Tag: reformed theology

Week 22

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Memory Verse: Psalm 119:89

Questions:  What message do the heavens declare?

Reading #1: Psalm 8

Questions:  According to verse 1, which attribute of God’s is set above the heavens?

Reading #2: Psalm 19

Questions:  According to verses 1-3, which 3 things do the heavens declare, proclaim, or reveal?

Reading #3: Psalm 50

Questions:  According to verse 6, which attribute of God’s do the heavens declare?

Reading #4: Psalm 97

Questions:  According to verse 6, which attribute of God’s do the heavens proclaim?

Psalms and Hymns

Psalm 8B “When I view the skies above which your own fingers made, When I see the moon and stars which you in order laid, What is man so frail and weak that you should remember him?  What can be the son of man that you should care for him?”

Psalm 19A “The spacious heavens declare the glory of our God;  The firmament displays His handiwork abroad.”

Praying Under the Same Sky

Qatar, Romania, Russia

Tolle Lege: ESV Gospel Transformation Study Bible

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I feel hugely privileged to be able to write the following book review of the ESV Gospel Transformation Study Bible(Crossway, 2018).  It’s only been in my eager hands for a day, but I wanted to share my first impressions.  Before even opening my hard-cover copy, I’m already loving the promising subtitle, “Christ in All of Scripture, Grace for All of Life.”

Thumbing through, I’m excited to see that it’s in the same single-column format as my ESV Journaling Bible.  Once you experience that format it’s really hard to go back to the double-columns.  Of course that difficulty also applies to the ESV translation itself.  That was enough thumbing for me.  I wanted to dig right in.

The introduction makes clear right away what makes this Study Bible different from other Study Bibles.  Editor Bryan Chapell states their twofold goal as being, 

“(1) to enable readers to understand that the whole Bible is a unified message of the gospel of God’s grace culminating in Christ Jesus, and (2) to help believers apply this good news to their everyday lives in a heart-transforming way (vii).”

That statement is exactly why I wanted to get my hands on a copy of this Study Bible in particular.  I’m not a student of Study Bibles.  Even though we have several in the house, the last time I actually regularly studied the notes in one was back as a teenager when I had a copy of the NIV Student Bible.  In fact, a good portion of the doctrinal error from my formative years I can pretty much trace back to those notes.  Praise the Lord for ministries like The Gospel Coalition, Ligonier, Desiring God, and The Proclamation and Charles Simeon Trusts!  Not only did those resources help correct so much of the error I had been exposed to, through them I kept hearing that various authors, pastors, and teachers which I had come to respect had contributed notes to this volume.

So when I turned to page xvii and scanned the list of contributors, it was like walking into a room full of old friends.  Michael Horton, Kathleen Nielson, Elyse Fitzpatrick, Ray and Dane Ortlund, Graeme Goldsworthy, David Helm, Colin Smith, Nancy Guthrie,  Iain Dugoid, Kevin DeYoung, Burk Parsons, Dan Doriani, Vern Poythress… (xvi-xix)  Really?  You’re all here?  I’m imagining myself showing up to the Bible Study I was at tonight, only all my best and most learned friends have shown up too, and we get to study God’s Word together!  So what that none of these contributors know me from Adam?  I know they know Jesus, and have helped me immensely the past few years to see how all of scripture bears witness to Him (vii) and that scripture isn’t the Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth of my Student Bible Days, but the amazing revelation of God to man concerning His Son, Jesus Christ and the salvation He grants to all who believe in His Name.  

Oh, and besides not knowing me from Adam, these contributors actually do have a pretty good handle on Adam, himself.  Since the ladies Bible study I’m in was studying Genesis 2 tonight, I took the opportunity to quickly check out the notes for that chapter.  And there was Jesus!  William VanGemeren (a brand new friend :), traces the story of Sabbath through scripture to Jesus Christ Himself, our Sabbath Rest (6).  I had to get to Bible Study, so I couldn’t read more, but that little morsel was enough for me to know what a feast would be awaiting me later on.  I really can’t wait for my next bite!

Although I was provided a free copy of this book through Crossway, I am under no obligation to write a positive review.

Devo Week 20

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“Who alone stretched out the heavens.” Job 9:1-9

“He stretches out the north over the void.” Job 26:7

“Can you, like Him spread out the skies?” Job 37:18

“It is He…who stretches out the heavens like a curtain.” Isaiah 40:22

“Who created the heavens and stretched them out.” Isaiah 42:5

“Who alone stretched out the heavens.”Isaiah 44:24

“It was my hands that stretched out the heavens.” Isaiah 45:12

“Who stretched out the heavens and founded the earth.” Zechariah 12:1

I don’t know about you, but when I hear the scientific community go bonkers over some new theory like “The Expanding Universe” I just want to say “well, duh.” At least 8 times in scripture God is described as having S T R E T C H E D out the heavens. With His own hands He took the universe and E X P A N D E D it out. Stuff got further and further away from other stuff. And if it’s still getting further and further away, wouldn’t that mean that the light we’re seeing from stars now actually started traveling toward earth when that star was much closer to us? I’m neither a scientist nor a mathematician so if there’s someone out there with some real knowledge on this stuff that could explain it to me that would be great.

In the mean time, I know this at least. The question Job asks in chapter 9 immediately before his expanding universe statement is of far more import than the question of starlight and time, “How can a man be in the right before God?”
I know there’s more surety in the proclamation he makes right before his expanding universe statement of chapter 26, “How You have helped him who has no power! How You have saved the arm that has no strength! How You have counseled him who has no wisdom, and plentifully declared sound knowledge!”

I know that the same God of Isaiah’s expanding universe who brings out the stars by number, calling them all by name and ensures not one of them is missing, that same God who tends the stars tends His flock like a shepherd, gathers the lambs in His arms, carries them in His bosom, and gently leads the mommas with young (40:11,26).

I know it is the God of Isaiah’s expanding universe that gives me breath and spirit, who formed me from the womb, He also created the heavens, and formed the earth (42:5, 44:24, 45:12). And the God of Zechariah’s expanding universe? He is the God who saves. Who pours out a spirit of grace upon His people “and pleas for mercy, so that when they look on ME, on Him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for Him (12:1,10).”

Friend, have you ever mourned for the piercing of the God of the expanding universe? Has His spirit of grace been poured out upon you allowing you to plead for His mercy? The very next chapter in Zechariah proclaims that on the day that you do a fountain will be opened unto you to cleanse you from your sin. THAT my friends is the only answer to Job’s all important question, “How CAN a man be in the right before God?”