Author: revheff

In Prayer

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This Sunday I continue my series of New Year’s messages, Lord willing, beginning a two-part sermon on prayer from Luke 11:1-13 entitled With Christ in the School of Prayer.

By way of reflection in preparation for this Lord’s Day, I offer you this Puritan prayer from the Valley of Vision collection:

O Lord, in prayer I launch far out into the eternal world, and on that broad ocean my soul triumphs over all evils on the shores of mortality. Time, with its gay amusements and cruel disappointments never appears so inconsiderate as then.

In prayer I see myself as nothing; I find my heart going after Thee with intensity, and long with vehement thirst to live to Thee. Blessed be the strong gales of the Spirit that speed me on my way to the New Jerusalem.

In prayer all things here below vanish, and nothing seems important but holiness of heart and the salvation of others.

In prayer all my worldly cares, fears, anxieties disappear, and are of as little significance as a puff of wind.

In prayer my soul inwardly exults with lively thoughts at what Thou art doing for Thy church, and I long that Thou shouldest get Thyself a great name from sinners returning to Zion.

In prayer I am lifted above the frowns and flatteries of life, and taste heavenly joys; entering into the eternal world I can give myself to Thee with all my heart, to be Thine for ever.

In prayer I can place all my concerns in Thy hands, to be entirely at Thy disposal, having no will or interest of my own.

In prayer I can intercede for my friends, ministers, sinners, the church, Thy kingdom to come, with greatest freedom, ardent hopes, as a son to his father, as a lover to the beloved.

Help me to be all prayer and never to cease praying.

Why Don't You Hate God?

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Someone actually put that question to me not long ago. Why don’t you hate God?

Granted, he had his own anger issues, by his own admission. It never ceases to amaze me how rage can grip the human heart so as to strangle superior affections.

He posed the question in light of my head and neck cancer battle back in 2005. I didn’t recall the occasion, but he told me he actually saw me curled up in a fetal position on my family room couch suffering from the effects of treatment, balancing precariously between life and death. Somehow, and I hurt for him on this, he couldn’t imagine that somehow I would feel anything towards God after such suffering than outright hatred.

I paused. It was a legitimate question. Of all the things I said to him to try and redeem pastorally the opportunity presented before me, I simply said, “Jesus was enough.”

I also quoted Psalm 73:25-26.

Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Have you ever heard someone say, “As long as you have your health, you have everything?” I have. Among the things people tend to idolize, good health ranks near the top of the list along with lovers, wealth, power, and no doubt a few other so-called messiahs. I learned in 2005 that health makes a lousy functional savior. Cancer taught me, among other things, as long as you have Jesus, you have everything. And that’s why I don’t hate God.

How to Pray in Light of Abortion

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Another Sanctity of Human Life Sunday is upon us tomorrow.

If you wish to meditate in advance on my text for the sermon, please see Genesis 9:1-7. The title of the sermon is Why God’s Blessing Means Making Babies Not Murdering Them.

I don’t know about you, but I struggle to know how to pray redemptively in light of the scourge of abortion beyond the obvious.

Scotty Smith, pastor of Christ Community Church in Franklin, Tennessee, a frequent blogger for the Gospel Coalition, posted a helpful piece entitled A Prayer of Advocacy for Unborn Children. In it he expresses the following concerns and requests:

  1. For the courage and compassion to live as faithful advocates for human life.
  2. For the gospel compassion necessary to care for the women and men whose stories are marked by abortion – either as victims or agents.
  3. For wisdom to know how to love and serve those who have had to give up their children before birth to the heartbreak of miscarriage and stillbirth.
  4. For grace to open our hearts and homes to the millions of orphaned children who have made it safely into the world – that our zeal against abortion be matched by our zeal for adoption.

To read his entire prayer, which I wholeheartedly commend to you, click here.

What's On Your Heart?

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Or should I say, “What’s in your chest pocket?”

If you heard last Sunday’s message, you get the picture. I’m talking about meditation as a means of treasuring up the Word of God on our hearts. If you missed the message, you can listen to the audio here.

By way of reminder, I wanted to put two things from the message in this post.

The first is Don Whitney’s definition of and helpful analogy about meditation:

Let’s define meditation as deep thinking on the truths and spiritual realities revealed in Scripture for the purposes of understanding, application, and prayer. Meditation goes beyond hearing, reading, studying, and even memorizing God’s Word. A simple analogy would be a cup of tea. You are the cup of hot water and the intake of Scripture is represented by the tea bag. Hearing God’s Word is like one dip of the tea bag into the cup. Some of the tea’s flavor is absorbed by the water, but not as much as would occur with a more thorough soaking of the bag. In this analogy, reading, studying, and memorizing God’s Word are represented by additional plunges of the tea bag into the cup. The more frequently the tea enters the water, the more effect it has. Meditation, however, is like immersing the bag completely and letting it steep until all the rich tea flavor has been extracted and the hot water is thoroughly tinctured reddish brown (Spiritual Disciplines For The Christian Life, Colorado Springs: Navpress, 1991, 44).

The second is my eight-step plan for doing meditation:

1 M MAKE a text selection by reading Scripture.
2 E EXAMINE a text’s details by questioning Scripture.
3 D DETERMINE a text’s meaning by studying
Scripture.
4 I INTERNALIZE a text’s content by memorizing
Scripture.                             Psalm 119:97
5 T TAILOR a text’s content by personalizing Scripture.
6 A AMPLIFY a text’s ideas by paraphrasing Scripture.
7 T TAP a text’s power by praying Scripture.
8 E EMBRACE a text’s impact by applying Scripture.

May the Lord help us store up His word in our chest pockets for the storming of our doubting castles and the slaying of our giant despairs.

The Need for “Frontline” Prayer

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That’s what one writer calls concerted prayer for the cause of the revival of true religion among God’s people. It normally includes intercession for three things to see God move by His Spirit across a church and/or region:

  1. For grace to confess sins and humble ourselves.
  2. For a compassion and zeal for the flourishing of the church and reaching of the lost.
  3. For a yearning to know God, to glimpse His face, and see His glory.

For these things and more we will pray this Sunday evening in our monthly concert of prayer from 6 to 7:30 PM in the conference room at the church. Dear ones, these precious realities will not likely come our way unless we earnestly ask, seek, and knock at the throne of grace for God to bring them.

My challenge in 2013 is that we zero in on praying for these precise things in our private prayer times and our corporate ones. Also, may I ask that each of our households make it a goal that someone from the family would attend at least one of our monthly concerts of prayer?

There is power when God’s people come together to pray!

Save the Date!

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Let me encourage you to access your calendar right now or as soon as possible and set apart the dates below at OGC for the following:

What: Living in the Grip of the Gospel – What Is the Gospel? Conference

Who: Pastor and Author Greg Gilbert, Third Avenue Baptist Church of Louisville, Kentucky

When: April 19 & 20, 2013 (Friday evening and Saturday morning)

Where: Orlando Grace Church, 872 Maitland Ave, Altamonte Springs, FL

Why: Greg Gilbert is author of the 9Marks book What Is the Gospel? (Crossway, 2010, 127 pages). Dr. Al Mohler writes this about Greg and his book:

Greg Gilbert is one of the brightest and most faithful young men called to serve the church today. Here he offers us a penetrating, faithful, and fully biblical understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ. There is no greater need than to know the true gospel, to recognize the counterfeits, and to set loose a generation of gospel-centered Christians. This very important book arrives at just the right moment.

That’s our goal – to set loose a generation of gospel-centered Christians in Central Florida. Pray that God does just that!

Piper Passion 2013 Disclaimer & OGC Equipping Hour

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Wondering how those two things connect?

Let me explain. Pastor John Piper spoke in Atlanta this week at Passion 2013 just as he always does. His message was vintage Piper – a call to Christian hedonism from Hebrews 10, 11, & 12.

The next day, Louie Giglio, Passion’s host, gave a Piper disclaimer during the announcement time. He recalled at the first Passion so many years ago how Piper spoke on the deep things of God in that unique and challenging way he typically does. He told us after that first message somebody came to him and said something to the effect of “All that stuff Piper said last night went right over our heads.” To which Giglio replied, “Isn’t that great!” He then went on to exhort the 60,000 plus of us in the Georgia Dome not to settle for the trend today in some teaching to dumb down the great mysteries of the sovereign God by putting them on the lower shelf. Rather he would have us reach high for those same things with careful, rigorous thought through teaching like Piper’s that fosters it. It was a good, solid word for all to hear.

Now for my connection to our equipping hour. Tomorrow we start a new quarter in our discipleship scope and sequence during the 9:30 hour with three offerings that will challenge us to reach high for the mysteries of God and His word. Scott Devor will teach Systematic Theology Two – Spirit, Church, and Last Things. Will Powell will tackle Old Testament 1 – Creation to United Kingdom. And Ted Herrbach will lead an extremely practical class called How to Study the Bible. I guarantee you, without apology, that these offerings will stimulate us with careful, rigorous thought as we pursue the deep mysteries of God, His Word, and His church.

Here’s one very practical way that we get to love God with all our mind (Luke 10:27).

Hope to see you in one of these classes tomorrow morning as we go deeper by reaching higher.

Special Guest at OGC

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I am pleased to announce that our church will host this month’s gathering of the Spurgeon Fellowship of Florida. The meeting will take place on Thursday morning, January 10, at 10 AM in the fellowship hall. Spurgeon Fellowship is an association of like-minded pastors and churches which meets monthly for prayer, study, and fellowship around the gospel.

We are most fortunate to have as a guest speaker on this occasion, Dr. Sam Waldron. Dr. Waldron is the Academic Dean of the Midwest Center for Theological Studies and professor of Systematic Theology. He is also one of the pastors of Heritage Baptist Church in Owensboro, KY. Dr. Waldron received a B.A. from Cornerstone University, an M.Div from Trinity Ministerial Academy, a Th.M from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and a Ph.D from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. A member of the Evangelical Theological Society, Dr. Waldron is a prolific author, including a much beloved-by-me commentary on the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith. Oh, and how could I forget? Dr. Waldron is one of the professors in the newly formed Nicole Institute of Baptist Studies at RTS Orlando.

He will speak on Phil. 2:1-11 and then take questions and share his answers. If anyone from OGC would like to join us for these two hours, you are most welcome!

January Resource of the Month

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Don’t think of it as rushing things. Yes, I know we still have a few days left in December. And we still do have a copy of December’s resource of the month left in our resource center for anyone still needing to snag John Piper’s Momentary Marriage for a measly $5. Think of this post as a way to get a jump on the New Year with another great read.

January’s resource costs twice as much at $10 per copy, but I assure you it is worth the cost. I selected How to Read to Read the Bible for All Its Worth by Gordon Fee and Douglas Stuart (Zondervan, third edition, 2003, 275 pages) for a time-sensitive reason. Beginning January 7 during the 9:30 AM Equipping Hour at OGC, we will commence three new classes in our discipleship scope and sequence. For more information on all three check your insert in tomorrow’s worship bulletin. Also, look for future blog posts on this site by all the instructors.

As we heard last week however, during the announcements, Ted Herrbach will teach the class called How to Study the Bible. Let me suggest that this handbook by Fee and Stuart would make an excellent companion text for Ted’s class for anyone intending to take it. Billed as “a practical approach to Bible study in an easy-to-understand style” the authors build most of the book (chapters 3-13) around the different genres of the Bible (Epistles, Old Testament narratives, Acts, the Gospels, Parables, Law, Prophets, Psalms, Wisdom, and Revelation). They explain why this particular approach in the introduction:

What we do hope to achieve is to heighten the reader’s sensitivity to specific problems inherent in each genre, to help the reader know why different options exist and how to make commonsense judgments, and especially to enable the reader to discern between good and not-so-good interpretations–and to know what makes them one or the other (p. 21).

They open with an informative chapter on choosing a good translation. While I would differ with their recommendation to favor the TNIV, they do make several good arguments for why consulting multiple translations makes sense for solid Bible study determined to get at the commonsense meanings of a text. Why they have so little to say about the ESV, given its widespread popularity in evangelical circles these days, puzzles me, but that does little to detract from the helpfulness of this resource. They close with an appendix on the evaluation and use of commentaries that includes suggested volumes for various books of the Bible.

Starting tomorrow we will have over twenty copies of this book for purchase in our resource center for $10 each. Why not get a head start on this important subject by picking up a copy to read over the New Year’s holiday, especially if you intend to take Ted’s class? If you want to avoid bad interpretation of the Bible and recognize that not bothering to learn interpretation skills is not the answer but rather doing good interpretation based on commonsense guidelines is a nonnegotiable, then this book is for you.

Testing the Grinch Within

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Teddie’s out of the office for her annual year end vacation this week and next. That means, among other things, I get to type up and send out the connect card prayer requests. No big deal. Glad to do it.

Among the requests that went out to the leadership team were my own. They included this one: for my servant heart – our son and grandchildren are in town for the week.

Now, don’t get me wrong. There are multiple joys attached to the yuletide invasion of Joel and his tribe. But it also tests the reality of the gospel in my heart during an already busy time of year. And I can find myself easily irritated and Grinch-like.

For example, I went to take a shower earlier today. All I ask for is a relatively few minutes of uninterrupted, hot water streaming from above until I get myself clean. Any idea how hard that is to come by with four extra people in the house, three of them children?! It amazes me how little patience I can have with inconvenience. Perhaps I should have gotten that prayer request out on Monday instead of waiting until today!

Jesus warned against sins of hypocrisy (Matt. 7:5). I seem never to be far from putting on airs or keeping up masks in my flesh.

One thing that helps is focused self-examination, always, of course, under the lavish grace of the gospel.

Recently I came across this test for self-evaluation proposed by John Wesley for waging war against hypocrisy.

Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I’m a better person than I really am? Do I laugh at the mistakes of others, reveling in their errors and misfortunes? Do I insist on having my own way? Is there a tendency for me to put others down so that I’ll be thought of more highly? Do I pass on to others what is told to me in confidence? Am I thoughtful in expressing ‘thanks’ to people for what they’ve done for me, no matter how insignificant it seems? Am I a slave to dress, a slave to friends and their opinions, a slave to work or habits? Am I self-conscious, self-pitying, or self-justifying? Did the Bible live in me yesterday? Did I disobey God in anything yesterday? Did I insist on doing something about which my conscious was uneasy? Did I handle discouragement well or did I have to be coddled? Am I enjoying prayer? When did I last speak to someone about Christ? Is there anyone whom I fear, dislike, disown, criticize or hold resentment toward? If so, what am I doing about it? Is Christ real to me?

Frankly, I don’t ever want to take a walk down a road lined with signs asking those questions without gospel grace bracing me from condemnation. Still, giving ourselves to this kind of disciplined testing of ourselves to see that we are in the faith is commended to us in Scripture (2 Cor. 13:5) and and can reveal to us some measure as to how much the gospel is working itself out realistically in our every day lives.

Might 2013 be a year where at least once or twice a week we take a test for self-evaluation and not just at Christmas? Here’s to keeping the Grinch at bay and granting Jesus free reign.