Christ Church

Delighting in Your People (The Well-Pleased Father #1) (King’s Cross)

Lindsey Gardner on

Introduction

We are a nation of bastards. A bastard is an illegitimate son, a son born out of wedlock, a son without a covenant father, and thereby at some level, abandoned and rejected by his father. This has been enacted by mass fornication, adultery, divorce, and in its most violent form, abortion. Even in the church where there is often far more cohesion, there is still sometimes great tension and distance in our families, where there ought to be delight.

This fatherlessness and generational static have their root cause in our alienation from our Heavenly Father. You cannot reject God the Father Almighty and end up in any kind of happy place. If there is tension between fathers and children, it is because we are not in full fellowship with the Father. Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of Lights, in whom there is no variation or shadow of turning (Js. 1:17), including the gift of delighting in your family.

The Text: “And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened unto Him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon Him: and lo a voice from heaven, saying, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3:16-17).

 

Summary of the Text

The Father shows up directly in the gospels just a couple of times, and both times He says almost the same thing. The first is at Christ’s baptism: “this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3:17, Mk. 1:11, Lk. 3:22). The second is the transfiguration: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 17:5). What we learn in the gospel directly from God the Father is that He is well pleased with His beloved Son.

 

Restored to the Father

Eph. 3:14-15 says, “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom every family in heaven and earth is named.” This means that families exist because God is Triune: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All human fatherhood gets its meaning and purpose from God the Father. And when the Father shows up, the central thing He wants the whole world to know is that He is well pleased with His beloved Son.

Many men did not have fathers or else their fathers were absent or harsh, and this is why God sent His only Son into the world: “And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to the fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse” (Mal. 4:6, cf. Lk. 1:17). Generational dysfunction and animosity are burdens, and when sin is not dealt with, it is a great curse. But Christ came to bear the curse of sin and heal the generations. He does this by taking away our guilt and shame, but He restores families fundamentally by restoring us to God the Father. “For He [Christ] is our peace… For through Him [Christ] we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father” (Eph. 2:18). That Spirit is the same Spirit that came upon Jesus in His baptism, the same Spirit that caused the Father to proclaim, “this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Gal. 4:6).

 

Delighting in Your People

Our delight in our people is grounded in the delight of God in His people in His Son. “The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing” (Zeph. 3:17). This is not God rejoicing over a perfect people; this is God rejoicing over a people He is saving. This is not a blind love; it is faithful love. It is a delight in what is and what will be.

This is the bedrock of Christian family life: we are The Delighted-In and so we are Delight-Full. Our Father is well-pleased with us. He rejoices over us with singing. It is His holy, infinite delight in us that is to spill over into our homes. This infinite joy is plenty for every Christian, but he who finds a wife finds a good thing and has obtained favor from the Lord (Prov. 18:22). Children are the inheritance of the Lord; they are His great blessing and reward (Ps. 127:3-5, Ps. 128). Christ is the pool into which the pleasures of God pour infinitely (Ps. 16:11), and if you are in Christ, that pleasure pours out of you.

 

Delighting in Creation

This delight is not only directly in your people. God has also created a universe that expresses His delight, and it was created for the enjoyment of God and His people. Delight is a gift, but shared delight multiplies the gift and binds us together. This was part of God’s point in His reply to Job’s great complaints: God points Job to His favorite parts of the universe and invites Job to join Him in ruling the weather patterns, riding constellations, caring for ravens and goats and unicorns, and playing with dragons (Job 38ff).

Our Father delights in His work and creation, and therefore, this delight in work and creation should mark Christian families: work, hobbies, sports, games, camping, fishing…

 

Applications

The center of this delight is a bloody cross where all our sin was nailed and crushed. This is not a humanistic optimism or a stiff upper lip. This is gospel grace. Sin paid for. Debts forgiven. Adopted by the Father. As you have been forgiven, so forgive. Confess, forgive, walk in the light. No backlogs. No bitterness. No hidden sin.

This is also central to discipline and correction. Christian discipline restores joy, which means it must be your baseline. Is your discipline and correction doing that? Parents, your job is to make sure that it actually yields peace and joy (Heb. 12:11).

A Christian family should be marked by playful delight: joyful work, chores, wrestling, tickling, jokes, laughter, singing, dancing, adventures, and games. And in the midst of it all, many, many words of praise, delight, gratitude, and love. Why? Because this is the way of your Father.

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Times of Refreshing on the Threshold of Doom (Acts of the Apostles #8)

Lindsey Gardner on

Introduction

Jesus Christ was a murder victim, killed by the ungodly men who ran the ecclesiastical machinery of ancient Jerusalem. They thought that they had dispensed with the Christ threat, but He exploded their plans by coming back from the dead. Now this risen one had predicted that He would come back from the dead, as His enemies well knew (Matt. 27:63). This prediction had been fulfilled, as they also knew (Matt. 28:11-15). But in addition to this, He had also predicted that Jerusalem would be flattened within one generation (Matt. 24:34). The city was now on death row, and the clock running down. The resurrection was therefore the guarantee that the destruction to follow was certain.

In this context, the great apostle Peter was offering the miscreants terms. He was giving them a chance to repent. Many did, but—in the teeth of the evidence—many others did not. It was not a matter of evidence.

 

The Text

“Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. For Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you. And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people. Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days. Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. Unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities” (Acts 3:19–26).

 

Summary of the Text

In the first half of this chapter, Peter has preached the objective facts of the gospel—the death and resurrection of the Christ of Israel. He now comes to an appeal for the subjective response to that gospel. He tells his listeners to repent, to be converted, with the result that their sins will be blotted out (including the sin of crucifying Christ), and they will enjoy times of refreshing that will come straight from the presence of the Lord (v. 19). God will send Jesus Christ back again, the same one just preached to you (v. 20)—but this Christ must remain in Heaven until the “times of restitution of all things” (v. 21). These times of restitution have been spoken about by God from the world’s beginning, through all His holy prophets (v. 21).

Moses, for example, predicted that God would raise up a prophet like him, and the people were instructed to listen to everything He taught (v. 22). Moses also said that anybody who did not heed that prophet would be destroyed (v. 23). All the prophets, from Samuel on, were foretelling these days (v. 24). Those listening to Peter were children of these prophets, and children of the covenant that God made with their fathers (v. 25). This covenant was made when God spoke to Abraham, saying that in his seed all the families of the earth would be blessed (v. 25). And so consequently God, having raised up Jesus, sent Him to bless those who had murdered Him. That blessing would be in turning anyone from his iniquities (v. 26).

 

Faithful Prophecy

 Prophecy should be understood as having two components. There is the forthtelling—where the prophet speaks to the people, in the name of God, telling them what their current spiritual condition actually is. But how can the people know whether this message is truly from God or not? This leads to the foretelling, the predicting. Fulfilled prophecy proves that the messenger of God is truly speaking on behalf of the God who is in full control of all history. This is why Isaiah is able to taunt the idols. “Shew the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: Yea, do good, or do evil, that we may be dismayed, and behold it together” (Isaiah 41:23).

Look at the showdown between Hananiah and Jeremiah (Jer. 28), revolving around just this point. The same was true of Micaiah and Zedekiah (1 Kings 22:15-25). “And Micaiah said, If thou return at all in peace, the Lord hath not spoken by me. And he said, Hearken, O people, every one of you” (1 Kings 22:28). False gods do not know the future, and the true God does.

Immediately after the passage that Peter quotes, false prophecy is made a capital offense (Deut. 18:20). But how can we tell? the people ask. The answer is straightforward. “When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him” (Deut. 18:22).

This is a central qualifying characteristic of a true prophet. Christ met that description.

 

The Great Unforced Error in Apologetics

A number of years ago, I traveled with the atheist Christopher Hitchens, debating him, and one of his arguments was that Christ thought the end of the world was going to happen . . . and then it didn’t. Christ was clearly mistaken, Hitch thought, and so why should we listen to Him? The atheist Bertrand Russell thought the same: “He certainly thought that his second coming would occur in clouds of glory before the death of all the people who were living at that time. There are a great many texts that prove that.”

But Matthew 24 was not about the end of the space/time continuum, but rather (very clearly) about the looming destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans. “Your house will be left to you desolate” (Matt. 23:38). Not one stone will be left on another (Matt. 24:2). The disciples naturally ask when will this happen (Matt. 24:3)? Jesus says it will be within one generation (Matt. 24:34). People are confused because of the collapsing solar system word pictures (Matt. 24:29). But everywhere in the Old Testament that such imagery is used, it is always describing the destruction of a city, and never the destruction of the cosmos—as we discussed in the fifth sermon of this series, it is used of Babylon (Is. 13:10), of Edom (Is. 34:4), of the northern kingdom of Israel (Amos 8:9), of Egypt (Ezek. 32:7), and of Israel (Joel 2:28-32).

One of the great tragedies in the world of apologetics is that many conservative believers have interpreted Matthew 24 in a way that robs Christ of His great vindication, and robs Peter of the great and forceful point of this sermon. Listen to the prophet, and stand in awe, which is not the same as moving the fulfillment of His prophecy to the end of the world, well out of reach.

 

Christ the Faithful Prophet

Peter is at pains to show that Christ was the prophet that Moses had predicted would come. For Moses truly said. This prophet would be raised up, and moreover, He would be raised up again. You must listen to Him about everything. And every soul that will not listen will be destroyed. Will you not come? Will you not believe? What more could you want?

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Discerning the Lord’s Will (The Continuing Adventures of Jesus #38) (King’s Cross)

Lindsey Gardner on

INTRODUCTION

How do you know what the will of God is for you? We pray that God’s “will” would be done on earth as it is in heaven, but we have many choices to make, some obviously significant and every choice momentous.  

Paul said that he was compelled by the Spirit to go to Jerusalem (Acts 19:21, 20:22), and yet, the same Spirit filled disciples urging Paul not to go (Acts 21:4, 11). Does God do this regularly? Does God send mixed signals? 

God is not trying to trick anyone, but He does test us. The Holy Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted (Mk. 1:12). This was not so that Jesus would fail, but so He would succeed. Christians must trust and obey God’s clear Word, and then we trust His providence in the gifts, opportunities, and desires He gives us. 

The Text: “And it came to pass, that after we were gotten from them, and had launched, we came with a straight course unto Coos, and the day following unto Rhodes, and from thence unto Patara…” (Acts 21:1-14).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

After leaving the Ephesian elders at Miletus, Paul’s entourage sailed along the coast of southwest Asia Minor, until they came to Syria (Acts 21:1-3). While there for seven days, the disciples, by the Holy Spirit, warned Paul not to go to Jerusalem before sending him on his way with prayers (Acts 21:4-6). Sailing south along the coast of Palestine, they came to Caesarea and stayed with Philip, one of the seven, who had four faithful daughters (Acts 21:7-9). While there, the prophet Agabus, foretold that Paul would be arrested in Jerusalem, and everyone tried to dissuade Paul from going (Acts 21:10-12). But while Paul felt the emotional force of their pleas, he was unmoved and ready to die if necessary, and the brothers committed him to the will of the Lord (Acts 21:13-14). 

THE WILL OF GOD

How did Paul know what the will of God was? We may not be able to answer exhaustively, but we can have a basic understanding of how God wants us to discern His will. Theologians commonly distinguish between the “decretive will” of God and the “preceptive will” of God. The decretive will is what God has decreed will come to pass before all time (Gen. 1:3, Is. 46:10, Eph. 1:11); His preceptive will is what God has revealed is good and right for His creatures to do (cf. His law, Ex. 20, Dt. 5). So it is God’s preceptive will for all men to repent of their sins and obey God’s law, but regardless of whether they do or not, God works all things together for good for those who love Him (Rom. 8, Gen. 50:20). So while we cannot know God’s ultimate decretive will, His preceptive will (His law and gospel) is the central revelation of His will for us (1 Thess. 4:1-7).  

DISCERNING THE WILL OF GOD

So, when you’re trying to determine God’s will, begin by asking: is it lawful/moral? If not, it is not the will of God. It is not the will of God for you to marry an unbeliever, to disobey your parents, or cheat or steal. These moral obligations also include providing for your family, your parents, and having a church community. You would need a clear indication from God that a higher duty is requiring you to set aside one of those duties (e.g. a boss or parent or pastor asking you to sin). 

If it is lawful, then the next questions would be: What are your abilities, opportunities, and desires? You may have the ability and desire, but no opportunity. You may have the opportunity, but no ability or desire. As it is sometimes said, “the need is not necessarily the call.” Many orphans need to be adopted, many unreached peoples need to be evangelized, but the need is not necessarily the call. But if you have an opportunity and the ability, sometimes the will of God comes down to what you really want to do. On the other hand, as Jonah learned the hard way, sometimes the need amounts to a command and it doesn’t matter what you want to do (e.g. the Good Samaritan). Also, remember that wisdom is found in the multitude of counselors, and at the same time, you can’t just go along with the multitude (Ex. 23:2). 

FACE TOWARD JERUSALEM

Later, Paul will explain that he came to Jerusalem to bring alms and offerings (Acts 24:17). While there may have been other factors at work, it appears that Paul was very concerned to bring his entourage from the new churches in Greece with their offerings to Jerusalem. He knew the risks involved full well, but he believed that this was what was most needful, perhaps particularly for the unity of the Jewish and Gentile churches. 

It also continues the pattern of the apostles imitating Jesus, “And it came to pass, when the time was come that he should be received up, he stedfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Lk. 9:51). And just as Peter wanted to insist that Jesus not go (Mk. 8:31ff), Paul faced similar resistance, testing his resolve. And so we can expect similar testing, and while it can occasionally be wise to double check our decisions, our general instinct ought to be “not to doubt in the dark what we knew in the light.” If we are walking in the Light, confessing our sins and forgiving one another, while God does test us, He does not trick us. 

APPLICATIONS

Safety is Not the Highest Good: Our God plays with death and dragons. Wisdom is not reckless, but it is ambitious and courageous. By faith some overcame armies; and by faith some were stoned and sawn in two (Heb. 11). And all of them obtained a good report. Winning and victory are found in obedience to the Lord, not necessarily surviving. 

Parents, beware of making safety the highest good. Obedience is the highest good, and obedience often requires selfless courage, danger, and even harm. Paul was prepared to go to prison and die if necessary for the name of Jesus. Wives, beware tempting husbands or children to be unfaithful by your fear of harm. Better the obedience of Christ (dying at 33), than a long life of grieving His Spirit. 

Stick to Your Near and Clear Duties: “Seek first the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you” (Mt. 6:33). “Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart” (Ps. 37:4). And this includes keeping your word/vows/covenants (Ps. 15:4). This is how God ordinarily shows us His will.

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Heaven (Last Things #5) (CC Downtown)

Lindsey Gardner on

20 For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus
Christ,
21 who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the
working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.

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Trials and Temptations

Lindsey Gardner on

SERMON TEXT

James 1:12 Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. 13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. 14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. 15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. 16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

INTRODUCTION

Many churches struggle to rightly emphasize practical help in living the Christian life and theological depth in understanding the character and works of God. Some churches major on practical help in living the Christian life and minimize theological depth. Other churches major on theological depth and minimize practical, how-to Christian living.

If we were to place James in one of these categories, I suspect we’d put him in the practical category. The book has over 50 imperatives in 108 verses. James is constantly telling us what to do and not do. But one of my aims this morning is to show you how James brings together the practical bent with complex explanations of God and his relation to the world and to us.

 

FROM TRIALS TO TEMPTATIONS

In chapter 1, James teaches that Christians should expect trials and own their pain while counting them all joy (1:2), and that God does his most important work in us through trials. Trials test our faith and produce steadfastness, leading to maturity (1:3-4). God grows us up into full and complete people through various trials, and promises a reward—a crown of life—if we endure through trials (1:12). We believe that God uses trials, even that God ordains trials for good and wise purposes, and promises to compensate us in the next life for the suffering and hardship that we endure in this one. The Westminster Confession testifies to this big God theology:

God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; (Westminster)

“Whatsoever comes to pass.” All things, including trials, hardships, sufferings, are ordained by God for his glory and our joy. But this creates a danger, a potential deception, namely, that if we believe that God ordains trials, we must believe that God tempts us to evil.

This misunderstanding is enhanced by the fact that in Greek, the word for trial and for temptation is the same (1:2, 1:12, 1:13-14). James is telling us that this is not simple. Yes, God sends trials to test our faith and mature us. No, God does not tempt you to do evil. We need new categories; otherwise, we’ll be deceived.

So what are these new categories? I find one key in comparing 1:13 to 1:17. The key for James here is that, while all things are from God, all things are not from God in the same way. We could say it like this: Good things are from God directly. Bad things, hard things, evil things (like trials and temptations) are from him indirectly. Or, God is the source, origin, and author of good things, because he is good; he is not the source, origin, and author of evil things in the same way, because he’s not evil or tempted to evil.

We can grasp this better by thinking about the phrase “Father of lights.” Think with me about sun. Both light and darkness are “from the sun.” But they are not from the sun in the same way. The sun causes light by its presence; light comes from it directly. The sun causes darkness by its absence; darkness comes from it indirectly.

So also with God as the source of good things and hard things. Light and darkness, well-being and calamity (or evil) come from God. God sends both good things, and he sends hardships and trials. But he is not the source of them in the same way. God gives good things directly; he sends trials indirectly. And this is important to James, lest we be deceived, and in our deception, be unable to endure trials faithfully and receive gifts gladly.

 

PRACTICAL HELP IN OUR VISION OF GOD

How does that clarity—that avoidance of deception and error—help us to live? What happens if you flatten out those distinctions or deny one side of the truth? You might deny that God sends trials to produce maturity in us. You might say that he doesn’t have anything to do with hardships, pains, sufferings. And so you face them believing that they are ultimately meaningless, that your pain is pointless, that God is powerless to help you. And so in the midst of trials, you despair.

But let’s say that you believe that God sends trials, but you flatten out that distinction. On the one hand, you’ll try to deceive yourself into thinking that hard, painful things are good in themselves. You think that faithfulness means pretending hard things aren’t hard. Another possibility is that in the trial, you’ll start to blame God. You’ll say, “God has sent this trial to test my faith. Therefore, if I fail, he is to blame.”

Another possibility is that you’ll view God as a cruel sadist, as someone who delights in your pain. And therefore, you won’t run to him in your pain. You won’t rely on his strength and compassion to endure the trial; you’ll try to rely on your own (because that’s all you have) and you won’t make it for long.

But this deception won’t simply affect your experience of hardships. It will affect the good things in your life as well. God is kind and blesses you. But because you believe that he sends trials, you can’t really enjoy the goodness, because you’re terrified that “Behind a smiling providence, he hides a malicious face.” The goodness you have now is just God fattening you for the slaughter. This is what the gods of the ancient religions were like. As one person said, “We are their bubbles. They blow us big before they prick us.”

The result is that your view of God is constantly distorted. In hard times, he is a cruel sadist. In good times, he is a trickster waiting to spring his trap. It’s impossible to live the Christian life under such distortions and deceptions. And so James is adamant that good gifts come down from a loving Father, and there is no shadow of turning with him. He’s not playing a trick on you. Good gifts are from him and designed to lead you back to him, and hard painful things are not from him directly but are instead designed to produce steadfast faith and maturity.

 

PRACTICAL HELP IN RESISTING TEMPTATION AND FIGHTING SIN

So if temptation doesn’t come from God directly, where does it come from? James describes the process of sin and temptation in terms of four stages.

Stage 1: God gives good gifts, which we desire to enjoy. Stage 2: Those desires go astray, and we begin to want things at times or in ways or in degrees that God has forbidden. Desire is now enticing and luring us away from God and toward evil. Stage 3: Desire conceives and gives birth to Sin. We pass from temptation to concrete, deliberate, willful disobedience to God. Stage 4: That willful disobedience grows and becomes stronger until it gives birth to spiritual death. We have hardened our hearts.

Desire and Temptation are not the same. Temptation and sin are not the same. Sin and death are not the same. These distinctions have practical, real-world effects.

Here’s one: this process of temptation and sin shows us the danger of little sins. We want to play with the lures, dabble in fantasies, nurse small grievances. We think, because the sins seem so small in comparison to some, that it’s no big deal. Until it is a big deal.

Here’s another: if we fail to distinguish godly desire for God’s gifts from enticing desire and allurement, then we’ll treat the gifts of God like idol traps. He gives us good things, and we view them with suspicion and hostility because he’s dangling temptations in front of us. Or we feel guilt because we want something other than God.

Here’s another: if we fail to distinguish temptation from deliberate sin, then every experience of temptation brings the full weight of condemnation down on our head. We develop a hypersensitive and false conscience.

Here’s another: if we fail to distinguish deliberate sin from its consequences in spiritual death, then we won’t believe that the gospel is for us. If we knowingly and willfully disobey God, we’ll think that we’ve gone too far, we’ve out-sinned his grace, and we’re doomed. But the reality is that in this life, we’re never doomed. There’s always a way back. The gospel is always good news. You may have been a prodigal. You may have willfully despised your Father and spent the good and perfect inheritance that he gave you on your own sinful pleasures. But it’s never wrong to be the prodigal coming home. You can still come home.

 

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