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Discerning God's Will from His Providence

2008-10-25T14:06:00Z

Romans 11:33-34 Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?”

In an effort to discern God's will for our life we attempt to "frame the leadings of providence" and make decisions concerning what we "believe" God is doing in our life. Providence is the practical outworking of God's foreordained purposes and plan in His creation today. We being creatures of His creation are included in His providence and in recognition of our present station we attempt to ascertain the will of God from what we observe of His providence. Yet Romans 11:33-34 reminds us that God's ways are inscrutable. Something that is inscrutable is not readily interpreted or understood. When we attempt to interpret and understand God's ways we are attempting something for which we are most unsuited, unprepared and incapable of doing. In a sense, we try to lower the mind of God to our own when we believe that we think we are capable of understanding His ways. Instead of lowering God to our understanding, we should turn to God in faith and obedience. We turn in faith believing that His purposes will bring Him glory and are our good. And we turn to God by obedience in that we will do what He has commanded us to do regardless of whether we understand His providence or not. God's source of "practical guidance" (God's will) for our lives is contained in the Holy Bible. The Bible is sufficient to reveal eternal life in Jesus Christ by repentance and faith and it is sufficient in directing us to a life holy and pleasing to God. In his essay What Is A Call To The Ministry? Robert Lewis Dabney writes,

It is true that everything which befalls us is determined by God's special providence, for which reason we justly conclude that, in many cases, an occurrence, after it has happened, is a real expression to us of God's will. But there is another truth, that the designs of God's special providence are chiefly reserved among the awful secrets of his own fathomless wisdom. He forbids us to attempt to surmise his secret purpose from the apparent tendencies of his sovereign dealings, and pointedly remands us “to the law and the testimony” for our practical guidance. The light which “providences” cast upon the question of God's will as to our conduct is chiefly cast backward on the past, not forward on the future. The man who attempts to frame the “leadings of providence “into an indication of duty, instead of resorting to his revealed will, is often in danger of wickedly intruding into those secrets which belong to the Lord our God, and of profanely foisting the selfish leanings of his own inclination upon the Holy One as the teaching of his acts.

While the quote above is in reference to a call to the ministry, it is equally applicable in all areas of life. Regardless of our understanding of God's providence, we need to turn to God by faith and live our life for Him through obedience.

Putting Your Heart Into the Sermon

2008-10-08T11:59:00Z

In his book The Christian Ministry, Charles Bridges writes, "The Minister, that does not manifestly put his heart into his sermon, will never put his sermon into the hearts of his people." How true this statement is. Every preacher should strive to preach to the hearts of his people with great fervency and love for them. The preacher should strive to be plain in his speech rather than eloquent with his words. He should strive to be useful to the lowest of men rather than seek praise by appealing to the highest of men. The goal of preaching is not to bring glory and praise to the speaker but rather to let the Word of God have its perfect work in the hearts of the congregation. The people need the living water and the bread of life not the fine delicacies of high minded, intellectual oratory. Preachers, preach it plain, preach it simple, preach it fervently and through your preaching always love your people as Christ first loved you.

What Do Men Despise?

2008-10-06T12:01:00Z

I Thessalonians 4:7-8 For God hath not called us unto uncleanness, but unto holiness. He therefore that despiseth, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given unto us his holy Spirit.

What is man despising? In the context of the verse, he that despises is despising the holiness of God which in effect is the despising of God. Therefore, when the preacher preaches against sin in favor of a life of holiness those who are opposed to such preaching are not in opposition to a mere man, but rather, oppose God and are the just subjects of His wrath. The Apostle further adds that we have been given the Holy Spirit of God. He does this to encourage us not to despise holiness but rather to embrace it. John Calvin notes of three reasons why the Apostle would include this additional thought concerning the Holy Spirit: to show that holiness comes from God, that there is a difference between holiness and uncleanness and finally that we should reject uncleanness because we have the HOLY Spirit of God and failure to depart from uncleanness will result in the chastisement of God against us. Without the help of the Holy Spirit we are unable to discern uncleanness from holiness and therefore choose uncleanness and live under the wrath of the one true and living God. To receive the Holy Spirit we must be regenerated, that is born again. Have you repented of your sin and place your faith and trust in Jesus Christ for the saving of your soul? Apart from Christ we have no hope and no discernment and will by nature choose to live a life of uncleanness and depravity. Thinking ourselves to be wise, yet we will be fools.

Faithfulness: Talent or Obedience?

2008-09-30T11:27:00Z

In the Parable of the Talents as recorded in Matthew 25, people often associate the talents given to the servants by their master as symbolizing the talents we personally use in the service of the Lord today. The Greek word for "talent" as used in the parable is talanton which is defined as money. Because English Bibles translate the word as "talent" people naturally make the association between talanton and personal talents when applying this parable to them personally. The popular reasoning follows that a faithful servant will make use of their talents in their service of the Lord. By extension, they even reason that God will take away their talents for unfaithfulness just as the master took away the one talanton from the unfaithful servant.

I however believe this supposed natural association between the Greek word talanton and the English word "talent" is weak at best and self-serving at worst. First, the talanton was given from the master to the servant. The talanton was not something the three servants had within themselves. It was external and came only from the master. Furthermore, its growth was external to the servant. To claim that the talanton could be compared to a person's talent is to associate a talanton with the servant's trading ability not the physical object of the money being traded. Secondly, within the context of the parable the master was not interested in the development of the servant's talanton trading ability. Rather, the master was interested in the servant's faithfulness. Faithfulness is not measured according to a person's talent, but rather by their obedience whether they have talent or not. In my opinion, the talanton represents the Gospel message, and the faithful servant will preach the Gospel. The unfaithful servant was not condemned for losing money; rather, he was condemned for not having the faith to honor the contract and trade the talanton while the master was away on his journey.

I believe people like to associate the talanton with their talents because the idea of having their talents developed appeals to them. Unfortunately, it's largely a selfish concern masked in the appearance of service to the Lord. Rather, when we have a view of the talanton as being the Gospel we see God growing His church through the work of His servants. The development of our personal talents is at best a side effect of us honoring God with our faithfulness through obedience whether we have talent or not. As Ray Comfort says, "the quality is in the seed not the sower." The sower need only be faithful to sow the seed. The unfaithful servant needed only to be faithful by trading or investing his talanton while his master was away. This does not mean that we should not seek to become better equipped to serve (because we should) but we must remember it's about who we serve not what talents we think we do or do not possess.

The Faithless Servant

2008-09-30T02:11:00Z

In the Parable of the Talents written in the 25th chapter of Matthew's Gospel we are reminded that faithfulness is an evidence of our salvation. The unfaithful servant saw only the harshness of God and failed to see the graciousness of God extended to the other two servants for their faithfulness. God's graciousness is magnified to the faithful, while those who are faithless will experience the harsh wrath of God for all eternity. Have you taken that the first step of faithfulness? Have you repented of your sins and placed your faith and trust in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins and the gift of eternal life? Jesus Christ is the very person of God's amazing grace and the only hope of salvation we have. Repent and trust Christ today to receive forgiveness of your sins and begin your walk of faithfulness toward God. Are you already saved and not walking faithfully toward God? Examine yourself to see if you are truly in the faith by reading John's first epistle. Compare your life to the life of a Christian described by the Apostle John. There should be a resemblance. If not, then repent and believe today!