Life2gether

Sometimes we separate preaching and counseling as two distinct parts of pastoral ministry.  But good, gospel-centered preaching is a means of soul care to believers as Lloyd Jones makes clear in this quote below:

The preaching of the Gospel from the pulpit, applied by the Holy Spirit to individuals who are listening, has been the means of dealing with personal problems of which I as the preacher knew nothing… D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

My pastor, Tony Rose, models this well.  You can listen to his radio broadcast on 94.7 FM/900 AM at 6:00 PM. or go here for past broadcasts.

This is a good word from J.C. Ryle (one of my favorite dead pastors):

Our Lord experienced everything that belongs to man’s nature – except only sin. As man He was born an infant. As man He grew from infancy to boyhood. As man He yearly increased in bodily strength and mental power, during His passage from boyhood to adulthood. Of all the sinless conditions of man’s body – its feebleness as a child, its growth, its regular progress to maturity – He was in the fullest sense a human being. We must rest satisfied with knowing this. To pry beyond is useless. To know this clearly is of much importance. An absence of settled knowledge of it has led to many wild heresies.

One comforting, practical lesson stands out, something we should never overlook. Our Lord is able to sympathize with humanity in every stage, from the cradle to the grave. He knows by experience the nature and temperament of the child and the youth and the adult. He has stood in their place. He has occupied their position. He knows their hearts. Let us never forget this in dealing with young people concerning their souls. Let us tell them confidently that there is One in heaven at the right hand of God who is exactly suited to be their Friend. He who died on the cross was once a youth Himself and feels a special interest in youth, as well as in adults.

Adapted from The Gospel of Luke by J.C. Ryle (Chapter 2).

Paul Tripp, from his new book on marriage called, What Did You Expect:

“His grace purposes to expose and free you from your bondage to you. His grace is meant to bring you to the end of yourself so that you will finally begin to place your identity, your meaning and purpose, and your inner sense of well-being in him. . . . To add to this, he designs circumstances for you that you would have never designed for yourself. All this is meant to bring you to the end of yourself, because that is where true righteousness begins. He wants you to give up. He wants you to abandon your dream. . . . He knows there is no life to be found in these things.”

(HT: Walt Mueller)

This is a great reminder when caring for people’s souls:

“Though we are all Christians together, we are all different, and the problems and the difficulties, the perplexities and the trials that we are likely to meet are in a large measure determined by the difference of temperament and of type. We are all in the same fight, of course, as we share the same common salvation, and have the same common central need.  But the manifestations of the trouble vary from case to case and from person to person.  There is nothing more futile, when dealing with [a] condition, than to act on the assumption that all Christians are identical in every respect. They are not, and they are not even meant to be.”

~ Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure

(HT: Eric Schumacher)

A friend of mine put this verse on a post-it note yesterday and laid it on my desk.

“Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart.” ~ 2 Cor. 4:1

What a good reminder.  I encourage you to pass it along to someone you know in ministry.

Since my twin brother is a missionary in Japan, I found this quote to be quite fascinating in regards to community:

The Japanese word for human person is ningen, which literally means “between people.”  To be human from [their] viewpoint is to be together with others.  ”Community” is thus built in to the very nature of “humanity,” as the language serves to reinforce the strongly held conviction that the group comes first.

~ Joseph H. Hellerman, When the Church Was a Family, p. 20.

**BTW … for all you LBC folks, make sure to come out this Sun. night @ 6:30 to see my brother and his family as they share about “The Fight of Faith for All the Nations.”  Should be fun!

From Jim Collins’s book Beyond Entrepreneurship: Turning Your Business into an Enduring Great Company:

1. People execute well if they’re clear on what they need to do. How can people possibly do well if they don’t have a clear idea of what “doing well” means — if they don’t have clear goals, benchmarks, and expectations?

2. People execute well if they have the right skills for the job.The right skills come from talents, temperament, and proper training.

3. People execute well if they’re given freedom and support.No one does a good job with people looking over his shoulder; when people are treated like children, they’ll lower themselves to those expectations. Also, people need the tools and support to do their job well. To use an extreme illustration, imagine how difficult it would be for Federal Express employees to make on-time delivery without reliable trucks.

4. People execute well if they’re appreciated for their efforts.All people want their efforts to be appreciated. We’ve consciously chosen the term appreciated rather than rewarded because it more accurately captures that excellent performers value respect and appreciation as much as, and often even more than, money.

5. People execute well if they see the importance of their work.

(HT: Matt Perman)

A few days ago I wrote this post and it triggered some good dialogue with a friend of mine about the gospel and community.  This particular section stood out.  It was written by Chad Nuss who planted Christos Church in Jeffersontown, KY.

Church community consists of people that are very different, who sin against each other, who don’t like each other from time to time, who do all kinds of bad, hypocritical things–yet they stick together because the call to Christian community is to learn how to die to ourselves for the sake of the Gospel, for the sake of the church, for the sake of community, and for the sake of the glory of God.

Our enjoyment of community does not primarily come from how much we like each other, but from how much we are being rescued from destroying each other by the Gospel! The overflow of joy in the Gospel is joy in each other because we can look at each other and announce the Gospel to each other–the very Gospel that forgives us of sin and helps very different people with very different backgrounds with very different sinful tendencies with very different agendas, frustrations, and preferences come together around a common Savior.

We must be careful that we don’t get fired up and invite people to our community because of how awesome our community is–that is idolatry. We invite people to our community because of how awesome the Savior of the community is and what he is doing to enable our diverse community to gradually die to ourselves and become more and more authentic.

As we think about all the types of people we preach to on Sundays, don’t forget the children.  They may be the biggest group of unreached people in your church…and I guarantee when you get on their level, the adults will be tracking right there with you. 

Spurgeon once said:

…He is no preacher who does not care for the children.  There should be at least a part of every sermon and service that will suit the little ones.  It is an error which permits us to forget this.

~ Charles Spurgeon, Spiritual Parenting, 15.

Once in awhile I’ll meet a kid who seems wise beyond his years.  Whenever I do, it reminds me of Charles Spurgeon’s words:

I have sometimes met with a deeper spiritual experience in children of ten and twelve than I have in certain persons of fifty and sixty.  It is an old proverb that some children are born with beards.  Some boys are little men, and some girls are little old women.  You cannot measure the lives of any of us by our ages (Spiritual Parenting, p. 29).

Spurgeon is right!  Consider Ecc. 4:13: “Better was a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king who no longer knew how to take advice.”

John Piper comments on this verse: 

Better a wise youth than a foolish king! Think of that. Here is a poor lad badly clothed, and here is a rich king in fine robes. And the Bible says that this lad may be wiser than that king. How can that be? Because wisdom comes from God through his word. 

Read/Listen/Watch Piper’s whole sermon on Let No One Despise You for Your Youth