Which "Promise" Is to You and to Your Children?

Then the LORD your God will bring you to the land which your fathers possessed, and you shall possess it. He will prosper you and multiply you more than your fathers. And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.
Deut 30:5–6

In v5, the Lord says that He will prosper and multiply His people more, after the exile, than He had before the exile. But, historically, we did not see this until the grafting in of those elect from among the nations. 

It is helpful for our understanding of God's dealing with covenant children, in the administration under Moses, that His promises to them were not only visible/externally covenantal, but internal and spiritual: "YHWH your God will circumcise the heart of your offspring, to love YHWH your God with all your heart and with all your soul."

And it is helpful for our understanding of God's dealing with covenant children, under Christ, is that this "and the heart of your descendants" aspect of the promise has a focus especially on the time in which the visible church would be prospered and multiplied "more than your fathers."

When it included children, under Moses, it was the covenant of grace.

And under Christ, the covenant of grace still includes children!

When the apostle says, "For the promise is to you and your children, and and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call," (Ac 2:39), he is saying exactly what Deut 30:5–6 says.

What is Spirit baptism, but the circumcision of the heart? It corresponds to water baptism just as the Lord's gracious work of heart-circumcision corresponded to the covenant sign that He had commanded upon covenant children.

Deut 30:5–6 was solving the problem of a people who could not circumcise their own hearts, as commanded in Deut 10:16. And, on the day of Pentecost, there was this wonderful proclamation that Jesus provides, by His Spirit, the repentance that the baptism of John could only announce to us that we need it. Christian baptism announces that Jesus actually gives it.

This hope He gives us for ourself. This hope He gives us for our children.

How God Treats His Enemies

How many are my iniquities and sins?
Make me know my transgression and my sin.
Why do You hide Your face,
And regard me as Your enemy?
Job 13:23–24

Almost certainly, v15 is more well-known, from this chapter, than v23–24. But, here we have important insight into "how God treats His friends" (to borrow from the title of an excellent little commentary on Job by Bob Fyall). 

When God makes you to know your iniquities, sins, and transgressions, He is treating you as friends. (And Hebrews 12 would remind us that it is when He afflicts us for them, in service of bringing us to repentance, that He treats us as sons!)

But, when God allows you to feel justified in your own eyes—when He permits you to continue in blindness to particular sins—that He is treating you as an enemy.

Job was distressed that he was being treated according to unmediated justice, rather than according to grace in the Mediator. He had confessed what he knew of, and repented of it, but still affliction was coming. He was learning more about how God treats His friends. But he was worried that he was being treated as an enemy: that the Lord was permitting him to be hardened in his sins by blindness to them.

So I wonder, gentle reader, if this is one of your and my great desires of the Lord: that He would not hide His face from us as an enemy, but that, as a Friend and Father, He would make us know our transgression and sin.

Values-Reorienting Promises

So He said, “I am God, the God of your father; do not fear to go down to Egypt, for I will make of you a great nation there. I will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also surely bring you up again; and Joseph will put his hand on your eyes.”
Genesis 46:3–4

v4 is very interesting, in that the bit about Joseph closing his eyes makes it plain that the promise to "bring you up again" is still personal and particular to Jacob himself. However, Jacob would only return as a corpse, as he will remain until the resurrection. The Lord is faithful, so He surely kept His promise. But, is it such a promise-keeping as we would find faithful and true? For it only to happen to us after our death? If not, then the problem is that we are so worldly and short-sighted as to "insist upon our good things in this life" (cf. Luk 16:25). But God's promises are not just for better, fuller, more enduring things. They are also for teaching us to prioritize and value those better, fuller, more enduring things.

The Deceitfulness of Riches

The tents of robbers prosper,
And those who provoke God are secure—
In what God provides by His hand.
Job 12:6

Job's friends are in the midst of saying that he must have some secret, unconfessed sin, and if he would just confess it and repent of it, his affliction would be eliminated.

But, here, Job makes an important observation: it is dangerous to assess one's spiritual condition by his prosperity and security in this world. God, in His common grace, often gives prosperity and security to those who truly love neither their neighbor, nor the Lord.

But this is a pitfall into which we may easily fall: feeling like things are well with us spiritually, so long as they seem well to us temporally. But just because things are well with me temporally does not mean that I am justified in my treatment of men, nor that I am not provoking God. 

So, riches may deceitfully promise blessing in this world, but they perpetrate a more subtle and dangerous deception: they may deceive us that we are spiritually well, when we are currently provoking God.

"He Who Observes the Day Observes it to the Lord"

Today's M'Cheyne readings included Romans 14—favorite recourse of those who would include manmade religion in Christ's church, and demand that no one challenge it. But, it occurred to me, that v6a couldn't possibly have been used to justify following the calendar of Jeroboam I, even though it was modeled after God's own calendar, had precedent in the providentially postponed Passover for those who were unclean on the proper day, and was purportedly in worship of YHWH, Who had brought the people up from Egypt.

And yet, it cannot be legitimately claimed that anyone kept Jeroboam's calendar unto the Lord. Why? Because it was Jeroboam's calendar, not the Lord's calendar.

The only way to "observe" a day "unto the Lord" is if the Lord Himself had appointed that day. This cannot be claimed for any of the annual feast days of contemporary evangelicals (or any other branch of the visible church). 

In other words, Rom 14 cannot be used to justify any manmade religion, any idolatry. And it must not be used as a cudgel, with which to beat the strong (gospel age) believers who, by reason of understanding the implications of Christ's priesthood, and by purpose of love unto God and eternal souls, challenge the manmade religion that grieves them.

Even if it were the case that Rom 14 covered such observances, these observances must not be permitted to alter the doctrine or practice of the apostolic church which, unto the Lord, Who obsoleted it in Christ, does "not observe the day." To permit the day-observers to alter the teaching or practice of the church would be to welcome them in a way that invited debate over the things that were doubtful to them, contra v1.

Praise God, our hope is not in our "not observing the day" unto the Lord. Our hope is only in Christ, Who died and rose again.

But, since He is our hope, let us see what He has done to His former calendar, and let it be "unto Him" that we do not observe the day.

You Have Moses and the Prophets—and the Gospels and the Epistles!

Luke 16:29–31 Abraham said to him, ‘They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.’ And he said, ‘No, father Abraham; but if one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.’ But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”

There is a convicting implication here about the level of hard heartedness required to neglect reading Scripture and hearing biblical preaching.

The living God has bestowed upon us His written Word, and the preaching of it by His servants. If we neglect to hear these, we are of such full, stubborn, resistant characters that we are sure to be unmoved if even someone rises from the dead and addresses us. 

Do you read your Bible, dear reader? Do you hear biblical preaching whenever you can? The Lord has given these to us, and if we neglect them, we treat with contempt both His glory and the good of our souls.

—Adapted from Archibald Hall in Gospel Worship

Are Your Sheep Without a Shepherd? Are You a Sheep Who Politely Declines Shepherding?

In Mark 6 today, v34 was striking: "And Jesus, when He came out, saw a great multitude and was moved with compassion for them, because they were like sheep not having a shepherd. So He began to teach them many things."

Jesus was moved with compassion for them, and the shepherding to which that compassion moved Him was "to teach them many things."

May He sustain me (and you, dear pastors who might read this) in this calling, that He would not be moved with pity for my congregation because they lack shepherding. May He give me to be His instrument, here, "to teach them many things."

But it was also sad to me to think of those who underutilize the shepherding that they have. How much, cumulatively, they have missed, who absent themselves from the evening sermons, who absent themselves from the midweek sermons, who do not avail themselves of the teaching in the devotional booklets and recordings, who do not attend (or at least review) the Sabbath School lessons. It does not take long for a great amount of the teaching of Scripture to be missed by such as these. In Jesus's estimation of things, are they not in a pitiable condition, because they might be taught many things, but politely decline it?

Oh that we would love our souls in a manner after that in which Christ loves them!

One area that has been a weakness is the house-to-house teaching highlighted by the apostle in Ac 20:20. May the Lord give me grace to be moved with compassion for a flock (cf. 20:28) that certainly needs more of it.

The Covenant Blessing of God As Our Shield

Recently, while in Job 1–2 in the M'Cheyne calendar readings, after recently working through Deuteronomy 28 with the family, I noticed how much overlap there is between Satan's own preferred attacks on Job, and the curses that fall upon the church for unfaithfulness. It really is an amazing parallel. I won't take the time just now to highlight all of the specifics in common between them, but would encourage you just to read or listen to both sections. What emerges, in the composite of two passages, is an implication that Satan would always attack us, except that the Lord raises Himself as a "hedge of protection" (Job 1:10) around us. How sweet it is to know that our God has given Himself to be our shield! And, how grievous it is, then, when our own unfaithfulness becomes the occasion for the withdrawing of that protection. 

It's Too Easy to Become a Tool of the Devil

In a recent sermon on how families profit from sermons, Dr. Beeke was working from the parable of the soils in Luke 8. Many of us have just been through that parable in the M'Cheyne readings in Mark 4. One of the points that he makes is how hard Satan works to distract us from the Word. I'd encourage you to listen to the whole thing. The following clip from 19:35 may whet your appetite:

"Remember children, Satan will oppose your listening to God's word with might and main, knowing that if you truly hear it, and you truly bow under it, and you truly go out to live it, He will lose you. So Satan will do everything he can to try to disturb you before the sermon begins, to distract you during the sermon, and to dismiss the sermon from your mind as soon as it's finished. Oh, he loves it when you go right out into the vestibule and talk about the score of a ball game last week or something like that, some crazy thing like that, when you've just been in the presence of Almighty God and you've just heard a matter of life and death and you shake it off like that hearer who just cast it away as soon as the seed was sown." (emphasis mine)

That bit about the conversations after worship struck me. Consider Jesus's own explanation of the parable (nearly identical in all parallels): "Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. Those by the wayside are the ones who hear; then the devil comes and takes away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved." (Luke 8:11–12)

It's been some time since we emphasized having Lord's-Day-appropriate conversations, but I had never quite thought of it from the angle of the parable of the soils. When we hear the Word, Satan labors to snatch those thoughts right away from us. But if we immediately distract each other with whatever's new out in the world, he doesn't have to labor so much, does he? From Jesus's own explanation of the parable, that would make us tools of the devil.

That's sobering in both directions, isn't it? Both that we might be tools of the devil, and that someone who seems quite friendly could actually be acting as an enemy to our soul in the moment.

One of my great joys, in recent Lord's Days, has been to hear snippets of conversations in which so many are being friends to one-another's souls. What a glad privilege it is to be used by the Lord, to help the Word take root and bear fruit! But it's so easy to become a tool of the devil. The Lord give us grace to tremble at His Word (cf. Isa 66:2). 

Different levels of functional legalism

When correcting moral defects, how is your approach different from an unconverted but outwardly pious Jew? If it isn't, you are functionally anti-Christian and should be concerned about whether you are converted at all.

When correcting moral defects, how is your approach different from a converted Jew before the revelation of the Son, conscientious union with Him, and the outpouring and indwelling of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the ascended Christ? If it isn't, you may be converted, but you are functionally sub-Christian.

Col 4:6

Wouldn't it be wonderful if our highest horizontal priority in every relationship was to do the other person spiritual good? And how would our speech and conduct change, if that was the case?

Christian Nationalism? First Things First.

By all means, let nations be Christian. Christ is not only Prophet, and Priest, but King. And the government of every nation owes explicit allegiance and submission to Him.

But as transgression of the first table of the law is rampant in their homes and congregations, men who are waking up about the second table are in danger of letting zeal run without knowledge. 

It is a trap to think that one can make a nation Christian, when the home and the church have yet to recover the right worship of God as the rhythm of our days and weeks, and the heartbeat of lives lived in communion with Him, and therefore diligently offered as sacrifice unto Him.

"Christian" Music?

I got to work from a beautiful conference room in a hospital most of today. When I turned to go home, the maps app told me that the drive would be 20 minutes longer if I returned at that time, due to traffic. So I got a $1 bottomless drink and worked from a Wendy's. 

They're playing what I assume are the current "Christian hits." Even when quoting or alluding to Scripture, the songs don't sound at all like Scripture (generally) or the Psalms (specifically). Many of these songs are even unintentionally blasphemous. Musically, the timbre is so indulgent of the self rather than expressive of greater realities. It's been quite the experience (enough to take the time to break from work to post this).

And to listen to it, you would think that man's biggest problem is that his feelings have been hurt and that he feels badly about himself. It occurs to me that American Christianity is ultradistorted, not experiencing "real" suffering like the vast majority of the church throughout the whole of history. And, of course, we are theologically distorted by our ignorance of the immensity either of God's glory or of the evil of the guilt/power/presence of our sin.