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The Strange, Illuminating End of 1 John

The last verse of 1 John in the Bible is the strangest end to any book I've ever read. Or, at least it first seemed so.

John's whole first letter is about what it looks like when you've really met Jesus and been changed by Him. He makes the point that when Jesus has changed us, we have a hunger to know God, a hatred for sin, and the desire to pour our lives out for others as Jesus poured His out for us. This love for God and others consumes us, propels us, and keeps us away from sin and wordliness. True Christianity consists of growing in those things.

He ends the book with the tart phrase, "Little children, keep yourselves from idols." (1 John 5:21). This is the first time he's mentioned idolatry in the book. That means one of two things: 1. John, at the end of his very thematic letter,is throwing in a random "p.s." that has nothing to do with the theme (i.e. like putting "Go Heels" at the end of a sermon); or, 2. That one command is crucial to executing the things John has proscribed in the rest of the book.

I think the latter option is definitely the right one. It is idolatry--the love of the things of the world, that will quench our love for God and people and our hatred for sin. It is not merely bad things that darken and deaden our heart toward God, but love of the things of this world. John even explains this in 1 John 2:15, "Do not love the world... for if any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him." Or, as Jesus explained, "You cannot love God and money."

Many Christians know to avoid pornography and drugs and other flagrant sins. But how many realize that love of the world--its money, creature comforts, prestige and respect--deadens more people's love for God and squeezes out true Christianity than anything else?

John calls us "little children," which means in this area we probably aren't as accomplished and grown-up spiritually as we think we are. When it comes to the world's ability to slowly deaden our hearts toward God, we are like defenseless little children. The world--it's money and prestige--is not a plaything. Little children (that's us) should stay away from it.

Summit Church, I plead with you--avoid idolatry! Beware materialism. Beware learning to love money and the comforts it brings. Beware too much enjoyment of the praise and respect of others. As C. S. Lewis said, "Wealth slowly knits a man's heart to this world." There is NOTHING, in my opinion, that threatens to quench the work of the Spirit of God in us and through us more than that. FLEE IDOLATRY.

Fellow pastors--avoid the ice cold clutches of money, prestige, and creature comforts. Nothing diminishes spiritual power like the love of the world.

Go Heels. and Duke. and occasionally State.

Temptation and Sin: John Owen

Pastor JD is traveling, but here is rerun of a post about the book On the Mortification of Sin, a great read which JD quoted heavily from last Sunday.

The book I want to recommend to you is On the Mortification of Sin by Puritan John Owen. A relatively short book (80 pages), but I feel like it explains some of the major problems of my life.

Owen deals with how most Christians, even the fervent, full-time ones, let sins go "unchecked" (or, to use the Apostle Paul's word: "unmortified"). These sins of the heart darken us spiritually, choke out the seed of the word, and cause us to make bad judgment calls and miss opportunities God has for us. I sometimes ache with regret thinking about how much grace I've missed out on and opportunities to bless others because I have refused to go to war against sins of the heart like love of money, love of praise, the lusts of the flesh for things like sex or food, the attention of others, etc. "The vigour, and power, and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh." (p. 9)

Owen also shows that not only do we often not deal with the lusts of our heart, when we do we use the wrong weaponry. We try to overcome lust through spiritual busy-ness and discipline, rather than on total death to self, belief in the Gospel, and reliance on the Spirit. As Bible teachers, we often try to give people ways to improve their lives, relevant steps to take, etc, that are "merely legal duties, without the least mention of Christ or His Spirit." (v. 17)

Finally, sometimes God lets us struggle with lust because it's one of the only things that keep us coming back to Him--which is His ultimate purpose, to keep us dependent on Him: "Says God, 'Here is one, if he could be rid of this lust I should never hear of him more; let him wrestle with this, or he would be altogether lost'... Wasn't it a correction to Peter's self-confidence that God left him to deny his Master?" (p. 41-2).

Here are some other juicy extractions:

• "The choicest believers, who are assuredly freed from the condemning power of sin, ought yet to make it their business all their days to mortify the indwelling power of sin." (p. 7)
• "Be killing sin, or it will be killing you." (p. 9)
• "Let not that man think that he makes any progress in holy who does not mortify the bellies of his lusts." (p. 15)

• "Fasting, memorization, meditation and Bible reading have their place in order... but they are to be looked on as the streams, whereas we look on them as the fountain." (p. 17)
• "Mortification of sin by self-strength, carried on by ways of self-discipline, unto the end of self-righteousness, is the soul and substance of all false religion in the world." (p. 7)
• "(Much of organized Christianity) is made up of designs and contrivances to pacify conscience without full surrender to Jesus." (p. 37)
• "He that changes pride for worldliness, sensuality for Pharisaism, vanity in Himself to the contempt of others, let him not think that he hath mortified the sin that he seems to have left. He hath changed his master, but he is a servant still...Simon the Sorcerer (Acts 8) for a while left his sorcery, but hi covetousness and personal ambition remained still, and simply acted out another way." (p. 26).
• "It is to be feared that very many Christians have little knowledge of the main enemy that they carry about with them in their hearts." (p. 31) (OUCH... sometimes haven't we just socialized and Christianized our love of money, personal ambition, and love of the praise of men?)

• "A man may beat down the bitter fruit from an evil tree until he is weary; whilst the root abides in strength and vigour, the beating down of the present fruit will not hinder it from bringing forth more." (p. 30)

• "Jesus is the (only) fire that burns up the very root of lust." (p. 19)

So here's a shout out to an old book... the Puritans were often depressed and I don't want to be exactly like them, and the English is a little old, but it's very readable and, as C. S. Lewis said, at least every other book we read should be from a different culture or time period.

The WEEK OF HOPE for RDU is coming! Want to know how others are serving through Hope For Durham? Visit www.hopefordurham.info to read the stories and post your own!

Here's also a great post from our friend, Clayton King... in which he reflects on the Boston Celtics' victory and some things they did right that we would be wise to heed.

The Power of Words

It should not be surprising that the majority of the time I am discouraged it is because of negative words--words that either someone else, Satan, or even my own self has spoken into my life. Whoever came up with that "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" is an idiot, and ought to be pelted ruthlessly with those sticks and stones. Words are powerful. As Proverbs says, the  actual power of life and death is in the tongue. And that's not just a metaphor.

Over the weekend I read some great insight on this by Martin Luther. Luther pointed out that the two most powerful things ever to happen on earth, the original creation and our salvation (the new creation), are both accomplished through words. God's words are different than how we normally understand language... we typically give names to things that are already realities; God speaks and His words become realities. At creation, God looked into nothingness and spoke. He said, "Let there be light," and where there was darkness there was light.

The same is true with our salvation, the new creation. God speaks to sinful, screwed-up people and declares them righteous and whole through the cross. We know our reality to be sinful, corrupted and dysfunctional. But when we believe His words, through His power of new creation we become those very things He declared of us.

That means that when someone (or Satan or my own heart) tells me I am a failure, or worthless, or sinful, I have a choice. I can believe what they say and become what they say about me, or I can believe what God says about me and become that. God says that in Christ I am a new creation. He says I am clean and forgiven. He says I have a future and a hope. He says I was chosen to be incredibly fruitful and a world overcomer. He says goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life, that nothing can separate me from Him, and that no weapon formed against me will prosper.

I believe Him.

I encourage you to become a part of the Gospel process in people's lives. Don't speak words of criticism and judgment into people's lives. Rather, speak in words of hope, which God has declared as the new reality. See not what people are in themselves, but what they could be in Christ and speak that over them. The words you say negatively to people may be true, but they do not reflect the new reality which God has declared. We usually want to change people by pointing out their failures and making them feel bad about them. God grows us instead by hope... by calling us to put faith in a vision that He sees for us. When we believe it, we become it.

The Confusing Language of Calling

It is common Christian parlance to say “I feel called to do so and so…” What we’re usually trying to communicate is we feel that God has given us a specific missional assignment in God’s Kingdom. I wonder, however, if that language is not misleading and harmful. Where do we really find biblical support for all these special “callings”?

Christians never need to be “called” to live missionally, it is inherent in being a disciple. To become a disciple of Jesus means you begin to evaluate your talents in terms of how they can best be used in the spread of God’s Kingdom. Say you are a businessman, and you know your talents are best suited for work in the marketplace where you can do excellent work to the glory of God and benefit of humanity and use relationships there to testify to Christ. You don’t have to wait on a call to begin to do so. When you become a disciple, you begin to immediately live missionally, no longer for yourself, but for Jesus. You go to work each day doing your work for the glory of God, the benefit of humanity, and in pursuit of proclaiming Jesus.

If that is the case, then if you realize that your talents can be best be used in God’s Kingdom by using them overseas to benefit a poorer nation and you can use your skill there to testify to Christ, why must we wait on a call to do so? I say this because we have so many people sitting around waiting on some warm-fuzzy, goose-bump-inducing vision from God before they will even consider serving overseas. If your talents can best serve God’s Kingdom by using them overseas, why would you wait on a call to do so? You have alrady been given that call!  To do what is best with your talents for the Kingdom of God is not a special calling God gives to some disciples, it is the duty of all disciples. Maybe we’ve invented the whole language of calling to mask the fact that most Christians have never started to live missionally, as disciples. Personally, I think the parlance of calling is evangelical heresy.

So, let me say it clearly: I DON’T THINK YOU NEED TO BE ‘CALLED’ TO GO OVERSEAS. No more than I think you need to be “called” to live missionally wherever you are. I don’t think you have to wait until God spells out “Africa” in your Cheerios one morning. I think you, as a disciple, have to ask, “How can my talents best be used in God’s mission all over the world?” If the answer is that you can be part of an overseas community-building, Jesus-preaching project, don’t wait for a “calling”. Pack your bags.

Instead of “calling,” maybe what we should be looking for from God is GUIDANCE. Maybe our prayer should go like this: “God, you did not give your talents to me for me, simply to live where I want to live and make a ton of money to live luxuriously. My talents are yours—dedicated to doing all I can to extend the message of your Kingdom all over the world. Guide me in seeing where I can be most beneficial on earth.” If you’re not willing to pray that prayer and obey what God tells you out of it, then you’re not really a disciple of Jesus.

I owe this insight due to a vigorous discussion I was in with a group of the greatest guys on earth I get together with every other Friday—future church planters and pastors and Christian entrepreneurs.

Dry Times

Sometimes I go through periods where it feels like I'm hearing directly from Jesus every day. He seems to clearly be lighting my path, I feel Him moving in my heart, and I can see His handiwork all through my life. Sometimes these periods last a few days, sometimes they last several months.

Other times it feels like I'm in a desert. Even when I press in and plead with God, I can't feel anything. I don't see how God is answering any of my prayers. It feels like God wrote the Bible and then simply turned me loose to obey it on my own. Temptations I struggle with get more intense and even more difficult to shake. My heart yearns after idols. I get lazier and more self-centered. I get short with people. I watch TV more. I care less. Life feels bitter. And then I get physically depressed at how little progress I seem to have made in Christian growth and maturity. So I seek God, I press in... and God seems to be silent. Nothing. Like He's gone on writer's strike and all I can do is watch lame reruns of things He did in my life last year. And so I don't know exactly what to do.

Anybody else like that? Why is God like that? What are you supposed to do during the "dry" times?

I don't know if I have the answer, but here's what I have discovered:

1. Read the Psalms. Encourage yourself with the thought that this is the common experience of the greatest believers in history.

2. Preach the Gospel to yourself. I am not loved or accepted by Christ because of how I feel, how much victory I have over temptation, or how well I'm doing. God's love for me never wavers or changes, even in the dry times. My faith is not in my feelings, but in the unchangeable facts of the Gospel.

3. Press on in obedience. I believe that part of the "faith journey" is actually learning to obey when you can't see or sense God. Sometimes we have to simply believe "that He's there" and that He really is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Endure and press on. Faith is acting when you have nothing else to go on but God's promises. And you can't feel those. You believe them.

4. Think about Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. There, He tried to meet with His Father for motivation and consolation before going to the cross. He found nothing, but obeyed anyway. Because of that obedience, I am never really alone and I never have to fear God's displeasure of me. He endured all that in my place.

I'm looking forward this week to starting our mini-series, Scarred, about the last days of Jesus before the cross. My prayer is that we will learn to really love and be amazed by Him. You can pray for me.

Come to RENEW this Friday. It's a big deal. It's going to be a revival.

The Size of My Army and a Special Request

Psalm 33: Read this yesterday from Psalm 33 and it really pumped me up:

16 The king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength. 17 The war horse is a false hope for salvation, and by its great might it cannot rescue. 18 Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear him, on those who hope in his steadfast love, 19 that he may deliver their soul from death and keep them alive in famine. 20 Our soul waits for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. 21 For our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name. 22 Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us, even as we hope in you.

It is not the size of our army or the speed of our horse that gives us success. If having a large army and a fast horse doesn't guarantee success, then the absence of those things doesn't guarantee failure, either. When I look to the future, I don't put my hope in the acumen of our skill, the prowess of our staff, or the amount of our resources. My hope is in something much more dependable: the STEADFAST love of the Lord. The one thing I can always bank on is God's compassion for people and His commitment to glorify His name. It glorifies Him when I am fruitful. It glorifies Him when I do my work with excellence. It glorifies Him when I prosper. And when I glorify Him people fall in love with Him, and when they fall in love Him they are saved. Whether or not I have a sufficient army or a fast enough horse is irrelevant. I have the steadfast, unchangeable love of the Lord to draw on. It is a well I can never plumb the depths of. I don't measure the task against the size of my resources, I measure the task against the size of His love.

PLEASE COME AT 9:00: If you come to the Brier Creek campus, please come to the 9:00 service. This is a time of year when we have a lot of new guests, and they usually come to the 10:45 service. By coming at 9:00, you can free up space for them. If they don't have a comfortable experience because of overcrowding, they may not come back. So, if you don't have commitments (like working with our children, etc) that demand you come at 10:45,  you could do a real service to us by coming at 9:00. Thanks!

Tribute to a Sunday School Teacher

Last week I got word that a favorite childhood Sunday school teacher of mine had died. His name was Jim Scott.

Most of you, especially you at the Summit Church, will never have heard his name before. But every message you hear from me was formed, in some way, by him. I've never given him credit, but he's present in almost every one.

He was my Sunday school teacher for many years. He was insane enough to volunteer to teach the 6th grade boys. He then "grew up" with us through several years... I can't imagine that he probably felt very "fulfilled" after teaching us each Sunday. We didn't really act interested in what he had to say. We determined whether or not it was a good class by if he brought donuts or not. Frequently one of us had to sit outside because we couldn't cease being idiots for the 40 minutes he had with us.

But we were listening. At least I was. I especially remember how so many of his lessons were filled with stories of people he had shared Christ with. He knew that people needed Jesus, that we needed Jesus. He told us that. Every Sunday. The Word of God was alive to him.

Years later, this would all come back to me.

When God began to work in my life... it was the ministry of men and women like him that suddenly came alive in my life.

He'll never read this blog. As far as I know, he may have died not knowing I had a blog, or even what a blog was. But from heaven I hope he looks down and sees the fruit of his life multiplying 1000 times over.

Here's to all you under-appreciated, overworked children and student volunteers, especially at the Summit Church, who are making a bigger difference in the generations that follow you than you'll probably ever know.

P.S. (I can't help but add that if you want to be involved in the lives of children or students, email Angie Field for children and Jason Gaston for our student ministry. They'd love to talk with you about it.)

P.P.S. If you come to the Brier Creek campus, PLEASE consider coming to the 9:00 service this week! Last week we had more people at the 10:45 service than we've ever had on campus. We are by no means empty in the 9:00, but there's still a few seats left there, and it will create more room from those first time people who come at 10:45! Thanks!

Temptation and Sin: John Owen

(Major props to the huge number of Summit people who came out for our GroupLink last night. If you missed it, there's still a chance to be a part of a group here.)

I'm reading a book that is POSITIVELY kicking my tail right now... it's the kind of book I wish I'd read at 12, or had someone teach it to me.

It is On the Mortification of Sin by Puritan John Owen. A relatively short book (80 pages), but I feel like it explains some of the major problems of my life.

Owen deals with how most Christians, even the fervent, full-time ones, let sins go "unchecked" (or, to use the Apostle Paul's word: "unmortified"). These sins of the heart darken us spiritually, choke out the seed of the word, and cause us to make bad judgment calls and miss opportunities God has for us. I sometimes ache with regret thinking about how much grace I've missed out on and opportunities to bless others because I have refused to go to war against sins of the heart like love of money, love of praise, the lusts of the flesh for things like sex or food, the attention of others, etc. "The vigour, and power, and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh." (p. 9)

Owen also shows that not only do we often not deal with the lusts of our heart, when we do we use the wrong weaponry. We try to overcome lust through spiritual busy-ness and discipline, rather than on total death to self, belief in the Gospel, and reliance on the Spirit. As Bible teachers, we often try to give people ways to improve their lives, relevant steps to take, etc, that are "merely legal duties, without the least mention of Christ or His Spirit." (v. 17)

Finally, sometimes God lets us struggle with lust because it's one of the only things that keep us coming back to Him--which is His ultimate purpose, to keep us dependent on Him: "Says God, 'Here is one, if he could be rid of this lust I should never hear of him more; let him wrestle with this, or he would be altogether lost'... Wasn't it a correction to Peter's self-confidence that God left him to deny his Master?" (p. 41-2).

Here are some other juicy extractions:

• "The choicest believers, who are assuredly freed from the condemning power of sin, ought yet to make it their business all their days to mortify the indwelling power of sin." (p. 7)
• "Be killing sin, or it will be killing you." (p. 9)
• "Let not that man think that he makes any progress in holy who does not mortify the bellies of his lusts." (p. 15)

• "Fasting, memorization, meditation and Bible reading have their place in order... but they are to be looked on as the streams, whereas we look on them as the fountain." (p. 17)
• "Mortification of sin by self-strength, carried on by ways of self-discipline, unto the end of self-righteousness, is the soul and substance of all false religion in the world." (p. 7)
• "(Much of organized Christianity) is made up of designs and contrivances to pacify conscience without full surrender to Jesus." (p. 37)
• "He that changes pride for worldliness, sensuality for Pharisaism, vanity in Himself to the contempt of others, let him not think that he hath mortified the sin that he seems to have left. He hath changed his master, but he is a servant still...Simon the Sorcerer (Acts 8) for a while left his sorcery, but hi covetousness and personal ambition remained still, and simply acted out another way." (p. 26).
• "It is to be feared that very many Christians have little knowledge of the main enemy that they carry about with them in their hearts." (p. 31) (OUCH... sometimes haven't we just socialized and Christianized our love of money, personal ambition, and love of the praise of men?)

• "A man may beat down the bitter fruit from an evil tree until he is weary; whilst the root abides in strength and vigour, the beating down of the present fruit will not hinder it from bringing forth more." (p. 30)

• "Jesus is the (only) fire that burns up the very root of lust." (p. 19)

So here's a shout out to an old book... the Puritans were often depressed and I don't want to be exactly like them, and the English is a little old, but it's very readable and, as C. S. Lewis said, at least every other book we read should be from a different culture or time period.

Samson and the Evangelical Community

I saw something about the life of Samson this past Saturday in some personal study that I'd never noticed before. Give me a minute to tease this out...

The land of Canaan that God gave to Israel was not a backwoods hicktown. It was, arguably, the premier world trade route, as people traveling around the Mediterranean would have to go right through the plains of Canaan to get from the prosperous North to Egypt.

However, scholars say that during the time of the "Judges" Israel was living in the mountains of Canaan rather than in the trade-route plains, which the Canaanites and Philistines still possessed. Israel was simply too lazy and unbelieving to go and take what God had promised to give them. They settled for a 'ghettoed' existence rather than engaging in battle with the Philistines.

Samson was one of the many champions God raised up to deliver Israel and lead them to their Canaanite domination. However, rather than leading Israel to conquer the Philistine cities, Samson began to live in the Philistine cities. There, he began to absorb Philistine values. The ultimate expression of this was his living with the prostitute Delilah.

Scholars agree that Samson was intended to be a picture of the entire Israeli nation. Rather than engaging the culture, they retreated from it; rather than confronting the culture, they absorbed it. In other words, they were OF the world but not IN it.

Sadly, I think this describes our American Evangelical Christian community. We are separated from the world, living in Christian enclaves reading Christian literature, watching Christian TV, listening to Christian music and talking with only Christian friends. We are separated from the world.

Yet, when you look closely, it's easy to see that we have absorbed our culture's values. St. Augustine said that our attitude toward money and power should be what distinguishes us from the world. The world uses its money to possess; the disciple of Jesus uses his money to give. The world uses power to control; the disciple of Jesus uses her power to bless. However, we crave money and power and position for the same reason the world does--self-benefit. Even, and perhaps especially, among us pastors. Just look at how some pastors crave money and power! In the words of Puritan John Owen, we "separate from the world, but live wholly to ourselves."

For Samson, this compromise cost him all his spiritual power. It was not the cutting of Samson's hair that "lost" it for him--his hair was not a magic talisman that subpoenaed God's power. The cutting of his hair was simply indicative of the fact that Samson had compromised those things that were supposed to make him distinct from the surrounding culture. It was the last element of the Nazirite vow he hadn't broken. He had so lost touch by that point that the "didn't even realize the Spirit of God was no longer on him."

In the same way, Christian leaders today have no shortage of magic horcruxes they point to that will supposedly bring back God's power: more relevant preaching; more expository preaching; trendier worship; ancient liturgy; more direct preaching; more conversational preaching; more prayer; exercise of spiritual gifts; etc etc.

Those things are great and often necessary. But perhaps the answer is simpler...and more difficult at the same time. Perhaps the power of God will return when we forsake the values of our culture and love Jesus rather than the world. Perhaps the fact that we have given away our souls to idols means we cannot ascend to the hill of the Lord (Ps. 24:3); perhaps our love for the world crowds out our love for God (1 John 2:15); perhaps our adulterous love affair with money and power means that He won't hear our prayers (James 4:3-4). If we would love only Jesus, perhaps His power would reign through us again.

In the words of Robert Murray McCheyenne, "I know that what my people most need from me are not great sermons but my personal holiness."

Not Fanatical Enough

I've received a few emails from friends about my post of yesterday, and I wanted to clarify what I said  about overcommitment to the Bible being a false diagnosis of the problem that many Christians care more about knowledge than they do about loving and serving Jesus and communing with Him in the Spirit.

I am not denying that many evangelical Christians place higher priority on knowing the Bible than they do knowing God. Many don't seem to realize that the point of the Book is not the Book itself but the Author. What I am denying is that that comes from too much emphasis on the Book; rather, it comes from the wrong type of emphasis on the Book. If you read the Bible as a source of doctrinal knowledge rather than as a manual for knowing and loving Jesus, you are reading it wrongly. Repent and read it again, this time with God as your goal and not the increase of your own, vain knowledge quotient as the goal.

Let me draw an analogy. Some people say that fanaticism is a problem among some Christians. Fervent devotion to Jesus is good, they say, but fanatical Christians (i.e. arrogant, strident, self-righteous, condescending, triumphalistic, even violent) are bad.

Arrogance and triumphalism among Christians are serious problems. But the problem is not that such Christians are fanatics, but that they are not fanatical enough. A fanatic is someone who follows the teachings of his religion radically. Jesus was not arrogant or strident or violent. So, a person who is arrogant, self-righteous and mean-spirited about Jesus is not fanatical enough--they need to follow Jesus radically in His love, service and humility.

In the same way, for the person that is zealous about knowing the Bible but who has a cold heart,  doesn't believe God for miracles and doesn't commune with the Spirit, the problem is not that they are too committed to the Bible, but that they are not committed enough.

How, in their commitment to the Bible, could they have missed that the whole point was to make us love and trust Jesus, long for His return, serve Him with all our hearts, and make us joyful, righteous, and peace-loving people?

P.S. This is my life right now: