Praise for the past, trust for the future

I trust you find the name and grace of Jesus more and more precious to you; His promises more sweet, and your hope in them more abiding; your sense of your own weakness and unworthiness daily increasing; your persuasion of his all-sufficiency, to guide, support, and comfort you, more confirmed. You owe your growth in these respects in a great measure to His blessing upon those afflictions which He has prepared for you, and sanctified to you. May you praise Him for all that is past, and trust Him for all that is to come!

--from a letter John Newton wrote that has been titled "The School of Suffering" whole thing here

many other newton letters here

Pleasures in Life.... and waiting

P Yancey says:
CS Lewis saw the world as a place worth saving. Unlike the monastics of the Middle Ages and the legalists of modern times, he saw no need to withdraw and deny all pleasures. He loved a stiff drink, a puff on the pipe, a gathering of friends, a Wagnerian opera, a hike in the fields of Oxford. The pleasures in life are indeed good, just not good enough; they are:

"only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited."

RP: So true. And sometimes the struggle of faith is to wait and hope for the Day when God shall bring us to that place where we find the flower, hear the tune, and arrive in that country

It is the especial wretchedness of man not to be with Him,
without whom he cannot be.

--St. Augustine

Hold People Lightly

As people move away from Gainesville.... 'tis the season to ask how we will respond. Options abound:
-- Get cynical
-- Refuse to befriend new people
-- Trust God and believe this life is fleeting.... and one way to do that is described below:

The phrase "hold people lightly" is an old one, born of the truth that God brings certain individuals into your life for a season. No one stays permanently. Friends move away or find other friends. Children grow up and leave home. Even a spouse eventually dies. In the familiar words of Ecclesiastes, "To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under Heaven." (3:1)

But if my life is rooted in the love of Christ, then friendships and relationships are what they are-gifts for a season to be received and enjoyed. If I cling or hold on for dear life, the relationship will crumble in my hand. If I hold people lightly, my friend is not required to take my advice or accept my help. I can love someone without pulling from her more than she wants to give. Holding people lightly is a huge part of loving well.

--from Paula Rinehart's Better Than My Dreams...Finding what you long for where you might not think to look....

7 aspects of the Lord's Prayer

As analysis of light requires reference to the seven colors of the spectrum that make it up, so analysis of the Lord’s Prayer requires reference to a spectrum of seven distinct activities:

• approaching God in adoration and trust;
• acknowledging his work and his worth, in praise and worship;
• admitting sin, and seeking pardon;
• asking that needs be met, for ourselves and others;
• arguing with God for blessing, as wrestling Jacob did in Genesis 32 (God loves to be argued with);
• accepting from God one’s own situation as he has shaped it;
• and adhering to God in faithfulness through thick and thin.

These seven activities together constitute biblical prayer, and the Lord’s Prayer embodies them all.

-- J. I. Packer

Jesus, teach us to Pray

We need to see that the Lord’s Prayer is offering us model answers to the series of questions God puts to us to shape our conversation with him. Thus:

“Who do you take me for, and what am I to you?”
(Our Father in heaven.)

“That being so, what is it that you really want most?”
(The hallowing of your name; the coming of your kingdom; to see your will known and done.)

“So what are you asking for right now, as a means to that end?”
(Provision, pardon, protection.)

Then the “praise ending” answers the question, “How can you be so bold and confident in asking for these things?”
(Because we know you can do it, and when you do it, it will bring you glory!)

Spiritually, this set of questions sorts us out in a most salutary way. -- J.I. Packer

He's building a palace

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right, and stopping the leaks in the roof, and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably, and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.”

- C.S. Lewis

Christ Alone

“Our nature struggles fiercely against being saved without our works and tries to deceive us with a grand illusion of our own righteousness. So we may find ourselves attracted to a life that merely appears to be righteous. Or because we know we aren’t righteous, we may be frightened by death or sin. Therefore, we must learn that we should have nothing to do with any other way of becoming righteous, except through Christ alone.” --Martin Luther

His Love is Utterly Realistic

“What matters supremely is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it–the fact that he knows me. I am graven on the palms of his hands. I am never out of his mind.

All my knowledge of him depends on his sustained initiative in knowing me. I know him because he first knew me, and continues to know me. He knows me as a friend, one who loves me; and there is not a moment when his eye is off me, or his attention distracted from me, and no moment, therefore, when his care falters.

This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort–the sort of comfort that energizes, be it said, not enervates–in knowing that God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love and watching over me for my good. There is tremendous relief in knowing that his love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench his determination to bless me.”

- J.I. Packer, Knowing God, 41-42

Deacon Candidates

Matt Kubo
Member since: September 2006
Family: Becca
Vocation: Product Design Engineer at ExacTech

Ronnie Neder
Member since: November 2002
Family: Arlene
Vocation: Sales Representative at Construction Sales

Christian Smith
Member since: December 2004
Family: Harmony
Vocation: Pharmacy Procurement Specialist at VA and Independent I.T. Consultant

Frank Stankunas
Member since:1997
Family: Sharon, Trace, Tyler, Hayden, Callie Beth
Vocation: President of Stankunas Concrete

CCC will elect men to the office of deacon in a Congregational Mtg at 12:15pm on August 24. The men are NOT running "against each other". Every man receiving a vote from the majority of members present is elected to the office. (Conceivably our voting could result in the election of 0,1,2,3, or 4 deacons.)

But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Deacon Candidates

The slate of candidates for the office of deacon is as follows:

Matt Kubo
Ronnie Neder
Christian Smith
Frank Stankunas

There will be a congregational meeting to elect deacons on Sunday August 24.

So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.

Pray for Matthews Family today...

.... as 7 year old Joshua has out-patient surgery on his broken arm

Random Post 1

“Run, John run. The Law commands
But gives neither feet nor hands.
Better news the gospel brings;
It bids me fly and gives me wings.”

-quoted in The Dicipline of Grace by Jerry Bridges

Romans 7... do you know this experience?

For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

and in "The Message":
I know the law but still can't keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don't have what it takes. I can will it, but I can't do it. I decide to do good, but I don't really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.

It happens so regularly that it's predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God's commands, but it's pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

God Reserves for Himself

Some aspects of distance between people (friends, husband/wife, parent/child) are not wrong. For example, in Proverbs 14:10, the writer speaks of bitterness, pain, sorrow and loss. There is a fundamental distance between people because of these difficult emotions and experiences. The living God reserves for Himself certain intimacies as a person goes through hardship and suffering.

--David Powlison

The heart knows its own bitterness,
and no stranger shares its joy. --Proverbs 14:10

Cleanse Me

Be of sin the double cure
Cleanse me from its guilt and power.

i know tobey mac is no Handel or Watts... but ....

.... riding in the van with my family these lyrics struck me powerfully:

I keep trying to find a life
On my own, apart from you
I am the king of excuses
Ive got one for every selfish thing I do

Whats going on inside of me?
I despise my own behavior
This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That Im still a man in need of a savior

(chorus)I wanna be in the lightAs you are in the lightI wanna shine like the stars in the heavensOh, lord be my light and be my salvationCause all I want is to be in the lightAll I want is to be in the light

The disease of self runs through my blood
Its a cancer fatal to my soul
Every attempt on my behalf has failed
To bring this sickness under control

Tell me, whats going on inside of me?
I despise my own behavior
This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That Im still a man in need of a savior

Resources on Forgiveness in Personal Relationships

The Four Promises of Forgiveness
Ken Sande - A great way to remember what you are really saying (and committing to) when you say "I forgive you."

Forgiving Others - Part 1
Bryan Chapell (mp3) - Matthew 18:21-31

Forgiving Others - Part 2
Bryan Chapell (mp3) - Matthew 18:21-31

Bundle of Paradoxes

“When I get honest, I admit I am a bundle of paradoxes. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am trusting and suspicious. I am honest and I still play games. Aristotle said I am a rational animal; I say I am an angel with an incredible capacity for beer.”     -- Brennan Manning

When I Receive Jesus... I receive HIS view of things

John Stott first exposed me to this path to receiving the Scriptures as the Word of God... it is described well here:

I am not here trying to argue for the complete trustworthiness of the Bible, only that its portrayal of the life and teaching of Jesus is historically accurate. If it is, then we can draw conclusions about who Jesus is from the information we read there. If eventually we put our faith in Jesus, then His view of the Bible will become ours. Speaking personally, I take the whole Bible to be reliable not because I can somehow prove it all to be factual. I accept it because I believe in Jesus and that was His view of the Bible. --Tim Keller, page 263 endnote 4... in The Reason For God

What we take in by the Word we digest by meditation and let out by prayer.        
                                                        — Thomas Manton

"You have given so much to me.  Give me one thing more--a grateful heart."
    
                    --a prayer in a poem by George Herbert, a seventeenth-century Anglican--

The Lure of the Village of Morality

Many are turning aside from the Christian pathway; they are turning to the village of Morality, and to the house of Mr. Legality, who is reported to be very skillful in relieving men of their burdens... 'Making Christ Master' in the life, putting into practice 'the principles of Christ' by one's own efforts – these are merely new ways of earning salvation by one's obedience to God's commands.  
------------
J. Gresham Machen in What Is Faith?

Sweeter than all pleasure

How sweet all at once it was for me to be rid of those fruitless joys which I had once feared to lose!... You drove them from me, You who are the true, the sovereign joy.  You drove them from me and took their place, You who are sweeter than all pleasure...O Lord my God, my Light, my Wealth, and my Salvation.
                                                               --Augustine, Confessions, IX, I

Tonite tonite tonite 5:30pm

Vacation Bible School (VBS) along with nights in the park


Good times.... at kanapaha park

Why God Wants Us To Sing

We do it every Sunday.  When was the last time you thought about WHY we do it?  Good thoughts to prep you for tomorrow:

Sing praises to God, sing praises!
Sing praises to our King, sing praises!

For God is the King of all the earth;
sing praises with a psalm!     --from Psalm 47

Why Does God Want Us to Sing?

1. Because singing helps us remember.  When Moses was getting ready to lead the people into the promised land... God told Moses to teach the people a song... so they would remember.

2. Helps us combine doctrine & devotion.

Music has the capacity to stir us emotionally... in a way that stating the very same truths does not often have.

3. Aligns us with Heaven, now and  future

God is being praised by creatures above

We shall sing Him sin-free one day with people from every tribe, tongue, and nation.

-- Bob Kauflin

Go to the Cross!

There is no victory over the indwelling power of sin, and there is no pardon for the guilt of sin, but as the soul deals with the blood of Christ. All true sanctification comes through the cross.



Seek it there. Go to the cross—oh, go to the cross of Jesus. In simplicity of faith, go. With the strong corruption, go. With the burden of guilt, go, go to the cross.


You will find nothing but love there—nothing but welcome there—nothing but purity there. The precious blood of Jesus ‘cleanses us from all sin.’ And while you are kept low beneath the cross, your enemy dares not approach you, sin shall not have dominion over you, nor shall Satan, your accuser, condemn you.”        —Octavius Winslow

Almighty God, who has given us this good land for our heritage: We humbly beseech you that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of your favor and glad to do your will. Bless our land with honorable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogance, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion us into one united people. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in your Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to your law, we may show forth your praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in you to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

This my friends, is what idolatry can feel like

Every night you are trying to prove your self-worth…you want to be the absolute best, wittiest, smartest, most charming, best-smelling version of yourself. If I can make people enjoy the experience and have a higher regard for me when I’m finished, it makes me feel like an entire person. If I come short of that, I’m not happy. How things go for me every night is how I feel about myself for the next 24 hours.

— David Letterman

I am NOT throwing stones at Letterman... he is one of us!  The addicted & insecure.  The ones who are looking for acceptance and longing to be righteous.  The question is NOT, in my opinion, whether or not you struggle with Letterman is talking about... you do.  The question is: "Are you aware of those wells from which you seek to slake your thirst?  Are your friends aware of them?  Are you repenting from them or thinking that one more drink will satisfy.  Rescue us from ourselves, Jesus."

Ways people try to define themselves:
-- How goes my late-nite TV show?
-- How goes my preaching, teaching, leading?
-- What do people think of my kids/marriage/reputation?
-- How is the portfolio?
-- Am I on the team?  In the starting line-up?
-- Have I been published?  How many times?

-- etc

Gospel-Happiness

John Bunyan, in meditating on the phrase "I will in no wise cast out" in John 6:37, wrote this:

"He that cometh to Christ shall not want anything that may make him gospelly-happy in this world, or that which is to come."

A Communion Prayer

May the grace of Christ our Saviour,
                    And the Father's boundless love,
                    With the Holy Spirit's favor,
                    Rest upon us from above.

 
                    Thus may we abide in union
                    With each other and the Lord,
                    And possess, in sweet communion,
                    Joys which earth cannot afford.
                                Amen.
                                     by Rev. John Newton, 1779

Lie & Blush at Jesus' feet as your safe retreat

What a motley wretch am I!
Full of inconsistency!
Sure the plague is in my heart,
Else I could not act this part.

Let me come unto my Lord,
Self-condemnèd and abhorred;
Take the sinner's safe retreat,
Lie and blush at Jesus' feet.

If my heart is broken well,
God will surely with me dwell;
Yet amazèd I would be,
How the Lord should dwell with me.   --John Berridge

Gadsby's Hymns, #301, 7s
Inconstancy. Ps. 39. 5-7, 11; Job 25. 6

Gadsby 194 by Newton

Preserve the power of faith alive
In those who love thy name;
For sin and Satan daily strive
To quench the sacred flame.
 

Thy power and mercy first prevailed
From death to set us free;
And often since our life had failed,
Had it not been in thee.

  To thee we look, to thee we bow,
To thee for help we call;
Our Life and Resurrection thou,
Our Hope, our Joy, our All.                      --John Newton

Dwelling in the Same Heart

... What has puzzled and amazed many a good Christian, that there should be

that which is so divine and precious, as the saving grace of God, and the

new and divine nature dwelling in the same heart, with so much corruption,

hypocrisy, and iniquity, in a particular saint.    -- J. Edwards

The Father Loves by GIVING

The Father loved us by giving His Son for us

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

..... God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

(John 3:16, Romans 5:8)

And, He loved us by giving us to His Son

All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.

And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.

I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

“I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.

I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.

Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

(John 6:37, 39, John 10:28, John 17:6, 9, 24)

A Huge Shift Comes When We Begin.....

To recognize and believe that the many unexpected events are not just disturbing interruptions of our projects, but the way in which God molds our hearts and prepares us for His return.

--Henri Nouwen