church history

HE WHO HAS AN EAR, LET HIM HEAR

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Four Practical Applications for Overcoming Lovelessness

My recent posts focused on Christ’s letter to the church at Ephesus in Revelation 2:1-7.

“To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: ‘The words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2 “‘I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. 3 I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary. 4 But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent. 6 Yet this you have: you hate the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.’”

Jesus holds his churches accountable for practicing fervent love. We must make every effort to comply with his demands to that end. We need ears to hear his complaint against lovelessness. Embrace his remedy for lovelessness. Heed his warning about lovelessness. What will it look like if we have ears to hear what the Spirit says and overcome with conquering love? Here are some ideas for application.

Audit Your Love

What better, more obvious way to be a doer of the word and no hearer only from this text, than to continually audit yourself individually and your church corporately about how loving you are. If we don’t do this, we run the risk of hearing Jesus say, I have this against you. Please take this seriously. Regularly subject yourself to the blazing light of the attributes of love in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and remember and repent accordingly.

Study Biblical Love

Alexander Strauch’s little book Love or Die: Christ’s Wake Up Call to the Church (Lewis & Roth, 2008) is a profitable resource to this end. He points to nearly 1,000 references to love in one form or another in God’s word. Do you want to pursue love more diligently? Then you must read and study what God says about love in his word. Strauch’s appendix B contains 50 Key Texts on Love. That will get you started. Prefer learning by listening? Consider streaming John Piper’s sermon series (15 messages) entitled The Greatest of These Is Love.

Pray for Love

If Jesus reported on an audit of your church, would it include a commendation like this? I know your works how you earnestly pray for one another—especially that you grow in love and even overflow in love? Let’s take our cue from Paul in 1 Thessalonians 3:12. May the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you. The Thessalonian church was a prime example of first love according to 1 Thessalonians 4:9-10:

“Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another, for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers throughout Macedonia. But we urge you, brothers, to do this more and more.”

Practice Genuine Love

First John 3:16 says this: Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. Here’s my challenge. Conduct a self-audit in Romans 12:9-21 soon, and ask the Lord to focus you on just one tangible love practice in which you want to grow. Choose from among honoring, praying, giving, serving, showing hospitality, blessing, rejoicing, weeping, peacemaking, associating with the lowly, and more. You can do this! The Holy Spirit will help you (Gal. 5:22). 

There is evidence in the writings of the church fathers of the 2nd century that the Ephesian church did repent. A letter by Ignatius to the church praised them as “characterized by faith in and love of Christ”—their pastor “a man of inexpressible love.” 

May we too have ears to hear what Jesus says about the serious sin of lovelessness. To the one who conquers he will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.

PURITAN PEACEMAKING

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The Best of Jeremiah Burroughs on Matthew 5:9


Upon retirement I gave away a number of books from my personal library. Among the ones I kept and that lately has captured a part of my quiet time reflection comes from the pen of Puritan Jeremiah Burroughs (1599-1646). The Saints’ Happiness: Forty-One Sermons on the Beatitudes, includes no less than four messages on Matthew 5:9.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

In this post, I have captured a sample of Burrough’s best on this subject so crucial to a legitimate claim to the identity child of God. Read and pursue your happiness, saint!

It is interesting to note the placement of this Beatitude—it is the seventh in order. In Proverbs 6, we find a list of seven things that the Lord hates, and the seventh item mentioned is “one who sows discord among brethren.” In contrast to God’s hatred, the seventh blessing pronounced is upon the peace-makers.

Those who keep themselves pure, with clean hearts and consciences, are peaceable and capable of making peace with others.

A contrary disposition—one that is stubborn and perverse—is cursed. But a peaceable, gentle, and quiet disposition is blessed. Moreover, it is even more blessed to be an instrument in bringing about peace in the places where we live and among those with whom we interact. In the present times, there is a great need for peace-makers.

Blessed are those who, having experienced the blessedness of peace themselves and having obtained peace with God, earnestly desire to bring others into reconciliation with Him. Blessed is the person who, in a gracious manner, labors to draw others into peace with God and whom God blesses in these endeavors.

Jesus Christ’s heart is so committed to being a peace-maker between the world and God that He willingly sheds His blood and even becomes a curse. Consider, you children of men, the vast distance that existed between God and you, and how Christ— both God and man—had to intervene to make peace between you and God. He shed His blood and became a curse to accomplish this great work of God. This, my brethren, is the great mystery of godliness. We should spend our days in admiration, standing, wondering, and blessing our Saviour, the great peace-maker.

To meddle with the subject of peace between man and man is one of the most challenging tasks for any minister, especially during such times. It is difficult because people’s hearts are impure, filled with filth and uncleanness, and how does one go about making peace with them? It is difficult because hardly anyone can bring themselves to acknowledge that they are in any way responsible for the lack of peace among others.

A person who wishes to meddle in matters of peace among others must first ensure that their own relationship with God is well. They must possess a peaceable disposition themselves. If someone of a froward or turbulent disposition were to speak of peace and denounce divisions, everyone would be ready to challenge them. They must exhibit much self-denial, not considering themselves or their own party in any way, but aiming purely for God’s glory and the public good. Therefore, it is evidence of much grace in the heart, and thus the person is blessed. They are blessed when they handle matters wisely, prudently, and graciously.

When you are tempted to a fit of passion, know that the devil expects a great deal of sin to follow. Now blessed are the peace-makers, for they are the means to prevent an abundance of sin. That is a most blessed thing. What greater blessing can a person have than to be an instrument in preventing sin? It is a blessed thing to prevent even one sin, but to be an instrument in preventing so much sin must undoubtedly be blessed.

Blessed are the peace-makers, for they are instrumental for God in a work that He greatly delights in. When you read the Scriptures, you will find no duty more emphasized, backed by arguments, motives, and persuasions, and no duty that has stronger exhortations than peace. Read the Epistles to the Philippians, Ephesians, Colossians, Romans, and Corinthians, and you will consistently find that peace is what the Holy Spirit most persuades men to pursue. Even Christ Himself, the great peace-maker, is concerned not only with peace between God and us but also between man and man.

If people do not have wicked and vile hearts, when their corruption is stirred, and they have bitter thoughts and desperate resolutions, if God sends a person of peace to them—someone who approaches them with a calm and peaceable spirit, persuades them with scripture, and quells their boiling emotions, cooling their passionate hearts and dampening their desperate resolutions—then, if they are not desperately wicked, they will see cause to bless God for it. They will say, “Well, blessed be God who sent such a person to prevent me. I now see that I would have done something I would have later regretted.”

Want to read more? You can access an eBook version on Monergism. More to come soon in a series of posts.

WHEN CHRISTIANS DISAGREE

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A Review of Dr. Tim Cooper’s Book (Crossway, 2024)


Subtitled “Lessons from the Fractured Relationship of John Owen and Richard Baxter,” this helpful peacemaking resource opens with a spoiler alert: “There is no happy ending.” In these 167 pages, readers face a reality check.

Relationships rupture even among the best of believers. With this summary tale from seventeenth century English Christianity, we force down a bitter pill: two of church history’s giant leaders bickered over decades only to bog down “into a fixed and mutual dislike.”

They went to glory unreconciled. No happy ending indeed. Before reading further or after, you may wish to view here for a biblical account with a happier conclusion:

Or perhaps not entirely sad, if we learn the lessons that a four-hundred-year-past dispute offers. Cooper wrote this book with just that aim in mind. He performs a thorough Owen/Baxter relational postmortem. He records insightful observations and practical conclusions for negotiating our own context of conflict.

You need not fear the theological and historical sections interspersed throughout the book. They provide the necessary contexts for gleaning the peacemaking takeaways to be had. The rewards warrant any effort required by those who feel challenged by such content.

Cooper writes charitably. While leaning hard into Owen and Baxter’s faults for the purposes of this study, he doesn’t fail to remind us of the many virtues and gospel good works on display in their stories—both literarily and pastorally. They were indeed two good men, but like all of us, a mixed bag.

What follows this balanced disclaimer is a dissection of multiple forces—outside their control—which profoundly shaped the men over time. The author argues persuasively for how these things contributed to their relational demise.

He details their experience of a civil war, their geographical settings, their contrasting personalities, their theological debates (argued in print), their initial contact, their eventual in-person collision (ironically in a project designed to foster unity and mend division), and, last but not least, their lingering memory of past hurts that left them both bitter and resentful. Good grief! What a mess. Sound familiar? If so, you need to read this book.

You will find particularly helpful, as did I, the book’s conclusion. Cooper muses over five possibilities which may have resulted in a happy ending, not a sad one. What if there had been a mediator to assist them? What if they had focused more on what held them together and less on what drove them apart? What if they had paid more attention to the many Bible verses which summon us to unity and concord? What if they had manifested greater humility and less pride in their dealings with one another? Ouch! What if they could see what we can see with the advantage of distance and hindsight?

Do we see? If so, Dr. Cooper will have achieved his aim: “In understanding their story, perhaps we can better understand our own narratives. If we can see what they missed, perhaps we will have a much clearer idea of what we may be missing.”

Amen to that.

Where Was This When We Were Raising Kids?

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We start a new round of Equipping Hour classes this Sunday. I’m excited about all four offerings.

I get to teach another newcomers class. You can read my blog post about that here.

James Harvey will tackle the church history elective. I expect that will be a rich journey through the ages of God’s work among His people.

Pastor Mike and Ben Hamilton will lead the evangelism and mercy ministry class, always a gospel-shaped, practical treatment of our calling to bend the gospel outwards as followers of Jesus.

For our parents, we have Chuck and Pam Mitchell facilitating the Paul Tripp DVD curriculum entitled Getting to the Heart of Parenting. I was moved by the video promo shown on Sunday and included it at the top of this post for any who missed it. May I strongly encourage our Dads and Moms to take advantage of this unique teaching content? How I wish I had thought and acted in these categories when Nancy and I were bringing up our sons.

Hope to see as many of you as possible this Sunday, April 26, at 9:30 AM!

New Oxford Book Now in Stock!

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I managed recently to secure fourteen copies of the Hendriksen Classics version of our new read for the Oxford Club for Men. I am talking about William Wilberforce’s classic, A Practical View of Christianity.

Copies will be available this Sunday at the SDA resource table for a donation of $10 or whatever you can afford. While the study guide below will not conform to the pdf version of the book available free on line, and keeping in mind that this ebook version is not updated to modern English, you can still read it here if you prefer. For a previous post introducing this history-shaping resource click here.

We had to push back our first meeting to begin discussing this book to March 31 at the church office. We are on schedule to meet at 7 AM that day at the church office (bring your own breakfast) and a discussion of the preface.
For help in your prep here is Study Guide #1 – Preface.

May the Lord use this book that helped catalyze the Second Great Awakening to stir our hearts for pursuing great satisfaction in Jesus and passion to influence our culture for Him.

Why Celebrate Reformation Day?

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Better known for Halloween in our culture, October 31 marks the anniversary of Martin Luther’s bold and courageous posting of his 95 theses on the Wittenburg Church door in 1517. The dominoes toppled from that point on culminating in what we know as the Protestant Reformation.

Last night folks from our church gathered for a family-friendly, interactive-learning, fun-filled and creative celebration of this oh-so-important date in church history. Many thanks to all who served to make the evening so memorable and worthwhile!

At the outset of the evening, I spoke briefly as to why I believe we simply must as a church shaped by reformed theology mark Reformation Day with some sort of observance and celebration. In a nutshell, it is because all that was recovered for God’s people in the radical departure from the doctrinal and ecclesiastical aberrations of Roman Catholicism.

We need only look at the five solas of the Reformation to summarize what Luther, Calvin, Bucer, Zwingly, et al managed with God’s help to restore to Christianity.

Sola Scriptura – scripture alone. We got the Bible back as the sole source of divine authority. No pope, no council, no confession, no creed can bind the conscience. Only God’s word can. Unless all of the above conform to holy scripture, we should bear them no heed.

Solus Christus – Christ alone. We got the gospel back. The real gospel. Instead of a Christ plus human effort – baptism, church attendance, indulgences, giving alms, etc., we saw recovered the only thing that will actually save lost sinners – the substitutionary atonement of Jesus Christ on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins. Without the declaration of this precious truth,  a so-called gospel is no gospel, no good news at all.

Sola Gracia – grace alone. We got sovereign grace back. This recovery goes hand-in-glove with the previous one. The Reformation recovered the majesty of God in His sovereignty and the glory of His grace in that due to man’s sinful condition inherited from Adam leaving him unable to do anything on his own to remedy his condition, only by God’s electing, calling, and justifying of His own good pleasure is there hope for any member of the human race.

Sola Fide – faith alone. We got the chief article back. This became the rally cry of the Reformation. Salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. The Reformers never tired of declaring justification by this formula. Where would we be without the reformation restoring to us this precious truth: justification is the act of God by which he declares sinners to be righteous because of Christ alone, by grace alone, through faith alone?

Soli Deo Gloria – to God alone be the glory. We got the centrality of God’s glory back. The Reformation returned us to Rom. 11:36. All things are from God and to God, especially our salvation, so we must cry to God alone be the glory.

To my grief I have gone far too many years in a near forty year walk with Christ ignoring Reformation Day. No longer. Two years and counting. I am committed to this observance for as many years as the Lord will allow me to live. If you sing things like Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to the cross I cling, I would urge you to do the same.

For a couple of excellent blog posts from others on this Reformation day click here and here.