A boy bathing in a river was in danger of being drowned. He called out to a passing traveler for help, but instead of holding out a helping hand, the man stood by unconcernedly, and scolded the boy for his imprudence. "Oh, sir!" cried the youth, "pray help me now and scold me afterwards." Counsel without help is useless.  From Aesop’s Fables.

Paul Tripp refers to this as “lobbing grenades of truth”.  I wonder how often and in how many areas we, as the church, do this to struggling believers and unbelievers.  Are there homosexuals dying of AIDS and without Christ that we refuse to reach out to?  Are there poor people that spend their money unwisely that we ignore?  Are there teenagers that we refuse to counsel because of their unwise choices?   

I fear that we often look more like the passing traveler than Jesus.  We are pretty good about exercising church discipline.  But sadly the church discipline that we often exercise is on unbelievers.  We let many that claim to be believers go untouched (so long as they are within our friendly confines, tithe, or at least on our membership rolls) with discipline and we “discipline” those are not even within the church. 

You see Aesop really does well at pointing out the ministry of Jesus here.  Jesus most frequently helped and then counseled.  The only time you really see the opposite is with the religious elite that “don’t need help”.  If we only lob truth at people and scold them in their sin then our counsel is useless.  If we only help people but never counsel them then our help is shallow at best. 

Perhaps, rather than boycotting Pepsi and picketing gay parades we should try to build a relationship.  Perhaps, rather than saying to a poor person we will only give 25% to your electric bill we should give until it hurts us, come alongside the person making poor decisions, and counsel them in biblical finances.

But of course lobbing grenades is far easier.  It is more destructive but at least it takes less out of us than hand-to-hand combat.  I could probably lob 15 grenades to every instance of hand-to-hand combat, but it remains impersonal.   So, which type of ministry do you want with people?  Easy yet destructive or tough yet personal?

The only way Satan can effectively be the Father of lies is by knowing the truth so well. 

Our lives are not so much a quest to gain truth as it is to live by the truth that has been revealed to us.  Our problem is often not that we are unaware of the truth.  Our problem is that we are painfully aware of the truth and we rebelliously reject it.  Lying is not a problem of information it’s a problem of knowing the truth but not liking it.

Idolatry is at the heart of lying.  How more prideful and idolatrous can you be than to stare reality in the face and attempt to reconstruct it with a reality of your own making? 

The only hope we liars have is that the truth of the gospel might penetrate our hearts in such a way that we love reality more than a lie.

I realize that I am quite behind on posting past sermons. There are four new sermons on Colossians that I have preached.

The first one is part 2 of Colossians 1:15-20: Jesus, Lord of Reconcilation. It is always neat for me looking back at sermons that the Lord uses (at least in part) in His mighty process of reconciliation. One young lady came to know Jesus the night this sermon was preached.

The second one is Colossians 1:21-23: Must I Endure? In this sermon we consider the doctrine of eternal security (or as we Calvinist call it--Preservation of the Saints). I am indebted to Tom Schreiner for many of thoughts in this sermon. He helps us to see how we ought to heed the warning in this text.

The third sermon is on Colossians 1:24-29, where we consider: Are You a Faithful Minister? This was (is) and extremely difficult text to preach. (At least it was for me). At the beginning of preperation it was one of my least favorite sermons. However, once I began writing it quickly became one of my favorites. If I had it to preach over again I would spend more time on the final point--but until I edit you get the uncut sermon.

The fourth sermon is last weeks sermon on Colossians 2:1-5: Truth Matters. This is another sermon that students responded to. I know for me, considering whether or not I truly believe Jesus to be the storehouse of all wisdom and knowledge, this was convicting. In case you read the sermon and want the answers to the first 13 questions: 3, 4, 5, 8, 9 are true the rest are false. You may disagree with calling 11 false--I mean it to be somewhat tricky.

May God be glorified!

The Internet is overflowing with garbage. I am not merely talking about all of the pornography and the ramblings of the idiot culture. I am talking about the Christian blogosphere. Just as it is in a Christian bookstore there is quite a bit of rubbish out there. I do not care to add to the collection. So, I have set up a filter for myself; I use it for blogging, for preaching, and for engaging in deeper conversations.

As I have mentioned in the past I have a quote in my office that is taken from Piper's Don't Waste Your Life; I use it as my mandate. "To so live and so study and so serve and so preach and so write that Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen God, be the only boast of this generation." That is great, but how can I determine whether or not I am writing to make Jesus the only boast or if I am simply adding to the heap of Internet rubbish? Simple, you use the Rubbish Filter 101...or as some people like to call it 1 Timothy 1. I use it to ask 7 sets of questions:

1. Does it promote speculation? Is it clearly related to Scripture or does it require a "secret" knowledge to find it in Scripture?
2. Does it accurately preserve the gospel and transmit the clear gospel? Is it faithful to the stewardship that God has given us?
3. Is it motivated out of love? Or is it pride, self-evaluation, revenge, self-righteousness, bitterness, discord, or unbelief?
4. Will it lead to vain discussion?
5. Is my motivation to promote the unity and purity of the Bride of Christ or my own name?
6. Does this come from a deep conviction and love for the Christ and His Gospel?
7. Will this doctrine exalt man to an undue place?

There you have it. Mark Dever has a few good questions he asks concerning what doctrines are essential (I would be indebted to anyone that could provide a link to that). Also Michael Patton considers the same question, here.

Compromise can be a good thing. Compromise is especially necessary when partners have conflicting desires in marriage. However, compromise can also be synonymous with selling out the gospel. A quote that Steve Camp referenced made me think of this. Campi quoted Jay McInerney as saying, "The good life is the middle way..." What a wonderful summary of postmodern thought. In one sense I actually agree with the quote. In another sense I disagree with it from the core of my being.

I agree that compromise (or the middle way) can be a good thing. When no clear answer is spelled out in Scripture then compromise is a wise way to go. If my wife wants Burger King (and enjoys their slow service and gross food) and I want Taco Bell (with its luscious Chicken Bacon Ranch chalupas) then a compromise (you decide what that would be) is a good option. Theologically speaking, if there are issues in Scripture that are somewhat unclear and not very close to the gospel then perhaps compromise is a good idea. There are quite a few hills that are not worth dying on.

On the other hand when truth is known compromise is stupid and morally repulsive. Christians believe Jesus is the only way to God. Nobody else does. Compromise in this regard would not be a virtue but tantamount to abandoning the faith. Now, the pomo will tell us that truth cannot be known, therefore, the "good life is the middle way..." As believers in the God that calls believers to worship Him in spirit and truth, we cannot sell out to such garbage. God has clearly revealed Himself in Scripture. There are things that can be known, and known absolutely. On these matters refuse to compromise.

Compromise can be appealing. After all is it not easy to be "unified" when we all seek the middle ground? But, unity for the sake of unity is no virtue. If unity is not unified around the truth of Christ then it stands just as opposed to God as the people in Genesis 11. Brothers and sisters, there are things that we must NOT compromise on. The good life is not the middle way, it is the narrow way.

One last thing. There is a difference between compromise and cooperation. Take the debate in the SBC over those darn Calvinists. I would consider myself on the Calvinistic side of the debate. To me compromise is not an option. My Arminian friends would probably say the same thing. The truth is compromise for either side would be (in the opinion of each) a sell out. Therefore, in these situations the call is not to compromise it is to cooperation. It is having a "self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision" and cooperating despite our differences. Compromise is stupid, cooperation is not.

Welcome to February. I am beginning to think that many bloggers are snowed in today; we are having quite an active Friday.

Steve Camp has a well put-together post on Discerning whether or not you are in Christ. He provides quotes from Flavel, Whitefield, and the little known Matthew Mead. Really good stuff here. Also you can view his first post in this series on discernment, here.

Alvin Reid, whom we used his book for Intro to Evangelism in college, has a wonderful discussion on The Great Commission in the Home. Recently in my conversation with David Michael (Pastor for Parenting and Family Discipleship at Bethlehem in Minneapolis) he mentioned something similar. For some reason we forget that the home can be a strategic center for missions and obedience to the Great Commission. I look for a resurgence in this in the coming days. Reid offers an interesting challenge to pastors: "Ask your congregation how many grew up in a Christian home? Then ask how many of those who raised their hands can recall their parents leading a discussion ever about reaching your neighbors. Then, ask how many remember the family ever doing anything specifically to get the gospel to their neighbors."

Timmy Brister closes up our discussion on The Bruised Reed. The last post is an open thread (which if you are involved in the challenge be sure to post on to be eligible for the prizes--I'm pulling for #7). Timmy also offers a summary of all the posts on Sibbes. He concludes his discussion by pointing out the mercy exhibited by Sibbes as well as the fact that he was a 17th Century Christian Hedonist.

Scott Lamb posts a transcript of Jimmy Carter's speech(?) at the New Baptist Covenant Celebration.

J.D. Hatfield has a phenomenal post on The Heart of the Matter. It is a very phenomenal articulation of the balance between being a jerk in our proclamation of the truth and neutering the gospel for the sake of being nice. Excellent job, J.D.! (Will: Make sure to read this one!)

I am overjoyed that C.J. Mahaney has joined the blogosphere. He gets it going with a great lists of Cross-Centered books. After reading this I need to update my wishlist with a couple of these books. He also offers a lists of helpful books on the Person and Work of the Holy Spirit.

Scott Lee asks, "Is Church Membership Divisive?"

Thabiti has written a wonderful article on The Gospel and Bitterness, at NA. I absolutely love Thabiti's heart (from what I've seen) and his ministry! Thanks, dear brother!

Steve Camp is concerned that many Christian men are more concerned about niceness than truth. His main contention is that these men are, "...toy-soldiers [that] carry what I call 'a velvet covered sword.' It's lightweight, easy to wield, isn't designed for battle, takes little strength to lift it, looks inviting, and won't cut too deep for fear of offending too greatly. " Also central to Camp's argument is this statement: "But in our day, postmodern evangelicalism would have us place tone above truth, demeanor above doctrine, feelings before faith, and embrace the comfort of the retreat rather than the campaign of the battlefield."

Challies blog tour reaches Day 9 and finds itself at the home of the IMonk. As Challies sums it up IMonk asks, "questions about what happens to churches and Christians who refuse to practice discernment, about freelance discernment ministries, about a Protestant magisterial and about Tim Horton’s (along with a few other topics)."

Ray Ortlund points us to an excellent quote by James Denney. "No man can give at once the impressions that he himself is clever and that Jesus Christ is mighty to save."

Yesterday at Team Pyro Dan asked a question about a card left at his doorstep. Today he gives the answer, it was indeed Mormons. Dan also shares his experiencing of witnessing to them. It was inspiring and convicting. We've had a couple Mormons walking around our neighborhood and I've never stepped out the door and screamed "Mormons!" so as to engage them.

Jared Wilson shares 5 Important Things the Seeker Sensitive Movement Got Right. Great thoughts. It takes much wisdom to mine even things you do not agree with for truth! Thanks for these thoughts Jared.

Tony Kummer is giving away 3 Children's books at his website. I own The Jesus Storybook Bible but would love to have the other 2 for Isaiah. If God does not grace me with winning this give away I will probably buy them later.