My Life Verse

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

Two verses from the book of Jeremiah have been guiding lights for me from early in my Christian life:

23 This is what the Lord says:
The wise man must not boast in his wisdom;
the strong man must not boast in his strength;
the wealthy man must not boast in his wealth.
24 But the one who boasts should boast in this, that he understands and knows Me—
that I am Yahweh, showing faithful love, justice, and righteousness on the earth,
for I delight in these things.
This is the Lord’s declaration.

Jeremiah 9:23-24

Let’s do a little hermeneutics on this passage today.

First, ten observations.

  1. God is speaking.  Jeremiah is reporting what God has said.  This is the Lord’s declaration.
  2. “Boast” is repeated three times in the negative and twice in the positive – key verb.
  3. The command to “not boast” is absolute (must not ever).
  4. Boasting in God and boasting in our wisdom, strength, and wealth are mutually exclusive.
  5. God commands mankind to boast in knowing Him as Revealed in His Word (covenant God of Israel).
  6. God reveals Himself through His works of love, justice, and righteousness on the earth.
  7. God delights in his character traits.
  8. The context before (verse 22) reminds us of the fragile nature of humanity.
  9. The context after (verse 25) teaches us about God’s coming judgment.
  10. The cultural context was a people who trusted in their own strength and riches.

Second, four interpretations.

  1. God commands His people to never trust in their own attributes, which are passing away, but to trust in His attributes.
  2. The goal of human life is not to make much of ourselves, but to know the God of the Bible in the fullness of His revelation.
  3. What we boast about (with our words) reveals what we worship with our hearts.
  4. God has most fully shown His commitment to love, justice, and righteousness by sending Jesus into this world.

Third, two applications.

  1. We should spend as much time seeking to know God Almighty as we do pursuing our wisdom, strength, and wealth.
  2. As Christians, we should be marked by our praise of God instead of endless self-promotion.

I am thankful for these verses because they teach me what is important and constantly drive me back to my need for God’s grace.  I regularly miss the point of the Bible and forget that all of life is about knowing God, not boasting in myself.  What do you boast in?  Where do you look in times of trial?  What do the words of your mouth and the meditations of your heart declare?  That God is your source of refuge and strength or that you will be able to make it based on your own wisdom, strength, and wealth?

If we build the largest army and gather the largest pile of riches and earn the most degrees, but don’t know and understand the God of all armies, riches, and knowledge, we have missed everything.

Store treasures like Jeremiah 9:23-24 in your heart.  They will most certainly light your way.

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Men & Women

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

One of the greatest areas of confusion around our globe today centers on gender issues.  We are all aware that our personal gender and the gender of others is important, but we are unsure why and for what purpose.  As a global generation, we tend to distort gender in two ways:

1- Some think that one gender is superior than the other.  In more traditional and hierarchical cultures, men are seen as more valuable than women.  Many have carefully documented the abuse that women face at the hands of men worldwide (see Half the Sky by Kristof & WuDunn as one of the best).  This includes female infanticide (leaving girl babies to die after birth or aborting pre-term girls because parents want to have a boy).  This includes forced marriages, rape, sexual abuse, poverty based on being underpaid, lack of education, and birthing complications (lack of access of basic healthcare, especially in childbirth).  These circumstances demonstrate the impact of cultures where men are seen as superior to women.

In more progressive cultures, women are seen as more valuable than men.  Women are understood to be smart, caring, and wise while men are understood to be brutish, stupid, and foolish.  More often than not, women are given custody of kids in a divorce, fathers are devalued in their role in the home and the culture at large.  Men are portrayed as being unable to do anything of worth or value without the guiding hand of a wife or mother to guide their steps.  Education is built on models that favor girls over boys, and boys are told to act more like girls.  Overall, masculine energy is seen as destructive rather than constructive.

The Bible rejects this view of gender as contrary to the Creator’s original design.  The Bible’s first statement on gender (in the first chapter of the first book of the Bible) says that God made both male and female in His image.  In other words, the creation narrative teaches us the equal value of men and women in God’s sight.  Beyond that, the gospel of Jesus Christ also teaches the equal value of men and women.  Paul says in Galatians 3:28 that there is neither male nor female in Jesus Christ, but that we are all one in Christ.  His point is that Jesus died for men and women, and that in Christ, we are co-heirs to the promises and benefits associated with the gospel. Here we see that creation and the cross teach the equal value of men and women in the sight of God.  This biblical doctrine challenges both traditional and progressive worldviews on their view of men and women.

2- Some think that men and women are the same.  Instead of appealing to the biblical narrative to establish the equal value of men and women, some seek to eliminate all distinctions between men and women.  If gender differences give rise to oppression, then the solution must be (some would say) to remove gender as a meaningful category at all.  This leads whole sections of our society to ignore gender completely or to explain gender differences as social constructs more than essential realities.  The result of this view of gender has been equally devastating for culture at large and relationships in particular.  The practical result of this worldview is the expectation of women to act like men and men to act like women.  This impacts the way we date, our view of marriage, and our view of parenting.  Huge consequences flow from flattening the differences between male and female.

Of course, this worldview flies in the face of the universal experiences of the human race.  We are different.  At a minimum, we can all agree that men and women are different biologically.  Our bodies are not the same.  Whether they were designed by God to be that way (which the Christian Bible would teach) or not, we are not physiologically the same.  As much as I might want to have a baby, my body will never be able to do that.

Beyond that, we are different in our responsibilities before God.  This teaching is uniquely biblical, but it also squares with human experience.  God has given us unique roles and responsibilities based on our gender differences.  Many of his commands are universal, but some are gender-specific.  By understanding this, we can learn how God has uniquely wired men and women.

The Bible has much to say about this important issue.  I hope you will join us starting this Sunday, Mother’s Day, as we begin a six-week series on biblical manhood and womanhood.

Categories: Culture | Leave a comment

Gospel Identity

Posted on May 7, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

One of my personal core-values (and one that I have tried to build into the culture of our church staff) is do ministry out of my identity in Christ.  What I mean by this is that we don’t seek our identity in our performance or metrics, but in what Jesus Christ has done for us in His death, resurrection, and His promised return.  I don’t always live up to this core value (making it more aspirational than actual), but I return to it again and again in my personal prayer time and in the way I lead staff and volunteers.

So much of our work “for the Lord” is actually motivated by trying to prove ourselves.  We want approval and recognition from our family, our friends, our co-workers, and our community.  But this can be a never-ending trap (a form of self-justification).  It is one thing to seek excellence in all we do in order to honor God.  It is another to over-work and stress-out because we are looking for some kind of validation of our value and worth.

The Christian gospel teaches us that our position with God is established not based on our efforts, but on the finished work of Jesus Christ and the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit.  Paul beautifully captures this idea on Titus 3:5, “He saved us – not by works of righteousness that we had done, but according to His mercy, through the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit.”  This truth must get deep in our souls so that we don’t seek to self-justify based on our ministry efforts or results.

A good way to evaluate your own source of worth and value is to ask this question, “what, if taken away from me, would crush my sense of worth as an individual?”  Maybe the answer to that question is your children or your job or your hobbies.  For me, it can so often be ministry itself.  And so the irony grows – that which I do for the Lord can become the very thing I substitute for Christ as the foundation of my worth before the Lord.  If we can turn ministry into a false-god, we can turn anything into an idol.

Lord, help us every day to recognize that You are the only one who can justify us, and that everything we do must be in response to your grace or it is destined to become a unstable source of identity than will enslave us to the opinions of others.  Set us free, Lord, to serve You for Your sake and not for ours.

Categories: Gospel, Spiritual Life | Leave a comment

The Whole Counsel (& Money)

Posted on May 6, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

One of the most important skills to learn in Bible-study (as a student of the Word and a teacher of the Word) is to teach everything the Bible says about a subject rather than just emphasize one thing the Bible says.  We are constantly in danger if we reduce the teaching of the Word to one sentence or principle for two reasons.

ONE, pulling biblical principles out of the narrative of the Bible can change the meaning of the passages we are teaching.  For example, if the main narrative of the Bible is that God created everything that is out of nothing for His own glory and sent His only Son to redeem and restore His creation which was broken by our rebellion, then the individual stories and principles must be put into that broader context.  If not, we will actually contradict the primary story of the Bible (you need a Savior to redeem you and the Spirit to help you) with moralistic parables about how to live moral lives without the presence and power of God.

TWO, emphasizing one teaching from the Scriptures on a topic can distort the whole counsel of God’s Word because the Bible says complimentary things on numerous topics.  This is called reductionism, where the teacher over-emphasizes one part of the biblical narrative at the expense of the whole.  For example, if a teacher just says the Bible teaches that sex outside of marriage is wrong but doesn’t say the Bible teaches that sex inside of marriage is beautiful, then people can get the idea that God is against sex in general rather than the true teaching that God created sex and puts boundaries on our sexuality.

This paradigm for Bible study (don’t reduce the biblical teaching to one point) has been elevated in importance in my mind as we have tried to teach the biblical worldview on money and possessions.  The Bible (and Jesus Himself) says so much about money and possessions that you can’t reduce it to one sentence or principle.  In fact, we must teach the whole counsel of God on money or we are likely to distort and misapply the Scripture in some way.  When it comes to money, the Bible teaches AT LEAST the following eleven truths in different passages:

1- Wealth-building can be wise.
2- God gives excess to some so that they can share with those who have less.
3- Jesus’ radical generosity toward us serves as a model and a motivation for our radical generosity.
4- The Holy Spirit must guide us as to which sacrifices we, personally, are to make.
5- God delights in our enjoyment of His material gifts.
6- God, not money, should be our primary source of beauty and security.
7- We can’t take anything we collect here with us but we can invest in eternity.
8- The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
9- No one can be a slave to money and a slave to God at the same time.
10-  Everything belongs to God.  We are just managers of His stuff.
11- God wants His people to be regular, sacrificial givers.

Do you see my major point?  If you and I take only ONE of these truths and ignore the rest, you will distort the teaching of the Bible on money (as many have).  Those who teach a prosperity theology (God wants you to be rich) and a poverty theology (God wants you to be poor) are doing this kind of reductionism – finding ONE verse that supports their worldview and teaching it without the context of the whole counsel of the Bible.

Where do we go from here?  First, we read the whole Bible (a point I’ve made many times on my blog), not just parts of it that we like.  Those that read only the New Testament or the Gospels or the Psalms are destined to make these kind of mistakes.  Don’t ignore any parts of the Word – read it all.  Second, make sure that you don’t overstate what the Bible says when applying to your life or the lives of others.  This is where we get into trouble and become legalistic.  Allow God to speak to you personally and clearly, and trust Him to lead others as they read the Scriptures.  Third, put together everything the Bible teaches on a topic before you build a case on just one passage.  In other words, teach the Bible holistically.

May God be glorified in us as we listen to everything He has said to us.

Categories: Bible Study, Money | Leave a comment

Contextualization & Syncretism

Posted on April 4, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

Good missionaries know that they must contextualize their ministry to their receiving culture.  Missionaries seek to present the eternal truth of the gospel in a way that a non-Christian culture can understand and respond to God’s voice.  The most obvious form of contextualization (though not always the most simple) happens when a missionary crosses a language barrier to communicate the truth.  For example, a missionary from Texas who travels to France to spread the gospel must first learn how to speak French before they do anything else.  This is called contextualization – learning how to communicate effectively in a different culture.

What is clear for missionaries in foreign cultures is not always clear for missionaries on their home turf.  In other words, learning to communicate the gospel to a people group that is foreign to you makes the contextualization steps abundantly clear.  The missionary sees quickly that he is an outsider and that he needs to adopt new styles of dress and speech and patterns of behavior in order to work in this new cultural context.  But what does contextualization mean in your own cultural context?  How do use the language and patterns of your native culture to effectively communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ?

One of the reasons that this is exceedingly difficult is because the line between contextualization and syncretism is thin.  Whereas contextualization is entering a cultural worldview for the sake of clearly communicating God’s eternal truth in an understandable way, syncretism is the merger of two worldviews into one new worldview.  In other words, if we are not careful in our missionary work (especially in our own culture but also in foreign cultures), we will enter the worldview of those around us not to challenge it but in order to adopt it and merge it with Christian theology.

When you travel overseas, syncretism is fairly easy to see.  If Christians in another context have adopted non-Christian beliefs from their culture, you are more likely to see them as an outsider to both cultures.  But discerning syncretism in your own culture is exceedingly difficult.  Let’s look at two biblical examples to further illustrate the difference between effective missionary contextualization and unhealthy theological syncretism.

First, let’s look at Paul’s missionary work in Athens in Acts 17:22-34.  In this passage, Paul goes to the place of religious practice for his receiving culture, the Areopagus, and intelligently engages the pagan culture.  He obviously had read their poets and knew their philosophers.  He spoke their language and knew their customs.  Paul identifies with them and speaks highly of their religiosity.  However, in the midst of entering the Athenean worldview, he also challenges it with biblical truth.  He enters the worldview to challenge the worldview – which is the key of missionary contextualization.  Please note in this passage that Paul goes to the people he is ministering to and does not critique their morality.  He gets below the surface of their activities to their idolatry.  He wants to speak to their foundational beliefs, not their outward behaviors.  He understands the worldview of those he is trying to reach (and explains it clearly) so that He can engage it intelligently and challenge it biblically (with the metanarrative of Scripture).

To see a clear illustration of crossing the line into syncretism, let’s look at the Israelites in Judges 2:11-15.  Instead of driving the foreign peoples out of the Promised Land like they hand been commanded, the Israelites assimilated the religious beliefs and practices of those around them into their own faith system.  This is essential to understand.  They did not abandon Yahweh completely.  They abandoned Yahweh uniquely.  In other words, they continued to worship Yahweh and bring sacrifices to Yahweh, but they also wanted to include the gods of the Canaanite religions in their worship.  This is called syncretism – adding the gods of another worldview into the Christian worldview to form a new melting-pot religion.  The result is a mixture of Christian language and theology with pagan language and theology.

You can see why the missionary has a difficult task – to study a worldview at the level of understanding it and being able to communicate within it without adopting the beliefs and values of that worldview.  In our current American culture, the dominant worldviews are materialism, hedonism, secularism, pluralism, naturalism, and moralism.  As we engage each one of these religious systems (which they are) with the gospel of Jesus Christ, we must be aware of the danger we face of uncritically adopting the idols associated with each.  Moving forward, the challenge for Christian missionaries is to effectively contextualize our work without falling into theological syncretism.  May God give us wisdom and insight into our tendencies as His servants so that we can avoid the traps that would hurt our witness for Christ.

Categories: Culture, Missions | Leave a comment

The Best Gospel Tract Ever Written

Posted on March 11, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

I wish every person in the world would take at least take ten minutes and read these words that were written 750 years before Jesus was born.  They never cease to amaze me.  Read it slowly and in awe.

Isaiah 52:13-53:13

See, My Servant will act wisely; He will be raised and lifted up and greatly exalted. Just as many were appalled at You— His appearance was so disfigured that He did not look like a man, and His form did not resemble a human being — so He will sprinkle many nations. Kings will shut their mouths because of Him, For they will see what had not been told them, and they will understand what they had not heard.

Who has believed what we have heard? And who has the arm of the Lord been revealed to? He grew up before Him like a young plant and like a root out of dry ground. He didn’t have an impressive form or majesty that we should look at Him, no appearance that we should desire Him.  He was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering who knew what sickness was. He was like someone people turned away from; He was despised, and we didn’t value Him.

Yet He Himself bore our sicknesses, and He carried our pains; but we in turn regarded Him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But He was pierced because of our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on Him, and we are healed by His wounds.  We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the Lord has punished Him for the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth. Like a lamb led to the slaughter and like a sheep silent before her shearers, He did not open His mouth. He was taken away because of oppression and judgment; and who considered His fate? For He was cut off from the land of the living; He was struck because of my people’s rebellion.  They made His grave with the wicked and with a rich man at His death, although He had done no violence and had not spoken deceitfully.

Yet the Lord was pleased to crush Him severely. When You make Him a restitution offering, He will see His seed, He will prolong His days, and by His hand, the Lord’s pleasure will be accomplished.  He will see it out of His anguish, and He will be satisfied with His knowledge. My righteous Servant will justify many, and He will carry their iniquities. Therefore I will give Him the many as a portion, and He will receive the mighty as spoil, because He submitted Himself to death, and was counted among the rebels; yet He bore the sin of many and interceded for the rebels.

Categories: Bible Study, Gospel, Jesus | Leave a comment

Jesus in Beijing

Posted on March 10, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

David Aikman’s book on the history of Christianity in China is a must read for anyone today who wants to understand non-Western Christianity and the missionary movement of God around the world.  Aikman worked at one time as the Beijing bureau chief for Time Magazine where he was able to gain perspective on the rapid expansion of Christianity throughout China.  His book was first published in 2003 and is now approaching ten years old – which means you can buy a used copy on Amazon for next to nothing.  While the last decade has seen additional developments in China, all of Aikman’s reporting is still timely and helpful in giving the reader a sense of what the last 200 years have looked like for Chinese believers.

The story of Christianity in China includes some of the most famous figures in the history of western Protestant missions.  Robert Morrison worked in China in the early 1800s and produced the first translation of the Bible into the Mandarin language.  J. Hudson Taylor led one of the largest missions mobilization movements in history when he started China Inland Missions in mid 1800s.  CIM mobilized thousands of missionaries to go to interior mainland China, contextualize their ministry to the different people groups, and share the gospel.  In addition to Morrison & Taylor, Lottie Moon spent over 40 years in China starting in the late 1800s.  Her work as a Baptist missionary is remembered today in the annual Lottie Moon Christmas offering that Southern Baptist Churches take to support international missions.

This large influx of missionary work planted the seed out of which the Chinese Protestant church was to multiply exponentially.  Starting in the early 1900s, political and worldwide events led to the removal of most western missionaries by force by 1950.  China was occupied by the Japanese, then ravaged by World War II, and finally taken over by the Communists under Mao Zedong in 1949.  Mao crippled the people of China an heavily oppressed them during his thirty-year reign.  The Cultural Revolution under Mao remains one of the darkest seasons in the history of modern China when millions where killed and misplaced by the Red Guard.  After Mao did, Ding Xiaoping came to power and began the process of opening Chinese markets to semi-capitalism and the world.

The Chinese Protestant church was predominantly forced underground after 1950.  Even after the Communist Party officially approved of Christianity in China, it was tightly controlled by those in the Party structure who were lifelong atheists.  Because of this, most Protestant Christians continued to gather in homes and apartments rather than submit to the control of the Communist Party leadership.  As they did this, God worked in miraculous ways to confirm the truthfulness of the gospel and deliver millions from darkness.

In his book, Aikman introduces you to the primary figures who led the house-church movement throughout China during the darkest years of oppression and opposition from the government.  Many of these leadership figures served 20 to 30 years of their lives in prison for the cause of Christ in China.  After release, they continued to serve Jesus by proclaiming his gospel and building up the local church.  Aikman interviewed many of them in the late 1990s to write his book.  We should all be thankful for this as many of those that he interviewed have now passed away.  Leadership of the house-church movement in China has now passed to the next generation of leaders.

If you are traveling to China any time in the future for business or leisure, I would ask you to read Aikman’s book.  It will change your view of the world and the Chinese people.  As Americans, we can have a very small view of what God has done and is doing in the world.  I would encourage you to pick up a copy of Aikman’s book and learn the story of our brothers and sisters around the world who have suffered greatly for the cause of Christ.  Their faithfulness to Jesus and faith in Jesus are examples to us all.

Categories: Uncategorized | 2 Comments

$5,300,508.29

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

Our church is currently running 25 Financial Peace University groups across the city of Round Rock which include more than 360 adults.  As of spring-break (next week), we are approaching the half-way mark in the program (6 weeks out of 13).  We just recently compiled the consumer debt load of those in FPU, and without mortgages, our families are carrying $5,300,508.29 in debt.  I don’t know how that number hits you, but it is staggering to me.  A reminder that the church of Jesus Christ in America is struggling with consumerism, materialism, and debt just as much as the culture at large.

But there is hope!  Families have already started making major changes in their patterns of behavior, paying off debt, and saving for the future.  In addition, many are beginning to give to God for the first time.  What could the families in our church do to invest in the kingdom of God if they were not buried in 5.3 million in debt?  Imagine the freedom these families will experience when they live within their means and the joy they will experience as they make eternal investments.  But we have a long way to go.  We are just at the beginning of the process of changing a lifetime of habits and we won’t get out of debt overnight.  But by God’s grace, we can get there together.

This Sunday, March 11th, I am preaching from James 5:1-6 as we continue our series Life Between Sundays.  In this passage, James warns us of the dangers of worshiping wealth instead of Jesus Christ.  Money is a powerful idol that many serve and worship – hoping to find security, significance, purpose, and meaning in their net worth.  But money is a terrible idol because it is not the Living God.  It cannot deliver us from ourselves or redeem this broken world.  Only Jesus is God and only Jesus can set our hearts free from the love of money.

Apparently, the church in America has not learned this truth yet.  FPU has revealed 5.3 million reasons we need to be at church this Sunday, to ask the Holy Spirit to set us free from this idol that has only led us into bondage.

Categories: Church, Money, Spiritual Life | Leave a comment

Marriage Under Seige

Posted on February 10, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

http://www.pendoreilleco.org/photos/Auditor/gods_design_for_marriage_umjr.jpgCharles Murray has written a new book called Coming Apart where he examines the changes in American culture over the last 50 years.  One can argue with his suggestions of how we fix some of our cultural problems, but one cannot argue with the data he has collected.  He wrote a summary article in the Wall Street Journal providing some of his most startling findings.  Among them, he wrote, was one that strikes at the foundation of the American soul – the rapid decline of marriage.

The 2010 US Census confirms Murray’s conclusion.  The NY Times reported in December that one of the most startling findings in the 2010 census is that married households are not a minority in the United States.  This is a dramatic shift.  In 1950, 78% of American households were led by married couples.  In 2010, that number had slipped to 48%.

I have seen this trend first-hand in my own neighborhood in suburban Austin.  One of our next door neighbors is a single adult woman who has never been married.  The other next door neighbor is a single dad who has been divorced and is raising his daughter.  Our new neighbor across the street is a newly divorced father.  I am not throwing stones as these neighbors in any way.  I love them all and we are glad to call them friends.  I am simply making an observation of those living around us on our small cul-de-sac in middle America.

So, why is this decline happening and how do we stop it?  There is no doubt that our cultural values have changed – away from the importance and sacredness of marriage and toward the inevitability and reasonableness of divorce.  Because of the shift away from seeing marriage as a lifelong covenant and toward a legal contract that exists for the pleasure of those involved, less people see the value of getting married and more married people don’t see the problem with leaving marriage.  What are some good resources available to help us in our marriages and in our churches?

http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/120320000/120325748.JPGFirst, if you are married or single or thinking about marriage, I would highly encourage you to pick up Dr. Tim Keller’s new book on marriage called The Meaning of Marriage.  This is my new favorite book on the biblical view of marriage, especially as it is set in contrast to the current cultural view of marriage.  Dr. Keller and his wife Kathy give us great insights into the Scriptures and great insights into our culture.  This book will help you understand the ways in which your view of marriage has been shaped by our self-centeredness and our idolization of romantic love while giving you a contrasting beautiful picture of biblical commitment.  In addition, as Dr. Keller always goes, he shows us how the gospel of Jesus Christ is both the best tool for understanding the meaning of marriage and for actually living faithfully in marriage.  While books like Love and Respect by Dr. Eggrichs are immensely helpful and practical in working on your marriage relationship, Dr. Keller’s book is one of the best in pushing back against the message we are hearing about the institution of marriage itself.  I highly recommend this book to you to read with your spouse to get a greater grasp on what marriage is, why it is important, and how we can should live in it.

http://www.shopfamilylife.com/images/Product/medium/RPK15055.jpgSecond, if you are a pastor or church-leader, I would recommend a new resource developed by Family Life.  Family Life has hosted weekend marriage conferences for years called Weekend to Remember.  Barie and I have been to two of these conferences and really enjoyed them.  However, we always wished that more of our church families could attend.  Well, Family Life has taken their best material from their Weekend to Remember speakers and put together a DVD-based resource for churches called The Art of Marriage.  Barie and I were blessed to attend a weekend retreat last week hosted by another church where these videos were shown.  I can testify to the quality of this resource.  I was really encouraged by the professionalism and helpful biblical teaching in these videos.  I am going to propose to our elders that we host a marriage weekend for our church in 2013 and use these videos.  I would encourage you to think about doing something similar.

It is important for all of us to know the forces that are at work against our own marriages and the marriages around us, both so that we can stay faithful to our own commitments and encourage others to do the same.

 

Categories: Book Reviews, Culture, Family Life, Tim Keller | Leave a comment

Study Break Day #5

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Keith Ferguson

10:00pm  End of my study break 2012.  Still reading, but done blogging.  Thankful to God for His grace to work hard this week in praying, reading, planning, and dreaming.  My prayer is that some of what I have dreamed about and worked on during this break will help our congregation grow in the likeness of Jesus Christ and take His gospel to all people.

http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/155280000/155287602.JPG

9:30pm Dave Ramsey’s group gave us a copy of John G. Miller’s book QBQ! The Question Behind The Question, about living with personal accountability in work and life.  Miller’s book is very short and a very quick read, but has a powerful message.  His main point is that most people ask the wrong questions and therefore get the wrong answers which shape their behavior.  He says that most people ask Who, When, and Why questions about other people which only lead to blame, procrastination, and passivity.  The only way to move to responsibility is to ask a different set of questions in everyday life.  These are what Miller calls the QBQ – questions that start with What or How and include “I” and some kind of action.  This moves the questions we ask from looking for someone else or something else to explain our inactivity to taking personal responsibility.  Our questions would look like, What can I do to help? or How can I make a difference in this situation?  The list goes on and on, but the idea is the same.  Take responsibility for your actions and don’t use other people/processes as excuses.

 

Tempted and Tried

4:30pm Another incredibly insightful book from Russell Moore, Tempted & Tried is a penetrating look of James 1 and Matthew 4 to see both the patterns by which we are tempted and the ways in which Christ’s victory over Satan can give us victory over temptation.  As with Dr.Moore’s other book, Adopted for Life, this book is full of Scripture.  The brother knows the Word and it flows from his pen.  I really appreciate that.  In addition, his insights on those Scriptures are helpful and deep.  He sees patterns and words that I have missed, though I have read the same passages many times before.  I like reading a writer who makes me think, and Dr. Moore is one of those writers.  This book is short, but don’t mistake the length for a lack of depth or intensity.  As a Christian and a pastor, I found his observations helpful.  Beyond my own fight with temptation, I know that some of my pastoral counseling and discipleship will change because of this book.

11:30am What a beautiful morning.  I was able to get a 2-mile jog in today – blood pumping, fresh air in the lungs.  Sinuses are finally feeling better and the lips are healing.  God is good.

9http://img2.imagesbn.com/images/105860000/105866707.jpg:45am If the gospel can be described doctrinally (God reconciling humanity to Himself through Christ), through narrative (Jesus as the fulfillment of the story of Israel), culturally (Jesus establishing a counter-kingdom in the world), it can also be described existentially (rooting your identity in grace instead of works).  JD Greear’s new book Gospel works to move the gospel from head-knowledge to heart-knowledge, to articulate how the gospel gets worked into the soul of a person and becomes existential reality in their life.  Greear is (by his own admission) not covering new ground.  Rather, he is showing how God has moved the gospel-identity deeper into his life as a pastor and a person.  To help us, he proposes a gospel prayer that can be prayed every day as a way to preach the gospel to yourself, by which he means a way that we can root our daily experience in the gospel and not our performance.  Here is the prayer he suggests (and then explains in the book): In Christ, there is nothing I can do that would make You love me more, and nothing I have done that makes You love me less. Your presence and approval are all I need for everlasting joy.  As you have been to me, so I will be to others.  As I pray, I’ll measure Your compassion by the cross and Your power by the resurrection.  I really appreciate Greear’s testimony and suggestions.  I think they are helpful.  In many ways, his story is my story – learning to live daily in light of the gospel.  As I like to say, learning to see the gospel not as the doorway into the Christian faith, but the boat that carries us throughout the Christian faith.  All that being said, Greear’s book is really a look at applying the gospel to the human heart, not an exposition of the gospel itself.  The gospel (as Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 15) is ultimately a description of a historical event – the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ according to the Scriptures (the OT).  It is first about what God has done in Christ to resolve the story of the Old Testament.  Greear’s book is not an explanation of this.  Instead, he assumes this – using Jesus died in your place for your sins and rose again as shorthand for the gospel narrative.  He then gives chapter after chapter on how to live in light of the gospel.  In this way, his book is about how the gospel gives us a new identity (based on grace, not works), a heart free of idolatry, a passion for God above all else, a new view of relating to other people and stuff, and an expectant faith in our prayers.  I share this just so if you read this book, you know what you are getting – a very helpful, practical look at how the gospel gets to the heart and then changes a life.  Very practical, challenging, and funny.

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