Marriage is Tough

Fireproof is a really powerful movie on marriage. It hits at the heart of some very important themes that people really struggle with as they try to build a healthy marriage. I love Tim Keller's thought that marriages are "Gospel Reenactment". I also have been reading lately John Pipers book this Momentary Marriage.

Marriage for me is the closest thing I have to a visible representation of my relationship with Christ. I can see that relationship out loud through my dedication and devotion to Adriane. I praise God we have never fought like this, but I know it can come if we choose to stop turning towards each other and selfishly pursue our own needs and wants before we pursue others.

Worship God 09

I have made it through a couple of these and it really has me thinking about the importance of what worship should look life in our lives in our church.

The God of Worship | John Piper

The Heart of Worship | John Piper

The Leaders of Worship | Jeff Purswell

The Church of Worship | Thabiti Anyabwile

Lessons Learned from Three Decades of Leading | (CJ Majaney and Bob Kauflin)

The Future of Worship | Bob Kauflin

Don't Waste Your Life Video

I really enjoyed this video by Lecrae. I have not really listened to his music before, but I really enjoyed this. I enjoyed the book Don't Waste your Life by John Piper, but it always surprises me by how much it has touched people. John Piper has an amazing affect on people.

Knowing Jesus through the Bible

I loved this message from John Piper. It gave me a great perspective on how important it really is to keep the Bible at the center of our growth in the Lord. When we invite others into our conversation, through books, discussions, and lectures this is fine, but when we do it in replacement of knowing and learning from the word ourselves then we can fail to recognize the one we need to know most.

National Adoption Month

Don't Waste Your Life

I recently found that Desiring God made John Piper's book "Don't Waste Your Life" an iphone readable book. Find it here.

Adoption

One of the painful experiences in my faith has been my wife and mine lack of ability to conceive. We have two precious boys that I love very much but there is always sadness about these things that linger like residue on an old window. Today I was made aware of an online book by John Piper that is going to be released next year. The book is entitled “This Momentary Marriage” (if you would like to read the book click here).

I was looking through the chapter list and saw chapter 11 titled ‘Marriage Is Meant for Making Children . . . Disciples of Jesus: How Absolute Is the Duty to Procreate?” I immediately turned to it and then read this passage.

Having Hundreds of Children

In Mark 10:29–30, Jesus says,

“Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.”

Here Jesus shifts the absolute from having children biologically to having hundreds of children through the family of Christ and through spiritual influence. It might include adoption. It might include foster care. It might include making your home a place for backyard Bible clubs. It might include hospitality in a neighborhood where your home is every kid’s favorite place. It might include your nursery job or your care for your nieces and nephews or the Sunday School class you teach. The point is: Marriage is not absolutely for making children; but it is absolutely for making children followers of Jesus one way or the other, directly or indirectly.

I have known in my heart that God has blessed Adriane and I and he has a plan for us in the loss of having biological children, but I think I needed this chapter to help fill an intellectual gap in the whole process.

On Suffering

I recently read the second chapter of the book “Suffering and the Supremacy of God”. It is a collection of seminars given at the 2005 Desiring God conference. I specifically gained a great amount of strength from the second chapter of this book which opens up with the memoir of Elie Wiesel describing his time in a German concentration camp and how this destroyed his faith. Mark Talbot quoted Wiesel as follows:

In the beginning there was faith—which was childish; trust—which is vain; and illusion—which is dangerous. We believed in God, trusted in man, and lived with the illusion that every one of us has been entrusted with a sacred spark from the Shekhinah’s flame; that every one of us carries in his eyes and in his soul a reflection of God’s image.

I believe so many of us live with this understanding of God and man. We do not understand the quite dominate sense of sins ultimate destruction path. Even in men who try to pursue the Lord with all their might. Sin is a force with devastating effects for those that give it cause.

I believed that I could avoid the affects of sin if I simply lived a good life. Don’t get me wrong I believed that God would still make life “hard” and “difficult”, but I would avoid the “majors” (infertility, cancer, deep betrayal). I believed that these would fall to the wayside for me and mine because I was doing “it” right.

Instead in this chapter Mark Talbot turns us towards the idea that we have to embrace the truth that God created evil and uses evil for his purposes. We cannot accept anything less from a God we consider sovereign. When I read that part I stopped and needed a break. That hurt. However, it is starting to give me peace. I feel the transition in my heart. If you would like to read this article the book is online and you can go to it here. Look for Chapter 2.