The Fear of the LORD - An Introduction

“Aslan is a lion- the Lion, the great Lion." "Ooh" said Susan. "I'd thought he was a man. Is he-quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion"..."Safe?" said Mr Beaver ..."Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.” | C.S. Lewis

There is much that can be said about the fear of the LORD. In fact, I would argue that there is much that should be said regarding this subject. Fearing God is something the Bible certainly isn't silent on, but unfortunately fear is a word that most people probably don't understand—in the biblical sense—and therefore view it in a negative light.

Try it some time. Ask a person for their definition of fear. For many people the idea or feeling that the word FEAR invokes in them will more than likely be negative. However, the Bible speaks candidly about our need to fear God, and passages like Proverbs 9:10 which says, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom..." seem to give us the impression that fear is a good thing. 

"Fearing God...is the sobering recognition that He is not to be trifled with." | Daryl Wingerd

I'll be taking the next several blog posts to talk about this topic in greater detail. The hope is not only to help us reshape our understanding of FEAR from a biblical perspective, but it is also to show the beauty and blessings which come when, out of reverence for his glory, we choose to live with a healthy fear of the LORD.

Happy Reading.

Jason

Our Greatest Loss is Our Greatest Gain.

When God expelled them from the Garden of Eden, the greatest loss Adam and Eve experienced was not the blessings of the garden. The consequence for their sin was far greater than material things. They lost the blessing of God's presence. They lost the one thing they were created to fully enjoy forever, namely complete and unadulterated intimacy with their Creator. When we struggle to "get back to the garden" what is the true goal in our efforts? Are we seeking the blessings of a prosperous and abundant life or are we seeking an intimate relationship with God? How we answer this question will reveal a great deal about the truest desire of our hearts. Do we desire God more than we desire his blessings? Do we love God more than we love ourselves?

The (12) Minute Challenge

Gentlemen:

I have a challenge for you. Give me (12) minutes of your time by choosing to listen to the sermon clip below, from Matt Chandler, and then try to convince me that you've spent 12 better minutes today.

Ready, set, go!

A Relevant Thought on Marriage From an Old Reformer

Here's a relevant thought on marriage from an old reformer:

"Join together in frequent and fervent prayer. Prayer forces the mind into sobriety, and moves the heart with the presence and majesty of God. Pray also for each other when you are in secret, that God may do that work which you most desire, upon each other's hearts." | Richard Baxter - The Mutual Duties of Husbands and Wives Towards Each Other

In the Beginning: Why Our Foundation Makes All the Difference

As Christians we accept one foundational truth – God – and everything else makes sense. An atheist denies God and has to accept incredible explanations for everything else. It takes more faith to deny God than to believe in Him. | John MacArthur

Why do Ken Hamm's statements from last night's debate make sense to Christians, but not to secular humanists and atheists? In my opinion, it's because Ken Hamm affirms the Bible as the Word of God.

Mr. Hamm starts with the affirmation of God as Creator and LORD, and is able to reach clarity and understanding through that lens. On the other hand, atheists start with the premise that there is no creator, and therefore their understanding and clarity are found through this lens. 

Whatever position you find yourself in, whether believer or sceptic, the foundation on which you approach the age-old questions of life...will make all the difference. 

"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight." | Proverbs 9:10

"The atheist can’t find God for the same reason that a thief can't find a police officer." | Author Unknown

God's Mercy in Messed Up Families

"The Bible’s main theme is God’s gracious plan to redeem needy sinners. It teaches us that what God wants most for us is that we 1) become aware of our sinfulness and 2) our powerlessness to save ourselves, as we 3) believe and love his Son and the gospel he preached, and 4) graciously love one another. And it turns out that the family is an ideal place for all of these to occur."

Read the entire article here: http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/god-s-mercy-in-messed-up-families

No Plan B - On Discipleship.

What Does God Exalt Above All Other Things?

"...you [God] have exalted above all things your name and your word."

Psalm 138. It's short, but the truth wrapped into this Psalm is wonderful. I think the entire Psalm is wonderful, but I've emphasized the parts which stuck out to me the most. I praise God for his word. His living, breathing and spiritually active word!!!

Q. If God exalts his name and his word above all things, then why is it so seldom that his people and churches do the same?


A. I think that generally speaking it's much easier (and more comfortable) for us to put value in some of the other attributes of God (i.e. his love, mercy, grace, forgiveness, faithfulness etc.) God's word says some hard and challenging things. Things that as individuals we will not always like. Things that for a church body will be challenging and difficult. Things that the culture in which we live, will be opposed to and will sometimes even hate. I think it's pretty easy, if we don't put value in God's word, to say, yes I know that such-and-such is a sin...but God is loving and his love covers a multitude of sins. While this statement is certainly true...a side-effect of this kind of thinking is that we tend to become complacent and apathetic to God's word, which this Psalm clearly tells us is one of the (2) things that God exalts above all other things. God cares about his glory. He cares about his reputation and how his name is glorified. Why? Is it because he's an egomaniac? No...it's because he knows the true condition of our hearts. If we are honest with ourselves, the reason that we typically run towards words like forgiveness, mercy, grace etc. is because we are sinners and those words bring us comfort. But God is Holy, He is Just and He is Righteous. Why do we find it so easy to disregard God's command for us to "Be Holy as [He] is Holy" (Lv. 20:26) when His Holiness is an equal part of God's character to his love, mercy, grace and forgiveness.

I believe we do a serious disservice to ourselves and others (both inside and outside the church) when we fail to acknowledge that the thing which God loves most is not us, but is instead his own glory. God alone is great and he alone deserves honor, glory and praise...and I believe that as Christians and as a church we need to start putting the same kind of significance, reverence and exaltation towards His word and His Name that he does.

Psalm 138 (ESV)

Give Thanks to the LORD:

I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart;
before the gods I sing your praise;
I bow down toward your holy temple
and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness,
for you have exalted above all things
your name and your word.
On the day I called, you answered me;
my strength of soul you increased.
All the kings of the earth shall give you thanks, O LORD,
for they have heard the words of your mouth,
and they shall sing of the ways of the LORD,
for great is the glory of the LORD.
For though the LORD is high, he regards the lowly,
but the haughty he knows from afar.
Though I walk in the midst of trouble,
you preserve my life;
you stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies,
and your right hand delivers me.
The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me;
your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever.
Do not forsake the work of your hands.


For His Glory,

Jason

Biblical Interpretation and Why it Matters

I wanted to share some thoughts on biblical interpretation. How many of us have been involved in Bible studies where after a passage of scripture is read, the inevitable question is asked, what does that passage mean to you? While I commend the effort to study God's word, the Bible should not be approached this way. The Bible is not filled with subjective truths that can be finagled and twisted to mean whatever we desire for it to mean. Faithful interpretation of the scriptures doesn't ask the question, what does this passage mean to me...but instead asks the question...what does this passage mean and how can/should I apply this truth to my life.

We get into some serious trouble when we evaluate and interpret scripture based on our own feelings and/or our own inner-voice. We must be willing to admit that even our best efforts to interpret scripture based on our own thoughts and opinions are still subject to the simple fact that we are sinners. Pride, selfishness, sin, and many other things will always be working against us, trying to lead us to see things in scripture that simply are not there. To call good what God has called evil and to call evil what God has called good (Isaiah 5:20).

Because the timing of this subject is relevant, I'd like to use yesterday's passing, by the Minnesota State Senate, of the same-sex marriage law. Now, while I do commend the diligence and dedication of those who fought for their right to marry who they please, as a Bible-believing Christian I was not pleased with the results of yesterday's vote. I was saddened not only because as a state, society and culture this is where we find ourselves (morally speaking) but also because many of the arguments being leveraged yesterday by supporters of this bill were being passed off as biblical. We cannot fool ourselves. This battle, while it was painted as a human/civil rights discussion was clearly about the sinful desires of a secular world versus what God has called good (Genesis 1:31) and what he has called sin (Romans 1:26-27). While not all of you will agree with me on how serious yesterday's vote was for our society and our church...it was heartbreaking to hear how people in support of this bill continued to leverage twisted and out of context scripture as well as their Christian faith as the reasons why they must vote yes. 

And then, I thought about how the vote yesterday affects me as an individual and also how it will affect us as a church body. No doubt there are people within our body who affirm the work that was accomplished yesterday in the Senate and what will inevitably be passed by Governor Dayton in a matter of days. But what concerns me most in all of this is, how have these Christians moved towards this conviction, in light of what scripture clearly says about homosexuality? The only thing I can think of is that either these people don't understand how to rightly handle (interpret) scripture...or worse yet, they simply don't care. While there is very little that we can do about the second option, there is plenty that we can do about the former. We can ensure that we are rightly interpreting scripture..and we can also encourage others to do the same.

Why Does it matter?

The results of November's Marriage Amendment as well as the vote last Thursday (house) and yesterday's vote (senate) are a clear reminder that there is a battle going on for our minds. The church has clearly lost the influence it once had on the culture, but what is even more alarming is that it seems the church is also losing its influence on its own people. While God has given the world his infallible and inerrant scripture to be our guide...if we are not rightly handling (interpreting) the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15) then our efforts to be a faithful and obedient church will always fall short of glorifying God. Only when we are willing to submit our lives and our leadership to the absolute truth of God's Holy and revealed word, will we be able to faithfully reflect God's image and his gospel to a world and a people who desperately need to know and receive both.

When (we interpret Scripture by focusing) on our inner voice, we risk losing the original voice of Scripture, the historic anchor that has given the church its foundation and faith, and the uniqueness of a moment of historical revelation without parallel to anything we may experience. And evaluating our own experience risks confusing what is subjectively true for me with what is objectively true. Truth (does not) reside in my own temporal experience (but rather in the correct interpretation of the Scriptures.) | Gary Burge

For His Glory,

Jason

The Essence of Male and Female Corruptness

"The essence of sin is self-reliance and self-exaltation. First in rebellion against God, and then in exploitation of each other."

So what is really described in the curse of Genesis 3:16 is the ugly conflict between the male and female that has marked so much of human history. Maleness as God created it has been [distorted] and corrupted by sin. Femaleness as God created it has been depraved and corrupted by sin. The essence of sin is self-reliance and self-exaltation. First in rebellion against God, and then in exploitation of each other.

So the essence of corrupted maleness is the self-aggrandizing effort to subdue and control and exploit women for its own private desires. And the essence of corrupted femaleness is the self-aggrandizing effort to subdue and control and exploit men for its own private desires. And the difference is found mainly in the different weaknesses that we can exploit in one another.


The Different Weaknesses Exploited in One Another

As a rule men have more brute strength than women and so they can rape and abuse and threaten and sit around and snap their finger. It's fashionable to say those sorts of things today. But it's just as true that women are sinners. We are in God's image, male and female; and we are depraved, male and female. Women may not have as much brute strength as men, but she knows ways to subdue him. She can very often run circles around him with her words and where her words fail, she knows the weakness of his lust.

If you have any doubts about the power of sinful woman to control sinful man, just reflect for a moment on the number one marketing force in the world—the female body. She can sell anything because she knows the universal weakness of man and how to control him with it. The exploitation of women by sinful men is conspicuous because it is often harsh and violent. But a moment's reflection will show you that the exploitation of men by sinful women is just as pervasive in our society. The difference is that our sinful society sanctions the one perversity and not the other.

(Note: There are societies that do just the opposite.)



John Piper - Manhood and Womanhood: Conflict and Confusion After the Fall

Some Thoughts on Idolatry

“All the sin that men commit is what they do in the service of their idols: there is no one act of sin, but what is an act of service to some false god.” | Jonathan Edwards -- Men are Naturally God’s Enemy

Idols are our functional saviors, or to say this differently idols are what we use in our lives to supplement (or replace) the living and true God. We use our idols to save us from the realities of life in a sinful and fallen world. They offer us pleasure, distraction, hope and other benefits but the interesting thing about idols is that they cannot deliver on these promises. Regardless of this fact, people still rely on idols and their false promises, anyway.

Tim Keller says the following about idols:

"Idols are often good things. That's right, I'm not talking about little statues we bow down to each morning. I'm referring to normal every day things which function as gods in our lives. They have our allegiance and we rest our sense of security on them. As John Calvin noted, our hearts are factories of idols. Not that we create idols, but we turn good things into idols. The problem is not “out there”, but “in here” [our hearts]."

Take a look at Genesis 1:26-31. This is a story of creation [before the fall]. These verses show us how God created everything, including man and woman...and then gave Adam and Eve dominion over all creation and commanded them to be fruitful and multiply and to fill the earth and subdue it. God did this both for their joy and for his glory.

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

And God blessed them. And God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

Genesis 1:26-31 (ESV)

But now the bad news. Because of sin, even the things which God gave to mankind for our joy are now often times turned into idols instead. We see a number functional saviors in the verses from Genesis above and the sad reality about idols is that instead of bringing people the joy which they were created to find in God's provisions and blessings...they instead begin to entrap or enslave people and keep them from experiencing true joy.

Here are a few functional saviors (idols) found in the verses in Genesis:

Religion: We see in these verses that God blessed Adam and Eve, he had a relationship with them, and they saw value in their relationship with God. But sin destroyed their relationship and sin's destructive nature is still destroying our relationships with God, today. People make efforts to replace a genuine relationship with God with something else. Religion is a great substitute…where true connection with and faith in God are replaced by our leanings towards ritual and legalism which can provide us with a false sense of assurance.

Marriage: Marriage is also a favorite idol for many people. We see in the Gen. 1:26-27 how God created and then blessed the bond between man and woman. However, many people today don’t see marriage as a way to glorify God and instead look to marriage to become a refuge from loneliness, economic insecurity and hopelessness. Single people often think that life would be tolerable if they were married and many married people live in fear of their marriages ending so they don’t take the necessary steps to make that relationship healthier and more godly. And to some, marriage -- which was ordained by God as a covenant between a male and a female -- has become another way for people to rebel against God's holy design for this sacred relationship.

Sex: We live in a culture that has, without question, turned sex into an idol. God divinely connected sex to marriage…but it has been disconnected from marriage by humanity. People think that sex will offer them enough pleasure to overcome the pain and/or boredom of their lives. People think sex will offer them  intimacy, but they forsake its intended intimacy through perversions and objectification of various kinds. And the sad reality is that sex, outside of God’s divine plan, often destroys the very relationships people so desperately desire.

Children: Also connected to marriage by God, and increasingly disconnected from marriage by people, are children. God told Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply, but this was always intended to happen within the confines of a marriage relationship. Apart from children being born outside of the marriage covenant, many parents today also seek love from (rather than giving love to) their children. They seek to fulfill their own failed goals through their children lives and by doing so they place intolerable burdens on their children, destroying them as a result.

Control: God commanded that Adam and Eve subdue and have dominion over creation. However, this was always supposed to happen under God’s authority. Instead, we try to play God and make everything bend to our authority. Because of sin, we crave control (Genesis 3:16). Fear drives many of these efforts as we feel unable to handle unexpected events or circumstances which fall outside the realm of our “control”. Control destroys relationships. Control is fueled by pride and our resistance to trust God. We were created to be dependent but sin drives us towards independence and control.

Creation: Because of sin, people often make a god out of God’s creation. People begin to worship the created things instead of the creator (Romans 1:25). Sin causes our idol making hearts to twist God’s command of stewardship for his creation into a neo-environmentalism, where the environment and/or animals become more important than people made in God’s image. People often times look to their pets to fill the desire of their hearts for God's unconditional love. No doubt we are commanded to care for the environment and animals, including our pets, but unfortunately many people give these things an ungodly and unhealthy status in their lives.

Work: is another functional savior for many people. Sin entices people to seek independence, security and safety through their work. For many, work provides an ultimate meaning for them that only God was intended to have. God works, and he calls us to work as a means of providing for our families and ourselves.  However, God never intended for us to work as a means of obtaining our righteousness or self-worth. We were created to have our identities firmly-rooted in Christ, not our personal accomplishments, achievements or recognition.

“A true hope looks forward to the obtaining of happiness in no other way but the way of the gospel, which is by a holy Savior, and in a way of cleaving to and following him.” | Jonathan Edwards in Charity and Its Fruits

As the verses we read in Genesis show us, all created things were given to Adam and Eve (and us) by God and he called them very good (Genesis 1:31). However, because of sin, we continue to elevate created things to inappropriate levels in our lives. Instead of receiving these things as blessings and pointers to God…we instead put them in the place of God in hopes that they will provide us satisfaction, security, pleasure and even salvation. Anything that has become a functional savior in our lives will only be returned to its rightful and godly place if we make efforts to seek & find our significance, meaning, security and satisfaction in Christ alone. This will only happen if we choose to believe in the supremacy and sufficiency of Christ as both Creator and Redeemer. As Jonathan Edwards argues, “only when we see Christ as sufficient to bestow all the happiness we need, will we forsake other means to secure earthly happiness.”


Some more (audio) resources on Idols:

http://www.1031sermonjams.com/media/idols.mp3

http://www.1031sermonjams.com/media/americasidols.mp3