Roots by the River

“Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near” (Revelation 1:3). Here is a promised blessing to those who read or hear it and take to heart what is written in it. Periodically, I take an informal poll that goes something like this: How long have you been a Christian, in years? How many times do you know that you have read the whole Bible? How many times do you know that you have read all of the New Testament? The last time was a few months ago in an evangelical church in another state. We collected all of the answers, added up the years and divided the total times into the total years. The results were, as I remember, for the New Testament once every four years; for the whole Bible once every eight years. At a men’s conference a few years ago, the results were New Testament once every 17 years, the whole Bible once every 27 years. If we have a conference of cons...

“Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1). It was at a Bible conference in Japan in 1956 where I heard Bill Pape teach on faith. One of his statements stayed with me over these many years. It was, “ Faith requires ignorance .” Recently,* I received a letter from a man named Gary, a Young Life staffer in San Jose. Let me quote them both, starting with Gary. “It became quickly apparent that I had indeed relied very heavily on clarity and detail when it came to seeking God’s answers. Whether for myself or for those I work with, I was guilty of wanting clear answers and direction as the ultimate assurance of God’s will. “I began to consider people in the Bible that God directed. It seemed that in almost all cases He gave them only enough information to take the next step. ‘Leave your family and go to a far country that I will show you,’ ‘Stay in the city for three days until I send someone to you,’ ‘Stay in Jerusalem until I se...

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind ” (2 Timothy 1:7). God has given us His Holy Spirit. As we read the characteristics of the Spirit that He has given, we find… • Boldness (Acts 4:31, 4:8-13) • Faith (Acts 11:24) • Power (Acts 1:8) • Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control (Galatians 5:22-23) All of these are the opposite of fear. “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18). If God did not give a spirit of fear and we have a spirit of fear, guess who gave it. • Fear comes from the Enemy. • Fear always has to do with the future. • Fear is always based on a lie. • Fear is contrary to those gifts and fruit the Holy Spirit gives. At present, we are seeing thousands of Christians giving in to fear. These thousands are generating more thousands. The...

“Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach , not resentful. Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will” (2 Timothy 2:23-26). “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation : that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors , as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God . God ...

“But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 15:57) “As I have already said, the first twenty-five years of my Christian life I lived in utter ignorance of this simple truth. I can never forget the 14 th of August, 1910, when the scales dropped from my eyes, and I saw that Christ was my life. Christ was my victory . I wasn’t bothering about the theological questions that have been discussed to the entanglement and defeating of so many Christians…. How God does things…is His business, not mine. But I do know that God does this thing; and I know it not because of any experiences of victory God has given me—blessed though some of them have been, and beyond anything I dreamed possible—but I know it because God says so . I don’t know it by looking at my own victories, or at the victories of others. I don’t know it because of any present experience or consciousness of Christ that I have. I know it because the Word of God says it. He says,...

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13). We know that faith and love remain. We have had our doubts about hope . Perhaps it is because we have placed a 21st century definition on hope . For instance, we may say something like, “I hope so,” meaning, “I wish it would happen, but it probably won’t.” To us, hope is wishy and doubtful. That is why it doesn’t sound like it belongs with faith and love. In the Bible, hope is not wishy; it is a sure thing. “God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure ” (Hebrews 6:18-19). “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for...

“Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge” (1 Timothy 6:20). We are bombarded with “godless chatter” every day. In university towns, we are immersed in it. In all of this, there is some of God’s truth. People hear God’s truth and consequently do not recognize the godless chatter for what it is. This makes the godless chatter even more dangerous. Nevertheless, Timothy was instructed to turn away from it. There are three ways to discern godless chatter: Know the wisdom of God very well. “We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory” (1 Corinthians 2:6-8). Know the enemy “…in order that Satan might not outwit...

“How much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!” (Romans 5:15). This is the cure for the trespass and the death that entered the world through Adam. Notice that it is the grace of God and of the one man Jesus Christ. Notice, too, that this grace and gift both overflow to the many. This agrees with verse 20: “But where sin increased, grace increased all the more...” Isn’t that wonderful? If some little kid threw a mudball and hit a white sheet hanging on a clothesline, the housewife would not take a little soap and water to wash out that amount of mud. She would use much more soap and water and wash the whole sheet. That is the way with the grace of God. God uses more than enough. His love has no limit; His grace has no measure. His pow’r has no boundary known unto man. For out of His infinite riches in Jesus He giveth, and giveth and giveth again. -Annie Johnson Flint This post coordinates with toda...

Here are some thoughts on the character of God. “By faith Abraham, even though he was past age—and Sarah herself was barren—was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise. And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore” (Hebrews 11:11-12).  “They will say, ‘Where is this “coming” he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation’…. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:4, 9). The first passage has to do with God’s promise to Abraham when he was 100 years old, because Abraham knew that God was faithful and would keep his promise. God kept his promise! The second passage has to do with the promise of Jesus to return to Earth. He gives us the reas...

“But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps” (1 Peter 2:20-21). Do you have a calling? Yes! What is it? To this you are called : Do good. Suffer for it. Take it patiently. If we do good, suffer for it and take it impatiently , this is not commendable before God. Two out of three is not good enough. Christ, in His suffering, left us an example that we should follow in His steps . We are to imitate Jesus in His goodness, sufferings and patience. The book In His Steps was written more than 100 years ago. It is a novel about a group of people who wanted to follow Jesus by asking the question, “What would Jesus do?” The fallacy in the book is that it took imagination to come up with the answer. The answer is in the text—do good, suffer for it, and take it patiently. We already know what Jesus would do. He has already...

“They seized Peter and John, and because it was evening, they put them in jail until the next day. But many who heard the message believed, and the number of men grew to about five thousand” (Acts 4:3-4). “Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace. It was strengthened; and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it grew in numbers, living in the fear of the Lord” (Acts 9:31). These two passages have something in common. The church grew in numbers in both cases. There was a difference, though. In the first case, the church was persecuted, and in the second the church enjoyed a time of peace. The conclusion is that church growth is not related directly to persecution or peace . It is related directly to the preaching of the gospel in power . The church can die under persecution, but it does not have to. The church can die in peace, but it does not have to. The church died in the Middle East, North Africa, and Turkey because of persecution. Over the last c...

“While the beggar held on to Peter and John, all the people were astonished and came running to them in the place called Solomon’s Colonnade. When Peter saw this, he said to them: ‘Men of Israel, why does this surprise you ? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go. You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you . You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has given this complete healing to him, as you can all see. “Now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders. But this is how God fulfilled...

"Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God" (Eph. 4:31–5:2). In this text, we are instructed to get rid of all bitterness. Before we begin discussing how and why this must be done, it is crucial to realize that the basis for all our actions in this regard must be what Jesus Christ has done for us on the cross. In all our actions, we are to be imitators of God. In the Old Testament, there was a woman whose name meant Pleasant. Her name was Naomi, and she had moved from Israel to another land with her husband and sons. But her husband had died, and within the next ten years both of her sons died. She made some comments to her recently widowed da...

by Richard Baxter, excerpted from  The Poor Man’s Family Book , 1672 In times when churches are corrupted, and good ministers are wanting, and bad ones either deceive the people or are insufficient for their work, there is no better supply to keep up religion than godly families. If parents and masters will teach their children and servants faithfully, and worship God with them holily and constantly, and govern them carefully and orderly, it will much make up the want of public teaching, worship, and discipline. Oh that God would stir up the hearts of people thus to make their families as little churches, that it might not be in the power of rulers or pastors that are bad to extinguish religion, or banish godliness from any land! You have greater and nearer obligations to your family than pastors have to all the people. Your wife is as your own flesh; your children are, as it were, parts of yourself. Nature bindeth you to the dearest affection, and therefore to the greatest dut...

by Wes Callihan , ( Antithesis , July/August 1991, p. 3) Do you enjoy what you read to your children? “No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally (and far more) worth reading at the age of fifty.” If C.S. Lewis was right about this, then a good test of the quality of a given “children’s” book should be whether or not adults can (not whether they do) enjoy it as well. To put it another way, if it is only a children’s book, it is probably not a good children’s book. He’s right, of course. Consider those books that are called children’s classics. Peter Rabbit is considered a classic. So is Winnie the Pooh . So are many fairy tales, and so also (though for different reasons) are the Little House books. Children love these stories—but the same is true of the adults who read them to the children. Something in them goes deeply enough into a person to obviate the question of age. A child may be delighted in a story in different ways than the adult who ...

by Richard Baxter, excerpted from The Reformed Pastor (1656) Many a tailor can go in rags while making costly clothes for others. Many a cook may scarcely lick his fingers when he has prepared the most sumptuous dishes for others to eat. Believe it, brethren, that God never saved any man for being a preacher. Nor did he reject a man because he was not an able preacher. He saved a preacher because he was a justified and sanctified man. Take heed, therefore, to yourselves first. See to it that you be the worshiper which you persuade your hearers to be . Make sure first that you believe what you persuade others daily to believe.   Make sure you have heartily entertained the Christ and the Holy Spirit in your own soul before you offer Him to others. He that bids you love your neighbor as yourself implied that you should love yourself instead of hating and destroying yourself—and others, too. O dear brothers, what men then should we be in skill, in resolution, and in unwearied dili...

John Murray , Collected Writings, vol. 1, (Banner of Truth, 1976) I take it for granted that we all believe the Bible to be the Word of God, the only infallible rule of faith and practice. I take it for granted that we all read the Bible with regularity. What I am going to plead for, however, is concentrated, sustained, devoted study of the Bible, the kind of study that is not fulfilled by the perfunctory reading of some passages each day. The set periods of family worship are not, of course, by any means to be disparaged. This is a highly necessary and most fruitful exercise. The influence for good exerted by honouring God’s Word in this way is incalculable for all concerned. Indeed, the minimal use of the Bible in this way has often left an indelible impression for good. And furthermore, the set periods of family worship may become the occasions for very concentrated and systematic study of the Bible. But what I stress here is the necessity for diligent and persevering searching ...

Here are two benedictions which we find at the end of letters in the Bible. “Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way. The Lord be with all of you” (2 Thess. 3:16). “May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen” (Heb. 13:20-21). Please look at every phrase, for I will not comment on all of them. Notice “at all times and in every way ” and “ everything good for doing his will.” The God of peace does a thorough work in us. Recently* I have been conscious of the lack of moderate commands in the Scriptures. During the same period of time, I have noticed many Christians moderating these commands. The commands are so extreme, we think we have to run them through a transformer or a reducti...

I have just written to a man in a California prison.* He has just started on a 44-year prison sentence. After that, he has 35 years waiting for him in an Idaho correctional institution. His children live with their mother in Florida. He is not a Christian. I am sending him a Bible and books. I am his only correspondent. We send Bibles and books to many people in prison at their request. We correspond with some of them and take collect calls from others. If you were here, you would think it is our only ministry. It is only a minor part, but biblically it is a very important part. Jesus said in Matthew 25:31-40, “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, y...

“‘Haven’t you read,’ he replied, ‘that at the beginning the Creator “made them male and female,” and said, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh”? So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate’” (Matthew 19:4-6). The marriage service says that marriage is a “holy estate.” The Christian marriage is more than physical, economic, cohabitating and child bearing and rearing. It is a spiritual fellowship; it is a picture on earth of Christ and His body, the Church. “Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with w...

“And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matt. 6:7–8). Why do we need to pray when God already knows what we need?     First, we should pray because God commands us to. We are to obey Him. “Rejoice always, pray continually , give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thess. 5:16–18). “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests . With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people” (Eph. 6:18). The quality of our obedience is inextricably linked with the closeness of our walk with God. A major component of that walk is prayer. For a strong Christian life, look to the Lord continually. Seek His face. Pray the prayers of Scripture.      God has chosen us to fulfill His will. He taught us to pray...