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Reading for the New Year

At the beginning of each new year I read the same three things:

1. Psalm 90

2. Ephesians 5

3. The Resolutions of Jonathan Edwards

I also remind myself of the words of Charles Spurgeon: ‘He who marries today’s fashion is tomorrow’s widow.’

I would also encourage readers (if you aren’t already working through the Bible systematically) to start a plan to read the Bible at least once this year. There are multiple resources available to help you. For those who really want to get after it, I recommend the three month plan HERE. I followed this plan through a few years ago and managed to read the Bible four times that year. I eventually figured out that I could do this without the exact plan so long as I read about 25 minutes a day. I have settled in on three times a year for the past couple of years, that seems to work best for me. I am to the point where I do this by feel, and don’t need to follow a concrete layout, but there  is a structured four month plan available HERE. I will also provide a link to Robert Murray M’Cheyne’s one year plan HERE.

Whatever you do, be persistent. Expect setbacks, and do not let them deter you. This is not something that you do in order to be accepted by God, so there is no external pressure. This is something for the good of your own soul. If you miss a meal, you just eat a little more at the next one. That’s the way it works.

It’s Like…You Know…Okay?

This post has been sitting in the ‘drafts’ for a while, but tonight I actually saw a video shared on Facebook that makes the point much more strongly than I was orgininally able to.

A portion of a sermon by Martyn Lloyd-Jones (on Ephesians 6:15, ‘feet shod’) got the ball rolling on this line of thought:

Have you a definite position? Are you prepared to stand in it, and say, ‘I will never yield, I will never move from this?’ The moment you begin to compromise on this Word of God you will soon be slipping and sliding both in doctrine and in practice. Some people are constantly contradicting themselves; they praise the Protestant and the Nonconformist Fathers in the first half of their address or article; then criticize them in the second half. That is not ‘standing’; that is sliding. They do not know where they are, and no-one else knows.

As the Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 1:19, the Gospel of Christ is not yea and nay at one and the same time. That is true of politics, of ecclesiasticism, of ‘the world’; but it is not true of Christ.

I recently listened to a Mars Hill Audio anthology on the subject of ‘words.’ An author, who was being interviewed, made the point that she theorizes the common American usage of the term ‘like’ as a conversation filler has more to it than meets the eye (or ear in this case). Like is a term of equivocation. It is the language, obviously, of ‘likening.’

Jesus uses such language when he likens the kingdom of God to certain stories or things. The kingdom of God is like a man in search of costly pearls, etc. But Jesus used the term ‘like’ in order to convey ideas and concepts in concrete terms. He actually wants us to know what the kingdom is like in terms that we can understand and relate to.

I am afraid it is not so with many modern Americans. Perhaps the word simply slips out as an unconscious filler in the midst of brain lags. Perhaps not. Perhaps we have been trained, unlike Jesus, to never say things concretely, but to equivocate and make our language as ambiguous as possible so as not to offend or contradict anyone else. Rather than standing in their speech they are sliding.

Here’s a clip from Def Poetry Jam that says it more clearly than I have been able to. I don’t know who the man is yet, but I appreciate his articulation of the idea:

Without God in the World

John Wesley has a good time with some Greek:

We see, when God opens our eyes, that we were before ἄθεοι ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ. – without God, or rather, Atheists in the world.

(from John Wesley’s Theology: A Collection from His Works, p. 25).

Ephesus was a bastion of idolatry (see Acts 19), with a temple to Artemis (otherwise known as Diana) at the heart of the city’s religious and economic system. Yet Paul is not afraid to say that the Ephesians were atheists (albeit religious atheists). An atheist is not simply someone who denies God, or disbelieves. But worse, in some sense, an atheist can be someone who professes a god, or many gods, but who is, in the last account, without God at all.

In short, an atheist is not simply someone who denies God, but someone whom God denies. God denies him because of his idolatry, and he denies him not only in the final judgment, but now. We often ask, ‘What is your view of God?’ We might ought to ask instead, ‘What is God’s view of you?’

  • …Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world (Eph. 2:12).

Not Yea and Nay (MLJ)

The Doctor applies Ephesians 6:15 to us and our world: Are your feet rooted down deep in the gospel? Are you prepared to stand unmoved? Have your feet been placed on the unmoving Rock that is Christ?:

Have you a definite position? Are you prepared to stand in it, and say, ‘I will never yield, I will never move from this?’ The moment you begin to compromise on this Word of God you will soon be slipping and sliding both in doctrine and in practice. Some people are constantly contradicting themselves; they praise the Protestant and the Nonconformist Fathers in the first half of their address or article; then criticize them in the second half. That is not ‘standing’; that is sliding. They do not know where they are, and no-one else knows.

As the Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 1:19, the Gospel of Christ is not yea and nay at one and the same time. That is true of politics, of ecclesiasticism, of ‘the world’; but it is not true of Christ.

– D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Christian Soldier, pp. 276-277

  • …and being firm-footed in the gospel of peace (Eph. 6:15, ISV).