Some more thoughts on glory

I will return to the Piper quote when I’ve got some time.  Meantime, here are some jottings I did a while ago on glory in John.  They are not joined up thoughts, it’s all a bit scattershot…
Jesus insists He will not glorify Himself, but His Father glorifies Him (John 8:50,54).  Glory is other-centred – even [...]

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He loves us because He loves us

I wasn’t a huge fan of this paragraph quoted on Tony’s blog (as my comment makes clear).
But I love this one:
Thomas Manton, from a sermon on John 3:16
“Love is at the bottom of all. We may give a reason of other things, but we cannot give a reason of his love, God showed his wisdom, [...]

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Glory is not…

Glory is not a something that God gets.  Glory is the display of who God is. 
And this display, shining out from Christ and Him crucified, reveals the overflowing plenitude of God’s being as Giver.
Glory is not what lies behind the cross (the cross considered as a veil or mere stepping-stone).  God’s glory is this [...]

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No merit in man’s receiving – only in God’s giving

“To be bursting with thanksgiving is a true witness of the Spirit within us. For the voice of thanksgiving speaks without ceasing of the goodness of God. It claims nothing. It sees no merit in man’s receiving but only in God’s giving. It marvels at his mercy. It is the language of joy because it [...]

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Why should I let you into my heaven?

From Doug Wilson:
I was talking to a woman one time… and she told me sheepishly about her first reaction to that great grace question hypothetically presented at the pearly gates — “why should I let you into heaven?” The right answer of course is a variant of “because of the blood of Jesus Christ, plus [...]

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Mike Reeves on Justification part 1

Hour long talk.  Mike opens with the story of justification. Really, really good.
Here’s an early stop along the road.  The Epistle to Diognetus:
He himself took on Him the burden of our iniquities, He gave His own Son as a ransom for us, the holy One for transgressors, the blameless One for the wicked, the righteous [...]

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Amazing Grace

How sweet the sound.
66 minutes of the marvellous Menon on grace.  He plunges us to the depths then takes us to the heights.  Balm for the soul, as Will would say.
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He rescued me because He delighted in me

I preached that verse about a month ago (Ps 18:19).  And you know my first reaction as I was preparing?
Hmmm, tricky, how on earth should we understand this…?
I hope you’re all saying: But why Glen – it seems perfectly straightforward.
Well, there’s the slightly tricky part about how we take the verse on our own lips.  [...]

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Christ Alone, Grace Alone, Revelation Alone

I’m halfway through Mike Reeves’ excellent lectures on a theology of revelation.  Go and listen now if you haven’t done already.
Maybe I should put them somewhere prominently and permanently on the blog because they explain much better than I can the thinking behind ‘Christ the Truth’. 
To be an evangelical theologian is to have your method [...]

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Dying with Jesus

How do you think of judgement and salvation?
If you ask me – you shouldn’t think like this:
 
Instead think like this:
 
Or to be a bit more nuanced – like this.
Now I could take this observation in many directions.
Perhaps we could explore its significance for an infra versus supra-lapsarian debate.
Perhaps we could discuss the strong link that [...]

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The bleeding charity

I just used this quote from CS Lewis’s The Great Divorce to illustrate the difference between the two sons in Luke 15.  
It’s a parable about a bus-load from hell who are Ghosts.  They come to the outskirts of heaven and the Bright Men from heaven come out to try to convince the Ghosts from hell [...]

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What grace is not…

‘Isn’t it wonderful that we’re now under grace?’ they enthuse.
‘Sure is,’ you say.
And then they explain what they mean by ‘grace’ and you wonder what it is they’ve really found themselves ‘under’.
 
Here are 8 common misconceptions.
1. Wahey!  Isn’t it great that God has lowered the bar?  He used to care about loads of stuff.  Now it’s [...]

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Gonna mess you up

There are two things that will really mess you up in life.  Getting married and becoming a Christian.  You can poodle along quite contentedly before either of these states.  But once you enter marriage, or once Christ enters you – life as you know it is over.
I know a good number of people who have [...]

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The fruit of the Spirit as works of the flesh

For years I prayed for the fruit of the Spirit every day.  (Galatians 5:22f)  Yet, looking back, I prayed for the fruit in an altogether fleshly way.
How so?  Well basically my prayers were petitions for the moral character of ‘love, joy, peace…’ as abstract qualities. I would judge my own spiritual walk that week by how loving, [...]

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Sanctification by Faith

Just an excellent podcast (25 mins)
Tim Rudge talks to Mike Reeves on living by faith on an hour by hour basis – applying the truths of the gospel to our sin and cultivating a healthy and happy walk with Christ.  I’ve listened to it twice already.  Great stuff.
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How to win the world

It’s a story about high school football.  But really it’s about how to win the world.  Go and read now!
h/t Letters from Kamp Krusty
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Trinity sermon part 2

I’ll get round to responding to comments soon.  Here’s the second part of yesterday’s trinity sermon
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Trinity Sermon part 2:  Galatians 4:4-6 (audio here)
…The trinity is the good news that God is love. 
 

 
On the other hand: – the imaginary, solitary, self-centred god is nothing but bad news. 
 
 
 
The difference between these two ideas of God comes out [...]

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Trinity sermon

Seems like a few more people have stumbled onto the blog recently (thanks for the links Dave, Dan, Ed, Paul, others).
I thought I’d bring everyone up to speed with where I’m coming from.  So I’m posting a sermon I preached a couple of years ago.  It’s about the trinity and grace. 
I reckon between preaching, trinity and [...]

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What would cheap grace look like?

…The younger brother came to himself and said, ‘My dad’s an old softy.  I reckon if I returned looking sufficiently contrite he’d bail me out.  It’s worth a try anyway.’ he reasoned. 
And so he rose and made the journey back to his father rehearsing his sorry-spiel along the way.  ‘Father, my father.  I know I messed up.  [...]

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Performance vs Grace

Go and read this wonderful post by Tim Chester.  I’m looking forward to downloading the whole talk.
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Seeing the Doctor 1

Do you ever wonder, like this blogger, if Jesus would actually like you?  Not whether some abstract principle of grace covers you.  But the question, How would the radical Jesus of the bible deal with you?
I mean the Guy’s fierce.  Totally uncompromising, pure.  No double-standards, no tolerance for double-standards.  He sees you to the bottom.  [...]

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Go and preach the gospel…

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… TO OTHER CHRISTIANS!
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Here’s my ill-considered overstatement of the issue:  Our problem is not that we aren’t telling the gospel to our pagan friends.  It’s that we don’t tell the gospel to our Christian friends! 
When’s the last time you looked another Christian in the eye and said ‘Mate you’re a sinner.  I know you have struggles, [...]

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Jesus, not some Christ-principle

An interviewer once suggested to Barth that he followed a christo-centric principle in his theology.  Barth was not impressed.  He insisted that he had no interest in a christo-centric principle.  He was interested in Christ Himself. 
Whether Barth always achieved that is another matter (who does?).  But at least he identified the danger with which all [...]

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Seething civility

Back from holidays now.  While away I was very tickled by this from Saturday’s Guardian. 
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One Million Tiny Plays About Britain by Craig Taylor
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Two old women finish their tea at a cafe in Lichfield. One holds the bill…
Anna Oh, you. Now don’t be so utterly ridiculous.
Eva I insist. I insist, my dear.
Anna Absolutely not and I [...]

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What changes the heart?

Tim VB put me onto this 9 week course about Gospel Centred Living which is freely available here.  It looks great.  They draw on material from World Harvest Mission – their Gospel Tranformation and Sonship courses.  To give you a flavour of these, here is the blurb about the Sonship course:
Sonship: Live the theology you [...]

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Sin is not the problem

I was once in a preaching seminar with 15 other young guns.  We were being taught by someone you might call a living legend.  One session I remember was on how to preach Romans 3:21-30.  The point came when the living legend asked us what we thought the application should be.  Now aside from my various [...]

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Means of Grace not the end of our work

The means of grace (things like preaching and sacraments) are meant to be just that.  Means by which the grace of God reaches down to us.  I’ve been reflecting recently that often we try to absolutize the means of grace so that they become not means but ends in themselves, and not grace (i.e. His [...]

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Five Smooth Stones – Reward

This is the last in our series looking at various doctrines through the lens of the David and Goliath story. (The other four stones were: preaching, grace, faith and election)
Here we consider why it is that the concept of reward is not counter to the doctrines of Christ alone, grace alone and faith alone.
So let’s ask: [...]

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Five Smooth Stones – Faith

We’ve looked at Preaching and Grace, now we examine Faith through the lens of David and Goliath.
One of the most significant ‘light-bulb’ moments for me in the last couple of years has been to hear Alan Torrance and Mike Reeves say in different contexts basically the same thing.  Namely this: the reformers did not speak [...]

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Five Smooth Stones – Grace

I’ve begun looking at the story of David and Goliath as a lens through which to view five different doctrines:

Preaching
Grace
Faith
Election
Reward

In my last post we saw that preaching is not like a military briefing to troops on the front line.  It’s the war correspondent heralding the victory of Another to an otherwise hopeless people.  It’s about His victory [...]

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Five Smooth Stones – Preaching

You’ve all wondered what David’s five smooth stones represent (1 Sam 17:40).  Now I bring you the definitive answer…
Not really, I just have some reflections on David and Goliath and there happen to be five of them… 

Preaching
Grace
Faith
Election
Reward

But first, let’s remind ourselves of the story. (Read it here)
So here we are (verses 1-3) the uncircumcised Philistines [...]

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