On the way to school this morning, my eldest Son, aka the Joker, asked “dad, what are your 3 Rs?”

I didn’t want to say “reading, writing and arithmetic” so I said:

• Read the bible every day
• Run the race with perseverance
• Receive the crown of glory

(these three are not the gospel – perhaps I should have said “receive Christ as Saviour and Lord” first, but then that would be 2 Rs)

My son said, “that’s good.  Mine are: reduce, re-use, recycle.”

Guess what they’ve been learning at school this week!

In Judges 19 a young woman is raped and murdered by a gang of sex craved men.  There is something missing in the event.  Throughout the book a pattern of behaviour is repeated:

• the people forget God
• they fall into evil behaviour by copying the world around them
• so God hands them over to be oppressed for a while
• then they cry out to God for mercy
• God delivers them.

The only exception to this pattern is in Samson, where there was no cry for mercy and yet God delivered his people in an act of sovereign grace.  In Judges 19-21 there was no cry for mercy, no appeal to God for deliverance, and he didn’t deliver them, he withheld his grace.

If doing what feels right to us is the rule we live by then we become like passengers on the Titanic. It felt right to race across the Atlantic, it felt right because the ship felt unsinkable. But then disaster struck.  Human nature, human weakness, a very human desire to do what what felt right ended in 2,223 people needing to be rescued, to be delivered. 1,517 people lost their life in that man-made disaster.  The captain didn’t send out distress signals or put up flares for almost half an hour after the ship had hit the iceberg, but at least he sent them out.

It would be have been ridiculous if the ship’s crew or captain had not sent out distress signals, only a fool would let the ship go down without a call for help.  And yet, that’s exactly how many people, individuals, communities and government leaders act today.  Our first instinct, as a human beings, is to take matters into our own hands, to try and sort out the mess ourselves, but as Judges 19 shows, we only end up doing what we think is best according to our flawed human nature.  But Jesus teaches us how to pray “deliver us from evil.”  A cry for mercy is not a weak thing to do, it is the right thing to do.  God there and God is strong but I am weak.  God is wise, I am foolish.  God is merciful, I need mercy.  God loves to deliver us, we need delivering.

As secular society slides into moral chaos we need to collectively cry to God for mercy and look to his ultimate deliverer, Jesus, who died for our sins to set us free from judgement and wrath.  His death shows how serious God is about delivering us and so it is right to call to him for mercy.

In yesterday’s post I showed how Judges chapter 19 teaches us not to trust our human nature to do the right thing.  When everyone does what seems right in their own eyes, society melts down.  Some people are good but others gang rape and murder young women, because it seems right in their own eyes.

British culture has reached a similar situation to that of Israel in the time of the judges.  Everyone does was feels right according to their human nature.  Bankers stuff their pockets with other peoples’ cash, which is little more than legalised theft, because it seems right in their own eyes.  MPs feather their nests with the taxpayers hard-earned cash, because it seems right in their own eyes.  Drug dealing, binge drinking, sexual promiscuity and pornography are part of the fabric of society as people do what seems right in their own eyes.

When this happened in Israel the people cried out “nothing like this has happened before, what are we to do?”

First, they tried to sort the mess out by taking matters into their own hands.  This is the secular approach, where humans believe that they have the solution.  Israel used heavy handed tactics to wipe out the evil in their ranks, but that simply created another problem elsewhere, like squeezing a balloon.

We find half of the solution to the social malaise in Judges 19:1, “at that time Israel had no king.”  The problem was not the lack of a king per se as God was their king.  The problem was a lack of respect for His authority.  And so, the choice for every human being is either to do what seems right in our own eyes or to do what is right in the kings eyes.

People have a God given instinct to look to leaders in authority, kings, prime ministers and presidents, we expect them to do the right thing.  The question we need to ask about our current batch of hapless world leaders is, “where do they get their authority and direction from?”  It is not from God.  Therefore, government is run by what our leaders think is right in their own eyes.

As Chancellor, Gordon Brown steered the economy of this nation in a way that he thought was good, in his own eyes.  In reality, he helped fuel a speculative bubble by borrowing and overspending, selling the nation’s gold reserves and squandering it all on expensive government projects.  Secular governments are monetarily and morally bankrupt.  We can have no respect for leaders who make things up as they go along.  For three or four generations we have drifted away from our once Christian ethos and world view and this is where we find ourselves.

We need a king, someone all people respect and obey.  We need God to rule in our hearts and minds.  At this time, there is no respect for the King and everyone does what he thinks right in his own eyes.

Tomorrow, I’ll blog on the second half of the solution from Judges 19.

The seventh book of the bible, Judges, ends with a harrowing account of the gang rape and murder of a man’s girlfriend. The morning after the attack, the girl’s lover found her dead on a doorstep. In his dismay he cut her body into 12 pieces and sent a piece to each of the 12 tribes of Israel. Everyone who heard the news of the incident was horrified and asked “what are we to do?”

The parallels with British culture are obvious, not only because incidents of gang rape are increasingly common, but the account gives a sense of unease about human nature. The mid-twentieth hope of a rose-spectacled social utopia which flourished on the assumption that humans were essentially good has now evaporated. We aren’t really that good and many in British society are asking “what are we to do?”

I suggest we start by learning from biblical history. The event recorded in Judges is a real life cautionary tale. It cautions us about three things, the first of which I’ll blog on today.

The first caution is about our human nature. The final sentence of the book of Judges says “in those days everyone did what is right in his own eyes.” This closing line makes sense of the events in Judges 19. There is moral confusion in Israel because every man is his own moral authority. The events in the chapter sound much like the way British culture operates:

• The man shacked up with his girlfriend, because is was right in his own eyes.
• She had sex with another man, left her boyfriend and went home to stay with her father.  At each step, her actions seemed right in her own eyes.
• After four months, the man decided to go and get his lover back, because this was right in his own eyes.
• Her dad welcomed his daughter’s estranged boyfriend, was really kind to him for five days, because is was right in his own eyes.
• The man eventually left, late on the fifth day, not wanting to overstay his welcome, because is was right in his own eyes.
• The servant, wanted to stop in Jerusalem, because he was tired and it was right in his own eyes.
• His master said, no, the Jebusites are our enemies, lets go to Gibeah, where there are other Jews, because is was right in his own eyes.
• In the village, no one offered the man, his girlfriend and their servant any hospitality.
• Then a villager, who came originally from the same home town as the man, offered him generous, happy and relaxed hospitality, because is was right in his own eyes.
• The sex craved mob of ASBOs who wanted to rape the visiting man, did so because is was right in their own eyes.
• The host pleaded with them and offered them his virgin daughter and the man’s concubine, because, as much as I can’t get my head round this moral code as a father of a young girl, is was right in this man’s eyes.
• The mob refused, still wanting sex with the visiting man. So the man shoved his girlfriend out the door and slammed it shut behind her, because is was right in his own eyes.  No wonder she’d had sex with another man, this guy was a selfish git.
• The gang raped her all night, because is was right in their own eyes.
• When the man found his girlfriend dead, he chopped her into pieces and sent them all over Israel, because is was right in his own eyes.

And so, the first caution is: As human beings we must not trust what seems right in our own eyes, because our human nature is fundamentally flawed. We are not essentially good. Some of the characters do good, like the two men who offer generous hospitality, but even they have mixed motives.  Doing what is right in our own eyes is self serving, it can be good or evil, the main point is that moral confusion ensues and society disintegrates.

I’ll blog tomorrow and Wednesday on the two solutions God gives us in Judges 19-21.

From the vicarage November 2009

Dear All

One of the great heroes of modern British history is Scott of the Antarctic. His goal to be the first man in the world to stand on the south pole inspired millions. His tale of failure to return, dying hungry and exhausted in extreme cold is legendary.

There are two lessons the church can learn from Scott. First, it is very easy for a church to drift without direction or any sense of purpose, to have no mission. Scott had a single minded goal and sense of purpose which took him and his colleagues to the south pole. He had to plan, provision and prepare for his journey. His goal gave him and his men energy, enthusiasm and bravery. He had a vision of what could be achieved and how. In much the same way, God has given a goal and purpose for his church. We must know God’s goals if we are to live and be inspired by them.

Second, Scott failed to appreciate the scale of the task and so failed to prepare adequately which led to his failure to return. It is easy for a church to have grand visions where we don’t fully appreciate what might be involved and so we fail to prepare and fail in our mission.

On the Saturday 14th November, the church council will be spending a day in Brewood, Staffordshire, seeking God’s will and purpose for Holy Trinity church. We hope to enjoy our time away together, engage with God’s word and will for his church and so envision Holy Trinity.

Please pray for us that day, for God’s direction, guidance and a common sense of God’s call. Please also give some thought to God’s purpose for us as his church. At church last week I gave out an information sheet on the vision and asked the congregation to think about two questions:
1.What does God tell us in the bible about His purpose for the church?
2.What is the church to do?

If you would like to contribute to the vision setting day, and if you are moved by God, do let me know what answers you have to these questions.

Lastly, you might ask, why are we doing all this? Can’t we just carry on as we have, doing what we do? Yes we could, but the wisdom of God calls us to prophetic vision:

Proverbs 29:18 Where there is no vision, the people perish

I am looking forward to the day and expecting great things.

With love, Neil

I’ve preached two series on Samson in the last 12 months, at two different churches. It has occurred to me this week that Samson’s life is a good model for paedobaptism:

• God made a Nazirite vow (see Numbers ch6) with Samson before he was born and God would prove to be faithful to Samson as long as Samson kept his vows.
• Samson broke the first vow, not to touch a dead body, when he scraped honey from the guts of a rotting lion. But God remained with Samson and faithful to him.
• Samson broke the second vow, not to drink wine, at his wedding feast.  But God was still with him, as Samson killed 30 men with his bare hands.
• Samson was hanging by a thread, two vows down, one to go.
• Samson slept with a prostitute and God was still with him as he used the strength God gave him to rip up 3 or 4 tonne city gates and heaved them up a hill.
• God only left Samson when the last of his three vows was broken. Samson’s hair was cut.
• God walked away from Samson, but that is not the end of the story. The suffering which Samson then endured led him to repentance.

How does this support paedobaptism?

• God makes vows with children shortly after their birth.  And God will remain faithful to these children as long as they keep their vows.
• The vow of baptism is to repent of sin and believe in Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord.
• The vow is not a vow never to sin, only to repent of it, as Samson eventually did.  Children should be encouraged to repentance as they grow.
• More importantly, the vow is never to deny Christ.  Children should be taught what it means to be in covenant relationship with Christ and never to renounce him.

He who is not with me is against me,
and he who does not gather with me scatters.
And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men,
but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.
(The words of Jesus in Matthew 12:30-31)

What is blasphemy against the Spirit? Living as if Jesus never lived.
Living as if Jesus never died on the cross for our sins. Blasphemy against the Spirit is to publicly deny Christ.

Just as God was faithful to Samson until he publicly renounced his last vow, made before he was born, so God is faithful to baptised children until they publicly renounce their baptismal vows. Parents of baptised children need to remind their kids of what their baptismal vows mean; that their baptism points them to Christ and seals them in a covenant relationship with God, that they should practice repentance and never renounce Christ.

How, then, do children break their covenant vows? They renounce Jesus, saying something like; “I once believed that Jesus was the Son of God.  I once believed he  lived and died on a cross because he loved me before I loved him, he died for my sins. I once believed that by not any more.” That’s when God walks away from his baptised children.

I’m really interested to know if John Piper has ever read Ebenezer Erskine. Compare the following extract from Ebenezer Erskine’s sermon on the first commandment, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me”, with an article from John Piper’s church website:

This commandment requires us to believe and be persuaded, that this glorious God is the chief good of the rational soul; that as his glory is to be our ultimate end, so our chief happiness lies in the enjoyment of him alone; Thou shalt have no other gods before me”; i.e. Thou shalt place thy chief happiness in the enjoyment of me, who “am the Lord thy God.” So that, when God commands us to have him as our God, he commands us to be happy for ever in himself, and to say with David, “Whom have I in heaven but thee? and there is none in all the earth that I desire besides thee.”

This extract is from the Bethlehem Baptist church’s article “Quest for Joy”

God made us to magnify his greatness – the way telescopes magnify stars. He created us to put his goodness and truth and beauty and wisdom and justice on display. The greatest display of God’s glory comes from deep delight in all that he is. This means that God gets the praise and we get the pleasure. God created us so that he is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.

Last week I summarised chapter 2 of Knowing God by Jim Packer. In that chapter he gave 4 marks of Christian living which result from a deep knowledge of God:

1. Great energy For God
2. Great thoughts of God
3. Great boldness for God
4. Great contentment in God

Packer suggests reflecting on where we are weak so that, having made an assessment, we might ask God to strengthen us in those areas.  This venn diagram is designed to help us reflect on these four inter-related areas of Christian leadership.

A – the clamorous crusader
Energetic, bold, with a big picture of God but lacking peace and contentment.

This leader exudes everything except the peace of God through faith in Christ (Romans 5:1-8). This lack of peace leads to frenetic leadership which often lacks humility.  As C.J. Mahaney writes, anyone in this situation needs to spend a season soaked in the doctrine of adoption. I’d add the discipline of  meditation on what it means to be united to Christ and to own his imputed righteousness.

B – the timid teacher
Energetic, with big thoughts of God, content but timid.

This leader does all things well at church. He’s a great teacher, who runs programmes with enthusiasm and does it all with a sense of shalom. What’s missing is boldness in mission, evangelism and a lack of directness in challenging individuals and the congregation to live for God.  This leader is not quite sure of God and His word.

This person needs to spend a season memorising the great promises of God in scripture. “Fear not, for I am with you” Isa 43:5, “be strong and courageous for I the Lord your God am with you” Josh 1:8 and so on. These verses need to be planted deep in the heart so that when faced with tough choices, he’ll do or say the bold thing.

C – the blinkered builder
Energetic, bold and content but with a small view of God.

This person comes across as totally sold out for God but the God which he follows is unattractive because He is small.

Ways to expand our view of God include the disciplines of systematics and biblical theology. There are no short cuts to getting a big view of God. John Frame’s The Doctrine of God and Goldworthy’s According to Plan are good places to start, then we must keep reading to expand our knowledge of God.

D – the lethargic leader
Bold, content, big thinking but demotivated or just plain tired.

This is perhaps the default position for present day church leaders; burnt out by being busy. It is easy to get tired and when tiredness creeps in, lethargy follows, contentment wanes and boldness evaporates. Time for God and with God is used up by work and so God becomes small in our view once again. I’ve written on avoiding ministry burnout which gives symptoms and strategies to avoid this slippery slope.

But tiredness and burnout is different from lethargy. Life can be fairly quiet and still the Christian does little work. And so, the antidote to lethargy is also found in knowing God. It is the cross which makes all the difference to the lethargic. If a Christian is demotivated, he has probably lost sight of the cross, and the pain Christ was willing to suffer to make peace between God and sinners.

God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labour, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me. Colossians 1:27-29

E – the complete Christian leader
Energetic, bold, content and with a big view of God

Lord, give me the wisdom to order my days here on earth that I might be all things through the knowledge of Christ my Saviour and Lord. Amen

Also see similar posts on this subject:
8 biblical personality types
13 Christian personality types

In our human rights based, multi-cultural, individualistic society, most people function with a highly pragmatic view of faith; “if it works for you, that’s great” or “I’ll try anything which might make my life better.” Many churches recognise this view of life and faith and so approach evangelism on this basis. These churches use personal testimony based on transformation towards a better life: “it worked for me, it might work for you.”

In the second of his five points on God’s commandment “you will have no other gods before me” Ebenezer Erskine shows why all people should acknowledge Christ as Saviour, not for individualistic, pragmatic reasons, but because God is there, he has commanded us to acknowledge, worship and obey him alone and supremely because he is the redeemer God:

This commandment of the law, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me,” narrows and extends its obligation on the children of men, in a suitableness to the revelation that he makes of himself. When God reveals himself only by the works of creation and providence, as he doth to the hethen world, then his commandment obliges us to know and acknowledge him as God, Creator and preserver; but when he superadds to this revelation of himself as a reconciled God (I am the Lord thy God), a redeeming God in Christ, then the law superadds a new obligation, namely, to know and acknowledge him as such, and to claim him as the God of salvation, a saving, pitying, pardoning God.

I am reading “Knowing God” by Jim Packer with my ministry trainee. These notes from chapter 2 show the essence of Packer’s faith; the knowledge of God must make a real difference to the way we cope with life situations.

Lots of orthodox evangelicals can state the gospel clearly, and can smell unsound doctrine a mile away. If anyone asks us how men may know God, we can at once produce the right formula – “though Christ, his cross, his word and promise, by the power of the Holy Spirit, personal exercise of faith.” Yet the gaiety, goodness and unfetteredness of spirit which are marks of those who have known God are rare among us.

A little knowledge of God is worth more than a great deal of knowledge about him.

Can I say “that because I have known God the unpleasantness I have had, or the pleasantness I have not had, through being a Christian does not matter to me.”

1. Those who know God have great energy for God. (i.e. Daniel)

2. Those who know God have great thoughts of God. (i.e. Daniel)

3. Those who know God show great boldness for God. (i.e. Daniel)

4. Those who know God have great contentment in God. Full assurance in the completed work of Christ for believing sinners.

We must take time to ask God how impoverished we are.

Do we desire such knowledge of God? Then-

First, we must recognise how much we lack knowledge of God. We must learn to measure ourselves, not by our knowledge about God, not by our gifts and responsibilities in the church, but by how we pray and what goes on in our hearts. Many of us, I suspect, have no idea how impoverished we are at this level. Let us ask the Lord to show us.

Second, we must seek the Saviour. When he was on earth, He invited men to company him; thus they came to know Him, and in knowing Him to know His Father.

I’ll blog next week on how this affects Christian leadership types.