I Want the Spirit of Glory and of God to Rest on Me

How do I get it?

Extended retreats of solitude and meditation?

Buckled down resolutions?

Fasting and prayer?

Mortification of sin?

By loving God and loving others?

I won't speak against any of these things. But according to 1 Peter 4:14 the answer is: get insulted for Jesus. "If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you."

Shame on earth, bringing glory down from heaven.

The World's Eye Was Put Out

Samuel Rutherford, reflecting on the three-hour darkness from noon to 3:00 p.m. as Jesus hung on the cross:

Darkness was all in Judea when our Lord suffered. And why? Because the Candle that lighted the sun and the moon was blown out. The God-head was eclipsed, and the world's eye was put out. He took away the sun with him, as it were, to another world, when he that was the world's sun was put out. When he went out of the earth, the sun would not stay behind Him. Sun, what ails thee? 'I have not will to shine when my Lord is going to another world.' As if the sun had said to Jesus, 'Lord, if Thou be going to another world, take me with you.'

--Samuel Rutherford, in Fourteen Communion Sermons by the Rev. Samuel Rutherford, with a Preface and Notes by Rev. Andrew A. Bonar (Glasgow: Charles Glass and Co., n.d.), 286-87; quoted in Donald Macleod, Christ Crucified: Understanding the Atonement (IVP, 2014), 42

Six Theses on the Bible

Excellent thoughts from my brother Gavin as we head into a new year of Bible reading.

Against All Intuition

The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength. (1 Sam 2:4)

One gives freely, yet grows all the richer; another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want. (Prov 11:24)

One’s pride will bring him low, but he who is lowly in spirit will obtain honor. (Prov 29:23)

He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. (Isa 40:29)

Thus says the Lord GOD: Remove the turban and take off the crown. Things shall not remain as they are. Exalt that which is low, and bring low that which is exalted. (Ezek 21:26)

So the last will be first, and the first last. (Matt 20:16)

Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained it--the righteousness that is by faith. (Rom 9:30)

For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Cor 12:10)

Sharing Christ with Nominal Family Members

Lovely counsel here from our brother Chris Castaldo, via the Billy Graham Center. 

What the Lyrics Should Have Been All Along

God's Work Begins When Ours Ends

Jack Miller, writing in 1987 to a fellow pastor under criticism--

God's work begins when ours comes to its end.

Sometimes His presence is not felt with power through our methods however useful they may be, especially when we are confident we have the right approach and insights. God has a way of wanting to be God and refusing to get too involved where we have our own wisdom and strength. Then when we run out of wisdom and strength, He is suddenly present, a lesson I find myself relearning practically every day that I am in my right mind. (On my crazy days I am not ready to learn much!)

I think He wants our confidence to be exclusively in Him, and when we lose our self-confidence then He moves in to show what He can do. Perhaps self-dependence--and forgetting the strength to be found in Christ-dependence--is always our biggest blind spot. There is also presumption and pride that go with self-reliance.

So let's not lose our trust in God and the power of His gospel and the spirit of praise which goes with its proclamation (Rom 15:13; 1 Cor 1:18, 22-25; Gal 6:14).

--Barbara Miller Juliani, ed., The Heart of a Servant Leader: Letters from Jack Miller (P&R, 2004), 200-201

Confession, Freedom

HT: Sean Brown

How Does the Holy Spirit Actually Produce Change in Us?

A rich and wise answer from Abraham Kuyper:

Dwelling in the elect, the Spirit does not slumber, nor does He keep an eternal Sabbath, in idleness shutting Himself up in their hearts; but as divine Worker He seeks from within to fill their individual persons, pouring the stream of His divine brightness through every space.

But we should not imagine that every believer is instantly filled and permeated. On the contrary, the Holy Spirit finds him filled with all manner of evil and treachery. . . . His method of procedure is not with divine power to force a man as though he were a stock or block, but by the power of love and compassion so to influence and energize the impulses of the feeble will that it feels the effect, is inclined, and finally consents to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. . . .

This operation is different in each person. In one it proceeds with marvelous rapidity; in another, progress is exceedingly slow, being checked by serious reaction which in some rare cases is overcome only with the last breath. There are scarcely two men in whom this gracious operation is completely the same.

It may not be denied that the Holy Spirit often meets serious opposition on the part of the saint. . . . And the Holy Spirit bears all this resistance with infinite pity, and overcomes it and casts it out with eternal mercy.

Who that is not a stranger to his own heart does not remember how many years it took before he would yield a certain point of resistance; how he always avoided facing it; restlessly opposed it, at last thought to end the matter by arranging for a sort of modus vivendi between himself and the Holy Spirit? But the Holy Spirit did not cease, gave him no rest; again and again that familiar knock was heard, the calling in his heart of that familiar voice. And after years of resistance he could not but yield in the end.

--Abraham Kuyper, The Work of the Holy Spirit (trans. Henri De Vries; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979), 529–30

HT: Steve Porter

The Fury of the Theologians

On April 17, 1560, Philip Melanchthon was two days away from death. He asked friends of his to take him into his study. He could not walk, but was placed in a bed in his study. There he silently looked around at his books.

He asked those gathered around for a piece of paper to be brought to him. With trembling hand he wrote on it the reasons why he was glad to die. On one side he wrote:

You shall be done with sin.
You shall be free from trouble and vexations and from the fury of the theologians.

On the other side he wrote:

You shall come into the light.
You shall see God.
You shall behold the Son of God.
You shall learn the secret mysteries which in this life you cannot understand--why we are created as we are, and what is the character of the union of the two natures of Christ.

HT: Dr. David Calhoun