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Grace & Peace: Proverbs 21:7

Douglas Wilson on July 3, 2024

At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore (Ps. 16: 11)

“The robbery of the wicked shall destroy them; Because they refuse to do judgment”

Proverbs 21:7

“The violence of the wicked will destroy them, Because they refuse to do justice”

Proverbs 21:7

The disparity between the KJV and NKJV (robbery/violence) is not the result of mistranslation, but rather the consequence of the underlying word having a broad semantic range—despoil, oppress, devastate, deal violently, rob, pillage. 

The principle here is that a certain kind of wickedness, greedy for gain, snatches at that gain in counterproductive and suicidal ways. Because justice is not their concern at all, they refuse to “do judgment.” They do not recognize any standard over them that arises from outside the realm of their own lusts and desires. All their guiding principles arise from within, and the end result of that is self-destruction. 

They fall into the pit they dug for others. Haman built a gallows for Mordecai, and yet he was the one who wound up swinging from it. They scheme and plot without reference to righteousness, which is why a righteous universe will not suffer them to get away with it. The way the world is recoils upon them. They get caught in their own traps, tangled up in their own wires, ensnared by their own tricksy hearts. 

All of this is because they would not tolerate that hateful word no. They refused accountability, and resolved to ignore any admonitions that went contrary to what they wanted in the moment. As it turns out, this is a very poor strategy for making your way in the world. It is an artificial feedback loop that provides you with nothing but lies to go on. 

There is only one thing that the violent robber does recognize that is outside of him, and that would be the shiny bauble that he is reaching for. But it, like everything else in this arrangement, is deceptive. 

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Now I Am Old – Christ Church Downtown Exhortation

Ben Zornes on June 30, 2024

Psalm 37:25a doesn’t make its way onto many Hallmark Cards: “I was young & now I am old.” You are aging. Your body isn’t infinite. Very soon your earthly sojourn will be done. Aging is inevitable. This being the case, it’s imperative to make Moses’ prayer yours: “Teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom (Psa 90:12).” 

Paul tells young Timothy to flee youthful lusts. Elsewhere, he gives different warnings to aging saints.  Both older men and women are summoned to sobriety (Tit. 2:2-3). Older men are admonished to be patient, while older women are explicitly given a warning against drunkenness and being busybodies. 

Aging comes with temptations to grumbling, resentment, and regret. Life never adheres to youthful daydreams. Providence socks you on the jaw. Sin brings hard consequences. Others wrong and fail you. Thus, Paul’s stress on patience & sobriety. Older men are tempted to become impatient with youthful zeal, or else grow despondent and long for death in despair. Older women can become intoxicated with wine or pills or romance novels, seeking escape from their duties, regrets, or pains. 

Scripture paints another picture of aging righteously: “They shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be fat and flourishing (Ps. 92:14); When I am old and grayheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to every one that is to come (Ps. 71:18).” Notice that combination of steadfast faith and undiminished fruitfulness in order to pass on both material and spiritual provision to future generations.

The chasm between aging righteously & unrighteously is found in that wonderful word: faithfulness. Faithfulness demands an object of faith and only the everlasting arms of Christ are strong enough to hold you steadfast through each year and enable you to truly age gracefully.

Ben Zornes – June 30, 2024

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The Unmanning of Man – Christ Church Exhortation

Jared Longshore on June 30, 2024

As our society continues to stumble head over heels into the sexual abyss, we must be aware of the central play being run on us. It is not merely a cultural revolution. It is not merely an attempt to send our legal order base over apex. It is ultimately an attempt to unman man. We face an ontological anarchy that would erase the imago dei, if it could. Alan of Lille, the twelfth century French theologian, once said, “Large numbers are shipwrecked and lost because of a Venus turned monster, when Venus wars with Venus and changes “hes” into “shes” and with her witchcraft unmans man.” Alan was not referring to transgender surgeries, but homosexual practice. Such practice is itself a transgender activity as the active sex degenerates into the passive sex and man is turned woman.

Sodomy is fruitless, resulting in hollow wombs. It attempts to abolish man. By removing woman from the equation, man is stripped of his glory. His glory is discarded as entirely irrelevant. Men who engage in homosexual practice, then, are both misogynists, hating their glory, and effeminate, trying to be man’s glory.

Our answer to the work of this monstrous Venus is to put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Christ came to deliver us from sexual corruption and constitute a new humanity. This involves men acting like men, leading, providing, sweating, protecting, and bearing the glory of God as they sacrifice themselves for their wives. And this involves women bounding around like that woman from Proverbs with more fruit than she has baskets, and more children than she has rooms, as her husband comes home to discover, not only has she purchased a field, but she has vines from the Rhone valley coming in on Tuesday, oh, and for dinner she’s turned the leftovers into Turkey Tetrazzini.

This new humanity is a pleasing aroma, and the prophets of Baal had a better chance of calling down fire on Carmel than the rainbow revolution does of snuffing it out. 

Jared Longshore – June 30, 2024

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Love Your Enemies – King’s Cross Exhortation

Shawn Paterson on June 30, 2024

“But I say to you who hear: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who spitefully use you” (Lk. 6:26–28). 

These are the words of Jesus of Nazareth, and they have rightfully undergirded Christian ethics ever since he first spoke them. And so this morning, I want to encourage you in two specific ways regarding our Lord’s command to love your enemies. 

The first is this – you should live in such a way that you have enemies. Too many Christians think that Christ’s words mean that we should not have enemies. That something has gone terribly wrong when we receive opposition. But this is simply not the case. All the way back to the Garden, enemies have risen against the Lord and his Anointed. And if we are united to Christ, if all that is His is ours, then His enemies by necessity must be our enemies. As Jesus said, “A servant is not greater than His master. If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you” (Jn. 15:20). 

The second item of note is this – after rightly acknowledging your enemies, you are to love them in all sincerity. True love is not simply a vague feeling tucked away in the recesses of your heart. Rather, it is an inward disposition outwardly displayed. Love is concrete. Love can be touched. And here Jesus gives three tangible ways for you to love your enemies. You are to do good to them, bless them, and pray for them.

As Pastor Toby works through the Book of Acts, we have a great example of what this love looks like in the life and ministry of the early church. Consider the first martyr, Stephen, who prayed for his enemies as they stoned him to death. Or the Apostle Paul, who takes beating after beating, never returning evil for evil but relentlessly continuing to preach the gospel. 

Of course, their ultimate example, and ours in this, is our Lord Jesus. What enemies did He love? He loved you and me. And how did He demonstrate that love? He laid down His life – He did good to us – in order to make us His friends.

Shawn Paterson – June 30, 2024

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Grace & Peace: Proverbs 20:28

Douglas Wilson on June 25, 2024

At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore (Ps. 16: 11)

“Mercy and truth preserve the king: And his throne is upholden by mercy”

Proverbs 20:28

Thrones are established by two things. One of them is intuitive, and we understand it naturally, and the other is pretty counter-intuitive. 

First, kings are frequently established by strength, by conquest. That is pretty simple to understand. Either it happens, or somebody understands that this is how it frequently happens, and so they make their attempts on the basis of it. “Let us go up against Judah, and vex it, and let us make a breach therein for us, and set a king in the midst of it, even the son of Tabeal” (Isaiah 7:6).

The counter-intuitive way to establish a throne is pointed to by our proverb. Truth and mercy are a king’s preservation. One of the things that upholds his throne is mercy. 

In this, our thrones are like God’s throne. But what is counter-intuitive to us (because of our sin) is not at all counter-intuitive to Him. “Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: Mercy and truth shall go before thy face.” (Psalm 89:14). Notice how these things harmonize—justice, judgment, mercy, truth. There is no discordant note there. 

“And in mercy shall the throne be established: And he shall sit upon it in truth in the tabernacle of David, judging, and seeking judgment, and hasting righteousness” (Isaiah 16:5).

Christian leadership understands that these things all go together. Righteousness and peace are friends, after all. They kiss each other (Ps. 85:10). This should not be surprising to any Christian, because when we petition the Lord for mercy, we are coming to a throne of grace. “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16). An understanding of this should be down in our bones, in such a way as to enable us to petition the Lord for mercy with boldness. We must not come to Him crawling. His promises are stronger than that. His throne is mightier than that.

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