For a preacher to have mastery of a passage, the passage ought to have mastery over him.- Preachers who preach God’s truth into life (births, deaths, marriages, job losses, debts, breakins, car accidents, cancers etc.) give me the equipment to fight and survive as God’s child in the real world.
- Good preachers obliterate the divide between lofty grandeur of God and the messiness of real life, so that I see and do something about the constant rub of idolatry against the call to discipleship in my own life.
- I love it when preachers tell me what arrests, intrigues, amazes and captivates them from God’s word. A preacher’s delighted, wide-eyed insight is a massive aid to engagement.
- Preachers with a humble conviction about the authority of preaching pack more punch.
- “Unpacking a passage” is much less exciting than releasing a wild lion into our midst.
- I sense when a preacher’s preparation has included preparation of his own heart, because he preaches not only to me but to himself.
- I find preachers who walk boldly into a passage hungry for vital truth, fearless of apparent exegetical, theological or pastoral difficulty are far more compelling for their courage.
- I like to hear a preacher’s certainty born of a thoroughness of preparation and theological conviction.
- It is frustrating when a sermon has no application.
- I am discouraged when applications are effectively an exercise in heaping guilt on the listener. Rhetorical questions are a cheap way out! It is different from being challenged by gospel. My guilt has been taken by Christ!
- I’m captivated when I get sense that the preacher’s hardest fight has been the fight for his own soul, obedience, understanding and submission to the truth.
- Only after taking God’s word to his own heart is a preacher able to cleverly, sensitively, wisely, boldly craft a sermon that has the hearts of others as its goal. Pastors make good preachers – they are students of their own heart and other’s. They anticipate my questions.
- Laughter opens hearts and minds and helps me stay awake.
- Listeners lose interest when the preacher has lost interest first. (Boredom is the new morality – if it is boring it is more than wrong!)
- Every preacher must ask himself at the end of every sermon, “So what!?”
- God-breathed scriptures are full of risk, danger, opportunity, drama and daring – not like a stuffed lion in a museum. Tame sermons turn the living Word of God into a lifeless museum exhibit.
- Preachers shouldn’t be afraid of deep truths that average mortals have to take time and thought to comprehend. It isn’t bad that a listener doesn’t understand something this time round.
- I feel secure when preacher shares his sermon structure/aim for his sermon with me.
- Passion in preaching is by product of love for God.
- Preachers who tell me how to feel – or how they feel – leave my feelings unstirred. Challenge is to so use their words and their insight into the text and people to add the weight of all their energies to the Spirit’s sovereign work.
- Choose someone interesting if you are going to copy another preacher!
- Poetry and art are the preacher’s friends – they move hearts and stir affections…that my life would be warm to God!
- Biblical theses and models are helpful in my understanding and recall of breadth, theme and unity of the bible.
- Biblical theses and models can suck the life out of sermons when they become wheel ruts.
- Good preachers don’t take themselves too seriously, but take God’s truth seriously enough to die for.
- A sermon must be personal, passionate and pleading – not just a talk.
- A truth known intellectually may not be a truth truly comprehended, believed and obeyed. (It’s helpful when a preacher knows I believe it, but that I haven’t acted on it or truly comprehended it. It’s great when a preacher probes, personally, from pulpit!)
- You may never say anything really new, but that’s no excuse for not saying it in a fresh way.
- My obedience (thought, word, deed) completes God’s purpose for preaching.(These points were taken from a talk given at the QTC Preaching Conference 2012 by musician Colin Buchanan)
christianity
Pursuing Unity in the Spirit of grace
“Unity is unique because it relies on the Holy Spirit. While uniformity is built upon the preference of the individual, unity is built on the foundation of Christ. The same Lord that dwells in my soul is the same Lord that dwells in your soul, and the Spirit of God will literally agree with itself inside two believers when we put aside personal preferences and insignificant differences.
The church can and should be a motley group of believers working together for the gospel, but this kind of unity is counterintuitive to sinners. It requires love, patience and self-control – all character qualities we don’t naturally have.
If you and I ever want to experience true unity with one another, we need to take advantage of the abundant grace in Christ so that we can give that same grace to our brothers and sisters. And because of the Cross, that grace is made available to you every morning.”
Paul David Tripp
Always in His presence
And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus. . . (Ephesians 2:6)
“…the gathering is unique not as an encounter with God (it is that, though God’s presence is a constantly available comfort and help to the Christian); rather it’s unique because it is an encounter with the people of God, filled with the Spirit of God, spurring one another along in the mission of God. Christ in me meets Christ in you.” (Mike Cosper, Rhythms of Grace)
Lately I’ve been chatting with fellow musical Christians on “LinkedIn” – particularly on the question of worship, the difference between the titles ‘song leader’ and ‘worship leader’ (click here to read that discussion) and if there is any way to reconcile our different opinions. In some ways I feel I’ve been told that my preference for calling those who lead the singing in church ‘song leaders’ is way too blinkered, because singer do so much more than just lead the singing. In the view of many, it seems, song leaders are actually leading people into God’s presence through the experience of corporate worship. Now this may just be semantics, and perhaps all they mean is that we feel closer to God as we draw near to Him together in praise. But if not then such ‘Worship leaders’ have the responsibility of making a way of access between sinful man and God. To me, that is a huge claim, a responsibility we could never have. In fact, it sounds like something that JESUS has already accomplished.
Now should I sit quietly and take this as being a denominational difference, or difference in opinion, which doesn’t really matter? Or is this view actually misleading, with no grounding in the New Testament texts or the practice of the early church? Does this view of corporate worship actually detract from what Christ has already done? Does it hark back to the Old Testament ‘temple worship’ model which is now fulfilled in Christ?
From what I understand in God’s word, the idea that our corporate worship is a worship experience – where we tentatively approach God and hope that he will inject his spirit and power into us through this experience – has very much been surpassed in Christ! This is how the Old Testament people (who did not experience the Holy Spirit in an ongoing, everyday, ‘I will never leave you’ kind of way) approached God in the temple. They came with some measure of uncertainty and a great measure of unworthiness.
But for us as Christ followers, living this side of the cross, the power that raised Jesus from the dead is living in us! He is living in us! We are always in Him, always in His presence. (Check this review of One Forever: The transforming power of being in Christ.) We are in the very throne room of heaven right now, even while our daily lives here continue. You could even say that we Christians are always in church, because we are always ‘in Christ’. There is such great certainty and confidence here. Our unworthiness has been dealt with and wrapped up in Christ.
“We do not go to church to worship, but, already at worship, we join our brothers and sisters in continuing those actions that should have been going on – privately, [as families], or even corporately – all week long.” (Harold Best, Music through the eyes of Faith, p.147)
Jesus is our great High Priest, the way to the Father which the Father provided. He is our one true worship leader, who leads us into a life of worshipping our loving Heavenly Father at the very moment we are saved.
Of course it is great to gather together as God’s people, to remind one another of the reality that we serve a great and wonderful God. As we sing we fulfill the way God designed for us to be building each other up in the Lord, speaking the ‘Word of Christ’ into each other’s lives. But we don’t need to see corporate worship as a tenuous time, when hopefully the music is good and powerful enough to lead people into His presence. My friends, we are already there! We are always in His presence!
“Paul says to the church at Corinth, ‘Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you?’ He later tells them that their bodies are the temple of God. This is the astounding reality of New Testament religion: we as Christians are the house of worship.” (David Platt, Radical Together, 2011)
Here are a few other verses from God’s Word to consider – to remind us that our worship of the Almighty God is an ongoing and daily activity, which is also expressed corporately when we gather together.
“In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” (Ephesians 2:21-22)
“Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.” (Romans 12:1)
Thanks for reading my rant – an important one! If you want to think more on these things check out the following:
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2014/04/17/why-i-prefer-song-leader-to-worship-leader/
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2013/09/13/two-books-ive-got-to-get-hold-of/
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2013/09/25/all-of-creation-sing-with-me-now-the-veil-is-torn/
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2013/10/26/corporate-worship-is-a-serious-gift/
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2014/04/30/how-worship-murders-our-self-righteousness/
https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2014/04/26/drawing-back-the-curtains-on-christ-the-role-of-song-leaders/
Most Influential Blogger Award
I’d like to thank John Mark Miller at The Artistic Christian for nominating me for the Most Influential Blogger Award!
If you enjoy posts about Art, Culture and Life from a Christian Perspective, then you should visit his blog. I’m sure you would enjoy it!
http://theartisticchristian.wordpress.com/welcome-to-the-artistic-christian/
Award Guidelines
Here are the guidelines for acceptance – really very straightforward.
To accept this award, the awardees must do the following:
1. Display the Award on your Blog.
2. Announce your win with a blog post and thank the Blogger who awarded you.
3. Present 10 deserving Bloggers with the Award.
4. Link your awardees in the post and let them know of their being awarded with a comment (or a pingback).
5. Include an embedded video of your current favorite song (YouTube has almost everything, just copy and paste the link into your WordPress editor). If a video is not possible you can embed a SoundCloud track.
My Favorite Song
At the moment I’m really enjoy listening to the album WORTH IT ALL by Meredith Andrews. This song, PIECES, is a goodie!
My List of Most Influential Bloggers!
It’s my privilege to introduce you to some talented bloggers who I believe are Most Influential Bloggers. I hope you enjoy their writing as much as I do:
1. Nick at MOUTHFUL OF GOSPEL http://nickmorrowmusic.com/
2. Bryan at BRYAN PATTERSON’S FAITHWORKS http://bryanpattersonfaithworks.wordpress.com/
3. Mel at IN MY FATHER’S HOUSE http://melwild.wordpress.com/
4. Rob at MERE INKLING http://mereinkling.wordpress.com/
5. Nathan at NATHAN MILLICAN’S BLOG http://nathanmillican.com/
6. Deidre at CRUSTY BREAD http://crustybreadblog.com/
7. Anna at A JOURNEY OF FAITH http://daughterbydesign.wordpress.com/
8. Lori at A DISPLAY OF HIS SPLENDOR http://adisplayofsplendor.com/
9. Justin at EMBRACING GOD’S GRACE http://jmeyerksu.wordpress.com/
10. Belinda at GRACE AND TRUTH http://graceandtruth.me/about/
Growing into sacrificial, radical living
As we grow in relational intimacy with Christ through the gospel, we gradually overflow in radical living for Christ. Any low-grade sense of guilt gets conquered by a high-grade sense of gospel that compels a willing, urgent, joyful, uncompromising, grace-saturated, God-glorifying obedience in us. We live sacrificially, not because we feel guilty, but because we have been loved greatly and now find satisfaction in sacrificial love for others. We live radically, not because we have to, but because we want to.
David Platt in “Radical Together“
Lost in worshipping the created
I have some friends who are totally in lo
ve with the beauty of the natural world. They ravenously consume nature documentaries and scientific discoveries, and relish the fascinating and amazing laws which exist in the universe. I must say I do share and rejoice in such a fascination! Yet it is possible to be lost, from God’s perspective, even with such an attitude. Linked to this love of creation is the exaltation of mankind, as the crown of creation. As mankind exalts, expresses, captures, ponders, reproduces, learns from and preserves all the wonder of creation, the wonder of the Creator (who in fact made, entered and sustains this creation!) can be, sadly, pushed aside.
Consider these words from John Piper:
“The tragedy of the world is that the echo is mistaken for the Original Shout. When our back is to the breathtaking beauty of God, we cast a shadow on the earth and fall in love with it. But it does not satisfy. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them. . . For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of the flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never visited.”
(from The Dangerous Duty of Delight)
His words remind me of those penned by the apostle Paul in his letter to the Romans, chapter 1: For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. . . They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator
Piper comments further on this ‘exchange’: How could I put my eye to some great telescope, designed to make me glad with visions of the galaxies, and notice in the glass a dim reflection of my face and say:”Now I am happy, I am loved?” How could I stand before the setting sun, between the mountain range and the vastness of the sea, and think that everlasting joy should come from making much of me? . . . “
(Don’t Waste your Life, John Piper, 2003, p.186.)
What this really boils down to is love of humanity, humanity exalting itself in bold denial of the Creator, saying ‘all this can exist and be sustained simply by the ingenuity of mankind’ – or by the evolutionary process, which apparently needs no initial designer (?!).
How sad to be so in love with the shadow of the Creator, that a relationship with the Creator is fortfeited, the Creator in whose image we are made, the Creator whose love and sense of right and justice and compassion lives in us as a testimony to his character – even if we deny him.
If this is a struggle for you, please check out my older post on a similar topic: https://sevennotesofgrace.com/2013/07/01/an-unwasted-life-makes-much-of-jesus/
I trust and pray you can see the God who created and sustains this universe, by His living and eternal Word, Jesus Christ. Faith in him will never disappoint!
Shake like you’re changed
Mercy Me has produced another fun song with Shake (video and lyrics below) but the message is most significant! God’s love is real and we can’t stay the same as we were before. If we are in Christ there will be a noticeable difference in our lives, our attitudes, our reactions, our level of contentment, thankfulness and joy. This is the confidence we have, that God is committed to his project of changing us to be more like His Son. “He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6)
(Another great song you might like to look up on this topic of change is an older one from Steven Curtis Chapman: The Change?)
I just can’t believe
Where my life was at
All that I know is that my heart was broken
And I don’t ever wanna go back
Ain’t no explanation
How I saw the light
He found me and set me free
And it brought me back to life
Blame it on the transformation
Changed down to the core
His love is real
And I can’t sit still
Cause my name’s not shamed no more
Great God Almighty, gonna change this
Great God Almighty, He gonna change me
You gotta shake, shake, shake
Like you’re changed, changed, changed
Brand new looks so good on you
So shake like you’ve been changed
Come on and shake, shake, shake like you changed
Shake, shake, shake like you changed
Maybe He came to you
When everything seemed fine
Or maybe your world was upside down and hit you right between the eyes
No matter when it happened
At 7 or 95
Move your feet ’cause you are free
And you’ve never been more alive
You gotta shake, shake, shake
Like you’re changed, changed, changed
Brand new looks so good on you
So shake like you’ve been changed
Come on and shake, shake, shake
Like you’re changed, changed, changed
Brand new looks so good on you
So shake like you’ve been changed
Come on and shake, shake, shake like you changed
Shake, shake, shake like you changed
Shake, shake
Great God Almighty, gonna change me
Great God Almighty, He gonna change me
Great God Almighty, gonna change me
Great God Almighty, He gonna change me
No matter when it happened
At 7 or 95
Move your feet, ’cause you are free
And you’ve never been more alive
You gotta shake, shake, shake
Like you’re changed, changed, changed
Brand new looks so good on you
So shake like you’ve been changed
The Cross has made you Flawless
Thanks to the band Mercy Me we have another way of appreciating what the cross has achieved for us, by grace. In Christ we stand before our heavenly Father as perfect, flawless people. We are wrapped up in Christ’s righteousness. What a great image. We have done nothing to deserve this grace, nor can we do anything to deserve it. The song is called Flawless, from the album Welcome to the New.
FLAWLESS
There’s got to be more
Than going back and forth From doing right to doing wrong
‘Cause we were taught that’s who we are
Come on get in line right behind me
You along with everybody, Thinking there’s worth in what you do
Then Like a hero who takes the stage when
We’re on the edge of our seats saying it’s too late
Well let me introduce you to amazing grace
No matter the bumps, No matter the bruises
No matter the scars, Still the truth is
The cross has made, The cross has made you flawless
No matter the hurt, Or how deep the wound is
No matter the pain, Still the truth is
The cross has made, The cross has made you flawless
Could it possibly be That we simply can’t believe
That this unconditional Kind of love would be enough
To take a filthy wretch like this
And wrap him up in righteousness
But that’s exactly what He did
Take a breath smile and say
Right here right now I’m ok
Because the cross was enough
Then Like a hero who takes the stage when
We’re on the edge of our seats saying it’s too late
Well let me introduce you to grace grace
God’s grace
Chorus:
No matter what they say Or what you think you are
The day you called His name
He made you flawless, He made you flawless
Chorus:
Scraps of Worship
Sharing today a good post for Monday morning – for encouragement! How is your “devotional life” going? Much of this post from The Blazing Center will no doubt ring true for you too:
If you could use one word to describe your current devotional life, what would it be? Mine would be “scraps”. So often I feel like all I can muster is a distracted scrap of devotion to God. For example, here’s what my Bible reading time often looks like:
Step 1: Open Bible. Pray that God would meet me as I read his word.
Step 2: Read diligently for thirty seconds, taking in at least three full sentences.
Step 3: Begin wondering if I’ll ever receive my tax refund, because it sure would come in handy right now.
Step 4: Feel guilty for being distracted. Try to “come back” into the presence of God (whatever that means).
Step 5: Repeat steps one and two plus additional prayer of repentance for being distracted.
Step 6: Begin thinking about my next killer blog post that will rock the blogosphere.
Step 7: Repeat steps 1, 4, and 5.
You get the point. It’s a constant battle against my sinful nature, which will seize on the slightest distraction. Many times I feel guilty instead of refreshed after doing my devotions. I feel like I didn’t pray enough, or with enough passion, or for enough people. And I certainly didn’t have enough love for God. My feeble scraps of devotion to God are pathetic, with a capital “pathetic”.
But God has been teaching me about devotional scraps lately. My devotion (probably too strong of a word) to God is nothing more than scraps, but God accepts, and even delights in those scraps. And when I get distracted, I don’t have to work my way back into God’s presence. I can come right back to God and experience full acceptance. Why? Because Jesus Christ is holding the door open. Always.
God’s love for me has nothing to do with my devotion and everything to do with Christ’s perfect devotion. Jesus was passionately devoted to God. He didn’t offer any scraps, he offered perfect obedience and love. And then his life ended. Abruptly. Brutally.
Now his righteousness is mine, and he perfects my feeble scraps of devotion and presents them to God. God loves Jesus, which means God loves me, end of story. The door to God is held open by the cross.
So yes, my worship is nothing more than scraps. But to God, they’re delightful scraps, made perfect by his son. How freeing this truth is. Today let’s throw aside any hope we have in our scraps of devotion and place all our hope in Christ. True devotion to God starts at the cross.
Can you relate to my feeling of devotional scraps?
‘Christ in us’ rescues our relationships (James 3:16)
Yes, the title is a bit of a mouthful. I was also considering: “The wisdom that saves us from our destructive tendencies in human relationships.” Admittedly that is a tad too long, but this is the very essence of James 3:16. “For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.”
Continuing the Three Sixteen series we see here in James how our relationships suffer apart from Christ. Our fallen nature pits us against one another as natural enemies. We hold each other with suspicion, trying to ensure someone else is not better than us, or better off than us, with better stuff, or people, in their life).
You see this attitude play out clearly when two toddlers meet and cautiously approach each other for the first time. Can I really trust you? As adults we try to veil our suspicion, and often do it quite well, but the bent of envy and selfish ambition runs deep in our hearts. We can trace this way back to the vulnerability Adam and Eve felt once they recognized their nakedness. There was a need to cover up, to be on the defensive against the ambitions of others. Our relationships suffer as a result. Yet this is the wisdom of the world we live in.
James shows us another way, the way of wisdom from above. Let’s read the verse in context below:
“But if you harbour bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice. But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.” (James 3:14-18 NIV)
These are such challenging things to actually live out, but when the peace of Christ comes to rule in our hearts we can have true peace with each other. We can rejoice with those who rejoice and express genuine love and care for others. This is what makes the Christian community so unique, so attractive to the world. Sure, we are not perfect, but if Christ is in us he cannot but shine through our relationships, which (to some extent) lack envy and selfish ambition. In Christ we can know some measure of sincere love, due to the measure of humility in our brothers and sisters, who are also being transformed into the likeness of Christ.
Let’s work to heed the warning of James’ 3:16 and yet also rejoice! The indwelling Saviour has sweetened our human existence beyond measure. Praise be to Him!
sevennotesofgrace 