Romans 5:15-21 May 18, 2008

15But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for^(A) many. 16And the free gift is not like the result of that one man’s sin. For^(B) the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought^(C) justification. 17For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness^(D) reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.

18Therefore, as one trespass^[a] led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness^[b] leads to justification and life for^(E) all men. 19For as by the one man’s^(F) disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s^(G) obedience the many will be made righteous. 20Now^(H) the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased,^(I) grace abounded all the more, 21so that,^(J) as sin reigned in death,^(K) grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Something I heard yesterday May 15, 2008

Yesterday, while working, I listened to a message by Rob Bell on Philippians 2:1-2 called “One Mind” (click here to download the mp3 :: click here to view the past 12 sermons from Mars Hill Church).

The talk was very interesting and certainly kept my attention. Rob even played highlight films of Larry Bird (a great basketball player from when I was a kid).

At one point during the talk — and I think you could reasonably say that this is the thesis of the message — Rob makes this statement:

“What if the cross was God’s way of asking, ‘What do I have to do for you to get along?’ ?”

At first I thought, “Wow, that’s powerful.”

But then, the more I thought about it, the more my eye brows went up…

what do you think?

A REALLY, REALLY strong book endorsement April 4, 2008

JDGreear from the Summit Church in Durham, NC, has a post titled “The Book Besides the Bible to Take If You Get Stranded On An Island”.

He begins like this:

G. K. Chesterton was once asked what one book he’d take if he were stranded on an island. He said a book about shipbuilding.

Other than that, and the Bible… this is what I’d suggest you take: Tim Keller’s new The Reason for God.
If you read one book in your LIFETIME, THIS SHOULD BE IT. I know this sounds like I’m exaggerating, but this really is the absolute best book I’ve ever read at interpreting the Gospel for our culture.

He later goes on to write:

One depressing thing about reading this book is I realize how little many “evangelical” churches preach the actual Gospel (seems to me). I’m thinking even of those places that have high “conversion” numbers. People are moved to pray salvation, come-to-Jesus prayers and get baptized, but you don’t see a people falling in love with Jesus…

Ummm… yeah. I just said almost the exact same thing at Bible study Wednesday.

I believe I have identified that next book I’ll be looking to get.

Another great start to the day… April 4, 2008

I noticed this scripture in Acts 13 for this first time this morning:

(3 Let it be known to you therefore, brothers,^(CL) that through this man^(CM) forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, (39) and by him^(CN) everyone who believes is freed^[c] from everything^(CO) from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses.

Morning off to a good start… April 3, 2008

This was in my view at 6:30 this morning…

Who Was I? February 20, 2008

I spent some time looking at the Scripture this morning for the first time in several days. It’s so easy to let that piece of my day get away when I get busy. Somehow the logic goes, “I have to work 10 hours today so I need my extra sleep so that I can have a good attitude and be a good witness to the people I’ll work with.”

And there’s some wisdom in that. But not when it’s the usual case. My soul can’t survive long without meditating on God. No one’s can, I believe.

This morning, I decided to wait until I got to work to get into the Word, so that the drive in could wake me up a little bit. When I got here, I realized that I don’t have my Bible, so I used BibleGateway instead. I haven’t used that site for much in a while, but they have really made it useful!

So this morning, I was read Acts 11, and a line really jumped off the page. The context is that Peter is getting a bunch of crap from the religious people because he spent time with, and ate with non-Jews. Basically, these were the bloggers/watchdogs/jealous wannabe ministry guys who chose to criticize Peter for what God did through him because they were jealous that He didn’t use them instead. (The amount of time that is spent each week writing blog posts criticizing Mark Driscoll really comes to mind here)

In verse 17, Peter is in the middle of giving his defense, and he asks, “Who was I that I could stand in God’s way?”

Let that question sink in for a minute.

Let me tell you what it means to me.

Goals for 2008: Think Big January 8, 2008

So, as I mentioned before, I’m going through the ‘10 Questions For the New Year‘, and this is number 2:

Question: What’s the most humanly impossible thing you will ask God for this year?

Answer:

Wow! Good question. Note that it says ‘humanly’, because with God, all things are possible.

Honestly, I need to pray more about this. So my answer here is sort of tentative, but two things come to mind:

My sister and her family - I’ve written before about my sister Jennifer. Her and her husband, Moses, are trying to raise 5 kids in the very pricey southern Californian economy with very little income. Her story is amazing, and I believe that God is just getting started with her and that family. But they really struggle. Financially and spiritually. And I feel really helpless being so far away. I dream of what this year would be like if they lived 10 miles away, but they live 2,600 miles away. So, I want to ask God to explode in their world. Of course, that isn’t very measurable, so I want to pray about a better way to put that… but there’s one that I’ll continue to prayerfully flesh out.

Raise global awareness in my church - God is doing amazing things at our church. Amazing! I have never been more excited about ‘church’ in my whole life. But I want us to see outside the walls of our building, and outside the walls of our country. And I want our community to see how incredibly wealthy we are. I want people to spend their time/money with opportunity cost in mind. I want people to spend their $50 a month on cable with the understanding that it could provide for all the needs of two kids for a month — two kids who might die without it…

I’m not sure how to approach this one either, but I’m praying about trusting God to rally our body to dig three wells in Africa this year. And I don’t just want to raise the money, I want to really and truly rally people. And I don’t want the money to come out of tithes… I want it to be sacrificial.

I’m still praying about this one, and I’m open to any ideas…

Goals for 2008: First things first January 4, 2008

(For those waiting for the followup to the ‘Describe Your Ideal Church’ discussion, don’t despair… I’m not blowing it off. I am reading a book about William Wilburforce that seems quite appropriate to the topic, and I want to finish it before I move on…)

In the meantime, I’m jumping on the bandwagon of people who are posting their goals/resolutions on their blogs. I hesitate to because it’s so cliche, and yet it’s so useful.

• For one thing, simply writing down my goals forces me to have some, and also to identify them.
• For another, this provides a (tiny) bit of accountability, and hopefully you (Mr./Mrs. readers will continually challenge me with regard to these).
• Lastly, I believe that one of the main purposes of community is to create momentum, and I want a momentum towards a life that will count in eternity.

So, having said all that — yesterday, I stumbled across this great list of “questions to ask yourself on new years or on your birthday” that I’m going to use to identify my goals. Since there are a lot of good questions, and since one of my less serious goals is to blog less frequently but more faithfully, I’ll just pick one or two at a time.

I would love it if you want to followup and tell me your answer to these questions too! I believe when they’re all listed, I’ll move them over to a separate page here so that we can look back on them throughout the year.

Ok. Ready? Here we go…

Question 1) What’s one thing you can do this year to increase your enjoyment of God?

Sidenote: see why we’re doing these one at a time? :0)

Answer:

2007 has been incredibly jam-packed. We got married, Katie and Anthony got married, we worked at a church, we bought a house (which meant moving twice), I got a lot more responsibility at work….