Pursuing Joy

Do you remember when life first entered your dead heart, when the chains of sin were broken, when the dungeon of your sin-dead life flamed with light?  In those first days, weeks, months, Andrew Murray in Abide in Christ says, “you experienced that His word was truth; all His promises fulfilled; He made you partakers of the blessings and the joy of His love.  Was not His welcome most hearty, His pardon full and free, His love most sweet and precious?”

Yet many lose the blessings they once enjoyed and the love and joy of their first days with their Savior becomes “faint and feeble”.  Listen to Murray explain why:

“Often you have wondered what the reason could be, that with such a Savior, so mighty and so loving, your experience of salvation should not have been a fuller one. The answer is very simple. You wandered from Him.”

If your affections for our Savior are faint and feeble, if your joy in His saving love has waned, put off everything you are abiding in and abide in Christ.  The power of sin has been broken, so take hold of the everything spiritual blessing God has gracious given His people in Christ.  The gospel is not only the door to life with Christ, but also the power to abide in Him every day.  We cannot do this in our own strength… all “this Jesus Christ himself alone must do by His Holy Spirit. But what I would fain by the grace of God be permitted to do is, to repeat day by day the Master’s blessed command, ‘Abide in me’”.

Let us abide in our great and glorious Savior today through the power of the gospel and with the help of the Spirit.

The Resurgence, an arm of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, has posted a helpful article outlining John Owen’s On The Moritification Of Sin (you can buy Justin Taylor’s excellent edited version of 3 Owen books combined here, buy the standalone book here or download the original treatise here).  You can also download a 12-page pdf reading summary.  Although Owen is “heavy and hard to read” (JI Packer), it is definitely worth the effort.  Download the reading summary and use the outline to assist as you read through this important work.  It is important because, as Owen says, “Be killing sin, or it will be killing you.”

I can empathize with Jon Acuff in this post.  I hate throwing up… its the worst.  He makes an excellent connection between how our bodies expel toxins and harmful elements, but we hardly take this approach with sin.  His site has a different way of approaching things, most times hilarious, but I usually find his commentaries edifying and encouraging.

As shepherds care for their flock, Christian brothers and sisters are given the responsibility to “make disciples and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” (Matt 28:19-20)  Just the other day as I had the privilege to sit one on one and study God’s word together with a brother and I found J.I. Packer’s, Concise Theology to be a helpful read and  wonderful reflection as we reflect on God’s season of sending his son to earth for the redemption of our soul, for His glory.

God’s Glory Showing Requires Glory -Giving

“God’s goal is his glory, but this needs careful explanation, for it is easily misunderstood.  It points to a purpose not of divine love.  Certainly, God wants to be praised for his praiseworthiness and exalted for his greatness and goodness; he wants to be appreciated for what he is.  But the glory that is his goal is in fact a two-sided, two-stage relationship: it is, precisely, a conjunction of revelatory acts on his part whereby he shows his glory  to men and angels in free generosity, with (b) responsive adoration on their part whereby they give him glory out of gratitude for what they have seen and received.  In this conjunction is realized the fellowship of love for which God’s rational creatures were and are made, and for which fallen human beings have now been redeemed.  The to-and-fro of seeing glory in God and giving glory to God is the true fulfillment of human nature at its heart, and it brings supreme joy to man just as it does to God (Zeph. 3:14-17).
“Glory” in the Old Testament carries associations of weight, worth, wealth, splendor, and dignity, all of which are present when God is said to have revealed his glory.  God was answering Moses’ plea to be shown God’s glory when he proclaimed to Moses his name (i.e., his nature, character, and power, Exod. 33:18-34:7).  With that proclamation went an awe-inspiring physical manifestation, the Shekinah, a bright shining cloud that could look like fire, white-hot (Exod. 24:17).  The Shekinah was itself called the glory of God; it appeared at significant moments in the Bible story as a sign of God’s active presence (Exod. 33:22; 34:5; 16:7, 10; 24:15-17; 40:34-35; Lev. 9:23-24; 1 Kings 8:10-11; Ezek. 1:28; 8:4; 9:3; 10:4; 11:22-23; Matt 17:5; Luke 2:9; Acts 1:9; 1 Thess. 4:17; Rev. 1:7).  New Testament writers proclaim that the Glory of God’s nature , character, power, and purpose is now open to view in the person and role of God’s incarnate Son, Jesus Christ (John 1:14-18; 2 Cor. 4:3-6; Heb. 1:1-3)
God’s glory, shown forth in the plan and work of grace whereby he saves sinners, is meant to call forth praise (Eph.1:6, 12, 14), that is, the giving of glory to God by spoken words (Rev. 4:9; 19:7).  All life activities, too, must be pursued with the aim of giving God homage, honor, and pleasure, which is glory-giving on the practical level (1 Cor. 10:31).
God would not share with idols the praise for restoring his people, for idols, being unreal, contributed nothing to this work of grace (Isa. 42:8; 48:11); and God will not share the praise for salvation with with its human subjects today, for we too contribute nothing more to it than our need for of it.  First to last, and at every stage in the process, salvation comes from the Lord, and our praise must show our awareness of that.  This is why Reformation theology was so insistent on the principle, “Glory to god alone” (soli Deo gloria), and why we need to maintain that principle with equal zeal today.”

“Why did you do that?” is a common question in parenting.  I have yet to receive the Jonathan Edward’s response of “It was the strongest inclination of my heart”. In my house this question is usually met with a less than helpful mumbling of “I dunno”.   Then the question is usually asked again trying to invoke a real response, “Why did you do that?” My goal of the question is to cause a moment to rethink the actions that just preceded the issue.  What questions would God ask you in your everyday living?
Our challenge is to cry out for the wisdom that is granted to us by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:8), then exercise and install that wisdom into our own lives first as we lead in proper biblical thinking.  As we lead and guide the thoughts and minds of the youngest child and adolescents it’s important to lead with the mind and love of Christ. Although that conversations’ primary end is to discipline the child, it would better serve as a mirror to our own souls, allowing us to be shaped by similar questions, therefore to produce discipline and godly shaping of our own souls. The question then becomes ”Why did I just do that?”  Soul shaping discipline isn’t just for our children, age is simply not a means to sanctification; Godly discipline is the means.  We must be willing to allow the Holy Spirit to prompt difficult soul shaping questions in us, without us quenching the Holy Spirit. Our living must then fully rely upon the Spirit to answer and stir about repentance (Jn 14). This difficult delight of discipline has the potential to produce so much joy
In adoption the Heavenly Father holds us as His own sons (Gal. 4:5, Matt. 5:45, John 10:28). O’ that we would delight to find joy in that love of the Father.  To see His hand in “trials of various kinds” (James 1:1-4) and to know His certain (cross enduring) love that was demonstrated on the cross.  In our adoption as sons and daughters He promises to never cast out those given to Him via the Father (John 6:37).  Despite our deepest sins our heavenly Father continues to love and discipline us.  He may ask us the same type of question that He asked “man” in the garden, “Where are you?” (Gen 3:9). This well placed rhetorical question has a poignant aim; causing man to think.  God didn’t need Adam and Eve to answer him.  He was causing them to think.  In our case, whether good, bad or indifferent, “Why did I just do that?” is a question of thought to bring us outside of the event to look in to the event or actions and reassess the God glorifying or denying actions.
Dr. John Piper offers to us in his writing in Desiring God the thoughts of Blaise Pascal, Pascal’s Pensees p. 113

“All men seek happiness.  This is without exception.  Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end.  The cause of some going to war, and others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views.  the will never takes the least step but to this object.  This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.”

Do I settle that the actions of what I want are therefore what God wants of me, or do I allow the Holy Spirit to lead me to a greater joy in what God would actually desire? To say it as simply as I would to my own son, “Is that action that I just observed the way that God is most happy and satisfied with you?”