Abouts: Because next week is finals week here at UCI I will either not post, or have a extremely short post or if I feel like procrastinating I will have the longest post of my life…
Ooh, just came up with an idea, for next week I will reveal (make) my summer reading plans and I will include reviews, summaries, and whatever else I can find on the books I will be reading this summer
Articles: Six Ways to Hinder Your Prayers (Challies) Selfish Motives, Turning Away From Scripture, Unforgiving Hearts, Family Discord, Unconfessed Sin, Doubt
If sin be but a common scar or wrinkle, to be erased from the soul’s surface by a few simple touches; if pardon be a mere figure of speech, meaning God’s wide benevolence or good-natured indifference to evil, why tell of wrath and fire and judgement, the never-dying worm and the ever-rising smoke?
Horatius Bonar is also known for his book, Words to Winners of Souls, and one section I found very rebuking/refreshing was a extensive quote of a public confession from the Church of Scotland in 1965, I could not find the origin document, if there is one, so I found a pdf version of the whole book and the excerpt is in the 4th chapter extending from page 16-21, if you have time read the book, better yet if you have money go buy the book; if anyone knows of the origin document can you please inform me about it or where I can find it
We are al living distracted lives that promise only to grow more complicated and distracted in years ahead. The discipline and stewardship of our attention is a matter of great and unquestionable urgency.
The Ultimate Conference Guide (The Blazing Center) Rule 1, 2, and 3
This week over at Woot Shirts they have some pretty funny slogans, I might buy the blue one, tempting…
Thoughts: Watch the video first if you haven’t. The saddest part of watching that was when panning through all those scenes of the doctors after work has to be Cutner’s scene. It was the scene where after a day as a doctor we see him just sitting at home eating cereal while mindlessly watching TV. Every time I see that my soul just cries, “STOP IT!” What makes it sadder is just how we see what he went through the rest of the day saving lives, seeing lives end, and some change, but at the end of the day where does he find his rest, in a bowl of cereal and some tv shows. I feel bad for him (as much as I can for a made up character), but how much different is that from our lives; after a day of hard work, seeing life changing, seeing tragedy in the news, we end up coming home and become a couch potato, thinking we lived life enough for the day and now we have gained enough life points to waste it away on the night being totally idle.
Videos: Iron and Wine – Passing Afternoon (Season finale final scene of House)
Verses: Hebrews 5:11-14 About this we have much to say, and it ishard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
John 6:35 Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.
So after going to my friends graduation and hanging out with him the whole day Saturday, inevitably I was tired on Sunday morning. So by the second half of the message I started to nod off a little. When I was thinking about it I started thinking about those people who go to church every week, listen to the messages and then goes home and when you ask them what they think about the message or church they have no idea what you are talking about. Then when you see them fall away from church and you ask them why they did, because they didn’t get anything out of it. But when you look back, they are the ones sitting down and nodding off during the sermon, they are the ones texting while the word is preached. They think that to be holy, to be sanctified is an involuntary motion. What happens every Sunday is the pastor takes the ingredients he has, prepares and prepares them throughout the week, cooks everything, makes a nice presentation, places the plate down with the right utensils and then on Sunday presents the meal in-front of everyone to enjoy. The pastor’s hard work is in-front of the congregation, sometimes the meal isn’t that great, and sometimes it’s amazing, but no matter what, he sets this meal in-front of them and then he goes on to prepare next week’s meal. What am I missing, where is the eating portion of the meal? Well, that’s my question as well. The pastor presents this meal but does he hand feed everyone, does he go to every member of the congregation and cut up the meat and then place the piece of food in their mouths? Of course not, he does all the preparing but leaves it up to the congregation to feed themselves. He goes and looks the Word, find the treasures that are in it and then prepares it into a message that will be impactful, applicable, and clear. Then on Sunday he presents this message to the congregation, but then here is where so many go wrong. People just tend to stop here and go, “Ok, now effect me sermon!” They think it is as involuntary as digesting food, but the truth is they don’t really care for the food. They look at it at a distance and think it’s nice and might even admit that it’s good for them, but when it comes down to it, they don’t feast on it. They sleep during the message, they listen to the sermon in one ear and it leaves out the other, and when you talk to them they explain how they don’t get anything from church, they say they aren’t being feed any food. The problem is that they aren’t taking the time to examine the food that is presented in-front of them, they don’t take the time to pick the food up and put it in theirs mouths to chew on, they don’t apply it to their lives to see what they may do with that new information. They
Verses: Exodus 33:18-20
Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.”
I must admit, I don’t fully understand this excerpt yet.
When these verses were brought to my attention this week, I was a little perplexed at a section, specifically the second part of 19 (which I will refer to as 19b), “‘And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.’” At first it doesn’t sound to weird, you’ve probably seen it used in the context of Romans 9:15, but as I looked at the whole excerpt again, I was confused.
We start out with the Lord staying away from the people of Israel because of their disobedience, so then Moses had to take the tent away from the camp so that he would be able to commune with God and intercede for the people. God then grants Moses request to guide him, and now it gets interesting. Moses then requests to see God’s glory. God answer’s, “‘I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name “The LORD.”‘” That is the understandable part, then He goes on to say “‘And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,’ he said, ‘you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.’” Now if I was God (gratefully not!) I would have not said 19b, and leave it as: “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’ But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 19b just seems out of place and doesn’t fit with the flow of what He is saying, but as I meditated I find it fits perfectly.
If we take 19b by itself and examine it we could sum it up in two words, God’s sovereignty, but why assert His sovereignty in the middle of answering Moses request to see His glory? That is exactly why, He wanted to affirm and confirm His sovereignty over everything, to Moses and to us. God wanted to tell Moses before He showed His glory to Him was that He is the one who is doing this. Who’s presence will go with His people, God’s, why? Because Moses asked nicely, NO, because God will be gracious to whom He will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom He will show mercy! Is Moses deserving of seeing God’s glory, NO, but God will be gracious to whom He will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom He will show mercy! And as the LORD proclaimed his name in 34:6-7, I can only speculate that He proclaimed His name in a similar way here.
“The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.”
In our giving heed to God’s power there rises up in us a realization that God created the universe for this: So that we could have the supremely satisfying experience of not being God, but admiring the Godness of God—the strength of God. There settles over us a peaceful realization that admiration of the infinite is the final end of all things.
Scripture is wonderfully balanced in all its parts; let our study of it be the same that we may be well-balanced men. The study of prophetic word must not supersede that of the Proverbs, nor must we search the latter merely to discover the traces of the ‘higher doctrines’ which may be found in that book. We must not overlook the homely, and the little, and the common; we must stoop to the petty moralities, and courtesies, and honesties of tamer life, not neglecting those parts of Scripture which treat of these as vapid or obsolete, but bringing them to bear upon each step of our daily walk, and delighting in them as the wisdom of the God only wise. There is a vitiated literary taste, arising not so much from reading what is bad, as from exclusive study of one class of books, and these perhaps the more exciting. There is also a vitiated spiritual taste, not necessarily growing out of error or the study of unsound books, but arising from favouritism in the reading of Scripture, which shows itself both in the preference of certain parts to others, and in the propensity to search these others only for their references to certain favourite truths. Let the whole soul be fed by the study of the whole Bible, that so there may be no irregularity not inequality in the growth of its parts and powers. Let us beware of ‘itching’ ears and eyes. True, we must not be ‘babes,’ unable to relish strong meat, and ‘unskilful in the word of righteousness’ (Heb. 5:13). But we need to beware of the soarings of an ill-balanced theology and an ill-kint creed. True Christianity is healthy and robust, not soft, nor sickly, not sentimental; yet, on the other hand, not hard, nor lean, nor ill-favoured, nor ungenial.
Random:
If I have it my way and I have at least $7,000 to spend on a photographer I want Cliff Mautner to photograph my wedding, and no I didn’t find him because I was searching for wedding photographers I found him through photo articles. Favorite picture in his portfolio. I think I have to add wedding photographer now to my dream jobs.
Videos:
The Bravery – Believe
I love macs!
Verses: 1 Peter 3:13-17
Nowwho is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.
The great central heartbeat of Christianity is that Jesus Christ, the Savior and Lord, is exalted and hallowed and sanctified by the happy hope that his people put in him. And he shines all the brighter when our hope is fearless and well-defended and meek and zealous for good deeds.
Randoms: If you ever wanted to know all 613 commandments of the Old Testament
Thoughts: So random eving I go up to this guy sitting on a bench reading some book and I ask him if he’s busy, he answers with a why, and I ask if he’s heard about the gospel. He’s taken back a little and says, ” The gospel!?” in a sour tone, I said, “Yeah.” Then unexpectedly he gives me a “ha, I’m not religious!” and at the same moment gives me the hand motion that clearly says, “Move along buddy, you’re not wanted here.” That same motion you see when an angry master wants his servant to leave him alone. I was taken back. Out of all the times I’ve done this, I’ve never had this reaction towards me, I’ve had a lot of no’s but never something so adverse to the gospel. While walking away, I really wanted to feel like punching him, but I could not but feel sad for him. That guy will go in life pushing and pushing aside the gospel not wanting to hear it, not wanting to think about it and have nothing to do with it. He’s going to wave that hand every instant the cross is presented and that will harden his heart even more every time.
Recently I watched a debate with James White and a Muslim, and I saw the same exact motion, no, he didn’t wave off James White, but he did wave him off with his attacks. It’s these moments that I rejoice in my salvation.
Videos: Ben Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie) – Carolina
Verses: 1 John 4:20 If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
What does it mean when it says what is seen and what is not seen? One is in-front of you eyes, the other cannot be seen by the eyes those making it harder to perceive. Of course God is not seen and a brother or sister is seen but what does that have to do with love? Love is only some kind of feeling, right? Wrong, we must look at the previous verses to see that love is so much more than an expression. Verses 7 and 8 gives us the necessary foundation we need to validate the claim that the subject is a liar.
Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. (1 John 4:7-8)
In verse 9 God “manifests” that love through sending His Son. Then, I think most importantly to understanding this passage is verse 10:
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (1 John 4:10)
We are told the source of that love. The mainspring that love is manifested through and from and in, it is God! And it is brought about from the cross.
So to answer the question in the beginning, how can they relate the sense of sight to love, it comes down to faith. John eloquently shows us faith is from this love and if one does not have this faith, he has not loved, and thus cannot say “I love God,” and hate his brother, for he is a liar and sadly perishing, for he presents to others what he thinks is genuine faith genuine love, but is really only clearly saying he has no God.
He who comes as partly righteous is sent empty away. He who comes acknowledging unrighteousness, but at the same time trying to neutralize it or to expiate it by feelings, and prayers, and tears, is equally rejected. But he who comes as an unrighteous man to a righteous yet gracious God, finds not only ready access, but plenteous blessing. The righteous God receives unrighteous man, if man present himself in his own true character as a sinner, and does not mock God by pretending to be something less or better than this.
Randoms:
Looking at all the stuff I needed to bring back to Irvine, I get my quote of the day:
(just for your information, ‘mmm’ in Cantonese means ‘not,’ or ‘is not’)
Me: Dude, I don’t have enough room to fit all this in.
Mom runs upstairs to get be a bigger bag.
She brings back this gigantic woman’s suitcase down.
Me: Dude, that’s humongous!
Mom: Noo, mmm mong!
Videos:
Sweet interview with Ben Stein by R.C. Sproul!
Verses: Romans 2:6-8
He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury.
God has not rescinded His law which says “Do this and Live”. We herald the law and the gospel to people (1) to let them know that they must obey the commandments of God perfectly to live. This is God’s requirement for mankind. But (2) when persons recognize they are morally impotent to obey, then the law serves its convicting purpose. They then, seeing their own inability and spiritual bankruptcy, can only flee to Christ for salvation.
Gospel and Ministry (New Attitude) “How do I lead people into a robust understanding of gospel-centered living? How can I make sure they don’t dismiss the gospel off to the side of life for a litany of good things?”
Resources: Remember Sinim Books, if you thought that was sweet I found this site recently, China Christian Books, it has some of the same resources, different books, and other reformed literature, but what the kicker is, is that it is all online to read for free. So if cost was an issue all you need is the internet (or a friend with the internet and printer…)
Verses: Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
What then is the point saying that the “word of God” pierces to the “division of soul and spirit”? The point is that it’s the word of God that reveals to us our true selves. Are we spiritual or are we natural? Are we born of God and spiritually alive, or are we deceiving ourselves and spiritually dead? Are the “thoughts and intentions of our heart” spiritual thoughts and intentions or only natural thoughts and intentions. Only the “word of God” can “judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart” as Hebrews 4:12 says.
I think Dr. Lawless’ message should be heard by all aspiring ministers. There are too many students at Southern and other seminaries who are attending not because they need to learn anything–they already know everything. Rather, they are attending simply to gain credibility. In essence their education has become the choice idol they would rather worship.
Jesus Christ: The Interpretive Key to the Scripture (Monergism), this article tackles some key concepts of Christianity that are taken to a level that it shouldn’t just because Christ was not the focus, for example the first point of how there is a false assertion that one can lose his salvation, but this is only “because the focus becomes your own moral ability rather than Christ.”
Love and Marriage: Luther Style (Boundless) “In a handwritten invitation to the public ceremony for their wedding, [Martin] Luther wrote to a friend, ‘I feel neither passionate love nor burning for my spouse, but I cherish her.’”
The Vow (Washington Post) Must be the sweetest story I’ve read in a long time, if not ever; I hope I will some day be as loving to my wife as he is
News:
If you have not heard, the New York Philharmonic (NY Times) has recently paid a visit to North Korea getting a chance to perform in front of the North Koreans (Times). With the orchestra came of course journalists, here are some photos not usually seen by Americans of North Korea (NY Times). (Links are to photoblogs and they are all different sets)
That Martin Luther? He wasn’t so bad, says Pope (Times UK), “the Pope will argue that Luther, who was excommunicated and condemned for heresy, was not a heretic.” If you read the article it seems to me that no one really has a solid stand on anything happening anymore, the article is confusing in the way it will say something like this, “the move would help to promote ecumenical dialogue between Catholics and Protestants,” and then say it is to “counteract the impact of July’s papal statement describing the Protestant and Orthodox faiths as defective and ‘not proper Churches.’” I think that sums up ecumenicalism.
Here is a quote of a quote from Charles Swindoll’s book, Improve Your Serve, that I found most insightful and surprising that it came from a child’s book. The chapter is on how we are called to be servants and how it is what we were made to be, but so often we don’t think that way. The child’s book is about a stuff rabbit that wants so hard to be “real,” but then encounters a worn-out stuffed horse and begins to have a dialogue (If you’re wondering what child’s book it is, it is The Velveteen Rabbit.
The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for the had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.
“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”
“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become real.”
“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”
“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “orbit by bit?”
“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and yours eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all because once you are real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”
Thoughts:
Usually on the bus ride from campus back to my apartment I tend to just stare at things or play some solitaire on my phone, it’s only a 10 minute ride so there isn’t much time to do anything. Well last Tuesday I look up just to look at what kind of ads there were this time around, and I look at one that seems to be a timeline, it had a the point ‘born’ at one end and ‘die’ at the other, and in between were just the “normal” phases of life, nothing fancy, it had ‘graduate,’ ‘get a job,’ and ‘retire.’ What I found interesting was that there was a hand (computer) drawn dot between ‘graduate’ and ‘get a job,’ it read ‘change the world.’ One would think, “O, how clever, maybe I should think about doing something after graduation?” I took a step back and I thought, “I can only change the world after I graduate and before I get a job?” Of course that is absurd thinking and not what the ad wanted to convey, but how many times do we think that way. We get stirred up by some sermon, we get pumped up about some future job, we hear stories about guys who are ‘living the life,’ and we think to ourselves, “Man, I wish man, too bad schools in the way, too bad I have this job.” How many times are we jealous of other’s circumstances, how many times do we just look at opportunities in the future and dwell on them and not see the plain opportunities now. For example, I would love to go on missions right now, but what is holding me back, school. See, already I put a condition in-front of myself, I was taking school as only the pathway between the parking lot and track. To me school wasn’t the main event, it was just stalling the main event to me, but I really don’t think we should think that way. I think each aspect of our lives we should take as a main event.
“Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.” (Colossians 3:23-24) Who is your master?
Videos:
(For the Bereans you can see Diane, Mimi and Brian at the 1:03 mark)
Verses: 1 Kings 8:27
“But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you; how much less this house that I have built!
God’s immensity, His eternality has always been some abstract concept that I never really grasped, and I know I will never fully grasp it in my lifetime, and knowing that I never really gave it much attention. But recently during my prayers questions like ‘Why did he make us?’ Why did he make us so small?’ started coming up. ‘If He’s so big, why make something so small to worship Him?’ Growing up in the church I heard all the illustrations comparing God’s immensity to us, like the universe compared to earth, a human to an ant, and so on, and that has always been my picture of God and us, but I think that has brought about a misguided illustration. All these analogies have something in common, the problem arises when all of them seem to place a finite quality unto an infinite God, they equate a Human which dies, which grows old, which is a certain height, which is a certain weight to God, who never will die, does not need to grow, and has no certain measurement. What I have recently realized is that we will be small and always small compared to God. You might say to yourself that I have gone in a complete circle and have not accomplished anything, but what I am trying to say is that if God created us as giants the size of planets, we still would be miniscule compared to God, if each of us were the size of solar system, we would be still be microscopic compared to God, what I am trying to say is we must realize how small we are and will always be, not because God purposely made us small, but because when you compare anything to an infinite, eternal God what you compare with Him will be essentially nothing. We cannot think or even compare Him in terms of physical capacities and earthly dimensions but I think we should grasp the idea that we will never know the immensity of Him and dwell not on analogies that show how small we are compared to Him, but we should show just how great, how everlasting He is and from that we begin to see how we are nothing. So the question I need to ask is not ‘Why did He make something so small worship Him?’ but ‘How glorious is our God?’
Audios: Something that has been in browser sitting next to future blog articles recently is the addition of Pandora, it’s a pretty sweet music player that is essentially a really good radio. All you do is type in the artist/song name that you really like and it gives you a station that has that artist/song and also plays similar artists/songs, it does a real good job and matching styles. Also it is a clean format that feels lightweight, so all it is is the station player so there is no fluff. If you make a profile, then you can save the stations you have loaded before.
Articles: Five Rules for Choosing a Commentary (The Road To Emmaus), how many times have you looked for a commentary and been daunted with the task to pick one out of hundreds of different titles, or you don’t want to only have the commentary a friend suggested but don’t know which other commentary to get, well Chad has the answer (sounds like an infomercial), well more like guidelines In addition here are Ligonier and Desiring God’s recommendations of commentaries, I would suggest going to Ligonier’s first because it is also helpful in explaining the different commentary series that are out (e.g. EBC, NICOT, etc…). Also here are Calvin Theological Seminary’s recommendations
The reason Paul and Silas could worship in the blockhouse was because they didn’t derive their joy from their circumstances, but took joy in the God of their salvation.
Randoms: Mark Altrogge shares a very touching story (Blazing Center) about him and a friend he lost touch with, if I were a girl, right now I’d be crying…
Verses: Psalm 27:14 Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the LORD!
I was pointed to this passage during the Sunday message while going through Psalm 27. It was a little surprising that this statement was made after the whole chapter. In the beginning, David is presenting his present position as confidence in the Lord while going through pain and opposition of all sorts. The psalm is filled with the praise of God, “The LORD is the stronghold of my life,” “my head shall be lifted up above my enemies,” and petitions for God’s protection, “Give me not up to the will of my adversaries,” “Teach me your way, O LORD.” So all in all it goes along with our logic to how someone with David’s heart would trust in the Lord and ask for guidance in times of trouble, but what is unusual is that in verse 14 he says “Wait for the LORD.” What does trust entail, according to David it requires us to wait, though we be in anguish, in pain, we are to “wait for the LORD,” but the waiting the world thinks is one of sitting on the couch watching TV until someone tells them that God is ready. What Psalm 27 shows us is that the waiting is focused on the stronghold of the Lord, on prayer towards the sovereignty of God, and trust in the Lord’s promises which strengthens us.
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Every Monday I will update you on happenings in my life, interesting articles I have read, and whatever my crazy mind can think of, and hopefully it will help in yours and mine worship of God.
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Posted by ChristianSmoker 
