This is, honest to pete, the last post I'm going to make on this topic from last week's imbroglio about the Piper video, and it's about iMonk's podcast this weekend. I have a HUGE stack of stuff on the next wave of baptist prohibitionist propaganda, and I'd rather do that as it is the season.
The first bit is this: I appreciate Michael's spirit and message in that podcast. No question. The "simul justus" thing is exactly what I was arguing two weeks ago when the fundies were trying to say something false about regeneration, and I appreciate that iMonk got e-mails that were, frankly, misunderstanding what I had written and he was willing to make clarifications.
The second bit is this: iMonk is right that the church culture in which the "know that you know that you know" "invitation" is the so-called "revival" message is broken. I am 100% confident that Dr. Piper wiuld agree with that.
Here's the place where, I think, iMonk and I part company -- and we have to, or else all kinds of people are going to get raptured and the world will be thrown into end-times chaos: assurance drives us to something other than mere solace.
Now, before I say another word, it is possible that this end part of the conversation is a function of people just talking past each other, and I'd be willing to see where we are disconnecting here.
In his podcast, iMonk makes a connection to Lutheran theology to say that we gain assurance through the sacraments and the preaching of the Gospel. Fair enough: stipulating the differences between Lutheran and Baptist sacramentology, I'd agree with him as far as that goes. But what does that assurance mean? Does it only mean that we are, as the olde hymn says, standing on the promises of God? Or does it mean that we have a basis for advancing our sanctification?
See: this is Piper's point, and my point. When iMonk makes the point that perfectionist doctrine goes nowhere, it seems like he and his cohorts/supporters/readers overlook the part where they are willing to admit that someone who is an adulterer in a "glib" way (as he said in the podcast) has a false assurance.
I mean, if you're going to go Luther, even he says, "[the Holy Spirit] works and promotes sanctification, causing [this community] daily to grow and become strong in the faith and its fruits which He produces." If you are willing to say that the adulterer is "glib" in his confession of faith. you have to be willing to ask if anyonbe's sanctification which has stalled out is "glib".
Now, why? Is it because you're (as someone said in the meta last week) trying to snap the bruised reed? Oh good heavens. Listen: there's no question that we will not be finished with sin until the last day -- but think about that in this way: should we be therefore finished with our concerns about sin until the last day?
It is my belief, and my hope, that iMonk would agree with me that the answer is "no way". And the call to die daily to sin is still the Biblical admonition.
Discuss.
Showing posts with label loving God. Show all posts
Showing posts with label loving God. Show all posts
Monday, February 04, 2008
Friday, February 01, 2008
I Heart Piper
Before this week, I think I'd say, "mixed bag" when it comes to reader of this blog and Piper and leave it at that, but in the meta this week I've seen something I didn’t expect: I didn’t expect to se readers of my blog – or visitors from TeamPyro, which many of you have been – to be merely last-generation evangelicals who would hold to a Billy Graham Crusade view of conversion where a pastor who says that people who prayed a prayer might not be saved is castigated as a trouble-maker.
Here's what Sled Dog (a reader and commenter in the meta) said last night:
Dr. Piper's point is the wholly-scriptural point that the believer is called to test himself, and see if the faith which he claims he has is a faith which is changing him. As someone pointed out in the meta, it's a matter of knowing by one's fruits what kind of branch one is.
But apparently that's out of line. Some will call it legalism, and others will call it "works-based faith", and some will simply turn their noses up at the idea that people ought to have a little bit of concern over whether what they say is actually what they mean. You know: when I say that I am a child of the living God, adopted into His Household rather than left for punishment where I belong – and that, bought at the price of the blood of God's one and only son – maybe I should act like that really happened and not like it's a political slogan, a talking point, or a t-shirt.
Maybe I should act like there's a real God who really did this stuff and I'm, at least, grateful.
Think about this: if Donald Trump, who is a billionaire egoist, drove through your town and stopped at your house because he saw your posts on my blog, and he rang the doorbell, invited himself in, and handed you the closing papers on your house, the title for your car, and receipts for 10 years worth of utilities to your house paid in advance, what kind of person would you be?
That is, what would you feel? You'd feel something – maybe stunned at first, or embarrassed. But my guess is that you'd feel grateful. You'd feel grateful – and then the question is what to do about that.
And what Piper is asking here, exhorting here, is that Christ has done more for you than the billionaire egoist can do for you, and if you don't feel grateful, maybe you haven't really received the gift. It could be other things – maybe you haven’t considered the gift; maybe you haven’t examined the gift. But to do those things, you have to be somehow awakened to the fact that you ought to make sure you received the gift.
You know, I drove my first car for 14 years, and the morning it wouldn’t start anymore I was a little put out, but a couple of weeks later my wife bought me my new car. And you know something? Every time I get in it, I wonder if it's really mine, and if I deserve it, and if I will take care to show that I am grateful. Not to the car: to my wife – even though I'm the breadwinner in the house. And for the record, I thank God for his generosity that I have it.
For a car. How much more should we think that way about our salvation? And why on Earth would anyone think that challenging people to examine whether or not they are still grateful, and whether that gratitude has any spiritual bearing on them, is wrong? It's not hardly wrong.
Think about who you are this weekend. Be in the Lord's house with the Lord's people on the Lord's day and let your assurance be challenged – because unless your assurance is changing you, unless it is putting your treasure in things which cannot rust and thieves cannot steal, you have a false assurance.
Here's what Sled Dog (a reader and commenter in the meta) said last night:
[Dr. Piper said] “You gotta make this an issue Sunday after Sunday so that they feel scared that they're not saved."Now, let's be very intentional here. This is what Dr. Piper said:
For me, that's the line that goes over the edge.
The call of the pastor/preacher is to communicate the Word...the whole counsel of God.
The role of the Holy Spirit is to convict.
If I start thinking about scaring people in regards to assurance...that's beyond the call of duty. The Word and the Spirit handle that task much better than I could ever dream of.
Catch on to the affectional nature of Christianity, conversion. It is not merely a decision to believe a fact. It is a heart treasuring Christ and His glory more than football, sex, money, power, play, toys. You gotta make this an issue Sunday after Sunday so that they feel scared that they're not saved.What Dr. Piper did not say is that people should walk around the world wondering if they are saved or not – which is the impression one gets when one views that one sentence out of context, and is the impression guys like Sled Dog are giving in the meta.
You know, I think some pastors are so afraid that somebody might walk up at the end of the service and say, "you really jostled my assurance this morning." If we don't -jostle- people's assurance when they're not saved, we send them to hell.
We must preach in such a way so that people can test -- Test Yourself! 2 Cor 13:5 says, "test yourself to see if you are in the faith". Well, one of the tests is do you love Football more than you love Jesus? Do you love Golf more than you love Christ? What does your heart say about Christ? Late at night, all alone, in front of an internet screen, mouse ready to click, what does your heart say about Christ over pornography?
Dr. Piper's point is the wholly-scriptural point that the believer is called to test himself, and see if the faith which he claims he has is a faith which is changing him. As someone pointed out in the meta, it's a matter of knowing by one's fruits what kind of branch one is.
But apparently that's out of line. Some will call it legalism, and others will call it "works-based faith", and some will simply turn their noses up at the idea that people ought to have a little bit of concern over whether what they say is actually what they mean. You know: when I say that I am a child of the living God, adopted into His Household rather than left for punishment where I belong – and that, bought at the price of the blood of God's one and only son – maybe I should act like that really happened and not like it's a political slogan, a talking point, or a t-shirt.
Maybe I should act like there's a real God who really did this stuff and I'm, at least, grateful.
Think about this: if Donald Trump, who is a billionaire egoist, drove through your town and stopped at your house because he saw your posts on my blog, and he rang the doorbell, invited himself in, and handed you the closing papers on your house, the title for your car, and receipts for 10 years worth of utilities to your house paid in advance, what kind of person would you be?
That is, what would you feel? You'd feel something – maybe stunned at first, or embarrassed. But my guess is that you'd feel grateful. You'd feel grateful – and then the question is what to do about that.
And what Piper is asking here, exhorting here, is that Christ has done more for you than the billionaire egoist can do for you, and if you don't feel grateful, maybe you haven't really received the gift. It could be other things – maybe you haven’t considered the gift; maybe you haven’t examined the gift. But to do those things, you have to be somehow awakened to the fact that you ought to make sure you received the gift.
You know, I drove my first car for 14 years, and the morning it wouldn’t start anymore I was a little put out, but a couple of weeks later my wife bought me my new car. And you know something? Every time I get in it, I wonder if it's really mine, and if I deserve it, and if I will take care to show that I am grateful. Not to the car: to my wife – even though I'm the breadwinner in the house. And for the record, I thank God for his generosity that I have it.
For a car. How much more should we think that way about our salvation? And why on Earth would anyone think that challenging people to examine whether or not they are still grateful, and whether that gratitude has any spiritual bearing on them, is wrong? It's not hardly wrong.
Think about who you are this weekend. Be in the Lord's house with the Lord's people on the Lord's day and let your assurance be challenged – because unless your assurance is changing you, unless it is putting your treasure in things which cannot rust and thieves cannot steal, you have a false assurance.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Jesus Hearts Piper
Here's the thing with this "Piper goes to far" battalion: they are simply trying to force Dr. Piper to say things which it cannot be demonstrated that he is saying.
In the last few days, the other side of this hoopla have tried to say that Piper's view somehow thwarts God's sovereignty because Piper is here instructing pastors to "make people feel" like they need to be saved. Unlike, I guess, Peter at pentecost, where the folks listening were cut the the heart and were pleading with him, "what shall we do to be saved?"
I guess.
But here's the thing: that troublemaker Jesus was also on about how our affections relate to our standing before God. There are a couple of places I think this is demonstrated pretty clearly, but here's one that is simply to obvious to ignore.
Where your -treasure- is, there your -heart- will be. Jesus' words here say explicitly that your treasure -shows- where your heart is.
See -- God's sovereignty is not hardly at stake here: your ability to measure yourself is at stake here. And while we would all affirm -- Dr. Piper included -- that the foundation of our salvation is the finished work of Christ, and the basis for being assured is that Christ saves, our hero Mark Dricosll made a keen point about Grace in his recent "Ask Anything" sermon on the topic.
There was a guy who was a member of Mars Hill Church, and he was a serial adulterer. Married one grrl (that's how they spell it in Seattle), cheated on her, and married that one with whom he cheated. Did it a second and a third time. When Driscoll sat down with the guy, his response was classic: "Jesus forgives all my sins."
Driscoll's response is also classic: "Dude, while I can't see your heart or your soul, in my professional opinion, you do not know Jesus."
That statement is not legalism. It is the assessment that this guy's affections are not Christian affections. He wants worldly sex, not Godly sex. His treasure is laid up in the lap of women who are not his wife, and not at the feet of a savior who paid the highest price for his sin.
This is what Piper is talking about. This is how he is talking about it. Encouraging other pastors to talk about it this way is not hardly a vice -- because it turns out that this would actually be the most serious sin of the American church.
And I'll line that out, and finish up this Pyro-free week on this topic, tomorrow.
UPDATED:
Piper speaks for himself, and if you don't understand him after this, I'm not sure I can help you. The really-vigilant will listen to the audio as it has nature embellishments that the text here doesn't necessarily represent.
In the last few days, the other side of this hoopla have tried to say that Piper's view somehow thwarts God's sovereignty because Piper is here instructing pastors to "make people feel" like they need to be saved. Unlike, I guess, Peter at pentecost, where the folks listening were cut the the heart and were pleading with him, "what shall we do to be saved?"
I guess.
But here's the thing: that troublemaker Jesus was also on about how our affections relate to our standing before God. There are a couple of places I think this is demonstrated pretty clearly, but here's one that is simply to obvious to ignore.
- Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. [ESV, Mat 6]
Where your -treasure- is, there your -heart- will be. Jesus' words here say explicitly that your treasure -shows- where your heart is.
See -- God's sovereignty is not hardly at stake here: your ability to measure yourself is at stake here. And while we would all affirm -- Dr. Piper included -- that the foundation of our salvation is the finished work of Christ, and the basis for being assured is that Christ saves, our hero Mark Dricosll made a keen point about Grace in his recent "Ask Anything" sermon on the topic.
There was a guy who was a member of Mars Hill Church, and he was a serial adulterer. Married one grrl (that's how they spell it in Seattle), cheated on her, and married that one with whom he cheated. Did it a second and a third time. When Driscoll sat down with the guy, his response was classic: "Jesus forgives all my sins."
Driscoll's response is also classic: "Dude, while I can't see your heart or your soul, in my professional opinion, you do not know Jesus."
That statement is not legalism. It is the assessment that this guy's affections are not Christian affections. He wants worldly sex, not Godly sex. His treasure is laid up in the lap of women who are not his wife, and not at the feet of a savior who paid the highest price for his sin.
This is what Piper is talking about. This is how he is talking about it. Encouraging other pastors to talk about it this way is not hardly a vice -- because it turns out that this would actually be the most serious sin of the American church.
And I'll line that out, and finish up this Pyro-free week on this topic, tomorrow.
UPDATED:
Piper speaks for himself, and if you don't understand him after this, I'm not sure I can help you. The really-vigilant will listen to the audio as it has nature embellishments that the text here doesn't necessarily represent.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Hosea Hearts Piper
See: yesterday I gave the short form of Moses giving Piper some air support for the idea that our affections must be God-centered, and two objections have come back from that. The first is this, from brother Stefan:
Fair enough. Why make that mistake? I mean, was it a mistake, or was it my point?
See: the passage I cited was the reason for the Sh'ma. God is saying to Moses here, "Dude, I'm about to take you people into a land which, frankly, has all the comforts of home. But when you get there, you will forget that you didn’t dig the wells, or plant the orchards, or put the roofs over your heads. It's easy to forget God-who-delivers when your tummy is fat and happy."
The exhortation to "love God" comes as a warning in spite of circumstances. We should love God when it doesn’t take a miracle to get water from a rock: we should love Him when we have received the blessing and don’t see our needs quite so clearly.
Love. God.
But then there's the second objection, which is really the original complaint, that if God is telling this to Moses, isn’t this the Law? Isn’t it a standard that we can't live up to, so we only get conviction from it?
Yeah, no.
Listen: Hosea knew a little bit about love, and God told him to say this --
God doesn’t want your penance, or your religious work, or your bulls and sheep and rams: God wants your love, dude. And love, it turns out, is not a fruity emotional cocktale – even in that little snippet from John Piper which is getting so many angry eyebrows this week. Setting our affections on God is not the same thing as sending Him a Valentines Card every day. It is also not, as some have intimated, somehow a dismissal of God's sovereignty.
We'll talk about that tomorrow.
No argument with the substance of your post. Strictly speaking, however, the passage you cited—verses 10 to 14— follows immediately after the Sh'ma (verses 4 to 5, as cited by Jesus in Mark, followed in Jewish religious practice by verses 6 to 9, 11:13-21, and Numbers 15:37-41).He brings that up because I said "Sh'ma" and technically the part I listed was not the Sh'ma.
Fair enough. Why make that mistake? I mean, was it a mistake, or was it my point?
See: the passage I cited was the reason for the Sh'ma. God is saying to Moses here, "Dude, I'm about to take you people into a land which, frankly, has all the comforts of home. But when you get there, you will forget that you didn’t dig the wells, or plant the orchards, or put the roofs over your heads. It's easy to forget God-who-delivers when your tummy is fat and happy."
The exhortation to "love God" comes as a warning in spite of circumstances. We should love God when it doesn’t take a miracle to get water from a rock: we should love Him when we have received the blessing and don’t see our needs quite so clearly.
Love. God.
But then there's the second objection, which is really the original complaint, that if God is telling this to Moses, isn’t this the Law? Isn’t it a standard that we can't live up to, so we only get conviction from it?
Yeah, no.
Listen: Hosea knew a little bit about love, and God told him to say this --
- For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice,
the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.
God doesn’t want your penance, or your religious work, or your bulls and sheep and rams: God wants your love, dude. And love, it turns out, is not a fruity emotional cocktale – even in that little snippet from John Piper which is getting so many angry eyebrows this week. Setting our affections on God is not the same thing as sending Him a Valentines Card every day. It is also not, as some have intimated, somehow a dismissal of God's sovereignty.
We'll talk about that tomorrow.
Moses hearts Piper
Since the meta template ate the red pill or something yesterday, and the conversation there went nowhere as far as I'm concerned, I have a second volley on the question of whether or not John Piper is preaching some kind of emotive legalism.This one comes from Moses:
- And when the LORD your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the LORD your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear. You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you— for the LORD your God in your midst is a jealous God— lest the anger of the LORD your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth.[Deu 6, ESV]
It's Moses who starts that crazy idea that men owe their affections to God, and Jesus signs off on it.
So when Dr. Piper says that people who love football more than God might not have faith in the savior of men, maybe what he means is that Moses knew something about faith in God which the rest of us would do well to reconsider.
More on this tomorrow.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Well, it is Monday after all ...
I apologize for starting the week out both with embedded video and with a response to something iMonk said over the last couple of days, but this is Phil's week off and people need something to chew on.
Here's what iMonk said:
Several months ago I stopped listening to or reading John Piper on any regular basis. Gave away all but six of the books. Unsubscribed to the sermons. Gave away two big boxes of tapes. (I kept quite a bit of audio and video in our ministry’s audio/video library. Don’t think I had a bonfire. I love the man, and I owe him much.)To which he linked the above video, Yes? Here's the transcript of the Piper video:
Steve Brown and I talked- on and off the interview- quite a bit about Piper and what’s going on. We both agreed that the command to feel an emotion is not the foundation of Christian assurance. (That’s Spencer, not Brown, so don’t write him. He can speak for himself.)
Here’s what I’m talking about. Much good, but at the core, my assurance is what I do and what I feel.
Catch on to the affectional nature of Christianity, conversion. It is not merely a decision to believe a fact. It is a heart treasuring Christ and His glory more than football, sex, money, power, play, toys. You gotta make this an issue Sunday after Sunday so that they feel scared that they're not saved.Now, does Piper here say that my assurance is in my emotional state? Or does he instead say that his assurance causes an emotional state?
You know, I think some pastors are so afraid that somebody might walk up at the end of the service and say, "you really jostled my assurance this morning." If we don't -jostle- people's assurance when they're not saved, we send them to hell.
We must preach in such a way so that people can test -- Test Yourself! 2 Cor 13:5 says, "test yourself to see if you are in the faith". Well, one of the tests is do you love Football more than you love Jesus? Do you love Golf more than you love Christ? What does your heart say about Christ? Late at night, all alone, in front of an internet screen, mouse ready to click, what does your heart say about Christ over pornography?
You gotta get in their faces about this because there are a lot of people who've grown up in the church -- baptist churches, methodist churches, presbyterian churches, Catholic, Lutheran churches -- for whom their faith is all tradition, all all head. There's no power in their life to love Christ, to cherish Christ, to have similar kinds of affections for divine things that they have for earthly things.
Make that an issue.
So I'm prayin' that across this convention, there would be a one-mindedness that we must all Yes! Love Justification! Love Redemption! Love Propitiation! Love Deliverance! Love the healing power of God! Love escape from Hell! Love entrance into Heaven! Love restoration with the relatives!
But all of it is a means to an end! Namely, do you love Christ? Do you know Christ? Do you embrace Christ? Do you want Christ? If you've got cancer? And you don't know how long?
Can you say from your heart, "To die is gain! God will take care of Noel. To die is gain!" And feel it! That's a challenge. Then the rubber meets the road.
Do you feel, "this would be good. This would be a gift. This would be sweet."
Pastors, let's do this. Let's help our people be saved.
It is possible that someone could make a case that Piper is saying, "you don't know if you're saved unless you feel happy that you're going to die." I'd be willing to hear that person out. It is my opinion that Piper is saying instead that the goal of the Gospel is to love Christ in spite of circumstances. That is, entertainment and tragedy are two states which misdirect us from keeping God in the right place in our affections.
Think about this: he gives two kinds of examples here -- that we should love Christ more than football, and that we should love Christ when we are diagnosed with cancer. In the former case, I think Dr.Piper is implying that there are no football games around which we should schedule our devotion to Christ -- that if we have to choose between serving and savoring Christ and the Superbowl, we should miss the kickoff for the sake of our savior. Amen?
But what's he mean when he's talking about Christ and cancer? Is he saying something like, "I won't have any moments of doubt when I find out I'm dying"? Or is he saying, "it is my affection for Christ, my faith in Christ as savior, which will overcome my doubts and overcome my fear for my family so that I can trust Him with them as well as with my soul"?
But these have something in common: it is the love of Christ which motivates us. It's not some glum mysticism: it's the fact that He lives and it means something to me.
Let's hear from the other side. I think they are simply mistaken about Piper, but I'd like to see their exposition of his excerpt here. I have done the transcription work for them, so let's see what they can do with it.
As you undoubtedly noticed, I like comics. I wouldn't call myself a "fan boy" because I don't give a flying FOOM what they are worth. That said, almost all the images on my blog are scanned from comics I own -- so they are scanned from comics I own and are used under what I assume is 
