If January is the month to set new goals and resolutions for the New Year, February is the month to desert resolutions, like the abandoned cars on D.C. side streets packed tightly under the snow tossed from city plows.
Pastor John Newton (1725–1807) was familiar with this challenge of attaining lofty goals, a topic he discussed in a letter written in February 1772 to one of his friends.
Newton writes, “The Lord has given his people a desire and will aiming at great things; without this they would be unworthy of the name of Christians.”
The desire to aspire is very important to the Christian life. We are to aim high in so many great things. Newton notes four of them:
1. We aim to pray regularly. What greater privilege to approach the throne of grace and to cast all our burdens upon the King of Kings?
2. We aim to read and study Scripture diligently. What is more desirable than much fine gold, sweeter than the dripping honeycomb, but God’s Word?
3. We aim to delight frequently in Christ and live in his debt. What greater aim to live daily with a grateful heart for the Savior’s work on the cross?
4. We aim to trust God in all circumstances, whether prosperity or adversity. What events in life are not directed by the infinite goodness and wisdom of God?
But …
… what often happens?
Newton writes:
1. In reality, prayer becomes a mere chore. Our lips move, but our hearts are far from God.
2. In reality, Scripture gets neglected. We give our time and attention to other books, and magazines look more appealing.
3. In reality, Christ gets ignored. In an average day we show more gratitude for the people in our life than the Savior who saved our life.
4. In reality, God's providence over life is forgotten. When life gets hard we are quick to “complain, murmur, and despond.”
Newton writes,
Alas! how vain is man in his best estate! how much weakness and inconsistency even in those whose hearts are right with the Lord!
Alas, we aim big—but we often miss big. We miss because we are weak sinners.
Divine Designs in the Missing
So is there anything to learn in the missing?
Again Newton writes:
By these experiences [the misses] the believer is weaned more from self, and taught more highly to prize and more absolutely to rely on him, who is appointed unto us of God, Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification, and Redemption.
The more vile we are in our own eyes, the more precious he will be to us; and a deep repeated sense of the evil of our hearts is necessary to preclude all boasting, and to make us willing to give the whole glory of our salvation where it is due.
We mean well and we aim high, but we are sinful, inconsistent creatures. Our aims often fail like a field goal kick that lands on the 5-yard-line. So often we miss low—very low.
The solution is not to aim lower. The proper response is to continue aiming high. Rejoice in the successes and the periods of consistency. And then redeem the misses; let them remind you of your weakness and of your need for Christ, “who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, ‘Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord’” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31).
By continuing to aim high,
- we honor God in our aims
- we learn firsthand of our feebleness, weakness, and inconsistencies
- we are weaned from self-sufficiency
- we long to see Jesus and to be freed from this body of sin
- and we learn to boast in Christ alone
When a kicker aims high but fails, he hangs his head.
When the Christian aims high but fails, he learns to properly boast.
Tony Reinke serves as the editorial and research assistant to C.J. Mahaney. Reading Newton’s Mail is a series of blog posts reflecting on various published letters written by John Newton (1725–1807), the onetime captain of a slave trading ship, a self-described apostate, blasphemer, and infidel, who was eventually converted by grace. Newton is most famous for authoring the hymn “Amazing Grace,” or maybe for helping William Wilberforce put an end to the African slave trade in Britain. Less legendarily, Newton faithfully pastored two churches for 43 years, a fruitful period of his life when a majority of his letters were written. Reading Newton’s Mail is published on Fridays here on the Cheap Seats blog.
Source letter: John Newton, Works of John Newton (London: 1820), 1:439–444; Letters of John Newton (Edinburgh; Banner of Truth: 1869/2007), 88–92.
I have learned a very important lesson over the years: those I have the privilege to teach are not usually most affected by the general content of my teaching; they are often most affected by what I am most passionate about.
I am still learning this, and it’s all too easy to forget.
When I teach, my passion must be theologically informed, and proportional to the content or point I am making in the sermon. This insight is not original with me (no insights are original with me!), and I have found this point better articulated by Dr. Don Carson in a lecture he delivered last year at the CBMW Different by Design Conference (Feb. 2, 2009, Minneapolis, MN). While speaking of those who are passionate for social justice, he delivered this caution:
There are some wonderful instances of ordinary Christians, not least the young, who are concerned to preach the whole gospel unabashedly and do good first to the household of God and then, as much as is possible, outside as well [Galatians 6:10]. That has got biblical mandate behind it.…
My warning would be to those who are coming along and talking a lot about, “I want to be faithful to the gospel, but I also want to do social justice of good works.” My warning would be: it is not just what you do, it is what you are excited about.
And the implications are broader than social justice. All manner of topics can capture our excitement, like church methodology, parenting style, or any other point of application. Carson continues,
If I have learned anything in 35 or 40 years of teaching, it is that students don’t learn everything I teach them. What they learn is what I am excited about, the kinds of things I emphasize again and again and again and again. That had better be the gospel.
If the gospel—even when you are orthodox—becomes something which you primarily assume, but what you are excited about is what you are doing in some sort of social reconstruction, you will be teaching the people that you influence that the gospel really isn’t all that important. You won’t be saying that—you won’t even mean that—but that’s what you will be teaching. And then you are only half a generation away from losing the gospel.
Make sure that in your own practice and excitement, what you talk about, what you think about, what you pray over, what you exude confidence over, joy over, what you are enthusiastic about is Jesus, the gospel, the cross. And out of that framework, by all means, let the transformed life flow.
Seminary professors and preachers will transfer to others what they are most passionate about. And those we serve should see a difference between our passion for the gospel and our passion for other issues. It’s worth asking ourselves regularly: Is it clear to others that nothing excites me more than the gospel of Jesus Christ and him crucified?
Let me begin this post by asking you four direct questions about the condition of your soul right now:
- Do you sense that your affections for the Savior have diminished recently?
- Has your appetite for Scripture weakened?
- Does your soul seem dry?
- Does God seem distant from you?
If so, you are not alone. These struggles are common to even the most mature Christians—so common that Scripture anticipates them. But these are serious problems and must be addressed and not ignored. They don’t just go away over time.
So how should we respond?
Tucked away in the short (and often neglected) letter of Jude we find help and hope:
But you, beloved, building yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life. (Jude 1:20–21)
In these verses we find a command and three practical ways to obey the command.
The command
First, the command: "Keep yourselves in the love of God." This is our responsibility and it requires effort on our part. The good news is that Jude doesn’t leave us guessing. One commentator writes, “Jude did not leave his congregation in suspense about how to keep themselves in God’s love.”[1]
No, he does not leave us in suspense or wondering how to do this. In fact Jude wonderfully provides us with three means by which the reader can keep himself in the love of God.
1. Remind yourself of the gospel (“building yourselves up in your most holy faith”).
The “most holy faith” is the gospel. And the first way we keep ourselves in the love of God is to grow in our understanding of the gospel and to remind ourselves of the gospel each day. There is no more effective way to keep yourself in the love of God each day than to remind yourself of the gospel.
As you meditate upon the gospel, as you preach the gospel to yourself, as you receive the gospel into your soul afresh each day, your awareness of the love of God increases and your affection for the Savior grows.
So how much time do you devote each day to the strategic study, thinking, meditation, contemplation, reflection, and proclamation of the gospel to your own soul as a means of keeping yourself in the love of God?
Review the content of the gospel, rehearse the content of this “most holy faith,” and rejoice in the gospel each and every day. What a sweet assignment! And as we do this we are keeping ourselves in the love of God.
2. Pray in the Holy Spirit (“praying in the Holy Spirit”).
An awareness of God’s love cannot be sustained without prayer. Nor can a relationship with God be maintained or cultivated apart from prayer. So Jude commands us to pray. In dependence upon the Spirit, we pray to God the Father, through the Mediator he has provided in Jesus Christ.
We pray to God at the beginning of the day. We pray at structured times in our day. We pray spontaneously throughout the day. Prayer is not only a discipline it is a means of keeping ourselves in the love of God. This perspective will transform our perspective of prayer and our practice of prayer.
3. Await Christ’s return (“waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life”).
Waiting is not my preference. I don’t believe in lines! I try to avoid waiting in lines at the grocery store and I try to avoid traffic on the road. In fact I’d rather be moving in the wrong direction than stuck in traffic going in the right direction.
On the other hand, I don’t mind waiting 45 minutes for a table when I’m at a restaurant on a date with my wife. Why not? For the next 45 minutes I will look into the eyes of the woman I love with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. There’s a big difference between waiting in line at the grocery store and waiting 45 minutes to be seated when I’m at a restaurant with my wife.
As Christians we wait. But we await the mercy of our Savior that brings eternal life. Think about that! We do not wait for God’s judgment or condemnation. We do no wait for God’s wrath that our sins deserve! No, we are anticipating mercy. We anticipate mercy because Jesus Christ suffered as our substitute, receiving upon himself the wrath we deserve so that we receive mercy—mercy we don’t deserve. That is what we are waiting for.
As we anticipate the future our perspective of present circumstances will be transformed. It will keep us aware of God’s love. On the other hand, "Those who take their eyes off their future hope will find that their love for God is slowly evaporating.”[2]
So are you waiting with eager anticipation? How often do you think about Christ’s return (Titus 2:13)? How often do you think of the new heavens and the new earth (Revelation 21:1–4)? How often do you think of eternal life? And how often do you think about the mercy you will receive in light of the judgment that we so richly deserve?
This eternal perspective will keep us aware of God’s love.
Reminding, praying, waiting—this is how we remain aware of God’s love.
Kept
To be honest my grip upon God is sometimes weak. I don’t flawlessly keep myself in the love of God daily. I don’t. My love for Him fluctuates. But while my love for him is uncertain, His love for me is fixed. We keep ourselves in the love of God because God is keeping us in his grasp.
Both at the beginning of this short letter (v. 1) and near the end (v. 24), Jude reminds us that our safety is in the Father’s hold upon us and his preserving grace. As Puritan Richard Sibbes once wrote, “As we say of the mother and the child, both hold, but the safety of the child is at that the mother holds him.”
His grip never weakens.
When I neglect the means that He has given me to keep myself in the love of God, when my grip upon him weakens and my love fluctuates, His grip upon me does not weaken and never changes.
God promises to “keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy” (v. 24). This promise is an enormous assurance for our souls, and especially for those who feel as if their love for God has diminished. Receive this assurance provided from Jude: Our hearts may shift and change but God’s love for you is unchanging. May we keep ourselves aware of God’s unchanging love toward us in the gospel.
Conclusion
If we fail to attend to our hearts, if we fail to attend to our relationship with God, if we fail to obey this gracious command to “keep ourselves in the love of God,” the consequences upon our souls are inevitable. The consequences may not be immediately obvious, but a persisting pattern of neglect will become obvious in time.
So have your affections for the Savior diminished? If so, ask yourself these questions from Jude:
- Am I preaching the gospel to my own soul each day?
- Am I praying with any level of consistency?
- Am I eagerly awaiting Christ’s return and am I longing for heaven?
For more on this topic see C.J.'s recent sermon "Jude: A Call to Contend," at Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, MN (Sept. 12, 2010).
Notes:
[1] Tom Schreiner, 1, 2 Peter, Jude (NAC), p. 474.
[2] Tom Schreiner, 1, 2 Peter, Jude (NAC), p. 484.
You may have seen reports of the murders of three people associated with the U.S. Consulate in Juárez, Mexico, earlier this month. Sadly, these are among the latest of thousands of murders in the city of Juárez and elsewhere in Mexico as the country battles drug traffickers. The weekend of the Consulate shootings, 28 other people were murdered in Juárez alone. Stunning doesn’t quite capture it; it’s devastating, a social shock to the people of Juárez.
We recently received some updates and prayer requests from
Iglesia Gracia Soberana de Cd. Juárez, the Sovereign Grace church in that city, and wanted to pass them along to you. Will you join us in praying for believers in Juárez?
First, some more specifics. As Mexico’s war on the drug cartels continues, the city of Juárez is embroiled in violence. On average, at least seven people have been murdered every day since 2009, including more than 500 murders since January. The violence is not limited to those involved in drug trafficking—innocent bystanders, including children, are among those killed. In addition, the city is facing a crime wave in which anyone can be a target of kidnapping, armed robbery, and extortion.
This ongoing social catastrophe has far-reaching effects. About 5,000 businesses have closed, and some estimate that as much as 15–20% of the city’s population has left. Those who remain face the daily threat of ruthless violence.
Carlos Contreras is senior pastor of Iglesia Gracia Soberana de Cd. Juárez (Sovereign Grace Church of Juárez). For more than 20 years this church has been a faithful gospel witness in their city. They have trained a number of pastors and leaders and in 2006 planted another
church in Aquascalientes, Mexico. And they’re continuing to preach the gospel faithfully in spite of the trials they’re facing.
After describing the violence in Juárez Carlos writes,
But there is good news also. The church in the city remains strong and has apparently become the only remaining source of hope for many people. We all pray and we pray a lot, and we pray boldly and we pray publicly for God to intervene in a miraculous way to change things and to do justice. But mostly we pray for revival and for the salvation of thousands.
Under the leadership of their pastoral team, Iglesia Gracia Soberana is taking the gospel to the streets. The most recent session of their Alpha class (an introductory class on the gospel) graduated 63 students, more than they’d ever had. The church is airing evangelistic programs on local TV. Earlier this month, 150 church members went to two busy intersections, handed out about 800 evangelistic tracts and about 200 New Testaments, and prayed for about 300 people. On Saturday they hit the streets again, handing out 6,000 invitations to church, 300 copies of the Gospel of John, and 200 New Testaments—and praying for 1,300 people.
Here’s a slideshow of their outreaches:
My friends, this is authentic Christianity.
Carlos’s email continues,
What is most encouraging to me is to see our dear church steadfast in Christ while enduring faithfully in the midst of all this. Christ is certainly our solid rock, there is nothing more to trust in. Scripture has been our guiding light in the midst of great darkness and our fellowship is a constant source of joy and encouragement….My main job is to serve them by almost daily having the privilege of pointing their eyes to Christ and away from the despair surrounding us.
So here’s our appeal: Will you join us in praying for our brothers and sisters in Juárez? Please pray…
• that God would grant wisdom and strength to Carlos Contreras and other pastors in Juárez
• that God would give sustaining grace to Iglesia Gracia Soberana and the other churches in this city
• that the gospel would be clearly preached and many would put their faith in Christ for forgiveness of sins
• that peace and justice would be restored to Juárez
Thank you for joining us in prayer.
For more about the Sovereign Grace churches in Juárez and Aguascalientes (as well as in Bolivia), see this 35-minute film produced in 2007.
If you’d like to support Sovereign Grace Ministries’ work outside the U.S., you can make a designated gift by clicking here.
As the typical day unfolds, the unexpected expectedly happens. With one eye on the clock and another on our schedule, we can often watch our planning derail throughout the day. And as I realize my plans for the day will not be flawlessly executed, my soul has a tendency to be weighed down by accumulating cares. But rather than humbling myself as I should, I find myself vulnerable to self-sufficiency, at risk of relying upon my limited strength and wisdom. This is pride.
If we are not watchful, our burdens will subtly accumulate over time, and will gradually weigh down our soul. But it doesn’t need to be this way. There is a biblical alternative.
Casting Pride and Casting Cares
Scripture calls us to cast all our anxieties on God, because he cares for us.
6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, 7 casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:6–7, ESV)
Casting all my cares upon the Lord is a means of humbling myself before the Lord. In reading these passages we discover that casting our cares upon the Lord falls under the command to humble ourselves. Casting our cares is an expression of humility. When I fail to cast my cares upon him, I display prideful self-sufficiency.
A Few Words of Prayer
As I make my way from meeting to meeting, decision to decision, and phone call to phone call, I find the counsel of Charles Spurgeon very helpful. “I always feel it well,” he wrote, “to put a few words of prayer between everything I do.” Throughout his busy days, Spurgeon scattered words of prayer between each activity, a model I have sought to emulate over the years.
The content of my “few words of prayer” is not unique and if you overheard them, you wouldn’t be impressed. I am a simple man and when I think of casting all my cares it is a simple acknowledgement of my dependence upon God and my need of grace throughout the day.
But the very act of pausing in a busy day to pray is an act of weakening pride in my life, acknowledging that I am a dependent creature. I am not self-sufficient.
And taking a brief moment to humble myself in prayer makes all the difference in my soul throughout the day.
At its root, weariness is often the result of pride and self-sufficiency in my life. When I neglect casting my cares upon the Lord, the heavy fatigue of weariness will settle into my soul.
Casting our cares upon the Lord and humbling ourselves before him are critical activities, regardless of how busy we are. And this practice cannot be replaced by hours of careful planning and scheduling.
How about you? Do you follow the practice of Spurgeon and “put a few words of prayer” between everything you do throughout each day? Are you casting cares or accumulating burdens? Are you humbling yourself before the Lord or displaying self-sufficiency?
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Biblical Productivity: This post is likely the final in C.J.’s series. For a complete index of the series posts click here. A printable PDF of the entire series is forthcoming.
Welcome to the second part of my interview with biblical counselor and author Dr. David Powlison (part one here).
David, apart from Scripture, what book do you most frequently re-read and why?
Two books are nearly as marked up as my Bible: Valley of Vision and Luther’s Prayers. I don’t read them straight through, but I frequently return to them, dipping in here and there, returning to favorite places. Why? They freshly express how faith lives, thinks, feels, talks. They struggle, they delight, they need God, they see God.
I extensively annotate, add, reword, update, personalize VoV prayers to make them my own. For example, simply turning “thee/thou” into “You” makes a prayer sing more pointedly and personally. I find that I often add two strands to VoV prayers:
[1] a brighter note of joy, gratitude and meditation on the mercies of Christ (so the prayers don’t turn introspective regarding a sense of sinfulness);
[2] a more candid awareness of and expression of our experience of sufferings (so the prayers don’t turn stoic, as if spirituality rises “above” our life situation). To my ears, the Puritans can have a slight drift towards sin-centricity and stoicism, somewhat slipping from the grace-centricity and humanity of Scripture. But that said, these prayers are a gold mine of living wisdom.
Luther’s way of engaging God and Scripture has deeply shaped me. He takes Scripture (and the Creeds) and puts it to work in a “four-stranded wreath”:
[1] as a textbook, revealing God and His will, wisdom and work;
[2] as a hymnbook, giving reasons that call forth gratitude and joy;
[3] as a book of confession, teaching me where to repent, where I need forgiveness, mercy, and awakening;
[4] as a prayerbook, guiding intercession into rich paths, rather than the “list” mentality that can make prayer so dull and man-centered.
When you finish a book, what system have you developed in order to remember and reference that book in the future?
For many years I used the EndNote bibliography program to track what I read. I’d make summaries, take notes, and write out key quotations. I’ve not been as diligent with it in recent years, as I’ve tended to re-read choice books more often than read new books. I mark up books extensively with highlighting and marginal notes, and I write notes in the front pages that direct me to the page numbers of significant quotes and discussions.
If you could study under any theologian in church history (excluding those men in Scripture), who would it be and why?
I can’t decide on only one! But I can settle on two: Augustine and Calvin. These men lived, breathed, prayed, thought, felt, and communicated so very well all that they understood of Jesus Christ and the Word of God. Both men were mastered by the Psalms, and so their humanity and their ministries flourished in the ways of God.
What single piece of counsel (or constructive criticism) has most improved your preaching?
Live your message for a day, a week, a month, a lifetime. Then aim low, and you’re sure to hit something.
What books on preaching, or examples of it, have you found most influential in your own preaching?
I don’t preach very often, but THE influence has been the model of how Scripture brings truth to bear. The Lord and His prophets and apostles always speak TO human beings and what they were facing, and they always speak personally, rather than speaking ABOUT topics and speaking impersonally. Jay Adams calls such I-you directness and relevance in communicating God’s truth “the preacher’s stance.” The Bible is not just “normative” truth about God, but enters into the “situational” realities and “existential” choices of the people to whom God speaks. (That way of putting it comes from John Frame.) Ministry must do the same, afresh, entering people’s experience of troubles (external) and struggles (internal).
Please join me next time for part three of my interview with David.
Meet Jerry Bridges.
Jerry Bridges is 79 years old and has served faithfully on staff at The Navigators for over 50 years. And he continues to serve there within the Collegiate Mission where he is involved primarily in staff development, and speaks at various student events. Mr. Bridges also teaches on the gospel around the country.
Mr. Bridges is the author of numerous excellent cross-centered books like:
- The Discipline of Grace
- The Gospel for Real Life
- The Pursuit of Holiness
- Respectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate
- The Great Exchange: My Sin for His Righteousness
- The Bookends of the Christian Life (March 2009)
But you probably know all this already.
So who is Jerry Bridges? What is he presently reading? How does he structure his devotional time? What is his favorite book on the gospel? Let’s find out.
Thanks for your time, Mr. Bridges! Please describe your morning devotions. What time do you wake up in the morning? How much time do you spend reading, meditating, praying, etc.? What are you presently reading?
On a normal day, I get up at 5:00 a.m.
I spend from 5:30 – 7:00 a.m. reading and meditating on Scripture and spending time in prayer. I begin with what I have tried to teach others to do, which is to preach the Gospel to myself. My usual practice is to read through the Bible simply starting with Genesis and going through Revelation.
I am currently in the book of Numbers. For my prayer time, I start with thanksgiving and move to petition. I always start with the first petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Hallowed be Thy name.” Over a six-day period (Monday-Saturday), I pray for the progress of the Gospel around the world. I pray for my family, my organization and their leaders, and my own personal growth. I have about eight ongoing special prayer requests for friends who have acute needs.
What book(s) are you currently reading in these three categories: (a) for your soul, (b) for pastoral ministry, or (c) for personal enjoyment?
(a) The Existence and Attributes of God by the Puritan, Stephen Charnock. I’m actually not reading the entire two-volume set but am focusing on two chapters, “The Holiness of God” and “The Goodness of God.”
(b) For my ministry (not pastoral but The Navigators) I have just finished reading Why We’re Not Emergent (By Two Guys Who Should Be) by Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck because I need to keep up with all the “bad stuff” that students are apt to read.
(c) For personal enjoyment, I have been reading John Calvin: A Heart for Devotion, Doctrine, and Doxology. I have to confess when I’m really mentally tired I read a murder mystery by Agatha Christie.
Apart from Scripture, what book do you most frequently re-read and why?
The Apostles’ Doctrine of the Atonement by George Smeaton because it is the best book on the Gospel that I have ever read.
When you finish a book, what system have you developed in order to remember and reference that book in the future?
I don’t have a very good system but I note page numbers on the inside cover of the book with the key thought I want to go back to.
If you could study under any theologian in church history (excluding those men in Scripture), who would it be and why?
John Calvin, hands down, because he not only was a brilliant theologian but had a heart of devotion for God.
What single piece of counsel (or constructive criticism) has most improved your preaching?
Years ago I took the Dale Carnegie public speaking course. In it I learned three things that I try to practice: 1) Know your subject thoroughly. 2) Be convinced your audience needs to hear your message. 3) Have a strong passion to deliver the message. Though these principles were applied in the context of secular speeches, I found them very helpful for my message preparation and delivery.
What books on preaching, or examples of it, have you found most influential in your own preaching?
Christ-Centered Preaching by Bryan Chapell, particularly chapters 10 and 11, and John Stott’s Between Two Worlds.
What single bit of counsel has made the most significant difference in your effective use of time?
Arrange your “do list” in order of priority and work progressively through, starting with number one. You can’t get them all done but this way you get the most important things done. I have modified this advice by realizing that the morning hours from breakfast to noon are my most effective, creative hours, and as much as possible I dedicate those hours to study, writing and message preparation.
What single bit of counsel has made the most significant difference in your leadership?
This question is not applicable to me since I have not been leading or managing anyone for about 15 years.
Where in ministry are you most regularly tempted to discouragement?
Too often, after preaching a message, I feel like I have not done a good job.
Do you exercise? If so, what do you do? If not, why not?
My main exercise is walking either outdoors or on the treadmill. I had a practice of minor weight lifting (no more than 25 lbs) but that practice got dropped in the busyness of life and I am trying to re-start it.
Currently, what sport do you like to play and/or watch?
I don’t play any sport at my age and seldom watch any on television. However, my main sport of interest is football and my favorite teams in order are: University of Oklahoma (I’m an alumnus), the Air Force Academy and the Denver Broncos.
What do you do for leisure?
Read something that is outside of my ministry. I like history, biographies and older (19th or early 20th century) novels.
If you were not in ministry, what occupational path would you have chosen?
Teaching.
Thank you, Mr. Bridges, for taking the time to answer my questions!
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Related: Last November, C.J. interviewed Mr. Bridges in the Sovereign Grace recording studio on the topic of cross-centered living (with some sports talk at the end). The interview can be found here.
Over the years many pastors, leaders, and authors who have influenced my life have also become my friends. I marvel at and am humbled by this fact. And while I am always eager to promote these men and draw attention to their writings and teachings, too often these friends are known primarily for their public ministry.
I know from personal experience that these men have much to teach us from their private lives. So on this blog I want to occasionally interview these men, ask them questions to draw out their personal example, and introduce you to a private side of them you possibly have not seen.
Here we go.
Wayne Grudem
Meet Wayne Grudem. Dr. Grudem is smart—B.A. from Harvard, M.Div. from Westminster Theological Seminary, and Ph.D. from Cambridge, smart.
Dr. Grudem is the author of a number of excellent books including Systematic Theology and a simplified systematic theology for guys like me (Bible Doctrine).
He is the cofounder of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and coeditor (with John Piper) of one of the most important books I know of: Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.
Dr. Grudem is now the Research Professor of Bible and Theology at Phoenix Seminary, having previously taught at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School for 20 years.
But you may already know all this.
So who is Wayne Grudem? What does he read for fun? What discourages him? How does he structure his devotional time? What correction from others has most benefited him? What career path would he have chosen if not ministry?
Dr. Grudem was kind enough to entertain my curiosity. I divided the interview to run over the next four days (Tuesday–Friday).
Thanks for your time, Dr. Grudem! Please describe your morning devotions. What time do you wake up in the morning? How much time do you spend reading, meditating, praying, etc.? What are you presently reading?
I usually wake up about 6:00 a.m., but sometimes as late as 7:00 or 7:30 (if I’ve been up late the night before—I need between 7 and 8 hours of sleep or I don’t think as clearly). I get a cup of tea and one of Margaret’s excellent high-protein muffins and open my Bible.
I simply read sequentially through the Bible and then start over at the beginning (I’m currently in 1 Corinthians and Psalms, reading two portions each morning). I will read the Bible for 15 or 20 minutes, underlining some verse, or making some very brief notes. Many times I will wonder about something in the Greek or Hebrew text and check it briefly, but I don’t get involved in extensive exegesis because that is not my purpose at that time. I’m looking for God to teach me directly from his Word, with application to my life.
Usually I just “camp” on a phrase or verse, sometimes writing it out and pondering application to my own life. I also keep a blank notepad beside me because God often brings to my mind things that I need to do and I make a quick note.
Then I will usually pause for five or ten minutes just waiting in the Lord’s presence and thinking about the verse or talking to him about it. After that, I pick up a notebook with different pages for people and things that I am praying for—some pages about various things in my own life, then my wife Margaret, then our children and their families, then my parents and other members of my extended family, and then other friends and people in different organizations such as our church or Phoenix Seminary where I teach.
There’s also a section having to do with our government and concerns of our nation and world. That will take 15 or 20 minutes, and sometimes longer, so the total time may be between 30 and 60 minutes.
At the end of the time I will usually bring before the Lord my “to do” list, and pray about various items on the list, asking the Lord to help me know what to make a top priority today, and asking his blessing on the things that I plan to do. Often at the end I also have another time of maybe two or three minutes or maybe five or ten minutes just resting in the Lord’s presence and waiting on him.
I find in those times of quietness, when I’m not praying about anything in particular but simply resting in the Lord’s presence, that he will bring to mind solutions for problems, or people I need to contact, or things I need to write, or things I should not spend time doing, or any of a number of other things. I also find that over the course of the entire Bible reading and prayer time a deeper sense of peace and rest in the Lord’s presence comes on my heart.
What book(s) are you currently reading in these three categories: (a) for your soul, (b) for pastoral ministry, or (c) for personal enjoyment?
For my soul: Only the Bible at the present time, no other Christian books. But I recently finished your book Worldliness and was challenged and rebuked by it!
For pastoral ministry: I’m not in pastoral ministry, but for professional ministry I’m just finishing Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel. This is an attempt (unpersuasive I think) to show that geography and local types of plants and animals determined why some nations became rich and some did not. It’s all materialistic determinism and, in the end, terribly dehumanizing because it gives no importance to the real factors, human choices and human cultural values, and whether those choices and values were obedient to the truths established by the one true God.
For personal enjoyment: I just finished a new Vince Flynn novel, Extreme Measures. I think I have read all of his books and I enjoyed them a lot (the terrorists are the bad guys and the Americans are the good guys, and the Americans win in the end). But I liked this last one the least because it was so inconclusive at the end. I’ve also enjoyed a number of spy novels by Daniel Silva within the last year (the hero is an Israeli Mossad agent). These are “escape” novels that give my brain a change of pace.
Apart from Scripture, what book do you most frequently re-read and why?
Probably The Hidden Life of Prayer by David MacIntyre, because it encourages my faith to read of Christians in the past who have had such a significant effect on advancing God’s kingdom through their ministries of prayer.
When you finish a book, what system have you developed in order to remember and reference that book in the future?
I underline and write notes in the margin as I go through the book and often write some key thoughts or summary points on the title page as well. Then I shelve it in the right place in my home library!
Join me tomorrow for the second part of my interview with Dr. Grudem.
At a number of conferences, I have had the privilege and joy of sitting in the front row to hear my friend John Piper speak. And a few times I have been assigned to speak after him. It’s never my preference to speak after John. Preaching after John is always a humbling experience.
As you know, I cannot preach like John Piper. But what I have discovered over time is that great preachers like John, Charles Spurgeon, and Jonathan Edwards do model practices all preachers can emulate and benefit from.
At the Together for the Gospel conference, I had the privilege to participate with Mark, Al, and Lig in interviewing John. During the panel discussion, John provided us with a glimpse into how he prepares his sermons, and how he prepares his heart as he prepares his sermons.
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C.J. Mahaney: Most of these guys are already in the process of preparing a sermon for this Sunday. If they were to meet with you for lunch, how would you counsel them about both the preparation process and the preaching event?
John Piper: The most important thing I want to say in answer to that question is this: There isn’t any technique to preaching. It is not a technique. It is not a profession that you go to a homiletics class to learn how to do.
God is doing sermon preparation when your throat is blazing with yellow pustules and you have a fever and you feel like quitting. He is doing sermon preparation there. Don’t begrudge the seminary of suffering. Don’t begrudge the marriage difficulties. Don’t begrudge the parental stuff that is so hard. He is making you a preacher. He is making you a pastor.
So the main preparation work is walking with him through it all, and going deep with him, and being there and not running away from it into endless food or television. That would be a—very practical thing to do would be to get rid of your television so that you have some time, family time and reading time and reflection time, and basically keep your mind free from pornography.
We were talking about this pornography thing over lunch the other day, and we who are 60 years old were reflecting on how difficult it was to get pornography when we were teenagers. The implication of that is that in my brain I have two pornographic images from my teen years. I found a
Playboy in a Laundromat, and they were passing a really weird book around in the locker room one day. I remember both images like I saw them yesterday. Most of you have a thousand images in your brain. That really makes sermon preparation hard, but not impossible. He died to purify our conscience, although you make your job a lot harder if you keep going to that cesspool.
…Keep your minds from being contaminated, because the preparation moment is a heart/mind thing in which every three minutes you are crying out to the Lord as you are reading your text in Greek or Hebrew or English. You are reading it and you are saying, “God, please. I have got to have a word. I have got to have a word for my people. Let me see what is really here.” That is a prayer for the mind part. My points must be here in the text. I can’t make this up. My people have to see it. I have to see it. I don’t want to pull rank on these folks by quoting Greek—and they say, “I don’t see that,” and I say, “Well, believe me it is there.” I don’t want to do that. I want them to see what is really there, so I need to
see what is really there. So I am pleading with the Lord, “Show me what is there.”
And then I am pleading just as strong, “Help me to
feel what is there. If it is a horrible thing, help me to feel horrible. If it is a beautiful thing, help me to feel thrilled over its beauty. Bring this dead heart into some kind of conformity—moral, affectual conformity to what is really there.”
Those are my two kinds of prayers,
light and
heat. If you try to work it up without the Holy Spirit giving it, people will know. They will know. Your people will know sooner or later. “I don’t think that was a real affection. That was planned.”
So there are a thousand details I could say about the preparation moment as far as poking at the text, but the preaching moment is the same. You plead with the Lord.
I do
APTAT, before I stand up.
A—I
admit, O Lord, that I can do nothing of any lasting value.
P—I
pray for self forgetfulness, for fullness of the Holy Spirit, for love, for humility, for passion, for zeal, for prophetic utterance that may come to my mind while I am preaching so that I can say things that I hadn’t prepared that might penetrate where nothing else would.
T—I
trust a particular promise from the Lord that I have found in my devotions early in the morning. So today I read Deborah’s song in Judges 5 as well as Psalm 84 between 6:30 and 7:00 this morning, and pointed out a verse to Mark as we were sitting there. “Oh my soul, ride on in strength.” That was my word this morning.
The Lord gave a word from his Word this morning: “Ride on in strength.” So I take that. That’s my T: trust. So as I am walking up, I am saying, “This is your work. It has come. Don’t leave me here. You have got to do something here. I am counting on you.”
And he is saying, “I got this under control.” He is God.
A—Then you
act. You have got to do it. It is your hands that are moving. It is your voice that is moving. You have got to do this. Walking by the Spirit, putting to death the deeds of the body by the Spirit, being led by the Spirit, bearing the fruits of the Spirit is a mystery. “I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me” (1 Corinthians 15:10, ESV). That is the mystery. So sermon preparation is: You put out when you are preparing and when you are preaching. You put out, but if you have prayed and done APTAT and God is merciful, you won’t be putting out. He will be putting out.
T—
Thank God. And when you have acted and you go sit down, you thank him. He is going to do, and is doing what he is going to do, and he regularly does more than you think he does.
I don’t think after 28 years of preaching that I can correlate with any degree of confidence my sense of effectiveness in the moment and the true effectiveness of the moment. I don’t know any keys to know how to correlate those two. This keeps me from being too excited or too depressed.
The Lord will be sure to put me in my place if I do the one and lift me up if I do the other, because he said, “I am working out there in ways you can’t make happen at all. You thought that was a good thing to say? That wasn’t it. You missed it. That wasn’t what did it. This thing over here that you didn’t even know I gave you did it, and you will find out in heaven that that happened.”
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Listen to the T4G panel discussion
here.
The Sovereign Grace Leadership Interviews feature a roundtable discussion among C.J. Mahaney (president of Sovereign Grace Ministries), Jeff Purswell (dean of our Pastors College), and Joshua Harris (senior pastor of Covenant Life Church). The three gather on a regular basis to discuss a wide array of theological and practical leadership issues.
In the second episode, the topic turns to care for the pastor’s own soul. Harris’ opening question sets the stage:
Pastors are obviously called to care for the souls of others, and yet today we want to turn the focus and ask: How does a pastor make sure that he is caring for his own soul? What does it look like for a man to pursue his own personal relationship with God and make sure he is growing spiritually?
The full hourlong podcast, “The Pastor and His Soul,” can be downloaded here.