Justinroy

I’m just asking, does the format on sunday mornings matter, or is it a non-issue?

If we “break” the exposition into 3 parts, with singing in between, does it help or hurt the teaching of the word?

Does it help people pay attention, or is it a better way to “entertain” the audience?

What is the goal of the format? (promote worship/promote exposition /Does exposition lead to worship?)

What would induce a change? (i.e. genuine care, kicks and giggles, staying true to God’s word, relevance)

Just some questions to think about.

One of the clearest examples of God showing his glory was when Moses wanted to see God’s glory, and he said, “Show me your Glory.” (My initial reaction to this verse was to pop in an old Third Day album and listen to Mac Powell sing like a songbird,  but I resisted).

But, back to the subject at hand…(really, you can stop laughing now) God answers Moses by saying, “I will cause my goodness to pass in front of you and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion” (Exodus 33:19). Just so we’re on the same page, Moses wants to see God’s glory and God says he will cause his goodness to pass in front of him.

Then, God fulfills his promise to Moses. Moses stood on Mt. Sinai and “the lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name the lord. And he passed in front of Moses proclaiming “the lord the lord, the compassionate and gracious god, slow to anger abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin (Ex 34:5-7).

The two important Hebrew words are hesed (variously rendered; steadfast love, mercy, covenant love, graciousness) and met (truth or truthfulness).  hased and met are used over and over to describe God’s compassion or goodness in the Old Testament.

The essential thing to grasp is that God’s glory is supremely his goodness

Now, fast-forward to John’s allusion to Exodus in John 1:14.  John already has the reader in Exodus; a Greek speaking Jew would have read the beginning of 1:14 more like this, “the Word pitches his tabernacle, or lived in his tent, amongst us” (carson). So, John is already taking his readers to chapter 25, but then he states,  “and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”  John has seen “his glory” glory that can only be from the father, and the only one who can possess this glory must be from the Father (Jn 1:18)

Grace and truth is John’s  word pairing that relates back to hesed and met. Carson seems to think that John is moving his readers back to Exodus and that the glory (goodness) passing in front of Moses was now incarnate, dwelling among them, and they have seen his glory, word-made-flesh……. God’s ultimate self-revelation.

So, how does this relate to the Cross?

It relates to the cross because Jesus, the God-man, is most glorified in the cross, (John 7:39; 12:16; 13; 31-32) therefore, God is most glorified in the cross.  And, what did we say God’s glory was? His goodness. God’s ultimate glory was in the cross because he displayed the ultimate good.  This is why Jesus Christ is the true/real/ultimate revelation of God  (jn 1:9).

With this in mind, when we read that God loves the world  ( Jn 3:16) we should view it in light of God’s character because it took the ultimate revelation of God to display his love for a world that did not know Him. John 3:16 shouldn’t give us warm fuzzies, as if we were lovable, but it should testify to God’s character— that he loved a world that hated him.

In short, God’s glory is found in the cross of Christ because the cross displays the perfect goodness of God’s character, in that, Jesus, the perfect and spotless lamb of God, substituted himself for a people who were in rebellion against him.

Just for a second, think of God’s glory (Ex 24:16/ Is 6) …. How majestic He is and how zealous He is for his own glory (Isaiah 48:9-11)…

Now think of the amount of glory God has (if it could be quantitative) and relate it to how much goodness it took for God to redeem his people. It’s sobering…….(Rom. 3:10-12; 14:23: Heb. 11:6)…… It took nothing less than the God who is necessarily perfect in goodness and power to redeem such a lost world.

Dwell on God’s goodness in view of his awesome glory, and we’ll begin to understand 1 Corinthians 1:29 “so that no one may boast in God’s presence.

I’m teaching a Bible study on John. Here’s the poster I made for it.

I hope to eventually blog some of my notes on John and share some insights.

I also think that the font I used for John 1:14 looks like the font on the front of Crazy Love by Francis Chan

During our church meeting last night, we were encouraged to proclaim what we’re thankful for.  I was surprised that no one mentioned God’s word or God himself, or his immutability. I was silent and didn’t proclaim my thankfulness during the church service; I wrote it down on a note pad.

I praise God for his word, not for it’s conformity to our standard of beauty and truth- but that it is God’s revelation of himself, and it offends me, it exposes me, and it transforms me – giving me the ability to see the ultimate truth and purist beauty that is God through the Glory of Jesus Christ.

I’m still at odds with my silence and why I refused to speak. I wanted to. My “gut” told me it was the right thing to do. Maybe I’m still uncomfortable around EBC. Maybe I don’t feel like I’m apart of the church. I’m sure I could conjure a million different reasons for my silence, all they way down to my selfish, introspective personality that keeps me from developing biblical friendships.

Matthew 5:18

For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

Sincere gospel confusion is a term I have coined for sincere Christians who teach something other than gospel.  The “sincere” might lead you to believe that I am being gentle, or that I don’t understand the severity of the issue.  Maybe I’m guilty of that at times, but I  understand the weightiness of mixing the gospel with worldly wisdom.

Usually gospel confusion is found in the form of behavior modification.  A sincere gospel confuser will teach and preach that “you need to change your attitude” or “try harder” or “be accepting”.  Preachers slip into behavior modification  when they want to start teaching something “relevant”, something that the people can “take home.”

Having a  new attitude and being a better person are not bad things to do,  they’re just not the gospel; it may be the result of the gospel, hence the futility in preaching those things to people who don’t know the gospel.  Preachers miss the concept that “trying harder”  or “attitude adjustment” don’t come from within ourselves, they come from the power of the gospel.  So, it does zero good to preach “try harder”, without allowing the gospel to change a persons heart. We can scold people when they do wrong. We can reward people when they do good, but this is nothing more than Pavlov’s dog , no heart change.

Behavior modification can never change a persons heart. Our hearts are wicked and bent  in constant rebellion.

What’s entertaining, but ultimately sad, is when we teach behavior modification along with the gospel. Here are a few equations for you:

Gospel + Behavior Modification = nongospel

Gospel + Anything = nongospel

We must be  careful that we are only preaching the gospel of God and nothing else.

I don’t have much time, and I don’t see myself being able to blog much this week. I have about 500pgs for Dr. Russel Moore’s systematic class to read,  and I wanted to post a link to an article. The article is entitled Young Restless, and Reformed. It’s an old article from Christianity today, but I still wanted to share.

here’s an excerpt

“If you really understand Reformed theology, we should all just sit around shaking our heads going, ‘It’s unbelievable. Why would God choose any of us?’” Harris said. “You are so amazed by grace, you’re not picking a fight with anyone, you’re just crying tears of amazement that should lead to a heart for lost people, that God does indeed save, when he doesn’t have to save anybody.”

The reason this article is bouncing back up is Collin Hansen has written an article on reformation21.org entitled Reflections on Young Restless and Reformed.

If you don’t know anything about reformed theology, you’ll still enjoy the article. Also, you might want to know that Collin wrote a book called Young Restless and Reformed about a year ago. I haven’t been able to read the book, but if it’s anything like his article, I’m sure I would love it.

Night Photography is one of my favorite things. I love the hassle of positioning the tripod just right. The anticipation, waiting for the shutter to snap, is like the cream in the middle of an Oreo- it’s delicious, it’s awkward and you don’t experience it  much. The shutter usually  opens for a 100th of a second, but with night photography, you can leave it open as long as you want. Night photography is usually a hit or miss; it’s trial and error.  All in all, we got some pretty good shots, however, the most memorable part of the trip wasn’t the pictures we took, but the ones we were afraid to take.

While we were driving/walking around downtown Cincinnati at 3 am, we met, or at least saw, many interesting people. They were the poorest of the poor. The prostitutes and homeless. Here I am walking around with enough camera equipment to probably pay their rent for a few months.  I’m actually ashamed that I didn’t help anyone. I was afraid.

Jesus came for the poor and the broken. My heart was burdened for them, but not broken. I want my heart to break for the weak and the poor. We saw a 23 year old girl selling herself on the street. Should I have purchased her for the night and taken her for coffee? Do I consider my own safety? Would she even listen to me?

Jesus came for those in need. He was a friend of sinners. He ate with the wretched. He is their savior.

Tim Chester and Steve Timmis have written an extraordinary book on “church” called Total Church.  I’m actually just starting it, but I’m excited about where it’s going.   Chester and Timmis are co-founders of the Crowded House in Sheffield UK.

Being involved an the stereotypical church in rural America, I’m acquainted with the antitheses of what Chester and Timmis are purposing, “A gospel community intentionally living gospel”.  Ordinary people doing ordinary things with gospel intentionality.

I’ll have a review of the book up in a few days, but i just wanted to write a little bit today.

Today, I’m also reading  The Baptist Faith and Message.  It’s an eloquent document that outlines what we as Baptist believe.  Here’s an excerpt:

The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man. It is a perfect treasure of divine instruction. It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter.

Do Baptists still believe this ?