Goodness That Leads to Repentance

Today we sung a song in church which reminded me it is God's goodness which leads to repentance.  Paul held forth this truth in Romans 2:4:  "Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?"  God's lovingkindnesses are many, and it is due to His mercy which has stayed His hand from justly destroying men for their sin instantly.  Whilst it could be truly sin we should "Repent or else!" with knowledge of God's judgment, God does not threaten us with pain or torment should we refuse His righteous demands.  It is not the fear of God's wrath but the kindness and goodness of God which moves us to repent.

For many Christians, it may have been fear of death and hell which caused us to trust in Jesus - more than the goodness and kindness of God toward us.  Like Bob Sjogren and Gerald Robison conveyed in the book Cat & Dog Theology, our posture towards God is important.  There are people who came to God because they were backing wide-eyed away from the abyss of hell, and those who have turned towards God because He is a glorious God and a worthy Saviour.  It is a awesome day when we learn to fix our eyes primarily upon Jesus rather than turn to Him as a last resort.  If we are in the habit of backing away from troubles and not looking where we are going, we will ultimately trip over and have no sense of direction.  It is the love and trust of Jesus - not the fear of hell - which should move us to repentance and do what is right.

Even faithful dogs can have curious moments, like when they wander out of the back yard.  Concerned for the safety of the animal, a caring owner will pursue their pet.  Many times I have witnessed dogs who know full well their owners who are trying to coax them to return to the yard, but the dog is more interested in sniffing everything in sight, happy to stay just out of reach.  God is like a loving Shepherd who pursues His sheep, not threatening us with hell to make us return.  It is His kindness and patient pursuit which leads to our repentance, and He is kind and gracious even when we have been stubborn and foolish.  If we are more moved by the fear of punishment than the love of God for us, it seems we need a change of perspective which aligns with Romans 2:4!

We have been greatly enriched by God's goodness, forbearance, and patience which suffers long.  Let us be patient with others as He has been patient with us.  May we also do good in God's sight, realising and walking in kindness and mercy God has freely bestowed upon us.  God, forgive me when I have repented to save my own skin and thought little of your goodness and grace!

Think On These Things

"God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble."

Psalm 46:1

The Bible provides great insight and objective truth to all who believe.  Memorisation of scripture is good, but to understand and personally apply scripture is better still.  When I was a kid I went to Awana, a youth group which placed a high priority on scripture memorisation.  Admittedly I learned to repeat verbatim many scriptures I did not understand and could not explain.  If we will emphasise the importance and value of memorisation, let us not miss the crucial steps of understanding and obedience to the scripture.  At the end of Lesson 2 in the Self-Confrontation Manual developed by John C. Broger, after suggesting several plans to memorise scripture and to recite them to others it reads, "When you recite your verses to this person, also explain what the verse(s) mean and how they are to be applied to your life."  To this I say, amen!

The meaning of a verse of scripture has the depth and breadth of an ocean of God's wisdom, and most of the time we are content to splash around in the shallows.  We may understand what the verse says and means, even in context, yet there is more.  How good it is when we stop and think about each word or phrase carefully.  God has much for us to glean in the 12 words of Psalm 46:1.  Just for fun (because it truly is for a hungry soul!) let's break this verse down into parts to consider fully the truth presented here.

• "God is..." Here is objective, unchanging truth.  God not only is, but has always been and will always be.  His gracious love, infinite strength, wisdom, provision, protection and salvation are available to all who repent and seek Him in faith.
• "our..."  God has united all who fear Him, having accepted us in the beloved through faith in Jesus Christ.  We have continual access to our heavenly Father who has chosen and called us to trust Him.  He will never leave or forsake those redeemed with the blood of Christ.  We are never alone!
• "refuge and strength..." Just like we run to the shelter of our homes in a massive storm, Christians find refuge in God who protects and keeps us.  Unlike a house which can be flooded, burnt down, or rendered unsuitable for living because of a destroyed foundation, our God has all strength.  The foundation we have in Christ will endure forever.
• "a very present help..." Emergency services have standard response times, but the help God can provide is immediate.  God is more than nearby or "on-call" but He is very present - in fact, the Holy Spirit lives inside of born-again Christians and can help us and others simultaneously according to every need.  God knows what help we need and how to provide it for our good and His glory.
• "in trouble." If we have car trouble we go to a mechanic; when our bodies are ill we go to a doctor.  Whilst we require specialists for our troubles, God is able to be a very present help in any kind of trouble.  Our troubles do not trouble God.  He invites us to be casting our cares upon Him at all times because He cares for us.

Now wasn't that fun?  What verses have you memorised?  Have you applied the eternal truth of them to your situation?  Take time to think them over and how you might apply them to your own life.  Expect God to expand your understanding of what you think you know when you obey what He has said.  We haven't hardly scratched the surface of fully appreciating the wisdom of Psalm 46:1, and God delights to teach and reveal Himself to all who humbly seek Him in faith.  God has much to say to us when we will listen and obey!

The God Who Reveals

"Now the eyes of Israel were dim with age, so that he could not see. Then Joseph brought them near him, and he kissed them and embraced them. ¹¹  And Israel said to Joseph, "I had not thought to see your face; but in fact, God has also shown me your offspring!"

Genesis 48:10-11

As Israel's days drew to a close, Joseph brought his two sons Ephraim and Manasseh to be blessed by their grandfather.  Israel's eyes had grown dim, yet God allowed him to see something beyond his wildest dreams.  Many years earlier Israel was deceived by his elder sons to believe Joseph had been torn by wild beasts when he had actually been sold by them to slave traders.  Israel was shocked when it was revealed Joseph still lived and was a ruler in Egypt.  In the twilight years of his pilgrimage, Israel rejoiced to spend time with his beloved Joseph again.

Whilst in Egypt, Israel's long-lost Joseph had two sons.  Genesis 48 conveys the touching scene when Israel kissed, embraced, and blessed Joseph's sons, adopting and blessing them as his very own.  Blind though his eyes were, I cannot imagine Israel speaking without a twinkle in his eyes when he said, "I had not thought to see your face; but in fact, God has also shown me your offspring!"  This is how our amazing, awesome God works.  Israel was resigned to never seeing Joseph again with his eyes, yet God allowed him to see Joseph and his sons!

Our eyes are naturally dim like Israel's, for we see as in a mirror dimly.  Even when we have "perfect vision" according to optometrists our range of vision is limited in scope, and our ability to see images and colours is dependant on light.  The things God reveals to us are greater than we could ever ask or think, more astounding than our wildest dreams.  The things we cannot fathom God simply does, and He opens our dim eyes to see it.  The light God shines drives the darkness away.  God brings hope to the hopeless.  For decades Israel mourned the loss of his son Joseph, but he later received his two sons and treated them as his own.

Things which are improbable, even impossible, God does. The miraculous is common for our God, the great Revealer of secrets, the One who brings the dead back to life.  God is able to melt hearts of stone and restore souls.  He opens blind eyes and brings reason to corrupt minds devoid of understanding.  God has done amazing things for us, but He is not finished.  He has more in store for you in this earthly pilgrimage, things you would not dare verbalise for the sheer impossibility of the thing.  As we continue trusting the LORD, He will bring to pass things beyond our imagination.  Israel's heart longed for his son, but God gave him two grandsons which never came into his mind.

The truth of 1 Corinthians 2:9-12 seems an appropriate conclusion:  "But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him." ¹⁰  But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. ¹¹  For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. ¹²  Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God."  What an impossibility, that finite man could know an infinite God!  Yet God has revealed Himself, and has opened our hearts and minds to know Him and appreciate all He has freely given us.  Hallelujah!

Dealing with the Dead

C.H. Spurgeon is known as the "prince of preachers," but it is not only his brilliant preaching and writing ministry which impresses me.  Like Dwight L. Moody, Spurgeon had an intense passion to bring children to faith in Jesus Christ.  He did not relish time in his lofty pulpit preaching to thousands more than dropping to a knee to speak face to face with one small child.  We cannot ask him today, but I imagine he would find greater delight in privately ministering to a little one in Christ's name than receive a public commendation from the Queen of England.  Today I read an address to the Sunday School teacher's union by Spurgeon in March 1867 at a prayer breakfast titled, "How to Raise the Dead."  Here is a link for you to read it yourself.

Spurgeon made it clear Sunday School teachers have a sober duty and calling to bring children to faith in Christ.  It is not a session of upstanding moral guidance or just to mind children whilst the "real" ministry is happening in the sanctuary:  Sunday School teachers lead the charge to win souls for the kingdom of God.  Using the case of Elisha bringing the dead son of the Shunammite woman back to life through the power of God, Spurgeon explained:

"The position of Elisha in this case is exactly your position, brethren, in relation to your work for Christ.  Elisha had to deal with a dead child.  It is true that, in his instance, it was natural death; but the death with which you have to come in contact is not the less real death because it is spiritual.  The boys and girls in your classes are as surely as grown-up people, "dead in trespasses and sins."  May none of you fail fully to realise the state in which all human beings are naturally found.  Unless you have a very clear sense of the utter ruin and spiritual death of your children, you will be incapable of being made a blessing to them.  Go to them, I pray you, not as to sleepers whom you can by your own power awaken from their slumber, but as to spiritual corpses who can only be quickened by a power divine.  Elisha's great object was not to cleanse the dead body, or embalm it with spices, or wrap it in fine linen, or place it in an appropriate posture, and then leave it still a corpse:  he aimed at nothing less than the restoration of the child to life.  Beloved teachers, may you never be content with aiming at secondary benefits, or even with realising them; may you strive for the grandest of all ends, the salvation of immortal souls.  Your business is not merely to teach the children in your classes to read the Bible, not barely to inculcate the duties of morality, nor even to instruct them in the mere letter of the gospel, but your high calling is to be the means, in the hands of God, of bringing life from heaven to dead souls." (Spurgeon, C. H. C.H. Spurgeon's works as published in his monthly magazine The Sword and the Trowel. Vol. 1. Pasadena, TX: Pilgrim Publications, 1975. Print. pg. 100)

Spurgeon concluded the address with these searching thoughts:

"Ah!  My friend, may God in his mercy give you life, for how else can you expect to be the means of quickening others?  If Elisha had been a corpse himself it would have been a hopeless task to expect life to be communicated through placing one corpse upon another.  It is vain for that little class of dead souls to gather around another dead soul such as you are.  A dead mother frostbitten and cold cannot cherish her little one.  What warmth, what comfort can come to those who shiver before an empty grate?  And such are you.  May you have a work of grace in your own soul first, and then may the blessed and Eternal Spirit, who alone can quicken souls, make you to be the means of quickening many to the glory of his grace." (ibid. pg. 108)

Many people face teaching children with great trepidation often because of perceive personal weakness and insufficiency.  It would be atrocious to refuse to obey God's call to minister to children because of unbelief or sloth.  Are any sufficient for these things?  Aren't the things God has called us all to do utterly impossible for us, to bring a dead soul to life?  Yet what is impossible with men is easily accomplished by God in His time.  May God strip us of our self-confidence so we might seek Him earnestly and in weakness be made fruitful by the Holy Spirit.  Once we are quickened by the Holy Spirit who fills us in power, then we by His grace can bring His saving life to others.  Let us not be content to wax warm when we can be fanned into flame as a living sacrifice unto our LORD.