Isaiah 64:5b says this:

    You meet him who joyfully works righteousness,
those who remember you in your ways.
Behold, you were angry, and we sinned;
in our sins we have been a long time, and shall we be saved?

God meets those who joyfully do things that are pleasing to him.

Here’s an even more pointed passage when Israel refused to serve the Lord with gladness:

    Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, because of the abundance of all things, therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and lacking everything. And he will put a yoke of iron on your neck until he has destroyed you.
(Deuteronomy 28:47-48 ESV)

YIKES!
The Bible commands us to serve the Lord with gladness!  Have you ever thought that?

OK, yes…this is a struggle, but don’t underestimate this command or how important the Bible says it is.   Why is it that we struggle even in church with this?  We have been saved from God’s wrath and an eternity in Hell apart from God, yet some days who can tell?  Us worship leaders get to see your faces, don’t forget. 

Even still, the reality is that we all struggle with walking in joy.  Life is hard and pulls on us, weighing us down.  This doesn’t make the command in Scripture any less important.  In John Piper’s excellent book “When I Don’t Desire God” he goes through several ways to fight for joy.  I highly recommend reading this book if you are struggling to walk in joy and have your mind refreshed in the greatness of our God and the joy that he brings us like nothing else can.  Check out the book, pray thru it, soak it in, walk thru the Word with it…and here are a few things to whet your whistle to use in the fight for joy:

1. Realize that authentic joy in God is a gift.

2. Realize that joy must be fought for relentlessly.

3. Resolve to attack all known sin in your life.

4. Learn the secret of gutsy guilt – how to fight like a justified sinner. (Don’t confuse Justification and Sanctification!)

5. Realize that the battle is primarily a fight to see God for who he is.

6. Meditate on the Word of God day and night.

7. Pray earnestly and continually for open heart-eyes and an inclination for God.

8. Learn to preach to yourself rather than listen to yourself.

9. Spend time with God-saturated people who help you see God and fight the fight.

10. Be patient in the night of God’s seeming absence.

11. Get the rest and exercise proper diet that your body was designed by God to have.

12. Make a proper use of God’s revelation in nature.

13. Read great books about God and biographies of great saints.

14. Do the hard and loving thing for the sake of others (witness and mercy).

15. Get a global vision for the cause of Christ and pour yourself out for the unreached.

PS:  Desiring God has posted a free e-Book version of When I Don’t Desire God.  Check it out by clicking here!

For more on When I Don’t Desire God, check out previous post here.

8 Things Contentment Opposes

1. It is opposed to murmuring and repining at the hand of God, as the discontented Israelites often did. If we cannot bear this either in our children or servants, much less can God bear it in us.
2. To vexing and fretting, which is a degree beyond murmuring.
3. To tumultuousness of spirit, when the thoughts run distractingly and work in a confused manner, so that the affections are like the unruly multitude in the Acts, who did not know for what purpose they had come together. The Lord expects you to be silent under His rod, and, as was said in Acts 19:36, “Ye ought to be quiet and to do nothing rashly.”
4. It is opposed to an unsettled and unstable spirit, whereby the heart is distracted from the present duty that God requires in our several relationships—towards God, others, and ourselves. We should prize duty more highly than to be distracted by every trivial occasion.
5. It is opposed to distracting, heart-consuming cares. A gracious heart so esteems its union with Christ and the work that God sets it about that it will not willingly suffer anything to come in to choke it or deaden it. A Christian is desirous that the Word of God should take such full possession as to divide between soul and spirit (Heb 4:12), but he would not allow the fear and noise of evil tidings to take such a hold in his soul as to make a division and struggling there, like the twins in Rebekah’s womb (Gen 25:22).
6. It is opposed to sinking discouragements. God would have us to depend on Him though we do not see how the thing may be brought about; otherwise, we do not show a quiet spirit.
7. It is opposed to sinful shiftings and shirkings to get relief and help. Thus do many, through the corruption of their hearts and the weakness of their faith, because they are not able to trust God and follow Him fully in all things and always. For this reason, the Lord often follows the saints with many sore temporal crosses as we see in the case of Jacob, though they obtain the mercy. It may be that your carnal heart thinks, “I do not care how I am delivered, if only I may be freed from it.” Your hearts are far from being quiet!
8. The last thing that quietness of spirit is the opposite of is desperate risings of the heart against God by way of rebellion. That is the most abominable. They find in their hearts something of a rising against God. Their thoughts begin to bubble, and their affections begin to move in rebellion against God Himself. This is especially the case with those, who besides their corruptions, have a large measure of melancholy. The devil works both upon the corruptions of their hearts and the melancholy disease of their bodies.

Now Christian quietness is opposed to all these things. When affliction comes, whatever it is, you do not murmur or repine, you do not fret or vex yourself.

http://matthewhoskinson.wordpress.com/2012/05/10/josh-hamiltons-nine-great-minutes/

The book of James, in Chapter 1:14-15 describes the process that sin works.  It starts with a thought of ours…our own desires which bubble up from the sin within us tempt us, lure us away, we act on them and then if you follow the whole course thru it ultimately brings separation from God and death.  Sin starts with a thought, I think of them as poisonous thoughts, pregnant with sin.  It may be temptation to do a specific sin (adultery, lie, etc) or it may be an “internal” sin like remaining bitter, or thinking lustful thoughts.  This is where Philippians comes in (you thought I forgot didn’t you…). When we have these poisonous thoughts we need to discern them as such in knowledge and discernment and dismiss them, taking them captive and making them obedient to Christ.  If not, they will give birth to sin.  All sin causes damage.  For believers, it grieves God, creates a separation of fellowship with him, and stalls the work of the gospel in our lives.

The gospel needs to be growing and bearing fruit, when we lack knowledge of God’s word and discernment of the Holy Spirit, sinful thoughts can give birth to actual sin and the poison spreads, and the work of the gospel is stalled.

In those times, preach the gospel to yourself.  Remember what God has done in Jesus for you.  Repent (turn) from the sin and turn towards God through Jesus in faith and walk in the grace that he supplies in the gospel…and get back on the road, live a life that is worthy of the gospel (Phil 1:27)being confident that he who began a work in you will bring it to completion. (Phil 1:6)

We sometimes fly right over those words when we read the Bible.  Paul uses them a lot in his writings.  Today I started reading Galatians and had the good thought to read Luther’s commentary on it while I read God’s word. So good. (Thank you Ed and Sharon for giving it to me!)  Here is a tasty morsel to start your Wednesday.

Galatians 1:3 says “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.”

“These two words comprehend in them whatever belongs to Christianity. Grace releases sin and peace makes the conscience quiet.  The two fiends who torment us are sin and conscience. But Christ has vanquished these two monsters, and trodden them underfoot, both in this world, and in that which is to come.

Grace and peace contain in them the whole sum of Christianity. Grace contains the remission of sins; peace a quiet and joyful conscience. Peace of consciousness can never be had, unless sins be first forgiven.”

- Do you have this grace and peace today?

- Are you spreading it to others?

Today, I read Nehemiah 8 and ran into one.  The coffee cup version of the verse chops it in half and usually reads “The joy of the Lord is my strength.”

It’s nice, but let’s look at it in context, eh?  I think you’ll see it’s a bit different —

    Then he said to them, “Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”

The “he” is Nehemiah (with Ezra the priest standing with him).  They had just read the law to the people and it caused am immediate repentance on the people, verse 9 says that the ‘people wept as they heard the words of the law.’  They were convicted by the word of God…and Ezra and Nehemiah know that is a GOOD thing.  Repentance (turning towards God) and conviction are GOOD things, it’s God’s way of bringing us back in line to him.

After we are convicted and repent, it’s time to end the pity party as soon as possible.  Get up.  Get on with your life.  Celebrate even!  Enjoy the fat, drink the wine, send to those who need it and pursue Godliness with a passion.

It’s also interesting how in this verse they declare that day of conviction from God’s law as ‘holy.’  Some people think that holy = boring, somber, quite, reverent.  Yes and amen…and there are certain parts of scripture that speak to that, and we must have that too.  But don’t miss that holy also equals joyfully celebrating because God has revealed himself to you and that’s a GOOD thing.

Elyse Fitzpatrick in her excellent book, Counsel From the Cross, talks about this very thing. She differentiates between the “happy moralists” (why wouldn’t God love me?  I’m awesome!)  and the “sad moralists.” (How can God love me?  I’m so bad.)  We’ve all seen both – the answer, like many things of God is the balance of both.

She writes

We must believe (and continue to ‘beat it into our heads daily, as Luther once said) that God is perfectly satisfied in Christs sacrifice for us, that we have obtained full adoption, and that God is pleased with us and calls us his ‘beloved’. These truths will stimulate your joy and expand your faith.   Most of us think that our efforts should be focused solely on godly living. While this is partly true, it’s not the whole story. We’ve also got to focus our efforts on ‘striving” to enter into the rest he has provided for us. If our souls are not fully resting in his love and welcome we won’t have the energy we need to fight for godliness.  Christianity will be utterly exhausting. This rest of soul is found only the the gospel message: we are sinful and flawed, yet loved and welcomed.

Fast forward — when Jesus died on the cross the veil in the temple was torn in 2 from top to bottom.  (Matt 27:51).  This signified a few things – it was torn starting at the top so that it was obvious that no man could do it…besides the fact that no man could do it anyway as massive as it was.  I found a picture that gives some perspective of how huge it was.

Even more huge than the size of it, was the significance of it.   The Old Testament laws, sacrifices, priests, etc were all copies of heavenly things that are fulfilled in Jesus, who is our high priest who enters the Most Holy Place on our behalf before God the Father and makes atonement for our sins.  But, he only had to do it once, because he was perfect and divine – priests in OT days did it year after year.  Look at Hebrews 9:11-12 -

But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

Christ entered once and secured for our eternal redemption!  The separation between us and God is removed, Jesus removed it and he is now our intercessor to God.  We secure this redemption by faith in Jesus and then live it out by his grace and the power of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus put away our sin once and for all.  We don’t have to jump thru religious hoops.   We then are clean, pure, holy before our Father as we stand in Jesus.  Is this to say that we still don’t struggle with sin?  Heck no.  But sin no longer has mastery over us (or it shouldn’t if you truly are a believer – Rom 6:14), and our identity is no longer “sinner” but “saint” – an adopted son or daughter of the Creator God of the universe!  When we do fall into, we should immediately run TO Jesus (not away from him) and remember that our sins are on the cross, agree with God that sin is no longer characterizing us, turn (repent) and go in the opposite direction of our sin.

Hillsong’s “At the Cross” speaks of this…the lyrics are on the YouTube page…let them soak in and rejoice that Jesus has truly won this for us.

One of the biggest things that biblical counselors try to do by God’s grace is impart hope.  Not of ourselves, but hope in a person – Jesus Christ.  I will frequently ask people “How is your hope-o-meter?”  Yes, it’s kind of a silly question, but it’s a way to gauge how hopeful they are.   Usually, when everything is hitting the fan, the hope-o-meter is very low.  But as we go thru God’s word as we see the glorious gospel of Jesus expanding before their eyes a funny thing happens – Hope emerges, and slowly but surely the needle on the hope-o-meter rises!

A Christians hope is not a fickle, tentative hope (like “I hope I get a pony”) it’s rather a confident expectation of what is to come, based on the person and work of Jesus as recorded in His revealed word – the Bible.

One of the clearest and most encouraging verses on hope is Romans 15:13 -

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit, you may abound in hope.

There is a prayer, there is proof that God is the God of hope.  Easter is drawing closer…our hope is grounded in the resurrection of Jesus.  He rose from the dead, literally and so we to can rise to a brand new life in Jesus, because of what he did.  Check out Romans 6 – thru faith we are united with him into his resurrection.  Leave our old life behind and start over!  There’s hope!  Unfortunately, there is a bit of a warning implicit here – there is hope in no other name, no other process.  Everything else is just putting a band-aid on…real hope, real lasting change, real healing is only found in one place:  Jesus.

So what if your hope-o-meter is low?

• Pray – literally pray Rom 15:13 out loud. Yes, out loud, trust me, it makes a difference.  “I pray that you, the God of hope, will fill me with all joy and peace in believing YOU, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit I would abound in hope.”
• Meditate on this truth
• Lather, rinse, repeat.  Pray, mediate on that verse…
• Find other verses and sections of scripture that deal with hope! (Hint…Romans has a lot – see Rom 5:1-5)
• Dwell on the truth of the Gospel and literally preach it to yourself.  Read his word, read books about the gospel, like Milton Vincent’s “The Gospel Primer”
  • For a quick link to the prose version, you can click to this blog here
• Find a gospel-centered church that preaches the whole word of God and find some encouragement in Godly brothers and sisters…perhaps they may even have biblical counseling available.

How is your hope?

Oh well…I digress.

This morning’s yearly reading plan had me smack in the middle of the giving of the Ten Commandments, in Exodus 20.  You know:

1. Do not have any gods before me
2. Do not make any idols for yourself
3. Do not take God’s name in vain
4. Remember the Sabbath, why I made it and the rhythm of work/rest
5. Honor mom and dad
6. Do not murder
7. Do not commit adultery
8. Do not steal
9. Do not lie
10. Do not covet (which means suffer from “Oh-I-wanna-gotta-have-it-like-they-do-itis”)

So, I’ve broken every one of these.

Yup.

Even the biggies.  Now, before you go calling the cops thinking I’ve physically whacked someone, let’s look at what Jesus says. In Matthew 5 Jesus is teaching and he says that even if you are angry with your brother, it is as though you have murdered him.  (Matt 5:21-22).  Even if you haven’t physically committed adultery, if you have lusted after someone in your heart, you have in fact committed adultery in the eyes of God.  (Matt 5:27-28).  Don’t get me started on how many idols I’ve made for myself…I’m on a constant idol-hunt.  But you get the idea – God himself laid down the law (Ex. 20:1), and  when he was here with us in the person of Jesus, he said we all broke it.

So why?

In short – to show the equality that we are all guilty before him because of our sin and to show us that we cannot save ourselves by religiously keeping the law.  The whole Bible is about Jesus. (Jesus himself said it in Luke 24:27).   Jesus is the fulfillment of the old law, we are not under obligation to the law any longer for he has come and fulfilled it’s purpose and now we our guilt is declared innocence by faith in Him.  Don’t skip over that last part – we need to be diligent in our faith in Jesus and surrender control of our lives to him, every corner of our heart — that’s a tall order.  However, he has given us justification and he took the penalty for my breaking his law. The life we live by the power of the Holy Spirit as we increasingly turn more of our hearts over to his loving control and become more like Jesus and less like sin.

    Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.
(Galatians 3:23-26 ESV)

We need the gospel every single day – are you trusting fully in Jesus today?