R.C. Sproul's Blog, page 557

O My Soul – Why We Sing to Ourselves

No one talks to me more than I do. 

That’s right, I talk to myself.  It’s not in the crazy “that guy belongs in an asylum” kind of way.  You would never guess that there is a constant inner monologue going on inside my head, and you would never believe the kind of amusingly insane conversations I have with myself. 

For example, this past July, my wife and I were traveling home from Ethiopia with our two newly adopted sons. The moment we arrived in Germany for our connecting flight, we found out that it had been canceled and we would need to make arrangements for a different flight.  Sounds easy enough, right? 

Wrong.

My new sons were not yet U.S. citizens, so we didn’t have the proper documentation to obtain a visa and leave the customs area.  I was forced to leave my wife alone in the airport of a foreign country with two majorly sleep-deprived boys who knew no English to go wait at the back of a line of four hundred people who were all trying to get a new flight as well.  I was downcast, to say the least, but seven hours later, I had four tickets home.  I booked it back to the holding tank where my lovely family awaited me.  We made our way to the boarding area and handed over our tickets to the gate attendant, only to find that we were not actually on the flight and I would have to leave them alone yet again to go straighten it all out.  At each desk I went to, I was sent to another.

“Sorry, we can’t help you.  Go there and they can help.”

Again and again this happened.  All the while, in a sort of out-of-body experience, I started to see a version of myself morphing into the Hulk and smashing desks, breaking through walls, and generally wreaking havoc on that airport.  Just as it was really getting out of control, I thought to myself, “Hey man, you might want to calm down.  The last thing you need to have happen here is that you get thrown into jail in a foreign country and then your wife and two newly adopted sons never get to leave this airport.”  It worked and I returned to my usual chipper, worship-pastor self.

We made it home, but it could have all gone terribly awry had I not talked myself out of being an idiot.  I can just see myself now, three months later, still locked up in a German prison with a long, unkempt, Robinson Crusoe-like beard, my family still sleeping on the floor of a German airport.

King David had moments like that. In Psalm 103:1–14, we see David actually coaxing himself to praise the Lord.  He prays with such confidence and familiarity that it seems these are well-worn phrases on his lips.

Bless the LORD, O my soul and all that is within me, bless his holy name!
Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits,
Who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases,
Who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,
Who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.
The LORD works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed.
He made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the people of Israel.
The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger forever.
He does not deal with us according to our sins,
Nor repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
So great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;
As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
As a father shows compassion to his children
So the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him.
For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust.

Again he says in Psalm 42:

As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When shall I come and appear before God?
My tears have been my food day and night,
While they say to me all the day long, “Where is your God?”     
Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.
My soul is cast down within me; therefore I remember you.
Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.

For years, David hid in caves and ran for his life, relentlessly pursued by ruthless enemies.  For decades, he weathered a life of battle scars and bloodshed, the horrors of war likely haunting his dreams each night, coupled with the feelings and consequences of murdering an innocent man to steal his wife.  The intense stress of leading a massive kingdom must have aged him.  The weight of the world was on his shoulders.  I suspect that sometimes it was all David could do to preach to himself that God is better than everything else and to stop worrying.  That God is graciously patient and really does forgive completely.

We can all relate to the struggle to believe that God is bigger than our situation, that He is better than the sin we are being tempted to choose over Him.  In those moments, it is entirely appropriate and helpful to say to our own souls, “O my soul, bless the Lord, trust in him, follow him.  O my soul, don’t forget his goodness, kindness and compassion.”

Singing these same truths to ourselves is doubly effective. The beauty of music and singing is that it takes truth to whole new heights where words alone can’t go. Music etches truth in our minds in a very unique way by attaching emotions and memories to it. 

You’ve probably experienced this.  When you were a child, you most likely learned your ABCs using the catchiness of a 350-year-old French melody.  Something about that time-tested melody caused that knowledge to stick with you.  And if you have children yourself, you have most likely used that very melody to teach them the alphabet as well. 

In singing the truth of God to ourselves, we are actually training ourselves in doctrine and engaging our hearts in worship, which is a powerful weapon in the hands of the saints to fight sin and pursue joy in God. 

On my latest record, “God & Sinner Reconcile,” I wrote a song called “O My Soul” as a way to equip the church to sing to ourselves that God is better than all the fleeting, fading pleasures of this world and to remind ourselves to look to the cross and believe that the true, lasting joy Christ purchased for us there is greater than all the phony pseudo-joys that sin offers us.  Take a second and say these words to yourself, and believe God and worship Him for who He is and what He’s done. 

Oh my soul, why should you so be swayed?
Oh my soul, why should you so give way?
When Eternal Joy goes before you
With eternal bliss in His wake.
Why should you whore after idols that fade?
Why should you so be swayed?
Why should you so give way? 

Hallelujah, my God is better
Hallelujah, my God lives forever
Hallelujah, oh my soul 

Oh my soul, look on the cross and see
Such great love poured out to rescue me
And the bonds of sin have been broken
By the Curse on Calvary’s tree
Suffer no more as a slave to those things
Look on the cross and see
Look on the cross and believe

Hallelujah, my God is better
Hallelujah, my God lives forever
Hallelujah, oh my soul 

Let the beautiful lies that wrinkle and stain
Fade out near the light of His glory and grace
Let all that I am contend for His praise
And the holiness He’s working in me 

Hallelujah, my God is better
Hallelujah, my God lives forever
Hallelujah, oh my soul

Stephen Miller is worship leader at The Journey, a church in St. Louis, Missouri. He is also a songwriter, having released the album People of Redemption and the upcoming album God & Sinner Reconcile (January 17, 2012).  For more about Stephen Miller, his writing, and his music, please visit Stephen-Miller.com or twitter.com/StephenMiller.

$5 Friday: Suffering, Fear & God's Will

It's $5 Friday! Today's resources look at suffering, godly fear, the will of God, spiritual fruit, free will and more. Thanks to Reformation Heritage Books for partnering with us this week. Sale runs from 8 a.m. Friday through 8 a.m. Saturday EST.

View today's $5 Friday sale.

Get Dr. Sproul's Series on Mary for a Donation of Any Amount

Who is Mary, the mother of Jesus? According to the Roman Catholic Church, she was the only person other than Jesus who was born without original sin, she is a mediatrix between God and man, and she dispenses grace to those in need. In their reaction to Roman Catholic excesses, many Protestants have ignored Mary altogether. In this series, R.C. Sproul explains what the Bible teaches us about Mary, separating truth from falsehood, and giving appropriate honor where honor is due.

This week you can get this CD series for a donation of any amount. Messages include:

Hail Mary?
A Model of Submission 
Mary's Magnificent Savior
Listen to Him!
Questions & Answers

Offer valid through December 2nd. Donate Now .

Columns from Tabletalk Magazine, December 2011

The December edition of Tabletalk is out. This month's issue examines the brokenness afflicting all households and seeks to offer hope amid the turmoil through the gospel of Jesus Christ. It aims to provide wise biblical direction for all readers as we seek to live out the gospel in caring daily for our own families and other families around us. Contributors include R.C. Sproul, John Piper, Scott Anderson, John Starke, Anthony Carter, Burk Parsons, and R.C. Sproul Jr.

We do not post all of the feature articles or the daily devotionals from the issue, so you'll have to subscribe to get those. But for now, here are links to a few select columns and articles from this month:

"Hope for the Broken" by Burk Parsons
"Divorce" by R.C. Sproul
"Holy People Are Happy People" by John Starke
"Rest for Restless Hearts" by Scott Anderson
"Being Black and Reformed: An Interview with Anthony Carter"
"The Origin of Calvinism" by John Piper
"Broken Churches" by R.C. Sproul Jr.

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If you have not subscribed yet, you should. It's only $23 for a year, and $20 to renew. You save even more if you get a 2- or 3-year subscription (as little as $1.36 per issue). Special discounts for churches or businesses are available for those who want multiple copies of each issue. Start receiving Tabletalk by calling one of Ligonier Ministries' resource consultants at 800-435-4343 (8am-8pm ET, Mon-Fri) or subscribe online.

Great Quotes from The Holiness of God

I recently had the opportunity to read through almost all of the books of R.C. Sproul. Along the way I built a collection of some of the best quotes from each one of them. Here are several of the best from The Holiness of God.

Some modern theorists believe that the world was created by nothing. Note the difference between saying that the world was created from nothing and saying that the universe was created by nothing. In this modern view the rabbit comes out of the hat without a rabbit, a hat, or even a magician. The modern view is far more miraculous than the biblical view. It suggests that nothing created something. More than that, it holds that nothing created everything—quite a feat indeed!

How we understand the person and character of God the Father affects every aspect of our lives. It affects far more than what we normally call the “religious” aspects of our lives. If God is the Creator of the entire universe, then it must follow that He is the Lord of the whole universe. No part of the world is outside of His lordship. That means that no part of my life must be outside of His lordship. His holy character has something to say about economics, politics, athletics, romance—everything with which we are involved.

Ministers are noteworthy of their calling. All preachers are vulnerable to the charge of hypocrisy. In fact, the more faithful preachers are to the Word of God in their preaching, the more liable they are to the charge of hypocrisy. Why? Because the more faithful people are to the Word to God, the higher the message is that they will preach. The higher the message, the further they will be from obeying it themselves.

We tend to have mixed feelings about the holy. There is a sense in which we are at the same time attracted to it and repulsed by it. Something draws us toward it, while at the same time we want to run away from it. We can’t seem to decide which way we want it. Part of us yearns for the holy, while part of us despises it. We can’t live with it, and we can’t live without it.

Holiness provokes hatred. The greater the holiness the greater the human hostility toward it. It seems insane. No man was ever more loving than Jesus Christ. Yet even His love made people angry. His love was a perfect love, a transcendent and holy love, but His very love brought trauma to people. This kind of love is so majestic we can’t stand it.

The most violent expression of God’s wrath and justice is seen in the Cross. If ever a person had room to complain of injustice, it was Jesus. He was the only innocent man ever to be punished by God. If we stagger at the wrath of God, let us stagger at the Cross. Here is where our astonishment should be focused. If we have cause for moral outrage, let it be directed at Golgotha.

God’s grace is not infinite. God is infinite, and God is gracious. We experience the grace of an infinite God, but grace is not infinite. God sets limits to His patience and forbearance. He warns us over and over again that someday the ax will fall and His judgment will be poured out.

Our peace with God is not fragile; it is stable. When we sin, God is displeased, and He will move to correct us and convict us of our sin. But he does not go to war against us. His bow is no longer bent, and the arrows of His wrath are no longer aimed at our hearts. He does not rattle His sword every time we break the treaty.

#Truth4Inmates: Thank You For Your Support

Every week Ligonier Ministries receives letters from inmates across this nation. We are blessed to read accounts of how the gospel is setting prisoners free from their sin and shame as they place their faith in Jesus Christ.

The stories prisoners tell are also sobering. Although many prisoners are searching for the truth, biblically sound resources are scarce. False teaching is rampant. Leaders often lack the training and materials they need in order to reach their fellow prisoners.

In response to this need, earlier this month we launched the #Truth4Inmates campaign. We reached out to you, asking you to please help us raise $4,000 in order to send one-year subscriptions of Tabletalk to inmates throughout America.

On behalf of Ligonier Ministries, I'd like to say "thank you."

Thanks to your generous support we reached 100% of our goal.

Please continue to pray for our nation's inmates, and for the copies of Tabletalk and select R.C. Sproul books that will be distributed. Pray the Lord will continue to be at work raising up His Church behind the walls of our nation's correctional institutions.

Matthew 25:36 – I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.

Hebrews 13:3 – Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.

Cyber Monday: Get an Extra 30% Off

It's Cyber Monday! Get a jump on your shopping with an additional 30% off of our already discounted prices. Valid today only (November 28, 2011).

Use coupon code MONDAY30 at checkout.

Revealed Ethics

At the heart of Christian ethics is the conviction that our firm basis for knowing the true, the good, and the right is divine revelation. Christianity is not a life system that operates on the basis of speculative reason or pragmatic expediency. We assert boldly that God has revealed to us who He is, who we are, and how we are expected to relate to Him. He has revealed for us that which is pleasing to Him and commanded by Him. Revelation provides a supernatural aid in understanding the good. This point is so basic and so obvious that it has often been overlooked and obscured as we search for answers to particular questions.

The departure from divine revelation has brought our culture to chaos in the area of ethics. We have lost our basis of knowledge, our epistemological foundation, for discovering the good. This is not to suggest that God has given us a codebook that is so detailed in its precepts that all ethical decisions are easy. That would be a vast oversimplification of the truth. God has not given us specific instructions for each and every possible ethical issue we face, but neither are we left to grope in the dark and to make our decisions on the basis of mere opinion. This is an important comfort to the Christian because it assures us that in dealing with ethical questions, we are never working in a vacuum. The ethical decisions that we make touch the lives of people, and mold and shape human personality and character. It is precisely at this point that we need the assistance of God’s superior wisdom.

To be guided by God’s revelation is both comforting and risky. It is comforting because we can rest in the assurance that our ethical decisions proceed from the mind of One whose wisdom is transcendent. God’s law not only reflects His righteous character but manifests His infinite wisdom. His knowledge of our humanity and His grasp of our needs for fullness of growth and development far exceed the collective wisdom of all of the world’s greatest thinkers. Psychiatrists will never understand the human psyche to the degree the Creator understands that which He made. God knows our frames; it is He who has made us so fearfully and wonderfully. All of the nuances and complexities that bombard our senses and coalesce to produce a human personality are known in their intimate details by the divine mind.

Taking comfort in divine revelation is risky business. It is risky precisely because the presence of hostility in the human heart to the rule of God makes for conflict between divine precepts and human desires. To take an ethical stand on the foundation of divine revelation is to bring oneself into serious and at times radical conflict with the opinions of men. Every day, clergymen around the world give counsel and advice that run contrary to the clear mandates of God. How can we explain such a separation between God’s Word and ministerial counsel?

One critical factor in this dilemma is the fact that ministers are profoundly pressed to conform to acceptable contemporary standards. The person who comes to the minister for counsel is not always looking for guidance from a transcendent God, but rather for permission to do what he or she wants—a license to sin. The Christian counselor is vulnerable to sophisticated forms of manipulation coming from the very people who seek his advice. The minister is placed in that difficult pressure point of acquiescing to the desires of the people or being considered unloving and fun-squelching. Add to this the cultural emphasis that there is something dehumanizing in the discipline and moral restraints God imposes on us. Thus, to stand with God is often to stand against men and to face the fiery trials that go with Christian convictions.

Ethics involves the question of authority. The Christian lives under the sovereignty of God, who alone may claim lordship over us. Christian ethics is theocentric as opposed to secular or philosophical ethics, which tend to be anthropocentric. For the humanist, man is the norm, the ultimate standard of behavior. Christians, however, assert that God is the center of all things and that His character is the absolute standard by which questions of right and wrong are determined.

Excerpted from How Should I Live? 

Twitter Highlights (11/27/11)

Here are some highlights from the various Ligonier Twitter feeds over the past week.

Ligonier If God only exercised justice to a fallen race everyone would perish. But God chooses to grant mercy to some. -R.C. Sproul



Reformation Trust In the substitution that took place at the cross, we see the glorious grace of God—the very heartbeat of the Christian faith. -RC Sproul



Ligonier Doctrine divides...but doctrine also unites. It binds together the hearts of God's people who celebrate the truth of God together... -Sproul



Tabletalk Magazine God had one son on earth without sin, but never one without suffering (Augustine).



Ligonier The Bible portrays God as gracious and generous, blessing us not according to what we have "earned" but according to our needs. (J. Bridges)



Tabletalk Magazine Lead me in your truth and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all the day long (Ps 25:5)



Reformation Trust The proof that we are loved as Christians is not found within ourselves, but at the cross. -Derek Thomas

You can also find our various ministries on Facebook:
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Reformation Trust | Tabletalk Magazine

Ever Ready

…and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear. — 1 Peter 3:15

We are told always to be ready. In a sense, Peter's motto is much like that of the Boy Scouts—"Be prepared." Our preparation is to make us ready to give a defense and a reason for the hope that is in us. If we are dragged before magistrates, if we are on trial for our faith, we are to be prepared to say why we believe what we believe. If your neighbor says, "I notice that you are a Christian. What is it that you believe?" are you ready to explain not only what you believe but why you believe it?

Some Christians tell those who inquire that we simply take a leap of faith with no bother about the credibility or the rational character of the truth claims of the Bible, but that response goes against the teaching of this text. The only leap of faith we are to take is out of the darkness and into the light. When we become Christians, we do not leave our mind in the parking lot. We are called to think according to the Word of God, to seek the mind of Christ and an understanding of the things set forth in sacred Scripture. The Bible is a big book, and every bit of it, I believe, has been inspired by God the Holy Spirit. Ultimately, the author of this Book is God. He gave it to us to be understood, and we cannot understand it if we close our mind to the careful study of it.

Peter says that we are to stand ready to give what the English translation calls "a defense" to everyone who asks for a reason for our hope. The Greek word translated "defense" is apologia, which may be translated as "apology." Every Christian is to be prepared to give an apology to all. This does not mean that we are to apologize to people—"Please, excuse me for being a Christian; I'm sorry that I'm so irrational; I just can't help it"; it means that we are to give a defense.

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Excerpt from 1–2 Peter (2011, Crossway).

Be equipped to give a defense of your faith at our 2012 National Conference, March 15–17 in Orlando. Register early to save.