Pastors, Seek Souls not Fame

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“they who are called to preach the gospel, to teach the flock of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to lead them, cannot do their duty, unless they lay all ambition aside and seek not to please men, not to be seen, nor to be in reputation. They must account all this as vanity, and content themselves to build the Church, to procure the salvation of souls, to magnify the Majesty of our Lord Jesus, and cause all to submit themselves obediently to God.  To be short, let it suffice them to put forth the simplicity of the Gospel, to enrich those who desire to be satisfied with God’s blessings. Let them content themselves herein, and not covet as many do to be exalted, to be esteemed for their showy babbling and lofty speech, for their subtleties, for their fine and sharp wits, for their fleeting, pretentious displays. All these things (he says) must be laid underfoot, or else we can never serve God and his Church.  And therefore this knowledge that men so much seek for is but a mere vanity, because there is no soundness nor substance in it.”

(Calvin, preaching on 1 Timothy 6:20)

This quote is challenging and helpful in a variety of ways. In spite of mischaracterizations to the contrary, we see here Calvin urging pastors to labor in order to “procure the salvation of souls.” Also, here we are reminded that we cannot pursue God’s glory and our own glory at the same time. We cannot simultaneously build the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of self, though it is so easy to build the kingdom of self and simply rename it, “Kingdom of God.” To be useful to God in the salvation of souls and the building up of his church and thus to hear Him say “Well done,” is of so much more value than winning the applause of our contemporaries- despite the inner clamor of our hearts for the immediate gratification of the praise of man.

Tornado & Providence, Union University & William Cowper

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Today is the fifth anniversary of the tornado that devastated so much of the campus of Union University. You can see a nice news story from a Tennessee TV station here.

Five years ago tonight my family sat down to dinner with Bob Cali, a Union student and a fellow church member. Dinner was interrupted as the sirens went off, and we gathered into our laundry room. We sang hymns as we waited, and occasionally Bob & I slipped out to get another taste of the dessert which was interrupted (that pie has now been dubbed by my kids as “storm pie”). Then, my wife and I heard the sound we had often heard described but had never before experienced- a sound like a train, which we realized meant a tornado was just then passing very near our home. We huddled with our crew and waited, not knowing we were entering a defining moment in our lives and the life of our community.

The story has been told in full elsewhere, most notably in Tim Ellsworth’s book, God in the Whirlwind: Stories of Grace from the Tornado at Union University. To reflect back on that time, the fact that everyone survived, that the university survived, the amazing leadership of the university administration, and the various fruit which came from it all is a lesson in providence.

Reflecting on that today, my mind returned to this poem by William Cowper, which captures our experience quite well. The biblical truths expressed here are a great comfort and a spur to move ahead boldly with great confidence in a great God.

Light Shining Out of Darkness

God moves in a mysterious way,
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.

Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never failing skill,
He treasures up his bright designs,
And works his sovereign will.

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take,
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.

Judge not the LORD by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence,
He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding ev’ry hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flow’r.

Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain;
GOD is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.

Cherish a Holy Warmth

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I really appreciated this excerpt from Spurgeon, finding that it both challenged and encouraged me personally and expressed what I am aiming for in teaching and preaching. It is so easy to become the overly cautious person he rebukes here. I think he is exactly right that the failure to be loving and gracious often arises from a failure to revel in the reality of God’s grace.

I hope the quote encourages you as it has me.

“Next to that, cherish a holy warmth. Do not repress your emotions and freeze your souls. You know the class of brethren who are gifted with refrigerating power. When you shake hands with them, you would think that you had hold of a fish: a chill goes to your very soul. Hear them sing. No, you cannot hear them! Sit in the next pew, and you will never hear the gentle hiss of mutter which they call singing. Out in their shops they could be heard a quarter of a mile off, but if they pray in the meeting, you must strain your ears. They do all Christian service as if they were working by the day for a bad master and at scanty wages: when they get into the world, they work by the piece as if for dear life. Such brethren cannot be affectionate. They never encourage a young man, for they are afraid that their weighty commendation might exalt him above measure. A little encouragement would help the struggling your mightily, but they have none to offer. They calculate and reckon and move prudently; but anything like a brave trust in God they set down as a rashness and folly. God grant us plenty of rashness, I say, for what men think imprudence is about the grandest thing under heaven. Enthusiasm is a feeling which these refrigerators do not indulge. Their chant is, ‘As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen’; but anything like a dash for Christ and a rush for souls they do not understand. Mark this, if you trace such brethren home, you will find that they have little joy themselves and make very little joy for others. They are never quite certain that they are saved, and if they are not sure of it we may readily guess that other people are not. They spend in anxious thought the strength which ought to have gone in hearty love. They were born at the north pole and live amid perpetual frost: all the furs of Hudson’s Bay could not warm them. About them you see none of the rich tropical flowers which bedeck the heart upon which the Sun of Righteousness shines with perpendicular beams. These chilly mortals have never traversed the sunny regions of heavenly love where the spices of holy delight load the air, and apples of gold are everywhere within the reach of glowing hearts. The Lord bring us there!

Jesus Christ loves warm people; he never shines on an iceberg except to melt it. His own life is so full of love that its holy fire kindles the like flame in others, and thus he has fellowship with those whose hearts burn within them. The fitness for love is love. To enjoy the love of Jesus we must overflow with love. Pray for earnest, eager, intense affection. Lay your hearts among the coals of juniper till they melt and glow.”

(Charles H. Spurgeon, Sermons on Men of the Bible, 237-238)

Encouragement for Discouraged Preachers

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As we approach the anniversary of John Calvin’s last sermon (February 6, 1564) I am posting comments from his sermons on 1 Timothy. In the section below, from a sermon on 1 Tim 6:12-14, Calvin provides powerful encouragement for those times of discouragement, opposition and despair. Appropriately, Calvin points us to God drawing especially on the fact that Paul’s charge is rooted in “the God who quickens [makes alive] all things.”

I pray you may be encouraged in your labors today and persevere knowing your labor is not in vain (1 Cor 15:58).

As we see a great number who when they consider what they have to do, their hearts fail them if it be weightier than they are able to perform and go through with. ‘Ho, is it possible that I can do this?  I feel myself weak, I see that this is a great burden, and a burden that I am not able to bear.’  No, no, only let us take pains, although the things be hard for us, God will work for us.  And since we see that Saint Paul, naming things that surmount the strength of men, ceases not, notwithstanding, to exhort men to do them, know we that it will be no excuse for us to allege that we were astonished and amazed when he saw that we were not able and fit for that charge which God laid upon our shoulders. For he knows what we can do- that is to say, nothing at all.  And moreover, he will not be lacking to us, nor ever fail us, so long as we walk humbly and learn to submit ourselves to him, and commit ourselves wholly into his hands.

This is what we have to mark.  And because these things might discourage us let us mark well also the circumstance which Saint Paul adds. And let it be to shut up the matter withal when he says, That God quickens all things, for he shows us hereby, though it seem that we are poor and miserable wretches, that our condition is accursed, that as touching the world we are despised and reviled, that men mock at us, that they put out their tongues at us, that others torment us, that we are taken as castaways, that nevertheless we must not faint for all that, for God does quicken. Therefore let us cast our eyes upon that life which God keeps hidden with himself, and which he opened when he revealed it by the Holy Ghost and gave good witness of it in his Gospel.  So then, when the world has conspired our death a hundred thousand times, and we are taken for condemned persons, and reviled, let us go on, for our lives stand not here below. It hangs not upon men, neither upon their reputation, nor upon their credit. Let us not think so, but let us surmount all grief that the devil casts in our way to make us faint-hearted, considering that it is God who quickens all things. He holds our life in his hand. He will keep it safely and securely, and it is his pleasure that we should bend to him and content ourselves therewith, knowing that he will not deceive us in that which he has promised us.

Now God does not quicken anything but that which seems to be dead.  Therefore when we walk as we ought, and as we are called, it cannot be but we must be as it were cast away in the sight of the world, and that death itself threatens us and compasses us about on every side.  And why so?  Otherwise God would not do that which he challenges to himself in this place, namely, to quicken us; but in the midst of death we may hope for life, knowing that no man can molest us when the invincible power of God is for us; and that they who now trouble us shall abide confounded, and God will cause us in the end to triumph with our Lord Jesus Christ.

Abandoned to God

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“Upon what condition has God called us to his service?  Is it for one deed or two, and then give us leave every man to rest?  No, no; but that we should dedicate ourselves to him, both to live and to die, and to be his, for good and all.”

–  John Calvin, sermon on 1 Timothy 6:12-14

Gospel-Inspired Striving

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“If men through vain ambition are so set on fire that they spare not their very lives, what shall we do?  What cowardliness is it and how can it be excused if any may spare himself, when God sets not before us any temporal wages, any piece of silver, and fleeting and brittle possession, but gives us everlasting life, and shows that he seeks nothing but to have us to be his heirs, to be partakers of his glory and immortality, to enjoy all his blessings, yes, and him himself?  Where God lifts us up so high, are we not worse than stocks and blocks, if all the sinews we have strive not to follow this fight, the reward whereof is so great and inestimable?”

–  John Calvin, sermon on 1 Timothy 6:12-14

Holiday Reading

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At this time of year, among other things I’m often thinking of what I might read over the holidays, and I typically have in mind more books than I can possibly get to. So I thought I’d share the books recently purchased or received (often due to the generosity of my colleague, Ben Mitchell) which I have before me hoping to get to them- at least some of them- over the break.

I’ve been waiting to read Brian Godawa’s Enoch Primordial: Chronicles of the Nephilim, The Lost Book Two. My enjoyment of the first book in this series (commented on here) has made me anticipate this prequel. And, actually, since starting work on this piece I’ve finished this one! It’s a great story in line with the previous volume of Godawa’s series.

For Christmas I’m reading Douglas Wilson’s God Rest Ye Merry: Why Christmas is the Foundation for Everything and just starting Adam English’s The Saint Who Would be Santa Claus: The True Life and Trials of Nicholas of Myra. Wilson is a great writer with good insight on culture and biblical theology which is great for a book on Christmas. I’ve long been interested in Adam English’s topic so this is another book I’ve had my eye on.

 

I still haven’t read Hunter Baker’s The End of Secularism, and he kindly gave me a copy. His thesis only becomes more and more relevant. I’ve been wanting to read some more A. J. Conyers, and recently picked up The Listening Heart: Vocation and the Crisis of Modern Culture & The Long Truce: How Toleration Made the World Safe for Power and Profit.

In November I saw Paul R. Kolbet’s Augustine and the Cure of Souls: Revising a Classical Ideal, and it caught my interest. I don’t know the author, but the early church’s leading theologian on a topic dear to my heart- oh yeah!  Harold Bloom’s The Shadow of a Great Rock: A Literary Appreciation of the King James Bible is a continuation of my interest in the KJV. I’ve been very interested in Tim Grass’s F. F. Bruce: A Life especially after Ben Mitchell’s strong commendation. Ben also pointed me to Marilyn Chandler McEntyre, Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies which looks very compelling.  Lastly, I picked up Daniel Grotta’s J. R. R. Tolkien: Architect of Middle Earth due to Louis Markos’s recommendation in his book On the Shoulders of Hobbits which I enjoyed last month.

Preaching Christmas

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Pastors often talk about the challenge of preaching on Christmas once they have done so several years in one place. This is a real issue, and I think a key answer is awareness of biblical theology- seeing that Christmas is not simply one event in the Bible but is the culmination of the hopes and dreams of the Old Testament with implications for what is still future to us. In this sense Christmas is all through the Bible.  When God promises to build David a “house,” to establish his line with a Son always on the throne (2 Sam 7), this is a promise of Christmas. When Athaliah, that daughter of Jezebeel, rose up to destroy all the royal house of Judah (the line of David) and make herself Queen (2 Kings 11), this was just one more example of the seed of the serpent seeking to destroy the seed of woman. The deliverance of Joash and preservation of the Davidic line was the rescuing of Christmas. When Haman conspired to destroy the Jews, this was simply the seed of the serpent once more bent on preventing Christmas, and God raised up Esther to preserve the seed of woman.

Examples abound, and I have previously sought to deal with this issue in this audio.

May God bless you in the preaching of His glorious gospel this Christmas.