Chasing Crowns

Watch out

2006-07-17T09:17:00.000-07:00

Pardon me for my extended absence. I hope this entry signals my return to consistent blogging.

That said, it's time to comment on the unrest in the Middle East. As we watch rockets, bombs, missiles and bullets rain down in Israel and Lebanon, stocks are plummeting and oil prices are rising. People are scared because of this intense and seemingly overnight escalation of open war in the heart of the world, the cradle of civilization, but do not forget . . . We have been told it is coming.

This is just another event in a series of events that paving the way for Antichrist to sign the peace treaty with Israel that will usher in the final seven years of tribulation -- and after that the judgment.

So Christian, I urge you to not be ignorant of the end time prophecies. Why? There are two reasons:

1. So that you may know the power and preeminence of God who has ordained all things and been merciful to show us what is to come
2. So that you may give an accounting of your faith to those who ask -- in other words use this to spread the gospel. How odd we will seem when we are at peace when the world is in turmoil. Show them the peace we have in Christ, the Alpha and Omega!!

Unashamed

2006-05-11T10:34:00.000-07:00

Hebrews 11:16 -- "Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city."

Would that God could say this about me. This one verse may be the highest calling of a Christian's life. O, to be put in the company of these Old Testament saints who believed God and their belief was credited to them as righteousness!! They did not even have the gospel nor did they live in the time of Christ; they knew God. They spoke with Yahweh and they had visits from angels, and they brought down the law and they ruled Israel and they fought the enemies of the Lord.

These are men worthy of imitation.

It is as Piper said, we do not serve God because He needs help' we serve Him out of a deep love for Him, a love in which we are satisfied in Him. That comes through introducing other people to this God in whom we are so in love with. Just as we want everyone to know who our wife or husband is, how much more should we be desiring to tell others of the God of the universe who died that we might live with Him -- and why? Not for our sake, but for His!!

Hebrews 12:28-29 -- "Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire."

Idols

2006-05-08T10:18:00.000-07:00

Who but the Lord, jealous for His name and His glory, could have spoken so truly about imposter gods. I can hear you thinking, "What do you mean?" Well, I'm glad you asked. Look at Isaiah 44:16-20 -->

"Half of the wood he burns in the fire; over it he prepares his meal, he roasts his meat and eats his fill. He also warms himself and says, 'Ah! I am warm; I see the fire.' From the rest he makes a god, his idol; he bows down to it and worships. He prays to it and says, 'Save me; you are my god.' They know nothing, they understand nothing; their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see, and their minds closed so they cannot understand. No one stops to think, no one has the knowledge or understanding to say, 'Half of it I used for fuel; I even baked bread over its coals, I roasted meat and I ate. Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left? Shall I bow down to a block of wood?' He feeds on ashes, a deluded heart misleads him; he cannot save himself, or say, 'Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?'"

What a great God we have who leaves no room fro interpretation here. God the Almighty, Yahweh, explains the futility of idols and the truth in the law, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me," and "Thou shalt not make for thyself an idol." (Ex. 20:3-4)

We may not make idols from wood or precious metals in America, but we do idolize things. Is this any better? I say with Paul, may it never be. Think with me about what you place above God. Is it your family, your job, TV, the internet, sex, religion . . . ? They are no different from a wooden statue except in physical form.

I preach to myself, but I would ask you to inventory your life that you may see what or whom sits on God's throne, who is first in your heart.

Who has instructed the LORD?

2006-04-26T11:22:00.000-07:00

"Who has understood the mind of the LORD, or instructed Him as counselor? Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him, and who taught Him the right way? Who was it that taught Him knowledge or showed Him the path of understanding?" -- Isaiah 40:12-14

How humbled and confounded I am by these verses. YAHWEH has said this about Himself. He asks His people to come up with an answer. Of course, the question is rhetorical in the negative, but our LORD asks it to prove a point. He is the I AM WHO I AM.

"Who was it that taught Him?" No one!! Why? One reason is because no one was there to teach Him. He is the ever-existent. Try just for a minute to wrap your mind around the fact that God never had a beginning. If you get anywhere with that, let me know.

Even science admits they have no idea what came before the Big Bang or where that initial matter came from. It's called the argument of infinite regression. They cannot explain the true beginning, and there is only one reason. It is beyond science. It is YAHWEH.

Oh how God must repeat these lines to today's scientific and liberal communities. How it must grieve Him to watch brilliant minds miss the point while boasting in their own faulty knowledge, and woe to them for leading others astray.

YAHWEH, the I AM WHO I AM shows His true nature here to Isaiah with a series of rhetorical questions just as he did to Job as recorded in Job 38-41. Read them and be humbled. I cry out in my smallness and praise God who has seen fit, for a reason that is to me as inexplicable as His existence, to deflect His wrath to Himself so I can enjoy Him forever.

Ah, the jealousy of God for His own glory. He has not saved me for my sake. He has saved me because in doing so, His glory is put on display. To think that God saved me for my sake is blasphemy. What worth do I have that God would pardon my eternal sin debt? None!! He did it because it glorified His name, and in so doing, He allows me to find true joy in Him and Him alone, forever glorifying His name . . . YAHWEH.

Lift up your voice

2006-04-24T09:28:00.000-07:00

This passage is from my reading this morning:

"You who bring good tidings to Zion, go up on a high mountain. You who bring good tidings to Jerusalem, lift up your voice with a shout, lift it up, do not be afraid; say to the towns of Judah, 'Here is your God!'

See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power, and his arm rules for him. See, his reward is with him, and his recompense accompanies him.

He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young." (Isaiah 40:9-11)

God, through Isaiah, is addressing Israel's return from Babylonian captivity, but in the church age, we are called to the same mission in anticipation of being restored, not to the promised land in Caanan, but to the promised new heavens and new earth. What a blessing to be called on by the Lord to lift up our voices and say to the nations "Behold your God!"

Behold Your God!!

2006-04-24T08:44:00.000-07:00

Our God is in the heavens

2006-04-18T10:44:00.000-07:00

"But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases." --Psalm 115:3

After the Passover meal, the people of Israel would sing hymns. Those hymns are recorded in Psalm 113 - 118. As I read these hymns of praise to the God who delivered them from Egypt, this one line stuck out.

How the psalmist glorified in our God!! "But our God is in the heavens," he declared. Why make such a declaration? Because all other gods are not. They are confined to their temples, dead, mute and impotent idols fashioned from wood and precious metals. But not our God. He is in the heavens.

"He does whatever He pleases!" Our God is not limited. He is the omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent God.

And this God who does whatever He pleases, what does it please Him to do? It pleases Him to condescend, to serve, to make a way at great cost to Him for us to enter into His presence. In short it pleases Him for His creation to delight in Him.

How, Christian, does this redefine your identity? How does it make you feel to know that your delighting in His glory pleases Him who can do whatever he pleases.

To Him be glory and honor forever and ever. Amen

Easter Sunday

2006-04-16T20:14:00.000-07:00

Musings:

Absense makes the heart grow fonder
But gone too long, then fond no longer
It seems our stony heart grows stronger 3
And we have forgotten.

Spinning on this tiny rock
Round and round, our lives we plot
Friends we made and then we lost
To time's eternal cavern

But only One remains consistent
And to Him we are resistant
Dead to sin, we lack existance
Unless He first pursues us.

Ceaselessly He toiled on earth
Forsaking Heaven's eternal mirth
Giving us eternal worth
By seeking then to woo us.

Then deep within, our spirit quakes
Showing us our desparate state
And we cannot sin's power break
Unless to ourselves we die.

Then to Glory we awaken
The world by God's grace is shaken
One day to Heaven we'll be taken
Nevermore to cry.

Good Friday

2006-04-14T13:49:00.000-07:00

Today I give you a simple transcription of one of Martin Luther's hymns. I pray it touches your soul as it did mine.

In devil's dungeon chained I lay
The pangs of death swept o're me.
My sin devoured me night and day
In which my mother bore me.
My anguish ever grew more rife,
I took no pleasure in my life
And sin had made me crazy.

Then was the Father troubled sore
To see me ever languish.
The Everlasting Pity swore
To save me from my anguish.
He turned to me His Father heart
And chose himself a bitter part
His dearest did it cost Him.

Thus spoke the Son, "Hold thou to me,
From now on wilt thou make it.
I gave my very life from thee
And for thee will I stake it.
For I am thine and thou art mine,
And where I am our lives entwine,
The Old Fiend cannot shake it."

Passover

2006-04-13T06:40:00.000-07:00

Today I offer up two thoughts, one stemming from the other, but still different enough to be separated. The first I might elaborate on tomorrow, and the second is an insight into the Lord's Supper that I had not seen before. How glorious is God to continually reveal Himself in His Word. I hope you take as much joy from it as I have.

1. How great is God and how merciful to plan the deliverance of the world on the same days He delivered His people Israel from Egypt. For most non-Jews, this may be lost. The significance of Passover may end with the first part of Matt. 26:2 when Jesus says, "As you know, Passover is two days away," but the second half of the verse is not to be separated from the first, "And the Son of Man will be handed over to be crucified."

These are not separate statements. There is meaning in the timing. The first deliverance was a temporal one and limited to His people Israel. The second and final is eternal and encompasses the entire church.

2. As Jesus and his disciples were keeping the Passover feast as commanded by God through Moses at Succoth, he instituted another sacred meal. We know it as the Lord's Supper or Communion. After breaking bread and lifting the cup, our Lord made ended with a promise outstanding in its scope and meaning. Christ said, "I tell you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father's kingdom." (Matt. 26:29)

Since we pray, "Thy Kingdom come," we can only assume Christ is referring to the millennial kingdom to be established after judgment when all of His redeemed are gathered with Him. As we partake of the cup on earth, how great it is to look forward to that time when all will be set right.

When the anticipation is fulfilled and we all are gathered around the Father, God the Son Will at last lift His glass in toast and in triumph.

Let us not be silent

2006-04-12T11:27:00.000-07:00

Is America’s rebellion any different than Israel’s? This is what the LORD said this Isaiah, “These are rebellious people deceitful, children, children unwilling to listen to the LORD’s instruction. They say to seers, ‘See no more visions,’ and to the prophets, ‘Give us no more visions of what is right! Tell us pleasant things, prophecy illusions. Leave this way’ get off this path, and stop confronting us with the Holy One of Israel.’” (Is. 30:9-11)

Has America, not said the same thing? Of course we do not call on “seers” or “prophets” to be silent, but those who “Have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity” (Rom. 1:29) rail against those who would have God known in public. They may not attack a church outright, but they use the courts and sway public opinion to have every vestige of God removed from public view.

So what does God say will happen to His people Israel who have rejected His Word and instruction? “Because you despise this word and trust in oppression and perverseness and rely on them, therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach in a high wall, bulging out, and about to collapse, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant; and its breaking is like that of a potter's vessel that is smashed so ruthlessly that among its fragments not a shard is found with which to take fire from the hearth, or to dip up water out of the cistern.” (Is. 30:12-14)

Ahh . . . but grace!! “Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you. He rises to show you compassion. For the LORD is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for Him.” (Is. 30:18)

And in the light of God’s coming judgment on the earth, should we be quiet. Should we restrain our voices from speaking the truth about what is to come and the grace provided as a way of escape? May it never be!! Instead let us be as Isaiah who spoke the Word of God in unpopular times.

Anticipation

2006-04-11T12:31:00.000-07:00

How Christ's heart must be bursting to give us our inheritance!! We as imperfect people tremble with joy and anticipation when we give a gift to a loved one, right? Guys, remember when you presented your engagement ring to your girlfriend? You weren't in it for your glory, you wanted to do it to see her eyes tear up with joy.

How much more then must the church's bridegroom be chomping at the bit to reveal Himself to us and bestow on us the new heaven, new earth and our crowns of reward?! And when we receive them as the redeemed and hear "Well done my good and faithful servant" how our hearts will burst. How great to stretch out your arms and throw back your head as you bask in the glory of Christ and sing, "Glory to God in the highest and to the Lamb."

Will we do this because we are proud of our crowns or because we think we deserve the new heaven and new earth? I say with Paul, "May it never be!!!" It will be out of pure joy for God's glory alone. Forever.

Welcome

2006-04-11T11:37:00.000-07:00

Following in others' cyber footsteps, I've decided to open up a forum to throw out my daily (maybe) reflections on God and His Word. It is my prayer that this site will stimulate growth in the body of Christ, and spur conversation among its members.

Join me in digging as deep as possible into who Christ is and how we can bring Him glory.