I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

I have ten minutes tonight, so this is going to be a quick (and probably short) set of reflections. I got to Genesis 29 and 30 this evening, and read them together since the former flows neatly into the latter. The short version is: Jacob and his family are a mess, right from the start. If it wasn’t bad enough the way Jacob left his own family, it quickly becomes apparent that things with Laban won’t be any better—indeed, they’ll be worse.

Jacob falls in love with Rachel, makes a deal with her father than he can marry her if he works for seven years. Two thoughts: (1) that’s serious dedication; (2) I wonder how Rachel felt about the whole thing. Jacob finishes the seven years, Laban throws a party, and then Jacob and Rachel go to bed. Er, except that it’s Leah. One of my favorite lines in the Old Testament, here: “And in the morning, behold, it was Leah!” (Genesis 29:25). I’m married, and I’m really not quite sure how that worked.

Growing up, I was always under the impression that Jacob then had to work another 7 years before he got to have Rachel as his wife; as it turns out, he worked those 7 further years after having her as his wife. He had both Leah and Rachel as wives within a week of each other. To any guy that’s ever been tempted to think polygamy is a good idea, the rest of chapters 29–30 could be put here precisely to put that notion to rest. You know, with a bullet to the heart. What follows is a tale of sisters who clearly envy each other and see themselves in constant competition with one another, even using their maids as a way to get offspring for themselves.

Seriously: who does that? What woman says, “Here, go have sex with this other woman so that I can outdo my sister (with whom you are also sleeping) in our competition for having children?” Different culture, yes,¹ but still: these people were a mess.

And that right there is one of the greatest comforts in Scripture to me. We have Abraham, the patriarch of the faith, followed by his son Isaac, who repeats his father’s mistakes and then gets outfoxed by his wife and son’s trickery. Then comes Jacob, who steals his brother’s blessing after tricking him out of his birthright, and the twelve sons who become the patriarchs of the twelve tribes of Israel come out of the backbiting and jealousy between the two women he married. This is the cast of characters through whom God is planning to bring blessing to all the nations of the world.

There is a magnificent, beautiful gem that gives a hint of what is coming buried in the middle of this. Throughout all the jealousy, giving of maids, and so on, only once does someone stop and simply praise God: Leah, when Judah is born (Genesis 29:35). And where does that promised blessing come from, ultimately? The line of Judah—not the firstborn son, but the kid in the middle, who is the only one about whom there is no complaining or wheedling for more, just a simple bit of praise offered to Yahweh.

God is working his plan. Jacob’s family makes it clear that he can work it just fine with people who are a mess. And in the midst of that mess, the Messianic hope just keeps growing. Praise Yahweh.

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

One of my assignments for Christian Theology I at Southeastern is writing short devotional reflections on J. I. Packer’s Knowing God. On the days I read it, I am using this as my primary devotional material, so it will take the place of reflection on Scripture on those days.

Chapter 1: The Study of God

I find myself both challenged and encouraged here. I am encouraged, for it has long been my conviction that the knowledge of God is the most practical thing in the world. Seeking to know him more truly is both the most important task in my life and the most effective in bringing change in my life. I am challenged, though, because as Packer rightly points out, “If we pursue theological knowledge for its own sake, it is bound to go bad on us.”

Even as a seminary student only a few semesters in, I have seen the ease with which I could slip into approaching Scripture merely academically, and I know that for many, seminary degrees are a time of spiritual dryness. Packer’s exhortation helps me remember how to avoid that kind of spiritual deadness: we must “… turn each truth that we learn about God into matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.” In other words, I have come full circle: it is God who is the center of this enterprise, not me. That means that it is God, and not me, for whom I must conduct my studies—I must orient them on glorifying him, not on self-improvement or bettering others’ opinions of me. Turning my studies and reflections that way, not only apprehending intellectually but meditating so that these truths seep deep down into my affections and my ways of living, will keep me humble, and will lead me closer to God. As it should be.

Chapter 2: The People Who Know Their God

Packer writes, “If we really knew God, this”—that no worldly troubles matter, because of the joy of knowing God—”is what we would be saying, and if we are not saying it, that is a sign we need to face ourselves more sharply with the difference between knowing God and merely knowing about him.” This is a concern that presses deeply on me. I have seen friends grow in knowledge about while diminishing in knowledge of God, a fate I wish very much to avoid. More importantly, I have experienced the same in seasons of my own life, an experience I very much wish to avoid repeating. To grow in knowledge of theology without coming to know God more thoroughly is simply to end up arrogant, distant from God, a thorn in the side of other believers. Just as bad, it is to end up dry, dusty, and academic instead of full of the “gaiety, goodness, and unfetteredness of spirit” that Packer calls us to.

I have known many who knew less theology than me, but loved God more truly. I heartily believe that they would have loved God yet more truly had they known more of him, but I also believe that God desires their love more than their knowledge (even if he does desire both)—which is to say, he desires my loving him even more than he desires my knowing about him. It occurs to me that this is inherent in Jesus’ shocking comment that only those who come as little children will enter the kingdom: children do not come full of knowledge, but they do come full of love. I may grow in knowledge; indeed I must if I am to fully love God with the mind he has given me. Yet I must make sure that I am loving God with my mind, not loving myself.

Packer, quite rightly I think, points to prayer as both barometer and means of accomplishing this state of knowing God as well as knowing of him. If my knowledge is not leading me to prayer (and praise), I am missing the point somehow. I have seen this born out often in my devotions. When I am really grasping the passage, I want to pray and worship. When I am merely going through the motions, or only picking up the information academically, I am not so moved. Thus, my heart’s response toward prayer, or lack thereof, is a weather vane for how I am responding to the increased knowledge. At the same time, the discipline of prayer helps me turn away from mere academic apprehension of facts to the sovereign God those facts describe, and whom I ought to be worshiping, so it is also a way of avoiding that particular failure.

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

Tonight’s post is going to sound familiar—a great deal like last night’s in many ways, because the topics are similar. Today I come to the Passion itself: Matthew 27. Here, Jesus stands before Pilate, is whipped and mocked and spit on again, and ultimately is crucified.

That word has too little force for us, I think. We Christians are too accustomed to the word “cross,” to used to the idea of Jesus being “crucified.” We have become inured to the horrifying nature of the image of a man dying in agony because he has had his body nailed to some pieces of wood. The pain was excruciating. Paul points out in Philippians that Jesus was humbled not just to death, but even to death on a cross. And for all that we come back to this idea in sermons from time to time, I think we still are too little aware of how great Jesus’ sufferings were on our behalf.

I am grateful that the Spirit let me see again, just a little, the horror of that moment. The God-man, the Savior-King who came to redeem the world from its sin, hangs there on a few pieces of wood from some trees he created, both upholding the universe by the word of his power and dying in agony, each breath impossibly hard. In a heartbeat he could have said, “Enough; I will not do this thing!” but the immeasurable depths of the riches of God’s kindness and mercy held him there. Not the Father abusing the Son, as some (fools) would have it, but the Son full-willing taking all upon himself as they and the Spirit in perfect unity did what man never could, so that the mercy and the justice of the Triune Godhead would be on display, side by side, forever. Impossible, glorious mystery.

And then the impossible words: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” This, Jesus the eternal Son of God suffered on my behalf: not only the physical agonies of the cross, but somehow—in a great mystery—somehow he suffered the agony of relational separation from the Father and the Spirit that we all deserve and have borne in tiniest part, that we might never taste it in full. Somehow he suffered the wrath of the Godhead that we all deserve, so that we might never taste it at all. Impossible, glorious mystery.

He took our thorns—the thorns that grew from the ground that God cursed for Adam’s sake—on his brow. He took the lash on his back. He took the nails in his hands and his side. He took the mockery from Roman soldiers and passersby and wicked thieves hung beside him to die in ignominy. He took it all, that Father and Son and Spirit might pass over our sins and still be good—that when the Son comes again in power and judgment, we his people will stand clothed in his own righteousness. Impossible, glorious mystery!

So praise him: the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Mighty One of Israel, the Lion, the Lamb, the one from whom the scepter will never depart, the Holy One, the great I Am, in every way a man and very God of very God, Redeemer, God with us, judge and judged, prophesied prophet, sacrifice and priest, servant-king—Yahweh! Yahweh, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

Hallelujah!

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

The combination of Matthew 26 and Psalm 36 is like a double punch to the gut—in the best way possible. Reading through Matthew 26, I was struck over and over again by the force of what is going on: Jesus, knowing exactly what was about to transpire, went willingly forward. Every step of the way, he knew what was coming next.

He knew that the religious authorities who should have seen him for who he was would plot to kill him. He knew, when a woman came and poured expensive ointment on him, that it was a preparation for his death. He knew when Judas went to the priests to sell Jesus’ life for a few pieces of silver. He knew exactly what the Passover had always been pointing to, and he knew what he meant—even if his disciples did not—when he spoke the words of institution of the Lord’s Supper. H knew that all his disciples would fall away, and the boldest and most devoted of them all would publicly deny him. He knew the enormity of the price he was about to pay, and in agonized prayer pleaded with the Father that if there were any other way, it be made available. He knew when Judas returned what his “friend” was about. He knew the hearts of the men who came out at night for fear of the crowds. He knew the hearts of the men who condemned him for “blasphemy” because he was indeed the Son of God, and they would not worship him.

They would not worship him. Instead, as verse 67 tells us, “they spit in his face and struck him. And some slapped him…” They spit in the face of the Messiah, struck very God of very God, slapped the final Passover lamb. Peter denied the one who came to save him.

This is us. This is you and me when left to our own devices, when trapped in our sins. We refuse to worship God. We spit in his face. We mock him. We deny him. Jesus knew this. He knew us. And, in loving obedience to the Father, and in love for us—when we were the worst of rebels, traitors, wicked fools in open revolt—he went knowingly, and willingly, to his death.

Psalm 36 opens with a picture of “the wicked”: the sort of person who “plots trouble while on his bed” and “sets himself in a way that is not good” and “does not reject evil” (v. 4). Then David turns and glories in Yahweh—his steadfast love, his faithfulness, his righteousness, his judgments, his sheltering, his abundance, his delights, his life, his light. The psalm is a perfect complement to Matthew 26: they both point to the wretched sinfulness of man and the glorious loving kindness of God.

I cried as I pondered these verses tonight (and I near tears again now): my God—against whom I sin over and over again, against whom we all had propped ourselves up as little dictators and tyrants over our own lives—the God who made all things and who is righteous and just and holy—my God died in my stead. I can stand before him now because he is righteous, and in his righteousness he counts my debt paid because Jesus Christ, the blameless Lamb of God took away the sins of the world. He knew then every wicked deed of my life, knew the weight he would bear for me, for you, for all of our hatred and racism and murder and adultery and gossip and gluttony and every last unkind word we speak to our spouses. And he went willingly to that cross, that the Father might be glorifed and that you and I might be saved.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah!

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

I spent way too much time working on a random little programming project tonight. It was fun, and it will be useful. But unfortunately, working on it meant that I didn’t even get to start my personal devotions until now, at just after 11:30 pm. That was, in a word, stupid. One might also use “undisciplined.” I like programming projects like this one,¹ but I need time in the word of God. It is all too easy to let little hobby projects get in the way of what is truly essential. On which note: I’m going to read my Bible now. If, when I am done, I am still reasonably awake, I may return and add a bit to this post. Otherwise, I shall post it as is.

I think that will do it for tonight. One of the disciplines I have increasingly come to value in the last few years is sleep. Sleep, it turns out, is right up there with eating well and regular exercise when it comes to being able to continue being productive the rest of the time. My ability to serve God faithfully depends on many things—above all his grace, and then for my part my obedience and discipline in matters of holiness, faithfully pursuing him day by day, and so on. Yet those simple practical matters are just as important in some ways.

We are physical beings—a good thing! God made us so and called us good—and when we try to ignore that, we do ourselves and others no good. Yes, we bring our body into submission, because (like our souls) it still acts rebelliously at times. But we also ought to honor the natural cycles with which God endued our physicality. Take a Sabbath. Get to bed on time. Eat well. Exercise regularly. Honor God in your body, and not only in your mind, or you will not be able to honor him with your mind as well in the future.

So: I’m headed to bed.

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

Cease to hear instruction, my son,
and you will stray from the words of knowledge.
—Proverbs 19:27

This admonition from Proverbs 19 seems to me to be at the heart of many young people’s struggles with their parents, their teachers, and their churches. By “young,” I mean “under the age of 30,” so I’m in that list, too, as are most of my closest friends. This is a perennial struggle, and the reason every generation ends up relearning the same lessons its parents (or their parents; things tend to go in cycles) already learned. Simply put: young people (I include myself) are not particularly good at listening. It doesn’t matter how smart I am, how widely I read, or how well-educated I am; if I refuse to be instructed, I will wander away from truth.

I have, sadly, seen this born out in others’ lives, and it was a chastening experience. I have seen smart young people who love God walk deeper and deeper into folly simply because they will not be corrected. There are few things more dangerous to our spiritual health, and therefore few things more foolish, than refusing to listen to the counsel of those who have gone before you. Age does not always equal wisdom, and experience does not always make one right… but they do give one a much better shot, especially when coupled with diligent pursuit of God and holiness. Perhaps my cohort ought to take James’ admonition to heart: “let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger…”

Matthew 24, as one of the central prophetic texts in the New Testament regarding Jesus’ return, is of course hotly debated. Those debates, while interesting,¹ can sometimes distract us from the point of the passage. Matthew spent a substantial part of his book on this section, and it comes at an interesting point in the narrative. Jesus’ increasingly public embrace of his role as the Messiah has culminated with his smashing condemnation of the spiritually blind religious leaders of his day (in chapter 23), and this prophetic section (chapters 24–25) is folloewd immediately by the plot to kill Jesus, the Passover, and the Passion narrative. So why the sudden pause on prophecy? It seems almost a detour, but if we assume Matthew was a competent author who knew what he was doing, he had a reason for turning to the only extended prophetic section in the book.

First, this future-telling cements Jesus’ role as prophet. Given the role that prophets played in Israel’s history and Matthew’s portrayal of Jesus as the fulfillment of each Jewish archetype (prophet, priest, and king), this makes sense. Moreover, the placement in the text makes sense here, as well: just as the prophets condemned religious blindness and empty ritual in their day and foretold God’s future works, here Jesus does exactly the same.

Second, this extended narrative provides a cap to Jesus’ teaching in the book. He has covered ethics (especially in the Sermon on the Mount), outlined a theology of the coming kingdom (mostly through parables), and now explains in greater detail what the coming of that kingdom will be like. From here on out, the book turns almost entirely to pure narrative, with no more extended teaching sections. Jesus, Matthew shows us, cared about the state of his followers after his death, resurrection, and ascension. He gave them (us) an idea of what to expect—not the nitty gritty details we all might like,² but the big picture that we need. Jesus will come again, after his followers suffer trials and tribulations so fierce that many will be tempted to (and indeed many will) fall away. Believers must endure, and hold fast to their faith in him, and be ready. He will come when we could not predict, and he will come indeed.

A final thought: if our anticipation of Jesus’ return—with its attendant end to wickedness and suffering and sorrow—is great, how much more so is his?

Lord, haste the day.

I am writing up reflections on my devotions every day for six weeks. This is one of those posts.

As Matthew comes to the close of his narrative, things start to heat up. Coming to chapter 23, Jesus engages with the Pharisees and scribes in terms we would be hard-pressed to describe as gentle or forbearing. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!” he belts out over and over again, calling them on the floor for their folly.

This passage is challenging on a number of levels, but I think it most profoundly runs up against our culture of hyper-tolerance. It is hard for most of us nice Christian types to imagine ever speaking this way—to ever be so harsh or judgmental as to call anyone out like this, to be so blunt and so bold and so mean. To be sure, there are some unique circumstances in play here, circumstances in which we do not exactly find ourselves. We are never the son of God confronting those who have rejected his messianic ministry, never in perfect knowledge of the hearts of those with whom we interact, never completely sinless in our anger. It is right for our response to be tempered toward grace and charity in our interactions with others.

Even so, I wonder if perhaps we have not taken on something of the character of the milquetoast. It is an easy direction to slide, given the timbre of our public discourse these days. With few exceptions, and the rancorous quality of much political debate notwithstanding, it is increasingly rare for anyone (but especially Christians) to be bold in confronting sin without being immediately accused of being judgmental jerks.

I am all for grace, and seeking to understand one another’s positions well before we offer critique, and representing one another’s positions well when we do offer critique. I am sensitive to my own tendency to assign motive where I ought not, to my own inability to judge clearly and rightly, and to the ease with which I fall into pushiness. But I worry that if building a culture where this kind of stern rebuke is unacceptable (again, with those very few exceptions), we are doing great harm to ourselves. Without diminishing the call to grace, or making any less of precisely the qualifications I outlined above, I think the church needs to grow in boldness in confronting in our own midst both blatant hypocrisy and doctrines that keep people from coming to Christ.

One of these is easy: if there is a single exception to our unflagging devotion to tolerance, it is in our hatred of hypocrisy. The other, however, too often gets a free pass. People who hinder others from coming to Christ because of their additions to or subtractions from the gospel are dangerous and, after being confronted graciously and gently, should be confronted harshly and shown up to be the false teachers that they are. The aim is not to win; it is to preserve the people of God from being deceived. To do this well is hard; the “watchblogger” cohort—the “heresy hunters” who appoint themselves this task—are almost by definition not up to the challenge of discerning what response is appropriate in any situation.

When the people of God are at risk, however, we must learn to be bold. Jesus was. Paul was. Peter was. James was. Perhaps it is time we follow their example instead of bowing to the whims of culture.