Bitterness Defined

By: Jim Umlauf

"Bitterness is selfishly indulging in the hurt rather than selflessly pursuing the restoration."

- Jim Umlauf

What is God Like?

By: Jim Umlauf

Do yourself a favor, and read this quote from Bryan Chapell out loud to yourself:

(God) is separate from anything that would sully his glory or diminish his perfection. He is majestic, elevated, high and lifted up. He is not entangled by his creatures’ failures. He is not tainted by earth’s stain. He is pure. The radiance from his purity is so brilliant that even the heavenly hosts cover their eyes and themselves in his presence. They want neither to see nor to be seen in the intensity of the blinding and burning illumination of God’s holy glory. Nothing created, either in heaven or on earth, appears as virtuous in the presence of this glorious holiness. Only God is truly good.

That’s what God is like.

Francis Chan asks "Which is worse?"

By: Johnny Coggin

Today was Grace Evan's 20th anniversary celebration, and Dr. Young challenged us with a message on getting "outside the shire" and into the adventurous world of risk-taking for the kingdom of Christ.

In God's providence, this evening I ran across this brief video clip from Desiring God. It's a simple "which is worse?" question taken from a message by Francis Chan (author of Crazy Love), and it just may convict every one of us who have been blessed by God to receive so much good biblical teaching and preaching over the years.

The bottom line is the same as that of Dr. Young's message: It's time to take what we've received and get busy with it. So watch it, and take a moment to ask yourself: "What am I doing with what I've been given?"

And then perhaps, "What will I do?"

I Am Jonah

By: Landon Ditto

I can relate to Jonah well. Not that I’ve spent a weekend in the bowels of a giant fish, but because there is part of me that actually believes fleeing from the presence of the Lord is a valid option. As God’s word confirms, it’s not.

One barrier that a well-known narrative such as Jonah presents is that we gloss over it and think we have extracted all of its available meaning. We can’t make this mistake with Jonah. Our tendency would be to hyper-focus on Jonah’s disobedience and walk away with a moral assignment that looks something like, "Obey God or avoid sea travel." However, the emphasis of this narrative is not on the rebel’s rebellion. The emphasis leans heavily on the persistent and lavish grace of a pursuing God.

So what does this have to do with life? Go read Jonah. Again. No, seriously. What I pray you find is not an old childhood memory of an odd story, but that you will see the unfolding grace in the life of a fleeing servant (you and me), and that the story of God’s pursuit of His people is far beyond anything we would have ever written for ourselves.

Does God get upset when we disobey?

By: Johnny Coggin

In the video below, counselor and author Dr. David Powlison responds to the important question, "Does God get upset when we disobey?".

This might seem like a no-brainer, but think about it: If you're a Christian, the Bible says that "there is now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1). If God sees Christ's perfect righteousness when he looks at you, rather than your sinful unrighteousness, can he then be displeased, grieved, and even angry because of your continuing sins?

An important question to resolve, and a helpful explanation from Dr. Powlison, as always.

Dr. David Powlison - Does God get upset when we disobey? from CCEF on Vimeo.

What do we mean when we talk about God’s “law?”

By: Jim Umlauf

In Psalm 119, David writes, “O how I love your law.” What does he mean by that? The Old Testament wasn’t written in its completion, so was it the Torah (the first five books of the Bible, written by Moses), or something more?

There are basically three kinds of Old Testament law.

Civil law is easy to understand because we have American laws just like the French and Italians have theirs. Jewish civil law became non-existent when Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 A.D. Think about it. When the Soviet Union ceased to exist, so did their legal system.

Sacrificial law had to do with temple worship. Various offerings were made to God, such as burnt offerings, grain offerings, peace offerings, sin offerings, and guilt offerings. What happened to all of those? Fulfilled in Jesus Christ! He himself was the offering and there’s no need for any more. “It is finished,” remember? There’s no need for a priest or earthly mediator because Jesus is our great High Priest. So the sacrificial laws are no longer needed. The theological word is abrogated.

Moral law reflects God’s nature, and communicates to the Christian the reality of God’s being. Thus, it is unchanging and eternal. The moral law is summarized in the Ten Commandments (Ex.20, and Deut.5) and distilled further in the great commandment (Matt.22.34-40). God makes this wonderful covenantal promise to his redeemed:

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. (Jeremiah 31:33)

So to summarize, when a Christian says, “O how I love your law,” it is to say, “I want whatever you want. I’ll bend to your will. Change me into what you want in the power of the Holy Spirit.” For us, God’s law is anything he wants as he has revealed it in his word.

Pain Over the Holidays?

By: Jim Umlauf

When joyful or tragic things occur, it changes the way we view holidays. But when it’s the latter, the pain it produces can linger over many years, even a lifetime.

Here’s a thing to remember: though Christmas and Thanksgiving may be different—even radically different—from our perspective, in heaven, everything remains the same.

If you’re hurting right about now, or treading water, or barely hanging on, or lonely, or aching, know that God is unchanging. Grace is forever. Christ is still reigning. And God has NOT turned his attention away from you. He knows you intimately, understands what you’re feeling, receives you in Jesus, loves you with an infinite love, and has supplied his own Spirit in your heart.

Should the holidays heighten or ignite some embedded pain, you can bank on the unchanging God who loves you. That’s a promise.

A Fight to Proclaim

By: Will Savell

Although we’re always going to be dealing with elements of the old self, the reality of the new should overshadow. And this reality should become the greater reality.

Sinclair Ferguson writes:

While we continue to be influenced by our past life "in the flesh," it is no longer the dominating influence in our present existence. We are no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit. Christ’s past (if we may so speak) is now dominant. Our past is a past "in Adam"; our present existence is "in Christ," in the Spirit. This implies not only that we have fellowship with him in the communion of the Spirit, but that in him our past guilt is dealt with, and our bondage to sin, the law, and death has been brought to an end.

This new life is one that is now identified with Christ and directly opposes sin and the Devil. It’s one that shares in every spiritual blessing in order to fight the Devil.

So that is what we do.

Knowing that Satan and his forces will be bombarding us with old life temptations, we fight!

And we fight in order to live life as a picture of the Gospel…for the glory of God.

Perhaps that comes through rightly functioning in the certain relationships that point toward the gospel, like our relationship with our spouse and the ones with our children and the ones with our employers.

For the apostle Paul, he fought so that, as he wrote, “words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel…”

For us, it’s the same thing. When it all boils down to it, we fight in order to proclaim and display the Gospel.

May we do that well.

Isaiah 53:6 and the Reason for a Happy Melody

By: Johnny Coggin

If you've been in a worship service at Grace Evan over the last 5 weeks, you know that we've begun singing Scripture Songs together. These are all-new songs written and recorded by a team of musicians at Grace Evan, with word-for-word Bible verses as the lyrics. (You can hear the first batch of 10 songs at http://graceevan.org/scripturesongs, and even download them for free.)

This Sunday and next (Nov 7 & 14), we'll sing Isaiah 53:6 together (check it out at the link above). It's a happy, upbeat, celebratory tune, although the Bible verse is found in a sobering prophecy of the sufferings to be endured by the Messiah, who had not yet come in Isaiah's day.

So why sing a celebratory song for a passage with such a heavy theme? In this video, our own Jim Umlauf explains why we do so.

And while we're at it, why not take his challenge to read Isaiah 53 in its entirety to prepare your heart for Sunday morning worship?

John MacArthur & Joel Osteen

By: Johnny Coggin

You may already have an opinion of Joel Osteen, the pastor of the largest "church" in the U.S., but whether that opinion is a high one or a low one, you should watch and hear John MacArthur's confrontation of Osteen's teachings.

This is a prime example of how to call out dangerous, unbiblical teachings (and teachers) of our day, though it may not be considered "nice" or politically correct to do so. Eternal matters of life or death call for clearly-spoken truth, and MacArthur lovingly gives us just that.