Tag Archives: Theology

Becky’s Testimony

09 Thursday Jun 2016

Posted by in Testimony, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman

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“And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.”  (Revelation 12:11 ESV)

I have heard people that were raised in  Christian homes claim that they don’t have exciting testimonies. I don’t agree, at all. I have often thought anyone who thinks that about their own testimony does not understand how sinful or how needful of God’s grace they really are. Here is a great testimony of God’s grace to a young woman who was raised in a Christian home. Her name is Becky, and I love her dearly- I especially love her tenacious love for God. Here is her testimony, I am sure that it will greatly encourage you- especially, if you think that your own testimony is boring because you were raised in a Christian home.

Becky’s Testimony

Ever since the first time my parents held me in the hospital I have been privileged to hear the gospel but it wasn’t until I was about twelve years old that the Lord started working the miracle of salvation in my heart.

Before I came to know the Lord I had a constant thirst for sin. I often meditated on sinful thoughts and I enjoyed watching things that I knew where sinful and God would not be pleased with. However, what God was pleased with made no difference to me, I did whatever would “gratify the desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16), i.e. whatever made me feel good at whatever time I wanted it, I chose not to think about the possibility that what I was doing was only storing up wrath for me. Whatever made me feel and/or look good was what I set my mind to do. I read the Bible daily and quickly prayed before I started my day, but I saw devotional time only as a duty. I didn’t think, whatsoever, about the Word in depth, and I never even paused to think about who I was praying to. There was no joy in spending time with God. As long as I could check it off my to-do list, I was set. I wouldn’t say I thought I was a good person, I knew everyone was a sinner and I knew God hated sin, but I never stopped to think about myself personally. I assumed I was already a believer, at least until I was about eleven. Around that time, I went into about eight months or so of a spiritual depression. I can’t remember exactly when it started, but I began to have terrible thoughts about the Lord Jesus come into my mind. I tried fighting them with all my might-  but I couldn’t seem to get them out of my mind. It was because of this that I thought God hated me. Worse than that, I thought He detested me. I tried over and over again to beg for his forgiveness, but no matter what I did I felt filthier and more depressed as the days wore on. I felt a heavy, heavy burden on my soul that was far more weight than anything I could ever explain. I thought for sure God would not forgive me, I was His one exception. No one else could ever be as wicked as me and my thoughts were. It was because I knew God was perfect and He demanded perfection that I thought He would most definitely reject me, for I had ruined my only hope. I constantly bore the overwhelming feeling of what I thought was God’s anger and rage towards me, it was as though it were a thick fog, always all around me and all I could see in front of me. I can remember times just lying awake at night crying myself to sleep, thinking about what my eternity would be like. But God never ordains anything without a purpose. My weakness and helplessness before a holy and almighty God led me to finally bring my depression to my sister. She encouraged me to go to God- to get up early to daily read the Scripture and have a prayer time- not to just do devotions for the sake of checking it off my to do list, but to really spend time with God. So I did.

I was also able to finally bring my depression to my parents and specifically, my mom.  God used these things mightily to bring me to Himself. The Lord used many people and things to lead me to see Him as He really is, not how my puny, sinful mind portrayed Him to be. I came to realize first that God will save anyone He wants to, you can’t out-sin God’s grace. As Daniel 4:25 says, “All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, and He does according to His will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and no one can stay His hand or say to Him, ‘what have you done?’” I also realized that He is the One that places the desire to know Him in us. I came to realize I was hopeless, wretched and deserving of eternal torment, and that was exactly what I was going to get, except for one reason and one reason only – Jesus Christ. He is everything to the believer, He is everything to me. He is the only one that took away my sin and wicked deeds on the Cross. He died because He loves me, not because of me- but because of Himself. And He rose again so that I can have new life, eternal life, in Him. I also came to realize a little bit about spiritual warfare. The Scriptures say in Ephesians 6:12, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” The Enemy is really at work in this present darkness and the only One who can defend us is God, we are indeed weak.

Through all of this I’m not exactly sure what moment God changed my heart from loving me to loving Him, but I know I started to see a lot of changes in my life, mind, and heart. I started enjoying my time with the Lord first of all. I now look forward to being able to pour out my heart to Him and thank Him for His work. I love reading Scripture and I get excited when God gives me an insight in His Word. During those prayer times I started confessing sins and bringing them to the Cross. I started being able to actually encourage and talk to others about the Lord from my own experience with Him. I started meditating on the Lord instead of immorality. One of the most joyful things for me was when I found myself actually joyfully anticipating the second coming of The Lord Jesus. These things didn’t come simultaneously but God did work and He is definitely still working.

Since coming to know Christ I have had sustained, immovable joy in God. The joy I have in Him is sustained and immovable because He is the one who saved me. I can and could do absolutely nothing to save myself I was dead. But Christ raises the dead. He saved me and “He who began a good work will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6) The more I think about it, the more overwhelmed I am at God’s kindness to me, He is so good. Now, I have a joyful eternity in front of me because of Jesus. Luke 11:20 says, “Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”. I can now be a part of bringing glory to God – that is perhaps the best gift of all that we receive in Christ. To sum it all up, Ephesians 1:11-12 says, “In Him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the council of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory.”

 

 

Jonathan Edwards: Living for the Glory of God and Family Bible Time…

10 Tuesday Feb 2015

Posted by in Boasting in Weaknesses, Call to the Cross, Edification, Encouragement, Jonathan Edwards, Reformed Theology, Testimony, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman, The Glory of God

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For several years now, my husband and I have been meeting with our kids for Bible Study on Monday nights. I take the girls and we have a “Ladies Theological Society Meeting” -complete with Bible Study, prayer, and chocolate. And, my husband takes the boys to another room in the house, and does “Men for the Lord” (which, by the way, was quite an undertaking for those years when some of Dan’s ‘mighty-men’ were still in feety-pajamas and needed to be in bed by 8:00 PM). Anyways, I share this about our home study time with the kids, because Jonathan Edwards’ Resolutions are a regular part of study time with my girls. We have read the Resolutions together, talked about them, and prayed over some of them for each other. Last week, one of my girls asked me to pray that she would be like Jonathan Edwards- that she would be resolved to live her whole life for the honor of the Lord. It’s for this reason that I decided to post Jonathan Edwards’ first resolution. I figured that maybe some one would read it- and (just like my girls and I have begun to do) catch the passion and intensity of Jonathan Edwards’ intentionality in living for the glory of God!

Resolved, That I will do whatsoever I think to be most to the glory of God, and my own good, profit, and pleasure, in the whole of my duration; without any consideration of the time, whether now, or never so many myriads of ages hence. Resolved, to do whatever I think to be my duty, and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general. Resolved, so to do, whatever difficulties I meet with, how many soever, and how great soever.

One more thing! Here is a link to the Christian Classics Ethereal Library where you can read all 70 of Jonathan Edwards’ life changing Resolutions for free. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/edwards/works1.i.iii.html

 

Endure in Faith by Looking to Jesus

31 Wednesday Dec 2014

Posted by in Boasting in Weaknesses, Call to the Cross, Edification, Encouragement, Exhortation, Faith, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman

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“And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” 1 Peter 5:10-11

Jesus lived and died believing God, and so should we. Jesus lived by the truth that “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). For example, it was His belief in the faithfulness of His Father to answer His prayers, that motivated Him to forego the luxury of sleep, in exchange for hours of uninterrupted prayer with God (Luke 6:12). It was also the Lord’s faith in God that sustained Him for forty days of fasting and testing in the wilderness (Luke 4:1-2). It was Jesus’ trust in God’s wisdom to ordain His cross-suffering and His trust in God’s power to deliver Him through resurrection, which gave Him the ability to submit to God’s will and endure the horrors of Roman crucifixion for His people. Jesus endured all of the afflictions of His earthly life and especially the afflictions that He suffered on the cross by believing in the promises of God.

The promises that Jesus relied upon throughout His life are found in the Old Testament Scriptures. All the books from Genesis to Malachi (the Old Testament) contain promises that God specifically made to the Messiah, who was the long awaited suffering servant of God (Isaiah 52:13- 53:11). For an example in Psalm 16:10 we read, “For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, or let your holy one see corruption.” In this verse, we see that God had promised Jesus He would neither abandon His soul to Sheol; that is, the grave, hell, or the pit; nor allow His Son’s physical body to decay in the grave after He died physically. It was Jesus’ belief in God’s ability and willingness to keep this promise (and other promises similar to it) that enabled Him to humble Himself in faith and become “…obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:8).

When Jesus was on the cross He was thinking about God’s word. We know this because while on the cross, Jesus quoted from the Scriptures. Eyewitnesses of His crucifixion reported that when Jesus was being crucified, He cried out with a loud voice “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34). This quote is taken from Psalm 22:1 where the death, burial, and resurrection of the Christ was foretold. From this, we learn that when the Lord felt most troubled in His Spirit, He held most tightly to His Father’s promises. We should be mindful that Jesus’ confidence in the faithful fulfillment of the promises of God did not diminish the painful realities of His crucifixion. Jesus really bled, really hurt, and really died on the cross. His trust in God to raise Him from the dead did not belittle His cross-work. Conversely, it magnified it. Christ’s reliance on the promises of God throughout His life, and especially on the cross, magnifies the truth that we also can rely on God’s Word throughout the duration of our lives, and especially in the midst of our own afflictions. Since the Son of God was enabled to endure the agonies of the cross through His faith in the promises of God; we are assured that we will be enabled to endure in the obedience of our own faith, in the midst of our lesser trials, by trusting God and by relying on His promises.

If we truly desire to see God transform our lives, we must endure in our faith in God. We need to look to Jesus “…the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross…” (Hebrews 12:2); and be strengthened in our resolve to believe God. We must choose to persevere in our belief in God’s power to transform us, regardless of the many complex difficulties- which may be present in our lives. We need to rely on God’s ability and faithfulness to do all that He has said He would do for us, in us, and through us. God has commanded His people to believe Him. In all things- throughout the trials and afflictions of our live-  we must remember the promise of God that “…after you [we] have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.” And, it is for this reason that we can all say, “To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen“

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John Piper on Prostituted Knowing

12 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by in Boasting in Weaknesses, Christian Love, Christian Service, Edification, Education, Encouragement, Exhortation, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman

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Now concerning food offered to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” This “knowledge” puffs up, but love builds up. If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God. 1 Corinthians 8:1-3 

So the crucial question is: “What would turn this imagined knowing into true knowing?” In other words, what does it mean to know as one ought to know? To think as one ought to think? The answer is in the text before and behind.

Before, Paul had said love builds up (v.1). That implies that any knowledge that does not stand in the service of love is not real knowing. It is prostituted knowing. It is as though God put surgical tools in our hands and taught us how to save the sick, but we turned them into a clever juggling act while patients died. Knowing and thinking exist for the sake of love- for the sake of building people up in faith. Thinking that produces pride instead of love is not true thinking-. We only imagine that we are thinking. God does not see it as thinking. It’s not surgery; it’s juggling.

-John Piper, Taken from Think: The Life of the Mind and the Love of God (pp.159-160).

On Confession of Sin and Playing Games with God

29 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by in Confession of Sin, Edification, Exhortation, Repentance, Sin, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman, Walking in Newness of Life

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“Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.” Revelation 3:19

“Confession is the authenticating mark of repentance, and likewise, repentance is the authenticating mark of our confession. They are like two sides of the same coin. If we truly agree with God about our sin, we will make every effort to stop sinning. We will do everything that we can do to turn away from our sin and turn towards God in the pursuit of holiness. Confession without turning away from sin is not real confession: it is lip-service that we are making to God. Giving lip-service to God reveals either deep stupidity (for who is stupid enough to play games with God?), or it reveals a genuine lack of understanding of who the God of the Bible is and how dangerous sin is. Jesus tells people who think that they are all set with half-hearted Christian living (things like insincere confession or lives that lack the fruits of repentance): “Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent” (Revelation 3:19).”

Walking in Newness of Life: Experiencing the Power of God in Resurrection by Identifying with Christ in His Death and Burial pp. 51-52

 

On Living in the Reality of Philippians 2:12-13.

19 Friday Sep 2014

Posted by in Boasting in Weaknesses, Edification, Education, Encouragement, Pauline Theology, Reformed Theology, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman, The Holy Spirit, The Sovereignty of God, Walking in Newness of Life

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“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” Philippians 2:12-13

“Personally, I cannot imagine a way that we could possess a more intimate knowledge of God than having Him inside of us in the person of the Holy Spirit, manifesting His resurrection power through our physical, mental, and emotional capacities; literally changing us from the inside out, and thus enabling us to walk in newness of life in Christ- only the Lord could think of that. Yet, astonishingly, this is exactly what has been happening in us since the moment that God saved us. God has been making us more and more holy, conforming us into the image of His Son. He has been forgiving sin. He has been at work healing that which is lame in us. He has begun to unravel our twisted sinful thinking and untangle all the shame filled knots in our souls. God has only begun to resurrect that which is dead in us; teaching us how to walk in the glorious newness of life that He has so graciously given us in Christ. Since the moment that we passed from death to life, God Himself has been at work in our souls producing all of the necessary graces that we have needed for walking in newness of life- through our union with Christ. Every step of faith that we have taken, every act of obedience which we have completed, every willingness and inclination towards God’s will has been a fulfillment of both the exhortation and the promise of Philippians 2:12-13: “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”

Taken from Walking in Newness of Life, p. 138.

Why Matter- Matters.

10 Wednesday Sep 2014

Posted by in Edification, Encouragement, Walking in Newness of Life

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“God created everything that exists in order to manifest (or to make known) His glory. All matter was created to give us a small glimpse, a physical picture, of the incomprehensible greatness of who God is. Do you think that fruit is sweet? God is sweeter than the sweetest of fruit. Do you think that the sun is dazzlingly brilliant? God is dazzlingly brighter still. Do you think cool water is refreshing on a hot summer’s day? God is more refreshing than a thousand thirst-quenching mountain springs. Do you think that the ocean is vast? The vastness of God is greater still. Do you think that the universe is large? It is nothing in comparison to the greatness of God. So you see, matter matters because of what it shows us about God.”

Taken from Walking in Newness of Life: Experiencing the Power of God by Identifying with Christ in His Death and Burial (p.25).

What Does it Mean that God is Glorious?

08 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by in Education, Encouragement, Reformed Theology

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Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory! Isaiah 6:3

“Since God is holy in every way possible; God is glorious in the most possible way. To say that God is glorious means that God is worthy of fame and admiration; that God has striking beauty and splendor that evokes feelings of delighted admiration in us. God’s glory is the overflowing radiance and the brilliance of the holiness of God (i.e., the set-apart-ness of God) which calls forth our worship, admiration, and praise. God’s glory is the revelation of the surpassing magnificence, beauty, and value of Who God is in all of His perfect characteristics. His perfect love, His sovereignty, His patience, His kindness, His wisdom, His loveliness, and all of His other perfections make God desirable, delightful, pleasing, admirable, and glorious. This is why in God’s throne room, the great seraphim cry out, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” (Isaiah 6:3).♦

For a good article on the essence of the glory of God see: Piper, John. 2012. Soli Deo Gloria. http://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/soli-deo-gloria/. April 19, 2014.

♦Taken from Walking in Newness of Life: Experiencing the Power of God in Resurrection by Identifying with Christ in His Death and Burial (pp. 24-25).

Personal Red-Sea Experiences?

03 Wednesday Sep 2014

Posted by in Boasting in Weaknesses, Call to the Cross, Cross-Bearing, Edification, Encouragement, Exhortation, Testimony, The Believing 21st Centruy American Woman, The Sovereignty of God

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The cross is the  place where our weaknesses and God’s sovereignty make sense.  When we bring our weaknesses, brokenness, and messed up pasts to the cross of Christ, we can start to grasp the weight of the truth that Jesus, of His own volition, identified Himself with our frailty through the incarnation, and then willfully identified Himself with our brokenness on the cross, so that by sovereign grace, we can identify with Him in His powerful resurrection life. It is at the cross of Christ that we begin to understand that Christ is not the indifferent Sovereign Bystander that some assume Him to be. But that our Lord is the voluntary Sovereign Substitute, who has voluntarily identified Himself with our weaknesses through His cross. And it is at the cross that we learn that the Lord overcomes all of our pain, because it is the cross that leads us to experience the resurrection.

We find at the cross that the Lord is not at all the Silent Witness to our brokenness, neediness, and weaknesses, but that He is, in fact,  the Silent Lamb, who has been slaughtered for them, and that He is the Sovereign Lord who even now, by the power of an indestructible life, rules over them.  When we begin to understand the cross-work of Christ, we can begin to understand in a very personal way the massive and life-changing reality of the sovereign power and deep love that God has for each of His children. For, the cross is not the end of experiencing the redemptive power of God, but it is actually the means to the experiencing the resurrection power of God.  At the cross we  begin to really appropriate the awesome truth that God is most certainly and most emphatically sovereign over all things in life – working them all to the end for our good and His glory (Romans 1:4; 6:3,4; 2 Corinthians 13:4).

God has given each one of us our own personal Red Sea Experience – some life changing providence intended by God to lead us to a desperate need of experiencing the awesome power of God in resurrection. These events, as painful as they may be, are all part of God’s perfect sovereign ordering of our lives. Our personal Red Sea Experiences are the practical outworking of the sovereign grace of God in our lives. Each one ordained to the end that we would turn to Christ in saving faith; experience the powerful redemption of the cross, and know the depth of the love of God and the power of His sovereignty more intimately through our union with Christ. So embrace the cross and experience the sovereign power of God in resurrection.

Appropriate the Doctrine of the Sovereignty of God.

01 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by in Edification, Encouragement, Exhortation

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“God alone is sovereign (Ezekiel 12:28; Acts 2:24; Revelation 6:10). To be sovereign is to be unrestricted in power and absolute domination, confessing no limitations or restraints. In layman’s terms this means that God is in control, totally and completely in control of everything, everywhere, all the time. As the Bible says, “…He does according to his will among the hosts of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?” (Daniel 4:35). Unlike all created entities (angels, humans, animals, everything but God), God is not dependent upon any outside source for anything at all. God never has to ask permission. God never needs help, aid, counsel, approval, or affirmation: He does what He wants to do, when He wants to do it, how He wants to do it, and He does it despite how people may feel about it. Only God is sovereign; because only God has absolute and unrestricted, unlimited power and domination. For this reason, King David prayed, “Yours, O LORD, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, for all that is in the heavens and in the earth is yours. Yours is the kingdom, O LORD, and you are exalted as head above all… In your hand are power and might, and in your hand it is to make great and to give strength to all” (1 Chronicles 29:11-12).”♦

Since God is sovereign we, (believers in Christ), do not have to be afraid, anxious, worried, or upset about anything at all. For, our God is in control. He is in control of everything. He is in control when we have huge life changes, when we feel terribly alone, when we are under massive amounts of stress, and when we face circumstances that seem impossible to overcome. As Believers we have the comforting knowledge that in everything- at all times and in all places- our perfectly kind and gloriously gracious God has total and absolute power, authority, and dominion over everything in life. We have the certain knowledge that our good and Sovereign Lord is working all things out for the good of His people and the glory of His name. Therefore, when our lives feel unbelievably out of control- we have to remind ourselves that God is still in control. In other words, we have to  appropriate the doctrine of the sovereignty of God.

♦First paragraph taken from Walking in Newness of Life: Experiencing the Power of  God in Resurrection by Identifying with Him in His Death and Burial (p. 24).