Category Archives: Jesus

Meditation of my heart #1

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Oddly enough, the last year and a bit that I have spent at bible college has been the worst time for my personal bible reading and prayer times. Not that I don’t want to do these things, but my life seems to be so much busier than before college, and college work always seems to come before everything.
But I want desperately to change my priorities.

In an attempt to be better at holding myself accountable for this I am going to try to blog regularly about what I am reading and how it is affecting me. I hope you enjoy a sneak peek into my thoughts. My prayer for myself (and for you) is this –

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, LORD, my rock and my redeemer. Psalm 19:14

So I start today with 2 Corinthians 1.

Paul talks about a time when he was ‘completely overwhelmed’ (v8). Paul’s circumstances were so bad that he says ‘we personally had a death sentence within ourselves’.

It is fitting that I read this passage today because I feel completely overwhelmed by things at the moment too, although I have no right to complain when compared to Paul.


Paul gives us an incredible example of how to respond to these times in our life.

However we personally had a death sentence within ourselves so that we would not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead. (v9)

God raises the dead! Thats incredible! And this is who calls us to trust him. Why would we not trust a God who is powerfully enough to raise the dead?

He has delivered us from such a terrible death, and he will deliver us; we have placed our hope in him that he will deliver us again. (v10)

Chances are that I am not the only one feeling overwhelmed. Paul also encourages his friends to help him, and I can help my friends in the same way –

and you can join in helping with prayer for us, so that thanks may be given by many on our behalf for the gift that came to us through the prayers of many. (v11)


Want to live forever????

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Whenever someone I know goes though any kind of serious, or semi-serious, health issue it reminds me of how temporary this life is.


If someone offered you eternal life in a great new earth where death will no longer exist, and where grief, crying and pain will no longer exist, would you be interested???

Someone is offering this. Want it?? Here it is.

John Piper responds to N.T. Wright

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My first assessment for second year is due in one week. It is a 2000 word book review. The book I choose to review is ‘The Future of Justification’ by John Piper. 

If you haven’t heard of the book, it is a response to another well known and popular theologian, N.T. Wright. 

One of the things that has struck me the most as I read the book was how respectful Piper is in his critique of Wright’s work. Obviously he rights about an issue that they disagree on, never the less page 3 of the introduction says: 

Nicholas Thomas Wright is a British New Testament scholar and the Anglican Bishop of Durham, England. He is a remarkable bled of weighty academic scholarship, ecclesiastical leadership, ecumenical involvement, prophetic social engagement, popular Christian advocacy, musical talent and family commitment. As critical as this book is of Wright’s understanding of the gospel and justification, the seriousness and scope of the book is a testimony to the stature of his scholarship and the extent of his influence. I am thankful for his strong commitment to Scripture as his final authority, his defense and celebration of the resurrection of the Son of God, his vindication of the deity of Christ, his belief in the virgin birth of Jesus, his biblical disapproval of homosexual conduct, and the consistent way he presses us to see the big picture of God’s universal purpose for all peoples through the covenant with Abraham and more.

While Piper works hard to show the biblical errors in Wright’s views, he has humility as he does it. He speaks of Wright with great respect, knowing that while they may disagree they share a great unity through Christ.


Piper says this later in his introduction:

My little earthly life is too far spent to care much about the ego gratification of scoring points in debate. I am still a sinner depending on Christ for my gratification or regret. Among these greater things are faithful preaching of the gospel, the care of guilt-ridden souls, the spiritual power of sacrificial deeds of love, the root of humble Christian political and social engagement, and the courage of Christian missions to confront all the religions of the world with the supremecy of Christ as the only way to escape the wrath to come.

All too often I think we all forget that these things come so far in front of our need to score points and win the argument. We are puffed up by our sense of being right and forget our real status as sinners who have no knowledge or hope apart from the grace of God.  


And so I pray for us all the prayer Piper finishes his intro with:

May the Lord give us help in these days to see the word of his grace with clarity, and savour it with humble and holy zeal, and spread it without partiality so that millions may believe and be saved, to the praise of the glory of God’s grace. 

Amen.

The Importance of Hell

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Here is an interesting quote from an article by Tim Keller called The Importance of Hell



Hell is therefore a prison in which the doors are first locked from the inside by us and therefore are locked from the outside by God (Luke 16:26.) Every indication is that those doors continue to stay forever barred from the inside. Though every knee and tongue in hell knows that Jesus is Lord (Philippians 2:10-11,) no one can seek or want that Lordship without the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:3.This is why we can say that no one goes to hell who does not choose both to go and to stay there. What could be more fair than that?

Read the whole thing here

Wisdom from Calvin

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My exploration of the blogosphere in the last few days have lead me to discover the nasty side of life and the blogging world. I stumbled across some pages of people from the UK who harshly slander people across the world (by name) with very little truth or justification from what I can tell. It saddens me that these men profess faith in God, yet openly criticise anyone who suggests that the bible is God’s authority, in one post comparing a minister in a Sydney church to the taliban and a rabid dog.


As I sit and wonder what it would take to convince them of the truth of the bible, something I have recently read from Calvin comes to mind –

“But those who wish to prove to unbelievers that scripture is the Word of God are acting foolishly, for only by faith can this be known.”

And so I pray for these unbelievers, that God will give them faith that will lead them to truth, and that the truth they learn will set them free.

What is NT prophecy???

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Last week I was privileged to be able to be a part of a conference that teaches youth and children’s ministry leaders to write bible studies/talks for their groups. It was a great conference!

(see www.nextgen.kcc.org.au for more info)


One of the speakers for the week was Grant Retief, the minister of ‘The Bible Talks Student Church’ in Durban, South Africa. He spoke to us from John chapters 14 & 17. In one of the many Q & A’s I was able to hear Grant spoke about what he thought NT prophecy and tongues was. He said it much more elegantly than I can remember but his definition was something like ‘a prophetic insight of application of the scriptures, that may or may not be correct’. (I should clarify that he said prophecy is not less than this but could be more). He also commented that he thinks this happens in bible studies which set my brain to work thinking about the implication this has on woman leading mixed bible study groups.

Anyway the questions I have is what do you think NT prophecy is and how does that related to the woman & bible study issue??? Big question I know – but I would love your thoughts!