Discourse about God

“Prayer is the Christian thinking theologically.”[1]

Prayer is a constant conversation with the invisible God who has made Himself visible in Christ and available through the Spirit. In prayer, we are brought to understand the mind of Christ, for the Spirit “moves our hearts into harmony with God’s concerns.”[2] Jesus said, “No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (Jn. 15:15, ESV). Then he says, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” (Jn. 16:13, ESV). Paul says, “And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Gal. 4:6, ESV). We are able to address God as our heavenly Father in prayer because we have the Spirit in our hearts to convict our sins so that we turn away from sins and implant a new heart in us so that we can have a desire to pursue the holy Father. In other words, we can pray because of the objective work of Christ applied by the subjective work of the Spirit in our lives. Prayer is trinitarian in nature.

Christians love the triune God with our minds. God is a rational God, therefore, we pursue Him with our rationality. As John Stott said, “The only worship pleasing to God is heart-worship, and heart- worship is rational worship. It is the worship of a rational God, who has made us rational beings and given us a rational revelation so that we may worship him rationally.”[3] For sure, this kind of rationality is not mere intellectual activity. It’s involved with mind, heart, soul, and strength. In other words, doctrine, devotion, and doxology are intertwined. The Christian thinking is not dead orthodoxy. Rather, it’s lived doctrine.

Theology affects every area in life. All of us are theologians. We are either good theologians or bad theologians, for we all do things according to our beliefs. “The Christian mind does not think exclusively about ‘Christian’ topics but thinks about every topic ‘Christianly.’”[4] We think about things theologically. The word theology can be broken down into two parts. In Greek, theos means “god”, and logos means “word” or “discourse.” Thus, theology could be understood as “discourse about God.”[5] For Christian theology, whether such discourse about God is theologically sound or not, it depends on how much this discourse is regulated and sharpened by the revelation of the sixty-six canonical books in the Bible, which, as a whole, points to Christ Jesus. To think and act theologically is a discipline. It is a spiritual discipline.

God wants us to talk to Him genuinely and theologically. God is not so happy with our childish languages through the years. How long have we used the exact same language to pray to Him in different occasions, such as meal time, small group prayer, private prayer, etc…? If we really know someone, will we talk to that person with the same content, same tone, and same vocabulary through the years? We certainly talk differently as the relationship deepens gradually. Our language is subtly changed to relational language in any meaningful relationships. We change. We deepen. We grow.

In this morning, I read Psalm 119:18—“Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” (ESV) In humbleness, the psalmist prays that God will grant him wisdom and understanding to know His law, for the revelation of God is always given, not earned. No one can truly understand if God doesn’t reveal it to us. For me, this is a theological prayer.

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[1] James M. Gordon, Evangelical Spirituality (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 1991), p. 238.

[2] Richard L. Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life: An Evangelical Theology of Renewal (Downers Grove: Inter-Varsity Press, 1979), p. 157.

[3] Quoted by James M. Gordon, Evangelical Spirituality, p. 297.

[4] Ibid., p. 297.

[5] Alister E. McGrath, Christian Spirituality: An Introduction (Oxford: Blackwell, 1999), p. 26.

Grow in Grace

“But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 3:18a, ESV).

What does it mean to “grow in grace”? Does it mean that those who grow in grace have less sins and more grace? In my reading, I have a chance to read James M. Gordon’s Evangelical Spirituality (Wipf & Stock, 1991) in which he introduces Christian spirituality through different spiritualities of evangelical figures in the past (e.g. John and Charles Wesley, Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield, etc…). One of the chapters is about the spirituality of John C. Ryle whose classic book Holiness: Its Nature, Hindrance, Difficulties, and Roots (Hendrickson, 2007) that I purchased last year and haven’t had a chance to read.

In Holiness, he proposes that religious growth is a reality. In this reality, “There is such a thing as ‘growth in grace’” (p. 104). Ryle wrote:

When I speak of “growth in grace,” I do not for a moment mean that a believer’s interest in Christ can grow. I do not mean that he can grow in safety, acceptance with God, or security. I do not mean that he can ever be more justified, more pardoned, more forgiven, more at peace with God, than he is the first moment that he believes. I hold firmly that the justification of a believer is a finished, perfect, and complete work; and that the weakest saint, though he may not know and feel it, is as completely justified as the strongest. I hold firmly that our election, calling, and standing in Christ admit of no degrees, increase, or diminution. If anyone dreams that by “growth in grace” I mean growth in justification, he is utterly wide of the mark, and utterly mistaken about the whole point I am considering…Nothing can be added to his justification from the moment he believes, and nothing taken away.

When I speak of “growth in grace,” I only mean increase in the degree, size, strength, vigor, and power of the graces which the Holy Spirit plants in a believer’s heart. I hold that every one of those graces admits of growth, progress, and increase. I hold that repentance, faith, hope, love, humility, zeal, courage, and the like, may be little or great strong or weak, vigorous or feeble, and may vary greatly in the same man at different periods of his life. When I speak of a man “growing in grace,” I mean simply this—that his sense of sin is becoming deeper, his faith stronger, his hope brighter, his love more extensive, his spiritual-mindedness more marked. He feels more of the power of godliness in his own heart. He manifests more of it in his life. He is going on from strength to strength, from faith to faith, and from grace to grace” (pp. 105-106, emphasis added).

This is a very good description of what it means to “grow in grace.” There is nothing we can grow in terms of justification. We can only grow in sanctification, which, however, is forever grounded in justification. We can never grow out of being justified by the finished work of Christ. We can only grow deeper and deeper into the life of Christ through the life of the Spirit in this sanctifying process. May we all grow in grace.

Return and Rest

“Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you” (Ps. 116:7, ESV).

The psalmist exhorted himself to return. Returning is a recurrent theme in the Psalms. It’s a holy yearning to get back to the center of life. Getting lost in one’s life is a recurrent reality. It’s necessary to know that we are lost and realize that we need to get back. The psalmist spoke to himself, saying “Return, O my soul, to you rest.” Resting is the means to the end. The Lord God, the Holy One of Israel says, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength” (Isa. 30:15a, ESV). We don’t get saved in resting, quietness, and trust. We encounter the peace of God and enter into the presence of God through resting, quietness, and trust: the means to the end. It requires obedience and wisdom to get back to the means because not everyone sees the need to get back to the means. God says, “But you were unwilling” (Isa. 30:15b, ESV).

The reason to get back to the means is in the second half of the verse: “for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.” For is the ground for the psalmist’s returning. He has tasted and seen the goodness of the Lord throughout his life. Such goodness is bountiful. There is no lacking in His holy goodness towards us. Each morning, each day, each night, when we learn to get back to the means of returning, quietness, and trust, we are silently declaring His bounteousness in life. When we are able to declare His bounteousness in action quietly and silently, we start to return and enter into rest in and through which we begin to understand and view our life (daily) concerns differently.

A Dangerous Church

I really like this person's reflection on Peterson.

(Taken from http://bigbigshan.blogspot.com/2011/07/blog-post_12.html)

Some brilliant excerpts from Practise Resurrection by Eugene Peterson:
 
"Life in the church is dangerous. Much of the danger comes from being cozily familiar with the way of faith that we feel set apart or above our early status of what we sometimes think of as a mere Christian. We become so diligent in learning about and working for Jesus that our relationship with Jesus erodes.

The constant danger - and this has been going on a long time in church - is that we take on a role, a religious role, that gradually obliterates the life of the soul.

But our participation in the life of church does not bring us into an advanced level of gospel living. Faith is life at risk. Love is life at risk. Worship is life at risk. Familiarity with God and church and congregation can dull awareness of the stakes involved so that we forget to put in protection."

.......

"Karl Barth is eloquent in his insistence that we are always and ever beginners in this Christian life. No matter how much we know, no matter how diligent we are, we never graduate from being 'Christian' and go on to advanced levels. Neither Christian living nor Christian service, whether as layperson or pastor, can ever 'be anything but work of beginners... What Christians do becomes a self-contradiction when it takes a form of a trained and mastered routine, of a learned and practiced art. They may and can be masters and even virtuosos in many things, but never in what makes them Christians, God's children.'"

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教會危險之處在於，把信徒都局限於同一個形式的「信仰」。
同一種敬拜、同一種事奉、同一種見證，
同一些屬靈字眼、同一種傳福音的形式。

每個人的信仰如倒模一樣；
就像都是一個角色，一套儀式，失卻了原來的活潑。

任何破壞這種「合一」的聲音或思考，
都會被視為分化、搞分裂，不屬靈，被關心、被勸導。

漸漸地，我們被一個宗教框框困死了，
反而不懂得做回一個有血有肉，
有感情有上帝心腸的 "mere Christian"。

於是，人越上教會，反倒是越固執，甚至是更為教條化；
對社會更冷漠，只着重個人得救，看不見社會需要。

很喜歡Karl Barth 的講法，所有人都只是基督徒，
沒有人能從「基督徒」畢業過來；
那怕你是牧師也好，會眾也好，
那怕你對敬拜流程、聖經經文再熟識－－我們都不過是基督徒。

更重要的是，
要真正行出基督徒的樣式，
我們每一個人都還是初學者一般。

搖搖擺擺、跌跌碰碰。

吊詭的地方是，
當你以為自己已經得着了，那反倒是失去了。

The Soul's Conflict

Alexander Whyte, who died in 1921, was appointed Principal of New College, Edinburgh. In Whyte’s spirituality, he insisted that the reality of sin is an inescapable reality in Christian experience. The presence of sin brings struggle and conflict. His interest in the problems of the spiritual life, in particular to the area of the soul’s conflict in Christian experience, was much greater than in the pursuit of pure scholarship. As James M. Gordon notes,

Unlike many of his contemporaries, Whyte did not pursue a career in pure scholarship, though in intellectual power and breadth of knowledge he was their equal. Whyte’s best energies were poured into his lifelong research project, the problems of the spiritual life, and especially the soul’s conflict.[1]

In pursuit of the God of holiness, Whyte saw a great obstacle in Christian experience and labored at this task: “the soul’s conflict with indwelling sin.”[2] Whyte’s theological inquiry and pastoral endeavor reminds me of Paul’s dictum in Colossians 1:28-29—“Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.” (ESV) In order to present every Christian mature or perfect in Christ, Paul labored at it and struggled with it. “The soul’s conflict with indwelling sin” is one of the issues in Christian spirituality. It deals with the reality of stagnation in Christian experience. It deals with the fact that the majority of Christians merely exists and grows old. We don’t fully live and grow up unless we seriously deal with “the soul’s conflict with indwelling sin.” No labor; no struggle; no growth.

The Spiritual conflict waged at the centre of redeemed personality is ultimately a conflict between love and hatred and between holiness and sin. The Christian heart enters that conflict with a bias towards the loveliness and purity of Christ but with no guaranteed outcome.[3]

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[1] James M. Gordon, Evangelical Spirituality (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 1991), p. 240.

[2] Ibid., p. 239.

[3] Ibid., p. 246.

Dishonorable

(Taken from http://dogmadoxa.blogspot.com/2011/08/one-reason-homosexual-desires-are.html)

I had never considered this insightful point in considering what is 'dishonorable' in homosexual 'passions' (Rom. 1:26). Our friends write in the ESV Study Bible--
Homosexual desires are 'dishonorable' both because they are contrary to God's purpose and because they treat a person's biological sex as only half of what it is. While the logic of a heterosexual bond is that of bringing together the two (and only two) different and complementary sexual halves into a sexual whole, the logic of a homosexual bond is that another person of the same sex complements, and fills what is lacking in, that same sex, implying that each participant is only half of his or her own sex: two half males making a full male or two half females making a full female.

In other words, the logic of sexual intercourse requires a sexual complement, and thus a same-sex bond is a self-devaluing of one's own gender inasmuch as one sees the need to complement structurally one's own sex with someone of the same sex. (p. 2548)

Buy the Truth

“My son, if your heart is wise, my heart too will be glad. My inmost being will exult when your lips speak what is right. Let your heart envy sinners, but continue in the fear of the Lord all the day. Surely there is a future, and your hope will not be cut off” (Prov. 23:15-18, ESV).

A teacher who is like a father speaks to his student as a son with these affectionate counsels. The quality of the heart of the son affects the joy of the father in his heart. When the son is able to articulate what is right and act upon it in life, his inmost being of the father is filled with joy. Such an interconnection is more than a mentoring relationship. It’s a father-son relationship in which their hearts are joined.

What is right and wrong is not defined by our own moral standards. It does not come from our own religiosity either. It comes from the fear of the Lord through which we know who the boss is in life: God is the Creator, Sustainer, Provider, and Redeemer. He is the source of hope. He is the reason for us to press on with faith. God who is love is the reason for us to learn to love the unlovable.

Prov. 23:23 says, “Buy truth, and do not sell it; buy wisdom, instruction, and understanding” (ESV). Godly thinking and upright living don’t come to us spontaneously. It requires some sort of efforts to attain it. No pain; no gain. They are precious, and they are not easy to get. Once we get it, we don’t give them up for the lesser goods. Rather, we keep them even though we need to give up the lesser goods. In the parables, Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it” (Matt. 13:44-46, ESV). Once we find what is invaluable, we sell the lesser goods to get it, not vice versa.

Savor the Taste

In Taste and See: Savoring the Supremacy of God in All of Life (Colorado Springs: Multnomah, 2005), John Piper notes:

Boston pastor John Cotton, who died in 1652, had spiritual tastes that are unintelligible to the average modern person. In his declining years he was asked why he read late into the evening. “Because I love to sweeten my mouth with a piece of Calvin before I go to sleep,” he replied.

There are bad reasons to turn to other writers besides the Bible. And there are good ones. One of the bad reasons we turn to other writers is that we find the Bible tame and tasteless. It is anything but tame and tasteless. One of the good reasons we turn to other writers besides the Bible is that we savor the taste of God not only in the Bible, but also in the way others savor him. The best writers intensify our taste for the Bible, and especially for God himself. (p. 11)

The way others articulate God according to the Bible and interpret the Bible in order to know God has been encouraging me to move on in the Kingdom of God. It’s so easy to be self-content and stop. It’s okay to pause for a minute. But it’s a great sin to stop. As the author of Hebrews says, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us” (Heb. 12:1, ESV). Because of the example of Christ, it’s certainly not okay to “grow weary or fainthearted” (Heb. 12:2-3) in the race.

Eugene Peterson has had this effect on me in the area of spiritual and pastoral theology; Walter Brueggemann, on the interpretation of the Old Testament; John Calvin, on Reformed Theology; John Stott, on Evangelical Theology; and Roy Ciampa and Scott Hafemann on the interpretation of the New Testament. All of them savor the taste of God in Christian theology and ministry, and they intensify my taste for the God of the Bible and the revelation of God as Scripture.

“Because I love to sweeten my mouth with a piece of Calvin before I go to sleep.”

The Goal of Theology

(Taken from http://www.andrewfullercenter.org/blog/2010/10/martin-bucer-on-the-goal-of-theology/)

A great statement about the goal of theology by the Reformer Martin Bucer: “Vera theologia non theoretica, sed practica est; finis siquidem eius agere est hoc est vitam vivere deiformem.” (ET: “True theology is not theoretical, but practical. The end of it is living, that is to live a godly life.”)

For All Who Believe

In Rom. 1:18-3:20, Paul proves the fact that all humans, Jews and Gentiles, are totally depraved. Before he further elaborates the righteousness of God, he first illustrates the reality of human predicament. Otherwise, there is no need for the necessity of the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. The following macro-structure of Rom. 1:16-3:26 helps us understand Paul’s rhetorical strategy in his letter:[1]

A The gospel reveals the righteousness of God (1:16-17)

            B The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven (1:18-3:20)

A’ The righteousness of God has been manifested in Christ’s saving death apart from the law (3:21-26)

Human predicament is sandwiched by the righteousness of God. In other words, it’s impossible to understand and solve the human plight apart from God’s own righteousness that “has been manifested apart from the law (3:21a). Then Paul immediately adds, “although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it (3:21b). The righteousness of God in Christ does not depend on the law. What Paul is trying to say is that no one can attain God’s own righteousness by obeying the law, “for by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight” (3:20a). But the law and the prophets witness to the righteousness of God. “This is why Paul will insist that the faith that the gospel proposes does not nullify the law but confirms it (3:31).”[2]

Paul then continues, “The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe” (3:22a, ESV). “Through faith in Jesus Christ” is taken as an objective genitive. Many commentators prefer a subjective genitive, which is “the righteousness of God through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ” (New English Translation). No matter whether it’s “through faith in Jesus Christ” or “through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ”, the important thing is that the gospel of the righteousness of God in Christ is a gift and a demand. It’s a gift because the gospel is freely given to us. It’s a demand because it requires a response. Paul adds, “for all who believe” (3:22b). “It is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (1:16). In order that the saving effects of that righteousness are available to us, we must believe.

Such believing involves participation: we participate in Christ’s death and resurrection (6:1-11). By nature, faith is participatory. To believe in Christ is to be united to Christ. Once we are united with Christ, we are imputed to God’s righteousness in Christ and continuous to cultivate a righteous living with the empowerment of the Spirit who is our sanctifying agent in the process of sanctification. Its end is eternal life (6:22).

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[1] Frank J. Matera, Romans. Paideia: Commentaries on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010), p. 41.

[2] Ibid., p. 97.

In Those Days

I am reading the Book of Ruth along with a Chinese commentary on Ruth. “In the days when the judges ruled…” indicates the background of the narrative. At the end of Judges, it says, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Judg. 21:25). People did things according to their own standards, meaning that there was no standard.

With this chaotic background, Ruth’s loyalty to Naomi is outstanding. After the death of Elimelech (Naomi’s husband) and her two sons, Mahlon and Chilion, in the country of Moab, Naomi sent her two daughters-in-law back to their homelands while she was planning to return to the land of Judah (1:1-14). Orpah left, but the text says, “But Ruth clung to her” (1:14). The verb “to cling” is used in Gen. 2:24: a man clings to his wife. The way Ruth clung to Naomi is like a man clinging to his wife. Such an intimate attachment made Ruth to abandon her old way of life and follow Naomi—“For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you” (1:16-17).

In the time of judges, it was rare to find such a loyalty in relationship. Israel failed to cling to God; God subjected them to nations to be punished. Israel cried out to God. God raised up judges to save them. Then there was peace among them for many years. Once they failed to cling to the Lord, the same cycle happened again and again. In those days there was no loyalty. Israel cried out to God not because of the covenant they made with God. They cried out because of self-centeredness. They cried out to God, but there was no glad obedience to God from Israel. Who wouldn’t cry out to God in the day of trouble? Who would call upon the name of the Lord in the day of prosperity? No matter what, Ruth clung to Naomi in those days.

To look at Ruth’s loyalty from a Christological perspective, her loyalty does foreshadow the loyalty of God towards humanity in Christ Jesus who died on the cross and was raised from dead to fulfill the salvation of God in spite of human sinfulness. God clings to us in Jesus. The cross demonstrates that attachment.

A Theological Crisis

In quietness, the psalmist allowed himself to make a diligent search (Ps. 77:6). When he started to search within himself honestly, the Spirit of God encountered his spirit. He asked a few questions in his spiritual search:

Will the Lord spurn forever, and never again be favorable?

Has his steadfast love forever ceased?

Are his promises at and end for all time?

Has God forgotten to be gracious?

Has he in anger shut up his compassion? (77: 7-9, ESV)

In the day of trouble, the psalmist questioned his belief. More specifically, he doubted his God. This is a theological crisis for the psalmist. His faith did not jump from quietness (77:6) to conviction—“Then I said, ‘I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.’” (77:10) Rather, from doubt to solid faith, he welcomed such a crisis by questioning what he truly believed and scrutinizing his own theological conviction. God is still God after being “investigated.” As Augustine said, “God longs to be longed after.” In this sense, I believe that God is ok with our rebellious search because God knows that we are in the journey: The Promised Land is ahead of the wilderness. With his promise “search and we will find,” we will move from disorder (doubt) to order (faith).

The psalmist confronted himself with these questions about God. He always articulated his faith in this language (e.g. his promises, his grace, compassion, etc…). How much did he truly believe and embrace? It’s necessary to revisit our religious jargons. We use it so often that we don’t usually mean it most of the time. We use it as if it were part of our system. We may be surprised how much we don’t believe and embrace when we search. But the good news is that when we start to search, we get to know God from where we actually are. We don’t start with where we think we are. God only meets us in reality. The doctrine of the incarnation confirms it.

Barnabas: Son of Encouragement

The sermon for today came from Acts 4:32-37. The pastor preached on this text with Barnabas as the focus. Sue and I both think that the pastor delivered a good sermon today. As a Levite, Barnabas’s original name was Joseph. But in 4:36, it says that he “was also called by the apostles Barnabas (which means son of encouragement).” In the literary context, we see that Luke purposefully places this brief summary of the early church in front of story of Ananias and Sapphire (5:1-11): Those who sold their possessions for the common good sets a sharp contrast with this couple who lied about their possessions. Among them, Barnabas “sold a field that belonged to him and brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet” (4:37). Sacrifice is one of the marks for Christian discipleship. The early Christians demonstrated this basic principle. We must give up something in order to follow Christ: “let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (Mk. 8:34). The early Christians took up their own crosses and followed the cross of Christ. Ananias and Sapphire failed to take up their cross. So they died for that cross. They lived, but they didn’t follow. Can we say that they merely existed in God’s sight?

After the conversion of Paul, he came to Jerusalem and attempted to join the disciples. But “they were afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple” (Acts 9:26). Who would believe that a prosecutor of the church would become a proclaimer for the church? The text says, “But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles…” (9:27). No one accepted Paul except this son of encouragement. Perhaps, Barnabas saw something unique in Paul. Or he believed that the worst sinner could be turned into an obedient saint by His grace. Barnabas took Paul. And later on, both Barnabas and Paul were sent off by the church at Antioch to do mission work (Acts 13:1-3). The result of Barnabas embracing Paul was that they became partners in ministry. Maybe there would be no Paul without Barnabas’s encouragement. Who knows whom God would use in our surrounding?

It is not enough with Barnabas’s encouragement alone. I believe that the reason why the disciples listened to Barnabas when he accepted and introduced Paul to them is that Barnabas had a good testimony among them. He earned their respect when he spoke. He backed up his talking; they respected his living. Who would trust someone who just talks aloud with no integrity, faithfulness, and commitment in life? If Ananias and Sapphire didn’t die in Acts 5, would the disciples believe this couple when they introduced and recommended Paul to them?

又要威，又要戴頭盔

(Taken from http://fishandhappiness.blogspot.com/2011/08/blog-post_05.html)

有一種人，挺不痛快的，就是心裏自視頗高，卻滿口謙遜之辭，希望別人欣賞自己之餘，又不會覺得自己驕傲。這種人，以我接觸過的人而言，是中國人多於歐美人士，而其中又以讀書人居多。對於這種人來說，最理想的形象是謙謙君子，但問題是，他們不是真正的謙謙君子，卻又想有謙謙君子的形象。

真正的謙謙君子接受孔子說的「如有周公之才之美，使驕且吝，其餘不足觀也已」，同時還做到「人不知而不慍」，因此，他們不但不會自以為高明，就是有自知的長處而不為人賞識，也能泰然自若。

那種只求有謙謙君子形象的人則不同了，他們自以為有過人之能（例如博學、有文才、思考力強），可是，人不知時，他們是會慍的。要有謙謙君子的形象，便不可以令人覺得露才揚己，但不露不揚，別人又怎有機會欣賞自己呢？他們的痛苦就在於此了：一方面要想方設法讓人知道自己了得，另一方面要保有謙謙君子的形象，但要拿捏得恰到好處卻又不容易，太過，便會被人指不夠謙虛，不及，則沒有令人佩服的效果；有時露得著跡了一點，事後會懊悔，恐怕謙謙君子的形象受損，有時太不著跡以致被人忽略，也會後悔，覺得錯失了一個被人讚賞的機會。說話寫文章這麼多思前想後，你說痛苦不痛苦？

這種人與其如此閃閃縮縮、諸多顧慮，倒不如坦白表達對自己的評價，痛痛快快說話寫文章，口出狂言也無妨，做人會快活一點；畢竟，那麼著意他們是否謙謙君子的，恐怕只有他們自己。

The Intimate Stranger

Psalm 77:5-6—“I consider the days of old, the years long ago. I said, ‘Let me remember my song in the night; let me meditate in my heart.’ Then my spirit made a diligent search:”

Either in national tragedy or personal disaster, the psalmist pondered what was going on and meditated contemplatively. It was at night. He couldn’t sleep. This Psalm paints a picture of solitude and silence. In the midst of it, we see the struggle of the psalmist. He struggled with God—“In the day of my trouble, I seek the Lord…my soul refuses to be comforted” (77:1-2). He also struggled with the inner person—“Let me meditate in my heart. Then my spirit made a diligent search” (77:6b).

Lauren F. Winner, assistant professor of Christian Spirituality at Duke Divinity School, wrote a book review on Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life by Richard Rohr (Jossey-Bass, 2011) in Christian Century (Vol. 128, No. 17, August 23, 2011).

An excerpt:

Rohr’s framework leans heavily on Carl Jung. The spiritual life has two stages. In the first half of life, you are devoted to establishing yourself; you focus on making a career and on finding friends and a partner; you are crafting your identity. Spiritually, people in the first half of life are often drawn to order, to religious routine. We are developing habits and letting ourselves be shaped by the norms and practices of our family and community.

Then—a crisis. “Some kind of falling,” Rohr says, is necessary for continued spiritual development. “Normally a job, fortune, or reputation has to be lost,” writes Rohr, “a death has to be suffered, a house has to be flooded, or a disease has to be endured.” The crisis can be devastating. The crisis undoes you. The flood doesn’t just flood your house—it washes out your spiritual life. What you thought you knew about living the spiritual life no longer suffices for the life you are living.

Rohr does not offer a syrupy evasion of this crisis. But he does underline two crucial points. First, God has not abandoned you, even if you are sure that God has…Second, “We grow spiritually much more by doing it wrong than by doing it right.” That may be cold comfort during the crisis—when your house has flooded, who wants to think about spiritual growth? But later you will notice. You will wonder how you possibly could have come to where you are without that flood.

As Rohr notes, it is written into the very life of Christ, how descended to the dead before he could be resurrected and ascent into heaven. The falling will happen—there is no way to avoid it. But the growth, the second half of life, doesn’t necessarily happen. You can stay stuck if you wish. You can refuse the second half.

If you welcome the second half of life, this is what you will find: you learn to hear “a deeper voice of God” than you heard before. “It will sound an awful lot like the voices of risk, of trust, of surrender, of soul, of ‘common sense,’ of destiny, of love, of an intimate stranger, of your deepest self.” You can hear this voice in the second half of life precisely because of all the work you did in the first half; your very self is now a container strong enough to hold the call of the intimate stranger.” (p. 39)

In the second of life, the psalmist learned to hear “the call of the intimate stranger” at night.

Deform.Transform

I am reading the Gospel of Mark with The Message this morning. In Mark 6, after feeding the 5, 000, the text says that “Jesus insisted that the disciples get in the boat and go on ahead across to Bethsaida…After sending them off, he climbed a mountain to pray.” He didn’t travel with them in the first place. He sent them off. He was in solitude instead. The storm hit late at night. The text descriptively says, “The boat was far out at sea.” In the middle of nowhere, the disciples fought and struggled with the nature. Jesus walked towards them on the sea. They got scared. Jesus comforted them. The wind calmed down. “They were stunned, shaking their heads, wondering what was going on. They didn’t understand what he had done at the supper. None of this had yet penetrated their hearts.”

Mark draws a statement here: “They didn’t understand what he had done at the supper. None of this had yet penetrated their hearts.” We are constantly exposed to a lot of things, such as graphics, images, concepts, noise, etc… What penetrates our hearts is what shapes us inwardly. Once it penetrates, it starts to be working in our hearts. Once an idol penetrates, it deforms us. When the Word of God penetrates, it forms, reforms, and transforms us.

I find it interesting that the miracle of feeding the 5, 000 just happened in front of the disciples, the whole incident did not affect their hearts at all. I believe that there is a reason why Mark’s Jesus started to discuss the source of pollution in chapter 7: “It’s what comes out of a person that pollutes…,” said Jesus.

Our Only Infallible Rule

Scripture is understood as the Word of God among Christians. I remember when I was in seminary, a professor said that almost all Christians say that the Bible is the Word of God, but how many of them read, study, re-read, and re-study the Word of God? This simple statement seems simple, but it caught my attention. Obviously, it still does.

“Knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was every produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Pet. 1:20-21, ESV) The Scriptures were written by humans as well as inspired and illuminated by the Spirit. The Scriptures came from God and yet were spoken from humans who were “carried along” or “moved” by the Spirit.

The Scriptures that we have in our hands are the inspired Word of God. They are sufficient and inerrant. They are “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” (2 Tim. 2:16b-17, ESV) Knowing Scripture as a whole is essential for Christian spirituality, maturity, and growth. Such knowledge of Scripture comes from hearing, learning, reading, studying, obeying, rereading, studying again, and obeying again and again. Most Christians are not equipped for good works because we are incompetent in many ways. We are not competent to do good works, such as training others in righteousness because we are rarely trained in righteousness.

Christian spirituality is Word-centered. Scripture is “our only infallible rule.”[1]

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[1] See Michael A. G. Haykin, The God who Draws Near: An Introduction to Biblical Spirituality (Webster: Evangelical Press, 2007), chapter 5.

切了七年洋葱: 作家.牧者

(Taken from http://arnoldii.wordpress.com/2011/08/03/小說家的人生歷練/)

切洋葱秘技　3/8/2011　關麗珊

【太陽】村上春樹常在散文提及他曾經營爵士酒吧七年，那是他跟妻子貸款開設的。由於必須歸還貸款，兩人從早到晚工作，包括入貨、切菜、計數和招呼客人等，起初是打烊後才寫小說的。我喜歡的作家大多有工作經驗的，比方說，中一在學校讀狄更斯的小說，看過英文簡易本，再到圖書館借各種中譯本。後來知道狄更斯苦讀成才，學習法律的背景讓他的小說有理性基礎，加上豐富的人生經驗，讓他對人有悲憫之情。馬奎斯是新聞工作者，他以魔幻寫實手法寫小說，不失現實寓意。本地作家劉以鬯當編輯，西西教書，他們未必以寫實手法創作，但作品不失實感。

有些學生以為成名要趁早，怕遲了來不痛快，沒有留意早慧作家一如流星，例如十七歲寫《日安，憂鬱》的沙岡，往後沒有更精彩的故事。村上春樹寫他切了七年洋葱，可以不流淚的切完洋葱，秘訣是「流淚前趕快切完」。這種語調跟他虛構的小說近似，因為有現實的領悟，虛構的領域才有種荒誕而實在的吸引力。我並非說所有作家都要有工作經驗，世上永遠有例外的，只是說學生不妨工作幾年才立志做作家，作家的年齡不是問題，抄襲、無聊和作狀才是寫作路上最大的障礙。我們永遠不怕太遲開始寫作，只怕作品寫得太差。

A Christian Mind

Jesus commands us to love the triune God with all our faculties: heart, soul, and mind (Matt. 22:37). Paul said to Timothy, “Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything” (2 Tim. 2:7). On the one hand, the Lord illuminates us to understand the truth. On the other hand, we must labor to know the truth. Christian mind is required for all disciples. In The Passionate Intellect: Christian Faith and the Discipleship of the Mind (Downers Grove: IVP Books, 2010), Alister McGrath notes:

We cannot love God without wanting to understand more about him. We are called upon to love God with our minds, as well as our hearts and souls (Matthew 22:37). We cannot allow Christ to reign in our hearts if he does not also guide our thinking. The discipleship of the mind is just as important as any other part of the process by which we grow in our faith and commitment. (p. 21)

We think about what we believe. We pursue it. We seek it until we are sought by God (See Gal. 4:9). Augustine encouraged us to think over what we believe and believe in thinking:

No one believes anything unless one first thought it believable…Everything that is believed is believed after being preceded by thought…Not everyone who thinks believes, since many think in order not to believe; but everyone who believes thinks, thinks in believing and believes in thinking. [Quoted by Robert Louis Wilken, The Spirit of Early Christian Thought: Seeking the Face of God (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), p. 164.]

Gratitude and Faith

Christian journey points to both directions: backward and forward. We look backward with gratitude; we look forward with faith. John Piper writes:

Gratitude embraces a person with glad affections for past goodwill aimed at helping us; and faith embraces a person with glad affection for future promises aimed at helping us.

Since every moment is the beginning of the rest of your life, and every moment is the end of the past, every moment should be governed by the glad affections of both gratitude and faith.[1]

When we look back, we say, “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life” (Ps. 23:6a). When we look forward, we say, “The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps” (Prov. 16:9). Gratitude affirms the goodness and providence of God in life. When Joseph looked back, he said to his brothers, “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good…” (Gen. 50:20a). The goodness and providence of God was shown in Joseph’s gratitude. When Joseph said that, it took him many years to draw such a theological conclusion.

“Without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Heb. 11:6). Those who seek the Lord will find. “You will seek me and find me. When you seek me with all your heart, I will be found by you, declares the Lord…” (Jer. 29:13-14a). Seeking God requires faith with all our hearts. It’s a promise with a condition. The promise is real and out there, for God does not and cannot lie (Num. 23:19; Heb. 6:18). However, we must claim it with earnestness.

Gratitude is one of the humblest affections; and faith is one of the boldest. Just think what kind of people we would be in the next year for the cause of Christ if we were continually humbled by our backward look of gratitude and continually emboldened by our forward look of faith! No, don’t just think about it. Pursue it—with all your mind and all your heart.[2]

The prepositional phrase for the cause of Christ sets the right tone for backward and forward looking. It also gives us a right motivation to pursue it.

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[1] John Piper, Life as a Vapor: Thirty-One Meditations for Your Faith (Sisters: Multnomah, 2004), p. 48.

[2] Ibid., p. 50.

Pray to Speak

The sermon for today came from Acts 4:23-31. Earnest prayer was one of the distinctive marks in the early church. Their reflex was to pray. In the midst of prosecution, they prayed. The religious leaders charged Peter and John not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus (Acts 4:18). After being threatened and released by the authorities, they went to the other believers , reported to them what happened, and prayed as one voice [voice: singular noun] for boldness to continue to speak the word of God (4:23-24, 29, 31).

In their prayer, they started the prayer with God’s own sovereignty: “Sovereign Lord…” (4:24) This group of early church believers prayed for boldness to speak the word in Jesus’ name. Their prayer was grounded in His sovereignty. Due to the reality of the resurrection, they were not filled with fear. They recognized the sovereignty of God in the midst of difficulty. The current circumstance did not overcome their sound theology. Or they did not yield to what they saw and allow the circumstance to distort their theological lens.

The pastor said that we can go to a seminar to learn the word of God. But we can’t learn how to speak the word of God with boldness from a seminar, for such boldness comes from the Spirit who works in our hearts. It comes from the heart—the center of our passion. We pray for boldness to speak the word in the name of Jesus. When we pray in order to speak and speak with prayer, the sovereign Lord will bring it to pass.

Discipleship Letters 41-42

Discipleship Letter 41                                                May 10, 2009

“And you should follow my example, just as I follow Christ’s” (1 Cor. 11:1).

“But it is essential not to confuse the person who introduced us to Christ, or helped us deepen our walk with him, with Christ himself. Without realizing what is happening, we can allow Christianity to be defined by a person—whereas in fact all that they did was to introduce Christ to us.” [Alister McGrath, Knowing Christ (New York: Galilee, 2002), p. 196.]

How do we introduce Christ to those who are mature or immature in Christ? Do we introduce Christ to others without commitment? Do we introduce Christ to others without moral conviction? Do we introduce Christ to others without consistency and honesty?

Often time we say that we aren’t good enough to introduce Christ to others. Accept it or not, we are inevitably introducing Christ to others. It’s not about doing, but being.

“But as for you, promote the kind of living that reflects right teaching…And we are instructed to turn from godless living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with self-control, right conduct, and devotion to God” (Titus 2:1, 12).

We introduce Christ to others with godly and right living.

Discipleship Letter 42                                                May 17, 2009

There are at least six steps in Jesus’ discipleship training. [Bill Hull, The Disciple-Making Pastor: Leading Others on the Journey of Faith. Revised and Expanded Edition (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2007), pp. 243-244.]

“Tell them what.”

“Tell them why.”

“Show them how.”

“Do it with them.”

“Let them do it.”

“Deploy them.”

Jesus taught his disciples about the kingdom message and ethics. Jesus taught them the kingdom content and the kingdom reason. God cannot use us to make disciples if we do not know about the what and the why.

Jesus told his disciples the what and the why, and then he helped them put the teaching into practice. It’s always a challenge to show them how. “Show them how” and “Do it with them” make us alert how much the what and the why become part of us, not external to us. Knowing about is pointless; knowing is the point.

“Let them do it”—“Too often multiplication falls apart here, because people are given too much too soon. There must be final testing, fine-tuning, and solid instructions to insure the integrity of what is multiplied.” (p. 254) I struggle at this stage.