Prayer: James killed, Peter set free?

Jon Bloom writes well on the DGM blog:

Luke says it so quickly, so matter-of-factly: "[Herod] killed James the brother of John with the sword" (Acts 12:2). In the flow of the story this little phrase sets the stage for Peter's dramatic prison rescue by the angel. So that's what we remember. When Peter later wrote, "The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials" (2 Peter 2:9), this is the sort of rescue that easily comes to mind.

But the night that James sat in prison the angel didn't come. I'm sure he prayed for an angel. He knew God could send one if he wanted to. An angel had already rescued him and the other disciples once before, in chapter 5. But this night there was no bright light, no chains falling off, no sleeping guards. Just desperate prayers and fitful dozing—if he slept at all.

In the morning James was still in jail when the dreaded voice of the captain of the guard shouted, "Bring out the prisoner!" There was an anxiety-filled, prayerful walk to the place of execution. There was a pronouncement of guilt. Possibly there was an offer of pardon in exchange for recanting, followed by a refusal. There was a raised sword. There was a wince of fearful anticipation. No deliverance.

Or was there?

Jesus allowed the sword to fall on James as intentionally as he opened Peter's prison door. So the death of James is as crucial for us to remember as the rescue of Peter. Why did God let James die?

This question is relevant because at some point most of us will find ourselves facing death, pleading for deliverance, and not receiving what we think we are asking for. And it points to a difficult lesson that all of Jesus’ disciples must learn: Jesus often has different priorities than we do. What may feel desperately urgent to us may not be urgent to him—at least not in the same way.

Remember how Jesus slept in the boat during the storm? The disciples panicked at the fear of drowning and cried out, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” (Mark 4:38). He calmed the storm and then said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?”

Jesus’ lesson was clear: you’re afraid of the wrong thing. Don’t fear what or who can kill your body, but fear and trust me because I rule over storms and death (Matthew 10:28). Jesus knew that there were more dangerous “storms” ahead for the disciples, ones that would kill them. They needed to know whom to fear.
(Vitamin Z)

Mistaken Identity

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James MacDonald on preachers having a high view of Scripture

James MacDonald shared this thought after being asked this question @Preaching Today: As you hear other preachers, what's the biggest thing you want to tell them about preaching with authority?

I would never use the term "preaching with authority," because I think that ascribes authority to the messenger, and the authority is not in the messenger. The authority is in the Word. I hope if you hung out with me a lot—granted I'm a strong personality, I know what I think, I can articulate myself, I'm not afraid to talk about anything—but I hope that if we spent more time together you would see a marked gap between the tonality of my preaching, where I'm speaking for God and representing him, and the tonality of my private conversation. It shouldn't be the same. The authority should be in the message, not in the messenger.

I never listen to another preacher and think to myself, How could he be more authoritative? What I sometimes do, though, is I listen to a preacher equivocate about God's Word, and I think to myself, What an awful business it must be to have to get up and teach a message from a Book that you don't even believe, or that has portions you don't believe. To me, if you don't believe portions of it, then really what good is it at that point? It's not supernatural, it's just a human document, so let's go golfing, right? I wouldn't want to spend my life preaching something I don't think is a message from God.

When I hear a preacher and his message sounds weak—not weak because it's a comforting or teaching message, but weak in that I can tell the guy doesn't have any confidence in what he's saying—I think, Low view of Scripture.

You and I have had several conversations about different movements and significant leaders within Christianity over the last 20 years. Some of them have knowingly or unknowingly deemphasized the centrality of the Word of God. No ministry that deemphasizes the priority and centrality of God's Word will last for long. Jesus said, "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my Word will not pass away." God himself is supernaturally preserving his Word in the center of the work that truly is his kingdom.

Where the Word is deemphasized, ministries are doomed. They're doomed. They're paddling toward the falls, and they don't even know it. They're not confident in God's Word. Their ministry is not going anywhere good. There are preachers that have been loose and free and cavalier with the explicit statements of Scripture, and they've been celebrated from coast to coast, but their ministries and their lives are in freefall—already, in our lifetime. God does not sustain such a ministry. "The eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that he may strongly support those whose heart is completely his." God is not going to strongly support someone who does not strongly support his Word.

Sinning against God by Denny Burke

This is from the comment section over at Parchment and Pen (great web site).

read Denny's thoughts on what it means to sin against a Holy God.

"If we were to see a little boy pulling the legs off of a grasshopper, we would think it strange and perhaps a little bizarre. If he were pulling the legs off of a frog, that would be a bit more disturbing. If it were a bird, we would probably scold him and inform his parents. If it were a puppy, that would be too shocking to tolerate. We would intervene. If it were a little baby, it would be so reprehensible and tragic that we would risk our own life to protect the baby. What’s the difference in each of these scenarios? The sin is the same (pulling the limbs off). The only difference is the one sinned against (grasshopper to a baby). The more noble and valuable the creature, the more heinous and reprehensible the sin. And so it is with God.

The heinousness of sin is not measured by the sin itself (its content or duration) but by the nobility of the one sinned against. If God were a grasshopper, then to sin against him wouldn’t be such a big deal, and an eternal judgment would be disproportionate. But God isn’t a grasshopper, He’s the most precious, valuable, beautiful being in the universe. His glory and worth is infinite and eternal. Thus to sin against an infinitely glorious being is the most heinous sin in the universe that merits an infinitely heinous punishment.

We don’t take sin seriously because we don’t take God seriously. We have so imbibed of the banality of our God-belittling culture that our sins hardly trouble us at all. Our sin seems small and eternal judgment too severe because we think so little of God."

What do you think?

True Grace and True Faith by MacArthur

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should boast. Ephesians 2:8-9

Salvation is solely by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8). That truth is the biblical watershed for all we teach. But it means nothing if we begin with a misunderstanding of grace or a faulty definition of faith.

God's grace is not a static attribute whereby He passively accepts hardened, unrepentant sinners. Grace does not change a person's standing before God yet leave His character untouched. Real grace does not include, as Chafer claimed, "the Christian's liberty to do precisely as he chooses." True grace, according to Scripture, teaches us "to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age" (Titus 2:12). Grace is the power of God to fulfill our New Covenant duties (cf. 1 Cor. 7:19), however inconsistently we obey at times. Clearly, grace does not grant permission to live in the flesh; it supplies power to live in the Spirit (cf. Rom. 6:1-2).

Faith, like grace, is not static. Saving faith is more than just understanding the facts and mentally acquiescing. It is inseparable from repentance, surrender, and a supernatural longing to obey. None of those responses can be classified exclusively as a human work, any more than believing itself is solely a human effort.

Salvation is a gift, but it is appropriated through a faith that goes beyond merely understanding and assenting to the truth. Demons have that kind of "faith" (James 2:19). True believers are characterized by faith that is as repulsed by the life of sin as it is attracted to the mercy of the Savior. Drawn to Christ, they are drawn away from everything else. Jesus described genuine believers as "poor in spirit" (Matt. 5:3). They are like the repentant tax-gatherer, so broken he could not even look heavenward. He could only beat his breast and plead, "God, be merciful to me, the sinner!" (Luke 18:13).

Faith and works are not incompatible. Jesus even calls the act of believing a work (John 6:29)--not merely a human work, but a gracious work of God in us. He brings us to faith, then enables and empowers us to believe unto obedience (cf. Rom. 16:26).

We must remember above all that salvation is a sovereign work of God. Biblically it is defined by what it produces, not by what one does to get it. Works are not necessary to earn salvation. But true salvation wrought by God will not fail to produce the good works that are its fruit (cf. Matt. 7:17). No aspect of salvation is merited by human works, but it is all the work of God (Titus 3:5-7).

Steve Camp on Grace

THE GRACE OF GOD
Grace is a perfection of the Divine character which is exercised only toward the elect. Neither in the Old Testament nor in the New is the grace of God ever mentioned in connection with mankind generally, still less with the lower orders of His creatures. In this it is distinguished from mercy, for the mercy of God is "over all His works" (Psalm 145-9). Grace is the alone source from which flow the goodwill, love, and salvation of God unto His chosen people. This attribute of the Divine character was defined by Abraham Booth in his helpful book, The Reign of Grace thus, "It is the eternal and absolute free favor of God, manifested in the vouchsafement of spiritual and eternal blessings to the guilty and the unworthy."


There are three principal characteristics of Divine grace:

First, it is eternal. Grace was planned before it was exercised, purposed before it was imparted: "Who hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began" (2 Timothy 1:9).

Second, it is free, for none did ever purchase it: "Being justified freely by His grace" (Romans 3:24).

Third, it is sovereign, because God exercises it toward and bestows it upon whom He pleases: "Even so might grace reign" (Romans 5:21). If grace "reigns" then is it on the throne, and the occupant of the throne is sovereign. Hence "the throne of grace" (Hebrews 4:16). Just because grace is unmerited favor, it must be exercised in a sovereign manner. Therefore does the Lord declare, "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious" (Exodus 33:19). Were God to show grace to all of Adam's descendants, men would at once conclude that He was righteously compelled to take them to heaven as a meet compensation for allowing the human race to fall into sin. But the great God is under no obligation to any of His creatures, least of all to those who are rebels against Him.


What do you think?

Fortune Cookie or Osteen by Challies

The other day I ate some rather extraordinary Thai food for lunch and, on my way out, grabbed a fortune cookie. I cracked it open and read a silly little proverb meant to inspire, I suppose. I wish it had said "Brisk uphill walk after all-you-can-eat Thai is a bad idea." Never mind. As I waddled my way home, regretting that last bowl of curry (so delicious...),

I thought "This fortune sounds like something Joel Osteen would say." And then it struck me--there is very little difference between Joel and those fortune cookies (except that the cookies are delicious, of course). And now, to prove it, I will give you these twelve quotes. You tell me which are from the fortune cookies and which are from Joel Osteen.

Question One
"Happiness is not the absence of conflict, but the ability to cope with it."

Question Two
"Do all you can to make your dreams come true."

Question Three
"Take time to make a difference. Think about how you can make somebody else's life better."

Question Four
"Avoid focusing on the negative aspects of the past."

Question Five
"You have something to offer that nobody else can give!"

Question Six
"When you can't naturally feel upbeat, it can sometimes help to act as if you did."

Question Seven
"To affirm is to make firm."

Question Eight
"Relationships are more important than our accomplishments."

Question Nine
"Somebody needs your encouragement. Somebody needs to know that you believe in them."

Question Ten
"The best things in life aren't things."

Question Eleven
"You will produce what you're continually seeing in your mind."

Question Twelve
"Judge each day not by the harvest you reap but by the seeds you plant."

How did you do?
Answers: Q1=FC, Q2=JO, Q3=JO, Q4=FC, Q5=JO, Q6=FC, Q7=FC, Q8=JO, Q9=JO, Q10=FC, Q11=JO, Q12=FC

The Death of Saints by Spurgeon

“I have seen believers die, and if anything can convince a man of the reality of religion, of the truth of the Scriptures, and of the power of the Spirit, it is the death of saints. I have seen many persons who seemed to be as much dying of their joy as of their disease, they were so happy. Their eyes, their face, their whole bearing were those of persons in whom the utmost pain was forgotten in an excess of joy, while weakness was swallowed up in the delights of the heaven which was dawning upon them . . . for Christ has come to them, and they have seen the King in his beauty, even in the borderland before they have crossed the river and entered into Canaan. ‘Is this to die?’ said one. ‘Well then,’ said he, ‘it is worth while to live even to enjoy the bliss of dying.’ . . .

Only mind you do not miss the way, one of you. Mind you do not miss the way!”

C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of the Old Testament (London, n.d.), III:272.

Precious in the sight of the LORD Is the death of His saints. Psalm 116:15