Memorial Day

Yesterday was the day we take to remember the sacrifice our soldiers have made in order for our nation to be free. And as we thank them and remember them and pray for the soldiers currently fighting on the other side of the world, I would like us to remember some others who have died. I speak of those who have died for their faith in God. Many Christians have died because of what they believed for the sake of the gospel, and through their death we are given an example and an encouragement to live our lives radically for the gospel. The verse that keeps coming to mind is John 21:18-19 "'Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.' (This He said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this He said to him, 'Follow Me.'" The first thing that strikes me in this verse is that Peter's death and our deaths are meant to glorify God. All of us, whether martyr or not, are meant to glorify God in the manner in which we die. That is a tremendous thought. We should ponder more often our end and how we will die. It may sound morbid, but it is for the glory of God and is immensly important. May we all consider more often our end. But the second thing that really strikes me about these verses is what Jesus says after He tells Peter how He will die. He tells him to follow Him. Here Jesus says, you are going to die at the hands of another. It won't be pleasant and I know that you won't like it. In fact, it will be horrible and incredibly painful. "Follow Me." Any one of us might be called to a horrible and torturous death for the sake of Christ. His answer and call to us is the same as it was to Peter. "Follow Me." Let's walk into the Colliseum, face the Islamic radicals, endure the hatred of the world for the sake of following Christ and glorifying Him.

Some thoughts on the weather

Isn't it ironic? Yesterday, when I didn't have to get up, I couldn't sleep past 5. Today, when I needed to get up at 6, I probably could have slept until 7 or 8 at least. So God decided that our Memorial day would be cold and wet. We even got snow/hail at my house today. Does anyone else struggle at times like these? I get really upset that the weather isn't how I want it, but the weather is exactly how God wants it and, therefore, I should want it like that. As it turns out, while I was driving home from a friend's house after church I realized how beautiful and Oregonian it looked. It was overcast, slightly drizzly, and everything was an amazing color of green and the lake looked amazing. And I realized that it wouldn't have been nearly as beautiful (to my eyes) if it had been 80-90 degrees and sunny. So what if I didn't get to go out and have a much fun as I wanted? The weather is another display of the power of God. Job 26:8 says "He binds up the waters in His thick clouds, and the cloud is not split open under them." Piper also wrote a short meditation on Job 5:8-10, which reads "But as for me, I would seek God, and I would place my cause before God; who does great and unsearchable things, wonders without number. He gives rain on the earth, and sends water on the fields." I won't re-type the entire thing but it is in chapter 4 of his book "Taste and See." Basically, Job calls rain a "great and unsearchable thing". Rain is a display of God's power. It is in His power to keep it in the clouds and it is in His power to release it upon His creation, both in judgement and mercy. I just wish that I would remember these verses before I start complaining about the weather. It reminds me of the song we played for church today titled "Center" by Charlie Hall. The chorus starts "Oh Christ, be the center of our lives, be the place we fix our eyes." So often I am the center of my life and that's what the complaining springs from. "How could the weather be like this when I wanted it to be something different?" Rather I need to focus on Christ and make Him the center. When I do that my response will be something like "How awesome that God has chosen to display His power and glory through the weather that we are having right now!" May we all see Christ and His glory on display through the weather that He graciously gives us!

The Classic Crime

For anyone interested in indie alternative rock, I highly recommend "The Classic Crime". I'm listening to them right now on purevolume. From what I've heard, their lyrics seem pretty good and their music is really good.

The heartbreak of witnessing

It's Saturday morning and I've been awake since 5:00. That's the only bad thing about having to wake up at 5:00 every morning for my job. I can't stop. As you may know, I've been witnessing to this girl at my work for the last few weeks. Yesterday was her last day in my building. And again, she stated her rejection of the gospel. It's truly heart-breaking. To witness to somebody and then to know that their end is probably hell is hard. I know and rejoice in that fact that God is sovereign and just and that she might very well be "a vessel of wrath prepared for destruction" through whom God will glorify Himself. But I still mourn over her end. I don't know exactly why God caused her to keep asking me questions. Maybe God will use it later in her life to draw her to Himself. Maybe it was to teach me how to have a broken heart for the lost, how to trust God more, and how to put off the flesh and obey God's Great Commission through my love for Him and a love for others. Praise God for His sovereignty. Praise Him that it isn't up to me to save somebody, but that it is entirely up to His calling. Praise God that I am so inadequate and so weak that it requires the strength and Word of God through my weakness to save. How amazing it is that He chooses to use jars of clay to carry the great gospel of His glory!

It seemed that every day I had the same lyrics running through my mind. They were from a Jason Morant song and said "O God, I will abandon myself as I worship You upon the throne. I will become a living sacrifice." I had two realizations about myself as I thought about these lyrics. The first is that my hesitation to witness was because I hadn't abandoned myself, but rather I was seeking the praise of men and not being hated for the sake of the gospel. I also realized that my worship of God can't stop with my hands being raised to Him, but must continue with my hands reaching out to others. If I truly love God, then I will seek to spread that love among all peoples. If I love God then I will obey His commandments, including the great commission, because true love and belief produces action and the doing of the good works that He has prepared beforehand for me.

Submitting to God in my witness

Our God is an awesome God. Recently, I've been struggling with being submissive to God and actually doing what He commands me to do. Specifically, I'm talking about my witness at work. I find it so easy to just sit back and not say anything about God and, in all honesty, love the approval of men rather than God to the point where I am ashamed of the Gospel. Praise God that He wouldn't let that continue. This is one reason why I listed that prayer request in the last post. I posted it on Friday night. Saturday morning I went to the leadership and discipleship meeting at my pastor's house and gave the same prayer request. Later that morning, I went to work to put in a few credit hours and was informed by my manager that I would be replacing that very girl and doing her job so I was going to be trained by her and another guy for the next week (starting today). That alone was an answer to prayer because I knew that it would provide ample opportunities to witness to her. Then, today, we got into a small discussion about burning cd's and I told her that I thought it was wrong. The conversation started to die down and I knew that God was telling me to turn the conversation to eternal things. Isn't it ironic that that moment is often when satan and the flesh really turn up the heat? For a few moments there was a definite battle going on in my mind, but, praise God, by His grace I listened to Him and told her exactly why I thought that it was wrong. Namely, that it was a sin against God. For the next hour-and-a-half, I was able to witness to her while we worked, until it was time to leave. I don't know how God will use it, but I know that it won't return void. I was also able to give her a copy of the Gospel of John (praise God I carry some around with me) and she said she would read it. I ask that you would pray with me that God would open her eyes through His word and the words He puts in my mouth. Praise God that He is sovereign over the hearts of men.

A couple prayer requests

I just wanted to share a couple of prayer requests with those who might read this:

1. Pray for this girl at my work. Her name is Jen and, for some reason, God continues to bring her to me with questions about God, evolution, etc. Just pray that God would open her eyes and my mouth so that the light of the glory of God as seen in the face of Christ might shine into her blinded heart (I Cor. 4:4, 6). She just got a new job, so I only have a week to talk to her more. Also pray that I might speak with boldness and not be ashamed of the gospel.

2. Pray for me as I continue to seek God's will for my future. I still believe His will is that I become a pastor, but I don't know what path He has for me. Pray that I will be submissive and patient as I seek His sovereign will.

A couple (hopefully) short thoughts

I was just driving home from worship practice and I think that I must live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. (Yes, I said world) The sun was setting behind the still snow-covered mountains with a bunch of wispy cirrus clouds that were beautifully silhouetted and illuminated by the sun at the same time. It was an incredible picture of the beauty that God shows us in the world. And all of this is just a little glimpse of Him who is infinitely more beautiful. What really completed the moment was the fact that I was listening to the new Jason Morant cd "Abandon" and was worshipping God through the songs. So to have both the words and music going in my car and to see this amazingly beautiful setting was truly awesome. My words are so inadequate so I'll leave you with some of God's:

"The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork." (Ps. 19:1)

"Praise Him, sun and moon, praise Him, all you shining stars! Praise Him, you highest heavens, and you waters above the heavens!" (Ps. 148:5-6)

"For His invisible attributes, namely, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made." (Rom. 1:20a)

"For by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities - all things were created through Him and for Him." (Col. 1:16, emphasis mine)

A realization

Arrgh! I can't write concisely!

It's too long, it's too long!

A few random thoughts

Hey everybody, (as if lots of people read this, but hey, you have to grant me my delusions) sorry I haven't posted in a while. A week ago, I went to a concert with my brother-in-law, Kellen and our friend Ben. The headliner was Todd Agnew, and the other bands/worship leaders were Big Daddy Weave, Nate Sally, and Jason Morant. The first three were really good, especially Jason Morant (I highly recommend buying his cd). However, when we got to Todd Agnew it was kind of like worship time ended and a concert began. Not that this was his goal, between a lot of his songs he talked about God, but even then it was presented as kind of a conversation between him and God without much application and it was loaded with jokes. I don't know about anybody else, but when there were as many jokes as there were, it seems like the speaker stopped taking God seriously, and this is what seemed to be happening to the audience as well. I'm not saying that there isn't any room for jokes in sermons or small messages, but they have to be for a purpose and be grounded by the emmense weight of God's glory. We ended up leaving halfway through Todd Agnew's part. Overall, we had a good time and got to share some good fellowship. I also, again, highly recommend Jason Morant.

Yesterday (Sunday) God gave me the opportunity, through Kellen, to sing a song that I wrote during the offering (for those who don't know, Kellen is the worship leader at the church I go to, I also play on the worship team with him). It's really awesome and humbling to use the gifts that God has given me to glorify Him and edify the body. Being in that situation really forces you to consider why you are doing what you are doing. Are you doing it for selfish gain and seeking the approval of men? If so, then you have already received your reward. Rather we should do it for the reward that God has for us in heaven. The Bible commands us to seek His reward. So we are to seek reward. This reward has to be found in God, but we are to seek the reward that comes from God. It is not just a duty thing. It is the seeking of our pleasure in God. May we never do anything out of pure duty, for that does not glorify God. Paul tells us that God loves a cheerful giver. Consider what it means to be cheerful when we give, and consider what God's attitude is toward those who are not cheerful in their giving. It's scary, isn't it.

Anyway, the song I wrote is basically lines from Psalm 63 put to music. The reason I wrote the song is that Psalm 63 has really affected me. I encourage everyone to read it, and, while you read it, make it the prayer and cry of your heart to God. If you are a leader in a church, make it your prayer for the people under you. There are so many awesome things in this psalm that I want to comment on, but I can't because this post would be way too long. But I will comment on this: Does your soul thirst for God and cling to Him, does your flesh faint for Him, as in a dry and weary land? If a man has been stuck in the desert for three days his only thought and desire is going to be for water. He desires it over all things and would do anything for it. We are in that same situation spiritually. We thirst for God and He is the fountain of living water. In fact, He is so good, that He is worth more than the life that I live now. We need to give everything for Him, even to the point of death. Be willing to suffer for that which is infinitely better.

One more thought before I go. Sunday went terribly from an organizational standpoint. The sermon (as delivered by our youth pastor) was fairly unorganized. Worship was really bad. During one of the songs Kellen realized that he had forgotton to take his capo off and was playing a full step higher than the rest of the band, so we had to stop in the middle of the song and do it again. Kellen had had only four hours of sleep that night because he was witnessing to his co-worker who had relieved him at work (he is a security guard) and he wasn't very organized in his thoughts for the Sunday school class that he leads. As Chris Tomlin would put it, Flow wasn't in the building. As Kellen and I joked about it, Flow died in a car accident on the way out of town, it was that bad. But as I look back on the day, it was a very good day. The worship service was deep and affecting. The sermon included some very good information. Sunday school was very convicting. Praise God for Sundays like that for in that He shows that it is not the organization of a service that impacts people. It is God and God chooses the foolish and the weak to shame the wise and strong of this world. God used the foolish and weak yesterday and He reminded us of that.
"Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do His just commands, seek righteousness; seek humility; perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the LORD." (Zeph. 2:3) "But I will leave in your midst a people humble and lowly. They shall seek refuge in the name of the LORD..." (Zeph. 3:12) "Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; He makes my feet like the deer's; He makes me tread on my high places." (Hab. 3:17-19).

Francis Chan

I just recently got the audio series from the Thirsty '06 conference put on by Passion ministries. I've listened to three of the sermons so far. I've been really impressed by Francis Chan. Of the three that I've heard, two of them were Chan's (the other was Louie Giglio's, which was also very good). Chan is the pastor of Cornerstone Community Church located in Simi Valley, CA. You can visit the website and hear his sermons at cornerstonesimi.com. Anyway, in the second sermon I heard by him, he spoke about living your life according to what God calls you to do, no matter what the cost. He based most of this off of the book, Haggai. His exposition really convicted me about my own life. In Haggai, it talks about the Jewish remnant. They knew that they were called to rebuild the temple of God, but they built themselves new, beautiful houses instead. God then tells them that because of their disregard for God's commands they don't have rain or crops and when they save money they save it to put it in a bag that has holes in it. It's pointless. So the people heeded God's command, feared the Lord, and started construction on the temple. The interesting and convicting part of this passage is that God doesn't promise them that He will now send the rain or that they will have an abundance of crops or that they will be prosperous in business. Rather, the only thing that He promises is that He will be with them. How often do we say (at least to ourselves) "OK, I'll follow You because then You will give me a better job, a girlfriend (or boyfriend, depending on who reads this), health, etc." So often we obey God because we think that we will get something else out of the deal. God tells us that what we get is Him. And that is more than enough. What we are really doing is undervaluing God when we do this. We are saying "I want the gifts more than the giver. I am serving God for the sake of the reward." When we say this we make an idolater of the reward (a reward that we aren't even promised).

I could probably go on and on about this, but the bottom line is this: God is our portion (Ps. 73), He is our fullness of joy (Ps. 16:11, Phil. 4:1), He is beautiful (Ps. 27:4). He is the point and end of all our service. We serve God to get God and all of the riches of His grace (which includes heavenly rewards). This is always a convicting message for me, because I so often get sidetracked on what I hope to get in this world from my service. Our obedience results in God's nearness and that nearness is our good (Ps. 73). If we lost everything, but had God's nearness, then we would have enough.

The kind of preacher/man that I want to be

I was just reading a sermon by John Piper about preaching and he quotes George Whitefield. By the grace of God, this is the kind of man and the kind of preacher that I want to be. As you read this quote, keep me in prayer as I strive to become this and may God work in a mighty way in our country and culture.

Here it is:
Oh…that we shall see the great Head of the Church once more . . . raise up unto Himself certain young men whom He may use in this glorious employ. And what manner of men will they be? Men mighty in the Scriptures, their lives dominated by a sense of the greatness, the majesty and holiness of God, and their minds and hearts aglow with the great truths of the doctrines of grace. They will be men who have learned what it is to die to self, to human aims and personal ambitions; men who are willing to be ‘fools for Christ’s sake’, who will bear reproach and falsehood, who will labor and suffer, and whose supreme desire will be, not to gain earth’s accolades, but to win the Master’s approbation when they appear before His awesome judgment seat. They will be men who will preach with broken hearts and tear-filled eyes, and upon whose ministries God will grant an extraordinary effusion of the Holy Spirit, and who will witness ‘signs and wonders following’ in the transformation of multitudes of human lives.

Amen and Amen

Golf

Sorry that I don't have a decent title for this post, I'm just not very original tonight.

I just got back from golfing with my pastor and a couple other guys from my church. I was soundly defeated, not that winning was the point. It was good to be out with some brothers, having a good time, trying to figure out what tree I hit my ball under, seeing how many times I can miss the hole while putting. Lots of good fun. I also found out that the set of clubs that I've been using are women's clubs. So I've got to bend down even farther to hit the ball. I would love to have a picture of my bending over these short little clubs, trying to hit the ball. (For those who don't know me personally, I'm 6' 7", so it's a long way down.) I think the best part about the whole outing was playing against the backdrop of the Wasatch mountains. It was a truly beautiful day and demonstrated so well the glory of God. But yet, it is just the fringes of His glory (Job 26). Speaking of this, I love the Shane & Shane song based on this chapter. These are just the fringes of His glory, so "I'll sing for grace, for grace it let's me sing." How amazing is that truth!!! We can only sing to God because of the grace that He has given us, so let us praise the greatness of that grace to the glory of God. How unworthy of it we are. Another line in the chapter and the song, after talking about all these amazing things, is "and how faint a word we even hear of Him." Let's proclaim the truth of God and His amazing glory and greatness and grace with boldness.

All that from a golf game. God truly is amazing!!!

Don't know why I'm writing

It's late (I know, I'm weak)

I felt like posting, but I don't really have much to say (this must truly shock all who know me).

I've found that I really enjoy Pride and Prejudice. This is very cool but also a little scary. Does it diminish my masculinity for liking it so much? I think not, but others might beg to differ. I really should go to bed. But yet I know I won't.

My parents are watching the second season of the West Wing for the second time. They have almost all the seasons on dvd (I was the one that started their collection) and enjoy watching them every night. I really can't understand why they continually cycle through them. I like the show, but not that much. But yet I always seem to find myself watching the shows with them. It must have something to do with not having much of a social life.

I just realized that Pride and Prejudice is the first fictional book I've read since I finished the Lord of the Rings series about three years ago. Wow, that's a long time.

Before I go, I'll leave you with one of my thoughts about God that hit me again today. The fight for joy is truly a fight. It isn't easy and it never is pleasant and always ends with me crying out to God to restore my joy. It also comes with the realization that I don't fight hard enough or in the right ways. Often my fight is trying to ignore it, or replace my joy in God with joy in something else, which is idolatry. In order to fight properly, we need our weapon, the Word, and the strength to wield it, which is the Holy Spirit. In other words, we need to read and meditate on the Word and be praying constantly. We need to throw ourselves down at the merciful feet of Jesus and declare "You are all I want, You are what I need, You are my first love and there is no one that I desire more than You. My flesh yearns for you, my soul faints for you. I thirst for you as in a dry and weary land." During my fights for joy, one song keeps coming to my mind and it is truly the cry of my heart. It is "Be Near" by Shane & Shane. It is based off of Psalm 73 (on which my brother-in-law Kellen preached an awesome sermon the other Sunday). The chorus says "Be near, O God, be near, O God of us. Your nearness is to us our good." We need God to be near. We need to declare with Asaph, "Who have I in heaven but You? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides You." (Ps. 73:25) Praise God that He allows us to enter into His sanctuary and learn all the more about our dependence upon Him. And that is the purpose of the fight. To humble us, and get us to rely on Him more and more. He withholds nothing good from those who walk uprightly (Ps. 84:11). May God's grace be upon all those who have experienced this fight and will continue to experience it throughout their (our) lives.

New blog

I just joined a new blog by the title "Our Simple Minds." It's purpose is for a group of guys who are passionate for God's glory can post their thoughts on God. Feel free to check it out at oursimpleminds.blogspot.com.

Thrice - Dustin Kensrue

For any Thrice fans, I just found out that Dustin Kensrue (the lead singer) has his own myspace.com website with a few acoustic songs on it. I highly recommend it.

The web address is: www.myspace.com/dustinkensrue

Pride and Prejudice

So tonight I will start my journey through Jane Austen's (I don't know if I'm spelling that right) "Pride and Prejudice." Some might be wondering why on earth I would do that. There are multiple reasons for this (hopefully none of them are sado-masochistic) (I don't know if I spelled that right either). The first is that I recently watched the two-hour version on dvd with some of my family and really enjoyed it. I realize that for those who love the book that this might not have been the most accurate portrayal. However, I have also watched the A&E six-hour mini-series and I enjoyed that as well. So I decided to read the book.

But there are some more important reasons for why I am reading the book. I realized them after I watched the most-recent version. I realized that, as a single guy, I often an looking for or desiring a relationship just to have a relationship and not because there is a deep and abiding love for that person, or even a hope of that. I just want a relationship. Pride and Prejudice made me realize that my true desire is for a deep, Christ-like love and not a casual affection (not that I have experienced either of those). But more importantly I saw that this story reflected (albeit very dimly) the relationship between us and Christ and how Christ yearns for us and how desperately we need and desire Him, even though most of the world doesn't know it. To me it reflected in a small way the yearning in Psalm 63. So, by the grace of God, this book will help me to love God more and learn a little bit more about God-glorifying relationships.

Psalm 27:4

Have you every been impacted with a verse so much that you keep going back to it again and again? Psalm 27:4 is one of those verses for me, especially coming from my Christian Hedonist perspective. It says:

"One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after:
that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life,
to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire (or meditate) in His temple." (ESV)

I ablsolutely love this verse. To me, it is the perfect picture of worship. Worship is about loving God and wanting to gaze upon Him and never stop. But it is not just love. This love comes through and inspires knowledge of God. If we love God we will seek to inquire of Him and meditate on Him. As lovers of God, if we had one request of God, David is saying, this should be it. If we had one wish, it should be to dwell in the house of the LORD every moment that we are on this earth because in His house we can see and know our awesome Lord, Saviour, and Treasure. Like the post before this I decided to write a page about this verse. This is definitely a verse that I would like to do for a sermon sometime in the future (whenever God decides that that will happen). So here it is:

What is it to dwell in the house of the Lord? It is to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to meditate upon His truths – to know Him. Here is a description of both head and heart. The idea of gazing upon or beholding the beauty of the Lord seems to be that of adoration, love. Like a man beholding his bride, but yet we are the bride. We are to love and adore God. We are to long to see His face and when we do we don’t look away, for it is beautiful.

But yet this cannot be taken by itself. For if we adore the beauty of God without knowledge then we are looking at a magazine ad. Our love cannot be real. It is vacuous, empty – it is lust. Our love and adoration must be according to knowledge. However, the same can be said of knowledge. For if we have knowledge without love then we are a scholar who misses the point of his studies. We are the scholar who attends so much to his studies that he forgets his wife. We are a scholar who refuses to leave the library and look at the Alps or the Grand Canyon and misses the beauty of God revealed in creation.

In either scenario (love without knowledge, or knowledge without love) we become idolaters. For if we love someone without seeking to know more about that person then our love is not real and is, at best, lust. It is a seeking after ungodly pleasure, and desire for the blessings and benefits of being a child of God and bride of Christ without really loving the source of those gifts. It is an adoration of the gifts and not the giver. And if we seek knowledge without love then we make an idol out of knowledge. Love abounds from knowledge (Phil. 1:9) and if we don’t have love but have knowledge then we did not understand what that knowledge was meant to do in our lives. The knowledge of God is meant to cause us to love Him more. The more we know about our God, the more we are to love Him. Therefore, if we do not have love, then we have placed our focus on the gaining of knowledge rather than on the purpose of that knowledge – we have made an idol out of it.

No, we cannot be the person with a vacuous, empty love, or the scholar who misses the point and won’t look outside. Our love must spring from knowledge and love must push us to know more. For if we pursue knowledge out of love for God then we make much of God and He is supreme in our lives. But if we pursue knowledge without love then we make much of knowledge and ourselves in that we seek to exalt ourselves through our knowledge. Knowledge and love cannot be separated if our worship and adoration of God is to be true. We must gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and meditate in His temple for love abounds in real knowledge and all discernment (Phil. 1:9). This spirit will be in all God’s children and true disciples.

Blog title

I was just taking a shower and a thought hit me about the title of this blog (thoughts often hit me in the shower). When I named this blog I decided on the title "a flawed expression of God's glory" for two reasons. The first is that I am a flawed expression of God's glory. I was created to worship and glorify God but sin gets in the way, even in my new life in Christ (Gal. 5). The second reason is that everything that I post on this blog is a flawed expression of God's glory because it can never capture His fullness, there will be errors (both in word and motive) and I cannot escape my sinful nature, even when I write about God. So the term "expression" carries two different meanings. In the first reason, I use the word expression to refer to a picture. I am a flawed picture of God's glory. In the second reason, I use the word more traditionally to refer to the written expression of my thoughts. But this is where the thought that I refered to at the beginning comes in.

This is my thought: We are flawed expressions of His glory, and perfect demonstrations of His grace. Both of these have to do with our sinful natures. Because of my sin, I can never, on this earth, be a perfect picture of God's glory. I am a pot created by Him (Rom. 9) but I have imperfections because of sin. But, because I have a sinful nature, I became a perfect candidate for God's grace because if I didn't have a sinful nature and never sinned then I wouldn't need the grace of God, but rather I could be justified through the law (Gal. 3:10-13). Therefore, I am a perfect demonstration of God's grace in that I couldn't be saved or justified or perfected apart from His grace. Therefore, I am both a flawed expression of His glory, and a perfect demonstration of His grace.

I apologize for any rambling or disconnected thought. But I thought that it would be useful and helpful to understand why I named the blog the way I did. I also thought that it gives a little glimpse of our relationship to God, which is far more important than any reasons I have for naming anything. We are sinners saved by grace, designed to live for the glory of God through His grace, to the praise and glory of His name (Rom. 11:36).

Jonah 2:8

For those who don't know, I like to write about those things in the Bible that really affect me. One of those verses is Jonah 2:8. After I read it, I couldn't get it out of my head for about four or five days. I ended writing almost two pages on it. I'll publish it here and on the other blog(s) I am a part of. It is kind of long, just to warn you. I encourage anyone to post their thoughts on this matter.

Those who pay regard to vain idols
Forsake their hope of steadfast love.
Jonah 2:8 (ESV)

There are some fundamental questions that we must ask about this passage. What does it mean to pay regard to vain idols? What does it mean to forsake the hope of steadfast love? And what is God’s steadfast love? For this last question, I am going to assume that the steadfast love that is mentioned in this verse is God’s because that is the only love that is steadfast and that love is only ascribed to God.

In order to understand what it means to pay regard to vain idols I think that it is useful to look at verse nine. Jonah juxtaposes verses eight and nine. In verse eight he talks about paying regard to vain idols. In verse nine he talks about sacrificing to God with the voice of thanksgiving. So paying regard to vain idols is the same action as sacrificing to God. Therefore, paying regard to vain idols is the same as worshiping them. We worship what we sacrifice to. Those who pay regard to vain idols are worshiping those idols.

What does this lead to? This leads to their forsaking their hope of steadfast love. Before I talk about the word forsake I think that we should ask the question about why they had hope in the first place. Was salvation offered to them and they didn’t take it? No, I don’t believe this to be the case. In the context of the book of Jonah, he hadn’t gotten to Ninevah yet and hadn’t offered the word of salvation to the people there. Rather, I think that the answer to this question lies in his heritage. Jonah obviously was a Jew, and as a Jew, he was a member of the chosen race and the hope of steadfast love was offered through the Jewish line. This then makes the idolatry even more amazing. The idolatry was committed by those that had the privileges of God and had seen His works and yet they followed after vain idols. How much more should we take heed of this. While I do not believe that the people who are referred to in this passage are saved, we certainly have the same flesh and are just as prone to idolatry and “doing what we hate” (Rom. 7). And because we are as capable as these people were we need to take heed as to what the result of that idolatry was and is. It is the forsaking of God’s steadfast love. The term forsake is the same term that is translated as abandon in Psalm 16:10 where David praises God because He does not abandon his soul to Sheol. In that verse abandonment is the utter and absolute removal of David from the presence of God. That is what is being referred to here. It is the utter abandonment of the love of God. It is a complete 180 from God’s love to the love of an idol which is directly opposed to God. If we are delighting in the worship of something other than an idol, then we are abandoning the love of God. And why is this so devastating?

What is so important about God’s steadfast love? Psalm 6:4-5 says “Turn, O LORD, deliver my life; save me for the sake of you steadfast love. For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who will give you praise?” I want to just focus on this verse for a little bit. Here, David is crying out for deliverance, but not for his sake, it is for God’s sake. Now did David not think that salvation was important for his own sake? Of course he did, as we will see in a little bit. But the ultimate goal of his salvation was for the sake of God’s steadfast love, because if David were to die and descend to Sheol then He wouldn’t be able to praise God. So there is a connection, then, between our salvation and God’s glory. We are saved in order that we might offer God praise and remember him. That is the goal of our salvation. David was very concerned about this. He longed for and cried out for his salvation in order that he might offer God praise because God must be glorified. This is very much the same as Piper’s frequent comment that “God is most glorified when we are most satisfied in Him.” These verses are telling us that it is God’s steadfast love that allows us to praise God and thus be satisfied in Him, thereby glorifying God.

David says the same thing in Psalm 16:11: “You make known to me the path of life; in Your presence there is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” God makes known to us the path of life, and in that life there is fullness of joy and pleasures for all eternity. We are saved to be satisfied in God which is what glorifies Him because it comes through His steadfast love. This thought is also echoed in II Thess. 1:10 where it declares that our salvation finds its purpose in glorifying God and marveling at Him. Both of these verses (Psalm 16:11 and II Thess. 1:10) come after the description of hell. Hell is the abandonment by God where there is no praise of God or remembrance of Him. This is torment to the utmost degree. God is the most beautiful and glorious thing to ever be and to be denied that after you come to know this is torture.

So how does this apply to Jonah 2:8? When we commit idolatry and pay regard to or worship false idols we reject God’s steadfast love. We forsake and abandon that which brings us to the Most Glorious. By forsaking God’s steadfast love we forsake the means of getting us to God’s house (Ps. 5:7), which is where we can gaze upon God’s beauty and learn about Him (Ps. 27:4). It is in this sanctuary that we can offer up sacrifices with thanksgiving and shouts of joy (Jonah 2:9, Ps. 27:6). How important then does this make Jonah 2:8 to our everyday lives. Every time we commit idolatry we are turning our backs to that which saves, that which brings us joy, that which satisfies our souls. We lose fellowship with our Beloved. For anyone who is married, imagine losing fellowship with your spouse. Imagine committing adultery. This is what our idolatry is. Forsake all idols. May we be a generation that seeks God’s face, and that has clean hands and clean hearts and has not lifted our souls to another (Ps. 24). Enter the sanctuary of God, through His steadfast love, and offer up yourselves as living sacrifices with shouts of joy and with all thanksgiving, for in that will God be most glorified in us and we will be most satisfied with Him.

Hey everyone who might take the time to actually read any of this

This is my first blog of my own. Some of my good friends had blogs of their own so I thought I would start one for the heck of it. I guess that I intend to use this as a way of posting some of my thoughts on God, His glory, and how it can apply to my life. I might even post some stuff about my life when I get one. Currently, my life is pretty boring so these kind of posts might be few and far between. Anyway, if you read this, thanks for actually taking the time. Post plenty of comments if you like.
All for God's glory.