Feeding our Longing
Written by T. M. Suffield |
Saturday, February 25, 2023
The great writer on joy and longing, C. S. Lewis, tells us in a famous passage from The Weight of Glory that we are far too easily pleased. We do not know what the Lord is offering us, what joy is available to us in God. Lewis argued, especially in his autobiography, Surprised by Joy, that we find our way to joy by longing. He liked to describe it with the German word sehnsucht, a sort of yearning for a joy we don’t yet know, a nostalgia for a place we haven’t been.
Have you ever felt like there was more to life than this? Known some sense of longing for the future?
Perhaps you’ve enjoyed a great steak done exactly how you like it, or a really well poured beer, or the absolute delight of seeing your team triumphant in your favourite sport (Curling, in the Suffield household). The memory of that enjoyment is delightful, and yet it isn’t the same as the actual pleasure you experienced. The pleasure doesn’t last, it’s fleeting. Maybe that makes you lift your head and wonder—and long—for a day when delight lasts.
Or perhaps you’ve wondered if everything should be more intense than it is? I’m profoundly colourblind. Apparently, I only see in a spectrum of grey and brown, though my experience is wonderfully vibrant. I’m told that the world is much more intense than I know, though have no way of accessing that level of reality. Maybe something one day shook you and made you wonder if there are colours that only the angels can see. I’m pretty sure there are. Maybe that makes you lift your head and wonder—and long—for a day when the browns are bright, burned, blue.
The great writer on joy and longing, C. S. Lewis, tells us in a famous passage from The Weight of Glory that we are far too easily pleased. We do not know what the Lord is offering us, what joy is available to us in God.
Lewis argued, especially in his autobiography, Surprised by Joy, that we find our way to joy by longing.
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The God of Marxism—Part 3
The entire worldview of the Marxist is inescapably materialistic… Marxist ideology teaches the exact opposite. It does believe that life consists in the things we have (or do not have). It has no kingdom of heaven. Everything is earth-bound and materialistic.
Karl Marx was a professed atheist, but I do not believe in atheists and neither should you. Whatever a man lives for, whatever a man is willing to die for, whatever a man is willing to kill for; that, I say, is his god. The god of Marx, Lenin, etc., was the act of revolution because that was the only thing that could bring about their imagined Utopia. A revolution in the Marxist mind is very much like Christ’s second coming to the Christian in terms of its function. However, the theology upon which it rests is contrary to scripture.
First of all, the entire worldview of the Marxist is inescapably materialistic. Jesus said, “Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth” (Luke 12:15). He also said, “Take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:30-33).
Marxist ideology teaches the exact opposite. It does believe that life consists in the things we have (or do not have). It has no kingdom of heaven. Everything is earth-bound and materialistic.
Further, the very concept of revolution is entirely unbiblical. Another word for revolution is rebellion and scripture condemns that with no uncertain terms, “Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft” and “An evil man seeketh only rebellion” (1 Samuel 15:23, Proverbs 17:11).
Such scriptures may cause some Americans to squirm in the pew a bit (because we love and therefore tend to excuse our own little rebellion), but adopting rebellion as a way of life, or as a means of grace, yea even as a god, is what you call Marxism. We must reject this false god and also the pseudo-apostles which preach in its name. This, we shall explore in the next article.
Christian McShaffrey is a Minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and is Pastor of Five Solas Church (OPC) in Reedsburg, Wis. -
God’s Faithfulness & Demonic Attack
The High Priest was entirely disqualified to stand in God’s presence. He bore all the sins of the people of God and the stink of their sins was unbearable. God removed the defiled garments demonstrating to Zechariah that God indeed forgave the sins of His people and will not abandon His people despite what they deserve.
God’s faithfulness to His people is astounding; His loyalty to His people is staggering for its unwavering character. God’s people do not earn this astounding, staggering loyalty and faithfulness; in fact, they do not deserve it at all. Even more remarkable is that God’s faithful loyalty to His people is also characterized by rich and deep covenant love. The Hebrew Church had a single word for this: hesed.
Because of God’s faithful, loyal covenant love for His people, despite their sins God does not abandon them. The Old Covenant Church sang about this reality:
Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion, and to you shall vows be performed. O you who hear prayer, to you shall all flesh come. When iniquities prevail against me, you atone for our transgressions. (Psalm 65:1–3)
And this truth remains precious to the New Covenant Church:
Praise waits for thee in Zion; all men shall worship thereand pay their vows before thee, O God who hearest prayer.Our sins rise up against us, prevailing day by day,but thou wilt show us mercy and take their guilt away.(Trinity Hymnal No. 372)
The saints in the Old Covenant Church knew their sinfulness well. And the psalm suggests, they also knew well the attacks of the Devil and his minions: to remind the people of their sinfulness, unworthiness, and lack of deserving any good thing. When under such attacks by the Devil, God’s people can draw strength from the truths of Psalm 65.
Because the Accuser has a limited number of tactics to deploy against God’s people to rob them of their joy or entice them to sin, he uses those same, tired tactics frequently.
I. Old Offenses
God’s people were cast out of the Promised Land because of their sinfulness and covenant breaking, but God did not cast off His people. He brought them back to Jerusalem and provided the means for them to rebuild the Temple.
Although the people were physically in the Promised Land, yet for many of them their hearts had not returned to the Lord their God. But God still did not cast off His people; instead he sent Haggai and Zechariah to call them to repentance afresh.
To encourage His prophet and to demonstrate His unfailing commitment to His Church, God gave Zechariah a vision of the unseen realms.
Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the LORD said to Satan, “The LORD rebuke you, O Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?” Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. (Zechariah 3:1–3)
The prophet saw Joshua, the High Priest who represented the Old Covenant Church before God and God to the Church, clothed in filthy garments, wholly unsuited for ministry. The garments were filthy because of the people’s sinfulness.
There stands Satan, the Accuser, ready to lodge all manner of charges against the High Priest regarding the past sins of the people, which have defiled him and should render him disqualified for his priestly duty.This is a common tactic of the Devil: bring up old sins to rob God’s people of our joy, to discourage us from seeking God’s grace, and to try to disqualify us in our own minds and the minds of others from God’s service by alleging: Behold, a sinner! Look how bad this person is! Look what he did! Look what he said! Behold, a sinner!
This demonic tactic is effective because what the Devil or his minions allege – in this regard – is often true. We have committed horrible sins; we have brought grief upon ourselves and others. We rightly deserve to be clothed in shame and filth.
But God’s people must not allow these demonic attacks to prevail in our minds or hearts; we must remember neither our sins nor the Devil’s accusations define us.
II. New Righteousness
Zechariah’s vision did not end simply with the Lord’s rebuke of Satan’s accusations. The Lord acted to overcome the defilement of sin, to overcome the truth of Satan’s allegations.
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Dear SBC, the Answer to the Sex Abuse Crisis Is Not Pragmatism
This report contains real stories of real women who were abused or assaulted. It’s tragic. It’s painful to read. However, the real answer is found in the pages of Scripture and does not require the implementation of new methods, programs, or policies. Women and girls within local churches need to know that men, pastors, and the church as a whole is committed to obeying the Scriptures which address matters of abuse, sin, assaults, and sexual misconduct.
Over the last few years, we have witnessed a barrage of news stories emerge within the Southern Baptist Convention that point to sex scandals, misconduct, and abuse. In 2019, the Houston Chronicle report rocked the SBC world. It revealed 700 cases that spans over a 20 year period.
Although I am no longer a pastor of a church within the SBC, I speak as a pastor who spent many years in the SBC and feels the tension growing rapidly. In short, the criticism I provide in this article comes from a heart of concern.
The 2021 SBC messengers approved to allocate funds from the Cooperative Program for a large scale investigation into the allegations and claims of sex abuse cases. Guideposts was hired as an independent investigative firm, and the SBC is prepared to use up to $4 million dollars on this entire investigation. This is the largest of such investigations in the history of the SBC.
On Sunday, May 22, 2022, the report from Guideposts was published and made available to the world. Needless to say, it was a lengthy detailed bombshell report containing harmful stories of abuse victims and accusations against public figures and well known pastors within the SBC. Since the report was published, there have been many different responses. Obviously, pastors and leaders within the SBC are trying to process this news just a few weeks prior to a decisive presidential election in Anaheim, California.
At this crisis moment, the SBC can make the right choices to move in the direction of biblical sufficiency or the Convention can choose to walk down the pathway of pragmatism. That one decision could change the future of the SBC.
The SBC and Pragmatism
The SBC has a long historical commitment to pragmatism. Not only is the SBC the largest Protestant denomination in the United States with some 47,000 churches, it’s also the most pragmatic denomination. In 1954, the SBC adopted a growth campaign under the slogan ‘Million More in 54’ and the results were extremely harmful. The idea was to grow the SBC by one million members, but the tactics were program driven and pragmatic which led to false conversions. That’s why the SBC witnessed an overflow of unconverted church members rebaptized through the years following that explosive era of church growth models.
Pragmatism is the philosophy that encourages people to make decisions based on whatever will give them positive results. In other words, if it works—do it. Pragmatism originated in 1870s and continues to be a popular means of evaluation and assessment. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:
Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that – very broadly – understands knowing the world as inseparable from agency within it. This general idea has attracted a remarkably rich and at times contrary range of interpretations, including: that all philosophical concepts should be tested via scientific experimentation, that a claim is true if and only if it is useful.
Like anabolic steroids offer instant muscular growth to athletes, pragmatism offers church growth success at a much faster rate than a model that is centered upon the Bible alone. Once leaders taste this instant success, they become slaves to it. Rather than focusing on the Scriptures, they begin looking outside of Scripture to arrange their worship services in ways that will attract people to their local church—regardless of what the Bible says.
In 2010, Andy Stanley was invited to address the pastors during the annual Pastors’ Conference of the SBC. Andy Stanley told the story of Chick-fil-A, which originated south of Atlanta. As Stanley tells the story of Chick-fil-A leaders who were trying to figure out how Chick-fil-A could grow faster, he explains how company founder Truett Cathy pounded on the table and said, “I am sick and tired of listening to you talk about how we can get bigger. If we get better, our customers will demand we get bigger.” The entire session was devoted to how pastors could learn from corporate America in making their churches better which would result in the community responding to make their churches bigger.
I recall being there in that session and looking around at a room filled with SBC pastors. What those men needed at that hour was more Scripture and less talk of corporate America. Yet, at every turn the SBC continues to turn to feed pastors pragmatism while promising them good results. It’s put on display and platformed at the SBC Pastors’ Conference and modeled through SBC leadership, Convention programs, and resolutions.
In the wake of the Houston Chronicle report, Beth Moore entered the conversation with an argument that women needed more women in places of leadership so that they could find help in moments of crisis. Moore spoke in Dallas at the ERLC’s Caring Well conference:
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