The Gospel Coalition

Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.  Matthew 5:4

“The difference between an unconverted man and a converted man is not that one has sins and the other does not; but that the one takes part with his cherished sins against a dreaded God, and the other takes part with a reconciled God against his hated sins.”

William Arnot, Laws From Heaven for Life On Earth (London, 1884), page 311.

One of the books from my dad’s library which I received after his death in 2007 was this one:

He had his assistant use this book to keep a personal record of the various aspects of his pastoral ministry through the years, starting with his ordination in 1950.  There are 486 pages in the book, most of them filled out — pages and pages and pages recording weddings, baptisms, funerals, new members, sermons.  For example, here are his sermons from March to October of 1963:

All in all, these pages record, one by one, over 1800 sermons during his ministry at Lake Avenue Congregational Church alone, and by no means a complete record even during those years.

How many hours of preparation and prayer and study are represented by this simple but eloquent written record, I wonder?  Add to that the weddings, funerals, ordinations.  Add to that the committee meetings, the personal evangelism and counseling, the social events.  Add to that the seasons of strife and opposition which he had to endure, all the while keeping up the steady output of gospel ministry without being crushed.  Add to that the way he came home every evening with something emotionally positive to give to the family.  Add to that the fact that he not only came to all my high school football games but even to many practices during the week.  Add to that . . . .

I am not impressed by young pastors who seem too eager to publish books and speak at big events and get noticed.  They are doing the work of the Lord, and that’s good.  But what impresses me is my dad’s daily slogging, year after year, in the power of the Spirit, with no big-deal-ness as the payoff.

This is the pastoral ministry that brings Jesus into the world today.

Earlier today I received via email the following from one of the fine men at Immanuel Church.  I reproduce it here with his permission.  This warms my heart!

Five Things I Don’t Understand About Men’s Community at Immanuel:

1.  How when I reveal the darkest sins of my heart and my innermost struggles, I receive not humiliation, shame, or condescension, but forgiveness, hope, and unconditional love.

2.  How when I honor a man, he is not made glorious, but rather the One who works in him.

3.  How when I am honored, I am not puffed up, but humbled that God would use me in such a meaningful way in someone else’s life when I’m a complete mess on my own.

4.  How as I learn more about God, he doesn’t become more boring and static to me, but more exciting, unfathomable, and deep than a lifetime’s pursuit could ever uncover.

5.  How when I feel like I’ve gone far with God, the men of Immanuel show me how much further I can go in my relationship with the Lord.

Whenever we put a qualifier in front of the noun “Christian,” we might be inserting legalism.  But we might not be.  It depends on whether we perceive that qualifier as meritorious.  Does it elevate us above other blood-bought Christians who don’t wave the banner of that same qualifier?

It is possible to be a “missional” Christian or a “radical” Christian or whatever, and that language is being used merely as a way of communicating something biblical that you want to call people to, something truly in Christ.  But it is also possible — it all depends on internal factors, difficult to discern even in ourselves, much less in others — to use such qualifiers in a way that is truly legalistic.

Legalism is a serious accusation, as is obvious from Galatians.  That makes me reluctant to use it in a targeted personal way, naming names.  I could identify a specific man as a legalist only if (1) he makes an obvious theological blunder in writing, diminishing the finished work of Christ on the cross, adding something of his own to the empty hands of faith as the way of receiving that finished work, and he stands by his stated error even after appeals to reconsider, or if (2) I can have direct personal conversation with him and really press into what he means by what he says and I find out that, yes, he really is requiring more than the cross, received by mere faith, for peace with God.  But without that clarification, legalism is an easy accusation to make, and a difficult one to prove.  And any unprovable accusation is itself a wrong — a different kind of wrong, but still wrong.

It can get complicated, and quickly.  Caution seems wise.

“Where are the young men and women of this generation who will hold their lives cheap and be faithful even unto death?  Where are those who will lose their lives for Christ’s sake, flinging them away for love of him?  Where are those who will live dangerously and be reckless in his service?  Where are his lovers, those who love him and the souls of men more than their own reputations or comfort or very life?

Where are the men who say ‘no’ to self, who take up Christ’s cross to bear it after him, who are willing to be nailed to it in college or office, home or mission field, who are willing, if need be, to bleed, to suffer and to die on it?

Where are the adventurers, the explorers, the buccaneers for God, who count one human soul of far greater value than the rise or fall of an empire?  Where are the men who are willing to pay the price of vision?

Where are the men of prayer?

Where are God’s men in this day of God’s power?”

Howard Guinness, Sacrifice (Chicago, 1947), pages 59-60.

“God’s goodness is a spreading, imparting goodness. . . . God is more willing to bestow good than we are to ask it.  He is so willing to bestow it that he becomes a suitor to us, ‘Seek my face.’  He seeks us, to seek him.  It is strange that heaven should seek earth, and yet so it is.”

Richard Sibbes, Works (Edinburgh, 1983), VI:113.

“The gospel spirit is a catholic spirit, a noble and unconfined benevolence, like unto that of our Creator, not confined to any particular part of mankind exclusive of others. . . . To make the wickedness of men the cause of contention and strife in us is to make one sin the cause of another.  We cannot please the devil better than by hating men’s persons under pretense of duty.”

Jonathan Edwards, quoted in George M. Marsden, Jonathan Edwards: A Life (New Haven, 2003), page 97.

I give my sheep eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.  John 10:28

“Some will tell us that a man may receive spiritual life, and yet may die eternally.  That is to say, a man may be forgiven, and yet be punished afterwards.  He may be justified from all sin, and yet after that his transgression can be laid on his shoulders again.  A man may be born of God, and yet die.  A man may be loved of God, and yet God may hate him tomorrow. . . . As for me, I so deeply believe in the immutable love of Jesus that I suppose that if one believer were to be in hell, Christ himself would not long stay in heaven but would cry, ‘To the rescue!’”

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “The Two Effects of the Gospel,” 27 May 1855.

“It is one thing to love the Lord and His service, and quite something else to have an inexpressible longing for revival that cannot be denied.  It is one thing to wish for revival, and yet it is something in addition to be willing for revival at any cost to come in any way through any means that God may choose.”

V. Raymond Edman, quoted by my dad in a sermon at Lake Avenue Congregational Church, Pasadena, California, 1 February 1976.