Friday, July 20, 2007

Too Busy To Pray: Part Two

The following is a quote from R.C. Sproul's book, "Following Christ." This has several excellent chapters on prayer that I would suggest anyone to read.

"Looking at the issue from another perspective, however, we ought to be surprised every time we experience forgiveness. We ought never to take God’s mercy and forgiveness for granted, even though we live in a culture that does. It is terrifying to consider the ease with which we take God’s grace for granted. I occasionally ask collegians, seminarians, seminary professors, and ministers the questions, “Is God obligated to be loving? Is he bound to forgiveness and grace?” Again and again their answers are in the affirmative: “Yes, of course, it’s God’s nature to be loving. He’s essentially a God of love. If he didn’t show love, he wouldn’t be God. If God is God, then he must be merciful!”
He must be merciful? If God must be merciful, then his mercy is no longer free or voluntary. It has become obligatory; if so, then it is no longer mercy, but justice. God is never required to be merciful. As soon as we think God is obligated to be merciful, a red light should flash in our brains, indicating that we are no longer thinking about mercy, but about justice. We need to do more than sing “Amazing Grace”—we need to be repeatedly amazed by grace."

R.C. Sproul, Following Christ (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 1996, c1991).

Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Too Busy to pray: Some Food For Thought

Have you ever thought to yourself at any time that you are too busy to pray? Be honest, even if you can trick others you can't trick God. Now that your being honest with yourself, lets be even more honest. This idea that we are too busy to pray is a sinful thought manifested from our selfish lusts and desires. We have too many things crammed into our life that we think we must do that God just gets pushed out the time frame. By the time we are finished doing everything that we wanted to get done, there is no time left to pray.

The key word to catch in that phrase is "wanted." In reality, if we "wanted" to pray to God, we could never be "too busy." That whole phrase "too busy to pray" is just ridiculous and reflective of our self indulging society. Stop and give this some food for thought: God is our Creator, in Him we live and move and have our being. We enjoy today and are busy today because God has given us life! Can we not then at the very least take a few moments each and every day to stop thinking about ourselves and thank God for the busy day? That would at least be a good first step.

John Wesley once remarked that he didn’t think very highly of ministers who didn’t spend at least four hours per day in prayer. Luther said that he prayed regularly for an hour every day except when he experienced a particularly busy day. Then he prayed for two hours. We need more Christians like that in today's world; Christians who breathe prayer like they breathe air.

Probably more to follow...

Saturday, July 14, 2007

Quotes worth Quoting from "The Reformed Pastor"


"This is the sanctification of your studies, when they are devoted to God, and when he is the end, the object and the life of them all."


"Theology must lay the foundation, and lead the way of all our studies. If God must be searched after, in our search of the creature, (and we must affect no separated knowledge of them) then tutors must read God to their pupils in all; and divinity must be the beginning, the middle, the end, the life, the all, of their studies. Our physics and metaphysics must be reduced to theology; and nature must be read as one of God's books, which is purposely written for the revelation of himself."


"O what sadder case can there be in the world, than for a man, who made it his very trade and calling to proclaim salvation, and to help others to heaven, yet after all to be himself shut out! Alas! that we should have so many books in our libraries which tell us the way to heaven; that we should spend so many years in reading these books, and studying the doctrine of eternal life, and after all this to miss it! - that we should study so many sermons of salvation, and yet fall short of it! - that we should preach so many sermons of damnation, and yet fall into it?"


"Take heed to yourselves, for you have a depraved nature, and sinful inclinations, as well as others. If innocent Adam had need of heed, and lost himself and us for want of it, how much more need have such as we? Sin dwelleth in us, when we have have preached ever so much against it; and one degree prepareth the heart for another, and one sin inclineth the mind to more. If one thief be in the house, he will let in the rest; because they have the same disposition and design. A spark is the beginning of a flame; and a small disease may cause a greater...Alas! in our hearts, as well as in our hearers, there is an adverseness to God, a strangeness to him, unreasonable and almost unruly passions! In us there are, at the best, the remnants of pride, unbelief, self-seeking, hypocrisy, and all the most hateful, deadly sins. And doth it not then concern us to take heed to ourselves?"


"When we have led them to the living waters, if we muddy it by our filthy lives, we may lose our labour, and they be never the better."


Thursday, July 12, 2007

The Puritan Study

Ever wanted to learn more about the Puritans but just didn't know where to start? Tony Reinke has made "The Puritan Study" and I would encourage you to take full advantage of it! He covers such topics as the following: The Puritan Study series covers many related topics: Which Puritans are most helpful in expositions? How do electronic and printed books work together? How do we effectively and quickly search Puritan literature? How can I implement specific Puritan insights into my sermons? And, how can I build a useful Puritan library of my own? Go there now!

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

John Owen and Derek Thomas

Over at The Shepherds Scrapbook, a blog I until today knew nothing about but heartily recommend, you can download for free 8 lectures by Derek Thomas on John Owen. I have already downloaded them myself! Here is what it says on his site regarding these lectures:
"John Owen’s Pastoral Theology Lectures by Dr. Derek Thomas
Here are the valuable lectures of Dr. Derek Thomas on the Pastoral Theology of John Owen delivered at the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary this past Spring. They are here posted with the kind permission of Dr. Thomas and the President of PRTS, Dr. Joel Beeke. Here you can stream the audio through this page or download the lecture audio files. The course description and objectives are below."

What are you waiting for! Go download and listen to them!

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Ten Luther Myths

James R. White has posted "Ten Luther Myths." I enjoyed reading them and I thought you might as well! After you read that, read "Five More Luther Myths" by White also. The most surprising one to me is Luther perhaps never really said, "Here I stand!"

Friday, July 6, 2007

Interview with Tom Schreiner

Over at Against-Heresies is an interview with Tom Schreiner concerning "penal substitution." Here is a link to the interview. One question Schreiner was asked is "what books on the atonement are a must read for pastors?" To my shame, I have only read one of the books suggested! Have you read them all?

Book Sale!

The Westminster Bookstore is having a sale on its products good through July 10th. There are several books there I hope to purchase and I hope you will find some also to purchase! As Thomas Jefferson once said, "I cannot live without books..." They also just recently began a useful blog for the sole purpose of reviewing books! So if your a book lover, this is a website to put in your favorites folder! Go there now!

Verse of the Day