Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, ” and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Therefore let everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found; surely in the rush of great waters, they shall not reach him. You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with shouts of deliverance. 

"I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you"

Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord. Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart! 

non-fiction

We did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. He received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain.

We also have the prophetic message as something completely reliable, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

reading

i have sometimes not enjoyed reading the bible
i have sometimes found it difficult and hard

but i have never once regretted doing it. ever.

He is coming back again

Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.

Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.

So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him.

beginnings

how many dominos need to fall for it to be considered ‘the domino effect’? surely just one has to hit the other, surely the very first moment is as much a part of things at the last moment or the middle. the middle is more exciting but it’s not like the first 100 are preparatory and the last 10 are an optional conclusion. every connection in the domino set up is a part of that event, they’re just arranged in different places. in fact, the first few connections are essential to there being any later on.

fulfillment

I read Matthew 1-2 yesterday and before Jesus makes a single decision He has already fulfilled six prophecies

He was born in David's line
He was born to a Virgin
He was given the name Jesus
He was born in Bethlehem
He went to Egypt
He settled in Nazareth

by the time He hit primary school He already had an impressive resume that He was the Christ

how real is real enough?

We are well taught Christians who live in a comfortable Christianity. Why don’t we run out the doors of church and scream the gospel from every corner? Why don’t we give our money to the poor and to ministries and just keep what we need? Why don’t we ask each other the hard questions and admit our weaknesses? Why don’t we persist with our non-Christian friends even when it’s hard? Why don’t we value the internal over the external with each other?

I want to suggest two reasons for this. Firstly - we don’t believe that it’s real, or we do believe but we’re not convinced. We live without urgency – forgetting the weight of the reality and the immediacy of the possibility of Jesus’ return.

Secondly – we’re fitting in to a Christian climate! We negotiate our lives under the prerequisite of whether or not we will be accepted by others and even other Christians.

But this should not be.

The reason we don’t do these things, I would like to suggest, is because we don’t have to. We’re looking for a pass mark from our Christian peers.

The average Christian doesn’t have to scream the gospel from the roof-tops, we just have to stop swearing. The average Christian doesn’t have to give dramatic amounts of money away; just some. We don’t have to persist with our non-Christian friends; just ask one to one outreach even and we don’t have to value the internal – its ok to make and effort on the externals and we expect everyone to look good enough.

There are those other things, those “extra” things that we could do to be distinction Christians, but they’re for the super keen, the high achievers. We do enough to get by.

And here’s where I want you to stop and think with me because I’ve been trying to reconcile the two.

Be honest with yourself when considering the above paragraph – we may be getting credits in some of those areas, be we’re struggling in others – others I haven’t mentioned and we know it. We’re apathetic.

Here’s my question – how can we, who live in such a reality (as mentioned) and deal with such a God (as discussed) ever be “doing enough”? The nature of our reality is eternal and infinite. Where do we find room to say “I’m passionate enough”? Joyful enough, loving, giving, caring, serving enough?

Enough to fit in with the other Christians perhaps. But why are we Christians? Because we each know and love the living God and it’s Him we’re trying to be like, not each other.

And so, brothers and sisters, I want to push us to push each other. To not get comfortable in our own conformity – but to remember and remind each other of our mind blowing reality in such a way that we never stagnate.

Not that it’s easy by any means, but I hope that you agree that it is important.

feelings

you'll forgive this for being 'applicable', i can hardly turn my thoughts off. but the rest is rhetoric, not directed to any individual even if it sounds specific, they're general thoughts.

you know who got it?
you know who got feelings and wasn't necessarily just a bookworm historian scouring for facts?
you know who had a full heart and anguish and joy?
david. he knew what was what. he knew what life was. he knew the measure of truth but he also knew the honesty of a human heart. and his heart was full, filled to bursting. he was a man who was swimming with love and passion and joy inexpressible. for as many days as he lived i bet he sang. i bet he sang with a passion of crazy proportions. his voice would be hoarse from high notes and repeated chorus and feeling. just raw, gutsy feelings and tears, more tears than i have cried in my whole life. he didn't shy away from 'reality' and he didn't shut things up into 'philosophy' and 'reason'. his life wasn't based on an obligation and he wasn't swept along by any culture, he was a man with an undivided heart. he was a man in love. he was drunk on the deepest love. it wasn't a rational love and it wasn't a tame love, he was physically overcome with affection and admiration for God. he was a baby lying, crying in safe arms of a God who knew every inch of his mind and every movement of his heart. he was a messy, flawed, weak little man, and he was head over heels for his Maker. even if a hundred other people have no idea what this is like, it doesn't change that fact that he does. his life was full and rich and colourful and real. he got it. go read his songs, he gets it.

loud music

there are a lot of things that are like listening to music in headphones.

when i'm listening to a song sometimes it sounds like i am there, standing in front of a band. and it colours everything. everything i'm doing and writing and seeing and how i'm moving. it is the 'communitas' that Victor Turner writes about - feeling united to everyone on the planet; as if life has a unified goal and purpose.

but at any point and for any reason i'll take off my headphones and cross the room. i can still hear the music, playing quietly from the small speakers and it's the same shape and form and tune and tone but it's smaller. it's a background noise of minimal significance.

and there are so many things that i am too close to. i can't see the big picture that they are just a noise in my ears. i'm too involved and too near to see that this is not the high point of reality, but this is just a piece of loud music which from another perspective is small and inconsequential.

the danger is not knowing
the real danger is to think that just because things feel one way (significant) that they are that way. because i feel like a fool when from three steps away i can barely hear the music that i could have sworn was the only thing that mattered.

life's beginning

the thing is - a cracked egg will never be a chicken
a silk worm will never be a dress
an acorn on the ground will never be an oak tree

but

a fertilised egg will be a human.
it is step 1 of many but the question isn’t “when does life begin?”
it begins at fertilisation
the question is “when does life stop?”
it doesn’t stop of its own accord…
instead it stops when you take the morning after pill
and it stops when you abort a baby at one of many of its stages of development.

why don’t we kill pre-pubescent children? they’re not at their final stage of development either. are we being stage-ist to say that a person needs to physically resemble a human to be alive?

with the logic of the egg/acorn/worm argument - why not destroy every egg, acorn and silkworm? and the answer is because we’d be killing off the planet’s hope of seeing an oak tree or a chicken. but then how can we attach such insignificance to these things as the argument does? and we find that it is short-sightedness.

an enduring city

Cornhill Finished.
the two years are over.
i have spent two days a week with the same 30-40 people for two years, wrestling together through God's word, how to know it, how to teach it. We have sat in one building in central London, but we've been to Mount Sinai together and all around Jerusalem with Jesus and we have also glimpsed the New Creation together, all in His word.

when it came for goodbyes, Cornhill has sensibly blocked out half of the last day to share our plans for the future and to pray for each other. and as we talked and prayed and thought about leaving, it was in a sense like heaven was breaking. we were the gathered people of God from Africa and Australia and England and Ireland and China and Russia and for two years we had gathered to hear God speak in His word and now we were leaving.

and it made life seem transient in a great way. and it made the gospel seem true and real and worth it. and it brought to mind that verse in Hebrews 13 "here we do not have an enduring city". we are meant to feel displaced, we are meant to live as exiles, we are meant to expect the delay of the coming of God's Kingdom, because there is work to be done here, lost souls to save. but one day we will have a city of our own and God will be there. one day we will be together again, and part of a multitude that cannot be counted and we will stay there in perfect joy forever.

dreams

psalm 73:20 says of the wicked
"As a dream when one awakes,
so when you arise, O Lord,
you will despise them as fantasies"

and in the tone and content of the psalm it struck me that they will be like dreams. not just the wicked, but the whole way of life, the whole 'injustice'. the pressure to conform is so strong right now and it all seems to serious and urgent and real. like a nightmare where you are terrified and you can't see how anything else matters.
but as a dream when one awakes, all those pressures and 'realities' melt away in an instant and the true substance of life and the way things are is restored. how quickly do we forget our dreams when we wake, how instantly does their authority disappear? and when Jesus returns with shouts of acclamation the pressures and lures of sin will be like passing dreams. we will wake up in the real world.

temporary marriage

i went to a wedding on saturday,
and i was struck by how temporary marriage is.
not because of rising divorce rates, but because life itself is temporary.
all the aspects of the day, while significant, were set in the context of the bigger picture; which is this life as a vapour and eternity as what counts. i suppose part of it was me having in mind the conversion of this girl, and how real all these truths are to her, and how the kingdom is what we're waiting for. marriage is daunting and lifelong on one hand, but on the other hand it's a brief partnership before a greater wedding and a land of substance without end.

sun or shade

do you know that feeling when you're lying in the sun and there are clouds moving overhead and it goes from full force sun to cool cloudy shade? and somewhere between the two it passes so slowly that you're not quite sure which it is. and at some moments you need to open your eyes to check whether you're feeling the full force of the sun on your skin or if it's cloudy. and without looking it can be hard to tell if you're lying in light or shade. and it's impossible to know (if it is cloudy) whether it's a small cloud covering you or a long stretch that means there will be no more sun for a while. there's something about my skin lying there blind that isn't accurate enough to know after a while. i think that's how i feel spiritually a lot of the time.

happy birthday

Evening, May 12

“Fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also surely bring thee up again.”

Genesis 46:3,4

Jacob must have shuddered at the thought of leaving the land of his father’s sojourning, and dwelling among heathen strangers. It was a new scene, and likely to be a trying one: who shall venture among couriers of a foreign monarch without anxiety? Yet the way was evidently appointed for him, and therefore he resolved to go. This is frequently the position of believers now—they are called to perils and temptations altogether untried: at such seasons let them imitate Jacob’s example by offering sacrifices of prayer unto God, and seeking his direction; let them not take a step until they have waited upon the Lord for his blessing: then they will have Jacob’s companion to be their friend and helper. How blessed to feel assured that the Lord is with us in all our ways, and condescends to go down into our humiliations and banishments with us! Even beyond the ocean our Father’s love beams like the sun in its strength. We cannot hesitate to go where Jehovah promises his presence; even the valley of deathshade grows bright with the radiance of this assurance. Marching onwards with faith in their God, believers shall have Jacob’s promise. They shall be brought up again, whether it be from the troubles of life or the chambers of death. Jacob’s seed came out of Egypt in due time, and so shall all the faithful pass unscathed through the tribulation of life, and the terror of death. Let us exercise Jacob’s confidence. “Fear not,” is the Lord’s command and his divine encouragement to those who at his bidding are launching upon new seas; the divine presence and preservation forbid so much as one unbelieving fear. Without our God we should fear to move; but when he bids us to, it would be dangerous to tarry. Reader, go forward, and fear not.

billy graham

Billy Graham's Prayer For [y]Our Nation

'Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance. We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery. We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.. We have killed our unborn and called it choice. We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable. We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self esteem. We have abused power and called it politics... We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.. We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression. We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment. Search us, Oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and Set us free. Amen!'

if not this, then what?

have you ever had that feeling of being at a party and everyone's there dressed in all that they wear, and there's music that we all love and there are drinks and there's food going around. and you're standing there with a beautiful house and lovely smiles all around you. and you sort of step out of the flow for a moment and you realise- you're really alone. and you think 'no one here really understands how i work' and 'all this stuff that we do doesn't make me feel any better in the long run'. and you look around yourself and it feels very meaningless all of a sudden. the whole concept of hanging around a noisy room seems less fun. it even begins to feel a bit like we're trying to distract each other. as if it's a collective effort to keep each other from thinking about both: how heavy life is, and how we're packing it full with meaningless things. and it begs the question that if this isn't making sense of life and bringing meaning, then what is, or what can?

strength

the difficulty of repentance

why am i so reluctant to come back to God?

How can my heart be so short-sighted that I can choose anything over eternal joy? I know (for certain) that repenting and coming back to God is not just right, but it’s good. I know that taking those difficult steps to say to Him “I’m sorry, I’ve tried to wander off again” and taking that time out to hear His word will be infinitely worthwhile. I know that drawing near to Him is right (James 4:8) and I know that before long I’ll be rejoicing in clarity and hope and peace and love and forgiveness. but I don’t do it. I’m sure I’m not the only one who stumbles back to Him with plans in my mind of how I’ll run away next time.
I’m so amazed by my love of sin.
at the points of strongest friendship with God there is nothing about sin that I desire. It’s not as if I spend my time with God convincing myself I’m happy; I am happy, I have all I need (Him). But before that stage my heart says “no. you’re going to miss out. He can’t be trusted” and I listen.
It’s better now to live for and with God, it’s better in eternity. It’s worse for me now to live in sin (“what benefit did you gain from the things that you are now ashamed of?”) and in eternity it’s horrific (“those things result in death”).
I am like the people in Zechariah 7:12 who made their hearts “diamond hard”
and I need to hear God’s call from 1:4 “return from your evil ways and from your evil deeds”.
But to do that I need a new heart. I can’t choose that or do that on my own. I need a saviour from a murdered in my ribcage. I need a heart of blood and life and flesh and muscle. And I need to be taken by the hand and lead back to my Father.

being loved

you know what you need to be loved?
for someone to know you.
and you know what happens when you're not known?
you're not loved. no matter how much people say they like you.
because you know they only like the pretend version of yourself that you let them see.
so all the effort you put into making sure people only see your good parts is actually effort being put into ensuring that you won't ever properly be loved

corrupt principle

"This kind of endeavour for mortification proceeds from a corrupt principle, ground, and foundation; so that it will never proceed to a good issue. The true and acceptable principles of mortification shall be afterward insisted on. Hatred of sin as sin, not only a galling or disquieting, a sense of the love of Christ in the cross, lies at the bottom of all true spiritual mortification. Now, it is certain that that which I speak of proceeds from self-love. You set yourself with all diligence and earnestness to mortify such a lust or sin; what is the reason for it? It disquiets you, it has taken away your peace, it fills your heart with sorrow and trouble and fear; you have no rest because of it. Yea, but friend, you have neglected prayer or reading; you have been vain and loose in your conversation in other things, that have not been of the same nature with that lust wherewith you are perplexed. These are no less sins and evils than those under which you groan. Jesus Christ bled for them also. Why do you not set yourself against them also? If you hate din as sin, every evil way, you would be no less watchful against everything that grieves and disquiets the Spirit of God, than against that which grieves and disquiets your own soul. It is evident that you contend against sin merely because of your own trouble but. Would your conscience be quiet under it, you would let it alone. Did it not disquiet you; it should not be disquieted by you. No can you think that God will set in with such hypocritical endeavours - that ever his Spirit will bear witness to the treachery and falsehood of your spirit? Do you think he will ease you of that which perplexes you, that you may be at liberty to that which no less grieves him? No. God says "here is one if he could be rid of this lust I should never hear of him more; let him wrestle with this, or he is lost." Let not any man think to do his own work that will not do God's. God's work consists in universal obedience; to be freed of the present perplexity is their own only. Hence is that of the apostle: "cleanse yourselves from all pollution of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Cor. 7:1). If we will do anything, we must do all things. So, then, it is not only an intense opposition to this or that peculiar lust, but a universal humble frame and temper of heart, with watchfulness over every evil and for the performance of every duty, that is accepted."

-John Owen [the mortification of sin]

"i'm ok"

i've been thinking about our level of honesty in fellowship.
i'm not about to drag out the old "let's just be real with each other" and turn every "how are you?" into a conversation about your struggles.

but it's interesting the more christian people i talk to, and the deeper we get into friendship and fellowship, and when we start to share how we are really doing and what is really bothering us, most people are on the same page. it's not the page we all talk about but it's more a place of confusion and problems.

most of us know more intellectually than we're living out.
most of us struggle to have a warm heart.
most of us are fighting off some kind of inappropriate lust.
most of us think that the people 'of the world' have more 'life' in them.
most of us find it really hard to read and pray regularly for a decent amount of time.
most of us are scared to admit that we're fallible and vincible.

and i'm not advocating what Jonathan calls "spiritual strip tease" whereby we bear all our flaws to everyone every sunday. but i'm completely convinced that within our smaller circles of fellowship it's essential to have this honesty. because before long we'll be convinced that Jesus came to call the righteous, not sinners and The Doctor came for the healthy, not the sick. and if we spend all our time talking as if we are the (perfect) people we want to be, then we'll never be helped to actually grow into those people.

Why Don’t You Love Me? - Beyoncé

despite being vocally outstanding, Beyoncé's new song Why Don’t You Love Me is beautifully honest. it's a one-sided discource between a woman and a man. and she's asking the question:

Why don't you love me?
When I make me so damn easy to love?
And why don't you need me?
When I make me so damn easy to need?

somewhere at the end of all the games we play, we all do come face to face with this problem:
"i'm trying my hardest, but i'm not enough.
and i really really really want to be loved"

superliminal

Lisa: But you have recruiting ads on TV. Why do you need subliminal messages?
Smash: It's a three-pronged attack. Subliminal, liminal, and superliminal.
Lisa: Superliminal?
Smash: I'll show you. (opens the window and shouts at Lenny and Carl, who are standing on the corner) Hey, you! Join theNavy!
Carl: Uh, yeah, all right.
Lenny: I'm in.

It struck me the other day that temptation has moved to this 'superliminal' method.
banners on the internet which say "be naughty", the classically identified use of 'sinful' in chocolate advertising campaigns etc. it's not like in the spiritual battle that anyone's trying to hide what is going on any more. we're not falling into traps, we're coming up against clear options to obey or disobey God. and still, we're walking into it (willfully?).

my friend and i talked about the misuse of the word 'struggling'
when we say we're struggling with a sin we really mean that we're giving into it. we noted that if someone said "i'm struggling with x" we should say "praise God! you're in the fight! i'm just giving into sin but this guy's struggling that's awesome!"

but we're not really struggling all that much, are we?

"In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood."

hebrews 12:4
that's sure true. i've barely resisted to the point of my own discomfort.

the next verse of hebrews 12 says "and you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons" - is our failure to fight sin tied up in our forgetting that we're adopted and ingrafted and we're sons and daughters of I AM? without a clear understanding of our identity we will start to think that our lives are trivial and that decisions should be made on our personal (and immediate) preference

quote

Is there any doubt that the handwriting is on the wall for where we are heading? ... We see in such cases that manners have been corrupted, morality has sunk into depravity, indulgence is out of control and, above all, faith has been discredited and unbelief has become fashionable. When a culture reaches this point, it becomes so out of touch with truth that masses of people deny outright the existence of God. God’s will for the nation has been abandoned and man has been made God.

William Wilberforce

come back

When all these blessings and curses I have set before you come upon you and you take them to heart wherever the LORD your God disperses you among the nations, and when you and your children return to the LORD your God and obey him with all your heart and with all your soul according to everything I command you today, then the LORD your God will restore your fortunes and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where he scattered you. Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the LORD your God will gather you and bring you back. He will bring you to the land that belonged to your fathers, and you will take possession of it. He will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers. The LORD your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live. The LORD your God will put all these curses on your enemies who hate and persecute you. You will again obey the LORD and follow all his commands I am giving you today. Then the LORD your God will make you most prosperous in all the work of your hands and in the fruit of your womb, the young of your livestock and the crops of your land. The LORD will again delight in you and make you prosperous, just as he delighted in your fathers, if you obey the LORD your God and keep his commands and decrees that are written in this Book of the Law and turn to the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.

sometimes He says

"that's quite enough.
stop it.
come Home"

and i stop
and i go back to Him

easter

death in vain forbids Him rise

Christ has opened paradise

drugs and drink

there's a funny pressure that people put on you when they meet you.
if they're a heavy drinker or into drugs it's kind of rude if you're not.
i told a girl that i didn't do drugs and she said "but you do drink, right?"
as if to say 'you're not completely weird are you?'

i once talked to a guy who said that he didn't want to be a Christian because he liked making his own decisions and he didn't want to give up drugs. we talked through drugs for a bit, about how he would save up all his money for them and how he liked the 'escape' they provided. then i said to him -
"so at the moment, your life (which you don't want anyone to change) is one where you get out of reality as often as you can? that doesn't sound like you really enjoy your life at all. how can that be better than what Jesus is offering?"

and he didn't know what to say,
but i don't think anything changed.

advice

i love the concept of 'advice'
[i love ethnography]
that there would be a situation that we come up against and we know that there is a 'right' or a 'wrong' thing to do, a 'good' or a 'bad' outcome. sure, most of the time it's minimising the pain of all parties involved (that seems to be the greatest desire of man; minimal pain and evading death) - but there is still a proverbial path we need to take and we can't see it.
so we go to someone else who's living and breathing and facing their own intersections and we say "can you take a look at this for me?" we invite them to come and see the puzzle we've been handed and we want them to solve it for us. so we paint them the events leading up to the situation and as much detail and information as possible surrounding the events. and then from two dimensional awareness we are given the advice we were after. [as if life in its symphonic complexity could be relayed in a series of sentences and events]. the logical guess towards the future from a person who is looking into a black and white photo we've taken from our limited angle and then have developed poorly. and daily we're walking down roads that we've been encouraged towards, we're following something we hope turns out to be good advice.

time is love

i know that they say time is money
but i think that time is love.

i got thinking about it the other day
people were saying things like "I've got time for him" / "I've got time for you"
and i thought about how willing we are to spend time with people and why and what it communicates and what it costs us.
and i figured; it's a value system.

when i give my time to someone, i'm giving them myself.
i can't be anywhere but where i am and the time it takes to be there is the extent of how much of 'me' they get. so why would you give yourself to someone? why would you 'have time' for someone - and be willing to give yourself away when they need/want you?

i'll get up and go to work because i have to
but i only have to because i need the money.
and it's essentially springing out of this desire, need, love for money.
it can be a deferred love like that. i can love my dad so i help his friend with some work. and i can give my time to a project that i hate because i love what it is intended for, or the big picture that it is a part of.

i'll put a date in the diary to see you just so that we can be near each other, spend time together, give of ourselves in the exclusive way, where we're both tied to the same place. and i'll do that because i appreciate you, i enjoy you, i have affection for you, i love you.

and if you love someone enough you give them your whole life. you marry them.

i think that the cynical capitalist option of time being money is just missing the bigger picture that time is love,
(and the world's love is for money).
i think that throws a different angle of light on eternal life. that our unending reality is with the Trinity. we are bound with God forever, spending all our time and all our love on Him.

O My Soul

O my soul arise and bless your Maker
for He is your Master and your Friend
Slow to wrath but rich in tender mercy,
worship the Saviour Jesus
King of grace His love is overwhelming,
Bread of Life He's all I'll ever need
For His blood has purchased me forever,
bought at the cross of Jesus

And I will sing for all my days
of heaven's love come down
Each breath I take will speak His praise
until He calls me home

When I wake I know that He is with me,
when I'm weak I know that He is strong
Though I fall His arm is there to lean on,
safe on the Rock of Jesus
Stir in me the songs that You are singing,
fill my gaze with things as yet unseen
Give me faith to move in works of power,
making me more like Jesus
And I will sing for all my days,
of heaven's love come down
Each breath I take will speak His praise,
until He calls me home
Then one day I'll see Him as He sees me,
face to face the Lover and the loved
No more words the longing will be over,
there with my precious Jesus

being new

repentance is necessary before change
i've been trying to kill sin while holding onto it
but a lot of the change is clearing your life out first
because there's a difference between regret and repentance

i think satan ups the anti around easter.
my heart is usually far away on good friday
i feel like i'm working up some emotion
as opposed to just feeling it
but i don't think it's even about the feelings

friendship's second things

somewhere in this our conversations got stale

[maybe that's the wrong word. words are a bulky attempt at a feeling. my sister has a thing about words. something about cultures story telling and painting and how we're visual and literary communicators]

i don't know if it was the content
things that were the rarity
and then became the all
and it was a default

it's like making out in a relationship
or sex for some people.
you love someone, and it's all from who they are, and then you get them, and you date, and then you kiss, and it says everything, there in that action;
"i want you near me"
"you're the object of my affection"
and then soon it's all you do
and you miss them, because you put the expression of your affection first, as a means
not the end
and maybe that's us
and some of those things we do that were special shifted to the norm
and you forget why you're not feeling new things, when you're doing the old things
and then before long, a relationship that is the primary topic of its own conversations isn't really anything at all

c.s. lewis talks about friendship and relationships being two people standing side by side looking at something great together and saying "i think this is amazing" and "so do i"
like people with music and film and art and beauty, and hobbies and sports and video games and places
but if you turn to that person and say "i love that i love you" and they say "i love that too" and that's all you have, you're at a bit of a loss

i don't think that's us
i'm just working out the word 'stale'
and thinking of a synonymous idea
or synonymical

but you know that feeling when we're shoving the bi-product up centre stage.
c.s. lewis said it
"Put first things first and we get second things thrown in: put second things first and we lose both first and second things"

acceptable worship

Hebrews 12:28&29 say
“let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire"
Acceptable worship, Consuming fire.
Now the author is this letter has in mind the book of Exodus and the book of Leviticus and the whole old law. And these terms come straight out of Leviticus 9 and 10. You might know the story, the Israelites have just been given instructions about priests and sacrifices at the tabernacle, at the temple. And Aaron has just been commissioned and ordained and he has offered the first sacrifice and followed every letter of the law. He offered acceptable worship. But then in chapter 10 we read

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the LORD, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD.

Leviticus 9 Aaron offers acceptable worship, Leviticus 10 his sons offer unauthorized fire and are consumed by the fire of God. So the central question for Hebrews chapter 13 is 'what is acceptable worship?'
And the one thing that I think really matters here is that acceptable worship for God is not working for His love, it is not working for His forgiveness, it is not working for His acceptance. Those things are not just missing the grace of God, they are unacceptable worship.
We had a massive problem between us and God but Hebrews 1-12 has already outlined and celebrated how that has been solved, fixed, restored, forgiven.

and Hebrews 10:12&18 say
But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God,
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.

There is no longer any offering for sin
that sentence brings a very great calm.
And with easter this week, this verse is a great reminder of why we celebrate. I once wrote about easter in these terms “the world wakes up to the deafening calm of sin paid for”. It’s done, the sacrifice is made, it’s been paid for.

So do you see that any attempt from us to be good enough for God, to be righteous on our own, these are unacceptable sacrifices. It’s done it’s been paid for. Do you see that if we get this wrong we’ll be in a world of trouble? We’ll be coming to God with our guilt and our legalism and our promises to try harder to be good enough for Him. But none of that is required, none of that is acceptable, we are to come grateful for what He has given and promised to us.
But only once you can say “I am receiving a Kingdom that cannot be shaken” and “Jesus has offered the perfect sacrifice for my sins and I cannot be more forgiven and I cannot be less forgiven” are you ready to obey.

Acceptable worship is gratitude.

masters

some of you will say "i'm free, why do i want to be a slave?"
i would ask you to be completely honest with yourself; are you really free? you're not.
who or what is your master?
if it is alcohol if it is drugs if it is food if it is pride if it is straight As and achievement, someone, something is your master. here's my question - is it, are they better than Jesus?

- mark driscoll

no fear of falling

from these moments we awake
our heads clear of the mistakes
how we never hit the breaks, or felt it stalling

piper on lewis

"He helped me become alive to life.
To look at the sunrise and say with an amazed smile,
“God did it again!”
He helped me to see what is there in the world;
things which if we didn’t have them,
we would pay a million dollars to have,
but having them, ignore."

the safe castle

i saw alice in wonderland at the movies.
there is a red queen and a white queen.
and for so much of the film there's tension and discomfort and we're in this world of danger. for all the time alice is in the red queen's court she's only protected by a made-up name. and for all the beauty and mystery and magic of the world it wasn't 'safe' and there were no anchors or stability.

but the story gets around to alice being discovered and attacked and chased and she runs and runs and runs and gets to the white queen's castle. and high on a stone balcony of the castle, on the neat white stone under a clean night sky she stands overlooking a series of quiet, tall waterfalls.

for whatever point they were aiming at making, i was so struck by that calm. one day soon, maybe tomorrow, i'm going to live in a castle like that. but better. i couldn't stop thinking of how tangible it will be, my daily, momentary lived reality will be in a calm paradisal kingdom. i'll walk that balcony. the instant i'm there i never won't be there.

what's wrong with the world?

is there anything wrong with the world?
i heard the sentence "things aren't as they should be" today.
but i thought - things are as they are. things just happen, they just exist, occur, they just are. where does this higher standard come in?

look at the news, read about war and murder and rape and injustice and genocide and theft, adultery, abortions. these things just are. and really, someone could say "nothing is wrong with the world". this is the world. there's no more wrong in these things than there is wrong in a fish swimming in water. that is the nature of the game.

i see this as one side of a contract. because as soon as you respond by saying "but they're wrong, it's obvious that they're wrong". then i will say - then the universe must have meaning. and it must have been founded upon some system of justice. and that system must be real enough for us to know, but too high for us to keep.

and whatever else you believe, you can't deny that, because you signed on the dotted line. and you're now only one step away from hearing the best news that any human has ever known.

flowchart

box 1 - we're alive
right?
i mean, that's the starting point, because that's our certainty
and you have to look at life
and weigh it
and across every dimension its breathtaking
complxities of our bodies, development in the womb
at 8mm an embryo's heart is beating
you know, ecosystems, the balance
the perfect percentage of oxygen in the atmosphere to breath, but not cause spontaneous combustion
the axis of the planet, the distance friom the sun, the spin - day and night; work and rest
the complexity of the brain, human emotion, art, expression, love, significance
the meaning we demand for every single event before we agree to it
relationships, procreation
jump out to the galaxy being 100,000 light years across in diametre
sitting in the middle of a universe of hundreds of billions of other galaxies. the universe is beyond comprehension
i mean we could go all day. take any one thing and think for more than 5 minutes and you'll be floored.
death, and fear of death. our scrambling for being remembered, our inherent morality, systems of justice
the fact that there are 12,000,000,000,000,000,000 atoms in a grain of salt
the human eye, the concept of language
and even the things we feel that can't be expressed
i guess at the end of thinking (if there was an end) the first flow-chart box is "are we here by chance, is there no order or meaning to life, or is there a meaning, is there a purpose, a "god"?"
as a person who's alive in this life and reality and on this planet spinning in this universe, i can't not think that there has to be a god behind it all.
the big bang doesn't make sense of my reality. it tells me i'm an accident created by pre-existant, eternal atoms who bumped into each other and created this? i can't take that. and it tells me that everything i've ever felt comes to a total of 'nothing' and i can't believe that's true.

box 2 - ok, if there is a god. has it/he/she/they made contact with the world. are they knowable in any way. or is it/he/she/they a force out there not to be known?
and i suppose it's 50:50 to an extent
but if you take the world as it is and the people we are in the reality that is, then you consider that this was conceived and created by this 'god' then you've got to account for
1. that's a lot of effort, to then take no credit and remain an anonymous force. seems logical for there to be some impact remaining, some fingerprint or evidence of god
2. if you consider how intensely relational we are as people. that life is up when relationships are, and never more down than when relationships are breaking apart. how keenly we pursue love and companionship. how we worship it in all our art. how we long to be known and to know.
and if we're the creation of a 'god' it would make more sense that that 'god' be knowable. relational. relatable in some way. rather than not.
i lean towards realtional, because i have a box 3 and because of the above logical reasoning - 'logic' being another evidence for the first box)

box 3 is also somewhat logical
if god is knowable in some way - is it in one of the major (or minor) world religions (i.e. some people are onto the communication/understand-ability that 'god' has provided) or is it a 'communication' that no one has really grasped and organised and understood yet?
and i suppose i'd consider that if 'god' was making a universe that plays out like a rubick's cube times by a symphony orchestra to the power of an orgasm and then times infinity (in complexity, logic, beauty, feeling and experience) then i'd back it/him/her/them as able to communicate in a way that is understood by people - i.e. the god who made the world and 'communicated' to the world is probably one of the world-religion gods

scopes of comparison

this is a question, not an answer

i think about in the movies when they want to show that someone is really powerful, they show some intro sequence where they come up against some impossible situation - like a truck coming at them or a gun pointed at that them or another strong guy who they destroy. and it's the most exciting thing to see some hero walk into a situation where they are surrounded by ten guys who think that he is about to get destroyed, but he's got that quiet calm because we know he is more powerful than all of them. and when you follow some protagonist through a series of adventures and you become more and more impressed with how powerful he is, then they meet someone and we learn that the new character is one hundred times more powerful.
and it's those comparisons that make us say 'wow'. and they put it all in perspective.
and we love that first guy, and we love that second guy, because we've come to understand just how great they are. and if i saw a man on the train and knew that he could crush a truck i'd be in such awe.
are you with me here?

but something is lost when we jump to 'Jesus was God in human form'.
and there's something in Him having 'too much power' that our minds can't handle it.
he was a man. he was a man on earth. he was a man on earth who would think the universe out of existence.

maybe it's like zooming out on google-earth and for the first little while your brain says, "wow, look sydney's huge" but then it's too far and too much and you can't hold the comparison together and pretty soon you're back at the old familiar shapes on the map and you feel as though you 'understand' the size of the planet. but there's something missing. because we still look at a cliff or a waterfall or a tree and say "that's giant" without the same awe when we see our entire continent on a map.

he loves the unlovely

Jonathan said last night:

"He loves the unlovely.
which is why some of your are saved"

i don't know if i did physically, but inside i was nodding in full agreement.

unapproachable

i took quickly think of God as the idol my mind had created; where he is my buddy and it's kind of me to give Him my time, but He knows that it's hard for me to care about Him. and when my mind and life wander i think that i can come back to Him with a knowing smile that says 'sorry to do that to you, but you know me...' as if i'm that friend who jokes about always being late.

in numbers they are counting the different branches of the Levite tribe and each branch has a different role in the assembly and disassembly of the tabernacle. the Kohathites deal with "the most holy things" - the ark of the Testimony, the table of the Presence, the lampstand, the gold altar, the articles for ministering in the sanctuary, the bronze altar, all the utensils. but it's Aaron's job to go in and cover everything in (usually three) layers of cloth before the Kohathites transport it.
and in numbers 4:20 it says about this set apart 'branch' of the Levite tribe of priests (which in the previous chapter have all been given to the LORD as the firstborn of Israel)

"But the Kohathites must not go in to look at the holy things,
even for a moment,
or they will die"

and if i sat and thought about that for long enough, as i should, i'd start to feel a very great weight in regards to God, and i'd probably not be so flippant or so wayward. and it would send me searching for something like the cross on calvary hill which is the one chance humanity has to know anything but destruction from the LORD. and the temple curtain tearing would seem all the more amazing, and God's love for the world in Jesus would be my greatest treasure.

each other

i read numbers 5:5-6 today

"The LORD said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites: 'When a man or woman wrongs another in any way and so is unfaithful to the LORD, that person is guilty"

and it struck me the 'logic' that God has here that we don't have.
it explicitly says when a man or woman wrongs another in any way they are unfaithful to the LORD.
and i'm sure that a lot of our thinking about reality is wrong and a lot of our 'intrinsic', inherited values are wrong. but while i don't know what all of those are, and i do know that it is definitely true here. my emphasis and weight on relationships with other people ought to have the weight of being a decision and impact directly upon God. it is He who has said that we should love our neighbours [as ourselves] and my decision to comply or not can't be made on the basis of that person's 'value' or 'appeal' but it is a matter of my faithfulness to the LORD.
David knew this. psalm 51

"Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight"

look where we were and look where we are

it's these two years in london that have me thinking about life more than ever. but no one else seems to think about it with me.
i said to Rob today 'look, we met in this alley last year and now we're walking down it to the flat we live in together'. look where we were and look where we are. i think these are such transient years. we're all here, gathered in this experience of a staff team for two years. look, we've come from all over the world and we're in this together. i say to John when we're cleaning 'look at us now John, one day soon this will all be memories' and he says 'yes' but i don't know if he means it. but all these moments and feelings and significances are just temporary, they're just building blocks. and i said to Sioned and Jayne and Anna 'how strange is it that all the way through your life and at every moment you've been conscious and alive and you've felt every interaction and every event as if they are all that matter, but when you look back on being aged 5 or 8 or 12 or 17 you can only remember pieces of it. all these minutes get simplified into a small list of memories' - and do we see now how all of this that we're doing is just going to get bunched up and collected in our minds as a time we used to be in? look where we were and look where we are and think where we will be. life is so heavy and so real. and then in staff meeting Kenji and i look at photos of Jane from when she was younger and her family photos and her newspaper clippings as a nurse. and you can't fake that stuff. you can't decide what you are going to grow up to be. and i asked whether her flat was Emmanuel property, but the thing is, from here on it's Jane's. she's not going anywhere from here, there's no next step in a career, she's in these people's lives and she's working hard for the kingdom here. and we come and go, pass through in our two year blocks, overlap by one either side and then spend the rest of our lives not being near each other. and here in my room, with all my photos on the walls, and my blackboard square and my 'not to be forgotten' stencil and the conversation turns to my visa's expiration and me trying to stick around for a couple of weeks to say goodbyes. and how come september i'll need to be out, i'll need to give my room up, paint it new and paint it clean and paint myself out of the memory of the house. and another two years will roll on by with new faces on a photo board and sunday lunches with 'get to know you' questions, and i'll be on a plane, flying away from a gap already closed-in, taking a hundred thousand memories with me. and i'll leave my chords of significance tied to a thousand different places, with holographic ghosts memories playing over and over in the same streets. and here hurrah we're off again. life is dealing us all her pains and thrills. and in all of it, in the years from now someone will say 'i once knew...' or they'll say 'i've been there before' and our encyclopedic memory bank files away a place-name in a list. all the burns and bravery we suffered make us more of who we were going to be. but i am inclined to stop the song before it's played out and consider which piece of the whole i am inside of now. and how does my today change my tomorrow. form it, force it. i'm carrying all of this in my feelings and when it seems most significant, i can't help but ask 'do you remember where we were? because look where we are now'.

the new covenant

i was behind in my reading and so i covered hebrews 1-10 today.
and there are so many beautiful sentences
(on top of all the beautiful points being made)
the overwhelming encouragement that we are not judged on the law

7:18-19

"The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless (for the law made nothing perfect), and a better hope is introduced, by which we draw near to God"

8:7-8

"For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. But God found fault with the people and said:
"The time is coming, declares the Lord,
when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah"

8:13

"By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear"

9:12

"[Christ] entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption"

and then 6:18

"God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged."

the criteria for someone who benefits from the new covenant is someone who has fled to God to take hold on the hope that is offered.

"it must not go out"

i'm reading leviticus at the moment
and i was thinking about the weight of all these regulations.
i think the most common feeling i have about leviticus is 'boredom', it seems so dry and so repetitive and so detailed and dull. but this time reading it i've been thinking about how elaborate it is, and what a process it is the make restitution for sin. i wrote under the title of the book in my bible "A HEAVY WEIGHT" because i think that is what we ought to feel as it's read.

and today i read 6:12-13 about the altar
"The fire on the altar must be kept burning; it must not go out. Every morning the priest is to add firewood and arrange the burnt offering on the fire and burn the fat of the fellowship offerings on it. The fire must be kept burning on the altar continuously; it must not go out."

and it hit me a little, that God was openly not creating a system that would deal with sin. in generations down the line the priests would be burning sacrifices on the fire that Aaron first used. and every day of the calendar year the priests would have the flame alive and burning because there would be need, every day, for a sacrifice for sin.
and i thought about how amazing it was that in Hebrews it can say about Jesus:
"Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy."

and without ever or at all wanting to undermine the finality of Jesus' sacrifice, i think that the constant fire in leviticus still stands to teach me something.
i thought about how the fire was a continual reminder of sin and separation and a need for sacrifice. and i thought about how before you get to chapter four of leviticus you've had a whole list of sacrifices, but you still haven't had one that deals with sin. and how there is a place for sacrifices of fellowship and free-will offerings in the people of God (and in me, a person of God).

and i thought it would be a good thing if i went through my days and weeks and years, considering this fire that 'must not go out' and to apply this to myself in the constancy of my repentance. to bring every sin to God every day, without a lamb or a bull or a goat or a ram, but trusting in Jesus' blood. but the lesson for me here is that the fire of my repentance is one that 'must not go out'. i mustn't leave my sin and hide it and forget it and let it grow; bur at every moment, every shortcoming and failing, i should come to His throne and confess my inadequacy and appeal to His cross, which has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

fear

He whose walk is upright fears the LORD, but he whose ways are devious despises him

proverbs 14:2

Moses said to the people, "Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning."

exodus 20:20

i meant to do a word-search, systematic theology of 'fear'. i meant to do that nearly two years ago but i didn't get around to it. this proverb brought it to my attention today and i realised it was a test of fear to look at your life. how do i feel about God = what's my walk like?

i love exodus 20:20 because it puts 'afraid' and 'fear' next to each other and uses them completely differently. God doesn't want us to be sacred, but He does want us to fear Him. like we're standing in front of an active volcano and it's not time to play games.
we don't wake up trembling, but we eat and drink knowing who He is, what He is like, what He's capable of. Jesus says that, right?

do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

matthew 10:28

i don't know that i have that austere seriousness very often.
which probably also explains why my walk is often less than upright.
things to pray for

10.24

What the wicked dreads will overtake him;
what the righteous desire will be granted.

the safe fire

i read proverbs 10 today and as i read "the way of the LORD is a refuge for the righteous, but it is the ruin of those who do evil" i thought about that duality.

in Cornhill we were looking at Amos and we had to study this one section which is apparently the most famous chiasm in the Old Testament. Amos 5:1-17. and we went into groups to talk about teaching it and people were throwing all this stuff around and trying to come up with points at stuff. but i just kept looking at the structure.
there's God's judgment at the start and finish
there's His command to Seek Him and live
there's their obvious guilt
there's God's character as Creator etc
and in the middle is says "the LORD is His name"

and people talked about how we're learning about God and do we know Him and they said some things, but i thought that the thing is, as you step through the text you've got to start asking questions. if judgment is coming from God, how can He then also offer them life? and the next thing it spells out is how obviously guilty they are and then how magnificent God is and in the middle of it all "the LORD is His name". that has got to be the point. where else is there safety in the arms of the wrathful judge? how else can this perfect God forgive a guilty people? how do we hold all these things together? the LORD is His name. that is YHWH's character. He is all about justice, but He is all about mercy.

and if we're to escape the fearful judgment, the promises of destruction, the wrath of God, the lake of fire, the abolition of the unfaithful, we're told to run straight towards the danger. because the one who has wrath, also has our protection.

He is the safe fire

and i love that that is true. i love that the gospel is news of such ferocious danger and such free liberating life. and more than life; endless, full, perfect life. and they both come from the same source, they are from the same hand. if we have any fear of the wrath of God, we run to Him for safety. continually in His word, God commends those who take refuge in Him. our action of merit is fleeing to Him for safety. to run at the flames is to avoid being burned.

antioch

Acts 13&14 is such an exciting episode.
Paul and Barnabas set out and go preach the gospel around a host of different cities, go through severe persecutions, lots of people are saved, the gentiles believe and they pass back through encouraging all the new converts on their way home.
and then get back to Antioch and tell everyone all about it.

i kept thinking as i read through some of Acts that Antioch would have been such an exciting place. for some reason believers are first called Christians there (probably because their lives and words had such a focus on Christ) and Paul and Barnabas were always there and coming back to there and spending years there teaching and telling of the things God had done through them.

i'd love to have been there as the two of them came back from a trip, to welcome them and hear all their stories. i'd love to have passed one of them in the marketplace or woken up excited on the sabbath to hear them teach in the synagogue. the early church days were so beautiful and thrilling, and it's great to read about it and remember that it was all real.

i am the thief

things have been quite busy, so that i haven't sat to write here,
but i have written other things, like this talk on Luke 23, see below
if you've got time then

proverbs 10:3

"the Lord does not let the
righteous go hungry
but he thwarts the cravings
of the wicked"

flavour

i've recently been learning that Jesus isn't vegetables. He's not the good we should have but lacks the appeal of the sugar we want. He is substance and flavour and we lose nothing when we gain Him.

Beautiful, Scandalous Night

"go on up to the mountain of mercy
to the crimson perpetual tide
kneel down on the shore
be thirsty no more
go under and be purified

follow Christ to the holy mountain
sinner sorry and wrecked by the fall
cleanse your heart and your soul
in the fountain that flowed
for you and for me and for all

at the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
on that beautiful, scandalous night you and me
were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
on that beautiful, scandalous night

on the hillside, you will be delivered
at the foot of the cross justified
and your spirit restored
by the river that poured
from our blessed Savior's side

go on up to the mountain of mercy
to the crimson perpetual tide
kneel down on the shore
be thirsty no more
go under and be purified"

sin's aim

"sin aims always at the upmost; every time it rises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin in that kind. every unclean thought or glance would be adultery if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression, every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its head. men may come to that, that sin may not be heard speaking its scandalous word in their hearts - that is, provoking to any great sin with scandal in its mouth; but yet every rise of lust, might it have its course, would come to the height of villainy; it is like the grave that is never satisfied. and herein lies no small share of the deceitfulness of sin, by which it prevails to the hardening of men, and so to their ruin - it is modest, as it were, in its first motions and proposals, but having once got footing in the heart by them, it constantly makes good its ground, and presses on to some farther degrees in the same kind. this new acting and pressing forward makes the soul take little notice of what an entrance to a falling off from God is already made; it thinks all is indifferently well if there be no further progress; and so far as the soul is made insensible of any sin - that is, as to such a sense as the gospel requires - so far it is hardened; but sin it still pressing forward, and that because it has no bounds but utter relinquishment of God and opposition to him; that it proceeds toward its heights by degrees, making good the ground it has got by hardness, is not from its nature, but its deceitfulness. now nothing can prevent this but mortification; that withers the root and stikes at the head of sin every hour, so that whatever it aims at, it is crossed in. there is not the best saint in the world, but if he should give over this duty, would fall into as many cursed sins as ever any did of his kind"

-John Owen [the mortification of sin]

'christian' friends

well you think about x
and you think, she's not too uncharacteristic of the sydney anglicans who are at the conferences, occasionally putting up a spiritual status update, who have got terms like "serving" flying around, will add a verse to a birthday card and have hillsong on their ipod.

and then you think.
has she...
have they...
ever sat down with exodus 20 and thought "the God whom i worship is a consuming fire"? have they ever had the option of something they want and something God wants and they've clenched their teeth and said "Lord, i'm trusting that your way leads to life"? and if all the 'glamour' and 'fun' of the Sydney christian scene faded, where would they be? where would they be in Africa where it takes more than throwing around buzz words to explain the gospel? and where you need to be able to say "yes God was sovereign when you were raped and your parents killed, but let me tell you why He's still good and how He can heal"

i see myself, 'giving it all up and moving to england' and there's me preaching the bible and writing 'articles' and being interviewed. going away on mission. teaching the youth and the sunday school. and whatever else i've done to be an encouraging example of a passionate christian man. and i can see that in so much of it my heart was hard and i was cold and i was far away.

and it makes me think;
if before now i was so easily wayward and so frequently 'nowhere' (while i also struggled with this and was determined to change.)
where are these people?
it just makes me wonder what goes on inside the majority.

i'm sure on the Last Day we will be shocked by just how many people God saved. billions. but i think we'll be equally shocked by how few of our generation's church-goers are among them.

sunlight

sorry
i was taking photos of the window
and enjoying how still i was allowed to sit
and i lost track of time

i saw God in the sun and the storm cloud

the sun shines so quietly, but so actively
i'm indoors and the window's only showing a storm cloud
but there's the sun

does the sun exist?
is there actually a ball of fierce power and deadly heat?
is there a sphere hundreds of times the earth in the sky?
it doesn't look like there is
from my desk

but there are marks on the wall
sunlight markings
just saying "yes. i'm here"
quietly spread into my room and over my wall

i hope you know that we're not talking about the sun

day 526

i feel beaten up
physically, spiritually, emotionally
dragging my body between events without sleep or rest or time to cease
i'm running on empty and taking more things on and i'm tired and sore

ezra 9

The context is really the history of Israel before and after exile. But we get to that. Ezra has come to Jerusalem 79years after the first Israelites returned. The temple has been complete for 58 years. He gets there in the 5th month and then in the 9th month he gets the message in 9:1
“the people of Israel and the priests and the Levites have not separated themselves from the peoples of the lands with their abominations [8 Gentile races]”

we left it at a pretty dramatic point last week. Ezra has just heard this news, and 9:3 “as soon as I heard this I tore my garment and my cloak and pulled hair from my head and beard and sat appalled” – v4 he stays until the evening sacrifice. At that point v5 he gets on his knees and spreads out his hands to the Lord and prays.
And it’s a powerful prayer.

1. [v6-7] what Israel have done

Ezra comes before God ashamed and blushing and unable to lift his face to God.
He admits their complete guilt before God. Their iniquities have risen higher than their heads and their guilt has mounted up to the heavens. And he’s real about what has taken place in Israel’s history v7 “from the day of our Fathers to this day we have been in great guilt”. There are no real old golden days for Israel, in reality they have always been a nation of sinners, just as this world is populated entirely with sinful people. And it’s that sin that got them into exile in the first place.
“given into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, to plundering and to utter shame, as it is today”.

Ezra doesn’t make light of Israel’s situation, he doesn’t gloss over it. but on his knees in the space of two verses he says: ashamed, blush, iniquity, guilt, great guilt, iniquities, utter shame.

2. [v8-9] what God has done

v8 “but now” in spite of all that Israel are and all that Israel have done, God has still been good to them, has still been gracious to them. “for a brief moment favour has been shown by the Lord our God to leave us a remnant and to give us secure hold within his holy place” all the actions God has taken seem to be completely backwards. Because Ezra still feels the shock of God’s kindness on the backdrop of their unfaithfulness and deserved exile.
Firstly he hasn’t wiped them out, but He has left them a remnant.
Secondly He hasn’t left them in exile but has given them a secure hold of the holy land.
Thirdly he hasn’t left them in slavery but has brightened their eyes and given them freedom and relief.

Beautifully, humbly, soberly v9 starts with a four word sentence – “for we are slaves”
and yet this specific deliverance has taken place with the King of Persia and allowing them to rebuild the temple and even down the protection we heard about in previous weeks. And it’s all a result of his steadfast love. Any other love would waver with such a wayward people, but God’s love is exceptional.

3. [v10-15] now what?

And with these two clear in Ezra’s mind, and laid before the Lord. And with the knowledge in his mind, of why his beard and hair are torn and why his garment and cloak are in rags. He asks the question v10 “and now, O our God, what shall we say after this? For we have forsaken your commandments” [again. We’ve done it again].
It’s not a new law or a new error, but God was clear as Ezra cites a combination of Deuteronomy 11, Isaiah 1 and Ezekiel 37
and the clarity of such a law increases the guilt of the priests and Levites who are mentioned as those who have intermarried in 9:1.
And v13-14 Ezra puts everything up against each other
“And after all that has come upon us for our evil deeds and for our great guilt, seeing that you, our God, have punished us less than our iniquities deserved and have given us such a remnant as this,
shall we break your commandments again and intermarry with the peoples who practice these abominations?”

but there isn’t really a prayer. There doesn’t seem to be any grounds even to plead.
In this situation will God consume them so there should be no remnant nor any to escape?
v15 is a summary verse
what else can he say but: “O LORD the God of Israel, you are just, for we are left a remnant that has escaped, as it is today. Behold, we are before you in our guilt, for none can stand before you because of this”

and we leave Ezra there, on the ground, unable to stand before the Lord for the guilt of Israel. And this prayer, this representation of Israel to God, it isn’t anything more than admitting what they have done and how terrible it is. it’s not a wild plea, but I suppose it’s Ezra seeing Israel with the Lord’s eyes and saying “we are terrible to you even when you are so great to us”.

which is why my big idea is Ezra confesses Israel’s guilt to their righteous God. it doesn’t appear to be more than that.

and I’d have to be careful in applying it, because I so easily identify with this prayer of continual sinfulness. This sort of millionth apology that I’m sure we can all identify with. But I guess there is something here for us as the teachers of the people – since the sin mentioned was not limited to but shockingly includes the priests and the Levites. Because surely we who are closest to the Laws of God are also aware of how frequently we fall short of them.
so in main application I’d want to draw that thick line between God then and God now and the patience and mercy He has for such a wayward people. And the holy response to such sin is to run to, not from God.

grumbling

in exodus 16-17,
just after ten giant plagues in Egypt
and immediately after the crossing of the Red Sea
[which is so miraculous that the whole nation of 600,000 men, besides women and children, sing praises to God as their Saviour and because of the certainty that He will take them to the Promised Land]

three days after that they're thirsty and they start to say things like "did you bring us out here to die?" and "it'd be better if we were back in Egypt". and then a couple of months in they're dying of thirst again and Moses says to God that the people are so angry that they are ready to stone him.

and there are so many things going on here. in Hebrews we'll learn that even though they had so much reason to, they majority never had true faith in God. and in Corinthians Paul's going to tell us that this is all a warning to us to, among other things, make sure we don't grumble.

and so the main thing i was asking myself as i walked home last night was: 'did the Israelites have reason to grumble?'
and i thought about my own life and the areas where i would think i was justified in grumbling.
and on the one hand - yes, of course they had reason to. they had left their homes and property and had with them only what could be carried and they were out in the desert dying of thirst and soon their entire nation would be wiped out. it was a severe situation.

but on the other hand - no. are you insane? you have been delivered from Egypt by a God of limitless power that has been demonstrated on many occasions, in crucial times for your good and preservation and with the end that you will be taken to a great land of beauty and freedom away from the chains and impossible labour you were under.

and i suppose this does connect these things together because the only reason you'd complain would be if you didn't trust that God was good and able to provide for you.

so then there's me. going through life's little ups and downs. and in the downs i'm wondering and i'm praying and i don't know why on earth God has brought me to this place. why does He want me to feel like this? and i'm tempted to throw my lot in with Israel and just complain. but the question is not 'am i experiencing anything that's difficult here?' because nine times out of ten the answer will legitimately be 'yes' (and then we'll feel like we're justified in complaining) but the question is 'am i in a situation that is out of God's control?' because the answer to that is always 'no' and with it, the question 'do i have cause to complain?' will be 'no' also.

psalm 23

i don't understand psalm 23
i don't know if i'm the only one

i wondered this morning if Jesus had it in mind on the cross,
if after He quoted psalm 22 whether in their bibles psalm 23 came afterwards and he thought You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows - i wondered whether that suffering and safety duality was in his mind. and even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. but i don't fully understand how divided the trinity was on the cross. in my [flawed] mind there must be some deep low constant chord of fellowship, even in amongst the wrath of the Father being poured on the Son. they're working for a common purpose in it and achieving the glory of their name through it. but overall it just confuses me. seems reductive to just say it's a nice poem for the believer.

at any rate psalm 23 taught me

He guides me in paths of righteousness
for his name's sake.

and so today i'm praying that for myself

pharaoh's heart

i've been reading exodus
i read chapters 9-11 on the train the other day
i was meeting a friend so i printed them out instead of carrying my whole bible and i sat by the window. it was a sunny day for the first time in a while and i read these pages, the story of the plagues with the sunlight flitting on the paper.

i read about the first nine plagues where Moses keeps going to Pharaoh to warn him what will happen is he doesn't let the Israelites go. and it jumped off the page to me how terrifying Pharaoh's hard heart was.

Egypt is being destroyed by frogs and blood and boils and hail, and there are horrific smells in all the streets and animals are dying and no one can sit still in comfort for even a moment. and time and time and time and time and time again Pharaoh doesn't get it. and i just wanted to jumped into the scene and shake him by the shoulders and say "what. are. you. doing?! your country is destroyed! every time they threaten something new you know it ends up happening and you know that it ends up being so bad that you beg for it to stop! how can you be so blind? how can you be so foolish?"
but at no point in the entire story does he see things clearly and at no point does he relent.

and really the terror was the exemplification of a hardened heart.

i remember sitting there on the train and with a concerned frown that i couldn't shake i prayed desperately that God would soften my heart.

because hard hearts are just. so. blind.
no wonder Paul says that it takes a miracle on par with the creation of the sun for a sinner to believe the gospel. and thank God that He "made His light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ"

the race and the rescue

imagine if God said to you that there would be a running race in two weeks. a 100m race and the loser would go to hell and the winner would go to heaven. can you imagine how dramatically that would affect your life for those two weeks? you'd only eat healthily, you'd run in any weather and train as hard as possible in the time-frame.

if. you. lose.
you. go. to. hell.

and don't you wish in a small way that things were that urgent? or felt that urgent. because we are dealing with things of that magnitude, but it all feels a little vague at times.

the daily faith in the promises of God and the mortification of sin (the parts we play on top of the grace and cross of Christ) are the way we gain heaven and avoid hell, but it's not long before we tire of doing them. like salvation is too easy to be bothered with or something.

and i thought to myself that following Jesus is tough and it's relentless and sin's always at my door and my mind and values and priorities and perspective are always wandering. and i thought 'i can't handle this, i can't keep doing this my whole life and keep failing my whole life'.

and i thought - yes, knowing Jesus is amazing sweet joy.
but really, what's going on here is that God is saving real people from real evil and real destruction. and our whole lives here are not a game and we're not entitled to any comfort or respite, but every day is a day to hold on tightly to the rescue God has provided.
i don't know where the idea came from that we need to be happy and comfortable for Jesus to be worthwhile. i think maybe people have been selling the gospel wrongly. if God said He would forgive us and take us to be with Him forever, but in the mean time we'd be in agony for eighty years or however long we have, that would be infinitely worthwhile!

we are in an evil darkness being saved from an eternal hell.
why don't we have more of a war-time mindset?
i suppose the devil is the enemy or urgency.

and maybe Aldous Huxley had it right in Brave New World Revisited, when he noted that the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions."

when i think these things it makes me pray to feel the magnitude of the reality i'm a part of.

summer camp

in 2007 i talked to our youth leaders about making one of our weekends away a week away and having a full five days with the kids in our care. no one really had the time, so i said i was going to do it in the summer and whichever leaders wanted to come could and whichever kids were free could attend. around the middle or the end of 2007 one of the youth group kids asked me if i was still going to do that. i kind of laughed and said "oh yeah, i should do something about that". somewhere between then and january 2008 a lot of things happened and melinda was co-directing with me, we'd booked a site, gotten out notes and fliers and promotional videos, booked a coach, brought a team together and a speaker and a cook and it was all real. completely unknown but real.

the 20th-25th of January 2008 was one of the most beautiful and blessed weeks of my life and the fruit of it is still being seen today as a number out of the forty kids who first attended (and even some of the leaders) would place summer camp 2008 as the point in which they really met Jesus.

and six months later i was leading the country for England. and it was possible that summer camp would never run again (it had faced serious opposition when we had proposed it and the idea of another one was even now being opposed).
but praise God, there has been a summer camp 'o9 and just these past few weeks a summer camp '1o has taken place. and it has grown from the original 40 kids to 80 this past summer.

and Melinda who was there with me on the ground floor was co-director again for summer camp '1o. since my heart's in it, she wrote to me about how camp had gone and i sat and read it tonight. for the first time in so many days i was dealing with really real things. it was so refreshing. and i said to her in response:

i was reading your chronology and it was so ... substantial. it was all this weight of things that matter and real things and big and tired and raw and earthy things. i was listening to a song and reading your account and it made me feel things so deeply.

i guess the things is - this is it.
i mean, this is real life. if we're dealing with real life, that's all there is.
there isn't more than real life. than deep reality and real issues.
there isn't more than people coming to see themselves and to see Jesus.
even when you were tired and it was all so hard and such a 'mess' it's all there is.
and it made me think what an amazing thing it is that these kids get to come away and just have the opportunity to be vulnerable and be cared for and see real love, God's love for a few days.

and that's true. and it was amazing to see life as life is, again, for a while.

sin

the thing is, sin does list a series of appealing promises. what you need to remember though is that they're always empty.

[as i fell asleep last night i thought about sin being a series of inflatable fruits. and each time you bite into one you realise you got nothing. but more and more these realistic ones come along and tell us that we could have them. they sell us on this idea that they're real and they'll be satisfying and worthwhile.
but they all turn out the same]

promises

psalm 13

"how long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
how long will you hide your face from me?

how long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and every day have sorrow in my heart?
how long will my enemy [read: 'sin'] triumph over me?

look on me and answer, O Lord my God.
give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
my enemy will say, "I have overcome him,"
and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

but I trust in your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in your salvation.
I will sing to the Lord,
for he has been good to me.

two years ago

"on wednesday i woke up and drove to an all girl's private school up the highway. i spoke at their outreach focused christian group. a 7 minute presentation on God's existence and the gospel. immediately after that i walked into two year ten english classes who were combined in a lecture theatre and i talked about why i am a christian and how my faith impacts my life - that was 80 minutes. i got home, exhausted and i had to sit down to write/finish my final english essay worth 80% which was 5000words. i hadn't read the texts and it was an honours course so the standard would be high. finishing that early thursday morning i drove into uni for my 10am tutorial for psychology. i handed my english essay in and then went to the computer lab where i watched two hours of rehearsal videos. when i got home i wanted to die, but i had to write my final performance studies essay due the next day, based on the two hours of rehearsal i had watched. 2500 words, worth 50%. i wrote half of it that night and the next morning i couldn't finish it because i had to get up early and drive to my sister's school in the inner west because i was speaking at their junior and then senior chapel services. after both of those i got home and was still tired, believe it or not, but i had to finish my performance studies essay. i finished it eventually and drove it into uni, when i got home i had about half an hour before i had to leave for our junior and senior combined youth group outreach night which i was running and MCing and playing drums in. before i left i got asked to make a video for it, so i did that, picked people up, got there, set up, music practice, videos, MCed and by 9pm it was over. and i was tired."

sick

woke up at 5am and threw up for a while
and kept doing that over the next few hours
i was exhausted, but couldn't sleep when i felt like that
and my dreams would become an uneasy feeling that something was wrong, and i'd wake up to find that my body wanted to be sick again.
so i was there, sitting on the bathroom floor next to the toilet with my eyes watering and my stomach raging and i thought "i don't want to keep doing this. i already threw up a few minutes ago", but we kept going until i was just throwing up water i'd drank and bile.
so i didn't make it to cornhill - my first sick day ever. and i won't make it to acorn tonight to lead and play guitar.

the question is - am i praising God for this? in this?
here's the chance to put my other post into practice.

heaven outside

for me it's always hard to think of what heaven will be like. i can get a vague picture of bright clouds and a soft-focus, dream-like, obscure dimension. but we're in the shadowlands now and the new creation will be the substance. we're not heading to a white room; we're going to a real reality. the air will be cool and full and you'll feel it fill your lungs. it will be sensory.

so sometimes when i am in a room somewhere, or deep in a forest where life seems neutral - i like to think that i've died and i'm in heaven. and i imagine that outside or far off in the distance all the noise and life and whirr of heaven is taking place. and i imagine that when i go outside of the room, or get out of the forest, i won't be met with the regular world that i'm expecting, but i'll be in a perfect place. the people on the street will be the saved family of God, and the Lamb will be the light of the city. we'll have all different things to do, places to travel between and people to see. because the thing is that one day i will be there in heaven, and i will be conscious and alive and maybe in a room somewhere, or amongst trees. and even though i don't know what it will be like, it's much more exciting to imagine i'm there and be reminded that it will be no less real than my present lived experience.
even the small thought of jostling in a crowd as we all pour into the heavenly city thrills me. because it takes my knowledge of things being real (like being in a crowd) and glues it to my concept of heaven (being a flawless place)
and when i feel the reality of that hope i am full up.

ali cried

on our weekend away we looked at revelation 21-22
and ali came up to me with a question:
would we be sad in heaven to think about our friends and family who weren't there?
and i told her - no death, mourning, crying or pain.
and she began to cry
i wasn't sure what exactly had made her cry, but it hit me then that all of this is so real.
there are the people who think it's all made up, but here was ali, expressing the deepest emotions about these questions because she knows that this stuff is true. and it is. and there's no more justified cause for her tears than these truths. and i prayed that i'd believe it that much.

churches

not the church, but church buildings.
i got talking to some guys at cornhill the other day and we thought about how most modern churches are hanging onto a gothic/catholic style of building. and now people are thinking that there's something in that. you need sandstone to meet with God.

i guess there was a public forum. they had synagogues back in the day. in acts 20:20 paul talks about his ministry being in public and from house to house; large and small-scale.
someone said that churches that meet in schools are probably closest to what the original church was.
and it's the convenience of having your own building that drives people.
convenience over the congregation's concepts of 'church' being accurate.

but really, it is the people.
and i thought it'd be cool to gather in a different place every week.
whenever i read about Israel coming together in the old testament it sounds exciting and like something's about to happen. there's expectancy and intentionality.
but church feels like a tired show. if it was a casually created social group, everyone would have jumped ship years ago when it got stale.
Israel assembling never feels stale when you read it.
and people say "yeah but if you changed the location every week people couldn't make it depending on where they were coming from"
but this is what's backwards about church - we're meant to be dedicated to meeting the people there each week (i could say a lot here about 'performance v family' but that's for another time).

just think of the thrill if the church leaders called an emergency meeting at 10pm on a tuesday night and everyone came out from their houses and everyone would be buzzing and excited to see what would happen and why we were all there together. together. there'd be that sense that we were sharing this together. i want that feeling every sunday.
yeah, so there are no answers here, only thoughts - but that's just the nature of the game.