Just Do Something: Part 2

Part 1 of this serialized interview with Kevin DeYoung’s book, Just Do Something, is here.

Q: Why do we have difficulty discovering God’s wonderful plan for our lives?
A: If the truth be told, God doesn’t really intend to tell us what it is.

Q: Does God not have a specific plan for our lives?
A: Yes, He does.

Q: Does God expect us to figure this plan out before we do anything?
A: No.

Q: Are you saying that God won’t help me make decisions?
A: No, God does help us. This is called wisdom.

Q: Doesn’t God care about my future?
A: He does.

Q: Is God not directing my path?
A: Yes, He  does. I believe in providence.

Q: Why are many Christians desperate to find out God’s plan for their lives?

A: 5 reasons:

1. We want to please God.
2. Some of us are timid.
3. We want perfect fufillment.
4. We have too many choices.
5. We are cowards.

Q: Could you flesh these reasons out more?

A: Sure. They are in chapter 3 of the book.

Q: What is the significance of the etymology of the word “decide”?

A: “Decide” comes from the Latin word decidere, meaning “to cut off”, which explains why decisions are so hard these days. We can’t stand the thought of cutting of any of our options. If we choose A, we feel the sting of not having B and C and D.

Q: The “will of God” is one of the most confusing phrases in the Christian vocabulary. Sometimes we speak of all things happening according to God’s will. Other times we talk about being obedient to doing the will of God. And still other times we talk about finding the will of God. Can you help clear up the confusion?

A: The phrase is used in at least three different ways, specified in the 3 sentences mentioned in the question. If we examine the Bible, we see that God’s will has 2 sides to it. On the first side is God’s will of decree. Everything that happens is according to God’s will, and what God wills, will happen. The other side of the coin is God’s will of desire. This refers to what God has commanded. It tells us what he desires from His creatures. If the will of decree is how things are, the will of desire is how things ought to be. There’s a third way in which we sometimes speak of God’s will. Most of the time we are looking for God’s will of direction.

Q: What is the significance of knowing God and his attributes and His will of decree and will of desire?

A: Knowing God’s character and his promises gives us confidence to take risks for His name’s sake, as Esther did. Becase we have confidence in God’s will of decree, we can radically commit ourselves to His will of desire, without fretting over a hidden will of direction. In other words, God does not take risks, so we can.

Sometimes we speak of all things happening according to God’s will. Other times we talk about being obedient to doing the will of God. And still oter times we talk about finding the will of God.

Just Do Something: Part 1

Kevin DeYoung’s Just Do Something is a book for Christian young people. But it’s not just for them. It’s for burned-out parents, retired grandparents, and tinkering millennials. The subtitle gives a preview of the book’s message: how to make a decision without dreams, visions, fleeces, impressions, open doors, random  Bible verses, casting lots, liver shivers, writing in the sky, etc.

Note: This is the first installment of a multi-part “interview” that I conducted with the book.

Question: What is the aim of the book?

Answer: The aim is not so much to tell you how to hear God’s voice in making decisions as it is to help you hear God telling you to get off the long road to nowhere and finally make a decision, get a job, and perhaps, get married.

Question: From where comes the hesitancy many of us feel in making decisions and settling down in life?

Answer:  There are at least 2 sources:

1. The new generations enjoy—or at least they think they enjoy—”unparalleled freedom”.
2. Our search for the will of God.

Q: What has this hesitancy in making decisions and setting down in life resulted in?

A: It has resulted in our being full of passivity and empty on follow-through.

Q: How ought we to be?

A: When it comes to our future, we should take some responsibility, make a decision, and just do something.

Am Just Reading: Just Do Something

I hope to post more on Kevin DeYoung’s Just Do Something shortly.

Is it God’s will to read this book? The book answer the question on page 9.

Read the first chapter online here.

Machen on the Paradox of Efficiency

“[I]t is the paradox of efficiency that it can be attained only by those who do not make it the express object of their desires.”

-J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith? (Banner of Truth, 1996), 209.

W.G.T. Shedd on Work

There is discipline in labor. The scrupulous performance of work of any kind improves both the mind and the heart. A thorough and punctual mechanic is a man of character. He possesses a mental solidity and strength that render him a noticeable man and a reliable man in his sphere. The habit of doing work uniformly well, and uniformly in time, is one of the best kinds of discipline. He who has no profession or occupation must be, and as a matter of fact is, an undisciplined man. And in case one has an occupation or profession, the excellence of his discipline is proportioned to the fidelity with which he follows it. If he half does his work, his moral character suffers. If he does his work thoroughly, when he does it at all, but does not perform it with punctuality and uniformity (a thing which is, however, not likely to happen), it is in expense of his moral power.

(p 296 of Homiletics and Pastoral Theology)

William Greenough Thayer Shedd

Shedd is author of Calvinism: Pure and Mixed and  Dogmatic Theology, which is the book he is best known for.

Online Devotions in One Place

Devotional Christian makes it easy to read your daily devotions online. “We list all the best Bible devotions on one page.”

The Objective of Bruce Waltke’s An Old Testament Theology

An Old Testament Theology: An Exegetical,  Canonical and Thematic Approach

A. To know God personally

B. To understand the nature of God’s revelation

C. To know self

D. To understand the Old Testament

E. To understand the New Testament

F. To contribute to spiritual formation

To read chapter 1, go here:

To preview more, please visit the publisher’s site.

Bruce Waltke

Bruce K. Waltke (PhD, Dallas Theological Seminary; PhD, Harvard Divinity School), acknowledged to be one of the outstanding contemporary Old Testament scholars, is professor of Old Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary in Orlando, Florida, and professor emeritus of biblical studies at Regent College in Vancouver. He has authored and coauthored numerous books, commentaries, and articles, and contributed to dictionaries and encyclopedias.

Review of ‘Savior: Celebrating the Mystery of God Become Man’

A few general words on the album

More than a Christmas CD, Savior includes twelve songs focusing on the Incarnation.The album was released in November 2006 by Sovereign Grace Music.

From the site:

How can we get to God?

This question, divinely woven into every living soul, finds its echo in Scripture. There we see that God wants an intimate relationship with his people—to live with them. Yet the presence of this holy God is a consuming fire, so we, in our sinfulness, cannot dwell there.

Savior: Celebrating the Mystery of God Become Man is an exaltation of the One who resolved that dilemma through the miracle of the Incarnation. The baby in a manger is God himself, the Savior who came to bear our sins and reconcile us to the Father.

Savior contains twelve truth-saturated songs, suitable for worshiping God year-round. Each song ponders and celebrates the reason for Christ’s coming.

Truth comes through words and not through music, so I would like to quote in full the lyrics of the songs under review. The 3 songs in this review are the mellower tracks in the album.

Sleep, Jesus, Sleep

Sleep, Jesus, sleep
We’ve come to see
You who never closed Your eyes
Watching over earth and skies
Now in frail humanity
Must sleep

Sleep, newborn King
We’ll gently sing
You who reigns forevermore
Ruling as the Lord of lords
You who never had a need
Must sleep

Sovereign One
Born as Mary’s son
Prince of Peace
One day You’ll deliver me
Deliver me

But now sleep, Son of God
We’ll watch in awe
You’ll fulfill the Father’s plan
Reconciling God and man
Now Your promises to keep
Must sleep

The soothing voice in this track belongs to Shannon Harris, wife of I Kissed Dating Goodbye author Josh Harris.She is also the singer of The Precious Blood and O Great God on the Valley of Vision album.

“Sleep, Jesus, Sleep”, one of my favorite songs on the album, could very well be the most truth-packed lullaby sung to Jesus. I’ve listened to Sleep, Jesus, Sleep many times. In my later replays, a grammatical inconsistency, if not an error, became apparent.

Please take a look at the following two lines:

1. You who never closed Your eyes
2. You who reigns forevermore

Line 1’s clause “Your eyes” is second person. Line 2’s clause is third person plural (“He reigns forevermore”, and not “You reigns forevermore”). Grammar dictates that in the construction

[Person] who [verb],

the verb takes on the third person form. This means that “You who never closed Your eyes” should be “You who never closed His eyes”.
For more information on this grammatical issue, please refer to: http://voiceofiyov.blogspot.com/2007/06/you-who-hears-sic-prayer.html

http://www.englishforums.com/English/ItsYouWhoIsAreAnsweringMe/dcwdz/Post.htm

The Son of God Came Down

The Son of God came down and laid aside His crown
Born without great renown, this Sovereign One
All holiness and might, all glory shining bright
Have come to earth this night in Mary’s son
O come, let us adore

O Christ the Lord, our hope and Savior
Son of God yet made like us
O Christ the Lord, our King adored
Born a child, our Lord Jesus

Messiah born so small, asleep in cattle stall
Come to redeem our fall, nailed to a tree
This tiny, helpless child through death would reconcile
The holy God and vile, His grace so free
O come, let us adore

This song was written by Doug Plank. I loved the acoustic music in this song. Let us worship the King of kings with awe and humility.

Salvation is Born

Come let us worship, come let us adore
Jesus, Messiah, our Savior is born
Carol His glory and sing His sweet Name
Offer a life of thanksgiving and praise

Join with the angels proclaiming to earth
Join with the shepherds in awe of His birth
Join all creation rejoicing this morn
The glory of God-become-man has been born

Come, let us adore Him
Jesus, the hope of the world
Come, worship before Him
Christ, the Messiah has come
Salvation is born

Prophets foretold Him, the Promise of God
The hope of Salvation and light of the world
Born in a stable and born as a man
Born to fulfill God’s redeeming plan

The coming of the Babe was a historic event. Indeed, it split history into two (BC and AD). In this song, we are invited to join with creatures in heaven and on earth in remembering Jesus’ birth.

The Christian’s Only Comfort

Question:

What is your only comfort in life and in death?

Answer:

That I am not my own,

but belong —

body and soul,

in life and in death —

to my faithful Savior Jesus Christ.

He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood,

and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.

He also watches over me in such a way

that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of my Father in heaven:

in fact, all things must work together for my salvation.

Because I belong to Him,

Christ, by His Holy Spirit,

assures me of eternal life

and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready

from now on to live for him.

Christian Social Theory: The Trinity as a Model for Human Social Life

Nancy Pearcey‘s Total Truth is to today as Francis Schaeffer’s books were to 20 years ago. Green-coloring is the blogger’s. Italics are the author’s.

The Rosetta Stone of Christian social thought is the Trinity. The human race was created in the image of God, who is three Persons so intimately related as to constitute one Godhead— in the classic theological formulations, one in being and three in person. God is not “really” one deity, who only appears in three modes: nor is God “really” three deities, which would be polytheism. Instead, both oneness and threeness are equally real, equally ultimate, equally basic and integral to God’s nature.

The balance of unity and diversity in the Trinity gives a model for human social life, because it implies that both individuality and relationship exist within the Godhead itself. God is being-in-communion. Humans are made in the image of God who is a tri-unity—whose very nature consists in reciprocal love and communication among the Persons of the Trinity. This model provides a solution to the age-old opposition between collectivism and individualism. Over against collectivism, the Trinity implies the dignity and uniqueness of individual persons. Over against radical individualism, the Trinity implies that relationships are not created by sheer choice but are built into the very essence of human nature. We are not atomistic individuals but are created for relationships.

As a result, there is harmony between being and individual and participating in the social relationships that God intended for our lives together. This may sound abstract, but think of it this way: Every married couple knows that a marriage is more than the sum of its parts—that the relationship itself is a reality that goes beyond the two individuals involved. The social institution of marriage is a moral entity in itself, with its own normative definition. This was traditionally spoken about in terms of the common good: There was a “good” for each of the individuals in the relationship (God’s moral purpose for each person), and then there was a “common good” for their lives together (God’s moral purpose for the marriage itself).

In a perfect marriage unaffected by sin, there would be no conflict between these two purposes: The common good would express and fulfill the individual natures of both wife and husband. In fact, certain virtues necessary for spiritual maturity—such as faithfulness and self-sacrificing love—can be practiced only within relationships. That means individuals cannot fully develop their true nature unless they participate in social relationships, such as marriage, family, and the church. *

…

The doctrine of the Trinity has repercussions not only for our concept of the family but also for virtually every other discipline. In philosophy, the triune nature of God provides a solution to the question of the One and the Many (sometimes called the problem of unity and diversity): Ever since the ancient Greeks, philosophers have asked, Does ultimate reality consist of a single being or substance (as in pantheism) or of disconnected particulars (as in atomism)? In politics, the opposing poles play out in the two extremes of totalitarianism versus anarchy. In economics, the extremes are socialism or communism versus laissez-faire individualism.

In practice, of course, most societies shuffle toward some middle ground between the two opposing poles—like America’s “mixed economy today. Yet merely hovering between tow extremes is not a theoretically coherent position. A consistent worldview must offer a way to reconcile them within a consistent system. By offering the Trinity as the foundation of human sociality, Christianity gives the only coherent basis for social theory.

Nor is the answer merely theoretical. In Redemption, believers are called to form an actual society—the church—that demonstrates to the world a balanced interplay of the One and the Many, of unity and individuality. In John 17:11 Jesus prays for the disciples He is about to leave behind, asking the Father “that they may be one, even as we are one.” Jesus is saying that the communion of Persons within the Trinity is the model for the communion of believers within the church. It teaches us how to foster richly diverse individuality within ontologically real relationships “The Church as a whole is an icon of God the Trinity, reproducing on earth the mystery of unity in diversity,” writes Orthodox bishop Timothy Ware. “Human beings are called to reproduce on earth the mystery of mutual love that the Trinity lives in heaven.” And as we learn to practice unity-in-diversity within the church, we can bring that same balance to all our social relationships—our families, schools, workshops, and neighborhoods.

—————–

*People who are not married can and should participate in other forms of relationship, preeminently in the church, in order to experience the spiritually maturing effects of being morally committed to others.

From Total Truth by Nancy Pearcey, copyright ©2005, pages 132-134. Used by permission of Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, IL 60187.