heart and mind of every person did not actually need to see the blood on the lintels and doorposts in order to keep things straight in His mind as to who was His and who wasn’t. He knew the heart of every person with the blood smeared on the doorpost as well as the heart of every person who did not have it. So the blood served as a reminder, not for God but for those inside the house. It was to show them that it was out of their hands; their salvation depended wholly on God alone. The Lord told them, “I am about to release a judgment on the land of Egypt so fierce and terrifying that there will be a great cry throughout the land such as there has not been before and such as shall never be again. And this judgment will be so encompassing that it will strike every single household in Egypt. But I have made a way of escape for you. Just do what I tell you and trust Me.” This is the theme throughout redemptive history that would point not just to a symbol or a shadow of things to come, but the reality of Christ being the source of salvation for all who trust in God alone.

Picture in your mind an Israelite family by faith sacrificing the lamb, by faith preparing the unleavened bread, by faith spreading the blood on the doorposts, and by faith eating the Passover meal. Their hope was beyond themselves; it rested in the One who said “when I see the blood I will pass over you.”

Martin Luther wrote in his classic Bondage of the Will:

God has surely promised His grace to the humbled: that is, to those who mourn over and despair of themselves. But a man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realizes that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, counsels, efforts, will and works, and depends absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure and work of Another – God alone. As long as a man is persuaded that he can make even the smallest contribution to his salvation, he remains self-confident and does not utterly despair of himself, and so is not humbled before God. Such a man plans out for himself – or at least hopes and longs for – a position, an occasion, a work, which shall bring him final salvation, but which will not. Conversely, the man who is out of doubt that his destiny depends entirely on the will of God, despairs entirely of himself, chooses nothing for himself, but waits for God to work in him; and such a man is very near to grace for his salvation.

The Feast of Passover is also known as the Feast of Unleavened Bread. God commanded them to remove all of the leaven from their homes and to bake their bread without leaven because they would not have time for their bread to rise before they were rescued. So with that, it is much easier to understand Paul’s words to the Corinthians: “Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Corinthians 5:7-8)

The bread and the cup of communion before you are to serve as a reminder that Christ is our Passover lamb and we, by faith, consume all that He is, and by faith we place our hope firmly and exclusively on the Person and work of Jesus Christ so that when our heavenly Father sees the blood, He will pass over us.

Communion meditation- on our revised confessional statement re: Lord’s Supper

This morning we will begin with the Lord’s Supper as we do each week.  We do so to proclaim the Gospel again each week to ourselves and each other, as it the basis and foundation of all that we are and do.  But before we approach the table together, I want to share something that I hope helps inform and shape our worship together today.

We believe that theology matters.  And we believe that theology (the study of God) is not some dry, academic pursuit, but that it should lead us to worship.  Thinking rightly about God should enlarge and enrich our view of God, and that should cause more praise and adoration and a life of worship to spring up within us.  In light of that, and before we come to the Lord’s table together, I want to share a recent change to our church’s confessional (doctrinal) statement regarding baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

Let me first say that we have not changed our understanding of or belief about either of these ordinances that were instituted by Jesus.   We have simply come to see that we should more fully describe what we believe.  Although our confessional statement is by no means an exhaustive statement of belief, we felt there was more that had to be said, that the former statement, which was drawn from the Baptist Faith and Message, was not wrong but simply incomplete.  The new statement is a blending of The Gospel Coalition’s and Bethlehem Baptist Church’s statements of faith with a couple of small tweaks.

The entire statement is available on our website at http://www.threeriverscc.org, but for our time together this morning I’m going to focus on the statement about The Lord’s Supper.  Here are the statements:

Old Statement
The Lord’s Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming.

New Statement
We believe that baptism and the Lord’s Supper are ordained by the Lord Jesus himself. The former is connected with entrance into the new covenant community, the latter with ongoing covenant renewal.  Together they are simultaneously God’s pledge to us, divinely ordained means of grace, our public vows of submission to and joyful worship of the once crucified and now resurrected Christ, and anticipations of his return and of the consummation of all things.  (skipping down to 3rd paragraph past paragraph on baptism)

We believe that the Lord‘s Supper is an ordinance of the Lord in which gathered believers eat bread, signifying Christ‘s body given for His people, and drink the cup of the Lord, signifying the New Covenant in Christ‘s blood. We do this in remembrance of the Lord, and thus proclaim His death until He comes. Those who eat and drink in a worthy manner partake of Christ‘s body and blood, not physically, but spiritually, in that, by faith, they are nourished with the benefits He obtained through His death, and thus grow in grace.

Now all of that is a mouthful and a lot to ponder and unpack.  I want to unpack for you three observations from this confessional statement that I pray will lead us into worship this morning.  Remember, theology should lead us to worship.

1.  The old statement was true, just not complete.
The Lord’s Supper is a symbolic act of obedience whereby members of the church, through partaking of the bread and the fruit of the vine, memorialize the death of the Redeemer and anticipate His second coming.

The Lord’s Supper IS a symbolic act of obedience, and we do memorialize (or remember) Christ’s death and anticipate his second coming as we take the elements.  But it is also SO MUCH MORE, so much richer than that.

Let me give you an analogy.  I could stand here and tell you only that Jenny and I are best friends, and that would be accurate, but incomplete.  I could further state that I have vowed to provide for her physical and emotional needs to the best of my ability for the rest of her life.  Still accurate, but incomplete.  I could even further state that she has agreed to stand by me in sickness and in health and to support and encourage me.  All of that is true.  But it does not get to the ultimate reality that leads to those statements.  The glorious reality is that God has knit our hearts and lives together in Christian marriage, and that those marriage vows and commitments flow out of the love that God has given us for Him and each other.  Because of that we desire to see our marriage give glory to God, enjoyment to us, and blessing to others.  And so the “contractual” statements of obligation of our love flow out of a much deeper and richer reality, without which the contractual part is feeble and incomplete.

In the same way, we want to affirm that the Lord’s Supper is an act of obedience, a memorial, and an anticipation of Jesus’ second coming.  But it is so much more.

When we come to the table, these elements are a means of grace to us- they are physical objects that God uses to impart grace to us by reminding us of the reality of his supernatural work in our lives, and helping to keep us in Christ right now and until the day of his second coming.

Church, when we touch and taste these elements at the table, we should be reminded of our utter hopelessness apart from Christ, but also our complete salvation in Christ.  We should be reminded that there is nothing we can do to satisfy God’s righteousness, but that in Christ “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (Rom 8:1)”  And that should lead us not just to remember, but also to worship.

2.  Just as the people of Israel gathered together in the Old Testament to renew their covenant vows to God, we do so every week as we remember what Christ has done for us.  And just like their covenants, we remember that it is not an agreement between God and us as equals, but that God in Christ initiated peace with us when He could have righteously crushed us.  Instead, he has made a way for us to be justified and adopted into his family, he empowers our ongoing sanctification through the Holy Spirit, and that he gives us meaning and purpose in life and a task here on earth.  Our response under that covenant is to joyfully obey and praise him as we marvel at what he has done.  And we are taught to do all of this as we anticipate and long for his second coming to gather us as part of his bride, the church, and take us to be with him directly in the Father’s presence.  Church, every time we take the Supper together, we declare that we are God’s covenant people and he is faithful to keep his covenant with us, and that should lead us to worship together this morning.

3. Finally, I want to say a word about the attitude in which we take the supper.
What does it mean to partake in a worthy manner?  When Paul addressed the Corinthian church in 1 Corinthians 11, he was addressing a church that had taken the Lord’s Supper from a communal remembrance of and celebration of Christ’s redemptive work on their behalf and transformed it into a selfish occasion for snobbish gluttony for some while the needs of the poor in the body were completely neglected.  They had taken something that was intended to be a response of worship to Christ and turned into something that was only about their desires.  In the process they both robbed Jesus of worship and caused division in the church.  Because of that, Paul rebuked the church and said many of them were under God’s active judgment, some to point of sickness and even death.

Church, this morning, I want you to examine your heart before you come to the table.  Eating in a worthy manner is not about you cleaning yourself up before you come to God.  That is the antithesis of the gospel message, and if we try to do so we are not trusting that Jesus’ death and resurrection are sufficient for us.  Eating in a worth manner is about acknowledging that we are each individually and collectively in constant need of his grace, forgiveness, and power to live for him.  We are nourished spiritually by Jesus as we admit our spiritual poverty and hunger and depend on Jesus to feed us.  If we fail to admit this and come pridefully and selfishly to the table, we dishonor Christ and become like those who greedily stuffed themselves, both denying our need for Christ and inviting his judgment.

Church, as we come to the table this morning, let’s come to eat in a worthy manner that admits our great need and gives great praise to God for meeting that need in Christ.  Let’s make much of Jesus together, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works,”  (Hebrews 10:24)

Invitation to the table

Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.  I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” (Matthew 26:26-29)

May God in his grace spiritually feed you and sustain you as you taste these reminders of his grace and mercy to you.  Let’s respond in worship together.

Epiphany

January 6^th on the Western Church liturgical calendar is the Feast of the Epiphany. Epiphany comes from a Greek word that means “to appear, or to become visible.” Epiphany is among the oldest Christian feasts dating back to the 4^th Century and traditionally commemorates the visitation of the wise men to the baby Jesus. In the broader sense it is the celebration of the “epiphany” or the manifest presence of Jesus Christ – the Son of God in human flesh – to the Gentiles.

The fact that God the Son took on flesh and bone is of supreme importance to us. One of the reasons Jesus became Immanuel – God with us – was so that we could experience Him. Or to use biblical terminology it is so that we could have fellowship with Him. It is what Jesus meant in John 15 when He instructed us to abide in Him. Christ came so that we could experience the manifestation or the epiphany of God in a very real, tangible way. And He returned to the Father so that He could send the Holy Spirit to us so that we would be able to experience the manifest presence of the Spirit in our lives daily.

John Piper spoke of the experiential reality of the Spirit, saying, “When you read the New Testament honestly, you can’t help but get the impression of a big difference from a lot of contemporary Christian experience. For them [the believers in the New Testament] the Holy Spirit was a fact of experience. For many Christians today it is a fact of doctrine… In Protestant evangelicalism [the gift of the Holy Spirit] is equated with a subconscious work of God in regeneration which you only know you have because the Bible says you do if you believe. It is easy to imagine a spiritual counselor saying to a new convert today, ‘Don’t expect to notice any difference: just believe you have received the Spirit.’ But that is far from what we see in the New Testament.”

I’m afraid we fall into that contemporary Christian experience category where the presence of the Holy Spirit is more an academic exercise than an experiential reality. And I hope you realize that. I hope you don’t think that we have arrived. I pray you begin to long to experience the Holy Spirit like they did in the New Testament, even if you are a little uncomfortable and are not quite sure what that would really look like.

Three Rivers, you are approaching a divide in the road. To the left is a well-worn path taken by most because it is easier, neater, more manageable, status quo, indifferent. That path is well-traveled and easier because it can be done on our own strength and with our own wisdom. But straight ahead is a narrow path with steep grades and cliffs on either side, but it is the path that leads to life. That path is impossible to negotiate without the epiphany, the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit at each step.

Can I just be real honest here? I’m tired – not of the ministry or the pastorate – I’m tired of apathy, of indifference…in my own life and the life of this church. I’m tired of 20-25% participation in connect groups. I’m tired of seeing a prayer ministry that only has 2 to 3 college students and has to be led by a college student because no one else is willing. I’m tired of not seeing older men and women not stepping up and teaching the younger men and women.

Have you ever wondered where the Jewish religious leaders were when Christ was born? They knew the prophecies; they saw the star; they knew where the Messiah would be born. (see Matthew 2:4-6) Isn’t it ironic that they were not in the stable worshiping their King? Instead, there were pagan astrologers who had traveled hundreds of miles and uneducated, dirty shepherds who gathered around the newborn God-man in worship. The religious leaders knew the scriptures, had all the knowledge, but they did not act on what they knew. They were indifferent; they were apathetic. Their knowledge had not transformed their hearts. (see http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/the-irony-of-the-epiphany)

A.W. Tozer wrote in The Pursuit of God, “We have been too blind to see, or too timid to speak out, or too self-satisfied to desire anything better than the poor average diet with which others appear satisfied. To put it differently, we have accepted one another’s notions, copied one another’s lives and made one another’s experiences the model for our own…we have made the Word of Truth conform to our experience and accepted this low plane as the very pasture of the blessed.” (Chapter 5)

Frankly, I am growing weary of walking down this worn-down path of dry academic theology here in the Western church lined with cold stone walls that have chiseled in them the oldness of the Law, which can still be full of emotion, but it lacks real spiritual power. I’m tired of persuasive words of wisdom instead of the demonstration of the Spirit and of power (1 Cor 2:4). I want to begin walking in the newness of the Spirit. I want to begin experiencing Isaiah 30:20, that says, “[The Lord], your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher. Your ears will hear a word behind you, ‘This is the way, walk in it,’ whenever you turn to the right or to the left.”

What if you woke up every morning longing to hear the voice of God? What if the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit was a fact of daily experience in your life? What if you trained yourself to discern the voice of God behind you, telling you, “This is the way, walk in it”? Many of you are uncomfortable with that. Good. I want you to be. I’m not going to explain that away and say, “Well, what Isaiah really meant was…” No, what Isaiah really meant was hearing the voice of God in our daily lives.

Now, there are some who think, “Well, you know Brad, Hebrews 1 says that in these last days, God has spoken to us in His Son. That’s past tense; He has spoken. Jesus is God’s final word to mankind.” And in one sense that is very true – but it is in the sense that final means ultimate, not finished. Because it is nonsense to think that God, the omnipotent Creator who spoke creation into existence, and who has communicated to mankind since the days of Adam, the One who said that man cannot live on food alone, but by every word that proceeds from His mouth, the One whose very name is The Word, should somehow have ceased to communicate to His people once the last word in scripture was penned. God is not just a God who has communicated; He is a God who communicates.

An integral part to the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives is the use of spiritual gifts. What if we took Paul at his word and “earnestly desired spiritual gifts.” And then we began using our spiritual gifts in a way that edifies the church? I’m not talking about simply our talents or skills – those are of our own strength and wisdom. We trivialize the importance and uniqueness of spiritual gifts when we lump them in with talents or things we just enjoy doing. I’m talking about biblically-based supernatural Holy Spirit driven gifts for the building up of the church like prophecy, and helps, and administration, and healing, and tongues. See, I think Satan has done an amazing job at making spiritual gifts taboo in otherwise biblically sound churches.

Why are we content on just knowing that the Holy Spirit is with us instead of longing to experience the presence of the Holy Spirit in our church?

So before you take the bread and the cup of communion, I want you to pause – not to rest, but to consider: Are you able to drink the cup that Christ first drank, or to be baptized with the baptism with which He was baptized? (Mark 10:38) In other words, are you willing to pursue the manifest presence of God regardless of what lies ahead? Are you willing to say with Job, “Though He slay me, I will hope in Him.” (Job 13:15) If so, then drink deeply of His cup, and savor the richness of His bread. He died to bring you near to God. And He returned to the Father so that you could experience the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit in your life.

Father, forgive us of our sinful preoccupation with our own pursuits in our own strengths and with our own efforts. Holy Spirit, we want to experience You, we want to fellowship with You, we want to abide in You. We want to grow to discern Your voice telling us “This is the way, walk in it”. Now bless this cup and this bread, I ask, as we honor Christ’s death and eagerly await His return.

Taste and See

Honey. We all know that honey is made by honeybees. The bees collect nectar from flowers and then transform the saccharides in the nectar into honey through a process of repeated regurgitation until it is partially digested. The last regurgitation is still high in water content, so the process continues through evaporation and enzymatic transformation. The enzyme invertase synthesized by the bees and digestive acids hydrolyze the sucrose from the nectar to give the same mixture of glucose and fructose. So, honey gets its sweetness from these monosaccharides, and depending on the variety is slightly sweeter than granulated sugar.

Sweetness is almost universally regarded as a pleasurable experience. Foods rich in simple carbohydrates such as honey are those most commonly associated with sweetness. The tongue uses a different taste receptor pathway for each of the five basic tastes: sour, bitter, savory, salty, and sweet. So, when incoming sweet molecules in the honey bind to their taste receptors, it causes a conformational change in the molecule. This change activates certain proteins, which in turn cause the release of ions that ultimately cause neurotransmitter release, which is then received by a primary afferent neuron. So basically it takes all that for your taste buds to tell your brain that honey is sweet.

Now, I have just described to you more than you probably ever wanted to know about how the human body determines the sweetness of honey. But one thing I did not do, in fact cannot do, is cause you to experience the sweetness of honey.

The following quote comes from Jonathan Edwards’ sermon A Divine and Supernatural Light –

There is a twofold knowledge of good of which God has made the mind of man capable. The first, that which is merely notional…And the other is, that which consists in the sense of the heart; as when the heart is sensible of pleasure and delight in the presence of the idea of it…Thus there is a difference between having an opinion, that God is holy and gracious, and having a sense of the loveliness and beauty of that holiness and grace. There is a difference between having a rational judgment that honey is sweet and having a sense of its sweetness. A man may have the former that knows not how honey tastes; but a man cannot have the latter unless he has an idea of the taste of honey in his mind.

In other words, there is this “head knowledge” of God where you believe certain truths about Him. But then there is a “heart knowledge” where you not only acknowledge these truths about God, but you sense them, you feel them, because you experience the pleasure of His presence with you. It is extremely difficult, if not impossible to accurately describe the taste of honey. That is because honey was not meant to just be described, and analyzed and studied. Honey is meant to be tasted and experienced; its sweetness is to be enjoyed. In the same way, the Holy Spirit is not Someone merely to be described and studied, but He was given to us as a pledge of our inheritance, a deposit, or a taste, if you will, of the sweetness we will experience when we are with the Father for all eternity.

This may be overly simplistic, but it seems there are two extremes in churches today. Some emphasize knowing the truth of God’s Word. Others emphasize experiencing the Holy Spirit. But shouldn’t there be both? Isn’t that what Jesus meant when He said to the Samaritan woman, “the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers.” (John 4:23)

Which extreme do you think Three Rivers leans towards? And if you think we are a good balance, then I would suggest you are guilty of what is called confirmation bias; you have surrounded yourself with people and information that confirms your own beliefs and bias. But how many of you woke up this morning and begged the Holy Spirit to impart to you a supernatural gift so that you could edify the church? How many truly understand what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit? I don’t mean you can write a paper on it, but you understand it because you have experienced it. It has been real to you. None of us have arrived, not your pastors, not Mitch, not Emmett, and especially not me. The Apostle Paul himself confessed that he hadn’t obtained it, but he longed to gain Christ so he pressed on to make it his own, because Christ Jesus has made him his own (Philippians 3:12-14). He wanted more of Christ.

Many of us stop short of a supernatural encounter with the Holy Spirit because we are satisfied with good theology. Let me be clear, there is nothing wrong with good theology; it is essential and without it we will not come to a saving knowledge of the truth. Just before Jesus explained to the Samaritan woman about worshiping in spirit and in truth, He told her that she worshiped what she did not know; the Jews worshiped what they knew. The Jews knew, but they had not yet experienced Immanuel – God with us. As someone once said, “The word of God is to lead us to the God of the word.” People without experience tend to be overly confident in their beliefs or theories, or good theology. To continue the analogy, they can describe to you down to the molecule the sweetness of honey, but they have rarely if ever tasted it. But people with experience tend to long for more; they crave the frequent and tangible interaction of the Holy Spirit in their lives.

Christ came to earth to die and be resurrected so that we could experience Him. He left earth so that He could send the Holy Spirit to be with us and in us so that we could proclaim to the world with King David: “O taste and see that the Lord is good!” (Psalm 34:8)

Holy Spirit we confess that we do not know You as we should. We know about You, and we are intrigued with the idea of You, but the realness of You in our lives is sporadic at best. We want to know You in a deeper way. We want to experience You. We want to be continually filled with You. Jesus, You suffered and died to make that possible. You purchased that on the cross. Father, You are seeking worshipers of You in spirit and in truth. Seek us out, Father; make us pleasing to You. Let us taste and see that You are good.