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May 7, 2016  by

Stopping Jesus Cold

Mark 6:1-6

Jesus begins his ministry.  He teaches, like no one has ever taught before (Mk. 1:22). He heals and casts out demons and performs unprecedented mighty works (Mk. 1:27).

The public response is overwhelming.  People come from everywhere, and they come in great numbers to hear him and to see his works for themselves.

  • 1:28 – “his fame spread everywhere”
  • 1:32 – “the whole city was gathered together at the door. And he healed many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons.”
  • 1:48 – “Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places, and people were coming to him from every quarter.”
  • 2:12 – “they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, ‘We never saw anything like this!’”
  • 3:20 – “Then he went home, and the crowd gathered again, so that they could not even eat.”
  • 5:20 – “everyone marveled”
  • 5:24 – “And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.”

And then Jesus comes home, back to Nazareth.  What a happy occasion! The hometown hero returns! Now his neighbors and friends can congratulate him personally and hear his remarkable teaching for themselves.  Now they too can witness the miracles done by the hand of Jesus.

So Jesus starts teaching (Mk. 6:2), and the result is sheer astonishment on the part of the hearers.  But the flavor of the astonishment is bitter, and it is played in a minor key.  It is a cold, questioning (note the 5 questions in v. 2-3), defensive response to Jesus.  Listen to them, “Where? What? How?” It is as if they were asking, “ Who does Jesus think he is?  Where did all his specialness come from? He can’t pull this over on us; we know him better than anyone.  Ultimately, he is just a carpenter.  There is nothing extraordinary about him.”

Yet his wisdom is unmistakable (“What is the wisdom given to Him?”).  His works are undeniable (“How are such mighty works done by his hands?”). This could only come from God. These are the obvious conclusions from what everyone can hear and see.

But the hometown folks do not accept His divine authority, let alone His divine origin, because they will not believe.  And the Healer will not heal people who question His identity, authority and person. Jesus is stopped cold; “he could do no mighty work there.” The sick could have been healed, but they remain sick. The lame could have walked home, but they hobble away. Sins could have been forgiven, but the burden and the guilt remains.

And what could we see Jesus do, if we would just take Him at his word? What would Jesus do in our lives, if we would just think about what He has said and what He has done and reason from the evidence of His divinity, power and faithfulness to the obvious conclusions of who He really is? What might Jesus do in your life, in your family, in your church, in your neighborhood if you will just believe in Jesus, the Son of God?

Are you praying for and waiting for Jesus to act, when in reality He is just waiting for you to believe Him? Don’t stop Jesus cold;  He is ready to perform His mighty works in you and for you. He is eagerly looking for your faith (“when Jesus saw their faith, he said…” Mk. 2:5) so that He can proceed to work His mighty works.

Let it be done for you as you have believed.   (Mt. 8:13)

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February 24, 2016  by

Meditations toward Purity – #3 – Proverbs 23:26-28

26) Give me your heart, my son,
And let your eyes delight in my ways.
27) For a harlot is a deep pit
And an adulterous woman is a narrow well.
28) Surely she lurks as a robber,
And increases the faithless among men.

The focus of the battle is the heart

Solomon says, “Give me your heart.” He knows, and he longs for his son to know, that the fight for sexual purity will be won or lost on the battleground of the heart. (Proverbs 6:25; 7:25) It will not do merely not to sin outwardly, with the body and in the flesh. We can be, to all outward appearances, clean and circumspect, but still be overrun by sin in the heart. We may refrain from outward acts of sin, but in our hearts be eagerly desiring to sin such that we are consumed by our wants. Solomon knows the battle is for the heart, so he focuses his son’s attention on the real issue and priority in life.

My focus on my heart must be voluntary

Solomon begs his son to give his heart. This yielding of the heart (to God) must be entirely voluntary; it cannot be out of compulsion or external constraint. Rather, because I know what God requires and what is good for me, both in this life and in eternity, I choose to give my heart to God. I am not simply trying to be respectable or good to please other people or even to comply with some laws or expectations forced on me. I desire inward purity because I know God gazes deep into my heart, and because I want to protect my conscience from defilement, from screaming pain, and from draining regret. I make a free choice to take my heart and to point its desires, not at pleasing myself or in drenching myself in the readily available showers of illicit sexual pleasure, but to keep my heart dry and to give myself to God.

My eyes are the gateway to my heart

The point is not what the eyes see, but what the eyes delight in – what they settle upon, feast on, and drink in. Solomon calls for his son to choose (“let your eyes delight in”) to let his eyes find their delight in the ways of God, the ways of holiness, the ways of purity and not the ways of the world or the ways of his sinful flesh. This is not to deprecate delighting in legitimate sexual pleasure (Prov. 5:15-19) for these pleasures are not excluded from “my ways,” the ways of holiness.

There is a close connection between the eyes and the heart. Job makes a covenant with his eyes not to gaze upon a virgin (Job 31:1) knowing full well that the danger is that his heart will follow his eyes (Job 31:7) and the result may be that his heart will be enticed by a woman (Job 31:9). Sexual temptation begins with the eyes, but the pipe from the eyes to the heart is very short, and the heart quickly is touched by what the eyes are drinking in and delighting in.

God calls me to delight as well as denial

Solomon does not call on his son to retreat into asceticism and the denial of all pleasures, but rather he beckons him to find positive delight, with all his heart, in the ways of God and of righteousness. God created all the trees of the garden and directed Adam to eat freely of any of them. Except one. So God withholds no good thing from those who walk uprightly (Ps. 84:11).
Three solid reasons for purity of heart

The “For” at the beginning of verse 27 points us to three very good reasons why Solomon is urging his son to exercise control over the cravings of his heart.

The first reason is that the loose woman, a “deep pit” and a “narrow well,” represents a fall and a trap for the eager participant in her amorous adventures.
A deep pit and a narrow well. Both figures convey a drop into an abyss, a sharp decline down a precipice where descent is easy but the return trip is far more challenging. The descent into fornication is easy, effortless, pleasurable and rapid. But once you have plunged into the deep pit, returning to level ground is not so easy.
Many are hurt by the fall. And all will find it very difficult to climb out again.
A sexual fall is enslaving. He that commits sin is the slave of sin. (Jn. 8:34) Once you have acquired a taste for those delicious, forbidden pleasures, you will not find it so easy to go without.
A sexual fall opens the eyes. Like the serpent promised Eve, “in the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened…, knowing good and evil.” (Gen. 3:5) Your eyes will see evil and temptation where before you were innocent and oblivious.

The second reason is that “she lurks as a robber.” This is shocking, isn’t it? You thought she would give pleasure, not take something! You are the fool. You had it all wrong all along. She is a robber. She will rob you of innocence, of a good conscience, of the ability to enjoy legitimate sexual pleasure, and of the freedom to delight in God and good without defilement and regret.

And the third reason is that she “increases the faithless among men.” Every man who engages in illicit sexual liaison breaks trust with someone. Always with God, who designed us for purity and holiness. Perhaps with your wife, who is one flesh with you and who trusts you to remain wholly committed to her. Perhaps with your children, who look up to you and who expect you to show them how to live. Perhaps with other Christians, who count on you to be an example to their children and to uphold the spotless name of Christ that we bear. Perhaps with some unbelievers who look to you to back up your words with actions and to demonstrate to them that Christ really does change lives.
Adulterers and fornicators are always faithless, trust breakers, men you cannot count on.
Solomon gives us these three critical reasons why we should be pure in our hearts and with our eyes.

O Lord, I would give you my heart. I want to hold nothing back. You know how readily I look and how quickly I want and how vulnerable I am to fall. Keep me by your grace and your Spirit, for only by your Spirit can I give you my heart.

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February 8, 2016  by

It Is Not For You To Know

Acts 1:7

We have many, many questions. And there are not enough answers. We live with unknowns and uncertainty.

Will I marry? Whom? What is ultimately meaningful? What should my career be? Should we have children? Will I get cancer? Are we headed for political or economic doom?

The disciples of Jesus had pressing and urgent questions for Jesus in the few moments remaining before he left them for good. Is it now? Is now the time that the long-anticipated kingdom will be restored to the nation of Israel? Isn’t this why you, the Messiah, came? Haven’t you come to restore justice and to relieve the nation of Israel from Roman oppression?

But Jesus did not give a clear answer to their burning questions. “It is not for you to know.”

Jesus says we are not to know when He will return, what time and date the Father has selected for this glad event. It would not be good for us to know. We might be tempted to abuse the grace of God and delay repentance until just before He comes back. Jesus wants us to live watching, trusting, praying, seeking Him until He returns for His own.

And more broadly, we want to know things and times and explanations that God does not intend for us to know. But we want to know, for knowing gives us the illusion of control. Nothing new here. In the garden, the serpent tempted Eve by saying “…you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” To know is to be like God, to rival God Himself. God is the one who knows all and all things. And God is the one who controls all and all things. For God there are no unanswered questions, no mysteries, no paradoxes and no ambiguities.

But Jesus says, “It is not for you to know.” Or as Moses once said, “The secret things belong to the Lord our God.” Some of our questions must remain unanswered. Let God be God. Learn to be human, and trust God in your finiteness and limitations and knowledge with boundaries. God made you for this. He wants you to trust Him where you do not and cannot know (Proverbs 3:5). Trust Him where you cannot see. Trust God in the dark (Psalm 139:12).

Faith in God will take you where your limited knowledge cannot. It is not for you to know.

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January 18, 2016  by

It Ain’t So Bad To Get Old!

Next month marks my 60th birthday. I would not be honest if I didn’t tell you that I struggle with growing old. I tend to fixate on what is lost and what is past, what will no longer be, rather than what has been gained and is now possible. Yes, silly, I know, but that’s where I am. It has not just readily fallen into place for me.

Solomon brings wisdom and clarity to the subject of aging, its significance and its advantages in Proverbs 20:29.

The glory of young men is their strength,
And the honor of old men is their gray hair.

Here are the relative advantages of youth and age. The young are strong. They have energy, capability to do, vigor, and youthful beauty.

The old have lived long, and through their success and failures have (normally) increased in wisdom. Frequently they have advanced in responsibility and authority, and therefore honor. The gray hair is emblematic of all this.

Our culture is fixated upon youth, human beauty and physical attractiveness. We are unable to accept what is lost in the process of aging, because we value beauty and youth over wisdom. Furthermore, we fear the loss of strength and the approach of death. Yet God through Solomon tells us that while the glory of young men is their strength, there is a peculiar honor that is associated with old men. It is not the same as the glory of youth, strength and attractiveness, though there is a particular beauty in gray hair and a serene acceptance of who I am as an older person. What is this honor? What is gained? This honor is the wisdom that accrues to the person who has lived long and learned from the process. This honor is the respect that is accorded to and often the authority invested in the wise older person.

Solomon gives me a new, game-changing perspective. Getting older is not just about losing the vigor and beauty of youth, but aging brings with it a peculiar honor and advantage. Getting older actually brings something to seek and to celebrate! Here is a whole new perspective for us to get and to maintain.

Let’s focus on and value what is gained in the aging process. Wisdom. The entire book of Proverbs is written in praise of wisdom; it is written to call the young to prize and seek wisdom. The good news is that wisdom is what we have been gaining (hopefully) as we have walked along this road of life. Wisdom. Learning how to live. Learning how to avoid the waste of our lives and energies. Learning to be cheerful, patient, loving, diligent, pure and virtuous. And in so doing, earning the respect of others and becoming a model (though imperfect) for the young as to how to live wisely.

What is gained is more, much more, than what is lost. It ain’t so bad to get old!

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January 4, 2016  by

Meditations toward Purity – #2 – 2 Corinthians 7:1

Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

Paul urges us to cleanse ourselves. The matter of growing in holiness, of cleansing the dirtiness and defilement in our conduct and in our hearts, of moving closer to purity, is not something we can just pray about and leave to God. There is a work to be done here that only we can do. God expects and requires us to take the initiative. Many a battle for purity has been lost because I failed to act decisively, waiting for Someone else to do something. If I fail to cleanse myself, no one else will step in to do it for me.

Paul names the scope of my concern as all personal defilement. I am not just targeting the big and obvious reprehensible sins, the ones that other people might gasp at if they knew. But I am aiming at every kind of sin and behavior that will defile my purity, even the little, hidden ones about which some may ask, “Why are you worried about that little thing?” The battle is not done if one guerilla fighter is still on the loose. The shirt is not clean if one small black spot remains. All defilement.

Paul focuses on defilement of the flesh and of the spirit. It’s not just about what you do, but it’s about what you think and what you want. God cares about what is hidden and invisible in my heart, not just what I do with my body. Jesus makes it clear that, contrary to our common conclusions, the source of our defilement is what comes out in our lives from our desires and thoughts. Keeping myself from engaging in visible and obvious sins does not make me a good boy; purity is far more than that.

All our obedience is built on faith in God’s promises. Therefore, having these promises… God has taken the initiative. Seeing our weakness and helplessness, God moves near and commits Himself to us and commits to help us. God does not give us commands to obey without offering to us power to obey and incentives to obey Him. With God’s promises in hand, believing obedience to God becomes an entirely different thing.

Not just any promises, but these promises. Here Paul refers to some very specific promises of God, quoted from the Old Testament in 2 Cor. 6:16-18. Promises of what God will be – their God and a Father to them (relationship, not alienation or isolation). Promises of what God will do – He will dwell in them and walk among them (God is near, not far away). Promises of what God will do for us, if we will only separate ourselves from sin – He will welcome us, be a Father to us, make us His sons and daughters (identity, security, significance and purpose). God promises I am not alone and I am not on my own. Though the fight against impurity is harder than anyone will ever know, I have these promises from God. Based on these very promises, I tackle the challenge of purity.

Father, thank you that You have not left me on my own. My sin is blacker and more deeply rooted than I once imagined. And though You do not lower Your expectations for my purity, You promise Yourself to me, as my God and my Father. Lord, you are enough for me. Help me to believe these promises in the moment of temptation.

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December 16, 2015  by

How does God regard my prayers?

As incense… As the evening offering…

Ps. 141:2 – May my prayer be counted as incense before You; the lifting up of my hands as the evening offering.

What is “prayer” for David?

  • Prayer is when he calls upon God, when he calls to God. (Ps. 141:1) Prayer is not just something he is supposed to do, a religious formality. David has something to say, and he has to say it to God.
  • Here David is praying when he is in trouble (Ps. 141:9-10). He is weak and vulnerable. When he is in need, where does David go? He is not calling upon his own resources, but he goes to God. This defines prayer for David; out of a sense of his need, he calls out to God.

Listen to David pray about his prayer.

  • He asks (Ps. 141:2) that his prayer would be regarded by God as incense. Saying the same thing with different words, David asks that the lifting up of his hands (in prayer) be counted as the evening offering.
  • What does David mean by this? Let’s zero in.
  • What is incense? Why do people burn incense for religious purposes? They imagine they will please the deity with the aroma.
  • How did incense fit into the Old Testament religion instituted by the true God (David’s context)? God designated an altar in the tabernacle for burning incense every morning and evening (Ex. 30:1, 8).
  • What does incense symbolize in the broader picture of God’s salvation? Prayer from God’s people (Rev. 5:8; 8:3).
  • What about sacrifice? Why do people offer sacrifices in religion? To appease the deity and turn his anger away from them when they have offended him.
  • How did God regard sacrificial offerings in Old Testament religion? Among other things, they (like incense) were a soothing aroma to Him (Ex. 29:18, 25). God was pleased as He saw (“smelled”) men retreating from themselves and appealing to Him.
  • How does this relate to Christ and the New Testament? Jesus is the ultimate realization of what an offering to God should be, and as such He is a fragrant aroma to God (Eph. 5:2).

What can I take away from this?

  • What David desired for his prayer = what God designed for incense and offering to be in Old Testament religion = a fragrant aroma to God.
  • In other words, God is pleased when we pray. It smells good to Him. Like when you drive down your driveway to home and smell steak on the grill. Our prayers are especially pleasing and fragrant to God.
  • Sometimes we think that we have to pray long and hard to coax an unwilling God to hear our prayers (a la the unrighteous judge of Luke 18). Not so, for God is eager to hear our prayers, and He is absolutely delighted when we pray to Him. He is pleased when we ask Him for our needs rather than resorting to our own resources. He is pleased when we honor Jesus by coming to the Father through Him. He is pleased when in our weakness we come to His strength.
  • So let’s pray! Let’s pray with faith, in confident hope that God will regard our prayers with delight!
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December 2, 2015  by

“Contributing to the Mission of Jesus”


note from will 1note from will 2An encouragement and a lesson from Will:

If you know Will, you have seen the truth of Ephesians 4:7 at work. Paul writes to the Ephesians, “But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift.”

The grace and gifting of Christ is very evident in Will’s life. Will is a senior in high school from my former church. He also has Down syndrome. When we were still at Redeemer Ada, I could always count on Will coming up to encourage, hug, or just simply talk about our common love for food.

He exudes a love and joy that leads to a desire for service and mission. This was apparent in his consistent desire to help others and serve in the church.

A few weeks ago, I received the attached letter in the mail from Will with a gift for Redeemer Ann Arbor.

It was one of the most encouraging things that has happened in our time of church planting.

Will wanted to do his part to “contribute” to God’s ministry in Ann Arbor.

So, what an encouragement to us! But, also, what a lesson for us!

Where do you “contribute” in Christ’s kingdom? I’m not talking about just money. Will serves as an example of giving what he had to benefit Christ’s cause. I think he gives us a great example. Christ gives gifts to his church for the building up and expanding of his church. If we withhold the gifts and graces he has given us, it impacts the whole body. Will did/does his part. Have you?

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