The Lost Virtue of Modesty by Kevin DeYoung

I don’t know if modest is hottest, but I do know that modesty is biblical.

It is one of the marks of the confusion of our age that so many teenagers and young adults are more ashamed to dress with modest reserve than to very nearly undress entirely. Even after we give full throat to the necessary caveats–being pretty (or handsome) is not a sin, working to improve your appearance does not have to be vanity, the line between modest and immodest is not always black and white–we are still left with the undeniable biblical fact that God considers modesty a virtue and its opposite a vice.

Here are five biblical reasons Christians should embrace modesty as a God-designed, God-desired good thing.

1. Modesty protects what is intimate. There is a certain strand of feminism which says women should be proud of their sexual prowess and that any insistence they cover up what they don’t feel like covering up only serves to reinforce patriarchal notions that men have the right to determine what women do with their bodies. But the Bible’s call to modesty is not based on the supposed naughtiness of the female form. God’s good command to cover up is not meant to punish, but to protect. As Wendy Shalit writes, “The pressure on girls today to take sexy selfies comes out of a culture that routinely equates modesty with shame, instead of recognizing it for what it really is: an impulse that protects what is precious and intimate.” The common refrain of the bride–“do not stir up or awaken love until it pleases” (Song of Solomon 2:7)–is a call from one woman to a group of single women to save sexual arousal and sexual activity for its proper time, with the proper person, in the proper place.

2. Modesty accepts that our bodies also live in community. What does that mean? It means that while it sounds nice to say, “It’s my body. If I want to let it all hang out, that’s my business.” This is to forget that our bodies exists in a wider network of relationships, just like our speech does, and our actions, our will, and our desires. How we dress is not determined by how others wished we would dress. And yet, it would be sub-Christian to act as if the spiritual state of those around us was inconsequential.

Before going any further, let me state this as clearly as possible: men are responsible for their adultery, for their fornication, for their pornographic viewing, for their lust, and for their (heaven forbid) sexual assault, regardless of how a woman dresses. The Bible does not enjoin modesty on either sex because the opposite sex is simply incapable of keeping its pants on and its thoughts in check. Listen men: if Potiphar’s wife were to barge in and dance a bare-bellied jig on your kitchen table and strip you down to your birthday suit, you would still not be excused in committing adultery with her. The absence of modesty in one party does not justify the absence of restraint in another.

Having said all that, does not the law of love suggest that we should want to avoid enticing others into sin? The phrase “with lustful intent” in Matthew 5:28 is translated by some scholars (D.A. Carson among them): “so as to get her lust.” The meaning, then, instead of being about lust in the man’s heart, would be about the man wanting to get a woman to lust after him. Whether one accepts this minority position or not, it’s still a fair application to think that Jesus’ statement forbids us from having a heart attitude that lusts and a heart attitude that wants to be lusted after. Some people want to see pornography and others want to be pornography. Maybe not in a literal sense, but there are men and women who crave the power, the attention, and the status that comes from being noticed and sought after. This entices others to sin and is in itself sinful.

3. Modesty operates with the Bible’s negative assessment of public nudity post-Fall. From Adam and Eve scrambling for fig leaves (Gen. 3:10), to the dishonorable nakedness of Noah (Gen. 9:21), to the embarrassingly exposed buttocks of David’s men (2 Sam. 10:4), the Bible knows we inhabit a fallen world in which certain aspects of our bodily selves are meant to be hidden. Indeed, this is precisely what Paul presumes when he speaks of “our unpresentable parts” which must be “treated with greater modesty” (1 Cor. 12:23). There’s a reason momma called them private parts.

 4. Modesty embraces the strong biblical admonition to refrain from sensuality. Sensuality (Gk:aselgeia) is a distinguishing characteristic of the flesh and one of the marks of the pagan world (Gal. 5:19; Rom. 13:13; 2 Cor. 12:21; 2 Pet. 2:2, 18). Does the word give us exact instructions on where good taste trips over into sensuality–how long skirts can be, what sort of bathing suit to wear, or whether beefy men need to run around shirtless when its 60 degrees in Michigan? No. But surely we can agree that it is not uncommon for men and women to dress in ways which only add to the look and feel of our culture’s ubiquitous sensuality. If the word aselgeia suggests sexual excess (TDNT), we would do well to consider whether the desire behind our deportment is to starve this sensual beast or to sate it.

5. Modesty demonstrates to others that we have more important things to offer than good looks and sex appeal. The point of 1 Timothy 2:9 and 1 Peter 3:3-4 is not an absolute prohibition against trying to look nice. The prohibition is against trying so very hard to look good in all the ways that are so relatively unimportant. The question asked of women in these verses–and it certainly applies to men as well–is this: will you grab people’s attention with hair and jewelry and sexy clothes or will your presence in the room be unmistakable because of your Christlike character? Immodest dress tells the world, “I’m not sure I have anything more to offer than this. What you see is really all you get.”

Let me state the obvious: the Bible has no pictures. There is no inspired how-to manual for getting dressed in the morning. There are matters of culture, conscience, and context which surely come into place. I have no checklist to check off before you head out the door.

But if the Bible is to be believed, this whole business of modesty is not irrelevant to Christian discipleship. 

Our bodies have been bought with a price. Therefore glorify God with your body (1 Cor. 6:20). Which means we don’t show everyone everything we might think is worth seeing. And it means we won’t be embarrassed to keep most private those things that are most precious. Shame is a powerful category, in the Bible and in our own day.  The key is knowing what things we should actually be ashamed of.

Community 101 - Part Two - Shalom by James Emery White

Vol. 10, No. 82

Community 101 (Part Two):
Shalom 

Shalom is commonly understood to mean “peace” or “health” or “prosperity.” It carries within it the idea of “completeness.” Neil Plantinga writes that the word “shalom” is “the webbing together of God, humans, and all creation in justice, fulfillment, and delight.” Shalom is the vision of community; it is what community strives to be.

It reminds me of something I once read about Mother Teresa. When asked how she could give so much of herself to the poor, she would always say that when she looked at them, she saw Jesus in a distressing disguise. That is the heart of authentic community; being Jesus to others, and seeing Jesus in others. If we’re married, we are interacting with our spouse as if unto Him. If we’re a child, we’re obeying as if unto Him. If an employee, we’re working as if we’re working for Him. And the reverse is true: we’re parenting as if we’re parenting for Him; we’re leading others as if we’re leading for Him.

It’s a radical idea.

Even more radical is what such shalom is built on. Namely, grace. Grace, at its heart, is getting what you don't deserve, and not getting what you do. Grace is the essence of any successful relationship. Grace toward other people’s differences. Grace applied toward other people’s weaknesses. Grace applied toward other people’s sins.

And that is quite the challenge. Not that we don’t like grace – we do. Not that we don’t want to experience grace – we do. It’s just that we are better at receiving it than giving it. But it is precisely the giving of grace that allows us to work through the relational stages that afford community.

You know the stages. You’ve lived with them your whole life.

The first stage is usually some kind of general attraction. Not many people instantly hit you wrong. Usually there is something there that’s likable, or at least you’re openly neutral. So stage one is extending a general welcome to the relationship.

But you know what that stage is almost always followed by?

Disappointment.

You start off by viewing someone from a relational distance. All you have are short, quick, interactions that haven’t been subjected to the test of time. But once you get to know someone beyond that level, you start to see their dark side. And they will have a dark side. They will have weaknesses. Differences. Sins. Now here’s our tendency – to let the second stage of disappointment be the defining stage in your relationship with someone. Sometimes it’s called for. When you find out that someone’s dark side is too strong to deal with, or you realize you’ve got an unsafe person on your hands; or that what you thought was chemistry turns out to be an allergy, then it’s okay to let this stage be a wake-up call.

But a lot of the time, the differences that we often let end the relationship are trivial and we just don’t extend the grace or maturity to let the relationship go through the necessary – yes, inevitable – disappointment stage. But if you don’t work through it, you will never move on to the third stage, which is where real community begins to take place.

And that third stage is acceptance.

This is when you work through the disappointments, you do the labor of extending grace and understanding, and from that allow yourself to come to a healthy understanding of someone's strengths and weaknesses. Then you accept them on those terms. The Bible specifically challenges us on this. In the book of Romans, it says: “Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you” (Romans 15:7, NIV). If you're not able to do this, you will never have meaningful relationships in your life.

Ever.

If you are unable or unwilling to move into the stage of acceptance, then you will be a very lonely and isolated person. No human on earth is free of things that might disappoint you. If you don’t believe this, you’ll just go from person to person, relationship to relationship, and never have any of them move into real community. But if you’ll journey through the second stage and into the third, then you can move into the fourth stage – which is appreciation. This is getting back to what you found attractive about the person to begin with, and enjoying all that is good and wonderful about them. It’s almost like a return to the first stage, but with wisdom and insight. If the first stage is like a first date, the fourth stage is like seeing a couple having their fiftieth wedding anniversary, and you see the look in their eyes toward each other – the deep, mature sense of love they share.

And it’s a beautiful thing.

Is there anything more? Yes. Intimacy; a fifth stage where you can love and be loved, serve and be served, celebrate and be celebrated, and know and be known.

So do you see how the work of commitment is key?

Too many of us have a brightly illuminated “EXIT” sign over every relationship in our life – where we work, where we live, where we go to church, even in our marriages. As long as we hang that sign over the door of our community life, we won’t do the work of commitment that is needed to experience the community we long for. The secret of the best friendships, the best marriages, the best job situations and churches and neighborhoods, is that they’ve taken down the exit signs. And when there is no exit sign, you have one and only one choice: do whatever it takes for the relationship to flourish.

I recently read of a family who brought home a 12-year-old boy named Roger whose parents had died of a drug overdose. There was no one to care for him, so the parents of this family decided they would raise him as if he were one of their own sons. At first, it was difficult for Roger. This was the first environment he had ever lived in that was free of heroin-addicted adults. As a result of the culture-shock, every day – and several times during the day – either Roger’s new mom or dad would say, “No, Roger, that’s not how we behave in this family.” Or “No, Roger, you don’t have to scream or fight or hurt other people to get what you want.” Or “Roger, we expect you to show respect in this family.”

In time, Roger began to change.

For so many of us, community – particularly the new community that the Bible calls us to – demands new behavior. The death of old practices, and the birth of new ones. We’re like the boy, adopted into a new family, needing to re-learn how to interact with people.

But here’s the good news: when we hear the Holy Spirit say to us, “No, that’s not how we act in this family,” we can say, “You’re right. It’s not.”

And change. And begin to have the relationships with others we want as part of the new community God desires for us to experience.

James Emery White

Sources

James Emery White, A Traveler’s Guide to the Kingdom (InterVarsity).

Neil Plantinga, Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be: A Breviary of Sin.

“How God’s Children Change,” PreachingToday.com, cited from Craig Barnes from sermon, “The Blessed Trinity,” May 30, 1999.

  

Editor’s Note

James Emery White is the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, NC, and the ranked adjunctive professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, which he also served as their fourth president.  His latest book, The Rise of the Nones: Understanding and Reaching the Religiously Unaffiliated, is now available on Amazon.  To enjoy a free subscription to the Church and Culture blog, visit www.churchandculture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world.  Follow Dr. White on twitter @JamesEmeryWhite.

Community 101 by James Emery White

Vol. 10, No. 81

Community 101:
Finding vs. Building 

One of the great myths of relational life is that community is something found. In this fairy tale, community is simply out there – somewhere – waiting to be discovered like Prince Charming finding Cinderella. All you have to do is find the right person, join the right group, get the right job, or become involved with the right church. It’s kind of an “Over the Rainbow” thing; it’s not here, so it must be “over” there.

Which is why so many people – and you’ve seen them, and probably flirted with it yourself – go from relationship to relationship, city to city, job to job, church to church, looking for the community that they think is just around the corner if they could only find the right people and the right place. The idea is that real community exists, somewhere, and we simply must tap into it. It’s not something you have to work at; in fact, if you have to work at it, then you know it’s not real community.

This mindset runs rampant in our day. If you have to work at community in a marriage, you must not be right for each other. If you have to work on community where you are employed, you’ve got a bad boss, or bad co-workers, or a bad structure. If you have to work at community in a neighborhood, you just picked the wrong subdivision. If you have to work on things with people in a church, well, there are obviously just problems with the church, or its leadership, or...yep, its “community.”

I cannot stress enough how soundly unrealistic, much less unbiblical, this is. Community is not something you find, it is something you build. What you long for isn’t about finding the right mate, the right job, the right neighborhood, the right church – it’s about making your marriage, making your workplace, making your neighborhood and making your church the community God intended. Community is not something discovered, it is something forged. I don’t mean to suggest any and all relationships are designed for, say, marriage. Or that there aren’t dysfunctional communities you should flee from. My point is that all relationships of worth are products of labor.

This is why the Bible talks about people needing to form and make communities, not just come together as a community, or to “experience” community.

It’s why principles are given – at length – for how to work through conflict.

It’s why communication skills are detailed, and issues such as anger are meant to be dealt with.

It’s why the dynamics of successfully living with someone in the context of a marriage, or family, is explored in depth. As the author of Hebrews put it so plainly, "So don’t sit around on your hands!  No more dragging your feet...run for it!  Work at getting along with each other...." (Hebrews 12:12-14, Msg)

But that raises a problem. You probably don’t know how to work in such a way as to create community.

Don’t worry; you’re not alone.

Benedictine oblate Kathleen Norris once wrote how several monks told her that one of the biggest problems monasteries face is people who come to them “having no sense of what it means to live communally.” They have been “schooled in individualism,” and often had families that were so disjointed that even sitting down and having a meal together was a rarity. As a result, “they find it extremely difficult to adjust” to life in community.

Monks called into monastic life feeling unprepared for relational life?

Welcome to our world. We spend years in school to prepare for a career without having to take a single class on getting along with a co-worker.

We spend months planning a wedding, meeting with caterers and photographers and wedding directors, and never once have to check off exploring what’s involved in communicating with our spouse.

We go through pre-natal classes, decorate the nursery, and set up the college fund, and never even think about how we’re going to interact with them as a teenager.

Add in our flaming depravity, and things really get sketchy. Running alongside our longing for community is a deep current of anti-community behavior. We are filled with anger and envy, pride and competition. We do not naturally extend grace or forgiveness. We seldom take the high road, and we usually assume the worst of others.

What is missing from most of our visions is a picture of community. It’s like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle without the picture on the box. One of our family traditions is putting together a jigsaw puzzle on New Year’s Eve. We lay out the pieces on our kitchen table and invite anyone and everyone to put it together. Of course, the picture on the box is always front and center. Why? Without a sense of what we’re trying to produce, we’re just putting pieces together in random, haphazard ways, hoping something good comes out in the end.

So what is the picture on the community box? Between 1994 and 1996, South Africa’s new democracy drew up a constitution marked by seven values that are commemorated by seven pillars standing in the courtyard entrance of the museum: democracy, equality, reconciliation, diversity, responsibility, respect and freedom.

The Bible calls it “shalom.”

More on that in the next post.

James Emery White

Sources

James Emery White, A Traveler’s Guide to the Kingdom (InterVarsity).

Kathleen Norris, The Cloister Walk.

  

Editor’s Note

James Emery White is the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, NC, and the ranked adjunctive professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, which he also served as their fourth president.  His latest book, The Rise of the Nones: Understanding and Reaching the Religiously Unaffiliated, is now available on Amazon.  To enjoy a free subscription to the Church and Culture blog, visit www.churchandculture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world.  Follow Dr. White on twitter @JamesEmeryWhite.

Why is Change so Hard? by Johnny Hunt

Why is change so difficult? Why a whole book on change? “The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; who can know it?” Jeremiah 17:9 (NKJV) Note the qualifier: desperately wicked. Not just wicked; desperately wicked. Gosdeck commented, “The heart, the inner self, is the problem. It deceives even itself. It is knotted and twisted like a hopelessly tangled knot. Every attempt to untie it frustrates.” “I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind.” Jeremiah 17:10 (NKJV) If the mind is not thinking right, it will mislead the heart, and the heart will produce idols. We desperately need the Lord to test our mind. This was David’s prayer after his sin with Bathsheba, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties.” Psalm 139:23 (NKJV) Our heart is desperately wicked. How can we cooperate with God in changing it? “Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You.” Psalm 119:11 (NKJV) This week I hid this verse in my heart: We give thanks to You, O God, we give thanks! For Your wondrous works declare that Your name is near. Psalm 75:1 (NKJV) I am sixty-one years old. I have been studying the Bible my whole life. I still memorize Scripture. Nothing will transform the mind like committing God’s word to memory and meditating on it. If you want to be changed, there is no surer path than memorizing and meditating on God’s Word. Memorizing and meditating on God’s Word is the best way to combat the conforming influence of the world. Memorizing and meditating on the Word of God will transform me on the inside so I can be strong from all the attacks from the outside. The world, the flesh, and the Devil will seek to squeeze me into its mold. I memorize and meditate on God’s Word to combat that influence. “Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly. “ Colossians 3:16a (NKJV) “Dwell” suggests that God’s Word would be at home in our hearts. When I am in my own home, I can go into any room I want. If I am a guest in your home, I can only go where I am invited. Paul said to let God’s Word be at home in your heart. This means it has freedom to go into every corner of our lives. If God’s Word makes you uncomfortable, it may be because you have not let God’s Word dwell in you richly. What did Jesus do when He was tempted? Three times He was tempted in the desert and three times He said, “It is written…” When the world tries to squeeze you into its mold, you will do well to say, “It is written…” God renews our mind through the wealth of His Word and the weight of His glory. The word for “glory” actually means, “fat” or “heavy.” In an ancient world where food was scarce, fat people were considered glorious. Common people could barely get enough food and were thin; kings were fat—and glorious. Do you remember the old song, “He ain’t heavy; he’s my brother”? Jesus is heavy and my brother. The Bible says we are joint heirs with Christ. (Romans 8:17) That means Jesus is my Brother. Jesus, my Brother is glorious. Jesus is heavy and my Brother. Do you want to know why the world has such a pull for some of us? Jesus ain’t heavy. We don’t see Jesus as the heavy, significant, glorious person that He is. And when He ain’t heavy in our eyes, the world looks heavy to us. Do you want to know why you struggle to be as generous as you would like to be? Jesus ain’t heavy. Do you know why you can’t get yourself motivated to serve? Jesus ain’t heavy. Do you know why you spend countless hours looking at naked bodies on a computer screen? Jesus ain’t heavy. When we see—really see—the weight of this glory, the transformation begins. I love the last two lines of this hymn: Turn your eyes upon Jesus, Look full in His wonderful face, And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, In the light of His glory and grace. In the light of His glory and grace, all the things of this world that would squeeze us into its mold will grow strangely dim. Let the transformation begin. David M. Gosdeck, Jeremiah, Lamentations, The People’s Bible (Milwaukee, WI: Northwestern Pub. House, 1994), 113.

Thinking by Keith A. Craft

"When you elevate your thinking, you elevate your life." -Keith A. Craft   Thought Behind the Quote: In Isaiah 55, God says, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor your ways My ways, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." God is not bragging about the fact that He thinks better than us, but He gives us an invitation to think like Him. Our thoughts determine our emotions. Our emotions determine our actions. Our actions determine our habits. Our habits determine our character. Our character determines our destiny. If you will elevate your thinking, you will empower your destiny. In what areas do you need to elevate your thinking so you can elevate your life?

Why Keep Sexual Boundaries? By: Ed Welch

(This article by Welch was first published Sept. 26, 2014)

This scares me.

Recently, I was talking with an older, single man who keeps drifting back into sexual sin. It’s as if the tide of sexuality is going to win in the end—like he is destined to postpone sexual sin—but not to beat it. That way of thinking is scary enough, but there is more.

While we talked, I quietly reflected on how my battle with sexual sin is easier because I am married. I did not mean it is easier because I have opportunities to have a sexual relationship with my wife, though, of course, I do. Rather, I meant that sexual drifting for me would hurt an actual person, whereas for him, sexual drifting would not directly hurt another human being because he is single.

My reasoning makes some sense, but it is worse than it appears. Here is what I was really saying: I live within sexual boundaries for the sake of my wife. And though almost any reason for sexual boundaries is a good one, mine is not a Christian reason in that it has nothing to do with Jesus. That scares me. Jeopardizing my relationship with my wife is more motivating to me than jeopardizing my relationship with the Lord. My power to resist temptation comes from my relationship with her, not from Jesus. I love my wife—or my relationship with her—more than I love him. The truth is that any motive that replaces Christ is less than Christian.

Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you, to love the LORD your God, and to walk in all his ways and to keep his commandments and to cling to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. (Josh. 22:5)

For the love of Christ controls us. (2 Cor. 5:14)

So I am thankful that the Spirit reveals matters of the heart that scare me, and I set off again to know Christ and aim for nothing short of a full-bodied, full-hearted love that surpasses all others. 

Sunday Sermon, October 19, 2014 "The Value Of One"

I preached today "The Value of One" from Matthew 9:36 and Luke 15.  Here is the audio of that sermon:

Surrendering to Sheer Grace by Martin Luther

“Even though we are now in faith, the heart is always ready to boast itself before God and say, ‘After all, I have… lived so well and done so much that surely He will take this into account.’ We… want to haggle with God to make Him regard our life, but it cannot be done. With men you may boast, ‘I have done the best I could… If anything is lacking, I will still try to make recompense,’ but when you come before God, leave all that boasting at home. Remember to appeal from justice into grace. But let anybody try this and he will see and experience how exceedingly hard and bitter a thing it is… I myself have been preaching and cultivating [grace] through reading and writing for almost twenty years and still feel the old clinging dirt of wanting to deal so with God that I may contribute something so that He will give me His grace in exchange for my holiness. I just cannot get it into my head that I should surrender myself completely to sheer grace, yet I know that this is what I should and must do.”

- Martin Luther

Disciples Hunger for Jesus by John Thweatt

I was in a small group the other day when someone asked if one could be a Christian and not hunger for God. That’s a good question isn’t it? I have another one, an you be a Christian and not be a disciple of Jesus? In the Western World many would immediately answer yes, but if you come to the Word of God you would have to say no.

“Christian” is the main term for followers of Jesus, but it is only used three times in the New Testament. Three times, but the word “Disciple” is occurs over 260 times in the New Testament. Dallas Willard said, “The New Testament is a book about disciples, by disciples, and for disciples of Jesus Christ.”

To be a disciple is a way of life. If you are a disciple you are a follower and following is not an option. You either follow and are a disciple or you do not follow and you are not a disciple. Think about what Jesus called us to do in the Great Commission—He said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

Jesus didn’t call us to go and get converts—Jesus called us to go and make disciples. Jesus told us to make disciples by baptizing them and by teaching them to obey Him. In other words, He taught us to make disciples by teaching them to follow Him. That means as we follow Jesus we are to teach others to follow Jesus.

The Twelve left everything to follow Jesus—they hungered more for Him then they did for earthly things. With the exception of John, everyone one of the Twelve died a martyrs death (Judas is excluded from this, but it is true of his replacement)—they hungered more for Jesus than life itself.

Bonhoeffer saw the danger of “un-discipled disciples” in 1937 and this led him to write The Cost of Discipleship. He attacked what he called ‘Cheap Grace’ and masterfully said, “When Christ calls a man He bids him come and die.” That’s discipleship and that is what it means to be a Christian.

Can you be a disciple and not hunger for Jesus? No…you may have periods of carnality in your life, but you can’t have an entire life of carnality and call yourself a disciple of Jesus. Let me ask you—do you hunger for Him? That hunger should drive you to do several things,

• Spend time in solitude with Him,
• Spend time in His word daily,
• Spend time learning to pray without ceasing,
• Spend time in community with other disciples of Jesus,
• Spend time making disciples for Him.

Sunday sermon, October 12, 2014 "How Does Your Future Look?"

Here is the audio of the message from Sunday, October 12, 2014 at CrossRoads Baptist Church where I preached "What Does Your Future Look Like?" from Luke 16: 1-13

Hunger for God by John Thweatt

I’m preaching through Acts on Sunday morning and yesterday we came to Acts 13. Originally I was going to preach on the worship, prayer, and fasting of the church in one sermon, but as I studied I felt led to spend one week on each discipline. As I prepared to preach on the three actions of the church before they sent Barnabas and Saul for their first missionary journey I found myself reading through John Piper’s book A Hunger for God.

In the Introduction he said,

“The more deeply you walk with Christ, the hungrier you get for Christ…the more homesick you get for Heaven…the more you want ‘all the fullness of God’…the more you want to be done with sin…the more you want the Bridegroom to come again…the more you want the Church revived and purified with the beauty of Jesus…the more you want great awakening to God’s reality in the cities…the more you want to see the light of the Gospel of the glory of Christ penetrate the darkness of all the unreached peoples of the world…the more you want to see the false worldviews yield to the force of Truth…the more you want to see pain relieved and tears wiped away and death destroyed…the more you long for every wrong to be made right and the justice and grace of God to fill the earth like the waters cover the sea.

If you don’t feel strong desires for the manifestation of the glory of God, it is not because you have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because you have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Your soul is stuffed with small things, and there is no room for the great. God did not create you for this. There is an appetite for God. And it can be awakened. I invite you to turn from the dulling effects of food and the dangers of idolatry, and to say with some simple fast: ‘This much, O God, I want you.’” (page 23)

Six Reasons to Live More Simply—and Give More Generously by Randy Alcorn

Someone has said, “Live simply that others may simply live.” Of course, there is no automatic relationship between my simple living and someone else being rescued from starvation or reached with the gospel. There is only a relationship if I, in fact, use the resources I have freed up to feed the hungry and reach the lost. This itself assumes I will continue to make a decent wage. For if I go off and pursue simple living for simple living’s sake, spending what little I earn on myself, it does no good for anyone else. The point is not merely saying “no” to money and things, but using money and things to say “yes” to God.

How can we live more simply? There are thousands of ways. We can buy used cars rather than new, modest houses rather than expensive ones. We don’t have to replace older furniture just for appearances. We can mend and wear clothes we already have, shop at thrift stores, give up recreational shopping and costly clothes and jewelry, cut down on expensive convenience foods, and choose less costly exercise and recreation. Some of us can carpool, use public transportation, or a bike instead of a car or second car. But these are things few of us will do unless we have clear and compelling reasons. Here are six:

1. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because Heaven is our home.

The single greatest deterrent to giving—and to living more simply—is the illusion that this world is our home.

Suppose your home were in France and you were visiting the United States for eighty days, living in a hotel. Furthermore, suppose there’s a rule that says you can’t take anything back to France on your flight home, nor can you ship anything or carry back money with you. But while you’re in America, you can earn money and send deposits to your bank in France. 

Question: Would you fill your hotel room with expensive furnishings and extravagant wall hangings? Of course not. Why? Because your time in America is so short, and you know you can’t take it with you. It’s just a hotel room! If you’re wise, you’ll send your treasures home, knowing they’ll be waiting for you when you arrive.

We’re here on earth on a short-term visa. It’s about to expire! Don’t spend too much time and money and energy on your hotel room when instead you can send it on ahead.

2. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because it frees us up and shifts our center of gravity.

Copernicus sparked a revolution when he proved that the sun doesn’t revolve around the earth. Giving will spark a Copernican revolution in the lives of Christians who understand that life doesn’t revolve around the things of earth. In giving, we surrender our possessions to their proper center of gravity: God. Life no longer revolves around houses and land and cars and things. Giving—and the simpler living that results when we give—breaks us out of Money’s orbit and sets up for us a new center of gravity, in Heaven.

3. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because we’re God’s pipeline.

Christians are God’s delivery people through which he does his giving to a needy world. We are conduits of God’s grace to others. If we forget that we’re God’s stewards—his delivery drivers—it’s like FedEx or UPS forgetting that what they carry in their trucks doesn’t belong to them. When that happens, deliveries grind to a halt and people don’t get what they need.

God comes right out and tells us why He gives us more money than we need. It’s not so we can find more ways to indulge ourselves and spoil our children. It’s not so we can insulate ourselves from needing God’s provision. It’s so we can give and give generously (2 Corinthians 8:14;9:11).

4. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because of the reward we’ll receive in Heaven and the joy it will bring us.

If I choose a smaller house here on earth and invest the savings in God’s kingdom, God will give me eternal treasures in Heaven that will make a big house on earth seem utterly trivial. Why settle for an expensive necklace now when by selling it and giving the money to meet needs it could contribute to an imperishable treasure in eternity?

5. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because of the dire spiritual needs of the world.

Suppose God wanted to reach the world for Christ and help an unprecedented number of suffering people. What might you expect Him to put in the hands of His delivery people? Unprecedented wealth to meet all those needs and reach all those people? Well, He’s done it, hasn’t He? The question is, what are we doing with it?

John Piper makes this observation:

Three billion people today are outside Jesus Christ. Two-thirds of them have no viable Christian witness in their culture. If they are to hear—and Christ commands that they hear—then cross-cultural missionaries will have to be sent and paid for. All the wealth needed to send this new army of good news ambassadors is already in the church. If we, like Paul, are content with the simple necessities of life, hundreds of millions of dollars in the church would be released to take the gospel to the frontiers. The revolution of joy and freedom it would cause at home would be the best local witness imaginable.

6. We should live more simply—and give more generously—because of the world’s urgent physical needs.

“[Agabus] stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. (This happened during the reign of Claudius.) The disciples, each according to his ability, decided to provide help for the brothers living in Judea. This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul” (Acts11:28-30).

Here is the biblical pattern for giving: See a need, give to meet it. Giving according to our ability means living on less than God has entrusted to us. If He has entrusted us with a great deal, as He has most people reading this, it means living on far less so we can deliver the excess to the needy. That way they will not have too little and we will not have too much—exactly what God intends, according to 2 Corinthians 8:14.

Read more: http://www.epm.org/blog/2014/Sep/29/live-more-simply#ixzz3FBAn2hco

Man Up by James Emery White

Vol. 10, No. 80

Man Up 

*The following is an excerpt from the first installment of Dr. White’s latest series at Mecklenburg Community Church, “Man Up.” It will “read” like the oral event it was, but we felt it deserved to be lifted out and sent out as today’s blog.  – The Church & Culture Team

It’s only week five of the NFL, but the season is already filled with headlines. And as you know, the biggest ones haven’t been about the games.

They’ve been about the players.

And not about what they’ve done on the field, but off.

From Ray Rice beating his wife in an elevator – one of the sickest videos I’ve ever seen – to Adrian Peterson reportedly beating his son with a stick so long and hard that he damaged his scrotum, it’s been violence off the field – not on it – that has dominated the news.

Closer to home we’ve seen even more domestic violence stories, from Greg Hardy of the Panthers to Jeff Taylor of the Hornets.

The latest stats are just stunning.

Around the world, 30% of all women age 15 and older have suffered intimate partner violence.

That’s almost one out of every three.

You’re probably thinking, “But yeah, there’s some pretty primitive, backward parts of the world out there.”

Here in the United States, it’s slightly more than one out of every five.

And get this: Nearly 20 people per minute are victims of physical violence by an intimate partner in the United States alone.

That is not protecting.

And the Bible would condemn it in every possible way.

In Colossians 3:19, it says:

Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them. (Colossians 3:19, NIV)

And in I Peter 3:7, it says,

Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner. (I Peter 3:7, NIV)

That’s how power and strength are to be used.

To protect, not to prey.

A husband may take a blow for his wife, but never, ever, is he to give a blow to his wife.

And just to be fair, women should not be violent toward their husbands.  Forty percent of all spouse abuse is female on male! And we turn a blind eye to it.

To prove the point, an undercover team went on to the streets of London to see how people reacted to the two kinds of domestic violence. Men on women, and then women on men.

The difference was stark.

Take a look. (*Warning: clip contains explicit language that was censored when shown during the service) 

The point is that violence is violence, and it has no place in a marriage.

And the same is true for children.

Every year more than 3 million reports of child abuse are made in the United States, involving more than 6 million children. On average, more than 4 children die every day to child abuse and neglect.

70% of those who die are under the age of 4.

Four!

And sexual assault of children?

More than 90% know their offender. In fact, according to the 2012 Child Maltreat Report from the Department of Health and Human Services, four-fifths – 80% - of all types of abuse on children was done by a parent.

And usually, the father.

No man – no real man – does this.

No man – no real man – hurts his wife.

No man – no real man – hurts his child.

Period.

We are called to love as Christ loved the church, and how did Christ love the church?

He died for her. He died protecting her, rescuing her, saving her.

Now, before we go any further, let me say a word to you who are victims of this. I can’t leave this without talking to you about it as your pastor. Which means a word to you women.

You are not to submit in any way, you are not to tolerate in any way, physical abuse.

If you feel that you somehow deserved it, or provoked it, no. There is nothing you could ever do that would justify being physically abused.

If you are being abused, flee.

Leave.

Get out of that home.

We’ll go to work on that marriage, and go to work on your husband, but you are not to submit to it.

And if he won’t change, you have complete biblical grounds for divorce.

I’m not rooting for that, I’m not hoping for that, but I need to tell you that you are not called to a marriage where that is happening.

That isn’t marriage.

The Bible says that one of the grounds for divorce is physical abandonment. Which means your spouse leaves you, or acts in a way that you are forced to leave.

Physical abuse is forcing you to separate.

And if you’re dating someone who hits you, or is violent in any way, you end that relationship. I can tell you right now that he is not God’s man for you.

The same goes for the abuse of your child. You take that child and flee.

And let me say this to everyone here.

If you know of any child being abused, physically, sexually, you are to report it immediately. This is unconscionable behavior, and criminal.

And there should be zero tolerance.

And if you don’t feel you can leave because it’s not safe – that he’ll try and physically stop you, or hurt you, I will personally see that you are escorted out.

And men, if it has a place in your life, I have one word for you.

Repent.

Man up and repent.

Please, don’t you see that you’re better than this? That it’s not what it means to be a man?

It has no place in God’s world.

No place in God’s family.

No place in God’s marriage.

No place in God’s man.

Which means no place in you.

James Emery White

Sources

James Emery White, “Man Up, Part One: A Man and His Wife,” message delivered at Mecklenburg Community Church, Charlotte, NC, the weekend of October 4/5, 2014.  Full message available at churchandculture.org.

“A third of women worldwide abused by partners, study finds,” Bill Briggs, NBC News, June 20, 2013, read online.

National Child Abuse Statistics from Child Help.

Child Maltreat Report (2012), Dept. of Health and Human Services, read online.

    

Editor’s Note

James Emery White is the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, NC, and the ranked adjunctive professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, which he also served as their fourth president.  His latest book, The Rise of the Nones: Understanding and Reaching the Religiously Unaffiliated, is now available on Amazon.  To enjoy a free subscription to the Church and Culture blog, visit www.churchandculture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world.  Follow Dr. White on twitter @JamesEmeryWhite.

G.K. Beale on the Assurance of Salvation by Joe Buchanan

At the recommendation my dear friend Nathan Martin (@nater_Martin) I spent some time last night reading the excursus in G.K. Beale’s “A New Testament Biblical Theology” on the assurance of salvation (pgs. 865-870). Assurance is one of the most important doctrines for a new believer to comprehend, but unfortunately it is often presented in ways that are at best unhelpful and at worst can be unbiblical. Instead of offering trite sayings or clichés, Beal provides us with a clear, simple and Biblical model for understanding the assurance of salvation. He argues that we can understand assurance as a triangle, “with each angle contributing to an aspect of assurance. “

Trust in God’s Promise of Salvation

Beal states that, “First, God promises throughout the NT that those who place their faith in Christ and his redemptive work will receive an inner assurance that they have truly benefitted from Christ’s work (the top of the triangle).” (p.867) He then cites 1 John 5:9-15 as a classic example of this teaching in Scripture:

If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater, for this is the testimony of God that he has borne concerning his Son. Whoever believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. Whoever does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne concerning his Son. And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him.

This passages teaches us that “God ‘has testified’ that ‘eternal life’ comes through belief in ‘His Son,’ and those ‘who believe’ in the Son ‘have the testimony in ‘themselves.’” (p.868) We have the assurance of God’s Word that He has given life to all who believe.

Good Works

The Bible clearly teaches that no one will be saved by their good works, but it is also equally adamant that those who have been saved will produce good works. Beale uses Ephesians 2:8-10 to demonstrate this point:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Verses 8 and 9 are universally used to demonstrate the Biblical teaching concerning justification by faith alone, however; we often skip the next verse. Verse 10 is important because it teaches that as believers we are saved to do “good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them,” Beal says, “..one who has truly been resurrected (Eph 2:4-6) and thus becomes a part of the new creation will inevitably and increasingly be characterized by good works (Eph 2:10) instead of behaving like “dead people” in bondage to “trespasses and sins” (Eph 2:1-3).” (p.868)

One of the ways that I explain this to new believers is that the greatest evidence of genuine salvation is a changed life. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” This new life is exhibited through a change in behavior and attitudes that lead to good works. These good works not only demonstrate to others that we have received a new life, but also serve as assurance to us that God has indeed transformed our lives through the gospel. Beal says, “…believer’s assurance of truly being part of the new creation comes as they look back at their former life and see the changes that have come about as they look back at their former life and see the changes that have come about since they became Christian.” (p.869)

Conviction by the Spirit

Many years ago I heard an evangelist say that one of the ways that we know we are saved is that “whenever we fall into sin we are immediately convicted by the indwelling Holy Spirit.” He summed this teaching up by saying, “We can’t get away with anything.” Looking back this was one of the most evident signs to me that something had changed in my life. I can remember shortly after I was saved falling under tremendous conviction for uttering a curse word on the playground. What had been a regular activity before now suddenly felt out of place and wrong.

Beal closes by saying, “…faithful, growing Christians should receive multiple assurances from these three angles, which have a cumulative force, enhancing the overall sense of confidence about the reality of their Christians experience.”(p.870) But also warns that, “no confidence should exist in those who profess to believe in Jesus but who reflect no discernible change for the good in their lifestyles and who have no conviction about changing their sinful ways.”

G.K. Beale “A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New” (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011)

Sunday, October 5, 2014 Sermon "The Most Critical Decision You Will Ever Make"

I preached a message this morning to believers called "The Most Critical Decision You Will Ever Make" based from Hebrews 5: 7-9.

Here is the audio of that message:

Iain M. Duguid on the power of the Gospel

Iain M. Duguid has some excellent advice for us.

“Sermons and Bible studies that focus on ‘law’ (the demands of Scripture for our obedience), no matter how accurately biblical in content, tend simply to add to the burden of guilt felt by the average Christian. A friend of mine calls these sermons ‘another brick in the backpack’ – you arrive at church knowing five ways in which you are falling short of God’s standard for your life, and you leave knowing ten ways, doubly burdened.

In my experience such teaching yields little by way of life transformation, especially in terms of the joy and peace that are supposed to mark the Christian life. Focusing on the gospel, however, has the power to change our lives at a deep level. Through the gospel we come to see both the true depth of our sin (and therefore that our earlier feelings of guilt were actually far too shallow), while at the same time being reminded of the glorious good news that Jesus is our perfect substitute who removes our sin and guilt. He lived the life of obedience in our place and fulfilled the relentless clamor of the law’s demands, and he took upon himself the awful punishment that our sin truly deserves. As the Holy Spirit enables us to grasp this gospel reality, he frees us from our guilt and refreshes us with a deep joy that motivates our hearts to love God anew. In this way, the gospel begins the slow transformative work of changing us from the inside out. This is what the nineteenth-century Scottish pastor Thomas Chalmers called ‘the expulsive power of a new affection’: the fact that profound change in our behavior always comes through a change in what we love most, not through external coercion” (Is Jesus in the Old Testament? [P&R Publishing, 2013], 13).

Wednesday, October 1, 2014 "The Wrath of God" Part One

I started a series of messages on the Attributes of God in the summer.  Last night, I returned to this series preaching/teaching part one on "The Wrath of God."

Here is the audio of the message.

6 Evil Effects of Sin by Tim Challies

We do not sin with impunity. We cannot sin without consequence. Once the Holy Spirit reveals sin within us, we cannot simply ignore that sin and expect that our spiritual lives will continue to grow and thrive. In his great work Overcoming Sin and Temptation, John Owen lists six evil effects of sin—sin that we identify but refuse to destroy.

In chapter four of his book, Owen wants the reader to think about this: A God-honoring life is one in which we constantly wage war against sin. He says it like this: “The life, vigor and comfort of our spiritual life depend much upon our mortification of sin.” I take life to be the existence of spiritual life, vigor to be the extent of it, and comfort to be the Holy Spirit’s assurance of its existence. All of these are imperiled by the existence of sin. He will give six consequences of sin in our lives, but first he has a couple of foundational points to make.

The first foundation point Owen makes is that putting sin to death is necessary for a secure and comfortable Christian life, and yet they are not a guarantee of it. I find this important as a Christian and as a pastor: “A man may be carried on in a constant course of mortification all his days; and yet perhaps never enjoy a good day of peace and consolation. The use of means for the obtaining of peace is ours; the bestowing of it is God’s prerogative.” In other words, God does not owe us anything for putting sin to death; it is our duty and we must do it out of love and loyalty to him. However, under ordinary circumstances, he rewards such action with life, vigor and comfort.

The second foundational point is that we must not confuse mortification of sin with the gospel. “In the ways instituted by God to give us life, vigor, courage, and consolation, mortification is not one of the immediate causes of it. … Adoption and justification … are the immediate causes.” Spiritual life, comfort, and vigor are not ultimately the fruit of mortification, but of justification.

With those matters aside, he now offers a series of six evil effects of refusing to do battle with sin:

1. Sin deprives us of spiritual strength and comfort. “Every unmortified sin will do two things: it will weaken the soul and deprive it of its vigor. It will darken the soul and deprive it of its comfort and peace.”
2. Sin weakens the soul and deprives it of its strength. “An unmortified lust will drink up the spirit and all the vigor of the soul, and weaken it for all duties.” When he speaks of duties, he speaks of the ordinary means of grace, and particularly reading Scripture, praying and gaining the spiritual benefit that comes from doing these things.
3. Sin becomes the delight of the heart. “It diverts the heart from the spiritual frame that is required for vigorous communion with God; it lays hold on the affections, rendering its object beloved and desirable, so expelling the love of the Father.” Unmortified sin becomes our delight, and we come to love it and rejoice in it.
4. Sin becomes the meditation of our minds. “Thoughts are the great purveyors of the soul to bring in provision to satisfy its affections; and if sin remain unmortified in the heart, they must ever and anon be making provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof.” When sin goes untouched, it becomes the meditation of our heart, taking the place that should be filled with the Lord.
5. Sin hinders our spiritual walk. “The ambitious man much be studying, and the worldling must be working or contriving, and the sensual, vain person providing himself for vanity, when they should be engaged in the worship of God.” Sin steals the time, attention and affection that we need to maintain our communion with God.
6. Sin darkens the soul. “It is a cloud, a thick cloud, that spreads itself over the face of the soul, and intercepts all the beams of God’s love and favor. It takes away all sense of the privilege of our adoption; and if the soul begins to gather up thoughts of consolation, sin quickly scatters them.” When we continually choose sin over godliness, sin destroys the comfort that the Holy Spirit seeks to provide. Our souls become darkened to his goodness and to the privileges of our adoption.

The solution to all of this is to put sin to death. Here is how Owen says it: “Mortification prunes all the graces of God and makes room for them in our hearts to grow. The life and vigor of our spiritual lives consists in the vigor and flourishing of the plants of grace in our hearts.”