The Fear that Releases Us from All Other Fears

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The fear of the Lord releases us from the bondage to all other fears. What does Jesus tell us his followers when he wants to calm our fearful hearts? When Jesus wants to calm the fearful hearts of His followers, he tells us to fear God!

He says in Luke 12:4-5: “I tell you, my friends, do not be afraid of those who kill the body and after that can do no more. But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after the killing of the body, has power to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him.”

Friends, the same God who can throw us into hell, is the same God that we are to address in prayer as Abba Father. Then, without even a break, he says we should relax: “‘Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows’” (12:7). Jesus’ message: You are worth everything to the One who is to be feared. Fear God and you’ll fear nothing else!

Oswald Chambers, “The remarkable thing about fearing God is that, when you fear God, you fear nothing else; whereas, if you do not fear God, you fear everything else.”

If You Have Ever Questioned the Practice of Infant Baptism…

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Here is an excellent, brief, biblical rationale that answers the question: Why Christians baptize their babies?

The Controversy of Infant Baptism

 

An Increasing View of the Infinite Dignity of Jesus Christ

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hawkers_portraitThanks to my good friend David Elmore I know of the esteemed Robert Hawker, an evangelical Anglican minister back in the late 1700s and early 1800s. His devotional The Poor Man’s Morning & Evening Portions can be assessed here:

Poor Man’s Morning & Evening Portions

Here is a lovely thought of his that I am thinking about and praying through this week:

  • That I may have increasing views of the infinite dignity of His person, work, merit, offices, relations, characters, and in short, everything that relates to one so dear, so lovely, so glorious, and so suited to a poor sinner like me, as the Lord Jesus Christ is in all things.
Robert Hawker, The Poor Man’s Morning & Evening Portions

Temptation & the Loveliness of Jesus

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The below three quotations remind us of the only real, lasting cure for resisting temptation.

To respond to the distorting nature of temptation and sin
you must set your affections on the beauty and glory of God,
the loveliness of Christ, and the wonder of the gospel:
Were our affections filled, taken up, and possessed with these things…
what access could sin, with its painted pleasures,
with its sugared poisons, with its envenomed baits, have unto our souls.
– John Owen

How sweet all at once it was for me to be rid of those fruitless joys
which I had once feared to lose. . . You drove them from me,
you who are the true, the sovereign joy.
You drove them from me and took their place,
you who are sweeter than all pleasure,
though not to flesh and blood,
you who outshine all light,
yet are hidden deeper than any secret in our hearts,
you who surpass all honor,
though not in the eyes of men who see all honor in themselves.
O Lord my God, my Light, my Wealth, and my Salvation.
– Augustine of Hippo

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you…
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me. – John Donne

A Prayer to Align Our Hearts with God’s

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Lord of the nations, You are pursuing with omnipotent passion
the worldwide purpose of gathering joyful worshippers for Yourself
from every tribe and tongue and people and nation.
As we prepare to worship You today,
grant us to share in Your inexhaustible enthusiasm
for the supremacy of Your name among the nations.
Bring our affections into line with Yours,
and, for the sake of Your name, may we renounce the quest for worldly comforts
and join Your global cause. Amen.
Adapted from John Piper

Anoint Us with Your Gladness

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Martin Lloyd-JonesOh that the Lord might anoint us with His gladness.
As we face the modern world with all its trouble and turmoil
and with all its difficulties and sadness,
nothing is more important than
that we who call ourselves Christian,
and who claim the Name of Christ,
should be representing our faith in such a way before others
as to give them the impression that here is the solution,
and here is the answer.
In a world where everything has gone so sadly astray,
we should be standing out as men and women apart,
people characterized by a fundamental joy and certainty
in spite of conditions, in spite of adversity.
– Martin Lloyd-Jones

The Marks of a Redeemed Community – Worship Reflections

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The below reflections come from studying Isaiah 56:1-8.

God wants his gathered people to seek him for Himself, not merely for His blessings, great though they are. He wants us “to minister to Him, and to love His name, and to be His servants” (Isaiah 56:6). Then, he promises to “make us joyful” in his house of prayer for all nations. He’s the one who is calling the nations to Himself. He wants us to know that we are never stronger than when we are most aware of our weakness, and therefore most dependent on Him.
– David Jackman

God values a heart for Christ. That’s how he defines spiritual authenticity… We draw lines of exclusion that God wants to erase. He throws the doors wide-open to all alike who will take Christ as their legitimacy.

What matters in church is what matters to God, especially the gathering in of outsiders (John 10:16), and nothing else matters. When we accept that and implement the implications in our churches, we move toward revival.
–  Ray Ortlund, Jr.

Try and make ourselves kings and we find only shame;
bow to become his slaves for love and we find ourselves wearing crowns.
– John Oswalt