No one can come to the Father but by me

When planning for community group, I read through one of Spurgeon's sermons on John 14:6 "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father but by me."

Spurgeon says:

Do we not each of us in ourselves at times an aptness to come to God in some other way than through Jesus Christ? "Now you have preached well," says Satan; "you have been successful in such-and-such a labor. Ah!" says the devil, "how liberal you have been in such-and-such a cause. Now go to God in prayer." And we go, and we pray with such assurance; we think we are sure to be heard. But perhaps without our knowing it, there is lurking at the bottom of our excellent fluency in prayer an evil thought that surely God will hear us, for we have been so diligent, and liberal. And on the other hand, when we have been committing sin, when conscience chides us, then we go to the throne, and we are half afraid, because we say God will not hear us. Is not that still pride? Why, were we ever better than we are now? Were we not always, and are we not now, as bad as ever we can be? In ourselves is there anything that can commend us to God? Is not the very fact that when in our good state we come boldly, and when in our low state we come timidly, proof that there is lurking in us a secret suspicion that we are to come to God by something that is in us? Oh! if we could but learn this truth and stand to it, that our acceptance with God depends upon nothing that we do or can do, nothing that we can think, or feel, or be, but depends wholly and entirely and solely upon what Jesus is, and what he has done, and what he has suffered, let us once get that thought—and it is in the text—we shall then be able, by the divine assistance of the Holy Spirit, to come to God at all times with boldness, knowing that we were so coming through Christ, and therefore we might always come boldly to the throne of grace.

Though none come to the Father but through Christ, all that come in Jesus' name, not one will he cast out.

John 6:37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.

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Why We Don't Pray

Prayer is essential for the Christian, as much for what it says about us as for what it can do through God. The simple act of getting on our knees (or faces or feet or whatever) for 5 or 50 minutes every day is the surest sign of our humility and dependence on Father in heaven. There may be many reasons for our prayerlessness—time management, busyness, lack of concentration—but most fundamentally, we ask not because we think we need not or we think God can give not. Deep down we feel secure when we have money in the bank, a healthy report from the doctor, and powerful people on our side. We do not trust in God alone. Prayerlessness is an expression of our meager confidence in God’s ability to provide and of our strong confidence in our ability to take care of ourselves without God’s help.

Too often when we struggle with prayer we focus on the wrong things. We focus on praying better instead of focusing on knowing better the one to whom we pray. We focus on our need for discipline rather than our need for God. Almost all of us want to pray more frequently, and yet our lives seem too disordered. But in God’s mind our messy, chaotic lives are an impetus to prayer instead of an obstacle to prayer.

You don’t need to work and work at discipline nearly as much as you need faith. You don’t need an ordered life to enable prayer, you need a messy life to drive you to prayer. You don’t need to have everything in order before you can pray. You need to know you’re disordered so you will pray. You don’t need your life to be fixed up. You need a broken heart. You need to think to yourself: “Tomorrow is another day that I need God. I need to know him. I need forgiveness. I need help. I need protection. I need deliverance. I need patience. I need courage. Therefore, I need prayer.”

If you know you are needy and believe that God helps the needy, you will pray. Conversely, if we seldom pray, the problem goes much deeper than a lack of organization and follow through. The heart that never talks to God is the heart that trusts in itself and not in the power of God. Prayerlessness is unbelief.

Prayerfulness, on the other hand is an evidence of humility and faith, which is why God loves it when we pray.

HT: DeYoung

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Holy Idols?

“…In trying to explain the universality of religion, Sigmund Freud asked why it is that people are so incurably religious. He claimed that we have invented God to deal with things in nature that we find frightening. He explained that by inventing God we personalize or sacralize nature. We feel deeply threatened by hurricanes, fires, tornadoes, pestilence, and armies, but we do not have the same terror concerning our personal relationships. If someone is hostile toward us, there are many ways we can try to defuse that anger. We can try to appease the angry person with words or gifts or flattery. We learn how to get around human anger, but how do we negotiate with a hurricane? How do we mollify an earthquake? How do we persuade cancer not to visit our house?

Freud thought that we do it by personalizing nature, and we do that by inventing a god to put over the hurricane, the earthquake, and the disease, and then we talk to that god to try to appease him.

Obviously, Freud was not on the Sea of Galilee when the storm arose and threatened to capsize the boat in which Jesus and his disciples were sitting. The disciples were afraid. Jesus was asleep, and so they went to him and shook him awake, and they said, ‘”Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?’ Then He arose and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace, be still!’ And the wind ceased and there was a great calm” (Mark 4:38–39).

There was not a zephyr in the air. You would think the disciples’ gratitude would have led them to say, “Thank you, Jesus, for removing the cause of our fear.” Instead, they became very much afraid. Their fears were intensified, and they said to one another, “Who can this be, that even the wind and the sea obey Him!” (v. 41). They were dealing with something transcendent.

What we see in the disciples is xenophobia, fear of the stranger. The holiness of Christ was made manifest in that boat, and suddenly the disciples’ fear escalated. This is where Freud missed the point. If people are going to invent religion to protect them from the fear of nature, why would they invent a god who is more terrifying than nature itself? Why would they invent a holy god? Fallen creatures, when they make idols, do not make holy idols. We prefer the unholy, the profane, the secular—a god we can control.”

—R. C. Sproul, Romans: The Righteous Shall Live By Faith, St. Andrew’s Expositional Commentary (Crossway, 2009) p. 45. Paragraph breaks mine {gasp}.

HT: Miscellanies

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Desiring God Audio FOR FREAKIN FREE

Yes, pinch yourself, cause you may be dreaming.

John Piper's classic book "Desiring God" is available as an audio book download FOR FREE thanks to Christianaudio.com.

Here's the link, follow the directions on the page and enjoy. God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. Christian Hedonists Unite!

woah, sorry about that. And act somewhat quick, the offer is only available in November.

oh, the link: http://christianaudio.com/free_download.php

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The Marriage Index

Thanks to Albert Mohler, my eyes were opened to the almost UNBELIEVABLE fact that only 28.4% of African American babies are born to married parents. That means almost 3 out of every 4 black babies are born to either an unmarried couple or to a single mother...

See these numbers and others concerning marriage from 1970 to Now:

http://www.americanvalues.org/pdfs/IAV_Marriage_Charts.pdf

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Do You Pray?

Why this is an important question: here.

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Massive Book Review Extravaganza

Work is slow right now, which means I have the unique opportunity to host the first annual Massive Book Review Extravaganza. Here goes nothing:


I'd describe this book as simple, relatively cheesy, and powerful. I may have just beens going through an interesting season with the Lord when I read this book, but it did minister to me greatly.

Rating: 7/10





One of the greatest books i've ever read...kinda. I only say "kinda" because I listened to it via audiobook on the many commutes between WV and Columbus. If you've never read or heard Piper before, this book will be a great intro into his heart and the theology that shapes his ministry and life.

Rating: 10/10


If you've read Keller before, you know he's a skilled writer, especially on the topic of apologetics. This book provides some money responses to objections to Christianity that I've heard from both educated and uneducated people at work. Bottom line, the world is believing that all paths to God are good, people are inherently righteous, and that there is no moral right and wrong. If you feel your answers to this are inadequate, check out the book.

Rating: 7/10


Written by a Navy Seal returned from Iraq, "Lone Survivor" takes the reader from Seal training (which is most of the book) to Iraq where a team of Seals are ambushed in a mission gone bad. Only the author survived. The book was longer than it needed to be, very average in the writing, and has several areas of pro-America propaganda. However, it's a true story, and it's crazy.

Rating: 5/10


Amazing account of WWII. With the Old Breed is written by a marine who left college to join the battle overseas and is one of the few who made it through both the campaigns of Peleliu and Okinawa alive. The horrors of this war are almost unbelievable. It is excellently written and very engaging. I STRONGLY suggest you read this.

Rating: 10/10



The author, a columnist for Christianity Today, traveled around the US to document the recent rise in Reformed doctrine. He stops at Mars Hill (Driscol), Southern Seminary (Mohler), and DG (Piper), soooooooooooo, I'm kinda biased in my review here. I liked the book, but I don't know if you'd enjoy it unless you love Reformed doctrine.

Rating: 6/10

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Gettin Married

Although something like 98% of people get married someday and therefore almost everyone could say that they are going to get married, it's even MORE likely in my case...

yeah...I liked it so I put a ring on it.

that was for you chels....and jody.

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How it Should End

If you have seen the movies Terminator and Back to the Future, this should be entertaining for you.

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Bullseye

John Stott, writing 27 years ago (I Believe in Preaching, p. 69):

It is difficult to imagine the world in the year A.D. 2000, by which time versatile micro-processors are likely to be as common as simple calculators are today.

We should certainly welcome the fact that the silicon chip will transcend human brain-power, as the machine has transcended human muscle-power.

Much less welcome will be the probable reduction of human contact as the new electronic network renders personal relationships ever less necessary.

In such a dehumanized society the fellowship of the local church will become increasingly important, whose members meet one another, and talk and listen to one another in person rather than on screen. In this human context of mutual love the speaking and hearing of the Word of God is also likely to become more necessary for the preservation of our humanness, not less.

HT: http://takeyourvitaminz.blogspot.com/

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