Trust AND Obey » Paul

What is God’s Sovereign Grace?

Dave Miller — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 03:14:52 +0000

Many friends, family and acquaintances of mine are suffering right now. Death, divorce, drug abuse, alcoholism and familial betrayal are but a few things that people I know and love are fighting at the moment.

I hear of others just outside of my circle who are afflicted as well. Loss of work and home, debilitating disease, dementia, depression, cancer and suicide are among the sufferings of the people who know people I know.

What makes these problems more heartbreaking is that many of those suffering these things don’t know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. They don’t know that God’s grace is sufficient to get them through their struggles (2 Cor. 12:9).

Poetry rarely appeals to me, but this poem by John Piper touches something in me that prose just doesn’t reach. Read it three times and then meditate on the words of Jesus, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

What is God’s sovereign grace?

Not grace to bar what is not bliss
Nor flight from all distress but this:
The grace that orders our trouble and pain
And then, in the darkness, is there to sustain.

– John Piper

http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/not-grace-to-bar-what-is-not-bliss

The Incubator

Dave Miller — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 00:22:22 +0000

As mentioned in an earlier post, I have recently left the church that has been my home since I was two years old. I was baptized and confirmed there. I built the altar and the baptismal font. The minister married my wife and me. Both my children were baptized there. I served the church as Elder, liturgist, guest preacher, choir member, Sunday school teacher, and president of the church council. It was the church my grandparents and my parents attended. It is the only church I have ever belonged to in 45 years of life, and I have quit it.

This has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done in my life – and one of the most necessary, because I believe I’ve outgrown my home church.

I like to think of my home church as an incubator; a place where baby believers of all ages are loved and comforted and nurtured with milk until they become mature enough to eat meat. A young believer in an incubator isn’t ready for meat, and a growing believer who is ready for meat doesn’t need an incubator.

I love my incubator because it was there that I first heard the Gospel, where I fell in love with Jesus, where I first tasted and saw that God was good, and it was the place where my faith began to grow. I have in no way outgrown my need to hear the good news; I need to hear it every day, as every believer does.

Though Christ commands His followers to have a child-like faith (Matthew 18:3), nowhere in scripture does He say we should have a childish, immature faith. Quite the opposite; in fact, we are encouraged to grow and mature as believers (Ephesians 4:14-15).

There are people I am leaving behind who have been in the incubator for decades – their spiritual growth seemingly stagnant – they love their milk and their comfortable surroundings and seem to have no desire for real food. I leave behind people 40 years my senior, whom I love dearly, but who exhibit no signs of Christian growth.

There are others there whose faith seems strong and mature, like a tree growing beside a stream, yielding up fruit in its time. (Psalm 1:3) Some of them are much older than me, and a few of them are younger. These people puzzle me and cause me to question whether or not I should have left.

It broke my heart to leave because I still love my incubator and the believers being nurtured there. Ultimately, though, staying would have meant compromising on Christian essentials, so the decision simply became one of obedience.

But because my perceptions above may be mistaken, and I don’t want to think too highly of myself (Romans 12:3) I chose to leave rather than continue to fight against the rest of the leadership of the church. It is also possible that I should have stayed and kept fighting – I just don’t know. I won’t go into details; but it should suffice to state that the main problem was one of the same things that Paul wrote to the church at Corinth about in his first epistle.

Yet I cannot minimize how the Apostle started out his epistle to this church whose people engaged in immorality, idolatry, worldliness, jealousy, lack of discipline and tolerance of sinful behavior.

To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, saints by calling, with all who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours : Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. – 1 Cor. 1:2-3

The paragraphs above this line were written two months ago. I’ve been trying to develop a conclusion for this article since then with little success. At the same time, I’ve been trying to come to a fair, rational and Christ-like outlook on my former church. I now think it would be wise to abandon the conclusion to this article until I can resolve my outlook.

I’ve prayed for wisdom in this matter and now think that sometimes you’re just not in a place to make a sound conclusion on an issue. Wisdom is knowing when to stop trying so hard and realize that understanding is further down the road. It will just take time to get there.

The journey continues…

Beautiful ‘Buts’ in the Bible

Dave Miller — Fri, 07 May 2010 12:00:12 +0000

The word ‘but’ changes whatever comes right before it. A ‘but’ is not always pleasant, like when somebody says to you, “I think you have a good idea, but…” It doesn’t matter what comes after a but like that, it isn’t going to be good.

But a ‘but’ is beautiful when it changes a bad beginning into a good end. For example, “I was sick last week but I got better” or “I once was lost but now am found.”

Here are some of my favorite buts in the New Testament

Matthew 4:4 – But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’” (Quoting Deut. 8:3)

John 1:17 – For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

John 3:17 – For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.

Romans 5:8 – But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 11:22 – Behold then the kindness and severity of God ; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s kindness, if you continue in His kindness ; otherwise you also will be cut off.

1 Corinthians 15: 56-57 NKJV – The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

1 John 4:10 – In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Revelation 21:27 – and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

Each of these verses contrasts two different states of being. Death and Life. Romans 6:23 makes this clearer, perhaps, than any other verse in the bible. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. I think this is the most beautiful but in the Bible.

Here is where I usually spend time summing up the point, but my words are useless. Read God’s word through His servant Paul.

Ephesians 2:1-10 – And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved ), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith ; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

Truth.

Paper-thin Bible Study

Dave Miller — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 19:05:14 +0000

Welcome to our bible study. Today we will be covering Paul’s letters; all of them. We might even throw in Hebrews if we have time.

Open your bibles to Romans 1:1 and follow along as I read, “Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, set apart for the gospel of God,” Well that’s all the time we have for Romans. There’s really not much more to it, a lot of theology and rules and things. What we have learned so far is that Paul is a servant of Jesus. That will really help us in part two of our lesson. If you must go deeper, you can read Romans 8:28 which says that God gives us everything we want. Be sure you don’t read any further into chapter 1 and stay away from chapter 9.

Let’s start into Paul’s letters to the Corinthians. Look at 1 Corinthians 1:2, “To the church of God which is at Corinth, to those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus.” Wow that’s a big word. What does sanctified mean? I guess since it is written to the church it means that everyone in the church is sanctified. That’s good news to all of us and that about does it for Corinthians. Everyone in the church at Corinth was sanctified, that’s all you really need to remember. Be sure to avoid chapters five, six, eleven and twelve if you insist on reading more.

Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians are all pretty much the same book. Paul talks about living a good life. Ephesians 5:1 really sums up everything in these four books. ” Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children;” That’s what we all are, children of God.

The two books of Thessalonians are next in our study. Let’s start with 1 Thessalonians 1:6, “You also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit.” Well, here we have a mention of the Holy Spirit which, along with the previous verses about God and Jesus make up the Trinity. That pretty much covers all we need to know about God. Let’s move on.

Timothy and Titus were both ministers that Paul was writing to and since none of you are ministers, there’s really not much point in going into them. If any of you are thinking of going into the ministry, they’ll probably make you read them in seminary.

Philemon is the shortest of Paul’s letters and it will take us very little time to study it.

Thank you for attending Bible Study today. It looks like we’re out of time so we’ll save Hebrews for another day.

Obviously this is an exaggeration, but have you ever attended a bible study like this? The leader of such a study is plowing a furrow ten miles long and a tenth of an inch deep. It is useless for planting anything. A good teacher could spend an hour talking about 2 Corinthians 5:21 alone. Covering entire chapters of the bible in a matter of minutes is an insult to the intelligence of the believers attending and does no justice to the Word of God.

How is God glorified with such paper-thin bible study?

On Women Pastors

Dave Miller — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 00:43:03 +0000

Earlier today, a friend on Facebook asked me my opinion on women pastors. My opinion doesn’t matter, so I told him what I have found in the Bible. If you disagree, or have another view, please post a comment with the biblical basis for your belief.

I still have much to learn, but this seems rather plain to me.

The Bible doesn’t bar women from teaching altogether, just from teaching and having authority over men in the assembly. For that reason, I have to say that female pastors and elders are unbiblical. 1 Tim.2:8-15. That said, I have met some very godly women who have the gift of teaching and use it as God intends.

Titus 2:3 says that older women are to teach what is good. Acts 18:26 tells of the beginnings of the ministry of Apollos. One of his teachers was Priscilla. Clearly, even in the early church, women teaching was approved and even encouraged in certain situations. I don’t think that has changed and we shouldn’t put unbiblical restrictions on women who have the gift of teaching.

A common counter-argument is “Paul is just stating a cultural or religious difference that doesn’t apply to us today.” But Paul doesn’t appeal to cultural or religious examples for the reasons behind his statement. In 1 Tim. 2:13-14, Paul uses the example found in Genesis 3 of the woman supplanting the authority of the man and deciding to eat the fruit and encouraging Adam to do the same. Look at Gen. 3:9, who does God call to account for the sin? Not Satan, not Eve, but Adam. The man is held accountable.

The problem in the modern church isn’t only that women want to do what God has said they shouldn’t, (like Eve) but also that men let women usurp the authority that God intended for them (like Adam). The “adolescentizing” (to mint a word) of the American male is behind this problem. Many men would rather play with their toys than lead a community of believers. But that’s another rant for another time.

Dear Timothy

Dave Miller — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 03:30:14 +0000

2 Timothy 2:24-26 – 24 The Lord’s bond-servant must not be quarrelsome, but be kind to all, able to teach, patient when wronged, 25 with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.

Dear Timothy,

Thanks for passing along the note that Paul sent you. His words are always helpful for teaching, reproof, correction etc. How are things in Ephesus? I hear that your preaching has gotten much more confident and forceful since Paul’s last letter. I guess they don’t call you “Timid Timmy” anymore.

I was surprised by Paul’s use of the word, bond-servant in reference to believers. That’s not a word that is widely understood in my country. In our nation’s history, a servant was sometimes a slave (a human being owned for life by another human being). I’m sure that concept sounds as strange to you as “bond-servant” does to me. When I shared your letter with my friend Nathan, I explained that when people in your country owe a debt to someone, they often place themselves in service to the one they owe until they work off the debt. We don’t do things that way exactly, but we certainly understand the concept of debt and I think that helps us understand that a bond-servant of the Lord is someone that owes a debt that can never be repaid. Is that what you think Paul meant?

Another thing that helps me understand the concept of bond-servant is that there is an alternative. It’s not like being a slave, because we have a choice; slaves had no choice. We incurred a debt and are now unable to pay it back, so our choice is to either work for our creditor or go to prison. It’s not that much different here in my country and it’s not much different between us and God. We owe God a debt that can never be repaid and we have a choice – obedience or prison. Obedience leads us to belief in Jesus as Savior and Lord which leads to eternal life in the presence of God; while prison leads us to a life in this world as a slave to sin which leads to eternal punishment away from the presence of God.

Paul says that we shouldn’t be quarrelsome, but kind to all. Do you think he really means all when he says all? That’s a difficult order, even for a bond-servant. So God wants us to be kind, patient and gentle to those who oppose us. Paul may have traveled around quite a bit, but I know he never made it to this part of the world. Maybe if he had, he wouldn’t call us to such an impossible task. People around here don’t take kindly to correction, especially not from folks like us who use the Bible as their standard of truth. Objective truth is sneered at in my country.

Paul also says that repentance leads to knowledge of the truth – and that God may grant repentance to those who oppose us. Most people think that repentance is something that we do ourselves, not something that is a gift from God; (actually, most think that repentance isn’t even necessary and too many preachers ignore the subject altogether).

So if our opposition comes to knowledge of the truth, they will come to their senses; and if they come to their senses they will escape the snare of the devil. I really like the way that sounds. It’s like one thing leads to another logically, step by step. Looking at it backward works too. Do you think Paul knew this? They are in the snare of the devil because they’re not in their right mind; they’re not in their right mind because they have no knowledge of the truth and they have no knowledge of the truth because they have not been granted repentance by God.

But it doesn’t end there. God may grant them repentance if we treat them with kindness, gentleness and patience. It could all hinge on how we respond to someone who opposes us. Everything could depend on it! I had no idea that how we treat unbelievers and those who oppose us could have such an effect. Thank you for passing along this knowledge, my friend.

One more thing that I almost left out: Paul’s last phrase, those who oppose us are, “held captive by him [Satan] to do his will.” Timothy, do you think Paul used that word on purpose? I used to believe in coincidence, but now I just see the hand of God everywhere. We are bond-servants of God and those who oppose us are captives of Satan. This language isn’t just an accident, is it? Servants and captives are very different things. We are bond-servants by choice but why are they captives (prisoners) of the devil? Is it ignorance or apathy? Is it selfishness or laziness; or is by choice?

Please send me more soon. There is a richness in Paul’s writing that refreshes me and helps my friends and me know and love God more and more every day.

Grace be with you, my friend.

To Know the Will of God

Dave Miller — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:09:35 +0000

For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. Colossians 1:9

This is from the beginning of Paul’s letter to the Colossians. What a wonderful thing to pray for. I can’t think of anything I could hope for in this life more than what is contained in this verse – to know God’s will. That is my prayer for you, dear one; that you may know God’s will.

That may seem like a strange thing to hope for. Usually, people hope to be happy, healthy, successful, or even rich and famous. I’ve met many rich people in my life and I’m not very impressed with them as a group. I’ve met a few famous people in my life too and they’re not any different than the rest of us.

If you are able to know the will of God and to do what you know God wants you to do, you will have the true riches of wisdom and understanding. You will live your life fearlessly and with strength. Monetary riches don’t last and fame really doesn’t matter or last. If you know the will of God, you’ll be guaranteed to be content in all circumstances.

Read your Bible to get to know the will of God. Start with the first chapter of Colossians if you want. Give thanks to God and be content.

Conversion Story – Paul Washer

Dave Miller — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:56:15 +0000

Paul Washer is a great Christian speaker. He is an itinerant preacher affiliated with the HeartCry Missionary Society. His most famous message online is known as “The Shocking Youth Message” which was given in 2002 at a youth evangelism conference in Montgomery, Alabama. It is an hour long but every Christian should see it at least once.

Below, is the account of Washer’s conversion at the University of Texas in Austin. Please take 15 minutes out of your day to listen to this entire message, especially if you are feeling down or discouraged. Hearing how God worked to bring Paul to Himself is uplifting for all and helps us to know that God will work miracles for those who love him. (Romans 8:28)

He references Psalm 103:15-17 NASB in his testimony.

If your tear ducts haven’t kicked in yet (mine didn’t, but my heart was refreshed) watch this next video. It’s about six minutes long and it is an amazing story of God working His righteous will in the USA and Peru. Like two electrodes in a spark plug, God worked to bring two men close together to do great work for the Lord.

All for the glory of God! Soli Deo gloria!