Eternal Election

" ...the conversion of a sinner being not owing to a man's self determination, but to God's determination, and eternal election, which is absolute, and depending on the sovereign Will of God, and not on the free will of man; as is evident from what has been said : and it being very evident from the Scriptures, that the eternal election of saints to the faith and holiness, is also an election of them to eternal salvation; hence their appointment to salvation must also be absolute, and not depending on their contingent, self-determining Will."
Jonathan Edwards

Stevie Ray Vaughan - "The Sky is Crying" - Live in Iowa 1987

Fractured Fairy Tales

Nine Characteristics of Biblical Prayer

by Daryl Wingerd
True prayer is not merely a matter of saying the right words. Biblical prayer is characterized and motivated by the right attitude-right thinking about the greatness of God, the beauty of Christ, and our own unworthiness and weakness. Ask yourself if your prayers are characterized by:
An Understanding of Your Own Insignificance and Sinfulness
When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained; what is man that You take thought of him, and the son of man that You care for him? (Ps. 8:3-4 NASB)
If You, Lord, should mark iniquities, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with You that You may be feared (Ps. 130:3-4).
The Knowledge that Jesus is Your Only Access to the Father
Therefore, brethren, since we have confidence to enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which He inaugurated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh . . . let us draw near (Heb. 10:19-22).
. . . you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Pet. 2:5)
Adoration for God because of His Character and Attributes
Ascribe greatness to our God! The Rock! His work is perfect, for all His ways are just; a God of faithfulness and without injustice, righteous and upright is He. (Deut. 32:1-4)
I will extol You, my God, O King, and I will bless Your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless You, and I will praise Your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised, and His greatness is unsearchable. (Ps. 145:1-3)
Joyful Praise for God's Work in Creation and Redemption
Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created (Rev. 4:11).
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us. . . . In Him also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will (Eph. 1:3-8, 10-11).
Thankfulness for God's Kindness in Giving Every Good Thing
Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights . . . (James 1:17).
. . . let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name (Heb. 13:15).
A Sense of Your Need of Strength to Fight against Specific Sins
Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak (Matt. 26:41).
So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh-for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live (Rom. 8:12-13).
Humble Trust as You Ask the Father to Meet Every Need
Ah Lord God! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and by Your outstretched arm! Nothing is too difficult for You (Jer. 32:17).
This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him (1 John 5:14-15).
Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Heb. 4:15).
A Selfless Burden to Pray for Others
With all prayer and petition pray at all times . . . be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints, and pray on my behalf . . . (Eph. 6:18-19).
Brethren, pray for us (1 Thess. 5:25). We pray for you always . . . (2 Thess. 1:11).
Pray for those who persecute you . . . (Matt. 5:44; also see 1 Tim 2:1-2).
A Thirst for Increasing Spiritual Wisdom and Understanding
Open my eyes, that I may behold wonderful things from Your law (Ps. 119:18).
For if you cry for discernment, lift your voice for understanding; if you seek for her as silver and search for her as for hidden treasures; then you will discern the fear of the Lord and discover the knowledge of God (Prov. 2:3-5).
I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the surpassing greatness of His power toward us who believe. (Eph. 1:18-19)

An Earnest Call For Evangelical Leaders to Recover the Gospel from Its Present Humiliation

Jared Wilson reprints the afterword from Ray Ortlund’s book, A Passion for God.
I’d encourage you to read the whole thing.
Ortlund ends by applying Jeremiah 4:30 to contemporary evangelicalism:

O desolate evangelicalism, what do you mean by your stylish fads and restless search for ever new “relevance”?
Why are you so insecure that you long for the world’s approving recognition? They despise everything you hold dear! “All things to all men” is no license to cater to the whims of the consumer. Christ alone is Lord. Or have you yourself forgotten his majesty?
And why are you so boastful of your numbers and dollars? How poor you really are!
Come back to the gospel.
Come back to the wellspring of true joy and life and power.
Sanctify Christ again as Lord in your hearts.
Wake up!
Strengthen what remains, for it is on the point of death. But if you will not return to the centrality of the gospel as God’s power for the church today, then what reason does your Lord have for not abandoning you altogether?

Local indie band, The Juliets, rock The Blind Pig

This past Thursday one of Ann Arbor’s best known venues, The Blind Pig, hosted four local bands.
Headlining the show were The Juliets composed of Jeremy Freer, Kip Donlon, Scott Masson and EMU students Kaylan Mitchell and Sarah Myers.
This classic indie pop band performed for one hour, and from the crowds response, it went off without a hitch.
“The band played well together and they were very solid,” said Jared Walker, a senior music performance major.
“I do not think however that everyone has to play all the time. There can be silent parts. Over all I think the show was good it could have gone just a little further.”
The Juilets performed with a variety of music instruments, ranging from traditional guitars and drums all the way to Orchestral instruments such as the violin and cello. It was a nice clash between the classical and rock sounds that did not sound unpleasant to the ears.
“It was interesting to hear this particular combination of instruments pull together to create The Juliets,” stated EMU alumni Cassie Harris.
“I highly enjoyed hearing something that traditionally does not go together. The Juliets were extremely entertaining and that got people off their seats and start dancing.”
By Nicole Bell | THE EASTERN ECHO

Only One Hero

There is only one hero in the gospel story. His name is the Son of God.

One implication: While you and I should live wholeheartedly for him, we should not set for ourselves standards and routines that are unsustainable long-term. The truth is, we are weak. We must, and we may, factor into our lives the rejuvenation that weakness requires. Let's believe the gospel so much that, along the way, we goof off and have fun and even sleep in now and then. We'll be more useful to the Lord for the long haul.

Kevin DeYoung wisely writes:

"No doubt some Christians need to be shaken out of their lethargy. I try to do that every Sunday morning and evening. But there are also a whole bunch of Christians who need to be set free from their performance-minded, law-keeping, world-changing, participate-with-God-in-recreating-the-cosmos shackles. I promise you, some of the best people in your churches are getting tired. They don’t need another rah-rah pep talk. They don’t need to hear more statistics and more stories Sunday after Sunday about how bad everything is in the world. They need to hear about Christ’s death and resurrection. They need to hear how we are justified by faith apart from works of the law. They need to hear the old, old story once more. Because the secret of the gospel is that we actually do more when we hear less about all we need to do for God and hear more about all that God has already done for us."

Cream - Born Under A Bad Sign - At The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame

What Really Happened To The Dinosaurs

How Not To Deal with a Pastor

A second instructive passage related to this is 1 Thessalonians 5:12. Here Paul says, "And we urge you, brethren, to recognize those who labor among you, and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love for their work's sake." In other words, because of the job that pastors are called to do, and the office they are fulfilling, the congregation is to esteem them "very highly in love." To entertain (much less start!) a rumor about a pastor that would cast aspersion upon his character or conduct is a violation of the kind of respect that is owed. It also has the potential to undermine his credibility and hinder his ministry. In fact, the church member who is determined to obey 1 Thessalonians 5:12 will be unwilling to listen to such accusations.
Anyone at any time can start a rumor that has absolutely no basis in reality. Anyone can make an unfounded, unsubstantiated charge against an individual, particularly if that individual is in a leadership position. Spiritual leaders should not become suspect because of rumor or innuendo. Neither should a process of dismissal be instigated based on a single, unsubstantiated accusation. Paul wrote very unambiguously, "Do not receive an accusation against an elder, except from two or three witnesses" (1 Timothy 5:19). In other words, just one witness is not enough.
Is Paul building walls to protect pastors from ever being accused of serious sin? Not at all! Rather, he is establishing for us, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, proper guidelines and parameters in which we must walk if we are going to bring charges of serious sin against an elder or pastor.
Pastors are extremely susceptible to false accusations by virtue of the nature of their work. Think of counseling. Who can prevent a disgruntled person from charging a pastor with improper speech or conduct in a one-on-one situation? Even with people whom I trust implicitly, I try to be very careful and not give any occasion, as best I know the possibilities, where an accusation could be charged against me by someone who may want to do in the reputation of the church I serve or its ministry. It is simply prudent for pastors to avoid situations that make them easy prey for rumormongers.
John Calvin, in his Commentary on 1 Timothy 5:18, made a wonderful statement on this whole subject:

For none are more liable to slanders and calumnies than godly teachers. Not only does it arise from the difficulty of their office, that sometimes they either sink under it, or stagger, or halt, or blunder, in consequence of which wicked men seize many occasions for finding fault with them [in other words, the pressures of the ministry sometimes get weighed down so much that the temptations become more formidable and the defenses are weakened and sometimes these slip-ups and sins do come in light of that]; but there is this additional vexation, that, although they perform their duty correctly, so as not to commit any error whatever, they never escape a thousand censures. And this is the craftiness of Satan, to draw away the hearts of men from ministers, that instruction may gradually fall into contempt.

This is very insightful and to the point. In the Old Testament, when Absalom was allowed to return to Jerusalem while David was king, remember what Absalom did? As the people came to David to have their cases solved, and as David was busy and unable to hear all the cases, Abasalom, the Scripture says, "began to steal the hearts of the people away from David." Through innuendoes, doubts and question marks placed in the minds of the Israelites, he stole their hearts from David. This is exactly what can happen with ministers, and when it happens, it causes the instruction of the Word of God, which they are commissioned to give to the people, gradually to fall into contempt. Calvin continues:

Thus not only is wrong done to innocent persons, in having their reputation unjustly wounded, (which is exceedingly base in regard to those who hold so honourable a rank,) but the authority of the sacred doctrine of God is diminished.
And this is what Satan, as I have said, chiefly labours to accomplish;… Not only so, but as soon as any charge against the ministers of the word has gone abroad, it is believed as fully as if they were already convicted.…
We need not wonder, therefore, if they whose duty it is to reprove the faults of all, to oppose the wicked desires of all, and to restrain by their severity every person whom they see going astray, have many enemies. What, then, will be the consequence, if we shall listen indiscriminately to all the slanders that are spread abroad concerning them?

It is easy to make an accusation, spread a rumor, or begin speaking with innuendoes that undermine the credibility of the voice--the mouthpiece--that God has placed in the church to instruct from the Word of God, and we must guard against it. Paul had been falsely accused when he wrote this letter to Timothy. In Jerusalem he had been accused of desecrating the temple by taking a Gentile into the court beyond where the Gentiles were allowed to enter. Though he was not guilty, nevertheless the charge was made and he wound up being imprisoned and ultimately sent to Rome. The difficulties he faced there, along with the opportunities to preach the gospel, can all be traced back to false accusations.
When an unfounded accusation is made by an individual against the pastor, not only is this accusation not to be acted upon, it is not even to be received. Rather, 1 Timothy 5:19 ought to be cited and the accuser ought to be asked if he or she has another witness to substantiate the accusation. If not, we are not to receive it. The Scripture tells us not to even listen to or entertain an accusation that is unsubstantiated. If it cannot be substantiated, you and I must not participate in the sin of the accuser by listening to it.
The Puritans had a saying that the person who gossips has the devil on his tongue, and the person who listens to gossip has the devil in his ear. Paul here says, don't even listen to an accusation that comes from only one witness.
By Tom Ascol - To read the entire article

The Sky Is Crying - Albert King - 1966

The Evil Dr. Pelosi

9 Ways to Know the Gospel of Christ is True

1. Jesus Christ, as he is presented to us in the New Testament, and as he stands forth from all its writings, is too single and too great to have been invented so uniformly by all these writers.

2. Nobody has ever explained the empty tomb of Jesus in the hostile environment of Jerusalem where the enemies of Jesus would have given anything to produce the corpse, but could not.

3. Cynical opponents of Christianity abounded where claims were made that many eyewitnesses were available to consult concerning the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

4. The early church was an indomitable force of faith and love and sacrifice on the basis of the reality of Jesus Christ.

5. The prophesies of the Old Testament find stunning fulfillment in the history of Jesus Christ.

6. The witnesses to Jesus Christ who wrote the New Testament gospels and letters are not gullible or deceitful or demented.

7. The worldview that emerges from the writings of the New Testament makes more sense out of more reality than any other worldview.

8. When one sees Christ as he is portrayed truly in the gospel, there shines forth a spiritual light that is a self-authenticating.

9. When we see and believe the glory of God in the gospel, the Holy Spirit is given to us so that the love of God might be "poured out in our hearts" (Romans 5:5).
By John Piper - to read the supporting thoughts for each point go here

John Piper - Why I abominate the prosperity gospel

Mark Steyn: Shooter exposes hole in U.S. Terror Strategy

Thirteen dead and 42 wounded would be a bad day for the U.S. military in Afghanistan and a great victory for the Taliban. When it happens in Texas, in the heart of the biggest military base in the nation, at a processing center for soldiers either returning from or deploying to combat overseas, it is not merely a "tragedy" (as too many people called it) but a glimpse of a potentially fatal flaw at the heart of what we have called, since 9/11, the "war on terror." Brave soldiers trained to hunt down and kill America's enemy abroad were killed in the safety and security of home by, in essence, the same enemy – a man who believes in and supports everything the enemy does.
And he's a U.S. Army major.
And his superior officers and other authorities knew about his beliefs but seemed to think it was just a bit of harmless multicultural diversity – as if believing that "the Muslims should stand up and fight against the aggressor" (i.e., his fellow American soldiers) and writing Internet paeans to the "noble" "heroism" of suicide bombers and, indeed, objectively supporting the other side in an active war is to be regarded as just some kind of alternative lifestyle that adds to the general vibrancy of the base.
When it emerged early Thursday afternoon that the shooter was Nidal Malik Hasan, there appeared shortly thereafter on Twitter a flurry of posts with the striking formulation: "Please judge Maj. Malik Nadal [sic] by his actions and not by his name."
Concerned tweeters can relax: There was never really any danger of that – and not just in the sense that the New York Times' first report on Maj. Hasan never mentioned the words "Muslim" or "Islam," or that ABC's Martha Raddatz's only observation on his name was that "as for the suspect, Nadal Hasan, as one officer's wife told me, 'I wish his name was Smith.'"
What a strange reaction. I suppose what she means is that, if his name were Smith, we could all retreat back into the same comforting illusions that allowed the bureaucracy to advance Nidal Malik Hasan to major and into the heart of Fort Hood while ignoring everything that mattered about the essence of this man.
Since 9/11, we have, as the Twitterers, recommend, judged people by their actions – flying planes into skyscrapers, blowing themselves up in Bali nightclubs or London Tube trains, planting IEDs by the roadside in Baghdad or Tikrit. And on the whole we're effective at responding with action of our own.
But we're scrupulously nonjudgmental about the ideology that drives a man to fly into a building or self-detonate on the subway, and thus we have a hole at the heart of our strategy. We use rhetorical conveniences like "radical Islam" or, if that seems a wee bit Islamophobic, just plain old "radical extremism." But we never make any effort to delineate the line which separates "radical Islam" from nonradical Islam. Indeed, we go to great lengths to make it even fuzzier. And somewhere in that woozy blur the pathologies of a Nidal Malik Hasan incubate. An Army psychiatrist, Maj. Hasan is an American, born and raised, who graduated from Virginia Tech and then received his doctorate from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. But he opposed America's actions in the Middle East and Afghanistan and made approving remarks about jihadists on U.S. soil. "You need to lock it up, Major," said his superior officer, Col. Terry Lee.
But he didn't really need to "lock it up" at all. He could pretty much say anything he liked, and if any "red flags" were raised they were quickly mothballed. Lots of people are "anti-war." Some of them are objectively on the other side – that's to say, they encourage and support attacks on American troops and civilians. But not many of those in that latter category are U.S. Army majors. Or so one would hope.
Yet why be surprised? Azad Ali, a man who approvingly quotes such observations as "If I saw an American or British man wearing a soldier's uniform inside Iraq I would kill him because that is my obligation" is an adviser to Britain's Crown Prosecution Service (the equivalent of U.S. attorneys). In Toronto this week, the brave ex-Muslim Nonie Darwish mentioned that, on flying from the U.S. to Canada, she was questioned at length about the purpose of her visit by an apparently Muslim border official. When she revealed that she was giving a speech about Islamic law, he rebuked her: "We are not to question Shariah."
That's the guy manning the airport security desk.
In the New York Times, Maria Newman touched on Hasan's faith only obliquely: "He was single, according to the records, and he listed no religious preference." Thank goodness for that, eh? A neighbor in Texas says the major had "Allah" and "another word" pinned up in Arabic on his door. "Akbar" maybe? On Thursday morning he is said to have passed out copies of the Quran to his neighbors. He shouted in Arabic as he fired.
But don't worry: As the FBI spokesman assured us in nothing flat, there's no terrorism angle.
That's true, in a very narrow sense: Maj. Hasan is not a card-carrying member of the Texas branch of al-Qaida reporting to a control officer in Yemen or Waziristan. If he were, things would be a lot easier. But the same pathologies that drive al-Qaida beat within Maj. Hasan, too, and in the end his Islamic impulses trumped his expensive Western education, his psychiatric training, his military discipline – his entire American identity.
What happened to those men and women at Fort Hood had a horrible symbolism: Members of the best-trained, best-equipped fighting force on the planet gunned down by a guy who said a few goofy things no one took seriously. And that's the problem: America has the best troops and fiercest firepower, but no strategy for throttling the ideology that drives the enemy – in Afghanistan and in Texas.

By MARK STEYN

Syndicated columnist

Bob Dylan - It's all over now Baby Blue 1965

Break Out The T.P. And Tylenol

Our Gospel Is A Person

"Our faith is a person; the gospel that we have to preach is a person; and go wherever we may, we have something solid and tangible to preach, for our gospel is a person. If you had asked the twelve Apostles in their day, 'What do you believe in?' they would not have stopped to go round about with a long sermon, but they would have pointed to their Master and they would have said, 'We believe him.' 'But what are your doctrines?' 'There they stand incarnate.' 'But what is your practice?' 'There stands our practice. He is our example.' 'What then do you believe?' Hear the glorious answer of the Apostle Paul, 'We preach Christ crucified.' Our creed, our body of divinity, our whole theology is summed up in the person of Christ Jesus."

C. H. Spurgeon, "De Propaganda Fide," in Lectures Delivered before the Young Men's Christian Association in Exeter Hall 1858-1859, pages 159-160.

Prayerlessness is Unbelief

Prayer is essential for the Christian, as much for what it says about us as for what it can do through God.  The simple act of getting on our knees (or faces or feet or whatever) for 5 or 50 minutes every day is the surest sign of our humility and dependence on our Father in heaven.  There may be many reasons for our prayerlessness—time management, busyness, lack of concentration—but most fundamentally, we ask not because we think we need not. or we think God can give not.   Deep down we feel secure when we have money in the bank, a healthy report from the doctor, and powerful people on our side.  We do not trust in God alone.  Prayerlessness is an expression of our meager confidence in God’s ability to provide and of our strong confidence in our ability to take care of ourselves without God’s help.
Too often when we struggle with prayer we focus on the wrong things.  We focus on praying better instead of focusing on knowing better the one to whom we pray.  We focus on our need for discipline rather than our need for God.  Almost all of us want to pray more frequently, and yet our lives seem too disordered.  But in God’s mind our messy, chaotic lives are an impetus to prayer instead of an obstacle to prayer.
You don’t need to work and work at discipline nearly as much as you need faith.  You don’t need an ordered life to enable prayer, you need a messy life to drive you to prayer.  You don’t need to have everything in order before you can pray.  You need to know you’re disordered so you will pray.  You don’t need your life to be fixed up.  You need a broken heart.  You need to think to yourself: “Tomorrow is another day that I need God.  I need to know him. I need forgiveness. I need help. I need protection. I need deliverance. I need patience. I need courage. Therefore, I need prayer.”
If you know you are needy and believe that God helps the needy, you will pray.  Conversely, if we seldom pray, the problem goes much deeper than a lack of organization and follow through.  The heart that never talks to God is the heart that trusts in itself and not in the power of God.  Prayerlessness is unbelief.
Prayerfulness, on the other hand is an evidence of humility and faith, which is why God loves it when we pray.
Kevin DeYoung

Bob Dylan & Paul Simon - Knockin on Heavens Door

Unburdened

And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Isaiah 53:6

"Here is a beautiful antithesis. In ourselves we are scattered, in Christ we are gathered together. By nature we go astray and are driven headlong to destruction, in Christ we find the path that leads us to the gate of salvation. Our sins overwhelm us, but they are laid on Christ by whom we are unburdened. Therefore, when we were perishing and, alienated from God, were hastening to hell, Christ took upon himself the filthy depths of our sins, to rescue us from eternal destruction."

John Calvin, Sermons on Isaiah's Prophecy of the Death and Passion of Christ, pages 66-67.

Matt Redman Interview

I asked Matt Redman if he could fill us in on some of the background to his latest album, We Shall Not Be Shaken, which I reviewed yesterday. His responses give some insight into the songwriting process, as well as Matt’s humility.
Themes of God’s sovereignty pervade the songs on this album. Why did you choose to make that focus for this album?
I had a sense that many people right now need re-assurance that God is in control in their lives. So many recent events, particularly economic ones, have reminded us that much of this life and this world is fragile, temporary and changing. We’ve heard so many statistics about mortgage payments defaults and unemployment - but these aren’t just facts and figures - this is real people’s lives. So into this environment I wanted the songs to inject some truth - that in contrast to all of this, God is unchanging, unfailing, unshifting and unshakeable. Jesus is the solid ground and firm foundations we can build our lives upon.
Unlike previous albums, all the songs are co-writes. Was that intentional, and if so, what were the benefits and drawbacks (if any)?
I loved the team dynamic. I wrote many other songs, but this time the co-written ones rose to the top of the pile, and that I think is a good thing. Not many things in the kingdom of God are meant to be carried out lone-ranger style all of the time!
How did you choose Robert Marvin as a producer and what did you enjoy about working with him on the project?
I came across him a while back - he’s a real worshipper but had never worked on a congregational style worship album until my last project. I also loved many of the other projects he’d produced, especially Mat Kearney. This time we went into the album process on such a strong footing, as we had a couple of years of friendship in the mix this time.
What song on the album is the most personally meaningful to you?
It’s hard, to say, but maybe ‘You alone can rescue’ - as we’ve had the privilege of singing this in 18 different countries already, and had a very encouraging response to it.
If there any song that has a unique story behind it?
Maybe the opening song, ‘This is how we know’. It’s based on John 3:16 and 1 John 3:16 - so easy references to remember! I tried to finish this song for 3 months or so but had no chorus. My wife Beth came into the songwriting process, and 45 minutes later the song was finished!
Which song took the longest to write, and which song took the shortest?
The longest was ‘Gloria’ - Jonas Myrin and I had never settled on a chorus for this, then one day it all fell into place. That song probably took 18 months to complete (as we live in different nations!). The quickest was ‘How great is Your faithfulness’ - Jonas brought the beginnings of a chorus idea, and the verse thoughts came straight away, as did the bridge. It felt like a theme that was in our hearts and minds already, so when the melody started to take shape, the songwriting process flowed really quickly and smoothly. We made a few tweaks and edits afterwards, but most of that song was written within a few hours. It’s not always like that!
You don’t have to have songs being sung around the world to benefit from Matt’s example. Sometimes songs come quickly, sometimes they come slowly. But unless we’re faithful to write, you can be pretty sure they won’t come at all.
Worship Matters

Bob Dylan - Highway 61 Revisted

The Main Difference Between Calvinist and Non-Calvinist Views of Saving Grace by John Hendryx

Recently I had am exchange on a message board regarding the particulars of Calvinism. Hopefully you find it helpful:

Visitor #1: I gave up on Calvinism a long time ago.


My response: You mean you gave up on the idea that Jesus Christ alone is sufficient to save you?


Visitor #1: Yep


Visitor #2 chimes in: John, is it possible you're caricaturing the situation just a smidge? Calvinism cannot possibly have a monopoly in affirming Jesus Christ as sufficient.


My response: Actually the central difference between Calvinist and non-Calvinist soteriology is that Calvinist believes Jesus Christ is sufficient to save to the uttermost while non-Calvinist soteriology believes that while Jesus is necessary, he is not sufficient. To clarify what I mean, both Roman Catholics and Arminians for example, would anathematize anyone who says you can be saved without the grace of God. The Reformers never claimed Rome believed you can be saved apart from grace. That wasn't the debate. The debate of the Reformation was never ever about the necessity of grace, it was always about the sufficiency of grace. That remains the issue today in so many contexts (James White). So no I am not caricaturing the situation. This is the essence of it. The theology of Calvinism or Reformed Theology centers on the sufficiency of Christ in salvation. There is nothing more essential to its position and this is what sets is apart from other all other types of theology. Another way to put it: it is the difference between Monergism &. Synergism. As Michael Haykin notes, "the most vital question, is, whether sinners are wholly helpless in their sin, and whether God is to be thought of as saving us by free, unconditional, invincible grace, not only justifying us for Christs' sake when we come to faith, but also raising us from the death of sin by His quickening Spirit in order to bring us to faith." In other words, whatever God requires of us, (including faith), if we believe the unregenerate man has the power in himself to exercise, then we make the cross and grace of Jesus Christ of no effect. Either Christ is a complete savior, OR He helps us to save ourselves. What Calvinism means in the historic sense, is that Jesus Christ is a complete savior, not a partial one.
Read the rest

Bob Dylan at The Fox Theatre In Detroit

I took my daughter Jessica to see Dylan last night at the Fox Theatre which is an amazing place. The picture gives you an idea of how beautiful the place is. The concert was great. Dylans band is really good. It was a 2 hour show by the 68 year old Dylan and we really had a good time. All my children like Dylan they heard Slow train Coming , Saved, Infidels and shot of Love along with eariler Dylan as they were growing up. They played a killer version of Highway 61 that rocked the house and Like a Rolling Stone ending with All Along The Watchtower.

Eric Clapton - Hoochie Coochie Man Live

What Is True Of Him

God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control. 2 Timothy 1:7

"We must think of suffering in a new way, we must face everything in a new way. And the way in which we face it all is by reminding ourselves that the Holy Spirit is in us. There is the future, there is the high calling, there is the persecution, there is the opposition, there is the enemy. I see it all. I must admit also that I am weak, that I lack the necessary powers and propensities. But instead of stopping there . . . I say, "But the Spirit of God is in me. God has given me his Holy Spirit." . . . What matters . . . is not what is true of us but what is true of Him."

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression, page 100.

Frankinstein Lives - Thanks To Nancy Pelosi

The Great Disturbance

"Our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, in saying 'Repent,' intended that the whole life of believers should be repentance." Martin Luther, Thesis 1

According to Schaff, History of the Christian Church, VII:160, Luther was attacking the medieval notion of sacramental penitence. That kind of "repentance" could be limited to isolated outward acts, leaving the rest of our lives safe from the mega-upheaval of true repentance. Luther contended that real repentance opens us up to endless personal change, leaving nothing about us untouched.

When Luther posted his Theses, he undermined self-reinforcing Christianity, which is no Christianity, and he launched a new era of self-challenging Christianity, which is the power of the gospel.

In Karl Barth's commentary on Romans, he entitles his section on Romans 12-15 "The Great Disturbance." The whole world needs gospel disturbance.

Six Flags Over Jesus

Jared C. Wilson

I am from Texas. I love Texas. I get Texas.
I lived half my life in Texas, grew up in Texas churches, ministered in 3 of them, accepted the gospel of Willow Creek (which is from Chicago but is Texas-sized) in one of them, and know full well what Jesus meant when he said a prophet is not accepted in his hometown.
Most every time I talk “church” with Texas folk who are still in Texas, the leading question is “How many are you running?” or “How big is your building?” It would be an exaggeration to say every conversation begins this way but it would not be an exaggeration to say most of them do. I have been in Tennessee for the last 12 years, and the Bible Belt is in full cinch there, along with its focus on bigger, better, and faster. Your church is not taken seriously by most in Nashville if you’re not big. But nobody makes bigness the looming necessity that Texan evangelicals make it. In Nashville, the bigness is an unspoken rule while people are talking about small groups and spiritual formation and music, but in Texas they talk about bigness without apology, without any trace of irony, without any sense that it’s utterly ridiculous to assume the church growth movement. Most of them don’t know what irony is or what the “church growth movement” is. But they know what church is, and it’s big, dang it. Or else you’re not doing something right. Or, bless your little heart, you sure are giving it a go.
In Nashville, the people might think your small church is cute but in Houston they will tell you it is, as if this is a compliment and not a condescension. The second pastor I was a youth minister for planted his church in 1995 in Houston. He’s been there 15 years now with a regular attendance of about 100 for the last decade, and our mutual friends consider this as “Hanging in there.” As if 15 years of existence with 100 people constitutes the verge of death.
This isn’t just a Texas problem, but it is a Texas-sized problem in evangelicalism. Enter First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas and their new $130 million building campaign. Normally I don’t give one whit about how much a pastor is being paid or how much a church spends on whatever; I get my ire raised more by other things. And what FBC Dallas is doing doesn’t really raise my ire. But it is reflective of something that, yes, is bigger than FBC Dallas, bigger than $130 million.
Do we even know what $130 million looks like? Well, we do, actually. It looks like this.
What is at stake is what church is. In the building Q&A linked above, we find this gem: “[T]he glass walls have an evangelistic effect: people walking by have a view in from the street and feel drawn in.”
In the same way a hobo on the sidewalk might press his face against the window of a fancy restaurant in a Norman Rockwell painting, no doubt.
Nobody should fault FBC Dallas or anybody else for building a building. But this isn’t a building. This, and a bunch of other stuff, is Bible Belt Disneyland. This is evangelicalism with more cowbell. This is Field of Dreams attractional church. And it stinks to high heaven. I was directed to a church website once while doing some research that had in its mission statement this sentence: “We will be a missional church, reaching out to the community to invite them to come see what we’re doing at ___________.”
Not go and tell. Come and see is the “mission” of megachurchianity. Which is why you need evangelistic windows.

Jeremy Freer and The Juliets

Deep Cutz
by Jeff Milo

Jeremy Freer’s vocals should have always been paired with the soaring, sawed moan of a cello — even if the guy has a soft spot for post-hardcore stuff like Fugazi or shredded indie-rock like Sebadoh — we also have to consider his undying love for the haunting beauty of Chopin. Indeed, blend that with the baroque-pop and folk influences upon his string-playing bandmates Kaylan Mitchell and Sarah Myers, with the hook-happy pop acrobat of Freer’s longtime friend and collaborator Scott Masson (also of Office) and you have the delicate and rousing orchestral sweeps of The Juliets.

The quartet are currently finishing up their debut full-length (for an early-2010 release) and play Friday (11/6) at PJ’s Lager House with Timothy Monger (of Great Lakes Myth Society), Kittens Ablaze and Social Studies
From Real Detroit Weekly
http://www.myspace.com/julietsband

Yawning at the Word - It's really hard to listen to God when there are really interesting things to think about.

It has been said to the point of boredom that we live in a narcissistic age, where we are wont to fixate on our needs, our wants, our wishes, and our hopes—at the expense of others and certainly at the expense of God. We do not like it when a teacher uses up the whole class time presenting her material, even if it is material from the Word of God. We want to be able to ask our questions about our concerns, otherwise we feel talked down to, or we feel the class is not relevant to our lives.

It is well and good for the preacher to base his sermon on the Bible, but he better get to something relevant pretty quickly, or we start mentally to check out. Don't spend a lot of time in the Bible, we tell our preachers, but be sure to get to personal illustrations, examples from daily life, and most importantly, an application that we can use.

It's easy to see how this culture has profoundly reshaped the dynamics of preaching and teaching. All the demands have been placed on the shoulders of the preacher, so anxious are we to meet needs and stay relevant. No longer are listeners asked to listen humbly to the proclamation of God's Word, in all its mystery and glory. To be sure, we want the preacher to begin with the Word—we're Christians after all—but only as a starting point, and only as long as he moves on to things that really interest us.

We often hear people say how difficult it is to hear God anymore, and I wonder if one reason is that we've forgotten how to listen to the Word of God when it comes to us in the sanctuary or the classroom. We listen like a husband and wife listen when they are in the middle of an argument: they listen only so they can have ammunition to mount a counter attack. That's not listening. And when we listen to the sermon only to hear what seems immediately and directly relevant, neither is that listening. And yet we've raised a whole generation of Christians to listen like this.

Whenever the Bible is read, a hush should come over us. We should be inching toward the edge of our seats, leaning forward, turning our best ear toward the speaker, fearful we'll miss a single word— the deeds and words and character of Almighty and Merciful God are being revealed! In a world of suffering and pain, of doubt and despair, of questions about the meaning and purpose of existence, we are about to hear of God's glory, forgiveness, mercy and love, of his intention for the world, of his promise to make it all good in the end, of the way to join his people, of the means to abide with him forever! And there we sit, tapping our feet, mentally telling the preacher to get on with it.

But if we take the trouble to listen, really listen, to that Word, we'll discover something else marvelous: that the One being revealed is as patient with us as we are impatient with his Word, and as enamored with us as we are bored with him. Ah yes, even more enamored.

By Mark Galli - to read the rest

Fattening Frogs for Snakes, Sonny Boy Williamson & The Animals

The Most Incompentent Group In The Country Are Promising to Fix Health Care

Joel Osteen’s Christianity without a Cross

The sad thing about Joel Osteen is that he has all the marks of a sincere person. I just finished watching the profile of his ministry on “60 Minutes,” and there is not one thing about him that looks phony. He is one of the most likeable, loveable fellows that you’ll ever see. I really think he believes everything he is saying.
That is why what he does is so awful. The prosperity gospel that Osteen preaches will damn the very people he intends to help (if they believe it), and he appears completely unaware of the darkness into which he plunges his followers. Osteen’s lack of awareness of his own blindness was prophesied in the scriptures: “Evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived” (2 Timothy 3:13). If anyone has ever been deluded by his own error, it’s Joel Osteen.
Nevertheless, Osteen pastors a church that has about 42,000 people attending every week. On top of that, his television broadcast reaches an estimated 7 million people on a weekly basis. Yet by his own admission, his message focuses on the “positive,” and not on sin, redemption, and the cross of Jesus Christ. In other words, his message doesn’t focus on the Gospel. I would have to say that there is hardly anything distinctively Christian about anything that he says. And if fact, the prosperity “gospel” is decidedly anti-Christian (1 Timothy 6:10).
As I was watching the “60 Minutes” interview, I was aghast that Osteen openly admits that he preaches this way. He doesn’t even blush when he says it.
Inteviewer: “[In your new book, you write that] to become a better you, you must be positive towards yourself, develop better relationships, embrace the place where you are. Not one mention of God in that. Not one mention of Jesus Christ in that.”

Osteen: “That’s just my message. There is scripture in there that backs it all up. But I feel like, Byron, I’m called to help people…how do we walk out the Christian life? How do we live it? And these are principles that can help you. I mean, there’s a lot better people qualified to say, ‘Here’s a book that going to explain the scriptures to you.’ I don’t think that’s my gifting.”
Osteen has no idea that the Bible teaches that pastors must be able to do precisely what Osteen says he’s not gifted to do—teach the scriptures (1 Timothy 3:2). Moreover, pastors have to know the word so well that they are able to refute false teachers and their teachings: “He must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it” (Titus 1:9). Not only does Osteen not have the pastoral gift of teaching, he is himself a false teacher.
I am writing this blog because I think Osteen is dangerous. The prosperity “gospel” that he preaches makes the Almighty into a cosmic slot machine; just believe hard enough and you’ll hit paydirt and have your “best life now.” Yet the Christian gospel explicitly teaches that if a person tries to have their best life now, they will forfeit eternity: “Whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake shall find it. For what will a man be profited, if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his soul?” (Matthew 16:25-26).
Listen to Joel Osteen at your own risk. He is peddling death. And he is affable enough to make you feel like it’s life. But do not be deceived. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Reactions to the “60 Minutes” Joel Osteen Piece

The mentality that thinks in terms of marketing Jesus inevitably moves toward progressive distortion of him; the pursuit of the next emotional round of experience easily degenerates into an intoxicating substitute for the spirituality of the Word. There is non-negotiable, biblical, intellectual content to be proclaimed. By all means insist that this content be heralded with conviction and compassion; by all means seek the unction of the Spirit; by all means try to think through how to cast this content in ways that engage the modern secularist. But when all the footnotes are in place, my point remains the same: the historic gospel is unavoidably cast as intellectual content that must be taught and proclaimed. -D.A. Carson, The Gagging of God
A few thoughts on tonight’s 60 Minutes’ piece on Joel Osteen.
1. Byron Pitts, the reporter doing the piece, was simply superb. To the point. Unmoved by show. Understood the problem. In fact, probably understood far more than Osteen himself does about Christianity.
2. As much as I would like to join those who say that Osteen is a simpleton who doesn’t know what he’s doing, a close examination will show that at every point where there is a choice between being part of the church or departing into heresy, Osteen sticks with the church where there is money to be had and departs from the church where there is a faith to be confessed. He’s could be called a heretic by some, even if he is a believer, and he communicates a purposefully false trivialization of the person and work of Jesus Christ in favor of a man-centered motivational message of self-improvement.
Again, as I’ve said before, every evangelical leader needs to personally and by name repudiate and separate from Osteen, and call upon him and his followers to come back into the faith that is articulated in the Apostle’s Creed.
3. Osteen’s 73 million dollar cash cow is making a lot of people wealthy. This is about money, and Osteen is smart enough to know there is more money to be had by avoiding begging on TV. This doesn’t change a thing, however. He’s taking enough money to fund a huge part of the modern missions movement and using it to put on a show and promote materialism.
4. The line about getting people into “church” who have been out of “church” is simply crap, to be polite. No one in this movement is in church. They’re in the worst form of the prosperity Gospel, they are abandoning the God of the Bible, and they are glorifying a man who is assisting in the humiliation of the Gospel of Jesus. Osteen is a motivational speaker, and he uses only enough Christianity as necessary to get in the pockets of the gullible. Osteen is a Gospel preacher like Col. Sanders is an army officer.
5. Osteen’s tears of gratitude over being part of “changed lives” shouldn’t erase the fact that he is responsible for the spiritual delusion of millions, and his dressed up denial of the Biblical Gospel will be judged for the lie that it is on the day of judgement. I’ve got hundreds of letters from people telling me that IM essays “changed” or “helped” them. Send me 73 million bucks and I’ll be grateful, too.
6. The piece got what it needed out of Dr. Horton, but you should read Made In America to get the whole picture of what Horton would say if he had more time.
7. Evangelicals: Want to know why thousands of us are looking toward Rome? How bad can Marian dogmas and purgatory be in comparison to a movement that has tens of millions of people hailing Osteen as the great Christian proclaimer of our age? From Graham to Osteen. God help us. You cannot help but feel dirty.
8. Osteen probably doesn’t have the knowledge to be able to judge his own errors in the light of Biblical truth. Sad, but true. He simply has no idea that he has no idea. He thinks Jesus, the Holy Trinity and the Holy Scriptures are all means to the end of having a better paycheck. According to Osteen tonight, you can get the same truths from any psychologist or motivational speaker.
9. The story no one seems to want to tell: Osteen never used the principles that are in his books in order to succeed. He dropped out of college after one year at ORU. (Too academic?) He was a media guy at his dad’s church. He was brought into the pulpit by his dad’s sudden death, and he was clueless. Parroted his dad’s methods for a couple of years, then found Norman Vincent Peale’s positive thinking and abandoned the Gospel for “life coaching.” In other words, he stumbled into daddy’s pulpit and found what drew the crowds. A guy with a message of personal improvement like Tony Robbins? Hardly.
UPDATE: A page of Horton resources related to Osteen.
UPDATE II: So many good Osteen pieces on there. Denny Burke zeroes in on Osteen’s glad admission that he does not preach the Bible’s main message.

UPDATE III: Slate Magazine on Osteen’s God.
Internet Monk

Bob Dylan - It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry

Sleeping At The Controls

Why So Many Words in Worship?

Perhaps you’ve wondered why Christian worship is so heavy on words? Perhaps you or your church has been criticized for being too propositional, too auditory, too…wordy. Well, here are twenty-five reasons why verbal proclamation–through the reading, preaching, singing, and praying of the Bible and biblical truth–should have the preeminent place in corporate worship:
1. Faith comes by hearing (Rom. 10:14-15). We cannot call on Jesus unless we believe in him and we cannot believe in him unless we hear of him from the lips of a herald. Faith begins with words.
2. God has chosen word-gifts and word-offices to build up the church (Eph. 4:11-12).
3. God creates through his word (cf. Gen. 1; Col. 1:16). God’s work of creation is always a speech act.
4. God regenerates through his word. We are born again through the living and abiding word of God (1 Peter 1:23). And “word” here is not merely Jesus Christ, but the preaching Peter’s audience had received (v. 25).
5. God’s people are called to follow his commands and keep the laws. Jesus exhorted “if you love me, you will keep my commandments (John 14:15; cf. Deut. 11:1). We cannot love unless we are obedient and we cannot obey unless we are instructed in the law of the Lord. That is why the Psalmist not only rejoices in the person of God, but delights in his decrees and statutes (Psalm 119:16, 24).
6. Throughout the Bible, there is an unmistakable priority of hearing over sight. In distinction to the popular religions around them, God insisted that he was a God who would be unseen (cf. Exodus 20:3-4). When Moses asked to see God, the Lord refused, saying, “You cannot see my face, for no one can see me and live” (33:20). Instead, God caused his goodness to pass in front of Moses by proclaiming his name–“Yahweh”–and declaring his character–“I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion” (33:19). Biblical faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see (Heb. 11:1; cf. 1 Peter 1:8).
7. All the corporate worship we know of in the early church is saturated with words. While there are many things we don’t know about the worship of the early church in the Bible, we do know that they devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer (Acts 2:42). We know they were devoted to the public reading of Scripture (1 Tim. 4:13). We know they brought hymns, words of instruction, revelations, tongues and interpretations (1 Cor. 14:26). In other words, while we can make inferences and prudential judgments about the role of visual arts in worship, we know for certain that their gatherings were infused with words.
8. Jesus Christ is the preexistent, incarnate, eternal, Word of God (John 1:1). It is sometimes objected that our focus in worship is to be on the Word (Jesus) not the word (the Bible). This is surely true. We worship Christ not the Scriptures. But the argument goes too far if it places a wedge between the incarnate Word of God (Jesus) and the word of God (Scripture). We don’t believe the Bible is Jesus Christ, but let us not miss the connection between the Word and the word. God created by means of the eternal Logos–his wisdom, his speech, his voice, his word. At the same time, we know that God created by and in Jesus Christ. Both truths demonstrate that the Logos is the mediating agent in all of creation and revelation, whether by means of the Divine Voice or incarnated in the person of Jesus Christ. In other words, the Word we see revealed and embodied in Jesus, is the same Word we meet in God’s self-disclosure in the pages of Scripture.
9. Paul places a high value on maximum intelligibility in corporate worship (1 Cor. 14:1-25). There are times and places for ambiguity and subtlety. Corporate worship, however, is for proclamation. And words are the least ambiguous (though not always crystal-clear themselves) means by which the truth can be proclaimed. Dance can honor God, painting can praise our Maker, and music can please the Lord, but no other art form can proclaim the truth with as much shared intelligibility as words. Even the parables, which are often cited as encouragement for using stories and drama, were too ambiguous. That’s why Jesus told parables: to be unclear. “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you,” Jesus told his disciples. “But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that they may be ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never understanding; otherwise they might turn and be forgiven” (Mark 4:11-12).
10. Jesus was a preacher. “But he said, ‘I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns also, because that is why I was sent’” (Luke 4:43).
11. The church was founded on the teaching of the apostles and prophets (Eph. 2:20; cf. John 16:13).
12. Teaching-preaching was a normative part of early Christian worship. The first Christians inherited from the Jews a strong tradition of teaching and preaching (cf. Acts 13:14-16; 15:21). From at least the time of Ezra, for example, we know that the Levites “helped the people understand the law.” They “read from the book, from the law of God, clearly; and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading” (Nehemiah 6:7-8; cf. 2 Chronicles 15:3). We see this same emphasis in the New Testament church. Paul was preeminently a preacher (Ephesians 3:7-9). He commanded Timothy mainly to preach and teach (1 Tim. 4:13) and to instruct others in the same (2 Tim. 4:2). Titus’ primary instructions are concerned with teaching what is in accord with sound doctrine (Titus 2:1). One of the main roles of the elder was to teach (1 Tim. 3:2; cf. Acts 6:2), so much so that “the elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching” (1 Tim. 5:17). Clearly, the authoritative teaching and preaching of Scripture was a normative part of the early Christian gatherings, if not the central event of their meeting together.
13. We live by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord (Deut. 8:3; Matt. 4:4).
14. The gospel is first of all news (Rom 10:15). Words must be central in corporate worship because the gospel is first and foremost a message–not an experience or an expression or even a command, but a declaration of good news.
15. Powerful emotional experiences come through Holy Spirit anointed preaching. Giving priority to the word, does not mean short-circuiting our affections. Our aim is not wise and persuasive words, but a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words (1 Cor. 2:4, 13). True preaching does not simply fill our heads with knowledge, but removes the veil from our eyes (2 Cor. 4:3) and clearly portrays Christ crucified (Gal. 3:1).
16. The word of God is no dead letter. It is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, dividing soul and spirit, joint and marrow, and judging the thoughts and intentions of the heart (Hebrews 4:12; cf. Acts 2:37).
17. Transformation into Christ-likeness is not less than a mental-cognitive activity. We need words and truths in order that we might be transformed by the renewing of our minds and reach maturity in the knowledge of the Son of God (Romans 12:1-2; Eph. 4:13).
18. Jesus abides in us through his words. There is no rigid distinction between the person of the Jesus and the words of Jesus. We know Jesus through his words. “If you abide in me and my words abide in you,” Jesus tells his disciples, “ask whatever you wish and it will be given you” (John 15:7). For Jesus the two are interchangeable: remaining in him and his words remaining in us. When his words abide in us, we abide in him.
19. The promises of God sustain us in hard times. For example, the Psalmist says, “My comfort in suffering is this: Your promise preserves my life” (Psalm 119:49). And, “If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction” (119:92). And “I rise before dawn and cry for help; I have put my hope in your word” (119:147). Only the word of God has the power to keep us going when life grinds us down.
20. God has exalted above all things his name and his word (Psalm 138:2).
21. When all else passes away, the word of God will remain (Isa 40:7-8; 1 Peter 1:24-25).
22. Our only weapon in spiritual warfare is the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God (Eph. 6:10-18; Matt. 4:1-11). We fight the devil’s temptations to disobedience and despair by claiming the promises of God and knowing who God declares us to be; that is, we resist the devil with words and by belief in God’s words to us.
23. All of Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16).
24. Through God’s great and precious promises, we are able to participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires (2 Peter 1:4).
25. The Scriptures cannot be broken (John 10:35). There is much flexibility when it comes to corporate worship, but since we know that the Scriptures are inviolable, and that we are sanctified by the truth, and that the word is truth (John 17:17), we would be foolish if we did not make a priority that which we know has the power to save, transform, and endure.
Kevin DeYoung

Why Are We So Busy?

*This is really worth thinking about!! 

Pascal, to my mind, has written the most profound reflections on God, man, and “diversion.” I’d recommend getting Peter Kreeft’s edition, Christianity for Modern Pagans, Pascal’s Pensees Edited, Outlined, and Explained, where the relevant thoughts are all gathered in one section (pp. 167-187). Kreeft writes that when he teaches this material, his “students are always stunned and shamed to silence as Pascal shows them in these pensees their own lives in all their shallowness, cowardice and dishonesty.”
Here is one line from Pascal (from #136) that it worthy of a lot of meditation, especially in The Age of Internet:

I have often said that the sole cause of man’s unhappiness is that
he does not know how to stay quietly in his room.

Kreeft’s restatements and commentary are also worth reading. For example, here is an excerpt from pp. 167-169:

We ought to have much more time, more leisure, than our ancestors did, because technology, which is the most obvious and radical difference between their lives and ours, is essentially a series of time-saving devices.
In ancient societies, if you were rich you had slaves to do the menial work so that you could be freed to enjoy your leisure time. Life was like a vacation for the rich because the poor slaves were their machines. . . .
[But] now that everyone has slave-substitutes (machines), why doesn’t everyone enjoy the leisurely, vacationy lifestyle of the ancient rich? Why have we killed time instead of saving it? . . .
We want to complexify our lives. We don’t have to, we want to. We wanted to be harried and hassled and busy. Unconsciously, we want the very things we complain about. For if we had leisure, we would look at ourselves and listen to our hearts and see the great gaping hold in our hearts and be terrified, because that hole is so big that nothing but God can fill it.
So we run around like conscientious little bugs, scared rabbits, dancing attendance on our machines, our slaves, and making them our masters. We think we want peace and silence and freedom and leisure, but deep down we know that this would be unendurable to us, like a dark and empty room without distractions where we would be forced to confront ourselves. . .
If you are typically modern, your life is like a mansion with a terrifying hole right in the middle of the living-room floor. So you paper over the hole with a very busy wallpaper pattern to distract yourself. You find a rhinoceros in the middle of your house. The rhinoceros is wretchedness and death. How in the world can you hide a rhinoceros? Easy: cover it with a million mice. Multiple diversions.

Bob Dylan & Eric Clapton - Crossroads

Anti-Modernist An illuminating new biography of Chesterton.

In his brilliant study Chesterton and the Romance of Orthodoxy: The Making of GKC 1874-1908, William Oddie revisits Chesterton's formative years to show how his critique of the modern culminated in Orthodoxy (1908), one of his finest books, in which he set out his distinctly Christian vision, celebrating God over nihilism, joy over despair, the common man over Superman, wonder over sophistry. Taking it as a given that, "We need so to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of welcome," Chesterton saw in the Christian tradition a means of acquiring that view by discovering the "romance of orthodoxy." "It is always easy to be a modernist," he wrote, "as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion … set along the historic path of Christendom … would indeed have been simple … But to have avoided them all has been a whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling and prostate, the wild truth reeling but erect." If Orthodoxy is Chesterton's conversion story, Oddie's book is its illuminating exegesis.
Read the rest here

How Liberals Think

A Christian Heresy?

As I’ve said before, in print and on this blog, I don’t think the talk of “building the kingdom” or our role in “ushering in the kingdom” is language that can be supported by Scripture.  God already reigns, and he doesn’t need our help to get on the throne!).  The kingdom of this world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ.  We should live out the ethics of the kingdom, pray for the kingdom, and by faith we can receive the kingdom.  But we do not bring about God’s reign.
Along these lines, here’s John Goldingay in his soon to be released Old Testament Theology: Israel’s Life:

The Psalter goes on to protest about how things are in the world (Ps. 3; 4; 5).  Here a link between politics and ethics on one hand and prayer on the other becomes more overt.  The world’s not being as it should be may be a reason for human initiative; it is certainly a reason for prayer.  Ethical commitment without calling on God appropriates too much responsibility to us as human beings.
The Psalms will later declare that “Yhwh reigns” or “Yhwh is king” or “Yhwh has become king” (e.g., Ps. 96:10).  Generally speaking, it does not look as if this is the case.  Israel’s world often looked like one in which Pharaoh or Sennacherib reigned, not Yhwh, as our world does not look like one in which Jesus is Lord.  Like us, then, when Israel entered worship and declared that Yhwh reigned, it was often making statements that went against the evidence.  It was creating a world.
Admittedly, talk of “creating a world” could be misleading.  The Psalms’ conviction is that in the real world (as opposed to the world that we see) Yhwh indeed reigns.  In worship we are making the already-real reality in our ears and before our eyes.  We may then be inspired to go and live out our ethical and political commitment in the world outside worship in the knowledge that the world in which Yhwh reigns is indeed the real world.  But we would be unwise to make that a covert way of reckoning that it is our task to bring about Yhwh’s reign, which would be laughable if it were not a Christian heresy that is alive and well (p. 27 [paragraph breaks are mine]).

We would do well to expect less of the “already” in the world, and expect to see more of it in our worship.  I encourage you to read the Goldingay excerpt a second time.
Kevin DeYoung

An Interview with Steven Curtis Chapman

Rising from the Valley of Death

Steven Curtis Chapman opens up about losing his daughter, their family's arduous journey, and a new album of songs chronicling the path of pain and hope.

by Interview by Mark Moring |
Steven Curtis Chapman’s new album, Beauty Will Rise, is the first recording he has done since the tragic death of his 5-year-old daughter, Maria Sue.
CT’s Mark Moring interviewed Steven about the album and about the pain in their grief. Here’s an excerpt:

Ain’t feeling it at all. I’m just not sure. I needed to hear my pastor speak truth again to me. I needed to hear somebody say again, here’s what’s true.
That has been an important process, the whole thing of taking every thought captive and saying, God, this is what I choose to believe. Because I’ve found myself, especially in the first few days and weeks after Maria went to heaven—and there’s still moments of this—that I could almost feel myself being sucked into this black hole of doubt and despair. Of saying, “God, if I let myself keep going in this direction, there seems to be no bottom, no end to this, and I’ll never be able to escape from it.”
At the hospital at Vanderbilt, literally within an hour of knowing that my little girl was in heaven with Jesus, I found myself having to make a choice, when I would start to feel myself and everything in me being sucked into this place, this abyss. I would begin to say, “Blessed be the name of the Lord. You give. You take away. But, God, I trust you. I trust you. You are faithful. You are good. I trust you. I trust you.” And as I would say that, literally just choose to make that declaration in the midst of this, I would almost physically feel myself being pulled back from that place. And I’d start to breathe again.
But it wouldn’t be long before I would go, “But, God, what? How could this happen? How are we ever going to survive?” And it’s like here I go back into that black, dark place.
But there was a grace to even recognize that you were falling into that place.
Yes. That is the grace and the gift of God to be able, in that process, to make that choice. That’s the crazy theology of all that—to even be able to make that choice to say, “God, I trust you,” that is a gift of grace. But we’re making that choice over and over again.

Christianity Today

American Folk Blues Festival 1983 - Louisiana Red & his Chicago Friends

Louisiana Red-voc/git Carey Bell-harmonica Jimmy Rodgers-git Lovie Lee-piano Queen Sylvia Embry-bass Charles"Honey Boy"Otis-drums rec-live in Germany 1983

Trust Me!

Six Questions for Evangelicals to Ask Themselves on Reformation Sunday

1. Ad Fontes. Do we read the Bible as often as we read books about the Bible?
2. Sola Scriptura. Is Scripture alone the supreme authority to which we direct thoughtful attention each day?
3. Priesthood of Believers. Do our neighbors and friends see in us a commitment to gospel ministry worked out in a regular routine of service?
4. Solus Christus. Do we enter God’s presence directly and with confidence by virtue of the high priesthood of Christ?
5. Sola Fide. Do we rest in our Lord’s finished work, accessed by faith alone, as the sole basis of our right-standing with God?
6. Soli Deo Gloria. Do we regularly communicate the good news of Jesus’ death, resurrection, and new creation, believing that the Holy Spirit will extend redemption through the foolishness of this message to save lost people and transform the world?
Chris-tocentric

Babel’s Tower and My Schedule

“We are all expert planners, are we not? Those people [the builders of Babel’s Tower] were planners. They drew the specifications of the city. They had it all worked out. We all do that in life, do we not? You have your plans. Your future life and career are mapped out. You know what you want to do. Where does God come in? Is the plan made under God, or is it made apart from him? The one lesson of [Genesis 11] is that if you plan your life without God at the center, it will come to nothing, nothing at all. It will be as futile and as fatuous as the Tower of Babel. God will come down and will destroy it, whether you like that or not. This is the whole history of the Bible. It is the history of the subsequent centuries after the end of the Bible. It is the history of the twentieth century. The human race is not allowed to build a civilization without God, and you are not allowed to build your life without God.”
—Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Gospel in Genesis: From Fig Leaves to Faith (Crossway, 2009), p. 141.

Halloween Worries, Doctrine Apathy

I'm surprised each year by the amount of concern and attention given to whether Christians should participate in Halloween, especially when the same amount of concern and attention isn't given to issues at least of equal weight and what I think have more weight.  Many Christians delve into the details of the history of Halloween in a sincere effort to try to make a good decision about what's pleasing to God; I just don't see the same time and attention given to studying the details of central Christian beliefs like the Trinity or justification, or the Apostles and Nicene Creed.  I dare say that many of the Christians who decide they cannot participate in Halloween, have never taken note of the fact that October 31 is also Reformation Day - and none of us Protestants would be here enjoying the grace of God as we do if it weren't for that day.  Even churches that decide to opt out of Halloween or opt in for Harvest Festivals take little notice of Reformation Day, which restored the Gospel message that we treasure.
I grew up Lutheran, attended Lutheran grade school, and each year we'd have a Halloween costume parade, then change our clothes and have a Reformation Day service - and another one on Sunday at church.  I don't think there was the level of worry over whether Christians should participate in Halloween back then, and certainly our parents, pastors, and teachers were no less pious or dedicated Christians.  In fact, they even knew Christian doctrine quite well and passed it on to us in word and deed - without ever worrying over Halloween.
I cite the example of my own childhood at church not as a justification to celebrate Halloween - it's not an argument.  I offer it as an illustration that participating in Halloween doesn't negate sound Christian living and coincided comfortably with serious Christian living.  It's possible we shouldn't have celebrated Halloween at my Lutheran school (I do think it was okay), but I think it was preferable that our teachers and pastor took very seriously training us in the Christian faith even if they spent no time worrying about Haloween.  I think that's better than obsessing over Halloween and neglecting the weightier things of Christianity.
I'm not talking about the decision Christians make about what to do about Halloween.  That's a matter of conscience each has to make.  I'm talking about the inordinate energy, attention, thought, and focus spent on what to do about Halloween and the polar opposite apathy about theology, doctrine, church history.
It's fair to be concerned and think carefully about how we participate in the culture and Halloween.  It's important to evaluate how cultural practices influence us.  It's essential to use wisdom and discernment how we participate in Halloween, if we do.  It's, obviously, a duty to avoid any occultic involvement.  What I'm talking about is the level of energy and attention given to it and the contrasting lack of it given to arguable more central issues of Christianity.  Christians can be shocked that another Christian will go trick or treating, but not blink an eye of awareness or concern when another Christian distorts the doctrine of the Trinity.
I'm not sure what this inordinate worry over Halloween and apathy about doctrine says about contemporary Christians, but I think it says something - and it's not good.  One friend's theory is the inordinate emphasis in modern Christianity on application and therapeutic teaching to the near exclusion of theology and Bible study (not just Bible reading).  That sounds like a pretty good theory to me.
Whether you decide to opt out of Halloween, which is just fine, or whether you dress up, let's also remember it's Reformation Day and that we have a treasure and privilege of studying the Bible ourselves and learning from the rich heritage of church history and the careful thinking and love for the truth people committed to hand down the faith to us. Let's be even more diligent in learning the full teaching God has revealed through His Word than we are in investigating Halloween.
Stand To Reason

Eric Clapton: Five Long Years

William Wallace was a monster, admits Gibson

From the moment that Mel Gibson’s William Wallace — in blue and white facepaint and a tartan kilt — charged the English with the cry of “They can take our lives but they will never take our freedom”, historians have lined up to point out that, actually, Wallace was not the poor villager depicted in Braveheart, but a landowner and minor knight.
Now, 15 years on from filming, Gibson has conceded that the film played fast and loose with the historical truth — and that Wallace was “a monster” who was recast as the good guy for the sake of Hollywood convention.
Yet the star’s admission has done little to appease historians, who have claimed that Wallace’s real character probably fell somewhere inbetween.
Gibson, who also directed the 13th-century epic, spoke out in an interview to mark 15 years since its release. He said: "Wallace was a monster. He always smelt of smoke; he was always burning people’s villages down. He was like what the Vikings called ‘a berserker’.
“He wasn’t as nice as the character we saw up there on the screen. We romanticised him a bit. We shifted the balance because someone’s got to be the good guy against the bad guy; that’s the way stories are told.”
Dr Fiona Watson, a Wallace biographer and former University of Stirling academic, said that Gibson’s new position was fascinating. “After 15 years, Mel Gibson’s giving us the other version of the myth, the knuckles dragging across the floor one, which is equally untrue,” she said.
“The real man surely lies in between. After all, Wallace went to the Continent on diplomatic missions after the debacle at Falkirk (the 1298 battle), which Wallace lost. I don’t know of many berserkers who did that.”
She added: “And if we’re looking for uncivilised behaviour in that period then Wallace is not the only one indulging in it — Edward I of England was surely at least as bad, if not worse.”
Despite the film’s commercial and critical success — it won five Oscars, including those for Best Film and Best Director — Braveheart was described by some as “Jocksploitation”. Commentators said that it created a second Brigadoon: a fantasy Scotland based on lies. The areas of artistic interpretation include Wallace’s love affair with Queen Isabella. She would have been aged 2 at the time.
And the errors extend beyond the script to the wardrobe department. The kilts, which were worn by all Scots on the screen, were not invented for another three centuries. The historian Sharon L. Krossa likened it to “a film about Colonial America showing the colonial men wearing 20th-century business suits”.
Randall Wallace, the screenwriter, has defended his script against such onslaughts. He has said that it was based more on the earliest account of Wallace’s death, by the minstrel Blind Harry, than on any historical source. “Is Blind Harry true? I don’t know,” he said. “I know that it spoke to my heart and that’s what matters to me.”
Braveheart was also adopted by many Scottish Nationalists as a rallying call for independence, a move that Gibson said he had not given permission for. Leaflets distributed at cinemas when the film was released — pre-devolution — read: “Independence isn’t just history. Most European nations have it. Scotland needs it again and now almost 40 per cent of the Scottish people agree. Most of them vote SNP.”
Times Online

Offendedness is a Double-Edged Sword

Comedian Larry David is best known as the creator, writer, and producer of Seinfeld.  He also plays a fictional version of himself on the HBO series “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”  David is currently in hot water  (see this and this) for a “Curb” episode that aired last Sunday in which David accidentally urinates on a painting of Jesus.  A woman later sees the painting and mistakes it for a miraculous crying Jesus.  She brings her mother back to the bathroom and both kneel in prayer.
Not surprisingly, Christians, and Catholics in particular it seems, do not find peeing on Jesus very funny.  Deal Hudson, author and publisher of InsideCatholic.com asks “Why is it that people are allowed to publicly show that level of disrespect for Christian symbols? If the same thing was done to a symbol of any other religions — Jewish or Muslim — there’d be a huge outcry. It’s simply not a level playing field.”  Hudson has demanded an apology from the show’s producers and writing team.  Similarly, Bill Donahue of the Catholic League criticized the episode as crude and insulting.
Clearly, urinating on a picture of Jesus is not going to win any accolades from the Church.  The episode from last Sunday sounds tasteless, wildly irreverent, and just plain stupid.  It’s no wonder Christians don’t like it.
But playing the grievance game with these kind of stunts is not always a good move.  For starters, it attracts more attention to the offending show.  More to the point, it overlooks the fact that just about everything on television is tasteless, irreverent, and stupid.  If we are going to be offended by sin, we should be disgusted by more than the occasional shock episode.  We should be just as opposed to taking the Lord’s name in vain, fornication, lust-enticing sensuality, glamorized crime, voyeuristic entertainment, and all manner of worldliness.  Sure, peeing on a picture Jesus is bound to get more headlines, but there are a thousand other sins that get broadcast every day and every night.
Most importantly we should be cautious about demanding apologies because offendedness is a double-edged sword.  Sure, there’s a time to publicly call out trash as trash.  And I’m sure there’s a double standard when it comes to mocking other religions.  The majority will always makes for safer satire.  But Christians make a mistake when they give into our culture’s obsession with being victims.  We have the right to free speech in this country.  So of course we are going to be upset with things that other people say and do.  But is it surprising that Larry David thinks Jesus Christ is a joke?  Do I need to be offended?  God’s thinks Larry David is a joke (Psalm 2:4).  Besides, when we go around asking for apologies when people mock what we value, we set ourselves up for the same demand the next time Miss California defends biblical marriage or Tim Tebow puts Bible verses under his eyes.  It’s not a crime to offend people.
Now, just to be clear, the issue is different when anti-Christian trash gets paid for through taxpayer supported programs and agencies.  But when junk shows up on HBO, or on any station for that matter, the best way to fight back is simply to turn off our TVs.
Come to think of it, that could solve a lot of problems.
Kevin DeYoung

Late Show Top Ten - For Detroit Lions Fans

Top Ten Revelations In Chad Ochocinco's Autobiography
10. The book is all about my life as a hockey mom from Alaska
9. I was once put on the disabled list when they found an ocho in my cinco
8. During the season my QB Carson Palmer and I sleep in bunk beds
7. I'm going to ask Tom Hanks to play me in the movie
6. There's nothing like winding down after a big game with a Red Bull and a DVR of "Tyra"
5. I like tacos
4. Brett Favre is so old, his social security number is 1
3. Terrell Owens doesn't like it when you criticize his teammate
2. I'm planning a special touchdown celebration that involves pulling a dancing raccoon out of my pants
1. I thank the Lord every day I don't play for the Lions

The Problem In Detroit

"There is a certain way things get done in Detroit. And this is part of that political process. It is part of our culture."

Jai-Lee Dearing, a businessman running for city council in Detroit, on political candidates in the city paying groups for their endorsement.

Crazy Nancy and her Public Option

Sonny Boy Williamson - Nine below zero

Scary Halloween Costumes for Christians

United with Christ

The following is one of the sweetest descriptions of the believers union with Christ I have read. The text originates from a fictional dialogue between a pastor, a legalist, an antinomian, and a young Christian, as written by Edward Fisher in his 1650 book The Marrow of Modern Divinity (Christian Focus, 2009). The Marrow Controversy is an important event that raised significant questions about how we should best explain the grace of God, the Christian life, and even the gospel!
The following excerpt explains the reality of the Christian’s union with Christ and the far-reaching consequences of living consciously aware of this union. The language is beautiful.
I tell you from Christ,
and under the hand of the Spirit,
that your person is accepted,
your sins are done away,
and you shall be saved;
and if an angel from heaven should tell you otherwise,
let him be accursed.
Therefore, you may (without doubt) conclude
that you are a happy man;
for by means of this your matching with Christ,
you are become one with him,
and one in him,
you ‘dwell in him, and he in you’ (1 John 4:13).
He is ‘your well beloved, and you are his’ (S. of S. 2:16).
So that the marriage union betwixt Christ and you
is more than a bare notion or apprehension of your mind;
for it is a
special,
spiritual, and
real union:
it is an union betwixt the nature of Christ,
God and man,
and you;
it is a knitting and closing,
not only of your apprehension with a Saviour,
but also of your soul with a Saviour.
Whence it must needs follow that you cannot be condemned,
except Christ be condemned with you;
neither can Christ be saved,
except you be saved with him.
And as by means of corporeal marriage all things become common betwixt man and wife;
even so, by means of this spiritual marriage,
all things become common betwixt Christ and you;
for when Christ hath married his spouse unto himself,
he passeth over all his estate unto her;
so that whatsoever Christ is or hath,
you may boldly challenge as your own.
‘He is made unto you, of God,
wisdom,
righteousness,
sanctification,
and redemption’ (1 Cor. 1:30).
And surely,
by virtue of this near union it is,
that as Christ is called ‘the Lord our righteousness’ (Jer. 23:6),
even so is the church called, ‘the Lord our righteousness’ (33:16).
I tell you,
you may,
by virtue of this union,
boldly take upon yourself,
as your own,
Christ’s watching,
abstinence,
travails,
prayers,
persecutions,
and slanders;
yea,
his tears,
his sweat,
his blood,
and all that ever he did
and suffered
in the space of three and thirty years,
with his
passion,
death,
burial,
resurrection,
and ascension;
for they are all yours.
And as Christ passes over all his estate unto his spouse,
so does he require that she should pass over all unto him.
Wherefore,
you being now married unto Christ,
you must give all that you have of your own unto him;
and truly you have nothing of your own
but sin,
and, therefore, you must give him that.
I beseech you, then,
say unto Christ with bold confidence,
I give unto thee, my dear husband,
my unbelief,
my mistrust,
my pride,
my arrogancy,
my ambition,
my wrath,
and anger,
my envy,
my covetousness,
my evil thoughts,
affections,
and desires;
I make one bundle of these and all my other offences,
and give them unto thee.
And thus was Christ made ‘sin for us, that knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him’ (2 Cor. 5:21).
‘Now then,’
says Luther,
‘let us compare these things together,
and we shall find inestimable treasure.
Christ is full of
grace,
life,
and saving health;
and the soul is freight-full of all
sin,
death,
and damnation;
but let faith come betwixt these two,
and it shall come to pass,
that Christ shall be laden with
sin,
death,
and hell;
and unto the soul shall be imputed
grace,
life,
and salvation.
Who then is able to value the royalty of this marriage accordingly?
Who is able to comprehend the glorious riches of his grace,
where this rich and righteous husband,
Christ,
doth take unto wife this poor and wicked harlot,
redeeming her from all devils,
and garnishing her with all his own jewels?
So that you,
through the assuredness of your faith in Christ, your husband,
are delivered from all sins,
made safe from death,
guarded from hell,
and endowed with the
everlasting righteousness,
life,
and saving health
of this your husband Christ.’”

—Edward Fisher, The Marrow of Modern Divinity (Christian Focus, 2009), pp. 166–167.
Miscellanies

Late Show Top Ten

Top Ten Questions On The Northwest Airlines Pilot Job Application
10. How many sleep hours have you logged while flying?
9. Do you have any flight experience because if not, that's totally cool
8. How many times have you safely landed a plane in a river?
7. Are you at the controls of an airplane right now?
6. Are you a cop?
5. Do you have a good attorney?
4. Name the jet engine that makes this sound: Pssshhhhhheeewwwwwww!
3. Are you available for both take-offs and landings?
2. Besides "using my laptop" and "having a heated conversation" what other lame excuses can you come up with for falling asleep in the cockpit and missing an airport by 150 miles?
1. Are you drunk right now?

Bob Dylan- Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues [Live]

Primordial Soup

Double click to enlarge

The Sufficiency of Grace by R.C. Sproul

The classic issue between Augustinian theology and all forms of semi-Pelagianism focuses on one aspect of the order of salvation (ordo salutis): What is the relationship between regeneration and faith? Is regeneration a monergistic or synergistic work? Must a person first exercise faith in order to be born again? Or must rebirth occur before a person is able to exercise faith? Another way to state the question is this: Is the grace of regeneration operative or cooperative?
Monergistic regeneration means that regeneration is accomplished by a single actor, God. It means literally a “one-working.” Synergism, on the other hand, refers to a work that involves the action of two or more parties. It is a co-working. All forms of semi-Pelagianism assert some sort of synergism in the work of regeneration. Usually God’s assisting grace is seen as a necessary ingredient, but it is dependent on human cooperation for its efficacy.
The Reformers taught not only that regeneration does precede faith but also that it must precede faith. Because of the moral bondage of the unregenerate sinner, he cannot have faith until he is changed internally by the operative, monergistic work of the Holy Spirit. Faith is regeneration’s fruit, not its cause.
According to semi-Pelagianism regeneration is wrought by God, but only in those who have first responded in faith to him. Faith is seen not as the fruit of regeneration, but as an act of the will cooperating with God’s offer of grace.
Evangelicals are so called because of their commitment to the biblical and historical doctrine of justification by faith alone. Because the Reformers saw sola fide as central and essential to the biblical gospel, the term evangelical was applied to them. Modern evangelicals in great numbers embrace the sola fide of the Reformation, but have jettisoned the sola gratia that undergirded it. Packer and Johnston assert:
“Justification by faith only” is a truth that needs interpretation. The principle of sola fide is not rightly understood till it is seen as anchored in the broader principle of sola gratia. What is the source and status of faith? Is it the God-given means whereby the God-given justification is received, or is it a condition of justification which is left to man to fulfill? Is it a part of God’s gift of salvation, or is it man’s own contribution to salvation? Is our salvation wholly of God, or does it ultimately depend on something that we do for ourselves? Those who say the latter (as the Arminians later did) thereby deny man’s utter helplessness in sin, and affirm that a form of semi-Pelagianism is true after all. It is no wonder, then, that later Reformed theology condemned Arminianism as being in principle a return to Rome (because in effect it turned faith into a meritorious work) and a betrayal of the Reformation (because it denied the sovereignty of God in saving sinners, which was the deepest religious and theological principle of the Reformers’ thought). Arminianism was, indeed, in Reformed eyes a renunciation of New Testament Christianity in favour of New Testament Judaism; for to rely on oneself for faith is no different in principle from relying on oneself for works, and the one is as un-Christian and anti-Christian as the other. In the light of what Luther says to Erasmus, there is no doubt that he would have endorsed this judgment."
I must confess that the first time I read this paragraph, I blinked. On the surface it seems to be a severe indictment of Arminianism. Indeed it could hardly be more severe than to speak of it as “un-Christian” or “anti-Christian.” Does this mean that Packer and Johnston believe Arminians are not Christians? Not necessarily. Every Christian has errors of some sort in his thinking. Our theological views are fallible. Any distortion in our thought, any deviation from pure, biblical categories may be loosely deemed “un-Christian” or “anti-Christian.” The fact that our thought contains un-Christian elements does not demand the inference that we are therefore not Christians at all.
I agree with Packer and Johnston that Arminianism contains un-Christian elements in it and that their view of the relationship between faith and regeneration is fundamentally un-Christian. Is this error so egregious that it is fatal to salvation? People often ask if I believe Arminians are Christians? I usually answer, “Yes, barely.” They are Christians by what we call a felicitous inconsistency.
What is this inconsistency? Arminians affirm the doctrine of justification by faith alone. They agree that we have no meritorious work that counts toward our justification, that our justification rests solely on the righteousness and merit of Christ, that sola fide means justification is by Christ alone, and that we must trust not in our own works, but in Christ’s work for our salvation. In all this they differ from Rome on crucial points.
Packer and Johnston note that later Reformed theology, however, condemned Arminianism as a betrayal of the Reformation and in principle as a return to Rome. They point out that Arminianism “in effect turned faith into a meritorious work.”
We notice that this charge is qualified by the words in effect. Usually Arminians deny that their faith is a meritorious work. If they were to insist that faith is a meritorious work, they would be explicitly denying justification by faith alone. The Arminian acknowledges that faith is something a person does. It is a work, though not a meritorious one. Is it a good work? Certainly it is not a bad work. It is good for a person to trust in Christ and in Christ alone for his or her salvation. Since God commands us to trust in Christ, when we do so we are obeying this command. But all Christians agree that faith is something we do. God does not do the believing for us. We also agree that our justification is by faith insofar as faith is the instrumental cause of our justification. All the Arminian wants and intends to assert is that man has the ability to exercise the instrumental cause of faith without first being regenerated. This position clearly negates sola gratia, but not necessarily sola fide.
Then why say that Arminianism “in effect” makes faith a meritorious work? Because the good response people make to the gospel becomes the ultimate determining factor in salvation. I often ask my Arminian friends why they are Christians and other people are not. They say it is because they believe in Christ while others do not. Then I inquire why they believe and others do not? “Is it because you are more righteous than the person who abides in unbelief?” They are quick to say no. “Is it because you are more intelligent?” Again the reply is negative. They say that God is gracious enough to offer salvation to all who believe and that one cannot be saved without that grace. But this grace is cooperative grace. Man in his fallen state must reach out and grasp this grace by an act of the will, which is free to accept or reject this grace. Some exercise the will rightly (or righteously), while others do not. When pressed on this point, the Arminian finds it difficult to escape the conclusion that ultimately his salvation rests on some righteous act of the will he has performed. He has “in effect” merited the merit of Christ, which differs only slightly from the view of Rome.

An excerpt from R.C. Sproul's book, Willing to Believe

God's Love

In a sermon on John 3:16 (“God so loved, that he gave…”), Puritan Thomas Manton makes the following point on God’s indescribable love towards sinners in sending His Son:
“Love is at the bottom of all. We may give a reason of other things, but we cannot give a reason of his love. God showed his wisdom, power, justice, and holiness in our redemption by Christ. If you ask why he made so much ado about a worthless creature, raised out of the dust of the ground at first, and had now disordered himself, and could be of no use to him, we have an answer at hand: Because he loved us. If you continue to ask, But why did he love us? We have no other answer but because he loved us; for beyond the first rise of things we cannot go. And the same reason is given by Moses, Deuteronomy 7:7–8: ‘The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because you were more in number than any people, for ye were the fewest of all people; but because the Lord loved you…’ That is, in short, he loved you because he loved you. All came from his free and undeserved mercy; higher we cannot go in seeking after the causes of what is done for our salvation.”
–Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, 2:340–341.