The Wittenberg Door

The Goose and the Swan continued

2006-09-01T05:43:00.000-07:00

1521

In the year 1521, in the public room of a small country Inn on the road that traversed the great Thuringian forest three travelers were sharing the blazing and cheerful fire of the establishment. Two of the travelers were friends, merchants who were passing through the region in the normal course of their trade while the third, a dark and heavily muffled man who had been left there temporarily by his companions the night before was unknown to them. The landlord (for so keepers of such an establishment were called at this time) seemed surprised when one of the merchants broke out with the news that all the country was repeating.
“Well I guess we all knew it was coming. Luther’s dead by now, you know.”
“Is he then sir?” asked the host. “And how came you by that information?”
The merchant smiled indulgently at the host’s simplicity.
“Know landlord, that we who travel about the country converse with many and can better judge the truth of what we hear than you of more stationary pursuits.”
“He was taken on the road from Worms, where he had seen the emperor.” Volunteered his companion. “Twelve armed knights in the pay of Rome snatched him in broad daylight off the public highway.”
The landlord looked at the muffled stranger in surprise as if waiting for him to answer the merchants, and the stranger’s eyes seemed to smile as he asked, “And have you this for certain then my friends? Is Luther really finally taken?”
“It is certain friend, at least as certain as the report of every traveler we passed from Bohemia to Saxony can make it.”
“That is to say,” said his companion, “not certain to the degree that the law would allow, there being as you know, no certainty of murder without a corpse.”
“But this Luther,” continued the stranger, “Is he really such a loss as your sad faces seem to indicate? For I have heard that for all his talk he is just another heretic.”
“Another heretic sir?” answered the smaller of the two men hotly, “Another heretic? aye, heretic I suppose is ever what they call anyone who would restore the church to the days when an endless river of gold didn’t flow from the Germans, down the valleys and over the alps to enrich already wealthy Italian bishops. Does that make him a heretic sir?”
“Nay, calm yourself my good friend, for I meant no disrespect to anyone.” answered the stranger smiling. The astonished host continued to stare at the stranger for a moment before shaking his head and putting another log on the blazing fire to return behind the bar where he listened from there, intending not to intrude himself any further upon his customers.
“So” continued the muffled man, “Is that what all this controversy is about then? A dispute about money or trade?”
“Sir as you appear to be a man of quality I need not tell you that these unhappy dissensions that have set German against Roman originated in the teachings of the church and such like, which it hardly becomes me, as a layman, to speak.”
“Yes but can you not at least tell me something of them, from a layman’s point of view? asked the muffled man. “I‘ve been away for awhile you see.”
“Well I can.” said his friend. “The whole trouble started over money.”
“Ah?”
“Yes but not just money.”
“What he means,” his friend cut in, “is that the whole thing started over that pardoner fellow who came through the country a while back. Luther, you see was a pastor and took offense at his parishioners going over to buy pardons from the pope’s man when they could have stayed home and he would gotten them forgiven for half the price.”
“At this the stranger’s eyes widened in surprise and after a second had passed he burst out laughing.”
“Is that true then, mine host?” he asked, looking in the direction of the landlord. “all this controversy over who gets paid for the forgiveness of sins?”
“Not to gainsay mine honored guests sir,” Answered the inn keeper reluctantly, “for what they say is partly true, but as we are in the vicinity of Wittenberg I should know something of Luther, and can say that Dr. Luther never took money for showing men where to go to get their sins forgiven.”
“So do thou tell us then, which part is true?”
“To be sure sir, the pardoner, that is to say, the monk, John Tetzel by name came preaching that you could buy your relatives out of purgatory and into heaven by purchasing an indulgence, for which the holy father would be pleased to release them as soon as the money was paid.”
“But would not the holy father release them in mere Christian charity, supposing he had the power that you speak of?”
“Well, sir that is for the priests, the monks, and the bishops to decide and not for poor simple folk like myself.”
“But I do think it for yourself, Hans Tapsman, and for every simple Christian to decide.” said the stranger turning serious. “Hath not God given us his word and commanded us to diligently study it?”
During this time the two merchants studied the stranger’s looks and were aware that they may have said too much already in a country where to speak your mind was not always the most prudent or safest course. Fearing that they had spoken too rashly before an ecclesiastic sent by Rome they seemed suddenly more wary.
“I perceive that you are a bit more learned in this matter than at first you would have us believe my friend.” said the smaller man.
“Well I may have studied the scriptures myself in my youth.” Admitted the stranger. “The question is, what do we do, and who do we follow when God’s word goes against the things the church is teaching?”
“But surely,” said the merchant, loosening up, “the church can’t be wrong in what they teach when all they teach has it’s origin in the scriptures?”
“Yes, but how do we simple people know that what they teach is in the scriptures? Hast thou ever read the scriptures thyself my friend?”
“No, to be sure a merchant must follow his calling and leave the priest to follow his, but if you can’t trust the church...” the merchant left off with a laugh.
The stranger’s honest smile showed as he unwound the muffler that had shielded his countenance, at which the two merchants started back before a face that Cranach’s art had made the most famous in Germany and perhaps all Europe at that time.
He pretended not to notice the surprised looks of his companions and continued.
“I have read in the scriptures that when the apostle came preaching to some Jews at a place called Berea, these Jews received him with all courtesy but did not just accept right away the gospel that the apostle preached but rather went home and searched the scriptures to determine whether those things were so, and the Bible,” here the stranger became visibly more animated, “calls them more noble for doing so. What? more noble for holding the holy apostles themselves to the word of God? More noble for not accepting what was taught by the church but holding the church accountable to God’s holy word? Suppose ye, my masters, that these Berean Jews were all rabbis or in ministry? No, scripture indicates that they were simple folk like ourselves, bakers, merchants, and... maybe even an honest inn keeper among them, and yet, they listened to what they heard at church and then went home and studied their own Bibles to make sure what they heard was correct. And God’s word calls them more noble for doing so.” The room was hushed as even the servants had stopped talking in order to attend to the words of the stranger and though the walls and great timbers which supported the old inn were blackened by the smoke of many a fire in the fireplace the man’s face shone in the darkened room.
In the silence that ensued as everyone considered the stranger’s words one of the merchants blurted out artlessly “I should like to be able to read God’s word for myself like that.” To which the stranger quietly replied, “If I have anything to do with it, very soon you shall.”

For Jesse:the only person who ever reads this blog!

2006-09-01T05:41:00.000-07:00

1415

The Goose And The Swan

As they brought the old man to the stake which stood amidst all the necessary ingredients for a good fire, a quantity of dry hay being pitched on the ground along with several of the books the old man had written and for which he was now to suffer, his calm composure
earned him a measure of grudging respect even from his persecutors. He wore only a paper hat and gown with demons and flames drawn upon them, a ridiculous costume to mock him as a heretic who deserved the death he was about to partake of, while his tormenters wore the rich silken ecclesiastical dress and gold crucifixes which marked them as higher members of the clergy of Rome. And yet he who was supposed to be degraded in the eyes of the onlookers, in reality only looked more noble, a higher and more celestial being compared to the course creatures who led him to his place of execution. The old man was tied to the stake and as custom allowed him to speak his last words his voice was as calm as his appearance when he said,
“Lord Jesus it is for thee that I patiently endure this cruel death. I pray thee to have mercy on my enemies.”
Looking specifically at the Bishop and the other ecclesiastics he warned,
“You will not stop the gospel no matter what you do.”
And then, making a play upon his name, Huss, which meant goose in the Bohemian language, he added in an unearthly and unusually firm voice which they who heard would ever remember afterwards,
“This day you do but roast a goose to keep him silent, but someday God will raise up a swan and him you will not be able to silence! ”
The shocked and outraged onlookers thought this speech was delivered in a tone that had more of the authority and power of a divine prophesy than a simple play upon words and they hurriedly lighted the flame which would consume the old man’s life.
“Lord Jesus forgive them.” the old man cried as his voice became choked with smoke.

Almost exactly one hundred years later a young man nailed 95 theological theses to the old door of the castle church in Wittenberg. It was to be the opening salvo in the war that would return the biblical doctrine of salvation to a church from which it had long been all but extinguished. The young man’s name was Luther, a word which in the old German tongue originally meant Swan.

The old Methodist hymns and the sorry state of the church today

2006-08-02T13:33:00.000-07:00

I recently came across some hymns from one the early Methodist hymnals and found there the sweetest fruits of that wonderful revival that lit a flame throughout the English speaking world and was pretty much the vanguard of evangelism for the next two centuries. It is always a shock to read the thoughts of people from such a distant time, a time so very different than our own, and it was ridiculously apparent after glancing over only a few of these old hymns that they pretty much typified what a real revival is. The common themes running through these hymns are precisely those which are most lacking in the popular works that so dominate the church today-repentance, acceptance of personal guilt, culpability and blame, deep sorrow for sins and revulsion of not only sins actually committed but of the very sin nature itself. Oh friends these are the hallmarks of true revival! Again, compare this with any of the popular teachings currently in vogue and there could not be a greater contrast. The contrast consists of the very absence of the whole concept of personal culpability, blameworthiness, and the real need to sorrow deeply and from the heart over our sins! Are any of these themes even present in the last ten Christian bestsellers?

Listen then to the words of some of these wonderful glimpses of one of the greatest revivals in the history of the church:

How shall a lost sinner in pain
Recover his forfeited peace?
When brought into bondage again
What hope of a second release?
Will mercy itself be so kind
To spare such a rebel as me?
And O! can I possibly find
Such plenteous redemption in thee?

Do you not hear the anguished cry of a soul in travail over it’s guilt and sin? Do you not hear the desperate hope that God forgives and restores? The writer doesn’t take God for granted but has a healthy fear of the Lord whom his sins have offended, he has a fearful hope not bold presumption. Oh that we could somehow restore that good healthy fear of the Lord. “Fear him who hath power to kill the body and then cast the soul into hell, Yea I say unto you, fear him!” Saith our Saviour. I didn’t say it, Jesus did and we would do well to preach in such a way that a good healthy fear of the Lord were restored to a church that desperately lacks it.

Or how about this one:

God of my salvation hear
And help me to believe
Simply do I now draw near
Thy blessing to receive
Full of sin, alas! I am
But to thy wounds for refuge flee
Friend of sinners, spotless Lamb,
Thy blood was shed for me

Do you hear any complacency, any casual prayer taking for granted God’s forgiveness or is this the cry of a soul grieving over it’s sinful tendencies and desperately longing to be pure and holy? This should give you a clue as to what kind of preaching these hymn writers were motivated by and it wasn’t the presentation of a God who is so seeker sensitive that no one fears him anymore, which I fear is all too common these days.

Then listen to this one:

Jesus thou knowest my sinfulness
My faults are not concealed from thee;
A sinner in my last distress,
To thy dear wounds I fain would flee,
And never, never thence depart, Close sheltered in thy loving heart

Again we see the theme of sorrow and grief over sin. This is a beautiful thing and there is no revival without it.

Or this:

Glory to God, whose sovereign grace
Hath animated senseless stones
Called us to stand before his face
And raised us unto Abraham’s sons

The people that in darkness lay,
In sin and error’s deadly shade,
Have seen a glorious gospel day,
In Jesus’ lovely face displayed

Isn’t that a beautiful expression of humble gratitude for God’s grace in saving poor gentile dogs who didn‘t belong to his house in the first place? Does it not magnify his grace?

Check this out:

Suffice that for the season past
Hell’s horrid language filled our tongues
We all thy words behind us cast
And lewdly sang the drunkard’s songs

But O the power of grace divine!
In hymns we now our voices raise
Loudly in strange hosannas join
And blasphemies are changed to praise!

Glory to God friends, this is the language of the penitent! These are the words of a one who loveth much because he was forgiven of much! And this too is the consistent theme of true revival throughout the history of the church.

As the old Methodist hymnal signifies, there was a deep feeling of contrition and sorrow for sins as well as a joy and strong faith that they had been forgiven. The grief for sins though is what seems so incredible to me. Think of this-people in the early Methodist revival were deeply repentant and sorry not only for their own individual sins but for the sinful state of the world in which they lived--- and they lived in 18th century England! 18th century England---a world that didn’t have crack cocaine or internet pornography or drive-by shootings; a world where mothers killing their children or school teachers having sex with young pupils or thousands of missing children simply didn’t happen. We now have open homosexuality, something not seen since the pre-Christian era! Oh I’m not saying there wasn’t much sin in the 18th century but I am saying that we live in Sodom and Gomorrah compared to them. And yet they sorrowed deeply over the sins of their age while we who live in a far, incomparably far, more wicked time than they did just can’t seem to work up any true repentance and grief for our sins at all! I know the 18th century had much to repent of; all ages do but we have an incomparably greater need for bitter heartfelt repentance than they ever did and yet, amazingly we somehow can’t manage it. Why not? The difference is probably the preaching. Where is our Wesley? Where is our Whitefield? Where is our Zinzendorf or our Jonathon Edwards? Where are the men who will quit trying to be amiable and call the church and the world to repentance, consequences be damned?

What we need at this hour is an old fashioned, blood-bought, Holy Ghost filled, sin slaying, devil chasing, flesh mortifying, cross centered, Christ exalting, God glorifying, Bible believing gospel to be preached by men who don’t care whether the world likes them or not! Men who are willing to bare shame and reproach for the old rugged cross; men who are not afraid to be socially and culturally marginalized, called un-intellectual fundamentalists or worse. Where are our heroes of the faith? Where are our Hebrews 11 men? Where are the early Methodists of our age?

I love to bring that sacrifice

2006-08-01T17:12:00.000-07:00

“Yet it hath pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed...” Isa.53:10

O I love to bring that sacrifice
The offering for my sin
And though I fall full seven times
I’ll go back up again
And come before the temple
Up to that holy place
To lay my sin before him
And claim forgiving grace

I love to bring that sacrifice
Not trusting in my good
But wholly lean on Jesus Christ
On what my savior did
The offering Isaiah said
Would cleanse my sin sick soul
The blood of Jesus, Mary’s son
Sufficient and alone

I love to bring that sacrifice
My faith in Christ alone
Who’s suffering on that cross for me
Doth for my sins atone
Bringing up my offering
The lamb for sinners slain
That suffered there instead of me
To cleanse the awful stain

Thank God there is a sacrifice
That I and all may bring
The blood poured out on Calvary
Will wash the foulest clean
It’s power will unharden
The hardest hearts of men
Take prostitutes and turn them
Back to virgins once again

Matthew Henry's commentary

2006-07-29T18:56:00.000-07:00

Last summer I set myself the task of reading from 1 Samuel up to The time when Israel was carried away captive to Babylon. This period of Israel’s history has tremendous relevance for our own times and for our own nation; especial parallel to contemporary America are--national falling away from the principles of God’s word, sin increasing and abounding, and the various judgments which God brought upon his people for their sins. Along with the Bible reading itself, which was actually reading along while listening on CD (faith cometh by hearing) I would stop after every couple of chapters and read Matthew Henry’s commentary on the chapter I had just listened to. As most everyone knows, Matthew Henry was an English Puritan pastor who lived in the late 17th century. He and his wife would arise early in the morning and after prayer and breakfast he would comment while she wrote it down, on the New Testament from the Greek text, and every evening when the day’s work was done he would comment and she would write it down from the Hebrew Old Testament. He was not an exclusivist whose work was intended for an academic elite and apparently actually cared more for pleasing his master in heaven and edifying the people of God than winning academic accolades or acquiring intellectual respectability. So I have isolated a few reasons why I think the Matthew Henry commentary should be read (and in my opinion even offered as a required course for anyone going into the pastoral ministry).

1. Because it has stood the test of time and borne fruit over the church’s history.

To begin with, Jesus said that you know a tree by it’s fruit. Let us briefly examine the fruit of the Matthew Henry commentary. George Whitefield credited the commentary for much of the success of his extraordinary evangelistic ministry; he claimed to have read it twice on his knees during his prayer time! No mean feat when you consider the size of the thing. Charles Spurgeon said: “Every minister ought to read it entirely and carefully through once at least.” (Commenting and Commentaries, p. 3) It certainly showed in his preaching and it is to be doubted whether the evangelical revival of his day would have been as deep as it was without the influence of the old puritan pastor and his godly wife. Besides these famous men, the commentary has had a tremendous and beneficial impact upon the regular Christian folks in the English speaking church for about 300 years!

2. Because it is moralistic

Unlike today’s scholarship which sometimes tries too hard to look good and intellectually respectable in the eyes of the academic world (which demand no value judgments!) Matthew Henry did not care about the world and wrote unapologetically for the moral betterment of his readers. His goal was to exalt his master and feed the master’s sheep. Oh that we had more pastors and professors today whose top priority is to exalt Christ and serve the cause of the simple faith of the common people and have less care for impressing their academic peers with learned papers or books! Matthew Henry wrote for the simple people of God, to address their spiritual needs, to fulfill the solemn pastoral duty to reprove and rebuke the morals of carnal men and did not fear being “too judgmental.” The commentary challenges the reader constantly and will cause us to repent and reform those places in our secret hearts where covetousness or lust or carnal ambition may yet be lurking. How many preachers works do that desperately needed task today and how different would the church look if they did?

3. Because it is Christocentric

If you’ve heard of people finding Jesus in every book of the Bible you will find the commentary to be probably the ultimate example of this. Here is a quick sample from 2 Kings 5 where Naaman the leper comes to Elisha to be healed of his leprosy---

“Elisha, though it is likely he perceived that what he had said had put Naaman out of humour, did not care to pacify him: it was at his peril if he persisted in his wrath. But his servants were made use of by Providence to reduce him to temper. They reasoned with him, (1.) From his earnest desire of a cure: Wouldst thou not do any thing? Note, When diseased sinners come to this, that they are content to do any thing, to submit to any thing, to part with any thing, for a cure, then, and not till then, there begin to be some hopes of them. Then they will take Christ on his own terms when they are made willing to have Christ upon any terms. (2.) From the easiness of the method prescribed: “It is but, Wash and be clean. It is but trying; the experiment is cheap and easy, it can do no hurt, but may do good.” Note, the methods prescribed for the healing of the leprosy of sin are so plain that we are utterly inexcusable if we do not observe them. It is but, “Believe, and be saved” “Repent, and be pardoned“ “Wash, and be clean.” For Matthew Henry all roads led to Calvary! All the scriptures point to Jesus!

4. Because it is filled with practical wisdom

Although the book is not what today’s scholars would consider a specifically “critical commentary” it not only has enough scholarship and depth to please the highest academicians living in the rarified air of their ivory towers but (which is far more important) also the simplest and least educated of readers. It was written for real people living in the real world. Again from 2 Kings 5 on Elisha rebuking his servant Gehazi for receiving a reward from Naaman which he was forbidden to do,

“And he tells him also the evil of it: "Is it a time to receive money? Is this an opportunity of enriching thyself? Couldst thou find no better way of getting money than by belying thy master and laying a stumbling-block before a young convert?’’ Note, Those that are for getting wealth at any time, and by any ways and means whatsoever, right or wrong, lay themselves open to a great deal of temptation. Those that will be rich ( per fas, per nefas; rem, rem, quocunque modo rem—by fair means, by foul means; careless of principle, intent only on money) drown themselves in destruction and perdition, 1 Tim. 6:9. War, and fire, and plague, and shipwreck, are not, as many make them, things to get money by. It is not a time to increase our wealth when we cannot do it but in such ways as are dishonourable to God and religion or injurious to our brethren or the public.”

Sounds like something the oil company executives should hear at church next Sunday! Contrast this teaching with the capitalism without ethics so popular today. How many in America today make a wreck of their soul simply because they don’t know that? How hurtful is this greedy attitude to society? How simply and easily Matthew Henry deals with it, laying the axe of God’s word to the tree of man‘s covetousness.

5. Because it is doctrinally sound.

It humbles the pride of man, exalts Christ and glorifies God. Oh I know, everybody claims their work does that but how many actually do? Matthew Henry was a Puritan and after the habit of classical Calvinism (not to be confused with neo-Calvinism) he never left man anything to glory in but always gave God-not 99% but 100% of the glory. For what does the scripture say? “That no flesh should glory in his presence.”(1 Cor.29) And what is it to glory in his presence but to ascribe part of the credit for salvation to your own works? Pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps may be admirable in the business world but when it comes to your eternal destiny you can only pull yourself down to hell. That’s why the four and twenty elders of Rev.4:10 cast their crowns at the feet of him who lives forever and give him all the glory, that no flesh (or even angels) should glory in his presence. When we give God the glory we mean that all credit arising from an action properly belongs to him; not simply because we are being magnanimous but because he really and truly did it and really and truly deserves all the praise. This glorifying of God lies at the heart, as was typical of the Puritans, of Matthew Henry’s theology.

6. Because it engenders a love for Jesus.

You simply cannot read Matthew Henry without being edified, which is more than you can say for the work of most contemporary scholars. Many academics, have been taught that only the latest scholarship is worthy of serious study. The main objection put forward is that it is not up to date. To this foolish criticism I answer the obvious truth it is simply not possible for wisdom, godliness, and love of Jesus to be out of date. Matthew Henry was first and foremost a pastor who happened to be a scholar and so his main concern was edifying the faith of common Christian people rather than impressing the academic elite of his day. He did this the way we all ought to do it-he loved the Jesus of the Bible and his love was such that his enthusiasm for his master communicated itself in almost every sentence he wrote. Oh friends, when you meet a man who has a true love for the Lord and that love is contagious enough to communicate itself to you then bind that man to your soul and count him a true friend even though we can only know him through the book he left. Walk with the wise and the godly and you will increase in wisdom and godliness and it is my opinion that studying the Matthew Henry commentary will increase collectively the wisdom, godliness and love for the Lord Jesus of the contemporary church.

Things no one should get out of seminary without reading

2006-07-22T15:21:00.000-07:00

Now that the semester has ended and some seminary students may have time for reading something besides assigned books it occurred to me that there are certain books which every minister of the gospel should read. If one were to get out of college without making at least a brief acquaintance with Plato I’m not sure that person should be referred to as educated no matter what technical proficiency in computers or engineering he may have and in like manner if one can out of seminary without making the acquaintance of some of the following I’m not sure they have had much of a theological education no matter how driven their purpose or what proficiency in the latest church growth fads they have learned. Keep in mind that this is just a brief list, entirely subjective and in no particular order. So with that in mind here is my barest minimum of things no one should get out of seminary without reading. Please feel free to add your own favorites and why a minister should read it.

Luther’s great works of 1520-21-The Babylonian Captivity, Christian Liberty, Treatise On Good Works, etc.-This is so incredibly important because it places the doctrines of salvation against the backdrop of medieval legalism. What has that to do with us in the 21st century you say? Everything. Medieval heresy has been recycled in many different forms from that time to this. When you counsel someone coming out of the Jehovah’s Witness cult, or Herbert Armstrong’s Worldwide church of God or the United Pentecostal Church, just to name a few, you will be dealing with someone who has been deeply scarred by legalism; you will be dealing with people who hold many of the same views as the people did in the middle ages. Legalism is a huge problem for many churches and a perennial threat to sound doctrine but very few ministers know how to deal with it. However they would if they’d studied Luther.

Calvin’s Institutes Of The Christian Religion-Everyone should read as much of Calvin’s Institutes as possible. This book is worthy of life long study of course and is the systematic theology by which all systematic theologies are measured and has stood the test of time. If, and this is only if, you can’t find the time to read this and you had, absolutely had to narrow it down, then read the last three chapters of Book one, the chapters on providence and things relating to that. Or maybe the chapters on prayer. Or at least have a look at the chapter on the Old Testament saints and their belief in eternal life. Oh forget it just read the whole thing.

The Psalms and Hymns of Isaac Watts-The father of hymnody in the English language. Watts’ theological profundity is unmatched by any save the real giants, the Augustine’s, Luther’s and Calvin’s of the church. Watts’ theology differs from theirs only in that it was written in poetry rather than prose. Watts’ mind was absolutely soaked in the scriptures and it shows in his writings. If you will steep your mind in the poetic beauty of Isaac Watts’ works then you will not be merely better informed in the scriptures (although that will happen too) but edified in your faith; you will not merely know the scriptures more intimately but they will seep into you and change your character. I suspect that in many churches more sound doctrine has been learned through the hymnal than from the pulpit and Watts’ hymns are both biblical and edifying.

Don Benedetto-Il Beneficio Di Christi (The Benefits of Christ)-Never heard of him? Don’t feel bad. Even a lot church historians aren’t familiar with this 16th century Italian monk of the Benedictine order. In fact not a whole lot is known or has been written about the Beneficio Di Christi movement, which was basically the Protestant reformation in the most fervent and prayerful form taking place quietly and secretly among the Italian Roman Catholic Countess Vittoria D’Colonna and a few clergy, nobles, diplomats and even monks who read the works of Luther and Calvin and above all, the Bible, and underwent a move of the Holy Spirit within the Roman Catholic Church in Italy in the days when the inquisition was murdering everyone who even smelled faintly of unorthodoxy. This is reformation era doctrine at it’s most pure but with a flavor, a spirituality not usually found in the reformers north of the alps. Most of the participants of this movement were probably eventually arrested and killed though no one knows for sure about some. Both simple and sublime, Benedetto’s book (which I cannot commend enough) is quite simply and without doubt the greatest book of monastic devotional literature ever written, and perhaps one of the most Holy Spirit soaked, biblically, theologically and historically profound books in the 2000 year history of the church. Don’t take it out of it’s context but read it with the era and circumstances in which it was written in mind. As far as I know it’s not in print (Rick Warren and Joel Osteen can sell ten gazillion books of shallow rubbish written at an eighth grade level but Benedetto’s work is out of print; and then we wonder why the church is in such need of a revival?) Anyway you can read it here:

http://homepage.mac.com/shanerosenthal/reformationink/dbbenefit.htm

The Matthew Henry Commentary-for the edification of your own faith you must read this commentary. Like Watts’ hymns and songs this is not merely for education, any fool can get an education. Knowledge puffeth up, but love edifieth! This is to be read for your edification, for the spiritual betterment of your soul and to further your relationship with the Lord. Hugely influential over the centuries, George Whitefield claimed to have read it through twice on his knees during his prayer times and it was a favorite of Charles Spurgeon as well as countless puritan divines and has had a deep impact upon English speaking Christians to this day.

John Bunyan’s Grace Abounding To The Chief Of Sinners-Short but incredibly important to understanding the effect of a guilt ridden conscience on people and the way to find lasting relief from this most hideous affliction. Every pastor should read this for of a certainty he will have to deal with the issue of defiled consciences at some point in his ministry.

E.M. Bounds, The Power Of Prayer-Your real ministry, any real work that you do for Christ that will having lasting consequences will flow out of your relationship with him. Ministry must flow out of relationship! Though he doesn’t use that exact expression this is the essence of the works of E.M. Bounds on prayer. Every minister should know at least The Power Of Prayer and preferably Bounds other works on prayer as well. This book was written to all Christians but particularly those in the pulpit and I cannot imagine a more indispensable tool for the preacher than Bounds’ wonderful encouraging books on prayer. Read it and heed it!

Corrie ten Boom, Tramp For The Lord-This small volume is far lesser known than her deservedly famous and much loved The Hiding Place but is a gem of a book. In Seminary we get plenty of theoretical and little of the experiential but this short chronicle of some of Corrie’s travels, the people she led to Christ, the mistakes she made, and the demons she encountered is worth more than twenty dry academic books which are forgotten as soon as the semester ends anyway and it is not possible to read it without coming away with your faith and love for the Lord increased.

The Augsberg Confession-Philip wrote it and Luther approved it and that alone should make you want to read it and if you read no other of the great confessions then at least be familiar with this one.

Honorable mention,
...meaning, if you do all these and still have a little reading time then seriously have a look at:

The Regula Of St. Benedict-Monasticism is little studied and less understood. Wow, If I ever get remembered for a brilliant line it’ll be that one. That’s such a good description you should go back and read it again. In fact, I’ll say it again so you don’t have to-monasticism is little studied and less understood, which is really absolutely inexcusable considering that it completely and totally dominated the church for over a thousand years-see Luther‘s Babylonian Captivity Of The Church again. I don’t think most Protestant historians understand how deep and cult like the legalism of the monastery was and the enormous spiritual and psychological damage monastic legalism caused. That being said, there is an interesting spirituality about Benedict’s regula and some sincere discipline we could do well to learn from. To lead a disciplined life of regular prayer times is of course something all Christians should do so it’s good to look at how this was done during the middle ages. It also gives insight into how subtly salvation by works legalism can slip in when we have works without sound doctrine.

A History of The Papacy, I don’t even have in mind a particular one though there are several good ones. History repeats itself and this holds true even more for church history than for secular history. If you read the history of the popes then you will understand when your congregation has a family member join Herbert W. Armstrong’s Worldwide Church of God or the Jehovah’s Witnesses or some other pseudo-Christian cult. You will understand when you hear that the local Anti-Trinitarian oneness Pentecostal Pastor tells the whole town Baptists believe in three gods and his church is the only way to heaven, everyone else is going to hell. Every Christian minister, of whatever denomination, should read a history of the Popes; certainly no one doing a concentration in church history should ever be allowed to graduate without reading intently at least one history of the popes.

Diarmid McCulluough, History Of The Reformation- Macullough, a brilliant Oxford Professor of Church History, is probably the greatest church historian of our day and this book is as close as we can come to time travel. Honestly it’s almost like MacCullough lived through the times he writes about and the amount of things he knows about that time period would almost convince you that he did. A brilliantly deep account of this important period.

Total Depravity in Leviticus

2006-06-20T13:56:00.000-07:00

THE LEPROUS HOUSE

In the book of Leviticus we read of the strange case of what to do when a house contracts the disease of leprosy. Evidently it was a leprous like mold or something or perhaps houses could actually catch a disease, it matters not. What does matter is the spiritual application of it. After inspecting the house and confirming the report of the leprosy,

“Then the priest shall go out of the house to the door of the house, and shut up the house seven days: And the priest shall come again the seventh day and look: and, behold, if the plague be spread in the walls of the house; Then the priest shall command that they take away the stones in which the plague is, and they shall cast them into an unclean place without (or outside of) the city. And he shall cause the house to be scraped within round about, and they shall pour out the dust that they scrape off without the city into an unclean place. And they shall take other stones, and put them in the place of those stones; and he shall take other mortar, and shall plaster the house. And if the plague come again, and break out in the house, after that he hath taken away the stones, and after he hath scraped the house, and after it is plastered; Then the priest shall come and look, and, behold, if the plague be spread in the house, it is a fretting leprosy in the house: it is unclean. And he shall break down the house, and the stones of it, and the timber thereof, and all the mortar of the house; and he shall carry them forth out of the city into an unclean place.” (Lev.14:38-45)

Leprosy in the Bible a symbolic of sin. What this leprosy was is not as important as what it represented and the people could not possibly miss the meaning that sin spreads; in fact that is why this particular phenomenon was chosen to symbolize sin, because it spreads and therefore is a fitting type of sin in a person. But even more than that look at the prescribed treatment for leprosy. Can you imagine your pastor coming to examine your house and sealing it up for seven days, then if the leprosy spread in your wall, taking a huge chunk out of the wall of your house and replacing it with new brick and mortar? And all the while you had to stay with relatives or in a hotel? This was a costly and inconvenient operation.

Another seven days go by and if it did not come back it was not a leprosy, therefore not sin and after a time consuming ceremony you can move back. That’s more than 14 days of hotel expenses or inconveniencing your friends or relatives, and if that weren’t enough look what happened if the contagion spread. He shall break down the house! The priest would have your house torn down to the last stone and then would have even the dust of it scraped up. He would in fact, have every last trace of the house infected with leprosy completely removed and taken out of the city to an unclean place. No ancient Israelite could fail to see that that in the case of sin God demands that we remove every trace of it from our homes and our lives but few penetrated to the deeper truth that we are the house infected with the fretting leprosy of sin and must be removed from the city wherein holiness dwells and taken without the gate to an unclean place. The sin nature cannot be reformed, just like the fretting leprosy could not be removed from the house by the mere removal of a few bricks. No, the entire structure infected by sin is completely contaminated and must be utterly destroyed and removed outside the gate of the city to an unclean place and a new one built in it’s place. This sounds similar to the way in which Christ suffered unto the death. And where did he suffer? “Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without (outside) the gate.” (Heb.13:12) God made him to be our sin and as our sin offering he was removed outside the city to an unclean place where they executed criminals. By such ceremonies as the leprous house people in Old Testament times were constantly reminded that sin must be removed from the midst of the church because in the midst of the people is where the holy God dwells. But spiritually speaking the destruction of your fretting leprosy can only be brought about by the destruction of your earthly house, your sinful body. This begins when you come to Jesus and repent of your sins and receive his forgiveness and his righteousness. Strange as it may seem, when that happens a transfer is made whereby you are given his righteousness and he is given all of your sins. Thus you profit and he suffers. But when this happens you actually experience death because you die to your sins and at the same time the old you dies a new you is born again, recreated in Jesus Christ’s perfect image rather than sinful Adam’s. Your old leprous house is taken without the city and nailed to the cross and you receive in exchange an incomparably beautiful temple of God’s own Holy Spirit. “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you?” (1 Cor.3:16) And also “What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? (1 Cor.6:19) So then the house infected with the fretting leprosy of sin cannot be reformed and cured of the disease but must be utterly destroyed so that, like the house in the Old Testament, not so much as a trace of it remains to pollute the holy people among whom God dwells. It cannot be reformed because it is totally unclean as we by our sin nature are totally depraved and incapable of reformation but instead must be born all over again. And then we can say with the apostle Paul “For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven.” (2 Cor.5:1-2) To trade an old shack infested with the fretting leprosy of sin for a mansion built in glory is a good exchange by any standards.

Some poetry

2006-05-23T12:13:00.000-07:00

“And thou shalt put the mercy seat above upon the ark; and in the ark thou shalt put the testimony that I shall give thee. And there will I meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat...” Exodus 25:21-22

There is a place of refuge

There is a place of refuge
Where God and sinners meet
A place where blood once richly stained
God’s truest mercy seat

A place for all our cleansing
A fountain filled with blood
Where all can find God’s mercy
His cleansing healing flood

There is place of mercy
Where sins are washed away
And deeds as black as midnight
Are purged as bright as day

There is a place for changing
The hardest hearts of men
Back into child like innocence
To make them clean again

This place where God once punished
The sins of all our race
Is still the place appointed
For his amazing grace

It is a place for sinners
For murderers and whores
To come and be forgiven
And have their lives restored

For far away upon that hill
Once stood a sacrifice
The lamb of God for sinners slain
Whose blood has stained the cross

The cross where God once poured out
His wrath against the world
Is now the sanctuary
Where mercy is assured

The sufferings he bore there
Upon the cruel tree
Assures us tender mercies
And his forgiveness free

And now God’s wrath against us
Is poured out to the full
The blood of him who died there
No more of goats and Bulls

Can wash away our sin stains
Save wickedest of men
Give harlots their virginity
And make them pure again

The refuge of God's forgiveness

O cleanse me Lord I pray
Take my guilt far away
For my life is all stained now with sin

Take my lust and my pride
From it’s hold deep inside
And wash me all clean once again

Let the power of the blood
That was shed for the world
Be my plea at the Father’s great throne

And in faith I’ll receive
And rejoice to believe
There’s forgiveness in his blood alone

O Lord my guilt feels so great
And it seems awfully late
To be turning to you for relief

But I’ll trust in you Lord
And remember your word
On the cross where you pardoned the thief

Let my faith rise above
To the display of your love
Where your wrath against sin was poured out

And though conscience condemn
I’ll believe you forgive
And let faith drive away all my doubt

Not the works that I do
Could make me right with you
Should I pray or I fast or I give

I’ll not trust those things
For no peace can they bring
Just filthy rags of my own righteousness

So I come as I am
All defiled by my sin
And throw myself on your mercy alone

I’ll receive it by faith
Your salvation by grace
And praise you someday at your throne

Jimmy’s old fashioned simple minded Puritan strategy for prayer meetings

2006-05-14T18:13:00.000-07:00

We have a youth group at our church. Not being experienced at being around church youth groups, I find myself grieved by what everybody else seems to take as normal. For example, last week a girl in the ninth grade Sunday School class asked the youth pastor, “What happened to Jesus after his resurrection? Where did he go from there?” The youth pastor explained the ascension, how Jesus was caught up in a cloud and received up to heaven; the class’s response? They laughed. They didn’t laugh in a mocking fall down on the floor, you’ve got to be kidding me, kind of way but they laughed, briefly. And not all of them either, only a few but still, they laughed. Clearly they didn’t believe a word of it. I’ve seen unbelief like that at university and among rank unbelievers but I’ve never seen such open skepticism at a church, ever. I am the toughest critic of people of my own background, the Pentecostals and Charismatics but I can tell you that such a response, in fact any kind of doubt of the word of God, is something I’ve never ever seen in a Pentecostal or Charismatic church, it is simply unimaginable, which is probably why I‘m having such difficulty coming to terms with it. It was obvious that some of these kids simply don’t believe the things in the Bible. In fact, they seem to find them ludicrous. Now, I’ve been told that kids are just like that, it’s regrettable but what can you do? I have to confess, I am not soothed by any of this. I’m grieved. There’s no other way to put it. Maybe I am just a simple minded fundamentalist but if being grieved at the unbelief of the children in our churches makes me an unsophisticated fundamentalist then so be it because I’m grieved. In fact I’m really depressed and have been for a week.

Well, all this brings me to the point of this post, my idea for a way to respond to this grievous unbelief-prayer. I had the radical idea of seeing if maybe a few of the youth, only the really committed ones mind you, the ones who really want to, would like to show up at the church on Friday evening or Saturday afternoon or any other time during the week when we aren’t having church and pray. I volunteered to show up and pray with anyone who would care to. The guy I asked about this is a really good man but I was disappointed by his response. He said something like, “Yea maybe we could order some pizza and pass out some flyers and see if we could get a good response, a bunch of the youth showing up.” I was frustrated by this well meaning attempt to get the youth praying. “No man,” I told him, “You don’t understand. I don’t want a bunch of the youth showing up. What is it with Baptists and numbers? That’s exactly the reason why we have such unbelief among the youth in the first place. A good response is not twenty unregenerate kids who are there for the socializing or to be entertained, a good response is when two or more are gathered in his name and HE shows up! I don’t want a big crowd of unbelieving kids who show up just for the socializing and the pizza, that’s exactly what I don’t want. I just want one or two or maybe three or four who are truly born again and really love the Lord and are hungry to see the Holy Spirit move among the youth.”

Our church is at present organizing a prayer program. We have 1800 members and we have one prayer meeting a week and about 30 old people show up for socializing, a short devotional and about 5 minutes of prayer so they decided to organize a prayer program. I was asked to be on a committee. I'll do it of course but the thing is don’t want to organize a committee, or appoint a chairman or start another useless program, I just want a few kids who want to humble themselves and pray and seek God’s face. When the ones who can really pray get together without all the teenage distractions then they could pray and the Holy Spirit would go to work on the unbelieving ones. I will never understand the Baptist penchant for thinking that the solution to every problem is another organized program. In my opinion this is a fine way to circumvent the Holy Spirit and make sure control of the church stays in the hands of man and not God, in the hands of a committee and not the Holy Spirit. I’m sure that will offend people but I find the great Martyn Lloyd Jones in agreement with my assessment:

“Up until 1860 it was the instinctive thing to think in terms of revival. If there had been a period of spiritual drought, if things were not going well in the church, the first thing they thought of was this-’Should not we have a time of confession and humiliation and prayer to God to visit us again?’ They did it almost instinctively. But we do not do that. Why not? What is the explanation of this change that seems to have come into the thinking of the church? The influence of Finney’s teaching upon the church has been quite extraordinary. People now, instead of thinking instinctively about turning to God and praying for revival when they see that the church is languishing, decide rather to call a committee, to organize an evangelistic campaign, and work out and plan an advertising program to ’launch’ it, as they say. The whole outlook and mentality has entirely changed.”

Martyn Lloyd Jones The Puritans

So am I being too sensitive by grieving over our young people’s unbelief? I am being too insensitive about the Baptist tradition of organizing programs? Am I being too naive and optimistic about what a few committed born again people can accomplish when they humble themselves and pray?

A plea to the Theologians and Pastors!

2006-04-20T11:28:00.000-07:00

There is a tremendous need that goes largely unaddressed by the church today. Let me explain by way of a personal illustration. I came up in a legalistic Pentecostal church that taught salvation by works. I thought for years that if I did not pray at least an hour a day (and often I did more than that) and fast at least one day a week (and often I did more than that too) that I could not be saved. I was taught to trust in my religious works to make and keep me right with God. Legalism does something to the conscience; it brings one into a state of guilt that seems absolutely crushing. That’s why Paul called the law the ministration of condemnation (2 Cor.3:9) and contrasted it to salvation by grace. All that trying to please God by keeping the law or any other works, can do is bring us a deeper experiential knowledge of our guilt, our sin. Preaching the law without grace always produces legalism. Paul was an ex-legalist and this, more than anything else was responsible for the depth of his theology. God had used his past as a legalist to prepare him to elucidate salvation by grace. In fact no one but an ex-legalist, someone who had known the depths of guilt and the despair that condemnation brings, could have done it. Compare Paul to the guilt ridden 17th century Baptist John Bunyan. Read Bunyan’s wonderful Grace Abounding To The Chief Of Sinners and behold there the very picture, drawn to the letter, as Spurgeon once said, of a guilt ridden conscience, condemnation and despair. Bunyan, like many a Christian after him could find solace in the words of no contemporary preacher nor anyone else except the greatest minister to the wounded conscience, the greatest interpreter of Paul the legalist- another ex-legalist -Martin Luther. Bunyan records how he found God’s word came alive and brought him to a real faith, a living trust in Christ to take away his sins, by reading Luther’s Commentary On Galatians. I have similar testimony to share. I came out of legalism by the revelation of salvation by grace through faith. I got it simply by reading the Bible and spending time in prayer seeking God for understanding. I was delivered but for years I suffered deeply from what Paul called a defiled conscience. I would feel guilty if I committed a sin but I also felt guilty if I did something that the Bible doesn’t label a sin, like watching a movie. Our church taught against TV and movies so I would feel guilt if I watched even after I knew that this was just a man made teaching and I wasn’t doing anything wrong. I could not ignore my guilty feelings either, I suffered terribly and simply did not know how to find relief for a wounded, defiled, guilt ridden conscience. And what bothers me today is that no one ever preached or taught on it. I did not know how to deal with my crippling guilt because preachers today don’t preach much on it. Preacher's today don’t seem to write many books on it. I lived in a nightmare of guilt and condemnation, what Luther called Anfechtung, until one day stumbled across Luther's Treatise On Good Works. I was supposed to meet a friend of mine, one of my professors at a junior college I had gone to, for lunch. I picked up a volume of Luther's Works from the library and went to her office to wait until she got out of class. I was in a suicidal depression and despair and had been this way for weeks. I opened the Treatise On Good Works and began to read. Within ten pages the despair was gone and my heart was absolutely filled with real trust that Christ indeed forgives and forgives even me! I had been to many churches and watched probably every preacher on TV but only Luther could minister the Word of God to my condition. That's kind of sad if you think about it. The guilt ridden conscience, which all humanity is to some extent or other afflicted with, is seldom if ever a sermon subject. My brethren, we live in such a Sodom and Gomorrah as Luther and Bunyan never knew. We now have open homosexuality, something not seen since the pre-Christian era! We are drowning in a sea of sin and filth, don’ tell me that a guilt ridden conscience is not one of, or maybe even the major challenge facing the church’s evangelistic mission today. And yet how little is this taught on! My brethren be amazed at this for this ought not be so. Our culture is filled with people who are crippled by unresolved guilt and the church is busy telling them how to get God to give them a happy marriage or how to have their best life now. I remember talking with a prostitute (yea that‘s the kind of neighborhood I live in) not long ago and the sudden hope that sprang up in her eyes when I told her, “Hitler could have been saved if he had believed!” Leave off speculations about reprobation for now for that was little to my purpose. She looked alive for the first time as she told me, “I never thought of it like that.” Yes, Jesus died for sinners. Jesus saves sinners! Jesus can take an old sin hardened prostitute and turn her back into a virgin! How deep the guilt of this generation, and how little equipped the ministers of this generation seem to be when it comes to dealing with a guilt ridden conscience.