I am fully funded for my upcoming trip to Thailand, which is such a blessing and encouragement. There are still people at church who ask how my fundraising is going, though, and each time, I get to say, "I'm done! God is good!" And it's true - He is good. But I have been reflecting recently on how often I praise His goodness to me only when I experience "good things" (read: things that I want) from Him.
There is an essential distinction that I often fail to make. God is good. Always. In all that He does. However, we usually say, "God is good because...(insert something good you experienced from Him)." But God isn't good because He does good things. His goodness and character are not dependent on His actions. Rather, His goodness produces those good actions. It is much more truthful to say, "God is good; therefore He..."
God isn't good because he chose to send His Son - He is good. Therefore, out of His overflowing goodness, He chose to send His Son. He isn't good because He provided for my Thailand trip. He is good and therefore, I am now fully funded. If I wasn't funded, it was still because God is good and always does good.
You see, when we make God's goodness dependent on His actions, trials and sorrows can break us. When something happens that we don't understand, we don't know where to turn because we have always said that God is good only when we received His blessings.
But when God is good always and regardless of what we understand to be a "beneficial" thing, we have a refuge in the time of the storm. We can run back to the Father and cry out that He is good and does good (Ps. 119:68), and therefore know that we only ever experience good things from His hand.
God is good and therefore He does all things well. This God is an anchor for our souls.
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Friday, April 26, 2013
Weekend Links 4/27
Leap and Weep - John Piper's thought on finishing his time as a pastor.
53 Fun Nights Out for $10 or Less - I love all of these different ideas!
Letter to a Parent Grieving the Loss of a Child - "This loss and sorrow is all so fresh. I hesitate to tread into the tender place and speak. But since you ask, I pray that God would help me say something helpful."
Naming False Securities - This was so convicting. "All of these false securities erode our trust in God, and when our trust in God is gone our joy evaporates and we are left with dehydrated souls. The response is to turn to Christ, and there to find all the security we need eternally and for our daily bread today."
Dear Church Kid - "Did you know that you functionally deny the reality of our need for grace in Christ when you put on your church kid mask?"
The Complementarian Woman: Permitted or Pursued - "The challenge for any pastor would be to consider whether he is crafting a church culture that permits women to serve or one that pursues women to serve. Because a culture of permission will not ensure complementarity functions as it should.
Salvation's Tenses - Don't miss this glorious gospel poem
53 Fun Nights Out for $10 or Less - I love all of these different ideas!
Letter to a Parent Grieving the Loss of a Child - "This loss and sorrow is all so fresh. I hesitate to tread into the tender place and speak. But since you ask, I pray that God would help me say something helpful."
Naming False Securities - This was so convicting. "All of these false securities erode our trust in God, and when our trust in God is gone our joy evaporates and we are left with dehydrated souls. The response is to turn to Christ, and there to find all the security we need eternally and for our daily bread today."
Dear Church Kid - "Did you know that you functionally deny the reality of our need for grace in Christ when you put on your church kid mask?"
The Complementarian Woman: Permitted or Pursued - "The challenge for any pastor would be to consider whether he is crafting a church culture that permits women to serve or one that pursues women to serve. Because a culture of permission will not ensure complementarity functions as it should.
Salvation's Tenses - Don't miss this glorious gospel poem
Book Review: Delighting in the Trinity
As I mentioned last week, I have been reading Delighting in the Trinity. Now that I am done, I am hard-pressed to think of a book that has been as much of an encouragement to me. I think intellectually, I have always been able to say why the Trinity was important - the Father sent the Son to bear His wrath and the Spirit applies salvation to our heart, etc., etc. All true. But I had never understood the depth of this precious truth.
Reeves argues that if God is triune, this central truth changes everything. It is not a problem to be solved, an after-thought, or a technicality. In actuality it is "the vital oxygen of the Christian life and joy." If God is, indeed, eternally Triune, then He has always been a Father, who gives life, love and glory to His Son through the Spirit. We now, in Jesus, receive the overflow of this eternal love.
Many times, the way that Christians discuss God is no different than the way that a Muslim or a Mormon would discuss their God. But this Triune God is shockingly different; rather than being a self-absorbed, singular being, He is a God who has always delighted to share His love and glory. This explains why He would create us and why He would send His Son. He seeks to have His life and goodness shared.
Karl Barth contended that, "The triunity of God is the secret of His beauty." After reading this, I cannot help but agree. At the beginning of the book, Reeves says that his purpose in writing is to help us taste and see that the Lord is good. This was the effect on my heart.
Delighting in the Trinity is relatively easy reading, and it is short, about 130 pages. But for me, it has changed so much about how I read Scripture, how I think about the Lord and how I relate to Him. The Trinity changes everything - it really is the foundation of Christianity. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Life Update
Sorry for how quiet I have been! I leave for Thailand in just over 3 weeks, and the closer it gets, the busier I have become. Between worship practices, team meetings, VBS preparation and more, any extra time that I have is usually not spent on my computer. If you think about it, your prayers would be much appreciated as we prepare for our trip.
In other news, I run my first half marathon with my brother in a week and a half. And by run, I really mean that I hope I don't die while I move my body 13.1 miles. In all seriousness, though, it will be fun. It's in a beautiful area of San Diego, and my parents and my brother are meeting me down here the day before so that we can spend some time together, which I am looking forward to.
Speaking of family, I've just been feeling more and more torn. I love going - I want to travel and see the world. There is so much to learn and know. But my heart already feels torn and divided between home and here. I love going, but I hate that going means that I have to leave. My heart hurts because here on this earth, my world will never be a complete whole. Come soon, Lord Jesus!
It has been a reflective week, a week that has forced me to trust that the Lord is who He says He is. His promises are true and His timing is perfect. I don't always understand the way that He chooses to do things, but when I look to Jesus, I cannot help say, "You alone are my hope and stay." And He is. There is peace.
Please enjoy this wonderful song, one that I have been listening to over and over again this week...
In other news, I run my first half marathon with my brother in a week and a half. And by run, I really mean that I hope I don't die while I move my body 13.1 miles. In all seriousness, though, it will be fun. It's in a beautiful area of San Diego, and my parents and my brother are meeting me down here the day before so that we can spend some time together, which I am looking forward to.
Speaking of family, I've just been feeling more and more torn. I love going - I want to travel and see the world. There is so much to learn and know. But my heart already feels torn and divided between home and here. I love going, but I hate that going means that I have to leave. My heart hurts because here on this earth, my world will never be a complete whole. Come soon, Lord Jesus!
It has been a reflective week, a week that has forced me to trust that the Lord is who He says He is. His promises are true and His timing is perfect. I don't always understand the way that He chooses to do things, but when I look to Jesus, I cannot help say, "You alone are my hope and stay." And He is. There is peace.
Please enjoy this wonderful song, one that I have been listening to over and over again this week...
Saturday, April 20, 2013
Weekend Links 4/20
What Gosnell and the Gospel Mean to the Brave - "If the compassion of the world is 'We do not unwanted children born into the world,' then the compassion of the Gospel has to be far more powerful. The compassion of Christ-followers needs to literally and practically and sacrificially be: 'We do want all the children born into this world.'"
Ten Simple Strategies for Prayer - "I know very few people who don’t struggle with prayer. We know we should pray, but doing so consistently and fervently is not easy. Most of our praying is reactionary – that is, in response to a problem – rather than proactive, lifestyle praying."
Find Your Worth in the Gospel - "The therapeutic gospel says, 'I am valuable, and that’s why God loves me.' The biblical gospel says, 'I am valuable because God loves me!'"
Hard Training - "We agreed that God seems to give much more frustration to some Christians than to others. It is a fact that God will eventually put you ‘to death’ one way or the other through sorrow and disappointment. But with some this comes through a thousand cuts. With others through a few major strokes."
Mirror Wars - "But I wonder if Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches has the right idea. I wonder if seeing ourselves through the eyes of others will show that we are too hard on ourselves, that the real source discrediting our beauty is found in ourselves. And then I wonder what we would see if we chose to see ourselves through the eyes, not only of charitable strangers, but of Christ."
Strength to Hold On - A great reminder.
Ten Simple Strategies for Prayer - "I know very few people who don’t struggle with prayer. We know we should pray, but doing so consistently and fervently is not easy. Most of our praying is reactionary – that is, in response to a problem – rather than proactive, lifestyle praying."
Find Your Worth in the Gospel - "The therapeutic gospel says, 'I am valuable, and that’s why God loves me.' The biblical gospel says, 'I am valuable because God loves me!'"
Hard Training - "We agreed that God seems to give much more frustration to some Christians than to others. It is a fact that God will eventually put you ‘to death’ one way or the other through sorrow and disappointment. But with some this comes through a thousand cuts. With others through a few major strokes."
Mirror Wars - "But I wonder if Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches has the right idea. I wonder if seeing ourselves through the eyes of others will show that we are too hard on ourselves, that the real source discrediting our beauty is found in ourselves. And then I wonder what we would see if we chose to see ourselves through the eyes, not only of charitable strangers, but of Christ."
Strength to Hold On - A great reminder.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Who is God?
I have been reading Delighting in the Trinity by Michael Reeves. I will be reviewing it soon - it has been a wonderful help to me in so many ways. But I wanted to share one quote:
At bottom this God is different, for at bottom, He is not Creator, Ruler or even "God" in some abstract sense: He is the Father, loving and giving life to His Son in the fellowship of the Spirit....Having such a God happily changes everything.For the first, I feel as if I am beginning to see how a trinitarian God changes everything, and how so much of what we see in the world around is simply the overflow of this wonderful truth about the Lord.
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