Own Your Desperation

Don’t be fooled by the world’s paradigm for leadership, or the whisper of your indwelling sin.

We cringe at the thought of being seen as needy and coming off as desperate. Especially in positions of leadership. Don’t disclose your flaws, we hear from without and feel from within. Exhibit your strengths, demonstrate your capabilities, win their confidence. But a different word comes from above.

Good spiritual leaders — indeed, healthy Christians — are not those who suppress their failings and tell themselves over and over again they can do it. Rather, they own their neediness and acknowledge they are helpless to do what matters most.

“All true spiritual leadership,” writes John Piper in The Marks of a Spiritual Leader, “has its roots in desperation.” The spirit of the true Christian leader is not, “I’m up for the task,” but, “Who is sufficient for these things?” (2 Corinthians 2:16).   Continue at David Mathis

The Wintry Soul: Four Lessons from Suffering

Seasons of suffering in life are as sure as March snow flurries in Minnesota. 

And such climate shifts test trust, materialize maturity, and make us long for spring.

In the not so distant past, God let a blizzard of pain hit my home that drained our fuel and tried our faith. While the season of deep sorrow covered months, not years, the grief was real and the scars permanent. The suffering was part of our journey of adoption –– with one child lost, declared unadoptable, and another secured, but only after an arduous battle among the visible and invisible realms. Beautiful creations can be shaped from ice. Below are four lessons learned in the cold.

1. I am excessively sinful and weak, and the gospel is amazingly beautiful.

God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from the wrath of God. (Romans 5:8–9)    Continue at Jason DeRouchie

The Weakness of the World’s Strongest Man

When the writer of Hebrews listed the Old Testament heroes of faith, he included Samson (Hebrews 11:32). Really? Samson’s story, recorded in Judges 13–16, reads like a narcissistic super hero’s whose Kryptonite weakness does him in in the end.

But God wanted Samson included in the list because there are crucial things about faith that God wants us to understand from him. To explore these, let’s imagine two of Samson’s brothers on their way to collect Samson’s body in Gaza (Judges 16:31) reflecting on all that went wrong (I’ve given them the fictitious names, Abijah and Nadir).

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The two brothers said nothing for a long time after the ruins of Dagon’s temple came into view. It lay on the ground like a torn carcass. The living were crawling through the debris extracting the dead.  Continue at Jon Bloom

Hope for the Battle with Intractable Weakness

We all have sin-infected weaknesses that are intractable. They are deeply woven into the fabric of who we are and are frequently exacerbated by our sinful responses to them.

Inherent weaknesses are different from indwelling sin. Indwelling sin is evil that is waging war against God in our very members (Romans 7:21–23). Inherent weaknesses are our bodily experience of God’s curse of futility that is affecting all of creation (Romans 8:20). Sin is moral corruption resulting in real guilt. Weakness is a constitutional corruption — a disease or disorder or disability — resulting in sometimes anguishing struggle.

When we’re young, we tend to underestimate our weaknesses. We think they’ll change when our situation changes. Or we believe they will simply fade away as we get older. Or we assume our future mature selves will muster the discipline to conquer them. Or surely the Spirit will come with healing power and give us victory.

We battle our weaknesses every day for years. And years. And at some point, often in middle age, we find ourselves bewildered. Our old enemy is not vanquished. We thought sanctification was supposed to be progressive. Where’s the progress? Will this never end?     Continue at Jon Bloom

When You Can't Even Pray

We are not strong but weak. How are we weak? Well, how aren't we weak? Brokenness, unmet needs, emptiness, confusion, weariness, unbelief, fear, dullness, depression, bewilderment, sin—we can be so overwhelmed with the crushing weight of this existence that we don't even know how to pray. The very enormity of our struggles silences us. We don't know what to pray for, as Paul says in Romans 8:26. We may be paralyzed in helpless indecision. We may be too distressed to utter a coherent prayer at all. We are weak.

Christians are not always on top of things. Where in the Bible are we taught to expect unruffled composure and unbroken victory? Sometimes life is so troubling, we feel defeated even in prayer. And if we cannot pray, we are really in trouble. At that very moment when we most need to draw upon God's promises through prayer—what if we fail at that vital point of connection, when it really counts? Will our weakness bungle the purpose of God? Under normal conditions we tell ourselves that, when all else fails, we can fall back on prayer. But what if we do come to the end of ourselves and our own devices only to discover we don't even know what to pray, we don't understand how to connect the Bible with our experience, and God himself seems far away? What then? What encouragement can we look to beyond our own radical weakness?

When we're reduced to helplessness, the Holy Spirit will help us. Have you ever thought of the Holy Spirit as a gracious person who steps in with the offer: "May I help? May I bear that burden with you? You're in anguish over your children. You feel forsaken by God. You don't know how to negotiate that important decision. You're lonely. You're tempted. You're sinful. You need to pray. May I help?" The Holy Spirit does not reproach us. In fact, he "gives generously to all without making them feel foolish or guilty" (James 1:5, Phillips).    Continue at Ray Ortlund

The Threat of Gospel Amnesia

I used to be a Christian who didn't think about Jesus. I was bored with him. I remember telling my husband one day that I was tired of hearing him say, "Jesus loves you, Luma." It all seemed trite and superficial. I wanted, I needed, something deeper. Something more challenging to my mind, more impactful than "Jesus died on the cross for your sins." That tired story, heard countless times since my father first spoke the gospel to me in a train station in Thessaloniki, rang hollow.

 

But despite my weakness, ambivalence, and even hostility, this same gospel has never let me go and will not let me go—through hardships, divorce, rebellion, passivity, legalism, and back again. Although I believe I've been a Christian since I was 8 years old, for many years my faith was accompanied by a cloudiness and distortion like that of the blind man Jesus healed: "I see men, but they look like trees walking" (Mark 8:24). It hurts to write these words, yet they must be written. They must be written for the sake of many who silently live the way I lived and think the way I thought.

Most of my life has been spent finding one way or another to atone for myself. Operating from a hazy understanding of what Christ did in his life and death to win my salvation, this self-atonement was like a vortex—a downward spiral into the depth of my amnesia.     Continue at Luma Simms

Just Disconnect

It was said of John Henry Newman that he was never less alone than when alone. Newman liked the peace and quiet of isolation: it allowed him to read, to think and to write.

 

I confess to some sympathy for Newman on this. I do not like the hyperconnectivity of the current world. As an administrator at Westminster, I had a seminary cell phone. I had to upgrade it to a smartphone last year because Verizon indicated they would no longer support  the vintage model I then possessed. I remember that, when I went in to exchange it, the man behind the counter looked at the phone, looked at me and then, choking back the laughter, declared "You're that guy!"  Shamed into silence, I nodded mutely and mumbled my mandated request for a smartphone.

Now, having stepped down from the administration, I have rid myself of the thing and reverted to a phone that (and yes, this sounds terribly outdated, I know) simply allows me to phone people.   You know, like they did in the olden days. Sadly, I am sure that the free market will ensure that it will be 'no longer supported' within a few years. At that point I will have to pay extra every month for a data package to provide data which I have no interest in receiving, but until then, I can resist, Canute-like, the incoming tide of things I really do not need or like but which others have determined that I apparently 'must have.'

There are other advantages to downgrading. If I receive an email, I am one of those compulsive types who has to read it straight away. Result: not just friends, but everyone from work to whackos and every point in between has been able to invade my privacy. Now, with no mobile e-mail facility, I am safe from my own weakness, at least temporarily. Further, while I have rarely ever answered my cell phone anyway (possibly the result of keeping it switched to silent), ditching the seminary's smartphone has allowed me to purge my contacts list. It is amazing how, over time, my number leaked out to all sorts of people, some of whom were simply miscreants that I would really rather avoid. At the time of writing, I now have a grand total of eighteen contacts: strange to tell, most have the same surname as me; and those who do not either serve with me at church as elders or deacons or play some part in paying my salary. In other words, pretty much the sum total of people with whom I actually need to have any regular contact.   Continue at Carl Trueman

Discipling When You Need to Be Discipled

[Ed. Note: For more articles like this one, check out the latest 9Marks Journal on Discipling in the Church.]

I was not sure what discipling was supposed to look like, but I was certain it did not look like what I was doing.

“I must have it all backwards,” I thought as I closed the door behind the poor sister who had given up an hour of her life to come and be discipled.

“I am a mess. I have no idea what I’m doing here. There certainly wasn’t any ‘teaching’ going on with my crazy hooligan children and my heart in a bad place toward my husband. I shouldn’t be teaching anyone. I’m the one who needs discipling! God, what would you have me do?”

I mumbled all this half aloud as I walked back into the kitchen to finish making dinner.

FINDING STRENGTH IN WEAKNESS

Little did I know how God would use this situation, along with many other similar ones, to teach me a great deal about his purposes in my life. Little did I know how God would turn my weaknesses into strength. During this season my husband and I, both in our thirties, found ourselves thrust into the category of “older people” in our church. I searched for a woman who might be able to encourage me spiritually as we muddled through some challenging times, but God had other plans.

Instead of granting this desire, he grew my passion for discipling. Gradually I learned that it was less about me doing the right thing and more about me obeying God’s command to “teach the younger women” (Tit. 2:4). I found God frequently brought women into my life who were younger in either age or spiritual maturity and who were desperate for someone to help them learn how to love the Lord with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength (Deut. 6:4-9).    Continue at Erin Wheeler

The Spirit’s Silent Prayer Ministry

“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Romans 8:26). Just as creation groans, waiting for the fullness of redemption; and as believers groan, waiting for redemption from their earthly bodies; so the Holy Spirit groans in prayer.

The Holy Spirit prays for us because we are weak.
 

The Spirit who resides within us as believers in Christ “helps” us, that is, He comes to our aid, rescues us, and helps to carry our heavy burden. This is the ongoing ministry of the Spirit in our “weaknesses,” our human frailty. It is significant for us to realize that physical, emotional, and spiritual weakness reveal human frailty, but are not necessarily the result of sin. Jesus, the sinless Son of God, experienced human frailty, which is partially what qualifies him to be our High Priest who is able to “sympathize with our weaknesses,” yet he never sinned (Hebrews 4:14–15). The omniscient Holy Spirit knows our weaknesses as well and it this same “Spirit of adoption,” whom we have received from God, “by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Romans 8:15).

The Holy Spirit prays for us because we are ignorant.
 

Often we “do not know what to pray for” (v. 26). Sometimes we are aware of our ignorance¸ like the disciples who said to Jesus, “Lord, teach us to pray” (Luke 11:1). And sometimes we are blind to our ignorance. For example, when the sons of Zebedee came to Jesus with their mother to demand a position of leadership, Jesus said, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” (Matthew 20:22).  Continue at Paul Tautges

Warning to Calvinists: Don’t Let Your Love for Truth Excuse Factionalism

Two new books address a familiar controversy:

• Michael Horton. For Calvinism. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011.  [PDF sample]
• Roger E. Olson. Against Calvinism. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011. [PDF sample]

(Horton wins hands-down on the more attractive book cover—not to mention the argument!)

Horton’s last chapter is entitled “Calvinism Today: A SWOT Analysis.” Here’s how he introduces it:

We know from daily experience that our greatest strengths can also become our greatest weaknesses.

1. Persistence can become stubbornness;
2. sympathy can devolve into sentimentality; and
3. genuine concern for others sometimes turns into an obsequious craving for approval.
4. Remarkable gifts of leadership and creativity can be used for good or ill, depending on the motivation and the goals.
5. The same is true of movements, since they are largely the collective activity of people like us.

It has become popular for businesses and organizations to conduct a periodical “SWOT” analysis, exploring

1. Strengths,
2. Weaknesses,
3. Opportunities, and
4. Threats.

Read the rest HERE

A Place for Weakness

One of the things I appreciate about Michael Horton is that he writes both for the academy and also the congregation. It’s a mark of a good theologian to do both well. Horton is a professor of apologetics and theology at Westminster Seminary California. Some of his outstanding titles include Putting Amazing Back Into Grace, People and Place, We Believe, and A Better Way. He is also the publisher of the indispensible monthly journal Modern Reformation and host of the White Horse Inn radio program.

This relatively slim volume was originally published with the title Too Good to Be True: Finding Hope in a World of Hype, which I rather liked. Zondervan has released it with a new title and a new cover, and I am glad that new attention is being given to this outstanding book.

A Place for Weakness is driven along by an unrelenting but refreshing realism. There are no false promises here. There are no clichés or newly discovered secrets for “living in victory.” Horton helps us understand suffering as unromantic but deeply purposeful. In other words, we do not have to pretend that suffering does not hurt and cause dismay. At the same time, we are confidently pointed to the mysterious comfort that everything that comes our way passes through the hands of our good and sovereign God. “The unity of God’s sovereignty and goodness that will be finally disclosed on the last day has already dawned decisively in the work of Christ” (45).    Keep Reading...

Horton defines “the bottom line of this book” in this way:

The gospel is good news for losers, that in fact we are all losers if we measure ourselves by God’s interpretation of reality rather than our own. The demand for glory, power, comfort, autonomy, health, and wealth creates a vicious cycle of craving and disillusionment. It even creates its own industry of therapists and exercise, style, and self-esteem gurus—and churches—to massage the egos wounded by this hedonism. When crisis hits, the soul is too effete to respond appropriately. We become prisoners of our own felt needs, which were inculcated in us in the first place by the very marketplace that promises a “fix.” We become victims of our own shallow hopes. We are too easily disappointed because we are too easily persuaded that the marketplace always has something that can make us happy (26).

Why Pastors Should Value Sermon Feedback from their Wife

I don’t think anyone especially enjoys criticism. At least not initially. Pastors are no different. After all, we get our fair share, we don’t want criticism from our wives too.

Or do we?

The pastor’s wife is his closest friend. She knows his weaknesses and his strengths. Therefore, she is uniquely qualified to be the pastor’s greatest proponent as well as his best critic.

Let me get real practical and transparent. Awhile back I preached a sermon that I knew was not my best. I felt a bit disjointed and unclear. It was a homiletical dud. I knew it and so did my wife. She quietly bid her time and then I asked the dreaded question. “How do you think things went today? Was I clear?” She looked back and said, “I had a hard time tracking.” From there she gave me her thoughtful review.

At that point I didn’t want to hear it. I would have rather talked about crafts, jewelry, cloth diapers or Martha Stewart. Anything would have been better than hearing my wife land body-blow after body-blow on my freshly preached sermon.

Why was I so resistent? Because I value her opinion and I want to deliver quality sermons.

But what I missed was that this was precisely the reason why I should be listening to her in the first place! The heart is tricky and pride runs deep.

In light of this, I want to give a few reasons why pastors, particularly preaching pastors, should listen to their wife’s sermon feedback.

1. She Loves You: We forget this sometimes, especially when we are feeling so extra sensitive. The bottom line here preachers, your wife probably has your best interests in mind. She is not out to filet you, she wants you to get better. Because she loves you and wants the best for you, you owe it to her to listen to what she says. Keep Reading>>>

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Strength Depending on Weakness

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