A Look Back & A Look Ahead

We talked about this a few times during our study of James: Justin Taylor shares some "Echoes of the Sermon on the Mount in the Book of James."  You may have noticed some of these between our lessons in James and Quintin's series through the Sermon on the Mount.  Here are a few examples (out of 18) that Taylor lists:

Rejoice and be glad in your trials. 

“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” (Matthew 5:10-12) 

“Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds.” (James 1:2) 

Be perfect and complete. 

“You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48) 

“And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” (James 1:4) 

Ask your good and wise God who loves to give good things. 

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:7-11) 

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. . . . Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” (James 1:5, 17)

Read the rest of the parallels here.

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Looking ahead to our next study, this is something that I've been meaning to share since I found out that we would be studying Jonah.  A little over a year ago, Tullian Tchividjian was interviewed by Collin Hansen of the Gospel Coalition about his book, Surprised by Grace: God's Relentless Pursuit of Rebels.  Hansen asked Tchividjian the following questions:

• Why do you say Jonah is one of the best books for helping us get a better grip on the gospel?
• How does the book of Jonah reveal the contrast between God's heart and ours?
• How does Jesus' treatment of Jonah help us teach it today?
• How did you see your congregation respond when you preached the gospel from Jonah?
• What do you mean by saying Jonah is a storied presentation of the gospel?
• What books, articles, sermons, etc., helped you preach Christ and the gospel from Jonah?

Here are a couple of Tchividjian's answers:

Why do you say Jonah is one of the best books for helping us get a better grip on the gospel? 

Surprised by Grace started out as a series of sermons on Jonah that I preached during the hardest year of my life. Preparing those sermons and preaching them proved to be a functional lifeline for me, not because of things I learned about Jonah (everything we learn about Jonah we learn by way of negative example), but because of things I learned about God’s amazing, sustaining, pursuing grace. 

I learned that God’s capacity to clean things up is infinitely greater than our human capacity to mess things up. I learned about the “stubbornness” of God to accomplish his will, regardless of how hard we may try and thwart it. In fact, as I reflect on that painful season of my life now, I can honestly say that I am genuinely thankful for all the ache I experienced. For it was during this trying time that God helped me recognize, through the story of Jonah, the practical relevance of the gospel—that everything I need and long for, in Christ, I already possesses. 

What do you mean by saying Jonah is a storied presentation of the gospel? 

It is a story of sin and grace, of desperation and deliverance. It reveals the fact that while you and I are great sinners, God is a great Savior, and that while our sin reaches far, his grace reaches farther. This story shows that God is in the business of relentlessly pursuing rebels—a label that ultimately applies to us all—and that he comes after us not to angrily strip away our freedom but to affectionately strip away our slavery so we might become truly free.

Read the full thing here.  More importantly, read through all four chapters of Jonah sometime this week and come prepared to dive in this Sunday.

It Is Finished

I read part of an interview with Tullian Tchividjian tonight, and it made me think of our discussion of faith & works in James this morning:

So how did Christians become legalists about the whole idea of sanctification, where did we get it wrong do you think?


Tullian: I think since Genesis 3, we have all been prone towards works righteousness. Our heart is bent to do it on our own and that doesn’t go away after we become Christians. We still drift into what Jerry Bridges calls the “performance treadmill.”


For instance, none of us has a problem saying that our good works don’t get us in. We know our good works don’t get us in. Any good works are as filthy rags because we’re justified by grace alone through faith alone and the finished work of Christ alone. We acknowledge that.


But once God saves us it gets weird because we start thinking, OK, my good works do keep God’s favor. My good works may have not earned God’s favor, but it’s up to me to keep God’s favor. As a result, we become the hero of the story. We become the centerpiece of our own narrative, and Jesus is sitting on the sidelines and we’re on the field and he’s like, “Put me in, coach,” and we’re like, “No. We got it. Thanks for getting us on the field, but we’ll take it from here.” And we add all sorts of things.


...


The good news of the gospel is that my standing with God is not dependent on my obedience but Christ’s obedience for me. People will say, “Well, you can’t say that because then what impetus will you have to get people to do what they need to do?” and I simply go back and give them an illustration and say, “Listen: if I know that my wife loves me unconditionally—whether I’m being nice or whether I’m being a jerk—does that make me want to be more of a jerk?” [Laughing] It actually makes me want to be nicer. The thing that makes me want to love my wife more is when she loves me when I’m not being nice.


That’s the kindness of the Lord that Paul says leads to repentance. It’s the amazing grace of God, the unconditional favor of God given to us because of what Christ has done that transforms the human heart and turns us into the kind of people the Bible describes.

This was from part 3 of the interview.  You can also check out part 1 and part 2.

Wrecked by Grace

One of my latest favorite guys on the planet is Tullian Tchividjian, grandson of Billy Graham and Senior Pastor at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. He challenges me to think about the grace of God and the gospel like few people do. He has taught me much about the radical nature of God's love and the centrality of the gospel in the Christian's day to day life, particularly regarding sanctification and holiness. I highly recommend anything by him.


Here is a great example of his writing. Enjoy!