Do we hate every false way?

Psalms 119:104 "Through Your precepts I get understanding; Therefore I hate every false way."

One of the wonderful truths about the gospel is that it will cast down every vain thought and imagination of man. The gospel is a precious thing and it is in this gospel that asserts that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners that we most certainly believe. Through faith we march with the saints, choosing rather to believe in the promises of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for season. We understand that the gospel came at great cost, indeed, even the life of the very Son of God. Therefore we are to live our lives in such a way as to glorify God and to show testimony or evidence of the work of God in our hearts.

The question that I have been musing of late is whether or not the saints realize what it means to hate sin? Sin is an ugly thing - we can see its staining and ruinous effect in the world in which we live. Even though we have been delivered from the bondage of sin and are told that sin no longer has dominion over us, we sadly even observe sin within the assembly of the saints. What believer who has been saved for any amount of time has been immune from terrible schisms and fights even within local assemblies?

The arminian gospel that has unfortunately invaded the church in modern times tends to not like concepts like repentance and the acknowledgement of Christ's Lordship. This watered down gospel, sometimes referred to as cheap grace, tends to mention that we are sinners and need to trust in Christ. This is true enough as it stands, but this gospel tends to minimize repentance, preferring to place its weight on the recitation of a sinner's prayer. "Every eye closed, every head bowed..." says the good evangelist, "If you just pray the sinner's prayer you shall have life eternal."

Now to be sure, there have been many people converted under ministries that do not embrace the doctrine of God's sovereignty in salvation, often referred to as "the doctrines of grace" or "Calvinism." Even as Paul rejoiced when Christ was preached, even if it be in the spirit of contention, we rejoice, yes, and do rejoice. But sadly enough, the fruits of cheap grace that was popularized by the revivalist Charles Finey and men of his ilk has manifested itself in the church today. Much of what passes as Christianity is sickening indeed. Instead of treating men as vile wretches who need to repent of their false ways and who need to lie prostrate before a God who is a consuming fire, many modern churches defile the holy things by bringing a god down more to the liking of a wretched and seething humanity. Some may think I am an exclusive grouch by so saying, but I am convinced that some of what passes as religion today is nothing more than a false gospel, for they seek to worship a god that they have invented.

There are those who feel that the gospel is no longer relevant for today's seeker. It seems as if lost men in this age don't prefer the preaching of the gospel, which commands people to repent of their sins and warns that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all those who work unrighteousness. Do you suppose Jonathan Edward's sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" would be well received in many modern churches? Hardly! Old Mr. Edward's evidently has never heard of the doctrine of positive thinking. How dare he refer to me as dangling from a slender thread over the fires of hell!

Somehow, churches have been established that lost men can actually enjoy attending. Sensitive seekers feel warm and cuddly as the handsome ministers, with their silk suits, large gold rings, and winning smiles, encourage them by telling them that they are quite alright. The lost man does not understand the things of God. In fact, Paul tells us it is impossible for the lost man to comprehend spiritual things. Jesus warned the disciples that the world will hate them and will hate the light. The gospel is to the Jew a stumbling block and to the Greek foolishness. The lost man, apart from the regenerating work of the gospel, is going to hate God, hate the church, and hate the gospel. These are the true, hard facts. The church is for the saints of God. The church is to be filled with godly people who love and worship God. The elders of the church are to be instructing and exhorting the saints so that they can out and teach others. We've forgotten this lesson, so when youth pastors observed that their rebellious, lost teens actually got bored sitting in Sunday school class learning about being kind and patient, they decided that if they could get the kids interested in jumping up and down in unison to the pounding of drums and the screech of electric guitars that perhaps they coulds see some growth. "We need to be relevant! Kids don't like the old hymns and preaching.", they decided.

We must learn to hate every false way. We first must search our own hearts. We tend to love sin too much. Oh, we hate the really bad things that we don't commit, but we are rather content with our own sins. We don't cheat on our spouses and we are not homosexuals or thieves, so we tend to think of ourselves as quite alright. We must love God's Word and apply it to our lives. We must repent of each and every sin and learn to hate it. We need to learn what it means to weep over our sin and iniquity, to learn what it means to fall prostrate before a holy God, covering ourselves with sackloth and ashes.

We need to learn how to serve God acceptably, with a holy fear, understanding that God is a consuming fire. God has prescribed how He is to be worshipped. It is not up to worship leaders to concoct new and effective ways of modern worship. God is Holy, we are worms, and He has ordered how He is to be worshipped. We most regard worship as a most holy thing - and not follow after the pattern of Nadab and Abihu, who offered strange fire to the Lord which the Lord commanded not. I personally embrace the old doctrine of the regulative worship principle, which states that we must worship God only in the manner in which he has prescribed.

We need to consider every area of life and see as to whether or own lack of knowledge has caused to embrace false ways. Our nation is not Christian. It is wicked to the core. Our lack of Bible knowledge has made it possible for us to embrace much of what is in actuality a pagan culture. How do we buy and sell? How do we till our fields? How do we run our businesses? How do we order our homes? Have we diligently sought out what it means to live in a holy and acceptable manner before God? Does our life's practice look like its ordered through a principled understanding of the precepts of God or does it look like it follows after a postmodern Western ideology?

We have a lot of work to do - in our own hearts, in our families, in our churches, and in our respective work places. We have more to do than we know. This is not a daunting task, however. Let the gospel do its perfect work. Be sensitive to the spirit of God. Learn to hate sin. Learn to love God's Word. Stop doing things just because it is the American way - start purposing in your heart that you are going to do things in another way - a way that lends toward acknowledging Christ as your Lord and Savior, as your sovereign King, for the glory of God.

Ten years ago, the Lord was pleased to beging blessing Rachel and I with children. We are very thankful that God has been pleased to give us four children and we pray daily for wisdom so that we might train them up in a godly fashion. Aaron, our oldest son, just turned ten years old! It is hard to believe that so many years have already passed. He stands chest high to me now - but it does not seem that long ago when he as an infant slept on my chest as I laid on the couch!



Who says that kids need a lot of expensive toys to keep them busy?! Mariah enjoyed playing with this empty box for nearly a day before she had it destroyed. Sometimes in the evening I will rock her in my favorite rocking chair, but this night I had to rock her as she sat in her box! We praise God for little moments such as these, for as insignificant as they may seem, they fill us with great joy!




What happened to winter? We had three weeks of winter that began the last part of December, but now for three weeks we have had mild temperatures. The snow has melted and the ice on the rivers has broken up and floated down stream. This fuzzy picture as it appears here was a very stunning early morning photo of the setting moon.

Some thoughts on debt

One of the greatest challenges that I think we face as believers is figuring out to glorify God through the manner in which we govern our finances. In order to glorify God, we must understand that we must obey Him. God has actually had quite a lot to say about the subject of money, but unfortunately, we are more prone to govern our life by our understanding of the Wall Street Journal than through our knowledge of the Scriptures.

There are a lot of tough passages to weigh out as we consider our approach to money. They are perhaps not so tough to understand, but difficult indeed to properly apply.

“The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.”

We know that we humans are impressed with the things that glitters and shine. We also know that is really hard to be content with just food and clothing, unless of course we find ourselves starving and naked. We should understand that money is not intrinsically evil, but rather the love of acquiring it and storing it. We are actually commanded to labor with our hands so that we will have something with which we give. John Piper commented somewhere that an increase in wages had better adjust our style of giving rather than our style of living.

It’s difficult to keep the scales balanced - if we listen specifically to the word of Christ, not weighing them in the context of his message, we might end up as the Thessalonians, not working and not worrying about what we are to wear and what we are to eat. Isn’t Jesus coming back tomorrow?

On the other hand, we could observe Joseph stockpiling the grain for the years of drought and we might consider the ant, as we are commanded, who labors wearily through the heat of summer to provide for their winter’s sustenance and find that we are working 17 hours a day and have stored up great wealth only to discover when we are old and gray that we have wasted our lives accumulating that which moth and rust corrupts.

I am convinced that our country has become enslaved to the gods of Capitalism and Industrialization. We have forgotten how to live frugally and the mountain of debt has grown so large that it is blocking out all but a slight amount of the glory of the sun. I believe the cold nights of winter are quickly approaching. Our gods are about to demand their due - and I fear we will soon learn exactly what it means to be the servants to our lenders.

I have recently read reports that the Bush administration has in the last four years borrowed more from foreign investors than all the preceding presidents combined. Credit card debts are weighing down the average family with a burden over $8500. People are flocking to take advantage of the “sure” investment called inflation and are borrowing money in which they need not pay any of principle. For 85 years or so our government has been creating money out of thin air through fractional reserve banking and it is nice to know that our federal reserve notes have no more intrinsic value than the paper they are printed on. (The new watermarks are pretty cool, though!) It’s to bad we forgot about the old US Coin Act that legislated the amount gold backing the currency and even threatened those who tampered to be guilty of treason and put to death!

In the Old Testament, Israel was forbidden to loan money out at interest to their country men. They were permitted to lend at interest to their enemies, and this was in fact part of their covenantal blessing conditioned upon their obedience. So long as they kept the Word of the Lord, they would be lenders and not borrowers.

David asked the question as to whom would be able to enter into the temple and ascend unto the holy hill and one of the several answers given stated that it was the man who did not put his money out at usury.

Nehemiah was appalled when he came back to Jerusalem to find that some of the wealthier Jews had loan money at usury and he condemned them for it and demanded that it cease and that everything be returned. The interest rate was a meager 1%. 1% or 100%, it didn’t matter, for they were sinning against God.

What principles apply to us today? Surely, the discontinuity between the Old and New Covenants permits us to allow our money to go to work for us! Besides, how would we have ever managed an industrial revolution without the rise of the banking elite? How could we have fared in a capitalistic global economy if we were committed to having as a country an economy that was established upon honest weights and just measures? How could we fair if we actually saw to promote the good of our countrymen rather than to beat them down by loaning our money out to them for gain? Oh, we have gained our nuggets that makes us forget about our taskmaster, but if the banks were to fail tomorrow, what would be the result for most of us?

Historically, the ancient church was strongly opposed to debt and usury. In fact, you can hardly find any admirable thoughts about usury until the end of the middle age and economies were beginning to take root. Luther and Calvin, while opposing lending with interest on some levels, began to embrace that maybe, just maybe, it would be ok for business loans. Christians now had a bit of a foundation. Yes, borrowing and lending seems to be good and necessary for our economies to grow.

Modern day commentators have all bought into the wonderful lie that claims that a debt-based economy is good and necessary. The Old Testament principles are rendered as superfluous, necessary only for those old saints under the Mosaic administration. The golden rule, doing to others what we would have them to do unto us, is now a slippery slope that is difficult to scale and define. I want interest on my money and I’m putting it in the bank! What do I care about the neighbor who borrows it and finds he cannot pay it back and loses all that he has? Tough luck! Or as Judas was told, “What has that to do with us? You see to it!”

What about Romans, the passage that says “owe no man anything, except to love one another?” Again, modern day commentators say that it means nothing about our debt-based economics. We just have to pay our debts - and to love, especially. We can love while ignoring the tremendous bondage that we and our countrymen are shouldering. Older commentators were more grouchy, though, and say that we shouldn’t be in debt at all. But what did they know? They plowed with horses, worked with their hands, learned to enjoy the bounty of the land through their work, got to work with their children, and endured all kinds of other icky, primeval things.

Charles Spurgeon was especially grouchy: "Without debt, without care; out of debt, out of danger; but owing and borrowing are bramble bushes full of thorns. Scripture says, `Owe no man anything,' which does not mean pay your debts, but never have any to pay. My opinion is, that those who break this law ought to be turned out of the Christian church."
(This is from his “John Ploughman’s Talk” which is really a delightful read.)

I am unfortunately in debt, but have recently begun to seriously think about these things. It is not my intent to operate on a slavish fear of what may come to pass for it is not my part to be anxious and desperate, but I do wish to honor God in all that I do, even in how I receive and use money. When our giant industrialized nation crumbles, I doubt seriously that I’ll be able to do much about it, but I do wish to be able to know while I go out to look for a grub to eat that I attempted to glorify God by all that I did - and that I took the time consider His precepts and to live accordingly. I have more questions than answers, but I am glad for the conversations I’ve had with other saints that have at least allowed a breeze to blow off some of the status quo fog that had surround me.