Why Pride Should Absolutely Terrify Us

Posted on December 15, 2014 by Dana Dill

timthumbEveryone knows that pride is bad, but not everyone knows why. Sometimes we hate pride for prideful reasons. That is, we hate it when others try to lift themselves above us. When we detect pride in another, though we would never say it like this, even in our minds, we silently think to ourselves, “How dare he think he’s  better than I when I know I am greater than he!” Our pride-filled hearts hate anyone who contends with us for greatness. Sometimes we hate pride in others because we are prideful. However, that is not the reason pride is evil; but it is close.

Pride is evil, not because someone is contending with us for greatness, but pride is evil because it contends with God for greatness. Pride yearns to eclipse God. Pride wishes to be praised, adored, applauded, and loved more than God.

Pastor C.J. Mahaney teases this out well:

Pride is when sinful human beings aspire to the status and position of God and refuse to acknowledge their dependence upon Him.

Charles Bridges once noted how pride lifts up one’s heart against God and “contends for supremacy” with Him. That’s a keenly insightful and biblical definition of pride’s essence: contending for supremacy with God, and lifting up our hearts against Him. (Taken from Humility, p. 31).

In this light, pride quickly turns from being a casual sin we lightly confess to a more terrifying crime: the act where we face off with God to get more glory than Him. Far from a small sin, pride is the act of pulling ourselves up by pulling God down.

How can we fight against such an evil? Among the many things we can do, specific confession is a very needed work. Mahaney elaborates:

For purposes of personal confession, I began adopting this definition of pride a few years ago after I came to realize that, to some degree, I’d grown unaffected by pride in my life. Though I was still confessing pride, I knew I wasn’t sufficiently convicted of it. So rather than just confessing to God that “I was proud in that situation” and appealing for HIs forgiveness, I learned to say instead, “Lord, in that moment, with that attitude and that action, I was contending for supremacy with You. That’s what it was all about. Forgive me.

And rather than confessing to another person, “That statement was prideful on my part; will you please forgive me?” I began saying, “What I just did was contending for supremacy with God, ” and only then asking for forgiveness. This practice increased my conviction in my heart about the seriousness of sin.

Pride take innumerable forms but only has one end: self-glorification. That’s the motive and ultimate purpose of pride – to rob God of legitimate glory and to pursue self-glorification, contending for supremacy with Him. The proud person seeks to glorify himself and not God, thereby attempting in effect to deprive God of something only He is worthy to receive. (pp. 31-32).

With this definition of pride in mind, no wonder God hates it (Proverbs 16:5). With this definition of pride, may we be rightly terrified of it, run from it, and pray that God never let it grow within us.

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A Place to Preach or a People to Pastor?

Posted on December 15, 2014 by Dana Dill

preachthewordI was struck by the sweetness of Phil Newton’s word to young pastors (although applicable to old as well). May God fill His churches with pastors devoted to the good of the people and not their own gain.

Phil Newton:

I was discussing this subject with one of our pastoral interns who recently preached at a church that may be considering him as a pastoral candidate. I asked simply, “You have to discern whether you are looking for a place to preach or whether you are committed to shepherding that congregation.” There is a difference. In the former one might polish his sermons, add oratorical flash, and expect compliments that he has preached a solid sermon. In the latter, he feels the weight of that congregation’s needs as he approaches the pulpit with the Word of God.

He’s conscious that from his trembling lips comes life for that man he’s counseled over and over for habitual sin;

hope for the lady recently diagnosed with terminal cancer;

a vision of the sufficiency of the gospel for the one struggling to put one foot in front of the other;

and the call to serve Christ internationally in the Spirit’s power for that young couple burdened for unreached people groups.

That kind of preaching takes place when a pastor lives with, prays for, loves, invests in, and faithfully shepherds his flock in all of the ups and downs of pastoral ministry. Is it just a preaching point? No, but rather a people entrusted to him by the Lord of the church to pastorally preach week after week after week, even when things get difficult, even when those very people rise up in rebellion, and even when the preacher is no longer popular—that’s the call to pastoral preaching. And so he preaches until Christ is formed in that congregation.

So, my pastor brothers, preach the Word whenever the opportunity arises. Take advantage of filling a pulpit. But don’t accept a church’s call as pastor to simply have a place to preach. Don’t use the people of God for your own gain, but shepherd them with Christ’s heart.

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The Saturday Post(s)

Posted on December 13, 2014 by Dana Dill

Saturday Post

How Do You Sleep? A very good piece on the importance of and lessons within our sleep. There are tons of great Spurgeon quotes, of which this is my favorite: ““He rocks the cradle for us every night; he draws the curtain of darkness; he bids the sun shut up his burning eyes; and then he comes and says, ‘Sleep, sleep, my child; I give thee sleep.’”

When Your Wife Struggles to Follow You. “Here are seven questions a husband could ask himself if his wife struggles to follow him…”

A Confession Based on the Ten Commandments. This is a very short and very good tool to both introduce the Ten Commandments and learn how to use them in prayer.

Who Was St. Nicholas? If you didn’t know, he was a real guy. Also, if you didn’t know, he one time slapped a dude for spreading lies about Jesus.

Confessions of a Hardcore Homeschooler. Some thoughtful reflection on how to school your kids. “Insisting on a particular education method is harmful to the church and runs contrary to God’s word. When we insist on a certain practice, we create an “in” crowd and an “out” crowd, with those who are in being more “spiritual” than those who are out. When we take principles and turn them into hard and fast practices, we make the commands of Jesus burdensome.”

The Best Gift for Christmas Haters. “I’m not going to launch a crusade to promote the observance of Christmas with all its tiresome trappings and requisite redundancies; what I am going to do is call for some reasonableness by those believers who vociferously object to their brothers and sisters in Christ enjoying seasonal festivities.”

5 of the Most Disturbing Things About a Benny Hinn Miracle Service. “There are a lot of things you should try at least once in your life — skydiving, eating some exotic delicacy, traveling alone. Let me give you one thing not to add to that list: attending a Benny Hinn Holy Spirit Miracle Service.”

What Happens to Your Body When You Cleanse or Detox? The conclusion (which needs to be re-taught every few years or so): “Health and nutrition might seem like a confusing mess, but a healthy diet is really all you need. Not a gimmick, not a week long cleanse, not a detox. You’ll need a full reboot of your diet.”

Family News Clips. A collection of very good and relevant articles concerning the family.

Self-Incrimination. I can’t help but feel this is what many will be like before Jesus on that Day: completely self-incriminating.

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He Got Involved

Posted on December 9, 2014 by Dana Dill

nativity-sceneIn 1964, the murder of Kitty Genovese rocked Manhattan.

The story is told that a mugger came up to the young woman in a dark alley and stabbed her twice in the back. She screamed, “Oh my God, he stabbed me.” The lights from the surrounding apartments came on. People looked out their windows and some even shouted. The mugger, seeing the stir, ran off. Kitty stumbled in the alley bleeding from her wounds, crying for help. But nobody came to her help. A little later, when the assailant saw that no one was coming to help her, he walked back to where she lay, raped her, killed her, and took $49 from her purse.

Later, the detectives who investigated the crime documented that 37 people saw the attack, but no one helped. When the detectives asked the witnesses why they didn’t help, they responded, “I didn’t want to get involved.”

And herein lies the beauty of Christmas: God is no bystander. He did not simply sit in heaven, look down at us, and shout. He saw our plight. He knew our inability to save ourselves. He knew the suffering involved in stepping in. And He came. Christmas is God come to the rescue. Christmas is God getting involved.

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14

HT: Paul Levy

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How Can I Help My Pastor Study & Preach as He Should?

Posted on December 8, 2014 by Dana Dill

preaching2I don’t have an answer to the question posed in this post’s title, but someone else does! Here is one Christian’s unforgettable plan on how to help make sure their pastor is preparing for and preaching God’s Word with the seriousness and care it demands.

Fling him into his office. Tear the “Office” sign from the door and nail on the sign, “Study.” Take him off the mailing list. Lock him up with his books and his typewriter and his Bible. Slam him down on his knees before texts and broken hearts and the flock of lives of a superficial flock and a holy God.

Force him to be the one man in our many communities who knows about God. Throw him into the ring to box with God until he learns how short his arms are. Engage him to wrestle with God all the night through. And let him come out only when he’s bruised and beaten into being a blessing.

Shut his mouth forever spouting remarks, and stop his tongue forever tripping lightly over every nonessential. Require him to have something to say before he dares break the silence. Bend his knees in the lonesome valley.

Burn his eyes with weary study. Wreck his emotional poise with worry for God. And make him exchange his pious stance for a humble walk with God and man. Make him spend and be spent for the glory of God. Rip out his telephone. Burn up his ecclesiastical success sheets.

Put water in his gas tank. Give him a Bible and tie him to the pulpit. And make him preach the Word of the living God!

Test him. Quiz him. Examine him. Humiliate him for his ignorance of things divine. Shame him for his good comprehension of finances, batting averages, and political in-fighting. Laugh at his frustrated effort to play psychiatrist. Form a choir and raise a chant and haunt him with it night and day—“Sir, we would see Jesus.”

When at long last he dares assay the pulpit, ask him if he has a word from God. If he does not, then dismiss him. Tell him you can read the morning paper and digest the television commentaries, and think through the day’s superficial problems, and manage the community’s weary drives, and bless the sordid baked potatoes and green beans, ad infinitum, better than he can.

Command him not to come back until he’s read and reread, written and rewritten, until he can stand up, worn and forlorn, and say, “Thus saith the Lord.”

Break him across the board of his ill-gotten popularity. Smack him hard with his own prestige. Corner him with questions about God. Cover him with demands for celestial wisdom. And give him no escape until he’s back against the wall of the Word.

And sit down before him and listen to the only word he has left—God’s Word. Let him be totally ignorant of the down-street gossip, but give him a chapter and order him to walk around it, camp on it, sup with it, and come at last to speak it backward and forward, until all he says about it rings with the truth of eternity.

And when he’s burned out by the flaming Word, when he’s consumed at last by the fiery grace blazing through him, and when he’s privileged to translate the truth of God to man, finally transferred from earth to heaven, then bear him away gently and blow a muted trumpet and lay him down softly. Place a two-edged sword in his coffin, and raise the tomb triumphant. For he was a brave soldier of the Word. And ere he died, he had become a man of God.

(Taken from Rediscovering Expository Preaching by John Macarthur and the Master’s Seminary, p. 348).

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The Saturday Post(s)

Posted on December 6, 2014 by Dana Dill

Saturday Post

No, I Won’t Pray for You. There is a lot of very good wisdom in this article. “It’s the easiest thing in the world to say: “Yes, I’ll pray about that.” And it’s the easiest thing to neglect. The list of all the things I’ve said I’d pray for but then forgotten about would stretch from here to next year. So I’ve started to say, “No, I won’t pray for you.” I am still not entirely comfortable with it, but I think it’s the right thing to do.”

The Real Santa Claus Slaps Heretics. I love this story.

Non-Christians Are Incapable of True Virtue. That was my own title based on this very short thought that Denny Burk takes from Jonathan Edwards. As he says, “The implications are staggering.”

A Confession Based on the Ten Commandments. This is excellent.

What Are We Supposed to Do With Bill Cosby? “It turns out Bill Cosby isn’t the wholesome guy we thought he was.” So what are we to do?

Sexual Orientation & the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Albert Mohler explains why he has started to recognize the concept of sexual orientation. His thoughts are worth reflecting on. Also, kudos to him for always being willing to be challenged, corrected, and sharpened.

What Was the Purpose of the Old Testament Tabernacle? Why did God tell the Israelites to build Him a tent in the desert? For a lot of very exciting reasons.

Why It’s Ok for Christians to Worship Idols. As is cleary stated at the beginning of the piece, this is satire. The author does an excellent job using Christian pro-homosexuality argumentation to argue for the legitimacy of idolatry. “For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to worship idols. It’s not that my parents raised me that way, because they didn’t; I was brought up in a loving, secure, Christian home. But from childhood until today, my heart has been drawn to idolatry. In fact, if I’m honest, one of the defining features of my identity has been my desire to put something else – popularity, money, influence, sex, success – in place of God.”

Interstellar Movie Review. A Christian offer his thoughts about the blockbuster.

Five Points for Parents Who Want to Pass on Their Faith to Their Children. “Five things families should know, do, or remember if they want to pass on their faith to the next generation.”

Archery Amazement. The fellas from Dudeperfect, a group known for their insane basketball shots, picks up some bows and amaze us all. Is there anything these guys aren’t good at?

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Do Our Churches Only Want Mediocre Men?

Posted on December 4, 2014 by Dana Dill

The Apostle Paul once wrote to a young pastor:

“Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love and in endurance” (Titus 2:2).

In preaching this passage, Pastor Voddie Baucham takes some time to apply Paul’s command to produce men who are sound in faith to the church today. Let me just say it, I think he absolutely hits the nail on the head. Take five minutes of your time and be challenged to pursue greater joy. May we raise our expectations to that of Paul’s.

Update: I think it is helpful to note that Baucham is not equating one’s knowledge of church history, theology, or philosophy with their maturity. One can be very knowledgeable of God’s truth without being mature or God-honoring (see James 2:19). Knowledge does not equal maturity. Instead, he is taking aim at the sin issues within the heart that cause many Christians to be lackadaisical or apathetic toward growing their faith and love. So don’t come away focusing on how much your know or don’t know, but think hard about why you are or aren’t seeking to grow your knowledge, faith, and love.

You can see the whole video here.

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Never Compare Your Sufferings

Posted on December 3, 2014 by Dana Dill

gray_sadness_by_eresaw-d4oceee“In an instant, a tragic car accident claimed three generations of his family: his mother, his wife, and his young daughter.”

That is a line from the back cover of a book on my shelf. It is talking about the author of the book. And now for the surprise, the book is titled, A Grace Disguised. As you can guess, the book is about the author’s journey in coming to see his suffering, with all its pain and tears, as just that, a grace disguised.

Without giving too much of the book away, I wanted to share a passage from the book. I remembered the day I read it and have benefitted from its wisdom ever since. In the passage, the author, Gerald Sittser, explains how comparing our sufferings with one another can be one of the most harmful things we can do to ourselves and others in suffering.

We tend to qualify and compare suffering and loss. We talk about the numbers killed, the length of time spent in the hospital, the severity of abuse, the degree of family dysfunction, the difficulty and inconvenience of illness, the complexity of details during divorce, or the strings of bad luck. I have done so myself. After the accident I found myself for the first time on the receiving end of this process. The newspapers covered the story for several days running. I received hundreds of telephone calls, thousands of cards and letters. I became an instant celebrity – someone whose loss could not be imagined or surpassed. Consequently, I often heard comments like, “Three generations killed in one accident!” Or, “All the important women in your life gone, except for poor Catherine!” And most frequently, “I know people who have suffered, but nothing compared to you. Yours is the worst loss I have ever heard about.”

But I question whether experiences of such sever loss can be quantified and compared. Loss is loss, whatever the circumstances. All losses are bad, only bad in different ways. No two losses are ever the same. Each loss stands on its own and inflicts a unique kind of pain…

His conclusion, is well worth reading slowly and carefully. Pray you never forget it.

The very attempt we often make in quantifying losses only exacerbates the loss by driving us to two unhealthy extremes. On the one hand, those coming out on the losing end of the comparison are deprived of the validation they need to identify and experience the loss for the bad thing it is. They sometimes feel like the little boy who just scratched his finger but cried too hard to receive much sympathy. Their loss is dismissed as unworthy of attention and recognition. On the other hand, those coming out on the winning end convince themselves that no one has suffered as much as they have, that no one will ever understand them, and that no one can offer lasting help. They are the ultimate victims. So they indulge themselves with their pain and gain a strange kind of pleasure in their misery.

Whose loss is worse? The question begs the point. Each experience of loss is unique, each painful in its own way, each as bad as everyone else’s but also different. No one will ever know the pain I have experienced because it is my own, just as I will never know the pain you may have experienced. What good is quantifying loss? What good is comparing? The right question to ask is not, “Whose is worse?” It is to ask, “What meaning can be gained from suffering, and how can we grow through suffering?” That is the question I want to explore…(Taken from A Grace Disguised, pp. 33, 38).

In a world filled with tears, may we never forget this wisdom. Instead of comparing our suffering to others’ or vice versa, let us bear one another’s burdens and together look to the one who promises to wipe all our tears away.

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College Students & the Local Church

Posted on December 2, 2014 by Dana Dill

collegeI have had a growing concern for Christian college students that began when I was a young college student. My concern is this: many Christian college students have little to no significant membership with a local church. They may be a part of a campus bible study or go to their school’s weekly chapel or participate in a Cru fellowship, but many are either only superficially connected to a local church by solely attending on Sundays or they neglect it altogether.

This concerns me for various reasons. First, I know that what students practice today is one of the best indicators of how they will live the rest of their lives. Churchless college years easily turns into churchless lives. Churchless Christians tend to be fruitless ones and perpetually live in danger of being hardened by sin (see Hebrews 3:13; 10:25). Second, the church is in need of college aged Christians. Jesus has saved people into His body and the Holy Spirit has gifted all believers (college ones too) with gifts to use for the building up of the body of Christ (see Ephesians 4:12; 1 Corinthians 12:7). When college kids neglect the local church, they are in actuality depriving the church from the gifts Jesus has given them to use. They are refusing to use their gifts for their intended purpose and the church suffers for it. Lastly, college kids need the church. Personal sanctification is a group project that requires the eyes, ears, minds, and hearts of other believers to carry on well. Those are a few reasons why churchless college kids concern me.

College Life Doesn’t Negate Church Membership

At one level, however, I can understand why some college kids struggle to be in a local church. College is a unique season in life and many college students are only around a certain area for a semester at a time. These students think to themselves, “How can I have any kind of meaningful membership in a local church when I know I’ll be moving out at the end of the semester and probably gone for good when I graduate?” Many answer this query by choosing to be loosely connected to a local church or to neglect it altogether. Although I don’t think that’s a good reason to keep oneself from membership in a local church, I understand that college is a unique time with unique circumstances that are sometimes a little more confusing than more normal situations.

However, the uniqueness of college life does not negate the college student’s need for local church fellowship/care or their duty to be a body building member of a local church (Ephesians 4:12). Dave Russell said it well,

Though college years are a unique season of life, college students shouldn’t think of themselves or be encouraged to think of themselves as some kind of special case. Though a student’s time at college is limited, four years is more than long enough to plug into a local church. Living somewhere temporarily doesn’t negate the call to be in the fellowship of the local church. Rather than being viewed as special, college students should be viewed as normal and, thus, should be encouraged to do what Christians “normally” do: join a local church.

Although college is indeed a unique season in one’s life, it provides no exception to live the Christian life abnormally.

Some Practical Counsels

Christians in college have been saved by Jesus Christ into the Church of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 12:12-13). They are members of the church by virtue of being connected to Jesus through faith. Therefore it is imperative that they display their membership in the universal church by being members of a local church; even while they are in college. So, how can a college student seek to have meaningful membership in the local church while school is in session. Here are some practical counsels to help toward that end.

Learn the necessity of joining a local church. Many students simply need to learn that membership in a local church is not an option for Christians, but a necessity. Before the actions change, the heart must change first. To help find some truth and conviction about the necessity of church membership, look no further than this fine list of sermons on the local church (I recommend listening to “The Church and Membership” first and then “The Church and Disappointment” second. Also, I cannot more highly recommend this little beauty by Jonathan Leeman.

Find a good church. Before joining, you must first find one. Here is a simple list of questions to ask and questions not to ask when looking for a church.

Join the church. Don’t simply attend the services. Non-believers or visiting believers attend local churches, local believers join them and submit to them. Obviously, let them know that you are a college student so they understand the possibly temporary nature of your membership.

Introduce yourself to the pastors. Don’t be a face in the crowd, but get to know you pastors and let them get to know you. After all, they are tasked with watching over your soul (1 Peter 5:1-4; Hebrews 13:17) and it should be obvious that they cannot do that if they don’t even know your name.

Talk with one of the pastors and ask how you can best serve the church during the semester. The pastors are most likely well acquainted with ministering to college students (since their church is in proximity to your college campus) and they will have good counsel for how you can build up the body of Christ as a college student.

Make Sunday gatherings a top priority. Don’t treat Sunday gatherings as an option, but as a privilege and responsibility. If you need motivation to go to church, enjoy this.

Try to Get to Know a Few People Well. If the church is bigger than 50 people, you will probably won’t be able to get to know everyone, but that shouldn’t stop you from getting to know a few people well. Pray that God would give you some friendships within the church during your time at school so you can both be blessed and bless. Look for some older Christians to learn from, some peers to befriend, and maybe even a youth or two to pray for and encourage.

My Hope in Writing This

I hope you don’t get the wrong idea about this post. This isn’t written to be a massive guilt trip for the college student, but it is a call toward greater blessing. You have been created for community and saved by Jesus into His family. Joy awaits you within the local church.

I write this as a youth pastor who desperately wants to see my children walk in the truth of the gospel (3 John 4) as members of a local church. The reality is, a neglect of the local church in college often turns into a lifelong habit that continues on well after graduation. Remember, what you do today is the greatest indicator of what you’ll practice tomorrow.

We all must remember that Jesus has saved Christians into the church. Membership in the church is a spiritual reality that must be displayed in the nitty gritty of daily life; even during our college years. Go to your Bible studies. Enjoy your chapels. Drink deeply of your college classes. But never, never, never neglect serving and being served by the Bride of Christ.

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Three Necessary Elements of True Faith

Posted on December 1, 2014 by Dana Dill

faithThe age old question was once asked by a simple jailer:

“Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” Acts 16:30

His prisoners (the Apostle Paul and his companion Silas) responded with confidence, clarity, and boldness:

They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” Acts 16:31

This sums up the message Christians are proclaiming to the world: sinners are saved through faith in Christ alone. But what does the Bible mean when it speaks of trust, belief, or faith? What does it mean to believe in Jesus or put your faith in Christ? Theologian Wayne Grudem sums up the Biblical teaching well in a few short sentences:

When a person comes to trust in Christ, (these) three elements must be present. There must be some basic knowledge or understanding of the facts of the gospel.

There must also be…agreement with these facts. Such agreement includes a conviction that the facts spoken of the gospel are true, especially the fact that I am a sinner in need of salvation and that Christ alone has paid the penalty for my sin and offers salvation to me. It also includes an awareness that I need to trust in Christ for salvation and that He is the Only way to God, and the only means provided for my salvation. This approval of the facts of the gospel will also involve a desire to be saved through Christ.

But all this still does not add up to true saving faith. That comes only when I make a decision of my will to depend on, or put my trust in, Christ as my savior. This personal decision to place my trust in Christ is something done in my heart, the central faculty of my entire being that makes commitments for me as a whole person. (Systematic Theology, p. 712)

There you have the three necessary elements of true saving faith: knowledge, agreement, and trust. Without these, there is no true faith. In order to be saved, one must know the basic truth of the gospel (and the basic truths therein), agree to them, and trust in Christ as their Savior and Lord.

So, do you know the gospel?

Do you agree to the truths of the gospel?

Have you trusted in Jesus alone to save you from your sin?

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