Tag: Bible

The Advance of God's Kingdom, Updated

~ fundyreformed

The Advance of God's Kingdom

About a year ago, I posted the pictures of a power point presentation my brother (Dave) had put together for a series of Sunday morning messages at his church. The series traces the covenants of Scripture and how they relate to the advance of God’s Kingdom. It is an excellent presentation and also serves as an excellent (albeit  simple)  introduction to covenantal theology (as opposed to dispensationalism).

Well lately I’ve received a few requests for the actual presentations themselves, rather than pictures of them, and so I updated the original post to include the power point files (which WordPress allows me to upload). The files actually take up much less memory than the pictures of each slide, and you are welcome to download them if you’d like.

Since I was updating the post, I thought I’d bring it back to the front page again as it really is one of my favorite posts of all time. If you’ve got the time, take a look at some of the presentations, just click on the picture above to go to that post.

“Alone with God” by Jason Janz

~ Bob Hayton ~ 3 Comments

I love blogging, and recently I have started experiencing some of the unique benefits that blogging brings. One of these is the occasional free book. Of course in return, we bloggers are expected to showcase the book with a raving review, hopefully.

One of the first free books I received is Alone with God [Greenville, SC: Journey Forth/BJU Press, 2006] written by Jason Janz the site publisher of Sharper Iron. Don’t worry, the review is going to be good, because this book is both unique and exceptional.

If you are like me, you struggle with a good routine, not to mention consistency, in your devotions. And I’m sure you have experienced times when you read your Bible and pray and yet don’t feel like you really encountered God at all. Jason’s book was written with you and I in mind, so don’t worry there is hope!

Now I’m sure you are also aware that no book will prove to be the panacea for all of our spiritual maladies. No single book, short of the Bible, contains the cure-all for every spiritual problem. And as Jason admits, books written to help readers have meaningful times with God are a dime a dozen these days.

But Alone with God is different. It is not a devotional guide, nor is it a mystical, new age, “fresh” approach. Rather it is designed to be a book that both encourages us to press for a real and sustained relationship with God and gives us a practical approach or plan to make it happen. It is the combination of these two aims which make the book so unique and so valuable.

Now, nothing magical or brilliant is necessarily offered within its pages. Jason believes we should be reading the Bible and praying and that this will be the absolutely indispensable means for us to know and commune with God. But Jason (an assistant pastor for 10 years) also knows a little bit about how people tick. And so his book contains just the right mix of “preaching” and encouragement along with a do-able plan so that the average person will be empowered to consistently have a meaningful time “alone with God” each day.

The book is so helpful, because it was born out of Jason’s need to help himself. He faced his own struggles with consistency and vitality in devotions—faced them and won. Jason’s plan draws from his experience at beginning a disciplined work-out and exercise routine. He has found that planning out each step of what he is going to do was immensely helpful. Then he applied a similar approach to his personal time with God. The result is a simple and organized plan which frees a person to experience a deep and meaningful relationship with God.

The book is basically an explanation of his practical approach to planning out his quiet times with God. At times it seems to simple. In all it is only 148 pages (thirty or so from the appendix section). But who needs something complicated when it comes to revamping your walk with God?

This book challenged me about the seriousness and importance of time with God. But it also encouraged me and provided real hope. Jason doesn’t push for Bible reading or memorization so much as he pushes for encountering and knowing God through the Word. He claims, “We are not simply seeking facts about God; we are seeking to know Him personally.” This focus weaves its way throughout the book and is one of its greatest strengths. Jason also includes a very helpful chapter on meditation, a practice which modern Christians have all but abandoned. Jason also goes out of his way to dispel many myths which surround a daily time with God.

The book, as I said, is not much more than an explanation of the plan, and so you will want to know more about that plan. Again, like the book it is fairly simple, but it draws from insights from George Mueller and others (the book includes a fascinating four page excerpt written by Mueller describing his own habit of meditating and praying from Scripture). Jason has also given a timeline for his plan to be used in either a 20 or 30 minute session. The best thing about the plan is that it’s flexible and includes variety. It should keep you awake and also engaged in the Word and in prayer. What more could we ask? What follows below is my own explanation of Jason’s approach. [I keep using “Jason’s” rather than “Janz’s” because I think its easier. Hope you don’t mind, Jason.]

  • Preparation — This step prepares your mind for time with God. It might be a brief prayer, worshipful song, or even a short reading form a Christian book or devotional.
  • Confession — This step includes a time of searching one’s heart to confess known sin. It may even just be a time to look over a list of sins that the book provides and seriously examine whether they are present in your life. It allows you to get sin out of the way and dealt with before a more intimate time with God ensues.
  • Revelation — This step is an intentional reading of the Bible with the goal of learning about God. It is the longer time of Bible reading that is included in the plan.
  • Adoration — This step is where you praise God intentionally. You may praise Him for the things you just learned about Him in your reading. Also the book provides lists of the names of God for you to ponder. Jason encourages a song of praise or thanksgiving to be sung.
  • Transformation — This step is an interactive reading of a passage of Scripture, primarily from Psalms or Proverbs. It is a time for reading slowly and praying back to God or meditating over and rejoicing in each line or thought that you read. This method will prove to be worth the time it takes to learn. This is when God is speaking to you and you to him in a very personal and transforming way.
  • Communication — This step is for personal and intercessory prayer—praying for needs. It includes a time of casting your cares on God intentionally and may include a time of claiming one of God’s promises.
  • Meditation — This step is where you actually write down what God has taught you and recording a verse or thought from your Bible readings which you will try to meditate on throughout the day.
  • Application — This step includes more journaling. You are to write down what God has told you to do, or what you plan to change because of this time with God. You may also journal other insights during this time.

I would encourage you to get this book and read it. There is a companion journal available to purchase in conjunction with the book. Amazon even offers a deal when you buy both. The book certainly has helped put a fire in my heart again to really and truly know God personally each day. I want to be “alone with God”, and this book can help me actually do so by giving me a simple plan to aim for each day. With God’s help I intend to follow this plan for the remainder of this year (at least).

Before you go, you may be interested in reading Jason’s own review of his book. It includes his reasons for writing it.

Disclaimer: this book was provided by the publisher for review. The reviewer was under no obligation to provide a positive review.

This book is available for purchase at the following sites: Amazon.com or direct from BJU Press.

Storms, Sleepers, and Substitutes–Jonah As a Type of Christ

~ fundyreformed ~ 4 Comments

I have finally started listening to the sermons from Desiring God’s recent conference (I blogged about that here). Well, toward the end of Tim Keller’s message he mentioned a parallel between Christ and Jonah I had never before considered. I thought it was a great example of the typographical element so often found in OT Scripture. The OT Scriptures are not written in a vacuum, but rather are part of an overarching scheme of a history of Redemption.

Jonah was asleep during a great storm which put the lives of the  ship’s crew in danger of destruction. He had to be awakened, and was rebuked for not caring about the potential  danger to everyone’s lives. Jonah was appointed by God as being the cause of the storm (through the use of lots), and Jonah owned up to his guilt. Jonah then asked to be thrown overboard since this would stop the storm. The sailors tried to make it on their own, but ultimately came to trust in Jonah’s offer as a last result. They threw him overboard and were gloriously saved from their terrible predicament. Destruction was averted.

Jesus, too was asleep in a great storm (Mark 4), during which the lives of the disciples, who were piloting the ship, were in danger of destruction. He had to be awakened, and was rebuked for not caring for his disciples’ plight. Jesus then calmed the storm, and miraculously the danger was averted.

Ah, but the parallel is more than this. Jesus was ultimately sacrificed, just like Jonah, to save the lives of all from complete destruction. And while Jonah was legitimately guilty, Jesus took on himself our guilt. Jesus took our destruction that we might be spared. The words of Psalm 69:1-2 (which  psalm is applied by Jesus to himself and his ministry in the New Testament)  were true of Jesus as he hung on the cross:

Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me.

This picture does much to convey the wonder of the gospel. And I do not think that the parallel to Jonah’s situation from the events in Mark 4 is a stretch. I believe it was intended to point us back to that picture from Jonah’s life. In so doing we see the great terror that Jesus saved us from. We comprehend with great clarity the substitutionary death of Christ on our behalf. And we can see that God’s wrath for our sin was placed on Him. Indeed, Jesus drew the parallel between the duration of time Jonah spent under the water and inside the whale with the time Jesus would spend in the belly of the earth in death’s fast hold.

To make clear to all that this is not a recent innovation by myself leaning on Tim Keller, let me provide a couple quotes from older  commentaries which bring attention to this point.

“Herein Jonah is a type of Messiah, the one man who offered Himself to die, in order to allay the stormy flood of God’s wrath (compare Ps 69:1,2, as to Messiah), which otherwise must have engulfed all other men.”

[Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary on verse 12, online here.]

“The reason he gives is, For I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you. See how ready Jonah is to take all the guilt upon himself, and to look upon all the trouble as theirs: “It is purely for my sake, who have sinned, that this tempest is upon you; therefore cast me forth into the sea; for,” 1. “I deserve it. I have wickedly departed from my God, and it is upon my account that he is angry with you. Surely I am unworthy to breathe in that air which for my sake has been hurried with winds, to live in that ship which for my sake has been thus tossed. Cast me into the sea after the wares which for my sake you have thrown into it. Drowning is too good for me; a single death is punishment too little for such a complicated offence.” 2. “Therefore there is no way of having the sea calm. If it is I that have raised the storm, it is not casting the wares into the sea that will lay it again; no, you must cast me thither.” When conscience is awakened, and a storm raised there, nothing will turn it into a calm but parting with the sin that occasioned the disturbance, and abandoning that. It is not parting with our money that will pacify conscience; no, it is the Jonah that be thrown overboard. Jonah is herein a type of Christ, that he gives his life a ransom for many; but with this material difference, that the storm Jonah gave himself up to still was of his own raising, but that storm which Christ gave himself up to still was of our raising. Yet, as Jonah delivered himself up to be cast into a raging sea that it might be calm, so did our Lord Jesus, when he died that we might live.”

[Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 1:12, online here.]

A Few More Points: I forgot to mention a few other parallels.    First, Jonah did not just jump in, instead he told the sailors a saving “gospel” message: throw me in and you’ll live. Then, the sailors refused to heed the message at first, and tried to save themselves from the storm. This parallels the fact that the lost often try to atone for their own sin or to work their way to heaven. Thirdly, just before the sailors finally sacrifice Jonah, they declare they are innocent of his blood. This parallels Pilate’s declaration that he was innocent of the blood of Jesus, and the Jews’ declaration that they wanted to be guilty of his blood. Pilate and the Jews, however, were guilty of the blood, while the sailors were actually innocent of Jonah’s blood. Fourthly, a parallel could be given in that Jonah did not excuse his sin or offer any defense, and likewise Jesus willingly took our sin, not offering a defense of his own innocence. There are probably more, and for some of these I drew from JFB and Henry and possibly other commentaries.

The Glorious God behind the Story of Esther

~ fundyreformed ~ 1 Comment

The only book of the Bible to not mention God at all is Esther. This feature has led to some canonical questions concerning the book. Yet, perhaps no book so clearly shows the hand of God in the background of the story.

Nathan Pitchford in a recent post on Esther, points out the many things God did to prevent the destruction of His people so that He might still bring the Messiah, Jesus Christ into the world. Nathan makes many helpful observations and even presents a picture of Christ as seen from the book. One important point he makes is this: since God is at work behind the scenes (and only “behind the scenes”)  in accomplishing His purposes in the story of Esther, we can draw encouragement and trust that God is at work behind the scenes in our own lives to bring to completion that great work He has begun in us.

Beyond an excellent example of a redemptive, historical, hermeneutical approach to the book of Esther, Nathan gives us a feast for our souls. He takes the many intricacies of the story of Esther and paints a glorious and stunning picture of our great sovereign God and His Son, Jesus Christ.

I encourage you all to read Nathan’s post, but I want to quote two paragraphs of it below, to whet your appetite.

We see the immutability of God’s purpose to accomplish the coming of Christ from the seed of the Jews in two circumstances: the first is how he sovereignly effects the minutest details of history to preserve the line from which he should come. Consider how many incidents he brings about for the preservation of the Messianic line: first, he causes King Ahasuerus, in whose pleasure resides the fate of the Jews (in an earthly sense), to become angry against his queen. Then he causes Esther, who is of Jewish seed (although unbeknownst to him) to find favor in his eyes. Then he provides for Esther the godly counsel she needs in the person of Mordecai, her cousin. Next, he reveals a plot against the king to this same Mordecai, and gives him the opportunity and desire to report the plot and deliver the king from the potential assassins. He causes Haman, the next in power to the king, to be angry with Mordecai, and with the Jews in general; he causes Haman, through the use of lots, to mark a certain day for the destruction of the Jews; he gives Esther the counsel and the courage to seek an audience with the king; he gives the king a favorable reception to this brazen request for an audience; he allows Esther such trepidation that she is unable to ask for her true request, and causes her instead to prepare a feast for Ahasuerus and Haman; he gives Haman the false sense of flattery, that he alone was invited to Queen Esther’s feast; and he does the same thing a second time, so that Haman is emboldened to construct a gallows for Mordecai; he causes the king, on the night before the second feast, to be smitten with insomnia, so that the chronicles of the kingdom should be read to him, so as to put him to sleep; he causes that very portion of the chronicles to be read which speak of Mordecai’s heroic saving of the king from the assassins; he leads the king to desire to honor him who saved his life; he causes him to seek counsel how to honor him from Haman; he stirs up Haman to think that the king wishes to honor himself; he instructs Haman of a method by which true honor might be shown to him who is worthy; he causes the king to command Haman himself to carry out this true honor for Mordecai, whom he hates; he gives Esther boldness, at the proper time, to declare to the king Haman’s wickedness; he causes Haman to fear, and to fall upon the bed of Esther in seeking her mercy; he causes the king to find him in this position; he stirs up anger in the king, at the false supposition that Haman is attempting to force Esther in the king’s own house; he gives Ahasuerus the heart to grant Esther’s request to overturn the intention of wicked Haman; he brings to the king’s attention the gallows of Haman, and gives him the desire to have Haman hanged on the gallows he built for Mordecai; he gives the Jews a mighty victory out of what should have been their annihilation, from the counter decree of Ahasuerus. He brings to his people a feast of celebration out of the sorrow of defeat; and finally, he causes Haman’s own sons to be hanged upon the gallows of their father, while the Jews celebrate their victory. It is simply staggering to consider how many tiny details God worked together for the salvation of his people.

The second notable circumstance is how God accomplished this great orchestration, as it were, behind the scenes. In no place at all is the name of God mentioned in the book of Esther. And yet, even when he is not seen, God is sovereignly and mightily at work to effect his great plan. How comforting is this reality to all who are his! God truly does cause “all things to work together for good to them that love him” (Romans 8:28)! And more comforting yet is the reality that the purpose for which he is exercising this minute and staggering sovereignty is nothing other than to bring Christ into the world. Christ alone is the good that God has purposed to bring about for his children, through every circumstance. The effect of God’s great control over history is that “nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:39). Oh Christian, do you despair at the manifold trials which attend the insignificant details of your life? Rejoice, for God is at work, even when you cannot see him; and he is at work to bring to you Christ, your only hope of glory and eternal satisfaction! [Read the whole article here.]

Redemptive Historical Interpretation Compared to the Dispensational Hermeneutic

~ fundyreformed ~ 2 Comments

I came across an excellent article on Triablogue by Evan May entitled “The Redemptive-Historical Hermeneutic vs. The Foreign-Eschatological Hermeneutic” (HT: Doxoblogy). The article does a good job explaining redemptive historical hermeneutics to a dispensational commentor. I will quote a few points he makes here, and then refer you to read the article–it will help you understand reformed hermeneutics and will be well worth your time (it is not that long of a read, actually).

1. The Pendulum swings both ways. The Covenantal hermeneutic interprets the Old Testament in light of the New testament. The Dispensational hermeneutic interprets the New in light of the Old. Both camps must defend their hermeneutical methods. We don’t simply assume a Dispensational hermeneutic until we find something better….

3. Much of the Covenantal hermeneutic isn’t so much “the way NT authors used the OT,” but simply being fair to a text in its own context. Dispensationalists habitually rip OT prophecies from their redemptive-historical context and force them into a foreign eschatological context. It’s almost as if Dispensationalists believe that the prophets couldn’t find a topic to speak about: one moment they’re talking about restoration from the exile; the next moment they’re talking about folks disappearing out of their clothes on an airplane….

5. But, it must be noted that the Covenantal hermeneutic is not some knee-jerk, arbitrary dogma of “spiritualize any Old Testament prophecy whatsoever.” Rather, we deal with texts on their own merit. We want to be fair to what the text itself states, and we exegete them on a case-by-case basis (and for this reason, I am glad that Bobby posed a text rather than simply speaking generically)…. [Read the whole article.]