The prophet Jeremiah was called to follow Christ down a difficult road. Four decades of preaching fell on deaf ears. No one listened. No one responded. He was hunted by the authorities and hated by his own friends and family. He was not allowed to marry. He was forbidden to be a part of the life of the community either in the joy of its feasts or the sorrow of its funerals. His life would be a living sermon, declaring that God has also withdrawn from the life of the people. How far will Jeremiah follow? What about you? How far will you follow Christ? He offers grace and mercy freely. But it is a costly grace. It bids us to come and die. Is there a place where you say, “here but no further?” Listen as we examine Jeremiah 16 and consider the costs of God’s call to follow.
Misdiagnosis
Medical misdiagnosis is a serious problem. Recent studies have estimated that as many as 12 million adults a year seeking outpatient care are misdiagnosed. Worse yet, diagnostic errors may result in as many as 10% of patient deaths — more deaths annually than breast cancer. To be fair, diagnosis is incredibly complex and patients place extraordinarily high expectations for accuracy on their doctors. Patients often bet their lives on the opinions of their doctor. When those opinions are wrong the prescribed treatment will fail to address the real condition and may even make the condition more acute.
Misdiagnosis is serious but nothing compared to the misdiagnosis of a deeper sickness that affects us all – a spiritually terminal condition the Bible calls sin. This condition is congenital and inherited. It is always fatal. Every one of us has it. Yet it is often misdiagnosed. Doctors of skepticism dismiss that any sickness exists, while doctors of philosophy are more concerned with classification than cure. Doctors of psychology declare this sickness to be a non-fatal dysfunction, easily resolved with the right therapeutic tweak. Doctors of religion prescribe a course of works, coupled with a regimen of rituals and outward piety. But with all these prescriptions, the cirrhosis of the soul continues unabated.
Just before the Reformation, the Church taught that man needed the grace of God to overcome his sin problem, just not grace alone. The Church and its teachers had misdiagnosed the depth and severity of sin as mere spiritual sloth. If only the patients would exert themselves, even just a little, and show that they were trying, God would give them the loan of grace they needed to make up what they lacked. God helps those that help themselves!
Yet these Doctors of the Church had failed to read their diagnostic manual, the Scripture, which reveals that the patients are suffering from total depravity. They are already spiritually dead (Ephesians 2) and none of them can exert themselves, even just a little (Romans 3).
Martin Luther worked and worked to do his part, yet with all his working he only felt that more working was needed. Far from loving or seeking God, he hated and despised God for his implacable justice and harshness. It was not until he read in Romans 1, “the just shall live by faith” that he realized that his hope was not in a loan of grace, but in grace alone, grace given to him, not in response to his willingness, but in spite of his rebellion. Luther commented.
“He is not righteous who does much, but he who, without work, believes much in Christ…. The love of God does not find, but creates, that which is pleasing to it…. Rather than seeking its own good, the love of God flows forth and bestows good. Therefore sinners are attractive because they are loved; they are not loved because they are attractive.”
Dead men do not need renovation, but resurrection. For this reason, the Reformers insisted that the only remedy for sin was Grace alone (Sola Gratia) through Faith alone (Sola Fide).
Our diagnosis is much more serious than we imagined. The Fall broke more in us than we are aware. The effects of total depravity extend into every last aspect of body, mind, and soul. The prophet Jeremiah expressed this most poignantly. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9) The ancient word heart used in this verse is an inclusive idea, encompassing the heart, soul, mind, knowledge, thinking, reflection, memory, inclination, resolution, will, conscience, the seat of appetites, emotions and passions and convictions and courage. All these, Jeremiah says, are treacherous, rebellious and incurably sick. Yet, we cannot see it. As one pundit noted.
“The depravity of man is at once the most empirically verifiable reality but at the same time the most intellectually resisted fact.” ― Malcolm Muggeridge
Join us this Sunday, June 28, as we examine Jeremiah 17 and consider the diagnosis of total depravity and the remedy God offers us in Christ. We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP.
Costly Grace
Free and cheap are not the same thing. They are not even in the same ballpark. In fact, the “free” things in your life will often be the most costly. Everything costs something, to someone. A free car will come with unforeseen expense. And a free pet is anything but free.
Years ago we took our children to a local pet store in search of a cat. The pet store hosted a pet adoption and it seemed a good idea to give a good home to a free, stray cat. The adoptable cats ran the gamut of breeds, colours, and patterns. But as we were perusing, the charming salesperson said, “and then we have this poor little kitten.” Ushering my tender-hearted little girls to the back of the store she pointed out a tiny little calico with only one eye. The girls were smitten. All other options were off the table. Their little motherly hearts went out to Callie and she joined our family. She was freely adopted, but she was not cheap.
In addition to shots, spaying, and the usual pet expenses that confront a first-time pet owner, Callie lost her eye due to an infection shortly after she was born. The cost of her vet care was not cheap. She was free, but costly. But she lived a long life in our family and was a most beloved cat. Unlike many of our other cats, she loved to be with us, to be held by us, to stay close to us. She would hear the approach of our car, run to the end of our long drive, and run ahead of us as we drove up – without fail.
The free things in our lives are often the most costly. This is especially true of God’s grace. It is absolutely free, but unbelievably costly. It is the costliest thing in your life. It is freely given and can only be received freely by faith. Yet it’s cost to God was incalculable as His Son spent His life to fully pay the debt of justice that was ours to pay.
But it comes also at the cost of our lives as well. When we are made new by God’s grace, the old passes away and the new comes. But this new normal is a life lived under the Lordship of Christ for the glory of God the Father. It is not simply forgiveness of sin and pardon from its consequences. But we are united to Christ and undergo the work of sanctification wherein our sin is forsaken and holiness is pursued. Grace is free. But it is not cheap. On the contrary it is costly.
In his book, The Cost of Discipleship, Dietrich Bonhoeffer contrasts cheap grace and costly grace.
Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession…. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate….
Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: “ye were bought at a price,” and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us.
In the introduction to this book, Bonhoeffer famously observed that “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” How far will you follow Christ? In Luke 9, Jesus challenges three would-be disciples with just this question. How far will you follow me? Through what adversity? Through what difficulty? Jesus concluded these encounters with a startling statement. “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
The prophet Jeremiah was called to follow Christ down a difficult road. Four decades of preaching fell on deaf ears. No one listened. No one responded. He was hunted by the authorities and hated by his own friends and family. He had no one to support him in his own grief over the judgment coming upon his people. His only refuge was the Lord, but even the Lord often seemed distant. All this comes to a crisis in Jeremiah 15 and the prophet confronts God and God calls Jeremiah to repent – to turn back from contemplating turning away. The Lord reminds the prophet of His grace and his calling. He reminds Jeremiah that the only way to stay close to Him is to follow wherever He leads. Then the Lord calls him to an even rockier path. He was not allowed to marry. He was forbidden to be a part of the life of the community either in the joy of its feasts or the sorrow of its funerals. His life would be a living sermon, declaring that God has also withdrawn from the life of the people. How far will Jeremiah follow?
What about you? How far will you follow Christ? He offers grace and mercy freely. But it is a costly grace. It bids us to come and die. Is there a place where you say, “here but no further?” Join us this Sunday, June 21, as we examine Jeremiah 16 and consider the costs of God’s call to follow.
We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP
06/14/2020 | “When God Disappoints” | Jeremiah 15:1-21
Have you ever felt let-down by God? Have you been disappointed when He seemed deaf to your prayer, unconcerned about your trials, and unappreciative of your obedience? How will you respond? How will you move forward in following Him when he seems to have become an adversary? Listen as we examine Jeremiah 15 and observe Jeremiah’s struggle to come to grips with a God who seems to have let him down.
Let Down
My twelve year-old son is the most optimistic person I know. He loves technology and has boundless confidence that it will always work as advertised. One particular app on his tablet just will not work. We have researched, reconfigured, and run every diagnostic known to man – all to no avail. Yet with every software update, he asks, with brimming expectancy, “Dad, I got an update. Can we give it another try?” As a recovering software engineer, I am steeped in pessimism, especially when it comes to software. But nothing – not even repeated disappointments — can dampen Noah’s confidence that “today is the day” that the latest update will make everything right. And time after time, we are let down by open systems that aren’t so open after all.
But life is full of let-downs — meals that bear little resemblance to the advertising and online products with five star ratings, 378 “awesome” reviews, and that one bad review that turns out to be the only faithful narrative. And then there are social media friends who are really not friends. Just in case you don’t realize, your social media friends are not really friends. If they were not your friends before social media, they are not committed to anything more than spectating your life.
I recently crossed paths outside of cyberspace with an online “friend.” She couldn’t quite place me. I offered congratulations on her recent marriage and commented on the exciting places she traveled on her honeymoon. Looking at me as though I was a stalker, she asked me how I knew. Somewhat dejected, I said, “I’m your friend on Facebook.” If you are depending on social media friends to be your friends, then I am sorry to say, you will be let down.
But live relationships let us down as well. If you want to know if someone is really your friend, ask them to help you move. Moving is a severe trial for the closest of friendships. Years ago, Melanie and I were moving out of a second story apartment. We moved almost everything ourselves, negotiating two flights of stairs with a narrow landing. All that remained was a washer and dryer. The dryer was not a problem, but our faithful old Maytag washer was crafted from heavy American steel and offered no easy hand-holds. I called a close friend who lived nearby to help me get this last item into the truck. After a few hems, lots of haws, and a flimsy excuse, I realized that we were operating on two different understandings of friendship. I admit that our relationship never quite recovered from that let-down.
Every person you know is a sinner. This guarantees that sooner or later you will be let down by someone close to you. You don’t have to live very long to experience this. But the pain is especially great when the let-down seems easily avoidable, or worse, intentional. And the closer, more intimate the relationship, the greater the pain of this disappointment. How do you recover? How do you move forward? How can your relationships survive a let-down?
The story of the prophet Jeremiah is a story of disappointments. Four decades of preaching fell on deaf ears. No one listened. No one responded. He was hunted by authorities and hated by his own friends and family. He was not allowed to marry and lived a life of solitude and sorrow. He had no one to support him in is own grief over the judgment coming upon his beloved people. His only refuge was the Lord, but even the Lord seemed to him to be deaf to his prayers, unconcerned about his persecution, and unappreciative of his ministry. All this comes to a crisis in Jeremiah 15 as the prophet confronts God.
Have you ever felt let-down by God? Have you been disappointed when He seemed deaf to your prayer, unconcerned about your trials, and unappreciative of your obedience? How will you respond? How will you move forward in following Him when he seems to have become an adversary? Join us this Sunday, June 14, as we examine Jeremiah 15 and observe Jeremiah’s struggle to come to grips with a God who seems to have let him down.
We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP
06/07/2020 | “Crisis Management” | Jeremiah 14:1-15:4
Jeremiah was called to a ministry of crisis. From his calling to his conclusion, Jeremiah’s life and ministry was one of sorrow and struggle. He was a man of great faith in the midst of a faithless generation, called to preach judgment to his beloved people. But as we read through Jeremiah’s preaching, as well as his emotional confessions and lamentations, we see a man who was,never a dispassionate observer of his nation’s sufferings, but entered into the anguish of the people and suffered with them.
By observing his struggle, the Lord sets before us warning and direction as we wrestle with God’s chastening. What will God’s refining work provoke in us? Bitterness? Accusation? Presumption? Growing hardness? Faith and repentance? Lustrous silver? Or only dross?
Listen to “Crisis Management” as we examine Jeremiah 14 and consider how the prophet’s lament in a time of crisis warns and instructs us as we respond to God’s refining work.
Under Pressure
My father’s favorite poem, Rudyard Kipling’s “If-“, begins and ends with the following lines that have always resonated with me.
If you can keep your head when all about you
“If,” Rudyard Kipling
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
…
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
I admire those who are cool under pressure – neurosurgeons, fighter pilots, and mothers of small children. While neurosurgeons and fighter pilots are trained to anticipate fast-moving crises, mothers daily face a host of unforeseeable emergencies. No one can predict where a small child will climb, what he will find and then eat, or what deep existential questions she will ask. Men, remember this when you ask your wife, ‘how was your day? what did you do today?’ — brace yourselves. Whatever challenges you overcame were child’s play compared to the ones fielded by your children’s mother.
I am always in awe of how my wife handles the moment of crisis. She may be rattled to the core, but she never lets it show. She is all business. Assessing damage, applying relief, anticipating the next step and dialing back everyone else’s drama, even if her own is skyrocketing. Her faith in God’s goodness, wisdom and providence is daily put to the test and refined into a thing of growing beauty and strength. Struggle is good. But it is still struggle. It does not merit us anything, but it may mentor us. Struggle is the agency of refinement. James, the brother of the Jesus, put it this way.
Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
James 1:2-4
Crisis is an unavoidable part of life in a fallen world. We try out best to avoid it. We have text and app alerts for weather, bank balances, family location or status changes, hoping to get ahead of a situation before it escalates. We have more news feeds than Reuters, keeping us abreast of developing stories. We insulate our lives with insurance, security systems, backup power, and our “emergency fund.” After all, Dave Ramsey assures us that those with an “emergency fund” don’t have emergencies. But what about those crises that are bigger than our plans or our preparation? Crises like financial ruin, sickness and death, irreconcilable estrangements, and even national and natural disasters? Crises which penetrate to the depths of our souls. How do we manage when the crises are unmanageable?
Jeremiah was called to a ministry of crisis. From his calling to his conclusion, Jeremiah’s life and ministry was one of sorrow and struggle. He was a man of great faith in the midst of a faithless generation, called to preach judgment to his beloved people. But as we read through Jeremiah’s preaching, as well as his emotional confessions and lamentations, we see a man who was,
never a dispassionate observer of his nation’s sufferings, but entered into the anguish of the people and suffered with them…. [He bore] a message of divine judgement while at the same time sharing the sufferings of the people…. [He was a man] torn asunder between God and the people, to both of whom [he] was bound with deep ties.
The Book of Jeremiah, J. A. Thompson
As God’s people suffer His gracious, Fatherly discipline for their unrepentance and idolatry, Jeremiah struggles along with them. And by observing his struggle, the Lord sets before us warning and direction as we wrestle with God’s chastening. What will God’s refining work provoke in us? Bitterness? Accusation? Presumption? Growing hardness? Faith and repentance? Lustrous silver? Or only dross?
Join us this Sunday, June 7, as we examine Jeremiah 14 and consider how the prophet’s lament in a time of crisis warns and instructs us as we respond to God’s refining work. We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP
05/31/2020 | “Asking for a Friend” | Psalm 122
In our idiom, “asking for a friend,” is a euphemism for our own concerns. But when it comes to Christian prayer we are called to ask boldly for others through the ministry of intercession. Listen to “Asking for Friend” as we consider Psalm 122 which calls us to pray for the sake of our brothers and to intercede for the church, the world, and our neighbors.
Asking for a Friend?
English is a hard language to learn. It plays fast and loose with its own rules of grammar. And it refuses to conform to the basics of linguistics shared by virtually every other language — basics such as gender, case, and predictable syntax. No doubt, this is a consequence of the long and storied history of English-speaking peoples. As J. R. R. Tolkien noted, there is no such thing as a language without a history. As English-speakers ventured out across the globe during the Age of Exploration, they imported bits and pieces of language and expression from a myriad of other cultures into the warp and woof of the mother tongue. Consequently, the irregularity of the grammar and, especially, the pervasive use of idiom makes English one giant inside joke.
One, not so subtle, example is the phrase, “asking for a friend?” Nothing is more disingenuous than this qualifier. We tack it on to uncomfortable or embarrassing questions. Questions that, if actually from us, would surely reveal what we want to conceal. But like the Emperor with new clothes, everyone knows the game, but no one will admit it. We all know who is really asking the question. “Asking for a friend” does not conceal anything – quite the contrary. Yet we all play the game. And the asker is allowed to lay all censure for shocking questions upon some imaginary friend. The question is depersonalized allowing us to broach delicate concerns in third person rather than first or second. Asking for a friend makes questions academic, not biographical. Or so we think.
But there is a remarkable exception to this ruse – a time when “asking for a friend” is just that. And that is intercessory prayer. Typically, our chief concern in prayer is typically ourselves, asking for the things we want or need. And, indeed, there is nothing wrong with this. Scripture calls this dimension of prayer supplication, which is another way of saying “to ask.” The Bible encourages us to ask God for what we need. Jesus instructed his disciples and by extension us.
And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Luke 11:9-13
And in another place, Jesus promised, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.”(John 16:23) Jesus’ brother, James, wrote, “you do not have, because you do not ask.” But then goes on to warn “you ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.”(James 2:4) We are instructed to ask boldly. The author of the Hebrews reminds us of this. “Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”(Hebrews 4:16)
But James warning should give us pause. What should we ask for? What types of things? And how do we ask? Interestingly, most of the instruction in Scripture regarding involves praying for others. While we are certainly to ask for our own needs, the bulk of our asking is to be for others through intercessory prayer. And like most other aspects of our prayer, the prayer of the gathered church should model the trajectory for our private prayer. The Apostle Paul, in giving instruction to Timothy regarding worship in the Ephesian Church wrote.
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
1 Timothy 2:1-4
The church has always understood this to mean that in public worship we are to pray for others – for those responsible for government, for the peace purity and prosperity of the church, for the general welfare of society and for the spread of the gospel among all peoples. Christian worship puts a strong emphasis on intercessory prayer, particularly in public worship. John Calvin noted that intercessory prayer exhibited the church’s core value.
“It has pleased God to work with human beings through human beings. We are creatures of need. We need God and we need each other. It is therefore through the ministry of other people that God in his wisdom has chosen to bless us. It is in our intercession for each other that we realize what it is to be the Church.”
Just as Jesus’ prayer was characterized by intercession, so must ours be. We are to “ask for a friend.” We are to be bold askers at the throne of grace and mercy. But much, if not most, of our asking is for others. When we gather in church and pray alone in our closet, how much of our asking is “asking for a friend?”
In our idiom, “asking for a friend,” is a euphemism for our own concerns. But when it comes to Christian prayer we are called to ask boldly for others through the ministry of intercession. Join us this Lord’s Day, May 31 as we gather for worship both in person and by live-stream and consider Psalm 122 which calls us to pray for the sake of our brothers and to intercede for the church, the world, and our neighbors.
We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship. Get directions here or contact us for more info. Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP
05/24/2020 | “Grace and Gratitude” | Psalm 107
Is your life characterized by thanksgiving, or better yet, thanks-living? Have you learned to receive everything – the good and the bad, the joyful and the sorrowful – with thanksgiving? Our redemption is manifest chiefly in a grateful heart. What does your life declare of thankfulness to God? Listen as we examine Psalm 107 and consider the promptings, the pattern, and the practice of giving thanks and living thankfully.
Pottsville Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church 