Kevin DeYoung's Blog, page 117

Science and Christianity

The good folks at St. Helen’s Bishopsgate in London have developed a website designed to show that science and Christianity can go together called ‘Science a personal view’.

In the Post Modern age we’re very scientific. The media has spotted this trend, thrusting celebrity status on Prof. Brian Cox (more so than when he was in DReam) and commissioning shows like ‘Attenborough: 60 years’ and ‘Stargazing live’. These programmes show something of the scale, complexity and wonder of God’s universe. However Post Modernism has taught us that nothing is communicated without a purpose or agenda and all too often Science is used to discredit Christianity or worse disprove the claims of the Bible.

In light of this William Taylor (Rector of St Helen’s Bishopsgate) asked 9 scientist from St Helen’s (including 7PhD’s, 1 Prof.) to say on camera why they think Science and Christianity don’t contradict each other. The 12 short (90 second) films that comprise the body of this work is the project titled ‘Science a personal view’. The aim of this work is:

1. To encourage Christians (particular scientists) to show them many credible scientists are Christians.

2. To engage with some of the viewpoints of atheistic scientists.

Below is the introductory video. To view the entire 12 video series, go here.

How to Prepare For Hostility

How will the church of Jesus Christ respond when the things that the church must believe are considered laughable, backwards, or worse?

It’s always been the case that Christianity has been derided by some. But now it’s not just people in far off Hollywood or in far away academia. It’s people next door. It’s the people you work with, the people you live with, the people you go to school with. How will the church of Jesus Christ respond when so many of those around us tell us that what we believe is repugnant? What will we do when we are the moral minority?

You cannot plan for opposition, at least not in the way we might think. You cannot plan for it by ruminating and worrying about it, or by making yourself miserable now so you’ll be prepared to suffer later, or by fearfully anticipating the worse in every situation.

The only way to prepare for persecution (however big or small) is to trust that if that day comes there will be new mercies on that morning for you. The only way to prepare to walk with Jesus on that day is to walk with him on this day.

The best preparation is not to meditate on yourself. What would I be like if I were persecuted? Would I be a coward? Will I be terrified?  Sometimes we think, “If I suffer or get cancer or something bad happens to me, I’d be a wreck. I won’t be able to handle it. If persecution comes my way, or people think poorly of me, or if I have to deal with hatred in the classroom, I will surely fail.” But that’s putting the focus in the wrong place. The answer is not to meditate on yourself, but to meditate on Christ.

If you want to have a face like an angel on the day of trial, you need to reflect the glory of God now.

If you want to see the Son of God in the clouds on your last day, you need to look upon the face of the Son of God on this day.

Be full of faith. Be full of wisdom. And pray for the Holy Spirit that you may know Christ richly, love him sweetly, and be assured of his grace and mercy to you at all times. If that is deep in your hearts, then how could you possibly deny him? How could you turn from him? How could you reject Him? He is your only comfort in life and in death.

The Secret to Ministry

Paul Tripp:

I am more and more convinced that what gives a ministry its motivations, perseverance, humility, joy, tenderness, passion, and grace is the devotional life of the one doing ministry. When I daily admit how needy I am, daily meditate on the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and daily feed on the restorative wisdom of his Word, I am propelled to share with others the grace that I am daily receiving at the hands of my Savior. There simply is no set of exegetical, homiletical, or leadership skills that can compensate for the absence of this in the life of a pastor. It is my worship that enables me to lead others to worship. It is my sense of need that leads me to tenderly pastor those in need of grace. It is my joy in my identity in Christ that leads me to want to help others live in the middle of what it means to be “in Christ.” In fact, one of the things that makes a sermon compelling is that the preacher is worshiping his way through his own sermon. (Dangerous Calling, 35)

 

Cold in California

This has been a brutally cold this week–in Michigan and in many parts of the country. But let’s be glad it’s not as bad as it was a couple weeks ago in L.A.

40 Years after Roe, 64 questions

What shall we call the unborn in the womb?

If the entity is a living thing, is it not a life?

If your person began as a single cell, how can that fertilized egg be something other than a human being?

Isn’t it more accurate to say you were an embryo than that you simply came from one?

So when does a human being have a right to life?

Shall we say size matters?

Is the unborn child too small to deserve our protection?

Are big people more valuable than little people?

Are men more human than woman?

Do offensive linemen have more rights than jockeys?

Is the life in the womb of no account because you can’t hold him in our arms, or put him in your hands, or only see her on a screen?

Shall we make intellectual development and mental capacity the measure of our worth?

Are three year-old children less valuable than thirteen year-olds?

Is the unborn child less than fully human because he cannot speak or count or be self-aware?

Does the cooing infant in the crib have to smile or shake your hand or recite the alphabet before she deserves another day?

If an expression of basic mental acuity is necessary to be a full-fledged member of the human community, what shall we do with the comatose, the very old, or the fifty year-old mom with Alzheimer’s?

And what about all of us who sleep?

Shall we deny the unborn child’s right to life because of where he lives?

Can environment give us value or take it away?

Are we worth less inside than outside?

Can we be justly killed when we swim under water?

Does where we are determine who we are?

Does the eight inch journey down the birth canal make us human?

Does this change of scenery turn “its” into persons?

Is love a condition of location?

Shall we reserve human dignity only for those humans who are not dependent on others?

Do we deserve to live only when we can live on our own?

Is the four-month old fetus less than human because she needs her mom for life?

Is the four-month old infant less than human when she still needs her mom for life?

What if you depend on dialysis or insulin or a breathing apparatus?

Is value a product of fully-functioning vitality?

Is independence a prerequisite for human identity?

Are we worth only what we can think, accomplish, and do on our own?

If the unborn life is human life, what can justify snuffing it out?

Would it be right to take the life of your child on his first birthday because he came to you through sad and tragic circumstances?

Would you push an 18 month old into traffic because she makes our life difficult?

Does a three year-old deserve to die because we think we deserve a choice?

What do you deserve now?

What are your rights as a human person?

Did you have those same rights five years ago?

What about before you could drive?

Or when you used training wheels?

Were you less than fully human when you played in the sandbox?

When you wore a bib?

When you nursed at your mother’s breast?

When your dad cut your cord?

When you tumbled in that watery mess and kicked against that funny wall?

When your heart pounded on the monitor for the first time?

When you grew your first fingernails?

When you grew your first cells?

What shall we call the child in the womb?

A fetus?

A mystery?

A mistake?

A wedge issue?

What if science and Scripture and commonsense would have us call it a person?

What if the unborn child, the messy infant, the wobbly toddler, the rambunctious teenager, the college freshman, the blushing bride, the first-time mother, the working woman, the proud grammy, and the demented old friend differ not in kind but only in degree?

Where in the progression does our humanity begin and end?

Where does life become valuable?

When are we worth something?

When do human rights become our rights?

What if Dr. Seuss was right and a person’s a person no matter how small?

Why celebrate the right to kill what you once were?

Why deny the rights of the little one who is what you are?

A Great Multitude and a Great Hope

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Revelation 7:9-10)

The great multitude is a host of overcomers.  They’ve done it.  They triumphed.  They finished the race. They faced hunger and thirst and heat and tears (v. 16), but they did not curse God. They did not bail. They did not compromise.  They held fast to word of God and the testimony of Jesus.  They proved to be more than conquerors through him who loved us.

They also prove to be a colorful bunch. This is not a vanilla multitude. When we get to heaven we will be pleased to find a vast array of people that do not look like us. There are going to be millions of Africans in that great multitude and plenty of Brazilians and Chinese and Filipinos, and lots of Mexicans and Indians and Arabs, and there will be some white people too.  And if you think it is great to sing your favorite hymn in English, it’s going to be even better when you get to hear it in Shona and Swedish and Swahili. You’ll thrill to hear praise in Fang and French and Finnish, and rejoice to see the throng spill out their songs in German and Japanese and Hausa and Hungarian and Quechuan and Kazakh and Korean. Heaven will be diversity without the political correctness and multi-culturalism unified in one single purpose. Every heart, every head, every voice giving glory to God and to the Lamb.

Revelation 7 is the final fulfillment of the promise to made to Abraham to multiply his offspring and make him a great nation. God’s plan has always been for more than ethnic Israel, more than Europe, more than the West. His plan has been to make a people for himself from every nation and tribe. God loves to be praised in white churches and African American churches and Russian churches and by every other congregation that calls on the name of his Son.

How sweet it will be when all our churches can sing together. Let us pursue now what we will enjoy in glory then. For what started with one man, called out of paganism, and joined to his barren wife, will one day come to culmination on the other side of the seven seals with a vast array of singing saints more numerous than the sand on the seashore.

It Has Fingernails

Five Reasons to Read the Heidelberg Catechism This Year

[image error]If you love the Heidelberg Catechism and have for a long time, read it again this year. If you learned the Heidelberg Catechism years ago and dismissed it as cruel and unusual punishment, give it another chance. If “Heidelberg” sounds like a disease to you and catechism sounds as thrilling as detasseling corn, try it anyway.

Here’s why:

1. This year marks the 450th anniversary of the Heidelberg Catechism. The first version of the Catechism had a preface dated January 19, 1563, which makes tomorrow the big anniversary date. Happy Birthday!

2. The Heidelberg Catechism is the most personal and most devotional of the Reformation era creeds and confessions. The theme is “comfort” and the emphasis is on how the person and work of Jesus Christ benefits the believer. The pattern of questions and answers make the catechism accessible, while the conspicuous use of “I,” “me,” “my,” and “mine” make the theology warm and practical.

3. The Catechism is more influential than you know. Not only have Reformed churches around subscribed to the Heidelberg for centuries, but believers all around the globe have found theological ballast and personal comfort in these 52 Lord’s Days. According to Joel Beeke and Sinclair Ferguson writing in 1999 The Heidelberg Catechism “has circulated more widely than any other book except the Bible, Thomas à Kempis’s The Imitation of Christ, and John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.”

4. There are a growing number of fine resources to help you understand the history and theology of the Catechism. The most important work is the Commentary by Zacharius Ursinus (the principal author of the Catechism). Lyle Bierma from Calvin Seminary has edited a scholarly introduction on Heidelberg’s history, sources, and theology. Willem Van’t Spijker’s volume, The Church’s Book of Comfort, is also a fine place to start for those wanting to know the people and context behind the Catechism. I know of at least two excellent books coming out this year (one by P&R and one by RHB). For a general look at the importance of creeds, confessions, and catechisms, be sure to read Carl Trueman’s The Creedal Imperative. And for a popular level treatment of the Heidelberg I’m partial to The Good News We Almost Forgot.

5. The Heidelberg Catechism is full of gospel. It is nothing less than a deeply moving, theologically careful, biblically faithful exploration of God’s grace. You won’t find a better man-made paragraph in all the world than Question and Answer 1. My only true and lasting comfort is that I am not my own, but belong–body and soul, in life and in death–to our faithful Savior Jesus Christ.

For more information on the Catechism you can also search this blog. I’ve written short articles about the history of Heidelberg, my favorite Lord’s Day, good works, tears at the Lord’s Table, Christian Hedonism,  and a host of other topics related to the Catechism. We are also preaching through the Catechism during our evening services this years.

 

Why Pastors and Elders Need Your Prayers

Your pastors and elders need your help to live out the calling of Acts 6:4: “But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.”

Because everything seems more important and seems more urgent than being in the word and prayer. Everything.

What happens if all the lights are burnt out and the heat doesn’t work and the pews are upside down and the sound is off? People will notice. People will say something. People will be upset.

But what if your elders didn’t pray more than five minutes at their meeting last month? Would you know? No on would, not right away. What if your pastor hasn’t prayed for weeks? What if the elders are not deep into the word? With almost everything else in the church someone will says, “What’s going on? Why didn’t you show up? What’s the problem? Why didn’t this get done?” But who knows when the pastors and the elders forget Acts 6:4?

Most pastors won’t tell you this, but they can preach a passable sermon with almost no preparation. We know how to string sentences together. We know more about the Bible than almost everyone in the church. We can cheat our prep time and no one will know. Not right away.

But over time, church members will think to themselves, “Something’s missing. There’ some power not here that used to be here. There’s some gospel connecting no longer at play. I can’t put my finger on it, but pastor doesn’t preach like he used to.” It happens slowly but surely. Maybe the emails seem more pressing this week, or maybe it’s a meeting, or this administrative thing. It’s not one massive thing, but a mountain of molehills. And then one day, Acts 6:4 is gone. The elders don’t pray. The pastors don’t study.

We must all fight for the ministry of the word and prayer. Elders and pastors must fight to keep it and congregations must fight to support it, to encourage it, to give time for it. Because most pastors and most parishoners don’t notice Acts 6:4 is missing until it’s too late.

Spartan Christian Fellowship

Here’s a look at our church’s campus ministry, Spartan Christian Fellowship. Thanks to Barry Peterson and his guys for working on the video. And thanks to Jon, Jackie, Chip, Andrew, Vanessa, and Sneha for doing what you do.