Pure Church

Jim Elliot:

I see clearly now that anything, whatever it is, if it be not on the principle of grace, it is not of God. Here shall be my plea in weakness; here shall be my boldness in prayer; here shall be my deliverance in temptation; at last, here shall be my translation. Not of grace? Then not of God. And here, O Lord Most High, shall be your glory and the honor of your Son. And the awakening for which I have asked--it shall come in your time, on this principle, by grace, through faith. Perfect my faith, then, Lord, that I may learn to trust only in divine grace, that They work of holiness might soon begin....

In Shadow of the Almighty: The Life and Testament of Jim Elliot, p. 110.

I appreciated this post from Mockingbird on the return of Mark McGwire to major league baseball as a batting coach. I wonder if you agree?

Awoke about 6:30am. Brief prayer and reading of scripture.

Two posts today really lifted my heart. They both were meditations on grace in their own way.

First, was Lee Irons' comments on the Law and legalism (HT: JT). Here are the couple of paragraphs that struck me as fresh insight:

The way to avoid legalism is to believe that, as the Law teaches, only the perfectly righteous may be admitted into heaven. This counterintuitive premise accomplishes two things in a single blow: it crushes legalism and clarifies the meaning of grace.

First, it crushes legalism because legalism cannot get off the ground unless the standard has first been lowered. But if the Law requires perfect righteousness, clearly the half-baked, imperfect obedience promoted by legalism will not do.

Second, it clarifies the meaning of grace. Grace is that God provides and accepts the imputed righteousness of Christ, in place of our own inherent righteousness demanded by the Law, as the righteousness by which the unrighteous can attain heaven. Now that’s grace! The true Gospel, then, presupposes the Law as its antithetical counterpart. Otherwise grace is no longer grace."

Second, was John Piper's meditation on why he has no merit of his own. This is the meditation in full:

This is my confession:

I was born into a believing family through no merit of my own at all.

I was given a mind to think and a heart to feel through no merit of my own at all.

I was brought into the hearing of the gospel through no merit of my own at all.

My rebellion was subdued, my hardness removed, my blindness overcome, and my deadness awakened through no merit of my own at all.

Thus I became a believer in Christ through no merit of my own at all.

And so I am an heir of God with Christ through no merit of my own at all.

Now when I put forward effort to please the Lord who bought me, this is to me no merit at all, because

...it is not I, but the grace of God that is with me. (1 Corinthians 15:10)

...God is working in me that which is pleasing in his sight. (Hebrews 13:21)

...he fulfills every resolve for good by his power. (2 Thessalonians 1:11)

And therefore there is no ground for boasting in myself, but only in God's mighty grace.

Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord. (1 Corinthians 1:31)

I read these today, and my heart said, "Yes! Glorious grace!"

It's been a really full and joyful week at FBC this past week. We've had vacation Bible school and Upward Basketball activities going on each afternoon and evening.

Yesterday we joined in the wedding celebration of Shane and Ronnie Ebanks. We try to make our weddings worship services, focused on the Lord Jesus Christ and thanksgiving to God for the gift of marriage. Yesterday was as Christ-centered marriage as I've ever had the privilege of attending. The couple did a wonderful job of focusing on the Lord. And it was a tremendous time of celebration in the church family, with seemingly everybody in the church pitching in in some way. It was truly a family affair, and it was lavish in love. The couple wrote their own vows. See them below and let me know what you think.

Today, we had the joy of baptizing four persons following the morning service. Their testimonies of God's grace and salvation were powerful. And while we were at the ocean conducting their baptism, an older lady who has attended the church for years and wrestled with many questions, decided to profess her faith in baptism. It was one more example of the Lord's kindness to us all.

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Shane and Ronnie's Vows



I confess that I am a sinner who has offended a Holy and Righteous God, as a result of my sin I was separated from God and his perfect justified wrath was upon me.

God being rich in mercy and love sent His Son. Jesus Christ, the Son of God, being without sin thus the perfect sacrifice, died on Calvary’s Cross to take the punishment for my sins. The Father has given me a faith in him, so I can now confess that Jesus is Lord and believe in my heart that the Father raised him up from the grave.

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. I have been given a new eternal life in Christ. Christ has become my righteousness. I am adopted into the kingdom of God. By the spirit of Christ I call out Abba, Father. The Holy Spirit has sealed me for the day of redemption. And it is in this new life...

I promise to love you all the days of my life. I will treat you as if you were part of my own body. I will be quick to listen and slow to speak. I will exist with you in the covenant of marriage in a way that glorifies God, communicating the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Husband

Sharon I will care for you always. I will honor you and cherish you with a love that I possess only through Christ. I will esteem your counsel above all others. I will always try to be first to the cross, when it comes to sacrificing for you. Knowing that adultery is detestable to the Lord, I will keep our marriage bed pure. Should the Lord see fit to bless us with children, I will endeavor to raise them with you in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. In the example given by Christ the groom to the Church his bride I will attend to your needs helping you to become all that God wants you to be. I Love You!

Wife

Shane I will joyfully submit to your God ordained leadership in everything. I will love you and cherish you in all that you do. I will esteem your counsel above all others. Knowing that adultery is detestable to the Lord, I will keep our marriage bed pure. Should the Lord see fit to bless us with children, I will endeavor to raise them with you in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I will support, trust and respect you, for I love God and He has given you to me. I Love You!

You are all sons of the light and sons of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled. (1 Thes. 5:5-6)

Gene L. Green in The Letters to the Thessalonians (PNTC) has this helpful comment and reminder about Paul's words in these two verses:

The believers' existence as "children of the light and children of the day" has moral implications that the author begins to elaborate in [v. 6]. The imperative is put in the first person plural and begins with the words so then, which introduce the inference drawn from the previous statement (v. 5). Since Christians are "children of the light and children of the day," they should not sleep but rather be alert and self-controlled. This intimate relationship between their new existence and their new moral life touches a fundamental aspect of Christian ethics: What they are is what they should do. The moral exhortation finds its roots in the previous work of God in their lives. They have been made "children of the light and children of the day" via their salvation, and now they are to act according to that new state of being. The gift of grace includes within it the call to obedience. As V.P. Furnish states, "God's claim is regarded by the apostles as a constitutive part of God's gift. The Pauline concept of grace is inclusive of the Pauline concept of obedience." Since the imperative is integral to the indicative, the summons of Christian ethics becomes, "Act what you are." (pp.237-238)

Breaking off the indicative and emphasizing the imperative leads to gospel-less moralism and even legalism.

Breaking off the imperative and emphasizing only the indicative leads license and cheap grace.

What God has joined together (grace and obedience) let not the Christian or the preacher separate.

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope--the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good. (Titus 2:11-14)

The pastoral epistles are becoming increasingly dear to me. As I read them, serving now as a senior pastor, I am constantly encouraged, corrected, challenged and guided by Paul's words. I am thankful to God for including these letters in His Word for the repeated use and divine wisdom they provide to His undershepherds.

Meditating on Titus in my quiet time recently, I was struck afresh by Paul's words in Titus 2:11-14:

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope--the glorioius appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.

For my first several years as a Christian, the only time I heard this text mentioned or expounded was during sermons on the rapture or in some debate over eschatology. Usually the preacher or friend would focus in on "the blessed hope--the glorious appearing" and ride off on clouds of rapture ecstasy.

Looking at the text the other morning, however, the centrality and sufficiency of the grace of God gripped my heart. In particular, the teaching activity of grace in the lives of believers left me all kinds of encouraged.

1. The grace of God teaches us to say "no" to ungodliness and worldly passions.

That's good news. How often the tumult of Romans 7 has ravaged the Christian. How often has doubt and despair overtaken the believer with tender conscience and hopes of progress in holiness. Then comes grace... teaching... telling us to say, simply enough, "No." No treatise or complicated system of works and self-flogging. Like a parent with a two year old, the grace of God grabs our attention, locks onto our little eyes, and teaches us to say "No." How often my life would be improved by saying "No." And how often my life would be purified with the mastery of this first lesson of grace: just say 'no.' Seems Nancy Reagan was on to something. But it applies to more than just drugs. Grace enables a simple but powerfully resolute "no" to all manner of ungodliness and worldly passions. Praise God!

2. The grace of God teaches us to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.

Second lesson: say "yes" to godliness. It's the nature of grace to produce self-control, uprightness, and godliness. It's a Christ-denying, cheap imitation grace that leads to lewdness and license (Jude 4). The grace of God leading to salvation is powerful enough that in this present age--this present evil age (Gal. 1:4)--we may live the life of Christ. Our instruction at the hands of grace leads us to Christlikeness. Our old schoolmaster (the Law) lead us to condemnation. But since graduating from that classroom, have we not been taught of a new life where there is no condemnation (Rom. 8:1) but the beauty of holiness in Christ our All.

After trying for years to find discipline, self-control, uprightness and godliness through the empty legalisms and rituals of Islam, I'm so thankful for the grace of God that leads to salvation and teaches me to live in union with Christ!

3. The grace of God teaches us to wait for Jesus.

Here, then, is the glorious end of it all--life with Jesus when He comes! Grace teaches us to say "no," then to live godly lives, and all the while to "wait for the blessed hope--the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ." The grace that produces eager waiting, triumphant hope, anchored in the promised return of Jesus our great God and Savior seems to be a rare commodity among us Christians.

How seldom do we wait upon the Lord. We're the disciples who could not tarry for one hour. How seldom do we appropriate that grace of God which cultivates patient anticipation of our God's return. How seldom do we clutch on to the grace of God and the end of that grace--Christ Jesus who redeemed us from all wickedness and purifies us for himself. How different is this grace of God which teaches us to wait from all of that endless jangling about precise endtimes schedules and schemes! I'm thankful for this grace that creates a longing for the Redeemer and purity of soul! Come Lord Jesus. And grant me grace to wait!