TheVirtualWord

It is somehow strangely fitting that on Easter Sunday I should hear of the death of Mark Ashton (yesterday). Mark was the minister of the church I attended when I first became a Christian at university, and so like many others I owe him a huge debt of thanks for his ministry and example.

How wonderful, on Easter Sunday, to celebrate the Christian hope – that death is not the end, and that we will be raised with Christ. Here are a few words from Mark, recorded about 8 months ago, which show how that hope has transformed his life.

I have just finished reading Adrian Warnock’s excellent book, Raised with Christ.

As the book’s subtitle suggests, this is a book about “How the Resurrection changes everything.”

One of the central arguments of the book is that we Christians often spend a lot of time talking, singing and preaching about the death of Christ, without carrying on to talk, sing and preach about the vindication which followed. He demonstrates from the Bible how the two concepts of ‘death’ and ‘resurrection’ go together, and notes how much more air time ‘resurrection’ gets in New Testament preaching than ‘death’.

As such, this is a really timely reminder (in fact there seem to be a spate of such books – Sam Allberry’s Lifted: Experiencing the Resurrection Life being another example).

The book is saturated with Scripture which is a joy – barely a page goes by without us being pointed to some truth from the Bible. Dave Bish notes Adrian’s fondness for quoting Martin Lloyd Jones, and to this I would add Spurgeon and John Piper. But they are all Godly preachers worth hearing from and help us to see that this isn’t some novel doctrine he is presenting.

The first half of the book covers ’standard’ ground – but is a helpful summary and reminder of the Biblical teaching on resurrection, the apologetic defence of the resurrection, union with Christ etc. I am sure that I will come back to much of this again in my own studies and teaching.

The second half of the book seeks to work out some of the implications of the resurrection in our life as believers. I was delighted to be encouraged to reflect on what this ‘looks like’ in the Christian life, and challenged about how little of this ‘resurrection power’ I seem to experience day by day. Adrian’s theology would be more ‘charismatic’ than my default position, but he kept leading me back to the Scriptures to support his arguments and there was plenty to make me think.

I would certainly recommend this book. It will encourage you to look forward to the day when we will be finally raised with Christ and be like Him in our resurrection bodies; it will challenge you to think about the implications of that same power which raised Christ from the dead being at work in our bodies even now; and it will remind you that we worship a living, vindicated and raised Saviour. And hopefully it will help me with my Easter Sunday sermon too!

(you will find some more resources related to the book at http://raisedwithchrist.net/)

The death of Michael Foot this week definitely marks the end of an era in British politics. As I watched clips of his speeches from the 60-80s I was struck by the sense that here was a man who believed in something and was not ashamed to stand up for those things – even if they were unpopular.

At the risk of sounding unduly cynical, our current crop of politicians seem more motivated by what people want to hear, rather than what they actually believe/stand for. Perhaps this is the real reason for the increasing apathy amongst young voters.

It strikes me that the same tendency can easily slip into our pulpits today – the desire to say what people want to hear rather than what we actually believe. Ironically when we say what “itching ears” want to hear (cf. 2 Tim 4:3), we may reach a wider audience, but all power and authenticity is lost. Hence the historical decline in the liberal churches. This may parallel the disenfranchisement of many voters in the UK today.

I have just read a wonderful sermon by Tim Keller on the subject of Hell. In it he suggests that far from being a problem for those who believe in a loving God, the doctrine of Hell is actually a really helpful one. It helps us to understand our hearts, to live at peace in the world, and to know the love of God. Big claims? Have a read and come to your own conclusions…

And if you like Keller’s preaching, have a look at a wonderful resource of 150 free sermons from Redeemer Church.

I have just done a bit of fiddling with the old blog design, and added a couple of widgets which include content from other people’s blogs. Hope they will be of interest – they are both much better and wiser bloggers than I.

I also thought I’d add a ‘tag cloud’ – just because I like them – but a word of explanation is necessary. I have only fairly recently started tagging posts, so more recent posts are heavily biased in the cloud. Hence the enormous significance of Ajith Fernando and his book, on which I have been doing chapter by chapter reviews. Until I get round to either i) going back and tagging some older stuff or ii) writing some more stuff with tags, not related to Jesus Driven Ministry, then we’ll just have to put up with it…

We’ve just got back from a few days at the Living Leadership conference. What a blessing that has been to us. Some space, some fantastic reminders of God’s grace, great company and fellowship, wonderful food. Bring on next year, and many thanks to our generous church for enabling us to go.

It also brought the opportunity to finish reading Tim Chester’s excellent:

What is so special about this book, is that it looks to dealing with the underlying sinful tendencies, thoughts, and processes, rather than simply being a self-help book dealing with the externals. It is honest, Biblical and extremely challenging. And worth reading, and then reading again. Thanks Tim.

This isn’t new, but it is new to me and I wanted to share it. A beautiful visualisation of all the cross-references in the Bible.

I’m actually quite tempted to buy a print…

Many thanks to Mark Meynell for pointing me to it.

In some ways this is one of the hardest chapters to summarise because it ranges over several topics, yet I also found it one of the most challenging yet. The chapter is structured around the 3 temptations of Jesus after his baptism, and explores the idea of Affirming the Will of God.

I found the reminder of our Lord’s example when Satan tempted Him to feed Himself most helpful:

“Jesus knew that he could use his power to provide food. He would do that later on two occasions and feed five thousand and then four thousand hungry people. But he refused to use this ability for his own gratification, listening to Satan and missing God’s call. We too are called to a cross. Like Jesus, we also give up our rights for a greater ultimate good (Phil. 2:5-11). How many lose their spiritual credibility and authority by using the ministry and its privileges for temporary personal gain!” (p75)

As ever, Fernando provides some very helpful practical examples to bring all his teaching home and the chapter as a whole is a powerful call to Godly living and personal holiness – themes I repeatedly need to be reminded of in this world we live in.

There is a very helpful (and again challenging) discussion of our ‘uncrucified desires.’ But as ever, Fernando avoids the easy trap of legalism in his discussion, for which he is to be commended.

Here’s a big aspirational quote to end:

“When we habve a biblical vision of God, we will measure success not by earthly standards but by the extent to which we conformed to the principles and the will of God. This standard will deter us from trying to achieve ambitions with the wrong methods, but it will not discourage godly ambition. When we see that God is glorious, we are fired by an ambition to do great things that reflect his glory. So we too will dream big. But in achieving those ambitions, we will not do things that will diminish his glory. The vision of glory will give us the courage to pay the price on the path to victory. This price is the way of the cross, which Christ embraced at his tempation by refusing the crown Satan offered him.” (p87)

It has been a while since I have had time to do any non-essential reading, and so it is rather ironic that the title of this chapter is Retreating from Activity.

As ever, looking to the model of Jesus, Fernando points out how regularly Jesus took time out, especially before particularly significant moments in His ministry, to fast and pray and spend time with God. How I need repeatedly to be reminded of this. If my Lord took time out, how much more should I.

Fernando gives several personal examples of the benefits of mini or more extended ‘retreats’ and includes a brief and balanced discussion of fasting at the end of the chapter (encouraging Christian leaders to take advantage of this form of spiritual discipline, though helpfully showing it is not a command).

Top quote:

“Our ministry is not a reaction to people’s rejection of us but a response to God’s acceptance of us.
So in times of crisis, we should develop the discipline of retreating to God’s presence in order to get our strength from him. Then we can return to act as his representatives who have been called and strengthened by him.” (p68)

A friend of mine has recently produced an iPhone app which is a comic strip version of the life of Jesus. With it he aims to improve biblical literacy among visual learners. I don’t have an iPhone so haven’t been able to try it out, but you can find out more at theJesuscomic.com or just search for ‘Jesus comic’ on the iTunes store. Mark Meynell obviously does have an iPhone and has reviewed it briefly!